Doctor Who

[Thad]

Also: nice nod to the spinoff media in Jack waxing nostalgic about all the wonders he got to see during his travels with the Doctor. As far as we saw on the TV show, those wonders consisted of "21st century Earth" and "satellite where they're making game shows where people get killed"; we've got a pretty clear allusion here that he traveled with the Doctor for a lot longer than those two trips.

I know there have been some Ninth Doctor comics that featured Jack, and I assume there are novels and short stories too. And while AFAIK Big Finish hasn't released casting details yet for its upcoming Ninth Doctor series aside from "We got Eccleston", I'd be pretty surprised if Piper and Barrowman weren't involved.

[Thad]

The first of Big Finish's Ninth Doctor Adventures release has a title and a cast. The title is Ravagers and I'm a little surprised to see the cast includes neither Billie Piper nor John Barrowman (though there are still three more of these to come and I wouldn't be surprised if they showed up in one of the later sets). It looks like there's a new companion named Nova (Camilla Beeput) who I bet we'll be hearing more of in future sets. And it's got Dan Starkey in it, though he's not playing Strax.

[Thad]

Short episodes The Word Lord and An Eye for Murder are currently free.

I'm not familiar with Eye for Murder, but Word Lord is a good solid little story, and it introduces the villain who later appears in A Death in the Family, which is one of my favorite Doctor Who stories in any medium.

[Thad]

The first of Big Finish's Ninth Doctor Adventures release has a title and a cast. The title is Ravagers and I'm a little surprised to see the cast includes neither Billie Piper nor John Barrowman (though there are still three more of these to come and I wouldn't be surprised if they showed up in one of the later sets).

Evidently not, per the latest episode details. Looks like all four releases take place prior to Rose. Ah well -- fantastic to have Eccleston back anyway, and I hope vol 4 isn't the last we'll be hearing from him.

(It appears that there *will* be a familiar companion in this set, though: the Brigadier, played by Jon Culshaw, who's been playing the role at Big Finish for a couple of years now.)

Meanwhile, there's a Master sale on. I haven't heard most of these, but Unbound: Sympathy for the Devil is good. (It's a parallel-universe story with David Warner as an alternate version of the Third Doctor. Helps if you know a little bit of Third Doctor lore.) And I quite liked what I've heard of The Diary of River Song Series 05; I still haven't listened to the last part (with Jacobi), but thoroughly enjoyed the first three (with Gomez, Beevers, and Roberts).

Also I've never listened to Master but it routinely makes best-of lists and it's currently $1.49. (Not to be confused with Master! with an exclamation point, which was just released and is not on sale.)

[Thad]

Colditz (Seven/Ace) combines two of my favorite Doctor Who formulas: it's timey-wimey and it features the Seventh Doctor manipulating everyone with an elaborate plan where everything falls into place at the end of the story.

It's tough to describe what I like about it without spoiling my favorite plot twists, but I'll say that I quite liked this one and leave it at that.

[Thad]

Seasons of Fear (Eight/Charley, written by Paul Cornell and Caroline Symcox)
This one combines a few of my favorite time travel/immortal tropes. In the twentieth century, a man named Grayle approaches the Doctor and informs him that they're old enemies -- and gloats that he's finally killed him and that his alien masters have conquered all of time and space.

The Doctor -- who's never seen Grayle before -- travels back in time to try to figure out exactly what's happened and stop it. He encounters Grayle as a young man in the days of the Roman Empire, and then follows him to the eleventh century, and then the nineteenth. The time jumps follow Grayle's descent into villainy; in Roman times he's not such a bad guy, just misguided, but centuries of watching everyone die around him (plus the malign influence of his masters) wear away at him until he no longer has any empathy or conscience.

There's some continuity in there, at the beginning and the end of the story, but the main plot is pretty well self-contained and I'd consider this a standalone story.

It's quite good! Cornell does good work as usual. This one's recommended.

[Thad]

Also: There's a bit in Seasons of Fear where someone mentions Ben Franklin, Charley says "The American president?" and the Doctor responds in the affirmative.

Now, this could be intended as a clue that the timeline has been altered...but I don't think it is, because it's never addressed again. I think it's likelier that this script somehow got from first draft all the way to production without anybody involved at any stage ever realizing that Ben Franklin was not a president.

Which I find kind of amusing, but on the other hand it's not like, as an American, I have more than the most cursory knowledge of British PMs. I can name four prior to Thatcher: Chamberlain, Churchill, Pitt the Elder --

[Friday]

Pretty sure I remember reading a poll where the majority of Americans thought he was a President when asked, so.

[KingRoyal]

He's on the $100 bill, the most important money denomination. Why would they put him there if he wasn't a president? Answer me that, Franklin-Truthers

[Büge]

it's all about the Benjamins

[zaratustra]

Pretty sure I remember reading a poll where the majority of Americans thought he was a President when asked, so.

Benjamin Franklin was 25 years older than the rest of the founding fathers crew so he was basically a bernie sanders with adhd

[nosimpleway]

"Benjamin Franklin was president" is such a politically incorrect thing to say

[Thad]

Bang-Bang-a-Boom! (Seven/Mel; written by Gareth Roberts and Clayton Hickman)

This one feels like it really wants to be one of those TV satire episodes of the Sixth Doctor era (like Vengeance on Varos, or whatever the Sixth Doctor's Dalek serial was called; Home Renovation of the Daleks or whatever), but it lacks the juice. It tries to simultaneously satirize Star Trek, Agatha Christie, singing competition shows, and mass entertainment in general, but it comes across as meandering, unfocused, and too cute.

The Star Trek parody, for example, never rises above the level of shallow reference humor, stuff like setting the story on a station called Dark Space Eight and having characters say things like "Remember that time we fought that mind-controlling alien but it turned out it was an ancient space probe?" There's no depth to it; it's just "Hey, remember Star Trek?"

The Agatha Christie formula works a lot better, and gives the whole story a murder-mystery structure to hang on. But it's not without its faults; it shunts Mel off into a bumbling sidekick role that really doesn't do her any favors and leaves her spending most of the serial endangering people by recklessly chasing after red herrings. I was hoping there was going to be some kind of metatextual twist to explain this away -- maybe there's some kind of alien intelligence forcing everyone into these tropes, and that's why Mel keeps acting like an idiot -- but no, it never comes. There is a narrative reason for Mel to be an idiot for most of the story, but it's just to put a couple failures in her path so that when we get to the end and she figures something out that nobody else did and saves the day, it's more of an arc. But it didn't work for me; mostly it just made me hate Mel in this story.

There are some good bits where it plays with the format -- cliches like a "dun-dun-DUNNNN!" musical sting they really milk for all it's worth, and a record-scratch sound effect at one point -- and the last part of the serial is a lot more focused and satisfying than the rest of it. It's got a pretty solid ending, but takes a long walk to get there.

I didn't love this one but I didn't hate it; it's currently on sale and for $1.49 you could do a lot worse.

...and now I'm looking at the credits and realizing the reason I kept thinking "God, Queen Angvia sounds just like Magenta" is that she is Magenta. So hey, one more mystery solved.

(As opposed to Dr. Harcourt, who sounds a lot like Tress MacNeille but in her case I'm willing to bet good money it's because she learned her American accent from recordings of Tress MacNeille. It's one of those Doctor Who American accents that's slightly off, slips into British pronunciations of words like "status" and drops R's, but hey, this is a future-set serial; why not have weird cross-Atlantic hybrid accents in the future?)

[Friday]

cross-Atlantic hybrid accents

Not for nothing, Gillian Anderson has both accents and can switch between them at will. She was born in Chicago, but grew up in London and Grand Rapids, Michigan.

When asked which accent she considers her "natural" accent, she replied that it was really both. I don't really see any cross contamination like you're describing, though, both sound entirely authentic.

[Thad]

cross-Atlantic hybrid accents

Not for nothing, Gillian Anderson has both accents and can switch between them at will. She was born in Chicago, but grew up in London and Grand Rapids, Michigan.

When asked which accent she considers her "natural" accent, she replied that it was really both. I don't really see any cross contamination like you're describing, though, both sound entirely authentic.

Yeah, as far as Who-connected actors, John Barrowman's a good example; he was born in Scotland and moved to the US when he was 8, and he's comfortable switching back and forth between accents.

And even among British folks who didn't grow up here, there are plenty who can pull off convincing American accents (and vice-versa). I bought Martin Freeman as a Minnesotan on Fargo.

Sabina Franklyn in Bang-Bang-a-Boom! is more one of those actors who does a pretty good job of it, good enough that a local audience probably wouldn't pick up the false notes. She's got a good ear and she's done her homework, but listening to accent tutorials only gets you so far. (FWIW I'm probably the same way as far as the handful of British accents I can imitate -- most Americans probably wouldn't pick up what I'm doing wrong but it would be immediately obvious to anyone who's actually from the region in question.)

[Mongrel]

Hugh Laurie is always the first person I can think of when that subject comes up. So many of his earlier British roles were comedic and had him emphasizing his British accent to the point of absurdity, making his acerbic American roles that much more striking. Going from Blackadder to House is one hell of a demonstration of an actor's range.

[Thad]

I've noticed other British actors playing American roles who affect pretty much exactly Laurie's voice on House (looking at you, Benedict Cumberbatch). It kinda makes me wonder if they're imitating Laurie directly or that's just a "generic American accent" that's currently vogue among British thespians.

[Mongrel]

It's possible they actually asked him directly for advice.

[Thad]

Project: Lazarus (Six/Seven/Evelyn, written by Cavan Scott and Mark Wright)

The Doctor has found a cure for Cassie's vampirism, but Nimrod and the Forge okay I have no idea who the fuck any of these people are or why I'm supposed to care. It turns out this is a followup to a previous serial, Project: Twilight, which I haven't listened to. And that really bogs down the first two episodes. The writers do a perfectly decent job of catching me up to what's happened, but there's a difference between explaining the plot and making me give a fuck. Also, not for nothin', the first episode is largely spent on red herrings that never come up again. (At least, not in this serial; apparently there are more in the series, including Project: Valhalla, Project: Destiny, and Project: Nirvana, so maybe the stuff that gets shunted aside after the end of part 1 comes back later, in another story that doesn't work unless you've heard the previous part?)

It all builds toward a big emotional climax in part 2 that just left me cold. I almost stopped there, but I'm glad I didn't, because the last two parts are excellent. I don't want to give too much away, but the format is split; the first two episodes feature the Sixth Doctor and Evelyn, and then in the last two, the Seventh Doctor returns some time later. I like this kind of story, and appreciate that it's really only practical in the spinoff media, not on the TV show. (And I also like the little touches, like changing the theme music; Six gets one arrangement of the theme and Seven gets another.)

And there's some really fantastic work by Colin Baker.

As for a recommendation? Recommended, but only if you've already listened to Project: Twilight. (Which I hear is good!)

[Thad]

Davros (Six, written by Lance Parkin)

My favorite Sixth Doctor stories are the ones that offer up biting satire of capitalism. My favorite Davros stories are the ones that show he has a glimmer of humanity -- and actively rejects it. This story is both, and it's damn good.

Davros is revived from cryogenic slumber by a more mundane evil: Arnold Baynes, a corporate CEO looking to use Davros's genius to make money, and his wife Lorraine, the stock character who insists that the most evil person in the universe is just misunderstood.

Meanwhile, we get a series of flashbacks, told out of order, examining Davros's backstory. There are several places where he seems sympathetic (his rant about the needless suffering and death caused by capitalism is a highlight), but then of course the other shoe drops and reveals him as an even bigger monster than he seems.

Davros is not a sociopath; he's something worse. He has a conscience. He has regrets and nightmares and he's tormented by the things he's done. And he pushes all that down, dismisses it as irrational emotion, and keeps on doing what he does.

Baynes, on the other hand? He's a sociopath. Like Davros, he cloaks his self-centeredness in lofty language about the greater good; unlike Davros, he never takes a moment's reflection on the monstrous things he's done. He's one of those villains who's trying to cut a deal to the very end.

It's a great character piece, dark and haunting. Recommended.