Many people here and elsewhere clearly found a great deal to like in this episode. I have just watched it a second time with that in mind, because my initial reaction was that it confirmed all the reasons why, in BG Who especially, I tended to prefer the futuristic episodes where anything goes, to those set in the past – with or without alien…[Read more]

@ichabod

I’d read about pubs going under all over the UK, a development that I’ve seen attributed to the influence of inflows of muslim residents into old neighborhoods

This seems a more appropriate space to continue on this topic 🙂

That explanation sounds like the kind of thing propagated by UKIP or Fox News. Where a relatively large Mus…[Read more]

@ichabod

The village of Akenfield does not exist under that name, but Charsfield in Suffolk, the real village on which Blythe largely based his work is close to where the elder of my two brothers lives, only 50 miles or so from Norwich, Norfolk where am, and within the region which I covered as an archaeologist from 1991 until retirement, so I…[Read more]

@ichabod

a) it’s going to take more than a Doctor and crew to “fix” what’s rapidly shaping up to be humanity’s second biggest 21st c problem — the sucking out of the system of work without considering what could replace it as a lifetime focus … and b) that the social solutions that work best have to come from and be carried by the people affect…

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@ichabod  @idiotsavon

Thanks for the good wishes. They are indeed taking it seriously. Out of curiosity I looked up the record of the consultation, which can be accessed on a secure site, to see if there was anything additional to what was discussed during my consultation with the GP, and it was marked ‘cancer, fast track’. Skin cancers can be…[Read more]

@craig  Fransico alice apparently wants to be my friend, too (message now deleted). I checked on her/him/it, and apparently they registered here about a month ago.

@JimTheFish

And I still can’t get over how cramped that console room is compared to the last few iterations.

Yes, especially when there are four people crowded into it, and the massive crystalline structures just contribute to the oppressive,claustrophobic atmosphere. I was hoping that it would somehow open out to reveal a larger space beyond, b…[Read more]

The old style pattern of alternating historical and futuristic episodes continues, and this for my money was the best so far of the future set episodes. The plot, with all its mildly satirical contemporary references and relevance, was sufficiently intriguing and involving, and it ended with a satisfactory twist which was equally applicable to…[Read more]

@pedant  @thane16  @JimTheFish  @KevinWho  @blenkinsopthebrave  @Bluesqueakpip

Thanks everybody. As I said, I have been through this before and it turned out OK. Been through it twice, in fact. if you count the time they thought I had ovarian cancer, although I was reasonably certain then that it was just a very large cyst. And boy, did I feel…[Read more]

@CathAnnabel

Thank you. It does sometimes feel as if I have reached a stage in which life is throwing just one damn thing after another at me, but so far I keep bouncing back 🙂  The hospital phoned this morning to give me a date for my appointment with the dermatologists – 12 pm on 26th of this month, so only ten days to wait.  I’m hoping t…[Read more]

In other news, it looks as if I may shortly be having my nose reshaped in a less than aesthetically pleasing fashion.

Over the past five weeks a small, doubtful-looking, oozy spot on my nose has developed, and first thing this morning I finally got round to calling the GP practice and arranging an appointment to have it looked at. It turned out…[Read more]

@ichabod  @thane @janetteB

Your confidence in my omniscience in all things historical is very flattering, but my knowledge of the incidence of plague is not very detailed. There were few if any places in Europe not devastated by the Black Death, least of all urban centres, although Poland is supposed to have remained largely unaffected. This…[Read more]

@pedant

Don’t underestimate the influence of the Wahhabi’s since the 50s.

Yes. In Birmingham in the 1970s I often saw women wearing the salwar kameez , but very rarely with their heads covered, and never with the hijab.

The widespread adoption of the hijab, let alone the niqab is a relatively recent phenomenon.

@troygorsline

The dupatta (the long scarf worn with a salwar kameez), or the end of a sari might have been drawn over the head in public or in the presence of strangers, but not necessarily in informal circumstances and not within the family. It might have been expected when Graham and Ryan appeared, but wouldn’t have been imperative. The custom…[Read more]

There was just one trivial detail which bothered me in passing. On past evidence the Tardis can provide a wardrobe of clothing for all occasions, so why not a shalwar kameez for Yaz, especially when she knew she was going back in time to see her grandmother?  Her clothes, however nondescript in a 21st century context, would have stood out like…[Read more]

@Juniperfish

it’s creating a negative space in the narrative arc screaming, “We MUST DO something to stand up to bigotry!!!” which, as I’ve said upstream, Chibnall and team are thereby inviting us to apply in our own time.

That thread and the continuing moral imperative is, above all, what is keeping me engaged with S11, because there is a small p…[Read more]

@Bluesqueakpip

It’s well worth watching; it can be distressing. Especially seeing the genuine footage of the real cost of the war – all those dead young men, without the distancing effect of black and white.

Yes, it is astonishing how much colour and sound effects contribute to the sense of immediacy, and this was very well done – far more so tha…[Read more]

Partition was such a difficult subject for a show such as Doctor Who to address, in view of the millions who died in the needless and senseless bloodletting, that I was reluctant even to watch this episode for fear that it would be mishandled, and the title, suggesting the introduction of alien antagonists, was not reassuring. My fears were…[Read more]