WHOCHURCH: The Chris Chibnall era

I unreservedly love Love & Monsters, a fantastic love song to fandom, which does well with the mandated monster - I even love the sex joke at the end, a sex life is a sex life even if it's not Rutting for the Continuation of the Species.

Still really think they should go all in on a single story/arc season. At this point it might be the only thing left to try and lift Chibnall out of mediocrity. This feeling is never stronger than after the usually arc-exempt monster of the weak difficult second/third episode tho.

be careful what you say or those tranquility human-things are gonna.... stand around a lot next to you

where do (my counter-trollfarm and) I go to upboost Love and Monsters?

you need to have been part of the BBC's regular audience survey panel fourteen years ago (run by GFK)

I adore Love & Monsters (one of only two RTD episodes that I actively like), but the last-minute cheapjack redesign of the Absorbaloff, and Kay's performance after the change undermine a lot of what is well done beforehand. For a story that manages so many tones of slapstick, senstivity, satire, social sort-of-realism and character comedy beforehand, the broadness of the monstery section is really jarring. (I'm agnostic on the paving slab ending. They both seem happy.)

Still really think they should go all in on a single story/arc season. At this point it might be the only thing left to try and lift Chibnall out of mediocrity.

He can't make the ideas in a single episode connect up from scene to scene, or often sentence to sentence. Imagine this inability over an intricate 14-episode serial that relies on everything connecting up, with no episodes originating from other minds.

Ooh, what was the redesign from? I'd thought it was a "winner of a design-a-monster" competition - was it something else before that?

Yeah, it was a kid's competition design. Apparently the kid was really disappointed, because his idea was a big scary monster that kept growing as it absorbed people - the size of a double-decker bus was in his pitch - and it turned out to be Peter Kay in a silly rubber suit making fart jokes with CGI faces in his bum.

(no doubt a double-bus-sized monster was going to be too expensive, and didn't necessarily fit with the "gradually arsesorbing the group" plot that RTD came up with, but at least it's still scary up until Kay's dancing around in the suit in broad daylight, jabbing his tongue out like his sole memory of Dr Who monsters is Sil out of Colin Baker's seasons.)

Love and Monsters is a story I liked on initial viewing but every time I've subsequently thought about it, I've increasingly hated it.

Curious what sic’s other (single!) favourite RTD episode is

Betting Midnight or Turn Left.

Rose

(aesthetically it’s nigh-hideous but that script is incredible. all the spookiness and mystery and set-up of An Unearthly Child, plus pulse-pounding action and laughs and character moments that tell us whole backstories in lines*, and huge implied history for the world and the title character without slowing down for exposition, and fully integrating the premises of Dr Who into modern technology and the style of current young people / family television. situating the audience identification character / protagonist so firmly that Doctor Who’s invitation to come along on adventures feels like the audience being treated to the invitation. What a fucking genius, who just happened to make loads of Who that isn’t on the whole much to my taste.)

Here’s how good that script is: the director was so shithouse that the star of the show quit a week into the shoot and refused to talk about it until after a nervous breakdown over a decade later, and they had to reshoot half the episode as second unit in the middle of other episodes over the next few months, with a hodge-podge of directors, and it still created an international hit that has been running for 15 years (w/ another two contracted!).

* we see enough of Ian & Barbara in the school scene of Unearthly Child to like and follow them, but never learn anything more about their history or personalities in a year and a half after that, let alone the rest of the episode. There’s scarcely even any hint of whether they like-like each other apart from colleagues, until they’ve suddenly apparently banged in between episodes of The Romans.

(I guess there’s not really any privacy or scope for 1960s-style missionary on the deckchair-like couches in the TARDIS sleeping chambers, so maybe it took weeks of drinking wine in togas and not being chased by aliens to even hold hands.)

"Rose" does have a good script, but aside from Eccleston's and Piper's and Camille Coduri's performances, the execution is pretty crappy (as you point out), and the special effects look cheap even for its era (that trash can that eats Mickey!), so I wouldn't really rate it among Davies' best. The aforementioned "Midnight" and "Turn Left" are both incredibly well done one-shot stories that rely on the actors giving their best, which they do, so those are definitely the high points of his writing.

I also have a soft spot for "Boomtown", because it's a very nice done character piece that focuses on fleshing out the protagonist and his morality instead of doing a typical "monster-of-the-week" type of story, and I do like it that it actually follows up on a previous monster-of-the-week episode, which makes the world of the series feel more lived-in, since the events of the previous aren't simply forgotten once the bad guy is defeated. That kind of attention to continuity was kind lacking in Davies's later seasons, though.

Aside from those, IMO "Army of Ghosts"/"Doomsday" was the high point of the Davies era, and the only time he managed to write a season finale that didn't suffer from glaring plot holes nor from OTT mawkishness. The plot twist at the end of the first part is really good and genuinely shocking, and the sentimentality at the end feels earned, plus it's way more subdued than what Davies would do in the next three finales.

I dig Gridlock as well - maybe not the most brilliantly plotted episode, but such a compelling setting and charming tone.

yeah, Gridlock's pretty good afair. never rewatched it, but iirc Gridlock's also v impressive in writing for a budget, where they spend all the money on two minutes of world-establishing CGI and then shoot 90% of the ep on the same tiny car set, with different windscreen decorations or w/e to make it look like a varied bunch of cars

Dan do you hate stuff from the first 35 minutes of Love & Monsters?

No, that stuff was pretty good. Once the monster is revealed the entire thing goes to shit.

https://i.imgur.com/dS8IjfU.jpg

"How can we do the Slitheen only less charming?" wasn't really a question I wanted the production team to answer

Do you guys all hate Bad Wolf/Parting of the Ways? I really like those

never rewatched but from memory: good dramatic structure, the TV parodies work well but the Captain Jack “I hid this enormous laser gun up my bum” joke doesn’t, Eccleston is great, I hate it every time RTD gives characters superpowers.

That joke wouldn't work for anyone else but c'mon, it's Barrowman, he pulls it off!

I think the early-2000s reality tv element of bad wolf, Anne-droid, etc., is not good.

“I hid this enormous laser gun up my bum” joke doesn’t

If you rewatch you will find the joke works because of how relatively tiny the gun is.

Barrowman you coward

Chibnall’s biggest problem seems to be that he thinks this is primarily a show for kids - where did he get such a preposterous idea

― El Tomboto, Saturday, January 4, 2020 2:26 PM (two weeks ago)

Robert Holmes thought it was almost exclusively a show for kids

― don't care didn't ask still clappin (sic), Saturday, January 4, 2020 2:41 PM (two weeks ago)

No problem with it being a show for kids, just want it to be better than disposable trash for kids.

― Tsar Bombadil (James Morrison), Saturday, January 4, 2020 4:26 PM (two weeks ago)

Just watched the first part of Mackenzie Crook's Worzel Gummidge adap, and somehow managed to find a show for kids to be delightful, charming, spooky, mildly witty, and to follow through on the premises and gags that it sets up.

― don't care didn't ask still clappin (sic), Saturday, January 4, 2020 4:48 PM (two weeks ago)

I should give that a go, Wiesel Gummidge terrifies me a a child and I could exorcise that demon.

― American Fear of Pranksterism (Ed), Saturday, January 4, 2020 6:19 PM (two weeks ago)

The two Worzel episodes were really, unexpectedly impressive.

― Chuck_Tatum, Sunday, January 5, 2020 10:35 AM (two weeks ago)

Just watched the second ep of nu-Worzel and it's even better (and with more & way creepier creatures than part one, or all of Who S11)

flicked over to the Doctor Who Classic channel on Pluto afterward and am one-and-a-half episodes deep into Caves Of Androzani

man, shows for kids are great

btw

"an updated spin on The Daleks' Masterplan"

The Master's Dalek Plan

― Chunky Backgammon (onimo), Friday, November 10, 2017 11:19 AM (two years ago)

^irl giggle

― shackling the masses with plastic-wrapped snack picks (sic), Friday, November 10, 2017 7:31 PM (two years ago)

am tipsy but accidentally snorted at this again while the thread was unspooling

is Worzel Gummidge worth watching when i'm totally unfamiliar with the other versions?

sure!

(I read most of 'em when I was six or seven, but the main element of the premise that I can even remember wasn't part of this version.)

this seems to be a season solely for kids.

tesla: (describes crazy inductive charging idea)
ryan: that's wifi! tesla invented wifi!
doctor: tesla should have been a billionaire!
me: groan

Finally got to see the 2nd episode of Worzel Gummidge yesterday and it's pretty good. My brother who read the books in his childhood says it's truer to the book. THough obvioulsy there are some updates. I haven't read the books so don't know how th children are represented. I'm assuming they've been othered in some way, like they're city kids in the country for some reason. I'd assume reason was the war or them being orphaned or something.
Seems to be a lot of talk about the current show being untrue to the Jon Pertwee original but it seems like the Pertwee show may have been more loosely based on the books. aunt Sally in this seems to be a more matronly aunt figure , the love interest if that is the relationship is the allotment scarecrow Earthy Mangold.
& Mackenzie Crook looks like he's an anthropomorphised traditional scarecrow, like with a turnip head and clothing over crossed sticks quite effectively. Heard some watchers were complaining that he wasn't anything like Pertwee , no he's more like a scarecrow.
Still not sure where that jacket came from, think it's survived very well fora 19th century garment if not earlier. Like if it's been out in the elements etc.

Very good show

Speaking of kids Tv, every series of SarAh Jane Adventures had at least 1 story better than any Chibnall Who.

Even Richard Curtis--RICHARD CURTIS--managed to actually make the eventual fate of the miserable tormented failure genius in his story moving.

At least Edison was correctly portrayed as a total shit. Wouldn't have been beyond this version of the show to hero worship him.

felt like the Edison guy was kinda auditioning to play Trump

ha ha, i thought there might be a team-up in the works with edison and the fake trump from last season.

hello

my name is nikola tesla

you steal-a my invention

prepare to die

what were they doing hanging around the year 1900 in those get-ups by the way? did they explain that?

this was extremely basic crapola once again but i will admit i did a little 'whoop!' when the doctor caused a large piece of the ceiling to ignominiously clonk one of their hooded pursuers on the head

also surely the racnoss have a copyright infringement suit to file against the *checks notes* skithra??!? all of whom are absolute rubbish at running around corners?? (apart from their queen, who does not look like a scorpion but a human with a racnoss mask on.) my son: "shoot it!!" me: "look at them! a gun wouldn't do any-" *one shot from a 19th-century pistol causes a skithra to immediately crumple and expire*

I'd assume reason was the war or them being orphaned or something.

(they're first sent to the farm to be quarantined with whooping cough, and to recover in clean country air! definitely not a relatable motivation for audiences in 2019 vs 1935.)

didn't recognise Luka from er as tesla until i read imdb*. croatian actor playing serbian historical figure, close enough.

* was looking for the actor playing the queen. was the girl from sarah jane adventures** keeping it in the family.

** not the one from submarine

The queen's tail seemed to be invisible most of the time

Speaking of kids Tv, every series of SarAh Jane Adventures had at least 1 story better than any Chibnall Who.

This otm. "Whatever Happened to Sarah Jane" is a goddamn masterpiece.

I tried getting through more than 10 minutes of this week’s episode, but it’s just so excruciating and boring to watch. JW is genuinely awful in this imo

what were they doing hanging around the year 1900 in those get-ups by the way? did they explain that?

They were just hanging around having a holiday on the Orient Express when they went to investigate Tesla's weird electrical signals or something handwavey like that.

The queen's tail seemed to be invisible most of the time

tbf that's how it is in real life too

Since this seems to have become the default Worzel Gummidge thread, might I suggest those with rose-tinted memories of the Pertwee show not run the risk of breaking the spell by actually watching the show again. Christ, it's a chore for the most part. (Actually, the guest stars and the sort of plot that links them all is quite good but it's very loose.)

Setup (usually involving Mr Peters sloping off to have a bit of a drink, which frees the kids up)
Slapstick routine (usually involving cakes being thrown round)
Lesson is learned
Every series ends with a dance routine

I must’ve watched that show every week, but I can’t remember a single thing, except being frightened by an episode that ended when Jon Pertwee fell off a hill in a wheelbarrow

I assumed the Orient Express line was a joke? Weren’t they in New York ?

This is the time I met Worzel Gummidge at the International Garden Festival in Liverpool, I am the terrified child.

https://i.imgur.com/u4Blr4s.jpg

xpost to Chuck

There's actually not a lot to remember. An awful lot of head changes and lots of cakes being thrown around.

In retrospect, by the end of S4 Una Stubbs' Aunt Sally (as opposed to the Connie Booth Aunt Sally that turns up in one episode) is a completely tragic figure - poisoned by the romantic fantasies that are completely imagined, she's so lost in them that her dismissals on Worzel become increasingly cruel as he doesn't live up to them. Worzel, on the other hand, is a puppy you watch repeatedly being beaten and not going with the nice man from the RSPCA because he's not the master.

In other Worzel news, I am still laughing at cows with swears painted on them.