Phil

[Phil]

Can’t we have one meeting that doesn’t end with us digging up a corpse?

[Phil]

Also, whomever knocked this thread off the front page deserves to die.

[Phil]

I’m having trouble understanding how much of series XV was part of Rimmer’s dream. Obviously it’s clear by now that he never bought the hotel on Mimas and employed Hollister as the lowly bellman, who then had to cater to a hilariously rude but famous orangutan, and that Cat did not really win the Fish-For-A-Lifetime Sweepstakes. But how come Lister remembers solving all of those curry-related murders since we’ve only ever seen his detective agency in connection with those two stories?

Still not convinced Kryten could have gotten Kochanski pregnant, either. The synthetic sperm explanation was logical, sure, but I’m not sure why they would have bothered having it installed…

[Phil]

>?Urination. Ur doin it wrong?

Um…was that a urination joke? I always assumed it to be the other…what with Cat popping up from a squat…

[Phil]

>Goodall will also compose one piece for the show each month.

Niiice!

[Phil]

Inferno’s the black guy?

[Phil]

Finally got to see this thanks to a friend with a metal plate in his skull.

I have mixed feelings. I mean, was it ever mentioned before that Lister had a dog before he went into stasis? And how, exactly, did it get “fast fossilized” when everyone else on board the ship was just vaporized?

Some really good moments throughout (Scrappy, the janitor, is an excellent new character and a great addition, and I really enjoyed the wrestling scene between Kochanski and Pete Tranter’s sister) but I hope I’m not alone in feeling that it was VERY out of character for Kryten to toss the dog into the lava pit. (Why did they have one of those on board, anyway?)

All in all a 7/10, but if you don’t cry during the ending sequence that shows Lister’s dog waiting for him for three million years set to the tune of Don’t Go Breakin’ My Heart, then you’ve got no soul man. No soul.

[Phil]

>If you?ve read any spoilers you?ll know the ?crystal? skull is in fact neither gold nor crystal?

And if you haven’t, you just have.

[Phil]

I nominate this thread for Hall of Fame induction.

[Phil]

Missed this week’s due to a collapsed lung. Did they make it back to Earth!?

[Phil]

I’m writing some Jump Leads slash fiction, if you’re interested.

[Phil]

You should host a contest where the winner gets free admission. And a plane ticket to London from Florida, and back again. Plus he gets lodging and a meal allowance.

Also, it’s me.

[Phil]

Um…yes, it was definitely intended to be. Sorry. The above is the best you’ll ever get out of me after a 10-hour workday. I meant it sincerely.

[Phil]

Yeah, it looks great, Ben. I really need to sit down and go through the whole of Jump Leads. I read a bunch of them a while back and was much more impressed than I was prepared to be.

[Phil]

I love you.

[Phil]

I don’t even have to click your link Andrew to know it’s that Imitation of Life video. :-)

Definitely a great video…it actually manages to take a mediocre song and make it seem far better than it really is, simply by association.

I do wonder, though, how they got certain party guests to mouth fragments of the song…if it was only a 20 second loop then they must have had everyone singing a different part of the song at the same time, which is by no means undoable…but it would sure take an admirable amount of coordination!

[Phil]

Yes, yes, we know the title of this thread, but what is the title of the documentary?

[Phil]

Speaking of Mario Kart:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FuX5_OWObA0&feature=related

Fuck you if you don’t love this.

[Phil]

A lot of good in that. Some scattered excellent lines and–though others may disagree with me–I was definitely a fan of the motionless camera. The ending wasn’t quite “right,” but I definitely enjoyed it overall.

Would it be too much to ask for a bit of context? What IS it?

[Phil]

I bet you didn’t even remember to move your clothes down onto the lower peg.

But serizzles…G&T Tourney.

[Phil]

I like to do that, too. It gives you a chance to reflect on what you’ve been through before returning to the “real” world. It’s kind of like leaving the film behind gradually, rather than immediately and all at once. A chance to linger a bit in the mood of the film.

[Phil]

Doing a tournament tomorrow, noon eastern. I’ll set up the room. Just log in and join if you’re interested.

[Phil]

G+T TOURNAMENT PLEASE

Also: after a few days out of town I got home, popped in the game for a quick race or two before bed, and shot up THREE HUNDRED POINTS.

Of course this still leaves me slightly below the starting value of 5000 points…but I do at least feel a bit better about myself.

[Phil]

John Hoare:
a) Hot
b) Not

[Phil]

Is it fun?

[Phil]

Yeah, yesterday was the worst I’ve seen it. I could get on and play for a stretch, but after a few races I’d be disconnected.

In fact, the same thing happened to me as happened to you, John: I was winning a race when I got disconnected…only I didn’t get the points for it! You lucky shit.

[Phil]

>?Note : The Joker died on the way back to his home planet?

I love you.

[Phil]

>GNP moves towards?well, something exciting, hopefully. (If it happens, I?ll probably come running back.)

Even in your farewell you can’t resist toying with us. Grrr.

Serious question, though: when you finally do leave the website duties behind, are GNP still planning to hire someone to handle weekly updates? Not that I’d be applying for the job or anything…I’m just curious if they’ve taken any of that into account.

[Phil]

>Smash Bros isn?t out in the UK until JUNE THE FUCKING 27TH.

Maybe they’re going to use that time to improve the servers, or something. Internet Smash is fun, but compared to how reliable and fluid the Mario Kart online experience has been so far, it’s a joke. If anything, it shows how much room for improvement there is for Smash.

I’ve been told that it’s far better when you play against friends, and I believe that, but my only friend on Smash is Ben Paddon, and I haven’t managed to catch him online yet.

Which is probably for the better. He’d murder me.

[Phil]

I did some online karting last night…a very strange thing is that I actually did BETTER right off the bat than I started doing later on, after having logged more race time.

No idea why that is…I started off always finishing in the top three or four, and then, later on, it was a struggle to stay above 9th or 10th. I should be getting better, not worse!

Also strangely: I’m better in battle mode. Which I’m fine with, but I’d have never expected that.

Anyway, the main thing is that even though I ended up getting my butt THOROUGHLY DECIMATED by my online opponents, the game was still FUN. And that’s what matters most…that you can enjoy the game without having to win every time. Granted, I called Luigi all manner of filthy names, but I was still enjoying myself. The game is doing something right, after all, and it says a lot that it’s still a delight to play while you’re losing.

[Phil]

There might be a problem with the way the board works that prevents the link from being shown…I say that only because I presume the post started with “<" and nothing appeared. My own post, earlier, was of one of those little "<3" things, which also started with "<" and nothing appeared.

Either that or performingmonkey posted a blank topic. Which…I wouldn’t put past him.

[Phil]

Added you all. Now add me.

1590 5083 2099

[Phil]

Went out to buy it today…turns out it’s not released til tomorrow. Wahhh.

[Phil]

>(They hug Gervais but barely notice Coogan? What IS that?!)

Whomever decides which BBC programs to export is certainly more to blame for that than either Gervais or Coogan and I can’t see you holding it against Gervais.

Blame it easily on the fact that The Office arrived here with enormous fanfare and multi-network advertising (I didn’t even have BBC America at the time and I always knew which episode was going to air next, and when), with a fairly quick turnaround after its UK run (meaning it was still “fresh”). I’m Alan Partridge, on the other hand, is the ONLY thing Coogan has done that’s had a US airing. (Saxondale may have had a US airing in the recent time that I’ve been without a television, but if that’s the case, then I haven’t heard a thing about it.)

And it came unadvertised.

About two years ago.

To a morning slot.

Between two episodes of Bargain Hunt or some crap.

I understand your frustration…I’m the only American I know who’s seen League of Gentlemen, but practically everyone can quote Little Britain. But you can’t hold it against either one of them, though, because one has actually been introduced to the country with some dignity, and the other just kind of appeared and vanished.

[Phil]

Yeah, don’t you bastards dare lose interest before I get the game!

[Phil]

>but my point is, look how long it?s taken Sky to still-not-yet get it in production.

Ah, gotcha. I think I was just very much thrown by the fact that your earlier post didn’t end in a “thank fuck.”

[Phil]

The way you reacted to the news that they wanted to remake The Prisoner would lead me to believe you’d be GLAD they haven’t gotten around to it!

[Phil]

Also: Eric Kaplan wrote the “Girlfriends” episode of Flight of the Conchords. This movie is gonna rockkkkkkk.

[Phil]

Yeah, don’t get me wrong, season one is still good, but it’s got to be the weakest of the first eight, by quite a lot. The quality kicks up HUGELY for season two (for the most part). It’s still great stuff, but very slow moving, and very different.

Peas and Corn is right about the emotional stuff, but I still tend to prefer the later emotional episodes (Mother Simpson, for example, or the adorable–and surprisingly touching–A Fish Called Selma) where it’s just as heartfelt but still manages to be at least ten times as funny.

They really struck the right balance of emotion/comedy somewhere in the course of seasons two and three, and it stayed pretty constant for the rest of the run. Too much in season one is either emotional OR funny…the show got better at managing both as time went on.

And then, just as suddenly, became horrible at doing either.

[Phil]

>I?ll just sit down with the DVDs from the beginning at some point –

Nothing against the earliest of Simpsons stuff, but I’d actually recommend starting with season four or five and working forward from there, dipping back occasionally into the first seasons.

There’s excellent stuff there, don’t get me wrong, but the gag-rate took a while to increase, the voices/animation took a while to come together, and the writing was sometimes pretty spotty.

There’s really no reason to START with season one, at this point, as the characters are well-enough known to even casual television viewers that you won’t need much orientation before plunging into the episodes. So you might as well dive right in to the absolute best the show had to offer.

My two cents.

[Phil]

>this is the episode with the show takes the audience into its confidence that the show depends on the reset button.

I still think it could have been handled much, much better. The “reset” button is highlighted just fine in Itchy and Scratchy and Poochie, and in the previous season the whole, “Don’t worry! We’ll never see this character again I promise!” thing has already been overused (Poochie, Frank Grimes, Shari Bobbins, Rex Banner…).

I don’t know. Part of me wants to like it if only because it DOES attempt to do something interesting with the concept of “a character.” I just wish they’d decided to do that with one that wasn’t already a functional, perfectly-well developed one already.

Ah well. Season nine definitely did usher in the concept of “skippable Simpsons episode,” it’s just a matter of which qualifies for which people.

[Phil]

Look!

>Ken Keeler himself said, “I am very proud of the job I did on this episode. This is the best episode of television I feel I ever wrote.”

If ever we needed more evidence that the artist himself is the least equipped to judge his own work…I mean, think what you will about this episode, but how on Earth does it compare to the absolute brilliance of his work on Futurama?

[Phil]

Ah, okay. See, that’s basically what I figured he was going for. (If it was even his own idea to begin with…the odds are fairly high that it wasn’t since, as I understand it, the Simpsons episodes are often assigned to writers other than the one who pitched the idea.) And I did want to like it, because I agree with what he’s saying, and I don’t think that it was even a bad idea to do that to *a* character.

But the thing is…Principal Skinner…okay. The other characters may not have been close to him. Agreed. But he’s one of the best-developed secondary characters on the show, and he’s always had a place in my heart as a favorite. So many of the characters (by design, mind) are just stereotypes, so it’s nice when someone like Principal Skinner turns up, because he feels more like a real, rounded character.

He may not have meant much to Springfield, but the reaction to this episode shows how much he meant to the viewers.

Had they done this with Disco Stu, or the Sea Captain, or Sideshow Mel or something (ie: a character who doesn’t mean much to the townspeople NOR the viewer), I don’t think there’d have been any real reaction at all from the viewers. Some might dislike it, but there are least wouldn’t be such a widespread temptation to forget it ever happened.

Also, Skinner is one of the secondary characters that, by that point, we’ve been asked to pity. The show had already made several attempts to align us emotionally behind that character, so it’s a bit unfair for that same show to make us all feel like asses for doing so.

As an aside: I was dating a certain girl when this episode aired and she thought it was a great episode. We broke up soon afterward.

[Phil]

>Keeler?s defence of the episode

Do go on!

[Phil]

>Plus it was written by Ken Keeler and David X. Cohen! They absolutely and completely can DO NO WRONG.

David X.: correct.

Ken Keeler: The Principal and the Pauper. But otherwise, correct.

[Phil]

I don’t think it craps all over the two most emotional moments at all…it just kind of rewrote them. Seymour was pining for Fry to come back from the North Pole, rather than the future, and the fact that Yancy missed his brother in Luck of the Fryrish doesn’t mean he has to STILL miss him for those scenes to have had impact. We saw one side of what happened and then Fry managed to go back and prevent it…it doesn’t change the emotional weight of the original, just the causal repercussions.

Think of it this way: Fry realized how much his brother missed him and went back in time to put it right (among other things). That’s touching in itself, no? I don’t think Yancy needs to suffer continuously for that previous episode to hold its own…

Not that I’m disregarding your point…if it truly ruins those episodes for you then I understand you being frustrated. But I have a high regard for both of those episodes, and this film didn’t undo any of the emotion for me at all.

[Phil]

For those of you who don’t know, this episode is being written by Eric Kaplan, who is probably second only to Ken Keeler in quality of Futurama writing. His previous episodes:

“Hell Is Other Robots”
“Why Must I Be a Crustacean in Love?”
“A Bicyclops Built for Two”
“Parasites Lost”
“I Dated a Robot”
“Jurassic Bark”
“Three Hundred Big Boys”

Truly a talented guy, and a great choice to assign the film to.

[Phil]

>Rimmer?s right there and doesn?t correct Lister?s ?lie? about being dumped by Kochanski?

That scene occurs several years after meeting Kryten, though…surely Rimmer would have tired by then of pointing out the lie every time. Besides, Rimmer already has something larger to take issue with: the perceived inanity of the story.

[Phil]

>there?s no way to reconcile the change to the Kochanski relationship.

I had it in mind, at one point, that the Lister/Kochanski thing went pretty much as we knew it to go in series I/II–he was pining for her, getting nothing.

Then Kryten comes aboard, and Lister tweaks his history a little bit so that he doesn’t sound like such a lonely, worthless guy to this robot who looks up for him. He pretends they’ve actually dated. Kryten accepts that.

Series VI: Lister is defrosted in Psirens and Kryten prompts him with information about his life. One of those tidbits is that Lister dated Kochanski, which Kryten does believe to be true. Now Lister, hearing it about himself, comes to believe it as well.

Series VII: Kochanski arrives from a parallel universe where she actually WAS dating Lister. Our Lister/Kryten has no idea that it was any different in “our” universe so nobody questions it. Cat doesn’t give a shit.

Paradox resolved.

[Phil]

It’s time’s like this I wish Tonguetied were here to address the question with a 700 word stream of unpunctuated nonsense.

[Author]

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