1 down, 19 to go

I started re-reading Ellis Peter’s Brother Cadfael books and re-watching the BBC series starring Derek Jacobi. So far I have only finish the first one, “Morbid Taste for Bones.”

The episode (no surprise) was a highly condensed version of the book. For the sake of clarity, the whole series reduced the amount of characters from the books. For instance, instead of a series of incompetent to fairly competent assistants in the books, in the series Cadfael only has Brother Oswin (sp?) to deal with. To this end, there was no Brother John who runs off with a Welsh girl, and no sub-prior either. This episode was not the first to air and therefore, Abbot Radulfus is already there. Cadfael gets more to do in this show than he did in the book. He examines the dead body and discovers the wounds, not the daughter. And the daughter is not used to fool Brother Columbanus in the chapel either. Cadfael does that all by himself with the daughter only serving as witness.

Besides the condensation, the shows give a good sense of the books and was an enjoyable series all together.


<*<*<*<>*>*>* >
www.netflix.com provides me with all the DVD’s I can handle.
As for books, my thanks go out to www.amazon.com, Borders (a chai latte, please!) and all the used book sales I can get to.
For anything I can’t find in any of these places, I go to my local library. (Interlibrary Loans are SHINY!)

LIBRARIANS: the GPS locators in a wilderness of information.

Scotland used to be so nice…

I am moving very quickly through the second season of “Monarch of the Glen”, not because I love the show but because I can’t stand it. When I first saw the show there were some interesting and nice characters as well as the beautiful Scottish scenery. So, I rented the DVDs of the first season and was a bit disappointed to find that there was a whole different cast involved.

My interest in this original cast ranges from mild dislike to extreme hatred. Everyone is petty and pathetic at the same time. No one however is more disagreeable than Lexie. I know that Archie eventually marries her, but right now in the series he is juggling a series of nasty, spiteful women and Lexie is just in the background now, being a stand-by harpie. She is smitten with him because he was a gentleman and wouldn’t sleep with her. Meanwhile she is still stringing poor sweet Duncan along. (The best thing about this show is knowing that Duncan manages to get away from her!) I would shout at the screen and tell Archie to run for those famous Scottish hills and get away from Lexie himself, but I don’t really care who he ends up with. Archie is so insipid and dull I can’t be bothered to care about him.

Even Gully, who I like in later seasons, is a petty, passive-aggressive prick when he doesn’t get his way. I am waiting for him to hold his breath and turn blue one day when Archie tries to make the slightest change to the estate.

The only character I like is Duncan… but I know he doesn’t survive into the later seasons. I hope that when he leaves it will be to a much better place where shrewish cooks (Lexie) aren’t constantly insulting him while slyly trying to seduce him, where his immediate superior (Gully) doesn’t treat him like an idiot and use him to get back at people, and where he can continue to where a kilt and look absolutely grand while standing on a granite outcropping.


<*<*<*<>*>*>* >
www.netflix.com provides me with all the DVD’s I can handle.
As for books, my thanks go out to www.amazon.com, Borders (a chai latte, please!) and all the used book sales I can get to.
For anything I can’t find in any of these places, I go to my local library. (Interlibrary Loans are SHINY!)

LIBRARIANS: the GPS locators in a wilderness of information.