new-nu-Who: RTD2 (Doctor Who on telly 2023-?)

Jinkx Monsoon's performance was something though.

The trouble with screen depictions of that era of the Beatles is you have to be as good looking as the Beatles to pull off that haircut without looking completely dopey.

Ncuti looked amazing with the afro, on the other hand.

Ok well that was good

Agreed, I enjoyed that a lot

like even a sliiiightly subpar Moffat effort is still a glittering masterpiece compared to most of the last 5-6 years - just so relieved to watch doctor who being good again AND being ABOUT something again

Whenever they mentioned the secret chord needed to banish Maestro, I kept thinking it had to be 'the fourth, the fifth, the minor fall and the major lift' - doubt I was the only one.

la boîte diabolique...

“everywhere’s a beach, eventually” was so very Moffat/Capaldi

Of course Larkin didn't actually say "what will survivie of us is love", but thinking he did is very Moffat.

Bits I loved and bits I hated in there, Ncuti was consistently great though.

ep3 was a notable step up from the first two, big rogue trooper energy

was so much easier when Tom Baker stood on that land mine in Genesis

Does seem to be getting better. Hope it continues.

"I'm Anglican."

think this would have worked better if they shot it in a real quarry instead of a cgi quarry. The whole thing seemed predicated on building up tension but also failed to build up any tension, not sure why exactly, but I don't think Murray Gold's music was helping. I wish they'd done more with the idea of the unseen enemy that is possibly hiding in the smoke or the mud, this is an intriguingly spooky concept and would have made the eventual payoff that there is no enemy have more of an impact.

I know the whole point of this episode is them intentionally doing something more static and restricted than usual, but it felt like a drag to me after the freewheeling inventiveness of the last few episodes. The creepiness of the AI recreation of the dead soldier is weirdly undermined by the ending's suggestion that there is some spark of the 'real' solider remaining that allows him to defy his programming, at first it seemed like the reason we were supposed to find it ghastly is because it's a convincing looking/sounding imitation of someone who no longer exists, the same as how the Doctor seems to agree with the kid's belief that "he's not gone ... he's just dead"

what are the best film anticapitalist doctor who episodes? this one, oxygen, what else?

think this would have worked better if they shot it in a real quarry instead of a cgi quarry. The whole thing seemed predicated on building up tension but also failed to build up any tension, not sure why exactly, but I don't think Murray Gold's music was helping. I wish they'd done more with the idea of the unseen enemy that is possibly hiding in the smoke or the mud, this is an intriguingly spooky concept and would have made the eventual payoff that there is no enemy have more of an impact.

jfc I thought the new series would be a good chance for my son to start watching, as he's been watching some of the Tom Bakers ones. anyway we're watching the Devil's Chord and it's so boring and plot-free, it's making me really dislike Who. I stopped watching around the Capaldi ones and I don't think I can slog through more. Kid likes it enough though.

the long arms in space one was good I guess.

Yeah Wild Blue Yonder and Boom are my favourites so far. 2/7 ain't bad - still a better ratio than most of Chibnall's run.

One thing I've disliked so far about this series is that it repeats one of the most tired RTD/Moffat tropes: the companion with the mysterious backstory. After Rose became the Bad Wolf, suddenly it wasn't enough for the companion to just be a regular person anymore - Donna became the Doctor-Donna, Amy was followed by the cracks in the universe, River Song was River Song, Clara had all her reincarnations through time. They're doing it again with Ruby, but worse because they're repeating it every episode now instead of just sprinkling it in every now and then.

also, not really a spoiler since it was announced earlier but Varada Sethu, who played Mundy, is going to be the new companion next season and so far no explanation has been given about her early appearance in this episode.

Could be just a Martha/Amy/12 situation where they liked the person so much during shooting they decided to bring them back for a larger role, but could also be intentional like Clara, where their initial appearance is tied to some future plotline.

the heavy handed anti-capitalist stuff and the heavy-handed pathos with the innocent little girl all reminded me of a Pat Mills scripted strip from 2000ad, the killer ambulance robots that repeat customer-service bromides as they execute you were straight out of Ro-Busters or ABC Warriors. I think the heavy-handedness usually works better in those comics though, Mills leans into the lurid and grotesque stuff, but this just came out feeling tepid.

https://i0.wp.com/thetryingscotsman.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/screenshot_20240417-1619172050267769768839738.png?w=1200&ssl=1

new-nu-who and starlord

The pro-choice line was followed about 2 minutes later by the line about refugees literally having to show up on people's shores before they have to let you in - I agree the very RTD lack of subtext is enjoyable

Another odd thing was the reappearance of the schoolboy from the opening scene during the musical number at the end.

Sadly, another very RTD thing is that he always needs to seed "maybe this villain will return!" - he had the Dalek burbling about "Emergency Temporal Shift" in Doomsday, as if without it there'd be a riot the next time they reappeared.

That was unnerving in spots

Pretty good! No idea if it actually made sense but it felt satisfying enough - nice mix of (lite) Ghost Story For Christmas vibe and DW timeline shenanigans

my favorite so far - unnerving, like you say. obviously paradoxical in that the best thing about doctor who at the moment - ncuti gatwa - wasn’t in it. i got a sense in the first three episodes of a splendid doctor trying to find a centre of gravity and consistency in some mediocre stories. and his absence in that means gatwa still feels slightly out of place, through outshining and being more vivid than the material.

still don’t like the way it looks but it would take a tv professional to tell me why i think. the faces are too clean and the eyes too vivid, and the landscapes all feel either synthetic or a million miles away as if they’ve had some sort of rendering or or bokeh effect applied to them.

of course in the best episode with the 10th doctor, he was also barely in it.

That was good creepy fun although bit of a pointless appearance for 'Mrs Flood' and lmao putting big glasses on to look 40

ending gave me logopolis vibes. it almost makes sense, like if you squint from a distance....

this was the first visually well-told one, I thought ten minutes in, and looking forward to the same director next week

by thirty minutes in I was “third-best RTD ep ever?”

That episode was very good on ~vibes but I’m not sure it really held together plot-wise. 

If the old lady was Ruby all along, then why did (she make) everyone who approached her run away? I've seen some theories saying that it was Ruby's fear of abandonment personified... but if that was the case, then why did the Doctor disappear without the old lady nearby? 

It also implies that Mad Jack will continue to launch the nukes, since she doesn’t stop him in this timeline and the Doctor still mentions it happening. Who knows what will happen to Marti the campaign volunteer either? :(
 
I hated the bit near the end which seemed to imply that Ruby put Marti in Roger’s path so she could prove he was a monster (which she already knew because the Doctor said so!), and then later had the gall to be like “sorry you were abused, I’m gonna go save the day now”. Weirdly out of character and gross. 

idk most of this was great especially the first half - I really loved the rural horror creepiness, the hilariously mean Welsh pub, the bit with UNIT etc. And I'm fine with leaving stuff unexplained but this just didn't really make much sense in the end.

And again, we get it, Ruby is special/magic and has abandonment issues, can we please give her some new character traits already?

SIÂN fucking PHILLIPS!

yep! had my usual 'is that Sheila Hancock?!' moment tho

That episode was very good on ~vibes but I’m not sure it really held together plot-wise.

https://i.ibb.co/f0T5KWQ/rtdbb.jpg

"I'm so back, baby!"

73 Yards has restored my faith! esp "your magic phone" lol.

Couldn't quite shake the thought throughout that RTD had been upcycling past top episodes: "how about creepy unmoving figures who get closer further away when you're not looking..."

are there gonna be tons of memes of what the Herald was saying to cause people to run away shrieking now

because if so, send them my way

also, this happens in our house now:

me: I'm enjoying this so far!
me kinder: I should warn you that this is a RTD one

*mr kinder, that is
he jane

Wonder why it skipped the opening credits - and hope it won't become a regular thing.

because the Doctor disappeared from the story before the opening credits would have appeared

(and Gatwa joined the production after this ep — having still been on Sex Education previously — so I wouldn’t expect any other Doctor-lite episodes in the remaining four, no)

like when Clara’s eyes replaced Capaldi’s after she bluffed the cybermen that she was the Doctor

It could have, like, opened with the opening credits?

Not that I am miffed by their absence or anything - but I did find it a curious choice

I thought it was an effective way of throwing off the tone of the whole show to make one more unsettled as a viewer, leading into the creepiness of the apparition

I'll buy that!

As a one off in that context it's fine - I just hope it's not part of an attempt to rebrand the show as more 'prestige' or whatever.

I didn't even notice the lack of titles lol but yeah, going straight to them can have its own 'this one's intense, strap in' power.

Two fun sort-of-fake-outs for me were briefly thinking (hoping) the Herald was going to be whizzing along in parallel with the train somehow and, less amusingly, also that she might appear in the same position as Gwilliam causing them both to explode.

I just hope it's not part of an attempt to rebrand the show as more 'prestige' or whatever.

it's TWO WEEKS since an episode called "Space Babies" had talking babies with CGI mouths and a farting monster made out of snot :)

yeah i liked that one
no thoughts just vibes