Latest / A Hamster With a Blunt Penknife - a Doctor Who Commentary podcast / Talks to James Lark about his choice of The Invasion (2/8)

Transcript

Talks to James Lark about his choice of The Invasion (2/8) · A Hamster With a Blunt Penknife - a Doctor Who Commentary podcast

• 0:23
  Welcome back to a Hamster with a blunt pen Knife, the Doctor Who
• 0:30
  commentary podcast. Not, not just any the one, the
• 0:35
  one that you're listening to. Now, at any rate, there are
• 0:37
  others, but don't go listen to those because I am here with the
• 0:41
  the one and only, the great, the beloved Joe Ford.
• 0:45
  Beloved, who have you been talking to?
• 0:49
  Tolerate it more like. Thank you.
• 0:54
  That was just on the right side of respectful that intro there.
• 0:57
  Yeah, I'm sticking with respectful for now.
• 1:00
  Have you heard Luke Lloyd doing it?
• 1:01
  He's somewhere over there, I felt.
• 1:05
  I could see you tightening your belt and I felt that I didn't
• 1:09
  want to overstep the mark. Well, no, to be honest with you,
• 1:14
  ever since that girl I've never tightened my belt since.
• 1:17
  That's the cause of a lot of problems.
• 1:19
  But before we head down that rabbit hole, why are we here?
• 1:23
  We're here. We're, we're, we're very much
• 1:25
  enjoying the Doctor Who story, the invasion, the baptism of
• 1:31
  fire for UNIT, who I believe we're about to get introduced to
• 1:36
  in Episode 2. It's like this, this is like a
• 1:39
  four hours, well, about 3 1/2 hours.
• 1:40
  I think the overall run is time is there's so many talking
• 1:43
  points this we ain't even covered.
• 1:45
  Canfield, Harper, any, any of them.
• 1:47
  Yeah. And, and, and I think fair to
• 1:51
  say, one of Patrick Charlton's strongest outings.
• 1:54
  Did it, did it win strictly for this season?
• 1:57
  That was that was the war games, wasn't it?
• 1:58
  Yeah, OK, tough. Which is another strong.
• 2:00
  Yeah, yeah, absolutely. For me, there's a three-way win
• 2:03
  in this season. I love the mine robot, I love
• 2:05
  the invasion, I love the war games, so that's a tough call
• 2:08
  for me. 100% strong agree with all of those, but the invasion
• 2:12
  has got an it's probably the most consistent of the three.
• 2:16
  It's got an atmosphere all of its own and it's and it's the
• 2:20
  one that we're going to talk about Derek Sharon some more.
• 2:23
  I think it's the one it's his vision for the show.
• 2:25
  It's the purest version of that we get probably ever.
• 2:31
  Because I think even as even in season 7, we get hints at the
• 2:36
  the new radically different direction it's going to go in a
• 2:40
  year later. Whereas here he really is doing,
• 2:44
  as you say, spy fi. He's doing really kind of hard
• 2:49
  military stuff and an element of espionage and then some quite
• 2:56
  restrained science fiction ideas just dripped in there and.
• 3:01
  Some button comedy as well. A lot of that A.
• 3:05
  Drip of the swinging 60s in there.
• 3:07
  Absolutely. Big difference between this and
• 3:09
  seven. 7 is very clinical. It's very cold.
• 3:13
  I mean there are funny moments in it, but it ain't laugh a
• 3:16
  minute. Whereas this is, I'd say
• 3:18
  throughout. This is hugely entertaining.
• 3:20
  It's genuinely funny and and it's got a more subversive Dr.
• 3:24
  than than the 3rd Doctor. In a way.
• 3:26
  The 3rd Doctor, because he takes it so seriously it it, it
• 3:31
  doesn't quite have that sense of fun.
• 3:33
  Whereas this has got a a maverick in the centre of it
• 3:37
  causing, creating chaos. It's interesting that he, the
• 3:41
  doctor in a way, is the thing that makes this surreal, rather
• 3:45
  than the Cybermen that just sort of fit into this world very
• 3:48
  naturally. And it's the best when you think
• 3:50
  about where where we've come from, the Cybermen stories we've
• 3:53
  had so far, they they've always been very heightened.
• 3:56
  The Cybermen have always been in a, a, a very science fiction
• 4:02
  world, not, not grounded in anything like this.
• 4:05
  How interesting that they're suddenly put in contemporary
• 4:10
  England and they I think they work better here than ever
• 4:14
  before. That idea you just said there of
• 4:17
  the chaos of trout and in the middle of all of this sort of
• 4:20
  espionage when he sent on missions in this.
• 4:23
  It's so funny. Or just in this episode alone
• 4:26
  where he's like, Oh yes, you want like a cup of tea?
• 4:29
  Yes, and a patter cake biscuit, please.
• 4:32
  I love it. And you've got all that and he
• 4:34
  goes, what's that? A tank?
• 4:35
  You know, like he's so funny. He's so serious.
• 4:40
  Isn't it? Yeah.
• 4:40
  And he's tall and he's so he he towers over his military
• 4:45
  colleagues. Whereas Troughton is this impish
• 4:47
  character in the middle of this seriousness, and he's therefore
• 4:51
  constantly undermining it. But there is also an element as
• 4:54
  well, and we'll get to it in the second-half in those scenes with
• 4:57
  Vaughan of that slice of 7th Doctor, you know, he's sitting
• 5:04
  there going, oh, you're a full born.
• 5:06
  Like everyone takes their eye off him in this.
• 5:09
  He's the smartest man in the story.
• 5:12
  And I think he is the the 7th Doctor is very much modelled on
• 5:16
  this version of the Doctor, the Trickster.
• 5:22
  And I'd say Matt Smith as well. The.
• 5:25
  Yes, I would agree. Doctor Yeah, you probably love
• 5:27
  all three of them, don't you? I do.
• 5:33
  I have reservations about Matt Smith.
• 5:35
  Oh, or explore. And I, and I think and I and I
• 5:39
  think it's uncontroversial to say that that Charlton delivers
• 5:42
  the most consistent performance of those three doctors.
• 5:47
  Yeah, I like it when he goes down into the sewers layer,
• 5:50
  right? Yeah.
• 5:50
  And he just does a bit of business.
• 5:52
  He's on the radio going oh, hello, hello.
• 5:54
  When they come through, he looks so delighted.
• 5:56
  He's like, oh, hello, Oh, he's he.
• 5:59
  He just doesn't waste a moment, does he?
• 6:01
  He doesn't and, and, and it's interesting because Trouten is
• 6:05
  again, compared to McCoy, Trouten is the the the serious
• 6:09
  actor with a a very prolific television career behind him
• 6:15
  already by this stage. But when it comes to physical
• 6:17
  comedy, he's not afraid to absolutely go for it.
• 6:20
  And he's very, very funny to, he's magnetic to, to look.
• 6:23
  Are you talking about that bit where he's having photographs?
• 6:26
  Taken in the last episode. I love.
• 6:28
  That scene I. Love it.
• 6:31
  This is my best. Angle yeah, all the.
• 6:33
  Devastation around him. Well, look, I mean, one thing I
• 6:37
  will say about going into live action is as good as that
• 6:40
  animation is, you do lose some of the nuance of actors as
• 6:45
  strong as Stony and Troughton's performance.
• 6:48
  Yeah. That is how.
• 6:49
  We'll see now as as the pictures move, gasp, just what he brings
• 6:55
  to the screen. Well, who's counting us in
• 6:58
  You're me? Well, I did it last time.
• 7:00
  Well, I guess I should do it this time then.
• 7:02
  We'll go in then. Egalitarian way of doing it 3.
• 7:07
  You'll tell me. What that word means one day 21
• 7:11
  Off we go into time and space. Or what on earth, actually?
• 7:18
  Oh, actually it looks a lot darker now on the iPlayer.
• 7:20
  It does. Oh, these are really bad prints,
• 7:23
  that's why. Oh no, I should put the DVD in.
• 7:26
  There we go. It's fine.
• 7:27
  It's take us back to to to the the old VHS.
• 7:30
  But it's so bad it looks like it's being projected on a wall
• 7:33
  or something. Why have they done that?
• 7:34
  Yeah, a lot of their black and white stuff is the really crank.
• 7:38
  It's not. It's not the restored version.
• 7:39
  Not the restored version. I mean, I right?
• 7:41
  It brings back memories though, because this is obviously how I
• 7:44
  first saw it. My lost, you know, pirate
• 7:48
  version of this was very like this.
• 7:51
  Sometimes it was like looking for a snowstorm, you know?
• 7:55
  Oh wow, it's so old. You can see all the film
• 7:58
  crackling and popping. Have you?
• 8:00
  Are you on the iPlayer? I am, yeah.
• 8:02
  Yeah. And we got this now.
• 8:04
  So straight away, the location stuff looks great and they're
• 8:08
  being trailed by car. And, and because of the way it
• 8:10
  was introduced, it wasn't clear to me that this wasn't the
• 8:12
  cliffhanger, that that we weren't building up to what I I
• 8:16
  thought would have been the Episode 1 Playfanger.
• 8:19
  I'll start off at 10 for Canfield.
• 8:20
  There is. He went from handheld camera
• 8:22
  work following the Doctor and Jamie to ABPOV shot in the car
• 8:26
  looking at them to a shot from outside the car looking in at
• 8:30
  the two people in it within about four seconds.
• 8:35
  Oh, that camera was almost right up her skirt then.
• 8:38
  Did you see that? I did.
• 8:40
  Isabelle can wrap yourself in some curtains, love.
• 8:45
  Yeah, I mean, she's got a lot of pictures of herself on.
• 8:47
  Them she has got a lot of pictures of her.
• 8:48
  That's, that's, that's the the she didn't take those, did she?
• 8:54
  She's she's done some modelling, which is how she bought the
• 8:57
  camera. She's just incredibly vain and
• 8:59
  has had her own modelling photos blown up to a huge size to put
• 9:04
  on the wall. It's a bit like my Facebook or
• 9:06
  Instagram, you know, all those bloody selfies.
• 9:08
  I mean, I'm basically watching the podcast world and I'll hang
• 9:13
  out with the Zoe Herriot as well.
• 9:14
  Hello James Smart and. Cute am I?
• 9:19
  Smart and cute. Yeah, that's right.
• 9:22
  OK, can I get up now? Photographs of.
• 9:25
  Me, you can. Well, I've just.
• 9:26
  Put this can I take off? No.
• 9:28
  Can I take? Off.
• 9:29
  No, it's going on for the rest of the record.
• 9:32
  Now look, if you just come with me down the sewers, let's go.
• 9:35
  I said This is why I didn't like Isabel, because she was very
• 9:38
  much she. She's not at all bothered about
• 9:41
  Jamie and the doctor. Les still she.
• 9:44
  Doesn't know those people. I mean, she knows him,
• 9:45
  obviously. But the location is great that
• 9:50
  there's a car at the end of the Abbey Alley and Don Harper's
• 9:54
  music is going now and you've got this dulcimer just it reeks
• 10:01
  of atmosphere, doesn't it? What the one thing that my most
• 10:05
  vivid memory of the invasion wasn't the visuals when I lost
• 10:09
  that tape, it was the music. And I had that, you know, that
• 10:12
  bit that goes dum dum, that's now when they're down in the
• 10:16
  sewers. That just lodged in my head.
• 10:19
  It was doing something so different to anybody else.
• 10:22
  It's a great score and it is pulled from the world of spy
• 10:28
  thriller. And no, No, the nonetheless
• 10:32
  weaker for that, and I'm not sure there's anything quite like
• 10:34
  it in the rest of Doctor Whoever.
• 10:37
  Looks a bit jazzy at times. I suppose.
• 10:39
  Yeah, yeah, again, it's. That unit theme all.
• 10:41
  About it's very. I'm not so sure about the unit.
• 10:46
  I'm not sure that quite comes off, but it is quite jazzy and
• 10:50
  and the yeah, I guess it's taking its cue from any, any
• 10:57
  kind of 60s spy program. Every now and again, right when
• 11:01
  I watch a Doctor Who story, I get the impression that
• 11:06
  everybody has brought their A game 'cause they know this is
• 11:08
  something really good. Yeah, I get it in like sit Your
• 11:11
  Death when we go to like rando 1 scene, you know, settings and
• 11:16
  all. The set design is absolutely
• 11:17
  gorgeous, and I get it in this as well.
• 11:20
  All of those perspective shots of the skyline of London out the
• 11:24
  window. They didn't.
• 11:25
  Have to do that. They could have just shot the
• 11:27
  curves, you know? No, it's great but that but but
• 11:30
  I think that really finishes off that set.
• 11:32
  And it goes day to night as well.
• 11:34
  Yeah, it does. It's beautifully lit.
• 11:37
  Given that Isabella is meant to be so swinging, she's not got a
• 11:40
  very trendy taste in music, has she?
• 11:42
  If you go down to the woods today, sure of a big surprise,
• 11:47
  you went to the woods tonight, didn't you?
• 11:49
  No, I went to the Portobello road to pick up a a few vinyls.
• 11:52
  No, I did go to the woods. You're quite right.
• 11:55
  Of the Bella Rd., that's where I picked up quickie the quarter.
• 11:58
  Baron Portobello Rd. Were there?
• 12:00
  Were there no other record would say nothing?
• 12:02
  Was that the trendiest thing in 1969 that you could get?
• 12:05
  Teddy was picnic. Well, is that the only record
• 12:09
  she's got, then? Sounds like it.
• 12:11
  Oh, she. Could have been playing some
• 12:12
  Beatles or something like that. Couldn't she?
• 12:13
  You'd have thought, Probably. Couldn't even the chaser tickets
• 12:16
  arrived that's. True.
• 12:19
  And here we are in the Brigadiers moving HQ.
• 12:25
  It looks fab, doesn't it? I love the shot of the car going
• 12:29
  in. What's baffling to me, right, is
• 12:32
  I've recently watched the Sontaran Stratum and the Poison
• 12:35
  Sky, OK, where they have this enormous truck, which is a unit
• 12:39
  truck, which somehow is dimensionally transcendental
• 12:42
  because when they get in, it's the size of about 50 trucks.
• 12:45
  Yeah. Whereas this I actually can
• 12:47
  believe the scales about right. And here's dear old Brigadier.
• 12:57
  I love it whenever Janet Fielding sees Nicholas Courtney
• 13:01
  on the Behind the Soldiers, she always goes, oh, look at Nick,
• 13:04
  he looks so young. He is.
• 13:09
  I'm going to say it. He's a beautiful man.
• 13:11
  Oh yes, they haven't quite fixed the mustache on straight.
• 13:15
  So that's a. That's a.
• 13:17
  Do they ever? It takes a while.
• 13:20
  He eventually grows his own, doesn't he?
• 13:22
  No, we're doing continuity look and even less unbelievable than
• 13:25
  the Yetis. But that story, I I guess wasn't
• 13:32
  that long ago when this was broadcast.
• 13:35
  That would have been what, a year ago?
• 13:36
  The. Year ago, yeah.
• 13:39
  And they know, they know that that format, they the being on
• 13:43
  earth, the soldiers, because the web of fear.
• 13:46
  Oh, thank you. With a Patty cake biscuit.
• 13:48
  There's some What is a Patty? Cake.
• 13:50
  I don't know, it's an odd thing. That must have been an ad Lib
• 13:53
  surely? I have said it since and no
• 13:56
  one's been able to give me an answer.
• 13:57
  Oh, I love that line from Jamie. It means.
• 14:00
  You're like a world secret police.
• 14:04
  I mean, this is such an exciting idea as well that there is a a
• 14:08
  military organization there to deal with alien incursions.
• 14:13
  Yeah. And we never let it go.
• 14:16
  We haven't let it go to this we. Haven't.
• 14:18
  No, no, it's, it's a, it's a full on reframing of, of, of the
• 14:22
  Doctor Who concept. Now, this building is not far
• 14:26
  from where I work. And you can indeed walk in
• 14:31
  through. There's a Pizza Express there
• 14:32
  now, but you can walk underneath that thing and walk up to the
• 14:35
  doors just like Isabel and Zoe do.
• 14:38
  Well, I just certainly hope you've done that.
• 14:40
  At some point, many, many times, when in fact it's one of those,
• 14:43
  you know, you know, when there are locations and you you have
• 14:46
  to do certain things. Yeah.
• 14:49
  Mark tried to get down that manhole cover in this.
• 14:52
  So the manhole cover I've not yet discovered.
• 14:54
  So that's maybe a thing that I need to do.
• 14:56
  But but yeah, I've I've done the, I've done the.
• 14:59
  Moment please for the spinning reels in action.
• 15:02
  It's the most high tech technology.
• 15:04
  I like that Zoe goes in. Unlike the Doctor, she thinks
• 15:08
  she knows how to get the answer she needs out of the machine.
• 15:12
  Yeah, but then when she doesn't get her own way, she gives her a
• 15:14
  nervous breakdown. Zoe is so great.
• 15:17
  There's just nothing about Zoe I don't love.
• 15:19
  And and there are characteristics that she has,
• 15:22
  but I really hate in people. Like she's pompous and she's
• 15:26
  arrogant. Yeah, she's really funny.
• 15:28
  She's so cute. She is you.
• 15:31
  You in your strictly's. You were quite down on on
• 15:34
  Victoria, weren't you? Oh yes, he's appalling character
• 15:39
  Snively. I have to say I disagree.
• 15:42
  And my my first exposure to Troutton wasn't watching it on
• 15:45
  telly, it was listening to those cassettes that came out.
• 15:48
  And a lot of those were stories with Victoria, I think.
• 15:51
  Crab like creature was. Well, that one Jamie lay tossing
• 15:57
  in his bed. I beg your pardon?
• 16:01
  It works when Colin makes. What's that from?
• 16:03
  I don't know. If you've been on Teaspoon and I
• 16:08
  open my website again, I told you to stop doing that, all
• 16:11
  right? I just listened to a podcast in
• 16:14
  which you shout Bakaki whenever I speak.
• 16:16
  So I was educated on the word bakaki, OK.
• 16:20
  I didn't know anything about it. How did we get here?
• 16:24
  How indeed? Anyway, what was I I think
• 16:26
  Victoria wouldn't have I would I wouldn't have wanted Victoria to
• 16:30
  stay any longer, but there is something about her that works
• 16:33
  as a as a character journey, and I think she's well played for
• 16:37
  what she is. She's has an absolutely
• 16:39
  traumatic time. She's out of her depth, but
• 16:43
  occasionally gets to show off a a bit of scientific knowledge or
• 16:47
  a bit of education. But basically she's, she's lost
• 16:51
  her father and she's in incomplete, she's, it was
• 16:55
  inappropriate for the doctor to try and take her on adventures
• 16:58
  basically. And I love when he tries to come
• 17:00
  for her. And I love that she basically
• 17:02
  her exit is she can't cope with this anymore.
• 17:05
  And I think it's really sad and I think it's played in a way
• 17:08
  that's very heartfelt and it works.
• 17:10
  My issue with Victoria is that I think in two of the side men
• 17:15
  she's shown to be quite competent.
• 17:17
  Yeah, she picks up a gun, she shoots that side of things.
• 17:19
  She flirts with Captain Hawker. She's she's a bit bad at badass.
• 17:23
  As the season goes on, she gets less competent, are more whiny.
• 17:27
  There is a lot of just being covered in snow and and and.
• 17:31
  Shrieking. But it's the riots.
• 17:33
  It's not really Debbie Watling's fault.
• 17:34
  They just write her as being sniffly, whereas Zoe's always
• 17:38
  got, I mean, some occasionally she's very stupid, but mostly
• 17:42
  she's, I mean, at the end of this where she's working out the
• 17:45
  trajectory of all the spaceships, you know, and blows
• 17:48
  up an entire cyber fleet. Oh, she's glorious.
• 17:51
  And Wendy Padbury just has presence.
• 17:55
  I agree. Huge personality that she isn't
• 17:58
  lost between Fraser Hines and Patrick Trowan, and that's kind
• 18:01
  of hard. Yeah, obviously totally agree.
• 18:06
  I love his reaction to the machine blowing up.
• 18:09
  And he's very drolly amused, isn't he?
• 18:11
  But. The whole thing.
• 18:14
  Oh, he goes. Two young girls bring them to
• 18:16
  me. Good shackle.
• 18:19
  I mean the in one of my favorite scenes later, the laugh you get
• 18:23
  once he's been had bullets hiding him.
• 18:29
  Yeah. That's it's great, yes.
• 18:32
  And now we lose them, don't we? For a bit.
• 18:33
  They have a scene with Vaughan, then they're shoved in those
• 18:36
  containers. And I think Wendy Padbre has a
• 18:38
  week off, I think. I'm not sure.
• 18:44
  Yes she does, because she spends a whole episode in in a box.
• 18:48
  She's represented by a feather boa.
• 18:53
  It's no comparison, all right, to Wendy Papri.
• 18:57
  The feather boa it's got, it's got personality, it's very pit
• 19:01
  in the photographs, it's very, very lurid.
• 19:04
  Isn't it? I always imagined it was.
• 19:05
  It's red, isn't it? It's red and she's wearing like
• 19:08
  a a bright. It is yellow.
• 19:09
  Bright red, and she's wearing a very yellow dress.
• 19:12
  Yeah. Yeah, I'm kind of pleased it is
• 19:13
  in black. It is in black and white, yeah.
• 19:15
  Can I ask your opinion of the unit?
• 19:18
  The original unit costume? The uniform.
• 19:22
  I think Barry Letts is wrong. I like the sort of boiler suit
• 19:28
  approach. It feels more functional and
• 19:30
  less upper crust and starched than they all look later.
• 19:36
  Everyone looks pristine. I feel as if they haven't been
• 19:38
  fighting. Anyway I.
• 19:39
  Agree. I think Courtney thought that it
• 19:42
  wasn't terribly flattering from the rear view.
• 19:47
  Oh, what made you think that? I've read it in an interview.
• 19:51
  Oh well, I should have a look later and when he's in action
• 19:54
  and see what I want to think. But I like but I I do like the
• 19:58
  tailored aspect of it and I like that unit have a have a slightly
• 20:03
  different that it's not a military.
• 20:05
  Uniform. It might have something to do
• 20:06
  with the fact that once he's in that green uniform, yeah, that
• 20:11
  the character is dumbed down a bit, that that's what I have my
• 20:15
  sort of bad reaction to to that. But he he's a bit stiff.
• 20:18
  He's a bit stiff as well. He's like a man of action in
• 20:23
  this and in all of seven. You're right.
• 20:26
  It's it's, it's, it's not unflattering.
• 20:28
  It's it makes makes everyone look kind of slender.
• 20:31
  Jimmy who you know I've recently seen animated in the Savages as
• 20:36
  I can't remember the character's name now.
• 20:38
  Avon, not the one from Blake 7. Jimmy looks fabulous in this
• 20:43
  uniform. He does and I like what's what's
• 20:46
  the other? It's the Jimmy.
• 20:50
  Jimmy is your Mike Yates character.
• 20:53
  Oh way better though I think. I think if if Jimmy had been
• 20:59
  throughout the 7th, the early 70s were Perry.
• 21:02
  Well, he never would have got involved with those dinosaur
• 21:04
  people, would he? I would have been really
• 21:06
  invested in that character, I. Really, I really like him, but
• 21:10
  Sergeant Walters is a good character.
• 21:12
  He doesn't have a lot to do, but Sergeant Walters has got a has
• 21:15
  got a sort of slightly cheeky persona and he's very endearing.
• 21:20
  I feel like the there's, there's a, an alternate unit family
• 21:23
  here. I.
• 21:24
  Prefer the the audition pieces? Yeah.
• 21:26
  What was the one in Web of Fear? You know the one who who goes
• 21:29
  with Shrout and to Covent Garden to get those electric.
• 21:32
  Spheres. Oh yes, he's.
• 21:33
  Good. He's really good as well.
• 21:35
  Yeah. I mean, the same actor comes
• 21:38
  back and plays Get back, not get back.
• 21:42
  Yeah. Is it get back in Monster
• 21:43
  Peloton? He's dreadful in that.
• 21:46
  Yeah, now look at look at Patrick Troughton taking apart
• 21:50
  Jamie's radio. And I love, I love, I love that
• 21:52
  he's so worried that he's going to break his radio.
• 21:54
  Oh. It's all right, Jamie.
• 21:55
  He. Gets his little spyglass out.
• 22:01
  It's very complex circuit. And he's still eating a
• 22:04
  sandwich. Yes.
• 22:07
  I think he's an actor who knows all about.
• 22:08
  Business. I also suspect that Troughton is
• 22:14
  an actor who doesn't pass up the opportunity to eat a sandwich
• 22:18
  when it's provided. This is great.
• 22:21
  I'll suggest we check the wall. Hey.
• 22:24
  You can't lose a wall, Jamie, remember?
• 22:30
  Do you? Do you think this is a terrible
• 22:33
  idea? Then using the.
• 22:33
  Wall writing on walls yeah, I won't be writing on my own walls
• 22:39
  certainly I think it's a terrible idea I I think having
• 22:42
  seen invasion Earth 2150 AD when Susan writes on a sliding door
• 22:48
  and the doctor misses her message because she's very
• 22:51
  foolishly written on a wall that's.
• 22:52
  Beautiful handwriting though. Beautiful.
• 22:54
  Handwriting. But what a waste.
• 22:55
  So I I I'm quite suspicious of the idea that walls don't go
• 22:59
  anywhere and. And what's wrong with a nice, a
• 23:03
  nice chalkboard or or or or a whiteboard if, if you're that
• 23:09
  way inclined, do. You have AI just like being a
• 23:12
  bit scruffy, you know? OK.
• 23:14
  Do you write on your walls? Then I'll.
• 23:16
  Leave my borrow at home when I visit your house now I don't.
• 23:20
  Think so? Do you?
• 23:20
  What do you write on other people's walls as a matter of
• 23:23
  literally going into other people's houses?
• 23:25
  Oh, Joe's. Story.
• 23:26
  Yeah, there's. Phone numbers all over the wall.
• 23:29
  See you later guys. I like the fact that of all
• 23:33
  there, he doesn't deny at all that her her uncle said he's
• 23:37
  perfectly well, Yeah, he's he's doing some business now.
• 23:40
  Take them away. You.
• 23:41
  Gave them so you can go up to these double doors if you're if
• 23:45
  you're on. What is the building?
• 23:51
  What the actual rear it? Looks like it might be a bank or
• 23:54
  something like that. I don't know what goes on in
• 23:56
  there these days. Millbank Tower is the name of
• 23:59
  the building and it is also in which Tom Baker's story.
• 24:10
  Tell me. Terror of the Zygons.
• 24:14
  Oh, at the end. Yes.
• 24:19
  I like how this just automatically has a big scale to
• 24:24
  it now. Now that yeah, it's involved.
• 24:27
  It's gone from 1. You know, one man trying to
• 24:30
  escape from the evil electronics company to international.
• 24:38
  I'm not sure we can call Zoe the little dark one anymore.
• 24:42
  Is that what we said? Yes.
• 24:44
  Oh. Dear.
• 24:46
  Oh, there's Jimmy. Oh, he's so handsome.
• 24:50
  He's a bit posh, isn't he? Well, nothing wrong with posh
• 24:54
  people, James. No way.
• 24:55
  No, no, no. But he's a little bit.
• 24:57
  He's a little bit. He feels a little bit too public
• 25:01
  school to be getting his hands dirt.
• 25:02
  He's a little bit disapproving. He is, but he has wonderful
• 25:06
  chemistry with Isabel. I'd, yeah, I, I like him very
• 25:09
  much. I, I, I I'm not sure he quite
• 25:12
  feels the same role as Mike Yates, for all that he's
• 25:15
  prettier. If I'm just saying this, if I
• 25:18
  saw that those two were with the officers, I'll be signing up to
• 25:22
  the Army immediately. And I did just see Nicholas
• 25:26
  Courtney's posterior, and I think he's spreading erroneous
• 25:29
  lies. It looks very nice, but a
• 25:32
  peachy. I love that they're breaking
• 25:34
  into a railway line as well. Look at that.
• 25:36
  Is this the Guinness factory where they're filming now?
• 25:38
  It is it is and it it just has that what did you say other like
• 25:43
  the IP Chris file? Yeah, it's got that.
• 25:46
  Sort of feel to it. I don't think we do this again
• 25:52
  like a disused railway place until like the empty child, I
• 25:56
  think. That's the next child, probably,
• 25:57
  yeah. And it's gorgeous there as well.
• 26:00
  Oh, so you do look that is, that is the Palace of Westminster in
• 26:04
  the background, isn't it? And then I like the fact that
• 26:09
  they've got other buildings off in the country, you know?
• 26:11
  Yeah. Oh well, the reuse of this set
• 26:14
  is is also a stroke of genius, you say?
• 26:16
  Look, he's doing the Patricia Arquette thing, just staying
• 26:19
  perfectly. Still, he has an incredible
• 26:21
  stillness. It's a very well.
• 26:23
  It's really intense. And yet later on, he's sitting
• 26:27
  there at the desk, right really still, and he suddenly leaps.
• 26:30
  And you're an incompetent fall backer.
• 26:33
  Now Camfield does the thing where he puts the camera quite
• 26:36
  far back and moves it forward. So we get the the cyber planners
• 26:40
  POV and every time it opens and we and we get that point of view
• 26:45
  as it slides across, Stony does something weird with his face
• 26:50
  and he just makes it bigger and bigger.
• 26:52
  It's like he raises his eyebrow as if he's decided that the way
• 26:56
  to command control of the cyber planner or to assert his
• 26:58
  authority is to look quite threatening.
• 27:01
  And by the end he's contorting his face.
• 27:05
  He's can you see that? Look at that eyebrow.
• 27:11
  Yeah, I love the fact he's, I mean, he's in a bit of a
• 27:14
  disadvantageous position, right? It's him versus the Cybermen.
• 27:19
  And yet he's not even sweating, is he?
• 27:21
  No, he's so cool, which is why his downfall in the end is so
• 27:27
  great. Yeah, when he's on the run with
• 27:29
  his. Little Surrey patrol machine.
• 27:31
  Well, and he thinks that he can reason with them.
• 27:33
  It's, it's that thing. I've I've gone into this with a
• 27:35
  strong negotiating eyebrow. You know, he reminds me of a
• 27:39
  less problematic Mavic Chin who also allies himself with a great
• 27:45
  galactic superpower and reached an unfortunate and who played
• 27:48
  Mavic Chen again. It it escapes me this.
• 27:53
  This is a better performance than Mavic Chen though, isn't
• 27:56
  it? We haven't got those.
• 27:58
  Weird. I mean, he's less, he's less
• 28:01
  heavily made-up, but but also, I think that it's a, it's a more
• 28:05
  may Maverick Chen is, is what is needed in that kind of space
• 28:09
  opera, sprawling, 12 part epic and it's a little bit more over
• 28:14
  the top and he has to go completely mad as Maverick Chen.
• 28:17
  I just feel like Vaughan is a really well crafted performance
• 28:24
  for television. He knows just how big he can
• 28:26
  make it without it becoming ridiculous.
• 28:28
  And, and he is a he's charming and he's genuinely scary.
• 28:32
  He's got Bond villain quality. Yeah, he definitely feels like a
• 28:36
  Bond villain. Did you see that man there
• 28:40
  carrying that that piece of equipment there?
• 28:44
  Super strong? He.
• 28:45
  Must be very very. Very heavy.
• 28:47
  Oh, there you go. He just said it.
• 28:48
  That man must be a Superman. I love all this.
• 28:52
  All the shadows. I don't.
• 28:53
  There is just something automatically atmospheric about
• 28:56
  black and white. Doctor Who?
• 28:58
  Well, this is this is the most atmospheric it's been for a long
• 29:01
  time. It cleaned up.
• 29:03
  It doesn't look quite this Moody.
• 29:05
  That there is a problem with that isn't there?
• 29:08
  Like like a genuine problem with it.
• 29:10
  When they clean it up, it becomes.
• 29:12
  You can suddenly see that it's a set.
• 29:14
  That cyclic thingy in the mind Robber and.
• 29:17
  Yeah. Yeah, sometimes more detail is
• 29:22
  less atmospheric. That's so funny with a minute
• 29:26
  when they go running around the corner and then they come
• 29:28
  running back straight away. I mean at this point the the 2nd
• 29:35
  Doctor in Jamie, it's just like the ultimate bromance in Doctor
• 29:40
  Who, isn't it? It is and they work so well
• 29:44
  together. And it's a yeah, it's, it's a
• 29:46
  lovely relationship they have. And it's it's hard to think of
• 29:50
  the what the what the 2nd Doctor era would look like if if they
• 29:55
  hadn't recruited Fraser Hines when they did.
• 29:58
  I can't imagine if Michael Craze had stayed on.
• 30:00
  It would have because he was so aggressive.
• 30:02
  Michael Craze. Yeah, but I, I'm a big fan of
• 30:04
  Ben and Polly though, and I, I do feel we didn't get enough
• 30:07
  time with Ben, Polly and Trout and on their own, because I
• 30:10
  think that's a magical combination as well.
• 30:12
  Power of the Talex. Yeah, love it, absolutely love
• 30:15
  it. And there's.
• 30:16
  The one doctor, you know, James, I think there's stars and ends
• 30:19
  on an on a banger. I don't mean.
• 30:21
  Anyway, I agree. Yeah, he does, isn't he?
• 30:24
  I mean, I, I, I think The Power of Daleks is, is perhaps the
• 30:28
  greatest opening story for a Doctor.
• 30:31
  I wouldn't disagree with that. Oh, what's going?
• 30:35
  It's so dark now. I actually can't.
• 30:37
  Were we inside the container? Then I?
• 30:41
  Don't know, but I'm trying to I I imagine this is closer to what
• 30:44
  the contemporary audience would have got because their their
• 30:47
  televisions wouldn't wouldn't have been high quality either
• 30:51
  and it would have been a tiny screen and it probably would
• 30:54
  have looked a lot like this. That comedy run when they come.
• 30:58
  I love the way that he puts his hands up so high as well.
• 31:02
  Well, it's very funny in the two Doctors when they make a point
• 31:05
  of that, isn't it? Where the 2nd Doctor and Jamie
• 31:07
  are up here and the 6th Doctor and Perry are down here.
• 31:12
  Oh, it ended. It ended like rats in a trap.
• 31:15
  Oh in super danger Zoe's but not unconscious and his battery
• 31:21
  shipped off God knows where. Like it's.
• 31:24
  It's a more considered pace I think than the first episode,
• 31:28
  this one. Yeah, although a lot's happened,
• 31:29
  doesn't it? Think about all the stuff we've
• 31:31
  learned since the first episode and A and a different atmosphere
• 31:35
  to the for as a viewer, this is this is keeping me pretty well
• 31:41
  hooked. I mean, think about we've got
• 31:43
  another six parts to get through, but I don't feel that
• 31:46
  the the pace is let up at all. I don't feel like the delivery
• 31:49
  of information is stalling. There's none of the since you
• 31:52
  get in Season 7 where however glorious the padding is, you
• 31:56
  know that all that daring do with the helicopters is padding.
• 32:00
  Well, I like as well the fact that Derek Sherwin just ramps it
• 32:05
  up a little bit with every. Episode.
• 32:08
  Every episode. Until you get to the manhole
• 32:10
  covers bursting open, I've been walking down the steps of them
• 32:13
  poles. Absolutely glorious.
• 32:16
  Well, look, I've got some questions I want to ask you
• 32:18
  about Packer at the start of episode 3.
• 32:22
  Should we skip on over and watch that?
• 32:24
  I absolutely think we must. Let's do it.