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Doctor Who... Page 590

I wasn't going to comment on the last story but I have been asked to in a PM and I can't say no to a lady (even though she's no lady).

The first part was exciting and was at least in the area of where the show should be in my view. The Roman soldier addressing the doctor as Caesar with hallucinogenic lipstick on his face is the sort of unpredictable and exciting writing that would satisfy most fans of the show I think - including me. Things got more shaky when all the baddies turned up, and the second part for me was a fairly neat summary of what the show SHOULDN'T BE.

We started our comments on season 32 complaining about the overuse of the Sonic screwdriver. We end the season with it saving the universe. There are so many reasons why this shouldn't happen that I won't go into them, but surely wherever possible the Doctor should show ingenuity and creativity in problem solving, not rely on a single mechanical gadget.

We learned this season that the Doctor has the power of telepathy. By headbutting men and holding women's heads in his hands he can project his thoughts into their mind. Good idea, no? That's right no. It's super lame and should not have happened once let alone twice.

If you're involved in making Doctor Who, sooner or later you come up against the realisation that other people have made the show work before you did and this should promote humility and thoughtfulness. Unfortunately this hasn't happened with the current production team. Moffat is capable of creating an arresting image, and writing thrilling and unpredictable scenes but he can't do it all by himself. There is often a 'borrowed' quality to his ideas (where they are not just nicked) and he still struggles too often with convincing dialogue for the doctor. (The 'I've got chills' section from the girl in the fireplace still makes me cringe).

I watched two extra stories this year for the first time - The Girl in the Fireplace and Midnight. In my opinion nothing this season has been as good as Midnight - flawed though it was. The Eleventh Doctor would cross the tape if it wasn't a retread of the relativity idea used in the Girl in the Fireplace. The Weeping Angels story added little new and it's strongest element - the scene where the Angel comes out of the video image - though brilliant - is basically a straight steal from the Ring. Moreover this episode features some of the first use of 'magic' in Who when the Doctor quotes from a book that 'whatever takes the image of an Angel becomes an Angel...' Since when was an image of anything the thing itself? Early bollocks from Moffat.

The show has not ended well. The Riversong story is being kept back for the next series - or a special. Wherever Song appears Amy disappears - He clearly can't be bothered to write well for her when he can give dialogue to a more interesting and unpredictable character. Rory is now back with Amy. This is nothing other than an obvious and unnecessary mistake. Previous producers have learned that male companions always have to be written out as they get in the way of the Doctor. Especially when the Doctor is young and dynamic. To ignore their experience is pointless.

On the positives, we have the 'perfect' casting of the new leads. It's not a small thing, but it's not enough, and there is a big minus in the new titles and theme arrangement, which is hugely misjudged.

What next? Moffat back on one story a season - new writers - and old writers - why not? Dicks, Boucher - and Hinchcliffe - get him advising on the show. He's its best living producer and he only had three years.

Quote: Godot Taxis @ July 2 2010, 1:57 AM BST

There is often a 'borrowed' quality to his ideas (where they are not just nicked)

Hasn't Who always nicked stories and ideas and filtered them through the show? Yes, even in Tom Bakers pomp.

Quote: Godot Taxis @ July 2 2010, 1:57 AM BST

If you're involved in making Doctor Who, sooner or later you come up against the realisation that other people have made the show work before you did and this should promote humility and thoughtfulness. Unfortunately this hasn't happened with the current production team.

This I just don't get. They're not being 'thoughtless' or showing a lack of 'humility', they're just trying to make a TV show as best they can.

This series was overall a bit of a dissapointment, there were far too many middling stories.

Quote: Godot Taxis @ July 2 2010, 1:57 AM BST

We learned this season that the Doctor has the power of telepathy.

Wherever Song appears Amy disappears.

I seem to remember some kind of hypnotism mind control in the Tom Baker incarnation and with the Delgado Master as well.

When you block a River it forms a Pond.

Quote: Marc P @ July 2 2010, 9:36 AM BST

I seem to remember some kind of hypnotism mind control in the Tom Baker incarnation and with the Delgado Master as well.

I think McCoy did a bit of mind controlly stuff in one episode too, though I may be mistaken. But I wasn't keen on the 'headbutt and you have my memories' thing either, it seems it was there mainly because they thought it would be a funny and quick way of making the Corden character understand.

I believe it is called the Vulcan Mind Meld.

Quote: Godot Taxis @ July 2 2010, 1:57 AM BST

We learned this season that the Doctor has the power of telepathy. By headbutting men and holding women's heads in his hands he can project his thoughts into their mind.

Moffat had set this precedent in his earlier 'The Girl in the Fireplace' in which he has a mini mind meld with Madame de Pompadour...

Quote: Godot Taxis @ July 2 2010, 1:57 AM BST

We started our comments on season 32 complaining about the overuse of the Sonic screwdriver. We end the season with it saving the universe. There are so many reasons why this shouldn't happen that I won't go into them, but surely wherever possible the Doctor should show ingenuity and creativity in problem solving, not rely on a single mechanical gadget.

Yes. This would be my biggest bugbear of the series. Sloppy and lazy storytelling. Again I refer back to Annie Wilkes in Misery when she's talking about how bad it is to cheat audiences:

"My favourite was Rocketman, and once it was a no breaks chapter. The bad guy stuck him in a car on a mountain road and knocked him out and welded the door shut and tore out the brakes and started him to his death, and he woke up and tried to steer and tried to get out but the car went off a cliff before he could escape! And it crashed and burned and I was so upset and excited, and the next week, you better believe I was first in line. And they always start with the end of the last week. And there was Rocketman, trying to get out, and here comes the cliff, and just before the car went off the cliff, he jumped free! And all the kids cheered! But I didn't cheer. I stood right up and started shouting. This isn't what happened last week! Have you all got amnesia? They just cheated us! This isn't fair! HE DID'NT GET OUT OF THE COCK - A - DOODIE CAR!"

That's how I feel about the last episode. Cheated.

Quote: Godot Taxis @ July 2 2010, 1:57 AM BST

Rory is now back with Amy. This is nothing other than an obvious and unnecessary mistake. Previous producers have learned that male companions always have to be written out as they get in the way of the Doctor. Especially when the Doctor is young and dynamic. To ignore their experience is pointless.

I agree that bringing Rory back was a mistake. He's a bit of a drip and brings with him no inherent conflict or drama. They pretty much went as far as they could go with all three of them together in the Venice Vampire episode.

Quote: chipolata @ July 2 2010, 9:54 AM BST

That's how I feel about the last episode. Cheated.

Interested you feel cheated. I mean, it seemed like it was set up during the series that something like that last episode was going to happen; rewriting time (They said it enough times) and travelling into his own timestream (everyone had realised they saw two different Doctors in the Angels story) and the whole 'if it can be remebered, it can come back' and 'nothing is truely forgotton' stuff was pepeered throughout, too. So Moffat at least did set up the stuff some people ended up not liking.

Quote: Matthew Stott @ July 2 2010, 9:58 AM BST

Interested you feel cheated. I mean, it seemed like it was set up during the series that something like that last episode was going to happen; rewriting time (They said it enough times) and travelling into his own timestream (everyone had realised they saw two different Doctors in the Angels story).

They didn't put in the spadework earlier in the series. To me, at least, they seemed to just pluck solutions to problems out of thin air.

As for the two Doctor's in the Angels episode... Meh!
It struck me as a lazy gimmick, and no substitute for rigorous storytelling.

Quote: chipolata @ July 2 2010, 10:02 AM BST

They didn't put in the spadework earlier in the series. To me, at least, they seemed to just pluck solutions to problems out of thin air.

Well, like I say, it was peppered throughout the series, as far as I can see.

Quote: chipolata @ July 2 2010, 10:02 AM BST

As for the two Doctor's in the Angels episode... Meh!
It struck me as a lazy gimmick, and no substitute for rigorous storytelling.

Really?! By Jove! To me it seems like the work of someone who had really thought through the whole storyline. It was a glimpse at the end of the story half way through the series. I have no idea what was lazy about it. It showed that Moffat wasn't just pulling something out of the hat in the last episode, he'd thought through his whole arc and filtered it through the series.

Quote: chipolata @ July 2 2010, 9:57 AM BST

I agree that bringing Rory back was a mistake.

Rory has already died twice, and is set to die in every other episode of the new season in the BBC's homage to South Park...

DOCTOR:- Oh my God... we've killed Rory!

Quote: Matthew Stott @ July 2 2010, 10:03 AM BST

Well, like I say, it was peppered throughout the series, as far as I can see.

Really? By Jove, how odd!

I think there were two major parts to Saturday's story.

Firstly, there was how he saved the universe by kickstarting a new big bang. That was the meatier and more important story, and the one I thought was weakest, what with the over reliance on the sonic screwdriver, the flying pandorica and over reliance on the oh-so convenient temporal displacement device. Not to mention niggling questions about how the Earth hung on for 2000 years etc.

Then you had the second storyline about how the Doctor saved himself. That was okay, and had echoes I thought of Charlie Kaufman's Eternal Sunshine of The Spotless Mind. As I say it wasn't bad, and it was nice seeing him whiz through a few old episodes, but it was just the postscript to the whole story. And since you always knew Amy would remember it wasn't exactly high on suspense or drama.

Quote: Gagsy @ July 2 2010, 10:11 AM BST

DOCTOR:- Oh my God... we've killed Rory!

:D

Quote: Matthew Stott @ July 2 2010, 10:06 AM BST

To me it seems like the work of someone who had really thought through the whole storyline. It was a glimpse at the end of the story half way through the series. I have no idea what was lazy about it. It showed that Moffat wasn't just pulling something out of the hat in the last episode, he'd thought through his whole arc and filtered it through the series.

No, because there's a difference between chucking in a few clues throughout the series and actually laying the foundations for an ingenious escape. I think we'll have to differ on this point, Stott.

Quote: Matthew Stott @ July 2 2010, 10:06 AM BST

Really?! By Jove! To me it seems like the work of someone who had really thought through the whole storyline. It was a glimpse at the end of the story half way through the series. I have no idea what was lazy about it. It showed that Moffat wasn't just pulling something out of the hat in the last episode, he'd thought through his whole arc and filtered it through the series.

I really thought that bit was brilliant.

But did it work? The whole how the Doctor came back seems woolly to me. Did Amy remember because of the Doc popping up, or did she remember because Riversong gave her the book... in which case, how did Riversong remember since the Doctor was supposed to have been wiped from existence. :S

Well to me, I'd forgotten that had even happened, but as soon as they showed it in the final episode I remembered. I just found it a really clever call back. Something I subconsciously knew all along had happened but had no idea was important until the end, it had been waiting there all that time for me to discover it. It gave me chills, and that has not happened much AT ALL in this series.

(Of course that doesn't work for a lot of people who discussed that bit at length and suspected it would be mentioned again - which I didn't at all.)

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