Latest / A Hamster With a Blunt Penknife - a Doctor Who Commentary podcast / Talks to Jack Coyer & Steven B about their choice of The Time Monster (1/6)

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Talks to Jack Coyer & Steven B about their choice of The Time Monster (1/6) · A Hamster With a Blunt Penknife - a Doctor Who Commentary podcast

0:33
Hamster with a blunt. Pen knife for doing quicker
0:35
quicker. Quicker.
0:39
Welcome. Back to a hamster of Jesus
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Christ. I forgot what I'm doing.
0:46
Welcome back to a hamster with a blood pen knife.
0:48
The Doctor Who Commentary podcast.
0:51
Not the A, but let's be honest, the Sorry Toby Today Avengers
0:59
Assemble 2 of the Super brains of my life, Stephen B and Mister
1:06
Jack Coyer are here. Unbelievably to discuss an
1:12
absolute classic of Doctor Who 1st, let's say hello to Stephen.
1:16
Hello, Stephen. Hello, Stephen.
1:18
OK. And and.
1:20
Hello, Jack. Hello, Stephen.
1:23
I know it so Jack. Would you do everyone the great
1:27
honour of discovering what intelligent masterpiece we've
1:32
come together to discuss today? Yeah, we are discussing the epic
1:38
phenale for John Perth with third season as the Doctor, the
1:42
Time Monster. Yeah, Who's responsible for
1:46
this, Stephen? I I think it was a collective
1:49
decision. That's that's probably the
1:51
nicest way of putting it. Yeah.
1:53
Well, I mean, it's not our fault that everybody else already got
1:56
to or we have a John Perth with him about at this point.
2:02
Well, look, we've, we've got 6 episodes to get through, but I'm
2:07
just going to ask you both your sort of initial thoughts before
2:10
going into this because you know, sometimes when we watch
2:12
these things through, they're very different at the end.
2:15
So I'll ask you the same question at the end once we've
2:17
pulled this thing apart. Jack, what do you think of the
2:21
Time Monster? I think it's a very interesting
2:26
example of what tenant sticks. So must those, in particular
2:31
Barry Letts are trying to do with the programme.
2:36
When we were discussing stories that we wanted to do, we
2:39
obviously had hops on the idea of looking for what 3rd Doctor
2:44
stories were available because I think it gives a much wider
2:49
range of discussion. This is obviously the third year
2:53
now for most of the people in the production crew and in the
2:58
cast, obviously second years for Richard Franklin and Katie
3:02
Manning and the third years for just about everyone else here.
3:08
And I think it's, you know, very few people in Classic who I
3:14
think understood how to structure a year of television,
3:19
you know, a season in the way that that that in terms feel
3:27
like openness and their closures feel like closures.
3:30
And obviously we'll get further into, you know, why that is as
3:35
we start pointing out, you know, traumatic and plot links with
3:40
the other stories. Yeah, I feel that the Thai
3:42
monster is a little bit neglected because in Doctor Who,
3:49
we because we have access to everything, often the tips, we
3:53
have the privilege to to start picking out individual serials
4:00
or or stories that, you know, to pick a mix of 60 years worth of
4:04
television. Whereas if you look at you have
4:08
to acknowledge this story's function and I think as we go
4:13
through it, we will, yeah, discuss the grandiose sort of
4:19
entertaining attempt blockbuster that it's that it's coming for.
4:26
I'm wondering if the word attempt was the keyword there
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and that. Yeah, yeah, put that.
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Stephen This is a steaming pile of hot trash just full of
4:38
endless scenes of artolery that I just think is the most
4:41
incredible, inordinate amount of fun.
4:44
It's the last Terrar of the great gathering of the Unit
4:47
family, which doesn't happen actually too often if you sort
4:51
of count up across series. Seasons 8 and 9 are Doctor Who,
4:54
but it kind of feels more totemic and great, greater than
4:58
that. And this is the last chance
4:59
where everyone gets to do a little party piece altogether
5:03
and before they just sort of unfortunately never sort of come
5:06
back together again. And I like it for that.
5:08
And I like it for those endless scenes of asshole really where
5:11
nothing really makes sense and things happen in random orders.
5:15
But it's it's the wonderful people that we spend the time
5:17
with that I really enjoy. I sort of veer between
5:22
absolutely loving this and thinking it is the worst thing
5:25
that ever came out. Classic like that, that comment
5:31
in the discontinuity guide that they're all having so much fun
5:35
that they forgot to actually allow us to have some as well.
5:39
I think there is a bit of that going on here.
5:42
But like Jack said, I think there's enormous ambition to
5:45
this. They are they are trying to do a
5:47
finale right and we don't usually get that they're trying
5:52
to do something interesting with the master.
5:54
I don't think they entirely get there and I'll say kindly that
6:00
they are pushing the resources of the BBC to an absolute limit,
6:06
which I think they should be doing because I don't think they
6:09
should be resting on their laurels.
6:10
But maybe one idea less? Well, a couple of set pieces
6:14
less or a few trips into BBC Shakespeare less might have done
6:19
this in favours, but it is great fun.
6:21
It is great fun, and these are such engaging characters.
6:24
Even when they are written as stupidly as this, there's still
6:28
one very fun to be around. Well, OK, well then let's get
6:33
Tom titting together, shall we? Who's going to count us in?
6:38
Oh, happy to do so from 543. I'm so excited.
6:47
I almost thought, let's play. See ya.
6:48
Come on. Brilliant.
6:52
OK, 54321 play. I think it's the first time so
7:00
excited and the time monsters everything sort of mentioned in
7:04
the same sentence. OK, well look, come on, let's go
7:10
down Predictable corner. The Jumpertwee title sequence
7:15
full technicolour. Yay or May?
7:19
Yeah, I mean, I I really enjoy it, obviously, I believe.
7:23
Are these episodes Mission from the Archive, are these black and
7:27
whites that have been turned to colour or are they actual
7:31
colour? You can.
7:33
Usually tell I think these are actually colour ones that came
7:37
back. Now, this shot on film, this
7:43
lovely Little Dream sequence, there's just some stuff that
7:46
they have lying around in the BBC archives.
7:51
We get already here a reflection of something that's happened in
7:55
a previous story. It's a nice little flip of the
7:59
mind of evil, obviously, with the Master as the Doctors fear,
8:04
I suppose in in the same way, but you know, Doctor of the
8:08
Masters. You think that's deliberate?
8:12
I mean, I choose to believe so. There's no other way to think.
8:16
What is it? Terrorist success?
8:17
Fans always seeing connections and things that aren't there.
8:22
I mean, this would be very short if we.
8:24
I know, what else would we talk about, right?
8:28
Although I do think that is a nice dramatic opening.
8:31
That camera from below looking up at Roger Delgado is fabulous.
8:37
Yes, it's great to see what they can do when they actually shoot
8:40
on film. They're supposed to be sort of
8:41
stuck in the studio with the same, you know, 5 cameras all
8:44
pointed in the same direction. I agree there's there's an
8:48
alternate history here where the entire Pertwee series is shot on
8:53
film after the example of Spearhead from Spaceman's exist.
8:56
That was a last knot. I mean, we've got videotape for
9:00
interior and film for exterior and we're kind of used to that
9:03
perhaps as Doctor Who fans. But you know, when we go to
9:06
places like Ealing, for instance, and the shooting in
9:08
the big studio is there to see the film.
9:09
Mcgrane does does add that extra bit of Sheen and maybe also that
9:13
sort of dream like quality I guess that we get in that first
9:16
opening scene there of of the time monster as well.
9:19
Think of all like the the latter day Avengers shot on film and
9:24
just how gorgeous they are. And then imagine a world where
9:28
Doctor Who looks like that sit on Earth every week.
9:32
That is an enticing glimpse, isn't it?
9:34
It's been heaven space. Pretty much so here here we are
9:39
three at the end of the the third season.
9:41
Beyond that, I guess, And and what I really like about the
9:47
unit family is that there's a sense of space and place and
9:51
family about it that I, you know, we probably don't see
9:54
again until Russell's time with the show where we sort of bring
9:57
the doctor back to the power of the state quite often.
10:01
And, you know, Rose isn't just a a lonely child or a sort of, you
10:06
know, orphaned companion. She's she's someone who's got a
10:10
family back home and and maybe this is the closest that that
10:14
classic who does ever get to that.
10:17
And it's it's the richer for it. I really just admire the way
10:20
that the the ensemble comes together.
10:23
And obviously the actors have got a big part to play in that
10:25
where you're even, you know, rooting for the villain often
10:28
with with, you know, the charm and the the suave elegance of of
10:32
Delgado as a performer. They're just so watchable and so
10:37
lovely. And after two seasons, perhaps,
10:40
and even even though this is really the second appearance of
10:43
the Master for for Season 9, we kind of feel like he's part of
10:48
the furniture. I'm going to do a terrible Star
10:51
Trek analogy now, so forgive me everybody who has never seen
10:55
Star Trek before. But if series one to six are
10:59
Star Trek The Next Generation, where we go from place to place
11:02
and we deal with that story and then we move on, then the Jumper
11:06
era Star Trek Deep Space 9 where we are in a stationary location
11:11
and consequences happen from story to story, right?
11:15
Like it's not as linked as it would be when Rusty Davis comes
11:20
along and basically one invasion informs another and you actually
11:24
see them building momentum. But it means you do get pay off
11:28
for things like Joe joining and going and then her reference in
11:32
Planet the spiders and things like that.
11:34
And it's just stuff that the show had never dealt with
11:36
before. And that's a really interesting
11:38
point. Unfortunately, that doesn't mean
11:39
that 80s Doctor Who is Star Trek Voyager.
11:41
Inconsistent, a bit over the top, and frankly quite
11:44
embarrassing to watch, but never mind.
11:48
As a non Star Trek person, that was a beautifully explained
11:51
analogy. Thank you.
11:52
Well. You know, I've done a bit of
11:53
this now. Even I followed that.
11:58
Can I ask you both OK, why is Joe Brown suddenly talking with
12:02
this jazzy 70s dialogue when she never does it before this story
12:06
and she never does it again? Because we're in the 1970s now.
12:12
And so we need a sort of groovy chick to, to, to sort of be at
12:16
the centre of the show. Obviously Katie Mamie has
12:21
commented on the story quite a bit that she had to get them to
12:24
tone down some of the quirks that Joe now gets given.
12:31
And yeah, I, I just think they, the companions are usually best
12:37
served when they represent us, I suppose for modern culture.
12:43
I think Ian and Bob were sort of very much adults of the 60s as
12:48
opposed to, you know, children, you know, with, you know, with
12:52
much a child of the 70s of like the 70s years of the 2000s, you
12:57
know, and yeah, I, I just think she is one of the younger
13:02
companions that we've had for a while.
13:04
At least he's been presented as such.
13:07
And yeah, it's an attempt to do something modding with her.
13:13
But, but, but particularly when compared to John Pertwell, he's
13:17
obviously trying to be 70s in his own way with the, the flares
13:21
and the, you know. Frankly, if I look at the two of
13:25
them, I'll see Moore, the 70s in John Perry, certainly now he's
13:28
dressed. But does it work?
13:30
That sort of flowery? It was clearly a real Pippin of
13:33
a dream. You know, people don't read at
13:35
all like that, do they? It's it's inexplicable in the
13:37
fact that she never speaks like that prior to this.
13:42
And it's Barry let's uncredited, but Barry let's writing a large
13:46
part of this, like what is going on?
13:48
And of course, the only thing I can think of is that, you know,
13:51
Barry's just having all too much fun with the character and
13:54
Terence can't edit his boss. Yeah, it's yes, Yeah, I think
14:00
there's a bit of that going on in Planet of the Spiders as
14:02
well, because this is going on far too long.
14:06
But you know, I want to do the classic serial, so I'll let it
14:09
through. And we've spoken about,
14:16
obviously, the show now being reframed as a sort of domestic,
14:21
you know, sitcom for family sort of sitcom.
14:25
And we're now going to get obviously the comedy beat over,
14:29
but for the beer going. Oh, well, you know, I really
14:33
need someone to come to this institution and do some boring
14:36
unit work with me in that, you know, John Levine poking his
14:41
head for the door. Oh, I'm just going on holiday
14:43
now. I hope no one wants me to go on
14:48
an inconvenient work. You've even.
14:52
Got me and Stephen here as the laughter track, you know, for
14:54
your. What?
14:57
What? What?
14:58
Yeah. And that's the number one.
15:00
What was? There are many wah wah wah
15:03
moments in this stuff. Yeah, unfortunately, many of
15:06
them provided literally by Bethany Simpson.
15:11
That last say, well, we'll get there.
15:13
I I think you have to accept that though, really, because
15:16
this is the age of are you being served, which I think premiers
15:20
in this year. At the same time, I think 1972.
15:24
You know, man about the house, George and Mildred problems nest
15:27
we're in. We're in that period, fellas,
15:29
and this is this is the sense of humour on telly.
15:35
Don't you love the fact that the Master's got a companion in this
15:38
story? Yeah, he seems to have two,
15:41
doesn't he? Yes.
15:42
He's not just got a companion. And I think this is what a lot
15:47
of the they've got a lot of stuff is trying to do.
15:50
We're trying to parallel him directly.
15:53
The Doctor, so in this story is now culminating him.
15:57
The Master doesn't just have a companion.
16:00
The Master has a UNIT family. You've got the stuffy boss who
16:07
doesn't believe anything we have to say.
16:10
You know Doctor Percival's rhyme of and what to tell if
16:16
interstitial time. That's just the Nicholas
16:19
Courtney rhyme. He's got a young haired go
16:24
getter bloke with a funny moustache who is just so, you
16:29
know, cool and so above it all. And more importantly, he's got a
16:35
young independent woman with a sort of Pixie haircut.
16:39
Blonde Pixie haircut. Can I ask you this other?
16:42
Question then Jack Joe Blonde. Is this deliberate?
16:46
I think that element of of everything in this story that I
16:50
think is one of the most deliberate elements.
16:52
I think the master is being given a human family of his own
16:58
in this story, and we're seeing how he reacts to it, which is to
17:02
just think that they're all idiots and that you can just
17:05
sort of bypass them all. And he's given a TARDIS.
17:08
Yeah, well, the TARDIS is in the corner of his human lab.
17:13
Just absolutely. TARDIS is in the corner of.
17:16
And we're seeing lots of tedious experiments like we normally do
17:19
with, you know, they're beaming off the dematerialisation
17:22
circuit and day of the. At the.
17:24
Beginning of the season. We've not seen Myth Mammy Zebko
17:27
since Inferno. I'm trying to sort of look
17:30
through to an alternative universe though, where this was
17:32
our unit family and the master was the, you know, the the hero.
17:38
I don't know how long that would have lasted if I'm honest.
17:41
I mean, I'm a little bit surprised if we've been caught
17:43
on to it earlier. I'm just sort, you know, every
17:46
master story would just sort of cut between these characters and
17:50
do. You know, what impressed me a
17:52
lot, though, going back and looking at this, was just how
17:55
many competent women were in this story.
18:00
And I think Doctor Ruth Who, despite some pretty clunky
18:04
dialogue, go feminism. It's she's clearly, you know,
18:09
running rings around these two half the time when we get to
18:12
Atlantis, obviously that's way in the future.
18:15
But you've got Queen Gallia there, who's a political player
18:18
and very, very good at what she does.
18:21
And then there's Joe as well, who throughout the entire story
18:24
is very smart. And there's a few other female
18:26
characters in there as well. Now this is the period of
18:28
Terence Dick's scripting scene, you know, tying them to the
18:31
railroad tracks, etcetera, etcetera.
18:33
I want, I want to again say I think that actually is bullshit.
18:37
And this era does bring in some really, really good female
18:41
characters. Doctor Ruth.
18:44
Discuss. So this is a great staple of the
18:51
era, which is, you know, Clayton Bannon says, oh, doctor, I'm a
18:55
complete moron. Can you tell me what's going on
18:58
with the science this week? And the doctor goes, Oh, well,
19:02
this is the science thing, but because it's the Senole and this
19:05
is the sort of last we're seeing them of the year, we have to
19:09
have a develop so the doctor can go, oh, Joe, you're not, you
19:13
know, the completely simple thing that I was forceded upon
19:16
me 18 months ago. He.
19:21
Gets one reaction when she says something clever and he
19:23
literally looks at her and goes well done Joe, what the hell.
19:30
Although by the end of the story you should probably say look Joe
19:33
will you please stop self sacrificing yourself?
19:35
Come on now, get a bit out of hand.
19:38
Oh, I'm here for a little cameo from Doctor royalty Terry Walsh.
19:43
Terry Walsh, Yeah. Talk about the unit family.
19:46
You feel like he gets a go. Second, he stepped up that
19:49
ladder. But he was going to fall off it
19:50
though, right? It's in his contractor.
19:54
Well, yeah, I mean, he's only a climb out the ladder because
19:56
it's otherwise it'd just be some guy in the mosque.
19:59
But you know, you might as well let him.
20:04
Now this is a hamster of a blunt pen knife, so please can we
20:07
discuss this TARDIS sniffer outer?
20:10
The cock and balls. Yeah, it's, it's the, I mean,
20:15
the thing that really makes it, pushes it over the edge is the
20:19
two circular diodes that's supposed to be.
20:24
And it's like that element in particular.
20:28
Someone has to know that. That's what that is, I mean.
20:31
Well, I mean, that draws attention to it, right?
20:35
Yeah, I mean, it's just marking out the geometry of it, even 0
20:40
and now it's region. Now there's founder, but I
20:46
didn't know that Katie Manning is actually operating this
20:50
device by hand. She's got trigger that she
20:52
squeezes to turn it on and off. And you can see it.
20:56
If you look closer, you can see. Throughout this story, I would
21:02
like to talk about Paul Bernard's direction because I
21:05
think he's a little undervalued. I don't think he's one of the
21:07
best directors that he ever had, but he always, he loves a crash
21:10
zoom though, doesn't he? He zooms in and out all the
21:13
bloody time to suggest movement when you know someone should
21:16
have whispered in his ear. Paul, you can move the camera.
21:21
We have obviously Katie Mamim, who's usually very glowing and
21:25
positive about everyone. She has in the making of
21:29
documentary on the on the time monster, she said Paul Bernard,
21:33
you know, she wasn't really an actors director.
21:37
And I think if if Katie Mamim is on couch in her language around
21:42
you, I think that's possibly some indicator of the general
21:48
feeling towards him. I know that Stephen and I met
21:52
Katie Manning at a Phantom convention and she is an
21:56
absolute ball of sunshine, right?
21:58
She only says positive things about people.
22:00
But interestingly, Barry Letts also says that he fell out with
22:04
Paul Bernard a couple of times, that he tried to give him
22:08
suggestions of how to do things more visually interesting.
22:12
And Bernard would just go, no, no, no, no, it's fine.
22:15
I mean, we'll have a a giant white Budgerigard, it'll be fine
22:18
on the screen and a. Special effect over it.
22:21
And that obviously culminates, as we discussed in the Season
22:24
10, still come hamster in the orange testicular monster from
22:31
Frontier and space. Absolutely, yeah.
22:37
Barry, let's says I, I would never hire him again after that,
22:41
after quite right now on screen. Have you boys ever grasped hold
22:46
of anybody and danced across the room saying we've done it, we've
22:50
done it, we've done it, we've done it?
22:52
Only in the 70s, Joe. OK.
22:58
Oh dear, they've got a bit of a lot of energy, haven't they?
23:05
What do you think about the Masters persona?
23:10
You know this accent he's putting on?
23:14
Well, he's the master disguises, so you know, he's, I mean, he's
23:18
already immediately in his ordinary master costume.
23:21
He's already abandoned the Professor Locke, but I just
23:29
think it's an interesting sort of meta element of the show that
23:33
the Master already knows. If he's doing something, the
23:37
Doctor will probably be along to investigate at some point, so he
23:42
might as well get his disguise in place already, even when none
23:45
of the other main characters have shown up.
23:47
Yeah, he might as well just It is a character.
23:51
It is a bit odd, though, when he has this sort of logical
23:54
conclusion in Mark of the Ronnie where for no reason whatsoever
23:58
he's dressed as a scarecrow. And you kind of wonder why is he
24:01
doing that? But you're right, Jack.
24:03
These are just the conventions of storytelling.
24:05
You know, why? Why would you have, you know,
24:07
Moriarty dressed up as a, you know, you know, something, some
24:11
sort of disguise because he's the master of disguise.
24:13
And part of the pay off is it's revealed to the audience that
24:16
it's the master. Yeah, kind of already knew that.
24:19
But it's part of the game. It's part of the pantomime.
24:21
It's part of the unit family storytelling, I guess.
24:24
So I think you just have to take it for what it is and not look
24:27
too far into it. But what I do kind of
24:30
appreciate, particularly as we get to this sort of point in the
24:33
unit family history and the master on Earth history, and
24:36
this is his last story on Earth. Let's remember it all kind.
24:40
You can kind of look back and kind of see the perhaps the the
24:45
instruments of power and the institutions of power that the
24:48
master seems to have, you know, tried to infiltrate.
24:50
And you know, whether it's academia or in this one, the
24:52
prison system in mind of evil. I think the military and and
24:57
plastics factories in in terror of the Autons.
25:00
You can kind of start to hint at maybe a story that wasn't quite
25:04
told but but could have been and certainly is in something like
25:08
Who Killed Kennedy? Which is a fantastic 90s bit of
25:11
fan wank by the way, where the the Master has ingratiated
25:16
himself and infiltrated levels of society in a way that is
25:20
equal to but opposite the the way that the Poetry Doctor has
25:24
infiltrated and and found a home in UNIT effectively.
25:29
And you could argue that's almost this all the tenants
25:32
Dicks, small C conservatism jumping out in the you know, a
25:39
an undefinable evil is entering our institutions and we won't.
25:44
It's not a greater structural problem.
25:47
It's just an evil. But you know, we must the hero.
25:52
One hero must stop the one evil. And yeah, yeah, it's a very
25:58
simplistic view of the world, but of course, we're talking
26:01
about family television and primarily children.
26:04
So I guess it's part of the territory.
26:05
But it's interesting point, Jack.
26:07
I love that. Is it sort of an unconscious
26:10
bias of Terence's Morsi conservatism and his his world
26:13
view? Very possibly, yeah.
26:16
Does he get his scooby-doo moment in this?
26:19
Does the Doctor look at the screen and go, you know, fascal?
26:21
It's the Latin word for master, you know, it's doesn't even
26:26
enter into it. Oh, I do like all of the the
26:31
slow MO that he does with the time experience because we don't
26:34
really explore time a lot in classic Doctor Who.
26:39
And from what I learnt in the documentary, it started off with
26:42
Robert Sloman having an idea of a Second World War pilot
26:47
slipping through like a time thing and ending up in the 70s.
26:51
And that was the start of the story.
26:53
And then they were like, we can't really make this work.
26:55
But they didn't. They were like, no, let's do
26:56
something with time. Though the trouble is they do
26:59
about 15 things with time. Definitely.
27:02
And it's interesting that obviously the other Paul Bernard
27:04
story at the start of the season, Dave obviously also
27:08
plays around with time. That's more on a sort of
27:11
structural level, I suppose, where this is more
27:14
philosophically, you know? Somebody still.
27:17
Around with time. Yeah, it's it doesn't seem to
27:21
sort of have a central construct around time, other than the fact
27:25
that Kronos is the big bad. At the end of Kronos meeting
27:27
time in the Greek right, There's a sort of nod to that.
27:32
So all as I say, all this asshole around different, you
27:35
know, time things going backwards and forwards, aging
27:38
Stew and then de aging him, the the nasty sugar or whatever it
27:42
is sort of coming back through time, the medieval misfits,
27:45
etcetera. These are all it's effectively
27:48
padding, but it's also scene setting.
27:49
It's also about, you know, thematically introducing
27:52
something's going on with time, and at the end of it, the big
27:54
bad is actually time. I sort of, I can see Robert
27:57
Sloman and Barry Letts in ABBC Bar drinking, you know, a glass
28:01
of Macon each and just writing down a list of oh, wouldn't it
28:05
be fun if, and that's what we get in this story, you know, one
28:08
after another. Do we know the process that
28:14
Barry Letts and Robert Sloman had for writing these?
28:17
Do we know if they were sort of sat at the typewriters together
28:20
or if it was, you know, Robert Sloman hands the script.
28:24
Him and Barry Letts, you know? Detail it.
28:28
Barry Letts, he says, I think Robert Snowman wrote the first
28:31
pass. Then Barry Letts would rewrite
28:33
the whole thing. Then they would have
28:34
discussions. So I think I don't think it was
28:37
like, see, they did a different scenes.
28:40
I think they both took a full pass at it.
28:42
And then there was some compromise on on their two
28:45
approaches. But he says you can't tell where
28:48
he starts. And I begin because, you know,
28:50
we were. So we're both in there in every
28:53
scene. So I.
28:54
Mean, I think you can when, when there's a lot of CFO or when the
28:57
doctor starts talking about, well, I think you can tell when,
29:00
when ballots step. In Oh yeah, yeah.
29:03
But I think the other thing that's happened, and, you know,
29:05
we're now 12 months on from the Demons, which is a very
29:08
different script, by the way, but same writers, is that
29:11
they've looked around the stable of writers that Terence has
29:14
gathered together. And I think they're looking at
29:16
the copy book of in particular, Dave Martin and Bob Baker, who
29:19
sort of seem to have these endless processions of why
29:25
endless processions of scenes that kind of don't really do
29:28
anything or progress the narrative.
29:30
But those sort of thematic loops and cycles, I guess that sort of
29:35
reinforce the the central idea without really taking it too
29:38
far. And I wonder whether that wasn't
29:40
as much of an influence on the Thai monster as, as you know,
29:45
you know, perhaps we might think.
29:46
I'm wondering if the dude is so different.
29:49
They look at the copy book of Malcolm.
29:51
Holt. Holt.
29:52
Absolutely. Green death.
29:53
And it's far more morally political and character focus as
29:59
well. Far more so than this is.
30:01
Yeah. Oh, what is that speeding up
30:03
Betsy all about? Well, it's time, isn't it?
30:06
It's a time story. So, you know, the car goes fast,
30:09
the car goes slow. Isn't the most Batman thing in
30:12
Doctor Who? Well, we referenced Batman
30:15
earlier in the story. Of course that's true.
30:20
These are great. These themes of like, oh John
30:23
and Katie, you just go off in the Car, Talk rubbish and we'll
30:28
sort of cut some of it forgether and stick it in the episode.
30:32
I find the trouble with these scenes of the Experiments 1 is
30:35
they're a bit long and two is like the the culmination of the
30:40
scene is this has been from there to there.
30:43
But we've been watching Star Trek for three years now.
30:45
Like, this isn't revelatory, and I know it is.
30:48
If you're on Earth, this sort of thing doesn't happen all the
30:50
time. And it's.
30:51
Been news. But it's like I feel a bit like
30:54
and. I think to gain a sense of a
30:59
sort of wide importance, we obviously have the sort of
31:03
official people in shoots at the back and you kind of get the
31:07
sense that this is the sort of meeting that we never saw in bed
31:12
with Dalits. You know, they're all going off
31:14
to a big conference and important things are going to
31:17
happen. And I think that's sort of the
31:19
structure that we're going for here.
31:22
But you love the fact that the master there's, he has to wear
31:25
that massive boiler suit just so nobody recognised.
31:28
We are literally doing Scooby-doo at this point.
31:33
Well, nobody asked the question in episode 2.
31:36
Yeah, we'll get there. And says well why did he start
31:38
screaming out come Kronos? Come everyone.
31:41
Goes so well. He's eccentric, you know, like.
31:44
Well, the three is in my mouth. They know that that's where the
31:47
Cliff hanger is. So Oh my God, it's just setting
31:51
up a Cliff hanger. They've checked their watches.
31:53
We're 25 minutes in. Right off you go.
31:56
Look, Roger shouts. I'm in them.
31:58
We'll. Look up there.
32:00
I mean, it's Roger Delgado. He can show what he likes,
32:03
right? How do you guys feel that works
32:05
as a scene setter Stephen? Look, it's a bit flabby even for
32:10
a Part 1. Usually you get a really tight
32:12
Part 1 and can sort of fall to bits with the the less
32:15
successful stories in parts 2-3 and four.
32:18
And I'm thinking of the Android Invasion in particular, where
32:20
it's it's a fantastic and tight Part 1 and it does everything
32:23
that it needs to do to set up the rest of the story.
32:26
But I guess maybe with six episodes, there's a lot more
32:31
space and time to play with. So they can afford to not
32:34
necessarily have such a type one part of and there might be
32:37
certain things that you'd see we'll see in second episode that
32:40
might come, you know, should probably have been in the first
32:42
episode, but with six parts, I guess you can be not as strict.
32:47
So I don't I don't think it's it's a huge success.
32:50
I think it's incredibly fun, though.
32:51
Again, you know, all of the set pieces, all of the the unit
32:55
family sort of stuff. The location work is really
32:57
pretty as well. I I just think it's eminently
33:01
watchable. I can you know what?
33:03
I can put this on and I have believe me, over the last few
33:06
days on endless loop and it's just there in the background and
33:09
it's incredibly soothing and rather fun.
33:11
It's nice to hang out, but you mentioned the demons earlier,
33:14
right, and that has got such a crafted first episode in that it
33:18
is building up to that huge ending where the apocalypse
33:22
reigns snows coming out of the devil's hump.
33:25
You know a huge things going on. You've got the TV broadcast
33:28
making this international massive, whereas this in
33:32
comparison feels well, you said flappy.
33:34
I say indulgent. You know, it just feels a bit.
33:36
Let's just hang out with these people for an episode and see
33:39
where. They end up Yeah, I mean, I
33:41
could fish. It isn't that it's even flabby
33:43
or indulgent. It's that it, you know, you
33:46
compared it to the demons episode 1.
33:49
I think this is the demons episode 1.
33:51
You know, the master is trying to shaman of being a, you know,
33:55
colossal power. But this time it's going to be a
33:58
sort of theoretical physics monster rather than a black
34:02
magic monster. The events under public
34:06
scrutiny, you know, there are members of the media or big
34:10
academics who are coming to observe what's going on.
34:13
The doctor and Joe have to drive off in Bessie, but they don't
34:17
get there in time. So the master's going to do
34:20
going to summon the monster. You know, it is the Demons
34:24
episode 1 to some extent and I think because.
34:27
I feel totally this is quite different.
34:30
I think because the demons leans into sort of magic more, I think
34:35
there's more there's more of a sense of the Doctor being set up
34:40
as like a straight man to Dolores Haman's character, who's
34:45
sort of more of a humorous for which.
34:49
Whereas I think maybe in this you're kind of meant to take the
34:54
Master a bit more seriously because you know, the Master is,
34:59
which kind of makes it seem a bit more unintentionally comic
35:03
or juxtaposition because you you don't maybe get that quite as
35:09
strongly as you should. Not to be too rude about Paul
35:14
Bernard, but I feel like the demons had buckets of atmosphere
35:18
in episode 1 and might be lacking a little bit here in
35:22
broad daylight in this scientific institute.
35:25
Oh yeah, I think the location work on the demons definitely
35:28
helps as well. Here it maybe feels like we're a
35:30
little bit trapped in, you know, little little ones.
35:35
Just having the night filming as well like that just adds adds
35:38
tons of atmosphere. Well, what an exciting episode
35:42
1. Shall we skip on into episode 2?
35:47
I'm. Glad someone said yes.
35:49
I I think so, yeah. We'll see how it goes.