Beautiful minds

There's a series running on BBC4 that started last week called Beautiful Minds. http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00s0ggv

Last week it was all about Jocelyn Bell Burnell and her discoveries, for which other people were awarded the Nobel prize (she's a woman, so...). Tonight it's James Lovelock, which will be fascinating (he's the chap who came up with Gaia theory), and next week it's Tim Hunt, who I don't know but looks like he's a biologist. Truly interesting stuff.

V: the new one

Hmmm. I watched the first two episodes of V, and, while there does seem to be a compelling character or two, and obviously the story is interesting (just as it was the first time around), I kept thinking I was missing things. Was it just badly edited? People would act as if something had happened, and I didn't remember that something happening. Was it lots of telling instead of showing? I was a little confused. There's more next week, and hopefully it'll be less patchy.

In other news, it looks like Flash Forward will be renewed for another year. Not sure I'll be watching after this week's debacle. That show had so much potential but very little of that potential is being realised. I read the book: it's much better, so maybe I should just leave it at that.

This explains so much

http://io9.com/5517045/do-you-have-an-abusive-relationship-with-pop-culture

"Do you have an abusive relationship with pop culture?"

Oh yes, indeedy. Though I think I'm getting better.

And the article includes:

"What if Iron Man 2 sucks? Or the finale of Lost leaves us cold? Why do you care so much about things that don't care about you? It's possible that you're in an abusive relationship with pop culture." 

and

"We build up this image of what the Thing will be once we finally get to experience it, and when we do? Sometimes it's bliss. Sometimes it's the Lord of the Rings trilogy, or Grant Morrison's Batman & Robin, or Star Trek, or The Matrix. But then, sometimes it isn't. Sometimes, it's the Battlestar Galactica finale, or Ang Lee's Hulk, or most of Heroes, or The Matrix Reloaded. Sometimes, we get exactly what we want. But all too often, we don't."

Yep.