Doctor Who - “Planet of the Ood”

4/10 – OK, seriously, when is the series actually going to start …

There is something desperately wrong with the 4th season of Doctor Who. Some might blame Catherine Tate as Donna, others the writer Russell T. Davies, but I’m not so sure. I think they’ve stretched themselves too thin. For one thing, the new season has lacked a lot of the slick luster previous series have had and look a bit more like the children’s “Sarah Jane Adventures.” Quite frankly, maybe two spin-offs is slightly too distracting from the original? Who cares about Torchwood’s great ratings? They are miniscule by comparison to Doctor Who … even in America!

Then there is the story telling. The seasons have a predictability to them that has now gotten a bit annoying. Episode 2 always has to be an historical, while the future shows always revolve around something we’ve previously seen. The only chances the season takes are towards its gallop to the half-assed story-arc ending.

Planet of the Ood. Well, where to begin? Oh, why not the Ood themselves? They aren’t anything interesting, apart from a good creature design. But, that doesn’t matter since we’ve seen enough farting aliens – oh please, one more f’ing Slitheen story, preferably on New Earth -- in the last few years to make us grateful for anything else. The story, while on its very obvious surface, is a simple metaphor for slavery, basically goes no place and ends no place. It felt nice, but bored me.





And, next week we get the mid-season old monster 2-parter with the Sontarans … and I dearly hope they haven’t ruined them the same way they did with the Cybermen (my official favorite classic monster) … But, if they can do it, they will find a way. Perhaps farting Sontarans … all in unison, since they are a clone race.

Basically, where once I was hopeful, now my enthusiasm is sinking fast …

Doctor Who - The Fires of Pompeii

8/10 - Up Pompeii (Yeah, I know)



Well, there’s nothing like a good old history story is there? “Its Pompeii … and its volcano day” is the line we’ve been waiting for since Captain Jack said it in 2005. It was almost inevitable. The Doctor and Donna arrive in what they think is ancient Rome and the usual "This is wonderful" scene ensues.



But, as usual, there is something not altogether right going on. As we long-time fans have come to expect, these historical adventures always have some alien influence (unlike the Hartnell days) and in Pompeii the Doctor finds that the soothsayers know a lot more than they should. (What is on Donna’s back?)

The aliens that landed centuries ago are reconstituting themselves into an invasion force … one that puts the Doctor in a very difficult position. There are a lot of great special effects and a good solid story that puts the morality of Doctor Who back into position. Donna comes across, again, as the voice of reason for the Doctor, but also understands the impossible choices he must make.

But, I have to add, that something about this story didn’t sit right with me. I can’t quite put my finger on it, so perhaps I should let it be for now. Some stories take time, while others (like “The Shakespeare Code”) seem wonderful on first viewing and become tiresome after multiple viewings.

Doctor Who - Partners in Crime

Its been a while since I last reported in, so I’ll have to make up for some lost time. But, in that, I can only start from today.

7/10 - Growing up Baby Fat



The return of Donna Noble from “The Runaway Bride” might have a lot of viewers vexed at our yelling comedian Catherine Tate bitching her way through an entire season, but this first episode shows a new (and yet old) dynamic entering into the new Doctor Who. However, Donna is a changed (somewhat) woman from when we last saw her and she’s looking for the Doctor. It is rather funny, then, that they spend half of the episode just missing each other. When they do meet, it might be the funniest moment in the history of the new series.

It is a light comedy about an alien breeding farm masquerading as a diet pill manufacturer. The Adipose are breeding a new generation out of the fat from human bodies. That all sounds pretty grim, but the “monsters” are so cute that this becomes very silly most of the time. In fact, it is a bit more like the children’s show “The Sarah Jane Adventures” (specifically the pilot “Invasion of the Bane”) than proper Doctor Who. It is only at the end that a good punch in the stomach of the coming season’s dark path.



Donna, in a classic comedy bit at the end, makes it very clear that, unlike Rose and Martha, she is not love with the Doctor and … at last … Doctor Who returns to total reset.

Time-Crash

Just a couple of pics from Friday's "Time-Crash" ... and this does look pretty funny. Just look at Peter Davison's face!

The Two Doctors .... again

Peter Davison and David Tennant will star in a Children in Need special Doctor Who!



From the BBC " ... Fifth Doctor Peter Davison, who played the part in the classic series from 1981 until 1984, will reprise his role alongside current Doctor David Tennant in the forthcoming Children in Need scene. The mini episode, entitled "Time Crash", was written by award-winning Doctor Who writer Steven Mofatt, and will be transmitted as part of the Children in Need fundraising evening on Friday 16 November 2007.

"It is an honour for me to be able to make the connection between the Fifth Doctor and the Tenth Doctor," noted Peter Davison. "However, now is not the time for sound-bites. I can feel the hand of history on my shoulder, even if I can't do the buttons up!"



Of course, that's not altogether fair, as David Tennant is thinner than all of his female costars, let alone his male ones. And, Peter still holds the "record" for youngest Doctor (he was 29 when he took the part) and Tennant's portrayal undoubtably owes a lot to this incarnation. Well, as a bonofide Doctor Who geek, this is kind of one of those moments when you have to question your sanity. Sure, it's for charity, so there are going to be some forgiving feelings about it.

The question is ... how will it be treated? Will it be a joke or a semi-real episode?

Sarah Jane Adventures - Revenge of the Slitheen

Well ... er, it's Slitheen and Sarah Jane. Equals farting school headmaster. I mean the math is simple enough. What I truly don't understand is why this is actually better than the blatantly over-hyped (and more expensive) Torchwood. It's stupid, childish, and all those other words you can think to describe it. In fact, it makes K-9 and Company look like I-fucking-Claudius!

It is EXACTLY everything you expect. We knew the title, and even if you didn't, that's the first thing you see, so no surprises. Sarah's surrounded by children ... so school is kind of an obvious start ... A strange remake or mish-mash of School Reunion and WWIII ... with cheaper costumes and a lower budget. And, yet ... even though I'm very tired from a long day of stuff (a 12 hour one, almost) I still watched it all the way through. Honestly ... whatever it is that fuels the new Doctor Who with energy is present in the show (again, the way it is not in Torchwood.)




And, perhaps that is the reason ... the ultimate reason why Doctor Who really works ... when you compare the two spin-offs: the family and child oriented program fairs better than the unbridled sci-fi-fuck-fest. It's not really nostalgia that brings the audiences to Sarah Jane (it's a children's show full-on.) So, clearly the mixture of adult-to-children themes favors the child in us all.

Lesson to Mr. Davies.

Yes, definitely not Doctor Who. But ... not Torchwood.

Voyage of the Damned pic

Kylie Minogue and David Tennant ... on the Titanic. Well, I'm already excited.

MISTER MEDIA ME>BLOG

If I were being very faithful with this blog and you my dear readers I’d try to keep up to date with my media immersion, but frankly … I just can’t seem to convince myself that it matters.

So what if I’m listening to the 3 CD Sergeant Pepper’s bootleg? Does it matter that I watched Tom Baker’s first season of Doctor who over the weekend? Or that I’ve been watching the brilliant Ian Richardson in the House of Cards series? Is it a crime to have down-time?

The truth is I am constantly immersed in media, as we all are if we’re honest, but I’m also participating in it … which makes writing a blog objectively reviewing things a bit distracting. Currently, I have a lot of songs and Spacefinger music written, a new Spacefinger “set” available on the podcast, and am trying to get some back catalogue on lulu.com in case one or two of you want to buy this stuff.

Not too long ago I self-published a novel (not too disguised to the right of this blog.) Of course, this was really just me being too lazy to go through the double-whore process of selling myself to a publisher. Believe me, unless you are well connected, that’s just harder than writing the novel in the first place. So, I went the self-publishing route. Vanity Press … yes, I know.

So, someone a few weeks back asks if I had copies to sell (not online.) Well, this is Print on Demand … I don’t have a few hundred sitting around. I have to buy them, too. So, I got a couple of copies … and no one is interested. They are just sitting here …. Even with signs up and everything … bastards.

And, then there is the short-story I just sent off to a science fiction magazine.

So, I’m a busy guy. I have a job, too, which is rather too dull to write a blog about. So, I’m a bit depressed. Just turned off the Beatles from the ipod monster. Not even the fabs can save me today.

“It’s only a Northern Song.”



ps ... this thing really isn't into using the Title box lately ...

Vote Saxon

Get the word out and Vote Saxon ...

Doctor Who “Utopia”

1000/10 … holy cow … two Masters for the price of one …

OK, so I missed a few weeks … and they were good weeks, but I can’t go back. Looking back now as we teeter on the edge of the massive trilogy that ends this season is pointless. We are fully launched and I can’t go back to something like “Blink” (which was another Doctor-Lite story … meaning they didn’t have time to get David and Freema for most of the episode and made up another story around nothing … though it was better than “Love and Monsters” from last season.) I can sort of look back at “The Family of Blood” the conclusion of “Human Nature” … but there isn’t much to add apart from more of the same. The story was great.

But, this is “Utopia.” Yes, say it like you mean it, because in more ways than one this was a Doctor Who fan’s Utopia! Forget that Spiderman vs Superman ending of last season with the Cybermen and Daleks (the war that never should be seen) … this is the reinvention of the Master. Arguably 3rd (certainly chronologically) of the Doctor’s enemies, The Master is also a Time Lord. But, how? The time war? Yes, yes … I’m sure we’ll get to skirting around those issues in the future. Or is it the past? You see how that works? But most importantly to the series itself, a humanoid not a robot, which allows for the possibility of a real sense of uncertainty. Even though The Master is a cliché mustache (or goatee) twirling villain, if pitched right by the right actor, there can be real menace in knowing that the Doctor’s “tricks” could be out-matched.

Basically, if you heard anything about Utopia, you heard something that is a spoiler. Though it was kept a fairly unconfirmed secret for quite awhile … the cat is out of the bag after Saturday. Captain Jack is back from his purgatory in the dreadful Torchwood and is very much a good spike of adrenaline with his “yes sirs” and coat holding thing. Whatever, he’s good fun and has a great entrance.







And then there is The Professor or Professor Yana played by Sir Derek Jacobi.



Well, there is a reason they gave this guy a knighthood. He plays the befuddled Professor with such incredible skill and talent that you feel, what with the high production values, that this might be a major motion picture you are looking at instead of the legendary “cheap sets” Doctor Who.




What we discover … in quick succession is that he has a watch like the Doctor’s from “Human Nature” and that he doesn’t really recognize what it is or means. He was discovered with it as a naked child on the edge of the Silver Devastation (which is where the Face of Boe is from.) This all connects up as the Professor opens the watch and becomes The Master. The turn from befuddled friendly genius to sad old man to pure evil is just astonishing acting for 44 minutes. Everything from the previous episodes comes into play (the watch from the chameleon arch explains why the Doctor couldn’t sense another Time Lord and even his name, Yana, is an anagram for “You Are Not Alone”.) During the Master’s transformation (or “ascendance to his majesty”) the Doctor realizes who he is … even though he isn’t in the same room.





The Master is shot by his assistant as he enters (and steals) the Doctor’s TARDIS … and regenerates into John Simms (“Life on Mars”).



Simms has a moment of insane glory at the end, yelling to his old foe the Doctor from inside his stolen TARDIS, “Why don’t we have a nice chat where I tell you all my plans so you can work out a way to stop me. I think not!” (Very Austin Powers, but still … to the point.)







This is the first of a 3-part ending to the series. Next week we see the Master’s assume his new identity as the oft mentioned Harold Saxon, the new Prime Minister … in all his insane glory.

Hi, It’s Been a Long Time …

So, I’ve been busy. In fact, I will continue to be busy, so I’ll try and get this down in some form and post it all in one mighty lump. My spare time has been boxed and limited due to exhaustion from work and a new medication my body is adapting to (don’t worry, I’m not dying.) My viewing habits are largely dictated by the fact that I’m too lazy make up and then change my mind.

I promise I’ll catch up on my new Doctor Who series reviews soon …

So, first up

Deadwood – Season Three



I still can’t decide if I love this show or hate it. What I do know is that it makes me watch it, whatever the feeling I am having. HBO’s complicated DVD menus sure do aggravate me, but the presentation is always high quality. Deadwood season three is easily the best of the three (so far, anyway) with the Bullock and Swearengen becoming allies in the town’s war against George Hearst. In fact, the third season is easily the best season as it sees the characters come to terms with who in what they are, but not in any sentimental or cliché TV show way.

What everyone knows and talks about when they mention Deadwood is the amount of swearing. Yes, in fact, episode 1 of season 1 was like listening to someone swear who didn’t know how to do it … ie, very odd and off-putting. But, what isn’t mentioned, though is immediately apparent if you haven’t watched the show in a while, is that convoluted language (vacillating from the eloquent, well-read classical style to gutter talk) that makes for quite a strange and highly stylized show. When Al comments “and Leviathan smiles” the audience is expected to understand and know what a Leviathan is and the literary reference (in this case, Hobbes’ very famous philosophic masterpiece). Not the average show about violence and swearing.


Doctor Who “The New Beginnings” Box set
The Keeper of Traken, Logopolis, and Castrovalva



Once upon a time, this was the “new” Doctor Who. Reinvented in 1980 under the leadership John Nathan-Turner, it is hard to believe the this looked really fresh and new, but it did. To be totally fair to this DVD set, you must remember that this was the “new” era of video effects, music videos were literally just beginning, and the synthesizer hadn’t yet become an innocuous invention and was appreciated as a new sound. The video effects look very dated now, but back then Duran Duran hadn’t even gotten off the ground (the New Romantics wave had barely started.)

This trilogy of stories features probably the most jaw-dropping TV moment of my entire life – the regeneration of Tom Baker into Peter Davison. Tom Baker had been the only Doctor for many Americans since the show first began to pop up on PBS stations and, although I did know something about the past Doctors by the time I saw Logopolis, I was not prepared to actually deal with seeing the series go on without the character I loved.

In the US we don’t perceive the series as being scary or family oriented or even mass market. It was mainly for more mature/geeky kids and was on Saturday nights and therefore will always be seen as a niche or cult program by outsiders (or the “not we”.) Add to that the essential “cheapness” of having the program shot on videotape in an era when only game shows and soaps were on video, science fiction in the post Star Wars environment shunned it as a whole. In short, being a Doctor Who fan in the US has always had some “shame” attached to it. Even now, as I write this, the show is all but invisible on people’s radars in the US because … well, it’s on the sci-fi channel, which carries such a stigma that some refuse to watch it. In fact, a few stragglers found it on BBC America and even though I said “the 2nd series is coming on Sci-Fi channel …” they will obviously wait until it shows up on what they consider “respectable” channels.

Much of the charm of the series – back when it caught the cult TV public’s eye on a bored Saturday night -- was generated by the personality of the lead actor playing the part of the Doctor and Tom Baker’s seven year reign in the role made him unquestionably "the" Doctor for many people. When, at the end of “Logopolis” he fell (rather feebly) from the Pharos radio telescope and regenerated into Peter Davison (the Vet from “All Creatures Great and Small”!!!) many casual viewers just dropped it altogether.

Watching it then was just bizarre. Oh sure, on soaps they occasionally have actors replacing another in the same role (with a disturbing disembodied voice-over saying “the part of so-and-so will now be played by …”) but to actually have a story device to change out the lead actor in the series and allow them to be different is just revolutionary. It can also be quite startling to a 12 year old (or whatever I was back then.) At one moment you are watching a character’s death and then (fortunately “Castrovalva” was broadcast back-to-back with “Logopolis”) you have to get used to entirely different person as the same character. And, it wasn’t the same at all.

Now, over 25 years later, it’s kind of embarrassing to watch these studio-bound melodramas because, although nothing emerged unscathed from the 80s, Doctor Who was then being managed by a man who especially was conscious of trends and fads. Add to that the introduction of THREE companions (none of which could act) and you have a series of comedic tragedies. But, on the plus side both Tom Baker and (yes I do like him) Peter Davison are great in this changing of the guard, as it were. Fans of the new series will find it mostly cheap, while fans of the old series might also find the new direction to be a little too casual (question marks on the lapels, a stick of celery … wha …?) But, for a generation, this really was a startling moment … something new and inventive and weird. I suppose that’s why were are still watching … hoping for that moment again.

Doctor Who – “Human Nature”

10/10 – Brilliant!

Plot – The story is told partly in flashback to scenes in which the TARDIS is being pursued, under attack using some kind of energy beam weapon. The Doctor tells Martha that those who are pursuing him could trace him across the universe, and he must undergo a transformation to turn him into a human.



His plan is to transform into a human via the “chameleon-arch” leaving his Time Lord configuration is stored in a pocket watch and Martha is charged with guarding it.





As a human, John Smith, is a school teacher in a private school in England in 1913. Smith is unaware of his previous life as a Time Lord, and his character is quiet, a little timid and introspective. He has dreams of being a in the future (“in the year of our Lord 2007”) and sometimes sketches them in a notebook. Martha is his maid.





His pursuers, who refer to themselves as the Family, show up on Earth in an invisible spaceship and take over the body of a school prefect who stumbles upon their ship while digging up a hidden cache of beer. They have scarecrow creatures as their henchmen, who round up more victims to use as vessels.




Smith is cajoled by the school nurse, Joan Redfern, to attend a dance.



Martha is distraught as she realizes that he has fallen in love with a human other than her. The Doctor left recorded instructions telling her what to do in any nearly eventuality. One of these was "Don't let me abandon you". But his instructions did not foresee that he might fall in love.



Meanwhile, one of Smith's pupils, Timothy Latimer, who has previously demonstrated extrasensory perception in an encounter with other students, finds and takes the pocket watch, having heard the Doctor's thoughts despite the perception filter the Doctor had placed on it. When he briefly opens the watch, the Family sense that the Time Lord they are hunting is located somewhere within the school.





The climax comes at a dance where the Family locate Smith, one of them having overheard Martha trying to convince Smith he is the Doctor. Martha is unable to restore him to his Time Lord configuration because she cannot find the pocket watch.




Meanwhile, the pursuers crash the dance and take Martha and Joan hostage, demanding that he "change back" into a Time Lord and asking him to choose which they will kill: "Maid or matron, your friend or your lover. Your choice," as the episode ends with a horrified Smith unable to choose.


Rant – There really isn’t much to rant about here. The story is by Paul Cornell and is based on his Virgin new adventures novel in the late 80s-early 90s. The novel is long out of print, but the clique (again, this small band that seems to dominate the show from the cancellation to the present day) have kept its memory alive. I never read any of the New Adventures (because I hated Sylvester McCoy) but even I’ve heard of it.

THEN


NOW



Paul Cornell wrote the 2005 season’s big tear jerker, “Father’s Day.” And while I have come to some terms with it, my initial reaction was “that’s it … doctor who’s has been taken over by Eastenders!” Paul Cornell wrote some of the new Robin Hood series and, despite claims that he’s “turning down big TV shows” he will be working on season two of “Primeval” … so, he’s a liar ... though I wouldn't be ashamed to be working on high-profile shows.

So, there was much negative baggage.

In fact, so much so that when I was alone in a hall with Paul Cornell at the 2006 Gallifrey I didn’t even speak to him. I just couldn’t think of a polite way to say “Hi … er … your novelization of “Scream of the Shalka” was … better than the script you wrote …” that was something I could only think of later …

I just looked away sheepishly and it his “I’m a Geek God” look will haunt me forever. I mean, he’s not exactly got anything else over me …


Review – BUT …

This story reminds me of classic Doctor Who in terms of writing and pacing, with all the benefits of modern CGI special effects. But, in 1913, there really isn’t much need for special effects, apart from an invisible spaceship and a few laser blasts.




There are plenty of nostalgic nods to the past, including John Smith’s journal where a page of shows drawings of previous Doctors. (Clearly visible are the Seventh, Eighth and First incarnations; the hairlines of the Sixth and Fifth Doctors are also just visible.)




The Doctor saves a baby from a falling piano by throwing a cricket ball triggering a long chain of events.



Smith tells Joan that his parents Sidney (Newman) and Verity (Lambert) who were essentially the parents of the program itself back in 1963.

The Doctor falls in love ...





Well, this is exactly the sort of story where this could make sense, because the Doctor literally becomes a human (one heart, the whole bit.) Normally my fan “gene” keeps me from wanting overt and soapy emotional story, but this seemed effortlessly done … both completely believable in the overall Doctor Who story … and as a character piece in the fictional world of 1913.

The sense of “absence of the Doctor” that everyone in the production team has been talking about since this story was first discussed is readily apparent and very effective. Because the Doctor is literally not himself, the plot carries some precarious sense of overall danger that usually isn’t present. The cliffhanger may not be the most brilliant, but it certainly feels the most effective I’ve seen in a long time.




Since this is a 2-part story, it is a little hard to award such high marks, but “Human Nature” really did do quite a good job.