Oddverse

Sometimes it's important to pause and remember the things that you have acheived. And this month, we've done a few.

We went to Glasgow on a glorious summer's day, meeting up with someone who knew Mr Twinky from School.

We went shopping and I bought clothes without being prompted.

We went to four shows in the Fringe.

We packed up and successfully sold our old flat in Dublin.

We had visitors for the weekend.

Mr Twinky had a week's worth of classes, that went very well. And also jury duty - although he wasn't picked as he is a cat.

I saw the troup of performing monkeys. Twice.

I finalised most of the arrangements for Mr Twinky's forthcoming birthday, and successfully kept a lot of secrets. I mean a lot.

More... later...

There are many words I could say about Dublin. However, they would all - at this point - be tinged by the fact that for the last 18 months or so, we have been trying to sell our flat. We've ended up selling it for less than we bought it for, and fully expect it to recover in value over the next couple of years. This is all not good.

We stood in the flat on Sunday morning, having cleaned it thoroughly on the Saturday before. It is, it has to be said, a stunning flat to look at.

There are things about any flat that get you down, though. We had some great neighbours. We had some hellish neighbours. We got some evicted, once. Ah, happy happy memories.

We drove back. The coast road up from Stranraer to Glasgow was stunning, partly due to the season and the weather, and partly due to the preponderance of shirtless chavs taking their feral children for a paddle. We held hands a lot.

It wasn't the dream ending to a life of international travel. It was the end of an era, though.

Dublin: See you again soon.

Slitheen, Cybermen, Daleks, Sontarans, Weeping Angels. Week five is Villain Week.

World War III

Some of the deaths in the previous episode are conveniently forgotten, the Slitheen look different as CGI from costumes, and there's a comedy chase scene.

The Slitheen are one of the few races who don't wear masks half the time for budgetary reasons. They have a few good twists to them, but they are ultimately a bit rubbish.

Rise of the Cybermen

And we've got an alternate universe with alternate versions of characters and a new origin for the Cybermen. Nicely realised, it feels like there's a lot more to this world than is shown on screen. And the Cybermen are suitably monolithic.

Evolution of the Daleks

Bring on the parade of bad science. Magic lightning, random hybrids, so on and so forth. But Daleks in a theatre in the 1930s is pretty cool. Shame that the "Human Dalek" isn't.

The Poison Sky

Picks up all of the elements from the previous story, runs them on to logical conclusions, with a nice good role for Bernard Cribbins. And by throwing Donna on to a spaceship, she becomes critical to the plot - and steps up to the mark admirably.

It's a shame that in later stories she decided she was useless.

Flesh and Stone

It's a game of two halves. We've got the Angels approaching through the forest on the spaceship, we've got Amy walking through the forest with her eyes closed, while all around her people are vanishing, we've got Octavian and his sacrifice. Almost a bottle episode, just a couple of sets.

And then at the end, we have the crack. The none-too-subtle thread running through the first few episodes is addressed, and used, and to some extent dealt with. And it leads back to Amy's home, where she behaves in a not unreasonable manner.

Ranking for Episode 5

1. Flesh and Stone


2. Rise of the Cybermen


3. The Poison Sky


4. Evolution of the Daleks


5. World War III

Only one point separates the first three series. I'm interested to see where this is going.

Aliens of London

Russell T Davies brings us London. Spaceships flying in to the houses of Parliament, UNIT, Television news covering the whole thing. Rose, controversially at the time, tells the Doctor he's so gay, and the monsters are disappointing fart creatures.

The Girl in the Fireplace

Beautiful story, with small character moments, great set pieces of horses jumping through mirrors, good character work throughout, and an almost perfect conclusion. Hard to believe it's the same series as farting Slitheen

Daleks in Manhattan

Clearly, however, this is the same series as Aliens of London. Mind you, it's a great setting, the Daleks are developed a bit, and the design is beautiful. It was rumoured that there were going to be Art Deco Daleks in this. However, all the Daleks in this era were pretty much Deco to begin with. As opposed to now, when they are Playmobil.

The Sontaran Stratagem

It's a "best-of" episode 4 compilation! Threat on contemporary Earth, check. First part of two-part story bringing back an old monster, check. UNIT, check. First trip back to companion's family, check.

It also brings back Martha, once more addressing the issue of what happens to companions when they leave. Martha's arc is an interesting one here, not least because Freema Agyeman spends most of the time playing a clone. Enjoyable, though, and UNIT troops only recruit the handsome ones.

The Time of Angels

Say what you like about Stephen Moffat, he knows how to write episode 4.

Bringing back two of his creations - the much-loved Weeping Angels and the Marmite-flavoured River Song, putting them together in a cinematic story with warrior clergymen, some great misdirection, a bit of Ring and some fantastic dialogue... potentially great.

Not quite as great as The Girl in The Fireplace for me, though. Something about it - the direction, the sound mix, something just made it feel a little less polished.

So, after four stories we have

Ranking for Episode 4

1. The Girl In The Fireplace


2. The Time of Angels


3. The Sontaran Stratagem


4. Daleks in Manhattan


5. Aliens of London

Series 4 and 2 are very close now, with Series 5 edging in to third position. Series 1 is languishing very much in fifth place, and looks unlikely to change

Next week: Week 5 means classic monsters every year. And the Slitheen.

The Unquiet Dead

Historical setting, high-profile guest star, gag about Wales, bit about Christmas. All good. Except it just kind of misses. The Gelth don't come across too well - they're hard to make out, sometimes. And it's trying too hard to evoke The Talons of Weng Chiang, which it can't do well, because it wasn't made in the 1970s.

School Reunion

And here we have a couple of icons, and proof, if proof were needed that this is the same series that Lis Sladen was in in the 1970s. Some great character moments for Billie and Lis, and Mickey realises that he's the metal dog. All of which makes this episode rise above the thinness of the plot.

Gridlock

Heavy on the CGI, reuse of sets and characters, combining the returning Cat People from Season 2 with the Macra from the 1960s. Another slim plot, bookended with the Doctor talking about Gallifrey - and that's what lifts this story.

Planet of the Ood

In their previous outing, the Ood were an innocent race, used by an outside force, and they all died. All of them. That's not really a very good message, perhaps, to send out to kids. Yes, they had red eyes and went mad and stuff, but here they carry their brains around, and they get liberated from slavery. Which they would probably have done without the Doctor being around, actually.

Catherine Tate is very good.

Victory of the Daleks

I want to like this one more. I want to proclaim it as a hidden gem of a story, with the humour of the Daleks offering tea, the fantastic dog fight, the brilliant reveal of new daleks, and the humanity of the characters - even the robots.

It's got great hopes for itself, but it fails.

Part of the problem is that it needs to be a longer story. The Dalek subterfuge needs to be questionable for longer - there needs to be a real feeling that the Doctor is wrong about them. And then there's the reveal of the new range of toys that look like a marketing group sat down and wondered "how can we make these nasty machines of death less threatening and more cuddly?"

Curse of Fenric handled war better, over twenty years ago. And it had Tomek Bork in it.

Ranking for Episode 3

1. School Reunion


2. Gridlock


3. Planet of the Ood


4. The Unquiet Dead


5. Victory of the Daleks

Series Four extends its lead, but Series Two and Three are close behind. Next: Slitheen, Clockwork, Daleks, Sontarans and Angels.

The End of the World

And in episode 2, we get diverse aliens, Britney Spears, Rose befriending a local, being under threat, a swift resolution, the first mentions of the Time War, and a scene about chips.

Almost as important to get episode 2 right as episode 1, and this does pretty damn well.

Tooth and Claw

However, by series 2, things are very different. The Doctor's established. Rose is established. So we have Scotland, a werewolf, martial arts monks that not only exist for no reason, also vanish for no reason, and the beginnings of Rose being smug in time and space. Impressive werewolf, though.

The Shakespeare Code

Perhaps the role of episode 2 is to set up the strengths of the companion, to really bed them in. It didn't really happen in TEotW, as Rose was damsel in distress with Jabe as assistant. Here we've got Martha's feelings for the Doctor in the mix, some witches, some glib cultural references. It's fun. But not on a par with

The Fires of Pompeii

which is possibly the beginning of the end for Tennant's Doctor. Lots of angst about not being able to change history, you see. Reminding us that Donna will challenge him, will ultimately be more human than he is. And sometimes she'll be right.

The Beast Below

We're still establishing a new Doctor and a new companion. He doesn't interfere unless there's a child crying. Amy gets separated, gets nosy because she's a nosy person, and we get the beginnings of mystery about her crack

Ranking for Episode 2

1. The Fires of Pompeii


2. The End of the World


3. The Shakespeare Code


4. The Beast Below


5. Tooth and Claw

Series 4 - Series 5 - Series 1 - Series 3 - Series 2

A reminder.

I have split Britain, hypothetically, in to twelve states - Northern Ireland, Wales, Scotland, East, South-East, South-West, North-East, North-West London, East Midlands, West Midlands and Yorkshire and Humberside,

I have taken the general election results for the last fifty years, and assumed the same votes and constituencies had made up a local federal government.

Finally, I have assumed that the Prime Minister in a UK central government was from the party which won the greatest number of "states".

The following things are the initial points of interest...

• Whichever party Northen Ireland voted for would never have got in.
• There's a clear North/South divide.
• Seven States never change control in fifty years - East, South-East and South-West are staunchly Conservative, while Scotland, Wales, North-East and Yorkshire and Humberside are consistent Labour states.
• Whichever party won London would have won the UK.
• The Prime Minister would have differed from the current system on two occasions. In 1970 Harold Wilson would have been re-elected, and in 2010 Gordon Brown would have been re-elected.

There's more data for me to look at, but it's an interesting exercise.

Doctor Who. Which series is best? There's only one way to find out - rank them, episode by episode.

Rose

Introduction to the brave new world. Had a lot to do. It introduced us to rubber Mickey, won the day with Anti-Plastic and had a great speech or two about the spinning of the world.

New Earth

As the first real full story for David Tennant's Doctor, this had some running to do to catch up. Fortunately, bringing back Cassandra and the Face of Boe gave a confident familiarity. The hospital didn't have a little shop, but the leads were both strong. The resolution was pretty glib - mixing together all the cures in the world making something that can cure anything... but that's kind of the way of these things.

Smith and Jones

The first new companion since the series began, coming in cold. Freema Agyeman's Martha comes across as clever, sensible and grounded. The hospital does have a little shop, and the villain is a little old lady with a straw.

Partners in Crime

I'm waving at fat. Enough said. And the sign-language section.

The Eleventh Hour

Some big shoes to fill - for the first time since 2005, we were seeing a new Doctor and a new companion in the same story. Some good parts - not least the whole post-regeneration eating session. Good start to a season, and full of promise of what is to come...

Overview

Generally speaking, five good strong stories. Hard to rank them, really, but here goes.

1. The Eleventh Hour
2. Partners in Crime
3. New Earth
4. Smith and Jones
5. Rose

I've done some stats.

I've done quite a lot of stats, actually, looking at the following question:

"If the UK was a federal system, what might it look like?"

I'm doing this on the basis of splitting up England, partly because I can, and partly because I think it makes sense.

The idea, you see, is to extend the idea of the Scottish Parliament and the Welsh Assembly to the rest of the Kingdom, and I've been using the EU seats, pretty much because they're there, but also because they have the benefit of splitting up the UK in to some fairly equally sized chunks, some of which I strongly suspect have different characteristics.

I've looked at results of General Elections over the past fifty years, and I've started with Scotland because it's always going to be one of the most contentious.

In 1959 - the first election I'm looking at, the Conservative and Unionist Party took 28 seats - almost 40% of the seats available. By 2010, there is one Conservative MP in Scotland.

The interesting thing is when they lost the seats and who they lost them to.

28 is the peak in the period I'm looking at. There was something of a decline in Conservative support over the next 20 years, but even in 1979, 22 Scottish Tories joined the first Thatcher Government.

Even in 1983, 21 Scottish Tory MPs were elected. Then, in 1987 the number of MPs dropped to 10. It seems likely that the main event triggering this was the closure of a number of pits in the North of England, Scotland and Wales, with the consequent loss of 20,000 jobs in these areas.

The seats lost don't show any real pattern. While some are in mining areas, others (eg Edinburgh Central) are not. The main benefactor was the Labour party, who had been losing some ground to the Liberal Democrats and Scottish National Party.

Between the elections in 1987 and 1992, the Government introduced the Community Charge ("Poll Tax"). This was pretty much universally hated. Virtually impossible to enforce and woefully mistargeted at the best of times, it was also introduced in Scotland a year earlier than England. It's often cited as one of the reasons why "Scotland will never vote Tory again," which is an ironic impact of a choice by a party that ostensibly seeks to strengthen and maintain the Union between the various parts of the UK.

Despite this, there was one more Conservative MP after the 1992 election. By 1997, however, there were none. With one exception, this remains the case.

On 2010 results, over 50% of the seats in Scotland are represented by Labour MPs, and this would have been the case consistently over the last 50 years.

The old witch has a lot to answer for.