New Doctor Who

[Jazzy G]

I really enjoyed it. Felt a bit like something Steven Moffat might write in places. The doppelgangers and the mystery was great. I agree that the Fourteenth Doctor is very different from the Tenth, but then he's also hundreds of years older than the Tenth, and has been through a lot, plus Donna was Tennant's best companion by a country mile because neither of them was trying to bang the other one. I prefer Fourteen to Ten, but Matt Smith's Eleventh Doctor is my Doctor.

There was so much love between David Tennant and Bernard Cribbins at the end as well. I almost wonder whether neither of them knew the other would be there before that scene was shot.

The image of Ncuti Gatwa in the trailer for next week was a heck of an image. I'm really looking forward to seeing what his Doctor is like. I hope we don't have to wait until the very end of the episode to see him. 

I watched the Mind Robber Tales Of The TARDIS. it's one of The earliest stories I remember seeing when they were repeating some of them on BBC 2 during an anniversary year. I want to say 30th because I remember watching it in my gran's back room in her tiny telly, then firing up my Amiga to play some Street Fighter II. Anyway, this and The Three Doctors is probably the best job they've done of editing these longer serials down to the ninety minutes or so they do to allow for the little intro/outro stuff they wrap around it. Time Meddler next. That'll be a good one. 

 

[BomberPat]

I liked the Star Beast - I was never a big fan of RTD as a showrunner, but he could do these little domestic slice of life bits where mundanity intersects with the Doctor's world probably better than anyone, and he's now managed to get another tearjerker out of David Tennant and Bernard Cribbins, the bastard.

The resolution of the Doctor/Donna thing felt much more like the third act RTD that made me sour on a lot of his writing, just taking what had been an all-consuming problem and handwaving it away with a magical solution that nobody had thought of before now, but that's Doctor Who in a nutshell, no point getting annoyed by that at this stage. I'm not sure if they tried to imply that Rose being non-binary was because she was part-Doctor and part-Donna, which feels extremely problematic, or if the suggestion was that Rose being non-binary gave them some insight into who she was that allowed them to more effectively split the Doctor/Donna powers, which is clunky and woolly, but marginally less dodgy writing.

I also wonder if it's going to turn out that Rose chose that name because they possess some of the Doctor's memories or some nonsense like that. 

 

I was actually slightly less keen on the second episode, maybe because it lacked those more personable moments that RTD is actually really good at, and was a more straight sci-fi mystery. Not bad by any stretch of the imagination, but the thing with Doctor Who mysteries is that you know it's never going to be something you could have figured out on your own, because they never give you all the information required to figure it out, so it sometimes feel like you're just sitting around waiting for the Doctor to say, "well of course, this species of alien you've never seen before is actually a Farblefrox from the Dickhead Nebula, and they're deathly allergic to the colour green, it's all so obvious!". This one wasn't quite that bad, but I still didn't find the resolution half as interesting as the set-up, which was a decent enough sci-fi premise.

[JNLister]

What if the role had always been played by females: https://scifind.com/the-other-11-doctors/

[Jazzy G]

That's a really good article with some really well thought out choices.. I wonder whether in that universe Michelle Gomez and Peter Capaldi would still find themselves cast opposite each other as the 12th Doctor and a gender-swapped Mistress. Maybe Tennant would get cast as 13.

[CharlesTuckerTheThird]

8 hours ago, Vamp said:

the Doctor is bisexual (well, as far as humanity understands it)

My headcanon, for all it's worth, is that since Regeneration is a completely random process, labels like "gay" "bisexual" etc etc just don't matter to Time Lords since they never know what they'll end up with. What was it Jack Harkness said? "You people and your quaint little categories...."

[Vamp]

15 hours ago, CharlesTuckerTheThird said:

My headcanon, for all it's worth, is that since Regeneration is a completely random process, labels like "gay" "bisexual" etc etc just don't matter to Time Lords since they never know what they'll end up with. What was it Jack Harkness said? "You people and your quaint little categories...."

Oh definitely. If gender is as fluid as ot is in Time Lord society than sexuality must be as well.

I remember having arguments with a friend who was adamant the Doctor shouldn't be played by a woman because he'd been in love with Rose. She was okay with the idea of an interspecies relationship with hundreds of years as an age gap but not with the idea that the Doctor's gender and sexuality might be fluid. Bizarre.

[Chris B]

19 hours ago, JNLister said:

What if the role had always been played by females: https://scifind.com/the-other-11-doctors/

Written by an old friend of mine - Al's awesome, and was a big wrestling fan back in the day too.

[Factotum]

Personally I could do without the Doctor being in any way sexualised or fancying people.  It was one of my annoyances with RTD era. I don't care about him being in love. They even foisted in Jodie's tenure. Can we just do away with it? The only 'Doctor in Love' story they ever got right was The Girl In The Fireplace. Absolutely perfect. That's all you need.

I can really do with never seeing Catherine Tate shouting on my screen again as well.

 

Edited December 5, 2023 by Factotum

[CharlesTuckerTheThird]

Thoughts on The Giggle, contains spoilers:

Spoiler

+++Neil Patrick Harris. I thought he was absolutely brilliant as The Toymaker. 

+More jabs at angry neckbeards. A personal plus to me, but still a plus.

+Oh hi Mel! Nice to see you!

+References to The Master/Saxon Master.

+Nice to see NewWho continuing to make innocuous songs *fucking terrifying*. First Rasputin by Boney M now Spice Up Your Life by The Spice Girls.

+Donna's "negotiation" with Kate. Hilarious.

-NewWho making innocuous songs terrifying so now I look like a weirdo when I start having Vietnam-style flashbacks over hearing these songs.

-Ncuti Gatwa was great but the story either needed more of him, or have The Doctor regenerate at the end and let him take over at the Christmas Special.

-Needed more Mel. It was great to see her, but personally I'd have liked to have seen more.

-Might just be me, but there were points I had to rewind because I was struggling to keep up with what was going on. I know that was sort of the point, Celestial Toymaker, intricate games etc etc but I can't imagine Jolene and Cletus, Average TV Watcher doing that for the sake of Doctor Who.

I'm going to put this point as both + and - because I'm not entirely sold on it, but Bigeneration. It's an interesting idea, BUT it does seem like RTD saying "In case of series tanking, break glass and get a free David Tennant."

All in all, I give it 3.9 Dr Owen Harpers out of 5

 

[Hannibal Scorch]

As my wife was a fan of Ncuti Gatwa on Sex Education she chose to start watching Dr Who with these specials which we watched with my daughter as her first introduction to Who. I stopped during the 10th run due to not being around when it was on live. 
 

We have thoroughly enjoyed the 3 specials. I was quite surprised how and why we got our new Doctor but I actually think it was really well done and thought a really great introduction into 15. Seeing the trailer for the Christmas special has certainly kept my interest up on it. I’m also glad the reaction has mostly been positive with the racist comments in the minority.

[Jazzy G]

I enjoyed it. I love the energy Ncuti Gatwa brings to his Doctor, and look forward to seeing him in the Christmas special. I'm on my phone at the moment, but when I'm on the laptop and can do spoiler tags properly I'll post more thoughts about the specifics of the episode. 

[ReturnOfTheMack]

Spoiler

So according to RTD the bigeneration echoes through time and resurrects the past Doctors where they died. 

 

https://www.doctorwhotv.co.uk/rtd-suggests-bigeneration-affected-every-doctor-creating-a-doctorverse-99917.htm

 

Edited December 10, 2023 by ReturnOfTheMack

[Jazzy G]

OK, here comes some Spoilery bits:

Spoiler

The "Bi-generation" was a little surprising, but it was good to see two Doctors interact with each other like this. I loved the chemistry they had, and how quickly he was accepted by Donna & Mel.

I do worry that this is some kind of "In case of rating drop deploy Tennant" shadow now hanging over the series, but I also feel like the reason they did this was so RTD could give Tennant's Doctor a "happy ending" and bring the curtain down on the previous iteration of Doctor Who, just like how this era of Doctor Who has its own section in the "Whoniverse" on the iPlayer. Several places have suggested his comments about every other Doctor now suddenly existing in the same way was a little tongue in cheek, although it would be another good explanation of how the Tom Baker Curator turned up in Day Of The Doctor. I guess it does free up chances for them to do animated things with the other Doctors, and kind of explains how we can now have Davison, Tom Baker, and Sylvester McCoy turning up in the Tales Of The TARDIS episodes. Also leaves the door open for Paul McGann to finally get a few episodes.

NPH was brilliant as the Toymaker, although his accent did wear a little thin at times. The "villain dances to a pop song while they do evil things" is starting to get a little routine, but is usually well-done.

Rumours now abound that Jynkx Monsoon's hand may have been the one picking up the gold tooth, leading to a possible return of the Master?

 

[andrew "the ref" coyne]

On 12/6/2023 at 1:50 AM, Factotum said:

Personally I could do without the Doctor being in any way sexualised or fancying people.  It was one of my annoyances with RTD era. I don't care about him being in love. They even foisted in Jodie's tenure. Can we just do away with it? The only 'Doctor in Love' story they ever got right was The Girl In The Fireplace. Absolutely perfect. That's all you need.

I can really do with never seeing Catherine Tate shouting on my screen again as well.

 

The irony of your post is that Catherine Tate, who in my opinion was fantastic, did so much to move the role of the companion away from the romantic love interest. She was nagging him like a mother fucker and made a great and different dynamic.

[andrew "the ref" coyne]

4 hours ago, jazzygeofferz said:

 

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The "Bi-generation" was a little surprising, but it was good to see two Doctors interact with each other like this. I loved the chemistry they had, and how quickly he was accepted by Donna & Mel.

I do worry that this is some kind of "In case of rating drop deploy Tennant" shadow now hanging over the series, but I also feel like the reason they did this was so RTD could give Tennant's Doctor a "happy ending" and bring the curtain down on the previous iteration of Doctor Who,

So wait... does this not mean there is a core Doctor Who and TWO David Tennants running around? Wasn't he cloned so he could run off and shack up with Rose or something?