One way stop...

Fandom Life cronology

1980 - Born.

1988 - I'm madly in love with TV anime series called The Three Musketeers. I remember being grounded on an episode day and begging my mother on my knees to watch it (to her absolute amazement). Spend the early 90's recording all 52 episodes on VCR (and mistakenly re-recording over them). 3 episodes per tape. Yep. Knew nobody else who liked this series. I was a fandom of one.

1994/5? - 1st internet contact: a new tech exhibition. They had PC's connected to this new "internet" shizz. Browser was Altavista and I asked the guy next to me what to do. He told me to look for something. What? Anything. I searched for "Queen" as was a big fan. Browsed a few fansites. All a bit boring.

1995-6 - Huge internet boom. I go to internet shops once a week, to basically chat on mIRC and spend a lot of money on 2 hours of internet. Ahahahaha, what a waste. Meet up with other internauts, who are as boggled by meet-ups as I am. Everybody is safe and nerdy.

1997-9 - Become huge fan of anime Rurouni Kenshin. Search the web and start reading fanfiction. For a couple of years I'm even a moderator/poster in a Kenshin fanfiction mailing list (that's right!!!). It's there I'm introduced to lime/lemon (aka het porn) and eventually yaoi (gay porn). At first super weird, then I really like it. Jump on the Yaoi bandwagon. Go on to original slash stories and random other slash anime fandoms/doushinjis.

2000-6 - There's rumours of a real, live, in the flesh, gay TV series. I jump ship from Yaoi to Slash and become huge fan of Queer as Folk (US). At this time the only things I had acess to were recaps, fanfic and small clips of scenes people shared online (via ZIP files and direct download). Only saw the full episodes years after series is over. Start on LiveJournal (2004) to be able to read all the fanfic. There's space for a little bit of LoTR's fanfic, but I don't go deep into the fandom.

2006-9 - Through LJ I dable in lots of interests, like Sherlock Holmes (yeah, slash of the original stories) and keep in touch with random Yaoi groups.

2009 - An old friend from the Yaoi days writes a ficlet for the new Star Trek. I go to see the movie so I can read her new story. Boom. Star Trek happens. New fandom.

2010 - Rumours of a new Sherlock Holmes adaptation abound. Very sceptical. Boom. Sherlock happens. So does Benedicts Cumberbatch. New fandom. Find out AO3.

2014 - Still in love with all my fandoms. :D

I understand what Whitechapel is going for (scary criminal exploration pulling heavily on the horror part). But me being a scientist with a penchant for control, it annoys me endlessly that:

- phone rings, somebody whispers spookily down the line. Whitechapel: character scared shitless, does nothing. Me: it's an incident room in a police station (ffs), get a record of incoming calls, see who's calling.

- water tap doesn't fully close, water keeps dropping atmospherically. Whitechapel: character scared shitless, does nothing. Me: call plumber.

- water seeping from bathroom floor. Whitechapel: character scared shitless, does nothing. Me: call plumber.

- footsteps echoing down the hallway. Whitechapel: character scared shitless, tries half-heartedly to check for origin of mysterious footsteps. Me: yeah, scared shitless, currently working on this one. With both eyes semi-shut. ;)

Something worth emphasizing about the movie: in spite of its weaknesses and foibles and fumblings, it has a kickass cast.

( Thoughts on cast... )

Acting aside, I enjoyed the movie better the second time (I think I was too strung out the first time), even if I did think at the end there "oh, it's now gonna be another 10 minutes before Cumberbatch is on again. BORED." And before you ask, yes, I have tried therapy and it clearly didn't work. LOL

<3

Star Trek Into Darkness is opening in Portugal next week. There are 1 or 2 different ads going on TV right now (so happy!). So the time has come for me to hunt down some tickets. There is a avant-premiere on wednesday night, but only for promotional purposes, like giveaways (I would totally buy a ticket, you guys! With cash!), so I signed in for 3 different giveaways. Eh.

In the meanwhile, today I went to my favourite cinema and asked about any special program, but no, they didn't even know the schedule for thursday yet. :( It is of course, good to remember that socially and economically my country is living pretty lean, depressing times, not much helped by this depressing weather. So the times for big dos (like the Lord of the Rings movies) are over.

Hopefully I'll get a ticket for the avant-premiere, but even if not (sometimes a bunch of people who are only there because they got free tickets do not make the best kind of audience), I'm not very bothered. I'll just get a ticket to the first showing on thursday. Because it'll probably be at some ungodly hour like 1pm or 4pm, fingers crossed not a lot of people will be there (remember I'm not keen on cinema, or people ;)), or if not, at least true hard core fans.

Watching Elementary's second episode.

I've decided before hand to treat this series as fairly as possible. Being me it's impossible to shake the cynicism inherent to "wow, who would have thought a modern Sherlock Holmes would be a good idea, hmm? oh wait...", but I really thought I could give it a fair go.

I've now realized it's impossible. It's not that it's impossible to give it a fair go, but it's absolutely impossible to see it with fresh eyes, when these same eyes very recently saw another show and I know most of the 6 episodes by heart. So when Miller's Holmes shouts "wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong!" there's really one thing I can think of. Plus, what is wrong with him? Why is he constantly twitching? Even Cumberbatch's weird, Asperger's Holmes looks more normal in comparison. You're not supposed to make Holmes look like he has a mental and physical disability. I think...

Also, I'm still baffled by Liu's Watson. Today she's wearing false lashes? I'm sorry I'm thrown. I cannot think of anything else when she's in the frame. And she waves a dollar note to shut Holmes up with a bag of crisps? What is he? A freaking puppy? A child placated with a treat? This show is starting to look like Rain Man, with Liu as Cruise and Miller as Hoffman.

I've only watched 8 minutes of the second episode...

PS- The cases seem strong though, if not the deductions. Also that explanation with the oil and water? Very good writing. Took a potential "oh, here comes the lawsuit" scene into its own. Well done.

PS2- I also like that Holmes calls Watson "Watson" and not Joan.

I've seen the Elementary pilot.

It is a cross between House and the Mentalist, and my reaction to it is, appropriately, a cross between my reactions to both shows.

I remember watching the first couple of episodes of House and thinking "what an ass! who doesn't even know what he's doing! It takes them 10 tries to diagnose the patient... is this the best diagnostician in the country world?" and then quite soon warming up to it, until for a brief period I was completely hooked, and then one day the season started with House in an asylum... and I never could watch that whole episode (despite several attempts), so that was the last House episode I saw.

As for the mentalist, it's a procedural cop show, with a smart twist. I watch it fondly, if only just for a few minutes while the show I want to see doesn't start.

In conclusion, I thought Elementary's Sherlock Holmes was an ass, and it's a procedural cop show, that I watched a little bit half-heartedly to the end (and it's only 47 minutes long!).

I didn't like the character's of either Holmes or Watson: the gender change diluted Watson's strengths (least of all being a doctor) and Holmes feels taken out of Fanfiction.net and Wikipedia. I didn't like the actors: is Jonny Lee Miller really the same actor I was so impressed in Frankenstein? His facial expressions are bland and dull, and he speaks as though he's not sure whether to present an American or an English accent ( or maybe he's going for the diluted British accent... there is that word again...). And Lucy Liu? I know literally nothing of her as an actress, but mind blown I was not. Again, bland, dull, not really in full grasp of the character, probably more due to the script/direction than anything else.

I'm not sure how Elementary stands right now, but based on this pilot, I wouldn't order a full series. Probably a first series, with a small number of episodes will still go ahead, but I don't expect it to continue much further, unless they can make it on the cheap. And seeing the two lead actors... I'm not sure how feasible that is.

Finally, can I just point out that Lee Miller really should have known better? It's clearly a case of getting work in America, because that's where his family is, and hey, it's a paycheck. Not the smartest move, and one that I suspect will turn out to be detrimental to his career in the future.

I while back I had a sort of wake up call at MAC. A brand and shop I had always associated with professional products and professional makeup artists is in fact a money making machine with a handful of assistants who couldn't find their own arses in the light of day.

Turns up the I had the wrong foundation AND concealer. I bought a new foundation (oh, yeah, because you know what? no returns obviously!) but left the concealer for later. I never felt like I need anything special for the eye area, besides something to make the skin uniform with the rest of the face, and it bugs me that they have to push the concealer automatically, regardless of whether you need it or not.

What I used to use on the eye contour was the Yves Saint Laurent Touche Eclat. For anybody less makeup minded, it is an iconic product, copied by every drugstore brand, that not just acts as a concealer but mainly as an illuminator, so not so much to cover your dark circles, but to give them less definition, so your eyes don't look so sunken in.

Even I who didn't wear foundation or a lick of makeup, had one, courtesy of my more beauty-minded sister. Of course I loved it. Three years ago when it finished mine I bought another, shade number 3. Easy peasy. Airport duty free.

Except, it was not the same. It was waaaaay too dark. I puzzled over it. My previous Touche Eclat had been a 3. What was up? I eventually gave up and gave it to my BFF, who really does have dark circle problems.

By now I was wearing a little bit more makeup and nothing quite filled the Touche Eclat space. I went out to buy another one. With the help of an assistant at Douglas (ah, last time I ask for help from a Douglas assistant, they are even more ignorant that at MAC!), I, again, bought a Touch Eclat 3. And guess what? It's too fricking dark!

Holy fricking Jesus!

Meanwhile, my sister (a previous 2) told me that they had a 1.5 Touche Eclat and that it was her new colour. Just now, checking the YSL site I discovered they extended the range quite a lot (probably 3 years ago when I bought my first mismatched Eclat) and I'm very likely now a 2.5 shade.

And in all these years and 2 wrong purchases later, and I have to find out for myself about it? Jesus, people, the quality of assistant service in makeup shops is truly appalling.