I'd love to endorse some school board candidates, but I have to admit I'm not well-enough informed to publicly commit to
endorsements. School board is really important and I wish I had time to dig into it. Good, critical evaluation of
candidates would also be really valuable because it's so hard to come by. But I don't have it. I suck, basically.
As if to contradict myself, I have some less well-informed opinions of other races around the region. If you're
interested in them, check out
my Sticking My Oar In section.
So on [[wiki:Kill the Moon|this week's Doctor Who episode]], the Doctor asserts a couple times that the moon is 100
million years old. This, along with a lot of other Jack Kirby-esque science nonsense, irritated a great many viewers.
Like this respected and lovely local author on Twitter:
Speaking of the moon, if you are doing a science fiction story in which the mass and age of the moon are plot points, LOOK THEM UP, Moffat.
In our universe, the moon is about 4.5 billion years old, give or take a few hundred million--there's still some
debate. That information isn't hard to find. However, I assert he did look it up.
The Doctor Who universe isn't our universe. In the Doctor Who universe, the arrival in the moon in orbit around the
Earth is a specific and important historical event. It did two things: its sudden appearance in the sky convinced the
Silurians (aka Homo Reptilia. SCIENCE!) to go into hibernation to avoid the impending doom it almost certainly
portended (see: Doctor Who and the Silurians), and it
destabilized the fragile Earth-Mondas twin orbit, sending Mondas drifting into
interstellar space (see: The Tenth Planet and, in
particular: Spare Parts).
Putting it at about 100 million years makes some sense for the Silurian timeline (moreso than the Doctor Who History of
the Universe's assertion that the Silurians' ancestors survived and evolved 20 million years after
the Earthshock extinction event that killed the dinosaurs). And it suddenly
appearing as described in those stories is nicely in line with what is revealed about the moon in Kill the Moon.
So yeah, the age of the moon, to me, was a delightful callback to previous adventures. The nonsense about the increased
mass of the moon was a bit more irritating, but I'll give them a pass for not wanting to pay for all that wire work.
Update! 2015-05-05 Writer Peter Harness confirms on this
week's Radio Free Skaro,
episode 474, that the 100 million year age of the moon was, in fact, a deliberate reference to Doctor Who and the
Silurians. Validation!
I'd kind of dismissed the [[wiki:Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008 TV series)|Star Wars: Clone Wars]] animated series,
because I didn't see a need for it what with the already pretty
awesome [[wiki:Star Wars: Clone Wars (2003 TV series)|Clone Wars series by Genndy Tartakovsky]]. And also because,
seriously, people, nobody likes the prequels. Why do we need to dwell on them?
But I think Clone Wars managed to redeem the prequel trilogy for me a little bit. Oh, it's still terrible, but they kind
of help show how it might have been good if George had actually hired a real director or something.
The best part about Clone Wars, hands down, is [[wiki:Ahsoka Tano]], Anakin's padawan introduced by the series. She's
feisty, brash and hot-headed, like the prequels were desperately trying to make Anakin, but she's also deeply moral and
just and kind. She gives Anakin something to care about that's not his horribly dysfunctional relationship with Padme.
And she's fun. Oh god, it's so refreshing to have a Star Wars that's fun again.
Her morality causes conflict. With the Jedi, with Anakin and with herself. But she comes through, mostly doing the right
thing when she can, and doing her best when she can't.
The series does a bunch of other amazing things even when Ahsoka isn't on screen. The Clones become actual characters
you care about. All the political machinations start making some semblence of sense. You see how things like trade
embargoes (somewhat simplified) affect actual people. Jar-Jar is still a (mostly) useless buffoon, but everyone's in on
it now and rolling their eyes along with you. I didn't hate the Jar-Jar episodes! They kept Assaj Ventress from the 2003
series and she's still awesome.
It's not perfect. The Jedi are still inexplicably dumb. The politics, while amazing for being coherent and relatable,
are clearly simplified for the kids watching. [[wiki:Legend of the Galactic Heroes]], this ain't. And they almost
completely avoid the mystical Jedi stuff, gloss over anything about what it means to fall to the Dark Side or how any of
that stuff works, much like the prequels. With one notable (tho odd) exception. Which is a shame, because all that stuff
is what I loved thinking about playing Knights of the Old Replublic or the West End Star Wars RPG.
None of that overshadows how great the characters are (even Anakin sometimes), or how much fun it is to watch.
I should also note that it gets pretty dark towards the end. Fair warning: characters die. Ones you care about. Not Game
of Thrones dark, but surprising for a kids' show. Not that I don't think kids could handle it, and I thought it was
great what they pulled off. But it surprised me.
I gotta say, I recommend it. Clone Wars made me love Star Wars again. And I'm really looking forward
to [[wiki:Star Wars Rebels]].
![[Peter Capaldi on the moon]](/img/Lu1rY0gmlr-644.webp)
![[The History of the Universe]](/img/rNKc3fWy3H-335.webp)
