In the Jungle of Guns and Opium

A man claiming to be "a hunter" wanders into a remote mining town with a shotgun in Seijun Suzuki's 1961 film Man with a Shotgun (散弾銃(ショットガン)の男). A tale of yakuza, bloody revenge, and a surprising amount of moral confusion, it has some beautiful locations and is an early example of how Suzuki's impatience with the genre led to some amusing and fascinating editing choices.

Hideaki Nitani stars as Roji, who's immediately set upon by toughs in the woods who pummel him heedless of the shotgun he carries over his shoulder. After they've given him what looks like a good thrashing, he laughs, gets up, and punches out two of them who stand in his way. Suzuki is off-handedly subverting the conditioned expectations of audiences to establish Roji's preternatural skill. Suzuki then goes for something more extravagant, having a bridge suddenly give out while Roji's trying to cross it.

An impossible instant after the thugs are laughing at his fate, Roji is seen napping on a nearby rock in his underwear, his clothes hanging up to dry. He musters just enough energy to ask the thugs to let him sleep.

Things get more serious when Roji gets to the mining town where the yakuza boss, who runs the town, almost immediately offers him a job. The sheriff is a pathetic, ineffectual man who took his position to avenge his dead wife. The yakuza are really in charge, a fact underlined when the local business owners and some outside investors arrange a meeting to ask the boss to bring in more "security" after it turns out there's a killer on the loose. After this, Roji, who initially seemed happy to take the job offer, suddenly decides to strike out on his own. It turns out he's been hunting the man who raped and murdered his wife in the Japanese Alps.

Confusion arises when it turns out several people are hellbent on endeavours with contradictory perspectives. There's the current sheriff who's willing to kill anyone else who tries to act as sheriff, there's a rival almost as skilled as Roji who also wants to hunt the killer for unclear purposes, and there's also the younger sister of the sheriff (Izumi Ashikawa) who's constantly trying to get everyone to stop fighting.

There's also the boss' wife, played with a magnetic, saucy insolence by Yoko Minamida, who demands Roji hand over his shotgun to her for safe keeping. When Roji's told her relationship to the boss, he surmises this is the only reason the rowdy bar thugs haven't assaulted her. She pushes her precarious authority to the edge--the bar scenes in this film, which feature a lovely musical number performed by Nitani, are marvellously grimy and reeking of desperate, ruthless folks. It comes off as a more dangerous version of the tavern in Only Angels have Wings. The jungle environment gives this yakuza film a nice adventure vibe. Man with a Shotgun is available on Amazon Prime.

The Wall Between the University and the Hairdresser

A young hairdresser takes lessons from a dishevelled professor in 1983's Educating Rita. Lightly touching on the class consciousness inherent in conceptions of higher education, the appeal of the film is mainly due to the chemistry between stars Michael Caine and Julie Walters and the gulf between their respective ideas of self-improvement.

Caine plays Frank Bryant, a literature professor at an unnamed university in England--Trinity College, Dublin served for exterior shots. What a beautiful school. And I loved Frank's office but I was amused at how disorganised his shelves are.

Chaucer between two Oscar Wildes and then Shakespeare and Milton. It's as though someone just decided to stick Oscar Wilde in random spots.

Frank is shown disgusted that one of his students would like to discuss William Blake's metaphysical qualities and wonders why everyone isn't playing outside instead. He seems to have lost interest in his vocation entirely, his disorganised books apparently serving only to hide liquor bottles. Then in walks a pretty working class woman in a tight skirt who calls herself Rita (Walters) though her name is in fact Susan. She wants Frank to tutor her.

She's so unlike anyone Frank usually interacts with that it's easy to see why he's charmed by her practical advice about the hinges on his door or her inference that there's something dirty about the title of Howard's End. But he imputes something much grander in her simple-hearted, first exposure to the classics. He regards it as a purer love than the carefully orchestrated opinion machines of his students while she is amazed at the students' ability to see so much in a text and discuss it from so many angles.

The movie doesn't get into a lot of specifics about critical theory, though it does more than most. He tells her one of her first essays, in which she uses a variety of cheap Romance novels she's read as points of comparison, is fascinating to him but would never pass muster in official examinations. My impression is that academic opinion nowadays seems almost opposite to this, as many voices are keen to discard Chaucer, Shakespeare, Milton, and even Wilde. Like the relationship between Frank and Rita, you could say the grass is always greener in some other critical perspective (though I would say Chaucer, Shakespeare, Milton, and even Wilde have endured for good reason).

There's some teasing about the idea that Frank and Rita could become romantically attached but it doesn't really feel necessary, they're sweet enough as friends. Caine really does come off as a good teacher--patient and warm but honest and severe when necessary while Walters uses a light touch that makes Rita's determination and uncertainty seem admirable. Frank never quite seems to understand the feeling of being trapped Rita has in her working class family and home where she's expected to have a baby just because she's twenty six. Ironically, his feeling that his students are so disconnected seems due to his being out of touch but the movie could certainly have said more about how reducing beautiful works to lab specimens deprives the reader of something fundamentally important about them.

Twitter Sonnet #1233

A charming feast induces knights to sing.
Ballista fire rapid off the screen.
In knowing nothing, one's a pretty king.
Maroon cravats become a pallid Queen.
Electric swords return, consuming soy.
Belief contains elastic bands and clips.
In sandwich bags the ramen's like a ploy.
In certain shoes the toes had winged tips.
On kitchen boards the garlic waits in cloves.
A random chair results in sudden sits.
For books the papers glue to spines in droves.
To handle power always wear your mitts.
Assorted names insensibly array.
Familiar birds announce another day.

The Salvation of Mind Sex

In the first episode of Farscape written by David Kemper, the crew of Moya meet some political refugees from Zhaan's homeworld, Delvia. It turns out Zhaan's not the only one who's had to confront an inner darkness and now her former colleagues in the priesthood seek her advice, or something more substantial, to learn how to deal with it.

Season 1, episode 12: Rhapsody in Blue

David Kemper was one of several Star Trek writers who worked on Farscape, having written two episodes of The Next Generation and one of Voyager. But his more significant contribution to Sci-Fi and Fantasy is definitely his work on Farscape and, alongside creator Rockne S. O'Bannon, he became essentially what we would to-day call the showrunner, eventually writing more episodes than any other writer by a considerable margin. "Rhapsody in Blue" dwells on themes that become very important for the series having to do with memory and alternate timelines.

The opening scene is a flashback in which we learn Crichton (Ben Browder) once had a fiance named Alex, played by American actress Darlene Vogel. Vogel had a small role in Back to the Future Part II as a member of Griff's gang which is maybe why Kemper includes a joke in the episode where Aeryn (Claudia Black) feels justified in appropriating Crichton's underwear because the name "Calvin" is written on it. The joke is kind of tortured because Aeryn has to ask Crichton what the word is, when she's already wearing the underwear, before she can know it's a name. Maybe there was an earlier draft where the dialogue was more like, "Hey, that's my underwear!" "Looks to me like it belongs to someone named 'Calvin'."

Later, Crichton makes chicken clucking noises to goad Zhaan (Virginia Hey) into action, then wonders if the translator microbes made sense of the sound for her. Judging from her expression, they seem to have done. Maybe she hears a Delvian animal with a reputation for cowardice?

Vogel also plays one of the priests, a bit of double casting that doesn't really make sense but there is a kind of poetic sense to it when Crichton starts having visions of Alex along with false memories of his former fiance being his co-pilot on the fateful mission and becoming a member of the Moya crew. This is a fascinating idea that the episode really could've played out more than it does but, on the other hand, later episodes would make plenty of hay from similar concepts. This may have been the writers finding their footing, the show deciding what it's going to be.

A fitting subject to a discuss for a show that, at this point, was so much about establishing identity. The climax of this episode is almost like something from a later Neon Genesis Evangelion episode--Crichton and Zhaan share a telepathic connexion in which her ability to conquer her violent urges is based on the reality of her existence in his perception--that is, she draws strength from the version of her that exists in his mind. I could almost hear, "This is the Misato that exists in your mind." It's an idea Twin Peaks plays with a lot, too, being a series that is so much about how people effectively adopt different roles and identities depending on who they're with and where they are.

Crichton describes the fusion with Zhaan as being like having ten years of great sex in one moment. It's so refreshing to watch a show so comfortable with sex.

. . .

This entry is part of a series I'm writing on Farscape for the show's 20th anniversary. My previous reviews can be found here (episodes are in the order intended by the show's creators rather than the broadcast order):

Episode 1: Pilot
Episode 2: I, E.T.
Episode 3: Exodus from Genesis
Episode 4: Throne for a Loss
Episode 5: Back and Back and Back to the Future
Episode 6: Thank God It's Friday Again
Episode 7: PK Tech Girl
Episode 8: That Old Black Magic
Episode 9: DNA Mad Scientist
Episode 10: They've Got a Secret
Episode 11: Till the Blood Runs Clear

First in Tyranny

After the moral clarity of a battle with the Night King, Game of Thrones delivered a more dramatically fraught episode last night, "The Last of the Starks", the best episode of the season so far and my favourite since season six.

Spoilers after the screenshot

First of all, what a great party (complete with coffee, as sharp eyed viewers observed). It was fun seeing everyone drinking and relaxing, particularly the Lannister brothers and Brienne (Gwendoline Christie). Inebriation finally brings out some of Tyrion's (Peter Dinklage) old cruelty and he loudly informs everyone that Brienne is a virgin, not an observation requiring the keenest of insights. Jaime (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau), fortunately, is more of a gentleman and assists his former captor in changing this lamentable state of affairs.

This ends up being a set-up for Jaime's departure for King's Landing. There are evidentially some viewers who believe he's going off to join up with Cersei (Lena Headey) again, despite that prophecy still hanging over Cersei's head about being strangled by her brother. Though that might be difficult for Jaime to accomplish with one hand. Anyway, poor Brienne.

Before he leaves, though, we get the amusing confrontation between the Lannister brothers and Bronn (Jerome Flynn) who basically uses his order to kill the two fellows as an opportunity to demand more money. I do hope we haven't seen the last of him.

It looks like this was likely the final episode for Sam (John Bradley), Gilly (Hannah Murray), and Tormund (Kristofer Hivju), who all make their farewells, which makes sense--none of them really have any stake in Daenerys (Emilia Clarke) taking the throne. Less explicable is the departure of Ghost, the dire wolf.

He's aptly named. Watching the rarely glimpsed significant plot element from season one, he's like the ghost of the Game of Thrones we'd have had under George R. R. Martin's unfettered stewardship. Seeing the beast go for no apparent reason seemed symbolic of the show bidding farewell to its book origins finally and totally. The characters say something about Ghost having no place in the south but that doesn't explain why he can't stay at Winterfell.

At the heart of last night's episode, though, was Daenerys (in another terrific outfit), who I really started to feel for. Seeing her watch Jon (Kit Harington) being Mister Popularity at the party following her foray into cleverness by making Gendry (Joe Dempsie) a lord and then Tyrion and Varys (Conleth Hill) having a sober (despite Tyrion's vigorous attempts to drink it down) debate about her viability as a ruler all contributed to a dark cloud over her future. It made the usual paradoxes of her character a bit poignantly sad--you could sense everyone's chagrin when she demanded she could use the might of her dragons to force herself as sole reigning Queen onto the kingdom as part of a project to "end tyranny", an evident and all too common contradiction Varys points out to Tyrion as gently as possible. Everyone is finally, belatedly wondering what makes Daenerys such a good bet anyway, and even if Jorah (Iain Glen) were still alive, the writers had long since lost the will or ability to use him as her cheerleader.

And then Daenerys loses one of her dragons in another stupid surprise attack from Urine--I mean, Euron (Pilou Asbaek). A fleet of ships on a beautiful day like that ought to be visible on the horizon, long before they could get into firing range. Lookouts at Dragonstone should've been able to spot them in ample time, particularly in broad daylight, to say nothing of Daenerys' own ships or the birds eye view offered by dragons. And once Euron is in range, what exactly stops Daenerys from attacking them from behind or above? Plot armour, I guess.

I don't necessarily need a plot to make sense but in a case like this it's crucial. The reason something like the Red Wedding works and something like this doesn't is that the Red Wedding made sense. We knew everyone's motives, we knew how the Starks misread the situation, we knew how it could happen logistically. All of these questions need to be answered because it's painful for people to see their favourite characters get killed. If they get killed for no reason, it's like a cheap prank pulled by the writers. If you show reasons, then it might still be painful but the viewer is forced to recognise how it reflects the way things work in reality, which ultimately makes it a cathartic experience. This is why the best part of last night's episode was the troubling questions surrounding Daenerys' fitness to rule and Jon's complete inability to keep his heritage secret.

He is such a dope. That's part of what makes him likeable, but do people really want a dope on the throne? It might be nice for a change, I suppose. But no-one really comes off as very clever on the show anymore, I think because Benioff and Weiss simply aren't very clever. Which doesn't necessarily make them bad writers, but I wonder if they were themselves aware that Tyrion was basically responsible for Missandei's (Nathalie Emmanuel) death.

Tyrion walks up to the gates alone, Cersei wants to execute him the spot but she can't bring herself to do it. She really does love her family or, more likely, she doesn't want to be seen publicly doing something so cheap and cruel. Which is exactly why Tyrion shouldn't have publicly declared that the people hate Cersei and Cersei hates the people. After that, any concession Cersei made to Tyrion would be as much as to say, "Yeah, you're right, I do hate the people." Tyrion is talking like someone so blinded by the ideology of his chosen side he longer has any ability to negotiate. This would be more interesting if Tyrion had made one useful contribution in the past three seasons, but at this point he's another character whose capabilities we're supposed to take on faith who continually fails to demonstrate them. Tyrion forced Cersei to choose between executing Missandei and losing public support then and there.

I guess it was sad to see Missandei go. Her and Grey Worm (Jacob Anderson) are both really cute though not the most exciting of characters.

Anyway, it was nice to see an episode that was predominately about thoughtful debate and negotiating emotional stakes. I'm looking forward to seeing where it goes next week.

Useful Advice for an Ancient Mesoamerican Empire

Barbara learns it isn't so easy to stop human sacrifices, even when she's taken for the reincarnation of a high priest, in the 1964 Doctor Who serial, The Aztecs. The only television story set in Mexico, it was written by John Lucarotti who had lived in Mexico and was fascinated with Aztec culture. The serial's Wikipedia entry and the entry in the TARDIS data core praise the serial for thorough research into 15th century Aztec culture on display. Yet the creators of the story seemed to have missed the simple detail that the Aztecs didn't call themselves Aztecs but Mexica. Still, it's a good story, justly remembered as one of the First Doctor's best.

The fight scenes are extraordinarily good for any era of the series, particularly the first fight between Ian (William Russell) and the warrior Ixta (Ian Cullen), which is basically a grappling match. You can see the contest for control in both actors' bodies when Ian pulls Ixta's arm over his shoulder and Ixta slowly turns the position into a pin of Ian on a nearby table.

A climactic sword and shield fight between the same two men in the final episode is also very good but the grappling match effectively tells a story with bodies.

In the more cerebral part of the show, Barbara (Jacqueline Hill) struggles with her inability to alter Aztec culture, despite being accidentally taken for a priest's reincarnation because she emerges from a temple wearing the priest's bracelet. When Susan (Carole Ann Ford) says Barbara couldn't be the priest's reincarnation because she's a woman, Barbara points out that the physical form for a reincarnation needn't be so like the previous incarnation. Seems this human could teach a young Time Lady a thing or two about her own people.

The Doctor (William Hartnell) is adamant that Barbara can't and shouldn't attempt to so drastically alter Aztec culture. I like how the serial shows the ways even such an obviously bad practice is inextricably linked with others, that you can't simply edit out one unpleasant piece of a culture without potentially disastrous, unintended consequences. Though, realistically, Barbara wouldn't likely be up against such an over-the-top villain as Tlotoxl, played with an amusing lack of subtlety by John Ringham, who brings the first episode to a close by wagging his arched eyebrows directly into the camera, promising the ultimate destruction of our heroes.

Meanwhile, the Doctor accidentally begins a romance with a woman named Cameca (Margot Van der Burgh), who mistakes his offer to share cocoa with her for a marriage proposal. It's sweet how the two of them instantly seem to be come a contented pair of aged retirees with the Doctor even daydreaming aloud about the two of them having their own garden. The final episode concludes the subplot abruptly with Cameca somehow sensing the Doctor needs to leave and taking it in stride. It might be fun to see a story where the Doctor encountered her again.

Twitter Sonnet #1232

Expensive thirds would cost apparent halves.
The pillars paint the awning's lips with red.
The stairs beneath the scene'll pump the calves.
A million legs ascend when all is said.
The dough from dawn became a destined nut.
The sugar waits along the paper flow.
A surface sweet in powder form to glut.
The boxes thence to heaven pastries go.
A sweetened temple offers drinks to gods.
Tequila rounds appeared across the sky.
Tortilla tanks defy burrito odds.
In choc'late draughts we learned the reason why.
Agave treats the desert mind to thoughts.
Dessert reserves the cornless Coke for lots.

A Sexy Dame and a Twisted Scheme

Arguably, the most interesting thing about 1954's Pushover is all the movies it's not. A film noir starring Fred MacMurray, it very obviously invites a lot of comparisons to Double Indemnity, comparisons that vividly highlight Pushover's flaws. But there are also strange echoes of great Alfred Hitchcock movies that hadn't been released yet, Rear Window and Vertigo.

Pushover was Kim Novak's first film in a credited role. She's captivating; beautiful, sexy, and ethereal, and it made me think how perfect she was for Vertigo, really better than Hitchcock's first choice for the role, Vera Miles. Something about Novak's manner suggests her peculiar type of femme fatale; a kind of forceful artifice, an unabashed cunning and a paradoxical simple-heartedness. In his book length interview with Alfred Hitchcock, Francois Traffaut talks about Kim Novak as having, "an animal-like sensuality. That quality is accentuated, I suppose, by the fact that she wears no brassiere." Hitchcock replied, "That's right, she doesn't wear a brassiere. As a matter of fact, she's particularly proud of that!"

The absence of a bra is really obvious in the scene where Novak's character in Pushover, Lona, first takes home MacMurray's character, Paul. Like in Vertigo, he's a detective who's been hired to spy on her, though in this case sex seems to be "part of the plan"; there's the implication that Paul seducing and sleeping with her is all part of the undercover operation sanctioned by the department. This may have seemed slightly less morally repugnant to the audience because MacMurray maintains a professional, disinterested attitude while Novak exudes carnality, but it would be a mistake to conclude absolutely the filmmakers see nothing wrong with Paul's actions or the institutional support for them. It then turns out that Paul and his partner, Rick (Phil Carey), are conducting a long-running stake out of Lona's apartment with binoculars across the street--and think nothing of spying on her neighbours. We overhear some crude comments from a couple other detectives about the physical attributes of one of the other female tenants. There is a sense director Richard Quine is subtly criticising the presumption of moral authority that sanctions the kind of voyeurism these men indulge in.

The shots remind one strongly of Rear Window, a film that would be released three months after Pushover. Something must have been in the air in Hollywood or, more likely, overheard at lunches. But Pushover lacks Hitchcock's style and subtlety that draw the viewer in to contemplating troubling questions.

Dorothy Malone has a role in the film as Lona's disappointingly straight-laced next door neighbour, Ann, with whom Rick starts falling in love after shamelessly peeping on her for weeks. Every time she's introduced into a shot, the score lamely switches to peaceful, pretty strings, making sure the audience is constantly reminded just how innocent and pure and good and sweet Ann is. The lack of nuance is the main problem with Paul, as well. His deciding to turn crook early on and then spend most of the movie improvising as his schemes fall apart is all distinctly reminiscent of Double Indemnity. But Paul lacks all of Walter's heart. Paul just seems to be coldly using everyone; the filmmakers either failed to recognise or didn't care that part of what made Walter's transgressions in Double Indemnity so fascinating is that he was also the man who cared about Dietrichson's daughter and who had a genuine and sweet friendship with his boss, Keyes. There's never really a sense of love between Paul and Rick though some effort is made to show the two have a moderately comfortable partnership.

Ultimately the film comes down as too simplistic to be a truly great noir but there's a lot to admire in it, too. Pushover is available on The Criterion Channel.

Peter Mayhew and Chewbacca

I always felt like Chewbacca appealed more to adults than children. Peter Mayhew, the actor who portrayed the famous Wookiee, passed away a few days ago (his death was announced yesterday), at what seems the surprisingly young age of 74. There was always a sense of age in his portrayal of Chewbacca, right from Mayhew's first appearance as the character in 1977's Star Wars, a kind of weariness implied in the slight tremble of his limbs. It's no wonder Expanded Universe stories made Chewbacca hundreds of years old, the long life of a Wookiee finally confirmed canonically when Mayhew appeared as Chewbacca in the prequel, Revenge of the Sith, in 2005. This is a quality not quite replicated by Mayhew's replacement in the role since retiring, Joonas Suotamo, who played Chewbacca in The Last Jedi and Solo.

George Lucas supposedly based the character on his dog but somehow Chewbacca never seemed dog-like to me. The costume vaguely recalls Lon Chaney Jr's Wolf Man, Planet of the Apes, or even Creature from the Black Lagoon. This may be another reason I think he appealed more to older viewers than to young. He's like an old friend, no longer the main attraction but still a welcome presence, along for the ride. The 60s and 70s had a lot of fiction rethinking the roles of traditionally villainous characters, notably in books like Grendel and Interview with the Vampire. Chewbacca was part of the menagerie of Star Wars; a novel aspect of the film that advanced the idea to its next stage--now the aliens and monsters were just common sights, fellow citizens. Yet the seven foot tall "walking carpet" could never just fade into a patchwork.

I met Mayhew briefly in 2010, at Comic Con. He seemed a very kind, patient man.

The Wicker Remains Flammable

Yesterday being Beltane/May Day, I decided to again watch the classic May Day film, 1973's The Wicker Man. I've always liked the movie but I feel like I've only recently really understood what's scary about it. It's not simply the eeriness of the various animal embryos in the chemist's shop or even the ritual human sacrifice. It's the complete ease with which an entire community conducts a human sacrifice, to the point where even the small children are teasing the intended victim.

Like several other "folk horror" movies made in Britain around this time, its relevance to contemporary culture seems obvious, specifically the decline of 1960s counter-culture. The beauty in rebelling against established tradition and codes of conduct for a righteous cause didn't necessarily look too great in some of its specific manifestations following incidents like the Manson murders. It turns out the rarefied air of the neo-pagan camaraderie was not as unquestionably, intrinsically virtuous as some thought. This is a criticism that oddly echoes the hippy derision of old fashioned, institutionalised ideology. And certainly the film's protagonist, the devoutly Christian Sergeant Howie (Edward Woodward), has no doubts regarding the righteousness of his ideology.

It's important to watch the Final or Director's cut and see the part of the film that introduces Howie in his own community on the mainland. He's the classic prude satirised so often throughout the 60s and his subordinates at the police station laugh at his maintaining his chastity or ordering one officer to keep his hair cut quite short. His unyielding fidelity to his starched religious convention is similarly mocked by the people of Summerisle who, given to practices such as routine public orgies or the decoration of human graves with body parts, find his conduct even more ludicrous. The neo-pagan community might seem extreme but it hadn't been so long since Paul McCartney asked, "Why Don't We Do It In the Road?"

I'm reminded of something from William Empson's 1961 book about Paradise Lost called Milton's God:

A number of young people nowadays, as one can readily understand, feel that 'modern' ideals and programmes, a very mixed bag of them, have worked out so badly that the traditional ones may be better; but how badly those used to work out too seems to have been successfully kept hidden. Thus young people often join a Church because they think it is the only way to avoid becoming a Communist, without realizing that a Renaissance Christian State was itself usually a thorough-going police terror.

Empson's words may have been preaching to a choir not long after and by the time The Wicker Man came out just over a decade later we see an argument that, as bad as the Christian status quo might be, it's worth bearing in mind the Old Religion has its own qualities that may seem as unpleasant when directly experienced. Though, of course, the "Old Religion" of Summerisle really dates from the end of the 19th century when the ancestor of Christopher Lee's Lord Summerisle used a revived version of pagan beliefs to organise and compel to the local populace to work the fields.

Above all, I love how The Wicker Man is a story of two ideologies incapable of listening to each other meeting head on. We certainly don't agree with Howie's violent disruption of Diane Cilento's classroom just because she's taught the children, in plain terms, the May Pole symbolises the penis. But we're constantly reminded, too, he's looking for a missing girl and no-one seems to take this seriously.

The presentation of such a reductive interpretation, though--straight out calling a May Pole a penis--is one of the things that keeps Summerisle's religion from feeling genuinely pagan and smacking more of puerile deconstructionism. And that fits perfectly well with the giddy delight in the populace at Howie's unwillingness to sleep with the Landlord's Daughter (Britt Ekland) or at his increasing frustration that everyone who lives on the island, from the smallest child to the lord himself, treats a life and death subject as a game of semantics and symbol. And that is truly horrifying.

Twitter Sonnet #1231

A shirt in theory keeps the chest from cold.
A thicker cloth enables safer strolls.
The storied Strider's walk was ever bold.
The spider god could step across the poles.
For reasons left obscure the sandwich sat.
Composure placed the napkin 'fore the life.
'Twas better put in lap than any bat.
As ev'ry fork deserves a butter knife.
Repelled between the jelly walls, a moon.
Revived in thinking, hats of minds reflect.
Approaching steps foretell arrival soon.
A final crate demands a last inspect.
A yellow pie consumed a dotted line.
A metal tree supports an open sign.

Following Scents in the Sand

Farscape starts to show one of the great benefits of shooting in Australia with an episode set on a desert planet. Crichton's first attempt at recreating the conditions that sent him through a wormhole goes awry and the crew are forced to deal with a pair of dogged bounty hunters called "Blood Trackers".

Season 1, Episode 11: Till the Blood Runs Clear

The title refers to D'Argo (Anthony Simcoe) whose species, Luxans, were established in a previous episode to have a strange circulatory system--when they bleed, the blood is initially dark, something that would eventually lead to death unless the blood is allowed to flow until it turns transparent. Whether this was ever worked out to any kind of scientific logic, I don't know, but it's a nice visual and dramatic idea.

D'Argo's role in this episode is relatively minor, though. Mostly the story involves Crichton (Ben Browder) and Aeryn (Claudia Black) trying to get his Earth spacecraft fixed by a local mechanic named Furlow.

She's played by English actress Magda Szubanski with a peculiar, clipped, sort of Chicago accent. She's appropriately used in small doses but her odd mannerisms and white eyes keep the viewer captivated and trying to guess her motives. There's an amusing sense of her eyeing Crichton as a piece of meat.

The Blood Trackers, though, seem to look at everyone as meat in a more literal sense. Rorf (Jeremy Sims) and Rorg (Johanna Kerrigan) are introduced with electric guitar on the score and their adherence to sexual hierarchy compels Crichton to pretend Aeryn is his subservient mate. This is one of the things that helps the viewer think she might actually be tempted by an apparent offer from Crais (Lani Tupu), hidden in a holographic wanted poster, promising her reinstatement, or at least "honourable retirement", as a Peacekeeper. On top of that, she ends up getting temporarily blinded by a solar flare, this being another especially unpleasant sequence of events for her. Already in the series we've seen her suffer from debilitating heat delirium, get her DNA crossed with a vastly different alien species with painful consequences, and get her hand glued to the floor. So it's nice seeing the big grin on her face in the episode's climax, a very rare sight.

No-one has a better time than Zhaan (Virginia Hey), though, who, we learn in this episode, experiences "photogasm" due to exposure to sun flare radiation, sometimes at inconvenient moments. Zhaan always seems amenable to the experience, though.

. . .

This entry is part of a series I'm writing on Farscape for the show's 20th anniversary. My previous reviews can be found here (episodes are in the order intended by the show's creators rather than the broadcast order):

Episode 1: Pilot
Episode 2: I, E.T.
Episode 3: Exodus from Genesis
Episode 4: Throne for a Loss
Episode 5: Back and Back and Back to the Future
Episode 6: Thank God It's Friday Again
Episode 7: PK Tech Girl
Episode 8: That Old Black Magic
Episode 9: DNA Mad Scientist
Episode 10: They've Got a Secret