bironic

1.

Super brief and not really spoilery thoughts on the new season of Doctor Who so far:

I really like Peter Capaldi in this role. He's doing interesting things with the character that are not all necessarily clear at this point. He is also lovely to look at.

With this Robin Hood episode, I feel the season has finally hit its stride. It had such lively writing, a great leadership role for Clara, and a nice arc with the Doctor and Robin from bickering to reluctant cooperation to grudging acknowledgement of their similarity in a way that made a point about the nature of the Doctor. Felt more organic than last episode's point-blank "Am I a good man?", although that set us up well for this.

My main complaint concerns the season premiere. It should have come after this episode. We needed to get to know Twelve a little before other characters could start complaining about him or expressing suspicion. The way it aired, we had about three seconds to get used to Peter Capaldi's face before everyone was all, "Ew, you're old," "You're not Eleven," "Who are you," "What are you doing," and the guy hadn't even had a chance to settle into his skin yet. Far less charming than Eleven meeting little Amy. And maybe nothing will ever be Eleven and Amy, but I was predisposed to like Capaldi and the whole premiere just felt prematurely defensive. They needed to show us Twelve before we could form an opinion about him.

Oh, speaking of Eleven and Amy, or Eleven/Amy(/Rory), and sexual tension with companions, "Clara, I'm not your boyfriend" was the freaking sexiest thing I've seen on TV in a while. If the show didn't suddenly seem so ageist, it'd be enough to make you suspect they're headed toward proving that statement wrong. (For the record, I'd be in favor. Although the soldier teacher dude seems cute enough.)

2.

Interesting conversations that have happened recently and may still be going on:

On capitalization in fic titles, over at

roga's

What about doing a Vidding Bingo, by

thirdblindmouse