Land of the mildly insane

Out of nowhere I am suddenly smitten all over again with love for my cracked alien show. Kicked off yesterday evening when I was reminded of one of the shallow reasons I am rather partial to a good dose of Jack/Ianto.

x. Exhibit A: spaceygal64 posted ( her pal's rather fetching pic of GDL at Summerhill Vets open day )
x. Exhibit B: John Barrowman's hands. ( And their relative size to everything else... as shown here in To The Last Man )

Then of course amanda_is_wacky posted belated pics of Masters, David-Lloyd, Owen, and Myles at The Rift. The pictures of Eve and Kai in particular left me a happy puddle of fangirl-y glooop =)

And finally, because the best posts have a good sense of humour: The Idiot's Guide to Writing Torchwood Fan Fiction. 20, mainly multiple-choice, questions that will leave you with a good basic outline of an 'acceptable' Torchwood fic. Yes I do like Jack/Ianto, that doesn't mean I don't enjoy mocking them mercilessly if it's good-natured like this :)

Word of warning - if you hated this week's ep, this is not the place to voice that opinion. This post is full of heartbroken squee, let me enjoy it :)

Suffice to say that yes, I loved this week's ep. I didn't actually cry, but god was it a close call. My eyes were welling up at certain points. Hats off to Moffat. Also, serious hats off to Tate. Donna broke my heart this ep and she is now my favourite companion of the RTD era - I'm 'alright' too *sniffle*

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First things first *clears throat*

*~*~*HAPPY BIRTHDAY madders !!!!!*~*~*

I hope you had a fabulous day filled with sunshine and prettiness of all forms and plentiful cake :)

And whilst you're bathing in champagne, I'll recount my weekend. ( Which comprised of a wedding, Indiana Jones 4, and a smattering of Doctor Who (no spoilers)... )

Of course I'm also full of happiness over the sudden splurge of 'Torchwood' related news. Congratulations to Burn on bagging the role of Bill Sykes. (The Ghost Master actor has also been cast - I might have to see this production...) Also congrats to dear Barrowman and David-Lloyd on getting themselves within the top 20 of AfterElton.com's Hot 100 for 2008 list. (I also ♥ their reactions: JB - "I’m thrilled with the results. Who wouldn’t want to come in behind Jake Gyllenhaal?"; GDL - "I understand I'm underneath John Barrowman, which seems to happen quite a lot."). And finally, whilst there's still no official word from the BBC, TVGuide's blog / interview with Julie Gardner (exec producer) does apparently confirm that S3 is a go, and also what format it will take. I miss my show... *pines*

Yes, I have come to an important decision, or rather I think I'm nearly there. I know you are all breathless with anticipation, but I think I can begin to pinpoint my favourite gladiators from the new series.

( Swinging behind a cut... )

I feel quite exhausted, and I only watched the last ten minutes of the game. ( Cut in case anyone is still waiting to hear the results of Man U vs Chelsea. Suffice to say I was impressed, not least because it's amazing how touchy-feely men get with each other when they win/lose... )

*happy sigh*

You know how it's always a risk going back to childhood memories due to it being rare things will in fact be as shiny and cheesily fun as you remember?

Times like this it's good to know the risk can sometimes be worth it, because sometimes they do get it right and bring it back pretty much good as new.

Yes, thank you moonlettuce for pointing out YouTube, I am so happily geeked out right now =)

It's been a good bank holiday weekend for me, I hope it's been the same for everyone else. Balmy sunshine, fantastic company, and gratuitous oggling of pretty people - colour me content :)

Breaking it down into specifics.

x. I finally got to watch the second part of Sontaron arc (SPOILERS in comments). My main reactions were 'NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!' about 20mins in (*sob*); 'Dammit why does Donna's gramps always make me cry', and 'Oooh'... Looking forward to next week!

x. Collectormania. I hooked up with princess_s and friends for the Sunday, and it left me knackered but generally full of love. ( Cut to save the FL... )

x. Returned to princess_s's where we planned to have an early night, and instead stayed up to the early hours discussing crack!fic, trying to fix the internet connection, and then watching Desperado. It was the first time I've seen it, and I liked it muchly :)

x. Returning home, catching up on 3 days worth of LJ history *collapses* I'd heard that GDL's gig up in Cardiff had overall gone well if not swimmingly for his own band's set. I blithely swanned onto OG and smack into what I think, with a few more threads under its belt, could qualify as wank. Brilliant stuff. I backed right out, had a cider, and then returned to reread the various flailings. Oh Gareth. Oh fandom. Oh life. Right now I'm in a mellow mood, so I'm just amused and happy to move on and contemplate deep issues such as when I can go watch the new Indy movie =)

I'm generally having a prolonged geeker joy moment right now. Happy aftershocks of The Rift aside, I'm already collecting myself for Collectormania next weekend. So far being listed is Barrowman, Myles, Owen (EEEEE!!! ♥♥♥), and one Matt Rippy. I'm mildly gutted that the olden day Torchwood crowd are attending on every day BUT the one I can make, but still, Matt Rippy people! CAPTAIN JACK HARKNESS!!

Anyway, for the Torchwood fans amongst you in need of a lift, let me rec these two posts for good vids of the impromptu gig given by Kai Owen (and towards the end Gareth David-Lloyd) when Marsters had to bow out due to sickness.

Post the first: Gig highlights - by fairyd123
Here be vids, a report and pics. I recommend Land of my Fathers, in particular hold out to the end where Kai Owen has really warmed up and nails the final chorus and earned himself the first of a couple of standing ovations :)

Post the second: Even MORE gig highlights! - by londinensa
I recommend Bread of Heaven sung beautifully by Kai, but with great backup by Gareth David-Lloyd. If, and I cannot stress this enough, IF you have a strong sense of humour then I'd also suggest Summer Nights by Gareth David-Lloyd and some anonymous member of the audience. Musically this rendition is nothing but PAIN. Bless em, but they could not keep in key with each other to save their lives. BUT Gareth did salvage what he could from the train wreck by abandoning any real attempt to get the right lyrics and simply substituted some of his own :)

The second post also has Gareth singing Bam Bam. The problem with a hard blues-y song is that a lot of the drive, tune and beat come from the backup. Of which there was none. There was just Gareth, but he did do just fine on his own. And even if there was no back-up music, there was Steve with his back-up dancing which left me in happy stitches.

Just a quick initial reaction to the Rift today. Firstly, rather disorganised, there were delays and queues all over the place. But I still give it a firm thumbs up - all the guests were brilliant and the Q&A sessions great fun.

But the main highlight, as it were, came at the end of the day. We all settled in our seats for Marster's concert, only for his manager Steven to come onstage and announce that due to sickness the gig was cancelled. Refunds were offered for those that wanted, and for those willing to stay for a bit, Kai Owen had volunteered to try and entertain us for a few minutes since there was no-one else around. He was obviously, and quickly warned us that he was, very drunk.

What followed has got to have been the most cracktastic 40/50 minutes of my life. Kai swore like a trooper pretty much constantly but actually managed to hold the fort for nearly half an hour until the cavalry arrived. Or at least Gareth David-Lloyd joined the fray (he'd phoned to see how it was going and was told Kai was doing stand-up. His reaction: 'Oh f**k.') Highlights included Gareth and some audience member massacring Grease's 'Summer Nights', Kai singing in general (great voice), Kai singing a hymn (Bread of heaven, bread of heaven...) with Gareth providing the human beatbox backup, and Gareth singing some hard blues-y song with Steven providing the backup dancing.

They kept on apologising for cancelling the gig, saying James would really have been there if he could, and then thanking us repeatedly for sticking around anyway. One of these apologies/thanks leading to Gareth pointing to us as we cheered and applauded one of his and Kai's tuneful efforts and going 'Kai, that is fandom.' Whereupon we all felt rather proud and chuffed and cheered a bit more :)

So we are in the final run-up to The Rift on Saturday. Somehow it does seem to have morphed a bit into an unofficial Torchwood convention (or, as the website puts it, a 'Torchwood gathering'), and assuming no more guests cancel it's certainly got a guestlist that any official con would be proud of.

In any case, predictably the usual pre-con/gig/meetup dilemma has finally arrived, namely the age-old question: What am I going to wear?!

I think it must be something in the genes that kickstarts this reaction, as it really is the most pointless question I could ever ask myself, and yet I do so every time. I know what I will wind up wearing, because it is the same outfit I always wear. Why I always go into such a tizz is quite beyond me, but the panic's here now, and I glumly predict it will not go away until I'm actually on the train. *sigh*