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Underground > Film, TV & Theatre >

DOCTOR WHO! SEASON...um.....thirtyone (No Spoilers)

  
  

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■
17:52 / 08.06.10
Big whale, little universe, po-lice box.
 
 
■
17:45 / 12.06.10
An absolute cracker, there, i thought. Trying to find things to fault it on and aside from the repetiton of "perception filters" (which I'm cool with, as it's a concept only geeks like us think are commonplace), I got nothing.
HordenCorden had it pitched perfectly, nothing was rushed (except where it had to be to precipitate the big crisis), I REALLY didn't see the Mawdryn moment coming until they were at the top of the stairs, and I was even quite excited by the spoilerrific preview.
While I bet it's not going to become a rewatchable classic, it was six hairy toes of pop TV at its best, jammed into a tight 45-minute sock of joy.
Naysayers, I am ready for battle.
 
 
imaginary mice
18:35 / 12.06.10
I agree - that was brilliant. The perfect role for James Corden and Matt Smith was lovable as always. The previous few episodes were a tad disappointing, but now I'm giddily looking forward to the finale.
 
 
■
18:38 / 12.06.10
"No, there will be NO violence, I am the Doctor, the lonely god, you were talking about a footabll match, weren't you?"

His timing is beautiful.
 
 
Poke it with a stick
08:39 / 13.06.10
So, I guess we can say with certainty now that the crack in Amy's wall isn't following her about, then?

I'm slightly less effusive about the episode, but I think it needs a second viewing where It's not James Corden but his character I'm watching and I'm not dreading it turning into Fear Her all over again.
 
 
Kali, Queen of Kitteh
10:11 / 13.06.10
Sundazed and slightly tipsy, I watched this one last night. I really liked it. I don't mind James Corden actually and he hit the right frustrated notes with me. The thing that tickled me is that the voices that came from the spaceship sounded, in their different incarnations, like very third-tier voices from past Doctor Who episodes. Well, at least they did to me. I still maintain that Amy is the cause of the cracks, but upon seeing the teaser for the season finale two-parter, some part of me reckons that it's the Doctor in the Pandorica. I think this ties back to what exactly we didn't and did see in the Angels two-parter. I look forward to being proved wrong.
 
 
iamus
12:16 / 13.06.10
Well, when Rory had just been time-erased and The Doctor was frantically trying to get her to remember him, he kissed her on the forehead in the exact same way he did as futuredoctor in the angels two-parter. eeennteresting..
 
 
Spatula Clarke
21:37 / 13.06.10
That was okay, but it's another that I've not got any great urge to watch a second time.

Increasingly, episodes set in the current day UK deonstrate not just a lack of financial resources, but also a lack of imagination. Nothing much happened, the comedy wasn't as funny as it could have been and the whole thing was carried by Smith alone. Again. If this had been a Tennant episode, it would have been abysmal.

Not enough was done with the upstairs spaceship. There was the gem of an interesting science fiction episode in the last five minutes (before the crack stuf intruded), but it was wasted here.

The idea that this show should ever be extended beyond its current dozen episode format is laughable, because it's not once managed to reach a consistent bar of quality in five series. They really need to get some better writers and ideas people on board, so that we don't keep on ending up with at least two or three filler episodes per year.

Corden's fine - I really don't see the problem that an awful lot of people have with him, but I suspect that it's got little to do with anything but his size. And anybody who thinks - celeb goss time! - that Patrick Stewart came out on top of their little spat the other day is clearly off their fucking tits.

There was no spark between the two humans this week, but then ubelievable, dry 'romantic' relationships have been something of a theme.

Also: Amy. Wasted again. I guess this was this series' shooting-time-limited episode, only they tried to do something other than making it another Doctor-lite one. I don't think it worked - it was clear that Smith and Gillen were unavailable for joint scenes and this was the workaround, right from the beginning when we see the Doctor talking to Amy, with there being absolutely no sign of her.

I'm glad we're reaching the end of this series, now. The stuff with the crack hasn't been used properly in any episodes other than the first and the two Weeping Angel ones - every other time it's appeared, it's been uncomfortably tacked onto the end of a completely unrelated storyline. I've been frustrated by Gillen's performance through much of the second half of the season, but then I don't think she's been well-served by the scripts. Most of the energy - in direction, effects, plotting, acting - was focused in just three episodes (the first and the two Weeping Angels ones) and the others could have come from any of the previous four series (well, maybe not series two, which was a complete bust).

New companion next year, please. Or a second one. An alien one would be nice, to get rid of some of the domesticity that infects New Who like a cancer.

And a lower proportion of current day Earth stories. What the fucking point of the Doctor having a space ship that can travel through time is, I'm often left wondering.
 
 
Spatula Clarke
21:40 / 13.06.10
Oh, and aliens that are actually alien, rather than being humans with strangely-coloured/textured skin. That's got nothing to do with budgetary cutbacks and everything to do with the aforementioned lack of imagination.
 
 
Tuna Ghost: Pratt knot hero
23:13 / 13.06.10
Well, when Rory had just been time-erased and The Doctor was frantically trying to get her to remember him, he kissed her on the forehead in the exact same way he did as futuredoctor in the angels two-parter. eeennteresting...

I think you'll find he does the forehead kiss as early as the second episode and maybe the third (which I refuse to watch again). I remember not liking it because it is an intimate sort of thing, and he only just met the girl.

Also, my love for Patrick Stewart makes it impossible to believe that he is ever anything but the winner of any argument, no matter how drunk he is (or I am).
 
 
Tuna Ghost: Pratt knot hero
23:16 / 13.06.10
Corden's fine - I really don't see the problem that an awful lot of people have with him, but I suspect that it's got little to do with anything but his size.

Really? Weird! In the states, being a funny overweight guy is part a long comedic tradition. We can't get enough of them.
 
 
■
22:55 / 14.06.10
There was no spark between the two humans this week

What? From the very start we had a fizz with the shared quiet joy of the prospect of "Pizza, booze, TV". It may sound mundane, but it sent a crackle of recognition up my spine (or maybe down). The point is that they already had the unspoken bond they wanted but neither of them recognised or would admit it. I cared about both of them almost instantly, far more than I ever did about Yawny Rory.
By the way, this isn't technically a spoiler, but Mr Rilstone has some cracking ideas here.
 
 
Spatula Clarke
18:19 / 15.06.10
I'm not finding many of those either appealing or likely, cube. The only thing I really agree with in that post is the worry about the crack/Pandorica being a reset button.

Which seems even more like a real possibility, what with the suggestion that the Tardis is going to be destroyed.

Caught myself wondering, during the trailer for the coming episode, if the Pandorica is a container for the energy expelled by the Tardis when it explodes. With the crack being the leaking of that energy.

Also suspect that the 'repository for fictions' thing that I was talking about weeks ago might still come to pass. The voice-over in the trailer lists a rage of the Doctor's past foes. Some people are reading that as meaning that the final two episodes are going to be Teh Doctor Who Megaton, with all those enemies featuring, but it seems more likely to me that if they're present it'll be in spirit, not in body. I doubt they'll be there at all, though, as anything more than psychic residue from any potential Tardisbang or a "here's the shit that we might have to face if things go arse-about" slice of dialogue.
 
 
Poke it with a stick
20:10 / 15.06.10
Spatula, not to delve too deep into spoilerdom, but there will be monsters in a very real sense, judging by stills I've seen.

I'll agree with you on the danger of the crack being a reset button of sorts, although I really hope it isn't something as blatantly simplistic as that. I have greater faith in Moffat than I ever did in RTD, so would hope for something a little more creative.
 
 
Kali, Queen of Kitteh
10:30 / 16.06.10
Stephen Fry adds his two cents regarding Who.
 
 
Spatula Clarke
17:53 / 16.06.10
Fry later said: "The temptation to scream 'F*** off' so loudly... there is no possible excuse, defence or claim that you can make that justifies such absurdity.

Funnily enough, I get exactly that same urge whenever I see Fry and his talentless, tramp-biting chum Alan Davies haw-hawing at each other, drowning out better, funnier comedians on QI.
 
 
Billuccho!
02:24 / 17.06.10
Boy, you fellas are hard to please. I found Vincent & the Doctor to be an instant classic, a lovely character piece that left me a blubbering wreck by the end. Call it unsubtle if you want, but it was handled infinitely better than the Churchill episode, for instance. I'm a sucker for the celebrity historicals, though, so maybe that's it.

The Lodger was also a great bit of fun. I have no idea who James Corden is, never saw him before in my life, but I liked him fine here. The episode felt very much like a throwback to the RTD era-- all domesticity and romance. I expected filler fluff, and it may have been, but it was great filler fluff.

So yeah, the past two have pulled the series back up from the dull nadir of the Silurian double-header.
 
 
Mistoffelees
17:20 / 18.06.10
I found it weird how the museum guide correctly pronounced Van Gogh and for the rest of the episode the doctor says Van Goth.
 
 
Spatula Clarke
18:27 / 19.06.10
That was pretty good, right up until the point where the fucking Daleks appeared. Again.

Somebody explain to me how it is that the Daleks decide to imprison the Doctor in order to save reality, when at the end of series 4 they were all set on destroying reality themselves.

Rory's death and return make even less sense now. If he never existed, how come the Nestene dragged memories of him from Amy's subconscious? But then, if he never existed, who bought the ring that the Doctor left in the Tardis? And why did Amy go off with the Doctor in the first place? That whole idea has been a duffer since it was introduced, so it's probably best that they stick with "it's a miracle" as the answer, because no matter how unsatisfying it is, nothing else is going to be any better.

The other downer about the episode was the very last moment, where it just seemed to... stop. Like three seconds had been accidentally cut out.

Good stuff:

The atmosphere in the Underhenge set was fantastic (until the aliens rolled up, looking various dodgy shades of shiny and plasticy, and the lighting cheaped out to fit). It actually looked expensive and real, which is something that we've not often had from Who.

The Cyberman head was wonderfully creepy, with its Cthulhu tentacles. Bit of a shame it turned obvious with the skull moment.

I enjoyed it while watching it - up until the stupid Megaton moment that I'd not been expecting/wanting - but the more I think about it, the more unsure I am. The whole business with River ending up in Amy's house, finding the books - that had already been made explicit earlier in the episode, and the repetition was unnecessary.

Rory killing Amy, the Doctor being sealed away in a permanent prison, all the monsters working together (fucking stupid fanwank idea that it is), reality being destroyed... I don't think a reset button has ever been so clearly signposted before.

God, I hope I'm proved wrong. The only suggestion that it might be something better than that is the wrongness of Amy's life, as commented upon by the Doctor early in the episode. If that's not already been dealt with by the "a companion has been manipulated from the beginning to set a trap for you" stuff, that is.
 
 
Spatula Clarke
18:51 / 19.06.10
I seem to exist in a permanent state of disappointment at the moment, because, reading around, it looks like everybody else loved that episode.
 
 
Tom Coates
22:34 / 19.06.10
I thought it looked a bit cheap in places, and not all of it made total sense, and it wasn't as well acted as some of the others, but honestly, I thought it was really good. Sorry guys.
 
 
Kali, Queen of Kitteh
23:57 / 19.06.10
Aside from some dodgy moments for me, I liked it, enough where I'm madly curious as to how they are going to resolve this. I was pleased that I turned out to be a little right in that the most dangerous thing in the universe is The Doctor and he needs to be contained. I got it wrong where I was thought that jacketed Doctor was already in the Pandorica but it turns the alliance of Who enemies had conspired to put him there. I agree that all the monsters working together is a bit shit, though.
 
 
MattShepherd: I WEDDED KALI!
00:47 / 20.06.10
I'm afraid I am, in some respects, Bad At Doctor Who because I get confused by episodes like this one and the last, where

SPOILERS FOR DOCTOR WHO SEASON 5, EPISODE 12

the Doctor is somehow on the telephone with the TARDIS, but the TARDIS is SOMEWHERE ELSE IN TIME and it is somehow, still, imperative that the Doctor solve a problem in 1200 A.D. because it will affect whether or not the TARDIS explodes in 2010 A.D.

Is there some sort of "super-time" that underpins "regular time", or does the Doctor now have 900 or so years to work out how to get out of the Pandorica and wander on over to England to keep the TARDIS from exploding?

I can sort of get over the "fixed points in time," even though that also seems like a bit of a fuzzle, but the relatively recent (to my immediate recollection) business with people at split points in the timestream doing things that are IMMEDIATELY IMPORTANT to the other person -- in a direct-effect way, not a Bill and Ted "then we'll hide the key in the flowerpot" way -- are kind of messing me up.

I know it's all hand-wavey timey-wimey, but is there any canon explanation for this?
 
 
Billuccho!
02:23 / 20.06.10
Somebody explain to me how it is that the Daleks decide to imprison the Doctor in order to save reality, when at the end of series 4 they were all set on destroying reality themselves.

The Daleks themselves were not threatened in Journey's End-- everything but them was gonna die. Then they would be the only things left, which is, after all, their primary goal. This time, they're in danger too, and they don't like it.

And if that's not good enough, well, this is a different set of Daleks with a different agenda.

I know it's all hand-wavey timey-wimey, but is there any canon explanation for this?

Since the cracks are in all of time and space, and the Doctor believes the Tardis exploding is the thing that causes them, and all the big shit's going down at that particular moment, then I can believe it.

It's the same logic as in Parting of the Ways, with Rose insisting "It's happening now!" even though she's thousands of years away.
 
 
imaginary mice
09:18 / 20.06.10
I agree that all the monsters working together is a bit shit, though.

It's daft, yes, but I prefer it to having an entire episode devoted to each one of them. It's a neat compromise - keeps the "monster fans" happy, while those of us who are a bit tired of Daleks and Cybermen don't have to put with them for too long.

Loved the Cyberman head with its "tentacles" though.
 
 
Poke it with a stick
10:01 / 20.06.10
Whilst I loved it, the one thing that keeps me from swallowing the plot completely is this:

There was a Time War, right? All the Daleks and Timelords were wiped out, ok? And all these Timelords used their fabulous, fully-functional and powerful TARDISs* in this war, yes? So why the hell did the universe not go "kablooie!" back then?

If the TARDIS going up in smoke can cause all that devestation, presumably the same thing should have happened on a much greater scale (is that even possible?) before.

And there's the whole paradox Spatula mentioned about Rory's memory surviving his erasure to be copied by the Nestene.

*well, what is the plural for a fleet of TARDIS?

Having said all that - this is what Moffat is so good at doing - he makes you ask questions and then the answers come from a completely different direction and leave you mostly satisfied.
 
 
Triplets
10:12 / 21.06.10
I live some more!

Really liked the episode.

Trashtalking the alien fleet was suitably epic for a finale, even if it did feel a touch too much like an RTD episode. But it did bring itself back down with the offhand, "that'll keep 'em busy for half an hour!".

Good bits:

Amy's being happy, and crying, and not knowing why was seriously creepy from her perspective.

The episode suddenly switching gears from alien invasion story to invasion of the bodysnatchers was brill. Complete with the mention of psychic ghosts, ambulatory cyberheads, living dead boyfriends, etc it was like a train ride on the horror line.

The Pandorica as anti-Tardis (confining, containing, inescapable) was nasty. Could have been more Giger/Saw-esque to amp up the horribleness but oh well.

The Doctor's manically scared rant at the beginning was hilarious, "They'll never expect three people to attack twelve-thousand warships, so we'll have the element of suprise. Of course it'll be a... very short suprise. Aaaah!". Smith is consistently the best thing on this show, which is how it should be.
 
 
Triplets
10:30 / 21.06.10
Also, River Song's bargaining with the space trader at the beginning was ace. It felt like something out of Indiana Jones, pulp with a sci-fi gloss. I'm a sucker for shit like that.
 
 
Evil Scientist
10:34 / 21.06.10
Watching it the first time around I was really wound up by, what appeared to be, yet another "Doctor backs off alien invaders/warfleet by shouting about how he's beaten them before".

It just seemed stupid given the overwhelming force.

But, of course, it's all a big bluff to lure the Doctor in. Which is what I have liked about this season so far, the frequent challenging of New Who staples (don't question why Rory's back it's just another of those amazing things that makes the universe so amazing... whoops, perhaps you ought to have looked a little closer).

Not too sure about some of the species involved in the alliance but given that they're from all across time/space I suppose I can allow for beings such as the Silurians being present.

Poor old Daleks. Their first chance to save the universe and they cock it up.
 
 
Evil Scientist
10:43 / 21.06.10
There was a Time War, right? All the Daleks and Timelords were wiped out, ok? And all these Timelords used their fabulous, fully-functional and powerful TARDISs* in this war, yes? So why the hell did the universe not go "kablooie!" back then?

Timey-wimey wibbly-wobbly.

Or, fanwanking, the technologies used by both sides in the war prevented tactical armageddons as no-one wins if the sandbox is incinerated.

With the Doctor possessing the sole remaining TARDIS there's no-one powerful enough to stop the explosion.

Of course that assumes that even the "New Paradigm" Daleks lack access to all the technologies the empire possessed during the Time War.
 
 
Spatula Clarke
17:45 / 21.06.10
There's also the manner in which the Tardis is exploding - from the inside, out.

Suggestions on other boards that Amy's house is a Tardis, hence the 'too many rooms'. Perception filters are definitely going to have a part ot play in this, given the regularity with which they've popped up this series. There's also a comparison doing the rounds of the staircase in Amy's house and that of last week, with the time machine in the non-existent first floor. I'll se if I can find the screen grabs. The one from Amy's house looked like the staircase went all the way up to the ceiling, but I'm not convinced that it wasn't just a result of the angle and lens type on the camera.

The mystery voice sounds worryingly like Davros. The only other realistic possibility right now is th Dreamlord bloke from Amy's Choice, because one episode isn't enough to suddenly throw a new enemy into the mix.
 
 
Spatula Clarke
19:45 / 21.06.10


 
 
Dead Megatron
22:31 / 21.06.10
Wouldn't it be cool if the real villain/threat turned out to be Amy, even though she may not know/remember it herself yet?
 
 
Mistoffelees
07:28 / 22.06.10
Very nice blog post about the fairytale/dreams theme this season: link

501 Young woman goes on an adventure with her imaginary friend in her nightie, telling her not to grow up (Peter Pan).

503 Victory of the Daleks: A fake man turns human thanks to having emotions (Pinocchio).

504/5 Time of the Angels/Flesh & Stone: Amy Pond, dressed in a red hoody is chased by something evil through a forest. The Pandorica is a fairytale. River: Aren't we all?

etc.
 
 
Dead Megatron
20:18 / 22.06.10
Ooops!
 
  

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