Happy Halloween to all, and to all a restless night!
Today is All Hallow’s Eve, and all manner of things creepy are cropping up across the internet. And this weekend, that has included the Halloween Shorts event which I and a few other authors have been holding. In brief, Friday through today Jennifer Williams has hosted four Halloween-themed short stories on her blog.
It’s been a great experience, seeing some great stories featured (free, naturally) for the whole internet to read, and if you haven’t taken a look yet, I very much recommend giving them a read. The stories are great, and the authors are some of the up-and-coming stars of the genre. So light up your jack-o’-lantern (See? I can do the lingo!), put on a creepy soundtrack, tuck into something with far too much sugar to be healthy, and scare yourself silly with four short stories:
Horror can be funny, as well as creepy. The first story of the lot features a couple whose (rather annoying) child suddenly turns emerald green. Plumbing the ample reservoir of fear within parental responsibilities, Andrew offsets the fear with a very funny ending. Slightly scary fun- just the spirit of Halloween, I think.
The second short story is a loosely connected anthology of snapshots of different people’s fears, and how fear can chase and pursue you. A very well written tale, which will have you wondering what form your fear would take, what would be in your metaphorical “Room 101″.
Yep, I’m number three. And I’m not nearly vain enough to do a flattering summary of my own story. Sufficed to say, it involves a little girl, an inattentive father, a railway line, and evil pumpkins. You can make your own mind up about it.
Halloween itself naturally goes to our host, with a creepy diary-style story about love, hunger and shapes in the snow. I read it on the train this afternoon, and in a gloomy carriage, it really puts a chill in the blood.
So there you go. Some spooky fiction to indulge in this evening. And once you’re done, you can put on a good horror film, wrap yourself up warm, and if you hear any odd noises in the darkness outside, it’s probably best to just ignore them and turn the TV up…
“Rising star” is a phrase which I seem to use all too often, but when I say it in relation to Gareth L. Powell it seems entirely appropriate. Here is a man who I started reading in genre magazines of great repute, such as Interzone, a few years back. His short stories demonstrated a profound understanding of science-fiction’s place in the world. His debut novel Silversandswas excellent, and the follow-up was sensational.
The Recollection is Powell’s take on the space opera, and the scale of the story really should not be underestimated. Spanning the galaxy, and hundreds of years, it follows characters on various convergent plot threads, weaved into a beautifully complete story.
The story starts with the appearance out of nowhere of arches across Earth. When his brother is gobbled up by one, Ed Rico sets out, with his brother’s wife Alice, to follow and find the missing man. Meanwhile (or not, exactly) space captain Katherine Abdulov seeks redemption with her family and revenge upon a former lover, in a race across the galaxy into the arms of danger.
It’s a wondrously complex patchwork, with a great attention to detail and to the sub-genre’s rich history. To those who are widely read within it, the wealth of little nods here and there will stand out like little gemstones. For those without such experience, the attention to detail will do the same.
Particularly notable is Powell’s grasp of the consequences of relativity. Space travel across the cosmos is possible in the world of The Recollection, but a journey which is instantaneous from the the perspective of the traveller takes objectively as long as the same journey would at the speed of light. It not only throws up fascinating problems of timelines out of synch, but manages to knit the plot together across centuries.
The beauty here is that Powell has a good grasp of both the technical and the artistic side. I’m loathe to call this “hard” sci-fi, because it lacks the dryness which frequently marrs that genre. But it feels accurate, with a realistic atmosphere and entirely believable characters.
One thing that moved me in particular: the acknowledgement page makes a point of thanking the late Colin Harvey, whose death shortly before the novel’s launch was truly tragic. Given the credit which Powell himself has given to Harvey for his role in The Recollection‘s existence, I think it’s safe to say that Harvey would be proud of the finished product.
The Recollection is a thought provoking work, brimming with imagination. It has the vital undercurrent of “what if?” that is the lifebood of good science-fiction. And what if there was more sci-fi like The Recollection? Then the world could only be a better, more exciting place.
Tuesday brought some very sad news from those parts spooky and frightening of the internet. Murky Depths is closing down.
Issue #18 of Murky Depths will, unfortunately, be the last.
I realise that a lot of readers of this blog will be wondering what that is, which is sad all in itself. But for the benefit of those people, Murky Depths was a magazine. A very good magazine. In fact, it was one of the best genre magazines this country has produced. Edited by Terry Martin, it published the finest fiction alongside some brilliant short comics and artwork in a format I’ve never seen an exact equivalent of.
I first encountered Murky Depths in early 2009, when I was first embarking seriously upon writing. It was a magazine which caught the eye, and after my girlfriend bought a copy of issue #1, I decided to splash out on a subscription. Not something I’ve regretted. I have the last issue (#18) on my desk, half read at the moment, and I almost don’t want to finish it, because I don’t want it to be over.
My intense disappointment at the news on Tuesday night was somewhat offset by, on Wednesday, the lastest issue of Black Static dropping through my door. This is the only other print magazine (along with it’s sci-fi sister mag, Interzone) to which I subscribe, and is run by Andy Cox and the team at TTA Press. It takes a more traditional approach, with stories, reviews, interviews and columns, and although I’ve only read the first story of #25, I know it’s up to its usual standard.
Here we have two different examples of top-class genre print magazines. Black Static is the stalwart of the British horror scene. It publishes the best in the business, and to people who are even tangentially involved in the genre it is well-known. On the other hand, Murky Depths was superb and adventurous, but never quite seemed to gain the widespread awareness of Black Static. The world is a sadder, less exciting place for its demise.
So what should you, the horror-interested reader, do? Well, I’d suggest two things. Firstly, head on over to Murky Depths‘s website, and buy some back issues. You won’t regret it, and you likely won’t get another chance. This is some of the best writing and artwork you’ll see in the genre, and a piece of genre history now. Secondly, take out a subscription to Black Static. Or Black Static and Interzone. They’re both well worth the money.
And there’s something about the print magazine. Something about the smell. Something intoxicating. Something…a little sinister…
The EU has been a distraction shouting on the sidelines of more pressing political debates for too long now. Let's have a referendum and kill the issue for good.
The European Union seems to be the flavour de jour at the moment. It’s probably partly due to the fact that the eurozone (contrary to popular belief, not the same thing) is in meltdown. It’s probably also partly due to the fact that euroscepticism has become one of the principle markers of “right wing” now that openly hating poor people is considered uncivilised.
But whatever the reason, next week will see a House of Commons debate on whether there should be a referendum on our continued membership of the EU. It’s a backbench motion, so not binding on the government, but anyone who knows their political history will know quite how destructive Europe can be as an issue for the Conservative Party. It brought down Thatcher, proved a continual thorn in the side of Major, and left the public with a decidedly unsavoury impression of the Tories for years.
So I’m sure Cameron will welcome this motion like a hole in the head. They’ve even moved it forward, from Thursday to Monday, so he can attend. How generous of them!
Now, I should declare an interest: I’m (broadly) pro-EU. It’s far from perfect, but in a basic in/out referendum I would vote in. Because I genuinely believe that it’s in the best interests of the country. In a three-pronged referendum, offering choices of in/out/renegotiation-and-reform, or as I like to call it “shake it all about”, I’d probably lump for the hokey cokey option.
The fun thing about this motion is that it seems to be causing huge headaches for everyone who isn’t me. Allow me to explain the various parties’ objections.
Our (somewhat) eurosceptic Prime Minister and his government feels trapped between a hard place and a rock. It’s easy to be slaveringly eurosceptic and ally your party with “nutters, anti-semites, people who deny climate change exists and homophobes” when you’re in opposition, but when you’re in government you actually have to work with the EU. So he can whip his party to vote against a referendum, which a) risks pissing off an already pissed off Conservative right wing, and b) would make a referendum-winning rebellion. Or he could give his party a free vote, which would run the very real risk of passing the motion.
Rampant eurosceptics, too, seem to be hesitant about it. The thinking ones, at least. Alex Singleton, writing on the Daily Mail website, says that in just such a three-option referendum the “better off out crowd” would lose to the much more reasonable third choice. He’s right, in my opinion. Which is all the more reason to do it.
You see, I’d quite like a referendum I think. The eurosceptics, with UKIP at the head, have been screaming for one for ages. I say we give it to them. They would object to a three-choice referendum, naturally, but if they argued against it then the clear comeback is that they’re trying to use the question to influence the result. Also, when the majority chose to renegotiate/reform the EU, then we can actually move on and make a positive improvement to it. That, surely, is both in the best interest of democracy and the country.
The fact that it would split the Conservative Party, drive Cameron to the brink of nervous breakdown and put an end to UKIP’s bleating and raison d’être is just a bonus.
I don’t usually do this. In fact, I usually shy away from exactly this. But yes, I’m actually going to do a blog post about someone being stupid on the internet. Actually, several people. Specifically, in the customer reviews section of the new keyboard-less Kindle on the Amazon UK website.
The newest addition to the Kindle family has caught my interest because it’s a cheaper, stripped down version of the e-reader I have been in love with since last Christmas, when I got mine (a keyboard-ed 3G version, currently retailing at £149). My thinking is that the £89 version, lacking the keyboard, would be perfect for a number of loved ones come the festive period.
So, naturally, I’ve been doing research. I started out with the reviews posted on the Amazon site itself, though I’d point out that they alone would by no means sway my opinion. I went for the 1-star reviews first, thinking I’d see what the drawbacks were. Except, all I learnt from reading them was that there are an awful lot of particularly stupid people with internet connections and too much free time on their hands.
The majority of the complaints were all along the same lines; it’s too expensive. Now, since I strongly suspect few, if any, of them had actually bought (and thus used) the damn thing, they seemed to largely be basing their shrill, harpy-like objections on one thing: the price on the US site.
See, in the US (as the denizens of the 1-star reviews section will gladly tell you), customers can buy the basic level Kindle for $79. At current exchange rates, this would be £50. Which, as the reviewers correctly point out, is less than £89.
However, what they appear to have missed is that the $79 version on the US site has an extra feature: adverts. Yes, when you turn the $79 Kindle off, instead of the pictures of assorted authors which you see on any other Kindle, you see paid-for advertisements. From what I can see, the UK £89 version doesn’t have this feature, so it would be more comparable to the $109 advert-free version.
Now, converted directly this would be equivalent to £69, which is still about £20 in difference, but seems fairly acceptable given that a) Amazon needs to make a profit, and b) prices are never directly equivalent on anything.Ever.
But the review that takes the biscuit comes from a certain D. Bentley. Mr Bentley manages to construct a more detailed argument than the wallet-clutching “too expensive” brigade, and trip himself up on said detail. His first complaint is the lack of a physical manual. For an e-reader. I’m not precisely sure what he bought the Kindle for, but I guess we can assume it wasn’t reading. My own, more expensive Kindle, didn’t come with a paper manual either, and you didn’t see me climbing the walls. Why? Because the manual is preloaded onto the bloody thing!
His second complaint is that he couldn’t get it to connect to his wireless router. He says:
“…when I tried to connect it to my router – nothing! A vicious circle of connect – try again – connection failed. Finally, I don’t know how, another screen came up telling me to enter my password for the router. What password!! I don’t have one and never had that I remember.“
Can you see what the problem here was? His wireless network was quite obviously secured with a password, which his computer had saved to more conveniently connect him to the internet. Hence he had forgotten the password, which rather than being his fault for not writing it down somewhere, was Amazon’s fault. Of course.
Perhaps I’m being a little harsh, but I’m genuinely astounded at just how incapable some people are. Quite how he expected that his Kindle would come out of the box ready connected to his wireless network is mystifying.
The result of all of this is that I’ve learnt pretty much nothing about the new Kindle, other than the fact that it will confound anyone without the slightest idea of how technology works. I’ve also learnt that a healthy section of the people who post reviews on Amazon are idiots, and should not be listened to at all. Which is a worthwhile, if stroke-inducing, lesson I suppose.
The UK has many questions about employment and the state of the economy. Unfortunately, the government don't seem to have any answers.
This evening, I attended for the first time in my life a recording of BBC Radio 4 discussion programme Any Questions? For those not familiar with the programme, it is similar to it’s TV equivalent Question Time (which it predates) and even has its own Dimbleby.
Today’s offering was broadcast live from St Mary’s School, in Ascot, and featured Chris Grayling (Minister for Employment), Chuka Umanna (Shadow Secretary for Business, Innovation and Skills), Kevin Maguire (Politics Editor at the Daily Mirror) and Rita Clifton (Chairman of the world’s largest branding firm). It was fairly lively, in quite oppulant surroundings, and was a lot of fun.
This was enhanced by the fact that my question was one of those selected to be asked. It was: “Do the unemployment figures this week show that the government’s economic strategy has failed?”
The unemployment figures in question are, of course, Wednesday’s revelations that unemployment had increased by 114,000 between June and August to 2.57 million- a 17 year high. It’s particularly devastating for young people between 16 and 24, for whom unemployment is at 21.3%.
Chris Grayling, as Minister for Employment, had a particularly rough time around this issue. He tried, quite admirably, to blame it on the EU to begin with. Which makes little sense to me- people aren’t losing their jobs because the Euro is on the way down. Then, naturally, switched onto Labour.
This is becoming tiresome. The coalition have been in government for sixteen months now, and things have gone nowhere but down. The coalition is insistent that it is cutting the deficit in the national interest, but really it was only ever in the Conservative interest.
Osborne and Cameron created a fallacy that the UK was comparable to Greece and Portugal, and nearly bankrupt. Neither was true, but they talked the economy down to such an extent that the markets and the electorate both believed it. Basically, they campaigned themselves into having to cut drastically and deeply. (Though, the Lib Dems don’t have the same excuse. Make of that what you will)
When Labour left power, the economy was growing. Now it is stagnating. Chuka Umunna pointed this out, but Grayling was in no mood to listen. The fact is that the Conservatives have been pegging their political hopes on the lack of a real plan from Labour. Now Labour have announced a five-point plan for growth, and all the Tories can say is that it means borrowing.
Well, yes it does. In the short-term, a VAT cut and National Insurance holiday will require borrowing. But given that August saw record high borrowing, and still no growth to speak of, perhaps it’s just what’s needed. The analogy of the family credit card isn’t really appropriate, but to since people insist, let’s continue with it. What the coalition is doing is the equivalent of quitting your job in order to focus full-time on your debt. It’s just barmy.
So whilst Chuka actually took the time to acknowledge that these unemployment figures are people, whose lives are being torn apart, and focused on growth strategies and how to breathe life into our flat-lining economy, Chris Grayling only had partisan grenades to throw.
The Freedom of Information Act 2002 is a wonderful piece of legislation- a real tool of individual power in a functioning democracy.
Under s1(1) of the act, any person has a general right to request any information from a public body. Think about that for a moment, about how powerful a tool it is. The right isn’t absolute, there are grounds under which a public body can refuse, but the presumption is that information should be released.
I’ve been making a lot of FoI requests lately, uncovering a lot of interesting information, but the thing is that this act shouldn’t be used only by journalists and political activists. This should be something at the fingertips of every man woman and child in the country. So here, ladies and gentlemen, is my guide on how to do it:
Who are you asking?
The first thing you need to think about is who it is you want information from. The act only applies to public bodies, but that doesn’t simply mean ministerial departments and local authorities. Public body is wider than that, and would include bodies such as Ofsted, as well as publicly funded universities.
I’ve included below a list of contact details for various public bodies, in Excel documents. This isn’t all-inclusive, and I will continue to update and add to this in the future. You’d do well to check back here when you’re thinking of making a request, to make sure you have the latest version. What I am proud of here is a complete list of English local authorities.
With local authorities, be clear who is the relevant body for you to query is. For example, I live in Wokingham Borough, which is a unitary authority. This means that all local matters are under the control of Wokingham Borough Council. However, some people will still live under the two-tier system of County and District Councils. If you’re not sure, have a look at the Excel spreadsheet and find your local council. I’ve included the types of council in there too. If it is a non-metropolitan district, then you will need to consult the county council (which is included in brackets) on some matters. For precisely which, see the table below:
Service
Non-metropolitan county
Non-metropolitan district
Unitary authority
Education
Housing
Planning applications
Strategic planning
Transport planning
Passenger transport
Highways
Fire
Social services
Libraries
Leisure and recreation
Waste collection
Waste disposal
Environmental health
Revenue collection
What are you asking for?
This is very important. You cannot make vague requests to public bodies. Most often, the reason you’re making the request is because the body hasn’t released the information already themselves. Hence there may be some reluctance to release it to you. So you need to construct your request so as to avoid any loopholes through which they might be able to escape.
The best way is to keep it simple. Raw data is the easiest. For example, in my quest to compare libraries across the country, I’ve asked for the budget, the number of visits and the number of registered members. I can work out the rest for myself. If you’re confident enough in your abilities to do this, then it’s what I’d recommend.
Below, you’ll find a PDF of an example wording for a request. There’s no set format, but that contains everything you need. Of particular importance is the paragraph about s16. s16 says:
‘It shall be the duty of a public authority to provide advice and assistance, so far as it would be reasonable to expect the authority to do so, to persons who propose to make, or have made, requests for information to it.‘
This basically means that they have to be helpful towards you regarding your request. If there’s some minor problem with your request, they can’t just decide not to fulfil it. They have to advise you on it, and help you get the information you want.
The right to information is not absolute. The act itself provides for exemptions. These are all fairly common-sensical- if the information is already available elsewhere, or if it is not conducive to the public good (national security, etc). But a public body should acknowledge receiving a request, and should respond within 20 working days (so not including either weekends or public holidays) with either the information you requested, an explanation as to why the provision will take longer, or an explanation as to why they won’t release the information.
If you’re unhappy with the response you receive, then you can contact the body in question to request an internal review, or make a complaint to the Information Commissioner’s Office (but you should do the former before the latter).
This is a very important and valuable tool for keeping government in check, so please do make use of it. Requesting trivial data is fine- as without such requests we’d never know all sorts of interesting tidbits. But daft and stupid requests, like asking a council what preparations have been made for a zombie attack, are wasteful (though, if the request had revealed expensive preparations had been made, we’d all have been up in arms about wasteful local government spending, so I guess it’s swings and roundabouts, really).
It's been a fair few years since I studied maths, and it was never my favourite subject, so I offer this to you as a labour of love!
The Freedom of Information Act is a wonderful thing, isn’t it? It allows me to request any information from a public body, and they must respond within 20 working days with either the answer to a question or an explanation as to why that answer is not forthcoming. And anyone in the UK can make such a request.
Over the last few months, I’ve made a couple of such requests to Wokingham Borough Council, regarding the library service which they want to privatise. Specifically, I asked for the number of visits to each library in the last financial year, the number of registered users at each library (broken down into age groupings), and information regarding the libraries budget.
The information was forthcoming, and those interested person can find the result here:
This is not, I should point out, exclusively the raw data that was provided to me (though I would point out that it is there). I have done some mathematical acrobatics in order to coax some of the interested facts out of it (pick your jaw up- yes, I can do maths!).
One such interesting point is that, for the financial year 2010-2011, the Borough spent an average figure of £24 per registered member of the library. Also, that the whole library system costs the Borough £193.28 for every hour which it is open (of which there are 12,944.5 each year). This works out at costing the borough £5.41 per visit to a library. Which doesn’t sound too bad to me. It makes a library cheaper than the cinema, certainly.
Other interesting facts emerged in the demographics. The largest age group of registered members in the Borough was 25-40, though this varied between individual libraries, as you would expect. I was quite heartened to see that my own local library in Wargrave has under 18s as its largest age group.
The problem with this data is, of course, the lack of a context. £5.41 per visit sounds pretty good to me, but given that I’m not privy to the intricate and mysterious workings of library services, I have to accept that it could be a woefully inefficient use of money. If I’m to use this data to assess whether the council’s privatisation plans are a justified attempt to increase value for money, or trying to fix something that isn’t broken, I’m going to need to know how other councils are doing.
And to that end, I’ve sent out some more FoI requests today. 152 of them, to be precise: one to every county council, london borough and unitary authority in England (non-metropolitan districts do not have responsibility for libraries). So in 20 working days (10th November, by my watch) I’m going to be swimming in numbers. Hopefully I’ll manage to hammer out something coherent in time for the council debate on the matter, on 17th Novemmber.
One interesting result is that I’ve been left with a rather lengthy list of all of the contact address for FoI requests for all of the local authorities in England. I may need to post it up here, later, along with a guide to FoI requests, and help bring power back to the people…
Since my review of Doctor Who series 5 is still seemingly so popular over a year on, and since the sixth series of the time-travelling sci-fi institution is over, I’ve decided that I’ll stage another review of the whole series. And, without resorting to any River Song jokes, this review will contain spoilers.
To recap where we are as of the end of series 5, the Doctor (along with Amy, Rory and River) has saved the universe from destruction at the hands of an exploding TARDIS, but still doesn’t know what caused it to explode in the first place. Rory and Amy have gotten married, before whizzing off with the Doctor for more adventures (including their honeymoon, as depicted in A Christmas Carol, the 2010 Christmas special). We also know that River Song is married, and is in prison for killing “the best man I’ve ever known”.
Now, come along reader. We have a series to review! Geronimo!
(Sorry)
The Impossible Astronaut
The Doctor is back with a bang. Literally. After seeing an older Doctor die at the hands of a mysterious astronaut on the shores of Lake Silencio, Amy, Rory and River join their Doctor on a trip to 1969, following a series of cryptic clues. This was a good opener, with a particularly powerful opening gambit. Killing off main characters in the opening episode isn’t an unusual move, but killing off the main character is new. The joke about Americans and guns made me giggled (again, sorry) and showed that the usual DW wit is alive and well. One of the particular highlights of this episodes is a Richard Nixon which puts the play-dough version in Watchmen to shame.
The Day of the Moon
Following directly on from The Impossible Astronaut, this episode sees the Doctor and his usual companions- joined by Canton Everett Delaware III, who eagle-eyed sci-fiers will recognise as Romo Lampkin of BSG fame- waging a revolution against the mysterious Silence. The Silence are a fantastic idea, creepy figures standing in the background of forever unable to be remembered. They’re up there with the Weeping Angels in the downright creepy stakes. This was another brilliant episode, opening the season with a cracking two part story. And the regenerating girl at the end was a superb touch.
The Curse of the Black Spot
From the brilliant, to the not so brilliant. There wasn’t anything exactly wrong with this episode, but coming after the The Impossible Astronaut/Day of the Moon two-parter, it feels very flat. The pirate romp idea has been shoehorned into a Doctor Who story, and one expects that it’s only in order to show Karen Gillian in a pirate outfit. And not enough was made of Lily Cole, whose perfectly spherical head made her excellently suited to being a much more alien monster than she played. Probably the only real filler episode of the series.
The Doctor’s Wife
Having said that The Curse of the Black Spot was the only filler episode, I do feel that if this episode wasn’t magnificently good, it would dispute that title. Written by the brilliant Neil Gaiman, it adds nothing to the overall story arc, but really is so good. The Doctor follows a Time Lord distress call to a TARDIS-eating asteroid creature, where the TARDIS enters a human body. Cue endless witty exchanges!
The Rebel Flesh
The Doctor, Amy and Rory land smack bang in the middle of a showdown on an island between a group of acid miners and their “flesh” duplicates, formerly merely tools, now sentient. This is classic DW fare, with the Doctor desperately trying to keep two peoples from going to war. See last season’s Silurian two-parter. It’s good enough, but doesn’t really come into its own until the second part.
The Almost People
And here we are. With a flesh duplicate of the Doctor running around too, things were always going to be more fun. Everything goes to hell in a handbasket when one of the Flesh duplicates goes a little monstery. Lots of running around and shouting, until at the end Amy goes into labour, and is revealed to be a Flesh duplicate herself. This was a cliffhanger and a half. Moffatt knows how to keep an audience watching, and this is it.
A Good Man Goes to War
Back to the main storyline we go. The Doctor and Rory gather an army to rescue Amy (plus her daughter). This was an episode that should have been great, and that knew it should have been great. The problem was that it overreached a bit. The Doctor winning the battle without any bloodshed was a good touch, but when it went wrong (as we knew it would) it just felt a bit too…obvious, for the Doctor to fall for. The reveal of River Song’s identity (She’s Amy and Rory’s baby. Also, part Time Lord. Don’t ask) was made entirely too obvious, but the performances of Matt Smith and Alex Kingston in the last few minutes save it.
Let’s Kill Hitler
It’s not filler, but it’s not good. The addition of Hitler was wholly unnecessary (he spends all but the first five minutes of the episode in the bloody cupboard), and frankly was probably only for the jaw dropping title at the end of A Good Man Goes to War. The whole point of the episode was to show Melody Pond “becoming” River Song, via a shapeshifting robot (the teselecta) crewed by mini-people. Which seemed unrealistic and entirely too sudden. And so the Doctor would know the date of his death. All of which could have been achieved without Hitler. My least favourite episode of the series.
Night Terrors
The Doctor helps a frightened child, and ends up trapped in a dolls’ house filled with very creepy dolls. This feels very close to the Tennant/Ecclestone episodes that RTD used to write. Not in a bad way. It’s creepy, and endearing, and explores the Doctor’s character surprisingly well.
The Girl Who Waited
The best episode of the series. Really, truly, fantastically made. The Doctor and Rory try to rescue Amy from a different “time stream” which is moving faster, and end up finding a bitter, angry Amy who has been waiting for them for decades. More Doctor characterisation, but this time vicariously, through his effects on other people. RTD tried for this a number of times, most notably in the series 4 finale, but never managed it as effectively as The Girl Who Waited.
God Complex
Another very good examination of the Doctor’s character through his relationship with others. The gang become trapped with a bunch of other randomers in a hotel, in which there is a room somewhere containing each person’s greatest fear. It’s a nice use of the Room 101 idea, and a particularly nice twist at the end which sees the Doctor have to break Amy’s faith in him. The ending, with Rory and Amy leaving the TARDIS, came straight out of left field, though it’s a bit dampened by knowing that they will certainly be back in the series finale. The question you’re left wanting answers for, though, is what was in the Doctor’s room?
Closing Time
James Corden and Cybermen. Oh joy. One is the silver enemy of the Doctor who I have never found scary (sorry, I know that’s heresy, but it’s true). The other is a man I very much want to dislike, but keep catch myself giggling at. It wasn’t a bad episode, even despite my prejudices. And actually, placing it 200 years on for the Doctor, and just before the events at the beginning of The Impossible Astronaut, was a good touch. The best part was at the end, when the Doctor is finally ready to go to Lake Silencio.
The Wedding of River Song
This is an episode which has divided opinion, but which I loved. The Doctor searches for the reason that he has to die (he will answer the first question), before going to Lake Silencio. There, a younger River in the astronaut suit fails to kill him, causing time to “all happen at once”. This episode has some lovely scenes, including Emperor Winston Churchill, and a steam train into an Egyptian pyramid. The Doctor convinces River that she has to kill him, in order to save the universe (for a change) and she does.
Except she doesn’t. Face it, we all knew that the Doctor would survive. He always does- that’s half the fun of it! The use of the teselecta was something a lot of people guessed, but I admittedly didn’t.
The resounding theme of this series was the Doctor, facing who he is and his own demise. It did that very well, particularly with the Doctor’s realisation in A Good Man Goes to War of the effect his fame was having on the universe. The end of The Wedding of River Song has the Doctor very much alive, but with only a handful of people aware of that fact (and the fixed point in time thing does make sense, it’s all a matter of perspective). It’s an excellent lead into the seventh series, which will be the 50th anniversary of the show.
As for the future? I think we had a fairly large hint from Dorium Maldovar (who still looks like the fat Zahn from Farscape episode John Quixote) with that business about the fall of the Eleventh, on the fields of Trenzalore. I wouldn’t be surprised if this is the big hurrah Moffat has planned for the anniversary.
River Song’s story, too, isn’t as finished as everyone else seems to think it is. In Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead, River knows the Doctor’s name. But he hasn’t told her yet (when he said he had told her his name, he’d told her to look into his eye). I think we’ve more to see of Alex Kingston.
Finally, in the break between A Good Man Goes to War and Let’s Kill Hitler (whoever came up with that break idea really does deserve something painful to happen to them) a teaser trailer was released. It showed a skeleton, holding a dying sonic screwdriver. I don’t think it was a teaser trailer for Let’s Kill Hitler. I think Moffat is playing the long game with us.
The thing is, though, this sort of thing gets a daily airing in the tabloid press. Not a day seems to go by without the right wing papers featuring some scandalous story about the Human Rights Act causing some scandalous miscarriage of justice, coupled with various calls for it to be repealed- along with the idea that people have any rights at all.
Right wing attacks on the HRA have long been classic strawman arguments. By and large misconceiving court cases, to demonstrate that human rights are evil things indeed. That’s not to say that sometimes the provisions of the HRA aren’t sometimes misapplied, but that’s surely only an argument for better judicial training, rather than repeal of the act.
I won’t go into too much depth about the act itself, since I’ve already written a response to Theresa May’s calls in the Sunday Telegraph for the act to be scrapped, in an article published on The New Political Centre. Everything that I said in that article still stands, and the repeal of the act is absolutely the wrong thing to do.
I just hope that a few things will change now. I hope that bizarre statements about how the HRA means psychopaths can rove around old folks’ homes, doing residents in with meat cleavers, will in future be subject to a little more scruitny. And I also hope that high-profile right-wing politicians will not be able to pass off such nonsense-on-stilts as factual.
I, the people of Maidenhead constituency and the whole of the UK await Ms May’s retraction of and apology for her comments.
EDIT: After a comment by Will Prothero, I feel I should probably make clear here that I do recognise that May has been called out over this from the right, as well as the left. Particularly, by Ken Clarke. So bravo Ken, and bravo Will for making me take another look at how I presented the facts.
