Another cracking episode on Saturday night.

Its always nice to see a returning New Series monster as well (although to call the Ood monsters is perhaps a bit unfair).  There’s a general reliance on classic series monsters to provide a big punch for a season (you can’t beat the Daleks or Cybermen turning up), but its nice to see the new series developing its own classic monsters.  I was really pleased when the Slitheen turned up in Sarah Jane Adventures for example.  While I maybe thought the comedic aspects of them had been (very) overplayed in the Aliens of London 2-parter, there was still no doubt that they’d really resonated with the kids.  I’d like to see us get to the point where a Doctor Who season finale can have a shock reveal of a returning new series monster, and it to be as big a shock as the return of the Daleks or the Master.

The one thing that’s really striking me so far about this season, is the amount of fore-shadowing going on.  Every episode so far has had at least one big moment hinting at big things to come.

Its interesting, as this kind of thing has always been a bit more subtle in past seasons, or at least not as prolific.  For example, the Harold Saxon arc of season 3 only appeared in some of the episodes, or back in season 1, it was easy to miss the Bad Wolf mentions if you weren’t watching for them.

It does add to the feeling that this season’s building up to something epic in its finale.

Star Wars Galaxies has long been a subject of scorn in the MMO world.  It promised a lot from the initial previews, but they never seemed to get the balance right, and subsequently have been continually tweaking the game, sometimes quite drastically to the cause of much controversy in the player base.

I’ve dipped in and out of the game over the last couple of years, although previously never played it for more than a day or two.  First time I played, I kept getting slaughtered by either overly-high level monsters, or over-zealous 14 year olds.

The second time I played was a year or so later.  The intro to the game had been substantially refined to introduce you to the game world more appropriately, however by starting everyone in Mos Eisley I found the lag in the game unbearable.

However, over Christmas I decided to give the game another try.  This was my first time playing since their most major revamp of the game (which caused a lot of controversy due to them radically changing the classes for characters).   Of course, I couldn’t resist going a Jedi.

Well, despite the flack the game gets, I’m loving it.   I’m still very much a casual MMO player, dipping in now and then.  I tend to solo a lot, but its good fun.  My Jedi is now level 47 or so, and has a selection of ships at his disposal, and a house on Tatooine for my stuff.

One change I really loved, was moving the spaceship expansion (Jump to Lightspeed) into the main game.  You get a basic fighter easily, and can use it to get from planet to planet without having to pay for flights.   A nice tool for those that like sight-seeing.   Even better, due to my having had an account for a couple of years, I was awarded a Sorosuub Personal Yacht.  A non-combat craft, that you can use to travel around, but also as a handy role-playing tool.   You and your friends can all travel in the craft, which gives you a nice instanced area for a quiet natter, or arguing over who’s going to drive.

If nothing else, its made me appreciate that the full multiplayer ships from later in the game, which can have one player flying, while others man gun turrets, must be a lot of fun.

Here’s some videos from in game.  There’s a  couple of clips showcasing the Sorosuub Yacht and my Tatooine house (plus a glimpse at using a Swoop Bike to get around), and a shot of my Jedi in combat versus a giant spider (you can’t get much more Sci-Fi than that )

Well, one of the early announcements at the NYCC was that Power Girl is finally getting her own ongoing series and it features Amanda Connor doing the artwork.

Brilliant. Sign me up. PG getting her own monthly has been coming a long time, and I love Amanda Connor’s artwork in both the JSA Classified story, and in the Green Arrow/Black Canary wedding comic (although I wasn’t a big fan of the story).

The really interesting thing is that the title will apparently be using events from the upcoming “Welcome to Earth-2″ annual as a springboard. Does this hint at the series being set on Earth-2, or just the her experiences there force Power Girl to take a fresh look at her life?

TrustedReviews.com have the first review of the new Asus EeePC 900 up here. In a nutshell, they love it.

While the price has been pushed up quite a bit by the improvements, there’s no doubt that you’re getting your money’s worth here. And its great to see a manufacturer actually passing on the savings made by not installing Windows. It’ll be very interesting to see how the sales of the two models compare. While I can see a lot of people being swayed by the familiar OS, there’s no doubt in my mind that the Linux model, with its 20Gb storage will be the superior model to own.

How did I miss this news? Bioware announced a couple of months back that contrary to their previous “No PC version” statements they’re releasing Mass Effect for the PC.

Its getting a June release here, and from the sounds of things on the Bioware forums and podcasts they’re taking it seriously. Its not going to be a straight port, instead they’re re-jigging some aspects of the game to better suit the PC market.

I’m a sucker for Bioware RPGs, and I’ve been wanting to play this since it came out for the 360. I’ve got my copy pre-ordered

Well, the clip I was working on didn’t quite work out.  I may go back to it and try and get it how I want, but in the meantime I’ve put two separate tribute videos up on Youtube.

The first is the one shown here earlier, only with the Harriet Jones voiceover removed (as it had been intended as part of the bridge between the two tributes).

The second is the rough cut of the classic series tribute I’d thrown together to see if it was going to work or not.

I’ve been working on this for the last week or so.    Its the second part to the new Doctor Who music video I’m working on, but I thought it stood pretty well on its own.   The intro might seem a bit odd by itself, but hopefully it’ll make more sense once I do the first (more complicated) half to the video.

Here’s a sneak peak anyway.  Hopefully I’ll get the first part done over the course of this week, but incase I don’t I thought I’d share this

Well, we’re just over the halfway mark now in Transformers: Animated.

This is easily the best show since Robots in Disguise. While I enjoyed Cybertron, Armada was quite painful for most of its run (surprisingly since the plot was actually good - just badly executed with really annoying kid sidekicks) and Energon I just got bored of and stopped watching by the halfway mark.

However Transformers Animated has a good balance between humour and action. They’ve changed things around in a way that’s probably not been done since Beast Wars, with Optimus Prime being much younger and an academy washout, now running a simple repair team who happen to find the Allspark while on a routine maintenance mission. Its not long before the Decepticons (who haven’t been seem in generations) turn up and attack them, forcing them to crashland on Earth.

This show did two key things which make it a great draw I think. The first was to muck things about. We have a Prime who’s young and not the best commander in the world. The Autobots on Cybertron being run by Ultra Magnus in this continuity (yes!).

The second was to make the Decepticons much more of a threat than they’ve been in years. In this show, we’ve got an unexperienced maintenance team of Autobots. So if even one Decepticon turns up, then they’ll be fought to a standstill. There’s a real sense of them being out of their depth when 2 turn up together, and when Megatron is finally reactivated you know they’re in big trouble. Its a big difference to the classic days when Megatron’s favourite battlecry was “Retreat!”

On a personal note as well, as a UK G1 comics fan, I’ve always loved Ultra Magnus. He was the first “big” Transformer I got as a kid, and as such I’ve always had a soft spot for him. So it was a bit dissappointing to see the character be so ridiculed in the US fandom (which I guess is understandable, as they didn’t get the ongoing Magnus/Galvatron grudge match we did). I loved it when the character was resurrected for Robots in Disguise and thought it was a great updating. However since then, he’s been relegated to being a white Prime repaint in just about every line, and he’s certainly not been a character in the show.

So having him not only back, but now the wise, leader of the Autobots is brilliant. Its another very different interpretation of the character but I love it none-the-less. And he’s got a whacking great hammer. Which he controls thunder and lightning with.

He’s the Autobot Thor! Brilliant!

Annoyingly the toys still aren’t out. There’s a good few must-buys for me from this line. Sadly part-and-parcel of getting sucked into the cartoon is that now I want loads of the toys. I’m going to be skint

Well, that was a cracking episode.

Between Voyage of the Damned, and now this episode, the production team have really raised their game in terms of just how epic, and cinematic Doctor Who can look. The eruption of Vesuvius was fantastically well realised.

Of course, all that’s only part of the story. James Moran’s script was brilliant. I always feel Doctor Who is at its strongest when it showcases the Doctor’s dilemma with what he knows should happen. It goes right back to Genesis of the Daleks when he is forced to examine the consequences of committing genocide against the Daleks, and here we have him agonising over his choice to destroy Pompeii and kill all its people. There was a nice parallel to Gallifrey’s destruction as well, which I hadn’t even considered.

There was some nice foreshadowing as well. “She is returning” is surely a reference to Rose, and there seems to be a few running themes this year, with another lost planet. It certainly gives off the impression that this whole season is building to something big.

Great production design, fantastic script, and cracking performances. And next week the return of the Ood. Season 4’s off to a great start

I’ve been searching for this for a while.  What do you get, if you cross Doctor Who, Star Wars, Flash Gordon, Star Trek…and Top Gear?