Bryce Moore's Blog, page 207

Ender’s Game: When Adaptations Go Wrong

I love me some good film adaptations. I studied them as part of my Masters in English at BYU. If you’ve been reading my blog and my reviews for a while, you’ll know I’m no simple “the book is always better than the movie” sort of a guy. I fully realize that books and films are two different mediums, and as soon as you make the transition from one to the other, you’re going to have to make some changes. Got that? I get it.

Ender’s Game is a terrible movie adaptation because it tries too hard to be a “good” adaptation. And by “good,” I mean the dreaded F word:

Faithful.

Movies that try to be too faithful to their corresponding books almost always end in wailing and gnashing of teeth, and Ender’s Game is a prime example of this principle at work.

I love the book. Let’s get that out of the way right off. I read it when I was 10 or so, and I’ve loved it–and reread it–ever since. Why do I love it? Because of the believable journey Ender goes on. I loved how Card was able to convince me that this child became the leader for the entire military force of Earth. I loved the way he moved up the ranks in battle school. The innovative approaches he had. The struggles he overcame. The friends he made along the way. I loved Command School. I loved Peter and Val and the way they gamed the system.

It’s a fantastic book.

And when it came time for the film to be done, they tried to cram all the best scenes from the book into the movie. The end result is what feels like a “best of” compilation on fast forward. The book was Danny Kaye in the Court Jester Knighting scene. It started out somber and cool and got me thinking that things might really be awesome–and then the king said “Faster!” and it all fell apart.

Yes, there’s the giant’s riddle. There’s the messages on the tablets. There’s some battle training. Dragon Army. Bean. Petra. Rackham. But they’re all rushed so quickly across the screen, we never have a chance to get to know them. To like them. Ender feels like he’s in the school for a few months. He’s in Command School for a few weeks.

It looks like the military of earth put a kid in charge who’d had less than a half year of real training. And worse yet, he was somehow able to earn all their trust in that half year.

It doesn’t work at all. It hits all the scenes, but by skipping the parts that set those scenes up, the scenes don’t work at all. The characters feel flat and forced, no matter what the actors try to do to breathe life into them.

Is the book unadaptable? Nope. But it certainly needs a different approach. In this case, I would have recommended ditching Val, Peter, and Earth life altogether. Start off at Battle School. Focus on that. Make us see it and understand it and see Ender overcome it. If that’s in place, then Command School is going to work much better. Also, doing all of this in under two hours? Not going to happen. I think you’d need another half hour or so to really make it snap.

Ideally, I think it would work best as a television series that lasts one season. Give it a good 13 hour HBO adaptation, and you could have a whole lot of awesome on your hands. Unfortunately, this film makes the possibility of that ever happening remote at best. It’s got some good effects and some good scenes, but it lacks any sort of an emotional punch. Five out of 10 stars for me, and considering the book is a 10/10, that’s quite the fall. Sad.

Good thing a bad adaptation can’t do anything to a great book.

A Real Pain in the Foot

(Name that movie!) Hey–I haven’t complained about my health all year, so I was figuring you all were beginning to wonder if I’d been swapped with a doppelgänger. Have no fear. I’m here to put that rumor to rest, while simultaneously building off my “foot theme” from yesterday. I’m a man of many facets–what can I say?

For all the various aches and pains I’ve had over my years, one thing that never really bothered me were my fee (when they’re not being cold). They were sturdy, stalwart companions who went about their business, day in and day out, doing what they did best: letting me walk around places so I could do cool things. It’s not a glamorous job. There’s a lot of sweaty, smelly working conditions, the hours are long, and they never really got too much in the way of pay raises or even Christmas bonuses. (Seriously. Who wants socks for Christmas? Ironic, isn’t it.)

But they didn’t mind. They just did what they did best, and every know and then I’d give them a scratch or a foot rub, and we called it good.

Then, last year, I upped the ante. I started that whole “jogging in place” thing. And to be honest, I never really talked that idea over with my feet. I just kind of assumed, you know? And to make matters worse, I didn’t even let them do it in anything so cushy as a sneaker. I used my regular shoes. My normal, worn out and getting worner, shoes. In my defense, the plan was to get new shoes for Christmas. I even had those shoes in my possession. I was only waiting for Christmas morning for their unwrapping.

And I guess that was too much for my poor feet. The right one, at least. He finally threw in the towel and went on strike.

A week or so before Christmas, my right heel flared up with severe pain. Pain that just hung around and wouldn’t go away. I tried to walk it out. Tried to ignore it. But I soon discovered there are some pains in this world that demand attention. That cannot be ignored. (Plus, it was putting a serious cramp in my whole “exercise” thing. I didn’t want to risk getting sick because I couldn’t exercise regularly.)

So I went to the doctor. (While I was there, I asked about my headaches, as well. Just in case you were wondering still. Two birds, one doctor visit.)

The verdict? Plantar Fasciitis. And it might be here for a while. Thankfully, I got some insoles for my shoes (and finally cracked open the new pair), and my feet are feeling better-ish. Weeks later, it still hurts (especially in the evening), and I have to hobble around some, but it’s so much better than it was. (Imagine having an open wound in the bottom of your foot, just in front of your heel. It was kind of like that, but without the blood.)

Moral of the story? I no longer take my feet for granted. They have been promoted to full and active partners in my daily life, and they now get the respect they deserve. (And the socks to boot.)

Even if they still have to keep working in dark, smelly environments.

Ice Fishing with Warm Feet? Is Such a Thing Possible?

Over winter break, I’d been hoping to get out ice fishing at least a few times. I had the time off, the ice would be fairly thin and hopefully slush free, so what could be better? (Side note: I know it might seem odd that I listed “thin ice” as one of the pluses of fishing early in the season. Aren’t I worried about falling through the ice? Not so much. Ice that’s 2 inches thick can technically support a 200 pound person. The thicker it gets, the amount of weight it can support goes up exponentially, so it doesn’t take much for a normal person to be able to go out safely. (Side side note: type of ice makes a difference. Solid, black ice takes more weight than white ice. Also, thickness isn’t uniform across a lake. Currents affect it, and snow depth affects it. Recommended depth is 4 inches for ice fishing.) The thicker that ice gets, the harder it becomes to make your hole. Also, early in the season, there’s no slush on the ice. (Snow falls, and then insulates the snow beneath it. The insulation raises the temperature, and so that snow underneath melts. You can be walking through deep, wet slush on top of deep, thick ice. Not a fun combination.)

Anyway.

So I’d wanted to get outside and do some fishing. Did it happen? Nope. Why not? Well, because it was in the 50s over the break. I might not be a scientist, but I know water doesn’t freeze when it’s 50 degrees out.

Long story short, I got to go out for the first time on Monday after work. This was minimalist ice fishing. One auger. One jig. No traps. Ice fishing really doesn’t take much. I’ve said it before: it’s about as easy as it gets. Just a little cold is all. Particularly my feet. I’ve always had a problem with cold feet (save your jokes, please!). Even in bed with a bunch of covers on, I need to sleep with socks almost all the time. My toes just get way too cold. When I go ice fishing, I’ve always worn extra socks and gone for the really thick ones. It didn’t matter. My toes would always freeze up, and I’d have to sit there jumping around to try and get my blood circulating.

However, this time, I had a secret weapon. Denisa had bought me some special socks for Christmas. (I tried to find them online, but I’m honestly not sure which ones she got me. They’re black. Does that help? She would know, if you have questions.) Supposedly, these socks were able to keep your toes toasty warm no matter what. I was excited to try them out, even if I was still skeptical.

The verdict? I was outside on the ice for two hours or so, and my toes were nice and warm the entire time. Honestly, I’m wondering if some black magic is involved in these socks. Maybe a fire demon was enslaved to keep them going? Maybe I shouldn’t look too closely at that.

All I know is that one of the few problems I had with ice fishing has been solved, and that’s just dandy. Thanks, Denisa!

How did the rest of the trip go? We caught 7 fish. Lake trout, and fairly sizable. It was quiet–not another person I could see on the lake. Saw some wild turkeys, and nothing else. I like ice fishing a lot, mainly for the peace and quiet that’s usually there. Any excuse to get out and do something different is a nice way to mix things up a bit and pep up a day. I don’t eat the fish (Denisa takes care of that), so even actually catching anything isn’t a huge requirement.

Come on–a picturesque Maine lake, with a light snow falling and no one else but me and my friend out there? It doesn’t get better than that, people.

Downton Abbey 5.2: Bringing Sexy Back

(I went ice fishing yesterday, and I’m putting my post on that up tomorrow instead of today. See the love and attention I give you Downton fans? I asked you last week if you were still reading, and you said yes. And here I am, ready to provide your weekly Downton fix.)

Let me say right off the bat that I’ve been impressed with this season so far. We’re two episodes in, and there’s only one plot line that’s driving me insane for far. Even then, it’s a plot that’s driven by character choices and not bizarre circumstances (though there’s hints of bizarre circumstances headed our way). Still, it’s avoided anything like soap opera shenanigans or after school special of the week-itis. Yay for that. This week’s show was strong again. Here’s a rundown of some of my thoughts:

The biggest one is definitely Mary going off on her sexcapade with Gillipants. I got a kick out of Anna having to go buy the unmentionable. Ha ha. Tee hee. But the whole argument that “I’m going to be stuck with this guy in a smaller house, and if I don’t like him in the sack, I think I’ll go mad” doesn’t hold a whole lot of water with me. It might work for a different character (Rose, for example), but Lady Mary? Please. I don’t see it. Then again, she is the one who jumped in bed with the Turk back in the first season, so maybe I’m just refusing to see what’s right there in front of me. Or maybe it’s because I can’t stand the oily little rich guy. Ugh.
Edith remains the not very bright sister. The Godmother approach to raising her child is about as contrived as it can get, and I’m glad the adopted mother isn’t falling for the hijinks. But at the same time, it seems just like something Edith would do. When brains were being handed out to the Grantham daughters, Sybil took a serving, Mary took two, and Edith wandered off somewhere to look at something shiny.
Tom becoming more of a firebrand again–I’m still okay with this. I want him pushing back. It doesn’t make sense that he’d have given up to the point he has so far in the show. But I don’t want him swinging too far the other direction. So far, they’ve handled this well. I hope it continues.
I wonder when we’ll get the spinoff to Downton, where it’s basically The Odd Couple, but with Violet and Isobel. Comedy gold, folks. Comedy gold!!!
I like how Molesley is becoming less of a running gag and more of a character. Some nice touches there, even if he’s still mainly around to look stupid.
The radio bit was hilarious, and so well done. Standing during the king’s speech, for one thing. Fantastic. They had a lot of fun with that arc, and it shows. Perfect for the series–illustrating how all these different characters and classes are interacting and responding to the changing times. Well done.
Thomas’s discussion with Anna almost makes me feel sorry for the guy. Big bonus points for that. I like viewing him as a self-destructive villain who wishes he could be something different at times, but just can’t let go of the hate.
Where oh where shall we put the memorial? Another fun plot, and interesting to see how it all played out. So much of a good time can be had out of this show when they just stick to the day to day lives of these people. No need for extravagant, outlandish circumstances. Like murders or rapes or things like that. Maybe they’ve learned their lesson?
Oh wait. Intimations of trouble for Mr. Bates. Maybe they haven’t. Here’s where I get a bit troubled. Didn’t we already do this plot with Bates? The whole “accused of murder and now has to have an investigation and go to trial” thing? Why are we recycling it–for the same character, no less? Seems a bit “been there, done that” to me.

But hey, I don’t have much to complain about, and that keeps me watching. Yay for that. How about all you lovely Downtonites out there? Any issues you’ve been having? Anything I missed? Speak up!

How the Hobbit Trilogy Affects the Lord of the Rings Trilogy

As soon as the Hobbit trilogy was announced, I had one goal that popped right up on my radar: watch all 6 movies as close to back-to-back as I could. (When you have a full time job and three children, watching 20 hours or so of films is going to be difficult to pull off on a literal back-to-back basis. And there was no way I was going to watch anything but the extended editions. What do you take me for?) Ideally, I wanted to do it all over Christmas break. In practice, I started December 20th or so and finished last night. (I had to wait a bit until I could see Battle of Five Armies in the theater, and then there were pesky things like “parties” and “family activities” and “friends” that kept getting in the way.)

One of my biggest questions going into this was what seeing the Hobbit trilogy first would do to my viewing of Lord of the Rings. Because there was no doubt it would affect it. Would they work to make something better? Would they feel like one overarching story? Would it be clunky? I really wasn’t sure what to think.

Wonder no longer.

I’m sure there will be some who will disagree with me. Opinions of The Hobbit range all over the map. But for this Tolkien fan, the new trilogy and the old fit together like a glove. The LOTR becomes a better trilogy by watching The Hobbit trilogy first. And in significant ways.

For example, one of my complaints with the original trilogy was how little time we spend with Gandalf the Grey. When he falls in Moria (spoilers?), we’ve had a bit of experience with him, but not too much. Everyone’s very sad for his passing, but come on–there’s like 11 or 12 hours of the trilogy, and he’s Grey in only about an hour and a half of them. The rest of the time, it’s White all the way. With the Hobbit, we now get more Grey than White, which is how it ought to be, in my opinion. When Gandalf the White shows up in Two Towers, he’s a stark contrast to the Grey, and he does a whole lot of awesome.

Another example: Moria. Dwarves in the original trilogy really get the short end of the stick. (Pun intended?) We see Moria, and then we’ve got Gimli. That’s it. The end. Having viewed the Hobbit first, Balin’s tomb means something. Seeing all those orcs and the balrog in this dwarf city has more oomph than it did the first time I watched it.

How about Legolas? The character some people can’t stand for appearing in The Hobbit. How does he fare? For me, he becomes even better. When I watched the LOTR the first time, Legolas’s battle acrobatics seemed pretty cool, if far-fetched. The trick with surfing down the shield while firing arrows in The Two Towers? How does he do that? But then you watch him at full awesome in Battle of the Five Armies, and seeing him surf a shield is no longer surprising. It is the right and proper way for Legolas to behave in battle. Jumping up on a rampaging Oliphaunt and taking it down? Standard Operating Procedure for the elf. Really, I loved how when he shows up in Fellowship, it becomes that much more impressive. You’re watching, and you’ve just seen Legolas be a one man wrecking machine last movie. That they have him on their side? That means a whole lot more than it meant when he was just being first introduced in that movie.

What about the much maligned Dwarf/Elf love in The Hobbit? That’s solved a great deal by watching the movies as a complete whole as well. Because I–like many of you–questioned that relationship the first time. A dwarf? And an elf? Get real. And then you have that end the way it does, and the next film, you see Aragorn and Arwen, and suddenly you’re wondering why you had such a problem with Dwarf/Elf love. Was it because they looked too different? Do we accept Aragorn and Arwen because all that separates them is some pointy ears? The two relationships are great mirrors for each other.

Speaking of elves and dwarves, Legolas and Gimli’s relationship also takes on more meaning. We can understand why Elves and Dwarves have some bad blood between them–and why Legolas in particular might not be too rosy when it comes to Gimli in particular. So when the two of them hit it off and declare their friendship at the end of the series, that has more of a punch than it did even before.

There are many more examples. Saruman’s betrayal now feels like an actual betrayal, something the original trilogy just couldn’t pull off, because we only get to see Saruman as good for about 10 minutes of screen time. Galadriel is much less bizarre and freaky, because that one scene with her and Frodo isn’t allowed to dominate our perception of her–instead, it calls back to when she was facing down the Necromancer, and it makes a lot more sense.

More than just individual examples, though, there’s the whole feeling of the first trilogy (Hobbit) compared to the second (LOTR). You’ve got epic battles that finish both of them, but the stakes in LOTR are so much higher than Hobbit–and that’s again, how it should be. Hobbit is a lighter trilogy. It’s Middle Earth when it was still mostly Sauron-free. Watching it, we get a sense of how things used to be. Battle of the Five Armies gives a glimpse of where things are headed, and it works very well for that purpose. The Hobbit makes LOTR even bleaker by comparison. It’s an excellent foil for the later trilogy.

There are few movies that I’ll happily sit down and watch again and again, let alone whole series that I’ll shove that much time over to. But these two are definitely the exception. The biggest criticism I’ve heard lobbed at The Hobbit trilogy again and again is that it didn’t capture the essence of the book, but I think that’s evaluating it by something other than what it was trying to do. Viewing the two trilogies as a whole, it’s clear to me that Jackson was trying to create a foil for LOTR, using the events of the Hobbit to do so. This is different than the book versions, where Hobbit and LOTR are so drastically different. You can look at one as the prequel to the other, but you’d be on shaky ground. Other than some shared characters (who don’t really behave the same) and shared settings, they’re two totally different works. Jackson’s movies, on the other hand, are all LOTR, all the way.

It’s fantastic to me that he was able to pull off something like this over so many years–it’s a great testament to all the creative minds that contributed to the effort, from the designers to the actors to the composer and everything in between. Let the haters hate–after watching all 6 movies in a half month, I can unequivocally say that I love them all.

Culturfying My Kids: Weird Al and Michael Jackson

If you’ve been following my posts, you might recall one I wrote a while ago all about showing my kids Michael Jackson and introducing them to the Moon Walk. I’d enjoyed that experience so much, last night I decided the time and come for another “culture moment.”

First up? Showing my kids the music video to Bad. Nothing says late 80s cool like this. It sums it all up in a nice, tidy package. They teach in school when they do the 80s section, right? RIGHT?

This was really just supposed to be the foundation for what was to come, but it brought up several important questions that had to be answered–most of them by DC (my six year old daughter).

Why is he wearing all those buckles?
Can I get a jacket with that many buckles?
Why is he so happy that he’s bad?
If I go to school tomorrow and tell everyone that I’m really bad, will I be cool too?
What happened to his nose?
Why is he standing in front of that grate with all that wind?

These were questions that just didn’t get asked back in the day. (Well, maybe some of them did.) And so I had to explain how cool these music videos were at the time, and how everybody would watch them and talk about them. I think this did nothing more than cement in my kids’ mind the idea that I really must be clueless when it comes to judgment calls. Great.

However.

All of it turned out to be well worth it, because then I got to show them this:

And suddenly, it all made sense to my kids. They were laughing through the whole thing, though DC was a bit confused why they were making fun of the other video so much. (She might still have been attached to the idea of a jacket with all those buckles . . .) TRC thought it was pretty much the funniest thing ever. So that was good.

I hadn’t watched the parody video in years, and I think if anything, it’s gotten funnier in the intervening time. Why? For one thing, the “Bad” video just looks pretentious and strange now. It’s no longer “cool,” though you can clearly see how cool the people in the video thought it was. And so to have Weird Al come along and lampoon it that easily . . . we’re talking T ball here, folks. Comedy gold.

Anyway. Just thought I’d pass that on to you, if any of you are looking for some interesting family activities over the next bit. It was a fun-filled fifteen minutes at the Bryce household.

47 Ronin: An Exercise in Misunderstanding

Keanu Reeves was in a film that came out last year: 47 Ronin. I’d seen the trailers for it, and it seemed like it was right up my alley (minus the Keanu Reeves part): a Samurai action fantasy movie? Sign me up, right?

Well . . . it didn’t quite turn out as I’d hoped, on many different levels.

First off, let’s get the elephant out of the room: Keanu Reeves. The guy just has a talent for one note performances. It’s what made him such an excellent choice for The Matrix. Half of the fun was that “The One” turned out to be a bit of a wooden idiot. Bill and Ted succeeds because he’s so good at being that idiot. Put the idiot into a love story in medieval Japan? Um . . . not so much.

But let’s assume for a moment that Reeves could have done a perfect job. Let’s give the film the benefit of the doubt. Even then, it’s got one big, serious, glaring issue. The movie hinges on a white guy (okay, half-white) being able to save all these poor Japanese warriors who just can’t do it on their own. Worse yet, he has to teach them all that they’re all racist and need to get over their prejudices.

It’s not quite this blatant in the movie, but the whole time, it was bugging me, and it wasn’t until I thought it over in the middle (I watched the movie over several days, when I had time) that it became clear. I suppose this is a trope that’s used fairly often in film and pop culture. You’ve got the reverse that happens when Asian martial arts masters come over to America to take names and bring order to society. Or Crocodile Dundee, I suppose . . . But when you start looking to Crocodile Dundee to defend a trope, maybe you’re looking too hard.

And really, it felt different in this movie. With Crocodile Dundee, it was simply a fish out of water showing the rest of the fish what life could be like. With 47 Ronin, the white guy shows the rest of the world how he’s really better than all of them. It would be like having Crocodile Dundee show up and show Americans how to be better Americans. I’m flailing to describe it in words that make it clear, but hopefully you’re getting the point.

No. One more try. What if you had a story about a basketball player who’s a great basketball player, and he finds himself on a football team. And through the course of the movie, he shows the rest of the team how awesome he is at football, as well. He leads that football team to the national championship, because basketball is really awesome.

Does that illustrate the disconnect here? I give up.

I’m willing to give the movie a bit of leeway, because it sounds like it was a nightmare behind the scenes, with the studio coming in and getting all trompy during the editing process. So who knows what it was supposed to be before that happens. But it’s no surprise to me that the film absolutely bombed. Even taking out the racist undertones, it comes across as a movie that resulted when someone watched Lord of the Rings and came away thinking the reason the trilogy was successful was because it had great special effects.

Honestly, the production values in the movie were high. You can tell it cost a pretty penny to make. It’s just the acting, the story, the fantasy development, and the characters that derail it all. LOTR worked because it was a package deal. It had a lot going on so many different levels. This? It’s shiny, but once you get past the wrapper, it’s pretty rotten.

So in the end, this is one movie you should actively avoid. Yes, it’s PG13. Yes, it’s got some cool action sequences. But no, it’s not worth your time. Trust me. 4/10

Earworm of the Week: Somebody, by Depeche Mode

Last week, Denisa and I took the kids down to Portland and places in between to run a few errands. As we were driving, I had my iPod on, shuffling through my music, when I came across a strange song I didn’t remember putting on there. It started out with what sounded like a heartbeat and some odd ambient noise. Typically, I’d just hit Next and go on to something more immediately rewarding, but I wondered what the song was. My guess was that it was Halloween sound effects I loaded on about 10 years ago, and I wanted to know if my guess was right or not, so I let it play.

Then singing started, and I was disappointed to discover I had been wrong. I hit Next without thinking, and then paused as the beginning of the actual singing caught up with my brain. I knew that song, didn’t I? (It’s a sign of how much music I have when I can put favorite songs on my iPod and then forget they were favorites in the first place.) I hit back to listen again and asked Denisa to read off what song it was.

“Somebody,” by Depeche Mode

It’s been stuck in my head since Friday, playing pretty much non-stop. I don’t particularly mind in this case. It’s a nice song, and I did some research into it to find out more about it–that it was written by the singer, for one thing (I’m always a bigger fan of a song if I know the performer wrote it as well as performed it), and it’s a really interesting contrast between saccharine and sarcasm.

You’ve got this very nice vocal/piano track from a group where I’m much more used to hearing synthesizers and drumbeats. The sentiment is all lovely, but then at the end it adds “Though things like this make me sick, in a case like this, I’ll get away with it.” That just confusing enough to make you wonder if he was serious or not the whole time, and to me it’s thrown in there to give the group an out. To let them have a sincere song that’s full of longing and hope for what they want in a relationship, but to be able to maintain there image of a new wave pop band. In many ways, it reminds me of Extreme’s More than Words:

Really, “Somebody” expresses a lot of what I was looking for out of a relationship, both when I first heard it back in the day and now when I heard it again. The modern day Bryce felt very connected to the 80s/90s Bryce for a moment. Interesting how a thing like a song can do that so quickly and so easily. No need for anything messy like time travel–songs can work so much better. Here are the rest of the lyrics, in case you’re curious:

I want somebody to share

Share the rest of my life

Share my innermost thoughts

Know my intimate details

Someone who’ll stand by my side

And give me support

And in return

She’ll get my support

She will listen to me

When I want to speak

About the world we live in

And life in general

Though my views may be wrong

They may even be perverted

She will hear me out

And won’t easily be converted

To my way of thinking

In fact she’ll often disagree

But at the end of it all

She will understand me

I want somebody who cares

For me passionately

With every thought and with every breath

Someone who’ll help me see things

In a different light

All the things I detest

I will almost like

I don’t want to be tied

To anyone’s strings

I’m carefully trying to steer clear

Of those things

But when I’m asleep

I want somebody

Who will put their arms around me

And kiss me tenderly

Though things like this

Make me sick

In a case like this

I’ll get away with it

And that’s your bit of sappy 80s nostalgia for today. Enjoy.

Downton 5.1 Review

[image error]I’ve written before about how much I like routines. They keep me doing things I want to do, but wouldn’t do without that extra nudge to keep doing them. One unfortunate side effect of that? I have a really hard time letting go of things, even when it seems like most of the rest of the country has moved on.

Which brings me to Downton Abbey. Back in the day, it seemed like my Facebook feed was crawling with Downtonites. Everybody was posting about the show left and right. I started writing reviews of each episode because I couldn’t help it. I just wanted to talk about it with other people.

These days? It seem like a lot of that has worn off. Barely anything about Downton was mentioned when it aired Sunday, and for the most part, it seems to have gone unnoticed. Some of this is likely due to the fact that we Americans get it a half year after England, and many people in the states have discovered this thing called the internet, which lets them watch shows when they actually come out, as opposed to when our television stations deem fit to air them. Some of it is likely due to the fact that the newness of the show has worn off. It’s been five years now, after all–give or take.

In fact, I paused the show last night right at the beginning to tell Denisa I was actually worried about this season. So much of the energy of the show–the stuff that I really liked way back in the day–came from the natural two class system of the house itself. And then in later seasons, the creators seemed intent on looking elsewhere for conflict: World War I, the Jazz Age, random rape and murder investigations. It’s when the show veered away from its starting premise that it fell apart the most for me. (Well, that, and when actors let their careers get in the way of a great show. Tell me, Dan Stevens (Matthew Crawley), how’s playing a bit part in Night at the Museum 3 working out for you? Still feeling good about that decision to ditch the show?)

But Denisa loves the show, and I’m still quite fond of it myself, and so here I am, ready and willing to write up another season’s worth of reviews. As I said, I was worried they’d screw up the season. So far, if I had to rank seasons from best to worst, I think I’d go with Season 1, Season 3, Season 4, Season 2–just off the top of my head. It would be interesting to watch them all back to back and see what I think then. How would Season 5 do?

My reactions, in no particular order:

Lord Gilligan continues to irritate me, though I’ll admit I couldn’t for the life of me remember for the first while whether he was the one I was rooting for (the one who worked with the pigs) or the one I couldn’t stand. When he traipsed into Mary’s bedroom and proposed they abscond for a week long sex orgy, it all came back to me. (Seriously. What’s with the sudden “Let’s make sure we’re good in bed together before we commit to a marriage” plot line? Am I just a complete and utter prude? Maybe, I guess. I know this was the roaring 20s and all, but I didn’t appreciate Mary going from the cold hearted woman Matthew had to coax affection out of and then becoming a woman who wants to try out the merchandise before she’s ready to really commit. That felt phony to me.)
Fire at Downton! Caused by Lady Edith being a complete and utter moron. So . . . just about par for the course when it comes to conflict at Downton. That said, it was interesting to see how they handled it, from an historical perspective. And it did provide for some interesting revelations: that Thomas can actually do heroic things, for one. And that Pretty Boy might get the pretty boot out of the Abbey, for another.
Speaking of Edith, her mopey-moping over her child and her still missing husband feels like a big spinning of the wheels. Time to fish or cut bait there, people. But maybe I just feel that way because Edith is such a doofus.
School Marm visits for dinner was an interesting diversion. It’s been long enough since Sybil died that I’m definitely ready for Tom to move on, and the teacher’s got some get up and go, so I’m in favor of that happening. I worry Tom will leave for America and make the show duller than it ought to be. Have him stick around, marry the teacher, and mix things up some more.
New maid is actually a thief, for mysterious reasons she refuses to detail–I like the fact that she just came out with it, but I’m less impressed with the insistence that she’s not going to say why she stole what she stole. That feels contrived. Seeing Thomas get a dressing down was appreciated, even if they then backtracked on him being on thin ice just minutes later. Ah well.
Daisy learns algebra is intriguing, and felt fine to me as far as plot lines go.
Molesley dies his hair–Man, does that guy get a beating by the writers of this show. That said, he does just enough to make me enjoy seeing him get that beating. I enjoyed this arc in this episode. Poor guy.
Isobel vs. Violet at least had some new machinations that were interesting to watch. Violet continues to get the best lines of the show, which is right and proper and as it should be.

Overall, I enjoyed the episode. There was nothing outrageous or lame in the writing. It was upstairs/downstairs shenanigans, informed by the times these people were living in. That’s the bread and butter of the success of Downton, and I would love to see more of the same. Then again, I seem to remember wanting that at this point last year, and then it all went wrong with that Mr. Green fellow . . .

How about you? Anyone out there still watching? Or should I hang up this Downton review business and focus on other things? Inquiring minds want to know . . .

New Year’s Goal: Keeping Track of My Reading and Viewing Lists

Something I noticed a lot of my friends doing online at the end of the year was reporting back on what they read over the course of that year–What their top books were, or in the case of my more movie-centric friends, what their top films were. That’s something that I haven’t noticed before (was I just snoozing through it? Maybe I’ve gotten different friends? Maybe Facebook was hiding it from me so that I wouldn’t feel bad?), but I love the idea, and so I want to do the same thing this year.

What’s my plan?

I’m going to keep a Google Spreadsheet listing every movie, book, and TV episode I watch. I’m also going to include the date and a rating (0-10) for each one. That way, I can look back at a particular month and see what I liked the most, or check for a year. More data means more ways to have fun with the information when the fun-having time starts.

Why am I going to do this?

Well, besides the obvious answer (“Because I want to.”), and the almost as obvious answer (“Because I think it will be interesting.”), there’s the dark, real answer: “Because I don’t think I’m reading enough.”

I know from experience with myself that when I start tracking things, I start doing them better. More effectively. I thrive on keeping track of numbers and statistics. That says something about me, I suppose, but I’m old enough now to be at peace with that. If I know some ways of motivating myself to do more, why wouldn’t I take them?

Tracking the number of books I read each month will help me to read more of the things. Tracking the number of television shows and movies? That’s more just curiosity, there. If anything, it might inspire me to watch less theses days. Who knows?

Either which way, it seems like a fun experiment, so I’m going to give it a shot. I don’t anticipate sharing many of the details on the blog, other than the typical reviews I post now and then. I suppose I might consider adding a little blurb at the end of each post with the current tallies, but that sounds too much like work.

So probably not.

In any case, that’s my thing I’m doing differently this year. (Really stretching myself, I know.) What are you planning on giving a spin this time around the sun?