The Librarians... and the City of Light

Well... I'm sure glad I don't look stupid in this.

You spend time with people who don't do something and you start feeling like you can't do it. That's how it goes.

This week, the Librarians are off to small town New York in search of aliens, after a UFO hunter goes missing. Jenkins insists that there is no such thing as UFOs - minotaurs, fairies, magic swords and Santa yes, but no UFOs - but Ezekiel is already working on his pitch to sell humanity down the river if it should become necessary. The truth, as ever, is stranger than the initial supposition can encompass, and it emerges that the town is occupied by the body-riding displaced energy waves of the population of Wardenclyffe who were knocked out of phase by Tesla's wireless energy experiments a century ago and that the archivist Jake takes a shine to is the semi-immortal human grounding wire keeping them stable.

This episode gets props for the Tesla, and for Ezekiel in goggles following energy signatures, and for its central dilemma: do the bodysnatching discorporated townsfolk of Wardenclyffe deserve the Librarians' help after a century of 'borrowing' the corporeal forms of the people of Collins to do their dirty work? For once, Ezekiel is taking the - or at least a - moral high ground.

Jake: "We're Librarians... doing research on... local histories."
Mabel: "That makes sense."
Cassie: "It does... for once."

Unfortunately, a lot of this one is very talky, not in the sparky snarky badinage way, but in the expository. There's usually a bigass plot dump round about the third act that slows everything down, but this week it's a mountain, not a hill. Jake's doomed romance is also hurt by the fact that it is so obviously doomed, which kills the tension in the otherwise very sweet denouement.

Next week (because UK SyFy may be messing around with running order, but it isn't running double episodes) we have the season finale. After that... Well, I'm hoping for a renewal, since even the less gripping episodes have had Tesla in them.

Warehouse 13 - Season 1

Artie, Myka, Pete and Claudia. Although technically members of the US
Secret Service, Warehouse Agents are pretty much on a universal first name
basis.

Another one I've been catching on Netflix, Warehouse 13 is a series that has my name written all over it.

Secret Service Agents Myka Bering (Joanne Kelly) and Pete Lattimer (Eddie McClintock) are recruited by the mysterious Artie Nielsen (Saul Rubinek) to work at Warehouse 13, a storehouse of bizarre and dangerous Artifacts (their term, so I'll use the i) that have acquired powers largely as a result of narrative significance in the great story of humanity. Other Warehouse employees include their almost-preternatural 'caretaker' Mrs Frederic (CCH Pounder), pastoral care superviser Leena (Genelle Williams) and stroppy tech diva Claudia Donovan (Allison Scagliotti).

The Warehouse is located in America as a consequence of the United States' dominant position in the world stage, and the agents who work there are American because it is the 'host' nation. I always like it when a series bothers to explain why mystical stuff is centred on America. Warehouse 13 is the 13th iteration of the facility, which was originated by Alexander the Great (I also loves me some in-universe historical weight) and is filled not only with an assortment of random crap that happens to possess world-threatening powers, but a variety of cobbled together maintenance and defence systems ranging from the ultra-modern to the dieselpunk. The organisation is headed by a board of Regents apparently drawn from very ordinary walks of life.

The series has a good balance of characters. Of the two field agents, Myka is the sensible, disciplined one, possessing an eidetic memory and high intelligence, while Pete is the intuitive one and possesses a degree of extrasensory perception. Although Pete is established as an ex-Marine, Myka is nonetheless noted to be the better shot. Artie is the vague but endlessly knowledgeable mentor, especially to Claudia, the rebellious teenage daughter he never had. Leena is... in all honesty a bit bland, but the season actually uses that to its advantage.

The Artifacts are the show's USP, and are a splendid mix of weird devices and simple curios, from Native American cloaks to Hashishin exoskeletons and Edgar Allen Poe's pen and notebook.

The show is a lot of fun, with a sparky cast - although I prefer the support to the leads, finding McClintock a little too glib and Kelly's eyes often alarmingly huge - and a great sense of joy in its X-Files/Indiana Jones/Moonlighting mash-up premise. When it gets into legendary items it's a bit close to The Librarians, and I prefer Warehouse 13 when it's focused on more contemporary Artifacts, but there's a lot to like.

Constantine - 'Quid Pro Quo'

What is it they say about a good man going to war?

A city plagued with mysterious comas and a little girl in peril. It's all in a day's work for John, except that this one is personal. The little girl is Chas's daughter, and the rising darkness might be about to learn how good it is for anyone bad that Chas is such a decent guy.

So, as you can probably tell from the synopsis, we're leaving Zed's father and all that jazz for another time and it's Chas's episode this week. Returning home for his weekend with his daughter, he finds her in a mystery coma and calls in John to help. Discovering that her soul has been stolen, John is wary of such a power, but Chas has no patience in this case.

'Quid Pro Quo' delves into Chas's backstory, the secret of his 'survival skills' and the motivation that drives him to risk life after life helping John. The title refers both to Chas's belief that he must pay the debt of the 47 lost lives that keep him from dying, and to DCU guest star Felix Faust's attempts to bargain for Geraldine's soul. The latter is right up Constantine's alley, of course - certainly more so than going toe-to-toe with the suddenly badass Faust - but when Chas offers to bargain nicely with the man who stole his daughter's soul... Well, you don't have to be a dad to know how that will end*.

* It doesn't end well.

This is another strong episode, pitting the eternal sidekick Chas against long-time occult runner-up Faust in a main event. It also brings out a rare flash of conscience in John, who continues to use Chas in his fight but clearly understands both how much he owes his friend and how much Chas has given up.

Continuum - Season 1

'Nice' Time-Travel Terrorist, Nasty Time-Travel Terrorist, Basically Honest Cop, Lying Time-Travel Cop, Innocent Tech-Nerd Who Grows Up to be the Chessmaster, the Lounge Lizard from Time-Travel Accounts.

Thanks to a Netflix account and a weekend of hideous blurgh, I have been catching up on some series that I missed first time out. One of these is Continuum, which is kind of like Time Trax for the arc-plot generation.

In 2077, the world - or possibly just Canada/North America - is run by a congress of representatives from the major corporations following a bail-out of the government(s). A group of terrorists demanding a return to representative government and personal liberties blow up the Congress and are sentenced to death, but dramatically escape by smuggling a small time machine into the execution chamber. Protector (police officer) Kiera Cameron (Rachel Nichols, which is presumably why she didn't appear in the GI Joe sequel) is caught up in the field and finds herself in 2012, along with half a dozen terrorists with knowledge and methods far ahead of their new time.

Cameron teams up with tech geek Alec Sadler (Erik Knudsen,) a young man whom she knows will one day be the head of the most powerful corporation in the world and will create most of the technology she has brought back with her - a high-tech suit, a handgun that unfolds from its own handle and a multitool which is fortunately not quite as omnpotent as a sonic screwdriver. She is able to communicate with Alec through a compute in her head, and also connects with the Vancouver PD in the form of hunky Detective Carlos Fonnegra (Victor Webster). Throughout the first series her main goal is to get back to 2077 and the husband and child she has left behind.

I do not know why Tony Amendola isn't in the cast shots.

On the flip side of the coin are Liber8, lead by Edouard Kagame (Tony Amendola). Kagame represents a flawed balance between peaceful protest and violent activism. Of the remaining Liber8 members, three are more for violence and three for a more measured approach, although one of the former is killed early on and one of the latter essentially sets out on his own to profit from his future knowledge and live large. Liber8 are interesting mostly because they have valid arguments, but employ unacceptable methods (to assassinate the Corporate Congress they set off an explosive device and killed 10,000 innocents.) They are directly compared - and linked - to Alec's stepfather, a peaceful grass-roots activist, and stepbrother, who is played by the guy with the scary intense eyes who is Murphy in The 100 and so you know he's going to be trouble.

It's this measured approach that makes Continuum interesting. While Kiera is the good guy and Liber8 the bad guys, the system that Kiera defends is clearly a terrible one and many of Liber8's arguments are valid. They are also presented in a - sorry - continuum from peaceful protest to mass murder which makes it harder to draw sides, especially after an information gap leads to the death of a peaceful protester by a police sniper's bullet.

All-in-all, Continuum is an interesting series with decent action and technothrills accompanying a more than usually nuanced social position.

Constantine - 'The Saint of Last Resorts: Part 2'

So... that went well.

Oh deary me; things look bad for our - for want of a better word - hero: Riled by his blase attitude, his ex-lover (now 'with' Jesus) Anne-Marie left him gut-shot in a sewer while she rescued a pair of babies. He soon gets out of that quandary... by inviting the Demon King Pazuzu into his body to heal him and scare off the unkillable Invulche, figuring that he'll evict it later. Said eviction - or exorcism, this show being more trad than Dominion - takes up the bulk of Part 2, along with John occasionally Pazuzing out and killing a few people.

Pazuzu you ungrateful gargoyle, I put you through college and 

this is how you repay me?!

Back from the mid-season break, Constantine shows us that John is pretty much willing to sacrifice anyone to get the job done, but that if it's him being sacrificed, he'll work to the bitter end to find another way. Arguably he'll do the same for others, but as that is rarely the focus of an episode it's hard to say. In this instance, his rescue costs at least nine lives, although admittedly all bad people (eight hardcore gangsters and a corrupt diplomat.) Was it worth it? I'm sure John thinks so, although as Manny points out, it's telling that he'll welcome a demon into his own flesh rather than ask Heaven for help.

Zed gets some early focus as she escapes from her kidnappers, but really it's Chas and Anne-Marie who get the lion's share this week, Anne-Marie finding her strength to exorcise Pazuzu and Chas generally providing the loyal core of decency and niceness that prevents us just giving up on John as a bad job. After all, if someone as gosh-darn stand up as Chas rates him, he must have something going.

The Librarians... and the Heart of Darkness

It doesn't look so bad...

Cassandra: You think you're death? I face death every day in the mirror!

In the wilds of Slovakia the Librarians encounter a scared, bloody girl fleeing from the house where someone - or something - took her friends. The bad news is that the house is at a convergence of fractured leylines. The worse news is that the house is The House, the source of all the really bad Haunted House stories.

...and the Heart of Darkness is... a bit weird at first sight. After several weeks of development, the team are all spiky and no-one trusts Cassandra or thinks her capable, despite her proving otherwise several times over. This is, it turns out, because the episodes are showing out of order. The preferred order is in fact:

1 & 2 - ...and the Crown of King Arthur/...and the Sword in the Stone
3 - ...and the Horns of a Dilemma
4 - ...and the Fables of Doom
5 - ...and the Heart of Darkness
6 - ...and Santa's Midnight Ride (clearly moved for Christmas)
7 - ...and the Apple of Discord
8 - ...and the City of Light
9 - ...and the Rule of Three
10 - ...and the Loom of Fate

So, this episode should actually have shown quite early on, while ...and the Apple of Discord should have been a later episode, such that the betrayals of the characters effected by the Apple would be more pronounced.

Anyway, moving past that to judge on its own merits, the episode manages the spooky haunted house vibe pretty well, especially given that the entirety of the action takes place in the day. The idea that all of the houses in the various urban myths are the same house - or one of six, anyway: The House of Refuge, The Ur-Adobe, The Dionaea House, The Shatterbox, The Final Rest, and The Soul Cage - is creepy as anything (if you don't believe me, just read the masterpiece of electronic horror writing that is The Dionaea House) and I loved the way that Jenkins' list of possibilities once more blended modern and traditional ideas.

This is very much Cassandra's episode, and suffers from the change in running order by addressing issues which were not in evidence in the past weeks. The haunted house stuff is effective, if conventional, but the episode hits a twist at the third act break which knocks it up a gear as well as giving Lindy Booth her moment to shine.

I'm a little sad that there are only two more episodes to go, but on the plus side maybe I'll go back over the episodes in the right order.

Ex_Machina

Caleb Smith (Dohmnall Gleason), a coder with the company behind the world's largest search engine, BlueBook, wins a competition to spend a weekend at the remote wilderness home of his boss, reclusive genius Nathan (Oscar Isaac). Here he is asked to take part in a psychodrama update of the Turing test and assess whether Ava (Alicia Vikander), a sophisticated computer in a lithe, female form, is a true, conscious artificial intelligence.

Ex_Machina, directorial debut of writer Alex Garland, is a stark, almost Spartan film. It has only four speaking roles - Caleb, Nathan, Ava and a pilot who is in the film for about three minutes at the very beginning and plays no significant role in the actual narrative - and one silent - Sonoya Mizuno as Nathan's unspeaking domestic, Kyoko - is set in perhaps five rooms of a single complex and shot in a suppressed palette of muted traffic light pastels. It focuses on the relationships between Caleb and Ava, and Caleb and Nathan (with Nathan and Ava only sharing a couple of scenes) over the details of the AI itself. The three leads are excellent: Gleason as a slightly colder version of his usual loveable nerd persona, Isaac as the misanthropic lovechild of Steve Jobs and Grizzly Adams, and Vikander as the wide-eyed cyber-gamine.

"Pay attention: Here comes the science part."

The mechanics of the AI are, in as much as they are discussed at all, moderately bunkum, and a piece of code that Caleb hacks out would apparently only serve to find prime numbers up to 100. This is, however, because the film is not concerned with how to make an artificial intelligence, but by the standards by which we might judge one. This means that, unlike say The Machine, this is a film that very much cares about the motivations behind giving an AI a human body, and in particular an attractive feminine form. Its discourse is on what makes us human, more than how to make a conscious machine, a question which manifests in Caleb's increasing uncertainty in his own nature.

Ex_Machina is a sophisticated, slow-paced technothriller which takes a bleak - some might say harsh - attitude to alpha-nerd masculinity and perhaps to humanity in general. I don't think it's a misogynist film, but it is definitely a film about misogyny, which means that there is a fair bit of it on screen and it can get pretty skin-crawling in places.

It isn't a feelgood film, but it's well worth a look.

Elementary - Season 2

Boom.

With Moriarty in prison, season 2 of Elementary focuses on another favourite from the canon's minor characters, Mycroft Holmes (played with insouciant flair by Rhys Ifans.) Leaner and less arrogant than the Mycroft of the books, Sherlock's restaurateur brother is the target of the deductionist's scorn for his idleness and lack of ambition, but strikes up a friendship - and more - with Joan, and proves to be significantly more than he seems (as should be little surprise to readers of the original stories or fans of Sherlock.)

While I am among those who fear the day that the series can no longer resist a romantic entanglement between Sherlock and Joan - a sure sign that the shark has been well and truly jumped - linking Mycroft and Joan is a very effective narrative gambit. It's pleasing enough just to see a female character who is capable of having a relationship which is casual, but has both a sexual and emotional component, but it also creates tension between the lead pair which exposes flaws in their partnership and reveals to Sherlock how much he values Joan without having him realise that he wuvs her.

Hey gang! It's Sean Pertwee!

Mycroft also brings with him some of Sherlock's baggage from England, including his old Scotland Yard oppo Gareth Lestrade (Sean Pertwee), a vainglorious plod who enjoyed the reflected glory of Holmes's work a little too much and commands none of the respect Sherlock displays for Gregson and Bell.

All that, and a season full of cases lifting more or less from the original canon. The arc-driven episodes this season have a tendency to suffer because they move away from the core dynamic which includes the NYPD characters, and from crime to espionage, a move which was not entirely successful in some of the later Doyle stories.

The Musketeers - 'An Ordinary Man'

"It's been at least nine hours since I slept on an eiderdown and d'Artagnan
won't let me use the hair and make-up trailer."

The Musketeers are snookered when the King wants to 'experience the life of the ordinary folk'. Predictably, trouble breaks out, and as bad luck would have it Louis and d'Artagnan wind up chained together to be sold as Spanish galley slaves, because the Spanish are the baddies in this series, okay? That's why they have accents and the French just sound English.

The Musketeers set out to rescue the King, but the Queen puts the blame on them for losing him and this pushes Rochefort further into her good graces. An attempt to eliminate the King and all witnesses leads to a battle royale, but d'Artagnan and Louis are saved by the intercession of an unlikely heroine, Milady de Winter.

I'm sure this good deed will go unpunished... right?"

Ordinarily, we would expect this to be the episode which turns Louis around from prancing fop to serious king. It has all the hallmarks - a bonding moment with d'Artagnan, an insight into the plight of the poor - but actually it serves merely to highlight what a dick the king is, blaming the whole thing on the Musketeers he bullied into escorting him and exacting petty revenge on his captors instead of thanking those who risked - or gave - their lives to save him.

Speaking of dicks, d'Artagnan may not be able to act like a dick to Constance this week (note that despite his dickishness last week, she is unshakable in her faith in him) but we get our weekly 'treating women like crap' quotient in with Aramis, who is absent from the initial kidnap scene visiting the royal governess, whom he has clearly seduced in order to spend time near his son.

The Musketeers - 'Keep Your Friends Close'

"You have a son, your majesty. It's totally the result of faith and not me
getting knocked up by a Musketeer at all."

As one door closes, another opens, and so even as Cardinal Richlieu is buried, having died between series of an offer of a starring role in the BBC's flagship SF series, Queen Anne gives birth to the Dauphin Louis (no sign of a twin as yet) and a new adversary arrives at court in the form of the Cardinal's former agent in Spain, the intense and brooding Comte de Rochefort (Marc Warren.)

Captain Treville drops the ball by refusing the King's offer of a position as his close adviser, leaving the way open for the returning viper Rochefort to take up his master's place, with the added twist that he is revealed to be working for the Spanish Ambassador (Patrick Malahide, looking pretty damned spruce compared to Game of Thrones.) Rochefort then leads the Musketeers on what he hopes will be a suicide mission to rescue a former fellow prisoner, General de Foix.

I have no idea why you might think I was evil.

With the loss of Peter Capaldi to the lure of the TARDIS, Rochefort is our new lead villain. He is instantly thrown in with an opposite direction by establishing him as a confidante of the Queen, whereas Richlieu was her particular enemy, and  personal rather than political beef against the Musketeers. He is also much more direct, and even in this one episode kills a lot of people (Athos identifies him as an assassin.)

Aramis has some angst-filled moments as he tries to get some face time with his unacknowledged son, with Athos having to be the voice of reason: "The Dauphin is not your son, Aramis. He can never be your son unless you confess to an act of treason and take the Queen down with you." Meanwhile Constance is appointed as the Queen's official confidante, and d'Artagnan acts like a complete dick because she wouldn't leave her husband, which given that she has just found him making out with de Foix's sister at the time is pretty fucking rich.

On the plus side, she has something to brood over now.

The Musketeers - Season 1

It's about honour, romance, and four sexy guys in a lot of leather.

Like the big brother to the network's Atlantis, last year's BBC America production of The Musketeers is a very loose adaptation of Dumas' novels, wrapped up in a sumptuous parade of vaguely period frocks and not remotely period leather jackets. Before I move on to the current second series, here is my round up of series 1.

D'Artagnan (Luke Pasqualino), a brooding and dashing minor Gascon landowner, comes to Paris and joins up with the elite King's Musketeers, here depicted as a sort of go-to special forces unit with a signature shoulder spauldron in place of an actual uniform and a sufficiently bad ass reputation that it's hard to see why people are so willing to attack them. "Kill the Musketeers!" they cry, like someone in a modern day thriller shouting: "It's the SAS! Get 'em!" The best of the best of the best are of course the brooding and tortured Athos (Tom Burke), the brooding and powerful Porthos (Howard Charles) and the brooding and soulful Aramis (Santiago Cabrera).

They also brood who only sit and wait.

Their chief is the brooding and conflicted Captain Treville (Hugo Speer) and their main adversaries the brooding and subtle Cardinal Richlieu (Peter Capaldi) and his agent the brooding and deadly Milady de Winter (Mamie McCoy.) Ultimately, they all work for the brooding and petulant King Louis (Ryan Gage) and his missus the brooding and resentful Queen Anne (Alexandra Dowling.)

D'Artagnan lodges with Constance Bonacieux (Tamla Kari) and her husband. Constance is almost unique in Paris in that she almost never broods, at least not darkly as everyone else is given to.

In case you're not into guys.

The arc of the series concerns Milady's machinations against Athos (her former husband who condemned her for murdering his brother) and his friends. Subplots include the affairs between D'Artagnan and Constance and Aramis and the Queen, and Treville's complicated history in Richlieu's affairs.

For what it is, The Musketeers is a pretty decent series. It looks gorgeous - if only vaguely in-period - and is packed with pretty people and action set-pieces. The leads are all good at what they do, and establish strong - if simple - personalities for the four heroes (Athos is dark and serious, Porthos is fierce, D'Artagnan hot-headed and Aramis loves the ladeez.) An interesting quirk is that while Porthos is once more the brawling heavyweight of the team, he is portrayed as neither fat nor drunk. He is also the everyman figure, coming up from the streets instead of being a gentleman by birth. This is especially interesting as he is also the only regular black character.

The 100 - 'Inclement Weather'

The character I initially dubbed 'too stupid to live' turns out a total fucking
badass.

The big news this week is that The 100 has a proper credit sequence. Woo!

For the rest, I'm going to break it down into the same three groups as last time and Jaha, since he hasn't popped his clogs after all.

The 48: Clarke continues to distrust the apparently perfect community at Mount Weather, especially when a patrol comes in, apparently suffering gunshot wounds. Jasper continues to press her to accept their new lives, but Clarke's fears are borne out by a startling discovery in medical.

Olivia: Silly, useless Olivia proved to be the surprise moral core of the original 100 last season, and now emerges as some sort of fucking ninja, taking a hostage to bust Lincoln out from his tribe's retribution. Unfortunately the hostage exchange goes pear-shaped when it is interrupted by Reapers, who in a surprise twist take the men and leave the women.

The Grown-Ups: Kane is set on establishing a base before sending out more search parties. Abby is critical, although given that a team of three armed members of the Guard (whose training Kane has brought up when denying Finn and Bellamy's requests to search themselves) are overcome and crucified by Grounders without firing a shot in return, you can see his point. Nonetheless, with Raven in recovery, Abby helps Finn and the two kids from last episode (Sterling and Monroe) to bust out Bellamy and Murphy to go looking for the rest of the 100.

And Jaha: Having not died last episode, Jaha finds a baby in a locker and determines to get it back to Earth in a missile. The baby vanishes though, proving to be a hallucination pushing him towards survival (later turning into a grown Wells Jaha to talk him through the last steps) and a crash landing somewhere in the wilds of Earth.

One of the things I'm really enjoying about The 100 is that is has few cut and dried situations, although a lot of reviewers seem intent on finding them.

Okay; it's obvious from a narrative perspective that Clarke is right about Mount Weather, but internally it makes sense that the 48 want it to work out, and while Jasper may be blinded by this, he is also right that they shouldn't be making waves. If Clarke were smarter she would realise that the last thing she wants is for the residents of Mount Weather to decide that she is a liability, but subtle is apparently something that happens to other people. A more measured approach would also help her to maintain the trust of her cohort.

With the Grown-Ups, it is again on the surface obvious that Abby, Bellamy and Finn are right about going looking for the others and that Kane is reverting to dictatorial jackass. Look closer, however, and note that a) Finn and Bellamy are actually going looking in the wrong place and b) the loss of the Guard patrol so close to base camp means that Kane has a solid reason for every decision he has made. On the other hand, he also needs to recognise that the 100 have developed skills that he would be smart to trust in, rather than insisting that the Guard are more Earth-ready.

I really hope that the series maintains this ambiguity.

Furchester Hotel

Welcome!

"We welcome you with furry arms!"

Welcome to the Furchester Hotel, the finest half-star establishment anywhere. Run by Furnella Furchester and her husband Fergus Fuzz, and staffed by their daughter Phoebe, Furnella's nephew Elmo and an itinerant American catering worker with breathtaking impulse control issues, the Furchester is kind of like the Happiness Hotel from The Great Muppet Caper after a serious cash injection. A tottering pile of eccentric rooms with an easily distracted staff, it nonetheless manages to retain several long-term guests and attract new visitors every episode.

"Cookie monster! Mr Crumb is a guest!"
"Yeah; Mr Crumb is a cookie, Phoebe!"
"You can't eat the guests! It's strict hotel policy!"

A Sesame Street production in association with CBeebies, The Furchester Hotel is nebulously British set series about a hotel run by monsters, including Sesame's Street's Elmo and Cookie Monster. It's strictly formulaic - each episode opens with the theme song 'Welcome to the Furchester Hotel', a guest arrives, there is a problem, the Furchesters sing either 'A Furchester Never Gives Up' or 'The Catastrophe Song' depending on the scale of the problem, they put their furry heads together and solve the problem and the episode closes on 'Don't Check Out' and the end credits; at some point the Tea Time Monsters will charge through the lobby in response to the gong - but enlivened by sparky writing and energetic performances.

"I am the greatest cow sculptor in the world, or my name isn't
Henry Moo-er."

Arya loves it because it's got Cookie Monster (or, as she calls him, 'cat') in. I'm impressed by the progressive marriage in which the wife has retained her surname and the daughter has a double-barrel (Furchester-Fuzz.)

The Librarians... and the Rule of Three

Because high school.

It's back to school for the intrepid Librarians this week, as the book of cuttings leads them to a STEM fair in Chicago, where the nerds fight with science for prestigious scholarships. Unfortunately, this particular science fair is dogged with bad magic, which is causing various contestants to fall prey to 'accidents'. All eyes are on top prospect Amy (or her super-competitive mother,) but the true culprit may be someone just a little older and much more dangerous.

Cassandra and Stone get to shine this episode. Cassandra is in her element as the former nerd-queen, while Stone knows what it's like to wear a mask to try to fit in, allowing him to bond with the early red herring outsiders. After a couple of weeks of Ezekiel Jones hail Mary's, Stone and Cassandra also get to make the save this week, with a dazzling science/magic theory and architectural surveying combo. Ezekiel has a few moments, but is basically lost in this world, not least when faced with a science fair contestant determined to prove that sea otters are the most evil and dangerous creatures on the planet.

The eventual solution to the mystery is kind of awesome; the big bad has created a smartphone 'brain gym' app which actually allows the use to cast a spell to create an advantageous situation by messing with your rivals. This has allowed people to unknowingly bring misfortune on others, with the ultimate goal of harvesting the magic from the eventual threefold backlash (a solid and fairly accurate invocation of the titular rule of three) from using magic to do harm. 

And who is our big bad? 

"Does my ambition look big in this?"

It's Morgana la Fey, a sassy, snarky red-head with awesome magical power and a take no bullshit attitude.

Jenkins: This is Morgana la Fey.

Blair: I know that name.

Morgana: You're a Librarian?

Blair: Where do I know that name from?

Morgana: Oh. Guardian.

This also gives us another piece of the puzzle in the larger 'war', as she refers to Jenkins as Galeas (the old name for Galahad - although I initially misheard it as Peleas the Fisher King - which would tend to make him Dulaque's son.)

The Librarians... and the Rule of Three is another fun episode, with a slightly dark edge. It's not as good as ...and the Fables of Doom, but it's still pretty good.

Elementary - The Rest of Season 1

Thanks to my flu, I powered through the remains of Elementary Season 1, and may even make it through Season 2 before it runs out on Sky boxed sets.

Natalie Dormer, femme fatale for hire.

The plots are many and varied, but the arc and the grist of the series basically covers its handling of two of the more controversial figures in the Sherlockian canon: Irene Adler and James Moriarty (note; spoilers will apply.)

Basically, no-one ever really knows what to do with Adler. She tends to be shoehorned into a romantic role, and usually that of a master criminal, if not on Moriarty's scale. It's an odd departure from the original, in which she is just a smart, tough, independent woman who is being victimised by her ex - Holmes's client, whose case he actually takes lest instead he employ a blunter instrument - whose goal is to be allowed to marry and live her life in peace.

Adaptations find this difficult to deal with, perhaps because for a figure that looms so large, she doesn't actually do very much. Mind you, neither does Moriarty, who only has one appearance, in which Holmes concludes his pursuit of the Napoleon of Crime with what is revealed later to have been a dismissive curb stomp duel. Adapters tend to reverse the balance of power, making Moriarty the stalker.

Elementary goes one step beyond, making the American Irene Adler (Natalie Dormer) the assumed identity of British criminal mastermind Jamie Moriarty. Dormer plays both roles to the hilt, although she's clearly having way more fun as the slinky, lethal Moriarty. Adler is once more the love of Holmes's life, rather than merely a woman whose intelligence impresses him, but by making her a fiction I find I mind this less. That 'the paragon of her sex' is a mere figment of Moriarty's imagination speaks volumes of this Holmes with his awkward mannerisms, operational approach to sexuality and tendency to stand way too close to people.

The 100 - 'The 48'

I paint; like that nice Mister Hitler.

After the bombshell ending of Season 1, The 100 returns with an episode ominously entitled 'The 48', and we quickly learn that our - for want of a better word - heroes have been split into several groups: The 48 are the surviving members of the original prisoner mission who have been taken by the 'Mountain Men' to Mount Weather survival station; Olivia has been rescued by Lincoln; and The Grown Ups have escaped capture and soon make contact with Kane and Abby's team from the downed Ark.

Clarke breaks out of her cell at Mount Weather and takes a hostage, but the folks there seem mighty welcoming, explaining that she was just in quarantine and... I don't know, apparently explaining this at any previous stage would have been a contamination risk or something. She immediately takes against their hosts, not just because the old timey world of Mount Weather looks too good to be true, but because they did not bring everyone back with them. The rest of the 48 seem willing to go with it, especially Monty and Jasper (the latter pretty smartly hooking up with a local girl.)

In the immediate case, this conflict displays how much Clarke has absorbed the necessities of the wilderness, becoming almost feral. In the longer term and simply based on the need for drama, I am guessing that Clarke is right on this one. Aside from the fact that their president is a bit creepy, they apparently flat out left Raven behind. My guess is that this is because what they really want is healthy breeding stock to integrate their bloodlines with the superior radiation and toxin resistance of the 'Sky People'. This is the only reason I can think of for not immediately beginning to add the battle- and environment-hardened members of the 48 to their patrol and search and rescue efforts.

Olivia has a poisoned wound, so Lincoln heads back to his village to get the antidote, despite being an outcast traitor. It looks as if this Romeo and Juliet plot could run and run.

The Grown Ups - the name I am assigning based both on their hooking up with the actual grown ups and because Bellamy, Raven and Finn represent the most 'mature' archetypes in the 100; Bellamy's pragmatism, Raven's practicality and Flynn's moral coherence - are rescued from the Grounder Tristan by Kane and Abby's party and return to their base, although Bellamy is almost immediately arrested for whaling on multiple traitor and murderer Murphy.

It's clear that acting-Chancellor Kane and Bellamy (and probably Finn and Raven as well) are going to clash a lot over Kane's age and experience, and his pronouncement that the law is back, measured against the 100's hard-won Earth skills. Currently, this looks to be the most interesting strand of the season, as it is less obvious which way it will go. I am waiting for an episode where Bellamy and Kane are trapped together in a Reaper tunnel or something.

I am assuming that we haven't seen the last of the Grounders either, and his reappearance at the end of the episode (accompanied by the mysterious sound of a crying baby) hints that Chancellor Jaha will also have a role to play, despite being stranded on a dying space station.

Into the Woods

That tagline is oddly apt for any adaptation.

Once upon a time...

Fan: I wish!

...in a far off kingdom...

Fan: More than anything!

...there lived a young fan...

Fan: More than life!

...a mighty studio...

Fan: More than jewels!
Disney: I wish!

...and a movieless musical.

Disney: More than life!
Fan, Into the Woods: I wish to go to the cinema!

Okay, I broke the meter there a bit, but seriously; writing Sondheim filk is really hard.

Let me relapse into prose. Once upon a time there was a musical called Into the Woods. It wasn't a huge musical like Cats or Oliver, but it was clever and witty and did solid business and was much loved from the time of its first release. Naturally, with the boom in big-budget adapted musicals running on from Chicago to Les Miserables and all, there came a time when the clever little musical met a big, important movie producer, and they planned to go into business together.

Now, in a lot of cautionary tales, this is the point where we tell how our hero was jacked by the movie studio and forced to become nice and clean and decent and dull, but actually, that isn't what happened. Maybe because James Lapine, the original lyricist, was still alive to write the screenplay, or maybe because the composer, the mighty Stephen Sondheim, was still alive to glower at Disney with the force only another icon of American culture could muster against the House of Mouse if they got it wrong, but whatever the reason... Disney did good.

I'm not going to say that Disney's big screen adaptation of Into the Woods is perfect, because I'd be lying, but it is good. I'm not going to say that it isn't softened, because it is - you simply can't maintain all of the subtext if you cast actual children as Little Red Ridinghood and Jack - but it's not been completely bowdlerised. Also...

MacKenzie Mauzy as Rapunzel, Billy Magnussen as Rapunzel's Prince, Anna Kendrick as Cinderella, Johnny Depp as the
Wolf, Emily Blunt as the Baker's Wife, Daniel Huttlestone as Jack, Meryl Streep as the Witch, James Corden as the Baker,
Lilla Crawford as Little Red Riding Hood and Chris Pine as Cinderella's Prince

Let's see who we've got in this thing.

In song/introduction order, Cinderella goes to Anna Kendrick, who is pretty much of a big thing and more importantly can both sing and act (I give you Pitch Perfect and 50/50 in evidence), Jack is veteran stage and screen Gavroche Daniel Huttlestone and the Baker and his wife are played by James Corden and Emily Blunt. Of these, Corden is the weakest singer, cast more for his mix of comic timing and big, adorable sad face, but is by no means bad.

Then we have Lilla Crawford, a former stage Annie, as Little Red Riding Hood, Meryl Streep as the Witch - I hear she's been good in stuff before - Johnny Depp in a somewhat flashy cameo as the Wolf,  Mackenzie Mauzy as Rapunzel and Chris Pine and Billy Magnussen as the Princes. Mauzy and Magnussen are the wildcards, but Magnussen and Pine pretty much nail 'Agony' with a histrionic waterfall performance, and that's what your Princes need to do in Into the Woods.

The film sticks pretty solidly to the plot of the stage musical, although for timing purposes it removes a number of songs. The big departure is in terms of pacing. Lacking an intermission, the film omits the first act closer, 'Ever After', and the second prologue 'So Happy'. This requires the removal of the reprise of 'Agony' by compressing the timescale between the two acts, which makes me sad.

This actually casts a more unflattering light on the characters' dissatisfaction with their happy endings than is present in the stage version, which is perhaps why they are never allowed to sit as endings. With no time passing for a natural pregnancy, the Baker's Wife is magically impregnated by the Witch's spell (providing slightly darker overtones to the Baker's refusal to hold 'his' child.) Cinderella has become disenchanted with palace life in a matter of weeks and her Prince makes his move on the Baker's Wife pretty much on his wedding day. Rapunzel's madness and death are slashed from the plot, and instead she rides off with her Prince early in the act.

ETA: Ultimately, the problem that this engenders is that the characters and their problems become superficial in the timescale. 'Oh no, it's been all of three days since I magically popped out a sprog after a five minute pregnancy and my husband still won't bond with the baby.' The opening line of 'so Happy' is 'Once upon a time later' and without ever after becoming that later, there is no context for the dissatisfaction which is the core of the second act. Ultimately, this weakens the second act, rendering it more superficial than the first when it should be more substantial.

In some ways the most glaring and most subtle of the changes is the removal of the Mysterious Man/Narrator, and all the metatextual elements that go with him.

In musical terms, in addition to 'Agony', the director and ensemble make a meal of 'Into the Woods' (although this makes me regret the loss of the later ensemble numbers all the more) and Streep rips it up for 'The Last Midnight' (although the effects volume was a little overwhelming in the scene itself.)  The other showstopper is 'On the Steps of the Palace', performed not as recollection but literally on the steps of the palace, with the world slowing to a stop as Cinderella sings her thoughts. Despite the range of experiences the actors bring to the project, no-one was glaringly off-style and where called on to sing together, the voices complement.

A number of new songs were proposed for the adaptation, written by Sondheim and Lapine, but never made it in. This is far preferable to the glaring Oscar-bait bullshit in the middle of Les Miserables.

This is perhaps not the greatest adaptation of Into the Woods that could be made, but I think in terms of adaptations that were ever going to be made, this is pretty strong. While clearly pitched at a younger audience than the stage show and frankly overselling Depp in the publicity, it retains enough of the darkness and subtext of the original to remain Into the Woods in substance as well as name.

If I were looking to criticise beyond the compressed second act, I would probably pick out that the cast is very, very white, but it's quite possible that in this instance the black talent was all off filming the new version of Annie.

Into the Woods: It's not perfect, but it is pretty damn good.

Dominion - Those Closest to You

Get me to the chapel of dubious denomination on time!

Dominion's first season (and there is set to be another) finale is all go.

We open with Alex getting Michael kicked out of Vega for hiding higher angels, but it's all part of an elaborate plot. also part of a plot is the wedding of Claire and William. Alex confronts Gabriel and first kills and then miraculously heals Noma. Claire becomes unexpectedly kickass as she takes over her father's role as leader of the city, and follows up her success by outing William as the Acolyte leader.

Okay, so Pseudosapphic Diplomat needs a new
handle on every level.

Meanwhile Pseudosapphic Diplomat is revealed to actually be Evelyn, the leader of the city of Helena, and not Evelyn's wife after all, and the lover of Uriel. Gabriel surrenders to Vegan custody, only to be sprung by his Acolytes in order to confront Michael with Sexy Lady Senator's experiments on dead or captive angels, triggering a bit of a regression to Michael's old murderous ways.

We end the series with William cast out into the desert, Alan Dale on his way to retirement in New Delphi, Claire pregnant with Alex's child and ruling Vega with the aid of Evil Giles, and Alex himself climbing the cliffs to Gabriel's funktastic crib in the mountains.

Dominion is not a great series, but it's been fun. I'm interested enough to come back for the next series, but I'm disappointed to see that they've gone with another 13 episodes given that the first season's great flaw is that it has seemed very rushed. Choices which could have formed the basis of whole episodes have been made within minutes and the dramatic tension has been lacking as a result. The series really needs to learn to take its time and savour moments like Alex's acceptance of his destiny, and to build up concepts like Sexy Lady Senator's experimentation before they are revealed in universe as plot points.

The Flash - The Man in the Yellow Suit

No, really; I'm the good guy. Let me in.

It's Christmas, and time for Barry to confront his demons. This is both a figurative and a literal thing, as for the first time in his life he opens up to Iris and tells her how he feels, and is then confronted by the man in the yellow suit who killed his mother; the man who calls himself 'the Reverse Flash'. As if this weren't enough, Caitlin realises that the metahuman known as the Burning Man is her fiance Ronnie, thought to have been killed in the Star Labs explosion two years before.

Wow! This was a rollercoaster of a mid-season finale and no mistake, putting Barry and Caitlin - and indeed Iris, who clearly has been shaken by Barry's admission of his feelings for her - through the emotional wringer, as well as featuring our first speedsters duel and the emergence of Firestorm. My shippy side hopes that with Iris moving in with Eddie and Ronny abandoning his human identity, Barry and Caitlin will get their shot, but the nerd side of me is still expecting Eddie to become the Reverse-Flash (or, it would seem, a Reverse-Flash, and that's okay because there are almost as many of them as there are Flashes) and Caitlin to end up as Killer Frost.

But I digress. Looking back, I was amazed by how much they fitted in to this episode, which didn't seem particularly rushed or overcrowded. The revelations came thick and fast, and I'm excited to see where we're going. I also hope that his defeat at the hands of the Reverse-Flash will inspire Barry to get some serious training from Oliver, because I'm enjoying the crossovers when they happen and because I like the idea of superhumans having to practice as well.

The Librarians... and the Fables of Doom

If it helps, that abnormally large wolf was not good.

The Librarians are called to a small town where the third and largest of three vehicles crossing a bridge has been attacked by a troll. It soon becomes apparent that town is under a spell which is causing fairy tales to displace reality. As they investigate, they become aware that whatever it is is beginning to affect them too, with Eve becoming a princess, Stone the huntsman, and Cassandra for some reason Prince Charming. Soon the effect is everywhere, and with the whole town against them only the one character immune to harm can save them; the reckless, roguish Jack.

Rene Auberjonois guest stars as a small 'l' librarian.

Once more, The Librarians scores over other, higher budget shows in terms of pure fun. The characters' transformations, and their reactions to them, are hilarious, from Jacob spontaneously manifesting a falconer's glove and owl (Baird: "You've got bird on you.") to Ezekiel's gleeful acceptance of his preternatural luck. Baird's frustration with going from the team's protector to a helpless damsel is especially effective (Baird: "Why am I in heels?") The episode also represents an interesting twist in the Jacob and Cassandra double act, with the implications of her role as an initially bashful Prince Charming potentially foxing the earlier shippy overtones.

Perhaps it's the fairy tale content, but this is one of my favourite episodes of the series to date.

The Librarians... and the Apple of Discord

How do we follow up Bruce Campbell as Santa? How about Cary-Hiroyuki
Tagawa as a dragon? Yes please!

The world is in uproar, literally, with earthquakes, storms and volcanoes popping up anywhere that they can. Flynn Carson, actual Librarian, returns to the Annex to announce that the problem is dragons, only for Ezekiel to stumble into the role of the Library's arbiter, first in negotiation between the Eastern and Western dragons and then a full conclave of supernatural beings (thankfully with Jenkins as his Counsel.) As the other Librarians search for a stolen pearl to restore peace between the dragons, Dulaque throws his hat into the ring, asking the conclave to dissolve the Library entirely.

This episode allows Noah Wyle to come in and be incredibly manic at people (seriously, I don't think he pauses for a second ever,) and for everyone else to get the chance to do what Ezekiel did last week and play their character in reverse. The pearl is just a shell hiding the Apple of Discord, which brings out the worst version of you, so Jacob becomes a bullying know-it-all and trashes a gallery for organising its collection wrong, while Cassandra turns into a trampy, vampy maths ninja, dismissively disabling Dulaque's sidekick Lamia before attempting to create a catastrophic power grid failure that would plunge Europe into an effective dark age. Flynn and Eve both want to rule the world, while Ezekiel... is already the worst possible him.

Props to the series for having trampy, vampy Cassandra discard her floral print dress to reveal some of the weirdest sensible undies in TV history instead of uncharacteristic lingerie.

Also, my suspicions regarding Dulague are confirmed when the fey envoy at conclave vouches for 'the son of Ban.' It also confirms the link between him and Jenkins. I'm currently guessing Merlin for Jenkins, but he could be someone less pivotal. John Laroquette gives it his all in his 'nothing ever changes' speech to Ezekiel; it's moving and reveals a lot of the rationale behind his grumpy, misanthropic exterior.

The conclave itself provides a lovely teaser of the depth and order of the supernatural world, and hints at these various secret groups hungering for a taste of the magic that the Serpent Brotherhood returned to the world in episode 2 (and I still want to smack them for murdering poor Cal, the bastards.) Plus, Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa as a scheming dragon. Fuck yeah!

The Librarians... and Santa's Midnight Ride

One of these men is not what he appears to be.

At Christmas, a gunman attacks a soup kitchen in London and is talked down by a jolly man in a distinctive hat (guest star Bruce Campbell.) But it's a trap, and soon the Serpent Brotherhood have drugged and kidnapped Santa, a living battery of the magical energy of human goodwill, and plan to sacrifice him as Christmas Eve becomes Christmas Day. The Librarians have a matter of hours in which to rescue Santa and save Christmas!

Jenkins: "That’s why everyone’s always cranky around the holidays- because we’re running out of good will."

The Librarians' Christmas special is a romp, with Campbell hamming it up as the mercurial and timeless spirit in his many guises (drugged and bereft of his anchoring totem, he cycles through his past 'aspects', from the impish Nicholas the Toymaker to freaking Odin.) Throughout, he refers to himself in the third person, and impressively this stops short of being completely annoying.

"Somebody jacked Santa's ride."

In terms of the regulars, Lindy Booth plays Cassandra's delight in learning that Santa (whom her parents 'outed' to her as fictional at age three) is real with infectious enthusiasm, while Rebecca Romijn gets some big character moments as Santa presses Baird to deal with her hatred of the holiday season. Christian Kane's Stone gets some nice byplay with Matt Frewer's Dulaque as he and Baird threaten the Serpent Brotherhood's art collection to keep their enemies at bay, but it's John Kim's Ezekiel Jones who gets to shine, wearing Santa's hat as a decoy and, as a result, becoming the embodiment of goodwill and generosity against his thieving tendencies.

The Librarians and Santa's Midnight Ride is a joy; not for all tastes, perhaps, but for me it manages the delicate balance of sweetness and savour that makes a Christmas episode more than just a disposable treat.

Also, it has Bruce Campbell in it.

Agents of SHIELD - What They Become

This is all getting a little too Mariah Carey.

In the mid-season finale of Agents of SHIELD (or the season finale; I'm not clear on this) Coulson's team plumb the depths of the hidden city, intent on destroying it before HYDRA can plunder its secrets. Meanwhile, Skye is brought to her father, the mysterious Doctor, for a series of double crosses in and around the HYDRA ranks.

In the good news column, Fitz and Simmons are starting to work as a unit again, and yet Mack appears to be back in action. In bad news, Triplett becomes the obelisk's last victim, essentially being shoved in the fridge in service to Skye's story (I'm sure it's not intentional, but Agents of SHIELD really hates the black man.) I suspect that it will only become more of a problem in the future that I still don't give a shit about Skye. She's not interesting to me, and I hate that she's the super special one. Frankly, watching poor Triplett (who was one of my favourite characters in the closing episodes of Season 1) turn to rock while Skye burst out of her chrysalis like a bloody pop diva near turned my stomach.

The latest victim of the Whedon curse.

The rest of the ensemble cast sort of muddle through in their badass fashion, but Skye and her father - Cal, he is called - get centre stage. This mirrors the focus of the season as a whole, and I suspect that my readers will have guessed that this isn't a direction I'm wild about. Agents of SHIELD was - I think - at its strongest as an ensemble show, and making any one character - especially Skye - the main centre of the action is to its detriment.

Also, seriously; look at that shot of Skye; that's some cheese right there.

Doctor Who: Last Christmas

Still loving the posters

"There's a horror movie named Alien? That's really offensive. No wonder everybody keeps invading you."

It's Christmas! And what does Christmas mean? That's right; a Doctor Who special.

Following on from the Doctor's encounter with an unexpected Santa Claus at the end of 'Death in Heaven', the Fat Man puts in an appearance on Clara's roof, presaging the Doctor's arrival to whisk her off to an adventure in a research station at the North Pole. It's the usual lighthearted stuff - terrifying psychic parasites which home in on your thoughts when you perceive or think about them and possess the body of their host like a cordyseps fungus or Half-Life headcrab - but with the trust between the Doctor and Clara has been broken by lies. With reality in question, belief is everything, so a lack of trust could prove fatal, and the most vital question in a situation fraught with uncertainty might just be 'do you believe in Father Christmas'?

The Good

• Nick Frost as Santa, from beginning to end, refusing to wink at the camera even when he's winking at the camera. 
• The emergent dream logic of the situation is present brilliantly, and hinted just enough for the audience to stay a step ahead if they're trying. 
• The pathos of the penultimate scene is breathtaking in a series that had been showing signs of going distinctly stale, helped by the production's absolute silence on the future of Clara. 
• Danny Pink's dream self manifesting his protective nature by essentially breaking character to save her from her own mind. 
• The fact that Clara is given agency without taking it away from the Doctor. 
• The tangerine running gag, used sparingly and effectively.

This is basically the definition of a Hail Mary.

The Bad

• The problem with undercutting a well-played tragic denouement is that it interrupts the catharsis, and is never quite as satisfying as the real thing, even if it is more feelgood.

The Ugly

• There is no outstanding ugly in this one.

Top Quotes

• Various: It's a long story.
• Shona: I will mark you, Santa!
• Shona: I’m scared.
  Doctor: Congratulations. That means you’re not an idiot.
• The Doctor: There are some things we should never be okay about.
• The Doctor: You know what the big problem is in telling fantasy and reality apart?
  Ashley: What?
  The Doctor: They're both ridiculous.
• The Doctor: Clara, could you fetch me the dead one?
  Clara: Maybe I could fetch you a cup of tea while I'm at it.
  The Doctor: Oooh. Yes and a punch in the face, too.
  Clara: My very next suggestion.
  The Doctor: Fair enough.
• Danny: Do you know why people get together at Christmas? Because every time they do, it might be the last time. Every Christmas is last Christmas, and this is ours.
• Santa: I can commit several million housebreaks in one night, dressed in a red suit with jingle bells. So, of course I can get back into the infirmary.
• The Doctor: These are Christmas hats. I've seen people use them. You put them on and absolutely everything seems funny.
• Shona: You’re a dream who’s trying to save us?
  Santa: Shona, sweetheart, I’m Santa Claus. I think you just defined me!
• Santa: You are deep inside this dream, all right, and it is a shared mental state, so it is drawing power from the multi-consciousness gestalt which has now formed telepathically …
  Doctor: No, no. No, no, no. Line in the sand. Santa Clause does not do the scientific explanation!
  Santa: All right. As the Doctor might say, “Aw, it’s all a bit dreamy-weamy!”
• The Doctor: Do you know what I hate about the obvious?
  Clara: What?
  The Doctor: Missing it!

The Verdict

There is a long-standing tradition that at the end of each series of Doctor Who, the production team hash out a slightly disappointing special with a tooth-achingly sweet Christmas theme, full of effects and spectacle and signifying nothing. Perhaps it is apt then that the ugly, struggling first series featuring the Twelfth Doctor should be one of the best Christmas specials they've ever done. Oh help me, I like the Twelfth Doctor. Hell, I like Clara. I like their interaction. It feels as if they've finally got it and decided what they're doing with them. The Doctor is a more rounded and accessible character, and the magical balance that they hit so rarely in the series is note perfect.

The first half of Last Christmas is full of flaws and sloppy writing, pretty much all of which turns out in the second half to be the result of dream logic and entirely deliberate. It's a proper Doctor Who episode that happens to be disguised as a whimsical holiday adventure with Nick Frost as Santa Claus, and yet it manages a more genuine Christmassy warmth and good cheer than most. I was looking forward to Clara going at the end of this, but by the time it got there I had a genuine lump in my throat. Why couldn't they have managed that level of investment in the Clara/Danny relationship with an entire series to work with?

Score - 9/10