By Roy Mathur, on 2024-06-16, at 23:40:22 to 00:37:32 BST, for Captain Roy's Rusty Rocket Radio Show
The big thing of the pod tonight is Doctor Who: The Legend of Ruby Sunday, but before that...
UK 2020 home intrusion/horror movie.
Maisie Williams, her crooked boyfriend, and nastier friend of her boyfriend break into kindly old doctor, Sylvester McCoy and his ailing wife's lonely country house. McCoy turns the tables on the yobbos, when he and his wife are revealed to be a pair of elderly serial killers.
I saw this on 40D the other day, with the resume label highlighted, and remembered that I actually watched it years ago, but didn't like it, left it on pause, and never talked about it on the podcast. I'm not into gleeful torture porn.
Everytime I watch this movie I appreciate it more. I have seen it at least three times since pod 432, in which I said I mildly enjoyed it. But since then the crazy story, the fanservice of all the villains and three Spideys, and the bittersweet ending seems to get better and better.
And don't worry about Spidey's educational prospects. We know that Peter Parker does eventually make it to university, just not MIT, but the fictional Empire State University.
2020 adaptation of Roald Dahl's book about children-hating witches is as average as the original 1990 film starring Anjelica Huston, despite Anne Hathaway vamping it up, and Chris Rock's rich voice acting that I quite enjoyed.
In 530, I extolled the qualities of Alastair Sim's The Green Man (1956), while only watching the first few minutes. I have since watched more and found it wanting.
It starts well as, "a delightfully nasty and extremely funny black comedy that begins with a first person voice over by Sim. He tells us how the nascent act of his career as an assassin was accidentally blowing up his headmaster." All promising, with a great performance by Sim, but then degrades into a laboured farce.
In 542 I said I had seen the first two episodes of The Acolyte, but did not tell you how the baddie's first kill in episode one is a Jedi played by Trinity actress, Carrie-Anne Moss. She does a version of Trinity's flying around combat style before being unceremoniously murdered. It's a calculated shocker and it works. Yes, they kill Trinity.
Years before Ahsoka's Force Witches of Dathomir, I remember complaining of why only Jedi and Sith are the only Force users in Star Wars, so I'm pleased to see this this explored again in episode three. Of course, given that witch covens might have originated with exiled Jedi Allya, it's still an extension of Jedi lore.
This episode also shows us the Jedi's willingness to act almost as child snatchers of Force sensitive children. They seem well-intentioned, but like evangelicals are unaware that they are seducing children away from their parents and grooming them for their cult. It's an uncomfortable watch.
Wouldn't it be mind blowing if they pull a Fight Club on us and there is no evil sister, Mae, only Osha? Unlikely, after episode three, but there's the unnatural circumstances of their birth, "And what happens if the Jedi discover how you created them?". However, the doppelganger is one of my favourite tropes, so I'm holding out for something weird.
HBO Max 2023 cold war spy drama, based very loosely on the defection of Lieutenant General Ion Mihai Pacepa of the Romanian Securitate secret police, and available on BBC iPlayer.
Tense, dramatic, very well acted, mostly performed by actors of the correct corresponding cultures in their native tongue.
It is also a very paranoid conspiracy thriller in which you can literally trust no one because almost all characters aren't what they appear. Whether this is intention or not, it seems to accurately reflects the psychological makeup of the defector. Reading the general's post-defection views on the West, one supposes his paranoia and beta-male status to Nicolae Ceausescu that enabled him to survive, warped his ability for objectivity.
In the penultimate epsiode of Ncuti's first season, the Doctor asks UNIT about the woman who keeps appearing in his timeline (the Abulance in Boom, the tea lady in The Devil's Chord, etc.; she appears throughout the season). She is entrepreneur Susan of S Triad group about reveal a momentous development in technology. Her cleverness and S Triad being an anagram for TARDIS makes him wonder if she is his granddaughter Susan Foreman.
The Doctor also tries to get to the bottom Ruby's origin with the help of UNIT's time window to enhance the poor VHS CCTV footage of her abandonment as an infant. Ruby finds the tape at home. Before leaving, Mrs Flood, who is left to look after her grand mother, acts menacingly and says that something is on the way. They to UNIT, but the device goes berserk and a UNIT officer is burned to a crisp.
The Doctor and Mel Bush meets Susan. though she is not Foreman, she is haunted by other existences.
Back at UNIT, a possessed Harriet Arbinger (Harbinger) proclaims the imminent arrival of some terrible entity and finally the gigantic vengeful Egyptian deity Sutekh appears.
I like that Gatwa changes outfits so often, after all, the TARDIS wardrobe must be stuffed to the brim with interesting clothes from many different periods, cultures, species, and genders. While Tenant changed his shoes, and, though I'm hazy, Capaldi jumpers, I think Gatwa may be the first Doctor to change outfits often and so completely. I particularly liked the first leather trench and the latest 50s rocker look.
London's UNIT HQ is suspiciously similar to Manhattan's Avengers Tower; a giant skyscraper with a big overhanging bit.
Neither in Old, New, or newest Who, don't join UNIT; you are cannon fodder. You are doomed. Ballified forever in The Giggle and incinerated here, it's a bad career move.
In Pyramids of Mars and here Sutekh has both servants and those he directly possesses.
Though the Master's return was teased at the end of The Giggle, I'm glad RTD brought back a different villain. However, it wasn't Omega, my favourite Who supervillain, and Sutekh literally died of old age at the end of Pyramids of Mars (pod 345). Also, Susan mentions "the Mara, the god of beasts." I'm guessing those demon were-snakes (pods 477: Kinda and 494: Snakedance) are being dredged up for future scripts too. Conclusion: busy, complicated, cliffhanger ending.
For lack of anything better to talk about let me regale you with an expansion of my journal entry from 542.
On the 9th, we took our new car shopping. It drove without fuss, certainly not launching us into zero-g around every corner like the old blue Millennium Falcon. The moment we returned, I bought the Observer, which Dad promptly stole. Importantly, I have restocked the Garibaldis.
I attended my club meeting in London on the 8th. The rail journey was marred by Avanti delays, drunk Northern rugby fans on the way down, and a rebooting train and drunk Southerners on the way up. While there, I saw more of those curious metal knobs; this time on street furniture at Outernet Arts Tottenham Court Road to discourage rough sleepers. The bastards won't be happy until my kingdom is a cold fascistic hellscape. Trafalgar Square was annoyingly completely closed off for Major League Baseball promotion. One could not even see what was going on inside. I selfied myself betwixt the Sphinx's paws at the Needle. Have you read the inscription? Such a defensive tone. They knew they were nicking it. After the club meeting, I ate an interesting discounted Japanese Katsu curry sandwich in Sparks' foodhall afterwards and I bought one of those fake Toblerones that they sell. A good day and a total of 14.83 km walked.
Possibly brought on by recovery and better food, in an attempt to emulate my parents resistance to germs, I've had several intense dreams.
Finally, earlier today I caffeinated myself to the point of exploding and tackled the lawn, the shopping, and zapped the house and garage with insecticide. Apart from the odd throb, I'm okay. Glass half empty: I've been dwelling on a recent rejection for an intern-level journalist position.
I have between about 500 and a 1000 listens per episode. That puts me in the top 10% of podcasters. However, my podcast is useless in terms of continued lack of listener engagement, i.e. correspodence, comments, reviews, and the same for financial support.
Every so often there's a spurt in episode downloads---maybe for the holidays or because I've twanged the zeitgeist---but most listener engagement on forums, blogs, chats, social media, both third party and my own, have been a bust. Recent impreciations on social media have also fallen on deaf ears too.
After 544 episodes in 12 years, has the experience of podcasting been worth it? It's given me something to do, some way of recording my thoughts; an audio diary of sorts, but honestly, no. In fact, I had more reactions from blogging, which preceded the podcast by a year and was far less time-consuming.
What now? I don't know, but each time I put out a new episode, it feels like it might be my last.