Doctor Who - Big Finish Audio Adventures - 2.3 Brave New Town

Contrary to his Series 1 outing (IMMORTAL BELOVED), writer Jonathan Clements Series 2 outing BRAVE NEW TOWN didn’t leave me with the same warm fuzzies. This is not to say that it was bad, more than it was just a step down from his previous script, as well as from the two preceding Series 2 stories. Instead of coming in at Great, or Solid, I think it just kind of succeeds by the use of a classic villain in an interesting way...and Is.

Nitty Gritty. The Doctor takes Lucie to a seaside town in 2008, just not the one she thought it was going to be (she was thinking of her home, Blackpool). The town has a few anomalies though. It’s seemingly not by the sea (though it is called Thorington-on-Suffolk), and instead rests at the center of what looks like a dried up lakebed. The people who inhabit the town think it’s Sunday Sept. 1st 1991…everyday. Brian Adams is annoyingly still #1; there is no food, no gas in the cars, and no electricity. So what exactly is going on?

Enter Classic Who villain the Nestene Consciousness and the Autons. More importantly Autons that look and act VERY realistic because instead of merely being remote controlled by the Consciousness, they have a small piece of it inside them.

Now, while the Autons work fine on Audio (something the producers at Big Finish revealed initially being leery about), the telltale arm gun sound is pretty much all you need. It’s about as recognizable as “Exterminate” and “Delete”, so there was really now worry there. However, because of the nature of the tale, one in which these Auton’s don’t really KNOW they are Autons, and aren’t really doing any kind of attacking, they come across as far less scary than they could/should. I get that we are seeing the Audio Drama equivalent of the TV episode DALEK in which we take a Classic villain and put them in a situation that humanizes them…but where DALEK still maintained the scare-factor of the villain, the Autons all but have their teeth removed by being too humanized. So in the end the Doctor is simply working against the connection to the consciousness VIA the control box that gives them orders, and That’s. About. It. If there is anything scary about the episode, I’m not sure what it is. That’s obviously not a prerequisite to a DOCTOR WHO story, but it is nice. My fave thing about DW is the running, and the action, mixed into a good story. There is little of that in BRAVE NEW TOWN.

That’s not to say there is nothing good. It’s a rather compelling mystery to begin with before the Auton’s are introduced. It’s just afterwards that it becomes a bit plodding. Or at least it did for me. McGann, Smith and their co-stars (Adrian Dunbar, Derek Griffiths, Lorna Want and Nick Wilton) all do an admirable job of performing the script, and Lucie especially gets some plum funny lines (“Where does plastic come from?” “Taiwan!”), but overall that’s the only thing I come away with having enjoyed. The tale itself was probably one of the more mundane ones I’ve listened to since I stared the EDA’s.

So all in all, I think my experience with BRAVE NEW TOWN comes down to match the final line by Lucie.

Doctor: I saved a brand new race from certain destruction!
Lucie: With a little help from me.
Doctor: …
Lucie: You’ll never admit it will you? Never in a month of Sunday’s.

So yes, that’s a bad pun on the fact that it’s always Sunday on Thorington, and that’s the final flavour I walk away from this story with. It’s decent enough, but is about as entertaining as a weak pun.

NEXT TIME: We skip 2.4 SKULL OF SOBEK (mostly because I don’t have it yet) and move onto 2.5 GRAND THEFT COSMOS.

Doctor Who - Big Finish Audio Adventures - 2.2 Max Warp

As much as the Series 2 opener (DEAD LONDON) was an irreverent and yet mostly effective (if odd) way to start the 2nd series of Eighth Doctor & Lucie Adventures…the second episode, MAX WARP, makes up for that by being pretty much everything we love about DOCTOR WHO in any medium.

The story begins with the Doctor and Lucie attending a Motor Show. Well, it’s technically a very popular Spaceship Show. If you’ve not already guessed it from the title and that small description, this really is TOP GEAR in space. Strangely, or perhaps not-so-strangely, this premise fits into the DW mythos and story-style like a leather driving glove (yeah, I went there). From the multiple, and varied hosts talking about the newest, sleekest spaceship, to the Doctor behaving like a proper Ship-Enthusiast like a gleeful 12-year old, to Lucie calling it all boys-with-their-toys and making jokes at the Doctor’s expense, this is everything you love about TOP GEAR transferred into DOCTOR WHO.

So where does the intrigue come from in this episode? Well that’s an easy one. The show Max Warp is filming live from the Sirius Inter-G Cruiser Show, which was installed as an event to bring two previously warring worlds (the Varlon Empire and the Kith Oligarchy) together, and is set in a station orbiting nearby. The two hosts, smarmy, sexist Geoffrey Vantage, and spaceship enthusiast, Vantage-whipping boy O’Reilly are seen commenting on their fellow Max Warp member, and hotshot pilot Timbo “The Ferret” just before his ship malfunctions and plows into a nearby moon. The intrigue and investigation (launched, of course by our intrepid Doctor and Lucie), begin in earnest with Lucie attempting to guess whodunit, and the Doctor trying to methodically interview people. Because Timbo was clearly murdered, and the uneasy peace between the Kith and the Varlon is at risk.

Lucie is absolute, 100% pure gold in this episode. Sheridan Smith just nails the comedy in Jonathan Morris’ script. I kept laughing at her comments as she gets most of the plum lines, up to and including her final line (which I won’t spoil for you, but it’s hilarious!). Her verbal sparring with Eight (one of the best bits about their relationship) is in fine form in MAX WARP. Not only do we get Paul McGann doing a proper fanboy excitement about the fastest and the sleekest ship (listing off features like he’s read multiple magazine articles about it), but we also get a wonderfully diverse secondary cast. Graeme Garden is suitably nasty, sexist, and just deliciously horrible (read: hilarious) as Geoffrey Vantage. I seriously could not believe some of his script beats (‘It’s a mans spaceship! Literally fuelled with testosterone! Ladies bring a toothbrush and a spare pair of knickers!’ or ‘Just smile and stick out your bits!’ to Lucie), but I adored how well Lucie sparred with him and put him in his place without him really catching on. Further still to the sexist angle we are given a different, but no more unwanted bit of that with mousy O’Reilly attempting to get Lucie to go to his room with him, and she kind of beats around the bush to let him down easy, but even he doesn’t get it and she has to end up rather sternly telling him “No.” I loved that aspect of the script as it showcases that sometimes even the nicest of guys can say and do the wrong things without realizing they are, and they need to be told they are out of line. It’s an attentive moment that I noticed and enjoyed, because Lucie really does give him a second to realize (and he’s just totally oblivious) before getting more direct with him.

The mystery/motive is fairly well hidden amongst a few red herrings and plot twists, added to by Lucie throwing out suspect after suspect and giving Sherlockian reasons for their guilt. The SpinDroid (a politician’s assistant / crutch) is wonderfully whimsical when he is on scene and sounded suspiciously like the droid from RETURN OF THE JEDI who tells R2 that he “has need for him on the master’s sail barge, and that he’d soon learn some respect”.

The political machinations at work are light, but given gravity due to the instability of the two world governments, and add tension to the proceedings of the investigation.  The whole thing (the event, the crash and the murder) begins to stink of an elaborate scheme and it's up to the Doctor and Lucie to sort out what and why. It's quite satisfying on that end when all is said and done, and that's really all you can ask of a DW mystery. I should not be able to guess the final outcome, and I think in MAX WARP, this is achieved well. But it's more than likely going to be how fun and hilarious this episode is that will sit with you afterwards. It's pure enjoyment for 50 minutes.

The aspect of envy on the part of the Doctor, who adores his stolen TARDIS, towards these super sleek, fast spaceships was palpable and entertaining. It’s always funny to think of it, since the TARDIS really does trump every other mode of transport, but the Doctor can’t help but feel a little envious. But it’s like owning a Smart Tank than can roll through anything and survive (and travel in time and space), but being jealous of a Ferrari, which is shiny, fast and nice looking, but could be ripped through like tin foil (BTTF reference intended).

Big Finish has their first big hit of their second Series with MAX WARP, as entertaining as some of the best from Series 1. The comedy and action are both spot on, and character interaction is tops. I’d ALMOST want to say if you were thinking about giving Series 2 a go and were wondering if it was worthy, that you should put DEAD LONDON off (briefly) and hit up MAX WARP first, as I feel it’s probably more entertaining to the casual listener.

NEXT TIME: The Doctor and Lucie visit a seaside town, in the middle of nowhere in 2008 that is seemingly stuck on a Sunday in 1991 and so are its inhabitants, in BRAVE NEW TOWN.

Doctor Who - Big Finish Audio Adventures - 2.1 Dead London

 The 2nd Series opener for the Eighth Doctor Adventures is a bit of a gamble. We start things off in DEAD LONDON with the Doctor and Lucie Miller separated. Considering how solid their bond was by the end of Series 1, it's quite a bold choice to begin the second Series this way, but it pays off as far as I am concerned. It only pays off though because the story is such a clever spat of time shifting.

Basically this episode drops our TARDIS team into a very strange London where a parking violation in 2008 can earn you a hanging in the 1800's. Time is seemingly shifting around both Lucie and the Doctor, and there are only a few connecting threads that allow the two to sniff out the trail of what is going on. The Doctor, charged with parking the TARDIS in the wrong place, links up with a fellow lawbreaker in Victorian London named Spring-Heeled Sophie. The two eventually find Lucie and attempt to sort out what exactly is going on and why the Judge in one time looks like the chief of police in another time who looks like a hangman in another time. In any other tale it might seem convoluted, but in DOCTOR WHO it's par for the course for our intrepid Time Lord.

The best bit about this opener is the rivalry between Sophie and Lucie. It's only slightly there as Lucie is too proud to actually comment on it aloud (ala Rose Tyler), and instead just tries her very best to trump Sophie in the companion category at every chance. It's incredibly fun to watch as Lucie really does trump Sophie for me...Sophie is interesting, but she just can't match the sassy, strong nature of our companion.

The story in DEAD LONDON is a great little diddy. It's interesting without being over the top. It's got different timelines, scattered characters, and crazy alien connotations. Great voice acting form the guest stars, and a really, solid opener to the series. Is it great exercise in Doctor / Companion relationship and it is really just a good DOCTOR WHO story at the end of things.

There's not much more to say. It's not as good as some of the previous stories in the range, but it certainly is a cool, irreverent choice as an opener for the 2nd Series and for that I applaud Big Finish.

NEXT TIME: Stay tuned for one of the most fun DW Audio Drama's in the EDA range, MAX WARP!

Doctor Who - Big Finish Audio Adventures - The Human Resources Part 1 and 2

Big Finish should be exceedingly proud of what they accomplished with Series 1 of the Eighth Doctor Audio Adventures, starring Paul McGann and Sheridan Smith. It was a well-wrought and thrilling ride through the Eighth Doctor’s Era that I was sad to see come to an end. Not for long obviously, as the Eighth Doctor Adventures (EDA's) continue through 3 more Series and are still going today thankfully.

The Series finishes the same way it began - another two-part story, with another Classic Fan favoruite villain. And as such an outing it almost succeeds more than the Series opener does, there is a hardy and ingrained quality to the Doctor and Lucie by the time the finale rolls around and it helps in making the story utterly engrossing.

THE HUMAN RESOURCES PART I & II, chases upon the last few minutes of NO MORE LIES, in which the nefarious “Headhunter” (played by Katarina Olsson), who has been menacing and following our Lucie since Ep1, finally catches up with her and steals her away from the Doctor. This episode begins non-chalantly enough though; seemingly in an ordinary office building. But appearances are deceiving. Naturally.

On the day Lucie was to have met the Doctor she had gone for an interview in London to work at an office. Well, in this story she finds herself on her first day of work at such an office building and doesn’t have anything but very scattered, fuzzy memories of her time in the TARDIS. The Doctor is simply a name that she sort of recalls, and those around her begin to help her integrate into cubicle life instead which she hesitantly allows. The Doctor, distraught after losing his companion, is visited by Straxus (whom some may recall is another Time Lord from Gallifrey), who tells him Lucie is very important and allows him to go rescue her. Straxus gives him a Time Ring which can get him to where she is without being discovered. Once he agrees and arrives at the office he quickly finds that things aren’t what they seem. The office isn’t really an office and the people who run it are actually being manipulated to do something more far-reaching and evil.

Spoiler: Enter the villains of the piece, the Cybermen (the Mondasian Cybermen, BEFORE they eventually settled on Telos in the Classic WHO story THE TENTH PLANET), who…for at least part of the narrative are on the defensive against mercenaries in possession of tech they shouldn’t have.

I won’t talk more story, but sufficed to say these two episodes are an absolutely humdinger of a finale. And both Eps are less about the Cybermen, than they are about politicking and war. I honestly could not have asked for a better story to end on. It has action, intrigue, comedy, mystery, twists and turns, and even some arc-wide plotting resolutions. It neatly spends the first hour establishing the bizarre events and setting with enough nods to keep you moving along and understanding while still keeping you relatively in the dark. The reveal at the end of the first hour is very interesting and the subsequent hook for the next half is well played indeed. The second hour gets to the meat of solving the problem, which puts the Doctor’s wits VERY much to the test, and simultaneously allows Lucie to shine herself in that same category. The two spend time both apart and together solving various issues, but what seems to come out most overall is that this is the episode where the bond between them is solidified. It’s at this point you realize “come hell or high water” these two are now the very best of friends and anything that threatens that bond is going to pay dearly. You will notice this from the outset since the Doctor is willing to leave his TARDIS (a vehicle he is well known to have stolen) in the hands of his people (whom he rejected years ago), and use only the Time Ring to go rescue Lucie. That’s friendship.

We also come to the resolution of WHY Lucie was placed in the TARDIS under the Doctor’s care, and just what the Time Lords were up to when they did that. It’s a resolution that I particularly liked to be honest. They could very well have chickened out on the reasoning behind her appearance and this whole business of the “witness protection program” and chalked it up to nothing much…but the writers go out of their way to make it a compelling reasoning, and tie it into her personality and the rest of the arcing story. It’s believable, because it is believable. Which seems like a copout statement, but you’ll have to listen to know what I mean by that. Trust me, it works very well.

One thing I always liked about RTD’s Era of DW on TV was his skill at wrapping up arcing plotlines while still allowing some parts of them to organically move forward still (example: Sealing Rose off on Pete’s World at the end of S2 [making way for Martha and Donna], and then letting her story loop back into S4). The same is true here, in that at the tail end of THE HUMAN RESOURCES the slate is wiped clean for The Doctor and Lucie. They now get to choose what they do and where they go, because they’ve dealt with the “How she got in the TARDIS and Why” plotline…but it allows other things (like the “headhunter”) to move forward on their own headed off in their own directions. I like seeing that knitting up of arcs that doesn’t also cut off all ties to what came before…but still managed to give me the standalone “ending” aspects I was looking for to feel satisfied the Series had a beginning, middle and an end. We don’t have to say goodbye to Eight and Lucie, but we close out their first chapter and look forward to the second.

I’ve loved, loved, loved my time with Eight and Lucie and feel that McGann and Smith deliver an impressive TARDIS team that I will be overjoyed to continue following through the next few Series (of which I have the entirety of S2, and the first ep of S3…with an eye to purchasing more when the time comes).

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. The Big Finish team (casts, crews, and everyone involved) are delivering DOCTOR WHO to the fanbase on a level that I can only describe as sparkling. If you think the TV show is all there is, I think you may owe it to yourself to seek out these Audio Drama’s (and if Eight isn’t your cup of tea there are also Audio’s for the 4th, 5th, 6th and 7th Doctor’s as well) and treat yourself to the hidden gem of DW fandom. I can’t praise the quality enough and I look forward to many more hours of enjoyment!

NEXT TIME: We start Series 2 with Eight and Lucie being shifted around time in the wonderful opening story DEAD LONDON!

Anime Wednesday: January 2013!

It’s been a while.

Sorry about that. My issue was not to do with there being a lack of good Anime out there, and much more to do with the time I had to devote to it recently.

So lets jump back in the water shall we? I was recommended a few different shows that are currently airing in Japan and therefore airing on CrunchyRoll…

The first of those shows is the topic for today’s Anime Wednesday feature is SHIN SEKAI YORI (FROM THE NEW WORLD), which is based on a novel by Yusuke Kishi, that’s been adapted to Anime by A1 Pictures.

I don’t know if it’s evident from my enjoyment / championing of things like EVANGELION, STEINS;GATE, and SUMMER WARS but I like Anime that is twisty, brain-melty, and makes you think…and then makes you rethink what you thought from a different angle…and then beats that theory all to hell and presents you with something that makes your jaw drop and in hushed tones you whisper “Sweet gods…that is brilliant." before passing out in your fishsticks and custard.

SHIN SEKAI YORI (SSY) is a show that does that. In fact it does it from the very outset prologue. It begins in 2011 when people start appearing to have strong psychokinetic powers…but instead of being a good thing, what follows are shots of young people standing and the people around them being obliterated into smears of blood and goo. It appears that they can’t handle these powers and in some cases allow the darkest parts of their personalities to take over and commit horrible atrocities.

That was in the first 3 minutes.

I was agog…and hooked. What the hell was going on?

Then we jump forward in time 1000 years. In a secluded rural village, the young people (whose powers have awakened) are taught in school to control, and use those powers for benign goodness and to help in everyday life. They are closely watched and any behaviour of an offensive nature is quickly stamped out. This is evident in a game they play with clay dolls and constructs where they must move a giant ball from one end to the opponents end and try to score, but you cannot directly offensively attack the ball, and instead have to manipulate the clay constructs around the ball to try to defend your goal. It’s idyllic, or at least it seems idyllic.

Enter our various protagonists. Two girls and three boys. They are: Saki, Maria, Shun, Satoru, and Mamoru respectively. As we first look in on them, they range in age from 12-14. Slowly, and seemingly innocuously in the first episode, one of Saki’s friends who is shown to have weaker powers than her classmates disappears. But it’s not until the second episode (when a student is accused of cheating in the game) when another child disappears that the audience is hat-tipped to something “going on”.

Intrigued? Me too.

The key event that tempers their youth is a summer trip, which all students must take, up the river to a location where they must examine the natural world and write reports on it. But after a campfire-story about a creature called a Minoshiro (who won't let you past it and kills you) scares/intrigues them, they head out in search of one…but when they find one they realize that the creature is not what it seems to be and may not be natural at all. What follows is an absolutely ENTHRALLING episode in which the young, naïve children are told a large selection of the bloody, violent history of the last 1000 years that they knew nothing about. That’s about as far plotwise as I’ll go, since you need to watch this show yourself, but hell, aren't you curious?!

So, why should you watch SSY? Well, quite frankly the writing, though subtle, is delectable perfection. Every single time I thought I had a grasp on what the show was trying to tell me, or assumed I’d unraveled a mystery…it would spend the next episode throwing curve balls at me. The best feature of SSY is that you don’t know who to side with from episode to episode. Upon an initial watch of the first few eps you begin to think that the children of this peaceful town are obviously being manipulated by someone…but then you’ll get a few eps where they spin you around and you get a different angle where you almost side with whomever is manipulating things, and then you’ll get another episode from another angle entirely which flips your POV even more. It’s like the thought patterns of SSY are on a gyroscope and can turn and twist at any moment….but it never loses track of the tale it is telling in the process. It’s a difficult type of show (I am sure) to write, but it has nonetheless not yet faltered. There is a side story with these anthropomorphized Rat societies (some warlike, some slaves, and some peaceful) that seems like it’s not part of the main story, but the more they concentrated on it, the more I realized it actually IS part of the overall tale…their position on the game board just hasn’t been solidly established yet.

The show also time skips at episode eight forward two years, and we get the same tale being told, but this time it’s with hormonal teens as well, so you can add romance, jealousy, rebellion, and other teenage issues to the mix…which on another show might add an unwanted complication to the narrative, but here it actually works, since the ages of the characters are very important.

My single favourite thing about the show (other than finding out how humanity progressed after 2011’s gruesome beginnings), is the fact that we are actually being told the story from a further 40 years in the future by an aging Saki…and she is wont to pepper her narrative with nods, secrets and cryptic phrases that make you question even what you are watching and look at it harder.

As far as I am concerned this show is utter and complete genius so far (They are 16 episodes into what I assume will be a 26 ep season) and that if there was a short list of television that was airing in Japan that you OWE it to yourself to be watching, SHIN SEKAI YORI would be very near the top of that list (if not the very top).

Head on over to crunchyroll.com right now and check it out for yourself (streams with ads for free), you WON’T be disappointed!

Teaser Trailer:



Stay Tuned next time for an article about the other show I recently discovered there called BLAST OF TEMPEST!

Doctor Who: The Snowmen (review)

I was waiting. The boy who waited, if you will...for THE SNOWMEN.

DOCTOR WHO’s 2012 Christmas Special.

When last we left the Doctor, he was stuck in THE ANGELS TAKE MANHATTAN...his best friends had slipped away through a plothole you could drive a mack truck through, in an hour where that wasn’t even the biggest plothole or script gaff. Bottom line: He was in rough shape. So he moved...to Victorian England where old friends Madame Vastra, Jenny and the Sontaran named Strax (reconstituted after his death in A GOOD MAN GOES TO WAR [thus removing ANY sentimentality you had about how heroic his death was...but nevermind eh?]by some process known only to Vastra) protect him and allow him to be a grouchy old miser who refuses to save the world, let alone be bothered by it...

...Sorry. Are we watching DOCTOR WHO? The man who always saves the world starts refusing to...

Nevermind eh?

So. That’s pretty much where we stand as the episode opens. But not to leave him alone in his grouchyness and Victorian hat, the universe has other plans in the form of nasty snowmen who seemingly feed off bad thoughts. Er...yeeaaahh...okay...


Never.
Mind.
Eh?

Brass tacks.
There are some significant changes to the show that appear in this episode. They appear to stem from the 50th Anniversary coming up in November. These are, I should note, the things I REALLY liked about the episode. The opening sequence and title song are new...and the former even shows the Doctor’s face in the vortex (which hasn’t been done since the 7th Doctor), the later has some nice audio ticks and clicks to hearken to Classic Who. The biggest Classic Who nod here though is most certainly the new TARDIS interior. It’s stark, mainly metal, cool toned (blues, silvers, greens) and is not even a shadow of the warm, scatterbrained, yet inviting interior from his time with Amy and Rory. My feelings on that are that this new interior mimics his own new grumpy exterior, and perhaps even hearkens back to the look of the 5th Doctor’s TARDIS as something he KNOWS, something that comforts HIM....if no one else. Bottom line, I like it and it feels RIGHT for the 50th as a nod to days gone by. He also has new gear, a Victorian look that I’d say probably hits up the style of the 3rd and 8th Doctor’s gear (prior to the 8th Doctor's gear changing recently)...and the glasses-he-doesn’t-need have made a return appearance, which I always liked on Ten, so I’m cool with Eleven adopting them as well.

The last change, but biggest is the addition of the newest companion Clara Oswin Oswald (even though TECHNICALLY this version from the Xmas special isn’t the one he’ll travel with...yeah, I’ll get to that). Jenna Louise-Coleman is a wonderful, heartfelt actor whom I know from previous shows and love her (she can act circles around Karen Gillan). If anyone has a chance to be a really great companion to Eleven, it’s her...now if Moffat would just let her be the caliber that Rose and Donna were on an emotional level...anyways...

The episode’s actual story is totally beside the point. No honestly, it’s not even really there. It’s a by-the-numbers ep that requires nothing much from our intrepid Time Lord to deal with. It’s here only to introduce the new features I mentioned above...and present us with a big bad for Series 7.5 (don’t get me started on him breaking seasons up into pieces)...in the form of Yog Sothoth, otherwise known as The Great Intelligence...a creature from another dimension who can’t exactly enter ours...so uses proxies to do so instead and carry out his will / do his bidding...ah yes, in the from of the eponymous snowmen! So yeah, we’ve not seen TGI since the 2nd Doctor battled it many years ago. And again, part of me sincerely hopes that TGI is a cover and the real villain leading into the 50th will be Omega (another baddie from another dimension, but one with far greater connotations to the Time Lords). I digress. Either way, TGI is voiced by the stellar Ian McKellen and he does a wonderfully menacing job at the role. In the end though the doctor doesn’t really even defeat him and sort of sends him on his brief way from infecting Snowmen and terrorizing children. What astonished me is Eleven doesn’t immediately recall fighting TGI. He just mulls the name over and over saying it "rings a bell". I’m fine with that as TGI is definitely a cool villain and will make for something interesting down the line. But I wonder at his overall arc and how it will tie into the 50th.

But yeah, as fun as the episode actually is, that fun has nothing to do with the story itself, and much more to do with the introduction of all this new stuff. If you go in looking for the new shinies, you won't be disappointed. If you go in looking for a meaty Doctor Who adventure, this isn't really it. It’s like a new show now, and I can’t help but hope that it’s a sign that things will be getting better.

Oh, and Clara.

SPOILERS!

Yes, the Victorian Clara dies at the end, but it’s shown that she is linked to Oswin Oswald (from the future who was a Dalek in ASYLUM OF THE DALEKS) and apparently to a modern day version who will likely be the companion (she is briefly shown in modern day clothes at the grave of her “ancestor” at the end). The trailer talks of the girl who dies twice ect. I’m not buying that she’s another Rory. I think she’s either a Time Lord (possibly Jenny, the Doctor’s Daughter), or perhaps even my theory about her being a regeneration of The Master will pan out. Either way, there is no way she’s a normal human. I don’t know who she is, but I suppose we’ll find out...in APRIL! Again, don’t get me started on Moffat breaking up the seasons...just don’t, it will only end in tears.

THE SNOWMEN is a blast to watch, but it’s not the most substance-filled of episodes. It’s also not Timey-Wimey (I’m actually glad of that to be honest). It DOES, however, have the briefest moment near the end where the Doctor is trying to get Clara to hang on and he promises to save her...the emotion that passes between the two in that minute or so is probably the MOST I’ve seen Eleven bond with anyone since regenerating from Ten. I’m not kidding, that little moment gave me a LOT of hope for the dynamic Matt and Jenna have. I'm hoping for a Ten and Rose style relationship...and if not that, then at least a Ten and Donna caliber one.

So, bring on April now and let’s see if we can’t make this show sing again!

Doctor Who: Big Finish Audio Adventures - 1.1 & 1.2 Blood Of The Daleks

After finishing and thoroughly enjoying my first Big Finish DOCTOR WHO Audio Drama (the 8th Doctor’s latest series, DARK EYES), I decided to go back to the beginning of the 8th Doctor’s main line of episodes (can I call them episodes?).

And I got to meet the indomitable Lucie Miller (Sheridan Smith)!

BLOOD OF THE DALEKS is a two-part story set around 2006 (Lucie’s earth-based time) and produced by Big Finish at the end that year, and stars the amazing Sheridan Smith as the 8th Doctor’s latest companion. It’s technically considered the first two episodes of a series (1.1 and 1.2 respectively) which runs 8 episodes.

I just want to get something out of the way first. I actually can’t truly describe the joy I get from listening to these Audio Drama’s; they are an absolute treat, and I hold myself back from listening to each episode in a row so I can savour them.

So this story begins much the same way that the 10th Doctor’s Series 2 Christmas Special (THE RUNAWAY BRIDE) did, with a random human woman appearing in the TARDIS, defying all logic and TARDIS defenses. The difference here being that it’s not some nefarious ploy by an alien race which causes it, (wait, maybe it is!) but this time the Time Lord High Council have put Lucie Miller in the Doctor’s TARDIS as a sort of Witness Protection Program to a mysterious event she witnessed that was otherworldly, and locked her there. The Doctor is taken totally by surprise by her and decides to immediately take her home (2006 Northern England)…but the Time Lords have thought of that and the two end up shunted onto a world called Red Rocket Rising. The planet has recently been struck by an asteroid and is experiencing a sort of nuclear winter, REAL acid rain is falling and the people who remain on the planet are furiously attempting to get off but being stymied by a lack of governmental coordination. Said government, in the form of a woman named Eileen Klint, have sent out a distress call and had it answered by a race of beings who have promised rescue. There is only one problem…those rescuers are a fleet of Daleks. Further interesting is that a local, recently deceased, scientist has created his own versions of Daleks and his apprentice has taken up his work at trying to make them the new form of dominant life on the planet.

It’s a really interesting tale all told, and explores things like the Dalek’s TOTAL ethnocentric personality. They view these new Daleks (created with the remnants of the people of Red Rocket rising) as abominations, impurities of the Dalek pure bloodline. In that vein, the Doctor has to switch sides a few times to defeat both the real Daleks and the new Daleks, but for him they are both enemies. Again it’s interesting to see a pre-Time War Doctor tackle the Daleks. He’s not QUITE the 9th Doctor level of hatred for them…but you can see it building here. As far as the Daleks go, they are still in “conquest” mode as opposed to their later “destroy the universe” mode, so I’m curious to see when that transition happens, and maybe even why.

Paul McGann and Sheridan Smith are absolutely on game here. While their relationship begins rather rocky, with each one spitting barbs at the other due to a mutual mistrust (brought on by the Time Lords secrecy to both of them), by the end you CAN see the hinting of the relationship to come, the friendship. Perhaps that’s why they work so well together, she’s full of fire and vigor, and he’s full of energy and drive. I mean you really come away thinking there’s nothing they CAN’T accomplish. I love this Doctor/ Companion relationship…it’s just so easy to get on side with them. The peripheral actors are no slouches either, Anita Dobson (as Eileen Klint), Kenneth Cranham (as Tom Cardwell), and especially Haley Atwell (as the scientists’ apprentice Asha) all do a wonderful job at filling out the cast.

As a DOCTOR WHO story goes, this one is easily right up there with anything on the TV series. Classic villain, Doctor and Companion in a really complex situation that neither fully understands, and a whole world and its people at stake. What’s not to like? This is how I like My DW. The production is stellar as per usual, creaking doors, pulsing rain, space ships, TARDIS beeps and whistles, and (my personal favourite) the TARDIS in the middle of a road crashed into by a car and not getting a scratch! That was a great moment on an "audio" level for me. Fun stuff!

I find it endlessly impressive that Audio Drama's can really bring these stories to life to this degree. I mean they must have it tough getting across what's happening, script, sound effects, acting...all has to happen without the visual. Well, not only do they pull it off, but they pull it off splendidly in a way that makes me proud to display the discs next to my TV Series DVD's and BluRays.

I love this series and as soon as the Christmas Gift Buying season is over, I will be buying and reviewing a bunch more. So please stay tuned, and I hope you are enjoying these reviews for the Big Finish Audio Drama’s

Note: I have the first part of the Series finale (THE HUMAN RESOURCES) already and listened to it (couldn’t help myself!), and I also have an episode from the 2nd Series (DEAD LONDON, ordered VIA Amazon with some Xmas gift orders…again couldn’t help myself), which I’ve not listened to yet…

Trivia: When is a form of genre media an addiction? When you listen to the same Audio’s more than once and revel in the special feature interviews…yeah…that’s what this is like.

Doctor Who: Big Finish Audio Adventures - DARK EYES

Let's begin with a small bit of history on my experience:

My DOCTOR WHO fandom stretches WAY back to being probably about 5 years old and having PBS on while my mum made dinner and watching the 4th Doctor battle Daleks or the Master. That familiar time vortex visual, the blue box, the spooky theme music, the scarf, the jelly babies. It always takes me back to that time. The DW-related phrase “watched hiding behind the sofa” definitely applied to the 5-year old me. That fandom never ended and though my knowledge and viewings of Classic Who are rusty at best, I watched it till it went off the air in the late 80’s. At the time there was no internet and all I could be was a little baffled that my show was off the air.

In 1996, at the age of 19, the BBC and FOX (of all networks) I saw that they were going to air a new TV movie. I still recall being over the moon excited. Here was this icon, one a lot of my friends here in Canada didn’t have the foggiest clue about at the time, coming back to TV for one night only. I was not only home to watch the event, but I think I may have had it on tape for a while. In retrospect, it’s has a LOT wrong with it: The Master being on trial on Skaro (the Dalek homeworld), the Daleks (the Time Lord’s mortal enemies) apparently trying a human (something they’d never do, you know... as a conquering genocidal race) and then allowing him to leave in chains escorted home to Gallifrey for death by none other than their very worst enemy The Doctor. Yeah, add to that the nutty, overacting of Eric Roberts (overacting a character who is KNOWN to be over-the-top and overdoing THAT) and you have the makings of a canon-istic DOCTOR WHO nightmare that is still argued over by fans to this day.

What they don’t seem to argue over is the canon of the 8th Doctor. Portrayed in that 1996 film (the 8th Doctor’s only TV appearance...so far) by the wonderful, adept Paul McGann. He has always been undoubtedly the 8th Doctor. It doesn’t really matter that the 1996 film itself is argued over...HE is canon.

He is canon not just because his performance was so good in that film (though it certainly was), but also due to the existence of the company known as BIG FINISH, and the fact that they set out (probably around the same time as the 2005 re-launch of the TV show and the 9th Doctor’s adventures were getting underway) to continue the adventures of DOCTOR WHO. In 2006 they broadcast the first of the 8th Doctor’s Full Cast Audio Adventures...and the series has been a hit ever since. Now I say all this in hindsight, since I’ve only as of (...*checks watch*...) just last week discovered BIG FINISH and the Doctor’s Audio Adventures (which also include adventures with the 4th, 5th, 6th, and 7th Doctor’s) for the first time. My route there was a little superficial I admit. I’ve been excited since it was announced about the 8th Doctor’s new outfit (which he had designed, the sonic even was done by WETA) about the prospect of McGann appearing in the 50th Anniversary, as I loved him in the 1996 movie. My favourite thing about the 8th Doctor is the fact that technically, historically he would have been the Time War Doctor, and the new outfit (a shorter haircut, a leather Naval Pea coat, a shoulder bag and a brand new Sonic Screwdriver) just suits that. So it was in my frequent DW Google Image searches I came across the image you see at the top of the post for the latest 8th Doctor Audio Adventure from BIG FINISH (DARK EYES) and was blown away. Wow, does he look great! So it was that I decided that the DARK EYES boxed set (4 episodes and a 5th hour of bonus behind the scenes features) would be my first DOCTOR WHO Audio Adventure.

I listened over the course of two days on my way to and from work. And when I finished listening, I put it on one more time to give it an immediate second listen. Yes, this means it was THAT good. I was in fact, so impressed after hour one, that I tweeted about it to fellow DW fans who may not have heard about it, I shouted about it to local friends and scared people at work, and I immediately began considering purchasing more. Imagine what it is like to be a fan of something and assume you’d seen or read the majority of things to do with that subject, that there was simply little more to consume and it was a wait for each new episode of the TV series...only to discover that there were YEARS worth of the series, simply in another media format. It was like Christmas and my Birthday occurred at once. That’s probably going to sound a tad obsessive....but have you MET me? I like to frighten my cat with my remote control Dalek. I own 3 sonic screwdrivers and umpteen gajillion t-shirts. I’m a DW nerd, through and through. This is what I do!

DARK EYES
I realize that my first 8th Doctor Adventure should probably not be one that’s the most recent, and especially tailing on apparently big events (TO THE DEATH), but I’m rectifying that now. After I finished DARK EYES, I bought 3 more 8th Doctor Adventures from BIG FINISH beginning at the beginning, so don’t scold me too much. DARK EYES caught my eye, so it was the one I purchased. From the very beginning, McGann makes himself the center of the story. He’s just such a commanding presence. Always has been. Even on BBC’s LUTHER I can’t take my eyes off him, he’s simply wonderful. If there is an actor who belongs next to the likes of the other men who have played the roll, it’s him. I’m convinced i could listen o him talk for hours (he narrates a few Bernard Cornwell Sharpe Books I have). In DARK EYES, the Doctor is still reeling from some pretty heady, disturbing loss and is out to search for some “hope”. He’s despondent, scatterbrained and broken. From the very first scene before the theme plays you can feel that this man is in a bad place. Enter another Time Lord (Straxus), as the Doctor attempts to go to the end of the universe to look back upon it and see how it turned out, the other Time Lord stops him telling him it’s forbidden by those that make the rules (his fellow Time Lords and the High Council of Gallifrey), but offers him hope in another way and sends him on a mission instead.

Said mission takes him to the First World War and to find the woman known as Molly O’Sullivan, though you don’t find the specifics of the mission till the second episode, it’s clears from the outset that she’s important. I don’t want to go too much into the content of the 4 episodes that comprise DARK EYES, but sufficed to say that they include the Daleks and the Time Lords in equal measure, and the story is a rip-roaring, time jumping adventure you won’t soon forget. It’s literally brilliant. Writer (and voice fo the Daleks) Nicholas Briggs has done a wonderful job of crafting a tale that is at once VERY DOCTOR WHO and at the same time emotionally resonant and compellingly interesting. I adore the tone of the story. This is the 8th Doctor and this is presumably one of the events that starts the slow and agonizing road to the eventual Last Great Time War. It’s a disassembly of this man. The 9th and 10th Doctor are absolutely, guttingly broken by the events of the Time War, the (as I’ve frequently mentioned) PTSD Time Lord. Well, at some point Eight needs to be broken. We know those events will happen slowly over time and that the Time War will be the last few straws that do it. It’s really nice to see attention to that detail happening in DARK EYES. He’s already damaged as the Time Lords continue to show their disregard for life and their machinations here are just one more example to him of how that corrupt power will feed the eventual conflict. You can see how Rassilon will eventually become the desperate man we see in the 2009 special THE END OF TIME. Eight is not fracturing yet, but the strain is beginning to show and I LOVED that aspect here. There is also plenty for Classic fans to sink their teeth into with this story arc. There are nods to previous companions (Lucy foremost amongst them obviously), and events that have occurred. When the Doctor speaks of the Daleks (for example) he says how they were created by a madman for one propose and one purpose only, and later on mentions the Kaleds. It was a small moment that for any Classic Who fan brings to mind the 4th Doctor and the GENESIS OF THE DALEKS. There’s plenty of running (which I always love) and oodles of time jumping.

The acting is wonderful across the board. Everyone brings their A game and I swear to you that if I didn’t know better and I closed my eyes I could have been just been watching episode on TV with the visual. And I suppose that’ the point isn’t it? Well, Briggs and Co. have totally pulled it off. Paul McGann and Ruth Bradley especially make this just a great outing all together. I relished every moment I got to spend with the Doctor and Molly (not to mention Straxus, the Dalek Time Controller and even the villainous Kotris). On par with any of the episodes of the Re-launched TV series, BIG FINISH Audio Adventures are an absolute joy for the casual fan and a dream come true for the die-hard fans. DARK EYES was a wonderful experience and obviously it was one that caused me to begin buying the other Audio Adventures. You don’t have to start this far into the series and it’s probably a good idea to go back and start at the beginning of Eight’s Adventures...BUT, if you are at all on the fence about the ideas of the format, then give DARK EYES a go.

The Audio’s are assembled and edited with such a splendid eye as to be seamless from track to track. The music is lovely, bombastic when it needs to be and emotional when it needs to be, and is again seamlessly integrated with the special effects and the dialogue. It’s worth noting that the post production is damn near flawless as I never felt that I was listening to something with “tracks” and always felt like the whole hour was one large chuck with no dividers. These people know what they are doing and this speaks highly of the post-production team involved who do just a stellar job!

As for myself, like I mentioned earlier I’ve gone back to the beginning of Eight’s Adventures now. I’ll be listening to the two-part BLOOD OF THE DALEKS this coming week and will be reviewing that as well when done. So stay tuned for that!

And if you’ve not discovered them yet, please go to the BIG FINISH website and have a gander at the DW Audio’s they offer. There’s an entire library of them and any DOCTOR WHO fan would think they’d died and gone to Valhalla. They are reasonably priced, offered in CD or Download format (Collector Note: buy the CD and you get the Download as well) and buy purchasing them you will be assuring that they will continue bringing us the Doctor’s Adventures in this format and keeping us entertained.

Doctor Who: Series 7 Ep. 2: Dinosaurs On A Spaceship & Ep 3. A Town Called Mercy Reviews

Since I was attending TIFF and doing a multitude of reviews for that I didn’t get a chance to properly do my weekly review for DOCTOR WHO (namely episodes 2 and 3 which aired during TIFF), both of which I watched.

So, consider this a two-fer review for both DINOSAURS ON A SPACESHIP and A TOWN CALLED MERCY.

Without further ado…

DINOSAURS ON A SPACESHIP

This episode is a little more bombastic and less introspective (at least initially) than the Series opener ASYLUM OF THE DALEKS was. I mean let’s run down the list of things in the ep:

- Huge planet sized spaceship? Check.

- Dinosaurs running around on said spaceship? Check.

- Evil megalomaniacal pirate bent on collecting everything? Check.

- Two giant henchman robots with silly dialogue? Check.

- Nefertiti? Check.

- Big Game Hunter reminiscent of someone from a Wilbur Smith novel? Check.

- Amy and Rory post-marital strife? Check.

- Rory’s Dad? Check.

- Angry Doctor? Check.

- Indian Space Agency defense force threatening to destroy the ship and dino’s to save earth from collision? Check.

So yeah, a bit of a dogs breakfast with all the bits in. What makes it actually succeed is the clever writing and the acting across the board. This is not to say that it doesn’t contain things that are odd (Rory’s dad seems to take about 15 seconds to drink in the fact that not only is he in space but also that his son and daughter-in-law have been traveling with a man in time and space saving worlds…which kind of bothered me a bit), but that it contains enough good old fashioned adventurous DW to make it well worth your time.

First up, the side character the Doctor calls on for help, Nefertiti and Riddel are worthy of the temporary companion roles, and a big notion here that will jump out at the informed (AKA those who know that Amy and Rory’s time in the TARDIS is ending with Ep 5) is that the Doctor (who has been without regular companionship for roughly 300 years by the time that last Series CLOSING TIME aired) is starting to show the wear and tear of travelling on his own (which always seems to produce an angrier, and more unrepentant Doctor…like the 9th in DALEK or the 10th in THE RUNAWAY BRIDE) and seems to be at least attempting to supplement the frequent absence of Amy and Rory in his life. That’s a good thing, and it is the reason that both Nef and Riddel are present, but it’s not really working that well. The Doctor shows his unrepentant side on the pirate Solomon and allows him to basically die. It’s a telling moment, but for those speculating that this has never happened before and think the Doctor is not acting like himself… you are quite wrong. Throughout his history (in relaunched Who if not older Classic Who) the Doctor has showcased unrepentant anger, and vicious retribution on people when he’s not travelling with companions. Heck, 11 showed it early on with Amy (THE BEAST BELOW). It’s part of what makes him who he is. The companions temper him, and without them he can become cold and distant. This is what has happened, and I’m happy to see this particular personality trait return. It shows that Moffat and Co. haven’t forgotten it. It also seems to show us how unwilling The Doctor is to let the Ponds go, whereas when other companions have gone on to other lives (willingly or unwillingly) in the past he usually accepts it and moves on. With the Ponds it’s like he clinging to them, and that’s interesting considering how aloof he can be.

DINOSAURS ends on a bleakish note with the Doctor’s anger on display, but it was a fun, and adventurous episode all told and a great way to spend an hour. It’s certainly showing that Series 7 is already kicking Series 6’s ass in the entertainment dept. The standalone nature of the eps (with teeny tiny arc threads) is truly brining us back to a more solidly grounded, uncomplicated DW. And that’s a good thing.

A TOWN CALLED MERCY

This one I liked. I liked it a lot. But my reasons for liking it aren’t the old west town with the anachronistic tech, or the cowboys, or the gunslinger cyborg, or even Ben Browder.

No, my reasons for liking it stem from the alien doctor named Kahler Jex. And more over what he did.

You see Kahler Jex is essentially a war criminal, though he is not thought of like that by his own people. He stopped a war on his planet that was killing millions by experimenting on a number of the inhabitants (under false pretenses) and creating killing machine cyborgs, who eventually stopped the war by virtue of being unstoppable. Though the war was stopped, Jex was ashamed of what he had done and he fled to earth and took residence in the town called (you guessed it) Mercy. There he gave them electricity and running water, and cured Cholera and basically tried to forget what he had done while at the same time pay his own penance for his crimes against those experiments. Well, of course one of them comes look for him and wants to kill him, but doesn’t want to harm the other inhabitants of Mercy.

It’s compelling because once the Doctor learns what Jex did, out comes the angry Doctor again…no less angry than he was on the last episode, but no further. That is until Jex talks about how similar they are to one another. And that hits home for the Doctor who has been told (most recently by Davros in S4) that he crafts weapons out of his companions to do his killing for him. The Doctor tells him that he doesn’t get to choose his own form of punishment, that’s not how this works. He needs to answer for his crimes, even though they stopped a war.

But what really rocks the Doctor back and sets his anger to overload is when he realizes that he really IS NO different from Jex in that facet. The Doctor locked the Time War out of reality, resigning two entire races (the Daleks and the Time Lords) to an eternal state of hell. He essentially (to stop the aggression that threatened to destroy the universe) made the decision to do this on his own, and that falls on him. It’s almost a worse act of war crime, and what’s worse is he KNOWS it. So he snaps and manhandles Jex out to the edge of town past the barrier that the Gunslinger won’t cross and points a gun at him to await his death at the hands of his creation.

WHAT?! You say…The Doctor and a gun? Yes.

Probably my favorite thing about the episode is this moment. And Amy even comments on it (“You see? This is what happens when you travel alone for too long!”). The Doctor, (the man who never would) hasn’t held a gun up to someone since he was at his wits end in THE END OF TIME PART II and Rasillon was threatening to bring the Time War out of the lock and bring about the end of time. So couple that with this moment where Jex has reminded him of his own digressions against not just one but two races of people. It’s poignant and is the likes of which we’ve not seen since RTD gave us the PTSD Doctor (9th Doctor). Being brought so entirely low it is only Amy firing off a gun that brings him back. But not after he tries to defend his actions by mentioning his “mercy” of the Daleks, the Master ect. It’s a key point for him to do so. It shows that the Time War was exactly what he was thinking about (since both the Daleks and the Master were heavily involved in that era of his life) when he was railing at Jex.

So in the end A TOWN CALLED MERCY ends up being a great standalone, with a darker yet still entertaining story…but the core of it is this interaction between the two doctors and their crimes…and then you have Amy telling him he’s traveled too long alone…and finally the parting shot of Amy (when asked to keep traveling) turning him down and talks about their friends might start to see them age faster. The Doctor’s face is priceless in that shot. He knows the trips are getting less frequent with the Ponds and that a time will come soon when he is utterly alone.

And that’s what makes A TOWN CALLED MERCY so compelling as an hour of TV, but especially as an hour of DOCTOR WHO.

As a final note: Hopefully everyone has noticed that the titles sequences (aside from being slightly different with the logo being tailored to fit the theme of the episode)  started slightly murkier than past years and have been getting slowly darker and murkier with each episode. The running theory is that this will continue to happen until Ep 5 (THE ANGELS TAKE MANHATTAN, and the Ponds exit) where it will pretty much be just a murky black screen with the music playing and white titles. Or it could be leading to something more ominous down the line. Either way, I think it's a nice little mystery.

TIFF 2012: Thermae Romae

This is a tough one for me. I REALLY, really wanted to see this. A fish out of water comedy where a roman bath architect finds a secret passageway from 124A.D. Rome to modern 2012 Japanese Bathhouses and starts to steal the future’s ideas to appease his own Roman superiors. What’s not to like?

Well, as it turns out, nothing was not to like. It’s charming, funny, and well acted across the board…

…but…

As an Anime fan (and knowing this was based off of a very popular Manga series) I kept thinking throughout that it could have been even better as an Anime rather than a live action film. It has all the bells and whistles and hallmarks of what makes comedy anime so great…but here I the live action version it began to be a little…overwrought? It also begins to be a BIT repetitive and predictable in the second hour. Once you’ve worn off the novelty of watching Lucius react to modern things like food and drink he’s never tasted, or thinking this “flat-faced clan” (he believes that the future is actually just a slave version of a bathhouse) is superior in their methods of bath-houses, it just ends up ringing a little falsely the 3rd and 4th time they go for that comedic beat. Another thing I noticed is that when the love interest from modern Japan, Mami (a struggling manga artist looking for a muse), ends up in ancient Rome the whole thing that makes her so charming falls apart. She ends up resigned to plot-device-rescue territory and I felt that was really unfair to her character. She was the best bit about the modern world storypoints and every time she was on screen I was overjoyed…but once back in Ancient Rome I just felt bad for her as a character.

Like I said, it’s a good film, and there’s plenty to like here, but it’s not anything that couldn’t have been done better in Anime. The second hour is a lot of been there, done that with a rescue tagged in for good measure.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m really impressed that the programmer’s chose such an offbeat Japanese comedy to be a Gala Presentation, but a big part of me thinks that KEY OF LIFE (which I’d seen earlier the same day) deserved to be there more I guess if we were choosing Japanese comedy films. And maybe having seen and been so charmed by KEY OF LIFE made me react the way I did to THERMAE ROMAE.

You will enjoy the film, laugh and be charmed (especially by the lead and the older Japanese bath house users) by it…but I can’t help feeling that it could have been something better in the end.

TIFF 2012: Wasteland

Ever since I saw LOCK, STOCK & TWO SMOKING BARRELS years ago I have found that certain British directors really have a great grasp on what exactly makes a gritty, and interesting heist drama.

With WASTELAND by director Rowan Athale I have found another film to love in this genre. It’s compelling, well-told in the non-linear style that usually works best in these types of films, and acted with verve by the young cast (Luke Treadaway, Iwan Rheon, Matthew Lewis, Gerard Kearns, and Vanessa Kirby) with an old British favourite anchoring the cast (Timothy Spall).

Basically this is the tale of a young man named Harvey who gets out of prison (from a drug possession rap he was set up for), and sets about gathering his friends into a scheme to rob the REAL drug dealer / local thug boss who set him up to begin with, while trying to not piss off his old girlfriend who’d rather he didn’t get himself into trouble.

While it’s a simple tale, the non-linear storytelling, the impressive acting of the cast, and actually the cinematography which captures the Yorkshire town it takes place in truly well make it really soar.  The cinematographer makes every shot beautiful, but in a wholly gritty way. I watched as the shot choices frequently appear behind the actors as they walked (allowing us to identify the actors through their jacket design and the back of their heads), and wide shots were designed in a picturesque fashion to maximize effect on the audience. I found one particularly well-filmed scene where they had the young men scattered in different positions around a rusty children’s playground as they argued to be quite well done.

In the end the film is definitely carried by the performances though and you will care about the story as well, with Treadaway teasing that something is not quite correct as he relates his story to Spall’s police detective character. The group of friends actually act like friends would (as opposed to actors attempting to make it seem real). They argue, make comments and behave like good friends would when in extraordinary circumstances. It adds a level of realism to the proceedings that I found quite refreshing.

Great stuff, and well worth your time when it hopefully drops internationally.

TIFF 2012: Key Of Life

I’d never seen a film by renowned comedy writer/director Kenji Uchida, though I’d heard he had a deft hand at the genre. So I was quite intrigued to see KEY OF LIFE, and thankfully I was pleasantly surprised.

It was a great film, and one in which I laughed loudly many times. It was also full to brimming with heart, charm and sensibility…even though it’s technically a black comedy.

The main characters (played pitch perfectly by Masato Sakai, and Teruyuki Kagawa) Sakurai (who wishes to kill himself but can’t and lives in near poverty) and Kondo (an assassin who lives the high life, but is seemingly bored by it) end up accidentally switching lives when Kondo slips in a bathhouse and thunks his head producing amnesia prompting Sakurai to take it upon himself to steal the assassin’s clothes without realizing what he’s gotten himself into. The events that follow are hilarious from minute one. Rounding out the cast is Kanae (Ryoko Hirosue) who is a terribly nerdy magazine editor looking for a husband to marry by a certain date (which she announces as "I'm getting married" to her co-workers). She’s hilarious. The film opens with her and I was almost falling into the aisle gut laughing at her antics. Perfect comedy timing on her part.

The film actually takes a bunch of turns I wasn’t expecting and ended up being far more refreshing than it had any right to be based on the premise. It was written skillfully, and directed even better. The acting was great across the board (like I mentioned above) and I could not think of a better qay to spend two hours early on a Saturday morning.

See this film when you can get your hands on it. It’s about as charming a film as I saw at the whole of TIFF this year. Loved it!

TIFF 2012: Outrage Beyond

Takeshi Kitano is one of those Directorial names that I always pay attention to. I like his yakuza movies (BROTHER) as much as I like his comedy stuff (TAKESHI’S CASTLE), as much as I like his quiet, introspective stuff (KIKUKIRO, DOLLS). He’s one of the best auteur’s that Japan has produced.

What’s interesting about Kitano is that his output has gone on a wave, beginning with violent yakuza stuff, then drifting into the thoughtful stuff, then into kind of inner eye surrealism, and then with OUTRAGE he’s drifted back into violent yakuza films again.

What immediately jumps out with OUTRAGE and it’s sequel OUTRAGE BEYOND is that Kitano is seemingly tired of the genre…but in a good way. Basically these two films are scene after scene of a bunch of suited yakuza bosses, underbosses, soldiers and thugs spitting line after line of bravado and dialogue at each other interspersed with bright, garish, visceral violence. There is really not much else to either film. Yes they follow a story progression, but even that seems to be a side-car. What makes the films compelling then? Well Kitano’s statement about the actual yakuza themselves. This antiquated crime lord system that exists in the safest country on the planet, in which the old guard do things a certain way, and the new guard do things in a different but no less surreal way…and neither of the sets of guards has the first clue how backwards it all is.

In what is essentially the Japanese version of a Scorsese mob film, OUTRAGE BEYOND basically is a cautionary tale for the elite crime syndicate. It shows how you cannot go against the boss, and if you do and take the boss spot for yourself, there is always someone wanting to take that from you. It’s a constant ebb and flow of a rat eating its own tail. Up and coming mobsters want to make a name, older mobsters want to keep power, and everyone in between is scheming in some way. It’s basically an organization you join if you are looking for a quick and violent demise. And isn’t that utterly ridiculous. That is the point I think Kitano is making here. These men in these rooms spitting bravado and insults at one another mean less than nothing to the outside world. The rest of the ball keeps spinning while these tools set about killing one another for power that really is a figment of their imagination.

And THAT is why Kitano is such a master.

If you can’t tell, OUTRAGE BEYOND was excellent.

TIFF 2012: Artifact

I've been a solid 30 SECONDS TO MARS fan ever since I stumbled upon their self-titled first CD (2002), and have followed them closely for ten years now. I love their music, their passion and especially their attention to fans.

So imagine my surprise and delight at seeing ARTIFACT on the TIFF bill this year. I immediately snapped up two tickets (for myself and my gf who is also a huge fan) and fit the premiere screening into my schedule. So we trundled down to the Ryerson last night for the screening and excitedly buzzed in line about the band and the subject of the documentary, which documents their long battle with EMI who was suing them for $30,000,000, while simultaneously telling the story of the making of their third album (THIS IS WAR).

The very first thing you'll notice about ARTIFACT is that it is a very, very polished documentary above and beyond all else. Well assembled, edited (by Shelby Siegel, Stefanie Visser, Daniel Hernandez, Ishai Setton), scored, and paced the entire endeavor works really well for even those who don't know about the band, as a significant marker in the long, recent forced evolution of the record business. It tells the story of dinosaur corporate business folk who basically screw the artist at every turn, and that's the business model: Screwing the artist. It's just something that is apparently accepted, albeit grudgingly on the part of struggling bands who just want to play music. In ARTIFACT you will also see how when a giant corporation who takes control of flagging EMI, they end up not having a clue about how to run it.

It showcases that 30 STM were present at the apex of the influx of digital music, the advent of the single returning (no longer having to buy a whole album to get the song you love), and especially during the fast evolution of the idea that the Record Label business model no longer applied, leaving record companies hemorrhaging money. Ultimately very informative about just how the record industry (used to) work, how the company would front a decent sized fee and then proceed to take nearly every penny of the profit for themselves, leaving most bands in debt. I'd rather not spoil too much of the film but sufficed to say you will walk out of it with a MUCH clearer understanding of exactly how the industry (used to) work. I say "used to" because the film touches on some of the bigger changes in the industry, like Amanda Palmer's (one of my faves) recent Kickstarter success for her THEATRE IS EVIL album and tour. That shows that things ARE, however slowly, changing. It just so happens that when 30STM began fighting EMI, this sort of thing (crowdfunding) didn't exist yet so they were on the front lines of a war of attrition and the suits at the top of EMI were attempting to mentally and physically drain them of their will to fight.

Various musicians, ex-EMI executives, and other folk from the industry weigh in throughout the film to help tell the story. It's Jared, Shannon and Tomo who really tell the story on the ground floor though. Every single beat of emotion, upset, anger and elation is on display here, laid bare for the audience. Also on display is the absolute, drive that Jared and Co. have in them about music. It wasn't just about making the record, it was about something higher. Something attainable, but only at great cost. There are quiet moments with Jared tinkling at a piano after a decidedly hard phone call, or Shannon succumbing to his drums till they become an extension of him and you can actually FEEL what he feels, or even Tomo shouting his upset into a rock that is cast off a cliff into the sun-sinking dusk. It...resonates. Not just for me as a fan of 30STM, but I think it resonates for everyone and how music affects us on a mental level. It can make you feel joy, or anguish, or even stillness, and that is also on display in ARTIFACT.

Probably one of the best documentaries I've seen in a long time, and certainly the best music doc I've ever seen. Produced by Jared Leto, and Emma Ludbrook, it's important, it's informative, and most of all it's entertaining. The film got a well deserved standing ovation after the screening (which was the 1st ever screening), Jared and Shannon taking the stage afterwards for a wonderful, funny and endearing Q & A. I proudly stood up (my gf keeps gushing about how she held her hand out and both Jared and Shannon five-d her) and applauded with everyone else. They DESERVE that praise. This is a documentary that should be seen by everyone. As fans we have a responsibility to be educated about how these bands we idolize, about their struggle, and about where exactly our money goes when it leaves our hands. It shows how human they are, and how they approach music the way we approach anything that we are passionate about.

If anything it made me an even bigger fan of 30STM. I don't know that this is possible for this, Echelon member, white seraphim wristband owning devout disciple...but I can try. What I hope comes of this is that this documentary stands as a grounding stone for the FUTURE of music. I want this to be a call to fans that things need to change and while Jared, Shannon and Tomo do so from the inside, we can do so from the outside by being aware of how we lend our support.

An absolute triumph of documentary film making, if you missed ARTIFACT then I hope you go out of your way to see it when it comes out after the Festival. You won't be disappointed and maybe, just maybe you can help affect the future of music.

TIFF 2012: The Impossible

 

I am so glad that TIFF allows me to see something as spectacular as this film early, so that I can go off and tell everyone that they need to see it. THE IMPOSSIBLE is one of those films.

The 2004 Tsunami is one of those events in my life that I was old enough to be truly affected by, and also one which I vividly recall from the news footage and stories that rose up out of the aftermath. It was one of those moments where our planet shrugs and we realize just whose grace it is by which we live on it. It was a horrific tragedy that tore people apart, brought them together, and as the director himself (J. A. Bayona) said after our screening, "wiped away race, country and all else"...reducing those people affected directly by it to simply...human beings trying to survive.

The narrative focuses in on a family vacationing in Thailand at a beach resort, and when the tsunami strikes without warning they are ripped from the resort on chaotic tides that destroy nearly everything in their path, and a passing tree branch can spell horrific death as easily as a wrecked car can. The  family (played to perfection by Naomi Watts, Tom Holland, Samuel Joslin, Oaklee Pendergast, and Ewan McGregor) not only have to survive the initial wave, but also have to attempt to survive wounds, separation and despair after the fact. These specific events are based on an actual Spanish family, and that fact makes the story pluck a louder chord with the audience. 

I want to call special attention to Tom Holland who plays the eldest son Lucas who utterly carries the film on his shoulders. As big as the name stars are, Holland's present and stripped bare performance coupled with his on screen chemistry with Naomi Watts (who plays his mother Maria) just makes him shine. Enough that people in the audience commented on it repeatedly, echoing what we were all thinking. Speaking of Watts, who is always very good, I do believe she's turned in an award-worthy performance here. Both she and McGregor are able to translate the role of not only parents dealing with separation from their children, but from each other. It was also noted in the Q&A that some of the extras in certain scenes were REAL survivor's of the 2004 ordeal, and that the hotel that they shot at in Thailand was the very same hotel that the family stayed at.

Now, Spain has been hiding something from us. This is a Spanish production (first and foremost), but the country has apparently been hiding their secret weapon screenwriter Sergio G. Sánchez, because this man can WRITE! I attended another film (see my review for FIN (THE END)) that he wrote and consider me just blown away by his ability with crafting subtlety, poignancy and true feeling. As someone pointed out in the Q&A to him, EVERY SINGLE emotional moment is totally, unforgettably earned. This is a tough thing to do and Sánchez needs to be truly proud of how he accomplishes this here in THE IMPOSSIBLE. I am certainly not afraid to admit that I sobbed at least a few times during the screening and from the sniffles and eye-wiping that was occurring around me I am pretty sure I wasn't the only one. The second part of that equation is definitely the direction, and Bayona proves that his debut film (THE ORPHANAGE) being so well-received was not a fluke, THE IMPOSSIBLE is the real deal. It's an important event, and the aftermath especially is something we need to pay attention to. Bayona approaches each shot and scene with the same verve and quality, but with an unforgettable viscera that will haunt you long after you've left your seat. The carnage, bone cracking and blood spurting, is not shied away from, but that direction allows us to FEEL the event ourselves. Bayona throws you into the 2004 tsunami as much as he can do from a theatre seat. It's difficult, tense, and seat grippingly real. 

So far, if I were to choose a favourite film of the festival so far it would most certainly be THE IMPOSSIBLE. It is magnificent, and will continue to affect me for a while yet as I'm truly still trying to process it all. I do believe it will be out this winter in North America, and I really think everyone should get out to see it. THE IMPOSSIBLE is an absolute home-run, and further evidence that the Spanish film industry is a force to be reckoned with.

TIFF 2012: DREDD 3D

 

Dredd: "Are you ready rookie?"

Anderson: "Yeah"

Dredd: You look ready."

What would TIFF be without a few hiccups eh? The Midnight Madness screenings start around 11:59PM...normally. But when it comes to events like TIFF there are sometimes snags. Last night's snag came in the form of the film version of a Jack Kerouac book (On The Road) and Kristen Stewart which was the film (and its star attending) that screened before DREDD. It proceeded to start late and they STILL had to do a Q & A after. This basically resulted in our not getting into DREDD till about 1AM. Now during the festival I don't get upset about these things as they really do just happen with so many films screening over 10 days. So I just hit play on my iPod and listened to Gangnam Style again. :)

Happily around 1AM we were let in, donned our super expensive Dolby 3D glasses, and Colin Geddes (MM Programmer) introduced the director (Pete Travis), writer (Alex Garland) and both stars (Karl Urban and Olivia Thirlby). Urban gave us a little Dredd voice, and told us to "Enjoy the show, mother f*****". Ah yes, Midnight Madness!

Sidenote: News and review sites have been aware for a little while that there had been some sort of tension or upset on set between Travis and Garland for DREDD. Though no one is really sure what the extent of that upset was, Travis stayed seated through his intro and merely waved at the crowd, and Garland (who was stood about 3 feet from me, next to the wall) rubbed his jaw fiercely looking kind of uncomfortable throughout the intro. Take from that what you will. 

Getting to the film. This was a balls to the wall, violent as hell Judge Dredd film. There is no way around the comparison's some folk might make to last year's super successful action flick THE RAID, as the premise is VERY similar...but as I've not seen that film I was able to enjoy DREDD for its own merits. And DAMN it has them. Instead of trying to concoct some elaborate criminal plotline, with mutants, corrupt judges, cloned brothers ect. (like the Stallone version), DREDD sets out to basically introduce Judge Dredd, his commander at the Hall of Justice, and to his rookie companion Judge Anderson, and then throws them into a block building run by a violent, unremittingly insane Ma-Ma (played exquisitely baddass by Lena Headley) where things are put into lockdown and the two judges have to fight to survive.

The dialogue is nearly note perfect. Every line Dredd or Anderson speak is amazingly on task for the Dredd mythos, and Ma-Ma herself gets some cherry lines. The visual design (something I was leery about ahead of time) actually worked decidedly well. Things aren't full blown futuristic or dystopian with Mega City One looking more like a huge conglomerate of current cities, only with added huge blockbusting skyscraping tenements that can house 70,000 people. It FEELS like what a future of our world might look like without attempting to be over the top. Once I settled into that, and especially when the protagonists were in the block (called the Peach Trees) it FELT like a good, solid futuristic film. The futuristic bits of the set  and character design ARE there, but they are in smaller details and that's part of what REALLY works about DREDD.

The action and gore is simply nutbar. In a great way. For example, have you ever wondered what it might look like when a bullet goes through a jaw in slow motion blowing teeth out the other side? Well, wonder no longer, DREDD has you covered. Basically don't expect them to skimp out on the violence that has always permeated Dredd comics in 2000AD magazine, it is here in spades. And in 3D some of those shots are...well simply amazing.

Is it a perfect film? No. It has a few minor flaws in the pacing department and the amount of villains that are sent against Dredd and Anderson. while you do feel they are in trouble, it never feels overwhelming to the point where you are truly concerned for them. I think a larger cast of thugs constantly being sent against them and wearing them down would have benefited the script. That's a small complaint though.

I can honestly say that I truly enjoyed DREDD. Anyone looking for a faithful adaptation of the character, need look no further. Seriously, DREDD delivers in spades there. Urban is perfect as the title character, and never, ever misses a beat. His voice, mannerisms and delivery of scenes was fantastic. Not to be outdone, Thirlby brings a realistic edge to the proceedings, and goes through a nice growth process over the 80 minutes to the point where in the last half hour she becomes nearly as badass as Dredd himself. 

So, my first film at TIFF is a success. Much enjoyed. Go see this when it comes out later this fall. I plan to see it again for sure.