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I'm getting this sinking feeling in my heart that with the whispers of a writing room, and a seemingly larger class, Doctor Who is gonna move towards a serialized sort of story telling. I know that's how classic Who was, but that version of serialization and the kind we commonly think of today (GoT, Breaking Bad, TWD) is very different, and I think Doctor Who is more suited for an episodic style storytelling, with maybe just light trappings of serializations here in there. I think the extra couple minutes would let the writing team sort of refine whatever plot threads they have running through the season so they would seem less half-baked.
Doctor Who has changed a lot over the years in many different ways, I have no problem with them trying a more serialized season to see how it goes.
It's best if you don't think too hard about it. The adventure games made it so River had met or adventured with every single incarnation of the Doctor before Tennant as well, and none of these pre-Tennant meetings attempted to address the fact that Ten was the "youngest she'd ever seen him" when he first encountered her.
Hell, River even insinuated in the Library that she and Ten had other adventures together before that one and we never saw them.
River's timeline is a mess.
I'm ok with all of this :D
I thought that was "before" from River's point of view, not from the doctor's?
regardless, more River is all good in my book, purists and logical story lovers be damned :P
Correct, River insinuated that she had adventures with Ten (in his future) before the first time he met her in his own personal timeline.
I wish we got to see at least a few of those. Her nigh-omnipresence in the Smith era really kind of messed up the idea that she was tied to the Doctor as a general entity by making her into Smith's "girlfriend" in particular.
oh i don't know, i liked the romance it added.. "MY doctor".. especially with the character difference between 10 and 11. no way 10 would be able to hold down a relationship with a woman like that. he'd be far too needy, reading too much into her FB status, etc (i'll stop now before fanfic)
Hey ResetEra!
I wanted to respond to the Christmas Special home video chat on the previous page but my account hadn't been verified yet. This upcoming Christmas special is a bit unique in that it'll be the only one orphaned from a complete boxset. I suppose they might fudge it by giving the packaging design a complete series-esque vibe/having a Steelbook edition but it'll be the first one where it's just that and nothing else. The Eleventh Doctor specials were compiled in a complete 50th Anniversary boxset, although it was a limited edition and hasn't been reprinted - although it might be if the Steelbook reissue line reaches that far. It's a bit of an odd situation in that Tennant and Smith had a series of specials outside their last series, whereas Capaldi just has the one. But I think the increasingly erratic behaviour of BBC Worldwide also plays into it. They attempted to release Series 7 without the first special at first until fans complained. The Smith specials didn't get a standard complete release and the Time of the Doctor set isn't a standalone, it's a Smith Christmas specials compilation. Then they initially released Last Christmas as part of this weird Christmas Specials boxset that had purchase incentivisation in the form of exclusive special features. So they're getting a bit weird and I suspect there's a manager somewhere that wants to shuffle Christmas specials off the series boxsets and have them as their own weird little thing.
I think you can sort of fudge this a bit so it still makes sense. It's still legitimately the youngest she's seen the Tenth Doctor and she's aware that she isn't supposed to properly meet the incarnations before him. IIRC, she knows she's fucked when she meets the earliest Doctor she's allowed to interact with at the point where he's the youngest, so the line retains its significance even though it's only true in a certain sense.
I wanted to respond to the Christmas Special home video chat on the previous page but my account hadn't been verified yet. This upcoming Christmas special is a bit unique in that it'll be the only one orphaned from a complete boxset. I suppose they might fudge it by giving the packaging design a complete series-esque vibe/having a Steelbook edition but it'll be the first one where it's just that and nothing else. The Eleventh Doctor specials were compiled in a complete 50th Anniversary boxset, although it was a limited edition and hasn't been reprinted - although it might be if the Steelbook reissue line reaches that far. It's a bit of an odd situation in that Tennant and Smith had a series of specials outside their last series, whereas Capaldi just has the one. But I think the increasingly erratic behaviour of BBC Worldwide also plays into it. They attempted to release Series 7 without the first special at first until fans complained. The Smith specials didn't get a standard complete release and the Time of the Doctor set isn't a standalone, it's a Smith Christmas specials compilation. Then they initially released Last Christmas as part of this weird Christmas Specials boxset that had purchase incentivisation in the form of exclusive special features. So they're getting a bit weird and I suspect there's a manager somewhere that wants to shuffle Christmas specials off the series boxsets and have them as their own weird little thing.
I think you can sort of fudge this a bit so it still makes sense. It's still legitimately the youngest she's seen the Tenth Doctor and she's aware that she isn't supposed to properly meet the incarnations before him. IIRC, she knows she's fucked when she meets the earliest Doctor she's allowed to interact with at the point where he's the youngest, so the line retains its significance even though it's only true in a certain sense.
In the Big Finish plays she tries not to interact with them and either just about manages to protect her identity or wipes their memories after meeting them - she does have a clear sense that they're not 'her' Doctors.
I've been meaning to rank the new series Big Finish releases for a while so here goes:
- Unit: The New Series - Series 1 to 4 - This is my favourite set of releases, consistently enjoyable.
- Classic Doctors, New Monsters - Volumes 1 and 2 - Pretty close between this and Diary of River Song, although I think this has a better Volume 2. A bunch of strong standalone new-style stories with classic Doctors and original one-off companions.
- The Diary of River Song - Series 1 and 2 - Volume 2 is slightly weaker so this lost out to Classic Doctors, New Monsters. Decent sets of stories.
- The War Doctor - Series 1 to 4 - Consistently decent but in retrospect not particularly memorable.
- The Churchill Years - Volume 1 - Three decent stories and one I didn't like as much, although told in a dramatised audiobook style rather than as a straight audio play.
- The Tenth Doctor Adventures - Volume 1 - That's right, it's all the way down here! Decent recreation of the Tenth Doctor era but it specifically recreates the three throwaway rompy episodes we used to get at the start of each RTD series which limits its appeal as there consequently aren't any standout stories.
- The Lives of Captain Jack - This is the only set I didn't particularly enjoy. It feels a bit thrown together and is the only one on this list with no Making Of disc for some reason. The stories are a bit weak and lifeless and the Russell Tovey one even retrospectively manages to undermine the scene from The End of Time that sets it up.
Thanks for these! I really need to get back into Big Finish. I got through just about all the old "main range" 8th Doctor stories and was soon to start on Eighth Doctor adventures...
I suppose it's only loosely a new series release, but what about Jago & Litefoot & Strax?
This... seems like it is going a bit deep. But more power to them, if the audience is there.
I know this sounds hyperbolic, but I seriously don't think I've ever heard of anyone who specifically likes Jenny. She's always felt like a bit of a Poochie in a not-great story
First new series boxset based on a single episode I think, although if you discount cameos and minisodes I guess that includes the Eighth Doctor and the War Doctor as well.
A set based around Jenny...ehhh, no. I'm assuming Freema Agyeman wouldn't do it, but why not a Mickey and Martha series, if you're gonna do the side character stuff?
I'm not particularly interested in the Jenny set but I don't really think it's much more of a stretch for a spinoff premise than Churchill or Tales from New Earth.
The first Churchill set turned out to be a nice little box of Doctor lite stories from throughout the man's life narrated as journal entries, actually. Wasn't something I'd been interested in beforehand but copped it in the last BF Humble Bundle and was pleasantly surprised. So who knows.
The first Churchill set turned out to be a nice little box of Doctor lite stories from throughout the man's life narrated as journal entries, actually. Wasn't something I'd been interested in beforehand but copped it in the last BF Humble Bundle and was pleasantly surprised. So who knows.
Hahahaha.
Incidentally, since this brings up Class, I wanted to mention I felt it was really awful (and sort of indicative of the loss of oversight Moffat had in his later years) that Capaldi appeared in that show. It was a YA show, a teenage show - much the same as Torchwood - and the logic was the Doctor, the TARDIS and the Daleks could never appear in Torchwood because kids would want to watch it, completionist. Class occupies much the same sort of space as Torchwood, with blood splatter, swearing etc etc - and if you're eight and a Doctor Who fan you probably shouldn't be incentivised to watch it, but an appearance by the Doc is always sure to do just that. Just a thought.
Maybe BF can make something with that character but I don't have high hopes. They really didn't sell me on her with her introduction.
Had a good laugh when the articles on what Pegg did showed up on my feed. What a mess!
Ah, and glad to see you here :)
It's in the pictures APZonerunner posted.
But just in case they're not loading for some reason: He wrote an article in which the first letter of every sentence end up spelling "Panini* and BBC Worldwide are cunts."
*they publish the Doctor Who Magazine
I never heard the term Big Finish before today, what does it mean?
Big Finish is a production company that make incredibly high end Audio dramas telling more stories in the Doctor Who universe.
They at every available opportunity use original actors for the Voice acting and at times cast note worthy actor in new roles such as Sheridan Smith as a companion or the 8th doctor.
If you have spotify a huge swath of David Tennant 11th doctor audio dramas are available via that as a nice intro. Personally I'm a fan of the 8th Doctors stuff since he never got much media and anything using the war doctor.
The "canonicity" of the audio dramas is up for dispute but I like to think of them as official events unless contradicted by the show
They at every available opportunity use original actors for the Voice acting and at times cast note worthy actor in new roles such as Sheridan Smith as a companion or the 8th doctor.
If you have spotify a huge swath of David Tennant 11th doctor audio dramas are available via that as a nice intro. Personally I'm a fan of the 8th Doctors stuff since he never got much media and anything using the war doctor.
The "canonicity" of the audio dramas is up for dispute but I like to think of them as official events unless contradicted by the show
What Stalker said, but I'll add some other things:
Many people would happily argue that Colin Baker's performance on Big Finish has massively rehabilitated him as a Doctor - he's fantastic there in ways he was never given the opportunity to be on television.
I present this from Doctor Who and the Pirates, a Gilbert and Sullivan-themed episode:
On a similar-ish note, McGann had a different problem on TV - only being the Doctor for the TV movie and the Night of the Doctor short episode - yet has had a full and plentiful run on audio, and has shone in ways he couldn't before - in a sense you can see that, in how Night of the Doctor is absolutely the character he developed into on audio (including explicit nods to some of this audio-only companions, at that)
And finally, in terms of acquiring Big Finish audio, the best bet to get a lot of BF cheaply is to keep an eye on Humble Bundle; they've had two (if I remember correctly) bundles that included a wodge of BF content. However, of course, you're at the mercy of their release schedule there. An alternative is to keep an ear on BBC Radio 4 Extra, who will occasionally broadcast Big Finish audios. There's none broadcasting at the moment - looks like the most recent ones listed there were some of the first series of the Lost Stories line back in July. Based on previous years, they usually broadcast something Doctor Who over the winter, although it's not always Big Finish - sometimes there's some BBC Audio productions instead.
So they didn't ever bring her back after her intro episode, but they'll do THIS? Idk could be interesting.
Moffat saved her by requesting RTD give her a regeneration scene and then Moffat got too far up his own ass trying to finish his own arcs after he wrote himself into corners he forgot all about her.
I'm nearly finished with all of the 8th Doctor's Big Finish productions - I'm on Dark Eyes 4. So I've just got Doom Coalition and the newly released The Time War I left. I really loved the Eighth Doctor Adventures and I like Nicola Walker a lot, but I do miss Lucie.
I don't know what I'm going to do after I've finished! Maybe listen to the Tenth Doctor stuff, since 10 is one of my favorites. The Eighth Doctor is by far my favorite doctor now, though. McGann is simply amazing.
Hopefully they'll do some more stories with 8 and Mary Shelley. I really enjoyed those.
I don't know what I'm going to do after I've finished! Maybe listen to the Tenth Doctor stuff, since 10 is one of my favorites. The Eighth Doctor is by far my favorite doctor now, though. McGann is simply amazing.
Hopefully they'll do some more stories with 8 and Mary Shelley. I really enjoyed those.
Might just be his. Those were the ones I went looking for, I assumed they were all there.
Basically the man behind the music of the series from the mid sixties to the end of the 70s (if Shada had been completed in 1980, that would have been Simpson's final contribution to the series). He didn't do every story in that time but he did most and was almost the only composer used for most of Tom Baker's episodes. His early 70s scores where he tried (sometimes unsuccessfully) to record scores written for traditional instruments but performed all on early synths at the BBC Radiophonic workshop gave the show its unique sound.
He also had certain directors boycott him. Apparently Douglas Camfield never used him after an argument at a dinner party in the 60s.
I found when Simpsons slowly went back to mixing synths and traditional instruments (and over time, using a lot less synthesizers), his stuff improved a lot, though like many composers, it could sound 'samey.'
Even his nickname 'Deadly Dudley' is a bit much considering the scores that were really panned in the 70s where generally those by other composers
He also did the theme and incidental music for Blake's 7 (all those teleport cues) and did the theme tune for the original 70s Tomorrow People. Plus a lot of stuff up untl the late 80s.
I remember being quite taken with Dudley Simpson's work in the 1970s, particularly the original Survivors series (Edit: no, that was somebody else). I think he did some early Horizons, though Paddy Kingsland's much more commercial sound (HHGTTG, etc) was more their style.
I find the austerity of his style rather difficult to take, nowadays. It no longer sounds so new, just very thin.
I find the austerity of his style rather difficult to take, nowadays. It no longer sounds so new, just very thin.
not much you could do back then when your budget allowed you three musicians doubling up and some synth overdubbing. I think the early 80s stuff from the Radiophonic workshop worked better, but both were preferable to the mostly awful stuff from 86-89.
Now I'm a year or two out of date with the 8th Doctor, but up until that point I had fully completed his audio library. After that I moved on to the 6th Doctor and it went swimmingly throughout his run.
After the War Doctor audios I sort of fell off the bike and I've really got to get back on task. A couple preorders have probably unlocked on the website already and I haven't even checked. I think I had some 8 and 10 stuff on order, and I should really jump on that new David Bradley stuff.
Edit: Just checked my account and I've got this hotness waiting for me:
THE EIGHTH DOCTOR - THE TIME WAR SERIES 01 - DOWNLOAD
Yeeeeeaaaaaaahhh. Also, 10th v2 this month and War Master next month? And Bradley 1st Doctor January? It's a good time to be a big finish fan.
Edit2: Went ahead and ordered the Bradley 1st Doctor v1&2. Also noticed that Billie Piper is in 10thV2. Hnnnnnng.
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To be fair, it didn't take the Doctor that long either. ;)
I still feel so weird about the show moving forward. I'm glad we're losing Moffat, and I'm glad we have a female Doctor, but at the same time I want more Capaldi.
When Matt left I was just 100% ready for him to move on...feels different this time.
Continuing my Hartnell marathon.
The Romans
Probably the most comedic Hartnell story I've seen yet. While some of the humor leans into slapticky, Benny-Hill-chasing-people stuff, a lot of is just clever wordplay and sharp dialog that feels like something of a precursor to, say, Douglas Adams or Moffat; there's some genuinely funny stuff in here. Vicki acquits herself as well as a Susan replacement, which is to say, she does almost nothing and isn't annoying at any point. Ian and Barbara do much of the heavy lifting here, though the Doctor gets an amusing subplot where he pretends to be a gifted musician and manages to fool everyone, which Hartnell clearly has a lot of fun with. Hartnell seems to be having a lot of fun in general here, frequently laughing to himself and poking fun at his comrades. The Doctor seems particularly amused at the suggestion that he accidentally inspired the great fire of Rome.
All in all, it's enjoyable fluff.
I also checked out the ending of The Chase, just to see Ian and Barbara's depature from the TARDIS. It was kind of not great. The moment when they realize they can finally go back home is a good one, as is their argument with the Doctor about wanting to go back now that they have the chance. But for some reason, the writers decide to rob the three of actual on-screen goodbye together. And when the pair return to 1965 London, there's this really bizarre montage of sorts of them running around and playing with pigeons, and shit. Really strange and an unfortunately poor way to leave behind two of the original three companions. At the very least, Hartnell's "I shall miss them" was touching.
The Romans
Probably the most comedic Hartnell story I've seen yet. While some of the humor leans into slapticky, Benny-Hill-chasing-people stuff, a lot of is just clever wordplay and sharp dialog that feels like something of a precursor to, say, Douglas Adams or Moffat; there's some genuinely funny stuff in here. Vicki acquits herself as well as a Susan replacement, which is to say, she does almost nothing and isn't annoying at any point. Ian and Barbara do much of the heavy lifting here, though the Doctor gets an amusing subplot where he pretends to be a gifted musician and manages to fool everyone, which Hartnell clearly has a lot of fun with. Hartnell seems to be having a lot of fun in general here, frequently laughing to himself and poking fun at his comrades. The Doctor seems particularly amused at the suggestion that he accidentally inspired the great fire of Rome.
All in all, it's enjoyable fluff.
I also checked out the ending of The Chase, just to see Ian and Barbara's depature from the TARDIS. It was kind of not great. The moment when they realize they can finally go back home is a good one, as is their argument with the Doctor about wanting to go back now that they have the chance. But for some reason, the writers decide to rob the three of actual on-screen goodbye together. And when the pair return to 1965 London, there's this really bizarre montage of sorts of them running around and playing with pigeons, and shit. Really strange and an unfortunately poor way to leave behind two of the original three companions. At the very least, Hartnell's "I shall miss them" was touching.
The new Doctor looks great
The new show runner looks... eeeeeeh. I'll reserve judgment. I'll always watch it. But I'm ready for the show to take a dive.