The Farseer Trilogy (Robin Hobb) : Review

Book(s):  Assassin's Apprentice, Royal Assassin, Assassin's Quest (The Farseer Trilogy)
Author:  Robin Hobb
Genre: Fantasy


First of all, let me just say that I can’t believe I’ve managed to call myself a fan of fantasy all these years and have never read any Robin Hobb.  I’ve actually read these all out of order.  I started with the Rain Wild series (after a recommendation from my mother to read the Liveship Traders, which I still have not done) so I ended up finding out a bunch of stuff in advance of the Liveship books which will probably ruin some of the surprise (specifically what the “wood” is that the Liveships are made of).  At any rate, I read those and then decided that I wanted to read the Farseer Trilogy.  I was admittedly a little put off, at first, by some of the names.  The nobility all had names like Verity and Chivalry and Shrewd.  It took me a little while to stop rolling my eyes every time she referred to King Shrewd or King-in-Waiting Chivalry.  It got even worse when Chivalry’s bastard, the main character of the book, took the name FitzChivalry (“Fitz” denoting that he was, in fact, a bastard).  But, as I continued to read, the story overrode my issues with the weird names and I really enjoyed all three books.  It had a bit of a Song of Ice and Fire feel to it, thought not quite as involved.  The characters, I thought, were very well fleshed out.  

One thing I both loved and hated was the reader’s relationship with Fitz himself.  Fitz starts out as an uncertain and eventually somewhat precocious youth who was taken from his mother at the age of six and dumped into Prince Verity’s lap, for the king to look over, since he was the bastard of the King-in-Waiting.  I’m not going to recap the plot of all three books, by the way.  I’m just going to assume that anyone reading this is already familiar with the plot and go from there.  Anyway, Fitz’s character progression was grueling and painful, for me.  He started out with such promise and you sort of have all of these hopes that he’ll Harry Potter it and turn out to be The Most Important Man In The World.  Which, he kind of does, but not in the way you’d expect.  His experiences with Galen were unexpected for me, probably because the series doesn’t follow the typical fantasy formula.  In typical fantasy, Fitz would be incredibly gifted in the Skill (which he is, at first) and would eventually, after many trials and tribulations, learn to master it through some kind of dramatic event and be a card carrying Skill bad ass.  That is not the way it goes for Fitz at all, though.  Instead, he has a tough time concentrating and doing what the rest of his potential coterie can do, and Galen eventually burns a lot of his Skill out of him.  Then, he starts using elfbark all the time and eats up a great deal more of what’s left (which he doesn’t find out until book three - oops).  Fitz never becomes the hero, in a conventional sense.  He is always a little bit of a coward and is always outmatched by the people around him in terms of Skill, physical prowess, etc.

People turn on him easily and leave him.  Molly leaves (although he was an idiot for not realizing she was pregnant - how many more hints did Hobb have to drop?) and Burrich decides to be a real dick about the whole Wit thing and abandons him for a while.  Fitz is childish and, even as he grows into a man, never really learns how to be a man.  He can be churlish and sullen, predisposed to holding grudges and dwelling on The Unfairness Of It All.  Basically, Fitz is human.  He isn’t perfect and he isn’t supposed to be.  He isn’t what you want him to be, and yet you feel like he couldn’t be anything else.  You root for Fitz, even when he’s being an idiot, and you keep hoping he’ll see it coming this time, or he’ll wise up and stop being such a child.  Sometimes he does and sometimes he doesn’t, but that’s what makes Fitz unique.

His extraordinary stretch of bad luck and bad timing was also a bit hard to stomach.  He doesn’t get the girl.  Well, he does, but only long enough to get her pregnant and for her to run off to take care of her child elsewhere and eventually marry Burrich (at least both he and Molly think Fitz is dead).  Starling seemed like a promising love interest, but Fitz is so dedicated to the fantasy of Molly and their daughter that Starling is all but ignored.  He sleeps with her once, eventually, when everything else is falling apart and he’s found out that Burrich and Molly are in love, etc., but there’s very little emotional connection there. Which is fine, but just unexpected.  He’s accused of murdering the king after he hunted down and slit the throats of the people who actually killed the king.  Regal throws him into a dungeon, beats the hell out of him, and he has to fake death to escape.  Chade and Burrich leave him.  Kettricken and Chade assure him that his daughter will be used as a piece in their game every bit as much as he has been and he has no say in it - it’s for the good of the kingdom.  He finds Verity, who has gone a little insane and dipped his arms in a Skill river, so he’s making dragons and eventually has to put himself into the dragon.  Verity Skill-swaps bodies with Fitz and gets it on with Kettricken, impregnating her with which is actually Fitz’s child, but it’s billed as Verity’s child.  So, not only does Fitz never get to see his daughter by Molly because she and Burrich think he’s dead and there’s no reason, apparently, to rock that boat, but he also gets to create another child who he can’t acknowledge or ever see.  Except on the coinage, maybe.  All of that (and so much more!) was hard to adjust to.  Realizing that the “hero” of the piece isn’t a hero at all and has had a really awful life, when you just wanted him to be awesome and win, is sobering.

But, I liked it.  I liked what Hobb did with it. She made Fitz real.  Bad luck is real.  Heroes may be a dime a dozen in the books, but in reality, things rarely go as well as you’d planned.  While Fitz had successes, it was his failures that were so mubh bigger, and isn’t that the way it is, so often?  We succeed to make ripples and fail to make tidal waves.

The books were written very well, and I enjoyed Hobb’s penchant for backstabbing and clever ploys.  More than once, Fitz got caught up in some scheme that I really hadn’t anticipated.  Over all, I really enjoyed the series.  I’m about to start the Tawny Man trilogy, which is apparently a continuation of Fitz’s story.  Maybe he’ll catch a break in this one.

Doctor Who: Series Four End

Holy Tardis of Gallfrey.  The last two episodes of the series were written by sadistic maniacs.  Seriously, I haven't cried over a T.V. show that much in... possibly ever, actually.  And LOST could be brutal, but it was nothing in comparison to the abject misery I experienced watching the last two episodes of series four.

Ten's unwillingness to regenerate literally ripped my heart right out of my chest.  And they just kept making it worse.  We didn't get much fanfare when Nine regenerated into Ten.  I mean, he told Rose he wouldn't see her again ("Not with this dusty old face,") and told her she'd been brilliant.  Then, he regenerated.  No hysterics, no emotions, just poof!  New doctor!  David Tennant made some crack about new teeth and that was that.

But this.  Oh my god, this was something altogether different and horrible.  Not only had the Doctor just had to give up Rose to his clone and wipe Donna's memory because her brain was going to fry otherwise, he also knew that he was going to die, courtesy of the Ood, and didn't want to.  Almost every single conversation he had with Wilfred throughout the episodes were devastating.  His conversation about needing a companion and his explaining to Wilfred what happens when he regenerates - that everything he is dies and some other man strolls away with his memories.  And Wilfred offering him the gun and saying, "You're the most wonderful man and I don't want you to die," caused me to completely lose my shit, for a second.

Then the hope he felt after the Master and the crazy Timelords were gone, and he was still alive, only to find out that he had to kill himself to save Wilfred.  His rant about it not being fair - AND OH MY GOD IT FUCKING ISN'T.  Then for him to go on his little journey to see everyone that he loved and cared for before he regenerated (Rose included, which just started up the waterworks again).  It was almost too much.  And then, when he started to regenerate and he said, "I don't want to go," I fucking was too much,

I found myself really angry with the writers of the show, because it was all too much.  Leaving your audience sad and potentially crying is one thing - completely destroying a character that they love after three seasons of completely shitting on him because he's a Timelord and apparently can't have anything good for more than a few minutes is just completely fucked.  I can't understand it.  I adored Ten.  David Tennant was beyond amazing as the Doctor, and his last performance quite literally had me in tears for a good, solid ten minutes.  I was not handling my shit well at all.

Now, we've started series five, with Matt Smith, and I am just struggling with it.  I can't seem to connect with Eleven (although, we've only watched three or so episodes) and I can't seem to find a reason to care about him.  I thought the transition would be good because I could stop associating the Doctor with all the shit Ten had to go through, but I find myself missing Tennant's brand of Doctor and not all that impressed with Smith's.  Smith seems like a watered down version of Ten as far as Doctor quirks go.  I don't care for the whole "Geronimo" thing (who the fuck came up with that idea?) and his quick temper doesn't work as well as it did for Nine.  Not that Nine had a short fuse, but when he got angry, it was intimidating.  Eleven seems to want to be intimidating, but... eh.  River is coming back in the next episode (maybe that's the third one, so we've watched two?) and I'm excited to see her.  I find myself missing, not just Ten, but also Rose, Martha, Donna, Jack - all of them.

It wouldn't be as irritating if I had immediately taken to Eleven like I did with Ten.  I was convinced that Nine would be my favorite Doctor and that Ten would take some getting used to, but no.  I immediately fell in love with Ten.  Now, granted, we had a lot more episodes with Ten than we did with Nine, but still.  I'm not digging the adjustment.

I do like Amy, though.  I like how capable she is and how easily she's taken to life with the Doctor.  I also liked how it was Amy that saved the day in the space whale episode, instead of the Doctor.  But, so far, Eleven - you are no Ten, sir.

And I'm getting way too worked up over Doctor Who.  I need to breathe.  Although, I did get two fun Tardis t-shirts today.  So, yay me and fandom obsession!

Doctor Who: Series Three

So, I have discovered that doing an episode by episode recap of our Doctor Who adventure was entirely too much.  If we'd been watching one episode per week, I could've kept up, but multiple episodes over a day or two was just too taxing.

So!  I'm just going to update as I go, when I feel like it.  As it stands, now, we have just finished Series Three, wherein Martha Jones takes her leave as the Doctor's companion.  I'm going to talk about the whole season, but I will largely concentrate on Martha.

So much to cover!  I enjoyed the revelation of Jack Harkness being The Face of Boe.  I had actually already spoiled myself on that a bit when I was researching Torchwood (oops), but I had been under the impression that it was more of a prevailing theory than something that had been confirmed on the show, so that part was a nice surprise.  I like Jack, so I was happy to see him back, even if it was just for a few episodes.  I also already knew that Rose had inadvertently immortalized Jack, so I wasn't surprised when he wouldn't die.

I also knew that Martha was going to leave at the end of the season and the circumstances surrounding it.  I have to say, I start off really unimpressed with Martha.  I didn't like the way that, after a grand total of two or three episodes, she was already getting weird and possessive about the Doctor and seemed to be throwing little mini tantrums every time he mentioned Rose.  Case in point, the Shakespeare episode, where the Doctor was lying in bed with Martha and said that Rose would know what was going on and have something clever to say, etc.  Martha's little flounce was ridiculous and totally uncalled for, not to mention a little creepy stalker of her.

However, as time wore on, she dialed it back a good bit and I was able to connect with the character more, instead of being constantly put off by her uncontrollable urge to make poorly veiled passes at the Doctor.  He total lack of sympathy for his having lost Rose, in the beginning, really turned me off.  It was nice, when she stopped doing that. You could tell that she had fallen in love with the Doctor, but she didn't make a big spectacle of it anymore and huff around getting mad about the fact that he wasn't in love with her.

Speaking of love, I really liked the 1913 episode with the Family of the Blood.  David Tennant really is a tremendous actor, and my heart was breaking for John Smith when he was confronted with the fact that he would have to become the Doctor again.  When he kept accusing Martha of being his executioner, I just wanted to hug him and Joan, too.  It was so sad, to see the Doctor have a tiny little glimmer of an ordinary life where he was loved and could love, only to have to return to his duty as the Doctor and abandon it all, Joan included.  Also, the flash forward - tears forever.

Anyway, Martha turned out to be pretty cool, what with saving the world, and all.  They ripped my heart out of my chest once again in the finale, when the Master died and the Doctor was so heartbroken.  To think that even though the Master was a villain and had tried to wipe out the human race had turned the Doctor into Dobby...

Dobby is a free elf!

... he was still torn up when he died, because they were the last of the Timelords.  And that was so sad.  Then, of course, Martha chooses to leave him because she loves him but she knows he doesn't love her, and won't.  And why waste her life chasing after him for nothing?  I had a lot of respect for her when she did that.  I ended the series liking her must more than I had started out.

Overall, I enjoyed series three, but Martha did take some warming up to.  We're onto Donna, now, and I love her, but I'll discuss that later.

So, Rift is Free-to-Play.

So, a few posts back, I was talking about MMOs and how much I love SWTOR.  And I do.  However, when we were experimenting with things other than WoW, we stumbled across RIFT and downloaded a free trial.  Unfortunately, at the time, it wouldn't run well on our computers, so we uninstalled it and gave up.

Since then, we've both gotten new computers and my husband came home today and informed me that RIFT was now free-to-play.  You don't get all the perks of subscribers, of course, but still.  And I couldn't help myself.  I downloaded it.  It runs perfectly (victory!) but it is having a few hiccups as it downloads.  It will let you play as it's downloading, like WoW will, but it's getting to the point where it keeps screwing up, probably because I am playing.  So, I'm laying off for an hour or so to let it download.

However, I did take screenshots of my two little toons.  One Defiant and one Guardian.  Not gonna lie - I like my Guardian better, so far.

That's Sarait, who is a High Elf Cleric... Shaman, I think?  The talent trees are hella confusing, because there are four main classes, but then there are all these subclasses and then talent trees.  Still, she's cool and is my favorite, so far.

And that's Taurel, who is a Kelari Gravelord (Mage).  She's also got pretty bitchin' hair.  Anyway, I'm actually pretty excited about having a WoW-ish alternative to SWTOR that isn't costing me, monthly.  Plus, it's always fun to start a new MMO.

We'll probably make it back to WoW eventually, but for now, SWTOR and the occasional RIFT, it is.

Doctor Who: 1x03

1x03 - The Unquiet Dead

This episode was actually one of my favorites.  For some reason, it really seemed like they took the production value up a notch or two, but I couldn't figure out if that was because they did, or if it was because it's a lot easier to reproduce the year 1869 than the year 5.5/apple/26.  Either way, I appreciated the difference.

So, we start out in the 19th century with Funeral Home Guy and Gwyneth, who reminds me powerfully of Dina Waters' character in The Haunted Mansion.   Funeral Home Guy is flipping out a little because some old lady who bears a startling resemblance to Bill Nighy has awakened from her eternal sleep and is screaming blue smoke at everyone.

 R.I.P. - Granny Nighy

 

She runs out into the street, banshee wailing, while ghostly vapor comes out of her mouth and flies around.  Then we swap to Rose and the Doctor, bouncing about in the TARDIS and trying to decide on a destination.  Eventually, the Doctor chooses 1860 because reasons and takes them there.  He tells Rose she has to go change her clothes because she'll probably be burned at the steak for witchcraft if she goes out looking like that, so she runs off to the wardrobe that is apparently hidden in the much-larger-than-previously-assumed spaceship.

We're back to Gwyneth and Funeral Home Guy.  Gwyneth is apparently a psychic and Funeral Home Guy, who up until now has been relatively chill, suggests that Gwyneth use her mind powers to find old dead Granny Nighy, which she refuses (because black magic, duh) and he then comes back with, "Do it or I'll fucking fire you," which seemed to be a bit harsh, frankly.

I will stop this cart and slap you with that bonnet. Don't think I won't.

So, Gwyneth, spineless creature that she is, agrees, and takes on a far off look for a moment.  She then informs us that Mrs. Nighy is going to see the very important man.  That she had been looking forward to it before she died, and, goddamnit, she was going.

Then we skip over to Simon Callow, who is a pimp, I don't care what he's doing.  He's Charles Dickens, author of Oliver Twist, and apparently renowned for his captivating oration, which we see a little later on once he's bitched and griped for a few minutes about being old and knowing everything and why is life so shitty, etc.

Back on the TARDIS, Rose comes back, decked out in 19th century garb and wonders why the Doctor hasn't change, to which he replies that he's changed his jumper.  But, he basically looks the same.  At this point, I wondered aloud why it was that he got to wear whatever while Rose probably had on a corset.  My husband seemed to think that people saw whatever they wanted to see when they looked at the Doctor, but this was never clarified.

Then, they go out into the city (which is supposed to be Naples, but...) and oops!  It's Cardiff.  And it's 1869, not 1860.  But, Rose could give less than two fucks about that because SHE IS IN THE PAST.  Which would be my precise attitude, so thank you, Rose, for finally being impressed with the TARDIS.

Then we return to Charles Dickens, who is performing a riveting recitation of "A Christmas Carol" to an audience of people who clearly have nothing better to do with their time, including Granny Nighy, who is being generally dead and creepy.

 "And all they found was a hook dangling from the passenger's

side door, and no one ever heard from Bob Cratchett again."

And then he notices Granny Nighy, and that's she's glowing and then she's spitting out ghosts which swarm around the room and freak everyone out, so they all start running, to Charles Dickens' exclanmations that they stay in their seats.  Because that's totally what I'd do in that situation.

Out on the streets, the Doctor hears screaming and runs in to try and save the day... or maybe just observe the cacophony, I'm not really sure.  Funeral Home Guy and Gwyneth show up at this point and snatch up a now limp Granny Nighy and carry her out, Rose hot on their heels.  Rose starts asking probing questions and gets a nice face full of ether handkerchief because it's the 19th century.

The Doctor commandeers Charles Dicken's carriage, which Charles Dickens gets into also, and commands his driver to follow that hearse!  They end up at the funeral home, where Gwyneth and Funeral Home Guy have considerately laid Rose out on a table for dead people in a room with the guy Granny Nighy killed in the beginning of the episode (which was her son... or something) who promptly comes to life and starts spitting blue ghost smoke as Charles Dickens and the Doctor are arguing with Gwyneth about coming into the house.

The Doctor lets her out and now Granny Nighy and Granny Nighy, Jr. come waltzing over to the doorway, spit some screamy smoke and disappear.  This is when the Doctor notices something weird going on with the gaslights.  Then, the Doctor sort of takes over everything and gets really pushy and insists that Gwyneth lead a seance, which she agrees to do, and that's when we meet the Gelth, who are actual assholes.

But, we don't know that yet, and Gwyneth is kind of stupid, so she decides that the Gelth are her angels and somehow her responsibility after they claim that their physical forms were destroyed during the Time War and that their race is dying off.  The next logical step is to let them use the recently deceased as vessels to move around in.  So, like the giant roach guy in Men in Black.

Nothing bad could possibly come of this.

 At this point, the Doctor gets sort of bossy and starts throwing his Timelord weight around, telling Gwyneth that she has to open a bridge for the Gelth to let them "pass through," the rift, which is apparently in the house.  Rose gets pissed and says she she won't let Gwyneth do it, because since they had an awkward five minute conversation in the pantry, they're besties, now.

Gwyneth eventually speaks up and agrees to do it, so everyone goes down to the morgue.  Of course.  She stands in a random doorway and starts letting forth WAY more Gelths than the Gelths agreed to bring, and the Doctor is like, "THESE PEOPLE DID NOT RSVP WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK?" and then everyone realizes that the Doctor made a really stupid decision and they're all going to die, because the Gelth don't want just dead bodies, they want all bodies.

I immediately regret this decision.

Charles Dickens goes running out of the place, because he's a pansy, but once he gets outside, he realizes that the whole gas thing they'd been talking about earlier that didn't seem to make much sense made WAY MORE sense than everyone though.  So, he goes back inside and, at the risk of choking everyone to death on gas fumes, turns up all the lanterns all over the house. 

He runs back downstairs, where Rose and the Doctor are sort of almost but not really having a brief romantic moment and tells them they have to turn on all the gas.  The Doctor realizes the sense behind this (which I didn't) - apparently the gas will draw out the Gelths, because they're mostly gas... or all gas... something.

Anyway, this works and the Gelths start swirling around the ceiling in confusion while the Doctor consults with Gweneth about sending them all back.  Which, as it happens, she cannot do.  But, she can hold them there to give everyone time enough to get outside before they blow the shit out of the building.  She keeps a book of matches, the Doctor says sorry for basically insisting that she do this and getting her killed.  Oops.

He runs outside where he gets to Cool Guy dive away from the exploding building.  Rose is upset (is this a trend?  She seems to be upset at the end of most episodes...) about the fact that Gwyneth died, especially since she saved the world from the Gelth and no one will ever know about it.  Charles Dickens says he's going to go hang out with his family and will make The Mystery of Edwin Drood about blue smoke aliens.  The Doctor confirms that his work will endure the test of time.

Back in the TARDIS, Rose brings up the fact that it might make things sort of weird for Charles Dickens if he actually does write a book about blue smoke aliens, to which the Doctor cheerily uplifts all our spirits by reminding us that he'll die in about six months, anyway, so he won't get to write it.  No harm done.

And that's the end!

Doctor Who: The Beginning.

After years of being told that we should watch it, the husband and I are finally beginning our Doctor Who journey.  Admittedly, we don't have the patience to go back and watch the eight doctors preceding Christopher Eccelston.  So, we've begun with the reboot, episode 1 - Rose.

And so far?  I love it.  Of course, I have a bit of a bias, because I've always liked Christopher Eccleston, and his Doctor is so abrupt and funny.  The first episode Rose nearly gets strangulated by Evil Shop Dummies, which is unsettling enough.  Then the Doctor shows up and tells her to run.  Off they go, and Rose is pretty much "wtf?" for the duration of the episode.  She searches for a bunch of random stuff that would never bring up any information ever about the Doctor, and if it did, it'd be on the last page of the entire search, despite the fact that it claims to be on page 1-10.

 At this point, she clearly has to contact Clive, who has apparently started a website inquiring about Doctor sightings. So, she does, and her Very Nice Boyfriend voices concerns about Clive potentially being an axe murderer.  Which, in all honesty, is a pretty legit concern.

Did I say Clive?

So, they go to see Clive, who turns out to be a relatively normal, if somewhat squat and awkward, guy.  At this point, we are introduced to some truly terrible CG when Very Nice Boyfriend notices a garbage can that is moving by itself and generally just being inappropriate.  Being A Very Curious Guy as well, Very Nice Boyfriend gets out of the car to investigate and ends up being devoured by the angry trash can.

There's no caption to really do this screencap justice.

Then, Very Nice Boyfriend is back, but is made of plastic and is evil and wants to kill everyone.

From there, all hell breaks loose, which eventually culminates with the revelation that Some Horrible Thing is controlling all of the plastic in London and is planning to unleash an army of awkward, inanimate objects (some of which inexplicably have firearms hidden in their hands) on the city to wreak havoc and do murders.

And, of course, the Doctor eventually shares all of this with Rose and they decide to go try and stop it.  They show up in some awful underground place where there's a giant pit of sentient, undulating melted plastic.  The Doctor proceeds to quote some Important Space Ordinances at the plastic glob who then orders his shop dummy minions to grab the Doctor and threatens to destroy the TARDIS.

Rose remembers that she was mediocre at gymnastics in grade school which means that she can swing like an orangutan from dangling chains and knock out bad guys.  She does that, saves the day, then clambers into the TARDIS with the Doctor and an extremely rattled Very Nice Boyfriend (who was there, by the way - apparently getting eaten by a garbage can and turned into Unfriendly Plastic Boyfriend sent the real him to the horrible plastic death room).

At this point, Rose decides to go with the Doctor in the TARDIS and explore the universe with no reservations, whatsoever, for leaving behind her Very Nice Boyfriend and scatter-brained mother.

Thanks for being such a Nice Boyfriend.  It'd be way harder to completely abandon you if you were an asshole.

 The next episode features the Doctor trying to impress Rose with the size of his TARDIS.  She says she wants to go one hundred years into the future, and he's all, "Child's play.  Pick again."  So she goes higher.  And he's all, "Step outside.  You're in the fuuuuuture."  She's unimpressed, she says (although, that's bullshit - I'd be outside freaking out of he'd taken me three hours into the future because TIME TRAVEL) so the Doctor decides he'll show that bitch and takes them five billion years into the future, when we've run out of numbers so hard that we've started using fresh produce into our years.

Because Rose is being such an uppity bitch, the Doctor decides to pwn her hardcore and make her witness the destruction of Earth.  Which isn't as sadistic as it seems, since no one lives on Earth anymore.  Still, I had kind of a Princess Leia flashback moment.

Dantooine!  They're on Dantooine!

An assortment of odd alien creatures are then paraded in, including a giant head (The Face of Boe), an awesome looking tree woman and Lady Cassandra O'Brien (yeah, she has her own Wikipedia page).  For another episode, Rose is just sort of like... wtf?  Lady Cassandra was, by far, one of my favorite parts of the entire episode.  She was flanked by two guys in HAZMAT suits with shower heads that she kept muttering, "Moisturize me!  Moisturize me!" to.  She was seriously hilarious.

She's being billed as the "last human," but she's basically a face on skin stretched on some sort of weird mount.  She's kind of like the Lady Catherine  de Bourgh of this episode.  Unsurprisingly, then, she's also a treacherous shrew and has released some kind of crazy mechano-spiders onto the ship to try and burnmurder everyone just after she teleports out.

They suspect nothing.

So, again, the Doctor saves the day after Jade, the pretty tree lady, has to catch on fire (because it's hot enough to set wood on fire in the room, but the Doctor is totally unaffected) and sacrifice herself, but everyone is saved!

Rose is momentarily traumatized by the fact that the Earth was destroyed and no one was paying attention, because they were too busy trying not to get burnmurdered by the the skin curtain.

Too bad I don't have a machine that could transport me back five billion years to when the Earth was still there.

Anyway, I really like the show, so far.  I mean, it's cheesy (as far as the effects go), but the concept is pretty awesome.  I'm dedicated.  We'll probably watch an episode or two more tonight after the kid goes to bed.  Pretty soon, I'll be able to change my Facebook header to the TARDIS and not feel like a noob.

Game of Thrones: Mhysa

If ever there were an episode of a television show that proved wholly anticlimactic, it was last nights Game of Thrones.  In fairness to HBO, it was a perfectly adequate episode, and what they’re doing is necessary.  Because Martin jumps all over the place with his characters (some of them disappearing entirely for a book or two - I’ll get to that in a minute), there is great deal of setting up you have to do, plot-wise.  I see why they wanted to go ahead and establish that Jaime and Brienne were back at King’s Landing.  That will be important for next season, because Jaime’s presence at King’s Landing plays a significant role in the events to come, particularly those involving Tyrion.  But, I’ll get to those spoilers in a minute.

I don’t recall Arya stabbing anyone to death in the books after The Red Wedding, but maybe she did.  I was so shell-shocked after the wedding itself, that I doubt I’d have noticed if she did.  I’m sure I approved, though.  I’d have stabbed the bastards, too.  Arya holding up the coin Jaqen H’ghar gave her and saying “valar morghulis” was extremely foreshadowing, if you’ve read the series, so they’re clearly setting that up early on.  Which is weird, because that part of Arya’s story line doesn’t get kick started until the end of Storm of Swords, I thought, but Game of Thrones has got me so turned around with doing time lines so crazy, I might be wrong.

Dani’s victory in freeing all of the slaves is a big deal, but get ready to watch her sit... and sit... and sit... and still not have marched on Westeros by the fifth book.  My frustration with Dani knows no bounds.

Jon Snow got shot in the back by Ygritte!  Which didn’t happen exactly that way.  She doesn’t shoot him in the back/shoulder, she just shoots him in the leg.  But she does shoot him, and can we really be surprised by that?  Ygritte is a wilding to the core.  And, if I remember correctly, as touching as the “I love you, you love me,” conversation was, that never happened.  But, still.  Oh, Ygritte.

 What else?  Oh! Tywin is being a dick (shocker) to Tyrion, and basically tells him he wanted to drown him as a baby, but let him live because he was a Lannister.  I guess that means Tyrion won’t be getting that Best Dad in Westeros t-shirt for him.  Cersei is ever a bitch, but I feel sorry for Cersei occasionally, because she really has been handicapped by her gender.  Can you imagine if she were a man?  She’d just rule everything and everyone.  She would be ruthless. 

Also, I can’t tell you how much I enjoy Tywin constantly taking Joffrey to task.  Sending him to bed without supper, while Joffrey is throwing a tantrum and insisting that he isn’t tired.  That little barbed threat that Tyrion threw at Joffrey will turn out to be a big problem for him (Tyrion) later on.

On that note, TO THE SPOILERS!  I’ll go ahead and start with that.  I’m enjoying all of the subtle foreshadowing going on in this last episode.  It wasn’t nearly as heart pumping as The Rains of Castamere, but you can’t murder three main characters every show.  Tyrion’s comment to Joffrey at the Small Council meeting is going to come back to bite him in the ass later on, because Joffrey is, to much rejoicing of the fandom, I should think, going to get himself dead.  Yep!  Just after his wedding to Margaery Tyrell, no less, which is rather fitting considering the tone of the last wedding we saw.  He’s poisoned and keels over at the wedding reception.  Goes all black and green and chokey.

So, of course, Cersei is devastated (probably moreso in the books than on the show - you’d almost think she’d be relieved, the way Joffrey is on the show) and immediately blames Tyrion.  They throw him into the dungeon and decide to have a trial for him, which ends up going poorly, as you might imagine.  He is testified against by Shae, of all people (which is just heartbreaking).  A lot happens that I won’t detail, then Tyrion escapes from the dungeon, decides to shoot Tywin through the gut with a crossbow on this way out (while he’s on the john, no less) and just so happens to discover Shae sleeping in Tywin’s bed.  So, he strangles her to death with the Hand of the King chain (which doesn’t exist in the show, so maybe he’ll stab her with the pointy end of the pin?).  And off goes Tyrion across the ocean.

Theon Greyjoy, on the show, is being ruthlessly tortured by Ramsay Snow (Bolton) because sociopath. In the book, Theon is actually absent from the sack of Winterfell on.  You kind of assume he’s dead for a long while, and then suddenly you’re getting perspective chapters from someone named Reek, whom you discover to be the broken remains of Theon Greyjoy.  At first, when all of this with Theon Was happening, I was really confused as to why they were totally fabricating this story.  Then, I realized (with a little help from a fellow fan) that they were taking the part of Theon’s story that we aren’t privy to - the part where he becomes Reek - and showing it to us.  I imagine this was to keep Alfie Allen employed, more than anything.  I’m sure they’d hate to recast Theon if Alfie had gotten another T.V. gig elsewhere during the several seasons that his character would be gone.

Gilly and Sam are cute as ever, and if I recall, their story line is basically right.  I'm not as interested in their characters as others (although I do love Sam) and their story doesn't really get good and interesting until later, when they leave Castle Black to go somewhere else with Aemon Targaryen and there's a baby swapping plot and Mance Rayder is involved and it's a little crazy.

Basically, hats off to a great season, I'd say.  They've set the stage for the second half of Storm of Swords very well, so I'm excited for next season, especially since Joffrey and Tywin both die, so the playing field (as far as murdered family members) is leveled somewhat for the Starks and Lannisters, even if it was a Lannister who murdered one of the other Lannisters.  Petryr Baelish, if I'm not mistaken, is the mastermind behind Joffrey's demise.  But, no one figures that out and he sails off to The Eyrie with Sansa where he will eventually throw Lysa Arryn out of the moon door.

Because it was way past time for someone to do that.

The Art of Using Tumblr.

I am an admittedly infrequent Tumblr user.  I mean, I update it semi-regularly, but then I'll go for days and not sign in.  I always thought Tumblr was a place for posting pretty things you liked, geeky things you liked - basically just things you like, right?  Apparently, however, when you sign up for Tumblr, you are required to participate in An Intro to Tumblr Etiquette 101.  I'm not entirely sure who offers this course, but someone must, because if you don't know The Rules, you are a giant asshole.

Case in point - myself.

So, a couple of weeks ago, right after the season finale of Once Upon a Time, I was ruminating upon the fact that, to my surprise, my OUaT OTP seemed to have shifted from Emma/Hook to Emma/Neal.  Basically, I felt like Neal and Emma seemed to have way more chemistry than Emma and Hook.  I mean, the little interludes with Emma and Hook in the giant episode(s) were nice, but you could just tell, man, that Emma was still in love with Neal and visa versa.

I can't ever really keep up with some of the ship names, but I do know that Emma/Hook is rabidly and affectionately referred to (at least on Tumblr) as Captain Swan.  Apparently there's a name for Emma/Neal, too, but I can't remember what it is.  It's like... Swanfire, or some shit like that.

Anyway, so, I'm dicking around on Tumblr and I decide to post about the fact that I liked Emma and Neal as a couple more than Emma and Hook.  So, I do this, and I tag the thing with various tags (Emma Swan, Neal Cassidy, Once Upon a Time, etc.) including Captain Swan.  Because... I'm talking about that ship, right?  So, it makes sense to tag something based upon the content of your post, doesn't it?  Doesn't it?!

NO, FUCK YOU, IT DOES NOT.

I shit you not, within two minutes of posting it, Captain Swan shippers lost their shit and started messaging me about it.  Some were nice and just asked that I remove the tag because they didn't want to see negative shit about their ship.  (Which is apparently the Tumblr P.C. portion of the entrance course.)  Others, however, started ranting at me about how rude I was and ignorant I was and how this was SO AWFUL to theeeeeeeem!

The worst, though, was a chick who PMd me whining about how I was such an asshole (not her words) because I had used the Captain Swan tag while being disparaging (because, apparently saying that I felt like Emma/Neal had more chemistry than Emma/Hook was disparaging) about her ship and how she came onto Tumblr to ESCAPE from negativity and immerse herself in her fandom and I was just the biggest, fattest asshole of all and HOW DARE I? 

At this point I was trying to decide between being a real shit and just being like, "I have no idea what the fuck you are talking about."  So, I went with the latter, and explained to her that I had no idea what the fuck she was talking about, that I did not realize there was some sort of Tumblr Tag Etiquette and that I hadn't gotten the memo.  I pointed out the fact that I am a relatively infrequent Tumblr poster, because I can't use Tumblr at work, etc., so I'm not on all the time during the week because I have to go to work.  However, I also pointed out that it is not my responsibility to preserve her delicate feelings over a fandom (because, let's face it, I'm not posting triggers, here - I'm posting about a fairytale T.V. show) and basically get over it or GTFO.

This was apparently a foreign concept to her, that the rest of the world wasn't responsible for her feelings and she then proceeded to accuse me of doing it on purpose. Before that, though, she launched into a three message or so diatribe about how I thought I was better than everyone on Tumblr because I told her I had to work all week, so I wasn't on Tumblr much.

Then, she "complimented" me by saying she could tell I was smart, but then followed it up with the accusation that I had known exactly what I was doing when I used the Captain Swan tag and that I had done it on purpose, to stir up some sort of Tumblr flame war.

Did you mean to say all those words you said?

I was seriously so flabbergasted by the ridiculousness of that assumption, I couldn't even respond for a minute.  I was relaying all of this to my husband in real time, and were just sort of stared at each other in mute confusion, for a second.

I have never been more confused by the Internet in my life.  So, let me break this down for you, in case you don't know how to use Tumblr tags.  Never, ever, ever tag anything ever that you're talking about unless you're talking about how it's awesome and rainbows and unicorn farts.  If you do, be prepared to get crucified by people who take fandom WAY too seriously.  And yeah, I said it.  You take your fandom too seriously, you psycho.

But, seriously.  Beware the Tumblr tags.  They'll cut you over that shit.

An MMO Story

Several years ago... like... five, or something, my husband and I dipped our toes into the wonderful world of online gaming.  We blame it on South Park.  We had been watching the World of Warcraft episode, and both of us were like, "Hey... we should try that out.  We can play it for free."  So, we downloaded it onto our equally ancient computers, and gave it a whirl.

And, then we promptly got totally addicted, got ourselves monthly subscriptions and dove in.  We started out as Alliance (because we didn't know any better) and made the mistake of choosing the recommended server (Vashj) which just so happened to be a PvP server which meant nothing to us at the time because we were absolutely MMORPG noobs.  I know, I know.  Only super badasses can play on a PvP server!  Whatever, man, I am shit at PvP and I have no trouble admitting that.  I hate PvP.

We actually both started off with Night Elf Druids.  How that happened, I will never know.  That was back when the newest expansion was Burning Crusade and not long before Lich King was released.  Anyway, we played as Alliance for a while.  I think we got our Druids to around the level 50 or so mark.  Then Lich King dropped and we immediately made Death Knights because reasons, which both of us promptly leveled up to 80.  We were super proud of having level 80 characters, even though we'd only worked for less than thirty of those levels (oops).  We raided a bit.  Went through several guilds, but raiding ended up just not being for us.  It was too time consuming, for one thing.  If you had any sort of normal schedule you were fucked.  There was all this pressure to put out THE MOST DPS EVAAAAAR and constantly check your DPS output and tweak things and change gear and talent trees and hot bar rotations and OH MY GOD IT WAS LIKE A SECOND JOB.

So... we dispensed with that.  Then, WoW said we could change factions, so we swapped to Horde side and never looked back.  Thinks had gotten a little stale by the time Panda Party Express Mists of Pandaria came out, but we hadn't been able to find any other MMOs that filled the void of WoW.  We gave Rift a half-hearted try, but were mostly disappointed.  However, that had a lot more to do with the fact that neither one of our laptops (yeah laptops - eat me) wanted to run it worth a damn and moving five feet took ten minutes than with the game itself.  So, back to WoW we went.

Then, a friend of mine suggested that we try out Guild Wars, which I was immediately sort of turned off to because the name is stupid, but he's a pretty solid gamer, so I downloaded a trial version of the original game.  Apparently, Guild Wars 2 had either just come out or was coming out - something, I don't know.  Anyway, Guild Wars was... okay, judging solely by the trial (which apparently isn't much to go on, from what I hear).  During all of this, I remember hearing about a Star Wars MMO and thinking that would be bad ass, but there was no demo, and I was not about to pay money to download a game that I may or may not actually want to play.

So, Star Wars: The Old Republic got sidelined and back to WoW we went.  Then, we discovered DC Universe Online, which is actually a pretty fucking cool game, especially if you're a fan of the DC Universe.  It's free to download/play, and you pay like.. $10.00+/- for add ons.  For example, I bought the Green Lantern expansion (so I could play as a green or yellow lantern) for $10.00 which was pretty ballin'.  DC was really cool, but I kept getting drawn back to WoW.  Mists of Pandaria came out and I looked at is as an opportunity to get my one maxed character (I'm an alt whore, I freely admit) to 90 and make a panda (the latter of which ended up being way less fun that anticipated).

Visually, I thought MoP was stunning, so hats off to Blizzard for that.  However, after a while, I was bored again.  We didn't have time to raid.  Rep grind was really the only thing left for me to do (with the exception of the occasional Sha of Anger run with random groups) and I just wasn't into it.  I was paying $15.00 a month to basically never play, and that was crap.

Then, someone told me that SWTOR had offered up a demo.  Holy shit awesome.  I was all over that.  I downloaded it and immediately made a Sith Inquisitor (who I've since deleted) and then a Jedi Knight (who I've also since deleted).  Of course, on the free-to-play, you start getting less XP when you hit level 10 and you don't have access to a lot of things like Sprint (which makes your toon run faster) and the Fleet Pass (although you can buy it at the Cartel Market).   Still, I played it for probably a grand total of two days and had to have it.  HAD TO.

I suspended my WoW subscription, something I had never done before, and immediately subscribed to SWTOR.  I have never looked back.  To me, personally, SWTOR (for the time being) is the superior game.  The story driven quest chains are fantastic, and the fact that every class has it's own story line and that stories are influenced by your choices as you quest (Dark Side, Light Side, etc.) is super cool.  I've actually made one of each class (and a few duplicates) and enjoy all of them.  I seriously have not found a class that I don't like.  My favorites are my Smuggler, my Imperial Agent and my Sith Warrior, but I also dig my Trooper, my Jedi Consular... all of them, really.

Graphically, too, I was way more impressed with SWTOR.  Also, I really enjoy flashpoints and heroic questing, among other things.  We've been subscribers to SWTOR for about two or three months now and, so far, I have no intention of crawling back to WoW.  At least, not for a long time.

SWTOR definitely recommended.

Game of Thrones: The Rains of Castamere

As sick as this sounds, I've seriously been waiting for The Red Wedding for the entirety of season three.  Not because I was excited to watch Robb and Catelyn Stark be brutally murdered, but because my husband never finished reading Storm of Swords.  He was so close to it.  He says he remembers talk of Edmure Tully marrying Roslin Frey to smooth over things after Robb Stark went and fucked it all up with Jeyne Westerling.  But, that's the last he recalls.

So close.

So, you can imagine the anticipation I've been in all season, wondering when The Red Wedding would feature.  I can't lie, I was mildly surprised that they didn't save it for the season finale.  I had fully expected them to, and the end of The Rains of Castamere was exactly how I had anticipated they'd end the season.  So, I'm very interested to see what next week brings.

But, this isn't about next week.  This is about Sunday.  The Day the Starks Died.

You can't help comparing the show to the books, if you've read them.  Being that I have, and I knew what was coming, I spent the entire episode up until the last fifteen minutes or so biting my nails and trying to keep a straight face and not fidget too much in my chair.  I thought HBO did such a good job of lulling everyone into a false sense of security.  Things with Dani ultimately went well, even if Ser Jorah was ruthlessly friendzoned.  Arya threatened to stab the Hound in the face, Edmure ended up with a smokin' hot wife, Bran superworged Hodor and we had some tears at Rickon's surprise soliloquy, but it wasn't too bad, and it was for his own good.  Gilly told Sam he was a wizard because he can read.  Jon Snow ran off and left Ygritte, which I'm sure jerked on some heartstrings.  All in all, a fairly typical Game of Thrones, right?

Except for the murdering.

In the books, Catelyn makes a super big deal out of the fact that everyone has to be sure to eat Walder Frey's food and take his drink.  This is because, once they've done that, they are guests in this house and it would basically be really bad form to slaughter them all, or something silly like that.  The first thing you notice in Catelyn's chapter (wherein there is much massacreing) that seems amiss is how god awful the minstrels are.  She goes so far as to remark on how she can't tell what song they're playing.  On the show, however, Catelyn says something about the minstrels being good.  In the book, you're sort of like, "Huh... I wonder why she chose to tell us how bad the music is.  Whatever.  WEDDING FEAST!"  Roose Bolton is totally there in the books, and he's totally sitting next to Catelyn, but it isn't him she finds the chainmail on.  It's what's-his-face-Frey who goes to shut the doors before all the killin'.  She grabs his arm, realizes he's wearing chain mail and has a definite "Oh shit" moment.

But, that's okay.  I thought they did that just fine on the show.  In the books, just as on the show, Catelyn has her second "Oh shit" moment when she realizes that the God Awful Minstrels of the Twins are playing "The Rains of Castamere."  This is bad if you know your Westerosi history because, A.) it's typically associated with the Lannsters, which is because B.) they fucking killed all of House Reyne in a bloody massacre.

Oh shit is right, Lady Stark.

There's also the fact that Catelyn bitchslaps Roose Bolton, which does happen in the book, except that it isn't Roose, it's still what's-his-name-Frey.  

As most people know, Talisa is not a character in the books.  She was created specifically for the show and, up until this episode, I had really wondered why.  Robb married Jeyne Westerling in the book, and he did it because he loved her and also probably because she was smokin' hot. Jeyne is not only never pregnant with Robb's child in the book, but she isn't even present at The Red Wedding.  So, I'm guessing HBO dreamed up Talisa for some gratuitous violence.  How can you make audiences desensitized by a crossbow bolt to Ros' crotch still cringe?  Stab a pregnant woman multiple times in the abdomen to complete, stunned silence.  And, holy shit, that was pretty brutal.  Of course, I also felt like it was pretty needless  I like Talisa okay, for a Character That Never Happened, but her violent death was really unnecessary and it came across as if her character had only been created because HBO decided they wanted to go all Roman Polansky's house at The Twins.

Aside from that, however, I thought the rest of the scene was well done.  Robb's death was pretty accurate.  Except that Roose Bolton doesn't say, "The Lannisters send their regards," in the book.  He says, "Jaime Lannister sends his regards."  I'm not sure why they changed that, unless they're not wanting everyone to hate on Jaime, so they removed it.  But, Catelyn gets a knife and snatches up, not Walder Frey's wife, but his simple-minded grandson, Jinglebell (or Aegon Frey).  I cannot even tell you how horrible I felt for Jinglebell in that scene.  God, it was awful.

On the show, of course, Catelyn grabs Walder's wife and tells him she'll slit the woman's throat if he doesn't let Robb go.  And, Walder Frey being Walder Frey, is basically like, "I have no fucks to give, woman," and has Robb killed.  I saw some complaints of "over acting" on Michelle Fairley's part in the show, and I would just like to point out that in the books, Catelyn goes a little insane and starts laughing maniacally, to the point that one of the Frey guys is like, "Um... I think maybe she's crazy."

She slits Jinglebell's throat (oh, poor Jinglebell) and then has her own throat slit for her.  But let me interject this.  Last night, I was talking to a friend of mine about how I didn't necessarily think that the books were more brutal than the show.  I used examples of Ros' death, which never happened, and of Talisa's death, which never happened.  However, emotionally, I might be wrong there.  I had completely forgotten about the fact that George R.R. Martin is a sadistic bastard.  Seriously.  Look at this:

It hurts so much, she thought, Our children, Ned, all our sweet babes.  Rickon, Bran, Arya, Sansa, Robb . . . Robb . . . please, Ned, please, make it stop, make it stop hurting . . . The white tears and the red ones ran together until her face was torn and tattered, the face that Ned had loved.  Catelyn Stark raised her hands and watched the blood run down her long fingers, over her wrists, beneath the sleeves of her gown.  Slow red worms crawled along her arms and under her clothes.  It tickles. That made her laugh until she screamed.  "Mad," someone said, "she's lost her wits," and someone else said , "Make an end," and a hand grabbed her scalp just as she'd done with Jinglebell, and she thought, No, don't, don't cut my hair, Ned loves my hair.  Then the steel was at her throat, and its bite was red and cold.

- Storm of Swords, Catelyn, Pg 122

When I got to the part about her hair, I almost lost it, man.  What is wrong with you, George Martin?  You sick bastard.  So, I guess, in that sense, the book is more brutal that the show.  But, they still did a pretty good job of conveying the betrayal of House Stark.

Now, we'll have to see if they actually sew Grey Wind's head onto Robb's body, because damn that might have been worse than the rest of it.