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

I did post that I thought this episode showed us the crack in the Doctor, instead of one in some nearby wall.

no crack in Venice either - the Angels have temporarily nipped it in the bud.

Or Rory is like grout.

Pasty and somewhat thick.

His Lyndhurst vibe is a bit distracting.

The crack in Venice was shown when the sun came out at the end, following the line of a receding cloud. And then came the timey-wimey mute button and the Tardis keyhole that looked like the crack on its side.

I get a bit fed up with the amazing companion girls having dorky boyfriends who are blatantly written as undeserving of them and their amazingness then they have some big epiphany and realise that dorky boyfriend is actually ace (Rose/Mickey, Gwen/Rhys, now Amy/Rory). Also "I never told him I loved him" fuck off you big idiot, you've been married to him for five years and are having his baby, of course you've told him you love him. Haven't you? (yes, I know it was a dream, but she thought it was real)

This is OTM. I desperately want to chalk this all up to the fact that it has to do with Amy Pond, who is played by Karen Gillan, but it's all in the script, isn't it.

Don't get your Karen/Amy hate. She's been less annoying than previous companions so far.

She does this very self-conscious pout thing that is a dead ringer for every vapid Facebook photo ever. It drives me up the wall. Happy to accept that this is my own personal thing.

No, I don't like her either.

I do like her, I just don't like the amazing girl/dorky boy meme.

I never thought Mickey was dorky but Rory definitely is. If Amy really does end up marrying him it will be a bit sad.

Mickey was quite cowardly but became brave. Rory can at least score points with medical knowledge - when the sonic screwdriver isn't healing wounds in seconds. I was hoping they'd be able to explore Amy's former 'craziness' more wrt Doctor obsession when younger. Possibly the crack in her wall came because of her subsequent contact with the Doctor - the cracks latching on to Timelord energy (he could be causing the cracks both after and before he appears at the same location). Paradox tho innit.

She does this very self-conscious pout thing that is a dead ringer for every vapid Facebook

Yeah, but this is what makes her realistically of her generation. 20ish girls just do that now, don't they? I see them doing it on trains and things.

Trying to decide whether I should watch/rewatch all the silurain/sea devil stories this week in preparation for next week's episode. Tried watching the Pertwee silurian story a couple of months back and got bored about two episodes in (it's a six parter).

oh that story goes on for days and days

you are better off watching "The Sea Devils"; it's shorter, has more action and features the Master

I couldn't sit through Silurians either. Sea Devils ain't bad, though certainly not one of Pertwee's best. I bloody loved Warriors of the Deep when it first aired, I must've been six or seven. I haven't watched it since, but I understand it has a reputation as being particularly risible.

Yeah, have seen and liked Sea Devils, will probably give that another spin. And yep, I should give Warriors of the Deep a chance too.

"Warriors of the Deep" is let down by some terrible, terrible production values and acting, but if you get past that it is a really shocking, brutal story and forecasts Tegan's departure pretty well; in fact, looking at that season, you have this really amazing arc where the stories kind of escalate to "Resurrection of the Daleks" and Tegan's freakout makes total since, given that she'd just recently seen:

- one of her (admittedly hyper-annoying) friends die
- another one of her friends almost die, leading to her deciding to leave the TARDIS
- a total frenemy join the crew who spends most of his time running away from things and advocating that they let the Doctor die (btw this is one of the greatest/funniest things about "Warriors of the Deep"; I think Turlough shouts "Leave him, Tegan! He's dead!" about the Doctor like 5 times in a 4 episode story)
- a series of adventures where either everyone around her gets slaughtered or people from her childhood are threatened

No matter how silly some of the stories are, there is a grim, relentless pace from that season ("Warriors of the Deep", "The Awakening", "Frontios", "Resurrection of the Daleks", "Planet of Fire", The Caves of Androzani") that I still remember as breathtaking whenever I think back on it.

But yeah, "Warriors" is super-goofy at the end of the day. If you aren't laughing at the Myrka, you're doing it wrong.

a total frenemy join the crew who spends most of his time running away from things and advocating that they let the Doctor die (btw this is one of the greatest/funniest things about "Warriors of the Deep"; I think Turlough shouts "Leave him, Tegan! He's dead!" about the Doctor like 5 times in a 4 episode story)

This is why I heart Turlough.

I've said this before but Tegan and Turlough are two of my favorite companions of all time.

They really are great, and just on an aesthetic level Tegan's 80s hair and clothes have brought me many lulz.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SbOQ8kRcFxs&feature=related

i looked up that song and apparently it was the theme song for one of those Flavor of Love spinoff reality shows? catchy tho

i probably need to see more but i didn't really like the one or two Davison stories I saw, didn't warm to those two companions

Davison probably suffers a lot if you didn't grow up with him; too many of his stories don't know what to do with all of his companions, so you end up with things like Nyssa taking a nap for the entirety of "Kinda".

Ha, wasn't she supposed to have been sacked by the time that was filmed though?

Did they really have four companions at that stage? That seems to be overkill...

and a bit crowded in the TARDIS - it's not *that* much bigger on the inside when you all hang around the same wee control room every day.

I remember at least one scene taking place in Adric's room, so at least they had their own rooms.

Speaking of wee, does the Tardis have a toilet?

Yeah, but this is what makes her realistically of her generation. 20ish girls just do that now, don't they?

I don't know why it took so long for this to occur to me.

Getting back to the last episode it showed up how good the new Tardis set is, lots of different levels to run around on, the Doctor down underneath the control console, etc.

Also perving:

http://imgur.com/MDgcc.jpg

http://imgur.com/e6Ho8.jpg

I do wonder what would have happened if Amy had chosen the Doctor over Rory -- I know if it had been Rose, she would have brushed off Mickey dying and would have pushed to be with the Doctor forever. He probably would have kicked them both off of the Tardis, wouldn't he?

I quite like The Silurians, but it's very heavy going. On the other hand, there aren't many of the heavy handed modern political allegories that aren't - Global Warming DO YOU SEE all the Army are violent thugs DO YOU SEE.

Ingrid Pitt's Kung Fu Kick is my favourite thing about WotD. That, and the resigned look the Wet Vet gives to camera then goes "Oh no, it's the Myrka..."

Tegan/Adric/Nyssa are my least favourite companions of them all, particularly since because they know there's too many people one of them always has to be off doing something else. One of the best examples is maybe Terminus where, despite being Nyssa's last story she spends nearly all of it shut away in a room recovering from a disease she suddenly catches. I watched Traken/Logopolis/Castrovalva over the weekend and came to the realisation I maybe hate Tegan more than Adric, she's just so fucking smug. And whiny.

I don't know, I think if I was trying to get to work and some random alien killed my aunt and then another random alien accidentally kidnapped me, I would do some whining.

Adric is totally unforgivable though.

What was the point of that kid, anyway? He makes Wesley Crusher look like Han Solo.

I think they were trying to go back to the interpersonal dynamics of the original TARDIS crew, only with certain things inverted like the Doctor looking/acting much younger, everyone in the crew effectively being an orphan, an slightly older woman who wants to leave with two younger kids who want to stay rather than a slightly older couple who wants to leave with a younger girl who wants to stay, etc etc etc.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3lL6hkpJveM

Anyone else think the SoftMints man has a passing resemblance to Matt Smith - in clothes, expression and general manner?

RUMBLED.

In other news, a colleague has revealed that he was the stylist for all of Karen Gillan's BBC publicity stills. She is apparently dating someone who works in fashion (I think a graphics guy).

"He makes Wesley Crusher look like Han Solo"

only wesley never died pointlessly trying to be cleverer than he was. CURSES. *roll silent credits*

that happened to be the ONLY Adric story I saw, what a tool

Real talk: killing Wesley Crusher would have made me definitively decide TNG > TOS

I DO NOT APPROVE OF ALL YOUR ADRIC HATES.

In case any of you haven't seen this:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/archive/doctorwho/

So, apparently the Clerics from the Weeping Angels story might be really really really REALLY important?

The last 10 minutes of this is Eps 3-5 of The Silurians. And I hate Amy.

BBC ethnicity conspiracy junkies ahoy today, can't refuse Meera Syal a shot in the TARDIS.

Also LOL Scottish Silurian.

And I hate Amy.

My man!

Yeah, need to see the rest of it, liked quite a lot of specific moments in this week's but wasn't impressed by the Silurian hostage, who was totally alien-by-numbers (looked much better before the mask came off). Weird pacing too, seemed to last ages. Don't really give a shit on the "one of you is going to kill me" side of things, three pretty uninteresting characters to choose from. Liked the big underground city lots though.

anyone who dislikes this needs their heads examined. Matt Smith is amazing. Shuttling sea devils in a graveyard behind a kid gone to fetch something = classic nightmare material. People being dragged into the earth = classic nightmare material. Rory excellent. Don't get the Amy dislike in the slightest - bolshie but ultimately slightly frightened but not going to show it lass. This was classic comic book material culminating in a massive subterranean city. What the hell's wrong with you lot?