Be Excellent To Each Other

Chinny = Dead inside.

That was brilliant, loved it! Looking forward to next week as well!

Or we could all watch some paint dry instead:

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=u1VEY7ndKCs

The only decent bit was the bit directly ripped off from Planet Of The Spiders where an alien menace hops on your back but nobody can see it. Davies really is out of ideas.

Low budget beetles are neither big nor clever.

Except this one, which was fairly big.

But will they be making beetle rucksacks in time for Christmas?

And why had Billy developed a lisp?

Deleted scene:

Pete Tyler: No one can achieve this but you Rose.

Rose: But I'm scared.

Pete: I know and I'm sorry. I really am sorry, my love. But to save the universe you have to... you have to make sacrifices.

Rose: What will it do to me? What will it do to me?

Pete: ... It'll give you a lisp. And some twonking of the eyes.

(Dramatic crane zoom out and up as Rose falls to her knees and cries out to the sky)

Rose: Noooooo!

.....................

Not a bad episode that, I give it a four out of five. Marred somewhat by Donna stearing grimly back into annoying gobshite territory. It was sort of interesting to see how horribly selfish she had become, being ground down by life. It took the reintroduction of the genuinely fantastic, and to be told that she was special, to start changing her from fish-mouthed harridan to fish-mouthed hero.

Good to see some nice scary imagery as well. The threads mushroom cloud and the non-comical consequences of the Titanic II didn't make up for the wretched Queen in slippers bit in the monumentally poor Voyage of the Damned (and I'm sorry RTD, you can't make things retroactively epic, no matter how hard you tried - and it was a good try) but they did give a great dystopian future. Still not sure what she had against Leeds though, it's quite a nice city now. The adipose in America was good as well, some darkly funny apocalypse there.

Bernard Cribbins was awesome in this. He's the gift that just keeps giving. He basically anchored the entire thing and counterbalanced the excesses of Donna - and Tate's - incessant shouting and self-finger pointing. Also amused to see my suspicions conclusively confirmed that Donna's mum is the most shrivelled, dour, joyless and horrible thing in the Doc Who universe.

And it was great to see Rose again, and to see how she's transcended into a hero figure too. And Donna's sacrifice, although not actually moving, was well thought out and had the dramatic weight.

Glad to see who's showing up in the next time trailer, I won't say in case you didn't see it, but I was pleased.

And yes, that beetle did look incredibly fake. Anyone remember the Keeper on Londo's neck in Babylon 5? That was the ickiest scariest thing B5 ever did. Shame the Doc Who team couldn't match that.

A good episode with good dystopian stuff. I'm also not sure why she didn't like Leeds. It's quite nice. I go quite often.

Some of the dialogue sounded too much like a statement of something and not what someone would say, Billie was awful and the Bad Wolf thing was awful too.

I'd go with a 4/5 but probably a 7/10.

That mushroom cloud was terrible. It would have been OK, if during The Voyage of the Damned the Doctor hadn't said on multiple occasions (and had it confirmed by other characters) that the Titanic crashing into Earth would wipe out the entire planet.

In my head, that was because a group of passengers inside the Titanic had struggled to the engines and somehow massively powered them down at the cost of their lives, knowing they were going to die but doing it anyway to save the planet below. Then I realised that sounded quite a lot more exciting than the episode we actually got, and got annoyed. But yes, it's all a bit United 93 on the Titanic in my mind.

I really, really, really liked this episode. I would put it in my top 5 of all Who in all formats I've seen, read, heard or operated, and that's now an embarassing volume of Who. I haven't seen dark British sci-fi that good for a very long time.

The Doctor was right really wasn't he? Sure the explosion didn't destroy the whole planet but the side effects..

Oh no wait.. hang on.. that was only because he was dead (in a quite implausible manner too).

Well maybe he was exaggerating for dramatic effect.

Eh? How was it implausible?

Donna snapped him out of his killing spider babies with an old N64 joypad.
If she hadn't been there, he would have drowned / been spider fodder / had to have played Milo's Astro Lanes.

Wouldn't he?

I really think you should qualify that by pointing out that the only other story you've seen is Timelash.

What I felt was implausible was that the doctor didn't have time to regenerate. I assure you I know absolutely everything about timelords as I took a degree in Timelord physiology and passed with flying colours. Obviously. Of course if he regenerated and was still in the deathly situation and basically used up all his regenerations that way.. well that's different.

Yeah. Gagh. Ahh well, since there isn't a chance in hell I'd put myself through Voyage of the Damned again, I'll just go along with it.

Less forgivable is the sunshiney leafey tree and flowery garden of the the hotel on - erm - Christmas day.

And I'm not saying that Tate was bad or anything, or Donna, just that this alternate reality that set her in angry gobby mode had her annoying me a bit.

This kind of thing is why I don't feel comfortable describing myself as a Doctor Who fan despite having more Who CDs than music CDs and knowing that Colin Baker was the only Doctor who did all his own stunts- there's an awful lot of blanket intolerance about. I don't mind that you thought it was dreadful at all; hooray for differences of opinion!

Especially considering that I have seen Timelash, and thought it wasn't all that bad. BLASPHAMY! Although it's nowhere near my top five*.

*-Which are The Kingmaker, Circular Time (Autumn), Turn Left, Alien Bodies and Master. The fact there's only one television story on there's just becase I think the other four here are really amazingly good.

vegetables, you are a "Whovian".

Oh come on, there's no call for that sort of language.

No, he's just an enthusiast:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3u_Rs8N66iE

In Doctor Who, the south of England is 'the planet'.

Which is fun because "All of time and space" is apparently "Early 21st century London, which looks a bit like Cardiff"

I fight it, but alas, yes. I would end up being the kind of fan that has the worst name of any of them. At least "Trekkie" can be spun to be vaguely postmodern, "Whovian" is, well. Less spinable.

He's an enthusiast, you, meanwhile, are a Whovian, you who goes to look at places it was filmed for kicks and suchlike.

Have to say, that whiulst I enjoyed that episode, I did think it was a pile of tosh. It quite simply didn't make any sense, and as far as I can see, the only reason it was there was to get up a cast list of everyone in the next episode so you know who they are. "And news just in, investigative journalist, Sarah Jane Smith... ." "A brave team from Torchwood [insert entire Torchwood team here]"

Having said that, I did enjoy it. I also thought that Rose volunteering for dental research was very brave of her.

I went to Winspit, which was also used for Blakes 7 and is a very nice day out.

Details me do:

http://www.doctorwholocations.net/locations/winspitquarry

Great place for a picnic and they also did some Blakes 7 there as well.

Rose's accent - she's spent two years in a parallell dimension, where they may not talk like wot we do - and the Tardis is no longer with her to translate (or is it? Is Bad Wolf still an entity the sum of Rose and the Vortex?) so she's tring her best to speak how she used to (which is what the actress is actually doing, having viewed DVDs of herself from before).

Anyway, it's Billy Piper - all criticism is null and void. Fitter than Jesus, that lass.

Hands up everyone who fancies Jesus?

Even if he stuck two dead slugs to his forehead?

No? Nobody?

Oh, come on and be fair... Sontarans aren't that bad!

Mofo rode a T-Rex, bitch. He can be as sexy as he wants, surely?

If Jeus was a hot chick, Piper would be hotter than him/her, let's put it that way.

Last episode of the series is going to be 65 minutes long, apparently. Blimmin' 'eck! My mum's incredibly excited.

If that's true then so am I!!!!!

Malc

Of course, the BBC will change the start time to 6:15 so you miss half of it, just to piss everyone off.

An.... enwhosiast?

25 minutes of that will just be Russell T Davies fanwank.

Has the start time ever been the same on more than one occasion this season? It hasn't seemed so. It always bothers me that a TV channel constantly changing the start time of a TV show is a sign of someone deliberately trying to sabotage ratings, to justify scrapping that show. But then I am massively paranoid about pretty much everything.

There's a reason I always Iplayer or homebrew-iplayer who.

We've just discovered it.

I believe the controller who commissioned Who has left so we're back to having some idiot coke head who hates the show schedule the channel while a large fat gay man tosses himself off over the shows history. Ahhh, smell that 80's nostalgia.

No, that actually is a known tactic to try and kill a show, and it sort of worked with this series, although its ratings have apparently picked up again. Fuck knows why the BBC's head-honchos are doing this (and word is that those with THE POWER are somewhat hostile to the show, unlike those who were around during the first reboot series), what with it actually fulfilling an important role (the BBC being bound to create shows across lots of genres and all that), being fairly good, and raising its profile around the world as a station that can do more than Top Gear, David Attenborough and period drama.

It's also making the Beeb an absolute fortune in overseas broadcasts, licensing, DVD sales and renewed interest in the older Doctor Who material. If they dump the show, they're turning a prime-time cash cow into hamburgers.

Ah, but the high-ups at the BBC don't give a shit about the commercial arm and never have. If they did, Who would have been back in the 1990s, funded by the commercial arm and overseas companies, but the BBC itself nixed that.

Welcome to the space year 1989 where Doctor Who is the top selling non-factual BBC TV show abroad............

It's been proven time and time again that due to the way the BBC operates, the people who run BBC 1 don't give a toss how well a show sells. All the cash that Who makes has always gone into a big pot that BBC Worldwide hands back to BBC TV each year. The people at BBC TV never did and never will care what went into that pot, just how big it is.

A few years before Who was revived I had lunch with someone from BBC Worldwide who said if Worldwide had their way both Who and Blakes 7* would be back in an instant. But without co-operation from BBC TV it was not going to happen.

Right arm fighting the left arm......


* Although B7 is a little bit more complicated. However I think he was using it as an example of a show they knew could make money easily.

Ello. Last week's episode, whilst not the best ever or whatnot, was nonetheless fucking great. Fuck any minor complaints over CGI or shit, it was brilliantly written and acted. And I will be massively upset if Donna dies, as she's been consistently excellent. Still, next week's looks a bit good/over-egged, eh? Cor!

I mean, for fuck's sake. It was about the most radical piece of British TV I've seen in years, within its context. Immigrants are good? The government can be terrifying and dictatorial in responding to a crisis? And of course, live your life, do what you think is best, and... stand up and be counted! I mean, I love that it echoes the first episode, Rose, where the Doctor berates humanity for just sitting around eating chips and watching TV. Yes?

I thought it was fucking excellent, especially for what is a family program, at prime-time, to be watched by kids. Then again, I freely admit to loving anything that espouses a liberal agenda to the festering heart of Middle Britain. Unless the next episode *really* balls things up, I hereby officially forgive RTD for all the Jesus stuff at the end of the last series. Bravo.

But if this is true (and I don't doubt you really, Chinny) why do the Beeb hate sci-fi so much? I mean, it can't be on the grounds of snobbery since they already produce a certain amount of trash. Is it just a weird sort of ingrained reaction - like institutional racism in the police - or a dislike of complicated productions and tedious quips from the Radio Times, or what?

They-they can't take sci-fi away from us again, can they? I don't mind if Doc Who goes away for a few years again as long as we have something new and ace and sci-fi clever to take its place. But from what you're saying about the Beeb, I am worried.

Yes. It's getting better in memory, I might watch it again. I liked it very much from the off, it was merely compromised for me by the way I don't like the old Donna as I find her shallow and irritating - which is what she's meant to be. The great idea being that the least of us can rise up and become something ("Oh ho!" - RTD) noble. But that big idea is growing on me more and more, so yes, I think I'll watch it again.

Uniquely for sci-fi, Nu-Doc-Whu has shaky sci-fi concepts, but really big themes when it comes to humanity, morality and empowerment. Personally I like the trade off at the moment.

Really can't wait for next week!

Teaser trailer spoiler:

The fact there there is no full Who-season next year is equally bothersome I find. Someone at the top definitely seems to want shot of the program, but why they would elludes me. Especially considering the Beeb's penchant for churning out all that Strictly Come Dancing and Lloyd-Webber shit.

Last weeks episode reminded me waaay to much of the one with Derek Jacobi in last year. That too was awesome, building up for what promised to be an incredible finale. Except that finale turned out to be utter, utter wank. I hope it doesn't go the same way again this year - I desperately want to be good again!

From BBC One's point of view Who is expensive, and yes programmers personal feelings *do* come into it. Who got shunted around the schedules in the 80's because people didn't care. And now it appears that talent shows are more important than Who so it gets shunted around again. Ironically each episode of Who costs far more than a talent. In fact you could have 4 or so talent shows for every episode of Who and get the same ratings. That's why the people at BBC 1 hate it. In their minds Who is expensive and takes money away from other shows.

Although remember that in 1989 circumstances overtook events. Who was only intended to be "rested" but the overtures from the USA meant that for the five odd years that talks were ongoing the BBC didn't do anything else. BBC Worldwide wanted to do their own direct to video adventure in 1993 for the 30th anniversery but it was vetoed by Segal who was in negotiations with the BBC.