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Storytellers Unplugged for October
Oct. 7th, 2010 02:02 pm"The Wonderfulness of ...," about I Spy and The Man from U.N.C.L.E., is up. We shall celebrate with my favorite MfU icon.
TIME: 50 min.
DISTANCE: 6 mi.
TOTAL DISTANCE: 162.4 mi.
DISTRACTION: "The Neptune Affair."
NOTES: Not in the mood for eight-year-old Kurt Russell tonight.
SHIRE RECKONING: In another 0.6 mi we will camp in the eastern Chetwood, and three miles after that we will get out of the forest. About damn time says I.
DISTANCE: 6 mi.
TOTAL DISTANCE: 162.4 mi.
DISTRACTION: "The Neptune Affair."
NOTES: Not in the mood for eight-year-old Kurt Russell tonight.
SHIRE RECKONING: In another 0.6 mi we will camp in the eastern Chetwood, and three miles after that we will get out of the forest. About damn time says I.
TIME: 49 min.
DISTANCE: 6 mi.
TOTAL DISTANCE: 156.4 mi.
DISTRACTION: "The Project Strigas Affair"
NOTES: Leonard Nimoy at 33 with a comic-opera Ruritanian accent is love.
SHIRE RECKONING: This damnable forest will never end.
I love this episode, and the least of my love, really, is for Nimoy (and Shatner) in pre Star Trek glory. I love the intricacies of bluff and double bluff; I love the dialogue; I love the interrogation scene and the moment when Leo G. Carroll lets the steel shine through. "You're our animal now." I love the energy that all of them, Vaughn and McCallum and Shatner and Nimoy, bring to the screen. And I love the fact that Our Heroes' ethics are ever so slightly dubious--I don't think it's an accident that Machiavelli gets invoked.
DISTANCE: 6 mi.
TOTAL DISTANCE: 156.4 mi.
DISTRACTION: "The Project Strigas Affair"
NOTES: Leonard Nimoy at 33 with a comic-opera Ruritanian accent is love.
SHIRE RECKONING: This damnable forest will never end.
I love this episode, and the least of my love, really, is for Nimoy (and Shatner) in pre Star Trek glory. I love the intricacies of bluff and double bluff; I love the dialogue; I love the interrogation scene and the moment when Leo G. Carroll lets the steel shine through. "You're our animal now." I love the energy that all of them, Vaughn and McCallum and Shatner and Nimoy, bring to the screen. And I love the fact that Our Heroes' ethics are ever so slightly dubious--I don't think it's an accident that Machiavelli gets invoked.
TIME: 50 min.
DISTANCE: 6 mi.
TOTAL DISTANCE: 150.4 mi.
DISTRACTION: "The Double Affair"
NOTES: Illya menaced by toy robots! FTW!
SHIRE RECKONING: Still in the Chetwood. If Pippin sings one more round of "Eleventy-one bottles of beer on the wall," I'm going to stuff him in a sack.
The kindest thing one can say about the plot is that at least the TSTL is evenly divided between UNCLE and THRUSH. And the '60s As You Know Bob Handwavium has a kind of kitschy retro charm. (Apparently the gamma rays understand that it's not fair to aim for the head. Or the hands. You wear your goggles (Because if you look at them, they hypnotize you, like a cobra. Or a dragon.) and your cute white coverall, and you're fine!)
On the other hand, I really do admire Robert Vaughn's acting. You never have any difficulty telling the real Napoleon from the fake; it's partly body language and Napoleon's INCREDIBLY LIMP WRISTS (which he also totally uses to make the guards underestimate him), and it's partly that the fake Napoleon never smiles. He shares not one particle of Napoleon's joie de vivre. And I especially love the very subtle bit at the end, where the real Napoleon is trying to fake out his airline stewardess by pretending, just for a moment, to be the fake Napoleon, and he can't maintain it because he can't keep his dimples down.
[ETA: Also, the fake Napoleon doesn't kiss back.]
And, in our continuing series, BDSM Subtext in MfU Rapidly Becoming Text: only Napoleon Solo would EVER be chained face down on a cot by his captors so that a strapping Valkyrie could GIVE HIM A MASSAGE.
DISTANCE: 6 mi.
TOTAL DISTANCE: 150.4 mi.
DISTRACTION: "The Double Affair"
NOTES: Illya menaced by toy robots! FTW!
SHIRE RECKONING: Still in the Chetwood. If Pippin sings one more round of "Eleventy-one bottles of beer on the wall," I'm going to stuff him in a sack.
The kindest thing one can say about the plot is that at least the TSTL is evenly divided between UNCLE and THRUSH. And the '60s As You Know Bob Handwavium has a kind of kitschy retro charm. (Apparently the gamma rays understand that it's not fair to aim for the head. Or the hands. You wear your goggles (Because if you look at them, they hypnotize you, like a cobra. Or a dragon.) and your cute white coverall, and you're fine!)
On the other hand, I really do admire Robert Vaughn's acting. You never have any difficulty telling the real Napoleon from the fake; it's partly body language and Napoleon's INCREDIBLY LIMP WRISTS (which he also totally uses to make the guards underestimate him), and it's partly that the fake Napoleon never smiles. He shares not one particle of Napoleon's joie de vivre. And I especially love the very subtle bit at the end, where the real Napoleon is trying to fake out his airline stewardess by pretending, just for a moment, to be the fake Napoleon, and he can't maintain it because he can't keep his dimples down.
[ETA: Also, the fake Napoleon doesn't kiss back.]
And, in our continuing series, BDSM Subtext in MfU Rapidly Becoming Text: only Napoleon Solo would EVER be chained face down on a cot by his captors so that a strapping Valkyrie could GIVE HIM A MASSAGE.
TIME: 25 min.
DISTANCE: 3 mi.
TOTAL DISTANCE: 144.4 mi.
DISTRACTION: 2nd half of "The Giuco Piano Affair" (this time I checked the spelling, but it still looks wrong)
NOTES: Napoleon always, always kisses back. Even when he shouldn't.
SHIRE RECKONING: Still in Chetwood.
What I like about this episode--as opposed to the things that pain me--is the fact that the villains, Gervaise Ravel and Harold Bufferton, are genuinely in love with each other. And not in the scenery chewing, "Darling, I love you when you're evil" way that one might expect. Bufferton's love for Gervaise is cynical and clear-eyed and self-sacrificing, and her love for him doesn't change the fact that she's ruthless, power-hungry, and amoral. It's oddly beautiful, and it's not even the point of the episode. It's just there.
DISTANCE: 3 mi.
TOTAL DISTANCE: 144.4 mi.
DISTRACTION: 2nd half of "The Giuco Piano Affair" (this time I checked the spelling, but it still looks wrong)
NOTES: Napoleon always, always kisses back. Even when he shouldn't.
SHIRE RECKONING: Still in Chetwood.
What I like about this episode--as opposed to the things that pain me--is the fact that the villains, Gervaise Ravel and Harold Bufferton, are genuinely in love with each other. And not in the scenery chewing, "Darling, I love you when you're evil" way that one might expect. Bufferton's love for Gervaise is cynical and clear-eyed and self-sacrificing, and her love for him doesn't change the fact that she's ruthless, power-hungry, and amoral. It's oddly beautiful, and it's not even the point of the episode. It's just there.
TIME: 50 min.
DISTANCE: 6.0 mi.
TOTAL DISTANCE: 132.4 mi.
DISTRACTION: "The Green Opal Affair"
NOTES: I love how Illya apparently waited three nanoseconds after Mr. Waverly left the office to set up his samurai spinny-thing in the briefing-room-cum-agents'-lounge.
SHIRE-RECKONING: Tom has left us and Strider is hiding from us. What, is our breath bad?
What I love most about this episode is the way it savages the hell out of Chris Brinel's "I'm just a housewife" defense. No, sweetie, you can't hide behind that. THRUSH sees right through you.
DISTANCE: 6.0 mi.
TOTAL DISTANCE: 132.4 mi.
DISTRACTION: "The Green Opal Affair"
NOTES: I love how Illya apparently waited three nanoseconds after Mr. Waverly left the office to set up his samurai spinny-thing in the briefing-room-cum-agents'-lounge.
SHIRE-RECKONING: Tom has left us and Strider is hiding from us. What, is our breath bad?
What I love most about this episode is the way it savages the hell out of Chris Brinel's "I'm just a housewife" defense. No, sweetie, you can't hide behind that. THRUSH sees right through you.
TIME: 53 min.
DISTANCE: 6.2 mi.
TOTAL DISTANCE: 116.1 mi.
DISTRACTION: "The Shark Affair"
NOTES: Both Robert Culp and Robert Vaughn wear pinkie rings. Is there some deeper meaning here?
SHIRE-RECKONING: We have been captured by and rescued from barrow-wights. Onward!
Oh, Man from U.N.C.L.E. and your BDSM subtext. First episode has Napoleon manacled, second episode has Napoleon bound, nothing much in the third episode beyond the obvious fact that Gervaise Ravel is a domme, and then in the fourth episode Napoleon is flogged. As "discipline."
ETA: You know, rescued by barrow-wights would be awesome. Somebody should write that.
DISTANCE: 6.2 mi.
TOTAL DISTANCE: 116.1 mi.
DISTRACTION: "The Shark Affair"
NOTES: Both Robert Culp and Robert Vaughn wear pinkie rings. Is there some deeper meaning here?
SHIRE-RECKONING: We have been captured by and rescued from barrow-wights. Onward!
Oh, Man from U.N.C.L.E. and your BDSM subtext. First episode has Napoleon manacled, second episode has Napoleon bound, nothing much in the third episode beyond the obvious fact that Gervaise Ravel is a domme, and then in the fourth episode Napoleon is flogged. As "discipline."
ETA: You know, rescued by barrow-wights would be awesome. Somebody should write that.
TIME: 50 min.
DISTANCE: 6 mi.
TOTAL DISTANCE: 109.9 mi.
DISTRACTION: "The Quadripartite Affair" (MfU 1.3)
NOTES: Is it just me, or does everyone want to drown Jill Ireland in a bucket?
SHIRE-RECKONING: still lost in the Barrow-downs
A question for those familiar with the history and geography of New York: in 1964, when the Man from U.N.C.L.E. intro says that the tailor shop entrance to HQS is in the east Forties, what is that signaling, if anything, about the neighborhood?
DISTANCE: 6 mi.
TOTAL DISTANCE: 109.9 mi.
DISTRACTION: "The Quadripartite Affair" (MfU 1.3)
NOTES: Is it just me, or does everyone want to drown Jill Ireland in a bucket?
SHIRE-RECKONING: still lost in the Barrow-downs
A question for those familiar with the history and geography of New York: in 1964, when the Man from U.N.C.L.E. intro says that the tailor shop entrance to HQS is in the east Forties, what is that signaling, if anything, about the neighborhood?
TIME: 50 min.
DISTANCE: 5.5 mi.
TOTAL DISTANCE: 100.9 mi. (w00t!)
DISTRACTION: "The Iowa-Scuba Affair" (MfU 1.2)
NOTES: I covet Napoleon's bathrobe.
SHIRE-RECKONING: Heading from Tom Bombadil's house toward the Barrow-downs.
Although it suffers from a sad dearth of Illya, this episode does have one of my very favorite exchanges between Waverly and Napoleon:
WAVERLY: And definitely dead.
NAPOLEON: Oh, very dead. It was a matter of his life or mine, and I chose his.
WAVERLY: Unfortunate. . . . Unfortunate and incredible that he should recognize you. I always thought you had a very common face.
DISTANCE: 5.5 mi.
TOTAL DISTANCE: 100.9 mi. (w00t!)
DISTRACTION: "The Iowa-Scuba Affair" (MfU 1.2)
NOTES: I covet Napoleon's bathrobe.
SHIRE-RECKONING: Heading from Tom Bombadil's house toward the Barrow-downs.
Although it suffers from a sad dearth of Illya, this episode does have one of my very favorite exchanges between Waverly and Napoleon:
WAVERLY: And definitely dead.
NAPOLEON: Oh, very dead. It was a matter of his life or mine, and I chose his.
WAVERLY: Unfortunate. . . . Unfortunate and incredible that he should recognize you. I always thought you had a very common face.
TIME: 50 min.
DISTANCE: 5.5 mi.
TOTAL DISTANCE: 95.4 mi.
DISTRACTION: "The Vulcan Affair" (The Man from U.N.C.L.E. 1.1)
NOTES: Napoleon Solo runs like a girl.
SHIRE-RECKONING: Old Man Willow! AIEEEEEEE!!!
Although I love all four seasons of The Man from U.N.C.L.E., I have to admit the first season episodes, with their moody noir atmosphere, beautiful B&W cinematography, and delicate moral ambiguity, are the ones I admire most. And I love this episode, in 1964, for letting the housewife rescue the spy.
DISTANCE: 5.5 mi.
TOTAL DISTANCE: 95.4 mi.
DISTRACTION: "The Vulcan Affair" (The Man from U.N.C.L.E. 1.1)
NOTES: Napoleon Solo runs like a girl.
SHIRE-RECKONING: Old Man Willow! AIEEEEEEE!!!
Although I love all four seasons of The Man from U.N.C.L.E., I have to admit the first season episodes, with their moody noir atmosphere, beautiful B&W cinematography, and delicate moral ambiguity, are the ones I admire most. And I love this episode, in 1964, for letting the housewife rescue the spy.
