Gallifrey round-up

[lizbee]

I'm on the verge of being done with my Gallifrey re-listen.  Which makes me a bit sad, because there's a whole world of Big Finish audios out there, but I've already listened to all the ones with Romana and/or Brax.  (Miles Richardson is apparently playing Iris Wildthyme's ex-husband in an upcoming audio, but ... look, there are depths to which I refuse to stoop.  This week, anyway.)



Here are some random thoughts, covering mostly "Appropriation" and "Mindbomb":

- Genartis, in addition to being the only Time Lord on Gallifrey with a regional UK accent, is a delightful worm.  Former allies are invading the planet?  He'll just give them Romana, no one here wants her.  The plan is delightfully slimy, not to mention rather clever.  I will be very sad when he's exiled to the Outlands and has to spend his days mooching around Romana's family House and threatening passing ex-presidents with rape.  Even sadder when he is zombified, not least because then I have to hear John Leeson and Lalla Ward use the word "zombified" multiple times.
- In retrospect, it's Really Quite Obvious that Matthias is working for Braxiatel.  Nevertheless, it's lovely to see all Brax's scheming-by-proxy.
- Soooo, Romana has been imprisoned for at least a couple of days, and thinks she's on her way to being executed, and instead gets to sit and have a chat with Narvin.  Which is lovely, and I'd be a lot more cheery about it than she is, but then he's all, "So what would you do, if you could walk out of here?"  And she answers, "Break into Braxiatel's office."

And I'm like, WHAT?  Because in that situation, "Oh, go through Brax's stuff" is what I'd answer, but there's no in-story reason for Romana to be thinking of him, except that the plot requires Leela and K9 to be in his space.

Ideally, Romana's proper answer should be, "Take Leela and K9, steal a TARDIS and hit the beach AND NEVER COME BACK", but she's a bit too crazy for that. 

- Seriously, it makes me a bit sad that Romana ends the series even crazier than when she started.  At the beginning she was just restless and constantly putting herself in situations where she kept ending up nearly dead/tortured/humiliated.  By the end, she's ... well, a bit power-mad and broken, possibly from all the time she's spent hosting at least one incorporeal lunatic in her head.  She was totally planning to sacrifice herself to destroy Pandora, and since Leela saved her she's been a bit lost.
- Concentrating on Romana's INSANITY makes it easier to overlook all the times when they write her like Gallifrey's own Sarah Palin. 
- I don't know why it's apparently so hard to write Romana and Leela in-character, since girl!fandom does it all the time, but in pro-fandom, only Gareth Roberts and Chris Boucher seem to manage it with any consistency.
- Every now and then I get this urge to write fic where Narvin survives the Time War and ends up working for Torchwood in Cardiff.  'Cos, they need someone competent, and Narvin could be sarcastic when they stuff up and endanger the world every week.  Also, Torchwood is pretty fail in general, and having a former xenophobic-secret-police-type-commander in their midst might actually improve their moral standing.
- I have this problem where all the chancellery guards sound the same to me.  I tell them apart by remembering that Wynter is dead, Hallam has a slightly deeper voice, and Annos is the nice one who is secretly in love with Romana.
- It makes me a bit sad that we don't find out what happens right after Brax declares Matthias his successor, because there were probably shenanigans.  At the very least, we know that Romana was exiled from the Capitol.  STUFF HAPPENED AND I WANT TO KNOW HOW IT WENT DOWN AND THEY CHEAT ME, DAMMIT!
- Equally sad is the unlikelihood that BF will ever do anymore of these.  *weeps*

Comments

[garpu.livejournal.com]

Do you know if they're going to do any more stories with Brax on the Bernice Summerfield line? Feels like they just dropped that whole plotline.

[violetisblue.livejournal.com]

"Seriously, it makes me a bit sad that Romana ends the series even crazier than when she started. At the beginning she was just restless and constantly putting herself in situations where she kept ending up nearly dead/tortured/humiliated. By the end, she's ... well, a bit power-mad and broken, possibly from all the time she's spent hosting at least one incorporeal lunatic in her head."

Though you can't argue that they haven't legitimately kept up the hinted-at canon that every Gallifreyan president who serves for long enough inevitably goes mad. In that thing we're writing I presume she did in fact lose it, then got it back at some point between being deposed/ending up in that refugee camp (private fanon there, pay it no mind) and when we see her again. Which just adds to the whole Haunted by Time War Ghosts thing in actual nice ways.

"Concentrating on Romana's INSANITY makes it easier to overlook all the times when they write her like Gallifrey's own Sarah Palin."

Oh, thank God it's not just me sitting there going, "GAAH! This is NOT the same character AT ALL, you stupid STUPID fanboys!"

"I don't know why it's apparently so hard to write Romana and Leela in-character, since girl!fandom does it all the time, but in pro-fandom, only Gareth Roberts and Chris Boucher seem to manage it with any consistency."

Through absolutely no fault whatsoever of Louise Jameson, I'm finding their version of Leela just...insulting, a lot of the time. I've said this before, but Jim Mortimore's tie-in Eye of Heaven has some actually great Leela characterization and backstory; that and Chris Boucher's tie-ins are Leela canon to me.

[benbenberi.livejournal.com]

If you ever do get around to writing Narvin-in-Torchwood, I will cheer loudly! They need someone like him to actually do the dirty work of world-saving while they strike attitudes and sex each other.

[biichan.livejournal.com]

There's a guy named Peter Anghelides that's doing two BF audios with Romana in them next spring. One of them is going to be end of that Key 2 Time three-parter with Fivey where Lalla will be playing Madam President and the other one has Mary Tamm doing Romana I's companion chronicle. It says in Wikipedia that he wrote an EDA called The Ancestor Cell--is that one of the more crappy books?

[silly-cleo.livejournal.com]

I want to respond to this in more detail but I'm so inarticulate right now, just this:

Ideally, Romana's proper answer should be, "Take Leela and K9, steal a TARDIS and hit the beach AND NEVER COME BACK", but she's a bit too crazy for that.

*FLAILS* YES, DAMNIT. *CRIES* THIS is my answer to everything from about 'Pandora' onwards, though. Actually, no, 'Blind Eye' onwards.

My re-listen is a lot less thought-y than yours, it's mostly proving my level of batshit for Leela/Romana as a pairing. Hai.

[akashasheiress.livejournal.com]

I shouldn't be reading about these audio-thingies. They make me sad. *clings to in-character-Romana*