I promise not to talk about Macs again until I can order my iMac. Cross my heart. But Apple announced the next version of OSX, Tiger, will be available on April 29 today, and put online a whole bunch of new pages and movies about it.

The Dashboard looks particularly sweet. And best of all — all these snazzy effects will work on my new iMac! Because, it’ll be new. And shiny. I saw one in Myer yesterday and it was just beautiful…

OK. That’s it. No more.

… Oh, the watery ripples as the widgets drop into place. I’ll just be doing that for two days …

Ahem.

If there’s a book equivalent of DVDs, it’s these awesome Shakespeare books. And I don’t mean those lame, large-format blue ones we had at school. I’m talking the ‘Arden Shakespeare’ series. My copy of King Lear has 22 illustrations, a 151 page introduction, at least half a page of explanatory footnotes per page, marks showing where a piece of script was only present in the Folio or Quarto editions, two appendices, and an index.

Absolutely PACKED with extras, basically. The play’s not bad so far, either, although it’s pretty damn long. I reckon I could read the whole of Macbeth in the time it took me to read the first act. I was always put off by the stupid-seeming beginning, where Lear splits his kingdom into three to give to his sisters. But things have only improved since then.

In this age of remakes, I’m surprised that Romeo + Juliet was the only modernised version of a Shakespeare play done recently. By which I mean, keeping the language intact. Not that I scoff on 10 Things I Hate About You, but I quite like listening to the old-fashioned dialogue in a modern context. Damn, Romeo + Juliet was cool.

A wise writer by the name of Raymond Chandler once talked of detectives in fiction.

… down these mean streets a man must go who is not himself mean, who is neither tarnished or afraid… He is the hero, he is everything. He must be a complete man and a common man and yet an unusual man. He must be, to use a rather weathered phrase, a man of honor, by instinct, by inevitability, without thought of it, and certainly without saying it. He must be the best man in his world and a good enough man for any world. I do not care much about his private life; he is neither a eunuch nor a satyr; I think he might seduce a duchess and I am quite sure he would not spoil a virgin; if he is a man of honor in one thing, he is that in all things. He is a relatively poor man, or he would not be a detective at all. He is a common man or he could not go among common people. He has a sense of character, or he would not know his job. He will take no man’s money dishonestly and no man’s insolence without a due and dispassionate revenge. He is a lonely man and his pride is that you will treat him as a proud man or be very sorry you ever saw him. He talks as the man of his age talks, that is, with rude wit, a lively sense of the grotesque, a disgust for sham, and a contempt for pettiness. The story is his adventure in search of a hidden truth, and it would be no adventure if it did not happen to a man fit for adventure. He has a range of awareness that startles you, but it belongs to him by right, because it belongs to the world he lives in.

If there were enough like him, I think the world would be a very safe place to live in, and yet not too dull to be worth living in.[ftn]

I’ve been wanting to mention it on Grapefruit for a while, but as you can see, it’s a shade too long to slip into the random quote section on the front page. The reason why I wanted to list it here is because while it was written about detectives, it seems to me that it applies very nicely to a lot of the ‘adventure’ style television that we seem to watch around here: Joss Whedon’s work, Lost, Stargate and especially, to my mind, Doctor Who. Back at high school, Rob Morrison would always argue to me that good guys were boring compared to the bad guys — this quote is the kind of thing I would have liked to pull out in my defence.

In ‘Rose‘, understandably, the Doctor himself didn’t get much focus. In ‘The End of the World’, he’s back with a vengeance: bluffing his way into a high-class function, flirting with walking trees, dashing through giant spinning fan blades, getting angry and vengeful, shedding a tear for the loss of his home, and providing comfort to his new friend Rose. All my reservations about Eccleston’s performance fell away in this episode — he has a new, improved insane grin, and shows a bit of the Doctor’s darker side too. The opening scene, where he shows off to Rose by pushing the TARDIS further and further into the future was particularly noteworthy: Eccleston really can be very, very funny. That we then take him completely seriously in his last scene with Cassandra is impressive. This Doctor, more than any other, seems very similar to Chandler’s idea of the perfect detective hero.

The episode itself is great fun; the Earth is finally getting destroyed, and for once, the Doctor isn’t there to save it. No, he’s here to rub shoulders with the rich and alien, and give his new companion Rose a bit of perspective. Rose has a weird time of it: meeting her ultimate ancestor, the ‘last human’ in the universe, Cassandra O’Brien. In a really nice touch, she also has a touching conversation with a plumber: “There’s still plumbers in the future?” The plot is light, but the jokes and character development are there in spades. Just when I thought the jokes were over, the Doctor started bopping along to ‘Tainted Love’.

The special effects are excellent, too. There’s some excellent aliens, though the Face of Boe was something of a disappointment. And the final destruction of the earth looks beautiful, especially with the debris bouncing off the observing space station. They’re probably not actually better than last week, but when you have the effects all by themselves, with suns and space stations, things are always going to look cooler than when you tie them into the real world.

If I wasn’t completely convinced last week, I am this time. Doctor Who is back.

Footnotes

1. Raymond Chandler, “The Simple Art of Murder”, in Howard Haycraft (ed.) The Art of the Mystery Story New York: Carroll & Graf, 1983. pp 237. Originally published 1946.[ftn]
2. Woah, a proper footnote! Well, I shan’t spoil the effect with one of my normal, stupid ones, then.

Hmm… I’m not sure I understand what all this is. New technology is always a bit daunting for me.

But while I’m here: What happens if you use Uyo, Silent Prophet to make a copy of Squelch, targeting Uyo’s ability? : )

Famke Janssen will be returning for X-Men 3. This is pretty good news, on account of her insane hotness, but I’m still a bit worried. I loved the first two films, and the news that Bryan Singer would not be returning for the third was quite a shock. I liked the idea of having one, perfect comic book movie trilogy. If they’d gotten Joss Whedon in to replace him, things would be looking up, but they didn’t. He’s doing Wonder Woman, for heaven’s sake.

But at least most of the right actors are back. Hugh Jackman, Famke, Alan Cumming and Rebecca Romijn are all returning. The others are still in negotiations, but they’re not doing anything better as far as I know, so why wouldn’t they. Irritatingly, James Marsden (Cyclops) is off to be some bit part in Superman with Singer, and won’t be back. I hate recasting. Halle Berry said she’d come back if they gave Storm something to do, which is fair enough.

So will X-Men 3 be any good? It’s too early to tell, obviously. But the writer/director team now giving us Superman Returns will be sorely missed. And I prefer X-Men to Super Men any day of the week.

It feels kind of weird, sitting here comfortably, after something that I’ve been waiting for for twelve years has just, well, happened. I suppose, if I were still in Grade 6, I’d be jumping up and down in excitement. As a 23 year old who was just about to lose interest in Doctor Who, my reactions are a bit more restrained.

So, where to begin?

As it’s been a while since Doctor Who was on the telly, ‘Rose’ has to introduce the idea of the series to a whole new family audience. So, rather than trying to do the ultimate Who adventure, instead it follows a day in the life of Rose Tyler, shop assistant and all-round cutie. Of course, this day intersects with the Doctor’s attempts to save the planet from an Auton[ftn] invasion, and things get a little messy for both of them. It’s an approach that reminds me of Buffy‘s ‘The Zeppo’, and it works really well. Certainly compared to the fun, but flawed 1996 telemovie starring Paul McGann,[ftn] it makes a lot more sense.

Subsequently, the plot isn’t really up to much. The episode feels like the end of an old fashioned Doctor Who adventure, after the Doctor has:

1. Found out the Autons are attacking.
2. Attained a means of destroying them.
3. Located a key location in their plan and gone there to destroy it.

When I put it like that, I’m not at all sorry that we missed it; I presume future episodes will also be slicing out the fat of the old Who structure.

While the story isn’t deep, Rose is brilliantly introduced — which is of course, the point. Having never heard of Billie Piper before her casting, I never had the “oh my god, a popstar acting in Doctor Who” fear that others may have experienced. I did have an “oh my god, hottest companion ever” feeling though. The good news is that Billie proves herself above both of those stereotypes. ‘Rose’ would be lost without a great actor as Rose, and Billie Piper turns out to be just that. Reminding me a lot of Sarah Jane in the classic series, Rose has the perfect balance of grounding in the real world, and excitement for the Doctor’s insane world. Rose has gotten near-equal billing in the promotion for this series, which she deserves. Also, it’s probably the way it should have always been.

The Doctor’s other constant companion, of course, is the TARDIS. And it’s also perfect. The console room has been pristine white, it’s been Jules Verne style wood. An organic look was the only direction left, and they’ve done it brilliantly. There are so many cool things about the console room that I can’t be bothered working them into sentences. * The huge supporting struts. * The glowing insides of the console and time rotor. * The back of the real-world door of the TARDIS, complete with reverse ‘Police Public Call Box’ light. * The crazy gadgets incorporated into the console. Here’s hoping we get some close-ups later. * The coral-like textures. * The hatstand.

It’s wonderfully alien. It could do with some homely touches though — perhaps Rose will see to that. The outside of the time machine is the same old Blue Box. Well, except it doesn’t look so wobbly as it used to. Solid, reassuring and innocuous.

The tone of the show is interesting. At times it reminded me of the lighthearted freewheeling of Wonderfalls. There’s some ridiculous stuff happening here, which sometimes works, and sometimes doesn’t as much. There’s a scene with a wheelie bin might make you cringe, but might make you laugh out loud. There’s some of the worst Photoshop work you’ve ever seen. There’s a plastic hand changing direction in mid-air. In places, the show feels like a live-action cartoon. When I think about it, that’s not quite so different to a lot of Doctor Who either.[ftn] But when the story comes down to the wire, it has an edge, and it has danger. And this is largely due to Christopher Eccleston.

After the vanilla Paul McGann version,[ftn] Eccleston’s Doctor is a welcome shaking about of the quintessential character. Short tempered, but happy. Supremely confident when everything’s going right, but quick to panic when his plans go awry. Scornful of the human race in general, but willing to accept he’d be dead without Rose’s help. Grounded in the real world, yet still containing that trademark Time Lord arrogance. And finally, a return to the Doctor wearing clothes and not a costume. Even if this is Eccleston’s only season in the role, it’ll be a fantastic one.

‘Rose’ is a good opening story. It’s not great, but it sets things up for greatness so deftly that there’s no doubt in my mind it’s coming.

Footnotes

1. The Autons are plastic forms manipulated by the Nestene Conciousness. Depending on who you believe, the Consciousness is one of the Great Old Ones that managed to jump across the destruction of the previous universe, and emerged in ours with terrible powers. For the purposes of this episode, it’s a big blob in a vat, and so it should be.
2. Ah yes, the telemovie that opened inside the TARDIS, somewhat draining the excitement of getting in there for the first time. And confusing the hell out of casual viewers: “Nice cathedral. Now what’s that blue box bumping around that swirly thing for? I don’t get it.”
3. And yet, it was Star Trek who got a cartoon series. Odd.
4. Don’t anyone go calling Peter Davison the vanilla one.

Don’t panic. My weblog has not eaten all the other ones. I know it looks like that, but it’s only because I haven’t made a new graphic and chosen a name for this, the new group grapefruit weblog.

Everyone will be posting to this one now, and there’s categories too. Ah, I won’t go into details, in case no one uses it and it flops unspectacularly. But there’s potential here. Bear with me while things become more tightly honed — some places are a bit rough, but I felt it was better to get most of it up now.

RIP the Ninth Doctor, by the way. Gosh they go through them quickly these days.

That’s such a bad pun it’s almost not a pun. It’s mostly crap. Anyhow, two bits of news that excite me.

1. Lena Olin is returning to Alias for the season finale. Finally, we get what Jack Bristow would no doubt refer to as “closure”. And the return of the hottest older woman I’ve ever seen.
2. More multiplayer maps are coming to Halo 2! Apparently, some people are irritated because they were expecting an extension to the campaign mode, too. These people clearly don’t want to see the full scale invasion of Earth by the Covenant on the super duper next version of the Xbox. They’re the sort of sick people that would download and watch a crummy version of Doctor Who a week before it was properly available. Pah!

In the future, all the grapefruit weblogs will be combined into one, more frequently updated, weblog. Smaller posts may proliferate with interesting links. I may stop rabbiting on about Doctor Who. Posts will be placed in different categories — Politics, Sport (hah!), Gaming, etc. All the bloggers will post to this one.

In the future, more reviews will pop up!

In the future, we’ll have flying cars. And jetpacks.

If this was the future, I’d have posted a politics post concerning Tony Abbott’s long-lost son, who turns out in fact to be proof that Mr Abbott’s girlfriend of the time was cheating on him. That’ll teach him to have politically convenient live events happen to him in the middle of abortion debates.

Those areas of my brain have been quarantined as I write this post…

ER isn’t bad this season, but I must say I’m beginning to tire of it in general. I suppose any show gets to the point where you know all of their standard plots back to front. But ER can’t really suddenly move them all into a law firm. Patient comes in, family/friend acting shifty. Doctor notices, leaves it, notices again, follows up, gets to the truth. They subverted it quite nicely last night, but still.

Carter has improved greatly, but I can’t help but remember Alex Kingston’s comments about how the producers wanted all young people. There’s very few older people in the cast these days and it starts to show. And everyone’s just a little bit too good looking. Back in the day, you had good old normal-looking Dr. Green to smooth things out.

University… There’s a lot of Shakespeare to be read, and I’m the one to do it. And my Sherlock Holmes books are actually on the course, which means I might have to speed up my ‘one story a month’ system. Physics remains dull. Though Optics is slightly less dull. Again I find my brain trying to slide into good old “how much work can I avoid doing and manage to scrape through?” mode. There’s a class presentation, too, which means I need to make some friends, or at least acquaintances. Pah!

And, the Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith trailer has been released. As always, the trailer looks cool. Unlike all the other times, there was at least one good line of dialogue: “Are you threatening me, Master Jedi?” I can’t wait for that scene. This may just be because I’d like to see Windu meet a grisly end, but also because I enjoy those moments where the bad guy unveils himself. My prediction: the film won’t be great, but it’ll be better than 1 and 2 (not hard, but still). And the basic linking-up will raise it a little more, by association.

Plus, I heard C-3P0 gets a bigger role this time. Yay!