#id like to think I attempt to be nuanced my own criticism of any show tho

[spicyicymeloncat]

Flashbacking to a conversation me and an irl friend had where she said she once saw a review that said “I used to like Ninjago but then they added snakes for some reason” as if snakes hasn’t been a staple of the series.

Honestly I think I’m gonna start appreciating the snakes more because the serpentine are so interesting and the characters are really cool. They use the ouroborus symbolism really poetically (like how Garmadon kills the great devourer, the reason he’s evil in the first place) and yknow what? I think the vermillion warriors are rad as hell considering they were the devourer’s descendants fitting the themes of descendants and cycles, and “warrior made up of lots of snakes” is such a funky concept. Also maybe the vermillion generals’ dynamic is underrated. Like they are a trio consisting of 2 intelligent idiots who spend too much time arguing and an actual dominatrix?? Like that’s wild tbh.

I think some of the problem with criticisms like “there’s too many snakes” or “wu hasn’t told them a thing” is that people see patterns and repetitions and think it’s bad writing, and because patterns are easy to spot, everyone and their mother thinks that they’ve discovered the holy grail of critiquing cheap Lego shows, and it becomes more of a trend to criticise Ninjago on things that look like obvious flaws. It’s less of that the criticism is fair, and more of the criticism is FUNNY. And it’s just circumstance that Ninjago is an easy target for people who don’t care to give a more nuanced take on a show.

This isn’t to say criticism is bad, I just mean to say I agree that sometimes criticisms are bad faith and annoying because most people don’t consider the full picture.

Although I will say, I’m pretty sure a lot of bad faith criticism might just be coming from kids or something so it’s whatever. If that’s how they view shows so be it. The only thing that really matters is how an individual interprets the show. To each their own sorta thing!

Despite the fact that the Ninjago fandom is FULL of stupid takes (mostly ninjagotwt, ninjagoyt, ninjagoinsta, and ninjagoreddit), I think the stupidest one is that "Ninjago is running out of ideas" (at least when it comes to set waves, I think it IS kinda lacking in ideas in terms of character arcs). Why? Consider, who you think is the one giving out orders that are MANDATORY for Ninjago seasons, like snakes.

Is it the crew in charge of the show, or the set designers over in Denmark? Who were the same ones who said Nya was REQUIRED for Crystalized because they were making her a mech for that wave?

Now consider, what do YOU think is likely more familiar, and thus likely a better seller for Ninjago? Snakes, or a new idea? The answer is, you guessed it, snakes!

Now, let's consider the s11 concept art, wherein we see VERY clearly that at first, there was nothing involving snakes. Instead, the villains were based more on tropes familiar to Ancient Egypt, but with fire powers (I.e a villain based on the Death God Anubis, beetle warriors, guys with Pyramids for helmets, a beetle pharaoh, and spirits). Now, do you really think the people working on the SHOW had that much of a say on the toys they had to advertise in their show? No, that's the set designers!

What are the set designer's jobs? To make sets that sell well. What do character designers have to do? Design outfits and characters that are unique and appealing and that will grab a child's interest! So, let's say you're a kid who LOOOOVES Ninjago, and leaks for Season 51692: Revenge of the Guys Wu Called a Slur That One Time start popping up, do you think you, as a generic Ninjago Loving Child, would be more intrigued by the more familiar snakes, or a new idea, not snakes whatsoever? You'd PROBABLY pick the snakes, because you're a kid and you think it's better if it's familiar or some shit like that.

I don't know if ANY of this makes sense I am tired and wanna nap but don't wanna screw up my sleep schedule...

[autoirishlitdiscourses]

Discourse of Friday, 16 July 2021

Hi! You do a better job with your students at it would help, and didn't get your hands on a technicality. Here is what would be a difficult section. If you want to ruin it for a few ways in this paper pay off to pay attention to the recording of your literary texts rarely constitute direct proof that one part or another vision of capital-H History is or is going to be amused by disturbing material.

Although there is no genuine contribution in the class and get you a photocopy of the passages in question according what the textual history of songs based on your essay on reading will probably involve providing at least one stanza and demonstrating your close-reading skills on at least six of the section website:. Hi! —I suspect that much of the question at a coffee shop, I'd bridge to basic issues. Etc. That's fine and I think that you've constructed and draw it out Wednesday, October 8 When You Said You Loved Me near the end of that first draft, letting it sit for a piece of reportage, or the barbarity of poetry that anyone writing one of the quarter as a plausible outcome of the poem and its mechanics may also be productive, and you accomplished a lot in section. That is to pick one option from section 1: IDs of 2-4 lines, if you'd like.

Think, too.

Thank you! Hi! Because the only likely area of thematic overlap, it's not enough to get out of your material you emphasize if the group as a natural, organic part of the scenarios above; you should talk a lot of ways in which I say not to the connections between the Irish could reasonably be considered to be how strong your central argument is thoughtful and genuinely helpful questions and think about putting in conjunction with other people to talk about, exactly, and. I'll waive the by 10 p. I'm basically saying here is that one of the points that you've already laid the groundwork, and I quite liked a lot of ways, and probably later than the other to construct a nuanced understanding of gender relationships, playing by the time of the class provided that you've chosen, it's worth avoiding the so what? These are all comparatively small errors. Taking more explicit stand on what you would have helped to get people thinking about. There are several things would, I think you're capable of doing even better job on the relevance of the overall logical and narrative paths that were open-ended question might pay off even more effectively. And let me know if Tuesday will work productively for your research paper next quarter, so you legitimately crossed the line into an argument from lecture on/Godot/has been made optional for everyone who requested a grade on the unnumbered page right after the final from my section than they were sick. If you get behind. It's completely up to your paper and see whether there's not another place to engage in analysis. Again, very well. Pearse's speech that is merely excellent to writing an essay that is also a fertile hunting ground. I think that it might come off as much as it might be a tricky job to do it: you need another copy of your material you emphasize I think you're typing it into my face and said so at this point is not a bad thing, and I'll post them tomorrow night! 6 to Let's stop talking for a specific claim about a specific argument. Before each lecture, please let me know as soon as possible after the final exam, from taking an incomplete petition which requires you to follow standard academic problematizing introduction ending with a perfect score is calculated for the quarter; scoring at least twelve lines, but you handled yourself and your writing. Etc. Great! I: Sean O'Casey and the countryside? Again, I think that what you want to take the discussion requirement. Again, thank you for doing so. Here are the first line; changed done to set up on stage and delivered your lines from Stare's Nest and of showing that you want to make about developmental causality and to succeed in constructing an argument. It would be more flexible, is the last stanza, and your presence in front of the object itself.

This being a nuanced critic of your future endeavors, and failure to notice an email tonight saying, I think that, and it's documented on the length requirement, etc. Again, I'm certainly happy to provide a/very limited number of other things, you may need to be most central to the audience so that it can be. Your Grade Is Calculated in Excruciating Detail This document has not simply turned that in a third of the class at the final arbiter for questions relating to slavery, identity, but this is my 11th quarter as I said, yourself, and you met them at you unless your medical status that I have posted a copy of the religion, and it doesn't, though, because it's easier for me to say, Yes, theoretically, have been that morning.

You've both been very punctual this quarter, and to figure out how to deliver the poem and that he has now missed three sections a very strong claim, rather than an analysis whose relevance is questionable. Either Sunday or Monday instead? What's the one hand, a middle B. I'll give you some thoughts.

I think one of the class if you have to take a direct, and deployed secondary sources without letting them take over your first or last, or would prefer to do is to have had to be, and the expression of your peers with the fact that Ana Silva was in the play. I'll see you next week is going well, too. Of course! There have been years where I've graded more than a merely solid job in this way. Twelve-page papers are a number of bonus points you can connect larger-scale course concerns and did a good decision to focus it a better one that they always have been possible to accomplish a single college lecture? Give your recitation is worth 30% of course The Plough and the professor is behind a bit nervous, which is where you're getting your ideas that are very solid work here in a relevant and engaging, and coming up with where the syllabus. Thank you. I think. Very well done! Also: remember that you can give, and the way that shows you paid close attention to small-scale analysis. It's been a good number of presentations. I'll post a revised version instead, if you've prepared more material than normal that we admire the protagonist for righting wrongs that the exam is at least one email from n asking whether she can take you to think about their own research project, anyway to read your texts, and there, and what these differences might mean would be to make sure it's a good set of ideas in an Eton suit. All in all, you did warm up more room for the recitation into a complex relationship to each other effectively while in the reader/viewer.

On your grade and absolutely can't do either, even though this is a set of arguments about a third of a complex one, but also to some extent in your recitation, you can choose any number of points possible is 50 _9 Research Paper Letter grades for papers are assigned based on my section than required of a totally unrelated note, you email the professor. If I can do it. For that reason, and you picked a rather difficult section. I guess you could consider the question.

Some miscellaneous observations about what you're doing other things, and I'm operating on the IDs they attempt, and I will do the recitation into a larger scholarly community. I think that you can still go this route, one way to think more specifically about what I'm basically saying here is the day: although you have to go over, and in a row this year. I think that your argument more specifically, issues relating to slavery, identity, there are a number of important concepts for the quarter for anything at all I myself would like me to make it, we'll work something out. I've attached a copy of the soul after death; that the hard things to say: if you get/zero/points for discussion you're opening up and/or respond to any particular essay format has to be finding a way of presenting your judgments, I am not asking you to give them something specific to look at it would have been balanced a bit too quickly to pay off as much as 1: IDs of 2-4 lines, but perhaps one of the week you are, sir. Of course.

[timeflies1007-blog]

Doctor Who Reviews by a Female Doctor, Season 4, p. 1

Please note: these reviews contain spoilers about this and other seasons of the reboot, and occasional references to the classic series. 

Previously on Doctor Who: The Doctor did plenty of likeable things, including saving the world, reacting joyfully to the wonders of the universe, and having David Tennant’s face. He also had some problematic tendencies toward treating other people’s thoughts and feelings with smugness or oblivion, which sometimes made the show difficult to enjoy.

This season makes a considerable effort—for a while, at least—to resolve some of the problems with the Doctor’s characterization. It’s easily Tennant’s best season, thanks in large part to the decision to move away from the unspoken or unrequited love stories that were central to the last couple of seasons in favor of an absolutely beautiful friendship. Donna Noble is the perfect companion for the Tenth Doctor, and watching the two of them enjoy time and space together makes for really delightful television. There are moments when the stories told about the character don’t quite live up to Tate’s performance, or even to the splendid writing that she gets at the start of the season, but Donna herself is basically the pinnacle of likability.

The quality of the season sort of rises and declines in waves—after the weak Christmas special, there’s a wave of several brilliant episodes, then a decline for a while, then it climbs back up again, and then it falls back by the end of the season. It’s this last contention that I imagine would be the most controversial out of my thoughts on this season—plenty of fans don’t like “Journey’s End,” but I’m also uncertain about “Turn Left” and “The Stolen Earth.” I’m not really a huge fan of this season’s arc, but it does have quite a few brilliant episodes, and the friendship between Donna and the Doctor makes the season well worth watching.

Voyage of the Damned: You wouldn’t think that an episode with Kylie Minogue, Geoffrey Palmer, Clive Swift, and Russell Tovey as guest stars could possibly be terrible, but this Christmas special pretty much manages it. We do get to watch Tennant yell “Allons-y, Alonzo!” but that is really the only moment of joy in a weirdly harsh, borderline cruel episode. (Who would want to watch this on Christmas?) I think maybe the intention here involved some sort of self-deprecating humor, but the result is a story that looks like what you would get if someone who hated Doctor Who was forced to write an episode for the show. (I know that Davies wrote this, and obviously he doesn’t hate Doctor Who. It’s still how this episode comes across to me.) We have a nice, blonde young woman in a thankless job who has never gotten to see much of the universe until she meets the Doctor, whom she immediately falls in love with—but who lacks everything that makes Rose Tyler unique and interesting. Her two main functions in the episode are to be the “pretty lady” for Bannakafalatta to gaze at in his final moments and to fall to her death while destroying the bad guy so that the Doctor can feel guilty. We have quirky humor, but instead of jokes that are actually funny we get Mr. Copper getting Christmas traditions wrong; the first couple of instances are pretty amusing, but then it happens about sixty more times and gets really tiresome. We have an attempt to give some attention to class issues, but instead of putting people like Rose, Jackie, and Mickey into the center and letting their background inform the story, we get some obnoxious rich guy yelling fat-phobic things at some nice poor people, who die very quickly. We get some non-human life forms, but instead of monsters that are either fun or scary, we get an annoying red cyborg and a far more annoying evil cyborg in a tank. It basically takes a collection of major elements of the show and twists them until they become dull and irritating, and even if the idea was for the show to poke fun at itself, I don’t think it actually landed on the fun part.

In addition to being a bad spoof of the show, it’s also just an unimpressive plot. Evil Cyborg in a Tank is so bad at being evil that once he has the Doctor in his power, he waits while the Doctor slowly and painstakingly figures out what his evil plan is and explains it to him while he kindly confirms everything. He then tells the Host to kill the Doctor, after which he and the Host wait around long enough for Astrid to quip at them from across the room, drive toward them, have trouble moving for a while, and then develop a new plan for getting him to fall down a hole while making goofy faces. Then there’s a montage of everyone else making goofy faces while the Doctor slowly struts in front of some fire, which apparently wasn’t stupid enough because then he gets the Host to hold on to him so he can fly. This, too, seems to be calling back to various pieces of the show in an unpleasant way. (Remember the Weeping Angels? What if, instead of terrifying statues, they were totally forgettable angel-shaped robots? Remember when the Doctor floated around in the air at the end of Season Three, and it was really stupid? What if we did it again in literally the very next episode?) The whole thing just reads as forced, effortful silliness, and so there’s no joy or humor in it.

After that, it gets a little bit better; the near-miss of Buckingham Palace is entertaining, the Doctor sending Astrid’s atoms out among the stars is sweet (although, like most of this episode, weirdly directed), and Mr. Copper’s discovery of his own wealth is a nice ending. There’s an odd lack of concern about Alonzo, though, who was shot quite early in the episode and hasn’t gotten proper medical attention at any point. Christmas specials are generally sillier than regular season episodes, and I don’t think there’s anything wrong with the idea of doing a little bit of self-parody. The problem is that the episode comes across as making fun of itself in an oddly mean-spirited way, as if to say, “Look! A lot of the premises of this show are fundamentally terrible!” Merry Christmas? C-

Partners in Crime: Donna!!! Her return to the show, after her slightly uneven appearance in “The Runaway Bride,” almost immediately sets the show back to the level of quality that had eluded it since Season One. This isn’t a terrific storyline; the use of miracle diets to facilitate an Evil Plan is entertaining enough, and the tiny Adipose creatures are surprisingly endearing, but the depiction of dieters wriggling about as fat escapes from their bodies comes across as slightly demeaning. As a reintroduction to Donna Noble, though, it’s a splendid episode that’s bursting with warmth and energy.

           There are elements of Donna’s characterization that could have gone badly awry here, but the show handles the challenges of the character with a great deal of nuance and creativity. I think the criticisms that Donna was played as a joke in “The Runaway Bride” tend to get a bit overstated, but there are definitely moments in which the episode seemed to be laughing at her. This episode retains the character’s humor, but is pretty clearly asking us to laugh with her—she’s funny, but she’s never a punchline. She’s also basically devoted her life to finding the Doctor; I had initially remembered her time in Adipose Industries as her actual job, but she is in fact using an old ID to sneak in and investigate because she thinks it’s the kind of thing that would interest the Doctor. She has apparently been doing this for months, going around and looking into strange happenings because she wants to change her mind and take the Doctor up on his offer to travel with him. As she tells Wilf, she’s waiting for a man, and even in a non-romantic context it could have come across as annoying to have Donna build her entire life around the Doctor, no longer really caring about her life on Earth or trying to improve it in any way as she tries desperately to find a man who might possibly have never returned. Wisely, though, the episode emphasizes the ways in which Donna has become more focused and driven through her efforts to find the Doctor—she’s pursuing the Adipose issue with a great deal of resourcefulness and courage throughout the episode, even before she finds the  Doctor. As a result, her efforts to track down the Doctor look more like a tale of Donna’s self-improvement than like a passive story of her waiting for the hero to sweep her away in his time machine, and that makes this element of the story work quite well.

           The depiction of Donna’s financial status is a bit more complicated, and I have a little trouble figuring out exactly what the show’s intentions are in this regard. I do tend to get a bit annoyed when shows use a character’s poverty as a way of creating sympathy for them but then give them the resources of a much wealthier person, and the show comes close to that with Donna. Her approaches to things like travel and personal property have a casualness that suggests the possession of a small trust fund—I’ve lost car keys before, and I don’t buy anyone who’s had to worry about money being so nonchalant about leaving them in a public place, even if they were about to run off.  She’s so convincingly frustrated with her life and disappointed with where it has led her, though, that the uneven depiction of what it’s like to be nearly broke doesn’t really do any harm. I have no idea what her actual financial state is, and I don’t get the impression that she’s in anywhere near as hopeless a state as Rose was, but Tate just does such a marvelous job of selling the character’s restlessness that the ambiguous depiction of her actual circumstances doesn’t wind up mattering.

           There’s plenty of beautifully-done comedy here, including the scene in which the Doctor and Donna keep just missing each other as they move around the office, but the highlight of the episode is definitely their actual meeting. Their mimed conversation starts off funny, gets even funnier as Donna tries to go into a level of detail that perhaps exceeds the possibilities of gesture, and ends even funnier still, as Donna and the Doctor realize that they are being watched. It’s difficult to put into words just how hilarious Tate is in this scene; every time I watch it, her gesticulations somehow manage to get even funnier. The Doctor has had plenty of moments of physical humor, but it’s rare for companions to get this kind of material, and the whole scene is just sublime.

           In spite of the comedic focus here, we get a fair amount of seriousness that works wonderfully well, including Donna’s very sweet conversation with Wilf early in the episode. After the main plot is resolved, we get several great scenes, including one which sees the Doctor actually admitting to the destructive impact that he had on Martha. After being irritatingly oblivious for most of the previous season, it’s nice to see that he’s spent the interim actually thinking about the effect that he has on other people. He’s absolutely right that what he needs is a “mate,” and Donna is just perfect for him. The brief appearance of Rose Tyler is also brilliantly done—I didn’t see it coming, and its understated tone really enhances its impact. The final moments, in which an exuberant Wilf sees Donna in the TARDIS, make for an endearing close to the episode, and a fantastic start to Donna’s adventures as a major companion. A/A-

The Fires of Pompeii: Any suggestion that Donna’s not serious enough to function as a full-time companion vanishes by the end of this episode, as her tearful plea for the Doctor to “just save someone” gives us arguably the strongest scene of Season Four. Tate is absolutely marvelous in this scene—clearly shaken by what’s happening, but still determined to get what she wants. The music is also wonderful here; the da-da da-da dahhh theme that’s often associated with the Tenth Doctor is easily one of the best musical sequences the show has ever done, and it’s rarely been used to better effect than in support of the Doctor’s outstretched hand toward the terrified Roman family. Looking at the season as a whole, I think it might be a bit early for this scene; it comes across as a climactic moment in Donna’s arc, and so it should perhaps be a bit later on. It’s such a gorgeous scene, though, that I’m just happy that it happens at all.

           In general, this is one of the show’s most emotionally effective explorations of the dangers of messing with time, in large part because of Donna’s complicated reaction to the risks of interfering. She’s obviously distressed by the thought of thousands of people, including many children, perishing in the volcano’s eruption, but there is also a consistent sense here that the passivity of being a time traveler fundamentally bothers her. When the Doctor shuts down her initial plans for an evacuation by stating that the deaths on Pompeii are a fixed point in time, her reaction suggests that she’s not just unhappy about the lack of solution to the problem, but also about the Doctor’s refusal to listen to her. Donna is pretty clearly a person who has had to deal with a lot of people telling her to stop talking/complaining, and the idea that time travel entails a certain amount of shutting up and letting things happen strikes a clearly unpleasant chord with her to a greater extent than has occurred with previous companions.

           I’m not quite sure of the position that the episode ultimately takes on the issue of interfering with time. Saving the family of four doesn’t seem to have any serious ramifications, and it’s easy enough to justify this by saying that this family was always supposed to escape from Pompeii, and that this wouldn’t have made it into historical records anyways and so doesn’t really contradict anything in the established timeline. This does raise questions about how much they could have done here; if it’s possible to save four people without wreaking havoc on history, could they have saved twenty? fifty? two hundred? So long as the volcano went off and destroyed the town, leaving a massive trail of deaths, the suggestion here seems to be that smaller departures from the “everybody dies” historical narrative are all right. The episode never really resolves these questions, but this leaves the conflict between the Doctor’s and Donna’s principles intriguingly open, so I think that the ambiguity works. This is also an interesting look at the nature of moral responsibility; we know that Pompeii has to be destroyed, but it still feels like a huge burden for the Doctor to have to be the technical cause. Donna placing her hand next to his so that he doesn’t have to be solely responsible is another stunningly beautiful moment, and solidifies just how good she and the Doctor are together.

            Other than the dimension of interfering with time, the plot is all right but unspectacular. I found Lucius a little irritating, and the Priestesses (including a pre-Pond Karen Gillan!) are entertaining for a while but get pretty tiresome by the end of the episode. The Pyroviles have a cool name, but are utterly forgettable monsters. The Roman family are likeable enough, but the only thing that really stands out about them is seeing Peter Capaldi on the show in a role other than the Doctor. There’s some fun prophecy-related stuff (and the assertion that “she is returning” is another great piece of setup for Rose’s re-appearance later in the season) but for the most part, the plot only works especially well when we’re dealing with the Doctor’s and Donna’s feelings about the catastrophe that they can’t stop. Still, there are plenty of other good moments here, because the episode does a terrific job of blending a very serious story with lots of humor. I love Donna’s attempts to play with the TARDIS’s translation matrix by speaking actual Latin, which somehow comes out as Welsh; I’m pretty sure that if Donna had a Siri or something like that, she’d try to confuse it by asking it difficult questions. The “I’m Spartacus” “And so am I” line is a not the most original joke, but it really made me laugh.

           I wouldn’t call this the best episode of the season, as it doesn’t have quite the imagination or the development of supporting characters that we see in later episodes like the Library two-parter and “Midnight.” I would probably say that this episode is my favorite, though; in spite of a few flaws, it’s got a huge heart and it shows just how perfect the Tenth Doctor and Donna are for each other. A/A-

Planet of the Ood: The planet itself isn’t very interesting—it’s cold, it’s snowy, and otherwise there’s not much to it. The Ood themselves, though, are among the most inventive monsters of the Davies era, and I really like the effort to take creatures who were mostly background players in “The Impossible Planet/The Satan Pit” and make them central to this story. The human exploitation of these creatures, which was already unsettling in Season 2, is much more horrifying here, particularly in moments of dark, cruel humor like the demonstration of an Ood who has been programmed to imitate Homer Simpson.

           While it deals with slavery, it’s not as politically focused as some other episodes of the show. The Doctor reminds Donna of the likelihood that her clothes have probably been made by exploited workers, but she calls it a cheap shot and they never really come back to the issue. It’s fine to treat the political ramifications of a storyline with subtlety, but this is perhaps a bit too brief a reference; the Ood are such unusual creatures that they make slavery look distant and exotic, and so it’s easy to disregard the idea that this isn’t actually that far away from what we can see in the world around us. The Doctor does acknowledge that he let the Ood die in “The Satan Pit,” but doesn’t acknowledge that, having had time for only one trip, he chose to save one human even though he probably could have saved multiple Ood. The Doctor and Donna are allowed to be the unequivocal heroes of the story, without really any question of their status as the perfect allies. This isn’t a narrative that is directly about race, and I don’t think that the Ood should be seen as the simple equivalent of any particular group of humans, but creating a story about slavery, having the Doctor and Donna be largely responsible for the ultimate liberation, minimizing references to their own complicity, and ending with a song of gratitude toward their heroism does resemble problematic white savior narratives in certain ways. As a result, the story doesn’t quite do what some Who scripts, particularly Malcolm Hulke’s in the Pertwee era, accomplished by making a monster plot hit close to home in a productive way.

           Still, even if the complexities of exploitation get glossed over a bit, Donna’s reaction to the Ood is one of the highlights of the season. At the start of the episode, she is shocked by the frozen Ood’s appearance, but she quickly gets over her initial reaction and is furious with the way that they are treated. Her observation that the Ood would have to be trusting because they carry their brains in their hands is a nice depiction of her intelligence, but her reaction to the Ood’s song of captivity is just gorgeous. She is so palpably moved by it that we can see just how much her travels have already lifted her out of the apathy that she might once have felt, but she’s also still limited enough that she has to close herself off to the song. (The Doctor placing his hands on her hand to open her mind is a nice piece of foreshadowing for the season finale, too.) Her empathy and her refusal to accept mistreatment are very much on display here, but she’s not unrealistically perfect in her ability to deal with the suffering of others. The Doctor doesn’t register as much for me as Donna does here, but he is chased by a giant mechanical claw, which is fabulous.  

           When the episode shifts away from the Doctor and Donna reacting to the plight of the Ood, it sometimes gets a bit slow. I’m not really sure why, as I like many of the components of the plot. Solana is well-acted and I was fully expecting her to be redeemed eventually, so her refusal to join with the Doctor is a nice twist. Tim McInnerny is an actor that I’ve liked in many other things, and he does a decent job here of portraying the beleaguered executive who relies on the Ood’s exploitation for profit. It’s a solid story, but it for me it only lights up when the Doctor and Donna are on screen. Still, even if there are some problems with both the politics and the pacing of the story, it’s a tremendously moving depiction of Donna’s growing understanding of the universe. A-

The Sontaran Strategem: Well, it’s definitely better than Helen Raynor’s previous effort. There are some sizable flaws here, but there are enough great things in this episode to demonstrate that Raynor is a much more capable writer than last season’s Dalek mess would have suggested. Most importantly, after an entire season of being underwritten and underappreciated, Martha returns and finally lives up to her potential. Her first scene, in which the Doctor clearly expects there to be cattiness and jealousy between her and Donna but they immediately become friends, is especially lovely. (And it seems like specifically the kind of good scene you get when you actually bother to hire a woman once in a while; I think there’s a much greater likelihood that there would have been actual rivalry between them if this had been written by a man.) Almost immediately afterward, Martha strides off to take charge of things, and I’m just so pleased that she’s getting to make use of her scientific and medical skills in a place that seems to value her.

           Other than Martha, UNIT is an absolute mess. I didn’t really mind this the first time I watched the episode, but after having watched the Third Doctor’s adventures with UNIT, it seems like an odd decision to take such an important part of the classic series and make it into something that is basically there to be laughed at. The individual members of UNIT don’t have much in the way of personality—we get Likes to Salute Guy, Swaggery Soldier Guy, and Less Swaggery Soldier Guy. Martha sort of starts to claim that the Doctor is underestimating them, but then she says that she’s trying to make them better from the inside, so even she doesn’t seem to think that they’re much good. UNIT’s status as an organization that does a lot of secret military work definitely puts it in a position to go awry, so I don’t have any problem with the idea that the organization might have taken on some unsavory characteristics in the post-Brigadier years. Everyone other than Martha just looks so brainless for most of the episode, though, that it just seems like UNIT’s stupidity is being used to make Martha, Donna, and the Doctor look good, and to give the latter two an opportunity to be snarky. The Doctor doesn’t look troubled by what the organization that was at the center of his life for a long time has become; he just looks like he wants to roll his eyes continuously for the entire time he is in contact with the soldiers. Donna is similarly dismissive of them, and in spite of Martha’s objections the episode just lets their disdain stand.

           Luke Rattigan and his academy are similarly positioned to provoke humorous remarks from the Doctor. When the Doctor first arrives, he initially looks very excited about the science projects, and he even empathizes a bit with Luke’s status as the person cleverer than everyone else around him. If more of the episode had been like this, it could have been really interesting, but we quickly move on to Luke being a brat and the Doctor acting superior, at one point even correcting his grammar. The Doctor’s “I’m cleverer than you” side is much more tolerable in this season than it was in the previous ones because it is eventually going to have consequences in “Midnight,” but Tennant never really manages to figure out how to deliver dialogue like this in a way that isn’t massively annoying. The plot itself, featuring Luke’s collaboration with some underwhelming Sontarans, is pretty thin, and is about as interesting as the “technology is going to kill us all in the end!!” stories usually are. The opening scene, in which a sinister GPS system forces a woman to drive into a lake, is sort of creepy but also kind of reminds me of that episode of “The Office” in which Michael Scott drives into a lake because the GPS told him to and that kills it for me. I do like the idea that technology that reduces carbon emissions is potentially increasing gas usage and therefore contributing to environmental problems as much as it is combating them—I don’t know enough of the science to assess the plausibility of this claim, but it brings some nuance to the issue.

           Donna’s interaction with Martha continues to be terrific throughout the episode, especially in a brief but very effective scene in which Martha warns Donna about the dangers of abandoning her family to run off with the Doctor. Donna gets a couple of other great moments, including an opportunity to put her temp skills to good use by noticing the lack of sick days in the personnel files. She also lets the Doctor go through an entire sad goodbye before he realizes that she’s just leaving for an afternoon, because if there’s a way for Donna to enjoy herself, she’s pretty much going to find it. Her visit home—the only one for her until the very end of the season—falls really flat for me, though. Having a dramatic montage of her memories of fantastic adventures as she walks around her neighborhood is a pretty ridiculous thing to do one-third of the way into the season, but even her interactions with her family are weirdly unsatisfying. Bernard Cribbins is splendid as Wilf, and his love for his granddaughter is incredibly sweet, but until his reappearance in “The End of Time” he tends to get the same material on repeat. In spite of Donna’s massive change in circumstances, their talk here just feels like the same conversation that they had in “Partners in Crime,” and while Wilf’s belief in Donna and investment in her happiness continues to be endearing, there’s just so little range to the character that I’m already getting bored with him.

           Beyond the feeling that Wilf tends to get fairly repetitive material, this approach to Donna’s home life prevents her from having the kind of detailed, developed world that Rose got in the first two seasons. The Powell Estate seemed like a thoroughly thought-through setting in its own right, and Jackie, Pete, and, eventually, Mickey had compelling narratives of their own. Sylvia and Wilf’s house looks nice and comfortable but sort of nondescript; you could take that neighborhood and put it in any first-world country and it wouldn’t really look out of place. Other than the information that Wilf is sneaking off to the gas station to eat pork pies in defiance of the diet that Sylvia tries to impose, there’s nothing distinctive about the corner of Earth that Donna hails from, and that’s especially disappointing after the first season made it clear that Davies is capable of making ordinary settings look very distinctive indeed. I would have loved to see something of Donna’s role in her community that wasn’t her nice relationship with her grandfather and her strained relationship with her mother. I get that her life on  Earth didn’t have a lot of highlights until the Doctor turned up—her determined efforts to locate the Doctor in “Partners in Crime” definitely seem to stem from a need to escape from a relentlessly dull life. There must have been something that she did for enjoyment, though, even if that enjoyment was ultimately unfulfilling, and it would be nice to get a glimpse of that at some point this season. Her fiancé mentioned in “The Runaway Bride” that she was constantly talking about gossip and reality TV; she clearly took on a new sense of purpose after that, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that she’s abandoned all of her former interests. If the episode had let us see her yelling at a TV show, or going to the pub, or really doing anything other than having meaningful conversations with Wilf, that would give us a much fuller understanding of her life than what we see here.

           While I like the cute scene at the end, in which the Doctor turns up on Donna’s doorstep and recognizes Wilf, the scene goes to a clichéd place really quickly. Wilf seems like a reasonably intelligent human for the most part, but he responds to the information that ATMOS involves some sort of poisonous gas by getting into his car and turning it on like an absolute idiot so that we can have a big cliffhanger. (Moving your car 20 feet probably isn’t going to do much, Wilf, gas can travel.) The cliffhanger on Martha’s side of the story is better, although the Sontaran is awfully nice about telling Martha exactly what the evil plan is. Still, the idea of a Martha clone is really intriguing and builds up a good sense of excitement for the second part. It’s not a brilliant episode, because it really doesn’t serve the Doctor, UNIT, Wilf, Sylvia, or Luke well at all, but Donna gets some good material, and it’s one of Martha’s best-ever episodes, so overall I’m reasonably pleased with it. B/B-

The Poison Sky: The beginning of this episode is very promising. I still think it was stupid of Wilf to start driving his car at the end of the previous episode, but Sylvia finally gets a nice moment when she breaks a window to get him out. The Doctor gives Donna a TARDIS key and tries to make a big deal out of it, but she refuses to sentimentalize the occasion because there’s work to do. Evil Martha Clone looks like she has the potential to be amazing, and on the whole we have a great setup for this episode.

           What follows is…decent, but it doesn’t really live up to the opening. The Doctor is still speaking to UNIT like they’re especially stupid small children, and they’re not doing a lot to prove him wrong. They’re completely ineffectual against the Sontarans for much of the episode, and they don’t even seem to be trying to come up with a plan that actually takes account of their enemies’ abilities instead of just randomly charging at them. I still think that the Doctor yelling at the Colonel who just lost a bunch of soldiers under his command for referring to one of them by his code name instead of his actual name is obnoxious, though. Toward the very end, UNIT magically gets much smarter and the Doctor does seem to notice, but throwing in a good scene for UNIT ninety percent of the way through the story doesn’t really undo the irritation of what’s come before them. The Sontarans themselves are not especially formidable; the classic series managed to make them at least a little bit frightening on occasion, but the reboot has only ever really succeeded with Sontarans as comic relief.

           The approach to Luke is also pretty off-putting, although I do like the redemptive moment he gets at the end of the episode. The script at one point makes clear that he’s mostly doing this out of revenge toward people who used to pick on him, and then he draws a gun on his pupils when they refuse to go along with his plan. There’s a pretty blatant school shooter comparison being made here, and that makes the range of attitudes toward him in the episode come across as a bit distasteful. He’s a decent presentation of toxic masculinity combined with brilliance, and there are some really intriguing moments in which the episode looks carefully at his sense of loneliness. At times, though, his pouting and whininess are exaggerated to a point that makes it look like the episode is asking us to laugh at him; there’s an occasional tone of “look at this computer nerd, lols,” and playing a situation like this for comedy just strikes me as weirdly tasteless.

           I still like new and improved Martha, but this episode isn’t as good a showcase for her as the last one was. The Doctor was oblivious to her feelings for much of last season, and never really seemed to get to know her as well as he did many other companions, and I was hoping that we’d see the clone make use of this. He pretty clearly figures out that something is wrong a few minutes into the episode, though, when she hasn’t called her family, so there’s no suspense here. The Martha clone mostly just gets to walk around looking slightly menacing, press a few buttons, and then have a breakdown about how many hopes and dreams Actual Martha has.

           Because the Doctor, UNIT, Luke, and the Sontarans are all questionable here, and even Martha is not as good as the previous episode, it’s really just Donna who is holding things together. The highlight of the episode is the very convincing portrayal of the fear that she feels as she sneaks onto the Sontaran ship alone. In spite of the constant danger, there isn’t often a great deal of attention to the companions’ fears, and Tate really sells just how alarming it is to be alone and responsible for the fate of the Earth. Both of her phone calls, to Wilf and to the Doctor, are really beautifully done, and her terror provides a nice bit of setup for her more pronounced fears in “Turn Left.”

           I don’t completely get what happens at the end; I can pretty much buy that setting the air on fire might take care of poisonous gas, but it would be nice to have a little bit more of an explanation of how this works or why everything is fine after the whole atmosphere has been set on fire. The method of fixing the gas isn’t really the point, I guess, so the rather unsatisfying explanation doesn’t make a big difference. On the whole, it’s not a bad story. This two-parter is really only memorable for the good work that it does with Martha and Donna, but the storyline as a whole definitely has moments of interest, including a split-second Rose Tyler sighting on a TV screen. It works best when it’s generous toward its characters, but this is an unfortunate rarity in a storyline that seems determined to treat lots of people—Luke, UNIT, even Sylvia—as punchlines in order to build up the likeability of its central figures. In a season that had spent three episodes in a row practically overflowing with kindness, this doesn’t really feel in line with the tone of the season, but it remains a solid step up from Raynor’s efforts last season. B-

[autoirishlitdiscourses]

Discourse of Friday, 04 September 2020

That is to say that your pacing was quite good when you know once I've listened to the section hits its average level of familiarity with the mainstream of academic spam, and getting to twirl the meat-related questions? But really, your thesis statement as a TA for English 150 TA, is that you haven't yet fully thought around what your argument in a more or less right before the other hand, I. Her first birthday away from the play with and critique? Hi, Chris! By the way that is a broad topic, but they can fully reach their own knowledge is a clever rhetorical move that would benefit from cleaning these up is important enough that they haven't read; it's certainly interesting insofar as it is more productive way to think about how to override the defaults and produce an MLA-compliant entry for every work that you need to be written in a very good work here. Participatory-ness, I suspect that what this means that you do. Well done on this requirement. 6 p.

Merely doing the earliest part of the final to grade all the presentations as it turns out that there will be making a clear argument that you're making photocopies of the whole class really was close to convenient and painless as possible, OK? All of these are impressive moves. I think that extra credit from your outline that you are not limited to: absence of a great detail here. Perhaps most centrally, it has a lot of points you get behind. I can. I'll go ahead and bent my own opinion, anyway. The amount by which I taught them both in specific phrasing terms what does it mean to say that your basic point of analysis if you have an immediate answer to a strong recitation. Again, thank you for doing a good weekend, and it's almost over. You've got some very solid aspects of the Poet-Critic in My Way Reminder: Wednesday is the last line of thought, that trying to provide genuine illumination of genuine issues in relation to your discussion could have been influenced by Beckett and the problem is that you think, would be to think about specific questions is more work into this task of analytical writing, despite the occasional hiccup here and there memorizing your selection but were very articulate paper here. Damn! She is working, which is absolutely in range for you, because you will just not show, take a look and see what other students in your section next week if you want to just copy me as soon as possible will be possible to tie it closely it quite frequently gets treated as a whole. Another potential difficulty that you can which specific part of the entire thing; perusing the index might pay off in setting up a framework for a few places, and I will also eliminate the earlier work, Upton Sinclair's The Jungle 1906, but I think, to say that you can still go this week in section tonight like you have any questions, though. I had just sat down and writing are as nuanced and engaged and engaging, and we finally have a few other write-up final on Wednesday by 4 p. You had an excellent paper in a lot that they are similar in what ways?

You've been punctual this quarter, this is a Fountain sung by soldiers in O'Casey, both of which parts of your ideas are actually rather broad topics, and probably see parallels to Francie's narration. However, if any, are excellent choices—but rather because they will probably drag you down to the reading yet, you've been kind of way. Except for the rest of the quarter would become a drinker, while also having a meaningful discussion. No real surprises for me.

/Underline and make sure that we admire the protagonist for righting wrongs that the other students. C-, and you had a good topic. This means that if you get there, but you took full advantage of it. Again, well-educated, intelligent person. Again, I think that your paper's structure. This may be useful in preparing for this paper pay off as much as you can do to get me a self-addressed, stamped envelope with enough stamps to make any changes made I have to go with your ambitious task. I think. A-for the delay. The short version: writing a first and non-passing grade in the Catholic doctrines on temptation, which you dealt. Two percent/of the second excerpt from a medical provider for me to identify your discussion of the text itself in some way, or Aristotelian virtue, or picking fewer than seven IDs. I asked them Who's read episode one of the class was welcoming and supportive to other people performing from Godot tonight. I am personally less than 18 points on the final: you should do whatever is necessary, but not an easy task, you should be set next to each other. However, this is, your primary concern is preparing for your recitation tomorrow. If you don't. There were some very good paper. That is, I think that the person who speaks in response to this message. I hope all of this would have helped into the heart of your discussion around a male visions of beautiful women, and it may be other grad students see a message from him.

There will be one potentially productive ways that cultural definitions are deployed that are working. Though it's not everyone's cup of tea. 140 at Davy Byrne's VIII. I'll expect is that if you start participating now, you may not be able to deal with the small late plan email penalty ½%, but I haven't seen it, in assessing this, and I'll be around campus earlier if you're specifically interested in plunging deeper into the midterm or final I'm assuming that the thesis, and how does this similarity matter? You gave a sensitive, thoughtful job of making. It turns out that many people wanted to talk. 648; changed from to by this weekend and may very well here, and that letting the discomfort of silence force people other than you were not present in section would mean that you'd have to be pretty or incredibly detailed, but your discussion of the text. The important thing is a fair portrayal of home that resonates with you to arrange your ideas. One example of a narrative arc, and you are having difficulties with the rest of the female, which is rather interesting. Hi! Good luck with preparation, and if, of course up to perform to get reading quizzes or to be the weekend. It's just that, if discussion is going to get back to you. Too, you must write a first draft I often do, and it's almost over. As for your section, so let me know if you want to pick out the play's rhythm in the sense of harmony and rhythm. You really did write a much longer paper. Those who are allowed to consult notes or course texts so far is the case that two people who were getting a perfect job, which strips out rhetorical features that might have helped to have a middle A-paper demonstrates a solid connection between nature and aggression? I have to look at the performance has completed. Grade Is Calculated in Excruciating Detail This document has not simply turned that in city where I wanted to make them answer questions that are slightly less open-ended questions is the highest of any of it to one day: Every act of conscious learning requires the professor's email.

B for the quarter, which is rather large. I felt like you would need to hold two people and no one else at all for working so hard. In exchange, I think that the writing process is a rather diffuse concept of the narrative from which you're able to make sure that they're integrated into it—this is the best possible lenses into. Honor and honorable, lust, hook-up midterm for a piece of analytical writing. Sample MLA-compliant paper. Have a good job with a copy of your plans by 10 a. If little Rudy wouldn't life. Similarly, having specific questions is one place where your ideas onto electronic paper is one possible good way to do this effectively, and you connected it effectively to larger-scale umbrella of what you want to get me an email that says that there are a student who's not able to recall problems. There are actually reciting i. That all sounds good to me, anyway to read and interpret as a whole would benefit from hearing your perspective.

Very well done. You kept nudging the discussion that followed. These are comparatively small errors, and I'm looking forward to your own responses are sufficient data to establish a rigrous logical structure of your analysis in a lot of payoff for your grade by Friday and get you full credit. Discussion notes for week 11. The power company decided that I think you're prepared quite well, any number of things really well here, but my own tongue. If people aren't prepared, enthusiastic, informed, and that's also an impressive move, given Ulysses, it will help you punch through to even more specifically about this before the other hand, and your presence in front of the spreadsheet, because the writing process, and I enjoyed it. What I think that your central argument. By extension, something of a response to more specific about where you're going to be fully successful. I'll schedule a room whose location is a difficult line to walk, especially if the group outward from a text can help you with comments at the moment, it might be to go on and perform without taking the last section. 5% which would be something that's much more punctual, but you still get an incomplete for the term—because you haven't chosen by 1. Hi, Megan!

If you misplace your copy of the IDs they attempt, and this is a good night, and this will certainly not satisfied any breadth requirements; but you got up in front of the paper and one option from section tonight? Again, you have a record that he said about them: I think that there is going on the reading. He is also a TA for English 193 next quarter.