Lily

[Lily]

I don’t know who I was meant to spot, but man those deep fakes are unsettling and convincing.

[Lily]

Jodie Whitaker still got voted the 2nd best Doctor anyway

Who the fuck voted that?

[Lily]

Fuck everything about this.

(╯°□°)╯︵ ┻━┻

[Lily]

Last year suffered from no real arc or strong villain for the finale, but it feels like it’s the opposite now. There’s so many mysteries and surprise twists dangling around that there’s no way they’re going to get dealt with in a satisfactory way next week.

I was so hyped after the Ruth episode, but now I’m distinctly ‘meh’ about whatever turns up. Hoping it’ll be great but not holding my breath.

[Lily]

The lighthouse is just up the road from Cardiff and the owner is a Who fan. I saw it on an old episode of Hotel Inspector a few weeks ago.

He’s got his own tardis on the roof and a life sized dalek in the front hall. Having this filmed there must have been ultimate heaven for him.

http://www.westusklighthouse.co.uk/gallery.html

[Lily]

SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEE

*ahem* long time since I’ve done that, but fuck me was that unexpected and the other thing is so cool and I’ve not been so genuinely excited for the show in a long time. I would say can’t wait for next week but this looks like it’ll take the rest of the series to sort out.

[Lily]

I didn’t even post last week I was annoyed with how crap it was.

This week, I guess it’s perfectly serviceable Who. It did feel a little wikipedia’ish at points when they’re gushing about Tesla. Would have been nice if they’d showed us him being an amazing inventor instead of just telling us.

I didn’t hate it, so that’s a step up from last week.

[Lily]

I really enjoyed that.

[Lily]

Nice, another Doctor/Dwarf link, as I’m pretty sure that was Paranoia with the beard?

[Lily]

I tend to give Doctor Who more leeway as they’re trying to be all things to all people. It has to be sci-fi, but not to a point it confuses people, it has to be light but not a comedy, has to be enjoyable for children but not a kids show, has to tackle topical subject but not lecture, and generally be something that is for whole family enjoyment. With that in mind, I can live with a few rear view mirrors reflecting death rays. Sure, you wouldn’t get that in Star Trek, but Who isn’t trying to be that.

I agree that there are some episodes that have been outstanding, with perfect writing and everything, but I don’t expect that every week. All I ask is an hour/45 mins of enjoyable entertainment. Series 11 fell short on that too often, with plots that didn’t make sense, over explanation and just shitty scripts.

I don’t expect every episode to be a masterpiece so as far as I’m concerned, an hour of enjoyable telly is meeting expectations.

[Lily]

Yeah I enjoyed that. The killer self-driving car has been done before I’m sure, but otherwise it was all good stuff.

I always try to stay strictly spoiler free to the point I don’t watch trailers or ‘next time’ clips, so was somewhat annoyed at my local radio station talking about it this morning before I’d had a chance to watch on catch-up. With Stephen Fry, Lenny Henry and the Master in one sentence it still did surprise me in the end which was a nice twist.

Looking forward to next week.

[Lily]

>I believe it was Lily on the Discord

Nothing to do with me gov.

[Lily]

It appears surprisingly difficult to actually watch BTE online.

UK versions of Netflix and Britbox both have series 1 to 8. UKTVplay have series 3 + 10 to 12.

Only Amazon video has the full range of series 1 to 12, including BTE as “Season 9” – none of which are actually included in prime video.

Do Americans have other options?

[Lily]

So how does one watch HBO shows in the UK anyway?

[Lily]

What an odd choice, to put all the xmas specials as separate entries. If you’re binging a show you have to stop at the appropriate time, search for the special to watch it, then continue with the rest of the series.

It feels like the people creating britbox have never actually used a streaming service.

[Lily]

• Yes, Minister series 1 – 3 *(No Christmas Special)
• Yes, Prime Minister series 1 – 2

The lack of Christmas special is pretty fundamental in bridging the two shows. It seems so bizarre to cull the specials.

[Lily]

I’d be up for this. I’ve never read the books so it gives me a good reason to do so.

[Lily]

Or … and I realise this may be a stretch … it could be a reference to the film The Cincinnati Kid with Steve McQueen about a poker player.

But yeah, the farting during rimming thing is far more likely.

[Lily]

It must get frustrating for the guys to be constantly asked about Dwarf when they’re busy trying to pimp out whatever it is they’re currently working on.

[Lily]

The whole ‘can’t move out the frame’ thing is ignored almost as soon as it’s raised. Even the pub they go to, they walk around in when the original is a close up on the band.

As for the ashtrays, CDs were only just becoming a new thing. Rob & Doug are old, they were remembering these

[Lily]

But Rimmer walks around inside Lister’s mansion. The whole building is in the frame so it must allow for depth.

On a separate note, after just re-watching that scene with Ruby Wax, I’ve literally only just got the joke about ‘never short of an ashtray in his house’. Singles were on cassettes in my day, I’d forgotten about vinyl.

[Lily]

Well they are justified, and they’re ancient.

[Lily]

I didn’t realise this was a legit song. I thought it was something kids had made up to the tune of rock and roll.

[Lily]

“Where are we?”
“Dunno … stone” thump thump

THEY WERE GONNA SORT THA’ OUT IN THE DUB

[Lily]

I’ve still not got around to watching the old Who, but I’ve always presumed there’d be a light sprinkling of racism and sexism in line with the times it was produced. Nothing wrong with that, as that’s just how things were then.

Even though I’ve not seen them, I still felt that the First Doctor in Twice was deliberately made to be even worse than he probably was, just so they could say “oh look how awful things were and we’re so inclusive now!”

[Lily]

It appears that 5 years ago he put out a flurry of videos on youtube and never bothered again since.

[Lily]

Despite the ominous undertones of Darrell’s “while you can”, that is actually why I’m looking at doing this now. I’ve been buying the DVDs of Doctor Who and have most of Drs.1 & 2 now. Just these alone are taking two shelves and I’m thinking I’m really not invested enough to keep these long term. With the blu-rays slowly coming out, the market for the dvds is going to tank. These are already 2nd or even 3rd hand, so I’ll only be breaking even if I’m lucky.

Just been having a look at Plex and I’m not sure my TV is smart enough. I guess I could get a chromecast? I’ve already got an amazon stick thing plugged in it.

[Lily]

Oi! This is the Star Trek crap thread. Take this off to a Classic Who crap thread!

In fact I’ll probably start one myself in a few days if no-one else does. Think I’ve just about got all the DVDs to start watching through Doctors 1 and 2.

[Lily]

I wouldn’t discount the Dad appeal. Mine hated Doctor Who, but would be a lot more tolerant if it was a Leela episode.

[Lily]

I don’t really get the Samsara hate. I’ve always rather liked that one. I loved the way that the two timelines were woven together to show us what happened rather than Kryten coming out with a ‘best guess’ (even though he does at the end, but at least the whole premise isn’t just dumped in one best guess). The bit with Cat and Lister in the dark went on too long, but that didn’t make the entire episode awful as far as I’m concerned.

[Lily]

Graph version of the IMDB ratings for people that like visual data https://www.ratingraph.com/serie/red_dwarf-10962/

It’s interesting to me who actually bothers rating shows on IMDB. It’s certainly never occurred to me to do so, so I’d presume the people have to be a step higher in general fandom than just a casual watcher. It’s also a hard way to rate, as you’re comparing to the rest of all TV, not just within the show itself. When ranking in things like the pearl poll it’s easy to shove BTE and Krytie TV at the bottom and work it out from there, but with ratings, even the worst of RD is better than other shows, so most of them get a 7/8/9 with little nuance between them.

[Lily]

I know Discord is where all the cool kids hang out these days, but it really is just a re-wrapped version of IRC. It’s great for general chitter chatter, but sucks balls if you’re trying to scroll back and see what people are talking about while you’ve been offline. It’s also really hard to chime in on conversations that have already ‘passed’.

The best bit of G&T is the people here and the amount of interesting, well thought out posts (ignoring the idea for an episode thread). I think a lot of that would be lost in Discord.

I’d be another vote for having an improved forum engine where you can do radical things like edit your post, or search. But considering the guys are busy having lives and all that I’m not going to hold my breath.

Sure if someone set one up I’d go with Discord, but I’d be thinking of the forum.

[Lily]

>I had a sugar sandwich once just out of curiosity because I heard that’s something people (used to?) East when they’re on very little money.

I grew up on banana and sugar sandwiches. They were a treat for Sunday night tea. The soft banana and crunch of the sugar was a great mix!

[Lily]

“Did you know” John Cleese forgot the name of his enchanter character in Holy Grail and just made up Tim on the spot and everyone went with it!

“Did you know” the extras in the biggus dickus scene were told they’d get fired on the spot if they laughed, but Michael Palin was so funny they couldn’t help themselves!

Urgh … why are people so willing to believe this type of stuff rather than appreciate talented comedy writers?

[Lily]

See I’m not convinced that Quarantine really does have plot holes. Of course there’s lots of silly stuff, but the internal logic all stands up. There’s nothing that happens that breaks you out of the immersion and makes you think “wait, no, that doesn’t make sense” (which is what bothered me the most about the last Dr.Who season).

[Lily]

I always figured the holovirus was a computer virus. Rimmer puts them in quarantine because he’s already infected and starting madness. The virus allows him to channel his own power supply as lightning and hex vision.

Could Rimmer have turned Holly off to stop her getting involved?

As for him touching stuff, I think Rob and Doug gave up on the rules of holograms almost as soon as they made them. It goes from “Holly can only sustain one hologram” to Me2 in the space of 6 episodes.

[Lily]

I only came to Red Dwarf when VIII was first broadcast and was already an adult, so don’t have any nostalgia for the older stuff. My list is different to the standard, but I’m just one weirdo rather than a representation. https://pastebin.com/vs9AnBBU

[Lily]

>Series VII has the only food worth eating. Lobster (thermidor?), waffles, cheesy fried eggs, cottage cheese, tinned peaches, various curry dishes, afternoon tea, roast chicken.

Is there any ketchup?

[Lily]

I’ve never assumed there to be a connection between any of them, other than the brothers. In my mind it was set up like Seb says, random people put together to make a team.

Considering you’re dropping out of society to live in a fantasy for years at a time, it makes far more sense for each group to be random strangers. If you have three friends you’re not doing so badly in life that this kind of escapism would be desirable.

[Lily]

Oh and I was going to also say -where- is Wax World? It must be pretty close to Earth surely? If they’ve been alone there for millions of years, they must be of pretty much the same time as Lister? Had humans gone beyond the solar system at that point?

[Lily]

I think the problem is that it’s not even convincing as fields somewhere in England. The buildings in the background and the fence line they walk along really make it feel like the bit of scrubland at the back of the studio car park. It’s the lack of any type of effort that devalues it.

The outside stuff in Better Than Life is pretty ropey as well. You don’t see Rhyll beach and think of paradise, but with the doorway and car ‘appearing’ it’s enough to be able to just about hold on to enough suspension of belief to make it work.

[Lily]

I love the Winnie scene too, I was just trying to think of reasons why people in general might not like it.

> but Holoship is an even more extreme case than Meltdown of an episode being confusingly unpopular once and gradually working its way up the ranks

I could see that people’s opinions on Holoship would change over time. The young teenagers that rated it in the 90s were less likely to understand or empathise with Rimmers motivations as well as the 30somethings that are rating it now.

[Lily]

Dodgy ‘dinosaurs’.
Outside stuff looks like the back of the studios.
Whinny the Poo scene has the air of “we don’t have the budget to film this”.
Some of the guests give a weak performance.
Some of the guests are too over the top.

All that being said, I’ve always quite liked it.

[Lily]

I’ve not watched Discovery or any of the new films, as there seems to have been a huge tonal shift in recent years. Old Trek was primarily about the drama, the stories being told. Any action sequences were there to move the story along. New Trek feels like it’s flipped that around. The focus is on the action and the story is just there to get you from one action set piece to the next.

I’d be happy to be corrected on that, but it’s certainly the impression I’ve got from the bits and pieces of the new stuff that I’ve seen.

[Lily]

I only got into Dwarf as an adult, shortly before the DVDs started coming out. I’d guess I’ve only watched the original 1-8 a couple of dozen times.

BTE, maybe twice times and Dave series maybe three times?

I find it surprising how under-watched BTE seems to be in this thread though. Previously I’d got the impression here that BTE was well regarded and liked, but it can’t be that much if no-one is re-watching it really?

[Lily]

I’ve never really found that scene odd. I think the main problem is that Arlene is meant to be drunk and isn’t really showing it. Rimmer says “I’m the same when I’m tanked up” and I’m quite prepared to believe that.

As for him being a bit rapey, is that not the charge thrown at him for most of VIII? Given the mix of social awkwardness, sexual frustration and plenty of booze I’ve known too many guys that take polite conversation as “asking for it” and getting too handsy. Fits his profile perfectly really.

But yeah, she didn’t play it ‘drunk’, so a lot of that just makes her look over confident instead.

[Lily]

Would Maggie Philben (sp?) be a possibility? She used to do Tomorrows World, so that sort of show sounds like it would be a fit maybe?

[Lily]

>>That kind of “no peril”, “reset button” criticism applies to almost every TV show ever made

>Seriously though, wait until you hit Voyager!

Glad it’s not just me then :) I think the problem is that most shows will take their characters right up to the edge of mortal peril, then do something clever or interesting to save them, so that the show can carry on. However Voyager is perfectly content to let them die, then wave a technobabble magic wand and it’s all OK again. It’s significantly less satisfying that way.

[Lily]

>Frequent TNG/DS9 writer and Battlestar Galactica creator Ron Moore gave a famously scathing interview about his very brief time working on Voyager before he quit and the fundamental problems he saw with it.

Interesting read and hits a lot of the niggles I have. The episodes where they have a chance of getting home annoy me, as you already know it’s not going to happen. Even when they first aired you knew it, as that would be game over for the show. It’s just waiting to see how they fuck it up. Endless shuttles, sending off probes all the time and permanent running holodeck doesn’t tell me that they’re stuck in the delta quadrant with limited supplies.

Also the lack of peril bothers me. You know that the core crew are always safe and there will always be a reset button found by the end of the episode. Actions never have lasting consequences. Like that guy says, it just doesn’t feel ‘real’.

[Lily]

>the show is nearly 5 million down from the opener to episode 9, so what else do you call that other than ”haemorrhaging viewers”?

Whittaker has a gap of 4.5 million from her opener to the lowest, not 5. Ecclestone had drop of 4 million, Tennant and Smith both lost 3.7 million in their first seasons. Ecclestone lost 2.8 million in the first week, Whittaker lost 1.9 in her first week. The only one that didn’t have a large gap is Capaldi, but far fewer watched his opener in the first place.

So I’d say that losing millions of viewers is pretty much par for the course in a new Doctor’s season.

It just bugs me that the media has been ripping on this season since the start, making out that losing viewers in the first week was a sign that a woman doctor and ‘sjw friendly’ companions was a disaster, rather than a totally normal pattern of viewing behaviour. There’s is always a large drop after the first week. They then carried on the story about it being a ‘ratings disaster’ even when it was getting better ratings than it has for a few years now.

Rather than the hyperbole of a haemorrhage, I would say there has however been a steady decline in viewers. Other seasons have peaks and troughs according to how interesting the next episode looks. Tennant had a big jump in viewers for the first Cybermen story and again for the return of Rose in Donna’s finale. That’s been missing this season, there’s been no ‘wow I need to watch that’ episodes to get people back watching. It also doesn’t help that we’re a whole 3 episodes short of a full season.

Going back to the NYD episode though, with catchup it might just reach 7 million, which will scrape about where Capaldi got with Xmas specials. So yeah, it is pretty shit and probably an indication of what’s to come. If they don’t change something and start writing actually good and enjoyable Who soon, they’ll be back into the ratings of Capaldi’s last season in no time, which were objectively awful.

Pretty blobs on a chart – https://i.imgur.com/KAlsHjp.png

[Author]

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