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Astroman posted:But here the Doctor did the "right" thing and let Tim go--and he ends up enslaving 1/3 of an entire race for 3000 years I'd argue it's not on the Doctor to be held responsible for what this guy chose to do. He was the one who triggered the DNA bombs after she warned him not to, he was the one who took getting his rear end handed to him while trying to gank noobs as a personal affront to his "dignity", he was the one who chose malice and revenge and hatred. He blamed her for everything that went wrong but that doesn't make her responsible, if he'd been a better person or learned a lesson none of this would have happened. He chose to be a dick because he wanted to be superior to everybody else, so gently caress him, he can suffer the poetic fate of being turned into the same kind of trophy he wanted to turn completely innocent people into. He's responsible for his own actions and reactions, and the Doctor shouldn't be poo poo on for choosing not to kill somebody who she had already tricked into completely and utterly defeating themselves.
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Dec 11, 2018 02:27
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BSam posted:Shame it's all been downhill since then. Remember that time the Doctor tried to kill The Natives with a rock? Good times.
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Dec 11, 2018 02:47
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Infinitum posted:Remember that time the Doctor tried to kill The Natives with a rock? First Doctor knew what was up. That guy was Hitler's ancestor. 
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Dec 11, 2018 03:33
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Wow, uncanny, I just rewatched Unearthly Child with my 8 year old too (ok he only watched the tail end). It grew on him despite the ancientness. I just wanted to comment on the new series somewhere so I'm glad it's stripped back from Moffats puzzle plots which I think jumped the shark after Day of the Doctor. I still liked it but it was often losing the younger parts of the family. Given how much fan service Moffat offered, the show needed to focus on bringing new children on board and that's been partially successful but... While it's getting back to basics I'd really like to see the show step back and just let the best writers put out some great stories. The effects are fantastic right now, so much that I'd rather see budget go towards multi episode stories with cliff hangers which I'd hope might result in a longer season. So much of the writing overall feels very self conscious. I think the instinct to strip the show back is correct but also the show could do with stripping away the showrunner as main writer. I sadly doubt that will happen but I'm tired of the showrunner hogging so much writing just because. Chibnall could focus on getting the character arcs working well across the season while letting other writers bring amazing new ideas to this infinitely flexible premise. For this season Rosa, Witchfinders, Demons of the Punjab (8 year old favourite) and It Takes you Away were working best. The finale was terrible, clunky and forced.
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Dec 11, 2018 04:13
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Yeah, I've not minded this season as much as many of you seem to have, but that finale was bumfluff. If you're going to give your villain a comedy name, don't expect the audience to be intimidating when he makes a return appearance. (The Doctor's dismissiveness over his name has never sat right with me, always felt quasi racist, but that's another issue.)
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Dec 11, 2018 04:18
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I guess maybe the new years special will be the season finale
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Dec 11, 2018 04:42
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Well, that was...something. It's clear that Chibnall wanted Tzim-Sha to be a thing, which is a problem when because Tim's kind of one-dimensional (tooth-faced predator!). Overall, this series was what I had feared: bland and unmemorable, like Chibnall's previous Doctor Who episodes. On the bright side, I've thought of a good title for the hiatus thread.
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Dec 11, 2018 05:21
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Tim Shaw, you mean off brand Darth Vader?
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Dec 11, 2018 05:25
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Edward Mass posted:Well, that was...something. It's clear that Chibnall wanted Tzim-Sha to be a thing, which is a problem when because Tim's kind of one-dimensional (tooth-faced predator!). Honestly, if it were Krasko instead, we'd have a much more interesting story. He's not much more complicated, but he is much less cartoonish and would have a more interesting resulting plan.
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Dec 11, 2018 05:48
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What worked for me this season: -13 has a 5/8/Early 11 sense of optimism and wonder -Graham was amazingly good. I knew Walsh would bring it, he was my favorite part of L&O:UK, but he was even better than I'd expected. His arc was full, and his emergency sandwiches were great -Demons of the Punjab was a fantastic near historical -the direction and cinematography, especially in the first episode, was almost cinematic. The show seems bigger than before in some ways -cool set designs, especially of future tech and ships. They've stepped it up a notch -Alan Cumming hamming it up in The Witchfinders What didn't work: -the "Magic Fingers" in the TARDIS console room -Yaz and Ryan need more to do, but I'll be happy with a larger crew and the knowledge they'll get more featured episodes -Tsuranga Conundrum was kinda dull -talking frogs -forgettable villains/monsters -underwhelming finale The best part though was there were no really bad episodes. Even the worst ones were perfectly serviceable. If we can get such high quality with 10 eps I'd settle for that than 12-13 with some real duds. Not happy about 2020 though. It took a few years for RTD and Moffat to choke and need a gap year, if it was even their fault. And I'm not necessarily blaming Chibnall either, but it still sucks.
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Dec 11, 2018 06:01
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Also I just want to point out that shooting a giant spider would do DICK ALL TO IT At least with a hand gun and only once. That fucker died of its preexisting conditions, it didn't die because some one shot it. I also find it kind of laughable that the Doctor didn't think "How about we round them up on the TARDIS and take them somewhere they could survive" Instead her entire problem was, let's kill them by...starving them to death? Gassing them? Because that's more humane for the giant spiders? Seriously shooting a spider that big would, at best, annoy it. Even 1950s shlock knew that much and they ignored square cube law.
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Dec 11, 2018 06:14
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Honestly, my only issue with the 'early 2020' is if it's actually going to be late enough to be considered 'mid 2020'. Because, taking away actual year markers, let's say they hit February, which is by no means unreasonable. Because this series was October spanning to December, it actually means without specials Who's only been off for 14 months, and that's not actually that bad. In fact, that's a smaller break than we had between series 10 and 11, since 10 ended on the 1st of July last year. This only feels bigger because of the new year separating them, and the end-of-year special being really close to the start of that Who-less stretch.
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Dec 11, 2018 08:07
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Astroman posted:What didn't work: How dare you!
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Dec 11, 2018 09:40
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My biggest criticism of Chibnall's writing and S11 overall is that he somehow makes the whole less than the sum of its parts. This season had at least two brilliant episodes, a couple more good ones and only one (maybe two, depending on who you ask) complete clanger, with the rest being fairly solid by Who standards. Yet it still didn't feel as good as Moffat's first and last seasons, or RTD's fourth, in spite of those being pretty much the same in overall episode quality. There just isn't the same cohesion or drive, the same something that ties it all together, both in the series and the episodes themselves. The acting, dialogue, sound and technical work were all top notch, the concepts ranged from solid to brilliant, but overall... eh.
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Dec 11, 2018 15:24
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In some ways it's what I've been wanting from Who in a long time, but in others it's just falling short. It's so refreshing to have a break from arc heavy stories, and just have random adventures in time and space - no recurring enemies, just new poo poo. Everything is pretty great - acting, set design, cinematography, Akinola's music - it's just the writing that's letting it down for me. It feels bad to lable it at the feet of just Chibnall, but every episode where he has sole writing credit feels constantly like the actors are straining against the writing. Or the story itself will be constrained by the writing - there's some cool and interesting poo poo in there, but it's struggling to burst out. He can write - he seems to be better at writing grief, or misery than he is more cheery scenes - but the flow is turgid, his antagonists are boring as sin, and the resolutions never feel like they're building up to it. It feels like he ran out of time, and then just ends the episode, with none of the proper emotional climax that we should get. It feels so much better when there's a co-writer, or another writer entirely, because they mitigate some his failings, and I hope he takes on a more producer role, rather than writing most of the stories. On the positives, my family is actually engaging with the show in a way they haven't really since the RTD era; Whittaker is great, Walsh is great, Sharon D. Clarke as Grace is great (to the point I wish it had been Graham & Grace as the companions), Tosin Cole, and Mandip Gill are great (very underutilised properly though), and the presentation is top-notch. Also you take that back, Astroman, that talking rubber frog is the kind of poo poo we need. [e]: Also, have been listening to that latest War Master boxset - it's a bit of false advertising in that it's only peripherally related to the Time War, and spends the whole runtime on the planet Callous, where the protagonists trying to mine a pyschic mineral that has a use in spaceship interfaces but drives you insane in its raw state. I don't rate it as highly as the first one; Jacobi is great as always, and the set up is interesting enough - I guess, I did get a bit sick of focusing soley on the one planet - Silas Carson is great as the assorted Oods (including one called "Gertrood" and "Dood"), with that wonderfully soothing voice saying menacing/ominous things. And while the third episode is filler, it's the surreal mind-fuckery filler I can enjoy. Short version; Best way I can describe the boxset is that it's a extended Master story, that is only (barely) incidentally related to the Time War, rather than what the first was - a War Master directly in the heart of the War. It's a one-and-done from me. 
Pesky Splinter fucked around with this message at 21:55 on Dec 11, 2018 |
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Dec 11, 2018 21:37
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Atlantic has a hot take about the season, that the doctor's helplessness this season is an intended statement about systematic sexism. Not sure I buy it.
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Dec 11, 2018 22:02
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Hemingway To Go! posted:Atlantic has a hot take about the season, that the doctor's helplessness this season is an intended statement about systematic sexism. Not sure I buy it. Most of the scripts were written before the Doctor was known to be a woman, and it appeared that only The Witchfinders was considerably edited with that fact in mind afterward. Doesn't check out.
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Dec 11, 2018 22:23
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Yeah the sense I got was that this was more about the Doctor (regardless of gender) kind of running headfirst into obstinate assholes who ignored her appeals to their better nature, and the end result of that SHOULD have been her being present for or made aware of Graham choosing the higher road against Tim Shaw, as a kind of endorsement/proof of her belief that people can be better than their base desires for revenge or just taking what they want. Graham and Ryan standing together to judge (but not execute) Tim Shaw on behalf of Grace was a wonderful moment, and felt like a capstone to a theme running through the season. The only problem being that the theme was most closely linked to the Doctor herself, and she wasn't there for that resolution. It should have been catharsis for her. I love her optimism and I hope it sticks around, but it would make more sense to me if she got to actually see things that reinforced that worldview.
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Dec 11, 2018 22:38
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Jerusalem posted:Yeah the sense I got was that this was more about the Doctor (regardless of gender) kind of running headfirst into obstinate assholes who ignored her appeals to their better nature, and the end result of that SHOULD have been her being present for or made aware of Graham choosing the higher road against Tim Shaw, as a kind of endorsement/proof of her belief that people can be better than their base desires for revenge or just taking what they want.
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Dec 12, 2018 00:20
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Is what they did to the villain definitely better than killing him?
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Dec 12, 2018 00:47
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Astroman posted:Also I think they missed the mark with The Doctor being responsible for Tim Shaw's wave of destruction. In the past we've seen the Doctor create problems unintentionally, such as Ashildr/Me. But here the Doctor did the "right" thing and let Tim go--and he ends up enslaving 1/3 of an entire race for 3000 years (even if they do live a long time and it's just 2 of them), destroying 5 planets and killing all life on them, causing the deaths of hundreds of people who tried to stop him--and the Doctor is like "yeah don't put this on me." No maybe DO put it on you. She clearly rejected the claim, it just doesn't happen overtly. I could have done with her throwing more shade his way before rushing off. "You've been a god for 3000 years and this was the best you could do? Badly-programmed robots, an industrial park inside a tower, and petty revenge? No wonder you had to cheat that test!" He could have changed his ways; he chose to define his life around revenge and cruelty. Graham didn't, and he didn't have all the advantages Tim Shaw did. The real problem is that we don't meet the people the Doctor "let go" who have redeemed themselves. Like those assassins-turned-witnesses weren't past villains the Doctor refused to kill who have since reformed. Maybe we can get some of that when she fixes Omega up on a date with the Solitract. Infinitum posted:Tim Shaw, you mean off brand Darth Vader? Try off-brand Dark Helmet. Burkion posted:Also I just want to point out that shooting a giant spider would do DICK ALL TO IT Setting aside the problem of navigating the TARDIS with loads of frightened giant spiders inside it, how is creating an ecological disaster on another planet going to be a better solution? If it wouldn't have led to a lot of collateral damage and casualties, I think stashing them in Mr. Big's house would have been a little more just, but not transporting them elsewhere makes perfect sense. 2house2fly posted:Is what they did to the villain definitely better than killing him? Depends. Is life in prison without parole better or worse than the death penalty? Making him live like one of the trophies he'd taken did have some poetic justice to it, even if it wasn't necessarily kind, and Graham isn't a killer now, so there's that. It's interesting that the Doctor just left punishing Shaw to her companions. At the very least, we're seeing Chibnall's answer to Davros' claim that the Doctor makes her companions into weapons.
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Dec 12, 2018 01:10
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Yvonmukluk posted:Graham did tell her he took the high road. Then she told him he was one of the strongest people she knew. They...literally did the thing you're talking about? I know he told her, I'm saying I wished she'd been there to see it. Him telling her after the fact is nice but lacks the impact that being present would have had. The Doctor is a role model, and after a season of watching assholes walk away without learning a lesson/getting off scott-free, I think it would have been more appropriate for her to see one (the first one she met, in fact) face his comeuppance at the hands of one of her proteges. It just felt (to me) like that was what the season was building to, but she was off doing her own (remarkable, to be fair) thing with Yaz when the big moment came and I feel that was a missed opportunity.
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Dec 12, 2018 02:16
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2house2fly posted:Is what they did to the villain definitely better than killing him? It's Doctor Who - eternity in a timeless prison tends to work out more like a six-hour probation, especially for the Master and Davros. (Although Davros' description of it in his self-titled audio was legitimately horrifying.)
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Dec 12, 2018 05:37
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Jerusalem posted:I know he told her, I'm saying I wished she'd been there to see it. Him telling her after the fact is nice but lacks the impact that being present would have had. On the other hand there's more weight to Graham making the decision all by himself with no one there to stop or influence him rather than with the Doctor present.
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Dec 12, 2018 08:32
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Poor Yaz, finally gets some me time with the Doc and all the fans can talk about are Graham and Ryan.
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Dec 12, 2018 08:46
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I had a Doctor Who heavy week. I caught up with the current season and it's been thoroughly mediocre unfortunately. I get it that the theme of the season that the Doctor encounters symptoms of larger problems that can't be fixed with the sonic screwdriver, psychic paper or even Moment or whatever, I appreciate the radical rejection of "there's no bad tactics, only bad targets", but that doesn't mean that plots have to be so dull and uninspired. Also, the Doctor comes of as a huge hypocrite in Arachnids. First episode was by far the best. On the other hand, I listened to "Jubilee" and it's really, really good you guys. Shocking, I know. The way Shearman weaves together an unapologetic pulp and a bitter absurdist satire is simply magical. And it was really funny how the twist only really works for the long time Doctor Who fans (who don't pay any attention to the story, obsessed with continuity bullshit), while completely transparent for the newcomers. "Spare parts", however, was extremely entertaining, but thematically all over the place. rvm fucked around with this message at 11:05 on Dec 12, 2018 |
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Dec 12, 2018 11:01
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Dec 12, 2018 14:03
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Wow Jodie looks way different in photos huh
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Dec 12, 2018 14:12
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Organza Quiz posted:On the other hand there's more weight to Graham making the decision all by himself with no one there to stop or influence him rather than with the Doctor present. This is true in the context of just the episode itself, but I still think it was a missed opportunity to actually cap off that running theme (which itself might be too strong a word) of the season with the Doctor finally getting to see the better side of human nature win out.
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Dec 12, 2018 14:22
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After The War posted:(Although Davros' description of it in his self-titled audio was legitimately horrifying.) I think Davros is a decent story that kind of collapses under its own weight at the end but goddamn is Terry Molloy's vocal performance in it brilliant.
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Dec 12, 2018 14:44
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After The War posted:It's Doctor Who - eternity in a timeless prison tends to work out more like a six-hour probation, especially for the Master and Davros. I guess it's established at this point that Tim Shaw is immortal so he'll just pick up where he left off if he ever gets out again
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Dec 12, 2018 15:17
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Wow that did not feel like a series finale.They spent too much time taking the piss out of Tim for me to take him seriously anymore. Send him to the dentist Saw a trailer for the special and I can guess what's gonna be in that now. Something else would be neat tho. Oh well, should still be good and Whitaker has been great so far. Stories just let her down a bit really.
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Dec 12, 2018 16:24
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After The War posted:It's Doctor Who - eternity in a timeless prison tends to work out more like a six-hour probation, especially for the Master and Davros. Well, it's a six hour probation for us, but if he ever came back, you know that Tim would say something like "I was in that box for six million years! Time for my glorious revenge!" hopefully as an episode starter, with the after-the-credits being a 30 second bit where the Doctor just uses the screwdriver to immediately put him back inside.
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Dec 12, 2018 17:36
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Bicyclops posted:Well, it's a six hour probation for us, but if he ever came back, you know that Tim would say something like "I was in that box for six million years! Time for my glorious revenge!" hopefully as an episode starter, with the after-the-credits being a 30 second bit where the Doctor just uses the screwdriver to immediately put him back inside. Well if the finale was anything to go by he'll sit around for 6 thousand years with his thumb up his rear end then when the doctor turns up he'll suddenly go "oh poo poo yeah, earth, that's what I was meant to be destroying" and actually initiate his evil plan
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Dec 12, 2018 17:39
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Chalks posted:Well if the finale was anything to go by he'll sit around for 6 thousand years with his thumb up his rear end then when the doctor turns up he'll suddenly go "oh poo poo yeah, earth, that's what I was meant to be destroying" and actually initiate his evil plan I HAVE WAITED EONS FOR YOU TO RETURN SO THAT YOU COULD WITNESS THE DESTR- *faint "thoomp!" sound as he gets sucked back into his prison* See you in a few millenia, Tim.
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Dec 12, 2018 17:42
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A fitting end for Tim Shaw is for him to break out, make his way to Earth, and then no one knows who he is. Also, Earth is advanced enough that he's completely ineffective and they kick him out.
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Dec 12, 2018 18:28
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Next season should have a completely unremarked Tim Shaw in the background of every episode doing ineffectual villainous schemes and occasionally the Doctor just absently waves her screwdriver over a shoulder and you hear him scream "OH COME ON!" in the distance.
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Dec 12, 2018 18:51
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docbeard posted:Next season should have a completely unremarked Tim Shaw in the background of every episode doing ineffectual villainous schemes and occasionally the Doctor just absently waves her screwdriver over a shoulder and you hear him scream "OH COME ON!" in the distance. But that's a good idea, and everyone knows those aren't allowed Also, Thirteen's theme https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-gNz_6HeaW4 Vinylshadow fucked around with this message at 19:10 on Dec 12, 2018 |
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Dec 12, 2018 18:55
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... the gently caress? https://twitter.com/PulpLibrarian/status/1072910027978084352
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Dec 12, 2018 19:24
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Can we talk about those hands though?
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Dec 12, 2018 19:29
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