Morning links

Breaking Bad:

A very good interview with Bryan Cranston in the Observer. (As he has a supporting role in the film Argo, he's on our side of the Atlantic currently as part of the film team doing promotion.) Mind you, the opening line by the reporter is involuntarily funny if you're German, because the journalist compares other actor's names "who invoke danger, adventure" "even before they were famous" with the ordinarily named Bryan Cranston, and one of those danger and adventure associating actorly names he picks is "Johnny Depp". Err. No. Not if you're German. "Depp" is German for "Idiot". Or maybe "Dope" would be a better translation, because it means the kind of fool who is so by low intelligence. Anyway, back to Bryan C: as I said, it's a good interview, and here's something every Breaking Bad fan will enjoy when Cranston comments on fellow actor Aaron Paul, who plays Jesse:

Cranston speaks of Paul with obvious paternal-like affection. "I love his parents – I know them pretty well – but he could be my son almost. I'm old enough to have fathered him and I do have fatherly feelings towards him.


The Hobbit:

Like many a fan, the news that the cheerful little volume would be expanded into three big films, use of the Lord of the Rings appendices notwithstanding, made me a bit "won't-that-destroy-the-charm-of-the-story-which-was-never-meant-to-be-epic queasy, but then again: I do like everyone involved, and who am I do deny us Peter Jackson's Tolkien fanfic? Also at the Frankfurt Book Fair there was a fun cosplay competition judged by none other than Richard Taylor (master of the special effects, known to LotR fans via the dvd extras), which was great fun and left me in a cheerleading mood. Which was only heightened when reading this article about the filming, in which among other things actors and production crew talk about fleshing out the dwarves to make them into distinct inviduals; Tolkien does that with Thorin, of course, but not so much with the other twelve. Speaking of Thorin (played by Richard Armitage), the journalists weren't allowed to take photos, so there are sketches of the actors and costumes which are plain adorable, like this one:



And two choice quotes:


McTavish contributed an interesting bit of Dwalin lore. He recalled that Emily Brontë had two hounds named "Grasper" and "Keeper," and decided that they would make great names for Dwalin's twin axes.

I love a man who is an Emily Bronte fanboy and knows what her dogs were called.

And:


Everyone seemed to agree that Jimmy Nesbitt has the best singing voice. And yes, the Dwarves do sing the plate-throwing song. Much dinnerware was harmed in the making of this film.

I bet.

"I walk, I talk, I shop, I sneeze. I'm going to be a fireman if the flood rolls back."

...I may have been rewatching some Buffy episodes for the first time since years - Something Blue, Hush and Restless, to be precise - and now I'm all aglow with the fannish love. It won't lead to meta - I've written all my BTVS meta a long time ago, and if you're relatively new to my ramblings, check out my own favourite of my meta posts, on Restless - but considering I share my multifandom fannish angst now and then, a moment of pure fannish joy also deserves posting. Oh, but this show. Yes, like all watchers (err, no pun intended) I liked some aspects more than others, prefered this episode to that one and what not, but BTVS was one fannish experience where I didn't just enjoy one character/storyline/ship, I loved and love the entirety. From the moment Darla vamps out in the pilot teaser to the moment Dawn asks Buffy what she wants to do now and Buffy, realising that for the first time in her life she actually has all the choices at the end of Chosen, from s1 line up to the s7 line up of characters, I love it all. And rewatching these particular episodes for the first time in, what was it, six or so years reminded again me why.

Merlin 5.04 Another's Sorrow

Now that's more like it. Thank you, Jake Michie, writer of this episode.

( Appearances can be deceiving )