Roma Eterna

I finally finished watching all the back tapes of Rome week on the History channel. As usual, it was a mixed bag of stuff. “Lust in Rome” was an awful documentary about the sinful practices of the Roman Emperors. They even went as far as to call Claudius “grotesquely deformed” as if his limp and stutter were the reasons behind his supposed debauchery.

The documentary about the battle between Caesar and Vercingetorix was well-done. They had two military historians pretending to be the two combatants in modern day France. They didn’t dress up in costumes or anything like that, and they “chased” each other in cars across the French countryside, but it was still quite effective.

At the top of my list is a series called “Life and Death in Rome.” This series had several episodes but I only managed to tape two of them. Sometimes the camera work was dangerously close to “MTV” style, but I like the host (can’t remember his name) and the stories were mostly about how the everyday person lived in 1st century Rome.

“Modern Marvels” also pulled out a very good episode about the Flavian Ampitheater, more commonly known as the “Coliseum.” It’s not exactly a “modern” marvel, but I like the way they talked about the Coliseum’s more recent history. Although, I can’t imagine that Paul McCartney’s concert did the fragile structure any good.

Whew! I am sated for now with all that Ancient Roman history under my belt, but it still makes me yearn for a decent copy of Pliny’s “Natural History.”

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LIBRARIANS: the books, the fame, the fortune… What more could you want? (Maybe more books.)

I read books too

It seems this blog is increasingly about the movies, DVD’s, videos and televisions shows that I watch. I do read books too and here is the update.

Just finished “RVing Alaska and Canada” by “Charlie” Minshall. This book really makes you want to travel and have a few adventures of your own. It particularly amazed me that even in some of the most remote towns, there is a library in the center of it all.

I’m about half way through “Doctor Strange: Essential #1.” This book really makes me want to go out and do some black magic. No seriously… I really love Dr. Strange and now that I have filled a rather large gap in my collection, I am realizing a dream of reading the whole of his works from beginning to end. For those of you who don’t know what that will entail here is a list of his appearances.

Strange Tales 1963 to 1968; 56 issues - Essential Vol. 1 reprints the whole thing (I’m not that rich!)
1st series: 1968 to 1969; 15 issues – Essential Vol. 2 reprints most of this.
Marvel Premiere: 1972 to 1974; 11 issues
2nd series: Master of the Mystic Arts 1974 to 1987; 81 issues
Strange Tales Vol. 2: 1987 to 1988; 19 issues
3rd series: Sorcerer Supreme 1988 to 1996; 90 issues
Flight of Bones: 4 issue mini series 1999

And this doesn’t include special appearances, some of which I have, Annual issues, Graphic Novels, “Defenders,” “Secret Defenders” and other stuff. I can’t wait to get every single thing he ever appeared in before I start my marathon read. But I have everything from 1972 on and enough reprinted material to get started.

I just started reading “Empire of the Word” by Nicholas Ostler. It is a fascinating book about the history of language. It’s big and a bit dense, but the first 30 pages so far are riveting.

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LIBRARIANS: the books, the fame, the fortune… What more could you want? (Maybe more books.)

Mini reviews

Doctor Who: The Master collection. I have a collection (nearly complete) of all the episodes of Doctor Who that feature his arch-nemesis, the Master. As I get the DVD’s in my “Doctor Who Marathon” I will fill in the gaps with tapes that I own. Unfortunately the tapes don’t have all of the cool extras the DVDs have. Doubly unfortunately, DVDs of “Master” episodes have not been released yet. I don’t know why, it’s about as weird as the fact that Seasons 1 and 3 of Law and Order: Criminal Intent are out on DVD, but not Season 2. What’s up with that? Well, maybe when they make the DVDs of the Master episodes they will ask me to be the commentary expert. I know all there is to know about the Master.

First up is “Terror of the Autons” which is the intro to companion Jo Grant. Jo is the fluffy-brained precursor to the current fluffy-brained companion Rose Tyler. Jo and Rose are about neck and neck when it comes to whining about traveling through space and time. Though there isn’t much whining in the beginning because the Doctor is Earthbound. The Master is introduced here as well and is most memorable. I won’t get into it now since I have already written a great deal about the Master. These essays under the umbrella title of “The Master Plan” will be available to read from my website soon.

“Mind of Evil” is a great episode that once again pits the Master against the Doctor. But the best part is at the very end when the Master realizes that he cannot control the forces he unleashed and the two of them work together.

This “camaraderie” (?) is continued in “Claws of Axos” where once again the Master and the Doctor need each others help to get out alive.

“Colony in Space” is Jo’s whining episode where they travel to a colonized planet in the far future to thwart the Master’s plans. My copy of this tape is very bad; I hope they come out with the DVD someday.

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LIBRARIANS: the books, the fame, the fortune… What more could you want? (Maybe more books.)

Samurai Deeper Who?

I’ve just finished 6 discs, 26 episodes of Samurai Deeper Kyo, and it wasn’t too bad. The premise of two samurai souls in one body was initially interesting and held a great deal of promise. Especially since the two samurai in question were mortal enemies.

But then the show got weird… First they said that Hideyoshi Ieysu (sp?) was a demon controlled by other demons. Then they say that Nobunaga was a “Demon King.” Egads!!! Nobunaga?? A demon bent on destruction of all humans?? How can they say stuff like that?

Note: For those of you not too familiar with Japanese history, it would be like saying that Thomas Jefferson was actually an alien life form from the planet Ultron 3, where they draw their nutrients from eating human brains. And then saying that Jefferson ate the brains of all his political opponents in order to gain power and the mental capacity to control his slaves telepathically. Do you think I could get away with saying stuff like that??

But the most confusing part of SDK was when they tried (with unendurable exposition) to explain all that had been going on from the beginning and what it all means. I still don’t get it. Kyo never existed, Kyoshiro is a nasty bad guy (and not a funny pervert of a medicine man), and Nobunaga is the Demon King!

Well, it turns out that Kyoshiro is not all that bad; he and Kyo are just two parts of the same person. Each part having developed into a separate entity… This is all so confusing. The ending reminds me of “Trigun” or “FLCL” with its desperate attempt to bring some semblance of logic to an increasingly illogical story. This is the epitome of “Making it up as we go along.” But it was okay and it ended painlessly… as has this blog entry.

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LIBRARIANS: the books, the fame, the fortune… What more could you want? (Maybe more books.)

Firefly Disc #3 part 2

War Stories – This is one of the best episodes ever. It concentrates on the relationship of Zoe and Wash. Many people don’t understand how these two can be married, but it is obvious in this episode that they love each other very much. After an argument about who wears the pants in their relationship, Wash insists on going on a “milk-run” mission with Mal. The evil Niska captures and tortures them. This is brutal stuff but it gets out in the open how Wash feels about the “war buddy” relationship between Mal and Zoe. It is mentioned several times that a maniacal torturer/poet said that you get to know the real person when they are tortured. We got to know the real Wash and Mal in this grueling episode and they get to know each other as well.

DVD note – After watching and cringing at this episode turn on the Commentary and hear Nathan Fillion (Mal) and Alan Tudyk (Wash) banter. It is hilarious; their humor is dry but so very refreshing after such a dramatic episode.

Trash – I didn’t like Saffron in “Our Mrs. Reynolds” and I don’t like her here. At least Zoe gets a chance to punch her for knocking out Wash. Yeah Zoe! It’s basically a caper episode where part of the plan was planning for when Yo-Saf-Bridg double crosses them. In an aside, Jayne gets knocked out and is at the mercy of Simon after River tells Simon about what Jayne did on Ariel. (I tell ya! DON’T watch these episodes out of sequence!) Simon, ever the doctor, tells the paralyzed Jayne that he would never hurt him, but River tells him she could kill him with her brain. Was she joking? We’ll find out in the movie.

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LIBRARIANS: the books, the fame, the fortune… What more could you want? (Maybe more books.)