Speak Coffee to Me

Krampus Anthology to Take Submissions

noreply@blogger.com (Eileen Wiedbrauk) — Fri, 14 Jun 2013 18:32:00 +0000

Gorgeous Krampus art from a book
I have absolutely no association with
other than drooling over the art:
Krampus: The Yule Lord by Brom.

Specter Spectacular II: 13 Deathly Tales closes to submissions on Saturday, but don't despair you writers of the macabre! Also on Saturday, June 15, Kate Wolford will start reading submissions for a Krampus based anthology as part of a joint venture between World Weaver Press and Enchanted Conversation: A Fairy Tale Magazine.

Description:
You know the Jolly Old Elf of Christmas, right? Of course you do. You can’t avoid him. Yet, Santa Claus isn’t just a kindly old expert at breaking and entering and leaving gifts he didn’t actually buy for the children of a house. At least he isn’t in Austria and many other parts of Europe.

In these ancient places, where, perhaps, the old, old gods still add a touch of mischief, Krampus is the angry, punishing sidekick of St. Nicholas (Santa’s counterpart in much of Europe). Known for his willingness to punish rotten children, Krampus might even be considered Santa’s dark side or evil twin.

Krampus is the sort of guy more and more North Americans want to explore. He’s definitely having a moment this side of the Atlantic. To that end, World Weaver Press and Enchanted Conversation: A Fairy Tale Magazine are pleased to announce a joint venture: An anthology of Krampus short stories.

Although the book is yet to be named, we hope you’ll explore every possible Krampus angle via short stories. He’s a nasty old dude, and we hope your imaginations will get the better of you.

Anthology editor Kate Wolford ran a mini Krampus story contest for Enchanted Conversation last Christmas where there was lots of interest -- it was certainly the first time I'd heard of the Krampus! -- and gives her insights on what she's looking for in the upcoming anthology: “Krampus taps into a kind of ancient darkness that captures the spirit of winter. He also seems to lend himself to humor and horror and maybe, a bit of magic. I think the story possibilities are endless and intriguing.”

Guidelines and instructions for submission.

Kate Wolford is editor and publisher of Enchanted Conversation: A Fairy Tale Magazine at fairytalemagazine.com. She teaches first-year college writing, incorporating fairy tales in her assignments whenever possible. World Weaver Press released her annotated anthology, Beyond the Glass Slipper: Ten Neglected Fairy Tales to Fall In Love With, in April 2013.

World Weaver Press is a publisher of fantasy, paranormal, and science fiction, dedicated to producing quality works. As a small press, World Weaver seeks to publish books that engage the mind and ensnare the story-loving soul.

For Lack of Substance...

noreply@blogger.com (Eileen Wiedbrauk) — Thu, 06 Jun 2013 23:20:00 +0000

For lack of a topic of substance today, I present you with the Sad Cat Diaries. With luck, I will craft something of brilliance by next week.

The Next Doctor

noreply@blogger.com (Eileen Wiedbrauk) — Mon, 03 Jun 2013 04:00:00 +0000

Matt Smith is officially slated to leave Doctor Who during the 2013 Christmas special -- now I'd heard this news as likely coming from credible sources (namely the way that the show's creators/writers/producers were phrasing the way the talked about the future of the show) but people kept telling me it was "just a rumor," "allegedly leaving," "don't believe it."

Regardless of the naysayers, I trusted my own ears and intellect -- it's been a four year run, after all. Consequently, I've had some months to think about my top choices for which actors I'd like to see as The Next Doctor.

** Although, I should note that in the best of all possible worlds, the Doctor re-regenerates back into David Tennant. Just saying. **

Paging doctor cranky-pants
English actor Hugh Laurie, best known to Americans for his dramatic role in House M.D. We're already used to seeing him as a cranky, eccentric, meddling, lying, smartest-man-in-the-room doctor. Why not upgrade to being the Doctor?

(Note: I would probably pee my pants if this absolutely awesome idea came to fruition.)

Laurie is an amazing actor -- watching the wheels in his head turn (his characters' heads, to be exact), is fascinating. It would be so much fun to see him in an action-ish role. Lot's of running in Doctor Who, you know. But it would be beyond fun to see the Doctor with the cynical-romantic edge that Hugh Laurie portrays so well.

Am I a ginger?
The Doctor's always wanted to be a ginger, why not let him? And here I turn to suggest a former member of the Harry Potter cast -- but not one of the leads. Puhleeze. Can't imagine Ron, Harry, or Hermione stepping from one iconic British spec fic lead into another -- my little brain would explode. Although to be honest, just about all of England's finest actors and actresses have played in Harry Potter at one time or another.

I suggest for the role of the Doctor, Domhnall Gleeson who played Bill Weasley. A redhead and an Irish actor -- does that DQ him? We've had Scottish actors play Who after all. I have to admit that I'm an ignorant American when it comes to the sometimes prickly nature of English-Scottish-Irish-Welsh cultural overlap.

But how can we let such notions stand in our way when there are already movies stills of Domhnall Gleeson like this one that could come from just about any episode of Who? Puts you in mind of William Hartnell, no?

I'm a girl!
Every time the public scents a regeneration in the air, the question becomes when will everyone's favorite Time Lord appear as a Time Lady? A prospect reanimated not that long ago in the episode "The Doctor's Wife" when the 11th Doctor mentioned a particular tattoo a Time Lord friend of his got every regeneration -- whether he regenerated as male or female.

My top actress pick -- just for its timey wimey impossibilities -- would be Georgia Moffett. How awesome would it be to have the actress daughter of the 5th Doctor (Peter Davison) and the wife of the 10th Doctor (David Tennant) play the 12th Doctor? Oh yes, wibbly wobbly timey wimey goo indeed.

Alas, that seems unlikely to happen as she's already played Jenny, the Doctor's cloned daughter, and the writers of Doctor Who prefer to make sense of actors who reappear -- even going so far as to have characters take a time out while trying to save the universe from imminent destruction to explain why the Reboot Season 1 Episode 2 actress Eve Myles appears as part of the Torchwood team (a Welsh family with deep roots, apparently). Other actresses that reappear in unrelated episodes get entire story lines to explain themselves (see: Impossible Girl).

So Georgia Moffett appears to be an unreasonable addition to my list, but maybe her adorable son will one day take up acting.

Let me get sidetracked for a second: dangling story line here people! The Doctor's cloned daughter is still out there! Someone! Write an episode, or five, about that! Please!

In all seriousness though, what about Jennifer Ehle? An English-American actress I'm most familiar with for her roles in Pride and Prejudice (BBC version) and The King's Speech. Narratively speaking, I think that if the Doctor were to regenerate as a woman, she would need to not be a barely legal hot young thang, she would need to be a bit more mature in order to deal with all the bits and people of her past ... including her dead wife.

That's the shortlist. I'll be waiting with bated breath this Christmas to see just what the heck happens on screen. I might cry. Well, there might be tearing up. Gotta admit that I'm not likely to shed the tears I did when Tennant uttered the line "I don't want to go."

And if, for any reason, the Doctor Who production team wants to hire me to help write for the show, or cast actors, or shine Dalek chrome tops -- call me.

The Handshake

noreply@blogger.com (Eileen Wiedbrauk) — Thu, 30 May 2013 04:00:00 +0000

A good college will teach you how to shake hands. This may sound totally stupid, but it's true. The basic extend hand, grasp other hand, let go of said other hand, social exchange does have to be taught. Moreover, it should be taught.

In American culture, the handshake is a huuuuuuuge part of meeting people and establishing the basis of your future relationship. Personally, I have a tendency to wait to see if someone's going to offer me their hand before sticking out mine when we're in a social gray area, particularly if the other person has more power in the situation / we're on their home turf -- and I'm always a bit disappointed in those who don't go right for the shake. Always.

In those shake-less situations, I'm left wondering -- in an academic capacity, mind you -- if the lack of offer was because I'm a chick and "women don't shake hands like men" and therefore there's a weird sort of sexual inequality going on in this person's lizard brain, or if the lack of offer was because the other person is a socially inept flake. Neither is a good impression.

I'm always ready to shake hands, and always sad when I don't get the offer.

There are two places where I can rely on to get the offer: job interviews and sorority rush. And here is where the whole college should teach you to shake hands thing comes into play:

Shaking hands is important. It's a physical demonstration of your personality, it's also a respectful means of broaching your personal bubble and establishing personal and communal space. I'm sure ethnographers would suggest it's a means of bringing respected individuals into a physical space of social acceptance while keeping unacceptable members of society outside of the group space.

Ethnographers aside, most people think it demonstrates personality: assertive types verses wimpy types. We've all heard of the clammy, dead fish handshake of doom. While near impossible to control how much you sweat without chemical interference, it is however, very easy to control how much pressure you do or don't apply to the other party's hand. I'm rarely more amused than I am by women who give the handshake equivalent of the golf clap: they sort of gingerly clasp your hand the way they would a raw egg using only first two fingers and thumb, then quickly let go, leaving the metaphorical eggshell still in tact. It's all very HRH. Worse is when you offer the whole palm and finger array and leave it there all limp. Fishy. Blah.

We practiced this in the sorority. Women were coming to our door to rush. Maybe not rush our house, maybe they'd never had contact with a single one of us, maybe they'd make friends and decide to join -- whatever the situation, the at-the-door greeting was the first official moment of contact. In so many ways, my experience of Greek life was absolutely nothing like the movies. What I can tell you about rush is that it was not a snippy, catty series of par-tays; it was instead an alcohol-free, highly choreographed, likely inefficient, social dance that the rushee was never supposed to catch on to. And we practiced all of it. From the handshake, to where we sat the girl, to the conversations we'd have, to how we'd offer her food, to the way we'd walk her out the door and what we said as she left. It took us months to prepare. Not to mention learning all the accompanying songs and chants -- don't ask. Among the prep work: we one by one walked up to a near-stranger adult rush adviser, grabbed her limp hand, shook it, and welcomed her. And if we didn't pass, we did it again.

I think we could all do with more handshakes and more handshake practice in our lives. No matter how silly you feel. Come on. Unless you're one of those types who wrap everyone up in a bear hug, shake my hand and do it like you mean it.

Ad of the Week

noreply@blogger.com (Eileen Wiedbrauk) — Mon, 27 May 2013 23:41:00 +0000

This may be the best campaign I've seen all year: GE's "Agent of Good."

Type in All Cats

noreply@blogger.com (Eileen Wiedbrauk) — Thu, 23 May 2013 04:00:00 +0000

It's bad form to type in all caps on the internet, a mode of communication generally perceived as "yelling." But what if, instead of caps, you could type in all cats?
Just when you thought the internet's obsession with cats could come no closer to all-consuming Ancient Egypt style worship, there arrives Neko Font, maker of the cat font.

Dear Impossible Girl,

noreply@blogger.com (Eileen Wiedbrauk) — Mon, 20 May 2013 03:51:00 +0000

We've solved your existence. More or less. Now I'm half-certain that I must go and rewatch the past half-season. How am I supposed to divine the emotional thread of these things if I don't line them up end to end to analyze? This whole one-every-week thing is a nice way to watch TV, but nice apparently doesn't do it for me. I must be immersed.

And yes, I'm also the kind of person who, when I get a good novel, will stay up all night to finish it.

My thoughts on season seven part two (without divulging spoilers):

We had an over arching question -- how is the Impossible Girl possible? -- which we answered in the final episode of the season. Not to say that there aren't going to be more impossible attributes to her existence, but we did learn her origin. But we really didn't chip away at that question except in the very final episode. Personally, I was hoping for more hints, I was hoping to chip away the way we did when we got to see Rose Tyler calling out to the Doctor in her failed attempts to punch through dimensions, then her discussion with Donna, eventually heralding her actually punching through dimensions.

The end of season seven poses loads of new questions, all of which make me very excited for season eight. Of course the existence of Clara as posed by the season seven Christmas special made me very excited and well ... it sort of panned out. The final two episodes were great. The stuff in the middle of the season? ... I guess every season needs filler. Like that episode with Rose and the 10th Doctor about the support group that got assimilated into the alien's body fat. Yeah, could have done without that one too.

When people raved about Neil Gaiman's "The Doctor's Wife" a few seasons ago I raised an eyebrow -- but Mr. Gaiman has redeemed and outdone himself with "Nightmare in Silver." Not only has he upgraded Cybermen back into the realm of scary but he gives as a brilliant statement from the Cyber Planner: (to paraphrase) you may have erased yourself from history, Doctor, but there's much to be learned from the shape of the hole you've made.

Now that's cool.

We finally get sense made of the stupid leaf. The leaf was cool when it was in her book. It was stupid when it was fed to a giant planet-ish vampire. Now, come the end of the season, we understand the leaf's importance ... but it was still stupid in episode two. A bit like Rose Tyler using Bad Wolf to keep herself from burning up in the second episode then sitting on it until the finale when she realizes what it means. Although in this case I guess she was always supposed to have known what it meant, we just weren't really privy to an understanding of that information? Maybe? I feel like I'm reaching here.

Two other interesting revelations which I'm still teasing out -- and since these do have spoilers, I'm putting a cut, which you'll have to click on to read more ... unless you came to this page via direct link, in which case: ahoy! spoilers ahead!

The Doctor's relationship with Clara ratchets up a notch in "Nightmare in Silver." There are things said when the Doctor's brain is being semi-controlled -- that's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about the very end of the episode, and the fact that the Doctor has a long standing habit of not seeing his companions as relationship material until someone else does. The Doctor was more like a father figure to Rose so long as her boyfriends were inept fools, but as soon as Captain Jack came on the scene, that all changed. The Doctor brought Rory on the Tardis to stop Amy Pond from making another move on him, but as soon as Rory starts to prove himself, the Doctor forces "Amy's Choice." Clara receives a marriage proposal from someone who can give her the universe -- someone other than the Doctor -- and the Doctor is quick to try and intervene. If I've read all the signs right, this is the potential turning point. Allons-y!

But isn't he married to River Song?

Maybe. Sort of. Time travel does a real number on marriages. And then there's the "Name of the Doctor" (final episode) assertion that we're more or less in a post-River timeline now. But there are all these great link with Clara hints of mysteries waiting to be solved. What is River's link with Clara? And if we're at a time when we're dealing with post-Library River, then why hasn't River faded as the Doctor suspected she would?

Although I cry foul on that notion of fading! But that's only because of some behind-the-scenes commentary from one of the writers saying "if you're dead and the choice is between oblivion and eternity in the world's greatest library..." implying, of course, that the "saving" process didn't allow for fade once she'd been uploaded. But interviews aren't canon. Hell, it's Doctor Who -- is there actually a canon that can't be rewritten?

Ad of the Week

noreply@blogger.com (Eileen Wiedbrauk) — Sun, 12 May 2013 12:00:00 +0000

Battle of the two Spocks.

Battling the Blank Page

noreply@blogger.com (Eileen Wiedbrauk) — Thu, 09 May 2013 04:00:00 +0000

A blank page is daunting. It's a fact. It's a totally illogical fact, but it's a fact.

Sometimes the vast possibilities presented by that which is unwritten can stymie a writer. Sometimes the idea of modifying a pristine white field (whether paper or word processor) with your inadequate first draft is demoralizing. Yet it's completely illogical: possibilities thwarted by the presence of possibilities? An empty sheet of wood pulp seeming more worthy than words representing your unbridled imagination? It's totally illogical -- and yet totally true.

So true, in fact, that I've been given advice my entire life of how to combat it:

In undergrad my creative writing adviser suggested we all draft in pencil because it would feel less permanent than pen therefore allowing us the ability to put mistakes on the page without fear of ruination.

A middle school English teacher forbade our class from writing in pencil because we were too tempted to erase our good ideas along with our bad -- pen only! Mistakes were to be crossed out, but kept. And when we got our writing back from her we saw why: she nurtured all those aborted thoughts of ours and helped us see that we could stretch beyond the safe answers we thought where the "right" answers.

I've known people who type only with their eyes closed. Or who write at night, turn off their desk lamp and pitch the background color of their word processor black so that they can lose awareness of the screen's harsh, mechanical glare. (This does provide sort of an ethereal state, especially if you alter the text color to something whimsical.)

For as many people who swear by ornate "writer helping" software like scrivner, I've heard from just as many who just want a basic word processor -- cut, paste, spellcheck -- because the additional bells and whistles of "writing helping" software can provide as much distraction as assistance.

Lately, even the word processor has become too fancy for me.

I find an inherent level of annoyance and formality involved in using Word. It keeps trying to get me to write in a sans serif font. And I can't draft in a sans serif font, it just makes me feel less intelligent. (My desire for serif fonts when using smaller than size 18 font or when stretching more than three inches per line isn't just preference, it's scientific -- why Microsoft designers haven't come to terms with typographers on this to make the world a more print-happy place, I have no idea.) So there I am, having waited all of too long for Word to load, and before I can begin typing my project, I'm fiddling with the formatting -- formatting which is utterly and totally unimportant to the unwritten idea as it's not yet written. So I open Notepad instead.

A tiny little program that lurks in all Windows computers in the "Accessories" program folder, its default is to generate .txt or "text" files. It has no formatting. And I mean none: no font choices, no paragraph styles, no font size choices, no bold, no italics, no autoformatting, no automated lists popping up. I recently discovered that it does recognize the Tab key as a character, which surprised me as I didn't think it was that fancy. And I'm still not certain whether or not I'm happy it recognizes the Tab as this program's appeal is its utter lack of formatting choices. Getting the words of the story out are choices enough, thank you very much. Start asking me to deal with formatting choices or why there's a new auto-indent or auto-not-indent is a distraction, and suddenly I'm not remembering why my character just said what he did or what her reply -- the one I've not typed yet --was going to be.

Oh, and it writes in courier. Completely charming and insanely easy to read and edit once you get over your illogical initial OMG who uses courier anymore? reaction. Typos don't hide in courier the way they do in other fonts.

In other perks, the Notepad program pops up a second or two after clicking on it, and I use it daily as a place to stick items which I'll need to copy and paste later. Since it has almost no options and almost no menu headers, I can keep a long narrow notepad file open to one side of my desktop, taking up about 25% of the screen. I'll use it often if I want to type notes about whatever's in my main window -- that way I can still see the main thing even though I'm typing in a different program. Trust me, it's useful.

The downside is that it has no spellcheck, but then neither does an ink pen.

I've been using Notepad like digital scrap paper for years, but lately I've been writing in it. Entire scenes. Last week I started jotting down some notes on a short story and ended up with 2,400 words in a .txt file and not once did I want to move it into Word. In fact, the thought panicked me. Put all that raw story into someplace where it'll need to get formalized? Not yet! It's not ready, it's still too delicate! It's the pen vs. pencil mindset reincarnated.

Of course I'll properly format the story for editing and submission, but I'm just talking about raw drafting here, and the fact that even simple writing programs like Word have been stymieing my drafting process lately with their abundance of options and choices. Perhaps it's because the more bells and whistles I learn within Word's formatting, the more I look at the program and see desktop publishing potential instead of a story-drafting-receptacle.

My current process is a bit like writing out whole stories on the backs of discarded envelopes -- except that as I'm typing on an envelope-width strip of screen, I'm getting the words down a lot faster. And this, this is the only way of late I've been breaking through the blank page, whether it's the first page or the next page.

Getting the Ghost

noreply@blogger.com (Eileen Wiedbrauk) — Wed, 08 May 2013 03:24:00 +0000

I'm editing a second Specter Spectacular anthology for World Weaver Press. Submissions are open now through June 15, 2013 (details). The first anthology was subtitled 13 Ghostly Tales and this time it's 13 Deathly Tales, allowing us to still include some awesome ghost stories but also expand beyond the spirit trope.

The inbox is seeing a lot of moment-of-death stories, and I encourage writers to look beyond that to the ... beyond. I've been pretty vocal about looking for some great stories of psychopomps (literally meaning "guide of the souls" but I also love the "death midwife" description), and I still want to see more such submissions. I'm also encouraging relevant connections to current society whether that's funny grim reapers glued to their cell phones, displaced Valkyries, parallels between a callus Charon ferrying souls across the river Styx with unscrupulous coyotes shepherding people across the border, or modern folklore retwistings.

Ad of the Week

noreply@blogger.com (Eileen Wiedbrauk) — Sat, 04 May 2013 13:35:00 +0000

I fell in love with this narrative. It flew by me on TV, and I've had great fun pausing and playing it back to capture the nuances that are all there. So much more than a minute's narrative tucked into the details.

The Artistic Line Between 'Vulnerable' and 'Self-Destructive'

noreply@blogger.com (Eileen Wiedbrauk) — Thu, 02 May 2013 04:00:00 +0000

I've been watching The Voice this season. I tweet my live reactions @EileenWiedbrauk BTW, if you're interested in following those joys, disappointments, and uneducated immediate reactions as I have zero knowledge of the music business beyond that of avid radio station listener.

Here's the big question I've recently been pondering: why was Amy Winehouse such a huge success in such a short life? She had a fascinating voice and a hot body, yes. But so do so many of the young people who try to make it in the music business each year. So do so many of those who make it as contestants but don't win national shows such as The Voice.

Now I admittedly don't know much about the music business. But if I'm to believe what all of The Voice coaches repeatedly say, it's all about finding an emotional connection to the lyrics/song, and finding a way to connect that emotion to the audience that isn't show-tune-emoting. As the coaches say, it's about being vulnerable.

The strong singers who can't get vulnerable when they produce their amazing vocals get phased out of the competition as often as those who have technical flaws.

This "vulnerable" produced a giant WTF? to my way of thinking/watching until a dude took on an Amy Winehouse song. I'm not a huge Winehouse fan, but it's hard to deny that her fans were/are legion. And if Winehouse was anything when she was singing, it was vulnerable.

I tend to think of people in terms of brave or reserved, not vulnerable/invulnerable. To my mind, only a fool enters a social situation in a vulnerable position ... and admittedly, this is a learned response to high school. Anyway. To this way of thinking, if you get on a stage in front of twenty or twenty thousand and sing, then you're brave in my book. But brave and vulnerable can exist simultaneously. And I often forget that.

There's pain in the way Winehouse sings. It's not all strength and invulnerable bravery. I'm not sure it's something I can fully appreciate without considering the rest of a person's life. Winehouse was strong but troubled, out there but in her head. Supposedly, Winehouse began binge drinking in 2008 after kicking a drug habit. And in 2011, drank herself to death.

Prior to that unfortunate incident, The New Statesman called Winehouse "a filthy-mouthed, down-to-earth diva"; Newsweek called her "a perfect storm of sex kitten, raw talent and poor impulse control." Karen Heller with The Philadelphia Inquirer stated:

She's only 24 with six Grammy nods, crashing headfirst into success and despair, with a codependent husband in jail, exhibitionist parents with questionable judgement, and the paparazzi documenting her emotional and physical distress. Meanwhile, a haute designer Karl Lagerfeld appropriates her disheveled style and eating issues to market to the elite while proclaiming her the new Bardot.

She was fascinating. Artistic. A seemingly unstoppable force. A terribly vulnerable one, riddled with drug and alcohol issues that were destroying her. Her ability to open up and connect to an audience was, perhaps, innate. Her ability to close off that openness and find her own strength, strength that would have allowed her to avoid or move past those problems, was seemingly not present.

In retrospect, it presents a tragic, illustrative picture of the line where necessary artistic vulnerability crosses over into self-destructive artist.

How many artists -- musicians painters, writers, etc. -- are known as much for their drinking and assorted substance abuse as for their art? A damn big lot.

There's a connection there between the ability to make yourself vulnerable enough for an audience to connect with you emotionally and not being able to shut off that vulnerability before all the shit gets into your soul. It's a fascinatingly thin line which artists toe / are encouraged to toe. One which I perhaps have not thought enough on beyond thinking ah, drug problems or not.

A Whovian Problem: Old men, young men, and decorative vegetables.

noreply@blogger.com (Eileen Wiedbrauk) — Thu, 25 Apr 2013 04:00:00 +0000

We've entered into a season seven (part two) Doctor Who problem which either qualifies as meta sci-fi, or the show and its production have been sucked into the Twilight Zone without its knowledge. Which is, in fact, a meta plot. So I guess that first sentence isn't so much a statement of this or that but more of a this or this non-option.

First problem: In the first few episodes of season 7.2, Clara, the current companion, comes across as more Doctor-ish than the Doctor himself. As if she's the timelord. Or as if she's draining him of his Doctor-ish mojo and his portrayal is becoming that of ... the companion.*

I told you it was very meta.

Clara is bright, witty, spunky. She delivers quick intelligent banter. And while her statements don't necessarily possess all the knowledge of centuries spent traveling the universe in an impossible time machine, she is always intelligent. Sometimes more intelligent than the Doctor. Clara also got to save the day in her first off-earth adventure ("Rings of Akhenaten") in a way that most of the other companions had to earn -- with the possible exception of Amy Pond in "The Beast Below"; although that was more of a save-the-day by gut instinct and the quick, last minute push of a button, whereas Clara had this whole drawn out speech proceeding her high-concept saving-of-the-day. All the other companions had to work up to that sort of Doctorish-understanding of how to save the universe, which makes Clara ... ahead of the game?

Unlike some past companions, Clara doesn't ask dumb questions or jump to mundane conclusions. Where Rose, Donna, and even uber-educated uppermiddleclass Dr. Martha Jones blundered into things in a very modern earth-centric human way, Clara ... doesn't.

Will this become an important aspect of her Impossible Girl conundrum? I sure as hell hope so because otherwise it's just dragging down my viewing experience. Clara's the Doctor, and the Doctor is ... old.

The character of the Doctor in season seven part two, is becoming an old man. But he's a thousand years-old, of course he's an old man! But he was so sprightly and spry when he was a mere 900 years-old, and now he's acting like when we first met him back when he was still traveling with his granddaughter Susan!

Don't think too hard on the problem of the older character now seeming older like he did when he was much much younger -- I tried and all I ended up doing was giving myself ice-cream-style brain freeze. But consider this:

The first few actors to portray Doctor Who played the character as if he were an old man. A weird old man, yes. But it wasn't until a few actors later that the Doctor gained a youthful energy.

Let me explain. No there is too much. Let me sum up.**

As part of a charity fundraiser in 2007, Doctor Who filmed the following short, featuring the tenth Doctor, David Tennant, and the fifth Doctor, Peter Davison, in a paradoxical moment of Doctor-Doctor overlap:

Old men. Young men. A vegetable as an accessory.

Well, it's less about the celery and more about not taking yourself too seriously. How on earth can you wear a decorative vegetable and carry yourself as old and grumpy and important? Doesn't work. Doesn't happen. When you invite the fun in, the fun shapes you. And this was what grabbed me when I started watching the 2005 reboot: it was dramatic, playing on the core of human emotions, but it never took itself too seriously. Not in the script, not in the acting.

As season seven (Matt Smith as the eleventh Doctor) gears up in 50th anniversary frenzy, I'm not sure I feel the same way about the series. As the eleventh Doctor, Matt Smith -- one of the youngest actors ever to portray the Doctor -- seems to be getting more serious. Harsher. More like the old men who originally portrayed the Doctor.

The show keeps bringing back original monsters in honor of the 50th anniversary. Monsters that they don't bother to make sense of, or reestablish the cool-factor for, because they appear to be relying on the audience to make personal connections to the monsters of old.

In short: Doctor Who has assigned me homework. Gone are the days when a Dalek or Sontaran shows up on screen with enough context to make him meaningful to my New-to-Who eyes. Now I must go back to the beginning to figure out the deal with The Great Intelligence or Martian Ice Warriors.

I don't mind going back to the beginning -- I had already started. Although sadly Netflix's "Classic Who" archive is miserably spotty. Thankfully my local library has Whovians who've ordered the DVDs for fifty years worth of Who. But I must admit that I'm a bit put off by feeling like the new narrative is requiring it of me to have a satisfying watching experience.

This is all a roundabout way of saying I've been watching the performances of the first three Doctors, and I find Matt Smith's performance moving more and more in that original direction every episode. Narratively speaking, I could lay this at the feet of the disastrousness of traveling alone for too long.

And while I'm on the topic of disatrousness: I would totally not let this guy talk to my child. An adult male appears suddenly in an area frequented by children but has no children of his own with him and wants to talk to my kid. Seems suspiciously pervvy to me. What would be the British idiom -- something to the tune of he's a total creeper, perhaps? Or am I to believe that late-80s/early-90s England didn't have Stranger Danger campaigns?

Fans who champion Smith as adorkable will likely dismay over my assessment. He is adorkable, I agree.*** He does possess that mainstay of quirkiness and seemingly random association. But the eleventh Doctor has always been curt in a way that didn't sit well with me -- he was the first Doctor whom I noticed telling someone to "shut up." Other Doctors said this, but never with the sort of curtness that made me feel that it was an insult. He seems old and mean, and no longer the charming hero of the universe, championing and protecting the human race.

That may be the most disturbing aspect of the eleventh Doctor: that he's been scripted as having written himself out of history. How many times has the Doctor stood up and proclaimed, "Don't you know who I am? ... Don't you know who protects this planet, these humans?" That was sexy. That was awesome. That was heroic. I never got into Superman saving humanity again and again. My Superman was The Doctor. But now he can't do that. Won't do that. Has undone that. My Superman has written himself out of Metropolis's newspapers and history books. And I don't know how I feel about that.

There's talk that Matt Smith won't renew his contract again and that he may depart as soon as the 2013 Christmas special. Whenever it happens that we embark on the twelfth Doctor, it's my hope that he's more of a Davison-Eccleston-Tennant Doctor than a Hartnell-Troughton-Smith Doctor.

Notes:
*This issue was largely resolved in "Hide" (Season 7 part 2, episode 4) when the Doctor finally returned to a unique state of youthful energy also known as being bonkers. This is either an intentional marker of personal improvement as the Doctor recovers from traveling alone, or it was a production team remedy to a rather ill-conceived first three episodes of the season.
** What's the point of rabid fandom if you can't cross reference quotes from one fandom while discussing another? Ten karma points for anyone who identifies this phrase's origin.
*** I dig the adorable dork combination, I won't pretend otherwise.

Grimm, Once Upon a Time & Story Structure

noreply@blogger.com (Eileen Wiedbrauk) — Tue, 23 Apr 2013 19:24:00 +0000

I'm blogging as part of World Weaver Press's Fairy Tale Festival today about the throughlines / story structure of the first seasons of GRIMM and ONCE UPON A TIME. Catch the whole article here.

Ad of the Week

noreply@blogger.com (Eileen Wiedbrauk) — Sat, 20 Apr 2013 10:30:00 +0000

A beautiful clockwork world -- reason to revive the old ad of the week feature.

Thoughts on Snow White and the Huntsman or How Peter Jackson's LOTRs has spoiled me for all other films

noreply@blogger.com (Eileen Wiedbrauk) — Thu, 18 Apr 2013 04:00:00 +0000

I was really excited for this rendition of Snow White. I really was. And boy, was I disappointed. And it might be Peter Jackson's fault.

No, Peter Jackson didn't work on Snow White and the Huntsman. More's the pity. But because of Peter Jackson, I now expect films of high fantasy to be visually gorgeous and knit together with great sense. Yes, LOTR was written by Tolkien, not Jackson and his creative crew. But the script was rewritten by Jackson and his creative crew. They cut and reorganized. They said hey, it makes no sense for the climax of the first story arc to be in second story. So they change it. And so on.

Snow White and the Hunstman did have some cool visual effects. Like when ... whenever Charlize Theron had a scene.

The first problem with this film is casting Charlize Theron as a character whose main crisis is that her rival is more beautiful than she is. Who -- who? -- in Hollywood do you possibly cast to play that part? Kristen Stewart, who was cast to play that part, isn't an ugly girl, but she, like most American women, can't outshine Charlize Theron, even with movie magic. Not by anyone's standard. Remedy? Flash back to the now-dead old Queen telling young Snow White that she's beautiful on the inside. Ooooh. Inner beauty. Got it. Doesn't make much sense given the whole mirror trope, but we'll role with it.

The second problem is how we connect to the main characters. The Queen was creepy. Great. Goosebumps: Check. The huntsman was rugged but troubled. Deadly, with a devastating past. We can totally empathize with him. (It wasn't until I went to write this post that I realized he was played by Chris Hemsworth -- you know, Thor.) Snow White? It was impossible to care about her or root for her success.

I should preface all my following statements with the fact that this was the first movie I'd ever seen Kristen Stewart in. I'd not watched Twilight at the time and I have no personal feelings about her assorted romantic dealings which headline the tabloids. But damn, did her performance ruin this film.

Every time she was on screen she made me remember that I was watching a movie. I couldn't ever get into it because I spent all my time wondering why the hell is she doing that?

The very first scene she's in, she crawls across a stone floor to a meager flame in a fireplace. It isn't the unconscious crawling of a normal adult -- or the scuttling of one who's supposedly been locked in a tower since she was prepubescent -- it was sexy slinking. No. Sexy is the wrong word. Sexy has too great of a positive connotation. Halle Berry is sexy when she shows up on the red carpet. Sexy and classy. This slinking wasn't sexy, it was erotic. Done to entice. Done for the purpose of carnal notice. And this is how the actress moves throughout the film: like she's an adult filmstar on vay-ca.

Since someone will likely bring it up in the comments, I might as well say that generally accepted gossip was that she and the film's director were having a sexual relationship at the time the film was being shot.

Add to this turnoff the fact that she appears physically unable to close her mouth for the entire run time.

Durrr.

Close your damn mouth! You're a princess for crying out loud!

And top it off, the makeup crew rimmed her eyes red. Super red lids, pale face, can't remember to close her mouth, moving like she's -- oh, let's just face it: she comes across like a strung out crack whore.

There, I said it.

And don't even get me started on that unmoving "rally the troops" speech that came completely out of left field. If I was a farmer who'd just been given a sword and shield, I think those little nuggets of widsom would make me want to desert.

No, I can't lay this perfect storm of things-that-cause-my-apathy-toward-the-supposed-heroine at the feet of the actress. Basically, I lay it at Peter Jackson's feet. He's ruined me. He's made me expect that awesome fantasy films will be AWESOME, from casting, to directing the actors, to the special effects, to the detailed closeups, to the dialog in the script, to makeup and art direction, to whomever's job it is to remind people that their mouths should be closed when not speaking.

[If you want more discussion of things fairy-tale-related, check out World Weaver Press's Fairy Tale Festival running April 15 - May 6, 2013.]

Anyone else see the pilot of Defiance and think, 'Hey, Syfy just repurposed Eureka'?

noreply@blogger.com (Eileen Wiedbrauk) — Thu, 18 Apr 2013 00:41:00 +0000

Consider this: A new guy traveling with his angry teenage daughter arrives in town after losing his car. He strikes up a friendly relationship with the current sheriff based on one's admiration of the other. The town bosslady, however, is not so keen on him staying in town. Bosslady is hot and the new guy obviously has a thing for her, but he's not going to act on it because he's getting out of dodge as soon as his vehicle situation is remedied. But as it turns out, he has the sort of street smarts that make him useful in solving the town's problems -- and manage to alienate him in the eyes of the male tycoon. He solves the town's crisis (well, one of the town's crises), then leaves with his daughter only to return without her before the end of the episode. Don't worry, she'll be back. And by the end of the pilot, the new guy has been installed as town law man after an unfortunate incident rendered the former sheriff incapacitated.

Mmmhmm. It's true: The Eureka pilot episode is the Defiance pilot episode.

Don't Play It Safe

noreply@blogger.com (Eileen Wiedbrauk) — Mon, 08 Apr 2013 04:00:00 +0000

[Image/quote via Advice to Writers]

As a writer, you should fall in love with your characters at some point, even the dastardly ones. Perhaps the dastardly ones most of all because when else in life is it safe to love a psychopath? But what I often see is the more a writer writes about a set of characters, the less she is able to torture them. She cares about them now and wants to give them a happy life / happy ending.

But creating meaningful ways to torture your characters is important to the narrative. Extremely important.

It's easy to set up a character with a conflict when you haven't yet gotten to know them, but as you come to understand their complexities, you -- like a good parent -- want to smooth the road ahead of them instead of throwing giant obstacles in their way.

Think of the movie Twister. A simple enough plot: chase a series of tornadoes trying to get close enough to put a scientific instrument inside a twister, all while grappling with daddy-issues and a marriage that's fallen apart. I'm not saying that Twister is the perfect narrative -- I'm saying that as your characters drive down the country road of the plot, you need to throw stuff at them. Throw a crazed rival scientist at them. Throw a new fiancée at them. Throw a cow at them. Roll a runaway house directly into their path. And if driving through a tumbling house wasn't enough -- throw an oil tanker at them and make it explode.

Keep throwing stuff at your characters -- physical obstacles and emotional ones. Give 'em both barrels. Inflict pain and suffering. Make it hurt so good.

Because we love to read it when it hurts so good.

Let Your Flag Fly

noreply@blogger.com (Eileen Wiedbrauk) — Thu, 28 Mar 2013 04:00:00 +0000

It's time to talk about social justice in America. Not politics or religion, but justice.

Earlier this week, I changed my Facebook icon to a red-and-pink equals sign. Why? Because I support marriage between consenting adults in America. And then I saw a number -- a handful -- too many! -- supposedly thoughtful individuals poo-poo on that choice of mine to act. These weren't even individuals who disagreed with my politics, if you want to call marriage a type of politics, which (for the record) I've believed for the past decade that government should get out of marriage and leave it to religion, handing out only civil unions to deal with the intricacies of health care, custodial, and survivorship rights.

These were people who decided to poo-poo on my choice to fly a flag because that flag appeared on Facebook and Facebook flags can only be "empty gestures." In some cases going so far as to say they are "liberal empty gestures." Implying that conservatives somehow don't use Facebook in a similarly empty manner.

If anyone wants to poo-poo on my flag-flying actions, then you have my pity, but not my admiration.

Is it an "empty" social media gesture? No. It's not. I vote -- and have voted regularly since I was 18. I take action to educate on the issues before I go to the polling station. I donate money to political/social causes even though I'm in such a position courtesy of grad school and teaching at a large university without a Full Faculty position as to qualify me for public health care assistance -- which I don't accept. I've stood up for my gay and lesbian friends since I was a teenager in high school when I told my social group that it was not right to "out" one of our friends no matter what they "thought" him to be; that we should respect what he vocalized, not repeat our own assumptions, because he had his reasons for choosing to say what he did no matter what we "suspected." (Something which he later, personally, thanked me for. Something which I wish I could have done for so many other young men and women in this country had I had the chance.)

Or are my flag-flying actions, as others say, a "worthless" gesture because so many people "don't know what it means"? I hope that action + ignorance, generates discussion and awareness among those who don't know. Who want to know. Who need to know. Who need to see their walls turn pink and red and ask, what the heck is that? NPR news reports statistics that claim, based on population age, in ten years the majority of eligible American voters will favor gay marriage. (And youth have registered and voted in OVERWHELMING numbers for the past five years. I don't expect that to change.) It's time to talk about the inevitable.

And for all of those who continue to think that my actions -- my delight in seeing the majority of my FB wall turn pink and red -- is "empty." I say three things: (1) You're cynical and pessimistic: how can I possibly hold you in my heart the way I hold hope for the future in my heart? (2) When George Takei asks you to do something that is within your means and abilities, you do it; you wear your nerd-badge with pride. And (3) you're wrong. You're wrong because you assume. You aren't willing to look case-by-case, you're only willing to make assumptions based on the lowest common denominator of human behavior. This individual act, my actions, are a truth. If you can't see that based on your assumptions or cynicism, or pessimism, then you are, simply, wrong about me.

If you want to send me a Facebook friend request, I'm https://www.facebook.com/eileen.wiedbrauk.

Ad of the Week

noreply@blogger.com (Eileen Wiedbrauk) — Sat, 23 Mar 2013 04:30:00 +0000

Imagine a world without hate.

The Truth of the Slush Pile

noreply@blogger.com (Eileen Wiedbrauk) — Fri, 22 Mar 2013 04:16:00 +0000

A recent article by David Cameron published by The Review Review poses an intriguing concept: the writer took a story printed in The New Yorker, supposedly THE magazine when it comes to literary short fiction, and submitted it to other magazines as part of an experiment to see if the story was empirically "good."

That is, would all the other magazines jump to accept the cream of the crop story on their desk?

Answer: not a one.

It should be noted that not a single one of those Top Tier or Second Tier literary magazines sent him a rejection saying this was already published in the biggest magazine in the country, who do you think you're trying to fool?

Not a one.

What does this say about literary magazine publishing? Three things:

People who buy into the idea that there is a TOP magazine for short fiction are buying into a myth. There is no empirical standard for a "good story."
Not everyone who reads fiction reads the same magazines. But we should have already known this, otherwise there wouldn't be more magazines published each month than any person could possibly have time to read.
Making it to the top of the slush pile is one part good craft, one part interesting story, one part dumb luck.

"Slush sucks," Cameron says. It's a good summation. In my editorial experience, it's all about hitting the right editor on the right day with a story they're going to want to fight for. If yours is the third ornithologist with marital issues story they've seen that day, they're not going to cut you any slack. If they've just lost a family member, your piece on death that starts crass and ends poignantly isn't going to be read all the way through. There's a lot about the slush pile and the editor that you can't control or even predict.

Although the bigger the magazine or anthology I worked on, it mattered that a story ended up with the right editor eventually, but it almost mattered more that it first was shuffled to the right slush reader who read it on the right day while in the right mood and found themselves so taken with the story that they wanted to fight their editor and the other slushers to see the story got printed. When I've slushed for larger operations, I've found stories that I've passed up to the lead editor because they were good enough for a second read, or because they were my editor's "thing" even though I didn't particularly care for it. I've also passed stories on up with the note You're going to publish this one! It wasn't a threat. It was a promise. And it came true.

How do you find the right slusher? The one who's going to write the note that says publish this, who then campaigns for your story at the editorial meeting? You don't find her. At every magazine I've worked on, stories were assigned randomly to slushers.

But this is the mechanics of the slush pile, not the truth.

The truth is that catching the right editor on the right day when she's in the right mood doesn't even touch on the fact that what each of us considers a "good short story" differs. It's not empirical. If it was, there would be only one magazine in the country and we would all read it and slobber with love over each word it printed.

February Is the Longest Month of the Year

noreply@blogger.com (Eileen Wiedbrauk) — Thu, 14 Mar 2013 21:05:00 +0000

There it is, the conundrum wrapped in a paradox that I really wish was wrapped in bacon: February is both the shortest and the longest month of the year. A short, painful 28 days that lasts forever. February begins when winter has gotten old and oppressive, and doesn't end until spring arrives. It's still February in my world. Never mind that it's already mid-March.

Seasonal affective disorder? Perhaps. Perhaps I just miss all the people whom I've loss contact with because the general ick-feeling produced by the weather has separated us since Christmas. Perhaps I'm just sick of the people with whom I'm forced to have regular contact in spite of the weather. (Teachers of the world, is it just me or do classes that begin in second semester always have lower morale than those that begin at Labor Day?) Many of my colleagues are citing Spring Fever or perhaps that no man's land between the Known Drinking Holidays of Spring Break and St. Patrick's Day as the reason for students checking out. But how many of them every really "checked in" this semester? I see moments like this from Missed Periods and Other Grammar Scares, and -- while I constantly see similar issues, never have they been so pyrotechnic -- it makes me wonder if the answer isn't just to raise one of your own and don't let them get away with shit like that.

Perhaps the past six weeks have seen the pendulum swing too drastically, too fast. Great news followed by devastating news. Again and again. Sometimes within hours of one another. Including the loss of my grandmother and putting some tough questions to myself, the answers to which would drastically change my day-to-day life.

Perhaps I just wish you were a dragon.

Like the above cartoon from exocomics.com says, Sometimes I look at you and I'm sad because you're not a dragon. I want you to be a dragon. I want you to be fabulous and fascinating. Bring a little bit of danger and a whole lot of wonder into my life.

Displace my desire for change onto someone else? Gladly!

Perhaps sometimes I look at myself and I'm sad because I'm not a dragon. After all, isn't that the basic life goal for all of us? Not power or money or an ass-kicking 401K. What we really want: to be awesome. Like a dragon. Dude. That's it. Be a dragon.

(Oh, and just in case you found this post too sad, I give you the top canines of sci-fi. Puppies!)

Ad of the Week

noreply@blogger.com (Eileen Wiedbrauk) — Fri, 08 Mar 2013 13:00:00 +0000

Ad of the Week is revived to bring you the UK's "Pony Dancer." Which is gathering a life of its own.

Who's Your Friend?

noreply@blogger.com (Eileen Wiedbrauk) — Thu, 28 Feb 2013 05:29:00 +0000

No sooner had I posted what I've now come to think of as my Love Letter to Doctor Who, then my friends and acquaintances already of Who-fandom welcomed me with open arms and told me that now that I've declared citizenship, it was time to pick my favorite Doctor, favorite companion, and favorite villain. I balked. But after careful consideration of Doctors 8-11 ... I can't pick a favorite Doctor, not yet at least. But I can tell you what I think of all the companions from that time frame.

My definition of "Doctor's companion" may be looser than some's. I've expanded it to one who travels on the Tardis through time and/or space and either chooses to travel or embraces the journey. This latter qualification is the difference between Rose's mother making the list or not. I've decided not. Jackie Tyler never really embraces the journey. She boards the Tardis mainly for the purpose or getting her daughter back or getting the hell back home. While some of the list below are Tardis-kidnapped like Jackie occasionally was, they eventually got into the spirit of the thing, accepting, learning, and growing from the experience. Or they just wantonly hitched a ride with an alien. Either way, here are my top ten companions from Doctors 8-11 in descending order.

[contains spoilers through season six, and mild season sever spoilers -- I've stayed away from the biggies]

10. Dr. Grace Holloway. Welcome to 1999 via 1996. The smart, moral, cultured, disciplined, career driven woman who has a gorgeous if foppish boyfriend who can't come to terms with her demanding career cutting into their relationship. It's a very early-to-mid-1990s relationship crisis. Not to mention the whole thing feels like a giant tipping of the hat to the first two films in the Terminator franchise. But Dr. Holloway is great from a feminist point of view: she's not only smart and powerful, when the hospital head honcho says go against your integrity and cover this up she tells him stick it up your ass, and quits. Which is nice plot-wise because it frees her up for an adventure with a rather uninteresting Doctor. But Dr. Grace first falls for the Doctor against what would seem to be her better judgment only to have rationality rear its head and by the time she believes again she's become a bit of a worry wort. Terribly hard to like. Sorry Dr. Grace Holloway, you're the bottom of my list.

9. River Song. I could not get into the River Song story line. In the library episodes when she first appears, River Song presented a fascinating conundrum -- intersecting timelines that never meet in order. Wait, isn't that the plot of The Time Traveler's Wife? In this case, The Time Traveler's Time Traveling Wife? Theoretically I love the concept of two people falling in love with each other because when they met the other, the other was already in love with them. And I think if we'd seen the chronology from River's point of view, I would have enjoyed it the way I did Daughter of the Blood from Anne Bishop's The Black Jewels trilogy. But I never found a way to enter into this story line and let it sweep me away. River and the Doctor bickering like a married couple was charming, but the apparent age gap between the actors threw me -- what can I say, Time Lords screw with my perception of who is an appropriate couple.

8. Sarah Jane Smith. I don't dislike Sarah Jane, she's just not up to snuff with my third wave feminist notions. Oh yes, she's the intrepid explorer who doesn't want to stay safe or stay home -- Well done, Sarah Jane. Well done. -- but when she runs smack dab into daleks, she's a bit too quick to throw her arms over her eyes and scream like a damsel in distress. When Sarah Jane talks to Rose in season two, we get the impression that the Doctor leaving Sarah Jane ruined her life; she couldn't ever get back to "normal," because she didn't want to and she didn't know how. While it appears that The Sarah Jane Adventures portray a further tale where she reclaims much of what she "lost," I still dislike the feeling I get that the character thinks it's been "taken away from her," and frankly, I don't do victims.

7. Amy and Rory Pond. The Ponds, as we come to think of them over season six, are the ones who waited. Two of Amy's voyages are among my all time Doctor Who favorites because they feel like Classic-Who to me: "The Beast Below" and "Vincent and the Doctor." But I could forget all of season six without regret. From a plot or gender-theory point of view, the Doctor traveling with a married couple is a fun new take. Doctor-as-third-wheel is an interesting bit although the uber-nerdy Matt Smith portrayal may take this overboard. Their attempts to reconcile youthful travels-with-the-Doctor with the "average" life of the settled 21st century earthling is endearing, and very much a contemporary struggle of interest. Although personally speaking, there are other struggles I find more emotionally intriguing (and emotionally intriguing trumps intellectually intriguing any day) such as Rory, initially a pushover, managing to find his own ground to stand on, and both Rory and Amy coming to recognize the other as strong and just as much in love as the other. Amy-the-little-girl and the Doctor is a heart-wrenching tale, one that is seemingly an absent-father tale where the father figure spends the rest of her life trying to make it up to her. In the end, he can't save Amy-the-woman, but at least he has another chance to save Amy-the-little-girl. Someone very old and very kind, the last of his species, who can't stand to see children cry. I respect the Ponds, but I never came to love them as more than a lens through which to view the Doctor.

6. Wilfred Mott. Donna Noble's grandfather just about breaks my heart (in a good way) every time he appears on screen. From the first time we meet him, conversing with Donna around the telescope he has pointed to the sky, to the moment Donna does her blue-box-flyover, to Wilfred's discussion with the Doctor on what it is to be an old man, to the moment the Doctor leaves Donna and Wilfred tells the Doctor that no matter what, he'll wave up at the sky every night, for him and for Donna, so that the Doctor doesn't have to be alone. Wilfred is a fabulous foil to the Doctor; we often forget that the Doctor is an old man due to his youthful face, but next to Wilfred, we realize how similar the two are. They're seen a great deal of the world and feel it keenly, although Wilfred, unlike the Doctor, is actually able to express those feelings.

5. Captain Jack Harkness. You're never sure whether to love Jack or be suspicious of him. The Doctor is suspicious, and with good reason -- Jack's pulling a con when we first meet him. But Jack is rather lovable. An incorrigible flirt ("Jack stop flirting." / "I was just saying hello." / "For you that's flirting.") and he's just as quick with the witty line as the Doctor, he's great fun to be around, and not at all hard on the eyes. We get to see more of his backstory in Torchwood but like some other characters, we get to see his eventual death before we ever see his beginning. Crossed timelines and all that. It's also easy to love Jack because, like Martha, Jack loves the brokenhearted Doctor. Some of my favorite moments are when Jack and Martha are commiserating about men who don't even think to look at them because they're still in love with some blonde.

4. Dr. Martha Jones. After the great heart/attitude but not exactly smart Rose Tyler, Martha Jones was a welcome change. Here was a woman who, when she didn't know what to do, read the instruction manual, bless her heart. She picks up on things, understands the concepts. She's not with the Doctor because normal life is too hard, but because she wants to learn everything. Not-yet-a-doctor when she meets the Doctor, Martha eventually achieves many if not all her dreams. She's smart and capable and the silliest thing she ever did was fall in love with a man still hung up on someone else. But that's a forgivable idiocy as she goes on to make herself over into the soldier that saves the world, then the U.N.I.T. doctor who helps the military deal with aliens. She's tough and capable and everyone recognizes it. She eventually settles down with a surprising but perfect choice, someone who understands the great, new, amazing world that she's seen and who was forced to become a solider in the fight against it as well. And by "settles down" I mean kicks alien ass with a spouse at her side.

2-Tie: Donna Noble. Catherine Tate does a fabulous job bringing this funny yet empathetic character to life. Donna has Rose's chutzpah, empathy, and bravery, but in a more mature package. And you watch her insecurities seep through around her defensive bravado, and you start to wonder if the Doctor hadn't made his way into Rose's life when she was only 19, if she would have grown into Donna. Of course, the best part of the Doctor/Donna relationship, is that Donna calls him on his shit. She doesn't let him get away with things. When the cloned daughter Jenny gives the Doctor grief, Donna sides with the grief-giver. When the Doctor's sure that introducing Donna to Martha Jones is going to produce a cat fight, Donna snorts and tells him sarcastically, "You wish." Of course, Donna also saves the world. Universe. Her moment as the-savior-and-the-fallen is just as poignant and resonant as Rose's because they both achieve the thing they need and want only to be parted from it -- for Rose it is the realization of a romantic relationship and for Donna it's a sense of self-worth and accomplishment.

2-Tie: Rose Tyler. I wasn't too keen on Rose originally. Too young, too dumb, too much eyeliner. She grew on me. She has chutzpah just like Donna. She's got this scrappy, lower-class ferocity going on. She's devastatingly loyal when she thinks it's deserved and insanely brave. It's hard to not be won over in the end -- especially once you realize that the Doctor's gone from having a more paternal relationship with her to being in love with her. Of course, he's never human enough to say as much, but if there's one thing you learn from watching enough BBC TV, it's how to read a British man not verbalizing his emotions. Then again, I'm not certain if I even knew how much I liked her until she was on the other side of that white wall. Whatever Rose Tyler is or isn't, she's a character that sticks with you.

1. Brian Pond. Technically, Brian Williamson, Rory's father. Initially sucked up into the Tardis by accident, Brian Pond acclimates with amazing speed, demonstrating resilience, resourcefulness, and strength of character. Before traveling as the Doctor's companion, Brian thinks his son to be lackluster and ineffectual, in particular, unable to deal with the minutia of keeping his own house working and lit. After traveling with the Doctor, he comes to understand that just because his son doesn't travel with a collapsible trowel in his pocket, doesn't mean that he travels with empty pockets and empty wits, that he's not ineffectual, he just approaches life differently and is good at different things. Brian Pond leaves the Tardis having reaped every possible benefit from his short time as the Doctor's companion: he has a renewed vigor to understand the world around him, and takes up the pursuit of world travel (this from a man who previously didn't like to drive to the next town), he understands the life of traveling with the Doctor and becomes one of the few Who-parents to encourage his child to pursue this amazing life, and most importantly, he gains an understanding of his son where previously there'd been none. In many ways, Brian Pond is the antithesis of Sarah Jane, leaving the Tardis with his eyes and heart open and ready to expand and embrace, whereas Sarah Jane left scarred and upset, unable to move on. Although knowing the Doctor will eventually end in heartbreak for this companion like all others, Brian Pond, I think, is the most capable of accepting it and leading a better life in spite of it.

Yet to come: I am absolutely, positively looking forward to Clara! Smart and savvy, I don't know if I've ever liked a companion so immediately as I liked Clara. And she poses the most intriguing mystery thus far. Well ... actually River Song posed the most intriguing mystery thus far but the resolution of that mystery was not up to my outrageously high expectations, so here's hoping Clara delivers. I'd love to say more about her, but I know too many people who've not yet caught up to the current story line -- so I won't spoil it! But I will give you this suggestion: watch season seven, then the 2012 Christmas special, don't skip the special like you might have in years previous as it will tie in to the second half of season seven starting up again this spring!

Fairy Tale Retold

noreply@blogger.com (Eileen Wiedbrauk) — Thu, 21 Feb 2013 05:00:00 +0000

If you're a fan of fairy tales retold --of the darker side where it's not just the wolves that have teeth -- then may I suggest the latest release from World Weaver Press, Wolves and Witches by sisters Amanda C. Davis and Megan Engelhardt.

In paperback and ebook (Kindle, Nook, Kobo), Wolves and Witches is 16 fabulous stories and poems that you'll want -- like Red Riding Hood's wolf -- to gobble up in one big bite.

Witches have stories too. So do mermaids, millers' daughters, princes (charming or otherwise), even big bad wolves. They may be a bit darker--fewer enchanted ball gowns, more iron shoes. Happily-ever-after? Depends on who you ask. In Wolves and Witches, sisters Amanda C. Davis and Megan Engelhardt weave sixteen stories and poems out of familiar fairy tales, letting them show their teeth.