Latest / A Hamster With a Blunt Penknife - a Doctor Who Commentary podcast / Talks to the brilliant Robert Valentine about his choice of The Gunfighters (1/4)

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Talks to the brilliant Robert Valentine about his choice of The Gunfighters (1/4) · A Hamster With a Blunt Penknife - a Doctor Who Commentary podcast

• 0:23
  None hamster with a blump pen knife
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  for doing. Quicker, quicker, quicker with
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  rings on their fingers and bells.
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  Well, God knows Joe and Rob come to hamster in their fishnet
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  hoes. They'll write you a story or
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  show you their moon for whatever's in your wife, France,
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  in the hamster saloon. Welcome back to a hamster with a
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  Blunt Penknife, the Doctor Who Commentary Podcast.
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  Rob, I apologize for that. That was brilliant.
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  The wife runs. How are you today, Mr. Robert
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  Valentine? I am very well.
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  Thank you, Mr. Joe Ford. Yes, all good.
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  All good. I believe something momentous
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  happened today. Oh, you're thinking now, aren't
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  you? The start of a 60th epic.
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  Oh yes, yes, yes. Doctor Who Wants a Future began
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  today. So yes, I am.
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  My first episode came out this morning and I've kind of done my
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  best to kind of ignore Twitter as much as possible and just try
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  and carry on with work. But it does.
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  You know, when you have a release out.
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  Yeah, Twitter can bleep and bloop a bit, but.
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  You have to respond to this at all.
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  You know, I always think the first one's the best one to do.
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  You know, I think the first one gets the best sales.
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  I think Sarah's at times scored amazingly well for sales just
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  because it was the first main range release.
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  Yeah. I don't know how these those
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  things kind of add up, but I will be kind of paying close
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  attention to my royalty statements in a year or so I
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  think. I bought the whole bundle, so
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  it's much of A much oh. Excellent.
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  Excellent. Yeah.
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  Rob, why are we here today? We are here to talk about a
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  Doctor Who's story that you've never seen before.
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  Oh, oh, oh, oh. I thought we were here to
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  discuss the 1993 film Tombstone. Shit.
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  Yeah. So you've been watching this
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  week? Yeah, it's brilliant.
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  We can discuss that too. Maybe.
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  But we are. Genuine outside location
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  footage. It actually does, yes.
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  Yeah. And it's.
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  Yeah. But anyway, we, yeah, we know.
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  We are here to discuss a Doctor Who story I'd never ever seen
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  before the gunfighters. I know I had a message from you
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  after you watched episode one just saying you're really
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  psyched to do this, so I'm assuming this went down fairly
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  well. Oh, yeah, No, I I had a good
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  time with it. I had good.
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  I think it's one of those things that it's like like like like a
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  gunslinger in the Old West. It's reputation plural kind of
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  preceded it. So I was aware of it's kind of,
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  you know, 1980s fandom Rep as the worst piece of crap ever.
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  Then it kind of its resuscitated reputation kind of more from
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  the, you know, from the 90s and like, you know, the
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  discontinuity guide kind of period And then and then now
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  it's kind of burying to say it's brilliant.
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  So I was kind of, you know, I but I kind of thought, you know
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  what, I'm not going, I'm going, I'm just going to kind of throw
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  all my preconceptions to the wind and just watch it as if
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  it's just a thing I'm watching kind of live for the first time
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  on its initial broadcast and just take it for whatever it
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  turned out to be. I did, yeah, a contrary sort of
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  person. So when those opinions started
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  coming out in the house, Dammers and Walkers reference books of
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  the 1990s telling me this was awful one.
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  Like the lowest rated. It's not even the lowest rated
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  Doctor Who story by some margin as well.
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  I was like, well, I need to see this because I want to make up
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  my own mind. And the first time I watched it,
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  I just loved it. I I loved the sort of overt
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  comedy of it. I loved Harlow's performance in
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  it. I loved the the boldness of
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  daring to do a Western in a studio in a small BBC studio.
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  Yeah, I yeah. Without sort of doing anything
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  other than keeping my Houser dry, I I I see no problem with
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  doing that anyway because I think it just, you know, TV
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  programmes of the period, not British ones, but TV programmes
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  period would. But I I just kind of thought
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  that since there are now we've, you know, it's been around long
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  enough that there are hugely negative, hugely positive and
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  more middling opinions about it. I kind of felt liberated from my
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  own contrarian impulses because there are people who, you know,
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  across the spectrum who've got widely differing opinion
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  opinions on it. So yeah, so yeah, I I honestly,
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  just, I I I was kind of a kind of liberating to throw all that
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  stuff out the window and just watch the thing and yeah, just
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  to see what see what it actually was.
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  So thank you very much because it hadn't been for your
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  invitation. I wouldn't have.
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  I wouldn't have done it anytime soon.
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  Yeah, good in the world. There we go.
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  What I also, I put a question out to Twitter for people to ask
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  some questions and we've had about 22 people come at us.
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  So at the end of each episode, I'm going to throw a few your
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  way summer comments, a lot of other questions.
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  Oh, those kind of questions. This is, this is, this is more
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  of a there's a comment rather than a question.
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  But I shall, I shall continue to.
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  Yes, Yeah. Yeah.
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  What we will. We will find the question in
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  those as well. See what we can do with them,
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  yeah. The only person I let get away
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  with that is Lucy McCall because she just writes smart comments
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  about every story. So.
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  Well, Lucy's smarter than all of us, so that's that's allowed.
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  She is. She is.
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  Well, look, yeah, we should probably head into episode one.
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  I think the doctor's got a toothache, you know, I want to
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  finally get it seen to. That's a very, very good idea.
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  Honestly Speaking of somebody who has had an extreme toothache
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  recently, I empathize. Well, I've got a dental
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  appointment tomorrow at 11:30 actually, so it's kind of, you
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  know, yeah, just having a. Not in the Old West, I hope.
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  What? No Ascot, But, oh, Ascot.
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  Really so. That.
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  You know, they may be, they may There are horses, so you know.
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  They must be paying you well, Rob.
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  What's it? All right.
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  Well, Cal is in then. Five Well, that's a bit Thunder
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  but well, Shane Rimmers in this, it's OK 54321.
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  And hurrah, Rob can actually see what's on the screen.
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  It's. I can confirm the opening
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  credits are now playing. Yes, yes.
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  There you are. This is, I think this is a
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  really unusual first episode, you know?
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  Yeah, my first note I wrote was hugely experimental exclamation
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  mark, so that must been what I thought at the time the other
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  day or last week, but yeah. Well, from the off with the
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  ballad, so. Yeah, and a great.
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  Let's deal with that shall. We Yeah, yeah.
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  But also. And a great opening shot here on
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  Under Under the Wagon, the sign of the OK Corral, A holiday for
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  the Doctor Pun Pun title. You win points for a pun title.
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  Right. I always feel like, oh look, I'm
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  going to talk about the director in this one because I do think
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  he, he does a heroic effort in this story.
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  He's always creating a sense of space as much as he possibly
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  can. Huge foreground, background.
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  And then the horses come in and that this little slow pan
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  tombstone. OK Corral, OK stood for all the
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  old Kindersley corral. That's what it was is.
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  That right? Yeah, and here we have Here we
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  have. Here are the Pirates, a white
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  Neil Cowboy. Sorry, Sorry.
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  Yeah. Shit accents.
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  They sound like pirates. Oh, they're terrible, aren't.
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  They my brain can hardly take in the words as my note.
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  And to be honest, that's. Sorry, what's that fellow all
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  about with the weird tick? Who's like what?
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  Sounds that's just a stutter to give him character, which is
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  good, you know. Which is a nice little touch,
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  but yeah, and I I like they've got horses and you know.
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  I think, I think. That's sandy ground and sort.
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  Of Western St. backdrop as well I'm.
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  Totally fine with it. I'm totally fine with it.
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  The cameras take literally taking us off into another.
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  Yeah, yeah, I look. And this, this pan and with the
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  the branches in the foreground, livery and it's the livery and
• 9:12
  feed store. It's not too different from
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  Totters Lane scrap merchants, is it?
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  I think it's the same font you know.
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  Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then suddenly, this is a
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  great entrance. It's a fact.
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  This again, for someone who went to great lengths to say how much
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  of a shit I don't give about direction in Doctor Who.
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  This is beautifully directed. Yeah.
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  And and look at the knees on sand here, all the stuff in the
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  foreground. And throughout.
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  There. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
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  The production design on this. Really.
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  Yeah. Yeah, yeah.
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  The camera work, the production design.
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  I'm absolutely convinced when we go and that's saloon, you know,
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  up those stairs is absolutely nothing.
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  But he keeps doing shots over someone's shoulder coming down
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  the stairs. Yeah, and.
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  We've got a great high angle shot there on Stephen and Dodo.
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  But yeah, and also the the Doctor having toothache is just
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  such a great sort of inciting incident.
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  It's it's just modest and lightweight and so relatable.
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  You know the Doctor has a tooth cake.
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  Adventure ensues. You know and.
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  Boy, did I get some. Did I say tooth cake?
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  That must have been the fraud in slip.
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  I say all those scenes in Doc Holiday's dentist coming up.
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  It's just. Ghosts, yeah.
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  That, and I love it as well because Heart looks really
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  grumpy. Oh, here we have them.
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  High on the whole, they just love the fact that they're in
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  the Wild West. And that, and we'll come back to
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  that. But that's kind of what I think
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  this should be about. Perhaps more than it is.
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  But anyway, but here have the great Shane Rimmer.
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  But I, I, I I worked with him once.
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  Oh yeah, years ago on a on a on a an audio drama called the
• 10:48
  Mikey Carlins and which I which I produced.
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  But I got to hang out with him for a day and he's a really
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  lovely guy. Did he?
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  Tell you fabulous stories about his career.
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  No, we talked about plans for Christmas and if we were both
• 11:02
  ready for it yet, so is. But yeah, I got because he's
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  Canadian. He's one of the one of those
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  Canadian actors who made a lot of his career in the UK playing
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  Americans. Even his accent I'm not too sure
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  about in this, to be honest with you.
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  And that's get you an American amongst them.
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  Yes, there is Parklanton. He's he's the yeah, yeah, yeah,
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  yeah he and he's he's my. I think he's actually just the
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  least offensive in this. I love the fact they're dressed
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  up as fake cowboy and cowgirl because their idea of the Old
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  West is the the, the mythic, you know, the TVTV and movie
• 11:43
  westerns. What are the Cowboys mentioned
• 11:45
  as Calamity Jane, doesn't it? Yeah, yeah.
• 11:48
  Later on. But was Calamity Jane a real?
• 11:50
  Yes. Yeah, she was.
• 11:52
  Yeah, Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, she was.
• 11:54
  And have you, Have you. I take it you've never watched.
• 11:56
  You've never seen Deadwood. The the HBOTV series of Ian up.
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  Shane I. Heard it had massive acclaim.
• 12:02
  Oh my. It's one of my it's it's
• 12:04
  incredible that's certain Deadwood.
• 12:05
  And it's, you know, it's got Calamity Jane and while Bill
• 12:10
  Hickok and people like that in it.
• 12:14
  But we can, you know, I think we can, we can kind of talk about
• 12:17
  the the history of the OK Corral and the herbs and the Clantons
• 12:21
  and the Cowboys and all that and how, how close and how close
• 12:25
  this doesn't adhere to it. Oh, here.
• 12:27
  Here we have Wyatt Earp, who's just turned up.
• 12:29
  Wyatt Earp this is This is literally like a modern day
• 12:33
  celebrity. Historical now isn't it?
• 12:35
  She gets all all giggly about. Well, it it is because he he,
• 12:38
  you know, he is a an historical celebrity, you know.
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  Almost as much as Hartnell does later when he sees you know that
• 12:47
  is Stephen, that's Johnny Ringo. Yeah, yeah, we, yeah.
• 12:52
  I look forward to we can when we get to that, it'll be oh
• 12:56
  interesting as well, but you. Know some of the back story of
• 12:58
  all of this, like the genuine historical detail?
• 13:03
  Bring it on, because I don't know any of.
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  It, yeah, yeah. I mean, it's most of what I
• 13:08
  know, barring some kind of just light research kind of over the
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  years, is from films like Tombstone and Wireturp.
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  Tombstone, Kurt Russell plays wireturp and Val Kilmer plays
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  Doc Holiday in wireturp. It's Kevin Costner, I think.
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  Are you a big Western fan then? Yeah, but I tend not.
• 13:30
  Not, to be honest, not the kind of the the golden age of like
• 13:33
  John Ford and stuff like that. I like Sergio Leone and and
• 13:36
  Clint Eastwood dead. The Revisionist Westerns are
• 13:40
  kind of my my bag. You know, the grit, the kind of
• 13:43
  the gritty deconstructions I like.
• 13:49
  When you should use your recommendums.
• 13:50
  For me then, because I had a double whammy of when I did a
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  media study course, we did like it felt like half a year
• 13:57
  studying Westerns and I just found it agonising.
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  And but also my man used to put on westerns every Sunday.
• 14:05
  They always seemed to be a Western on a Sunday afternoon.
• 14:07
  Yeah, you the really the really tedious ones from the 50s.
• 14:10
  Shame. Yeah, yeah, I like, you know,
• 14:14
  ones like shame are good. They're just that.
• 14:17
  They are the ones that properly mythologised the West, and this
• 14:20
  is the kind of the mythologised West of the gunfighters.
• 14:25
  But the thing about this one is that you've got the the song
• 14:30
  throughout song by Linda Baron but that but the song does the
• 14:35
  mythologizing and and you've got Stephen and Dodo plugged into
• 14:42
  the kind of the the mythic idea of the cowboy and then the rest
• 14:45
  of the story. I kind of think, you know, I
• 14:47
  think if I was going to start tweaking this and if I start and
• 14:51
  one of my instincts to tweak coming, it usually means that
• 14:53
  I'm not totally sold on what I'm watching.
• 14:57
  I kind of think it should have been more about the the myth and
• 15:00
  the reality of the Old West and kind of like, OK, I imagine you
• 15:06
  haven't seen it that the Clint Eastwood movie Unforgiven, which
• 15:09
  is very much a film about the myth versus the reality on here.
• 15:13
  Here we have Doc Holiday. He did actually have a a doctor
• 15:18
  in. He was actually a he did.
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  He was a dentist. He's qualified.
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  OK. But he was about 30 years old at
• 15:25
  the time of the OK Corral. But they made him an old geezer
• 15:29
  here so that he and the Doctor can be mistaken for each other.
• 15:34
  Yeah, but the whole idea of having the The Doctor muddled up
• 15:39
  with Doc Holiday is just most wonderful.
• 15:42
  Wonderful because and isn't William Hartnell shot.
• 15:45
  This is one I think this is Pete Hartnell.
• 15:48
  He is so great in this he. Wanted to do a Western.
• 15:52
  Yes, yeah. Yeah.
• 15:52
  Yeah. Tested.
• 15:53
  In this story and. He and he's It's so odd in this
• 15:56
  he he's kind of utterly clueless and gullible and naive one
• 16:01
  minute but then but then he he he he knows about Johnny Ringo.
• 16:05
  So what he knows and doesn't know about this period is very,
• 16:08
  very fuzzy and I haven't done a close enough watch to figure out
• 16:13
  that's a floor or not. Where he walks into the bar.
• 16:16
  Oh, it's so funny. And he's like, oh, hello
• 16:19
  gentlemen, You know I'm here. Yes.
• 16:21
  And they all think he's Doc Holiday and he's just like, you
• 16:23
  know, being as charming as hell. And then they go, oh, we're the
• 16:26
  Clanton brother, he goes, the Clanton brothers, Oh God, like.
• 16:29
  Yeah, yeah. So he knows who, he knows who
• 16:31
  the Clanton brothers are. And yet he's.
• 16:32
  Yeah, I love the fact, you know, but you know Doc, Doc Holiday,
• 16:35
  it, you know, it's neat. It's it's it's one a mistake in
• 16:38
  a maker, you know? Look at that perspective set.
• 16:42
  I do. Do you know?
• 16:43
  What it's. Great drops to the back, the
• 16:46
  people that paint those backcloths.
• 16:47
  Because, you know, we kind of know his artifice, but it sells
• 16:51
  it to me. Yeah, but it's television of
• 16:53
  course. It's artifice.
• 16:54
  We, you know it's just suspend that disbelief.
• 16:57
  But also I I, you know, I've, I've, I've come across reviews
• 17:01
  complaining about you know the BBC trying to do a Western.
• 17:04
  I think what they are doing a Western is great.
• 17:07
  It's the thing that kills this stone dead with the accents
• 17:10
  that's you know. So I've been trying to do the
• 17:14
  thought exercise of what if they cast Americans in this
• 17:20
  throughout what what if, what if the accent thing was not a
• 17:23
  problem and try and engage with it on those.
• 17:26
  I find it difficult, but I think it it deserves me.
• 17:29
  Trying to get over my hard time with the accents do.
• 17:32
  You know what? Why the accents don't bother me
• 17:35
  as much. And trust me, I do notice.
• 17:38
  I love that is, you know, it's really cold.
• 17:41
  It's the fact that it's a comedy.
• 17:43
  I think if it was being presented as a drama, I might
• 17:45
  have a bit more of an issue, but everyone's sort of a bit
• 17:47
  heightened. Yeah, yeah, I I I can accept
• 17:52
  that doesn't work for me, But I do think Stephen's been Stephen
• 17:55
  is brilliant in this. And Purvis hated this script, so
• 18:00
  props to him for giving it as much as he does.
• 18:03
  He was apparently he was He felt humiliated by this script where
• 18:06
  he had to sing and be really silly and dress up silly.
• 18:09
  And he's since gone back and watched it and said wow, I was
• 18:12
  wrong, this is really good. I I do kind of think it might.
• 18:15
  It could use a little bit of fine tuning just just in terms
• 18:18
  of the internal logic with him because I love the idea of
• 18:21
  Stephen just been going in really, really keen to
• 18:23
  experience the Old West and quickly getting in over his
• 18:26
  head. But and also the choosing when
• 18:29
  and when to not put on his cod accent because he is totally
• 18:32
  allowed and it's absolutely right, right for him to have a
• 18:35
  comically poor accent in this. But, but I kind of think just a
• 18:42
  little more suspense, a little more threat wouldn't have hurt
• 18:46
  too much. Well, that's what I mean this
• 18:49
  and the myth makers as well. What I like about those comedies
• 18:54
  is they do have a bit of a bite. I actually think Romans has that
• 18:58
  as well. It's just as you start getting
• 19:00
  comfortable with the comedy, the poor barman shot dead, you know,
• 19:04
  in Charles. Blanche But look at the set.
• 19:06
  This is great. This is great stuff.
• 19:08
  You know, a couple of extras walking in the back.
• 19:09
  It sells, it sells it completely to me.
• 19:11
  I just kind of think a criticism of, you know, the scenery in the
• 19:16
  production is churlish, quite honestly.
• 19:20
  I think I do really nice things with the lighting as well,
• 19:23
  because there's certain things that are at night and it's and
• 19:27
  that all convinced as well. I just think visually it worked
• 19:30
  to me. All of it.
• 19:31
  Yeah, yeah. Anyway, I can't look at the sets
• 19:34
  and all the extras because this three.
• 19:36
  I think this is this three at their best.
• 19:39
  I don't know how much it's. I I love the giant tooth.
• 19:43
  I don't. Know the form of advertising,
• 19:46
  you know Rob. And then he goes, I think I'm
• 19:49
  feeling better. Yes, don't worry.
• 19:50
  Let's go. I mean another note around here
• 19:52
  that Time Lords, not that he is 1 yet because they have been
• 19:55
  invented, have tonsils. So there you go.
• 19:59
  OK, yes. Oh, he does have that line,
• 20:01
  doesn't he? Yes.
• 20:02
  Yeah, I didn't have to have my tonsils out.
• 20:06
  I mean, Hartnell's kind of cut his chops on a lot of comedy,
• 20:09
  hasn't he? So he knows how to live a life.
• 20:11
  Oh yeah, and this is just, it's just a really.
• 20:13
  The whole thing is based on just on the comic conceit of the
• 20:16
  doctor needs a dentist. So why?
• 20:19
  If you if you need urgent dental care, why?
• 20:22
  Why why would you go to 1881 tombstone?
• 20:28
  But hey, he has, so yeah, oh. This said to the doctor, in the
• 20:31
  doctor's Wi-Fi, I always took you where you needed to be, all
• 20:34
  right. This is true.
• 20:36
  This is true. Oh.
• 20:37
  I love this where they're canoodling on the chair.
• 20:39
  I mean, you didn't say this in the 60s.
• 20:41
  Home very often. No, it's.
• 20:44
  And it's also interesting that at this point at least Doc
• 20:47
  Holiday is a villain. He is.
• 20:51
  He's playing the the role of a bad guy essentially in this he's
• 20:55
  you know he's he's he's the foil, he's the heel sort of
• 20:59
  I've. Never in time shot.
• 21:01
  I think it's Anthony Jacobs, isn't it?
• 21:03
  Who plays him? And I think that's a great
• 21:06
  performance as well. He he, Yeah, he's one of my
• 21:09
  favourites in this. His accent, I can forgive.
• 21:14
  I think he's he's actually pretty good.
• 21:15
  Yeah. I just can't think if they if
• 21:18
  even if like two or three of the worst offenders of the Clanton
• 21:22
  gang were. Marginally better.
• 21:25
  Marginally better. I'd have an easier time.
• 21:28
  I mean, what about Linda Baron? You know, yes, yeah.
• 21:32
  And and, yeah, Sheena Marsh's Kate.
• 21:34
  Unfortunately, again, it's I kind of think, you know, was
• 21:39
  there not one American actress they could have found in Greater
• 21:45
  London to play the part, you know?
• 21:48
  Probably didn't even look, did I hear?
• 21:50
  Well, no, no but accent. Right, you're in.
• 21:52
  But, but, you know, to be honest, we could discuss that
• 21:54
  for the whole run of it. And, you know, I'm just trying
• 21:57
  to get past that particular hurdle, you know?
• 22:02
  Oh, I love this. Oh, dear.
• 22:03
  I never touched charcoal. Well, I do.
• 22:04
  Yeah. There are just some.
• 22:06
  It's. Yeah, there's.
• 22:07
  I could crack you over the cranium.
• 22:09
  Yeah, there's just some really good holiday in this.
• 22:11
  I mean, one of my notices. Yeah, Doc, holidays are right.
• 22:14
  Bastard in this. Oh my God, this shot as well.
• 22:20
  On this shot. Yeah, yeah.
• 22:22
  It's it's precise. It's thanks to really you know,
• 22:25
  like Richard Herndel and like we've we've, you know, the whole
• 22:27
  memory of the Doctor beat the 1st Doctor being this funny, you
• 22:32
  know, it's so easy to forget. Oh, I think he's misremembered,
• 22:35
  though, because I. Think Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 22:37
  Yeah, and David Bradley in Twice Upon a Time and very
• 22:41
  curmudgeonly and I don't track, Sorry.
• 22:44
  Hartnell can, he can do a bit of that, but I think kind of wanted
• 22:47
  to play comedy and if you look at sort of Season 2 onwards, he
• 22:51
  does it as much as he possibly can.
• 22:53
  He grabs at those moments. Yeah, another great high angle
• 22:58
  shot here. He's.
• 23:01
  I mean, do you know the one at the line I quote most of all as
• 23:04
  I choose in the? Bottles.
• 23:05
  I go, I'm sorry, but I don't touch alcohol.
• 23:08
  But you know, a little glass of milk and I'll be too delighted.
• 23:11
  You know, he's great. Oh, and please, can we talk
• 23:16
  about Dodo, the much maligned Dodo?
• 23:21
  She's good in this. She's she.
• 23:22
  Is great in this. I mean, I don't think the
• 23:25
  performance. I don't think she's ever given a
• 23:26
  particularly stunning performance, but her enthusiasm
• 23:31
  carries. It I love that I I I adore the
• 23:34
  jump scare just then. When he comes up behind the bar.
• 23:39
  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 23:40
  That that that actually got me and I I I I had a that made me
• 23:44
  actually laugh. There's a very odd bit now where
• 23:48
  Dodo gets in a huff. Do you remember where Stephen's
• 23:51
  like, why don't she goes, why don't you have a good time with
• 23:54
  your friends down here? She goes stomping off.
• 23:58
  Yes, yeah, it says behind. It says no shooting in the
• 24:01
  saloon behind them, which is just for an historical accuracy
• 24:06
  thing. And I know that you know we
• 24:08
  there isn't a huge amount in this, but Tombstone was a no gun
• 24:13
  town. Oh.
• 24:15
  Yeah. And that's that's kind of the
• 24:17
  point. That's kind of, you know, that
• 24:19
  was sort of, I think part part of the pretext of the the
• 24:21
  gunfight that'll be OK Corral it was about.
• 24:25
  Law enforcement officers are not doing their job particularly
• 24:28
  well in this story, then. Yeah.
• 24:30
  But it's not just, you know, there's no shooting in the
• 24:31
  saloon because there shouldn't be any guns.
• 24:34
  They should, you know, they should be handed over to the
• 24:36
  Sheriff's Office, if I recall correctly.
• 24:39
  And any historians who really know the stuff, who know I'm
• 24:41
  wrong, forgive me, but, you know, Yeah, but I'm pretty sure
• 24:45
  it was a given that, you know, you were, you were not meant to
• 24:48
  be carrying in town. That's kind.
• 24:52
  That's kind of the point. Who's playing Charlie the
• 24:55
  Barman? Oh, it's.
• 24:57
  I've got it written down somewhere, but I don't know off
• 24:59
  the top of my head. David Graham.
• 25:02
  I I was looking. I was was looking them all up
• 25:05
  the other day just to see who who you know.
• 25:07
  Just to confirm that they weren't you know that they're
• 25:10
  mostly English. One of them's a Scott.
• 25:15
  What I'm saying is Canadian and it's only when.
• 25:21
  Oh, de Ruon, what's his name? Reed.
• 25:23
  Yeah. Reed is it.
• 25:24
  Reed. De Ruon is that.
• 25:25
  If that's how De Ruon is pronounced.
• 25:27
  But it's par Clanton. He's the only American, I think,
• 25:30
  in the cast. So that is David Graham playing
• 25:33
  Charlie the Barman who was Gordon Tracy and Brains in
• 25:39
  Thunderbirds. Oh, yes, that's right.
• 25:41
  That's right. Yes, we've got, yeah.
• 25:44
  He'd voiced Daleks as well, and he plays Kerensky in City of
• 25:48
  Death. Oh my God.
• 25:53
  Oh, here's the Doctor. The Doctor, charmingly
• 25:56
  vulnerable, having had his molar yanked out without anaesthetic.
• 26:02
  You know, you said about that tooth outside the dentist.
• 26:06
  Yeah, yeah. Shane, Room is standing under it
• 26:08
  right now. Yes.
• 26:09
  I work in a supermarket, you know, and there's an enormous,
• 26:12
  enormous butter about a fat session.
• 26:16
  All right, so it's not too far from the truth.
• 26:21
  See, I love that perspective shot out the window.
• 26:23
  I love that holiday. Yes, I suppose so.
• 26:26
  This. This.
• 26:26
  Yeah, this little in case a mistake, an identity.
• 26:30
  Go on here. It's just comedy gold and the
• 26:33
  fact that the doc, the 1st Doctor is just he's fought.
• 26:35
  I don't like calling him the 1st Doctor because I think it's just
• 26:39
  surprised how comic he is. It's great.
• 26:42
  You know I happen to kind of rely on myself.
• 26:43
  But yeah it's yeah, it's just so funny.
• 26:46
  This is all hugely delightful stuff.
• 26:49
  It's it's got not much relation to the events but who really
• 26:58
  care. You know how much of Doctor Who
• 26:59
  legitimately does. For my taste I would have we all
• 27:03
  will go into it as we go or answer any questions that come.
• 27:06
  For my taste, I'm always happier because I like writing, you
• 27:09
  know, historical fiction or you know as well as, you know as you
• 27:15
  know sci-fi fancy. But I I, I always think history
• 27:19
  history is there to kind of, you know, surprise you with.
• 27:21
  The actuality is is usually more in interesting and surprising
• 27:26
  than stuff you could come up with.
• 27:28
  And yeah, I'm just a little, you know, I think they could have
• 27:31
  honed closer to the actual events to their dramatic
• 27:35
  advantage, but that will come up as we go I think.
• 27:38
  Whereas instead they're just having a bit of a log.
• 27:41
  Oh yeah. But I think in, in, in, I think
• 27:43
  you have have the lark against the backdrop of just just have a
• 27:48
  bit more of an illusion of authenticity about it.
• 27:51
  But I love the fact you know, the 1st Doctor is now looking
• 27:54
  totally at home and in keeping in his usual clothes and Doc
• 27:58
  Holiday's Stetson with his toothache and and Doc's gun I
• 28:06
  think. You notice that toothache just
• 28:08
  vanishes. Now it's no longer relevant.
• 28:12
  Well, it's all bit it's been dealt with now.
• 28:14
  Yeah. OK yeah.
• 28:14
  Now, yeah. So Seth Harper has gone and told
• 28:16
  the Clanton brothers he's found Doc Holiday and I'll be here in
• 28:19
  5 minutes. So bit of a criticism coming up
• 28:23
  but we've just set a ticking clock at the Doc Holiday is
• 28:26
  going to walk through that door in 5 minutes.
• 28:28
  So that's, you know, our, you know, our Hitchcockian suspense
• 28:33
  block has been set in motion, and now we have, in the context
• 28:37
  of that suspense that's just been set up.
• 28:39
  We have Stephen and Dodo at the mercy of the Clantons, being
• 28:44
  forced to entertain them at gunpoint.
• 28:47
  So this is all really great tense but comic stuff and I love
• 28:50
  it. Funny, the way the gun goes,
• 28:52
  Dodo screams. It's still really and this is a
• 28:55
  really unusual cliffhanger as well.
• 28:57
  Where they're singing and playing the piano and he's just
• 29:01
  walking towards his dude. Yeah, look with looking at,
• 29:04
  looking at the gun in his hand with just bemusement.
• 29:07
  But utterly unknowing as the fate that was about to before
• 29:11
  him. Yeah, exactly, exactly.
• 29:14
  And it's just the Doctor wandering towards danger with
• 29:17
  his handkerchief to his mouth and Doc called his hat on.
• 29:20
  It's just a great image, Yeah, it's just, it's just really
• 29:23
  great stuff is. It the only Doctor Who episode
• 29:26
  that ends on a song. Probably.
• 29:29
  Yeah, yeah, yeah. And you just see, when the duck
• 29:31
  comes through the door, blast him.
• 29:33
  So this is all, this is all classic Hitchcock suspense
• 29:36
  stuff. There's a metaphorical bomb
• 29:38
  under the table while all this singing is going on.
• 29:42
  And it's yeah, I love all this. This stuff just works.
• 29:45
  But then isn't that sort of undermined in episode 2 then
• 29:47
  when he walks in the door and they don't just shoot him?
• 29:50
  It's undermined in a few seconds before the cliffhanger ends.
• 29:52
  So yeah, it's this is, this is my problem with the end of the
• 29:55
  episode. And I think we just with with a
• 29:57
  tiny bit of surgery, this whole thing could have been elevated.
• 30:02
  What's undermining it now then? Well, OK, next episode, don't
• 30:06
  shoot the pianist. And so Stephen's singing and we
• 30:09
  sort and with and we just sort of fade to black.
• 30:12
  What I think should have happened.
• 30:15
  The Doctor walks through the door, through the swing doors.
• 30:18
  They turn and fire. End of episode.
• 30:21
  Oh, yes, yeah, yeah, yeah, a bit like.
• 30:24
  Everything. Everything in that scene has
• 30:27
  been promised. And then building up to that
• 30:30
  moment and the fact that that isn't the cliffhanger.
• 30:34
  Keep in mind I've watched, only watched this for the first time
• 30:37
  the other day. I don't that was fully set up
• 30:41
  and I don't understand how that was then not the cliffhanger.
• 30:46
  Yeah, you know the couple of times when they did actually do
• 30:48
  that in Doctor Who, do you remember the war games episode
• 30:52
  one, which is Doctor? And they're all literally,
• 30:56
  they've all got guns on him. And then the gun goes off and
• 30:59
  it's like they're close up on on Trout's face as if he's been
• 31:02
  shot in the stomach. And the same thing happens in
• 31:04
  case of Angelani episode one, where the Doctor and Perry have
• 31:07
  marched out and then. And riddled and then.
• 31:10
  She'll go off. Yeah, you're right.
• 31:12
  I just. Kind of think, you know, but
• 31:14
  then all that needed to happen was then, you know the the
• 31:16
  Doctor's brand new steps and flies off.
• 31:18
  You know, nothing, nothing, You know, keep keep the cliffhanger
• 31:21
  resolution comic. But I just think just in the
• 31:24
  terms of the dramatic shape of the episode and what was been
• 31:26
  set up in that scene, I just think a bit of mild parallel for
• 31:30
  the cliffhanger would have just made the thing better.
• 31:32
  Oh. Yeah, because if you are going
• 31:34
  to fire that gun at the end of the episode, then the resolution
• 31:38
  is, boy, it's very nature. This is Doctor Who.
• 31:40
  We're not going to kill the Doctor, so.
• 31:43
  And we've already established the light comic tone of this.
• 31:45
  So just shoot his hat off, you know, man.
• 31:48
  Well, I wish you had scripted it in this, you know.
• 31:51
  It's a few years too late. But OK, but that doesn't spoil
• 31:56
  at all the fact that that is a charming episode one.
• 32:00
  Oh no, it's it's AI loved it. I loved it.
• 32:03
  Just getting past the accents. Everything else I think.
• 32:07
  No that Oh yeah I'm I'm sold on this.
• 32:09
  I'm sold on this. We've got we don't yet know or
• 32:12
  the Doctor doesn't seem to have twigged yet precisely when they
• 32:18
  are and what this is all leading to.
• 32:21
  Which is fine, but I think. He is about to very soon.
• 32:23
  He needs to find out soon. Yes.
• 32:25
  Yeah, Rob. That bit where he's got them up
• 32:28
  against the bar with the gun and it goes to Kate, how do we
• 32:31
  proceed? He hasn't got a clue what he's
• 32:35
  supposed to be doing. All right.
• 32:36
  Well, I'm going to hit you with a couple of questions.
• 32:38
  Oh, yes. Lovely, lovely, lovely.
• 32:39
  OK, so they marvellous fellow big Finnish writer Johnny
• 32:43
  Morris. Oh.
• 32:44
  Johnny Morris. How important is it?
• 32:47
  Oh, this. You talked about this in episode
• 32:49
  one. How important is it for Doctor
• 32:51
  Who to follow the facts when it comes to historical stories?
• 32:57
  Great question. I'm happier when it does.
• 33:01
  There's, you know, all historical fiction is to a
• 33:05
  degree unfaithful by by necessity of the needs of drama.
• 33:10
  But I kind of think the closer you can follow the facts or
• 33:17
  popular beliefs about the thing or the OR the myth or whatever,
• 33:22
  the better. I mean, Robot of Sherwood drives
• 33:25
  me up the fucking wall. It draws me.
• 33:28
  Out of the wall, but it's nothing to do with historical
• 33:30
  accuracy. Oh no, no, because it's it's
• 33:35
  it's a twenty 20th central 20th century Michael Curtis idea of
• 33:40
  Robin Hood. And then saying that no, this
• 33:43
  is, this is actually what it was like in 12th century.
• 33:46
  It's like, well, no because we we we know that it was nothing
• 33:50
  like this because a bit essentially it's you know it's
• 33:53
  it's an Ivanhoe rip off it's it's so it's yeah.
• 33:56
  So anyway, I digress slightly, but.
• 33:59
  If you think the historical atmosphere is best, then what's
• 34:01
  the best example of that? I always think what within It's
• 34:10
  a bit skewered and romanticized history in Doctor Who.
• 34:14
  Oh no. But in anything in all
• 34:16
  historical fiction, by by its nature, it kind of has to be.
• 34:19
  It's unavoidable, but it's just that you know, it's just like
• 34:22
  just if you do, if you do your research and just keep it, stick
• 34:26
  it to the gun, keep it to the gunfighters.
• 34:29
  I think a little bit more historical accuracy would have
• 34:31
  given more momentum and impetus to the whole thing.
• 34:36
  Because if we actually, if across the story, this story for
• 34:39
  example, we got more of the actual build up to the gunfight
• 34:44
  at the OK Corral, the events that led up to it and the
• 34:47
  doctors kind of aware of them and Oh yeah, this is all this is
• 34:52
  all this is all leading towards the gunfight at the OK Corral.
• 34:56
  Then you've got just loads of built in suspense and momentum
• 34:59
  that we don't that the story doesn't have.
• 35:03
  And also just on a purely kind of Arethian level, you know the
• 35:08
  the whole thing to educate and entertain.
• 35:12
  If we just like you know, just it's a ladybird book level.
• 35:14
  You know, if we just learnt, you know, like the Ladybird book
• 35:17
  version of Gunfight of the OK Corral from the story, then I
• 35:21
  think you know, it would have been better than it is.
• 35:24
  Is it a problem, then, that I don't know any of the detail of
• 35:29
  the gunfire of the OK Corral? I've watched this.
• 35:31
  Yeah, well, that's that's my point I.
• 35:32
  Figure this is how it happened. Yeah, but that's that's kind of
• 35:36
  the point, is that this, I think on some level, as well as being
• 35:39
  a funny romp, it could have been just a nice little primer on the
• 35:45
  basics of the the actual gunfight of the OK Corral.
• 35:49
  I know what you mean about the suspense, because that's
• 35:51
  basically what happens in The Massacre episode 4, where we're
• 35:54
  heading towards as a much more obscure historical moment.
• 35:57
  But we're heading towards that massacre and the Doctor comes
• 36:01
  dashing in and he's like, we've got to get out of here now,
• 36:04
  like, and then there's real suspense in them getting away
• 36:07
  from sort of mass murder. Yeah, and there's there's none
• 36:10
  of that in this sort. Of sits around at a table going
• 36:13
  well, I do hope they're going to be OK, and that's not fine, you
• 36:16
  know? Yeah, exactly, exactly.
• 36:18
  So just because I I like historical fiction, I kind of
• 36:22
  think, I mean you know if you watch a piece of historical
• 36:25
  fiction, you know it's not the truth.
• 36:28
  Big T you know it's, you know, it's it's an illusory thing.
• 36:34
  The whole based on a true story is the biggest lie you can tell
• 36:37
  in fiction. However, the more historical
• 36:41
  fact you can use, it's just it makes for a more interesting
• 36:44
  story regardless, because you know it's it's more educational,
• 36:47
  but also it's just historical events tend to be more
• 36:51
  interesting and surprising than the generic stuff you come up
• 36:55
  with if you're just aping the generic idea of a Western.
• 36:59
  So that's. A typically smart answer from
• 37:03
  you. Sorry.
• 37:05
  It's a. It was an intelligent question.
• 37:07
  So it was a. It's a.
• 37:08
  Smart bloke, isn't he? It's a sake git as well.
• 37:11
  Some of the questions he threw at Toby Haydock?
• 37:13
  Honestly, he's coming. Fuck off Darren Lick Roundles
• 37:19
  has asked 4 questions, so I'm going to do this in sort of
• 37:21
  quick succession. Or I'll try and answer it in the
• 37:23
  same spirit. Is this Dodo's best story?
• 37:30
  Don't know because I haven't seen all of them, but it's good,
• 37:32
  yeah. I've seen, I've seen what's
• 37:34
  available, and I've heard the soundtracks of what's not.
• 37:37
  It's by far her best story. Oh, lovely.
• 37:40
  Good. There we go.
• 37:41
  That's that sorted. Was director Rex Tucker right to
• 37:44
  add more verses to the ballad than cotton supplies?
• 37:49
  It largely works, I think. I think it works.
• 37:52
  That's. Really.
• 37:53
  Yeah. Would you have preferred a more
• 37:57
  conventional soundtrack, such as a score?
• 38:01
  No no, I I all I think is I would have preferred if the the
• 38:10
  what we what we see occur undercuts what we hear in the
• 38:14
  song a bit songs in the musical bits a bit more If there'd been
• 38:18
  a bit more dissonance between the yeah, what happens in the
• 38:22
  song which is the myth versus the grubby nasty reality which
• 38:29
  is the gunfighter. The OK Corral.
• 38:31
  Yeah. Like yeah.
• 38:32
  I mean, Unforgiven, the Clint Eastwood film basically, very
• 38:35
  briefly. The whole movie goes at lengths
• 38:39
  to it's got a character who's he's a he's a biographer of, you
• 38:44
  know, and he's a he's a he's a sort of a, he's a hack writer
• 38:47
  who writes these penny dreadfuls, essentially these
• 38:49
  chat chat book things about heroes of the Old West.
• 38:52
  He's following this cowboy played by Richard Harris called
• 38:54
  English Bob who's you know who's feeding in bullshit about you
• 38:58
  know the myths of the Old West. And then he gets then he then he
• 39:01
  falls in with the the sheriff of this town played by Gene Hackman
• 39:05
  who kind of dispels all those of these myths and you know and
• 39:08
  then Clint Eastwood comes along at the end and the whole movie
• 39:10
  is dispelling all these bullshit myths of the Old West, only for
• 39:13
  Clint Eastwood to kind of walk out at the end of the film being
• 39:16
  just as big and bad and dreadful as all the was.
• 39:20
  All the myths kind of said he was or not.
• 39:23
  So it's great. So all I can think I, I I I'm
• 39:28
  definitely team song on this and it works as Greek chorus it's
• 39:33
  fantastic. I would do, I would, I would
• 39:35
  have been more delighted if the yeah, if they'd just been a gap
• 39:40
  between what the songs what is mortalizing it's.
• 39:44
  Spelling out what's on the screen, isn't it?
• 39:46
  Yeah, when it should be spelling out what people remember.
• 39:50
  But we're seeing the the ugly truth.
• 39:52
  I think that would have been just that.
• 39:54
  That, for me, would have made this a masterpiece.
• 39:56
  You. Know Khan's a smart writer as
• 39:59
  well, so he could have done that justice, I think as well.
• 40:03
  Yes, yeah, yeah. Yeah.
• 40:04
  OK. And finally, would you buy a
• 40:06
  dance remix of the ballads? No, I.
• 40:12
  Would I'll tell you something. You're right.
• 40:14
  I it's this, the ballads on on the 50th soundtrack, right.
• 40:18
  So I ripped it off and put it on as my my ringtone for a short
• 40:25
  while and I've got and I was on a bloody train and my phone went
• 40:29
  off and fill up your glasses. I was like, Oh my God, where's
• 40:34
  my fucking? Phone.
• 40:35
  Oh, my phone. See, my phone lives on.
• 40:37
  Silence. I haven't heard my phone ring in
• 40:39
  years. OK, I'll turn.
• 40:42
  If I turn it face down the world, you know I'm dead to the
• 40:44
  world, basically. Because we have got 22 here, I'm
• 40:47
  going to go to somebody else very quickly.
• 40:49
  Yeah, sure, sure, sure. James H asks oh similar
• 40:53
  question. Does it matter if this if the
• 40:54
  show isn't remotely historically accurate?
• 40:57
  Kind of answer that one. Or does it matter?
• 41:01
  Doesn't matter. But I, I, I I would find it more
• 41:04
  stimulating if we learnt a bit more, just got the York notes of
• 41:09
  the actual some fight in the background of it all.
• 41:13
  And of which I hope you're going to spell out a little bit as we
• 41:16
  get there. Oh, a little bit.
• 41:18
  Not too much, you know. We'll turn this into a lecture.
• 41:21
  Come on. Secondly, he asked.
• 41:23
  Is this Hartnell's best comedic performance?
• 41:27
  What has something you've seen? Seen a handful?
• 41:31
  He's I again, it comes back to the old is this the best?
• 41:35
  How would how many after 10 would you rate this?
• 41:37
  It's like, I don't like it's no, it's it's fucking brilliant.
• 41:43
  How about that? His most overt comic performance
• 41:45
  is in the Romans. Yes, yeah, yeah.
• 41:49
  But that. Idea pass through and through
• 41:51
  and he's loving it. He he's great in this.
• 41:53
  I love the conceit of the only reason there is because he's got
• 41:56
  toothache and actually he and has a whole molar pulled out do.
• 42:04
  You notice that? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
• 42:06
  yeah. He's deliberately chosen to go
• 42:09
  to a point in human history, pre penicillin dental help, you
• 42:15
  know. And Comet wise, damn, I love it.
• 42:19
  Definitely not the flop we were told it was by certain Uber
• 42:22
  fans. Well, we're in agreement there.
• 42:24
  Correct, because certain Uber fans are clearly joyless tusks.
• 42:30
  One more Daniel Nye the ballad Genius storytelling device or
• 42:34
  hideous earworm? Genius storytelling device That
• 42:40
  could have been more genius if the dramatised bits showed us
• 42:48
  something different from the from what the lyrics told us.
• 42:51
  Yeah, yeah. Well, that was episode one, Rob.
• 42:56
  This is this is fun, isn't it? As an aside, this is this is a
• 42:59
  fun thing to do. Anyway, Yes, it's.
• 43:01
  A fun thing to do. Well, as you say that thank you
• 43:04
  very much. Don't quite know what to do with
• 43:07
  a compliment, except say let's go and watch episode 2.
• 43:10
  Plan.