Contains dinosaurs on a spaceship as promised
August 2, 2012 12:17 AM Subscribe

It's just past 6am in the United Kingdom, and that means the trailer for Series 7(a) of the New Doctor Who has been released to the Internet. It follows this striking desktop image featuring many, many older model Daleks, including the Special Weapons Dalek (not seen since 1988).
posted by Mezentian (337 comments total) 23 users marked this as a favorite

Dinosaurs on a spaceship are cool.
posted by ActingTheGoat at 12:24 AM on August 2, 2012 [5 favorites]

But Matt Smith is no Samuel L. Jackson.

Or maybe that'll turn out to be a good thing.
posted by oneswellfoop at 12:50 AM on August 2, 2012

Yay! More bad CGI!
posted by milkb0at at 12:52 AM on August 2, 2012

Yay! Special Weapons Dalek!
posted by Artw at 12:56 AM on August 2, 2012 [6 favorites]

Dalek Variants
posted by Artw at 1:01 AM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

I love the fact that the Special Weapons Dalek is an abomination in the Dalek castes, and it has been so warped in order to fit its weaponry that it is utterly insane, single-minded, and feared by the other Daleks.

It would be good if they could do it right.
posted by Mezentian at 1:06 AM on August 2, 2012 [5 favorites]

Death to the iDaleks
posted by brilliantmistake at 1:15 AM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

Great link, Artw.
posted by Foaf at 1:18 AM on August 2, 2012

Amy Pond is the best companion ever, eh?
posted by Foaf at 1:20 AM on August 2, 2012

Somewhere out there on the internet there's a super super spoilery image of a Weeping Angel from the upcoming season, and the brilliance of the concept behind it made me gasp. Man I'm stoked for that episode.
posted by painquale at 1:32 AM on August 2, 2012 [3 favorites]

Here's the spoilery image. Don't click if you care about spoilers. (Remember, the Angels can only move when no one is looking at them.)
posted by painquale at 1:39 AM on August 2, 2012 [4 favorites]

jaduncan: Jesus wept, massive spoiler! mods, can you remove pls?
posted by low_horrible_immoral at 1:54 AM on August 2, 2012

Yeah, sorry about that if it spoils things for anyone. I thought it was common knowledge due to the public press releases regarding forthcoming changes but I've also flagged my own comment and don't mind at all if it's taken down.
posted by jaduncan at 2:03 AM on August 2, 2012

Man I'm stoked for that episode.

It's the Daily Star. Not exactly a paragon of journalist truthiness.

Now, the cherub in the trailer. Genius!

If people still have cherubs on the walls of their toilets (as was popular in the '70s)... well, I'd not want to be a parent.
posted by Mezentian at 2:03 AM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

Okay, deleted a couple of spoilery comments.
posted by taz (staff) at 2:09 AM on August 2, 2012

Seven plus three kinda's.

Katarina
Sara Kingdom
Adric
Roz Forrester
Lucie Miller
Tamsin Drew
Astrid Perth

Then the tricky ones
Peri Brown (Death was probably an illusion caused by the valeyard, but then it gets complicated because of Timelord meddling)

Ace (There are conflicting cannon reports, but she did not die explicitly in an episode)

River Song (Died and regenerated, died and had mind stored in a computer)

I am obviously not including those who have died and then regenerated/resurrected/whatever. There are a lot of them.
posted by Just this guy, y'know at 2:15 AM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

Am I alone in thinking this new trailer looks, well, a bit boring and formulaic (dinosaurs! in! space! aside)?

It could just be that I'm sick of the Daleks. Fucking Daleks.
posted by fight or flight at 2:22 AM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

I have had it with these Geronimo! dinosaurs on this Geronimo! spacehip!.
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 2:26 AM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

God. More bloody Daleks.

It's so sad the way the Weeping Angels went from fantastic episode where they weren't really evil to let's roll them out again and again overly evil monsters.

Surely a few more episodes like The Empty Child and Blink where something new and clever is brought in are possible.
posted by sien at 2:41 AM on August 2, 2012 [10 favorites]

LESTRADE!

(this does not bode well for the Doctor Who/Sherlock crossover I have scripted in my head though)
posted by Lucinda at 3:12 AM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

Oh, fuck me. River Song is coming back? Maybe we'll get lucky and they'll kill her off this time.
posted by Mr. Bad Example at 3:12 AM on August 2, 2012 [9 favorites]

They killed her off years ago. That's what started this whole mess.
posted by dumbland at 3:14 AM on August 2, 2012 [18 favorites]

Other things I hope we'll be seeing much less of this season:

1.) Super Special Messiah Doctor Sue.
2.) Solving problems by RUNNING! AROUND! AND! SHOUTING!
3.) Parenthood as a deus ex machina to thwart the monster of the week.

I'm not holding my breath, though. =/
posted by Mr. Bad Example at 3:23 AM on August 2, 2012 [6 favorites]

Seven plus three kinda's.

If Astrid is a Companion...
No.

Tamsin Drew

Bleedin' 'eck. I've been out-nerded.
posted by Mezentian at 3:37 AM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

I'll happily take a double goddamn helping of Daleks if we can get through this season without Cybermen. Can we, please? PleasePleasePlease?
posted by palmcorder_yajna at 3:41 AM on August 2, 2012 [3 favorites]

Special Weapons Dalek

Sexual Harassment Dalek
posted by obiwanwasabi at 3:52 AM on August 2, 2012 [16 favorites]

Amy Pond is the best companion ever, eh?
I think you meant Rory.
posted by PapaLobo at 3:56 AM on August 2, 2012 [16 favorites]

I think you meant Rory.

I think you meant Mr Pond.
posted by fight or flight at 3:59 AM on August 2, 2012 [8 favorites]

Of course I meant Mr. Pond. Rory Pond.
posted by PapaLobo at 4:05 AM on August 2, 2012 [3 favorites]

Pond. Rory Pond.

Aaand there's an image that will gnaw away at my brain until it finally happens WHICH IT WON'T, WILL IT YER BASTICHES!
posted by Etrigan at 4:41 AM on August 2, 2012 [4 favorites]

Sexual Harassment Dalek

THAT MAKES MEE A SAAAD DAAALEK! SAAAAD DAAAALEK!!
posted by JHarris at 4:42 AM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

Hitler is still smarting from last season.
posted by markkraft at 4:47 AM on August 2, 2012 [4 favorites]

AS A LONG TIME VIEWER OF THE DOC-TOR, I THINK THERE SHOULD BE MORE DAL-EKS! EVERY EP-I-SODE SHOULD HAVE AS MANY DAL-EKS AS POSSIBLE! THE NEW COMPANION SHOULD BE A DAL-EK! THE DAL-EKS NEED TO BE LOUDER, ANGRIER, AND SHOULD HAVE ACCESS TO A TIME MACHINE! WHENEVER THE DAL-EKS ARE NOT ON SCREEN, OTHER CHARACTERS SHOULD BE ASKING "WHERE ARE THE DAL-EKS?"!
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 4:48 AM on August 2, 2012 [59 favorites]

Hitler is still smarting from last season.

HOW HAD I NEVER SEEN THAT?
posted by Mezentian at 4:52 AM on August 2, 2012

(Poor Hitler...)
posted by markkraft at 4:54 AM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

On the one hand, I want to get all pedantic because I happen to think it's DA-LEK as opposed to DAL-EK, but on the other hand that seems to fit so nicely with the off-kilter cadence of Dalek speech.

Wait no I'm not really that big a nerd where are you going I just have a couple ideas for how best to bring back Donna
posted by zombieflanders at 4:57 AM on August 2, 2012 [7 favorites]

I just have a couple ideas for how best to bring back Donna

Do any of them involve going back in time and not having the character written out of her for no reason, and then having that all completely undone for not reason other than ego-wank in the End of Time?

Because I would be down with that.

And so would my cat, Donna.
posted by Mezentian at 5:01 AM on August 2, 2012 [6 favorites]

Okay guys; I've had it with waiting for Sherlock and would like to get started on Doctor Who in the meantime. Where do I start?
posted by the cydonian at 5:01 AM on August 2, 2012

Other things I hope we'll be seeing much less of this season:

...
2.) Solving problems by RUNNING! AROUND! AND! SHOUTING!
...

I have sympathy for your point of view, but dude, it's been 49 years of running down corridors. I don't think there's much hope...
posted by kalimac at 5:03 AM on August 2, 2012 [8 favorites]

OH BOY MORE RIVER GODDAMN FUCKING SON OF A BITCH SONG!
posted by Legomancer at 5:05 AM on August 2, 2012 [3 favorites]

Initially, I loved River Song. A smart, interesting concept; a partner that was presented as an equal to the protagonist; a female lead that was allowed to be over 40 years old and weigh over 98 pounds. I mean, I loved River Song.

Then they took this very interesting character and decided to make her !!INTERESTING!!.

Now, a half-second head shot in a trailer is enough to trigger an eyeroll so hard it gives me a headache. I can't even quantify how tired I am of River Song. I would rather have six episodes of an an all-singing, all-dancing, all-Dalek Busby Berkeley revue than five minutes of River Song.

River Song has made me untired of Daleks. Which may be Moffat's long game. Perhaps the man's a genius.
posted by Shepherd at 5:06 AM on August 2, 2012 [24 favorites]

I still haven't motivated myself to watch the latter half of series 6. If you'd told me two years ago that all it would take to make me bored of Doctor Who was Steven Goddamn Moffat taking over the show, I'd have punched you right in your lying face, but here we are.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 5:12 AM on August 2, 2012 [15 favorites]

The cydonian: you've got 2 options (well, 3, but the 3rd's nor feasible).
1) Start at the beginning of Series 5 (of the modern stuff), which isa the beginning of the current Doctor (Matt Smith) and the current showrunner (Moffat). You'll get general continuity, but you should make sure you know the gist of DW before it.

2) Start at the beginning of the modern stuff, Eccleston's Doctor. You'll get more continuity, no knowledge required.

No big deal either way; depends on the time you have / are willing to sink in.

(Or, 3: start at the beginning of the Original series. Not really a good idea, 400-ish hours.)
posted by Lemurrhea at 5:13 AM on August 2, 2012

I still haven't motivated myself to watch the latter half of series 6. If you'd told me two years ago that all it would take to make me bored of Doctor Who was Steven Goddamn Moffat taking over the show, I'd have punched you right in your lying face, but here we are.

This astounds me as well. I never would have thought Steven Moffat would give us such a generic, dumb, boring show.
posted by Legomancer at 5:38 AM on August 2, 2012 [8 favorites]

The "striking desktop image" is striking because it really shows that Amy Pond is a strong character, and not a damsel in distress who just needs to be saved again and again by the doctor or Rory.

The Weeping Angels were awesome in Blink. So awesome! And then they came back, and they got all these stupid powers where they could live in the reflection of your eye and . . . I wouldn't mind a retcon that removes that so the Weeping Angels go back to being awesome. Though I don't trust Moffat to have the rest of the show be awesome around them, anyhow.
posted by jeather at 5:45 AM on August 2, 2012

AS A LONG TIME VIEWER OF THE DOC-TOR, I THINK THERE SHOULD BE MORE DAL-EKS! EVERY EP-I-SODE SHOULD HAVE AS MANY DAL-EKS AS POSSIBLE! THE NEW COMPANION SHOULD BE A DAL-EK! THE DAL-EKS NEED TO BE LOUDER, ANGRIER, AND SHOULD HAVE ACCESS TO A TIME MACHINE! WHENEVER THE DAL-EKS ARE NOT ON SCREEN, OTHER CHARACTERS SHOULD BE ASKING "WHERE ARE THE DAL-EKS?"!

BUT NOT SPECIAL WEAPONS DAL-ECK. HE IS CRA-ZY. SOMEONE MUST THINK OF THE DAL-ECK INFANTS. SUPPORT DAV-ROS 2212.
posted by jaduncan at 5:48 AM on August 2, 2012 [6 favorites]

the cydonian: "Okay guys; I've had it with waiting for Sherlock and would like to get started on Doctor Who in the meantime. Where do I start?"

Start with Eccleston (Ninth Doctor). The Classic series are fun to dip into and out of once you are immersed in Doctoriana, but for a modern viewer the pacing, acting and effects can be... challenging.
posted by Rock Steady at 5:53 AM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

GOOGLE DALEK RENEGADES
posted by Artw at 5:54 AM on August 2, 2012 [7 favorites]

Well, I'm excited.
posted by Sticherbeast at 5:57 AM on August 2, 2012

The "striking desktop image" is striking because it really shows that Amy Pond is a strong character, and not a damsel in distress who just needs to be saved again and again by the doctor or Rory.

This is sarcasm, right?
posted by fight or flight at 6:00 AM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

Imagine the new Dalek companion helps the Doctor take on the Angels... Dalek vs Angel, who wins?
posted by MikeWarot at 6:02 AM on August 2, 2012

The "striking desktop image" is striking because it really shows that Amy Pond is a strong character, and not a damsel in distress who just needs to be saved again and again by the doctor or Rory.

no
you see
she is napping
and she is so large
and in charge
that the doctor carries her around
when she naps
posted by Sticherbeast at 6:02 AM on August 2, 2012 [10 favorites]

I'm really glad that I watch Doctor Who with my 11-year-old daughter. Her enthusiasm and passion really washes away a lot of the cynicism and snark I see any time I try to get into discussions of it with adults. If you were to watch her barrel around the house brandishing her sonic screwdriver at the cats, the fridge and a panoply of imaginary Daleks, Cybermen, Angels, and whatever else for a few hours, I promise you would fall in love with the show all over again.
posted by Rock Steady at 6:04 AM on August 2, 2012 [39 favorites]

Oh, I wouldn't worry. Metafilter's just like that.
posted by Artw at 6:07 AM on August 2, 2012 [6 favorites]

Interesting trailer. It stirs up the conflicted feelings I usually get about something created by Steven Moffat. He's a tricky bugger, he really is.

Moffat does several things that DOCTOR WHO needs to do, and he does them really, really well. Much better than Russell T. Davies, anyway. He's funny. He's genuinely clever. His science-fiction ideas are thought through in interesting, surprising ways. At least some of the time, he seems to be trying to make this children's show be for actual children, rather than adult fans. These are all Right and Admirable and deserve a hearty Huzzah.

Unfortunately, he also brings a few other things to the table. And I wish he hadn't. In fact, I'd prefer it if he put them away, right now, because they are quite unsightly.

Specifically, first, I really do think he has some problems with writing women. This is a complicated issue that has been discussed elsewhere and I realise that some people feel differently about it to me, but I just can't shake the sense that, at bottom, he has the kind of stereotyping view of women that you would expect from a second-rate stand-up comic ("Oh, you know, women are all like this... except for the mad ones who are mad like this..."). You can just sort of sense when someone isn't being written as a full human being and it grates.

Second, I think he has a tendency - which Davies shared - to write the Doctor as a messiah figure, full of a sense of his own importance. This is more of a personal taste issue, but I just find it rather grandiose and self-important. Also, I know we are supposed to start thinking of the Doctor as more morally ambiguous, a bit of a bad-ass, but there is an air of self-pity to it all which sometimes gets right up my nose.

Third, Moffat can sometimes take really good, simple ideas and start over-complicating them. The Weeping Angels were brilliant when they only moved when you weren't looking at them. Making them infect people's eyes and crawl out of TVs... No. You need another monster altogether for that. Possibly called Sadako. Usually best to keep it simple: one set of rules per creature.

Fourth, parenting is not magic. For some reason, whenever a monster is defeated by the power of parental love (and, in series 6, almost always a father's love), I find myself thinking of all the parents whose children were killed who couldn't save them. It seems to be insulting them, somehow. Every parent wishes they could protect their child - but actually, sadly, that just isn't the case. It seems oddly dishonest to tell children that. If you are going to have the parents save their children, at least have them do it by being clever or brave, rather than just "wanting really hard".

Of course, all that said, I will undoubtedly watch the new series of DOCTOR WHO. It's the most intelligent, creative, fun science fiction show on television right now, as far as I know, and it can be delightful. And I accept that writing is personal and very hard to do well and so we often have to take the rough with the smooth - or the misogynist with the ingenious - when it comes to any particular author.
posted by lucien_reeve at 6:10 AM on August 2, 2012 [12 favorites]

MetaFilter: Oh, I wouldn't worry. Metafilter's just like that.
posted by Rock Steady at 6:11 AM on August 2, 2012 [3 favorites]

(Or, 3: start at the beginning of the Original series. Not really a good idea, 400-ish hours.)

Someone should put together a list of highlights, of the surviving original series episodes, for the purposes of saving time and avoiding inexorable serials like The Gunfighters (it's got some great moments, but it's ruined by all that singing!). Since we've been through every surviving video serial of the first two Doctors and some of the third recently, I can offer opinions on those if someone else wouldn't mind continuing?

I:
An Unearthly Child (the first serial, sets up the premise, shows us what a dick the Doctor could be before his companions started "humanizing" him)
The Mutants (later retitled The Daleks), for obvious reasons. Also, the second serial ever.
The Aztecs, as justsomebodythatyouusedtoknow notes, this is the serial that taught the guy how to be Doctor Who, and it's Barbera who teaches him. Back then companions were allowed to be right once in a while.
The Sensorites, a great serial overall, that presents future humans for the first time, and strange-looking aliens who turn out to be great guys.
The Dalek Invasion of Earth, a seminal moment in Who history, for the Daleks are back but not on some alien planet but on future Earth. Also Susan leaves.
The Rescue, bringing in Vicki to replace Susan, and also has an awesome ending.
The Romans, one of the best of the surviving historical serials, although by the end of it Barbara and Ian have had a pretty hard time of things. Also one of those stories where, by the end, you wonder why everyone speaks English.
The Web Planet, because classic Doctor Who could be damn goofy sometimes. An ambitious and challenging script is ruined by some of the most laughable costumes and oddball alien performances in sci-fi history, but if you can get past that it works in an Ed Wood kind of way. I can overlook a lot of silly special effects but this one breaks the meter.
The Chase, not really one of the better serials but has to be included for the haunted house section with the Daleks, and for the departure of original companions Ian and Barbera.
The Time Meddler, for bringing us our first glimpse of another Time Lord (although not yet named such) and another TARDIS.
The Ark, for its grand scope, and because it gives us one of the few repeat visits in classic Who of the Doctor and his companions to a previous stop -- in the same serial no less.
The War Machines, not because it's all that great, but because it's the first time a companion leaves under questionable circumstances. Poor Dodo is brainwashed by the eeeevil computer Wotan (remember when all computers wanted to take over the world?), the Doctor breaks the spell, she recovers off camera... and is never heard from again. We only have the other characters' word that she recovers. Oddly in this present-day serial The Doctor seem to be known and even respected by earth authorities.

II:
(Unfortunately, lots of Second Doctor adventures are lost. When we toured the surviving episodes I was astonished to discover that in none of them does he play his trademark recorder! Some episodes survive in pieced-together form as audio dramas, but we skipped those, as we did those serials which are incomplete. Sadly these include the Second Doctor's first appearance and the first UNIT story)
The Tomb of the Cybermen, for being terrific fun and bringing us great moments with Jamie, SPACE SCOTTSMAN. It wouldn't take a lot of work to adapt this story for Call of Cthulhu.
The Dominators, because I just like it, dammit.
The Mind Robber, for being insane.
The Krotons, which is in many ways a prototypical Doctor Who story.
The War Games, bringing us another of the Doctor's countrymen, this one evil and a prototype for The Master. Also the Second Doctor's last serial.

III:
Spearhead from Space, for being the Third Doctor's first serial, and also getting us more familiar with the awesome Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart.
Inferno, a terrific serial which brings The Doctor to an alternate Earth as an aside to the main story, which is basically the show's version of Star Trek's mirror universe.
The Terror of the Autons, for being The Master's first serial.
The Mind of Evil, for its interesting setting (in a prison) and for some interesting characterization by Robert Delgado's Master, which remains, I think, the best version of the character, mostly evil, but once in a while....

That's where our tour currently stands.
posted by JHarris at 6:18 AM on August 2, 2012 [30 favorites]

*creeps forward*

*freezes*
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 6:27 AM on August 2, 2012 [9 favorites]

Oh lords.
I don't have time for this..... I can probably be Memailed for more but, but suggeston:
1. Start with Rose. It's an ideal jumping on point.
2. Check Ask.Me. Fer sure.
3. Start with The Eleventh Hour if you like Sherlock.

Overall: continuity does not matter. Much, if ever.

And adding on from JHarris, assuming a neophyte Who watcher, I'm gonna flag some (objective) faves:

Robot, The Ark in Space, The Sontaran Experiment, Genesis of the Daleks, Revenge of the Cybermen

The stories follow on. So, it's a good transition. Genesis is awesome.

Terror of the Zygons - They'll be back. Watch now. Good alien invasion tales.
Pyramids of Mars - Well, look at the title.
The Brain of Morbius - Frankentein in Spaaaace
The Seeds of Doom - Mother-fucking killer plants. Like The Thing but for kids.

The Robots of Death - Robots, killers.
The Talons of Weng-Chiang Killer midgets in Chinatown.

City of Death - Douglas Adams, Paris.
The Horns of Nimon - Oh, you like over acting? This is good then.
State of Decay - Vampires .... in Spaaace!

Someone else can tag-team me.
posted by Mezentian at 6:32 AM on August 2, 2012 [5 favorites]

*creeps forward*

*freezes*
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 6:34 AM on August 2, 2012 [3 favorites]

Red light!
posted by JHarris at 6:36 AM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

*watches TheWhiteSkull, doesn't blink*
posted by Rock Steady at 6:36 AM on August 2, 2012 [6 favorites]

Everyone blinks eventually.
posted by BeeDo at 6:37 AM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

Second, I think he has a tendency - which Davies shared - to write the Doctor as a messiah figure, full of a sense of his own importance. This is more of a personal taste issue, but I just find it rather grandiose and self-important. Also, I know we are supposed to start thinking of the Doctor as more morally ambiguous, a bit of a bad-ass, but there is an air of self-pity to it all which sometimes gets right up my nose.

If I had to fault the current breed of Doctor for anything, I'd say this point voices it fairly well. The "ain't I great/woe is me" duality does tend to grate, and really reduces the Doctor to a fairly predictable single-dimension personality. Don't get me wrong, I still think it the best sci-fi going on tv. But, I pine for a more...restrained, thoughtful Doctor. Darker, and less manic, and given more to real galactic exploration, rather than fighting the galactic threat of the week. I yearn for a greater sense of wonder in the Doctor. I mean...He can go anywhere and anytime in the universe, ferchissakes.
posted by Thorzdad at 6:38 AM on August 2, 2012 [3 favorites]

*creeps forward*

*freezes*
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 6:38 AM on August 2, 2012 [7 favorites]

O.O
posted by fight or flight at 6:38 AM on August 2, 2012 [8 favorites]

Talking to some friends at the bar last night, telling them that I was planning on going to an 80's theme dress up party as Tom Baker era Doctor (just sneaks into the decade) but it was pointed out to me that I was already pretty much dressed as the Fourth Doctor, what with my coat, scarf (which wasn't that long really), and starting to curl unruly hair. Sure, I responded, but I have left my Sonic Screwdriver and TARDIS (don't drink and time travel kids!!) at home.
posted by Hello, I'm David McGahan at 6:42 AM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

O._

O.O

_.O

O.O

O._

We're onto you, you concrete bastards.
posted by Etrigan at 6:44 AM on August 2, 2012 [23 favorites]

*creeps forward*

*freezes*
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 6:45 AM on August 2, 2012 [6 favorites]

RUN!!
posted by Rock Steady at 6:45 AM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

True fact: the best way to experience many Classic Who stories is to read the Terrance Dicks novelizations as a small boy in the 80s.
posted by Artw at 6:45 AM on August 2, 2012 [9 favorites]

Film critic hulk tries to put the doctor's resurgence in the context of the current vogue of comic book superhero movies:

HULK VS. THE 'DOCTOR WHO' PANEL VS. AMERICA!:

EVEN THOUGH THE SHOW HAS BEEN ON THE AIR SINCE 1963 YOU CAN STILL EASILY PLACE THE DOCTOR’S RESURGENCE INTO THIS GREATER CONTEXT OF SUPERHERO-DOM. WHEN YOU LOOK AT HIM IN A CERTAIN LENS THE DOCTOR IS NOT ONLY A GREAT FIXTURE OF SCI-FI, BUT FOR ALL INTENTS AND PURPOSES, A SUPERHERO. HE CAN LIVE AGES BEYOND YOUR (PUNY) HUMAN LIVES. HE CAN TRAVEL THROUGHOUT ALL OF SPACE AND TIME, SAVE PLANETS AND INVIGORATE THE COSMOS. BUT MORE THAN ANY OF HIS ABILITIES WHAT MOST DEFINES THE TIME-LORD HIMSELF IS HIS STAGGERING INTELLECT, ZANY SENSE OF HUMOR, HUMANELY DEMOCRATIC VIEWPOINT, AND SENSE OF GENUINE OPTIMISM. HULK ARGUES THAT THESE ARE THE FOUR QUALITIES ARE ABSOLUTELY THE MOST LACKING ATTRIBUTES IN THE MODERN AGE OF HEROES.

posted by jenkinsEar at 6:46 AM on August 2, 2012 [4 favorites]

And yes there could definitely be a bit more nuance to the "The "ain't I great/woe is me" duality does tend to grate, and really reduces the Doctor to a fairly predictable single-dimension personality" that Thorzad mentions, it was/is an interesting idea, that Smith's Doctor basically starts of as a child-like character (i.e. the first scene in Amy's kitchen demanding to be fed but rejecting basically everything) that kids could relate to, but then developing a sense of responsibility about how those he loves might be harmed, simply by being around him (i.e. the motivation of the classic secret identity of the super hero). Might have worked better in they'd dialled back the 'emo' level a few notches though.
posted by Hello, I'm David McGahan at 6:50 AM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

Dinosaurs on a spaceship are cool.

Yes. Yes, they are. Hobbes didn't like it, but I'm kind of with Calvin on this one...Tyrannosaurs in F-14s!
posted by Kronos_to_Earth at 6:53 AM on August 2, 2012 [4 favorites]

Second, I think he has a tendency - which Davies shared - to write the Doctor as a messiah figure, full of a sense of his own importance. This is more of a personal taste issue, but I just find it rather grandiose and self-important. Also, I know we are supposed to start thinking of the Doctor as more morally ambiguous, a bit of a bad-ass, but there is an air of self-pity to it all which sometimes gets right up my nose.

That's why Ten grated on me so badly, especially once the Rose soap opera apparently ended and Martha Jones took over (in what turned out to be a wasted Companion role that I blame entirely on RTD). I think Eleven has been restrained by comparison, particularly in Season 5, though things tended to get wonky with last season. I have yet to see the trailer for Season 7A, but my hope is that Eleven's statement from last season's finale to hide in the shadows holds true.
posted by stannate at 7:00 AM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

This is sarcasm, right?

Yes. You can check out my piles of commentary at how misogynistic the 11th doctor is in all the previous threads here.

Moffat does several things that DOCTOR WHO needs to do, and he does them really, really well. Much better than Russell T. Davies, anyway. He's funny. He's genuinely clever. His science-fiction ideas are thought through in interesting, surprising ways.

He's clever, but I find he uses up all his narrative capital in being clever -- there's often nothing behind the cleverness, not enough plot or characterization to hold it up. I agree he's funny, that he thinks things through, that he's writing for children -- all things that RTD didn't do as well as SM does. (RTD had other skills that SM does not, mostly in characterization, but also in pulling off longer plot arcs.) Both tend to try to one up themselves in finales -- RTD with bigger explosions, SM with more twisty cleverness, neither with much plot.

I'll probably keep watching, though I am almost all the way to hate-watching it now.
posted by jeather at 7:00 AM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

True fact: the best way to experience many Classic Who stories is to read the Terrance Dicks novelizations as a small boy in the 80s.

Good to know.

I'll try it next time I'm there.
posted by General Tonic at 7:02 AM on August 2, 2012 [4 favorites]

...but my hope is that Eleven's statement from last season's finale to hide in the shadows holds true.

Yes, this please.
posted by Thorzdad at 7:06 AM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

stannate: "my hope is that Eleven's statement from last season's finale to hide in the shadows holds true."

Totally agree, and I'm going to stay optimistic, even though some of the shots in the trailer don't exactly lend themselves to that way of thinking. It's a much more fascinating place for the Doctor (especially the Matt Smith Doctor) to be than at the center of the Universe.
posted by Rock Steady at 7:12 AM on August 2, 2012

Would it be heresy to wish for a companion-less Doctor? With far fewer visits to Earth?
posted by Thorzdad at 7:14 AM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

LESTRADE!

(this does not bode well for the Doctor Who/Sherlock crossover I have scripted in my head though)

I also saw David John Bradley (Argus Filch, Walder Frey) screaming "DOCTOR!" in there.
posted by zombieflanders at 7:20 AM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

my hope is that Eleven's statement from last season's finale to hide in the shadows holds true.

That's mine as well but let's face it, not gonna happen. This show spends so much time on the reset button that it has to pay rent.
posted by gauche at 7:20 AM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

Would it be heresy to wish for a companion-less Doctor? With far fewer visits to Earth?

Given how the Companions have been almost entirely women, having only a male Companion would almost be heresy.
posted by stannate at 7:22 AM on August 2, 2012

I do like things a lot more when there's a Mickey or Rory on board, TBH.
posted by Artw at 7:27 AM on August 2, 2012 [3 favorites]

This looks really boring and annoying. But I will watch it anyway in the forlorn hope it isn't.
posted by Summer at 7:28 AM on August 2, 2012

Anyone who hasn't already seen the Fourth's serial "Genesis of the Daleks" really should - something Eleven said in the trailer about "people who've died because of my mercy" makes me think it will be very relevant for this upcoming series.

It's also quite possible that the end of Amy and Rory will cause Eleven to become less conspicuous and hide in the shadows as he had claimed he'll do. On the other hand, their deaths (or death, it's still not known) could mean that Eleven would end up "protecting" the new companion, Clara, to the point of smothering.
posted by stannate at 7:29 AM on August 2, 2012

"This astounds me as well. I never would have thought Steven Moffat would give us such a generic, dumb, boring show."

Oh, please. This is such a "but I miss the last Doctor!" argument... completely ignoring how downhill that writing went after the first couple seasons with the exception of Moffat, how poorly black characters were treated -- including one particularly well-educated, smart companion -- invariably, constantly, and negatively compared to a rather caucasian Rose of England. Or how annoying his character was during the lead-up to his death, despite several very big episodes at that time. By the time he died, I was well and truly ready for a Doctor who was kinder and less self-obsessed.

Matt Smith's Doctor keeps getting better and better. And many of the scripts last year were excellent. And having Neil Gaiman write a script? Awesome. And even when it would've been easy to kill off Rory, Moffat kept him in the series, and used clever writing to transform him into perhaps the most beloved male companion ever. A paragon of love, patience, determination, and acceptance that has really resonated with the public.

If you're mad at Moffat, perhaps it's justifiable that he is so busy running the show, that he hasn't had time to write more scripts, or create the next weeping angel, and has had to reuse a lot of monsters... which is something Doctor Who has been doing for over 40 years. Be upset, perhaps, that he gave the last guy his best creations. But as far as I can tell? He's doing better and better, and really beginning to master a very difficult, all-consuming job... whilst bringing you several other excellent shows as well!
posted by markkraft at 7:29 AM on August 2, 2012 [7 favorites]

Thorzdad: "Would it be heresy to wish for a companion-less Doctor? With far fewer visits to Earth?"

I think you need a Companion, for expository purposes if nothing else ("Where are we, Doctor?"), but maybe an alien Companion or a Earthling from an historic or future era would help the show branch out a bit?

stannate: "Would it be heresy to wish for a companion-less Doctor? With far fewer visits to Earth?

Given how the Companions have been almost entirely women, having only a male Companion would almost be heresy."

I do really hope they try a female Doctor at some point in the near future, and then a solo male Companion would make more sense.
posted by Rock Steady at 7:30 AM on August 2, 2012

Flibbertigibbet wrote up a great getting started guide to the new Doctor Who when Season 5 or 6 started.

My wife and I used this and it was a great intro to the new series.
posted by Lord_Pall at 7:30 AM on August 2, 2012 [4 favorites]

but maybe an alien Companion or a Earthling from an historic or future era would help the show branch out a bit?

Could this be the return of SPACE SCOTTSMAN??
posted by JHarris at 7:32 AM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

I do really hope they try a female Doctor at some point in the near future...
Isn't this pretty-much what River Song is in everything but title and function?
posted by Thorzdad at 7:35 AM on August 2, 2012

Thorzdad: "Isn't this pretty-much what River Song is in everything but title and function?"

Well, sure, but there's that pesky bow-tied gentleman who keeps getting in her way. I'd say she's more a Companion With Benefits than a female Doctor.
posted by Rock Steady at 7:37 AM on August 2, 2012

TheWhiteSkull: "*freezes*"

*glares*

*pulls out jackhammer*

Can concrete angels bleed? Let's find out.
posted by zarq at 7:41 AM on August 2, 2012 [12 favorites]

how poorly black characters were treated -- including one particularly well-educated, smart companion -- invariably, constantly, and negatively compared to a rather caucasian Rose of England.

Yes, Martha and Mickey were poorly treated, but on the other hand, at least there were non-white characters on RTD's series.

Or how annoying his character was during the lead-up to his death, despite several very big episodes at that time. By the time he died, I was well and truly ready for a Doctor who was kinder and less self-obsessed.

I think some of the annoyingness was deliberate, but I don't think 11 is particularly kind or less self-obsessed, he's just different.

And even when it would've been easy to kill off Rory, Moffat kept him in the series, and used clever writing to transform him into perhaps the most beloved male companion ever. A paragon of love, patience, determination, and acceptance that has really resonated with the public.

Because Rory is a man, so he is full of positive character traits, unlike Amy.

If you're mad at Moffat, perhaps it's justifiable that he is so busy running the show, that he hasn't had time to write more scripts, or create the next weeping angel, and has had to reuse a lot of monsters...

I didn't mind the idea of reusing the weeping angels, I minded that he changed them into something that isn't creepy or scary or really a weeping angel at all. If the weeping angel spoiler is a Blink-type angel, I will be perfectly happy. (I also don't mind Daleks. As long as the Slitheen never come back, I am good.)

But I'm not mad that he doesn't write more scripts, or that he hasn't come up with something else like the angels -- I'm mad because the show has made interesting female characters into caricatures, has made dull male characters into paragons, and has been overusing clever callbacks to itself in place of character or plot. Now, I grant this is Moffat's specialty, but I don't have to like it.
posted by jeather at 7:45 AM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

Would it be heresy to wish for a companion-less Doctor

They actually tried this once with classic Who. A Tom Baker story called "The Deadly Assassin". It was a good story, and worth watching, but you really saw how hard it is to keep the script going when the Doctor doesn't have a companion to explain stuff to. A lot of talking to random guys he just met and talking out loud to himself went on.
posted by unreason at 7:47 AM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

So am I the only one who loves the multicolor Dalek designs?

Also, Mr. John Crichton himself, Ben Browder, is in the old west episode and now I've got this urge that will never be fulfilled to see the rest of the Farscape cast show up. Shit, make Claudia Black the next Doctor, I'd watch that.
posted by jason_steakums at 7:49 AM on August 2, 2012 [8 favorites]

I think River Song may be getting short shrift in this thread, to an extent, but it's certainly true that Martha was the best companion by a mile and never got or gets her due. I really hope the next one is smart and competent like her instead of, well, the other thing.
posted by gerryblog at 7:50 AM on August 2, 2012 [4 favorites]

I would just like to say that Abed from Community should be the next companion.

"What's that!? Blogons!"
"No no no, they're just Darleks."
"EXTERMINATE!"
"Although perhaps this isn't the place..."
"Surely the question isn't where Inspector, but when?"
"ITS DOCTOR!"
"Doctor who?"
CUE THEME MUSIC
posted by litleozy at 7:51 AM on August 2, 2012 [5 favorites]

A lot of talking to random guys he just met and talking out loud to himself went on.

So just like regular Tom Baker episodes then?
posted by Rock Steady at 7:52 AM on August 2, 2012 [3 favorites]

Also, just from a television writing standpoint, you need the Companions both as exposition farms ("What's that, Doctor!") but also as entry points for the series as new kids age in (and other kids age out). Every time there's a new Companion the series "starts over" with reintroduction of the basic concepts; you can see this most clearly in the new "Who" with the Amy seasons, which started coming with a ten-second explanation of the series's premise from Amy's perspective. This was more to market the show to new American viewers than to snag new kids, but the same basic logic applies.
posted by gerryblog at 7:53 AM on August 2, 2012

OK this show looks entertaining and I'll probably watch it. It's not Doctor Who however.
posted by MrBobaFett at 7:54 AM on August 2, 2012

Yeah. The show has made it extremely explicit since Rose that The Doctor Goes Mad (at Brighton, and all of Time and Space) when he lacks an anchor.

I can't argue the merits of the show.
It's good. It's bad.
But it's been with me since before I was born and I can't be overly critical because it's a bit like a religion.

If it's there, however the form, I feel better.
posted by Mezentian at 7:56 AM on August 2, 2012

jason_steakums: "Shit, make Claudia Black the next Doctor, I'd watch that."

Companion: Gigi Edgley?
posted by zarq at 7:58 AM on August 2, 2012 [6 favorites]

It's interesting to me that Martha was clearly the most adult, making excellent adult decisions like "I'm falling for you, but that is a hornet's nest of a bad idea, so I'm going to take some time away", so she is pushed aside and forgotten, whereas typically all companions have their personalities painted in broader strokes and come off as childlike because of it, and they don't get the short end of the stick in the same way. It's like the Doctor is Santa Claus, and once you grow up enough to know the truth, you can't go back.
posted by jason_steakums at 7:59 AM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

It's like the Doctor is Santa Claus, and once you grow up enough to know the truth, you can't go back.

Which should have been how Amy and Rory's story ended, in the tail end of the last season, but they keep bringing them back anyway.
posted by gerryblog at 8:00 AM on August 2, 2012

Also can we bloody well be done with River freaking Song now?
posted by MrBobaFett at 8:03 AM on August 2, 2012 [3 favorites]

Companion: Gigi Edgley?

Oh no, no. Companion: Ben Browder. Contractually obliged to wear those leather trousers.
posted by fight or flight at 8:07 AM on August 2, 2012

Martha was clearly the most adult ... so she is pushed aside and forgotten

In their slight defense, she was supposed to wind up starring on Torchwood, but it got screwed up somehow. Slight defense only.
posted by gerryblog at 8:08 AM on August 2, 2012

No because in Doctor Who you cannot be a female companion unless you are also The Most Important Person in The Entire Universe™ oh and I guess also white you have to be young and white to be the Most Important Person in The Entire Universe™ too

I get being White and Female, but neither Donna (who was the most important person in the universe for a bit there) nor River Song are particularly young by TV standards.
posted by Bulgaroktonos at 8:12 AM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

I feel old. Doctor Who has become an American citizen and that hurts my heart.

BBC America is helping pay the bills now. Gotta give the new investors something in return.
posted by Thorzdad at 8:18 AM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

I like River Song. Eleven's my favorite doctor. I'm excited about the new series.

And I feel very alone in here.
posted by ocherdraco at 8:21 AM on August 2, 2012 [13 favorites]

*creeps towards ocherdraco*

*freezes*
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 8:24 AM on August 2, 2012 [10 favorites]

TheWhiteSkull: "*creeps towards ocherdraco*"

ocherdraco, I've seen this before... RUN!!
posted by Rock Steady at 8:27 AM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

Oh, please. This is such a "but I miss the last Doctor!" argument... completely ignoring how downhill that writing went after the first couple seasons with the exception of Moffat...

"With the exception of Moffat" is kind of the point - he was stellar. "Blink" and “The Girl In The Fireplace” were really great high-concept stories, and the World War II and Library episodes kept a bunch of balls in the air admirably (although the monsters in Library were a poor second to Weeping Angels as concept villains go). And then he takes the reigns and immediately decides to start copying Davies' excesses instead of playing to his own strengths. He's done some stuff right, starting by casting Matt Smith, and I don't have a bad word to say about the Silence, but...the new-look Angels, River. Ugh. Talk about a failure to keep the balls in the air.

It's not even that the show has really gone that far downhill (although I will take Davies' story arcs over Moffat's, because they pay off in things like Daleks vs. Cybermen that are satisfying on a mashing-action-figures-together level instead of Mary Sue escalation which isn't satisfying at all) so much as that my expectations for it to get better were dashed.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 8:28 AM on August 2, 2012

fight or flight: " Oh no, no. Companion: Ben Browder. Contractually obliged to wear those leather trousers."

Would you settle for Anthony Simcoe, instead? :D
posted by zarq at 8:29 AM on August 2, 2012

I like River Song. Eleven's my favorite doctor. I'm excited about the new series.

And I feel very alone in here.

I'm with you, mostly. River Song's plotlines can be a bit of a mess, but it's fucking Doctor Who; that happens. I like Rory a lot, and I have liked Amy and Rory's relationship, but I'm guessing we're on a long decline on that front. Is it the best television I've ever watched? No. Is it better than the fucking "End of Time"? Well, obviously.
posted by Bulgaroktonos at 8:29 AM on August 2, 2012 [5 favorites]

The only River Song story I really still want to see is one where the Doctor says "fuck spoilers" and goes back to the library for her completed diary, and deals with the fallout from trying to use a cheat sheet like that. That's really the only unexplored avenue with her character now, we've ticked off all of the other boxes in her character's premise so the mystery's gone and it's a lot like treading water after that.

I feel like it was probably a mistake to have her mysterious relationship with the Doctor entirely play itself out over the course of the next regeneration after he met her, she'd probably work a lot better if she just popped in and out of his life here and there and the bulk of their relationship was always just hinted at as taking place some time in the distant, murky future.

I don't dislike her, I just think her story's over. Who knows, maybe Moffat thinks so too, and this series will be the last of her.
posted by jason_steakums at 8:31 AM on August 2, 2012 [6 favorites]

Oh, and Donna was the best companion, because she was capable of interacting with the Doctor as an equal instead of a schoolgirl with a crush (props to Martha for dealing with hers intelligently, but it was still there).

*marrying a woman named Donna, having "Love Don't Roam" played at the reception, possibly biased*
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 8:32 AM on August 2, 2012 [7 favorites]

And even when it would've been easy to kill off Rory, Moffat kept him in the series, and used clever writing to transform him into perhaps the most beloved male companion ever. A paragon of love, patience, determination, and acceptance that has really resonated with the public.

Because Rory is a man, so he is full of positive character traits, unlike Amy.

What? Amy is awesome. Less awesome than she was at the start of her run, but still she is fearless, curious, insightful and speaks her mind. Not as awesome as Martha, but, I am really at a loss here.

I get the feeling in this thread that we all might be watching versions based on where we live or something.
posted by Hello, I'm David McGahan at 8:33 AM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

fight or flight: " Oh no, no. Companion: Ben Browder. Contractually obliged to wear those leather trousers."

Ultimate crossover: John gets turned into a statue in the three part Farascape episode, Look at the Princess. Statue spends its time terrorizing the kingdom as a Weeping Angel. Whilst wearing leather pants.
posted by zarq at 8:35 AM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

Little Amelia Pond > all other recent companions
posted by jason_steakums at 8:36 AM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

What? Amy is awesome. Less awesome than she was at the start of her run, but still she is fearless, curious, insightful and speaks her mind. Not as awesome as Martha, but, I am really at a loss here.

Amy is frequently awesome, but occasionally just awful especially to Rory; she's a difficult character to like as completely as you like Rory, but I think that's a good thing. She's a more complicated and nuanced character than Rory, who is basically a a very loveable dog in human form.
posted by Bulgaroktonos at 8:37 AM on August 2, 2012 [7 favorites]

I like River Song, the Ponds *and* Matt Smith. I think many of the scripts for recent stories have varied in quality, but the strength of the characters always comes through.

The change-up to Steven Moffat as show runner came at just the right time (We're now Post JesusDoctor).

Can't quite figure out why Martha ranks so highly as a companion amongst some though.
posted by panboi at 8:37 AM on August 2, 2012

ocherdraco: I agree.

While I think Moffat's series has its problems vis-a-vis women and maybe race (although the episode 'The Girl who Waited' is a fabulous, fabulous one for how it treats the women, as well as 'The Doctor's Wife'), I have one basic opinion on Moffat's run versus Davies':

Moffat's failures are far less complete than Davies'. Davies brought us the Slitheen. Davies brought us Fear Her. Davies brought us a lot of episodes I can't actually watch all the way through because I can't suspend my disbelief and irritation.

Of Moffat's episodes, only the season 6 Cybermen episode falls into that camp for me. Even the Angels two-parter isn't that disappointing (and I rather like the clones-in-a-mine two-parter, for all its weaknesses it had a lot of great character beats). There are four of these 'total failures' episodes in season 1 of Davies' run. SIX. IN A SINGLE SERIES. Season 2 fares better on this metric, but still worse than any series of Moffat's run.

And my all-time favourite episodes tend to be Moffat-penned (Doctor Dances two-parter, for instance) or from Moffat's time as showrunner (Vincent and the Doctor, the Lodger, The Doctor's Wife, The Girl Who Waited, The Eleventh Hour), so, frankly, I am still in his camp.
posted by flibbertigibbet at 8:41 AM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

Also I hate Rose. There. I said it.
posted by flibbertigibbet at 8:44 AM on August 2, 2012 [18 favorites]

Hello, I'm David McGahan: "I get the feeling in this thread that we all might be watching versions based on where we live or something."

Oh man, that gives me a great idea. Make a series of DW that shows veeery slightly altered versions to different audiences -- one version for the US, others for each of the UK countries, and another for Oceania or something. Start with just changing words to different synonyms, then maybe change the names of minor characters, and eventually changing the outcomes of entire scenes. Make the villain some kind of Silence + the Wire situation and really break the fourth wall -- make the Doctor realize he is being watched by Earthlings in some alternate reality/history and make him somehow merge the televised realities to save the day or something.
posted by Rock Steady at 8:46 AM on August 2, 2012 [5 favorites]

it's certainly true that Martha was the best companion by a mile and never got or gets her due.

I think you mean "Donna". Martha was great, but I loved Donna for finally not being all in wuv with the Doctor and for how well she dealt out the snark. (....Although, the fact that David Tennant and Catherine Tate VISIBLY loved working together helped too.)

ochredraco, you are not alone; Tennant was "My Doctor," but I do like Matt Smith. I do also wish that they'd handled River and the Weeping Angels better, but I'm more mildly disappointed and hopeful they can turn it around than I am "you had your chance and you blew it".
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 8:47 AM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

That's alright I hate Donna, purely because I can't get beyond the shitful sketch comedy Catherine Tate is responsible for

The abrasiveness of Amy towards Rory is a good thing for mine. It did trouble me before they fleshed out Rory's character though.
posted by Hello, I'm David McGahan at 8:48 AM on August 2, 2012

When a man is tired of Daleks, he is tired of life. EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE!
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 8:52 AM on August 2, 2012 [7 favorites]

Hello, I'm David McGahan: "The abrasiveness of Amy towards Rory is a good thing for mine. It did trouble me before they fleshed out Rory's character though."

Doctor: From now on I will be leaving the kissing duties to the brand new… Mr. Pond.
Rory: No, I’m not Mr. Pond. That’s not how it works.
Doctor: Yeah it is.
Rory: Yeeeeah, it is.
posted by Rock Steady at 8:53 AM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

Coincidentally, when a man is eager for Daleks, he is also tired of life.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 8:54 AM on August 2, 2012 [6 favorites]

I should mention that the over-riding theme for 11 is about 'growing up' in my read. So Rory needs to grow up and stop being a mopey adolescent boy. The Doctor has to grow up and realise that (sorry cliche) with great power comes great responsibility. Amy needs to grow up and realise that escapes into fantasy (i.e. the whole first series of the 11th Doctor) aren't the answer to the nagging sense of ennui that she has. River Song apparently doesn't have to grow up because she's already a grown woman and knows far more about what is going on than anyone else.
posted by Hello, I'm David McGahan at 8:56 AM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

Oh man, that gives me a great idea. Make a series of DW that shows veeery slightly altered versions to different audiences -- one version for the US, others for each of the UK countries, and another for Oceania or something.

Perhaps you'd be interested in Inspector Spacetime.
posted by Doktor Zed at 8:58 AM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

Ultimate crossover: John gets turned into a statue in the three part Farascape episode, Look at the Princess. Statue spends its time terrorizing the kingdom as a Weeping Angel. Whilst wearing leather pants.

I think I'm going to spend the entire episode of the new series in which Ben Browder is appearing pretending it's an elaborate crossover wherein John is suspended in a dreamworld/alternate dimension where he is a cowboy and also Scorpius is also there for some reason.

Can I get a HELL YEAH?
posted by fight or flight at 9:00 AM on August 2, 2012 [3 favorites]

The greatest thing about Blink wasn't the Weeping Angels (who were great in that episode), it was that awesome time-spanning conversation reassembled from DVD Easter Eggs. Such great writing.

"You live in Scooby Doo's house."
posted by ceribus peribus at 9:02 AM on August 2, 2012 [7 favorites]

The ultimate Farscape/Who crossover - where does the drumming that makes the Master insane come from? No, not the Time Lords.

Harvey.
posted by jason_steakums at 9:05 AM on August 2, 2012 [4 favorites]

Rock Steady, sure. But I was more meaning the way in which Rory's character, and also 'character' is slowly built up, particularly through association with ancient Europe. Maybe I've been reading too much Herodotus recently, but the poem from "A good man goes to war" sounds to me very much like a Delphic prophecy, for all the ... problems with that episode.

But yeah he is Mr Pond. What is wrong with that?
posted by Hello, I'm David McGahan at 9:05 AM on August 2, 2012

It also strikes me that as the Doctor gets older, the actors that play him tend, on the average, to get younger.
posted by Hello, I'm David McGahan at 9:08 AM on August 2, 2012

It also strikes me that as the Doctor gets older, the actors that play him tend, on the average, to get younger.

On average, yes.
posted by Rangeboy at 9:13 AM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

The greatest thing about Blink wasn't the Weeping Angels (who were great in that episode), it was that awesome time-spanning conversation reassembled from DVD Easter Eggs. Such great writing.

Yes indeed. The Weeping Angels were terrific, and you just know there's a generation of young 'uns who had nightmares from them (and the later material about them being inside eyes or whatever is some dumbness that ideally everyone involved will just agree to forget ever happened), which is good and proper.

But the time-spanning scheme of the Doctor in it was even better. Someone was finally writing our erstwhile Time Lord actually lording time! I'm still geeking out over it! If I had one disappointment to pick with Moffat's tenure is that he never really returned to that kind of focus. You get twists and turns and ah ha! surprise flashback attack! but that's not the same thing. Which is a shame, because it'd be a wonderful thread of the Doctor actually sticking more to the shadows, but as many, I suspect instead they'll squarely park the TARDIS on the reset button and keep on as they have instead.
posted by Drastic at 9:15 AM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

Thanks Rangeboy.

It would seem that the Doctor is also Benjamin Button.
posted by Hello, I'm David McGahan at 9:19 AM on August 2, 2012

Hello, I'm David McGahan:
"So Rory needs to grow up and stop being a mopey adolescent boy. "

fight or flight: " Can I get a HELL YEAH?"

HELL YEAH!
posted by zarq at 9:24 AM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

It also strikes me that as the Doctor gets older, the actors that play him tend, on the average, to get younger.

I've noticed this, too, and have always hoped that this was part of some underlying multi-decade story arc that is set-down in a master tome in a BBC safe somewhere. Every regeneration results in a younger, yet more experienced, Doctor.

Sadly, it's probably more due to our culture's continuing infatuation with youth.
posted by Thorzdad at 9:24 AM on August 2, 2012

Supposedly they were deliberately aiming older for Eleven but then Matt Smith got somebody to let him audition and blew everybody away.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 9:25 AM on August 2, 2012

The ultimate Farscape/Who crossover - where does the drumming that makes the Master insane come from? No, not the Time Lords.

Harvey.

HARVEY FOR COMPANION 2012!
posted by a hat out of hell at 9:32 AM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

jason_steakums: "The ultimate Farscape/Who crossover - where does the drumming that makes the Master insane come from? No, not the Time Lords.

Harvey."

Amy: "Bollocks! What the hell was that?"
The Doctor: "That is a DRD. Diagnostic Repair Drone. They fix the TARDIS so I don't have to. Now, who's up for a little jaunt to the outer moon of..."
Amy: "It looks like a giant bug. Rory, be a dear and stomp on it until it stops moving."
Rory: "Ah.... no. Why does it have a 1812 little sign on it?"
The Doctor: "Ah that. Well, it's very complicated you see. It requires that sign in order to gain access to... the inner workings of... the um..."
Rory: "You don't know."
The Doctor: "Haven't a clue. Anyway, it's a DRD, Pond. DRD's are cool."
posted by zarq at 9:33 AM on August 2, 2012 [5 favorites]

Moya and the TARDIS would get along just great, wouldn't they?
posted by jason_steakums at 9:36 AM on August 2, 2012 [5 favorites]

The Doctor: "Haven't a clue. Anyway, it's a DRD, Pond. DRD's are cool."

The Doctor rescued it from the ancient skeleton of a leviathan, floating at the edge of a galaxy somewhere between a shattered moon and a red giant bleeding out into the void. Ran his hand along the curve of a rib.

"You've been in the wars, old girl."
posted by fight or flight at 9:37 AM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

then Matt Smith got somebody to let him audition and blew everybody away.

You've reminded me of the fan reaction to Matt Smith I saw when they first announced he was the new Doctor; the first thing they released was just a picture, which didn't have the current costume and was obviously a very quick "let's just get a picture out to go with the announcement" kind of thing. The picture wasn't very flattering to Mr. Smith, or at the very least, didn't give any sense of who he is as a person, and a lot of fans flipped out and complained that the BBC was trying to make the Doctor too young or trying to appeal to the TWILIGHT fans and had it ALL WRONG and blah blah blah.

Then a couple weeks later, the BBC released a video of an interview with Matt Smith, in his full geeky twitchy flighty babbly glory. And the universal fan reaction to the video was, "Ohhhhhhhh. Okay, now we get it."
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 9:38 AM on August 2, 2012 [7 favorites]

I'd absolutely be up for more Gaiman episodes, or a broader range of writers in general.
posted by Artw at 9:38 AM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

Rock Steady no you can not get a female Doctor, you can get female Time Lords, there are bunches of them. However male and female Time Lords retain their gender and sexual identity during regeneration.

That said, I don't believe the Doctor from the new series is the same person as the original series. Theta Sigma may still be out there doing his thing, but I think this is a copy cat Time Lord who has a bit of a hero worship thing going on and is pretending to be the Doctor. I propose he is actually Neeloc, a student at the Academy during the Imperiatrix affair with Romana.
posted by MrBobaFett at 9:39 AM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish:
"Supposedly they were deliberately aiming older for Eleven but then Matt Smith got somebody to let him audition and blew everybody away."

And oddly enough Matt Smith feels older than a lot of the previous Doctors. He's able to make the Doctor look so TIRED. As loopy and manic as he can be, its the feeling that any moment he could just suddenly stop and say, "Sod it, I'm tired of this." With Smith, the darkness feels like the natural state and everything else is just him trying to distract himself.
posted by charred husk at 9:39 AM on August 2, 2012 [16 favorites]

See, if anyone I've always felt Rory is the only damn adult on the show right now. The Doctor is Peter Pan to Amy's Wendy, taking her away to go do impossible things. Rory comes along mainly to keep Amy safe. I don't think he has the attitude that humans aren't capable of keeping up with the Doctor, but he feels that prolonged exposure is not healthy. "You're turning me into you."
posted by charred husk at 9:19 AM on August 2 [2 favorites +] [!]

Sure, he acts like I felt adults should act when I was 16. But the whole part of his arc of standing up to the Doctor for being reckless, knowing that Amy did kinda fancy this tall strange yet strong jawed weirdo, yet being confident enough to realise that he had strengths himself that he hadn't realised, is part of his story of growing up.
posted by Hello, I'm David McGahan at 9:41 AM on August 2, 2012

Rock Steady no you can not get a female Doctor, you can get female Time Lords, there are bunches of them. However male and female Time Lords retain their gender and sexual identity during regeneration.

Wasn't there a regeneration where he was glad he was still male, or something? Anyway, I'm sure they could retcon it in if they really wanted to, for the right Doctor.
posted by Rock Steady at 9:50 AM on August 2, 2012

charred husk: "And oddly enough Matt Smith feels older than a lot of the previous Doctors. He's able to make the Doctor look so TIRED. "

That's exactly how I've felt about him. Tennant was wonderfully expressive -- angry and sad. But for all his bubbling excitement and quirkiness, Smith can project this ancient-feeling weariness that the role sometimes requires. And then there are scenes like this one, which send chills down my spine. "Hello. I'm The Doctor. Basically... Run."
posted by zarq at 9:52 AM on August 2, 2012 [5 favorites]

They could retcon that, but it would be stupid. Why does the Doctor need to have his gender changed? Why can't somebody who isn't the Doctor be an interesting and awesome Time Lord who also happens to be female?
Ah but they have already done that. Her name is Romanadvoratrelundar. She is just as capable as the Doctor only she is not as much of an explorer. As President of Gallifrey she makes some major progressive changes.
I don't see why there couldn't be a female Time Lord who also likes exploring but is less evil than the Rani.
posted by MrBobaFett at 9:55 AM on August 2, 2012

The greatest thing about Blink wasn't the Weeping Angels (who were great in that episode), it was that awesome time-spanning conversation reassembled from DVD Easter Eggs.

For me the main reason that Blink works so brilliantly and all other appearances of the Weeping Angels have fallen flat is that the Doctor isn't battling the Angels in Blink, Carey Mulligan is. See, whenever the Doctor or his companions are in danger, we know they aren't going to die because they have to return for next week's episode. That's why the RTD season finales were so boring to me...oh no, another arch villian with a plot-device that will destroy the entire universe!!! Maybe this time it will really happen! But no, there's a lot of dramatic build-up and sometimes even a countdown to doomsday but the Doctor always pulls something out of his arse at the last minute (and even if people do get killed the Doctor rewinds time or reboots the universe so its like it never happened). My point is: there's no real sense of danger when the Doctor is involved because we know he's not going to be killed off.

Which is why Blink is so brilliant: we spend the whole episode with Carey Mulligan's character and the guy from the video store. They're guest stars, only visiting the show for that episode, so they aren't invulnerable like the Doctor...they CAN be killed. At any point in the episode the Angels could send either one of them back in time. And this makes the Angels that much scarier because the threat is more real.

Then you've got the lame Time of Angels/Flesh and Stone where the angels have all these new Ringu powers to make them seem more dangerous, but right away you know that all the military guys are Redshirts and the Doctor and his pals will live to fight another day.
posted by mediated self at 9:56 AM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

Could hang a dang billboard off that forehead of his, though.

I feel like I've been built up and let down too many time by Dalek escalations in this new universe (Since the Ninth). I keep wanting to believe that this time the Daleks will be thwarted, but alas, that wallpaper.. shudders...

/would watch a 2 hour Tennant and Rose soap opera. I thought that thread was enormously rewarding.

(EDIT: Woopsie, top line talking about the esteemed Mr. Smith)
posted by cavalier at 10:02 AM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

Man, your minds are going to be blown when Matt Smith regenerates and it's revealed that the 12th Doctor is none other than Donna Noble, which is why she had to have her memory erased (obviously). This is great, because we can bring back David Tennant as a companion this time, which makes perfect sense when you think about it. Unfortunately, Wilf regenerates into River Song and starts that whole thing over again.

And then Tom Baker shows up and pelts everyone to death with Jelly Babies pausing only to kill Matt Smith (who is still hanging around for some reason) with his bare hands before perkily declaring, 'Come along, Sarah!"

You heard it here first.
posted by stet at 10:07 AM on August 2, 2012 [6 favorites]

Another great thing about Blink is that I'm fairly certain Larry and Sally Sparrow were prototypes for Rory and Amy Pond.
posted by ceribus peribus at 10:11 AM on August 2, 2012 [7 favorites]

Could hang a dang billboard off that forehead of his, though.

*snerk* There was a behind-the-scenes thing I saw from season 5 when they were filming "The Big Bang," that dealt with Matt and the fez. (He really, really, really dug the fez.) He and a costumer were playing around with it, trying to decide whether he should leave his bangs hanging out or whether he should tuck them inside the fez; she was taking pictures of him both ways on her camera phone and would show him so he could decide. When she showed him the picture of the bangs-tucked-in look, with that enormous forehead, his immediate reaction was "whoooa. No, bangs definitely out."

And then Tom Baker shows up and pelts everyone to death with Jelly Babies pausing only to kill Matt Smith (who is still hanging around for some reason) with his bare hands before perkily declaring, 'Come along, Sarah!"

We miss you, Lis Sladen.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 10:11 AM on August 2, 2012 [4 favorites]

The Doctor: See that snake. The mark of The Corsair. Fantastic bloke. He had that snake as a tattoo in every regeneration. Didn't feel like himself unless he had that tattoo. Or herself a couple of times. Oo hoo! She was a bad girl!

And Stephen Moffat isn't averse to the idea of a female doctor, if his script for the parodic "The Curse of the Fatal Death" is anything to go by.
posted by Doktor Zed at 10:12 AM on August 2, 2012 [3 favorites]

They could retcon that, but it would be stupid. Why does the Doctor need to have his gender changed? Why can't somebody who isn't the Doctor be an interesting and awesome Time Lord who also happens to be female?

Well, I'm not going to argue about it, but a female Doctor would be much different from just having another female Time Lord on the show. As has already been said, that's essentially what River Song is. The point is that the Doctor is the driving force of the show, and I think it might be interesting to see what kind of difference it might make if he was a she. I suppose if you are not open to switching the Doctor's gender you could get the same effect by largely removing the Doctor himself from the show for a period of time and letting another TL take the reins for some reason.
posted by Rock Steady at 10:13 AM on August 2, 2012

The Doctor: See that snake. The mark of The Corsair. Fantastic bloke. He had that snake as a tattoo in every regeneration. Didn't feel like himself unless he had that tattoo. Or herself a couple of times. Oo hoo! She was a bad girl!

I've always pictured The Corsair as basically Lord Flashheart from Blackadder.
posted by jason_steakums at 10:19 AM on August 2, 2012 [4 favorites]

Oh, fuck me. River Song is coming back?

River Song was fantastic in the Silence in the Library episodes, a really great and intriguing character. The end of that episode left us wondering "When did she get to know the Doctor so well that she would die for him? And how the hell does she know his name?" Unfortunately the subsequent character development has been like the Star Wars prequels. Darth Vader is really cool, and you may wonder how he ended up in that suit, but believe me you don't want to know.

I do still like the character, though. Her first appearance earned a lot of goodwill with me.
posted by mediated self at 10:21 AM on August 2, 2012 [4 favorites]

featuring many, many older model Daleks, including the Special Weapons Dalek

Oh whee. That will totally make up for the series recursively climbing up its own ass for the past few years.

Oh, not wait. It won't. I hate the Daleks.
posted by Squeak Attack at 10:26 AM on August 2, 2012

What they bungled with River Song was the fact that she wasn't allowed to have any real, intentionally written character flaws - or even motivations outside of her love for the Doctor. Flaws and interesting motivations are absolutely necessary when it comes to interesting characters. Otherwise, you wind up with Poochie.

Most importantly, she only killed the Doctor because she had been forced to by others. No real conundrum or interesting gray area to explore - just pieces moving on a board. Not only was it premature to tell that story in the first place, but it resolved itself by taking away her character's agency.
posted by Sticherbeast at 10:31 AM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

Mezentian: "including the Special Weapons Dalek (not seen since 1988)."

Ah yes, following the Dalek Armistice near the end of 1988 when all of the Special Weapons Daleks were melted down to make Agri-Daleks: "DO THEY E-VEN KNOW... THAT IT IS CHRIST-MAS? DO THEY? DO THEY? DO THEY KNOW?"
posted by boo_radley at 10:40 AM on August 2, 2012 [8 favorites]

Word. Someone who loves the Doctor more than anything in the world and intentionally makes the decision to kill him is way, way more interesting than someone who loves the Doctor more than anything in the world and is brainwashed into killing him.
posted by jason_steakums at 10:41 AM on August 2, 2012 [3 favorites]

Agri-Daleks

CROP RO-TATE! CROP RO-TAAAAAAATE!
posted by Mr. Bad Example at 11:00 AM on August 2, 2012 [20 favorites]

XQUZYPHYR:
"Which is why they need an episode where he meets the Tom Baker version of himself but because Tom Baker's too old they get Craig Ferguson to do it."

Your wish is granted.
posted by charred husk at 11:02 AM on August 2, 2012

I mean, granted!
posted by charred husk at 11:02 AM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

Internet marry me mr bad example?
posted by boo_radley at 11:06 AM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

I love Neil Gaiman, however he doesn't get to establish how Time Lord physiology works. It is possible that the Corsair was genderqueer, and remained genderqueer thru each regeneration.

Of course this was also in the new series where they have written silly crap like Gallifrey and the Time Lords were wiped out in a war with the Daleks (but the Daleks survived), they also suggest that Rassilon is a villian dictator of some sort. I think they are getting him confused with Omega.

Also I disagree that you need to change the Doctor or have the Doctor step aside to feature a female Time Lord. What you need is a different show. May I strongly recommend Gallifrey from Big Finish, or if you are up for a strong female that is not a Time Lord check out Sarah Jane Smith from Big Finish. Really the best Doctor Who currently being produced is coming out of Big Finish and not BBC.
posted by MrBobaFett at 11:41 AM on August 2, 2012

There's always Iris Wildthyme...
posted by running order squabble fest at 11:49 AM on August 2, 2012

Given how the Companions have been almost entirely women, having only a male Companion would almost be heresy.

The next Doctor should be female - I'm personally stumping for Jessica Stevenson - and her companion should be this absurdly handsome, perfectly polished man, a tall and mannered and excruciatingly fashionable continental gentleman.

The boyzone-nerdrage lulz would be beyond epic.
posted by Slap*Happy at 11:55 AM on August 2, 2012 [9 favorites]

The next Doctor should be female - I'm personally stumping for Jessica Stevenson - and her companion should be this absurdly handsome, perfectly polished man, a tall and mannered and excruciatingly fashionable continental gentleman.

Episode title: Time and Spaced.
posted by jaduncan at 12:26 PM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

I love Neil Gaiman, however he doesn't get to establish how Time Lord physiology works.

Why not? Surely Moffatt wouldn't have let Gaiman put that in the script if he didn't want it to be a possibility.
posted by ocherdraco at 12:27 PM on August 2, 2012

Also, the "unsure whether he turned into a woman" regeneration was the most recent one - written by Moffat - where Smith feels his longish hair, and says, "I'm a girl!" before he gets around to noticing his Adam's apple.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 12:35 PM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

Yeah for some reason you are thinking I accept Moffat as some sort of authority in regard to Doctor Who. Not so much. I'm highly suspicious of any producer post-JNT.
posted by MrBobaFett at 12:48 PM on August 2, 2012

Craig Ferguson would be PERFECT as the Doctor--but he just re-upped for the LLS. So, next part-time companion? Let's make this happen, internet!
posted by orrnyereg at 1:04 PM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

MrBobaFett:
"I'm highly suspicious of any producer post-JNT."

I'm suspicious of JNT.
posted by charred husk at 1:19 PM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

All this hate for River Song....wait a minute.
Is this NOT the universe where Series 6 reveals that River Song is the Rani and sets her up to be the villain for Series 7?
Whoops. Must have stumbled into the darkest timeline. Gottago!
posted by bartleby at 1:29 PM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

Start with Eccleston (Ninth Doctor).

I did this (and am very sad that I'm almost finished after a little under a year) and was really glad I didn't just hop right into the 6th season. If you have Netflix and don't need to be really really up-to-date, it's worth it.

Just don't remember this thread too well.
posted by ejaned8 at 1:46 PM on August 2, 2012

I miss Donna and wish she were a Time Lord. Doctor Donna.
posted by zarah at 1:51 PM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

If we can't have a female Doctor, can we have a Doctor-of-color? Because I'm stumping for Clarke Peters.
posted by palmcorder_yajna at 1:58 PM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

This thread is the best thread.
posted by a hat out of hell at 1:59 PM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

If you want to reject JNT then you're missing out on about a 1/3 off the original series. Including all of Peter Davidson, which would be a huge shame.
posted by MrBobaFett at 1:59 PM on August 2, 2012

MrBobaFett:
"If you want to reject JNT then you're missing out on about a 1/3 off the original series. Including all of Peter Davidson, which would be a huge shame."

Heck, I don't trust Sydney Newman.
posted by charred husk at 2:04 PM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

Don't trust anyone over 400.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 2:06 PM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

Really the best Doctor Who currently being produced is coming out of Big Finish and not BBC

Paul McGann and Lucie Miller are definitely in the running for best ever Doctor/Companion team
posted by brilliantmistake at 2:21 PM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

If we can't have a female Doctor, can we have a Doctor-of-color? Because I'm stumping for Clarke Peters.

If we go down that route, my vote is for Paterson Joseph, who's playing Brutus in Gregory Doran's African-themed Julius Caesar right now.

Not coincidentally, my second choice is Ricky Fearon, who plays Marc Antony in that same clip, and who Mrs. Example and I agree has a kind of Harry-Belafonte-crossed-with-Michael-Dorn thing going on.
posted by Mr. Bad Example at 2:24 PM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

I'm more than a bit leery of saying "I reject these people's additions to the series", because once that starts what it really ends up saying is "The only true Doctor Who is the one inside my mind", and that has no predictive capacity. And near as I can figure out, predictive capacity is really what's being talked about when we're talking about canon.

"Given what we know of the world, is there a way which thing X could happen?" Moffat kinda is, by definition, the final authority on Doctor Who. At least, until someone new comes around.

I really don't know why it matters (in a negative sense) how the Doctor represents themself. We've seen every which sort of personality shift, so why not gender shift? Unless the concept of 'Man travels the universe with attractive female companions who usually long for him' is really that intrinsic to the character, that is...

In other words, "What makes the Doctor 'The Doctor'?"
posted by CrystalDave at 2:26 PM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

Canonicity within Doctor Who is fluid at best. Luckily, the universe of the show itself allows for wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey, so this anti-canonicity is itself part of the accepted canon.
posted by Sticherbeast at 2:29 PM on August 2, 2012 [3 favorites]

Every time I hear the The 8th Doctor/Lucie Miller stories, I am like, "WHY GOD WHY BECAUSE I WOULD DEARLY LIKE TO SEE THIS LIVE."
posted by Kitteh at 2:33 PM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

My biggest problem with McGann's adventures being in audio play form is that you can't hear a magnificent shirt.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 2:36 PM on August 2, 2012 [5 favorites]

I like River, really like Amy and Rory, and like Matt Smith. I liked Rose until they decided to just have her and The Doctor mooning over each other all the damn time -- THAT was tiresome. And I didn't think Rose was THAT awesome that she'd be The Doctor's true love and all. Bleah. (I HATED that she came back. HAAATED that.) I adored Donna -- I like when the companion is just friends with The Doctor, I feel like it makes for a much more interesting relationship.
posted by sarcasticah at 2:41 PM on August 2, 2012 [7 favorites]

Every Clue and Spoiler From the New Doctor Who Trailer
posted by zombieflanders at 2:51 PM on August 2, 2012

If we can't have a female Doctor, can we have a Doctor-of-color? Because I'm stumping for Clarke Peters.

Absolutely! Skin pigmentation is such a minor change, why not? I still vote for Mos Def.

As for why does it matter if the Doctor is male, it's important for the same reason anyone's gender indentity is important to them.
posted by MrBobaFett at 3:29 PM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

Also the best Doctor/companion matchup from Big Finish I've found so far is Second Doctor/Jamie both voiced by Fraiser Hines.
Paul McGann is crap and all things related to him are crap. That is why if Christopher Eccleston is Theta Sigma, he is the 8th Doctor, or there is a missing regeneration.
posted by MrBobaFett at 3:34 PM on August 2, 2012

I can't really say anything bad about the current series, no matter how silly or camp the episodes get. That's because I remember when Doctor Who was all about the Doctor wandering around a gravel pit wearing a dog cone.
posted by happyroach at 3:35 PM on August 2, 2012 [6 favorites]

Male or female, regardless of skin color, I vote that the Twelfth Doctor has to be a ginger.
posted by Dr. Zira at 3:38 PM on August 2, 2012

Moya and the TARDIS would get along just great, wouldn't they?

I'm gonna 'ship that now.
OTP!

I feel so dirty
posted by Mezentian at 3:44 PM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

I still vote for Mos Def.

O.O

That.....actually would be really kind of awesome. (Even though he's already been Ford Prefect.)
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 3:49 PM on August 2, 2012 [3 favorites]

All you moaners... some us lived through that long long time when there was no Who at all, or even worse, the Colin Baker years.
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 3:54 PM on August 2, 2012 [3 favorites]

I see you the Colin Baker years (which weren't that bad) and raise you:
".... and some of us lived through "Time And The Rani" (which was).
posted by Mezentian at 3:59 PM on August 2, 2012

Paul McGann is crap and all things related to him are crap.

Paul McGann's Doctor is flaw-free. Your opinion is invalid.
posted by orrnyereg at 4:22 PM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

So many things I want to have opinions about! in this thread, but so many that I will avoid.

First, a female doctor:
Google Barbara Benedetti and if you're feeling in a swashbuckling type mood you can even find a copy of her episodes. Just a non canon fan made one, but notheless, it is a female doctor.
Anyway, in canon; Regenerations happen differently for different Timelords. Romana was able to "try on" various regenerations, whereas the Doctor's were almost always either forced or traumatic. Therefore it is safe to say that some Time Lords can change sex, but not necessarily all. If it is in the show it is canon, even if that canon then gets changed by Timey-Wimeyness.

Secondly, No to Mos Def.
Ford Prefect came from Guildford. The Doctor comes from Gallifrey. Both these things absolutely require an English (or at a push British I suppose) accent. (I don't know why Gallifreyans have English accents, they just do ok!
I don't care what skin colour he has, but he must be have a British accent. He was brought back to life by a nice cup of tea during the Christmas invasion for goodness sake. You can't get more British. The same goes for the Master, this is one of my two main problems with the Doctor Who Movie. (The second, half human! bah)

Oh and also, Doctor Who is not a Kids show. It is a Family Show, a category that we sadly do not really get much of any more. The important point is that is should be enjoyed, at teatime, by the whole family. Kids and Adults alike. Sarah Jane Adventures (while excellent) was a kids show.

My wife (A far bigger who nerd than me, by FAR) suggests that companions are analogous to pets for the Doctor. Time Lords being so far superior to humans in intellect. I've always loved the idea of a multi-doctor story where all the incarnations are disgusted by the bestiality antics of the 10th. That is one thing that Moffat got spot on. 11's utterly bafflement when it comes to human sexuality.
posted by Just this guy, y'know at 4:27 PM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

I don't know why Gallifreyans have English accents, they just do ok!

You've got it backwards- Brits have GALLIFREYAN accents!
posted by happyroach at 4:47 PM on August 2, 2012 [3 favorites]

I see you the Colin Baker years (which weren't that bad) and raise you:
".... and some of us lived through "Time And The Rani" (which was).

I went back and rewatched some Colin Baker episodes, and while I liked the concept of the Sixth Doctor, the reality fell far short. I mean, this was the time in the show when Brian Blessed's bellowing as King Yrcanos fit in perfectly with the ethos of the series as everything about Six was louder than loud. The "Trial Of A Time Lord" started out phenomenally well, but ended in a cloud of farts onscreen. And then you get to Seven and Mel, which was the show's equivalent of taking out an awl and gouging the bottom of the barrel. Seven's time with Ace was so much better, and a lot of the writing really carried the show through its decreasingly dire appearance.

(With the 50th anniversary approaching, I'd love for Sylvester McCoy to come back in his darker, more mischievous guise. His tenure with Ace has aged quite well in comparison with the New Who, just as much as the Colin Baker years & early McCoy hasn't. Hell, I'd like to get Paul McCann back just so the Time War can be officially shown.)
posted by stannate at 5:19 PM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

Gallifreyan's do not have English accents, they also don't speak English. . Just like Cyber-Men likely don't speak English, nor many other Aliens. They sound like they speak English because of the TARDIS translator circuit and they sound British because that is how the companions hear the translation in their head

Also yes, companions are very lovable pets to the Doctor. This is why the Doctor is not romantically interested in any of his companions.

If you somehow have the mistaken belief that Paul McGann is flaw free, then you obviously never saw that god awful piece of crap movie from FOX. The premise for which all acceptance of Paul McGann as the Doctor is based. I categorically reject all things Paul McGann and even referred to him as the fake Doctor when I ran into him at a con.
posted by MrBobaFett at 5:23 PM on August 2, 2012

Yes, the Colin Baker years were rough, but most of the writing was still better than most Nu-Who. Luckily he was replaced with Sylvester McCoy who was splendid.
posted by MrBobaFett at 5:25 PM on August 2, 2012

MrBobaFett, I cannot disagree with you more (except about the Big Finish adventures, but if you can't agree that Mel has been redeemed, well, we have no common ground).

You hate McGann fine. But he is the Eighth Doctor and you can't make it not so. I've enjoyed the Big Finish audios I have heard that he has done ('tho I prefer to stick to the original Doctors thus far).

Sylvester McCoy who was splendid? I'm sorry. He did not start out that way. Not at all.

But there are a lot of disgruntled older fans around. I know heaps who have progressively dropped off because they don't like the new direction (and it is flawed, no argument there, but so what? It brings in new generations of fans).

Just repeat to yourself "It's just a show, I should really just relax".
posted by Mezentian at 5:31 PM on August 2, 2012 [3 favorites]

I categorically reject all things Paul McGann and even referred to him as the fake Doctor when I ran into him at a con.

Wow. That's just...wow.
posted by zombieflanders at 5:33 PM on August 2, 2012 [7 favorites]

I categorically reject all things Paul McGann and even referred to him as the fake Doctor when I ran into him at a con.

From my parents' home in Wyoming, I stab at thee!
posted by jaduncan at 5:36 PM on August 2, 2012 [4 favorites]

Don Francks is the only true Boba Fett, and I called Jeremy Bulloch the Fake Boba Fett when I ran into him at a con.
And Daniel Logan should fear my scorn if I ever met him!
posted by Mezentian at 5:42 PM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

"Doctor Who has become an American citizen and that hurts my heart."

Not yet, he ain't. Really, though... he's always been a citizen of the galaxy, and has bristled at serving any one country or working for the government. And what about the last Doctor? Allons-y?!

I think they should go with an older actor the next time around... and there are some good options out there... in America.
posted by markkraft at 5:44 PM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

Ford Prefect came from Guildford.

No he didn't. He came from Betelgeuse.
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 5:46 PM on August 2, 2012 [4 favorites]

Yes Sylvester McCoy was splendid. Loved his doctor, contrasted with Colin Baker he was amazing.

How anyone can excuse that piece of crap TV movie is beyond me. If you like that and it drew you into "Doctor Who fandom" I don't really care for your company in said fandom. Really, why does anyone want to expand the fanbase of anything by changing the thing from what it is? That's like me wishing Dizzy Gillespie had more fans so he should do dub step. If they don't appreciate his music I don't care for them to become fans.

Also the real Boba Fett is Jaster Mereel, from Concord Dawn. Jango Fett is sure as hell not real.
posted by MrBobaFett at 5:57 PM on August 2, 2012

Oh, and if I were to cast The Doctor as a woman, I think I would pick Jane Horrocks, who is probably known best as Bubble from AbFab, if only because I would love to see her talk about transdimensional stabilizer thingies...
posted by markkraft at 6:01 PM on August 2, 2012

I wasn't aware that the BBC, Fox, 9m+ viewers in the UK and the US, and Paul McGann himself were all engaged in a conspiracy to attack you. Now that I've been enlightened to that, I see how he totally deserved to take all the blame and be insulted to his face for the horrors he personally inflicted on you.
posted by zombieflanders at 6:06 PM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

WTF are you talking about?
posted by MrBobaFett at 6:07 PM on August 2, 2012

I don't think the TV Movie created many fans.
It was silly and sub-par then, and it remains sub-par now. But McGann's performance was no worse than any post-regeneration Doctor, and the TARDIS console room was sublime.

Also the real Boba Fett is Jaster Mereel, from Concord Dawn. Jango Fett is sure as hell not real.

If I read Wiki right, Jaster Mereel was Jango Fett's mentor, not his son. But you're on might thin, thin ice of questionable judgement if you're going to start pulling up Expanded Universe Star Wars fiction to support your argument.

Because the overwhelming weight of legit and expanded Dr Who work confirms the McGann Doctor.

But all this arguing is pointless. So, whatever. That's your opinion, man.
posted by Mezentian at 6:08 PM on August 2, 2012

Let's not turn a really great thread into an argument, shall we?
posted by Rock Steady at 6:09 PM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

WTF are you talking about?

I can't think of any other situation where those actions were warranted, so I came to the obvious conclusion.
posted by zombieflanders at 6:11 PM on August 2, 2012

Gallifreyan's do not have English accents, they also don't speak English. . Just like Cyber-Men likely don't speak English, nor many other Aliens. They sound like they speak English because of the TARDIS translator circuit

I agree with you about the Cybermen, but the Doctor is clearly fluent in a billion languages (including Judoon, koporolomoloporo....), so why wouldn't he just speak to Earthlings in their native tongue? He speaks English even when his TARDIS is nowhere near, besides (e.g. Blink).

McGann might be my favorite Doctor, but I've never seen the TV movie. His Doctor on the Big Finish recordings is outstanding.
posted by painquale at 6:12 PM on August 2, 2012

If we're nominating next doctors, can I suggest Richard Ayoade, best known for Maurice Moss from The IT Crowd?
posted by peppermind at 6:19 PM on August 2, 2012 [4 favorites]

I am disappointed to learn that the big game hunter from the preview is not Redvers Fenn-Cooper. That would have been awesome. And made sense.
If sense can be said to be made of Ghost Light.
posted by Mezentian at 6:24 PM on August 2, 2012

The TARDIS interior in the movie was meh, all they had to do was dig the old set out of storage or refer to plenty of existing source material and rebuild it. Also I don't give a crap about McGanns performance, what I care about is the movie was a steaming pile that didn't even resemble Doctor Who. McGann was just the poor sap who got suckered into playing the role.

Either way the movie should obviously be rejected, just like Highlander II is rejected. The only way Highlander III works is because it does explicitly ignore and reject Highlander II. Same principal applies here. Any Doctor Who that uses Paul McGann in the role of the Doctor accepts his installment from the movie. Thus must also be rejected. It's pretty simple.

Also I assume the Wiki you are referencing is applying garbage from the new works in place of the original works. Jaster Mereel in either work is only part of the expanded universe, since he appears in no movie.

Of course it's my opinion, that is what I am doing. Stating my opinion, I understand that's how these things work.
posted by MrBobaFett at 6:29 PM on August 2, 2012

zombieflanders What actions? Discussing fiction and it's associate fandom?
posted by MrBobaFett at 6:31 PM on August 2, 2012

Certainly the Doctor might be able to speak English, but it's mostly irrelevant when he has a universal translator. Just because he can speak English however (also French, German and Russian) does not mean that is his native tongue or that any other Gallifreyans speak it.
posted by MrBobaFett at 6:44 PM on August 2, 2012

Richard Ayoade sounds like a very strong candidate to me. I could certainly be persuaded to vote for him.
posted by MrBobaFett at 6:49 PM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

"They sound like they speak English because of the TARDIS translator circuit"

Really? Then how do you explain this?!
posted by markkraft at 7:08 PM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

EX-TER-MIN-ER!!!! EX-TER-MIN-ER!!!!
posted by markkraft at 7:12 PM on August 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

If we're nominating next doctors, can I suggest Richard Ayoade, best known for Maurice Moss from The IT Crowd?

Boris Johnson.
posted by jaduncan at 7:23 PM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

The TARDIS translator circuit has always bothered me, it's one of the least defensible aspects of the show's tech. What is its range? Why does it still function even when companions are alone and many miles away, as are Ian and Barbara in The Romans? Why does it seem to continue to work for those companions who are left behind? And what about Scarecrow's brain?

~ please forgive me for the following indiscretion ~

I guess it's kind of my job as Resident Brony to be the one to link to this. It's been confirmed that a number of hourglass-marked ponies (including one in particular who has appeared several times) are intentional references to Doctor Who.
posted by JHarris at 8:52 PM on August 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

I guess it's kind of my job as Resident Brony to be the one to link to this yt . It's been confirmed that a number of hourglass-marked ponies (including one in particular who has appeared several times) are intentional references to Doctor Who.

I categorically reject all things My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic and even referred to Rainbow Dash as the fake My Little Pony when I ran into her at a con.
posted by panboi at 2:14 AM on August 3, 2012 [13 favorites]

*golf clap*

My Pretty Pony 4 life!
posted by Mezentian at 2:42 AM on August 3, 2012 [1 favorite]

The Weeping Angels were brilliant when they only moved when you weren't looking at them. Making them infect people's eyes and crawl out of TVs.

The trouble is that if the Weeping Angels hadn't had an upgrade they would have been a one shot monster. Just too easy to stop - you set up a ring of CCTV cameras and satelite photography and keep them stone all the time. Also the weeping angel coming out of the TV on loop? Terrifying. *shudders*

And seriously, which other nuWho monster has a chance of making it into the big leagues? The Judoon? Possibly the Silents but they hadn't made it by then.

Now if you want to say the Weeping Angels actually starting to move onscreen was silly, I agree. And the eyes thing was trying to be too clever. It was an attempt at inversion so Amy would have to walk through the field of weeping angels with her eyes closed. Better would have been to blind Amy - and have her have to walk through the field of Weeping Angels guided either by the Doctor or River Song from afar using a single pair of binoculars. And either play up the Doctor's flakiness or River's mysteriousness. Make it character based and trust based as well as just another way to terrify Amy.

Still, this pinpoints to me the biggest weakness of Moffatt's S5/6 writing. He's playing in his own universe and not really getting his ideas sense-checked or limited by time.

Also, to me, the biggest weakness of S5/6 is Karen Gillian. Moffatt was looking for certain attributes when he cast her (pout, hair flip, scream is one description I've read). And he got them - but those appear to be the limits of her range. A very good actor can turn a third rate script into something compelling. And Tennant was a very good actor. (Smith's merely a good one). A mediocre actor needs the script to support them - and Gillian's mediocre.
posted by Francis at 4:36 AM on August 3, 2012 [1 favorite]

And seriously, which other nuWho monster has a chance of making it into the big leagues? The Judoon? Possibly the Silents but they hadn't made it by then.

The Ood!
posted by painquale at 4:53 AM on August 3, 2012 [2 favorites]

Someone should put together a list of highlights, of the surviving original series episodes

Well here's my go from 4 to 7

4th Doctor

Tom Baker's run is practically an entire show on it's own and well worth a complete viewing, he tends to make even the worst Who pretty watchable through sheer force of charisma.

12.1 Robot - 1st Tom Baker, bit of a silly runaround but good fun
12.2 The Ark in Space - Alien done several years earlier for tuppence.
12.4 Genesis of the Daleks - The Dalek story which all others must be measured by
13.1 Terror of the Zygons - Scotland, shape changing monsters and Loch Ness
13.3 Pyramids of Mars - Gothic horror plus Egyptian Mummies from Mars
14.3 The Deadly Assassin - First proper look at Gallifrey and the Time Lords
14.5 The Robots of Death - Agatha Christie murder mystery on a Dune inspired sand miner
14.6 The Talons of Weng Chiang - brilliant Sherlock Holmesian horror in Victorian London, marred only by the casual 70's racism.
15.1 Horror of Fang Rock - Great claustrophobic trapped in a lighthouse horror story.
16 - The Key to Time - Full season of linked stories with the great TARDIS team of Tom, Romana I and K9. Also stands on it's own perfectly if you just want to drop in.
17.2 City of Death - Douglas Adams scripted, sparkling and fun romp set in Paris.
18.3,4 and 5 E Space Trilogy of stories, great linked set of stories as the TARDIS is thrown out of the universe, has a visibly older, melancholic Doctor and is something of a swansong for the Baker era
18.7 Logopolis - Tom meets his end stopping the newly regenerated Master in epic fashion.

5th Doctor

Wildly uneven in tone and quality, some great strong stories and some terrible, boring, by the numbers stuff.

19.1 Castrovalva - Newly regenerated Peter Davison in pretty trippy continuation of Logopolis
19.3 Kinda - An interesting and deeply odd critique of colonialism wrapped up in a lot of Buddhism (with a giant rubber snake)
19.4 Black Orchid - quite charming 20s masked ball period piece
20.2 Snakedance - Sequel to Kinda.
20.5 Enlightenment - Sailing Ships in Space. Great, bonkers and scary in bits. Moffat likes this period of Who a lot.
20.7 The Five Doctors - Makes no sense but very charming 20th anniversary story
21.6 The Caves of Androzani - Davison's regeneration, very dark and well written cynical political story. Currently voted Best Story Ever at Doctor Who Magazine

6th Doctor

Hmmm, the nadir of classic Who both commercially and critically

22.6 Revelation of the Daleks - return of Davros, isn't completely terrible

7th Doctor

Started poorly but picked up very well by the end, then it got cancelled. McCoy and Ace are a great team.

25.1 Remembrance of the Daleks - Great Dalek civil war action in 60's London, part of the 25th anniversary season.
25.4 The Greatest Show in the Galaxy - Scary, scary clowns and lovecraftian horribleness at the Psychic Circus
26.2 Ghost Light - Weird and wonderful Victorian haunted house story
26.3 The Curse of Fenric - WW2 viking vampires. Has a scene stolen wholesale by Moffat for one of his Season 6 stories.

8th Doctor

Forget the TV movie, McGann exists mainly in audio form of which there are many seasons available on Big Finish (and occasionaly on Radio 4). The four seasons of Mcgann and Lucie Miller (Sheridan Smith) work particularly well and are very much in a Nu Doctor Who style.
posted by brilliantmistake at 5:15 AM on August 3, 2012 [19 favorites]

Excellent brilliantmistake! It's worth noting how many times have I said that on Metafilter through the years? that Black Orchid is an honest-to-god historical, the first since the Second Doctor and the last in the classic series.

I miss those greatly I think they do a great job of grounding the Doctor in realistic settings and making him sweat through purely human situations. This is probably why they don't do them so much anymore, the Doctor has kind of gained a few levels since those earlier stories and he could probably resolve any historic Earth situation just by twisting the end of his sonic screwdriver.
posted by JHarris at 6:00 AM on August 3, 2012

Yes, Black Orchid is possibly the greatest story of the Peter Davidson era and it makes me sad when there are people who hate it because there isn't some hidden alien agenda.
posted by MrBobaFett at 7:12 AM on August 3, 2012 [1 favorite]

Yeah, there are quite a few historical stories which have great ideas but have the stuffing knocked out of them by there having to be a scifi threat forced in somewhere. Most of the settings are alien enough without the bugeyed monster bits.
posted by brilliantmistake at 7:56 AM on August 3, 2012

Moffatt was looking for certain attributes when he cast her (pout, hair flip, scream is one description I've read). And he got them - but those appear to be the limits of her range.

There are those that don't mind that...a good friend and his girlfriend are way behind me on nuWho because they wait for Netflix, and only just recently watched "The Eleventh Hour." I asked him recently what they thought. "I don't know," he said. "I'm still making up my mind about Matt Smith." Then after a pause, he added fervently, "But Amy Pond is hot."

I've got a feeling he gets teased enough about that by his girlfriend.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 8:14 AM on August 3, 2012

Amy Pond is Hot.
Redhead.
Scottish.
Female.
Take-charge kinda gal.

Is there a ticky box she is missing?

(Black Orchid is good, now, but on first broadcast I hated it).
posted by Mezentian at 10:05 AM on August 3, 2012

....Huh.

The discussion of other actors who would make good Doctors upthread now has me pondering a potential fanfic concerning the Doctor discovering that Tom Waits is secretly another Time Lord.

If Tom Waits were a Time Lord it acctually would explain a lot.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 10:09 AM on August 3, 2012 [3 favorites]

David Tibet would be a fine Time Lord, if he isn't already one.
posted by Sticherbeast at 10:11 AM on August 3, 2012 [1 favorite]

The Cumberbatch seems almost too obvious, no?
posted by Rock Steady at 10:18 AM on August 3, 2012 [1 favorite]

No, but only because "the Cumberbatch" is so obviously the name of an evil collective of ant-people.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 10:21 AM on August 3, 2012 [1 favorite]

Rock Steady:
"The Cumberbatch seems almost too obvious, no?"

For the Master, perhaps. I think Moffat may try to keep those two franchises separate, through.
posted by charred husk at 12:33 PM on August 3, 2012

Apparently I'm not the only person to think Tom Waits would make a good Time Lord.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 1:24 PM on August 3, 2012 [3 favorites]

That... is... beautiful....
posted by JHarris at 3:46 PM on August 3, 2012

If Waits were in Dr Who, I think he'd made a great K’anpo.
I can't imagine he was killed in the Time War, and could imagine that he'd be able to hide away.
posted by Mezentian at 11:32 PM on August 3, 2012

I think if the Doctor regenerates as a woman, she should be reunited with Jenny as a companion. Two female Time Lords working on a mother-daughter relationship in the TARDIS would make for a interesting core to a series arc.
posted by Rarebit Fiend at 12:52 AM on August 4, 2012

...and then they encounter an elderly Susan Foreman.
posted by Rarebit Fiend at 12:54 AM on August 4, 2012 [1 favorite]

Here are my favorite stories by Doctor from the classic series. I recommend avoiding most stories with the classic villains - the Daleks, the Cybermen, and the Master - as they are generally rubbish.

Hartnell:
An Unearthly Child - at least watch the first episode since it sets the stage for everything else.
The Aztecs - classic historical
The Dalek Invasion of Earth - great location filming with Daleks in a future London
The Romans - comic historical
The Time Meddler - Saxon historical, or is it?
The Gunfighters - comic historical musical

Troughton:
The Faceless Ones - missing episodes but has a modern feel
Tomb of the Cybermen - crappy Cyberman story saved by great performance by Troughton
The Mind Robber - inventive and surreal
The Invasion - compelling performances by guest cast make this a rare interesting Cyberman story
The War Games - epic story that keeps opening new layers like an onion with the ultimate reveal changing the show forever

Pertwee

Spearhead From Space - Action, adventure and in color
The Three Doctors - nonsensical but charming 10th anniversary story
Carnival of Monsters - really pushes what can be done with Doctor Who to new levels
The Green Death - social and environmental issues and the touching departure of a companion
The Time Warrior - a new companion, a new villain, and a new way of messing with the Earth's past

T. Baker

The Ark in Space - great acting with bubble wrap
Genesis of the Daleks - the best Dalek stories have hardly any Daleks in them
The Brain of Morbius - Frankenstein, Who-style
The Seeds of Doom - multi-continental epic with killer plants
Horror of Fang Rock - character study in a lighthouse with a killer alien
The Ribos Operation - crackling dialogue and good guest performances
City of Death - comic mystery in Paris
Warrior's Gate - worth it for the opening tracking shot and all-around surreal weirdness

Davison

Kinda - great performances of insanity and mind control
Snakedance - sequel to Kinda creat
Mawdryn Undead - timey wimey wibbly wobbly stuff
The Awakening - historical reenactors gone horribly wrong
The Caves of Androzani - great acting, great direction, great drama - more like a film than a tv show

C. Baker

Vengeance on Varos - the future of reality tv
The Two Doctors - the Second Doctor returns (I have a soft spot for Troughton)

McCoy

Remembrance of the Daleks - Daleks and Doctor Who history done right
The Happiness Patrol - high camp and anti-Thatcherism
The Greatest Show in the Galaxy - scary clowns
Battlefield - Arthurian myth and a multi-national UNIT
The Curse of Fenric - Russians, Alan Turing, and vampires
posted by Rarebit Fiend at 1:33 AM on August 4, 2012 [7 favorites]

Dalek Colour Scheme Creator
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 2:30 AM on August 4, 2012 [1 favorite]

Not bad additions Rarebit, but I so have to disagree about The Gunfighters. That "musical" element mostly consisted of that woman singing bits of The Last Chance Saloon OVER and OVER again, sometimes over the action, sometimes to slow tracking shots, the SAME SONG repeatedly, through EVERY episode of that serial. It crawled right UP MY NICE AUGH GET IT OUT GET IT OUT IT'S TOUCHING MY BRAIN.

And I love Tomb of the Cybermen, there's a lot of mystery in that one, at least before the C-Men show up, big empty sets lain dormant for centuries, mysterious machines, evil compumice, and not a little treachery among the humans and toying with forces beyond their ken.

Agreed about Troughton though. I'm saddened that I got to catch so little of his work. Not only is he generally great but after the grandfatherly Hartnell it fell to Troughton to forge a new personality, even way of being for the Doctor, and he established the basis of the character at least through Davidson.
posted by JHarris at 8:00 AM on August 4, 2012

Right up my NOSE. Sorry, it got to my spelling lobe.
posted by JHarris at 8:01 AM on August 4, 2012

Watch the First Doctor bid farewell to Susan — in color
posted by zombieflanders at 4:51 PM on August 4, 2012 [2 favorites]

Just for the sake of obsessive completeness an abridged 9-11,

9th Doctor

1.1 Rose The series returns, Eccleston a safe pair of hands, still surprising now how much it feels like a continuation of the old series.
1.5 Dalek Daleks made scary again (ruined by their overuse later mind).
1.7 Father's Day Scripted by Paul Cornell, timey wimey goodness
1.8/9 The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances First Moffat script, best Eccles by far.
1.12/13 Bad Wolf/The Parting of the Ways Epic Dalek ending for the first series, bombastic and already dated (in true Who fashion), worth it for Eccleston's regeneration scene.

10th Doctor

2.x The Christmas Invasion - First Xmas special, First David Tennant
2.4 The Girl in the Fireplace - Moffat scripted love story for the Doctor (when such things were interesting)
2.8/9 The Impossible Planet/The Satan Pit - An homage and return to classic Who's 'base under siege' stories
3.8/9 Human Nature/The Family of Blood - Cornell scripted from his novel, the Doc takes human form in preWW1 England with heartbreaking results.
3.10 Blink - Possibly the best individual Nu Who story, Moffat, Angels, Carey Mulligan
3.11 Utopia - worth watching for Derek Jacobi alone.
4.9/10 Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead - River Song before she was annoying
4.11 Midnight - Russell T Davies bottle episode (no, wait come back, it's really good!)
4.16 The Waters of Mars - Last great Tennant before the overblown regeneration saga

11th Doctor

5.1 The Eleventh Hour Probably the best 'New Doctor and Companion' story ever made
5.6/7 The Time of Angels/Flesh and Stone Return of the Angels
5.10 Vincent and the Doctor Richard Curtis scripted Doc meets Van Gogh
5.12/13 The Pandorica Opens/The Big Bang Neat, overflowing with ideas end to Season 5.
5.14 A Christmas Carol Surprisingly great Xmas Special with Michael Gambon
6.4 The Doctor's Wife Gaiman scripted love letter to Who
6.10 The Girl Who Waited Excellent Amy and Rory centric episode
6.11 The God Complex Hotel horror tale from Toby Whithouse
posted by brilliantmistake at 4:31 AM on August 5, 2012 [4 favorites]

3.8/9 Human Nature/The Family of Blood - Cornell scripted from his novel, the Doc takes human form in preWW1 England with heartbreaking results.

IIRC there's a couple of Who novels in the public domain, and this Cornell story is one of them, and I think it's worth downloading for comparison. The book is a Seventh Doctor adventure with a non-TV companion named Bernice Summerfield, and although it's a little confusing if you haven't ventured beyond the show itself, it holds up quite well. And the Tenth Doctor/Martha adaptation is fantastic, with an interesting take on race and class in the first half. Also, it stars Viserys from HBO's Game of Thrones series, which leads me to believe that Harry Lloyd is never poorly cast when it comes to evil characters with an overbearing sense of privilege.
posted by zombieflanders at 5:11 AM on August 5, 2012 [1 favorite]

4.11 Midnight - Russell T Davies bottle episode (no, wait come back, it's really good!)

I partially named my cat Donna while watching that, because the last scene by the pool was just
o_0
and I was all
(,)_(,)

and that that point there could be no question that Donna Noble was the greatest companion ... if not ever than of the new era.

Until she got pissed on.

FWIW the Human Nature novel is, as Zombieflanders says, in the PD at the BBC.co.uk website.

The books are, generally, not worth reading, and I have not read them all, mind.

I otherwise agree wjth y brilliantmistake's Cliff's Notes version of NU Who (except oddly, The Girl In The Fireplace). I preferred Tooth And Claw.
posted by Mezentian at 5:42 AM on August 5, 2012

(Poor Hitler...)

Are we running out of time to kill Hitler via time travel?
posted by homunculus at 1:15 PM on August 6, 2012

You need a really messed-up and incoherent theory of time travel to make that i09 article make any sense.
posted by painquale at 4:35 AM on August 7, 2012 [1 favorite]

Yeah, when I read the lead I figured it would just be based on the fact that most people alive today were born after World War II and thus would be grandfather-paradoxed out of existence if somebody were to successfully prevent the rise of Nazi Germany. Then it got strange.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 7:59 AM on August 7, 2012

thus would be grandfather-paradoxed out of existence if somebody were to successfully prevent the rise of Nazi Germany

Being "grandfather-paradoxed out of existence" is pretty much what I was objecting to though.
posted by painquale at 10:52 AM on August 7, 2012

brilliantmistake: "The Big Bang Neat, overflowing with ideas end to Season 5."

This scene in that episode (SPOILERS!) was particularly memorable.
posted by zarq at 11:22 AM on August 7, 2012

painquale, the argument I pictured was "the history of the world without WWII would be so different that almost nobody who is now alive would have been born had Hitler been stopped. Thus, only someone who was born before the rise of Nazi Germany can kill Hitler without running afoul of the grandfather paradox, and we are running out of candidates."
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 11:29 AM on August 7, 2012

The BBC have confirmed that a special ninety minute drama has been commissioned to mark the 50th Anniversary of Doctor Who. An Adventure in Space and Time will explore the creation of the series in 1963, looking at all aspects of the process and the variety of personalities involved in bringing the longest running science fiction show to life.

It has been written by Mark Gatiss.
posted by Mezentian at 5:35 PM on August 9, 2012 [3 favorites]

(Poor Hitler...)

Are we running out of time to kill Hitler via time travel?

Heh. I just caught up with the Misfits Hitler episode, which winds up being the smallest scale Days of Future Past I've ever seen done and kind of awesome for it.
posted by Artw at 5:42 PM on August 9, 2012

Speaking of time travel and killing notorious historical figures, I've just recently read Stephen King's 11/22/63, and it's pretty glorious. As the many blurbs have been saying, it really is his best book in years.
posted by Sticherbeast at 6:11 PM on August 9, 2012 [1 favorite]

Interesting. I was bored by the synopsis of 11/22/63.

To the online book seller!
posted by Mezentian at 6:14 PM on August 9, 2012

There's a new 20 second trailer.

As a fan my entire life: I got chills.
posted by Mezentian at 4:00 AM on August 19, 2012 [1 favorite]

Can't wait!
posted by Sticherbeast at 4:06 AM on August 19, 2012

Holy crap I'd only seen the odd season six episode so I decided to watch all of them in a row in a day like yesterday and ...yeah I agree with pretty much everyone on the faults and flaws of the series and the season and what makes a good hour of TV vs. what makes a good Doctor Who episode ( different things I argued, an episode can be weak and still saved if it feels like a Doctor Who episode and not a generic procedural) but for all the talky fighty watchy stuff I still turn into a fucking ten year old when that Bum bum Bah Bum bum bah dum music starts in cause HOLY CRAP ADVENTURES ARE IMMANENT
posted by The Whelk at 8:30 AM on August 20, 2012 [3 favorites]

That's what it's for. It's not for pleasing wanky internet people.
posted by Artw at 8:47 AM on August 20, 2012

Doctor Who works best when it feels a bit like a revue or pantomime show. I love Moffat, but sometimes we veers too far away from that. Making Who too much like a "real" show can obscure the concept's considerable charm.

That said, flaws and all, I liked Series Six. For me, the only bad part was the season arc about timeheads and goo babies and overexplaining River Song. Everything else was fine, and anyone saying otherwise must have been wearing some industrial-strength rose-colored glasses with regard to series prior.
posted by Sticherbeast at 8:48 AM on August 20, 2012

I'd actually say its at it's best doing spooky clever one off self contained episodes like Blink or Midnight or the Doctors Wife, but as far as the arc stuff goes I'd sooner have Moffat than RTD.
posted by Artw at 9:26 AM on August 20, 2012

The arc stuff just got into Moffant's Dr Who parody The Fatal Case Of Death too much: aha! I anticipated your plan and went back in time, aha! I anticipated your anticipation! Just too much by half.

That being said the bottle episodes where excellent, they all felt like proper Dr. Who episodes , complete ith some actual whoa he's kind of a bastard moments which I like when the writers remember that. And there's this like ...comic book feeling in that he can assemble a whole team of clearly awesome side characters for one episode and they all felt like they just took a break from whatever show they're in ( Aleya, Victorian Serial Killer Slayer why are you not a show?) to help out the doctor for a bit.
posted by The Whelk at 9:47 AM on August 20, 2012

The arc stuff just got into Moffant's Dr Who parody The Fatal Case Of Death too much: aha! I anticipated your plan and went back in time, aha! I anticipated your anticipation!

To me, I really liked that because you just don't see enough of it in your average Doctor Who episode. I mean, he's a Time Lord who rarely travels through time in the average adventure. I loved it to death in the Pandorica episodes. "But wait? How did you get here? Oh, nevermind, I'll just nip 'round and remind you to show up. Now that's sorted."
posted by Rock Steady at 10:42 AM on August 20, 2012

Oddly enough, I felt that "The Rebel Flesh"/"The Almost People" were the most old school episodes in recent memory. They took their time to flesh out some ideas and there was more talking instead of SHOUTING.
posted by charred husk at 10:44 AM on August 20, 2012

"Who is River Song", "How will the doctor escape apparent death?", "what are all these anagrams" and "will he ever fucking shut up about rose?" are more the kind of arc thing I was thinking of... Actually using time travel is more of a timely-wimey thing.
posted by Artw at 10:47 AM on August 20, 2012

Oh I agree, the Doctor needs more time traveling exploiting plots, I the six's long arc was too muddled with too many red herrings. When it fits together ( like it does in Pandorica I love that ending) you should go " aha!" not " wait what go out and get a chart."

I liked the plastic people too actually I was expecting to hate it based on the premise but it was pretty soild. Oddly enough my big Whovian SO didn't like it cause it felt and played so much like a retread of classic episodes, so I guess you can't win.
posted by The Whelk at 10:49 AM on August 20, 2012

Also six seemed more consistent, there wheren't any really dreadful episodes cause five was like, dizzingly high, terrible low. Six is more creamy middles.

But yes, love The Silence, love Rory, love stormageddon, love the Doctor's league of extraordinary minor characters, loved the girl who waited, loved " where is my thief?!", loved the wrap up.

Did not like what they did to River cause now she's All The Things and I liked her better before damnit.
posted by The Whelk at 10:56 AM on August 20, 2012

The Whelk:
"Did not like what they did to River cause now she's All The Things and I liked her better before damnit."

Agree there. Also, after the 5th season it was pretty plain that River was going to kill the Doctor, but I had assumed that it was something that would happen much later and for a good reason (like to keep him from becoming the Valyard or something.) The brainwashing thing felt so much more like cheap plot tricks than good story.

(I have this story in my head about a guy who meets the first Doctor in a pub one morning and the Doctor just lets his pain over letting Susan go. After he leaves, the 2nd Doctor shows up and talks with the guy. Throughout his day at the pub, each incarnation of the Doctor shows up to get some emotional baggage off his chest. The Sixth Doctor shows up a second time, though, and tells the guy, "Do you own a gun? If I'm still showing up about six more versions from now and seem very different, shoot me. Shoot me twice and make sure I do not get back up. I am not going to remember this." The day ends with Eleven dropping some dark, heavy stuff on the guy who goes home and the last shot is of him loading his pistol the next morning.)
posted by charred husk at 11:09 AM on August 20, 2012 [9 favorites]

Sherlock Season 3 Episode Titles Revealed
posted by Artw at 8:16 PM on August 24, 2012 [1 favorite]

Pond Life P1 is available!POND LIFE.

It is .... I cringed.
posted by Mezentian at 5:15 AM on August 27, 2012

Mezentian: "I cringed"

Surfing? Really? Did the Tardis land on Poochie's home planet?
posted by Rock Steady at 5:38 AM on August 27, 2012

charred husk, you seriously need to write that fanfic like whoa.

(I admit to toying around with my own "The Doctor finds out Tom Waits is actually a Time Lord who's been playing hooky on Earth and has every intention of staying that way" story now and then.)
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 6:03 AM on August 27, 2012

With the "laying down of phat beatz" and the poker joke I'd suggest: yes.
posted by Mezentian at 6:14 AM on August 27, 2012 [1 favorite]

Wait... what? The ditched Confidential and we get that...
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 7:25 AM on August 27, 2012

Mezentian: "With the "laying down of phat beatz" and the poker joke I'd suggest: yes."

Wait, there's no card-playing in that -- oh you meant fireplace poker. I'd missed that the first time through. Can just I send the bill for cleaning vomit off my clothing to the BBC, or does it need to go direct to Moffat?
posted by Rock Steady at 7:33 AM on August 27, 2012

For Poker... see also 'crumpet'
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 7:40 AM on August 27, 2012 [1 favorite]

Mezentian:
"Pond Life P1 is available!"

My wife showed me the original one hour pilot for Sherlock recently. There was this one scene where Sherlock is doing this awful Batman thing on the rooftops. Apparently Moffat loved that shot, he thought it was super cool, but more tasteful heads prevailed.

It is a good reminder that someone who can create something you think is utterly fantastic isn't always on the same page with you about other things that he thinks are fantastic.
posted by charred husk at 9:25 AM on August 27, 2012 [1 favorite]

For Poker... see also 'crumpet'

Oh. That's subtle, that is.
Right proper subtle. I missed that the first time.
posted by Mezentian at 9:49 PM on August 27, 2012

We have to keep this thread alive! I assume the Mods won't let us have one on the weekend if we don't!
FOR SQUEE!

Anyway, Pond Life Part 2 has just gone up, like 20 seconds ago.
posted by Mezentian at 3:59 AM on August 28, 2012

At about 58 seconds I cackled. CACKLED.

This almost makes up for Poochie Doctor.
posted by Mezentian at 4:01 AM on August 28, 2012

Steven Moffat hints that Who's next Doctor may be a Time LADY
posted by homunculus at 9:36 AM on August 28, 2012

The woman?

She'd be kind of great. Bit pretty for it, but she could make it work.
posted by Artw at 9:42 AM on August 28, 2012

Pond Life, Part 3.
One of the Dr/Rory watersports fans?
posted by Mezentian at 4:05 AM on August 29, 2012

Pond Life, Part 3.
One of the Dr/Rory watersports fans?

It's actually a hugely nerdy in joke...
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 10:13 AM on August 29, 2012

Oud sounds like loo or am I missing something deeper?
posted by The Whelk at 10:24 AM on August 29, 2012

Way deeper...
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 10:31 AM on August 29, 2012

fearfulsymmetry: "It's actually a hugely nerdy in joke..."

Yes, well? You must tell us now.
posted by Rock Steady at 11:20 AM on August 29, 2012

Yes, well? You must tell us now.

There's an oft quoted remark from Jon Pertwee about Who being at it's best/most frightening when it had its monsters in familiar surroundings, 'a Yeti on your loo in Tooting Bec'
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 1:38 PM on August 29, 2012 [3 favorites]

and now you know ....................the rest of the story
posted by The Whelk at 1:49 PM on August 29, 2012 [1 favorite]

And since we're all Who fans here, check out Hagan's Twatty New Who reviews, where she basically rips into the worst episodes of the reboot, like The Beast Below, which I enjoy cause I hated that episode. (NSFW Language, really intense picky nerdrage)

We hate cause we love.
posted by The Whelk at 1:58 PM on August 29, 2012

Does Steven Moffat have a master plan for Doctor Who?
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 1:59 PM on August 29, 2012 [1 favorite]

The Beast Below was the first terrible episode written by Moffat. It was also the first non-masterful episode written by Moffat, which made its terribleness all the more surprising and disappointing.
posted by painquale at 2:10 PM on August 29, 2012

and the one right after it just ....you know I LIKED the B-52s IN SPACE cause that's goofy pulp fun but ....everything else is just stuff happening and you can SHOOT him you know Daleks he's RIGHT THERE.

The rest of the season was fine.
posted by The Whelk at 2:14 PM on August 29, 2012

I still think The Eleventh Hour is the best of all the Matt Smith episodes and one of the best Who episodes period. My hopes at that time were so high. But then, next up, two of the very worst Matt Smith episodes.

I really hope for a return to form this season, but I don't know. The Christmas special was also terrible. I hope they stop making the Doctor such an infantile idiot. Many of his previous incarnations had a child-like quality, but they are taking his Willy Wonka character too far: in two of the last three episodes, the Doctor gets really excited about playing with toys. I can easily imagine this Doctor playing with Tonka trucks and making Vroom Vroom noises. Eleven is at his best when he's playing a confident but playful absent-minded professor, not an octogenarian occasionally beset with regressive dementia.
posted by painquale at 4:27 PM on August 29, 2012 [1 favorite]

Which Christmas one? I loved the Dickens one but Narnia left me cold.
posted by Artw at 4:31 PM on August 29, 2012

Narnia. The Dickens episode was great, Narnia was dreadful. I loved the oh-so-Moffetian ideas of Christmas tree ornaments being larval forms of baby trees and a tree growing into a rocketship (it's also in Saga!), but everything else was sappy.
posted by painquale at 5:26 PM on August 29, 2012

but everything else [about the episode with the trees] was sappy.

i see what you did there
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 6:13 PM on August 29, 2012 [1 favorite]

Yes, but the Narnia one had Bill in it! BILL BAILEY!

And, yeah, I've watched it the once.

I recently rewatched The Beast Below and it looks fantastic.
I enjoyed it, although I was let down at the time.

I just wish Moffat's shows would make sense.
posted by Mezentian at 7:18 PM on August 29, 2012

It's like, a whole city on the back of a space whale! 1940s Orwellian London! A Queen spying on her own government! These are good ideas!

The execution? Not ....really.
posted by The Whelk at 8:11 PM on August 29, 2012

It has it's moments though. The name change thing, setting up the Amy/Doctor dynamic, Queen Liz.
posted by Artw at 8:14 PM on August 29, 2012

I'm making a face and going nnnnnugh but whatever. It had more going for it then the next one which was just incoherent and not as cool as it thought it was.

I mean the last two episodes pretty much make up for anything weak in that series so, eh.
posted by The Whelk at 8:48 PM on August 29, 2012

Pond Life Part 4.

I am still kicking myself for missing the Yeti/Tooting Bec reference.
That's some hardcore stuff, yo.
posted by Mezentian at 4:04 AM on August 30, 2012

I caught tonight's reference to the Sarah Jane Adventures. There's that.
posted by Mezentian at 4:06 AM on August 30, 2012

painquale:
" I hope they stop making the Doctor such an infantile idiot."

When it was time for Tennant to leave, I was actually ready for him to go. I had loved him early on but by the time of the specials I had grown tired of his over-the-topness. The first season of Matt Smith felt just right - he seemed more alien than goofy, and the dark turns he took were really effective. The last season he just seems goofy and the dark turns feel much more forced. I really hope that he and the writers tone it down a bit this season.
posted by charred husk at 6:07 AM on August 30, 2012

Tennant had to go partly cause the arc kept trending toward fanfiction, bad fanfiction at that, I thought he did well with the awful scripts but there's a limit to how much SHOUTING and MANICNESS and LOVE can carry a story. Smith is at his best when the childish anticness is tempered with weariness (Smith does weary really well, his posture just makes him look so old) and a kind of possibly threatening, unexplored alien nature. I really hope we get a little more of the Doctor we saw in The Girl Who Waited, kind of a bastard who has to make really tough choices cause he's The Doctor and ultimately that comes before companions (or even say, whole civilizations). Like I want to him to have to make a really awful choice for all the right reasons like, brain wipe Rory out of Amy's head in order to save one of them and not loose both or something.
posted by The Whelk at 6:19 AM on August 30, 2012 [1 favorite]

No reason in particular, but I just rembered what a fantastic episode Amy's Choice was. Wasn't that a fantastic episode?
posted by Artw at 6:34 AM on August 30, 2012

It was!
posted by The Whelk at 6:42 AM on August 30, 2012

When it was time for Tennant to leave, I was actually ready for him to go. I had loved him early on but by the time of the specials I had grown tired of his over-the-topness.

You be nice to my Doctor, pal.

*cuddles her life-size Tenth Doctor carboard cutout, her signed program from MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING and her Tenth-Doctor sonic screwdriver to bosom*
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 8:28 AM on August 30, 2012

Artw:
"Wasn't that a fantastic episode?"

Yes! That was Matt Smith striking mostly all the right notes.

EmpressCallipygos:
"You be nice to my Doctor, pal."

I liked Tennant! And feel free to say things about Tom Baker while I twirl the scarf my sister knit for me.
posted by charred husk at 10:35 AM on August 30, 2012

I think Smith will be ready to move on after next year (since he now appears to be openly saying he'll be involved in the 50th), and I will probably think it's time.
As I did with Tennant. And Ecclestone.

But not McCoy. I never felt we got a chance to really see him (or C.Baker) grow into the roles. So at least all the new Doctors have pretty much been fully formed (except in the hair department), and Tennant's Shouty/Sorry Paradox. He was a good Doctor, except for that.
posted by Mezentian at 5:57 PM on August 30, 2012

Part Five is up.
posted by Mezentian at 4:00 AM on August 31, 2012

Mezentian: "Part Five is up."

Boy, that took an abruptly different tone. I'm not sure I buy the Pond-Williamses having sreaming, yelling, storm(ageddon) out of the house fights, though. Not that their relationship is perfect, but I'd guess their struggles to be more of the broody, sullen, silent-treatment (Silence-treatment?) type.
posted by Rock Steady at 5:29 AM on August 31, 2012

That turn had been flagged a while back, and I suppose there are reasons.

Personally, I'm annoyed Pond Life didn't address the Ledworth Duck Pond issue.
posted by Mezentian at 6:09 AM on August 31, 2012

I'd absolutely be up for more Gaiman episodes, or a broader range of writers in general.

I have an idea about an episode in which The Doctor meets Emperor Norton.....Steve, if you're reading, Memail me!
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 10:39 AM on August 31, 2012 [2 favorites]

GREAT episode today. I hope the season keeps up this momentum.
posted by Shepherd at 3:31 PM on September 1, 2012

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