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Doctor Who "The Age of Steel" Series 2, Episode 6 Can I just say one thing, before I even get into this review? The Cybermen are a stupid loving antagonist. They look stupid, they act stupid, they are stupid. The way they kill people, by giving them a friendly pat on the shoulder? Stupid. Their catchphrases? Stupid. They are a bad anatagonist and having the entire episode be built around them and their supposed narrative threat is a massive misstep, since they come off as just, well, stupid the entire time they're onscreen. Which is a major problem in this episode, to be quite honest. Having the ludicrously, horrifically bad Cybermen as the major antagonists for the episode constantly threatens to completely derail the show as it goes on. And for the first half of "Age of Steel", it's exactly that: a derailed, wandering mess of an episode of Doctor Who. Even from the very first shot, the very first action in the episode, it's completely idiotic: as The Doctor and co are closed in on by the Cybermen, who are threatening to "DELETE" them all, The Doctor hooks up his energy cell...thing to his Sonic Screwdriver and destroys all of them. I knew that the resolution to the cliffhanger from "Rise of the Cybermen" was gonna be some hamhanded, rear end-pully nonsense, because every single resolution of every single cliffhanger (including, yes, "The Doctor Dances"' cliffhanger resolution) for the show up until now has been that way, but even by that low standards this was an especially offensive resolution. This was Doctor Who blatantly flipping off the audience of the show who, despite all odds and reason, got invested in the cliffhanger ending. It's just nonsense, pure and utter nonsense. Which is essentially what the first half of this episode is. The first part of the two-parter was supposed to be exposition and setup, but was really neither, because there was so little necessary exposition- they're in an alternate world that's essentially exactly the same as ours except zeppelins exist and everyone wears bluetooth headsets. Okay, done. So, instead, "Rise of the Cybermen" boiled down to an episode where all the main characters wandered around doing, essentially, nothing whatsoever and as a result we had two of the three main plots- if you could call them that -of the episode focus on loving Rickey and Lumic. In a way, "The Age of Steel" had a lot to overcome to be decent, let alone good; "Rise" left it with nothing beyond a cliffhanger resolved in the first ten seconds of the episode, and it shows: The first half of the episode is about the squad escaping the Cybermen, resulting in Rickey's hilariously ignominious death from being unable to climb a loving fence well. We watch more scenes of Lumic harrumphing and chewing the hell out of every available scenery until his weaselly lackey attempts to kill him for no adequately explained reason- he seemed to have no real issue with Lumic's plans before, so why start now? -and then Lumic is also ignominiously "killed" and reborn as a Cyberman to save his life. It's just such a bizarre plot choice. Why kill off the two characters you spent the most time on in the previous episode within the first ten minutes of the episode? It called every decision of "Rise" into greater scrutiny because so much of the first quarter of this episode is spent destroying any narrative threads they built; Lumic is built up and built up (utterly ineptly, but still built up) as this huge threat, so why have him undone by some no-name flunkie over being able to finally confront The Doctor at the climax of the episode in a form that allows him to emote in some way? Why spend all this time on contrasting Rickey and Mickey (again, utterly ineptly), building up Rickey as this ruthless badass only to undercut it all by showing that he's one giant pussywillow, in trouble with the government over parking tickets, the organization he founded revealed to be virtual unknowns? And then, why have Rickey killed off in such a laughably pathetic way? None of the plot developments in this episode make any real sense, especially viewed as the closing act of a two-parter. These two episodes don't even feel like a narrative whole in any real way; it just feels like two completely disparate episodes of television that happen to share the same, stupid antagonist. In any case The Doctor et al, sans Rickey, all arrive at the big factory where all the Cybermen are being manufactured, as Lumic has used his mind-controlling earbuds to order the people of London to stream into the plant to be euphemistically "upgraded". Rose and Pete decide to sneak in and blend in as volunteers, to look for Jackie; The Doctor and the female other member of the Guardians, I can't remember her name she was so bland, decide to sneak into the factory to destroy it, and Mickey and Jake, the other male member of the Guardians whose name I can only remember because it was mentioned a lot, decide to head to the top of the factory to take out the transmitter. And, again, it's the same song only with a different verse, as these three different plots essentially boil down to a lot of aimless wandering and very little happening. The Doctor and whatshername have a conversation about her life, which was so intensely dull and pointless I didn't even bother to remember her name. Mickey and Jake go around waving bottles at guards. Rose and Pete have to, intentionally, not do anything and act emotionless and mind-controlled, so you can imagine how much of a riot that was to watch onscreen. Although, this led to some of the best acting of Billie Piper's career as she, by necessity, had to be wooden and awkward. It was an incredible performance, I swear she must be method or something. It's at about this point, the halfway point, that the show starts turning good despite itself. The Doctor and Whatshername down a Cyberman and disable its emotional inhibitor, only to find out that the brain operating it was a bride-to-be who still thought it was the night before her wedding day. It was an emotional, gut-wrenching scene even despite (or maybe because of) the Cyberman's flat voice performance: 's repetition of the phrase "It's so cold." still got to me, and the sort of horrifying inhumanity of forcing a living human brain into this metal husk, then stripping it of all emotion still was affecting, even if Cybermen are a terrible antagonist, I mean really, Jesus Christ are they so bad. The scene still ends with The Doctor realizing he can disable all the Cybermen's emotional inhibitors to destroy them, which although smart and logical is also still an enormously horrific thing to do, considering you're condemning hundreds, possibly thousands of sentient beings to become insane and suicidal, and the tone that the episode treats the revelation- with The Doctor essentially jumping for joy before Tennant tries to sell a moment of pathos about what he's about to do -is completely off and makes The Doctor look like a loving sociopath, especially when Tennant completely fails at conveying any sense of real moral conflict in the action he's about to take. In any case Mickey and Jake make it on board the zeppelin that controls the transceiver, as Rose, Pete, and The Doctor (whatshername was killed off; who cares) are all bunched up to meet Lumicbot, and it's at this point the episode finally becomes decent. Watching The Doctor subtly tell Mickey exactly what's necessary, as Tennant monologues and cavorts around the screen, is a pretty great sequence even despite the fact that Lumic as either a human or a Cyberman is terrible, or that the entire scene is a rehash of the sequence from "The Christmas Invasion" only with more chrome, or that it doesn't really make sense for a group of emotionless, coldly logical beings to let The Doctor clearly verbally stall for that long. Tennant throws himself into the sequence and it works despite itself, especially when he's able to deliver plum lines like "People! Ordinary stupid, brilliant PEOPLE." Maybe it's not good, maybe it doesn't really make any fuckin' sense when you think about it, but it's a bit of fun in an episode in desperate need of it. In any case The Doctor and his squad all win, and with ten minutes of the episode to boot! And that's when the episode turns into genuinely great. It's funny, because disconnected from the terrible plot or antagonists, disconnected from any real stakes, the writer of the episode turns in a really great script that has some great emotional moments. It's funny, too, because the plot is so threadbare as to be non-existent, and yet the albatross of serving this quote-on-quote- "throughline" must've been too much, and with it removed we get some genuinely great sequences. The standout was Rose, getting ready to leave in the TARDIS, finally telling Pete who she is, with this quick exchange: Rose: "Dad..." Pete: "Don't. Just, just don't." It was such a great, incredible sequence. A moment of genuine subtlety on Doctor Who, maybe the first time ever this has happened, able to convey so many layers of meaning in such a short two lines...just incredible. Having Pete just walk away, refusing to confront the by-definition impossibility that lay before him (especially as he's grieving the loss of his wife), and the devastating effect it has on Rose is just great. It's a perfect, emotional end to that arc that services both the plot and emotional stakes without selling out either character, doesn't go saccharine and creates a genuine, negative consequence to Rose's actions without objectifying her. Such a great loving moment, and I wish there were more like moments like this in Doctor Who. It really is just a perfect two lines, able to say exactly what it wants without overstaying its welcome. And finally, we get to the departure of Mickey Smith, temporary Companion of The Doctor for really no reason. He wasn't a great buddy, or even a good one- actually, he was almost always terrible -but his sendoff still works because, just for once in this episode, he's exceptionally competent and helpful without being a giant loving prat about it. Having him go with Jake just to prove that he's "not the tin dog" isn't the greatest character note ever, but it's a note that doesn't resolve around him being cartoonishly incompetent or whiny, and for that alone it should be acclaimed. During the episode, he's the source of the resolution to the major threats both during his plot and to the overall plot of the episode while still acting as a moral agent, so his decision to stay behind in the alternate universe and hunt down the remaining Cybermen factories and destroy them feels earned, and I have to admit I felt a pang of regret we wouldn't see any more of the ol' Micks. It especially helps that he finally recognizes how pathetic and utterly co-dependent and weirdly emotionally abusive his relationship with Rose is, and staying behind on the alternate Earth is both a good step for his individuality and also perhaps the only way in the loving universe he can, under no circumstances, ever have to interact with her ever again. As E/N likes to say, the only way you can get away from a bad relationship is to loving sever, which Mickey has in no uncertain terms. I mean heck, even his plan to ride around in a van with Jake hunting Cybermen is fun, if only because of the buddy cop antics those two knuckleheads are sure to get up to. So it's with all that said that I'm rather split on this episode. As the conclusion to a two-parter and especially as an episode of television, it is terrible; I mean truly wretched. But as ten to fifteen minutes of completely disconnected scenes between characters that I've grown to be invested in, it's absolutely great. So I really don't know what grave to give this episode; the parts of this episode I enjoyed, and mean really enjoyed, had almost nothing to do with the episode itself as a piece of serialized writing. This is a weird one to review. Grade: B Random Thoughts:
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Aug 29, 2014 03:57
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Toxxupation posted:The scene still ends with The Doctor realizing he can disable all the Cybermen's emotional inhibitors to destroy them, which although smart and logical is also still an enormously horrific thing to do, considering you're condemning hundreds, possibly thousands of sentient beings to become insane and suicidal, and the tone that the episode treats the revelation- with The Doctor essentially jumping for joy before Tennant tries to sell a moment of pathos about what he's about to do -is completely off and makes The Doctor look like a loving sociopath, especially when Tennant completely fails at conveying any sense of real moral conflict in the action he's about to take. Also, on a purely personal note, I can't believe I am now a person who posts on the internet about Dr. Who. It's so cold. So cold.
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Aug 29, 2014 04:21
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The Cybermen are poo poo apart from Spare Parts. They actually tried to claim this was inspired by Spare Parts but that's absolute bunk so gently caress'm. ... Would you believe that the guy who wrote this went on to wright one of the BEST episodes of Series 6?
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Aug 29, 2014 04:23
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Doctor Who "The Age of Steel" Series 2, Episode 6 So! Cybermen! Bit naff, aren't they? God, I love stealing slang from you English people. What the gently caress are you going to do in response, copy the lingua franca of New Jersey? Swallow a cheesesteak without chewing and scream the word "gently caress" at a mailbox for twenty minutes and you're already there. Not nearly as fun. The general discussion (for want of a better, far more demeaning word) in this thread has already covered much of what can be said about Cybermen, but I'll try to condense it a bit for the sake of this writeup. If the Doctor had a trinity of villains, three antagonists who get more screen-time and significance than any other, the Daleks would be point one, and the Cybermen point two (point three is yet to come, obviously, and Occ doesn't know about it, so hush, all of you). The Cybermen are a "race" of various sapient organisms assimilated into emotionless, uniform machine-people, and they are all totally stoked at the idea of making everything in the universe exactly like them. They share the central tenet of the Daleks, in that they desire to strip away freedom of choice and replace it with complete cultural homogeneity, but whereas the Daleks EX-TER-MI-NAAAAATE everything different from themselves, Cybermen incorporate others into their own number. Someone else said that if the Daleks were Nazis, Cybermen were basically mid-20th century Communists, and that seems like a fair analogy. I don't like Cybermen very much. Their design, while less bargain-basement than the Daleks, has little to recommend itself; they're big stompy robot-men with silly little tears etched into their eye-holes who kill primarily with handshakes. I do like the perfect chunk-chunk-chunk lock-step of their movement, which the show often exploits by ramming as many of them on-screen as possible, but besides that, Cybermen are amonst the most generic-looking bad guys in Doctor Who's roster. Their dialogue is flat, repetitive, non-threatening, and unengaging. Their weaknesses are frankly pathetic - killer handshakes aside, they're basically toasters that can cry themselves to death. And for beings of pure drive and emotionless logic, they are often astoundingly, even pitifully stupid, as evidenced by when they all stood around for about five minutes while the Doctor monologued the exact details of his grand, stupid plan to stop them all. But I'm getting ahead of myself. One point of interest about Cybermen is how wildly varied their origin has been from one appearance to the next. The Daleks pop up like omnicidal crabgrass, but their point of origin is always the same - they were genetically engineered by another crazy crippled gentlemen to hate and kill everything, and hate and kill everything they do. The Cybermen were initially sickly humanoids whose life-support equipment became so sophisticated and prevalent that it supplanted their whole biology; they then arrive at the conclusion that, since being mostly chrome made them feel so chipper, everyone else would like the same thing. Interesting in concept, though in practice they were extras in balaclavas with air conditioners strapped to their chests - still terribly lame. Their costume design didn't really improve with time, though, and they became a fifth-rate Borg after their first appearance. I think at one point they all lived on the moon and yes, they were weak to gold dust (paging Ron Paul). The fact that they continue to exist, in-continuity, with the same approximate design and motivations and wildly different origins almost suggests they're some kind of memetic force, like the repressed desire for Cybermen is always fighting to escape the mind of some crazy rich guy who thinks feelings are for babies. Fun theory. Never amounts to anything, though. It's not as if the Cybermen couldn't be menacing or unsettling on their own terms, and even this episode sort of brushes against it from time to time. The Doctor and Angela stalking through the underbelly of Lumic's HQ while ranks of Cybermen stare out blindly like space-age mannequins is briefly spooky, and Occ's already mentioned the Cyber-Bride (who was, if I recall correctly, originally scripted to be a twelve-year old girl. Not sure if that would've made the scene more effective or just plain farcical). "Age of Steel" is one of those episodes that's only briefly entertaining, and then always in spite of itself; the brief flashes of Cybermen menace amongst 45 minutes of stompy DE-LEEETE nonsense are just one example of that. There's a lot of half-assed espionage and derring-do that does nothing but take up time, the fact that Cyber-Jackie was able to just stumble across Pete and Rose in the midst of the entire population of London is loving ludicrous even by Who's standards, and seriously, Cybermen, other villains, everyone, you should know by now that whenever you have the Doctor cornered and he starts to talk, finish him quick, because he only shuts up when everyone other than him is dead. The Daleks at least have an excuse to mill about nervously whenever the Doctor monologues; for all their Nazi-tank swagger, they're legitimately terrified of the Doctor and shy away from taking him out unless they're absolutely certain they have every advantage. The Cybermen CANNOT FEEL FEAR, so they don't even have that excuse. Well, at least we say hail and farewell to Mickey, who as a Companion lasted slightly longer than the nerd who got an Ethernet port installed in his head. If anyone can shed light on just what the hell was happening in production with Mickey's tenure as a Companion, I'd appreciate it; it's always seemed to me like he was scripted in and viewer response to him was so negative that he was jettisoned immediately after. Rose still sticks around like a barnacle on a boat, but at least one member of her often-grating satellite cast has been bumped off. Well, one and a half. R.I.P, Jackie B. You will be remembered for your astonishing ability to pick two people out of a crowd of ten thousand, even as a big stupid stompy robot. Oxxidation fucked around with this message at 04:28 on Aug 29, 2014 |
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Aug 29, 2014 04:23
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And cut scene from this episode: After the others head off, Mickey gets in a truck with Rickey's minion Jake, noted mainly for having the worst most mid-90s hair ever. Jake reveals that he was Rickey's lover. The acting is beyond terrible.
MikeJF fucked around with this message at 04:43 on Aug 29, 2014 |
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Aug 29, 2014 04:39
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MikeJF posted:And cut scene from this episode: After the others head off, Mickey gets in a truck with Rickey's minion Jake, noted mainly for having the worst most mid-90s hair ever. Jake reveals that he was Rickey's lover. The acting is beyond terrible. To think of what would've happened if the "gay agenda" crowd had gotten whiff of Who back in the day.
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Aug 29, 2014 04:49
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Oxxidation posted:To think of what would've happened if the "gay agenda" crowd had gotten whiff of Who back in the day. Actually they kinda did! See, Big Gay Rusty actually had a Big Gay Agenda that permeated his work on Who. Basically he figured that Doctor Who is a family series enjoyed by families. Which means kids. Which means prime targets for his INSIDIOUS GAY AGENDA. Said Gay Agenda basically consisted of making a conspicuous effort to include queer secondary characters. This sounds innocuous, and it would've been if not for the fact that they were often very clumsily introduced. This arguably peaked with a Christmas Special which was weirdly influenced by Angels in America: A Gay Fantasia on National Themes. That episode made no sense and was terrible. This gay association goes back to Queer as Folk, where Stuart remembering the actors who played the Doctor (and the fact that Paul McGann doesn't count) was essential to proving that Stuart and Vince were meant for each other. While what he did was admirable from an ideological angle, it kinda hosed up the story. A lot. And pointing that out was enough to get you branded a homophobe way back when even if you were so gay that your cock sucks dicks.
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Aug 29, 2014 05:13
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Are we seriously discussing The Gay Agenda as if it were an actual thing, to be feared and avoided, here in the illustrious 2014?
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Aug 29, 2014 05:19
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Frankly, it's kinda homophobic and hosed up to pretend that that Rusty didn't have a conspicuous gay agenda. When you try to paint it as some imaginary straw-human being, you insult the work he was trying to do. It's a preemptive apology for the wrong thing. The gay agenda is not the problem. The problem is that he was often clumsy about how it turned out on screen, and I think it's entirely fair to argue that that's a result of trying to shoe-horn characters and themes in for ideological reasons. Then again, when he tried to do a properly queer episode, he turned out Voyage of the Damned, which is bizarrely influenced by Angels in America. So maybe doing a straight-on queer story is a bad idea.
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Aug 29, 2014 05:37
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What is the point of a work of art if not to express emotion or ideology? Malcolm Hulke was writing Communist sympathies into Doctor Who back in the 60s and 70s! And trust me on this, Captain Jack, as silly as he was, was pretty huge for that whole "bisexual representation" thing. RTD's era made extra effort to write background or bit-part characters as racial, social, and sexual minorities, which is absolutely commendable. If that's the "Gay Agenda", then more please.
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Aug 29, 2014 05:43
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Ol' RTD meant well, but his LGBT characters were often pretty clumsy, yeah. A lot of it is "ooh er, missus!" innuendo that paints being queer as something sort of naughty and strange. Jack's the biggest positive example, probably, or that one lady from that one good future episode everyone loves.
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Aug 29, 2014 05:54
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DoctorWhat posted:RTD's era made extra effort to write background or bit-part characters as racial, social, and sexual minorities, which is absolutely commendable. If that's the "Gay Agenda", then more please. While I agree his intentions are great the problem is that he can't write for poo poo, and bungled writing pretty much every sexually or racially diverse character in the show's history and in most instances didn't integrate these characteristics particularly well. There is basically only one gay relationship that was well written in this series' history and it was from Torchwood: Miracle Day of all things. Also I'll have words to say about this during Mickey's character wrap up if we get that far. Jack Harkness is the best by the way.
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Aug 29, 2014 05:55
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First off, Rusty's decision to include more minorities was part of of his queer agenda. He talks about it in The Writer's Tale, and it's been discussed by academics. Don't get me wrong. I'm gay. I like seeing gay people in media. I understand that the phrase "Gay Agenda" has baggage, but gently caress that. Rusty had a political agenda. It was a gay agenda. It was a progressive agenda when it came to gender and race. It was a very positive thing in science fiction. It was totally on point and he was a courageous and righteous person to pursue that. I'm gay and I like seeing representation of queer people on TV. I like to think that someday it'll be normalized enough that I can do all the things straight people do with their partners in public. But there are episodes where it seems like the gay characters are just there to check the box. I think that Rusty maybe should've been more careful about some of the times he inserted queer characters or about how lines that referenced queer characters were shot. I'd talk about when it worked and when it didn't in more depth, but we are kind of trying to avoid spoilers in this thread. Also I think it's really hosed up that people try to erase the fact that he had that agenda. Seriously, progressives. We should just own it.
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Aug 29, 2014 05:57
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I think it's worth having gay (and other minority) characters "just to check the box", is all. It's part of "normalizing", IMO - if there are going to be constant straight couples and straight characters all over the place, there should be a healthy number of LGBT characters, too! (man, RTD was not good at the T thing, though...)
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Aug 29, 2014 05:59
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DoctorWhat posted:
The only good portrayal of them that I've seen was in Orange is the New Black.
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Aug 29, 2014 06:06
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See, here's my thing, and I'm spoilering the whole thing because I can't meaningfully talk about it without spoilers. There's a very real difference between doing a queer story or including queer characters on the periphery and shoe-horning queer characters into an existing story for ideological reasons. I can think of examples of when Who has done all of the above under Davies. A good queer story? Look at Tommy in The Idiot's Lantern. The boy's a fag struggling with his family. Even his gran thinks he's too soft and needs a beating. But after his family's torn asunder by his father's anger problems and petty dictator bullshit, he sets out to build a new relationship with his family based on honesty and his own strength. That's a good gay story. As for when gay side characters work? gently caress. All of the companions under Rusty have gay friends who are just mentioned in passing. Sky from Midnight is getting over her wife. But there are also stories where it seems weirdly and awkwardly kludged in. A lot of people feel that way for the extended discussion of the Cassini 'Sisters' in Gridlock, and frankly I Think that the way that Davies processes Angels in America and shits out Voyage of the damned is hosed up and lazy. IT's all minor stuff, but that's part of why it's jarring. It doesn't correspond with what's around it. But yeah Davies is poo poo about Trans people. I mean Cassandra? What the gently caress? e: Also. Seriously. We should own Gay Agenda. Gay Agenda Now, Gay Agenda Tomorrow, Gay Agenda Forever. e2: Also I am seriously so mad about that episode I keep mentioning in spoilers. God drat it, it's a brilliant play and he fucks it all up so bad. Republican Vampire fucked around with this message at 06:13 on Aug 29, 2014 |
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Aug 29, 2014 06:08
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I never understood what the point of the alternate universe in these episodes was supposed to be. Like, alright, alternate universes are generally rubbish stories, but at least they normally have a fun concept like "This is the universe where everyone's evil" or "This is the universe where the bad guys won" or whatever. This is the alternate universe where everything's basically the same; why couldn't this have been set on regular earth? Alright, it's so you can reintroduce the Cybermen without getting bogged down in their existing continuity or lack thereof and not become reliant on references to the old series. Except the 'new' cybermen are exactly the same as the old cybermen? What's the drat point?! Even if the old cybermen weren't crap it'd be pointless! And then they bring in the old cybermen in later episodes anyway! I mean, it's not like the cybermen are a bad idea, it's just the execution that's always been poo poo. Start from scratch, redesign them to actually look menacing - or at least mobile - that's a good idea if you're really determined to bring them back. But no, we get the same b-grade robot suits, just now with a corporate logo. Wheee.
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Aug 29, 2014 06:09
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Republican Vampire posted:See, here's my thing, and I'm spoilering the whole thing because I can't meaningfully talk about it without spoilers. I have serious issues with that first story you mention under the spoiler bars, but we'll get to that when Occ does.
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Aug 29, 2014 06:13
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DoctorWhat posted:but we'll get to that when Occ does. Please bear that in mind and take your discussion to pms or the regular DW thread next time. No one wants to see big black walls in a no spoiler thread.
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Aug 29, 2014 06:15
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Zaggitz posted:Please bear that in mind and take your discussion to pms or the regular DW thread next time. No one wants to see big black walls in a no spoiler thread. I haven't posted anything in spoiler space in a dog's age - or is that just a general suggestion to the thread at large?
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Aug 29, 2014 06:16
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DoctorWhat posted:I have serious issues with that first story you mention under the spoiler bars, but we'll get to that when Occ does. It's next, isn't it? Either way, I just wanna make sure y'all understand where I'm coming from and that I'm not some homophobic weirdo that's mad about those drat dirty gays getting all up in my Doctor Who. It's very hard to criticize Davies about sexuality without coming off that way. e: Also buy plat so I can PM you instead of making GBS threads up this thread!
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Aug 29, 2014 06:17
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Angry Salami posted:I mean, it's not like the cybermen are a bad idea, it's just the execution that's always been poo poo. Start from scratch, redesign them to actually look menacing - or at least mobile - that's a good idea if you're really determined to bring them back. But no, we get the same b-grade robot suits, just now with a corporate logo. Wheee. Every time I think about how to redesign the Cybermen better and show off their fusion between man and machine, I just end up dreaming up a Borg rip-off costume.
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Aug 29, 2014 06:18
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Just do this made out of parts that you have a budget for: See those stretched-cloth faces? Those horrifying rubber-ringed empty eyes and mouths? Those mottled, decaying fleshy hands? Put half the budget that the Iron Man suits get into refining that and you'll have kids scrambling behind the sofa. The big accordion-chests and silly hats can get slimmed down, of course, but make them look wrong. The vacuum-sealed jumpsuits and exoskeletons supporting necrotic bone and mummified flesh. IT'S SO SIMPLE, FOR CHRIST'S SAKE!
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Aug 29, 2014 06:22
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DoctorWhat posted:I haven't posted anything in spoiler space in a dog's age - or is that just a general suggestion to the thread at large? General suggestion, of course.
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Aug 29, 2014 06:30
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Oxxidation posted:If anyone can shed light on just what the hell was happening in production with Mickey's tenure as a Companion, I'd appreciate it; it's always seemed to me like he was scripted in and viewer response to him was so negative that he was jettisoned immediately after. Something that it'd probably help to know is that the only British drama shows that air episodes while others are still in production are the soaps. Everyone else, you shoot some material, you edit it, you air it, then you see what people think, then if you and the channel controller both want to, you make some more. The indispensable A Brief History of Time (Travel) doesn't say anything, which indicates that everything involving Mickey this year proceeded according to the original plan in such a dull fashion that it wasn't worth mentioning; the idea was always to join, have him grow, and then leave again. Possibly RTD wanted to show an accelerated "standard companion" lifecycle to establish another convention of the show?
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Aug 29, 2014 10:44
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Republican Vampire posted:This gay association goes back to Queer as Folk, where Stuart remembering the actors who played the Doctor (and the fact that Paul McGann doesn't count) was essential to proving that Stuart and Vince were meant for each other. This "gay association" goes back to the fact that Doctor Who fandom in the nineties (especially) was incredibly gay.
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Aug 29, 2014 12:33
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DoctorWhat posted:What is the point of a work of art if not to express emotion or ideology? Malcolm Hulke was writing Communist sympathies into Doctor Who back in the 60s and 70s! It's worth noting that same is true for Sarah Jane Aventures, (although they were more than bit parts!) what with Clyde and Rani being the main cast for the bulk of the run. Luke was originally supposed to be gay, but they dropped it for some reason.
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Aug 29, 2014 15:04
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I don't normally talk about this with people because I always feel rather embarrassed about Doctor Who of all things being such a ridiculously big deal for me but I think it's worth adding to the conversation. For all you want to say about it being clumsy or whatever, the gay stuff in Doctor Who was literally life changing for me. I was 15 when Doctor Who first came back in 2005. A sheltered gay kid from a conservative, Baptist household. Very confused about his sexuality, still guilty and sort-of in denial about it and going through a really rough time mental health wise. Doctor Who was the first thing I ever saw with gay characters and relationships in it. Not just the first thing to ever treat it as normal or in a positive fashion but the first thing ever. Everything prior to that had just been a few warnings from my family and church about sinners and perverts and secret, guilt-ridden midnight wanking about fantasies of Spider-man. So when Doctor Who came along I don't even have the words to describe just how much of an amazing, beautiful shock it gave to my entire worldview. How amazing it was to see people talking about how Jack kissed the Doctor and how it was great that they had included it. How it introduced the idea for the very first time that there wan't something wrong with me. Doctor Who, Captain Jack in particular, is what finally allowed me to realise that I was gay and that it's not a bad thing. As clumsy or awkward as you guys think it may have been it's never going to change just how overwhelmingly grateful I am to them for that.
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Aug 29, 2014 17:30
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Captain Fargle posted:and secret, guilt-ridden midnight wanking about fantasies of Spider-man. You might enjoy the Legend of Korra or Community threads. Realtalk though, thanks for sharing that, it's really cool to hear that kind of perspective on the matter.
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Aug 29, 2014 17:45
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That's a really nice story Captain Fargle and totally in the spirit of the show's promoting hope and fun in the face of cruel authority. 
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Aug 29, 2014 17:47
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I thought a lot of the complainants about RTD "Gay Agenda" at the time is it came off as being so horribly written for the most part (as so much of Who is) but in a way it seemed more shoehorned into the plot. This of course got a whole lot worse on Torchwood.
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Aug 29, 2014 17:52
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sbaldrick posted:I thought a lot of the complainants about RTD "Gay Agenda" at the time is it came off as being so horribly written for the most part (as so much of Who is) but in a way it seemed more shoehorned into the plot. This of course got a whole lot worse on Torchwood. I'd say it's a combination of clumsy writing and plain old culture shock; if characters were wandering off to schmooze a smokin' dame every five minutes then it'd just come off as quaint and crazy sexist, but drop n' swap that for same-sex relationships and the unfamiliarity of the whole thing might make it seem incongruous to some viewers. It never particularly bothered me, insofar as I mainly like to read and write about relationships that are horribly co-dependent and self-destructive for both parties and Doctor Who is Not That Kind Of Show (Mostly [If You Squint A Bit]).
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Aug 29, 2014 18:01
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Bicyclops posted:It's worth noting that same is true for Sarah Jane Aventures, (although they were more than bit parts!) what with Clyde and Rani being the main cast for the bulk of the run. Luke was originally supposed to be gay, but they dropped it for some reason. They dropped it because Liz passed away. It was going to be a plot point in the latter half of Season 5- he'd gotten a boyfriend while at college. Other plans left tragically unfinished included the return of Ace in Season 6 - along with the Seventh Doctor! - and the reveal that the shop guy from the half-season 5 was a Time Lord in hiding.
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Aug 29, 2014 18:06
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Oxxidation posted:I'd say it's a combination of clumsy writing and plain old culture shock; if characters were wandering off to schmooze a smokin' dame every five minutes then it'd just come off as quaint and crazy sexist, but drop n' swap that for same-sex relationships and the unfamiliarity of the whole thing might make it seem incongruous to some viewers. It never particularly bothered me, insofar as I mainly like to read and write about relationships that are horribly co-dependent and self-destructive for both parties and Doctor Who is Not That Kind Of Show (Mostly [If You Squint A Bit]). I don't know if it was the culture shock or more that a bunch of TV critics watched Queer and Folk and figured that RTD was going to at least try to bring that inclusiveness to Who but instead everything felt shoehorned in.
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Aug 29, 2014 18:44
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Oxxidation posted:relationships that are horribly co-dependent and self-destructive This is Ten and Rose in a nutshell
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Aug 29, 2014 21:08
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If it weren't for Series 5 spoilers in this video I would have totally believed that OP was Soren Bowie after listening to this: http://www.cracked.com/video_19026_its-time-to-retire-doctor-who.html It not only addresses so many of the same flaws in the same ways Toxx is but up until those Series 5 spoilers in the video it honestly feels like the writer only got up to "Tooth and Claw." That's either a giant coincidence or some Cracked interns are reading this thread and getting paid to paraphrase. I thought that the readers of this thread, but not Toxx because of the Series 5 spoilers in this video would like to see it.
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Aug 29, 2014 21:30
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Toxxupation posted:I saw the first four episodes of the eccleston doctor which everyone told me to start with
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Aug 29, 2014 21:51
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What the gently caress happened to me
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Aug 29, 2014 21:53
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Toxxupation posted:What the gently caress happened to me Oh Occ 
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Aug 29, 2014 21:54
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| # ? May 17, 2024 21:56 |
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Toxxupation posted:What the gently caress happened to me Welcome to Hell. You may now appreciate Big Finish and understand what the gently caress a penguin is doing on the TARDIS.
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Aug 29, 2014 21:56
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