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FishyFish

By FishyFish
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jonamok

jonamok

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Such a lot of disappointment on here for the Ponds' farewell.

As I was watching it this morning, enjoying it, and (jeepers) engaging with it emotionally, a little part of me was saying: "This is a nice, bittersweet send off for Amy and Rory. But I bet the mukkers hated it."

Funny old world.

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sprite

sprite

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None of it makes sense really, even the fixed point thing - I mean Amy joined him. Also is the doctor just going to let an army of angles live in the center of Manhattan? Seems a little irresponsible. Ah well it was a cool and emotional episode anyway, logic was completely thrown out of the window so I'm not going to lose any sleep trying to make sense of it all.

The Doc said that last one was just "a survivor" - I took this to mean that...

... that angel at the end was the last one, no more back in 38. The farm wasn't there anymore in 1938, Rory didn't live out the rest of his life in that room, and that instead he and Amy just lived happy lives together, I mean she had a typewriter and all so I doubt they were holed up in that dump.

Of course, that doesn't explain why the doctor doesn't just swing by to visit at some point between 1938 and 2012 to see his old friends. :facepalm:

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Lag

Lag

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Such a lot of disappointment on here for the Ponds' farewell.

As I was watching it this morning, enjoying it, and (jeepers) engaging with it emotionally, a little part of me was saying: "This is a nice, bittersweet send off for Amy and Rory. But I bet the mukkers hated it."

Funny old world.

But it was crap!

Just a load of plot hole shite regarding why he couldn't go pick them up for more adventuring.

Why not have something real, like they wanted to settle down and raise a family? A really difficult decision, between really exciting, death defying adventure and mundane but important life? The previous episode (or was it the one before?) seemed to be heading that way: "you're weaning us off you, aren't you Doctor?"

It is not well written.

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c-cat114

c-cat114

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... It wasn't amazing but I enjoyed it.

It wasn't crap though, surely. And if you looked at it next to any of RTD's efforts (bar Midnight which I'm convinced someone will pop up and say he stole it from them) it was amazing.

My daughter (16) loved it and cried at the end. If this was my Doctor and my assistants and I was less of a cyncical old doodah I'd have loved it I think.

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Sprite Machine

Sprite Machine

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Only just got around to watching the Manhatten episode. Ok. It was scary and the imagery was amazing. The 'liberty' reveal was one of the best teasers ever.

Unfortunately, the episode didn't make one fucking bit of sense, for reasons already mentioned, and that made it difficult to enjoy on the whole. So much forced melodrama, yet so much genuine potential wasted. On the plus side, the angels were proper scary and River Song wasn't insufferable this time.

---

Meanwhile, back in 1965-o-vision, I've watched the twelve-part epic called The Dalek's Master Plan. Only four of the episodes exist in completed form, but due to the good audio quality and the large amount of visual material available, the reconstructions are the best I've seen so far. They even made some CGI Dalek sequences.

As for the plot, it is a long-winded one, entirely hinging on the Doctor stealing a core component of the Dalek's new time-destructor weapon, thus halting their invasion of the universe and causing them to chase him through time and space for a bit.

There is a low-point in the middle, a dreadful Christmas special shoved into the story, which is the worst episode of Who I've ever seen, taking its cues from those awful parts of The Chase but somehow even worse, and ending with the Doctor turning to the camera and wishing us all at home a merry christmas. I guess it was supposed to be charming and whimsical, but in the context of an epic disaster serial, it really didn't work.

The time-meddling monk from a few episodes prior makes an unexpected return near the end, perhaps to pad out the story some more, but this is handled rather well, and I suspect he will return again in later stories for his revenge (I hope so, anyway).

Also, the galactic council, previously seen in the one-off Doctorless episode Mission to the Unknown, returns, headed up by the ruler of the solar system (turned power-hungry traitor) Mavic Chen, who provides backchat for the Daleks and is generally enjoyable to watch in all his scenes. Obviously, he's betrayed by the Daleks in the end.

Again, the scale of the plot is laughably unbelievable. The rulers of the other galaxies are planning to invade the solar system (sol). That's like the leaders of Asia deciding to invade the inside of my shoe.

Still, despite its length (and awful sagging in the middle), this was an enjoyable serial, with the Daleks at their most ruthless and evil. Plenty of deaths, too. I was hoping Space Police Officer Sara Kingdom would survive for more adventures, but she died rather spectacularly to the ravages of accelerated time. Interestingly, the Doctor did not, suggesting for the first time ever that he may age considerably more slowly than everyone else.

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Lag

Lag

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Not a fan of RTD, but a reliable source tells me he rewrote 'everything', so he had a hand in the episodes you thought were excellent but weren't under his name.

Look, it's just my opinion - I think Doctor Who is an amazing concept, there have been brilliant stories, so when I see Doctor Who and the Ridiculous Plot-holes, or this kind of lazy and rushed writing, I think it's a bit of a letdown. That's all really.

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SqueakyG

SqueakyG

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Not a fan of RTD, but a reliable source tells me he rewrote 'everything', so he had a hand in the episodes you thought were excellent but weren't under his name.

The Writer's Tale is an awesome book that very thoroughly shows RTD's writing process. It made me have more respect for his episodes when previously I wasn't a fan of RTD at all.

In the book he says he often rewrote about 90% of other people's scripts, but he generally didn't have to touch Moffat's scripts much. He says he let Moffat go away and write without asking to see partial drafts, because he wanted to be surprised and entertained when he read a full Moffat script.

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davidcotton

davidcotton

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I was hoping Space Police Officer Sara Kingdom would survive for more adventures, but she died rather spectacularly to the ravages of accelerated time.

If you want more Sara Kingdom then go check out the Big Finish Companion Chronicles. They've done a trilogy starting with Home Truths. Excellent stuff.

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Davros sock drawer

Davros sock drawer

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I did. :)

Here you go (couple of pages back).

Excellent, you pretty much summed up my thoughts on that story.

I'm enjoying reading your impressions on these, can't wait until you get to some more "classic" stories.

As for Nu Who, I thought this series so far has been pretty forgettable. The last episode tugged at the heart strings in quite a cynical and artificial way I thought, and as with a lot of the companions since the show came back I'd already tired of Amy and Rory a while back.

Also, none of the episodes gave me the feeling that I would have hid behind the sofa if I was 10.

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Sprite Machine

Sprite Machine

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I'm enjoying reading your impressions on these, can't wait until you get to some more "classic" stories.

Thanks, me too! Some of these ones are a little hard-going.

The Massacre is next. Four part story (all reconstructed) set in 16th century France just prior to the events of the massacre of thousands of protestants. It was frightfully dull, in all honesty, and the whole story just felt like it was leading up to the riots at the end. Really, for three and a half episodes, it was just loads of British people pretending to be French, walking into rooms and talking and plotting with each other* And most of them had the same beard, so it was hard to follow who was who.

But, speaking of "who was who", it did have an intriguing sub-plot where the Doctor disappears and we're led to believe he's impersonating the Abbot of Amboise, who then gets killed. It actually turns out this was a bluff and he was simply someone else who looked like the Doctor for no apparent reason.

Really, the best part of the episode was right at the end, having escaped France and returned to present day, Steven temporarily leaves the Tardis and the Doctor reminisces about his prior companions and - for a moment or two - contemplates going home to his planet. But then a woman looking for a police box stumbles across the Tardis by mistake, Steven comes back, and all three vanish off on their next adventure.

*Basically this

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Sprite Machine

Sprite Machine

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My next Hartnell era story is 'The Ark', a four-parter.

I really enjoyed this one. Excellent premise with it being 10 million years in the future and the last humans are leaving Earth for a new planet. The Doc and co arrive and accidentally infect them with the common cold, which is deadly to them! It's perfect sci-fi, really, with a great twist in the story half-way through, and not one episode felt wasted or dragged out. The Monoid aliens are creepy (a single eye inside their 'mouth' under a mop of hair), and is it my imagination or did the BBC throw a shedload of money at this one, because the two main sets are pretty huge and extravagant too. The control room set is brilliant and full of little details and built-in TV screens and things.

The only bad thing I can say about it is that the new companion 'Dodo' has a terribly annoying voice, but I think that's the point of her, since even the Doctor says he wants to teach her proper English.

That aside, I think this is my favourite Classic Who serial so far, and not even a mention of Daleks!

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Sprite Machine

Sprite Machine

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Next Classic Who is 'The Celestial Toymaker'.

I struggled through this, it's pretty excruciating. The theme and style reminded me of old Star Trek episodes where they face god-like beings with childish minds ('The Squire of Gothos', 'Plato's Stepchildren', etc.). I never cared for those either, and this is more than twice as long.

While the Doctor gets distracted, Steven and Dodo have to play games against toys brought to life as real characters, and eventually find the Tardis. Each episode ends with a riddle for the next puzzle, so the kids watching at home can play along or something.

Learning is fun. This was not.

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