FIC: Torchwood and 300 (drabble) - Three Hundred

Title: Three Hundred
Characters: Jack, Dilios
Challenge: Crossovers - Torchwood/300
Rating: G
Disclaimer: Not mine, no claims, all property of the BBC and Frank Miller.
Notes: Cross-posted to my LJ and tw100. I wonder if I can manage more drabbles where the title is a number.

( Three Hundred )

~ ~ ~

Moral responsibility and joy...

I stole a couple of quotations from kikibug13:

I am free, no matter what rules surround me. If I find them tolerable, I tolerate them; if I find them too obnoxious, I break them. I am free because I know that I alone am morally responsible for everything I do.
— Robert A. Heinlein

Always remember: Joy is not merely incidental to your spiritual quest. It is vital. - Rebbe Nachman of Breslov

The quote about joy ties in nicely to her excellent drabbles slashing Captain Jack Harkness with Giacomo Casanova over on tw100.

Remakes and amnesia...

I just went and looked at fannish5, and this week's question means nothing to me, but I realize I missed last week's. This week's item is Name 5 remakes that never should have been made. I find that kind of meaningless... the world is full of movies that should never have been made; but on the whole, I've seen a number of remakes I've liked - more than that I have disliked, probably because in most cases I've seen the remake but not the original. I did like the later versions of The Lion in Winter and Born Yesterday, for example. I even liked the American movie Shall We Dance? as well as the (admittedly better) Japanese version.

I just don't have any problem with remakes. I like seeing the same material from different points of view, or done in different styles. How many versions have I see of movies based on one of my favourite novels, Jane Eyre? I hated some of them and have loved one of them and liked at least one more - I'm glad they kept remaking it, and I hope they continue to do so.

This week: What are your five favorite instances of amnesia, in canon or fan fiction?

Until recently I'd have probably said I didn't like any amnesia stories. I know of none I like in fan fiction; I'm open to recommendations. But in canon... well!

1. In Doctor Who: Captain Jack lost two years' worth of memories, and resents it, and wants them back.


2. In Torchwood, Captain Jack has invented Retcon, the drug that gives people selective amnesia, and he administers it wantonly and ruthlessly. I love the irony,the contradiction.


3. in The Game of Kings by Dorothy Dunnett, near the beginning, Francis Crawford of Lymond is hit on the head and temporarily forgets his own identity, while a prisoner in the custody of Christian Stewart. There is some lovely banter through this chapter; a sense that Lymond can be himself as we seldom see him, because for once he has been able to forget his troubles. Sometimes I have wondered to what extent he was faking it. Sometimes I have wondered at various implications of the section. But I do love it.


4. Brat Farrar, by Josephine Tey. I liked the TV movie based on the book, too.


5. I can't think of a #5... give me time, here....

More comments on Doctor Who: Utopia...

I find I have more things to say about last week's Doctor Who episode "Utopia", and if I don't say it soon, we'll have had the next episode and I'll never get round to saying what's on my mind. So...

( About the Doctor... )

( Captain Jack and his view of the world... )

( The Doctor changes, too... )

( Some people think the rather jarring transition from End of Days to Utopia was a continuity glitch.... )

The Piraha..

A fascinating article:
The Interpreter - Has a remote Amazonian tribe upended our understanding of language? by John Colapinto.

When I read The Language Instinct by Steven Pinker, I was extremely impressed. It was my first introduction to Noam Chomsky's theories, and to the neurological model of linguistic studies. Fascinating. And ever since then, when I read about the linguistic controversy - is language preprogrammed into our brains? how much psychological freedom do we have in linguistic formation? - I tend to float towards the Chomsky/Pinker side of the debate. It makes so much sense to me.

But it may not be the whole story. I'd say the culture of the Piraha just proves that humankind is capable of all sorts of interesting diversity.

Or maybe it's more than that. Perhaps they have a deficiency of some sort of DNA, or an unusual chemical make-up that makes them see the world with unusual pragmatism.

Who, me, ellipsis?

From tudorpot I got, "The Which Punctuation Mark Are You Test". I hoped to be a semi-colon, maybe an exclamation point - a question mark would be fine, too. But nooo, I got a piece of punctuation that is to my mind questionable at best, beloved of teeny-boppers and the undecided. The ellipsis.

It isn't even elegant.

And if I'm 82% sophisticated, why should I be insecure?( Here are my spurious results... )

The Barrowman Charm...

On freema_love I just saw two delightful videos posted by gryffinclaw, both from "Totally Doctor Who". I got to see Barrowman covered in muck (which I'd heard talk about), and to hear Freema Agyeman's comment on John Barrowman: "He's a catalyst for bad behaviour. If you've got the slightest bit of naughtiness inside you, bubbling away, he'll bring it out. Stay away!"

And then, a clip from tomorrow's episode of Doctor Who.