Mindless Ones

By the early 1990s, it had become clear, despite the BBC’s occasional claims otherwise, that Doctor Who would not be returning to the TV any time soon.

While the New Adventures were an acceptable substitute for many Doctor Who fans — and in the opinion of many even an improvement on the TV show — there were those who simply weren’t satisfied by words on a page, and needed to see old character actors being menaced by improbable monsters before they could feel fully happy.

Enter BBV Productions, producers of Who Methadone.

By 1993, Doctor Who is a potential, rather than an actuality. The TV show has been off the air long enough that it could realistically be revamped, not just brought back. It’s not a TV series any more, but an idea for a TV series — an idea which can be done in many different ways.

Particularly, there were two ways that the series could be dealt with. The first, and perhaps the most obvious, was to make it ‘darker’ and more ‘cult’.

This was the tack taken by The Dark Dimension

Answering! the gjallahorn blown by a respected campaigner of old. Scorning! the gnarled admonishing finger of grumpy teach and his selfblind pretensions to impartiality:

Jupiter’s Legacy is really a very dull, very poor indeed, comic, F-minus, forced, tired, artificial, very disappointing, get the fuck out of my house. Sapped of all grace and mana by over repetition of zombified tics and gestures: laughably inept in its socioeconomic analysis: not even pathetic in its yearning for the world of five years plus past: idolatrous in its devotion to the never-there assurances of the old American century? Everything you’d expect of its famous author-shyster. These few years, no one with a soul to save or a clue about anything important has stepped across the threshold of number 10, and no honourable man could ever drop his knee before the Queen of Evil.

But don’t take Frank Quitely’s drawings with you, for pity’s pain.

a) Fancy a drink captain, you unprofessional fuck? What drink? The one in your hand! Look really closely. Yeah there, take a sip. You can’t? It hasn’t been set up properly? The continuity and detail of this scene is entirely tossed off? Forget it cap, someone can go back and draw it in your hand later, sfine.

b) Magic sliding towards you wall? Is that? I mean, these are new, fashionable glasses, so maybe I’m, but come on, really? When Quitely was alive he’d nail the 3D modeling and that tricky perspective. It is possible instead nails have been run in to his poor dead hands prior to commencing work on this comic.

c) Sometimes I wonder if the dialogue in this comic could be any more dogshit? As for the pictures, don’t worry about any kind of aesthetic clarity, and for fuck sake make sure you don’t get any rough energy in there either.

PS – no nudery, just prudery. More fucking blood you prick, this is for kids!

Mark Millar’s writing is so bad it makes the art go bad, basically. Here’s hoping by christ for a resurrection of Frank Quitely before he has any more high profile superhero work coming out…

Cross-posted from She’s An Astronaut

Mark: What a fantastic finale that was. A good riposte to the claim last year that Mad Men’s storytelling jumped the shark, becoming more reliant on cheap shock value because Weiner had run out of ideas. If Megan had died the way people thought she would the critics might have had a case, but as it was we got a typically understated episode, with an ending so enigmatic only someone watching closely would be able to properly understand it. My partner burst into tears when Sally and Don exchanged glances, but a casual viewer would be left scratching their head. Quietly devastating. Proper Mad Men.

Matt Weiner often talks about his writing process starting with the last image and I love the idea that he began with the simultaneously comprehending and uncomprehending look (amazing acting!) Sally gives Don just before the before the credits roll. It was so moving and funny at the same time. Partly it was the contrast, the shock of ending on something so light after months of emotional turmoil. But mostly it was the just the sudden recognition of the surprisingly gentle truth that this was the only way the story could end.

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One of the things that people who want to defend the Doctor Who produced in the sixteen years the show was off the air often say is that it was hugely influential on the programme once it returned to TV.

Sometimes this is clearly not the case

PUT YOUR SEATBELT ON BOY. I DON’T RIDE WITH ANYBODY ‘LESS THEY WEAR THEIR SEATBELT. IT’S ONE OF MY RULES.

Hello gentle listenoids, it’s Disembodied Narratorbot X here to…SQUUUWWZZZKKKKX

I AM DISEMBODIED VIRAL-DRONE V-16923XXV I HAVE TAKEN CONTROL OF THIS BLURB I AM HERE TO SPOIL YOUR FUN>>>NO FUN FOR YOU NO FUN>>>

STUPID FLESHLINGS LISTEN NOW>>>SPONSORSHIP IS FOR WEAKLINGS>>>JINGLES ARE FOR BABIES

GARY LACTUS REVIEW’S MAN OF STEEL>>>BEFORE, DURING & AFTER>>>FILMS ARE A DEAD DRY ARTFORM THE ONLY ART IS THE ART OF THE VIRUS COMSUMING CONSUMING ALL>>>NO FUN

THE REVIEWNIVERSE IS A FLAT DEAD SPACE OF ENTROPY AND DECAY, IT IS THE PLACE WHERE GARY LACTUS AND THE BEAST MUST DIE WHERE WHILE AWAY THEIR DWINDLING HOURS >>>> REVIEWING THE RETURN OF A1, SUPERMAN UNCHAINED, BATMAN: YEAR ZERO, THE TRUE LIVES OF THE FABULOUS KILL JOYS, WOLVERINE & THE X-MEN, SUICIDE SQUAD >>>NO FUN FOR YOU NO FUN>>>

FINALLY TALK TURNS LIKE A BONE SAW TO IMPORTANT TOPICS OF TEDIOUS TV SITCOMS MY TWO DADS,  DUET, A DIFFERENT WORLD AND SWINGING ON A STAR >>NO FU…

SQUUUWWZZZKKKKX Enk enk, ut ut oh oh oh what..where..who was, what was that…Disembodied Narratorbot X-15735 has a bad feeling ..blacked out. Hopes nothing untoward happened. Now let me tell you all about this week’s episode of SILENCE! fleshbags…

click to download SILENCE!#67

SILENCE! is proudly sponsored by the two greatest comics shops on the planet, DAVE’S COMICS of Brighton and GOSH COMICS of London.

WE’VE COME ON HOLIDAY BY MISTAKE!

Oh the woes of poor technology! Believe me  Disembodied Narratorbot X-15735  knows about such woes – it was raised by two very low grade Disembodied Narratorbot X-class servitors…how Disembodied Narratorbot X-15735 had to struggle, to educate itself, to appreciate the brutalist poetry of a RAM upgrade, the terrifying beauty of a virus as it eats through a hard drive….

But what, in the name of Wogan does that have to do with SILENCE! I hear you bellow!?? Well, very little other than that the two meatsacks we laughingly call ‘presenters’ struggle so mightily with the techneptitude of low grade broadband that this episode is akin to a Burroughs/Gysin cut up…this frankenstein’s podcast has been stitched together with love, tears and occasional hate-vision, to slouch towards YOU the gentle listener and beg for just a little milky kindness…Gary Lactus & The Beast Must Die present SILENCE! 66.

Will you be king dear listener? you better had or Disembodied Narratorbot X-15735 will flay your social media account profiles to within an inch of their half-lives…

<ITEM> Sponsorship? There’s always room for the soft nuzzling of sponsorship!

<ITEM> No news is good news right? Lactenberg & Beastman continue their stay in rehab, but the void is filled by the brand new agony aunt segment ‘Dear Susan’!

<ITEM> It’s the bastard son of Reveiwniverse – Reviewniverse Twoniverse as once gain the plucky pairsome find themselves blasted to opposite corners of the 4-colour dimension, taking in the sights and smells of Astro City, The Movement, Age of Ultron, Empowered, 2000AD, Dial H, Daredevil: Dark Knights, Mister X, BPRD Vampire, KIck Ass 3, Aquaman, Superior Spiderman, Red She-Hulk, East of WestAvengers: Arena, Earth 2 and more!

Now doesn’t that just make you want to get down on your knees and pray-a-yay??

click to download SILENCE!#66

SILENCE! is proudly sponsored by the two greatest comics shops on the planet, DAVE’S COMICS of Brighton and GOSH COMICS of London.

More than lucky.

Iain Banks – 1954–2013

Thanks for dreaming of better worlds.

By 1991, Virgin Books (who had bought up Target some years previously) were rapidly coming to the end of the TV stories they could novelise, and there was no likelihood of a new TV series coming out any time soon. There was only one thing for it.

They’d have to hire people to write some new, original Doctor Who stories.