On the Precipice of Series 11… (Doctor Who)

First, a note.  Since the show is moving to Sunday evenings this season, I’m going to temporarily move the Sunday Who Review to Mondays, just so I’ll have a bit more time to digest each episode before my write-ups.  I’ll still use the Sunday Who Review tag, though – don’t want to make them hard to find!

Now, if there’s anyone who still doesn’t know the identity of the Thirteenth Doctor and is somehow holding out, leave now.

She’s almost here!  Not gonna lie, I squeed hard at the most recent trailer.  I’m nervous about what’s coming, but I’m also reaching peak excitement.  Here are my last thoughts/wishes/whatever before we see Thirteen in all her Doctory-ness.

I’m a little worried about the rumblings on how the season’s going to be so different this year, from no classic monsters (pros and cons) to suppositions that the Doctor may be without the TARDIS for part, or even all, of the season (I don’t see how that could possibly be true, and I call blasphemy.)  I get that a new showrunner is going to want to put his own stamp on the proceedings, but this concerns me for two reasons.  1) I know that Jodie Whittaker is likely to get the blame for any dissatisfaction, and I don’t want her shouldering the load for things that have nothing to do with her (goodness knows she has enough of that to deal with already.)  And 2) I want Thirteen to have the full Doctor experience, because she deserves it.  I hope the rumors we’ve heard are largely overblown.

I don’t know how much I want the show to address the Doctor’s gender.  I’ve said before that I don’t want it ignored but I don’t want it hammered on either, and I’m not sure what exactly that sweet spot would look like.  While I certainly don’t want her dealing with sexism constantly, it wouldn’t feel right to have it be a non-factor.  Maybe something where it’s there, but the Doctor being her astonishing Doctory self pulls people along anyway such that they don’t realize that they’re taking orders from her until they’re already doing it?  I know I’d like her companions to take note of how she moves through the world(s) and how people respond to that.

That said, if we’re going to look at sexism, I don’t want it to only be addressed in adventures that take place in the past.  Regardless of everything else happening in the world right now, some of the online reactions to Whittaker’s casting are proof enough that it’s just as relevant today.  If you’re gonna say it, then say it.

My personal preference is to stick with a mostly-asexual Doctor with varying levels of romantic attraction, hopefully tending more toward the aromantic side.  It would be interesting if we got confirmation on how Time Lord orientation works – whether the Doctor, no matter the gender, is primarily heteroromantic or primarily attracted to women – but I’m pretty apprehensive as to how the show would handle Thirteen in even a romantish situation.  Besides, I have my doubts that the show would really go there with Thirteen and a female character (other than possibly very mildly in reference to River,) previous characters notwithstanding.  Of course, I also suspected that we’d never get an LGBTQ full-time companion right before we got Bill, so maybe they’ll surprise me?

I just want it to be amazing.  I want it to be so good, it hurts.  I don’t know if that’s something fair to put on it, but I just want everything good for it.  I want fun plots, I want awesome dialogue, I want adventure and hope and excitement and impossible choices and heroism and joy.  I want little kids to see and love the Thirteenth Doctor, I want a new crop of fans coming to the show and having her be “their” Doctor, and I want her to take her place among all who came before her and all who’ll come after her.

A Little TLC(w): Come Fly the Dragon (1992)

Oof.  Okay, I love Tony Leung Chiu-wai and Andy Lau, but this is not a good movie, not even a little.  Super cheesy, crude humor, and a meandering storyline that takes forever to go anywhere.

In prepation for taking out a big triad boss, a number of recruits are cherry-picked for “Special Squad” and brought together for intense training.  However, most of the recruits are as incompetent as they are impulsive, which doesn’t seem like a great recipe for success.  In between raising their commander’s blood pressure, they somehow gain the expertise they need to complete their mission.

Okay, here’s what I don’t get.  We follow the commander going around to different places picking out recruits, and he seems to go out of his way to pick cocky guys with attitudes about authority who don’t take anything seriously.  If the goal of Special Squad is to whip sorry recruits into shape, that’s be perfect, but it’s not.  It’s supposed to be selecting the best for an elite, highly-dangerous mission, and interspersed scenes of the triad boss show what a big bad he is.  So why on earth does the commander assemble all these goofballs together, guys who are going to need to improve massively to even be a ragtag bunch?

That’s the incredibly-slender premise the plot, what little there is of it, hangs on.  The film seems unconcerned about that, though, as the story is mainly a vehicle for the jokes.  They are many, they are varied, they are rapidfire, and for the most part, they are not good.  I’ll admit that some of the sight gags earned a smile from me, but most of the time is spent on our knucklehead heroes clowning around during training with tons of corniness and little in the way of the actual humor.

The acting throughout is needlessly broad, and that goes for Leung as well.  He plays Eng Di An, one of the chief squad clowns.  He and Andy Lau’s character pratfall and wisecrack their way through training, mugging and pulling faces with abandon.  While Leung often plays the self-assured, smartass ideas man in his early comedies, he’s a bit more of a sidekick here, with Lau taking the lead.  Together, there’s no task or drill they won’t try to weasel out of.

I can tell Leung isn’t good in this movie, but I’m not exactly sure how far he veers into bad; the copy I found was dubbed into Mandarin, so another actor was giving the vocal performance.  Whether Leung’s original Cantonese is as hammy as this guy’s Mandarin, I don’t know.  Still, just going on his physical performance, this is no prize.

Recommend?

In General – Nope.  Too dumb, and at an hour and forty minutes, it still feels interminable.

Tony Leung Chiu-wai – For completists only – this isn’t a role to scour for.

Warnings

Violence, sexual content (including prostitution,) drinking/smoking, crude humor, swearing, and thematic elements.

News Satire Roundup: September 23rd-September 27th

Sunday, September 23 – We’re back after the fallout from the NASA mouse conspiracy two weeks ago, ha!  After Trump described Hurricane Florence as “the wettest” “from the standpoint of water,” we looked at the allegations against Brett Kavanaugh, the inevitable response (the woman who was all, “What high school boy hasn’t [committed a sex crime]?” disgusted me,) and the sober notion that we’re not nearly as far from the Anita Hill days as we might have hoped.  The main story was on Facebook in foreign markets, particularly focusing on Myanmar.  The show did a good job showing how Facebook’s worst qualities – easy means of spreading false info (especially in a country where Facebook is free on people’s phones but actual news sites require data,) slow response to abuse/hate speech – fueled horrific crimes against the Rohingya.  I liked the “Truth Facebook Ad:  International Version” that closed the show.

Monday, September 24 – Good opening bits on Rod Rosenstein (with news reporters admitting they don’t know what the news is,) people injuring themselves in the pursuit of selfies, and a bus driver arrested for letting kids drive the bus, with Trevor taking the unexpected viewpoint.  Of course, more on Brett Kavanagh.  The show looked at the same horrific “defenses” that Last Week Tonight did, and I loved the jokes about Kavanaugh’s 35-year-old calendar that doesn’t have “commit sex crime” written on it, especially Trevor’s point about whether Kavanaugh, as a judge, would accept that evidence in his courtroom.  New sports piece from Roy and Michael featuring a lot of short bits, including a football cornerback retiring midgame and a hockey mascot that looks like a Sesame Street character on meth.  Writer Jenny Han, the guest, discussed the adaptation of To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before and why she feels it resonates with viewers.

Tuesday, September 25 – Quick check-in on protesters dogging Ted Cruz at a restaurant, Bill Cosby’s sentencing, and Nelson Mandela’s statue at the U.N., and then it was back to Brett Kavanaugh.  First up was the Fox News interview, with Kavanaugh painting himself as a saint who’s “always” respected women and Trevor pointing to evidence from that time displaying very little respect.  Dulce reported on the whole “Kavanaugh was a virgin for ‘many years after’ high school” thing, and I think the story missed the mark a little, getting too fixed on the virgin aspect for comedy’s sake.  Great piece from Neil Brennan on how Trump has caused so many “family values” Republicans to defend sexual predators (along with family separation, adultery, and many other things.)  The guest was rapper M.I.A., talking about the journey of putting together the documentary on her life, family, and music that’s been many years in the making.

Wednesday, September 26 – Opening blurbs:  Trump preemptively blaming Chinese election-meddling(?) for GOP losses in the midterms, Spotify pairing with ancestry.com to make playlists based on your DNA (loved Trevor’s joke about getting racially profiled by Spotify,) and a legislative push to regulate leg room on planes.  More Brett Kavanaugh, looking at the latest allegation as well as dubious entries from his high-school alibi calendar – I laughed at the whole thing imagining an actual physician named “Dr. Strawberry.”  Roy reported on an organization that does team-building through simulated survival scenarios; he tried the tactic on a Trump supporter and a super-liberal, with less-than-successful results.  Guest Bill Gates discussed the importance of foreign aid and offered reasons for optimism despite our current presence in the darkest timeline.

Thursday, September 27 – Dr. Christine Blasey Ford and Brett Kavanaugh testimony, of course.  Nice job on the montage of Dr. Ford being polite and cooperative and Kavanaugh yelling and throwing Democratic senators’ questions back at them, and I was appalled by Lindsey Graham using his time to grandstand about the hearing being a miscarriage of justice; Trevor’s reference to Merrick Garland was easy but apt.  As Senate Republicans seem determined to stand by their guy, Michael came on to offer himself as an alternative “bland white man” who’ll go along with whatever they want.  America Ferrera was the guest, talking about a new book she’s compiled of marginalized voices sharing their American stories.  I loved what she said about the American experiment being so much about storytelling, whose stories get told to represent “American” and why.