The Doctor Who Thread.....

[Naïve Old Fart 9,524]

I've just watched EPs. 5 and 6. For the most part, I found them entertaining, if desperately unoriginal. It promised a lot (a "fuck off" battle between Sontarans, Daleks, and Cybermen, for starters!), and left a lot of loose edges.

On the plus side, I'd watch anything with Kevin McNally, and as for Jemma Redgrave...(sigh ). It was great to see U.N.I.T. up and running, again. Was that W.O.T.A.N. that I saw, at U.N.I.T. H.Q., especially after the reference to the G.P.O. Tower?

I'm not trying to make excuses for Chibnall, but I don't think it was that bad. If either R.T.D., or Moffat had done this, would we all have thought it a masterpiece of ingenuity and complexity, instead of the mess that appears to be the general opinion?

Anyway, there's only three specials to go until normality is - hopefully - restored.

 

[DarthDementous 1,059]

7 hours ago, Naïve Old Fart said:

I've just watched EPs. 5 and 6. For the most part, I found them entertaining, if desperately unoriginal. It promised a lot (a "fuck off" battle between Sontarans, Daleks, and Cybermen, for starters!), and left a lot of loose edges.

On the plus side, I'd watch anything with Kevin McNally, and as for Jemma Redgrave...(sigh ). It was great to see U.N.I.T. up and running, again. Was that W.O.T.A.N. that I saw, at U.N.I.T. H.Q., especially after the reference to the G.P.O. Tower?

I'm not trying to make excuses for Chibnall, but I don't think it was that bad. If either R.T.D., or Moffat had done this, would we all have thought it a masterpiece of ingenuity and complexity, instead of the mess that appears to be the general opinion?

Anyway, there's only three specials to go until normality is - hopefully - restored.

 

If Moffat or especially RTD were responsible then I would be even more baffled, Chibnall’s DOCTOR WHO show running work is such a jarring contrast to the previous eras even at their worst.

 

I specifically say DOCTOR WHO because that’s the enigma of Chris Chibnall. His work on Torchwood for the most part is quite good, with really good characterisation. It’s thoroughly unlike his DOCTOR WHO work, and I can’t chalk it up to other creators carrying him because RTD himself has said that he and Moffat are one of the few writers that he’ll let work independently and not do redrafts on.

[Naïve Old Fart 9,524]

I didn't like the Silurian story, and "42" was a crushing bore, but I liked The Power Of Three, especially since it reintroduced Kate Stewart.

Although there were certain aspects of these series that I liked, Chibnall doesn't seem to understand what DW is about. Perhaps he watched a video of himself on Open Air, when he was a teenager (it's on YouTube, folks!), and said "Yeah, I can do this".

Sorry, but he couldn't. 

[Docteur Qui 1,544]

What a wet fart of an ending. It wasn't boring at least, which the vast majority of Chibs' run has been. On the whole, Flux was anything but boring, but it's also been incoherent, needlessly complex, bafflingly paced and half-baked. The highlights were the Weeping Angel and Sontaran episodes, which tellingly were also the ones least concerned with the overarching narrative of the series (the ending of Village of the Angels notwithstanding).

 

All of the Timeless Child/Tecteun/upside-down house stuff amounted to nothing, except the Doctor flushing a fob watch down the TARDIS' shitter at the end. The universe is almost completely destroyed and nary even a mention of it. Hilariously in that penultimate scene Dan asks the Doctor and Yaz where they're headed and they say "anywhere". Nope, you've pretty much only got earth to work with, everything else was completely obliterated by the Flux. Maybe that's Chibnall's final legacy to the show: "most of the episodes are set on Earth anyway, may as well make it official and throw out all the rest of it lol". The Doctor commits triple genocide. At least when RTD did that with the Meta-Crisis Doctor in Journey's End he "punished" him by sealing him off in an alternate reality. Here it's just a Tuesday.

 

Dan was a pointless companion. He could've (and should've) been Graham and the story would've been identical. Jericho on the other hand pretty much sparkled in every scene he was in, but as usual the most interesting characters aren't the companions. I liked the short scenes with Yaz and the Doctor though. Some lovely unspoken feelings there, and a hint of a romantic undercurrent which is very welcome as Whittaker and Gill have excellent chemistry!

 

Three more episodes to go until this show is, at last, unpredictable again. 

 

10 hours ago, Naïve Old Fart said:

I'm not trying to make excuses for Chibnall, but I don't think it was that bad. If either R.T.D., or Moffat had done this, would we all have thought it a masterpiece of ingenuity and complexity, instead of the mess that appears to be the general opinion?

 

The key thing here is that RTD or Moffat never could've written this. Oh they could've come up with the same plot, but there would have been more connective tissue, meaningful character moments, jokes, poetry, actual themes. Even RTD and Moffat's most ham-fisted scripts (The End of Time Part 1 and Let's Kill Hitler, respectively) - which were clearly first drafts - made more sense than this.

 

[Sweeping Strings 2,358]

I liked the opening ep, the Sontaran one and the Weeping Angels one. The others were rather mixed bags in which there's just too much going on that was incoherent (a rewatch of the whole shebang may help, although whether I can be bothered doing so between now and the New Year special is highly doubtful). 

The overall impression is that although the likes of Broadchurch was terrific, Chibnall is not suited to overseeing sci-fi. 

 

[Disco Stu 15,495]

25 minutes ago, Sweeping Strings said:

The overall impression is that although the likes of Broadchurch was terrific

 

And notably Broadchurch season 1 was terrific and he struggled in the 2nd and 3rd series to keep that level of quality (admittedly, the 3rd series is MUCH stronger than the really very bad 2nd).

[Naïve Old Fart 9,524]

@Disco Stu, I've heard this about Broadchurch, as well. Not having seen a single nano-second of it, I wouldn't know.

How would other JWfaners compare DW to Broadchurch?

[Docteur Qui 1,544]

Broadchurch S1 was an entertaining whodunnit with gorgeous cinematography, a brilliant score by Ólafur Arnalds and a truly fantastic cast. The mystery was pretty well built-up and culminated in an emotional gut-punch featuring some stellar work by Olivia Colman and David Tennant. Chibnall had worked on series 1 for years before he made it, and it shows. It's intricate, balanced and satisfying.

 

Series 2 can be more directly compared to the majority of his work on Doctor Who. Sloppy writing, frustrating character work, a convoluted and unsatisfying story saved only by the aforementioned cinematography and charismatic cast.

 

Series 3 was an improvement, featuring very timely themes of sexual assault and rape culture, and Julie Hesmondhalgh shines in her role (add her to the list of actors who'd do a great job as the Doctor, she's got dramatic chops in this and is very funny in other things she's done). It never reaches the highs of series 1 though, and its ending is a bit of a cop-out. 

 

To me that show demonstrates that Chibnall can be a gifted writer, given enough time and resources. Unfortunately, that is not what Doctor Who offers its showrunners. RTD and Moffat made it work because they had decades of experience writing and producing under ridiculous time and budget constraints.

[DarthDementous 1,059]

13 hours ago, Docteur Qui said:

What a wet fart of an ending. It wasn't boring at least, which the vast majority of Chibs' run has been. On the whole, Flux was anything but boring, but it's also been incoherent, needlessly complex, bafflingly paced and half-baked. The highlights were the Weeping Angel and Sontaran episodes, which tellingly were also the ones least concerned with the overarching narrative of the series (the ending of Village of the Angels notwithstanding).

 

All of the Timeless Child/Tecteun/upside-down house stuff amounted to nothing, except the Doctor flushing a fob watch down the TARDIS' shitter at the end. The universe is almost completely destroyed and nary even a mention of it. Hilariously in that penultimate scene Dan asks the Doctor and Yaz where they're headed and they say "anywhere". Nope, you've pretty much only got earth to work with, everything else was completely obliterated by the Flux. Maybe that's Chibnall's final legacy to the show: "most of the episodes are set on Earth anyway, may as well make it official and throw out all the rest of it lol". The Doctor commits triple genocide. At least when RTD did that with the Meta-Crisis Doctor in Journey's End he "punished" him by sealing him off in an alternate reality. Here it's just a Tuesday.

 

Dan was a pointless companion. He could've (and should've) been Graham and the story would've been identical. Jericho on the other hand pretty much sparkled in every scene he was in, but as usual the most interesting characters aren't the companions. I liked the short scenes with Yaz and the Doctor though. Some lovely unspoken feelings there, and a hint of a romantic undercurrent which is very welcome as Whittaker and Gill have excellent chemistry!

 

Three more episodes to go until this show is, at last, unpredictable again. 

 

 

The key thing here is that RTD or Moffat never could've written this. Oh they could've come up with the same plot, but there would have been more connective tissue, meaningful character moments, jokes, poetry, actual themes. Even RTD and Moffat's most ham-fisted scripts (The End of Time Part 1 and Let's Kill Hitler, respectively) - which were clearly first drafts - made more sense than this.

 

END OF TIME PART 1 was absolutely not a first draft, RTD talks about the many iterations that script went through in THE WRITER'S TALE. Initially it was going to be a very quiet intimate piece set on a single spaceship but RTD felt he had to something more grand and bombastic to close out the era, which I can't help but agree with.

[Docteur Qui 1,544]

Fair point. I have read Writer's Tale, and I do recall him talking about the ideas in that script changing, but ultimately the script itself isn't particularly tight. It feels like he glossed over so much of it so we could get to the fireworks factory that was Part 2. The Disciples of Saxon, the Potion of Life (and Lucy's "anti-potion" lol), the Naismiths etc were all so undercooked and felt like placeholders until he could come up with something better, which he didn't.

[Naïve Old Fart 9,524]

7 hours ago, Docteur Qui said:

... the Potion of Life (and Lucy's "anti-potion" lol)...

Is that like anti-plastic?

[Thor 7,501]

I'll have to echo Doctor Qui. This last episode of the Flux series was totally all-over-the-place. Add to the fact that I probably understand some 30% of the dialogue -- too fast, too whimsical, too buried in sound effects, too information-heavy, I really only got the gist of it. Which is a shame, because it has several individual, good ideas (didn't they have enough antagonists without that serpent guy, who felt totally wasted to me?). They just don't come together well and organically over the time alloted.

 

To be fair, Moffat also did unnecessarily complex episodes at times (what's the name of the completely incomprehensible one that took place in some monastery ruins or whatever it was?), and I'm not a big fan of his work on the series either, but he usually left space for overview and character identification.

 

Hopefully, the New Year Special brings back some coherence.

 

I used to be able to watch DOCTOR WHO while having a beer or wine, but now I have to be sober and SUPER SHARP in order to get something out of it. Can't wait to have Davies back!

[Docteur Qui 1,544]

15 minutes ago, Thor said:

To be fair, Moffat also did unnecessarily complex episodes at times (what's the name of the completely incomprehensible one that took place in some monastery ruins or whatever it was?), 

 

 

You might be referring to Heaven Sent which is.... widely regarded as one of the all-time best episodes of the show. It's phenomenal, and not really overly complex at all. It's quite a simple story about a grieving man stuck in an endless time loop.

[Thor 7,501]

34 minutes ago, Docteur Qui said:

 

You might be referring to Heaven Sent which is.... widely regarded as one of the all-time best episodes of the show.

 

Don't know if it was that, exactly, but yeah -- I know the episode I'm thinking about got lots of raves. It just alienated me, however.

[Sweeping Strings 2,358]

On Moffat's sometime penchant for overly complicated writing ... reckon I'll go to my grave still not fully understanding what occurs in Let's Kill Hitler. 

Still, it did give us the glorious 'Can you ride a motorbike, Rory?' 

'I expect so ... it's been that sort of day'. 

[Naïve Old Fart 9,524]

All this Tecteun stuff: Is Claire Bloom's character in THE END OF TIME PT. II an earlier version?

[Brónach 1,302]

To the risk of sounding out of touch, I want Doctor Who to be more about slowly exploring weird environments instead of running around in hallways and explosions. They've done this a few times and it works.

[Richard Penna 3,687]

Exploring weird and misunderstood environments, or a villain with a less than black and white motive.

 

Chibnall's got an obsession with tearing apart the Doctor's own life/character.

[Naïve Old Fart 9,524]

1 hour ago, Richard Penna said:

Chibnall's got an obsession with tearing apart the Doctor's own life/character.

... sadly.

[Brónach 1,302]

There's no fear or drama if five non-previously established things are happening at the same time and everybody is running on hallways and the end of the world is already here and there's technobabble being thrown around (i hate technobabble)

 

I also like gray villains. I prefer character villains to generic evil species villains, actually. It's fun when they keep returning to be a pain in the ass.

[Sweeping Strings 2,358]

Technobabble isn't a new thing in Who ... to quote Tom Baker 'I found making the gobbledegook sound convincing quite easy. I was brought up in the Catholic faith.' 

  

[Brónach 1,302]

Yes, but it's so unnecesary if you don't do sloppy writing that requires it!

[Naïve Old Fart 9,524]

After 58 years, I'm just beginning to get my head around "Reverse the polarity of the neutron flow".

[Disco Stu 15,495]

I love technobabble

[Naïve Old Fart 9,524]

I don't care, it's all technobabble rap, to me.

[Tallguy 3,386]

It was fun. The Doctor really felt like the Doctor. (Not as hard as people seem to think it is.) They didn't re-write the show again. I liked the companions.

 

The next time the Doctor (or the show) complains about guns I'm going to laugh more than I usually do. (Daleks, Cybermen, Sontarans. Solution? Ohhh, kill them all A LOT. Laugh while doing it.)

[Sweeping Strings 2,358]

Anyone else find Whittaker's Doctor the least convincing (and I'm including all 12 of her predecessors) when it comes to anger towards adversaries? 

 

[Naïve Old Fart 9,524]

3 hours ago, Sweeping Strings said:

Anyone else find Whittaker's Doctor the least convincing (and I'm including all 12 of her predecessors) when it comes to anger towards adversaries? 

Sorry, Sweep, but, watching Flux again, I've realised that I just don't care about any of it. Not Whittaker, not Chibnall, not Flux. Not anything connected with DW since she started playing the role. It's bollocks. It's total and utter shit, and the sooner they both go, the better.

Geez, Louise, not even McCoy's first season was as bad as this.

I'd rather watch WARRIORS OF THE DEEP, on a 12-hour loop, than one more Whittaker story.

I say again: it's not her fault. Under another show-runner, she might have shone, but this overgrown adolescent who's currently in charge, has no idea about what DW is, and how it functions.

 

 

3 hours ago, Sweeping Strings said:

(and I'm including all 12 of her predecessors)

12? No love for SCREAM OF THE SHALKA?

[Tallguy 3,386]

3 hours ago, Sweeping Strings said:

Anyone else find Whittaker's Doctor the least convincing (and I'm including all 12 of her predecessors) when it comes to anger towards adversaries? 

 

 

Nope.

[Naïve Old Fart 9,524]

Well said.

[Brónach 1,302]

I dislike Chibnall's dialogue

[Positivatee 327]

The entire Flux season had too much "will they / won't they" romantic tension between the Doctor and Yaz. Right when it looked like they might finally kiss, the useless man character Dan pulls a Threepio and interrupts them. He cheated us out of the snog that they both clearly wanted. 

[Marian Schedenig 8,193]

On 09/11/2021 at 8:09 AM, Docteur Qui said:

Also did anyone else think the talking floating pyramid sounded like John Leeson (K9)? It’s not him apparently, but it sounds soooo much like the tin dog

 

This!

 

 

I finally watched Flux - I had seen the first episode shortly after it aired, but only caught up with the rest of it over the last three days. You'd think watching this convoluted mess more or less back to back would help, but I could barely follow a third of what was going on, or who was who. It's clearly Chibnall trying Who in long-form (which I'd expected would be his forte after Broadchurch) and Moffat-style complex construction. I loved Moffat's convoluted stories for their complexity, but they almost always worked because their construction and logic became clear by the end. With Chibnall, I'm just confused, and have little to latch on to emotionally. Moffat's emotional payoffs, despite all the stories' complexities, usually hinged on simple, tangible things put in unusual (i.e. often temporally epic) contexts - see Capaldi's chipping away, for centuries, at a wall in Heaven Sent. With Chibnall, it's all complexity, but with no recognisable fundamental logic or structure, and with characters mostly so functional and reduced that they hardly elicit an emotional response, either. There seem to have been some strong ideas behind it all, and done the right way they could have paid off, but as it is, the fact that this is probably the strongest run of Chibnall's Who tenure isn't as positive as it might sound. And the score… nah. Gold may have run out of steam by the end of the Moffat era (or perhaps the new sound of the Capaldi era was a wish of the producers), but his more Zimmerish turn did what Akinola's scores have been mildly praised for - deliver without putting the music front and centre - without at the same time making the music entirely uninteresting (if still much less interesting than his earlier series). Now we get endless ostinatos and endlessly repeated simple chord themes in a Zimmerish semi-synth orchestra setting, with a vaguely Duel of the Fates-ish (barely a) melody played over and over again as the only musically recognisable element in the finale. There was an earlier bit that seems to have been temped with I Am the Doctor, and the fact that it was about the most catchy part of the entire series despite dropping the melody and just keeping the rough rhythm of it speaks volumes.

 

On 29/11/2021 at 4:13 AM, DarthDementous said:

It's starting to get to the point that RTD is just going to need to reboot the whole universe because this is doing some incredibly strange and seemingly irreversible things.

 

Well, to be fair, RTD's universe seems to have repeatedly been at least semi- rebooted even during his own tenure.

 

On 07/12/2021 at 3:57 PM, Disco Stu said:

And notably Broadchurch season 1 was terrific and he struggled in the 2nd and 3rd series to keep that level of quality (admittedly, the 3rd series is MUCH stronger than the really very bad 2nd).

 

Interesting. I liked series 2 a lot, after loving the first one and doubting that there was any point to making another one. I thought focusing on the aftermath worked, both for the characters and the story. Yes, the third one was fresher and had some strong story elements, but in the context of things, I found it mostly pointless.

[Sweeping Strings 2,358]

23 hours ago, Naïve Old Fart said:

Sorry, Sweep, but, watching Flux again, I've realised that I just don't care about any of it. Not Whittaker, not Chibnall, not Flux. Not anything connected with DW since she started playing the role. It's bollocks. It's total and utter shit, and the sooner they both go, the better.

Geez, Louise, not even McCoy's first season was as bad as this.

I'd rather watch WARRIORS OF THE DEEP, on a 12-hour loop, than one more Whittaker story.

I say again: it's not her fault. Under another show-runner, she might have shone, but this overgrown adolescent who's currently in charge, has no idea about what DW is, and how it functions.

 

 

12? No love for SCREAM OF THE SHALKA?

I do like it (and think Grant would've been great as a 'proper' live-action incumbent) but I didn't include 'sideline' Doctors in the interests of simplicity.

[Tallguy 3,386]

I didn't find this that hard to follow. (I think the only place I got lost was when UNIT had the TARDIS from earlier in the series and I missed why. But that was because I was expecting it to be a crossover with Spearhead from Space. My bad.) (I suddenly NEED to see 13 meet 3.)

 

I think maybe my scales have been badly recalibrated at this point. It was just a joy to watch six hours of Doctor Who and not feel lectured to. So maybe my expectations are too low now.

 

IMHO I got tired of Moffat because he would always set up these mouse-traps and he would almost never stick the landing. (This is why I am still gobsmacked by Time of the Doctor. It managed to be joy start to finish AND it wrapped up the Smith era perfectly.)

 

We watched Runaway Bride the other night. What a weird mix of joy and utter meanness to Donna. But it reminded my (again) of how much I miss RTD era Murray Gold.

[Naïve Old Fart 9,524]

What? What?! What???!!!!!

[Sweeping Strings 2,358]

Good point about not feeling lectured to ... I was expecting an anti-Government diatribe of some sort about how terrible it is that food banks are necessary when we saw Dan volunteering in one, but no. And was genuinely surprised when the partner Bel was searching for actually turned out to be a bloke.

Although ... The Doctor and Yaz. Hmmm. Funny how Graham, Ryan and Dan weren't/aren't interested in the Doc in 'that way' ... but Yaz seemingly is. Gotta tick those boxes! 

I read an explanation/clarification of Flux on Facebook earlier ... damn thing needed 10 paragraphs. Bloody hell.       

[Tallguy 3,386]

25 minutes ago, Naïve Old Fart said:

What? What?! What???!!!!!

 

Ha! Funny thing is, to my kids it wasn't the Doctor and Donna, it was Scrooge McDuck and Magica De Spell! The TARDIS car chase is still just about the most batshit crazy thing that actually works in just about all of nuWho.

 

18 minutes ago, Sweeping Strings said:

Although ... The Doctor and Yaz. Hmmm. Funny how Graham, Ryan and Dan weren't/aren't interested in the Doc in 'that way' ... but Yaz seemingly is. Gotta tick those boxes! 

 

As aware as I am of the box ticking (um, is that too much of a euphemism here?) I didn't get that as romantic at all. It was definitely a bond, and it was touchingly warm. To me it was a high point of the season because I thought both actresses nailed it. Hell, wouldn't you love to see that kind of arc with the Doctor and Jamie? If you're going to "ship" anyone it would be the Doctor and... the Doctor.

 

I like Yaz a lot. I loved when they were in the 60's (right?) and she announced herself with her full police title. Not in any kind of pompous way but just because that's who she is. Seriously she's the most "responsible adult" we've had since Martha Jones. (Sorry, Graham.)

 

I just realized: I might watch this again. I haven't said that since Capaldi.

[Sweeping Strings 2,358]

I'm not going to 'ship' anyone, trust me. Not overly keen on family entertainment spawning sexually-orientated fan fiction to be completely honest, but such is the modern world. 

[Docteur Qui 1,544]

Yaz and the Doctor have an actual relationship though, which she didn’t really have with either Graham or Ryan. For what it’s worth, I like the subtle hint at something more between them, and it feels natural, not “box-ticking” at all. The actors have great chemistry together and the short scenes they actually shared together were some of the most genuinely touching of Flux.

 

It’s not unlike the Twelve/Clara relationship by the time we got to Hell Bent. It’s deliberately written to be ambiguous but both Capaldi and Coleman have admitted they acted it as if there was some complicated, unsaid romantic relationship between the two. A risky move for sure, but it’s obvious how much chemistry they had together, and they pulled it off with aplomb.

[Sweeping Strings 2,358]

Thing with Twelve and Clara ... if you take the actor's ages into account, it's a little creepy. If you take the CHARACTER ages into account ... hoo boy! 

See also Nine/Ten with Rose and Eleven with Amy.    

[Disco Stu 15,495]

I certainly never interpreted their relationship as even slightly romantic, Capaldi and Clara I mean.

[Naïve Old Fart 9,524]

The Doctor has always had a non-romantic relationship, with his companions. Imo, to introduce a lesbian undertone into what is meant to be a show for all the family, would betray its original intent, and add a sordid element to the programme.

Can you imagine Doctor #4 wanting to get his leg over, with Leela? I would, but that's another story .

I'm not a prude. I've no objection to any homosexual relationship portrayed on screen, as long as it's within the context of the programme. Personally, I believe that a relationship between #13, and Yaz is unhealthy, and unnecessary, and should not happen.

[Tallguy 3,386]

6 hours ago, Naïve Old Fart said:

The Doctor has always had a non-romantic relationship, with his companions. Imo, to introduce a lesbian undertone into what is meant to be a show for all the family, would betray its original intent, and add a sordid element to the programme.

Can you imagine Doctor #4 wanting to get his leg over, with Leela? I would, but that's another story .

I'm not a prude. I've no objection to any homosexual relationship portrayed on screen, as long as it's within the context of the programme. Personally, I believe that a relationship between #13, and Yaz is unhealthy, and unnecessary, and should not happen.

 

Three is another matter entirely.

[Docteur Qui 1,544]

 

On 14/12/2021 at 7:40 AM, Sweeping Strings said:

Thing with Twelve and Clara ... if you take the actor's ages into account, it's a little creepy. If you take the CHARACTER ages into account ... hoo boy! 

Well yeah, the age difference between the Doctor and any human is pretty huge! But for the record, I'm of the opinion that a 30-year gap between consenting adults is theoretically fine as long as the relationship is inherently equal in terms of power dynamics. The creepiness we tend to feel about age gaps is ultimately a concern about that power. In real life there's almost always some kind imbalance of power implied with a gap that large, but seeing as we're talking about fictional characters I think there's a more generous and nuanced take to be had. I'll also be upfront in saying that I don't necessarily think their relationship was sexual, but that doesn't mean it wasn't romantic. Twelve is presented as asexual, and asexual people can still have intimate and romantic relationships. 

 

Clara develops a lot of agency - and therefore power - in her relationship with the Doctor, and that was very much the point of her character arc. She eventually became the Doctor in a way, running from Gallifrey with a stolen TARDIS and her own companion. Having said all that, my reading of the show is that their relationship was ultimately unhealthy and destructive for both of them, demonstrated by Clara's increasing recklessness and the Doctor's willingness to literally die billions of times in the Confession Dial so he could get to Gallifrey and break the laws of time to bring her back from the dead. In the end, the dangers presented by their obsession with each other were enough for them to feel that permanent separation was the only option. The Hybrid, prophecised as the most dangerous being in the universe, was the Doctor and Clara together. 

 

Quote

I certainly never interpreted their relationship as even slightly romantic, Capaldi and Clara I mean.

 

The best thing about all of this, of course, is because all of this is subtextual, you can completely reject my reading and that's perfectly fine. Moffat was especially clever at presenting multi-layered and ambiguous concepts to the show so the viewer is readily able to take what they like and discard what they don't, whether it was character relationships or the show's mythology and continuity. A crucial point is that he has explicitly said that's a perfectly okay thing for a viewer to do, and in fact we should do that when we talk about art that we like and especially when it comes to Doctor Who.

 

The whole point of the Hybrid arc in Series 9 was to demonstrate how prophecies are inherently ambiguous and could be applied to any number of individuals or situations, and that ultimately it's only the choices people make while interpreting them that really hold weight. It's a metatextual comment on how we perceive and criticise art, as well as a critique of the role of prophecy in organised religion (but let's not go there). One of the pervading criticisms of Series 9 was that the Hybrid was never explicitly identified, but that was very much by design. George RR Martin is doing a very similar thing with the "Prince that was Promised" throughline in A Song of Ice and Fire, and arguably Rowling did the same with the prophecy narrative in Harry Potter (i.e. Voldemort chose Harry over Neville as his nemesis, but it could've been either of them).

 

Anyway I clearly think too much about this stuff, but by golly I miss thinking this much about Doctor Who. It's my favourite show, and I can't wait for it to stimulate me like this again.

[Positivatee 327]

8 hours ago, Naïve Old Fart said:

Imo, to introduce a lesbian undertone into what is meant to be a show for all the family, would betray its original intent, and add a sordid element to the programme.

Can you imagine Doctor #4 wanting to get his leg over, with Leela? I would, but that's another story .

I'm not a prude. I've no objection to any homosexual relationship portrayed on screen, as long as it's within the context of the programme. Personally, I believe that a relationship between #13, and Yaz is unhealthy, and unnecessary, and should not happen.

 

If Chibnall wanted to introduce a lesbian relationship, why not take the obvious route and bring back the magnificent Alex Kingston? After all, The Doctor is married to River Song. She has marital needs!

 

Their final episode was "The Husbands of River Song," so the obvious option would be to pen "The Wife (or Wives, let's bring Jo Martin into the sack, hubba hubba) of River Song." 

 

That would shatter the already-confusing Mobius strip continuity of River Song's story arc, with the plot elements that were foreshadowed back in The Library and neatly wrapped up with Capaldi. 

 

And it reeks of fan fiction. 

 

I'm going to guess, based on hope, that Moffat told Chibnall that River is now off limits. Her song is complete. 

 

Although Doctor Who was part of the inspiration for the 30-year-old Outlander book series, which became a stylish and highly sexualized TV series. 

 

So if someone wants to turn lesbian Doctor Who fan fiction into another TV show or movie, sign me up for that TV subscription! 

[Docteur Qui 1,544]

9 hours ago, Naïve Old Fart said:

The Doctor has always had a non-romantic relationship, with his companions. Imo, to introduce a lesbian undertone into what is meant to be a show for all the family, would betray its original intent, and add a sordid element to the programme.

Can you imagine Doctor #4 wanting to get his leg over, with Leela? I would, but that's another story .

I'm not a prude. I've no objection to any homosexual relationship portrayed on screen, as long as it's within the context of the programme. Personally, I believe that a relationship between #13, and Yaz is unhealthy, and unnecessary, and should not happen.

 

My viewing of the show does not at all gel with this. The Doctor has had feelings and relationships with many characters in the show, at least in the revival. Ten was head over heels for Rose and had an implied intimate relationship with Madame de Pompadour and Queen Elizabeth I. Eleven’s relationship with River Song is deeply sexual, again through implication but it’s right there in the dialogue. And in The Time of the Doctor it’s implied that he’s been intimate with Tasha Lem at some point in the past. Sordid indeed.

 

Based on all this, I can’t understand how introducing a romantic undertone to Thirteen and Yaz’s relationship is any different. And especially considering Chibnall’s comparatively sexless depiction of the Doctor, how is it not family-friendly? You don’t have to actually imply sex (as Davies and Moffat often did) to imply attraction or deep feelings.
 

Also what it’s worth, the Doctor himself states that he feels attraction (and sexual fluidity) as early as The Doctor Dances in series 1 of the revival - the word “dance” in the script and title is very much a euphemism for sex. 

[Sweeping Strings 2,358]

The First Doctor (if we can still call him that, given the 'spanner in the works' that is the Timeless Child stuff) is, of course, travelling with his granddaughter when we meet him. Which would indicate that Time Lords certainly reproduce biologically ... whether this is driven by desire or necessity, we don't quite know. And I would guess that back in '63, it probably wasn't intended as something for in-depth analysis  .     

[Thor 7,501]

3 minutes ago, Sweeping Strings said:

The First Doctor (if we can still call him that, given the 'spanner in the works' that is the Timeless Child stuff) is, of course, travelling with his granddaughter when we meet him. Which would indicate that Time Lords certainly reproduce biologically ... whether this is driven by desire or necessity, we don't quite know. And I would guess that back in '63, it probably wasn't intended as something for in-depth analysis  .     

 

Indeed.

 

By the way, Carole Ann Ford (the actress who played granddaughter Susan) is still alive at 81. Would be great if she reappeared in the new Who, although I'm not sure how the narrative logistics of it would work.

[Sweeping Strings 2,358]

She visited the set during the Capaldi era, and of course Twelve had the picture of her on his desk in his rooms at the university during his last series. I felt sure an appearance was gonna happen, but alas no.