Empress of Mars

[ichabod @ichabod]

@missy  Perhaps I am easily pleased, but I do know that I have been more transported, with dleight, sadness, grief and laughter, since Capaldi took over the Doctorship.

Me too; I just haven’t been this *engaged* in DW for years — it could be partly the hark-back to Tom Baker, who was the first Doctor who really struck me as an original creature from no known place.  With CapDoc, I think sometimes, Jeez, man, stay away from us humans — we’re not really all that good for you.  

Talk about addiction — the Doctor is addicted to US.  And there are consequences all round.

[Missy @missy]

@ichabod:

Addicted to us indeed.  Not a good thing to be, we aren’t nice creatures. No wonder he’s looking ill, we are a virus he’s contracted and there is no pill for it.

Missy

[Whisht @whisht]

@nick
Apologies – I’ve been missing replies to a few people ( @wolfweed – no I haven’t re-watched anything yet!) but just thought I’d acknowledge (with a big smiley) the nod to Dr Manhattan.

😉

[MissRori @missrori]

@ichabod  @missy  But if the Doctor stayed away from humans, he might hardly have any more heart than a Dalek.  He comes from a cold, mean race, those rotten Time Lords.  Getting to know humans and others made him the greatest of all heroes.  And if he’s sick I don’t think he wants to be cured if it meant losing all the love in his hearts.  He’d rather die a compassionate being.

[ichabod @ichabod]

@missrori  Well put, and you’re right.  Given a choice, he’d refuse to lose what he’s learned while wandering the universe with our company.  I’m just not feeling very — admiring of us right now.

Although new human heroes are definitely in the making as we speak; the times demand them.

[Missy @missy]

@missrori:

Yes, well said. Davros told him that his compassion would kill him one day.

@ichabod:

Being a cynic, I’ve never admired the human race, but admit there are exceptions.

Missy

[Mirime @mirime]

@missy I worked in retail for a while. Gives you a terrible view of the human race and I wasn’t exactly sociable before that.

I prefer cats.

[Missy @missy]

@mirime:

Doesn’t every intelligent being? *chuckles*

Dogs are a delightful, but cats have a certain (if you will excuse me) “up yours Jack!” I admire that immensely.

And that purrrrrrrrrrrrrr, so soothing.

Missy

[Mirime @mirime]

@missy apart from loving Doctor Who I’m also a massive Tolkien fan, and he did not love cats at all – the character that eventually became Sauron was an evil demonic cat originally. He also received a letter from a fan asking if it was ok to name their cats after his characters and, iirc, his reply was along the lines of ‘unfortunately I can’t stop you’.

There are three of the delightful creatures living with me currently, and I certainly know my place – it’s to be woken at 4am to feed/let in/let out/ just give them some fuss. Of course when one curls up purring for a cuddle it is lovely 🙂

[Missy @missy]

@mirime:

So that is why I have never been keen on Tolkien, a man of little taste. *chuckle*

Of course you know your place. Haven’t  you heard that “Dogs have owners but Cats have staff.” *winks*

Missy

[ichabod @ichabod]

I’m a bit hesitant to trust people who aren’t adventurous or flexible enough to enjoy the company of cats.  Well, I’ve got two, plus the feline gentleman boarder who comes in for meals and a safe place to sleep . . . If they did nothing more than lie round being beautiful, that would be enough for me.  They just delight my eye so . . .

[Missy @missy]

@ichabod:   They just delight my eye so . . .

Indeed they do, whether they be Tigers or good old moggies.

Their stare, their grace of movement, their purr, their treading, needle clawed on your lap and the sinuous winding of their soft bodies around your legs. Beauty at its highest degree, how can you resist them?

Missy

 

[Mirime @mirime]

You’ve not seen my Fry (as in Phillip J., Futurama). He has very little grace or elegance and is an annoying little sod. But I love him to bits anyway, he’s a big cuddly teddy bear of a cat and is a great friend to the rather more elegant Guybrush (Threepwood, mighty cat. Curse of Monkey Island.)

Sadly Guybrush is rather efficient at hunting birds. The only thing Fry can hunt is cat food, but he is ruthlessly efficient at consuming the contents of all three bowls.

[ichabod @ichabod]

@missy  — I can’t!  Well, except for the tuxedo boy who lives next door but hangs out in my hard and desperately wants to get into my house; he sprays on my porch to emphasize the point.  Vinegar helps; but then, vinegar, in moderation, helps most things.

Kinda like cats . . .

[Missy @missy]

@mirime:

As for hunting, that’s what cats do – well, most of them. When the odd person has told me that they don’t like cats because they kill wildlife, I remind them that if dogs could climb trees, so would they. Also, cats do not hunt in packs , bring down sheep and lambs and attack children or adults. You,  I tell them,  don’t like them because you can’t order them about – simple as that.

@ichabod:

He’s a bad, cat. Have you tried pepper?

Missy

 

 

[Mirime @mirime]

We’ve had good hunters and terrible hunters (one was very proud of the slug he caught), usually the females are better, but Guybrush has proved to be an exception.

I prefer it if the gift is alive and uninjured and I really object to dead rats being dropped on the kitchen tops, but if you have cats and let them out you have to expect the occasional something.

Must admit I did take steps to protect the lizards and slow worms at our previous house, but that was easier than for the birds and rodents.

[Missy @missy]

@mirime:

Thing is, they are cats not far down or up the scale of their wild counterparts – what do people expect?

They are hunters yes, but so are we.

Missy

[wolfweed @wolfweed]

Some chap called Gareth Roberts points out (quite rightly) that we never find out why the TARDIS fled from Mars…

[janetteB @janetteb]

This thread has turned into a discussion about cats and I have been missing it. My fault for not keeping up with every discussion, my cat, who is desperate to sit on my Wacom tablet is currently glaring at me because I won’t let him. As to killers of wildlife, our dog has killed more birds than the cat and eradicated our backyard lizard population which I find hard to forgive. In a country like Australia the environmental impact of domestic pets is painfully evident but not nearly so evident as the damage done by their owners.

And now back to Empress of Mars. I suspect the fleeing Tardis was merely a plot device which is best accepted rather than analysed, ie “because the script required it”. (There clumsy attempt to get back on topic.)

Cheers
Janette

[MissRori @missrori]

@janetteb Yeah, what was up with the TARDIS can only be one of those riddles for the ages.  Part of the mystique….  😉

[Missy @missy]

….or, she wanted Nardole to fetch Missy – mayhap?

@janetteb:

AH! Evidence that dogs are also killers of wild life – as are we.

[ps1l0v3y0u @ps1l0v3y0u]

The Empress of Mars

There’s lots to enjoy here and much that could annoy. I suppose. Mark Gatiss obviously remembers the Ice Warriors fondly. So do I. I liked the ‘Alien’ tinged Cold War, the previous IW outing, though David Warner’s Duran Duran obsessed dissident scientist could do with toning down. I like steam punk; it seems idle to point out that it looks a bit far fetched once transplanted into Who.

I like the reimagining of the Warriors and Mars.The IW used to look ridiculous (make sure he’s got big hips Jethro) but it turns out that’s because they’re wearing uber armour. Late 60’s special effects may be a joke, even with the addition of a Wilhelm Scream, but the Moff/Gatiss take on sonic weapons make Star Trek’s excruciating Varron T disruptor look a bit tame.

The basic plot of both is noble lizards facing off against dumb apes. The military are idiots. The Soviets very nearly started World War Three in the early eighties. British Imperialism was a disgrace. We didn’t mean to invade, we just wanted the gold and diamonds.

In many ways, Empress reminds me of Nightmare in Silver: packed sketchy plot, underwritten characters, lost dialogue even maybe? Not sure if the flakey Tardis was ever explained. Wouldn’t be the first time.The writers need a way of getting Missy out of the vault but I’m really not sure about Moff’s raging psychopath therapy program. Not really sure about Bill falling down the hole at the start either… unless it’s a reference to an earlier IW story. Not interested. Literally a waste of time.

Also, the Ice Warriors in Cold War (unless I got the impression from Waters of Mars?) were exotic colonists of Mars, weren’t they? Kind of makes sense. They give Mars a bit of Terraforming (cos it’s been dead for 2bn years) and, when they leave, this breaks down. But there’s no mention of this in Empress; just the ‘Golden Age’ comment.

The science could be updated but its not as bad as the Space Bat egg in Kill The Moon or the dopey atmospheric science from Forest of the Night. Or ‘the Little Ice Age was actually caused by a monster underneath the Thames.’

Otherwise Catchlove is a Flashman caricature, Jackdaw’s name is Potteresquely apposite, Vincey from Chesterfield(?) is a statement, presumably just in case people got the wrong end of the stick about imperialism. There’s no time for Godsacre’s change in motivation to be explored; all part of Gatiss’ ‘you and whose army’ schtick I suppose.

The Empress channels Grilka from Deep Space Nine and predator. Nice.

The Gargantua is a bit meh.

Personally, I like to imagine not just Godsacre but the whole unit integrated into the IW Imperial Guard and touring the galaxy. Failure to mythologise.

But the fact you can speculate rather than dismiss, saves the story.

[Dentarthurdent @dentarthurdent]

@ps1l0v3y0u Well much of that I would agree with (having just watched it) though I found it all a bit Indiana Jones. (Or did I say Edgar Rice Burroughs? One or the other). I much preferred Cold War (and I did like David Warner’s character). I didn’t really notice any dreadful inconsistencies such as in Kill The Moon or even the (much-less-awful) Forest of the Night. It just didn’t really grab me. For me, personally, it was the weakest episode of the season.

So, on to the much more atmospheric Eaters of Light…

[ps1l0v3y0u @ps1l0v3y0u]

@dentarthurdent

I’ll leave Eaters of Light for you then.

In hindsight the development of Bill through the series was disappointing. It got squeezed out by the Missy redemption subplot which I frankly didn’t care that much about. So more no Moira, no Penny. They were fun. But maybe that might a bit ZChib????!

There again no further Iraxxa/Bill interaction (Gatiss ran out of time). But also no exploration of the professor/student relationship. We don’t know why The Doctor’s doing this… ok, being ‘kind’, but how can he predict Bill will get Firsts? Is this just another 12 ego trip? Or did he see something specific in Bill? Why did he choose THAT university to hide the intergalactic psychopath?

Got a feeling Moff was cut off rather… did he think he might get another series? That quote about going through to 2020…

Otherwise it was a bit reminiscent of Graham Williams failing to secure decent scripts for Louise Jameson.

Of course, we know what’s coming.

[Dentarthurdent @dentarthurdent]

@ps1l0v3y0u Well Bill did have only the one series to develop in. Some might say getting turned into a Cyberman was rather too much ‘development’ 🙂
Although the professor-student relationship can be entertaining when the Moff writes it, in small doses, it isn’t really what Doctor Who is about, at least for me. ‘Who’ is relatively lightweight episodic television.
And, just personally, I found the Missy subplot fascinating and could have used a lot more than the brief glimpses we got. This has as much to do with Michelle Gomez’ delivery and personality as the storyline itself.
As to why the Doctor’s doing this (‘adopting’ Bill), I’d hypothesise that he needs the companionship. Who was it who said the Doctor shouldn’t be alone, it wasn’t good for him. River?

[nerys @nerys]

@dentarthurdent As to why the Doctor’s doing this (‘adopting’ Bill), I’d hypothesise that he needs the companionship. Who was it who said the Doctor shouldn’t be alone, it wasn’t good for him. River?

I seem to recall both Amy and River telling the Doctor he should never travel alone. And then in “Listen” (after the Doctor goes on a tangent about whether anyone is ever truly alone), Clara asks, “How long have you been traveling alone?” We saw that when Tennant’s Doctor was alone for so long, it did not go well for him. So perhaps that made him realize how much he needs his companions.

[ps1l0v3y0u @ps1l0v3y0u]

@nerys @dentarthurdent

Yes. Amy says something like that. The Doctor is the ‘damsel’ in ‘the husbands of…’ Donna introduces the idea… by her absence. “Things went wrong…” (The End of Time)

The point being… I think… is that The Doctor benefits from interaction (even with Rusty?) whereas The Master, in his thirst for power, never considers it…

until Harold Saxon??

Lucy, Martha’s family?

Pictures of grandchild (the daughter of the President; he was the father of the President?) and (second) wife (?) on The Doctor’s professorial desk. The actress featured as Bill’s mum was previously a Time Lord (Lady) in Day of The Doctor? Pictures being central to The Doctor’s relationship with Bill?

The Master on The Time War… “I ran…” (The Sound of Drums).

Interesting that RTD immediately returns to the theme of foundlings and adoptive parents. Like ZChib (a typo originally but I’m gonna call him that now) never happened…

[Dentarthurdent @dentarthurdent]

@ps1l0v3y0u @nerys Interesting point about the High Council lady. Is it possible that Bill is an orphaned Time Lady? And the Doctor ‘stole the President’s wife’. Is the Moff hinting that Bill might be the Doctor’s (other) daughter? (But if so, shouldn’t she have regenerative powers? Maybe not, if they were a technological feature ‘granted’ by the Gallifrey powers, as an orphan she’d miss out on that. I guess…) Though in that case she would not have triggered the Mondassian human-people-detector in World Enough and Time (notice that the only others present were two Timelords, an android, and blue-trigger-happy-idiot. Ah well, it was a lovely theory while it lasted.

[ps1l0v3y0u @ps1l0v3y0u]

@dentarthurdent @nerys

Well… is it genetic heritage that makes you a Timelord? Or in vitro exposure to the Time Vortex? As per River, immediately following the Roman kissogram party in volving two humans (presumably in the room with bunk beds)?

Surely, the Mondassians specialise in human conversion because, as Dalek Sec pointed out, we get everywhere. In large numbers. Not that Shobogan physiology is necessarily beyond the pale, as the Timeless Children shows, but the Timelord’s practical immortality must have been mitigated by their apparent preference for parthenogenesis… Timelords were “woven on a loom” weren’t they? But we’re never shown Shobogan colonies, maybe they didn’t procreate enough… and that was why Tecteun was so keen on (practical) immortality.

You were right about The President’s wife… and there was that bit about the Moon too. Who knows? Moff never said which President, or of whom. And as we now know the Moon is really a space bat egg.

But certainly Bill is human. But what is a Shobogan/human hybrid who was never exposed to The Vortex? Maybe human enough. Of course they just give her a mechanical heart initially. And her conversion was imperfect.

This is part of The Great Reithian Forbidding of Moff theory. Bill originally had a longer story arc (Amy and Clara both got 2 1/2 series) in which she was a critical element for the rehabilitation of Missy. And The Doctor was being kind to someone struggling to find her way.

Moff was told ‘no!’ DW should be more like Eastenders (again). And we’re giving the gig to ZChib.

So, is Bill’s mum a Timelady? Which Timelady? Is she human but The Master took her face much as The Doctor took Caecilius’?

Don’t breathe so hard; it took me ages to construct this house cards.

[nerys @nerys]

@ps1l0v3y0u I like ZChib. It’s a keeper.

[Dentarthurdent @dentarthurdent]

@ps1l0v3y0u Well I assumed the Mondassians were humanoid enough to be interchangeable. A bit like humans and Sebaceans in Farscape. As for Timeless Children, I’m afraid I’m unfamiliar with that. I’m afraid most of Chibs’ reign has failed to register on my consciousness, or been forgotten, at least partly involuntarily.

The President’s wife – I assumed the Moon in question wasn’t Earth’s moon, so any space bat nonsense would be irrelevant to that. (and I’m doing my best to let Kill the Moon episode mercifully fade from my consciousness too 🙂

I don’t think Moff had planned to stay on later than the end of S10 (from all accounts he was exhausted by then**) but if he had, I think it quite likely that Bill would have helped to rehabilitate Missy. Could a getting-rehabilitated Missy have lasted two seasons? Well yep. Intercut with other stories of course.

I was postulating that Bill’s Mum was the High Council timelady in Day of the Doctor. Is it conceivable that she was the President’s wife that the Doctor later stole? (Cheeky sod). Though I can barely recall her from the ep, so there may be reasons why that’s silly.

(**I’d still rather have an exhausted Moff than a gung-ho ZChib though).

I pronounce ‘ZCh’ as like the ‘s’ in ‘measure’ by the way. Or the Russian letter Ж

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