|
Dabir posted:The middle episode is 100% driven by intelligent people acting in the dumbest way possible, and the last episode reads like Moffat and Whithouse sighing and cleaning up Harness's mess. The mum thing, which is easily the worst part of the episode, would have been baked into the concept of the season from the start, so I have difficulty holding it against Whithouse tbh. Same with the "Amy Williams" line from The God Complex. I will acknowledge that I'm a tad biased, since I love some of his other television, but I also think I'm right -- definitely about the latter, anyway.
|
#
?
Oct 11, 2022 12:15
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 1, 2024 18:25 |
|
|
What do we think is 12’s worst episode? Kill The Moon?
|
|
#
?
Oct 11, 2022 12:24
|
|
|
Heroic Yoshimitsu posted:What do we think is 12’s worst episode? Kill The Moon? In The Forest of the Night.
|
|
#
?
Oct 11, 2022 12:30
|
|
|
Open Source Idiom posted:The mum thing, which is easily the worst part of the episode, would have been baked into the concept of the season from the start, so I have difficulty holding it against Whithouse tbh. Yeah I don't hold anything against the third part, it's just not very good or enjoyable. The second part had no reason to be such absolute trash other than it was written by Peter loving Harness. Open Source Idiom posted:In The Forest of the Night. Yeah it's this. Kill the Moon has godawful politics but moooostly holds together as a constructed episode of television, Pyramid at the End of the World is completely atrocious but doesn't like, cause harm in any way other than to the legacy of Doctor Who. The episode whose big message is "don't take your meds, kids, the voices are real" has to be not just the worst of Twelve, but the worst episode of Doctor Who ever put to film, and up there in the rankings for worst episode of television. Dabir fucked around with this message at 12:44 on Oct 11, 2022 |
|
#
?
Oct 11, 2022 12:41
|
|
|
Open Source Idiom posted:In The Forest of the Night. Agreed. Not only an absolutely horrible message, but an episode solution to a problem that essentially says "nobody in the story actually needed to worry because this is just going to get taken care of" while communicating nothing of value to any conversation about conservation, environmental change, or anything else. Plus encouraging everyone to take a position on medication for psychological problems slightly worse than Scientology's. And in the process, the episode also stole away the "Doctor Who high-concept story drawing on Blake's poetry" concept, and retroactively damaged one of the better bits in Planet of the Spiders by making me think of this poo poo story when Tommy encounters Blake's poem. You know what? On further thought, this episode is even worse than I remembered. Overnight, deforestation is reversed and the trees save the planet. The "message" to be sent out is "leave the trees alone," but in no other episode will any of this forest be present anywhere, so humans chopped down all these trees and then instantly forgot about them growing in the first place. So the real message is that no matter how much damage we deal to the ecosystem, the trees will just magically regrow and save us from catastrophe, and we can then defoliate without any consequence and forget right afterward. I guess the one thing this episode does is make Orphan 55 look less terrible.
|
|
#
?
Oct 11, 2022 14:18
|
|
|
Dabir posted:Yeah I don't hold anything against the third part, it's just not very good or enjoyable. The second part had no reason to be such absolute trash other than it was written by Peter loving Harness. Both Kill the Moon and In the Foreat of the Night are total messes of plot that stretch even the flexible reality of Doctor Who well past the breaking point. And then they somehow both have toxic, completely harmful messages stacked on top of them. And not just one bad message, for either of them, too. I think I have to go with Kill the Moon, though, since it not only has the terrible abortion message, but it hinges on only Europe getting to decide what's best for the planet and "Well, people deciding democratically decided wrong therefore I'm justified in forcing my opinion on them," mixed in with that.
|
|
#
?
Oct 11, 2022 15:10
|
|
|
'Kill The Moon' was terrible science fiction. 'Forest of the Night' was terrible fantasy, because everything that happened was basically magic. I know Moffat's era embraced a twee and annoying "the Doctor is a wizard with space trimmings" fairytale ethos, but 'Forest' grabbed the wheel and drove that bus right off a cliff.
|
|
#
?
Oct 11, 2022 15:10
|
|
|
Okay, I know the thread is currently in a blaming Moffat for everything you personally dislike about the show part of the cycle, but it wasnt Moffat who had "if you believe in the doctor clap your hands" as a season resolution. so I dont think you can lay the "space wizard" aspects of nu-who entirely at his door.
|
|
#
?
Oct 11, 2022 16:15
|
|
|
I blame all three showrunners for NuWho being terrible, they all brought aspects of their particular type of awfulness to it 
|
|
#
?
Oct 11, 2022 17:47
|
|
|
Random Stranger posted:Both Kill the Moon and In the Foreat of the Night are total messes of plot that stretch even the flexible reality of Doctor Who well past the breaking point. And then they somehow both have toxic, completely harmful messages stacked on top of them. And not just one bad message, for either of them, too. I think I have to go with Kill the Moon, though, since it not only has the terrible abortion message, but it hinges on only Europe getting to decide what's best for the planet and "Well, people deciding democratically decided wrong therefore I'm justified in forcing my opinion on them," mixed in with that. All good points, but I would charitably put the Europe thing down to just pure writing incompetence. The guy who doesn't know that eggs don't get heavier as they gestate definitely forgot that the Earth is round and has stuff on more than one side of it. And given that the target audience (nominally, children) is more likely to be in a position to flush their pills down the toilet and listen to the voices in their heads than to be in a position to subvert democracy...
|
|
#
?
Oct 11, 2022 18:08
|
|
|
Dabir posted:All good points, but I would charitably put the Europe thing down to just pure writing incompetence. The guy who doesn't know that eggs don't get heavier as they gestate definitely forgot that the Earth is round and has stuff on more than one side of it. And given that the target audience (nominally, children) is more likely to be in a position to flush their pills down the toilet and listen to the voices in their heads than to be in a position to subvert democracy... I think the "shutting off your lights" scene makes it a better story, personally, as it's a pretty strong visual metaphor as to how one section of the world controls the other, and in particular the owners of capital like power plants (notice how large chunks of the power grid go off at once, and not individually). As for the physics of eggs, I mean who cares, it's not hard sci-fi, it's a morality play.
|
|
#
?
Oct 11, 2022 19:19
|
|
|
Rochallor posted:I think the "shutting off your lights" scene makes it a better story, personally, as it's a pretty strong visual metaphor as to how one section of the world controls the other, and in particular the owners of capital like power plants (notice how large chunks of the power grid go off at once, and not individually). As for the physics of eggs, I mean who cares, it's not hard sci-fi, it's a morality play. I get what you're saying about the physics of eggs, but when the Moon, which was an egg, cracked and a creature came out, and immediately laid an egg that was as big as the egg it just came out of? My brain broke. It also removed all stakes from the episode, but that was separate from why it broke my brain.
|
|
#
?
Oct 11, 2022 19:23
|
|
|
Yeah, Kill The Moon really bends over backwards in the last part to tell you what to think. I don't think it's particularly well thought out -- I suspect it's intended to be an abortion metaphor even though the situation actually resembles a traumatic birth -- but when the episode ends its morality play by saying "actually there was a right reason and we're going to override anyone else's choice in the matter" it really undermines anything else the episode could possibly be arguing. Also, speaking of Harness, I can't believe we were denied the reality where the American delegate in Pyramid was Donald Trump.
|
|
#
?
Oct 11, 2022 19:32
|
|
|
And then Harness came back and did the first part of the Zygon two-parter which was so heavy-handed that Moffat had to row back on the conclusion.
|
|
#
?
Oct 11, 2022 19:43
|
|
|
I really think they forgot about the reason they were using an old space shuttle was that all the proper space launching stuff was destroyed by the calamitous waves and storms caused by the moon suddenly gaining a ton of mass, which would reasonably be assumed to have killed a large number of people living near the coasts too. Screw them though I guess, they don't matter because unspecified aliens would have thought badly of us for trying to stop something that by all reasonable inferences was going to destroy life on earth.
|
|
#
?
Oct 11, 2022 19:47
|
|
|
thrawn527 posted:I get what you're saying about the physics of eggs, but when the Moon, which was an egg, cracked and a creature came out, and immediately laid an egg that was as big as the egg it just came out of? My brain broke.
|
|
#
?
Oct 11, 2022 19:53
|
|
|
Rochallor posted:I think the "shutting off your lights" scene makes it a better story, personally, as it's a pretty strong visual metaphor as to how one section of the world controls the other, and in particular the owners of capital like power plants (notice how large chunks of the power grid go off at once, and not individually). As for the physics of eggs, I mean who cares, it's not hard sci-fi, it's a morality play. The thing about the egg thing isn't that magic sci-fi eggs couldn't get heavier as they gestate, I'm completely open to the episode telling me that. But what actually happened was 1) The moon is getting heavier, oh no! 2) It's because it's an egg! That's the entire explanation! Just... It's an egg! That's why it's getting heavier! Like eggs do! The impression I'm left with isn't that it's getting heavier because it's an alien sci-fi egg, but because Peter Harness just doesn't know how eggs work. And every single bit of his writing we saw after that just cemented the idea that he doesn't know how anything works. Dabir fucked around with this message at 20:04 on Oct 11, 2022 |
|
#
?
Oct 11, 2022 20:02
|
|
|
And then the space dragon instantly lays another egg the size of the one it just emerged from.
|
|
#
?
Oct 11, 2022 21:37
|
|
|
Boxturret posted:I really think they forgot about the reason they were using an old space shuttle was that all the proper space launching stuff was destroyed by the calamitous waves and storms caused by the moon suddenly gaining a ton of mass, which would reasonably be assumed to have killed a large number of people living near the coasts too. Isn't that also the plot to Moonfall?
|
|
#
?
Oct 11, 2022 22:03
|
|
|
Dabir posted:The thing about the egg thing isn't that magic sci-fi eggs couldn't get heavier as they gestate, I'm completely open to the episode telling me that. But what actually happened was 1) The moon is getting heavier, oh no! 2) It's because it's an egg! That's the entire explanation! Just... It's an egg! That's why it's getting heavier! Like eggs do!  The moon's mass is, per Google, 81,000,000,000,000,000,000 tonnes (approx). An increase of 1.3 billion isn't even a rounding error. I guess it sounds like a big scary number, but, well, planetary bodies are really chonky. (Hell, a cubic kilometre of water would weigh a billion tonnes, and there are lakes with more than that.) I could give Harness the benefit of the doubt and say he maybe thought nobody would believe it if he'd said his moon-egg space dragon weighed 1.3 trillion tonnes, but we're already talking about a moon-egg space dragon when it comes to believability.
|
|
#
?
Oct 11, 2022 22:45
|
|
|
The_Doctor posted:And then the space dragon instantly lays another egg the size of the one it just emerged from. Commented on with utter  delivery by a character recounting something happening off-screen.I had such high hopes for Doctor Who and the Space Spiders too 
|
|
#
?
Oct 12, 2022 00:50
|
|
|
Such a beautiful creature, it's hatching causes wide spread destruction to the host planet and the surface of the egg is crawling with giant deadly spiders 
|
|
#
?
Oct 12, 2022 01:07
|
|
|
The moon egg being heavier didn't bother me because I assumed it was handwavey excuse for why they weren't bouncing in low gravity. It was going to be inaccurate one way or another.
|
|
#
?
Oct 12, 2022 01:22
|
|
|
Well it getting heavier was the whole inciting incident, causing wide spread destruction on earth, that conveniently made it so they didn't have to do any wire work
Boxturret fucked around with this message at 03:14 on Oct 12, 2022 |
|
#
?
Oct 12, 2022 02:49
|
|
|
Also the egg looks exactly like the last egg in every way shape and form Also all the stuff humanity left on the last one is on the new one. A lot of Who assumes that the human race instantly forgets the WORLD CHANGING DISASTER that occured yesterday. Like it was a plot point for a bunch of people that they couldn't remember this stuff that happened globally -------- Counterpoint - What's the best 13 episode? For me it's Village of Angels
|
|
#
?
Oct 12, 2022 03:13
|
|
|
Power of the Doctor had its premiere tonight in London, so details will probably start leaking out despite the embargo.
|
|
#
?
Oct 12, 2022 03:14
|
|
|
Infinitum posted:Counterpoint - What's the best 13 episode? The Haunting of Villa Diodati.
|
|
#
?
Oct 12, 2022 03:22
|
|
|
Ah ha, apparently they didn’t show the regeneration.
|
|
#
?
Oct 12, 2022 03:23
|
|
|
Infinitum posted:A lot of Who assumes that the human race instantly forgets the WORLD CHANGING DISASTER that occured There's only so many times you can go to the same well, but I liked that they did address this with both Donna and Amy. With Amy things were literally being erased from history, and with Donna she just didn't pay attention to any of it.
|
|
#
?
Oct 12, 2022 04:16
|
|
|
Infinitum posted:Counterpoint - What's the best 13 episode? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l0ED6CGmjm4
|
|
#
?
Oct 12, 2022 04:24
|
|
|
The_Doctor posted:Ah ha, apparently they didn’t show the regeneration. Obviously to hide that Ncuti is just a feint to make sure people don't reveal the real new Doctor. Who is, of course, the hugely fan-requested David Tennant Again. Cleretic fucked around with this message at 12:58 on Oct 24, 2022 |
|
#
?
Oct 12, 2022 04:27
|
|
|
Cleretic posted:Obviously to hide that Ncuti is just a feint to make sure people don't reveal the real new Doctor. David Tennant in a Colin Baker Wig, wearing Pertwee's clothes, with Tom Baker behind the scenery providing the voice...
|
|
#
?
Oct 12, 2022 04:34
|
|
|
Infinitum posted:Counterpoint - What's the best 13 episode? It Takes You Away. Just a fantastic episode (ignore the weird troll man in the tunnel section which is.... I don't even know what the gently caress that was. Concentrate on the frog!  )
|
|
#
?
Oct 12, 2022 07:40
|
|
|
Jerusalem posted:It Takes You Away. Just a fantastic episode (ignore the weird troll man in the tunnel section which is.... I don't even know what the gently caress that was. Concentrate on the frog! I am absolutely a frog-on-chair apologist.
|
|
#
?
Oct 12, 2022 07:46
|
|
|
The regeneration scene will be some variation of 13 morphing briefly into Ncuti Gatwa before bursting into David Tennant's face and him going "wHAt?... What?"
|
|
#
?
Oct 12, 2022 08:15
|
|
|
https://twitter.com/ManningOfficial/status/1579962466549006339
|
|
#
?
Oct 12, 2022 08:20
|
|
|
Jerusalem posted:It Takes You Away. Just a fantastic episode (ignore the weird troll man in the tunnel section which is.... I don't even know what the gently caress that was. Concentrate on the frog! It was weirdly messy to me. A doorway to a place where you can meet your deceased loved ones is fine. Doesn't feel very Doctor Who but I'm not going to complain hard about that. But the fake monster, the tunnel, heaven, the sentient universe who gets a deep relationship with the Doctor that lasts five minutes. It's bouncing around like crazy and doesn't seem to actually explore anything. That said, it is probably the best 13 episode I've watched so far. It's a weak episode and it's still the best...
|
|
#
?
Oct 12, 2022 14:39
|
|
|
I love the weird tunnel gremlin man section.
|
|
#
?
Oct 12, 2022 15:03
|
|
|
The_Doctor posted:And then the space dragon instantly lays another egg the size of the one it just emerged from. Be honest, would the episode really be improved by a character explaining that the egg and dragon seem to be drawing mass from another dimension? Can’t wait for the next showrunner after RTD to write an episode revealing that Five never got out of the Matrix in Arc of Infinity and the entire show since that point has been inside the Matrix while Omega ran around using his body. My favorite 13 episode is just barely Demons of the Punjab. One of the few eps that doesn’t waste Yaz. I’d rate The Tsuranga Conundrum, It Takes You Away, Resolution, Spyfall (Part 1), Nikola Tesla’s Night of Terror, Fugitive of the Judoon, Can You Hear Me?, The Haunting of Villa Diodati, War of the Sontarans, Village of the Angels, and Eve of the Daleks as good episodes. It continues to baffle me that Chibnall repeatedly takes risks and goes with lots of bonkers premises, but most of his failures somehow come down to lack of ambition. How do you take big conceptual risks and still come across this way? It can’t just be his inability to end stories properly!
|
|
#
?
Oct 12, 2022 15:29
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 1, 2024 18:25 |
|
|
It's because Chibnall doesn't believe in anything. Even his most ambitious episodes don't push the characters or have interesting conclusions because his ideal world is the status quo.
|
|
#
?
Oct 12, 2022 16:49
|
|
