Unnamed Blog Update

I've been a bad blogger. Not bad as in murdered your parents and fashioned their faces into underpants but bad as in not really been updating the old blogerooney as much as I ought. In the spirit of a bit of catching up then, here's some of the nonsense what's been filling my head the last few months...

As I was recently saying over at the old Fractal Hall T2 never really delivered on the promise of the original Terminator film for me. I mean it's got some good moments, and Linda Hamilton does a fantastic job of turning the Sarah Connor of the first film on her head. I just couldn't be arsed with the cutesy 'I'm your best friend' version of the Terminator especially in the relentless-killing-machine-knee-capping-people-because-killing-is-bad scene. Call me a sourpuss but there it is. As it goes I was never a fan of ET or the Goonies either.

Anyway, I had zero interest in Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles (which is as much interest as I'd had in Terminator 3 or the upcoming McWhatever sequels) but I happened to catch some of the opening episode on Virgin and thought it looked worth a look. I'm now starting on the second series and I must say it's really good.

It's a perfect sequel to both the original films story of the future resistance and the story of Sarah and John from T2. Lena Headey is excellent as the terribly damaged but relentlessly determined title character and Thomas Dekker (formerly of fast disappearing up it's own backside - Heroes) is sympathetic as teenage John Connor, who is almost a prisoner of his own destiny, whilst sometimes showing the steel of the impossibly heroic future John Connor we have heard so much about. Also Summer Glau of Firefly fame gets to beat the crap out of big burly blokes on a weekly basis - which has got to be worth a look surely?

Fringe is great. It's often referred to as a kind of X Files clone but there's much more to it than that. While it owes plenty to Mulder & Scully (you know, mysterious strangers, magic torches (as seen on CSI) and all that FBI baggage) it's an awful lot more fun that that show was even at it's peak. Most of the audiences enjoyment of the show comes from the relationships between the principal characters.

These three characters are drawn together by the things they see and quickly seem to bond almost in spite of themselves. Olivia Dunham (Anna Torv), is an FBI agent drawn into a world of mysterious phenomena and niche science when her partner (in all senses) falls victim to a particularly unpleasant virus. The only person who can help them is Dr Walter Bishop (John Noble), an experimental scientist and grade A genius who has spent the last sixteen years in a mental institute. The third character is Peter Bishop (Joshua Jackson), Walter's brilliant and estranged son who is required to sign Walter out of the sanatorium.

Quite aside from weird science and hidden conspiracies Fringe is worth watching for the amusing and sometimes questionable antics of Walter Bishop, frequently reminiscent of televisions favourite Time Lord.

Right that's it for now but be warned, I'll be back soon to talk about Apparitions, Survivors and (as Look-In used to say) much, much more...