The Doctor has mothershagging HAD IT with these shagging dinosaurs on this shagging spaceship!

Cafe Society
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OK, this post has spoilers for the upcoming season of “Doctor Who.” So, if you don’t want to know anything, don’t scroll down…

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Ok there. Anyway, the titles for the first three episodes have been announced. The first story is called “Asylum of the Daleks” - featuring guess what old monster? It also features an appearance by Rory’s dad.

The second is the most intriguing. It’s called - believe it or not - “Dinosaurs on a Spaceship.” I have visions of the Doctor regenerating into a bad-ass black guy with a 'fro and 'stach and a ruddy brown leather jacket.

The third is called “A Town Called Mercy” and is a western (although it was shot in Spain.) Can it make amends for the infamous early DW western story “the Gunslingers”? We’ll see.

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The Gunfighters.

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So? Some of the best westerns ever made were shot in Spain. :confused:

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Hence the term “spaghetti Western”.

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Named after the famous Spanish Spaghetti? :slight_smile:

Spaghetti westerns were called that because most of them were directed by Italian directors. Many of them were filmed in Spain, yes.

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When does the show return?

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I always find British televisions complete non-caring attitude towards what American audiences would consider “spoilers” to be fascinating.

Granted, at this point in Dr.Who, having an episode with the Daleks (or for that matter the Cybermen) is no big deal, but they were when they first came back in NuWho, and yet right there in the episode titles, it tells you.

The first Dalek episode was just called “Dalek,” and the first Cybermen one was called “Rise of the Cybermen.” The latter, especially, could have had a lot more tension if it had a different title, and if the Cyberman body wasn’t shown to us a few minutes in…keep it hidden, so when they show up towards the end, longtime Who fans could have been like “Oh Shit! No way!”

Similarly, later appearances of the Daleks, before they got overused in NuWho, could have been more suspenseful if the episode title and promos didn’t give them away.

Likewise, the season 2 two-part finale does something similar…we see these “ghosts” that appear all over the world, and it could have been a much better reveal that they were in fact Cybermen from that other dimension, but again, they show us a Cyberman in the first few minutes for no reason other than to “spoil” the surprise.

I didn’t watch any of them when they aired (all Netflix,) so now I’m wondering if some of the even BIGGER surprises (Rory’s “death,” Rose leaving to get stuck in the other world, The Master returning) were spoiled in the promos or newspaper/blog/magazine articles.

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The article says in the autumn with 5 episodes then the Christmas special and then another 8 episodes.

I r excited.

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Ben Browder from Farscape/Stargate will be in the western episode, too. Very cool.

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Speaking of the first (new) Dalek episode, it actually took place in 2012, and there was a series 2 episode where the Doctor and Rose show up for the 2012 Olympics. I found it weird that they visited 2012 that way twice when I got to those episodes a month or so back while rewatching on On Demand. Usually the only year they keep revisiting over and over is the current year. Even when they went back to that satellite at the end of s1 it was like 100 years later.

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And Dame Diana Rigg (and her RL daughter too) will be appearing in a late season (post-Christmas special, new companion) episode as well.

Pictures here. Fair warning though, the site of an elderly Rigg is somewhat heart-breaking. Of course everyone gets old, but I had to gulp back a tear when I saw her. :frowning:

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I think at this stage, it’s sort of convention to have Dalek episode titles as “<something> of the Daleks”.

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She’s also going to be in the coming season of Game of Thrones, as Natalie Dormer’s grandmother.

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My first thought was of the absolutely awful Colin Baker story The Two Doctors, which was also filmed in Spain, back in 1985 or so. It was a bit of a coup at the time, although I remember wondering what was so special about Spain. It’s where English people go on holiday of a summer. Imagine if Christopher Nolan had decided to film The Dark Knight Rises in Florida or Miami, for example. And then imagine that Florida and Miami are sort of tacky, cheap, and low-rent. Which they are; but even more.

The thing I remember most is the cast squinting all the time, because it seemed to have been filmed at midday in blazing sunshine. There’s a thorough, depressing article about the serial here, which really goes to show how much things have changed; outdoors scenes in the old Doctor Who always looked as if they’d turned up with the film/video cameras, put them on a tripod, and shot then and there. Compare to e.g. Monty Python and the Holy Grail, which was done on a similar budget but had smoke machines, moody angles. It’s as if the BBC either didn’t care or (more likely) strict union rules forbade the crew from (a) working later in the day (b) using initiative (c) doing anything.