Latest / A Hamster With a Blunt Penknife - a Doctor Who Commentary podcast / Talks to Robert Valentine about his choice of The Abominable Snowmen (5/6)

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Talks to Robert Valentine about his choice of The Abominable Snowmen (5/6) · A Hamster With a Blunt Penknife - a Doctor Who Commentary podcast

• 0:23
  None. Hamster with a Blump pen knife
• 0:35
  for doing quicker, quicker, quicker.
• 0:40
  Welcome back to Hamster with a Blump Pen Knife, the Doctor Who
• 0:43
  Commentary podcast. I'm having such a lovely evening
• 0:46
  here with Mr. Rob, Valentine's Day.
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  Hello. Rob, hello, Rob, That I wasn't
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  doing a bit. I actually, I was drinking.
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  I was drinking my glass of water, not thinking about it.
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  And I literally just did. Now I, I, I did, I did the joke,
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  but for real. You wasn't even listening to me,
• 1:09
  was you? Well, I was harmless if this is
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  how our marriage is going to be, I mean.
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  It's a glimpse of the future. Sorry, it's.
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  Our three-way marriage. I'll promise you this, you'll be
• 1:20
  a very happy man. I've it becomes no surprise to
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  you at all that I have got a question for you.
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  I would lovely well go ahead well.
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  Fraser asked you in the last episode about what sort of Yeti
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  story you would like to tell. And you I'm not going to repeat
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  it because, you know, people might have forgotten and then
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  you can still write that story. But it did lead me to want to
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  ask you, and you're one of the very few people I can ask this
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  question to on the commentary podcast because you are a writer
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  is do you ever start there? Do you ever start with an insane
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  notion and then write? How do I get there?
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  Oh, yeah, yeah, you can. A story can begin absolutely
• 2:01
  anywhere. It could.
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  It could begin with a title or a line, or it could begin with
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  just a an idea for just one moment, and then you wrap the
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  rest of the story around it. Yeah, absolutely.
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  Yeah. I remember reading an interview
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  with David Renwick, who I think is a masterful storyteller,
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  certainly a sitcoms and he would say right.
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  I'd have the idea it's not the for the insane comedy climax
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  Hunchline, you know the big joke at the end of the episode and
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  then I'll figure out how the hell do I get there.
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  So it'd be something absurd at the.
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  End of the episode. Oh, actually, yeah.
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  I've spent 90 minutes today trying to come up with 11 liner
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  backwards, but where I've where I've known the structure of the
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  gag, but I haven't. But I haven't got the content of
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  it yet. Wow, have you got it now?
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  Nearly, nearly. Not quite, not quite.
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  I just I, I gave it, I gave it 90 minutes, two hours of serious
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  thought today and now I'm not. And what will probably happen is
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  I'll sleep on it. And then the idea will just the,
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  the answer will come with no effort, no further effort.
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  So I don't push it anymore. I've done the, I've done the
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  conscious work. I'm just going to let you know,
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  let it sort itself out. But yeah.
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  If it's happens, if this one single line has had that much
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  work, I guarantee I will laugh. Well, that's the, that's the
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  hope. That's the hope.
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  I'm not, it's not there yet. But you know, you, yeah, it's
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  funny. Sometimes you can just, you
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  know, one day you can like write, you know, get 10 pages
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  down. You can get load down and
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  sometimes like no 90 minutes to 2 hours just trying to get a
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  single joke right. I've got to say they were jokes
• 3:42
  because they were very, very pointed comments.
• 3:46
  But the lines that you put in Jane Ash's mouth?
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  Unforgettable. Oh well, you know.
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  And boy, did she chew it. Oh, yes, yeah.
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  In, in run. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
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  Well, that was all, you know, nothing I could get her to say
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  is and you know, could possibly be more over the top than real
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  life in in Trump, you know, which is, you know.
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  Oh, OK, I know I said this earlier on, but everyone please
• 4:14
  go out and get that knife doctor set and listen to run.
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  It was one of my favourites last year.
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  It was fabulous. Yeah, but you know, before I
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  stroke your ego too much because, you know, you're very
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  British and you don't like that sort of thing.
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  Oh, OK, OK. Don't you worry.
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  I don't don't mind me. Plenty of time.
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  Plenty of time for stroking. I'm going to take us back to
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  Fraser before we go into five. No, don't you hang on, wait.
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  Don't get too excited because this is a question he tries to
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  make me ask everybody. Every time I'm doing an
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  interview or anything, he throws this question at me.
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  I feel like this is finally the appropriate time to ask it.
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  Right. Quarks or yetis?
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  Which ones are the quarks again? Are they the ones with the?
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  That's right, yeah, Yeah, I haven't got around to that one
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  yet. What they against dominators
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  don't? Tell him that, Rob, please.
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  Why not That's. His favorite story?
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  He'll hunt you down. But it's it's I, it's me.
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  And not having seen his favorite story doesn't stop it being his.
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  Actually, this reminds me, I would see 2001 space.
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  I would see 2001 space on see the IMAX on Monday night.
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  And there's the guy kind of kind of introducing it, just did it.
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  He asked. Yeah.
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  Has anyone who who here has not seen this?
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  And quite a lot of people put their hand up and he was like,
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  oh, this is, that's terrible, that's rubbish.
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  It's like, and I thought that is absolutely the wrong attitude.
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  What your? Your reaction should be
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  wonderful. Yeah, you're going to see it
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  now, A. Whole load of new people are
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  seeing 2001 A Space Odyssey. But instead he chose the film
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  Snob. Oh.
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  Sorry. Well then can I, can I just turn
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  around my response then very quickly.
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  How wonderful that you haven't seen the Dominators yet and you
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  have yet to experience 5 glorious episodes of Patrick
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  Trout. Oh, fine.
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  Yeah. Well, Yeti, because I haven't.
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  Yeah, just generally because, because, because Yeti, they're
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  cryptids. So they've, they've got, they've
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  got that going for them, which the quarks don't.
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  There is a sequel to that question as well, but I'm
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  guessing you ain't seen this story as well yetis or Crotons?
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  Oh yeah, which ones to the curtains again?
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  You were lying, weren't you? You haven't seen all of Doctor
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  Rd. No, I haven't seen.
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  I haven't seen them. So jealous.
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  What one are they again? That oh, those are the ones with
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  the South African accents. You know, they were sort of
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  going around a quarry. They've got a sort of skirt and
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  crystal heads. Oh, yeah.
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  Thank you. Yeah, I will let you know.
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  I'll let you know. I mean, it's a pretty vivid
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  image. I'm assuming you haven't seen
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  that one. It's all, it's all that I play
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  in now. Yeah.
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  So I am I am working my way through this.
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  I haven't done the crotons coming soon so I have to wear a
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  blood penknife. Joe Ford and Rob Valentine
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  discuss the Crotons. We'll see.
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  For the, for the, for the motive that you can finally answer
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  Fraser's question, should we just go with?
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  Should we just go with the yetis then?
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  Well. I think Yeti would win anyway
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  because because of all the, the lovely baggage, they are, they
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  are, they are Yeti, of course. So you know.
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  I will, I'll, I'll go to one of his more sensible questions and
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  I'll say one off and that is, is this Victoria's best story?
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  And we saw attached on that in episode one a little bit.
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  I think she she suits the she suits the period.
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  And I like her chompers wherever they are.
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  Her Victorian Alpine, sort of Alpine climbing gear really,
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  isn't it? Sort of suppose so.
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  But you know, I again, I think I mentioned on the last episode,
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  you know, her and her insisting on going to wanting to see Pat
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  Masamba just comes out of nowhere and it's just it's to
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  give us something to do. So yeah, could be, could be.
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  I will say, though, the way that she acts, you know, when she
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  keeps repeating the same thing over and over again, yeah, there
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  is something a bit creepy about that, isn't it?
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  That that rising panic that that Debbie Watling plays again and
• 8:30
  again and again. Oh, yeah.
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  Yeah, yeah, yeah, she's good. Yeah.
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  But that's that's more Debbie Watling than Victoria.
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  I'm trying to think of a better story for her.
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  I've probably I I enjoy. I still, I think, I still think,
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  I still think Tomb of the Cyber is one of her best stories.
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  That's the one where she's going around with a gun, shooting
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  cyber mats, taking it on Kaftan. You know, she's, she's flirting
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  with the people from the spaceship.
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  Yeah, it's been a, it's been a while since I've seen tube at
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  the side. Tube, tube, tube, tube.
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  And Cyber Tube. Yeah, hang on, do you know what?
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  I'm going to kick it into it like 5.
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  I've got an image in my head. Would you count us in please?
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  Good God, yes 54321. I'll tell you what we'll do.
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  We'll catch up with the animation for sort of 5 minutes
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  and then I'll hit you with another.
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  I'll hit you with Nathan's question.
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  God help us all. Oh, lovely, though.
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  Oh, I'm I'm curious now. Yeah, I do.
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  I love the opening. It's so much.
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  And I do like I do like the the animated one is it's a nice
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  little because they could have just recycled the regular
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  credits and then just come into animation.
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  But I like the fact you get the animated face to kind of cue you
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  in that you get getting an animated episode.
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  Oh. Here we are.
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  Yeah. So this this is one of those
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  scenes where he talks in a very slow manner.
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  Yeah, these are sometimes. I suspect that actually the
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  animations are probably more entertaining than watching.
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  Oh God, he looks creepy there. Yeah, yeah.
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  I've, I said to you earlier that Mark's podcast part of Sarah,
• 10:24
  she just found these scenes interminable, but she's used to
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  a, a modern day pace. You know you wouldn't have.
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  You don't often have like a 5 minute dialogue scene now do
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  you? Yeah, I I was I was watching.
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  I don't want to do the whole thing, you know, you know, on
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  something like the gunfighters, it's kind of easier to which
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  I've really loved. It is easy to kind of figure out
• 10:45
  what you might do to G things up a bit.
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  And this one I don't know. I mean, Travers disappears for a
• 10:50
  while. We we send Travers Outdoor was
• 10:52
  doing his own thing, but. Have we even seen him in the
• 10:56
  last episode? I don't remember.
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  He goes, he, he, he does bugger off up to The Cave, doesn't he?
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  But yeah, Rob, yes. Prepare yourself for this
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  because I've got to do some pronunciations, OK?
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  What is this Nathan's question? Yeah, God, I'm a bit.
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  I'm a bit scared. I'm do you know what I'm curious
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  now to see? Yeah, OK.
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  Padma, you don't you dare ask me to repeat this one.
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  Padma Samnava is a revered figure in Tibetan Buddhism, the
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  Guru Rinpoche and enlightened being predicted by the Buddha
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  himself, the founder of the Vajaha Buddhism.
• 11:44
  I'll just say that and the author of the Tibetan Book of
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  the Dead. Is this story as much a reaction
• 11:51
  against the 60s counterculture as the dominators is?
• 11:54
  Should Heisman and Lincoln be more widely disliked than they
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  are? Can.
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  You read that question again, please.
• 12:03
  This is, this is a reaction to it's, it's definitely formed by
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  it, but I don't know what it's saying other than, you know, why
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  is there a problem? Why is there a problem here?
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  Because essentially Buddhism brought in some weird alien
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  intelligence which invented which, which then built some
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  robot Yeti to do bad things with.
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  Yeah, I'm not sure what is critiquing there.
• 12:32
  So, well, so really actually, you know, doing Buddhist stuff
• 12:37
  on the astral plane, which is quite hippy dippy stuff.
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  It's I don't really know how actually Buddhist any of that
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  is. Leads to bad things in this
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  story really, doesn't it? Nothing good.
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  Nothing. Nothing good comes from Buddhism
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  in this but. Do you know enough about the
• 12:56
  Dominators to know what he's talking about there about?
• 12:58
  Which one's the dominators again?
• 12:59
  So the Dominators is the one with the core.
• 13:01
  The answer's no, but carry. On So it's effectively the
• 13:04
  Daleks again, it's a group of pacifists that even when these
• 13:09
  two intergalactic warlords land on their planet and start
• 13:14
  murdering them, they're, they're such hippies.
• 13:17
  They're so peaceful that they just, you know, shouldn't we
• 13:20
  have a meeting about how whether we should attack back or not?
• 13:24
  You know, so the, the criticism is that, you know, we, that if
• 13:28
  you lean too much into the, the hippie culture of the 60s,
• 13:33
  you're basically dead. What if the dominate is this
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  saying I mean? A lot of that stuff is a
• 13:38
  reaction to the bomb, isn't it? And again, but, you know, being
• 13:42
  a hippie was kind of a, you know, a a luxury of being middle
• 13:48
  class, I think, you know. But aside from what you said
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  there, aside from the fact that Buddhism was the the avenue
• 13:57
  through which the great intelligence came to earth, I
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  don't see any critique there at all.
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  And I don't even think that's a critique.
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  It's just a a a story method of of, well, no.
• 14:10
  It's, you know, Eastern mysticism, which is, to be
• 14:14
  honest, you know, this is, is this really Buddhism in any way
• 14:17
  or shape or form? This is kind of this.
• 14:19
  This is I'm. Not sure we're well informed
• 14:21
  enough to make that call, you know.
• 14:23
  I I point is either the key is this is just a vague some vague
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  kind of sci-fi tinged eastern mysticism brought the great
• 14:32
  intelligence in from the astral plane basically.
• 14:36
  So actually, you know, it comes takes us back to Toby's question
• 14:42
  from last episode. You know, the the the Buddhism
• 14:44
  in this is real because it can bring things like the like the
• 14:48
  great intelligence into our world that then builds killer
• 14:52
  robots. And and although we're not there
• 14:56
  yet, but the way to defeat the killer robots is to smash stuff
• 15:00
  up, you know, So yeah, this is this isn't a critique of Buddha
• 15:06
  really. This is using just stock figures
• 15:11
  to tell a sci-fi story. It's a base under siege story
• 15:15
  where the guy who's in ultimate charge of the base is
• 15:18
  responsible. Responsible from bigging
• 15:21
  bringing in the alien threat. So I I do wonder how much of
• 15:25
  this stuff is actually conscious and how much of it is just an
• 15:28
  accident of taking something like the Nigel Neil Hammer film
• 15:33
  and applying it to a Doctor Who based Under Siege story.
• 15:38
  I wonder how many of these classic Doctor Who stories you
• 15:41
  can give these readings to where none of that was in the writer
• 15:45
  or the creator's minds at all. It was just an Ave. of telling a
• 15:49
  story. Yeah, so I worry about having
• 15:52
  not answered that question completely, but I can't have
• 15:54
  done because I'm, I'm too ignorant of, well, Doctor Who to
• 15:59
  and and of to and to Buddhism, to be honest, and, and of the
• 16:04
  hippie movement because I, you know, it's, yeah, I wasn't
• 16:07
  around for any of it and I need to see more reading, etcetera.
• 16:11
  So I'm from my state of relative ignorance.
• 16:14
  That was the best answer I could give.
• 16:17
  Well then you're ignorant. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 16:21
  I don't know about. I don't know enough about the
• 16:25
  the three, the three overlapping subjects which that question
• 16:29
  incorporated. Yeah.
• 16:30
  Well, I mean, I don't know why he's asking that.
• 16:32
  Nathan's not a Buddhist or a hippie or another thing either,
• 16:35
  so I'm not sure he can. I mean that he probably would
• 16:38
  have a good stab. You've heard this podcast,
• 16:40
  right? But.
• 16:40
  He's curious about what I think about the questions, so he must
• 16:45
  have he yeah, he, he, he's, he's.
• 16:47
  He'll have his own. I'd rather, I'd rather hear what
• 16:50
  he thinks about it, to be honest.
• 16:53
  He he senses another high brain, that's why.
• 16:55
  Also that's a Croton reference. You won't get that because you
• 16:58
  ain't seen it. Right.
• 16:59
  See. Yeah.
• 17:00
  But he does ask a second question, which you can answer
• 17:03
  definitively. Go on.
• 17:09
  Which absolutely tells you a lot about Nathan as well.
• 17:12
  And it's only 5-5 words long. Is Chris on kind of hot?
• 17:20
  I've seen again, I'm I'm not quite bisexual enough for that
• 17:25
  really, probably. But yeah, not not my type then
• 17:31
  again. He's married to an Asian, so
• 17:33
  this might be why he's asking the question.
• 17:35
  Oh, it's not that. It's just I'm.
• 17:38
  I'm really picky. It's like.
• 17:41
  It's not that, it's not that I'm selective, it's just that
• 17:44
  honestly, it's just my, my, my personal make up is I just, you
• 17:48
  know, there's only very there's a very narrow margin of guy who
• 17:52
  I'm in who yeah, anyway could. You give me one example in
• 17:55
  within Doctor Who then. Sorry, I'm totally away from the
• 17:58
  Abominable Snowman. Anyone I think.
• 18:03
  We've we've brushed on 4. I mean, did you say Chris in
• 18:08
  Sharda? Yeah, well, yeah, but he's not
• 18:11
  really. He's pretty, but he's not very
• 18:14
  much so certain members of the cast of The Curse of Fenrik.
• 18:18
  Oh, OK, right. I'll know what your time is now.
• 18:20
  OK. Yeah, Mine's dibber from the
• 18:23
  mysterious planet. Yes, see, I'm yeah, No, no.
• 18:27
  I'm. I might as well be heterosexual
• 18:30
  in that, yeah. Yeah, So I'm so sorry to pry.
• 18:34
  No. No, no, it's, it's interesting,
• 18:36
  but you know. Well, it is to me, it is to you.
• 18:42
  Oh, bless you for Oz Really though, OK.
• 18:44
  Honestly, if we were married, we'd be like Jack Spratt and his
• 18:47
  wife. What does that mean?
• 18:52
  Well, you know, you know, Jack Spratt would eat no fat, his
• 18:55
  wife would eat no lean. So, you know, we're into
• 18:57
  different things. So I see what you're saying.
• 19:01
  Yeah. Oh, Rob, you'll be happy.
• 19:02
  Don't you worry. I'll promise you you'll be
• 19:03
  satisfied. Let's go to another question,
• 19:08
  shall we? Before we get ourselves in
• 19:10
  trouble, Cy Heart. The lovely Cy Heart.
• 19:14
  And if we can tie these into Doctor Who, the abortal snowman
• 19:18
  at all, that would be kind of cool.
• 19:19
  Yes, it would. Carry on, Carry on.
• 19:21
  Yeah. That was that was Nathan that
• 19:23
  got us pride into your sexuality there.
• 19:26
  Of course it is. I mean, you know, he didn't know
• 19:28
  much about Buddhism and all of that, but he knows about hot
• 19:31
  guys. So no wonder who asked that
• 19:32
  question? Psy asks.
• 19:36
  It's a bit like phrases actually.
• 19:37
  Yeti in Tibet or in the underground, which works better?
• 19:42
  And I think I know. I've just listened that today.
• 19:46
  Yeah, listen, I, I get the, I get where he's going.
• 19:55
  I, I can, I can sense what sigh is driving at.
• 19:58
  You know, it's the whole idea of, you know, Yeti and the
• 20:01
  lyrics and back again. The, the idea of, you know,
• 20:03
  these cryptids in places where they shouldn't be.
• 20:06
  However, you know, like, you know, Loch, the Loch Ness
• 20:09
  Monster in the Thames, you know, as they do in Zygons.
• 20:15
  Because what else is this Garrison?
• 20:18
  However, I think for the Yeti to work in the London Underground.
• 20:23
  Make it the Yeti in the London Underground in Web of Fear, it's
• 20:28
  robots dressed as Yeti in the London Underground.
• 20:31
  It's not the Yeti. And that's kind.
• 20:33
  And that might give you a hint as to where I would go, because
• 20:37
  it's not really the it's not the Yeti in the in the London
• 20:39
  Underground. It's robots in fur coats.
• 20:44
  In a way, you know, I, I think it's a bit of a shame that we
• 20:46
  only see a real Yeti at the end of this, because a real Yeti
• 20:50
  could turn up halfway through. You know what?
• 20:53
  I think I in the way we did the first three, I think I might
• 20:56
  have meant thought you know, maybe you know, if if it's you
• 20:59
  know, if you rift on Nigel Neil more, you know, things go to pot
• 21:04
  and actually have rescue from without and have the real Yeti
• 21:08
  turn up and help sort things out.
• 21:10
  Oh, you did say that, yes. Yeah, that might.
• 21:12
  And how, if now you've seen the Nigel Neal, you know, there's
• 21:16
  there's there is kind of potential, there's some there's
• 21:18
  mileage in the Yeti that this story doesn't explore because
• 21:21
  they they literally are they and which is a it's it's a cute
• 21:25
  little camp on there's the real thing.
• 21:27
  But you know, what if the real Yeti had, you know, and if they
• 21:31
  they carried on the idea of the Yeti that even gets as far as
• 21:33
  the goon show of them being being with their own level of
• 21:37
  psychic power. What if the actual Yeti had been
• 21:40
  able to rock up and help repel the Great Intelligence?
• 21:44
  In fact, I think it's a scarier idea.
• 21:46
  You know that Professor Travers has captured a Yeti?
• 21:49
  Yeah. Takes it back to London, and
• 21:51
  that's loose in the London Underground.
• 21:53
  That's scarier than the robots. Yeah, yeah.
• 21:55
  But yeah, but for the. Yeah, exactly.
• 21:58
  So I I do think, yeah, having encrypted in a place where it
• 22:00
  shouldn't be psy, yes, that's better.
• 22:02
  But the web affair doesn't actually do that.
• 22:06
  Well, then I'm going to circle his rounds to Toby again,
• 22:10
  because we've got. I was, I was on sofa ground,
• 22:12
  that question. Anyway, many, many questions
• 22:14
  from him now you're doing fabulous.
• 22:17
  OK? Have you seen Nigel Neil's
• 22:19
  Abominable Snowman, which also features?
• 22:21
  No, not heard of it. No, neither have I.
• 22:25
  Do you think this was an influence on this story covered?
• 22:32
  If so, how cross do you think Neil would have been had he
• 22:35
  tuned in? Fucking livid.
• 22:39
  As he usually was with Doctor Who.
• 22:41
  There's an interview, isn't there?
• 22:43
  With, I don't know. Yeah, I think there I think
• 22:45
  there is where he basically, no, it was an interview with Derek
• 22:50
  Sherwin, who lived around the corner from Nigel Neal and he
• 22:55
  was desperate to get him to write for season seven and he
• 22:58
  would kept trying to convince him.
• 23:00
  He had a conversation with him and he said he was absolutely
• 23:04
  livid. He goes, you've been gripping
• 23:05
  off me for years. Like why would I come and write
• 23:08
  for you? Why would I debase my career to
• 23:10
  come and write for Doctor Who? Yeah, I actually think also the
• 23:15
  work, this is slight digression from the question, but I think
• 23:18
  the whole world view of Nigel Neal is doesn't mesh with the
• 23:25
  worldview of Doctor Who. They don't work together.
• 23:29
  He's. Why?
• 23:34
  In the in the world of the doctor, kind of the doctors on
• 23:42
  cover, he's on the he's on the side of right and he's a heroic
• 23:45
  figure who brings out the best in people and saves the day.
• 23:48
  There is a certain degree of innocence.
• 23:51
  Professor Quetomas do that as well.
• 23:55
  No, Quetomas is a man haunted by his own failures and the and
• 24:00
  when, when, when Quetomas saves the day, it feels like a
• 24:04
  reprieve. And there's a, you know, like
• 24:08
  with the Abominable snowman, there is a there is a sense of
• 24:10
  original sin with mankind. Mankind is, I can't remember,
• 24:14
  you know, the term he used. It's homo.
• 24:18
  And with man the destroyer, it's he's he, he, I think also in
• 24:23
  quite a mass in the pit, the whole idea of, you know, we are
• 24:26
  the Martians and we, you know, the whole idea of the Wild Hunt
• 24:29
  and, you know, we are inherently violent and oh, here's that.
• 24:35
  Here's that tricky. Cosmic look at it and in colour,
• 24:38
  all of the all of the starscape is different colours.
• 24:41
  See, this is. This is.
• 24:42
  This is. This is space Buddhism.
• 24:45
  This is where, This is. This is this is Buddhism, the
• 24:49
  power of real sci-fi Buddhism is back to Toby's other question
• 24:54
  while we take a quick reprieve. Yeah.
• 24:57
  So Buddhism is real in this, but it gives you as it gives you
• 25:01
  access to think the astral plane where the great intelligence
• 25:05
  dwells and leads to nothing good.
• 25:07
  Nothing good in this story. But yeah, But in Nigel Neal.
• 25:11
  Yeah, man, is a problem in Doctor Who.
• 25:18
  It's it. It doesn't.
• 25:20
  Yeah, just there's the degree of innocence and hope in Doctor
• 25:25
  Who, which doesn't exist in Neil.
• 25:27
  It's generally quite optimistic, isn't it about?
• 25:30
  Yeah, inherently, yeah. Yeah, even even when, even when,
• 25:34
  you know, humans disappoint the Doctor and more come along that
• 25:39
  you know. Even when Eric say, was writing
• 25:42
  the script, you know, like there's a, there's a, there's a
• 25:45
  note of optimism in it. You're right, it is.
• 25:48
  It's quite bleak, especially quite matching the pit, some of
• 25:50
  the things it's saying there. Yeah, but it's it's, it's, but
• 25:53
  it's also there's this, but it doesn't, it does it in a very
• 25:56
  profound way. That's that's difficult to argue
• 26:00
  with. Whereas I kind of feel that the
• 26:04
  doctor's optimism might kind of be with but.
• 26:10
  That's why you know. Yeah, so I just, I just think
• 26:13
  Nigel Neal would have been a terrible fit for Doctor Who,
• 26:16
  even if he had written for it. I think he would have had to
• 26:20
  sublimate his own concerns. He wasn't that kind of man.
• 26:23
  He wasn't that kind of writer. And I I think Doctor Who and
• 26:26
  Nigel Neil would have both suffered for them working
• 26:29
  together of. Course they did.
• 26:31
  Instead, they didn't get him, but they just basically ripped
• 26:33
  off at everything he'd ever done in Season 7.
• 26:36
  Yeah. I mean, yeah, but, but that's
• 26:39
  the thing. The particular era gets the
• 26:40
  stick. But it starts here, It's
• 26:43
  happening here, starts with Droughton you.
• 26:45
  Know how do you? Have you done other movies?
• 26:48
  Well, he he was before the Bumble Snowman was the creature
• 26:57
  which was the TV. The the TV production with Peter
• 27:01
  Cushing and Stanley Baker in the friend was so it was it was on
• 27:06
  TV then Hammer made a film of it just like quite a master the
• 27:09
  quite a you know, the question, the mass experiment to Hammers
• 27:11
  quite a message. So the version beforehand and I
• 27:17
  think the I think the Toby would know this.
• 27:19
  I don't say I don't get it wrong with Toby listening, but I think
• 27:23
  the creature might have been his first TV or near it if it wasn't
• 27:30
  1984. But yeah.
• 27:33
  But yeah. But the the the kneel
• 27:36
  consumption by Doctor Who starts here I think.
• 27:41
  And I don't think ever stops because we're they're still
• 27:46
  riffing off some of this now in the new series.
• 27:48
  Yeah, I in a way I kind of think they haven't.
• 27:51
  There's, there's more kneel for them to rip off.
• 27:53
  They haven't ripped off yet, you know.
• 27:55
  I'm sure Doctor Who could do Murrin or something, you know.
• 27:59
  Oh yeah, right. And that script then, were you?
• 28:02
  Oh, I'm, I'm talking about the On the Telly show.
• 28:05
  The telly show where? Yeah.
• 28:08
  Yeah. Well, Ryan, that script for the
• 28:09
  TV then, right? Well, let's go back to Toby
• 28:13
  again. And he asked, can you name any
• 28:16
  other Doctor Who stories that Harold Harold Pinter isn't in?
• 28:23
  What does that mean? Gosh, it's like those essays
• 28:28
  you'd get. Hang on, discuss.
• 28:30
  That's one of his very obscure references, right?
• 28:32
  Did some Did people think Harold Pinter was in this then?
• 28:36
  Is that a fan myth? I don't know.
• 28:39
  I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm just a dirty street boy.
• 28:42
  I don't know. I don't know enough about
• 28:45
  things. Yes, I'm, I'm going to look.
• 28:49
  I want to tell you what we will. We'll look it up between
• 28:55
  episodes and we'll come back to it in Episode 6.
• 28:59
  Next episode and then yes, then we'll put on put on a clever
• 29:02
  specks and come up with a come up with a good answer that's
• 29:05
  insightful and makes lives better.
• 29:08
  Well. OK, well, let's go to another
• 29:09
  one of his questions then. OK, OK.
• 29:11
  But we will come back to Harold Pinter because I'm intrigued.
• 29:14
  In Doctor Who, a celebration Gerald Blake's name was
• 29:17
  misrendered as General Blake. As a result, I always think of
• 29:24
  him as General Blake for a split second.
• 29:27
  Do you have any favorite Doctor Who related misspellings?
• 29:35
  That is such a therapy question, isn't it?
• 29:38
  No, I don't. I do.
• 29:39
  I do have my favorite Doctor Who mispronunciation, which is the
• 29:43
  the mascara, you know, because that.
• 29:46
  Was that was. I had the book, you know, but
• 29:49
  it's. Not Mantregora, I will say.
• 29:52
  You pronounce it man. Yeah, yeah, the mask of
• 29:54
  Mandragora. Do you know what mine was?
• 29:56
  Target novel what? Mine's even worse than that.
• 29:59
  I was going mummy mummy put logo polis on please.
• 30:04
  Although that's a made-up word. The logo polis are turned up,
• 30:08
  you know. Chris Rage bid me and a lot to
• 30:10
  answer for what's happened on the telebox here then.
• 30:14
  Oh Travis is back. Doesn't he look tall in the in
• 30:16
  the animation? Totally did on the team.
• 30:20
  No, I don't think he Yeah. No, no, no, no.
• 30:24
  I've totally lost track. Oh well, we're back on the snow
• 30:26
  side, on the on the mountain side now the two yetis.
• 30:32
  Oh yeah, you. Know what?
• 30:34
  Well, I think we've talked all over Victoria being possessed,
• 30:36
  are we? Yeah, I think it's all gone.
• 30:40
  Yeah. Well, then my question to you is
• 30:46
  this. Yes.
• 30:47
  How effective is possession as a scare tool with Doctor Who?
• 30:52
  Because I'll tell you what, there's a lot of it going on.
• 30:56
  Well, it's always nice to give back to something else, you know
• 30:58
  someone else to play and not. Always.
• 31:00
  Sometimes it can be pretty dodgy.
• 31:03
  Well, OK, well it's it's frequently nice to give, you
• 31:06
  know, to have have characters doing stuff they don't usually
• 31:09
  get to do, I suppose. Do you know which ones I think
• 31:12
  is the most effective? And I'm assuming this is a story
• 31:15
  you have seen Pyramids of Mars, Marcus Garman, just because it's
• 31:20
  an animated cadaver often that's a very scary.
• 31:23
  They even, they even get, they even get the word cadaver in.
• 31:26
  Yeah, cadaver, yes, yeah. But also Michael Schud's
• 31:30
  reaction, Lawrence, Lawrence Garman trying to get through,
• 31:34
  but also he, he actually does get through very, very briefly.
• 31:37
  So Marcus Garman still in there. He's not, you know, he's, you
• 31:43
  know, there was a moment where he kind of, he does remember
• 31:47
  before getting the the mummy to kill his brother.
• 31:50
  Yeah. That's a good thing.
• 31:52
  Yeah. It's certainly better than I, I
• 31:55
  don't really think there's a truly effective 60s example.
• 31:58
  I mean, Dodo in the War Machines when she's taken over by Photon,
• 32:01
  do you remember that? Yeah, I, you know what?
• 32:04
  I've seen the war machines. I watched that.
• 32:06
  I I I That was one of the first ones I did watch on the iPlayer.
• 32:10
  Oh, I'm relieved. Yes, yeah, it was.
• 32:13
  It was good. It was good.
• 32:14
  And again, it was felt very per to era in the 1st Doctor's era.
• 32:21
  I really am a terrible fan, folks.
• 32:23
  I'm. I really am, you know?
• 32:25
  You are, but you're a fantastic commentator on Doctor Who, so
• 32:29
  we'll forgive you. I'm just some twat on the
• 32:32
  Internet. I've no idea what's going on
• 32:34
  there. That cave, they were sort of
• 32:36
  webbing all sort of reaching out from that cave.
• 32:38
  Is it not? Is it not the phone machine
• 32:41
  again? What in the real thing?
• 32:45
  Yeah. I mean, they've made it look
• 32:48
  like sort of astral weavings. I don't know how to describe it.
• 32:53
  They've made it look a bit more just.
• 32:55
  Quickly check my notes that we didn't discuss in this one.
• 32:58
  Let's see. I love this when you when you do
• 33:01
  this in quick succession, it's wonderful.
• 33:02
  OK, these are the notes I made as I was watching but Yeti chess
• 33:05
  set. Nice visual for how they're
• 33:07
  controlled. Bloke crushed by a Buddha
• 33:12
  statue. You can't go wrong with a bloke
• 33:14
  crushed. By a statue, no.
• 33:15
  And did you see that in the animation when we were talking
• 33:18
  about it? Looks great.
• 33:21
  Pad Masambava speaks through Victoria, says Debtson monastery
• 33:25
  must be abandoned. He will remain to the end.
• 33:29
  Oh yeah, the doctor was here 300 years ago.
• 33:32
  Has Big Finish covered this? Yes.
• 33:35
  Oh, thought they would have done.
• 33:37
  It's called Oh, what's it called?
• 33:39
  The Secrets of Death Sen is written by Andy Franco Mallon
• 33:42
  and it features the 1st Doctor and Dodo as played by Lauren
• 33:46
  Corno. It's Ashia.
• 33:48
  Is it David Bradley? No, I think it's Lauren
• 33:50
  Cornelius and Steven Noonan. Nice one.
• 33:52
  And yeah, so Pat Musambaba remembers him.
• 33:56
  And I thought, yeah, shades of Lost Horizon in this idea.
• 33:59
  Glowing balls, lots of intercutting.
• 34:02
  Sorry. Oh yeah, astral travel.
• 34:06
  So the astral plane exists in Doctor Who.
• 34:13
  The Doctor hoping Victoria has been hypnotized rather than
• 34:16
  possessed. Nice gag when Jamie also starts
• 34:19
  to fall asleep on hypnosis. Yeah, that was a that was a
• 34:21
  lovely moment there. Yeah, now I say it wasn't
• 34:23
  possession, was it? It was, it was hypnotism.
• 34:26
  Yeah, yeah, he's what? He's worried.
• 34:28
  She's been possessed but she's been hypnotised, yes.
• 34:31
  Whereas actually, in the web of fear, Travis is possessed, isn't
• 34:35
  he, by the great intelligence he talks in that bizarre, raspy
• 34:38
  voice. Yes, that's right.
• 34:40
  Yes, Yeah, that's yes. He's very spooky there.
• 34:43
  Yes. I love the fact that we've
• 34:45
  managed to talk for 40 minutes and then at the end you got out
• 34:49
  in 2 minutes. Your thoughts on the episode?
• 34:53
  Well, those, those are, those are kind of those are my bullet
• 34:56
  points as I was kind of going through it, yes.
• 34:58
  I don't want to miss one. If you've got for six, we'll do
• 35:01
  it again all right at the end of 6.
• 35:02
  Oh yeah, sure thing. Yeah, whatever.
• 35:03
  Yeah. Because I've got all these
• 35:04
  questions still to read out to you.
• 35:06
  So all right, hit me. Hit me.
• 35:10
  I'll tell you what. I'll cut it there.
• 35:12
  Let's.