Going Through Doctor Who (Spoilers all Eps aired on BBC/BBCA)

[Flyboy]

1) If you like him on film, you'd love him on audio (mostly)...

2) See for yourself - http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-FPwj4b7-WM...400/who173.jpg

http://stuartreviewsstuff.files.word...011/10/tc1.jpg

3) Warm is not the phrase *I'd* use... it really IS horrific.... (imo), I much prefer his blue ensemble - http://www.thedoctorwhosite.co.uk/si...6thdrawing.jpg

[rushy]

1) I don't doubt that. I just wish those audio stories had narration. And more background noise to give a sense of space. I had no idea where half of the scenes in An Earthly Child were taking place. Imagination is a good thing, but at least give us something to start with.
2) Wow, that looks a lot more futuristic. Makes Attack look a bit cheap, doesn't it?
3) Did Colin actually wear that at some point? Not in the show I mean, but for photos.

[Flyboy]

1) I don't doubt that. I just wish those audio stories had narration. And more background noise to give a sense of space. I had no idea where half of the scenes in An Earthly Child were taking place. Imagination is a good thing, but at least give us something to start with.
2) Wow, that looks a lot more futuristic. Makes Attack look a bit cheap, doesn't it?
3) Did Colin actually wear that at some point? Not in the show I mean, but for photos.

1) You've listened to ONE audio that was done as an extra... give one of the main ranges or proper 8th Doctor ones a try. Seriously. Terrori Firma!

2) Yep, hence why I said that things went downhill for the Cyber race post-Five.

3) Nope, alas not.

[rushy]

The Curse Of The Fatal Death is one big LOL. I can't believe it was written by Steven Moffat(and is a big part of him ending up as showrunner)

To those who don't know, this story is a parody made during the years between Classic and New Who. It starred comedy actor Rowan Atkinson(who I happen to be a big fan of) as the "Ninth Doctor" and Jonathan Pryce as "the Master"(obviously based on Anthony Ainley's take).

The Doctor has fallen in love with a human girl(who happens to be blonde) and wishes to retire from adventures in time and space. However, the Master still has some tricks up his sleeve. I'll explain the rest later.

It's a very, very well done little story with a taste of Moffat-esque time travel twists(because he can't resist them even in the classic show), plays on the show using the same sets over and over, the little explanation given in some plots, the campness and idiocy of the Master and so forth. There's classic show references sprinkled about enough to bring a smile on any fan's face and in several ways, it's a cleverly disguised precursor to the new show even if it doesn't know or plan it.

My favourite scene was with Hugh Grant as the "Tenth Doctor". He's just so hilarious, especially compared to the solemn Dr. Simeon from The Snowmen. Like Tennant, Grant was bursting with energy and was even more eager for romance(he licked his reflection for pete's sake!)

I just love this sketch and the epic and horribly underused catchphrase: "I will explain later."
Moffat's wibbly-wobbly plots would be so much easier to understand and accept if the Eleventh Doctor just went "I'll explain later."
The reason I'd accept it is because... well, Doctor Who takes place over the entire universe, every time period. I'd just assume there's a clever answer behind it. It's when they try to explain it in a fairytale way that I get angry.

Speaking of the Eleventh, Jim Broadbent was... well, a little unnoticable, but still all around likable. Broadbent is a jolly nice chap, but he seemed a little out of place.

The end twist sure puts a whole new meaning to all the Doctor/Master fanfics out there. What might that be? I'll explain later.

[rushy]

Since I didn't plan to watch the classic series when I started this thread, I wasn't really planning ahead with gimmicks or anything. However, classic stories are far longer than new ones and deserve a proper resolution after each era. But then what about the new ones? So, here's my final final thoughts on the three Doctors who I've seen from beginning to end.

Paul McGann - The Eighth Doctor
Doc-meter: One of the most charismatic Doctors IMO, McGann made the role his after a very short period of time. He has an offworldly aura, but immediately manages to make himself credible if necesary. The Eighth is the youngest and most optimistic of the lot, thus his sense of humor is primarily restrained to sarcasm caused by realization that the universe isn't all it's cracked up to be.
Favourite Story: The Night Of The Doctor.
Favourite Companion: Does the Asian Child count?
Favourite Enemy: The Master(Eric Roberts incarnation). I like him.
Screwdriver: A tool, not a weapon. I like it though, it still means business.
Costume: The original seemed a bit short for him, but the gentlemanly tone fitted him as did the later adventurer tone which thankfully was a better fit. I think I like the original better though, it's nicer.
Worst Story: N/A
Worst Companion: Grace by a mile. Really glad the Doctor left her behind. She was like an unfunny version of Donna. Always whining.
Worst Enemy: The Daleks. Did they really just hand the Master's remains over to him?

Overall era: The beginning was promising, the middle is one gaping hole and the end was epic.

[rushy]

Christopher Eccleston - The Ninth Doctor
Doc-meter: If you've been following closely, you'll know that Ninth is MY Doctor. I'll try not to be too biased though. The Ninth Doctor is a war veteran, but one whose hearts remain young despite it all. He's desperate to regain his free spirit, even though deep down he knows he never can. On the outside, the Doctor's recent past has left him intolerant of fools and mistakes and thus(IMO) a more effective character. In his own words: "I only take the best." This Doctor doesn't mess around for anybody's sake. He does what he has to do. On the other side of the spectrum, he's also incredibly honest and when things go bad, he freely admits it(Rule no. 1 can piss off). However, the best thing about the Ninth Doctor is that he's still a good and loving person who only wants to help.
Favourite Story: Parting Of The Ways.
Favourite Companion: Rose Tyler.
Favourite Enemy: The Dalek from... well Dalek.
Screwdriver: Blue, slick and neat. It screams futuristic.
Costume: Dark and broody, yet still formal and reminiscent of the earlier Doctors. Very good choice.
Worst Story: End Of The World. It was just boring.
Worst Companion: Adam Mitchell.
Worst Enemy: The Slitheen.

Overall era: The last DW era to be low-budget, Eccleston's single shadowy season brings a bigger impact than three HD sharp-as-glass-in-the-eye seasons of Matt Smith.

[rushy]

David Tennant - The Tenth Doctor
Doc-meter: Oooh, he's good! He's rad, charming, intense, smug, mopey, epic, quiet, sneaky, loud... the Tenth is best described as an emotional rollercoaster. That's it. Except no rollercoaster is good enough to produce that hair.
Favourite Story: The Waters Of Mars.
Favourite Companion: Rose Tyler.
Favourite Enemy: The Master(John Simm incarnation).
Screwdriver: Looks a bit cheaper than before. Also, why does the bottom detach?
Costume: It's duller than those that come before but in a good way, specifically saying that "I'm still healing." while at the same time making him seem towering.
Worst Story: Love And Monsters by a frigging mile.
Worst Companion: Martha Jones(bored me).
Worst Enemy: A cross between the living drawings and the Abzorbaloff.

Overall era: Mostly crappy stories with epic gems hidden here and there.

[rushy]

The Deviant Strain is somewhere between mediocre and kinda decent. Most of you probably haven't heard of it, but it's a short Ninth Doctor novel taking place between The Doctor Dances and Boom Town. I bought it during my trip to Stockholm alongside the two classic serials.

The setting is the Russian naval base in the Novrosk Peninsula. The date is left mostly vague, but I believe it's somewhere in the 1980s. The TARDIS picks up a distress signal from somewhere in the area and Jack thoughtlessly responds to it, forcing the Doctor to go and rescue whoever's trapped.

The first issue I have with the book is that despite it's only 250 pages, it is slow. Very, very slow. It's almost as if the author is trying to pad out a 45-minute script. Who knows? The story takes half the book to build up(the first half focusing on various parts of the Russian community which no offense, I don't give a crap about. Mostly cause I live 5 kilometers from Russia.).
Again, as an episode, it works because of the dark visuals that the author is trying to convey, but as a book, it makes me wish I was reading about Daleks or Cybermen or even the Sontarans. Anything, but long descriptions of horrible Russian submarines and their cold weather! This is Doctor Who, not Dokmop Kmo, thank you very much!

However, when we finally get some action, it's pretty darn cool. From that point on, The Deviant Strain plays out like a combination of a zombie movie, The Blob and The Invasion Of The Body Snatchers. The climax is a bit underplayed with no "epic solution" that I've come to expect from Matt Smith episodes, but instead a simple explanation of how the heroes won as the bad guys die.

Now, the Ninth Doctor... I can easily imagine Eccleston saying most of his dialogue in my head(there are some exceptions, but I have no complaints) so he's written fine. However, all of his gimmicks curiously only appear once. He uses psychic paper to get into the village, he uses the sonic screwdriver to open a submarine door and he yells his catchphrase once towards the end. It's either a big coincidence or the author had a list of things to tick off so it'd work more as a Ninth Doctor book.
Oh yeah, speaking of that, there's also the obligatory Bad Wolf.

Overall, not too bad, but nothing I'd go back to unless it was filmed. If you want another Eccleston episode, this pretty much does the job.
P.S. Whoever wrote the summary on the back cover did not read the book itself. "They must discover who is really responsible for the Deviant Strain..."
The Deviant Strain is a reference to the alien ship only using humans as its power source instead of other stuff.

[rushy]

Series 7 is definitely the best Matt Smith outing so far. Whereas previous seasons usually comprise of crappy Earth eps with some gems in between, here the formula is reversed. Most of the season is great.
At least after The Snowmen. The biggest problem this time is Amy and Rory. There was just no need for them after Series 6, their story was complete. They had their own life and stuff. I would've been happy to see them gone after The God Complex. But here they are again with their family issues.
Okay, to be fair, Dinosaurs On A Spaceship was pretty darn cool, but other than that, the autumn part of Series 7 was entirely forgettable.

Now, I'm a huge Dalek fan, but Asylum Of The Daleks is really the weakest Dalek story I've ever seen. Firstly, didn't the NP Daleks exterminate the Time War-era ones? Secondly, how did the classic era Daleks(if there were any there, I certainly didn't see them) escape from the time-lock to end up in the Asylum?
And since when do Daleks care enough to even build such a place? Did they cross-breed with humans again a la Parting Of The Ways?

I've never found the Weeping Angels to be anything more than a nuisance(Blink is OVERrated) and that they should be the ones to end Amy and Rory was a bit disgraceful. It were those kinds of stories that made me think watching NuWho has become more of a job than entertainment.

The last crappy episode to take note of was The Crimson Horror. I don't think it was nearly as bad as some people have been saying, but it didn't make much sense and was just another excuse to have Madam Vastra in a story.

Speaking of which, who the heck is Madam Vastra? Am I supposed to know her? Well, she was in A Good Man Goes To War. When did she start living in Victorian London? Who's Jenny?
And why is a clone of Strax suddenly their butler? Does he have the memories of his past self? If not, why isn't he working for the Sontarans? Well, at least he made me like their race a bit more.

Matt Smith is epic as the Eleventh Doctor, to the point where I actually considered him to be better than Eccleston(though I came off that high fairly quickly). His new costume is a step up from the tweed jacket and the darker turn gave him more depth. On the other hand, he's still overly goofy and at times, I really just want him to calm. the heck. down.

Jenna-Louise Coleman is sweet as Clara Oswald. Whereas there's actually very little background to work with, she makes the character work as a new, bit bizarre, spunky companion. In fact, I think she puts Amy to shame, at least in terms of personality. I only wish she'd originate from somewhen else than the 21st century. It got old after Martha Jones. Also, Moffat's tendency to give nicknames to his characters strikes again.

Series 7 suffered a bit from being chaotic. In earlier series the story moved in a pretty much straight line(yes, even in the abysmal Wedding Of River Song) and everything came together in the end. Most of Series 7 seems random though. Other than Clara's mystery, nothing really happens. And I'm not saying that's entirely bad, the universe-ending plots were getting a bit tiresome(wait, didn't Vastra say the stars were going out? *sigh*), but it seemed like just a stack of mostly random stories. In Classic Who it works, because Classic Who never had to think ahead, but I've come to expect more from New Who.

The villain of the series, the Great Intelligence was downplayed too much. He basically wandered around the whole story. Literally. Richard E. Grant made it almost worth it though.

My favourite episode of the entire series was Nightmare In Silver which proved to me that the Cybermen CAN be cool, if written properly. Mr. Clever was an epic bad guy. Now why couldn't we have more of that? Oh hai Warwick Davis. Jeez, this show has grown big.
Also, it re-sparked my love for chess. Thanks Moff.
(I thought gold disrupted the Cybermen's life support systems? How did it knock out Clever?)

Overall, Series 7 was great, if somewhat cluttered. Moffat finally found a balance between too complicated and too simple and I'm glad for that. Definitely the first series to stand against the epic Eccleston season.
I will be watching The Day Of The Doctor on my birthday, April 10th. Until then, I'm moving onto Season 2 of Classic Who. Watching Hartnell after this is gonna be so relaxing... yes.

[rushy]

Planet Of Giants is the perfect 1960s Doctor Who serial for me. Inventive story: check. Astounding set and props for its time: check. Short: check(3 episodes!). Heartwarming characters: for the most part check. Women constantly needing the men to help them(hehehe): check.

It's the first Doctor Who serial I've watched straight all the way through(The Edge Of Destruction might be an exception, but I don't remember) and for good reason. It kept me hooked, it didn't tire me out and it was a fun and satisfying romp.

Trouble is afoot when the TARDIS shrinks down to the size of an inch(it's never explained why so I'm gonna go out on a limp here and say it's something to do with the doors opening, thus disturbing the dimensions of the TARDIS like in The Name Of The Doctor. Doesn't explain why it gets smaller instead of bigger or why the doors even opened though) and the crew ends up in the house of some chemist who's been working on an insecticide called DN6.

DN6 is poison(and also allows the showmakers to show off complicated puppets without actually having to move them) which kills on contact. Thus, the crew resolve to draw attention to it by putting the house on fire(isn't that REALLY dangerous??)

Alright, so there are multiple plot holes scattered about, but I didn't really care as I was watching it. It's a very creative story with the characters using small everyday objects like matches and paper clips for whatever they need and its really all just for the heck of it.

If there's one complaint, I'd say it's the editing. Sometimes it's too sudden and sometimes there's a long black fade-out for no reason. There also seems to be a few scenes missing since the crew go from
DOCTOR: We should get back to the ship.
BARBARA: Okay.
to
DOCTOR: I think Barbara's right. We should do something about this.
in the blink of an eye. There's also a VERY quick trip back to the TARDIS.

Early in the story, the Doctor's monitor literally blows up(for some reason it can't adapt to the changed dimensions), but at the end, the screen is just showing white noise, but is otherwise fine. I can buy the TARDIS repairing it(even though it usually needs the Doctor to do that), but why is it only half-fixed? She had plenty of time.

Overall, it's Doctor Who's first "turn your brain off" serial and I loved it. A great start to what I think is gonna be a great season. I won't be reviewing The Dalek Invasion Of Earth again so next up: The Rescue. Will the new companion be able to replace Susan?

[rushy]

The Rescue is easily the worst 60s Who I've seen so far. It's a blatant filler serial designed to introduce the new companion. At least The Edge Of Destruction had an aura of mystery about it, the Doctor was still an unknown and it took place in the TARDIS. Most of this is just crap.

For starters, Vicki comes across as an even worse whiner than Susan(I miss her "GRANDFATHER!!" screams though) in that she blames Barbara for killing her pet monster. I know she's been alone for long, but seriously? A pet monster? I would've just talked to a mirror. Besides, she gave her no warning anyway other than "don't!" which really doesn't help.
I do like the connection she and the Doctor make, though. It's the first time the Doctor invites a new companion and some of the dialogue was later recycled for The Eleventh Hour I believe.

I loved Ian in this story. He has some great bickering with the Doctor and the funniest moment in the whole series this far is him cracking up when Vicki tells him he's 550 years old. That was worth the whole serial. One other great line is when he goes to interrupt the Doctor and he says that if they don't want him in the room, they can always tell him to get out.

The Doctor was also on his highest, being suitably depressed at the beginning when he realises Susan is gone and caring when Vicki needs him. Oh yeah, and he falls asleep. In the middle of the console room. The best part is that the ship apparently flies around and randomly lands without any supervision. Why do we need this guy again?

Barbara gets her first kill. She fires a flare into Sandy(the pet monster)'s guts. Wowsers.

Lots of memorable moments in this serial, but I'm still saying, it overall sucked because Vicki was REALLY whiny("YOU RUINED EVERYTHING, WHY DID YOU COME HERE TO RESCUE ME?!?!") and the plot involving some guy who murdered a civilization just wasn't meant to be cared about so I didn't.

I will say one thing though: 60s Doctor Who can do some brilliant comedy if it wants to. That's why I'm hyped for the next installment: The Romans.
It's kinda strange. Whenever I hoped to "get somewhere" with this watchthrough(at least in Hartnell's era), I always thought of The Romans.

[The Flyattractor]

The Target novelization of this story does a much better job of telling the Rescue then the episode.

[rushy]

The Target novelization of this story does a much better job of telling the Rescue then the episode.

I'm really not a fan of target novelizations. Other than making up for missing episodes, they seem to be a lazy way for people not to watch black-and-white TV. Or rejoice in the full glory of Colin Baker's costume.

[The Flyattractor]

I'm really not a fan of target novelizations. Other than making up for missing episodes, they seem to be a lazy way for people not to watch black-and-white TV. Or rejoice in the full glory of Colin Baker's costume.

Well the target novels were a way for some of us back in the day it was the only way we could "SEE" some of those episodes. Buying a 5 dollar book was cheaper then buying a 40 dollar VHS.

[rushy]

The Romans is definitely the best historical so far and an undeniable classic. I said in the previous review that 60s Doctor Who can do some brilliant comedy and I'm glad to be right. I laughed so hard during these episodes and I am looking forward to the next comedy story(there WILL be one... right?).

The Doctor is an absolute laugh, doing various antics to the general irritation of everyone around him. This is the way I like William Hartnell... tricks and treats.
Some people complain about his reaction to having caused the Great Fire Of Rome, but I think it's perfectly understandable. Since it's a predetermined historical event and one that was caused accidentally btw, he can't really be held responsible. Besides, what time-traveler doesn't get giddy when he is behind a historical event?

William Russell gave his best-ever performance this time, switching effortlessly between dramatic, happy and a pouting child. His revenge at Barbara at the end was a show of continuity I really appreciated(and it was very satisfactory). Honestly, by this point he has passed Rose Tyler as my favourite companion ever. Please don't get rid of him any time soon, Ian is such a multidimensional character. The only complaint that I'd have is that neither he nor Barbara really do what they're supposed to: explain all about history and chemistry(there's a scene with a poisoner, but Ian's not even in it) which is supposedly what they're best at.

Vicki is growing to be a relatively sweet companion and she definitely has chemistry with Hartnell at least. She's still taking time to get used to the other two though. It's a shame that for her first proper story, she doesn't get to do a lot but comment on Hartnell's big ruse at the end.

Speaking of Hartnell's ruse, the scene where the Doctor "played" the lyre is officially one of the best tricks this series has pulled. It's a Steven Moffat level of clever and time travel wasn't even involved.
I'm noticing that Vicki spends the majority of her time asking questions from the Doctor. I guess this is the starting point of the Doctor's role as action hero.

Barbara spends almost the entirety of the serial separated from Ian, but she's grown on me enough that they get away with it by having Emperor Nero chase her around in a number of scenes that just needs the Benny Hill theme in it. I like her strong sense of morale and her sense of humor which add a big aspect to the TARDIS crew. Yes, she's definitely grown on me.

Overall, The Romans is a story that I'd heartily recommend to not just any Doctor Who fan, but any fan of comedy. Even if you're not fond of science fiction or time travel stories, The Romans will satisfy you with precisely timed puns and twists. It seems tremendously underrated to me.

Coming Next: The Web Planet. I love the smell of doom in the morning...
Or would you prefer Dr. Who And The Daleks for a change of pace? Because at this point, I'm willing to go either direction.