Doctor Who Revisit: Spoilery Clara Edition

Let’s talk about Clara, shall we?  Looking at “Face the Raven” through “Hell Bent.”  Complete and total spoilage ahead (mostly for those three episodes, but touching on Clara’s entire tenure.)

I’m of two minds about the ending we get in “Face the Raven.”  On the one hand, it’s interesting how Clara is essentially taken down by her own hubris:  she thinks she can play the game as well as the Doctor, but she doesn’t know what she’s doing and gets burned for it.  Also, I like that once she realizes there won’t be any last-minute saves, she accepts the death and her part in it.  On the other hand, it’s so drawn out, the angst is cranked way up to here, and overall, it feels like a very manufactured Big!  Emotional!  Moment!  Not that other companion exits haven’t been – Who loves its angst – but here, I feel the effort more than the effect.  Plus, the part where Clara insists that the Doctor promises he won’t blame himself, try to take revenge, or be alone for too long just rubs me the wrong way.  Maybe because it feels so “Clara knows how phenomenally important she is to the Doctor and how her death will destroy him.”  I dunno – I just don’t like it.

But this was my big thing with “Face the Raven”:  I needed that to be it for Clara.  I knew the Doctor would spend the rest of the season dealing with it, and I was prepared to see Clara again through flashbacks, hallucinations, further back in her timestream, or one of her splinter selves (just kidding – like Moffat remembers he did that.)  But I did not want Clara to come “back.”  It’s not that I wanted her specifically to be dead.  Despite issues I’ve had with Clara, I’m not that petty, and Clara has worked for me fairly well this year.  But a Clara death is what the show wrote, and, even apart from my disinclination trips to the “underworld” or breaking the laws of time to save her, I needed the show to stick with it.  Because Clara has had enough goodbyes.  Not counting Oswin and Victorian Clara, there’s the for-sure-gonna-die farewell in “The Name of the Doctor,” the break with the Doctor in “Kill the Moon,” the planned final trip in “Murder on the Orient Express,” the parting in “Death in Heaven,” the dream fake-out in “Last Christmas,” the extermination fake-out in “The Magician’s Apprentice,” and the killed-by-Zygon fake-out in “The Zygon Invasion.”  It’s like Moffat couldn’t decide how to write Clara out, so he threw them all in.  Given all that, and knowing the Jenna Coleman wasn’t staying past this season, it’d be wildly sloppy storytelling to give her a huge, dramatic death scene, bring her back, and then write her off again, for good, two episodes later.  Ridiculous, and way too much.

So… guess what we got?  To be fair, there are parts of Clara’s return in “Hell Bent” that I like, especially her conversation with the Doctor in the cloister, and I appreciate that she’s not down with letting the Doctor wipe her memories to “save” her.  But there was no cause to go through the whole teeth-gnashing goodbye again when we literally just did this two episodes ago.  If you didn’t want Clara to be dead, show, then you shouldn’t have killed her.  Also – she gets her own TARDIS and companion and is maybe a tiny bit immortal until she goes back to her timeline?  It’s like her has to have the most tragic companion ending and the happiest, both at once, even though that makes no sense.  It goes back to the Impossible Girl who saved every Doctor at every point in his timestream:  writers piling distinctions on her instead of just writing her as a rich, engaging character.  That doesn’t work for me.  First, you can “see the strings,” so to speak, and second, it does no good to play companion Olympics.  Pretty much every companion should be written as awesome, but when you start writing yours as “the best,” you make enemies of fans who will always have their favorites and won’t appreciate you implying that yours trumps theirs.

Favorite Characters: Hermione Granger (Harry Potter)

Over the years, as I’ve revisited the Harry Potter series in the form of both book and film, a certain fact continues to be further cemented:  I love Hermione Granger.  All things considered, she might be my favorite nerdy teenage witch (sorry, Willow!)  Some basic spoilers.

One thing that I like about Hermione is that she isn’t framed as girls typically are in stories for this age range.  Since she’s a supporting character, she isn’t the Ordinary Girl who turns boys’ heads every time she moves, which she can’t figure out because she’s so Ordinary.  Neither is she The Girl in the boy book, the beautiful object of his affection who basically exists for him to moon over.  She’s a bit of the Female Friend who, to the surprise of both young person’s involved, winds up being The One, but because her destined love interest is Ron rather than Harry, the trope isn’t hammered home as vehemently.  Instead, she originally comes in as a bit of an unwelcome guest.  Even though her natural smarts, workhorse dedication to learning, and well-practiced magical aptitude are obvious assets, Harry and Ron aren’t eager to hang out with her.  They find her annoying – a bossy, know-it-all goody-too-shoes.  (Interesting how Hermione is essentially dismissed because they don’t like that she’s outspoken, opinionated, and confident about her intelligence.  Ingrained gender expectations, much?)

But of course, Hermione is mad smart.  And hard-working.  And a skilled witch.  And curious.  And determined.  In other words, she’s who I’d want on my side if I was trying to combat the baddest wizard who ever lived and I was pretty set on only enlisting fellow children to help.  Hermione’s spell-casting ability is especially vital in early books/films, since the time she spends on her studies definitely pays off and the boys aren’t yet up to her level.  Beyond that, her book knowledge comes in handy time and again, and her practicality can be a lifesaver.

Oh yeah, and because both of her parents are Muggles, there are a number of kids – and even teachers – at the school who think she doesn’t belong there.  Malfoy hurls blatant slurs in her direction, and matters get more dangerous for Hermione as the series continues, because putting Muggle-borns “in their place” is a major goal of Voldemort and his Death Eaters.  Rather than let ignorant bigots make her feel small, Hermione holds her head up high and keeps working.  (I suppose it makes a difference that, as a Muggle-born, she wasn’t raised in the wizarding world, and so, the first time she’s called a mudblood, she doesn’t even know what it means.  Still, from age 11 on, Hogwarts is her home nine months of the year, and it’s not cool to discover that a bunch of people in your new community hate you because of your parentage.)  Kudos to Hermione for not giving the haters any satisfaction!

As a matter of fact, Hermione takes time to look out for a class of people even more marginalized than Muggle-borns:  the house-elves.  It’s kind of a weird subplot in the books, because everyone acts like her campaign to free the house-elves ranges from annoying to embarrassing, when the house-elves are actual slaves.  I get that it’s been a part of wizarding culture for a long time, and a lot of the kids from wizard families probably grew up with this instilled understanding of a house-elf’s “position,” but still.  There’s nobody else who’s not down with slavery?  The wizarding world is messed up.  Anyway, it means Hermione is a brave, smart, resilient, powerful, Muggle-born witch abolitionist, and that’s awesome.

A Few Notes on Dual Roles in Hamilton

Because there’s such a marked divide between Hamilton’s first and second acts (the American Revolution, followed by America’s early governance,) people who are important in Act I don’t feature in Act II, which introduces prominent characters of its own.  As such, several actors in the production play dual roles, and I thought it’d be fun to take a look at these.  (Some spoilers.)

Jasmine Cephas Jones has the least to work with in her two roles.  Essentially, she’s playing the two named females who aren’t Eliza and Angelica.  In Act I, she’s Peggy Schuyler, and she really only sings in “The Schuyler Sisters,” where her nervousness about the revolution contrasts with Angelica’s excitement.  She has a bit more in Act II as Maria Reynolds, who has an affair with Hamilton, but again, she’s only in one song (“Say No to This.”)  Still, the contrasting roles are interesting.  It didn’t really hit me that Jones plays both until I saw her onstage.  Jones is giving two entirely different performances of very different characters, jittery good girl Peggy and sad-eyed seductress Maria.  Especially since Peggy is such a “barely there” character, it’s to Jones’s credit that they’re so distinct; even their singing voices are nothing alike.

It’s neat to look at the two characters played by Anthony Ramos.  I suppose both roles – John Laurens in Act I and Phillip Hamilton in Act II – skewer younger than most in the show (in fact, for much of Act II, Phillip is an actual child.)  But there are other parallels as well.  Both men fight in duels, and both men die young (although Laurens dies in the war, not during his duel.)  Both have the same unbridled enthusiasm; Phillip’s cocky routine in “Blow Us All Away” reminds me of Laurens’s introduction in “Aaron Burr, Sir.”  Laurens, though, is much cooler to me.  While we seeing Phillip losing his life over a pique of family pride, Laurens is a dedicated abolitionist, and his devotion to the cause is mentioned in nearly every song he takes part in.

I’d say Daveed Diggs has the best one-two punch of characters.  I absolutely adore the Marquis de Lafayette in Act I, and Act II’s Thomas Jefferson is such an entertaining, engaging opponent for Hamilton.  The similarities here are a little more superficial.  Both characters are connected to France, with Lafayette being “America’s favorite fighting Frenchman,” while Jefferson appears in Act II after returning from his ambassador work in Paris.  I suppose you can say that fighting for freedom is important to both, since Jefferson supports sending aid to France during their revolution (even asking Hamilton, “Did you forget Lafayette?”), but then, Jefferson isn’t even around for the war in Act I, so the parallel isn’t as strong.  Probably the biggest common factor is that both have charisma in spades, although much of that is down to Diggs’s performance!

But if you ask me, Okieriete Onaodowan’s dual roles are the most fun, because of how different they are.  Act I’s Hercules Mulligan is a tailor’s apprentice/patriot spy, and Act II’s James Madison is a sly politician/wealthy slave owner.  The disparity in class and contribution are big enough, but what I really love is how different these characters act.  Mulligan is down-n-dirty, rough, raucous, the life of the party – the show’s first 18^th-century sex jokes come from him.  Madison, meanwhile, is the complete opposite.  He’s such a cold fish, it’s hilarious to me.  He has no game, which makes it even more fun when he’s backing up Jefferson’s swagger.  It kills me when Jefferson looks to him to supply the rhyme “France” in “Cabinet Battle #2,” and he says it without the slightest hint of rhythm or expression.  And to know that this is the same guy who played personality-bomb Mulligan in Act I?  Onaodowan is fantastic!

The Big Bang Theory: Season 9, Episode 11 – “The Opening Night Excitation”

This episode was such a thing that my brother, who has absolutely zero interest in The Big Bang Theory, had to text me when he was saw a commercial for it.  I had a different write-up in the pipeline for today, but that’s going on hold so I can talk about what I just watched (definite spoilers.)

The reason my brother needed my take on a preview I hadn’t even seen?  Sheldon Cooper, one of my precious few possible fictional asexuals, was declared to be “going all the way” in the upcoming episode.  I pointed out that, depending how the show handled it, Sheldon having sex wouldn’t necessarily preclude aceness.  Overall, I was wary but withholding judgment.

In all honesty, I can say that this episode is everything I could have hoped it’d be.  First of all, it’s clear throughout that Sheldon wants to sleep with Amy because he knows it’s something she wants.  They’ve recently gotten back together after a breakup that was pretty hard on him, and he settles on spending the night as his birthday gift to her.  Their first time around, the lack of a physical relationship was hard on Amy, and it was no secret that she wanted more, but Sheldon wasn’t into the right position to give her what she wanted.  Now, though, he feels ready.  It’s not that he’s eager for it himself – it’s that he’s in a place where he feels comfortable with Amy, and this is something he wants to do for her as a means of showing her what she means to him.

This absolutely works for me.  I particularly like that they continually use the term “intimate,” because for Sheldon, that’s what it’s about.  It’s about closeness, not orgasms, and that focus on them as a couple probably helps him feel grounded throughout.  I’m sure some romantics balk at this storyline, thinking it suggests that sex is an inevitable, eventual “next step” at some point in a relationship.  Certainly, a romance doesn’t need sex, and there are other ways to make sure both partners are getting what they need in a sexual/asexual relationship.  However, the odds were slim that The Big Bang Theory was ever going to have Sheldon and Amy working out alternative arrangements for Amy to get her physical satisfaction, and something had to be done.  Amy was clearly struggling with her needs in their original relationship, and if they’d gone back to the same dynamic, things probably would’ve gone downhill again fairly quickly. 

I like that Sheldon seems more sex-indifferent than sex-repulsed.  I would’ve had a problem with it if he’d been shown as doing it when he really didn’t want to.  Beforehand, he worries that he’ll be “overwhelmed,” and he (along with Amy) is awkward as they get the ball rolling, but it’s not a distasteful prospect for him.  And at the end, once they’ve done the deed, it’s played perfectly – he pleasantly observes that he “enjoyed it more than [he] thought [he] would” and makes plans to do it again on Amy’s next birthday.  This is great for me.  He’s not suddenly changed and no longer seemingly-ace, but that doesn’t mean he didn’t have a good time.  He’s open to more, but he doesn’t need more.  There’s no one picture of an ace, and aces can have all manner of different feelings and attitudes toward sex.  It’s a spectrum, and Sheldon is finding his place in it.

Final remarks – even though it’s played for laughs, I love that Sheldon pushes for affirmative consent, and the B-plot, about the other guys gearing up to see the new Star Wars movie, is a great analogy for the whole thing.  Well done, show!  Truth be told, I’m a little gobsmacked at how terrific this was.

The Good Dinosaur (2015, PG)

As a kids’ movie, The Good Dinosaur is fairly good.  As a Pixar movie, it’s only okay.  Don’t get me wrong – there are some truly standout moments – but this film doesn’t approach of level of fine Pixar works like WALL*E, Up, or Inside Out.  (A couple of basic premise spoilers.)

In a hypothetical world in which the dinosaurs never went extinct, they’ve had millions of years to develop as a species, cultivating language, technology, and technology.  Arlo is a young Apatosaurus eager to “make his mark” on the family farm but struggles to keep up with his brother and sister.  It’s not so much his small size that’s the problem – instead, he’s held back chiefly by his fears, which continually get the better of him.  When a freak accident carries Arlo far from home, he has to dig deep and discover what he’s really capable of in order to find his way back.

Arlo is a nice, relatable protagonist, and his character journey, while a bit typical, comes across well enough.  (Side note – I really like how Arlo and the other dinosaurs are sentient and civilized but not hugely anthropomorphized.  It’s fun to see how quadrupeds like the Apatosauruses operate a farm.)  My issue with the main story is that it doesn’t quite have the heft that I’ve come to expect from Pixar.  There’s not a lot going on here that’s really exemplary in terms of ideas and creativity, and the execution, for the most part, gets the job done but fails to impress.  The storytelling feels watered-down, like we’ve seen it before – because we have.

The elements that diverge from this well-traveled path are very hit-or-miss.  I’ll start with the misses, so I can work my way up to the good stuff.  The whole film has a frontier slant to it, with different species of dinosaurs standing in for homesteaders, ranchers, rustlers, and the like.  Although it’s definitely something that makes the movie a little less standard-procedure and we get some amusing jokes from it (such as a T-Rex playing a giant beetle like a harmonica,) it doesn’t quite gel.  I get a sense that the movie never figured out what it wanted to be, that it took a more “throw it against the wall and see what sticks” approach to filmmaking.

But not all of the film’s ventures are missteps.  Just like I enjoy seeing the dinosaurs perform human-like actions without moving like humans, I adore the wild “critter” who becomes a pet for Arlo on his adventure, a feral human boy that Arlo names Spot.  Spot is a fabulous, hugely endearing character from top to bottom.  I love how doggish his movements and mannerisms are, I get a kick out of his loveable obliviousness to Arlo’s early irritation with him, and it’s wonderfully sweet to see how quickly he becomes devoted to his new friend.  Every moment in the film that really connected with me – creatively, comedically, and emotionally – involved Spot.  For me, the best scene in the entire movie is the quiet exchange in which Arlo tries to communicate the concept of family to his nonlingual pet, but really, Spot shines pretty much whenever he’s given the chance.  This right here is the hook that makes the film worthwhile, despite its issues.

Warnings

Some scary images for kids and thematic elements.

Hamilton: Songs 34-38

(Couldn't find a picture from this part of the show, so have a little random Hamilton.)

The start of the second-act downturn – not in quality, but in Hamilton’s in-story situation.  Our boy has a hard time of it for quite a while, and these songs are where it starts.

“The Adams Administration” – After Washington’s departure, Hamilton doesn’t exactly remain the president’s right-hand man.  This short expository number runs through Hamilton’s sorry change of luck under John Adams.

Best lyric:  “Washington can’t help you now, no more mister nice President.”

“We Know” – In which Jefferson, Madison, and Burr confront Hamilton with the dirt they’ve found on him.  They think it’s treasonous – proof that he’s been speculating with Treasury money – when in truth, the sin is personal, not professional.  They’ve found the paper trail for the extortion money paid to the man Hamilton cuckolded.  But, as Hamilton realizes, a rumor is more than enough to ruin a man.

Best lyric:  “An immigrant embezzling our government funds–” – “I can’t almost see the headline, your career is done.” – “I hoped you saved some money for your daughter and sons.” – “Ya best g’wan run back where ya come from!”

“Hurricane” – What a lovely number.  Here, as Hamilton struggles to find his way out of the corner the Democratic-Republicans have backed him into, he looks back on his past hardships and finds the common thread that’s always been his salvation:  his writing.  Less hip hop, more melody as Hamilton plans to write “[his] own deliverance.”

Best lyric:  “I wrote my way out of hell. / I wrote my way to revolution. / I was louder than the crack in the bell.”

“The Reynolds Pamphlet” – Hamilton’s solution?  Not a great one.  Basically, he decides to air all his dirty laundry before his opponents have a chance to do it for him, so his publishes a paper about his affair and subsequent blackmailing.  A song about someone torpedoing their reputation has no right to be this catchy – the recurring “Well, he’s never gon’ be president now” line is a definite earworm, and I’m pretty sure the sight of Jefferson making it rain with copies of The Reynolds Pamphlet is single best visual in the entire show.

Best lyric:  “I love my sister more than anything in this life, / I will choose her happiness over mine every time.”

“Burn” – In this gorgeous song, Eliza reflects on her years with and letters from Hamilton, wondering how he could have exposed their family to such shame.  It’s another number that plays with the unknown nature of history – the title comes from the fact that Eliza burned her letters from his time, so no record of her reactions exist, and she defends that decision here.

Best lyric:  “The world has no right to my heart. / The world has no place in our bed. / They don’t get to know what I said. / I’m burning the memories.”

The Boat (1921)

Gotta love The Boat.  Even though I wouldn’t quite put it up with my absolute favorite Buster Keaton shorts, like One Week, Neighbors, or Cops, it’s very Buster, and it just tickles me.

The plot is very basic.  Family man Buster has built a boat, the Damfino, in his cellar (because reasons,) and the short depicts the misadventures that ensue as he, his wife, and his two small boys take it on its maiden voyage.  The Damfino leaves a trail of destruction, against itself and other structures, wherever it goes, and when a storm kicks up, things really go south.

In a way, this short is a more focused, seafaring version of the train sequence in Our Hospitality.  As with the train, it’s mainly a series of vignettes showing how ill-equipped the Damfino is for being on the water and how Buster and his family face the problems it sends their way.  I’d say it’s not quite as funny as Our Hospitality’s train stuff (so much love for that film, it’s ridiculous,) but it builds better to a comedic/dramatic head with the climactic storm and its fallout.  This is as it should be, since The Boat is a self-contained short and not an extended comic sequence in a feature film with a bigger story to tell, but the comparison itself is maybe a slight critique of The Boat – though it comes around in the end, it does mostly feel like a sequence rather than a story.

Still, you can’t knock the fun it has in the meantime.  I’ve already talked at length about the famous “Damfino” jokes and the hamster-wheel-esque, superbly executed Buster-in-the-cabin-of-the-revolving-boatscene, so I won’t get into those again.  There’s plenty of other stuff to talk about.  Right from the beginning, the Damfino is clearly trouble (Buster has built it too large to fit through the cellar door,) but bless him, Buster is determined to get the better of it.  There are some fun mechanical gags, like the boat’s collapsible fixtures and the bathtub lifeboat, and the image of Buster stoically going down with the ship as they’re still launching it is classic.

For me, much of the beauty of this short is in the little touches.  I love Buster literally pulling himself up by the seat of his pants when he falls overboard, and there’s something so delightful about Buster and his sons all hiding their inedible pancakes in their hats.  There are some great moments during the storm sequence, too, like Buster trying to light a candle in the middle of a howling gale/downpour.  And as much as I love Buster struggling against the hole he’s drilled into the bottom of the boat (to funnel out the water from the hole he made in the side, obviously,) what really kills me are his attempts throw the water out the porthole one teacupful at a time.

Once again, we have Sybil Seely as Buster’s wife, being a nice, charming presence in a role that doesn’t give her too much to do.  I absolutely love the two little boys playing Buster’s sons – not for any particular acting that they do, but for the great extent to which Buster uses them as glorified props.  I adore the fact that they wear matching porkpie hats, and it cracks me up every time Buster hauls one of them around like a sack of potatoes.  I’d say Buster probably required more acting from most of the dogs, horses, and cows he worked with, but those boys sure add a lot just for what he does with them.

Warnings

Slapstick peril and a little implied swearing.