GIP!

[xparrot]

Gratuitous Icon Post, just because naye told me to. Mainly so if anyone asks why I am crazy obsessed with Doctor Who I can point to it and say THERE, THIS IS WHY.

Also, if you're a fan and you're not watching the Dr. Who Confidentials, you probably should be, because they're all sorts of awesome. Not only is it fun to see how the special f/x are done and how scenes are filmed (that kind of stuff has always fascinated me), and it has all these great music videos (it's like they know that pop music would be inappropriate for the show itself, so instead they just stick all the oh-so-apropos songs in the Confidentials) but they've got loads of the writers and directors and actors talking about the show and analyzing the chars. And can I say I am mad in love with Russell T Davies, the man is brilliant and is hereby added to the list of writers who, should ever I meet them in person, I will drop to my knees before. And then, once their guard is down, I will spring up with my fork and knife and devour their brains. And then I too will be a genius! (Other notables include JMS, Neil Gaiman, and Kazuya Minekura. With Minekura-sensei I might eat her drawing hand as well. Oda-sensei is exempt because I believe the crack levels in his brain might be lethal for an ordinary human.)

In cross-fandom news: the thing about watching the Doctor Who specials is that it highlights the trouble with Smallville. I can't imagine the writers of SV showing so much care and understanding of their series, for the characters and the universe. DW is made by fans, people who grew up with the show and love it, are thrilled to be bringing it to a new generation, and you can feel that, watching the show. And the sad thing is, SV could have been like that. Superman is an American icon as Dr. Who is a British icon; there are plenty of differences (DW's canon is far more fixed, for one, despite its diversity) but there are people who love Superman, fanboys and girls who know the comics and are steeped in the myth and could have brought it to life with that kind of devotion. Maybe in the beginning, there were some people like that on SV's team, and they've just given up, I don't know. But it's a shame, to think of what it might've been, if TPTB behind it had cared the way DW's do.

Comments

[lukita.livejournal.com]

I'll fight you to eat Neil Gaiman's brain. =D

In the beginning you can see the love in SV, but then something happend and it just drifted apart. I'm not saying that every episode should be good, but I'm tagging Season 4 as the point SV broke.

[naye]

ICON LOVE x INFINITY. ♥

Just in case you hadn't noticed my love for it already. (Yay, I got a post!)

It does kind of make me want to take all of Smallville fandom and just hug you, while beating the writers with a stick, though. Because - yes. Smallville really could have been so much more, but. Ouch. That hurts in the bad way, not the good way you hurt when the show is breaking your heart with the characters and the story.

For TV, my pantheon is currently JMS, RTD and Joss Whedon. If I start adding writers and mangaka, it might grow a little, but not very much (but I want to expand it, just so I can include Minekura, who is a worthy goddess of Awesome). He's one of those people that make me happy just by existing, by being who they are and doing what they do. ♥ (You'd have a hard time getting to his brain, though! He's not exactly a small guy. If you've seen him with John Barrowman - who isn't small either - he's at least half a head taller...!)

And it amuses me greatly that you're pimping the Confidentials now, after asking for a choice few to download a few days ago. It's very much fun to say I TOLD YOU SO share the love. ♥ I squee over cool behind the scenes stuff - the guys in the Daleks and the people rigging David up over a cliff in the middle of the night and everything, it's fascinating! And the actors and writers having all this love for the show is just really filling and sweet icing on the cake. ♥

The vids. Oh, I love the vids. They're so much fun! And they really work like fanvids do - they find songs with fitting lyrics or themes, and then they do a montage. Except they have much easier access to raw materials, and can do fun stuff like keep voices and sound effects in, but leave the background music! Such a great idea. They're all such fanboys (and girls) over there. I love it.

[aerynvala.livejournal.com]

there are people who love Superman, fanboys and girls who know the comics and are steeped in the myth and could have brought it to life with that kind of devotion.

Yes, precisely. It's very sad and utterly unnecessary. I mean, they wouldn't even have to be fanatical fans to have gotten it way better than they do. Hell, they could've just relied on Wikipedia and done a better job. /bitches bitterly

Still, those rare moments when it does bother to play in the actual Superman universe, it is brilliant.

[yma2.livejournal.com]

I agree, I get a real sense of joy and passion from Doctor Who and, what's more, I also get the feeling that it's a lot darker, in some ways, than Smallville, which I like. It's a lot more intelectual.
The basic 'ideology' of Smallville is very black and white, which is godo in a way but also bad because it has this wonderfully grey character of Lex, who would work really, really, well in a slightly moraly ambiguous show. But because Smallville is about Superman, and thus to an extent, must be a very black and white show, Lex is made... er... evil. Which does't quite suit the character.
Erm... am I making sense here?
At any rate; Doctor who doesn't really have this problem. Yeah, it's a very positive show, yeah it's optomistic and hopeful and about this guy, this wonderfully humanitarian alien who's all about saving the world and who has this basic love and adoration for the human race. But at the same time it's about lonlieness, it's about the idea that, once you've experience so much, you'll never be the same again. It's about doing what has to be done, being that bit dark and that bit ruthless. It's about the idea that, for all it's beauty, Space does contain so much suffering and pain as well. And for all his humanitarion tendences the Doctor is still an alien, still alone, still utterly, completely and irredemably different.

Er... I'll stop ranting now...

I'd love to see some more of the Doctor Who confidentials, especially of this season, but I don't know where to watch them except from the short, five-ten minite vertions on the BBC website, which really isn't enough. So if you could tell me where I could pick them up from... especially if they're streamed...?

That said; if you have time do check out some of the audio commentaries on the BBC website. Especially those of Gridlock, Girl in the Fire Place and Family of Blood. They're very good and there's some interesting musings going on there.

Also, the more I hear David Tennant and Russel T Davis the more convinced I am that I want to hug them. Because they both actually come across as really nice blokes, especialy RTD.

[greenlady2.livejournal.com]

"SV could have been like that...if TPTB behind it had cared the way DW's do."

It is! It could have been brilliant if it hadn't wandered off into soap opera territory, and got stuck there.

But the worst danger for its integrity is its mushy moral centre, as I've ranted about before. If you're making a show about a comic book superhero, you must have a solid moral centre for the hero to work from, even if he or she wavers from that on occasion. In fact, he or she should waver on occasion, and be punished for it. Then he or she can angst about how they're not worthy to be a superhero, and decide to renounce superherodom, and be called back when a big disaster ensues, and so on.

On SV, for the most part, Clark sits around and mopes, and angsts about Lana, and decides that Lex is a villain on very little evidence, and seems incapable of thinking for himself, and the jump from this to being SUPERMAN is too much for me to contemplate.

You want to know what I foresee? At the end of the series, we'll be given incontrovertible evidence that Lex has gone completely Evil. Clark will make some big speech about how he's Seen The Light, and Heard The Call. He'll put on his Superman uniform and fly off to fight Evil, as embodied by Lex Luthor. And that's all wrong because it's a personal vendetta. I prefer to think of Superman as a little more heroic than that.

[naye]

Why are you not asleep?! NEECHAN! It's bedtime for me! *worries*

I'll answer this + mail tomorrow. Need sleep now. Sleep, or capping of hugs... hmmm. Anyway. You. Sleep! Just... remember the interesting things your brain has to offer when you're not awake anymore. (Jealous!) *hugs*

[littlehollyleaf.livejournal.com]

DW's canon is far more fixed, for one, despite its diversity

As a old!school fan I must point out- Blah! The idea of DW canon being fixed is actually rather amusing. There have been SO many continuity errors over the years, not to mention issues with time travel and paradoxes and mistakes about Gallifrey... and then there's the 100+ novels, which may or may not be taken as canon, plus the audio adventures, and the comics, and the novellas... really, DW canon is not fixed in any way. Superman canon and DW canon are fairly similar in that way :)

But I am a squeeful brit at your opinion of DW writers caring about their national icon better than the SV ones. Awww *hugs her country's DW writing team*

...Although, I personally have issues with RTD aka Rusty, because I've been known to disagree, quite a bit, with some of the directions he's taken the show in. He's actually influenced a fair bit by American shows like Buffy and Smallville (though he prefers Buffy apparently), and I think he's tried to make DW a bit too American, with the close close close up face shots and heavy, emphasised emotional moments (not to mention the 45min episode length, though these days there's not much you can do about that I suppose). And I'm still not entirely convinced this works with DW. But I guess that's my snobbish, old!school britishness coming out :p

Enough rant now. Sorry *blushes*

[littlehollyleaf.livejournal.com]

Just one more thing actually :p - You mention in reply to someone else how Doctor Who writers etc always try to give a human/realistic reaction to things and aren't so comic book like in their portrayal. Well, to be fair to the SV team, they ARE making a show based on a comic, so there will be the tendency for comic-book like effects/plots/actions etc, like in the Superman or Batman films. But Doctor Who never was a comic book, so it never had any comic book stories to mimic. That makes it a lot easier to take it in different directions, especially as you've also got this main character who can keep changing into someone a little different. So, there's never a fixed theme that needs following.

Superman on the other hand, has a big tradition of Clark being the hero and Lex being the villain that SV did need to honour. Plus, Superman is this big American icon (from what I gather), they couldn't just flip things around (ala Wicked in comparison to The Wizard of Oz) and make Clark a jerk... although, that might have happened anyway...

I'm not saying the SV team did their job well, in fact I agree with you that by season 4 they'd starting doing it pretty badly. But I do think adding some serious moral ambiguity and more complex issues is probably an easier thing to do in DW.

And that's really it now :) You possibly think more seriously about fandom than anyone else on my flist, who generally just stick to 'squee' and 'yay' and 'nooo!' I actually have to think about stuff when I read your posts. It's great :)

[airairo.livejournal.com]

I really need to watch Doctor Who Confidential! But I'm kind of... attempting to pace myself? Because I have fallen so hard that I'm already anticipating how badly I'm going to be flailing around when I catch up XD

DW is made by fans, people who grew up with the show and love it, are thrilled to be bringing it to a new generation, and you can feel that, watching the show.

I'm not surprised to learn this at all. It really is evident while watching that the people behind the show absolutely love what they're doing... and it's so contagious. DW has so, so much heart, it's been very easy for me to get attached. ♥