ChrisM

[ChrisM]

Not really.
https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=Deganwy&hl=en&prmd=imvns&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=dGsJUNKVMKfI0QXm1vjdCg&ved=0CGwQsAQ&biw=1263&bih=623

[ChrisM]

Yeah, a shame, although I’ll admit Jezzmund’s post made me laugh.

[ChrisM]

Is that a gelf show? ;)

[ChrisM]

You haven’t seen it yet. It could be excellent. (Although, considering the way a lot of shows go over time, I can see why you’d doubt this.)

Mind you, I haven’t seen the original yet either. I’m thinking maybe I should look it up at some point.

[ChrisM]

>So is Jesus.

No he isn’t.

Even if you disbelieve the things written of him, the fact that the original drafts of many of the books were written by people of the time period or shortly afterwards is indicative that the man existed.

[ChrisM]

Is it actually a reboot? Not just a completely new film that has a mummy in it?

I’d like to see the latter. I didn’t dislike the other remake/reboot with Brendan Fraser. Quite liked it in fact particularly having the Mummy as a kind of undead super-sorcerer with desert powers rather than just a shambling bloke wrapped in bandages (although that is a creepy image). I didn’t mind the first sequel either, although the stuff concerning reincarnation made little sense. (I’ve yet to see the other sequel.)

However a modern film dealing with the mummy character getting back to the proper scary horror roots rather than the blockbuster action movie extravaganza would be highly welcome. Mind you, they sort of did that with the rather good but somewhat overlooked Bubba Ho-Tep, but that had other themes and wasn’t really about the mummy so much. (Great film though.)

[ChrisM]

>Did it leak that Chloe was going to appear?

I don’t think so. That joke was kept well under the production teams proverbial hat. And it wasn’t the big chef thing Kryten wore in Red Dwarf VIII (although I liked that joke in all it’s silliness).

[ChrisM]

>I keep meaning to ask. Has anybody else watched Todd And The Book Of Pure Evil yet?

Yes, although I missed some of episode one as I was doing something else at the time.

I enjoyed what I saw. Goofy silly fun with a twisted slant.

As for Community… I confess I’d never heard of it until I read the posts here!

[ChrisM]

It’s certainly interesting that a character that is despised by a lot of fans* (in her second incarnation) turned out to be a surprise highlight of Back To Earth.

No doubt it’s all in the presentation (especially as it wasn’t really her) but.. well… I’m easily fascinated.

*Not including myself.

[ChrisM]

Which version should we watch? I did see it many years ago and keep meaning to watch it again. You should all watch Dark Star as well if you’ve never seen it.

The Final Cut is my favourite version, but to all the references I’d advise you watch The Theatrical Cut.

Actually, watch both. :)

[ChrisM]

>At the recordings I saw, Red Dwarf X may have had its faults – but it is at least its own thing.

I’m glad of this.

[ChrisM]

Oh, and the Katarina character was great and a nice foreshadowing of what was going on. I wish they’d had time to fit in the original arrest scene though. That fills more like a suitable way of Rimmer getting his revenge.

[ChrisM]

One thing BtE never fails to do is (almost…I am a man, duh…) bring a tear to my eye with Lister’s speech at the end, when he calls back to what the kids on the bus said.

I found myself wincing at that scene when Lister started quoting that kid… but ended up deeply touched by it. In many ways that scene really made BtE stand out for me. Not that I disliked the rest. (Well.. some of it.)

Find the comedy awkward (Lister sneezing tomatoes, the frequent behind-my-back joke),

I didn’t like the tomato gag. Gross* and as you say, awkward. I found the ‘behind you’ gag very funny though. I know it’s been done before, but Kryten’s attempt at subtle hinting to Rimmer sold the joke to me.

DETEST the BladeRunner stuff and despair at the BTR retread which was obvious as soon as squid ink starts getting sprayed around.

My feelings on the Blade Runner stuff are mixed. I got a geeky thrill in getting the references, but it got rather clunky. As for the squid ink, I think I prefer that they went that route than actually travelling to a parallel universe where they are fictional.

Okay, I suppose it could be argued that Kryten’s explanation suggests that both explanations are true, i.e. it was both a dream and real. (I’m referring to his statement that the world they encountered would continue after they left as there are worlds for every dream and area of the imagination**.) But at least this way the viewer has a choice of which they prefer.

Performance-wise I think BtE is amongst the best Dwarf has ever been, although Rimmer seemed a bit off to me. I thought that might be due to the character changing/maturing over the years, but I think maybe Chris Barrie just needs a bit more time to fill the uniform more. He wasn’t bad though, and some of his performance was spot-on. I’m interested to see how he fares in Red Dwarf X.

Edit- I’m not suggesting that Barrie’s acting is bad here. It just didn’t strike me as altogether Rimmer.

*Mind you, some gross jokes make me laugh, but coupled with the awkwardness…

**I think that’s a bit of a stretch even for multi-verse theory.

[ChrisM]

Oh, and the shape of Robocop’s right gun is reminiscent of Judge Dredd’s mark 2 Lawgiver. (The comic version.)

[ChrisM]

I disagreed with the idea of a reboot for Robocop. Still do, in principal, as to my mind the only films that should be rebooted should be those that were poor*.

I do think that image an interesting take though, if a bit messy (and I’m not a fan of that visor either.) I like the other big robot design. And this blurb on that site** sparks my curiosity:

“I have my take on it,” Padilha told ComingSoon.net late last year, “And I can tell you this: In the first ‘RoboCop’ when Alex Murphy is shot, gunned down, then you see some hospitals and stuff and then you cut to him as RoboCop. My movie is between those two cuts. How do you make RoboCop? How do you slowly bring a guy to be a robot? How do you actually take humanity out of someone and how do you program a brain, so to speak, and how does that affect an individual?”

*Granted that’s subjective. And there are exceptions. The 70s Invasions of the Bodysnatchers is my favourite, but I did see it first. I saw the earlier version, and although I didn’t like it as much as the other it wasn’t bad at all. I guess The Fly would fit that category too although I’ve yet to see the original all the way through.

[ChrisM]

> We could have lost Duct Soup, Beyond A Joke and both Petes.

Beyond A Joke is arguably my favourite episode of Series VII.

I say ‘arguably’ as Tikka to Ride is up there.

>For VIII, cut one part of BITR and Pete.

Yes I think shorter versions of those stories would have worked better.

[ChrisM]

I did a version of this. I kept the basketball game, but I cut all scenes that had nothing to do with Lister and Rimmer, as well as the delayed fight.

I liked the basketball game. And one of the delayed fight scene was one of the highlights of that episode for me! I thought it was very well done.

I had mixed feelings concerning the other repetitive Hollister stuff mind you. Starts amusing, gets irritating and gets amusing again. Or just more irritating, depending on how I’m feeling. The time wand gag making Hollister repeat himself should have been cut out though. At least after the first repeat.

As for Rimmer’s extended salute (was it that episode or another, they tend to blend together somewhat) I’m undecided if it’s a great piece of physical comedy or tiresome. Or a mixture of both.

[ChrisM]

A while back I met up with some guys from the 2000 AD web board a couple of times in London. It was rather weird that a couple of them actually called me by the screeen name I go by on that board.

“See you later Mardroid.”

Oh dear.

[ChrisM]

I just noticed. Hid=hide. Obviously.

[ChrisM]

>… in that pic it still looks CGI to me.

Me too. I’m not entirely sure whey. Maybe it’s just the shape, which is also unusual for an eye patch, although probably intentional to hid it behind the glasses. It always had a post production look to me.

[ChrisM]

>are there other musicians on here too?

I can play the keyboard, but I’m out of practice, and it looks like that’s covered already. :)

I’ve never been to DJ but I hope to rectify that at some point.

[ChrisM]

I always assumed it was meant to be a great big gaping hole. It looked strange (no doubt intentional for comic effect, whether it worked or not) but I assumed the implant must have consisted of the entire eye, lids and surrounding area. The idea it was an eye-patch didn’t even occur to me. If that WAS the intention, I think that again it was rendered in rubbish CG for comedy purposes. I know affects aren’t usually intentionally meant to be rubbish in Red Dwarf, but I think this is an exception.

Also, if Kryten’s self-repair system could disassemble / reassemble something as large as Red Dwarf in a matter of hours, what’s the point in having a mining fleet, anyway? But then, Kryten was manufactured after Red Dwarf, so maybe nanos weren’t as sophisticated back when the ship was built (plus they had three million years to break their programming / refine their technique).

Yeah, I don’t think Kryten’s nanobots would have been that sophisticated even in his time. I’d go with the bit I emboldened and add- machine evolution. I.e. if the nanobots can repair other systems, then it makes sense that they’d be able to upgrade each other as well. In all that time* I don’t think they’re the little beasties they used to be, particularly considering their independence.

Incidentally, I always wondered how Kryten’s self repair system worked when he was crushed into a cube shape considering his nanobots had left at that point. I understand that the real world explanation is that the writers hadn’t decided what had happened to the ship at that rate, but in-world…?

I remember bringing it up on the official site and Andrew suggested that might have been the point when Kryten became aware that his nanobots were missing. It still doesn’t really explain how he fixed himself though. I suppose it’s possible that the nanobots only formed part of his self repair system, maybe for the finer micro-level fixing.

*I’m not sure Kryten would have been on-line for the entire three million years. He may have leap-frogged through time by going in stasis or just switching himseolf off for a millennia or so while the girls were in stasis. I think it’s fair to say he’s been active a long time by our standards though.

[ChrisM]

Bouncing apparently.
;)

[ChrisM]

I watched the Strangerers, and although it had an interesting premise, I found that premise got old and irritating fast. I never saw it through to the end.

I’ve yet to see 10%ers. That I remember, anyway.

[ChrisM]

Most scientists we know are the absolute opposite of the stereotype on the show — when you’re super-smart, you spend your time working on world-changing projects, not visiting the comic book store every Wednesday.

Are those things mutually exclusive? Okay, since the Scientists probably work on Wednesday, they probably are, but… point is, you can be a brilliant scientist, and enjoy comic books.

>Penny and wine is probably one of the few combos that could drag me away from RD.

Me too, but then I’ve seen Red Dwarf. If she came around when the new series was being broadcast? Well… if I had to chose, I’d probably still go with Penny, but I’d be thinking of RD. (For a bit, anyway.) However, the fact that Dave show repeats and I’d inevitably end up buying the box-set would be a large deciding factor there.

[ChrisM]

Yeah. Model bits are designed to LOOK like bits of vehicle after all. As long as they’re utilised right they should look part of the ship.

[ChrisM]

>Wouldn’t that be generations of INbreeding? Perhaps they can all have genetic mutations due to the small gene pool.

Colony Spoiler:

That was pretty much a them in Colony. Not the mutations so much but inbreeding causing, well, stupidity.

[ChrisM]

Three years? Dear me, has it been that long?

Don’t get me wrong, I’m sure you’re right. It’s just time seems to slip past so fast nowadays.

[ChrisM]

>It may be late at night… but that makes no sense to me. Explain.

The theory?

I’m assuming he’s saying that the reason we never saw Lister go back and marry Kochanski is because the incident at the end of Series VI where the future selves killed their younger selves means that he will never become that Lister who went back…

Or something.

[ChrisM]

I think that’s a gun used by one of the guards in the Tank, not the Canaries, although I’d need to rewatch the episode to verify.

[ChrisM]

Snigger.

[ChrisM]

At least you got £150 out of it! Oh. Wait…

[ChrisM]

I think it may have worked better if they had played a bit more mystery to the Father’s original fate than they did. If at the beginning they had shown him seeing and flying into a bright light, the ending would have more palatable for me.

But wouldn’t that have given away the twist? I mean, I wasn’t exactly surprised anyway, as we never actually saw him shot down, but ‘flying into a glowing light’ would have pretty much let us know we’d see him again.

Not that I’m a fan of that particular twist as I said above. (I think he should have stayed dead or at least missing.), but if you’re going to do it you might as well do it properly. To be fair, I think they did.

[ChrisM]

Was last year’s the Christmas Carol one with the flying fish? (I ask because it’s scary how fast time seems to fly past as I get older.)

If so, I agree. It was a wonderful episode, although I’d have preferred something more alien than that shark. Great story involving a time travel related plot, in a Dickensian setting with a strong Christmassy feeling. And of course a feel good factor spiced with sadness. I like my Christmas stories like that*, big girl’s blouse that I am.

*Within reason.

[ChrisM]

I largely liked the story. I came to it with some trepidation that it would be a rip-off of The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe, so was glad that while it certainly homages that story, – I liked Doctor’s reference to his Tardis as a wardrobe for example, and no doubt the Doctor utilised it to create the portal – it had it’s own story to tell.

Spoilers:

I think I would have preferred it if they hadn’t saved the father though. I know that probably comes across as cold, but I actually think it would have been more powerful to have a bitter-sweet ending.

The whole business with the souls of the trees escape made little sense. “We need a human woman to escape, but once we’re off the ground we can fly across the universe all by ourselves, etc, etc.” Beside you’d think that beings that can grow a tower and a space ship could create a more direct control interface, but I’m probably being too logical in a story that was, ultimately, magical and no bad thing. I’d have preferred it if they’d found a way to stop the acid rain and save the trees, but maybe that would be a bit too predictable.

I agree, Bill Bailey was underused. I loved the setting and overall concept of the sentient Christmas Trees and the king and queen though.

Overall good, but far from perfect. It had that lovely Christmassy feeling though, and I’m a bit sentimental at heart.

[ChrisM]

The costume was silly but it served it’s purpose. It had a sense of oddness which fitted the character well.

[ChrisM]

I find most comedy amusing rather than laugh out loud funny. And that’s usually good enough for me.

Not that I’m opposed to some laugh out loud moments, but Dwarf, even at it’s worst, had it’s moments…

[ChrisM]

Belated happy birthday Jo.

And *I* don’t think you’re a spanner…

;)

[ChrisM]

It’s a great design anyway. In some ways it’s a shame we never saw more of it… yet it fits the premise better that we didn’t.

I actually found my eyes more drawn to the Starbug models in those pictures though. I know we’ve seen them before, but they’re really excellent with that weathered look and all. And I didn’t know they splashed orange paint on one of them for effects shots!

[ChrisM]

Heh. The first seems like Red Dwarf done Morcambe and Wise style.

As for the latter…. disturbing image aside, the guy/gal has talent but they need to sort out their proportions! Or maybe it’s a holo version of Ace and his light bee’s contracted a virus. His lifestyle may put him at particular risk of that. Next time install some proper RBR AV software before-hand Ace-lad. ;)

[ChrisM]

Not meaning to shoot this down,so did Craig, and then that was declared ‘unofficial’ on the main site.

The fact this is coming from two sources (albeit two who are mates) does bode well though. If you want a studio audience that is. Obviously. I can see pros and cons either way, but I think I lean towards being a supporter.

EDIT- And for some reason I didn’t notice the other thread. Oh well, think of this as a parallel universe, except, less exciting!

[ChrisM]

It got a bit sappy at the end, but I enjoyed it a lot. The mashed up universe was messy (but then it was meant to be) and didn’t entirely make sense if you analyse it, but… it was a lot of fun. I loved the steam trains in a modern setting. Not sure why so many cars would be lifted by hot air balloons but I enjoyed the imagery.

And I loved the resolution. Sure it was signposted earlier. I wondered when we saw the Doctor’s interview with the Tesselector if that would be used, but as he left through the door and it wasn’t revealed until later that he came back, my attention was diverted so he conclusion ended up a surprise after all.

[ChrisM]

The paradoxical stuff in that episode was confusing what with changing rules established at the start, etc.* No more so than Timeslides though.

A great fun episode.

*Or do they? We don’t know that ‘new universes spawned to deal with a paradox containing elements from both diverging realites/wotnot’ are always spawned in the same way with the same affect.

[ChrisM]

One way the story could continue without a reset button:

Possible spoilers, but I’m extrapolating this purely on the episodes I’ve seen so far, not leaked stuff on the internet.

The doctor actually dies…. and the ganger takes on his role instead. Considering the Tardis has some mysterious power to stabilise the biology of gangers he could be functionally identical to the original although I’m not sure that would include the regenerations. Their DNA would still be different surely, or maybe the bio-gunk copies that too.

Mind you, I think that would smeg fans off even more than the reset buttons since technically the Doctor who has existed for all these decades (centuries in show time) would be technically dead for good.

Of course he could transfer his consciousness to the ganger too, so it’s not just a copy of his mind. It would actually BE his mind. I know Moffat doesn’t believe in the soul but there’s forerunners of this in both the ganger episode and Gaiman’s one with the Doctor’s Wife. I think many fans would accept that better.

[ChrisM]

I’m pretty sure these are the original Cybermen despite how they look. (Well not original, original since I think they’re mainly converted shop-folk, but I think the technology is the alien Mondasian variety rather than the parallel universe jobs.) Didn’t those ones always convert the entire body? (I haven’t seen that many of the original episodes so I don’t know for sure, but I remember Old Who fans making a fuss when the Cybus cybermen turned out to be brains in mech-bodies.)

Mind you even the Cybus Cybermen started doing total physical conversions too when they’re resources started to run low, if we believe that Cyberwoman episode of Torchwood. As these guys are in a similar boat* I suppose this makes sense.

*Or ship. :)

[ChrisM]

> When did the sonic screwdriver start shooting green laser beams?

Some time in the last 200 years? Been a long time for the Doctor since The God Complex

My question was more rhetorical really, although that’s certainly a believable explanation.

Thing is, it’s not needed. Nothing the sonic screwdriver did in the episode was outside it’s usual capacity, except the fact we saw a visual beam. And I’m sure, even now, everything was still meant to be sound based, (the Doctor even drew emphasis to the nature of the device in the episode) the beam was there just to look cool. “Oh, look the doctor is shooting lasers at the baddies!” That’s not the Doctor’s thing.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s not really a big deal. Like complaining about the packaging for a present, maybe, and I did like the episode overall (bad resolution aside). The fact remains, the Doctor generally doesn’t shoot guns (okay he did shoot one in that Angels episode but not at anyone directly) but he does use tools.

[ChrisM]

>I don’t think Torchwood could, or should, exist without him from this point on

I agree. Well not that it couldn’t but shouldn’t, certainly. It’s changed too much as it is… although it’s still entertaining.

My comment wasn’t meant to come across that my continued watching was conditional on his leaving by the way!

[ChrisM]

I liked the latest episode, Closing Time.

Spoilers:

Silly walk aside, I like the Cybermen although they’re becoming a bit rubbish. And the cyber-mat was good fun. I also rather enjoyed the tone of the episode.

When did the sonic screwdriver start shooting green laser beams? On one hand it was kinda cool but I think they should have left it as a sound-based tool. You can use it to short circuitry and even fuse electronics (which he did) but all by sound waves.

I really didn’t like the love-reverses-cyberisation-process*-feedback-loop- resolution though. Or the cyberman who hit the doctor just having to have a knackered arm. Really? He could have escaped death in plenty other more interesting ways, I think. I know it established that these cybermen were not at their best but I think that could have been provided by a visual inspection or scan.

To leave on a more positive note, it was still a fun story. And that bit at the very end gave me a chill in a good way. I’m not so sure a bunch of kids on the street would be that interested in a geeky looking bloke in a cowboy hat though. Assuming they don’t actually watch Doctor Who. (Maybe it’s a documentary in their reality? Heh.)

*or whatever the process of becoming is called

[ChrisM]

They’re both good, but I think I’d rate Blink! over The God Complex. I’ll admit that’s largely due to novelty of following different characters and the fact I find the Weeping Angels rather scary.

[ChrisM]

Small spoilers ahead:

Thinking through the whole Blessing, anthropomorphic field thing, the effect on Jack made little sense.

I thought the series was quite good overall. I hope future series return to a more British cast/setting but I think it will likely become even more American, if the comments concerning RTD leaving turn out to be right. I’ll probably continue watching though.

[Author]

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