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.

Over the past few weeks, a number of Doctor Who fan sites have claimed that nobody will be continuing to the next series. It’s not just Moffat and Capaldi; Missy and Bill’s actors are apparently departing as well. Nothing specific about Nardole, that I can find, but it’s generally being assumed that he’s also out.

If true, I won’t lose any sleep over Missy, but despite them not giving her much to do, Bill has been an interesting character. I’d be sorry to see her go before Pearl Mackie gets a chance to develop the character. Not my favorite companion (that would be Wilfred Mott), but she hasn’t really been given the chance.

I’m quite optimistic about incoming showrunner Chris Chibnall, though. The man responsible for the first two seasons of Torchwood and half a dozen Tennant/Smith episodes has a good grasp of the universe.

So far, this season of Doctor Who has been… “unimpressive”. The set design mostly lacks imagination and scope. The stories feel like they were cribbed from better, or at least more ambitious, episodes in previous seasons. The Doctor’s monologs are being written by Captain Obvious and The Campus Socialist. The new companion got a decent intro, but has done little of note since. And as for the monster of the week, well, so far we’ve had:

The ideas and characters in each episode are undeveloped. There’s no supporting cast to speak of, just the Doctor, Bill, and Nardole, and Nardole spends most of his time delivering ominous foreshadowing with the delicate grace of a firehose.

Now that I’m caught up to episode 10.5, I have only one question:

Will the entire season be written by interns copying scenes from their favorite episodes?

They should have just called it “Tiny Groot Adventures”.

The movie is 2 hours, 16 minutes, and I don’t know if that counts the multiple before/during/after-credits scenes. It definitely doesn’t count the 20 minutes of trailers I had to sit through with earplugs in. I should have just showed up 15 minutes late; the theater was pretty empty at 10:40 AM on a Monday.

Without spoiling anything, I’ll just say that I don’t think it had 136 minutes of story to tell. The celebrity cameos felt forced, Kurt Russell’s performance turned to crap when he (spoilered), and the extended dance mix of (spoiler’s) (spoiler) at the end just went on and on. I was catching Pokemon for most of it.

Also, while the Stan Lee cameo in the previous film was amusing, his first scene in this one was a bit too wink-wink-nudge-nudge, and the second was just dumb. Howard the Duck’s performance was less annoying than Stan Lee’s.

Apart from the three major cameos, nothing really threw me out of the film, and those bits were short enough that I was able to forget them and enjoy the ride. I wouldn’t go see it again, even as a matinee, and I don’t think I’ll buy the Bluray. I’ll watch it again with friends when it comes out, but just the once.

Note: yes, that’s Ben Browder. And Ving Rhames. And Michelle Yeoh. And even Michael Rosenbaum playing someone bald…

DanSora, episode 4

In which it is revealed that Aiz once had a full range of emotions, before something as-yet-unspecified happened to her parents. Less time is spent on Lefiya’s desperate crush, but instead we get Tione going vigorously dere-dere over their pint-sized boss.

Speaking of which, I saw someone commenting that he had trouble remembering which name went with which amazon. The answer is simple: the last letter is their cup size. Tiona, DFC; Tione, boin!.

What really doesn’t work is splitting the party and having the annoying Loki annoy the annoying Bete. Their scenes advance the plot, but I just don’t enjoy the voice acting for either character.

By the way, this episode puts them about halfway through the second light novel, and it looks like book 3 wraps up the current plot. At the current pace, I’m guessing they’ll make it through book 4, at least, which includes Bell’s minotaur fight from their point of view.

Eromanga-sensei, episode 5

Okay, so Sagiri is a creepy middle-aged man in the body of an adorable loli, Our Hero is her pimp, and they both really need to get out more. The episode improved once Elf arrived, as usual.

Oh, almost forgot. WTF is up with the time-wasting shots of the fat jogger? Could you not find a better way to pad out the episode, like maybe animating the Elf-catch instead of showing a still?

Doctor Who, episode 10.4

Honestly, the best thing about this season is that it’s Steven Moffat’s last as showrunner. I don’t have a lot to say about this episode, except that, like the previous one, it feels like they’re just filing the serial numbers off of stories they did a few years ago and adding in a likely-disappointing season arc.

Your novel Eight Million Gods is a pretty good read. I spotted the occasional spell-check-editing error of the sort that is increasingly common in the genre, whether traditionally published or indie, but none of them were severe enough to obscure the meaning or knock me out of the story.

No, that was reserved for the error that I hope was introduced by an inept editorial assistant, because your knowledge of Japan is clear enough that I’m sure you know there’s no such thing as a hundred-thousand-yen bill, and that it would be ridiculous for a young woman to carry such a thing and use it pay the cover charge at a host club.

Also, someone needs to tell your cover artist that katanas are not swung like baseball bats. And that a collage of details from random pages in the book is not the same as drawing a scene from the book.