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Post by themeddlingmonk on Jul 31, 2020 14:43:19 GMT
I’m pretty sure that the actor playing Calypso is half Asian, which would indeed make them mixed race.
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Post by johnhurtdoctor on Jul 31, 2020 15:00:15 GMT
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Post by aussiedoctorwhofan on Jul 31, 2020 22:12:47 GMT
My background is 100% European, technically I am 1st generation (along with my brother/sister/cousins)born in Australia. interesting..
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Post by J.A. Prentice on Jul 31, 2020 23:31:35 GMT
The profile also seems to misgender them, unless I'm missing something, so I don't know if I'd trust it. |
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Post by Deleted on Jul 31, 2020 23:38:00 GMT
I though The Lovecraft Invasion was okay, I didn't think it was anything spectacular though, but I found it an enjoyable enough adventure for the Sixth Doctor, Constance, Flip and the new addition Calypso. Funnily enough, I never really thought much of H.P. Lovecraft's work anyway, even though generally I can separate the art from the artist. But I would never have expected Big Finish to condone Lovecraft's xenophobia, so ol' Sixie was always going to express his displeasure at Lovecraft's abhorrent views in this story, even if they did decide to tack some even stronger condemnations on. Personally I'm glad they did, as actions speak louder than words, so adding those extra lines in to the story is way more meaningful to me than Big Finish just parroting phrases on social media or posting black squares. In this story they have tackled the issue of racism head on and made it very clear that The Doctor is 100% against racist views and hatred, as we all know he should be. (Strangely enough, the Sixth Doctor seems the perfect Doctor to be so blunt. I couldn't imagine any other Doctor being so assertive in his condemnation of Lovecraft's bigotry, so it's just as well that this was a Sixth Doctor story, as it works!)
The story itself was a trip through the weird mind and creations of H.P. Lovecraft and it did have some fun moments. Calypso was a nice addition to the team as the no-nonsense bounty hunter that takes no shit from Lovecraft ... and has no problem pointing out his hypocrisy to him, as well as delivering him a right-hander for his racist abuse! (I wonder what Calypso will make of Daleks!!!) The Lovecraft Invasion might only be remembered for the subject matter but it's still okay as far as Doctor Who stories go. Maybe if I was a fan of H.P. Lovecraft's writings and Cthulhu mythos I might have enjoyed the story a bit more, but it just never appealed to me. I gave this story a 3/5 in the poll but it is Doctor Who how it should be; with the Doctor speaking out against evil, helping people and righting wrongs... in The Lovecraft Invasion he most certainly does that!
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Post by theillusiveman on Aug 1, 2020 2:33:47 GMT
Calypso describes themself as mixed race but the actor playing them is white! what seems to be the problem? there are heaps of Voice Actors and Actresses who voice people of different races for example Kimberly Brookes an African American voice actress has voiced plenty of White characters in her career for over 25 years
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Post by Sir Wearer of Hats on Aug 1, 2020 7:31:11 GMT
Calypso Jones feels awfully River Song-y as a character.
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Post by TinDogPodcast on Aug 1, 2020 7:38:23 GMT
Is the podcast still available which featured the 15 minute tease? Yes |
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Post by TinDogPodcast on Aug 1, 2020 7:40:33 GMT
Podcast review recorded. Will post links asap
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Post by TinDogPodcast on Aug 1, 2020 7:41:03 GMT
Calypso Jones feels awfully River Song-y as a character. I saw her a a variant of capt jack |
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Post by tuigirl on Aug 1, 2020 10:03:06 GMT
I finished it yesterday.
Hmm.
Well, overall, it is a good average story. The plot did not really do a lot for me. I thought a straight up confrontation with Lovecraft would have been better, without all that battle in the mind and using a literal alter ego as a more heroic proxy.
IMO that was a bit clumsy- I suspect it was done so that Lovecraft does not become centre stage in this play.
So what they do instead, they just show Lovecraft as a pathetic little person all the main characters look down upon.
And the Doctors words concerning him.... were a bit on the nose.
I am aware of the issues and these words may or may not have been added during the month this was delayed.
But to me, the whole thing just comes across as clumsy.
Now for the positives-
since I have listened to the (German) audio plays on Lovecraft's stories (I did not read any of the actual books myself and am not particularly interested), I was surprised how much this helped in following the story. I am not sure how much someone who does not know any of the Lovecraft mythology would be able to follow who all the creatures and characters are, but if you have a little knowledge, this becomes quite an imaginative setting.
I think all the mythology elements are used well, at least as best as they could in the frame they used.
And of course the performances of the leads were great. I have come to really looking forward to new stories with Sixie.
So, this release is not as good as the previous 2 in the trilogy and a bit of a mixed bag for me.
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Post by IndieMacUser on Aug 1, 2020 11:33:34 GMT
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Post by fitzoliverj on Aug 1, 2020 13:49:10 GMT
So far as I can make out, the word "Caucasian" meaning "white" is an Americanism and something of a misnomer. It appears to be a corruption or development of 'Caucasoid', a term used in a (now-defunct) categorisation of humans into different races. Caucasoids, meaning people who look roughly like the population of the Caucasus, were considered to be Europeans and North Africans and Western Asians and Southern Asians (essentially, white and brown people). |
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Post by Deleted on Aug 1, 2020 14:19:02 GMT
I've been bleating for years about how wonderful it would be if the stories of HP Lovecraft got the Big Finish treatment. Sad but understandable to think the personal views and politics of the man himself probably put the kibosh on this. As Old Sixie laments, it's sobering to learn of the prejudices expressed by the writer long after you've fallen in love with his work. To that end, I commend Big Finish and Robert Valentine for tackling such a thorny and uncomfortable issue.
As the TV show Rosa demonstrated, trying to address racism by making it a trait of 'this week's villain' can have mixed results. Some commend the story for having the guts to do this, others accuse the show of trivialising the issue. The Lovecraft Invasion attempts to balance things out and is partially successful - as tuigirl mentioned earlier in this thread, some of it, particularly portions of The Doctor's dialogue, come across as slightly clumsy. To hear him address racism so blatantly is strange to hear - and yet why should it be? He's been fluid enough in the past remonstrating with other crimes, prejudices and villainies. Perhaps because the subject of racism is so real to us, and currently so relevant, it's like he's addressing what we see see in the news to this day. Slightly odd and blunt to hear, but necessary in encountering such an issue within the confines of a four-part audio sci-fi adventure.
The character of Calypso, from many years in Lovecraft's future, tears him off several strips before proclaiming to be everything he hates. After securing his help, Calypso then refers to him as 'the chin' and 'string-bean.' Calypso is allowed to tell Lovecraft where he's going wrong, several years in the character's past, but doesn't mind making fun of his physical appearance. Capable and formidable as a fictional character, Calypso is almost entirely functional: there to tell Lovecraft where he's going wrong from a standpoint not afforded the Doctor or his travelling companions. As a person, I found the character pretty unlikable.
The story is good. The Doctor reeling off names of various HPL monsters and stories invites comparisons with a trip into The Land of Fiction, which is no bad thing. Andy Hardwick adds a few strings and tweaks (possibly courtesy of Peter Doggart) to his usual score, whereas the sound design is as usual, impressively cinematic especially toward the latter moments.
There are moments of Valentine's story that are beautifully self-indulgent, and the (fictional) monsters are well realised. I don't like that Lovecraft is treated with contempt by many around him, and sadder still that his personal views provoke such contempt. To give weight to the others' condemnation of him, he's also a scaredy-cat. He gets a good dressing down from The Doctor, in the incarnation who once tried to kill his travelling companion and has some pretty questionable characteristics himself, a superiority complex (something he shares with Lovecraft) among them.
Edit: In fact, thinking about it - and it is good to have a story that makes you think - the bombastic Sixth Doctor telling a dying Lovecraft how much better he is than Lovecraft doesn't paint the Time Lord in a particularly good light. Judgemental, yes, kind, no.
This has been an interesting experiment in a story that doesn't attempt to 'fix' these issues but confronts them nonetheless - I wouldn't have missed it.
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Post by mrperson on Aug 1, 2020 21:31:42 GMT
It was allright, but some of the extended (was this the added) dialogue about how bad racism is was a bit over the top for me and/or "clumsy" as is said above. I know social issues have always been explored in sci-fi and Who, but I much prefer the way episodes like The Peterloo Massacre handles it: show it in action rather than present it almost as a lecture. So for example, I could have dropped the extended Six-flip discussion of it and about not being able to separate an artist from their work, but kept things like the verbal take-down of HPL by Six at the end. The former feels like I'm being lectured (especially when I don't need to be) while the latter has a more natural feel to it in the same way that 5's dialogue in The Peterloo Massacre feels natural. Relatedly, in many cases I can separate an author from his work. Such as with Hemmingway. He had any number of faults, but I can compartmentalize. I can appreciate For Whom The Bell Tolls for what it is even knowing about how he wrote the Robert Cohn character in The Sun Also Rises. Similarly, if it were announced that J.R.R. Tolkien was a huge anti-semite, I, a Jewish person, would still be rereading LOTR every several years. To completely write an artist off because of some personal fault seems like cutting off my nose to spite someone else's face. Of course, this is all rather subjective. I would not want to listen to a Louis C.K. routine with pervy sex-related jokes because, um, yeah that.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 1, 2020 21:51:39 GMT
It was allright, but some of the extended (was this the added) dialogue about how bad racism is was a bit over the top for me and/or "clumsy" as is said above. I know social issues have always been explored in sci-fi and Who, but I much prefer the way episodes like The Peterloo Massacre handles it: show it in action rather than present it almost as a lecture. So for example, I could have dropped the extended Six-flip discussion of it and about not being able to separate an artist from their work, but kept things like the verbal take-down of HPL by Six at the end. The former feels like I'm being lectured (especially when I don't need to be) while the latter has a more natural feel to it in the same way that 5's dialogue in The Peterloo Massacre feels natural. Relatedly, in many cases I can separate an author from his work. Such as with Hemmingway. He had any number of faults, but I can compartmentalize. I can appreciate For Whom The Bell Tolls for what it is even knowing about how he wrote the Robert Cohn character in The Sun Also Rises. Similarly, if it were announced that J.R.R. Tolkien was a huge anti-semite, I, a Jewish person, would still be rereading LOTR every several years. To completely write an artist off because of some personal fault seems like cutting off my nose to spite someone else's face. Of course, this is all rather subjective. I would not want to listen to a Louis C.K. routine with pervy sex-related jokes because, um, yeah that.
It's a real problem, isn't it? I have always been a massive fan of Lovecraft, but now more than ever his indefensible views threaten to define him. I hope that never happens. Funnily enough, although I agree with your post, I would swap your dislike for the Six/Flip discussion (which I didn't mind), for his tirade against Lovecraft at the end. The Doctor has never been this hostile towards Davros (for example), who has destroyed worlds, so to hear him rather pompously berate Lovecraft, whom the Doctor knew was terminally ill, felt massively unfair to me - especially as all he had done was (equally pompously) invited him for tea! It just seemed to me that we were being force-fed the message c/o The Doctor, just in case we hadn't got it by this time,that racism is bad. |
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Post by Audio Watchdog on Aug 1, 2020 23:00:09 GMT
It was allright, but some of the extended (was this the added) dialogue about how bad racism is was a bit over the top for me and/or "clumsy" as is said above. I know social issues have always been explored in sci-fi and Who, but I much prefer the way episodes like The Peterloo Massacre handles it: show it in action rather than present it almost as a lecture. So for example, I could have dropped the extended Six-flip discussion of it and about not being able to separate an artist from their work, but kept things like the verbal take-down of HPL by Six at the end. The former feels like I'm being lectured (especially when I don't need to be) while the latter has a more natural feel to it in the same way that 5's dialogue in The Peterloo Massacre feels natural. Relatedly, in many cases I can separate an author from his work. Such as with Hemmingway. He had any number of faults, but I can compartmentalize. I can appreciate For Whom The Bell Tolls for what it is even knowing about how he wrote the Robert Cohn character in The Sun Also Rises. Similarly, if it were announced that J.R.R. Tolkien was a huge anti-semite, I, a Jewish person, would still be rereading LOTR every several years. To completely write an artist off because of some personal fault seems like cutting off my nose to spite someone else's face. Of course, this is all rather subjective. I would not want to listen to a Louis C.K. routine with pervy sex-related jokes because, um, yeah that.
It's a real problem, isn't it? I have always been a massive fan of Lovecraft, but now more than ever his indefensible views threaten to define him. I hope that never happens. Funnily enough, although I agree with your post, I would swap your dislike for the Six/Flip discussion (which I didn't mind), for his tirade against Lovecraft at the end. The Doctor has never been this hostile towards Davros (for example), who has destroyed worlds, so to hear him rather pompously berate Lovecraft, whom the Doctor knew was terminally ill, felt massively unfair to me - especially as all he had done was (equally pompously) invited him for tea! It just seemed to me that we were being force-fed the message c/o The Doctor, just in case we hadn't got it by this time,that racism is bad. I agree in large part with this. When making points I'm always going to favor being cut by a scalpel rather than being hit over the head with a hammer. |
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Post by BHTvsTFC on Aug 2, 2020 0:03:59 GMT
The story itself was a trip through the weird mind and creations of H.P. Lovecraft and it did have some fun moments. Calypso was a nice addition to the team as the no-nonsense bounty hunter that takes no shit from Lovecraft ... and has no problem pointing out his hypocrisy to him, as well as delivering him a right-hander for his racist abuse! (I wonder what Calypso will make of Daleks!!!) The Lovecraft Invasion might only be remembered for the subject matter but it's still okay as far as Doctor Who stories go. Maybe if I was a fan of H.P. Lovecraft's writings and Cthulhu mythos I might have enjoyed the story a bit more, but it just never appealed to me. I gave this story a 3/5 in the poll but it is Doctor Who how it should be; with the Doctor speaking out against evil, helping people and righting wrongs... in The Lovecraft Invasion he most certainly does that!
I thought Calypso was a bit of a over confident, self assured dick to be honest, making the character almost on the same level as Lovecraft, but the redemption at the end of the story is what defined the character. The adventure altered their world view, which is what made the character, and which often happens to companions who travel with the Doctor. Again, I do agree with this, especially having just listened to the First Doctor audio with the Romanovs where the Doctor seems to over sympathise with the authority that was so wonderful the country revolted against them. His sympathies towards despots like Davros, the Master and Ichtar make him, compared to treatments of characters like Carl (The Woman Who Fell to Earth), the family of blood, and now H P Lovecraft seem very contradictory. The editing of Part One was particularly forced - I wonder how many times the word 'racist' was used - we got it after the first time thanks! But at the same time I liked the scene at the end where the Doctor confronted him on the subject. I thought that was more well handled and overall the story portrayed a relatively balanced view of Lovecraft, going into his personal life, his mental illness, his hypocrisies, etc. If the Doctor stayed and debated with him the outcome could have been interesting. Or if he'd had some other influence in real life who is to say what might have happened. Overall an interesting and awkward little play that with some rewrites (or many going back to the original edit - the fifteen minutes on the podcast are far better than what we got) could have been far more. But I'm glad we have what we have. |
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Post by fantasticalice on Aug 2, 2020 14:25:29 GMT
Also, Although I do not know if Robyn would also describe themselves add "Trans, Non Binary" Robyn is NB and uses they/them pronouns. This was a HUGE deal to me because even though I have unique reasons for ny identity I don't get to feel this kinship often. I am not as conscious of my pronouns as other NB folk although on my twitter it used to list Xie/xem/she/her. Now it says Xie/xem/Goddess for pronouns. I also know of many cases in the past of BIPOC actors (especially Mixed Race) finding it easier to just have agent listings list them as their "dominant" appearance. I read the lady who plays quake on Agents of Shield was constantly having problems in auditions because she didn't "look Asian enough" Hopefully this is changing. I don't know how many NB actors are out there but I have yet to run into a NB role that wasn't played by a NB person which is super cool. I also think this may be BF's first first named NB character. I want to say there have been other characters of a gender that wasn't male or female or somehow both but I think this js the first NB human character.(well mixed human. Loved that nod) With all the bs out there right now I really loved this piece. I also found it quite the feat that they managed to make HP not even remotely sympathetic in any way. I really liked that it's not an easy thing to write that way. I really hope Calypso continues on I think xie is a really fun character and has potential. And also NB characters are pretty uncommon so I will buy just about anything with Robyn as Calypso. |
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Post by johnhurtdoctor on Aug 3, 2020 19:22:48 GMT
Also, Although I do not know if Robyn would also describe themselves add "Trans, Non Binary" Robyn is NB and uses they/them pronouns. This was a HUGE deal to me because even though I have unique reasons for ny identity I don't get to feel this kinship often. I am not as conscious of my pronouns as other NB folk although on my twitter it used to list Xie/xem/she/her. Now it says Xie/xem/Goddess for pronouns. I also know of many cases in the past of BIPOC actors (especially Mixed Race) finding it easier to just have agent listings list them as their "dominant" appearance. I read the lady who plays quake on Agents of Shield was constantly having problems in auditions because she didn't "look Asian enough" Hopefully this is changing. I don't know how many NB actors are out there but I have yet to run into a NB role that wasn't played by a NB person which is super cool. I also think this may be BF's first first named NB character. I want to say there have been other characters of a gender that wasn't male or female or somehow both but I think this js the first NB human character.(well mixed human. Loved that nod) With all the bs out there right now I really loved this piece. I also found it quite the feat that they managed to make HP not even remotely sympathetic in any way. I really liked that it's not an easy thing to write that way. I really hope Calypso continues on I think xie is a really fun character and has potential. And also NB characters are pretty uncommon so I will buy just about anything with Robyn as Calypso. I would have preferred Calypso to have appeared before with the 6th Doctor, the introduction of an NB character in a story dealing with a bigot seems like they are only there as a plot device, an antithesis to Lovecraft’s beliefs, which does them a disservice. |
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