Announcement

Collapse
No announcement yet.

Twice Upon A Time (Spoilers)

Collapse
This topic is closed.
X
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

    Twice Upon A Time (Spoilers)

    G'day,

    *cough* *cough*

    DOCTOR WHO - SEASON 36 (10)
    TWICE UPON A TIME
    EPISODE NUMBER - 3613 (1013)

    Two Doctors stranded in an Arctic snowscape, refusing to face regeneration.

    Capaldi's last ever Christmas romp (least til he's invited back for Thrice Upon A Time), which by all accounts was never meant to be (given the regeneration was meant to occur in The Doctor Falls), sees him team up with his original self, facing an opponent who, quite frankly, whilst shown as ultimately being rather benign, scares the willies out of me - a collective whom have taken it upon themselves to travel back in time and copy everyone's minds at the moment they are about to die... creating basically a back-up copy of every (human?) mind in history.

    These "glass" people are chasing a WWI soldier who fell out of their time transport technology, and essentially want to return him to his point of death. Meanwhile both Doctors are struggling with their own mortality.

    If this was any other episode, or any other Christmas story, I'd have been reasonably happy. It did get a bit talky, preachy even, but also had the usual running around and fun n games that Doctor Who's become synonymous with. The issue was however - this wasn't any other episode, this was - now - Capaldi's finale - and following on from World Enough and Time / The Doctor Falls (basically a 10 out of 10) - this story had to be an 11/10 at least! And it's simply not. 7. Maybe?

    There were a lot of rumours leading into this story, so when Bill came through the doorway, I did for a moment hope it was in fact going to be Susan... probably the last chance for it to happen. I like Bill, and don't begrudge her return, however like Capaldi, her story had reached a fairly nice resolution, so frankly I'd rather have seen her "space" utilised by another character - and Susan would have been great given her picture sitting on 12's desk at the start of the season, and the inclusion of 1 in the story.

    Watching the confronting scene in which the Doctor sees what he is to become, with a maelstrom of familiar sounds and images flying around depicting his future selves in all kinds of conflicts, and becoming more and more the powerful, almost dangerous figure of lore throughout the universe - was quite intense, especially when you look back on 1's era on the show. Yes, he fought evil, saved people, but in those days even if the scale was epic, even if the Doctor seemed in charge, you knew he was learning, he was winging it, he was fallible... The look in his eyes as he saw what he was to become... very well portrayed.

    The elephant in the room during the episode was 1's misogyny. Certainly back in the day, the Doctor was shown on occasion to be a tad misogynistic. Off top of my head, 2 once asked Polly to make some tea whilst he thought of something, and 3's relationship with Jo at times tended to blend condescension, paternity, and misogyny. Frankly though, firstly these aspects of the Doctor's character were simply fitting with the times when they were made. To highlight that aspect of the character in this story, having brought him back essentially for the first time since 1983, to me felt offensive.

    Aside from that.... Overall, there was a great balance struck in the story, ensuring Capaldi was at least not overshadowed by Bradley's re-interpreted first Doctor. His mannerisms and presentation of the character originally brought to life by William Hartnell are about on par with his attempts in the 2013 anniversary doco - which is to say - stilted. I think he paused way too much in his delivery, made it a lot more "showy"... Overall though, I just did my best to accept him for the character he was supposed to be.

    And talking of characters and destiny... Learning the Captain was in fact somehow related to our dear Brigadier - actually surprised me - much as it shouldn't! I'd read some silly idea that he was the person who invented the Police Box... Threw me off completely!

    Lastly... Whitaker....

    Her first words were "Oh, brilliant!" - which I only knew from a spoiler - even knowing this I couldn't make it out on 2 viewings. The TARDIS shakes her out... presumably leading to some kind of journey in her first story to recover the TARDIS - or maybe it's Red Dwarf S6 - Hunt for the TARDIS...
    back on YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@The-Cosmic-Hobo
    "How Doomsday Should Have Ended!" • "Bigger on the Inside?" • "The Doctor Falls - With Hartnell!"
    "The War Games - In 10 Minutes" • "Announcement of Jon Pertwee's death" •
    and lots more!

    #2
    https://forum.gateworld.net/threads/...-A-Time-(2017)
    "A society grows great when old men plant trees, the shade of which they know they will never sit in. Good people do things for other people. That's it, the end." -- Penelope Wilton in Ricky Gervais's After Life

    Comment


      #3


      Thought it odd that the Gatekeepers would have missed it... I've been thetvdb'd! "Specials" being separate to normal episodes, indeed... Bah humbug.
      back on YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@The-Cosmic-Hobo
      "How Doomsday Should Have Ended!" • "Bigger on the Inside?" • "The Doctor Falls - With Hartnell!"
      "The War Games - In 10 Minutes" • "Announcement of Jon Pertwee's death" •
      and lots more!

      Comment

      Working...
      X