And the winner is...
Oct. 31st, 2006 05:36 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
Doctor Who won the National Television Awards again.
I'm not sure how signicant this is - I'm a little suspicious of popularist awards in general, becuase the stuff I like usually doesn't win. Looks as if this is an exception.
And doesn't everyone look nice in the picture?
no subject
Date: 2006-11-01 12:00 am (UTC)My husband's heartbroken to see her go. XD
And, yes, they all look fantastic (as the Doctor says).
no subject
Date: 2006-11-01 03:18 am (UTC)Her name is Feema Agyeman (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctor_Who#Companions). She appeared briefly in Army of Ghosts as the member of Torchwood staff who is first assimilated by the Cybermen.
And, yes, they all look fantastic (as the Doctor says).
Quite right, too.
no subject
Date: 2006-11-01 10:57 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-11-01 12:18 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-11-01 02:19 pm (UTC)Perhaps Lady Cassandra could be Lady Bertram? (She's not confined to her couch; more stretched over her embroidery frame.)
Replace Pug with K-9.
no subject
Date: 2006-11-01 02:36 pm (UTC)Though it does seem rather suitable for Captain Wentworth. (My biases are showing.)
no subject
Date: 2006-11-01 02:42 pm (UTC)How about replacing Captain Wentworth with Captain Jack...?!
no subject
Date: 2006-11-01 02:49 pm (UTC)I'd love to see the TARDIS in Regency times. Hmm. A tempting thought. I did read one story that slashed Captain Jack with Lord Byron and Beau Brummel; I'm sure I could think of some trouble for him to get into.
no subject
Date: 2006-11-01 02:53 pm (UTC)Jack and Byron is a great idea... Byron finally meets someone who's more than his equal in outré behaviour! (Could his ego stand for that?!)
(Do people still call it slash if the characters are canonically gay or bi? I tend to think of 'slash' as changing the perceived sexuality of a character.)
no subject
Date: 2006-11-01 03:45 pm (UTC)I think so. The fashionable quality of charm and wit and repartee - the form-fitting clothes, and the 'period military' - suits him very well. This makes me want to picture Captain Jack on a horse. He's more of a high-tech guy as we see him, but especially in his "Torchwood" mode I think he'd do well as a Regency gent - including the arrogance and the vanity. (I mean this in the nicest way!)
Alternately he could be a salt-of-the-earth lower class kind of guy, like Weaver in "Precious Bane", smarter and more heroic than the indolent (or absent) landowners....
Fits a lot of heroic patterns, doesn't he?
The story I read that slashed him with Byron didn't, to my disappointment, focus much on Byron, who either didn't actually appear in the story or only appeared briefly. Brummel got a little more attention. It made me want to play the game myself.
Byron finally meets someone who's more than his equal in outré behaviour! (Could his ego stand for that?!)
I think it would follow the typical pattern of Byron's relationships: he'd be fascinated and enchanted at first, and it would be the heights of passion and utter happiness. And then: competition and dissention would creep in. And eventually: pistols at dawn, or at least loud drunken domestic fights at 3 a.m. After Jack had enough of that and took off, there would be some clever, insightful, witty, beautiful poetry about the affair.
Do people still call it slash if the characters are canonically gay or bi? I tend to think of 'slash' as changing the perceived sexuality of a character.
Only because most slash is written about characters who are by default taken taken as het in the canon. Slash just means it's a story about sex or romance between same-sex characters. When you slash bi or gay characters - say, if you were to write a story about Nathan and Stewart from "Queer as Folk" - it's still slash.
no subject
Date: 2006-11-01 04:41 pm (UTC)Re: definitions:
I always regarded 'slash' as only describing counter-canonical-orientation, and more on the porn-y side. One of my dislikes is the counter-canonical issue: just as when I encountered a much-loved, canonically gay (though discreetly so, as it was an old movie) film character being made straight in a fic (though I think that was more due to the young author's naïvety/poor gaydar). If characters are canonically gay or bi, it's just part of who they are.
no subject
Date: 2006-11-01 05:41 pm (UTC)And lots of pistol-shooting, directed randomly, if we're lucky, at the ceiling.
I always regarded 'slash' as only describing counter-canonical-orientation, and more on the porn-y side.
I've heard that said by others, though never by anyone within the community of slash writers. By the same token, I've heard people outside the community argue that stories depicting non-canonical sexual relationships between men and women were 'hetslash' and that the characters were being slashed becuase the pairing was written (for example) "Scully/Mulder". Which makes a certainly kind of sense, but it isn't the terminology we use. My example here comes from a conversation I recall at MediaWest con, long before Scully and Mulder in X-Fiels were a canonical couple.
Actually, slash writers might agree with what you say about the porn angle, depending on the writer. I know slash writers who never put sex in a story, and others who think that's the whole point. Most are somewhere in between.
I'm sure most slash writers would say that when they slash a character, it's because they perceive them as gay or bi in the source material - or at least potentially gay or bi - and this of course is highly subjective. It's a kind of bonus when the canon explicitly shows us that the character is gay or bi or, as in the case of Captain Jack, omnisexual.
I find it interesting that so far, though Doctor Who showed Jack as bi, Torchwood has merely raised the question of his orientation and has not definitively answered it, presumably because we're following Gwen's viewpoint, and she doesn't know. It does seem to me that on evidence so far, if a viewer had only seen Torchwood but not Doctor Who or any of the producer's commentaries, they'd be concluding that Jack is straight, the traditional default. We know he isn't, but it makes for an interesting ambiguity of perception. We will probably learn otherwise when Gwen does.
This strikes me as cool. It doesn't need to be an issue till it needs to be an issue, for some story/thematic point.
no subject
Date: 2006-11-01 06:50 pm (UTC)Going by what happened in Torchwood, George would be pretty shocked by what might happen if he hit Jack...!
I'm sure most slash writers would say that when they slash a character, it's because they perceive them as gay or bi in the source material - or at least potentially gay or bi - and this of course is highly subjective.
What I find rather sad - whatever the sexes and orientation of the characters - is that so many fic-writers can't accept characters being close friends without sexualising the relationship: it's as if they're devaluing the whole idea of friendship, that a relationship isn't important unless it involves sex.
no subject
Date: 2006-11-01 07:02 pm (UTC)Good point! It would probably shock him into sudden sobriety.
As for slash devaluing friendship - I've always seen it as a widening of scope, and a good thing in general - and not so much devaluing friendship as exploring other possibilities - there are a lot of 'friendship' stories in this world, they aren't hard to find, while good slash is hard to find. But I'm not trying to convert you, or anyone else, to slash - just trying to explain it a little.
no subject
Date: 2006-11-01 07:18 pm (UTC)The reverse these days, I'd say, especially in fanfic (and I'm taking about straight fic, here, too): people's imaginations seem to be hyper-sexualised. Nothing is allowed to be innocent.
no subject
Date: 2006-11-01 07:23 pm (UTC)With published books the field is a little wider but all romance (as far as I can see) is written to rigid formula and most gay novels aren't to my taste at all - either geared to men, or too sentimental, or badly written, or pretentiously artsy - I find fanfic often much more expressive and creative. But then, I like the slash genre to start with.
This is said with perfect awareness that there is a lot of really, really bad fanfic out there, which I do my best to avoid.
The good news is that there's some very good writing, too.
no subject
Date: 2006-11-01 07:34 pm (UTC)There's usually more than enough sex and romance in most mainstream fiction/ or film these days!
no subject
Date: 2006-11-01 07:37 pm (UTC)I like fic as back-story, too, and would like to see more of it.
(Somewhere my mind is speculating about writing a fic on how Jack hired Owen... or Tosh... or any of them. But we know so little about the initial set-up of Jack's Torchwood.)
no subject
Date: 2006-11-01 07:41 pm (UTC)We may find out more later in the series, I suspect!
no subject
Date: 2006-11-01 07:45 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-11-01 06:53 pm (UTC)But they'd know he's been pregnant!
no subject
Date: 2006-11-01 07:05 pm (UTC)Another give-away line was in Day One where he said to the delivery-man Carys was debauching, "Zip up your trousers and get out of here! - It always breaks my heart to say that." This sort of comment is probably why Owen is so sure Jack is gay.
no subject
Date: 2006-11-01 07:15 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-11-01 07:27 pm (UTC)I find myself curious as to how Owen and Jack met, and how he came to put the Torchwood crew together. How did he come to hire Suzie? Did he meet Tosh because she worked on the fake alien in Aliens of London? I wonder if Gwen is the only one who discovered Jack first, before being hired or recruited?
I picture a sign in a temp agency somewhere in Cardiff: "Wanted: researcher with expertise in alien objects. Experience not necessary. Some high-risk work involved. Knowledge of guns an asset."
no subject
Date: 2006-11-01 07:31 pm (UTC)I love the idea of the temp ad...!
no subject
Date: 2006-11-01 07:34 pm (UTC)I suppose death and rebirth would do that to anyone, and in his case, the circumstances were somewhat traumatic.
no subject
Date: 2006-11-01 07:37 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-11-01 07:46 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-11-01 07:43 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-11-01 07:46 pm (UTC)DT's Acceptance Speech
Date: 2006-11-02 11:05 pm (UTC)http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ve1ijSc_O6E
He's so dear!
Re: DT's Acceptance Speech
Date: 2006-11-03 04:06 am (UTC)Latest News On DW Soundtrack CD
Date: 2006-11-03 11:08 pm (UTC)Silva Screen will release Murray Gold's soundtrack to Doctor Who on December 4th. This is the first release of the music from the series revival and includes the 'must have' new version of Ron Grainer's immortal theme. Also included are songs by Neil Hannon (The Divine Comedy), one, which appeared in last year's Christmas Special and a new offering, Love Don't Roam, which will feature in this year's Yuletide special.
http://www.silvascreen.co.uk/news.htm
Re: Latest News On DW Soundtrack CD
Date: 2006-11-04 12:50 am (UTC)Re: Latest News On DW Soundtrack CD
Date: 2006-11-06 01:52 pm (UTC)http://www.bbc.co.uk/doctorwho/news/cult/news/drwho/2006/11/06/37664.shtml
Re: Latest News On DW Soundtrack CD
Date: 2006-11-06 02:01 pm (UTC)Re: Latest News On DW Soundtrack CD
Date: 2006-11-12 03:47 am (UTC)http://www.silvascreen.co.uk/master.cfm?SilvaCode=SILCD1224&id=4553
Doctor Who: A Celabration Concert On-Line
Date: 2006-11-18 12:16 am (UTC)http://www.bbc.co.uk/doctorwho/news/cult/news/drwho/2006/11/17/38074.shtml
Re: Latest News On DW Soundtrack CD
Date: 2006-11-20 05:50 am (UTC)http://www.bbc.co.uk/doctorwho/news/cult/news/drwho/2006/11/17/38074.shtml
Re: Latest News On DW Soundtrack CD
Date: 2006-11-20 11:00 am (UTC)