Links and a review

The rest of you might already have seen them, but in case you, like me, haven't: there are two shiny new promos for season two of The Sarah Connor Chronicles out there:
here and here. I'm so looking forward to it, and pleased that the promo puts such a strong focus on the female character (I liked Derek Reese as much as the next fangirl, but I would NOT want the show to become The Derek Woobie Chronicles); seems we'll get a new one as an antagonist, and there will also be more development and pay off for the high school girl of mystery.

Found more or less accidentally: Gene Hunt is not okay, a good post about media reactions to Gene and the difference to fannish reactions, as in, the fans seem to get that loving Gene Hunt as a character does not mean approval for his methods, while the media is more or less "ah, would that we had such policemen today!" I'm not really in either Life on Mars or Ashes to Ashes fandom, just skimming on the edges, so I wouldn't know whether the assessment of the fans getting it is true or not, but the media sure doesn't. Mind you, in other fandoms the difference between character love and complete approval of said character's goals and methods often is blurred as well, and "I love X, so of course X is right in any given situation!" is quite dominant. It used to drive me crazy in Highlander fandom (the phenomenon probably could be summed up with "fluffy horseman Methos", tm honorh, I believe), it made me, after valiantly trying to stay out of the Spike Wars, at last made my point in fanfic back in in BTVS fandom, and while I mostly watched Harry Potter fandom from the outside (i.e. I enjoyed the books and the occasional fanfic and meta, but no more), the contortions people went through to deny that Severus Snape, while a fascinating character, really had a lot of negative traits one couldn't explain away by either blaming the Marauders or Dumbledore or both were amazing. Take the part where Snape really is a lousy teacher. I don't mean to Harry; you can always explain Harry away due to very special circumstances if you absolutely want to. But Neville gets the humiliation and sarcasm treatment, too, and by book III is so afraid of Snape that Snape is his worst fear (this in a boy whose parents were tortured into insanity). And of course, as a result there were theories and fanfics where Snape didn't really mean it and actually was fond of Neville and just wanted to toughen him up for the upcoming battle and what not, and any bullying was because Snape himself was bullied at school anyway, never mind that in no way was this Neville's (or any other current student's, including Harry) fault. I never got that. In every novel, I was looking forward to scenes Snape appeared in; he probably still is the character most interesting to me. But I never ever would wish him as a teacher on anyone. (And yes, I think it says something about Dumbledore that he kept Snape in that position, too, but that's another matter.) Gene Hunt? Highly entertaining character in both shows. Wonderfully played, for the most part well written. I would not want him policing my town, as the poster says.

Not completely unrelated: another acquisition of my recent trip to England was the miniseries Masada, hailing from 1981 and starring Peter O'Toole and Peter Strauss. As with Shogun, we non-Americans got a truncated version as a movie but got the full series as well some time later, and I remember liking it, so I bought the DVDs, which sadly come without any extras. It still was worth it. Masada is based on a novel called The Antagonists which I have read, and imo, this is one of the few times where the filmed version is ever so much better than the source material. Both deal with the siege and fall of Masada (obviously) in the first Jewish-Roman war, but the tv version does a better job of keeping the Romans ambiguous instead of making them the all-out villains, though the rightness of the Jewish cause is presented as a given.

( Spoilers for a twenty eight years old miniseries and a lot of history )