Thoughts on "The Day of the Doctor"

If you haven't seen "The Day of the Doctor", the following will contain spoilers. I will put in a series of line breaks then try to mask the text so it appears when highlighted in a browser. Hand-helds are SOL. Sorry. Stop reading if this is a concern.































Still there? Okay...

I've now watched "The Day of the Doctor" three times. The OCD nerd that inhabits the place where my soul would reside feels a need to sound off: First of all: Ian Chesterson is now the head-honcho at Coal Hill School? HELL YEAH! Wonder what happened to Barbara Wright? Awesome sound off to the First Doctor's era. And I'm curious what happened to the Dalek time machine they used to get home.

Now that my squee is out of the way, let's deconstruct the episode a bit:

So UNIT snags the TARDIS out of an open field. Just like that. What the hell? Since when does UNIT go about stealing the TARDIS? What if the Doctor needed it? Hell, why didn't the Doctor just dematerialize from the helicopter's grasp?

Kudos to explaining the Elizabeth I references re: the 10th (Tennant?) Doctor, but it felt... forced and weird. I would have been happier if they'd never tried to explain all that. And Elizabeth I had a hidden gallery of subversive art that lasted into the 21st Century? Um...?

So, the War Doctor was present for the Fall of Arcadia. Yeah, okay. So this is the "Warrior" Doctor. He's got no gun. He's wearing an empty bandoleer and sounds like a flavor of the First Doctor with his crotchety behavior. If he's been fighting in the Time War, why isn't he armed with something? Grenades? Demat gun? I mean, just some kind of token weapon would have set him apart as the "Not-Doctor" he was built up to be. And using the TARDIS to smash Daleks doesn't count.

While on that topic, why the hell aren't there more TARDISes or Gallifreyan war-vehicles in-play around Gallifrey? I mean, c'mon! The Doctor's got an antiquated TARDIS. It's not armed. He's dicking around on Gallifrey during the final fighting and nobody's touching him in an obsolete bit of technology. You'd think up-to-date Time Lord TARDISes would be in better shape to mess-up the Daleks.

Hell, the entire "final day" was a disappointment. All this talk of the Time War being such a huge thing and all we see is Daleks blasting Gallifreyans. We never see the evil the Time Lords do. All we see are Gallifreyan soldiers firing "pew-pew" guns at Daleks or running around and getting blown up. If Gallifrey can master multi-dimensional technologies and time-travel, I'd expect more surreal and weird crap being hurled-about.

On the topic of multi-dimensional things, so how the hell did the Zygons get the dimensional art thingie in the first place? What, were Gallifreyan artists dinking around on the Zygon homeworld before it was destroyed? And how did those Zygons get out of the art? If it's so easy, why hasn't Gallifrey just popped-out of its alternate universe? Hell, why didn't Gallifreyan refugees and/or Daleks pop out when the Doctors and Clara popped out in the Black Archive?

WTF happened with the Zygons at the end? What kind of negotiations were even possible at the end?

So shout-outs for having the Moment take the form of Rose Tyler as "Bad Wolf". It was ridiculous fan service, but made a vague connection to Rose's tie-in with the Eye of Harmony make more sense. Kinda. Maybe.

Loved Oswald's scarf. That was improved upon with "The Curator", though that made so much of no-sense that I just shut my brain off at that point.

And kudos for having Capelli do a cameo.

Bits of things

• If you've accessed this site and get hit with some kind of weird popup/redirect thing, leave something in comments (if you're so-inclined) so I can report this to Blogspot. I have so many script-killing things in my Firefox setup that I'm not sure if this site still has the problem I saw earlier this week.
• Still tweaking and updating things to get the PC working at the level it was at before the grand crash. So far everything is working well. We'll see how this goes.
• Now reading "This Book is Full of Spiders" by "David Wong". The sequel to "John Dies at the End", this novel remains at the same level of bizarre entertainment of "Wong's" style.
• Also reading "Stormdancer" by Jay Kristoff. Japanese steampunk. Yeah. Despite that genre name, it's pretty damn entertaining.
• I've washed my hands of the hope of getting anything constructive done this weekend. After a week of being stressed-out over the PC and other things, I've decided to just fuck it all and chill out. I need decompression time, which is why I took Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday off. Time to just chill and drink a beer or two.

Adventures in Computer Disasters: Part Five

The PC is running.

Long story short: the power supply crapped out, causing the PC to shut down. This cascaded the issue by causing critical errors on the hard drive, making it nigh-impossible to boot.

Once the power supply was replaced, I was temporarily able to get into safe mode, but unable to run any kind of repair utility thanks to the errors on the hard drive.

Cue the heroic music as Ubuntu came to the rescue.

With Ubuntu loaded on a flash drive, I was able to boot an Ubuntu instance and eventually get it to the point where Ubuntu fixed the disk errors well enough that I could run the Windows Repair utility. From there, everything appears to be working... thus far. The PC passed a virus scan, so that's out of the way. Now I just wait for the other shoe to drop as I try to get to the projects I'd postponed...

Avoid this site for a bit

Seems to me someone's got a bit of malware infecting this blog. I'd suggest staying away until this get sorted out.

Adventures in Computer Disasters - Part Four

My PC is possessed by the Devil. It's the only real explanation.

I replaced the power supply. I can boot in safe mode. It technically works, but I can't get the goddamn OS to boot properly.

Won't boot from a recovery disk. Hell, it won't boot from a bootable Ubuntu flash drive.

Won't let repair mode work. Essentially all it will do is boot in safe mode. If I'm lucky.

My repair guy is out-of-town for the holidaze and I'm... filled with all sorts of holiday joy.

Since it's a goddamn Dell, it's got no installation disks. Everything of use to reinstall the OS is squirreled away on some inaccessible partition. So what I've learned today:

• I can't restore a system image from a backup in safe mode.
• I can't boot the damn PC in anything other than safe mode.
• I can't reinstall the OS.
• I've got a giant paperweight.
• I'm never buying a Dell again. Ever.

Adventures in Computer Disasters - Part Three

Got my PC back this fine morning. Needed a new power supply. $50+ later plus payment to the repair guy, I brought my baby home and fired it up.

And it won't boot.

I swear by all the gods, I am... not happy.

At least I can now get into safe mode. It's possible I'll be able to save it. I may have to reinstall the OS. Not sure. Still, it's an improvement.

If only I knew what sacrifices the technology gods required...

Adventures in Computer Disasters - part two

Bit the bullet and took the PC to my repair guy. I have hopes he can save it. I'd rather pay a couple of bills for a repair than more for a new machine at this juncture. With luck, I'll know later today whether I'm drinking in celebration or in memory of my PC. It's possible the data on it can be saved, but I'm not really holding out that much hope.

Adventures in Computer Disasters

Yep. The PC is still giving me trouble. Won't boot. I can't even get it to a point where I can run Windows Recovery or even boot in safe mode. It sticks on WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\DRIVERS\CLASSPNP.SYS.

A potential solution found online is to rename this file but I can't even get a command prompt going on the PC.

I should just wipe the goddamn thing and start over but there's a few files I want to try to recover and the damn Dell didn't come with installation disks anyway. It's got some separate partition that ought to allow a fresh reinstall but I can't get to the damn process to let me do the reinstall.

To say I'm irritated doesn't come close. So now I'm downloading an Ubuntu ISO and I'm going to load that on to a prepared flash drive. In theory, I can boot in Ubuntu from the flash drive and troll around the PC to see what I can do and what I can recover, if anything.

The important stuff is all backed-up, so there's that, but it would be nice to grab less-important stuff that didn't make the backups.

From there, I'm going to try to figure out how to fix the PC. If Ubuntu fires up, my first trip will be to address the CLASSPNP.SYS file, if I can manage that. If that fails... well, I'll have to track down my PC repair guy and see if he can squeeze in time to help me out. It's that or dust off, nuke the site from orbit, and buy a new goddamn PC.

I really don't want Windows 8. Sigh.

This is the hammer

With my PC running the longest ever diagnostic routine (78% at this point checking my hardware and it's been running since 10am this morning), and with my evening plans unexpectedly destroyed, I decided to get out of the house and get away from the sources of my anxiety.

In short, I went to the moves to see Thor: The Dark World.

That was a rather entertaining flick, I must say. Good popcorn fun. Hokey, but not too far down the rabbit hole. Hammy, but not too bad. Nice effects without being overwhelming. I thoroughly enjoyed it. Worth seeing and then some.

Talking Techno Turkey

First day of my extended Thanksgiving vacation. I'd planned to dedicate the time to projects of some import.

The Gods of Perversity and Irony, however, have different plans.

For a while now, my main PC has been fussy about booting up. Resetting to previous saved points have mostly addressed the problem. Over the weekend, the PC decided that was just not acceptable.

I backed up most of my data and believed I'd addressed the problem. I woke this morning intending to get the rest of my data backed up then see if I could make progress on the projects while trying to analyze what's up with my PC.

The PC refused to boot.

Okay, I tried the system recovery disk I'd made.

Nope. Didn't like that at all.

Ooookaaaaaay. Fired up the laptop (which I'm currently on and has its own unique form of fussy behavior) and did a little research. I have a Dell, so of course I wasn't sent the Windows installation disk with the PC. Why would they make my life easy? So I have no easy way to make a bootable USB. Crap.

A little more research revealed the hidden partition drive where there's a fresh Windows install. I could use that. Potentially I could wipe the PC completely and reinstall fresh. Yeah... that's a nuclear option.

So now I've gotten it booted through the hidden drive and am running diagnostics. I'm not convinced the hard drive is failing, but I've been wrong before. I'm pretty sure it's a software corruption. I'm loathe to wipe and reinstall, but it may come to that.

The timing is not the greatest, but I've got lots of time off, so I guess it could be worse.

And to the Gods of Perversity and Irony: that wasn't a challenge. Fuckers.

Review and reactions: The Day of the Doctor

Fifty years ago, on November 23, 1963, "Doctor Who" first aired in the United Kingdom.

Today, I sat in one of many movie theaters among many fans and watched the 50th anniversary special honoring that day.

"The Day of the Doctor" was a follow-up to "The Name of the Doctor", the finale to Series 7 of the revived "Doctor Who".

If you haven't seen it, be warned, I am about to spoil stuff.






































Still there? Okay, you were warned...













As revealed in "The Name of the Doctor", the 11th Doctor is not the 11th incarnation of the Time Lord known as "The Doctor". There was a previously-unknown incarnation in the mix who committed a crime so terrible that later incarnations (and the incarnation who performed the crime) did not recognize that incarnation as "The Doctor".

The minisodes reveal that the unknown incarnation is actually the 9th and the successor to Paul McGann's 8th Doctor. Transformed by necessity into a "warrior" to fight the horrors of the Time War, this "not-Doctor" (played by John Hurt) spends a long time (as implied by the minisode) fighting to restrain the worst horrors inflicted by the Time Lords while trying to stop the Daleks.

"The Day of the Doctor" takes us to the last day of the Time War, in the Gallifreyan city of Arcadia. As one of the minisodes, and prior revelations reveal, the Daleks manage to penetrate Gallifrey's defenses and are attacking the city. Arcadia is doomed.

The "War Doctor" is there and reveals himself to the Daleks, to their dismay. He destroys several of them then moves on to steal an ancient Time Lord weapon known as "The Moment". "The Moment" is a sentient weapon capable of destroying a galaxy. It lies unused by the Time Lords because this weapon possesses a conscience and they are afraid of it. The War Doctor, however, steals it and takes it to a distant place to activate it.

The Moment displays an interface in the form of the Bad Wolf (aka Rose Tyler) and tells the War Doctor the price for what he intends to do, then points him to other points in his life.

In his future, the 11th Doctor finds himself investigating a strange case for U.N.I.T. that crosses his timeline with the 10th Doctor (who is hanging out with Queen Elizabeth I). The plot winds up... well, there's no point in spoiling everything. Suffice it to say it's very fan-service-y. Eventually the War Doctor is tied into the 10/11th and 11/12th in a story that defines and redefines the War Doctor and the future of the series.

It's not an airtight story, but it's typical Steven Moffatt. It touches emotions well. The villains are an incidental - and ultimately irrelevant - part of the true tale, which is the journey of the Doctor to find reconciliation with his past self.

And the cameos are pretty solid.

I'm not generally one for 3D hokum on the big screen, but this special was well-done. If you're fan, watch the episode. I think you'll be pleased.

Friday and... Friday!

• Still reeling over Tuesday's "Person of Interest"
• Crazy winds last night. All sorts of neighborhoods are without power.
• BART is down. That's a great start to the morning. Though the news said they're supposed to be up and running by 5am, so hopefully that's fixed.
• Did a shot of Nyquil last night and slept a good ten hours. I feel human again. Just in time for the weekend and then some.
• I'm taking the entire week of Thanksgiving off. Time to get some chill in and see if I can focus on projects.
• Seriously. Tuesday's "Person of Interest" was just way too fucked up. I'm kind of upset!

uuuuuuggggghhhh

This morning's ramblings brought to you by the headache I can't seem to shake over the last two days.

• What is that wet stuff coming out of the sky? Is this the legendary "rain" I've heard so much about?
• WANT! NOW! TAKE MY MONEY! (via Nerd Approved
• It's wrong that the Keanu Reeves 47 Ronin movie is getting my interest. Very, very wrong.
• I have to say, I'm impressed. "Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D." has me actually starting to like Ward and Skye. Ever. So. Slowly. The bit at the end of the last episode was awesomely messed-up. Sorry, the bit before the absolute end. Though I will say Coulson was right. It looks like a magical place.
• I am trying not to get my hopes up over "The Day of the Doctor", but I gotta say that minisode prequel was pretty damn awesome. And writing the words "minisode prequel" seems very, very wrong to me somehow.
• "Person of Interest" writers, I have only one thing to say: "OH NO YOU DIDN'T!!!"

Avatardy

I caught the last four episodes of season two of "The Legend of Korra" over the weekend. The finale to Book Two: Spirit was pretty indicative of the series to date: crazed, disjointed, rushed, yet flavored with ridiculous amounts of awesome.

Book Two has covered Korra's journey to discover the spiritual side of the Avatar and the Avatar's role as the bridge between the human (material) world and the spirit world. It's also been an insane branching of side plots, some of which are ridiculous and all tie together only under the most contrived of circumstances.

This season's writing has been reflective of "Book One: Air" in weird jumps in story, a lack of narrative flow, and contrived as well as random character personality shifts to accommodate plot elements that are largely unnecessary to the main story.

It's also explored the world of Avatar (The Last Airbender, not the ridiculous James Cameron world) in unexpected and awesome ways. We've seen the origins of the Avatar and how the Avatar came into being. We've had a chance to see the pre-Avatar world in all its delightful weirdness, making me wonder what it was like before events took place allowing spirits to spill into the world.

We've also gotten to see Korra follow her own unique take on being the Avatar. In the first "Book", I admit I was a fan of the character of Korra. She was headstrong and took no shit from anyone. She was willing to throw down and face threats. She lacked any real sense of spirituality, but that was okay. By the end of "Book One", she was a full-realized Avatar and had her shit together.

Book Two seemed to erase all of that and take us to an immature, ridiculous Korra who seemed almost a cardboard cutout for half of the season and never really seemed to command the narrative at any point. She was always overshadowed by the villain as well as Tenzin and his kids. Hell, even the side characters of Mako and Bolin seemed to have more of their crap together and overshadow her narrative with their own ridiculous subplots.

The only character who seemed more sidelined in this "Book" was the character of Asami, who never really seemed to accomplish anything in the story.

Hell, Tenzin's kids got some of the more interesting stories and those just came from absolutely nowhere.

It remains an interesting series, but I really wish they'd take the crack pipes away from the writing team for a while. Of course, given the last finale, I have no idea if there will be more of the series. I guess time will tell.

Tuesday yammering

It's Tuesday. Disappointment is the norm and the day's started out appropriately. Not unexpected, but still... disappointment.

In other news, a friend of mine shared this. I am on board with the sentiment:



Warning: some NSFW language. Headphones are advised if you're at work or around sensitive ears.

Those who can't do...

You know, I've always taken exception to the saying "Those who can't do, teach."

It's goddamn hard to teach. I know. I've tried. Many times over the course of my life I've found myself shoved into the teacher role. It's most certainly not my calling and continues to give me a strong appreciation for the teachers I know.

Why bring this up?

The Gods of Perversity and Irony have decided over this full moon to continue with their little jape.

Currently I'm a bit at loose ends. I'm trying to figure out stuff and learning I know exactly jack shit about stuff I really ought to know more thoroughly.

At the same time, I have to teach/mentor someone and I haven't the foggiest as to where to begin or how to go about it.

The gods are having far too much fun with this.

A little taste

Okay, be warned. This is a "minisode" leading into "The Day of the Doctor".

If you're at all sensitive to something vaguely spoilery, don't watch this.

I don't consider this at all a spoiler, just to be clear. This just answers an open... question the series has always had.

I have to say, I love it.

Coutesy of AICN and the BBC:















































My thoughts: part of me never wanted an answer on this particular transition, but I have to say this was very well-done.

Postal Woes

First it was a missing incoming bill. Thankfully I'm a bit OCD so I tracked down the amount due and paid it before getting burned with late fees.

Now I found out that a payment I'm sure I mailed out for a different bill just vanished into the aethyr. Same month I had problems with the incoming bill. And now I'm on the hook for late fees and have to figure out if it's worth it to cough up for a stop-payment on the missing check.

This sucks.

Wherein I am being critical

I watch a mix of tv and web-streamed shows to distract myself when I'm not otherwise trying to do productive things with my life.

My definition of "productive" would no doubt be very entertaining to truly productive people, but we're moving on from that topic.

One of my amusements, RWBY, just appears to have concluded its first... season? Initially I was drawn to RWBY 'cause it's got that cheesy anime feel and looked entertaining. Over a year or so, the Rooster Teeth crowd that produces RWBY released four trailers focusing on a fairy-tale themed intro of each of the four primary characters accompanied with some kind of music. I enjoyed the trailers and was intrigued enough to track the series. I've now watched it all the way through and... hm.

Pros:

• The voice casting is solid.
• The characters are entertaining.
• The worldbuilding and premise is really interesting.

Cons:

• The story is a little choppy.
• There seems to be a lot of focus on the side characters and not enough on the primary characters.
• The animation could use some polish. I know Poser has its flaws as an animation program, but... yeah. Still. Flaws.

Hopefully whatever counts as the next "season" will find some focus for the show.

Then there's "Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.". So I was prepared to give up on this show until I watched "The Girl in the Flower Dress". That episode proved to me that this show has potential. Then, very slowly, without my even quite realizing it, I started to like the characters. I'm still iffy on super-hacker-girl and square-jawed-badass-guy, but I have to admit I am warming to them. I'm now quite fond of the previously-annoying techno-nerds. They're like adorable puppies. Kinda. And the Clark Gregg and Ming-Na Wen combo is just unbeatable. I'm finding the mystery of Coulson to be a bit tiresome. The mystery of Skye is a little intriguing. I'm still ambiguous as to how I feel about the character of Skye, so I suppose that impacts my reactions to the sub-plot. I kind of wish the show would spend a little more time on a better antagonist or two, just to give the show some better dramatic tension. A few more super-powered bits would be nice, as well. There's a billion minor Marvel characters out there. Surely a few could be plopped into the show?

I hate to compare "Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D." with "Arrow", but I have to say "Arrow" does a better job with the action/antagonist thing. Sure, the acting is worse (soooooo much worse) but "Arrow" does a better job of capturing the mood and throwing in the little touches of the DC Universe to keep the show tied to its roots. Just throwaways like Kord Industries or Ferris Airlines or the League of Assassins is making a huge difference.

I maintain that "Person of Interest" is the best show I'm currently watching in terms of plot, acting, and interesting characters. Sure it's my opinion, but that's all I really care about anyway. Heh.

Books

I finished "The Republic of Thieves" by Scott Lynch the other day. The latest in the tales of the Gentlemen Bastards finally introduces us to Sabetha, the phantom love of Locke Lamora who has teased us over two books. It also takes us to the homeland of the Bondsmagi and gives more insight as to their society.

Oh, and it goes into the mystery of just who Locke Lamora is.

It's an excellent story and up to Lynch's normal high standards. It was an even mix of present-day with the lads doing their shenanigans and a flashback in which we get to see the late, lamented Galdo brothers as well as the young Bastards in action with Sabetha in the mix.

Excellent reading.

I'm now on to "House of Blades" by Will Wight. Part of his "The Traveller's Gate Trilogy" (which apparently has two books out), it's a fun read thus far. I'm about halfway through. Book two is out in Kindle format, but alas I lack a Kindle and will likely wait for a dead tree version as I've managed with book one.

Then it's time to search for new reading material. The next Dresden Files book - "Skin Game" isn't due out 'till January, per Wikipedia.

Sigh.

Professor X blows minds

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The weekend is tantalizingly-close

• I put in 2.5 hours in martial arts last night. Got tossed around like a bag of meal. Got thrashed by weapons. Got to deliver as well as receive.
• Almost done with "Republic of Thieves". Holy shit this book is good.
• Good lord I have too much to do and not enough time to do it. Life, you so crazy.

Annual Tradition

The only mail I got yesterday is my ritual mail I receive EVERY GODDAMN YEAR.

Yep. Jury duty.

To the charming keeper of the juror selection list: I hope your privates are infested with hungry fire ants and your automobile consistently suffers from expensive maladies. I hope you suffer eternal indigestion and every time you encounter any form of primate whatsoever, said primate flings fecal matter at your face while your mouth is open.

I believe I have made my stance and position clear.

Novemonday

I had grand plans for the weekend. Projects I intended to make headway on. Constructive stuff I needed to get done. I had all sorts of time. I was even a good little monkey and didn't take side trips to the pub or anything.

Just wasn't meant to be.

One of my projects requires some... creative writing... on my part and I'm finding myself blocked in that regard.

I played a bit with getting git working on my machines. Now both my Linux box and my PC appear to have it running. And then my PC decided it was time to start freaking out on me.

I don't think it was related at all to my git installation (I've had that in-place for over a week now) but it pretty much threw my other projects completely out-of-whack as I worked on fixing the problem (I haven't "fixed" the problem so much as I've gone back to a previous restore point in the update cycle... that seems to address the issue).

Goddamn annoying.

The Korra of the Matter

I enjoyed "Avatar the Last Airbender" with a ridiculous passion. I still re-watch the series from time-to-time and marvel over the excellent world building, character development, and narrative style. I hold the series finale up to some of the best I've ever seen. It actually runs neck-and-neck with the finales for "Blake's 7" and "Angel" for best finale in my book.

As a fan of the "Avatar" world (not James Cameron's version, mind you), I found myself watching "The Legend of Korra" when it first came out.

"The Legend of Korra" was more of a Roaring Twenties style offering with the teenage Korra getting into her role as Avatar. Korra was the polar opposite of the goofy, pacifist Aang with her aggressive and completely non-spiritual way of dealing with matters. The first season was a fun ride, if a little compressed and suffering of both ridiculous (if not unexpected) teen angst and a choppy narrative. It expanded the world and gave us a hint of what happened to some of the favorites from Aang's era (hint: Toph never lost her badass edge).

The second season has gone in some interesting places. The narrative style is still choppy and tends to go all over the place. There's some good characters, but most of the plot elements feel unnecessarily contrived and don't flow terribly well. Where this season hits its stride is in exploring the mysterious Spirit World and the origins of the Avatar. The swimming into the mythology of the series is some truly awesome stuff and has me hooked enough to forgive and ignore the fairly ridiculous side-plots and forced-feeling side-romances.

I'll be curious to see how they'll conclude this season.

blagulgaggulFridayIsHereblahrgh

• Taiwan: On-track for best new Imperial Stormtrooper look.
• Japan: Zombies.

Caught up on "Person of Interest". Another solid episode with multiple threads coming to a satisfying conclusion. I could watch an entire show just around the adventures of Root and Shaw. They're a delightful combination of sociopathic chaos and awesome. The story twists were solid and glorious. Plus the new mystery group gets a name. Pretty damn cool. GOD I love that show!