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1 December 2014 at 11:18 #35946
@pedant @purofilion and @ all — yes, indeed if we do a Buffy-fest great care must be taken not to spoil the later episodes for puro, or anyone else who hasn’t got that far. Though I suspect that once puro gets into the swing of the show she’ll want to race through all the seasons in quick order. That’s usually what happens.
@katharine — I know there were plans for a season six of Angel, and we did see some of it in the comics, but the show feels kind of complete to me. I far prefer the finale of Angel to Buffy’s if I’m honest.
30 November 2014 at 16:12 #35923@purofilion — you’re discovering Buffy for the first time. I’m so jealous. Maybe we should have a group watch of some Buffy at some point, ponder its influence on NuWho and all that.
Oh and belated birthday greetings, @phaseshift.
30 November 2014 at 11:47 #35920@blenkinsopthebrave –all fair points which I totally respect and a big Yes to tolerance of ideas in this forum. And this is obviously a subject which means a lot to you and I totally respect that too.
However, I’m not sure I’d say the historical context is of vital importance, rather than just of secondary interest or resonance, largely because it is something that (necessarily) changes over time. At the risk of going wildly off-topic, the Quatermass 2 is a good example. Yes, a contemporary viewer of Q2 would have found different resonances with the Teddy Boy race riots. But at the end of the day, the show is a piece of SF horror, not a piece of social history. All you really need to take away from it is that even as ‘civilised human beings’ we have murderous instincts towards persecution that the show later posited a reason for. Yes, a modern viewer is going to ‘read’ the Teddy Boy character differently to a contemporary one (or one steeped in the social history of the time) but that doesn’t mean that one reading is automatically flawed or inferior to the other. All we need to know is that such tensions exist within the story, we don’t need to know the specific details. We just need to know enough to understand what the wider story is trying to tell us.
I’d argue that a similar argument can be made for Fenric’s use of WWII but I fear that it will have to wait until the discussion of episode four, for fear of spoilers.
29 November 2014 at 19:07 #35905I don’t want to get a reputation as being Captain Controversial and causing flaming disputes every weekend, I’m afraid I’m not sure that postmodern relativism counts necessarily as a ‘bad thing’. I’m not sure the story needed to go deeper into historical context — and the story is so complex anyway that I’m not sure it could have bore it. And I’d argue that the events of episode four will have a direct bearing on all this discussion of moral relativism and perhaps bring it into sharper focus.
In general, I’d agree with some of the criticisms of this episode. The girls are still awful. And the bulkhead scene is fumbled badly, I think. But I still believe the show is to applauded for the ambition and scope of a story like this. Compare to even any story of the previous series. There’s an awful lot it doesn’t get quite right, or doesn’t have the resources to pull off properly, but McCoy is great and it definitely sets the template for the Virgin New Adventures and then the new series itself.
23 November 2014 at 12:12 #35835I’d also add that Uuganaa Ramsay’s book Mongol is well worth a look and kind of relevant to yesterday’s discussion. She’s a Glasgow writer but her biography talks about reappropriation of the word Mongol to mean, as it should, someone from Mongolia and also talks about her child being born with Down’s Syndrome and having to then cope with an added (unwelcome) layer of meaning.
18 November 2014 at 13:11 #35735@bluesqueakpip — I think we’re agreed that Aldred was hired to be a companion in a show that was rather different than what Who was turning itself (back) into in the last couple of stories. And she’s definitely a gazillion times better than Mel (can you even imagine Bonnie Langford in Ghost Light?) You’re right, they were lucky to have landed a performer who could have a fair go at the heavy dramatics, even if she was never really going to be able to pull it off properly.
@badwulf — Corners was a kids’ programme that was a kind of ‘fun facts to learn’ type thing and was presented by Sophie Aldred at one point.
18 November 2014 at 01:00 #35729@bluesqueakpip — I was kind of aware of Sophie Aldred’s pre and post Who career — Corners still holds a special place in my heart. But that still doesn’t mean she wasn’t out of her depth with anything above a certain level of drama. She’s fine with the ‘flippin’ eck, perfessor, that’s well wicked’s but not really with anything heavier than that. Look at the baby scene in this episode. It’s not brilliantly written but with the best will in the world, she does rather fail to convey the necessary and convincing depth of emotion in that scene.It’s no reflection on her but rather on JNT’s casting. The kids’/light ent show that he envisaged it being was gradually re-developing its dramatic ambitions. Which is why Ace was in the process of being written out, I suspect.
17 November 2014 at 16:16 #35720Not sure if anyone’s posted this but I think those Mondas-style retro Cybermen would have been brilliant…
17 November 2014 at 12:05 #35714Just wanted to add that this story is great for seeing how the master manipulator of the Seventh Doc in action. As in Ghost Light too for that matter. Compare it to the bumbling amiability of Matt or even how Capaldi’s doc quite often admits to ignorance or makes mistakes throughout his adventures. But Seven just glides about, slotting pieces into place, unearthing the translation as if he already knows it’s there, taking it straight to Judson and so on. Never has there been a Doc so self-assured, with the possible exception of Pertwee, and never has there been one before or since who’s operated so blatantly on his own agenda….
17 November 2014 at 00:58 #35707For me Fenric comes just under Ghost Light as McCoy’s best. As others have said, it pretty much contains the template of many elements of the new series. You can see the genesis of Rose in Ace, for example.
I have to admit I’ve never been the biggest fan of Ace. You can see what they were trying to do with her and she’s definitely a vast improvement on Peri and even Tegan, but in terms of characterisation, she’s still far too rough around the edges for my liking. But she has an interesting arc, and it’s very to the fore here, but I’d have to say in both this and Ghost Light, Sophie Aldred tends to show that she doesn’t really have the acting chops to carry it off successfully. Or at least not to the extent that Billie Piper and now Jenna Coleman have shone with similar material.
But at the same time, she has a nice chemistry with McCoy. My test of whether a companion (and Doctor) are truly successful in terms of writing and characterisation is if you can imagine them existing and hanging out and having adventures even when the camera isn’t on them. Sarah Jane and Tom had that, so did Jamie and Zoe, Amy and Eleven. But Adric and Nyssa didn’t and neither did Martha. But Ace and Seven definitely have it.
McCoy is great in this story and has lots of great moments. It’s interesting that there’s much talk of Capaldi’s coldness and aloofness because I think he’s a far more cuddly and softie Doctor than Seven actually is. But perhaps that won’t become more apparent until later episodes. And he has lots of great moments with both Dinsdale Lansden and Nicholas Parsons here.
Agree with @phaseshift that if Parsons were cast these days there would be howls of protest at ‘stunt casting’. But I think he’s great. He’s never going to be an Oscar-winner but he invests Wainright with a quiet, tortured dignity. It’s also interesting to note that even at the winter of its popularity, the original series was still able to attract guest stars of the calibre of Parsons, Lansden and Alfred Lynch.
It’s a cracking story with lots of great imagery – underwater Viking longships replete with corpses, Viking runes, Ultima machines, religious angst. If anything, there’s too much stuff competing for attention. And there are a few plot holes here and there. For example, if Judson and Millington (an in-joke to Spike Milligan’s war memoirs perhaps?) had been long-obsessed with the Viking legend, how come Wainright just happens to give him the translation at that time? And if he’d been hiding it, why did he now give it up so easily? And then there’s the error of Millington’s moustache.
But quibbles aside, it’s a great story and it was great to see Who get its mojo back. It was also nice to see McCoy finally being allowed to fulfil his potential as a fine Doctor – one who’s only now getting his due recognition and one who doesn’t really resemble any of his predecessors at all (and quietly and subtly doing what Colin Baker had blustered along saying he’d intended for his Doc and I have to say failing miserably).
16 November 2014 at 16:59 #35682@pedant — that’s a fine piece. Enjoyed reading that. Good title too.
14 November 2014 at 10:55 #35529Just to echo to @phaseshift that glad to hear your brother is on the mend.
13 November 2014 at 19:23 #35468@fonsini — it might have escaped your notice but @phaseshift is one of the site mods, as am I for that matter. Not really the people you want to be upsetting. Might be an idea to take your demented ravings back to the Daily Mail where there’ll at least be a receptive audience for them.
13 November 2014 at 15:06 #35449@phaseshift — nice survey and I think I agree with your rankings entirely. Also would add I think Moffatt was very clever with the casting and hopefully headed off the ‘we want the Rani’ back brigade. We’ve now got a Master who fills both roles quite nicely. And Michelle Gomez — definitely mad as a tree — in the nicest possible way.
@fonsini — shoosh.
12 November 2014 at 17:31 #35397Cat slightly out of the bag….
12 November 2014 at 16:36 #35393@bluesqueakpip — I’m soo hoping it turns out to be an egg….
11 November 2014 at 10:50 #35341RE. the Graun — I’ve posted a few things over there — most are just there for the trolling but there are a couple you can decently and enjoyably engage with, though obviously not our multiply monickered pal. I do feel a bit sorry for Dan being left to their tender mercies and it does make me cringe that that is seen as the public face of fandom — all the nutcases too extreme even for Outpost Gallifrey!! I do hope that some involved in the production of the show do look in on here just so they can see it’s not all grinding negativity. But I think it’s beyond saving really and we should concentrate our energies on this site and making it civilised and thoughtful and awesome.
On that note, apologies for not posting anything yet but I’m incorporating my thoughts on Death in Heaven in an end of series overview and am refreshing myself (!) on previous eps on iPlayer while they’re still there.
9 November 2014 at 15:25 #35147A truly jaw-dropping level of ARSE on display on the Guardian thread if anyone’s masochistic enough to look btw….
8 November 2014 at 22:35 #35060As ever, proper thoughts later but lots to love here. Just great rather than awesome though. I still think that SM is yet to match The Big Bang for a finale. This still trumps most of the RTD season closers with a couple of notable exceptions. And loved the Cyber-Brig. And Capaldi has definitely found his Delgado. Those two were great together. Though as @pedant says, only if they don’t overuse her.
8 November 2014 at 15:26 #34995@burrunjor
Like I said imagine that in reverse imagine a female hero who constantly needed her male companion to save her and needed a man to keep her sane people would find it offensive.
I never once said that those characters were defined by their gender
Actually, you’re still doing it. What I’d say RTD and SM have done is display the interdependence of human (and pseudo-human) characters on each other. Neither the gender of the Doctor or his companions has all that direct a bearing on their motivations. That’s what makes the dynamics so interesting. It’s how they’re relating to each other as people and if the tenth Doctor had been female and Donna, say, had been male, it wouldn’t have been all that different. Certainly not sexist, nor demeaning.
But the examples you cite are ones that work with a male Doctor/female companion pairing. No one’s saying that that story would work in the future with a different Doc/companion. Hell, it wouldn’t have even worked with different existing Doctors. Would Smith’s Doctor have done the same thing to the Racnoss? Would Peter Davison’s? Probably not. It’s a false argument to use particular scenarios or viewpoints that worked in one period of the show to say that something like a female Doctor could never work because, yes, adjustments in writing/theme/plot would have to be accommodated because the dynamic would have once again changed. There would be different stories to tell and different ways in which to tell them.
It sounds more like you’re rather keen that the Doctor remain the dominant patrician, with the companion in the lesser role. The new show definitely plays and questions the incipient power relationships that were left unquestioned by the old show and that to me can only be a good thing. The point is the hierarchies within the TARDIS shift and re-align all the time now. As they did in fact in the show’s very beginning but were then solidified and unchanging for too many years, primarily under the influence of Pertwee and the first Baker.
It had been on for 3 years at that point they were still establishing the lore of the show. Its been on for 50 years now
Exactly. There were far more places for the show to go in those days. Now it’s got 50 years of baggage and has explored a lot more narrative avenues. A female Doctor would just be another one that it hasn’t explored yet. The show is also existing in an entirely different culture to the one it did in 1966. The proviso to this is as @phaseshift, and SM himself for that matter, has said — it shouldn’t be a gimmick or done ‘because we can’. But it should emerge organically for terms of narrative evolution. We shouldn’t go looking for a female Doctor but rather wait until the right actor for the next Doctor comes along, who might just happen to be a woman. Personally I’m in no hurry. I want to see Capaldi do at least another year, hopefully more. But I’ll have absolutely no problem to see a female Doctor should it happen then.
the reason the doctors companions often go with him, not always but often its because he is their friend and they want to make sure he is okay when he gets himself into trouble
And there’s no reason, no reason whatsoever, why that would somehow cease to be the case if the Doctor were a woman and her companion were male. To suddenly argue that the dynamic was suddenly, irrevocably, sexist is to me a daft argument and one made by people (again) who just see the Doctor/Companion role as patrician alpha male/supportive nurturer. It would all be down to the writing. It’s possible that such relationships could be written clumsily, but I’d imagine great care would be taken to ensure that they were not.
Tell me would you want the TARDIS not to look like a Police Box, the Daleks not to be evil, the Doctor to tell us his true name etc.
Well, we’ve seen not-evil Daleks in the new series and it’s an intriguing concept. I think we’ve seen some interesting nuances been hinted at in Dalek culture by Moffatt and I’d like to see more. So, yeah, I have no problem with that. As to the TARDIS not looking like a Police Box — well, it’s a cultural icon, a design classic and a key part of the show’s imagery so there’d have to be a good narrative reason for it to go, but if such a thing did arise then I don’t see why not. And as to the Doctor’s name, it sounds like you’ve spectacularly missed the point of The Day of the Doctor and its companion episodes. Hasn’t SM clearly established that who the Doctor is, what his real name is, is basically beside the point and irrelevant?
And I am sorry but the most famous performances of Hamlet are from men.
Most famous doesn’t necessarily mean ‘best’. But surely Sarah Bernhardt’s performance is secondary in fame only to Olivier’s, if it doesn’t actually take precedence, which I could argue it might? And Peake’s Hamlet is meant to be well worth seeing (and she’d also get my vote as a female Doc, actually). Frances de la Tour’s Hamlet was meant to be the definitive portrayal for a generation, although I haven’t seen it. I have seen Fiona Shaw as Richard II however and she gave the best performance in the part I’d seen.
But your comment is very telling in itself.
8 November 2014 at 14:00 #34991@burrunjor —
The role of the female companion is to keep the doctor on his toes and in some ways protect him
Says who? There are many, including myself, who would dispute that. Especially as it’s dated, sexist and just downright limiting. The dynamic between Doctor and companion changes all the time. There’s a world of difference between the dynamic of Troughton, Jamie and Zoe and, say, Hartnell, Ian and Barbara. Or Pertwee, Jo and the Brigadier and T Baker and Romana 2. That’s actually been a rather large part of the show’s enduring success.
I’ve no doubt at the time there were ‘fans’ who thought regeneration itself was a bad idea because it would change their show. They’d say the Doctor is mean to be old and they’d have thrown up their hands in horror at the idea of Davison or Smith, let alone Troughton. And look how wrong they’d be.
Yes, having a female Doctor would change that dynamic once again. But it adds to the richness of the programme, rather than detracts from it. And it’s not a case of simply switching genders between Doctor and companion. Every companion, of the new series at least, have been pretty well rounded and defined by a lot more than their gender. As has the Doctor, come to that. To see the show in terms of ciphers operating primarily in terms of gender is incredibly limiting.
The other argument I’ve seen a lot is ‘why not leave the Doctor alone and create some other, strong roles for women?’ My answer to that is there’s no reason why we can’t do both. The Doctor is a bona fide cultural icon and the stroke of genius of regeneration means that we have an opportunity to open up the character to a whole new dimension in a way that it would be harder to do with, say, James Bond. We’d be foolish not to exploit that.
Look, for example, at how some of the greatest portrayals of Hamlet have been by women — including, currently Maxine Peake. I’m not comparing Who to Shakespeare at all. But it seems to me that those saying the Doctor can’t be female, that something will be lost, are just suffering from a failure of imagination more than anything else.
5 November 2014 at 20:08 #34806Yes, indeed, our esteemed Emperor is looking very glam in that avatar.
On another note, I see over at the Graun — I’m not even going to dignify it with a hyperlink these days, is drumming up more faux-outrage over the ‘dark’ subject matter of the episode. This has been something I’ve been gritting my teeth and trying to avoid all week. As many of you will know, the trend for manufactured or exaggerated outrage is one of those things that truly grinds my gears so I hope you’ll forgive me if I re-post what I’ve put on the Graun’s site…
The faux-outrage over this story is deeply tiresome and sounds incredibly insincere and manufactured. OK, grief and bereavement is something we’ve all encountered, or will encounter, and it’s not pleasant. But it is a fundamental part of the human experience. As is love, hate, joy, misery. And they’re all perfectly valid subjects for drama, even fantasy drama. Otherwise it just becomes empty pantomime. Do we really want to go back to the days of rubber-suited pantomime villains bellowing ‘Powarrrr, Dok-torrrr’. I don’t think so.
If you’re recently bereaved then it might be a good idea to avoid TV for a while, or at least be prepared that you might see a few things that will touch a nerve. But no programme maker or artist is under obligation to tiptoe around your heightened sensibilities.
Certainly don’t wish to cause offence on here but this is Doctor Who, for goodness sake. Fear and horror and ‘darkness’ are a key part of its make-up. And I’d rather have some terror that has its roots and in profound human psychological terrors than merely some shallow body horror. Honestly, some people — well, nine of them (and presumably the same ones who were left spluttering at The Kiss in Deep Breath too — will moan about anything.
Swims off to his dam, grumbling under his breath….
3 November 2014 at 21:41 #346772 November 2014 at 00:01 #34478Well, that was quite, quite splendid. Quite traditional finale territory in many ways, after a series that I think has taken some admirable risks and twists and turns. But lots of moments of real darkness here too. This is real assured stuff — SM writing at the height of his powers and I think with even more elan than The Day of the Doctor. How anyone alleged fan can say he’s doing anything other than deeply enriching Who’s ongoing legacy is beyond me.
Agree with others that a surprise Cyberman reveal would have been nice but it was just never on the cards if you’re going to have to do exterior filming in central London. But I’m not sure part two is going to confirm that the story is All About Cybermen. It could go in all kinds of directions, especially depending on where they go with Missy.
Michelle Gomez was as excellent as I knew she would be. Like @phaseshift, I was chuckling out loud at the kiss — played brilliantly by both participants. And kudos to @bluesqueakpip and others for correctly guessing Missy’s true identity (and bang goes my Dark Clara theory). I really hope that we don’t see her disappear next week. I’d like to see her make a few more returns. I’ve said before, in this day and age you need a Master who is bat-shit crazy and one one does bat-shit crazy quite like Michelle Gomez. I think we’re almost certainly being primed for a female Doctor sooner rather than later though.
But make it a bit later though. Because Capaldi is playing a blinder as the Doctor. A terrific nuanced performance, that goes in all kinds of unexpected directions. He was cracking here and really seems to be finding his stride, after quite a muted beginning. I really do get the feeling that we’ve yet to see the best of his Doctor, whereas I don’t think Matt ever re-attained the heights of his first series.
And I find myself simultaneously alarmed and in agreement with @phaseshift‘s charity calendar proposition.
18 October 2014 at 22:33 #33750Great episode and, yes, @everyone, that was the killer line. The ending kind of throws my Missy is a future-Clara idea out the window. Must cogitate further on that.
And, yes, @bluesqueakpip, I think this is the episode where the 12th incarnation decides to take on the mantle of The Doctor. Loved that whole scene.
And agree with @phaseshift, we definitely need JM back next year.
17 October 2014 at 17:18 #33687@gothamcelt — let me be clear. I was not lumping you in with the faux-offence, usually Daily Heil-reading ‘down with this sort of thing’ crowd that I was referring to in my last post. However, I do still think you’re overreacting a bit.
17 October 2014 at 11:11 #33682@wordmuse — as @scaryb says, you don’t need to worry RE. ratings. The show is doing as brilliantly now in terms of audience than ever. And as SM has pointed out, the show is now a global brand. It’s kind of pointless to just focus on UK overnights (which don’t take account of things like time-shifted viewing, iPlayer etc). The final viewing figures for most episodes must total out at 60 or 70 million on occasion. In other words, more people are watching the show now than at any time in its so-called hey-day. Trust me, the Beeb aint’ going to kill off one of its biggest headline-generating, merchandise-spinning international hits. Having said that, I do think that a break might be the best thing for the show creatively at some point. Just not yet, Lord. Just not yet.
@pedant — that’s an excellently put line about the undervalued creators of yesteryear. It’s interesting that since the demise of The Bill, there just hasn’t been a cop-soap on TV and I for one feels its absence. But is there a Troy Kennedy Martin of today out there willing to do it? Is there even an appetite for it these days as soap figures are plummeting rapidly? (Hmm, maybe there’s a blogpost in this, or on the history of the genre at least?)
@scaryb — thanks for the link. You’re right. That obit was strangely moving.
@gothamcelt, @phaseshift @Raxo-getamoreuserfriendlyusername — @gothamcelt, overreact much? One of my major bugbears is the emergence of faux-offence in modern media. It’s one of the most insidious means of agenda-management you’ll ever see and it gets right on my nends. You often find people using spluttering outrage and an insistence on ‘civilised politeness’ to mask some truly offensive behaviour of their own — usually this means the oppression of someone or other, or their rights to do what with their bodies, or to publicly display their love for someone or some such thing. It’s very much my opinion that using demonstratively strong language to call these people out and tell them that their oppression won’t be tolerated is very much a good thing.
So, I’m thinking yeah, I’m thinking ‘knee-jerking homophobic fuckwits’ is fair enough. I actually didn’t have a problem with the original expression either.
17 October 2014 at 00:07 #33645@scaryb — I didn’t know McGrath had written for Z-Cars. That show had quite a pedigree when it came to writers….
16 October 2014 at 23:54 #33643@thatoneguy — as @scaryb says, it was referenced in the episode. It does beg the question though if the Doc Amy and Rory didn’t actually go to the Orient Express then, where did they go?
@wordmuse — I think it’s just a case that this particular arc is just not doing it for you. And that’s fine. I never really found myself on board with Martha’s arc. But it’s all good and different viewpoints and opinions are what this site is all about so long as they’re expressed intelligently and thoughtfully — which yours are.
With regards to Clara, I find her much more convincing and interesting this year than I did when she was with Smith. I think Jenna just has a better chemistry with Capaldi than she did with Smith — who I think struck with Amy much more successfully. And the whole impossible girl arc made her just a bit too unknowable and un-fleshed-out for my liking. So I don’t get the impression of anything contradictory really. Rather I get the impression of the creation of an interesting, if conflicted, personality where there didn’t seem to be much of one before.
But again, different strokes and all that….
16 October 2014 at 20:17 #33630@mudlark — regrettably I’m old enough to remember Z-Cars but not in any great detail and you’re right, ground-breaking of the time. I’d argue it was a soap of a kind too though compared to the more straight-down-the-line cops series of the time. But aside from launching the careers of a lot of great actors, it also produced some real writing greats — the mighty Alan Plater and Troy Kennedy Martin springing immediately to mind.
16 October 2014 at 19:22 #33628@gothamcelt — but probably accurate in the context in which it was used…
@phaseshift — great post and an excellent analysis of British soap. I think I’m probably more forgiving of British soaps of the 80s than some and the fact is I think that they often produced some of the best writing British telly has ever produced. Jimmy McGovern, Tony Jordan, Phil Redmond and going back Tony Warren are just fantastic writers period. It’s just snobbishness that makes people argue otherwise. It can often be risible in terms of subject matter or given to hyperbole when done badly, but these guys are often producing highly accomplished scripts which juggle quite a variation in tone to incredibly tight deadlines and often with significant production limitation — not just budget, but limited sets/actors being available etc. It’s worth giving that a bit of appreciation, I think. These shows were incredibly influential, although I think the glory days of the form are behind them now. (Although I think there’s a possibility of a migration to low-budget guerilla internet soaps. They already exist. It’s just a question of them making it to the mainstream.)
You’re right that all the elements were in place and ready to be exploited and I pretty much brought up Buffy because, as you say, it became the flashpoint in TV-land for these trends to be brought to the fore. Prior to that there seemed to be this assumption that genre TV either didn’t need or somehow wasn’t worthy of the effort of character development. (And not just SF shows, look at how character development in cop shows has changed in roughly the same time period.)
Thanks Russell for reintroducing the “Soap”, if that is what this is. And keep it up Steven
Absolutely agree.
16 October 2014 at 11:14 #33617@wordmuse — I think the messianic/Lonely God side of the character was certainly played up during the RTD years and SM certainly seems to have had a long game of ramping that back down again. I do think that Capaldi’s doc is definitely starting to resemble BG Doctors quite a bit in his ambivalence. Others may disagree.
RE. Clara. I am certainly starting to think that the end of her arc will be the Doctor (rather than her) refusing to take her on any more adventures for the sake of her health/safety/sanity. It may even be that her recklessness ends up in Danny being the one that comes to harm. However, I’d be wary of taking any ‘Clara’s lying will lead her to a sticky end’ chat at more than face value as that sounds dangerously close to ‘transgressive woman must be punished’ and I don’t see that Clara has done anything she should be ‘punished’ for.
The other possibility, I suppose, is that she will start to realise just how influenced in her behaviour she is by the Doctor and call some sort of a halt to it. Not that it’s surprising, given that she’s taken a journey through his entire timeline.
15 October 2014 at 12:49 #33591@janetteb — I’m afraid I’m rather of the Tim Bisley camp with Babylon 5 but I look forward to your trying to change my mind on the subject. It was a bit too densely space-opera-ish for me at times (I have the same problem with DS9 which I enjoy but don’t love for the same reasons.)
Actually I was also thinking of Blake’s 7 too when I made the above point. They’re a collection of archetypes who don’t really progress over the series. I suppose you could argue that Blake starts noble and ends up compromised but with the rest Avon starts off cynical and pragmatic and ends cynical and pragmatic. Vila starts off cowardly, ends up cowardly. There’s not that much character development going on there.
But with regards to Buffy vs Babylon 5, it might not be that they were the first, I’d argue that it’s not so much who was first (and I think I could make a strong argument for the X-Files over B5) but who cemented the concept in the popular imagination and was therefore most influential in the industry as a whole. I have heaps of respect of MJS, but I think Whedon wins that particular fight hands down. Babylon 5 I seem to remember had a hardcore following very much at the SF geek end of the spectrum but Buffy was very quickly a bone fide mainstream hit. In fact, I seem to remember an interview with RTD that pretty much says as much. (We are of course talking about a trend that had pretty much come of age anyway, so there is no one ‘inventor’ or ‘pioneer’ and all these guys were pretty much influencing each other).
But I will definitely look forward to your blog on the subject.
15 October 2014 at 11:43 #33587@wordmuse — let me once again dispute with you (it’s nothing personal, I’m just enjoying the conversation, and it beats packing boxes)…
With regards to Clara lying, there might not be a cosmic over-arching need for her to do so but it’s clear that she thinks there is and it’s just getting her in deeper and deeper. It started off being played for laughs, but now there’s signs of it going somewhere deeper, I think. Also no one is saying that she’s going to be vindicated or is right for doing so. I’m pretty sure it’s going to end badly for her. But that’s OK. That’s good drama. And here we are all debating furiously over it and anxious to see how it pans out. So, again, good drama.
As to the general ‘feet of clay’ point. I’m not sure we can argue that in BG Who, the Doctor and the companions were somehow loftier role models. Hell, we see the Doctor nearly bash in an unconscious man’s skull in the second ever episode. And how many people did Leela actually kill over the course of her time in the TARDIS? Not to mention the Brigadier apparently committing genocide. That doesn’t seem terribly lofty to me. And the Doctor is not an overly noble, ego-less character. He’s often selfish, capricious and self-centred, probably in some incarnations more than others. He does good things, yes. He fights the good fight. He makes sacrifices for the greater good. But he’s definitely flawed. He’s definitely human in spirit if not in biology. That’s why he’s so compelling.
But a lot of the time in BG Who, the characters might seem more noble purely because we just didn’t see any character development good or bad. For all we know Sarah-Jane Smith was a gin-addled nymphomaniac but we don’t know because we just didn’t see it, or any evidence to the contrary either. This is because until Buffy came along, genre TV — including the big-hitters like Star Trek — just didn’t feel that the genre was worthy of piddling little things like character development. Thankfully the genre has evolved way beyond that and is all the better for it.
@juniperfish — yah mad mental fish-myth Krew. Hope you’re on the mend btw….
14 October 2014 at 23:38 #33571@wordmuse — nice summation of the companion dynamics, although I’d argue that it’s not completely accurate. I’d argue that all the central characters — Rose, Amy, River and even the Doctor have been guilty of what you call “insular singular self-interest”. But that’s OK. That’s the very nature of the interesting character stuff. When you get down to it, it’s what makes for all the most interesting, relatable character motivation rather than all the lofty heroics in the world/universe. Because that is the realm that most of us generally operate upon.
With regards to Clara, I think she is lying and for the reasons discussed above. She’s in the grip of an addiction and she’s lying to her loved ones and herself about it. (As well as now playing both the Doctor and Danny off against each other and blaming each other for her inability to make her own decisions). Is that noble or heroic? Certainly not but it is understandable and human and I don’t think contradicts anything about the Clara we’ve known until now — except in the sense that she actually does have an interior life now, something that the Claricles of the Smith era didn’t really have, being more of a big plot device than anything else.
But I wouldn’t say that this story arc is any more soap opera-ish or pronounced than Rose and Micky’s troubled relationship, or Martha’s unrequited love, or Amy’s pregnancy and the strain it puts on their marriage. (I also don’t really subscribe to the view of ‘soap opera’ being somehow pejorative or a lesser form of drama btw. When it’s done right, it can be among the best things on TV.)
I also don’t see that there can’t be a place for such things in Who, or science fiction in general. Indeed, a good example is the recent-ish reboot of Battlestar Galactica. It’s when it was essentially a character-driven drama in its early seasons that it was at its most compelling. It was only when it became more obsessed with Big Ideas and High Spiritual Concepts that it became rather risible and frankly quite dull.
14 October 2014 at 19:27 #33560@wordmuse — Oh, definitely debate away. That’s what we’re here for. And I don’t think anyone on here would say that the show should be immune from criticism. I’d just argue that SM made it quite clear from the off that he was taking the show into a more mythic, fairytale realm, and the moon egg is just an extreme example of it. Like Slartibartfast, I’m a big fan of science but I honestly can’t really get overly worked up over this.
In fact, I’d probably say ‘what @soundworld says’ on this. I think his last post was a nicely articulated take on this.
But RE. the soap opera thing, I honestly don’t see that this is any more pronounced now than it was with the Doctor and Rose or the Doctor and Amy/Rory. Relationships have been the core of the show since the reboot and we’ve had nearly 10 years to get used to it now. And that’s kind of the way it has to be now. TV drama is living well and truly in the post-Buffy age now and character relationships are central to the show and I’d argue the key ingredient in its success. (Especially in a show whose relationship to hard science fiction a la Star Trek et al is questionable at best.) Going back to the ‘megalomaniac in a rubber suit of the week’ format was just not an option. Indeed, I think the BG show was beginning to realise this, as we’ll perhaps see when we take a look at Curse of Fenric.
14 October 2014 at 15:40 #33553@wordmuse — @bluesqueakpip is probably really the one to ask but I think you’re overestimating a) the time factor and b) the staffing levels involved in putting an episode of New Who together. But Moffatt and Harkness are far from idiots and I’d imagine that they probably just decided that it didn’t really matter that much to the narrative core of the story. And they’d be right too.
14 October 2014 at 12:52 #33546@phaseshift — I can’t believe we’re talking about the end of Series 8 already. But let the chains of Fenric shatter. It’ll certainly be an interesting one to watch in the light of Capaldi’s first season too, I reckon.
With regards to myth and faith, I’d say there’s whole swathes of Series 6 you could put in there too, with the whole myth of the Doctor, the man who could raise entire armies with his name and so on….
13 October 2014 at 21:59 #33523@juniperfish — agree totally. He hit the ball out the park almost from the off. To be fair, so did Smithy but I think Capaldi has the edge because he’s playing a much more tricky Doc. I’ve been blown away by him. Agree re. Tennant also. A strong start but he did seem to run out of steam by the end of his run….
13 October 2014 at 18:52 #33516@bluesqueakpip and @brewski —
Moffatt has gone on record as saying he considers the Doctor to be the same character anyway, despite regeneration. But personally I think it’s been less pronounced than in Matt’s first series, where for the first good few episodes he was still very Tennant-ey in terms of character.
Despite the occasional Eleven-ism — most obviously in Time Heist, which struck me as a story absolutely designed for Smith, River, Amy etc. — I thought Capaldi started freer of legacy characterisation than before, although it was definitely still there.. If anything, I think for the first few episodes writers seemed to indulge in the temptation to give the Doc pseudo-Malcolm Tucker-esque dialogue more than anything else.
13 October 2014 at 13:01 #33491@oblique — the title is part of the joke. It’s a call-out to the phone call that the Doctor gets at the end of The Big Bang (I think) and which is referenced in the episode.
Similarly Dinosaurs on a Spaceship was a meta title as well — referencing the Samuel L Jackson movie. Also a huge misdirect as the real meat of the episode wasn’t really anything to do with the dinosaurs, but with Solomon and Nefertiti…. so not really a spoiler title at all…
Nor when you think about it is Mummy. The core of the story is not really about the Mummy at all. That’s just the hook on which to hang the story. The true core of the story is Clara’s decision to stay with the Doctor. Character is at the heart of drama.
13 October 2014 at 11:24 #33486@geoffers–
i think he stopped travelling the universe, in that case, simply because of the threat of the time war breaking out again
I’m with @bluesqueakpip on this one. It doesn’t really matter why the Doctor stopped travelling but the fact is that he did (and therefore could). It’s Clara that has the addiction because it’s now been shown that she can’t stop even if she wanted to — and now she’s lying to her loved ones to cover up her addiction, a classic signpost for where her personal arc is going). It should perhaps be a bit troubling that the Doctor recognises this and is yet still happy to be her enabler — although I suspect the end of her story will be him realising that he can no longer do this for her own safety and sanity. In the end it will be the Doctor that reluctantly leaves Clara rather than the other way around.
@mtgradwell et al RE. moon egg
I consider myself pretty science-y myself and I must admit I really didn’t have a problem with the moon egg — apart from the initial ‘blimey’ when it was first uttered. If anything I now look back on it as a moment of incredible daring by Moffatt and co. Going by the Graun forums and a few posts on here the argument is that it’s a step too far into bad science for what it supposed to be a SF show. Personally I think they’re making a fundamental mistake in thinking of Who as a SF show in the first place. It’s essentially a fantasy show that uses some SF trappings — sometimes to a greater extent, sometimes to a lesser. Now is just one of the lesser times.
But just take a look at the show’s history. Christopher Bidmead started off wanting to make the show more in tune with hard science. He started off with plots about the heat death of the universe and ended up with hatstands sticking out of rubble. The Daemons makes a few tokenistic attempts at half-hearted technobabble but is essentially all about magic. The Silurians gets its science wrong from the outset and for all its scientific chat Inferno is essentially a story about an evil potion that turns men into monsters and all the Jungian archetypes contained in that. And as @scaryb says, look at the core concept of the TARDIS and the Doctor himself. There’s more of magical archetypes about that than there is about science. At its core there is as much CS Lewis about the show than there is Asimov or Verne.
So I personally don’t have a problem with the moon egg at all. Even if it does fly in the face of what we do know about the moon. But it doesn’t really matter. Who as a show does not really operate in ‘our’ universe. Just one that happens to look extremely like it. This has never been more the case than during the Moffatt era so I’d tend to look at the moon egg if not as a statement of intent, then as a pretty graphic reminder of it.
And this is all very long-winded way of saying that, scientifically, you just have to roll with stuff like that. And who knows? The series isn’t over yet. It might turn out that that episode was all just a dream or a story or something.
12 October 2014 at 13:17 #33432A cracker of an episode I thought and as @phaseshift says highly reminiscent of a Christmas special, but I think better than most of them. Jamie Mathieson is to be commended — he’s managed to out-Gatiss Gatiss with this one with a superb piece of genre mashing. I was never a massive fan of Being Human, but this was a cracking little script.
As well as the Christie and all the self-referential vibes, this also reminded me greatly of the 70s Spanish horror flick Horror Express, which I’d highly recommend and is indeed available in its entirety on You Tube:
It also reminded me slightly in terms of plot and feel of a more malevolent version of Douglas Adams’ computer game from the 90s Starship Titanic. Especially in the idea of being at the mercy of the on-board computer.
Capaldi was great in this episode. His Doc is certainly a slow burner but I think he’ll indelibly be the Doc by the end of this run and will be remembered as one of the greats. As he did with Smithy, SM has managed to bring us a Doc who clearly has an interior emotional life, who is a well-rounded 3D character in his own right rather than just some unknowable bloke in fancy dress who flounces around solving other people’s problems for them. RTD started this process of course but SM, Smith and now Capaldi have been bringing a greater subtlety to the process. He’s made this Doctor his own but there’s lots of lovely hints of previous Docs in here. The Baker ones were obvious this week, but I also saw a strain of Hartnellian intransigence and defiance here too (helped no doubt by his costume this week) and the confrontation with the Captain in his office was pure Pertwee.
The mummy was nicely done and, yes, definite shades of b0th the War Doctor and Danny Pink in there. For my money, I think the whole Missy thing is a massive mis-steer and she’s going to be on the side of the angels in this one (I’m still favouring that she’s some kind of future version of Clara, or a Claricle that we haven’t seen yet). I’m going to go with Danny Pink being the Big Bad this year. With perhaps Orson Pink not being a descendant at all but the same guy. I’d dismissed the idea that the Master is returning but I’d say that it might be back on the table. Gus seemed to know rather a lot about how the Doctor worked and this sort of manipulation behind the scene approach is very reminiscent of the Master of old.
And as I’ve said before, the only way the Master can work in this day and age is if he has more direct and intimate connections with the Doctor and his crew (kind of like Lex Luthor in Smallville, I suppose) and for him to spend a series as a ‘companion’ of sorts would be a good way to do this….
7 October 2014 at 00:04 #33183waves at @bluesqueakpip– good points about the production difficulties re. Courtney btw. Presumably this would continue to be an issue if she were to become a more regular companion too.
RE. the whole pregnant thing. I’m afraid I’m not convinced, and actually nor do I want to be. One of the major aspects of the Pond arc was that it took great pains to show that pregnancy did not equate with the end of the useful life of a companion and that life could in fact, you know, continue. Hell, you could even end up with the Doctor as your son in law. I’m not sure they’d want to undo all that good work by going back to a prehistoric companion falls in lurve/gets up the duff scenario so therefore is no longer welcome in the TARDIS scenario.
I think we’re looking at something a little more apocalyptic for Clara’s departure. If we hadn’t been told of Courtney’s eventual future, I wouldn’t have been surprised if she’d come to a tragic end somewhere along the line, making Clara turn her back on the whole thing. (Although maybe that is a bit too much on the dark side. Mind you, they did it to Adric.)
@blenkinsopthebrave — great clip and pretty much sums up the CiF mindset these days….
6 October 2014 at 19:54 #33152It also struck me odd that there’s such a negative response on the Graun. Normally they’re up in arms about deus ex machina (that aren’t really) and everything getting neatly tied up and possibly over-simplistic ways. Now they get a story that doesn’t give them that, that shows the fall-out of tricky moral decisions, that shows heroes changed and compromised by events and they don’t like that either….
6 October 2014 at 19:52 #33150@phaseshift, @scaryb, @barnable, @juniperfish — thanks for the welcomes back. What can I say? I just couldn’t stay away, although I will be flitting in and out for the next few weeks as I’m once again the throes of moving house on top of other stuff….
@barnable — feel free to argue away. That’s what we’re all here for. I’d also urge you to put down your thoughts on Clara and the Doctor’s bust-up too. There’s no better place for it than this thread. My own feeling is, as stated above, it’s too sudden and too much of a leap for the Impossible Girl to react that way.
With regards to Courtney, I don’t think we’ll be seeing her as a permanent companion as the pairing of her and a Doc as old as Capaldi just has too many overtones of a trip to Savile Minor to it. There would need to be at least a chaperone, much like Clara provides now. My money would still be on a rotating pool of semi-regular companions. Maybe we will in fact see River back at some point next year.
@pedant — yeah, I got that about there not being much of a choice available for this mission. But even within those parameters, these guys were rubbish. It was good to see the mighty Tony Osoba again though.
I enjoyed this much more on a sneaky wee rewatch. And it’s actually worth cherishing if for no other reason than it would have undoubtedly have given Chris Bidmead kittens…..
5 October 2014 at 23:46 #33084waves at @scaryb
5 October 2014 at 23:20 #33078I have a new rule. Any episode that features the main cast in orange spacesuits for more than five minutes is one that I’m not going to like. And I didn’t really love this one. Probably my least favourite of this series.
But it’s not the the science — which I see is what’s exercising the finest minds BTL over at the Graun. Doctor Who is not science fiction, it’s fantasy. And it always has been. And is the moon being a giant’s dragon egg really that much more ridiculous than fish people? Caves full of giant clams? Towing a planet across the universe to use as a base? An alien intelligence that can only invade civilisations with a thriving plastics industry?
I admit I did find the general unpreparedness of the astronauts a bit much too. No guns and is that really the best team for the job. An old dodderer, an angry cynic and a Michael Jayston impersonator? I know the Earth was in trouble but really….
The spiders were a bit wasted too. As well as shout-outs to everything from Alien to Ark in Space to the Beast Below what this really reminded me of was the comic story The Spider God, although that was a lot more logical than this (one of my favourite of the comic stories actually). Can’t help feel that spiders were chosen as a shout-out to that. Although perhaps not.
But it looked great though. The moonscapes were very convincing and compelling I thought.
And Capaldi as ever was excellent. I’m loving his portrayal of the Doctor. And I don’t really have that much of a problem with his refusal to help at the end of the episode. It’s certainly not something that Smith’s, Tennant’s or even Eccleston’s would have done. Or probably the 2nd, 4th, 5th or even the 6th. But I think I could have imagined the 3rd doing it and I certainly could have imagined Hartnell’s Doc taking that stance.
What I’m not really buying is the abruptness of Clara’s estrangement from the Doctor. I can see that it’s going to be the exit strategy for her character and I’ll be rather sad to see her go as she and the new Doc have a good chemistry I think and I also think Jenna Coleman has been brilliant but Clara this year doesn’t seem to bear that much relation to the Clara of last year. If anything she should be the companion, including Amy, who would cut the Doc the most slack, having tip-toed through his entire timeline. I’m just not convinced that it’s likely that she would reject the Doctor and if she did, I don’t think we saw nearly enough provocation here.
Finally, loved Courtney. She seems to be being lined up as possible companion material but I’m not entirely sure she’d work on a long-term basis. But I’ve no objection to see her on a few more trips in the TARDIS. But we’ve seen a few possible replacement companions this year and I’m starting to get the impression that there’s a sense of being at a loss as to just who will fit with Capaldi. I’m not that surprised. It’s a tricky one and Jenna has done it well. I wouldn’t be surprised if they actually settle for a series of semi-regular companions for Capaldi next year, if Jenna is indeed moving on (as far as I’m aware there’s been no official announcement on that score yet.)
Something did strike me this week though that Courtney preferring ‘Miss’ to ‘Clara’ made me think of ‘Missy’ for a moment. Is Michelle Gomez’s character some aspect of a future Clara? The Governess-style of the two of them would make that fit. Is Missy some kind of dark reflection of Clara?
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