This is literally my point. They’re harmless and they’re so much of a risk they must be killed, at the same time! That undisputably makes no sense, but it’s so much the accepted standard that it’s weird to take the ‘sensible’ view.
Anyway, this isn’t a thread about popular conceptions of spider acceptability. Consider me backed off.
<Adds Darren Garrison to The List of People Who Are Not Allowed on My Lawn.
But I thank you for the answer. Honestly I don’t see a huge degree of irrational spider fear in the United States, either among real people or in media, but spiders as particularly scary seems to be a very common British theme, from Shelob of Tolkein fame, to Aragog in Harry Potter, to this.
Trying to come up with a famous spider in American literature/media the first my mind comes up with is Charlotte and her web. But it seems that such a character, a loving, wise, and friendly spider, would simply never fly on the other side of the pond. (And our spider does indeed do that!) Then maybe “Itsy Bitsy” who climbed up the water spout, and our appropriated from Africa, Anasi, whose cleverness is scary I guess.
I’m English and I didn’t get the joke. 
Oh, I do think it’s relevant, I just didn’t want to suffer indignant wrath (as has happened, on occasion) by having the
“They’re harmless. You are literally thousands of times bigger than them. They eat the real vermin - which you only regard as mildly annoying - and want nothing from you, save for indifference.”
-“But…SPIDERS! Ugh!”
discussion again.
They’re very much a popular hate figure in British culture.
Two points:
First, we don’t know exactly where “Blink” took place, but there were places in 1960’s America where interracial couples existed - just not in the Deep South like Alabama. In the Northeast or upper Midwest, especially in the larger cities, you could get away with an interracial relationship although you’d still suffer discrimination for it.
Second, a white man with a black woman was (and to an extent still is) better tolerated by the society in question than a white woman and a black man. So… Tennant Doctor and Martha would have fewer problems than Whitaker Doctor and Ryan.
Yes, well, Krasko’s era found him so deviant they actually implanted a device in his brain to control his impulses. Pretty safe to assume he is/was considered “mentally ill” by his native society.
Blink took place in 1960s UK, I believe. Also we see so little of the 1960 setting, that it’s not clear to me if they were masquerading as a couple at all, or what, if any, reaction they got.
Wow, nobody’s even posted anything about today’s episode, that’s how mediocre it was.
All the reviews are saying that it was “okay” and I agree. It had a few moments, some a bit out of place, but it felt like a filler episode, where nothing of any real consequence happened, even if it did hit some emotional beats quite hard. They are maintaining the small scope.
I quite liked the latest episode. The Doctor manages to get everyone blown up, which is a novelty, and we get not two but three plots - the Pting attack / risk of ship being blown up, the whole sibling (and CloneDrone) squabble, and the pregnancy/Ryan’s daddy issues thing. All rather neatly wrapped up.
And we’ve gone from “big scary creature that is actually not so bad” to “cute babylike creature that is a massive threat”. I did think the Pting was channeling the gremlin from Hotel Transylvania, though; all we were missing was an “I didn’t do that”.
Excellent fun episode!
This one is more a call back to classic Who with some good humorous bits cutting into tension and the Doctor filling out her personality some.
Back to a universe though in which the Doctor has been written about … more a volume than a chapter … said somewhat sheepishly … is that consistent now? I’ve lost track.
I thought it was channeling gremlins, but didn’t think of any specific presentation.
Loose end question: did we find out why the Doctor was fixated on the name “Tsuranga”? Or is this another “to be revealed” point?
She’s a Futurama fan, but forgot Leela’s name doesn’t have an s in it?
I liked this episode a lot, it’s my favorite of the season (though I always count the post-regen episode as their own thing). They had an interesting alien threat that got resolved with a clever plan that wasn’t full of holes, one of those competent soldiers the doctor always pretends don’t exist, a major threat from automated beurocracy, interesting setting, several odd aliens and background characters, and the ending didn’t have any overly preachy bit.
Also I finally noted one really unique piece of this Doctor’s personality - she’s actually willing to admit that she’s wrong sometimes, instead of continuing to bluster indefinitely. The scene where senior medical guy talked her down from taking over the ship ended with her saying ‘oh, I am being unreasonable’ which isn’t something most Doctors are capable of.
I think we did. She was coming out of surgery, sort of recognized the name of the ship, but recovering brain didn’t put together ‘that’s a ship, you’re not on the junk planet anymore’, so she kept looking for an exit to the planet even though there wouldn’t be one.
His Chibs et al are still playing with gender roles and subverting expectations; the Doctor, Yaz, and the General running around stunning the bad guy, piloting the ship, doing the hero things; while Ryan and Graham were nuturing poor Yoss on his birthbed. The trope of “expectant, er, parent, gives birth in middle of crisis” is well-worn, but having the whole situation be an almost all-male affair was rather sweet. In addition to the Doctor admitting she was wrong - and she most certainly was - there was another subverted expectation: I assumed she fed the Pting the bomb in order to kill it. But that’s not how this Doctor rolls - her plan was to feed it, then send it on its way. Definite maternal vibe to this episode.
Anyone else think that her comment about feeling so much better informed after the computer briefing about the Pting was a wink at the fact that the scene was exposition-slash-infodump?
Took reading this thread to get the pun. I knew the phrase was a reference to something, but I just couldn’t remember to what. :smack:
I was thinking of gremlins, but also of the cute little creatures that turned out to have fangs in “Galaxy Quest”
The Galaxy Quest things were what I thought of when I saw the Pting.
Of course they’re minors. They’re like three years old!
Not MINORS, MINERS!
The pting made me think of Stitch from “Lilo and Stitch”.