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28 June 2017 at 20:28 #59883
@wolfweed–
So no chance of another cryptic clue then? Or even a non-cryptic one?
28 June 2017 at 13:42 #59843@missrori — well, as mentioned above, the battlefields of WW1 were the locale of a key story of the Troughton era. The Mondasian Cybermen were introduced in a key story of the Hartnell era. Perhaps we are going to see a Doctor in despair at the loss of all his companions and who is guided by a ‘certain figure’ from his own past and through his own past to find hope again a la It’s a Wonderful Life.
28 June 2017 at 11:29 #59837@missrori — dunno. a lot of redemption happens in wartime. Have you never Sgt York?? Besides which, let’s not jump to conclusions. This does not mean the Xmas story is set in the trenches, merely that there are scenes set there.
But at the same time, I just don’t see 12 getting the warm and fuzzy regeneration that you’re wishing for him. And as for Bill and Nardole, well, maybe they don’t make it to the end of The Doctor Falls. Maybe there’s no de-Cyberisation for Bill.
28 June 2017 at 10:31 #59834@tardigrade–
I’m not sure why you’re so down on the TLs. I think it was an important piece of exposition for the Doctor’s roots to be shown over the course of many seasons of BG Who
Not sure I’d agree. The only really essential TL appearance, I think is The War Games. That one, I think, serves a point, and serves the purpose of deepening and moving the show on at a point when it needed it. You can probably also make a case for the The Three Doctors as it was really the only plausible way at the time to get the three docs together. But everything after that is superfluous, even the Deadly Assassin. But yeah, you’re right, another issue has been the portrayal of Gallifrey, which even the new series just doesn’t have enough money to do justice.
One of the issues is that it problematises the Doctor and I think this was the key thing that SM was interested in when he brought them back. The TLs overlay a strata of class over the Whoniverse, with the TLs as the natural-born aristocrats, the old Etonians of the universe. However nomadic, however egalitarian, the Doctor is essentially operating out of a position of privilege. And that problematises him somewhat. I don’t necessarily have a problem with him having that background but it does complicate a) how he views the universe and b) how the viewer approaches the Doctor. I think both showrunners have recognised this. RTD solved it by making the TLs not exist anymore and SM, to his credit, tackled it head on and solved it by re-establishing the dynamic of utter estrangement.
My main problem is that their introduction constricted the Whoniverse far too much. Just to take an example, I’ve been dipping into The Tenth Planet on the back of WEAT and just look how otherworldly and strange it all is. The Doctor doesn’t know the Cybermen, doesn’t know Mondas. The Cybermen don’t know him. It’s all just one other strange, and menacing, event in a huge, unknowable universe. Flashforward to, say, Earthshock and the Cybermen know all about Time Lords, TARDISes, Gallifrey and so on. This universe of connection where everyone seems to know everyone else has been created. It’s more akin to the world of Star Trek or Star Wars, of races connected by knowledge, if not outright political alliances.
And I think Who was left the poorer for it. The Whoniverse of the 1960s was multifold, disconnected, unknowable and even a bit chaotic (kind of like its real-life version). It would have been far better I think if the Time Lords had been only rarely seen, if at all. Their planet should not even have been given a name and if they were just invoked in name, not unlike She Who Must Be Obeyed. The version of the 1970s-1980s was smaller, more parochial and had a definite hierarchy. The AG series and the Time War restored the Whoniverse to something resembling its original state and I think that was a good idea and not one I’d want to see reversed too much.
Sorry about that. Bit off-topic and lengthy to boot. (slaps wrist)
28 June 2017 at 01:41 #59823@wolfweed– uncanny. You are Steven Moffat and I claim my five pounds….
27 June 2017 at 23:14 #59816@wolfweed — yes, did think that… and also The War Games… can it be coincidence that this alleged three-parter has already included the villains from one doctor’s final story? If someone leaks a pic of a big giant spider than we’ll know for sure….
27 June 2017 at 23:03 #59811@blenkinsopthebrave — The wartime setting is interesting and not what I expected at all. And now @pedant‘s unseen location shots from months back make sudden sense.
27 June 2017 at 22:55 #59808@wolfweed–
Yes, saw a couple of them but they really just confirmed what I’d already heard from a lot of sources already. But you’re right, definitely a ruiner. And the perfect riposte to all those complaining about the early reveal of the Cybermen and the Master. If you try to keep a lid on it, this kind of thing happens.
27 June 2017 at 22:28 #59805@wolfweed–
That’s very cryptic indeed. Are we talking about the location snaps?
27 June 2017 at 17:06 #59786@nick–
I think that Moff would need to have a very clever idea indeed to avoid spoiling the end of the S10.
I agree, but much as I hate to say it, SM’s series finales have been a bit lacklustre of late, since The Name of the Doctor and possibly even The Wedding of River Song. For my money, both Hell Bent and Death in Heaven were a bit disappointing and underachieving compared to the storming part ones that preceded them. I fear — but hope that I’m wrong — that The Doctor Falls might fall into that pattern too.
27 June 2017 at 16:18 #59783@blenkinsopthebrave–
Such as the Simm Master’s need for a disguise. Bill is unaware of him, so is it just to surprise the audience?
Well, some of the Master’s previous disguises seemed to have been donned for no earthly reason too, so he does have form in this respect. I suspect he just likes them. But in this case I’m pretty sure Simm had a line of dialogue referring to looking like a former prime minister which I think was there to remind us that Bill would recognise Simm as Harold Saxon and that would be presumably be enough to raise her suspicions. Hence Mr Razor.
27 June 2017 at 15:48 #59779@pedant–
interesting idea, but would need to be executed with next-level aplomb for it not to feel like a cop out
tend to agree and not really convinced it will go in that direction. But thought it was interesting and was curious as to what others thought. And it does seem like the simulation aspect was given curious emphasis in Extremis and SM does have form for this sort of resolution a la the Tesselecta, so I wouldn’t be at all surprised if he did try this.
But if he did I fully expect the Graun to collapse under the weight of a collective howl of ‘waaaaaah. DEM!!!!!’ (Although it obviously isn’t.)
27 June 2017 at 13:44 #59769On another note, what do people think of the theory someone mentioned on the Graun (and which I find intriguing) that the whole thing could be a simulation (a la Extremis) to test Missy without putting anyone in danger — and therefore Bill has been fine this whole time. Which would also explain the re-appearance of Mondasian Cybermen and the Master — aspects of the Doctor’s fears and subconscious that he’s using for the simulation.
Of course, it doesn’t explain the regeneration in the snow, but perhaps that’s a consequence of when it all goes pear-shaped and of the Doctor’s pride (which comes before a fall)…
27 June 2017 at 13:38 #59768@missrori– I agree with you and @pedant that the Hybrid is a concept that’s done and dusted. I’m always slightly bemused when this keeps coming up as I think it was pretty clearly dealt with in Hell Bent. I suspect it’s because it’s such a grand phrase that evokes such a lot in the Whovian imagination that it’s hard to let of and accept the somewhat prosaic reveal that SM gave us.
Also agree that we’re unlikely to see any kind of return of the Time Lords either. But once again I don’t think there’s any need for it anyway. To my mind, Hell Bent was SM resetting the Doctor’s relationship with the Time Lords. Returning them into the Who mythos but re-establishing the antagonism between them and the Doctor, making the Doctor a renegade and an outcast, rather than just this slightly desreputable, nomadic but accepted member of their community.
Which is fine by me because I think the introduction of the Time Lords and Gallifrey was one of the worst things the BG team ever did. I can see why they did it and that the show probably needed to deepen its mythos as it reached the end of the 1960s but it’s had the effect of dramatically shrinking the show’s universe. Which is why RTD went to great pains to get rid of them for the reboot. SM clearly wanted to draw a line under the Time War and reinstate them and he’s done that, but I don’t think we will (or should) see so much of a peep of Rassilon or the rest of the big-collar brigade for years to come.
On the Heather thing, I seriously doubt if we’ll see her return either. It might be a nice way to bring closure to Bill’s story if her Cyberisation is permanent (it almost certainly won’t be, I think, which might have repercussions further down the line in reducing the menace of the Cybermen in later stories I fear). But I don’t agree with @nick that there are questions outstanding from The Pilot that need to be addressed. The sentient puddle concept was maybe a little undercooked in places but really it was just there as a McGuffin to explore the opening of the relationship between the Doctor and Bill and I no more expect to see it returned to than I expect to see the Emojibots or The Monks next week.
And I don’t think that that’s Heather at the window in WEAT. It looks to me just like a generic, sad Mondasian who happened to bear a passing resemblance to Heather.
This is all great bonkerising and long may it continue but previous experience should still teach us that series finales are always less complex and in need of far less resolution than our theorising has led them to be.
27 June 2017 at 13:14 #59767@missrori–
Spiro talking about her role in more detail here.
Yes, odd that she’s being given such prominence, but that to me suggests that most other elements of the episode are a) things that we’ve seen before e.g. Mondasian Cybermen or the Master or b) so spoilerific that the publicity department has been told to stay the hell away from them.
26 June 2017 at 22:38 #59739@missrori– I don’t find the flashback theory that outlandish to be honest. After all, Bill was seeing the Doctor via that telepathic link he set up. Who’s to say that doesn’t work both way? Maybe there will be some part of Bill that will still be able to communicate with him, despite her being physically Cyberised.
On the other hand, she could even be the Doctor by that point….
26 June 2017 at 18:41 #59727@missrori and @brewski — the Missy as Doc regenerating theory is not mine I hasten to add but think I saw it over on the Graun. I just thought it was interesting and chimes with how SM teasers have worked in the past — what we think we are seeing is not what we are seeing at all.
Personally, I don’t think it’s going to go that way. It’s too complicated a concept to shoehorn into an episode that, while extended, still has an awful lot to cram in. But at the same time, Time Lords don’t really need a big bag of disguises — though the Master is never short of a few. A Time Lord with a few regenerations up their sleeve have an instant built-in disguise-making kit.
(And let’s face it, SM has form in the rapid regeneration stakes with Curse of Fatal Death. Although I’m not sure that what he did for laughs is something he would import into the show proper.)
26 June 2017 at 15:48 #59717Tend to agree with @nick that the way Clara’s death was presented in Face the Raven made it clear (at least to me) that she wasn’t dead, or at least not in the sense of an absolute end, taking no further part in the series. Bill’s ‘demise’ seems different to me in that regard, The mise en scene presents it with significance, finality, that suggests no magic bullet is forthcoming. But, of course, it is. The coyness of SM and PM at the Q&A more or less confirmed it to my mind. But at the same time I don’t think it’s going to be quite as happy ever after as Clara’s was.
@missrori — I get the feeling that the intervening floors contain more evolved Cybermen that the further you go, the higher up the foodchain, more ruthless, they get.
@janetteb — I think next week will certainly reference the regeneration and take it on a bit but I’m in two minds whether we’ll see a face next week. It would be a nice way to do it and I think they’d like to, as it would lance the pressure around the announcement, especially as filming the xmas spesh will undoubtedly be taking place very, very soon. So definitely possible, maybe even quite likely, but I can’t help but feel that they’ll tease it out a bit further.
The problem is, I think, that if the story is bringing the Missy arc, and possibly the Bill arc, to an end, then a lot of hoo-ha over a regeneration is just going to drown all that out. There’s always a lot of anticipation over a new Doctor but I can’t help but feel it’s kind of overshadowed this series a bit too much. It makes me think that next time around there might be a case for the Beeb just issuing a press release when the time comes and sparing us all the endless clickbaity ‘top 10 people who should be the Doctor zzzzzzzz’ articles.
26 June 2017 at 00:52 #59689@blenkinsopthebrave–
You could well be right. As I said on the episode thread, I strongly suspect that Bill will be decyberised (we seem to have coined a new word tonight). And I’d be more than happy with a Michelle Gomez Doc — but I suspect the fact that she’s already played Missy will stand against her as ‘too confusing’ for the casual viewer. More than happy to be wrong on that one though.
As to the line spoken by Bill. Yeah, that does suggest that we get her back but it could be a flashback, say. And even if we get Bill ‘back’, it doesn’t automatically mean that she’s going to survive, especially as the line is such a hopeless one. I would expect that even if she dies, she would get some kind of farewell scene with the Doctor, even if cyberised. (Danny Pink did.)
And, of course, while that might be Pearl’s voice, who’s to say she’s still playing Bill at that point?
25 June 2017 at 22:54 #59676@blenkinsopthebrave–
Now, back to the link with “A Matter of Life and Death”. The final image we are given in “World Enough and Time” is of Bill’s teardrop. In “A Matter of Life and Death” the heavenly court decides to allow the David Niven character to live, and the deciding factor is the teardrop that drops onto a rose from the girl who loves him.
Oh, that’s a good call and I think that’s almost exactly the kind of thing that SM might do. And who is the other person who we’ve seen shedding a tear this year. Perhaps Missy, moved to an act of redemption (without hope, without witness, without reward) somehow gives her life, or her regeneration to de-Cyberise Bill.
25 June 2017 at 22:38 #59675If Marc Platt hadn’t already given the show Ghostlight — which along with Curse of Fenric, I think, provided much of the template for the show’s future post-cancellation — then he would definitely earn his place in Who lore with Spare Parts which has the distinction of being the only audio story that has been liberally, um, borrowed for the AG series — twice.
The RTD-era Rise of the Cybermen/Age of Steel two parter was an odd mish mash of Spare Parts, The Invasion and Philip Pullman which in the end didn’t really work for me. I think this was partially because the conception of the Cybermen was too badly off, partly it was because of Roger Lloyd-Pack chewing the scenery too much but it was the fact that they were just too coy about the horror of the Cybermen, and in particular, the conversion process — all that whirling blades stuff was a rather camp way of shying away from the body horror of what was actually happening here.
But this time, I think, they got it totally right. One of the most effective things about Spare Parts was the way they utilised the Blitz-like setting, the attitude of wartime sacrifice a convincing answer to the question of ‘why would people allow this to happen to themselves’. And the design of the Mondasian Cybermen does have something of a 1940s aesthetic to it. So it was totally the right thing to tap into that once again — the enclosed, roofed city is straight out of Spare Parts, as was the hospital matron, and the hospital itself was creepy as hell too — although it obviously owed a huge debt to computer games like Silent Hill and BioShock too. I was half-expecting to see some Little Sisters show up at some point.
It’ll come as no surprise to most that I find the Mondasian Cybermen the most effective version of the Cybermen, mostly because the human aspect is emphasised, as is the medical and scientific over the military. They are, I think, the most horrific concept that Doctor Who has ever come up with but it is lost when they’re reduced to tin soldiers or robots. It looks rather like we’re returning to that more prosaic level next week again but I’ll always be grateful that we got to see the Cybermen reach their full horrific potential for once and I’ll hope that they make a reappearance in the Chibnall era.
But on to other things. Wasn’t Pearl Mackie just great? She’s been great all year and again she really knocked it out the park. Her scenes with Razor also fulfilled another thing that I’ve always wanted to see — a companion who was duped or led astray by the Master. It was also nice to see John Simm get to play a bit of humour. He only occasionally gets the chance to do so. But as great as Bill is, I think she should die and stay dead. This was done too well and with too much emotional punch for it do be undone with a bit of time-wimey sleight-of-hand. But I suspect it will be. Firstly, because Pearl Mackie has shown herself to be too much of an asset to the show and secondly because Steven Moffat seems to me to be far too much of a sentimental old softie to go out on such a dark note.
And yet, and yet. SM also has the problem of the Master to deal with. I’ve said before it’s a perennial problem in bringing back the Master — once you’ve brought him/her back, you have to find something to do with them. Even the original show had this problem. After a bit of disguise tomfoolery, inventive dispatching of bit characters and general moustache twirling, he would tend to just change sides and then live to fight another day. RTD got round out by turning him into a Joker-esque maniac and Moffat went down the route of exploring the core friendship between the two characters.
But he now has the problem of resetting that relationship. If Missy becomes good, then that’s a significant chunk of Who lore taken out of the equation for good — and I’m not sure Chibnall would thank Moffat for that. The alternatives are a regeneration that returns Missy to evil but that would mean the problem of hope, of the possibility of redemption, would remain, and would forever colour the Doctor’s dealings with her. The other option is that she does something so terrible that he can never forgive her and returns them to implacable enemies. The permanent death of Bill would do that, I think.
On that regeneration scene — a great opening to an episode. But I feel that the fake regeneration in The Lie of the Land kind of stole its thunder a bit and made me at least a little bit suspicious of it. If it had come out of nowhere then it would have been a gob-smacking start to the story. I quite like the theory that it’s an in-disguise Missy regenerating rather than the Doctor, though I’m not sure that’s how it’ll work in practice. But if I have one criticism of SM, it’s that he’s used regeneration tricks just a bit too much over his tenure. I think it’s something that has to be used very sparingly. And it hasn’t always been of late.
So, next week has a lot of ground to cover and I must admit it looks a bit too bang-crash explosion explosion for my liking. I would have preferred something tonally similar to this week’s but I guess it’s a series finale and it has to pull out the crowd-pleasing stops a little — although I think it’s an approach that proved detrimental to, say, Death in Heaven.
No real predictions but very much looking forward, while simultaneously dreading the passing of Capaldi (who was great once again). I was sure that we were going to get a regeneration before Christmas but I doubt we’ll get one next week. I’m still hoping for a hidden in plain sight, totally gobsmacking surprise regeneration. Maybe it’s not too late for it still be Pearl — the Doctor’s tribute to the girl he couldn’t save? A future reproach, not unlike having to wear Caecilius’s face this time around?
I imagine that we’ll be ending on something of a cliffhanger for Christmas — perhaps the Doc’s regeneration at the South Pole being interrupted by —- REDACTED——–
25 June 2017 at 15:31 #59627I did mod one comment by last night, but just give me the heads up if people feel that there are others that need attention….
23 June 2017 at 10:19 #59481And in a week when we’re about to get some double Mastery action, this might be of interest…
Certainly it will make you look on Eric Roberts a lot more kindly….
23 June 2017 at 10:16 #59480I think Dracula is a great choice of project for Moffat and Gattiss and I’ll definitely look forward to it though. I imagine they’ll do something interesting with the part of Dracula and think Capaldi would be great but I also can’t help but feel he’d be a better fit for Van Helsing.
20 June 2017 at 14:17 #59351@frobisher — ooh, I like that theory a lot. The whole Cyber-converted Bill concept seems a little bit too close to the fate of Danny Pink for my liking so I do hope they do something different with it.
I do think that we will get a more uplifting end to the Capaldi era than some on here are predicting though.
And I’m not convinced that the curious lapses in the Doctor’s behaviour this year are any kind of a plan but are more likely just indicative of writers still struggling to get a handle on his Doc at certain points.
@missrori–
And I just had a bonkers-beyond-bonkers idea. What if…what if the Mondasian Cybermen here aren’t straight-up evil?
Well, the original Cybermen weren’t really. They were interesting, I think, in that they were doing clearly bad things firmly in the belief they were doing good, that they represented progress and were genuinely mystified as to why people couldn’t see that. The trailer looks very much like they’re channelling the audio stories Spare Parts (again) and it’ll be interesting to see just to what extent.
It certainly seems as if there’s going to be a lot going on for the next two episodes.
20 June 2017 at 00:33 #59326@wolfweed–
Cheers for those. Doesn’t Simm look great as an proper old school Master? And I might be biased, but those pics just prove my point that the Mondasian Cybermen were far and away the creepiest versions. Interesting though that there are various versions involved though. I’m assuming some time distortion chicanery, perhaps something to do with that black hole might be involved. Possibly that’s why we’re seeing different Masters too.
16 June 2017 at 23:20 #59156To be honest I think it’s just the Twittersphere putting two and two together and making a gazillion. Shouldn’t think there’s much scope for immediate excitement.
Though I will be very interested to see just how the Beeb does handle the announcement when it comes. Or whether they will indeed try to slip in a surprise regen this time. My hat’s off to them if they manage it….
16 June 2017 at 22:44 #59154@nick and @wolfweed–
That’s the standard release time for a PA embargoed story, so it could be a possibility. Could well be all over the Sunday papers in that case.
But I agree it’s unlikely that they’d let the Press get it first in this day and age. Unless they’ve decided not to go for some live telly announcement, which they quite probably haven’t. Interesting. If it does pan out like this then that means a) they’re doing it before they start filming the Xmas spesh or b) the new Doc is showing up earlier than Xmas.
13 June 2017 at 23:29 #59059@nick–
Alternatively, it means ‘we’re too chicken to go for anything other than a white, male vanilla Doc but we’ll make up for it in other ways, honest guv’.
But agree that CC should be given every benefit of the doubt in the meantime. I’m hoping to be pleasantly surprised and noshing down on some humble pie next year….
13 June 2017 at 21:30 #59055@nick–
re. a full-series story. Even if Chibnall wrote them all, which I suspect is an impossible task for a Who showrunner, I still don’t think it would work. Unlike Moffat’s stories under RTD, which were pretty tight, Chibnall’s stories have always seemed to contain one or two fundamental flaws in my view. The danger is that his attention to detail and reliance on the viewer to accept cavalier leaps in plotting would become even more pronounced if he was writing 13 episodes.
But I do suspect the ‘bold and risky’ line is code for a ‘black and/or female Doctor’ and these articles are the first in a series of ‘breaking the ground’ articles to prepare the way for the actual announcement…
13 June 2017 at 19:39 #59050@missrori — I think if the Monks Trilogy proved anything it’s that a whole-series storyline would be an absolutely terrible idea.
But I agree that there are many reasons for the show’s diminished profile at the moment and few of them are the fault of the current production team. It’s odd that the RT seem to be running two versions of essentially the same article and I have to say that the quotes, especially those from James Strong, do not fill me with confidence for the incoming Chibnall era.
‘Bold and innovative’ sounds a bit like ‘strong and stable’ to me….
12 June 2017 at 11:46 #58954@bluesqueakpip — I wonder if what SM is doing this series is essentially revisiting the Doctor/Master dynamic from Curse of Fatal Death, only this time seriously (or at least with fewer bellylaughs)….
12 June 2017 at 11:45 #58953On another note, it’s Glasgow Comic Con at the end of the month. Any of the Scottish contingent planning on going?
12 June 2017 at 11:44 #58952@mudlark — glad to hear you’re OK after your episode
@nick and @bluesqueakpip — I think Corbyn’s been doing very well at widening his appeal over the last few months. There’s no sign that he won’t be able to continue doing this I reckon. His immediate challenge is the tricky job of forming a shadow cabinet that looks like a Government in waiting, one that doesn’t piss off his core loyalists but which also finds room to extend an olive branch to previous Blairite opponents. (If one good thing has already come out of this, it’s that it’s finally killed the Blairite/New Labour faction of the party. As Jonathan Pie said, it’s driven the final stake through the coffin of Count Mandelson.
As for May staying on, there’s almost no chance of it, I’d say. No doubt the party would like a gradual and dignified ‘coronation’ of (most likely) Amber Rudd but I doubt it will happen. May will be gone within weeks, if not days. If the 1922 Committee don’t do for her then there’s no way she’ll get a Queen’s Speech passed at the end of the month. And then there’s the question of the Good Friday Agreement. By getting into bed with the DUP, she’s essentially put the entire peace process in jeopardy. And there’s many on both sides of the Irish Sea, and wider Europe itself, that won’t allow that to happen. Sinn Fein, for instance, have been remarkably silent since the aftermath of the election but I don’t expect that do continue for long. In fact, I wouldn’t be at all surprised if they broke their long-standing policy of not taking up their Westminster seats for the first time. Nah, she’s toast. Even The Donald can see it, which is why he’s ‘postponed’ his visit. He hates being associated with losers.
11 June 2017 at 22:41 #58937Not a bad episode at all and possibly Gatiss’s best, certainly his best since The Unquiet Dead. I agree with @arbutus et al that it very much had a BG feel — you can get much more BG than a tunnel-based romp with lumbering monsters and a factional dispute. Even the set design for much of the stories this year seems to be deliberately retro, echoing BG aesthetics rather than more contemporary influences.
Very light on arc stuff too but then we knew that anyway. Gatiss never seems to be given arc work to do and his episodes are always standalone, somewhat fillery, fare. I never find his stories that satisfying — I think he tends to be bit undisciplined as a writer. He can’t seem to help himself from shoehorning in pop cultural references — movies this time, 80s pop songs the last — and it can sometimes be a little clumsy. I tend to think of him as a pastiche artist, who, lacking the warm-hearted interest in human character of RTD, or the intellectual game-playing of SM, falls back on just throwing all the other works that have influenced and enthused him over the years and hope that some of it sticks. This sometimes works (personally, what I’d really like him to do is more documentaries, he’s an engaging and affable screen presence and his knowledge and enthusiasm for the by-ways of British pop culture makes for great TV) but sometimes it doesn’t, as in his attempted Bondification of the last series of Sherlock.
But here it largely works and he’s produced the best Ice Warriors story since The Curse of Peladon. As well as the Who touchstones, some nice Wells and British war film references — although I’d suggest that The Man Who Would be King was a stronger influence than Zulu, with the concepts of lost honour, British soldiers being closer to mercenaries than anything else etc.
Oh, and the Alpha Centauri moment. For Whovians of a certain age, The Curse of Peladon holds a special place in their hearts as it was repeated as a couple of compilations in the early 1980s. For them, this story would have been their first exposure to the 3rd Doctor on screen and I certainly remember being really enthused by seeing it (so much so that after the episode my friend I and would spend the rest of the evening lumbering around and hissing like Ice Warriors).
If this is Gatiss’s last story then he can rest assured he went out on a high.
11 June 2017 at 21:23 #58931On the new Doctor, it depends whether they go for an all-singing, all-dancing announcement as Capaldi’s, in which case I’d say they’ll go for a time of the year when they’ll get a big audience for it and that largely rules out the summer months, I suspect. Maybe sometime around the August bank holiday?
But if, as Pip says, they’re going to try and keep a lid on it until they absolutely have to then it’ll be just before they start filming, so a month or two later than that. All this is precluding an unexpected leak, of course. And it has to be said that the British tabloid press seems to have gone dramatically feral of late.
Certainly they won’t want the announcement of a new Doctor to overshadow the buzz of the remaining episodes of Series 10. Although I’m by no means convinced that we won’t be seeing the new Doctor a bit earlier than the Christmas special.
9 June 2017 at 23:07 #58825No doubt most will have seen this already. Contains some strong language obvs…
9 June 2017 at 22:22 #58821Agree with pretty much all of the above. Some kind of Norway-like situation seems likely, which won’t placate the hardcore kipper wing of the Tory party and will end up toppling May. But I don’t think she’ll get anywhere near that stage anyway. True, there are no obvious unity candidates to lead the party but Boris is reckless and ambitious enough to have a (literal) stab at it anyway. And at the moment, I don’t think May would survive any leadership challenge no matter who mounted it.
I think it likely we’ll see another general election long, long before 2020, possibly even this year. Getting into bed with the DUP will make NI fragile as it is and Foster and co won’t make many friends on the mainland if they try and rattle sabres too much — big swathes of even the Tory party will be extremely uncomfortable with giving them even a modicum of power. And they’ve not cleared themselves from things like the cash-for-ash scandal fully yet either. This is not an alliance that will last. And even with the DUP support, May only has a majority of 2. I doubt whether Corbyn, Farron and whoever ends up leading the SNP group at Westminster will remotely give her an easy ride. And as @pedant says, all it takes is a couple of shaky by-elections for the whole edifice to come tumbling around her ears.
The woman has created a clusterf**k of quite gob-smacking proportions and for no good reason, save her own hubris and arrogance.
9 June 2017 at 19:19 #58807@blenkinsopthebrave — yes, the power-sharing arrangements are still in a state of flux and had been put on hold for the general election. And yes, some form of formal alliance between the Tories and the DUP does skew the nature of the talks somewhat. Certainly I don’t imagine Sinn Fein will be at all happy about it — and I wouldn’t be at all surprised if they abandon their long-standing policy of not taking up their seats in Westminster should this all go ahead. Certainly, it’s not just made the political situation in the mainland UK messier, it’s not beyond the realms of possibility that it could derail the peace process in Norn Iron.
@lisa — Certainly the DUP are ultra-conservative, bordering on fundamentalist but they’re a little more than that too in that they’re to all intents and purposes the political wing of sectarian terror groups like Ulster Resistance and the UVF. It’s a very, very morally murky act for the Tories to get into bed with them politically like this.
9 June 2017 at 15:04 #58798@wolfweed — that video is excellent but begs the question why didn’t he get more votes? He certainly deserved them.
@mudlark — yes, the DUP is the worst of all possible worlds. Reminiscent of when the Cybermen suggested a pact with the Daleks in Doomsday and will undoubtedly go the same way, even if it takes a little longer. As someone on Twitter said, May did warn the election could end with a coalition of chaos propped up by terrorist sympathisers. She just neglected to mention she’d be leading it.
The one ray of hope is that it almost certainly won’t last long. The DUP has been incapable of forming a stable Government at Stormont. Those problems aren’t going to go away and will be compounded by them getting embroiled in the omnishambles that will be Westminster for the next few months…
8 June 2017 at 22:11 #58757In other news, this General Election night looks as if it’s going to be a belter….
8 June 2017 at 22:01 #58751@frobisher and @blenkinsopthebrave–
I’m liking the It’s A Wonderful Life scenario and while this was sort of done in Turn Left, I’m wondering whether SM might do it in more explicit style.
On Missy, maybe she will turn good and her ‘evil’ subconscious forces her to regenerate (into Simm?) to ‘save’ itself. Or if there is to be interaction between the two Masters, perhaps he shows up as an evil version of The Three Doctors, to foil his future/past self from performing a good act. And if the Doctor fails to save her, maybe he takes on Missy’s form as a memorial/tribute. (Because I’m also loving the idea of Gomez as the Doctor.)
8 June 2017 at 21:32 #58747@wolfweed — I had no idea until now just how polythene-y the Zero Room was — which leads me to think that the Doctor was technically guilty of fly-tipping when he jettisoned it.
On spoilers in general, I think I concur with @craig on the posting of camera phone footage snatched on location. I’m never really that interested myself and it does tend to just spoil the hard work of the production team for no real reason.
I think it’s a good idea to respect the sanctity of the rest of the site as possible but think that the Spoilers page should be pretty much fair game for anything else that’s out there and which might be of interest. On occasion this could well include something as gossipy as the Popbitch stuff, which @pedant did preface with a comment about how it might be relevant to ongoing discussion. To my mind, that’s fine and dandy, but at the same time I’m sure we don’t want the thread to become clogged up with bitchy scuttle-butt
8 June 2017 at 12:25 #58723@nick–
I’m reminded of the anecdote about the late Roger Moore, who was on set with a diva-ish Hollywood actor who was by all accounts making life hell for everyone on set. When Moore took the fellow aside to point this out, the guy exploded, saying he was there ‘to be a good actor, not win some goddam popularity contest’.
Moore’s reply apparently was, ‘well, you’ve failed at being a good actor. Why not go for the popularity contest?’
8 June 2017 at 11:21 #58717@nick and @pedant — if I ever see Barrowman again in Who it might be enough to tip me over the edge. For me Captain Jack will always be a potentially interesting character ruined by casting someone who couldn’t really act in the role.
But that’s a good call on that unexplained bit of filming. I think it would be highly likely that we’ll get some kind of callback to Clara at regeneration time and it would have made sense to film it at the time, particularly with her Victoria obligations.
And anything that upsets the ARSE brigade is fine by me. Which is possibly why I like the idea of Pearl in fact being the Doctor appeals to me.
@thane15 — I don’t think we should be too quick to damn Pearl either. Certainly not on the basis of some unattributed rumour on a gossip website. She might well be arrogant and rude, but she might equally be nervous as hell at getting such a high profile gig so young. Who hasn’t looked back on a time when their behaviour might have been considered impolite but which was actually unintentional. We all behave like dicks at some point, especially when young and/or under pressure.
And if she is developing diva tendencies, does that affect her ability to play the part, or for me to enjoy her performance? Not really. But it might affect her ability to ‘be’ the Doctor in all those extracurricular activities that come with the part. I’d say that might be more problematic. But then again, McGann was apparently quite snooty about the ‘anoraks’ to begin with before eventually warming to the fan community.
8 June 2017 at 00:30 #58697Interesting ideas re. Gomez and Pearl (although the scuttlebutt on Mackie is depressing, I agree.) One of the key advantages of this approach is that the new Doc can hide in plain sight for the filming of the Christmas special and I wouldn’t put it past them to do something like this.
While I like the thinking behind the idea that it’s Pearl (and she’s more than proved that she’s got the acting chops for the part), I’m not sure I buy it. First of all, they kind of playfully tried this with Clara in Death in Heaven and I’m not sure they’d pull the same trick again.My other reservation is that there’s more to being the Doctor than what we see on-screen. You’re a more or less full-time ambassador for the show and you seem to be required to be ‘in character’ a lot of the time for junkets, interviews, conventions. I think it’s the reason why it helps to be a prior fan — Matt wasn’t, of course, but he’s to be commended for the passion with which he threw himself into the Who world. This is the reason why a lot of the casting suggestions we’ve seen can be written off, I think — I just can’t see the likes of Tilda Swinton or even John Simm throwing themselves into this world for the next three years.
On the other hand, I could totally see Gomez doing so and I disagree with @nick and would argue that Michelle has both the charisma and the acting chops for the part. And it would be an audacious and frankly excellent move for her to become the Doctor. But I think he’s probably right in that it won’t happen. (I think I also agree that they can’t really go for another ‘safe’ white, male Doc this time. The show needs to evolve and I think a vanilla Doc would be counter-productive at this point. It would look like cowardice and would give the impression that the show is stagnating. They’ve probably left it too long already.)
On the regeneration in general however, I suspect we’ve already seen this Doctor in one form or another, so maybe this chat about Pearl or Michelle is closer to the mark than we think. Since the 50th, we’ve been told again and again that faces re-occur or are prompted by external influences. I don’t think that’s been idle chat and I suspect SM has been planning his big regeneration finish for some time. And as we know that it’s going to be something out of the ordinary, I can’t imagine which other direction they could go. (But then with SM’s era, we’ve said that before.)
6 June 2017 at 22:44 #58659@wolfweed — there, hopefully that’s worked this time….
6 June 2017 at 22:36 #58655@wolfweed — duly removed. Interesting though. I’d recommend you repost in Spoilers….
5 June 2017 at 00:18 #58533OK, I’m going to put it out there that I’m not massively sold on Toby Whithouse episodes which for me range from the ‘meh’ to the ‘flawed but interesting’. And this one personally falls right in the middle of that scale.
This has been the oddest loose trilogy of stories and I’ve not really been sold on it — if anything it’s proved once again (as if proof were needed after Key to Time and Trial of a Time Lord) that it’s a format that doesn’t work in Who. Bona fide serials work and standalones work but this kind of halfway house doesn’t.
Extremis was the strongest of the three I think, with Pyramid at the End of the World being the most disappointing. This I enjoyed (more on the second viewing) but it was still patchy as hell. The fundamental problem for me still is The Monks, who were underwritten, inconsistent, and just not really very threatening or memorable. This is a real shame on many levels, not least of which is the interesting interview with Gary Pollard on the After Show who comes across as a very talented, committed and personable figure and I found myself really wishing that I liked The Monks more. (The original concept of the kung-fu Monks sounds far cooler and it’s really annoying that they didn’t go for that, although I guess they just didn’t want to have to pay for a load of fight sequences.) But the idea of an invasion that requires to be invited first is a great one and I do wish it had been handled better/thought through a bit more. It clearly has political overtones with questions of regime change etc. which sound suspiciously Peter Harnessy to me and I’d have welcomed a clearer examination of that — and also of the religious overtones that having the villains just called Monks clearly implies.
I was left last week, going mostly by the trailer for Lie of the Land, being strongly reminded of the whole Jasmine storyline from Angel s4 (just as the ‘rehabilitation’ of Missy storyline is somewhat reminding me of Angel and Faith’s similar storyline from that series). Hell, the Monks even look a bit like Jasmine in her true form and the idea of Bill as the lone voice of reason seems very similar to Fred’s role. Nothing wrong with all that, of course, and the idea of a Doctor on the wrong side is a great one. But it’s just a shame that the episode didn’t run with that a bit more instead of getting it out of the way with what felt like indecent haste and heading back on a more trad trajectory. It felt to me like the production team not having the courage of its convictions.
There actually seemed to me to be an aura of cowardice going through this whole story (and possibly last week’s too). I got a real sense of punches being pulled. The ideas here are heady and interesting. Fake News, populaces being complicit in their own subjugation, propaganda, thoughtcrime (and am I the only one thinking that having that fake regeneration which was used to garner so much pre-series publicity veers dangerously close to being a bit of fake news itself? Talking about having your cake and eating it.)
But more than once I just felt that decisions had been made to shy away from the issues beirue, this is Who and not a piece of political polemic, but the show has more than once shown more courage in its convictions than it did here. The vision of life under The Monks was just a bit too generic dystopia I thought. Why, for example, were citizens required to wear overalls? Does it suggest a still industrial society? Is it too remove individuality, perhaps with a religious underpinning? Or is it because they’d seen it 1984 and just lifted it wholesale. Similarly, why are the bin bags piled up? Is it because The Monks neither know nor care about sanitation? Or is it because it was seen in Children of Men (where it has a clear purpose. No one cares anymore because in a world without children people have no reason to live) and it was again just lifted without thought.
The dreary, dysfunctional world had no thought behind it — except perhaps for falling back on familiar (and safely distant) tropes. It felt like care was taken to avoid anything that could be seen to have too many allusions to current events. The Monks’ UK had a East Germany/Soviet vibe to it, which made sense in 1984 but made less sense to me here. I’m in two minds about this punch-pulling.
As someone mentioned above, a collaborating Doctor, even if not sincerely, is problematic too and presumably leads to some innocent deaths. That’s something that’s hard to reconcile personally.
However, the episode as a whole is saved by Peter and Pearl who are once again brilliant. Bill is great in her confrontation with the Doctor, as is Capaldi, who gives his ‘evil’ Doctor a swagger and a righteousness that I think is the closest he’s actually been to Malcolm Tucker in Who.
I notice there’s been significant anti-Moffat wailing over this story, which is bemusing since he didn’t write it, but despite the apparent complexity of Extremis, I think I’d reiterate my feeling that this ‘trilogy’ has been far more reminiscent of the RTD era than of the SM years. Sketchy aliens. Earth in peril. Love save the day (and I didn’t really have a problem with the denouement and thought it worked). They all seem far more like RTD-era devices. And on a more negative note, Bill curing the Doctor’s sight, the Doctor’s ‘betrayal’ and shooting, they felt like the sort of flawed moments that RTD occasionally gave us — demanding of us a big emotional pay-off without having put in the pre-requisite groundwork (more so in Torchwood than Who, of course, and I fully expect that we’ll see a lot more of this kind of scene when Chibbers arrives.)
On the question of the story not dealing with the aftermath of invasions, I don’t think it’s entirely fair to lay this one at the door of the current production team and rather that it’s something you really have to take up with Terrance Dicks/Barry Letts/Malcolm Hulke. It’s a long-established Who trope and really all SM and co were doing in this story was servicing it. The best any production team can do now is merely acknowledge the loophole (as this story did do) and the carry on.
Not that there’s not scope for a story to explore this fertile ground at some point in the future, of course — only not in the last few minutes of a story. I jokingly said a few weeks ago that perhaps it was time for the Doctor to return to Peladon now that Brexit was happening but maybe he should to see how Peladonian society has evolved thanks to his play-acting and interference all those years previously…
3 June 2017 at 17:57 #58433Welcome back to @scaryb and @fatmaninabox…
I was beginning to worry about the two of you….
ah, it’s good to have the old family back together… sniff….
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