Television Rant: Doctor Who Season 31. "Victory of the Daleks"

Doctor Who Series 5, or 1, or is it 31?

Don't know, don't care!

So last night episode 3 of the newest Doctor Who aired on SyFy.

With major staff changes on all levels, I had hoped to be watching a more mature, less candy series this year.

But, this is not to be. All the candy and brand name "flags" are still there. The annoyingly freak tempo sound track they use to replace actual development of suspense, the "I'm the Doctor" monologues, that make me feel sick. The blatant Nationalism marketed toward 10 year olds and the semi retarded, the . . .

That's it. That's all this show is at its essence.

Me am Doctor!

The Universe Revolves around me!

We've taken a story telling tradition of 3 full acts that take hours to deliver and crushed them into 40 minutes.

Yeah, I'll keep watching.

But, f%ck you Davies and now you too Moffat!

Some one please do a fan dub!

Suck that awful music away!

Suck away the doctor's rants!

ps, I'll be back with a calmer review. I am a fan after all.

Laurie R. King: The Language of Bees.

Dear Mom, 

The readers have abandoned me! Someone started a rumor that I was looking to beat the world record for stuffing phone-booths(with living people). The youngest of my readers (Timmy and Felix) had no idea what a phone-booth was. That I had other readers left them dumbfounded.  So I showed them some pictures(of phone-booths). Somehow this lead to their holing up in the wine cellar to study 2600: The Hacker Quarterly's entire run of "pay phone" photos.  I've also noticed some of my notebooks have gone missing. I hope to hear from you soon!

Michael

ps It is the next morning. The boys are still in the wine cellar. I can hear them reading the photo captions aloud. Then the sound of typing. What the unexplainable! I swear I just heard an adult voice down there.  Also, someone put a very well made  paper replica of Napoleon's hat on Ziva!  I've got to figure this out! TTYL!

---

Sherlock Holmes returns in Laurie R. King's ninth Mary Russel book The Language of Bees(Detective Fiction 448 pp. Bantam 2009).  Sherlock Holmes had as many incarnations as had Doctor Who of science fiction fame.  Try more. Thousands of them to estimate conservatively.  Among my recent favorites are Caleb Carr's The Italian Secretary, Michael Chabon's The Final Solution, and King's series which began with The Bee Keeper's Apprentice.  After retiring to the Sussex downs Sherlock Holmes settles into his retirement by taking on the task of bee-keeper. It is in this role, the retired bee tending eccentric, that Holmes meets Mary Russell his future bride and detective's apprentice. The daughter of a Californian millionaire and Jewish-English mother, Mary is sent to live with a relative in Sussex when her parents are killed in a car accident. She attends Oxford studying Theology and Chemistry. I'm tempted to say "Because when they met, It was moider"! 

The book at hand has Damien Adler(Sherlock's son with "That Woman" Irene Adler, the foil of A Scandal in Bohemia)surprising Holmes and Russell as they have just arrived home from a nine month adventure abroad. It seems that Damien's wife and child have gone missing.  

Told from Mary's perspective(as are most of the Mary Russell books), the up and coming Avant-Garde Painter and the Ageing Detective set off leaving Mary to puzzle over a hive that has been abandoned. When Holmes returns alone the mystery only deepens the growing suspicions that Damien may somehow be involved.

What is this strange cult the Adlers may be involved with and what do they have to do with a series of murders at England's ancient landmarks? Will Holmes and Russell have acquired a grand-daughter only to lose her? 


I have read the first four books in this series. I can't find anything to be disappointed with. I really enjoy King's description of England and her portrayal of the time period(post Great War). The character of Mary Russell stands on her own. The relationship she has with the master detective is believable and suitable. An independent woman with her own course of study and expertise Mary functions as an integral part of a machine. A machine that only forms when needed. Much like (take your pick of which form)Voltron. There isn't much along the lines of cuddling or romance between the two so don't start blathering about mush factor. There is no mush factor. These are intellectual equals and I love it as such. Laurie R. King kept me hooked with her skillful and attentive presentation of a mystery, it's characters and the environs. Unless any discussion of the occult is offensive to you(here it drives the criminal behavior)I see no reason a mystery/Holmes fan would not enjoy this book. 

The Frequency of Fear Lite: Jurassic Despicable.

Dear Imaginary Readers(and Mom),

Today it pleases me to envision you all as one-thousand light-bulb headed beings packed into an auditorium just large enough to contain you. I am on the stage preparing to read the first of my audio play reviews. The over head lights fade to black and I can only hope that you enjoy this bit in a way that will cause your strange little heads to light our way out of this theater when this is over.

Michael

The Zombie Astronaut's Frequency of Fear is an appreciation and presentation of Old Time Radio(OTR) shows. Found on-line at http://www.zombieastronaut.net/ the program began as a hobbyist's outlet for his collection of classic radio mp3s. Evolving from individual episodes available to be streamed or downloaded,  into something in the style of late night horror shows such as USA's "Up All Night"  or perhaps closer to the style of "Mystery Science Theater 3000", the Zombie Astronaut was born. W. Ralph Walters both writes and stars as the voice of the Zombie Astronaut, a brain-eater who has misadventures around a thematic set of radio programs.  Posted on March 4th, 2007,  first episode featured work starring Bela Lugosi.

As the program continued Walters cast of characters developed into something bigger, funnier. What once were short gags, turned into fully realized audio dramas in their own right. The wrap around stories were so liked that he began to offer them as a stand alone download: The Frequency of Fear Lite was born.

"Jurassic Despicable"

The Zombie Astronaut's friend, Doctor Despicable, has perfected and mastered Time Travel! Determined to make a massive wad of cash by opening theme parks throughout history, he assembles a group of potential investors: Doctor Willhelm Von Martinez( a mayonnaise guzzling scientist driven by his search for a pill to change his accent), Basil Salt, "A Seasoned Explorer"), Dr. Bulletbra( just another mad-scientist?) and  Mojimbo Green, the host of the much acclaimed television show "Holy Crap!It's Nature!". Doctor D intends to set out for the Jurassic Period to woo the wallets. But, Zombie has his doubts about tagging along. It seems as though trouble always pops up when these two get together. Trouble, that is, for the Zombie Astronaut! After some soul searching the Zombie agrees to go, but, only after being tempted with the promise of being able to dine on a cave man's brain! What follows is a well crafted comic adventure that is guaranteed to make the average "fanboy" or "fangirl" as the case may be, chuckle, giggle, and break into out right laughter! The writing is solid in it's take on the sci/fi horror genres and Walters successfully pulls off his tongue in cheek approach that is true to his inspiration. The overnight hosted scary movie! Equally goofy and clever I have yet to be disappointed! The only thing left to do is listen and wonder.

"Will the gang survive the tests that prehistoric Earth has to offer? Will it be dinosaurs, cromagnon man, or the sinister stalker Mister Master Mastrepol who(out for Doc's Blood AND the Time Machine!) undoes our heroes resolve? Or will it be Doctor Despicable's love of pie?      

A Library in Vilnius to Celebrate Jewish Contributions to World Culture

Please read this article about Wyman Brent and his mission to open a library in Vilnius, Lithuania that would celebrate the cultural contributions of the entire Jewish diaspora.

Mr. Brent is asking people to write a letter to the Prime Minister of Lithuania in support of this project. Would You give him a hand?

Mail To:

Wyman Brent, Ausros Vartu 20-15A, Vilnius LT-02100, Lithuania. All letters should be written to Prime Minister Andrius Kubilius

Put Mr. Brent's name on the envelope and the Prime Minister's name in letter.

Interview with W. Ralph Walters Creator/Writer of the Zombie Astronaut's Frequency of Fear

Dear Imaginary Readers(and Mom),

It has been an odd week here in Princeton.
A section of road near the graveyard collapsed revealing  hundreds of corpses. The bodies have been removed and sent to a storage facility while their fate is determined. It is unclear how they came to be beneath the roadway.

I spent today doing house work and training the cat to shadow box while we listened to Old Time Radio shows and Contemporary Audio Dramas streaming from the web. There are so many quality programs out there today. I wish that more people knew about and were interested in listening to them. Some time soon I will be posting my review of an audio program called The Zombie Astronaut's Frequency of Fear. Episodes 1 and 2 of  "Jurassic Despicable".  For now here is a brief interview with the series creator and writer, W. Ralph Walters.

1)How long have You been doing the podcast? When was the first?

The first podcast was posted back in March of 2007, although I spent a couple of months trying to figure out what in the heck I wanted to do. When I couldn't come up with anything, I realized if I didn't just start recording the podcast, I'd probably never do it.

2)What prompted you to do the podcast? And why in this format?

I kept a blog for a long time - I think 6 years - posting OTR and BBC stuff. Jesse Willis, the editor for the SFFaudio site, suggested I do a podcast. He thought more people would be more likely to listen to the podcast than to sift through all the audio I posted to find something they really liked. I've also always liked the idea of the horror host, and always wanted to be one before infomercials killed horror hosts, so the Frequency Of Fear started out as simply a horror host introducing episodes of OTR. The in-between bits got more and more complicated over time until we were offering AD of our own around the OTR. KC Locke wrote "Mother Knows Beast", and suddenly listeners started requesting origin episodes of other characters, so the wraparounds became a little bit of a B-movie soap opera. I discovered there were people who liked the wraparounds but didn't get into OTR, so I started editing down the wraparounds as Frequency Lite.

3)You've got a talented group of people working with you, Who are they and how did you get them on board?

Bill Hollweg of BrokenSea Audio was a fan of the podcast and mentioned wanting to be part of it, so I created Bob Wolfenbridgen, the inexplicably popular TV anchorman. More BrokenSea folks approached me about being in the podcast, so I created characters for them. Eventually I had so many people asking if they could do bit parts in the Frequency Of Fear the huge cast just happened. Some people like Scott Wentworth had never done any audio drama, but turned out to be truly remarkable at it. I did approach a couple of cast members, but most of them volunteered. The cast is primarily BrokenSea affiliated folks, but Jack J. Ward of the Sonic Society signed on for Prof. Picklepepper and a few characters are old friends I conned into being in the podcast (like Therese Chevas (Eugene) and Brent Hinks (Dr. Von Martinez)).

4)You are a visual artist by profession? What are your markets? What are you most well known for? What kind of work do you enjoy the most?

I made some money doing freelance artwork (mostly tour posters and album covers) back in the 2001-2002, but the market bottomed out on me. You can find my stuff in a few books (The Art Of Modern Rock, Swag: Poster Art Of The 90s, etc.). I did illustrations for a conspiracy theory magazine called Paranoia for awhile - that was a lot of fun. Now I'm trying to build a portfolio of paintings. Even though they take me a lot longer to finish than the drawing, I love painting. I use acrylics because they dry fast so I can't accidentally screw a painting up by bumping into it.

5)Do You have other writing credits? Acting credits?

No writing, but I've been in a few other things - mostly Bill Hollweg's stuff for BrokenSea. I got to be the Cylons for his Battlestar Galactica AD, I was George C. Scott as Patton in his Planet Of The Apes and I'm Tony Vincenzo in his Kolchak The Night Stalker AD. I'm the announcer in Jack J. Ward's Spaceways and I play bit parts in other things occasionally too, like Gaia's Voyages.

6)What is the scope of the Zombie Astronaut project? Do you make any money with it? Do you think you will be doing the podcast in another 5 years?

I really don't know what the scope is or will be. I'm planning a comic book, but beyond that I'm not sure. It's actually become a little bit of a time suck to perpetuate, but I hate to see the podcast go before I wrap up all these dangling plotlines. There is going to be a spin-off called Streets Of Staccato that Victor Gates is writing and mixing. I'm tweaking the scripts now so we can get started on that one. Brent Hinks and I have discussed a Dr. Von Martinez spin-off, but that's still up in the air.

I make no money off the podcast. I'm not opposed to making money off it, as I've certainly pumped enough money into it, but I don't think it's easy to turn a dime doing DIY audio drama. One day it may turn into something lucrative, but right now I'm just happy people listen to it.

I'd love to be doing the podcast in 5 years. I'm hoping I can eventually train someone to help mix the podcast down, as that would buy me a lot of extra time and make it easier for me to continue to do the podcast without it infringing on the time I should be spending on more important things. Heck, I'd like to do this until I'm too old to sound excitedly irritated about anything as the Zombie Astronaut or until I can't do Capt. Bonemarrow without choking to death. We'll see.

7)Did I miss an episode, What ever happened to Zombellina?

Zombelina is reluctantly played by my wife, Jennifer. She's not really into my hobby, but she's been kind enough in the past to assist. Zombelina is mentioned occasionally, even if she hasn't made an appearance since "The Morgue The Merrier", so she's still around. She actually has a spike in appearances planned as she becomes an interesting part of the Zombie Astronaut's origin story, so she'll pop up again soon...

Would you mind/like me to link to your portfolio?

Eh, it hasn't been updated in a few years, but it'd be okay. www.wralphwalters.com

Would you mind providing a super short bio?

Hmmm... lessee... Artist and VA, born in Louisiana, presently living in Indianapolis with a wife and two pugs. Watches far too many horror movies.

Paranormal Activity.

First Review Welcome Message.

Dear Imaginary Readers(and Mom),

As You sit several feet away from a piece of warm glowing glass wondering what this is, I am drinking a cup of tea and doing much the same. This is the first post in what I hope will prove to be a weekly series of reviews and rants about television, movies, audio plays, and comic books that I feel the need to present to you, the disembodied audience.

I hope you enjoy it.


Michael R. Serecka


And Now the Meat.
Paranormal Activity (written and directed by Oren Peli)runs for less than one hour and a half. And why shouldn't it? The premise, like every other aspect of this film is simple: A woman who has been haunted, intermittently, her entire life by an extra worldly entity has moved in with her boy friend of three years.
Out come the night stalkers!
The skeptical boyfriend is apparently unperturbed as he proceeds to buy a video camera and some other ghost related data collection paraphernalia. It seems to me that day trading doesn't suit his persona(goof ball) and he begins to build a reel for "Ghost Academy".

What we get to see is an example of good story telling and old fashioned suspense. While I wasn't clutching the sheets in fear, the film had me hooked. At no time was I bored or did I wonder how much longer would this go on(under an hour and a half, remember?). The pay off comes after a slow methodical build of events that logically lead to a well deserved and much anticipated Scare.
Simply frightening. For people who prefer gore and garters flying every where or a hip hop rock opera sound track to drive the film, it may very well not be for you.
I liked it and would have preferred to have seen it in a theater!


http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1179904/