The Dr Who thread

[Col]

Yes. Worse than Bonnie Langford. I'm not sure how she did it, but she did.

*edit*

Then again... I think the fact that she was called "Ace" was irritant enough. There was a reason why Arnold Rimmer nicknamed himself "Ace". It's because anyone who calls themselves Ace is intrinsically a bit like Arnold Rimmer...

Good ol' Iron Balls

[Harlequin]

'Fear Her' Vs 'The Idiots Lantern'
Decent child Actor: The Idiots Lantern WINS!

Were there any child actors in TIL? If you're referring to Rory Jennings, who played Tommy Connolly, he's twice Abisola Agbaje's age (Jennings being 23 next month)

Bruce Campbell can have my babies!

Extraordinary! Thanks for the information. I never knew that about him

I really hated that episode of Doctor Who, and although i do like Sci-Fi, i find most of it complete rubbish to watch, so that is my problem, it's the same with books. I don't look down on anyone who likes something that i don't like, say if someone made me a NCoT and i was presented with a cup of Coffee, i hate Coffee, and even though it tastes like shit and makes your breath stink, i know a lot of people that do like it, and that's cool, but i still won't drink it!

That's why I was curious about your reasons (despite knowing how difficult it is to express personal taste and feelings in 'rational' text). Our opinions here are, after all, merely personal reactions.

Opinions this year seem more divided than last season for some reason. Most of my friends, at least one of which isn't a Llamasoftie, think that there have been fewer good stories this year but they've disagreed as to which episodes they perceived as the 'best' and 'worst'. Even after The Impossible Planet one mate thinks that nothing has topped School Reunion while The Girl in the Fireplace was weak and unimpressive. Personally, I think that Love and Monsters will be the episode I'll most rewatch.

Each to their own lack of accounting for the tastes of all types of different strokes, as it were. Let's just not forget to have fun

BTW: I didn't see

Mickey and Pete Tyler

in it.

That spoiler is indeed present in the trailer. I've just seen it on the OG forums.

I've already posted a link in this thread to the relevant screencap

I've been struggling to put my finger on it for quite a while now, and I've just been putting it down to me being a grown-up, watching a show designed to have the children hiding behind the sofa, but it isn't, is it?

Yes it is, judging from the responses of the 'Fear Factor' children who review the episodes and testimony of some of us here with little people

[...] I don't recall any point in New Who thus far when the main characters actually looked scared. I mean really, mortally, in fear for their continued existence, scared.

Rose has been adopting the Doctor's attitude more strongly throughout the season and has learned to laugh equally in the face of death. The Doctor is rarely frightened; the screams traditionally come from his companions. He seemed scared for a bit in The Satan Pit, however, and I suspect we'll see plenty of both fear and sorrow from both of them in the finale.

I know the Doctor knows a lot of What's Going On, but he can't know his future enough to know he'll definitely be in next week's episode. And yet he acts as if everything else in the universe is a fluffy, cuddly toy, to bend over and look at and say "Aren't you beautiful!" at, where any sensible person would wet themselves or run off. Or both.

That's the Doctor for you. Last year he was finding almost every potentially fatal situation "fantastic". He's an alien, you know


H.
_________________
"Any clod can have the facts - having opinions is an art."
[Unknown]

[DutchLlama]

Yes. Worse than Bonnie Langford. I'm not sure how she did it, but she did.

*edit*

Then again... I think the fact that she was called "Ace" was irritant enough. There was a reason why Arnold Rimmer nicknamed himself "Ace". It's because anyone who calls themselves Ace is intrinsically a bit like Arnold Rimmer...

Well Ace was the cool version of Rimmer, don't you remember?

And I have to disagree, Ace wasn't that bad even though she did have the very worst dress sence of all Dr. Who companions (BTW I'm not equally as fond of the outfits which Rose Tyler wears in some episodes).

I got back into watching Doctor Who in 1988 when we got the BBC on cable in our rural town. Hence I missed everything from the Davidson era until the McCoy era (which was on at the time). And I also missed McCoys first season which was terrible I've heard, with him acting like a clown (I wonder why Ace didn't hate him for that as she said she that she hated clowns in the serial about the circus).

By the time I started watching the McCoy stories were steadily improving and they weren't as bad as many people say (e.g. I don't see how Ghostlight or The Curse of Fenric could be seen as bad serials).

So maybe I'm a bit biased maybe because back then I was thrilled at seeing Doctor Who back on the screen after having missed it for 5 years (the Davidson era was briefly shown on Dutch TV in the early '80s). I still think the last season was rather good and then sadly it got cancelled and apart from the naff TV movie it took 16 years for the Doctor to return to my screen.

And like McCoy started playing the part more seriously Ace also got beyond the spunky rebellious teen routine in some episodes and Sophie Aldred showed that she could actually act (a bit) as there was much more depth in her character than say Jo Grant's.

So flame on if you must, I kinda like Ace even though her fashion consultant (the late '80s especially were really terrible for fashion, I wonder we didn't all end up wearing Mao suits out of disgust after that, well we did get the grunge period which can be seen as a similar response. ) should be the first to be put against the wall when the revolution comes.

BTW: Sophie Aldred also co-wrote a great book (called Ace!) about her experiences on Doctor Who, which I picked up at a second hand bookstore about a decade ago.

[Governmentyard]

[(BTW I'm not equally as fond of the outfits which Rose Tyler wears in some episodes).

Yes, she should take them off really.

[Firefox]

But... but... Ace was all plucky, with the blowing up of things with her homebrew explosives, and the battering of Daleks with her souped-up baseball bat!

And yet also rather...

[Spirit]

But... but... Ace was all plucky, with the blowing up of things with her homebrew explosives, and the battering of Daleks with her souped-up baseball bat!

And yet also rather...

She was one of my childhood crushes

[Kelloggs]

I've been struggling to put my finger on it for quite a while now, and I've just been putting it down to me being a grown-up, watching a show designed to have the children hiding behind the sofa, but it isn't, is it?

Yes it is, judging from the responses of the 'Fear Factor' children who review the episodes and testimony of some of us here with little people

Sorry, I think I could have phrased that a bit better. Can I try again?

I've just been putting it down to me bring a grown-up, hence not feeling scared by watching a show designed to have the children hiding behind the sofa, when I'd actually like something where I almost feel like hiding. I wouldn't, of course, and I didn't when I was little, either, but someone pointed out upthread that next week's trailer had given them a nightmare. This is the sort of stuff I'd like to be seeing some of.

[Bog]

So flame on if you must, I kinda like Ace

My life would have to be extraordinarily empty to find it worth flaming you because I find something irritating which you don't!

One thing I think is great about Who is that even episodes which I don't like, other people will get something out of. If I type "That episode was shite", then I don't expect anyone else to agree with me. I'll try to say why I didn't like it, but the last thing I expect is some kind of heated argument just because I thought, EG, the Absorbathingy episode was boring and embarassing to watch, or found the "Singing and Torch Symbol" thing to be patronising and trite. It's my opinion, nothing more.

On topics where I have specialised knowledge, or on things where I know my facts are in order, yeah, I'll hold out for The Truth(tm), 'cause that's the way I'm put together. Things like episodes of television programs are entirely a matter of taste AFAIC, and I've got absolutely no right to tell anyone else what to enjoy and what to call a pile of dross.

[DutchLlama]

So flame on if you must, I kinda like Ace

My life would have to be extraordinarily empty to find it worth flaming you because I find something irritating which you don't!

One thing I think is great about Who is that even episodes which I don't like, other people will get something out of. If I type "That episode was shite", then I don't expect anyone else to agree with me. I'll try to say why I didn't like it, but the last thing I expect is some kind of heated argument just because I thought, EG, the Absorbathingy episode was boring and embarassing to watch, or found the "Singing and Torch Symbol" thing to be patronising and trite. It's my opinion, nothing more.

On topics where I have specialised knowledge, or on things where I know my facts are in order, yeah, I'll hold out for The Truth(tm), 'cause that's the way I'm put together. Things like episodes of television programs are entirely a matter of taste AFAIC, and I've got absolutely no right to tell anyone else what to enjoy and what to call a pile of dross.

Exactly, opinions differ. And the best thing is that you can give things second chances based on the opinions of others. I didn't like Battlestar Galactica when I first saw the miniseries, but when you defended it so vigourously I gave it a second chance. Thanks for that!

I wonder did you stop watching McCoy's Doctor after the first few episodes? Many people did and they base their opinion of McCoy and Ace on that, Yet near the end it became quite good and Ace wasn't as as bad as you might think if you only saw the beginning. I think she might have been one of the first or maybe even the first companion with a back story, which was developed and referenced throughout the series. You got to know what drove her and why she acted the way she did.

It's also often the actors who played in it when you watched it intensily, especially in your childhood, who get remembered the most fondly. I hardly have seen anything of Hartnell, Troughton and Colin Baker, so I haven't much of an opinion of them. I did see a lot of stories from Pertwee in the early '90s when they were repeated on the BBC.

However I've been catching up a bit with the beginnings of Doctor Who through the magic of bit torrent and I like many of the serials I've seen so far. I might even get round to watching some episodes of the other Doctors I have not seen yet.

[Snakey]

That's classic Doctor Who that is.

Makes you wonder why it got canned, really. Oh, wait...

And now it's back and at least as successful as ever. Makes me wonder if some people in Wales are doing something right

Yes, they definately did do something right. It was called "Series 1" for some reason. And that is my point exactly.

Who originally got canned because it turned utter shit and nobody bothered watching it anymore. Very easy for that to happen again. Witness most of this bloody series.

Rose I can understand but you are assuming the Doctor actually fears death.

Go back and watch "The Unquiet Dead" again.

[HGFB]

and nobody bothered watching it anymore. Very easy for that to happen again. Witness most of this bloody series.

Ratings are mostly higher than last year. Apart from a couple of drops across the board because of very sunny days.

[Darkflame]

To be fair though, people dont stop watching when it goes bad, they stop watching awhile after it goes bad.

[Matrixxx]

Watching the Ecclestone stuff again I noticed couple of bits I thought i'd throw to the masses for thoughts.

Rose says "you're hardly santa claus" - the doc replies... "red bike on your 12th birthday" -- wha ?

I noticed a torchwood reference during the Anne-Droid "weakest link" sequence, was that the first mention ?

How could Rose survive having the time vortex running through her when there was clearly enough power to kill the doc ?

And just for it's comedic potential... why walk away from the tardis and let it die gathering dust on a corner, when you have a nuke proof flat, all decked out with everything you need - and no bills to pay ! - just move in !

[[Feeblez]]

'Fear Her' Vs 'The Idiots Lantern'
Decent child Actor: The Idiots Lantern WINS!

Were there any child actors in TIL? If you're referring to Rory Jennings, who played Tommy Connolly, he's twice Abisola Agbaje's age (Jennings being 23 next month)

23!? Well good performance anyway, and i wasn't singling out Abisola Agbaje as being the problem with the episode, there were many other things i felt were not up to par, personally.

Bruce Campbell can have my babies!

Extraordinary! Thanks for the information. I never knew that about him

I was refereing to WiteWulf's avatar from Buba Ho-Tep, Bruce Campbell as Elvis. Great film.

I think this should probably be my last post in this thread, i already admitted that i don't like a lot of sci-fi that's on the box, and i don't want to be any more of a killjoy than i already have been.

So apologies if my irrationalisations have been a bit off topic. I think i seek out trashy stuff as a preference, when i was a kid Doctor Who was all about the monsters and explosions, so my view is a bit limited when looking at the bigger concepts.

\\\/// can you do this?

[DutchLlama]

Who originally got canned because it turned utter shit and nobody bothered watching it anymore. Very easy for that to happen again. Witness most of this bloody series.

No, it got canned when it got the reputation for being shit. Mostly because lots of people didn't bother to stay watching after the crap first McCoy season and hence missed the much improved serials of the later McCoy seasons.