WE OBEY

I didn't find out until yesterday that Lady Gaga used a bit from the Vertigo soundtrack in the intro for her "Born This Way" video. The first two and a half minutes, nearly half the video, is basically a Bernard Herrmann music video starring Gaga. The pink triangle at the beginning even brings to mind the V in the Vista Vision logo which accompanies the same piece of music at the beginning of the movie. Though the unicorn in the middle makes it seem more like the Tri-Star logo. I actually really like the costumes and makeup in this video, except for the extra bones in Gaga's face. It's a shame the song itself is exceptionally bad--"Bad Romance" remains the only Gaga song I can at all dig.

Of course, the reason I watched it was that "Weird Al" Yankovic's parody video was released yesterday;



There seems to be a quite earnest argument in the YouTube comments about whether "Weird Al" Yankovic has breasts now or if, just possibly, his head is superimposed on a female dancer's body. It's a good thing he didn't show a train coming straight at the camera or these people would be terrified.

Not one of Yankovic's best parodies, though I do like it. It's certainly better than the original, and I take a certain amount of pleasure in seeing a video that almost never got made--I suppose most people know that Yankovic originally thought Gaga wasn't going to give him permission to release the song on his album. She'd initially refused to grant or withhold approval on the song until after it was recorded--even though he'd sent her the lyrics to read. When she refused permission after he recorded it, Yankovic released the song for free on YouTube (sans unmade video) prompting a massive internet backlash that ended with Gaga granting permission for the song to be released on Yankovic's album, claiming that she had been unaware of it as the responses Yankovic had received regarding her permission had all been handled, supposedly, by her manager. Personally, I think it's more likely that Gaga simply doesn't have a well developed sense of humour and her vanity was swayed by the apparent public opinion in Yankovic's favour.



Last night I watched "Dalek", the sixth episode of Doctor Who with Christopher Eccleston as the Doctor, and possibly my favourite so far. I certainly never rooted for a Dalek so much. Mainly it was because the Dalek in question was being held captive by an obnoxious American asshole--the Doctor described the Dalek as better than the American guy because the Dalek was "more honest" and damn, it's true. When the Dalek had the guy quivering against the wall it was so intensely satisfying. The episode finally tapped into how oddly adorable the Daleks' unabashed need to EXTERMINATE is, at the same time showing what a real badass war machine a Dalek is. I love how they stuck with the old Dalek costume most of the time, too--the few instances where a cgi Dalek is used are actually less effective though, again, they help establish an effective seeming killer.

And the episode mined more of the Doctor's recent trauma, turning his conflict with the Dalek into a fascinating last surviving members of two opposing factions story. The idea of one of the Doctor Who universe's emotionless villains having a story where they get emotions has seemed like a viable one since the Cyberman in The Invasion was given the capacity to feel fear and ran terrified--and terrifyingly--through the London sewers. This is territory somewhat explored on Star Trek: The Next Generation--I'm thinking mainly of Hugh and Seven of Nine, the turncoats of the Borg which are basically identical to the Cybermen. But "Dalek" was more effective than both of those examples.