Jump to content
Completely Different

Doctor Who

Recommended Posts

I was able to watch the episode twice. It was good, just not really my favorite. I dunno why.

Share this post


Link to post

It does annoy me how some fans slag off the Xmas Specials for being 'too happy' and 'not enough sci-fi.'

 

It's a Christmas Special! It's supposed to be heart-warming, it's supposed to be a simple enough adventure that the kids can follow it and enjoy it, we're supposed to go away feeling a little bit teary and a lot happy.

 

Xmas Specials are full of doom and gloom in so many other soaps and dramas. People dying in more extravagent and spectacular ways, dirty secrets left right and centre...so what's wrong with just a nice, easy story with a bit of action, a bit of suspense, and a whole lot of good feelings at the end?

 

What's wrong with the Doctor getting a happy Christmas for a change?

Share this post


Link to post

I enjoyed the Christmas special. I watched it 3 times - since I kept getting distracted I really only paid attention the third time.

Share this post


Link to post

I almost forgot! I went to post at SyFy and sudden;y realized if I didn't get my butt in gear and drive to a house with a TV, I was going to miss it. It was okay, not my favourite, but okay. Seems as though the Doctor is finally going to have Christmas dinner for a change!

Share this post


Link to post

I haven't seen this year's Christmas special, but I don't see what's wrong with a fluffy Christmas either. :3 I mean, it's Christmas.

 

 

However, I think I've figured out what's been bugging me about the last two seasons of Doctor Who. The earlier seasons always seemed like it was the Doctor's adventures with his companions. Now it seems like Amy Pond's adventures with the Doctor, like the series is being viewed through her... Particularly when they open with that "I had an imaginary friend" bit.

Share this post


Link to post

Maybe that's what bugged me. I don't do mushy xd.png

And I agree with Stromboli, the Doctor needs to be back in the center of the action.

Share this post


Link to post

I too agree with Stromboli. Usually it may take me a while to get to like a new Doctor, I've still not gotten to that point with Matt Smith. Maybe the problem isn't him but that Amy Pond has been made the center of too many of the stories. I also usually love watching the reruns of the Doctor Who shows but when it is a Matt Smith episode, I just skip it.

Share this post


Link to post

I didn't really like this Christmas special. I think the only thing I enjoyed was the ending.

I liked that it was happy. It's Christmas; it should be happy. What I didn't like was that the story was too easy and short. With short I don't mean the time, but that not many things happened.

Share this post


Link to post

I dislike the way Moffat, the writer, puts so much attention on Amy Pond. He favors his characters over older characters, to the point of having the Doctor avoid questions about people like Rose, Martha, Donna, etc.

 

But this special was okay, since Moffat wasn't writing it by himself. Still, I wish the producers would find a new writer for the series--preferably someone who doesn't write off his shortcomings and plot holes as 'the Doctor lies'. He never lied before Moffat realized he needed an excuse for the long-term plot holes he created in the story.

Share this post


Link to post

I dislike the way Moffat, the writer, puts so much attention on Amy Pond. He favors his characters over older characters, to the point of having the Doctor avoid questions about people like Rose, Martha, Donna, etc.

Oh man, I was so annoyed in... I think it was Let's Kill Hitler, when the Doctor was talking to the TARDIS interface and it pulled up holograms of Rose, Martha and Donna and he just wails about guilt.

Really? That's the main thing you're feeling at the sight of these women? Guilt? Way to underwrite everything they've done together.

 

 

ETA: Watched the Christmas special. Definitely was a lot lighter than it's been in a while, even for a Christmas episode. But I was kind of surprised that this episode was one of the rare "everyone lives" moments, but it passed unnoted. Normally the Doctor just eats up those times when he gets to save everybody. Well, I guess technically it was the mother who saved everybody, but still. The souls of the forest, the father, the children, everyone got a happy ending.

Edited by Stromboli

Share this post


Link to post

I did not like this special at all. The other ones were much better..this one just lacked everything.

Share this post


Link to post

Rewatching the Library episodes after watching the whole sixth season sends it from being sad and kind of confusing to tragic. ;-; Poor River.

Share this post


Link to post

The sentimentality of the Christmas special was underwhelming for me.... and overused...

 

I miss the RTD era sad.gif

Share this post


Link to post

Oh man, I was so annoyed in... I think it was Let's Kill Hitler, when the Doctor was talking to the TARDIS interface and it pulled up holograms of Rose, Martha and Donna and he just wails about guilt.

Really? That's the main thing you're feeling at the sight of these women? Guilt? Way to underwrite everything they've done together.

Because Tennant never mentioned about how he felt guilty over what he did to them? That whenever they finally left all he did was feel sad and morosely depressed for the following Xmas special - or all of the 2010 specials?

 

He expresses guilt because for all the wonderful things they may have done together, at the end of the day all he feels he did was ruin their lives. Those companions find happiness yes, but it's a happiness only because of how much loss they had to suffer, and that their happiness comes from valuing all the smallest things of life because they know how much evil there is, and that sometimes every breath is a blessing. After all:

 

- Rose split up with her boyfriend, had to find her father *must* die for the universe to survive, was stranded in another timeline, although on the flip side she did ultimately end up with a clone Doctor.

 

- Martha had the Year That Never Was, split up with her husband for Mickey (a bit of a shoe-horn in my opinion) and now seems to be a fugitive.

 

- Donna doesn't even remember, even if she has won the lottery.

 

- Micky lost Rose, then he went to an alternate Universe because of how badly his home one was going, then came *back* to this reality because of how bad *that* reality went.

 

- Captain Harkness is immortal and has do to a lot of bad stuff.

 

And one-off companions:

 

- Jackson Lake had to lose his wife and his mind before he could settle down with his kid, and a black nanny in the Victorian era - so still strife ahead for him I'm afraid.

 

- Astrid died.

 

 

- Captain Brooke killed herself.

 

- Christina de Souza has a happy ending with a flying bus at least.

 

And look how often he tries to leave Amy behind, how much guilt he expresses over what he's done to her (twelve years, and four psychiatrists).

 

I still maintain taking *some* focus off the Doctor is a good thing, because after nearly 50yrs it would be incredibly dull if all 35-ish series, with those hundreds of episodes, were always about him and his saving the day. Stories would get very old, and very tired - every new episode would simply be compared to being re-hashes of the old episodes. There's only so many ways to save the day after all.

 

By bringing the focus off the Doctor - who, if you notice, still ends up saving the day or at least being the catalyst to understanding how to save the day and why - and a little more onto those around him, it just means they're getting a little more life out of the series.

 

It needs to be a simply story, because it's a family show - emphasis on family[/]i]. It wants to be simple to follow and easy to understand so the little kids can watch (from behind the sofa as required), understand and enjoy it without pestering Mum and Dad all the time about what's going on, why this, why that, etc. And yes, he didn't make a big deal about saving the day - because the big deal that not only did a family have the happy Christmas they wanted (and bear in mind millions at that time never ever got a happy Christmas ever again), it was the fact that he's not the big, lonely character he sees himself as. He has got friends and family, even if 1,100yrs later he still forgets that most of the time.

 

Maybe it's just my perspective of Christmas altogether. I don't have a family to spend Christmas with. I spent Xmas Day doing housework, sleeping, then watching over a ward full of people who may or may not live. Xmas TV these days is, in a word, crap. Watch the big soaps and dramas, and there's lots of death and malice and bad stuff going on. Reality TV stars fight it out bitterly to be 'the best.' To flip onto Doctor Who were there is a happy, heartfelt ending, with enough drama to carry the story without too much to overwhelm it, made my day (well, morning by the time I got home to watch it). It was good to see everyone lived, that families were reunited, whereas I've spent this entire Xmas series watching families being pulled apart - strangers as well as my own.

Edited by Kestra15

Share this post


Link to post

Fair enough, but it just bugged me that we'd finally got a solid reference to the previous arcs and the old companions, and it was all shoved aside for Amy Pond... I want something that ties in to the bygone seasons, more than just a few second cameos that get brushed aside again. With the fifth season, everything changed. New Doctor, new TARDIS, new Sonic Screwdriver, new writers, new direction to the show. I keep looking for something familiar.

Share this post


Link to post

Hints are dropped all the time about the old series. And not being funny, how often in Tennant's era were there references to any of the other Doctors? Sarah-Jane reappeared, a few photos of the older Doctors, that's about it. In the first episode alone:

 

- The Doctor was wearing Tennant's clothes, using Tennant's screwdriver.

 

-

 

- Wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey (used through Series 5 and 6).

 

- The Shadow Proclomation.

 

There are references to all of the last Doctors across many episodes, not just Tennant. And you can't get much more familiar than re-using Tennant's TARDIS control room nor photos of his previous companions - which I don't remember happening during Ten's era.

Edited by Kestra15

Share this post


Link to post

I don't know the series from before the '05 set, so I'm not as fully informed...

 

Having Ten's clothes in the first episode would've been a matter of necessity, though. It picked up right where the last episode left off, with the Doctor crashing back to Earth... not exactly an opportune moment for a wardrobe change. smile.gif

And I did love the bit with the Atraxi hologram. It was a fantastic way to sort of formally introduce the new Doctor to the audience and the universe.

Since I don't know the earlier seasons, I don't know when the Shadow Proclamation came about, but I'd just kind of thought it was just part of the 'verse. Like, anyone that regularly deals with interstellar or time travel just knows about the Shadow Proclamation. That referencing it isn't any more spectacular than making mention of a planet or a species, it's not something personal...

 

I think what I'm missing is the way characters would suddenly crop up again after they'd left. I miss that interaction. But I guess it's not really fair to expect... the Doctor made a lot of effort to say a last goodbye to those who were important to him before his regeneration, he probably has no intention of reconnecting with any of them.

 

I dunno. I'm still trying to figure out what about the last two seasons just hasn't been doing it for me.

Share this post


Link to post

I didn't like all the drop-ins, especially Rose. It was almost a shoe-horning each and every time. And Moffat did want Jack Harkness for 'Let's Kill Hitler,' but he was filming 'Torchwood' at the time.

Share this post


Link to post

It needs to be a simply story, because it's a family show - emphasis on family[/]i].

Not excactly. Moffat made it a "family friendly" show with shallow plots, cheap turnarounds (like freeing from cybermen by love? Sick! Remeber that in the previous shows, getting assimilated by the cybermen was an irretrievable process). Doctor Who used to be a very complex show with epic showdowns, long running and very complex - but allways(!) absolute consistent - storys and rarely famlily friendly, the mask builders did a great job to make you realy uncomfortable. For example, i wouldn't call "The waters of mars" family safe, neither ANY episode which focused on the darlecs, cybermen or even worse like the flesh eating Vashta Nerada, especially the classic darlek storys from the original series.

 

This years special was just awfull weak, not even great pictures (well, except for the doctor "repairing the house), just a flat story and terrible acting, in particular from the walker-crew. Well, maybe not bad acting, but terrible dialogs.

 

I still can't get used to Matt Smith, but the problem is not Matt Smith himself (he sometimes plays quite well), but the storys. In the 6th season, there was not a SINGLE exciting episode with a real thrilling plot, only shallow fillers on base of this 3 seasons lasting "the silence will fall"-thing. Seriously? Who cares about the silence, its surely enough going to last at least another 5 episodes until the plot advances (a tiny bit), so it can't be that important.

Edited by Ext3h

Share this post


Link to post

Not excactly. Moffat made it a "family friendly" show with shallow plots, cheap turnarounds (like freeing from cybermen by love? Sick! Remeber that in the previous shows, getting assimilated by the cybermen was an irretrievable process). Doctor Who used to be a very complex show with epic showdowns, long running and very complex - but allways(!) absolute consistent - storys and rarely famlily friendly, the mask builders did a great job to make you realy uncomfortable. For example, i wouldn't call "The waters of mars" family safe, neither ANY episode which focused on the darlecs, cybermen or even worse like the flesh eating Vashta Nerada, especially the classic darlek storys from the original series.

 

This years special was just awfull weak, not even great pictures (well, except for the doctor "repairing the house), just a flat story and terrible acting, in particular from the walker-crew. Well, maybe not bad acting, but terrible dialogs.

 

I still can't get used to Matt Smith, but the problem is not Matt Smith himself (he sometimes plays quite well), but the storys. In the 6th season, there was not a SINGLE exciting episode with a real thrilling plot, only shallow fillers on base of this 3 seasons lasting "the silence will fall"-thing. Seriously? Who cares about the silence, its surely enough going to last at least another 5 episodes until the plot advances (a tiny bit), so it can't be that important.

I think kestra meant only the christmas episodes...

many more people will watch who on christmas day, because there's nothing else reasonable- it's all gloomy soaps and repeats of films.

 

 

EDIT: the (old) doctor and jenny, sitting in a tree..... wait, eww?

Edited by dracocharky

Share this post


Link to post

my fav episodes are the ones with the weeping angels. lol i started watching them in my class because my teacher is a big dr who fan so we watch dr who everytime we have free time laugh.gif

Share this post


Link to post

I just remembered something interesting.

 

Back in high school, one of the teachers had this thing where he always wore a bowtie on tuesdays and called them--predictably--Bowtie Tuesdays. When students asked him about it he'd reply with "Bowties are cool!"

 

I really want to visit the school again one of these days and ask him if he's a Doctor Who fan.

Share this post


Link to post


  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.