On the Sofa 11
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WhoHar 1 hour ago.
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9 December 2025 at 08:10 #78418
Anybody watched the Sea Devils spin off yet?
And, more importantly, is it any good?
We don’t have it down here so I can either wait until February or go looking for an unofficial version. Not sure it is worth the bother, so would be interested to know what people think.
9 December 2025 at 08:38 #78419@whohar watched the first 2 episodes on Sunday, given that to my knowledge the series is only 5 episodes long and appear to be 45 minuets long I thought they were a bit slow in progressing the story much to the point that I think for some it will be better to watch all the episode in a binge almost as a single film. Having said that the acting seems to be excellent. There’s an overly obvious ecological political theme running through the episodes I’ve seen so far. The effects are as you would expect from a collaborative Disney/BBC budget are superlative.
9 December 2025 at 10:30 #78420Much obliged. I think I’ll probably wait, as there is too much good stuff available right now, and coming up. Maybe if I get through my backlog over Christmas…
9 December 2025 at 17:39 #78421Hope this doesn’t give too much away. Overall, yes watch it!
Positive:
Acting… though Russel Tovey does his best, Barclay the character could become annoying.
Theme… why ARE we specularly failing to control plastics?
Effects… those are great rubber suits! No really it’s fine and we’ll be watching that water flow down the big tube many time I’m sure (sigh)
Unsure:
Bit slow… the ‘naming’ thing takes up lots of verbage. Maybe there will be a point at which Barclay will actually ask ‘what do you call yourselves?
There seem to be some clumsy Checkhov guns yet to be let off. Not sure how RTD can stop the overall effect being quite silly
It’s the new UNIT with all that entails… but not all the Who interns, so far anyway.
The villains/antagonists and the conflicts among the humans tend to the cliched comic book level. The overall effect may also become quite silly.
We’re dealing with marine reptiles with retro evolved gills. I think there should be more of… ahem… a ‘barf’ factor. But maybe not all of Checkhov’s arsenal is deployed yet.
9 December 2025 at 19:03 #78422Hello All, I’ve only watched one episode of The War Between the Land and the Sea so far, but it’s quite good.
Jemma Redgrave’s Kate Lethbridge Stewart continues to be very believable. You just know she comes from a family with an aga and the smell of wet dog in the kitchen in the morning.
The least believable bit is having a sane and functioning US administration (at least so far). Can you imagine the garbage Trump and his cronies would spout about “so monstrous, these fishy fish invaders” etc., but maybe that’s coming…
I’m not sorry the Disney partnership has ended however, despite the beautifully rendered Sea Devil outfits, as I would rather have extended storytelling and lower budget effects than incredible effects but hardly any time with the Doctor and companions, which is how Gatwa Doc’s run was, sadly, hobbled.
Got to do some work before I’m allowed to watch the next episode!
9 December 2025 at 22:01 #78423The overall effect may also become quite silly.
That’s my concern, and that the whole thing will be clumsily preachy about the environment (rather than cleverly showing us the ways the planet is being destroyed.
You just know she comes from a family with an aga and the smell of wet dog in the kitchen in the morning.
This is excellent
10 December 2025 at 03:56 #78424@ps1l0v3y0u I suspect the writers left because they were under paid, under appreciated and better jobs were on offer. also back in teh old days there wasn’t the love for the show that there is now and keeps writers like Moff and RTD on the hook. they grew up loving the show.
speaking of RTD, I was wondering if anyone has watched The War Between the Land and the Sea yet? Guardian gave it three stars but not a great review.
Meanwhile we are not doing our annual seasonal re watch of the Christmas Specials.Just watched what I refer to as “the giant stompy robot story”. I will be skipping the End of Time specials. Found them pretty unwatchable so now to some Moff christmassy goodness.
Cheers
Janette
10 December 2025 at 09:33 #78425Yes, I suppose writers’ relationship with the show was different after the gap, because of the gap. But there are loyal writers who were apparently cast aside before. And writers who were obviously commissioned, delivered and slid away after; Maxine Alderton almost made the Fam and T’floox work for ooh 45 minutes or so. Where is she?
Is it a case of ‘try anything once’? Or ‘not working with that guy again,’ or ‘it’s a madhouse!’
Obviously I think in a madhouse, one writer is as good as any other and anyway it’s a kid’s show.
tWBtLatS… it’s not a disaster… yet. 3 out of 5 is about right. As opposed to the (anticipated) complaints about heavy handed eco virtue signalling, I am worried that there are good ideas here which will be sold short. It does have a hohum feeling but NOT a glazed eye feeling.
I do hope it’s not Stockton Rush who’s going to deliver Barclay to the abyssal plain.
Stompy Robot? Husbands of River Song? Only problem is the final freeze frame. Not sure if Michael is being taken. I can take End of Time. ‘I like you. I bet you’d taste great!’
10 December 2025 at 22:08 #78426After seeing episode 2 I’m getting Shape of Water vibes. Tovey is going to boink the gender-fluid fish lady in the Mariana Trench, isn’t he.
18 December 2025 at 07:16 #78427I’ve enjoyed it so far. Not mind-blowing but solid telly
21 December 2025 at 04:42 #78428Hello! I’ve not yet seen the war between the land and the sea yet, though I also haven’t watched much of the UNIT series- once I saw this thread discussing it, I went to go check where I even could, and I can’t seem to find it streaming anywhere in the US. Does anyone happen to know a streaming service I could use to catch up on it? I’ve pretty much lost hope on finding somewhere to watch the actual DW series in any other way than buying the blurays secondhand. But it would be nice to be able to stream online. I had thought that UNIT was on Netflix, but apparently not, or at least not anymore. And apparently it’s not even on BritBox anymore too, so I’m a bit baffled as to how anybody is even watching it right now, honestly!
I must be missing something, right? Somebody please correct me! Good grief.
21 December 2025 at 20:14 #78429Only watched as far as The Deep (ep 3) so far. Interested to see the various resolutions, if Russ manages that, because there’s a lot of tropes and peculiar soft sci fi genuflections which I’m sure can’t be all they seem to be. But by the time you read this, you’ll know.
It’s interesting that this longer form seems more successful than the ‘combined’ effect of the various episodes of the last two series. Though there were real short form triumphs there too. Whether this is down to a rush in writing and editing, or because Russ is now less in sympathy with an episodic structure I’m not sure. Cos he mastered it effortlessly before.
Some critics have been moaning about UNIT too. I recognise the issue and hope this is part of the same question of resolution. ie I think the world of ‘The War’ is distinct to the world we’ve been looking at in Who.
Does that make sense?
Sorry, I watch ‘The War’ on I Player in Britain. Surely it’s on Disney+? Good luck. I think it’s worth watching.
22 December 2025 at 01:49 #78430Not on Disney+ until February apparently. Which tells it’s own story.
Happy people are enjoying it so far.
And hope you are all having an enjoyable festive period…
22 December 2025 at 03:56 #78431Huh, weird that it’s also so hard to access! Almost a conspiracy, I’d say… Jk, lol. But still, pretty frustrating. Ah well, I guess it’ll make it all the more exciting when it finally is available here! Based on the feedback I’ve seen, I’m definitely willing to wait for it.
Personally I don’t have any holidays to celebrate during this break, but hey, more time to catch up on the classic who episodes I can find on Tubi, etc! I hope everyone else is having a restful break or a happy holiday season, if you celebrate! Anyone else watching or catching up on any shows?
16 February 2026 at 02:39 #78539Well, I seem to have been absent for a while. Life…sometimes it gets in the way. Hello again to all (particularly @syzygy)
Was just re-watching the recent colourized version of “The War Games”–the last Troughton story and the first that introduced the Time Lords. And what a problematic group of authoritarian guardians they are. No wonder the Doctor ran away.
The colourized version is done very well indeed. Except for the conclusion. But I will leave that for others who have seen it to comment on.
p.s. it is It is great to be back.
16 February 2026 at 08:41 #78540I was quite excited by The Colourised War Games. Such an important story canonically, but 10 eps (250mins) was a bit long: the mad charging about, scenery chewing and interminable sonic screwdriver action, tedious. Nonetheless, the contraction to 90mins seemed too drastic. Two 1hr or 75 min films (The War Games and The Time Lords) might have worked better.
But… is the chief Time Lord played by Bernard Horsfall, none other than Goth? Where does 2 and Jamie’s (future) adventures with Androgums fit in? Was there an (unseen) bigeneration? If ‘War Chief’ can be said to translate as Raja… was that The Rani?
11 March 2026 at 01:43 #78562what if…
Was sitting with Mrs Blenkinsop–each of us with a glass of wine, discussing alternative directions Who might have taken (eg, imagine Doctor River Song…or Doctor Ruth..). But then we started talking about show runners, andMrs Blenkinsop came up with a brilliant insight….who has managed to kill off the show? First it was John Nathan Turner. And most recently, it was Russell T. Davies.
Conclusion? Never allow someone with three names to be a show runner!
11 March 2026 at 12:43 #78563Can’t say I was a huge fan of JNT, but there is a argument that he kept the show going for longer than might have been the case. And he did then nearly save it through the agency of Andrew Cartmel.
RTD WAS the show’s saviour 2 decades ago. I’m sure Chris Chibnall has a middle name too.
As, I expect, do Michael Grade and Piers Wenger.
JNT wasn’t to blame for the genre decaying effect of Star Wars, and current dog chasing squirrels noises of the internet do not herald the glorious return of The Daleks but the slow strangulation of the show.
13 March 2026 at 13:42 #78564I just googled to see if there was any news about Dr Who and found this just “breaking”. Not what I was looking for but a very nice surprise. Hopefully it will be possible to see these two episodes at some future time.
@ps1l0v3y0u I think of it more as “possum” noises. (Maybe because we hear of a lot of the latter. Had one snarling at the cat the other night, through the font door. they sound demonic.
Cheers
Janette
13 March 2026 at 17:13 #78565re noises. Different continents. It’s the repetitive/dumbly self satisfied aspect of the cyber aspect that raises the blood pressure I suppose, but how can you really annoyed at possums? Awww.
Locally, we have fun with foxes. There are some seriously fat ones in Kew Gardens and they want your egg sandwich NOW.
I did hope I had been VERY good and we might get the glory that must be Fury From the Deep, but I’ll settle for Katrina and the airlock, if just to compare with Tasha Yar for pointless exits. What a waste of an interesting companion! Criminal really.
14 March 2026 at 00:19 #78566Thanks for that news. It would, indeed, be wonderful to see them. I don’t know if you are familiar with “The Smallest Show on Earth, a lovely comedy from the 1950s about a tiny cinema struggling to survive, that starred Margaret Rutherford And Peter Sellars, among others. There is a wonderful scene where they are watching a clip from an old silent romance while Margaret Rutherford plays the Wurlitzer. It is a magical scene. Your story of the missing episodes evoked a similar feeling in me.
21 March 2026 at 13:29 #78572A story about watching Dr Who this time which made me smile.
@blenkinsopthebrave. I have not heard of that one. Will have to look it up. there is something magical about old cinemas. Are there any extant episodes?
cheers
Janette
21 March 2026 at 17:50 #78573Not sure about tracking down the movie. I have a DVD copy from when it was still available to purchase.
But here is the clip I was referring to.
It’s magical.
25 March 2026 at 02:21 #78574Thought this might be of interest, given the recent news about The Dalek Masterplan missing eps recovery.
It’s a recreation of Mission to the Unknown, done by the students from the University of Central Lancashire.
There’s a “making of ” video also (which I have not seen yet), but I surmise that their brief was to use the original audio, with design elements based off any existing footage / set photos / description in the screenplay. The actors, costumes and props (incl the Daleks) were sourced / made by the students I assume. They’ve done a decent job I’d say.
Anyhoo, enjoy:
25 March 2026 at 02:23 #78575Here’s the Making Of I mentioned…
24 June 2026 at 14:26 #78707Anonymous @
Hello. I’m Thomas and I’ve got something interesting to talk about. I am currently studying media at Creativity Works Preston and I am planning on making a special Doctor Who fan film based on a script I have written by the name of “Galaxy of the Daleks” and I am recruiting production personnel, Actors, Cameramen, Set Designers, Etc. I have also been in contact with a member of the media department of the University of Lancashire who said they may be able to spare a few days to help out near the end of next year. In the meantime, I would like to ask if anyone is interested in lending a hand in the production of this episode, (25 minutes in length.) I will now paste a previously written pitch here.
My Doctor Who Pitch
Working Title: Project Eye of Harmony
Title: Galaxy of the Daleks
Synopsis
Something very terrible has happened!! The Daleks have conquered an entire galaxy’s worth of planets!! They have learned from their previous failures and have conquered various planets they have failed to conquer in the past including Spiridon, Exxilon and Vulcan, as well as other planets including Vortis, Metebelis III and Marinus and have relocated them in an uninhabited solar system. They plan to use the planets and their inhabitants in a plot to destroy the Doctor’s home world, Gallifrey and to achieve their dastardly plot, they need the TARDIS!!!
The Eighth Doctor, lonely once again after his companion Charley left him to live her own life again, travels to the planet Mechanus after receiving a distress signal sent by the planet’s inhabitants, the Mechanoids, who have become some of the many slaves of the Daleks due to Mechanus being conquered as part of the Dalek Galaxy Plan. It turns out that the Daleks had ordered the Mechanoids to send the distress signal in order to lure the Doctor to the Dalek’s Galaxy and steal his TARDIS for a plot that could mean the end for the Doctor’s people. The Daleks must be stopped, no matter the cost and the Doctor must join a rebellion consisting of inhabitants of the different Dalek-Conquered planets to save all the planets endangered by the Daleks and their diabolical plot to annihilate the Doctor’s homeworld.
Pitch
This Doctor Who story has it all: Dalek action, drama, suspense, multiple alien planets and species, explosions, and a terrifying plot that could could spell the end of a universe free from the rule of evil. What more could you ask for? It will serve as a love letter to avid Whovians everywhere as well as something to fill the long void left by the absence of our favourite science fiction show.
I am hiring for people both in front of and behind the camera. So if you want to play a part in this great new Doctor Who fan production, then contact me at my Email Address: thomasshaxon943@gmail.com and I will send you a copy of the script as soon as possible. Filming will take place from 22-02-27 until 14-04-27 and recruitment/auditions will start from 29-06-26. If you can’t make it on the first audition day, its okay, the first window of recruitment/auditions is open from 29-06-26 until 15-07-26 and the second window is open from 01-09-26 until 21-10-26. Auditions/Recruitment will take place at Creativity Works Preston, the same people who will collaborate to help make this production possible. If you have any questions about this production, message me at my Email address.<span class=”Apple-converted-space”> </span>
<span class=”Apple-converted-space”> </span>
So, if you want to play a part in the Whoniverse by way of a spectacular fan project, then what are you waiting for? Contact me at my Email Address thomasshaxon943@gmail.com for a copy of the script and any further information. Be there!!!
Thanks for reading, avid Whovians and we shall speak again soon.
Until then, Allons-y!!!
27 June 2026 at 15:47 #78709Hello. I’m Thomas and I’ve got something interesting to talk about. I am currently studying media at Creativity Works Preston and I am planning on making a special Doctor Who fan film based on a script I have written by the name of “Galaxy of the Daleks” and I am recruiting production personnel, Actors, Cameramen, Set Designers, Etc. I have also been in contact with a member of the media department of the University of Lancashire who said they may be able to spare a few days to help out near the end of next year. In the meantime, I would like to ask if anyone is interested in lending a hand in the production of this episode, (25 minutes in length.) I will now paste a previously written pitch here.
My Doctor Who Pitch
Working Title: Project Eye of Harmony
Title: Galaxy of the Daleks
Synopsis
Something very terrible has happened!! The Daleks have conquered an entire galaxy’s worth of planets!! They have learned from their previous failures and have conquered various planets they have failed to conquer in the past including Spiridon, Exxilon and Vulcan, as well as other planets including Vortis, Metebelis III and Marinus and have relocated them in an uninhabited solar system. They plan to use the planets and their inhabitants in a plot to destroy the Doctor’s home world, Gallifrey and to achieve their dastardly plot, they need the TARDIS!!!
The Eighth Doctor, lonely once again after his companion Charley left him to live her own life again, travels to the planet Mechanus after receiving a distress signal sent by the planet’s inhabitants, the Mechanoids, who have become some of the many slaves of the Daleks due to Mechanus being conquered as part of the Dalek Galaxy Plan. It turns out that the Daleks had ordered the Mechanoids to send the distress signal in order to lure the Doctor to the Dalek’s Galaxy and steal his TARDIS for a plot that could mean the end for the Doctor’s people. The Daleks must be stopped, no matter the cost and the Doctor must join a rebellion consisting of inhabitants of the different Dalek-Conquered planets to save all the planets endangered by the Daleks and their diabolical plot to annihilate the Doctor’s homeworld.
Pitch
This Doctor Who story has it all: Dalek action, drama, suspense, multiple alien planets and species, explosions, and a terrifying plot that could could spell the end of a universe free from the rule of evil. What more could you ask for? It will serve as a love letter to avid Whovians everywhere as well as something to fill the long void left by the absence of our favourite science fiction show.
I am hiring for people both in front of and behind the camera. So if you want to play a part in this great new Doctor Who fan production, then contact me at my Email Address: thomasshaxon943@gmail.com and I will send you a copy of the script as soon as possible. Filming will take place from 22-02-27 until 14-04-27 and recruitment/auditions will start from 29-06-26. If you can’t make it on the first audition day, its okay, the first window of recruitment/auditions is open from 29-06-26 until 15-07-26 and the second window is open from 01-09-26 until 21-10-26. Auditions/Recruitment will take place at Creativity Works Preston, the same people who will collaborate to help make this production possible. If you have any questions about this production, message me at my Email address.
So, if you want to play a part in the Whoniverse by way of a spectacular fan project, then what are you waiting for? Contact me at my Email Address thomasshaxon943@gmail.com for a copy of the script and any further information. Be there!!!
Thanks for reading, avid Whovians and we shall speak again soon.
Until then, Allons-y!!!
23 July 2026 at 20:58 #78783@thane16 @dentesrthurdent @whohar
Thought I’d move over here…
Right! Neither I, nor Cardinals Fang or Biggles quite expected that!
Personally, I start off with the existential question ‘why should any right-minded Whovian be u fuly critical of Moff?’; and ‘how could the show written by Chib be both SO tedious AND incoherent.’ It shouldn’t be possible.
Not saying Moff was perfect but, as he kind of pointed out himself, he entertained.
The pointiest criticism (aside from the disintegrating first arc and the scattergun script edding) is levelled at the scene in ‘Listen’ when Clara is seen to observe approvingly her own derrière. Like the ‘The Test’, I can only observe it is there.
Bloke Adjuncts? Rose and 9/10 get on famously. Martha is disappointed. Donna was designed to confound hanky panky. Amy is, improbably, the Doctor’s mother in law, River is his (psycho) wife, Clara is… um… his ‘guardian angel’?? Skip Ashildr…
And Bill does the chips. Though she does have a good long look at the pictures of Susan and River on 12’s desk. And though she doesn’t know it, Missy lurks in the basement.
And her mum was (very briefly) in Day of The Doctor.
Was this tendency because the Doctor was (then) male, and the companions, as ever, were female. Or did Moff and RTD utilise ‘a plan’, whereas Chib thought he didn’t have to (though I would argue he did).
And then Chib got the Ladydoc. And The Fam.
24 July 2026 at 06:34 #78785@ps1l0v3y0u @dentarthurdent @thane16
Was this tendency because the Doctor was (then) male, and the companions, as ever, were female
I mean, yes I think so. The companion does tend to riff off the lead and, with Moff’s previous writing, we know he likes to explore the sexual politics of the traditional male-female relationship.
I liked RTDs take: Donna was a best friend rather than a potential lover. I do think both RTD and Moff really, really liked the romantic aspect though. It’s a bit odd, if you stop and think about it – a 2000+ year old alien having a fling with a 20-something Earthling.
There is definitely some crossover in the companion story, and some progression under RTD and Moff:
Rose – a traditional companion for the modern era, with modern sensibilities and a backstory. Fell in love with 10.
Martha – a traditional companion for the modern era, with modern sensibilities and a backstory. Fell in love with 10.
Donna – matey with 10.
Amy – had a crush on 11. But with a backstory that was universe significant.
River – married 11. Complex universe-significant backstory.
Clara – with a backstory that was universe significant. Liked (?) 11, not in love with 12.
Bill – not in love with 12. Also: gay, but I think she wouldn’t have been in love with 12 regardless. The (actors) age-gap would not have gone down well at the BBC / audience if they’d gone down this route. It would have been a bit too much “Werther’s Originals”.
At the end of the day there’s only so much you can do. It would be interesting to have older companions and / or a dynamic where the two leads are both the same gender and not romantically involved.
24 July 2026 at 12:05 #78787@syzygy @thane16 Um.
I think @ps1l0v3y0u meant that women could sometimes be written as “another bloke” as opposed to a well thought out female character. If I’m wrong please chip in.
I’m not sure what that means. Well, if they got drunk with the other – girls, cracked juvenile bad-taste jokes, and went out on the pull on Saturday night, I guess that would be bloke-ish. 🙂
But I don’t see that in Moff’s companions.
I’m not sure whether one could write a specifically female character (or a male one) without being accused of perpetrating stereotypes. I think they are written more as *people*, which is fine with me. Though I will admit that a certain degree of femininity – which probably comes more from the fact they’re female actors than from the writing – adds a little interest to the characters.
Now they do exhibit unusual strength of character (because they have to, being fantasy hero(ine)s, natch), and that is often wrongly associated with male aggressiveness. Which I think is a wrong stereotype, and not a desirable one. I don’t want my heroes to be mindless killers, I want them to be thoughtful killers who agonise about it afterwards (as I think Doug Adams said somewhere).
And in any case, all hero(ine)s, regardless of sex, have to be a little bit braver and stronger than the average bloke or blokess in the street, otherwise their adventures wouldn’t be interesting. I can get quite enough boredom in my own life (which is comfortable, predictable and boring*) without wanting to watch more on screen.
* Boring to anyone watching me, that is. I like it that way, and find it interesting enough.
To cut it short, I can’t see anything wrong with Moff’s heroines, but then I’m not a woman, maybe I’m missing something.
About the mouse – after it bit me, I had the brilliant thought of using a plastic ice cream container – worked even better than I expected, the mouse immediately dived in and hid in it. So I just had to put the lid on. Could have saved myself a bite if I’d thought ahead. Cockroaches I give ’em a squirt of toxic chemicals then wait till they’re dead before I carry them out on a piece of paper. I don’t really like to touch them. Ditto flies, though I know all I have to do is wash my hands afterwards. Beetles I carefully pick up and toss outside, praying mantises I let them climb on my finger and relocate them onto a plant. I like mantises, savage killers that they are. Centipedes creep me out (in the book Doctor No, someone put a giant centipede in Bond’s bed, made my hair stand on end just reading it. In the movie they changed it into a tarantula – massive anticlimax I thought).
24 July 2026 at 12:27 #78789@oops that’s @dentarthurdent above.
24 July 2026 at 12:39 #78790@ps1l0v3y0u I think what you call ‘bloke adjuncts’ is simply within the normal range of reactions of one human towards another human(oid). The premise of the show is that the Doctor is the Main Character (and happened to be a bloke). The Companion was, like all hero’s companions, a supporting character – except that, from ‘Rose’ onwards (and possibly from earlier than that) the Companion’s status de facto increased to rival the Doctor. A trend I welcomed.
And I think the writing arose naturally from that. It never felt forced to me.
That scene in Listen – was it this one:
(Clara leaves the restaurant, and Danny bangs his head on the table. The Doctor and Clara step out of the Tardis.)
CLARA: Is that what I look like from the back?
DOCTOR: It’s fine.
CLARA: I was thinking it was good.
DOCTOR: Really?
(Clara walks to the restaurant.)Um, I can’t see anything particularly unusual about that. I mean, guys certainly appreciate girls’ figures, but I imagine a girl, given the occasion, might be a teeny bit vain about their own appearance? But I’m guessing there.
Incidentally, this is not the first time that sort of thing has happened, in New Earth, Cassandra the flat, in Rose’s body, admired her new-found curves
CASS-ROSE: Look at me. From class to brass. Although, oh, curves. Oh, baby, it’s like living inside a bouncy castle!
and of the Doctor (in Rose’s mind) ‘nice rear bumper.’
@whohar The Doctor and the Companion are, functionally, a couple, so far as the structure of the story works. And by a ‘couple’ I mean anything from a pair of colleagues, to friends, to romantically involved. Either way they care for each other (the story would fall apart if they didn’t). They will certainly loom large in each other’s consciousness. So the writing naturally reflects that.
24 July 2026 at 12:45 #78791@thane16 syzygy I see a long post from you in my mailbox (addressed to demtarthurdent) and I see your one-line correction just above my last comment, but i can’t see your long post in this forum. Not sure what happened there.
24 July 2026 at 12:52 #78792Oh boy! My post vanished!
I’ll do a recap. @whohar @dentarthurdent @ps1l0v3y0u
I enjoyed Listen, particularly how Clara & the Doc can play against each other & poke fun? In my 20s I couldn’t accept my figure or my face.
I wondered as to how RTD with his “that’s alright” from the Toymaker seemed a gentle dig at Moffat? Though RTD brought back rose and returned Donna’s memory back to her in full.
The Family of Blood continued with Martha’s theme of love for the Doctor. And I recall Moffat on one of his DVD audio commentaries saying he doesn’t understand why, when the Doctor is so attractive, that the girls aren’t lining up to kiss him. 🙄
Yet it wasn’t just Moffat but RTD who wrote love interests into many of these episodes, including Nurse Redfern falling in love with John Smith. I’d personally love it if the doctor and the companions weren’t mutually attracted. Mind you, they did this with The Fam in the tardis. Was the tardis simply too small to capture the personal stories of those companions?
On another point, I was pondering the nature of the doctors enemies whether the Silence or the Weeping Angels (both work when one isn’t observing them- in fact, the enemy under the blanket is like this in Listen, too), both convincing with simple & pedestrian visual effects, particularly when you consider how speedily the Great Dog of death & the Withering Skeleton from the underworld were finished off.
Also, on that writing we can see in The Time of Angels etc how long it takes to formulate a plan to understand them so it feels well paced compared with some of RTD’s more recent episodes & the inevitable conquering of the main villains. Probably down to episode & season length? I actually liked how the longer 2 parter RTD-run episodes developed too: The Satan Pit was a terrific thriller. Those Oods!
Puro
24 July 2026 at 12:56 #78793yes, apologies: I saw, in my post, that I’d misspelled your name so added that in separately. Prior to this, though, I saw more mistakes so used the edit function which then happily decided to delete the entire thing! I know people will often compose a response in their Documents & then copy it into a post. I used to do this but forgot!
Puro.
24 July 2026 at 13:12 #78794@dentarthurdent Oooh I loved Cassandra! That whole configuration with Cassandra, the Doctor/Tennant playing her as well Piper’s brilliant mimicking worked a treat. The “bouncy castle” line is ace!
That’s one episode I rewatch because it’s funny, it takes one out of oneself but the ending, where the clone-grown humans are released & well, brings tears.
I can handle praying mantis’ reasonably well but our large tuckeroo is occasionally infested with reddish black bugs called stink bugs & when they “ooze” out of various branches, I immediately shut windows & doors & call a tree surgeon who sprays them & then carries away any still living insects.
@whohar @ps1l0v3y0u I think about Chibbers Who a lot, actually. What were 3-4 issues you had with this iteration or series. Was it an unsubtle political or socio-political issue? I recall early Who in the 60s was all about political & economic themes. Perhaps it was different in other ways.
24 July 2026 at 14:41 #78795I observe these were criticisms made of Moffat. They are aren’t my accusations. But, yes, RTD was also quite up for all that. Personally, I don’t really understand the angst, other than it being the natural tension of a kiddult scifi show. To me it’s Hinchcliffe/Holmes vs Whitehouse or JNT/Seward vs Grade.
I went out and researched some details: and there you are. Moffat seems to have got it in the neck, because of falling ratings and the burgeoning streaming scene. Moffat was aware of this and kicked back, which didn’t win him any new friends, but it entertained me.
Now if someone said ‘Time of The Doctor’ was barely coherent mate, or your sub edding of ‘Kill the Moon,’ ‘Nightmare in Silver,’ ‘Sleep No More’… etc left much to be desired, I would say ‘yeah, they have got a point.’
But are you seriously going to what? Rigorously define and distinguish humour, suggestion and innuendo, to protect the kiddie winks, until every character is two dimensional and speaks soap opera cliche? Because, as you may have noticed, I’m not particularly keen. Or you could remove the politics by making The Doctor a woman. Absolutely no reason why that shouldn’t work. Is there?
But, tone it down Chris. Ah. Well…
@thane16. I find it hard to discern any Chib message or theme, perhaps because I’m not eager to go back and check. It’s hard work. Or do you mean a societal theme was meant to replace Companion Interaction? Could be. Big push to ‘The Doctor is asexual’ claim accompanying RTD2. That IS a retcon. Also, once The Corporation or the showmaker do retreat, there’s no way back. ‘You’re lecturing me.’ ‘Ere luv! Where’s the Dalek?’
Maybe RTD thought he was brought back as the saviour of the show. He seems to have designed an arc accordingly, chock full of meta, aimed at the haters. And an incomplete arc explains some of the odd imagery. Maybe he took the brief and tried to us it to scare off Disney (surely not?)
Whatever was planned, it’s not going to happen now. Was he deluded? Dunno. Someone at the corporation signed off those press announcements. Someone changed their mind. New chairman 2024. New DG May 2026.
24 July 2026 at 16:37 #78796@thane16 I do hope you didn’t have to retype the entire post. I should have offered to fish it out of my inbox and send it to you. I just didn’t think of it.
I’ll comment on your points tomorrow. It’s 3-34 a.m. and Mrs D reminded me it’s about bedtime. (I’m retired so don’t have to worry about getting up in the morning. Mrs D is worse than me, some days she gets up after midday).
24 July 2026 at 20:04 #78797The ‘23 specials contained a few clues. Sylvia runs around yelling ‘none of this is real!’ For forgetful Donna’s benefit. This is BEFORE Mavity raises its now possibly completely irrelevant head.
Und zen ze Toymaker scene mit der outrageous Central European mugging. This would seem to be a straightforward catchup. Hmmm. Really?
Yes Rose and Donna were ‘supered’ companions, and Martha was NOT, and all the better for that. There again, Moff might be considered quite sadistic to ‘his’ companions. RTD’s lot did live more or less complete lives. Rose’s was presumably an alternative true love story in Bad Wolf Bay. Donna had a fourteen year hang-over. Martha got Micky. Aaaah.
Bill gets a return as part of Testimony. Aren’t all women made of gIass (as it were)? Is Clara the actual girl who points 1 to the ‘correctly malfunctioning’ tardis in ‘Name’? None of that tine-stream fragment nonsense. Amy presumably gets to witness bebop, beat poets, greenwich village, ceebeegeebies… does that qualify as enrichment?
The toymaker makes an accusation, surely? So, is RTD also? Meta? Could be. Of course, we didn’t know how the return would work out…
The Flux… I reckon that’s Streamers, that is. It’s what Chib is being told. By The Man. It’s where yer wanna be, honest Chris (he’s… unsure). We’ll see yer right. (Heavy cracks knuckles) I got this biltong cheap dahn the market. There yer go.
Chib did a press release recently. When I feel stronger I may take a look. But my first impression was ‘meh, meh, mumeh, meh, meh…’
25 July 2026 at 06:52 #78798All this talk of removing insects. Try this tip:
Instead of killing flies, spray them with hair lacquer mid flight and they’ll simply glide out of the window.
25 July 2026 at 09:15 #78799@thane16 Um yes, that Edit function does seem a bit – erratic. I try not to use it. If I have to, and I’m feeling cautious, I just copy the whole post into a text editor first, that way if something goes wrong I’ve got a copy on my system.
And long comments, I do use a text editor and just paste the whole thing into the edit box.
I think the ?imaginary? monster in Listen was probably the scariest of the lot. Made my hair stand on end. How do you fight something that may not exist? (As an aside, I used to work on sewage pumping stations, big empty underground rooms with pumps humming away, and walking down the steps into one of those always made me nervous for no valid reason whatsoever. I think it’s a natural reaction. Of course I could never admit it.)
Followed by the Weeping Angels and the Silents. In the case of the Angels, it was precisely because they only move when you’re not looking. What you can’t see…
The Silents with their memory wipe were an ingenious variation on that, almost the inverse in fact. You could see them but instantly forgot as soon as you looked away. As a concept for generating interesting situations I think it was the best of any monster. And, as you noted, quite economical on the FX budget.Love interests – I can take it or leave it. (I seem to recall an outcry from Old Whovians when Rose was first attracted to the Doctor). So long as it arises naturally and isn’t ‘tacked on’, I’m okay with it. It would be quite unusual if anyone had a whole string of female companions without mutual interest with any of them. I do recall Moff having a bit of fun with this on a couple of occasions when Companions asked the Tardis to show them a list of previous Companions. And of course there was a slight age difference – I seem to recall the Doctor was a few million years old after Heaven Sent – or I guess maybe not, if the clone machinery generated an exact replica each time of the Doctor who first entered, I guess he only aged a few hours in that episode?
@ps1l0v3y0u The Companions of nuWho – they all survived after a fashion. Rose is in the alternative reality with Doctor clone. Martha left the Doctor (and then, as you noted, ended up with Rose’s cast-off Mickey. Why? It made no sense at all. I have no idea why RTD did it, other than some impulse to ‘tie up loose ends’. She also ended up in UNIT. Both things made me unhappy). Donna survived, sorta, and even got her memory back. Lady Christina de Souza flew off to her own adventures (I wish she’d become a Companion, woulda been brilliant. Maybe a Clara before Clara arrived).
Amy (and Rory) ended up alive but back in time. Clara ended up roaming the universe with Ashildr in a stolen Tardis. And Bill ended up doing the same with her pet puddle Heather.
I don’t count any Companions post-Moff. 🙂
Like you, I can’t be bothered to devote the mental energy to reviewing Chibz’ episodes.
Incidentally, woud a female Doctor have worked for Moffat? I’m pretty sure it would. Moff (in my view) was good at constructing good female characters – Amy, Clara, Bill, Missy, Irene Adler (to stray into a different genre). He would have made it work.I agree Time of the Doctor was a bit incoherent, but mostly harmless. But I really can’t explain Kill The Moon other than to suppose Moff just didn’t have time to rescue anything from the wreckage of that disaster of an episode. Every single scene was an affront to physics, reality and common sense, and it was utterly out of character for the Doctor to leave the fate of the world to chance (unless he was lurking with a self-destruct-inhibit button on his screwdriver, but even that would be entirely out of character), the appalling Courtney was a walking liability with all the charisma and intelligence of a cowpat – I cannot believe that the person who crafted Blink with such logical coherency and appealing characters could have had anything to do with such a debacle. Um, if you want your science fiction to be coherent or credible, then one or two deviations from everyday reality are permissible (e.g. time travel, monsters), but not every single scene. It’s fine to get metaphysical in episodes like The Doctor’s Wife, but it’s a shocking clash in episodes that rely on such physically-real entities as the Space Shuttle and space suits. (I’m ranting again). Brilliant as he is, I think asking Moff to write half the episodes himself while also being responsible for all the others was just too much.
@thane16 Puro I know you asked ps1l0v3y0u but I hope you don’t mind me interjecting – things I didn’t like about Chibz’ seasons? First, it ‘felt’ wrong, the Doctor didn’t feel like the Doctor (in many ways other than just gender). Dropping occasional culty references into the dialogue didn’t mitigate that. Second, the ‘fam’ (ugh) were too – diffuse – to work as a companion. Third, the Crystal Cave Tardis. Fourth, I’m not a fan of Universe-destroying threats. Fifth, Chibz’ writing just felt clumsy.
25 July 2026 at 10:34 #78800I’m afraid the BBC didn’t want Moffat anywhere near Ladydoc. And I can see their point.
I also suspect they loaded Chib’s tenure with many, many stipulations; or maybe he thought The Fam up all on his own. BUT either RTD and Moff were both phenomenal auxiliary script editors (and I really don’t think that’s Moff’s forte) or Chib CAN’T be that bad a writer. For all the tick box soap features of Hungry Earth and Cold Earth, he could spin a half decent yarn. So, wherefor tedium and incoherence?
Not really bothered about the Tardis; it’s a prop. Some people loved the original Crowded Tardis but, for all the lunacy of T’floox, Dan did usher in an improvement. A few tweaks and some half decent scripts and Jodie might have been fine. If not a Earth Shattering.
And then The Timeless Children. I am NOT saying either the rehabilitation of Gallifrey, or the new cycle of regenerations were sparklingly perfect solutions, but to take both down in one plot move is absolutely shocking. I don’t understand the sheer hostility. Unless Chib… and The BBC… really thought Moff was an existential threat to the show??
But the hostility IS out there. Moff DID go away and write Douglas Is Cancelled.
25 July 2026 at 12:18 #78801@dentarthurdent @ps1l0v3y0u absolutely, I always ask anyone on the forum those same questions- to the ether & beyond!
<p style=”text-align: left;”>I felt the same about Chibbers characters there. Certainly my street had a lot of young ladies thrilled with a female Doc & it was good to see many costumes recreated from the show over those next few years.I actually enjoyed Hungry Earth tho the Doctor’s repeated “be better be better” was a tad robotic. 42 Hours (??) with Martha & Ten was a great episode too. So yes, something was off about the Chib era.
I did love Time of the Doctor though. It was chaotic, for sure, but entertaining. I always thought as you did with the Chibbers Tardis that the Fam were too diffuse (great concept). Yet, we had Amy, Rory, River, then the occasionally trio of Jenny, Strax & Vastra all with great stories behind them- so it can be done. ✅</p>
25 July 2026 at 16:02 #78802apologies for the weirdness of the post above! I wasn’t going to edit the post again for fear of loss.
25 July 2026 at 17:12 #78803have you SEEN some of my posts?!
25 July 2026 at 17:55 #78804@ps1l0v3y0u. Lol! No, but mine really are….
in the social messaging of Chibbers I thought it was overtly political – except I understand that’s both essential (plays & stories were always this) & part of Who’s rich history but something about the execution of their messages was clunky or unsubtle….
26 July 2026 at 11:01 #78805Right. Chib. The socio-economic years.
The history eps: Rosa, Demons… yes there’s commentary there but, because it’s buried in the (recent) past, you can (if you want) mentally sanitise it to oblivion. And, worthy though the ambition is, the narrative of Rosa is a problem. Old white bloke on bus. Then we get proper risk in Witchfinder: only it’s strangely undersold; also quite badly plotted. Most historicals are unsatisfactory.
Then Tesla: dunno what that’s about; and Villa, which was very much about the arc. This fatally detracts from what seems a superior script.
We got the Crimean War later but The Flux and the final specials stand alone. Well alone.
The new year specials were the Dalek zone. Yawn.
Arachnids, Orphan and Praexeus were essentially concerned with the environment. Oooh! None of them great stories.
Otherwise series11 was basically a new monster arc: Predator with a tooth fetish rather than cloaking; nasty military hardware aplenty. But there were some nods to sexual and generational politics. It’s interesting that it’s not just RTD2, but then it never was.
Before this, Moff and his mates gave us: scary old people in Amy’s Choice; blokes being idiotic in a flat-share; Nixon! and rogue CIA bods, faith on a space ship; much major sexual politics with Amy. And then a lull in series 7 until we get The Soldier Arc. Thereafter, The Zygon two-parter. A ‘nation of strangers’?
Series 10 really HAS to bring us race and gender: Thin Ice (pretty imperfect), Knock Knock, the unrelated but wonderful capitalist critique of Oxygen, revisited magnificently in the final two parter, and Extremis and the slightly undersold Monk two parter.
This of course is when vulgar noises off became (retrospectively) more noticeable. Thereafter, the new hostility is otherwise all about those creating a specific narrative about RTD. ‘None of this is real!’ as Sylvia would say.
Back to Chib. Kerblam is Amazon, I think… sigh… I can’t go on. This is not a terribly impressive record is it? Hard to distinguish from the other nonsense really.
Except ‘It Takes You Away’ was pretty wild and unique. Or just very odd. Can I watch it again? Yeah maybe.
Season 12 sets up The Timeless Children and you know what I think of THAT. Spyfall reintroduces the Master, who comes equipped with the Delgado/Pratt/Beevers/Ainley TCE. Curious. The Doctor rescues Noor Insyat Khan. Except she obviously doesn’t, does she?
Is all this an attempt to tone down ‘The Plan’ (if that exists)? Because it looks like elements of it, the Cyberman and Gallifrey, Missy and the Cybermen, and ‘I knew him when he was a little girl,’ survived the RTD/Moff era.
Even Tecteun is an alternate origin myth; not necessarily gospel. Maybe a deliberate red herring? The family jewels stay in the safe deposit box.
The Fam are, of course unsupered, companions. Just people. But they didn’t have to be dull, dull, dull. Alright, Thasmin was quite touching, especially the Bedknobs and Broomsticks sequence… er hold on! Was that Chib’s little joke?? Like Moff’s puddle? RTD and concrete slabs? And mopping… remember the mopping.
You’re ok, Chris. I can imagine I didn’t see it.
The two ‘nu’ non/supered companions before then were Martha; maybe Bill as the character was developed. But she IS cooking chips while Missy is in the basement. You couldn’t make it up.
Was it Chib then? Or The Corp? They wanted editorial control. There you are: ultimately a right mess. Though, yes, the ratings were better, or at least as good as Moffs.
But things have changed. Are the ratings recoverable? Can you really prolong a franchise through making it tedious and incoherent?
Of course, Trek is also in trouble. The old narratives are possibly now irrelevant. You REALLY want Daleks? That’s like using tanks against drones.
So, how do these Streamers stay so shiny wonderful. By NOT taxing you. Funny that.
I can’t watch all of it. I can’t afford it. But, from what I have seen, what do I find? Silo gives me ‘bad’ creeps. I can explain that if you want. Severance is wonderful but a slow dark burn, though not as a slow as Pluribus. Now, this looks a million dollars and it really wants you to appreciate every inch and every single second.
Hey! This is ‘A for Andromeda’, ‘Bodysnatchers’, ‘Soylent Green’ and ‘The End of Summer’ (classic ‘50’s sci-fi spot); everything I could smugly want and SO intelligent! But one entire episode seemed to be a woman chipping golf balls through all the windows of the varied condominiums of Albuquerque, while a Paraguayan gent learns to say ‘yellow dog’ in English as he takes a road trip through South America.
Beautiful. Bit boring. Maybe self indulgent.
So, what are you going to do with our 45 minutes of ideas, humour, comment and horror, BBC?
26 July 2026 at 15:19 #78806@ps1l0v3y0u Chibz’ ‘history’ eps made me cringe because of the inaccuracies in the ones I do know a little about, which leads me to doubt his accuracy on those I don’t know about. (I stole that from somebody). I have to admit I didn’t watch Rosa because I was sure it was going to be a depressingly simplistic stereotype of white men bad, black woman good. (And this from a guy who wanted to see Kamala Harris win). Demons of the Punjab – it was hard to pick sides, except to say killing people is bad. It was maybe a bit of a change to find that the Demons were benign, though it did look suspiciously like the idea was stolen from Testimony.
Tesla was, historically, rubbish, Edison’s adversary in the ‘battle of the currents’ was George Westinghouse, who didn’t get a mention. Villa Deodati felt quite good, or would have been if it hadn’t been derailed by the Cyberman thing, I think a better play could have been written without the Doctor in it at all. But then it wouldn’t have been in Doctor Who.
The Crimean War thing was absurd, it was just so predictable that the officers would be complete idiots. No explanation for how history does not record that the enemy was short aliens. I get acutely uneasy when actual historical figures (like Mary Seacole) get re-imagined i.e. misrepresented. And they blew up the formidable Sontaran ships with – gunpowder, was it? I just tried reading a synopsis on Tardis.fandom.com but I gave up, cast of thousands and I couldn’t follow the plot.
Witchfinder was full of it. Gave the impression that witch trials were commonplace in England and always fatal (about 500 people were executed for witchraft in 150 years, from 2000 trials, because judges and juries tended to be sceptical), that James 1 was entirely responsible (more executions took place in Elizabeth 1’s last decade than in James’s 22 years); oh, and witches weren’t burned, they were hanged. A fifth of those were down to the thoroughly evil ‘Witchfinder General’ Mathew Hopkins, by the way. So I would guess that most people then thought, as I do, that they were a disgusting and horrible travesty of justice.I’m a leftie environmentalist but Praxeus thoroughly put me off by the clumsiness of its message. And there’s the thing about Chibz – even things I would normally agree with, I instinctively disagree when Chibz says them because they’re so clumsy and obviously agenda-driven. Arachnids – I found the ugly American just too over the top to be credible (though in light of the last year or two I suppose I might have to reassess that). Orphan 55, again, wielded the environmental message like a sledge hammer.
Can’t help wondering whether Chibz was pandering to his perceived audience. Wasn’t he the guy who previously gave us Dinosaurs on a Spaceship with Queen Nefertiti (would have liked to see her as a Companion, by the way) meekly going off with obnoxiously super-macho Great White Hunter? (Because why? Presumably she Needed a Man? /s )
Finding any -isms in Moffs episodes is much more of a stretch. The scary old people in Amy’s Choice were inhabited by aliens. Nixon was fairly neutral I thought i.e. neither a villain nor a hero (in the episode). Thin Ice took a swipe at the bigoted aristocrat but other than him, nobody took much notice of Bill’s colour. Extremis used the Catholic Church as a background but neither particularly promoted nor attacked it, so far as I could see. Somehow I found Oxygen, savage as its anti-predatory-capitalism message was, was far less blatant than Kerblam! (And the way the owners of Kerblam had an epiphany and turned into humanitarian benefactors in the last couple of minutes was just – so simplistic as to be ridiculous).
Oh yeah, Spyfall. Started off really well, ended up doing violence to history and to real historic people (Noor Inayat Khan). Notice that in Let’s Kill Hitler Moff covered his tracks – he didn’t actually kill Hitler and one can reasonably assume that Adolf wouldn’t be too keen to publicise that somebody had punched him and shut him in a cupboard. That’s how it’s done.
Okay, I think that’s enough of me.
26 July 2026 at 15:22 #78807in the social messaging of Chibbers I thought it was overtly political – except I understand that’s both essential (plays & stories were always this) & part of Who’s rich history but something about the execution of their messages was clunky or unsubtle….
Well, you said in three lines what I took a page to do. The ‘social messaging’ was more noticeable because it was more clumsily done.
27 July 2026 at 03:56 #78808@dentarthurdent @ps1l0v3y0u @thane16 Hello! There are some very interesting posts here and it has taken me awhile to read them all. I have no problem with social messaging especially when so many more people seem to get their information and news from screens. There is proof that watching too much violence or too much doom scrolling can affect your mental health in an adverse way so maybe seeing positive messages can make us feel more hopeful. But, if that messaging is too preachy and clunky or even if it makes us feel guilty we tune out and stop listening and that defeats the purpose.
My kids watched Sesame Street and were very entertained, they didn’t know they were learning so much while giggling at Bert and Ernie. That is where Chibz went wrong, too much teaching and not enough giggling.
I still love the 13th Doctor. She was fierce in her protection of her Fam and so am I.
Good night from the smoky hell that is Ontario. I have to go turn on the fans we use to send our smoke to the White House.
stay cool
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