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Blink and you would’ve missed it, in fact I bet most people did miss it!

In last night’s episode of Doctor Who, ‘The Poison Sky‘, Rose Tyler’s face briefly appeared on the TARDIS’ communications screen for a brief moment before the Doctor’s transmission to the Sontaran spaceship replaced it.

Rose appeared to be mouthing the word ‘Doctor’ - attempting to communicate from parallel Earth perhaps? Rose Tyler was stranded on parallel Earth in the closing moments of The Battle of Canary Wharf at the end of series 2. In episode one of Doctor Who series 4, ‘Partners In Crime‘ she is seen very briefly before fading away in nothingness.

The Doctor bid farewell to Rose on parallel Earth by projecting a hologram through a closing rift in time and space, but he had to burn up a star to generate enough energy. Perhaps Rose is attempting to contact the Doctor using a similar method, but without access to a big enough power source, she is obviously struggling.

Any ideas what on parallel Earth is going on?

Here is a complete list of the 49 distinct Firefox 3 BETA User Agent that have visited my site from 2007-11-21 to 2008-05-03.

Firefox 3 BETA User Agent On Microsoft Windows

Firefox 3 BETA User Agent On Apple Mac

Firefox 3 BETA User Agent On Linux

You can see here how Firefox’s BETA testing program has really taken off as only a few user agent were from the first build 3.0b1, but the vast majority are from the latest 3.0b4 and 3.0b5 builds.

Firefox 3 has some really great features, I’ve already become addicited to the idea of Googling stuff directly from the address bar, and the ability to see detailed site information by clicking the favicon is a genuis idea. But I have yet to deduce how Site Owner information is derived in Firefox 3. It doesnt seem to come from OWNER or AUTHOR META tags, so I’m puzzled. Anyone got any ideas?

Since the Ood were introduced into Doctor Who I have wondered how such a species, apparently devoted to servitude, could come to exist. This week’s episode, ’Planet of the Ood‘ reveals that the Ood are taken from their natural, ‘uncultivated’ state and surgically mutilated to make them dosile and dependant upon humans. Like any good TV show, ’Planet of the Ood‘ begins with someone being savagely killed.

The TARDIS lands in 4126 on the Ood-Sphere, a planet in the Second Great and Bountiful Human Empire which spans three galaxies. The Ood-Sphere is controlled by a private company, Ood Operations. Upon discovering an Ood dying from a gunshot wound and suffering from ‘red-eye’, a sign of psychic possession, the Doctor and Donna suspect that the Ood are not the willing servants they are made out to be.

They break into an Ood Operations warehouse containing uncultivated Ood who are being kept prisoner, ready for processing. These Ood have a second brain which they hold in their hands, connected to the main brain via an umbilical cord; like a neural-tendril. This brain gives them free will. The Doctor, presumably through the TARDIS, can hear the telepathic song the imprisoned Ood are singing.

the circle must be broken

Red-eye spreads throughout the Ood workforce who now rebel and begin killing their human captors en mass!

One poor guy gets two Ood translator spheres to the head at the same time, I did laugh!

The source of this red-eye is revealed to be psychic possession from a stand-alone Ood Central Brain kept secret in Warehouse 15. The CEO of Ood Operations has kept this Central Brain inside a telepathic dampening field since taking control of the planet. This is the ‘circle’ the Ood spoke of in their captivity song. With the loss of this central point in their telepathic network the uncultivated Ood are a broken, disconnected people and are easily dominated.

An activist from ‘Friends of The Ood’ who long ago infiltrated the company has slowly been turning down the dampening field and giving more and more control back to the Central Brain. This is the cause of the red-eye rebellion; the Central Brain’s only means for fighting its oppressors.

The Doctor and Donna arrive at Warehouse 15 in time to stop the CEO from blowing up the Central Brain. The CEO’s right-hand Ood, Ood Sigma, has been slowly poising him for many years. Sigma administers the final dose, transforming the CEO into an Ood who Sigma says will be ‘well looked after’. The Doctor releases the dampening field, restoring peace to the planet and returning control to the Ood.

 I thought ‘Planet of the Ood‘ was a great episode, with lots of savage deaths; all administered via the head for maximum anguish. I thought the story was incredibly imaginative, with typically great acting and special effects. I seem to say this about every episode now but I’ll say it again, the characterisation was brilliant.

This episode contained another reference to ‘bees disappearing‘. This is obviously a clue to a story-arc thats developing, a bit like ‘Bad Wolf’ which appears as graffito throughtout series 1 as subconscious clues left throughtout time by Rose’s future self. There has also been a reference this series to the ‘Medusa Cascade‘ which was mentioned in the last episode of Series 3 ’Last of the Time Lords‘, so this series is proving to have some very enigmatic story-arcs.

Next week’s Doctor Who is entitled ‘‘The Sontaran Stratagem‘.

‘The Fires of Pompeii‘ was episode 2 of Doctor Who Series 4 and showed an interesting side to the Doctor’s personality; the burden of a Time Lord.

Upon realising that the TARDIS has landed in ancient Pompeii one day before the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79AD, Donna insists the Doctor begins an evacuation to save the population which numbers 20,000 or so. The Doctor explains that the destruction of Pompeii is a fixed and necessary point in time, he seems to be bound by some kind of Time Lord Non-Intervention Oath.

This it seems is the burden of a Time Lord, not to interfere in the natural development of a culture. The eruption of Vesuvius and the destruction of Pompeii appear to be natural events in human history so the Doctor refuses to change anything. Donna becomes enraged at the man who she has always seen as a travelling hero and cannot fathom this lack of compassion or his coolness about the deaths of 20,000 people.

The Doctor however, seeing all that was, all that will be and all that could be throughout time knows that the destruction of Pompeii is something he should not change. However it quickly becomes clear that there is alien involvement in the eruption of Versuvius: a group of stranded Pyrovile’s, creatures composed of living magma.

The Pyroviles have possessed many of the towns population and with the aid of a energy converter carved out of marble they’re trying to change the population of the entire planet into Pyroviles and create a new Pyrovilian homeworld.

The Pyroviles became stranded beneath the Earth’s crust when their ship crashed escaping the destruction of their homeworld Pyrovilia.

Armed with only a water pistol the Doctor prevents the Pyroviles from using the energy converter but must now allow the destruction of Pompeii rather than risk the entire planet.

As the doctor prepares to leave, Donna begs him to save a family who gave them shelter. Despite the Doctor swearing the family to secrecy we see at the end of the episode they have errected a shrine to the Doctor and Donna in their new home and worship them as household gods.

I thought ‘The Fires of Pompeii‘ featured some excellant special effects and characterisation. I enjoyed seeing how this policy of non-intervention is indeed a burden upon the Doctor. His is seemingly all powerful, compassionate and heroic much of the time, but bound by an Oath and haunted by his inactions for the rest of it.

I think this story echoes back to the classic Doctor Who episode ‘Genesis of The Daleks‘. In Genesis of the Daleks we see the fourth Doctor, played by Tom Baker, agonising over the decision to destroy the Daleks before they were ever created.

The Doctor knew that in the future many races will become allies because of the Dalek threat and that because they evolved in a relatively natural manner (without alien interference or time-travel) he feels he has no right to prevent that.

Next week’s Doctor Who is entitled ‘Planet of the Ood‘.

The long-running, award-winning sci-fi television programme Doctor Who returned to our screens tonight at last!

‘Partners In Crime‘ was the 739th Doctor Who and the first episode of series 4 of the new adventures Doctor Who.
‘Partners In Crime‘ saw the return of Catherine Tate as ‘Donna Noble‘ the tenth Doctor’s unlikely cockney assistant first seen in the Doctor Who 2006 Christmas Special ‘The Runaway Bride‘.
Before meeting the Doctor it seems that Donna was somewhat small minded; claiming to’ve missed The Christmas Invasion due to a hangover. But since then Donna’s tried to travel the world (but didnt get very far) and has become a conspiracy nut and a UFOlogist. Tonights Doctor Who featured a brand new enemy known as the Adipose.

The only Adipose we actually see are new-born Adipose which although they appear cute and friendly, have sinister origins. Check out this clip showing how the Adipose are born:

The real villian in ‘Partners In Crime‘ is Miss Foster, a kind of evil, intergalactic Super-Nanny.

She’s also the founder of Adipose Industries whose Adipose diet pills are marketed under the slogan

Adipose Industries: The Fat Just Walks Away!

Tonight’s Doctor Who was also the world’s first use of MASSIVE FX technology on television. MASSIVE FX technology is blend of computer-animation and artificial intelligence used to create CGI crowds featuring thousands (or even millions) of agents all appearing to act as individuals.

MASSIVE FX technology was used to create the fight scenes in I, Robot and Lord of The Rings. The birth of the Adipose and their collection by an Adiposian spaceship was animated using MASSIVE FX technology.

‘Partners In Crime‘ also saw the brief return of Rose Tyler who seems to’ve been able to return, albeit temporarily from the parallel Earth she was marooned on after the Battle of Canary Wharf. Billie Piper now looks even fitter than she did before, god knows how when she still has brown eyebrows and blonde hair, but hey, anything’s possible.

I thought that this Doctor Who was pretty good, not the greatest, but then it was more about characterisation than anything. It sets the scene for the rest of Doctor Who series 4 which looks absolutely brilliant. Apparently bees are disappearing…. I wonder what that’s supposed to mean? It was important enough to mention twice!

Next week’s Doctor Who is entitled ‘The Fires of Pompeii‘.

April Fools’ Day 2008 was pretty good I thought, Google made me laugh with Virgle and G’day and so did the BBC with this Flying Penguin April Fool commercial for iPlayer. The 90 second April Fool showed a newly discovered variety of Penguin that flies from the South Pole in Winter to live it up in the Amazon.

The first I heard of this was on The Telegraph website who got in on the joke and you know, for a split second I almost half caught myself maybe believing it despite knowing full well today is April Fools’ Day.

The Flying Penguins April Fool is the latest in a long line of BBC April Fools’ dating back to the 1950s and showed CGI penguins taking off in the Antarctic, flying over the tropics and eventually landing in thick Amazonian undergrowth.

The Flying Penguin April Fool featured ex-Python Terry Jones and was created by blending library footage and footage shot on green-screen with CGI and was created entirely in-house at the BBC.

Spaghetti Trees

In 1957 the BBC current affairs programme Panorama aired a 3min spoof report on how the Swiss were cultivating Spaghetti Trees as a April Fools’ Day joke. Hundreds of gullible viewers rang the BBC on April 2nd asking how to cultivate their own Spaghetti Trees and were told

“…place a sprig of spaghetti in a tin of tomato sauce and hope for the best.”