It started out as a good creepy episode until the weirdly quick and unexplained dispatching of what was presented as a powerful villain. I kept waiting for some twist.
So far this season has had one good episode. The Judoon one. The writing on all the others has been terrible.
I am caught up.
It was better and started out great but as EoD said, it ended quickly and almost easily.
I think there are two main problems that I have with Chibnall’s writing.
In the last episode, she’s holding something but it doesn’t exist. No. Wrong. It’s what annoyed me about the opener. If you perceive it, it should exist and be able to be measured. So, the fur/hair that she found? To me, it’s really lame that they fall back on “it doesn’t exist in the TARDIS databanks” so it doesn’t exist. Give us the basic things you have scanned about it and then say it’s an unknown configuration. It almost matches A,B, or C but not quite. Or say that even though it looked like E the hair is from F to give the Doctor the clues needed to realize what is going on.
Things keep getting bigger and trying to get higher and higher stakes. And when that does, it loses me. The Doctor is not going to let Earth, much less some bigger area of spacetime, be destroyed. (It’s the same trap Moffat fell into with both Doctor Who and the final season of Sherlock.) Give us a good, solid mystery with an old adversary or introduce something on a small scale. Make us care about the extra characters so that if they die, we feel the loss. The extra guy at the lab in Praxeus died and I felt nothing about him being gone or dead. “In 900 years, I have never met anyone who wasn’t important.” We lose that.
This is the reason that I don’t like three companions. I don’t feel particularly connected to any of the episodes characters when the companions fill in the gap for all of the guests. With the recent changes in Yaz, I would like her and the Doctor to have their own adventures. Nothing against the other two, but Yaz really stepped up and I liked that. Then we still see Yaz grow, the Doctor can shine, and we get memorable secondary characters that we want to see more about them.
It’s like they don’t know how to write high level adventures and so have to dumb everything down. But then I feel it dumbs down the Doctor waaaaayyy too much. Further, it dilutes the solution as well. The male god was being very careful … and then lost all intelligence, assumed he was better, monologued, and was easily trapped. That felt cheap, not worthy of the Doctor. It was play by play the evil villain handbook for failure.
Having said that, I found my usual good things. Overall, the episode was fine. I liked the callbacks to the many adversaries of the past, like eternals, guardians, celestial toymaker, and so on. Until we know what the man is, his scenes were nicely creepy. I did like the animation with explanation of the two rather than just exposition. So, some good things but it’s just not there yet.
Thanks for the discussion!
it didn’t exist because the girl had hallucinated the monster into existence (with the help from Zellin, probably).
Today’s another good one that avoided the too easy or cliche solution. And a bit more acting range allowed for Whittaker. That said she did less with the opportunity than I had thought she would.
I hope the follow up finale stays at this level or better.
Last night’s was pretty good (I guessed who the historical personages would be as soon as they named the location).
I do think they missed a chance. The story should have had far stronger links to * Frankenstein*. They were tenuous, and only lightly touched on the themes of the novel.
Two things from previous episode.
The mysterious new Doctor could be the Rani. It’s unlikely Chibnell will go that way, but it fits, and the Rani was willing to impersonate the Doctors companion, so why not the real thing? There’s also the Meddling Monk. Neither has shown up in New Who yet.
There’s some controversy about how the Doctor reacted to Graham relating his fears two weeks ago. I don’t see the issue. The Doctor has generally not big on expressing feeling and often merely telling someone your fears is enough to alleviate them. Note, too, that the doctor acknowledged Graham’s fears as valid, but showed that she had no idea what to say to him. I was in that position once and could think of nothing to say, but the person who told me thanked me and said I had really helped her.
A very Doctor moment, I thought:
Yeah. That’s some classic Time Lord arrogance.
I was trying to think who the Cyberman reminded me of and it finally came to me - Adam from Season 4 Buffy Adam (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) - Wikipedia
But, again, it did exist. She could touch it, scan it, see it. It also existed because it killed people. It didn’t exist in the TARDIS data banks but why not? That goes back to the readings. It looks like A and B but those don’t fit anything known compared to no information at all.
Latest episode.
Not knowing or read Frankenstein, I only saw a few connections and agree maybe it could have been tighter. And I’m not sure that they left it where she was going to write it down?
See, that’s the problem at times. If aliens are the reason for human things, then it detracts from humanity and the achievements we have done. I don’t think you want that. So, things like this have to handled carefully. I think The Wasp and the Unicorn is a much better example of working a historical figure and what they created into it. If they had already been writing and MS complained about where to go or how to do something, then the adventure could have nudged her without taking away her creativity.
I did enjoy it and yes to the Doctor’s arrogance. It is up to her to make the decision. I’m hoping that having the Cyberium in her for a time means that she was able to plant a few things to stop something later. I will see.
I’m cautiously optimistic about the upcoming finale.
Yes! I had that thought as well. We did have a Colin Baker’s Doctor Cyberman story where people are partially changed and fighting it but can only last so long before they lose. I do think the Cyberman was a reasonable adversary and handled mostly well. Mainly because I’m curious and have more questions. What caused the damage? Is the last one and that’s why he needs the Cyberium, to start up the Cyberman again?
And I don’t want all of the answers so that he stays a mystery!
Thanks for the discussion!
I wonder if the new Doctor might be Romana? She hasn’t shown up in New Who either.
The trailer for next week’s episode showed a character who looked (with dark hair, not red) and sounded like Donna Noble.
I’m not sure exactly, but the rules of time travel on Doctor Who (such as they are) never really did include the whole ‘careful what you do in the past so as not to erase yourself out of existence’, did they?
Also, I want a bit of a moratorium on meeting historical celebrities. ‘900 years of time and space, and I never met someone who wasn’t important. Because I mean, why visit those guys when you’ve got the who’s who in time and space to choose from?’
Other than that, though, I’m very glad that the show’s quality has been picking up the second half of this season.
Also, people have been talking about the finale next week, but IMDb shows two more episodes coming up?
It’s a two part finale.
Really disliked the Shelley one, overwrought, IMHO
Overall the two part finale was satisfying. The actors found their characters better all around. A little annoyed with the ending. And the ending after the ending.
It also left a bit too much hanging for a season finale. I do wonder if any point she [spoiler]hunts for the monument and for where she came from before …
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I’m really not sure how I feel about the finale.
I’m happy that they did give an answer to the Master’s taunts (“everything you know is a lie”) but I feel like it’s in a vacuum. Yes, I know Doctor Who and have watched as much as I can but has everyone. And I’m not sure we got much of an origin story in the original run or even NuWho. Other than Rassilon being important, that’s about it? (Omega, I suppose.) So, I don’t understand how the big reveal was meant to shock the Doctor to her core.
I also felt the melodrama a bit too much. Too much taunting, not enough time for explanations or at least discussing things.
I did like a lot of the episode, though. The companions did well in facing the cyberman. The resolution of the cyberman. I didn’t mind the mystery of the other Doctor and leaving that unresolved. Not sure why, but it worked for me.
Really, what tells me if I like a particular season isn’t if I watch it because I’m going to watch it once. It’s how often I watch it after that.
Thanks for the discussion!
Also: Cyberlords or Timemen? (Should this be a poll?)
I think that was resolved. At least it was heavily implied that the other Doctor was a previous (or future, I guess) incarnation from a previous/future set of regenerations (the Doctor’s memories being periodically wiped).
What I didn’t really get was the whole Irish policeman bit. I got that it was a way for the Doctor to kind of remember a previous set of regenerations. But why that in use that story in particular and, really, what use was it.
OB
I don’t really like the concept of The Doctor getting periodically reset. It sort of undermines the character, who always was a bit of a rogue, fiercely independent and opposed to power, but really, they just always had her in their hands, able to apparently reset memories and erase lives at will. It robs her of agency, she isn’t in that sense in control of herself anymore. In the end, it makes her a pawn in the machinations of others.
The same goes for the episode as a whole. She basically was subject to forces outside of her control all the time, without really being able to affect anything—or indeed, trying to. The only times something actually happened were when she got help, either from another version of her, or from the old general running in to steal the sacrificial moment. Not to mention that ‘I’m gonna blow us all up’ doesn’t really seem like a satisfyingly Doctor-y conclusion.
It also felt terribly crammed. The Death Particle, the reveal of the Doctor’s past, the destruction of Gallifrey, the CyberMasters, the Cyberium bonding with the Master, no wonder there wasn’t time for any interesting resolutions to the various conflicts.
I don’t know, I just feel this could’ve been a lot better. Jodi Whittaker clearly has the range to bring depth to the character, but overall, she essentially just never really was given a chance to shine. No really defining moment that I can recall.
But well, it wasn’t terrible either, and there were some genuinely fun moments. I hope future series manage to build on that.
(I’m watching the finale now)
THIS. IS. INSANE.