Reliving My Teen Years (Not)

God, I am so flipping excited about the new series of Skins!

Anyone know a good way I can watch it in the States?

Here are some things I miss from England:

Friends/family, obvs.

The NHS

Lucy Mangan in The Guardian

The money (I HATE dollar bills, what a pain in the arse.)

Jaffa Cakes

SKINS.

Basstastic

It's Gossip Girl day!!


I tell you, there had better be some more Chuck Bass time in this episode, or I am mutinying. Maybe Ed Westwick is shooting a movie or something, because he has hardly been in it lately. Last episode, instead of some satisfying Bass shenanigans, the three most boring people in the show/universe somehow managed to have a threesome. And all Chuck did was show up about twice to be the voice of reason to Blair's craziness. Something not right there. Although I did enjoy him chatting up a bloke a couple of eps back - "You think I never kissed a guy before?"

Also, here is an interview with my other major man-crush, Joseph Gordon-Levitt.

..........

I think I had better write something soon about some celeb ladies I fancy. As much as I have a straight-on for Chuck and Joseph, there's a chance that new visitors to this blog might not even realise I am a raving lesbo. And we can't have that.

TV, WTF?!

Hmm, what televisual delights await us this fall/autumn?

Flashforward, NBC

Men: 6
Women: 3

Trauma, NBC

Men: 4
Women: 2

Stargate Universe, SYFY

Men: 6
Women: 3

It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, FX

Men: 4
Women: 1

Heroes, NBC

Men: 7
Women: 3

Fringe, Syfy

Men: 5
Women: 3

Let's review, shall we? Percentage of women in human population:

50%

Percentage of women in the casts of this fairly arbitrary choice of 6 television shows:

32%

I am sensing a disconnect of some kind here.

Heck, maybe if they include more than three women in the casts of these shows everyone will die of estrogen poisoning...

anyone can happen

Loathe as I am to step on the robot blog fun, I think we all need to admire this piece of newly-released Dollhouse artwork.


Look, it has hottie Eliza Dushku, and fancy typography!! Everyone knows this is what the future will look like: lower-case letters scattered about willy-nilly, clean black-on-white spaces, and leather pants. It's like you're living inside a sexy ipod, and Eliza Dushku is there. Let's all take a moment to think about that.

Yet More Chuck Bass

"Hey Nick, want to hang out tonight?"
"Yeah sure, what will we do?"
"Look through endless photos of Chuck Bass."
"...Oh."



Susie: "Look, he's doing an emotion in this one!"
Nick: "So am I, it's called despair."



Susie "Look! This one's my favourite! Look at his face! He's amazing."
Nick: "Yes. It is totally different from all of the others."


Susie: "We happen to know he is wearing green socks with this outfit, don't we Nick? If only we could see them."
Nick: "Yes, if only."



Nick: "You're basically blogging my nervous breakdown."



Nick: "You seriously owe me for this."

We Have a Winnar

Just a little post to point out the fact that:

80% of people think that Eurovision is more entertaining than the Oscars.*

I feel so vindicated in my love for Eurovision! Obviously it helps if you get smashed. But certainly a night of quality entertainment for all! I have only watched the Oscars live once, obvs because of the time difference between here and the States, and it was entertaining enough. But nothing compares to the camp thrills, the confusing novelty and the sustained unintentional hilarity of Eurovision. I for one cannot wait til next year.

*Figures may not reflect all of humanity, merely the tiny handful of people who read my blog but it's still true so there.

There's a Rose in my VaJayJay For You

What is a fun thing to do with your buddies on a Saturday night? Yes that's right, it is drinking Dr.Pepper and vodka, eating Tangfastics and Pringles, and playing a Tipping the Velvet drinking game. Here are our rules:


Drink for vaginal imagery, i.e. oysters

Kitty throws the rose

Drink at antiquated Victorian sexual swearwords.

Boobies

Rachael Stirling (Nan) does terrible, terrible overacting

Appearance of antique dildo

"Whitstable"

Sarah Waters in the credits

Moment of melodramatic emotional crisis

Sexy smoking

Deep voice while unconvincingly passing as a boy

Music-hall style montage of Victorian doings

GAY.

If you hear "Oh Kitty!", down your drink



I recommend this as a fun activity. Ah, Tipping the Velvet. (Wahey!) Enjoy the hottness of Keely Hawes and Jodhi May, and put up with the ridiculous over-acting of Rachael Stirling because she is also hot when in drag.

Googly-Eyed Weirdo

I can't believe it took me this long to see the following Buffy/Twilight mashup. It basically demonstrates that Edward Cullen is a creepy, stalkerish pain in the butt, and that Buffy, bless her heart, would not put up with that kind of nonsense. This video is also really, really well put together, IMO. Watch it.

Bass Line (Get it??)

I currently have the most out-of-control straight on for Chuck Bass. In case you don't watch Gossip Girl, Chuck Bass is the slimy, sleazy, scheming, filthy-rich Manhattanite youth played by Ed Westwick. He's evil in a good way, a way that makes him far more interesting to watch than most of the other rather tedious characters in Gossip Girl (sorry Chase Crawford and Penn Badgely, I really don't see what use you are).

Plus, Chuck Bass wears the most wonderfully ridiculous outfits. And he is attractive to me in a way a do not quite understand. But why try to explain the sublime? Just bask. Bask in the Bass.

Ed Westwick probably in "Buy this cologne, smell like Chuck Bass" mode.

Look, he is literally rubbing his hands together in anticipation of an evil scheme.

Oh I forgot to mention, turns out Ed Westwick is actually English, which means he does a very good job with an American accent on Gossip Girl. Westwick sounds exactly as sleazy in a London accent.

Look! Look at him lifting his hair out of his eyes in an endearingly louche and affected manner!

How?! How can he make this look work? He must have made some kind of pact with Fashion Satan.

Chuck can be relied upon to woo you by delivering both a rose and a garish sweater vest to the scene.

What can I do further about this obsession? Why, watch more Gossip Girl of course. And make a cuppa tea when Chuck Bass is offscreen. Exceptions made for Blair Waldorf, and Serena van der Woodsen if she's wearing a tanktop.

One of Those Days (A Cure For)

Have you ever had a time in your life when all the lightbulbs blow, and all your socks simultaneously develop holes in them, and furthermore all your stuff breaks? I am having one of those times. Among other kaput things (including my camera! argh!) my laptop has become minorly broken, and this combined with my university systematically revoking all my student privileges, including computer stuff (weeks before graduation!) means that I have limited access to the internet. I am now in the city library. Thank goodness for free access of information through the awesome institution of public libraries.

Since everything is broken and all my friends have left, I at least have plenty of time to watch that miraculous show, Weeds. Here are some pictures of Mary-Louise Parker to make us all feel better.

Millennium Approaches

"Greetings, Prophet! The great work begins! The Messenger has arrived!"

What a wonderful image, the moment when the Angel breaks through Prior's ceiling and begins to proclaim his destiny to him. Incongruous and awe-inspiring at once.

If you haven't read Tony Kushner's Angels in America, this won't mean much to you, and also WHY haven't you read it yet?! Go out and read it, or see it. The first image here is from the Angels in America HBO series, showing Justin Kirk as Prior Walter and Emma Thompson as the angel (love); the subsequent images show the same moment in several different stage versions. Fascinating to see how they have conceived of the same scene in different ways, and within different limitations. Dude, I would kill to see this play on stage.

(Credit for this post goes to this wonderful blog, which is full of great images, mostly great images of boobs, so you can't go wrong there.)

(By the way, it always struck me as amazing that the first half of Angels in America, Millennium Approaches, was written and had its debut on stage considerably earlier than the second part, Perestroika. Can you imagine having to wait that long to see what had happened to the characters? Seeing a three hour play and knowing that there are three more hours with the same story and characters somewhere out there in the ether seems far worse than having to wait for the next episode of your favourite tv show, say. I think that they still stage the two parts separately. Seems odd to me.)

Past, Present, Future: All Buffy

These are hilarious. Dark Horse, in their infinite wisdom, are putting out a set of Buffy the Vampire Slayer tarot cards. It's an odd idea, but they seem to be going with the plot and charactersiation of the series to some extent, and kudos for hiring some nutso artist with a penchant for symbolic semi-nudity instead of using the same old publicity pictures. But yeah, these are mental.

The Magician

Temperance

The Devil

Death

(Who is this?)

These are the four publicity shots, the deck will be available for purchase in August, I believe. Anyone know anything about tarot?

Costume Drama Monday

Look, because it is Monday, and I had to get up early, and it is very cold and I'm feeling pathetic, I'm just going to be really shallow for a minute. While thinking about costume dramas and also therefore history. I can be superficial and intellectual at the same time, yesss.

The Other Boleyn Girl (2008), with Scarlett Johansson as Mary Boleyn and Natalie Portman as Anne Boleyn

The Other Boleyn Girl (2003), starring Natascha McElhone as Mary Boleyn, Jodhi May as Anne Boleyn

So here we have the current Hollywood adaptation of Philippa Gregory's novel The Other Boleyn Girl (2001), and the BBC version which showed a few years back. I didn't see the first one, I probably won't see the film version, but this is unimportant to my main question:

Who is fitter??

Obviously the Hollywood version is supposed to be a concentration of hotness, what with Scarlett and Natalie, but they are not really doing it for me in this film (Ghost World Johansson and short-haired, SNL rapping Portman, on the other hand...) I would go for the original courtly line-up any day, largely because it includes the divine Jodhi May. Votes?

Side-note: Has anyone in tv actually seen a picture of Henry VIII? He was an ugly ginger fat bloke who only got all that tail because he was king. Henry looked like this:

He did not look like these two:

He probably smelled pretty bad, too. Just saying. (Also, could we not get at least one English person in a movie about English history? I mean, I know you get more chance of an Oscar if you put on a funny accent, but still.)