A Day In The Life

January Meme: Leadership styles of Jean-Luc Picard and Emma Swan

2016-01-29T18:34:58Z

Return of the January Meme, as best I can in a very rl exhausted state. A canon knowledge preamble: I stopped watching Once upon a Time in the later third of season 4, and am inclined to count solely seasons 1 - 3 as "my" canon, though I'm not iron set on this. Anyway, I don't have knowledge about Emma in season 5, and thus my comparisons can't be based on later canon.

( Spoilers about two stoics in two canons )

The other days

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More Marvel

2015-11-25T08:41:30Z

Aaand we have another Marvel trailer, this for for Captain America: Civil War.

Thoughts, based on the trailer but no MCU spoilers (other than what is in the trailer), since I'm actively trying to avoid those, though I will discuss the comics Civil War storyline (which by necessity was different anyway): ( we used to be friends. )

In another fandom entirely: while I no longer watch Once upon a Time, I still care about the characters, so I was delighted to find this "life and times" story for Milah, fleshing her out and giving us her pov: Ship in a Bottle.

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Huh.

2015-10-31T09:28:41Z

Yuletide assignment: more generic than most I got - basically it amounts to "more of what canon does so well" (which I sympathize with, since I have fandoms where I want just that, too). I can work with that, since I love the canon in question (obviously) and it leaves me ample manvoeuvring room. But because there's no specific prompt, I'm currently at sea as to what the plot might be...

Meanwhile, I did a meme and fed it some of my stories in various fandoms. Fitting the day, the first result I got was this:

I write like
Edgar Allan Poe

I Write Like. Analyze your writing!

What surprises me about this is that the story in question was a Breaking Bad one, Blood Ties, about the relationship between Marie and Skyler. Mind you, I love Poe, but he's not the voice that comes to mind when thinking of either Breaking Bad in general or this story in particular.

Next, I tried one of my adventures into RPF, to wit, the one where Mary Renault meets Alfred Hitchcock, Saving Mrs Fleming. This led to vile slander:

I write like
Dan Brown

I Write Like. Analyze your writing!

Were it the real life prominent names? Hitch trying to lure Mary to the cinema side at the British Museum? I protest, anyway.

Still reeling, I tried a Once upon a Time story next, the one about Snow and Regina. Which had this result:

I write like
Anne Rice

I Write Like. Analyze your writing!

As long as it's early Anne Rice, when she still had an editor, I'm good with this. (And suspect the result came through all the fairy tale related words.)

Anyway, it seems I write differently for every fandom?

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Once upon a time Rewatch: 3.12 - 3.22.

2015-09-14T09:57:22Z

How do we call this arc? The Zelena arc? The Oz arc? Wouldn't fit the way "Neverland" fits as designation for the first half, though. Anyway: I finished it, and the season, and thus the rewatch.

( Observations beneath the cut )

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Once upon a Time 3.09 - 3.11 Rewatch

2015-09-11T14:00:27Z

End of the Neverland arc.

( Going back to being stories )

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OuaT Season 3 Rewatch Continued (3.05 - 3.08.)

2015-09-09T12:01:12Z

Still revelling in the rewatch. That doesn't mean I agree with every single narrative choice, mind; but so far, the season upholds really well and returned my love for the (s1 - s3) show to me.

( Second star to the right and straight until morning )

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Once upon a Time season 3 Rewatch (3.01. - 3.04)

2015-09-07T09:04:46Z

I started my Once upon a Time season 3 rewatch and am four episodes in. Damm but the Neverland arc was good. After reading and watching The Lost Boys and rereading Peter Pan, I appreciate even more how clever and creative the show's adaption of various elements was, bypassing the Disney version entirely and going straight for the Barrie. (In a darkside fashion, yes, but there's considerable darkness in the original already.) And it really fits with Emma's emotional development up to this point. Lost Girl (3.02.) has what is probably my favourite scene between Emma and Snow at its climax. ( Spoilery quote and analysis follows. )

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Recs, recs, recs!

2015-08-30T17:55:21Z

I was on the road the entire day, but some delightful fanworks were awaiting:

Doctor Who:

Pompeii: fantastic vid about Clara and Twelve. This last season clicked for me in a way no other Moffat season has done, and the relationship between the Twelfth Doctor and Clara is a big part way, along with Clara (present day Clara) coming into focus for me and gong from generic Companion to highly individual unmistakable CLARA. This vid captures a lot about Clara and the Doctor, and why I'm looking forward to the new season starting in a few weeks!

Once upon a Time/Once upon a Time in Wonderland:

The White Queen's Quest: what really happened with Will and Ana post -Wonderland and during the fourth season of OuaT. The way Will was (not) used and there was zilch explanation about Ana, when their story had been my favourite storyline of the spin-offs one season, wasn't my only issue with s4 of OuaT, not by far. But it's one fanfiction can fix, and this is a great example.

(BTW, I've aquired the third season of OuaT on dvd and am looking forward to a rewatch. Because I still love the first three seasons, and am curious to find out whether the third season, which during broadcast I thought was best and should have been the conclusion, still feels that way going back.)

Black Sails:

The Sundering Sea: novel-length, amazing fanfiction which can't be described in an unspoilerly for season 2 way, since it's set afterwards. ( Spoiler cut. )

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Farewell and Hello to shows

2015-04-14T08:06:49Z

Okay, firstly, as far as Once upon a Time is concerned, this week's episode settles it: we're in Heroes season 3 territory, and I'm out of here. Regretfully, since I really loved the show and the characters, but it's always been my policy not to stick around once you derive more anger than enjoyment from a fictional source, and not to spoil things for the rest of fandom by endlessly complaining when you can rather watch something else you actually do enjoy. This announcement also isn't an invitation to bash OuaT in the comments; as I said, until relatively recently, I enjoyed the show. I'll simply regard the end of season 3 as the perfect ending (minus the tag scene); in many ways, it brought the main characters full circle since the pilot and concluded several main characters' arcs in a good way.

Secondly, I marathoned Daredevil. Which is definitely well made, by two Jossverse veterans, Drew Goddard and Steven DeKnight, with a growing into iconic persona arc for both the hero and the main antagonist, conveying a great sense of atmosphere and place (Hell's Kitchen in New York definitely becomes a character in its own right), establishing an ensemble of interesting characters. This being said, it's also heavier on the male character side (which doesn't mean there aren't interesting women around, and one of them, Karen Page, has a great arc of her own). And yes, the pilot uses "bad guys get introduced as bad by attacking women" shorthand, though the rest of the show does equal opportunity menacing on the villains' side, and Karen being put through hell in the pilot (not via rape, I hasten to add, that's one cliché avoided throughout the season) motivates her relentless quest for the truth and to bring down the network which menaced her through the rest of the season - not in a "revenge" way, but in a "I must ensure this doesn't continue to happen to other people!" way. Let's see, what else on the negative side: while the New York depicted here is far more ethnically diverse than the one in Agent Carter, there's just one black main character - reporter Ben Urich (who btw is white in the comics, but as with Nick Fury, the MCU changed this) - and ( spoilery observation applies )

Violence: I was very amused to read Steven DeKnight in this interview profess amazement that people describe the show as very violent before ruefully admitting that working on Spartacus has maybe changed his standards for this. I'd say, so, yes. Sure, compared with Spartacus, where they lovingly slice people open in every episode, with lingering close-ups, Daredevil isn't that violent. But that's like saying Henry VIII. was a faithful husband and lover compared with Giacomo Casanova, i.e. beside the point. I'd say the violence level is comparable to shows like The Wire, which incidentally DeKnight names as the type of show he's going for (while admitting this is going for an incredibly high goal but better to be ambitious and failing than etc.).

Now re: my own familiarity with comics canon, I've encountered comics!Matt Murdock/Daredevil mostly in other people's comics books - he's Jessica Jones' lawyer, seems to have an on/off thing with Black Widow, and an Elizabethan version of him is a main character in Neil Gaiman's 1602 - oh, and as for the main villain onf season 1, him I encountered in The Runaways, of all the comics - , but I absorbed enough via general pop culture osmosis to recognize the joke on decades of continuity when in the pilot Matt's best friend/partner Foggy Nelson sighs: "If there's a stunning woman of questionable character in the room, Matt Murdock is going to find her, and Foggy Nelson is going to suffer." However, in the actual on screen show Matt/ Morally Ambuiguos Women aren't yet a thing. (Though Foggy mentions "that Greek girl you liked" in college, which I take it is a reference to Elektra.) The one brief romantic connection he forms on screen during the first season is with an unquestionably heroic woman who wisely breaks it off. Instead, the main romance of the season belongs to the main villain, Wilson Fisk, the future Kingpin. (The woman in question, btw, Vanessa, is another of the interesting female characters, and she's neither a deluded innocent nor an eye-liner heavy sex goddess, which love interests of villains more often than not tend to be. Instead, she's an age-appropriate smart art gallery owner who goes into the relationship open eyed.) Who certainly qualifies as most detailed and layered of all MCU antagonists. Granted, the villains of the MCU so far haven't been that great (in the sense of being three dimensional), and the only one who became popular was Loki, but still, this version of Fisk, placed by Vincent D'Onofrio, is an impressive creation, and you can see the Wire influence here - he has various varied relationships (not just the romance), both a close friendship with his main sidekick and rivalry-ridden antagonistic ones with his business partners/competition, we see him in his surroundings just as we see Matt Murdock in his, and like our hero, he has childhood backstory trauma and an "I must save my city" obsession, the difference being that Fisk's idea of saving comes with a lot of death first. But throughout the first season, he's definitely regarding himself as the misunderstood hero working for the greater good. ( Spoilers happen. ) "Who am I and how do I achieve what I want?" being a question of protagonist and antagonist get asked throughout.

On the relationship front, there's certainly OT3 potential with Karen, Foggy and Matt. The set up reminds me a bit of early Angel with Cordelia, Doyle and Angel, though Matt has yet to heroically jump into the wrong car. Also, Karen's the one with the hinted at mystery in her backstory, not Foggy, who has what's today called a bromance going with Matt that should make the slashers weep with joy, especially in the episode with the flashbacks to how they met in college. (Which comes late in the season for plot reasons.) ( More spoilery observations re: Karen follow. ) There's equally OT3 potential between Fisk, Vanessa and Fisk's Faithful Lieutenant Wesley (!), until ( spoilers happen ). Then there's the mentor/protegé type of relationship Karen and Ben Urich form. Matt also confides into a priest (one of the few things I knew about comics Daredevil was that he's a Catholic, so that didn't surprise me) and into Rosario Dawson's character for plot reasons, while Fisk has his two most entertaining relationships when it comes to fellow crime bosses with Madame Gao (heads the drug trade, old lady on the outside, but do not cross her) and the endlessly bitching Leland Owlsie (not sure about the spelling) who handles and transfers everyone's money.

Looks: definitely revels in the dark and the New York neon lights. Since Matt doesn't aquire his iconic red costume until the end of the season, and until then dresses in black for his illegal outings, this can make some of the fight scenes tricky to watch. I'm also not convinced of the brief attempts the show makes to visualize Matt's post-blinding sight, but other than that, no complaints. Also everyone, more or female, dresses professionally, i.e. like what their respective profession would make you believe they can afford and/or what's comfortable given what their job is.

Hang on, I know that actor: Rosario Dawson, obviously Vincent D'Onofrio; I thought Matt's father in the flashbacks looked like a slightly heavier Jason Dohring (Logan Echols in Veronica Mars), but the credits tell me it wasn't him, while Fisk's father in the flashbacks was none other than Herc from The Wire. Fisk's mother in the flashbacks looked a lot like the actress who played Amanda in Caprica and Katniss' mother in The Hunger Games, but I haven't checked yet whether it's the same woman. (I mean, I know Amanda and Katniss' mother are the same, just not whether she's also Fisk's mother Marlene.)

MCU continuity: Ben Urich has a couple of old articles hanging on the wall of his office, including one about the battle of New York (i.e. what happened in The Avengers) and one about the Hulk devastating Harlem. (The Incredible Hulk.) When Claire (Rosario Dawson's character) first talks to Matt in his not-yet-Daredevil outfit, she asks him whether he's "one of those billionaire playboys I keep hearing about", and the gentrification of Hell's Kitchen is directly tied to all the damage New York suffered through the last few movies. No Stan Lee cameo that I could spot, though. At a guess, this is set post Captain America: Winter Soldier, since no one ever mentions SHIELD, nor do they show up during certain events. Anyway, all these are brief injokes; plot wise, nothing depends on previous MCU knowledge, and the characters in this show are all new, they haven't been anywhere else before. (Though I wouldn't be surprised if in the upcoming Jessica Jones series, Matt Murdock does show up as he does in the comics, not as Daredevil but as Jessica's lawyer.)

All in all: impressive. I didn't fall in love with it the way I did with the more rambling but more of my favourite itches scratching Agent Carter, but I'll certainly keep watching.

And the question remains: Steven DeKnight in the interview I linked mentioned loving Better Call Saul. I'd say that calls for a legal crossover, Steven, wouldn't you?

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Monday's personal first world problems

2015-04-06T17:00:23Z

Tonight the first (? Do we have any word on whether or not there'll be a second?) season of Better Call Saul ends, which reminds me that the tv shows that most swept me away this year so far were all short ones - Agent Carter, Black Sails (and I must write a manifesto as to why everyone should watch Black Sails, not only because everyone should but selflishly because how else am I ever going to read any decent meta or fanfiction outside of bloody tumblr?), The Americans and to my surprise (because I really hadn't counted on it, due to having been only mildly fond of Saul on Breaking Bad) Better Call Saul. Whereas The Good Wife with its 23 episode length has become so stale and repetitive that I had to drop it, and I'm currently pondering as to whether or not to drop Once upon a Time because the current arc isn't really working for me and the last episode might just have broken my suspension of disbelief in the emotional reality of the characters. (I can take any amount of weird plots as long as the characters remain emotionally real for me.) Unless the next episode wows me back, I think I will. Which leaves Elementary as the one long season type show with an ongoing canon I currently have. (The last Elementary episode might have been meh, but the third season in general has been so strong that something like this doesn't register as more than a glitch.)

The problem with short season shows is that they, or at least the ones I tend to fall in love with, don't have big fandoms, and then there's my personal problem of being a gen oriented fan who only rarely gets in the shipping mood, which makes fanfiction to my taste hard to find. For example, Agent Carter, perhaps because it's tied to the MCU, does generate a lot of fanfiction, but last I looked, the Peggy & Jarvis case fic of my dreams isn't there yet. Instead, there are a lot of pairings, and I'm just not interested in Peggy/Anyone (or Daniel/Jack) right now. And Better Caul Saul, where I actually could be easily pushed into shipping the hell out of Jimmy and Kim, and at any rate would love to read about their relationship, no matter the state of same, has precisely two stories, one drabble type thing and a good longer one, about them. And the state of Black Sails fanfiction is one major reason why I MUST write this manifesto, argh.

In the meantime, two links:

Orphan Black: The many faces of Tatiana Maslany. Excellent profile of the actress, with some (minor) season 2 spoilers.

Agent Carter: The Mother of Invention. It's wartime in Britain, and Howard Stark is attempting to bake a better cake. Lovely Peggy and Howard during the war ficlet. Next to Peggy & Jarvis case fic, Peggy & Howard friendship fic is the other thing I want from Agent Carter fandom, and at least there once in a blue moon, you come across little gems like this.

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Once upon a Time 4.16

2015-03-24T06:44:21Z

In which Ursula gets a backstory.

( Read more... )

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Briefly, for lack of time...

2015-03-18T07:49:19Z

...two catching up reviews in one entry:

Once upon a Time: ( Spoilers. )

Call the Midwife: ( Spoilers. )

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Once upon a Time 4.14

2015-03-10T08:19:13Z

Hm, not sure about this one.

( Read more... )

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Once upon a Time 4.13

2015-03-03T08:16:53Z

And the hiatus is over!

( Can we just drop the E word already? )

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Once upon a Time 4.12.

2014-12-16T07:22:04Z

In which the show comes through with the pay-off for a long term build up, and then some.

( Pay off indeed! )

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December Talking Meme: Snow White and Cora Mills

2014-12-12T08:53:00Z

I first consciously noticed this one during The Miller's Daughter in season 2, but it's impossible to talk about without spoilers, and thus I shall employ the protective cut post haste.

( Spoilers, spoilers on the wall )

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Once upon a Time 4.11

2014-12-09T12:12:48Z

Go figure.

( Read more... )

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December Talking Meme: Albus Dumbledore (Harry Potter) and Rumplestilskin (Once upon a Time)

2014-12-08T07:32:29Z

Disclaimer: I haven't had the chance to watch the latest OuaT episode yet, so please don't spoil me for it in the comments. Also, it's been years since I read the Potter saga, so any inaccuracy is due to memory failure, and I apologize in advance.

This said, I love this prompt. It's not an obvious comparison, but if you think about it, the two do have their parallels. (And contrasts, obviously.)

( Which are spoilery for all of the Harry Potter novels and seasons 1- 4.10 of Once Upon a Time )

December Talking Meme: The Other Days

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Once upon a Time 4.10

2014-12-01T16:59:04Z

In which there's lods of build up, handcuffs and reunions.

( Read more... )

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Once upon a time 4.07 - 4.09

2014-11-20T10:17:02Z

Or, the great Once Upon a Time catching up post.

( Choices, Choices )

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Once upon a Time 4.05

2014-10-27T09:40:46Z

This show is currently my comfort food in a stressful time. With shards.

( Read more... )

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OuaT 4.04 The Apprentice

2014-10-20T12:35:20Z

In which Goethe joins the ranks of OuaT writers, and given Regina's stated goal this season, this suddenly makes me think of crazy RPF crossovers. She'd be his type. Emma, otoh, would be Schiller's.

( Hat der alte Hexenmeister sich nun einmal wegbegeben... )

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Once upon a Time 4.03

2014-10-13T11:36:58Z

In which your faithful reviewer was treated to a couple of familiar (actorly) faces while the characters found out a couple of new things.

( It's getting frosty )

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off to the fair

2014-10-07T12:24:24Z

It's that time of the year again - starting tonight, with the opening ceremony, the world's largest book fair takes place in Frankfurt. This year's guest of honor is Finnland. I won't be able to go to the opening ceremony for the first time in eons because of other rl obligations, but from Wednesday morning till Sunday afternoon, I'll be inhaling books at the fair, and hence rarely online.

Also, I wasn't able to catch the latest Good Wife before hitting the road, so I won't be able to watch it until next Monday, together with the next one. Something I did manage to watch before losing the benefit of broadbent access, courtesy of trobadora, is the lovely Snow and Regina scene they cut from the most recent Once upon a Time. Which really should have been in the episode!

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Once upon a Time 4.02

2014-10-06T16:11:43Z

Beastly day for rl reasons, but I did manage (some) tv. OuaT, I embrace your endearing corniness! You make me happy when I direly need it!

( It's your curse, you fix the electricity! )

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