On The Sofa (7)
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28 October 2015 at 01:53 #45689
Anonymous @
OMG: I woulda thought no-one woulda known that! (or cared)
The t-shirt: I never got one, I’m afraid, but I did get some DVD boxed sets.
Awesome
@worldaway welcome and hallo.. I’ve not been doing my duty: I’ve been afeeding the trolls instead. Silly me because it never works. So, jump in with your theories and enjoy 🙂
28 October 2015 at 05:05 #45710@seeoswald I’ll make my last remarks about Doctor Who here now.
Anyone wanna bet? I do wish this Underbridge would toddle off now to eat a goat or two, because my stomach is hurting from laughing. This “forus” has had such funny use lately that I’m sorry to have missed the fun as it rollicked along like a dumb ol’ ‘merican hayness ride.
Never mind; I am ready for some zygons, Mr. DeMille. Oh, and we loved Northern Exposure.
@worldaway Welcome! It’s not always this funny, though; I hope you realize that.
28 October 2015 at 05:49 #45715For those who are interested in all things Who related, there’s apparently going to be a K9 movie.
K9, for all you who did not ride to school on dinosaurs, was a robot dog from the 56th century picked up by Tom Baker’s Fourth Doctor, and Louise Jameson’s Leela in a serial about a giant virus – I think it was called Invisible Enemy. The character was popular, and lasted for several seasons, almost up to the end of the Baker era, departing in Warrior’s Gate. John Nathan Turner brought it back for a failed pilot – K9 and Company, with Liz Sladen as Sarah Jane Smith.
K9 was brought back in the new series, along with Sarah Jane Smith in School Reunion, with David Tennant. He showed up a couple of years later as a minor part of Journey’s End/Stolen Earth. K9 also returned in the Sarah Jane Adventures as a supporting character for several episodes.
Notably, K9 ended up as the third of the Doctor Who new era spin-offs – along with Torchwood and the Sarah Jane adventures. The K9 spin off happened because Bob Baker owned the rights. The BBC wasn’t along for the ride, so the K9 series wasn’t allowed to mention Doctors, Tardises etc. Instead, K9 shows up 50 years in the future, regenerated, hanging out in an abandoned police station with an agoraphobic professor, having ‘regenerated’ and suffered memory damage. I think it was an Australian production or co-production. It went one season, but 26 half hour episodes.
Anyway, there’s going to be a movie, apparently. Bob Baker’s writing it. And because he wrote or co-wrote the Three Doctors…. the primordial betrayed Time Lord – Omega, will be the villain.
28 October 2015 at 06:43 #45717@ichabod Oh, I agree, a goat or two should be eaten as a ‘pass’ sign for any of the Underbridge family.
In our debating with these fools we then forget to welcome and chat, politely, with @worldaway and other wonderful newbies with their new wisdom and love of the show. We can’t have that so @worldaway -we are actually nice people here, so don’t be turned off!
Cheers 🙂
28 October 2015 at 06:46 #45718yes @ichabod I didn’t realise that ppl remembered Northern Exposure much less enjoyed it! The wonderful actor as the Doctor? He then starred in a fav film of mine with Ralph Fiennes (sic) called Quiz Show. Tremendous.
28 October 2015 at 06:46 #45719Is it me or is the Doctor stuck on Earth at the moment? There seems to be a lot of travel through time but very little through space this series. Apart from the visit to Davros’ house…
28 October 2015 at 06:52 #45720Says Martha: “oh you know the Doctor….he’s wonderful. But he’s like fire. Stand too close and you get burnt”
This is what Ashildr was referring to, I think. And it stands to reason that these things don’t change -with the Doctor -no matter the incarnation
28 October 2015 at 07:20 #45721@purofilion Says Martha: “oh you know the Doctor….he’s wonderful. But he’s like fire. Stand too close and you get burnt” This is what Ashildr was referring to, I think. And it stands to reason that these things don’t change -with the Doctor -no matter the incarnation
Well, as long as he both attracts dangerous situations and can’t seem to resist being attracted to them in turn no matter who’s standing next to him, yep. Very dangerous materials there. AND he sometimes forgets his hard-won humanity for a bit, and the importance of various humans themselves . . .
As for Ashildr, I think that by the close of “The Woman Who Lived”, she has woken from the moral sleep of being Lady Me and is once more Ashildr, since when the Doctor calls her that in the pub, she doesn’t reject the name, as Me did, quite vehemently.
And thanks, puro, for the kind words, earlier on. Which reminds me, I can’t fault the goat-muncher on Americans not being clever (the shambles that is our election process pretty much cancels that option right there out in the open for all to see); but I do take it very hard that the M. Underbridge thinks that we aren’t funny.
28 October 2015 at 10:25 #45726Old news. It’s even on IMDB.
28 October 2015 at 14:10 #45736Thanks for the welcome everybody.
31 October 2015 at 07:02 #45947I got to meet Sylvester McCoy today.
He’s very nice.
31 October 2015 at 07:56 #45948Was it a com-con or some other special?
How exciting! Did you get some merchandise signed (my favourite thing to do other than, you know, converse with them!)?
Good on you!
31 October 2015 at 07:59 #45949yes, but that was the 1989 film -awful, actually with usually lovable Belushi. Is this a remake?
31 October 2015 at 09:08 #45950so to get my head sorted on timey whimey stuff, imagine a scene (I was watching a doco on K2 the Mountain) whereby a climber is falling and the Doctor sees this, turns the Tardis back in time about 3 mins and lands on the mountain and says to the climber ‘you’re going to fall, get in’.
The Doctor knows this is going to happen, because he’s seen it….but in saving the climber does it cancel the Doctor’s memories of the climber needing to be saved therefore he never saves the climber because, at that point the climber doesn’t need saving?
If anyone wants to weigh in on this -please do, I’m on Time 101 Introductory here!
I also presume this is a very basic intro to time ‘n’ stuff!
31 October 2015 at 14:02 #45965@purofilion There are two possible approaches here.
One is that time is entirely deterministic – ie, only one thing can ever happen, and anything that will happen, is in a sense destined. So every act of time travel creates a stable time look. History cannot truly be altered, and paradoxes are illusions, because the time traveller was always going to go back and be part of that history. So history isn’t so much changed as revealed.
I don’t think that’s the case in the Doctor Who Universe, because the Time Lords and other Agencies seemed to be so concerned about paradox and manipulating history.
Rather, the show came up with the Blenovitch Limitation Effect, which seems to say that a Time Traveller cannot obviate events that they have been a previous part of. Blenovitch (sic) seems to be a localized version of the Time Travellers Paradox. The Time Traveller is physically unable to create a change which directly affects their own personal timeline.
In the sense of your example – the Doctor never sees the person falling off the cliff, so his future self never goes back to rescue him, so that he is caused to fall off the cliff, which the Doctor sees… It’s not so much a time loop, as a time ‘figure eight’.
Actually, that begs the question – is it actually physically impossible? Or is it possible, but it just triggers those Time Eaters that plagued the 9th Doctor and Rose in Father’s Day? Or was it just something that the Time Lords found so problematic that they conditioned their people through either imposed ‘laws’ or subconscious programming to avoid doing such things.
From what I can tell, it’s mostly the latter. These things can be done, but the consequences tend to be unpleasant, so the Time Lords worked very hard to prohibit them. All this stuff about ‘fixed points in time’ might not be a hard and fast rule, but another stricture by the Time Lords to try and keep the Universes timelines at least slightly coherent.
Otherwise, uncontrolled populations of Time Travellers would simply be rewriting all of history every other day. Which seems to have been what happened during the Time War.
That may well have been one of the Doctor’s great criticisms – the Time Lords had abandoned their own ‘Laws’ for the preservation of time. Certainly when you look at things like the events of the Trial, or Image of the Fendahl, the Three Doctors, etc., it seems that the Time Lords were not above occasionally screwing with Time, but that was always presented as a moral travesty.
31 October 2015 at 14:05 #45966@bluesqueakpip Sorry, got names jammed up.
There are a lot of different approaches to time travel, and it differs in different mediums.
The Bill and Ted Shtick doesn’t seem to be popular in the Doctor Who universe (except in Curse of Fatal Death).
31 October 2015 at 15:16 #45969@denvaldron and @Purofilion
I agree with DenValdron – the climber can be saved, but only if the Doctor hasn’t seen him die. The fall has become ‘fixed’ by the action of the Doctor seeing it.
I talked about this in my blog Wibbley Wobbly, Timey Wimey – specifically, it’s the bit where the Doctor visits Blackpool and breaks his arm – but doesn’t, because he’s read the book. Which means it’s never written. Which means he doesn’t know to avoid Blackpool…
Myself, I call it a zig-zag rather than a figure eight. A more recent example is Dark Water, where the Doctor tries to explain that same paradox to a grieving Clara. You can’t prevent something you know is going to happen, because how will you know it’s going to happen if you’ve prevented it?
Regarding the climber – no, the Doctor wouldn’t stop him falling before he’s ever fallen. He might, however, be able to save the climber by opening the TARDIS doors and letting him fall into the swimming pool. Providing he does that in a place where his earlier self wouldn’t have seen it, that’s fine. 🙂
Similarly, the Doctor has to act to make Vesuvius blow up on schedule. He can’t save all those people. But he can save one terrified family, whose fate he doesn’t know.
That a fully trained Time Lord can break the zig zag (or the figure 8) if they want to is shown by Waters of Mars. That it’s potentially catastrophic is shown by The Wedding of River Song.
31 October 2015 at 18:07 #45975A couple of CG pumpkins I did last year (then forgot to post 🙄 )
Happy Wholloween 😈
31 October 2015 at 18:26 #45979@purofilion Oh, I meant to respond to this and it got lost in the shuffle. I absolutely remember Northern Exposure with massive fondness, it’s exactly the kind of quirky show that I love. If “Chris in the Morning” had been an option on my radio, I would have listened every day. ☺ Mr. Arbutus used to complain about the show, having spent his high school years in Alaska, because “the trees were wrong”.
@ichabod Au contraire, in Canada, we think your Republican primary is hilarious. My son even told his American friends that he “brought popcorn” (he also apparently supports Bernie Sanders, but that’s another story!).
@fatmaninabox Great job on the pumpkins!
31 October 2015 at 18:33 #45980Both are great explanations. This also makes more clear the problems that the Doctor had in The Angels Take Manhattan, where, in reading the book from the future, the Doctor was turning things into fixed points, because if he knew they would happen, he couldn’t prevent them happening.
1 November 2015 at 01:07 #46009Yes, thank you so much for those explanations and all the examples; see these mini essays (which obviously take enormous time considering my present self has forgotten [ahem]the timey whimey blog -is what the Underbridges should present to be noticed.
Ah, yes, so basically if the doctor hasn’t seen the climber die then he can save him -and even then maybe not. But yes, probably as long as he wasn’t ‘along’ the line (zig zag, figure 8) to watch him fall to his death.
This came from watching a film about the 11 climbers dying on K2. I thought, stupidly (on many levels) if the Dr was there, he could save them.
Nope.
Going to your blog now -hope all enjoyed last night’s/this morning’s viewing.
1 November 2015 at 03:04 #46026fantastic blog which I had read before but then promptly forgot! What’s interesting is that as far back as July 2013 you seem to be thinking that there’s no original Clara, as it were, in that the current Clara Prime (which definition is used by some of us) is in fact probably another claricle with a temporary life (perhaps due to run out when the Doctor requires saving) so the term ‘original Clara’ or Prime Clara might not be especially relevant.
I found it interesting that “all 12” appeared in person (12’s eyebrows anyway) to place Gallifrey in a pocket universe which could suggest that “all 12” are saved by Clara/icle as well: hence the Doctor’s rather sad, poignant looks at Clara and the suggestion, all season, of her impending demise/death/travel in a Tardis of her own (referring to @Bluequeakpip’s comment a day or two ago and not referencing anything from the latest episode, as in Oz we haven’t seen it yet -so by the same token, I’m staying resolutely away from any comments!)
Also, who the heck is Anthony? 🙂 – – in your Blog you, and others, refer to an Anthony 😉
2 November 2015 at 18:37 #46189Hi Whovians !
Anyone is going to the DW Festival in London the 14th of November (Saturday) ? I’m looking for some people to go with =)
2 November 2015 at 19:05 #46190@ludivine I wish! If I ever get a ticket to London and a place to crash where people don’t mind two little Wholigans boys in tow and one overgrown boy known as my husband, then I will meet you there. (;
Actually, my real dream is to move to Cardiff and work for the BBC, but I’ve never figured out how to make myself a desired asset to their team. I am not a British citizen, so I would practically have to be requested. I’m a terrible writer, can’t swim and don’t speak Welsh. Haven’t figured out how to make a past professional ballerina and current science teacher plus ballet company director of any interest to their respected team. All my skills are ballet production and science. Any ideas? (;
2 November 2015 at 19:36 #46193Come to think of it, has anyone on the Forum ever worked for a television company? What jobs are there? What would you recommend for someone with good ideas, a good memory, attention to detail, and overall sense of whimsy…so my students say. (; I teach science (astronomy, with a Whovian syllabus) during the day and I run a ballet school and company at night. I oversee all aspects of production, including sets, costumes, publicity, outreach, casting, and lighting. In the beginning I did it all myself, but the school and company is so large now I only oversee most of it now. My main role now is Artistic Director and I am the keeper of the vision and choreography. My first degree is in Theater & Dance and my second in Combined Science. My super power is seeing patterns, and the very INFJ ability to see through people like glass, and I truly can think outside of the box; I’m crazy creative. I’ve been told I have Macgyver like skills and can come up with near genius fixes. With all of that in mind, what role should I be working towards at the BBC? What skills should I acquire? Any suggestions on how to get my foot in the door, especially as a lowly American? I’m willing to start at a bottom level job. I’m clearly not a writer and I could not be an actress at the BBC with my Californian accent, so it would have to be one of those support jobs no one thinks of at first. Any ideas would be awesome. (: Working for the place that created Doctor Who, and anything else worth watching, would be an absolute dream. Any and all bonkers or legitimate ideas will be greatly appreciated. (:
2 November 2015 at 21:50 #46207Given the Zygon 2-parter we are watching, I thought I would post the intro to one of my favorite TV shows of the 1960s: “The Invaders”, about aliens who look like humans and are trying to take over the world. It was sci-fi paranoia at its best!
2 November 2015 at 22:13 #46210@blenkinsopthebrave Totally remember this from when I was still a kid.
The series didn’t last too long but it came at a time when invasion sci-fi
like Quartermass, Nomads, Body Snatchers were all coming out. Great stuff!
Thanks for this!2 November 2015 at 22:22 #46211@blenkinsopthebrave I’m still hoping for a version of this. Which the shades are/must be born for.
2 November 2015 at 22:53 #46215Absolutely! God, I love that movie!
When he first puts on the sunglasses, and the billboards display the subliminal messages, like “Obey”, “Consume”, “Don’t Think”, and all the rich people are revealed to be aliens and the poor are human–yes, I like my political satire to be both humourous and in-your-face!
But yes, the shades are made for this. Come to think of it, can his shades reveal distinguish a zygon from a human…?
2 November 2015 at 22:57 #46216can his shades reveal distinguish a zygon from a human…?
I think that is how he knew the school kids were a bit over-age.
2 November 2015 at 23:04 #46218Before there were Zygons…
OK, here is a clip from the movie that started it all, “The Invasion of the Body Snatchers”
2 November 2015 at 23:08 #46219Well, I suppose he could have been traveling from playground to playground with his glasses on, but, you know, I think he already knew where to find them…
2 November 2015 at 23:45 #462213 November 2015 at 00:34 #46222yes, see, this was one of the films I had hardly ever heard of when I was in my early 20s! Sir Ilion suggested this, and I was rapt. Great little film -love the close ups of the actresses perfect lippie.
Never gets old.
Also @craig @pedant I’ve never seen or heard of The They Live movie (that’s what it’s called?)
Why have I missed that? I love that line: “I’m here to chew bubblegum and to kick ass and I’m all out of bubblegum”
3 November 2015 at 00:54 #46224given your experience, choreography would be an obvious start -but maybe something you already do so therefore you’d want something different? I keep going back to things like wardrobe (with your creativity) and makeup and if you’re good at organising check out the job, Line Producer?
That’s a step down from other producers (I think @Bluesqueakpip would know a lot about this but she’s pretty busy at the mo) but I’ve seen them interviewed on various DVD extras -and it’s all very logistical and often done by the younger crowd, involves getting up and marshalling crews at unheard of hours -but then wardrobe would too, I imagine, and anything involving makeup and simple ‘before scene’ direction and organisation. What about sets etc? You’d be good at putting together that and trying (as you have to everywhere now) to get the most out the sets so they’re as cheap as possible. Though, if the UK is anything like Aus, they’re cutting back rather than hiring!
There’s always the g0fers but they are generally young men and women starting out in the film industry -and as always they’d say “hey, you’re over qualified!” Or maybe they wouldn’t? Who knows! One can only try. I imagine contacting the BBC and acquiring a job list of absolutely everything that is done on TV shows and films would be a start (it’s evident I know zilch) -but you’re not planning from moving from Sunny California are you? Not with the zygons loose in the UK? 🙂
3 November 2015 at 01:58 #46227@purofilion
Oh you must see They Live. It is glorious. John Carpenter at his most impish. Speaking of whom, have you seen Dark Star?
3 November 2015 at 02:17 #46229@pedant Oh no I haven’t see Dark Star!
Grr. Is this on Nextflix? -on the school holidays (or whenever I’m home for a week at a time!) I must investigate it -if I can see these films this way, rather than visiting my home-away-from-home -JB Hi-fi for various films (usually these ones tend to be about 5 bucks, though, so that’s eminently acceptable) then I will definitely sign up as long as I connect Netflix to the telly. The 3 or 4 of us struggling to watch the laptop would be rather uncomfortable: “turn it this way. Turn it UP”
“no, it’s already on the loudest it can go. You move. Over here. OK, take my place” 🙂
3 November 2015 at 02:36 #46231@purofilion
“They Live”
This has now been recommended by @craig, @pedant, and @blenkinsopthebrave
https://www.jbhifi.com.au/movies-tv-shows/movies-tv-shows-on-sale/horror/they-live/457287/
Enjoy.
3 November 2015 at 03:20 #46235thank you for that link. Onwards with good telly! It’s funny that on closer inspection, JB Hi-Fi adds “movies you may also need” rather than “want”. I love “need” because sometimes it’s exactly like that -my capitalist Dad would have heartily agree but for different reasons. He hated horror movies because he believed he’d seen ‘enough’ as it were. Me? Never. I escaped out of the house to watch Deliverance and the Chainsaw Massacre -neither exactly subtle or with a clever message but I was young and wanted to rebel and revel in ‘knowing things’
Kindest
Puro
3 November 2015 at 06:56 #46245surprisingly I’m watching Don Sutherland’s version of The Body Snatchers (1978) and I know that the ’56 original is better -but still, some of the takes and the fabulous on the edge of one’s seat scariness is terrific. The Tall Guy’s Jeff Goldblum is fantastic as is the brunette female lead.
Of course I should be on the movie thread and will go there directly. Sutherland really is so wonderful: one feels instantly (like the Doctor with the Zygons) that he can save the day.
3 November 2015 at 07:45 #46246@purofilion I will look into line producer. Thank you for the great ideas Yes, it’s true, I am a little bored with what I do, mostly because when you are a ballet dancer you have been doing the same thing since before you could talk. I danced professionally, taught, and now run a studio. It’s been my whole life. I care about my students dearly, but I hired great staff, some of my closest friends, and could leave it to them. California is not my cup of tea. I never really have fit in here. I’m more of a rain and tea kind of girl. I like reading, quiet, the ballet, classical music, tea, and oddly enough, I barely watch television. The only shows I like are Doctor Who and Downton Abbey. It always seemed like living in Great Britain would be the best way to experience it. Being a tourist sounds boring. I want to live in a regular town and have a real job. That’s why I am up for anything. I like being a part of things, I don’t need a special role, just a role where I could help.
4 November 2015 at 21:44 #46359For anyone who wants a bit more insight into Moffat’s mind and his style of writing, the BBC have released the scripts for “The Magician’s Apprentice” and “The Witch’s Familiar”.
Links to the PDFs are at the bottom of this page:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/writersroom/scripts/doctor-who-series-9
EXT. BATTLEFIELD – DAY
No Man’s land. Mud, craters, barbed wire, drifting hellish fog.
The dull stomp and crump of distant explosions. The rattle of gunfire.
Raising up now. The drone of engines. A flying formation, heading towards us. Now energy beams blasting down at the battlefield below –
– it’s a strafing run!
Now, as they zoom overhead, we see these are not X-wing fighters, they’re biplanes! Biplanes firing lasers!
4 November 2015 at 22:53 #46364I don’t know if you know that the BBC has a careers section?
It depends what you want to do – one thing that did occur to me when I read your skillset was ‘researcher’. The traditional entry level job if you want more hands on production/direction jobs is ‘Runner’.
The Raindance page on finding film work might give you a few ideas.
5 November 2015 at 01:01 #46372thanks for that link -it was absolutely wonderful to read The Magician’s Apprentice. I saw quite a bit that was edited out in the 1st Act, due to time, I expect, but it gave a fuller interpretation of the Dr and Missy’s long relationship and of how Clara is respected by Mr Dunlop -quite a bit, I think!
Kindest,
Puro
5 November 2015 at 01:52 #46375The idea of time repeating itself over and over and the concept that “you can’t go back to the past, and change things for if you did, then obviously you didn’t change anything because you’re here now” is brilliantly done in the last 10 mins of the 1964 film, The Time Travellers. Funny and spooky with some 4th Wall breaking. Nicely done.
5 November 2015 at 03:45 #46382@janetteb In my house we still refer to it as the tube as in
“what’s on the tube?”. Then some one says ‘not much”. Its like a running
gag. I turned it on this week a few times.
But I guess the tube thing probably wasn’t anything.I’ve been to the UK a lot. I don’t spend lots of time in the cities. There is
great stuff in the cities but all my favorite places in the UK are mostly
but not totally around the cities. Its the Peak district and the
Lake district and the Yorkshire area and all those great gardens, all the villages
and so on and on. I like taking the trains to get around too. Unfortunately I have
a bit of a problem with driving the things called the round abouts. lol Their
everywhere and they are very tough for me!5 November 2015 at 04:54 #46384@lisa I loved the Peaks District too and the Lakes of course and as for those roundabouts, grrr. It was the double ones and those that were only painted on the road that really got me. We have plenty of roundabouts here now but they are very standard, easy to negotiate apart from all those drivers who don’t know the rules regarding indicating which appears to be about 50% of the local population.
Heading way off topic though so I had better try and think of something Who related though I don’t suppose roundabouts are a problem for someone travelling by Tardis. ah, thought of something. Your mention of the Lakes reminds me that there have been no references to Carlisle this series. Maybe that was an in joke that no one else was aware of.
Cheers
Janette
6 November 2015 at 06:13 #46409@bluesqueakpip & @purofilion Thanks! Research does seem to be a good place to start. I also looked into being a runner and it sounds like a lot of fun. 🙂 My biggest hurdle is going to be getting a work visa. As an American I do not have a right to work in the U.K. unless I am sponsored. My talents are not grand enough or necessary enough for the BBC to ever sponsor me. I’m going to have to figure out a way around it. I’m a clever girl, so I need to just believe there is a way. 🙂
6 November 2015 at 06:19 #464106 November 2015 at 06:34 #46411I never noticed all the hissing until I read the script. Was there actual hissing sounds in the Magician’s Apprentice?
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