Two seasons down, four to go! (for now) I’ve been having great fun rewatching these episodes and commenting on them with David and Tehani (plus of course my offsider Raeli, now seven years old and firmly in the David Tennant camp after a year of being certain Matt Smith was her Doctor) because of the fresh perspective it comes from bouncing off each other.

You can find David’s report card and Tehani’s report card for this season on their websites.

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“Army of Ghosts / Doomsday”
Season Two
Episodes 12 & 13

The Doctor – David Tennant
Rose Tyler – Billie Piper
Mickey Smith – Noel Clarke
Camille Coduri – Jackie Tyler
Shaun Dingwall – Pete Tyler

TEHANI:
There’s a cluster of Hugo nominees at the beginning of this season (plus we wanted to talk about the Cybermen two-parter), then none until the season finale two-parter (which we’d review anyway), so let’s quickly recap the intervening episodes before we chat about “Army of Ghosts / Doomsday”…

“The Idiot’s Lantern” – another monster of the week episode with not a lot to distinguish it, I didn’t think. I liked the strength of the mother at the end though.

TANSY:
I liked “The Idiot’s Lantern” far more on the recent rewatch than I remembered. The Rose/Doctor vibe was bugging me by this point (oh, the smug, the glee) but I think the story about the family is an important one – and it feels like Gatiss is saying something (or rather, not quite saying something) about growing up different, with indications either that the son might be gay and/or that his father might suspect he is. I liked Ten’s interactions with the boy, which made me wistful for a solo male companion, something he never got! (well, apart from [SPOILER REDACTED])

TEHANI:
“The Impossible Planet” (concluded in “The Satan Pit”) – a lot creepier than we’ve really seen so far I reckon. We meet the Ood (remember them, David). I really liked the first of this two-parter, it’s nicely scary and science fictional, but the second part went to dumb places, I thought.

TANSY:
A solid piece of space opera science fiction, and it’s always a relief when they finally get the TARDIS away from Earth for a change, but I agree the second part was problematic. Once you bring the Devil into your science fiction, the shark has well and truly been jumped. I liked the crew a lot, though.

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Here, for those who requested it, proof that I made a TARDIS cake for Raeli’s birthday party tomorrow. It’s not finished yet, as I plan to have a cupcake light on top, and some decorations around the border, but those will be added tomorrow, so more pics then! (as well as pics of my two lovely girls, dressed as an astronaut and the TARDIS)

This is basically cake (two packet mixes swirled together so some is vanilla & some choc), cut to size & liberally spread with chocolate frosting. The windows and panel are made from roll-out white icing, the details from slices of a metre-long liquorice strap, and the fancy white writing parts from one of those squeezy writing icing things. All bought from the supermarket.

I had a near-disaster when I put gladwrap over the whole thing (having refrigerated the cake for some time I assumed all the icing was set – the frosting WAS but the writing sadly got smeared all over the place) so I recovered by putting a whole piece of liquorice strap over the mess, tidying up with a bit of spare chocolate frosting (always save the last spoonful just in case!!!) and re-writing the text.

It looks like a TARDIS, anyway! Imperfect, but delicious.

[and if anyone, not looking at anyone in particular, hon, thinks I was overreaching myself, I show further evidence that my goals in cakeitude are sensible, rational and achievable, unlike some people who take TARDIS-related cake art to EXTREMES - thanks to @greenspyders for the link]

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Pretty sure everyone on the internet has seen the latest feminist post by Jim C Hines, this time with him putting his male body through the bizarre poses displayed by women on various fantasy covers. Needless to say, he hurt himself in the attempt.

Malinda Lo riffs off a Kate Elliott post, talking about being a woman writer and still having to actively check your manuscripts to make sure the female characters are not being screwed over. I do this too! Did I accidentally kill off all the women in my book? Oh, crap. Rewrite!

NK Jemisin talks about why her editor, Devi Pillai of Orbit Books, should be considered for the Hugo race – she had me at ‘Paradol Protectorate’!

A lovely article about cosplaying the TARDIS, bringing steampunk into her design, and just how female the TARDIS is anyway. The cosplay/crossplay phenomenon as a feminist statement is something I never fail to find interesting, and the fannish craft evident in this post is awesome. I say this as someone who is planning to make two birthday cakes next week – a TARDIS and a Time Vortex.

Speaking of which, 3D TARDIS cookies are the best use I can think of for 3D printers…

The Guardian looks at the outpourings of mancrush inspired by the return of Thierry Henry to the Arsenal and questions why football is so institutionally anti-gay when, quite frankly, even the straightest of fannish football blokes are set all aflutter by certain men in certain shorts, scoring certain goals. It’s actually a slightly more serious article than I suggest here, and worth reading.

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Eh, I’ve been trying and failing to write an essay about how often women (fictional and otherwise) end up being shamed, dismissed or hurt in the name of feminism, but it’s tangling me up in knots, so I’m going to stop now and do something productive instead.

Hoyden talk about the myth of the bra-burning feminists, an idea which has been used to try to make women look stupid for decades, and how the false story was spread.

The Moffat’s Women series continues on Tor, with a comparison between the main female character in this Christmas special and last year’s. I find it very interesting how quickly people have leaped to criticise Moffat for writing a story in which the mother is the hero, so this article made me happy.

Sarah Rees Brennan’s response to the post we linked to in Galactic Suburbia about the wealth of positive girl heroes in YA right now.

One that I meant us to discuss on GS but forgot at the last minute (sorry, Sean!) – Sean the Blogonaut surveys his reading after a year of trying to change his reading habits, genderwise.

Linda Nagata talks about her rationale for self publishing rather than going back to big publishers.

The ever awesome Mary Beard comments on the latest salacious media drama about Ancient Romans and brothels. Yes, really. As ever, her pragmatism wins the day.

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A little one today because, funnily enough, many people have been a bit too busy to blog much this week, and most of the best blog posts I’ve read have been of the ‘summing up the year’ variety that are only worth reading if you follow that blog regularly.

Over at Last Short Story, we’ve been posting our lists of best short stories for 2011. You can read about the opinions of Sarah, Mondy, me, Alisa and Alex.

Sarah Rees Brennan has written a marvellous, loving parody of Jane Eyre, Or: The Bride of Edward ‘Crazypants’ Rochester and it turns out that she loves Press Gang, too! I knew our tastes were eternally intertwined. I’m so looking forward to both of Sarah’s new novels, to be released this year.

On a more serious note, Alisa wrote about her response to the Lovecraft-representing-World-Fantasy discussion, as a Jewish woman who recently won a World Fantasy Award and only learned about Lovecraft’s racism and anti-semitism recently.

UPDATE: Excellent, crunchy post about the awards system by the ever-sharp Ursula K Le Guin.

And yes, that’s basically it. Onwards to 2012! May there be linking frenzies, flamewars and feminist rage, as well as adorable music vids. That is what the internet is for, after all.

A home-made Adipose from Glammer to Raeli

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OK this is my favourite news article of the week – a Womble performer traumatised a nation (well, the six year old portion of the nation) when he accidentally removed his head during a live webfeed. Now, my first reaction was basically that it’s awesome that the Wombles are a THING again for today’s kiddies. As a mother of a six year old myself (who broke my heart with her reaction to finding out about the Santa thing last year)… seriously?

“Parents from around the UK said the ‘damage had already been done’ and that they had been forced to come up with ‘all kinds of explanations’ about why there was a human inside a Womble.”

HOW MANY KINDS OF EXPLANATION ARE THERE?

Elsewhere in the world, Aqueduct Press continue their marvellous blog series of posts about the Best Reading, Listening, Viewing, etc. in 2011. I like especially that the contributors are asked to talk about what they enjoyed, but not limit themselves to work published this calendar year. And I was honoured to be asked to talk about my own favourite things of 2011. I forgot lots of things, of course, but that’s what my own blog is for!

Also, Brit Mandelo of Tor.com blogs about her new reprint anthology, Beyond Binary, which includes a story by MEEEEE as well as a whole bunch of more famous and wonderful writers. Hooray for genderqueer SF being talked about!

Nnedi Okorafor blogs powerfully about her discomfort in discovering, in the wake of her marvellous World Fantasy win for Best Novel, that the trophy depicts the head of a very racist, unpleasant person. Ie. H.P. Lovecraft. Which has led to all kinds of conversations across Twitter and other forums about, you know, what kind of alternative trophy could better represent excellence in fantasy fiction, or the history of fantasy literature. I suspect TRADITION is going to win out on this one, or at least a combination of tradition and resistance to change, which are not entirely the same things, but personally I can think of a whole bunch of other unpleasant heads which could take his place. Like Medusa!

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I always think of Connie Willis at Christmas time. One of my favourite of her books is a collection of short fiction, Miracle and Other Christmas Stories, many of which were written for Asimov’s December issues over a decade or so. The title story feels like quintessential Willis short stories, because it is a romantic comedy with speculative elements, and includes references classic pop culture of some kind. In this case, it is a debate between which Christmas film is superior, Miracle on 42nd Street (the original) or It’s a Wonderful Life. At the time I first read this story, I hadn’t seen either film. They occasionally screen in Australia, more often now than when I was growing up, but they’re not as pervasive as they apparently are in the US at this time of year!

I went out and watched both movies, as I usually do when Connie Willis structures a story around a piece of Classic Hollywood. They’re both very good movies. But neither of them, for me, has a patch on the personal resonance of, say, Bernard and the Genie, which I adore beyond all reason, or even the resonance of “Miracle” itself.

It’s all personal, though. Christmas cultural texts come from our childhood, from happy moments in our lives, or they just happen like lightning – like anything else that becomes a new, instant favourite. But really, I didn’t start thinking about Christmas texts until I read “Miracle.” So it’s rather meta that, at Christmas time, I start getting the urge to re-read that story.

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Last night, just before I went to bed, the rumours were bouncing around Twitter. I didn’t know what the rumours WERE, but the implication was that maybe, just maybe, a missing episode of Doctor Who had been found.

When I woke up – boom! TWO previously lost episodes were back in the BBC archive: Galaxy Four Part Three and The Underwater Menace Part Two. It’s so long since a new episode came to light, and it was generally believe that this was it, we had reached the end of salvaged film canisters.

Having recently read Richard Molesworth’s history of the destruction and recovery of so many stories, and realising how close we came to having almost no Hartnell and Troughton available for rewatching, as well as how unlikely it seemed that anyone would have lost episodes and not realise the demand for them… I feel like the news stories reporting on this don’t have nearly enough exclamation points!!!

Sure, it’s not Power of the Daleks or the Myth Makers, but we get to see CHUMBLIES, the robots that were about the 14th attempt of the BBC to replicate the popularity of the Daleks (they weren’t even trying at this point, and apparently made mini-Daleks out of marshmallows) and we get to see Patrick Troughton being Patrick Troughton, in what is now the earliest surviving episode of his run.

Also, all over again, we have that foolish, foolish hope that some day, there might be ANOTHER film collector who hasn’t been on the internet, and one day there may be more.

Recovered clips below – because the entire things are not of course on the internet yet. We might have to wait for the DVD release!