Tag Archives: Anthony Stewart Head

Morganville – SDCC trailer

02 Saturday Aug 2014

Posted by in Film, Publicity

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As you should all know by now, I am a big fan of the Morganville series of novels by Rachel Caine. So much so that I became a backer for the Kickstarter campaign that aimed to produce a Webcast show of the series. I guess that makes me a producer (I am opting for the title of Chief Executive Producer in charge of giving over a small amount of cash to help make this happen). Anyway, the trailer for this series was released at San Diego Comic Con and while I was not there to see it myself, I did get sent an exclusive link to see it because of my backer involvement… so here it is:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GwUtF-P6cqs

Of course they did not follow my casting picks. I guess David Tennant was not available to play Myrnin and Anthony Stewart Head was not able to play Oliver. However, looking at the trailer you can see some stellar choices made. In particular you may recognise Amber Benson of Buffy fame as Amelia and Robert Picardo (yes, THAT Robert Picardo of Voyager fame in a grey wig) as Oliver.

So it is all looking promising and reasonably close to the source material. About the only thing I have spotted so far that is possibly different is that if this series is following book 1 they are introducing Myrnin too soon but since he is awesome I cannot see an issue with that…

So, yes, in my opinion (as Chief Executive Producer in charge of giving over a small amount of cash to help make this happen) you should totally check this out when it airs… especially if you like Buffy, Vampires or Voyager.

D.A Lascelles is the author of Lurking Miscellany, Transitions (Mundania Press) and Gods of the Sea (Pulp Empires). He lives in Manchester UK. You can sometimes see him writing about Zombie porn on https://lurkingmusings.wordpress.com/ but he mostly blogs about books, vampires, science fiction and Terry Pratchett. He is inordinately proud of the fact that one of his Pratchett articles was referenced on the French version of the author’s Wikipedia page.

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/DaLascelles

Twitter: @areteus

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[Vampire Month] Still a better love story than Twilight

29 Friday Mar 2013

Posted by in Vampire Month

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‘Still a better love story than Twilight’ seems to be a common refrain on the internets at the moment. Twilight has been a book and film series that seems to have polarised geekdom, turning many against the idea of Vampire fiction while, at the same time, bringing a horde of teenage girls into it.

Many misunderstood Ridley Scott’s reimagining of Romeo and Juliet

Geeks are a weird bunch. We hate change. We like routine and things to be as they have always been. We recall the ‘good old days’ like dear old grannies recall the casual racism and horrors of the past – through spectacles so rose tinted we are practically blind. We remember how great things used to be without recalling some of the really awful things – shoddy special effects, awful dialogue, overacting. When something new comes along claiming to be ‘geek’ we hate it and the ‘johnny come lately’ fans that come with it. They aren’t real geeks, we complain. They weren’t there, man, in the trenches in the days when they cancelled Doctor Who, they call themselves Vampire fans and they don’t even know who Christopher Lee is. I mentioned Lestat to them and they looked blank. THEY HAVEN’T EVEN READ DRACULA!

Of course, in 20 years time those same teenage girls who are the target of all this ire, will be there themselves –  hating on some other new trend. Sneering at some young newcomers at a con and complaining into their brown ale that these new Vampires don’t sparkle and that this entirely detracts from the whole angsty drama of the inherent horror of the vampiric condition because it juxtaposes the darkness of their soul with the light on their skin thereby providing a visual contrast the reader can identify with. This is how it goes in the cycle of geek. By then, of course, I will be an old man laughing at both groups, knowing that I am still far more geek than either and safe in the knowledge that the previous generation of geeks is not in any position to contradict me.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I am not saying that Twilight is good. There are many flaws in it and these do not include the ludicrous ‘glowing in sunlight’ nonsense which seems to be one of the main foci for attack. The heroine is far too passive, for example, which gives the whole love story angle a stalkery feel and, as the indoctorwhotwilightternet has reminded us repeatedly, undermines almost 40 years of feminism by convicing a new generation that all they need to be happy is to find an older man to look after them. This, above all others, is the main reason why the phrase ‘still a better love story than Twilight’ has been applied to a number of crazy pairings. The very fact that Fifty Shades of Grey started out life as a Twilight fan fic should tell you the inherent nature of the relationship here.

So, Twilight is certainly not flawless but I am not sure that the level of hate is quite to scale here. I think it is largely because it is such a big target – a massive fanbase who are intensely fantatical, the amplification of that fanbase through the films and a number of glaring flaws that even the dumbest geek can spot. At the moment it seems as if the entirety of geekdom is kicking into the franchise with big bovva boots because they have nothing else to do. And, yeah, I’ve done my share of that too. In geekdom the roles are reversed. It’s the big kid who gets attacked. And while I am not sure it deserves all the hate, it is equally undeserving of all the popularity.

However, it is worth considering what Twilight has actually achieved. Just as Interview with the Vampire and Buffy the Vampire Slayer before it, it has yet again put the Vampire in the forefront of publishing. Like the creatures themselves, it seems the vampire phenomenon is a hard one to kill – just as interest wanes something comes along to ressurect it. It is, I feel, a fitting concept. Plus, as Harry Potter did for fantasy, there is also the fact that more children/teenagers/adults reading is a good thing. Even if they begin by reading Twilight, many move onto to other things and the Vampire renaissance has led to such things as the Morganville Vampire books, which are in my opinion superior in many many ways. If only because they feature an insane, Welsh, medieval alchemist character by the name of Myhrrin who really should be played by David Tennant when they make the movie.*  So, maybe we should let the Twilight franchise alone for a little bit. It’s over with, the last film has been released. There is sure to be another thing we can enjoy hating along very soon.

*Yes, I have in fact written the cast list for the Morganville Vampires series in my head. It’s what I do. It also, by the way, includes Olivia Williams and Anthony Stewart Head as Amelia and Oliver. Please do not judge me in my insanity…

The Avengers UK: Crossover universes

15 Friday Jun 2012

Posted by in Film, Musings, Wierdness

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This particular photo-meme caught my eye the other day. It caused in me two almost simultaneous responses:

1) OMG someone should so make that film!!! Or at least make a fake trailer for it on You Tube by splicing together lots of bits of different shows in a way that makes it look as if they are all in the same plot!!!

2) There were no women in the group they had put together…

Before I discuss 2, let me just say that I really, really, REALLY want someone to make that trailer. Because I am sad like that. Such things really do amuse me. I went squee when I found this video done in celebration of Doctor Who’s 50th Anniversary. So if someone with the right skills could put together a video like that for the Avengers; United Kingdom I would be really pleased.*

Number 2… I was surprised at how much it concerned me. The fact that the purported fictional TV show was very Y chromosome heavy did make me wonder about the role of women in UK geek culture.

Now, don’t get me wrong. There are strong women in UK Geekdom. What concerned me was the fact that all the examples I could think of off the top of my head were supporting characters and many of them were already involved in the franchises represented by characters in that line up. Hermione Granger, various Doctor Who companions (Sarah Jane Smith and River Song being the two that spring most readily to mind), Judi Dench’s portrayal of M in James Bond… the UK just did not seem to have a straight up Geek lead character who was female (unlike the US where there are a few, though many of them are Whedon creations like Buffy). I was so concerned I expressed my opinion on Facebook and did get a couple of suggestions for strong female characters who were not involved in the franchises already mentioned (Emma Peel being one who I had somehow forgotten…) or who were sole leads (Lara Croft) but it does seem as if UK geekdom is a little thin on the ground. Plus, my concerns were not so much with the state of the feminist credentials of UK geekdom but rather with my own inability to think of some. I mean, I can be excused not thinking of Lara Croft because I have never played the game** nor watched the films but I used to watch the Avengers (the UK TV drama) all the time as a child*** so Emma Peel should have leapt out at me…

Maybe I am overthinking this, of course. It was, after all, just a fun bit of photo-manipulation that someone did. However, I think the discussion on facebook did come up with the following concept…

 – Ditch Harry Potter and replace him with Hermione. Her competence far exceeds his and it means we can have a couple of love scenes with Ron, who can also get jealous when Bond makes a move on her somewhere in the middle of the film (she’ll rebuff him, cos she’s not an idiot, though there may be some flirting, but Ron doesn’t know that…)

 – Chuck in Emma Peel in the Black Widow role. She fits the stereotype of that part perfectly, albeit with more English poise…

“I recognise the council has made a decision, but given that it’s a stupid-ass decision, I’ve elected to ignore it.”
Come on, you can so see her delivering that line as well as Samuel L Jackson did 🙂

– The team needs a Nick Fury. Someone to be all tough and shouty and manly and sarcastic at all the team members when they mess up. Which UK character suits this role best? Why, only Judi Dench’s M has the sheer brass balls to step into Samuel L Jackson’s shoes.

 – There has to be a role in this for Rupert Giles. Ok, technically Buffy the Vampire Slayer is a US show but Giles is so very British and there are few things that cannot be improved by the addition of Anthony Head. He could be the team’s librarian and be having an understated and typically British affair with M.

 – An enemy. In Avengers Assemble (or The Avengers as we still call it in the UK despite the rename…) that enemy was Loki who is devious and entertaining and malicious. There is really only one enemy that fits this mould in UK geekdom to my mind – The Master.

Of course there were other more outre suggestions for this film. Someone suggested that, since The Doctor is involved, in theory no time period is restricted. This means that we could have some other rather cool UK TV characters turning up. He suggested Richard Sharpe but we could also have Cadfael, the medieval mystery solving monk, Miss Marple and several others. Plus it might explain why Gene Hunt is there in 2012 (almost 30 years after the events of Ashes to Ashes and possibly in an alternate universe created by the minds of Sam Tyler and Alex Drake) and why Emma Peel is there (being, as she is, a character intrinsicly tied to the 1960s). In fact, in my head, this plot involves a centuries spanning plot spotted in several different time periods by different characters…

Hmmm, maybe I am overthinking this. Time to stop for now, I think. Before I start writing fan fic (and I have enough trouble finding time to write the characters I have created never mind taking on someone else’s intellectual property…)

What this does reveal is the appeal of crossover universes. Even though such things are ludicrous in concept and are likely to be done badly in fan fic and similar, they can be the cause of squee. They can also be done rather well in the right circumstances, as evidenced by the Wold Newton family created by Philip José Farmer  which ties many ficitonal characters (including Sherlock Holmes and James Bond) together into one family tree (making them all descendents of a group of people exposed to a radioactive meteorite near the North Yorkshire village of Wold Newton). There is also Alan Moore’s League of Extraordinary Gentlemen**** which has a similar concept. In fact, in the 1969 version of this series there is a very cool cameo by a certain Mr Tom Marvolo Riddle.

So, for discussion purposes, feel free to comment to add ideas for UK genre characters you would add to our Avengers team or for plot ideas for things that the team can face. Also comment if you have any other ideas for crossovers or actual crossovers that you have seen (whether they are well done or not).

*And if you could persuade Steve Moffat to actually make it, even better… having first made sure you have sacrificed to the gods of litigation to prevent various companies suiing him for Copyright… And if Moffat does want the gig and can sort out the copyright for the franchises he doesn’t own in that selection I have some plot ideas for him… 🙂

** No, really. I have never played Tomb Raider. I don’t tend to play computer games much. It’s ok, though. I checked. I don’t need to hand in my Geek card unless I also stop roleplaying and reading, watching and writing science fiction and fantasy.

*** And this had nothing to do with Emma Peel, leather catsuits and particular hormonal imbalances that occur around the age of 11. Absolutely nothing at all. I only ever watched it for the articles.

**** The graphic novel version not the film which was sort of OK (for, as Obi Wan Kenobi would say, a given value of OK which some may translate as ‘awful’) but had nothing on the graphic novel in terms of Victorian sleaze, drugs and nastiness and made Alan Quartermain not a drug addict and Mina Harker a vampire instead of the traumatised victim of a Vampire.

Being a Brit

17 Monday Oct 2011

Posted by in TV

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I feel I should warn you – this post is at risk of getting a little fanboyish. I think it is only fair that you get this warning because, as I am sure we are all aware, there are dangers inherent in second hand fanboyishness and it is my civic duty to ensure that you are saved from it.

Now that the ‘official government health warning’ is out of the way, I can get on with what I want to talk about today. Joss Whedon.

There, see, look what happened. The moment I say his name someone squeals and faints. It’s only relief I was not planning to talk about Nathan Fillion… Oh, bugger… Er, I’ll wait until the paramedics have sorted everyone out before I continue.

So, yes, Joss Whedon. I don’t think I need to bother with any introductions. I suspect that anyone with any claim to a semblance of geekdom is at least aware of the name of someone who is possibly one of the more influential people in geekery. He brought us Buffy the Vampire Slayer and revolutionised perceptions of horror while demonstrating that Sarah Michelle Gellar and Eliza Dusku look really hot in leather pants. He brought us Firefly and showed us that you do indeed get cowboys in space and that Nathan Fillion looks hot in cowboy duds. He created Dr. Horrible and showed how success is possible even without the big business backing and that Nathan Fillion looks hot in skintight t-shirts. He brought us Dollhouse and demonstrated that Eliza Dusku looks really hot in leather pants. Oh, and there was some quite profound lesson about equality, slavery and not treating people like objects in there too.

So, needless to say, he has had an influence and there has been much said about his attitude to strong women (‘Why do I write strong female characters?’), his feminist ideals both positively (Joss Whedon on Feminism) and negatively (A Rapist’s view of the world), his ability to subvert stereotypes (Mal’s best moments)  and concerns that he intends to kill off all the much loved Avengers characters in the upcoming film (‘What to expect when expecting Joss Whedon’s Avengers’ – pay especial attention to the comment about a major death in act 3).

What I want to talk about is his attitude to the British. In particular the English. You see, from the point of view of us over here in this tiny little kingdom of ours, the US has a strange opinion of us. ‘English’ accents are either very RP (to the extent that you would believe everyone is related to the Queen and went to the same elocution teacher) or so cockney that ‘within the sound of Bow bells’ can be interpreted as being as far away from London as Northumberland. We are invariably the bad guys in most Hollywood portrayals. As Eddie Izzard does say on one of his stand up tours, we are the only ethnicity it is still OK to demonise. I often find myself cringing whenever I see a British character portrayed on screen by American writers and directors and while many great actors do their level best to keep the side up they often end up mired in the cliches.

Now, Joss Whedon is guilty of these crimes. I am not denying that. His English characters (Buffy’s Rupert Giles, Dollhouse’s Adelle De Witt , Firefly’s Badger among others) display a cornucopia of stereotypes from the aforementioned RP accent to a liking for tea. However, the portrayals often come across as more than the stereotypes. I am not sure why this is, it seems hard to analyse the reasons for it. Perhaps it is due to the great acting talent that is employed in these characters (because it cannot be denied that there is some talent here). Perhaps it is how that talent is directed or how well it is written. However it comes about, English characters in Joss Whedon productions seem to acquire a vitality and depth which is often lost in other portrayals of ‘Englishness’ in American productions. Rupert Giles, for example, is overtly the stiff upper lipped English academic stereotype but as you delve deeper into his character you see the tearaway teenager he once was, before he became a Watcher, and the dodgy demon summoning occultist he was at University. Then there is the fatherly affection he has for the Slayer which is very understated but still present in every scene Anthony Stewart Head has with Sarah Michelle Gellar. Some of these elements come out in occasional, teasing flashes and you come to realise that the ‘bumbling librarian’ is actually a very clever front based on expectations.

Adelle De Witt is similar. On first viewing she is cold, efficient and immoral; all played excellently by Olivia Williams. Willing to serve in a role that is actually a high class, glorified Madam in a very expensive brothel. There are hints she does this for wealth and power – the connections to the Rossum corporation clearly guaranteeing both. However, as Dollhouse progresses, we see cracks in the Ice Maiden facade. They first appear in the first season episode Echoes (episode 7) when a drug causes all characters involved to reveal snippets of their secret inner selves and from that point on more and more of the ‘inner De Witt’ comes to the fore. As the series progresses we see less of the ice maiden, a common stereotype for strong English women, and more of the concerned mother who cares for all under her charge. As season two progresses, you see her face her demons and choose a side in the upcoming conflict between Rossum and the rest of the world, finally picking a side based on moral grounds rather than profit. In De Witt’s case, I believe it is a case of having to repress her natural instincts in favour of succeeding in a career and then facing a situation that even she cannot ignore.

Perhaps what we have here is a combination of Whedon’s desire to approach genre stereotypes and subvert them – showing the viewer an unexpected outcome to the one they expect – combined with an ability of skilled actors and writers to really get under the skin of these characters and  give them a great deal of depth. It applies to all the characters portrayed in the Whedonverse but I think it is especially relevant to his English characters because it is so rare to see them portrayed as being more than the stereotype. Also because, you know, I’m English and I like to see some role models of our greatest stereotypes done well.

And note, not once did I mention that his greatest British creation, the Cockerny Vampire Spike, is played by an American… 🙂

I am also wondering what we might expect in The Avengers. Will we get some interesting, British characters added to the Marvel universe?