S00.E160: The Power of the Doctor

[dankesean]

23 minutes ago, rur said:

Apparently they have some control. Remember, there was a holiday special where both #13 and #1 were putting off regeneration. 

Plus Ten put off his regeneration by hours if not days so he could do a quick farewell tour, Eleven took the time to use his regeneration energy as a WMD, stopped the process, got back into the Tardis, took off and then hallucinated a conversation with Amy before zapping. I think Eccleston was the last Doctor who actually had to regenerate with any sort of urgency.

[Pattycake2]

All I kept thinking was someone please shoot The Master and then shoot him again during regeneration. There, done.

[Anduin]

32 minutes ago, Pattycake2 said:

All I kept thinking was someone please shoot The Master and then shoot him again during regeneration. There, done.

Yaz had a gun at one point. What happened to it? Did it disappear because it was too easy a solution?

[WAnglais1]

I liked it, but as the rest of Chib's run has gone, it's all WHIZ!BANG!RUN!PEWPEWPEW! No plot or trying to have any semblance of a story. 

Sasha is not the first Doctor to play Rasputin. Tom Baker was the only good thing about the 1971 film NICHOLAS & ALEXANDRA. 

The meme with Tom Baker and "So you want David Tenant back as the Doctor? Clearly you understand how the show works," has never been more appropriate. 

During Four's time we were told the TARDIS console room existed in a "state of Temporal Grace," so guns or other weapons wouldn't work there. Chalk that up to now being PEWPEWPEW! enough.

I guess we have to endure more of Ten/Fourteen's underbite and the constant, "Sorry!" Don't get me wrong, I liked his run, but got tired of the approach the last season or so. 

Still good to see Tegan and Ace. Janet had a health scare a few years back. The moments with "their Doctors" was as well done as Sarah Jane running into Ten the first time. And the CA (Companions Anonymous) group at the end was so delightful. How I wish a few more could've been there.  

Jody didn't have good stories or writing, but I liked her version of the Doctor. Somewhere there are young girls on playgrounds running around with pretend sonic screwdrivers saying, "I'm the Doctor! Let's go fam!" The show is forward-looking while embracing a massive history, and that's cool.

Thanks, Jody. See you on the con circuit one day. 

Edited October 25, 2022 by WAnglais1

[PurpleTentacle]

14 minutes ago, WAnglais1 said:

I guess we have to endure more of Ten/Fourteen's underbite and the constant, "Sorry!" Don't get me wrong, I liked his run, but got tired of the approach the last season or so. 

He got annoying after Rose left. Because afterwards he was basically a depressed mess the whole time. I hope we'll get the doctor he was before she left.

9 hours ago, Llywela said:

We've got all the pre-One Timeless Child Doctors.

I will never accept that, unless some showrunner manages to make it not extremely stupid. But I'd rather have a complete retcon, to the Jo Martin doctor being part of Season 6b and the rest just being a complete fabrication by the Master.

Maybe we can kinda weave in that the events of Flux were all just in the matrix, which would explain away the Tecteun-bullshit and would explain why it seems that 99% of the universe aren't destroyed, like they should, after the events of Flux.

At least then it would make sense that the Jo Martin doctor has a police box TARDIS. How it stands now, it doesn't make any sense.

7 hours ago, Llywela said:

'Proper Doctors'? This implies that you believe there are improper Doctors, by which I assume you mean Whittaker. Which, no. Whittaker is very much a 'proper Doctor'. She suffered from poor writing, to be sure, as have many before her, but she is still very much the Doctor.

Sad but true. The lowest point in Doctor Who history, but still a point in it.

6 hours ago, taanja said:

So the Doctor is David Tennant again? ( is that possible for the Doctor to become one of his/her older regenerations? Since when?)

Since "The day of the Doctor", which aired almost 10 years ago.

4 hours ago, John Potts said:

The only reason the Doctor hasn't traditionally is that he is too busy dying to take active control of the process

I always thought he was just kinda bad at it. Like he is at pretty much everything, by timelord-standards.

3 hours ago, greekmom said:

I wonder how much they promised Tennant for a repeat, why he took the job and if he was their first choice.  

He always said how much he loved playing the doctor, how much he loved working with RTD as a show runner and that he was a fan since he was a kid. So my guess would be: actually not that much.

I assume the BBC was ecstatic that they could get RTD and Tennant, because that were the years DW had the most viewers ever.

It's not like it's forever. We already know who the next doctor after Tennant is.

33 minutes ago, WAnglais1 said:

Jody didn't have good stories or writing, but I liked her version of the Doctor. Somewhere there are young girls on playgrounds running around with pretend sonic screwdrivers saying, "I'm the Doctor! Let's go fam!" The show is forward-looking while embracing a massive history, and that's cool.

*shudders* I get PTSD symptoms when I hear "fam". It's not even that I inherently disliked the TARDIS-crew being called that in the beginning, it just reminds me of the godawfull writing and Whittaker's bad acting. If we could have gotten Jo Martin as our main doctor and a good writer, now that would have been great.

I'm still holding out hope for Olivia Colman. Maybe one day. Hopefully with a competent showrunner at the helm.

[QuantumMechanic]

7 hours ago, taanja said:

( is that possible for the Doctor to become one of his/her older regenerations? Since when?) and when he  regenerated -- his cloths regenerated too? seriously? What?

It's pretty clear that's what happened in the 50th Anniversary special with The Curator. 

[Llywela]

I am back with some more thoughts!

The first of which is that I've been feeling like the episode was missing something, overstuffed though it was, and I realised what it is I was missing: the betrayal. See, the Master teaming up with a bunch of bloodthirsty aliens to further his own goals is completely in character, but usually those stories end with him being betrayed by said aliens. That didn't happen here. Both Cybermen and Daleks just...did as they were told, to the point of destruction. Which is massively out of character for both parties, even allowing for the fact that the Master in fact created these Cybermen.

Which more or less brings me to my other point, which has to do with the way Chris Chibnall has approached his writing for Doctor Who throughout, and is at the core of the most fundamental flaws in his era. It's the way he writes for characters - or, rather, doesn't write for characters. Because he doesn't. He doesn't use his characters to drive the action, and he doesn't use the action to develop his characters. The characters are simply there to join the dots of the plot, which is why none of them have had any meaningful development of any kind in all the seasons they've been there. There was just so damn much he could have done with the characters at his disposal in this story - and he did manage a few really nice little moments, I'll give him that. The little exchanges between Tegan and Five and between Ace and Seven were really well done, especially the Tegan scene, with that little mention of Adric, which hit hard mainly because the actors sold it so well, the memory of that shared trauma, but also because the moment was given time to breathe - unlike most of the rest of the episode. But there was so much potential in the combinations going on here, all of which went begging. There was no build up to Dan leaving. He just left. There was no build up to Yaz leaving. She just left. There was no conclusion to Kate's story in the episode, or to Tegan's, or Ace's. They were just there until they weren't, and then the story moved on without them, once their part in the plot was done. No actual goodbyes. Vinder had no real characterisation or purpose at all, he was just there to carry a part of the plot, and was then unceremoniously shoved off.

Just imagine what this story might have been if it used its characters to drive the action, instead of having them run around after the plot the whole time. If the action had been used to develop the characters and their individual stories. If they had been allowed to talk to each other more, build connections. If meeting Tegan and Ace, and seeing Vinder again and talking to him about his life now, etc, had been allowed to feed into Yaz's decision to leave the TARDIS as the culmination of a four-year story-arc that had built and grown over the seasons, instead of being something she just drifts into without a single word to express her motivation. If Tegan and Ace had been allowed to express more of what it meant for them to be working with UNIT, of what it meant for them to see the Doctor again - what they will take from that experience going forward.

It could have been a much stronger story. And I know that Chris Chibnall is capable of writing powerful character stories. I honestly don't understand why he has consistently refused to do so in Doctor Who. Why does he believe Doctor Who must be plot-driven rather than character-led?

Ah well. He's gone now.

Edited October 25, 2022 by Llywela
typo

[libgirl2]

10 hours ago, fredfreddy44 said:

At first I thought it was Bob Barker from The Price is Right.  I had to rewind 3 times until I saw the name tag.

And Mel looked amazing.  Didn't need a tag to ID her.

He did look like him but I knew right away who he was. God bless him! 

Edited October 25, 2022 by libgirl2

[DanaK]

7 hours ago, WAnglais1 said:

I liked it, but as the rest of Chib's run has gone, it's all WHIZ!BANG!RUN!PEWPEWPEW! No plot or trying to have any semblance of a story. 

Sasha is not the first Doctor to play Rasputin. Tom Baker was the only good thing about the 1971 film NICHOLAS & ALEXANDRA. 

The meme with Tom Baker and "So you want David Tenant back as the Doctor? Clearly you understand how the show works," has never been more appropriate. 

During Four's time we were told the TARDIS console room existed in a "state of Temporal Grace," so guns or other weapons wouldn't work there. Chalk that up to now being PEWPEWPEW! enough.

I guess we have to endure more of Ten/Fourteen's underbite and the constant, "Sorry!" Don't get me wrong, I liked his run, but got tired of the approach the last season or so. 

Still good to see Tegan and Ace. Janet had a health scare a few years back. The moments with "their Doctors" was as well done as Sarah Jane running into Ten the first time. And the CA (Companions Anonymous) group at the end was so delightful. How I wish a few more could've been there.  

Jody didn't have good stories or writing, but I liked her version of the Doctor. Somewhere there are young girls on playgrounds running around with pretend sonic screwdrivers saying, "I'm the Doctor! Let's go fam!" The show is forward-looking while embracing a massive history, and that's cool.

Thanks, Jody. See you on the con circuit one day. 

Jodie is already doing the con circuit. She recently did Birmingham and one other and has one coming up in early Nov in the UK, one in the US in Ohio in Dec and Gallifrey One in Los Angeles California in Feb

[Enigma X]

I stopped watching Doctor Who some time ago. Since everyone was commenting on this episode on the internet, I watched. The only thing I liked were the cameos of the different doctors and former companions. My fave (10 now 14) made an appearance. I have nothing else nice to say.

[angora]

While watching, I was very much in a state of, "Sorry, brain, you can complain later--my heart's in the driver seat right now!" Because I knew a lot of it didn't make sense, and it was really busy and overstuffed. But all the feels got me so hard. I was excited when we first saw One, but from Six on, I just sat frozen with my hand over my mouth and tears in my eyes. Five! Seven! Eight! Then Graham! Then the companion support group at the end! My fangirl heart couldn't take it.

I loved all of that. I loved seeing Thirteen interact with representations of other Doctors, as it really acknowledged her place in the long history of the character. I loved seeing Tegan and Ace back in action, though I wish they'd gotten to spend more time with Thirteen and Yaz, and I too wish we'd gotten a reference to Tegan and Nyssa being together. The holographic Doctor interface was a good way to keep Thirteen in the story after the forced regeneration, and the scenes with Tegan-Five and Ace-Seven were everything. I loved Tegan and Ace comforting Yaz during the companion support group at the end.

I also continue to love the Master, sorry not sorry. Sacha Dhawan just brings so much to the character. He nails the way the Master hates/resents the Doctor but is also drawn to and kind of needs the Doctor. I loved him dancing to "Rasputin" (even though the "Voodoo Child" moment from "The Sound of Drums" is still the best,) and it killed me when he went overboard with the TARDIS wardrobe after the forced regeneration--he even had the recorder! I appreciated that, when UNIT captured him, we got so many callbacks, referencing his history with Tegan, Ace, and the Brigadier. I'm trying to remember, but I don't think Missy made any acknowledgement of the Delgado years when she was in UNIT custody during "Death in Heaven." New Who Masters have always focused on their long history with the Doctor, but not usually with specific continuity references. And I like the quieter moments we got of something deeper from the Master, like when he tells Yaz they could've had fun together or, when they're reversing the forced regeneration and he says, "Don't let me go back to being me."

On 10/24/2022 at 12:33 AM, Llywela said:

The Master has had the ability to transfer his mind into someone else's body since the early 80s, so that part can almost be made to make sense, if you squint, except that it couldn't be reversed, so Yaz certainly shouldn't have been able to reverse it, so...

That's a good point. If he stole the forced regeneration technology from Gallifrey and has been tinkering with it for who knows how long, he could've found a way to combine its function with his own body-stealing abilities. Yes, having the whole thing be reversible is pure Whovian handwaviness, but hey, so was Ten siphoning off extra regeneration energy into a severed hand that then grew into a second Ten.

On 10/24/2022 at 5:30 AM, Llywela said:

IAN! I've longed to see Ian again for so very long, William Russell is 97 now, this might well be the last chance, and if Ian couldn't get to meet the Doctor again, at least he got to meet other companions and hear all their stories, and find out what a massive impact he and Barbara had on the Doctor, since it was 100% their influence that made him the hero he became.

Yes, THIS! It's long been my headcanon that the reason the Doctor spends so much time on Earth and has so many human companions is because of Ian and Barbara. The Doctor may have stolen a TARDIS and run away, but it's under Ian and Barbara's influence that he truly became the Doctor we know and love. Everything they've done and all the planets they've saved since then wouldn't have happened without those two, and it was lovely for Ian to be able to see just a few of the lives the Doctor has touched.

On 10/24/2022 at 5:30 AM, Llywela said:

And while I disliked seeing the Doctor sidelined in her own show yet again, I did love that the companions – old and new – stepped up to be the heroes when she couldn't be, which is a powerful message to send. The New Who era has emphasised the legend of the Doctor so much, has built the character up so much – the Last of the Time Lords, the Lonely God, the Timeless Child, etc. But my favourite version of the Doctor has always been the Gallifreyan dropout who did badly in school and ran away to see the universe, and then learned compassion from a pair of human schoolteachers, and learned that lesson so well that they became a hero themself, simply because they realised that they could. Because that version of the Doctor reminds us that anyone can be the hero. Reminds us that the Doctor's companions aren't inherently special, either (Only takes the best? No. Inspires people to *be* the best). The Doctor's former companions are just people who happened to meet the Doctor, and learned from that experience and from that example, just as the Doctor learned from Ian and Barbara. Anyone can step up. Anyone could be capable of making those hard choices, if pressed.

This is a perfect paragraph, I love it.

I agree that Dan's exit was super perfunctory, though I like that he had a more personal goodbye with Yaz than with the Doctor, given the years they spent stuck in the past. And it was so weird that both Yaz and the Doctor were like, "Well, she's regenerating, so I guess this is over." But then, that's been par for the course for new Who. When the Doctor regenerates under the same showrunner, it's all, "I know I'm different, but I'm still ME! Can't you see that Rose/Clara?" But when the Doctor regenerates and is about to be handed over to a new showrunner, it's all, "I know I'm still going to be the Doctor, but the me you know is still TOTALLY DYING, so goodbye forever, kids!" :eyeroll:

I've long been an advocate that not all companions need a tragic/forced exit, and Chibnall has technically delivered on that, but they've all felt like afterthoughts. A companion deciding it's time to go home/move on/whatever can still be sad, touching, and meaningful, you know!

I liked that Thirteen's regeneration scenewasn't too drawn out, as I think some new Who regeneration scenes have been too "overcooked." When she realized what was happening, she was upset/sad but came to terms with it and enjoyed one last fond experience with Yaz before preparing to hand the reins over to her new (old) self. I love that she actually dematerialized and GOT OUT of the TARDIS first (seriously, the poor TARDIS,) and "Tag, you're it," was a very Thirteen line.

So intrigued for what's going to come next. I really want to meet Ncuti Gatwa's Doctor (Fourteen? Fifteen? Who knows anymore,) but they definitely have me curious with that ending.

[taanja]

16 hours ago, Ceindreadh said:

Well I for one was totally shocked.  I'd managed to avoid spoilers and my reaction was pretty much the same as 10/14s reaction.  "WHAT!!!"  (okay, maybe a little louder!)

Yup. Me too. 

I didn't even know a new episode was airing. I randomly turned to BBC America and -- voila! A new Doctor Who - so I watched. 

[libgirl2]

34 minutes ago, angora said:

Yes, THIS! It's long been my headcanon that the reason the Doctor spends so much time on Earth and has so many human companions is because of Ian and Barbara. The Doctor may have stolen a TARDIS and run away, but it's under Ian and Barbara's influence that he truly became the Doctor we know and love. Everything they've done and all the planets they've saved since then wouldn't have happened without those two, and it was lovely for Ian to be able to see just a few of the lives the Doctor has touched.

And through the Doctor, how many lives they touched. 

[Llywela]

48 minutes ago, angora said:

I've long been an advocate that not all companions need a tragic/forced exit, and Chibnall has technically delivered on that, but they've all felt like afterthoughts. A companion deciding it's time to go home/move on/whatever can still be sad, touching, and meaningful, you know!

I liked that Thirteen's regeneration scenewasn't too drawn out, as I think some new Who regeneration scenes have been too "overcooked." When she realized what was happening, she was upset/sad but came to terms with it and enjoyed one last fond experience with Yaz before preparing to hand the reins over to her new (old) self. I love that she actually dematerialized and GOT OUT of the TARDIS first (seriously, the poor TARDIS,) and "Tag, you're it," was a very Thirteen line.

So intrigued for what's going to come next. I really want to meet Ncuti Gatwa's Doctor (Fourteen? Fifteen? Who knows anymore,) but they definitely have me curious with that ending.

😃 I've also long been an advocate for companions not needing a tragic/forced exit, so I do appreciate that this was more low-key - trouble is, it went too far in the other direction! Because the exit does still need some build up, does still need to feel like the culmination of their journey, and it didn't here, for either Dan or Yaz. Which brings us back to what I said up-thread about Chibnall's Who focus being on plot rather than character, at the expense of the story. The character development has consistently been an afterthought, if it's even there at all, and it really didn't have to be. Yaz in particular has so much potential for a strong personal arc, on paper, yet very little of it came through on-screen. It wouldn't even have taken much, because the seeds of a good character story were all there, they were just never developed into anything truly meaningful. If just a little more attention had been paid to her journey as a journey, she could have had a really satisfying story and a really satisfying departure. As it is, though, we have literally no idea what she truly thought at the end there, or why she truly believed she had to leave now. We can guess and we can infer, Mandip Gill acted her heart out for us, but since she didn't have even a single line of dialogue to actually explain, we can't actually know, and that materially weakened the story.

As for Ncuti Gatwa, as things stand, currently, he is Doctor Fifteen. Except that strictly speaking, he is number 17 of televised incarnations - and possibly somewhere in the thousands, according to the Timeless Child storyline, so...let's just stick with Fifteen!

[PurpleTentacle]

6 hours ago, Llywela said:

Which more or less brings me to my other point, which has to do with the way Chris Chibnall has approached his writing for Doctor Who throughout, and is at the core of the most fundamental flaws in his era. It's the way he writes for characters - or, rather, doesn't write for characters. Because he doesn't. He doesn't use his characters to drive the action, and he doesn't use the action to develop his characters. The characters are simply there to join the dots of the plot, which is why none of them have had any meaningful development of any kind in all the seasons they've been there.

I think you are giving him too much credit. Because the plot also doesn't make any sense. Like how do the two timelines of the master in this episode fit together? Answer: They don't.

So Chibnall can neither write characters nor plot.

2 hours ago, angora said:

Sacha Dhawan just brings so much to the character.

Way too much. That is the problem.

[Llywela]

1 hour ago, PurpleTentacle said:

I think you are giving him too much credit. Because the plot also doesn't make any sense. Like how do the two timelines of the master in this episode fit together? Answer: They don't.

I didn't say the plot made sense. I said that the characters are there to move the plot forward (whether it makes sense or not), rather than the plot being used to explore and develop the characters. Which is true. All the writing decisions are about what suits the plot of the moment, such as it is, rather than what the characters might need, or how they might be built up and developed. A show can be plot-driven without that plot being good or coherent! Plot-driven versus character-led are terms used to describe where the focus of the writing lies, they have nothing to do with whether that writing is any good or not.

More character-led writing, for instance, might have focused on the inherent inner conflict that should exist within Yaz as a character, given that she was introduced to us as an ambitious young police officer, who was then so intensely drawn to the Doctor and life in the TARDIS that she effectively abandoned all those career ambitions, and the tension between those two desires might have been explored over the course of the seasons, with the episode plots used to draw out all those conflicted emotions and the moments of decision, etc, and how her growing crush on the Doctor fed into it, and all that inner conflict - and the Doctor's eventual, very gentle, rejection of any possibility of a romantic relationship - might then have fed into her ultimate decision to leave the TARDIS and pick up the threads of her life on Earth. As it is, we got almost none of that - mere breadcrumbs. Because the focus of each episode was always on developing the plot, rather than on developing the characters.

[Eulipian 5k]

Wow, back on a Space Train with Doctor Who!

So, with Graham, Ryan, Ace, and Tegan still pursuing the Doctor-ish abnormalities, the Companion's Support Group looks dangerous; they can show up anytime, anywhere like Vinder! Shed a tear for Wilf and Sara Jane, and that other Professor, Professor Eustacius Jericho.

[Eulipian 5k]

21 minutes ago, Llywela said:

that should exist within Yaz as a character, given that she was introduced to us as an ambitious young police officer, who was then so intensely drawn to the Doctor and life in the TARDIS that she effectively abandoned all those career ambitions, and the tension between those two desires might have been explored over the course of the seasons, with the episode plots used to draw out all those conflicted emotions and the moments of decision, etc, and how her growing crush on the Doctor fed into it, and all that inner conflict - and the Doctor's eventual, very gentle, rejection of any possibility of a romantic relationship - might then have fed into her ultimate decision to leave the TARDIS and pick up the threads of her life on Earth.

Then we'd accuse Chibnall of stealing Martha Jones' entire arc!

I think the Thasmin plot line is a case of the fandom seeing/wanting something and the showrunner going with it, (like Scully and Muldaur, or Ross and Rachel from yesteryear).

[Llywela]

2 minutes ago, Eulipian 5k said:

Then we'd accuse Chibnall of stealing Martha Jones' entire arc!

I think the Thasmin plot line is a case of the fandom seeing/wanting something and the showrunner going with it, (like Scully and Muldaur, or Ross and Rachel from yesteryear).

True. But we never heard Martha express the kind of ambition we heard from Yaz in that first season, or ask the Doctor to help cover her absences from work so they wouldn't affect her career. My point is, that was the kind of characterisation that needed to be built on, for Yaz, to make her less of a cipher, help us understand her better. She did a lot of great stuff - we got to see her learning a huge amount, growing into a leader, able to take on aspects of the Doctor's own role in many ways (without the obnoxiousness of Clara, who developed in much the same way) but we learned almost nothing about Yaz herself in the process, because she so rarely got to verbalise her thoughts and feelings along the way. My point is, her journey would have been much stronger if she had clear development through the seasons, with her ultimate depature coming as the natural culmination of that story, instead of what we got.

[Eulipian 5k]

On 10/23/2022 at 7:14 PM, PurpleTentacle said:

How did Graham get involved in the volcano plot? He seemed to know what was going on, but when the Doctor saw him, she was shocked to see him there, so she didn't send him...

How did Ryan and Graham get involved in the Dalek plot with the Spider guy? How did Sara Jane get to the School Reunion? How did Mickey get to the same school? How did Vinder get involved in the volcano plot? How did Ace and Tegan get involved in the missing paintings plot? Since Jimmy Olsen and Lois Lane we've accepted the involvement of nosy "companions" in superhero stories, but now we must draw the line and castigate the infidel Chibnall.

Well now you have a support group, like LINDA, to dispatch companions anywhere. (If Graham stops putting his whole bio on the Psychic Paper, lol)

[Eulipian 5k]

19 minutes ago, Llywela said:

True. But we never heard Martha express the kind of ambition we heard from Yaz in that first season,

Martha was already a Doctor, I think ambition describes very well the drive of many MDs and Med students.

Can You Hear Me was the place to develop all of Yaz' issues, but I prefer immortals and fantastical planets than achy-breaky teenage angst in space, YMMV.

[Llywela]

28 minutes ago, Eulipian 5k said:

Can You Hear Me was the place to develop all of Yaz' issues, but I prefer immortals and fantastical planets than achy-breaky teenage angst in space, YMMV.

I didn't say anything about achy-breaky teenage angst in space. My point is that the ongoing story is stronger when the characters have clear, coherent personal stories that weave through their ongoing adventures, allowing us to get to know and understand them better, and building toward their eventual, inevitable departure so that it plays as the culmination of their story, instead of them always remaining ciphers with little in the way of meaningful characterisation, always doing what the plot requires them to do, with little sense of their personal thoughts or motivations ever revealed. Again, mileage may vary, but that's my opinion.

This story, for instance, was fast and frenetic and entirely plot-driven, with very little breathing space for any of the characters. In my opinion, the story would have been stronger and more coherent if there had been more meaningful focus on the characters (the meaningful character moments we got are easily the best moments of the episode), and less focus on chucking in as many plot elements as possible.

Edited October 25, 2022 by Llywela

[Eulipian 5k]

James Bond has outlasted Doctor Who, (60+ years), with opening sequences that have nothing to do with the actual episode/movie; but, while I liked the Fam-on-a-Train opening, what was the need to imperil the little girl?

[Llywela]

8 minutes ago, Eulipian 5k said:

James Bond has outlasted Doctor Who, (60+ years), with opening sequences that have nothing to do with the actual episode/movie; but, while I liked the Fam-on-a-Train opening, what was the need to imperil the little girl?

There was no little girl - it was a projection of the Quarinx [sp?] creature, the energy ball that was later revealed as the energy source for the Master's convoluted plan. It projected the image of a little girl (specifically, the Timeless Child) as a defence mechanism, sending an image that the onlooker would instinctively want to protect. The image of the child was aimed at the Doctor, to inspire her protective instincts. The creature's true appearance was the mass of energy.

Edited October 25, 2022 by Llywela

[HauntedBathroom]

On 10/24/2022 at 8:25 PM, Llywela said:

'Proper Doctors'? This implies that you believe there are improper Doctors, by which I assume you mean Whittaker. Which, no. Whittaker is very much a 'proper Doctor'. She suffered from poor writing, to be sure, as have many before her, but she is still very much the Doctor.

She was a rotten Doctor, pish to her.

[PurpleTentacle]

@Eulipian 5k you quoted the wrong person. I didn't say what is in the quote you posted.

[AudienceofOne]

19 hours ago, Llywela said:

Why does he believe Doctor Who must be plot-driven rather than character-led?

If I can offer a no-doubt controversial opinion, it's because his first season was a simple character-led narrative that let his moments breathe and tried to tell human stories. And people - and by that I mean super loud Whovians with megaphones - hated it because they grew up on Moffat's nonsense. So Chib went, "Okay, you want nonsense. Here it is". And that's what we got. Loud, frantic, nonsense. Nothing that happened in the last three years was any sillier or more convoluted or less character-driven than the Moffat era. Nothing. 

It was a lot less misogynist though, which is one thing going for it.

I actually quite liked the first series he wrote. It doesn't compare to the best of NuWho but it was good solid television overall. 

[John Potts]

Because I can't help nitpicking (shocker for a Whovian!) - if the Master wanted to destroy the Doctor's reputation, wouldn't it have made more sense to have him regenerate into her (ie. Jodie Whitaker)? Granted, some of his enemies seem to recognise the Doctor (eg. the Daleks) on some biological level, irrespective of his/her appearance, but to most it would look like it was the Doctor doing whatever terrible things the Master did. It would even give Yaz & Dan a reason to leave - "I know it wasn't really you, but I can't look at you without seeing all those terrible things he did!" Or if you wanted to give Jodie more time off - an odd choice for her last(?) appearance in the role, but whatever - why not bring back The Valeyard? He's "actually" the Doctor and evil AND has a pre-existing relationship with the Master! Michael Jayston is still alive, but if he didn't want to do it, put somebody similar looking into the black robes & hat and I'm sure people would accept a recast

21 hours ago, Llywela said:

Both Cybermen and Daleks just...did as they were told, to the point of destruction. Which is massively out of character for both parties, even allowing for the fact that the Master in fact created these Cybermen.

I'm pretty sure the Daleks were only there so we could get line "the Master's Dalek Plan" (a plot that also involved the Daleks drilling into the Earth so they could eat its gooey centre*).

* OK, not exactly, and I don't think that was The Dalek Master Plan, but it has been a Dalek plot in the past (sort of)

[Daisy]

Tennant is back as the Doctor? RTD is back?!

My my, i might actually start watching again. (I usually get to Heaven Sent on the 12th Doctor season and I just could't do it anymore, and I missed all of the 13th Doctor Run... but 10 + Donna? I am Here. For. It. 

[AudienceofOne]

36 minutes ago, John Potts said:

if the Master wanted to destroy the Doctor's reputation, wouldn't it have made more sense to have him regenerate into her

I mean the Doctor regenerates and he made his TARDIS look like hers so... instead of bellowing about being the Master everywhere just claim to be the Doctor instead. How would people know when the conceit is that he literally looks like a different person anyway. And if the Doctor now looks like the Master and has the Master's consciousness then the Doctor isn't the Master, the Master is the Master. He even has the same face? What difference is there with the Master claiming to be the Doctor and this new regenerated Master-mapped Doctor claiming to be the Doctor? It's exactly the same.

This was done 80% for romp purposes and 20% for metaphorical purposes (the Master doesn't want to defeat the Doctor, he wants to be the Doctor). 

To achieve what the Master wanted to, he should have regenerated the Doctor to look like the Master while still being the Doctor so she had to go about in the world being blamed for the Master's crimes. 

[AudienceofOne]

51 minutes ago, John Potts said:

I'm pretty sure the Daleks were only there so we could get line "the Master's Dalek Plan" (a plot that also involved the Daleks drilling into the Earth so they could eat its gooey centre*).

* OK, not exactly, and I don't think that was The Dalek Master Plan, but it has been a Dalek plot in the past (sort of)

This is the Dalek Invasion of Earth but The Dalek's Master Plan is even more apropos since it involved the Daleks trying to take over the solar system.

It's notable for its devolution into a crappy redux of the awful The Chase and for the reappearance of the Meddling Monk, the First Doctor's Timelord antagonist.

It's also notable for the death of no less than two companions and a great arc for Stephen who, from surviving episodes, seems one-note. He's not. It's just that most of his character beats are lost. He comes out of The Dalek's Master Plan jaded and traumatised and ready to quite the TARDIS because of what he sees as the Doctor's cavalier attitude to the lives of the people around him. It's one of the reasons he eventually decides to leave. 

What was my point? Oh yeah. Timelord nemesis and Daleks trying to take over the solar system and destroy the Doctor. So very apropos.

[DanaK]

Sorry this is a bit late, but the overnights on the BBC was 3.71 million viewers and 4th for the night, 3rd if you don’t count a news program. 4.04 million watched the regeneration

Edited October 26, 2022 by DanaK

[tennisgurl]

So, in true Chris Chibnall style, instead of doing a long in depth post discussing my thoughts on this finale, Jodi's run, and what I think about the direction the show will be taking based on what we've seen, here are a bunch of random thoughts thrown at the wall based on my first thoughts! 

I hoped and prayed that the master would start playing Rasputin while dancing around, and I was not disappointed, although the best part of that scene was the Dalek and Cyberman exchanging a "are you seeing this?" look as he rocked out. I never thought that two alien robots incapable of making expressions could so easily express a look of pure "what the ever loving fuck" between each other. 

I overall really enjoyed this, mostly because I turned my brain off from second one and just let the spectacle and nostalgia wash over me. Like with most Chibnall stories, its got WAY too much going on, he just always throws a million things at the wall to see what sticks regardless or how it ends up fitting together, but I admit to enjoying his madness. If I don't like one plot or character, don't worry, it will gone in about five seconds to give time to yet another plot or character in a minute. That makes him a rather hit or miss showrunner, with high highs and low lows, but I was at least never bored. 

Not much about the child or that whole plot, which was for the best. Like every showrunner, Chibnall felt the need to add his stamp to the mythology and I never thought that his retcons were very well thought out or interesting enough to justify them. I am not a person obsessed with continuity, but the way he made balloon animals out of the shows history in the name of adding drama never sat well with me, I never felt like he came up with a real reason to add so much messiness to the backstory besides wanting to leave his mark on the franchise and make some sort of vague points about...stuff. 

I am such a sucker for a team up, so I loved seeing Ace and Tegan again, kicking ass again and getting to get some closure with their respective doctors, and I love seeing the companions support group, a thing that I know people have speculated on for years. I would have liked to see some representation from New Who, especially Martha, who should still be around, but most New Who companions are scattered throughout time and space, so I get it mostly being Classic Who companions. Even Ian, one of the ones who started it all! Looking great for a man in his late 90s as well! 

RIP all those UNIT soldiers who died in that explosion, who no one seems to remember. Just like how the majority of the universe may or may not be destroyed still after the Flux. 

Dan sure got a half assed goodbye, although I guess it fits his normal bloke sort of vibe. I do appreciate that all of 13's companions have gotten rather low key voluntary goodbyes after so much tragedy and drama followed the exits of the previous companions. Just a "that's enough for me" and a hug works just fine. I also figured that we weren't going to get a full romance between Yaz and the Doctor, its pretty rare for them to REALLY go there with Doctor's and companions, I thought their goodbye was nice. 

I liked Jodi's goodbye and while her run as the Doctor certainly had a lot of flaws, I thought she was a great fit as an actress and I found Thirteen to be a very charming and endearing incarnation. She had that sort of manic Ten energy but was more of a quirky tinkerer and explorer with a wide eyed way of looking at the universe. Her regeneration looking at the sunrise over an ocean and the "Tag, your it!" felt very in character and like a good send off. 

A wild Tennant appears! I yelled "what?" at my screen quite a few times, color me very intrigued. 

[libgirl2]

9 minutes ago, tennisgurl said:

I hoped and prayed that the master would start playing Rasputin while dancing around, and I was not disappointed, although the best part of that scene was the Dalek and Cyberman exchanging a "are you seeing this?" look as he rocked out. I never thought that two alien robots incapable of making expressions could so easily express a look of pure "what the ever loving fuck" between each other. 

I am such a sucker for a team up, so I loved seeing Ace and Tegan again, kicking ass again and getting to get some closure with their respective doctors, and I love seeing the companions support group, a thing that I know people have speculated on for years. I would have liked to see some representation from New Who, especially Martha, who should still be around, but most New Who companions are scattered throughout time and space, so I get it mostly being Classic Who companions. Even Ian, one of the ones who started it all! Looking great for a man in his late 90s as well! 

That look between the Dalek and Cyberman was one of my favorite parts of the show, that and seeing Ian. 

[Bruinsfan]

On 10/24/2022 at 6:26 PM, greekmom said:

Why did it take a long time for Jodie's Doctor to regenerate but in previous regenerations it was pretty instant.  Jodie had time to hang out with Yaz and have an ice cream.

I'm pretty sure everything from the Doctor's initial glow to Tennant's reappearance would fit within the time span of Capaldi's interminable speech to his future incarnation, and if memory serves he'd been holding the regeneration at bay since the end of the previous episode.

[DanaK]

46 minutes ago, Bruinsfan said:

I'm pretty sure everything from the Doctor's initial glow to Tennant's reappearance would fit within the time span of Capaldi's interminable speech to his future incarnation, and if memory serves he'd been holding the regeneration at bay since the end of the previous episode.

Plus David’s 10th Doctor held it in for awhile, at least long enough to revisit his old companions. So it’s been done at least a couple of times before

[Good Queen Jane]

21 hours ago, tennisgurl said:

RIP all those UNIT soldiers who died in that explosion, who no one seems to remember.

Didn't Liz make a deal that all the soldiers taken over by the Daleks and Cybermen be restored and released before she gave herself up? Although there wasn't anything shown, I'm assuming the bad guys kept the deal and all the UNIT folk were ushered out of the building before it went down.

[Llywela]

23 minutes ago, Good Queen Jane said:

Didn't Liz make a deal that all the soldiers taken over by the Daleks and Cybermen be restored and released before she gave herself up? Although there wasn't anything shown, I'm assuming the bad guys kept the deal and all the UNIT folk were ushered out of the building before it went down.

That was the deal, yes, but what we were shown was Kate (not Liz) being dragged off to be converted with no sign of the Cybermen complying with their end of the deal. There wasn't time for any de-conversion, even if such a thing were possible. If any imprisoned, non-converted soldiers had been released, we needed to see that, not be left to assume or wonder. Because Cybermen cannot ever be trusted to keep to such a deal, from which they have nothing to gain.

It was a loose end and probably shouldn't have been, given the implied loss of life.

[Affogato]

I haven't watched Dr Who between four and nine, so I was lost to a lot of the nostalgia.  Tennant was a surprise.  I did like that the story had a lot of scenes with women on the older end of middle age, doing important and active tasks, because that is rare and precious in our society (although men do this all the time). That said, I kind of wish they had figured out how to work Michelle Gomez into this, as a much more nuanced and interesting and appropriate version of The Master. Because this master is not that interesting. and seems like a wind up villain (wind him up and see him cackle and stroke his moustachios). Yes, his dance was cute, but Rasputin seemed random. I felt that the Dalek/Cyberman/Master mash up was just screaming vague and disconnected chaos and ultimately end of the world, must be tuesday.

I thought when Dan left, it was revelatory. Jodie is the only doctor that has that extreme sport approach, and only after the first season, when everyone responded so well to the spyfall show. But I can see for anyone that would be tiring. scary.  For the Doctor, traumatized by that imprisonment it would be a validation, look I'm alive, but who could keep up? The thing about Dan leaving, I felt she realized that she hadn't even noticed it bothered him and that bothered her.  We didn't have time to explore that, though.  She couldn't face Dan, but she managed a graceful goodbye to Yaz.

The doctor's need for connection and the toll on the companions needed more time to breath in this episode and it didn't get it. It is too bad, because that seems to have been the thread that holds Jodie's run together. She wants a family, and the companions--all of them--want something else. Graham did what she couldn't, and he did it for her--maybe, considering the meetup with Yaz--at The Doctor's instigation, when she knew she was regenerating. That worked.

[AudienceofOne]

3 hours ago, Affogato said:

Jodie is the only doctor that has that extreme sport approach, and only after the first season, when everyone responded so well to the spyfall show. But I can see for anyone that would be tiring. scary.  For the Doctor, traumatized by that imprisonment it would be a validation, look I'm alive, but who could keep up?

There's a reason also (apart from nostalgia) that the two companions brought back were Ace and Tegan. Tegan especially because she literally marched out of the TARDIS and said she'd had enough of the violence and death and that travelling with the Doctor simply wasn't fun anymore. And the Doctor felt this accusation so deeply he did in fact just up and leave and so when she turned back to potentially talk it out with him and have a further discussion, he was just... gone.

While there's no canonical reason for Ace's departure - she was there at the end when the show got cancelled but not in the terrible film I'd prefer to forget existed - they also imply she and the Doctor had a similar falling out and she chooses to leave because travelling with him isn't right for her anymore.

So Chibnall - and I actually love this about his era regardless of its other problems - portrays companions as people whose paths intersect with the Doctor for a brief period but who then move on with their own lives. It's a definite improvement on Moffatt who thought that people (read women) would have to die to leave the Doctor because the character was no more than an avatar for his own childish misogynistic fantasies.

It's actually very healthy for Yaz, as it was for Martha, to just realise the time is over and leave. And then join a support group in Yaz's case, which I wholeheartedly support.

[Eulipian 5k]

When Yaz asked Ace about being under a volcano and Ace pulled out her (not cricket) bat, could easily have been Dan whipping out his wok, "I'm ready!" It seems many roles and lines were switched around due to actor's availability:

• Obviously, Wilf would have been at the Only-Companions chat. (well, we'll get Donna, anyway)

[DanaK]

1 hour ago, AudienceofOne said:

There's a reason also (apart from nostalgia) that the two companions brought back were Ace and Tegan. Tegan especially because she literally marched out of the TARDIS and said she'd had enough of the violence and death and that travelling with the Doctor simply wasn't fun anymore. And the Doctor felt this accusation so deeply he did in fact just up and leave and so when she turned back to potentially talk it out with him and have a further discussion, he was just... gone.

While there's no canonical reason for Ace's departure - she was there at the end when the show got cancelled but not in the terrible film I'd prefer to forget existed - they also imply she and the Doctor had a similar falling out and she chooses to leave because travelling with him isn't right for her anymore.

So Chibnall - and I actually love this about his era regardless of its other problems - portrays companions as people whose paths intersect with the Doctor for a brief period but who then move on with their own lives. It's a definite improvement on Moffatt who thought that people (read women) would have to die to leave the Doctor because the character was no more than an avatar for his own childish misogynistic fantasies.

It's actually very healthy for Yaz, as it was for Martha, to just realise the time is over and leave. And then join a support group in Yaz's case, which I wholeheartedly support.

Chibnall said one of the main reasons he chose Ace and Tegan was they were more a modern type companion

[Llywela]

11 hours ago, Eulipian 5k said:

When Yaz asked Ace about being under a volcano and Ace pulled out her (not cricket) bat

This makes me curious. What did people who've not seen the classic show make of that bat Ace was using? Because to me, it was instantly recognisable as a callback to my childhood, watching Ace and Seven in the late 80s. A baseball bat rather than a cricket bat, yes. Ace used to carry a baseball bat around with her in her rucksack - she was 16, it was a relic of her very recent schooldays. In Remembrance of the Daleks, the Doctor used the Hand of Omega to soup it up, making it much harder and more durable, enough to damage Dalek casing when deployed against them - as Ace did in that serial, and then again here.

I've an idea the original bat may have been destroyed or at least damaged in Remembrance, but Ace stayed was still with the Doctor for some time after that, I've no trouble believing that he repaired it or got her a new one.

[DoctorAtomic]

I enjoyed the special. Doctor Who is what it is. I like this Master because he's just all over the place. You get to when the Daleks and Cybermen are side eying each other like, 'this guy? what are we doing now?' that you're Master plan is kind of out there. 

I was spoiled for Ten/Fourteen because I couldn't watch last Sunday when the special aired, and of course social media wouldn't even wait 15 seconds. I did like that Fourteen pulled the teeth gag and then was legitimately confused as to why they were Ten again. In my head, I always think that while the regenerations aren't totally controllable, the Doctor's subconscious influences. 

Since we know Fourteen is going to be short lived, and they were reaching back for this regeneration, I would have liked if they went to Eight instead, and give McGann a proper run. It's not like he isn't game. I mean, RTD when they rebooted the show with Nine, was clear to make sure McGann was canon as Eight. 

[bugsmum]

I deeply appreciate Jodie's regeneration being more low key than the over the top Moffat era spectacles.  For both 11 and 12 - especially 11 - all I thought was "oh for god's sake get on with it."   

And yes, it's nice when a companion can stop traveling with the Doctor and live to tell the tale.  

[DoctorAtomic]

I'm very glad Dan was able to walk too. That's three companions in a row! I'm totally unspoiled, but Yaz seems ride or die to me. 

[Llywela]

1 hour ago, DoctorAtomic said:

I'm very glad Dan was able to walk too. That's three companions in a row! I'm totally unspoiled, but Yaz seems ride or die to me. 

I'm confused. Have you seen this episode or not? Because you are posting in an episode discussion thread chock-full of spoiler-filled episode discussion, but you say you are totally unspoiled, yet you are talking about one companion as if you know exactly how their story ends, while mentioning the other in a way that suggests you don't know where their story in this episode takes them? Which makes it hard to discuss.

[DoctorAtomic]

I watched it last night. I posted about it after I watched it. I didn't check the thread here until I watched it, but because it aired last week everyone was going bonkers about Tennant basically immediately after the show ended in the UK airing. So I knew he was going to make an appearance. 

I'm unspoiled as to what may happen with Yaz in upcoming specials. I didn't get the impression she was leaving the Doctor like Dan did. Given that the last three companions were able to walk away, I'm concerned Yaz might have a tragic ending. 

[Llywela]

13 minutes ago, DoctorAtomic said:

I watched it last night. I posted about it after I watched it. I didn't check the thread here until I watched it, but because it aired last week everyone was going bonkers about Tennant basically immediately after the show ended in the UK airing. So I knew he was going to make an appearance. 

I'm unspoiled as to what may happen with Yaz in upcoming specials. I didn't get the impression she was leaving the Doctor like Dan did. Given that the last three companions were able to walk away, I'm concerned Yaz might have a tragic ending. 

Okay, then we can discuss this. Yaz has already left. We saw her leaving in this episode. She shared a final ice cream with the Doctor, then she was dropped off in London (at least, it seemed like it was meant to be London, although she lives in Sheffield) while the Doctor went off to Durdle Door in Dorset to regenerate. Yaz then joined the support group for ex-companions, as her first step toward Life After The Doctor. She has already walked away.

The episode didn't tell us why she walked away. Like you said, she's always been pretty ride-or-die, gave up her whole career to be with the Doctor. But she and the Doctor both seemed to take it completely for granted that the Doctor's regeneration signalled the end of their time together. Then they said their goodbyes and parted company without examining why they felt that way. We are left to draw our own conclusions. But Yaz has very definitely left. There is not going to be a tragic ending. She already had a soft, bittersweet ending.

Edited October 30, 2022 by Llywela

[DanaK]

1 hour ago, Llywela said:

Okay, then we can discuss this. Yaz has already left. We saw her leaving in this episode. She shared a final ice cream with the Doctor, then she was dropped off in London (at least, it seemed like it was meant to be London, although she lives in Sheffield) while the Doctor went off to Durdle Door in Dorset to regenerate. Yaz then joined the support group for ex-companions, as her first step toward Life After The Doctor. She has already walked away.

The episode didn't tell us why she walked away. Like you said, she's always been pretty ride-or-die, gave up her whole career to be with the Doctor. But she and the Doctor both seemed to take it completely for granted that the Doctor's regeneration signalled the end of their time together. Then they said their goodbyes and parted company without examining why they felt that way. We are left to draw our own conclusions. But Yaz has very definitely left. There is not going to be a tragic ending. She already had a soft, bittersweet ending.

Given that the Doctor gently turned her down in Legend of the Sea Devils and just wanted to remain friends (though that was a bit ambiguous at the time) and live in the moment, Yaz likely realized that seeing how things went with Ace and Tegan and with the Doctor regenerating, it was time to leave. Some of it was implied but given the Doctor liked her back but was too afraid to have a relationship with her (from Legends), it seemed only a matter of time before Yaz realized it was best to leave and go live her life. The Doctor likely felt the same way, hence her wanting to regenerate alone. The Doctor is a hero to so many in the universe, but is a mess in her personal life and can't really get close to most people.

Also, the Doctor dropped Yaz in the same place the other companions were meeting; Dan or Graham mentioned she supposedly had a mysterious invite like them. I don't know if that's the same place (Croydon?) Yaz dropped off her group after the Doctor lost consciousness

Edited October 30, 2022 by DanaK