ITS CHRISTMAS!

In order to really decompose Xmas we have to split into two seperate groups, both the positives AND the negatives (I don't think any kid has any...). Of course me being me lets start with the negatives:



LONGEST MONTH OF THE YEAR:
God, December MUST be scientifically proven to be the longest month of the Year (Every kid out there would agree, while the Parents can't wait for it to be all over)! Although not really a bad thing about Christmas, I really wish Xmas day was on the 1rst of December! For me this has been the longest Week of the Year! all the other months feel twice as short as one Week in December! But why is it so long? Well in December, every day feels like a step further to acheiving your ultimate heaven...YAY, PRESENTS! AND ITS FREE! ITS EVERYTHING I EVER WANTED AND MORE! THIS IS THE GREATEST DAY OF THE YEAR!! December is the longest month of the Year because it represents every kids dream all rolled into one (I'll never forget the day when I saw the Peter Pan Adventures: Hook's ship advert on T.V)!

CHRISTMAS = ONE BIG MARKETING PLOY:
While Halloween represents everything dark and instinctive about the Human soul, Christmas is like the complete opposite of that, aimed at giving and loving and everything nice and innocent about the human soul...and its also a great marketing ploy for practically every business and retailer out there to squeeze just about every spare penny you've earnt (with ridiculously overpriced presents) and to give it to your spoiled and undeserving kids (I'm not complaining at all though, but I dread the day when its ME that buys the prezzies and not your overly giving parents)! MERRY CHRISTMAS  (SMALL PRINT: WILL BANKRUPT YOU. IS MAKING YOUR KIDS SPOILT. MAY LEAD TO BEING NICE FOR ONCE)! Heck, Christmas is such a money-maker that pretty much every economy sky-rockets on Christmas Day. The Coca Cola Xmas advert, while being a bit of a silly family tradition for us (we don't officially call it Christmas untill we see that advert), is just Coca Cola's little marketing stategy to make you want a Coke. Father Christmas drinking Coke? His Teeth must be revolting! 

And now for the Positives:


ITS THE SEASON OF GOODWILL:
You can always count on Christmas to bring the best out of people, Charles Dickens A Christmas Carol is not one of the most famous pieces of storytelling for absolutely no reason you know! Despite mainly being wrote as a Victorian Ghost Story, it's a book about a man who's heart was so cold that nothing could cure it...except Christmas (and maybe a few bottles of Whisky that might lead to a few hullucinations, what can I say, Scrooge was either mentally ill or drunk!). Christmas is the symbol of all goodwill, the whole concept of gift-giving is to symbolise the good-ness in all our hearts. Either that or its just an excuse to give your kids presents so you can shove you arse full of "I'm a great Parent!" delusions. Remember all the Christmas movies we've seen over the past 50 years of cinema? Sure its a cliche now (you see one Xmas film, you see them all) but the main theme out of all of them is just getting into the holiday spirit and forgetting about all your troubles (ex: Its a wonderful life). They all have happy endings, and even the coldest, most evilest of men, is shown to have an Xmas tree. Ultimately Xmas is a representation of what we would all like to be, a season of much fun (decorating the tree, being given presents, watch the annual Doctor Who special, having fun with the family, all the Xmas dinners...) and showing the purety of the heart. Yes its a great sales booster and a ridiculous excuse for the Catholic church to shoehorn in a birth of a guy that probably never existed, but its also one of the best things to come out of the Human race (well that and Doctor Who, and maybe Capt. Hook...).

GETTING PRESENTS IS FUN:
What is the best thing about Christmas? Anyone that doesn't say Presents is quite frankly lying. What is the first thing you do in preparation for Christmas? Make a Wishlist, of course (or as what I would call it: This is what I want and I'll be VERY unhappy if I don't get it list!). Its easily the best thing about the season, a chance for kids to live out the ideal life: endless piles of toys just waiting to be played with! The hardest part is choosing whether you want to play the new Call of Duty first or Mass Effect 3 (TBA but come on 2011!). God, so many gifts, I don't know which one to choose! I couldn't give a crap about celebrating Christ's Birth or admiring the Christmas tree once i've got my grubby hands on that gleaming pile of gold, those things were just fillers to waste time and make Xmas day come ever closer. Not saying that those things are boring, its just that without Presents Christmas wouldn't be the phenominal celebration that it is today, billions of kids all over the world right now are just waiting for Xmas day and to chance to release the Doctor Who Blu-Ray boxset out of its prison of wrapping paper. BILLIONS! 

What it all comes down too is that Xmas is a great Holiday to celebrate. Winter is a cold, lifeless time and Christmas turns it into magic, its the one time of the Year when everyone can forget their troubles and the onslaught of oncoming Tests that await them and just relax and have fun! Its Christmas time, everyone, lets put the Music in the player, snuggle down and watch T.V and enjoy playing with your new gifts. It truly is the best time of the Year...

Doctor Who - Christmas Special Preview!

                    


OMG! Seems like Doctor Who is doing a Christmas Carol 'themed' Xmas this year! Very interesting indeed, it doesn't really explain alot though...Are they on another planet? Future Earth? Whats up with the flying shark? Why is Catherine Jenkins cryo-frozen? Why can we see Roman (Auton?) Rory and Amy dressed up in her Police outfit? Why is Amy on a ship (Spaceship?)? What's with the whole 'Christmas Time can be Rewritten' tagline? Why does the Doctor come out of the Fireplace in a burst of flames? Whats with the little boy and all the pods? Why? Why? WHY? From the Trailer, it seems this is going to be another one of those complicated, head-ache inducing but action packed Xmas Episodes! CAN'T WAIT!

The Sarah Jane Adventures

SJA! Yes, it's a kids show, but its the best kids show out there! For four years now (a considerably long run-time for a kids T.V show shown at 5pm) the Adventures of Sarah Jane Smith has entertained children and Doctor Who fans alike. A bit of a waste really, as this show really deserves a prime time slot just like Torchwood and Doctor Who. Torchwood is for grown-ups, Doctor Who is the  family show and SJA is for kiddies, or so we like to think. Unfortunatly, it feels as if kids T.V is trapping this show in its toned down, light hearted chains. Admittedly, if the show had nothing whatsoever to do with the Who-Universe I probably wouldn't watch it as regularly as I do, but seen as every Episode in the Series has at least something who-related this happily isn't the case 
(possibly due to budget reasons, the shows creators realised that they could save money if they re-used old monster costumes from the main Series, which is why the Slitheen, Sontarans, Bane and Judoon feature heavily in the Series. Heck, the Slitheen are used so often now they can almost be dubbed as the "Daleks" of SJA). The story involves past Doctor Who compagnion Sarah Jane Smith and her "Team" of Teenage friends battling countless Monsters and (of course) saving the world every single Episode (Okay, this is the point where I draw the line, does every single alien threat have to provoke the utter destuction and annihilation of the human race every single time? Why can't the aliens be nice for once?). 


The Series is split into twelve short twenty-five minute Episodes,

comprising of six stories split into two parts. So all in all, the Series is the length of about six Doctor Who episodes, which may not seem alot but for a kids T.V show is your standard Series run-time. As with DW, you get your Monster of the Week, which can sometimes vary from your generic Doctor Who bad guy or a new villain created for the Series. The Episodes can be a bit of a hit or miss sometimes, but it's a kids show so I can mostly forgive it. Though there are instances where this show truly becomes pure gold. The Series one Episode  "Whatever Happened To Sarah Jane Smith?" is considered by many who watched the show as a truly "cult classic" that acheives to actually be better than some Doctor Who episodes (I agree). Its a What If? type story where a villainous rogue called "The Trickster" wipes Sarah Jane out of existence (any memory of her is wiped, like being swallowed up by the crack) and replaces her with another woman so that she can't prevent an upcoming disaster and then "feed" off the chaos this disaster creates. Check out this awesome scene from the Ep here by clicking on the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IfjFsIWv3K0&feature=related. The Trickster is a great villain, but is a little holded back because of the fairly "light" tone of the Series, but if he was in Doctor Who I think they can truely do something great with him. In fact, he's already met the Doctor in the SJA-DW crossover:     

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnqSsw_WgGQ&feature=related (Which by the way, was the last time that David Tennant played the Doctor, you can see it on his face in this scene: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j8WpzLLWtvw&feature=related.) New Doctor Who Matt Smith will star with another previous DW compagnion Jo Grant in a special Episode of the show coming in a few Weeks, which will not only be written by previous DW showrunner Russell-T-Davies but is also titled "Death Of A Doctor." If that isn't enough to get me shaking with exitement then I don't know what will! Clearly this show has the possibility to become really good telly, but its confined to your average CBBC slot that it quite simply does not deserve.  

The previous Episodes that aired last Monday to Tuesday titled "The Nightmare Man Part 1 &2" saw Julian Bleach play a deliciously evil Freddy Kreuger/Joker rip-off that planned to make everybody in the world sleep forever while experiencing horrible Nightmares. Sounds pretty cool doesn't it? Except because its a kids show the Nightmares are nothing more than "unconfortable" and all he does is mainly hop around manically shooting out laser bolts without actually slaying anyone in their dreams. Still a great Episode, though you do have to accept that they couldn't really do alot to make him as menacing as he was supposed to be, alot of it seemed toned down (people rarely die in this show, and the ones that do are either the bad guys or the people that sacrifice themselves "for the greater good"). Which is a bit of a shame, as the guy does this laugh that could make even the Joker pee his pants then jump out of a three story high window (he does the laugh shortly after this scene: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5hKGjUMfoks, and you can see the last nine minutes of the Episode I found on youtube here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AjX0HW1Xtos&feature=related! In short, The Sarah Jane adventures is a enjoyable show for a kids T.V programme, and one that could benefit from a larger budget and respectable timeslot (although it's still the highest rated Childrens show on Television right now and is attracting some really high ratings). I will continue to watch the show until either the Series finally fades away or Sarah Jane really has become so old that she can't do anything but move along on her crutches!