Everything said below is true.

"Many fans of Metallica insist that they released nothing after that bus crash. Others say that their recording career ended immediately before the Black Album, or immediately after it. The tiny fraction of fans left insist that they went on to make three more albums after this, but when faced with a copy of St. Anger, go into violent conniptions."
-tvtropes.org

In actual fact, of course, their studio burnt down during the recording of the Black Album, along with all the notes they'd taken about which songs to leave off. A studio exec somewhere left the last three songs on the album despite the fact that they were clearly slated for deletion. Lost in the fire was a glorious three-minute solo in 6/8 time that would have appeared on "Nothing Else Matters." In recognition of what they lost, Metallica never entered the studio again, except briefly in 2006-07 to record no more than three songs.

And just in case it's not obviously clear, nothing said above is true.

StudyFail

Collegehumor.com got this first, but hey, here it is:

Study = no fail
No study = fail

Study + No Study = Fail + No Fail
(No + 1) Study = (No + 1) Fail

Study = Fail

Okay, let's take a look at the math behind that. I'll assume the following values.
Study = 1
No = -1
Fail = -1

Ergo
1 = -1 * -1
-1 * 1 = -1

So far so good.

1 + (-1*1) = -1 + (-1*-1)
(-1+1)*1=(-1+1)*-1
1=-1

Turns out the wiseguy just did the old "divide by zero" trick made famous by the following riddle:
x=y
therefore 2x=2y
x-y=2x-2y (because they're both zero)
1(x-y)=2(x-y)
1=2

And the Doctors

Okay, let's do this. This is really going to hurt at the end, trying to figure out who gets stuck in last place.

1. Tom Baker (4). Um, duh.

2. Patrick Troughton (2). Simply magical.

(these two are a few light-years ahead of all the others)

3. David Tennant (10). He's clearly doing throwbacks to Peter Davison, but Tom's madcap lunacy shines through on more than one occasion.

4. Jon Pertwee (3). James Bond - Lothario + in space = Third Doctor. (Snappy dresser, too.)

5. Sylvester McCoy (7). He got off to a rocky start, and his script quality was always sketchy at best (JNT had a thing about not letting old hands write for the show, which was stupid^infinity).
6. Tie. Paul McGann (8). The Shada remake gives us an example of what could have been, had we only had a decent script. He was witty and charming and reminded me of Pertwee (who died just before the telemovie aired) in every way that matters. Christopher Eccleston (9). Manic and loony, just as the Doctor should be. They both come in so low because neither had a great deal of time in the part; given a couple more years, either one could be up in 3rd or 4th place.

8. Peter Davison (5). Coming in for only three short years in between the two most bombastic Doctors would make anybody seem bland. To his credit, Peter underplayed the part, which was exactly what the role needed after 7 years of Tom Baker. Unfortunately, he came off as a weakling. He'd rate higher if he could have, on occasion, saved some people. That, and he bears the unfortunate distinction of being the first Doctor to be stuck in a bad costume. A cricket theme would have been all right, but the end result was too much.

...Okay. I'm not really in a last-place mood, and William Hartnell (1) and Colin Baker (6) both have redeeming qualities. Hartnell comes in so low because he wasn't much more than a typical absent-minded scientist (and yes, there were real-life reasons, tragically, for his absent-mindedness) and Colin's Doctor, as I've said before, was an awesome character but was just all wrong for The Doctor. Ergo, cop-out and tie for 9th place.

...and the greatest Sci-fi show of all time is...

Wait, you really had to ask? http://www.wizarduniverse.com/25greatestscfishowsever6.html

A different sort of Who Review

Yeah, whatever I said however many weeks back when I said whatever it was... forget it. Not happening, primarily because the way my life's going at the moment I can't be bothered to watch the 75 minutes of boring that are An Unearthly Child episodes 2-4. Though there is some skull-crushery in Ep 4. Children's program my @$$.

Speaking of deaths, how about Tom Baker's plunge at the end of Logopolis? Love the absurdly fake miniature effects, the pointless grab-the-support-thingy, the fact that the Master gets away while the Doctor dies... Everybody talks about The Caves of Androzani being the greatest exit story, but really that thing's absurdly nihilistic. Everybody dies, Rose... just this once, everybody dies! Tom went out saving the entire freaking Universe, and all Peter managed to save was one girl with a fake American accent. (Granted, she was the only person in that serial worth saving, except the real Maj. Salateen, but hey, this being a Robert Holmes script and him being a somewhat bitter survivor, he was a walking dead man from the word go.) Not only that, but take a look at the villains the Doctor has to ally with. 4 has to work with the Master, the most evil evil evil evil ad nauseam person in the entire Universe (bar possibly Davros). 5 has to work with the Phantom of the Opera's cousin.

(That's another thing. Holmes already did the Phantom bit in Talons of Weng-Chiang, and oh he did it well there. Sharaz Jek was a somewhat disappointing re-do of Magnus Greel. Hell, Greel's costume beat Jek's gimp suit.)

The thing that's really cool about Logopolis is the fact that the Doctor knows, after a discussion in the second episode, that he's going to die. Gee, wait, in Caves, the Doctor also finds out that he's dying in the second episode.

I like the political complexities of Androzani, but in a post-9/11 world they leave a bit of a sour taste - the government's corrupt, the President's a tool, the army is apparently run by a corporation of some sort (can't really remember Morgus's deal at the moment), and the terrorist is just out for some well-deserved revenge. As I said, sour taste. At least there wasn't an economic crisis. Oh, wait, there was a hint of that too when they were talking about the Spectrox shortages. (I like how everybody was a Spectrox junkie. Not sure what the subtext there was, but I liked it.) Oh well, at least there was no Swine Flu. (Insert jokes about the Doctor being retarded enough to not immediately administer the antidote to himself when pigs fly here.)

See, when the Master tilts that platform, 4 knows it's the end. He's gonna yank that cable out, and then he's gonna fall. (Gee, cult television show, high platform, very bizarre and poorly-explained setup/solution that requires the main character to go splat in order to save the Universe... history sure doesn't repeat itself does it?)

The 5th Doctor's last word is "...Adric?"
The 4th Doctor's last words are "It's the end... but the moment has been prepared for."

Which is better? Seriously?

-James

Oh, and in case you had to ask, yes, that other show did it a hell of a lot better... but it was still poorly set up.