It finally occurred to me to look around the web for what our two overseas fan guests said about the convention. Man, the web made them damn hard to find (well, more Angela than David).
Anyways, here are the links to David Cake (comments start May 30th), the FFANZ delegate from Australia, and Angela Rosin (blog dedicated to the trip), the GUFF delegate from England.
And just to pad out this entry, more pictures! (Click for larger versions.) The first is from page 15, the second has never been seen before!
Saturday, 7 July 2007
What they said...
Friday, 6 July 2007
Steven Moffat's other side
Steven Moffat is known for his Doctor Who episodes (which have been much raved about) and his previous BBC series Coupling. Now he has eschewed comedy and science fiction for a dark tale about the evil side of man. A very dark tale.
Jekyll is a six-part series, where James Nesbitt plays the lead character that finds himself in a strange life, part his, part someone else's. Three episodes down, and we are still no closer to answers than when we started, but by gods this is great television!
Steven Moffat definitely knows what the hell he is doing. This is some damn gripping stuff, and excellently acted by the cast as well. Almost makes me want to get Coupling, as if that's half as good as this, that would be great watching too.
Unfortunately there's a break now for Live Earth, but I can hardly wait. Still, this gives another week for you lot to grab the episodes and catch up. It's well worth it.
Thursday, 5 July 2007
Lonesome George likely to remain so
In the new series of Doctor Who, the Doctor is continually harping on about being the last of the Time Lords. But what about the last of a real species?
The Pinta Island tortoises have nearly gone extinct, what with human invasion of the Galapagos Islands with the subsequent changes in environment and, well, eating of tortoises. This has left just one remaining example of the species, known as Lonesome George.
In order for more of them to be around, not only does a female have to be found (no luck so far), but also George has to not act so Lonesome. "George has not been interested in reproducing in the past and may not know how, former keepers and others who have worked with him said."
And if that wasn't the best news, imagine reading about this in your job description: "[Sveva] Grigioni, now back in Switzerland, said she could normally get tortoises to ejaculate within minutes, but spent months manually stimulating George and never extracted semen from him."
The Galapagos have meant a lot to human history (they did provide the data Charles Darwin needed to form his ideas on evolution, but not immeditately, unlike certain Big Finish Audio would have you believe). And this is likely to be the last example of this particular variation evolution produces...
(Go on, buy a plush Lonesome George today! [Although, if you can get them to accept an NZ address, you're doing better than me!])
Wednesday, 4 July 2007
Picture this!
Just when you thought there could be no more said about the convention, allow me to present a special feature. Peter Adamson, known for his activities on Zeus Blog, accepted the challenge to provide illustrations for the Conspiracy II conbook. This piece was meant for the cover, but due to that spot already being taken, it was used as an internal piece instead (p32).
(Note that I'll be posting more than one pic at a time, but this one deserves a spot on its own.)
Monday, 2 July 2007
DW: Episode 3.13
Martha Jones, Earth Defender!
That was it! Episode number the last! (For this series, anyway.) A huge long extravaganza...up to about when the countdown ended. Really great stuff, Martha walking the Earth, coming up with the one way to defeat the Master, the Doctor at the end of his life, everyone else captured, yeah, that's tense... but then everyone says 'Doctor' and it's all over. Yea- huh?
Credit to RTD for jumping on a year. It's often too easy to get everything resolved the next day (especially in this version of the series, where you're lucky if the episode doesn't take place in real time!), but that, with the knowledge of the paradox machine, meant that certain conclusions to this episode were obvious. But I didn't see the deus ex telepathia coming.
The Master is dead? Yeah, that was never going to happen, although I had a different out in mind (he made the Doc think he was dead then regenerated later), but it looks like RTD is trying for a new spin on that as well. (Which does smell a little of being merely a change for sensationalism rather than for decent story reasons. But I'm willing to wait and see.)
But this is really Martha's episode (despite how much she gives to the Doctor), and when the end finally comes it's because she can move on when the Doctor can't. There's nothing to stop her coming back after the solo-Doctor Christmas episode, but that would undermine her decision to leave. (It could work, but would need a decent episode.) Having her come back for one episode would work better, but I have no idea what the production team have in mind.
It's an epic go at an episode, and didn't feature the Daleks. Still not convinced this is really the Master, but it did have to come down to him and the Doctor. Could have given the ending another go, though.
Next time: Looks interesting, but did we need the 'whats?' again?
NOTE: SPOILERS IN THE COMMENTS! (Re Martha's future.)
Now that's hideously expensive!
I buy plenty of DVDs, and, moreover, I like Mystery Science Theatre 3000, and buy DVDs of that. Currently, they are producing packs of four episodes per pack, and they have just released volume 11.
Obviously there are 10 volumes before that, and I now have them all. However, the last one I just got was slightly more than typical.
Volume 10 features the episodes of Godzilla vs Megalon, Swamp Diamonds, The Giant Spider Invasion and The Teen-Age Strangler. Great movies all (yeah, right).
However, that first one wasn't exactly allowed to be released, and Rhino (the distributors) had to pull the boxset because of the resultant rights issues. This immediately makes the items rare. And rare items are, of course, expensive.
The usual price of these sets are around $US35. I got mine through eBay, and paid around $US180! And the price is still going up! Now, that's incredible!
Sunday, 1 July 2007
Wait for it...
Recently was the news that airport scanners would be using radio waves to examine people in a way that makes them...naked! (Take a look at the picture with the article to see all those naughty bits you know people will be gandering at.) And, yep, already there are cartoons about it. But, heck, I remember this from Airplane!
But what I'm waiting for is for the scam artists to pounce. Come on, radio waves are penetrating people...and this isn't too far from the rays that penetrate people and cause...CANCER!!!!
Yep, sooner or later, someone will be claiming they got cancer from an airport scanner. As this will probably occur first in America, this will lead to a lawsuit and a huge payout. Moreover, the person will win the case, especially if there is a jury, because of purely emotive reasons. Certainly not because the science will be paid attention to, because that will say this claim is ridiculous, but, hey, what does science know? They don't have CANCER!!!!
Frankly, if this was a more popular blog I'd post an article proclaiming just such a cause and effect and see how long it takes to end up on Snopes. Setting up fake articles, stating that they are fake, has been done before, and been sent around believing they are real. People like to believe all sorts of things. Airport scanners causing CANCER!!!! is inevitable.
Gentlemen, start your quack watches...
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