So... Last Weekend's Telly Was Pretty Good Wasn't It?

First up was the return of series 7 (is this season 33?) of Doctor Who. For some reason I've been gradually losing heart with the direction of Doctor Who. It's becoming too clever for it's own good, in my opinion. Sometimes I just want a story with character development but not too much timey-wimeyness. Don't get me wrong, there's obviously place for timey-wimeyness in Doctor Who. But not all the time. So I started watching The Bells of Saint John more out of duty than pleasure and was not expecting to like it quite as much as I did.

Best episode ever? Hell no. But solid, enjoyable and rewatchable? Absolutely. Celia Imrie was an excellent villain, the episode sort of had thematic similarities to "Partners In Crime" and I'm liking the emergence of a proper "Big Bad" for the series in the form of the Great Intelligence. It hasn't made me fall completely back in love with the Doctor's adventures but it gave me a big slap in the face and told me to stop moaning and just bloody enjoy them!

Second came the season 3 finale of The Walking Dead. Here's another show I've fallen out of love with. It's not that it isn't following the comic storyline close enough; I quite enjoy the "surprise" of things going differently. But it just seems to be too decompressed. They could develop the characters just as much and tell the same story but in far fewer episodes (and I'm never usually one to call for less episodes). And whereas I was hoping for a final climatic battle, or at least some solid conclusion to this chapter of the story, all we got was a bit of a damp squib. Plus this series they first ruined and then in this episode killed my favourite character. There wasn't even a cliffhanger, just a set up for the next series. *sigh*

And then finally came the series 3 opening episode of Game of Thrones. There was no trepidation on my part in watching this, I've been waiting for this way too eagerly to be totally healthy. And it delivered, excellent story as ever and I'm (not having read the books) putting my flag firmly in Daenerys corner. Awesome, awesome, awesome. I just want more and more!

And this week, on a Twitter recommendation, I decided to watch the 3-parter "In The Flesh". My geeky love of zombies meant I'd heard about it but every blog post I saw on it as about how it was some lovey-dovey zombie story and I wasn't into that. How wrong those previews were. It was fantastic take on a less explored area of zombie lore... what happens if the zombies (or "rotters") are "cured"? Emotional and dark, the final minutes of the last episode had me quite teary. I cannot recommend this enough.

Genre TV is good these days :)

The Walking Dead's First Season

So, after 6 awesome weeks we are at the end of the first season of The Walking Dead. Whilst, as a Brit, I'm used to short seasons, 6 episodes seems insulting considering just how great the show has been!

I'm usually the sort of person who finds any changes to the source material in a movie or TV adaption pretty disgusting. You should of seen my reaction, at the age of 10, to the differences between Jurassic Park the movie and the book (she's not meant to be the oldest, it's a Stegosaurus not a Triceratops! etc.). Unusually, I've been far more forgiving of this series. The changes have been fairly substantial, with totally new characters and some important characters missing. And the CDC storyline came out of nowhere. BUT it's all been handled well, scripted excellently and with enough nods to the source material to keep this fanboy happy.

If you think "Oh God, I hate gore and zombies" and refuse to watch this, I urge you to reconsider. Yes there is gore. Yes there are zombies. But it's so much more than that. This is, like the comic book, about the characters, and how they deal with their circumstances. And it will have you hooked!

I cannot believe there's nearly a year to wait for the next set of episodes! :( How will I cope??

Night Of The Living Trekkies

As a zombie apocalypse fan and a (recovering) Star Trek obsessive, Night of the Living Trekkies has been on my radar for a few months. But I put off getting it as I just didn't see it being all that good. How wrong could I have been?! 

Basic plot outline in one sentence: a zombie outbreak occurs during a Star Trek convention in Houston. As diehard geek, that sentence is enough to get me extremely excited indeed. But I understand it might not appeal to everyone. I say, give it a go.

The book is superbly, tightly written, with humour woven into the dialogue so well that it feels totally natural. The characters are believable and likeable. It's a short, easy read and I will say it's definitely the best book I've read this year. My only criticism would be that, for those who aren't total nerds, some of the jokes might go over the reader's head. But hey, I am a total nerd so I laughed at every one.

A must buy.


Further Reading


Night of the Living Trekkies - Kevin David Anderson (UK Book, UK Kindle, US Book, US Kindle)

Zombie Apocalypse by Stephen Jones

Full disclosure: I'm a Zombie-aholic. I've seen the movies, read the books, adored the comics and just this last two weeks raved about TV series. So when, whilst wandering through my local bookstore the other day desperate for inspiration, I saw a book entitled "Zombie Apocalypse I could not walk past. 


In retrospect, picking it up and taking it home was an excellent decision. The story is told via the medium of letters, emails, diary entries, blogposts and Twitter feeds which makes it quite disjointed but not unduly so, and is very reminiscent of World War Z by Max Brooks (not a bad thing at all). It helps create a picture of the world far more easily and quickly than a normal narrative story. 


Mixing humour, recent political and news events, horror and an underlying bleakness, the story rolls on quickly to a humourous if despairing end. I got through it in a matter of hours, which shows just how easily it grabs your attention.


You do care about the characters, you do get taken in by the story (I stopped reading half way through and was surprised to find there were no zombies trying to break down my door!) and it will leave any horror or zombie fan very satisfied indeed. 


An excellent book and one I wholeheartedly recommend. 


Further Reading 


Zombie Apocalypse! US Amazon UK Amazon

If you feel benevolent and particularly generous, this writer always appreciates things bought for him from his wishlist

Dead Snow (Død snø)

Dead Snow is a Norwegian horror-comedy featuring Nazi Zombies. Now there is more to it than that but if you fail to think "Wow, Nazi Zombies!" after reading that sentence then this is probably not the movie for you. 

But if Third Reich zombies do it for you, this movie is actually much better than I thought. There is no toned down gore here, no pulled punches, but there are a few laughs in the Evil Dead vein. The acting is alright and despite being set up as a somewhat cliched group of young people in a cabin horror movie, it manages to break out of this with some tremendous fight back scenes. This is no "last girl standing" movie, nor a typical zombie movie (these are more Undead Nazi's than zombie ones) and it's all the better for that. 

I really didn't have high hopes, but was pleasantly surprised. This is no high minded masterpiece, but it is enjoyable.