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DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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Tiggum posted:

Also, why does it have a blue light on it now?

Merchandising. In fact, after the original prop kept breaking, they replaced it with one based on the toy mold (not a literal toy though, just with kid-toy levels of structural integrity).

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DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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The call to Rose's mom pays off, to a degree, in a later episode - but I have a feeling you won't be charitable to other parts of that same episode, so whatever.

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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Dirt posted:

I love this thread, and I really can't wait for the write up on Aliens of London/World War 3. Easily the worst episodes of New Doctor Who ever, and probably right up there in the whole 50 years of stories.


Every time I watch Series 1 I feel sorta sad that Christopher Eccleston got handed so many garbage scripts for his short run. I really liked him as the Doctor, but I can honestly only stand to watch about 4 or 5 of his episodes.

The next episode coming up is way worse than Aliens of World War 3, if only for how disgustingly xenophobic it is. For all of AoL/WW3's faults (and it has plenty) it also has some decent-to-great scenes and sets up one of my favorite episodes later in the season.

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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One Swell Foop posted:

Aliens/WW3 has good bits for fans, but also some pretty unforgivably dire stuff in it though. I suspect the alphabet won't go deep enough to express EPA's unhappiness. There's a good reason the director was never allowed near the franchise again. And apparently hasn't done anything of note since, according to Wikipedia.

Well, there's lots of reasons Keith Boak wasn't invited back, including, apparently, a row with Eccleston over what Eccleston perceived as lovely treatment of production crew. He also directed Rose and was apparently responsible for the burping-wheelie-bin poo poo and other childish bits.

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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Tiggum posted:

Two things:

  • Why are all the Time Lords dead? What does that achieve? The Doctor was already an outcast who could never go home, making them dead doesn't seem to gain you anything. In fact, it just adds an arbitrary restriction that you can never do stories involving other Time Lords without coming up with some bullshit explanation for how they managed to survive.

  • The new TARDIS interior is just incredibly dumb.

Stories with the Time Lords in the Classic Series and "wilderness years" were becoming increasingly dull - plus, with the Time Lords still around, the kind of universe-threatening stakes needed for season finales would be hampered with explanations of why the Doctor doesn't just go to the Time Lords for help.

Plus, pathos.

And "Coral" isn't that bad, though the interior from the 1996 TV Movie is clearly the best.

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

A little privacy, please?

From a dramatic standpoint, yeah, usually. For mainstream TV, certainly. My favorite "Season finale" story is the audio adventure A Death in the Family, but that's two hours of almost raw dialogue about a bad guy made out of language, and that doesn't translate well to TV screens.

Basically, active Time Lords limit the stakes. They limit the program. And it's not like the Time War was a wholly original idea - the series had flirted with destroying Gallifrey as far back as the unmade Season 23 story "Gallifray"(sic), and numerous flirtations with it during the Wilderness Years.

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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MikeJF posted:

What're you thinking? Dalek, Father's Day, and the Empty Child two-parter?

I've got a very soft spot for Boom Town, myself - I think Occupation will enjoy that one, to be honest. The Empty Child is, of course, a classic too. And while Dalek isn't as good as Jubilee, the audio adventure it's inspired by (by the same author, Rob Shearman, my favorite Who writer, and someone I've had the pleasure of hanging out with over coffee at the National Theatre in London), it's also fantastic.

Honestly, the only episodes from S1 I really dislike are The Unquiet Dead and about half of Aliens of London/World War 3.

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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MrL_JaKiri posted:

They're really not. There's a lot of window dressing which is really stupid and horrible and pointless but the core ideas are some of the best of the revival. First watch through it'll be the worst thing you've ever seen, second watch (if you can get past that) it's actually really good in ways you justifiably overlook the first time round.

Again, we can safely blame Keith Boak for everything bad in Modern Who because he probably made Chris quit, thereby causing a chain of cascade failures leading to the disasters of series 2 and all that jazz. Like the Master in Logopolis blowing up 3/4s of the universe/galaxy (depending on whether you believe Rob Holmes or Lance Parkin).

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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angerbot posted:

Looking forward to Fear Her

I have a soft spot for most of Fear Her because, unlike a certain other episode that season, it manages not to promote the idea that abuse victims need to "reconcile" with their abusers. On the other hand (hahahah, that's gonna be dreadful), the entire Olympics subplot is disgusting both aesthetically and (especially after the police-states on which recent Olympics have been predicated) morally repugnant.

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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Oxxidation posted:

JaKiri is one of the most popular posters in the Who megathreads, which means he is one of the worst posters absolutely everywhere else. A valuable guideline.

Hey! Stay out of Riverdale!

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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Yeah, and if you really want political drama involving the Space House of Lords we can direct you to the first three seasons of the Gallifrey spin-off audios, which more than exhausted any such potential.

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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Bicyclops posted:

The guy who spent hundreds of dollars on a rainbow Doctor Who coat spent less effort posting about Doctor Who than you have this week.

Full disclosure - if you follow me on Tumblr, you'd find that this is debatable, but I'm a statistical outlier anyway.

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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Spatula City posted:

I should clarify, "as the primary companion". Still, the finale of season 4 was also not good. No NuWho finales have been good except maaaaaaybe Season 5's, which was moderately clever.
Pro-tip for people going into NuWho clean: X-Files rules are in effect here, meaning the best episodes are stand-alones (two-parters count), the worst are heavy plot (for the most part). Maybe this will help Occupation? Although, ugh, some great stand-alones were retroactively made plot relevant (MOFFAT YOU FUCKHEAD).
GOOD EPISODES THAT HAVE NO IMMEDIATE PLOT RELEVANCE (putting 'em in spoilers to be careful): Father's Day, The Girl in the Fireplace, The Impossible Planet/The Satan Pit, Human Nature/The Family of Blood, Blink, Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead, Midnight, Turn Left, The Waters of Mars (special, but you know what I mean), The Beast Below, Amy's Choice, Vincent and the Doctor, The Lodger, The Doctor's Wife, Night Terrors, The God Complex, Cold War, Hide, The Crimson Horror.

BAD EPISODES WITH IMMEDIATE PLOT RELEVANCE: Rose, The Christmas Invasion, Army of Ghosts/Doomsday, Daleks in Manhattan/Evolution of the Daleks, The Sound of Drums, Last of the Time Lords, The Stolen Earth/Journey's End, The End of Time, Cold Blood, Day of the Moon, A Good Man Goes to War, Let's Kill Hitler, The Wedding of River Song, The Angels Take Manhattan, The Name of the Doctor, The Time of the Doctor.

Is there a reason The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances isn't in either of those lists?

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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Jerusalem posted:

Whenever the new main Doctor Who thread gets made this should be the title.

That or "LISTEN! (to Big Finish)"

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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Spatula City posted:

That is an awfully tortured justification for farting aliens.

For all bad things in Series 1, I blame Keith Boak, who directed Rose and this two-parter. His behind-the-scenes attitude convinced Eccleston to leave and he introduced loads of dumb, childish jokes like farts and burps into the episodes he directed.

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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Irish Joe posted:

Cardiff is better than a quarry?

Cardiff is a very nice place. Sunlight until 11 PM in the summertime, beautiful bay... you could do worse!

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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Hey Occupation, based on the parts of Dalek that you enjoyed, you might get something out of the audio drama Jubilee that it was loosely based on, by the same writer, Rob Shearman. Dalek was heavily rewritten both by Shearman and Davies, but Jubilee is a bit more raw (and the plot is considerably different). The companion, Evelyn Smythe, is a middle-aged history professor and is way more interesting than Rose, and the Doctor (6th) is Colin Baker giving a really great performance (though he interacts with the Dalek far less than Eccleston does).

It's $3 for a DRM-free download at http://www.bigfinish.com/releases/v/jubilee-206 and I know you're not currently, and quite likely will never be, a "fan", but if you have a car ride or commute(s) coming up in the near future and two hours to kill, there are worse ways to spend your time.

Rob Shearman is one of my favorite writers ever, generally, as my posts in the main Who thread will attest.

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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I have to try.

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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You will find some very loud fans of Shalka out there... okay, its fans are almost entirely composed of Doctor/Master slashfic writers.

Honestly, Richard E. Grant kinda phones it in as the Doctor, the Shalka Doctor's appearance is unpleasant, and the animation is kinda poo poo.

The Shalka Master was played by Derek Jacobi, however...

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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I know I brought it up earlier, but Dalek was co-written by Rob Shearman along with RTD (RTD did do rewrites on every non-Moffat episode during his tenure) and was loosely based on Rob Shearman's 2003 audio drama Jubilee (hence the "Jubille"-brand pizza box early in the episode).

While it isn't really important for the actual 2005-onwards TV series, and Rob Shearman has yet to write again for the TV show, I genuinely think that Jubilee (along with Shearman's other pre-revival audio work, The Holy Terror and The Chimes of Midnight is extremely valuable to anyone analyzing 2005-onwards Doctor Who on a critical level, because those radio plays definitely influenced many of (the better aspects of) RTD's creative decisions when reviving Doctor Who.

All three mentioned audios are available as $3 DRM-free downloads from bigfinish.com, if anyone in this thread (who isn't from the main DW thread) can be bothered to care. They're 2 hours long, each.

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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You could just listen to one of them, they're totally unconnected story-wise and are actually really good in the ways you seem to like. Apart from a couple of dodgy accents and voice SFX in The Holy Terror, they're also really well-produced and the performances are solid and the dialogue is never insipid or irritating (in those 3 audios, at least).

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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Irish Joe posted:

Also read the 1000 page novelization of Jubilee, which bridges the gap between the radio version and the show version of Dalek.

Irish Joe, just to clarify:

I'm not saying that any plot points are "excused" or "explained" by the radio plays. This isn't a "idiot, they didn't ride the eagles to Mordor because of this line from The Silmarillion" situation. From an entertainment/story cohesion perspective, the audios don't really change the experience of watching the TV series.

However, from a critical and (pseudo)academic perspective, "what Doctor Who was like between 1990 and 2004" has a lot of value for analysis and criticism.

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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That's probably fair.

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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MrL_JaKiri posted:

The line that explains why they don't ride the eagles to Mordor is in The Lord of the Rings :confused:

Is it? Well then substitute any other famous media plot-hole with some "expanded universe" explanation that nobody cares about.

In any case, I assumed LotR fans have an (unnecessary) answer to that one. (Other than the actual answer, which is "because then there wouldn't be a story, dipshit!")

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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According to Davies, the point of the Adam stuff was not specifically to endorse the Doctor/Rose romance, but to enforce the idea that not everyone is "cut out" to be a companion - and that Rose is. You're still free to gag at that, but it's not primarily a romance thing.

Generally, "The Long Game" is the episode everyone kinda forgets about when they're going over this season, anyway. It's definitely the closest the season comes to a "nothing" episode.

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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MrAristocrates posted:

Was Pegg really a big name back in 2005? I know this was right after Shaun of the Dead, but still.

mind the walrus posted:

Plus he's a huge nerd irl so I imagine when he heard about the Doctor Who reboot he leveraged whatever clout he had to get in on the ground floor, which is a pity because I always thought he was wasted in this ep. He definitely could have made some later episodes a lot more interesting.

Simon Pegg actually had a major role in the (frankly mediocre, even by DW standards) 8th Doctor audio drama Invaders from Mars, released in January of 2002, more than a year before pre-production on the 2005 series was announced.

Which just goes to show how the Big Finish audios' cast, crew, writers, and style had a major influence on the development of the New Series.

No one has to listen to them, but (much like Buffy and The X Files), their influence on the new series is profound.

Other surprising actors who made Big Finish Doctor Who appearances include David Warner (several times, and regularly returning even to this day), Derek Jacobi, Anthony Stewart Head, and some Scottish nerd named "David Tennant".

DoctorWhat fucked around with this message at 01:03 on Aug 10, 2014

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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Yeah, I'm done. Big Finish's influence basically disappears after Series 1 anyway. Simon Pegg was the last "major connection". I'm just gonna sit back and read along now.

I just find the production history and behind-the-scenes influences fascinating.

DoctorWhat fucked around with this message at 11:51 on Aug 10, 2014

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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oh poo poo that pun wasn't on purpose. That made me seem like an even huger tool than I've already made myself seem. Jesus, I'm peacing out. I've made an rear end of myself, haven't I?

DoctorWhat fucked around with this message at 11:52 on Aug 10, 2014

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

A little privacy, please?
I also seem to vaguely recall that, especially in Series 1, every episode had to have a monster for some contractual or marketing reason. So Father's Day was originally written to not have any monsters, the threat being purely to do with causality and time paradoxes, but that was made impossible.

That may just have been fandom rumor, though.

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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When you dig deep enough into Doctor Who fandom, you'll find that everything comes down to Looms.

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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Hell yeah looms are stupid. My point is that every fandom argument can be reduced to "does this person like looms".

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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But what if that name is already occupied?

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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Oxxidation posted:

Who-fandom memes

That reminds me of something that I think is worth mentioning, and which ties into the reason threads like this are interesting:

Doctor Who is a 50-year-old program, and just 25 years ago, most fans didn't have access to the internet. Even fewer had access to all the episodes, not even counting the fact that many were - and still are - lost (apart from their audio tracks).

As a result, publications like Doctor Who Magazine/Monthly and coffee-table books like Doctor Who: A Celebration had a huge effect on "fandom consensus" at the time. For instance, the then-lost First Doctor story "The Celestial Toymaker" had a hugely popular "fan memory" - it was considered a classic, even by people who had never seen it. In contrast, the more comedic (and watchable) story from the same era, The Gunfighters, was extant, but everyone hated it, even folks who'd never watched it, because that was the consensus.

Even after quality "reconstructions" of The Celestial Toymaker became widely available, it took a surprisingly long time - years, arguably decades - before most fans actually started to re-evaluate much of those 80s-era received wisdom. Which is disturbing, because The Celestial Toymaker consists of a ridiculous racist stereotype, played by Michael Gough in yellowface, forcing the Doctor to play Towers of Hanoi for 88 minutes while being vaguely menaced by Thing One and Thing Two. It's poo poo. It's plainly poo poo. Entirely unwatchable now and unwatchable in 1966. But no one seemed to want to go "against the grain" and point out that the emperor, as it were, had no clothes, and was also taking part in a minstrel show.

ANYWAY, what makes threads like this, and blogs like The Wife in Space, so interesting is that people are going into a highly mythologized TV show with (mostly) untainted expectations. Their interpretations and opinions aren't colored by decades of fandom dogma and received wisdom. And that's so neat!

DoctorWhat fucked around with this message at 15:10 on Aug 12, 2014

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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Oxxidation posted:

Hi yes these are posts I like, please continue making posts like these.

Will definitely do! 50-year fandoms are fascinating because of how... well, religious they can become. Legends form up about convention anecdotes, the lost visual details of missing episodes inspire whole novels, et cetera. It's bonkers and I absolutely love exploring it.

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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Bown posted:

I don't care that he disagreed with me. I made a post explaining why some people don't like Moffat and he replied with "Well I like him!" as if that makes even a bit of a difference. I literally do not care one bit if you or anyone else disagrees with me about the show.

Oxx has this idea that I'm some card-carrying fandom member and I'm annoyed that you guys aren't agreeing with the brunt of the fandom even though I had no idea they felt that way and really don't care.

Oh my god, just drop it. Don't post here at least until the next review-pair goes up, and it'll all blow over.

EDIT: Also, it looks like the hosting for the Wife in Space blog is down at the moment, so I'll give some context:

It's a blog about a married couple, Neil and Sue Perryman, who decide to watch every single pre-2005 episode of Doctor Who, including the slide-show reconstructions of the lost episodes, as a kind of... experiment? Neil is the total Who nerd, but even he hasn't seen all of it, while Sue has only ever watched (but enjoyed) the New Series and has been almost completely insulated from in-fandom received wisdom and suchlike.

They (and their marriage) manage to survive it and Sue's often iconoclastic perspectives, along with her ability to see past the trivia and did-you-knows straight to stuff like set design, direction, et cetera, are a really fascinating read!

When the hosting fixes itself, I'll post the link again. It's a lot of content, obviously, but it's hysterical.

EDIT: LINK

DoctorWhat fucked around with this message at 15:11 on Aug 12, 2014

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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30.5 Days posted:

It's not down, your URL was wrong. http://wifeinspace.com/

Well don't I look foolish. Edited.

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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Congrats on the modstar, Annakie!

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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JUST THIS ONCE, EVERYBODY LIKES IT!

DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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Senor Tron posted:

I see someone just watched Boom Town! (I actually thought you were up to the end of the series and it was only after checking an episode guide that I remembered this episode even existed)

Boom Town is, in fact, good.

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DoctorWhat
Nov 18, 2011

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J-ru said it better than I was going to, but this is a core issue with the RTD era.

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