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docbeard posted:I recall that on the DVD commentary for Vengeance on Varos the actor who played Sil talked about this (in general terms, not specifically calling out Davros) a fair bit. Nabil Shaban is kind of awesome, all around. It's a shame the Sil serials are all so hard to watch.
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Jan 25, 2019 17:48
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With Davros in Genesis, and pretty much ONLY Genesis, it makes sense for what he's become. He's clearly been scarred and destroyed by the war more than almost any other- lost his arm, his ability to move, his eyes, and has been seriously disfigured. He IS the proto-Dalek, who were ALL like him in one way or another originally. The problem is that it keeps happening- see, Lumnak or whatever his name was, the Cyber-Not-Davros
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Jan 25, 2019 18:01
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Also there was a lovely pound shop Davros in Voyage of the Damned.
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Jan 25, 2019 18:06
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Spent the week catching up to Big Finish: Muse of Fire was one of Paul Magrs' better stories - artists are fleeing Paris and destroying their works - and Iris Wildtyme is at the heart of it. It's quite a light, fun romp, with Ace, Hex and Katie Manning. And an amusing scene with Iris and Hex, where stupid sexy Hex nude models for her. Sadly no visuals of beefcake Phillip Oliver, (obviously) but just picture this (mild  )  The Hunting Ground was honestly kinda dull - an alien is using a section of Iceland as a game reserve to hunt humans - just couldn't get in to it. Devil in the Mist is Big Finish's attempt at developing cursed robot Kamelion into an actual character, and trying to salvage the utter wasted potential of him from the classic series. Jon Culshaw does a pretty good job, and hasn't died horribly yet, so that's a promising sign that the Kurse of Kamelion might be broken. (I am of course, checking the obituaries daily, just in case). It's a relief to be free of the limitations of the prop - worse than K9 - because Kamelion was an actual robot with very limited functions. The story is so so; it's mostly an excuse to reintroduce Kamelion, and in that they're pretty okay. There's some more Kamelion to come so... Also listened to the Diary of River Song - Master Quest edition  Alex Kingston is good as always when not actively being written by Moffat and allowed to expanded as a character, and the boxset is pretty enjoyable overall. The Bekdel Test has her team up with Missy, to escape an inescapable prison - and Michelle Gomez is on top form, and there's some pretty great dialogue and chemistry between them: (Paraphrasing) River: You're a time lord who knows the Doctor - ah you must be Missy: *Smug* River: The Rani. Missy: No. River: Romana? Missy No River: Ah! I know - one of his oldest foes - didn't know you could change gender, you must be the M- Missy *Double smug* River: The Monk. Missy: Yes the Mas...the Monk!? And there's also an interesting conversation regarding the whole turning into a different gender thing (cis, myself, but made me think of some of the trans posters here - again paraphrase) River: So...the upgrade? Missy: Oh, it's no big deal. River: So does it feel different? Missy: No. I was me. I regenerated. I'm still me. Also it references the Curse of Fatal Death which was pretty great. Animal Instinct is with the Beever's Master - it's an okay story. Beever's does his usual great work as the Master. That twisted silky voice. Lifeboat and the Deathboat is the return of the Eric Robert's Master after 22 years! He's pretty good - it's such a different take on the character - he's a lot more relaxed, and less eccentric than the other masters. The one shame is that it's pretty clear he was recorded seperately from the other cast, and does feel a bit disconnected at times - and if you're wondering how come it's still the Robert's Master, they do explain it away, and leave the door open for him to return - hope he does. The final story, Concealed Weapon is probably the weakest - it's the War Master hiding away on a ship taking out the crew. The big problem with the story is that you already know it's the Master killing them off. It's just not a very engaging story, despite Jacobi doing his usual good work.
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Jan 25, 2019 20:52
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God I need to start up on Big Finish again, I haven't listened to anything in ages.
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Jan 26, 2019 04:12
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Just watched Arachnids in the UK. Dear Lord, how horrible. Felt like a low ebb RTD episode with a bigger filming budget. The absolute worst moment is probably when the CEO's bodyguard pulls a gun on Yaz and her mum, and neither of them react at all. Dude just committed a major crime - possessing an illegal firearm and assault with a deadly weapon - in front of a cop who doesn't even seem to register that this is the case. The instant he put it away, Yaz should have arrested him. Like, if you've lived all your life in Sheffield, you've probably never even seen a handgun in person before, let alone had one pointed at you by a civilian for picking your mum up from her place of work. It's incredibly illegal for that dude to be carrying in the UK, there's no license you can "get" to let you do it, and threatening a police officer with a gun is an incredibly serious crime. But Yaz just doesn't even appear to notice. Bizarrely stupid writing.
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Jan 26, 2019 17:08
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Huh....I totally caught the "threatening a cop" thing would be bad...but aaa an American who's found 3 guns in my Cracker Jack boxes I didn't even think about the legality of the weapon itself
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Jan 26, 2019 17:10
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jivjov posted:...but aaa an American who's found 3 guns in my Cracker Jack boxes I've tried googling this, but I can't work out what this means. Care to explain?
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Jan 26, 2019 17:20
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The American equivalent would be like, some dude pulling out a missile launcher or flamethrower or whatever. Just this insanely illegal dangerous thing that you generally would need special government dispensation to possess, except in this case it's a guy who's in the country on a temporary visa and either smuggled his illegal gun with him through customs, or acquired it from a black market dealer on arrival. The firearms civilians can get special dispensation to possess in the UK are generally shotguns and longarms for hunting and farming (so that farmers can shoot predators that are stealing their livestock, for instance). Even then, you need to pass a bunch of tests and keep it stored in a safe place when it's not in use. A handgun is a sign of instant criminality - the only way to get them unless you're police or military is through a black market dealer that would mostly cater to gangs. Android Blues fucked around with this message at 17:30 on Jan 26, 2019 |
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Jan 26, 2019 17:25
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Cracker Jacks are a kind of weird snack often bought at Baseball games and which have historically had lovely toy prizes included. It's a joke about the abundance and ubiquity of guns in the US.
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Jan 26, 2019 17:25
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Open Source Idiom posted:I've tried googling this, but I can't work out what this means. Care to explain? I assume ‘as an american’ autocorrect failure. Also, J-Ru, am I right in recalling that you’ve not done any of the War Doctor stories?
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Jan 26, 2019 18:05
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my large son bradley finds this show absolutely thrilling. if he can watch it quietly without fidgeting he'll find an extra gooseberry and cinnamon yogurt his harry potter lunchbox tomorrow. that said, the wife and i were very troubled by the scene in resoloution where the dalek is about to make a party political broadcast and the doctor and her group of ethnic ruffians turn off the internet or some such? whatever you think of the dalek agenda to wipe out all non-dalek life in the universe it's simply not cricket to rob them of their right to free speech. let's be fair, even daleks deserve a platform and access to the marketplace of ideas. we highly approved of the episode where a literally soulless jeff bezos analog cried out for help and the doctor dropped everything to crush a worker uprising. we're very centrist in this house but frankly the left is out of control these days and this is something we strongly feel bradley and our younger son tarquin should be taught at an early age. some of our son's schoolfriends from more... troubled backgrounds, say this show is "pure AIDS" and "extremely fail" but they'll no doubt end up mangled in the gears of some heavy industrial equipment hahah.
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Jan 26, 2019 19:06
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Please try harder if you're going to troll.
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Jan 26, 2019 19:17
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The_Doctor posted:Please try harder if you're going to troll. it's jokes blud.
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Jan 26, 2019 19:28
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i laughed out loud
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Jan 26, 2019 19:43
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Jose Mengelez posted:it's jokes blud. Get off the stage!!!
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Jan 26, 2019 19:57
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*nodding thoughtfully* it is extremely fail.
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Jan 26, 2019 21:21
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Android Blues posted:A handgun is a sign of instant criminality - the only way to get them unless you're police or military is through a black market dealer that would mostly cater to gangs. Clearly Chris Noth paid a visit to Nick the Greek before going to his new hotel! The_Doctor posted:I assume ‘as an american’ autocorrect failure. I've done all (  ) of them!The War Doctor - Only the Monstrous | Infernal Devices | Agents of Chaos | Casualties of War
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Jan 26, 2019 22:13
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Is it the River Song ones then? 
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Jan 26, 2019 22:34
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Burkion posted:With Davros in Genesis, and pretty much ONLY Genesis, it makes sense for what he's become. (There was so much  in that episode, it contributed heavily to my giving up on the show about halfway through the season. Davros just needed the right encouragement to open his perfectly normal and healthy eyes, which turned out to be merely a bit crusty? The whole "my chair is my vital custom-built life-support system without which I'll die in moments - nah, kidding, you can toss out my half-body and ride the thing around like a dodgem"? The way the story minimised disability - often for laughs - made me wonder if it was written by loving ATOS.)
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Jan 26, 2019 22:45
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It turned out at the end of that episode that Davros was trying to steal regeneration energy from the Doctor, so how much of anything he said about his eyes was true is up in the air.
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Jan 26, 2019 23:15
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Payndz posted:made me wonder if it was written by loving ATOS. the fair and balanced bbc had previously permitted the writers of doctor who to subtly suggest racism was bad so it was only fair that they had to in turn meet the government's strict quota of "televised cripple pratfalls" to put those lazy shirkers firmly in their place. in the interests of impartiality of course.
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Jan 26, 2019 23:37
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Payndz posted:He didn't lose his eyes. He was just too lazy to use them until he fancied watching the sunrise with his arch-enemy. Here's the thing about Davros Dude was only actually good in Genesis of the Daleks, and after that he's just been varying degrees of Not As Good. Some times he's just kind of funny and eye rolly, just a whatever sure fine character. Other times, he's an awful mess that muddies up and dominates the entire Dalek story to the point of insult, or worse is actively insulting to even have around. The original Davros, Genesis Davros, was a multifaceted monster of a man- but still a MAN. A person. He was just as human as any of the other Kaleds or Thals, just warped and twisted by a literal lifetime of war. He had seen, literally and figuratively, more horrors than any other and was twisted to one singular purpose- to ensure that his people survive. We see how that worked out in the Non Doctor Timeline, the original time line. Dude creates the Dalek travel machines, the Kaleds mutate into the Dalek Mutants and take refuge within and they become the classic series Daleks that we know and love to hate across the 60s and 70s, with the first Dalek he 'creates' becoming the Emperor, if you want to go that far with it. The Doctor changed things. The Doctor forced the whole war to go a different way- instead of stretching on for another generation or two where the mutations took hold and they became the squid brains Davros knew they would, everything was sped up and Davros just started genetically engineering the mutants ahead of time en masse. But he's still a person. He's doing this because he genuinely sees no other way. Peace is more than illogical to him, it is impossible. His body is proof of that. And Davros has, in Genesis, honest compassion for those he cares about. His final moments are those of revelation- he was wrong. The Daleks are wrong. They are monsters, ruthless and soulless, worse than anything. His final act before being killed by his own creations was to decry their brutality and attempt to end them himself. The other two good Davros stories are that one Big Finish story where he has a sitcom lovers quarrel with the Doctor and the Journey Home where he's kept as a pet by the Daleks. And every single Davros appearance after Genesis completely and utterly ignores the fact that the Davros of Genesis of the Daleks does not and DID not approve of what the Daleks actually, truly were. Davros held no loyalties to any power structure, no, but he did value people. Even if for skewed reasons, he saw worth in those 'lesser', worth in loyalty and compassion. The Daleks have none of what remains of Davros' humanity. And the moment he came back, neither did he. Instead he just became a cackling super villain who only served to water down the Daleks and make them less interesting
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Jan 26, 2019 23:46
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The_Doctor posted:Is it the River Song ones then? I've done the first two volumes of River Song. I own the third but haven't had a chance to listen to it yet. I'm well behind, life has been hectic (in a good way) the last year and changing my commute drastically cut down on my audio listening.
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Jan 26, 2019 23:48
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Burkion posted:His final moments are those of revelation- he was wrong. Yeah, a lot of people forget that the final moments of Davros' life (before he proved so popular, and Terry Nation so lazy, that he got brought back) are trying to destroy his life's work because he realizes he hosed up. Not that he understands he was wrong, so much, but that the Daleks weren't what he wanted them to be. Edit: I do think there is a lot of value/interest in the notion of the endlessly resurrected Davros to now be so hosed in the head that he's convinced himself that the Daleks worked out okay and keeps desperately trying to ignore everything to the contrary, including the fact that they loving hate him just as much as they hate everything else.
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Jan 26, 2019 23:50
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I think the most effective Davros has been since Genesis is actually his tricking the Doctor into giving up some regeneration energy at the end of Witch's Familiar. It's a drat good "Haha, tricked you, Doctor, you idiot." moment, and the Doctor seems genuinely taken aback by this inevitable trickery. Shame about most of the rest of that season. I stopped watching Who for a bit, so I am trying to finish it now and struggling immensely. Why is it that Moffat can write a decent first season for a new Doctor, but then it goes to poo poo? I just want to watch Peter be a cranky old man.
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Jan 27, 2019 03:50
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I don’t truly dislike any era of Who- the worst I will say is that individual stories/episodes are not great- but I feel like during Capaldi’s run, Moffat was tired of traditional runarounds and was focused both on examining the Doctor as character (“Am I a good man?”), which did lead to some good moments, and constant timey-wimey twisting, which got to be a problem. Every so often you just want the Doctor to be the hero and solve problems, y’know? So far Chibnall’s run has felt very much like back to basics, which means avoiding some of the excesses but also has meant not quite hitting the same highs either.
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Jan 27, 2019 04:00
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There wasn't really any timey-wimey stuff with Capaldi; it felt like Moffat pretty much got that out of his system with Smith. Overtly, anyway; the fairly straightforward Capaldi era concluded with an alternate timeline whose originating event came from inside itself also creating the timeline to which it was an alternative in the first place, all without anyone involved saying a word about it. I'll never know if it was an attempt to do the barmiest timey-wimey poo poo ever or just a byproduct of Moffat viewing continuity as a handy way of cutting down on exposition.
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Jan 27, 2019 04:33
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Just skip to Capaldi's third season, I reckon that's when he really finds the Doctor he should always have been playing. The first season trying to push him as this big rear end in a top hat never really rang true to me. He's better in the second season but the Clara-focused drama swallows a lot of his character. When Clara's taken away and he gets some room to breathe with some actually good companions, the Twelve you see in that season just about beats out Nine for my favourite Doctor.
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Jan 27, 2019 04:34
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ALERT. ALERT. DO NOT SKIP PAST THE SERIES 9 FINALE.
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Jan 27, 2019 04:36
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Don’t miss the penultimate episode either, Heaven Sent is one of the best episodes ever made.
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Jan 27, 2019 04:50
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Dabir posted:Just skip to Capaldi's third season, I reckon that's when he really finds the Doctor he should always have been playing. The first season trying to push him as this big rear end in a top hat never really rang true to me. He's better in the second season but the Clara-focused drama swallows a lot of his character. When Clara's taken away and he gets some room to breathe with some actually good companions, the Twelve you see in that season just about beats out Nine for my favourite Doctor. every time they tried to say CAPALDI DOCTOR IS AMBIGUOUS NOW it felt so loving hollow cause he was already way nicer than eccleston
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Jan 27, 2019 05:58
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TheBigBudgetSequel posted:I think the most effective Davros has been since Genesis is actually his tricking the Doctor into giving up some regeneration energy at the end of Witch's Familiar. It's a drat good "Haha, tricked you, Doctor, you idiot." moment, and the Doctor seems genuinely taken aback by this inevitable trickery. There's also the utterly chilling line where Davros sympathizes with the Doctor telling him that Gallifrey might be back. It's so twisted because while it is totally borne out of Davros' xenophobia, it's also totally sincere. "A man should have a people..." is both of those things. And there's the scene where Missy puts Clara into the Dalek, and the mental controls interpret things like "You are different from me" as "EXTERMINATE." That raises so many interesting and horrifying questions. What makes a Dalek into a Dalek? How long do you have to be restricted by this simple and xenophobic language before your language is all simplistic and xenophobic? That's not even a particularly good episode! What is the takeaway from something like Resolution? It was cool when the Dalek piloted a lady like she was a Dalek suit? You should always forgive your family members (a message Doctor Who could loving stand to get away from)?
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Jan 27, 2019 06:12
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corn in the bible posted:every time they tried to say CAPALDI DOCTOR IS AMBIGUOUS NOW it felt so loving hollow cause he was already way nicer than eccleston Lol no he wasn't Eccleston posted:Run! Leave me and save yourself! Capaldi posted:Right, but if I give you the screwdriver so you can save yourself that'll mean I don't have it. So...
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Jan 27, 2019 07:00
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 yes, please continue to remind me of the cat people e:  big finish needs to help donna visit the planet of hats. make it happen corn in the bible fucked around with this message at 09:30 on Jan 27, 2019 |
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Jan 27, 2019 08:54
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Heheh. Missed that gag.
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Jan 27, 2019 14:20
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Rochallor posted:There's also the utterly chilling line where Davros sympathizes with the Doctor telling him that Gallifrey might be back. It's so twisted because while it is totally borne out of Davros' xenophobia, it's also totally sincere. "A man should have a people..." is both of those things. That's probably one of the best Davros moments ever. Bleach is really great in the role when he's given good material. It's a shame that the rest of those episodes don't really stick the landing. I wonder if it might have been better if it was just Davros on Skaro without the Daleks at all, just a sad old man staring death in the face. But then there would be even less of a reason for funny high jinks, which seemed to be half the point of a lot of Moffat's episodes. quote:And there's the scene where Missy puts Clara into the Dalek, and the mental controls interpret things like "You are different from me" as "EXTERMINATE." That raises so many interesting and horrifying questions. What makes a Dalek into a Dalek? How long do you have to be restricted by this simple and xenophobic language before your language is all simplistic and xenophobic? I never liked the expansions of the Dalek mythos that Moffat made with regard to the casing. It stretched my ability to believe in the threat of the characters, the idea that they are just generally pitiable, nasty pieces of work who sincerely believed in their mission and place at the head of the natural order. It seems to be part of the trend in the new series of the expansion of the Daleks' machines' powers, the move from just being solid individual tanks in the old series into ultra-super-invincible individual world-armies. This can work well sometimes (like in Dalek) but in Into the Dalek and The Magician's Apprentice/The Witch's Familiar, when it's basically stated that the tanks seem to drive the owners as much as the owners drive them. I find it less interesting than the idea that the Daleks act they way they do willingly. I don't think it even gels well with another major part of the Dalek lore, the idea that they have already been genetically altered only feel hate (and maybe other negative emotions; I also think that's another slightly silly idea that limits the potential for story telling and doesn't really make sense but  ). Why make the tank suppress emotional expressions or ideas that shouldn't be able to even occur to a regular Dalek?Both Into the Dalek and TMA/TWA's additions seem like they make the Daleks into robots, which is more thematically fitting to the Cybermen. That's one of the things I liked about Resolution's Dalek, that even without the travel-case it still had freedom of thought and action and it still believed in its mission and Dalek-supremacy. corn in the bible posted:yes, please continue to remind me of the cat people 
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Jan 27, 2019 17:12
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I like the idea that the Daleks' state of mind is maintained by control of what they see and hear (Into The Dalek) and even what they're capable of expressing (Witch's Familiar). It doesn't really gel well with other bits of Dalek lore, but you can handwave that as being Dalek evolution- after all, episode X where they're this could be separated from episode Y where they're that by hundreds or thousands of years. Plus genetic engineering and top-down information control kind of works with the zombie nanocloud from Asylum Of The Daleks to make Moffat's vision of "being a Dalek" something that is done to people, whereas he seems to see the Cybermen as something people do to themselves. It's also optimistic in its way: look at how much effort fascism takes!
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Jan 27, 2019 18:12
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2house2fly posted:It's also optimistic in its way: look at how much effort fascism takes! Naivety and optimism are often confused
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Jan 27, 2019 20:22
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I mean it is difficult to maintain in the long run. How long does your average fascist regime last? I can see how after generations they would try to ingrain their beliefs automatically and not just rely on their monoculture to do it for them.
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Jan 27, 2019 20:43
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