carmen_lj | On being practical, and That Spoiler

Despite my instincts against such a thing, I've had to concede that since the contents of my flat have to fit in here by Wednesday something has got to go and the choice is pretty much between books, Doctor Who stuff and furniture. Since I know what will happen if I suggest the latter to parent, it's books. So far I've excised old statutes, parts of fantasy trilogies that I picked up in charity shops that I thought "oh, right, yes, of course I'll get the next/previous part" and I'm pretty sure that since it's now several years later that ain't gonna happen, and my somewhat excessive collection of art books. Mostly Impressionism stuff, since I'm pretty sure I'm never going to have much enthusiasm for it ever again.

And I've still got three boxes of books sitting on the floor and about another hundred or so sitting along the walls and really, really I can't get rid of anything else. That's 'can't' as in 'won't,' in the petty and stubborn sense.

And then there's stuff like piles of old DWMs and Galaxies that I quite like, but they do just sit there and I haven't read them for years. And dozens of atrocious DVDs I've accumulated because I happened to like the actors in them. And my Hammer movies (WHY DID THEY MAKE SO MANY?) and *flails*. I should have spent more money on getting drunk at uni and less being a bloody magpie.

Also Ilya is fixed, hurrah! I get him and all his shiny back tomorrow. I am going to miss Word though. I forgot how much I love it over Works.

Had a strange moment wandering about the Beeb DW site earlier as was looking for a new background for this computer (ancient gallfrey now; shiny, shiny drawing done by someone for the Lungbarrow e-book). Was looking at Rose's gallery and got a wee bit sad and melancholy. Quite a lot. Surprisingly so really. Cause, yeah, there were moments this series where I would have cheerfully done something Not Very Nice to her, but she's been smashing really and she's leaving and that makes me terribly sad indeed. I no like Endings very much. Regenerations and leavings always make me sad when I watch them. That's one of the many Reasons why I love Liz. She leaves off-screen, thus sparing me Pain. And, and, I think the only leaving I've felt blah about was Dodo. Because the Doctor was just a git there, dude, and she was rubbish, but she still didn't deserve to be shoved off-screen in episode two of her final story because she'd gone crazy and then be pretty much forgotten about.

Also the Brigadier never says goodbye, because he always comes back and I love him for that. He is never going to die, you know. NEVER.

Right, yes, so while I do not think I will be bawling like a wean for a good half hour or so like last year, I do think it will be Painful and WOE. Yes. Dude.

Ah, and I found a half-eaten Easter egg in a box. Chocolate does not go out of date does it?

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

(ancient gallfrey now; shiny, shiny drawing done by someone for the Lungbarrow e-book)

Ooh, where?

He is never going to die, you know. NEVER.

In bed! The Doctor said so! And he's always trustworthy...

The Doctor fibs All The Time. That was simply his way of not scaring the Brigadier about his immortality, yes. *nods*

There are many shiny drawings here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/doctorwho/classic/ebooks/lungbarrow/gallery/

And I think all the book have their own gallery, differing styles of art and such.

Lungbarrow is now officially, incontrovertably Jossed! Jossed, Jossed, Jossed!

::dances::

That makes me Far Too Happy Really.

Though tis one of the NAs I actually like, if I don't take it literally and such, yes.

Really, with all the practice Who fans have had reconciling mutually exclusive things, it takes a lot more to throw them. :) (Besides, TGitF was really the clincher on that, anyway, not the father line, which is just a retread of Empty Child/DD.)

I've never been a Loom advocate, really, but the sheer negativity about it is enough to make me start, I think, because it's honestly much better science fiction writing than "Oh, they reproduce just like humans do, in families just like humans have... but, honestly, they're alien, we swear, walk in time, all that". ~~Besides, I've always had a soft spot for the Cartmel Masterplan.~~

Shrug. Something can be opposed by many and still be a stupid idea. The existence of the wank doesn't mean the immediate cause isn't an irritant.

In all seriousness, what makes it a stupid idea? It's not the one I personaly advocate, but it's very decent SF writing for a technologically advanced yet socially fairly medieval society.

It is not that it's inherently a stupid idea -- as you pointed out, it's a science fiction trope with a history going back to Aldous Huxley. It's that this trope doesn't make any more sense of Gallifrey than any other interpretation. (Compare "TARDISes aren't built, they're grown", which is "Oh, of course!" to me.)

When you present something like the Cartmel Masterplan as the unification and culmination of canon, and in so doing have to rewrite two significant bits of canon -- Susan as the Doctor's granddaughter and the Doctor casting eyes at whosis in The Aztecs -- your axioms are out of control.

You don't have to rewrite them at all, though, because of the strong (canonical) foreshadowing that the Doctor is someone older and more than just the Doctor. (Which was sort of a given, whatever they said about Timelord reproduction.) Is Susan a bit pushed-and-pulled to fit, by making her the Other's granddaughter? A bit, yes, and that's largely why I don't advocate it personally, because I don't know how literally I want to think that the Doctor equals the Other - if you take it very literally, it works, if you don't, not so much. But nothing in any version of that says that Gallifreyans don't fall in love with Aztec or Sevateem chicks - in fact, it very specifically says it was a technological response to infertility, which strongly implies that they do. And it's a perfectly good supporting reason for why Gallifrey has no one under the age of 25 living on it, why there's so very little reference to family, why the Doctor makes cracks about having been born under the sign of "crossed computers", why they're so blase about the old looking young and the young looking old, why the Sisterhood of Karn is so closely related (and needs other ways of staying young).

I am defenseless against your superior knowledge of canon.

Yes! Yay! Love. :D

Really the only book-canon event I had any kind of 'nooooooo' reaction to was the swiping of the AU TARDIS. Bleah. Three years of books before he got the proper one back!

I'm not super-Lungbarrow-girl or anything, but it was one of the good books, with well-developed world-building (in which the Looms are pretty culturally integral) and a lot of attention to canon, so I find it a bit rough to see it bashed so often. :)

My take on a lot of the books, actually, is that, rather than being canon or not-canon, they're Schroedingers-cat-style might-be-canon-if-you-don't-open-the-box. (If we've seen half a dozen Loch Ness Monsters, I'm very happy accepting other, more sensible, mutually exclusive canon.) So I don't feel a need to accept or reject the Looms; the way I see Who, they can be just as canonical as anything else I choose to think is plausible. Just, y'know, maybe not at the moment I want them not to be. :)

Wasn't losing the real Tardis in the AU a complete editing accident? :) I gather they didn't realize it until readers brought it up.

Oh I agree completely, I support multiple canons all the way. Schrödinger's Canon, I like that! :D With a show as (damn near inherently) full of contradictions as Doctor Who, whittling it down to One True Canon seems like throwing out the baby with the bathwater.

A mistake? Heh! I never heard that - As I recall there's continuity in the following books about losing all their stuff, and the AU Old Girl being extra-tetchy because she didn't like them. It's possible they edited that in at the last minute.

So long as it's not a Cadbury Buttons egg that's got salmonella that they've recalled....

Oh dear pixies.

But no.

Chocolate's good for ages. Unless it's started to sperate and there's white patches. I wouldn't eat it then.

it's books

Be careful what you part with. I did a similar clearance and regret parting with a lot of them (mostly badfic) but I have been recollecting my Agatha Christies since.

On being practical, and That Spoiler

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject