In case of Apocalypse, break glass

Well, much as I bitched about the delay in Living showing Season 5 of Supernatural, I certainly can't complain that they aren't promoting it enough. Not only has my daily commute been massively cheered by photos of SamnDean all over the underground, bus stations, phone boxes and the Metro, I'm also impressed by how inventive they have been. Take this fantastic bus stop ad, captured by lovely L (hubbie of C, owner of Dean pants).

And remember, if you haven't watched it before but fancy giving it a go, you can read my easy catch up guide.

Quote of the Day

He's coming!

Yup, Lucifer is on his way... Supernatural

Travel the verse...

I posted a while back about the super cool Battlestar Galactica propaganda posters from Think Geek - and these Firefly/Serenity ones are equally cool. Now if only I had a travel companion like Capt Mal...

Quote of the Day

What blood type is he - A positive? Bit Jacob's Creeky for my taste.

Could be worse, could be Blossom Hill, I suppose.

Seth, Being Human

Not Mad About Mad Men

Mad Men is one of those shows that, even though I had never seen it, people assumed I was in love with. When I revealed that I had never in fact even watched it, the answer was always the same. “Oh, you’ll love it! The clothes are fantastic!” Now, leaving aside the slightly worrying fact that people assume I judge my TV shows by wardrobe (when everyone knows I judge them by the hotness of the boys), I was so convinced I’d agree that, when I did my big post-birthday Amazon binge last year, I nearly bought both series one and two at once, as I figured it would simply save time from buying them separately. So, having restrained myself to series one, I settled down and watched the first three episodes. And, you know what? The clothes are fantastic. I did love them. But that’s pretty much all I loved.

Because Mad Men is one of those shows, like the Sopranos or the Shield, that I can admire but I just can’t like. I recognise the quality of the acting, the writing, the styling, the amazing attention to detail and the respect for the viewers’ intelligence – all rare enough qualities these days. But nothing made me actually want to watch it. I simply didn’t like any of the characters.
Now, I recognise that is not the most sophisticated filter for viewing, but if I’m going to commit myself to hours on end of watching something, I want to at least like some of the people I’m watching. I’m quite happy going to see a film or a play that consists of horrible people being horrible to one another, but I can’t sustain enough interest in that to get me through a whole boxed set. I like my characters flawed, it’s true, but there has to be some underlying core of decency somewhere, some light to balance the dark, and not a single person in Mad Men spoke to me. As a friend of mine who loves both this show and the Wire sympathised, it’s like trying to love the Wire if all you think of McNulty is he’s a disgraceful drunk. And that was my problem. I loved Joan’s clothes but disliked her character, and while I know I am supposed to swoon like a schoolgirl at the old school charm of Don Draper, I don’t see him as some damaged hero, I think he’s just a sexist prick.

Which ties into my other worry about the show – some of the fans really worry me. While I know this is in no way true of the majority of the viewers (many of my friends love the show, and nary a racist, misogynist or homophobe among them) there is that scary little group who see the show not as a quality drama about a time in flux, but as a window to a bygone golden age, where men were men and women secretly liked it. (When they weren’t drinking themselves to death in frustration at their stunted dreams and emotionally suffocating lives, of course.) In the flurry of articles that accompanied the launch of the third series, more than one suggested that women in particular yearn for that era, that the reason so many fancy Don Draper is that they wish modern men were a bit more like him. Well, I’m sure some do, but I can’t say I know a whole lot of them. I must admit I like my men fairly unreconstructed, but even I don’t yearn to be swept off my feet by a man who thinks my rightful place is pregnant in the suburbs. (Admittedly, I imagine I’d fall more into the role of “free spirited mistress” than “dutiful wife”, but neither really appeals, thanks). I don’t equate masculinity with misogyny, and while the clothes might be pretty, there’s more to life than a smart suit and a pretty dress. And this is me saying that...

But even if the politics weren’t off putting, it still wouldn’t be the show for me. To me, a film or a play is like a date with a stranger. You go along, not sure what you’ll encounter, but you owe it to yourself to get out there and try and be open to new people, even if they don’t seem your type. A TV series is like a relationship: there’s no point in sticking with it if you aren’t really in love.

Quote of the

- I'll take the shuttle in closer. Zoe, ship is yours. Remember, if anything happens to me, or you don't hear from me within the hour, you take this ship... and you come and rescue me.

- What, risk my ship?

Mal and Zoe talk tactics, Serenity

Supernatural for Beginners

With Living currently running a fairly blanket bombing campaign to promote Supernatural, even those of you who haven’t seen it before might be tempted to tune in. Regular readers of this blog will know I can’t recommend it highly enough – it’s scary, sexy and often hilariously funny. Plus, those boys are hot. But in joining Season 5 there’s a lot of plot under the bridge already. Need to know more? Read on.

The background
When Sam Winchester is a baby, his mother Mary comes into his room one night to find a strange man standing over his bed. Hearing her scream, her husband John rushes to her aid only to find her pinned, in flames, to the ceiling. Passing his baby son to the toddler Dean to get out of the house, he is unable to save his wife – instead, he hits the road with his two sons, determined to hunt the thing that killed her. Years pass and he trains the boys to be hunters, but when Sam decides he has enough of the life and wants to go to college, it splits the family and they are estranged. Then one night Dean shows up saying “Dad’s on a hunting trip... and he hasn’t been home in a while.”

Season 1
A reluctant Sam agrees to help Dean go find their father; they fail to do so but find his journal, which suggests he is finally on the scent of the thing that killed Mary. Dean wants to keep looking but Sam insists on returning to college, only to find when he does so that Jessica is dead – murdered in the exact same way as his mother...

Story Arc
Very much a monster of the week season, the loose story arc is the boys’ hunt for their father, who, it turns out, is avoiding them, having both tracked the Yellow Eyed Demon who murdered Mary and the one thing able to kill him, a Colt gun built by Samuel Colt himself. Eventually reconciled, the Winchesters confront the Demon and his cohorts but he escapes, while the Winchesters’ car is totalled by a demon-possessed truck driver, leaving them all seriously injured.

Big Bad: The Yellow Eyed Demon
Introducing: Meg, a demon, Bobby, a family friend

Season 2
The Winchesters are in hospital after the crash, Dean hovering between life and death. John makes a deal with the YED: his life, soul and the Colt for Dean’s life. The demon agrees...

Story Arc
Again, a lot of monster of the week episodes but a stronger arc as the brothers try and track the demon, deal with the fallout of John’s death and his final warning to Dean to look after his brother and, if he cannot save him, to kill him – because Sam is developing psychic and telekinetic powers – and not only that, there are a whole load of people the same age like him, whose mothers also died in similar circumstances, and not all of them are turning out to be well adjusted human beings. Turns out the demon wants someone to free his fellow demons from hell and he needs a human to do it. The season finale has him transporting his “special children” to a remote village for a lethal form of Survivor – Sam, refusing to play, is killed by the only other man who survives the game. A distraught Dean makes a deal with a crossroads demon – if Sam his brought back to life, Dean will agree to give up his soul in exactly one year. The brothers foil the YED’s plan, regain the Colt and kill him, but only after a hellgate is temporarily opened – releasing not only numberless demons but the soul of John Winchester.

Big Bad: Yellow Eyed Demon
Introducing: Ellen and her daughter Jo, fellow veterans of the hunter circuit, Ghost Facers, a bunch of inept geeky ghost hunters, the Reaper who tries to harvest Dean’s soul (and makes a reappearance in S4)

Season 3
The boys try and stop as many of the freed demons as they can, all the while trying to find a way to get Dean out of his deal before the year is out.

Story arc
In a season truncated by the writers’ strike, the story is more focused on getting out of Dean’s deal, which is now held by a demon called Lilith. A demon called Ruby shows up saying she is on the side of good, bringing with her a knife that kills demons and the claim that she can help Sam use his powers to defeat Lilith – something Dean is dead set against. The season ends with the boys and Bobby confronting Lilith – and failing, leaving Dean to be dragged off to hell...

Big Bad: Lilith

Season 4
Dean’s back! He claws himself out of the grave, claiming to have no memory of how he has been resurrected or what he did in hell. Turns out Sam has been busy in the six months he has been gone...

Story arc
An arc heavy season, when the mythology changes big time: turns out Dean has been pulled from hell by angels to play a role in a battle between heaven and hell to stop Lilith breaking the 66 seals that, once broken, will free Lucifer. (I’m guessing, if you’ve seen the trailers for Season 5, you know that didn’t go so well). Much of the season is spent not only on this but on the fallout from Dean’s stay in hell – where, having been tortured for years, he finally gave in and became torturer himself, which broke the first seal. He’s wracked with guilt and increasingly at odds with his brother, who in his absence teamed up with Ruby and honed his powers (gained, we discover, because the YED bled into his mouth and Sam now has partly demon blood in him) to exorcise demons. Only it turns out he needs to drink demon blood to do it... The finale has a Winchester showdown between Dean and Sam, with Sam choosing to side with Ruby and try to kill Lilith. Dean is kidnapped by the angels, who tell him that they don’t want to stop Apocalypse, they want to win it, and he’s their means to do so. He escapes with the help of Castiel, but is too late to stop Sam killing Lilith – which they discover is the final seal, as Ruby – evil all along and an acolyte of the YED, whose plan this was from the start – knew the whole time. Dean kills Ruby but it’s all too late – Lucifer is coming...

Big Bad: Lilith... or is she?
Introducing: Anna, angel fallen to earth who reluctantly goes back to heaven (after a steamy session with Dean in the back of the Impala - which would, after all, be heaven enough for many of us); Uriel, angel who hates humans and turns on his own kind but is killed by Anna; Alastair, head torturer in hell; Zachariah, angel who is mighty keen to see the Apocalypse happen and more than a bit impatient with Dean’s reluctance to get with the programme; Castiel, who pulled Dean from hell, and eventually rebels against the angels’ plans in order to help him. Plus Chuck, author of the "Supernatural" novels and very reluctant prophet of the Lord...

Need to know: Mary Winchester was actually a hunter herself, who made a deal with the YED before the boys were born to save John’s life. It’s the Winchester way...

OK – all up to speed? What are you waiting for? Tune in...

Quote of the Day

Like it or not, it's Apocalypse now...

I've used this Zachariah quote before, but it seems just so apt...

To some people this *is* romantic...

Another goodie from http://www.fmylife.com/

Today, my boyfriend of two years said he would finally take me somewhere romantic. I spent my day at a Star Wars convention. FML.

Quote of the Day

You don't cross people who give up their souls.

Yes, I can't help it - more from Devour.

Star Wars and Saddam

As part of my stepping up my culture regime, I went to the Tate Modern today, and checked out the exhibition called The worst condition is to pass under a sword which is not one's own by Michael Rakowitz, which puports to "trace links between western science fiction and military-industrial activities in Iraq during and after Saddam Hussein's regime.


Through a series of interwoven narratives this project addresses, among other things, the Iraqi leader's fascination with the iconography of Jules Verne's novels and the Star Wars films, and the World Wrestling Federation's unique take on Gulf War politics."



Um, oh dear. It actually sounds quite interesting - but what it amounts to is a load of tenuously linked images, snapshots from Iraq, a few magazine covers and a scuplture of the swords of Bagdad made out of plastic light sabres. (OK, I admit, I quite liked that bit). I'm all for inserting sci-fi into every day life - frankly my life has improved enormously now Living has plastered pictures of Supernatural all over the Underground and on phone boxes - but this was really stretching...



Quote of the Day
Come and get it! It's like a running buffet! All you can eat!
Shaun of the Dead

More scifi stars on stage...

OK, my campaign to see sci fi stars on stage continues, seeing Sadie Frost (what, she was in Dracula?) in Richard III. Admittedly, she was pants - read full review here - but it's another name off the list...

Quote of the Day

Imagine if Hitler had the internet...

It's lines like that which make Devour one of the worst films ever...