"I'm the Goddamned Batman."

[lifeonqueen]

I am reading The Golden Compass/The Northern Lights.

You were all warned and you may thank pretentiousgit for the inevitable ragey, pissy, Scholastic-Humanist cum outraged medievalist cum Catholic post this will inevitably engender.

That said, two chapters in, the things I've found that so far what I dislike I also disliked in the movie, like the classist, determinist bullshit relating to daemons and Lord Asriel behaving like a prick. I reserve the right to change my mind about Lord Asriel being a prick if it turns out that this is Pullman's way of challenging the set paradigm that heroes must also be nice people (and, yeah, fuck that clichéd bullshit). I also have no love for the already evident changes in the plot from book to movie.

On the other hand, having passed through the opening meeting between Lord Asriel and the scholars of Jordan College (are we ever going to get an explanation of why this hallowed brethren is raising Lyra anyway), the pace seems to be picking up.

And yes, Pope John Calvin makes me laugh.

Meanwhile, I have seen the first two episodes of Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles and I am in love.

Terminator 2: Judgement Day came out the summer of 1991 and electricland and I must have seen it three or four times that summer. I count it among the foundational texts of my inner universe as well as the herald of the "Third Wave Feminism" in pop culture. An entirely new hero was born the moment the camera pans down to reveal Sarah Connor's rippling muscles and the feral growl that rips out of her throat - from Sarah Connor, to Xena, to Buffy, to Kara Thrace. The transformation hinted at in Aliens - from woman to mother to warrior - was complete. And I totally lost my mind for it.

I wasn't thrilled when I heard they were going to make a TV series from the Terminator movies. 9 out of every 10 series based on movies suck ass. The only ones that haven't are M.A.S.H. and... M.A.S.H. "Thou shall not fuck with Sarah Connor" I thought. The only upside to Terminator 3 - which I prefer to pretend doesn't exist - is that Sarah Connor was saved from being demeaned by inclusion in the film. And since the guy behind T3 was also making the series, I had little hope that it would be good. Or watchable. Or not a travesty of all I held dear about the movies.

Ironically, the TV show I was looking forward to this season was Bionic Woman. When I saw the pilot screeners for both shows turn up in NeverNeverLand, I was excited to see BW and only looked into Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles to see just how bad the wreck was. Colour me surprised to discover that BW sucked hard (except for Katee Sackhoff who needs to get her own series after BSG ends in the worst way - with Will Yun Lee, if possible) and TTSCC rocked.

The show isn't perfect - there's a lot of suspension of disbelief involved in any show that involves time travel and killer robots - but they're doing an awesome job on characterization and building tension into each episode. I'm also a-twitter over the behind-the-scenes talent: John Enbom and Toni Graphia and David Nutter - each in their own way the best part of their past series work (Veronica Mars, Roswell, and X-Files, Smallville and Roswell respectively). In front of the camera, Thomas Dekker's emo hair troubles me but he's otherwise inoffensive, treading a good line between brooding teen and dutiful son. John and Sarah's relationship is one of the cornerstones of the series. They need to be believable both as mother and son as well as mentor and student. The relationship scenes so far run the gamut from cool to clunky but I personally liked the naturalism of John Connor and the Search for Turkey from episode two.

The first episode of Firefly I ever watched left me seething with rage (the despicably carelessly written "Train Job") so I came late to its charms. I never much cared for River Tam during the run of the series but "Serenity" did an excellent job of turning the character into someone I was interested in. Summer Glau has a knack for making a deadpan expression seem charming but while "Cameron" isn't exactly Robot River, her performance runs perilously close at times. That said, I find Glau extremely believable in the fight scenes, which is more than can be said of any of the BW cast, and she and Lena Headey's Sarah Connor have already begun to develop what promises to be an extremely entertaining 'bad cop, badder cop' chemistry.

I was surprised that when I ran into a flood of posts on LJ saying that "Lena Headey's okay but she's not Linda Hamilton", I found myself disagreeing. Headey (who gets props from me for answering the de rigeur and vaguely sexist 'what training did you do to prepare for this role' question asked of female actors with "I practice a martial art called sitting on my ass") brings a necessary empathy and compassion to Sarah that makes sense both narratively and dramatically. The incandescent rage Linda Hamilton gave Sarah in Judgement Day would be hard to maintain within the structure of a TV series as well as making little sense five years after supposedly saving the world. Headey's Sarah is still fierce but also weary of a lifetime of running and worried and conflicted about the effect it's having on her son. Hamilton is Sarah Connor and always will be but her television surrogate is doing a more than respectable job so far.

I think what I find most exciting is that the show so far is the Sarah Connor Chronicles. It's her journey, her story, with no he-bot there to save the day. It's finally getting to see the character that I loved the most get her moment in the spotlight and as long as that doesn't change, I'll be sitting with a beer and a bowl of popcorn ready to watch every week.