North King
blech
- Joined
- Jan 2, 2004
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- 18,165
The Doctor is coming, the Doctor is coming!!
- Thread starter bhsup
- Start date
I agree with Plotinus; Matt was a brilliant doctor. I am looking forward to Peter Capaldi playing the part; I think it will be good to lose the "will they or won't they" element between the doctor and his companion (with him being much older than Clara). I'm hoping that Peter and Jenna will surprise some by being the best doctor/companion duo since Doctor Who restarted.
One additional point which only struck me afterwards: I think that this was the first TV programme (or film) I have ever seen to portray Christmas in London without any snow. Good for them. It never, ever, ever snows in London at Christmas, and yet portrayals of London Christmas - even those not aimed at Americans (such as Eastenders) - are still inexplicably stuck in some Dickensian weather fantasy. Funny that it takes Dr Who to start being a bit more realistic about this.
It's a shame that you don't get snow there, Plotinus (or at least very much). To think that you've never had the pleasure of a sleigh ride, or tobogganing... 
When I was a child, that was one of the things we kids did on Christmas Day, whether we spent it here in town or at my great-grandmother's home elsewhere in the province. I still remember when my uncle decided to join us, and was intent on barreling down the hill on a piece of cardboard. It was most inconsiderate of that tuft of quackgrass to get in his way... 
When I was a child, that was one of the things we kids did on Christmas Day, whether we spent it here in town or at my great-grandmother's home elsewhere in the province. I still remember when my uncle decided to join us, and was intent on barreling down the hill on a piece of cardboard. It was most inconsiderate of that tuft of quackgrass to get in his way... It's a shame that you don't get snow there, Plotinus (or at least very much). To think that you've never had the pleasure of a sleigh ride, or tobogganing...
I have done those things at other times, as it does snow in southern England sometimes - just not very often, and never at Christmas (if it snows at all it's usually just a couple of days in January or possibly February if you're really lucky). I love snow, and the relative lack of it is one of the main things I don't like about England. (And that's saying something...) This is one reason why I'm always annoyed at portrayals of Christmas with snow everywhere, because the contrast with reality is so great that it drives home what a miserably mild winter climate we have here.
It's good that you do get the winter experience sometimes.
It seems so unnatural to me when the snow doesn't come on time. There was one year here when it didn't snow until a few days before Christmas (normally the first snow comes in October), and while some people were hoping it would never come, others (like me) were increasingly edgy and irritable, wanting things to be normal. Plus, in this area a good snowfall is critical for the spring growing season so the soil has enough moisture when everything melts, and before we get the spring rains.Which, you know, is really something odd until you learn a bit about how the weather works. As London is actually further north than Calgary, Alberta Canada.
It's the Gulf Stream that gives north-western Europe that warm climate. In this area we can get either warm or cold, depending on Pacific currents or whatever comes down from Alaska or other northern regions.
Yeah, I realize that. But there are several steps in learning what's going on before you hit that point. Step one, realizing that many of the well known places in Europe are actually far further north than the heavily populated parts of North America, because their weather tends to be milder. And then getting enough of a clue on how weather works to actually understand how that can be. French and British colonists went south, and found the winters too harsh to live in. At first pass it seems weird. London is milder than New York, but is far to the north of it. You don't really realize that until you start to pay attention to maps and geography. And how the hell can one of the biggest cities in the world be as far north as Moscow?
Geography is sometimes a matter of perception. To me, Edmonton seems like the northernmost civilized place in Alberta, yet there's a heckuva lot of province (and towns) that are much further north than that. And this isn't even mentioning what's north of that in the Territories.
Kan' Sharuminar
Fluffy
I think only 'Voyage of the Damned' has actual snow in a modern London. The rest is ash, or on another world, or actually set in Victorian London
For this episode: I loved it. It was utterly mad, a fine send-off for Matt Smith and I'm so glad it was just a single-parter. It suffered a little bit for being a little too dependant on storylines for the past few years, but I suppose that was a simple need to close off the Matt Smith storylines to make a clean slate for Capaldi. It excelled at being so well-paced, being a bit too clever for it's own good and generally being very lovely.
I don't quite understand this. Do you mean 'timey-wimey crap" in the sense it doesn't bother to fill in the technical details, in which case that's entirely what Doctor Who has always been about in the sense it's storytelling first, technical details "it'll explain later"? Or 'timey-wimey crap' in that it now involves time-travel-extensive storylines, which the original series rarely did?
I mean the fact that for the last several seasons the storyline has been tied up like a herd of pretzels and is pretty damn confusing at best. I'd need a flowchart to even begin to keep track of what happened, when, and to whom, and even then I don't care for the storylines for the most part.
Classic-era Who had straightforward, mostly-linear stories and at the end I wasn't left wondering what just happened. And the phrase "timey-wimey" is just baby-babble, and insulting to the audience (there, there, don't try to understand it, it's just timey-wimey stuff...
). It's lazy writing, when the writers/producers don't want to go to the effort of thinking up a proper way to explain stuff. I can't possibly imagine any of the Classic Doctors resorting to such childish phrases to explain things.As for tying up loose ends... it was never explained how Clara was a Dalek when the Doctor first met her.
And I really hate and LOATHE the idea that Clara was running around in the other Doctors' lives, saving them all. I remember Castrovalva very well, and she was NOT hung up in the Master's web with Adric (that's the pov of the clip shown from that episode). Dammit, those episodes stand by themselves, and no insertions of new characters or retconning from the nuWho era need apply!
Kan' Sharuminar
Fluffy
I completely understand. I also rather enjoyed the fact that the original series were mainly standalone adventures (albeit standalone adventures of 4-6 parts) that didn't require any previous viewings, nor did you have to watch previous seasons to understand the next. I don't think the Matt Smith era has been that hard to follow, though, but I do think it was rather convenient I had just completed my own marathon-run before watching this episode.
I would agree with you, but I'll just throw out 'Ghost Light' as a weak counter-point.
"I'll explain later."
Oh alright. I might be wrong, but I think "timey-wimey" has only used been used twice in the revived series? The first use essentially just as a funny throwaway line, and secondly in the 50th anniversary episode, in which an avatar for the older series (the Valka-Doctor?
) admonished the modern ones for using such silly lines. It's the fandom that's exploded the phrase.
Dalek Clara was one of those lives. There was no retconning involved with Clara's running about, and the episodes still stand as they are.
I would agree with you, but I'll just throw out 'Ghost Light' as a weak counter-point.
And the phrase "timey-wimey" is just baby-babble, and insulting to the audience (there, there, don't try to understand it, it's just timey-wimey stuff...
"I'll explain later."
Oh alright. I might be wrong, but I think "timey-wimey" has only used been used twice in the revived series? The first use essentially just as a funny throwaway line, and secondly in the 50th anniversary episode, in which an avatar for the older series (the Valka-Doctor?
) admonished the modern ones for using such silly lines. It's the fandom that's exploded the phrase.As for tying up loose ends... it was never explained how Clara was a Dalek when the Doctor first met her.
And I really hate and LOATHE the idea that Clara was running around in the other Doctors' lives, saving them all. I remember Castrovalva very well, and she was NOT hung up in the Master's web with Adric (that's the pov of the clip shown from that episode). Dammit, those episodes stand by themselves, and no insertions of new characters or retconning from the nuWho era need apply!
Dalek Clara was one of those lives. There was no retconning involved with Clara's running about, and the episodes still stand as they are.
I really enjoyed it. Not sure how I'm going to take to Capaldi, but I have an open mind. He's a fantastic actor, and it'll how come down to how he's written.
Loved Lem as the future incarnation of River, and it explains how River's grave ended up on Tenzalore. Overall, nicely done.
Loved Lem as the future incarnation of River, and it explains how River's grave ended up on Tenzalore. Overall, nicely done.
I saw them both in their separate episodes, and edited together as 90-minute or longer-length episodes. PBS did it both ways. I watched as much nuWho as was available on Canadian Netflix, and that didn't include most of the last season prior to Day of the Doctor. I caught up a bit during the Christmas/Boxing Day marathon, but unfortunately they didn't show all of them. And I nodded off during the Cyberman episode (lack of sleep).
I found all the "Ace's Angst" stories monumentally boring. Unfortunately, Sylvester McCoy didn't have all that many really good stories. The best one was Battlefield, and Paradise Towers has long been a guilty pleasure.
The "explain later" and "I lied" really grated on my nerves. And the "timey-wimey" phrase was used more than twice. I'm glad they had the War Doctor get all curmudgeon about that, and I loved the "what are you going to do, assemble a cabinet at them?" line. It looks like the Tenth and Eleventh Doctors got some of their sonic screwdriver schtick mixed up with Harry Potter and his magic wand."I'll explain later."
Oh alright. I might be wrong, but I think "timey-wimey" has only used been used twice in the revived series? The first use essentially just as a funny throwaway line, and secondly in the 50th anniversary episode, in which an avatar for the older series (the Valka-Doctor?
Yeah, there was retconning. That whole thing about Clara being present during the previous Doctors' adventures and saving them is a gigantic retcon. It's saying those Doctors and Companions owe their successes to Clara, not their own ingenuity and courage.
Clara just corrected the timeline by subtly undoing the sabotage of The Great Intelligence, which doesn't invalidate the original stories at all.
Kan' Sharuminar
Fluffy
I would never blame anyone for nodding off during any Cyberman episode (exception being Tenth Planet and The Invasion.)
Paradise Towers should never be considered a guilty pleasure: it's my favourite of the Seventh Doctor era.
I still can't think of a third time 'timey-wimey' got involved
I'm not sure of the argument here, beyond the fact they're all brilliant lines. This is a show that depends on being fantastical and imaginative, and shouldn't be held down by technicalities. It is trying to tell you a story.
As you like. As far as I'm concerned the earlier Doctor's weren't aware of her involvement except as much as a brief idea in their mind, and still won through with their genius and ingenuity. It doesn't require that much of a shift.
And for my part: I'm not that fond of Clara's "Impossible Girl" storyline. I just don't see it being a big deal with regards to the original stories
River had her consciousness downloaded into CAL. Not too much of a leap to surmise there may have come a point in the future where she was uploaded into a new artificial body as High Superious of the Papal Mainframe.
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