Doctor Who

[Thad]

Yes, thanks -- Waris Hussein, right? Meant to mention him too.

At any rate, the current cast makes for some great storytelling possibilities that the show hasn't really explored before. It's a pretty deliberate compare-and-contrast with how the show looked back in 1963 -- four people on the TARDIS, and one of them is an old white guy who's somebody's grandfather. But aside from that passing similarity, the changes in culture in the past 55 years are front and center; the way families have changed, and the way the workplace has changed.

There were a couple of moments in RTD's tenure where, say, Martha faced discrimination, but it was light-touch stuff. And I don't remember Moffat spending much time on that, even though his Doctor's last companion was a black lesbian. And that's actually fine; there are benefits to depicting history as kinder and gentler than it was, to escapist fantasy that doesn't deal in harsh truths, especially in children's entertainment. (I believe I've expressed my love for the comic series Goldie Vance before -- it's a girls' mystery series in the tradition of Nancy Drew and Harriet the Spy; it's set in the '50s and the lead is a teenage girl who's black and gay. None of the other characters ever give her any grief about her race or her sexuality, and I think that's great; there's room for utopian fantasy versions of the 1950s in comics just as surely as there's room for, say, secret African techno-utopias.)

But in 2018 we find ourselves in a very different place than we did in Davies's or Moffat's tenure, and Chibnall is wise to acknowledge it.

Plus it just plain makes for interesting storytelling possibilities. Traveling to the past is simply going to be a different experience for a female Doctor and two minority companions than it has been for past lineups. We haven't really seen the Doctor face discrimination because of her gender yet, but I'm sure it's coming.

Incidentally, Josh Bowman has played a time-traveling villain before; he was Jack the Ripper in the short-lived TV adaptation of Time After Time. It wasn't very good, but he was good in it.

[WingSounds]

Since all my memories of Doctor Who can be condensed into faint memories of jelly babies and having a mild crush on the Brigadier, is there any good first episode guide? Should I just dive into the season blind, or maybe devote... awhile... to marathon-watching the show? My love for sci-fi is maximum, it's really the sheer amount of show that's stopped me from getting into the newer stuff.

[Thad]

Each new Doctor is a good jumping-on point. If you want to just start with The Woman Who Fell to Earth, that's as good a place as any. The show's got a brand-new cast and a brand-new showrunner; you don't really need to worry about the past 13/55 years of backstory.

[WingSounds]

THANK YOU, it kind of helps to have a benchmark, especially as I do genuinely love nods to prior episodes and things like that. It's just, unnnnhh, there's a lot of episodes present, haha... And as I'm in a pickle where it really wouldn't hurt to have something to watch, so this is just the little nudge I need. I'll mosey on out, then, and return when I can talk spoilers with all of you!..

[mharr]

Each except Matt, who was a capering simpleton wearing the Doctor's flayed skin and shall be stricken from the record.

[Thad]

Each except Matt, who was a capering simpleton wearing the Doctor's flayed skin and shall be stricken from the record.

My uncle feels the same way about Troughton (who was definitely Smith's biggest influence).

I thought Smith was fine. I think his era of the show was pretty hit-or-miss (though not as uneven as Eccleston's), but there are some real gems in there (The Doctor's Wife, off the top of my head).

I don't think there's ever been a bad Doctor (no, not even Colin Baker; I'll agree with the general sentiment that his era is the worst in the show's history, but it wasn't his fault).

[Grath]

Each except Matt, who was a capering simpleton wearing the Doctor's flayed skin and shall be stricken from the record.

I'm biased (Matt Smith was when I started actually watching Doctor Who so...) but I've heard it said that Matt Smith's first episode is a good introduction to the show (The Doctor's eccentricity, reasonable Monster of the Week, etc)

[beatbandito]

Smith did have a hard time of it. Tennant was a pretty perfect The Doctor so anyone following him would have a hard time. Or even anyone before him on the new series, which there definitely wasn't, because that person would have had to have been completely forgotten if they existed.

Anyway I will agree that I didn't like the characterization of Smith's Doctor, but it never really felt like he was playing it poorly. It just felt written a little too much lake a lamer version of Tennant, which wasn't helped by all the #10 stories that kept trying to creep their way back in.

[Thad]

I thought Eccleston was great, and that he's not remembered as well as his successors has a lot more to do with his decision to fuck off after one season and never come back than any weaknesses in his characterization or performance.

He was sure in some stinkers, though.

And when I chose that word I didn't mean it as a direct reference to his spending nearly one-quarter of his run fighting flatulent aliens, but it works.

[Brantly B.]

I'm with what Thad said earlier: There hasn't yet been an actor who I thought played The Doctor badly (yes, even that one - since I'm not concerned about drama around the set I can still claim Ninth as my favorite), but there have definitely been some weak eras of the show. Matt Smith himself was fine and it's not his fault that his character was cast as some sort of Epic Willy Wonka.

[mharr]

Matt was swimming against the current of having Steven Moffat running the show rather than just writing episodes, but did have some fantastic individual stories. I took against him immediately for being surprised about hands when we've never seen a non-humanoid Time Lord, and I really wasn't on board for the Zany Adventures of Space Jesus. The whole thing seemed horribly focused on appealing to US media executives or something.

Also I'm pretty sure he boinked the TARDIS.

In unrelated news, this appears to be happening:

[beatbandito]

Two things on that last point:

1) They all have.

2) The TaRDiS boinked them.

[Mongrel]

Matt was swimming against the current of having Steven Moffat running the show rather than just writing episodes, but did have some fantastic individual stories. I took against him immediately for being surprised about hands when we've never seen a non-humanoid Time Lord, and I really wasn't on board for the Zany Adventures of Space Jesus. The whole thing seemed horribly focused on appealing to US media executives or something.

Also I'm pretty sure he boinked the TARDIS.

In unrelated news, this appears to be happening:

The incongruent Villager voices in the background are making me giggle inappropriately.

[Thad]

There hasn't yet been an actor who I thought played The Doctor badly (yes, even that one - since I'm not concerned about drama around the set I can still claim Ninth as my favorite)

From what little I've seen anyone say about behind-the-scenes conflicts, Eccleston sure hasn't come across as the bad guy.

[Grath]

Matt was swimming against the current of having Steven Moffat running the show rather than just writing episodes

Moffat shouldn't be allowed to run shows. Blink was amazing, but what he did to Doctor Who and Sherlock should've been predictable from the garbage fire that was Jekyll.

[Thad]

I really wasn't on board for the Zany Adventures of Space Jesus.

Yeah, but a lot of Moffat's depiction of the Doctor as a godlike figure spoken of in hushed tones was just a continuation of what Davies had been doing with him (the Oncoming Storm and alla that), which it's probably fair to trace back to Cartmel.

And it's not as if Ten wasn't saddled with some poor calls -- the romance with Rose and subsequent pining by Martha, the if-you-believe-in-fairies-clap-your-hands resolutions, Rose comes back except she's Buffy now, Donna's ultimate fate...Tennant was great in the role, but man, there was plenty to complain about back then, too.

The whole thing seemed horribly focused on appealing to US media executives or something.

But he never even had a motorcycle chase!

...wait.

He totally did, didn't he.

[mharr]

Screw it, start with Tom Baker. He has the best dad joke delivery.

[atog]

In unrelated news, this appears to be happening:

holy crap let's do this on a server

[mharr]

There's actually a bunch of those already released for various Minecraft versions, (And Sub has worked on basically all of 'em) but this is the first one I've seen that renders the view through the doors. The Dalek Mod is the one with all the toys and monsters and K9s. https://minecraft.curseforge.com/projects/the-dalek-mod

[mharr]