Sea Devils And Die: GeroniMoffat's Doctor Who In The 2010s

real test when it comes down to the normal time. i know there was a lot of info to put into this one, but the episode had time to actually breathe, which was sorely missing in RTD days.

So, that bingo card: I make it yesses on:

Geronimo
secondary character spouts cryptic prophesy
Shadow Proclamation namechecked
Run!
Flashback or recap of regeneration (if show of doctors counts to that)
Amy gets tour of TARDIS
Alien invasion on the news (was it on the news or just on telly?)
Doctor admires his own reflection (nicely done!)
Shapeshifting alien is a dog (whoever did these cards has seen this, right?)
Aliens take over earth communications devices blah blah
swirly blue vortex in new title sequence O NO RLY?

So, not that many, but a good few. Some obvious ones not done. Yet.

btw, has the TARDIS always had a mezzanine floor?

err...

http://imgur.com/NOFTQ.jpg

http://imgur.com/4WONJ.jpg

So either the Tardis caused the cracks in time and space, or the thing making the cracks is also inside the Tardis?

Or that's two wobbly lines of different shapes?

I dunno, James Corden spoiled it for me

― Top Geir (Noodle Vague), Sunday, 4 April 2010 00:01 (34 minutes ago) Bookmark

maybe he dies? got to look on the bright side.

hopefully something prolonged and undignified

Tell you what I really loved: no big regen crisis!

The bit where Sophie Peep Show turned into him and he was all "WTF is that? Oh right, is that what I look like?" was nicely done. I did also really appreciate the lack of Tennant, making a clean break was really good (as a firm "OMG not going to be the same without him" Tennant stan, it seemed so much easier to put him behind me and get with Matt Smith).

Also the completely rubbish Patrick Moore cameo.

I wonder whether aldo hated it.

"Kiss-o-gram," eh??

Bingo also:
Nobody dies
TARDIS referred to as she (he called her sexy)

Is Patrick Moore the new Churchill-looking PM of the UK?

Slightly farther to the Right than Churchill iirc

dug Matt Smith, really good to have someone new in the role. loved Tennant but I hadn't realized just how annoying his angsty doctor had gotten towards the end.

only thing i hated was music and title sequence. which bums me out cause i really like the new logo.

As good a debut as I could have hoped for! Really enjoyed it, Matt Smith was very Tennant-esque, but I think he'll get more room to stretch his legs very soon and he was nonetheless quite entertaining. Amy was really cute, trademark Moffatt lurking horror and time jump stuff being very cool and looking forward to more! (I am enthused.)

Gah I'm away for the weekend and can't watch this but there's total anticipation building now that seemingly everyone likes it.

That conference call/Jeff stuff was a bit sketchy tho. Actually it was baloney, but I think you can excuse that sort of thing if the tone was good.

Also not sure about the Johnny 5 Alive! 'what have I missed' bit on the village green.

I welcomed the use of a village setting, maybe because it feels more trad Who than the now over-used inner city London tower blocks of the nu-Who. It helps give the series a different feel. It's less trying to be 'relevant to the kids of today', which was always kind of hopeless.

Little Amelia was great, though I don't really agree she would've made a good companion, just for boring practical reasons I suppose. She would be too much of a burden in tight corners, too dependant on the Doctor.
Plus Amy is saucy.

As an opener it was typically flashy, and a touch hyperactive, but Matt Smith hit the ground running imo, and I'm looking forward to more of Moffat's dark fairytale take.

started groaning at the so-overdone 'all that amazing stuff that happened' and then proper lol'd at the 'that was two years ago!'.

James Corden, Bill Nighy and Meera Syal

guess this is the kind of shit that zerofies my interest in giving it another go

I like that the kiss-o-gram job showed that his failure to return forced her into sex work, in the mildest possible way.

The episode started as a nice nod to the start of the Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy, which was nice. Good to start with the Tardis being unreliable, a good old who standby. Coma patients speaking is becoming a little hackneyed. Good fun though, and i look forward to the rest.

Only thing that tested my suspension of disbelief was the existence of a rural cottage hospital in brown's broken 21st century Britain.

I think I missed it, but who were the people that were introduced later in the episode, the elderly lady and her son or grandson - were they friends/neighbors of Amy's?

Yeah, friends/neighbours. Pretty weak and slightly confusing tho.

First DW I've really enjoyed in a *long* time. Completely convinced by Matt Smith by 5 mins in. Anyone know where it was set?

A fictional village of Leadworth - filmed as usual around Cardiff.

Really loved this, except for the music. I wish Murray Gold would have some sort of major life epiphany that makes him give up composing forever.

So good!

Loved it--Smith seemed just like the Doctor to me. A great start.

Guess which newspaper?

The revealing outfit prompted a flood of comments on online message boards, with a section of fans accusing producers of 'shamelessly sexing up' the long-running family show and labelling it 'slutty'.

Writing about Amy, one viewer in an online forum asked: 'Why did she dress up as a tarty policewoman? Surely that's not fitting for a family show.'

Another said: 'They've completely demeaned Doctor Who by replacing good episode stories with slutty girls.'

i liked the new title music, if only because they'd ditched the guitars and put synths back in.

the storm clouds and fire textures in the tunnels were too earthly though. it's science fiction, make it look fantastic, not everyday.

golly, this was swell. new tardis looked super cool, and preview of future eps was pretty jaw-dropping (daleks vs. fighter planes?). loved the character design of the aliens, espesh the snowflake-eye-ship.

Writing about Amy, one viewer in an online forum asked: 'Why did she dress up as a tarty policewoman? Surely that's not fitting for a family show.'

sooooo... been thinking about maybe giving this a watch?

aldo is not in the country so has not seen this yet.

aldo you will fucking love it BUT we keenly await another timeline update from you! :D

Coma patients speaking is becoming a little hackneyed

I read that scene as a homage to Seven Crystal Balls, but that might be over-nerding it. Although Moffat did write one half of the first Tintin movie, so maybe not.

Loved the fish custard business at the start, the rest didn't quite match up, but otherwise very promising. It seemed a lot smarter, like a BBC2 Doctor Who, if that makes sense.

was anyone else mis-stepped by the 'hit with a cricket bat, hits floor, cut to ambulance siren-blaring to hospital forecourt' = ok so doctor has been taken to the hospita... oh hang on.

other odd bits/echoes:
an alien fugitive being reclaimed by law-enforcing aliens, plus some hospital scenes. martha's 1st story
whisked away *before* a wedding.
very fanboyish continuity jokes/refs re swimming pool and other stuff (i forget)
lots of kid's dreamstuff in there (room you never noticed, childhood 'invisible' friend, corner of the eye/blink stuff)
lots of allusions to teh filthy stuff (as per moffat in gen)

A full 8-tentacle salute from here. Really liked the first episode a lot - wanted to see the next one immediately afterward...

Sold on Matt Smith during the "you know when parents tell you everything is going to be alright?" line (which Tennant would have made ridiculously overdramatic).

was anyone else mis-stepped by the 'hit with a cricket bat, hits floor, cut to ambulance siren-blaring to hospital forecourt' = ok so doctor has been taken to the hospita... oh hang on

yep

on rewatching there's definitely something in the scene the pic james posted comes from - the doctor turns the monitor off as if worried that amy will see the image of the crack on the screen

something odd about the end too with the raggedy-doctor dolls (is amy gonna go psycho-stalkey halfway thru the season?) all out and so close to the wedding dress

I loved this :) which was a happy surprise! Man i love doctor who so much

Before everyone gets carried away I don't think this was a much better opening episode than 'Rose', but then again Moffatt's got form so I have faith.

Matt Smith - terrific. I really like his occasional bursts of sarcastic zinginess, like when Amy asked him if the door would hold the aliens.

The whole ep - bit of a mess, I thought, too frantic and overstuffed, and the alien stuff raced past as if it wasn't really important (to be fair, in a scene-setting epsiode it isn't really). Could have done with having about three characters removed. Still, The End Of The World is getting a bit boring so nice of Moffatt to get it out of the way early.

The first 10mins - great. Moffatt is at his best when aiming directly at the younger kids, and this hit the nail on the head. He needs to do a story with household insects given alien powers. Spiders, maybe.

Amy - dunno, jury's out. Didn't really get much of a sense of her personality in this one, relative to Rose/Martha/Donna, and Karen Gillen's repertoire of wide-eyed terror expressions leads me to think she might not be a great actress.

Doctor being a dick to Amy's boyfriend - this is always classic, a nice throwback to the Ecclestone era. Amy having to be back the next morning for her wedding day is a good reason not to go back to present day Earth for the rest of the series as well.

You know.. what is the deal with Doctor Who Confidential? I think I give it a shot maybe once a season, but... why is it 45 minutes long when half of it is montages of scenes from the episode you just watched set to pop music? Also why do they seem to repeat the same factoids over and over again? I just watched the one for the first episode, and they explained how stop-motion filming works at least three times, how the Doctor REALLY becomes the Doctor when he finally gets a new wardrobe (you don't say) three times, and so on... damn my behind-the-scenes curiosity.

Finally saw this tonight, and showed it to a bar full of abotu 16-17 people there just to see it.

I enjoyed it. I really liked the fact that they worked cell phones in, and that the camera movements were very, VERY different from what we've seen before.

the Murray Gold stuff was bleah, but I figure that what we have to put up with until someone finally kneecaps him. I wish the opening theme didn't have quite so modern beats.

The new theme crowds out the bassline with these bombastic strings, and that's unforgiveable in my book.

Very much in agreement with everything Matt DC said. Felt like there was something slack about the direction, too. The panel-to-panel storytelling felt a bit confusing, too much going on at one moment, too little at the next. Maybe a reflection of the smaller budget?

What's up with the first ten seconds of the theme, btw? It took way too long to get to the melody.

has the budget been cut?

Agree that Moffat keeps packing too much stuff in, but would still rather this than the weak episodes we're likely to get from other writers. Comparisons to 'Rose' are probably pointless as that was largely carried by the overwhelming excitement/expectation and ended up being one of the weaker eps of that series. No opener has ever gone on to stand out as one of the series highlights which is fantastic given The Eleventh Hour's overall quality.

big grin at the doctor sending amy a message to "duck!" - possibly the only person capable of sending such a message would be a time traveler - and it is just too delicious to refrain from using TWICE

(by moffat i mean - that was straight outta "Blink" right?)

(and in Blink he actually adds "no seriously, duck!!")