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Hamster Book Club - The English Way of Death by Gareth Roberts (featuring Kieran Pell) · A Hamster With a Blunt Penknife - a Doctor Who Commentary podcast

• 0:00
  He nipped across to where the telephone stood on an oak stand
• 0:03
  and put a call through to Harriet Kipps.
• 0:06
  The ringing tone trilled in his ear once, twice, a third time.
• 0:12
  Come along, dear Harriet, come along, he whispered to the
• 0:15
  mouthpiece, casting a glance over his shoulder at the living
• 0:18
  room door. At last it was a crackle, and
• 0:21
  then Harriet. Hello.
• 0:23
  Listen, Harriet, it's Echo, Percy, and so soon.
• 0:27
  How sore is your darling head, I wonder?
• 0:30
  Never mind my head, he is. Listen, something's cropped up.
• 0:35
  Oh, and after a pause, that rotten signal.
• 0:40
  Something like that. I can't talk freely.
• 0:42
  It's up to you. Bring round the circle, tell
• 0:45
  them to wait for my orders. She gasped.
• 0:48
  Darling Percival, how can I be expected?
• 0:51
  And you'll have to do it pronto, Percy, you must be in the most
• 0:55
  terrible lava. It's not that.
• 0:58
  He protested. My dear, you must know I
• 1:00
  wouldn't ask so much of you without good reason.
• 1:03
  Please do as I say. I'll flash you later by
• 1:06
  transceiver. It's the only way.
• 1:08
  The drawing room door opened behind him.
• 1:10
  He raised his voice. Never mind then, Harriet, dear,
• 1:14
  goodbye. He replaced the receiver.
• 1:16
  Couldn't make it. Not to worry.
• 1:18
  The Doctor stood in the doorway, a finger pointing in his
• 1:21
  direction. Closed.
• 1:23
  He said. Percy's throat ran dry.
• 1:26
  Yes. You're very keen on
• 1:29
  authenticity, aren't you? The doctor asked, his head
• 1:33
  angled slightly. So why closed?
• 1:37
  Percy relaxed. A simple error on my part.
• 1:41
  Well, I had to pick a name before I came here, didn't I?
• 1:44
  So the others could find their way to me when they arrived.
• 1:47
  I wanted something desperately ordinary, so I fished out an old
• 1:50
  photograph of clerks at work at a bank and their names on the
• 1:54
  little boards were in front of them.
• 1:56
  The only male was sat before a little board.
• 1:58
  That said, the doctor chuckled. Percy's sighed.
• 2:04
  Well, how was I to know? By the time I realised it was
• 2:07
  far too late. I wondered why everyone kept
• 2:09
  looking at me oddly. All of my papers have been
• 2:12
  sorted out, you see, in that time, fortunately, my lease on
• 2:16
  this place was simply made out for Mr. P Clothes.
• 2:19
  Hence, Percy. A sight better than position,
• 2:22
  though I didn't care for being called position in the
• 2:25
  slightest. Well, it's a name.
• 2:28
  Said the doctor, shrugging. He pointed over his shoulder.
• 2:31
  What I really came to tell you was that it's working.
• 2:34
  Percy swallowed. So we can expect more
• 2:37
  earthquakes. Somebody, somewhere, definitely
• 2:41
  time, Nutchurch 3 read the sign at the junction, barely glimpsed
• 2:48
  by the Colonel as he wrenched on the wheel.
• 2:50
  In the wing mirror, the Daimler was still visible in spite of
• 2:53
  the distance he'd attempted to put between them.
• 2:56
  It was strange, the way the driver kept going like that.
• 2:59
  Hadn't even stopped to reload, just kept going with one hand on
• 3:02
  the wheel, determined whoever he might be.
• 3:06
  It's no use, said Ramana. We're getting close to the town.
• 3:11
  Indeed a couple of other vehicles have swerved by.
• 3:13
  We can't risk getting into more populated areas.
• 3:17
  Apologies, Mistress, said K9 defensive capability unsuited
• 3:21
  for this situation. There's only one option left
• 3:25
  then, said Romana. Concentrate your fire K9 Lance
• 3:28
  function, aim for the engine. Warning Mistress.
• 3:32
  Narrow beam Lance function unreliable at this distance.
• 3:35
  It's too late to worry about that.
• 3:37
  The Daimler driver fired another couple of shots.
• 3:40
  Now, K9. The Colonel didn't like the
• 3:42
  sound of that. He turned slightly in his seat.
• 3:46
  Excuse me, my dear, he began. But I think it's high time you
• 3:49
  offered some sort of extra. A sizzling bolt of light shot
• 3:53
  from K9's snout. The car shook from side to side,
• 3:56
  and the Colonel lost his grip on the wheel.
• 3:58
  His vision blurred momentarily. It was a bit like a sudden
• 4:02
  desert dawn and he was nearly thrown forward over the bonnet.
• 4:05
  He heard the engine stall and sputter very quickly.
• 4:09
  He gathered his wits, rubbed at his streaming eyes, ascertained
• 4:12
  that he was in one piece and that the car was essentially
• 4:15
  undamaged, and turned to inspect his fellow passenger.
• 4:18
  Romana was fanning herself from the cloud of smoke that drifted
• 4:21
  from the wreck of the Daimler canine was frankfully inert, but
• 4:25
  it's poise somehow suggested smugness.
• 4:29
  Pursuing vehicle rendered inoperative, he said it must
• 4:33
  have contained quantity of high explosive.
• 4:36
  Oh, well done, K9, said Romana. The Colonel squinted through the
• 4:41
  clearing smoke. I'll be jiggered, he said as the
• 4:45
  smoldering skeletal frame of the Daimler became clear.
• 4:49
  Pax. Quite a punch or K9?
• 4:51
  A thought struck him and he blinked to his fellow passenger.
• 4:54
  I say, what did you do to accept the man so much?
• 4:59
  Nothing at all, she said briskly.
• 5:02
  Canine, How's the radnium level? The dog made a rapid series of
• 5:05
  clicks, something akin to a faulty ticket machine.
• 5:09
  Radnium concentration in this facility remains high.
• 5:12
  Suggest relocate to place of safety.
• 5:15
  Ramana turns to the Colonel. He stared blankly at her.
• 5:19
  We're still in danger. He coughed.
• 5:22
  My dear, the enemy has gone up in smoke.
• 5:25
  What we ought to do is call the police.
• 5:28
  I'll try to explain, she said on the way.
• 5:31
  Please, Colonel, we've got to get away from here.
• 5:36
  Hop Hair. Welcome to a hamster with a
• 5:40
  blunt pen knife. The most pithingest Doctor Who
• 5:44
  podcast in the Galaxy. My name is Perthy Closed and it
• 5:49
  is my delight and affectation to introduce you, my delirious
• 5:54
  friend, Mr. Kieran Powell. Hello, Kieran.
• 5:58
  Top of the morning. Hello.
• 6:02
  I'd get to try and keep it up for the entire episode.
• 6:04
  How do you think I'll do? Please don't.
• 6:08
  Not a worry, I can't be up across for more than a minute.
• 6:13
  Oh. God, I think we have to address
• 6:15
  the elephant in the room. Or, or rather the faction
• 6:18
  Paradox shapes objects in the room.
• 6:21
  Oh yes, of course, yes. Well, we explained that we did
• 6:25
  make a promise, didn't we, to the listeners after the degree.
• 6:29
  Yes, to read off the City of the Saved by Philip Bezahalud.
• 6:36
  Go on. We're too stupid for this book.
• 6:38
  I think we're too stupid for it, really.
• 6:40
  I don't think we are too stupid for it.
• 6:42
  I think it's just OK. It was a clearly very well
• 6:49
  written book. I I can't and and detailed.
• 6:52
  Fuck was it detailed? I feel Philip Purser Hallard has
• 6:58
  written a manifesto about what's occurring in heaven or wherever
• 7:02
  that was there. I didn't.
• 7:04
  I didn't get to further enough things to find out.
• 7:07
  But do you know my biggest issue with it?
• 7:09
  What? And we both struggled.
• 7:11
  I mean thank God you were the one that broke 1st and said I'm
• 7:14
  not sure I can finish this and I went thank God.
• 7:18
  Torment. I just, I think he was so
• 7:21
  spending so much time chaotically plotting out his
• 7:27
  setting that he left very little time for his narrative.
• 7:33
  So I just felt like there was more details, what felt like
• 7:36
  superfluous details being thrown at me all the time.
• 7:40
  Yeah. And yet the story really wasn't
• 7:43
  progressing at any great pace. I would say that a lot of these
• 7:48
  kind of novels that go to try like a Galaxy wide kind of
• 7:52
  ultimate scale thing is they run the risk of being a puddle deep.
• 7:56
  But Philip personality, because he's a very good writer, makes
• 8:00
  sure that his Galaxy wide thing is Galaxy wide deep.
• 8:03
  And the human brain just can't comprehend all of this
• 8:06
  knowledge. So half of it just goes in one
• 8:08
  ear and goes straight out the other.
• 8:09
  So it's one of those books where if you get it, you probably want
• 8:11
  to read it about 3 or 4 times before you even begin to unpack
• 8:15
  what's going on. So it is.
• 8:17
  I would recommend it if you are, if you boy, if you have nothing
• 8:23
  to do, or if you're stuck in a sane assignment.
• 8:25
  Makes some kind of sense. If you suffer from extreme ADHD.
• 8:29
  Right, you'd love it. And and you want to be just torn
• 8:32
  in One Direction from another all the time with oh, look at
• 8:35
  this, Oh, look at that, then you're absolutely going to love
• 8:38
  it. And in terms of fuck me here, in
• 8:40
  terms of a setting that is well considered, I don't think
• 8:44
  there's probably a better Doctor Who or Doctor Who's spin off
• 8:47
  related. It's.
• 8:48
  Got its own spin offs, isn't it? But she's got their own Ranger
• 8:51
  spin offs I. Just wondered if something could
• 8:53
  happen in the book, like literally I just want all the
• 8:56
  characters to progress or start going on some kind of a journey
• 8:59
  like literally. I'll get there.
• 9:01
  I was 100 pages into this thing, right?
• 9:04
  And all that had happened was Laura Tobin, which is compassion
• 9:08
  from the 8th Doctor books, had taken on a murder case, right?
• 9:12
  But that was it. And a man had left this sort of
• 9:16
  Roman zone and gone off into the slums on a mission.
• 9:21
  That's it. In 100 pages, that's like almost
• 9:24
  half the length of your typical Doctor Who book.
• 9:27
  At the halfway market, really picks up his pace.
• 9:30
  I will say well. Why don't watch it then?
• 9:32
  Explain yourself, Sir, I didn't. Understand what was going on
• 9:36
  and. You're a clever bloke, you.
• 9:40
  I think I needed to read a lot more books before I pick up
• 9:43
  again. I can't imagine I'm going to
• 9:46
  pick that one up again, laughs a bit.
• 9:47
  I think it's the people who've got like PhDs.
• 9:50
  Yeah, I mean like I have recently read History 101 right
• 9:53
  by Mags, she wrote Faction Paradox book and I might try.
• 9:59
  More in states I believe. Well because History 101 was
• 10:02
  amazingly good and it really holds up well, so I wouldn't
• 10:05
  mind seeing what she did with Faction Paradox.
• 10:10
  So yeah, go read it and try and do the things that we can.
• 10:15
  So instead of reading this sort of intellectual tone, instead we
• 10:19
  sort of went in the other direction, really for a bit of
• 10:21
  whimsy and decided upon, I can't remember which one of us now, I
• 10:26
  don't know who's to blame for this.
• 10:29
  The English Way of Death to Blame by David Agnew.
• 10:34
  Now, have you read much of Mr. Agnew's I?
• 10:38
  Was a big fan of his first book, The Romance of Crime as well as
• 10:44
  the little bit the plotters. His TV stuff I'm not too fond
• 10:50
  of. I'd say I think it's a tiny bit
• 10:53
  lazy. Although I did put in the
• 10:54
  Unicorn on the Wasp in our series 4B of Strictly Come
• 11:00
  Hamster. So overall, it's entertaining.
• 11:05
  Is that how you categorise his work?
• 11:08
  Oh, light fun, light fun. Don't have to think too hard,
• 11:11
  especially in the new adventures.
• 11:13
  I was certainly, Yeah, man. I mean, I'd say Mr. Agnew's week
• 11:17
  books are in the new. I don't think he's really suited
• 11:20
  for the new adventures. So it was.
• 11:22
  Here it is. Right Science, Zampa.
• 11:26
  Another one. Tragedy Day.
• 11:28
  With any good the irony that our Mr. Agnew created the first
• 11:33
  hermaphroditic race I. Don't know.
• 11:38
  That's right. Yeah.
• 11:40
  Yeah, well, maybe we'll get more into Mr. Agnew later.
• 11:44
  And his friend Robin Bland, you know.
• 11:47
  Yeah. But let's talk about Paula
• 11:51
  Moore. Yeah, anymore.
• 11:56
  Oh no. Yeah, Guy Leopold wrote the
• 11:58
  Demons, didn't he? Oh, it's just Barry let's, isn't
• 12:01
  it? Yeah.
• 12:02
  Yeah, and Robert Slobin. Yeah, Well, OK, now I think you
• 12:06
  and me are coming at the English way of death from two different
• 12:10
  directions. We certainly are this.
• 12:13
  This is like the trial of this book.
• 12:15
  It always comes to this, you know, like, right, usually when
• 12:18
  I start sort of book clubbing with somebody and you usually
• 12:21
  pick a couple of books you're on the same wavelength with and
• 12:23
  you're like, OK, fine, yeah, that's good.
• 12:27
  I know you can handle, you can handle the fight.
• 12:30
  And then eventually it comes to a book where you're on opposing
• 12:33
  angles and that's when your whole podcasting relationship
• 12:36
  changes. And from that point on, you're
• 12:39
  happily adversarial. So why don't you tell me why you
• 12:42
  like this bullshit? We're going straight into it,
• 12:47
  are we? So like like I did with Third
• 12:49
  Degree, I want to put this in, it's like proper context in
• 12:52
  1996. So at the same time as this, we
• 12:54
  have Sleepy by Kate Orman. It's one that I've not read, but
• 12:58
  I recently finished Christmas on a Rational Planet and it has a
• 13:01
  lot of references to Sleepy and what I can imagine it was.
• 13:03
  It was basically like a New Adventures mind book.
• 13:06
  Will we go into someone's mind and there's all this strange
• 13:08
  imagery and everyone's like, Oh my head.
• 13:12
  Which one are you talking about there?
• 13:13
  Sleepy or planet? Sleepy.
• 13:16
  Yeah, very. Is that a much so.
• 13:17
  Yes, yeah, you can see Chris Quedge on the front cover on
• 13:21
  that ziggurat sort of going my. Mind yeah, there's always a
• 13:24
  pyramid as well on Kate Orman book the month, the month before
• 13:29
  this for the missing adventures we had The Man in the Velvet
• 13:32
  Mask by Daniel Mahoney. Daniel which is that the one
• 13:36
  where Dodo gets like AIDS, space AIDS or something space?
• 13:39
  AIDS. That's right.
• 13:40
  I mean, Dodo, Kieran Dodo. I've all I wanna read that one
• 13:45
  because that just seems completely bonkers.
• 13:47
  You realize what this means though, don't you?
• 13:48
  So when she goes off to the Inferno nightclub and then
• 13:51
  disappears in the evening, well, we all know she's gone to have
• 13:53
  sex with somebody. It was the 60s, after all.
• 13:56
  She's been passing that space haze around to everybody in
• 13:59
  London. She.
• 14:00
  Was the common cold so it was affecting them on the ARC or was
• 14:02
  it space aids? We never know.
• 14:06
  I love how you put these books in context.
• 14:08
  You know what's coming out around it.
• 14:09
  What you got, you got really because.
• 14:12
  I mean, I don't usually. Thank you.
• 14:17
  But I think because of the though those such serious books
• 14:20
  came out at this point, someone like me at least needs something
• 14:26
  as not stupid as like putting this down a peg, but just fun,
• 14:32
  just like mindlessly fun and like I could I just turned my
• 14:36
  brain off of this book and has so much like I said, I can't
• 14:39
  stop saying the other word, but fun.
• 14:41
  It would just entertained me to extremely go out of smile from
• 14:43
  ear to ear. I don't think I ever.
• 14:46
  If the new adventures are being very rad at the time, this is
• 14:49
  incredibly trad, isn't it? Without doubt, Without fucking
• 14:52
  doubt. This is the most trad Doctor Who
• 14:55
  book that you can find in the virgin range I think.
• 14:58
  Well, I'm going to ask you a couple of questions, then a pre
• 15:01
  prepared questions. I don't do this very often, but
• 15:04
  I have so little things to say about this book.
• 15:06
  I thought I better I better have some questions prepared.
• 15:11
  What do you think of season 17 for a start?
• 15:13
  Like is it? Is it your bag 17?
• 15:16
  I love season 17 because why why can't you why can't you love
• 15:23
  season 17? It's like Tom Baker at the
• 15:27
  height of his like Tom Bakerness.
• 15:29
  He's he's kind of like checked out mentally of the show.
• 15:34
  I feel like at this point and he's just playing Tom Baker.
• 15:39
  So there's like there's it's also in my head.
• 15:43
  I feel like because of that, because he's just Tom Baker on
• 15:45
  the screen. This is some of the most like
• 15:49
  most powerful the Doctor's ever been because he just does not
• 15:52
  give a single flying fuck about nothing.
• 15:54
  He's got. He's like, oh, the world's going
• 15:56
  to end. Lovely.
• 15:56
  Let's sort this out. Or there's one line in this book
• 16:01
  I forgot. I've got where exactly it is.
• 16:02
  It's like, oh, the world's going to end on a Tuesday.
• 16:06
  Well, no, just nobody does anything of importance on a
• 16:08
  Tuesday. You know, it just does not take
• 16:10
  any of this seriously and just. The line from Nightmare of Eden,
• 16:16
  what is it? Interfere.
• 16:18
  Of course we interfere. Always do what you're best at
• 16:21
  you. Know it's just fantastic.
• 16:25
  It's sort of got this calamitous knockabout energy in the 17,
• 16:29
  doesn't it? And I think you're right, it is
• 16:31
  because Tom Baker just, he knew it was one of the biggest faces
• 16:34
  on TV. He didn't give a fuck.
• 16:36
  He's pulling in, you know, it's see your death got Jesus Christ.
• 16:40
  What was it, 16,000,000 Something absurd like that.
• 16:44
  And as well as that is like jet propulsioned by Douglas Adams
• 16:50
  script editing when he's not too lazy to do it, you know, when
• 16:54
  he's got the gun to the back of his head and locked in the room
• 16:56
  of a typewriter and he actually churns out the scripts he's
• 17:01
  supposed to do for the show. They turn out really well.
• 17:04
  Like all's I can think of is stuffing like Creature from the
• 17:08
  Pit where he's he pulls out how to climb a mountain and Feist
• 17:11
  how to climb Everest and he pulls that like he's Tibetan for
• 17:16
  dummies or something like that. What's the one in Destiny?
• 17:18
  The Daleks for? It's underneath that rubble.
• 17:20
  It's like history of the universe and he just starts
• 17:23
  reading it. He's got all this rubble on top
• 17:25
  of it. He starts reading it and going,
• 17:27
  well, that's rubbish from Star. Why didn't he ask somebody who
• 17:29
  was there? It's brilliant.
• 17:33
  And I guess that goes on to fuel Hitchhiker's Guide and all these
• 17:35
  kind of things. And me just being a Douglas
• 17:38
  Adams fanboy in general fuels away.
• 17:42
  From doctor, of course. Well, I've got this.
• 17:45
  A humongous tome of. The brief.
• 17:48
  Will you explain what that is to the listeners, please?
• 17:52
  It is, but I think brief. Block I just yeah it's all five
• 17:56
  books and some extra material stuff stuck in there for its
• 18:00
  42nd I think they put out for its 42nd anniversary as.
• 18:03
  You do all right, I promise you, we will get to the book.
• 18:06
  What is it about Adam you love so much?
• 18:10
  He can make the most like, although it sounds very clever
• 18:17
  and all the things you're doing are very clever.
• 18:20
  It's the same thing I get with like Monty Python where it's so
• 18:23
  smart it looks stupid where or like anyone can find it funny
• 18:28
  because it's so dumbed down without any of the like, the
• 18:32
  actual content being taken out of it, you know?
• 18:35
  So that's why, like, a child can find Douglas Adams funny even if
• 18:42
  they just don't get what's going on.
• 18:45
  It's still just like either a funny image or just a great
• 18:48
  joke. Just Yeah.
• 18:50
  And there are layers, right? He froze in social commentary.
• 18:53
  You know, his jokes are usually based in science fiction.
• 18:56
  In real science, there's substance there as well as a
• 19:00
  good gag. I feel as if, you know, I'm
• 19:03
  going to Just a little side note, I made a Dudlam's Adam's
• 19:06
  esque joke today. Our message Mark Mills because
• 19:09
  for a too hot for TV, right. I had to endure a three hour
• 19:14
  reading of a stranger audio read by Bill Bags himself, Right?
• 19:20
  So I'll ask it to Michael if this was the greatest literature
• 19:24
  of all time, Bill Bags would make this so utterly tedious.
• 19:30
  And then I waited a few seconds and then messaged this was not
• 19:33
  the greatest literature of all time.
• 19:36
  OK, that's not that great a joke, but that's the sort of,
• 19:38
  it's a sort of rug pull joke that Douglas Allen does, you
• 19:41
  know? Any rag on bill bags is funny.
• 19:43
  No matter, regardless. Yeah, I love season 17 as well.
• 19:49
  I like how Douglas Adams approaches Doctor Who in an
• 19:54
  unusual way. You look at all the stories in
• 19:55
  17 and every monster is unusual in some way or another.
• 20:00
  The Daleks are approached in an unusual way.
• 20:02
  That sort of logical impasse. Creature from the pit?
• 20:05
  You think the big blobs a monster?
• 20:06
  Actually no, it's the ice queen Lady of Dastra in Nightmare of
• 20:10
  Eden. Sorry I'm just ruining the whole
• 20:12
  season here. But the monsters are the drug
• 20:15
  that everybody is smuggling, you know?
• 20:17
  Was it hot so in? Yeah.
• 20:19
  I love that pilot. The beginning.
• 20:20
  He's high off his tits. He's don't care.
• 20:22
  The brilliant conceit in Horns of Naiman of, you know, Soldi
• 20:26
  being tricked into thinking there's only one Naiman and then
• 20:30
  the entire fucking race comes through.
• 20:32
  It's just there's always really the imaginative ideas in that
• 20:36
  season. I don't always have resources to
• 20:37
  pull it off mind. No, but the ambition is there
• 20:40
  and that's all that matters. Well then, my next question for
• 20:43
  you is how successfully does David Agnew pull off a Douglas
• 20:50
  adult prescription season 17 story in the English way of
• 20:54
  death and why? Well, I think he's got half of
• 21:00
  it. I think Agnew's got the the
• 21:04
  funniness of Adam's down to a tee here.
• 21:07
  He's got all the great one liners that you need.
• 21:09
  Just paste just right. Some of the pros as well is
• 21:13
  quite simple. I find.
• 21:15
  I found it just quite easy just to fly through this book, you
• 21:18
  know, but I don't think it has any of the smarts that season 17
• 21:23
  scripts should have. Like, I don't think there's any
• 21:27
  kind of social commentary about anything at all, really.
• 21:30
  And all the commentary I found was kind of accidental.
• 21:35
  And it's kind of more so from the like the books that Agnew's
• 21:40
  pulling from to make the setting of this and the characters of in
• 21:44
  this book, rather than him putting it in in the book
• 21:47
  himself. So it's like all the smarts
• 21:51
  there are kind of unintentional. And when he does try to be
• 21:55
  smart, I think it kind of falls in his face.
• 21:57
  What baffled me about this book is it is so obviously APG
• 22:01
  Woodhouse parody, right? It is a pastiche of all of you.
• 22:05
  Percy Closed has literally stepped from Jesus and
• 22:07
  Worcester. Now, as a preparation for this
• 22:10
  today, I have watched season 1 of Jesus and Worcester because I
• 22:14
  wanted to see just how, just how well David Agnew has captured
• 22:20
  that sort of Woodhouse plotting and humour.
• 22:24
  And I think it starts really well this book like, and it's,
• 22:29
  it's on the way to being a social commentary about the
• 22:31
  upper classes, right? Because the upper classes in
• 22:33
  this book, Percy Felicity, they're aliens, aren't they?
• 22:39
  They're aliens from another planet.
• 22:40
  So I thought, right, OK, that's a really good start.
• 22:43
  This is going to be a massive farce and we're going to get
• 22:47
  some kind of commentary about how the upper class stroke
• 22:51
  aliens are othered or something like that.
• 22:53
  Just some. More like completely distant
• 22:55
  from reality or some kind of thing.
• 22:57
  Yeah, yeah. And like a, a good PG Woodhouse,
• 22:59
  because I've read some of the books there, there's going to be
• 23:03
  sort of reversals and there's going to be like, OK, we're
• 23:06
  going to do this plan. It's all going to go hideously
• 23:09
  wrong. And then somehow, accidentally,
• 23:11
  it's all going to come right at the end.
• 23:14
  None of that happens. What happens is this starts as a
• 23:16
  Woodhouse. Yeah, it starts that way.
• 23:18
  And then it halfway through the book, they jump off through this
• 23:22
  portal and it's just, it's just Doctor Who from that point on.
• 23:27
  And I'm not quite sure why, because I think, I think if it
• 23:30
  had got all the way, this would have been absolutely delightful.
• 23:34
  Definitely. I think, yeah, the moment that
• 23:36
  kind of like smashes the illusion here is that bit where
• 23:42
  we meet. Should we go for our characters
• 23:43
  first before we go on get into like the events and things?
• 23:46
  So we have our evil infernal vapour, Zodal Zodal.
• 23:53
  Know the will of Zodal. You just.
• 23:55
  Know right? Oh I love that line.
• 23:57
  Can I say as well I did listen to the finish audio as well.
• 24:01
  Oh. No, I didn't.
• 24:01
  I should have. I wanted to hear, I wanted to
• 24:05
  hear how people would play these possessed performances.
• 24:09
  And it's every bit as agonising as you would imagine.
• 24:11
  Poor. It's terrible.
• 24:13
  Hardyman playing Stackhouse. Yeah, the first one who's taken
• 24:17
  over and he's playing the whole story for two fucking hours like
• 24:24
  this. Oh, bless his.
• 24:27
  So it's made the whole thing like half an hour longer than it
• 24:29
  should have been. Pretty much.
• 24:30
  Yeah, So I can't, I can't actually remember.
• 24:36
  Zaidal's plan is no, that's it. He wants to build these this
• 24:42
  like machine that will break open the Earth's crust so that
• 24:46
  he can harvest the energy of the Earth to reunite his like gas
• 24:52
  with with the other half of him that stuck on a spaceship in the
• 24:56
  time vortex. Is that right?
• 24:58
  Well, I mean, yes, that is right.
• 25:00
  And I sort of wrote down. You ready for this?
• 25:03
  I've written it down. It's like Star Trek
• 25:05
  technobabble. You ready?
• 25:06
  Oh God, here we go. So Zodao transubstantiated his
• 25:11
  consciousness into a gaseous form based on radnium in order
• 25:15
  to be beamed out into a corridor of a Cronon funnel.
• 25:20
  He then used his hyperzoic filter to split off his qualms
• 25:24
  and morals in order to become ruthless and to survive.
• 25:28
  And then the fragment of his personality thus removed
• 25:31
  remained in the capsule radnium. This acts as a corrosive agent,
• 25:38
  hence the trail of decay left by Zodal's presence.
• 25:42
  And that's why he's a smell. He's a sentient smell, right?
• 25:45
  Sodal intends to use his Sonic stimulator to destroy the world
• 25:51
  and use the energy release to refashion him, and he intends to
• 25:55
  use the doctor's body for this. How did I do?
• 25:59
  I didn't sound a word of it, but let's go with it.
• 26:01
  You read the bloody book. Yeah, so did you, evidently more
• 26:05
  closely than I did. I was literally taking it from
• 26:08
  the page I was going, right. Yeah, I'm sure.
• 26:11
  I'm sure I'd be able to tell me what will this actually.
• 26:13
  Be I think, I think I've got to that point with those lines of
• 26:17
  Chrononium Corridor I. Mean basically.
• 26:21
  I'm sure whatever. It's just an evil smell, isn't
• 26:24
  it? That's what it is.
• 26:25
  It's an evil smell now. An odorous spa.
• 26:29
  What do you know about evil smells?
• 26:34
  I know that I should never go to the toilet after my dad's been
• 26:37
  in there. Yeah, after I've had a vindaloo
• 26:42
  as well. I would suggest you give it a
• 26:43
  miss too. There are many occasions, you
• 26:47
  know, there's many occasions in my life where technically I
• 26:50
  could be being attacked by Zodal and I'm not even aware of him.
• 26:54
  It happens to me every day. Oh, really?
• 26:58
  Go to go to a Doctor Who convention, Brian.
• 27:01
  Oh my God, that's why I have. There are odor issues.
• 27:05
  Do you think that's what Roberts, Oh, I knew was trying
• 27:09
  to get here, was trying to get here?
• 27:12
  Doctor. Doctor Who fans stink, and
• 27:14
  they're all evil. Well, yes, I wouldn't put it
• 27:18
  past him anyway. Sodal.
• 27:21
  Yeah, go on. You were saying, Sodal, This
• 27:22
  evil smell. Yes.
• 27:25
  I feel like he's trying to do a bit like Agne is trying to do a
• 27:27
  bit of Lovecraft here with like the cosmic thing of just
• 27:29
  something that's so like beyond our conception that always we
• 27:33
  can kind of see. It is like a gas kind of thing.
• 27:35
  I was getting a particularly a bit like Herbert Westley
• 27:38
  animator with like all the weird zombies and stuff like like
• 27:43
  Living Dead and their Flash is kind of like peeling off and all
• 27:46
  getting the thing. I'm just thinking about stuff
• 27:48
  from the 1920s that kind of goes into the.
• 27:50
  Animator, you say? What's that all about?
• 27:55
  Well, it was like a like a parody of Frankenstein really,
• 27:59
  where there's where there's this doctor and he injects this like
• 28:02
  green. I think it's a green fluid
• 28:03
  because monster's always queen into these dead bodies and they
• 28:08
  come back as zombies. It's a traditional zombie thing
• 28:10
  really. And it will tear.
• 28:11
  They tear them apart at the end. It's not time reading English.
• 28:14
  Way of death. We could be watching that
• 28:15
  together. Good grief.
• 28:20
  Because HP Lovecraft is a very problematic man.
• 28:22
  Probably more problematic than David.
• 28:24
  I don't. Know about that.
• 28:29
  So. So do you like the idea then of
• 28:30
  the sort of oh. It's OK.
• 28:32
  Zombies. It's a great idea just to have
• 28:35
  like have a pretty much a sentient fart for your enemy.
• 28:39
  For a Doctor Who story. It's a great image you can
• 28:43
  conjure up in your head. I didn't very.
• 28:46
  It's very season 17 as well. It is an unusual villain in the
• 28:52
  style of Erato or what are they called, the Mandrels or the 91.
• 28:57
  You know, it's a, it's a quirky idea.
• 29:01
  It's yeah, it's practically stupid idea that you could talk
• 29:03
  to, you could get away with. But it also provides us with, I
• 29:07
  think the best cover in any virgin book, just that policeman
• 29:12
  walking up, coating that green smog on the on the beach.
• 29:16
  I think that is one of the no and that is the best new
• 29:20
  adventure. It is a great, it's fantastic.
• 29:23
  BBC reissue is nowhere near as good, is it?
• 29:26
  No, it's terrible, Tom Baker. I mean, that's probably the
• 29:31
  biggest selling point though, right?
• 29:33
  But yeah, I think for one of my arguments for this book is that
• 29:37
  the cover looks nice to say a lot more about its contents,
• 29:41
  that I'm using that as a defence saying.
• 29:43
  You you can't judge a book by its cover, then, is that what
• 29:46
  you're saying? No, you neither.
• 29:48
  It's title as well, because I think the English Way of Death
• 29:50
  is a fantastic title because it really pulls you in like, well,
• 29:54
  what's so English about this certain way of death?
• 29:57
  But oh, we're going all over the place.
• 29:58
  But back to the actual characters here in this
• 30:00
  commentary of all these aliens and stuff.
• 30:03
  I like to think that, although unintentionally, he has made a
• 30:07
  commentary about the upper class in that these people are
• 30:10
  confronted with these life or death situations and realising
• 30:13
  all the wrongs in their life and they still don't change for
• 30:16
  anything. They always remain the same
• 30:19
  people. I forget the woman's name.
• 30:22
  Felicia Chatter. She's the same as she is in the
• 30:24
  beginning of it because she's the end.
• 30:25
  She's just a self obsessed bitch.
• 30:27
  Isn't she? She was my favorite, yeah.
• 30:29
  She is. No, I like Rose.
• 30:31
  You know, for the same reasons. My favorite character.
• 30:36
  It was either Chatter or Sergeant Edwards, I believe his
• 30:40
  name is, who's lusting after Romana for this entire book.
• 30:45
  And he's always trying to be this very masculine kind of
• 30:48
  person, trying to say, oh, no, you stay out the way.
• 30:50
  I'll I'll do this for you, Madam.
• 30:53
  And utterly fails in every attempts to do so until the
• 30:56
  point where he just completely gives up.
• 30:58
  He's on the Sodal ship. I did really like Percy.
• 31:03
  Percy Closed. I Percy Closed was the most
• 31:07
  Woodhouse character in this book in that he is this sort of
• 31:10
  bumbling, you know, country bumpkin who just happens to be
• 31:14
  from another planet who unfortunately, when reviewing
• 31:19
  the records of Earth, the footage he had was of a bank and
• 31:24
  he just took because the man. Permanently closed.
• 31:27
  Wasn't it? Wasn't it position?
• 31:29
  Closed. No.
• 31:30
  Yeah, position closed. That's it.
• 31:31
  Yeah, so he thought he was going to cut.
• 31:33
  That must be his name, right? That's a name on a position
• 31:36
  closed. And then he realized his
• 31:37
  mistake. But he'd already got the
• 31:39
  documentation through for clothes, so he was Percy Closed,
• 31:42
  which is a good joke. That's a good joke.
• 31:44
  To go back to Mrs. Chatter, she has some incredible lines here.
• 31:50
  I think she's going after Percy, right?
• 31:52
  For the whole book, right? She's trying to like.
• 31:56
  That again, that's very Wodehouse.
• 31:57
  The, you know, unrequited love. That's very Wodehouse.
• 32:02
  There's the line. She knew and He knew.
• 32:05
  She knew and she knew. He, she and she knew.
• 32:08
  He knew. He, she knew.
• 32:10
  Oh Jesus Christ, they knew they were in love as and on another
• 32:15
  line when she's talking to the doctor, the doctor goes me, what
• 32:17
  do I do? The questions seem to take him
• 32:19
  aback when in general I fight monsters.
• 32:21
  Oh, I see Felicia grin. Felicia grin back it in a
• 32:25
  philosopher. That is a fabulous line, but
• 32:28
  then I'll never say that David Agnew can't write a witty line.
• 32:32
  He can write a witty line, but a witty line, a witty book, does
• 32:36
  not make a witty book. No.
• 32:41
  So I think. You know what you know what my
• 32:43
  big issue with this was right go for it.
• 32:46
  It was that I think it absolutely hits the brief it is
• 32:51
  nuts and bolts season 17 everything about it.
• 32:54
  You can see the location work, Allah set your death and Sharda
• 32:59
  yeah, the Cambridge stuff, but this out in the country or the
• 33:02
  seaside. You've got the doctrine Romana
• 33:06
  split up and each of them with a very funny character.
• 33:11
  Allah, Claire and Chris or Chronotis in Sharda.
• 33:15
  Again, it's very Sharda this book, like we've said already,
• 33:19
  the unusual alien entity. But beyond being season 17 like
• 33:29
  Pasty or whatever you want to say a copy a replica like
• 33:34
  simile. There's nothing else to it.
• 33:38
  There isn't. No there isn't.
• 33:39
  There isn't. Any great big twists in it?
• 33:42
  There isn't, I don't know. There's the science isn't there.
• 33:46
  I don't know. There's just no substance beyond
• 33:48
  it being Oh my God, I just read an amazing season 17 story that
• 33:53
  feels just like season 17. And I, I have got to the point
• 33:57
  now where I think I reject trads Doctor Who books in a way.
• 34:03
  And that's my issue because I should just enjoy this because
• 34:06
  this is fun. I flip flop between liking like
• 34:10
  rad and trad books if we're going to use those terms.
• 34:13
  But I don't remember what book I read before this because I read
• 34:16
  this probably a couple of weeks ago now.
• 34:21
  But when I picked it up and read it, it was after probably some
• 34:26
  book I had to read for a module for English literature that just
• 34:29
  completely fried my brain. So having a Doctor Who book that
• 34:32
  I could just, I can like glide through without having to think
• 34:36
  a second thought about was just such a treasure then.
• 34:40
  And like, I remember sitting in the living room because because
• 34:43
  I'd came, I'd come back home from university for a while and
• 34:46
  I just brought this along with me.
• 34:48
  So and just sitting in the living room while everyone was
• 34:50
  at work with my feet up on the sofa and all this stuff and just
• 34:53
  reading it in complete silence on a like a miserable February
• 34:57
  day or whenever it was, it was just invaluable to me.
• 35:01
  So that's that's why I liked this book was more so that it
• 35:05
  came to me at exactly the right time.
• 35:07
  I needed to read it. I think like there's that short
• 35:11
  story collection that Robert Shearman has is we all hear
• 35:13
  stories in the dark, I think, where if you read every book in
• 35:16
  the right or in just the right order, you'll read every single
• 35:19
  book every like a week or some such.
• 35:22
  And this is one of those rare occasions where I read the right
• 35:24
  books in the right order. So that is my kind of and the
• 35:28
  reason why I love it. I mean.
• 35:29
  That's. Rather lovely and absolutely
• 35:32
  what a book should be, right? A diversion from your life,
• 35:36
  something pleasurable that makes you smile.
• 35:39
  Like I'm not saying this book doesn't do all of those things.
• 35:44
  I just think like I've read a lot of Doctor Who books in the
• 35:46
  last year, you know how many book clubs so.
• 35:47
  I've I've I've also read probably more than I should
• 35:50
  have. But, and you and me we do have
• 35:55
  we are attracted to the darker, deeper what is it too broad and
• 36:02
  too deep for the small screen? Intelligent in quotes.
• 36:05
  Substantial, you know, the the, the Mars, the Marses, the.
• 36:10
  Lance Parkin. Yeah, Those sort of Lloyd Rose,
• 36:14
  those kind of authors. Yeah.
• 36:16
  They're trying to say something. Like, like someone like Si Har,
• 36:19
  my good friend Si, He would love this book.
• 36:22
  He fucking adores season 17. This is his TARDIS team.
• 36:26
  You know, he would absolutely fly through this and have the
• 36:29
  best sign with it. He doesn't like Doc, Doctor Who.
• 36:31
  He doesn't want to see John Pertwee getting murdered on the
• 36:34
  planet Dust. That's an anathema to him.
• 36:37
  Oh, that's the planet for him. All good reference, yeah.
• 36:41
  So I think the problem here is me rather than the book.
• 36:46
  Yeah, I think also that. So there are some problems that
• 36:50
  did come up while I was reading it, kind of because at the time
• 36:54
  I was reading it, I was writing an essay about like, focusing on
• 37:01
  like gender and stuff. And there was a really strange
• 37:03
  thing I noticed that Zodel only ever possesses men in this book,
• 37:07
  I think, and usually only men in power, like the businessman
• 37:12
  Stackhouse, the policeman Woodrow, but never a woman.
• 37:18
  At least I don't think there is If if if there is shout be on
• 37:22
  blue sky intervention not you think there's.
• 37:24
  Something to that then. I think so, but I think there's
• 37:29
  not really like a point to it. I feel like he began as you try
• 37:33
  to begin like some kind of commentary here about like power
• 37:37
  and stuff, but never really falls through with it.
• 37:43
  Yeah, I just to be fair, I also flew, ended up flying through
• 37:47
  the last bit of Part 4, like Part 4 in this book I thought
• 37:51
  was actually bad. Not bad, but the weakest part, I
• 37:56
  think it kind of, I glided through the end of it because I
• 38:00
  know part partially because I know that once you've reached
• 38:03
  Part 4 of a missing adventure, you know, Well, I know who's
• 38:07
  getting out of this. It's the Doctor and Roman are
• 38:09
  getting out of this and they're going to go in the TARDIS and
• 38:11
  they're off to they're off to Nightmare of Eden after this.
• 38:15
  And I've watched nightmare of Eden and they're fine.
• 38:18
  So but also I just didn't really care about what happened to the
• 38:22
  other characters. Like they were funny and I liked
• 38:27
  when they were funny, but there was no like actual emotional
• 38:30
  stakes or arc for them to go on that I cared to see finished.
• 38:35
  So they if they if they died, if they lived at the end.
• 38:38
  It was the same to me really. And also doesn't help is
• 38:41
  incredibly short and it's kind of just a convergent techno
• 38:45
  Babble ending and it's all sorted out.
• 38:47
  Much like Sharda, I think episode 1 of this is the best
• 38:52
  part. It's it sort of relaxes into the
• 38:55
  time period. The Prologue, episode 1.
• 38:57
  Introduces you to all the characters, the Doctor Ramana
• 39:01
  just turning up, You know, all the bullshit about him having to
• 39:03
  return the book and all. That's really bad.
• 39:06
  You can choose the tar. This is has never operated more
• 39:09
  than 39%. What were the names of the books
• 39:12
  we had to take back? I can't even remember.
• 39:15
  They all had ridiculous names. Yeah, some stupid.
• 39:17
  Names. But it does it.
• 39:19
  It feels so like Part 1 of. But then by the end, yeah, it
• 39:24
  was just like possession technobabble.
• 39:27
  I was like, oh, and it's a bit. Like Sharp in that respect.
• 39:30
  This is how they fix it. They fix it by using the
• 39:32
  equation of Russell on. Oh.
• 39:36
  Fucking yeah. I I kind of let the book get
• 39:39
  away with it because it was not taking itself too seriously.
• 39:42
  But if this is at the end of another Doctor Who book, if this
• 39:46
  is at the end of a new adventure, I would have thrown
• 39:48
  the book out the window. I've only ever done that to one
• 39:50
  other book, so that book really has to peed me off to do that.
• 39:55
  Yeah, the equation of Raslon is how everything is solved here.
• 39:57
  There was, however, just a couple of bits I just thought
• 40:00
  was done. I loved, I fucking loved K9 in
• 40:04
  the basket, shooting at the zombies as I was like shooting
• 40:09
  through the streets. That was great fun.
• 40:11
  And then like, he's talking and he goes to Romana.
• 40:15
  Oh, it's amazing how you throw your voice like that, you know,
• 40:18
  like. Yeah, that's the constant
• 40:20
  running. It's.
• 40:20
  Stuff I could just see on the screen.
• 40:23
  There's a great line with the zombies where the doctor goes.
• 40:27
  That's the trouble with zombies. It's very difficult to tell them
• 40:29
  to admit their time's up. But then of course, like going
• 40:32
  around the streets like that, that's very Sharda jumping into
• 40:37
  the portal, that's very Nightmare of Eden.
• 40:39
  Do you see what I mean? There's so many bits and pieces
• 40:42
  that have been dragged in from season 17.
• 40:44
  I'm like, what's original here? Yeah, it's if someone loves
• 40:48
  season 17 that much and they would have watched him again,
• 40:51
  again and again and again. Let's be fair.
• 40:53
  No, I think at this time you couldn't really get much of
• 40:55
  season 17 on video, could you? You get that City of death?
• 41:00
  No, like I can't. I think, like, Horns and
• 41:03
  Islands, one of the last VHS's to come out, isn't it?
• 41:06
  And like Nightmare of Eden's has come out as well.
• 41:09
  Yeah. I don't know.
• 41:13
  So you would really pick up on. The side of the books.
• 41:15
  Sorry I just realised I took a note because one of them is
• 41:17
  called Physics is Fun. The doctor goes Physics is Fun.
• 41:21
  Well that's a lie for a start. Which that is a great line as
• 41:24
  well. But now, in retrospective, you
• 41:27
  can watch all these things on iPlayer and watch 5 billion
• 41:31
  different versions of Sharda. What's your personal?
• 41:35
  Favorite. Oh no.
• 41:38
  Oh, you've got me in a chat. I've never watched Sharda.
• 41:41
  Or any version? No.
• 41:44
  The new animation was fabulous. I have.
• 41:47
  I have that one and I have the novel.
• 41:51
  Have you read the novel? No.
• 41:53
  That's another I'm. Saving it.
• 41:54
  I'm saving it, I'm saving it. I'm saving Sharda for like a
• 41:58
  miserable day. Like because it's because it's
• 42:01
  the one Douglas Adams one I've not seen yet.
• 42:04
  I'm waiting for like a special day where I'm at my lowest to
• 42:07
  watch Sharda. So it is, is it just sits there
• 42:11
  in like it's like in like an emergency like break in case of
• 42:14
  emergency box, you know? Can I ask you a question about
• 42:18
  the fourth doctrine, Ramana? OK, here we go.
• 42:21
  Well, because I have heard in, you know, nearly 1000 episodes
• 42:25
  of Hampson now many opinions of the thought Doctor Romana, the
• 42:29
  sort of side heart opinion that's the, the zenith of the
• 42:32
  regulars. It doesn't get any better than
• 42:34
  that. You know, delightfully witty and
• 42:36
  smart. And then I've had people like
• 42:38
  Pete Lambert on who said actually they're quite
• 42:42
  patronizing and arrogant and they look down on especially
• 42:45
  when they're in sort of earth stories like Duggan and Chris
• 42:48
  Parsons. And they're they're quite
• 42:51
  patronizing to those characters. And actually they're a bit sort
• 42:54
  of smugly superior. So where do you fall with this
• 42:56
  pair? I like them when they're not
• 43:01
  talking to other humans, but yeah, they can be really
• 43:06
  condescending. I I give a pass with Duggan
• 43:09
  because Duggan's an actual moron.
• 43:12
  So getting angry at Duggan is is part of the fun with that
• 43:16
  character. But yeah, they are always the
• 43:20
  smartest people in the room and that can get really tiring after
• 43:25
  a while, especially in Season 18.
• 43:29
  I think you can really tell the times up there for other reasons
• 43:33
  as well, but I just think that team kind of runs out of steam
• 43:37
  at that at that point. What about here then?
• 43:43
  This feels more like Ramana one to me than Ramana 2.
• 43:46
  She did like she. I don't feel like Roman has any
• 43:49
  fucking fun in this book at all. She's just really miserable.
• 43:53
  Probably because she doesn't want to be in 1930.
• 43:57
  She's. Awarding the audio then.
• 44:00
  I mean, I know she wasn't acting against Tom Baker.
• 44:02
  But she clearly. Did not want to be there.
• 44:05
  Did they do those audios separately?
• 44:08
  Yeah, so Jane Slavin, who plays Anya Kingdom in Reason for Lala
• 44:15
  Ward when Tom Baker's acting here, and then Lala Ward I think
• 44:18
  does it with Nick Briggs. And then they bring the two
• 44:21
  recordings together. And to be fair, like you can't
• 44:25
  hear the join, but this is Lala Ward back knowing she's acting
• 44:31
  against Tom Baker. I also feel like at that.
• 44:34
  Point Roman has been President Roman for so long, a big finish,
• 44:38
  that she can't go back. So you just get like, stern,
• 44:43
  angry Romana. I mean, she's, Oh my God.
• 44:46
  She's the only woman that turns me on when she's president of
• 44:50
  Gallifrey. She is.
• 44:51
  She is. She is one of the only reasons.
• 44:53
  That I've I've endured Gallifrey on the first three seasons of
• 44:56
  Gallifrey, I wouldn't be able to stand there in one of.
• 44:58
  Those roads, it would be a 10, honestly.
• 45:00
  She was shouting at me in one of her speeches.
• 45:03
  Good. Great.
• 45:04
  No, I. I I've not listened to that all
• 45:07
  those audios or any like Tom Baker Romana audios, because I
• 45:12
  just it's not going to be the same.
• 45:14
  Is it trying to recapture lining in a bottle?
• 45:18
  The the romance of the crime? One, like the book was a lot
• 45:23
  better, but I think the source material is better.
• 45:25
  English, English Way of death. It's a good production.
• 45:29
  It's a it's a solid production. The well, Man of War.
• 45:32
  It's a funny story, but they kept apart a lot.
• 45:36
  It's almost like David Agnew knew.
• 45:38
  You know, like the soothsayer. Yeah, the magic over his
• 45:44
  typewriter. I think because this stands
• 45:48
  after the romance of crime and before the Plotters.
• 45:53
  This sits in the middle of that. You can't help but think, why
• 45:56
  isn't it as good as this? And I guess that's half of my
• 45:59
  argument as well as to why this book just isn't what it probably
• 46:04
  should be, because I think the plotters comes out in this same
• 46:07
  year. And that book is so funny.
• 46:10
  It's so like I I Can't Sing enough the praises of the
• 46:13
  plotters and before we get on track and just make this this
• 46:17
  that book of the plotters instead.
• 46:20
  But that is where but that that fully capture season 2.
• 46:25
  You know, all, all continuities thrown out the window in that
• 46:27
  book. It's just the ship.
• 46:29
  And it's insanely funny as well. And I feel like all of the
• 46:32
  smarts went into that book. And this was written because
• 46:36
  Romance of Crime went down so well that they needed another
• 46:39
  season 17 book and didn't want anyone but Agnew to write it.
• 46:42
  Do you know isn't the plotters? The one where Vicky, a female,
• 46:47
  is mistaken for a male and lusted over that are by King
• 46:52
  John. By King James.
• 46:53
  It's almost. Like there's echoes.
• 46:55
  Of what's coming in his books. Yeah, tell me about it.
• 46:59
  I think I've got an answer for you though.
• 47:01
  I think romance to the crime, he poured all of his efforts into
• 47:04
  that book. That was his first one, and he
• 47:06
  really wanted to make an impact. He hadn't really made much, not
• 47:10
  too much of an impact with the higher science, but this is what
• 47:12
  he wants to do. Trad, Doctor Who, Missing
• 47:14
  adventures are here. Great.
• 47:15
  This is my team. What's that character called?
• 47:19
  Herbert strokes. Men love Stokes.
• 47:21
  Men love Stokes. Yeah, there's not a character as
• 47:24
  vivid in the romance of. I mean, what about the villains?
• 47:27
  Men love Stokes. I mean, there's just not enough
• 47:29
  villains called. Margot, I'm telling you, Zeus.
• 47:34
  So I think. I think he pours a ton of
• 47:36
  imagination into romance of the crime.
• 47:38
  I mean, it's got like fabulous Ogroms in it as well that are
• 47:41
  very that stinking. Ogron ship and I think.
• 47:47
  This is the difficult second album, and again, I think he's
• 47:50
  ticking all the boxes. Sophomore slump.
• 47:52
  It's like. Guns and Roses, like whatever
• 47:57
  their second album was, no one cares about it.
• 48:00
  I think his instincts are right. Though, because the Williams era
• 48:04
  is basically science fiction and literacy colliding.
• 48:08
  Yeah, there's so much, there's so many books involved in the
• 48:13
  Williams era. And I think he, like I said, he
• 48:15
  does start it. He just does.
• 48:17
  He just abandons it halfway through and just has.
• 48:19
  I thought this was right. And his doctor.
• 48:22
  And then with the plotters. When you said like, why is the
• 48:24
  plotters better? I think because then he's got
• 48:26
  fresh regulars and they're great regulars, the 1st Dr. Ian Barber
• 48:29
  and Vicky, I mean, come on, he's doing a historical story.
• 48:33
  So he's got loads of juicy stuff from the history to put in his
• 48:37
  book. And then there's his usual he's
• 48:41
  a, he's a good comedian. It's good comedy, I think as
• 48:44
  well that the plot is. Focuses on like it's one of the
• 48:47
  most like famous, like iconic events in British history of the
• 48:50
  Gunpowder Plot. And this is just a day in 1930.
• 48:54
  It doesn't really have the same sometimes like research for it
• 48:59
  and then it goes off into. You know, out of space.
• 49:04
  How would you imagine so thou's shit?
• 49:08
  Because I didn't. No, no, I did.
• 49:10
  It was a bit. Like a cross between, you know,
• 49:12
  the cell that they're stuck in, in shadow.
• 49:14
  Oh, no, you haven't seen it. It's sort of grey, featureless
• 49:18
  sort of grillings. Everything was kind of smooth
• 49:21
  for me those. Dreadful corridors in.
• 49:23
  Nightmare of Eden, those sort of beige, dreadful corridors.
• 49:27
  Is that? All it all I was thinking a.
• 49:29
  Little bit like that or just like everything is just smooth
• 49:32
  and white and boring. I can't really picture it too
• 49:35
  well. What I would have liked to have
• 49:37
  seen is have. You heard the antimatter.
• 49:42
  No. Do you know what that is?
• 49:44
  No, I have no. Clue what that is so?
• 49:45
  That was in the. Only season that Mary's hand did
• 49:48
  with Big Finish, it was the John.
• 49:50
  I've not listened to any of that because I've been.
• 49:52
  Told that is a bunch of rubbish. Some of them are good and.
• 49:56
  The antimatter kicks things off brilliantly.
• 49:59
  And it is even more of APG would have parody than this, right?
• 50:05
  All set on Earth with crazy evil aunts, people unlucky in love,
• 50:11
  and like I said before, loads of farce and things going hideously
• 50:15
  wrong. And then it's like Morris has
• 50:17
  absolutely studied Woodhouse. I thought, how do I transpose
• 50:21
  that into a Doctor Who story? Well, that's because Jonathan
• 50:25
  Morris is a very clever. Man, he's very good.
• 50:28
  Yeah, whereas I think, I think Roberts went, oh, wouldn't it be
• 50:30
  funny if I, you know, if I had, oh, wouldn't it be David Agnew
• 50:34
  said. Wouldn't it be funny?
• 50:37
  I, I wrote APG Wodehouse book as a Doctor Who story and then
• 50:43
  halfway through went, well, I suppose the Doctor Who's taken
• 50:46
  over, well, never mind. I don't know.
• 50:49
  Yeah, it is. It could have been cleverer I.
• 50:53
  Think it could have been more. And that's the crime of this
• 50:56
  book is that it could have been so much more, but but you still
• 51:01
  enjoyed it. Oh well, like I said earlier,
• 51:04
  it. Came exactly when I needed it to
• 51:07
  and it thoroughly entertained me from start to end.
• 51:10
  I'd have blasted it, what more can I say?
• 51:12
  So I'd call it one of my favourites just because I love
• 51:16
  to reading every page of it and I can't.
• 51:18
  I just couldn't wait to get to the next one liner.
• 51:21
  I was sort of turned in the. Pages going OK yeah, I can see
• 51:26
  that's from shop. OK yeah, that bit's from
• 51:29
  Nightmare of Eden Yeah, because I'm like, OK oh, I was about to
• 51:33
  say his name again. David.
• 51:34
  David, where are your ideas? You know, and I think he does
• 51:39
  have ideas in romance as a crime, and he does have ideas in
• 51:42
  the plotters beyond the. Sentience was he?
• 51:46
  Writing. Was he writing a new adventure
• 51:48
  at this time as well? He was.
• 51:51
  Probably busy. I think he was definitely
• 51:53
  writing for Doctor Who Magazine at the same time as well.
• 51:55
  There was, sort of. Yeah, I'm actually doing quite a
• 51:58
  lot this, the plotters, whatever new adventure he was writing and
• 52:05
  DWN. So he's just been pulled in
• 52:07
  about 5 different directions and you can't spin that many plates
• 52:11
  without once falling to the floor and splash and just
• 52:14
  cracking over. I think.
• 52:15
  What I suppose? In the second-half, what I did
• 52:18
  like was all of those eccentrics from the 1930s, whether they're
• 52:23
  humans or aliens in the last episode, they all sort of come
• 52:28
  together and they help in the climax.
• 52:31
  That that was all kind of nice. But yeah, I basically checked
• 52:35
  out at the end of the book. I I did check out.
• 52:38
  Towards the end and I didn't really understand what was
• 52:42
  actually happening with the machine and different people
• 52:46
  getting put in the machine and so on and so forth.
• 52:49
  But like I said, I just didn't really.
• 52:51
  I didn't, I didn't really. That's not what I was there for.
• 52:54
  So I just let it kind of wash over me.
• 52:56
  One thing I will say. Is that canine being taken over
• 53:01
  by zodal was and as things goes, eyes goes green.
• 53:05
  Please will you listen to the? Audio because John Leeson.
• 53:07
  Oh my God, imagine that is. Brilliant on the audio and he's
• 53:10
  doing Kane Doyle's voice. Now the will of Zodal.
• 53:14
  Yeah, and well, you know, he makes it.
• 53:16
  Really. Sinister.
• 53:17
  I was like, oh, really? Yeah.
• 53:19
  So it's John Leeson. Actually doing something
• 53:22
  different for once. Fantastic.
• 53:23
  That is dessert as worthy of a listen.
• 53:25
  More of a war bungle. Less Dougie.
• 53:28
  Yeah, that. Probably makes no sense.
• 53:31
  Whatsoever. Well, no it doesn't.
• 53:33
  How? Obvious I don't have an.
• 53:35
  Enormous amount of notes beyond this would have sort of fun,
• 53:40
  quirky traditional lights. Substanceless.
• 53:45
  That's sort of how I would summarize this.
• 53:48
  How about you? Yeah, it's a lot of fun, don't
• 53:57
  get me wrong. But it's not.
• 53:59
  I don't, I think it's a bad choice for, for a book club like
• 54:03
  this where you want to really pull a book apart and see what
• 54:06
  it's doing and where it's coming from and what it looks forward
• 54:09
  to. And this just isn't a book
• 54:11
  that's designed for that kind of analysis.
• 54:14
  So I I think more so this format doesn't suit what this book aims
• 54:22
  to achieve, which is provide a good time.
• 54:26
  Right. Yeah, it's just to provide a
• 54:28
  good time. Basically the conclusion.
• 54:30
  We can draw is you had a good time.
• 54:32
  I didn't. So on the one hand it did its
• 54:35
  job and on the other hand it didn't.
• 54:37
  It failed to entertain. Yeah, but there.
• 54:41
  What you just said there, that's the problem, is there's so
• 54:45
  little to grab hold of in terms of conversation with this book
• 54:49
  beyond just the experience of reading it.
• 54:52
  There's nothing. I would also argue that.
• 54:55
  Because of seeing so much of that season 17 in there that you
• 54:58
  can't get away with that showing that to a doctor audience, you
• 55:02
  can steal quite a lot from other books and do it quite well.
• 55:06
  I mean, look at the also people that is Ian and Banks, as every
• 55:10
  Ian and Banks culture book just ripped off straight in the in
• 55:13
  the introduction before the book starts, Rodovich says New
• 55:17
  Adventures writers. It's like great artists steal
• 55:20
  and new adventures writers get it off of the back of lorry, no
• 55:22
  questions asked because he completely steals in a bag.
• 55:26
  But he does it so well. And because Doctor Who fans
• 55:29
  don't read anything else but Doctor Who, they all beg your
• 55:32
  pardon. How dare you, Sir?
• 55:34
  No, that's true. That's.
• 55:38
  True when you're when. What you're.
• 55:40
  Offering is other Doctor Who you end up getting like a Simon
• 55:45
  Messingham book or a Colin Brake book where it is just like
• 55:49
  cannibal. It's just cannibalism, I think.
• 55:52
  I think you. Know a Colin Brake book could be
• 55:53
  described as the English way of death.
• 55:56
  You know, death by boredom. Oh, sorry, death by by language,
• 56:02
  actually. He has written a he.
• 56:03
  Did a good NSA, you know with the Judoon in it that was quite
• 56:06
  fun, but his past doctor one with the second doctor was very
• 56:10
  boring. The only one I've read of this.
• 56:12
  Was escape velocity and probably, yeah, that wasn't
• 56:16
  great. Yeah, that's like.
• 56:20
  It's like watching the Space Flight Challenger.
• 56:22
  What does? That mean?
• 56:25
  Well, we know the rocket goes off.
• 56:26
  Really. Well, and it's rising to the sky
• 56:28
  and Oh my God, they're going to finish an arc and it's going to
• 56:31
  be great for once and it just fucking explodes in the sky.
• 56:34
  Oh well, I'm very. Pleased those people lost their
• 56:37
  lives in order for you to come up with that metaphor there.
• 56:41
  Did you know the big? Bird from Sesame Street was
• 56:43
  supposed to be on that spaceflight.
• 56:45
  Oh, that would have been. A crime.
• 56:47
  Shame. Majestic.
• 56:49
  What are the feathers going everywhere?
• 56:51
  Yeah. Would have been a great tale.
• 56:53
  For the kids, Kieran, anyway. We need to have a discussion now
• 56:59
  not about this book now. This is the first David Agnew
• 57:03
  radio transmission. We've been lied to.
• 57:07
  Would you have slipped off? Gareth Roberts read this book
• 57:14
  that. Comes Michael.
• 57:17
  Is that who wrote this? Right?
• 57:20
  Let's talk. About Gareth Roberts, let's have
• 57:22
  the well, because I. Now, people might think I've
• 57:25
  been avoiding doing Gareth Roberts books because there are
• 57:28
  some really great ones. It's not that at all.
• 57:31
  It's just that no one's really wanted to do the man.
• 57:33
  You and one other brave enough to suggest one, I've said.
• 57:36
  Let's do a Gareth Roberts book. And I think it is worth having
• 57:39
  the conversation about the man and also about the man and the
• 57:46
  work. Where would you like to start?
• 57:51
  Get off Twitter and get over. Himself and shut the fuck up.
• 57:56
  So that's why I standing out Roberts.
• 57:59
  I do think however, that he is quite important for Doctor Who
• 58:06
  literature. Of course with the the season 17
• 58:10
  trilogy and then he writes only human for the NSA's and he goes
• 58:16
  on to he's quite important for me as well because he wrote a
• 58:19
  thing called Attack of the grass.
• 58:21
  It was like a little red button thing.
• 58:23
  And I spent hours, even though it was like I come back to you.
• 58:26
  It was terrible. I must have played that over and
• 58:29
  over and over and over and over and over again until I was just
• 58:32
  completely bored of it because I could fly the TARDIS.
• 58:34
  Thank you. He was.
• 58:37
  I also believe he was the commissioning editor at Virgin
• 58:40
  for a while. There's a very famous or not,
• 58:42
  not a famous story, but a story I heard about how the script for
• 58:47
  a Chris Christmas on a rational planet was lost behind a
• 58:49
  cupboard and he fished it out at some point and commissioned it.
• 58:52
  And therefore that goes on to give us all these amazing
• 58:54
  Lawrence Miles books. And imagine all the other
• 58:57
  writers, these books he's commissioned for the latter part
• 59:00
  of the New Adventures, you know, So anything rational.
• 59:07
  There you go. Every day is learning day, which
• 59:09
  will come back in my recommendation at the end.
• 59:13
  So I think he's quite important for Who literature, but how he's
• 59:17
  also written some great stuff in Big Finish.
• 59:19
  You've got the one Doctor, which is absolutely marvellous.
• 59:23
  And well, to talk about Doctor Who cannibalism, Bang, bang, a
• 59:26
  boom. And by the time this episode's
• 59:29
  out, we will have had our fantastic Interstellar
• 59:31
  Interstellar Song Contest. Come here, my little mum.
• 59:35
  Oh. My God.
• 59:37
  Angrier. Sorry everyone.
• 59:39
  Oh my God, do you remember when that great big Jelly ate Colin
• 59:44
  Baker and Christopher Biggins went sorry Mel is lunch?
• 59:49
  Oh my God it was great. You can drop the goody 2 shoes.
• 59:53
  Act what goody 2 shoes act that is the best Doctor Who.
• 59:57
  Parody. There has ever been the one
• 59:59
  Doctor is for sure, yeah. Fuck the curse of fatal death.
• 1:00:04
  But like I said, on the other hand, as soon as he gets his
• 1:00:06
  hand on the TV story it all goes to shit.
• 1:00:09
  The Shakespeare code is boring. We also have do you know what he
• 1:00:16
  does love to? I feel like he's got like a
• 1:00:18
  transphobar. You know, like a phobe bar,
• 1:00:22
  because he does a good old JK at the end of that one.
• 1:00:25
  That's a bit icky now makes that that makes that episode doubly
• 1:00:28
  icky, doesn't it? I quite like the Shakespeare
• 1:00:30
  code, but. I think owner, do you know what
• 1:00:32
  I think he writes? I think he writes on TV exactly
• 1:00:36
  what the general public wants from Doctor Who.
• 1:00:38
  Yeah, they want. They want a bit of.
• 1:00:41
  History. Fun monsters, some witty
• 1:00:44
  dialogue, a good rollicking pace, and a good time.
• 1:00:48
  You know it's like this book, lacking in substance, but it's a
• 1:00:53
  good time. It's entertaining.
• 1:00:56
  Yeah. And I feel in terms of like
• 1:00:58
  Saturday. Night Doctor Who.
• 1:00:59
  I don't think that is a bad instinct, no, But he does have.
• 1:01:05
  The ego of someone that someone like that should have.
• 1:01:12
  Yeah. He hasn't.
• 1:01:13
  He go on. Sodal.
• 1:01:14
  Like, like he, he, he. As we said earlier, you.
• 1:01:19
  You said he claims that the English way of death was the
• 1:01:21
  best Doctor Who book ever. Only human.
• 1:01:25
  Only human, yeah. He said he's in a Doctor Who.
• 1:01:28
  Magazine interview with him, like where he says it's just one
• 1:01:30
  of the best Doctor Who stories ever written or something like
• 1:01:33
  that. I was like, it was a good book,
• 1:01:35
  but you can't say that about your.
• 1:01:37
  Own work, even if. Even if it was, you can't say
• 1:01:40
  that about your own work because you I'd say you've run the risk
• 1:01:44
  of no, you just become an egotistical twat that no one
• 1:01:47
  wants to work with. Like in the introductions to
• 1:01:52
  this book. He spends half the time in the
• 1:01:54
  introduction. This is the reprint.
• 1:01:56
  This is a what is a four page introduction and half of it is
• 1:02:01
  talking about how well, next year in 2015, I'll be writing an
• 1:02:06
  episode for Doctor Who. This you'll be able to watch an
• 1:02:08
  episode was the caretaker for you all.
• 1:02:10
  So take that with I'm a wise known.
• 1:02:12
  As Why is Doctor Who suddenly a massive racist?
• 1:02:17
  These things build, you know, and Gareth Roberts is probably
• 1:02:22
  the reason why. And the rest of the time he
• 1:02:25
  talks about, well, the English way of death was pretty good,
• 1:02:29
  wasn't it? And that's why they republished
• 1:02:30
  it as well. Do you know what I think?
• 1:02:32
  It's really sad. Is I my politics and his do not
• 1:02:39
  align in any way shape or form. I am very much a everybody
• 1:02:44
  should be able to live their life however they choose.
• 1:02:46
  Yeah, that doesn't affect other people.
• 1:02:49
  And fuck off having an opinion about how other people should
• 1:02:52
  live their lives. Yeah, but it's sad.
• 1:02:56
  It's sad that his hideous opinions on certain things that
• 1:03:00
  have upset so many people in Doctor Who fandom means that
• 1:03:05
  somebody who is clearly talented, yeah, he can write a
• 1:03:10
  really funny, engaging Doctor Who story.
• 1:03:14
  That means he can't. Because of his ridiculous
• 1:03:17
  opinions on things, he can't write Doctor Who anymore.
• 1:03:21
  And that is his loss. And he's made many statements
• 1:03:26
  about, you know, I've been blacklisted, Blum.
• 1:03:27
  Well, yes, All you had, like you said to me in a message.
• 1:03:30
  Yeah, fine. You're allowed to have what?
• 1:03:32
  Freedom of speech? Whatever.
• 1:03:33
  You can have, whatever opinion you want, but expect
• 1:03:36
  consequences and the consequences.
• 1:03:39
  You can't write Doctor. Who books anymore?
• 1:03:41
  Because you're basically a massive twat.
• 1:03:45
  That's it. A.
• 1:03:46
  Lot of these people like JK Rowling or just a lot of these
• 1:03:50
  hateful people in general that try to police the way other
• 1:03:53
  people live, always talk about how they're bastions of free
• 1:03:57
  speech and you can't say anything these days, Ricky
• 1:04:00
  Gervais says on his Netflix special.
• 1:04:04
  You know, I like a lot. It comes back to a lot of
• 1:04:06
  comedians as well as saying, oh, you can't make church about
• 1:04:08
  anything these days. Oh, you're going to get
• 1:04:10
  cancelled if I say this. Like I said on their Netflix
• 1:04:12
  special, that's always when you open Netflix.
• 1:04:15
  It's right on the front page there being promoted.
• 1:04:17
  There's adverts all over the Internet for it.
• 1:04:20
  But what these people want is freedom, freedom of speech and
• 1:04:25
  freedom from consequences. And they don't understand that
• 1:04:28
  with freedom of speech comes freedom of consequences.
• 1:04:30
  Yes, you can say you don't like trans people, but expect someone
• 1:04:34
  to throttle you for it, you know, and, and, or if you'd be
• 1:04:38
  blacklisted and never write Doctor Who books again.
• 1:04:41
  Like you can't say these things and not expect other people to
• 1:04:46
  react with their own freedom of speech to tell you how much of A
• 1:04:49
  twat you are. But you know, there's.
• 1:04:51
  There's another issue with all this as well, beyond just
• 1:04:55
  spreading hate, which is appalling.
• 1:04:58
  And that is, it's the reaction of people that aren't the
• 1:05:03
  targets of that, hey, telling other people that they can't
• 1:05:08
  enjoy stuff that that person has created.
• 1:05:12
  And that really bugs me because do you remember when the Unicorn
• 1:05:15
  and the Wasp was going to be, you know, during lockdown, it
• 1:05:18
  was going to be one of these watches.
• 1:05:20
  And then somebody went, oh, no, he's a massive transfer.
• 1:05:23
  We're not. You can't put that on.
• 1:05:24
  And anyone who wants to watch that is basically supporting
• 1:05:27
  him. And I don't by that by all means
• 1:05:31
  take offence, by all means be angry.
• 1:05:36
  Do not tell me that I cannot separate art from artists,
• 1:05:41
  because I absolutely can do that.
• 1:05:43
  And I can still enjoy the English way of death, only human
• 1:05:46
  whatever, and still think that Gareth Roberts is not a pleasant
• 1:05:51
  man. I do think those people who.
• 1:05:53
  Kind of. They're doing the same thing
• 1:05:55
  that Gareth Roberts is doing. They're telling other people how
• 1:05:58
  to live their lives. Of course they're not.
• 1:06:01
  It's not on the same degree is what Gareth Roberts is saying.
• 1:06:05
  But it though to say you can't enjoy these pieces of work feels
• 1:06:10
  really performative. And it's almost like they're
• 1:06:13
  going out on a limb and saying, well, I'm not going to watch it
• 1:06:15
  because I'm such a good person. I would never condone art made
• 1:06:18
  by these people. And then they pick up American
• 1:06:23
  Gods and they start reading that and they go, Oh, my favorite
• 1:06:25
  comic is The Sandman I. Was at a convention, right?
• 1:06:29
  So I read a lot about totally off right now.
• 1:06:31
  I was at a convention and somebody it'd be more
• 1:06:33
  interesting to talk about these fairly.
• 1:06:35
  Big in. Phantom, I shall name no names,
• 1:06:38
  but yeah, tell me on camera he. Was quite drunk, so he probably
• 1:06:41
  won't. Remember.
• 1:06:42
  But still, he was properly angry because somebody had brought
• 1:06:45
  along A and they were so proud to have it.
• 1:06:49
  The talents of Wen Shai Yang script episode 4 and original
• 1:06:53
  scripts right. Oh bloody and he was there
• 1:06:56
  coming. That is racism in print.
• 1:06:59
  Get that off the table. How dare you bring this here
• 1:07:02
  like like I was like fucking calm down, mate.
• 1:07:06
  And then anyway, then was going on talking about the first
• 1:07:11
  doctor William Hartnell, right, who was the biggest fucking
• 1:07:14
  racist on the planet. I was like, are you mad?
• 1:07:18
  Because if you're going to hold yourself to those standards,
• 1:07:21
  yeah, then do your research and know exactly and know it's
• 1:07:26
  everybody that commits those sins.
• 1:07:28
  Because I'll tell you what, none of us are perfect, Kieran.
• 1:07:32
  No, that's that's. The that's the thing, isn't
• 1:07:33
  there? I guess I fall into like the
• 1:07:36
  camp of one of these like minorities.
• 1:07:40
  I'm an autistic man in my life. I've had people say some fucking
• 1:07:44
  horrible things to me and and get away with it.
• 1:07:47
  But if one of if, if one of my favourite writers say I'm trying
• 1:07:55
  to think now, like let's say it was found out that Terry
• 1:08:01
  Pratchett was, was all for eugenics and a massive ableist,
• 1:08:05
  which I'm, I'm probably he wasn't, but I'm just using his
• 1:08:09
  name just for, of just fulfiller here, then I would still read
• 1:08:13
  his books. You know, it doesn't change the
• 1:08:16
  work on the page. It, it, it changes what it does.
• 1:08:19
  It changes how you think about those things and how you
• 1:08:21
  approach those things for certain.
• 1:08:23
  But it shouldn't completely disqualify the merits that those
• 1:08:27
  works have. But I think there's a a certain.
• 1:08:31
  Tell me if I'm wrong. A certain naivety to people who
• 1:08:35
  I don't know. Say you love your gamer books
• 1:08:37
  and then you find out what happened there and you go, oh,
• 1:08:40
  God, oh, I wish I'd never read those books.
• 1:08:42
  Like, like he's never had a problematic thought.
• 1:08:46
  And I think as well, if you are going to throw stones at people
• 1:08:49
  that have had, you're sort of suggesting that you don't.
• 1:08:52
  And I'm telling you now, yeah, regardless of how Lily white
• 1:08:56
  people think they are, if you pull back the latest.
• 1:08:59
  Everyone. It's no, it's, it's all done
• 1:09:02
  perfectly in the Torch episode's Greeks Bearing Gifts.
• 1:09:06
  You know, everyone has these horrible thoughts about each
• 1:09:08
  other. You know, sometimes you may
• 1:09:10
  think your dearest friend in the world you, you at some point you
• 1:09:15
  will think something horrible about them, but you'd never say
• 1:09:18
  it. Don't venture into my group.
• 1:09:19
  Chats, all right, Jesus Christ and you and you don't.
• 1:09:22
  You don't. Even mean it, you just say
• 1:09:24
  sometimes. Sometimes you do.
• 1:09:25
  You know you do, but no, I'm taking that.
• 1:09:28
  But you don't, you know but. It's it's said like in heart is
• 1:09:33
  ingest really you just don't really mean these things.
• 1:09:36
  Now there are different layers there should.
• 1:09:38
  Be the space allowed to be an. Asshole.
• 1:09:40
  But I think because the way that society strucks now about the
• 1:09:44
  Internet and that once you put someone on there, or as, as, as
• 1:09:47
  your mum constantly tells you, all these old people, you put
• 1:09:50
  someone in the Internet, you're never going to get it off of
• 1:09:52
  there. It's true.
• 1:09:54
  And when you used to be able to say horrible things like down
• 1:09:58
  the pub at something and everyone would just forget about
• 1:10:00
  it. But it's, it kind of forever
• 1:10:02
  stains you there. That all history is completely
• 1:10:05
  documented now and there's always someone trying to troll
• 1:10:09
  through it. I troll through it to find how
• 1:10:12
  much of A swat you are to really prove you're an arsehole because
• 1:10:14
  they hate you, which has just made language so much more scary
• 1:10:23
  to approach. I'll give you an example.
• 1:10:26
  Of how the reaction against these things is really scary.
• 1:10:32
  Yeah. Because a couple of years ago,
• 1:10:36
  somebody else that's quite big in fandom, somebody who's had
• 1:10:39
  essays published, who has websites, can't wait to hear all
• 1:10:42
  these names and you. And you listeners, you ain't
• 1:10:44
  going to hear none of this. Well, they'll know, because some
• 1:10:46
  of them were. Involved in this oh right OK
• 1:10:49
  they she. Wrote.
• 1:10:54
  An article years ago about a Paul Connell book, right, which
• 1:10:59
  made a comment, a comment about the AIDS parody in it and made a
• 1:11:04
  suggestion, an intellectual suggestion.
• 1:11:08
  And somebody found this essay, published it on Twitter,
• 1:11:11
  highlighted it. Yeah.
• 1:11:13
  And where this person is ist phobic, whatever.
• 1:11:17
  Yeah. And then all of a sudden, and
• 1:11:19
  I'm not joking, you people, I know people are podcasts with
• 1:11:22
  friends of mine. There was a massive pile on on
• 1:11:26
  Twitter. Yeah.
• 1:11:27
  Oh, I would have thought better than that.
• 1:11:29
  Oh, and the people I know going, oh, if I know where they live,
• 1:11:31
  I'm going to go and post dog shit through their letterbox.
• 1:11:35
  It was, it was all on Twitter, all there for everybody to say.
• 1:11:39
  And I messaged her and said you need to deal with this.
• 1:11:42
  This is getting our hand and they will cancel you.
• 1:11:45
  And seriously, it was 2 hours of Rage Against this person
• 1:11:52
  building and building and building.
• 1:11:53
  It was like a really ugly thing. She wrote an apology and said,
• 1:11:58
  this is what I was trying to say with this thing.
• 1:12:02
  I apologise if I upset anybody, but this is what I meant.
• 1:12:06
  And then all of a sudden those same people that were really
• 1:12:09
  angry, that were so disappointed, that was so upset
• 1:12:12
  and angry were going. Oh well, I knew they were.
• 1:12:15
  It was basically vow from midnight.
• 1:12:18
  They were all well alone of vows.
• 1:12:21
  It's I knew it was scary and I. Sometimes think people need.
• 1:12:24
  To they need to step back and just take a breath.
• 1:12:30
  I really like this. This has become a very different
• 1:12:33
  conversation. No, but I think this is
• 1:12:35
  probably. More more an important
• 1:12:37
  discussion than anything in the English way of death, really,
• 1:12:39
  isn't it? Very much so, yeah.
• 1:12:41
  Yeah, yeah, but basically the the author himself rather than
• 1:12:46
  is more interesting than the one.
• 1:12:48
  Yeah. Well, because it has far.
• 1:12:49
  More to say about Doctor Who fandom, I guess.
• 1:12:54
  A lot. Of these I'm I'm trying to
• 1:12:55
  really care be careful my words in case of upsetting quite a few
• 1:13:00
  people on Twitter. It's kind of a vocal minority
• 1:13:05
  and I feel like these people don't have the emotional
• 1:13:08
  intelligence to understand that people can make these mistakes
• 1:13:14
  and not be a bad person. Like they should have the
• 1:13:23
  opportunity to learn from these things.
• 1:13:25
  If they do make like say, if this aids 1 was genuinely
• 1:13:31
  hateful or misinformed, then you'd want.
• 1:13:36
  I feel like these people should be given the opportunity to
• 1:13:41
  redeem themselves most of the time.
• 1:13:44
  Not talking about Neil game in here because that is when people
• 1:13:47
  that is a different fucking class, right?
• 1:13:52
  But I, I, I do feel like these people should be able to redeem
• 1:13:55
  themselves. Not without consequence, of
• 1:13:58
  course, but I'm kind of meandering a bit.
• 1:14:01
  It's tricky, isn't it? It's a tricky subject.
• 1:14:03
  It's and it's so. Personal and I'm 21 and a
• 1:14:06
  fucking moron so I don't have much.
• 1:14:08
  I can't really say a lot about this, but going back to what I
• 1:14:11
  was saying. About like everybody having
• 1:14:15
  problematic thoughts, there are levels of problematic and like,
• 1:14:20
  I don't know, my level of problematic is everybody our
• 1:14:23
  podcast with with three brain cells is really sexy to me.
• 1:14:26
  That's sort of my level of problematic.
• 1:14:28
  Whereas Gareth Roberts level of problematic is, oh, I'm going to
• 1:14:33
  write a book that says if homosexuality exists, then, you
• 1:14:38
  know, transsexuals can't exist. What the fuck?
• 1:14:41
  Like that's basically, that's basically what his book said.
• 1:14:44
  Yes. That's basically what this said.
• 1:14:47
  Oh, you don't want to know. I'm not giving him any
• 1:14:48
  publicity. And that is that is essentially,
• 1:14:51
  yeah, taking on 2 enormous groups of people and her in both
• 1:14:56
  of them. And that that is deeply
• 1:14:58
  problematic. I, I, I there is like a.
• 1:15:01
  Weird like in my head like some kind of like logical like fault
• 1:15:07
  in this man's mind. I don't understand how you can
• 1:15:10
  be a gay man living through the 90s and all that hate that goes
• 1:15:15
  that way and in to so easily turn that weapon on some on
• 1:15:20
  another minority. It fucking baffles me.
• 1:15:23
  That's what gets me about Gareth Roberts.
• 1:15:26
  I mean. Somebody I know, a second
• 1:15:30
  generation immigrant, is the most pro Brexit person I know
• 1:15:34
  and they should all be kicked out.
• 1:15:35
  So they're people are problematic in all these
• 1:15:37
  different ways. But basically I think, I think
• 1:15:40
  to sort of summarise this very passionate conversation because
• 1:15:44
  I think we've all got thoughts. On this I.
• 1:15:46
  Know there can be people that are angry listening to this and
• 1:15:48
  there's going to be. Let us know.
• 1:15:50
  Yeah, just tell us to fuck. Off if you.
• 1:15:51
  Want to, if you. Yeah, please do.
• 1:15:53
  Basically, my thought on covering Gareth Roberts books is
• 1:15:58
  that I am going to do it because he's written Doctor Who books
• 1:16:02
  and I will discuss them as much as everything else.
• 1:16:05
  But that doesn't mean I don't think he is problematic.
• 1:16:09
  I can just separate In the same way I could watch William
• 1:16:13
  Hartner acting in first stories knowing, you know, there are
• 1:16:17
  absolute anecdotes and quotes from actors that worked with him
• 1:16:20
  saying that he was deeply problematic.
• 1:16:23
  Man, I'm actually worse. He was.
• 1:16:25
  He was what like 60 in it? It was like he was born in was
• 1:16:29
  he? He was like 60 in the 1960s.
• 1:16:32
  That how that man was probably compared to any racist now that
• 1:16:37
  that's lower tier mate. He was like leveled.
• 1:16:40
  He was like Max level min maxed racist.
• 1:16:43
  He must have been. He must he must have won gold
• 1:16:45
  championships in racism and and. By all means, don't read Gareth
• 1:16:50
  Roberts books. By all means, don't listen to
• 1:16:53
  podcasts that are about Gareth Roberts.
• 1:16:56
  By all means, collects more into a.
• 1:16:57
  Bonfire and create a black candle ritual.
• 1:16:59
  Cursing into death. Oh no please, like bur books so.
• 1:17:03
  That horrifies me but but please do not think less of me or my
• 1:17:10
  guests if we are covering Gareth Roberts books because we we can
• 1:17:14
  make that distinction and that's OK.
• 1:17:18
  Yep. Yep, Well, Kieran I mean.
• 1:17:26
  Jesus Christ. I mean, I thought we were going
• 1:17:27
  to tentatively touch on that. Look, where are you sweating?
• 1:17:32
  Yeah, I am. We may have talked more.
• 1:17:33
  Longer about that than we did. About the book, you know that's
• 1:17:38
  that's about. Everything.
• 1:17:40
  Where are we going? Next.
• 1:17:42
  And is it going to be less controversial than this book?
• 1:17:46
  Well, we are going into the new adventures, so a period of
• 1:17:53
  Doctor Who that I may have said before on our verdict episode
• 1:17:57
  that I you did loathed. Loathed.
• 1:18:00
  Loathed. I mean, that's that's a.
• 1:18:03
  Strong word. We're going to the most new
• 1:18:07
  adventures, new adventure, or the period where it came.
• 1:18:11
  It's most new adventure, Z. We are going with the second
• 1:18:15
  book in a trilogy. We're going Warlock by Andrew
• 1:18:18
  Cartnell. And just by looking at the cover
• 1:18:20
  of this book, if any of your listeners don't have the cover
• 1:18:22
  of this book, it is a nuke going off with animals running around
• 1:18:27
  in terror while Ace with her tits out is holding a gun.
• 1:18:33
  There's nothing more new. Adventures than that.
• 1:18:35
  It's also the longest new adventure I checked.
• 1:18:37
  This is the longest new adventure, so be ready for this.
• 1:18:39
  Straightforward. It's going to be a long haul and
• 1:18:41
  the Doctor will never show up either, will he?
• 1:18:43
  It sounds. Far too broad and too deep for
• 1:18:46
  the small screen you know too. Broad and too deep for me now, I
• 1:18:51
  mean. I I think Andrew Cartmel has
• 1:18:55
  many strengths as a writer. I think you'll find his prose
• 1:18:57
  extremely readable. Definitely.
• 1:19:00
  Fuck me his. Tone is ugly.
• 1:19:02
  Oh, it's they're all the most. Nihilistic books you will.
• 1:19:05
  Ever read with season 26? In particular of 25 and 26, you
• 1:19:10
  can see a lot that he's trying to that no that he's read
• 1:19:14
  Watchmen and he's really going to try and be Alan Moore here.
• 1:19:22
  So I'm, I'm really going into this one as an avid Alan Moore
• 1:19:27
  fan, trying to pull apart what he's stolen from where do you
• 1:19:31
  know what I'm really starting to?
• 1:19:32
  Hate Alan Moore. I've I haven't.
• 1:19:35
  No, no, wait, hear me out. Because every time I talk about
• 1:19:39
  a shitty New Adventures book that is so far up its own arse
• 1:19:43
  and rim dark as hell, everyone goes to me.
• 1:19:46
  Well, Alan Moore was in the oh, he clearly had a a bad
• 1:19:49
  impression on all these New Adventures writers.
• 1:19:51
  Alan Moore. Has actual nuance for these
• 1:19:54
  things. He's got reasons to why these
• 1:19:56
  things are so miserable and there's always a simple truth
• 1:20:00
  was. He if he did.
• 1:20:03
  It would be the best 1. You know it's not.
• 1:20:05
  No, I'll agree with you here. This is Alan Moore's fault.
• 1:20:09
  It's all your fault, Alan Moore. Yeah, I'm coming for you.
• 1:20:14
  But. Until then, I'm exhausted.
• 1:20:17
  All this shouting up. He's vitriol Karen.
• 1:20:22
  Where can people find you online?
• 1:20:24
  You're a delightful human being. You can find me on Blue.
• 1:20:28
  Sky and Instagram at left-handed Dalek at some point in the
• 1:20:32
  future. I decided this probably about
• 1:20:34
  five hours ago that I think I might start a review site so you
• 1:20:39
  could be able to find that on my thing there or I'll probably be
• 1:20:42
  reviewing whatever books I've read in an incredibly long
• 1:20:45
  winded fashion. Oh wonderful.
• 1:20:48
  So. What?
• 1:20:48
  What? All books or Doctoroo books?
• 1:20:51
  No, not Doctor books, of course. 02.
• 1:20:55
  Books I wouldn't know anything but I'll read the reviews also.
• 1:20:59
  That's a good chance for this. This will never.
• 1:21:02
  Materialise, please do check out.
• 1:21:05
  Kieran on the Series 4 Strictly come hamster A&B.
• 1:21:11
  Yes, we ran to 9 hours talking about one season Kieran.
• 1:21:17
  That was the experience. If you get to the end of 4B you
• 1:21:22
  you'll realise how delirious we all are by the end because it
• 1:21:25
  was half one in the morning. Do you remember?
• 1:21:27
  Fraser said at the end He's going.
• 1:21:30
  He's going. God bless us.
• 1:21:32
  One and all. I went, someone goes, What's
• 1:21:35
  this, A fucking Christmas Carol? Yeah, We, we, we were off our
• 1:21:39
  tits by the end of it, weren't we?
• 1:21:41
  Pretty much, yeah. Not in a good.
• 1:21:42
  Way. No, it's like a bad.
• 1:21:45
  Acid trip? Well, Kieran, if.
• 1:21:48
  I cannot wait to explore a Doctor Who book that barely
• 1:21:52
  features the Doctor at all but does feature a ton of torturous
• 1:21:57
  experiments on animals. It sounds if Benny.
• 1:22:02
  Wasn't in this? I'd refuse to read it.
• 1:22:04
  Although I better warn you, EMI. Will be after us from We're All
• 1:22:07
  stories in the end. Cartmel's favorite new
• 1:22:09
  adventures, Araya. If we say anything mean it'll be
• 1:22:12
  coming for us. OK, but don't.
• 1:22:14
  Worry because David. Agnew's coming for us after this
• 1:22:17
  episode we're making. I hope he does.
• 1:22:21
  Kieran, I'll have spat within, I fancy a child of a.
• 1:22:25
  Legend. Can I pass money on it?
• 1:22:28
  I'd have a legendary. Spat against Gareth Roberts.
• 1:22:30
  I'd win that. I'd go until there was no
• 1:22:33
  tomorrow. I would pay to see.
• 1:22:36
  Kieran, thank you very much for your time.
• 1:22:39
  Thank you. The.
• 1:23:35
  The. The.
• 1:24:33
  The. The.