Doctor Who – Series 11

[Dave]

Worth a discussion thread?

We’re just watching Capaldi’s regeneration into Whittaker as part of our build-up to tonight’s episode. Such a great scene.

[Dave]

I thought it was OK, Whittaker was good and I like the new TARDIS crew more than I expected. It wasn’t a barnstorming debut like Smith though.

Oh, and I really like the new version of the theme tune.

[Bargain Bin Holly]

I thought Matt Smith was rubbish, that’s about as far as my opinions on Doctor Who goes before I stopped watching it.

[Pete Part Three]

The story itself was pretty by the numbers but the cast were on point and it worked pretty well as a new mission statement. I disliked pretty much all of the last season (and the Christmas special), so I’m interested to see where this goes.

[Flap Jack]

I really liked it! Very odd that there were no opening credits, though. I hope that’s not the new normal.

[Lily]

I’ll be honest and say that I’m not a fan of the sex change, but I’m watching at least the first few episodes to see how it pans out. It was good that they didn’t dwell on it at any point, just a quick ‘oh I’m a woman now, OK’ and moving on.

The story itself was alright but I feel like I’m left with a feeling of a lot of things not really making much sense.

How spoiler’y can we be in discussion? I presume because it’s aired it’s not an issue?

[Dave]

I was dancing around spoilers but maybe let’s just assume that anyone visiting this thread is up to date with the latest aired episode and only avoid spoilers for anything unaired.

So I can mention the fact that the advance publicity focusing on the three companions made it pretty clear that one of the four wasn’t going to survive past this episode! It was nicely handled, though – Walsh did well during the funeral scene.

I really liked it! Very odd that there were no opening credits, though. I hope that’s not the new normal.

I think Chibnall has said that we will see the new title sequence ‘in situ’ from episode two, so presumably it was just a one-off for this opener.

[Ridley]

I thought it was fine.

Doctor Who, at least the nu-ten series, has this atmosphere that I can’t describe which all the Who-wannabes – your Merlins, Primevals, Sinbads, Musketeer and Atlantiseses – try to emulate but can’t. This… didn’t have that.

Look: Art Malik!

[Warbodog]

Yeah, fine. It’s not really for me, but there’s a very limited range of Doctor Who that I really click with anyway (most of Tom Baker and early Matt Smith), so that’s okay. More interesting and worthwhile than series ten, which just felt like a by-the-numbers series for the sake of having one. Jodie felt a bit CBBC. New theme sounded good, the more electronic and less orchestral the better.

[Dave]

I liked series ten, largely because I thought Bill brought a great new energy and freshness to the series (after Clara long outstayed her welcome).

But either way I think a change was overdue this year, and this new version of the show definitely feels like something different.

[Toxteth O-Grady]

I don’t watch Doctor Who, but I do love the theme tune (the later Tom Baker version is my favourite, when they put it in a lower key).

Whenever there’s a new Doctor, I always watch the beginning of one of their episodes to hear what the theme tune’s like, and I’ve hated pretty much all of the versions since they brought the show back (Matt Smith’s theme was particularly unpleasant for me).

I’m glad to read they’ve gone more electronic for the latest series. Looking forward to hearing it. Orchestral sounded wrong, and they over-complicated it with daft little extra flairs throughout.
Minimal and electronic should be the sound of Doctor Who’s theme, as Delia Derbyshire arranged it.

[tombow]

I really liked the Eccleston series but I could never get into Tennant and kept drifting in and out of it.
Reasons –

-the sentimentalism was too sickly
-it seemed like there was too much quality variation – a great episode would be followed up by a silly one, and the extreme mix of styles from one episode to the next (horror to sci fi comedy) meant I never really felt excited about sitting down to watch it
-Tennant’s manic performance didn’t really grab me

having said that, I did enjoy a lot of episodes, and admired the imagination, I just couldn’t get excited about it.

Matt Smith’s era always seemed a bit too posh and mainstream for me, with all him and all his friends being tall white and skinny. Not saying there wasn’t good episodes.

[Bargain Bin Holly]

I quite liked Tennant (Of course, Eccleston beats him, but still), a lot of his stories stick with me as really good like Midnight, Turn Left, Waters of Mars, Human Nature, etc.

Though the number of times Tennant’s doctor went “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry” good christ, and his last story was just fucking terrible and he came across as such a whiny cunt “I DESERVE MORE” (If I was a Doctor Who fan, probably go down in my top 5 worst Doctor moments)

But overall, he was quite good and I enjoyed him.

[Warbodog]

I think the new theme might actually be the original theme embellished or remixxxed? Which is nice. People have ripped it to YouTube.

I often feel like rewatching the Eccleston year, I like how it’s so self-contained despite the flaws, but it’s probably better in my memory. It was mainly Moffat’s annual story that got me through the Tennant years, but all the other episodes mentioned were really good too.

We rewatched Matt Smith a few months ago and still mostly love series 5 & 6, but 7 was a largely unrewarding slog at the time and nearly all skipped now. Capaldi was alright, but I liked each year a little less and felt kind of detached from it. ‘Heaven Sent’ aside, which is ace.

[Bargain Bin Holly]

Okay, so I watched every Cyberman episode from Tennant and Smith (Exception of Smith’s last story with the wood Cybermen, but come on that’s fucking stupid anyway) so I have zero frame of reference for Capaldi’s Cyberman episodes; but good christ did they fuck them up. Never once was any episode with them good.

Worst ones:

1. Closing Time (James Cordon defeats them with the power of LOVE; give me a fucking break. Dumbest episode of Smith’s era)
2. Nightmare in Silver (Clara was a shit companion and should’ve been retired)
3. Doomsday (QUICK, we gotta make the Daleks look badass, give them some fodder to murder)
4. The Next Doctor (I’m waiting for the Power Rangers to show up anytime now)

Siliconia was the best Cyberman episode modern Doctor Who never had,

1. Humanised converted former humans; took time to actually watch and see them slowly lose their personalities (I know with Cybermen this is instantaneous except that one brief moment in The Age of Steel, but still the whole point of Cybermen is they were previously unwilling humans)
2. Made the enemies actually a force to be reckoned with by the main protagonists (I swear to God, every Cybermen story I’ve seen its just a bunch of army dudes blowing them up, OH LOOK AT OUR BADASS CLARA)
3. When the formerly human converts actually DO lose their personality, they are threatening (Cat especially, that voice Danny does is fucking ace) and they don’t act like robots like modern Cybermen but an uncanny middle-ground. Modern Cybermen is them clanging their feet and marching in rows all the bloody time in complete unison, no meat to bite into, yeah you can say its creepy that they are just indistinguishable from each other, I disagree you need some hints.

Yeah, Siliconia’s ending is practically a deus ex machina, but goddamnit does everything else about that episode work so well. Well anyway rant over, talk about Jodie and stuff.

[Lily]

So I can mention the fact that the advance publicity focusing on the three companions made it pretty clear that one of the four wasn’t going to survive past this episode! It was nicely handled, though – Walsh did well during the funeral scene.

I avoid all trailers and publicity, so this was a surprise to me. Unfortunately I found her the most likeable one of the bunch so was pretty pissed off that she got killed off for no particular reason.

I think one of the things that threw it most for me was that the sense of time and locations didn’t seem to flow right. I’ve a whole list of ‘that should have taken longer’ and ‘how did they get there so fast?’. Yeah it’s picky but it’s hard to get into a story when your mind is going ‘hang on, that doesn’t feel right’ all the time. How did the guy who lost his sister know the pod was there? Why are the construction workers on site at what must be middle of the night? She’s already killed him, why send him home and get annoyed at the lad for kicking him off when he’s already teleporting anyway?

So many niggles that just shouldn’t be there.

As for Whittaker? Ehhhhh, pretty hard to judge when it’s all regeneration madness. We’ll see after the next few episodes.

Fucking hate the culottes.

[tombow]

I haven’t seen it yet, but killing off one of the new team sounds like Torchwood

[tombow]

“I’ll be honest and say that I’m not a fan of the sex change”

I’m fine with it, but for logic’s sake shouldn’t it be called Nurse Who now?

[bloodteller]

>I’m fine with it, but for logic’s sake shouldn’t it be called Nurse Who now?

I’m pretty sure everyone’s already done this joke

Haven’t seen the new Doctor Who yet, don’t know whether it’s worth bothering with. The last episode I saw is that one where they accidentally make the TARDIS all small and the Doctor sticks his hand out and stuff. Not really a big fan of Doctor Who but if there’s nothing else on then I usually take a look. The only Doctor Who I really enjoyed was the movie with Paul McGann, I thought that was great

[bloodteller]

>I’m fine with it, but for logic’s sake shouldn’t it be called Nurse Who now?

I’m pretty sure everyone’s already done this joke

Haven’t seen the new Doctor Who yet, don’t know whether it’s worth bothering with. The last episode I saw is that one where they accidentally make the TARDIS all small and the Doctor sticks his hand out and stuff. Not really a big fan of Doctor Who but if there’s nothing else on then I usually take a look. The only Doctor Who I really enjoyed was the movie with Paul McGann, I thought that was great

[bloodteller]

>Yeah, Siliconia’s ending is practically a deus ex machina, but goddamnit does everything else about that episode work so well.

I didn’t mind the deus ex machina of them finding the Siliconia- it’s at least mentioned throughout the episode so it doesn’t feel like it comes totally out of nowhere- it was the little epilogue part afterwards that bothered me. We don’t actually see Rimmer and Cat back to normal, so it doesn’t really feel like they are, and “the soundproof airlock” is a really weak gag to go out on. The extended ending with Rimmer and Cat coming in forced to obey Lister should have been kept in, imo- it’s funnier and is a much more satisfying conclusion to the episode. It’s not like the episode was rushed for time either- it runs a little short actually, so they had plenty of time to include the scene.

It’s a shame, because apart from the ending Siliconia was an absolutely brilliant episode.

[MANI506]

I’m rewatching from 2005 using Ian’s excellent blog Curiosity In A Junkyard as a guide. I did watch every episode up until series 5 and after that I drifted in and out. My current opinion having only got halfway through series 2 is that Doctor Who is 33% amazing and 66% silly nonsense (1% awesome theme tune).

[MANI506]

I watched the first half hour of the new episode and found it surprisingly stagey with very functional dialogue. I will of course catch up with it all in due time (I’m currently on The Impossible Planet).

[genericnerdyusername]

>Doctor Who is 33% amazing and 66% silly nonsense

I agree, but the 66% silly nonsense is what makes the 33% amazing.

But what do I know, I enjoyed that one with Robin Hood. Pure silly nonsense, that was. This new one was a bit po-faced, which is fine. The thing that I didn’t like was any attempt at humour, which fell completely flat for me. That Capaldi one with him running around the castle on his own, I loved that one, and I don’t think there was any humour in that.

Jodie Whittaker is good in the role but hasn’t had a proper time to shine yet. I’ve seen people comparing her to Matt Smith but I found her very different. She talked fast sometimes, yeah, but she seemed more in control of her performance whereas Smith seemed a lot giddier, usually, which was part of his appeal (I liked Matt Smith a lot). She’s also clearly the most human out of nearly any Doctor (the only way she can top Davison is by doing something even more Doctor-y than sacrificing her life for someone she just met). At first I found it a bit jarring going from Capaldi’s aloofness, but then I realised I actually enjoy the Doctor being actually likeable as well as admirable.

I’ve said too much. If you’ve read all of this garble, I’m sorry, I’m so so sorry.

[cwickham]

Just as a sidenote, I see Mike Tucker has contributed storyboards for the next set of Tennant/Tate stories from Big Finish.

[Paul Muller]

My opinion is that it was good.

[Dave]

Christ, episode two was a bit dull wasn’t it. Clunky script and the cast all seemed a bit subdued compared to episode one.

It still looks very nice though, and I love the new version of the theme tune and opening. Plus, the Tardis interior looks pretty cool.

[q u i n n _ d r u m m e r]

I quite liked it. Reminded me of a Star Trek (possibly Voyager) type of episode. Though it was a little paint by numbers, with obvious preachy dialogue (not that I have a problem with dialogue that is preachy, it just was written badly, wasn’t clever or subtle which is what I tend to expect from DW) – and both of those things add to the Star Trek feel of it.

I still love Jodie, I think she is awesome. The rest of her team still need a little teasing out, like Yaz needs something to do. Graham and Ryan were ok, added something to the story by fixing the boat and their characters / relationship were moved along a little bit.

I’m intrigued what this “timeless child” is about … and don’t care anything for the Stynza (?)

I’m enjoying this new run, looking forward to next week.

[si]

There’s not a Doctor Who fan in Sheffield who didn’t have a smile on their face when they mentioned the Police Box on Surrey Street.
There was no way they were going to get through a series which features Sheffield so prominently without featuring our green TARDIS somehow.

[Warbodog]

I’d read that Chibnall wanted to be more educational, but that felt like the most patronising one ever. I hope kids are enjoying it, at least. I can’t muster any enthusiasm for these arcs they’re sowing. There’d better be a ‘Blink’ in here somewhere.

[Lily]

I rather liked it. It seems appropriate that the crew are more subdued when they’re in culture shock from being in space and crash landing on an alien planet. It’s going to be difficult to have all of them playing a significant part in every episode, so while it was Ryan and Graham this week, I’d hope to have more focus on Yaz next week. It makes sense you can’t do character development on all of them when you’re still building the Doctors new character too.

As for the patronising side, I felt it more for the character than personally. In both the getting the boat to go and climbing the ladder, the character development was already there and was just spoilt by the Doctor coming along and giving him a pat on the head for being a good boy. The pep talk to get up the ladder felt very ’11’, but really we’re getting a bit beaten over the head with the dyspraxia bit. Just a shot of him psyching up before climbing would have made the point.

The talking mindreading rags seemed very … odd. Leaving aside the question of how rags can talk, if they can see all the way into a time lords subconscious (memory/whatever), wouldn’t the plan of what they were about to do be in big flashing letters? Eh, nitpicky. That whole scene felt very Harry Potter’esque for some reason I can’t pin down.

I’m happy enough to look forward to next week now.

[si]

Like every other Sheffielder, I’m happy that the Surrey Street Police Box found its way into an episode. They’d have been missing a trick not mentioning the Sheffield TARDIS.

[Dave]

I think we’ve experienced this period of time before, sir.

[Dave]

It’s going to be difficult to have all of them playing a significant part in every episode, so while it was Ryan and Graham this week, I’d hope to have more focus on Yaz next week.

I gather that Yaz will be getting a bit more time in the spotlight in episode four.

[si]

I think we’ve experienced this period of time before, sir.

Ah, yes. I’ll read what I’ve written where in future. I’ve mentioned it in two or three places, didn’t realise I’d reached G&T yet.

[Dave]

Wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey etc.

[Lily]

>I’d read that Chibnall wanted to be more educational

Whelp, guess that was the educational history episode of the series then.

But well done on Ryan getting rid of the bad guy, we’re NEVER going to be seeing him again -_-

[tombow]

I’ve never watched any Capaldi episode, so I got his first box set today and just watched his first ep about the robot organ collecter under Victorian London. I really enjoyed it.

[Warbodog]

I thought that was better than last week’s, and definitely a memorable and worthwhile entry even if it’s not one I’d watch again for fun. It could have been a Tennant/Martha episode easily enough, but benefited from the expanded cast. I’ll always pine for that time Doctor Who was mainly written by sitcom writers, and I miss seeing the full colour spectrum, but I’m still on board.

[Dave]

I thought that was ok actually, they handled the issues pretty honestly and the sci-fi/villain elements were kept around the edges so it didn’t feel like too much of a crass clash with the historical stuff.

I had some problems with the shape of the story (like how flimsy the villain’s motivations and plans were, and how bluntly he was despatched in the end – and also how bizarre it was that the Tardis crew had to piece together Rosa’s story like detectives when they could have just used the Tardis to find out the details), but it wasn’t so damaging as to ruin the episode.

Ultimately the talk beforehand about it potentially being like a Quantum Leap episode was on the money. Quite good from an educational point of view for kids – it led to some good conversations about racism and the civil rights movement.

[Unrumble]

> also how bizarre it was that the Tardis crew had to piece together Rosa’s story like detectives when they could have just used the Tardis to find out the details

Well, there was a line of dialogue that went something like

“Why aren’t we going back to the TARDIS?”

“Because that bloke has eyes on it, and we’ll run into him again if we keep going in and out”.

Which seemed kind of invalidated after she then went deliberately looking for him a bit later.

[Pete Part Three]

The Quantum Leap comparison is valid, but specifically the JFK episodes. This got so bogged down in historical accuracy and highlighting real-life drama, that it forgot to innovate some drama of its own.

[si]

Historical Accuracy: Elvis *was* in New York for a publicity photo shoot on December 1st 1955.

[Dave]

But *didn’t* have a mobile phone at the time.

[si]

And, admittedly, wouldn’t have been close enough to Frank Sinatra to lend it to him. In fact, Frank wasn’t a big fan of Elvis, certainly not in 1955.

[Dave]

I trust everyone is reading Andrew Ellard’s notes on the new episodes, anyway – they’ve been very good so far.

[si]

Yes indeed.

[Ridley]

I do wish the writing on the wall hadn’t rubbed off only for the Doctor to realise that she’d used a permanent marker.

(Also wish she had said, in episode 1, that half an hour ago she was a Flying Scotsman.)

[Dave]

I thought Arachnids In The UK was alright, and I thought they judged the scariness about right – a couple of eye-covering moments in our house but nothing too disturbing.

It did feel like it lacked resolution though – some kind of scene to show the spiders definitively being dealt with. It suddenly jumped from the big plan to all the post-story stuff.

Also, all the Trump stuff was a bit on-the-nose. Presumably Noth is coming back later this series?

[Pete Part Three]

15 minutes in, I thought “this is promising”.

30 minutes in, I thought “Maybe something surprising will happen, they’ll be an actual escalation of stakes and this will go somewhere rather than just being a crap version of Aliens”

50 minutes in, it finished.

[q u i n n _ d r u m m e r]

That is an ending recent Red Dwarf would be proud of. Lure the spiders into a room and lock them in, then we all go home.

The end.

[si]

I can see that maybe the ending was a bit flawed (I had actually forgotten how the story was resolved about 15 minutes after it ended), but that was my favourite episode of the series so far. And Jodie’s Doctor has appeared tonight. We’ve got a definite character to latch onto properly.

[Warbodog]

The most optimistic I can be is that we’ve done most of Chibnall’s episodes now – just next week’s and the finale left. The four in-between are by other writers, which is where my hope lies. That’s just how I felt during most of the RTD era, to be fair.

[Lily]

Well that was a bit underwhelming. I really really don’t like spiders in movies (the Lost in Space metal spiders gave me actual nightmares for weeks) so I had to gear myself up for this episode. I figured Sunday tea-time shouldn’t be too scary though. Unfortunately I’m almost disappointed how un-scary they actually were.

Like Dave said, the Trump stuff was a bit unexpected as well. It was bad enough having a rich American hotel mogul running for president but I was really surprised when they literally name-checked him. Is this the first time Who has mentioned a real life politician? I mean, we’ve had two story lines involving prime-ministers without mentioning real politicians, why bring Trump into it?

As for the spiders, I’m really confused by the Doctors new pro-life policy. Sure, when you have a sentient lifeform that can be communicated with, having a little chat persuading them to bugger off is a nice idea. But these are literal man-eating monsters, I’m sure a previous doctor would have just torched the place and be done with it. The gun thing makes no sense either. Oh yes, let’s leave these spiders in a small room where they’ll starve and cannibalise each other before a slow and painful death. Likewise lets watch this giant spider slowly suffocate to death instead of putting it out of its misery. Oh and we’ll have a nice cosy chat afterwards and clear off, leaving all the other giant spiders roaming round the city, no probs bruv.

[Warbodog]

Obama was in David Tennant’s last episodes, back when people really loved Obama. Capaldi mentioned Trump in one of his last episodes, basically comparing him to the Cybermen as unavoidable shit humanity has to deal with.

If Chibnall is being clever, the high-and-mighty anti-gun tirades here and in episode two (both times where the Doctor’s solution was arguably worse) will be building to her realising a character flaw, similar to when Matt Smith’s Doctor got too cocky and speechy for his boots and was slammed down. Otherwise it’s just wank.

[Seb Patrick]

Is this the first time Who has mentioned a real life politician? I mean, we’ve had two story lines involving prime-ministers without mentioning real politicians, why bring Trump into it?

Ann Widdecombe endorsed The Master for Prime Minister. I’m sure Ken Livingstone got a namecheck when a cab driver was grumbling about traffic in an early RTD one, too.

Also: Churchill, obvs.

[Dave]

It does feel like there’s been so much focus on the anti-gun hypocrisy that it needs to amount to something more.

[Bargain Bin Holly]

Thatcher was referenced in the background in Eccleston’s Father’s Day, but doesn’t really count considering it was a decade after her government I suppose.

[Dave]

If we’re going back that far they had Nixon actually appear in that episode at the start of series 6 where Matt Smith’s Doctor ‘dies’, didn’t they?

[si]

He had Abraham Lincoln in to help with his history report didn’t…oh no, that was Bill and Ted, wasn’t it?

[Lily]

OK so I should have specified current politicians. Historical figures are another thing.

I guess I just don’t current affairs in my sci-fi. Can you imagine Tom Baker’s doctor making snarky comments about Harold Wilson? I’m not a fan of having pop music in episodes either.

Maybe I’m just a grumpy old woman, but maybe if the shows were better written it wouldn’t be so egregious. Sci-fi has always made social and political commentary, but Who is doing it with the subtlety of a brick through the window.

[Hamish]

> I guess I just don’t current affairs in my sci-fi. Can you imagine Tom Baker’s doctor making snarky comments about Harold Wilson?

Well, Helen A in The Happiness Patrol basically was Margaret Thatcher, and that was put out in November 1988.

[Ben Saunders]

Haven’t watched any of it yet for various reasons, but I’m about to dip into episode one now. They’ve managed to go 55 years while only fucking up the casting of the Doctor once (can you guess which time I’m referring to?), so they’ve got a good track record on it thus far, I’m not too worried by that. The writing is much more important and Chris Chibnall has… written episodes before.

[q u i n n _ d r u m m e r]

(can you guess which time I’m referring to?)

Give me 14 guesses and I’m sure I’ll get it

[Ben Saunders]

The Woman Who Fell to Earth was absolutely fine. Some very predictable writing as the deaths of the drunk man and the security guard, and the death at the end are all things I saw coming 50,000 miles away. Cringed at opening the new series with a vlog and all the social media references (yikes, this isn’t how you stay relevant to ‘the kids’, people), but I audibly aww’d at the twist regarding who the vlog was about. Whittaker is being written as a sort of Tennant Two, something a lot of us were worried was going to happen, and her performance felt a little forced with the more wacky stuff, but this is only her first episode and I can see her growing into the role – I didn’t like Smith at first either but he quickly became a favourite of mine in his second series. Playing the monster for laughs is almost always a mistake, and I could physically feel the tension being sucked out of the scene when they made fun of his name. I loved the stuff on the cranes, very tense. Monster design was cool I guess. The music is pretty good – I liked Gold but this is a nice change of pace. The show is shot in that way that makes everything look a bit fake via trying to make it look realistic-yet-stylised, and everything is a bit dark. Overall 6.5/10 for that first episode. Nearly hits 7/10 but there are a few moments made me roll my eyes enough to drop the score back down – less Wacky Tennant, please.

“It’s been a long time since I’ve bought women’s clothes” – LOL

[Ben Saunders]

A further note on Whittaker since I forgot to actually say what I liked about her – when she wasn’t being balls-to-the-walls wacky in the car she seemed very childlike in an endearing way, like when she asked to turn the sirens and lights on. I also really liked the sonic building scene and her speech at the end about her family. Bradley Walsh also surprised me by being able to act, the funeral scene was quite nice – although sit the fuck down, Doctor, honestly.

[Ben Saunders]

Oh and don’t quote the main theme in the episode’s incidental music!! Just don’t! They did it in the 80s and it was just as naff then!

[Lily]

>Well, Helen A in The Happiness Patrol basically was Margaret Thatcher, and that was put out in November 1988.

I’ll admit I’ve not seen that one, but from a quick google that it’s basically supporting my point. It may not have been terribly subtle, but it’s still only a caricature with plausible deniability. It’s not like she’s shutting down the mines and stopping free milk for children, or Ace right out saying “oh that Thatcher is a cunt”. (On a side note, wtf is up with the giant Berty Bassett?)

[si]

(On a side note, wtf is up with the giant Berty Bassett?)

People have been asking that for the past thirty years.

[Dave]

I was just the right age to be scared by Kandyman when The Happiness Patrol first went out. To this day I’m not quite sure how.

[Ben Saunders]

The Happiness Petrol is quite good once you get over the high pantomime tone, a leftover from McCoy’s first season. Certainly one of his better ones, if blatantly unsubtle in its anti-Thatcherism. Not to get into politics, but that aspect of it didn’t bother me at all. They certainly knew what they were doing. The whole McCoy era is a bit iffy but that’s a diamond in the rough. Spoilers, McCoy is the one I think was miscast, but I’m aware there are people who will want me hung drawn and quartered for saying so.

[Ben Saunders]

Also once you get over the appearance of the Kandyman. He’s still quite threatening despite looking so ridiculous, but… he died look ridiculous, doesn’t he?

[Warbodog]

Davison’s the odd one out for me. There are some good stories and he’s a good actor, but I can’t see the character continuity there, except maybe right at the end. Which is fine, it doesn’t always have to be the same.

I like Happiness Patrol a lot and enjoyed the grotesque, proto-Mr. Blobby/Bertie Bassett Kandyman for the joke I assumed it was. But I thought the moon-egg was funny too, so what do I know?

[Dave]

I like McCoy because he’s the Doctor I watched as a kid (and I maintain that Remembrance Of The Daleks is one of the best DW stories, despite knowing that it’s partly the nostalgia factor that makes it work for me).

That and Happiness Patrol were two of his most memorable stories, for me.

[Ben Saunders]

Davison was supposed to be completely different, so I guess they managed that. I agree he was a bit of a wet blanket in his first two seasons, but from Frontios onwards, he was absolutely incredible, and totally nailed the character. Luckily, it is his post-Frontios performance that makes it into Big Finish, so he’s great there, too.

[Ben Saunders]

Just reached the Call of Duty part of episode two.
Oh no.
Ohhh nnnoooooo.
Cuh-RINGE.

[Ben Saunders]

That second episode was a bit naff, wasn’t it? And the new TARDIS. And the opening theme. Closing theme is alright, though. Meh.

[Warbodog]

Ghost Light is the only original-run Doctor Who I can remember, when I would have just turned four. Definitely the appropriate age for that one. I didn’t know it was Who (and not T-Bag or something) until I watched again as an adult and remembered being scared by the golden ghost, and animal head busts with glowing red eyes were a feature of my nightmares for years, so might have come from there. Glad I didn’t miss out on childhood Who trauma completely.

[Ben Saunders]

The Rosa episode was a bit dodgy as well. If Grease Lightning can’t get violent, how did he smash up the bus? He was an alright actor, reminded me of Piers Brosnan.
Tosin Cole has very little presence, it’s as if he has has no power behind him, and his lines are often delivered very awkwardly.

>Ending the episode on pop music
Oh, no.
No, no, no.
No, no, no, no, no.

[Ben Saunders]

Ghost Light is incomprehensible drivel and I’m convinced the people who actually like it only do so because they’ve filled in the gaping narrative gaps with the novelisation and the two have become entwined in their memory. There’s some nice stuff with Ace in it, though.

[Ben Saunders]

Arachnids in the UK is like a mediocre, Series 7B kind of episode, which is honestly so refreshing after the shite we’ve been dealt so far this series. The grime music and the plot “resolution” were all fucking dreadful, though, Christ. Lock them all in a room and forget about it? Starving/suffocating to death is a more humane death than a gun to the head?. The politician character was a shitty caricature, the villains this series have all been really two-dimensional and underwhelming, and he was in the right for most of the episode anyway. It isn’t his fault other people caused all these problems, and any sane person would shoot the fuck out of those spiders, I liked the attempts at humanising him through Kevin and when he mourns that other woman. I get what they were going for with that character but he was just so surface level and there was nothing really to him.

Some great character stuff in this episode, love Graham and the line about not being happy the dad said “real family”, but still nothing that really drags it above anything but a 6.

Arachnids > Woman > Rosa > The one about the race

[tombow]

I’ve only seen nu Who, but I’m never sure what to make of regenerations. I’m never sure how much you’re supposed to feel the Dr is the same person with a new face, or a different person with the same spirit/mission.

[Dave]

I like the ambiguity about regeneration, and the way that different Doctors have approached the experience. There are clearly through-lines between different Doctors, but also a sense that a different person has taken over that identity.

It’s one of the reasons why I really liked Matt Smith’s goodbye speech, and the way it used regeneration as a metaphor for how a person grows and changes over the course of their life. “When the Doctor was me.” There was a certain acceptance that it’s a positive and necessary change. Whereas with Tennant and Capaldi there was a real reluctance and resistance there.

I liked the (slightly poetic) way that Whittaker described it in the series opener, actually. Something to do with being reborn but not fully formed and gradually moving towards the new person that you have to become.

[tombow]

another little thing. I rewatched the “day of the Doctor” scene where they freeze his planet, and when Capaldi says “no, all 13” to introduce himself, he sounds English. I wonder if they only decided to use his accent after that scene?

[Dave]

That isn’t his voice, is it? It’s the general on Gallifrey. We only see the attack eyebrows, we don’t hear him at all.

[tombow]

OH – I thought it was him introducing himself…

[Ben Saunders]

Nope, hahaha, it’s the general.

What a moment that was, seeing 12 in DotD. Then seeing 11 phone 12 in Deep Breath. The kind of timey-wimey bullshit only Moffat would give us, and I love him for it. Those and Night of the Doctor are some of the biggest “holy shit” moments I’ve had as a Who fan. Other than that guy getting mulched in Seeds of Doom.

[Dave]

Day Of The Doctor is just great. It’s Doctor Who as a big, epic, self-referential fan-pleasing romp but it works brilliantly.

[Ben Saunders]

Zygon subplot felt a bit like padding but it set up a quite-good two parter for Series 9 so I guess I’ll forgive it. I don’t think DotD is a good episode of Doctor Who but I do think it’s all those other things you said

[si]

I did hope that as Capaldi’s run came to a close, we’d see that ‘All 13!’ from the other side. When he returned to Gallifrey in Hell Bent, I thought we were going to see it…

[Lily]

Going back to series 11, I’m loving Bradley Walsh. The scenes with him talking to Grace in their house were just heartbreaking.

[Dave]

I’m sure Capaldi even teased in an interview that we’d see “all thirteen” again, from his perspective. Ah well.

[Ben Saunders]

With the Heaven Sent/Hell Bent we ended up getting, there’s no real place to put it without it just being a gratuitous fanwank moment that distracts us from the story, so I guess it either got written out or left on the cutting room floor.

And yeah Graham is my favourite thing about Series 11. Yaz is… there, Ryan is an alright character with some dodgy acting, and the Doctor herself……….. exists

[Dave]

I presume there was a vague notion to return to it at some point but a story never presented itself. It’s hard to imagine how to make that moment really interesting again from the other side, given how otherwise uninvolved the Twelfth Doctor is with Day of the Doctor and that we all know how the story played out already.

[Dave]

Random thought: do you think they’ll ever explain how the Doctor fell to earth safely at the start of this series? Or is it simply what it appears to be: one of those “I’ll explain later” moments that will never be referred to again.

[Pete Part Three]

Was there every confirmation that she’d fallen from a considerable distance? The woman “who fell to Earth” was Grace, not the Doctor, so didn’t think there was anything to suggest she’d fallen from a great height, or just jumped in from the roof of the train.

Well, certainly not a greater height than Tennant in The End of Time Part 2.

[Dave]

If you saw the end of ‘Twice Upon A Time’ then you saw how far she fell from.

[Lily]

>do you think they’ll ever explain how the Doctor fell to earth safely at the start of this series

“Still in regeneration”

I’m more confused about the whole ring falling off and Tardis throwing her out thing. I presumed the ring was required to operate the Tardis or something like that, but new Tardis apparently don’t care. There was such focus on the ring it’s got to mean something?

[Warbodog]

I don’t think it was any deeper than her hands being smaller than Capaldi’s. We saw her hands before her face in her original reveal video, and their small size made my wife twig that it was a woman immediately, maybe that shot was a similar clue for viewers who’d managed to remain unspoiled before slowly revealing the face.

[Dave]

Yeah, I think that was just a nice detail to show the physical change.

I wonder if there will ever be an explanation for the Tardis malfunction/explosion. Chibnall seems to leave a lot of loose ends that may or may not ever get followed up.

[Author]

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