"Oh, She's Back!"

 

The title of this post is from an episode of THE FALL AND RISE OF REGINALD PERRIN, a  delightfully subversive and acidic slice of British TV history that you should check out if you haven’t already.

I use it to note my surprise that this blog is back online after having been taken down for a while, probably due to an . . . injudicious comment I made about one of DOCTOR WHO’s showrunners. All I know for certain is that after the site vanished, I did remove a specific paragraph from one post, and after a while here we are, back in business. 

Except.

When TV looked its bleakest and it seemed like things could not get any worse for DOCTOR WHO . . . they did. As a result, I’ll most likely never again write about the series as a Living Thing; only as the relic of TV history that it has become. Face it if you haven’t: DOCTOR WHO is dead. It has ceased to be, expired and gone to meet its makers. 

Oh, there’s a show currently airing out there that calls itself DOCTOR WHO. But it’s WHO in Name Only — and Russell Davies knows it. That’s why he called it “series 1.” It is a wholly new and different animal that just wears a few trappings of WHO (mainly the time machine in the shape of a police box) as plastic surface decoration. It may look like a Wooly Mammoth from the outside, but under the surface it is all domestic terrier. That’s right: it’s now bigger on the outside than the inside. It may be a terrific show for all I know, but it ain’t DOCTOR WHO.

Davies is not wholly to blame even if he’s been instrumental in the show’s demise. A long while ago, when asked if the show would continue, Steven Moffat said that DOCTOR WHO would be around forever — adding, quote, “I’ve seen the business plan.”

I know a little something about Suited Corporate Bastards and their Business Plans, and I’d bet you folding money that ninety percent of everything that original series fans hate about the  show in its current form was mandated by the BBC. True, by the time of series ten Steven Moffat was written out vis a vis DOCTOR WHO: he’d said everything that he wanted to say about the show, done everything that he wanted to do with it and was danged tired of being its showrunner — but even if he’d been fresh there was nothing that any writer or showrunner could have done to save it, because the god-awul pile of dreck that Chris Chibnall delivered was what the BBC wanted. He was doing what he’d been ordered to do.

Suited Corporate Bastards and their Business Plans.

Of course I’ll continue to support the Blu-Ray releases of the original series, but beyond that? Not one dime of my money nor one nanosecond of time out of my life shall they get. As far as I’m concerned, DOCTOR WHO ended with series ten, and Peter Capaldi did not regenerate into Jodi Whittaker. It was by then the end of the line for the original Doctor. The final regeneration went Horribly Wrong, and he came out of it as the Roger Delgado iteration of The Master. The show became a closed loop. It is finished.

Such is the level of software and computing power we have at our fingertips today, I could actually create that ending and make it happen. But what would be the point? Doctor Who is dead, and I have other fish to fry.

—Thorn.

60th Annual-versity Trailer

 

The trailer for the 60th Anniversary Show has dropped. I for one cannot believe that it's been ten years since the FIFTIETH. I guess this means that "Dismay at how quickly the time has passed" is my strongest reaction to what the trailer shows us.

Other than that?

You can't tell from a trailer.

Keep that in mind when I say that while some fans are doing cartwheels and exploding with delight, I'm a little bit underwhelmed, but still willing to be Convinced.

What the trailer gives us to chew on is Fan Service and Member Berries, and little else.

But YOU CAN'T TELL FROM A TRAILER.

There are shots of Catherine Tate slipping seamlessly back into the character of Donna Noble; shots of David Tennent working too hard (I mean WAY too hard) and a single shot. of Ncuti Gatwa working Not At All.

There are indications that it's all very, very Russell Davies. Those who rate his tenure on WHO as the Best Ever ought to be heartened by that. For my part, IMHO the best things Davies did for the show were to re-create it with style, substance, and a solid understanding of Doctor Who's Inner Workings -- and then to bring Steven Moffat on board. 

A friend of mine has an expression for times like these: "more sizzle than steak."

Davies brought the sizzle to DOCTOR WHO -- Moffat brought the steak.

And after Chris Chibnall's disgraceful run, we desperately, URGENTLY need MEAT on the plate. 

Will we get it? That's still to be revealed. You can't tell from a trailer. This trailer says to me that Davies is trying, I'll certainly give him that much. Maybe he'll forgive me if it doesn't make me roll over onto my back with all four feet in the air and my tongue hanging out, the way some fans are reacting to it.

Me? The abuse of the Chibnall era was too severe, and is still unhealed. This dog is peering cautiously around the furniture, ready to approach -- or bolt.

--Thorn.

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Sick of Multiverses.

 

If anything is possible, then nothing matters.

I'm hearing rumbles that Russell T. Davies will address "The Timeless Children" by NOT addressing it; by saying it's a "possible" story in an endless sea of Possibility. 

Essentially, by saying "It's All Good,"

This is quite simply a COP OUT -- and nowhere near Good Enough.

If anything is possible, then Nothing Matters, and if Nothing Matters, why should anyone CARE about Doctor Who going forward? I'd rather see the show cancelled for good and all then to continue with that kind of a Shit Philosophy.

Of course this is all speculation until it happens (because in the real world Things DO Happen and Things DO Matter and Actions Have Consequences), but it seems likely given other things Davies has done in the past (like his rubbish Alternate Universe Cybermen). Meanwhile, fans have already put Davies and Co. On Warning that "The Timeless Children" needs to be wiped out of Doctor Who history if they expect us to stay on board as viewers and fans.

Dear Mr. Davies, were you not paying attention these last few dismal years?

We will not accept cop-outs, cheats, laziness or logrolling. I understand about not wanting to hang a fellow writer out to dry, but it needs to be made clear. Chris Chibnall KILLED Doctor Who. He took a gigantic crap all over the show and the fans, and it MUST be cleaned up. As a fan, I'd be willing to accept a lot of Rubbish, and I have done so in the past, it must be said. But now I have just ONE non-negotiable demand, and this is it.

It would be so EASY to retcon "The Timeless Children" out of existence. So just bite the bullet and DO IT if you want to hang onto what's left of your audience.

If Anything Goes, then Nothing Matters and the creators of the show have no respect for their audience. I for one have stoped rewarding creators for Disrespect. This is a "line in the sand" moment. There is Some Shit I Will Not Eat.

--Thorn.

The Dead Yet Live(?)

 

I hereby offer the sacrilegious proposition that it's time to let Doctor Who die.

Fictional characters, just like living people, have a lifespan. They live, and they die. We have reached a time in the death cycle of Popular Culture when people like Batman, Spider-Man, Doctor Who and Superman have long outlived their natural lifespan. 

Perhaps their ethics and character become incompatible with a new generation; perhaps they exhaust the potential of their notions. The time comes for them to pass on, and join the Immortals in another realm. Those of us who love them can still hold them in our memories, and continue to enjoy their adventures in the same way that we watch old serials and read old comic books, but the window for new adventures has long been closed, though we hate to admit it.

The world of the present seems inhospitable for my dusty old heroes. Time for new adventures from a new generation of heroes — if a new generation of creators can step up to the plate and deliver heroes worthy of our support. The failing here is that nothing worthy has come down the pike. The huge corporations that control the destiny of these characters have no interest in creating anything new.

And so rather than give the heroes of a more civilized world a decent burial, we are forced forever to watch their crumbling, reanimated corpses lumber across our screens in an ever more tragic state of decomposition and decay. I for one am tired of it. Let our heroes rest in peace. They have earned it.

-- Thorn.

Thoughts on The Interim, Post-Apocalypse

Appropriately, Mr. Davies posing with a broken Dalek.

We wonder, in the aftermath of Chris Chibnall’s disastrous tenure on the show, if DOCTOR WHO can be saved; we wonder even if it SHOULD be saved. 

Chibnall was by far the worst thing ever to happen to the show, worse even than cancellation of the original series. Russell Davies is a talented writer after all, but he’s not a superhero. His first accomplishment for WHO was to raise and reconstitute it after a prolonged time away, but he was dealing with a show that was not Fundamentally Broken as it is now.

Much as fans may want to see the show reconstituted, there is wisdom in letting it lie for a while, and allowing the dust to settle. The risk lies in trying to bring it back too soon when the wounds are still fresh. The corporate powers that be will always push for a hasty return, because it’s their Cash Cow after all (although it stopped giving milk several years ago), but pushing something like this never helped anyone. I see Davies as very much trying to walk a fine line here . . . And perhaps trying to walk several very fine lines at the same time. He’s faced by opposing forces who each have wildly varying hopes and expectations, and in order to find success he essentially has to build something new.

As yet, I don’t know how I feel about the return of David Tennant to the role, however brief it is. It’s fine, really, because Davies had already established that this can happen, and it makes a certain amount of sense. It also seems to me very much a “stunt,” and a bit of an act of desperation. However. If Davies can use this stunt as a means of buying story time with which he can repair the damage to the show before Forging Boldly Ahead, it will be worthwhile in the long run. 

For my part, I have only one Non-Negotiable Demand. The Timeless Children must go. If it cannot be retconned out of existence, it must at least be neutralized, and rendered harmless. It’s true that there have been other Stupid Doctor Tricks in the past (“half-human,” anyone?), and that newly arriving showrunners have been able to get away with Simply Ignoring them. 

That will not be good enough this time. The whole life of the show hangs on this one unimaginably stupid continuity revision. The show is Broken in its current state: so it’s not a question of simply Bringing Back to Life a show that was Merely Resting. It’s not “resting” now. It’s on Life Support.

For my part, Mr. Davies, please take all the time you need. We are open to your solutions. But will will not be Fucked With any longer.

--Thorn.

Changelog

UPDATE 1/4/23
New post on the main page and updated page "The Doctors Ranked."
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UPDATE 1/6/20
Finished comments for all 8 discs in the Tom Baker / Season Seven Blu-Ray set.
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UPDATE 12/2919
First thoughts on JON PERTWEE: THE COMPLETE SEASON FOUR and two other Blu-Ray releases are now up. Also updated news items.
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UPDATE 12/2219
Added "new season" editorial on the front page. Also removed one post from the front page (it dealt with rumors now disproved).
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UPDATE 12/1/19
Added specific remarks for Disk 5 of TOM BAKER: COMPLETE SEASON SEVEN, plus some hasty notes on other series' Blu-Ray releases in the News section.
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UPDATE 11/9/19
Added specific remarks for Disk 4 of TOM BAKER: COMPLETE SEASON SEVEN, plus random notes for other releases.
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UPDATE 10/13/19
Added specific remarks for Disk Three of TOM BAKER: COMPLETE SEASON SEVEN.
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UPDATE 9/29/19
Added the "Odd Observations" page (see the sidebar), which seeks to recycle a number of pieces from the old site that probably ought not be recycled.
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UPDATE 9/--/19
Added one mini-review to the Audio Adventures page, and added comments for Disk 2 ("Meglos") for the "Tom Baker Complete Season Seven" Blu-Ray.
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UPDATE 8/22/19
Changed the color scheme for posts to plain ol' black and white, because I was tired of trying to make the colors turn out the way they were supposed to, and even more tired of the eyestrain. I may have to tweak the look of the whole site. Well, we'll see.
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UPDATE 8/17/19
Added mini reviews for THE MUTANT PHASE (Davison) and THE EVIL ONE (Tom Baker) to "The Audio Adventures" page.
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UPDATE 8/11/19
Added specific remarks for Disk One of TOM BAKER" COMPETE SEASON SEVEN.
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UPDATE 7/24/19
Added a short and very basic review of the new Blu-Ray releases. I put this on its own page, accessible from the sidebar over there --> ...
... because it's my intention to add on and embroider this piece as I actually work my way through the disks and the sets. Yeah, wish me luck with that!
More to come... while months may go by between updates, rest assured this site is not dead! Perhaps a little green around the gills, but not dead yet!
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UPDATE: 3/28/19
This week I added a new post here on the main page (just scroll down!) concerning series 11, and today I added a longish article, updated from a much shorter piece on the old site, ranking all of my favorite Doctors. It's been given a page of its own; you can access it from the PAGES menu in the sidebar!

It needs graphics. We'll see about that. Right now it's more important to write real content and just get that content online the fastest way possible.

Further updates... as they occur! Thanks for visiting!

It Got Worse

UPDATED JULY 1, 2023 . . . to correct an error in the text that has been hanging here for far too long.

Like much of the rest of fandom, the news that Russell T. Davies has agreed to return as showrunner, on the condition of complete creative control, has me feeling Nominally Hopeful again after too long a time. But I'm not ready to be Burned Again. Unless Davies completely retcons out of existence the bulk of what Chris "I'm Writing as Bad as I Can" Chibnall did to the series, it will still be No Deal for me. I won't even type out the specific things that have to go -- you all know what they are. I believe Davies knows, too. But will he do it? Professional Courtesy and History suggest otherwise. 

I am holding my breath. As the song said, "There's a kind of hush all over the world tonight. . ."

Meanwhile, I have been keeping up with the American Blu-Ray releases of the original series, and for the first time in a long while I'm beginning to feel a readiness to listen to some of the audio adventures as well. In fact, I'm beginning to feel like typing about some of it, just a bit. We'll see.

It could all still blow up in my face -- again. 

Hopeful -- but cautious. I don't want to see DOCTOR WHO burned to the ground a second time.

-- Thorn.

------------------------------------------------------

Previously. . .

I haven't felt much like writing about DOCTOR WHO in recent days -- even the parts of it that I still love, the parts of it that have been thrown on the ash heap by the BBC and the current showrunner. I can hardly even bring myself to watch my new Blu-Rays of the classic series. Why? Because it's a bit like having the corpse of a loved one still sitting in an easy chair in your living room three weeks after they passed on.

In a nutshell, DOCTOR WHO is dead. Burn the sets, sell the costumes, line up the coffins and prepare the eulogy. Throw the TARDIS into the Pacific. It's over.

Chris Chibnall has not just killed DOCTOR WHO. He's raped it, fucked up the ass, disemboweled it, poured acid all over the corpse and dumped the whole mess onto a rubbish tip for the crows to pick at.

So thoroughly and completely has Chibnall killed the show, that I honestly believe Nothing Can Save it Now. The only way to save it now is for the BBC to re-hire Peter Capaldi and give us an episode in which his Doctor is shown waking up from a Horrible Nightmare. And carry on from there with a completely new timeline.

Because a Horrible Nightmare is exactly what it has been. Series 12 makes the unmitigated disaster that was series 11 look like a playful romp.

Dear Chris Chibnall: If you hated the show this much, why in Omega's name did you accept the job as showrunner? WHY? Why have you done this awful, horrible, EVIL thing to a show and a fan base that never did you any harm whatsoever?

WHY???

I trust you'll be keeping a wide berth around the convention circuit, because you must know that there are fans out there who would be glad to do you up for killing one of the few Good Things in their lives.

Whatever possessed you? What made you think that killing DOCTOR WHO was a Good Idea?

What made you think you had the right to shit all over the work your betters, something that used to make Millions of People happy? Life is hard and we rely on certain things, things that we love, to get us through. And what did you do? You put a gun to The Doctor's head and pulled the trigger.

You were appointed to be a CARETAKER of the show -- and instead you did an Ed Gein on it.

Dear Chris Chibnall, there is a special place in hell reserved for you, asshole.

--Thorn.
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