17 March 2024

London Loop Section 18

Or [audible squelching], as it would appear on a Netflix show.

Yesterday, I made my way to Enfield Lock station in the north of London, intending to cover Sections 18 and 19 of the London Loop. This would entail a walk to Chingford, then another one from there to Chigwell. About 9.5 miles.

Now it started off reasonably OK, apart from getting rather lost on the first bit of the walk before I realised I'd turned off one turn too early.

I reached Enfield Lock, not the biggest thing to name an area after by a long chalk.

I crossed over the River Lee Flood Relief Channel, which marks the boundary between the London Borough of Enfield and Epping Forest, which isn't in London.

So far, so good. Then I crossed Sewardstone Road and the whole thing went to pot. Or rather to mud. The next field I had to cross was very muddy and the grass itself squelched under my boots as I walked along. It hadn't rained that day, but a bunch of rain from previous days and weeks had saturated the ground.

Things didn't get much better condition-wise from there. Several times I was having to step across muddy puddles that were deep enough that you couldn't see the bottom and came dangerously close to the liquid mud ending up inside my boots. They needed extensive cleaning when I got home.

I passed Gilwell Park, home of the Scout Association (I went there when I was in Cubs) and then got some great views towards Central London from Yates Meadow.


I eventually reached Chingford, back in the London Borough of Waltham Forest and had lunch in the Holly Trail Café before making a start on Section 19, hoping things would get better.

I got as far as the Butler's Retreat and seeing the path ahead was still a quagmire, my heart was no longer in it. I wasn't prepared to spend at least two more hours trudging through thick mud, especially as the weather was turning.

So, after a look round the Visitor Centre and the Queen Elizabeth Hunting Lodge (that the Tudor monarch probably never personally used), I headed for home.

I plan to do the next two stages - getting me to Havering-atte-Bower - at some point in April, keeping a careful eye on the weather as usually. Hopefully be less muddy then... 

13 March 2024

Don't mind me. I'm just here for the screaming British woman (Review: 'Damsel')


Millie Bobby Brown is very much one of the main attractions of Netflix. At least they seem to think so, considering that they make big films centred around her, with The Electric State coming next.

Now, I wouldn't call myself a massive fan of the woman in Stranger Things (I prefer other characters in that), but she's pretty charming in Enola Holmes and when I saw this movie was coming out, I decided that there are worse ways to spend two commutes. I watched this on my tablet, so I didn't notice the CGI issues.

So anyway, my thoughts on this:

  • The movie takes rather a long time to get going. It's about thirty minutes before Elodie is yeeted into the dragon pit.
  • MBB is admittedly one of the common type of "slightly haughty posh British actresses"; or that's the sort of roles she plays outside of Stranger Things. Playing a noble lady therefore comes across as fine, but without a great dialogue coach, she's not going to pass as a shop assistant from Romford, unlike say Michelle Dockery.
  • Elodie screams a lot. Like seriously a lot. In fairness, much of it is in circumstances where screaming is to be expected, but MBB is definitely getting the reputation as a scream queen out of this. The actress has a wonderfully expressive face and can do a range of emotions very well; there's a good overall progression to her arc in this movie. A movie openly feminist and released on International Women's Day to boot.
  • Another aspect is that this is basically "Millie Bobby Brown does a striptease". Well, part of one. Her dress gets progressively torn to shreds over the course of the movie and by the end, she's gone from "royal ball" to "Romford nightclub and having fallen down the escalator at the Brewery". She gets some fairly nasty injuries, but most of them are healed and nothing ends up detracting from her beauty at the end of it.
  • There's some deep horror stuff in all of this, because Elodie isn't the first young woman to have been fed to this particular dragon by a long chalk.
  • The plot is a pretty good one, although some of the character motivations at the end are a bit odd and the conclusion of the story leaves some big questions open about the future.
  • Shohreh Aghdashloo has exactly the right sort of voice you'd want for a dragon; reminding of the late Sir John Hurt in Merlin.
  • Ray Winstone does Ray Winstone, just Ray Winstone with a castle. Now, I say that Pegasus was a one-trick pony, but I get a feeling that he was slightly miscast in this one.
  • Robin Wright as an evil queen is arguably the best of the rest of the cast; one notes that one of her early roles was of course in The Princess Bride. None of the others really stand out.
  • One can't help but notice the resemblance in names between "Elodie" and "Eleven". No-one makes an "El-o-die" pun, which is a pity.

Conclusion

A decent enough film, but not a true great. Definitely saved by Millie Bobby Brown.

7/10

09 March 2024

Scanning old material

I've been scanning some of my old notes and am currently finishing off the scan of my Persian Incursion playthrough that I did in 2012-2013. If you look in the November 2012 posts, that's where it starts

The raw PDF will be uploaded here shortly - minus 10 pages I somehow failed to save before throwing the originals away.

21 February 2024

Not Skimping on the Skimpy (Review: 'Star Trek' 3.13, "Elaan of Troyius")

  • Biochemical stuff making a woman irresistible to men? I've seen that sort of thing several times before. It's also date rape.
  • Elaan wears no less than four revealing outfits in this episode. Some of the other outfits are typical Trek silly ones.
  • Diplomacy is about being nice to people that you utterly despise. Jay Robinson does a great job as Petri in this regard, reminding me of the late Alan Rickman.
  • Arranged marriages are inherently dubious. That should have been explored in more depth and would have been today.
  • France Nuyen, who plays Elaan here worked with William Shatner four times, including on stage in The World of Suzie Wong in 1958-59, where they both won awards.
  • I hadn't noticed this until I saw it discussed on Memory Alpha, but the Dragon Lady stereotype is in full force here - with a mixed heritage actress seemingly using brown make-up to make her skin darker.
  • This marks the first appearance of the D7 battle cruiser in Klingon use; it previously featured in  "The Enterprise Incident" (filmed after this but aired earlier) in Romulan service.
  • Engineering clearly isn't very well guarded. One red shirt, who swiftly ends up with a broken neck.
  • We're in full "sneaky Russians" mode with the Klingons here. By having the Enterprise blow up and killing Elaan, they'll trigger a war and be able to take over the ruins.
  • William Shatner does a very strong performance here, with subtle emotional performances and a strong commanding moment in the climax.

Conclusion

Some of the action in this is pretty good. Some of the gender and ethnic politics less so.

5/10

05 February 2024

King Charles III diagnosed with cancer

 I wish His Majesty all the best at this difficult time for him and his family.

Space Saw (Review: 'Star Trek' 3.12, "The Empath")

I've never actually seen any of the Saw movies, by the way. Anyway:

  • How did the record tape get on the table in the first place when the two people involved were transported away?
  • This was one of the four TOS cases where someone sent in a script unsolicited and it actually got made into an episode. I wasn't aware you could actually do that!
  • Of course, the lifeform is female!
  • Clearly saving on the set construction costs here with the minimalist set construction more akin to a theatrical production. I'm reminded of "Spectre of the Gun", which did similar.
  • That's a 1960s haircut if ever I've seen one.
  • Having walked ten kilometres today, I can tell you that six is not a short distance to walk.
  • Of course, Kirk's shirt comes off again! But McCoy's one gets damaged as well.
  • This is all rather Swan Lake with the balletic style movements at times. Not that I've ever seen that.
  • The Vians are torturing people. In fact, the BBC didn't air this in the original run and not at all until 1994, although Sky One aired shortly before that.
  • There's some very good shots here with injuries fading in and out; remember this was pre-CGI.

Conclusion

An alright episode, but not a great one. Clearly a budget saver.

7/10

20 January 2024

A superb theatrical experience (Review: 'Stranger Things: The First Shadow')

Went to see this at the Phoenix Theatre today. 

Definitely the most spectacular thing I have ever seen in an actual theatre that does plays; there's some brilliant effects more akin to an actual episode of the television show, where it's hard to tell what's live and what's been pre-recorded.

The cast are great; remember this is a mostly British cast doing American accents. In particular, the Oliver-nominated Isabella Pappas as Joyce and Louis McCartney as Henry Creel stand out.

The runtime is very long, but there's an awful lot of plot covered during it and it definitely sets up Season 5 very well.

Definitely worth £75, although bring your own cold drinks because they're very expensive in the theatre.

10/10

26 December 2023

Well, at least it's not Hobgoblins (Review: 'Doctor Who', "The Church on Ruby Road")

  • I get a feeling we're going to see that mysterious woman at the church again.
  • The letters in the companion actor's name get out of the way of the TARDIS. They're sensible, I see.
  • Ncuti Gatwa has a very different energy about him to David Tennant or the other Doctors. Which is of course a good thing. He's got a strong heroic vibe and is a fast talker as well, which are good Doctor traits to have.
  • Millie Gibson as Ruby - bit early to say if I like her. She feels generic RTD companion to me, but she does have the whole "foundling" back story. She does a decent enough job though.
  • A new sonic screwdriver and those special gloves. See they're trying to sell more merchandise.
  • The Disney budget is clearly displayed on the screen - they'd never have this many goblins in the old days.
  • Goblins have fallen rather out of the popular mainstream in the last few decades and I'm not sure this will do much to bring them back; they don't really do that much that makes them a real threat bar "pranks".
  • Most of the goblin musical bit was released on YouTube before the episode along with an accompanying single on Spotify. It's a highlight of the episode, which isn't saying a great deal for the overall quality.
  • The rules of time travel have never been consistently applied in this show, that's for sure.
  • Suspect we'll be seeing Mrs. Flood again.

Conclusion

A fairly mediocre episode, saved by the quality of its leads.

6/10