A bit belatedly, it occurs to me that there’s no one to react to the results of this new regeneration. Unless they bring back a human(ish) character from a previous season, no one who encounters the new Doctor will have a reason to notice, much less care.

I was really kind of rooting for Hayley Atwell as the next Doctor, but while I’ve never seen Jodie Whittaker in anything, she seems like a sound choice. At least she has a good relationship with the new show-runner, which was apparently one of the (many) problems with Capaldi’s tenure.

What I find tiresome is the nitwits on social media who are treating it as a victory over The Patriarchy. Reminder: when you hate half the population, you’re the bigot.

Update

Naturally, Those Lovable Leftists hate her because she’s white. Of course, much like the deafening silence regarding the gender imbalance in the field of sewer-cleaning, I’m not seeing a lot of demands for Women Of Color to win the coveted Nazi roles in WWII movies and games. What kind of world denies a black Muslim lesbian her right to be Hitler?

Wither, BBC

(not a typo)

“One in six of all on-screen BBC roles must go to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender or disabled people by 2020, the corporation’s new diversity targets state.”

…

“The BBC’s royal charter, due to expire this year, is currently under Government review.”

(not a coincidence)

I’m guessing the disabled activists will be getting the short end of the stick on this one.

(via)

(via)

“No, but I’d kiss his redheaded clone sisters.”

The just-released SF anthology Straight Outta Tombstone has a lot of good stories in it, with a nice mix of authors. Good to see Phil Foglio working in prose again, and I particularly liked the fact that Jim Butcher’s story isn’t one of his usual “you’ll need to read this to understand the next Harry Dresden novel” (which is often used to sell anthologies full of stories I’m not interested in…).

As is usual for Baen, the first two stories can be read for free here.

DanSora 11

Good Lefiya: well, that certainly qualifies as “casting while moving”.

Bad Lefiya: just beg for a piece already, sheesh.

Bonus Lefiya: congrats, you finally ended up sleeping with somebody.

More and more, I wish they’d made Tiona the focus character. She’s the most interesting of Aiz’s gal-pals. There’s a novel in this series that’s focused on the Amazon twins, but we’re not going to get anywhere near it this season.

Eromanga-sensei 12

In which sinister dom Sagiri abuses Elf and Dere-Dere-Dere Muramasa in the service of her muse, leaves her subs to suffer as she discovers The Secret Rival, then finds a new ecchi hobby that she doesn’t know dick about. In the aftermath, Megumin provides definitive proof that she is both a virgin and a total noob, and Muramasa demonstrates that she pays attention in art class. Even with her help, though, Sagiri still has a hard problem to solve before she can really nail this new style. Maybe Elf can swipe some videos from her brother, although that might lead to other problems.

Also, bookstore-chan tries the just-kidding-only-serious method, which Our Hero is naturally oblivious to.

If this ends next episode, I’m guessing the big finale will be Sagiri setting foot in the front yard. By the way, if that’s the Aunt in the OP, she’s running out of time to show up.

Slight change to the ED this week, revealing more about Our Hero.

Doctor Who 10.11

The beginning of the end, with terrible Zathras impression. Also, more third-rate meta.

Dark Matter 3.4

I guess every writer and director has a Groundhog Day episode they need to get out of their system. While nothing can live up to the ones done by Xena and SG-1, this wasn’t bad, and made good use of Three’s character development and Anthony Lemke’s talents.

Quote saved to use on Rory:

“No. You can’t just make up your own words. You have to actually repeat the words that I say.”

I’m not sure why I’ve never mentioned watching the SciFi Channel’s series Dark Matter. I just caught up on the start of the third season, and I can’t really say anything to praise it, but somehow I keep watching. It’s shallow and clichéd and cheesy and Canadian, …and just as good as it needs to be.

Three, Five, and Six have plenty of sf-ghetto cred, and of course series regular Truffault goes all the way back to Forever Knight, making her time in service longer than Five’s life. Three did the best job of selling his character at first, but I’d say he and Six hit parity about halfway through the first season. Five is fun, but she suffers from having to be the genius teen who can do amazing things with technology (perhaps it’s no coincidence that Wil Wheaton has been a guest star…).

Two is a newcomer to the SF ghetto, moving from Canadian Idol and Broadway Éponine to “mildly-psychotic semi-superpowered space mercenary captain”, but she’s doing a solid job, and quickly grew out of the “badass eye candy” they wrote her as initially. Android is an acquired taste, but the actress has been able to have fun with the role.

If you’re counting, you’ll note that I’ve left out One and Four. While Four’s been driving the plot recently, so much of it revolves around him being King Of The Assholes that I kind of wish it was over (“dear writers, pleasepleaseplease kill off Misaki before her dialog and delivery kills me”); the more central his story has become, the less interesting he is as a character. One was Captain Whitebread from the Planet of Sensitive New Age Guys, so I can’t say that I object to his story being wrapped up abruptly.

Perhaps the most interesting thing about the show is that the original pilot graphic novel had Two as the only female, which would have made things a lot less interesting. And a lot less decorative, even though Android rarely lets her hair down, and Five’s awesome bosom is generally concealed to pretend she looks like a teenager.

In the end, maybe I like it because most of the actors have managed to make their characters work. It’s no SG-1, where the entire cast hit the ground running, but it works.

[Side note: the gang’s handler Calchek hasn’t showed up nearly as much as Truffault, but not only was he a villain in Forever Knight, he goes all the way back to Friday The 13th: The Series.]

R.I.P. Stephen Furst.