- Joined
- Aug 9, 2014
If you read The Writer's Tale you realise Davies had a boner for every male actor on the show.
Dr. Who
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- Joined
- Feb 3, 2013
i heard captain jack harkness was originally written as a self-insert and was so pissed that he couldn't play the role himself that he made torchwood to make the character suffer
- Joined
- Oct 27, 2017
Captain Jack was a shitty character, but Rose was so much worse that he looked better by comparison.
L
LN 910
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kiwifarms.net
Moffat wrote him the best, ironically.
- Joined
- Oct 27, 2017
Hopefully it'll be the sendoff they deserve.
L
LN 910
Guest
kiwifarms.net
Redpill me on Jago and Litefoot.
- Joined
- Oct 27, 2017
You asked for it...
Henry Gordon Jago and Professor George Litefoot were 2 semi-companions in The 4th Doctor's "The Talons of Weng-Chiang". They only appeared in the one tv serial, however they apparently made enough of an impression to become fan favorites to this day.
More than 30 years after that, Big Finish brought them back for a single doctorless episode/backdoor pilot: http://tardis.wikia.com/wiki/The_Mahogany_Murderers_(audio_story) which went over so well that they ended up getting 13 seasons, a handful solo specials, and a couple of crossovers with the 4th doctor's audio series, worth of material over the next 8ish years out of it, (which only ended due to the death of Litefoot's actor.)
The setting of the series is Victorian
London, and as such it's technically a period piece... But one with a ton of paranormal and extraterrestrial intrusions. (Surprisingly, and to the series' credit, it leans on Doctor Who very rarely for baddies. This means no Daleks, Cybermen, etc.. these guys wouldn't realistically be able to deal with threats of that magnitude.)
The premise is that the pair act as "infernal investigators" (think Sherlock Holmes with aliens, monsters, vampires, etc... The comparison to Holmes is made in story more than once).
It's a bit slow starting at first, but up to a certain point at least, each season is better than the last in my opinion.
One reason for this (one of the series' greatest strengths in fact) is that it's never afraid to mix things up before it gets too stale, notably the time where
they temporarily get trapped in the 1960's for an entire season... And it totally works...
A seasoned whovian may recognize a few familiar faces (err.. Voices) throughout, including
Leela
The 6th Doctor
The Master
Straxx the Sontaran from new Who
The series has a LOT of heart, and you can really tell everyone involved was having the time of their lives making it.
I'm sure I've already sperged more than enough about J&L, but I honestly can not recommend this series highly enough.
Their first audio (the backdoor pilot I mentioned) is a bit rough around the edges, and in a slightly different format from the rest of the series, but it can be purchased from big finish cheaply enough: https://www.bigfinish.com/releases/v/the-mahogany-murderers-475
And if you don't have a problem with piracy, it can obviously be procured cheaper than that... I'm sure... No help there though.
Hope that helped.
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- Joined
- Aug 9, 2014
Everyone's eagerly awaiting Series 11, but personally I can't wait for Ravenous, the latest four-boxset Eighth Doctor series from Big Finish, the first of which is coming out in April. I loved Doom Coalition (much preferred it to Dark Eyes which I thought was a letdown) so I'm looking forward to hearing the follow up.
- Joined
- Feb 3, 2013
Why? What'd he do?
- Joined
- Oct 27, 2017
Dark eyes had a decent setup... But yeah, it totally fell apart by the end... A low point in 8's tenure to be sure.
As for Doom Coalition, I liked it... But wanted to smack Helen for most of it. Liv is such a cynic though, I love it.
- Joined
- Aug 9, 2014
Right, you've prompted the Dark Eyes rant. Here we go...
For those unaware of what the hell we're talking about, Dark Eyes is a series of four boxsets, each containing four CDs featuring the Eighth Doctor. They take place after the Eighth Doctor Adventures and his main range stories. Together the four boxsets form an overarching story. The first Dark Eyes won a radio award, and the series is pretty popular among fandom, but not with me, and I shall now explain why:
I won't spoil what happens in Lucie Miller and To The Death, the finale of the Eighth Doctor Adventures because you need to listen to them unspoiled. Like, right now. Seriously, go listen to those two. You won't regret it. But to sum it up, the Daleks seriously fuck up the Eighth Doctor's shit. The Daleks have become a bit dull and toothless lately and Lucie Miller and To The Death are one of the now-rare occasions they're genuinely nasty fucking bastards. By the end of To The Death, the Doctor's ready to rain absolute bloody murder down on them and for good reason.
This would've been a great opportunity to take the Eighth Doctor to a very dark place. They basically implied at the end of To The Death that he was ready to go back and finish the job the Fourth Doctor started in Genesis of the Daleks, or if not that, light the spark that would start the fire of the Time War. So what happens in Dark Eyes to follow up that great finale?
We get another generic Dalek runaround which puts the Eighth Doctor right back where he started before Lucie Miller or To The Death, with none of the emotional stakes or impact those stories had. What a waste.
And that's only the beginning of the issues with Dark Eyes. The first boxset ends with a total reset button which writer Nicholas Briggs also used in Sisters of the Flame and The Vengeance of Morbius, but at least there it didn't invalidate the entire season that had come before. This in turn kicks off a problem that leads into the next three boxsets which, to be fair, is not entirely the writers' faults.
Dark Eyes, unlike Doom Coalition, was never planned to be four boxsets. This means that after the first one, the writers have to pull a story out of their arse that somehow connects to the first Dark Eyes (even though the events of the first Dark Eyes never happened so what's the point?) and also sets up a larger story that can sustain three more boxsets. We get introduced to a villain called the Eminence which was created by Big Finish and is a cool idea for an enemy, but never quite as cool as the writers want it to be, especially since the Daleks end up getting sidelined in favour of it.
One thing I liked about the Eminence was that it had a cool mystique to it - an ancient evil from the dawn of time type vibe. This gets ruined by having it revealed that it was some scientist in the far future's experiment gone wrong. It's Midichlorian levels of lame.
Things had started to improve a bit by Dark Eyes 4 when Big Finish realised they should just let John Dorney and Matt Fitton do their thing, but then we get to the overall ending of the entire four boxset saga where it's revealed that the whole thing is essentially just an extended origin story for Big Finish's pet villain the Eminence. It's the ultimate damp squib ending.
And Molly O'Sullivan. Jesus Christ. One of the worst companions ever. She could give Rose Tyler or Clara Oswald a run for their money. The character is just Nicholas Briggs's Mary Sue and a particularly grating one at that. Coming on the heels of Charley Pollard, Lucie Miller and Mary Shelley herself, she has a lot to live up to, but doesn't even come close. There's a reason beyond Ruth Bradley (the actress who played her)'s limited availability she gets abandoned in favour of Liv Chenka halfway through. The only time she was bearable was in Dark Eyes 4 where she was more or less a completely different character to the one we'd seen before, having had to live through a Dalek invasion and played by a completely different actress. Still, I suppose it could've been worse:
This isn't to say Dark Eyes doesn't have its moments. Alex Macqueen as the Master is a delight as always (who'd have thought Neil's dad from The Inbetweeners could be so menacing?), there's some cool Dalek action and seeing the Daleks meet the Sontarans properly for the first time is almost worth the high price of admission. Dark Eyes 3 and 4 also get off to strong starts that are worth experiencing even if they lead to weak endings. That said, I think overall Dark Eyes is a major net loss rather than a net gain.
This would've been a great opportunity to take the Eighth Doctor to a very dark place. They basically implied at the end of To The Death that he was ready to go back and finish the job the Fourth Doctor started in Genesis of the Daleks, or if not that, light the spark that would start the fire of the Time War. So what happens in Dark Eyes to follow up that great finale?
We get another generic Dalek runaround which puts the Eighth Doctor right back where he started before Lucie Miller or To The Death, with none of the emotional stakes or impact those stories had. What a waste.
And that's only the beginning of the issues with Dark Eyes. The first boxset ends with a total reset button which writer Nicholas Briggs also used in Sisters of the Flame and The Vengeance of Morbius, but at least there it didn't invalidate the entire season that had come before. This in turn kicks off a problem that leads into the next three boxsets which, to be fair, is not entirely the writers' faults.
Dark Eyes, unlike Doom Coalition, was never planned to be four boxsets. This means that after the first one, the writers have to pull a story out of their arse that somehow connects to the first Dark Eyes (even though the events of the first Dark Eyes never happened so what's the point?) and also sets up a larger story that can sustain three more boxsets. We get introduced to a villain called the Eminence which was created by Big Finish and is a cool idea for an enemy, but never quite as cool as the writers want it to be, especially since the Daleks end up getting sidelined in favour of it.
One thing I liked about the Eminence was that it had a cool mystique to it - an ancient evil from the dawn of time type vibe. This gets ruined by having it revealed that it was some scientist in the far future's experiment gone wrong. It's Midichlorian levels of lame.
Things had started to improve a bit by Dark Eyes 4 when Big Finish realised they should just let John Dorney and Matt Fitton do their thing, but then we get to the overall ending of the entire four boxset saga where it's revealed that the whole thing is essentially just an extended origin story for Big Finish's pet villain the Eminence. It's the ultimate damp squib ending.
And Molly O'Sullivan. Jesus Christ. One of the worst companions ever. She could give Rose Tyler or Clara Oswald a run for their money. The character is just Nicholas Briggs's Mary Sue and a particularly grating one at that. Coming on the heels of Charley Pollard, Lucie Miller and Mary Shelley herself, she has a lot to live up to, but doesn't even come close. There's a reason beyond Ruth Bradley (the actress who played her)'s limited availability she gets abandoned in favour of Liv Chenka halfway through. The only time she was bearable was in Dark Eyes 4 where she was more or less a completely different character to the one we'd seen before, having had to live through a Dalek invasion and played by a completely different actress. Still, I suppose it could've been worse:
Nick Briggs was originally planning to bring Lucie Miller back from the dead. Thank fuck he didn't. It would've completely undone the emotional gut punch of To The Death.
This isn't to say Dark Eyes doesn't have its moments. Alex Macqueen as the Master is a delight as always (who'd have thought Neil's dad from The Inbetweeners could be so menacing?), there's some cool Dalek action and seeing the Daleks meet the Sontarans properly for the first time is almost worth the high price of admission. Dark Eyes 3 and 4 also get off to strong starts that are worth experiencing even if they lead to weak endings. That said, I think overall Dark Eyes is a major net loss rather than a net gain.
So if you're thinking to yourself "The Daleks, the Master and the Sontarans in one huge, epic story? How bad can it be?", maybe think twice. Big Finish boxsets aren't cheap so think very carefully before you decide to drop that much cash on four of them.
I didn't mind Helen, but I can see where you're coming from. At least she didn't call the Doctor "The Doctor" when addressing him directly rather than "Doctor" like all the other companions do, and at least she didn't refer to the TARDIS as a "Tardy Box" which wasn't funny the first time and wasn't funny the subsequent six billion times it was said.
God I hate Molly O'Sullivan.
- Joined
- Oct 27, 2017
I could not agree more with quite a lot of what you said... To the point where, when reading your "rant" I literally said out loud "Midichlorians" a whole split second before I read *you* saying the same about how badly they screwed up the Eminence. As I felt the exact same way about it...
One thing though... I actually did kind of like Molly *at first* Hate to say, she more than wore out her welcome by the end of the *second* box set... Let alone by the time the actress got to busy to finish out the series, and they recast her with someone else just to finish the story... (who was absolute shite.)
Alex Macqueen has actually quickly become one of my favorite masters... (LOVED the master Trilogy) But he was actually active in that role quite a bit before Dark eyes... ( i think: http://tardis.wikia.com/wiki/Dominion_(audio_story) was his first time playing the master, correct me if I'm wrong)
Anyways... I get your criticisms of Molly... Maybe I'm a bit soft on her, as she kind of reminds me of an exe I still have feelings for @_@ (oddly enough, this particular exe isn't even remotely Irish...)
- Joined
- Oct 27, 2017
Those were all genuinely interesting... but if there was some grand theme linking them together, i missed it.
- Joined
- Feb 3, 2013
Oh there was no theme, just random moments from the audio plays. The closest one could come to describing a link would be the first and third clips being from the same range (novel adaptations) but that's it.
- Joined
- Oct 27, 2017
I'm honestly not a huge fan of 7... but 6ixie is one of my favorites, and i had not heard the one where he and Peri got body swapped. so thankyou, I suppose... (even though it sounds like a bad one haha)
The Valeyard
kiwifarms.net
- Joined
- Jul 16, 2017
- Joined
- Oct 27, 2017
Decided to watch The Talons of Weng-Chiang (the single televised appearance of Jago and Litefoot) tonight, for the first time since I listened to the audios... I've tried a few times before, and for whatever reason couldn't get through it.
I'm actually loving it now... One of the main villains is a guy in obvious yellow-face, you really can't beat that.
I'm actually loving it now... One of the main villains is a guy in obvious yellow-face, you really can't beat that.
PLB
kiwifarms.net
- Joined
- Dec 31, 2016
After watching most of the first season of classic who, man its so slow, especially the prehistoric episodes where literally nothing happens for most of the episodes, I cant imagine having to wait for several weeks for anything of consequence to happen. Also Chesterton being the universes greatest fighter for no reason is really jarring.