The Journal of the Browncoat Cat

One of the things that first threw me when I moved from RISC OS to Ubuntu Linux was the concept of Administrators and Root Users.  I could not understand why my computer was telling me that I could not do things that I wanted to, as I did not have permission from the Root User.  Who paid for this machine anyway, me or some Orwellian Root User.  There is a very simple reason why Ubuntu and all  the other Linux distributions establish this split personality, and that is to guarantee the security of the system.  If I, as the owner of the PC, could just switch it on and do some pretty spectacular and dangerous stuff to its systems, then so could  anyone else with access to the machine, and these days, with broadband connection to the Internet, that means anyone anywhere.

This is why Ubunutu Linux sets itself up as the Root User, with all the moves, and everyone else as simple Users, who need permission to do anything more spectacular than loading a file into the word-processor.  Each User has his or her own Username and Password for getting onto the computer at all, and their own section of the Hard Drive, a sub-folder within the “/home” folder for storing their files in.  All very safe, all very simple.

So, what happens when I need to do something that is slightly more advanced than loading a webpage into Firefox.  In that situation, I could log on as the Root User, and have my wicked way.  This is not advisable, as whilst I can get at every level of the system, so can anybody out there trying hack into my computer for their own neferarious ends.  The commonest method is to grant the User what is known as SuperUser privelages, so that they become an Administrator on a temporary basis, with access to all the moves.  This is done through the “SUDO” command in a terminal or “GKSUDO” command through the GUI.  In both cases, the user is asked to confirm their Password before they can go any further.

Of course, if you don’t trust the person you are giving access to your computer to tie their own shoe-laces, then when you set them up as a User, you can deny them all privellages, so they could issue the “SUDO” command until the cows come home and they still would not be allowed to do anything more advanced than visiting a web site.

Written and Created by Toby Whithouse
Produced by Matthew Bouch
Directed by Toby Haynes
Starring: Russell Tovey, Aiden Turner, Leonora Crichlow, Jason Watkins and Annabel Scholey
Guest Starring: Dean Lennox Kelly, Sinead Keenan

1. Plot:
It is the Full Moon again, and George transforms, so nothing new there, he is a Werewolf. The following morning, he is surprised to be met by a man who claims to also be a werewolf.  Tully tells George that he can help him come to terms with the curse and help him survive the next full moon.  At first George is not interested, but after some gentle persuasion from his friends, he agrees to let Tully stay for a few days, so that he can learn from him.

Tully is surprised that George is sharing a house with a Mitchell, as the vampires generally have a violent dislike of lycanthropes .  When he was in London, the local vamps would regularly beat him up, telling him that their time had come as they were doing so.

At work, George meets Nina, a Ward Sister and they spectacularly fail to hit it off.  George’s attempt to emulate Tully’s machismo is a complete disaster, and it is not until Nina sees George’s more sensitive side that she becomes attracted to him.

Tulley is starting to creep out Mitchell and Annie.  Even though she is dead, Tulley tried to make a move on her, and became viscious when she rejects him.  Annie runs screaming  out into the street, but does not know how to get to the hospital where George and Mitchel work.  She follows an ambulance to a crime scene.  Lauren has killed again, and been caught.  Herrick delivers a stern warning to her, saying that she is being too obvious and is close to screwing everything up, before letting her disappear into the city.

Now both Annie and George are  beginning to have their suspicions about what is going on in the Vampire Community and confront Mitchell.  He tells them not to worry, that the vamps have been talking big since the Crusades and nothing ever comes from it.

It is the full moon again, and Annie and Mitchell have a confrontation with George about Tully, who has now long outstayed his welcome.  George defends his friend, saying that if Tully goes, then he will as well.  At the deserted barn where Tully and George plan to stash their human clothes whilst they are in wolf mode there is a confrontation.  Tully admits that he infected George with the curse.  That the curse robbed him of everything as well and he wants to get close to the only person left he has a physical contact with.  George sees what a nasty piece of work Tully is, they fight and George is victorious.  George tells Tully to leave and never darken his door again.

Back at the house, someone has pushed a DVD through the letterbox.  The three housemates sit down to watch it, believing it to be a copy of the film Casablanca. In reality it is a video of Lauren’s last kill.  She is taunting Mitchell, trying to get him to fall of the wagon and join his fellow vampires in an orgy of bloodshed.

2.Thoughts:
Nobody should have been at all surprised that Tully was the person who infected George.  Wolves are pack animals, it stands to reason that werewolves are too, and it is not at all surprising that Tully would try to establish himself as an Alpha Male over the impressionable George.  Tully loses the final confrontation because he has nothing to live for, so no real will to win.  He has lost his family due to the curse,  he is deeply envious of George, who has managed to forge bonds after the curse bit home and has something to live for and go home to.   Although the whole “Luke, I am your father.” routine was just one of the many things in this episode that clearly outs writer Toby Whithouse as being a huge Science Fiction fan.  After all, only someone who loves SF would use a quote from The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy to describe a clever person.   “Brain the size of a planet”, is one of Marvin the Paranoid Android’s favourate phrases, but only a geek would remember something like that .

Casting Dean Lennox Kelly as Tully was a masterstroke.  As usual he gives an excellent performance as the “Devil May Care” urban werewolf who is hiding a deep sense of pain and loneliness beneath the cocky exterior.  However, it is Anabel Scholey, who plays the newly minted vampire Lauren who stole the show in this episode.  The psychopathic blood-lust of the vampiric killer does not sit neatly with caring young nurse she used to be, and Scholey brings this confusion nicely to the fore.  I look forward to seeing what direction the series and the actress take this character.

Likewise it was not really that surprising that after the very bad start to their relationship, George and Nina would become close.  The sheer brutality of her bitchiness towards George was a clear sign that things were  going to develop between the two characters.   There is something  fundamentally likable about George, despite the fact that he is a werewolf,  and he will inevitably break Nina’s snooty facade and have her eating out of his hand, but not his dog bowl.   I would not like to be in her shoes though.  On past form, being a nurse and getting too friendly to either George or Mitchell can get you dead, or worse undead.

Once again Annie stuck firmly in the world of the supernatural, invisible to all bar the vampire and the werewolves.  Still unable to move on to the next stage in her death, she is trapped in the house, making cups of tea that she will never be able to drink.

My friend Tim said that because this series has episodes that are 60 minutes long and we have all become used to dramas with episode of 45 minutes, that this series would appear to drag in the middle.  When things would normally be building towards the climax of a  three quarters of an hour episode of another series, in Being Human the episode is still leisurely building up its scenario.  I did not really notice this with the first episode, which I thought was well paced and balanced, however this episode moved so slowly.  I was thinking to myself, “yes we all know Tully is really a git, so get on with it.” and wondering how much longer the episode had to run.  On the other hand, it was nice that the relationship between Nina and George is being given time to develop.

The shape of the house has been bugging me for a while now, why does it have such large windows on the ground floor and why does it have doors in such funny places.  This to me is just another layer of decrepitude that adds wonderfully to the atmosphere of the series, as only two creatures of the night, desperate to pass as still human would want to live in such an ugly building.  I had a moment of clarity when I noticed that one of the funny shaped windows was frosted on the bottom two thirds and had the word “Spirits” (which is a really bad pun by the BBC Wales Art Department) written on it.  Of course, it has to be an old pub that has been converted into a private house.  Decay on top of decay, perfect for a haunted house.

So another entertaining episode of a very entertaining series.

3. Stars:
3.75 out of 5

One of my favourite web comics is Torchwood Babiez, which seems to be updated on an irregular basis on Live Journal, by its artist JigglyKat and writer Spastasmagoria.  It features the adventures of a group of clones of the Torchwod Cardiff team plus a toddler Doctor#10, Rose (or should that be Wose), and baby Martha  living in suburban Cleveland, Ohio. The Babiez see the World as their adult counterparts would, but we see the comic strip world of children and their toys.

The story recently took a bizarre twist with the arrival of Doctor#9, who of course knew nothing of the Torchworch Institiute, Jackie Tyler and the real Rose acting as nursemaid for all the Babiez.  It is implied that the reason the Babiez are seeing the World of their adult equivalents is that they are somehow twisting the fabric of space and time.  The next update will be the final and I cannot wait to see how it turns out.

For most of the game, the English looked a little bit lost and disorientated.  This match was not a Saint Valentine’s Day Massacre.  as there were moments when the Welsh got a bit too cocky and let their defenses down.  When this happened, the English switched on their game and punished the home team’s sloppiness with two spectacular Tries and a very lucky Drop Goal.  But at the end of the day, English indiscipline lead to their downfall, with the two yellow cards and numerous penalties awarded to Wales did much to seal the Welsh victory.

One of the main faults of the Welsh game in recent years has been their inability to win Line-Outs.  This fundamental flaw has been remedied in style, as Wales one the ball from each and every Line-Out they had the put for, and even cheekily stole the ball from English Line-Outs.

As usual, the atmosphere within the Millennium Stadium was electric.  74,594 spectators were present.  It seemed at some points that 74,593 of them were cheering on Wales, all except the single female voice crying “Come On England!”, from the woman sitting directly in front of me.

Here is an interesting photo of Matt Smith, part of the publicity for the detective series Moses Jones that is currently being broadcast on BBC TWO on Mondays.  It looks like he has already got the hang of The Doctor’s  Psychic Paper.

Also as part of the publicity for Moses Jones, there is the video below which mostly features Shaun Parkes, who plays D.I. Moses Jones, but also features Matt Smith.  Mr. Smith certainly likes to use bold hand gestures when he is talking, and he seems to have a childlike enthusiasm about everything he does.  If he brings these personal characteristics across to his portrayal of The Doctor, then he is going to be great in the role.

However, life is not quite over for the current incarnation of The Doctor.  David Tennant returned to Cardiff in the middle of January, and the Official BBC Doctor Who web sit has released this video diary of the big day.

And finally.  Doctor Who Forum User Canterbury created the photo below using the Bus Slogan Generator.  After what has happened in the UAE, it made me laugh.

http://ruletheweb.co.uk/b3ta/bus/

Written and Created by Toby Whithouse
Produced by Matthew Bouch
Directed by Toby Haynes
Starring: Russell Tovey, Aiden Turner, Leonora Crichlow, Jason Watkins and Annabel Scholey
Guest Starring: Dean Lennox Kelly, Greg Chillin

1. Plot:
It is the night of the full moon, and George has got problems.  It is the night of the full moon, and the abandoned isolation ward he uses as a sanctuary is full of workmen converting it into an office in the new Administration Wing.  It is the night of the full moon and Mitchell has got problems.  Herrick and is vampire supremacists are on the move.  He manages to prevent a vampire from “recruiting” one of the patients in the Intensive Care ward, making it clear that this hospital is out of bounds.  It is the night of the full moon and Annie has no problems at all.  More and more people can see her, she can leave the house and is coming to terms with being dead.   This will not last for long.

Mitchell drives George to the outskirts of the city, where he tries to find an area of empty countryside where he can safely transform into a werewolf.  However, it is a pleasant evening and the people of Bristol are out enjoying themselves.  Eventually he lets Mitchell take him home to their house, which WolfGeorge thoroughly trashes whilst Mitchell and Annie sit outside.

The following day Anne’s former finance, who is now George and Mitchell’s landlord pays a visit.  Annie wants to see him again, but is persuaded to stay hidden.  This makes her even more determined to see her ex again, so she borrows George’s mobile and send a text asking for her ex to come around and fix the kitchen tap.  She loses her bottle, and he cannot see her at all.

Mitchell is visited at work by Herrick, who is currently working as a sargeant in the local police force.  Herrick tells him that the Age of Man is at an end as the Age of the Vampire is about to dawn.

George is visited by Lauren.  He believed her to be dead and was completely unaware that Mitchell turned her into a vampire.  She planned to kill him and feed of him, but as soon as she realises that George is a werewolf, she leaves in disgust.

Mitchell has taken Becca, a young nurse from the hospital out for a drink.  Lauren bursts into the pub and causes a scene.  Mitchell decides that Becca is not safe.  This turns out to be tragically true, as Lauren kills Becca, and there is nothing that he or George can do to save her.

The episode ends with Annie having a relapse, unwilling to leave the house and once again totally invisible.  Mitchell is in a state of shock, aware that his actions continue to have terrible consequenses.  George is the only person willing to face the World, but even his enthusiasm has been dampened.

Outside the house someone is watching and waiting…

2. Thoughts:
It has been a year since the original pilot episode for Being Human was broadcast of BBC THREE.  The decision to commission it as a series over the inexcusably weak Phoo Action was made in April last year, and the series started broadcasting with this episode three weeks ago. A lot has happened since the pilot was broadcast.  For starters, this episode is essentially a second pilot, as it re-introduces the character and situations of the original pilot, introducing the concept of a byronic vampire and a nerdy werewolf sharing a house in Totterdown, Bristol with the ghost of its former owner.

The series has been almost completely recast, with only Russell Tovey remaining as George the Werewolf, it was all change for everyone else.  Leonora Crichlow has been cast as Annie and tries to play the character as vaguely Bristolian, which is a great improvement over Anita Riseborough’s annoying Mancunian Annie, although the South Glouscestershire accent did occassionally slip into a South London accent.  Also Annabel Scholey had more menace in her performace as the freshly-minted vampire Lauren than  the china doll pretty Dominique McElligott ever did.  The recasting of Mitchell did not bother me, as his portrayal of the vampiric heartthrob was identical to that of Guy Flannigan.  What did disappoint me was the changes to the character of Herrick, leader of the vampire Supremacists.  Adrian Salmon was mesmeric in the role in the pilot episode, whilst Jason Watkins was a bit flat, and I did not feel the menace from the character in this episode that was present in the pilot.

I was not surprised to see that the isolation ward that George used as his sanctuary in the original pilot was done away with at the start of this episode.  It was a nice solution for a one-off drama, but was to safe for an ongoing series. It allowed George to remain in denial of his curse. George will now have to confront what he is and what he can become when the moon is full.  And of course it did lead to the wonderfully comedic scene of George trying to find somewhere isolated in the heart of Bristol. I’m a little less convinced by the explainiation given for why he did not just break through the windows of the house and escape.  The whole notion that when he is a wolf he does not know what a window is strikes me as a bit of a cop-out.

I suspect that Annie’s relapse will prove to be crucial to why she has not moved on to the next stage.  She resents the fact that she is dead so much which is why she is glued invisibly to the house.  As her confidence grows, then she will be more able to accept the stark truth of her death and will be able to leave this earthly realm.  However, at that point she would have to leave the series, so expect a constant stream of steady knock-backs that will keep Annie pinned down in Totterdown.

So a good start to an interesting series.

3. Stars:
3.5 out of 5

At time of writing (7th February, 2009), this web log currently has a new theme. It is called Painter and was designed by Marcelo Mesquita. The cool thing about it is that I can customise the colour scheme.  Given that my web domain, that hosts The Journal of the Browncoat Cat, is based on my house name Gardd Lelog, which means Lilac Garden, I have edited the colours to varying shades of Lilac, Violet and Purple. I like it because it has a very clear layout and most things are nicely proportioned.  The only problem with it is that the header image is so narrow, just 120 pixels in total.

I have also added a link to Jay Dyke’s web comic Mows to the Web Comics section of my links.