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selenayThe whole snow/ice/winter thing has become such a huge source of anxiety and depression for me that I'm trying a new technique for dealing with it: acknowledging its existence but otherwise ignoring it. My Twitter feed of local news has been moved to a place I can't easily see it (apart from local travel news, which is important), I'm only allowing myself two daily checks on the forecast, and I'm trying to focus on other things.
Fun things.
We had a good, clear day on Saturday, so I made a last minute decision to Do Something Fun, and took myself to a lunchtime show at the cinema. JUPITER ASCENDING OMG.
It's not a good movie, okay? Objectively and critically, it is not good. But I freaking loved it. Entertaining as hell, utterly bonkers, and the cast had clearly gone "Welp, it's insane and we want to have fun so *jazz hands*, which worked. And best of all, it left so many huge plot threads unresolved that there should be a shitton of fanfic coming out of it. Hell, there probably already is.
(If anyone has any JA recs, send them over this way. Please *flutters eyelashes*)
Guys, in terms of cheering myself the hell up, this movie *worked* on so many levels. Hells yes, I shall be preordering the DVD.
I've been working my way through The 100, but this weekend I took a break. Largely because I feel that something as intense and crushing as that show doesn't work well with my intense and crushing weather anxiety.
So instead, I resumed my ST:TNG rewatch. I got up to Skin of Evil on Sunday. Now, I haven't seen this episode since it first aired when I was a kid. Ten/eleven year old little me had never seen a show where the main character died before. It was my first encounter with that, and I can remember being utterly shocked and devastated at the time. This time, part of my brain could analyse it and understand that it wasn't a particularly good or well-executed episode. It really wasn't. But the other part of my brain was back in little!me's body, remembering those feelings, and it still got to me. I didn't understand it at the time, but Tasha Yar was one of my early crushes, so losing her? Awful.
The worst part was this sudden understanding that characters could die. Until then, watching shows had been safe. Everything might look terrible at some point in the episode, but I knew my main characters would make it to the end credits. I can remember being so sure they'd find a way to bring Tasha back, but it didn't happen. It was unsettling. How could anything be comfortable and happy to watch if there was really a chance that the impossible situation couldn't be resolved?
With adult hindsight, I can see that was a good thing. I remember watching Spooks for the first time and thinking "Oh, wow, they've just set the manifesto for this?" when they killed a character in the second episode. We know now that characters won't always survive, and that adds a level of tension that keeps us watching.
It's weird to think back to that bygone time when I was still innocent and trusting, and characters didn't die, and then see the episode that changed all that for me.
Of course, in true ST:TNG style, that plot point didn't get acknowledged in the next episode. Oh, show.
One thing that I'm taking away from the rewatch is that my memories of the first season being incredibly uneven are totally true. Some episodes are quite good. Others are terrible. Thank goodness it wasn't being made now, it wouldn't have survived to season two.
And we wouldn't have got all those episodes that are actually genuinely brilliant :-D
Fun things.
We had a good, clear day on Saturday, so I made a last minute decision to Do Something Fun, and took myself to a lunchtime show at the cinema. JUPITER ASCENDING OMG.
It's not a good movie, okay? Objectively and critically, it is not good. But I freaking loved it. Entertaining as hell, utterly bonkers, and the cast had clearly gone "Welp, it's insane and we want to have fun so *jazz hands*, which worked. And best of all, it left so many huge plot threads unresolved that there should be a shitton of fanfic coming out of it. Hell, there probably already is.
(If anyone has any JA recs, send them over this way. Please *flutters eyelashes*)
Guys, in terms of cheering myself the hell up, this movie *worked* on so many levels. Hells yes, I shall be preordering the DVD.
I've been working my way through The 100, but this weekend I took a break. Largely because I feel that something as intense and crushing as that show doesn't work well with my intense and crushing weather anxiety.
So instead, I resumed my ST:TNG rewatch. I got up to Skin of Evil on Sunday. Now, I haven't seen this episode since it first aired when I was a kid. Ten/eleven year old little me had never seen a show where the main character died before. It was my first encounter with that, and I can remember being utterly shocked and devastated at the time. This time, part of my brain could analyse it and understand that it wasn't a particularly good or well-executed episode. It really wasn't. But the other part of my brain was back in little!me's body, remembering those feelings, and it still got to me. I didn't understand it at the time, but Tasha Yar was one of my early crushes, so losing her? Awful.
The worst part was this sudden understanding that characters could die. Until then, watching shows had been safe. Everything might look terrible at some point in the episode, but I knew my main characters would make it to the end credits. I can remember being so sure they'd find a way to bring Tasha back, but it didn't happen. It was unsettling. How could anything be comfortable and happy to watch if there was really a chance that the impossible situation couldn't be resolved?
With adult hindsight, I can see that was a good thing. I remember watching Spooks for the first time and thinking "Oh, wow, they've just set the manifesto for this?" when they killed a character in the second episode. We know now that characters won't always survive, and that adds a level of tension that keeps us watching.
It's weird to think back to that bygone time when I was still innocent and trusting, and characters didn't die, and then see the episode that changed all that for me.
Of course, in true ST:TNG style, that plot point didn't get acknowledged in the next episode. Oh, show.
One thing that I'm taking away from the rewatch is that my memories of the first season being incredibly uneven are totally true. Some episodes are quite good. Others are terrible. Thank goodness it wasn't being made now, it wouldn't have survived to season two.
And we wouldn't have got all those episodes that are actually genuinely brilliant :-D
no subject
Date: 2015-02-25 03:42 pm (UTC)I've been doing JA recs on my DW. Just four so far, but I'm keeping an eye on AO3.
Tasha dying had a similar (ish) effect on bb me, though I think I'd already seen characters dying. I was just saying over on tumblr that my current reaction to it is resentment. I wanted seven seasons of my adorable butch security chief who didn't do feelings (and never cared about Worf), and I would have LOVED to see her once the show figured out how to write women. One of the worst parts of the episode for me was that she was getting all those great scenes with Worf like a normal person, then boom, gone. We lost Crusher shortly there after because GM wanted to be treated better and have her character do more than be Westley's mom, so they replaced her (though I also liked Pulaski), and eventually Patrick Stewart had to more or less pitch a fit to get her back and get better writing for her. But she came back, and she got plots (not always great plots, but eh), and meanwhile Tasha stays dead (except when she comes back to be raped and murdered).
I have a complicated relationship with TNG. I mostly want to draw sparkly hearts around it, except when I want to scream at it and never stop.
no subject
Date: 2015-02-25 08:15 pm (UTC)In that context, it's a good movie :-D
Er, I already devoured your recs. Heh :-) I shall keep an eye out for any more you post!
I wanted seven seasons of my adorable butch security chief who didn't do feelings (and never cared about Worf), and I would have LOVED to see her once the show figured out how to write women
OMG, yes, I would have loved this. When they figured out how to write women, they did some good things. It makes me sad that they didn't figure it out sooner, and they wasted Tasha's character so completely. She could have been such an amazing character. She already had the shades of grey, the complex background, the potential for emotional nuance. It was all right there, just waiting to be picked up and run with, and I know Denise Crosby could have done it because she played the alterna!Yars so well over the years.
Now I'm also resenting her loss :-(
I have a complicated relationship with TNG. I mostly want to draw sparkly hearts around it, except when I want to scream at it and never stop.
This, so much. It was a show that was very, very good when it was on form...and failed so badly when it got things wrong.