T'eyla Minh

Apparently the three new episodes, a.k.a Series 5, are due to be shown at some point in February. Not exactly sure when. In any case, given the latest news, at least it'll be over with quickly...

( Cut because of minor spoilers. )

I am tempted to livetweet the new series when it's on, as I suspect I will have rather a lot to say once the incoherent silent rage has worn off, and it might be helpful to have a point of reference. :P

In other news, Paul and I have made a start on marathoning all eleven seasons of Frasier. :D We're currently halfway through season 1 (because they're only short, of course) and it's really great fun finally getting to see all the early episodes I missed the first time around. I didn't start watching properly until season 7, and even then managed to miss a few episodes (including the finale) because of Channel 4 rescheduling it...

So obviously, I spent the weekend reading fanfic (Niles/Daphne was one of my first 'ships, of course, then latterly Frasier/Roz) and episode transcripts and prematurely rewatching the season 7 finale on YouTube because OH MY GOD THAT EPISODE. (Resolving seven years of unrequited feelings / UST: ur doin it perfickly.)

Also I am amusing myself by retrospectively ascertaining where my Niles-crush came from whilst simultaneously trying to fight it off with a big stick (I think it was just lying dormant all these years). I can't even blame the frivolity of youth this time around. :P

It's a relief, actually - with three separate rewatches (X-Files, Buffy and now Frasier) in addition to the Grand JC Watchathon (which I must get back on track with), I do at least have something with which to distract myself from the above-mentioned fail...

And I'm determined to do a Farscape marathon this year as well, as Lloyd was nice enough to get me season 2 for Christmas. Not quite sure when, though - maybe when we're a bit further through Frasier and have finally finished Twin Peaks (it transpires watching a mind-mangling David Lynch show on a 12-inch screen at bedtime is not the best idea; we've moving it to the big TV downstairs instead...) I might actually attempt proper episode recaps this time around, as it's another of those fandoms which will benefit from being Older and Wiser. :)

(Oh, speaking of the TXF and BtvS rewatches, Denise and I have hit season 2 of both now. Which means abduction arc / "Irresistible" (a.k.a the Episode That Turned Me Into A Shipper) / "Humbug" (first comedy episode); and Spike, respectively. :D)

I think this is quite long enough. I'll try to update before the Creekfail occurs, but I promise nothing. ;)

I am still two write-ups behind, despite having promised myself I'd get them done this weekend. Am busy tonight and also Wednesday (meal for Jade's 21st) so hopefully on Thursday I might get at least one of them done.

Anyway, last night was the long-awaited Easter special of Jonathan Creek, namely "The Clue of the Savant's Thumb". I really wish it had been on Sunday night instead so I'd have a day to recover - as it stands, I didn't get to bed until gone midnight last night thanks to obsessively refreshing both Twitter and Tumblr for fan reactions, and even then did not get to sleep until nearly two.

I probably shouldn't be abusing New Job's technology to be doing LJ entries, but as it's quiet and nobody is looking (shhhh!) I shall at least try and get some of this nonsense out of my head before I attempt (and doubtless fail) to sleep tonight. (Entry also finished at home much later.)

Because seriously, I need to vent this. cloudsinvenice and thefleshfailure may both wish to wait until after they've watched before clicking the cut...

( The Clue of the Savant's Thumb - quite obviously, contains SPOILERS and copious amounts of CAPSLOCK ABUSE. )

I hope the three episodes being filmed in the autumn are better - or that Renwick falls out with Sarah Alexander and finds some way to write her character out like everyone else. :P

Okay, hopefully now I've vented that I will actually get some sleep tonight. SO TIRED.

Gah, I was SO TIRED last night. I left work at 4.45 and got home an hour later thanks to the worst bus journey I've had in a while... I decided to get the 35 because it was sitting there as I crossed Corporation Street and usually it's marginally quicker than the 50 as it's a slightly more direct route.

Possibly, when the doors clipped me as I stepped onto the bus because the driver hadn't seen me coming, that should have tipped me off...

The journey started out okay. We got as far as Highgate and then, er... well, I have no idea what the driver was doing, but somehow we ended up going down the Pershore Road, then turning left onto... Edgbaston Road? Whichever one it is with the MAC / cricket ground. Somehow he managed to get us back on track by the time we'd reached Moseley, but GAH. I was really starting to panic for a while. I mean, what do you do for the best? Get off and hope you can find another way home (if we'd gone any further down the Pershore I was ending to get off at the end of Fordhouse Lane and get the 11...) or just keep going and get irrevocably lost?

I suppose one good thing about Birmingham (especially that bit of Birmingham) is you can easily get back there, even if you can't get out again. ;)

Anyway, thanks to that journey (and also working full days all this week despite because of Noor's absence - I've soon gotten used to early afternoon leaving times) I was in no fit state to cook, so Paul did our stir fry. YUMS. (Remains of Monday's roast pork, fried until crispy, with green peppers, mushrooms, onion, garlic, and some Blue Dragon oyster sauce, with noodles.)

Watched telly for the rest of the night: My Name Is Earl and Big Bang Theory. Need to get both of them on DVD...

I did wake up once in the middle of the night at around 4.30am, which was quite surreal. I think I woke up as a combination of Paul rolling over to hug me and also needing the loo, combined with light coming through the curtains which made me think Paul had literally just finished reading and was randomly cuddling me, so I asked him to turn the light off. Most confusing.

I've been knackered all week, not to mention disorganised. Must get back into the proper habit of breakfast and packed lunches next week, and also not sleep horrendous amounts this weekend... I don't think it helped, really.

In other news, apparently the rest of season 2 of Ugly Betty was meant to start today, but apparently Celebrity Wife Swap is on instead, and obviously Big Brother starts soon after that. (Oh joy, more car crash television...) I checked the C4 forum this morning to see what the latest news is and apparently now it won't be on until the autumn. The US has had the season finale already and quite frankly, my patience is now wearing thin. (The reason C4 have given is that they had to plan their summer schedules whilst they still didn't know the outcome of the writers' strike, which I suppose is fair enough, but it would have been nice if they hadn't built our hopes up with S2 repeats on E4 and the endless torrent of complete and utter dross they were showing the UB slot on Fridays for the past three months...)

Anyway, as a result, I went to Amazon and have requested that they email me as soon as the season 2 DVDs are ready for pre-order. Up yours, Channel 4. :P (I wouldn't mind as much if I hadn't been waiting on seeing the end of season 2 before watching the season 1 DVDs Paul and I got for Christmas. I didn't want to start them because there are so many sub-plots that it would only confuse me. I may just make a start now in readiness for eventually getting season 2 DVDs...)

So, yeah. There we go.

In other news: the roofers are coming to fix the leak today, and I've hidden the washing that's drying in the bath by drawing the shower curtain across, just in case Trevor comes wandering in again (we're meant to dry it in the loft but it was so bloody cold up there I moved the drying rack downstairs). He'll probably go into the bathroom to look at the dodgy light pull, which will also be fixed next Saturday.

Also, we are having my grandmother over for dinner next Friday. Hopefully by then I won't be so completely knackered, especially as it's my turn to cook...

Which reminds me, we need to do a meat shop this weekend...

I shall now stop writing this entry before it gets even longer... ;)

Dear Channel 4,

please to be showing the rest of season 2 of Ugly Betty now? You've been leaving us hanging for months.

If you do not comply with my request, I shall be forced to throw a major hissy fit and launch a grenade through your window. If this does not persuade you, be prepared for me to go up there and kick yo' asses.

Yours in unending frustration,

teylaminh

liek, srsly - this is getting beyond a joke. I don't frelling care about Dirty Sexy Money or whatever the hell it's called. Placating me with a new series of Derren Brown's Trick of Treat is not going to work, either, and don't think distracting me with Peep Show will make me forget that you promised the rest of this season in January AND April respectively.

I don't have much energy for fandom these days, so holding out on me with the one I actually manage to latch onto is UNFAIR and CRUEL.

I WANT MY DETTYNESS, DAMN YOU!

*breathe* Spoilers on daniel_betty are not good for me, clearly. It's turning into the kind of fandom I need to watch on my own, in a hermetically sealed room, so I don't disturb other people... ;) But seriously, some of the stuff that's coming? SO GOOD.

*beats Channel 4 to death with blunt objects*

( It turned into a bit of a TV rant )

Enough about that. It's only telly, after all. :P

---

In other news, the opera stuff for choir is coming together quite nicely, although I hope I don't end up sitting next to either of people in the concert who I do in rehearsal. On one side is off-pitch vibrato woman, and on the other is too-loud-occasionally-wrong person and they're both really annoying...

Thankfully, the Italian is now coming together, and the Russian - whilst not as straightforward as originally thought - is starting to sound okay as well. The others are in English and/or American, so not as bad, although I wouldn't have minded singing Carmen in French... the translations are always a bit twee. I mean, the blokes have to sing this at one point:

Carmen
We've been waiting for no-one but you
Carmen
You're so lovely, be nice to us, do!

Not very masculine. ;) It would be nice to work through the Porgy & Bess stuff in order, though, as we've rehearsed it in a random order and I have no idea how it's meant to sound in context.

Sooo... yeah. I should get on with this letter of instruction, really... and I really need some sort of telly-related icon...

...or the bad news?

BBC, you suck big drannit arse.

Because blatantly, alienating the fanbase with crappy scheduling and bad editing and no promotion whatsoever isn't good enough for you, no, no, no.  You don't even fight for it?  Well, frell you, BBC.  Just shows how much you  'appreciate' your geeky little Sci Fi audience, doesn't it?  And honestly, I still contest that Sky One should've bought the rights in the first place, because it would've gotten a Hell of a lot more advertising.  The ratings'll be higher for that, at least; the only bad things are the fact that it'll have breaks in, and the fact that most newcomers won't really know what it is, as they didn't have the series before it.

Wait.  A memory stirs.  The BBC couldn't bloody get rid of it fast enough.  When it was time for the final four episodes of season 4, BBC2 showed them twice-weekly and got the whole thing over with as quickly as possible.  Rather than extending our viewing for the allocated time (longer, in fact, because of the usual Christmas schedule/random annoying sports event cancellation fiasco), it was cut short by two weeks.  Cliffhangers are way more effective when you actually have to wait the allocated seven days for the frelling conclusion, morons.

On the plus side, at least if it's on Sky One, it'll be on at a reasonable time (albeit apparently in two bits rather than four), and won't be edited to nothingness to Pwotect the Innocent Childwen, and we might actually get to see it as Kemper&Co. intended.  That's a blessing, at least, albeit a disguised one.  So, this means I have until January to catch up on everything.  And obviously, I will be taping it religiously, so anyone who wants it can borrow it gladly.

But, of course, for those people who don't have satellite television or Freeview, this is bad news, especially as SciFi UK still have the repeat rights.  So, on the plus side, Amazon are very, very nice people.

It begs the question, however: why are we to be condemned for loving something, for fighting, for wanting justice?  Why are we surrounded by automatons who do their master's bidding?  Why does everything have to boil down to who has the bigger bank balance?  Why is passion never enough?  Why is it that those of us who truly appreciate the beauty and intelligence in this world get voted out by an idiotic, senseless majority, and why is it that no matter how loud you shout, there aren't enough people out there listening?

Those with Sky, I implore you: watch Farscape.  Even if you don't know what it is.  Just tune to Sky One on January 16th and watch it.  If you're a fan who doesn't have Sky, but you know someone who does, invade their house, hold their remote control to ranson, bribe them, buy them dinner, do whatever it takes to get that channel on.  The ratings of this miniseries will dictate whether or not we get a full-length, big-screen movie, and I imagine the same'll go for the sale of the DVDs when they're released.  Do it.  Do it for the minority, the underdog, the persecuted.  Do it for Pilot, for Rygel, for DRD Pike, so they're not condemned to eternity in a darkened box stuck on a shelf.  Do it for Ben.  Do it for Claudia.  Do it for Anthony and Raelee and Wayne and Virginia and Gigi and Lani and Paul, and all the others.  Do it for Kemper, for O'Bannon, for their amazing team of writers and directors and editors and art supervisors and musicians and composers.  Do it for Moya, and Talyn; for John and Aeryn and their future; for D'Argo, for Chiana, for Scorpius, for Sikozu; Hell, do it for Harvey.  Just do it.

And if you won't do it for them, do it for me. Do it for all of these lovely people, too, and more besides.  Do it for the fans who might've been, who could be still.  You might know a closet 'Scaper, too afraid to reveal their terrible, awful secret - that they watch an intelligent show which has muppets in it, and made-up words.  Out them; drag them kicking and screaming to the fore of their geekdom, and tell them to do it, too.

You know you want to.

Edit, after some searching: Okay.  Wonderful.  It turns out that Sci Fi UK don't actually have the repeat rights for the mini.  Instead - as I believe I feared before - it's been jointly bought by both Sky One and Channel Five.  Channel.  Frelling. Five.  Excuse me if I find the fact that the BBC, the longest-established and furthest-reaching television institution in Britain, if not the world, bowed down to Channel Five, just slightly pathetic.  If it'd just been Sky One, fair enough.  Sky One and Channel Four, fair enough.  But Five?  Jesus.  And I pay my license money for this?  What, pray, is my money actualy buying?  Another fifteen series of Changing Rooms and seven more 'reality' shows making 'celebrities' out of annoying people who shouldn't even be contributing to the gene pool?

The answer to that question, obviously, is 'yes'.  But at least Sky One will treat our mini-series with the respect and love it deserves, commercial breaks aside.  I'm condoling myself with that, if nothing else.

---

On the other end of the 'passion' scale, the Phantom movie is almost upon us, and so far I've managed to avoid the trailers except for fleeting glances, and will be seeing it on the 10th, if all goes to plan.  I'm dreading it far less.  From what I've seen, it does look very 'movie-ish', and I do think it could work well, though this obviously does remain to be seen.  The Phantom is far too young, because Joel Schumacher didn't want to make a "middle-aged" film - obviously, he hasn't encountered the armies of phangirls that prevail in the phandom - but it has some good names in it in the form of Miranda Richardson, Simon Callow, and a couple of others I've forgotten...  I thought this day would never come, and still somewhat wish it hadn't, but my main fear in all of this was that the movie would become the 'definitive' version and the stage show would disappear into the limelight.  Andrew Lloyd Webber has, however, reassured people that the show is still going strong and will continue to do so... so my fear on that side of things is waning a little.  I suppose as long as he's getting bums on seats booking months in advance, it'll stay open.

Wow.  Fandom is exhausting.

although i'm probably only more aggravated by this because i'm in one of those moods where every tiny little thing pisses me off beyond reason.

fucking angel is being fucking cancelled. which shouldn't annoy me, per se, because i'm not exactly an angel fangirl or anything. but it's yet more proof that the decent stuff gets dumped for no apparent reason. one day, when the channels are populated by reality shows and soaps and horrible made-for-TV movies, and production companies are clamouring for something new, original and clever, you know what the creators should do? they should all live together in a cave somewhere and keep their ideas to themselves, and show them only to an elite few. they should start their own television channel to show things on, and only tell a few people about it on pain of death if it gets leaked. they should bring out DVDs and videos for only those who appreciate it.

that's what they should do.

because now, you see, there's no farscape (because, despite the fact that there'll be a mini-series, i somehow suspect that the liklihood of the bbc a) knowing this and b) getting a hold of it before, say, sky one or scifi UK does, is very slim indeed. in some ways, i really wish sky had gotten a hold of it in the first place; at least it might have been advertised to an adequate degree and gotten the recognition it deserved.), and there's no buffy, and no x-files, and after this year no more angel and no more frasier, and without caroline quentin, jonathan creek's not even as enjoyable as it used to be. (yes, i'm hung up on that. live with it.) there's no decent trek - i'm sorry, enterprise is bloody unwatchable - and i gave up on friends a while ago. i've never watched er or 24 and i don't really want to start now. i keep meaning to watch stargate but continually miss it, and feel bad about that as it is because it was 'scape's main rival on scifi US.

the only decent thing to watch - the only thing i can even vaguely imagine myself getting obsessive over - is the recent dead like me. it's utterly fantastic. there are several problems with this:

1) it'll never go mainstream. sky one hyped it, because that's what sky one do. if it gets to terrestrial at all, it'll end up on channel four and be shown at some ungodly hour, and will then get low ratings and not be brought back.

2) there is a proposed second series in the pipeline to be filmed this june. promising? maybe. but we know how fickle these production companies are. as soon as they need the money for something else it'll probably get axed. and why...?

3) ...because it's probably too clever for the majority of audiences to understand. farscape: case in point...

4) it'll never go mainstream beyond sky because it has swearing in it. lots of swearing. by - shock! horror! - minors. and it's about death, and it's a comedy. the poor sensitive british public will complain, more so if the bbc get their grubby paws on it. it's a catch-22. if the bbc get it, it'll be confined to bbc2 at a timeslot too early for its content, and it will get edited to death with a chainsaw and sellotape. failing that, it'll remain as it is meant to be, and be shoved to a 2am slot where nobody can watch it. or it'll end up on channel four, where the same problem remains - remember what they did with angel? (oh, look, we've come full circle...)

star trek nearly got axed.
roswell nearly got axed.
buffy nearly got axed.
farscape got axed.
the lone gunmen got axed.
randall and hopkirk (deceased) got axed (admittedly the new version, which was apparently crap, but i liked it...)
firefly got axed.
angel is getting axed.

do we sense a pattern here?

this rant isn't even going anywhere particularly sensible. i just had to get it off my chest. and while i'm at it, here's ( some other unrelated rants that you probably shouldn't read if you value friendship )

my sleeping pattern's frelled again; you can probably attribute this post to that fact. i am cursed by random images from dreams i never remember in their entirety...

last night, i dreamt i had a conversation with aisha. we were in the audience of some kind of ceremony, and beforehand, i'd said something that led into us having tearful confessions whilst being shushed by the other audience members, and my hugging crystal a lot. i can't remember exactly what i said, now. it related to gemma - as these things often do; i swear, when i'm in therapy, she'll be the cause of all my trust issues - and i think it was something along the lines that because of her abandoning our friendship, i was seeking revenge by hurting my remaining friends - crystal and aisha in the dream - by putting up a facade that wasn't really me. and for some reason, this really hurt aisha, and she was determined to talk it through with me. possibly i'm imagining that one of them said, "so we've all been living a lie where you're concerned? is that what you're telling me?" but i do remember aisha and i both being in tears (in the audience), and i was saying "please, can we not talk about this now? please..." and she said, "no, i have to know." and then there were apologies, and crystal was trying to find out what happened, and i was hugging her like she'd disappear if i let go...

last night, i dreamt i drowned. i was in a pool, i believe, and i was too deep, and i was climbing to the surface, but then my lungs couldn't hold any more, so i let out the breath i was holding and then breathed in, and as the water filled my mouth and throat and lungs i couldn't see the surface any more and just started to sink. it was so vivid; thinking about it now, it scares me a little that it was so very peaceful when it happened, and that i didn't even panic...

last night, i dreamt i gave thefleshfailure birthday cake. it was blue and white, with silver candles, and red writing icing. she ate the icing from around the edge (all ornate and piped, the likes of which is beyond my skills), and the chocolate fudge filling, and saved the cake for later. i said, "oh, you..." at her, and then we wandered off. and then she was at my house (at home), having stayed the night for some random reason (i'd even relinquished my bed and slept on the futon for the night; clearly, my subconscious is a better hostess than i) and my mother had put yellow voile curtains in her room just like those in mine, and all the furniture had moved. the walls were painted cream, and there were flowers on the bedspread. it was a glorious summer's day, with late evening sun pouring through the window from utterly the wrong angle to reality, birds singing in the trees, and i said, "doesn't it make the room so much warmer?" and she agreed, smiling, and everything was right with the world.

last night, i dreamt in symbolism, and i pre-empted the hours to a somewhat scary degree... i'm not entirely sure what to make of the dreams. happy? sad? meaningful? or the confused ramblings of a mind that thinks too much?

i should stop finding things out. i hereby decree i shall live in a dark room for the rest of my life...

but before that rant, another...

went into work tonight, having swapped shifts just for this week with the other girl they have working there, since she was going to the christmas ball. i did not go to said ball because a) the tickets were only £2.50, which implied it was basically very crap and b) it was at destiny and elite, which scares me...

anyway. i went to work feeling slightly ill, and now, combined with standing (or slouching) for three and a half hours, cigarette and cigar smoke, the smell of beer, and half a pint of sickly sweet over-syruppy pepsi, i am feeling even iller. the exact cause of my illness is unknown, but i demand that ti go away before tomorrow so i can actually eat some of the party food without feeling sick. basically, my body is making stomach-empty noises and stomach-about-to-upchuck noises at the same time, and whenever i sit down it feels like my kidneys are being rammed into my intestines.

so, yeah...

anyway, the rant.

*beats the BBC editors around the head with a book labelled "imagery for beginners", repeatedly*

i refer, obviously, to tonight's haphazard editing of buffy... "touched" is by far my favourite episode of the season along with "chosen", "storyteller", and "beneath you", and luckily the spuffiness of it came out relatively unscathed. however, because i'm obsessive and watched the buffy/spike conversation scenes about seventeen times over, and the whole everyone-having-sex montage bit, too (it was easier than fast-forwarding to the spuffy... :P) i noticed the following:

1) during spike's rant about buffy, the conversation is meant to go as follows. the line omitted by the BBC - for obvious, if utterly stupid reasons - will be in normal text...

BUFFY: Fine. The stage is yours. Cheer me up.
SPIKE: (pauses) You're insufferable.
BUFFY: Thank you. That really helped.
SPIKE: I'm not trying to cheer you up!
BUFFY: Then, what are you trying to say?
SPIKE: I don't know. I'll know when I'm done sayin' it. Something pissed me off, and I just... Unattainable. That's it...

etc.

see? it may seem like a very insignificant line, but it's about as humorous as the scene gets, and i happen to like that line. (what's even worse is from a few episodes back [i forget the title] where spike and anya were wandering in the alley and she was teasing him about the Magic Box Incident. he was meant to say, after the "you're like a dog with a bone" thing, and her "what's your point?": "so, it's my bone. so just drop it.". they cut the 'my bone' line. bastards.) not to mention the fact that they cut it with a rusty breadknife...

2) the everybody-having-sex montage. which wasn't a montage any more. the original run ran as follows: buffy/spike conversation leading to the "hold me" thing [which never fails to get to me even now. the buffy/spike theme in the music is so much less cheesy than buffy/angel ever was. of course, i'm biased...]; then faith talking to the first/mayor and robin, ending with the kissage; then willow and kennedy (DIE DIE DIE!) and the 'losing control' thing; then anya complaining to xander with "i think if we're done having sex, then everybody else should just knock if off..."; then, buffy/spike, then robin/faith, then willow/kennedy, then anya/xander, and then back to buffy and spike.

the entire sodding point is that everyone's having sex except buffy and spike. it's meant to be an ironic contrast to what happened last season; it's essentially the climax (sorry...) of all the relationships that have been built on this season, and a whole lot of other wonderful things that i'm too tired and ill to think of off the top of my head. so what do the beloved beeb do? they cut the robin/faith and willow/kennedy scenes out completely, so we only get spuffy - xanya - spuffy, and no sense of imagery whatsoever. the fact that the robin/faith and kenlow are implied is irrelevant! the whole point is the visual... thing of it!

losing brain cells by the second here... you know what i mean, i'm sure.

gah. gah. gah. someone please make them stop...

and on that note, i shall read my friends list, re-read my "touched" fic to make myself feel better, and probably go to bed...

so. let us mourn the loss of great things. here's my list; feel free to add your own as appropriate. in no particular order:

1) starting with tonight's escapade into what used to be jonathan creek, allow me to mourn the loss of maddy. carla, i can tell, is only going to get more irritating. want maddy back now. "the three gamblers" (final episode of series three, if anyone remembers that far back) showed potential for the jonathan/maddy relationship, bizarre though it is. the episode before that had them bloody sleeping together, and they want us to believe that this means nothing? that jonathan would fall back on carla, of all people? geez. an explanation to maddy's whereabouts was given in a throwaway line in the last christmas special, "satan's chimney", when carla was introduced - the blonder, slimmer new female lead. hm. pandering to male audiences, anyone? i wanted acknowledgement of maddy's existence, at the very least. whether they like it or not, it was the tension between maddy and jonathan that kept the majority of viewers interested - it's a fact of life, human instinct. ferchrissakes, when mulder went AWOL, at least they made a fuss about it.

which brings me nicely on to...

2) the x-files - i stuck with it til the end, albeit very badly for season 8 before rediscovering its wonderfulness in season 9. it represents the end of an era for me. well, it represents 9 years of my life that i wasted obsessing about it, but it's all the same in the end... at least x-files got a decent send off, and there's talk of a second movie. anything that reaches cult status within two seasons will never die...

3) farscape, of course, will be no more in two weeks' time. and the circumstances surrounding this turn of events suck in the suckiest way possible. it's going to end on a cliffhanger, and it's going to be horrible, and we're all going to cry for a week. or i will. whatever, it's going to be the most evil cliffhanger imaginable and i'm actually scared. above that, i'm disappointed and frelled off beyond belief that something like farscape, which - shock! horror! - has decent writing, believable characters and - oh, god, no! - deals with real issues that could, perhaps, affect real people, and not in a prettyprettyfluffy manner, either, gets cancelled, while things like big brother and the countless other pointless reality shows keep on getting damn well made.

hence, there are about a million tiny little loose ends thrown in amongst the larger main ones that will never get tied up; who the father of aeryn's child is (because we still don't know for sure); whether that baby will even be born; what scorpius' motives are; the ever-deepening relationship between him and sikozu; the recurring tension between chi and d'argo; where the heck noranti came from; how jool's doing; whether they'll all get home; whether there'll even be a happy ending. but these things mean nothing to television executives, of course, just the fact that they apparently can't afford to give us that much. i have faith that, given time, kemper and co could have adequately written an ending, but they weren't even given the chance. that, i think, probably sucks the most...

*sigh*

this, possibly, is a rant that should have come back in september. moving on...

4) buffy the vampire slayer - if anyone hasn't already heard, season 7 is to be the last. but at least buffy will have time to write a proper ending, which is more than farscape got. i still dread, though, that joss will prove himself to be the evil-anti-spuffy i think he is, in which case i'll be ranting a lot more come the end of the season...

5) frasier is also on its final season - season 10, admittedly. i am only glad that they finally redeemed the niles/daphne storyline after about 8 years of niles- and viewer-torture. i don't hold out much hope for roz and frasier, despite their also sleeping together at the end of last season. it seems to have been conveniently ignored. but i do have at least some faith in the writing team and they'll probably surprise me...

6) futurama, i think, also got axed by fox. which is quite suspect when you consider the similarities between it and farscape, but i won't read anything into that and turn it into a conspiracy... i think it got axed because it wasn't doing as well as its big sister, the simpsons - well, duh. the simpsons has been running for about twelve bloody years; futurama's only been going for what? five? and it's probably only seen as 'scifi' even though it's also an animation, and we all know the stigmae attached to that, don't we?

7) going away from television a moment - cats is closed, as you all know. (incidentally, go here and click on the "cats and me" link, for my long-awaited eulogy-of-sorts.) it's also touring at the moment and i'll be seeing it in 2 weeks. oh, two weeks? whee! *ahem* anyway. yes. it's touring. and rather than going to the brum hippodrome, it's going to the wolverhampton grand. which is more expensive. so thwarting my plans of seeing it many many times, and similarly thwarting plans of front row seats because i should really have booked it by now...

8) i worry intensely about the phantom of the opera, the more things are said about the movie, which is now definitely going ahead because they've found a director, and it seems that antonio banderas is still being considered for the lead. i've give up hope entirely in that regard, and hereby state for all and sundry (well, those who read this and/or care in the slightest) that i will not be seeing it. in fact, i hope it flops and teaches andrew lloyd webber a lesson. and believe me, if it had anyone but antonio banderas being considered, i'd be praying for it to get oscars. that aside, what worries me even more is the prospect that, once filmed, it'll be considered some kind of 'definitive' version of the show, just like the video for cats was. the result of that was the show closing. if andrew lloyd webber closes phantom, one of his most successful and sell-out shows... god, there are no words for the sense of dread i get thinking about it...

9) back to television. deep space nine ended a while back. i miss it. i'm fed up of constant frelling the next generation repeats. d.s.9 was far superior, in my opinion (which is undoubtedly in a minority) and yet has it ever been repeated? not that i can remember on terrrestrial... however, i can't rant about the show itself, because, as finales went, the d.s.9 one was perfect. they tied up the war arc, the focussed on what all the characters were going to do next, they redeemed themselves on the dax/bashir plotline, even, to some degree (even though they tortured the odo/kira-ers beyond belief in the process) and they left it wide open for a movie sequel. that's how you do a finale.

10) voyager, on the other hand... voyager's finale sucked. i mean really. it can be summed up as "oh, no, not another temporal prime directive storyline.", of which berman and braga seem to be far too fond (look at the pilot of enterprise, for god's sake... that's as far as i managed to watch...) i mean, come on, guys? blowing up the borg and changing the future? can't you do any better than that? not to mention pairing chakotay and seven and managing to alienate two groups of shippers at once. just because one of the actors thinks it's a good idea (jeri ryan, i think it was, in fact...) doesn't necessarily mean it IS a good idea. jesus... also, there was nothing even remotely decent, character's-future-wise. nothing. all the reunions, save for the oh-so-precious meeting between admiral paris and tom and b'elanna, voyager's couple of choice for the entire damn run, were conveniently avoided in the hope we'd all forgotten. what happened to libby? mark? t'pel? (no, not t'pol... t'pel was tuvok's wife...) b'elanna's father? seven's aunt? and what about the maquis?

you see?

i could go on longer, but i won't. there's too many things. however, people may feel free to add their own, as i said...

okay, that is the most ridiculous attempt at scheduling i've ever come across.

you'll recall a few days ago that i posted on kenneth branagh's "mary shelley's frankenstein", which was on at some ridiculous time in the morning on channel four.

it's on channel five. this week. at 9pm. same version.

so if anyone wanted to see it and couldn't be bothered to stay up, here's your chance...

have i mentioned lately how much i hate... well... everything?

okay, better narrow that down...

1) trains. i left at 3.00 to get to brum at some point before 6.00 so i could wander aimlessly and not, therefore, be late. i got to the station in time to get a train at 3.45 ish, but i'd just missed it. the next was at 4.11; it got stuck at nottingham because of signal problems. after that would have been 4.35. the engine broke down... at nottingham. i finally got on a train at some point, 4.50, i think, and got to brum for 5.30, which was actually better since i had less time to kill...

2) buses. now, see, derby (and uh, every other frelling city in england) has the right idea - the buses (shock! horror!) give change... and the drivers don't get mugged!! imagine that!! they have change under their window, and they're perfectly safe, and they don't have to be protected by glass! so, anyway, me, lloyd and sarra went to see "moulin rouge" (and hee!!! my book is now up here with me and there shall be parisian goodness on my journal very soon!). i had to pay for lloyd since he had no money since he spent it on food. but then again, he gets to pay for my rocky horror ticket (no, i hadn't forgotten that...). so, because of this, i had abour 40p in change, and my bus fare is 90p. i drew out a tenner. i briefly considered begging poverty at the bus drivers, but i know they only ever put the evil bastards on the night shifts and it would be utterly pointless. i thought there must be a newsagent around here somewhere that's still open. how wrong i was. my second thought was mcdonalds, having already missed my 11.30 bus by this point, i figured i could kill time in there. they weren't letting anyone in. which meant i had to get a taxi. and all because TWM doesn't give frelling change...

however, they did redeem themselves a tad when i left again this afternoon. he couldn't see me in the filthy bus shelter so when i saw him coming a foot away, his reaction time wasn't brilliant... but at least he stopped, albeit half a mile down the road...

3) taxis. apparently, the cost from the ramp by the pallisades to home is supposed to be £8.00. it cost me £9.20. not impressed, i have to admit. and eeeevil scary man in the taxi queue... (luckily, he was ahead of me...)

add to that, walking, when a strange man appeared from underneath the bridge and decided to follow me through the park. luckily, the walk isn't that long, it was still light, i was carrying a heavy bag i could have hit him with, and i managed to lose him at some traffic lights. i don't know if he was following me, but it was awfully convenient that he just happened to emerge from under the bridge as i stepped off it...

and there's too much on ITV. i wish permission to delete the bastard of a channel from the airwaves. either that or go on the roof and turn the damn aerial around... "pop idol" should be damn well finished! we don't NEED an extra hour of the frelling thing! argh!

rant over...