Latest / A Hamster With a Blunt Penknife - a Doctor Who Commentary podcast / Talks to James Lark about his choice of The Invasion (7/8)

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Talks to James Lark about his choice of The Invasion (7/8) · A Hamster With a Blunt Penknife - a Doctor Who Commentary podcast

• 0:26
  None. Hamster with a blunt pen knife
• 0:42
  for doing quicker. Welcome back to a hamster with a
• 0:46
  blunt pen knife, The Doctor Who Commentary podcast.
• 0:52
  James, hello. Hello.
• 0:54
  Here we are. We've reached Episode 7.
• 0:57
  I'm going to ask you now. You know, we're sort of four
• 1:00
  hours into this commentary now due to our diversions and
• 1:02
  things. You're running out of steam.
• 1:05
  Or do you still? Are you still running out of?
• 1:06
  Steam Oh no, and you've got to remember that when when when we
• 1:10
  first experienced this story, episode 7 was the 5th episode of
• 1:15
  6. So it's it's just I mean it it
• 1:20
  does help, but I but I do I maintain that I think that
• 1:22
  actually the having those those animated episodes back makes it
• 1:25
  feel like a somehow a shorter story than it did when they were
• 1:28
  missing. So that makes more sense.
• 1:31
  I sort of say that in pure sort of hampers of a blunt pen knife
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  term. So episodes one to four, it's a
• 1:36
  bit like edging, you know, it's like the promise of excitement
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  to come. I might we may have reached the
• 1:43
  climax though here in at the end of episode 6.
• 1:49
  Is there? A potential that that we're into
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  anti climax now. Well, I suppose it depends how
• 1:58
  these things tend to work out for for for people.
• 2:00
  In terms of my my mainframe of reference, of course is is my
• 2:04
  romantic entanglement when I was 15 years old.
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  How do you think that worked out?
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  Well, I mean, I know you're engaged to a man now.
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  So I think I think things took a bit of a different direction.
• 2:19
  Well, listen, a few days into my relationship, I wrote this in my
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  diary. People don't ask me if I'm going
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  out with Sally now, they ask me if I'm still going out with
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  Sally. Oh boy.
• 2:30
  This is beginning to annoy me. Will people carry on asking me
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  if we're still going out together in five years time?
• 2:38
  I hope not. All life become tediously
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  boring. So I was, I was putting five
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  years on this relationship. Is that how quickly you you
• 2:46
  become old news that people will?
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  Go very are you still going out or or did that just say what
• 2:53
  people thought about my my longevity as boyfriend material?
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  Anyway, So like about about a week into the relationship, we
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  get this. I gave Sally a letter this
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  morning and she gave me one. We're still communicating,
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  mostly in writing. That that bodes well, doesn't.
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  It, I mean, unlike now, James at that age, I'm sure it's as
• 3:18
  eloquent as as you could possibly be.
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  I think I mean basically I thought I was living in a Jane
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  Austen novel and we would mostly correspond to each other and
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  occasionally over a meal time exchange.
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  Niceties. This would make such a great
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  drama I. Think I would like, I mean I
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  would love if anyone you'll just give me the budget to film this
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  as a full costume drama in in period clothes.
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  I totally will. You have to.
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  Find the perfect young James though, wouldn't you?
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  Yes, yeah, that's going to be a tough one.
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  That that. That's that mixture of naivete
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  and Gorky charm. My letter asked if she'd video
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  Doctor Who for me as she has UK gold.
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  So this is where the Doctor Who aspect of the relationship comes
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  in. Then it says, uh oh.
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  I regret showing her my Diaries for a start.
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  She remembers my past better than I do now, and I haven't
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  been able to write certain things in my diary.
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  Things like I'm not as in love with her as I was when I first
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  asked her out. Hang.
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  On That was only last week, wasn't it?
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  Yeah, whole whole week has passed.
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  I was very happy last Wednesday but I'm not so sure I really
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  want to be going out with her. She's being very paranoid and
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  thinks I'm going to dump her. I'm very confused and I've got a
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  nasty suspicion it's something I've done.
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  I wouldn't be surprised if she dumped me tomorrow.
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  I'm not sure how upset I'd be either, except I want her to
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  video the Doctor Who. You had your priorities.
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  The dilemma isn't it OK a weekly?
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  Can I just say one thing though, right?
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  Yeah. If I got a letter or it says 15,
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  did you say 15? Or if I got a letter full stop,
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  I would be quite shocked by my prospective partner.
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  But also if I got a letter saying recall Doctor Who and not
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  meet me behind the bike sheds for a snog, I'll be very baffled
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  about the whole thing. Priorities though, was you
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  kissing? You and this girl, were you,
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  were you holding hands? There may have been a bit of
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  hand holding. That's nice.
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  Not so much kissing I think Valentine's Day a week a week
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  later with the the relationship has lasted now 2 two whole weeks
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  and I write off Valentine's Day. For the first time in my life
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  this has actually meant something to me.
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  I gave Sally her stuff before school and she put them in her
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  locker. It wasn't really very romantic.
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  She didn't give me my card until the end of lunchtime.
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  She also gave me a forever friends teddy with a drum.
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  It's very nice, but I'm not sure that Sally gave it to me
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  wholeheartedly. Perhaps I'm just imagining the
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  whole thing, but she hardly ever talks to me now.
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  I talked to her a bit before maths when we had a test, and a
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  little bit before physics when we had a test.
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  If only I was better at expressing my feelings out loud.
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  I couldn't bear it if she dumped me.
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  Do you still write your diary? The the kind of exhaustive,
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  obsessive writing a page a day, which is what I did at that age,
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  is just not remotely practical. Now I keep something more akin
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  to a journal where I'll tend to have kind of several weeks of
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  fact dumping to do. It's what's interesting about
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  the page a day thing is you get a completely different type of
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  entry because you're writing about the what's happened
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  immediately. You're writing about what's in
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  your head at the time. And quite often it's not the
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  thing thinking back that you think you should have been
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  thinking about at the time. It's it's just a very kind of
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  stream of consciousness experience.
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  Whereas what I write now is much more considered because it's
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  it's news that I've had a chance to protest.
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  It's such a wonderful window to the past though, isn't it?
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  And things that you don't, all this stuff goes out of your
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  head, you know, as life trundles on.
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  So to be able to go back and peek into.
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  Oh, my and my family find it infuriating because because I
• 7:09
  always win arguments because they'll say, Oh no, this, that's
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  not how it happened. I'm not well, I think you'll
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  find it happened this way and then I'll produce a don't go.
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  It did happen On this date. That is a subjective account,
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  all right, of what happened back then.
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  Well, at least we did find out as well how you managed to get
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  your mitts on the double cassette of the invasion as
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  well. Well, I mean, and the, and the
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  videos from UK Gold. Well, as as as I told you before
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  that that didn't go terribly well, but maybe maybe that was
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  just a little rocky moment and and after a successful
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  Valentine's Day, it will all end happily ever after.
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  And I mean, I kind of know it didn't, but how long did the
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  relationship last? Well, maybe we'll find out in.
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  Episode 8 to be continued. We're having our own soap opera
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  now. Well, look, let's go into I
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  don't want to get this shit out over and done with so I can find
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  out the interesting stuff in episode 8.
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  Will you count as in please? Yes, we're going to watch
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  episode 8 of the Invasion in 321 it.
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  Is true. It is true, a week when you're
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  15, it does feel like. Several, it's a long time and,
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  and stuff, I mean, stuff started to kick off.
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  There was that, I mean, I'm sort of, I'm truncating the story,
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  but other people were involved and there was a a whole issue
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  which was that we were both in a band.
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  Oh boy. And the band became quite decide
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  divisive. Because of your relationship.
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  Because more of the bands and of, yeah, bands are divisive,
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  aren't. I mean, look at The Beatles.
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  Well, yeah, don't tell me she was your Yoko.
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  But you know, James, I've got a feeling, you know, people
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  started off this commentary going, oh, my God, Joe Ford and
• 9:02
  James Lark are doing a commentary on the invasion.
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  And now a week later, they're going.
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  Are they still doing? Invasion.
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  Oh dear. Oh, OK, the invasion's in full
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  swing. OK, full.
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  And this is where slight disappointment awaits because I,
• 9:21
  I, I expected at this point to see many, many Cybermen because
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  the invasion is in full swing. They're all over London.
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  And what happens throughout this episode is people occasionally
• 9:32
  remind us that the Cybermen are all over London and we don't
• 9:35
  actually see any at all. See, that is something that I
• 9:39
  think, you know, when they try the sort of thing in the new
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  series, they got right, yes, side men, you know, think of
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  army ghosts. The army ghosts rise of the
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  side, men bursting through windows, and they're just
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  everywhere. Aren't they?
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  I do think, and I do think it's a mistake.
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  I think it's the maybe the one actual misstep in this episode.
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  I know why it's happened. It's happened because the side
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  men are being quite carefully deployed and we're going to get
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  loads of side men in Episode 8, but I think we need to see
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  something of the threat rather than hear about it.
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  I think the biggest mistake at the end of this story is the
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  double climax. You know, you get all that
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  action on the street and then you get everyone just sitting
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  around. I agree that.
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  Is so bizarre. And the and the and the first
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  climax is better than the second, yeah.
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  Definitely, yes. Look at Vaughan, he's got his
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  legs crossed. I love knowing he's also he's
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  also doing, I mean, I don't know what's on his clipboard, but I I
• 10:35
  love this. It's such a born the
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  businessman. He's he's kind of on his
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  clipboard, probably dividing up countries or something.
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  If I knew, we could take a look at that.
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  Let's see now the poor will be converted first.
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  That's right, yes. We should have a key conversion
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  point in Hull or maybe Sheffield, I don't know.
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  You could have conversations that akin to, do you remember
• 11:01
  that episode of Torture Children of Earth where they're talking
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  about which kids to give over just for the alias to shoot up
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  with? You could have conversations
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  like that, you know? It's going to be poor kids.
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  So isn't it? I mean, I think I think Tobias
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  is is fairly public school educated.
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  I think the poor, you know, would be sort of the ones that
• 11:18
  would be most violent in sort of revolting against.
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  Yeah, so deal with them first. I mean the poor presumably are
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  all hypnotize as well. That's me.
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  You're right, you're converting me first.
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  Yes, yeah. Thank.
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  You very much. That's right, I'd have been all
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  right in Cheltenham, protected by a bubble of entitlement.
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  I'm not sure where Mark falls, actually.
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  I think his family would probably be considered middle
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  class, so he might be all right, but I'm.
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  Doomed. I had to.
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  I had to answer that question on an application fairly recently,
• 11:54
  not about myself, but about my parents.
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  And it was about would you consider your parents working
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  class? And I I genuinely wasn't sure
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  how to answer. How did you answer?
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  I can't remember now. I mean, I would say.
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  Yes, both my parents were teachers.
• 12:14
  Oh, I would have said no for. You you're right, still working.
• 12:19
  Still working though. Isn't it a?
• 12:21
  Strange question, mind you, I've had some very odd interview
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  questions in my time. You know all those ones about
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  bloody if you were a fruit and all this stuff.
• 12:29
  What the hell has this got to do with?
• 12:31
  Any you're a fruit. Yeah, what fruit would you be?
• 12:34
  And all weird questions like that.
• 12:36
  And not for the sort of jobs you'd think you know.
• 12:39
  So we've got a street, we've got a lovely exterior here, but I
• 12:41
  just, I feel like they could have put a couple of sidemen in
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  the background or something. Yeah, although this is quite a
• 12:47
  dynamic scene, isn't it, where the gun goes through the door?
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  Jamie, it's. Doing all the right things,
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  Yeah, it's a good scene, but but the three, we're told that there
• 12:55
  are sidemen everywhere and I can't, I don't see any sidemen
• 12:57
  outside. Yeah.
• 12:59
  They just just someone. You know how in Dave the
• 13:02
  Triffids in that TV production, there's always a Triffid just
• 13:05
  sort of in the background? Well it's baffling as well
• 13:08
  because they have got exterior location work which was shot
• 13:11
  before the studio work. Yes of loads of Cybermen hanging
• 13:15
  about on roofs and things which are in episode 8.
• 13:18
  So why? Couldn't they?
• 13:19
  Why can't they just cut those in?
• 13:20
  This Yeah. Oh, Douglas.
• 13:22
  Well, I mean, he's been going for quite some time now.
• 13:25
  You can drop the ball a little bit.
• 13:27
  That was a bit of a daring shot of Courtney sitting up into
• 13:31
  shot. Was he asleep or what was going
• 13:33
  on? I'm not quite sure.
• 13:34
  I'm not sure that quite worked. Lucy McCall, I know you're
• 13:37
  listening, and this one's for you.
• 13:39
  Nicholas Courtney is fucking handsome.
• 13:41
  My God, he looks gorgeous in this shop.
• 13:45
  Good grief. Did Lucy have a question for us?
• 13:48
  I believe she did. Probably about the Brigadier.
• 13:50
  Probably about Nicholas Courtney.
• 13:51
  Yeah, yeah. And.
• 13:52
  How magnificent is his mustache or something like that, You
• 13:55
  know, Did he ever have his own? Mustache which?
• 13:57
  Which of which of Nicholas Courtney's mustache is is the
• 14:00
  best? I think what was his own was his
• 14:04
  own just battlefield. Battlefield's the only one in
• 14:07
  Doctor Who way, I think. Maybe, possibly for some of the
• 14:11
  unlicensed stuff. He grew A moustache as well.
• 14:14
  I've got to. Be honest, does it distract you?
• 14:15
  Because I never really see it when he's not really.
• 14:19
  Not like I do with Ailey Spears sometimes.
• 14:21
  This I would say the the massage he's wearing in this story is is
• 14:27
  often not on quite straight and that that is a bit distracting,
• 14:31
  but but he's he's only very rarely seen kind of full full on
• 14:34
  so it's. Lucy's question is typically
• 14:37
  Quirk. Thank you.
• 14:39
  Lucy is. I think those crazy kids have
• 14:42
  gone off to the sewers to try and get photographs of the
• 14:44
  Cybermen, the most Scooby-doo line of the era.
• 14:50
  No, that's Rago in the planned episode 6 of the Dominators
• 14:54
  where he would have said And I'd have gotten away with it too, if
• 14:58
  it wasn't for that pesky Dr. and.
• 15:01
  Listen to this. Oh Lucy, I love you.
• 15:04
  Honestly, I could never think like you though.
• 15:06
  Also, the eventual change in pronunciation from Cybermen to
• 15:11
  Cybermen. That was a point, a conscious
• 15:14
  decision or unconsciously moving with the times.
• 15:18
  I think there's probably a feminist reading on this where
• 15:20
  what should be called Cybermen very quickly became Cybermen in
• 15:24
  order to emphasize the toxic masculinity that they represent.
• 15:28
  I think it happened around Revenge of the Cybermen.
• 15:30
  You know, Robert Holmes, it don't surprise me at all.
• 15:32
  Yeah, yeah, it's very much like we don't want anyone getting the
• 15:35
  impression that we've cast women in these roles.
• 15:38
  Good creep. Even though you can't see their
• 15:39
  faces, you must know that they are men.
• 15:42
  And that's another thing keep bringing up Roger, the side of
• 15:47
  Mid and Age of Steel. But when that person is
• 15:51
  unconverted, it's a woman called Sally, isn't it?
• 15:54
  It is a woman called Sally. Well, we've been talking about,
• 15:59
  we've been talking about a woman called Sally.
• 16:00
  Do you think, do you mean to say this is what happened?
• 16:02
  The the tragic ending to my romance is that she became a
• 16:06
  Cyberman. You could have had a life of
• 16:08
  luxury and debauchery with James Larkin.
• 16:11
  Instead you ended up a tin pot machine.
• 16:13
  Well. That's what happens if you
• 16:15
  deliberately cut off the 1st 15 minutes of Battlefield.
• 16:19
  Oh yes, it's a lesson for us all.
• 16:22
  A scene indeed. What?
• 16:25
  The garden centre scene? You miss it that much, do you,
• 16:29
  Alistair? What about this?
• 16:31
  Well, for a long time I didn't. I didn't know that it started in
• 16:33
  a garden centre because I didn't have the 1st 15 minutes.
• 16:36
  Can I ask you right when you go to a garden center with your
• 16:39
  partner, do you say Alistair? What about this one?
• 16:43
  Because I do. Oh fine, if you like it.
• 16:49
  My partner absolutely loves a garden center.
• 16:54
  Honestly I pretty much run through every line in
• 16:56
  Battlefield by the time we're out of a standard gun centre
• 17:00
  trip. I'm almost willing to bet you
• 17:02
  know that he's picked up a lot of Doctor Who over the years.
• 17:05
  Oh, yes, subconscious. Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
• 17:09
  Yeah. He had a promise in life, you
• 17:10
  know, until he met you. I don't mean that.
• 17:15
  I don't mean that at all. Oh, what's happening.
• 17:18
  I've totally lost track of what's happening in the story.
• 17:20
  Well, I'll tell you. What has happened is that Fraser
• 17:22
  Hines has been written out. He wasn't.
• 17:25
  He was in it though, wasn't he? Brief It was, that was.
• 17:28
  That wasn't an extra dress. He does get shot in the leg.
• 17:30
  Yeah, yeah. So he is briefly in the episode,
• 17:32
  but presumably he's now off on holiday.
• 17:36
  I think so. He's certainly the only time
• 17:38
  he's back now is in the. Pre on filmed yeah.
• 17:41
  It's episode 6 that he's off technically.
• 17:43
  So how does that work? I'm not expecting you to have an
• 17:47
  answer for that. How?
• 17:48
  How does that work in terms of his holiday?
• 17:50
  He's had to come in for the beginning of this episode or did
• 17:56
  or might they have filmed that at another time?
• 17:59
  It's one brief, brief scene. Like trout and falls unconscious
• 18:04
  halfway through that episode in the seas of death.
• 18:06
  And then he's missing for the like, an episode and a half.
• 18:09
  Yeah. Oh, I do love the trucks coming
• 18:11
  out of that. I love that.
• 18:12
  I mean, I love this, but again, where are the Cybermen?
• 18:16
  Yeah, well, and we're also doing that jaunty music.
• 18:20
  It's a little bit jaunty, isn't it?
• 18:21
  For given that the whole world has been invaded.
• 18:24
  It doesn't. Yeah.
• 18:25
  See, I never feel at this point that the world's been in the
• 18:27
  next episode. I do.
• 18:29
  Yeah, so I, I feel like just get a couple of people inside my
• 18:33
  costumes and and have them in the background, have this sense
• 18:36
  that they're constantly there, that you're constantly having to
• 18:38
  be on the run. I love this though.
• 18:40
  I love that we're back in the sewers.
• 18:43
  Watch Trout watch his body language with the radio.
• 18:46
  Hello. He holds it like someone who's
• 18:48
  never used a walkie-talkie before.
• 18:51
  Unit control. This is the doctor speaking.
• 18:55
  It's a big idea there. He's he's effortfully talking in
• 19:00
  a way the the the least military way possible as.
• 19:02
  Well, if that was Perry, but I kept being that Brig it out, you
• 19:05
  know, it would be much firmer. So in a minute, right when Zoe
• 19:12
  it is this episode, isn't it, where she blows up all the
• 19:14
  ships? No.
• 19:16
  Oh well. What's this episode?
• 19:19
  Maybe Yes it is. Yes, it is.
• 19:21
  Because. Because that leads into the the
• 19:23
  cliffhanger. Yeah, because.
• 19:24
  Well, so what's she trying to do?
• 19:26
  She's she's, they've got a couple of missiles and a load of
• 19:29
  cyber ships. Yeah.
• 19:30
  And she's programming a trajectory that will allow them
• 19:36
  to bounce off all the ships and take them all out.
• 19:39
  Like play a really sophisticated game of snooker.
• 19:43
  Yes it creates a chain reaction and destroy all of the cyber
• 19:46
  fleet just like you nailed the Daleks.
• 19:50
  Yeah, indeed, indeed. Oh yeah, that is the end of
• 19:54
  Silver Nemesis, isn't it? Yes, so.
• 19:58
  Do you know after your beats every Doctor Who fan making
• 20:01
  Doctor Who in the future? They're very aware of these
• 20:03
  early sideman stories, aren't they?
• 20:08
  Rightly so. This, this this sets so many
• 20:11
  precedents, doesn't it? But I think the the sad thing
• 20:15
  is, is you tell me a villain in a Cyberman story as effective as
• 20:20
  Vaughan after this? Oh, there is.
• 20:22
  Oh yeah, there isn't 1 and and I think.
• 20:27
  That you know what's the Nazi called in Sylvan Nemesis?
• 20:30
  They're dreadful. Well, I just came here to watch
• 20:34
  the Wimbledon. Sophie, you got so fat.
• 20:42
  It's a good for your experience. Very good, very good.
• 20:46
  I love the camera system. Oh, no.
• 20:51
  Vaughn's reaction. He goes.
• 20:52
  He leans back in his chair and he goes yes, what is going on
• 20:58
  right now to. Avoid the Cyber Control beam.
• 21:02
  The last thing he expected was for anyone who's brave enough to
• 21:06
  come, you know, bypass all the Cybermen.
• 21:09
  He's set over London straight to where he is.
• 21:13
  Absolutely lovely. The scene in a minute between
• 21:15
  Trout and Stony is one of the best though.
• 21:18
  Oh oh, you're a full born, that whole scene.
• 21:22
  Yes, yeah, beautifully played. Oh, Belt close up for For Lucy
• 21:28
  there. What is going on there?
• 21:30
  Is that the Brig? Yes.
• 21:33
  I I want to know why he's doing his belt up in front of that.
• 21:36
  What? Just very pretty private, just
• 21:38
  there. So the Lion's den is a repeat of
• 21:41
  a line that he used in Fury from the deep bit of a running
• 21:49
  running motif of trout and being the one who goes into the.
• 21:55
  I absolutely can see why 15 year old James is a bit impatient at
• 21:59
  this point. Little bit, little bit
• 22:01
  impatient, but but this this scene, look at the way it's,
• 22:05
  look at the way it's framed. Look at the.
• 22:07
  Look at the setup of this shot and.
• 22:12
  Do you know what my trouble is with this scene is it's 2.
• 22:16
  Like usually there's one actor in the scene I can't take my
• 22:18
  eyes off and it unfortunately it's both actors in this scene.
• 22:22
  Yeah, I agree. But look, Cam Fields doing it
• 22:24
  for you. So he's he's he's set up the
• 22:26
  shot so beautifully. So you know who you're looking
• 22:29
  at because travels in the foreground, but look at the way
• 22:31
  and then he crosses. It's it's the choreography of
• 22:34
  these scenes shows what a a thoughtful director he is.
• 22:42
  I masterminded the whole operation from A-Z and then he
• 22:48
  just goes. They merely provided their
• 22:50
  advanced scientific skills, their might and strength.
• 22:55
  It's it. Is there a more hubristic
• 23:01
  performance in the whole of Doctor Who?
• 23:03
  Maverick. Chen OK, Fair enough.
• 23:06
  OK. Yeah, Stoney, man.
• 23:09
  He's got it. No one else stops him.
• 23:15
  Trout's so good at needling as well, are they?
• 23:18
  Are they conditioned to obey your commands?
• 23:21
  And this is where he is, he is the right doctor for this scene
• 23:25
  because Perth, we just would have, it would have been like a
• 23:27
  kind of a slightly school Mamish lecture.
• 23:31
  Look and now. And we've got the.
• 23:34
  Leaps over the table. He'll be under my command,
• 23:37
  exactly like the others. That call was just starting to
• 23:40
  crack. A bit that grin the doctor gives
• 23:42
  when he says, But we've got the professor.
• 23:44
  I like it when he goes. What is it with the professor's
• 23:46
  machine? That's right, with one machine.
• 23:53
  Not without the professor. And we've got the professor.
• 23:59
  Oh oh, this was This is a really great intro to this as.
• 24:03
  Well, it is. It's a good intro.
• 24:05
  It's the same and a great set. It's very kind of brutalistic in
• 24:14
  its design and it's very convincingly A launchpad.
• 24:17
  I mean, I think, I think it's probably all pony, but it it
• 24:19
  looks convincing. I really think Zoe's at her best
• 24:22
  scene. You don't need anyone else here.
• 24:24
  She is running this scene the midweek.
• 24:26
  Well, I hope you get your sums right.
• 24:27
  And she goes, I have, Thank you very much.
• 24:32
  And I like that we're hearing about Russia and there is a
• 24:36
  there is a they've remembered that we are meant to be getting
• 24:39
  a kind of a sense of this being a worldwide thing did.
• 24:42
  You see that she didn't just put the nervous star on his back,
• 24:45
  she was sort of giving him a nice little.
• 24:47
  Massage. That's the best thing.
• 24:49
  If you've if you come across someone who's been knocked out
• 24:51
  by a Cyber Beam little massage. James, I've just been knocked
• 24:58
  out by a Cyberbeam. OK, I'm on my way.
• 25:01
  Thank. You.
• 25:03
  I love a massage. I can't remember now how they
• 25:09
  end up on the streets. Oh no.
• 25:11
  It's, well, it's a bit. Where the Cyberman comes on the
• 25:13
  screen. Yeah.
• 25:14
  So we, we, we've got to wait for that because of Pekka, because
• 25:18
  we're still setting up the we're reminding the audience when he
• 25:21
  says Packer, Packer appears on the screen.
• 25:23
  His face is getting closer and closer to that screen every time
• 25:26
  he appears. His complacency is so is
• 25:36
  glorious. And Trout looks worried now.
• 25:40
  Yeah. It's like a constant power shift
• 25:42
  between the two of us. It's.
• 25:43
  Great. That's great writing.
• 25:45
  Great directing, but great writing as well.
• 25:47
  That window in that set is so savvy, it gives it such depth.
• 25:51
  That's. Yeah, yeah, I'm sure it's not as
• 25:56
  big a set as they've made it look as well, but it it has a,
• 26:00
  it has a genuine sense of scale. I like these characters, you
• 26:05
  know, they, they don't get much screen time, but they're, these
• 26:08
  two actors, they're, they're great, aren't they?
• 26:10
  But another question just in from Fraser Gregory, champion of
• 26:14
  the dams. What's your favorite way of
• 26:18
  saying the name Packer? Well, Fraser, the issue here is
• 26:25
  that so far we've been given 46 readings by my counting, too
• 26:32
  many, too many to choose from. Really.
• 26:34
  What we actually need is either, I mean, someone needs to either
• 26:38
  just do a reel of all the Packers in this story, I'm sure
• 26:43
  someone's got the time to do that, or we need an app where
• 26:46
  you can actually just pick the a Packer for each occasion, maybe
• 26:50
  accompanied by an an appropriate to buy us for an emoticon.
• 26:54
  Can I ask you, have you just been doing a dash every time
• 26:57
  we've had a Packer or have you been right next to it, the
• 27:01
  emotion that's been said with it?
• 27:02
  I haven't, no. I feel like I might have to go
• 27:04
  back and do that again. No, I haven't.
• 27:07
  There is. There is a.
• 27:08
  Trajectory. Yeah.
• 27:09
  Well, yes, definitely. There's an emoji diagram to be
• 27:13
  made with the Packers. I think my favorite Packer is
• 27:17
  the silky smooth one that where he elongates the bit.
• 27:21
  So it's Packer. He's he's just got such a
• 27:26
  mellifluous tone so that he can he can he can make the name last
• 27:30
  as long as he wants to. But obviously it's very
• 27:31
  entertaining when it becomes Packer.
• 27:33
  It's. A great It's a great name and I
• 27:36
  love how excessive, but my favorite line of his is still.
• 27:39
  And don't try and lose them again.
• 27:41
  There's a good fellow. I'm convinced that Packer's name
• 27:46
  was not in the script 46 times and that Kevin Stoney has gone.
• 27:52
  This is going to be fun if I can say his name as much as
• 27:55
  possible. And Canfield, it was absolutely,
• 27:57
  as much as he was regimented with his shots, he was
• 28:00
  absolutely the actor's director who would say, yeah, go on, try
• 28:04
  it if that's going to make you happy because we ain't paying
• 28:07
  you much. So who are who are these?
• 28:11
  Who are these actors? Because they they have, they
• 28:19
  have that thing that Cam Field has just cast people with the
• 28:22
  right faces. He's very good at casting rank.
• 28:27
  Yes, I have no idea who these actors are.
• 28:31
  I feel like there's a lot of people in this set as well.
• 28:33
  There's a lot of people in this set, yeah, but.
• 28:35
  This is why we've got no Cybermen in this episode,
• 28:38
  because they're all in here. See, I love all of this.
• 28:45
  It's just it's Zoe being brainy. Let's not forget we're going to
• 28:51
  go into a period where women are either forgotten entirely or The
• 28:59
  Perils of Pauline. Yeah.
• 29:01
  And so and Zoe, in this episode, Zoe is the is is the lead.
• 29:05
  She's the hero. And she's standing up to a
• 29:09
  bloke. I'd love to.
• 29:10
  See, she's great and she's got an energy.
• 29:12
  And I mean, of course, in that costume as well.
• 29:14
  She zips around this room like a spanky space.
• 29:17
  Girl, it's sparkling. Oh boy.
• 29:22
  There's another reason why you know a certain group of fandom
• 29:25
  likes her, but not you and me, James.
• 29:30
  Not. At least I hope not.
• 29:33
  Not in, not in that way. I do like, I do like Zoe.
• 29:39
  I, I, I think we get enough of Zoe.
• 29:43
  I'm not sure that she would have developed much as a character.
• 29:45
  Does that make sense? Yeah, I think, I think they
• 29:48
  could have done more of it, but I think they could have done
• 29:50
  more of every. What I mean is I'm not they
• 29:54
  wouldn't. I'm not sure they would have
• 29:56
  done. I'm not sure that Zoe going into
• 29:59
  the next season would have would have gone anywhere interesting.
• 30:03
  I think the desired effects of both Jamie, Ashley, all of
• 30:09
  Trout's companion setups, Jamie, Polly and Ben, Jamie and
• 30:14
  Victoria, Jamie and Zoe, In all of those cases, there's enough
• 30:19
  personality and chemistry and energy there to make the stories
• 30:23
  entertaining with them in it, which is what you really need
• 30:25
  them for. Yeah, yeah.
• 30:30
  Because we weren't really doing character dramas then, were we,
• 30:34
  about the companions? Not when there's cyber invasions
• 30:38
  of London to do. James another James has a series
• 30:42
  of questions for you. So I'm going to sort of fire
• 30:45
  them off to you just as we fire off these missiles.
• 30:47
  Firing off these rockets, yeah. I couldn't have time that
• 30:50
  better, could I? That's top footage, isn't it?
• 30:52
  James Hadwin Bennett Now you better prepare for some
• 30:56
  idiosyncratic questions now from this fellow.
• 30:58
  All right. Does this story a make the
• 31:01
  Cybermen look a little pathetic given they can be easily killed
• 31:05
  by unit? No, do you want a reason as
• 31:10
  well? I'm just I'm enjoying the the
• 31:13
  exploding ships that's look at this explosion it.
• 31:16
  Looks like a Catherine wheel. It does look, it looks like
• 31:19
  they've they've flung some fireworks in there.
• 31:21
  I don't know that there's that much smoke in space.
• 31:24
  No, but you know what? That's that's, that's, that's a
• 31:28
  a nice little, that's a nice little model shop there.
• 31:33
  Oh, here we go. Hang on.
• 31:34
  Just I'm going to come back to James's questions in a moment,
• 31:36
  but this is Kevin. Sony's about to get his Brexit
• 31:39
  moment. No, wait, give me more time.
• 31:45
  This what you wanted, Boris? I'd be the.
• 31:47
  Ruler of a dead world. He even says I can stop the
• 31:51
  opposition, we no longer need you.
• 31:58
  Oh my God James a cyber Megatron bomb.
• 32:04
  OK, I've completely. Yeah, that's up the ante, hasn't
• 32:06
  it, This. Plan has changed a lot, hasn't
• 32:09
  it? I mean, what were they
• 32:09
  originally going for? Were they looking to convert
• 32:11
  everybody? That was I think the original
• 32:14
  plan, but I'm not sure that I mean.
• 32:18
  So. Just we're going to blow up.
• 32:20
  The Planet. To be fair, Tobias has fucked up
• 32:23
  quite massively there hasn't he? Like the entire cyber fleet has
• 32:26
  just been wiped out by rockets. That's.
• 32:29
  But then the cyber plans never make any sense to me.
• 32:32
  Why were they keeping that, that that bomb on Earth, you know, of
• 32:35
  shock, how to destroy that conference.
• 32:39
  That was it, wasn't it? There's always a lot of holes.
• 32:41
  In, yes, yeah. But again, I think that's.
• 32:44
  A logic race. Head head cannon says it's
• 32:47
  because they're desperate and and like, they're not, they're
• 32:50
  not meant to be brilliant. They're not meant to be
• 32:52
  Machiavellian like the Daleks. They're meant to be on the edge.
• 32:56
  So coming back to the question about does it weaken them to see
• 33:00
  them blown up by UNIT? Well, a no, because all all you
• 33:04
  want to see when you're a child is side men being blown up by
• 33:08
  soldiers. That's just that's the best
• 33:10
  Doctor Who you can get. But also, I don't think the
• 33:13
  Cybermen are meant to be indestructible.
• 33:17
  Like I do think it weakens the Daleks when they can be just
• 33:20
  taken out by aim for the eyepiece and Chuck them out of a
• 33:23
  warehouse high window. But with Cybermen, I feel like
• 33:28
  there's there's much more sense their cannon fodder.
• 33:31
  And actually there's a there's a a lovely sense in this that even
• 33:35
  though the soldiers keep blowing them up, they keep coming.
• 33:38
  But it's not an easy win for unit.
• 33:41
  And it is also stated explicitly that it's a small cyber invasion
• 33:45
  of fleet. So there's always this sense
• 33:48
  that that the the the invasion to come would have been much,
• 33:51
  much more and unit and are only tackling a small number of them.
• 33:55
  I don't think there's a point where the Cybermen are ever not
• 33:59
  vulnerable. Yeah, in some way in the 10th
• 34:02
  planet. What happens there?
• 34:03
  They just. Fall to the floor.
• 34:04
  I mean, in the 10th planet they look particularly ropey, but
• 34:07
  that that it's a thing, it's an accident of design that Cybermen
• 34:10
  have always slightly looked like they're falling apart.
• 34:13
  Have you found? A beam gun at them, they die.
• 34:16
  They die, they die, they fall over.
• 34:17
  Basically all just go flying off into space.
• 34:19
  Gravity takes them out. Yeah, two of the Cybermen, they
• 34:23
  just get frozen again. We're in space.
• 34:26
  I think 2 of the Cybermen is where they are most kind of
• 34:30
  invulnerable, but they're on their home turf and they're
• 34:33
  fighting a pet, basically a group of unarmed chances.
• 34:36
  So yeah, the Cybermen are. Vulnerable, but all it takes is
• 34:39
  just to pull one lever and they're all frozen again.
• 34:42
  Yes, they're still alive though on them.
• 34:45
  Well, yeah, until some other stupid idiots come down.
• 34:48
  Yeah, when in space they just go flying off again.
• 34:50
  Then the gold comes in in revenge.
• 34:52
  Doesn't. It and then suddenly they they I
• 34:54
  mean by silver Nemesis, a child with the cast bolt can take them
• 34:59
  out so. Oh, I love those things though.
• 35:02
  I do exactly exactly. Well, yeah, I love it when, you
• 35:06
  know, when they're all lined up in the Five Doctors and that one
• 35:08
  vomits. The Rasta robot takes that's.
• 35:12
  That's when the Cybermen is one of life's great pleasures.
• 35:17
  And actually, although it makes no sense that Ace can take them
• 35:20
  all out with a caterpot and some coins, I love that scene.
• 35:23
  And and again, it's just what it's what kids want to see.
• 35:26
  There is a joyously dark moment in Attack of the Cybermen where
• 35:30
  a Cyberman is decapitated and then is still walking with his
• 35:35
  head in flames, going along like a chicken.
• 35:39
  But I think that's, I mean, I think that's deliberate.
• 35:41
  Whereas in Silver Nemesis the the their paranoia about gold is
• 35:45
  kind of laughable. That is very funny.
• 35:47
  The other one who's got the the sensor and he goes.
• 35:50
  Oh, gold, gold, and they and they all run away at gold.
• 35:55
  Oh bless. I'm sorry, there's just a few of
• 35:57
  us from James here. Does this story really mess
• 36:00
  things up for the 10th planet as no one seems to know what side
• 36:03
  men are? James.
• 36:05
  Now you got to stop worrying about continuity, James.
• 36:09
  I think that if I think that if Jerry Davis wasn't worried about
• 36:13
  continuity, we shouldn't let it trouble us too much.
• 36:16
  And. Finally, does this story kill
• 36:19
  zillions of people when everyone falls asleep at the wheel,
• 36:23
  planes drop out of the sky, etcetera?
• 36:25
  Oh yeah, I didn't think about that.
• 36:28
  Yeah, it does. Oh, wow.
• 36:31
  I mean the. Invasion, stroke, massacre.
• 36:36
  Yeah, it would have done, wouldn't it?
• 36:38
  People are going to die, you know, obviously people on life
• 36:40
  support that you know, it's there's always casualties in
• 36:44
  more. James the Doctor turned off a
• 36:45
  load of people on life support in the robot revolution.
• 36:48
  It's all the rage these days. It's true.
• 36:49
  It's true. It's true.
• 36:52
  OK, so we're basically saying yes, potentially this does
• 36:55
  weaken the Cybermen by making them cannon fodder. 2, we don't
• 36:59
  really care about continuity, and three, well, those people
• 37:03
  are going to die at some point anyway.
• 37:06
  Yeah. Yeah, I think that's what we're
• 37:08
  saying. OK, well I'm ready for a Bally
• 37:13
  big explosion and a ton of cyber actions in the last episode.
• 37:17
  And more importantly, there's some of bullshit.
• 37:20
  I'm ready to hear the end of what happened with Sally.
• 37:25
  We know what happens to her at the very.
• 37:26
  End well. At the very end she becomes a
• 37:28
  Cyberman. But.
• 37:29
  I'll never see that scene in the same way again.
• 37:33
  Neither will I. I think she's saying, talking
• 37:35
  about somebody called James, that she was engaged.
• 37:37
  To is that the wedding that she Sally all more tragic than.
• 37:47
  Poor Sally, honestly.