My Jane Austen Rereading Project is more or less at an end (though I may reread one of the better completions of the novel fragment The Watsons) as I have now finished Mansfield Park. I've already written about Fanny Price, and I hold to my opinion that she is, all in all, a sweet girl who has been too harshly treated by many readers and critics. (However, her reaction to Henry Crawford's and Maria's affair does feel a bit overblown - yes, it's a serious transgression which manages to injure most of the protagonists in some way, but Fanny makes it sound as if they've slaughtered a village). But there are other aspects of Mansfield Park worth getting into, as after having read and reread the novel they are still a bit of a puzzle to me. One of them is the role of Fanny's Aunt Norris.
Many will associate Mrs Norris with Harry Potter - it's the name of Hogwarts caretaker Filch's cat. I'm pretty sure that her name is inspired by Mansfield Park and is Rowling's way of signalling to her readers that this is an unpleasant animal. Judging from the films, though (I haven't read the Harry Potter books), there is one significant difference between the two Mrs Norrises, apart from one of them being a cat. Filch's Mrs Norris is beloved by her owner, while no-one loves Mrs Norris in Mansfield Park.
The unspeakableness of Mrs Norris is certainly universally acknowledged. She is stingy, officious, petty, stupid and consistently nasty to poor Fanny, whom she treats as a servant while not showing any gratitude for all the errands she makes the girl run for her. She is on the wrong side of any argument, and there is hardly one situation she can't manage to make worse. I can't be the only reader whose heart sinks a little every time Mrs Norris enters the fray. And here is perhaps her worst failing as a novel character: she is no fun to read about. As heroine antagonists go, she doesn't have the villainous glamour of a General Tilney or the entertainment value of a Lady Catherine de Bourgh. She is almost as much of a trial to the reader as to her niece. So why do we have to put up with her?
Something that struck me when rereading the novel is that Mrs Norris doesn't fill much of a plot function. Yes, it's her idea to bring Fanny to Mansfield to start with, but its owner Sir Thomas Bertram could easily have come up with that idea himself. Later, she is active in bringing about the disastrous match between Maria Bertram and the rich and thick Mr Rushworth, but Maria would have been perfectly capable of arranging the match herself. Once Mary and Henry Crawford enter the scene, it is they and the Bertram siblings who drive the plot forward, not Mrs Norris. She is just a hanger-on who can be relied on to do the wrong thing.
So why did Austen include her in the novel? The most important reason is probably to increase Fanny's misery. Fanny's story echoes the Cinderella story in many respects, and Mrs Norris is more reminiscent of the Wicked Stepmother than Lady Bertram, who may take advantage of Fanny but who is in her languid way quite fond of her niece. Then again, one thing to be said for Wicked Stepmothers is that they tend to add spice to a tale in a way Mrs Norris completely fails to do. As I've already mentioned, characters who plague the heroine needn't do the same to the reader. Mary Crawford is a case in point: as the paramour of Fanny's beloved Edmund, no-one makes Fanny more miserable than she does, but she is a delight to read about.
Another possible explanation for Mrs Norris's existence is that Austen may have relished creating a character whom not even the most perverse reader could like. As the Sanditon fragment shows, she was aware that there are readers who will stubbornly root for characters which the author has set up to be warning examples. As a villain-lover, I mostly fall into that category myself, though the rake villain type favoured by Austen isn't really my cup of tea. So if the intention was to force this kind of reader into line - congratulations, Austen, job done. Also, it's probably more enjoyable to write about a thoroughly despicable character than to read about one. Mansfield Park may partly be a tract against self-indulgence, but maybe Austen indulged herself a bit on the part of Mrs Norris.
The best case one can make for the importance of Mrs Norris, I think, is that she acts as a catalyst. Her treatment of Fanny rubs off on the other characters, who would perhaps have treated her with more kindness and respect had they not unconsciously taken their cue from Mrs Norris. The Bertram girls believe they're in the right to despise Fanny, because their aunt agrees with them that she is ignorant. Lady Bertram thinks nothing of employing Fanny to fetch and carry for her because she sees her sister doing the same thing, and at least she does it nicely. Not even Edmund really questions Fanny's inferior position in the family, which makes it easier for him to do her little favours for which she is then suitably grateful. As to Fanny, though I would have preferred Austen to make her suffer in a way less insufferable to the reader, I can't deny that Mrs Norris's behaviour towards her offers a better explanation as to why the girl is so shy and unsure of herself than merely the aloofness of Sir Thomas and the neglect of the rest of the family would have done. She would still have had a hard time at Mansfield Park, but maybe not sufficiently hard to make her what she is.
Mrs Norris is not a badly drawn character - in her awful way, she is believable - and it would probably have been difficult to remove her from the plot altogether, at least not without making the rest of the Bertram family a little worse. Nevertheless, I can't help thinking that we could have done with a great deal less of her.
Saturday, 20 April 2019
Wednesday, 3 April 2019
First-class folk tale fantasy
It's always easier to fill a blog post with whinging than gushing. However, when I come across a really good read, I (mostly) feel duty bound to write about it and spread the word a bit. And Uprooted by Naomi Novik is a first-class page turner. It engrossed me during two train journeys and nearly all moments I could steal during a two-day mini-conference.
The set-up easily explains why I bought the book in the first place. The heroine, the determinedly un-heroine-like Agnieszka, lives in a village in a fairy-tale version of Poland. The village lies close to the malignant Wood, a forest enchanted in all the wrong ways which each year encroaches a little further into the land. Keeping it at bay and protecting the nearby villages is a sorcerer called the Dragon, who is also the villages' overlord. Every ten years, he claims one of the girls in the villages who then goes to work for him in his isolated tower. After the ten years are over she is richly rewarded and can return to her family. Only, in the end, none of the girls choose to stay in their home village - they all go away and make a life for themselves elsewhere.
Agnieszka is one of the girls in the risk zone for being picked for Dragon duty, but she is not worried for herself: like everyone else, she is convinced that her best friend - beautiful, accomplished, sweet-natured and brave Kasia - will be the one selected. Agnieszka is no beauty, and her chief talent seems to be to tear her clothes and get herself muddy. She grieves for Kasia's sake, and yet when the day comes, the Dragon - somewhat churlishly - decides to take her instead.
So, sorcerer meets girl, sorcerer takes girl to his castle (well, kind of), sorcerer and girl get better acquainted - what's not to like? In fact, this is only one plot strand, forming a sort of classic fairy-tale base line, while there are all sorts of other things going on. We have to wait for quite a while before there is a thaw in the relationship between the Dragon and Agnieszka, and when it finally sets in they are both drawn in deeper than ever before in the fight against the Wood. There are twists and turns which keep you hooked to the end, wondering how such a formidable enemy as the Wood is ever going to be defeated.
The funny thing is, the few niggles I do have about the novel are closely connected to things that are good about it. A novel, like a person, isn't necessarily made out characteristics that are either good or bad: it can have traits that are both good and bad at the same time. Not that the aspects of the book I had problems with are bad, exactly - my criticisms are probably more to do with my personal tastes than anything else.
The reason the Dragon, aka Sarkan (which somehow sounds better though apparently it means the same thing), picked Agnieszka in the first place turns out to be that she has magic powers, and he is duty bound to train anyone with magic he comes across so they don't unwittingly make mischief. Now, Agnieszka's type of magic remains a mystery to him for a long time as it's quite different from his own, scholarly type of wizardry - it's very earthbound and close to nature. This is an important facet of the novel: because Agnieszka is so attuned to her surroundings, her descriptions of the Wood are intensely atmospheric, and it also helps her understand what kind of threat they're facing. At the same time, the whole concept of Agnieszka's magic being all earthy and mother-nature's-daughterish and Sarkan's being more dry and bookish and them complementing each other in some Yin-and-Yang way gets on my nerves a bit. I wouldn't go so far as to say it's clichéd, but somehow it's typical that the female magic user turns out to be the one who's unsophisticated but ultimately wiser because of her special bond with nature.
As I've mentioned, the relationship between Agnieszka and Sarkan is put on the back burner for a large part of the book. Which is also good in principle, because then parts of the story are highlighted that are more unpredictable. On the other hand, I liked Sarkan, and once the various adventures had reached their climax I would have preferred him and Agnieszka to move jointly into the foreground again. Instead, the narrative focuses more on Agnieszka finding her proper place and happiness on her own terms. Which is fine and dandy I'm sure, but... priorities, girl! It's not as if hot sorcerers are that easy to come by.
Agnieszka herself is another two-faced coin. She is certainly a more interesting heroine than the perfect Kasia would have been, but there are times when her anti-heroine status feels a touch overplayed, like when she's struggling at the royal court. Would it have killed her to make a little more of an effort to fit in, considering what's at stake?
These are just minor irritations, though, and as I said, probably down to my personal preferences. All in all, this novel is great, with an exciting story and well-drawn characters, including the supporting cast. Kasia somehow manages to be not unbearable; Prince Marek, who at first seems to be a typical "prince who turns out to be a bastard", has an overreaching motive for most of his actions which it's hard not to sympathise with; plus there's a delightfully shady wizard rival to Sarkan at court - the Falcon, aka Solya - who if I'm honest is even more up my street than Sarkan himself. For those who like their fantasy as close to a classic folk tale as possible, this is definitely worth checking out.
For my part, I'll be looking out for when Novik's newest novel Spinning Silver comes out in paperback, though the blurb has me somewhat worried. One can hardly fault the fairy-tale inspiration in this case, but, um, what happened to the original story's title character? Here's hoping the novel will not just be girl power all the way.
The set-up easily explains why I bought the book in the first place. The heroine, the determinedly un-heroine-like Agnieszka, lives in a village in a fairy-tale version of Poland. The village lies close to the malignant Wood, a forest enchanted in all the wrong ways which each year encroaches a little further into the land. Keeping it at bay and protecting the nearby villages is a sorcerer called the Dragon, who is also the villages' overlord. Every ten years, he claims one of the girls in the villages who then goes to work for him in his isolated tower. After the ten years are over she is richly rewarded and can return to her family. Only, in the end, none of the girls choose to stay in their home village - they all go away and make a life for themselves elsewhere.
Agnieszka is one of the girls in the risk zone for being picked for Dragon duty, but she is not worried for herself: like everyone else, she is convinced that her best friend - beautiful, accomplished, sweet-natured and brave Kasia - will be the one selected. Agnieszka is no beauty, and her chief talent seems to be to tear her clothes and get herself muddy. She grieves for Kasia's sake, and yet when the day comes, the Dragon - somewhat churlishly - decides to take her instead.
So, sorcerer meets girl, sorcerer takes girl to his castle (well, kind of), sorcerer and girl get better acquainted - what's not to like? In fact, this is only one plot strand, forming a sort of classic fairy-tale base line, while there are all sorts of other things going on. We have to wait for quite a while before there is a thaw in the relationship between the Dragon and Agnieszka, and when it finally sets in they are both drawn in deeper than ever before in the fight against the Wood. There are twists and turns which keep you hooked to the end, wondering how such a formidable enemy as the Wood is ever going to be defeated.
The funny thing is, the few niggles I do have about the novel are closely connected to things that are good about it. A novel, like a person, isn't necessarily made out characteristics that are either good or bad: it can have traits that are both good and bad at the same time. Not that the aspects of the book I had problems with are bad, exactly - my criticisms are probably more to do with my personal tastes than anything else.
The reason the Dragon, aka Sarkan (which somehow sounds better though apparently it means the same thing), picked Agnieszka in the first place turns out to be that she has magic powers, and he is duty bound to train anyone with magic he comes across so they don't unwittingly make mischief. Now, Agnieszka's type of magic remains a mystery to him for a long time as it's quite different from his own, scholarly type of wizardry - it's very earthbound and close to nature. This is an important facet of the novel: because Agnieszka is so attuned to her surroundings, her descriptions of the Wood are intensely atmospheric, and it also helps her understand what kind of threat they're facing. At the same time, the whole concept of Agnieszka's magic being all earthy and mother-nature's-daughterish and Sarkan's being more dry and bookish and them complementing each other in some Yin-and-Yang way gets on my nerves a bit. I wouldn't go so far as to say it's clichéd, but somehow it's typical that the female magic user turns out to be the one who's unsophisticated but ultimately wiser because of her special bond with nature.
As I've mentioned, the relationship between Agnieszka and Sarkan is put on the back burner for a large part of the book. Which is also good in principle, because then parts of the story are highlighted that are more unpredictable. On the other hand, I liked Sarkan, and once the various adventures had reached their climax I would have preferred him and Agnieszka to move jointly into the foreground again. Instead, the narrative focuses more on Agnieszka finding her proper place and happiness on her own terms. Which is fine and dandy I'm sure, but... priorities, girl! It's not as if hot sorcerers are that easy to come by.
Agnieszka herself is another two-faced coin. She is certainly a more interesting heroine than the perfect Kasia would have been, but there are times when her anti-heroine status feels a touch overplayed, like when she's struggling at the royal court. Would it have killed her to make a little more of an effort to fit in, considering what's at stake?
These are just minor irritations, though, and as I said, probably down to my personal preferences. All in all, this novel is great, with an exciting story and well-drawn characters, including the supporting cast. Kasia somehow manages to be not unbearable; Prince Marek, who at first seems to be a typical "prince who turns out to be a bastard", has an overreaching motive for most of his actions which it's hard not to sympathise with; plus there's a delightfully shady wizard rival to Sarkan at court - the Falcon, aka Solya - who if I'm honest is even more up my street than Sarkan himself. For those who like their fantasy as close to a classic folk tale as possible, this is definitely worth checking out.
For my part, I'll be looking out for when Novik's newest novel Spinning Silver comes out in paperback, though the blurb has me somewhat worried. One can hardly fault the fairy-tale inspiration in this case, but, um, what happened to the original story's title character? Here's hoping the novel will not just be girl power all the way.
Thursday, 28 March 2019
What went wrong with Wreck-It Ralph 2
A few weeks back I watched Wreck-It Ralph 2 - Ralph Breaks The Internet in the cinema and was - well, underwhelmed. At the time, I still thought it was OK. The animation is top-notch: it's hard not to be a little invested when the characters' pain at some fresh betrayal is so well-animated. Overall, I liked the side characters introduced in the film, and the Internet setting had some neat ideas. The part with the Disney princesses turned out to be more enjoyable than I'd anticipated. I'm still not wild about the "are you a princess?" interrogation scene, but in the end the fun-poking at princess tropes is pretty mild and a far cry from Shrek territory, plus the girls turn out to be handy in a crisis. There's also a really fun song where Vanellope channels her inner Disney princess and by "looking at water" realises what she really wants: to be a part of the tough, unpredictable internet game Slaughter Race. As time goes on, though, I find that the problems with the film start to grate on me more. Even on the same evening as I watched it, I thought (not without some grim satisfaction for having called it): "I guess Disney's golden revival era really is over". Now I'm even more convinced. Frozen 2 will need to be pretty spectacular in order to turn around the downward trend.
If online comments on places such as Youtube (which incidentally features under the threadbare disguise of "BuzzTube" in the film) are anything to go by, I wasn't the only one who was vaguely dissatisfied with Wreck-It Ralph 2. Few think it's downright bad, but they have various problems with it: the depiction of the Internet is too generic; Ralph behaves badly; Vanellope behaves badly; we see too little of the lovable side characters from the Arcade; the image of a computer virus in the shape of Ralph - made out of a teeming horde of needy virus Ralphs - is uncomfortable etc. I more or less agree with all of these criticisms, but what made these faults worse was the plot itself.
Quite simply, the film falls into the classic sequel trap of telling us a story which few of us wanted to see. The first Wreck-It Ralph film was mostly about Ralph accepting his role as the bad guy in his Arcade game and realising 1) that his was an important job that kept the whole game going 2) that he didn't have to be a bad guy off stage, as it were. His friendship with kid racer Vanellope in the game Sugar Rush played a large part in his acceptance of his lot, and in the touching ending of the film he admits that being thrown off the roof in his game, once he's been defeated by a player, is his favourite part of the day, because from up there he can see Vanellope racing in Sugar Rush. Now, who saw this scene and thought: "Isn't Ralph being a little clingy? Should so much of his happiness really rest on his bond with Vanellope? Wouldn't it be healthier if he gave her some space and made some other friends as well?"
I sure as heck didn't. Yet in this sequel, the message being peddled is the one the Earl of Grantham, with some justice, dismissed as a "slogan" in the Downton Abbey finale: "If you love her, you have to let her go". I didn't like the "don't be too needy" theme in Finding Nemo, and though it's not quite as enervating here as the stakes aren't so high, it still bothered me. It's not that this message is never relevant for kids as well as adults, but there's something finger-wagging about it, and unlike many a pat moral which you can just about swallow (all the while thinking "well, duh"), it's just not very compatible with family-friendly entertainment. I can't be the only one who doesn't find it enjoyable to watch someone being chastised for caring too much.
Of course all ends well, and Ralph's and Vanellope's friendship survives being long-distance. But I would have been happy to leave them both in the Arcade, happy with their roles in their respective games and with each other. In the end, watching Wreck-It Ralph 2 - Ralph Breaks The Internet subtracts a little from the experience of watching the first film - and that's something a sequel should do its best to avoid.
If online comments on places such as Youtube (which incidentally features under the threadbare disguise of "BuzzTube" in the film) are anything to go by, I wasn't the only one who was vaguely dissatisfied with Wreck-It Ralph 2. Few think it's downright bad, but they have various problems with it: the depiction of the Internet is too generic; Ralph behaves badly; Vanellope behaves badly; we see too little of the lovable side characters from the Arcade; the image of a computer virus in the shape of Ralph - made out of a teeming horde of needy virus Ralphs - is uncomfortable etc. I more or less agree with all of these criticisms, but what made these faults worse was the plot itself.
Quite simply, the film falls into the classic sequel trap of telling us a story which few of us wanted to see. The first Wreck-It Ralph film was mostly about Ralph accepting his role as the bad guy in his Arcade game and realising 1) that his was an important job that kept the whole game going 2) that he didn't have to be a bad guy off stage, as it were. His friendship with kid racer Vanellope in the game Sugar Rush played a large part in his acceptance of his lot, and in the touching ending of the film he admits that being thrown off the roof in his game, once he's been defeated by a player, is his favourite part of the day, because from up there he can see Vanellope racing in Sugar Rush. Now, who saw this scene and thought: "Isn't Ralph being a little clingy? Should so much of his happiness really rest on his bond with Vanellope? Wouldn't it be healthier if he gave her some space and made some other friends as well?"
I sure as heck didn't. Yet in this sequel, the message being peddled is the one the Earl of Grantham, with some justice, dismissed as a "slogan" in the Downton Abbey finale: "If you love her, you have to let her go". I didn't like the "don't be too needy" theme in Finding Nemo, and though it's not quite as enervating here as the stakes aren't so high, it still bothered me. It's not that this message is never relevant for kids as well as adults, but there's something finger-wagging about it, and unlike many a pat moral which you can just about swallow (all the while thinking "well, duh"), it's just not very compatible with family-friendly entertainment. I can't be the only one who doesn't find it enjoyable to watch someone being chastised for caring too much.
Of course all ends well, and Ralph's and Vanellope's friendship survives being long-distance. But I would have been happy to leave them both in the Arcade, happy with their roles in their respective games and with each other. In the end, watching Wreck-It Ralph 2 - Ralph Breaks The Internet subtracts a little from the experience of watching the first film - and that's something a sequel should do its best to avoid.
Thursday, 14 March 2019
Timeless - A nice way to spend TV time (but no new Who)
I've discovered that I'm not as good at TV bingewatching as I'd imagined. When there's a villain crush in the mix, then I bingewatch, and Doctor Who triggers the same impulse (yes, still, just about). But there are a number of series where I watch an episode now and then, think "this is nice, I'm enjoying this", but still only manage one episode per evening and very possibly watch something else the following day. Variety is good, I suppose, but it does leave me with a lot of half-watched series and a funny sense of under-achievement.
Which is one reason why I made a conscious effort to prioritise Timeless above other light-entertainment Netflix fare. One season containing fifteen episodes is available on Swedish Netflix: it was surely doable to complete it without stringing it out over months and months. I've watched the whole season now, and am glad I did, but making it to the season finale didn't really bring a reward. Instead of tying up the threads, the series opted for a classic season cliffhanger (which I'll get back to).
I hope Netflix sends the next season and the TV movie that (according to reviews on Amazon) completes the story, because I'm not sure I'm sufficiently invested in the series to buy the rest on DVD. All the same, I liked it. The story setup yields a satisfying amount of historical derring-do. A brilliant inventor has managed to build two time machines: a fancy new one (the mother ship) and the prototype, to be used in emergencies (the lifeboat). The mother ship is stolen by tortured dish Garcia Flynn, labeled a terrorist by US intelligence, and his gang of followers. His mission seems to be to sabotage key moments in American history, and a team consisting of nervy historian Lucy, tough military man Wyatt (who looks more like a pop star than a hardened veteran, but never mind) and the long-suffering programmer Rufus, who's the only one who can pilot the machine, are sent out in the lifeboat to stop him.
My impression of the first episode was "this is fun, if a little slipshod", and that impression more or less stuck during the rest of the series. The protagonists are likeable, the script is zingy and the acting's good. All the same, there's plenty to criticise. The series doesn't give you any in-depth view into or fresh angle on American history, as the famous people the heroes run into behave pretty much as described in historical textbooks. I don't really mind the hasty way in which it's established that time travel exists, and appreciate the fact that we're not bogged down with pseudo-scientific explanations as to how it's possible. The time machines themselves are clearly not of much interest to the writers: they're just an excuse to get the characters into historical adventures. Fair enough, but another far-fetched premise could have done with a little more elucidation. Flynn claims that there is a vast conspiracy, containing a large part of the American élite, who is clandestinely shaping the country in a harmful way. His history-changing plans, which include not only assassinating Lincoln but also half his government and sabotaging the moon landing, are necessary to take out "Rittenhouse", as this association of highly-placed baddies is called. Flynn turns out to be right, at least as far as the existence of Rittenhouse is concerned. However, it's not made clear what these people actually want. The conspiracy is as much of a simple plot device as the time machines, only there to furnish ethical dilemmas to the lifeboat team. Are they doing the right thing trying to stop Flynn, or should they be helping him?
What's more, little is done with the "ripple effect", which usually plays such an important part in time-travelling dramas. In the very first episode, where as a consequence of Flynn's and the team's meddling there are only two casualties in the Hindenburg disaster, the alteration has a vast impact on Lucy's life in the present. In the second episode, she has to convince her sceptical team mates that they can't stop Lincoln from being murdered as history has to play out the way it always did. Afterwards, though, this line of reasoning is dropped and the team both kill and save people in the past without it having any discernible effect on the present as long as the big events are preserved. This left the geek in me rather dissatisfied, as I had looked forward to seeing the present becoming weirder and weirder as a consequence of some random actions in the past - maybe not every episode, but every now and then. That it's never explained (at least not in the first season) how Lucy suddenly finds herself engaged to a handsome doctor she's never met was another disappointment.
My final gripe has less to do with this series specifically than with the habit (more common in the US than the UK, I think) of ending a season with a cliffhanger. I understand that it makes solid commercial sense to hook the viewers into the new season. Nevertheless, I prefer more or less completed season story arcs. Viewers who aren't too much into the series get a natural walking-off point (which, I realise, it's in no way in the series creators' interest to provide), and those who are into the series can look forward to new adventures with the satisfying feeling that at least some of the characters' old issues have been resolved. A cliffhanger which makes you feel as if you might as well have been left hanging mid-season - and I'd say the Timeless one fits into that category - can't help feeling frustrating. On the other hand, cliffhangers hinting at new dangers just as everything looks fine and dandy - such as Elsa stepping into Storybrooke (though that didn't go well) and the Doctor colliding with a space version of the Titanic - are OK. Just don't keep the original plot threads dangling forever.
Timeless isn't Doctor Who (at least not at its best), but it's still good entertainment. Speaking of Who, the series contains an actor who's often mentioned as a possible future Doctor - Paterson Joseph, who plays the morally compromised inventor Connor Mason. I'd definitely be on board with him as a future Doc; he does authority with a hint of arrogance very well. Perhaps it helps that the two parts I've seen him play so far (he was Rose's venal co-contestant in the Doctor Who episode "Bad Wolf") have been somewhat shady?
Which is one reason why I made a conscious effort to prioritise Timeless above other light-entertainment Netflix fare. One season containing fifteen episodes is available on Swedish Netflix: it was surely doable to complete it without stringing it out over months and months. I've watched the whole season now, and am glad I did, but making it to the season finale didn't really bring a reward. Instead of tying up the threads, the series opted for a classic season cliffhanger (which I'll get back to).
I hope Netflix sends the next season and the TV movie that (according to reviews on Amazon) completes the story, because I'm not sure I'm sufficiently invested in the series to buy the rest on DVD. All the same, I liked it. The story setup yields a satisfying amount of historical derring-do. A brilliant inventor has managed to build two time machines: a fancy new one (the mother ship) and the prototype, to be used in emergencies (the lifeboat). The mother ship is stolen by tortured dish Garcia Flynn, labeled a terrorist by US intelligence, and his gang of followers. His mission seems to be to sabotage key moments in American history, and a team consisting of nervy historian Lucy, tough military man Wyatt (who looks more like a pop star than a hardened veteran, but never mind) and the long-suffering programmer Rufus, who's the only one who can pilot the machine, are sent out in the lifeboat to stop him.
My impression of the first episode was "this is fun, if a little slipshod", and that impression more or less stuck during the rest of the series. The protagonists are likeable, the script is zingy and the acting's good. All the same, there's plenty to criticise. The series doesn't give you any in-depth view into or fresh angle on American history, as the famous people the heroes run into behave pretty much as described in historical textbooks. I don't really mind the hasty way in which it's established that time travel exists, and appreciate the fact that we're not bogged down with pseudo-scientific explanations as to how it's possible. The time machines themselves are clearly not of much interest to the writers: they're just an excuse to get the characters into historical adventures. Fair enough, but another far-fetched premise could have done with a little more elucidation. Flynn claims that there is a vast conspiracy, containing a large part of the American élite, who is clandestinely shaping the country in a harmful way. His history-changing plans, which include not only assassinating Lincoln but also half his government and sabotaging the moon landing, are necessary to take out "Rittenhouse", as this association of highly-placed baddies is called. Flynn turns out to be right, at least as far as the existence of Rittenhouse is concerned. However, it's not made clear what these people actually want. The conspiracy is as much of a simple plot device as the time machines, only there to furnish ethical dilemmas to the lifeboat team. Are they doing the right thing trying to stop Flynn, or should they be helping him?
What's more, little is done with the "ripple effect", which usually plays such an important part in time-travelling dramas. In the very first episode, where as a consequence of Flynn's and the team's meddling there are only two casualties in the Hindenburg disaster, the alteration has a vast impact on Lucy's life in the present. In the second episode, she has to convince her sceptical team mates that they can't stop Lincoln from being murdered as history has to play out the way it always did. Afterwards, though, this line of reasoning is dropped and the team both kill and save people in the past without it having any discernible effect on the present as long as the big events are preserved. This left the geek in me rather dissatisfied, as I had looked forward to seeing the present becoming weirder and weirder as a consequence of some random actions in the past - maybe not every episode, but every now and then. That it's never explained (at least not in the first season) how Lucy suddenly finds herself engaged to a handsome doctor she's never met was another disappointment.
My final gripe has less to do with this series specifically than with the habit (more common in the US than the UK, I think) of ending a season with a cliffhanger. I understand that it makes solid commercial sense to hook the viewers into the new season. Nevertheless, I prefer more or less completed season story arcs. Viewers who aren't too much into the series get a natural walking-off point (which, I realise, it's in no way in the series creators' interest to provide), and those who are into the series can look forward to new adventures with the satisfying feeling that at least some of the characters' old issues have been resolved. A cliffhanger which makes you feel as if you might as well have been left hanging mid-season - and I'd say the Timeless one fits into that category - can't help feeling frustrating. On the other hand, cliffhangers hinting at new dangers just as everything looks fine and dandy - such as Elsa stepping into Storybrooke (though that didn't go well) and the Doctor colliding with a space version of the Titanic - are OK. Just don't keep the original plot threads dangling forever.
Timeless isn't Doctor Who (at least not at its best), but it's still good entertainment. Speaking of Who, the series contains an actor who's often mentioned as a possible future Doctor - Paterson Joseph, who plays the morally compromised inventor Connor Mason. I'd definitely be on board with him as a future Doc; he does authority with a hint of arrogance very well. Perhaps it helps that the two parts I've seen him play so far (he was Rose's venal co-contestant in the Doctor Who episode "Bad Wolf") have been somewhat shady?
Thursday, 28 February 2019
The message of Northanger Abbey: is there one?
What to make of Northanger Abbey? I reread it this year as I planned to do as part of the Jane Austen Rereading Project and was pleasantly surprised, as it was more enjoyable than I remembered it. I've said before that it's my least favourite Austen novel, but I'm not so sure now: with its wealth of dialogue, it's a livelier read than the exposition-heavy Sense and Sensibility. It's also less of a critique/parody of the Gothic genre than I expected - the main plot is a straightforward Austenesque one hinging on how the heroine manages to bag her man. But this is what's so puzzling about it. Since most of the story is in no way dependent on the whole Gothic novel context, why bother with it in the first place?
The two TV adaptations of Northanger I've seen have both played up the protagonist Catherine Moreland's propensity for daydreaming. Her dreams and fantasies, where the people she meets in real life are cast in various Gothic-novel parts, are contrasted with her more humdrum reality. In fact, the novel's Catherine isn't as big a fantasist as all that. It's only for a comparatively short section of the book, when she is staying at Northanger Abbey itself, that she believes herself caught up in a Gothic mystery. During all the time she stays in Bath with her friends the Allens she has no exalted expectations of great adventures. Moreover, aside from making a friend of the mercenary flirt Isabella Thorpe - an error of judgement which is totally understandable in a seventeen-year-old, especially as the Thorpes are for a time the only acquaintances the Allens have in town - Catherine behaves pretty sensibly in Bath. She quickly realises that Isabella's brother John, in spite of being the friend of her own brother James, is someone whose company is to be avoided as much as possible. In spite of the Thorpeses' best efforts, she manages to make the better acquaintance of Henry Tilney (her love interest) and his sister Eleanor (too sensible to be much fun at this stage). She quickly notices something is off when Isabella, by this time betrothed to James, starts flirting with Henry Tilney's brother. When she voices her concerns to Henry, he waves them away, but in time Catherine is proven to be right: Isabella's association with Captain Tilney does lead to (an implied) scandal.
In fact, when Austen contrasts Gothic novel clichés with Catherine's reality in the first half of the novel, it's not the heroine's expectations she's puncturing but the reader's. This soon gets a little wearisome, especially if you didn't expect a Gothic yarn to begin with or in fact don't have much conception of what a Gothic yarn is like. It's a problem for me - and I suspect many a modern reader -that I have very little knowledge of the kind of book Austen's supposedly parodying. The more she concentrates on what does happen in Catherine's life, without pointing out how different this is from what would have happened in a Gothic novel, the better Northanger Abbey works for me.
So what does Austen want to say when she's sending up the Gothic novel? That you shouldn't confuse fiction with reality? It always makes me impatient when a novel preaches the importance of keeping fiction and reality apart, because the novel's reality is, of course, also a fiction. The unrelenting misery of the ending of Flaubert's Madame Bovary is as much of a construct as a happily-ever-after would have been, and some of the characters - ruthless merchant, womanising local squire - are types you'd be much more likely to come across within the pages of a novel than in a real small town in 19th century France. What's more, there's something disloyal about a novel that aims to show the dangerous influence of novels on impressionable minds. Jane Austen herself claims, in a defence of the novel which can be found in Northanger Abbey: "I will not adopt that ungenerous and impolitic custom so common with novel writers, of degrading by their contemptuous censure the very performances, to the number of which they are themselves adding". Is she as good as her word, though?
If there's a moral lesson to be learned in Catherine's mistakes, it is a pretty confused one, for in a way, she is vindicated. Her greatest fault is believing that Henry's father, General Tilney, did away with his wife or has her secretly locked up. This isn't true, and Catherine is suitably mortified when Henry guesses what she has been thinking. But the General is still the villain of the piece - he is a domestic tyrant, he throws Catherine out of his house when he discovers that she isn't the heiress he thought she was, and there's much to indicate that he was as impatient with his deceased wife as he is with his children. He expects his offspring to marry into money, more or less pimps Henry to Catherine as long as he thinks she's an heiress, and probably married money himself. Catherine leaping to the conclusion that the General is a murderer on scant evidence is very silly, but not as silly as if the General, in spite his formidable manners, had turned out to be a good egg after all.
The Introduction of the Oxford World's Classics edition of Northanger Abbey argues that the novel is in fact a subtle defence of the Gothic novel, and that Catherine's adventures do in fact have a flavour of the Gothic. The General's character is a case in point. As for the "rational" Henry Tilney, he is a mansplaining idiot (this is more elegantly expressed, of course). It's easy to agree with the opinion that Henry's protests against Catherine's imaginings sound hollow. His argument is that such things would never happen in England, with its admirable laws and institutions etc. This means that he's not really defending the General at all - he's saying that his country, not his father, is too civilised for anything too Gothic to take place. Which apart from being insulting to the General is a pretty dumb argument in itself as the most spectacular crimes can happen in the most well-ordered of societies.
However, I'm not sure I completely buy the argument that Austen is defending the Gothic novel as an art form that may contain a kernel of truth in spite of its sensationalism. It is she, not the reader, who has been scathing about Gothic clichés in the first place - what's the point of knocking down the pieces she herself has set up? The surface contradictions of Northanger Abbey may contain a message of some kind - say, that the relationship between reality and fiction is too complicated to be summed up in "novels are a trusty guide to explaining real life" or "novels are nothing like real life". But there is another possibility. Austen was a master craftswoman, but this is after all the first full-length novel she wrote. She may have started it intending it to be a parody of a Gothic novel, then not found the exercise interesting enough. While writing, she then gravitated more and more towards the kind of psychological realism - with a good deal of romance thrown in - that would become her trademark. Even the brightest authors don't always have a master plan - sometimes they just make things up as they go along. Northanger Abbey may not be trying to tell us anything in particular about "good" novels, "bad" novels and ordinary life after all.
The two TV adaptations of Northanger I've seen have both played up the protagonist Catherine Moreland's propensity for daydreaming. Her dreams and fantasies, where the people she meets in real life are cast in various Gothic-novel parts, are contrasted with her more humdrum reality. In fact, the novel's Catherine isn't as big a fantasist as all that. It's only for a comparatively short section of the book, when she is staying at Northanger Abbey itself, that she believes herself caught up in a Gothic mystery. During all the time she stays in Bath with her friends the Allens she has no exalted expectations of great adventures. Moreover, aside from making a friend of the mercenary flirt Isabella Thorpe - an error of judgement which is totally understandable in a seventeen-year-old, especially as the Thorpes are for a time the only acquaintances the Allens have in town - Catherine behaves pretty sensibly in Bath. She quickly realises that Isabella's brother John, in spite of being the friend of her own brother James, is someone whose company is to be avoided as much as possible. In spite of the Thorpeses' best efforts, she manages to make the better acquaintance of Henry Tilney (her love interest) and his sister Eleanor (too sensible to be much fun at this stage). She quickly notices something is off when Isabella, by this time betrothed to James, starts flirting with Henry Tilney's brother. When she voices her concerns to Henry, he waves them away, but in time Catherine is proven to be right: Isabella's association with Captain Tilney does lead to (an implied) scandal.
In fact, when Austen contrasts Gothic novel clichés with Catherine's reality in the first half of the novel, it's not the heroine's expectations she's puncturing but the reader's. This soon gets a little wearisome, especially if you didn't expect a Gothic yarn to begin with or in fact don't have much conception of what a Gothic yarn is like. It's a problem for me - and I suspect many a modern reader -that I have very little knowledge of the kind of book Austen's supposedly parodying. The more she concentrates on what does happen in Catherine's life, without pointing out how different this is from what would have happened in a Gothic novel, the better Northanger Abbey works for me.
So what does Austen want to say when she's sending up the Gothic novel? That you shouldn't confuse fiction with reality? It always makes me impatient when a novel preaches the importance of keeping fiction and reality apart, because the novel's reality is, of course, also a fiction. The unrelenting misery of the ending of Flaubert's Madame Bovary is as much of a construct as a happily-ever-after would have been, and some of the characters - ruthless merchant, womanising local squire - are types you'd be much more likely to come across within the pages of a novel than in a real small town in 19th century France. What's more, there's something disloyal about a novel that aims to show the dangerous influence of novels on impressionable minds. Jane Austen herself claims, in a defence of the novel which can be found in Northanger Abbey: "I will not adopt that ungenerous and impolitic custom so common with novel writers, of degrading by their contemptuous censure the very performances, to the number of which they are themselves adding". Is she as good as her word, though?
If there's a moral lesson to be learned in Catherine's mistakes, it is a pretty confused one, for in a way, she is vindicated. Her greatest fault is believing that Henry's father, General Tilney, did away with his wife or has her secretly locked up. This isn't true, and Catherine is suitably mortified when Henry guesses what she has been thinking. But the General is still the villain of the piece - he is a domestic tyrant, he throws Catherine out of his house when he discovers that she isn't the heiress he thought she was, and there's much to indicate that he was as impatient with his deceased wife as he is with his children. He expects his offspring to marry into money, more or less pimps Henry to Catherine as long as he thinks she's an heiress, and probably married money himself. Catherine leaping to the conclusion that the General is a murderer on scant evidence is very silly, but not as silly as if the General, in spite his formidable manners, had turned out to be a good egg after all.
The Introduction of the Oxford World's Classics edition of Northanger Abbey argues that the novel is in fact a subtle defence of the Gothic novel, and that Catherine's adventures do in fact have a flavour of the Gothic. The General's character is a case in point. As for the "rational" Henry Tilney, he is a mansplaining idiot (this is more elegantly expressed, of course). It's easy to agree with the opinion that Henry's protests against Catherine's imaginings sound hollow. His argument is that such things would never happen in England, with its admirable laws and institutions etc. This means that he's not really defending the General at all - he's saying that his country, not his father, is too civilised for anything too Gothic to take place. Which apart from being insulting to the General is a pretty dumb argument in itself as the most spectacular crimes can happen in the most well-ordered of societies.
However, I'm not sure I completely buy the argument that Austen is defending the Gothic novel as an art form that may contain a kernel of truth in spite of its sensationalism. It is she, not the reader, who has been scathing about Gothic clichés in the first place - what's the point of knocking down the pieces she herself has set up? The surface contradictions of Northanger Abbey may contain a message of some kind - say, that the relationship between reality and fiction is too complicated to be summed up in "novels are a trusty guide to explaining real life" or "novels are nothing like real life". But there is another possibility. Austen was a master craftswoman, but this is after all the first full-length novel she wrote. She may have started it intending it to be a parody of a Gothic novel, then not found the exercise interesting enough. While writing, she then gravitated more and more towards the kind of psychological realism - with a good deal of romance thrown in - that would become her trademark. Even the brightest authors don't always have a master plan - sometimes they just make things up as they go along. Northanger Abbey may not be trying to tell us anything in particular about "good" novels, "bad" novels and ordinary life after all.
Wednesday, 13 February 2019
Doctor Who series eleven: the Doc's not dead yet
Well, that could have been a lot worse. I recently finished watching series eleven of Doctor Who (except the new year special which isn't out on DVD yet) and found myself, surprisingly, not hating it. I had grave misgivings about this series: I didn't like the idea of a female Doctor, I wasn't a fan of the new show runner Chris Chibnall, and I found the way the series was marketed grating. In the end, though, although I'm not bowled over by it, it exceeded my expectations.
The quality of the episodes, though uneven, is by no means uniformly bad. The two first episodes were fine - not spectacular, but good entertainment. I especially liked "The Ghost Monument", with its satisfyingly alien world and Art Malik's enjoyable guest turn as the high-handed runner of a space race. Then the series hit something of a rough patch. The premise of the third episode ”Rosa”, where the Doctor and her team has to protect a small but important historical event from outward interference, isn’t bad in itself. What you could call the Sliding Doors theory of history, where small changes in the past can knock history seriously off course, usually provides entertaining time-travel plots. Not this time, though, as the sci-fi part of the story takes a back seat (no pun intended). It’s hard to quarrel with the episode’s message – segregation laws bad, Rosa Parks’s protest good – but it’s conveyed rather heavy-handedly. Every white person the Doctor and Co. meet is an eye-rolling, overacting racist, and every point is hammered home. Vinette Robinson is a good Rosa Parks, though: her weariness, stemming from having to watch her step and keep her head down every blessed day of the week, feels very convincing.
At least “Rosa” is well-intentioned. There's no excuse for “Arachnids in the UK” whatsoever. The threat is dumb – spiders grown unnaturally large by “toxic waste”? Is this a children’s cartoon from the Seventies? The Doctor’s squeamishness about killing said spiders outright is inexplicable – would she object to squashing a normal-sized spider in a bath, then? The solution she and her friends come up with instead is basically an “out of sight, out of mind” one which will end with the spiders dead anyway, only it will be slower. And then there’s Robertson, an American hotel magnate and presidential candidate who barks “you’re fired!” at a new employee… Yeah, they went there. Even if the Trump caricature had been done with Yes Minister-like finesse, it would have been out of place in a Doctor Who adventure. As it is, the episode takes a cheap shot at a goodish-sized target and manages to miss it completely. Robertson may be a one-dimensional bastard, but unlike the Donald, he is crushingly predictable, which would make him a pretty safe incumbent of the White House. Plus he has the right idea about those spiders.
After the just about OK "The Tsuranga Conundrum" the series picked up with two strong installments - "The Demons of Punjab" and "Kerblam!" - which where not at all what I'd expected them to be. "The Demons of Punjab" is set during the Partition of India, but the focus is an intimate family drama. Context is provided by conflicts within the Indian population rather than moaning about the awful Brits, and there's not a tropical-helmeted Colonel in sight. "Kerblam!" takes place at what's basically Amazon in space, and I braced myself for a lecture about the evils of commercialism. That's not what the adventure's about, however: instead, it's a fun caper full of surprising twists and turns.
"The Witchfinders" was another dip for me, though as it took itself less seriously than "Rosa" I somehow minded it less. I’ve had a soft spot for Alan Cumming since he played Boris, one of my all-time favourite Bond villains, in Goldeneye. So I was disappointed at first when Cumming camped it up as King James I – just because a king has male lovers doesn’t mean he’s a pantomime dame. All the same, Cumming’s campiness may have saved King James from having even a harder time. If the part had been played with Iain Glen-like grimness, the two character moments which the king is allowed would have had more impact, but at the same time all the “burn the witches” stuff would have seemed more sinister, and the companions would probably not have ended up amiably chewing the fat with him in the end scene. Not exactly a fair portrayal of the king who smoothly succeeded Elizabeth I, brokered a peace with Spain and commissioned an ace Bible translation – whatever James I was, I suspect he was no fool – but it could have been worse. Oh, and Siobhan Finneran (alias Miss O’Brien) as a paranoid estate owner acts everyone else off set. Could we have her in the Downton movie, please?
Then came "It Takes You Away" – which was amazing! Mirror portals, parallel worlds, characters having to face loved ones seemingly back from the dead and having to figure out whether they're real or fake... my geeky heart soared. This had the true Who feel, and even though the series finale was tepid, I found myself cautiously looking forward to series twelve. On the subject of the finale, though, it does contain one of my least favourite plot clichés: the one where a good character is tempted to kill a bad character out of revenge, then is persuaded that he's "better than that", then subjects the bad character to an even worse punishment than death would have been. But it's OK, as the goodie didn't get blood on his hands. For pity's sake (literally), just kill the guy, you wuss!
I'm still far from convinced by Chris Chibnall as show runner, but he did pick some good guest writers, and the main acting cast works well. Jodie Whittaker convinces as the Doctor – I don't think she will ever be my favourite, but she is suitably Doctorish as well as warm and engaging. The companions are likeable, too. Bradley Walsh nails it as retired bus driver Graham, the best-developed companion and a real sweetheart. His step-grandson Ryan, played by Tosin Cole, is disarmingly laid-back, and his and Graham's tentative bonding following the death of Graham's wife and Ryan's nan Grace suitably touching. Mandip Gill's apprentice policeman Yaz is, as has been commented on, under-developed, but she has potential. I really enjoyed the friendly dynamic between the companions – Ryan and Graham backing up Yaz when she tried to persuade a sceptical Doctor to go back in time so she could see her grandmother as a young woman was a sweet moment.
Having said all that, I do feel like some of the magic of the series is gone. Above all, it's not as clever as it used to be under brainbox Steven Moffat. With less brilliant banter and brain-twisting sci-fi concepts to distract one, the flaws of the series, which have always been there – a clunky political comment here, a certain sense of over-worthiness there – become more apparent. But it's still watchable, and as Chibnall settles in, I'm hoping he'll deign to use more familiar Doctor Who tropes, including some of its old villains (especially as he hasn't really managed to create impressive new ones this far). Perhaps the Master could come back, regenerated as a man again, thus flipping the Gomez-Capaldi dynamic? It would be nice if he still had that Scottish accent...
The quality of the episodes, though uneven, is by no means uniformly bad. The two first episodes were fine - not spectacular, but good entertainment. I especially liked "The Ghost Monument", with its satisfyingly alien world and Art Malik's enjoyable guest turn as the high-handed runner of a space race. Then the series hit something of a rough patch. The premise of the third episode ”Rosa”, where the Doctor and her team has to protect a small but important historical event from outward interference, isn’t bad in itself. What you could call the Sliding Doors theory of history, where small changes in the past can knock history seriously off course, usually provides entertaining time-travel plots. Not this time, though, as the sci-fi part of the story takes a back seat (no pun intended). It’s hard to quarrel with the episode’s message – segregation laws bad, Rosa Parks’s protest good – but it’s conveyed rather heavy-handedly. Every white person the Doctor and Co. meet is an eye-rolling, overacting racist, and every point is hammered home. Vinette Robinson is a good Rosa Parks, though: her weariness, stemming from having to watch her step and keep her head down every blessed day of the week, feels very convincing.
At least “Rosa” is well-intentioned. There's no excuse for “Arachnids in the UK” whatsoever. The threat is dumb – spiders grown unnaturally large by “toxic waste”? Is this a children’s cartoon from the Seventies? The Doctor’s squeamishness about killing said spiders outright is inexplicable – would she object to squashing a normal-sized spider in a bath, then? The solution she and her friends come up with instead is basically an “out of sight, out of mind” one which will end with the spiders dead anyway, only it will be slower. And then there’s Robertson, an American hotel magnate and presidential candidate who barks “you’re fired!” at a new employee… Yeah, they went there. Even if the Trump caricature had been done with Yes Minister-like finesse, it would have been out of place in a Doctor Who adventure. As it is, the episode takes a cheap shot at a goodish-sized target and manages to miss it completely. Robertson may be a one-dimensional bastard, but unlike the Donald, he is crushingly predictable, which would make him a pretty safe incumbent of the White House. Plus he has the right idea about those spiders.
After the just about OK "The Tsuranga Conundrum" the series picked up with two strong installments - "The Demons of Punjab" and "Kerblam!" - which where not at all what I'd expected them to be. "The Demons of Punjab" is set during the Partition of India, but the focus is an intimate family drama. Context is provided by conflicts within the Indian population rather than moaning about the awful Brits, and there's not a tropical-helmeted Colonel in sight. "Kerblam!" takes place at what's basically Amazon in space, and I braced myself for a lecture about the evils of commercialism. That's not what the adventure's about, however: instead, it's a fun caper full of surprising twists and turns.
"The Witchfinders" was another dip for me, though as it took itself less seriously than "Rosa" I somehow minded it less. I’ve had a soft spot for Alan Cumming since he played Boris, one of my all-time favourite Bond villains, in Goldeneye. So I was disappointed at first when Cumming camped it up as King James I – just because a king has male lovers doesn’t mean he’s a pantomime dame. All the same, Cumming’s campiness may have saved King James from having even a harder time. If the part had been played with Iain Glen-like grimness, the two character moments which the king is allowed would have had more impact, but at the same time all the “burn the witches” stuff would have seemed more sinister, and the companions would probably not have ended up amiably chewing the fat with him in the end scene. Not exactly a fair portrayal of the king who smoothly succeeded Elizabeth I, brokered a peace with Spain and commissioned an ace Bible translation – whatever James I was, I suspect he was no fool – but it could have been worse. Oh, and Siobhan Finneran (alias Miss O’Brien) as a paranoid estate owner acts everyone else off set. Could we have her in the Downton movie, please?
Then came "It Takes You Away" – which was amazing! Mirror portals, parallel worlds, characters having to face loved ones seemingly back from the dead and having to figure out whether they're real or fake... my geeky heart soared. This had the true Who feel, and even though the series finale was tepid, I found myself cautiously looking forward to series twelve. On the subject of the finale, though, it does contain one of my least favourite plot clichés: the one where a good character is tempted to kill a bad character out of revenge, then is persuaded that he's "better than that", then subjects the bad character to an even worse punishment than death would have been. But it's OK, as the goodie didn't get blood on his hands. For pity's sake (literally), just kill the guy, you wuss!
I'm still far from convinced by Chris Chibnall as show runner, but he did pick some good guest writers, and the main acting cast works well. Jodie Whittaker convinces as the Doctor – I don't think she will ever be my favourite, but she is suitably Doctorish as well as warm and engaging. The companions are likeable, too. Bradley Walsh nails it as retired bus driver Graham, the best-developed companion and a real sweetheart. His step-grandson Ryan, played by Tosin Cole, is disarmingly laid-back, and his and Graham's tentative bonding following the death of Graham's wife and Ryan's nan Grace suitably touching. Mandip Gill's apprentice policeman Yaz is, as has been commented on, under-developed, but she has potential. I really enjoyed the friendly dynamic between the companions – Ryan and Graham backing up Yaz when she tried to persuade a sceptical Doctor to go back in time so she could see her grandmother as a young woman was a sweet moment.
Having said all that, I do feel like some of the magic of the series is gone. Above all, it's not as clever as it used to be under brainbox Steven Moffat. With less brilliant banter and brain-twisting sci-fi concepts to distract one, the flaws of the series, which have always been there – a clunky political comment here, a certain sense of over-worthiness there – become more apparent. But it's still watchable, and as Chibnall settles in, I'm hoping he'll deign to use more familiar Doctor Who tropes, including some of its old villains (especially as he hasn't really managed to create impressive new ones this far). Perhaps the Master could come back, regenerated as a man again, thus flipping the Gomez-Capaldi dynamic? It would be nice if he still had that Scottish accent...
Wednesday, 6 February 2019
There's something about Alice
So, here are a couple of things you may not know about Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass if you've never actually read them but have seen various adaptations of them:
1) The Queen of Hearts in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland never actually beheads anyone. She does shout "Off with his/her/their head/s!", but the King pardons anyone singled out in this way, and the Gryphon confirms that "they never executes nobody".
2) The Queen of Hearts and the Red Queen are not the same person. The Red Queen appears in Through the Looking Glass and is a typically dotty character who's completely unthreatening.
3) The Red Queen and the White Queen (also dotty) are not enemies.
4) Alice never slays, or indeed meets, a Jabberwock. She reads about it in a poem she finds in Through the Looking Glass.
5) Jabberwock is the monster, Jabberwocky the poem.
6) We never see Alice as a grown-up, and though a bright girl who takes things in her stride, she is no action heroine. She is not romantically linked to the Mad Hatter nor anyone else.
7) The two Alice books are supposed to describe her dreams and both end with Alice waking up.
In short, various works that have been inspired by or even claim to be adaptations of the Alice books take considerable liberties with their source material. The worst offender in my view in Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland which has nothing whatsoever to do with the work on which it's based: it's more of a scrappy sort of sequel, but doesn't even work as that. A generic fantasy concept is forced onto Carroll's characters which doesn't fit at all. (I've not seen Alice Through The Looking Glass but I gather that has as little to do with the second Alice book as the first film had with the first.)
Others are more open with their Alice adventures being flights of fancy. In Once Upon A Time we ended up with two different versions of Wonderland - neither very faithful to the original, but enjoyable all the same. Second Wonderland's Alice, whose acquaintance we made in season seven, had an endearing quirkiness about her which in some way reminded one of the original, and there were several references to the books in her conversation which convinced at least me that the writers know them pretty well (I was particularly impressed with their picking up on Alice's penchant for orange marmalade). As for the first version of Wonderland, the Mad Hatter and the Queen of Hearts (Cora, also the Evil Queen's mum and the Miller's Daughter) were especially memorable, if a far cry from their "real" Wonderland counterparts.
In all these variations Alice is a grown-up, and in each case her adventures aren't dreams at all but real. The same is true of the heroine of Alice, a novel by Christina Henry who also uses Carroll's books as a starting point for her own fantastic tale.
For a while, I was in two minds about whether I liked this novel or not, and in some ways I still am. It starts in deep gloom, and I nearly gave up there and then, thinking "be so good as not to involve Carroll's poor Alice in your fantasy dystopias". The quality of the writing made me persevere, though, and once Henry's Alice and her fellow asylum inmate Hatcher (it took me an embarrassingly long time to make the connection to the Mad Hatter) have escaped from their prison and have started on their quest to defeat the Jabberwock/Jabberwocky, I enjoyed the story. At the same time the references to Carroll's books continued to rile me, as the dark fantasy setting bears abslutely no resemblance to Wonderland or the Looking-Glass World whatsoever. The characters with names/nicknames relating to the Alice books are usually crime bosses with an extra keen interest in exploiting girls. Even Burton's take on Alice seemed sweetly whimsical and faithful in comparison.
And yet - I can't quite claim that Henry uses the Alice books simply as a way to superficially dress up her own grim world. Alice herself reacts to events and characters with something of the same clear-eyed naïvety as the original, and the various shady people she comes across have something to tie them to their Wonderland counterparts, though it's not much. The Caterpillar is still patronising. The Walrus still has an appetite. And Cheshire smiles. I acknowledge that Henry would have had difficulty in telling the same story while removing all the Wonderland references. It's still a bit of an imposition, though.
The ending of the book was, to my mind, problematic. I disliked the way that Alice and Hatcher went from fantasy questers to avengers, cutting a bloody swathe through the Old City's Underworld. Moral indignation is, for me, one of the least relatable murder motives there is - give me good old lust, greed or personal revenge any time. In the end, there are only so many people that need to die for someone's personal gain: if on the other hand your mission is to rid the world of anyone you deem morally unfit, you can go on forever. It puzzled me how, when it comes to the final showdown between Alice and the Jabberwock, she clearly still thinks of herself as unsullied: "She would never comprehend the need to hurt those who never hurt her, the need to hate for the sake of hating." Er, remember that time you cut a man's throat and watched him slowly bleed to death? That's called hating, girl.
Also, said showdown with the Jabberwock and Alice's confrontation with the Rabbit, the man/beast who once took her prisoner (a not altogether convincing Big Bad - I'd have said the March Hare would have been a better fit), are a bit of an anticlimax after the way these two characters have been built up throughout the novel. The defeat of the Jabberwock isn't particularly clever and in no way more merciful than some straightforward snicker-snacking with a vorpal blade would have been. Yet, with all its faults, the novel has a strong redeeming feature: it's a good read. Plus, Cheshire is great. I've already ordered the sequel.
So, why is it so common for writers, filmmakers etc. to seek inspiration from the Alice books, when to a large extent they are going to do their own thing anyway? The answer is simple, really: the books are just that good. As anyone who has tried to retell an amazing dream which then only seems boring and disjointed knows, pulling off a truly intriguing dream narrative is no mean thing. And although Carroll's Alice never comes across a real antagonist, there is something unsettling about some of the adventures she goes through and the people she encounters (or hears about - like the Walrus and the Carpenter) which does lend itself to "dark" interpretations. For my part, I'm happy to go down a few more Alice-inspired rabbit holes - though I'd be grateful if people could tell their Red Queens from their Queens of Hearts.
1) The Queen of Hearts in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland never actually beheads anyone. She does shout "Off with his/her/their head/s!", but the King pardons anyone singled out in this way, and the Gryphon confirms that "they never executes nobody".
2) The Queen of Hearts and the Red Queen are not the same person. The Red Queen appears in Through the Looking Glass and is a typically dotty character who's completely unthreatening.
3) The Red Queen and the White Queen (also dotty) are not enemies.
4) Alice never slays, or indeed meets, a Jabberwock. She reads about it in a poem she finds in Through the Looking Glass.
5) Jabberwock is the monster, Jabberwocky the poem.
6) We never see Alice as a grown-up, and though a bright girl who takes things in her stride, she is no action heroine. She is not romantically linked to the Mad Hatter nor anyone else.
7) The two Alice books are supposed to describe her dreams and both end with Alice waking up.
In short, various works that have been inspired by or even claim to be adaptations of the Alice books take considerable liberties with their source material. The worst offender in my view in Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland which has nothing whatsoever to do with the work on which it's based: it's more of a scrappy sort of sequel, but doesn't even work as that. A generic fantasy concept is forced onto Carroll's characters which doesn't fit at all. (I've not seen Alice Through The Looking Glass but I gather that has as little to do with the second Alice book as the first film had with the first.)
Others are more open with their Alice adventures being flights of fancy. In Once Upon A Time we ended up with two different versions of Wonderland - neither very faithful to the original, but enjoyable all the same. Second Wonderland's Alice, whose acquaintance we made in season seven, had an endearing quirkiness about her which in some way reminded one of the original, and there were several references to the books in her conversation which convinced at least me that the writers know them pretty well (I was particularly impressed with their picking up on Alice's penchant for orange marmalade). As for the first version of Wonderland, the Mad Hatter and the Queen of Hearts (Cora, also the Evil Queen's mum and the Miller's Daughter) were especially memorable, if a far cry from their "real" Wonderland counterparts.
In all these variations Alice is a grown-up, and in each case her adventures aren't dreams at all but real. The same is true of the heroine of Alice, a novel by Christina Henry who also uses Carroll's books as a starting point for her own fantastic tale.
For a while, I was in two minds about whether I liked this novel or not, and in some ways I still am. It starts in deep gloom, and I nearly gave up there and then, thinking "be so good as not to involve Carroll's poor Alice in your fantasy dystopias". The quality of the writing made me persevere, though, and once Henry's Alice and her fellow asylum inmate Hatcher (it took me an embarrassingly long time to make the connection to the Mad Hatter) have escaped from their prison and have started on their quest to defeat the Jabberwock/Jabberwocky, I enjoyed the story. At the same time the references to Carroll's books continued to rile me, as the dark fantasy setting bears abslutely no resemblance to Wonderland or the Looking-Glass World whatsoever. The characters with names/nicknames relating to the Alice books are usually crime bosses with an extra keen interest in exploiting girls. Even Burton's take on Alice seemed sweetly whimsical and faithful in comparison.
And yet - I can't quite claim that Henry uses the Alice books simply as a way to superficially dress up her own grim world. Alice herself reacts to events and characters with something of the same clear-eyed naïvety as the original, and the various shady people she comes across have something to tie them to their Wonderland counterparts, though it's not much. The Caterpillar is still patronising. The Walrus still has an appetite. And Cheshire smiles. I acknowledge that Henry would have had difficulty in telling the same story while removing all the Wonderland references. It's still a bit of an imposition, though.
The ending of the book was, to my mind, problematic. I disliked the way that Alice and Hatcher went from fantasy questers to avengers, cutting a bloody swathe through the Old City's Underworld. Moral indignation is, for me, one of the least relatable murder motives there is - give me good old lust, greed or personal revenge any time. In the end, there are only so many people that need to die for someone's personal gain: if on the other hand your mission is to rid the world of anyone you deem morally unfit, you can go on forever. It puzzled me how, when it comes to the final showdown between Alice and the Jabberwock, she clearly still thinks of herself as unsullied: "She would never comprehend the need to hurt those who never hurt her, the need to hate for the sake of hating." Er, remember that time you cut a man's throat and watched him slowly bleed to death? That's called hating, girl.
Also, said showdown with the Jabberwock and Alice's confrontation with the Rabbit, the man/beast who once took her prisoner (a not altogether convincing Big Bad - I'd have said the March Hare would have been a better fit), are a bit of an anticlimax after the way these two characters have been built up throughout the novel. The defeat of the Jabberwock isn't particularly clever and in no way more merciful than some straightforward snicker-snacking with a vorpal blade would have been. Yet, with all its faults, the novel has a strong redeeming feature: it's a good read. Plus, Cheshire is great. I've already ordered the sequel.
So, why is it so common for writers, filmmakers etc. to seek inspiration from the Alice books, when to a large extent they are going to do their own thing anyway? The answer is simple, really: the books are just that good. As anyone who has tried to retell an amazing dream which then only seems boring and disjointed knows, pulling off a truly intriguing dream narrative is no mean thing. And although Carroll's Alice never comes across a real antagonist, there is something unsettling about some of the adventures she goes through and the people she encounters (or hears about - like the Walrus and the Carpenter) which does lend itself to "dark" interpretations. For my part, I'm happy to go down a few more Alice-inspired rabbit holes - though I'd be grateful if people could tell their Red Queens from their Queens of Hearts.
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