Monday March 3 2003
Well, it seems to be Monday again. Funny how they sneak up. My birthday present from me to me, Angel Series 3 on DVD, arrived today from Amazon; today's the release day, so I guess you guys who didn't preorder will just have to pay the full price now (she said smugly). But hey, you get 918 minutes of gorgeousness, Joss Whedon commentary for Waiting in the Wings, outtakes, audition tapes...oh, and no scripts this time, which is good cos they were really hard to read and you can get them on the Psyche site (no relation)...actually, come to think, you CAN'T get all the Series 3 scripts there. But a lot of them, you can.

The House Always Wins is a great episode, I thought, although the reviewer on City of Angel doesn't agree with me - but hey, he is an old grouch, and what kind of nom-de-plume is Ned Flanders anyway? I absolutely loved Lorne's stage show with the ostrich-feather fans and the dancing girls...and of course we all knew something was up with Lorne, didn't we, even though we might not have known what 'Fluffy' meant. (Well, maybe it doesn't really mean that anyway.) And green Fred was excellent, and so was moron-Angel hooked on the slots, and so was Lorne getting to destroy the evil device...I wonder if that's where MY destiny went? It sure doesn't seem to be round here.

I might one day get a teeny bit tired of Angel just happening to be present at all the historical events anyone has ever heard of - cos, looking at the state he was in at the end of his stay in the Hyperion in the early fifties ("Take 'em all!") I'm sort of doubting that he might then proceed to Las Vegas and start living it up with the Rat Pack, and as for Elvis' wedding, OH PLEASE...Although the mini fried-banana-and-peanut-butter sandwiches were a nice touch.

Next: Slouching Towards Bethlehem, which is a quote from The Second Coming, by WB Yeats, so for homework, class, I'd like you to read the poem before next time. No, I'm not finding the reference for you. Look it up on Google.


February 26 2003
Is it Wednesday already? Bloody hell...

So: Ground State.
Well, first of all I really liked the caption for the first bit being the same as the place-captions on 'Taken'. Deliberately, no doubt, since both Julie Benz and Adam Kaufman are in 'Taken', and isn't it nice to see Adam Kaufman play someone a bit less commitment-phobic than the evil Parker Abrams, the man every Buffy fan loves to hate, only without the love part...Oh, wait. Come to think, where is the commitment in being forced to impregnate a woman you don't know after you have just been abducted by aliens? Adam, my sweet, you need to talk to your agent: you're getting typecast. Anyway, I'm quite enjoying 'Taken', except for the not being able to remember who's who because the time goes by so fast. I can't even remember which is Jacob and which is Jesse half the time and hey, scriptwriters, what would have been wrong with giving them different initials? Then for a long time I couldn't tell the difference between Eric Crawford and Tom Clarke who are really similar physically, which was a bit awkward since they're bitter enemies; but luckily I've noticed that Eric has funny creases under his nose so I'm OK with that now, and we've got to the annoying little voiceover girl who makes dolphins stand on end so I think I've got it sorted now.

So anyway...Ground State. I thought it was quite a good episode in a stand-alone, monster-of-the-week kind of a way, with a monster (and notice I didn't call her a freak, cos I don't want her coming after me) so gorgeous that the bad guy tells her she's TOO gorgeous, cos she's drawing attention to herself, but of course what he really means is all the other blokes are ogling her and he doesn't like it. Wanting to be discreet, my arse...And she started Angel's heart, which was interesting; presumably it didn't keep beating though, so that's not the answer and in any case, hallo? Beating heart equals loss of superpowers, so that's no good; non-beating heart means curse in operation, so it's no use sighing 'Cordelia!', matey: you're still stuffed. Unfortuately for electro-girl who of course is lusting over him herself. Sigh.

So what I'd like to know: the Powers That Be turned Cordy into a higher being, right, and they took her to heaven, or wherever she is: don't they have things for her to do there? Because if not, I have to say, they resemble my own present management to no small extent. I'm beginning to lose all respect for them.

And oh, it was sad that they packed up Cordy's apartment. She's going to be REALLY annoyed about that. And what will become of Phantom Dennis?

Monday February 24 additional.
OK, I've just been told I have to write about things other than Buffy. Funny that: although I'm sure the word 'Buffy' is going to appear from time to time on this blog, because that's just the way it goes, I wasn't aware that it had done so up till now...Anyway: so last week, I got my picture in two local papers. It was no big deal, just a work thing, but the pictures were really frightful of me, even worse than my pictures usually are. So I wouldn't have shown them to anyone, only it was a work thing, so I had to, saying 'awful one of me, isn't it?' And, of course, the person came back with 'no, I think it's quite a good one, really.' Good grief. Is it only me? Am I the only person who's noticed that, if someone shows you a photo of them and tells you it's awful, YOU HAVE TO AGREE WITH THEM? Because, if you don't, it means you think the person really looks just as awful as the picture. So, EVEN IF THAT IS WHAT YOU THINK, don't do it. Tell a lie. Say 'Yes, it's frightful, isn't it?' Because then what you're saying is 'You look a lot better than that frightful picture.' Got it? Not hard, is it?

Monday February 24 2003

Deep Down
You know what it's like when you wake up from a nightmare and all day that feeling of dread follows you around and you forget how you got it? Well, that was me after I watched Tomorrow, only it was like it for the whole weekend. So I thought: well, why don't I just write another script and rescue him myself? So I did, and that's Resurrection. This was really interesting to do, because it was outside the story arc I'd already written, and I was wondering how to fit it in, when I realised all I had to do was make it an alternate alternate dimension...and that was fun, because things could be out of kilter, as when Psyche still fancies Angel but he doesn't fancy her...

Anyway. Well, I have to say the whole rescuing-Angel-and-getting-him-up-from-the-seabed was a bit lame. What, Wesley catches up with Justine and chains her in the cupboard till she spills the beans? Phooey. Hey, I had the Loch Ness Monster! But apart from that...well, yes: apart from that, there's the thing about the state Angel was in after being under the sea all that time. Spike, in Pangs (I think) is asked what happens to a vampire who doesn't feed and he replies 'Living skeletons, mate.' Well, you'd have to be looking at David Boreanaz for some time before you were reminded of a skeleton. Hey, David! Heard of the Atkins diet? (Sorry. But, you know, it's working for me...)

Aside: Lots of people think that I fancy Angel myself but that is not the case: he's really not my type, being too big and hunky. I just think he's a poppet. Spike, on the other hand, is very much my type, physically...but I think he's gross. Just goes to show looks aren't everything.

The other little niggle: OK, we get an answer at last to Willow's question 'Angel, how do you shave?' Seems he doesn't, and yet...when he was doing that is he/isn't he going bad thing, in series 2, and setting girls on fire, didn't he have a kind of unshaven look then? Hmm. Still, I've been told off before for being too pedantic.
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Sunday February 23 2003

I've had a set of blogs for some time under the collective title The Psyche Arc but they're 'static' blogs - that is, they're finished products; they're scripts that I've written for the TV series Angel - not the ongoing web-diary format that blogs are famous for being. So I was feeling mildly guilty about this, because it seemed I was wasting the new medium somehow (OK: does it matter? Well, I did say 'mildly') and yesterday I read Craig Taylor's article about blogging in the Guardian and decided I did really need the other kind of blog as well. So this is it. There won't be pictures on it until I find out how to do pictures: at the moment I'm stuck, because I only know how to add pictures that already have web addresses and what I want is to add my own pictures. But I will ask a person who can.

At the moment I can't decide whether to use the same template as The Psyche Arc, for consistency, or whether to change to a different one to show this blog is a different type of thing. Maybe the former to start with, as I'll probably be cross-referencing; but I may change my mind.

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The scripts I've written are at The Psyche Arc. One of them, (Fallen) is unfinished: I've written the beginning and the end (the end isn't on there) but the central section is about three tasks Angel has to perform, as you do, and I want to find modern equivalents of the tasks the mythological Psyche had to perform to win Eros, and I haven't thought of 'em yet. But soon enough, when I'm having a boring day at work, I'm sure I will...