Latest / A Hamster With a Blunt Penknife - a Doctor Who Commentary podcast / Strictly Come Hamster - Series Three (featuring Paul Quinn & Dylan Rees)

Transcript

Strictly Come Hamster - Series Three (featuring Paul Quinn & Dylan Rees) · A Hamster With a Blunt Penknife - a Doctor Who Commentary podcast

0:34
Life is short and you are all hot.
0:38
Thank you very much. Welcome back to oh fuck me, what
0:42
am I doing today? Welcome back to Strictly Come
0:45
Hamster. My name is Joe Ford and I am in
0:49
love with Martha Jones and I haven't watched her episodes
0:53
this week. I fear I may be on the turn.
0:56
But before we get into that sort of therapy, let me pass you
0:59
straight over to my Co host, the fabulous Mr. Rod Brown.
1:02
Hello Rod, how are you today? I'm very good.
1:05
How are you? Rather hot.
1:06
It's a little bit hot in the UK here today the first time.
1:10
Yeah, I've been putting up a gazebo in the garden today.
1:14
You're so manly, you're so much Joe.
1:17
I just don't know how you do it. I just want to sort of.
1:19
Record this man in fandom. That my Avarovs dad was in fact
1:23
teaching me today how to use power tools.
1:26
So I officially feel like I am a man now.
1:29
Fantastic. I'm sure there was a video in
1:31
the old days called Power Tool, but that's a whole different
1:33
story. Let's not go down that route.
1:36
Dylan knows. He's seen.
1:38
It please introduce our guests immediately.
1:41
So yes, getting back into Doctor Who, we are doing the 2007
1:45
series. So as a reminder, the last time
1:48
we all saw television's Doctor Who, he was saying goodbye to a
1:51
gobby redhead who obviously we'll never see again, having
1:54
defeated some giant spiders. So what's he going to face now?
1:58
Well, space rhinos, giant friendly cats, hybrid pigs, a
2:02
giant praying mantis and a massive dose of crabs.
2:06
But what will we all think about it?
2:08
Let's get into it and sort out our deadlock from our quantum
2:11
lock, as well as our gridlock from our witches.
2:14
Hemlock. I had to think about that one.
2:16
We're joined by two very special guests. 1 is a returnee to
2:20
Strictly, who's the source of the most salacious rumours in
2:23
fandom, so I look forward to him retelling us.
2:26
The story of how the bondage cut in gridlock, who's seen with her
2:30
two scantily clad slaves, is really based on RTDS
2:34
experiences. That's NAFTA Show party with
2:36
Stephen Moffett and Chris Chibnall, all of whom we'll be
2:39
featuring tonight and our other. Guests put some thought into
2:43
these now. And our other guest is a
2:46
strictly newcomer. He's a senior lecturer in
2:49
English literature, so God knows what he's doing slumming it on
2:52
this old nonsense. Between us, we're going to
2:56
decide which story's going to be lifting that the cursion glitter
2:59
ball, and which will be left to pick through the ashes of Gareth
3:02
Roberts and JK Rowling's reputations.
3:06
So let's welcome tonight's guest, Paul, as our newcomer.
3:09
Please welcome yourself to the podcast.
3:12
Hello, Rod. Hello, Joe.
3:14
Here I am finally. It's taken a very long time to
3:16
actually get me on here because I've got three small children
3:21
and yeah, that's why I can't do Polish Box because I spent
3:24
Thursday evenings around a smelly swimming pool which,
3:27
which generally was what's his name?
3:31
I just matter. Yeah, I'm delighted to be here.
3:34
And as you can see, I fucked up already.
3:36
So there you go. Well, you're in good company.
3:39
Don't worry about it. I'm Dylan making a welcome
3:42
return. Yes, I'm back here.
3:45
The RTD Skeptic is in the room, ready to revisit Series 3.
3:51
Or will you be tearing it apart? Well, we'll, we'll see.
3:54
We'll see. Won't we?
3:55
So go on, before we get into the stories, let's give us your
3:59
overall impressions of Series 3, Paul.
4:03
I used to think that Series 3 was the dog of RTD's first run
4:10
as showrunner, and now I'm not so sure because I I've I've
4:14
revised my position on Series 2. And once you revise your
4:19
position on two, particularly if you think Gun on the Fireplace
4:22
is essentially a grooming narrative, then you look at
4:25
three differently. And I mean, I haven't watched
4:29
some of these since the DVD was released, so I haven't probably
4:32
seen them since the end of 2017. So it's interesting going back
4:35
to them and watching them across 8 or 9 days, watching a couple
4:40
of episodes a night to see the recurrent themes.
4:44
Now, I'm not sure it's deliberate on Davis's part, so
4:47
I'm not sure that's quite the level of skill he's putting into
4:49
this, but he's interesting to see.
4:51
Ageing comes up across a number of these narratives, the
4:56
question of what it is to be human, becoming human,
5:00
transforming humans, which of course will climates with, with
5:02
the top line chopping up small children and putting them into
5:04
balls. It's also interesting that four
5:09
and a half of the episodes are Doctor Light.
5:11
It's. Very, very noticeable that he
5:13
goes down that route. And I do wonder if on one level
5:16
he's looking forward to that discussion that you get in
5:18
Children of Earth about when the Doctor isn't there and what
5:21
happens when he isn't there. Because you get that in across a
5:24
number of these, these episodes, you get this recurring idea
5:28
about stories and storytelling and myths and self construction.
5:34
And so there's an interesting discourse in human nature about
5:36
writing. And I, there's something going
5:38
on about Paul Cornell writing about himself, the Doctor
5:40
writing about himself. And of course he's all building
5:43
into to master telling tales about the Doctor.
5:45
And of course, it's about friendship, particularly
5:47
misunderstood friendship. So Martha's idea of their
5:50
friendship is very different to what the Doctor's looking for.
5:52
But crucially, with the Master as well, that's like, that's 2
5:55
old friends come back together after a long period of time, but
5:58
they're looking at two different things in that relationship.
6:01
The Doctor thinks that he can go back to before the Masters.
6:04
Terrible, terrible life as a as a psychopath trying to take over
6:07
the universe. But but the master, I think is
6:09
looking for some type of kink relationship with with the
6:11
doctor. There's something very odd going
6:13
on there as well. It's structurally interesting
6:16
because usually I think with with with Davis, the seasons
6:20
only really get going in the second-half.
6:22
So I I loathe the first half of season 1 with a passion and four
6:27
any really gets good from the library episode onwards. 2 I
6:30
used to think was good up until impossible planet, but this the
6:33
gold is scattered across a sea of shit so it'll be in.
6:37
Transported by fishing and. And I wasn't going down this
6:42
route. I was going to be serious and
6:43
academic and and now, now I'm not so.
6:46
We're already in a sea of shit and we're only 5 minutes in.
6:49
Serious and academic would only be wasted here.
6:52
It's just a series. Of knob gaps, you've got to do
6:54
and then we can be done in 20 minutes.
6:57
Anyway, Dylan, so it's my rough point.
7:01
Fantastic, Dylan follow that. So I I said I'm a
7:07
self-proclaimed RTD skeptic. However, I am very, very fond of
7:12
the first run of Russell T Davis's go at Doctor Who.
7:16
I think the first season I really liked the second SIS
7:19
season has problems, but it's so much fun.
7:21
It's got that heartbreaking ending.
7:23
I think Russell's running on empty a bit by Season 4, but
7:27
Catherine Tate and David Tennant save it.
7:29
Like we're used to the format and Series 3 at the time.
7:32
And now I think it's the best work he's ever done on the show.
7:36
I think this is a top tier season.
7:39
I loved it then and I still love it.
7:43
Fantastic, Joe. Yeah, I love it too.
7:46
And sort of thinking about this, for this, I really couldn't find
7:50
too much to criticize. So I think I'm going to be a bit
7:52
boring on this episode with how positive I am.
7:56
But the one word I would use to describe series 3 is confident.
8:00
And coming after Billy Piper's departure, they had no right to
8:05
be confident whatsoever. But it just shines out of every
8:08
episode and even in the middle of the season where and you wait
8:13
till we get to the comments, you know, there are a lot of
8:16
accepted duds. Those are the few I actually
8:18
went back and properly watched for this.
8:20
I thought there was a lot of gold there as well.
8:23
Funny and confident and stylish. I think this is a cracking year
8:27
of Doctor Who. And like Paul said, as soon as
8:30
you hear Human Nature, it's almost an A a solid run of
8:35
absolute bangers for me from that point on, with one
8:39
exception, just to keep my powder dry.
8:41
Wow. Bloody hell, Joe, you and I are
8:43
nearly in the quarter once. What the hell is going on?
8:46
Get off. I don't know.
8:47
No, I agree with you. I was going to say bold and
8:49
confident, because that's exactly what it is.
8:51
There's one here I actively dislike.
8:54
I wonder which one it is. You might be surprising.
9:02
I'm saying nothing. And there's two that we'll say.
9:08
We'll say. I certainly wouldn't say it was
9:09
a sea of shit, unlike my esteemed colleague on this
9:12
podcast, But we'll see as we get into it.
9:14
So let's do our overall comments from our listeners.
9:18
Paul, Dylan, would you like to do the honors of reading them
9:21
for us? I would like to just say to both
9:22
of you, as I say to everybody that comes on this thing, if you
9:25
do actively disagree or agree with these comments, please feel
9:28
free to say so. You want to talk about kinks?
9:31
Our listeners have this weird kink about enjoying being
9:34
insulted, so go ahead. Everyone's favorite podcaster
9:39
present company accepted. Yeah, psychotic.
9:44
Rescinders invite. A pretty consistent entertaining
9:48
season with more than a few highs.
9:50
Now that was genuinely speaking because my my mind is all over
9:52
the place so God knows what I'm going to say tonight.
9:56
Human nature's shit and laughter is brilliant and much
9:59
underrated. Shame she's saddled with the
10:02
unrealistic love thing highs with gridlock, utopia and human
10:06
nature. But Blink leaves me stone cold
10:09
for. Fuck's sake.
10:13
OK, Darren Lit Randall says when this season gets it right, it
10:18
really gets it right. My favorite year to live through
10:21
as so many friends were into it. Human nature to the finale is a
10:25
superb run. The Dalek 2 parter was the only
10:28
bum note. Martha was a properly likable
10:31
companion. Can I ask you a question?
10:34
Has it got something to do with bums?
10:36
I'm sure it does, yeah. Because because like Coleman has
10:39
got bum in it. Is that why you called him
10:41
Darren? Lit round hole?
10:47
No, I just mispronounced it. Oh.
10:49
Fair enough. It's a very Freudian slip.
10:52
Sorry, back to Paul. Charlie Barnes writes the
10:55
resolution and the Daleks aside are most excellent season.
10:59
Martha's journey, the Mr. Saxon Ark and intertwining with
11:02
Torchwood. For God's sake it as human
11:04
nature and blink. Gareth Boli says this was where
11:09
Doctor Who returned the romance elements with the Doctor being
11:12
dialed down allowed the adventure serial to come to the
11:16
come to the fore for the better. Mark Donaldson writes I'm a huge
11:21
fan of this series. Despite the madding decision to
11:24
make Martha's whole arc about being treated the second best.
11:27
They should have wrapped that up by episode 2 and got on with the
11:30
show because Freeman never said the chance of stepping from
11:32
Rosie's shadow. I mean, I think she does, but it
11:35
takes a long, bloody time. Gavin says Martha is superb.
11:41
One of the biggest mistakes of RTD one was dropping her after
11:45
the season. Gridlocked is my favorite.
11:48
Superb cast, cats and the seeding of the Yarna plot.
11:54
Dave Rennie writes my favorite year of New Who.
11:56
Martha is brilliant and has a wonderful ending that she
11:59
chooses as the Doctor has treated her shamefully.
12:03
Who gives a flux? The more I think about it, the
12:06
more I think it's one of the best.
12:09
Tom Newsome. It's confident and swaggering,
12:12
introducing a new companion after Rose.
12:14
Bringing back the Master. These weren't easy things to do,
12:17
but RTD makes it look mostly effortless, looks more expensive
12:20
than Series 2, and does some new things.
12:24
Chris Hogbine says one of my favorite series and companions
12:27
in Martha. Human Nature is one of my
12:30
favorite stories and Blink was great.
12:32
However, the finale would have just been stronger with the war
12:36
Master. John SIM is manic and camp, but
12:39
Jacobi is just pure evil. The point, the point is he
12:43
mirrors Tenon. I will get there, yeah.
12:47
Kevin Blower The run from human nature to utopia to the utopia
12:51
reveal might be the most exciting the show has ever had.
12:55
Adrian Townsend, weakest of the new era, did introduce us to
12:59
later companion Karen Gillan. Did it now.
13:03
That's the next season, Adrian. Your argument is losing veracity
13:09
by the word and the brilliant Miranda Raisin wrestle.
13:14
I don't know. And the Darlington part.
13:16
Yeah, Raisin. OK, great.
13:18
Generally, though, dragged down by Mark and never warm to her.
13:23
What a. Gift, I mean.
13:27
Adrian you have mistaken 1 overpowered shit historical from
13:31
series 4 for over under and. And you have suggested that
13:37
Karen Gillan being introduced early and the show is a good
13:40
thing as well. Your argument.
13:41
Oh, get it? Forward.
13:43
Together. So I was with you there, but now
13:45
you and aging both have to hand in your Doctor Who bands and
13:47
fuck off. See you later, Eric.
13:50
White writes Mixed bag. Shakespeare and Lazarus were
13:53
underwhelming and 42 felt like a poor version of Planet of Evil.
13:56
The Dalek story was a mess and the final episode didn't
13:58
convince Gridlock, Human Age and Blink were really good.
14:01
Others so so. I'd argue that Planet of Evil is
14:04
actually the poor version of Planet of Evil, but we're not
14:07
doing that season today. And then finally, Ian McCann
14:11
says. I distinctly remember this as a
14:14
very summary series of Who. Starts out well with the usual
14:18
RTD present, past, future stories has a hell of a dip with
14:22
the Dalek 2 parter, but the back half is probably one of the
14:25
strongest stretches in modern Who history.
14:28
Things drop down a bit after Utopia, but you have to admire
14:31
the absolute conviction of the insanity on display in the
14:35
finale. It's excellent.
14:38
Fabulous, right? Let's go.
14:42
We've got 10 episodes to go for Paul.
14:44
Pick your story of choice, you've got all 10 to pick from
14:47
and give us the reasons why you're going to champion or
14:49
condemn it. OK, so I've got a reputation
14:53
partly fair and partly unfair for being very negative.
14:55
So I'm going to be very positive.
14:56
I'm going to be like Roland Baths, as Susan Sultan reminds
14:59
us us we should look up. It's under appreciated text,
15:02
small text. So I'm going to check.
15:04
Sorry. I'm going to Champion Daleks,
15:07
Take Manhattan and Evolution of the Daleks.
15:11
Oh, I think we may have just wet our powder there.
15:17
Thought you said wet yourself. Almost.
15:21
Now, obviously it should be called Daleks Take Manhattan
15:24
rather than Dykes in Manhattan, because the clue is that you
15:27
have to look at this as a parody or a pastiche.
15:31
The whole season is full of intertextuality to the extent
15:35
where there isn't particularly anything original here.
15:37
And you know, early on this is signalled in the Shakespeare
15:41
code. But this is a way of salvaging
15:45
this unloved orphan child. Because either you look at this
15:49
as a brilliant, deliberate, bad, good episode of Doctor Who, or
15:54
you have to say that this perhaps the most competent
15:56
production team produced one of the worst stories in the
16:01
revival, certainly. And so let me take you by the
16:05
hand and suggest how we can save this.
16:07
Now there is another version of Diet state, Manhattan evolution
16:11
of the Diet, which is much, much better, which they didn't make
16:14
because they locked into this idea of we're in New York,
16:17
therefore we need to have the Statue of Liberty and we have to
16:20
have the Empire State Building. What they should have done
16:22
really is set in Detroit in about 1936 and had the Daleks
16:26
taken over the Ford factory and making new versions of the
16:31
Daleks. That would have been amazing.
16:33
Even Ford himself was a fascist. That would track nice.
16:37
Excuse me, no. Huge, obviously.
16:42
Popular podcast host revealed to be Fashion Week that they got
16:45
the shit and. We all knew it was.
16:49
Going to happen. No relative of Joe Ford, who's a
16:53
lovely person and never tried to bring down the government.
16:56
Thank you for clearing that up, Paul.
16:59
We get these clarifications in Joe Early Doors.
17:01
Otherwise, it's just going to get out of hand and you're going
17:03
to get the wrong type of people tuning in.
17:06
So they could have had the Daleks making new casings in a
17:10
Model T Ford factory and with Henry Ford working with them
17:12
because he was a fascist, and it would have fit nicely.
17:15
This is just weird. And so we have to acknowledge
17:17
that this is deliberately playing with a large number of
17:22
sources and you have to recognise them and you have to
17:25
see how it's playing with Dalek history and it's trying to pull
17:29
against it as well. And there's a there's a few key
17:31
moments, Tallulah, that is that that's Miranda Raison that's
17:34
been praised there by. That's the one.
17:36
Agent Townsend, who clearly doesn't really talk about now.
17:38
She's awful. She's.
17:39
Brilliant. She's wonderful.
17:42
Her terrible accent tells you we want to see this as a joke
17:47
because the accents otherwise Andy Pryor's fucked up royally,
17:51
and Andy Pryor's got a pretty good run of of casting.
17:54
Look at who he's cast just in this series alone.
17:57
My, my, my, my, I want to be the big hiss that he's got here.
17:59
But even Hugh Crusher has real trouble holding that accent, so
18:03
God bless her. Her accent is horrific, but it's
18:05
meant to highlight that this is a parody because she's both Miss
18:09
Piggy and she's Tallulah from Bugsy Malone.
18:13
Of course, the second famous incident of Jodie Foster being
18:17
cast as a sex worker as a child, so well done whoever was looking
18:20
after Jodie Foster. That would also indicate where
18:24
we meant to see the pigs coming from, because otherwise the pigs
18:27
make no sense whatsoever. Why are the Daleks turning
18:31
humans into pigs? It could be dogs, it could be
18:33
sheep, it could be whatever fuck you want, but pigs?
18:36
Makes no sense. Except we're meant to see this
18:38
as a Hamas to The Muppets. So Tallulah is with her overly
18:43
aggressive man singing. It's set in a theatre that's
18:47
kind of theme. Weedy figure who who who's the
18:50
object of her desires who. Might also meant to be Victor
18:53
Laszlo from Casablanca, but I'm not sure.
18:54
I was trying to do something about anti-Semitism in it, but
18:56
it kind of just just withered and died.
18:58
Like that Dalek thing in the sewer the tenant doesn't
19:01
recognise as the Dalek, which is bizarre, really isn't.
19:04
It. In a.
19:05
Sewer 2 Grumps from the Theatre from the Muffins A.
19:08
Little Moldov. That's you and me, Joe.
19:10
Oh well. There you go.
19:12
Because. There are so many things wrong
19:15
with this. They have to be there
19:16
deliberately, otherwise it's an abject failure down to things
19:20
like the sewers got no water in it.
19:23
That has to be homage to the attack on the Cybermen, which is
19:26
the only other sewer in existence that has no water in
19:28
if we look at DO. You think the new series is
19:33
Pastation Attack of the Cybermen?
19:35
Look their their. Core text as you and I have
19:38
discussed and as you've discussed on here is Season 22
19:41
and Dell from the bannermen, that's where they go to, to how
19:44
to do it and how not to do it. And they've learnt how to not
19:47
not do it by having no water in the sewer.
19:50
Strangest moment in in a very strange thing.
19:52
Look at Solomon. So there he gives his great
19:56
speech. You know, you've got you've got
19:57
that deliberately evocative name of wisdom and a king, and he
20:00
brings all these people together.
20:01
He's. Yeah, he's essentially a living
20:03
version of the Statue of Liberty.
20:05
He gives that great speech and the Daleks shoot.
20:07
But. That's what the Daleks do.
20:10
If you think about the Dalek Controller when he faces them
20:12
down in Day of the Daleks, they shoot him.
20:14
Think back all the way to the Daleks, the the Thal Leader
20:17
whose name I've forgotten, he telling us they shoot the shit
20:21
out of him. Hugh Crush is doing the same
20:22
thing here I think with Solomon that is shot dead.
20:25
There is an issue though I think with who's the who's the Greek?
20:30
Who's running the show there? Diagenous, isn't it?
20:35
If you look on .2 wiki for him, he's described as a
20:38
philanthropist because I have to find some way of explaining how
20:42
when he sucked into that Dalek and that weird sexual way that
20:45
Dalek sex sucks him in as opposed to suck him off this
20:50
figure who's who's like he's a union Buster and he's clearly
20:54
meant to stand in for hyper American capitalism.
20:56
He must provide the morality to Dalek sect, the Dalek sect, the
21:01
size. Do you know what?
21:02
We should just mate with these humans and we should become like
21:05
them and we can go off and live on another planet and the Doctor
21:07
can drop us off there. There has to be some version of
21:10
the script, I think where it's Solomon who gets sucked into
21:12
there because there's nothing to indicate the IG is anything
21:14
other than this kind of cliched mafia type figure.
21:19
It would be better if he was German, of course, because then
21:20
he could be something about the, the, the, the Bund.
21:22
So all of these mistakes have to be deliberate because otherwise
21:26
it's such a crushing failure on the part of Davis, Rayner,
21:31
Pryor, whoever directed the designer.
21:33
Surely in what's meant to be peak Doctor Who entering its
21:37
imperial phase or its imperial phase, you wouldn't put in
21:40
episodes four and five something as bad as this.
21:43
Because if you look at the structure of a new hue, season
21:46
4-5 and six are often crucial episodes.
21:49
They introduce a theme or they highlight a theme that you
21:51
haven't picked up on the first season.
21:53
And it's pointing us forward. So certainly it's the notion of
21:56
transformation, taking humans, turn them something else into
21:59
something else that's pointing us forward to the end of the
22:03
season. Solomon says, quite pointly, We
22:05
have to try and keep our humanity in a story that's
22:08
pointed us forward to utopia where mankind has lost its
22:11
humanity. Or you're you've got the future
22:13
kind a kind of amazing Blake 7 notion of the future is the
22:17
crash lands into Doctor Who and then you go going into what it
22:20
is to be human in in the in at the end of the season where
22:23
you've got tenant turned into into a human.
22:25
So 4-5 and six are often crucial.
22:28
You wouldn't piss away 4-5 and six or something as vapid and
22:33
flaccid as the Daleks come to Manhattan, they rock up into the
22:37
Empire State Building and they fuck around, turn themselves
22:40
into humans. It's just the strangest misfire.
22:43
Therefore, it has to be deliberately bad.
22:46
And you can see there how it stays.
22:48
You know, you've got the references, the Frankenstein,
22:49
but also back to the McGann thing.
22:51
You've got all those bodies down, that very striking scene.
22:53
Actually, you've got that massive syringes.
22:57
Jesus Christ, why do they have to be so big?
22:59
It's to highlight the fact that it's a lab and it's a cliche of
23:02
a lab. All the stereotypes are there,
23:05
the massive pots bubbling away there and all these strangers
23:08
like Dalek sex suddenly finding morality and that he likes being
23:12
kind of like the Doctor and then he gets chained up and he's
23:15
dragged in like a GIMP. When they turn up on the stage
23:17
at the end it becomes some type of I don't Hamburg type sex
23:21
theatre they go into and all these Muslim men come in with
23:24
their Tommy guns. How many sexual readings are you
23:27
going to give this? This and the end of the season
23:31
is where I'm going. And possibly the Shakespeare
23:34
code. So what the Shakespeare code?
23:38
No, keep going please. Oh, don't worry, I'm going to
23:40
piss all over that joke. Don't worry about that.
23:42
There's no idea and there's going to be a proper academic
23:44
takedown of them shit birds. So.
23:46
But this I. Hated it when I first saw it and
23:49
my wife really hates it. But I watched it again now and I
23:52
thought actually, it's so bad. It's good and actually tennis
23:57
really good in it because I've I've got difficulties with
24:00
tenant because when tenant goes all screechy and mad eyes and
24:02
big teeth, they're kind of like this is terrible.
24:04
And of course that's how they that's how they crippled Jodie
24:06
Whittaker and making a do a kind of tenant impression.
24:08
But tenant across this season has got some really good stuff
24:10
here. He's pretty good.
24:11
I mean, you know, I, I quite like the fact he becomes dot
24:17
Brown from back to the future when he goes up trying to take
24:20
the things off the Empire State Building.
24:22
He gets shot through the lightning.
24:23
I love all that intertextual. I love the fact that at its
24:26
heart, there's absolutely nothing in this episode except
24:30
references to other films, other TV programs and other episodes
24:33
of Doctor Who. I love the verve and the fact
24:35
that they decided this this was the Dalek story of the season.
24:39
I love as well the fact that Russell T Davis was such a such
24:42
a fame whore, such a publicity whore.
24:44
He. Couldn't.
24:45
Resist giving away the twist by getting Darling Pet onto the
24:49
front of the Radio Times that week.
24:51
Even RTD hadn't quite hit Pete. Even John John Leyton Turner
24:56
hadn't quite hit John Pete, not John Leyton Turner at that
24:58
point. He doesn't take famously the
25:01
front cover the Radio Times for Earth Shock, because he wants to
25:04
keep a surprise. Davis couldn't give less of a
25:06
fuck. He wants you know what's coming
25:08
and what it is is someone on the front cover those really kind of
25:12
unsettling cock like protuberances that hanging off
25:15
Dalek Zed. It's like a cow, but you replace
25:18
the others and put it on a head and replace them with cocks, and
25:21
that's what you're meant to get your nan to pick up to see what
25:24
she's going to what when's bargain hung on that week I've.
25:28
Got 7 of them all right. You know.
25:31
And so is my Nan. And a lot of Vaseline too.
25:38
Where's that? I bet if you squeezed anyway,
25:48
let. Me round up this way.
25:50
This. Way I shouldn't be let loose on
25:51
this at all. It's awesome because you can
25:55
fill it with all this kind of this kind of mad speculation
25:58
and, and the key is very early on, bless her, Miranda Racer is
26:03
fucking awful. And why she was cast because she
26:05
does that. My name is Tallulah.
26:07
And then all that heaven and hell stuff.
26:09
It it, it's fabulously shit. And so I urge everyone to save
26:13
it and hopefully, hopefully it wins out at the end of the day.
26:18
I'm so confused at this point. I don't know if you'd like it,
26:20
don't like it. With a defence like that, does
26:23
anybody need to prosecute? It shall.
26:29
We go to the comments. We go to the.
26:31
Comments, yeah. I've never been more confused on
26:34
that because. I'll tell you who read the
26:37
comment about the utter madness, you know, towards the end of the
26:40
season. Yeah.
26:41
Yeah. I feel as if that would be this
26:43
haunted already. Gun hamster.
26:45
Boy oh boy, I want to listen. Right, let's start with Daniel
26:49
Knight, says Darlington. Manhattan, unfairly maligned.
26:51
It's a fun romp, even though the accents are as variable as those
26:55
in the gunfighters. The dialects are great,
26:58
especially when one turns his eyes still ground to check who's
27:00
listening. Oh, Jason Thompson, and I can
27:03
just hear him saying every word of this.
27:05
All right? Plumsily plotted, padded and
27:08
nonsensical. By the 4th time the Doctor was
27:11
standing unarmed in front of the Daleks and they didn't just
27:14
shoot the bastard, I was groaning.
27:17
But the scene with Dalek can expressing grudging admiration
27:20
for humanity is good, Making him a character to engage with.
27:23
Love that but being the story. Michael Storm says there's so
27:27
much wrong with this, from storytelling direction to
27:29
design. One would almost think it was
27:31
intentional. Oh my God, we've got two madmen
27:35
that think. The same thing I thought you
27:36
actually. Are mentors, you know, podcasts
27:38
on the dizzy games and on something on on C double.
27:41
So I think probably there is some meet the minds.
27:43
There, I thought you had an air of Michael Storm about you,
27:46
Paul. Why does Dalek set get a
27:48
conscience after absorbing a mob boss?
27:51
Same comment as opposed to say Solomon.
27:53
And yet it's strangely re watchable.
27:56
Did you read that comment before you did your argument?
27:59
No, he wouldn't. I know you didn't.
28:00
I possibly have. Seen it, James Lark says.
28:04
A bit rubbish. A feeling of if we can patch
28:07
these set pieces together, it was to work along with a dose
28:10
who have been there, done that, Plus a production team happy to
28:14
spoil the cliffhanger for the sake of the Radio Times cover.
28:17
Razor Gregory, he says. A sad misfire in another way.
28:20
Stellar season. Champion of the.
28:24
Dad, my ass, title gone. Not even Spider Man himself or
28:30
Tenants on Fire can save this tale of pigmen, solar storms at
28:34
night, and Daleks with New York accents that have forgotten what
28:37
Daleks are supposed to be. Melvin Pena says both bit of
28:42
silly fun and biting critique of the myth of American You love
28:46
giving me that I always American exceptionalism.
28:50
We can strive to build wonders in one part of the city while we
28:53
let our most vulnerable citizens die of starvation in another.
28:57
Miranda Raisin Paul is wonderful.
29:01
John Ben John Bensarlia. No.
29:05
The first episode shows promise. Can we just leave it there?
29:08
Yes, please. It's quirky, unusual, and then
29:12
episode 2 exterminates that with poor pacing, acting and Dalek
29:16
Sack features the worst performance by a doctor in the
29:19
form of tenants shouty, obnoxious Jeremy Kyle wannabe.
29:23
Dan Hollingsworth says no redeeming features.
29:26
None. Nothing has no redeeming
29:28
features. Oh, sorry.
29:30
Except for an early appearance by the lovely Andrew Garfield,
29:34
Dan Hollingsworth is a horny bastard.
29:38
Daniel Rosley says, often oddly misshapen.
29:41
Never has Manhattan been this Welsh, but I don't care.
29:44
I love this one. Big ideas.
29:46
B Movie. Pulp Daleks.
29:48
Pink knickering, shouty Tennant. Tallulah in capitals.
29:52
Murray Music and a Dalek dickhead to boot.
29:55
Criminally underrated. David Gillespie, Pratt says
29:59
frankly. Awful and terrible in equal
30:01
measure. Padded beyond belief, some
30:04
horrendous American accents, and the Dalek hybrid fails on almost
30:08
every level. Can we burn this and get Power
30:11
of the Daleks back instead? No, I mean I would be all over
30:13
that. Crush dummy says not great and
30:16
probably the weakest RTD Dalek story, but it has some camp fun
30:19
with Tallulah. And finally Paul Smy says dear
30:24
God this is a terrible story. The human Dalek looks stupid,
30:28
terrible accents over long, and a waste of some great acting
30:32
talent. Mixed.
30:35
I'd say mixed. Mixed more more love than I
30:38
thought. Then let's.
30:38
See if Dylan can bring the love. Well I mean this is a weird 1
30:42
isn't it? And I think I remember really
30:44
disliking it at the time. But mainly the second part, and
30:47
I think it's because the Daleks have been so key to those first
30:52
two seasons and they're they're in the both of the finales and
30:55
they represent like doomsday, a serious threat.
31:00
Like, and then here they are just because they obviously want
31:03
the Daleks, because kids love Daleks.
31:04
Everyone loves Daleks. They want to get them in the
31:06
season, but they don't want to put them in the finale.
31:08
So they put it this weird two-part of it.
31:11
And yeah, it does have its issues, but my God, is it fun.
31:16
Like I spent I, I went into it thinking this is going to be
31:20
terrible. And honestly, I have changed my,
31:23
my mind completely. I just think it's so much fun.
31:26
I love the accents. I think the accents are
31:28
fantastic. It's very, you know, it's very
31:31
West End in terms of the accents they're doing.
31:34
You know, it's, it's a, it's a British person doing a stage
31:37
performance. But it, it sells it for me
31:40
because I don't want, this is a time of, you know, great poverty
31:43
and Great Depression. And I Doctor Who needs to find a
31:47
way to address that. But also to keep it in that
31:50
Doctor Who tone. You don't want this to be too
31:52
depressing, so it just injects a little bit of life and that's
31:56
why it's all Broadway and show tunes and things like that.
32:00
I love the pig slaves. That is my name on Grinder if
32:04
anybody wants to look me up. I thought you looked familiar.
32:10
Anyway, I think The Devil in Me is an absolute banger of a song
32:15
and it. Should be There is clearly,
32:17
there is clearly nobody in that audience.
32:19
Right. And I yes, it's got you know, it
32:24
looks all looks a bit Cardiffy and for some reason RTDS very
32:28
anti going abroad out of all the showrunners.
32:30
Who knows why this is, but I love the flying Daleks over
32:34
Hooverville, the execution of Solomon, and I just think the
32:39
Daleks are a little bit because they're not meant to be the
32:41
proper Daleks or the Cult of Scaro.
32:43
They're a little cheekier. They're a little bit more
32:45
malevolent and they're just allowed to shine a little bit
32:49
more in this. They're not just cannon fodder
32:51
as they appear in a lot of the finale.
32:53
So it's it's more classic Doctor Who.
32:56
It does have its tongue a little bit in cheek, but I mean, for
32:59
me, it's just so much fun. You have no soul if you do not
33:04
like this. No.
33:06
Have you got any soul? Really not because I really love
33:10
this as well. And I do think Paul is right, it
33:13
is kind of terrible, but it's sort of terrible in AB movie
33:16
sort of a way. And I love AB movie and
33:18
everything is heightened to like up into the up into the
33:22
stratosphere, right? Everything is crazy over the
33:24
top. And that's why I love Tallulah.
33:25
In fact, I'm very sad whenever Tolulu is not on the screen.
33:29
I wouldn't have objected to Tallulah popping into the TARDIS
33:32
at the end of this. Just, yeah, sunk the entire
33:35
second-half of the season, but it would have been so fun to
33:38
watch. I think this is really stylishly
33:40
directed as well. I just want to point out one
33:43
wonderful moment when the Daleks are zooming around those sewers
33:46
at the beginning of Part 2 and James Halls.
33:49
Is it James Halls? It's.
33:50
Pretty strong. Thank you as fixed a camera to
33:54
in front of the Dalek looking up and you're just watching him
33:57
going around like a crazy motherfucker.
33:59
It's really beautiful to look at.
34:00
I think that song is really well staged.
34:02
And I speak as the my ex partner's father was a
34:07
choreographer. He watched this and he said he
34:09
thought it was fabulous too. I love the gossipy Daleks in the
34:14
sewers. You know that bit where they
34:16
turn their eyes, stalks around and go, they're having fun with
34:19
Daleks? I do wish that the poor writers
34:22
it Helen Rayner had gone to Gallifrey base after the
34:25
episodes went out because, oh, I think we all have the same
34:28
reaction when this went out. But it was absolute dog shit and
34:31
everyone took to Gallifrey base and basically she was in therapy
34:35
for the next 10 years. She's been cancelled.
34:37
Now you know that, no. Is this a Dylan rumor?
34:41
No. Her and Gareth Roberts have a
34:42
lot in common. Oh Jesus Christ, I don't feel
34:45
sorry for her anymore. Then Ryan, everyone take to
34:48
Gallifrey Basin. It's about Ellen Rayner.
34:51
No, I used to hate this. I love it now.
34:55
I think it zips along. I think Martha's wonderful in
34:57
the second episode. She's got so much agency and
35:00
confidence in that second episode.
35:01
I find Tenon insanely annoying in this.
35:04
This is all teeth and shouting. It's a side of him I really
35:08
don't like. But apart from that, I think
35:10
it's it's fun, it's entertaining.
35:12
I would absolutely put this through.
35:13
It's like a big shit blockbuster movie.
35:17
Doctor Who, I love it. Well, it's 4 for four because I
35:21
love it as well. And Dylan, I completely agree
35:24
with you. I think people were expecting.
35:26
You're right. We've had Dalek, we've had two
35:29
finales with Daleks. We used them being big action
35:32
adventure and this isn't, it's a bit more thoughtful, it's a bit
35:36
more sedate. Their Daleks are in the shadows,
35:38
they're plotting, they're scheming, they're gossiping at
35:41
times, but it's very different. It's it's almost like, you know,
35:45
evil and power after you've had master plan and Dalek invasion
35:48
of Earth. It's just a different tone of
35:49
Dalek story. And I think that's probably why
35:51
people really took against it because they wanted yet another
35:54
whiz bang action adventure and that's not this.
35:57
This is something different. This is about evolution, if you
36:00
excuse the pun. So we've got 4 Daleks lost in
36:03
time, hiding in 1930s sewers, working on, you know, Dalek
36:07
hybrids. Then they decide no, we need to
36:09
capitalize on their greatest resource, which is people.
36:12
So we're going to make a hybrid Dalek and that results in Dalek
36:15
sack. And I think there's a lot when
36:17
you actually stop, it's very difficult because obviously he's
36:20
got a face full of dog sticks and that is very disturbing and
36:25
it's difficult to take that seriously.
36:27
But actually you're. Really supposed to take that
36:30
seriously at any point? It's it's, it's alarming, isn't
36:34
it? It's a visual image.
36:36
I mean RTD has seen a few Dicks right?
36:38
Like he. Knows.
36:38
What a Dick looks like he knows what that mouse looks like.
36:41
Absolutely. It's the yeah.
36:43
It's the way they kind of flop and then rise up and down.
36:45
Yeah, it's a little bit hard, isn't it?
36:48
I'm hearing. That much do they rod?
36:50
They do tend to be a bit flaccid.
36:51
And they are quite flaccid. Yeah.
36:55
If they were all erect, it would definitely be cancelled.
36:58
But actually, if you stop and listen to all him and the doctor
37:01
are talking about, there's actually some quite, you know,
37:04
there's quite good moral debates going on there.
37:06
And unfortunately that gets lost because that visual just looks
37:09
so ridiculous. It's difficult to get past it.
37:12
But I think there's some really interesting dynamics.
37:15
And the conversations almost mirror kind of Doctor and Davros
37:18
debates. There's, I think there's a lot
37:20
more meat there than people give this substance for second
37:24
reason. Martha and Tallulah together.
37:26
What a fucking amazing double act they are.
37:29
I love Miranda Raisin and this she was well known by Spooks by
37:33
this point. And yeah, she's giving a really,
37:35
really broad Nui arc accent, but she's she's endearing as hell.
37:40
That first scene where she's holding the Doctor and Martha at
37:43
gunpoint, just waving the gun round, completely carefree.
37:49
She's. So much fun.
37:52
And of course, she's got the Doctor's card.
37:55
She knows he's a fan of musical theatre and he likes show You
38:01
where's what Donna said later on.
38:03
You know, it's barely hidden below the surface, but her and
38:06
Martha make a really interesting team.
38:09
Yes. To start with, we've got them
38:10
both kind of talking about their love.
38:12
Tallulah's pining for Laszlo. Martha obviously is pining for
38:14
the Doctor. But once we get past that and
38:17
get into episode 2, they make a great double act and they really
38:20
get stuck in together. They show courage, intelligence,
38:23
daring do when they, you know, they're at the top of the Empire
38:25
State Building preparing to hold off all the pig slaves and the
38:28
Daleks. They're a great double act, and
38:30
I think they work really well together.
38:31
Like you said, they'd be great if they'd gone off in the TARDIS
38:33
together. And my last reason, Joe, we
38:37
recently did series 11 Joe this series and we talked about the
38:40
historicals bringing, you know, partition and American racism
38:44
any. Difference if I'm honest.
38:47
Well, I would say they bring Hooverville to the fore.
38:50
You know, that is a story usually.
38:52
I'd done a lot of history. You know, I knew about the Wall
38:54
Street crash. I knew about the kind of
38:56
economic turmoil across Europe. You don't hear it so much in
38:59
America. So I actually found Hooverville.
39:01
I didn't know about that. I didn't know that was a thing.
39:03
So you know that it's interesting you'd see that.
39:06
But you're right, Dylan, this is a Doctor Who story.
39:08
So we've got pig slaves and Daleks and flying and explosions
39:12
everywhere. Throw in a few musical numbers
39:15
as well. But at the heart of it, it is
39:17
actually there's a little bit of education in there, as well as
39:19
telling us something different. So yeah, I love her.
39:22
It's going through. Somehow, after all those banks
39:24
and whistles, it all focuses down on the cheapest possible
39:28
climax. All set in that cinema, that
39:31
theatre, isn't it, with some really dodgy acting.
39:34
And Can you believe they got in the one of the hottest men on
39:38
television from Desperate Housewives and turned him into a
39:41
fucking pig? I couldn't believe it.
39:43
Sorry, Doctor Who. Anyway, hurrah for Daleks in
39:46
Manhattan. It's going through Dylan, your
39:49
first pick. So I'd like to talk about the
39:53
Shakespeare code. Wouldn't we all?
39:57
I knew you two were going to be controversial.
39:59
Let's let's get this out of the way.
40:02
Gareth Roberts, I do not agree with his opinions on trans
40:07
women. I think he's become an
40:08
intolerable human person. Fuck that guy.
40:12
And I think there's some very uncomfortable moments in this
40:15
script, not least the one where the white doctor tells the black
40:19
companion to just walk around like you own the place.
40:22
And the certainly the doctor evoking JK now has a different
40:27
meaning to it. And the line.
40:29
Those are men dressed as women. London never changes.
40:32
This also has a slightly different take.
40:35
However, I am putting this one through because I think it's
40:39
fucking brilliant. As a kid, I hated Shakespeare.
40:44
As an adult, I still hate Shakespeare.
40:46
It's impenetrable shit that I just just does not work for me
40:50
on any level. And give me to Lucy McCall,
40:52
please. This she's.
40:54
Going to be cancelling You makes Shakespeare accessible to kids
40:59
and morons like me who just don't get it.
41:04
I think the carrier nights are fantastic monsters.
41:08
They're brilliant witches. I think redesigning Shakespeare
41:12
as a rock star makes this so much more accessible and so much
41:16
more fun. This is proper Saturday night
41:19
adventure series fun for all the family.
41:23
It looks fantastic and it's just a riot from start to finish.
41:28
So they may be. There may be 3 or 4 short
41:31
reasons there, but I'm putting it through because I think it's
41:34
a brilliant bit of telly and a brilliant bit of Doctor Who.
41:37
Well, OK, let's go to the comments.
41:40
Jack Coyer says. I suppose the key cultural
41:42
reference here is the 2007 film of Neil Gaiman's.
41:45
So there's another one. It's been cancelled.
41:49
I'm here, aren't we? I'm surprised we're all still
41:52
all right. I'm honestly.
41:53
It won't take long. So yeah, I suppose the key
41:56
cultural reference here is Stardust with three witches
41:58
using voodoo dummies to injure and torture people in a quaint
42:02
fantasy setting. I do wonder if this would have
42:04
fared better in RTD 2. Not only could the 15th Doctor
42:07
and Shakespeare have had a re intriguing roguish dynamic, the
42:11
visuals would have been an improvement on the sub Merlin
42:14
feel of this. Jason Thompson makes a very good
42:17
first comment here. He says nice concept, the power
42:20
of words. So it's a shame that the author
42:23
and the other author it references have gone on to use
42:25
theirs to cause so much harm. That said, I enjoyed this at the
42:28
time, apart from Martha who said she was not remotely interested
42:32
at the end of the previous episode.
42:33
Suddenly goes all doe eyed on the bed and reacts so badly to
42:37
the Doctor mentioning Rose. But yeah, been it.
42:40
Daniel Rawnsley says I hate calling Doctor Who dated, but
42:43
this one has aged. Interestingly.
42:46
As a historical it's entertaining enough and the
42:48
arrow in the TARDIS is a brilliant closing gag.
42:51
To quote or to misquote the Bard, I like all the sound and
42:54
fury, but it's a tale told by an idiot.
42:58
Ouch. Gregory separating the art from
43:01
the artist. A perfectly decent celebrity
43:03
historical. Dean Lennox Kelly's a stand out
43:06
though. Christina Cole is a close
43:08
second. You give me these tongue
43:10
twisters on purpose, I swear. The look and feel was also pitch
43:13
perfect and the power of was an interesting premise.
43:16
John Pensalia says still completely and utterly.
43:20
Awful. Now can we just say John
43:23
Pensalia basically hates the entire new series?
43:25
Oh, you might be surprised. There's no I can't wait.
43:30
The potential is there for a fun run around but it's wasted with
43:32
the Gallagher brother Will. Empty characters, shit witches,
43:36
poor effects and one of the most annoying and irresponsible takes
43:39
on the doctor. Plus good old JK really and.
43:43
Wasn't. At the time.
43:45
At the time it wasn't, yeah. Yeah, Michael Storm, who I
43:49
really think hates the Rusty Davis era.
43:53
Dull and full of cliche. It's not as clever, as funny as
43:56
it thinks it is. Some good performance, but
43:58
Bloodside and Doom Finger have the gravitas of witches in a
44:01
primary school production of Macbeth bin.
44:04
Malfin, Penya says, hence the callousness of the tenant Dr.
44:07
He's a hero but not false, faultless.
44:10
His walk around like you own the place mentality is white alien
44:13
privilege, and his dismissive attitude towards Malfa is a
44:16
quality of this Doctor that RTD doesn't hide.
44:20
Daniel Knight says good fun mainly mainly thanks to Charles
44:23
Palmer's direction and Dean Lennox Kelly's charismatic
44:26
performance. The witches look scary and the
44:28
conclusion is neat, even though the JK references will infuriate
44:32
some. If Glaspie Pratt says the
44:34
doctors dismissive attitude towards Martha and pining for
44:37
Rose here does this no favours, he's really needing a slap at
44:41
this point. He is, he is.
44:43
Paul Smye finally says the one I revisit very often.
44:47
He says try that again. Well, it's not, it says.
44:50
Not one I revisit very often. Shakespeare is badly cast.
44:54
The witches are pretty rubbish. Been it.
44:57
OK, not a popular episode then with the hamster listeners.
45:01
So Paul, I think he's already teased, but he's got something
45:04
to say about this one, so strap yourself in.
45:06
Hang on, I'll put my seat belt on, OK?
45:07
Go in. My notes I've written 10 is an
45:11
awful shit. I mean, it's true.
45:14
It's true. That's the the curious moment
45:17
when Martha and the Doctor are in bed and he starts talking
45:20
about Rose and he's really terribly clumsy of this type of
45:23
thing. This is a tricky 1 because
45:26
obviously you know where Robertson Rowling have gone
45:28
subsequently does colour how we view this text.
45:31
But even before before that, if you can set that to one side,
45:34
you know how far you can approach something by ignoring
45:36
the author. I I never really liked this one
45:40
and it's more annoying as times gone on.
45:43
If you recall that awful film Anonymous, which is about
45:46
Shakespeare, not right in his plays, and it swaps Richard the
45:52
3rd for Richard the 2nd. And we went to see in the cinema
45:55
and I was like fuming at the end of it and some bloke behind him.
45:58
Are you a scholar, Sir? Which was a mistake because then
46:01
I took that 10 minutes as to why it was so bad.
46:04
So I have to put my early modernism to one side because
46:06
the historical inaccuracy in this really pissed me off.
46:09
Most of them are harmless. So, you know, the office of the
46:13
Master Rebels is the actual centre in this period and it was
46:16
someone called Tilney or he's called Linley here.
46:19
Him dying on the street in a scene which is clearly a homage
46:22
of Mind of Evil would probably stop the theatre's performing
46:25
that week. Certainly Shakespeare wouldn't
46:27
be performing without a license. Loves Labour's 1 Elizabeth the
46:33
Second first rather appears to be rocking around with two
46:36
guards, which is interesting given the number of plots
46:39
against her by 1599. She's on our.
46:42
Budget all right. He's on.
46:44
We're on a the. Rest are outside.
46:46
Well, they've pissed the budget on using the Globe.
46:48
Now when they are at the Globe, it's a nice scene. 10 does some
46:51
nice work. There's some nice finger acting
46:53
from 10, not fingering from 10. When we were going to go there?
46:56
Finger acting was in there and when he's quieter and more
46:59
meditative he's good. It doesn't go over the fact that
47:01
he is a shit earlier on in it and when he's with Peter St. the
47:05
Peter Street scene is really well done as well.
47:07
That kind of madness and the attack that takes place.
47:09
But the witches are wrong and that kind of reading the witches
47:13
onto this period is wrong and it's misleading people.
47:16
So we're talking about kind of an educative pace.
47:19
The. Witches only become witches like
47:20
that after 16 O3. At this point they wouldn't be
47:23
witches like that. So there's this.
47:25
There's something odd going on there, but of course it's touch
47:28
point is Harry Potter because we've got it's all a bit Harry
47:31
Potter at this point. When she takes the broom and she
47:34
goes out the window, I think we're meant to think of Harry
47:36
Potter. Although actually it makes me
47:37
think of a much better text, which is Romano Broom, which is
47:40
fabulous by Julia Donaldson, where the broom is crucial, but
47:43
where I really have a problem with this text, and it's there
47:46
with its titling. The Shakespeare code is
47:48
meaningless and it's only called that because of the Da Vinci
47:51
Code, the dog shit popular text at the time.
47:54
And I was in bookselling and this will be my last bookselling
47:57
reference so you don't get dragged into these old ship
47:59
Warsaw. We sold a lot of that book, but
48:01
as was subsequently revealed, you know, it's a bad book
48:04
anyway. There's no mystery to it.
48:07
You've got a, a, an author, you've got a central figure in
48:10
it who knows everything. So there's no surprise.
48:12
And it's kind of formatting from other better texts or other
48:15
texts like Henry Lincoln of Yeti fame is Holy Blood, Holy Grail.
48:20
But it was hugely popular. So you can see they've they've
48:22
sharp that title on that. I think there was a book
48:23
subsequent called The Shakespeare Code.
48:25
But there's something in this about lack of originality
48:29
because we're told that Shakespeare is the most human
48:32
being. He's the most human genius.
48:34
He always chooses the best words.
48:36
And of course, that leads to the what's meant to be a very funny
48:38
joke of him going shut your big faces.
48:40
And he is that kind of Mank figure there.
48:43
He's been in Shameless, haven't he, Dean, Dean Lennox for that.
48:45
He's bringing that kind of role to it.
48:48
But what we find throughout this is that in fact, Shakespeare
48:50
can't choose the best words. And so the running joke of a
48:54
kind of bootstrap paradox where Tennant says a line from
48:59
Shakespeare, Shakespeare says, I'm going to have that.
49:01
And so Tennant has the Doctor has read these lines in
49:04
Shakespeare, but he's given the lines to Shakespeare.
49:07
And then you get the really pointless use of Dylan Thomas
49:10
and rage, Rage Against the dying of the light and the fact he
49:11
can't have that. And it kind of builds then to
49:14
the climax where suddenly Shakespeare has to be the great
49:18
words with who always chooses the best words for that.
49:19
That final scene where he has to send the carry lights back into
49:24
The Phantoms, I think is what it probably is, the closest
49:27
allusion to it. Certainly when they're in the
49:28
globe at the end, he's very Superman 2 and and and Superman
49:31
Motion Picture. But what is curious is so he
49:34
comes up with his dog role. There's a lot of rhyming couples
49:36
and I'm not sure that that's quite right.
49:39
And then he stumbles. He can't think of a final word.
49:42
Tennant can't think of a final word.
49:43
Martha thinks of the final word. But where Martha has to go to is
49:46
to JK Riley's and Expelliarmus and Joe Rogers at the time.
49:51
You know, big figure. And like Tenant talks about
49:54
waiting to read the 7th book, he's really pointing this
49:56
forward. But Rowlings is the least
49:58
original writer to gain prominence at this point,
50:01
alongside Dan Brown. So it's interesting.
50:04
The two cultural points at this are two figures whose entire
50:07
works are dependent upon what Tolkien calls the Cauldron of
50:10
Story. That's always bubbling and OK,
50:13
authors come and take from it and put back into it.
50:15
But it highlights a problem with Doctor Who at this point that
50:18
all the intertextuality is highlighting.
50:20
Doctor Who's lost that sense of originality.
50:22
We're back to the kind of complaints that you see about
50:24
when Ennis Lloyd takes over. The Doctor Who starts mimicking
50:28
other programs, loses that sense of originality that you have in
50:31
seasons 1-2 and three. And we've kind of got this here,
50:34
where it's all pop cultural references, some of which have
50:37
aged very, very badly. Something about the GIMP men in
50:40
Smith and Jones I can talk about in terms of the Zaverix advert.
50:44
That's meaningless to anyone watching it now unless you
50:46
remember that. And so by going to Rowling's the
50:49
great cultural touch point, you highlight the fact that
50:51
Shakespeare isn't the great wordsmith.
50:53
And you've already made that point, and then you want to be
50:55
the wordsmith again, but now he runs out and he has to go to
50:56
somebody else who, eyes themselves, has a complete lack
50:59
of originality. The fact that then history
51:01
overtakes it and Rowlings and Roberts, as whoever is the
51:06
comments said, have used their own words to attack minority
51:10
groups, makes it even more problematic.
51:12
I, I, I think, but that that's reading back on to the text, but
51:15
the text as it was in 2007. Like you think at the time, if
51:19
you were a child at the time, that joke would land and that's
51:24
why it's there. Absolutely.
51:26
It's there, but it does highlight the fact that and, and
51:28
you find it. I mean, I, I found Roberts's two
51:31
literary pastiches absolutely awful.
51:34
I think that addicted to the Christie Story is absolutely.
51:39
We'll talk. All right, we'll talk.
51:41
About the giant wasp on the front of the book.
51:42
Because Chrissy has nothing to do with the design of the front
51:45
covers of the Fontanas Weird series in the 1960s and 70s.
51:49
Here we've got the recourse of the great work.
51:51
The Grace Worsmith of all time is some type of sub Brit pop
51:56
cheeky Rascal who at the moment where he's meant to have depth
52:00
when he talks about the death of his son, that scene doesn't
52:02
land. And that's meant to have been
52:04
the emotional hook that's and the power that's dragged the
52:07
carry lights from the phantom site.
52:09
It doesn't convince at all and it just collapses into Rowling's
52:13
Expelliarmus, a text copying a text that's copied other texts.
52:17
It just kind of this this self reverential mirror and and I
52:21
really really don't like it. So you're putting this right.
52:29
I'm challenging this view that I'm this negative figure and
52:32
everything. 'S going through I.
52:34
Want to follow that? You follow that.
52:36
OK, well I'm also going to be down on the Shakespeare Co
52:39
because this is the one that I really, really dislike from this
52:43
series. I can't have seen this coming.
52:44
Go on I. Actively dislike that one and I
52:48
mean I've picked 3 reasons but really it's just the first
52:51
reason. It's the thing that just really
52:52
gets my goat and it's just, it's quite similar to pot.
52:55
I just hate the depiction of Shakespeare in it for me.
52:59
Unlike you Dylan, Shakespeare really talked to me when I was
53:03
at school. Absolutely loved it, and I just
53:06
found it really sane to me, and I just really embraced it and
53:09
loved it. So I don't think Shakespeare
53:12
should always be treated with absolute reverence.
53:14
I'm not saying that I enjoy stuff like Upstart Crow with
53:17
David Mitchell, the Shakespeare comedy.
53:19
I think that's very funny. But in Doctor Who, given the
53:22
audience, I think we should be treating him with a bit more
53:26
respect and it should be earned. And so the words that you've
53:29
just said, Paul, the first word Shakespeare utter, shut your big
53:32
fat mouths. That's the point.
53:34
At that point, it already loses. Every time of that.
53:38
No, that just piss because all the other literary characters we
53:41
see in this era where there's Agatha Dickens, they treat them
53:45
with respect. Yes, there's stories going on
53:47
around them, but think of, you know, Unicorn and the Wasp.
53:50
There's a load of comedy larks and I think it's a great
53:53
episode. Unlike Mike Paul, I think it's a
53:56
great episode, but they treat Agatha seriously and they don't
54:00
treat Shakespeare with the seriousness here.
54:03
So he has that awful line, then he starts acting like a kind of
54:06
stand up comic. He's speaking back to the
54:08
audience and it's just, it just completely loses me at that
54:12
point. I just say though, I find it
54:14
hard to bond with that after. That he's got swagger and kids
54:18
love that, you know, it's like Dylan said, this is a way of
54:21
making Shakespeare appeal to kids.
54:24
Oh yeah, we're putting him in that kind of rock God camp,
54:27
aren't we? When he talks about no
54:28
autographs and he's belittling his fans and but it just.
54:32
Doesn't work. It doesn't work for me.
54:34
You must surely see why they did it.
54:36
Though Oh, absolutely. I can completely get why they do
54:38
it, but for me it completely lost me on that.
54:41
Shut your big fat mouths. Because when I saw that in the
54:43
trailer, I thought, right, so he's not going to be
54:46
Shakespeare. Something has de Shakespeared
54:48
him to be using that kind of language.
54:50
And actually it's not that at all.
54:52
We just as, as someone said, we've kind of feeding into the
54:55
Oasis. My good brother rock.
54:56
God, that just doesn't work for me.
54:58
Look, Shakespeare. Oh, that's just awful.
55:04
No, it just doesn't work for me. So again, as Paul said for me,
55:08
when we get the series bit later on when he's starting to have
55:11
insights and awareness, I I don't believe in it because I've
55:15
just seen this Dick before, so I can't feel it.
55:18
And the fact that you know that the final act of expelling the
55:21
Carianite is not to use cod Shakespearean language, but
55:25
Harry fucking Potter. At that point, I'm not a Harry
55:28
Potter fan either, so that was just an insult too far.
55:30
So the whole depiction of Shakespeare I just find
55:33
irritating, annoying and insulting.
55:36
So I mean. I hate Harry Potter.
55:37
I've never read the Harry Potter.
55:38
I tried reading the first one and it was tedious but I I just.
55:42
I understand why I understand. Oh.
55:44
Absolutely, I I get why it's there and I get it, but for me
55:48
personally if I'm judging it. Maybe you shouldn't be watching
55:50
this show anymore. Then maybe it's not for you.
55:53
I think it's just maybe this one episode and then we got the
55:55
carrier night. I mean, they're just so so
55:59
cartoon, aren't they? Doomside and Blood Finger.
56:01
I mean, they're out, they're out a local and so aren't they?
56:04
It's like. You and me on this, what are you
56:06
talking about? Well, that's true, Yeah.
56:09
No, don't like that. And the production, the
56:10
production is really odd. So for 1599, everyone is so
56:15
unbelievably clean and groomed. So that first scene when the the
56:19
male suitor comes into Woo Lilith, they look like they've
56:21
just walked out of a shampoo ad. They're both so clean and tidy
56:25
and fine. If that's the vibe you're going
56:27
for, fine. But then they don't.
56:29
When we get to the Peter Street scene, he is dirty, he's
56:32
dishevelled, he's got blackened teeth and he's the only
56:35
character in it. They present that way, which is
56:37
odd because he's the one with mental health issues, so it's
56:39
odd that they choose to depict him as looking dirty and grimy
56:43
and as people of the age would have done, whereas everyone else
56:46
is is golden and shining and we don't want to.
56:48
Be looking at having people on. The TV Do we?
56:51
Come on. And yeah, he's OK if he's dirty
56:54
because he's got mental health problems, so that's fine.
56:56
No, I just find that I, I think there are some errors in the
56:59
production that it just doesn't work for me.
57:01
So All in all, this is an absolute dud for me.
57:04
But I get why they did that. I'm going to be really brief.
57:07
I mean, I want to put this through because I think this is
57:10
a really entertaining, super confident episode of Doctor Who,
57:15
especially in its realization. Like the second this started, I
57:19
was just being assailed with really pretty images.
57:22
Is this Charles Palmer doing this one?
57:23
It is and he does human nature later in the season.
57:26
Yes, he was such a find. He really brings us together
57:30
well. I adore the the CGI London that
57:33
they do as well. I, I and obviously all the
57:35
location work in and out of the globe.
57:37
Absolutely gorgeous. And I think Dean Lennox Kelly, I
57:40
think that was a a savvy move. I love that he's sexy and
57:44
uncouth and thoughtful and charismatic and silly and
57:49
flirting outrageously with Martha all the time, which is
57:51
exactly what I will be doing as well.
57:54
Yeah, Dylan, you really shouldn't have gone for this
57:57
one. We would have got it.
57:59
Through because it's in the bin. I had to talk about something.
58:02
Do you know? Just very quickly.
58:03
I worked with Dean Lennox Kelly once and whenever a runner would
58:07
go up to him and ask him if he wanted anything from the shops,
58:10
he would always request a discontinued chocolate bar and
58:13
they'd be out for hours trying. To.
58:15
Find like a sky bar or something.
58:17
They'd be like, Oh no, no. It turns out they haven't made
58:19
that since 1997. They just did it to wind people
58:21
up. It was very funny.
58:23
You know Luke Malloy said something you know it's rare,
58:26
but it's been known to happen. Very, very thoughtful about this
58:30
episode in his blog when he said like this is as safe as Doctor
58:34
Who comes right Pulling in all of these things that we know
58:37
will appeal to the kids, but I think they pull it off.
58:41
I think it's a really fun episode.
58:43
So. But anyway it's.
58:44
Going in the bin. So Shakespeare code falls, Joe,
58:48
Pick your story. I would like to put through
58:51
Smith and Jones Please to stay because I think it's probably
58:55
the best Rusty Davis season opener.
58:58
And I particularly want to focus on that first of that first
59:02
scene of the episode where he beautifully captures that family
59:06
in a series of vocals. He does more in 2 1/2 minutes
59:11
with Martha Jones than Steven Moffat managed with three and
59:17
and, well, No 3 episodes and then half a season with Clara.
59:21
And that takes some skill. I think she's wonderful.
59:23
I think make. Some skill, Joe, that's taking
59:25
you an hour before you slagged off Clara.
59:27
So congratulations for that. Thank you.
59:28
Thank you. Sophie all just come in, don't
59:30
you worry. I think Free Rajahman is
59:34
amazing. Like, she may not be the world's
59:35
best actor, but boy, she's got some charisma, right?
59:39
And when she smiles, she just lights up the screen.
59:42
And she's constantly proving herself throughout this episode
59:44
by being hugely competent and intelligent, asking brilliant
59:48
questions, saving the Doctor and not panicking.
59:51
It is a great introduction for Martha David Tennant breed of
59:56
Billie Piper. Suddenly he's really eccentric
59:59
and commanding. He's great in this, isn't he?
1:00:02
And I think this episode was probably the one Rusty Davis was
1:00:06
most nervous about post Billie Piper.
1:00:09
But it's. It's the confident second album.
1:00:11
It has a real urban feel in the opening scenes, full of crazy
1:00:15
concepts, camp villains, terrific lumbering monsters,
1:00:19
tons of running around that building.
1:00:21
I just think it's it's a wonderful opener for the season
1:00:24
and I would like to put it through.
1:00:26
Fabulous. Let us go to the comments.
1:00:28
Jason Thompson says a fairly good but not outstanding
1:00:31
introduced the new companion episode.
1:00:33
But it's biggest triumph is the JE Dune, a well defined, well
1:00:36
designed monster that caught on who turned a few times and made
1:00:39
it into a spin off to keep it for them Jack.
1:00:42
Weir says RTD serves up his strongest episode, one with a
1:00:46
story full of everything we've come to expect animal monsters,
1:00:49
camp horror and an unveiling of a new companion.
1:00:52
We're also setting up Tiny Wire, Minister of Blink, getting a
1:00:55
glimpse of the Doctor as a figure of temptation, someone to
1:00:59
be joined, but at your own risk. David Lespie practice as a
1:01:02
fairly frothy opener, but on recent rewatch the effects have
1:01:05
dated quite badly and some of the performances are as warden
1:01:08
as Luke from Mark of Therane. Oh don't, don't have a go at
1:01:11
Luke from Mark of Therane, but keep it for introducing Martha
1:01:14
who's got a big journey ahead of her.
1:01:17
Fraser, Gregory. Positive now hands down Rusty's
1:01:20
best series opener to date. Prima has hit the ground running
1:01:23
and does so hard, instantly making an impression that You Do
1:01:27
are one of the few new series monsters that have lasted.
1:01:30
Have they? Well, they came back in Sarah
1:01:33
Jane Adventures. They're in Jodi's era.
1:01:36
While Tennant is on top. We forget that one, Dylan.
1:01:39
That. The The Ultimate 10th Doctor
1:01:41
Primer. Daniel Rawnsley says smashingly
1:01:44
entertaining and rewatchable. Also an excellent jumping on
1:01:46
point for new fans. The Jejuna.
1:01:48
Wonderful, but Anne Reid's camp vampire granny makes it special.
1:01:52
How did I not mention that? I know my my My favorite,
1:01:56
though, is Martha's reaction to the TARDIS.
1:01:58
Oh my God, you can travel in time.
1:02:01
Daniel Knights as a fine start, efficiently introducing Martha
1:02:04
and her family as well as the Judoon, although as my nephew
1:02:08
who was three at the time, said, I'm not scared of rhinos.
1:02:11
Michael Storm says Martha is instantly likable and engaging.
1:02:14
The guest cast of Strong, particularly Anne Reed and Roy
1:02:16
Marsden the Judoon, sustain a threat despite not being out and
1:02:20
out villains. John Bensalia Bog standard
1:02:23
Earth. Visit Moon's tale.
1:02:24
Can I just instruct a minute? John Bensal Bog standard Earth
1:02:27
visits moon tale. How many Earth visit moon tales
1:02:30
are there for this to be a bog standard example?
1:02:33
Kill the moon and. This does the earth go to the
1:02:36
moon, The moon base there's three in 60 years which.
1:02:41
Is the most standard box standard of them all.
1:02:45
Martha makes a promising star as confident independent character
1:02:48
and then becomes a simpering lovestruck teen at the end.
1:02:51
The unrequited love idea is one of RT DS worst crimes.
1:02:55
Do you do enough fun? Extra actors are appalling.
1:02:58
Oh that is very funny. That bit where they go to the
1:03:01
moon and they're suddenly all anorexic.
1:03:03
Are they at the window? I'll be Anne Arthur.
1:03:05
Wouldn't you just be there going, you know, ruin the moon?
1:03:09
Dan Hollingsworth said a solid opener and anything that has
1:03:12
Anne Reid is an alien vampire who uses the straw to suck blood
1:03:15
has to be treasured. A good companion intro.
1:03:19
Rash Dummy thinks this is a brilliantly fun romp that you do
1:03:22
know. A great creation and the story
1:03:24
deftly paints Martha and her family.
1:03:26
And finally, Paul Smyse's great opener, the junior effective
1:03:29
Martha shines in her debut and Reid is sinister.
1:03:33
OK, so I am absolutely putting Smith and Jones through as well.
1:03:38
So this was the point, you know, Doctor Who's lost one of his
1:03:40
biggest assets in Billy. Can the show survive?
1:03:44
I think the production team at this point, we talked about
1:03:45
being bold and confident. And I think this episode shows
1:03:48
how bold and confident that they were.
1:03:50
At this point, I've picked 3 quotes, which aren't the
1:03:54
greatest quotes, but they kind of what illustrate the points I
1:03:56
want to talk about. And Joe, you've already talked
1:03:58
about the first one. I wanted to pick Francine Fryer
1:04:01
talking to Martha on the phone, which says I don't mind your
1:04:05
father making a fool of himself in private, but this is Leo's
1:04:08
21st. Everyone's going to be there and
1:04:10
the entire family is going to look ridiculous.
1:04:12
And that, as you said, Joe, completely agreed.
1:04:14
Our first conversation, Russell is so good in just a few simple
1:04:19
lines, painting the picture of people who feel believable and
1:04:23
relatable and understandable, even though it's quite a it's a
1:04:27
very swift, he's introduced it so swiftly and concisely.
1:04:31
But I believe in all those people.
1:04:32
I can see who they are. I can see all the the family
1:04:34
dynamics at play. Interestingly though, Rod, oh, I
1:04:38
don't think he's been as good at it in his second iteration.
1:04:43
I don't think he captured Ruby and the Doctor he.
1:04:45
Hasn't quickly he hasn't been as good at anything because he
1:04:47
wasn't his first. Oh, don't, don't, don't start.
1:04:51
Where's the mute button? But no, I agree with you, Joe.
1:04:53
I think this is that opening scene is just so clever and
1:04:57
smart. And straight away you see
1:04:59
Martha's the level headed child because her brother and sister
1:05:02
returning to her for help and mother's calling on her to sort
1:05:05
out a difficult situation. We see that Tish is young and
1:05:08
naive and obviously that comes back to to bear fruit in
1:05:11
Lazarus. We see the angry, frosty side of
1:05:14
Francine because you've realized she's a woman that's been hurt
1:05:17
and that affects her judgement later on in the series.
1:05:19
So you you get all these seeds that pay off in dividends later
1:05:23
on in just what, a 3-4 minute scene.
1:05:26
It's so clever. I should have paid off Annalise
1:05:29
though, shouldn't I they? Should she's she is very cartoon
1:05:32
or I love the fact I love the fact she's given Leo A75P soap
1:05:37
for his 21st birthday. What does what does every 21
1:05:40
year old want for their birthday?
1:05:43
Second quote I picked is Florence and she says oh I'm a
1:05:47
survivor Mr. Stoker, at any cost.
1:05:49
Look, I've even bought a straw, you know, I can see RTD
1:05:53
chortling thinking and really from dinner ladies, that's an
1:05:58
evil Princess child eating alien who's an.
1:06:01
Old. Woman but then she's a shape
1:06:04
shifting vampire who sucks people's blood through the straw
1:06:06
Joe you were talking about Shakespeare code.
1:06:08
You know that's the way to talk to the kids but me if this isn't
1:06:11
a way to talk to the kids I'm sure kids were walking around
1:06:14
with plastic straws saying they were going to be drinking
1:06:16
people's blood after this as a brilliant point.
1:06:19
It's ridiculous. It's camp turned up to 100, but
1:06:22
and Reed plays it completely straight.
1:06:24
David Tennant, when he's facing her, plays that bit of the
1:06:27
episode completely straight. He may he may muck around
1:06:30
elsewhere like throwing out the radiation out his foot, but when
1:06:33
he's talking to Anne Reed, he plays it completely straight.
1:06:36
So I think it's it's great performance.
1:06:39
And finally, the tradoon platoon upon the moon.
1:06:43
I don't think this is bog standard.
1:06:44
Earth visits the moon cell at all.
1:06:46
I think this is really ambitious.
1:06:48
I think the visuals pretty much work well.
1:06:50
The only one that I think looks a bit shonky now is the crater
1:06:53
left where the hospital's been taken.
1:06:55
But the stuff on the moon, I think looks brilliant.
1:06:57
It got all those hordes of Judoon walking out, the
1:06:59
spaceship marching on the hospital.
1:07:01
I think it looks great, you know that.
1:07:04
Little dodgy green screen but like.
1:07:06
All the green. Screen from the first four
1:07:08
series is pretty dodgy now. Exactly.
1:07:10
But you know why it's? It's already, well, 17 years ago
1:07:14
so I'm more than happy to forgive it.
1:07:17
And people still remember Judoon Platoon upon the Moon.
1:07:19
It's a silly rhyming gag, but it sticks in the memory.
1:07:22
So you remember it like the one with the statues.
1:07:24
And even though Fugitive of the Judoon did try to ape that line
1:07:28
to much lesser effect. Boo.
1:07:33
Are you being Fugitive of the Judoon or Fugitive from the
1:07:35
Judoon? As it should be.
1:07:36
But anyway, this is a great series opener and I love it and
1:07:40
it's absolutely going through. It's so fast as well.
1:07:43
It doesn't stop moving. Doesn't it don't stop running?
1:07:46
Don't let me great music so much throw up Dylan.
1:07:49
What do you think of Smith and Jones?
1:07:51
The first thing I'd like to talk about is RTDS Flabby Middle.
1:07:57
Which? Is very much present in rows.
1:08:02
I'm very much present in New Earth, though.
1:08:06
There's something about those first two seasons, but
1:08:08
particularly the season openers where the pacing is just off
1:08:12
like the, the, it's like they're 35 minute scripts that I've had
1:08:16
an extra 10 minutes thrown in somewhere.
1:08:19
So this script and indeed this season, I think they've really
1:08:23
nailed the 45 minute format. And not like none more so than
1:08:28
in this opening episode. It's bonkers.
1:08:31
It crams so much in it shouldn't work.
1:08:33
It's the sort of thing that if you read a list of it out, I'll
1:08:36
be like, well, that sounds like the worst Doctor Who story ever,
1:08:39
but it just works. So I'm, I'm I'm really glad that
1:08:43
RT DS really nailed the format by this point.
1:08:46
Also, Murray Gold score is just amazing on this one.
1:08:51
Like it's just got so much energy.
1:08:54
It's got it gets the threat right, it gets the humour right.
1:08:57
It's just, it's as bonkers as the the, the whole idea.
1:09:02
I just think, I just think Murrays really nailed it here
1:09:05
and there are, you know, there's so many things I could say that
1:09:08
you guys have already said, but I want to bring up also the
1:09:11
doctor's introduction, the way we first meet the Doctor and he
1:09:14
just appears very briefly in her life.
1:09:16
And then she's like, oh, what are you doing out on the street?
1:09:19
And this is RTD does it a bit in the finale and indeed in human
1:09:23
nature like that. He's thinking about ways of
1:09:25
telling the story in a non linear fashion and playing with
1:09:29
time travel a bit more. And I just think he's really
1:09:32
just sort of nailed the character of the Doctor in
1:09:35
different ways to just introduce the Doctor rather than just, oh,
1:09:38
let's run and go on an adventure.
1:09:40
So those those are my three reasons.
1:09:42
I just think it's a bunch of people predominantly are RTD
1:09:46
firing on all cylinders. And he had nailed this script.
1:09:50
Keep it. Crowded, the great Terrence
1:09:52
Dicks said about that last scene.
1:09:55
You know, where you realize why the Doctor was there, me and
1:09:58
Martha at the beginning of the episode, just for cheap tricks,
1:10:00
even, he said. And he wasn't afraid to be
1:10:04
critical about the new series, especially towards Moffitz time.
1:10:07
And I'm not just saying that Rod, he was.
1:10:10
He said he he said he went for the moment too much, but he said
1:10:12
no. That was a cracking moment.
1:10:13
And that dealt with the sort of temporal shenanigans in a really
1:10:16
fun and quirky way. If Tara Sticks is loving this
1:10:19
stuff, well. It's going to be good.
1:10:21
Only Paul Quinn could possibly criticize it.
1:10:23
Now off you go. I'm.
1:10:25
Afraid I don't like it. I, I was always a bit, I'm so
1:10:30
hum about it, but then I don't like Rose.
1:10:33
I, I'm always amazed they kept the audience after Rose.
1:10:36
I think it's as shoddy a piece of TV as you're going to see
1:10:38
that year. I don't particularly like New
1:10:40
Earth. I really, really love Partners
1:10:42
in Crime though. This.
1:10:48
Dylan, to take your point, I'm in the opposite.
1:10:51
That list of things which clearly have exclamation marks
1:10:54
after them. You know, it's a hospital on the
1:10:58
moon. There are space rhinos, police.
1:11:01
There's an old lady who's a vampire and she's got a straw.
1:11:05
And it's the best, worst example of Davis guy.
1:11:08
Let's get disparate items. Let's put them together and
1:11:11
let's make them work or let's hope for the best.
1:11:13
And the problem is it makes me think of that South Park episode
1:11:15
where they're looking at TV production and it's manatees
1:11:18
pushing balls with random words on.
1:11:20
That's how you make television. I really, I don't like Erase Roy
1:11:24
Marsden. Joe's, you know, I've got a
1:11:25
serious man crush on Roy Marsden.
1:11:27
But of course he never really got a decent gig after he played
1:11:31
Adam Dagley because he was so associated with that role.
1:11:33
Of course, his previous role of our Burnside in In the Sandbag
1:11:36
is one of the great TV performances until he gets
1:11:39
wasted in things like the Sherlock Holmes in in The Last
1:11:42
Vampire. He's absolutely wasted here.
1:11:45
He's quite good in human resources the the Big Finish.
1:11:48
I, I, but this is really wasted. I mean, I spent too long around
1:11:52
hospitals. I mean my mother's cancer and
1:11:54
her death and take my dad to the hospital for like 4 last four
1:11:57
summers to know that there's no way an NHS MRI scanner can be
1:12:01
reconfigured by an old. Have you tried?
1:12:05
Well, you. Know I'm.
1:12:07
Heading there to wipe out half the planet and that I think is a
1:12:11
repeat of a previous plot line, but I couldn't remember where it
1:12:14
was. My biggest issue though, is Joe.
1:12:18
I have to. I have to no.
1:12:19
I would say free Rushman please. I love free Ragman.
1:12:22
She's weak here. She gets really, really good.
1:12:24
The Jones family, I'm afraid. Oh, that's beautiful.
1:12:31
Is a collection of cliches and it's it I I was I was I was
1:12:36
examining a PhD before I went on holiday and the external heard
1:12:41
RTD talking at Wadham, which is his college, I think.
1:12:44
And it like didn't really like college a university writer, but
1:12:47
but soap opera, that's his thing.
1:12:49
And you can see that in that version of Nollie.
1:12:52
You can see it here. But the problem is it's a
1:12:53
collection of cliches. So all the women rightly Tish
1:12:59
Tish, there's always that question about how she's got
1:13:00
those jobs and then it's revealed that it's it's the
1:13:03
master. But certainly Martha and
1:13:05
Franzine have got these big jobs.
1:13:07
But the men are then the worst type of cliches.
1:13:10
So Clive with mid life crisis, his Dick compensation fast car,
1:13:16
his awful cliched white younger girlfriend who then said she was
1:13:20
seduced. So there's something then about
1:13:21
the sexual predator on the black male figure, Leo, of course, as
1:13:25
I'm right in thinking Reggie Yates couldn't, he clashes with
1:13:30
his schedule when he couldn't appear as often in the season.
1:13:32
Then he's just shifted off, going to see Boxer in what's
1:13:36
clearly not Brighton with his baby Mama.
1:13:39
And so that kind of sexual deadbeat figure.
1:13:42
But the problem with Francine, they turn her into the angry
1:13:44
black woman. And it really, really troubles
1:13:47
me because if you've read Rankin's wonderful prose poem
1:13:50
Citizen, just what a pernicious trope the angry Black woman is
1:13:54
and how it's used against Venus Williams, how we've seen it used
1:13:56
against Meghan Markle. And here we've got Francine
1:13:59
becomes that type of figure and that she's allied with Harold
1:14:02
Saxon. So I it it leaves me really
1:14:05
deeply uncomfortable. See, the number one adjective I
1:14:09
think of her is not an. I don't think angry, I think
1:14:13
protective. Protective.
1:14:14
That's exactly what I would. Say that's that's where they're
1:14:16
trying to go and and this idea that there's when they're
1:14:20
arrested as well, it's particularly striking that how
1:14:23
you know, they've been forced into the back of that car, into
1:14:25
the back of the police car. And I think that I can't be
1:14:28
convinced. I think it's badly directed that
1:14:29
we're meant to see it from the perspective of their neighbours
1:14:31
who are all white. And so they read the arrested
1:14:34
black characters in the way that they're socially constructed to
1:14:37
see black people being arrested. The problem is I'm not sure RTD
1:14:41
can really write black characters at this point.
1:14:43
Subsequent, he'll go on to and if you look at his, his
1:14:46
subsequent writing, particularly, it's a sin.
1:14:48
He can at this point, it just feels like it's the kind of BBC
1:14:52
script Bible. This is how you have to write
1:14:54
these characters and it, and it leaves me uncomfortable.
1:14:57
That's probably just me, though. And as the three of you have
1:15:00
voted through, it's grand, but I, it just leaves me really
1:15:04
particularly rewatched at this time.
1:15:06
The whole academic lefty centrist dad bullshit kicked in
1:15:10
and it really affected how I, how I was viewing it.
1:15:12
And I I just just left me uncomfortable.
1:15:16
I mean, you know me, I'm from a dysfunctional family that argues
1:15:19
a lot. So I was just basically seeing
1:15:21
my family on the screen when I was watching this and it felt
1:15:23
very authentic to me. I wasn't really thinking about
1:15:26
that colour actually at all. There's a very interesting
1:15:30
Twitter account and blog called I think it's Black Girls Create
1:15:34
and they talk about the racism that is prevalent towards black
1:15:38
characters within the pretty much the entirety of new Doctor
1:15:41
who from and they they cite this family and the treatment of
1:15:45
Martha and the the treatment of Mickey in particular.
1:15:48
But I I put this through, so I'm not going to talk about that.
1:15:54
Right. Should we move on to Light
1:15:55
Affair? Joe, as predictable it is that
1:15:58
you're going to slag off Stephen Moffett.
1:16:00
I'm going to talk about Chris Chibnall, so I'm going to.
1:16:04
Talk. About 42 The King, Chris
1:16:09
Chibnall's You know, you think about people that were writing
1:16:11
their first episode for Doctor Who.
1:16:13
Like Rob Sherman turned in an absolute classic.
1:16:16
Mark Gatiss turned in one of his best stories.
1:16:19
Stephen Moffett. Steven Moffett turned out one of
1:16:23
his best stories, so you know. People.
1:16:26
People that get their first shot of Doctor Who really put that
1:16:30
all their heart and soul and love into it.
1:16:32
So what does Chris Chibnall give us 42?
1:16:36
The bezels. So given that, this does have
1:16:40
huge parallels with the other favorite Terror of the Voids, in
1:16:44
that we are stuck on a ship, we're hurtling towards a
1:16:46
devastating space event, passengers are being picked off
1:16:50
1 by 1. I thought it would be really
1:16:52
good to look back and see what Chibas had to say about Pip and
1:16:56
Jane's Terror of the Voids in his 1987 Open air interview.
1:17:02
And it was most enlightening because he picked out three.
1:17:05
He didn't say that much, but Mr. Chibas had three things that he
1:17:09
really wants to pick on. Terror of the Voids,
1:17:12
specifically why it was poor Doctor Who.
1:17:15
And finally, all those criticisms apply to this
1:17:18
episode. So his first criticism of poor
1:17:21
old Pip and Jane was the Terrace of her voice was routine and
1:17:25
cliche Doctor Who. Well, I'm sorry, but 42 is
1:17:28
possibly the most routine and cliche Doctor Who.
1:17:32
Certainly this series, it steals from so many episodes.
1:17:37
We already talked about Plants of Evil, absolutely, where
1:17:40
Living Planet requires the return of its stolen minerals.
1:17:43
Otherwise, it's not going to let the spaceship leave its orbit.
1:17:46
Wasn't a sun though, was it Rod? Planet.
1:17:51
Mosting up the spaceship. The similarities are there.
1:17:55
Plus in that story too, you know someone's been infected because
1:17:58
their eyes change colour, so you know it's very planet of evil.
1:18:01
Plus you've got a Terry Nation style countdown clock.
1:18:06
Give me a bigger Doctor Who cliche than a countdown clock.
1:18:10
Excuse me, that's in about 80% of doctor.
1:18:13
Who? But if he's going to pick in
1:18:15
routine and cliche, then I'm going to throw straight back
1:18:17
heads in. You've got a good old Dave, Dave
1:18:21
Martin and Bob Baker catch phrase.
1:18:23
So we've got burn with me instead of Eldrad must live or
1:18:26
the quest is the quest. You throw in a bit of frontier
1:18:29
in space with the spacewalk. Admittedly, you can't see the
1:18:31
wires on tenant, but it's still there.
1:18:34
And come on, you cannot hide from the fact that this is
1:18:37
absolutely fits the mold of a basin to sage small group of
1:18:41
people being killed off one by one with a murderer lurking in
1:18:45
the shadows. It's the biggest doctor cliche
1:18:47
out there. And unfortunately, he turns it
1:18:49
in in this story. So I'm sorry, chippers, you
1:18:52
have, you know, you've you've done yourself down there.
1:18:55
So the second one that he criticizes for is there's too
1:18:59
much running up and down corridors, he says.
1:19:02
Well, how fucking ironic, because this story is all about
1:19:05
running up and down. Corridors.
1:19:07
So he's 80% of Doctor Who. Well, I know, but if you're
1:19:10
going to criticize it, do something different, Do
1:19:12
something better. But.
1:19:13
He was a cunt back then. We're all cunts when we're that
1:19:17
age. Well, This is why you used to
1:19:19
criticize it running up and down corridors.
1:19:21
But it's all right, because we're going to throw in a lame
1:19:26
Trivial Pursuit quiz, a Hub quiz to throw a bit of tension into.
1:19:31
It the. Hub quiz makes no fucking sense,
1:19:34
the Doctor says to Martha at the beginning.
1:19:36
We are in the far future. We're half a universe away from
1:19:40
where you are, where you came from.
1:19:41
And the first question is who sold more singles?
1:19:44
The Beatles or Elvis? Where on which planet you know
1:19:50
we don't have any conversation about if if this is half a
1:19:52
universe way, do they even know where who Elvis and The Beatles
1:19:55
are? Happily they mentioned it's free
1:19:57
download just to remind us it's actually 2007 and not the far
1:20:02
future. So.
1:20:03
Have any fun in your life at all?
1:20:05
I mean you overthink these fun modes.
1:20:07
Running up and down bloody corridors.
1:20:09
Apart from we get that shuttle craft sequence which again falls
1:20:13
into the Doctor Who cliche of padding because it takes 10
1:20:16
minutes off the running time and actually adds fuck all to the
1:20:18
plot whatsoever. The plot is very, very thin.
1:20:22
And thirdly, and how dare Chibbers his his final criticism
1:20:26
was he criticized Dame Bonnie Langford for being overly
1:20:29
theatrical. Well, I'm sorry, but if you're
1:20:32
going to have a swipe at Dame Bonnie, I think you need to look
1:20:35
at your own story and look at Michelle Collins.
1:20:39
She's. Brilliant.
1:20:41
She's totally miscast. She has lines like Corwin is not
1:20:46
a killer, he can't vaporize people, he's human.
1:20:51
I mean, admittedly it's a fucking awful line, but she
1:20:54
delivers it with about as much passion as asking for a coffee
1:20:57
down the calf. And then what have you done to
1:21:00
my husband? It's just 0 believability.
1:21:04
Christian didn't do the casting any day.
1:21:06
Christian didn't do the casting, did they?
1:21:08
If he's going to criticize his bombing, I'm throwing it
1:21:10
straight. I'm throwing it straight back at
1:21:12
him. So I don't like, I don't like
1:21:14
Michelle Collins. Too much running up and down
1:21:16
corridors and too cliched, tired routine.
1:21:19
Doctor Who, It's a no from me. Well, of course it is.
1:21:23
It's a Chris Chuckno episode. Should we go to the comments?
1:21:27
Did you go in not wanting to like this episode?
1:21:30
No, I didn't actually. I wasn't even quite open.
1:21:32
I always, it always bugged me that it was a RIP off, a plant
1:21:35
of evil. But compared to the rest of the
1:21:38
season, it feels quite tired. So David Gillespie Pratt says
1:21:42
this has its finger on the cultural pulse and does a 24
1:21:45
style real time thriller a couple of years after the buzz
1:21:48
of that series had died down. This is much better than its
1:21:51
reputation and as one of the few times the series feels really
1:21:54
down and dirty. I wish it was.
1:21:57
That would have made it more interesting.
1:21:59
Jack Coyer says anything to be gained here is driven by Graham,
1:22:02
Harper, Amazing David and Frema. I also like the dynamic between
1:22:06
Martha and her temporary boyfriend who's very hot.
1:22:09
He doesn't say that I do, but Beryl Reed.
1:22:12
But the Beryl Reed triple tribute act was unconvincing.
1:22:16
But what annoys me most is that 42 minutes limit isn't even
1:22:20
stuck to the clock. Cuts all over the place.
1:22:23
And Jason Thompson says the opposite of that.
1:22:25
He said love it. The real time gimmick has done
1:22:27
very well. The stellar life form is a very
1:22:29
huge concept and makes for an effective menace.
1:22:32
The Doctor being more terrified than we've ever seen him, yet
1:22:35
still trying to reassure Martha was great.
1:22:37
So this is good. Well paced, well designed drama
1:22:39
and should be kept. Jason Thompson, who usually is
1:22:43
very strict on the science of Doctor Who.
1:22:45
I know I did not see that coming.
1:22:47
James Lark says it left little impression on me at the time.
1:22:50
So going back to it, I'm surprised to find it's a bit of
1:22:52
a high point. Reworking the game show elements
1:22:55
of City of the Exelons or Pyramids and Mars into a tort
1:22:58
thriller sounds like the work of a madman, but this Chipnor
1:23:01
fellow really pulls it off, delivering tension while
1:23:04
injecting wit and emotion. He clearly gets Doctor Who.
1:23:08
He's being a sucky cunt as well and no doubt has a vibrant and
1:23:12
popular association with the show ahead.
1:23:15
I will just point everyone back to James Lark's comments on
1:23:18
Series 11 that we just did. But yeah, because.
1:23:21
I'm not find her on 12. Yeah, he wasn't on 11, Daniel
1:23:24
Knight says Not as bad as Reputation, even if it does
1:23:27
steal from Planets of Evil. Martha is well characterized,
1:23:30
although the guest actors are mainly there to get bumped off
1:23:33
or look shiny and sweaty. Daniel Rawnsley says the
1:23:36
sporting cast isn't as memorable as Satan Pit crew, but the
1:23:39
combined forces of Chippers and Harper make this very
1:23:42
traditional Who tale feel more nail biting than it probably is.
1:23:46
Bonus points for Martha's terrible phone manners.
1:23:49
Melvin Pena says love the countdown clock conceit, the pub
1:23:52
quiz lock system, Martha's Panic called to a mum and the Event
1:23:55
Horizon space horror. John Bensalia.
1:23:59
The writing was on the wall with Chipnall's debut script.
1:24:02
It says a lot when even the director of the calibre of
1:24:05
Harper can't make it work. Sloppy script full of cliches,
1:24:09
forgettable cannon fodder and irritating pop culture.
1:24:12
Plus, Tennant screams like a girl.
1:24:15
Paul Smyer says a brilliant Race against Time story.
1:24:17
The story never drags. A hidden gem.
1:24:20
Michael Storm says highly derivative, run-of-the-mill.
1:24:23
Who? I'm hearing that a lot this
1:24:25
season. Cliche derivative, generic.
1:24:28
No, it's the good stuff coming with some atrocious dialogue.
1:24:32
It's not bad per SE, it's just kind of there bin.
1:24:36
Rush Dummy says fourth in a line of OK episodes.
1:24:39
It's an interesting concept and Tenant is great, but it's not
1:24:42
very memorable. And finally, Dave Rennie says
1:24:44
worst of the season but it's still entertaining.
1:24:47
The question is to get through the door is daft and I'm not
1:24:50
convinced by Michelle Collins as the ship's captain, but it still
1:24:54
has good moments like the silent pod ejection and William Ash is
1:24:58
gorgeous. Who's William Ash?
1:25:00
He's Martha's temporary boyfriend.
1:25:01
He's. So pretty.
1:25:02
He's so pretty. So, Dylan, let's go to you 42,
1:25:07
yay or nay? Well, as you know, I'm a a big
1:25:11
Chris Chibnall fanboy and it started here.
1:25:15
I, I walked away from this episode when I first saw it
1:25:19
thinking it was amazing. Like it may have many Doctor Who
1:25:22
cliches in there, but I just, I, I loved everything about it and
1:25:26
I still do. And one thing that I want to
1:25:29
point out in particular, sort of, you know, to go a little bit
1:25:34
against some of the things in the comments, I think this is
1:25:36
David Tennant's second best performance as the Doctor.
1:25:39
And 1st you will get later in the season, I think that he him,
1:25:47
he's not screaming over the top and he's like this, he's toned
1:25:51
it down a little bit in this environment.
1:25:53
And when he's fighting with the possession and stuff like that.
1:25:56
And then when he sort of becomes becomes possessed, he it's, it's
1:26:00
a very sort of measured, painful performance.
1:26:03
And I truly believe that the Doctor sort of fighting for his
1:26:06
very soul as that happens without too much gurning.
1:26:11
So I just think he's brilliant. And then the quieter moments,
1:26:13
obviously, especially that that silent moment with with Martha
1:26:17
floating off into space, like it's beautifully shot, but it's
1:26:22
beautifully performed, you know, with him banging on the glass
1:26:24
and then just sort of coming to realize exactly what's going on.
1:26:28
And I just think I just think he's absolutely amazing in this.
1:26:31
And you know, perhaps earlier, earlier on last season and
1:26:36
particularly next season, he's having a bit too much fun and
1:26:40
being a bit too OTT. So I think he's brilliant here.
1:26:43
I also just think all the support characters, I know there
1:26:47
might be issues with some of the casting, but I think the
1:26:50
supporting characters, they're all believable characters with
1:26:53
lives. And I believe the world it's set
1:26:55
in, it's dirty and it's manky. And I believe that these people
1:26:59
got shit faced at their Christmas party and changed all
1:27:02
the security questions to, you know, random bits of general
1:27:05
knowledge. It just it just just works for
1:27:07
me. Just because that's something
1:27:08
you would do if you was pissed. Well, quite exactly.
1:27:11
Me and Luke Malloy were on a spaceship.
1:27:14
Oh, God help us. It will be crashing.
1:27:18
Yeah. And I mean, let's just talk
1:27:22
about Graham Harper's direction. I mentioned.
1:27:25
I mentioned that silent moment, which is obviously fantastic,
1:27:29
but he, he manages to turn this fucking shitty warehouse on the
1:27:34
outskirts of Cardiff somewhere into a believable spaceship.
1:27:38
And his monster is a man quite literally in a mask.
1:27:42
And the angles he shoots it from and the way he shoots it makes
1:27:45
it believable again. And then that beautiful shot of
1:27:48
them cuddling each other and hurtling towards the sun at the
1:27:52
end. OK, let's maybe the science
1:27:55
isn't fantastic there, but you know, I just think it, it does.
1:27:59
There's a poetic nature to his direction in this.
1:28:03
And I think he he gives the script the right time to
1:28:06
breathe. Who cares if if the 42 minutes
1:28:09
don't quite add up? It's because you've got to have
1:28:11
some believability. And I think that it comes from
1:28:16
his direction. I think he just knows exactly
1:28:19
how to pitch every. Scene in this.
1:28:21
So I'm putting it through. I think it's one of the best
1:28:23
episodes of the season. Surely that clock is just a
1:28:27
suspense tool, right? That's a point and a hook for
1:28:30
the episode. I don't think Rusty Davis was
1:28:32
expecting the Jack Koyers of this universe to be sitting
1:28:34
there going right where we're now. 18 minutes, right?
1:28:37
So I want to wait. We're at 20 minutes again.
1:28:39
What's going on? I suppose it's the expectation,
1:28:41
isn't it, Because you've called the episode 42, so you're kind
1:28:44
of setting yourself up for a ball a little bit.
1:28:46
I mean, 24 was actually 18 hours long, not because of commercial
1:28:51
breaks rather than 24 hours. So, you know, it's it, it's
1:28:56
taking off that point as well, You know, just like it's a
1:28:59
dramatic point. It's not meant to be timed.
1:29:05
The direction is all there is. There's there's nothing in this
1:29:09
episode whatsoever. It's utterly, utterly empty.
1:29:12
It's just a echo Chamber of other episodes and films.
1:29:17
And of course, Danny Boyle came along and pissed all over their
1:29:20
chips with the same spotlight. I mean, Roger, you're right,
1:29:25
you've got those. That'd be kind of the catch
1:29:27
phrase. It reminded me of Impossible
1:29:29
Planet and they're drifting off into space.
1:29:32
Surely that's the same way they shot Suki drifting off at the in
1:29:36
the Impossible. In in water, yeah.
1:29:39
Yeah, so, you know, Burn with me is just he is awake.
1:29:43
And every other menacing repeated phrase that you find in
1:29:47
in in Doctor Who, it's also pointing forward to Walkers and
1:29:51
Mars. I think there's there's elements
1:29:53
of that in it. And I loathe walkers and Mars
1:29:56
and he's the worst Doctor Who story of all time.
1:29:58
So I don't like the connection with it.
1:30:00
But, you know, appealing to a person.
1:30:03
It's Larry in the dark invasion of Earth to his brother.
1:30:06
It's the Scarman brothers in Pyramids of Mars, the door
1:30:10
closing to reveal the killer in his Princess Leia cosplaying
1:30:14
mask. Kill.
1:30:16
Whichever of the cannon fodder it is, there's no surprise
1:30:19
there. If you could do it as it was a
1:30:20
parody, you might get somewhere, but I don't think it's so.
1:30:23
It's so clunkingly serious. It's also a weird one because of
1:30:27
course, the doctor's missing for part of it and there's only
1:30:30
seven people by my count on that ship and five of them die
1:30:33
anyway. So the doctor essentially saves
1:30:35
one per two people. And it's not really the doctor
1:30:37
that doesn't, I know, you know, save one, Whoever saves one
1:30:40
person saves the world. But it just feels so, so small
1:30:42
and small stories are fine, but you want something else there.
1:30:45
And and and the first one I watched, I thought, yeah, this
1:30:47
is going along fair old pace. You know, one of my favorite
1:30:50
films is high noons. That sense of the timing of the
1:30:53
film matching the time of the narrative.
1:30:55
I I I quite like. I hadn't spotted the kind of T
1:30:58
DS detail. They don't stick to 42, but
1:30:59
watched it this time. It's just, it's just, there's
1:31:01
nothing there. It's it's it's.
1:31:03
Another one in the store this season where it's just a
1:31:05
collection of references to other things.
1:31:07
It's zombies in space, it's Blake 7, it's generic Doctor
1:31:10
Who. It's it's just a load of other
1:31:12
films. It's an industrial site.
1:31:15
They might as well it, it reminded me actually in that
1:31:17
extent. It's like the Crystal Maze,
1:31:19
people running around headless chickens trying to solve puzzles
1:31:22
to get through the industrial zone and so.
1:31:25
Why are you saying that like it's a bad thing?
1:31:28
Yeah, turn this into an escape. Room, it's a great thing, but
1:31:31
here, here it's not here. It's just it.
1:31:34
It's pointless for where Chippers going to go in Series
1:31:36
5, where he'll also produce the dullest story of that season.
1:31:40
Oh, this is much better. Than and then he will become a
1:31:43
really good show runner. But this I I can't even muster
1:31:48
up the energy to dislike it. Nothing, it's vapid.
1:31:52
I would just it's like a dead fly on a on a window.
1:31:55
You just wipe it away bin. I feel, I feel like Dylan's
1:32:00
basically got my nose because he said everything that I was going
1:32:03
to say except for I don't think anybody paces Doctor Who quite
1:32:07
like Graham Harper. And those episodes that he did
1:32:10
during RTD one are some of the best pace.
1:32:12
We've got another one coming up later on this season, and I just
1:32:16
think this starts furious and just gets faster and faster and
1:32:19
faster until the end. It's hysterical, isn't it?
1:32:21
Everyone's screaming, we're going into the sun, lovers are
1:32:24
killing each other, you know, it's just absolutely mental.
1:32:27
We're all screaming. Get Michelle Collins off our
1:32:30
fucking screen. But that's what makes that's
1:32:33
what makes the moment where the Martha is in the pod really land
1:32:37
because it just suddenly stops and it's totally silent.
1:32:42
I love that. I love the comedy of the quiz
1:32:44
questions. Paul, you named a lot of
1:32:46
sources. So he's stolen for for this, but
1:32:48
it's all really popular stories. So he's pulled in a lot of
1:32:51
stuff. Yes.
1:32:52
There's not a lot of original stuff here.
1:32:54
You mentioned Waters of Mars, you mentioned Pyramids of Mars,
1:32:57
you mentioned Dalek invasion of Earth.
1:32:59
You know, you mentioned The Crystal Maze, all very popular
1:33:02
things, and if he's going to mush them all in, it's not the
1:33:05
First Doctor or sorry, sorry, not the Last Doctor's story
1:33:07
that's going to grab a load of cliches, shove them all in and
1:33:10
make it. But it's Graham Harper really
1:33:12
that makes all of this work. And we've all said that it's
1:33:15
great direction, and it is. And I want to put this through.
1:33:19
Let's put 42 fruits around too. What a mistake.
1:33:23
Sorry, 42 is going through. Right.
1:33:25
So we're back round again. Dylan, pick your second story.
1:33:29
Oh. Should we do?
1:33:33
Let's do a biggie. Let's do human nature.
1:33:37
I've never read the Book of Human Nature, which is weird
1:33:40
considering I do a podcast about the extended universe of Doctor
1:33:43
Who. Or if I.
1:33:44
Have read it, I've forgotten it because I forget all books that
1:33:46
I read. I think this is sterling work
1:33:52
from Paul Cornell and RTD because obviously, you know,
1:33:56
there's, they both talked openly about who wrote this and how
1:34:01
much of it belongs to who and how long, how much of it belongs
1:34:04
to the other. And I think the first reason I'm
1:34:08
putting this through is because it's a fantastic look at class.
1:34:13
It's a fantastic look at sort of post World War generation.
1:34:19
Post World War no. Pre World War.
1:34:23
A pre a very different story if it's post a pre what I wouldn't
1:34:27
say is a pre industrialized warfare society and where this
1:34:32
is going. I think I like that it doesn't
1:34:34
shy away from Martha's race. You know, we get we you know,
1:34:38
these these young boys are horrible people before one of
1:34:42
them turns into a space asshole. I mentioned my second point is I
1:34:47
mentioned earlier that I think David Tennant's best
1:34:51
performances in this series, and I think it's this, I think him
1:34:55
playing John Smith is he's fantastic when he suddenly gets
1:34:59
hold of the the fob watch again and you get a sudden little bit
1:35:02
of the Doctor and he goes, oh, is that how he talks?
1:35:04
It's just like it's really, really well thought about.
1:35:07
And then at the end, sort of echoing something that happened
1:35:10
in Smith and Jones where he he's pretending to be the human
1:35:15
idiot, but he's actually being the doctor, learning stuff and
1:35:18
blowing things up. And then the final point being
1:35:21
what his punishment for the family of blood?
1:35:24
I just think it's a great, poetic, beautiful moment within
1:35:28
the history of the show. And even the the way he's
1:35:32
described as like he is like fire and ice, like, I love this
1:35:36
sort of this heroic version of the Doctor.
1:35:39
I think it gets taken a bit too far in later Moffit series, but
1:35:43
I think here it just works. The whole thing of the Doctor
1:35:45
running away from these people to save them from what he was
1:35:49
going to do to them. And I just think everything in
1:35:51
the story works. I have no issues with it
1:35:54
whatsoever. I think it's an absolutely
1:35:57
brilliant story. It's a classic.
1:35:59
Keep it, keep it, keep it. Lawless, you're saying without
1:36:03
flaw? Without flaw, yeah, I've got no
1:36:06
issue with it. OK, Rod's got the look of a man
1:36:09
who's about to condemn this. Lasserre says Doctor Who at it's
1:36:13
very best. The performance is a top notch
1:36:16
and Cornell's script never falters.
1:36:18
The human doctor in love, the futility of war and the anger of
1:36:21
a Time Lord. It's a perfect amalgamation of
1:36:24
classic and new Who. James Lark says truly
1:36:27
extraordinary. A rare foray into allegory,
1:36:30
eschewing literal storytelling for something almost poetical,
1:36:34
rich with potent imagery, hauntingly realized it's let
1:36:38
down only a little by a muddled and self contradictory attitude
1:36:42
towards the war. And what a relief to spend 2
1:36:44
episodes away from the irritating Dr. he says in
1:36:48
capitals. Michael Storm says pretty good.
1:36:51
Nowhere is effective. Nowhere near as effective as the
1:36:53
novel. The biggest flaw is 10, who's
1:36:56
too humanish in himself for the contrast of the alter ego to
1:36:59
work. Bullshit.
1:37:01
Michael Storm. That novel is severely
1:37:05
overrated. We'll get there.
1:37:08
Fraser Gregory incomes Chekhov's chameleon Arch, and we're all
1:37:12
the better for it. Tennant again knocks it out of
1:37:14
the park opposite Jessica Hynes, while Thomas Sangster and Harry
1:37:17
Lloyd are nipping at his heels, with Freeman effortlessly
1:37:21
keeping pace. As an exploration of human and
1:37:23
alien size of the Doctor's psyche, this is unsurpassable.
1:37:28
John Bensalia. Oh dear.
1:37:31
On the surface it shows promise. Moody direction, memorable
1:37:35
visuals, great cast. Scratch that surface and you've
1:37:38
got a pretentious load of old tosh that hinges on a flimsy
1:37:42
premise. Plus, Tennant wins the EMBL
1:37:44
award for non-stop blubbing. Melvin Pena says a classic that
1:37:49
foregrounds the doctors. Oh.
1:37:51
Rod P. That's what people say.
1:37:55
A classic that foregrounds the Doctors obliviousness, Ness and
1:38:00
thoughtlessness. John Smith maybe meek Timmy Guy,
1:38:05
but the Doctor puts Martha in a humiliating position and the
1:38:08
entire school at risk just so we can have a place to lay low for
1:38:11
a bit. A complex story.
1:38:14
Lacoya says his greatest strength is doing what TV can
1:38:16
and novels can't, showing rather than telling.
1:38:19
Look at the difference between reading Mr. Smith this, Mr.
1:38:23
Smith that versus seeing our beloved hero being incapable of
1:38:26
helping. Look at the descriptions of far
1:38:28
off wars and then watch a baby faced lad struggle through mud
1:38:32
and smoke. And Charles Palmer and Murray
1:38:34
Gold contribute in ways that can't be read.
1:38:37
John Arnold says could it match the book?
1:38:39
Damn right it could. David Tennant breaks your heart
1:38:42
as a man who never existed. Harry Lloyd relishes his
1:38:45
villainy and all the nuances of the Great War as loss of
1:38:49
innocents are intact. One of whose finest story twice
1:38:53
over. Now, Randall said.
1:38:54
I've been finding the rush of episodes frustrating, so this
1:38:57
was refreshing, a measured pace that didn't make me feel like I
1:39:00
was being slapped repeatedly. One of the true gems of New Who.
1:39:04
It's so easy to hate the Doctor at the end.
1:39:07
Oscar Groucho says a master class in post weed and telly
1:39:10
fantasy storytelling. A timeless tale of lost love and
1:39:13
humanity in the face of adversity that takes the leader
1:39:16
part to understand what makes them tick.
1:39:19
And finally, Kev Blower says the pinnacle of new who the cast of
1:39:22
top notch, especially Heinz and Lloyd, the portent of a bigger
1:39:25
bloodier war. The Journal Tim's description of
1:39:28
the Doctor as Fire and Ice and Jones on the wind put down of
1:39:31
the Doctor at the end is just devastating.
1:39:35
Paul, I'm almost afraid to go to you.
1:39:38
Yay or nay? I can't wait.
1:39:41
I think the last 9 minutes are fascinating of, of I think from
1:39:47
where Tennant is standing over the family of blood who kind of
1:39:50
read third rate villains, I think.
1:39:53
And then this very strange punishments that he meets Elton,
1:39:56
particularly the the the, the girl who's trapped in the
1:39:58
mirror. And kind of moves into a
1:40:01
different genre entirely. I think that's fascinating.
1:40:02
I think, I think Harry Lloyd, who I I don't like his
1:40:04
performance in his it's very odd.
1:40:06
It's too uncanny, I think. And so then the weird idea he
1:40:09
was going to be cast as the doctor at some point.
1:40:10
I I from this it always struck me as strange, but I think him
1:40:13
being trapped and turned into a scarecrow to watch over the
1:40:17
fields of England, as Tennant says, picks up Dylan's point
1:40:20
about how this is really embedded in world one narratives
1:40:24
and that sense of the world before the First World War.
1:40:26
So I think that somebody who teaches First World War
1:40:30
literature and culture, that that really intrigues me, the
1:40:32
sense at the school. And so often you go from school
1:40:36
to the Western Front. Certainly Robert Graves does and
1:40:40
that sense of can can the continuation of of an all male
1:40:43
environment to an all male environment on the front.
1:40:46
So that kind of homosociality homosexuality that you find it
1:40:48
in those texts is here in this. I think the way that it connects
1:40:52
to previous conflicts. So Jones husband has been
1:40:54
killed. It's either the bull war or it's
1:40:56
one of the colonial conflicts there at the end of the 19th
1:40:59
century. The fact the headmaster has been
1:41:02
in the World War, Tim borrowing the book on on Maficin and the
1:41:07
veteran from the Crimean War, who's it has to be at least 80
1:41:10
by this point is really building up this notion of of England at
1:41:16
this point. But all that being said, I'm,
1:41:19
I've been in it because I don't like it, because although it's,
1:41:25
it isn't about storytelling, is really interesting.
1:41:27
The notion about construct that the Doctor writes his own story
1:41:30
about realizing it. So there's, there's an
1:41:32
interesting meditation upon storytelling, which is, is which
1:41:35
is, which is connected with other ideas around storytelling,
1:41:38
particularly around telling the tale of the Doctor as the Doctor
1:41:41
tells his own tale. At this point he doesn't realise
1:41:43
it. I, I'm not interested in John
1:41:46
Smith because John Smith is a narrative constructed by the
1:41:49
TARDIS. So this would work if the idea
1:41:52
of tenant weeping really moved me.
1:41:55
But Tennant weeping bores me when the Doctor comes back.
1:42:00
But of course, when he comes back, he's straight into
1:42:02
screechy mode. And what's interesting is that
1:42:04
when he's on the ship, he does a full on fast show impression
1:42:08
because he does the full oh, suit you Sir, as the ship is
1:42:11
blowing up. So I think a lot of the power of
1:42:13
this rests on David Tennant marrying Daisy from Spaced, And
1:42:18
I wonder if it wasn't Jess Hynes would have quite the effect.
1:42:21
Because of course, space is hugely, hugely important for a
1:42:25
particular age group of nerds. It made fandom nerdishness
1:42:30
fashionable before Doctor Who comes back.
1:42:32
And like you can see there where Tim prays to the statue to the
1:42:37
poster of Buffy, it's intersecting with the other big
1:42:40
genre that's broken out of the idea of a genre narrative.
1:42:44
So I do wonder how far Jess Hines here elevates this into
1:42:48
something that fandom locked on to.
1:42:51
I never liked the book. I think it's better than the
1:42:53
book because when death turns up with the book, it's that kind of
1:42:56
new adventures doctor as God like figure that kind of bored
1:43:01
me. But I I what are the?
1:43:02
Villains in the book, some really terrible, like sort of
1:43:06
almost comedy Time Lord villains.
1:43:09
Yeah, it's it's very, I was looking back over this week.
1:43:11
What? They recalled.
1:43:12
But. They really odd names and.
1:43:14
He it was really sort of wanky in that new adventures.
1:43:16
One, and I don't think there's enough here for two episodes.
1:43:19
Actually, I, I, I really don't. I think Mark, I think Freeman
1:43:23
agreement is brilliant. I think it's discussion around
1:43:24
race is really interesting. I think it's fascinating that
1:43:26
Joan is the biggest racist after the scoreboard really quite
1:43:30
striking that they're trying to do something with it, but it
1:43:33
kind of runs out of of story and it's just about how long can you
1:43:38
keep this figure here before the doctor necessarily reappears.
1:43:42
The last 9 minutes, however, I, I I think are awesome and it's
1:43:46
looking forward to Utopia's final 10 minutes.
1:43:48
But I'm afraid for me it's a no can.
1:43:50
I ask you a question, are you as disinterested in Professor Jana,
1:43:55
who is also a construct of the same technology in Utopia?
1:44:02
No, but then it's working a different way.
1:44:07
Whatever comes out of Yana, if Yana becomes, that's different.
1:44:10
John. This is all built around here is
1:44:12
John Smith, here's his relationship, here's this
1:44:14
future. And I'm not sure whose future
1:44:16
vision that's meant to be. Is it John Smith, is it Joan?
1:44:19
Or is it the TARDIS? I don't understand.
1:44:22
That I don't understand it at all, but because Tennant weeping
1:44:24
doesn't interest me whatsoever, I want the docs to back to deal
1:44:28
with this strictly third rate group of villains that he's run
1:44:32
away from instead of just like going on the Lam and letting
1:44:35
them die out. So I, I don't know I I it it's
1:44:37
it's atmosphere, it's construction of that pre war
1:44:41
period. I I really, really like, but I'm
1:44:43
just I'm just not interested in it.
1:44:44
So I'm no, I'm one of those horrible refuse Nicks who who?
1:44:48
I'm not going to weep at David Tennant weeping and to.
1:44:51
Dismiss. No, no, you go next.
1:44:53
I want to hear your reading on the book.
1:44:55
You'll have to. You have to invite me back.
1:44:57
No, no, no. Rod, sorry.
1:44:58
I want, oh, no, I've always want to hear what you have to say.
1:45:01
But I want to hear what Rod thinks of human nature.
1:45:03
The book. The book Oh, I loved the book at
1:45:05
the time yeah. I, I, I've not read it in far
1:45:08
too long a time, but I, I thought it was an amazing book
1:45:10
at the time. Yeah, I agree with you.
1:45:12
The the villains are comedic in the book, but that's kind of not
1:45:16
the point. It's that's not really the
1:45:18
story. It's the story of the doctors we
1:45:20
see here. In terms of the TV version of
1:45:24
it, though, it's amazing. I I don't know why you think I
1:45:28
look like it's fantastic. I absolutely love this.
1:45:31
I think it's tremendous 2 parter.
1:45:35
I think I think it's really interesting because it's showing
1:45:38
Doctor Who in a much greyer form than we often see.
1:45:41
Doctor Who can sometimes be very black and white.
1:45:44
It can sometimes be very goodies versus baddies.
1:45:48
And this has the guts to make us question so much of that.
1:45:52
So think of that scene near to the beginning of Part 2 where
1:45:56
the scarecrows are coming to attack the school and the boys
1:45:59
plan to defend it. I've got the quote here, Jones
1:46:01
says to John Smith. Those boys, their children, John
1:46:05
Smith wouldn't want them to fight, never mind the Doctor.
1:46:08
Which thing's really interesting because particularly in New Who,
1:46:11
in Old Who as well, but certainly in New Who and
1:46:14
absolutely in the Eccleston era, Doctor Who has largely been
1:46:18
about the Doctor galvanizing and inspiring other people to take
1:46:23
up arms and take that take up against the enemy.
1:46:26
And we, we've usually seen that as a good thing.
1:46:29
But here we're kind of forced to ask and it feels a more ugly
1:46:32
question. Would the Doctor actually
1:46:34
encourage a group of school boys to take up arms against the
1:46:38
enemy? And it's it's a different spin
1:46:40
on it and it just makes you think from a different
1:46:43
perspective. All those time we saw Eccleston
1:46:45
kind of inspire other people to do it.
1:46:47
Would he do it in this scenario? I think that's really different
1:46:51
and we get that again. We do get it at the end of next
1:46:53
year when Davros accused the Doctor of, you know, fashioning
1:46:56
people into weapons. But here in this setting, which
1:46:59
feels so much more real and so much more grounded, I think it
1:47:03
makes you think about it rather than a big sci-fi fancy trope
1:47:06
with reality bombs where it gets a bit lost.
1:47:10
Then you see the Doctor's retribution on the family of
1:47:12
blood, which I think is glorious.
1:47:14
Still. I think you use the word poetic.
1:47:16
It absolutely is. What's really interesting
1:47:19
though, is of course that is the Doctor says these people are
1:47:22
mayflies. They'd be dead within three
1:47:24
months. So not only is he, you know,
1:47:27
imprisoning them in perpetual torment, he's actually extending
1:47:30
their lifeway beyond what they would normally live so that they
1:47:34
are punished. And that's that's a really dark
1:47:37
view of the Doctor is. That as dark as the doctors ever
1:47:40
go, I. Think so, yeah.
1:47:42
And and and and is it proportional?
1:47:45
I mean the bit I the bit I question a bit is, is it
1:47:47
proportional because he's they haven't done.
1:47:49
We've seen doctor villains do a hell of a lot worse or a hell of
1:47:52
a lot worse. So is it proportional?
1:47:55
But I still. Remember, though, he murdered a
1:47:57
load of kids in the Christmas special.
1:47:58
Just gone. So, you know, yeah.
1:47:59
True, true. And then the other thing that I
1:48:02
think is really great as well is when, when Joseph, you know,
1:48:05
asks him at the end, if you hadn't chosen our village to
1:48:07
settle, would these people have died?
1:48:09
And again, that's an aspect of the show we usually don't think
1:48:12
about. We have an adventure, people
1:48:14
die, we move on. But this story is making us kind
1:48:17
of look at those perspectives. It's the one time tenant does
1:48:21
not have a comeback. Yes, absolutely.
1:48:23
Can't say anything. Absolutely.
1:48:25
So I think all those things that make you really think about
1:48:28
actually almost the nature of Doctor Who and the program and
1:48:30
what it's doing, I think it's fascinating because there aren't
1:48:33
like you say, Joe, in that instance, there actually aren't
1:48:36
any answers. No one can give an answer.
1:48:38
There's no Patty can't come back with a comedy quit.
1:48:41
Those are really fascinating. Couldn't.
1:48:43
Do it very often could. You, Oh God, you couldn't
1:48:45
because it's almost kind of questioning the the kind of
1:48:48
format of the show. Almost.
1:48:49
I think RTD said we went about as far as we could go, yeah, Now
1:48:53
we've got to pull back a. Bit to do it again, but the fact
1:48:56
that it is that I think is is glorious.
1:48:59
My second point is picking up again what Dylan was doing about
1:49:02
the period. You know, we're absolutely
1:49:04
immersed in 1913 here. We're not doing like the
1:49:07
Shakespeare code where we're doing a bit of pastiche or we're
1:49:10
not doing, you know, crazy accents like Daleks in
1:49:12
Manhattan. This is fall 1913.
1:49:15
We know the BBC can pull out all the stops with costumes and sets
1:49:18
and of course that all looks glorious.
1:49:21
But what we see here are the sensibilities of the era.
1:49:25
You know, joke you've mentioned before we mentioned it, Joan is
1:49:27
a, a massive racist. She can't imagine Martha being a
1:49:29
doctor. And she's so patronizing the way
1:49:31
she talks about her and Hutchinson.
1:49:33
Hutchinson makes that awful joke to Martha, which I'm not going
1:49:36
to repeat, but he makes that awful comedy line to her comedy
1:49:40
in his eyes when she's when she's cleaning the floor.
1:49:43
Then we're asked to sympathize with him when he's got the.
1:49:46
Exactly, Absolutely. Exactly.
1:49:48
And again, that's what's so interesting about this story.
1:49:51
It makes you think about things. But I like the fact because, you
1:49:55
know, we've had Shakespeare code where race is just brushed under
1:49:58
the carpet, but it's not here. You're made to think about it
1:50:01
and look at how ugly it is. And you're also, you know,
1:50:03
throwing class politics in there as well, and misogyny in there
1:50:08
as well. The way the teachers treat the
1:50:10
maids. It's just horrible.
1:50:12
But they're not shying away from any of these things here.
1:50:15
And they're not giving a pat answer.
1:50:17
They're not giving a pat solution.
1:50:18
It's there for you to think about.
1:50:20
I think it's glorious that it's there and it's clever and it's
1:50:24
bold and it's daring. And the final reason is there
1:50:26
are horrors of war. You know, we've got Joe, you
1:50:29
just mentioned it, that that scene where where Tim actually
1:50:32
saves Hutchinson and and it quite moving that he saves him,
1:50:36
particularly because we've seen not only he's a racist, but he's
1:50:39
also a terrible bully as well. And yet Tim still goes out of
1:50:42
his way to save him. And a bit really gets to me
1:50:45
actually, is the remembrance ceremony bit at the end where
1:50:48
Tim is old and he's weeping because he sees the Doctor of
1:50:51
Martha and what is so. The only time when they age him
1:50:54
up authentically though, isn't it?
1:50:56
Absolutely. Or what is glorious about about
1:50:58
that is there aren't any words. If they'd started speaking, I
1:51:01
think he would have just killed there.
1:51:03
But it's all done with just looks and music and it's just so
1:51:06
powerful for that. So yeah, absolutely this is
1:51:09
going through 100%. And why are?
1:51:12
You not going to fight a word that you?
1:51:14
And obviously I'm going to fight what Paul's saying, but he's not
1:51:16
here right now, so never mind. Yeah, this is an absolute
1:51:19
masterpiece. This is the best of the year by
1:51:20
country mile. This is probably the best David
1:51:23
Tennant episodes there are, including RTV 2.
1:51:27
Nobody's mentioned the cliffhanger, which I love to
1:51:29
pieces because it's not a a stupid moment of jeopardy.
1:51:32
It's a great camp moment where he goes your lover or your
1:51:36
friend, your choice. I love Lot and the music in that
1:51:40
cliffhanger as it builds and builds.
1:51:42
It's one and the fact that Martha is the one that gets them
1:51:44
out of it just by grabbing the gum.
1:51:47
She's amazing. And this is it.
1:51:48
Freem Rajman is is really pulling her weight and I don't
1:51:52
think she's always the best actress.
1:51:54
I think she's always got presents and she's always got
1:51:56
charisma, but she's doing some serious fucking acting in this
1:51:59
episode. And can I just jump in that Joe
1:52:01
say I'm completely agree with what pisses me off a little bit,
1:52:04
and we had a lot in the comments at the beginning, is everyone
1:52:06
gets so hung up on the unrequited love storyline.
1:52:10
And yes, it is there. Actually.
1:52:12
There's far, far more to Martha than just that.
1:52:15
I said Here, she's got agency, she's got power, she's
1:52:18
intelligent, she's bright, she's saving the Doctor.
1:52:21
And yet so much that gets washed away because people just get
1:52:23
hung up on the unrequited love line.
1:52:26
A nice simple bit as she just wanders back to the TARDIS on
1:52:29
her own with that whistling music playing, you know, and
1:52:32
she's playing back the thing. And she does say in that moment,
1:52:35
you know, you have to fall in love with somebody and it wasn't
1:52:37
me. But it's just a gentle.
1:52:38
It's not overplayed in this at all.
1:52:40
And actually it does add a layer as well.
1:52:43
And you think about everything that Martha's been through, how
1:52:45
long have they been there? Like a month, two months,
1:52:47
something like that. Like it's that character must
1:52:50
have been through an awful lot. Forget the the spin offs about
1:52:54
what Martha did in the year between sound of drums and stuff
1:52:56
like that. How horrible was her life?
1:52:59
And you know, she's made a friend.
1:53:00
Obviously that is cruelly taken away from her in this.
1:53:03
It's like it like there must have been moments where she was
1:53:06
like, am I ever going to leave this time?
1:53:08
Is it? What?
1:53:09
What if he dies? What if something goes wrong?
1:53:11
Like what if they find us? Her performance in that scene,
1:53:15
you know, when she's saying about oh, sardines and jam or
1:53:18
whatever and she's trying to out the villain.
1:53:22
Primo is great in that scene. We're sort of giving it, letting
1:53:25
us know, but not letting the villain know.
1:53:28
It's really layered. I think Joan Redfern's a really
1:53:31
intriguing character. I have no idea how I feel about
1:53:34
her because I think she is appallingly racist, and yet I am
1:53:37
genuinely moved by the situation she is in at the end of the
1:53:41
episode. And I like it when TV makes me
1:53:44
conflicted like that and a bit uncomfortable.
1:53:46
And Proctor, who doesn't often work on that level.
1:53:49
It's a truthful response to the time though, isn't it?
1:53:51
It's like, I'm sure there were lots of very lovely people back
1:53:55
then who were had horrible horrendous views that we do not
1:53:58
share now. I recently found out that an
1:54:02
auntie of mine that died a while ago was a massive racist and it
1:54:05
was somehow kept from us our entire lives and I feel very
1:54:09
conflicted about her as a human being who I always thought was a
1:54:13
lovely human being but it turns out she was not, but I'm not.
1:54:16
Going to compare. This story to that, but you.
1:54:19
Know no but it's it's sort of it's that sort of thing of like
1:54:23
how do you reconcile the two elements because some people are
1:54:26
products of their time aren't and it's it's it's what they
1:54:30
hear what they see what information they get who the
1:54:33
it's the time they live in it's it's it's hard to condemn them
1:54:36
now because we live in different times we live fortunately as far
1:54:40
as race is concerned in more enlightened times but.
1:54:44
We do live in different times, but this does also shine a light
1:54:46
on how people watch television now as well.
1:54:49
Because I know people that won't watch this and will condemn
1:54:53
other people for watching this because Joan Redford is a
1:54:56
massive racist, you know, whereas I prefer TV just to be a
1:55:01
bit more sophisticated than that and to make me feel a bit uneasy
1:55:05
about the people I really love in the story.
1:55:08
So I think that's, but my third reason I put down was the scene
1:55:12
where the scarecrows were about to attack.
1:55:15
That is one of the most intensely shot scenes ever in
1:55:19
Doctor Who. And you've got young kids
1:55:21
weeping and obviously the parallels there to them about to
1:55:25
go off to war. This is exactly the and it's
1:55:27
shot exactly how you would shoot a war movie, despite the fact
1:55:31
that there's lumbering scarecrows, which are brilliant
1:55:33
monsters by the way. That weird lumbering gait of
1:55:37
theirs is so creepy. That scene that that for me is
1:55:43
darker than pretty much everything I've condemned Steven
1:55:48
Moffitt for in later years. And I think as a one off, it's
1:55:52
OK. But that's the line.
1:55:54
Are they? Yeah.
1:55:55
I mean, it's it's so adult. This isn't it.
1:55:58
But it does have great monsters, huge camp villains in it as
1:56:01
well. I disagree with Paul.
1:56:03
I think Harry Lloyd gives a wonderful performance in this.
1:56:05
Every line reading is a banger. I could quote all of those
1:56:09
lines. And just what he does to his
1:56:11
face when just in between him being a human and being taken
1:56:15
over and he has that weird sort of, you know, rice.
1:56:19
My grin almost. Yeah.
1:56:21
And it's just so like, he does it all with just his face just
1:56:26
slightly changed. We see a little bit of Derek
1:56:28
Jacobi doing that as well later in the series.
1:56:30
But you know, it's all it's. Like immitaceable for my kids in
1:56:34
the playground on so many levels.
1:56:35
The kid with the balloon? Just get a balloon.
1:56:37
You're that creepy kid. Just do the lumbering gate and
1:56:40
you're the scarecrow. Do the sniff and you're the
1:56:43
family of blood. You know, it's it is just
1:56:46
sublime. This story.
1:56:48
I think, like Dylan said, I cannot find a flaw in it.
1:56:52
Of course it's going through. So because Paul has dipped out
1:56:56
for a minute, Joe, let's turn to you.
1:56:57
Pick your next story. Oh.
1:56:59
OK. Can we talk about the Lazarus
1:57:05
Experiment please? I'm doing it for Dave Rennie and
1:57:08
I would like to to put it through.
1:57:11
This does feel like a per wee episode, right?
1:57:14
Like the scientific base, the doctor walking in like an
1:57:18
arrogant prick, the Super villain.
1:57:20
I mean, I, I love all of that. But the best thing about the
1:57:24
Lazarus Experiment by country mile is of course, Dave Rennie's
1:57:27
favorite, Thelma Barlow. And it's very sad when she
1:57:30
leaves the story. Ah, you're really so cruel, she
1:57:36
says at one point. Don't you just love an evil
1:57:39
elderly super villain couple? I didn't want to say it wasn't
1:57:43
like it wasn't like this damn McAfee Bonbon, but we don't get
1:57:46
that, sadly. But Mark Gatiss is no slouch
1:57:49
either in this, and I think he gives a really nuanced
1:57:52
performance for what is probably sort of a a bit of a comic book
1:57:56
villain. But I think he he plays the
1:57:58
older Lazarus extremely effectively and the younger one
1:58:02
as well. And he does get some really
1:58:03
thoughtful moments, doesn't he? They'll be in the church at the
1:58:06
end. And he doesn't look too bright
1:58:09
naked if I'm honest as well. And you I was wait, I was trying
1:58:12
to time how long it would be before I was going to say before
1:58:14
that came up. But maybe that's the wrong.
1:58:16
Expression Many people in the comments came after that
1:58:19
monster, and I think it's glorious.
1:58:22
Like, it's terrible. It's a pretty terrible bit of
1:58:25
CGI, but they've ripped off every bit of animal you can
1:58:29
imagine and mushed it all together.
1:58:31
And there's some really dynamic scenes.
1:58:33
There's a scene where the Doctor's running and the
1:58:34
creature jumps over onto a balcony, smashes.
1:58:38
So there's like a physical effect in there as well.
1:58:40
The Doctor runs down the corridor, it's coming behind him
1:58:43
but going around him. The camera's moving, he jumps
1:58:46
on, there's an explosion. There is some real effort made
1:58:49
in the direction to make that CGI bullshit look convincing and
1:58:55
I I think they do a pretty good job.
1:58:57
I think Martha and her family are extremely well served in
1:59:01
this episode and I would have liked a lot more of them this
1:59:04
season. Martha and Tisch, that's a great
1:59:07
combination, right? Really engaging.
1:59:11
Is Tish a total slut or is it my imagination?
1:59:15
Is that how she got all those jobs?
1:59:17
Well, you'd think so, wouldn't you?
1:59:18
That seems to be the implication, doesn't it?
1:59:21
Yeah, she goes. She goes for Lazarus.
1:59:22
She saw him as an old man literally 5 minutes before and
1:59:26
she's ready to put her tongue, put her tongue down his throat,
1:59:29
which is a little bit of a lot of a life choice.
1:59:31
I don't usually like to sort of, you know, be in favour of
1:59:36
unprovoked violence, but I do love it when the the mothers
1:59:39
slap tennis doctor every single time it happens.
1:59:42
I love it and it's particularly good here because it's in
1:59:45
public. No, but it's a, it's a really
1:59:48
fun dynamic. I like, I like the scenes of
1:59:51
Franzine being pulled aside by the sinister man going.
1:59:54
Let me whisper in your ear now and tell you what's going on
1:59:57
this season. It's really nice as well because
2:00:00
this is the point where you realise the whole season is
2:00:02
taking place over like a week, don't you?
2:00:04
You've got the tempo, Smith and Jones, the Lazarus experiment
2:00:06
and then the sound of drums. I think it's 5 or 6 days and
2:00:10
it's really, really cleverly done.
2:00:13
Yeah, again, it's really stylish.
2:00:15
I don't think there's a single episode this year where the
2:00:17
direction isn't on point, and I think they just learn how to
2:00:21
make Doctor Who extremely well at this point.
2:00:24
I think it's fun. I think it's four or four.
2:00:25
I think it's got some interesting character moments.
2:00:28
It's got some great arc moments. I think it's really underrated.
2:00:33
Let's please put the Lazarus experiments through.
2:00:36
Let's go to the comment. And of course, Dave Rennie is
2:00:39
the first to comment. I had to put in first for this
2:00:41
one, and Dave Rennie says, unsurprisingly, it's my
2:00:44
favorite. It's comic book style is so much
2:00:47
fun. Gatus laps it up as the villain
2:00:49
Francine is vicious. And it's the one I return to
2:00:51
again and again, just to be entertained.
2:00:54
Yeah, that's perfect. Just to be entertained, there's
2:00:57
nothing wrong with that, Melvin Pena says.
2:00:59
I love that we have Tish going along for a thrilling chase
2:01:01
through the cathedral. Could have done with another
2:01:04
Martha Tish adventure. The way Martha says it's more
2:01:06
fun that way. At the end, with simultaneous
2:01:08
joy and terror, is the essence of Doctor Who.
2:01:11
From Bensalia says refreshingly simple, fast-paced and features
2:01:14
a monster, or be it a crap one that reduces characters to
2:01:17
mummified skeletons. What's not to like?
2:01:20
Oh yes, they misguided, unrequited love subplots, which
2:01:23
does neither Martha nor the Doctor any favours by the way.
2:01:29
Nearly got there. Jason Thompson has modern
2:01:31
whoever missed the mark so completely as it did with the
2:01:35
Lazarus monster. No awful design.
2:01:39
Keep it, but only because there's nothing particularly
2:01:41
egregious about it. I can't go chucking away every
2:01:43
dodgy monster in the bed. It's just there.
2:01:46
Razor Gregory says a love letter to comic books and Margate has
2:01:49
put in a decent performance of the Chief Fellow.
2:01:52
The CGI may be weak, but since when has that stopped us and
2:01:55
joined Doctor Who? Great to see more of Martha's
2:01:57
family. Daniel Knight says OK, a bit
2:02:01
dull and predictable, but it's nice to see Thelma Barlow, the
2:02:04
climax in the cathedral. Looks good, does.
2:02:07
Daniel Rawnsley says owes a lot to mid season Pertwee.
2:02:10
OK so the CGI monsters ropy but POV shots more than make up for
2:02:14
it. Great showcase for tenant Gatis,
2:02:17
the Jones family and delicious Thelma Barlow.
2:02:20
Plus that 4 fact extra climax. And who doesn't like an extra
2:02:23
climax? Go on Daniel Jack Hoyer, there's
2:02:26
a standard Doctor Who run around that fulfills 2 key story
2:02:29
functions of new Who, the Back to Earth story and the mid the
2:02:32
mid series finale set up. People will know the perk we
2:02:36
influence is but I could argue for more of a Robert Holmes
2:02:39
vibe. This could slot into Seasons 12
2:02:41
and 13 with the Literary and Hammer creature feature
2:02:44
stylings. David Gillespie practices some
2:02:46
nice moments, but it devolves into a tedious run around with a
2:02:49
not great looking monster. But the Saxon Story is starting
2:02:52
to hot up and good things lie ahead.
2:02:54
Oh. God, that you just off the pit
2:02:56
where that woman's screaming. She's got the counterpage.
2:02:59
She's like the creature counts upon her.
2:03:02
I love that monster. Of course, my crash dummy says.
2:03:07
Feels like it's trying to be quite a mass, but hasn't either
2:03:09
the heft or plot to carry it off.
2:03:12
And there's no stand out performances.
2:03:15
Phil Barlow. Michael Storm says terrible CGI,
2:03:18
terrible hacking his plot terrible well, everything really
2:03:24
is on such a downer this one. He is the.
2:03:26
Fella that said that Nightmare in Silver was the best sideman
2:03:30
story ever. I will never stop saying that.
2:03:35
So, Paul, let's go to you. Lazarus.
2:03:38
I really like the Lazarus Experiment for the Lazarus
2:03:42
Experiment, and I haven't condemned the intertextuality as
2:03:46
revealing. There's nothing there.
2:03:47
I want to say this is a wonderful TS Eliot script
2:03:53
because you've got the overt references to Elliot in the two
2:03:56
quotations. So you've got this is the way
2:04:00
the World Ends, not with a bang, but with a whimper.
2:04:02
You've got the earlier reference to Falls, the Shadows from the
2:04:05
Hollow Man. You've got the line about Turn
2:04:07
to Dust, which I think is meant to be the Wasteland.
2:04:09
And of course that's got an old history of Doctor Who, because
2:04:11
where State Dance is really intersecting with terms of dust.
2:04:14
But it's a text about aging. Isn't it rich?
2:04:17
It's not about resurrection. I mean they, they completely
2:04:20
misunderstand what Lazarus is. You get 3 references to Lazarus
2:04:23
and they're all equally wrong. And they get the Pandora's box
2:04:26
wrong as well. But then Moffy gets it
2:04:27
completely wrong and the Pandora opens as well.
2:04:29
They forget hope emerges from the box.
2:04:32
It's not just all the unpleasantness that comes out.
2:04:34
They misunderstand these teleological legends.
2:04:36
They misunderstand how Lazarus is working in that biblical
2:04:39
narrative. But that aside, it's about aging
2:04:42
and about trying to say a life. And what you get then is a clear
2:04:47
reference back to the debate the doctor has in Brain of Morbius
2:04:52
about death being the price we pay for progress.
2:04:54
Richard Laos, the response to stay alive forever, and the
2:04:58
whole business about the kind of residual DNAI don't really get.
2:05:02
It doesn't really work. The monster's kind of out of
2:05:03
proportion. I don't hate the monster.
2:05:05
It's kind of it does what it's meant to do.
2:05:07
It kills lots of people, but he retains that kind of
2:05:10
consciousness. So he's this kind of monstrous
2:05:11
figure, but this notion of aging and it's meditation upon London.
2:05:16
London is really interesting is they look out to Southwark
2:05:18
Cathedral. He talks about the blitz, get a
2:05:19
sense of the history of London, which is there in the waste and
2:05:22
but it's also in um, proof rock, the love song Jay Alfred proof
2:05:26
from which of course is about wasting your life.
2:05:28
You know, I grow old, I grow old.
2:05:30
I should wear the bottom of my trousers rolled and you get that
2:05:32
lovely line about the fog rubbing its back on windows.
2:05:36
It's this cat like figure. So it's really engaged with this
2:05:39
kind of Elliott notions. Obviously Elliott was a terrible
2:05:41
anti Semite, but the literature is wonderful and it's kind of
2:05:44
really engaging with it and you get these other references
2:05:47
there. You know, there's elements of
2:05:48
Jekyll and Hyde in this. That kind of philosophical
2:05:51
discussion is quite interesting and you may be connected to the
2:05:56
fitness possible discussion with Daleks Zek that that Rob
2:05:59
directed us to. You do get Cray mes experiment.
2:06:03
Obviously the the conclusion Southwark Cathedral.
2:06:05
I think we're meant to see in terms of of the end of the Cray
2:06:07
Mes experiment at Westminster, Although crucially, Victor Caron
2:06:10
is a tragic figure. Richard Lazarus is never tragic.
2:06:13
He doesn't see this as a bad thing whatsoever.
2:06:15
This is a, a type of evolution. The bell Taron is really
2:06:18
interesting because it makes me think of Vertigo, but it makes
2:06:22
you get the hunchback in Notre Dame, Phantom of the Opera.
2:06:24
But crucially, I think it's Dorothy.
2:06:25
I'll say it because in the 9 tailors sound kills someone and
2:06:28
that's what kills this creature here.
2:06:29
It's a tacked on ending. Let's let's let's get that there
2:06:33
straight away. But I, I think I think it's
2:06:35
really interesting and it it you know, it's mid season.
2:06:37
It is pointless forward obviously quite yeah, it's kind
2:06:40
of cumbersome that Saxon gets the hand and then he uses his
2:06:43
technology and that kind of Bob that that's kind of stupid.
2:06:47
But you know, tenants in a in a tuxedo.
2:06:50
He he looks nice and tuxedo Francine again.
2:06:55
You know I go back to my previous comment, but it is good
2:06:56
to see them there. And there's a sense in which
2:06:59
this is this is Martha's life. These people are are living.
2:07:01
They they have an existence. They're not just popping in for
2:07:05
narrative purposes in the way that, say, Amy's parents turn up
2:07:09
at the end of of series 5, although because their return
2:07:13
is, is kind of significant as well.
2:07:14
So, yeah, I, I, I think keep it because it, it, it looks nice
2:07:18
and I, I like ATS Eliot reference.
2:07:24
Yeah, I'm going to keep this as well.
2:07:26
I don't have much more to say on what has already been said,
2:07:30
except that when this broadcast I was living in shoddy shared
2:07:35
accommodation in London, second or third year of uni, just
2:07:40
before the analogue switch off and the switch over to digital.
2:07:44
So I'll watch this on my Nan's old TV, fuzzy, fuzzy television.
2:07:50
And so that monster did not look terrible to me at all.
2:07:53
And I remember messaging my dad afterwards going didn't that
2:07:56
monster look brilliant? Who'd been watching it at home?
2:07:59
He went. It was shocking.
2:08:02
So I was the only person that I think saw that was Now, you're
2:08:06
right, the CGI does look shit. But as Joe mentioned, as this
2:08:10
weird sort of evolutionary sidestep with bits of all
2:08:13
different animals and things on a bigger budget, you know, you
2:08:17
can see a really brilliant version of that when they
2:08:19
finally get to releasing these on Blu rays.
2:08:21
I hope somebody polishes up that creature and keeps his face in
2:08:26
there too, because it's both terrifying and hilarious to see
2:08:29
Mark Gates's face just just just just out of there.
2:08:34
I think the arc, the way the arcs handled is brilliant.
2:08:38
I think it's the best handling of an arc in the RTD series
2:08:42
shown throughout this. And just like that, that bit at
2:08:45
the end where somebody tells Francine that the Doctor is
2:08:48
dangerous, you know, you're onto a really different sort of Arc
2:08:51
here. It's not just here's the
2:08:53
buzzwords, you know, it's not just Saxon.
2:08:55
And yes, the way that Francine responds to the Doctor at the
2:09:00
end gives him a slap. It's played for laughs when
2:09:04
Jackie Tyler does it. It's a lot more serious here,
2:09:06
Admittedly, I, I, I, I do take the point that perhaps there's a
2:09:10
more problematic reading of that.
2:09:12
But I just think her protectiveness and her concern
2:09:16
for a daughter is played really well.
2:09:19
And I just love how the family, they managed to sew them into
2:09:21
this sort of, it is quite a generic Doctor Who story, but
2:09:25
it's a hell of a runaround. And a lot of people mentioned
2:09:28
Pertwee and sort of Pertwee era. I think there's enough plot
2:09:31
there to sustain 45 minutes. And it's, you know, they're not
2:09:34
trying to stretch it over 625. Yeah.
2:09:38
So like, I'm putting it through, it's not the best, but it is
2:09:43
just a, it's just a great 45 minutes of Doctor Who of running
2:09:47
around, being chased by monsters.
2:09:49
Like brilliant. Yeah, I can only agree with you.
2:09:54
I think it's a great fun little episode.
2:09:56
I I thoroughly enjoy watching it.
2:09:59
Three reasons. I think Lazarus is really
2:10:02
interesting. I think Mark Gatiss does as, as
2:10:04
everyone said, gives a really good performance.
2:10:06
Start with that old Lazarus. And I think the ageing makeup on
2:10:09
him works quite well. We have a lot of ageing makeup
2:10:11
this season. I think it works quite well with
2:10:14
with Mark Gatiss at the beginning with his kind of
2:10:17
really gross predatory attitude towards women, where he tries to
2:10:20
take Tish's hand and he sniffs her and she says, Oh yeah,
2:10:23
that's Soap. And he's, he's just absolutely
2:10:25
gross, isn't he? But what I like about the way
2:10:28
Gatis does it is he doesn't take it into the kind of League of
2:10:30
Gentlemen pastiche. He stays kind of this side of,
2:10:34
of reality. And that works in the in the
2:10:36
story's favour. Her reaction though, Rod is very
2:10:39
odd when he gets younger and one, he's not that pretty so I
2:10:43
don't know why she's so rich, and two, he's still that
2:10:46
horrible old man. I know and she just wants to get
2:10:49
off with him. That is bad and she even says as
2:10:50
much. She wants a better job.
2:10:53
That is, that is odd, but then we're just seeing Tish as young
2:10:55
and naive. But yeah, there's naive and
2:10:57
there's just playing around. Fucking stupid, isn't that?
2:11:01
I like it when he turns CGII don't have that big a problem
2:11:03
with the monster. I think the monster works quite
2:11:05
well, but I think works really well for me with Lazarus is his
2:11:08
back story. When he talks about the little
2:11:11
boy cowering in the cathedral from the bombs and the blitz, I
2:11:15
think it just gives it a level of believability and context and
2:11:18
colour. It absolutely doesn't excuse or
2:11:20
justify what he's doing, but I think it just explains it more
2:11:23
so he makes it more rounded as a character.
2:11:27
I think the locations look really good.
2:11:29
I love the kind of apple look of the the stark white of Lazarus
2:11:33
house, the display room. I think that central kind of
2:11:37
capsule works very well. Yeah.
2:11:39
Now watching it with CGI as it is now, when the water and the
2:11:42
steam are spinning out of it, maybe it's a little bit shonky,
2:11:45
but you know what, the, the music's going, the pace is
2:11:48
going, the energy's going. So I just go with that.
2:11:52
So I love all that. And then I love the the looking
2:11:54
out over the London skyline, like you mentioned, Paul, that
2:11:57
looks, you know, amazing. And then we moved to Suffolk
2:12:00
Cathedral, which actually the interior is a Wells Cathedral in
2:12:03
Somerset. But what a fantastic location to
2:12:06
do a climax for Doctor Who's story and feels feels quite
2:12:10
unique for Doctor Who to kind of go to hallowed grounds like that
2:12:13
and and then even give us Mark Gatiss's bum at the end of it.
2:12:16
So I think the the choice and the range of locations here, I
2:12:19
think visually makes this a really interesting story as
2:12:22
well. And then finally, like we've all
2:12:24
said, the Jones family, we just see so much of them.
2:12:26
They're not a carbon copy of the Tyler's.
2:12:29
They've got their own characters.
2:12:31
They're they're unique. Leo is probably the most
2:12:33
disposable. I don't think we see him much
2:12:35
again after this. Obviously the final two parts
2:12:37
when you just as you oh, you mentioned rightly on that, that
2:12:40
that 4 tagged on scene on on a pier, on a nameless pier.
2:12:44
Not Brighton Pier though. Definitely not Brighton, but
2:12:48
yeah, I, I think that I really enjoy the Jones's family and
2:12:50
they they make it again, they give her a level of
2:12:53
believability to it. So yeah, it's great. 45 minutes.
2:12:55
I am more than happy to put this one through IS.
2:12:58
There all there's one moment that no one ever talks about
2:13:00
when the Doctor and Martha are squished up in that capsule to
2:13:03
go Oh yes, yeah. And then he suddenly just drops
2:13:06
to his knees with the Sonic screwdriver and there's a, a, a
2:13:08
dramatic, but it clamps up on Martha Jones's face, looking
2:13:11
very excited, very odd. Yeah, I'm glad they don't pay
2:13:16
any further. That would have been a little
2:13:18
bit odd. I'm waiting for you to mention
2:13:21
Moffett would have done something with that.
2:13:22
But before you do, I'm going to move a word swiftly on Paul.
2:13:26
Pick your next story. I'd like to pick Gridlock and
2:13:32
I'd like to come to praise Gridlock.
2:13:34
I I adore this. This is Russell T Davis's best
2:13:38
script since Part of the Ways, and it's his best script until
2:13:41
Turn Left. I believe in Gridlock in a way I
2:13:45
don't often believe in Davis's visions of the future.
2:13:49
Partly I think it's because it's better designed and and they
2:13:52
don't make mistakes with the costume because of course
2:13:55
they've gone towards 2000 AD. I think I'm right that the
2:13:58
bowler hat figure is is from 2000. 18 normal.
2:14:02
Yeah, it also makes me think of Trevor Sigma in Happiness
2:14:05
Patrol. And I think there are links
2:14:06
between this Happiness Patrol and Paradise Towers, which is
2:14:08
always a good thing. Although they're they're
2:14:09
satires, this isn't. And this is a great tale about
2:14:14
humanity and it's, you know, it's a script with a level of
2:14:19
sophistication as Kim mirror of Utopia in Yana and Yep, Chan tho
2:14:27
we can see in the face of Bo and in Nurse Hain and they're
2:14:30
waiting for the doctor to come along and say what's left of
2:14:32
humanity. It introduces reintroduces the
2:14:36
time or in the Daleks. So kind of works as an
2:14:38
introduction to what's coming the next week with Daleks Take
2:14:40
Manhattan. There's an interesting thing
2:14:43
around religion, I think, which you don't tend to expect to find
2:14:46
with Russell T Davis. And I think it's, it's kind of
2:14:49
fascinating that it becomes a kind of Leo Strauss type good
2:14:55
myth to unify the people trapped on the on the subway.
2:15:00
So when they sing the Old Rugged Cross, it's clearly meant to be
2:15:04
a communal event as when they emerge and sing Abide With Me,
2:15:08
which we might tend to think about in terms of funerals.
2:15:10
My mother's funeral, it was on the Titanic, but I think we're
2:15:13
meant to think of it being sung at the FA Cup final.
2:15:16
It was a great communal event. So it's not a piano religion,
2:15:19
but there's something about faith.
2:15:20
And what's interesting is the Doctor's the only one who
2:15:22
doesn't cry. Martha cries.
2:15:25
Everyone in the cars cries. Cassini Sisters who I think are
2:15:27
meant to be benign versions of the Rezis.
2:15:29
That's how I, I, I read them. But then it's about Martha's
2:15:32
face and the Doctor. I think she's quite clear.
2:15:34
She says you've got your hymns and your songs and I've got the
2:15:37
Doctor and that's pointing us forward towards sound drums last
2:15:41
the Time Lord. It's not going to work.
2:15:43
It's going to very weird direction there, but it's
2:15:45
certainly introducing this idea of faith in in the Doctor and in
2:15:49
stories about the Doctor. I love the fact that Macra back
2:15:53
in it. Tennant's really good at various
2:15:57
points in this. The kind of stillness there when
2:15:59
he gets to the Senate building, the music really builds this
2:16:04
atmosphere, the kind of tragedy of what's happened here.
2:16:06
And of course, against the back of her own global pandemic.
2:16:08
It works a different way now in 2007 when he very quietly brings
2:16:12
Martha in to see the face of Bo. There's kind of an element of,
2:16:15
of, of it's, it's moving. Yeah.
2:16:19
I, I, I adore it. I, I loved it on 1st view and my
2:16:22
wife hates it because of the kittens.
2:16:24
I love it because of the kittens and all the reasons I've given
2:16:27
there. So I yeah, let's keep it.
2:16:29
Fabulous. Let's go to the comments, James
2:16:31
Lark says in the run of So So stories the make up the first
2:16:34
half of the series. Gridlock stands out, but all of
2:16:37
it's leaping between vehicles. It's essentially doing what who
2:16:40
does best, A claustrophobic chamber piece strong on
2:16:43
character and concept. Gregory says what could have
2:16:47
been a hit or misadventure is elevated by its deeper look at
2:16:50
faith. 10 is suitably pious, thank you.
2:16:55
And if that final scene with Martha showing her worth doesn't
2:16:58
justify the entrance fee alone, then bringing back the bloody
2:17:01
Macra does. Samuel Ormsley says best of the
2:17:04
5 billion trilogy in RTDS best script this year.
2:17:07
It's that special Doctor Who story, fiendishly funny,
2:17:10
fabulous world building and huge contradicting ideas.
2:17:13
The result is brilliant, exciting and genuinely moving.
2:17:18
Oh dear, John Bensalia says boring.
2:17:21
Much is taken up with the endless exposition in tin boxes
2:17:25
as it's so slow and torquey. The plot holes loom large.
2:17:29
RTD Mr. Trick by including the Macra as they could have been
2:17:32
responsible for the brainwashing.
2:17:33
Plus sing along Murray pompous choir.
2:17:37
He doesn't lie much, does he? Bless them, Daniel, Knight says,
2:17:40
starts out looking like the cheapie of the season and
2:17:42
blossoms into a beautiful story about hope, faith and community.
2:17:45
Ardell O'hanlon is great as Branigan.
2:17:48
Melvin Penya dark and dystopic The Faith and hymn singing of
2:17:53
the Motorways dead. Why do?
2:17:55
You give. Me foreshadows the Archangel
2:17:59
Network prayer in the finale. This whole season is about
2:18:02
faith. We put in stories and legends
2:18:05
and challenging narratives that we take for granted.
2:18:08
And Hollensworth says I've come to love it as a great cast that
2:18:10
elevates the at times schmaltzy material.
2:18:13
And Macra. Bloody Macra.
2:18:16
John Ardell says RTD, as an atheist meditating on the power
2:18:19
of faith, might have been the most beautiful of all of his WHO
2:18:22
scripts. David Gillespie Press has lots
2:18:25
to enjoy, but the highlight must be Martha taking no more of the
2:18:27
Doctor's shit and forcing him to open up proof she was the friend
2:18:31
that the Doctor needed. Not that he ever appreciated her
2:18:34
for it. Michael Storm says it's a near
2:18:37
masterpiece. The scenes of the Doctor
2:18:38
recalling Gallifrey are some of Tennant's best work.
2:18:41
Bonus point for unexpected macro cameo.
2:18:44
Crushed dummy says brilliant, claustrophobic yet expansive.
2:18:47
Excellent use of music. The Macra yay like 2000 AD comes
2:18:51
to life. Jack Koya, one of the most RTD
2:18:54
scripts ever. The power of community, working
2:18:57
class individuals scraping to get by, having been abandoned.
2:19:00
The Salvaging of Hope from the depths of Despair, and the
2:19:03
Doctor as Miss. As a Masonic Saviour.
2:19:08
A rushed resolution, but I suppose it's the journey.
2:19:12
No, no good growth. A rushed.
2:19:16
Why are you all so simple? A rushed resolution, but I
2:19:21
suppose it's not the journey, it's the destination.
2:19:25
Finally, Mark Donaldson says a lovely spin on the Base Under
2:19:28
Siege trope that brings back a classic monster for the sheer
2:19:31
hell of it. A hugely confident story that
2:19:34
could have been disposable. So.
2:19:36
I don't think he is a messianic saviour.
2:19:38
I just got to pick up on that point.
2:19:39
Messiahs tend to be expected. No one on the subway is
2:19:43
expecting him. Only the face of Beau is.
2:19:45
They don't know they have to be saved.
2:19:47
That's what adds to the beauty of it.
2:19:50
Your point, Yellen, your take on gridlock.
2:19:54
I love this story. I thought it was brilliant when
2:19:56
it went out. Like this is what I want my
2:19:58
Doctor Who to do, to be doing interesting things, new things
2:20:02
with sort of tried and tested formulas in a way like Mark
2:20:05
Donaldson was saying about the, the, the, the base under siege.
2:20:10
But my my first point I want to sort of nominate is the Doctor
2:20:16
lying about Gallifrey. It's a beautiful moment when he
2:20:20
lies about it. And then it's an even more
2:20:22
beautiful moment where as Doctor Who fans, we're sat there and
2:20:26
we're getting this little glimpse of Gallifrey.
2:20:29
And it's not an 80s fucking the 80s ad agency of destiny that it
2:20:33
becomes. It's of this, it's a romantic
2:20:36
place. I used the word poetic a couple
2:20:39
of times during during this. And maybe I just need a bigger
2:20:42
lexicon, but there's something about this series that just
2:20:49
feels like RTD is sewing. It's not so much the narrative,
2:20:55
but the world building in a very poetic way.
2:20:57
And I just think it's a really beautiful moment and it's a
2:21:00
great character moment for the Doctor.
2:21:02
It's a great moment for Martha to get to know the Doctor, even
2:21:05
if it is through a lie. The second thing I want to
2:21:09
nominate is just the the world building.
2:21:13
And it's an obvious one, but it's not even the stuff in the
2:21:15
motorway. It's the beginning when they're
2:21:17
selling bending emotions, which is a very 2000 AD sort of thing.
2:21:21
But it's just like, you don't see things like that in Doctor
2:21:24
Who to this point. Like, maybe there's bits of it
2:21:27
in the New Adventures, but it just suddenly feels like, OK,
2:21:30
this is Doctor Who sort of, you know, drugs are for mugs, but,
2:21:33
you know, a little bit. Just for the Sally, the Sally
2:21:37
Calypso opening, that's very 2000 AD as well.
2:21:40
Exactly. And I just think what a
2:21:44
brilliant conceit that we're going to do this big expansive
2:21:47
sci-fi world. But actually it's just a bunch
2:21:50
of cars which are the same set just as a production one.
2:21:53
RTD thinking on all fours is like, that's an RTD thinking on
2:21:58
all fours. Then that's not what I.
2:22:02
Mean tonight. RTD firing on all cylinders.
2:22:07
I think it's just a wonderful like production conceit, but you
2:22:10
just you meet so many people and you know, just when he jumps
2:22:13
through and there's obviously a red person because there's
2:22:15
always got to be somebody. It's a completely different
2:22:17
colour. There's the guy in the bowler
2:22:19
hat, there's the naked people and then the cats, like the,
2:22:22
the, the cat people. I'm never bettered here than
2:22:24
when we meet some cats that aren't nuns, you know.
2:22:29
What's his name? The guest character.
2:22:32
It's gone for my brother Oliver Milo.
2:22:35
No, the the hang on. Let me look this up.
2:22:39
You can cut this bit. You guys always had it, right?
2:22:44
Only this No, we'll, we'll leave this bit him.
2:22:47
Dylan. Let's go to the front of the
2:22:48
show. This bit.
2:22:49
Who is he? The guy from Father Ted.
2:22:52
Arlo Hamlin, yeah, I just think what brilliant casting.
2:22:56
I just think he is a much needed bit of heart and comedy relief
2:23:01
in a script full of heart and comedy relief.
2:23:04
And I just think it's just a brilliant, wonderful world.
2:23:08
And I'm, I was sold from it. And I don't even need to use a
2:23:11
fourth point of the macro, which is great.
2:23:15
I do want to use the point of the macro because I don't think
2:23:18
there's been a single moment. And Paul, you could attest to
2:23:21
this because I watched a lot of Doctor Who of you when I was
2:23:23
younger. I don't think I've ever jumped
2:23:25
out of my sofa with so much joy as when I saw those enormous
2:23:30
claws snapping away at me because I just didn't think he'd
2:23:33
have the nerve to do it. So I sort of saw them and did a
2:23:36
double take, went no, no, I didn't even have that reaction
2:23:40
to the Master in Utopia. It's just so glorious, the world
2:23:45
building, like you've all said. I really like how just as a
2:23:47
setting, you see it as layers. You see the Undercity and then
2:23:51
you see the motorway and then you see the city at the end of
2:23:53
it and everything that's happening there.
2:23:55
So as a portrayed world in 45 minutes, he really does manage
2:24:01
to to do that with a lot of detail.
2:24:03
I like the dark tone of this as well.
2:24:05
I like the drugs at the beginning, the mass murder of
2:24:08
the Senate, Martha being kidnapped, the genuine fear that
2:24:12
people are expressing in the cars.
2:24:14
I think it's it's a really dark story, but it's a story with a
2:24:17
lot of hope as well. And it's playing emotions like
2:24:20
Rusty Davis always does. And sometimes he can really
2:24:23
think that. Like I think we get there at the
2:24:25
end of the season where it all gets a bit too sentimental, but
2:24:29
every single emotion is beautifully judged in this.
2:24:32
I think Travis Olia Oliver is hot as hell and who wouldn't
2:24:37
want to look at him all day long?
2:24:39
And the, the I think it's the possibly my favorite last scene
2:24:43
in any episode where she just sits down on the chair and says,
2:24:46
you know, you don't talk. You never say and forces him to
2:24:50
talk. And I think that's the point
2:24:51
where in his eyes, she's kind of in the door.
2:24:55
You know, he doesn't give her the key at that point, but
2:24:57
that's the point where she really stands up to him.
2:24:59
Yeah. I don't think he puts a foot
2:25:01
wrong in this. And I've said that a couple of
2:25:03
times this year. This is a supremely confident
2:25:07
season. Let's put GRIDLOCK through.
2:25:10
And absolutely, I'm making it 4 for four.
2:25:12
I love Gridlock as well. You've touched on a lot of
2:25:15
things I was going to touch on. I love the grimness of it.
2:25:18
I think RTD sometimes, because he's big and jolly and he's
2:25:21
always laughing and everything's marvellous.
2:25:23
Everyone thinks he's going to write all these really like
2:25:26
upbeat, bubbly, positive episodes.
2:25:28
But he injects some of the kind of darkest, starkest, bleakest
2:25:31
stuff into Doctor. We've seen it recently and stuff
2:25:33
like dot and Bubble. I hear there's, there's a lot
2:25:37
under the surface. So we've got New New York.
2:25:38
Everyone's talked about the drugs.
2:25:39
Yeah, there are drugs, mood enhancers if you like to make
2:25:42
them a little bit more acceptable to make people happy
2:25:45
or to forget. But that scene I think is really
2:25:48
interesting. Pharmacy Street at the beginning
2:25:50
because it plays out like the beginning of the long game where
2:25:53
they're bringing out the food stalls because the music's
2:25:56
upbeat, it's bright. It's fun until Martha points
2:25:59
out, you know, everyone's off their head on chemicals and
2:26:01
suddenly it starts to come down a little bit.
2:26:04
And there's there's that kind suggestion that the state is
2:26:06
happy to kind of turn a blind eye to everyone and allow the
2:26:09
populace to feed off their addictions whilst everything is
2:26:12
going to hell. And it's really interesting that
2:26:14
actually what killed society is the drugs because it was a
2:26:17
mutated mood enhance that's actually killed everyone.
2:26:20
So I think Russell is trying to tell us something there.
2:26:23
It's just well seeded though, isn't it for that?
2:26:25
Really well seeded, really well seeded.
2:26:27
And it's just a throwaway comment, but you think about it
2:26:29
afterwards and you realize, you know, the message he's trying to
2:26:32
give you. I also like the fact that, you
2:26:34
know, the people in the undercity.
2:26:35
Yes, we've got a, you know, a sci-fi reading on it that
2:26:38
they're trapped because they're trying to save them.
2:26:40
But actually what we're seeing here is kind of a parallel of
2:26:43
normal, you know, everyday working people being subjugated,
2:26:46
held down by the ruling elite. They're pushed down to the
2:26:49
bottom, they're trapped, they're going nowhere, they're slowly
2:26:52
choking to death in the pollution.
2:26:54
And it's up to the doctor to allow them to learn how to fly,
2:26:57
both metaphorically and literally by showing them the
2:27:00
light and allowing them to break out into the over city.
2:27:04
So I think there's a there's a hell of a lot here to read into
2:27:06
it. Secondly, the hymns.
2:27:09
I mean, I'm, I'm not one for organized religion, which I
2:27:11
think is quite different to faith, but I think the hymns
2:27:14
rooms here are really quite moving.
2:27:16
The first one, the rugged cross, I actually think you can see
2:27:18
that in a number of different ways.
2:27:20
I think if you're being really cynical, you can say that when
2:27:24
they sing the rugged cross in the cars at the beginning,
2:27:27
everyone's kind of uniting to sing it in a way that distracts
2:27:30
them from their predicament. And you can argue or you could
2:27:33
argue the kind of religions being used by the state in a way
2:27:36
to kind of pacify the population just as the drugs are doing.
2:27:41
But of course, there's another reading as well that actually
2:27:43
it's a it's a way of the community coming together.
2:27:45
It's kind of reminds me like a little bit of the, the people in
2:27:48
the London Blitz going down into the underground and, and all
2:27:50
singing and absolutely the, the, the hymn at the end, Abide by Me
2:27:55
is about faith and hope and you can't fail to be touched by
2:27:58
that. And then my third reason is
2:28:00
David Tennant. I think David Tennant is
2:28:01
magnificent in this. We see the full range here
2:28:05
without the history Onyx. You know, when he lies the
2:28:07
beginning, then he tells the truth at the end and he's really
2:28:09
moved by it. We seem excited.
2:28:11
We see him really angry to try and save.
2:28:14
He's determined to save Martha. And I love the fact that he
2:28:16
acknowledges I hardly even know her, yet he's funny.
2:28:20
He's charming when he's with the people in the cars.
2:28:22
He's warm and compassionate with the face of Beau.
2:28:25
And he hugs Haim when he first meets her.
2:28:28
So clearly, he is no longer the man who gives no second chances
2:28:32
because he's giving her a second chance.
2:28:34
So yeah, I think there's so much to read into this.
2:28:37
It's a really layered script, and I love it.
2:28:39
So it's going through right. We're down to our last three.
2:28:44
I've got to pick one, but we got the last three of the season,
2:28:48
Blink Utopia or last of the Time Lords, right, Kate?
2:28:52
I, I suppose I've got to go for blink really, haven't I, as a
2:28:55
Steven Moffett advocate? So it's pretty impossible now to
2:29:01
say new things about Blink, isn't it?
2:29:02
Because it's got everything. It's got everything that I love
2:29:06
about Steven Moffett. It's got really clever plot,
2:29:09
really intricate detail. Everything plays, pays off.
2:29:12
Got some really stunning conceits in there.
2:29:15
Sally and Larry talking to the Doctor via the DVD Easter eggs.
2:29:19
And he's so clever, particularly when Sally actually responds to
2:29:23
a couple of the Doctors prompts for the second time.
2:29:25
She's answered them already in an earlier scene.
2:29:28
And both times what she says works perfectly.
2:29:31
I'll just, I'll just makes him smile.
2:29:32
Just think that's so clever. There are characters that I care
2:29:35
about, I'm quickly invested in. There's a seemingly invincible,
2:29:39
unique foe, great dialogue, great pace, spotter, romance,
2:29:43
killer twist, bit of timely whiming us.
2:29:45
And I think that works here. So I absolutely love this story.
2:29:48
So I'm just going to talk very quickly about the three things
2:29:50
that bring a bit of a tear to my eye because I think it's quite
2:29:54
an emotional episode this. The first one is Kathy's letter
2:29:57
to to Sally. So first, when Kathy's grandson
2:30:00
brings the letter to Sally at West of Drummonds, we don't kind
2:30:04
of really think about the implications of being taken back
2:30:07
in time because you're too busy trying to plot the the plot
2:30:10
together. But then it gives you time to
2:30:12
think about it and to let those emotional beats really hit you.
2:30:16
We've got a quiet scene with Sally reading the rest letter in
2:30:19
the cafe, and then she goes to visit her old friend's grave.
2:30:23
And that really gives you the time for the emotion of that to
2:30:26
really hit into in the impact that actually Kathy lost all the
2:30:30
family, Everybody she built, all the people she knew and loved,
2:30:33
she lost by being taken back in time.
2:30:35
And yes, she's met her husband and yes, she had a family, but
2:30:38
she's lost everyone and around her.
2:30:40
I think that's quite moving. And the fact that she wants
2:30:42
Sally to go and tell the brother that she loves him.
2:30:45
I'm not clearly there are family who don't do emotions very well,
2:30:49
but she tells us to go and tell them that she loves Alfie.
2:30:51
It's really touching. So I love that second scene that
2:30:54
I think is beautiful is old Billy in the hospital.
2:30:57
So Sally's romance obviously is with the gorgeous, I will say
2:31:01
gorgeous Billy Shipton at the beginning.
2:31:03
Why wouldn't you fall in love with him?
2:31:05
But of course, Billy is of course attacked by the Angels,
2:31:08
and next thing Sally knows, she's getting a phone call from
2:31:10
him to go and visit him in hospital where he's dying.
2:31:12
I think what Moffett taps into really cleverly there is our
2:31:16
innate fear of death. Specifically that and a little
2:31:19
weird voice the back of your head wondering would you want to
2:31:22
know when your time he's going to come?
2:31:25
And Billy here, he absolutely knows this is the moment he's
2:31:28
gonna die. And that awful line when he says
2:31:31
I'm gonna die as soon as the rain stops is just.
2:31:34
Hasn't. Tails on rain stops.
2:31:36
Yeah, he. Says yeah, I think it's the best
2:31:38
liars David Moffett ever wrote. It's just I even saying it now,
2:31:41
but just makes the hairs on my arm stand up.
2:31:44
It's just emotional because he's there alone.
2:31:46
If, if Sally wasn't there, he will be there alone.
2:31:49
People have to say, well, it looks ridiculous because it's an
2:31:50
NHS ward and there's nobody there.
2:31:53
The point that nobody's there is to emphasize the fact that he is
2:31:56
totally alone and unless Sally stays with him, which he chooses
2:31:59
to do, he would die alone, which again taps into a very primal
2:32:03
fear. And then the last bit that again
2:32:06
brings tear to my eye is when Sally meets the Doctor of Martha
2:32:09
at the end. So a year's gone past and Sally
2:32:13
sees the Doctor and Martha get out of the cab and she rushes
2:32:15
out, hand over all the notes and documents so that the plot can
2:32:19
all come together as a beautiful hole.
2:32:23
And I just think it's that act because it's very clear from the
2:32:26
dialogue just before with Sally and Larry that she can't move
2:32:29
on. She's stuck wondering about it.
2:32:31
That ever so simple act of handing over the documents to
2:32:34
the doctor. She's literally unburdening
2:32:37
herself from the experience. And then she can carry on with
2:32:40
her life. So she's been unable to say
2:32:41
anything to Larry. And now when he approached her,
2:32:44
she can take his hand and walk off with him, with the man she
2:32:46
loves. I just think that's really life
2:32:48
affirming, beautiful. But it's a brilliant episode,
2:32:51
this. I absolutely adore it.
2:32:53
So I would like Blink please to go with.
2:32:57
Shall we go to the comments? Joe, do you want to go first?
2:33:01
Because I need to scroll through to the comments.
2:33:04
Gareth Bout Oh my Word says worst episode.
2:33:08
Moffett dials in a script that's a rehash of his short story from
2:33:11
the 2006 Doctor Who manual, but with Angels.
2:33:15
All the gimmicks were there in the annual story.
2:33:17
A little new here Beyond the Angels who are complete Yawn
2:33:20
Fest. Gosh, we need to go back to
2:33:22
Gareth's old Strictly episode and exercise.
2:33:24
I think we need to cancel it. How dare you.
2:33:27
James Lark says things that are brilliant about Blink.
2:33:29
The script, the direction, Carey Mulligan, the dialogue, the
2:33:32
angels, the genuine creeping dread.
2:33:35
The best companion we never had. Murray Gold on.
2:33:38
Former Doctor Light episode so good you almost wish it was like
2:33:41
this every week. Without question, one of the
2:33:43
very best episodes ever. You didn't have to look for your
2:33:46
notes, did you? You just wanted me to read out
2:33:48
the slag off and you, Jason Thompson says.
2:33:52
I love it. With the angels being a great
2:33:54
concept that should have been left as a one episode wonder.
2:33:58
Carrie Mulligan carries the show, so it's no surprise she
2:34:00
went on to be an award winner. It's the same rain.
2:34:03
Also, even I got the line wrong. It's such a desperately sad line
2:34:07
keep. No, that's that's the other line
2:34:09
where she says it's the same rain because the time is still.
2:34:12
It's the same time. Melvin Penya says Carey Mulligan
2:34:15
is brilliant as Sally Sparrow, and that's a really fun
2:34:17
supporting cast around her as she fumbles her way through the
2:34:20
doctor's world. Her relationship with the two
2:34:22
Billy Shipton's is the is the loveliest single sequence in all
2:34:26
of her. Razor Gregory, a phenomenal
2:34:29
piece of writing. Moffett goes into Terrance
2:34:31
sticks mode with his back against the wall, a tight
2:34:34
deadline and a story he can't have the Doctor in.
2:34:36
What he produces is just magnificent as he plots his
2:34:40
story tighter than a camels ask and a sandstorm.
2:34:42
I'm not losing sight of his characters.
2:34:44
The hospital scene still moves me.
2:34:47
But Corey says, I can't deny it's pretty good.
2:34:49
A spooky tale with an innovative monster will never be run into
2:34:52
the ground. It's always interesting to have
2:34:54
this Doctor in an outsider role to see how the real world
2:34:57
reacts. My big complaint is that it
2:34:59
derails the flow of the series. Even less time with the Doctor
2:35:03
and Martha. So it's fun, tense, but nowhere
2:35:05
near vital. David Gillespie Pratt The
2:35:08
episode so many fans have used to lure the Not we into trying
2:35:12
out Doctor Who. I tried it once with an ex and
2:35:14
it failed to interest him, but he had no taste.
2:35:17
A rightly lauded classic and a very cleverly done.
2:35:21
Daniel Nicer is A1 trick pony, great on 1st watch but doesn't
2:35:24
stand up to repeated viewings and loses points for introducing
2:35:28
that horrible phrase. You know the one.
2:35:31
Crash Dummy says just as good as everyone says.
2:35:33
Undoubtedly Moffitt's best script, and the Angels are never
2:35:36
as good again. John Bensalia sit down
2:35:40
everybody, the best of a very bad bunch.
2:35:43
Moffitt's dialogue is, as usual, stilted and very anti clever
2:35:47
postmodern Babble. But the Angels are inspired
2:35:49
creation, the direction is good, and Sally and Larry make for far
2:35:53
better leads than the regulars. Daniel Rawls Lee says.
2:35:57
I can see the brilliance of this while wondering if it's hallowed
2:36:00
reputation does it a disservice. Somewhat, but the Weeping Angels
2:36:03
are possibly Moffett's best idea ever.
2:36:06
And Carrie Mulligan, who's such a Debbie Downer in movies these
2:36:09
days, is great. And finally, Paul Smice is
2:36:12
overrated, but it is very clever.
2:36:14
Moffett's best script. Oh, what do you think of bling?
2:36:19
I it's lost some of its power, I think.
2:36:22
Repeated uses of the Angels and yeah, are they ever as good as
2:36:27
they are here? I mean, they're good in Billy to
2:36:29
the Angels, but I do, I do love that.
2:36:31
And the Moffetisms. Now when you come back to it,
2:36:34
they do make you, they do pull the the.
2:36:37
Bridge. Yeah, that's what I'm looking
2:36:40
for there. The Billy Shipton trying to pull
2:36:44
Sally Sparrow while he's on duty.
2:36:47
That doesn't fly anymore, I'm afraid.
2:36:50
There might be cutesy, and some of the musical cues are telling
2:36:53
you that various bits of it are meant to be kind of Moffat's
2:36:57
romantic comedy, coupling that, that type of thing.
2:37:00
Billy Shipton, a serving police officer, albeit one who's now
2:37:04
he's knocked off for the day trying to pull, has a very
2:37:07
different resonance now after a few local cases, but does lead
2:37:13
to that beautiful scene in the hospital ward.
2:37:16
I suspect it's also empty because you've been shoved in to
2:37:18
die, which is what you tend to do in hospitals, and you put the
2:37:20
dying person on their own. And so in being on his own, to
2:37:23
Rod's point, it's absolutely crucial.
2:37:28
Larry and Sally are the versions of Martin the doctor until the
2:37:32
moment she can let go. And there's there's a nice kind
2:37:35
of intersection with Internet forums, DVD culture.
2:37:41
The hairy man in the DVD shop is presumably Bill Bailey's
2:37:45
character from space. And there's a kind of a
2:37:47
conscious evocation of that type of culture.
2:37:50
Now I got it on AT shirt. You know that that that type of
2:37:54
that. What's that other line?
2:37:55
You've only got 13 DVD? I mean, that's come from space,
2:37:58
isn't it? The problem is, yeah, when when
2:38:02
Sally is in the flat and Larry's wandering around, no clothes on,
2:38:06
he's clearing up, pissed enough or starting off not to realise
2:38:09
and then she says it'll come to you and it's kind of the creaky
2:38:12
Moffatisms are all there. That being said, it's still
2:38:15
brilliantly creepy. I think it's really well shot
2:38:18
when Carrie Mulligan is in Western Drumlin's and she moves
2:38:22
between the angels and then moves back and their eyes are
2:38:25
covered and they're they're recovered.
2:38:27
That's as well shot and as carefully done as with the
2:38:30
broken clock, the unbroken clocks in the garden, the
2:38:32
fireplace and the quick cuts to the angels.
2:38:35
They work really, really well here.
2:38:38
I think Martha is brilliant in this.
2:38:39
There's kind of a different version of Martha here when she
2:38:41
bumps into goes now and yeah, and he's trapped me here and
2:38:44
I've got to. I've got to work to keep him
2:38:45
good. There's a kind of a different
2:38:47
assertive Martha here when they get out the taxi as well.
2:38:49
She's trying to urge you one. He's the one who's caught here
2:38:52
with this companion. And we all wanted Sally Sparrow.
2:38:55
But I think that you're opening comment there that it is the
2:38:58
child from the annual that Moffett reads and that material.
2:39:02
But most people don't realise that.
2:39:03
So I think it still stands up brilliantly well.
2:39:06
And yeah, I want to keep it. Ellen.
2:39:11
Boring. What?
2:39:15
I really like Stephen Moffett's writing and I liked this at the
2:39:22
time, but I could not focus on this at all.
2:39:27
I had to watch it twice because I just would just got distracted
2:39:32
doing other things. I don't know what it is about.
2:39:34
It maybe is the time Moffett isms that everybody talks about.
2:39:38
I didn't even write any notes on this one.
2:39:40
I just found nothing to say that was particularly positive or
2:39:44
particularly negative. I just, I was so underwhelmed by
2:39:49
the entire thing watching it this time that it is just a blur
2:39:53
of like meh in my head. And I think that's the rewatch
2:39:58
ability that has been mentioned a few times.
2:40:00
I think I've just, I think I'm overexposed to it.
2:40:04
I think I've seen it many times in the past, but it's probably
2:40:06
been a decade since I've seen it.
2:40:08
And I just, I'm much more of a time of angels man, if I'm
2:40:11
perfectly honest. But then I'm much more of an
2:40:13
aliens to alien fan, more gun than frock.
2:40:17
I don't know. It's I, I, I'm struggling to say
2:40:22
anything about it. I just was so bored by this.
2:40:26
And maybe it's because I just want the Doctor in my Doctor
2:40:29
Who. And I know that's the point.
2:40:31
I know that's the point of these episodes.
2:40:33
And I know Moffett requested to to write this one, but I've just
2:40:38
got nothing to say so I'm going to bin it.
2:40:41
Sigh. Heart will be very pleased with
2:40:42
you though, because he he went down as the one person who found
2:40:45
him who hates this, so at least there's two of you now.
2:40:48
Excellent. Oh, and Gareth Bowley, Sorry.
2:40:51
Hopefully you're not going to make it a third show.
2:40:53
No, this is wonderful. Good.
2:40:56
Yeah, I think it is one of Moffitt's cleverest scripts and
2:40:58
actually it didn't annoy me. Rewatching at this time and I
2:41:01
get irritated by Stephen Moffitt quite a lot.
2:41:04
You've never mentioned it. It's got the most effective jump
2:41:07
scare ever and Doctor Who, it genuinely made me like grab a
2:41:11
cushion to hide behind it. And that is the you're not
2:41:14
looking at the Angel Neva you and then suddenly when it's
2:41:17
there right in your face. And for me, that was just the
2:41:19
best live watching moment of dogs who I'd ever seen, probably
2:41:24
since I jumped off my sofa when the mackerel revealed in
2:41:26
gridlock. But you know, it was a season
2:41:27
that kept giving me great moments like this.
2:41:30
You kind of said it all, but it is Lawless again.
2:41:33
It's almost perfect. It's a witty script.
2:41:35
It's funny. I love the characters.
2:41:36
I like the scene where he's standing there naked.
2:41:39
I love the flirting in the parking lot.
2:41:41
I adore the scene where he dies in hospital.
2:41:44
That genuinely is one of the most moving scenes ever.
2:41:48
Yeah, this is Moffett firing on all cylinders.
2:41:50
And I think a bit like Love and Monsters in Series 2.
2:41:56
I think the Doctor Light episode might be the best directed
2:42:00
episode of the year. Some really wonderful direction
2:42:03
in this. So yeah, let's put it through.
2:42:05
Fantastic, right? So we are down to the last two,
2:42:08
which happened to be the final three parts or 1 parter and two
2:42:12
parts. We're doing them as 2.
2:42:14
So Utopia and Last of the Time Lords Paul is your choice first,
2:42:19
which are you going to pick? I'm going Utopia.
2:42:21
Let's keep it chronological. Utopia.
2:42:25
The last 10 minutes are the best 10 minutes in Doctor Who.
2:42:29
That's partly down to Graham Harper's amazing direction.
2:42:31
It's partly down to to Tennant's performance.
2:42:34
There's a desperation here at Tennant.
2:42:35
He's taught with Jack is brilliant, I think, and he is
2:42:40
that kind of sense that he's abandoned Jack because Jack is
2:42:43
wrong. Now that's got an entirely
2:42:45
different meaning given subsequent revelations about
2:42:50
shoulders. And again, it's another text
2:42:52
that's event of overtaking it revelations.
2:42:55
I mean, I have written fucking Captain Jack as my first comment
2:42:58
because when he comes bounding along there after the TARDIS, it
2:43:01
kind of annoys me. And he's pretty much just there
2:43:04
as a device because they need somebody who can't die.
2:43:07
Although I'm not sure why his skin doesn't melt by that
2:43:10
radiation because I'm thinking back to when when they keep
2:43:12
killing him at the start of Children of Earth.
2:43:14
And this is made me think of Children of Earth and I don't
2:43:16
like Children of Earth. I can't buy it, although it does
2:43:18
have the moment, the the best, worst moment in Doctor Who when
2:43:21
Capaldi closes the door and he kills the children and himself.
2:43:23
So Jack coming back is is a problem for me.
2:43:28
I figured you know he was there just as like an ex exposition
2:43:31
engine because the 1st 15 minutes is all exposition and
2:43:34
basically Jack being caught up to speed with the whole season
2:43:37
today. Yeah.
2:43:38
And then he doesn't really do anything, you know, just to die
2:43:41
an extra few times there at the end of the season.
2:43:44
And I I but the future kind of clearly some type of Blake 7
2:43:49
knock off, aren't they? I'm thinking about Terminal and
2:43:52
the really bad monkeys and various things that turn up in
2:43:55
season 4. Ace rats, yes.
2:43:57
Space rats, yes. I've got space rats written
2:43:59
down. I mean, so this shouldn't work
2:44:03
and everyone is on, I think the commentary for Partner of the
2:44:09
Waves or Bad Wolf Davis explains his theory about time track as
2:44:15
the future. So he's working on some type of
2:44:18
Yeatsian Gaia system where things go down and down and down
2:44:21
and get worse and then they come back up and up and up and up
2:44:23
again. And so his argument is that's
2:44:26
why people wear contemporary clothes.
2:44:28
Your problem is that Linda with a white, it looks the same in
2:44:32
terms of costume as as Billy Piper, as Rose does, and so it
2:44:35
kind of takes you out of that immersive experience.
2:44:38
Everything about Mendelssohn's ideas about immersion or, or
2:44:41
what Tolkien says about secondary creations, anything
2:44:44
that takes you out of it damages how far you believe it.
2:44:48
We believe gridlock because they've avoided that.
2:44:51
They've gone into a kind of fantastical vision of the future
2:44:55
whereby these clothes work in this setting, whereas all the
2:44:58
refugees are wearing stuff they could have gone down and bought
2:45:00
in H and A. And it doesn't quite work, I
2:45:02
don't think. And Yana shouldn't work,
2:45:05
although visually Yana is meant to make us think of the Doctor.
2:45:08
So it's a waistcoat and it's a watch and it's a big boat.
2:45:11
It's a big boat or a big, big fluff.
2:45:12
And I did, you know, there was the idea, wasn't it, that Yana
2:45:15
might be a future version of the Dodge.
2:45:16
And I think it would still have been better if Yana had been
2:45:18
like a, a parallel universe version of the Doctor.
2:45:21
But you've got that model of the Doctor and the companion and
2:45:24
Rose is still haunting Martha at this point.
2:45:26
And of course, you get the repetition of that with, with,
2:45:28
with, with, with Chanto. And so there's a lot here that
2:45:32
probably shouldn't work. I'm trying to think the pictures
2:45:35
on the wall. Of course, that's makes it makes
2:45:37
it think of 911. But of course they do that
2:45:39
Vassar Galactica as well. And my mind is so distorted, I
2:45:42
can't remember if this is before or after the reboot of Vassar
2:45:44
Galactica and how far it's drawing upon these, these wider
2:45:47
collection of texts. You know, you got the idea of
2:45:49
the foundation and that's how you preserve humanity and this
2:45:53
notion of utopia. Now what's interesting with that
2:45:55
is they all go for the understanding of utopia as the
2:45:58
perfect place. But of course, those of us who
2:46:01
you know Thomas Moore's original book from 1517 will tell you
2:46:03
that utopia also means no place. Only you know that, Paul.
2:46:07
Well now everybody listening who hasn't turned off once they
2:46:11
realise that it's the tedious will self doing an impression of
2:46:15
Henry's cat Paul Quinn. Boring.
2:46:19
YouTube. That will Can we take that as a
2:46:21
sound bite to promote this episode?
2:46:23
You can have that absolutely right as.
2:46:25
Part. Of my farewell tour.
2:46:27
So it's the good place and the no place and what what's never
2:46:31
really followed through, I don't think.
2:46:33
And it's haunting this season and I and I see it turned up
2:46:36
again this week. Dave is saying that everything
2:46:39
that happens is the Doctor's fault.
2:46:41
Harold Saxon coming to power is the Doctor's fault because he
2:46:44
forces Harriet Jones from power. And so you don't get that golden
2:46:48
age you described. But then he says it would have
2:46:50
been too referential, so we dropped it.
2:46:52
But absolutely, you need it to be the Doctor's fault because
2:46:54
the Doctor finishes the spaceship here and sends
2:46:58
humanity into this hell zone. Good place.
2:47:02
No, it's a note. There are huge problems here.
2:47:05
But that being said, I love it to pieces.
2:47:08
I absolutely love it to pieces, particularly that final 10
2:47:11
minutes. There's a pace here and an
2:47:13
energy tenant. Terrified, hopeful, terrified.
2:47:16
At the same time, Masters kind of fear out what's in the watch.
2:47:20
And like Jack, it might be a good Time Lord.
2:47:23
And we're thinking, no, of course it's not a good time.
2:47:25
It's the only good time is Romana and she's trapped behind
2:47:28
a mirror with a fucked up dog and some lion people and then
2:47:33
you get the revelation. Now the problem I have as you
2:47:36
know from spoiled on Twitter, I think John SIM is shit as the
2:47:40
master Derek Jackie Hover is fabulous.
2:47:44
He is phenomenal as both Yana, this poor old man who's taken on
2:47:49
this role, he's playing this part.
2:47:50
So again, with this notion of you construct yourself, you
2:47:53
construct a story about yourself.
2:47:55
And beneath it, of course, is this other story that he doesn't
2:47:58
know about. So there's a tragedy about him
2:48:00
when he turns on Chanto, the kind of another unrequited love
2:48:04
with a time traveller and and someone who's just wasting their
2:48:07
life with him. And then he gets shot.
2:48:10
And even though I can't abide John Sims, as I'll say for the
2:48:14
next section, I'll live with it because I think tenant is so
2:48:18
phenomenal there. The kind of desperation there,
2:48:20
the the fact the star rats or space rats, whatever the fuck,
2:48:23
they're meant to be trying to get in there and it's just Jack
2:48:26
holding them back with a door. None of it should work.
2:48:29
All of it worked. I I love it to pieces.
2:48:31
It's absolutely it's probably my second favorite script of the
2:48:34
season. And and yeah, yeah, anyone who
2:48:36
dumps it should just go off and join the future kind.
2:48:39
And each now it's either cannibals.
2:48:42
Brilliant. Let's go to the comments.
2:48:44
Lucy McCall says the Jacobi Master should have had more
2:48:47
screen time as his evil self. A huge opportunity missed.
2:48:51
He's the only person right that, on the strength of two scenes
2:48:54
worth of acting have had eight audio box sets brought out,
2:48:58
isn't. It.
2:48:59
Oh, I'm sure there are others. Have you not listened to the new
2:49:02
Earth box set? Where's the Tish box set?
2:49:05
It's coming. Just just her sleeping.
2:49:06
Around don't even he would him downstairs.
2:49:09
He would buy that All right, Michael.
2:49:10
Storn. Valerie box set and they're
2:49:13
kids. That's what we.
2:49:14
Really want kitten boxer? Yeah.
2:49:19
Michael Storn says an excellent teaser for the finale.
2:49:23
Jacoby is fantastic in look and performance for his dual role.
2:49:27
Jack isn't overly annoying here. Chantho is adorable.
2:49:30
That music and that reveal that cliffhanger?
2:49:34
Keep it. David Gillespie, Pratt says.
2:49:36
I can't think of many episodes that build and build such a
2:49:38
crescendo and do it so well. These are monumental moments for
2:49:42
the Doctor, and the universe won't be the same again.
2:49:45
Razor Gregory, a dog leg to the finale that winds up all of the
2:49:48
key pieces ready to be released, the throwaway story providing
2:49:52
one of Doctor Who's greatest twists.
2:49:54
The only sour no or Fraser is how little we see of Jacoby's
2:49:58
master, as the ending is breathtakingly good.
2:50:02
And Thompson says one of the best 45 minutes of Doctor
2:50:05
Whoever Derek Jacobi is superb. The reveal of the fob.
2:50:09
Watch the Delgado when Amy clips giving classic fans chills.
2:50:13
Champ though the scene with Jack under the rocket the last 10
2:50:15
minutes is just a flood of adrenaline.
2:50:17
Where's John Bensalia? Someone's got a piss over this
2:50:20
party. James Locke.
2:50:22
Clunky, poorly paste, and kind of ugly, but I'll forgive it
2:50:26
because we get 4 minutes of the best actor ever doing the
2:50:29
Master. 4 precious minutes and I think the first time round I
2:50:32
held my breath throughout. Seriously, how lucky were we?
2:50:37
Daniel Nice's 2 words Derek Jacobi He's wonderful and I wish
2:50:40
he'd stayed as the Master instead of John Sims.
2:50:42
Joker wannabe 10 Martha and Jack are a good combination and it's
2:50:46
a shame we didn't get more of them.
2:50:48
Jack Coyer takes the bleak aesthetic of this series to its
2:50:52
extreme. What could be more RTD than a
2:50:54
refugee camp at the end of the universe where a classic villain
2:50:57
lurks in the shadows? The themes of this series come
2:51:00
crashing into devastating effect as a Time Lord emerges from a
2:51:04
FOB watch after failing to change a group's innate nature.
2:51:08
Does he write long sentences or do you assemble long sentences?
2:51:12
He writes very long sentences but he does tend to write some
2:51:15
films properly, about 20 times longer than that.
2:51:18
We love you Jack, but they're very, very long.
2:51:21
Apologies for editing you, otherwise we'd be here for 10
2:51:23
hours. Paul Smythe says marvellous.
2:51:28
Derek Jack be a sublime genuine, jaw-dropping when we realise
2:51:31
Jana has a pocket watch and the subsequent reveal he is the
2:51:34
master is perfection. A gem.
2:51:37
Trash dummy says has no real story but it doesn't matter as
2:51:40
the characters and that reveal are so good even when you know
2:51:44
it's coming. Jacoby is electric.
2:51:46
Oh, this is a tongue to a socially given you this one that
2:51:49
Joe Dan Hollingsworth says love to Utopia and the Derek Jacobi
2:51:52
Yana drama Chan Poor Chan pho. Oh Chan or Chan pho pho.
2:52:02
Bloody hell, I wish we'd been able to keep him as the master
2:52:05
for a bit longer. The SIM version was not my
2:52:08
taste. Too much big acting.
2:52:10
I would have murdered that more than you did, you know?
2:52:13
Gareth Bowley. Best episode.
2:52:15
The joy of the Doctor being involved in helping humankind,
2:52:18
Martha's reaction to figuring out the watch, all culminating
2:52:21
in the reveal that has never been bettered.
2:52:24
Thrilling. Dylan, is this a boring light
2:52:28
blink? Or thrilling.
2:52:31
Well, I mean, I can only echo what everybody said about that
2:52:35
last 15 minutes. I mean, it is some of the best
2:52:38
Doctor Who in terms of the pace of it, the tone of it, the
2:52:43
music, the action, the direction, the the reveal of the
2:52:47
FOB watch and then that final cliffhanger.
2:52:50
But the first half an hour is absolute dog shit.
2:52:53
I know. We was going to see a big hairy
2:52:55
butt, then I. I cannot abide that anybody
2:53:00
signed off the future kind as a credible threat.
2:53:03
Like they look dreadful. They look like they're just from
2:53:06
Camden. That guy speaking, he says, ah,
2:53:08
hungry. It's like we are in like the
2:53:11
worst corners of Blake's Evan in classic Doctor Who.
2:53:14
He got 8 signings out of this episode, you know.
2:53:16
I'm sure we did. I'm sure we did, but and it was
2:53:18
his big teeth that probably stopped him from being able to
2:53:20
do a decent performance. Well, that reading of Hungry
2:53:23
Dylan was probably the campus that heard it delivered.
2:53:25
I can't say so. Well done for that.
2:53:27
Dylan, do you know who was going to play?
2:53:28
You know the the woman who secretly it was going to be Lisa
2:53:32
Balvin. And she said she took one look
2:53:34
at the script and she said all that work I've done, no thank
2:53:37
you and turned it down. What wise you know, it Don't
2:53:42
soil her legacy. It's all just so contrived.
2:53:48
I mean from the exposition from Jack just running out of
2:53:51
nowhere. Oh, we've got to stop off in
2:53:52
Cardiff. You know it's Doctor Who doesn't
2:53:54
do that anymore to Charger. Jack jumping on the TARDIS, Jack
2:53:58
having the hand Jana. Why is his name Jana?
2:54:02
And also you are not alone. Why is that?
2:54:05
How does that how does the twist?
2:54:10
Oh, tech is all I've got to say to you.
2:54:12
Yeah, no, I mean, it is up there with old Susan from the
2:54:14
technology department. It's just so clunky, So, so
2:54:21
clunky. But I have to put it through
2:54:25
because of the last 15 minutes. Like I can't hate on it because
2:54:29
I it's whereas blinks lost all appeal to me.
2:54:33
I'm still punching the air every time I watch the last 15 minutes
2:54:36
of this, but I I could, I could just watch the last 15 minutes.
2:54:41
So I'm putting it through with reservations.
2:54:45
Well, I'll go next on this one and I am going to have the balls
2:54:48
not to put this one through for pretty much the same reasons.
2:54:52
Because look, judge this story as a story in its own right.
2:54:56
Yes, the last 10 minutes is incredible.
2:55:00
It is me. I'm not going to dispute that at
2:55:02
all. But Dylan, I just for once, I
2:55:04
completely agree with you. The slog to get there, when you
2:55:07
watch this as just a story in its own right, the slog to get
2:55:11
there is just too hard. And I think there's too many
2:55:14
errors in doing that. My first one is talking about
2:55:17
the Fob watch and the chameleon arch.
2:55:18
So in in human nature, we use those things to tell a story of
2:55:22
what happens to the Doctor when he turns human.
2:55:24
So therefore it's a device to get us to the story.
2:55:28
And that story in turn explores all different aspects of the
2:55:31
Doctor's personality and motives and morals.
2:55:33
But here the Fob watch is the story.
2:55:36
It's just that hide the Master. It doesn't springboard into any
2:55:39
kind of wider storytelling, so we don't learn anything else
2:55:43
about from about the master apart from the fact there's he's
2:55:47
in hiding. So yes, it's a great trick and
2:55:49
it works really well. On an initial watch I was
2:55:52
jumping off the sofa, but today it just doesn't work for me
2:55:57
because all the attentions on the desec machina and that's
2:56:01
kind of it, not what the desec machina is enabling.
2:56:04
So it's so clever. Though don't you think the
2:56:07
second you see the FOB watch you know everything?
2:56:11
You need. To because of 10 minutes, I've
2:56:13
sat through 35 minutes of dross to get there.
2:56:15
And we'll get there because the setting is the most generic
2:56:18
Doctor Who setting. And they did ride down with a
2:56:20
hint of space rats, because absolutely it's space rats.
2:56:24
We're just humans hiding in a quarry, running around a quarry.
2:56:27
I mean, again, we talked earlier about generic Doctor Who.
2:56:29
This is probably the worst. We learn nothing about the
2:56:31
future kind, that one that's hiding in the refugee camp.
2:56:35
I didn't know that was supposed to be Lisa Bowerman, but why is
2:56:37
she there? Why is she never spotted?
2:56:39
It's just for RTD. This all feels just too surface
2:56:43
and too light, and visually they're not interesting.
2:56:45
There's nothing unique about them.
2:56:47
And you know, the only refugee we meet above from Yana and
2:56:51
Chantho is that bloody awful child who's the Blue Peter
2:56:54
competition winner outside to save his life, who's a very
2:56:58
successful accident that. Is true.
2:57:00
Wow. So him.
2:57:02
He started with Blue Peter. He's not.
2:57:04
He's not. Diamond.
2:57:06
He's not great here though, is he?
2:57:07
Let's let's be fair, I'm not sure whether that's Scottish
2:57:09
accent. Joe.
2:57:10
Scottish accent. Don't know anymore.
2:57:12
You're just murdered, whatever it was like.
2:57:14
But then my third reason, this is what really kills the episode
2:57:17
for me is Jack. For me, Jack completely
2:57:22
unbalances this episode because his inclusion means we don't get
2:57:26
time to develop the rest of the story if we needed Jack in the
2:57:29
finale. And that's kind of debatable
2:57:31
right at the beginning. We go back to present day Earth,
2:57:34
which is where he starts in this episode.
2:57:36
So why is he in this episode? He brings nothing to the story
2:57:40
apart from the fact that, you know, you can't say, oh, he's
2:57:42
there to die to make because they can always find another way
2:57:45
around that. OK, brings his vortex
2:57:46
manipulated so they can get back to Earth again.
2:57:49
The Doctor could have come up another device to do it.
2:57:52
I just don't get why Jackie's out.
2:57:54
I don't know what he brings to her.
2:57:56
Rid of Jack, bring him in the final.
2:57:58
I think he's here. Because they got to deal with
2:58:00
the how he was left, in part in other ways.
2:58:02
And they can't do that at the beginning of Sound of Drums
2:58:05
because there's too much going on.
2:58:06
So you need this time for them to get reacquainted and to ask
2:58:11
all questions as to why the doctor never went back for him.
2:58:14
I I want to spend time. We're on this generic planet.
2:58:17
Don't make it so generic. Build up more time with Jana.
2:58:21
Get to know more about his, his, his human side, you know, spend
2:58:25
more time with Chanther. We know she's sweet.
2:58:27
She. We know she's got a crush, but
2:58:29
imagine how much more devastating it would have been
2:58:31
if we'd spent longer with her and really built her up as a
2:58:34
character then for the master to kill her.
2:58:36
I think there's so many missed opportunities here because we
2:58:38
have to shoehorn bloody Jack into this that we lose the
2:58:42
potential that we could have had.
2:58:44
So yeah, I think the the ending is absolutely amazing.
2:58:47
It's breathtaking. But I think to get there as a
2:58:51
story in its own right, there are just too many flaws, so I
2:58:54
can't put it through. I love it.
2:58:57
Silence. I absolutely love this episode
2:59:01
for pretty much all the reasons that Paul said.
2:59:03
I love the fact that this feels like a shonky old classic.
2:59:06
Who Good. Let's have a bit more of that
2:59:08
running around in quarries and primitives, you know, people
2:59:11
just going around with guns for the sake of it.
2:59:13
I love all of that in the first time.
2:59:15
You're right, it's very generic Doctor Who, but it's done with
2:59:19
sort of pace and energy, you know, and excitement.
2:59:23
I love Jack coming into this. I think his chemistry with
2:59:26
Freeman regimen and with David Tennant is great.
2:59:29
There are brilliant threesome and they go on to be in the next
2:59:32
episode as well. But they've seen you highlighted
2:59:34
Paul where they're talking through the door.
2:59:36
That sort of Tennant's amazing in that scene, like really
2:59:41
restrained, a bit flirty, a very dark and and John Barrowman, who
2:59:46
I would not praise for acting very often.
2:59:49
He's beat the beat there with him and I love his flirty banter
2:59:53
with Chanto and I love his flirty banter with Martha.
2:59:55
So I just think they make a brilliant team.
2:59:57
But yeah, mostly for the last by.
2:59:59
The way, by the way, Joe, can you?
3:00:02
You all right? I was just going to say, can you
3:00:04
please not mention John Barrowman and Beating in the
3:00:06
same sentence? I'm so sorry.
3:00:08
The last 10 minutes, as you have all said, is some of the most
3:00:11
glorious Dr. Whoever I would we find a Doctor Who found that
3:00:15
doesn't like the climax of this. And I, I think it's not just the
3:00:20
reveal, it's then how it UPS the stakes and I think the line.
3:00:25
Oh. Now I can say I was provoked.
3:00:29
It's one of the scariest lines ever in Doctor Who.
3:00:33
This, for me, this is as good as gridlock is as good as human
3:00:36
nature. It's again another absolute
3:00:39
banger in Series 3. I love it and I'm so pleased.
3:00:42
Thanks to Paul and I. It's going.
3:00:44
It's not going through, is it? Going through it is.
3:00:46
Going. Through, I was telling you, put
3:00:47
it through, didn't you? Put it through reservations.
3:00:50
So yeah. You can change your mind, but
3:00:52
quick, let's move. On well, in which case, so we're
3:00:57
on the we're on the last story sound of drums last the time was
3:01:01
Dylan. Take it away.
3:01:03
I love this finale. I think it's absolutely
3:01:06
brilliant. I love the characterization as
3:01:10
the master Delgado never really worked for me.
3:01:12
I don't I don't see a point as why those two are at conflicts.
3:01:16
I get if I'm trying to believe the masters arc, then at some
3:01:20
point he goes insane around deadly and assassin and then it
3:01:23
becomes the master we know today.
3:01:25
I think the way he bounces up like he is, you know, the
3:01:28
perfect match for the the hyper David Tennant.
3:01:31
But even more so. I love that he's a naughty
3:01:34
schoolboy in places like the way he kills his colleagues the the
3:01:38
way by gassing them how Rudy is to the American president and
3:01:43
then ultimately just playing that here come the drums song
3:01:47
after talking about the drums for so long.
3:01:49
So the first thing is John Sims master.
3:01:52
I think he's brilliant. Give me a manic master all day.
3:01:55
I'm not interested in cool swab and sophisticated.
3:01:58
I also, I like the tone of this. This is an urban thriller.
3:02:03
I remember Russell T Davis saying in this production notes
3:02:05
of the time, we've never done anything like this.
3:02:07
It's completely different. The Doctor, Martha Jack on the
3:02:11
run, just in urban environments, I think gives a real different
3:02:15
tone. It's men in black suits.
3:02:17
It's, you know, speeding cars, but down normal streets.
3:02:20
It's not 24 or whatever. I love that.
3:02:23
And I love my third thing is I love how this series has played
3:02:28
on the themes of faith. And ultimately it's Martha's
3:02:31
faith in the Doctor and spreading a faith and a belief
3:02:35
that this situation can all go away and making people believe
3:02:38
in the Doctor that solves the situation.
3:02:41
So I have no qualms in putting this through.
3:02:44
I think it's a brilliant finale and I think it's it's perfectly
3:02:48
LED up to, throughout the season.
3:02:51
Fabulous. Let's go to the comments.
3:02:52
Jason Thompson says I'll defend the resurrection of the Doctor
3:02:55
using the Archangel Network as it's a decent Chekhov's gun and
3:02:58
it's turning the Master's own weapon against him.
3:03:01
But the Dobby Dr. isn't great, and the fact that the opening of
3:03:04
the last episode makes it really obvious there'll be a huge reset
3:03:07
at the end made me lose my enthusiasm before the opening
3:03:10
titles, sadly. Bennett.
3:03:13
Daniel Rawnsley says probably RTDS best Part 1 finale as
3:03:17
everything goes to hell and Martha's got no fucks left to
3:03:20
give. But come Part 2 some of the
3:03:22
budget seems begin to show even as Doctor Who goes full comic
3:03:25
book. Still rather underrated with
3:03:28
that build up to 15 satellites, Martha's departure and Sims
3:03:32
Master dying out of spite. Gregory says this is all about
3:03:37
Tennant and SIM, the two top talents of the time, slugging it
3:03:39
out. Then step forward Martha Jones,
3:03:42
who not once but twice shows why she's the best of the new series
3:03:45
companions as she walks the earth to save the Doctor, then
3:03:49
dumps his sorry arse because she deserves.
3:03:51
Better yes. Great scene.
3:03:53
Michael Storm. Oh I could have predicted.
3:03:56
Ends in utter cringe with the Doctor Jesus allegory so on the
3:04:00
nose it would make Zack Snyder cringe.
3:04:04
The Dobby Dr. is an abomination my God like nightmare and Silva.
3:04:09
Remember SIM is OTT in all the wrong ways.
3:04:12
Some good ideas but RTD defecates all over him.
3:04:17
Violent language in this stuff it in the crusher, he says at
3:04:21
the end. Well we go from Michael Storm to
3:04:24
Chum Bensalia Mr. Happy and he says golden rule don't back
3:04:29
yourself into a corner so you've got no alternative but repress
3:04:33
the reset button. Some welcome dark moments for
3:04:36
Tocclifan agent tenant are offset by the cack of Doctor
3:04:40
Jesus, Doctor Dobby and a lazy cop out resolution.
3:04:44
Jack Koya says throughout this series, the Doctor has been a
3:04:47
story, a warning, a cautionary tale.
3:04:51
Here he becomes a symbol of hope, a crumb of comfort and
3:04:54
Public Enemy number one. But this is probably my least
3:04:57
favorite RTD One finale, mainly due to Jesus, Doctor, and the
3:05:01
fact that we've split this TARDIS team up a bit too much.
3:05:04
Rush Dummy says Drums is tense, camp and thrilling, and the
3:05:07
cliffhanger is brilliant. But Doctor Dobie is a complete
3:05:10
miss, although Martha's journey resonates.
3:05:13
Melvin Pena. The master scheme is silly, it
3:05:16
always is, but the point of the top defame Saxon arc is to give
3:05:19
Martha a chance to shine like no companion has before her.
3:05:23
She does the work thanklessly and on foot.
3:05:26
Big, big love for Martha and Frema.
3:05:29
Wow. Yep, James Larks is the point at
3:05:32
which we really see the emergence of the RTD trend of
3:05:35
all build up and no knickers. The scene setting is great, but
3:05:39
the episode and 1/2 that follows are hugely undisciplined and SIM
3:05:42
delivers a performance that has me longing for the subtlety and
3:05:45
nuance of Anthony Ainley's Turner's Car lead in Time
3:05:49
Flight. Shalom, Shalom, Tom.
3:05:53
Newsome says I missed the subtle hints about Martha Fancy the
3:05:57
Doctor when I first saw this run.
3:05:59
Really. Maybe that says something about
3:06:02
14 year old me. He actually used the word subtle
3:06:05
hints. I'm not sure.
3:06:07
I'm not sure they're either subtle or hints, but.
3:06:10
You look out the camera in human nature and say why?
3:06:13
Couldn't it be me? Yeah.
3:06:16
And finally, John Arnold says an underrated homage to the power
3:06:19
of stories, with Martha ending up empowering the Doctor.
3:06:22
Love the Masters. Need for a pop soundtrack.
3:06:26
So Paul, yeah or nay? You lost the Time Lords.
3:06:29
John SIM gives one of the worst performances in Doctor Who
3:06:33
history. Is that the end?
3:06:37
No, it's not the end. That's why you never.
3:06:40
That's why I don't get invited places.
3:06:43
It, it's terrible. And it's partly to do with how
3:06:47
he's performed it. It's partly how it's directed.
3:06:49
The direction is weird. There's a weird stray shot of
3:06:52
Lucy Saxon's chin at the clients of Sound of Drums the The Urban
3:06:57
Thriller. I I don't I'm afraid I have to
3:06:59
disagree. I I think new who can't do
3:07:01
contemporary thrillers. The last time Doctor Who, really
3:07:04
a decent contemporary thriller, was probably Part 1 of Time
3:07:07
Flight before they land in the in in in.
3:07:11
Or you were going to say Part 1 of Attack of the Cybermen?
3:07:13
No, that's shit as well, because the musical hues are telling you
3:07:16
something different. The musical hues are telling you
3:07:18
step time and it's against a Houston film.
3:07:20
It doesn't doesn't work at all. This is this and and and and
3:07:26
Sims was meant to be the doctor, wasn't he?
3:07:27
There was about a three day campaign to get him to be the
3:07:30
doctor on the back of life on Mars.
3:07:33
And anyone who knew John Sims career up to that point knew he
3:07:35
might he might have done it. He probably wouldn't.
3:07:37
He's a bit chippy a bit like that point.
3:07:38
He's a bit chippy, a bit like Cumberbatch.
3:07:40
You didn't want to be on the front of lunch boxes and then he
3:07:43
didn't mind taking the money to to yellow up or be in a yellowed
3:07:46
up cast for Doctor Strange. Sims SIM would have gone after
3:07:49
two seasons because that's what he does if you look at his
3:07:52
career up to that point. So of course, bringing him in
3:07:54
was the most obvious thing. And Joe, you said it earlier on,
3:07:56
why is he so twitchy? Because he's meant to be a
3:07:58
parallel or a parody of the Doctor.
3:08:01
So you get this clearly. And and of course Lucy Saxon
3:08:03
then is his companion, so Vivian Rook.
3:08:07
So of course, obviously reference to Jean Rook, the 70s
3:08:11
journalist who'd done the big interview with Robert Holmes.
3:08:13
That scene with her and Lucy Saxon is really, really well
3:08:17
done. And when he's there behind them,
3:08:20
there's genuine menace and the tocclifane turn up and then you
3:08:22
get her screams and then they fuck it because you have the
3:08:26
lazy joke of him open the door, still screaming, open the door,
3:08:30
still bite his knuckles and I think is leading slowly to her
3:08:34
going, oh, but Harry, you said Archangel was 100% and you go
3:08:37
99% and it said tenantism when he moves his head.
3:08:41
And these two are meant to be read as parallels, but they're
3:08:44
essentially they're parodies rather than parallel.
3:08:47
So we can't take it seriously. And what they do to try and
3:08:50
suggest how dangerous this figure is, is they make him a
3:08:53
domestic abuser in Sound of Drums.
3:08:56
And it's like a cup of cold sick.
3:08:59
And I think we're meant to view it.
3:09:00
Someone said the Joker. The gassing is clearly the
3:09:03
Joker. But I think we're meant to think
3:09:04
about the abuse that Jerry Hall suffers in the first Tim Burton
3:09:08
Batman film when Jack Nicholson turns up as the Joker and he
3:09:12
burns her face of acid. We don't need it.
3:09:14
Davis would do the same thing again in 73 yards that the
3:09:18
campaign work will be handed over to Mad Jack as kind of
3:09:20
somebody to be sexually abused. And because the character of Mad
3:09:23
Jack is played by the great sexual abuse, the rapist from
3:09:25
Game of Thrones, that adds to that frisson there.
3:09:28
We don't need it. We know how bad the master is
3:09:31
because the first thing he does with the top level is he wipes
3:09:33
out 6 million people and he's killed Chanto.
3:09:36
Joe is quite right. We have to read this against the
3:09:39
backdrop of what Yana or what the the the Jacobi's master has
3:09:43
done. He he, his suit doesn't fit.
3:09:47
I made this point online and it's and it's a nothing point,
3:09:50
but it's a big point because he looks like a child playing his
3:09:53
dad. Costume department is really
3:09:55
bollocksed up here because he's meant to be this slick kind of
3:09:58
Tony Blair esque politician because it's kind of Dave is
3:10:01
still giving a kick into New Labour.
3:10:03
He's killed Tony Blair in Aliens of London.
3:10:06
Here we get like the end run but it doesn't quite work because
3:10:09
he's meant to have hypnotized everyone.
3:10:11
No one takes any notice. The first thing he's got cunts.
3:10:14
In his promotional video he's got Sharon Osbourne doing an
3:10:17
orgasm joke and fucking Widdecombe who the beat trying
3:10:21
to make an evil but she's a cunt and she always was, and McFly.
3:10:27
And then we get to when he does the broadcast to announce the
3:10:30
aliens have arrived and he he he acts it as though it's someone
3:10:34
who can't act trying to speak posh.
3:10:37
What we should have got was because because Tennant is
3:10:40
watching it, Martha is watching, Jack's watching and they still
3:10:42
being essentially hypnotized. We should have seen it as the
3:10:45
most slick PR performance ever. And instead he's this weird
3:10:49
performance. SIM has gone with the same way
3:10:51
when he meets the American president at the end, he does
3:10:53
the hand crossing the leg out like like a petulant child or
3:10:56
like a particular senior manager I know who deals with children,
3:11:00
who's an absolute twat and does that when she's faced with any
3:11:03
kind of push back. So the performance is just
3:11:08
imbalances, this whole thing. I like the fact that he won't
3:11:11
regenerate because it makes me think of Zizek and this notion
3:11:13
of the strike against the self. But really then all I think
3:11:16
about is his phone sex scene with David Tennant.
3:11:20
Is it? Glorious.
3:11:21
No, it's. Dramatically flat.
3:11:23
The most interesting? Is he?
3:11:25
Comes when he makes the doctor say master.
3:11:28
There's a weird kinky thing going on here and Lucy Saxon is
3:11:32
clearly getting off on death on what's going on This.
3:11:34
There's a weird thing going on here about sex and about
3:11:38
perversion and about getting off on violence and, and it just
3:11:42
it's just, it's just weird. I've written weird, weird, weird
3:11:45
time after time. I I I I never liked it.
3:11:48
I've got even worse now. But Freeman Agerman is
3:11:53
magnificent in it. But we never really resolve the
3:11:57
fact that tenant, the 10th doctor has done this.
3:11:59
When they open the top profane. There's a sense which that's the
3:12:02
revelation of RTD and the reel. I think Rod picked up on it.
3:12:06
We used to think here is Moffat. He's creepy, but Moffat won't
3:12:09
kill people. He may even keep his companions
3:12:11
dead. Davis will kill everyone if he
3:12:14
can get away with it. There's a dark heart to Davis.
3:12:16
And so in this season, there's either nothing there or you
3:12:19
crack open the top and what you find is the splayed face of a
3:12:22
child. Diamonds.
3:12:25
I love that bit. It's full and we don't pick on
3:12:29
it because Davis has got quite sloppy at this point.
3:12:32
But what we do get is Martha in the end, the whole season
3:12:36
through having saved, she goes out to evangelizing, doesn't
3:12:39
she? This is this is an act of
3:12:41
religious evangelization. We've gone from like the old
3:12:44
Rugged Cross, which was an evangelical standby in 1912, to
3:12:47
Martha walking the earth like a Pilgrim, telling everyone how
3:12:50
great the Doctor is. But what we get visually then is
3:12:53
it's tinker tenant. He's wished back to life or
3:12:55
David Bell, whatever you want. And he comes back and he scares
3:12:58
the shit out of the Master, but the Master won't regenerate.
3:13:01
And then Martha just goes, we're done.
3:13:03
I'm walking away and it's glorious, but it's not enough to
3:13:06
save it into to the bin. Go you.
3:13:10
Want to go next? I think John Sims is incredible
3:13:14
in this two parter, and it's mostly because I think he is
3:13:18
pulling in about 40 directions. He's genuinely unsettlingly
3:13:22
unpredictable and I do not know what he's going to do from 1
3:13:26
scene to the next. And I don't like that.
3:13:28
I like nice, predictable characters and knowing how
3:13:31
they're going to behave. So he's murdering one minute.
3:13:33
He's clearly beating, you know, he's comedy mask, he's doing all
3:13:38
of it. He's flirting with the doctor.
3:13:40
But one thing I I just thought he was a magnetic and I could
3:13:42
not keep my eyes off him. And I think that mirroring of
3:13:46
Sims to Tenant was just beautifully done.
3:13:50
Yeah, brilliant. The sound of drums is my most re
3:13:53
watched the week it came out episode ever.
3:13:57
I think I watched it about 15 times the week it came out and I
3:14:00
was desperate to see the second part, of which I was utterly
3:14:04
disappointed when I saw it. I saw Last of the Times and as
3:14:08
soon as I saw One Year Later flashed up, I was like, no, it
3:14:12
wasn't such a dramatic eye, why are we ducking the fucking drama
3:14:16
and going into the future? But upon rewatch many times, I
3:14:20
actually think last of the Time it was has a lot of mirror to
3:14:23
it. I really love the Professor
3:14:25
Docherty character, the thread through that.
3:14:27
I love Martha giving her the flowers at the end of it.
3:14:30
I love the bit where they capture the top Levane.
3:14:32
And you're right, Paul, it totally shows you the difference
3:14:35
between Moffett and RTD, because Moffett puts irritating scrotes
3:14:39
like Angie and RT on the screen and RTD murders them horribly or
3:14:44
cuts the Reds off and shoves them in murderous little balls.
3:14:47
And I know which approach I prefer.
3:14:50
I have to put this through because I just love the sound of
3:14:52
drums so much. I think it is the perfect
3:14:55
example of Rusty Davis's penultimate episode of Building
3:14:59
Up the Threat. And just everything about it.
3:15:03
The flashback to Gallifrey got me excited.
3:15:05
The going on the run in warehouses, the, you know, drive
3:15:08
master machine guns going off. I loved all of that.
3:15:14
The Gene Rook scene like you said, that was amazing.
3:15:17
I actually quite like the joke, I'll tell you for why.
3:15:19
It's because she takes it to phantom conventions and stands
3:15:23
on the stage and screams for the entire length that she does in
3:15:27
the episode whilst doing a song and dance routine.
3:15:30
And she's totally made a career out of that scream, God bless
3:15:34
her. But I actually think that the
3:15:36
last sort of five to 10 minutes of the Sound of Drums matches
3:15:40
Utopia beat for beat for that, giving you that apocalyptic,
3:15:45
furious ending. As soon as the music hits and
3:15:48
the the, the heavens are torn open and the top of rain down
3:15:53
and 10% of the population are being murdered.
3:15:56
And you're watching them going into people's homes and diners
3:15:59
and things like that. That weird dance that Lucy Saxon
3:16:02
does in that moment is it's so disturbing.
3:16:05
Yeah, there's two. There are things I don't like.
3:16:07
I don't like the Dobby Dr. I really don't like it when he
3:16:09
comes. You know, the Jesus bit at the
3:16:11
end. I really hate that.
3:16:13
But there's just too much that's amazing in this.
3:16:15
So I would put it through. It's all down to you, Rod.
3:16:19
Well, OK, well, let's just go for it.
3:16:21
I love this. I think it's a great finale.
3:16:23
I think it's just so much. It's some of the drums.
3:16:26
You've already said it's part urban thriller, part political
3:16:30
satire. I think actually watching this
3:16:31
now kind of almost reads better in 2024 than 2007.
3:16:36
So we know that Saxon is apolitical.
3:16:38
He's got no policies, he's got no agenda, but he's somehow
3:16:41
bewitched the British public into getting him into
3:16:43
Parliament. And he shifts between being
3:16:46
psychotic, dangerous and the bumbling fool.
3:16:49
Nigel Farage, anybody? As the new master?
3:16:53
Doesn't sound believable to me. No.
3:16:55
Well, you wouldn't have thought so, would you?
3:16:57
Then you do get that big shift, Joe.
3:16:59
I like that big shift with Part 2.
3:17:00
It kind of pre Moffit Moffit by having a a shift at the
3:17:03
beginning of the epic second episode.
3:17:05
I like the fact that we don't pick up straight away.
3:17:07
We're doing something different because again, you're doing
3:17:09
something different than you did at the end of series 1 and the
3:17:12
end of series 2, which I really appreciate.
3:17:14
He's not kind of just repeating the big action thriller again.
3:17:17
And the second part, I really like it because we start to see
3:17:20
the real darkness of the hearts of this two parter.
3:17:22
So you know, we see how the Earth's been subjugated.
3:17:25
We learn about the tocclophane, which we've talked talked about,
3:17:28
and at the beginning of Utopia, Tenant paraphrases Tom Baker in
3:17:33
Arc in Space by talking about mankind is indomitable, but this
3:17:37
presents us with a much grimmer suggestion of mankind, fate.
3:17:42
We're taking shelter in little baubles, basically becoming
3:17:45
prototype dialects, but there's got to be some contrast to the
3:17:49
dark. And we've got that.
3:17:50
That's Martha travelling the world, not assembling a weapon,
3:17:53
which I think is a great sleight of hand, both for the Master but
3:17:57
also for the audience, because you kind of buy into the fact
3:17:59
that she's assembling this gun. It sounds a bit nonsense, but we
3:18:03
go with it. But I love the fact that that's
3:18:05
a sleight of hand and Martha's actions result in in the
3:18:08
Doctor's resurrection. And everyone talks about that as
3:18:11
being a, a Jesus parallel. But I think it's more than that.
3:18:14
It's more about it's more about faith with a lower case F and
3:18:18
belief in the Doctor that pulls humanities through.
3:18:20
A bit cheesy though, isn't it? It is.
3:18:24
Well, I've got a different reading on it and I don't think
3:18:27
it will be lost on many of us. You know, a lot of us have gone
3:18:30
through shit in our lives and for some of us it's our love of
3:18:33
Doctor Who that's got us through that.
3:18:35
Certainly true for me. And so actually seeing a load of
3:18:38
people having faith and belief in the Doctor to get them out of
3:18:42
it. I don't necessarily, I don't
3:18:43
obviously I can see the, you know, the religious allegory,
3:18:47
but I just take it as as faith in that individual.
3:18:50
So, you know, it's not lost on me.
3:18:52
It's cheesy, but it really works for me and I like it.
3:18:55
And whilst we're talking about kind of parallels with with
3:18:57
Earth, the kind of scenes of, of crowds chanting the doctor's
3:19:01
name and talking about love and, and, and faith and belief in
3:19:04
mankind again, you know, back in 2024, we've, we've just gone
3:19:08
through a period where we've had some anti racist protests
3:19:12
against some of the most ugly and hideous riots that we've
3:19:14
ever seen in Britain. So actually watching this again
3:19:17
now just after that, so watching normal people kind of chanting
3:19:20
in the name of love and faith has parallels with what we've
3:19:23
just seen. So, you know, I think it has got
3:19:25
parallels with with what's going on today and good for RTD to do,
3:19:30
you know, to foreshadow that. My second reason is Martha,
3:19:34
Love, Martha to bed. Love.
3:19:36
Fremo is sad to see you say goodbye here.
3:19:40
I don't think there are many companions that I would believe
3:19:42
have walked the earth and told this story, but I absolutely
3:19:45
believe the Martha's done that. And I think it's it's told
3:19:49
really economically because we spend a lot of time with
3:19:51
Professor Doherty, like you say, Joe.
3:19:53
But again, it's that sleight of hand when she just assembles all
3:19:56
those people on the stands and tells them about the doctor and
3:19:59
you believe that's what she's been doing for the year.
3:20:01
So that really works for me. And then finally I've got to
3:20:05
mention there are so many little jokes in here that makes that
3:20:08
tickles my fan balls. So sound of drums, the four
3:20:11
beats, it's the Doctor theme. You got the Master watching the
3:20:14
Teletubbies, like he what? Like Delgado watch the Clangers.
3:20:19
You've got the Master on TV saying Britain, Britain,
3:20:21
Britain, which is obviously copying Tom Baker from Little
3:20:24
Britain. You've got Martha saying she
3:20:26
wasn't sure whether the Master was going to turn out to be the
3:20:28
Doctor's brother because that's what JNT wanted to do in Planets
3:20:31
of Fire. You got the Master's coat with
3:20:33
the Redliner. He looks like we in silhouettes.
3:20:36
And of course, who doesn't love peoples of the earth?
3:20:40
Please attend. Carefully.
3:20:42
I mean, there's so many jokes in here, it doesn't ruin it if you
3:20:46
don't get them, but it gives you a big smile if you do.
3:20:49
So I think this is a really bold, audacious 2 parter.
3:20:53
I won't have a word said against the Dobby Dr. I am putting it
3:20:56
through. One last thing, and I know
3:20:58
someone already brought it up, but just to stress it, how
3:21:02
triumphant that companion X it is just her making that
3:21:07
confident choice to say, you know what, you're not good for
3:21:10
me. I'm going to go and I'm going to
3:21:12
engage, you know, with my family and my life and and and have a
3:21:15
better life. But the fact that she sort of
3:21:17
says it awkwardly, like we probably all would leave and
3:21:20
then goes, oh, fuck this. I didn't say my piece and then
3:21:24
walks in and says it again. It is just like compare it to
3:21:28
all every single one of the companion X's that come before
3:21:31
and after in new Who. They all pale in comparison, I
3:21:34
think, to this. Yeah, and of course, of course,
3:21:39
everybody's faith in David Tennant coming to save them is
3:21:42
exactly what Doctor Who fans have now.
3:21:44
Every few years we need to have our faith in David Tennant, and
3:21:47
he'll come back and save the show once again.
3:21:49
He'll be back again, right? We're down to round two.
3:21:54
We have only one story out of 10.
3:21:57
We've lost the Shakespeare code. We've got nine stories to go
3:22:03
through. So let's spin the wheel.
3:22:07
Play the camp music, Joe. And we have got, oh, everybody's
3:22:11
favorite 42 and 42 is playing. Oh, it's come up 42 again, so
3:22:18
let's spin the wheel. It's going to.
3:22:22
Case. Gridlock.
3:22:25
See you later, Chip. No.
3:22:28
Do we need should we go around? I'm going to go with gridlock.
3:22:31
Me too, Dylan. I unfortunately I'm going to go
3:22:38
with Gridlock too, as much as I love Chris Chip.
3:22:41
Oh, gridlock. So 4042 is the second to four.
3:22:48
I believe a word of what you're saying.
3:22:50
It's true, the spin never lies. So we got gridlock plays
3:23:03
gridlock again, Smith and Jones, so gridlock, Smith and Jones
3:23:08
gridlock, Dylan gridlock, home gridlock and gridlock for me
3:23:14
today. So Smith and Jones.
3:23:17
Nice episode, but it's out. So we have human nature plays
3:23:29
Last of the Time Lords. It's the two human nature.
3:23:37
Human nature for me. Oh.
3:23:39
Christ, I can't stand either of them.
3:23:42
Let's. Let's think, let's think.
3:23:45
Let's think. Let's.
3:23:51
That face. While he stabbed.
3:23:55
Or shot What? What he didn't say.
3:24:01
My head says human nature. Yeah, last some time.
3:24:10
I think human nature is practically flawless, and I
3:24:13
think the last two parts are as good as parts.
3:24:15
Beers is flaws so human nature. I love the last two parts, I was
3:24:19
hoping it would go further but up against human nature
3:24:22
unfortunately Sound of Drums and Lust of the Time Lords needs to
3:24:27
go. Hey.
3:24:30
Though we have the wheel is starting to get a little bit
3:24:35
lighter. Spin the wheel and we have
3:24:39
Blink. Blink is going to play off
3:24:43
against Alex in Manhattan. That's easy.
3:24:51
For me, it's got to be Blink Dylan Daleks in Manhattan.
3:24:58
Paul. Daleks in Manhattan.
3:25:04
And. I just want to say it, Daleks.
3:25:06
In the. Actual this is for you 42.
3:25:14
It's more fun, right? It's more fun than Blink.
3:25:17
What? 2008.
3:25:21
You. Story that could.
3:25:23
You mad mad, mad people I've. Been through the best story in
3:25:28
season 14? Yes.
3:25:33
Yes, we did. So we've got gridlock against
3:25:37
Utopia. Have we done that one?
3:25:40
Oh shit, that is tough. Gridlock for me.
3:25:46
Gridlock for me as well. Oh, Paul, Gridlock and gridlock.
3:25:57
Though by by Utopia, right? We are finally into the last
3:26:01
four. So we've got Gridlock, Daleks in
3:26:04
Manhattan, Lazarus and human nature.
3:26:09
Come. On.
3:26:11
You've never seen the obvious outcome in this bloody.
3:26:13
Lazarus for the win. So you've got Daleks in
3:26:17
Manhattan playing the Lazarus Experiment.
3:26:23
Daleks Fruit. Fruit.
3:26:26
Dylan Daleks. Oh.
3:26:29
This is the way the world ends. Lazarus Experiment all the way.
3:26:33
Daleks for me too. If the Daleks in my hand was in
3:26:38
the last two, I'll just be so happy.
3:26:41
So Lazarus, sorry Dave, Rene, but Lazarus has got, you know,
3:26:45
so it got to 4th place. So we're left with the final
3:26:48
three gridlocks. Daleks.
3:26:49
What the fuck? Human nature?
3:26:51
So we have Gridlock, and Gridlock is going to be facing
3:26:57
off against the wheel. Says going to be facing off
3:27:00
against gridlock. It's really not.
3:27:02
It's facing off against human nature.
3:27:05
Again, gridlock. It's juggling.
3:27:13
It's juggling more balls, gridlock and it doesn't work
3:27:15
brilliantly. Human nature for me.
3:27:19
Oh. Gridlock.
3:27:23
I'm going to break the. I'm going for gridlock.
3:27:29
Yes. So human nature is going to
3:27:33
fall. But you know, so third place
3:27:36
ain't bad. So we are left with
3:27:39
unbelievably, yeah, Daleks in Manhattan gridlock.
3:27:42
Sorry. And I, as much as I'm very happy
3:27:48
to support Daleks in Manhattan, it has to be gridlock.
3:27:52
And there's no way I can, I can do this, you know?
3:27:55
Sanity has finally clicked in. Hole Daleks, Gridlock, Gridlock.
3:28:06
Did you say gridlock was the best Russell script?
3:28:09
Oh. This is fun.
3:28:11
I should just see the level of meltdown here.
3:28:13
That somebody. Can't go abroad?
3:28:16
Then your choice. Oh, I'm not.
3:28:18
I'm not a madman, am I? It's gridlock.
3:28:24
My name is Tallulah. Hands in the air?
3:28:32
No, because then it'll be a deadlock.
3:28:33
Nothing wins. Well, that's the season all
3:28:37
over, you know, everybody loses. Come on the Mac.
3:28:42
Oh my God, all the different people in the cars.
3:28:45
That last scene with Martha. It's got a deck to it, Daleks in
3:28:48
Manhattan. It's fun, but it's comic strip.
3:28:51
And it's unique, right? There isn't another gridlock.
3:28:55
No. There isn't.
3:28:57
There isn't another wait till. Next season, Joe, you probably
3:29:01
will get another type. Yeah, it's just as inebly done
3:29:05
as well. It's gridlock, of course it's
3:29:07
going to win. Wow.
3:29:09
Well. Daleks got to number 2.
3:29:11
That's not bad, is it? Who saw that?
3:29:14
Oh my, it's the way of the wheel.
3:29:17
Wow. Well, that was a marathon
3:29:18
session, guys. We've got there, we've got a
3:29:21
worthy winner, we've got Gridlock as our winner for
3:29:23
Series 3, yet again bucking the trend of the Doctor Who polls.
3:29:27
Well, there we go. So.
3:29:29
The only episode that Lawrence Miles enjoyed of the entire new
3:29:32
series. Fantastic, but Michael Storm
3:29:35
probably didn't. John Bensalia.
3:29:38
Gentlemen, is there anywhere you'd like to direct people or
3:29:41
anything you would like to plug? Dylan, I know you're a a right
3:29:44
podcast whore for plugging things, so go for it.
3:29:48
I do a podcast called Doctor Who to Hopper TV that looks at the
3:29:52
extended universe of Doctor Who and occasionally we look at the
3:29:54
extended universe of other shows.
3:29:57
So it's books, it's comics, it's audios, it's all that jazz.
3:30:00
I'm also a regular on Strangers in Space and yeah, find me on
3:30:06
Twitter because it's the only place to talk about Doctor Who
3:30:09
at Dylan Does Who or Too Hot for TV, which I can never remember
3:30:13
the handle of, But it's it's on there.
3:30:15
I'm on Blue Sky. I don't use it.
3:30:17
I'm on other social media but I don't post about Doctor Who, so
3:30:19
you'll just see what I'm having for dinner.
3:30:22
You are a prolific semi regular on hamster with blood pen knife
3:30:26
as well aren't? You, it's true.
3:30:27
I haven't done one for a while though, Joe so.
3:30:29
You said, well, we've got something in in the works, but,
3:30:32
and I know my opinion don't really account for much, but Too
3:30:35
Hot for TV is my absolute favorite podcast in the whole
3:30:38
world. Everybody who has not listened
3:30:40
to an episode, please check it out.
3:30:41
It's fabulous. That's very kind of you.
3:30:44
You're OK too. Thanks.
3:30:48
That was so subtly done. I'm nowhere, Rod.
3:30:53
You know, I, I drop in and out of these things like I'm kind of
3:30:56
retiring from podcasting after this one.
3:30:58
I. Think I hope that's not.
3:30:59
True. I think it is true, Joe, You
3:31:01
know, the voice is boring. It's verbosity.
3:31:04
I don't get asked back because people I I did one there for
3:31:07
work and the interviewer just got bored on the screen in front
3:31:10
of me. I'm mentally doing what's in the
3:31:12
box, but I said to Jimmy, it's part of my undeserved fell.
3:31:15
Well, I fell farewell tour, but you know, I, I, I, you know, I
3:31:21
had to disappear for 10 minutes for children.
3:31:23
But and reading the story, which is lovely, but it does mean that
3:31:25
you can't well, it's not a bad thing not to hear me.
3:31:27
So so I, I, I'm, I'm around on Twitter for now.
3:31:31
If anyone's desperate to get me on for something then then drop
3:31:34
me a line. Otherwise, you know, like like
3:31:36
breath on a mirror. I'll just be a voice in the
3:31:38
ether for a while until society collapses like in Gridlock.
3:31:42
You're. Gonna be like Elton John and
3:31:43
keep coming back for farewell tours till the end of time.
3:31:46
Everybody gets a bit desperate on you probably like like 7, you
3:31:49
know, goodbye. We sharp meet again and then
3:31:51
they turn up in, in, in, in before.
3:31:53
But you know, I'm around there somewhere like an unflucked turd
3:31:57
that sounds like Henry's cat. But if anyone's desperate, I'm
3:32:00
on Twitter or where we can get through work.
3:32:02
But otherwise, you know, it's, it's been fun, but I'm not a
3:32:04
natural, I don't think. I'm desperate and I will hear
3:32:08
your voice on this podcast again, even if I have to come to
3:32:11
your house on full share in front of a mic.
3:32:13
Well, I think you've both been Absolutely Fabulous tonight.
3:32:16
We've had a lot of laughs, a lot of deep.
3:32:18
We've talked about books I've never heard of from 1517.
3:32:21
So you've educated us as well, Paul.
3:32:25
So yeah, it's been amazing. Thank you very much for
3:32:27
listening. I am tempted to end off with an
3:32:29
appropriate quote. Say this is Sally Calypso
3:32:31
signing off. Missing you already?
3:32:34
Well, as soon as I've already been told off my Irish accents,
3:32:36
I won't attempt American. So Joe, stop shaking your head.
3:32:39
I know it was bad. So thank you all for listening
3:32:43
and until next time. Goodnight everyone.
3:32:49
Goodbye. The.
3:33:21
The.