@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…[Read more]

@wordmuse

Thing is, I can remember similar concerns being expressed in the 2005 show about the various issues surrounding Rose. Do we really need to see her mum? God – now it’s her dad. I got a bit exercised by some of the criticism of Father’s Day when it was shown. Boring soap opera, some called it, when I thought it was a very good chara…[Read more]

@wordmuse – thanks for your contributions and sorry this series isn’t panning out for you. It’ll change again soon enough (and maybe I’ll hate the next one; we all like different things as you rightly say). Maybe it’ll turn round enough for you to like it before the end of Series 8.  You don’t need to worry about the ratings though, they are…[Read more]

@wordmuse     What I am enjoying about this series is the fact that the “arc” is subtle enough that it doesn’t interfere with my enjoyment of individual episodes. I will admit to being less than passionately concerned about where Clara and Danny will end up, and far more interested in the recurring themes of soldiers, the doctor as “a good man”,…[Read more]

@wordmuse

wastes time on a story arc of a conflict that feels forced and beneath the character

It does, doesn’t it?

Sorry, I’m still suspicious of Danny. He’s just … wrong. I can’t think of anything, in fact, about his background that’s right. [Go on, tell me anything about his background that actually fits.]

And he’s not having a good…[Read more]

@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…[Read more]

Soap a bad thing? A Bad thing??

I was too young, only saw occasional and disconnected episodes and didn’t understand the half of it, but even I knew that Soap was all kinds of good!!

Can’t believe it’s being criticised!

But thankfully, some people here like @Phaseshift @JimtheFish and @mudlark (and…[Read more]

@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…[Read more]

I’m enjoying reading all the comments here as always! Especially all the talk around myth – and @wordmuse and @jimthefish (and I think @others) you got me thinking with your comments about what heroism is. It’s a complex notion, I think – and perhaps one that carries very different connotations depending on the era/genre/individual.

Thomas…[Read more]

@wordmuse As for Clara – well, we’ll just have to wait and see what the show does with her character.  But I have to admit to tentative disappointment. She’s gone from being my 2nd favorite companion (after Amy and Rory (I view them almost as a single companion), during the Matt Smith episodes) to someone that I don’t look forward to seeing al…

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@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…[Read more]

@ScaryB. You said just what I was about  to. I am getting really tired of the misuse of the term “soap opera” to apply to any form of human centric drama. Adding a little human complexity to the script does not turn a story into a soap opera and as @JimTheFish pointed out, there can be good soap opera. It is not a term of abuse just a form of…[Read more]

@Spider

Gallifreyans Using Stealth – love it! (Especially as it circumstantially supports my theory that Missy’s world is on Gallifrey (on the opposite side to the bit we usually see).

@wordmuse @JimtheFish

I like the companions having back stories and non Doctor lives, so long as it doesn’t feel tacked on (which is possibly the bit we may…[Read more]

@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…[Read more]

@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…[Read more]

@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…[Read more]

@Wordmuse and @MTGradwell

If I could do it in a few seconds, surely someone involved in the production could have done something similar.

Exactly. They could have found out in fifteen seconds. And we know that they do find these things out; Moffat’s on record as muttering bitterly that he checked tape machines were around at the date of The…[Read more]

@wordmuse

On another note: Doctor Who is not hard scifi. The facts of the real world are no more than props and devices. For example, in the real world, the moon actually masses in at something over 50 TRILLION tons, meaning that a space critter coming in at a few billion isn’t going to change gravity a wit’s worth of notice. But that’s OK with…

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@wordmuse – Well said.

@wordmuse

Some of it is downright squirm-worthy. Especially, when Clara – who’s supposed to be a strong woman (and was in the Matt Smith episodes) lies to Danny. My wife and I were so relieved when she finally fessed up and made things honest between she, Danny and the Doctor. We loved the relationship bits in the Moon episode.
But now we’…

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