somniloquence

Hi,:)here via the 'friends' page of cesperanza's LJ

>CoE reminded me a lot of movies and books of the late '60s or early '70s. The early '70s in particular produced some of the darkest, grimmest, deepest entertainment, the likes of which we haven't seen since<
True. And a lot of that stuff was fantastic. The bleakness etc of COE didnt bother me. But then, I'm a Battlestar Galactica fan *smirk*

>..the reveal of why the 456 wanted the children ..pretty great and horrible because it's so far outside of what most of us in the western world could really see as a reason. It's mundane and horrific at the same time<
I agree!It shocked me more than the eating them/needing them to live standard approach would have.

>I don't have a lot of love for Davies. I think he's kind of a jackass. I liked him at first for the whole reboot spin he put on DW, but like a lot of people who develop this cult around their work, where they become as entwined with the stories as the characters are and too much of their personality pushes into the medium, crosses boundaries it should stay out of, he's moved from bringing a fresh sensibility to the genre into making it all about him.<

There's..an element of truth in this. RTD is in danger of ruining the big rep he's built up in tv circles if he continues down that path. But there IS a lot ot praise in COE.
The brilliant, believeable, chilling discussion at the COBRA cabinet meeting about which kind of children should be offered up.The actor playing the PM was.. frightening. Absolutely believable. The female Cabinet Minister who came up with the idea of how to select the children, scared the crap out of me.And the 456 noting that 300+ children die globally every second and that is accepted.The flawed heart of COE was the character of Frobisher- Peter Capaldi should be up for a BAFTA-showing how a decent person can carry out evil acts (shades of Nazi bureaucrats who were 'following orders')

The casting was fantastic. A combo of distinguished stage/tv veterans, and up and coming new talent.Lois! Ms Spears!(Frobisher's PA) The scary special forces team leader Johnson! Rhiannon! Her feckless but ultimately brave husband-leading the charge against the troops to buy a little time for the kids to escape. The character arcs for the subsidiary characters were brilliant.RTD does 'little people stepping up in a crisis' well. And he obviously has a lot of credibility with British actors-the queue of talent to work with him on Who has been amazing.

I have a soft spot for RTD because as a black woman growing up in the UK (I'm in my 50s)I am thrilled to see black and asian characters included in a natural way in Scifi tv here.Casting in Who and Torchwood has been great for that. And I've loved some of the women in COE, we've had a wide range.

The point of SciFi is to reflect on society and certain trends in society extrapolated to show what they could lead to. This series did that...and then some! Given the hysteria in Britain over asylum seekers, and chavs etc, the 'solution' to the 456's demands was both credible AND evoked chilling echoes of the holocaust-which my teenage son watching with me noted, stunned.
The weakest thing, for me was John Barrowman. He is a gorgeous, sexy man. But I would say his talents lie in comedy or lighter fare. I don't think he has a wide enough range for where they took this emotionally. There are a whole load of British tv actors- Dominic West,Jonathan Rhys Meyers, David Morrisey, John Simm David Tennant himself, James Callis (Bltar in Battlestar Galactica)to name but a few- who could do both playboy and monster, and all the shadings in between: Barrowman can't. But then,the writers would have to be able to do the shadings in between in a much subtler, sophisticated way than we've seen them handle Jack.So they actually can't continue TW with Jack Harkness. Because how they've written him and how Barrowman plays him means it would freak audiences out if he sailed back a few years later, with a bit of wallowing in his manpain..