spottedreptile

According to the Wikipedia stuff he was an acting Senior Engineer but had very little experience in the job - it showed her just how little they valued knowledge esp. of the RBMK reactors - the more you knew about them the more dangerous you were to the State, because you knew what was wrong with them.

Holy cow it's an intense and compelling show so far. You know what happens, but it's all the details that you don't know that makes it so gripping. I love the Stellan Skarsgaard guy - he was a faceless bureaucrat in the first episode, now he's had his oh god I'm gonna die realisation, and he's doing what has to be done. I loved his talk to the pipe workers - true or not, he showed us the heroism required to go in there to a certain death, for others. That poor Alsatian running alongside the bus just cut me to bits. I didn't know about the risk of a huge further nuclear explosion. What a bullet dodged for the rest of the world. Those poor men when the torches sputtered and went out. The Central Committee stuff is intriguing. How can so many idiots get so high up in government. All covering their behinds, until Gorby pulls the rug from under them and they're done. Heh.

Very powerfully done episode. Hope the rest is as compelling. I wasn't sure if I'd be able to stick it, as I can remember a lot of the horrible details from real life, but it sure draws you in. The weird detachment from reality is often a symptom of disaster shock. People just cannot accept what is happening, so they deny it over and over, to themselves and to others. The worrying part of this is that these guys were top nuclear scientists and should have been able to react professionally during an emergency. That they didn't is a pretty good indication of why the accident happened and why it was managed so badly afterwards. I felt very bad for the pregnant wife, and all the others out there playing in the ash, and exclaiming how 'pretty' all the lights were. The death toll supposedly wasn't that huge - initially. Thousands have probably died over the decades though I imagine. You got that right. CYA and personal gain are not unique to any kind of politics. Look at the Challenger Disaster just a few months earlier!

Very powerful and moving. I loved the episode, and great work from everyone. The hard realities were not whitewashed and no tidy solution was presented. Valerie was wonderful and so was Gran. I would like to see more of Sister Hilda. She intrigues me. Sister Frances baptism by fire proved to be a bit anticlimactic. What happened to going on your hands and knees to back in bed spit spot and here comes baby? The difficult birth just suddenly got easy. Weird.

That's very Daneel. I love it.

Noooooooo!!! Alara was my favourite character. How could they do this to me? I like Pat Warburton, he was the NASA rep in The Dish with Sam Neill. But that was years ago.

Human nature being what it is, both sides will have people after power and wealth for themselves, so knowing what is available over there gives them an edge over their contemporaries here. This is one of the themes I find most interesting about the premise of the show.

Lady Mary Crawley. Beloved by Julian Fellowes, detested by nearly all the Downton viewers. Grace however is just being made out a clownish stereotype to further plot points and justify behavioural rules in other characters. Lady Mary was a pet of the writer so everyone else had to be sacrificed so she could be the focus.

One of the reasons I watch this show is that there seem to be quite a few, if faint, Fringe cues. I had to stop myself from yelling out: "It's the PATTERN, ffs!" when they started to question why the Callings were happening hehe.

I really like her brows! Wish I had them. Mine are miniscule.

The old guy who the Uncle-killer was attacking was dressed just like Walter Bishop. Looked like him a bit too.

I think Charles is aware of the shortcomings of his upbringing, and has sincerely tried to break the cycle with his own children, especially after Diana's death. The boys do seem close to him. I never had much time for Charles before watching The Crown, but now I can see how horrible his schooling was and how it affected a sensitive boy like him. I too, think he is decent at heart, but like Philip his genes sometimes come out and betray him. He seems to have a need to prove himself just like his father and aunt Margaret. This is a very good point you raise. I hadn't realised they had censored pictures of Charles being affectionate towards his sons. Doesn't surprise me tho, media always, always have an agenda. Anyway both William and Harry have turned out ok it seems, and that can't all be down to Diana.

Which I suspect is the point of the thing. Yes, you can be hideously damaged by something in your early childhood, but it is possible to get past the scars and stop the cycle, for some people at least.

So what is David Melrose's story? Was the same thing done to him as a child? Don't get me wrong, he's a vile person who ruins his son's life for whatever perverted reasons he comes up with to himself, but people aren't born this way. What makes him so cruel and so horrible. As for Eleanor, she must be terrified of her husband to refuse to protect her son. I'm guessing this also refers back to David's childhood. It seems self-reflective.

She would have been more interesting if they'd stuck to her backstory with Nadia the violinist and their father, and avoided all those superfluous lesbian scenes which seem to titillate male directors but which leave me stone cold as do most sex scenes - it's really not a spectator sport, on the screen anyway. But all non-network shows aggressively pursue it, and Starz has form - look at Black Sails, I lost count of the number of times I FF'd past Max and Eleanor or whichever pairing it was boring me into oblivion. I'm not sure what the end game of the show is yet. But I thought that about Fringe after the first season, and there was a point somewhere during the second where it suddenly coalesced for me into an aha moment - "that's what this show is about!" But haven't found it here yet, though I am def intrigued. The diplomacy angle, the grubby aspects of human nature on both sides, and the horse-trading of tech and other "differences" was something I'd like to see more of. Just hope it doesn't degenerate into soap.

Agree. But the core of the show has always been, for me, Jenny Agutter. Her being both a nun and midwife beautifully brings together the two different lifestyles into one statement of wisdom, love and empathy.

So Trixie can be fated to exist in a never-ending relationship with a guy she can't marry, again? I'd rather she drank herself to death and put an end to it. Or maybe, Heidi was just being cute and poor Babs will hang on until the Christmas Special.

I was a teenager in the late 1960s and I think I would have had the same reaction as you did if somebody made me wear those tasteless, badly designed clothes. Elizabeth had a stunning figure and did wear some really lovely gowns, but that blue nightmare was one of the worst. The blue was dull and muddy, the shirred top did nothing for her lovely bosom and the straps looked girlish. Perhaps that's the effect the showrunners wanted, but it looked such a fashion faux pas I'm amazed Elizabeth consented to wear it at all.

Oh my god I am so with you on this. I don't care about Royal protocol in this instance, this is a mother and her child who desperately wants to give her a huge hug and feel safe and loved again. I can't help but contrast it with Diana's wide open arms for both her boys (can't remember when that was but I'm sure you will remember it) so she could just envelop them with love when she got back home from some trip or other. You could just feel her delight at seeing her young sons again. I can understand the "no emotion" rules for adults or even teenagers, but these kids are very young and should be shown love at all opportunities. Otherwise look at the mess they become.

Producers get nervous when actors mount horses, so maybe they just figured it wasn't worth the risk of her being injured, especially if she is not a confident rider. But who knows, we may see more as the show unfolds in future years. Maybe Olivia Coleman is a great rider! I read a funny interview once where an actor said "never admit to not being able to do something" so he always said he fence, ride, dive, shoot etc, when he couldn't do any of those things, and if it came up in a job he would just wing it. Re Claire Foy in other roles: Her Little Dorrit is wonderful. She starred opposite Matthew McFadyen in the BBC miniseries.

Bruce Greenwood gave it a decent nudge in Thirteen Days, but on the whole yes I agree with you.

I find Philip very difficult to swallow in this show but have to hand it to Matt Smith making him so irritating but compelling as well. The cast on The Crown are superb and you can tell they really enjoy their roles and believe in what the show is doing with them. As for Ggalina, it was creepy seeing the dancer making all that eye contact with the Queen during her solo sequence. Seemed to confirm there was some sort of relationship there if she was so overt about it during her performance. Did the show really imply they were lovers? I must have missed that bit, sometimes it's hard to keep up with all the innuendo, which is why I love this show because you can watch it over and over and find new stuff each time.

But children like Charles lived in the 1950s, not modern day where kids constantly argue and ignore their parents. Children of that era had it drummed into their heads very early that parents were the law, and to disobey them was sinful under God. Charles wouldn't have dreamed of being a rebel. If your parents said you were going to a certain school, you went, especially if you were 11 or 12. And Charles strikes me as a very conformist child who constantly hoped for Dad's approval so the chances of sticking up for himself and taking a stand against his father were zero IMO. Philip is portrayed as very emasculated in the show, which I find plausible in the light of what I have read and seen about him in my lifetime. So being an authoritarian father probably gave him back some self-respect, but it would have been very hard on sensitive kids like Charles who would have seen very early on he was a disappointment to his father because he amplified all the character traits that Philip was uncomfortable with himself. Philip may have even resented Charles for being who he was, and not the strong masculine figure Philip desperately wanted his son to be so he could feel validated as a man.

I'm really enjoying the Klingons! At least they have a purpose and a deep pride in their culture. The Federation leaders seem to be a bunch of marshmallows worrying about their careers. I can't help wishing some of these Starfleet Admirals end up as Klingon fodder, they have no idea how to manage an armed force in wartime. I suppose they've been at peace for so long all they know is words. I sense a romance developing between Voq and whoever her name is, strangely compelling to be honest. On the Starfleet side, Tilly is the most interesting character. I don't think they've worked out Saru yet. Lorca feels like a real captain ought to. Stamets is one of those officers you have to endure from time to time, but he is showing some willingness to listen at least. Burnham just needs to turn the dial down a bit. She's not a new recruit, she was a First Officer and she should have realised it's not all about her by now. But I like her anyway. I'm looking forward to each week's new episode.