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Underground > Film, TV & Theatre >

Doctor Who Season 3 UK (No Spoilers)

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miss wonderstarr

17:45 / 15.04.07

Hope this isn't the wrong thread for the above.

Shiny: Well Over Thirty

17:55 / 15.04.07

There hasn't been much in canon info on the time-war. RTD apparently went into more detail in a story in the Christmas 2005 Doctor Who annual. Not strictly speaking canon, but I'd argue that simply be virtue of being written recently by RTD it can probably be considered semi-canon while he's in charge of the show. I've not actually read the story, though.

19:17 / 15.04.07

The Daleks have had access to time travel technology since The Chase, if memory serves. In Rememberence of the Daleks the Doctor referred to their time travel technology as very crude.

Shiny: Well Over Thirty

19:35 / 15.04.07

Rememberence has to retroactively be part of the time war. Probably that was when it started to hot up. The Doctor using a combination of Dalek time-travel tech and Timelord tech to wipe out Skaro must have a been a fairly big move in the war. That last scene when Ace asks for assurance they've done the right thing and the Doctor just said 'Time will tell' - that seems like a man who knew the war was getting started.

19:46 / 15.04.07

If you see Rememberence as part of the time war then the opening salvo has to be Genesis of The Daleks where the Timelords sent the doctor into the past telling him to attempt to avert their creation, effect their evolution or commit genocide against them...

20:29 / 15.04.07

My understanding is that the Time War is a retcon device used by RTD to set up this series. I imagine this series will probably explore it a bit further, but they'll never give too much of it away.

In my mind, though, there exists an incredible Nu Who prequel movie featuring Eccleson, Tennant, Mcgann (and McCoy and Baker in flashback footage from Genesis of the Daleks and that 60s episode) which features epic space battles a-go-go, explains what happened to the Doctor's daughter Miranda, and ties the Who continuity into Babylon 5 because it's the movie in my head, dammit and it can contain what I like...

miss wonderstarr

20:39 / 15.04.07

So the Time War would have sometimes intruded into episodes from 1965, 1975 and elsewhere (elsewhen) ~ as if its 4D nature meant that it occasionally sliced into contemporary continuity, even though it happened millennia ago? That's a nice idea, if I'm understanding it right. The Time War, because it involved forays into various points in past and future, could then actually happen ~ or a specific conflict in the war could actually happen ~ in a current episode. The Time War occurred many years ago, but in a way it's still ongoing and is still to come?

00:04 / 16.04.07

Unless, of course, the actions of the Time War erased the Time War and it's combatants. Everything decided in a war that never happened.

But I like wondy's uberdramatic sci-fi concept better.

All Acting Regiment

08:07 / 16.04.07

Well, that was a good episode. I do like the macra - and when they brought them on, it wasn't "here are the macra so its still the same", it was, "wow! something called the macra."

What was the point when he quoted his grand-daughter?

Our Lady Has Left the Building

12:50 / 16.04.07

I think it was in one of the DWC episodes that RTD said that you could see 'Genesis of the Daleks' as the first strike in the Time War, but as someone quoted Nick Briggs as saying, exactly how do you portray a War in Time, how do you portray a bomb that blows up last wednesday? Personally I prefer to think of it as a war, largely in space, that is called the Time War because one of the sides involved were The Time Lords. Like the Boer War innit?

jentacular dreams

13:43 / 16.04.07

I'm not sure I can buy that. It's pretty hard to fight a linear war against an enemy that can attack you before hostilities are declared.

Given that both sides were capable of time travel, I'd suspect that this would have played a major part as either strategy or as a direct weapon. Maybe Daleks and Timelords interfering in each others histories, until they removed themselves. Or perhaps gallifrey itself was instrumental in the daleks' rise, and their own destruction was required to remove the dalek threat.

13:56 / 16.04.07

The way I see it, in my hed, is a war that was fought all across time and space, with temporal loops and mobeius cages and whatnot. In order for Gallifrey to be gone, it'd have to be completely incinerated in a massive 4D explosion thingy that cracked it open across all of history. It no longer exists. Anywhere. Or the Doctor would be able to go back or forward and see it.

I thought the last episode was a pitch perfect bit of sci-fi. Exactly how to do big-concept stuff on a budget. RTD's cribbing from lots of stuff as usual, but this was how he should be doing it all the time. I'm inclined to think it's the best RTD-penned episode yet.

I like the way the story and world builds and builds from the ground-level to the big picture. Very emotional and personal, telling a huge big story from pretty much the one set. Loved the Brannigan/Valerie relationships and the OAP lesibians, but hats off to the Tomboycat and the her two mousy, chaste-looking ladyfriends. Extra credit to the fact that nothing is actually said about what's going on there, it's just there.

14:50 / 16.04.07

how do you portray a bomb that blows up last wednesday?

But that's exactly the kind of thing Who should be tackling. On occasion!!!

15:35 / 16.04.07

Well, now that the Doctor has suggested that TARDIS time travel functions like "Back to the Future" time travel, you could have a photograph of last wednesday that is fading away. The Doctor might have huge scrapbooks full of pictures of nothing because Gallifrey is gone.

17:48 / 16.04.07

Now that would be a very nice moment.

07:38 / 17.04.07

how do you portray a bomb that blows up last wednesday?

Get Lynch in to guest-direct an episode?

Our Lady Has Left the Building

09:19 / 17.04.07

Well, it's nice and vague because some people still remember the Time Lords, even if they are gone, such as the Trees from 1.2, and Jack knows of the Daleks and the Time Lords. It's implied he's a 50th century human, maybe by then the humans have effectively replaced the Time Lords, although by the year one billion and fifty-three what apparently passes for the new human race doesn't seem as advanced.

12:03 / 17.04.07

Probably a bit late now, but if anyone wants to avoid seeing a massive spoiler for next Saturday's episode, then DON'T look at the cover of this week's Radio Times.

Honestly. And RTD's inside, saying how he can't understand why they give away the plots to soaps in advance! Okay, it doesn't give away the end of the plot, but it does f--- up what *might* have been a nice visual shock. F---ing BAH!

12:33 / 17.04.07

I already saw it, but didn't realise it was a spoiler..

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

14:43 / 17.04.07

I've always (well, not always, but for the last few years... ah, fuck it, you know what I mean) imagined the Time War as being something akin to the war in The Adventures Of Luther Arkwright.

Only just watched this week's episode- yeah, wasn't convinced at the beginning, but that turned into something quite brilliant. In a way it reminded me of some of the more whacked-out 80s stories, like Paradise Towers- I can't quite put my finger on why, but it did. Maybe, as someone said above, it was the Ballardian elements to it, PT having been Who's very own High Rise.

I'd never have thought I'd find the death of the Face Of Bo quite so heartbreaking, either.

Mysterious Transfer Student

16:59 / 17.04.07

by the year one billion and fifty-three what apparently passes for the new human race doesn't seem as advanced.

I floated the idea back in one of the earlier season threads that, in imagining a future history of humanity, we and the show's creators could envisage a Cordwainer Smith-style, abyssal depth of future epochs; dark ages and bright ages, periods of expansion and decadence, eras in which humans and aliens mingle and intermix freely and others characterised by isolationism and racially purist ideologies. (Maybe Cassandra is an "old-fashioned" person, someone who dates back to one of these ages but has outlived it.) I admit to being a mite disappointed at the conservative image of deep-future humanity we've seen in 21st-century Who so far but like to counterbalance it, in my mind, by imagining these portrayals bracketed by more vibrant, pluralist, posthuman eras: ones we're unlikely to see on early Saturday evening BBC1 even with all the talent and money that's currently being sunk into the show, but still.

17:05 / 21.04.07

"Oh, I shoulda realised: he's into musical theatre, huh..."

Made me laugh like a drain.

miss wonderstarr

17:33 / 21.04.07

I dug the 1930s (alternative-history?) New York, despite the Bugsy Malone vibe, but I'm afraid I can't quite grasp how there are so many Daleks around in this and the last two seasons of Doctor Who, seeing as how I thought they were supposed to be as wiped-out as the Time Lords. I know the Doctor keeps remarking on this ~ that he's alone and they keep surviving ~ but bearing in mind that the first Ecclestone Dalek (of "Dalek" episode") was a sole survivor, a wreck, I don't really see how we keep on encountering them. The Daleks of the last season's end were from another parallel universe, were they? I think I need a fan to explain.

miss wonderstarr

17:44 / 21.04.07

Oh my bad. The Cybermen were from a parallel dimension. The Daleks had escaped the Time War in a "Void Ship" and returned to 2006. How this relates to four Daleks being alive in 1930s NYC is still beyond me.

17:45 / 21.04.07

I don't think that many Daleks are recorded as surviving the time war are they?

I can only think of two - the Dalek from Dalek and the Emperor Dalek from the parting of the ways. It was indecated that the other Daleks in the first season were manufactured from human stock.

In season two you had the cult of Skaro who had been hidden in a void ship, presumably during the war, along with a dalek prison...

17:47 / 21.04.07

Yeah, these are the same Daleks as the ones at the end of last season, W.

The muppet at the end didn't do much for me, I'm afraid - felt like some of the worst aspects of Old Who. Liked the episode up to that point.

17:47 / 21.04.07

In Doomsday we hear Dalek Sec activating a 'temporal shift' and it would appear that the other cult members acted in a similar fashion.

miss wonderstarr

17:51 / 21.04.07

Well, you take my point maybe that there have been quite a few Daleks in this and the last two series, seeing as how they're a dead race. I understand there are OK explanations for all these Daleks, but.. you know.

18:03 / 21.04.07

I guess the problem is that people love the daleks and identify them with Doctor Who - old fans, the new generation, tabloid editors, everyone. There's kind of an expectation now that every series of Dr Who will feature the daleks.

In some ways, I might have been better for the revived series if the Daleks hadn't appeared in season one - that way there would have been more of a precident for dalek less seasons, but as it is Daleks are pretty much an essential ingredient.

Which I hope doesn't prompt the estate of Terry Nation to make it financially unfeasable for Daleks to appear at any point in the future.

18:07 / 21.04.07

I think that's part of the point though. The Daleks are a bit like Magneto. They'll always come back. The Doctor sacraficed everything to take them out, even taking his own people with them, but in the end it made no difference. They're like a recurring cancer that just keeps breaking out.

That was the crux of Eccleston's arc to me. He's fucked himself up beyond belief but it's almost OK, because he took them out. When they come back as strong as ever everything he's done seems totally worthless. That's how come him and Rose. She totally redeemed his reason for living at the end of S1 by living by his example and saving the day.

They'll keep coming and coming and coming. As long as there's an unfolding story about the Time War and the Doctor's role in it, there's gonna be Daleks.

miss wonderstarr

18:15 / 21.04.07

As the Daleks also caused him to lose Rose, whom he seems to have loved, it might be a strong arc (and character-consistent) if the Doctor just devoted his entire life's mission now to making 1000% sure the Daleks were wiped out of all space and time. Rather than, as he seems to, jaunting about exploring various places and solving people's little problems. The guy should surely be obsessed. The moment in this episode where he looked absolutely pale and struck, like "oh fucking hell, no. I can't believe this", was truthful. But with that kind of absolute race-hatred against the Daleks (that seems a fair description?) you'd think he would do nothing but launch a one-man war against them until he's certain they're ruled out of existence ~ instead of hopping around visiting historical celebs and places he fancies seeing. Maybe next season. I think not, though.

18:23 / 21.04.07

I think that was part of Tennant's arc though. When Rose does what she does, she purges all that knotted hatred and he turns into a new man. He's still a hard bastard, but realises all the angst-tipped fire and brimstone will kill him. He's fighting monsters so there's a world worth living in, and there's no point in doing that unless you're able to see and enjoy it from time to time.

He also had no way of knowing the Cult of Skaro had survived Canary Wharf.

Anyway, the Doctor never goes sightseeing. There's always tons and tons of wee illnesses to treat everywhere he goes.

miss wonderstarr

18:30 / 21.04.07

Well, that's an interesting take on it, and it's true that in the Runaway Bride he had to be pulled back from a sadistic, destructive urge. That potential (the Daleks, of course, supposedly call him the Oncoming Storm, but also the Destroyer of Worlds and Bringer of Darkness) is, you're right, calmed by his companions. Rose surely saved him from that dark side.

Still, I'd think that if your nemesis is still out there ~ the thing that killed everything you loved, all your people, and the one person you recently grew to care for ~ you'd find it pretty hard to resist falling into that hell-bent, single-minded mission.

Interesting also that you're suggesting he's really a "doctor" in some broad sense! rather than a fixer, an engineer. He does carry a screwdriver after all, not a stethoscope.

18:37 / 21.04.07

i have a vague theory about the doctor/tardis acting like a white blood cell, zeroing in on points of infection, dropping him where he's needed.
If it was just another dalek story then i'd be feeling a bit meh too but it's gone lo key and is doing the Daleks as science villains and is developing the price of survival/evolution/purity/dancing theme nicely
damn classy looking episode, the visuals were stunning
loved Martha's brave though scared 'that's where we'll find out what's going on'...trying to emulate how it's done
and really like that the doctor's meeting lots of strong decent characters...his apology to (leader of hooverville) for trying to bamboozle and ignore him was great

18:47 / 21.04.07

i have a vague theory about the doctor/tardis acting like a white blood cell, zeroing in on points of infection, dropping him where he's needed.

That was mentioned in one of teh earlier threads on New Who, I think, and I seem to remember sombody saying that there was a hint of this in Old Who, somewhere along the line. We know that the Tardis is sentient, so why not.

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