Who Summons the Killer Baby?

It has a possessed baby, it has distinguished actors taking their roles seriously, but 1975's I Don't Want to be Born (a.k.a. The Devil Within Her and The Monster) never approaches The Exorcist in quality. Some nice dialogue thoughtfully delivered by Donald Pleasence and Eileen Atkins is undercut a bit by thoroughly unconvincing scenes of people getting pummelled to death by a newborn.

Baby's fingers dripping with his mother's blood following an attack when she tried to cuddle him soon after birth is the first real sign of trouble. For the baby's parents because this is not normal infant behaviour, for the audience because we're meant to accept what looks like drops of strawberry syrup on the fingers of a baby with an unmistakably oblivious facial expression as the sign of it cruelly perpetrating an act of physical violence. I wonder if anyone dared point out to director Peter Sasdy that one of the reasons The Exorcist worked is we were eventually able to see Linda Blair looking pretty convincingly demoniac.

Joan Collins is delicious as the baby's self-centred mother and I did like the scene where she narrates a flashback of the child's conception. Lucy (Collins) had worked as a stripper in a burlesque club where she performed with a dwarf named Hercules (George Claydon). In the flashback scene, she grudgingly admits to being turned on when he unexpectedly began fondling her in her dressing room but she angrily rejected him, pushing him away when he grabbed for her breasts. And so, like many evil dwarves before him, he takes revenge by putting a curse on Lucy. In case anyone thought this curse's relationship to the baby was too ambiguous, shots of Hercules in the crib in place of the baby are flashed for Lucy in moments when it's being particularly malevolent.

Lucy's husband, Gino (Ralph Bates), is blissfully unaware the baby might not be his, his guilelessness emphasised by an Italian accent so broad Chico Marx might call it stagey.

Gino's sister, a nun, has an accent not much more convincing but she's played with enough steel and intelligence by Eileen Atkins to make her seem the worthy counterpart to Max von Sydow in The Exorcist. She almost elevates every scene she's in, but maybe no performance can make up for a hairy little hand swatting up at adults from a crib. But I did really like a scene between Atkins and Pleasence, who plays the family's doctor. They have a fairly predictable debate about faith and science, with Pleasence concluding that, "a doctor can't write up a prescription against evil and violence. It's one of the severest limitations of our profession." But I love how Pleasence plays the scene. Except for the slightest of hints in his last few lines there's little sense of smugness in him and there's a sparkle in Atkins' eye that suggests her shrewd excitement in engaging in debate. I'd have loved to have seen these two as adversaries in a better movie with better dialogue.

This film is effectively funny, even if it didn't mean to be. Well, I'm pretty sure Lucy's hilariously useless stripper friend played by Caroline Munro was meant to be funny. I Don't Want to be Born is available on Amazon Prime under the title of The Monster.

Only Fur can be Seen in the Jungle

DOCTOR: "Well, Jo? Do I pass?" JO GRANT: "You'll do. In a pinch." Get a room, you two. It's not clear why the Spiridons, the indigenous inhabitants of the world featured in Planet of the Daleks, must wear these furry purple cloaks. They're naturally invisible but it seems like they could've been forced to wear something much duller by their Dalek enslavers. I'm not really complaining, it looks really cosy.

This six part Third Doctor (Jon Pertwee) Doctor Who serial from 1973 was written by Dalek creator Terry Nation, the first he'd written since the First Doctor era. As part of a larger sequence of linked serials that began with the six part Frontier in Space, the characteristic differences in Nation's writing are marked. Planet of the Daleks has been called a reworking of the first Dalek serial, The Daleks, written by Nation, and there are many reminiscent elements of that serial, welcome ones in my opinion.

I love how much the flora and fauna of the alien planet impact the story, for example. Alien planets too often become interchangeable quarries, here the Doctor, Jo, and their Thal allies must contend with spores that cause irremovable grime to spread over their targets and sinister, glowing eyes and growls from the dark.

Jo (Katy Manning), having been hit by one of those spores, is saved by a floating medicine bowl that turns out to be a Spiradon sans purple fur. The element of fantastic in the serial has a fabulous late 60s/early 70s quality and I do love it so.

When the Doctor and some Thals infiltrate the Dalek base, he throws the purple fur over a double breasted, burgundy velvet sport coat and bow tie with muted green and burgundy. I love that he takes a moment to change into this outfit at the beginning of the serial when the TARDIS is malfunctioning and running out of air. He changes from an all green outfit that would've provided perfect camouflage, even if it was too dressy, into something that sticks out like a sore thumb. But wear the same outfit for two serials? Three knows that would certainly never do. The Daleks would never understand such sartorial sensitivity. Well, we heard in the Tenth Doctor era a Dalek proclaim they have no concept of elegance.

Many developments in Planet of the Daleks depend on the non-Daleks making decisions influenced by love and fear, emotions the Daleks deem useless. The Doctor gets captured in a hasty, obviously futile attempt to save Jo from getting blasted and he's imprisoned with a Thal soldier. The two have a nice conversation about bravery which would be echoed later in the Twelfth Doctor era.

"Courage isn't just a matter of not being frightened, you know," the Doctor says to the Thal who's worried about controlling his own fear. "It's being afraid and doing what you have to do anyway."

This serial also marks the first time the Thals, the ancient enemies of the Daleks, appeared on the show since the first Dalek serial. Sadly no longer wearing their skimpy foam Y outfits. Wouldn't it be great if they brought those back in the new series? I might as well dream big.

Milton, Milton, and Milton v Milton and Milton

Those interested in canon court matters may be pleased to find my infrequently updated webcomic, Dekpa and Deborah, has its first new chapter since September. Over five months! I'm determined to get the next chapter out much quicker. This one was delayed by a lot of time spent writing a research paper. This particular chapter, and the one before it, required some research though I did most of it in early 2018 and 2017. The two latest chapters of Dekpa and Deborah deal with the true circumstances following John Milton's death, when his brother, Christopher, who was a Royalist and therefore ideologically John's opponent, and Betty Milton, John's wife when he died, filed a nuncupative will--that is, a will spoken rather than written. Since John was blind, he was obliged to do all his writing this way.

There was a bitter and, as some biographers and commentators consider it, embarrassing dispute between Milton's daughters and the team of Christopher and Betty regarding the veracity of this will. The court documents remain in existence and its one of the few direct pieces of information about John Milton's family that didn't come from John himself. So it's a valuable item for me since John's daughter, Deborah, is one of the main characters of my comic. Of all the characters in this new chapter only Dekpa is my invention and presents my interpretation of the events, what I think may have happened in the world outside those documents. So let me take you back to December, 1674 . . .

Twitter Sonnet #1213

An olive rolled between the cobble stones.
A giant's steps were marked in crimson shade.
The strongest house's timbers cracked as bones.
The morning's breath in fog begins to fade.
A diver shaped the air with freezing hands.
As clouds begin to slow they change to damp.
A thirsty story's told in sifting sands.
The message came but late to warn the camp.
Umbrellas gather late to wash the sun.
In careful carried vessels water drips.
In silhouette the crow was like a nun.
Her higher rank was told in godly pips.
Between the words a plantly human grows.
As flower closed apace they changed to toes.

Krill versus Hot Blood

There were things I enjoyed about it but last night's new Orville, "The Blood of Patriots", was my least favourite episode of the series so far. Maybe it's inevitable the episode to follow "Identity" would be a let down but this one disappointed me on too many levels.

Spoilers after the screenshot

I was hoping we'd get some follow up with Isaac (Mark Jackson)--some self analysis from him, figuring out why he made the decisions he made; some crew reactions--is everyone really still okay serving with Isaac?--maybe some further insight into the Kaylons. But Isaac only had, I'm pretty sure, one line in this episode and seemed to be reintegrated into the crew as though nothing happened.

I did like the awards ceremony with Yaphit (Norm Macdonald) who really was great in "Identity", something I failed to mention last week because I had so much else I wanted to talk about. And the premise of "Blood of Patriots", a possible treaty between the Union and the Krill, is a follow up to the conflict with the Kaylons.

"Blood of Patriots" begins with a Krill shuttle fleeing the Krill ship the Orville is scheduled to meet with. Ed (Seth MacFarlane) decides to allow the shuttle and its mysterious occupant to take shelter in the Orville shuttle bay. Orville crew enter the shuttle to discover the fugitives are none other than Gordon's (Scott Grimes) old friend Orin (Mackenzie Astin) and Orin's traumatised daughter (Aily Kei).

The episode begins to resemble many episodes of Deep Space Nine featuring Bajorans who can't understand why Bajor or the Federation want to work with Cardassians. Or the Next Generation episode "The Wounded" when Picard is surprised when a Federation captain decides to attack Cardassians against orders. All of these episodes worked better than "Blood of Patriots" because the Star Trek series did a better job establishing a history with the Cardassians and the complexities of their relationships with their victims. In "Blood of Patriots", we have one guy who was abducted after his family was murdered who managed to deal serious damage to his captors after years imprisoned, who dealt this damage apparently without even knowing there was a ceasefire.

I was waiting for Ed to say to the Krill ambassador--these were acts of war no worse than yours. I appreciated the idea and I think we should have fiction that talks about the challenges in getting past atrocities committed on both sides in the interest of peace but this plot just skipped over too much.

I did like the conversation between Gordon and Talla (Jessica Szhor), I liked how he awkwardly prefaced the talk with drinks. But the jokes in the episode mostly felt like the especially tired episodes of Family Guy. Seth MacFarlane wrote this episode and I would have said it's a sign he needs to hand the reins to more out of work Star Trek writers except he has written two very strong episodes this season, "A Happy Refrain" and "Identity part II". I could do with more episodes like those and fewer like this and "All the World is Birthday Cake".

The Man for a Free Ireland

If you're looking for a slow and rigid political biopic, don't see 1996's Michael Collins. With its action and pacing, its passionate performances led by an extraordinarily fervent and magnetic Liam Neeson, it's almost an action film. It's also beautiful, bearing Neil Jordan's usual great aesthetic sense, and more great work from Sandy Powell, his regular costume designer in the 90s.

I love this olive tweed suit Neeson wears for most of the first third of the film, despite Collins being described as a man who operated riding a bicycle in a pinstriped suit in plain sight. His advantage, he explains more than once, is that the police don't know what he looks like. We watch as Collins' techniques escalate in ferocity to the point where he's ordering hits on all collaborators, Irish citizens who go to the police to inform on Collins' and other Irish Republicans.

The movie makes clear why Collins finds this step necessary as the story opens with the defeat of Republicans by British military in the 1916 Easter Uprising. But the movie focuses primarily on tactics and the impact of acts of war, be it the Republicans, the British, or the Dublin police working for the British. A particularly horrific scene shows an armoured vehicle opening fire in the middle of a football match, the image of a gun protruding from an expressionless metal cylinder reminding me eerily of a Dalek.

And it's hard to see what else the British want here but ultimately the extermination of the Irish people, particularly when Charles Dance shows up as a cold blooded SIS agent. There's no time spent on what arguments were being made for or against British rule as it impacted the daily lives of the Irish people. Which is fine, it's clearly not the story Jordan has set out to tell.

We don't really get a look at the politics until the last part of the film when a rift occurs between Collins and the president of the Irish Republicans, De Valera, played with impressive subtlety by Alan Rickman.

But Liam Neeson is unquestionably the heart of this film. Even in his other 90s roles I'm not used to seeing him so energetic and he helps paint a portrait of Collins as a man inseparable from his work, his heart and mind completely consumed with weighing what needs to be done and the costs of every policy and individual campaign. There are also some fine supporting performances by Brendan Gleeson, Julia Roberts, and Stephen Rea.

Mutants Working Together

I've finally gone back and started reading some classic X-Men comics. I figured I'd read through from the introduction of the "new" X-Men in 1975 through the Dark Phoenix Saga because those are the comics I happened to have had sitting on my shelf for fifteen years. In 2004 I saw Barnes and Noble had released a "Masterworks" series of Marvel Comics collections. I thought this was great--finally, all those hard to track down back issues collected in an easy to find, affordable package. Only $12.95 for eight issues. I grabbed the first few volumes of Spider-Man and X-Men. I tore through Spider-Man pretty quick but for some reason never got around to X-Men. Partly I think it was because I found Chris Claremont's dialogue abysmally bad. I'd make it through Giant Size X-Men #1 and X-Men #94 and then I'd lose interest. I think I had four false starts. Well, now I'm all the way up to Uncanny X-Men #122 and am loving it. Once Claremont got into a flow his dialogue seems to have gotten less noticeably bad, at least in my opinion, and Dave Cockrum's excellent art gave way to John Byrne's even better art.

The best part, for me, is getting Storm's original introduction. She was my favourite comic book character in the late 80s and early 90s and I only knew her piecemeal from what random issues I got at the time, the animated series, the video games, and what I heard from people who'd read the older comics or who'd talked to people who'd read the older comics. It's that kind of thing that really makes me think comic book characters are like modern mythological figures, the way stories about them reach people in such a patchwork variety of ways. Of course, the important difference is that I never thought Storm was a real person.

Anyway, when I was teaching myself how to draw as a kid I used to copy the works of other artists and I remember carefully reproducing a big full page image of Storm by Jim Lee in one of the issues I had. Jim Lee's art is suited to being studied in isolation. Byrne's is much better suited to storytelling.

There's so much more expression in it, both in faces and body gestures, though Lee's certainly has a lot of intricate detail.

I was surprised how prominent Storm is in the issues I've been reading. In all the adaptations she's a relatively minor character but of the new X-Men introduced in Giant Size #1 she seems to quickly become the most important until Wolverine gradually takes centre stage. Her backstory is certainly the most complicated--she's introduced in Giant Size #1 with art by Dave Cockrum--I love all his complicated configurations of curves--as a living African goddess.

Then we find out she was a pick pocket in Cairo, trained by a master thief and an expert at lock picking, something that comes in handy in #113. In a really bizarre predicament, Magneto has most of the X-Men handcuffed to chairs and being treated like babies by a robotic nanny, apparently a revenge for Magneto having been physically changed into an infant. These two backstories seem mismatched yet they somehow work as intriguing instead of incongruous. What led this streetwise kid to depart for the wilderness upon discovering her powers? And what powers. I'm noticing that Clarement and Byrne frequently have to give reasons as to why Storm isn't able to use her powers--I guess being able to summon a hurricane at a moment's notice makes it hard to explain why she can't overcome certain foes. So they gave her intense claustrophobia, effectively shutting her down whenever she's in tight confines and adding yet another layer of backstory to explain it in the process. And there are several instances of explanations for individual problems, like her being tired from a previous battle, there being a competing enemy mutant controlling the weather, etc.

The only other character receiving half this much attention so far is Jean Grey. Wolverine seems a surprisingly minor character until John Byrne takes over as regular artist--the first several issues of the new X-Men seem to put more focus on characters that end up not sticking around for very long, Sunfire and Thunderbird. Good grief, I feel bad for any fans of Thunderbird, a somewhat stereotypical Native American X-Man who ends his run by doing something kind of embarrassingly stupid.

Nightcrawler is a delightful supporting character and I loved an arc set in Ireland where he meets a civilisation of leprechauns living in Banshee's ancestral castle. It's been a real pleasure finally reading these stories.

Twitter Sonnet #1212

Convenient pockets hold a cheesy pen.
In paper tables figures dance to clip.
The boot within the stocking's staying in.
The Ruffle kingdom falls within the dip.
A plume of dust betokens hidden hats.
Collected heaps of swords await a day.
A rumour spread among the sleepless bats.
The mice had found a tiny secret way.
A line of letters fell in pathless books.
The time became a band for broken arms.
In ev'ry seat the cushions make the looks.
For ev'ry gem a rock can have its charms.
Beneath a set of cups were perfect shells.
Beneath a cracking dome were paper bells.

The Gunfighter Lost in the Flowers

A man returns from war to find himself profoundly displaced from his family, community, and identity in 1965's The Return of Ringo (Il ritorno di Ringo). A great and fascinating film in itself, it takes on still more fascinating qualities when considered as a sequel to A Pistol for Ringo, a film released the same year with the same director and screenwriter (Duccio Tessari), the same composer (Ennio Morricone), and the same cast. But despite the fact that Giuliano Gemma plays Ringo, the hero of both films, and many of the other cast members occupy roles similar to those they occupied in the first film, many names are different, character occupations and nationalities are different, and the very tone of the film is vastly different. Instead of a near comedy, light action film, The Return of Ringo is almost operatic in its portrayal of tragedy and misfortune.

A lot of that is due to Morricone's score--although he composed the scores for both films, Morricone created something decidedly different for each one. Shots of Ringo seeing his wife, Hally (Lorella De Luca), with the leader of a family of Mexican bandits (George Martin) who now rule the town are accompanied by intense, almost screeching strings. This paired with the film's more saturated colours concentrated in a visual and thematic motif of flowers gives the impression of intense feeling that Ringo suppresses, generally only expressed by him in an involuntary tick he's picked up.

At the end of the first film, the cocky young Ringo had ridden off into the sunset after having saved the day, rescuing the family of a wealthy major from the clutches of a group of Mexican bandits. At the start of the second film, a much quieter and wearier Ringo, still played by Giuliano Gemma, returns from the American Civil War in which he'd fought on the Union side. He stops at a tavern first where he learns the town is now run by another group of Mexican bandits and that all of the young local men have been killed.

Ringo's wife is played by the same woman who played Ruby in the first film, Lorella De Luca, the daughter of the major being held captive. Now her name is Hally (the same as the false American name given to the actress De Luca to sell the film in the U.S.) and she's the daughter of a wealthy senator instead of a retired major. The actor who played the major in the first film, Antonio Casas, now plays the cowed and broken sheriff, who tells Ringo how being white now makes him an inferior race in town and beneath notice.

Before going into town, Ringo dyes his blonde hair dark brown and dresses as a field labourer. When he gets to the saloon, a sign informs him gringos and beggars aren't welcome. Inside the saloon, one of the bandits, Estaban (Fernando Sancho), immediately demands to know Ringo's race and is frustrated when Ringo evades the question. In light of to-day's politics in the U.S., the idea of Mexican bandits taking over an American town and imposing social order based on race might seem like the daydream of a Trump supporter but it's important to remember that this is an entirely Italian and Spanish production--all the actors are Italian or Spanish, mostly Spanish. Like all Spaghetti Westerns, the story is a foreign interpretation of the mythology of American cinema and the significance of race and nationality here is primarily that of plot faction. But it's also significant that Ringo fought for the Union and instead of fighting now on behalf of Caucasians, he deliberately makes his race obscure. It's the kind of distillation of the American ideal, which doesn't judge character based on race, stripped of political permutations by the simplicity of a fantasy from a foreign perspective. The Italians and Spanish wouldn't "know" why the racist bandits couldn't be Mexican. It's no more nuanced a commentary on American politics than Black Panther is on Central African politics.

Ringo has one Mexican ally, Rosita, a singer, dancer, and fortune teller played by Nieves Navarro who played the bandits' second in command in the first film. She seems to prefer taking Ringo's side entirely because she's physically attracted to him, something the film sweetly emphasises with pretty unambiguous symbols.

There are so many shots in this movie I thought wonderful, much more than in the first film. I love this shot of Rosita reading Ringo's fortune that has their faces in the foreground and a low angle shot of a mirror giving a high angle shot of her cards:

I also love the scene where Hally visits Ringo after his phony funeral and he goes to lift her funeral veil like a bridegroom but she prevents him, lifting it herself.

This is a display of loyalty from her--confirming that she acknowledges his life--but it also again renders him impotent because she assumes the groom's task for him. Sexual subtext is all over the film, which is no surprise given how thoroughly Ringo's been cuckolded.

The leader of the bandits, who's taken Ringo's place as Hally's de facto husband and is already her sexual partner, is played by the same man who played Ruby's fiance in the first film, Spanish actor George Martin. But in the first film he was the sheriff and was presented as more of a good guy, more morally upright, than Ringo himself. Now he's a sadistic and manipulative tyrant. Not literally the same guy but occupying the same place as Ringo's romantic rival. Only in the first film, Ringo would have only selfish justifications for fighting him while in the second movie imperatives for the good of the community align with Ringo's personal and emotional needs. It's so dreamlike it almost seems like one movie is the dream of the other. But which is which? Either way, they're excellent films, particularly the second, and they're both available free to Amazon Prime subscribers.

The Road, the Sea, and the Psychiatrist

Lovers of sinister, dreamlike, supernatural tales will enjoy this month's new Sirenia Digest in which Caitlin R. Kiernan has included some extra scenes from her upcoming novella, The Tindalos Asset. This novella will be the third in her series for Tor, the first two being Agents of Dreamland and Black Helicopters. Both novellas are intriguing sensory explorations, sort of Expressionist paintings of X-Files or Twin Peaks style tales of supernatural weirdness mixed up with the doings of government agencies. The exploits of someone called the Signalman emerge into a more concrete world providing some contrast to make the amorphous more seductive and intriguing. The stories become a map of the brain in a certain kind of frightening situation. The bonus scenes from The Tindalos Asset included in Sirenia Digest don't follow this pattern quite so obviously, in fact they feel closer to some of Caitlin's other stories, which may be why she's chosen not to include them in the finished novella--only Sirenia Digest readers get to read them.

A mysterious driver whose thoughts are drawn to a mythological pantheon of the sea, a woman named Ellison Nicodemo in a subtle adversarial relationship with her psychiatrist, and a more elusive narrator on the edge of a dream state are the subjects of the three segments provided in the Digest. The middle story, in the psychiatrist's office, is the most down to Earth but it certainly presents plenty of teasing ambiguity between truth and fiction. They're a nice trio of vignettes in themselves and they make me look forward to the novella.

People are Other People in Space

Immortal Beloved, the 2007 Eighth Doctor Doctor Who audio play, doesn't seem to have anything to do with Beethoven or the 1994 movie of that name. In this story, the Doctor (Paul McGann) and Lucie (Sheridan Smith) arrive just in time to prevent a pair of young lovers from committing suicide but unfortunately this leaves the kids vulnerable to the fate they were attempting to escape; having their brains wiped and their bodies used as replacement vessels for the elderly. So, yes, in case you had any doubts, that idea wasn't original to Get Out. I'm pretty sure it's not original to this audio play, either, but I can't think of older examples just at the moment.

It's a nice audio play, a short, 60 minute episode from the Eighth Doctor's series. Once again, though, it feels much too short, really not having enough time to establish the world of colonists and the love stories involved. The leader of the colonists, played by Ian McNeice sounding nicely like Michael Gambon, calls himself Zeus and his wife (Elspet Gray) is called Hera, their whole society modelled on ancient Greek myth. The mixture of sadness and repulsiveness in these characters trying to stave off death by murdering their own clones is nicely introduced but doesn't quite have enough time to develop.

Eight and Lucie continue to develop romantic chemistry, too, though it feels a bit rushed. I assume they've been on more adventures between episodes but it feels too soon for Eight to talk about how much she means to him at the end of the story. Sheridan Smith's performance sometimes makes her sound like Charley, Eight's first companion from the monthly range of audios, whose relationship was developed with him much more organically. There is a nice moment in Immortal Beloved where Lucie's trust in the Doctor is tested, though.

Twitter Sonnet #1211

Intentions saved a pack of gum from Hell.
Tormented tay attempts to sate the gut.
Of course the soup would fill the copper bell.
Unless we added just a single nut.
No mixture makes a really solid link.
As choral timers tick the pulse of feet.
A hoofless carriage brought a horse to drink.
Where knees and clouds at stations lately meet.
Intruding clouds confused the store with rain.
No falling peppers splashed the tile floor.
So boosted wheats and rice were muffled grain.
Entire crops were crowded round the door.
A certain ice was sweetened near the stove.
A troop of shades assembled near the grove.

Hamilton and the Perlman

I swear I don't work for Amazon Prime despite how much I seem to talk about things I watch on their streaming service. I have NetFlix, too, but Amazon just seems to stock more of what I want. NetFlix's selection of anything older than 2000, for example, seems to be pretty spotty. Last night I watched the first couple episodes of Beauty and the Beast, the 1987 television series, because I saw Amazon Prime had all three seasons. I'd seen bits and pieces of it before but never really sat down to watch it through. So far it seems to be living up to my half-remembered impressions of cool atmosphere and great casting, particularly when it comes to Ron Perlman.

The look of Perlman's Beast was obviously influenced by the 1946 Jean Cocteau film with Jean Marais as the Beast--that same "Lion man" look also having influenced the beast-like aliens in the 1981 Doctor Who serial Warrior's Gate. The aesthetics of 80s fantasy owes a lot to Cocteau. Perlman makes that suit and makeup his own, though.

He has a particular combination of gentleness, menace, and real physical strangeness. The first episode has a little too much fluff for me and the Beast and Catherine seem to jump right into the third act of a romance from the beginning. The second episode, written by George R.R. Martin, is better though its arguments about vigilante killing lack important elements.

All the subway muggers who get killed are two dimensional assholes. They never seem like full fledged people and if you're making an argument as to why you shouldn't execute common criminals on the spot you need to show why. The episode's much more effective in creating a real sense of beastliness in the Beast for a scene where Catherine (Linda Hamilton) has a nightmare about him.

In the first episode, he really becomes too familiar, too fast--this moment gives him back some of the mystery, the realisation that he's a strange looking guy from a totally strange world whose nature Catherine really has not had opportunity to fully understand. But the first episode does have Ray Wise in a small role as her asshole boyfriend.

This would've been shortly before he appeared in the pilot for Twin Peaks, my favourite show of all time. I love the 2017 revival of Twin Peaks--I'm now halfway through my fourth or fifth rewatch of it--but I think the main reason it felt to people very different from the first seasons is because it was shot on digital instead of whatever film was generally used on 80s television. It seemed a lot less sensitive to light than digital.

I love how the Beast's eye is completely lost in the shadow of his brow. It's true that on many occasions it's difficult to see what's going on and the film clearly necessitated some really bright light in night scenes sometimes. But it was an integral part of the atmosphere that a lot of the 80s nostalgia projects are missing.

Space Crowded with Energy Beams

What a wonderful episode of The Orville last night. Once again patterning itself on 90s era Star Trek--I was particularly reminded of "The Die is Cast", the 1995 Deep Space Nine episode, but The Orville hits the sweet spot of character and pacing that defies any attempt to explain it by breaking it down to the sum of its parts and influences. I guess you could say it's sentient.

Spoilers after the screenshot

That battle scene in the climax, wow. As it was happening I was brought back to how excited I was to watch a showdown between the Dominion, Cardassians, and Romulans on Deep Space Nine. I remember my friends and I in high school talking about how great it would be to see something like the Battle of Endor from Return of the Jedi on Star Trek but knowing a television effects budget would never accommodate something like that. Even in The Next Generation's "Best of Both Worlds", most of the battles were off-screen as the Borg cut their bloody swath to Earth--we didn't really get a sense of the scope of battle until a flashback in the pilot episode of DS9 years later.

Now we have cgi and we can have those large scale battles any day of the week but I realised it's more than the relative cheapness that makes such things generally feel less special. Too often we get the spectacle without the context that gives it any real weight, the established relationships with characters and their problems. Last week "Identity part 1", written by Brannon Braga and Andre Bomanis, presented a captivating sequence of events and this week, "Identity part 2", written by Seth MacFarlane, picked up with another set of linked subplots, all of them effective, building to that climax.

In one moment I really liked, Ed (Seth MacFarlance) tries to give a coded message to another Union ship while the Kaylons have custody of the Orville. It's one of those gambits seen from so many episodes and movies--in this case, it fails and Ed has to bear the burden of responsibility for his gamble; the loss of a whole other Union ship. Then the Kaylons decide to punish Ed by murdering another crewman, something that finally forces Isaac (Mark Jackson) to switch sides.

I said last week I didn't want Isaac to switch sides by suddenly discovering he has emotions. In the crucial turning point in this episode, when Isaac saves Ty (Kai Wener), I realised I didn't mind so much though it's worth wondering if it's really emotions that Isaac is discovering or if he simply decided the Kaylons have become irrational. Whether or not Isaac is capable of sympathy or empathy, he's the one who's stepped outside Kaylon 1 and breathed the fresh air of varied experience. The Kaylons are forever locked in the experience of their former suffering under their biological enslavers and are content evaluating all other potential relationships on those terms.

It's telling that Kaylon Primary (Graham Hamilton) refers to Roots, the 1976 novel by Alex Haley, for knowledge about slavery on Earth. Roots is a work of fiction--why not examine one of the many actual slave narratives from the 18th and 19th century? He could have examined the works of real former slaves such as Ouladah Equiano, Harriet Jacobs, or Frederick Douglass. For a species dedicated to decisions based on real data, they curiously prefer a work that is manifestly a commentary rather than a primary source.

Meanwhile, Gordon (Scott Grimes) and Kelly (Adrianne Palicki) are on a risky mission to Krill space where they deal with a people unabashedly devoted to an irrational religion. Despite my dislike for MacFarlane's unnuanced perspective on religion, I did like the idea of the more complex Union being caught between the two hostile factions of the extremely rational and the extremely irrational.

I wonder how much this episode will affect future episodes. There's plenty of material to digest now with Isaac, the Krill, and the Kaylons. With this episode, the universe MacFarlane created really feels like it's taken root. Happy Arbour Day.