Doctor Who 2008: Sontarans cometh, RTD Ood 'ave 'im etc.

1.21 jigawatts!

No, they weren't. I remember commenting at the time that the BBC sent the entire Confidential team to NYC to do a puff piece on the story, but wouldn't even send the director on factfinding (it was all in DWM).

Pretty sure I remember that they shot exteriors on Liberty Island and greenscreened everyone into them back in the UK. Although I'm not sure why I care.

I watched a Davison story recently which had bits shot in Amsterdam. Arc of Infinity, maybe?

Yes, there's that one too.

Did anyone watch the cop show with Matt Smith last night?

Yeah. Not much to say - his character was pretty unremarkable.

tonight's score:

http://www.linkandpinhobbies.com/Graphics/bk_who%20file.jpg

$20 at powells in hardback!

I had a copy of that! Kept it around the office when I was editor of the uni paper to scan photos and stuff, forgot to take it with me when my year was up. Bugger! From memory, the essay/memoir by Robert Holmes was very funny.

There are some bits in Paris in one old-school episode, I'm sure.

― Matt DC, Tuesday, 3 February 2009 12:03 (2 days ago) Permalink

That was the Jagaroth one - City of Death - penned by Douglas Adams. Although in retrospect it's one of the more playful and comic ones, this story terrified me more than ANY other. According to my mum anyway. I was having nightmares about the Jagaroth for some weeks after.

UH

That's actually pretty amazing (Pertwee's Venusian Aikido! lol at the busty anime companion tho).

Big Finish is going to make some audios this year out a few of the 'lost season' of scripts from 1985.

http://www.bigfinish.com/images/news/DSC02313-for-web.jpg

That io9 link adds this comment:

...Most of all, I'd caution the Big Finish people to be very careful if they decide to adapt Robert Holmes' lost Singapore story. Holmes may have been the greatest Doctor Who writer of all time, but he's also known for including bizarre racist caricatures of Asian people in his story "The Talons Of Weng-Chiang." And if it's true that Holmes' story set in Singapore was supposed to be called "Yellow Fever And How To Cure It," then that script may just deserve to sit in a drawer forever. (Not to mention the fact that it reportedly includes the Master, the Rani and the Autons, making it another overstuffed nostalgia-fest like his "Two Doctors" script.)

About the ToWC thing, wasn't the "white guy dressed up as asian guy to fool clueless white people at a magic show" a pretty established trope back then and went on for a few decades on both sides of the pond?

I know full well that this next bit could cross into all sorts of well-worn ILX tropes and we could very well have gone over all this before years ago, but perhaps by having this convo in a Doctor Who thread we can hide from the usual clusterfuckery: was the brouhaha over the ToWC story focused on a particular aspect, or just the whole "sinister oriental mage is sinister" bit? Was the problem just that the story showed all the bad stereotypes("orientalist?") that were associated with asian people at the time by white folks and had the villain being a chinese magician portrayed by an white guy? But weren't there plenty of white guys putting on make-up and affecting those same stereotypes back then to fool other white folks? Is it that there was no distinction made in the story as to the character's actual race?

In other news, bleah to more Colin audios with Peri. Having Charley around is much more interesting.

http://www.digitalspy.com/cult/a139069/dr-who-boss-discusses-new-companions.html

"We’ve got a young female companion at Easter, and then a much older woman next Christmas - someone in her fifties or sixties. I love that."

so, old companion or new companion? Katy Manning, Caroline Shaw, Janet Fielding, Carole Ann Ford, Wendy Padbury, Deborah Watling, Louise Jameson, Mary Tamm, and Lalla Ward all qualify. And even Maggie Stables, for that matter.

I don't have much of a problem with the character of Li Hsen Chang; he seems like a guy who's knowingly playing into the stereotypes as part of his act. The sinister silent Chinese henchmen, however, are a lot more questionable.

and that answers that

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/7897518.stm

http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/45489000/jpg/_45489816_006889682-1.jpg

Duncan will play Adelaide, the Doctor's cleverest and most strong-minded companion yet in the unnamed episode.

"strong-minded", huh? Like Tegan or more like Evelyn?

Who Evelyn?

irritating old biddy companion from the radio plays

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evelyn_Smythe

'Bizarre and racist cariacatures' seems a little bit much. They weren't bizarre at all in fact, they were well-established (Sax Rohmer was it, who came up with the Yellow Peril stuff in his Fu Manchu stories?). And they were racial cariacatures rather than, I think, racist.

I'm pretty certain the fuss centred around the Victorian-in-spirit as well as Victorian-in-context depictions of Chinese. Li Hsen Chang's stage presence is similar to that of the actual Chung Ling Soo - on stage Chinese bullet catching magician, but actually American William Robinson (who nicked the Chinese persona from genuine Chinese magician Chung Ling Foo. Li Hsen Chang actually does a bullet trick with Tom Baker in a particularly good set piece. There is precedence and what could be seen as deliberate reference.

However Li Hsen is genuinely Chinese and also, by the end genuinely sympathetic - in fact his type is not a racist type at all, but a generic Dr Faustus type - over reaching himself with the aid of supernatural/alien powers (if you'll pardon the crude backslash)

General henchmen somewhat problematic (and what feeble ninja skilz). Imbecile British bobbies don't show up too well either.

Robert Holmes probably wanted to do an old style early 20th century romp and didn't care too much about niceties. Personally I love it.

That season + Key To Time season = my favorite seasons

And they were racial cariacatures rather than, I think, racist.

That was over-casual, as well as being mis-spelt but I just felt that 'racist caricatures' rather belaboured the point.

FUCKING ZIMBABWE FUCKERS
http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/cult/a147355/zimbabwe-hoarding-lost-who-episodes.html

Time to invade.

Also I would like to see the new doctor and companion get involved a la Tennant and Piper.

No, really.

robert mugabe ruins the fun for everyone.

You mean the new companion gets involved with Mugabe?

there must be 'she'll turn out to be The Rani' rumours by now

the rani and robert mugabe: 2010 series finale.

That article's priceless.

Do you think Iran might have them as well?

what does it say about me that I don't think it's a good idea to invade a country for oil but I'm all for invading a country for old Doctor Who episodes

No blood for oil, but blood should totally be spilled to get more Doctor Who.

http://img.thesun.co.uk/multimedia/archive/00737/dialect_737444a.jpg

President Robert Mugabe has banned BBC personnel from entering the country, which has reportedly led the corporation to fear that they might never retrieve the missing serials.

ha, oh there's probably a handful of fans that would be willing to take the risk.

"Um, yes, we're here to see the sights. Lovely country and all, but there's one place in particular we'd like to, uh, visit..."

haha to the Sun. Check the filename on the Davros mashup:

dialect_737444a.jpg

http://media.townhall.com/Townhall/Car/b/lb0223cd20090220075017.jpg

OH NO NOW THEY COMING FOR OUR WHITE GRANDMAS' PURSES

http://media.townhall.com/Townhall/Car/b/2-20-09natohelprgb20090220033519.jpg

haha, wrong thread

dear ilxors: which Mccoy stories should I bother with? I've seen 'Curse of Fenric' and have the Dalek one sitting around here somewhere, but what about the others?

Survival - the one with the fuzzy cat women. And, er, Hale & Pace (who aren't terrible tbh). As it's the last 'classic' Who story, the ending is poigniant as eff.

Watching the extras on the 'Curse of Fenric' discs, it's funny to see the writer Ian Briggs both from vid back then and interview vid now and it's great to see how he's still this fanboy writer dork several years after the fact...

Ghostlight is regarded as McCoy's bonafide classic isn't it? It's an interesting story, but kind of bonkers. I've got a lot of love for Paradise Towers, due to it first being screened when I was nine and the robot cleaners giving me the shits hardcore.

he's still this fanboy writer dork

Ben Aaronovitch to thread.

Just saw Matt Smith watching the footie in the Camden Tup. Interesting story.

The Happiness Patrol has its moments. The Candyman is one supremely mental idea for a villain (robot made from boiled lollies mounted on cut-price-terminator-style endoskeleton), and really cool with it.

I won a Dalek Sec voice-changer mask from answering some trivia questions at a drunken geeky movie awards show at a local comic shop tonight. Photos to come.

I'm thinking of just ripping out the voice-mod circuit to see what interesting thigns I can do with it.

Ghost Light doesn't really make any sense and the last act kinda sucks but I still like it a lot. Greatest Show in the Galaxy and Survival are both pretty cool.

"Ghost Light" works much, much better as a book than it does as a television story. "Paradise Towers" is incredibly goofy but also pretty awesome in its full-on dementia; I also recommend "The Greatest Show in the Galaxy" and "Happiness Patrol". The ones that get mentioned as McCoy classics ("Remembrance of the Daleks", "The Curse of Fenric", "Ghost Light") have interesting ideas but seem to have been bungled one way or another in their presentation as shows; "Survival" isn't necessarily much better but most of the WTF-factor actually works for it rather than against it.

"Dragonfire" is possibly the worst thing ever filmed, don't ever watch it.

The chief clown in 'Greatest Show' is also an ace villain.

Dragonfire is worth watching for that very reason. See if you can spot the cliffhanger.