Doctor Who

User avatar
Mothra
Woah Dangsaurus
Posts: 3963
Joined: Mon Jan 20, 2014 7:12 pm
Location: Boston, MA
Contact:

Re: Doctor Who

Postby Mothra » Fri Mar 25, 2022 11:41 pm

I do love reading Thad's slog through these, the worst Doctor Who episodes since like Davis' second season.

I was reading a thing about how Chibnall was very much an olde Doctor Whoe fan, who has had his Timeless Child concept in mind since well before the revival. So when he rolled it out this season, it kind of depends a lot of reconning everything that's been set up in new Who.

None of which matters if it's written well and earned, of course, but that is a pretty wild decision.

I actually don't mind the Timeless Child idea in concept, at least the part where it would explore the origins of the time lords, but, it feels like 1/10th of a more complete idea.

User avatar
Thad
Posts: 13170
Joined: Tue Jan 21, 2014 10:05 am
Location: 1611 Uranus Avenue
Contact:

Re: Doctor Who

Postby Thad » Sat Mar 26, 2022 1:00 am

Mothra wrote:I do love reading Thad's slog through these, the worst Doctor Who episodes since like Davis' second season.


Davies's second season was way better. It had some dross, but School Reunion is good, The Girl in the Fireplace is an all-time classic, the Cybermen two-parter is great, The Impossible Planet/The Satan Pit and Army of Ghosts/Doomsday are both classic examples of stories that were solid but kinda fucked up the ending, and I'll even go to bat for Love and Monsters and say that I think it's in the same boat and would be more fondly remembered if the ending hadn't been so fucking gross.

I actually liked Flux, warts and all, but nah, Davies's second season was better. Or, I dunno, maybe they average out to about the same; Flux didn't have anything like the high of Girl in the Fireplace but it also didn't have anything as bad as The Idiot's Lantern or Fear Her.

Eve of the Daleks, though? At best, Chibnall simply wasn't up to the premise. He chose the sort of structurally ambitious hook that requires consistent rules, tight plotting, and attention to detail, and he simply wasn't willing to commit to any of those things. It's okay for a story like Flux not to make a whole lot of sense because it's a kitchen-sink plot, it's about being big and high-stakes, and while there's plenty to criticize about Flux, it does feel big and high-stakes. But Eve of the Daleks has a plot that's based on a set of explicitly-defined structural rules that it establishes in detail and then completely fucking ignores.

I was reading a thing about how Chibnall was very much an olde Doctor Whoe fan, who has had his Timeless Child concept in mind since well before the revival. So when he rolled it out this season, it kind of depends a lot of reconning everything that's been set up in new Who.

None of which matters if it's written well and earned, of course, but that is a pretty wild decision.

I actually don't mind the Timeless Child idea in concept, at least the part where it would explore the origins of the time lords, but, it feels like 1/10th of a more complete idea.


It's basically the Cartmel Masterplan. Which wasn't so much a masterplan, really, as a vague idea that the Doctor was one of the founders of Time Lord society alongside Rassilon and Omega.

I think it was a good fit at the time Cartmel was pitching it, which was the era of the Seventh Doctor, who was always played as a schemer who knew far more than he was letting on.

And the idea that the First Doctor wasn't really the first Doctor goes back at least as far as The Brain of Morbius.

But on the whole I'm kinda over the whole Chosen One thing; I like the Doctor better the way Moffat played him, as just a space vagabond who never intended to be somebody important but kinda stumbled into it.

The three showrunners of the modern era each had their forte. Davies grounded the series in the companions' present-day lives and the associated character drama. Moffat was best at complex, tightly-plotted time-travel stories. (He would have been ideal for the time-loop story in Eve of the Daleks. Chibnall was not.) I think Chibnall was really at his best when he was writing political polemics, but he abandoned those in his second season in favor of this mythology stuff, which...well, it has its moments. I like the Jo Martin Doctor, the Sacha Dhawan Master, the Time Lord Cybermen. There's some good stuff in there. But honestly I think the Chibnall run was at its best when the Doctor was fighting white supremacists. Truly a message for our times.

User avatar
Mothra
Woah Dangsaurus
Posts: 3963
Joined: Mon Jan 20, 2014 7:12 pm
Location: Boston, MA
Contact:

Re: Doctor Who

Postby Mothra » Sun Mar 27, 2022 3:06 pm

I do definitely agree that, both here and in general, the "Chosen One" storyline is vastly inferior to "regular person rises to become exceptional", every time.

You're right that Moffatt's Girl in the Fireplace is an all-timer, and Graeme Harper's cybermen two-parter was a good time. I guess what I meant is that it's a return to the Russell T Davies-penned episodes, which were pure shlock. I'm hoping that Davies stays mainly as the showrunner and has different people write the scripts, but, we'll see.

User avatar
Thad
Posts: 13170
Joined: Tue Jan 21, 2014 10:05 am
Location: 1611 Uranus Avenue
Contact:

Re: Doctor Who

Postby Thad » Mon Mar 28, 2022 12:30 am

I think a lot of Davies's episodes were solid, but he suffered from always having to top himself with more and more spectacle with each finale, he was bad at endings, and in particular he was bad at goodbyes.

User avatar
Mothra
Woah Dangsaurus
Posts: 3963
Joined: Mon Jan 20, 2014 7:12 pm
Location: Boston, MA
Contact:

Re: Doctor Who

Postby Mothra » Mon Mar 28, 2022 11:44 am

Davies really seemed to think we found the extended families of each companion to be very interesting and charming and worthy of repeat returns as "bewildered Normal thrust into crazy events" throughout the run.

Looking at the list of eps he penned, I'm thinking the pretty solid ones would be:

  • Doomsday
  • The End of Time
  • The Christmas Invasion
  • Voyage of the Damned
  • The Runaway Bride
I'm of two minds about Davies. I feel like he rightly brought fun back to Doctor Who after a long, dismal period of trying to make it "adult", and as shlocky as it got, he really did embrace that part of Who that never resists trying an idea, even if the special effects are nowhere close to being up to the task. Hell, the farting aliens was good for a laugh here and there, just as an insane alien romp.

On the other hand, my actual favorite Doctor Who eps are things like Boneless, Hide, Blink, Terminus, Listen... episodes with a creepy-ass setting and unsettling sci-fi premise, but driven by a Doctor that presents as aloof or goofy, if only to diffuse the terror. There's nothing in the Davies run that really approaches that characterization (I'm not counting eps he didn't write).

So definitely going to set my expectations accordingly for the upcoming run. There's fun to be had in going as insanely over the top as "End of Time" - an episode I enjoyed - it just requires a release of a lot of things I love about Doctor Who.

User avatar
Thad
Posts: 13170
Joined: Tue Jan 21, 2014 10:05 am
Location: 1611 Uranus Avenue
Contact:

Re: Doctor Who

Postby Thad » Mon Mar 28, 2022 1:36 pm

Mothra wrote:On the other hand, my actual favorite Doctor Who eps are things like Boneless, Hide, Blink, Terminus, Listen... episodes with a creepy-ass setting and unsettling sci-fi premise, but driven by a Doctor that presents as aloof or goofy, if only to diffuse the terror. There's nothing in the Davies run that really approaches that characterization (I'm not counting eps he didn't write).

I'd say Midnight is pretty close to that description, but the Doctor's not aloof in that one.

User avatar
Thad
Posts: 13170
Joined: Tue Jan 21, 2014 10:05 am
Location: 1611 Uranus Avenue
Contact:

Re: Doctor Who

Postby Thad » Sun May 08, 2022 1:15 pm

New ‘Doctor Who’ star is ‘Sex Education’ actor Ncuti Gatwa

...is an AP wire story appearing in the Washington Post and I don't think any of us saw that coming in 2005. Let alone before that.

Niku
Posts: 1808
Joined: Mon Jan 20, 2014 11:23 pm

Re: Doctor Who

Postby Niku » Sun May 08, 2022 4:14 pm

also if you've seen sex education you know why this is really really good news. ncuti is fuckin excellent.
Image

User avatar
Thad
Posts: 13170
Joined: Tue Jan 21, 2014 10:05 am
Location: 1611 Uranus Avenue
Contact:

Re: Doctor Who

Postby Thad » Mon Jun 20, 2022 4:32 pm

Big Finish:

Permanent price cuts to serials 101-150 of the Monthly Adventures. The only ones in that bunch that I've listened to are The Word Lord, which was already free, and its followup A Death in the Family, which is one of my favorites.

They've also got five award-nominated box sets on sale, including The Ninth Doctor Adventures vol 2 and vol 3 for $20 each (down from $30).

User avatar
Thad
Posts: 13170
Joined: Tue Jan 21, 2014 10:05 am
Location: 1611 Uranus Avenue
Contact:

Re: Doctor Who

Postby Thad » Sun Oct 23, 2022 8:30 pm

Got damn, Davies is going to have to work hard to out-kitchen sink that.

User avatar
Thad
Posts: 13170
Joined: Tue Jan 21, 2014 10:05 am
Location: 1611 Uranus Avenue
Contact:

Re: Doctor Who

Postby Thad » Sun Oct 23, 2022 8:32 pm

"Jesus, this is the third time I've regenerated into this guy."

User avatar
Thad
Posts: 13170
Joined: Tue Jan 21, 2014 10:05 am
Location: 1611 Uranus Avenue
Contact:

Re: Doctor Who

Postby Thad » Mon Dec 19, 2022 8:17 pm

The Guardian: Ncuti Gatwa’s vintage Doctor Who look honours show’s 60-year history

Image

You can't see it because his hands are in his pockets, but the article says he has Gallifreyan letters on his fingernails too.

User avatar
Thad
Posts: 13170
Joined: Tue Jan 21, 2014 10:05 am
Location: 1611 Uranus Avenue
Contact:

Re: Doctor Who

Postby Thad » Wed Dec 21, 2022 12:13 pm

Rumor is there's a series, or even multiple series, coming that focus on the monsters without the Doctor. It's plausible -- Davies has spoken about using Marvel and Star Wars as templates for the Whoniverse, and now that Disney+ is taking over as the series' distributor in the US, I have to figure there have at least been conversations about it.

I really liked the ending of the last special (and, for those who still haven't seen it, spoilers:) with the support group for former companions, and there's definitely some spinoff potential there. Not that you need to limit it to present-day Earth; there's no reason you couldn't do an anthology-style series that has episodes featuring the Paternoster Gang or River or Rose or whoever. Hell, let's work in some characters from the ancillary media, maybe bring in Bernice Summerfield. And if there's anybody who wants to be involved but isn't up for doing it in live-action, there's always animation. (It was delightful to see William Russell in the latest special, but dude is 98 years old, and some of the other cast members are getting up there too.)

I doubt we'll see anything like the current Marvel/Star Wars saturation where there's practically always a series running in one or the other, but Doctor Who managed to sustain two simultaneous spinoffs the last time Davies was in charge, and I wouldn't be surprised to see that happen again.

User avatar
Thad
Posts: 13170
Joined: Tue Jan 21, 2014 10:05 am
Location: 1611 Uranus Avenue
Contact:

Re: Doctor Who

Postby Thad » Sat Mar 11, 2023 1:16 pm

So I took a day trip yesterday and finally got around to listening to the first Eccleston Big Finish serial.

Ravagers
Ninth Doctor with a companion named Nova who is, so far, a one-off
Written by Nicholas Briggs

So of course it took a confluence of factors to convince Eccleston to come back and do more Doctor Who. One of those factors is, this is a really good script. I wouldn't put it among the top tier of Big Finish serials, but it's quite solid; it's a briskly-paced story with some effective use of time travel and a villain who's more complex than they initially seem.

I listened to a little bit of the behind-the-scenes stuff and Briggs explained that the decision to forego the obvious -- a Ninth Doctor story with Rose and maybe Captain Jack, both of whom have worked with Big Finish already -- was a creative choice, and I think it was the right one. I wouldn't mind having them show up for a reunion story at some point along the line, but Briggs notes that, in hindsight, when the Doctor meets Rose he's already approaching the end of his life, and it's more interesting to explore the period before that (which could span hundreds of years, for all we know, as long as we ignore one throwaway line in "Rose" that implies he's recently regenerated) than to tell more stories set in the short time we've already seen.

Of course the most important part of all this is Eccleston himself. It's great to hear him back in the role, and by all accounts he's having a blast. I mean, we know that if he didn't want to be there he wouldn't keep coming back.

Oh, and also it's got Dan Starkey as Marcus Aurelius, and he plays him pretty much exactly like he plays Strax.

All in all, I liked Ravagers a lot. Its $36 asking price is a little much for three one-hour episodes (plus extras). I think I got it on sale for $20, which feels more like it.

User avatar
Thad
Posts: 13170
Joined: Tue Jan 21, 2014 10:05 am
Location: 1611 Uranus Avenue
Contact:

Re: Doctor Who

Postby Thad » Thu Apr 20, 2023 11:45 am

@bbcdoctorwho:
What and when is going on here? [film projector emoji]

A first look at the Doctor and Ruby, as they arrive in the swinging 60s! Filming continues on the new series of #DoctorWho

Image

User avatar
Mongrel
Posts: 21290
Joined: Mon Jan 20, 2014 6:28 pm
Location: There's winners and there's losers // And I'm south of that line

Re: Doctor Who

Postby Mongrel » Thu Apr 20, 2023 2:07 pm

On one hand British shows sure love going back to the 60's, but on the other hand, the 60's were just about the only time in a thousand years you could call Britain 'cool'.
Image

User avatar
Thad
Posts: 13170
Joined: Tue Jan 21, 2014 10:05 am
Location: 1611 Uranus Avenue
Contact:

Re: Doctor Who

Postby Thad » Thu Apr 20, 2023 4:09 pm

Thad wrote:Frobisher, a shape-shifting penguin created by Steve Parkhouse and John Ridgway

...huh. Don't know why it took me this long to realize where I know Steve Parkhouse's name from.

He's the co-creator of Resident Alien (with writer Peter Hogan).

User avatar
Thad
Posts: 13170
Joined: Tue Jan 21, 2014 10:05 am
Location: 1611 Uranus Avenue
Contact:

Re: Doctor Who

Postby Thad » Thu Nov 09, 2023 11:52 am

The Roof of the World
Fifth Doctor, Peri, Erimem
Written by Adrian Rigelsford

So, the problem with this one is, I don't know who the fuck Erimem is. It's one of those stories that relies pretty heavily on the audience having some kind of emotional investment in a particular character, and I don't. As far as telling me everything I need to know to understand what her background is, I think it does fine at that, but catching me up on her backstory isn't the same thing as making me care.

So I'm not sure how much I would have liked it if I had the proper background, but I can recommend against listening to it cold, without any prior introduction to Erimem.

I can also say that there are some good ideas in there -- a companion apparently dying but actually being spirited away to somewhere slightly out-of-sync so that the Doctor can't see her; the depiction of a British adventurer archetype as a buffoon -- but it also suffers from a weak last act, with the Doctor himself commenting, in dialogue, on what a cliche the bad guy is.

Maybe this is a good serial if you've got the background, but it didn't do much for me.

User avatar
Thad
Posts: 13170
Joined: Tue Jan 21, 2014 10:05 am
Location: 1611 Uranus Avenue
Contact:

Re: Doctor Who

Postby Thad » Tue Nov 21, 2023 12:29 am



So we're serious about this "Fourteenth Doctor" business, huh? Grover Cleveland-ass shit...

User avatar
Mothra
Woah Dangsaurus
Posts: 3963
Joined: Mon Jan 20, 2014 7:12 pm
Location: Boston, MA
Contact:

Re: Doctor Who

Postby Mothra » Wed Nov 22, 2023 1:45 pm

Yeah I was... hoping this was going to be a one-off thing to introduce the next doctor.

We'll see I guess - decently fun little short!

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 14 guests