Why are all streaming services rubbish?

 Film  Like most film fans, I'm subscribed to a lot of streaming services and in terms of the television versions of their apps, they're all an absolute mess to use.  With each utilising a different interface, most are more interested in pushing new content than making it easy to get back to the films and television we've already been enjoying.  Watchlists are often hidden away or take several clicks.  The iPlayer's the absolute worst example with its "your added programmes" section at the very bottom of the page.

Much of this has to do with a lack of standardisation between the apps.  When streaming was first introduced, for the most part, the app producers had to the follow a template which was baked into the technology.  So on my first "smart" DVD player, the Amazon and Netflix apps worked pretty much identically.  But with more powerful technology, that's no longer the case and that freedom has come with a usability cost.  The user has to learn how to use each streaming service separately which as I found with my elderly parents creates a barrier between the user and the content.

Hypercritical suggests here a standard spec for streaming apps to adhere to and it all seems eminently sensible.

"There must be a way for the user to manually create a list of media. In the common case, this is a list of media that the user intends to watch (eventually), but it can be used for any purpose. The important part is that the user makes the list intentionally. Nothing gets added to this list automatically.

"At a minimum, the list must accept top-level items in the hierarchy (e.g., TV shows, movies). The list could also accept more granular items, like individual TV episodes." [via]

My solution has been to largely abandon smart apps altogether.  Instead, I have my TV set up as the third screen on my PC with a very long HDMI cable around the room to the television with the mouse positioned within hands length of the armchair.  Many streaming services have Windows apps and although they're somewhat like their TV counterparts, are much easier to navigate with a mouse and keyboard.  Plus it allows access to streaming services which don't yet have a workable tv app and remain stubbornly in the browser.

As for watchlists, my LetterBoxd Pro subscription allows me to tell it the services to which I'm subscribed and the free streamers which means I can have a unified list of films things I'd like to see which acts as a kind of off-site (honestly ITV Player and 4od are significantly less shit in a browser).  The list can also be sorted chronologically by release date and date added, filtered by decade or genre and shuffled so that if you have a list as long as mine, some of the more unusual stuff will surface.  

Cataloguing BBC Radio 4's In Our Time using Dewey Decimal Classification.

Radio  In Our Time is a weekly live BBC radio discussion programme in which the broadcaster Melvyn Bragg and several academics elucidate a topic of a  philosophical, historical, cultural or scientific nature.  It's been on air since October 1998 and its format has changed little in that time, a moment in the week to listen to a group of very clever people saying some very clever things for forty-five minutes.

The series has clocked up nearly a thousand episodes and its inevitable with an archive that rich that a listener is more likely to catch-up on instalments which cover subjects with which they might casually be interested or being studying at school or university.  Except the website only sorts the episodes into very broad topics, culture, history, philosophy, religion and science so someone wanting to hear about mathematics or theatre has to wade through many pages of other topics.

Which is why, with my librarian's brain, I hit upon the idea of sorting the episodes using a library classification system and after the comparing a few decided Dewey Decimal Classification system (DDC) would suit the purpose because it's less complicated to work through than others and will be most familiar to readers due to its prevalence in public libraries.  Also Library of Congress can be astonishingly obtuse with all of its letters AND numbers.

Find below the results of my free time this past week and a half.  As you can see it's pretty logically ordered, a combination of following an abridged copy of DDC designed for small libraries originally published in 1979, Classify (an experimental classification site which aggregates the choices of thousands of librarians across the planet) and this Wikipedia page which has the most recent names for class names and hierarchical divisions.

Classification is automatically a compromise.  You're applying a numerical label to an object which it wasn't really designed for, so on some occasions, especially with something like In Our Time which revels in obtuse topics, there isn't a perfect place for the episode to go.  Also I've only used the a heading when it pertains to an episode which is why it looks like there are gaps in the sequence.  Melvyn and the gang haven't covered every sub-division in the DDC.

Every title below links to the episode's page on the Radio 4 website.  

You'll notice that if you're on a PC and you hover over many of the links have what would be the original shelf number which was part of the initial iteration to show I'd done the work.  But it became too fiddly to update since so I've left them out and some of the items have moved around since then too.  There are too many of them to remove so we're stuck with them, but this paragraph was by way of explanation.

You might also like to hear, Melvyn talk to Mishal Husain on the Today programme to mark the 1000th episode.

Anyway, I hope this is of some use to you and if it is, please consider leaving a Ko-Fi donation.  The most recent episodes are here and I'll try to keep this list updated as much as possible.

The Hamlet Gamble.

Theatre  The last Hamlet I reviewed was from Shakespeare's Globe in April 2020, which I was fortunate enough to see via YouTube during lockdown.  Their latest production, from the Sam Wannamaker Playhouse was due to be streamed this month, but they cancelled sighting the cost.  Now the professional reviews are out, I should be pleased.  It sounds horrendous:

"I can just about understand why Holmes introduces a speech from Romeo and Juliet, but not why he replaces the gravediggers’ dialogue with a rambling contemporary improv routine and a singalong of Kenny Rogers’ The Gambler, all performed by the show’s composer/musician Ed Gaughan. This is the most misguided interpretation of the scene since I saw it done in the mid-90s as a rap that ended with the words “now I’m gonna neck Ophelia”."

Here's the key problem with this - it's for people who already know the play. I'm still curious to see it, because any variation from norm is always interesting especially if there's a particular intellectual underpinning. Lord knows, after seeing the play forty-one times in different versions, it's the variations on the main theme which keep it interesting.  It sounds brilliantly awful.

But I shiver to think about the people for whom this could be their first introduction to the play and Shakespeare in general.  Will any of this make any sense?  Isn't adding in lines from Romeo and Juliet simply confusing?  Not to mention my usual annoyance that you wouldn't do this sort of thing to other artforms, so why must Shakespeare's writing continually endure this desecration?  [via]

Annotations: An Editor's Burial: Journals and Journalism from The New Yorker and Other Magazines.

Books  An Editor's Burial: Journals and Journalism from The New Yorker and Other Magazines is a companion volume to director Wes Anderson's The French Dispatch which presents the voices, stories and people who influenced the fictionalised journalists and their tales as they appear in the film.  Each chapter has the density and intensity of reading a whole book, which is why its taken me nearly a week to reach the halfway point.

But throughout I wondered, did I need to buy this?  Given that they're mostly articles from The New Yorker, could I not simply have looked at the website instead?  Comparing the contents page to the available texts and the answer is both yes and no.  While there are plenty of New Yorker articles and many are free to read, many of the chapters about working at the magazine are excerpted from books and other articles are behind a paywall.

My finds are below for your edification.  If you have the money, I'd certainly recommend the book, especially if you're a fan of the film.  The chapter on Paris alone is worth the money, especially consider the current price for the full volume.  If the title's in bold, it's a link to the complete article free to read on The New Yorker website.  If it's in italics, it's a link to the complete article behind the paywall on The New Yorker website.  If it's underlined, it's a link to the source book on Amazon.

The Pilot Light
A conversation between Wes Anderson and Susan Morrison.

The Years with Ross

James Thurber

Here at The New Yorker

Brendan Gill

The Other Paris

Luc Sante

Thiry-two Rats from Casablanca

Joseph Mitchell

Mr.  Hulot

Lillian Ross

Remembering Mr. Shawn

Ved Mehta

The Days of Duveen

S. M. Behrman

Art Talker

Calvin Tomkins

The Events in May: A Paris Notebook Part I

Mavis Gallant

Dearest Edith

Janet Flanner

Equal in Paris

James Baldwin

Memoirs of a Feeder in France: A Good Appetite

A.J. Liebling

Memoirs of a Feeder in France: Just Enough Money

A.J. Liebling

Walcott Gibbs

E.B. White

Harold Ross: A Recollection

S.M. Behrman

H.W. Ross

E.B. White

Letters from The New Yorker Archives

Acknowledgements

Hearts of Darkness (The War Master).

Audio  Spoilers ahead, warning, spoilers ahead.  If you've not listened to Hearts of Darkness, stop reading here.  That caution proffered, the fact I'm reviewing all four episodes should be a strong indication that this is a bit more than the cover suggests except to say, within this pre-amble, that what we have here is essentially a bonus Eighth Doctor Time War box set under a different guise and so therefore essential to anyone at all interested in this incarnation (assuming printing McGann's face on the box wasn't enough already).  

The Edge of Redemption

Not having really followed The War Master series unless McGann's face is printed on the box, the changes to the renegade Time Lord's personality seemed to be a character choice made by the writers in order to sustain him as a protagonist over many episodes.  Even the lightened shades of Jacobi's performance seemed to be a choice to indicate that they're working towards Professor Yana or some ethical re-engineering in a boxed set I'd missed.  He's very specifically not attempting a McGann impression but rather what a Jacobi incarnation of the Doctor might be like.

The Scaramancer

Why doesn't the Doctor reveal his identity earlier, especially when The Scaramancer obviously has cause to have the body he's currently inhabiting?  The more obvious answer is to delay the end of the episode surprise but the in-story explanation could be that he sees the Master's identity as a way of opening doors and taking steps that he'd find morally dubious in his own skin.  My tired old brain did later wonder why the Doctor didn't recognise her from their old Doom Coalition days, until I remember that it's a different character.  She was the The Sonomancer, completely different 'mancer.

The Castle of Kurnos 5

Finally the big reveal that the Master is essentially a supporting player in his own series and that the character we've been listening to for the past couple of hours is the Eighth Doctor with a different face, the no guns rules now making perfect sense.  The Castle of Kurnos 5 offers us some prime Eighth Doctor shenanigans in the flashback with a witty one-off companion, a host of fantasy tropes and walking straight into a trap.  I know it's his job, but I'm always impressed with how McGann modulates his performance to reflect were the Eighth Doctor is on his timeline, at least in terms of the audios.

Cognition Shift

Which makes his portrayal of the Master even more sinister, especially when he says "the line".  Like Jacobi, he's proposing what his incarnation of the Master might be like, which is to say just as charming and in such a way that you can believe that he'd become a Kurtzian figure leading a population of dupes.  It's unfortunate his plan isn't allowed to succeed before its foiled.  Having the Master's consciousness consume the entire Dalek fleet is an epic, horrific prospect along the lines of the entirety of humanity having John Simms's face and on television would surely be the stuff of an RTD cliffhanger, the Dalek Emperor booming "I am the Master and you will obey me.  Or I will exterminate you ..."

Placement: The Doctor talks about becoming more involved so just before The Time War boxsets.

Short Trips and Side Steps.

 

TV Find above an absolutely adorable short trip to herald the release of Season 22 to BD. When I watched these again in situ (gods) nearly ten years ago, I found them to be pretty middling, mostly because the approach to producing forty-five minutes episodes amounted to stretching the content of a half hour instalment to fill the time rather than increase the richness of the story or incident which leads to moments like the one in Timelash were the Doctor and Peri are parked in a green room uncomfortably waiting for the next bit of plot to arrive.

This release includes A Fix With Sontarans which should be quite controversial if it features as is could be a source of controversy.  The chance are, as Martin Belam  says, it'll be topped and tailed somehow, perhaps fading out just as Tegan shouts "Doctor, look at the screen ..." providing a cliffhanger.  The "story" was also mentioned in a documentary on the special features about the hiatus.  Will they keep that in or will we lose Colin's intriguing line, "J---- S------ is much more frightening than the Sontarans, much more.  I will leave it at that."  Oh.

Blue Monday Links.

[Editor's Note:  This will be the last of the daily link posts.  I was going to try for the year, but without a particular focus it's taking too much of the day to do and stopped being fun.  Hope you've enjoyed it and be assured, if I'm still here, Christmas Links will be back in December.]

Radio 4 and Radio 3 explore the legacy of Modernism:
BBC Media Centre:  "Marking 100 years since the publication of Ulysses, Radio 4 and Radio 3 explore Modernism’s big bang - and its aftershocks - in a season of programmes."

The scandalous history behind one post box in Liverpool city centre:

Lee Grimsditch:  "The rare object is a reminder of one of the biggest scandals of the 20th Century."

Did Burt Reynolds Dump Horse Manure from a Helicopter on National Enquirer’s Christmas Tree?

Madison Dapcevich:  "The actor said he was sick of the crap coverage."

Melanie Lynskey Is Mad as Hell and Not Going to Take It Anymore. Maybe.

EJ Dickson:  "The ‘Yellowjackets’ star has gone from character actor to leading lady thanks to her singular ability to project simmering rage beneath a placid exterior."

There’s nothing worse than a restaurant that makes you feel like an old git:

Jay Rayner:  "Give us over-50s a menu we can read, grownup waiters and the chance to hold a conversation. It’s not too much to ask – and it makes business sense too."

Sunday Links

Wait, Who Are the Eternals?

Nola Pfau:  "The 2021 MCU entry is finally streaming on Disney+. Here’s what you need to know before hitting play."

Southport Lifeboat: £1.4m station opens after three-year construction:
BBC News: "The £1.4m building has been paid for entirely by public donations on behalf of the Southport Offshore Rescue Trust."

Play mini golf to see how politicians tilt elections using maps:

Dylan Moriarty and Joe Fox:  "Politicians in all but a few states have something urgent to quarrel about these days: maps! Control of the U.S. House is on the line — or within the lines. Here’s the deal: The once-a-decade census determines how many people from each state go to Washington, D.C. And states get to fiddle with the boundaries of those congressional districts. How the maps are drawn can make a big difference in which party winds up on top."

A Brief Investigation into Recording Dates for Are You Being Served?

John Hoare:  "At the end of last year, we talked a little about how some sitcoms were shot far closer to transmission than I ever expected. But sometimes, such stories just seem a little too unbelievable. Take Are You Being Served? – or, specifically, Wikipedia’s episode guide for the show. If you scan your eyes down that list until you reach Series 5, you will come across something rather odd."

Skytrain to Stratford-upon-Avon:  James Shapiro, interviewed by Daniel Drake:

Daniel Drake:  “I sometimes imagine a future in which Shakespeare’s plays have lost their edge, no longer speak to us. That won’t be in my lifetime.”

Ben Affleck, at the top of his game:

Leah Greenblatt:  "The actor-director has seen fame from both sides now — and he's ready to talk (with Matt Damon, and us) about it."

A Library the Internet Can’t Get Enough Of:

Kate Dwyer:  "Why does this image keep resurfacing on social media?"

Rosie Holt: the satirist whose ‘Tory MP’ video had so many fooled:

James Tapper:  "She began creating them as an outlet during the first lockdown, now the actress’s spoof sketches are a massive internet hit."

Jeremy Sisto on ‘Law & Order’ in ‘FBI’s Universe and Jubal’s ‘International’ Connection:

Meredith Jacobs:  "Jeremy Sisto, now in his fourth season as Assist. Special Agent in Charge Jubal Valentine on FBI, was no stranger to Dick Wolf‘s (ever-growing) TV universe before he joined the CBS procedural. In fact, Law & Order, on which he played Detective Cyrus Lupo from 2008 to 2010, is coming back for its 21st (!) season on February 24 on NBC."

'Encanto' is a Beautiful, Brilliant, Broken Mess:

Laurie Penny:  "Yes, we're going to Talk About Bruno."

Multi-Coloured Link Shop.

 
What happened to the Fox films Disney picked up?
Simon Brew:  "Disney inherited a slate of Fox movies when it bought the studio up in 2019 – here’s what happened to one that survived the initial cull of projects."

Singer Chelsea Cutler shared her frustration about social media demands. It hit a nerve in the music world:

Emily Yahr:  "Struggling to constantly promote herself online, she posted that she’d rather just be a musician and a performer. Artists everywhere told her they feel the same way."

The Best Worst-First-Date Movie:

Howard Fishman:  "A look at Tom Noonan’s forgotten masterpiece “What Happened Was . . .”"

Neve Campbell Was Once Attacked by a Bear on a Movie Set:

Mia Mercado:  "Actors will go to great lengths for their art. Take, for example, Neve Campbell, who, at 17, was attacked by a bear while shooting a movie."

Movie Poster of the Week: Peter Bogdanovich in Polish Posters:

Adrian Curry:  "A collection of gorgeous Eastern European posters for the 1970s films of the late, great auteur."

Here's How Time Works in 2022:

Eli Grober:  "Here at Time, we have made a number of changes over the last couple years. Now that 2022 is here, we’re announcing several major updates."

Strong Brain:

Dayna Evans:  "Try it out at your next party."

The First Major Drama of 2022 Is Between a Bunch of Disney Adults on TikTok:

EJ Dickson:  "On this week’s episode of ‘Don’t Let This Flop,’ we talk Adult Disney pranks, “So Hot You’re Hurting My Feelings,” and the resurgence of 2014 Tumblr girlie style."

Liverpool life in 1992 captured in fascinating photos:

Lee Grimsditch:  "Pictures taken 30 years ago remind us just how much has changed."

How The Book of Boba Fett Evolved Star Wars' View of the Tuskens:

Jordan Maison:  "The latest Disney+ Star Wars series went to great lengths to infuse its Tusken tribe with influences from real-world Indigenous cultures."

How ‘The Eternals’ Score Captured the Sound of Space, Love and Its Deviants:

Abbey White:  "Composer Ramin Djawadi explains his approach to crafting themes for an atypical MCU movie, setting up a major twist through music and working with director Chloé Zhao on the film, out on Disney+ this week."

Single page of Spider-Man comic sells for over $3.3m:

BBC News:  "The work was drawn by Mike Zeck and featured on page 25 of Marvel Comics' Secret Wars no 8."

Lohri Links.

Why Eternals Deserves A Second Chance On Disney+:
Ben Travis:  "WARNING: Contains major plot spoilers for Eternals."

Africa Oye returning to Sefton Park for 30th anniversary festival:

Elle May Rice:  "The festival celebrating the music and culture of Africa, the Caribbean and the diaspora will return after a two-year hiatus brought on by the coronavirus pandemic."

Doctor Who: The Forgotten Fugitive Doctor Returns For New, 'Epic Adventure':

Thomas Bacon:  "Doctor Who will continue the story of Jo Martin's Forgotten, Fugitive Doctor - but she's jumping into a completely different medium in April!"

An extremely rare, 400-year old book of Shakespeare plays is on display in Vancouver:

Brendan Kergin: "The UBC library has been gifted a rare and important book: a first edition version of William Shakespeare’s Comedies Histories and Tragedies. Printed in 1623, there are only 235 left in the world; this one is only the second to come to Canada."

Mission impossible – how to make a museum for artworks that were never made:

Catherine Bennett:  "It was designed as a life-sized version of snakes and ladders, plastered across Bologna’s central square, Piazza Maggiore."

Bank of England exhibition reveals views from London's past:

BBC News:  "Picture the City uses landscape paintings acquired by the Bank of England over the years and places them alongside modern-day views."

The 400 Blows: finding that beach and the Paris locations today:

Adam Scovell:  "With François Truffaut’s French New Wave classic The 400 Blows back in cinemas, we went in search of the locations, including the beach where that famous final freeze-frame takes place."

Night Watch:

BBC Radio 4:  "... four women from different parts of Britain share stories of street harassment. Woven through this feature is a new, specially commissioned poem by Hollie McNish."

Disney’s Encanto and its unexpected UK Singles Chart success:

Mark Harrison:  "Three songs from Encanto have popped up in this week’s UK Official Singles Chart – with stats and waffle, here are some of Disney’s other chart hit crossovers."

QR code scams are on the rise. Here's how not to get duped:

Bree Fowler:  "Cybercriminals are increasingly using malicious QR codes to trick consumers."

Thursday Links.

 
Christmas pudding sales fall 30% in five years as mince pies fly:
Amy North:  "Christmas pudding sales have fallen by nearly 30% over the past five years, British Baker can reveal."

Bar (in Liverpool) creates 'safe space' where people can feel less alone:

Paul McAuley:  "Special night aims to support people like Iwan Steffan, who is still struggling with the effects of lockdown."

Beijing 2022 Winter Olympic Games on the BBC:

BBC Media Centre:  "Join BBC Sport this February for all of the best moments from the Beijing 2022 Olympic Winter Games across TV, radio and online."

Pentagon launches new UFO office. Not all believers are happy about it:

Stephanie Pappas:  "They're definitely not saying it's aliens."

Surfable.app:

Sandoche & Farbod:  "Install any website as an app for instant access ."

The Electrical Life of Louis Wain puts cats centre stage in a film that’s filled with eccentric charm:

Philip Kemp:  "Director Will Sharpe proves himself to be one of the UK’s most individual filmmakers with a colourful biopic on Victorian cat artist Louis Wain, played by Benedict Cumberbatch."

[Editor's note:  Features a few spoilers if you don't know the actual life of Louis Wain and a reveals couple of casting choices, the surprise of which are part of the film's charm.]

‘I felt a sickening pain’: how the ‘first true Hitchcock movie’ almost killed its star:  

Henry K Miller:  "Alfred Hitchcock described his third film, The Lodger, as the true beginning of his directorial career but it would prove a near fatal screen debut for its leading light June Tripp."

Temuera Morrison has the only face that could bring Boba Fett back to life:

David Betancourt:  "Temuera Morrison vividly remembers the first time he tried on his Boba Fett suit."

BAFTA Unveils Longlists For 2022 Film Awards: Complete List:

Tom Gater:  "BAFTA has unveiled the longlists across all categories for its 2022 Film Awards. Scroll down to see them in full."

In pictures: British tank soldiers' final year in Germany:

Tobias Wilkinson:  "Nearly 75 years after the end of World War Two, the UK's last tank regiment in Germany, the Queen's Royal Hussars, returned home."

Tales of the Dark Times (Comic Creator).

Comics No matter how ardent the adult fan of Doctor Who, there are probably some elements which go ignored simply because they're not meant for our age group, and Comic Creator is a typical example.  Released in 2016 for ios, Amazon and Android, it's a more sophisticated digital equivalent of the rub-off transfer sets of the 70s and 80s, offering kids the ability to create their own stories using a predetermined set of characters and backgrounds.  It's produced by Scary Beasties, an award winning app creator who's worked with numerous licensees over the years including Disney and Nickelodeon and the BBC and it entirely pass me by until I had to download it in order to get part of the Time Lord Victorious story.

The Eight Doctor appears in two of the tales.  Chapter Three's set during his alliance with the Daleks as they encounter a suspicious looking ship which seems to have an all too easily digestible smorgasbord of Huon particles which leads the pepper pots down the road toward destruction.  Chapter Five is a multi-Doctor story with Eighth and Ninth on the hunt for Tenth.  They land on a planet and are surprised to stumble upon a suburban house which it transpires has fallen through the time fracture created at the close of play in Waters of Mars, aided by an inhabitant who's built a time machine.  Neither of the comics run to more than ten pages but both have a nice twist at the end.

Given the limitations of the format, it's surprising how well the writer of this, probably James Goss although it isn't stated, nicely captures Eighth's gentle sarcasm especially when he's bantering with the Dalek Strategist, a double act which is carried through audios and novels.  There's less chatter between the two Doctors in Chapter Five although it's clear they don't see eye to eye.  When Eighth says, "It's okay to change the universe when you change it for the better", Ninth doesn't look like he agrees entirely, although that could also be due to the limited number of facial expressions available for each of the characters and this just happens to be the one the artist chose to add some variety.

Placement:  They're set between chapters three and four of All Flesh Is Grass.  So for the sake of clarity, I'll split the entry for that novel into two and put this in the middle.

Wednesday Links.

Colors: Where did they go? An investigation:
Emily VanDerWerff:  "Why do so many TV shows and movies look like they were filmed in a gray wasteland?"

Marni Nixon: How Audrey Hepburn’s ghost singer was sworn to secrecy by Hollywood:

Alexandra Pollard:  "As the voice of Maria in ‘West Side Story’ and Eliza Doolittle in ‘My Fair Lady’, Marni Nixon should have been one of Hollywood’s biggest stars. Instead, other actors got the credit and she became American cinema’s ‘most unsung singer’."

How old Ugandan negatives are bringing families back to life:

Damian Zane:  "Ntare Guma Mbaho Mwine has made it his mission to preserve and exhibit the work of the late Ugandan studio photographer Kibaate Aloysius Ssalongo, who recorded the lives of people from the rural town of Mbirizi."

Words Invented or Coined by Shakespeare:

VizSweet:  "How many words did William Shakespeare invent? Probably around 1,000. Here are 400+ words Shakespeare invented or coined, a selection of the most interesting or notable." [via]

BBC Four celebrates the life of Sir Antony Sher:

RSC Press:  "An evening of programmes on Sunday 16 January, including a screening of 2014's Henry IV Part I, in which Sir Antony memorably played Falstaff."

Never mind the nose: what makes Cyrano de Bergerac a hero for all time?

Michael Billington:  "Edmond Rostand’s great romantic has drawn actors including Ralph Richardson, Antony Sher and James McAvoy to its lead role. It is a tale of glorious theatricality, glittering poetry and heroic self-sacrifice."

Sharon Stone Joins ‘The Flight Attendant’ Season 2 in Key Role:

Jennifer Maas:  "Sharon Stone has joined HBO Max’s “The Flight Attendant” for Season 2, playing the mother of star Kaley Cuoco’s Cassie Bowden, Variety has learned."

Dancing in the Aisles: The Public Shaming of Canada’s Most Infamous Influencers:

Ivy Knight:  "A production company chartered a party flight to Mexico, but when their antics ended up going viral, the rest of the world didn’t find it so amusing."

Energy Company Sorry For Telling Cold Customers to Cuddle Pets for Warmth:

Jenny G. Zhang:  "One of the U.K.’s largest energy suppliers has been forced to say sowwy for sending customers what were supposed to be helpful tips for keeping heating bills down this winter, including some endearingly twee ones like cuddling for warmth and having a nice bowl of porridge."

The major art anniversaries to look out for in 2022:

Apollo:  "... There are many reasons for 1922 to be considered a milestone in the history of literary modernism, such as the publication of ‘The Waste Land’ by T.S. Eliot and Jacob’s Room by Virginia Woolf, but the publication of Joyce’s novel is the most compelling."

Tuesday Links.

Star of Christmas film sets up online boutique:
David Adamson: "Ellie Coldicutt, 24, starred as Beth in the festive favourite Nativity! back in 2009, charming viewers with the song Sparkle and Shine before going on to feature in the sequel as well as touring productions of The Sound of Music and the RSC’s Richard III."

How Peter Bogdanovich Shaped the Backstory of Modern Cinema:

Richard Brody: "One of the most original directors of New Hollywood, Bogdanovich was also a critic who expanded our cinephilic heritage."

How Fake Spies Ruin Real Intelligence:

Amy Zegart: "Espionage-themed entertainment is influencing policy makers, from soldiers fighting on the front lines to justices sitting on the nation’s highest court."

Man Invents Possibly The Worst Way To Play Doom:

Ian Walker:  "A Calgary-based programmer recently shared his work turning a rotary telephone into what may be the least effective video game controller of all time."

Notebook Primer: Screwball Comedy:

Olympia Kiriakou:  "Screwball comedy’s fast-paced battle of the sexes explored the socio-economic politics of the 1930s and 1940s."

Paris’s ‘House of Molière’ wishes happy 400th birthday to French theatre legend:

Laura Cappelle:  "The Comédie-Française is celebrating the 17th-century dramatist by recreating Tartuffe, the play that outraged the Catholic church and almost ended his career."

Can this new pressing plant solve the vinyl crisis?

Ellen Peirson-Hagger:  "Press On Vinyl, a facility due to open in the new year, has been dubbed “the communist plant of Teesside”."

What is a book?

Lisa Gitelman:  "Anyone who remembers making the transition from typewriting to word processing has probably thrown away a fair number of floppy disks and jettisoned more than a few computers since then. Bad for the planet, yes. But it also poses particular challenges for the stewards and denizens of archives."

Cheese Accounting 🧀  aka Dairy Diary:

Jessamyn West:  "I won a year's supply of cheese in a contest May of 2019."

Banksy stable at model village could fetch 'seven figures':

BBC News:  "The tiny building appeared at Merrivale Model Village in Great Yarmouth, Norfolk, in August, during Banksy's "Great British Spraycation"."

Plough Monday Links.

Art historian discovers that £65 painting on his wall is work of Flemish master:

Dalya Alberge: "Picture of Isabella Clara Eugenia, Infanta of Spain, is likely to be by Sir Anthony van Dyck, finds Courtauld’s report."

26 places in Merseyside everyone needs to visit at least once:

Elle May Rice:  "How many of these are on your bucket list?"

Michael J. Fox Snuck Away At Christmas To Watch Back To The Future For The First Time In A Long Time And Was Surprised By What He Saw:

Adreon Patterson: "What did the Back to the Future star think of his performance in the film?"

The James Webb Space Telescope is fully deployed. So what's next for the biggest observatory off Earth?

Elizabeth Howell: "The generational observatory is en route to its parking spot and getting ready to test its mirrors and instruments."

In Beanotown:

Mark Sinker:  "Beano: The Art of Breaking the Rules (at Somerset House until 6 March 2022) consists of pages and tales from the comic’s eight decades, loosely organised into themes, along with work by some forty non-Beano artists that amplifies its characters, motifs and slapstick."

How TikTok Is Fueling Hollywood Marketing Campaigns Like Sony’s Epic Pitch For ‘Spider Man: No Way Home’:

Dade Hayes: "TikTok’s grip on young audiences is a well-established fact, but the social network has just released a new report detailing how that defining trait has made it increasingly attractive to Hollywood."

Gilgi, One of Us by Irmgard Keun (tr. Geoff Wilkes):

Jacqui Wine:  "I loved this novella, a striking portrayal of a determined young woman set in Weimar-era Cologne. First published in 1931, and subsequently banned by the Nazi authorities, Gilgi (One of Us), was Irmgard Keun’s debut novel, announcing its author as a powerful new voice in German literature."

Star Wars Hutts Should Never, Ever Be CGI:

Matt Singer:  "This week’s episode of The Book of Boba Fett introduced two new characters to the series’ cast, a pair of corpulent alien crime lords from the race known as “The Hutts.” Cousins of the notorious Jabba the Hutt, they are carried along on a sagging throne by a legion of footmen."

Tori Amos’s Little Earthquakes Still Resonates at 30:

Sal Cinquemani: "Tori Amos’s debut album, Little Earthquakes, helped reshape the pop landscape and the reverberations can still be felt today."

OH MY FUCKING GOD, GET THE FUCKING VACCINE ALREADY, YOU FUCKING FUCKS:

Wendy Molyneux: "Hi, if you are reading this essay then congratulations, you are still alive. And if you are alive, then you have either gotten the COVID-19 vaccine, or you still have the opportunity to get the vaccine against COVID-19. And holy fuck, if you aren’t fucking vaccinated against COVID-19, then you need to get fucking vaccinated right now. I mean, what the fuck? Fuck you. Get vaccinated. Fuck."

Sunday Links.

Stoke ditches curators for museums to become film locations:

Arts Industry News:  "Curators and management staff at the Gladstone Museum, with its famously recognisable brick bottle kilns where Channel 4’s popular Great Pottery Throw Down is filmed, and the Potteries Museum and Art Gallery have been told that all their posts are to be deleted as the council seeks to cut £7.1m from its annual budget. Both were scheduled to re-open on January 18 after a Christmas closure lengthened by the Omicron Covid crisis."

Forget Sherlock Holmes and try these other Victorian detectives:
Clare Clarke: "Rivals, clones and parodies of Baker Street’s finest sprang to life in the late 19th century. Clare Clarke walks you through the best of the bunch, from Loveday Brooke to Flaxman Low."

Pokimane Receives First Twitch Ban, But It's Only Temporary:

Zack Zwiezen:  "The popular streamer was banned after streaming episodes of the Avatar: The Last Airbender cartoon."

A Guide to Rewatching Sidney Poitier’s Most Memorable Films:

Matt Zoller Seitz: "His image evolved and adapted over decades as the central contradiction of the actor and director’s life played out on screens."

Gemma Chan on the truth about her father’s life at sea: ‘He knew what it was like to have nothing’:

Gemma Chan:  "The actor knew her father had served in the merchant navy, but it wasn’t until she read about Britain’s mistreatment of Chinese seamen in the 40s that she understood just how much his experiences had shaped her family."

The secret deportations: how Britain betrayed the Chinese men who served the country in the war:

Dan Hancox: "During the second world war, Chinese merchant seamen helped keep Britain fed, fuelled and safe – and many gave their lives doing so. But from late 1945, hundreds of them who had settled in Liverpool suddenly disappeared. Now their children are piecing together the truth."

‘Winnie-the-Pooh’ just entered the public domain. Here’s what that means for fans:

Michael Cavna: "Luke McGarry began drawing a nude Pooh Bear as soon as he heard the news. The original, nearly 100-year-old “bear of very little brain” from the Hundred Acre Wood had rung in this new year by entering the public domain. Now quite humbly, McGarry’s creative appetite felt rumbly."

11 things I hate about Christmas:

Karyn Starmer: "I love Christmas I really do. I love a good party and a thoughtful gift. As a child, I was fortunate to grow up with all the anticipation of Christmas Eve, then the early morning excitement to see what the man in red had delivered."

Mouldy tomatoes 999 call to Welsh Ambulance Service:

BBC News: "Panicked patients dialled 999 after eating sandwiches with mouldy tomatoes in and suffering papercuts."

New chapter of hope: indie bookshops defy the odds to hit nine-year UK high:

Alison Flood: "Independent sellers have battled lockdowns, supply-chains issues and Amazon to reclaim their place in the industry. We speak to the people who opened their own."

Nihilistic Saturday Links.

 

A Guide: Recognizing and Alleviating Anxiety:

Mirna Abdulaal: "It is easy to see the buzz expressions “mental health” and “ways to cope with stress/anxiety” appear regularly on social media, but it’s even harder to directly interact with someone who struggles from anxiety."

UK surge in post-Christmas returns reveals dark side of online shopping boom:
Sarah Butler: "Returns process thought to cost firms about £7bn a year and weigh heavily on companies’ carbon footprints"

Running events taking place in Liverpool and Wirral in 2022:

Phoebe Barton: "Half marathons, 10Ks, 5Ks and fun runs - there's something for everyone."

Canadian passengers partied maskless on a charter flight to Mexico. Airlines are refusing to fly them home:

Julian Mark: "Passengers on a Canadian charter flight danced, drank alcohol and vaped as they made their way from Montreal to Cancún, Mexico, the day before New Year’s Eve. Video footage of the rave-like atmosphere made its way onto social media, and the images of maskless travelers partying in the air amid surging coronavirus cases sparked broad condemnation."

Ben Affleck Says Shooting ‘Justice League’ Was the “Worst Experience”:

Ryan Gajewski: "The actor will reprise his role as Batman in the upcoming film 'The Flash.'"

BBC reporter covered by snow flurry while filming:

BBC News:  "BBC correspondent Laura Trevelyan got caught in a snow drift while filming in Washington DC on Monday and had "snow" way out."

Maa-ry Christmas! London goats feast on festive firs:

News Desk (AFP): "A herd of goats grazing on a London city farm are getting their teeth into hundreds of unwanted Christmas trees donated by residents in a fundraising drive."

The Ongoing Saga of the “Fearless Girl” Statue:

Sheelah Kolhatkar:  "Since its installation, the sculpture, by Kristen Visbal, has been mired in legal disputes and claims of “fake corporate feminism.” New York City will soon decide its fate."

Honoring Stephen Hawking’s scientific legacy:

Laurian Clemence: "As we welcome in another year, and reflect on the turbulent one that’s passed, the existential words of Professor Stephen Hawking are as poignant as ever: “Remember to look up at the stars, and not down at your feet.”"

Singin’ in the Rain remembered by its makers — and still reignin’ 70 years on:

Nigel Andrews:  "... revisits his interviews with Gene Kelly, Stanley Donen and Debbie Reynolds to tell the story of how they created Hollywood’s most enduring musical."

Across The Omniverse.

Film  Having given it the requisite few weeks, let's briefly talk about the magnificent Spider-Man: No Way Home and how it fits within the MCU's general "multiverse" system.  Numerous tweets, blog posts and video essays have suggested that there's a continuity error between the appearance of the other two Spiders and various villains and what was established in Loki (and Agents of SHIELD for that matter) something which presumably be explained in Doctor Strange's Multiverse of Madness.

But the structure of how these fictional universes fit together has already been well established in both the MARVEL and DC continuities and indeed the Marvel Database has a whole page explaining how these things are nested which I'm about to regurgitate in relation to how it works in this new live action version and once you have it fixed in your head you can see how the whole notion of "canonicity" in relation to "things happening in fictional universes" is absolute nonsense.  That everything is canon(ical).

This nested structure breaks down as follows:

Omniverse.

An infinite collection of all fictional universes ever.  As the Marvel article lists,  "not only Marvel Comics, but also DC Comics, Image, Dark Horse, Wildstorm, Archie, Harvey, Shueisha, Boom Studios, Rebellion, Dynamite, IDW, Graphic India, Derby Pop, Vertigo, Oni Press, Udon, Valiant, and every universe ever mentioned or seen".  Basically, this is everything.  Every film, tv show, comic, advert, every piece of fiction ever created.  The DC version of the article is a bit more exclusive because of course it is.

To keep things simple, I'm only going to refer to how this works for the MCU.  

Multiverse.

This is were the jargon becomes a bit confused and why what appears on screen is more complicated.  What seemed to happen at the close of Loki is the creation of a multiverse but its implied that all the individual universes must be branches of the main MCU timeline.  Except the universes which feature in the Spiderverse (including the animations) are wildly divergent to the point of not having their own Avengers and Peters fighting solo.  Not to mention wherever Venom is coming and going from.

That's because Loki isn't about creating the multiverse.  The multiverse already existed and contains all of the different live action MARVEL film series, all existing within their own continuity.  Roughly speaking:

The MCU

The Raimi Spider-Man

The Webb Spider-Man

All of the different universes in the Spider-verse film

The Tim Story Fantastic Four

The Josh Trank Fantastic Four and arguably Deadpool

The OG X-Men and/or the First Class X-Men

Whatever was happening with mutants on TV and/or Logan

The Blade films

The Ghost Rider films

What we saw in No Way Home was the top three of these connecting together and hopefully in Doctor Strange's Multiverse of Madness a few more of them giving us a cameo.  The Sony Spider-verses aren't alternative versions of the MCU, they are their own distinct universes that happen to share some similarities with each other but are wildly different in other ways, not unlike the Bondiverse and now potentially have their own branches thanks to the events in No Way Home.

Universes.

This is a single nested continuity which itself can contain numerous alternative realities.  But they're all variations on a much similar theme and their own history or continuity can be changed and its the variations in one of these which we watch being created in Loki and What If? with the various characters oblivious to the other timelines nested within their greater multiverse.  There can be an infinite number of timelines within these universes with all the Kangs which could look like a "multiverse" when viewed from inside, if you're not aware that other "universes" exist, that there's more than a sacred timeline.

At least that's how I rationalise it, although its possible DS's MoM won't view it that way or at least present it in those terms although it'll be possible to retroactively apply it to this structure anyway.  

Loki (the series) has already thrown a spanner in the works by not presenting us with lots of Loki that all look like Tom Hiddleston and could have emerged from places as significantly divergent as the Spider-verse but the show makes it clear that they're all the result of anomalies in this single timeline that they've had to trim, work the Time Variance Agency is presumably doing without an awareness that there are universes out there in which the laws of Time are wildly different anyway.

But how does Agents of SHIELD fit into this?  The timey-wimey direction the show takes in its latter seasons has been used as a reason to exclude it from the MCU even though with all of the various movie crossovers in which it literally set up storylines in much the same way as the Disney+ originated series.

Except it fits perfectly into the events of Loki.  Due to how its main character is resurrected, that show happens in 2012 as per MCU chronology.  So when SHIELD's adventures diverge and the timeline changes, they're creating or at least part of an alternate reality which can now exist because of Sylvie's actions and which they can travel back from in the final episodes to the main MCU leaving Deke behind (and the episode is sneakily vague on how that works in relation to the snap).

Reading back through that it looks like absolutely gobbledygook but I've had it rattling around in my head for weeks and its good to get it written down.  But it also makes it easier to understand how a particular fictional universe fits within a much wider narrative context.  I've simplified things a bit here, but obviously you'd include all of the various MARVEL comics universes in alongside the ones listed above and try to figure out how the spider-verse in the comics connects the film and the version which originated in the cartoon.

All of which said, my suspicion is that there are more levels to this and that you could make a clearer distinction between universes and timelines.  Oh god, now I'm trying to explain how this works in relation to the DCU and that's a whole other multiverse of madness.

Orthodox Christmas Links.

Orthodox Christmas: In Mostar, reconstruction of an Orthodox church is a sign of unity:

Aleksandar Brezar:  "Mostar’s rich skyline, with mosques and Catholic church towers peeking out above buildings and set against an imposing mountain range, now once again features the towers of an elegant Orthodox church — perched on a hill above the city’s eastern side — after it was destroyed during the brutal war in the city almost 30 years ago."

Buck found wandering Colorado with Christmas lights around its antlers, photos show:

Maddie Capron: "As you take down holiday lights, you may want to be mindful of deer and other animals."

What Clayton Square looked like before the shopping centre was built:

Lee Grimsditch: "The shopping centre opened in 1989 and faced fierce opposition from conservationists who wanted to preserve the city's Georgian heritage."

How Jessica Simpson Almost Lost Her Name:
Stephanie Clifford/Eliza Ronalds- Hannon: "The pop star’s billion-dollar fashion brand fell into the hands of the wrong company. After a two-year battle, she finally bought it back."

Tilda Swinton: ‘My ambition was always about having a house by the sea and some dogs’:

Simon Hattenstone: "The actor opens up about her queer years with Derek Jarman and her latest clutch of films, and reveals her plans for a career change. And all while taking her five spaniels for a walk."

Andrew Garfield Finally Spills About ‘Spider-Man’ Return and Future — and the ‘Gift’ of ‘Tick, Tick Boom!’ (EXCLUSIVE):

Matt Donnelly: "Is anyone having a year like Andrew Garfield’s?"

Shakespeare Documented:

"A multi-institutional resource documenting Shakespeare in his own time."

A Brave New World for UNIT’s Brigadier:

Big Finish: "Brigadier Winifred Bambera returns to the UNIT front line in her own brand new series of full-cast audio dramas from Big Finish Productions."

The Doctor Who treasure trove in a Northumberland village cellar:

Mark Brown:  "Neil Cole’s Museum of Classic Sci-Fi, hosted in cellar of his Allendale townhouse, holds costumes and props from numerous TV classics."

Star Trek super-fan releases short film created in his home-built basement set:

Chris Peterson: "Back in February of 2021, we told you about Todd Spann, the Indianapolis-based science fiction super fan who created a Star Trek set in his basement. The project took more than three years to complete. Nearly a year later, Spann made use of his creation, releasing a new short film based on Star Trek and filmed entirely on location at his home in Indiana."

Proper Twelfth Night Links.

 

This Twelfth night I’m packing away more than just my Christmas decorations:

Emma Beddington: "Yes, comfort and joy is nice. But there are some seasonal trappings I am glad to see the back of."

F.B.I. Arrests Man Accused of Stealing Unpublished Book Manuscripts:

Elizabeth A. Harris: "Filippo Bernardini, an Italian citizen who worked in publishing, was charged with wire fraud and identity theft for a scheme that prosecutors said affected hundreds of people over five or more years."

The Spine Collector: 

Reeves Wiedeman/Lila Shapiro: "For years, a mysterious figure has been stealing books before their release. Is it espionage? Revenge? Or a complete waste of time?"

Hello, Are You New Here?

Diamond Geezer: "Just before Christmas I published a simple infographic summarising the sequence of lockdown restrictions over the last two years... a brief monthly snapshot of fluctuating curbs on freedom."

Text appeal: Ceefax recreated by 20-year-old Northern Irish man:

Jim Waterson: "Nathan Dane spent six years honing his version of the BBC’s defunct text-based information service."

The weirdest and most interesting tech at CES 2022:

Chris Velazco/Tatum Hunter : "The consumer electronics trade show salutes 2022 with some of the strangest technologies we’ve seen in a while. Here are the highlights."

High-frame rate analog HDTV from 1990:

Rob Beschizza: "... this Sony demo video from 1990, then, is an uncanny thing: the technology and image detail we register as a 21st-century experience but with the lighting, style and vibe at least a decade older."

Why Scientists Become Spies:

Rivka Galchen: "Access to information only goes so far to explain the curious link between secrets and those who tell them."

Platinum Jubilee: The Queen depicted on horseback on commemorative coin

By:

BBC News: "The series commemorates the Queen's Platinum Jubilee, marking her 70 years on the throne."

ViacomCBS and WarnerMedia Exploring Sale of The CW:

Lesley Goldberg/Alex Weprin: "Local TV giant Nexstar is said to be among the suitors for the broadcast network."