Inspiration

Speaking of inspirations...

It seems likely that the "Flash Gordon" comic books and serial were inspired by ERB's writings, notably the "Barsoom" and "Venus" series.

"Star Wars" was most definitely inspired by "Flash Gordon". In fact, George Lucas apparently wanted to make a "Flash Gordon" film, but couldn't get the rights to do so, so made "Star Wars" instead. (And, incidentally, the same is true of "Willow" and "Lord of the Rings". Now, wouldn't that have been interesting...?)

After "Star Wars", there was a flood of other sci-fi produced, including "Battlestar Galactica" (the original), the "Flash Gordon" movie, "Buck Rodgers in the 25th Century" (the TV series - the original stories predate SW of course), and so on. Plus, of course, the "Star Trek" movies, "Next Generation", and the rest.

Then there's "Babylon 5", which is clearly sci-fi, and clearly inspired by SW, ST, and others, but is also inspired by fantasy writings, including "Lord of the Rings", Elric, and probably the Cthulhu mythos. Oh, and the King Arthur legends.

The key effect of B5 was to change the way TV shows told stories. Suddenly, you didn't just get a bunch of standalone episodes; shows had to have an ongoing plot. "Buffy" refined this concept, switching to a season-long plotline (as opposed to B5's five year epic), which spawned "24" and other shows.

But, importantly, B5 also gave rise to the new "Battlestar Galactica" and also to "Lost", neither of which could have done anything of the same scope had not someone showed the way - and both have distinct stories with a beginning, middle and end (even if "Lost" gets, well, lost about halfway through, and neither show ends very well).

Meanwhile, we get the "Star Wars" prequels, which build on much that has gone before. Those get mixed receptions, but do better than the last few "Star Trek" movies, which kill that series. But that, in turn, works out quite well, because we then get a reboot of the ST movies, which sensibly go for a much more action-movie vibe to them. By embracing that aspect of the series, they don't make the mistake of trying to be something they're not - much of the success of ST:TNG is due to Patrick Stewart in the lead role, but while he's a great actor, an action hero he is not.

And now we get back to "John Carter", which is adapted from those original stories (of course), but which features scenes that look very much like they were just lifted directly from "Star Wars" (and, actually, "Lord of the Rings" in at least one place).

There isn't actually a point to this post, you understand. (Maybe I should have said that at the outset.) I'm just intrigued at the way everything is now feeding off of everything else in a big symbiant circle. Plus, now I'm wondering what's next in the chain.

John Carter (of Mars)

Last night, Lady Chocolat and I went to see "John Carter" at the cinema. Lousy title, good film.

(Originally, it was called "Princess of Mars", which would have been a good and accurate title, and also serves as the title of the first of the Barsoom stories on which it is based. Apparently, though, marketing felt that boys wouldn't go to see a 'princess' movie, so they changed it to "John Carter of Mars". This would also have been a good and accurate title, albeit less good than the original. Apparently, though, marketing felt that girls wouldn't go to see a 'Mars' movie, so they changed it to "John Carter". This is an accurate but utterly bland title, which has managed not to alienate any particular groups - but has utterly failed to attract anyone. Good work! Next time, try "John Carter and the Princess of Mars", which isn't a great title, but at least has a little bit of an "Indiana Jones" vibe to it. Or just don't meddle.)

Anyway, the film was certainly pretty, and rather better written and performed than the last film I saw at the cinema. It told an entertaining story, and it told it pretty well. Which is about what was wanted, really.

But... I don't know...

It had sort of the feel of a modern "Flash Gordon" vibe to it - Earthman gets catapulted into an alien society, where he proceeds to ally with an alien species to bring down a great tyrant. Sure, there was a bit more to it than that, but that was my overriding sense of the film. (Probably because "Flash Gordon" was inspired by Edgar Rice Burroughs work, rather than the other way around, but still.)

The problem is that that story is, to be frank, more than a little silly. "Flash Gordon" dealt with this by embracing the silliness. It's pretty hard to be all serious when you're wearing those outfits, when spouting that dialogue, or when you're Brian Blessed. Plus, Queen.

"John Carter", on the other hand, took itself oh-so-seriously. Sure, there were a few humerous moments, but it just lacked the sheer absurdity of "Flash Gordon" (or "Pirates of the Carribean", for that matter). It was good... but it just wasn't as much fun as the earlier film.

And yet, at the same time it just didn't have the gravitas needed to pull off the "Lord of the Rings" vibe, either - the one that gives the impression that "all this stuff actually happened". Good as the story is, it is always going to be pretty lightweight fantasy, and the film just didn't carry that off.

Ultimately, I had fun. It was a decent evening. And I would recommend going to see the film, or at least catching it on TV when the time comes (depending on how allergic you are to the cinema's rip-off prices). But don't expect to be blown away - it's much better than any of the Star Wars prequels (and have some very similar scenes done better), but that's not really saying a lot.

No Longer Legend - wait for it - Dary

"How I Met Your Mother" has jumped the shark. In truth, it has been ailing for a while - the show depends on not wrapping up its main storyline, but it has now been in a holding pattern for some years; the writers ran out of things to do with Robin about two years ago; and they're now determined to have Barney 'grow up', and given that the best thing about the show was his determination not to do so, that's a big blow.

But the episode that I watched on Saturday (a repeat from the first half of the seventh season, but not one I'd watched previously) was dire, and I think marks the point of no return.

Part of the plot of the episode was another instance of "Ted dates a woman who is not their mother". Or, rather, it was a case of the writers and the cast yet again going through the motions of that storyline. But, while tedious, that was not the worst thing about the episode.

Neither was their use of Robin this episode, who serves solely as a means for them to include their special guest star du jour, Kal Penn. Again, they don't know what to do with the character... so they make use of her to include her boyfriend? Bad stuff...

But the major problem with the show, which has been ongoing for the past season and a quarter, and which is guaranteed to run for at least the rest of the season, is the 'baby' storyline. Which I wouldn't mind so much, except that it's exactly the same as every baby storyline in every other sitcom ever - the parents to be start thinking about having a baby, then they wonder if they're ready, then they decide they're ready but for some reason one of them delays, then they finally go ahead and run into fertility problems. This then leads to the episode where they consult a specialist, and we get to vicariously go through the pain of wondering if they maybe can't hace children (spoiler: they can). A few short episodes later, and the woman is pregnant. Yay!

Then we have the inevitable run of episodes focussing on pregnancy. So, there's the goofy midwife (every time). There's the "shall we find out the sex of the baby" episode (spoiler: they do, and spoiler: it's a boy), then the "what shall we name the baby" episode (spoiler: whatever they choose, that's not the name), then a fairly quiet spell, and then the inevitable "hilarious" episode where one or both parents have to rush to the hospital (spoiler: they make it, just barely in time).

(Occasionally, you also get a subplot where the parents discover there's a chance the baby may inherit some genetic disease, and get all worried about that. Spoiler: the child is perfectly healthy.)

Now, the spoilers above aren't for "How I Met Your Mother" - after all, we're only part way through the baby plot in that show. But they seem to apply incredibly widely to sitcoms (and, indeed, TV in general). Eventually, they all seem to do the 'baby' storyline, and then it's plotting by numbers.

Incidentally, regarding the "spoiler: it's a boy"... You'd think that there should be a roughly equal possibility of either a boy or a girl. But, actually, on any given show you can be reasonably sure that the first child born will be a boy. Then, if there is a second child, she will be a girl. This seems to be an almost universal pattern. (The biggest exception I could think of was "Frasier", where the first child born is Roz's daughter... but that doesn't really count - years before "Cheers" had done the 'baby' storyline, and the child born was Frasier's son.)

I wouldn't mind the 'baby' storyline, if they actually gave us something new. But now that so many shows have done it so many times, and since the storyline plays out in an almost identical manner each time, it's become something I dread. It's repetitive, lazy storytelling - better almost to write the parents out of the show for a while, if only to avoid the same tired jokes being told yet again.

Oh well. It had a good run. But it's now time for "How I Met Your Mother" to wrap up - it's done.

#10: "Pathfinder: The Empty Throne", by Neil Spicer

Forty Days before Easter...

Yesterday, I managed to get all confused. See, I've given up Irn Bru not-quite-for-Lent (that's a whole other rant). And, with the wedding being five weeks today, I'm much more conscious of the passage of the days than normally at this time of year.

So, yesterday I said that I'd done 15 days, so there were 25 to go (since the one key fact about Lent that everyone knows is that it is the 40 days before Easter). But then, that couldn't be right - Good Friday was 30 days away. I know this well, as I finish work the day before.

So then I considered that perhaps Lent ended on Easter Monday. Actually, that would make sense - it starts on Ash Wednesday, and 40 days is "six weeks minus 2 days", which does indeed take us to a Monday, so...

But I was absolutely sure that I'd not had Irn Bru for two weeks. I was sure I'd done two weekly shops since. Plus, I distinctly remember a discussion about pancakes for breakfast that took place on a Saturday within Lent, and it certainly wasn't last Saturday. Perhaps I was just going mad?

It turns out I'm not mad (or, at least, that that isn't an example of it). Lent does indeed start on Ash Wednesday, but it runs through to Good Friday, six weeks plus two days later.

So, that's a relief. Only now I feel rather aggrieved - I had to get rid of some perfectly good Irn Bru on Ash Wednesday, and now it turns out that I was giving it up under false pretences. Plus the "thought I was mad" thing, of course. But mostly false pretences.

Return to a Galaxy Far Far Away

I went to see "The Phantom Menace" in 3D last night. For some bizarre reason, Lady Chocolat had declined to accompany on this particular masochistic trip, so I went alone.

The cinema was rather less busy than any previous time I'd been to see a Star Wars film. Indeed, when I went to see TPM on opening day back in 1999, I was forced onto the front row by a near-complete lack of other seats. This time, there were seven of us in the audience.

Anyway, there were the interminable adverts, followed by trailers for a bunch of films I'm mostly not going to bother seeing, and then the film started.

Sadly, TPM is really not a good film. Previously, I've said that it's actually pretty good up until Nute Gunray's first line... but actually, it doesn't get that far. Just like Dan Brown's "Angels & Demons", it starts to fall apart even before we get to the film itself, because in the opening crawl the film starts droning on about taxation of trade routes. Oh dear...

Anyway, the film then proceeds onwards, and we get some nice visuals, a couple of lines of dialogue, and then a real clunker: "With all due respect..." It was a bad line in 1999, and it isn't any better now. And that's three lines into the film!

Then we get the aforementioned Nute Gunray. Frankly, I'm amazed that in all his tinkering, George Lucas hasn't made one easy change that would massively improve TPM - subtitle the Neimodians! As it stands, they are speaking English, but the prosthetics on their mouths just aren't expressive enough to do the job. They look ridiculous. (And it doesn't help that they sound like a bad racist caricature, too.)

(I'm not sure how you could have a good racist caricature, to be honest...)

Anyway, enough with the nitpicking about the film. If I were to detail everything that was wrong with it, this post might never end. Indeed, I have seen reviews of the film that are actually longer than the film itself, which don't even cover everything!

TPM is not particularly helped by the switch to 3D. It's not harmed, noticably, but it's not helped either. It's likely that live-action films (at least) probably need to be made with 3D firmly in mind in order to see any benefit.

What does help TPM immensely is the return to the big screen. Simply put, the film is gorgeous. Indeed, if you ignore the actors, ignore the bad dialogue, and just watch the scenery while listening to John Williams' amazing score, you can actually get a really good film out of it.

Speaking of acting... I feel Jake Lloyd gets a raw deal out of this one. Sure, Anakin is really annoying, but that's not his fault. After all, he didn't choose the words to say. And he does the job he's asked to do - he's cheerful when asked to be cheerful, he's sad when asked to be sad. Honestly, he's better than Keanu Reeves in most of his films. (Not high praise, I know, but he is very young.)

Also, there actually is some good acting on show in the film. Liam Neeson is actually pretty good, while both Natalie Portman and Ewan McGregor are okay (but no better than that). But what surprised me was the performance by Pernilla August as Shmi Skywalker - the scenes between her and Qui-Gon Jinn are actually surprisingly solid. (Also, Samuel L. Jackson isn't as awful as I remembered, although he has almost nothing to do here. I guess it's the next two films that just suck.)

All in all, TPM is about the same as I remembered. It's certainly not a good film, nor anywhere near as good as even Return of the Jedi. However, I continue to maintain that it's the best of the three prequels - it doesn't have an actively painful romance in the middle like Attack of the Clones, nor does it drag to a halt for about 90 minutes like Revenge of the Sith.

Unfortunately, next up will be Attack of the Clones, which is my least favourite of all the films (and which has the weakest soundtrack as well). But I'm actually quite looking forward to Revenge of the Sith in 3D - there were some scenes that seemed to be shot specifically for the 3D version, and really didn't work in 2D.

Unlamented

So, Terra Nova was cancelled. This was not exactly a shock, nor indeed was it a shame.

Actually, on this one I find myself in the slightly odd position that I was actively hoping for it to be cancelled. In general, I don't do this, because even if I don't like the show, other people probably do, and I can just as easily go watch something else.

(Although I have absolutely no interest in Twilight, them making the movies doesn't affect me in the slightest. Except the fifth one - the notion of splitting a single book into two movies is fundamentally wrong, and should be stamped out when encountered. And that goes for "Harry Potter", too - a good edit job would have eliminated any need for that awful seventh movie.)

But Terra Nova was a bit different from the norm. See, it was a show with a great concept, which was after all the reason that I watched. It was just that the execution of the show was pretty lousy - by the third episode it was already actively annoying me.

The thing is that that makes the show almost perfect fodder for an RPG campaign. It allows the GM to steal the things that work, ditch the things that don't, and then take the solid concept in whatever direction they want.

The only other prerequisite for this to work really well is for the show to last just long enough to give a sense of the setting, so players can easily get onto the same page, but also getting cancelled soon enough that the amount of lore doesn't become unmanageable. This is especially important if the GM wants to throw the existing material out - the more of it there is, and more tightly woven, the harder it is to discard.

(This is what separates Terra Nova from Star Trek: Voyager, in fact. Voyager also had a really strong concept and a lousy execution, but because Voyager lasted for the full seven years it is nearly impossible to 'reset' it for a campaign. The best you could do is have another starship thrown across the galaxy and have to make their way home... and I did that particular campaign back in high school.)

So, the cancellation of Terra Nova works out really well for me. And now I have another campaign concept to add to my list...

Relieved

A couple of weeks ago, I noted that there was a distinct risk that Celtic would win the league at the next Old Firm match at Ibrox in a couple of weeks. Under the circumstances, I felt that this was extremely worrying, and that it would be better if they could win the league absolutely anywhere else. (That they will win the league isn't really in question - it's just a question of where and when.)

Fortunately, Celtic dropped points at the weekend, and although Rangers lost their match the mathematics has changed.

If Celtic win the Old Firm match, that will now place them on 78 points. If Rangers win all of their other matches, they could (in theory) also reach 78 points. Furthermore, if Motherwell win all of their remaining matches, they too can reach 78 points.

In order for Celtic to win the league at Ibrox, then, they need Rangers to first drop points at Dundee United, and for Motherwell to drop points against either Aberdeen or Kilmarnock. (Plus, of course, they would need to win the match at Ibrox.) Granted, that's not a hugely unlikely sequence of results, but it seems much less likely than the previous "win all your games, and expect Rangers won't win all of theirs" - this now depends on two teams dropping points rather than one, and is almost entirely out of Celtic's hands.

Of course, there's still virtually no doubt that Celtic will win the league - any two wins and a draw in their remaining games will guarantee that. It's just now more likely that they'll do so at Celtic park on 1st April (against St Johnstone) than at Ibrox. And that's much less of a powder keg.

All in all, it's a bit of a relief.

Two not entirely unrelated facts

On Saturday, I had my Stag Day, which was fun.

On Sunday morning (well, afternoon), I had to go to B&Q to buy a new toilet seat.

And that's all I'm going to say about that.

Ruined

My car was in for repair on Friday. Originally, it was supposed to be another short-term job while they arranged to get the replacement parts in. However, they were able to find a good substitute and do the work 'properly'. I got the car back, and it should be fine now.

But I don't like it.

Every time I get in my car, I expect to see that engine management light come back on. Every time I press the accelerator, I expect to discover I just don't have the power I should. I expect the same problems to come back, if not in the next couple of weeks, then most likely in the next few months.

I just don't any longer have any confidence in my car. This ongoing issue has just ruined it for me.

Resolving the Region 1 Issue

On Monday, the band were playing at the opening of a new Tesco superstore. Because this meant getting up early in the morning, I retired to bed early on Sunday... only to find myself unable to sleep.

This proved to be somewhat annoying, but it did give me opportunity to deal with one of the issues that had been plaguing me for some days - I got up, dug out the instruction manuals for the surround sound amplifier and Sky+ box, and set to work.

I have thus been able to re-assign the various audio inputs on my amp so that they actually make sense again (that is, to watch the TV, you now set it to "TV" mode, and so on).

The other thing I discovered in all of this was that it was also possible to wire up my DVD player without any extra cables at all - the Sky+ box had an extra SCART input, and so I connected the DVD player through that. Sadly, the amp only allows full audio input from two sources, so we'll have to manage with stereo sound from the DVD player, but since it's only for region 1 DVDs that should be fine.

I even discovered that there's space to connect up the Playstation 2 in addition to everything else, so if we're so inclined we could even run that in parallel.

All in all, it was a bit of a triumph.

New PC

It's always fun getting a new PC. A chance to start afresh, with a clean slate, and without all the crud that gradually builds up in a PC as it is used. Nice!

Except that you inevitably have to then go through a long process of identifying the software you need and reinstalling that, of setting up all the preferences so that the PC is actually pleasant to use, and a whole load of other hassle. One of my particular favourites is the task of copying across all the vital data that has been built up over the years, which of course you don't want to lose.

Basically, the idea of having a new PC is great, the short-term process of getting a new PC sucks for a few days, and then actually having a new PC is quite nice - for a few weeks, until the novelty wears off.

Still, new PC! Shiny!

The Last Game

After the fund-raising, I spent Saturday afternoon running the Star Wars game I talked about in a previous post. This was probably my last game before the wedding in April, and one that I had been looking forward to for some time. It was also one that I had put a fair amount of work into.

And it was okay. Not spectacular, just okay.

Sigh.

There were really two issues at work here that I think contributed to my dissatisfaction. The first, and probably most significant, was that I was just a bit too over-loaded on Saturday. I got back to the flat a mere ten minutes before the scheduled start time, and hadn't even finished getting changed before the first knock on the door. In hindsight, I should have given myself at least an hour to wind down from the fund-raising before trying to run the game.

The other issue is that RPGs are incredibly dependent on the people around the table. Ultimately, it doesn't matter all that much which game you're playing, or how exciting the premise is, or the nature of the setting, or the characters, or how well prepared the DM is. The majority of the enjoyment of the group will come from the people around the table.

At the legendary Hunter game of last year, we had a spectacular group, who really grabbed their characters, were excited at the premise, and who really ran with it. At the Christmas game, again, we had a great group round the table, who generated all sorts of craziness, bouncing off one another.

On Saturday, we were slightly hampered in that one player completely forgot it was on, and when called felt that he should instead use the time to study. And fair enough - actually important things must come first! The other three players took their characters and worked with them, playing competently... but there didn't quite seem to be that 'spark' that turns an okay game into a spectacular one.

(Plus, there wasn't much by way of plotting, sudden but inevitable betrayals, or general backstabbing as I had expected, and maybe hoped. But maybe there just wasn't the opportunity for it?)

Still, everyone had fun, which is the main goal. There were some lovely and iconic scenes. And, of course, they spotted the Ackbar/trap correlation immediately. I neither found myself running out of material, nor having large amounts of excess material prepared. All of which was to the good.

The lessons learned, I think, are fourfold:

1. The 'magic' that turns a decent game into a great game can't really be manufactured, so all the DM should try to do is run a functional game, and let the players take care of the rest.
   
2. There should have been more opportunities for scheming, and more overt opportunities for scheming.
   
3. A game like that probably needs at least four players. Additionally, there are a couple of our players who serve as ideal "agents of chaos" - that's something this game could have done with a bit more of.
   
4. I need to remember to give myself more time between activities in future. Starting the game while tired was not a good plan.

And that's that. Barring a sudden resurgence of the Saturday Game (which I don't now expect), that's my last game before the wedding. After the wedding, all being well, the next game will be the restart of "The Eberron Code". And then I potentially have a game to run in September, titled "Black Crusade: A Heresy of Angels". But whether that happens or not will depend enormously on how the next few months play out.

I do apologise

On Saturday, the band engaged in the worst fund-raising event ever. We had applied to the council for the right to do a "flag day" collection in the local shopping centre, which basically involved showing up in our kilts and standing around rattling tins for several hours. No playing, no entertaining the crowds, not even bag packing. Just hours of tedious standing.

And, of course, we didn't raise much money, certainly not enough to justify twelve people each giving up three hours out of their Saturday. Of course, this was pretty much inevitable. We're in that awkward period when the Janurary sales have ended, nobody has any money, and everyone is pretty miserable. Of course people didn't want to donate to a pipe band that, as far as they could tell, didn't actually play the pipes.

So, I'm sorry to the people of Falkirk for that imposition on your good name. We'll try not to do such an event again - it's not worth our while, and we'd much rather be doing something (almost anything) else.

(Of course, the ideal is to try to support the band through playing events. I suspect that might be nothing more than a dream - we'd probably have to play pretty much every week to raise the same funds. Still, perhaps between playing and the bad packing events that tend to be quite profitable...)

#9: "A Town Like Alice", by Nevil Shute (a book from The List, although, sadly, not a good one)

Bit of a cheek

As you probably know, I'm not a great environmentalist. However, I certainly agree that we should recycle as much as reasonably possible.

But, as I've said before, reuse is better than recycling, and not using something in the first place is even better still.

In particular, one of the things that I most object to is the endless flow of junk mail through the post, almost none of which is of any relevance. I find these particularly annoying - not only is there the waste of recycling the envelopes (which shouldn't be used at all), but there's also frequently a need to shred the letters themselves before recycling, adding a waste of energy to the offense.

I find it particularly galling when the spam mail comes from companies who have my email address. If they absolutely must send me this junk, they could at least do it electronically, and so generate less waste. (Frankly, I'd rather they just not send it at all, but that's probably too much to ask.) And the absolute worst, of course, are those companies who have my email address, do send me their junk electronically, and then feel the need to send me yet more junk through the regular post!

My bank are perhaps the worst offender of all in this regard. It seems I can barely go a week without getting an offer of a credit card, or a loan, or a mortgage, or house insurance, or... (And, infuriatingly, even if I wanted any of these things from them, it's almost always best to ignore their correspondence and use their online-only specials through Digital Banking. They're wasting all this paper to make me aware of offers I know about, don't want, and know are less good than their other offers!)

Aaargh!

Anyway, on Sunday morning, I went through a batch of junk mail that had built up, recycling some, shredding others. This included yet another offer of home insurance from my bank. And, on the back of the envelope, bold as anything, was a Recycle reminder from my bank!