The Dr Who thread

[pogo]

Definitely the best. In some ways it’s equalled by Moffat’s earlier episodes, as highly original and full of ideas. But it goes places no other episode has before or since with an anthropomorphised Tardis and a sentient planet which turns out to be one of the scariest enemies seen ever. Plus it’s lifted above the norm by the performances of Smith and (especially) Jones. Of course it helps she has all the best lines to work with. Even the setting is very effective, despite clearly being done on a standard episode budget.

“Nightmare in Silver” isn’t at the same level but it’s still an original and action packed episode. And it made the Cybermen scary, something Moffat only managed with the disembodied head in the Pandorica episodes.

[Darkflame]

Problem with Nightmare in Silver was it made them uncomfortably close to Borg, which already where uncomfortably close to cyberman to start with.
Not that I wouldn't watch it, mind you.

Perhaps its easier to make an "avoid" list ?

The Power of Three?
In the Forest of the Night?

Else if we are doing a positive list of Moffat, its going to be essentially first and last episodes of each season (double when appropriate), as that's most of the continuity stuff. A few mid-season ones too.
Also even in terms of just quality the first epps of the season are often the best.

As for RTDs stuff. Its sort of the opposite. The middle of the season often being better then the starts and ends.

[Istar]

Michelle Gomez confirmed for DW Series 9. Which means she's not dead, and therefore my theory about Last Christmas holds true (i.e. everything from the beginning of Dark Water was a Dream Crab hallucination).

[pogo]

Michelle Gomez confirmed for DW Series 9. Which means she's not dead, and therefore my theory about Last Christmas holds true (i.e. everything from the beginning of Dark Water was a Dream Crab hallucination).

No, Moffat has already said how they’ll explain it: they won’t. It was an interview a few weeks ago so I don’t have a link but he essentially said that in the past the Master had repeatedly been emphatically killed off only to re-appear without explanation, so he felt free to do the same.

[pogo]

Series 9 and the first episode “ The Magician’s Apprentice” according to Facebook. Here she is announcing her return:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02kbm8s

[Darkflame]

Michelle Gomez confirmed for DW Series 9. Which means she's not dead, and therefore my theory about Last Christmas holds true (i.e. everything from the beginning of Dark Water was a Dream Crab hallucination).

No, Moffat has already said how they’ll explain it: they won’t. It was an interview a few weeks ago so I don’t have a link but he essentially said that in the past the Master had repeatedly been emphatically killed off only to re-appear without explanation, so he felt free to do the same.

Disappointing. Just because its done before doesn't mean its a good thing.

[F-ZeroOne]

Remind me again, are we or are we not talking about Steven "Pants On Fire" Moffat here, who has never previously been known to tweak, goad or on very rare occasions just flat-out lie to the fandom...?

[Cloudane]

The only thing predictable about that Moffat chap is his unpredictability!

Bit OT in context with the conversation but just to continue the occasional remark about watching the classics: Charming little tale from the Third about his childhood in The Time Monster, liked that a lot.

Spoiler: show

Very true to him to ask for the Master to be let go, too. He's a much better man than most, much to his undoing..

As for The Three Doctors so far

Spoiler: show

It took me a while to really warm to Jo Grant and I'm really getting there now. That went for Liz Shaw as well, which must mean she's leaving soon :p Just liking how at this point she's managing to translate the Doctor's technobabble for the Brig. Considering Jo started out dumb as a doorstop (reading about how they wrote out Liz so they could have a less intelligent companion didn't help me to warm to the introduction of Jo initially) she's developed well.

Incidentally I like how the Brig always has that massive smirk when he's complaining about the Doc.

"You've redecorated! I don't like it..." - hehe I had no idea this was a running gag from so early. It's funny seeing references in reverse so often, almost as if the classic series is referencing the modern one.

[Cloudane]

Fans of Katy Manning (Jo Grant) should tune in to Casualty tomorrow! https://twitter.com/DoctorWhoNews/statu ... 1582166016

[pogo]

Disappointing. Just because its done before doesn't mean its a good thing.

Infinitely better than the “it was all a dream” cop-out. You can see why other shows do it, when they crawl so far up their own arse in inconsistencies, loose ends, actor problems and want to start over with a cleanish slate. But it’s never needed on Dr. Who, where any such problems can be handily solved by timey wimey.

Want to kill off an actor without actually killing them off? Have them vanish from all time so no-one remembers them (Rory into the Crack of Doom), or have them vanish off into a parallel dimension (Rose), or have them forget everything to save the universe (Donna). And of course The Doctor can travel in time and space to escape stale plotting, or go back in time and change history to eliminate unwanted plotlines.

[Darkflame]

Disappointing. Just because its done before doesn't mean its a good thing.

Infinitely better than the “it was all a dream” cop-out. You can see why other shows do it, when they crawl so far up their own arse in inconsistencies, loose ends, actor problems and want to start over with a cleanish slate. But it’s never needed on Dr. Who, where any such problems can be handily solved by timey wimey.

Want to kill off an actor without actually killing them off? Have them vanish from all time so no-one remembers them (Rory into the Crack of Doom), or have them vanish off into a parallel dimension (Rose), or have them forget everything to save the universe (Donna). And of course The Doctor can travel in time and space to escape stale plotting, or go back in time and change history to eliminate unwanted plotlines.

Well, "it was all a dream' is the king of all cop-outs if its used to just get around a cheap death. Ye old "Classic Dalas" move.
I can accept it when the whole episode is based around a dream of some sort though. sometimes.

As you say, a show like Dr Who has lots of options.
You shouldn't ever just "give up" though else you devalue death too much. Even if it isn't necessarily permanent you gotta make it feel like it is to the audience.

[Little stoned kiwi]

Kinda bored of the 'this changes everything' moments that get undone and it all goes back to the same pretentious style of writing.

[Harlequin]

I thought it fairly obvious that Missy teleported when the Brig apparently shot her. Why would Cyberman blasts be the same colour as her teleport aura?

[Governmentyard]

Why wouldn't they?

I hope this next series doesn't have some entity or organisation plotting in the background all the way through. Ain't nobody got time for that. If there needs to be a grand peril at the end, let's have it build up in plain sight, without a governing evil entity jumping out like a pantomime baddie at the end of the penultimate episode. It worked the first couple of times Davies did it, and the Pandorica was a fun kitchen-sink riff on that, I suppose. But let's have well-meaning people end up causing the final double-parter to be about catastrophe-aversion for reasons that are shown and developed as the series progresses.

Of course, that might require Moffat to use abilities he does not have, such as developing a Who plot tangibly and without straining the internal credulity of the show, over more than a couple of episodes.

The final two-parters usually have a VERY complex situation, with a very simple explanation, which can usually be boiled down to "Davros/Master/Whogivesashit is completely irrational".

I want Who to show me the good intentions on the road to hell. I feel as if it has been trying to do so in a cack-handed, indirect way for some time.

"Am I a good man, Clara?" *proceeds to save all of time, space and reality. Again*

I think what I'm saying is that rather than having monsters-of-the-week where there's no actual evil, just people trying to get by and shit happening, as shit does... we should have such a setup for the 'big bad'. Princess Mononoke in space. For the series arc. If only they could get hold of Mononoke translator Neil Gaiman, who is really good at this sort of thing....

[Darkflame]

While I agree absolutely "good intentions results in bad results" should be done (and not just in Who).

Not really seeing a last-minute-bad-guy in Season 6 or 7. The River/Melody/Lets-make-a-doctor-killler stuff was pretty evenly spread all over them. Clara was a mystery till Name but not exactly a background manipulation thing.

Season 8 does fit the pattern, at least from the audience perspective (unlike the other seasons the dead/cyberman plot was pretty totally hidden from the characters but visible to the audience).

The final two-parters usually have a VERY complex situation, with a very simple explanation, which can usually be boiled down to "Davros/Master/Whogivesashit is completely irrational".

Could be explained better, but it seems fairly rational wanting to either lock away or kill the Doctor given how much of a big show off he became in season5. I thought that was the whole point of his arc really.

Now, arguably they are still all ignoring the fact given how often he saves not just earth but the universe. But villains being arrogant is a very hard to shift cliche.