Dr. Who

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My disappointment is immeasurable and my day is ruined.

If anyone needs me, I'll be crying into a tub of ice cream / watching Sense & Sensibility.
 
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starborn427614 said:
Whoever's next definitely has a lot riding on them, maybe even more so than Eccleston did back in 2005.
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I think the risk is definitely higher. Doctor Who was a fairly obscure nerd show when it came back in '05, with only the failed Fox pilot and PBS reruns as exposure in America. Not a lot of people comparatively got to experience the fall of Who in 89.

It rose to extreme highs in the early 10s and has crashed down now. Lots of folks have experienced Moffat getting high on his own farts, and Chibnall actively murdering the show in real time. I'm all for the show getting cancelled at least point. I will be shocked if anyone can pull it out of the fire now
 
UnKillShredDur said:
Didn't it also kind of start out as shit? "Cyberwoman" was one of the first few episodes after all. (and yes, Chinballs wrote it, he wrote a lot of other bad episodes as well iirc.)

I honestly haven't watched Torchwood in a very long while, but I basically remember it being Doctor Who, but for "adult" people who laugh at words like 'penis' and 'fart'. Not the worst premise for somebody like me, but the writing was pretty consistently shit from the beginning.

If anything, I remember "Children of Earth" (which was technically Series 3) being *significantly* better than the first 2 series were. It was kind of similar to 10's first episode, "The Christmas Invasion," except the Doctor never showed up to stop the alien invasion. That's a great idea for a story. The only thing about it that bugged me, was that after Captain Jack killed his grandson to stop the invasion (which he arguably had no choice but to do), there is no way in hell that the Doctor (if written properly) would have ever wanted anything to do with him again. So in retrospect, I guess it's a good thing that Barrowman liked to pull his penis out on set and sexually assault people 15+ years ago, because now that people actually care about such obviously retarded behavior, he probably won't be back to Doctor Who any time soon XD.

Miracle day *was* fucking garbage though.
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I would like to point out that Children of Earth, chronologically, is the second-to-last appearance of Jack.

His last appearance is in End of Time. Where the Doctor shows up and basically says "You need to get laid, Jack."
 
To be real though, I’m kinda wanting to get a bit into the lore of Doctor Who.

My dads side of the family really enjoyed other Sci-Fi-Space Epics like Star Wars, Star Trek and Battlestar Galactica, so I was surprised I never even heard of Dr. Who until the 00s

I’m big into 80s Television Programs. Was the 80s incarnation and storylines any good?
 
TrippinKahlua said:
To be real though, I’m kinda wanting to get a bit into the lore of Doctor Who.

My dads side of the family really enjoyed other Sci-Fi-Space Epics like Star Wars, Star Trek and Battlestar Galactica, so I was surprised I never even heard of Dr. Who until the 00s

I’m big into 80s Television Programs. Was the 80s incarnation and storylines any good?
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It started in the 60s, overall good but hit or miss, especially as the years went on. Tom Baker played the 4th doctor through much of the 70s and into the early 80s. He's still considered by many to be the definitive doctor, so much so he had a cameo in the 50th anniversary special.

The 5th, 6th, and 7th doctors rounded out the 80s, and generally were more inconsistent and cheese. The 7th started finding his stride in many people's opinions, but by that point the ratings were in the dumps and the show was soon cancelled.

Classic episodes were on iPlayer and britbox, probably other services as well.
 
Dixieland Buckaroo said:
It started in the 60s, overall good but hit or miss, especially as the years went on. Tom Baker played the 4th doctor through much of the 70s and into the early 80s. He's still considered by many to be the definitive doctor, so much so he had a cameo in the 50th anniversary special.

The 5th, 6th, and 7th doctors rounded out the 80s, and generally were more inconsistent and cheese. The 7th started finding his stride in many people's opinions, but by that point the ratings were in the dumps and the show was soon cancelled.

Classic episodes were on iPlayer and britbox, probably other services as well.
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If you don't want to pay, Pluto TV has a classic who channel. Stream all you want for free.
 
IDanceonTrannyGraves said:
Reminder - the new special is this weekend.
I'm moderately curious because of the Sea Devils, but I suspect that's what Chibs is banking on.
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The teaser had some nice visuals but I just can't believe Chibnall magically making good Who at this point.

For those who haven't seen it:
 
TrippinKahlua said:
To be real though, I’m kinda wanting to get a bit into the lore of Doctor Who.

My dads side of the family really enjoyed other Sci-Fi-Space Epics like Star Wars, Star Trek and Battlestar Galactica, so I was surprised I never even heard of Dr. Who until the 00s

I’m big into 80s Television Programs. Was the 80s incarnation and storylines any good?
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I kind of dropped out of Who mid-run on the Twelfth Doctor. And everything I saw of Jodie Whitaker's Doctor never enticed me back in the slightest. But... prior to that I was a pretty big Doctor Who fan. So here is my disordered suggestions to you on the subject.

The lore was mostly consistent-ish up until the Whitaker era. Sure, some mad stuff but for the most part could be patched over with some theories here and there. The Eighties is one of the worst times to look at DW though as that's when there were some weird plans to make him some kind of super-special person. Prior to Seven, he was pretty much the hooligan drop-out of Time Lord society. When he makes a snide remark about Romana's grades at the academy her response is something like: "well it's better than scraping through with a pass on my second attempt". Of course he makes up for that with his experience and more general cunning but the take-away is that he's nothing inherently special in Time Lord society. And in fact, becomes something of a useful tool of them at one point when they want a little plausible deniability on messing with the time stream. In Eight, there's all this stuff about "who he really is". For me that undermines the character somewhat though the ship is somewhat righted in the Nine/Ten/Eleven era when there's an actual reason the Doctor is this special case due to his role in the Time War. That said, I'm probably misrepresenting things given incidences like the "President of Gallifrey" stuff but somehow things like that never seemed to change the general character the way 80's hints of "it was a time of chaos" and certainly stuff like the Whitaker "timeless child" guff.

Anyway, getting ahead of myself. Here's a run down of the Doctors for everyone else to disagree with, written from the point of view of telling you what you might and might not like.

First Doctor (William Hartnell). Minimal budget, no reference to the Time Lords, Doctor Who really was an unknown stranger we knew nothing about except that he had a grand-daughter Susan with whom he travelled. You'll see some amusing and unintended historical comedy, plots that move at black and white TV serial pace (i.e. slowly) but is generally pretty entertaining. It's also got a lot more pure historicals in it. I.e. no aliens or monsters, just hanging out with Aztecs, etc. Good stuff and fun to watch, imo. So long as you have a liking and tolerance for old stuff.

Side-rant: I absolutely hate what they did with the First Doctor in the Christmas Special of a few years ago where they made him cartoonishly sexist and prudish. He was never this in the original series. Worst he ever did was ask a woman to make him some tea (she was an office assistant, iirc) and threaten Susan with a "jolly good spanked bottom" (she was his grand-daughter). I mean the guy is from an advanced society where both male and female time lords appear to be treated entirely equally, have the same educational opportunities and on rare occasions, someone will spontaneously change sex on death. So WHY is he acting like a caricature of a sexist old man?

Second Doctor (Patrick Troughton). One of my favourite Doctors. Even more of a trouble-maker than the First Doctor. It is in his era that we first get hints of the Time Lords. He's a mischievous little imp and his adventures tend to be more consistently Sci-Fi than the First Doctor's. He also has two of the best companions in Jamie (a Scottish Highlander rescued from a battle) and Victoria (a very prim Victorian young lady). I can still hear their voices now as they sit on a space station in their distant future:
Jamie: "Did ye see what them wimmen were wearing, Victoria?"
Victoria: "Yes, Jamie. I did."
Jamie: "Do you ever imagine yeself might be wearin' something like that, Victoria?"
Victoria: "No, Jamie, I do not."

I've probably mangled the dialogue but they were a perfect foil to the Second Doctor.

Anyway, I find the Second Doctor run enjoyable. You might roll your eyes a little at the Thunderbirds level of special effects and ideas that seemed original then but have been heavily mined since. Still, it lays a lot of the groundwork of the Doctor Who lore and there were several call backs in NuWho to things introduced there (Great Intelligence comes to mind).

Third Doctor (Sean Pertwee): Probably budget reasons but for most of his run the Third Doctor is confined to Earth. He is not happy about this and makes sure to make everyone else aware that he is unhappy. This expands the lore of the Time Lords significantly and also introduces some key elements of the canon such as the Master. From the newcomers point of view I am in two minds as to recommend this as a good insertion point. There's some great stuff in here but also there's some terribly hammy stuff which is going to be either hilariously camp and amusing, or make you roll your eyes so hard coins come out your mouth. Such as the Doctor's space judo... alright, fine - Venusian Aikido. Same difference. I guess with what we know about the Doctor from later on we can surmise he was probably just trolling the people around him epically. At least that's my head-cannon and I'm sticking with it. Anyway, Three is your "Action Doctor". Interesting stuff from a lore perspective but brace yourself for long scenes of people driving cars or sailing boats and some mad hammyness. Also a giant, talking green penis.

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We do get Sarah Jane. Deservedly one of the best companions. She carries through into the Fourth Doctor era. And even reappears in the Ten era. She's great. RIP Elizabeth Sladden, you are missed (and remained strangely hot even in your final years).

Fourth Doctor (Tom Baker). This is where Doctor Who really went off the wall. And I'm not talking about the terrible first story they did with the giant robot (the Fourth era does get much better, I promise). Where it went off the wall is that the Second and Third Doctors had both been sort of playing the same character. The idea of a personality change on regeneration hadn't been established. There were differences but not wildly exaggerated ones. Tom Baker was having none of that. He knew who he wanted to play and did so, scripts and directors be damned! And he was amazing. Terrifying, but amazing. Probably the most influential Doctor until Nine in terms of how they changed the character fundamentally. (Nine because it was post-Time War and this brought a very new trait to the Doctor - haunted by the past).

It's not Eighties but you could certainly enjoyably jump in here. The Fourth era contains many classics and also introduced another long-running character, Davros (creator of the Daleks). It's an extremely long run so there's plenty of good and bad in it. Just like there is in Tom Baker's spin on the Doctor. If I might make a suggestion, you could do worse than check out City of Death and Genesis of the Daleks as two good story arcs to try.

Fifth Doctor (Peter Davison). I didn't really like the Fifth Doctor so much when I was a kid. I found him kind of wishy-washy and weak. I don't know how re-watching it because he's anything but. The budgets and special effects in this era are almost legendarily bad. I can't think of anything particularly significant in terms of lore off the top of my head from this era, but I'm sure there is. Mainly my childhood memories are taken up with the pneumatic companion Perri that was introduced. Also, the Doctor playing Cricket. I do like the way he replies "Fast" when asked what sort of bowler he is. Very confident.

You'll need a strong tolerance for bad sets for some of this but there's some real gems in it. We also get Nyssa, the actress of which decided to remove her dress in her last story arc to "give the fans a treat". I liked Nyssa. ❤️

Sixth Doctor (Colin Baker, no relation). I have a great fondness for Six. Not only is the actor himself a wonderful human being whose magnanimous personality is matched only by his magnanimous waist, but the Big Finish audios he recorded are some of the best radio plays out there. I also really liked his Doctor. Unfortunately his initial storyline put a lot of people off. Five nearly died big time, barely able to regenerate. And its hinted that Six's instability and erratic initial behaviour are confusion from being so close to final death. But he certainly has some of the more violent outburts of any Doctor. It's hard to imagine Ten seeing someone tumble into a vat of acid and make a snarky quip about it.

Six's era is underrated, imo. Though I may be influenced by the audio dramas that he did later.

Blast - out of time. I might do more later if you're interested.
 
TrippinKahlua said:
To be real though, I’m kinda wanting to get a bit into the lore of Doctor Who.

My dads side of the family really enjoyed other Sci-Fi-Space Epics like Star Wars, Star Trek and Battlestar Galactica, so I was surprised I never even heard of Dr. Who until the 00s

I’m big into 80s Television Programs. Was the 80s incarnation and storylines any good?
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While starting with 80s Doctor Who is doable, the show's golden years was the 70s as the 80s was a bit of a "dark age" for the franchise, for better or worse.

If you want to properly start with 80s Who, I'd start with the Fifth Doctor as Davison's run was a big soft reboot for the franchise after seven years of Tom Baker as Doctor Who. It's also a bit fan servicey as Doctor Who's writing team started to pander to the show's fanbase with classic monsters showing up and heavy usage of the Master as the Doctor's main arch enemy over the Daleks (who only appear once in the Davison's run). Also Davison's Doctor had a full crew of sidekicks, including a couple of male sidekicks who range from "the scrappy teenage male sidekick played straight" (Adric) and the "the scrappy teenage male sidekick subverted in that he's amoral though has a heart of gold behind the jerkness" (Torlough).

After Davison was the Colin Baker run, which was two seasons and one holdover serial in Davison's run (The Twin Delimma, which is considered to be the worst Doctor Who story ever made in the classic era).

Davison's Doctor was a quiet, photogenic pretty boy who was the cool uncle who fans loved. Colin's Doctor.... was a complete and total asshole from start to finish. This was to make him different from Davison, though everyone and their mother involved in the Colin Baker years have since pushed the damage control line where "the sixth Doctor was supposed to be an asshole but slowly mellow out, with the eventual reveal that he was such a cunt because X was going to happen". With X being "the Doctor is going to die for realz, as seen with Rememberance of the Dalek having the big moment where we see the Doctor visiting his own grave" or "the Doctor's going to have to blow up Gallifrey to keep the Master from conquering it".

The second season of Colin's run Doctor was a season long arc that is of very hit or miss quality but the damage was done and Colin fired replaced by Sylvester McCoy.

McCoy's run saw the arrival of Andrew Cartmel to run the writing room and Cartmel wanted to turn the Doctor into a man of mystery with the end goal being retconning his entire past (the rape of the Doctor under Chinball, BTW, is directly the fault of Cartmel and his "masterplan" to reveal that the Doctor had multiple lives beyond the seven regenerations shown on TV by that point and had existed at the dawn of the Time Lord society as "The Other". Chinball, a huge Doctor Who fanboy in his youth, never fucking got over Cartmel never being allowed to execute his plan or that when it DID get executed in the New Adventure novels, that the backlash from other fans were so great that RTD pretty much declared the New Adventure novels non-canon so he wouldn't have to deal with the Cartmel Masterplan retcons).

McCoy's first serial was really bad but mainly because Colin Baker refused to come back to film a proper regeneration scene. McCoy was the Doctor for three seasons and while they were reviled for the most part when they aired, they quickly saw reevaluation by fans who saw them outside the context of when they first aired by people watching the show for the first time after the cancellation.

McCoy's run doesn't "really start" until year two. His first year ended with him trading out Baker era sidekick Mel for the scrappy teenager Ace; recreating the young girl/older mentor dynamic of old with the added twist that Ace is being manipulated by a cosmic horror which we find out in the second to last McCoy era serial. Outside "The Happiness Patrol" (a particularly reviled episode that was Cartmel and his writers in full-on "Fuck you Margaret Thatcher" mode), the Ace seasons are considered better than the Colin Baker and Davison years but not as good as the Tom Baker seasons.
 
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