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lonelybritI've been snappy and short-tempered recently, though the world briefly became almost rosy again today.
1) Me and my lab partners met up after lectures to begin our latest write-up. I arrived an hour late thanks to tutorials to find them looking tired and bored. They'd been trying to work out a particular factor with no luck all this time. It took me four lines to write out the equation we'd need, and another thirty seconds to remember I'd already done the working out for them last week and it was all neatly tabulated in a file not yet opened. We felt triumphant and promptly spent the rest of the hour chatting about booze.
2) Franz pic spam: I think this may be my favourite pic of the lads yet. Not un-pretty men in eyeliner is always a cheering sight. And everyone looks so happy: Alex with his sister, Paul with his frankly depressingly well-dressed wife, Nick and a shirt that takes the word 'skintight' to new levels. And Bob with his trousers. Long live the trousers *nods*
3) Supernatural. Last week's was a fun ep; Dean sharing lost parent angst with a wee kid, FRED!, a nice little murder mystery to keep the grey cells at least a bit occupied. This week's...
I'll start with the bad because it won't take that long.
Sam. I know I should be feeling for him but at the moment I'm just not. Dean too annoyed me in places when he only seemed to be capable of one expression. So far, both lads do fine overall, but acting wise they're not even close to drawing me in the way Alexis could with Wesley. However, it is still relatively early days. Wesley did take some time to truly show how deep he went, I'm hoping at least one of the brothers will do that before too long.
Plot. So far the basic premise seems very X-Files. (I'm sorry, but this is show isn't yet up to being compared with AtS.) There's a monster, they kill it. Except with the X-Files you always got a healthy portion of a mystery, and often a nice twist at the end. I miss that here. If we're lucky there might be a bit of backstory, a little guess as to who did it and, most importantly, why. Here monsters and demons are just monsters and demons. I can't get excited about trying to figure out what's going on because clearly we're supposed to be happy that these brothers google it or whatever and come up with the answer out of the blue. And it's all clean-cut and dried and at the end it's all done.
This week, for example, I would have found it more fun if Dean *had* been the one to be possessed. There seemed to be good tension building and my hopes rose for a morally complicated showdown, only for Sam to go and ruin it all by making it blatently obvious that that wasn't going to happen.
Also, we never got any explanation as to why the demon was so interested in taking down planes, other than it is a demon and EVAL! Even on the X-Files they tried to have a little backstory for most eps, a little mystery to solve, something for the audience to ponder over. Or at least a mention of what type of demon we were dealing with. At the end when it mentioned Jessica, for one moment I thought 'Oooh, cool, a possible first link to whatever it was that started it all!' Only again for Dean to quash that theory with his mind-reading explanation. I guess I'm looking for an arc, the kind that makes you go back and re-evaluate episodes and find the random mentions that weren't random at all.
Then again. Maybe Dean was wrong. *crosses fingers*
So, if there's been suble clues and I've missed them, I apologise to the gifted writers. If there hasn't... *sigh* Well of course I'll keep watching because, despite all that, I am enjoying this series. It's not a patch on AtS, and plotwise even it comes second to X-Files. But it's still shameless fun, and like the X-Files, it has a genuinely charismatic cast.
Dean. *happy sigh* That blatant, shameless slow camera pan over him at the beginning... Yep, a cheap shot. But damn did it work. I was goo, I might even have audibly mibbled.
Plus, AWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW DORK! *squishes him* All happy and proud of his homemade EM-detector thingie, and then slightly embarassed when he realises Sam just doesn't share his geeker joy in such matters.
Add onto that his furious mutterings over being stuffed into a suit, his hilarious flouncing in the airport when he reveals his fear of flying, and of course the running. RUN SAM! RUN DEAN! SCALE THAT FENCE! *ahem*
The icing on the cake would be the hints of family angst and past trauma. He would be otherwise simply another pretty face with good quips, but his genuine devotion to Sam and his inner nerdlet save him.
Sam... I'm going to withold judgement so far since I honestly don't know what the writers are going to do to try and expand his character. I'm hoping it's not just toughening him up a la Wes in Season 2, and actually I doubt that will be it given the nature of the show. One of the boys has got to have something slightly spooky going on sooner or later.
*happily settles to wait for next week*
1) Me and my lab partners met up after lectures to begin our latest write-up. I arrived an hour late thanks to tutorials to find them looking tired and bored. They'd been trying to work out a particular factor with no luck all this time. It took me four lines to write out the equation we'd need, and another thirty seconds to remember I'd already done the working out for them last week and it was all neatly tabulated in a file not yet opened. We felt triumphant and promptly spent the rest of the hour chatting about booze.
2) Franz pic spam: I think this may be my favourite pic of the lads yet. Not un-pretty men in eyeliner is always a cheering sight. And everyone looks so happy: Alex with his sister, Paul with his frankly depressingly well-dressed wife, Nick and a shirt that takes the word 'skintight' to new levels. And Bob with his trousers. Long live the trousers *nods*
3) Supernatural. Last week's was a fun ep; Dean sharing lost parent angst with a wee kid, FRED!, a nice little murder mystery to keep the grey cells at least a bit occupied. This week's...
I'll start with the bad because it won't take that long.
Sam. I know I should be feeling for him but at the moment I'm just not. Dean too annoyed me in places when he only seemed to be capable of one expression. So far, both lads do fine overall, but acting wise they're not even close to drawing me in the way Alexis could with Wesley. However, it is still relatively early days. Wesley did take some time to truly show how deep he went, I'm hoping at least one of the brothers will do that before too long.
Plot. So far the basic premise seems very X-Files. (I'm sorry, but this is show isn't yet up to being compared with AtS.) There's a monster, they kill it. Except with the X-Files you always got a healthy portion of a mystery, and often a nice twist at the end. I miss that here. If we're lucky there might be a bit of backstory, a little guess as to who did it and, most importantly, why. Here monsters and demons are just monsters and demons. I can't get excited about trying to figure out what's going on because clearly we're supposed to be happy that these brothers google it or whatever and come up with the answer out of the blue. And it's all clean-cut and dried and at the end it's all done.
This week, for example, I would have found it more fun if Dean *had* been the one to be possessed. There seemed to be good tension building and my hopes rose for a morally complicated showdown, only for Sam to go and ruin it all by making it blatently obvious that that wasn't going to happen.
Also, we never got any explanation as to why the demon was so interested in taking down planes, other than it is a demon and EVAL! Even on the X-Files they tried to have a little backstory for most eps, a little mystery to solve, something for the audience to ponder over. Or at least a mention of what type of demon we were dealing with. At the end when it mentioned Jessica, for one moment I thought 'Oooh, cool, a possible first link to whatever it was that started it all!' Only again for Dean to quash that theory with his mind-reading explanation. I guess I'm looking for an arc, the kind that makes you go back and re-evaluate episodes and find the random mentions that weren't random at all.
Then again. Maybe Dean was wrong. *crosses fingers*
So, if there's been suble clues and I've missed them, I apologise to the gifted writers. If there hasn't... *sigh* Well of course I'll keep watching because, despite all that, I am enjoying this series. It's not a patch on AtS, and plotwise even it comes second to X-Files. But it's still shameless fun, and like the X-Files, it has a genuinely charismatic cast.
Dean. *happy sigh* That blatant, shameless slow camera pan over him at the beginning... Yep, a cheap shot. But damn did it work. I was goo, I might even have audibly mibbled.
Plus, AWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW DORK! *squishes him* All happy and proud of his homemade EM-detector thingie, and then slightly embarassed when he realises Sam just doesn't share his geeker joy in such matters.
Add onto that his furious mutterings over being stuffed into a suit, his hilarious flouncing in the airport when he reveals his fear of flying, and of course the running. RUN SAM! RUN DEAN! SCALE THAT FENCE! *ahem*
The icing on the cake would be the hints of family angst and past trauma. He would be otherwise simply another pretty face with good quips, but his genuine devotion to Sam and his inner nerdlet save him.
Sam... I'm going to withold judgement so far since I honestly don't know what the writers are going to do to try and expand his character. I'm hoping it's not just toughening him up a la Wes in Season 2, and actually I doubt that will be it given the nature of the show. One of the boys has got to have something slightly spooky going on sooner or later.
*happily settles to wait for next week*
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no subject
Date: 2006-02-14 02:14 am (UTC)We felt triumphant and promptly spent the rest of the hour chatting about booze.
Heheheeh. Good to see some quality time was had by all.
no subject
Date: 2006-02-14 05:11 am (UTC)I was feeling unbearably smug. I came into the library and they were both sitting there complaining about how they didn't know how to work this thing out. Less than one minute later and we were all done. And considering I'm usually the slow one of the group, it was a nice moment for me, LOL!
no subject
Date: 2006-02-14 02:51 am (UTC)They've clearly been raised in a dysfuncional enviroment, and both have developed different coping mechansims, Dean is the devil may care smart ass, and Sam wanted out of it, kinda like how if your parents are alcoholics, you might get sucked into it too (Dean), or you might cut yourself of from them (Sam). Presumably they'll hug and cry, learn and grow. I think that's where the real story is here, the supernatural elements are really just a plot device for that, kinda an external manifestion of internal demons.
no subject
Date: 2006-02-14 05:18 am (UTC)I would agree with you except the very first episode made it clear that there's a mystery to be solved about who attacked the family and why. I want to know why it's come back now, and what it is about Sam that's so important - he's been at the centre of the attacks both times. Their Dad is off somewhere and seems to have cut them loose, I don't know why but I'm guessing it's because of all this.
I do adore the boys background and their relationship with each other and their father. Certainly it's what makes SN so damn watchable, but at the same time the show has a lot of potential to be doing other things each week in addition to keeping that development going. I keep on watching it and thinking 'And there goes another missed opportunity to make a nice moment a bloody fantastic one.'
no subject
Date: 2006-02-14 06:35 am (UTC)The thing about having a mytharc though is, it rapidly becomes a convuluted mess, like the X Files did, or puts a cap on the potential audience, like the later years of Buffy and Angel did. Im much more intersted in seeing character development than I am in seeing a mytharc develop, I don't need to see the supernatural stuff go anywhere as long as the characters do.
no subject
Date: 2006-02-14 06:49 am (UTC)But that could change *hopeful*
no subject
Date: 2006-02-14 02:53 am (UTC)YAY!
Gah - I LOVE that photo. MMMM. *stares* Also, why did I not know there was a
Re. Supernatural - all valid concerns. They've been signed for a second season, so I think that the network are keen for them to develop a loyal audience before they start getting totally bogged down in mytharc (although I'm not saying that they don't!). Plus, imo, the story really ramps up from here on in - some of your issues? Are you *sure* you haven't been reading spoilers?!
no subject
Date: 2006-02-14 05:36 am (UTC)Regarding SN, I thinks it's also simply that I'm a rather picky viewer. I'm the kind of soul who guessed the twist to the Sixth Sense from reading the summary, guessed The Others outcome about twenty minutes in, and generally enjoys picking things to pieces and trying to figure out why they work, LOL! SN gave us that lovely mystery at the beginning and I'm all ready to start taking notes and attempt making sense of it all. I guess I'm impatient *blush*
The only spoiler I let myself see was to check that Dean wasn't looking so poorly for any particularly heartbreaking reason. I am becoming quite fond of him. I think SN will be taking up the space in my heart left by Due South - another lovely show which was unashamedly fun, cheesy, had a great cast and every now and then indulged in plot and angst, without going continually twisty or dark like X-Files/AtS.
*twitches* and now I have to wait till Monday for the next ep. Oh well, I suppose I could work in the interim... *eyes waiting reports*
no subject
Date: 2006-02-14 03:24 pm (UTC)Supernatural has the same effect on me, I'm afraid. I want to be sucked in, but so far I'm not terribly impressed with the writing or acting. Dean is pretty, and there's a dash of dad/brother angst to keep me interested, but the storylines are fairly duff. Substandard Xfiles.
I shall perservere. *sigh* I shall also smap your work for you, as I'm in a serious work-smapping mood these days. *snarls*
no subject
Date: 2006-02-14 04:19 pm (UTC)*hugs you* We shall spork the work loads together and get them to go away and bug someone else!