Left to my own devices

    I'm not a big fan of recent buzzwords such as "trauma" and "closure." I dunno, it just seems like they're so much pop-psycho-babble that have been used so much as to become annoying. Those words have, however, seemed appropriate for how I've been feeling the last couple of weeks. Allow me to explain. I turned 50 on December 27th. It was a great birthday -- probably my favorite -- and has left me feeling all sorts of positive emotions in its wake. One aspect of it did, however, send me on a particularly deep emotional journey, one which I've oddly found to be quite healing. Where to begin? I've been thinking about this a lot, and don't really know the best way to frame it, or how to begin describing it, so... here we go.   

February 9th, 1985 was a Saturday. I know this because it was a special day in my life, and much of it has remained emblazoned upon my mind for decades. I also looked it up before writing this, so there's that. Why do I remember it so well? Why, I'm glad you asked. Let me tell you about it. As many friends and family know, Doctor Who has long been one of my favorite television shows. Specifically, its run from 1963 - 1989. The series was revived in 2005 and, while I've enjoyed parts of it, it just hasn't been the same as it was when I was a kid. The original show was serialized, with multi-part stories which always ended every episode (except the concluding one) on a cliffhanger. Classic Who was made on a shoestring budget, with tatty special effects, dodgy costumes, and sets that wobbled so much at times you wondered if they might fall down. And I loved it. The stories were engaging, and the circumstances of its production allowed one to use their imagination to fill...

A long time ago, back when I was in grade school, I wrote a story. It was an assignment, probably in Mrs. Sims’s second or third grade class (I had her as a teacher for both years, and the memory is a little foggy on the exact date when the story was written).  Regardless, we're talking 1982 or 1983. Bar and His Car was a simple tale, about a man named Bar, and his automobile. It was a short tome, probably no more than 5 pages, complete with some pencil drawings by yours truly, to illustrate the title character and his mode of transport. The story ended up getting bound for some reason — it was in a deep blue cloth with white circles to break-up the monotony — and ended up in one of the revolving bookcases at our elementary school library. It was, for a time, a source of pride. On every occasion when our class would visit the library, I’d touch the book, caressing its soft cloth cover and think, ‘I wrote this.’

When I was a kid, I once spent an afternoon reading a book under an umbrella, alongside a pond. It was a slim volume, An Unearthly Child , a novelization of the very first Doctor Who story. The author was Terrance Dicks. The surroundings were lush and green. The pond was still. It made for a pleasant afternoon. Mom and I had traveled to visit an old college friend of hers. I forget where we went exactly, or who the friend was. What sticks in the memory is that she lived in a house by a pond. As the two adults began to talk in earnest, catching-up on life and what not, I had no desire to listen to them talk. The book mom had recently purchased for me was calling my name. A huge fan of the Doctor Who  television program, I'd never seen the original first few episodes, and this book was the closest I had to experiencing it. Soon, I voiced my desire to exit the presence of the adults. Mom's friend was very nice. She suggested the pond area as a reading ground. It struc...

It isn't a giant leap of a statement to say that we're shaped very much by our childhood. Our parents and home life play a major role in development, along with friendships and, for most, pop culture. This includes TV viewing and, growing up during the 1980s, my television habits included  a lot of comedies, some drama (it was the era of nighttime soaps, after all) and, most notably, science-fiction & fantasy shows. Of all of the programs I have enjoyed over the years, it is the latter that has been most prominent in shaping my entertainment outlook. To this day, I'll take a sci-fi/action thriller over a romantic comedy. Given that my favorite television shows are often science fiction & fantasy, what, then are my favorite programs of said genre? Which ones stood-out as the best of the best over the years? I'm glad you asked, dear reader, because following is a break-down of my Top 10 favorite ones (in alphabetical order). Let's get to it.

I have a little joke with myself that goes something like this: Q: When are a TV show's ratings in trouble? A: When the fan updating its Wikipedia page uses both live + time-shifted numbers for its viewership numbers. That may be a somewhat obtuse private joke, so allow me to explain. First, television ratings are handled by a company called Nielsen. Many of us have, at one time or another, been part of "Nielsen families," wherein our household television viewing habits were monitored for a period of time. Next, "live" ratings are those based upon who watched the program at the time that it originally aired. "Time shift" viewings are those officially counted on stuff like DVR and iTunes, within a reasonable period of time after the original airing. Finally, "rating" is a bit of a dinosaur term these days, as Nielsen pretty much reports a show's viewership these days, and not its actual rating, which is a different nu...

Earlier this year, Doctor Who Magazine had a ranking of all twelve Doctor Whos. Unsurprisingly, 6th Doctor Colin Baker came in last. I've met Colin Baker, some thirty years ago when he and then-producer John Nathan-Turner came to Champaign for a Doctor Who convention, and I can say that he's a very warm, pleasant man. His Doctor, however, sucks. Hammy, shouty, dressed like a clown, the character just doesn't work. Alas, Colin Baker is only human, and felt wounded at his Doctor being ranked last, taking it somewhat personally. I feel for the man on a certain level, but can't say that I disagree with the rankings. In fact, seeing as how Doctor Who is my favorite television show of all-time (mostly due to the 1963-1989 run), I thought it only proper that I provide my own, definitive rankings. Fair warning: What you are about to read is truth. Here we go:

10 years ago today saw the revival of my favorite television show of all-time. Doctor Who has been a part of my life since, well.... since I was in short pants. A staple of PBS viewing, I watched it seven times a week (Monday through Friday at 10pm, and on Saturdays at 6:00pm and 6:30pm). There was a Doctor Who convention here in Champaign, in February 1985, where Sixth Doctor Colin Baker came to town. Charming man. After 26 years on the air, Doctor Who was cancelled in 1989 after waning quality and audience numbers. An American-made TV movie in 1996 did nothing to revive the program, and it looked like Doctor Who was gone for good, relegated to reruns, DVDs, books and the occasional radio show featuring the old actors trotted-out to re-create their roles.

As many of you know, my favorite television show of all-time is Doctor Who . A British program centered around the titular character who travels in time and space via his time machine known as the TARDIS, the show has been on the air, on and off, since 1963. I became a fan of Doctor Who during the early 1980s, when the local PBS station aired it Monday-Friday at 10pm, and on Saturdays at 6:00pm and 6:30pm. I stumbled upon it by accident one night, as I laid in bed and mom stood there, changing the channels on the little black & white TV in my bedroom, until something looked interesting. I saw a man with curly hair tripping over a long scarf, and the rest is history. I thought it would be fun to pick my 10 favorite Doctor Who stories, spanning 1963-2013. Probably should have done this in November of last year, when it was the show's 50th anniversary, but I didn't, so oh well. Without further delay, here, then, are my favorite Doctor Who stories, in chronologic...

This past weekend I watched both the new Star Trek movie, and the Season 7 finale of the new Doctor Who program. I enjoyed both, but had some issues with them that won't seem to go away. Therefore, I'm going to ponder said issues here on the blog. Obviously, if you haven't seen either production yet, and plan to do so, now would probably be a good time to stop reading.

The first five episodes of Doctor Who 's Series 7 are airing this month worldwide. In much of the press for the new season, the creative forces behind the program haven't been shy about wanting to tell us how "cinematic" and "epic" the new episodes are/will be. Anyone with half-a-mind not to trust everything that is told them tend to yawn in reaction to such hype, yet I find the whole 'it's like a movie!' trend in television to be a curious thing.

So, it's been a bit of a bumpy ride for Steven Moffat since he took the reigns as showrunner of Doctor Who . A lot of folks have complained that his vision of the show is too dark, too fairytale-like and --- mostly with this season --- too difficult to follow. A blogger/fan contemplates some of the problems here : Cheques are being written that currently can’t be cashed. It’s not going unnoticed; we’re staring right at it. Unfortunately for the production team, a glance to one side isn’t going to wipe it from our minds