24 Frames of Dreaming

Oh dearie, I really am the queen of procrastinators.

I swear I can find time to do everything except write on this blog. I started the blog because I knew I owed it to myself to make the effort to take my writing from 'shitty' to 'vaguely promising'. And I have so much to write about, but since I'm such a wonderful procrastinator, most of it stays in my head, swirling round in a colossal soup of colours and faces and enthusiasm.

So now I'm writing, and even if this is a horrible stream-of-consciousness crap piece, it's going up, I swear.

To be fair, I have had other things going on. I had surgery a week ago and the resulting enforced inactivity is definitely a double-edged sword. I have all the time in the world to lie around catching up on the films I want to see, but am physically incapable of doing anything else. It's my usual life, with frustration squared. I once read an Ernest Hemingway quote that went along the lines of "Writing is easy - all you have to do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed" - well, I really wish siphoning off my pent-up frustration into words was that easy. Then again, there's only been one Hemingway for a reason.

The last time I wrote - let's see - I was binge-watching my way through The Vampire Diaries. It's a rather unpleasant-sounding term but I find that 'binge-watching' is really the only way I do TV. I can't bear the drawn-out suspense of weekly instalments. Plus, that way I find I lose the sense of continuity. My happiest times in film-and-TV-land are when I'm bounding my way from one enthusiasm to the next at breakneck speed, limited only by my download speed.

Anyway, I've got up to date on The Vampire Diaries and sure enough, my interest has waned somewhat (although I'll never not be interested in Delena, no matter how ridiculously drawn out their love arc gets).

So it was time for something new. Unfortunately, I can't be assured of finding something new right on the heels of the old - if I don't like something, I usually don't make an effort. Call it egotistical, but I think films should help you to like them, and quickly too. Usually if I don't like a TV show after the pilot (or three episodes max), then that's it.

However, I actually made an effort this time. Partly because I have a brilliantly geeky friend who's watched everything sci-fi and knows exactly what films I'll like. (It was she who recommended Sherlock - oh, there's something else to write about). So when she insisted I'd definitely, absolutely love Doctor Who, I gave it a shot. Up until this point I really hadn't ventured much into sci-fi, although I enjoy Battlestar Galactica. More of a fantasy person, really. And I knew basically nothing about Doctor Who. I knew it was a real cult thing, and I had some vague mental image of unattractive British blokes in odd clothes, and police boxes inexplicably tumbling through very pixellated vortexes. I had the feeling, though, that it was probably something I'd really like if I tried to.

It almost didn't happen, though. When I finally started watching, I nearly didn't make it through the first episode. (To be fair, that's almost entirely Chris Eccleston's fault. Don't kill me, Ninth Doctor fans!). My thoughts went as follows:
-Animated shop mannequins? Really?
-Is this Doctor really supposed to be the protagonist? Why is he so freakishly cheerful all the time? I need backstory!!
-What the hell is a sonic screwdriver? Why is it? Is it a sort of psychic extension of the Doctor, or are there others like it? What power does it use? How does it operate? Is it unique or is there a Sonic Screwdriver Store somewhere? Explain!
-Most pressingly, why are there no beds in the TARDIS? What if you have to take a kip in the middle of empty space?

Above all, though, I just couldn't connect with Chris Eccleston as the Doctor. I didn't even know, then, who the Doctor was supposed to be, but it sure wasn't him. To be honest, he just seemed so two-dimensional, like a weirdly cheerful space-plumber - a beer-and-telly bloke who's the salt of the earth but no one really remembers him.

So I soldiered through three or four episodes and then realised I really wanted to like this show, but I was going to give up on it if I didn't skip ahead to the next Doctor and see if I liked him better. So I did. And voila, at the end of 'The Christmas Invasion' when the flamboyant (possibly crazy?) new Doctor declares that he's the kind of man who doesn't give second chances, I chuckled and said, "Oh, I like you." And the rest, as they say, was laughter, tears, and late nights glued to the screen. I wasn't expecting all the tears, actually. I see the point of a meme that shows a pie chart of Doctor Who: "50% sci-fi, 50% tears." But good tears, the best, always.

So the moral of the story is a) really do give things a go, and b) thank the sweet cinema gods for David Tennant.

Speaking of whom - I've temporarily thrown Benedict Cumberbatch over in favour of watching my way through Tennant's filmography (and the stage performances that I can find). He's absolutely fantastic and I don't think there's any kind of role he can't do. (I really mean it when I say any role - if you don't believe me, just do a youtube search for 'David Tennant in drag'!).

Well, I'm tired of writing now, and I promised myself I'd post this tonight, so there we are.

More later.