bennet_7

- Right now I'm going through a Sif/Loki from Thor phase. Luckily cobweb_diamond is also feeling these feelings (THERE ARE SO MANY) and I have been able to piggyback on her fandom adventures. Here is a handy dandy ship manifesto she put together.

- I tried out Pan Am for four episodes but it's just not good. Dropped.

- I marathoned Once Upon A Time a couple of weeks ago and was charmed but it's not very good either. It's just too Disney. I'll give it a couple more episodes, though.

- I am watching and sometimes enjoying Hart of Dixie without shame (I am a duck and your judgement is the rain). I really think it would be a better show if Rachel Bilson banged her hot redneck neighbour instead of pining for nice lawyer guy who is engaged.

- Shows I am watching out of habit: The Office and How I Met Your Mother. The former is close to being dropped.

- I really enjoy Revenge but I don't care about any of the characters. It's a weird new experience for me because normally I find at least one character to invest in but here there is no emotional involvement on my part. I mean, I guess I like Nolan best but I probably wouldn't if he didn't dress as he does. Thing I am excited about: ( Spoilers )

- The Dan and Blair Show is apparently coming back this week!

- If you're looking for a hilarious half-hour British comedy, may I recommend Spy? It stars a bunch of awesome people (including Mat Baynton from Horrible Histories!) in the story of a single dad who is unwittingly recruited into MI:6 but cannot win the approval of his Machiavellian nine year old son (for real, his kid is amazing. Normally I hate precocious kids but Marcus is a little shit who reads George W. Bush biographies and wants to head the IMF. I love him.).

- I have tried Ricky Gervais's new show. Was not impressed but I'll give it the series.

- For my fill of drama The Good Wife has been kicking ass and taking names, Being Erica has had issues but is still wonderful, and Homeland has been rocking my socks off. Claire Danes and Damian Lewis for all the awards.

- Yes, Dan Harmon, you are really clever but your constant need to point out how clever you are (and also - always - the way you have turned Britta into the buttmonkey) is disrupting my enjoyment of Community.

- Misfits is amazing. I don't miss Nathan at all.

- But in conclusion: Parks and Rec is the best! I would like to go on the record and state how much I love it.

Some things that I watched in the order that I watched them.

The Killing

Another good episode but I'm slightly concerned that ( Spoilers )

Forbrydelsen

I watched the first episode of the original Danish version of The Killing and damn it was weird. So many similarities, not just in terms of the script, but the shot composition and the acting choices as well - particularly Mitch Larsen. I knew before that the two series shared the same composer but it was really jarring to hear the same music cues used. There are some notable differences though, mostly in the structure. You learn something about Stan in the first Danish episode that only comes up in the fourth American one.

I know that the killer is going to be different and that the American version will eventually diverge from the original but for now I'm going to wait to watch the rest of Forbrydelsen until after The Killing is finished as its the latter I'm currently more involved with and I don't want to be spoiled on even the smallest details.

Game of Thrones

I wasn't super psyched for this one because it looked grim, depressing, and incesty and it is all those things but I enjoyed it anyway and am really looking forward to the next episode. ( Spoilers )

How I Met Your Mother

Decent! Loved the credits.

Chuck

Beige! The only bright spot for me was Sarah's impression of Chuck's intersect face.

Cougar Town

Yes, I watch Cougar Town. I swear it's really really good! These episodes were no exception: funny, but with heart. Penny can!

The Chicago Code

I liked how this episode showed that there are people other than Gibbons that Teresa has to fight. ( Spoilers )

The Dan and Blair Show

Feeling remarkably optimistic about this one because ( Spoilers )

Parks and Recreation

Was the best! As always! ( Spoilers )

Community

I enjoyed this episode a lot more than any other of late, even as it pointed out just how formulaic Community can be. ( Spoilers )

The Office

I was whelmed. ( Spoilers )

Doctor Who

I liked a lot of this episode but I think I'm going to need to see the next part to figure out if I love it. ( Spoilers, sweetie )

I finished/handed in my thesis a couple of weeks ago and since then I have been decompressing. This has involved sleeping in late, taking the time to cook elaborate meals, reading books with no other purpose than enjoyment, re-establishing contact with friends and family, and watching a lot of TV that I missed out on.

Here are my thoughts on various shows.

( 10 Things I Hate About You )

( Chuck )

( Community )

( Dance Academy )

( Doctor Who )

( The Good Wife )

( How I Met Your Mother )

( Modern Family )

( The Office )

( Parks and Recreation )

( The Vampire Diaries )


So El-Jay, what's up?

So I haven't posted in aaaages. Sorry about that. Partly, it's because I was working a really crappy job. I'd never been so miserable and so bored and so frustrated before and I didn't want to spew all that bile into this journal - LJ is my escape from real life.

I've gotten out of the habit of posting and I've found it hard to break the silence but I really want to get back into the swing of things. Any kind of writing is good for me, whether it's a 2,500 word essay on the cult of Amun in the New Kingdom or a paragraph on what I'm watching on TV at the moment, so I'm gonna try and do the latter a bit more (I did the former last semester and once was enough).

Right at the moment even a paragraph is beyond me so I'll take a baby step and start with a list of stuff I've been doing lately:

- Cooking. I've been baking, roasting, stir-frying, boiling, and leaving-to-cool-to-room-temperature a lot and I'm loving it. I've always liked cooking but I've started experimenting more, attempting my own recipes (with mixed results). Next time I make something impressive I'll post pictures.

- Reading Little Dorrit by Charles Dickens. I quite enjoyed the recent mini-series and the book is good to but it's very Dickensian - whole chapters about characters I don't like or don't care about and I struggle with those (though this isn't as bad as Our Mutual Friend. I refuse to give up but it's slow going.

- Re-watching The West Wing. The parallels between the campaign in season 7 and recent real life have me itching to skip forward but I'm still watching season 1 at the moment.

- Watching Being Erica (it has Eric from Wonderfalls!), How I Met Your Mother (spot the baby bumps!), Gossip Girl (why can't something good happen to Blair?), The Office (really good this season), 30 Rock (not so great this season), and Scrubs (oh dear lord but do I want that teal dress Elliot was wearing in the last episode).

What about you?

I haven't updated in ages for a couple of reasons, chief of which has been uni. I've been so busy lately with school, researching and writing, and I tend to feel guilty about posting to lj if I haven't finished the latest assignment. Fortunately, that hard work has been paying off as my current results stand at three high distinctions and one distinction, which isn't too shabby at all. One of those HDs was for an essay on the relationship between India and China since their independence and my prof said that it was the best essay he'd read in ages.

So yeah, very cool.

Unfortunately, all this hard work has had a deleterious effect on my health and I caught the flu. The worst part has been the headaches which were so bad I spent my 20th birthday (which was Tuesday) in bed. Not cool. Plus, I had an essay due the next day which I hadn't finished so I ended up doing that too. Yuck.

But I'm definitely on the mend now. I finished my last assignment this morning and spent three blissful hours sitting on the couch watching the 1996 BBC mini-series of Anne Bronte's The Tenant of Wildfell Hall.

(Which was very good by the way. While there were some diversions from the novel which slightly irked, it did succeed in capturing the spirit of the novel which is better. Helen was just as kickass awesome as she is in the novel, but I didn't immediately warm to the way they wrote Gilbert. They took away his narration of the story which disappointed me, but as Gilbert comes of as very smug in both the novel and series, it might have been a good idea. Anyway, the camera work was a lot less staid than you generally see in period mini-series and I for one was thankful, and the performances were great. It isn't as good as Pride and Prejudice or North and South, but I recommend this one).

Anyway, I have been sort of keeping up with the TV shows because I watch them while eating. That way I use the excuse "Hey, can't eat and type at the same time!" and my conscience is ok with that.

Here are my thoughts on:

( Pushing Daisies )

( Chuck )

( Gossip Girl )

( Dirty Sexy Money )

( Heroes )

( The Office )

I haven't been watching Dexter so far, but I plan to catch up. I've avoided Friday Night Lights but I am going to give the second season a shot, despite my misgivings.

Finally, my icon: great or greatest?

The latest ep of The Office was really great.

( Spoilers )

To all my friends and family who have doubted my psychic powers the joke is on you. I awoke this morning at 8:30 (which was, perhaps, the real miracle) certain in the belief that my latest order from Amazon.com would be sitting on my doorstep and it was (and sure I got the doorstep wrong but, hey, it was a step from a door from my house and I knew it would get here today so let's not split hairs ok?).

So now I have Season 2 of the US version of The Office, Our Mutual Friend on DVD and the two Dexter novels by Jeff Lindsay. In the words of Steve Holt, "Steve Holt!"

( A poll about cheesecake just because I can )

My five favourite things from the most recent episode of The Office as a picspam.

( Can this show get any better? )

16 icons from "Traveling Salesman" and "The Return".



( Icons! )

Due to some technical difficulties that I hope are finally resolved, I've been having trouble downloading all my shows. Haven't seen The Daily Show or The Colbert Report in aaaaages but I'm now caught up on Studio 60 and The Office (US).

( Studio 60: 1.02 )

( Studio 60: 1.03 )

( The Office: 3.02 )

And finally, on friday night I was in the same room as Hugh Jackman and it was awesome. He was, of course, performing in the musical The Boy from Oz which is the story of Australian singer/song writer Peter Allen. Hugh was fantastic - he has such a huge presence on stage. He spent two years here studying at the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts (WAAPA) so he knows Perth well and littered the show with lots of references and in-jokes, even appearing in the football jersey of one our our state's teams.

The story itself wasn't terribly good (I've seen a lot better), but Hugh more than made up for it, spending about 20 minutes amongst the audience and even dancing with one guy. Truly hilarious.

And when they sang "I still call Australia home" I must confess there were tears in my eyes. The had a huge flag and a choir - it was like a QANTAS ad ;-)

For my fellow Farscape fans, Murray Bartlett who played Crichton's best friend DK, played Peter Allen's lover Greg - no you don't get to see Hugh make out with another guy, they only ever hug ;-)

Here is the Broadway cast recording. Sadly they didn't do an Australian cast recording but this one is still a great listen.

And if you're taking any of the music, can you let me know please? I need to keep track of the bandwith. Thanks.

I have started watching the U.S. version of The Office. I adore the original version, which I know doesn't appeal to everybody, and when I heard that they were re-making it for Americans I was very much opposed.

Because seriously, why can't Americans watch the original TV shows? It is a complete mystery to me why instead of thinking "Hey let's show this to people" they think "Hey let's spend millions of dollars remaking this for people." I just do not get it.

But anyway, it turns out that the American version of The Office is actually good (it's not like the American versions of Coupling and Red Dwarf at least) so I downloaded the first season.

( More on the subject, very minor spoilers )

I've just discovered that there is a French version of The Office known as Le Bureau which is apparently very good, and there is soon to be a Quebecois version called La Job. I'm going to try and find a subtitled version of Le Bureau this weekend.

And now, for all my talk of the original version of The Office being over and done, Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant wrote, produced and starred in two hilarious training videos for Microsoft UK, with Ricky once again playing David Brent. They are hilarious and can be watched here.

Stephen, for (a) being tall, (b) wearing glasses, and (c) being incredibly funny, is my new boyfriend.

( Picture of new boyfriend )