I don't post about it much nowadays, but I still love Top Gear so much. It is a beautiful, brilliant series about three charmingly useless friends who go out and have adventures. It's tense (that part where Jeremy was trying to get around the other car on the Road of Death, augh), it's touching, it's hilarious, it is generally wonderful. The full-episode specials wouldn't look out-of-place in a cinema. I wish full-series DVDs were available; I really can't understand why they aren't.
I miss writing for it, actually. I haven't written Top Gear fanfiction for about two years, but the trio really were a delight to write for. I just don't know whether I'd be able to fall back into their voices after such a long period away from them. Also, very few of those of you I first met in the Top Gear fandom are still active there; it is now full of strangers, which is a bit scary. I do occasionally yearn for the days when the Top Gear fandom was ridiculously close-knit and we all met up to be dorks in West London.
Jeremy Clarkson is one of my favourite characters ever. He is such fun to write and watch! He is an amazing, ridiculous lunatic who will strap an enormous engine to a pickup truck and drive it across the English Channel, who is incapable of venturing near anything remotely flammable without somehow setting it alight, and the fact that he is a real person (even if he is putting on a bit of a persona) just makes it so much better.
(And more terrifying, admittedly.)
With particular reference to yesterday's Bolivia specia: my goodness, that trio are dedicated. I am awed. The number of times they nearly got themselves killed in the name of making good television: ridiculous. The oxygen-deprivation and parts of the Road of Death were actually painful to watch.
More musing on Shadow of the Colossus: how many videogames are there in which the fact that the hero becomes stronger with every enemy he kills is a plot point?
I love it when videogame stories do things that wouldn't work in any other medium.
I really need to stop playing Shadow of the Colossus, though. It's not good for me. I'm trying to get the Time Attack items at the moment, but killing the colossi is more harrowing every time I attempt it. The fight with the thirteenth is my favourite, in terms of both visuals and gameplay, but my enjoyment is somewhat hampered by the fact that it is also the fight that makes me feel most guilty. It is so pretty and graceful and doesn't even try to attack you! Shadow of the Colossus is making me hate myself.
It's actually making me feel guilty for my actions in other games as well. In videogames, I am used to 'Here are your enemies; they are evil, or at best mindlessly vicious. Kill them to save the world.' In Shadow of the Colossus, it's more 'Here are your enemies; they are unique and beautiful and, given the emptiness of this land, probably not hurting anyone. Some of them don't even want to attack you. Kill them for, essentially, personal gain.' And now I am questioning my true motives in other games. I WASN'T KILLING ALL THOSE SOLDIERS IN FINAL FANTASY XII TO SAVE THE WORLD; I JUST WANTED THE ITEMS FROM CHAINING.
Last night, I half-watched quite a lot of Peep Show, then fell asleep and dreamt that Mark and Jeremy (Usborne, not Clarkson) were snogging on a bed whilst Mark internally freaked out.
Not that I am complaining about such a dream, but now I have a bizarre urge to write Mark/Jeremy fanfiction. This is a bad idea for many reasons. My writing and Peep Show have entirely incompatible styles of humour! I'm not sure Peep Show even has a fandom!
I miss writing for it, actually. I haven't written Top Gear fanfiction for about two years, but the trio really were a delight to write for. I just don't know whether I'd be able to fall back into their voices after such a long period away from them. Also, very few of those of you I first met in the Top Gear fandom are still active there; it is now full of strangers, which is a bit scary. I do occasionally yearn for the days when the Top Gear fandom was ridiculously close-knit and we all met up to be dorks in West London.
Jeremy Clarkson is one of my favourite characters ever. He is such fun to write and watch! He is an amazing, ridiculous lunatic who will strap an enormous engine to a pickup truck and drive it across the English Channel, who is incapable of venturing near anything remotely flammable without somehow setting it alight, and the fact that he is a real person (even if he is putting on a bit of a persona) just makes it so much better.
(And more terrifying, admittedly.)
With particular reference to yesterday's Bolivia specia: my goodness, that trio are dedicated. I am awed. The number of times they nearly got themselves killed in the name of making good television: ridiculous. The oxygen-deprivation and parts of the Road of Death were actually painful to watch.
More musing on Shadow of the Colossus: how many videogames are there in which the fact that the hero becomes stronger with every enemy he kills is a plot point?
I love it when videogame stories do things that wouldn't work in any other medium.
I really need to stop playing Shadow of the Colossus, though. It's not good for me. I'm trying to get the Time Attack items at the moment, but killing the colossi is more harrowing every time I attempt it. The fight with the thirteenth is my favourite, in terms of both visuals and gameplay, but my enjoyment is somewhat hampered by the fact that it is also the fight that makes me feel most guilty. It is so pretty and graceful and doesn't even try to attack you! Shadow of the Colossus is making me hate myself.
It's actually making me feel guilty for my actions in other games as well. In videogames, I am used to 'Here are your enemies; they are evil, or at best mindlessly vicious. Kill them to save the world.' In Shadow of the Colossus, it's more 'Here are your enemies; they are unique and beautiful and, given the emptiness of this land, probably not hurting anyone. Some of them don't even want to attack you. Kill them for, essentially, personal gain.' And now I am questioning my true motives in other games. I WASN'T KILLING ALL THOSE SOLDIERS IN FINAL FANTASY XII TO SAVE THE WORLD; I JUST WANTED THE ITEMS FROM CHAINING.
Last night, I half-watched quite a lot of Peep Show, then fell asleep and dreamt that Mark and Jeremy (Usborne, not Clarkson) were snogging on a bed whilst Mark internally freaked out.
Not that I am complaining about such a dream, but now I have a bizarre urge to write Mark/Jeremy fanfiction. This is a bad idea for many reasons. My writing and Peep Show have entirely incompatible styles of humour! I'm not sure Peep Show even has a fandom!
