Doctor Who: The Movie Part 3: 1996 And All That

Last blog I looked at the 1960s Dalek movies on the grounds that there was a rumored Doctor Who movie with it's own actors and it's own separate continuity. It turned out I thought this was quite a good idea. Then Steven Moffat tweeted: "To clarify: any Doctor Who movie would be made by the BBC team, star the current TV Doctor and certainly NOT be a Hollywood reboot." So I figure we've got to look at the only official/cannon Doctor Who movie. The 1996 TV Movie.

The movie opens with a cool atmospheric graphic of an alien planet and a monologue voiceover from Paul McGann as The Doctor: "It was on the planet Skaro that my old enemy, The Master, was finally put on trial. They say he listened calmly as his list of evil crimes was read and sentence passed. And then he made his last, and I thought somewhat curious, request. He demanded that I, The Doctor, a rival Timelord, should take his remains back to our home planet, Gallifrey. It was a request they never should have granted." And then it hits us with a bloody fantastic arrangement of the theme tune.

But hang on...Was that Skaro, the planet of the Daleks? Or is it some other Skaro, like how there's a Manchester in America? No, the Dalek planet. Oh yes, here they are. I'm not familiar with these actors work myself, but I hear their collaboration with Alvin and the subsequent Squeakquel were very good, but I question whether getting the chipmunks to voice the Daleks was really appropriate. The opening scene did get one thing right though: "It was a request they never should have granted." They really shouldn't. Since when did the Daleks care about last requests and holding a fair trial? The Daleks aren't even a shoot-first-ask-questions-later kinda race, they're shoot-first-shoot-again-later guys. And what was the Doctor thinking? *ring ring* "HE-LLO DOC-TOR, CAN YOU COME TO SKA-RO, HOME-WORLD OF THE DA-LEKS AND PICK UP YOUR OTHER EN-EMY THE MAS-TER?" You'd be a mug to go!!

Cut to inside the TARDIS and it's the seventh Doctor, Sylvester McCoy. Awesome. I liked him. And he looks so much better without the question mark jumper John Nathan-Turner's gran knitted him. I do have to question though, given that this film was meant to bring new audiences to Doctor Who is it not confusing for new fans to be watching Sylvester McCoy but hearing a voice over from the bloke who played And I in the film Withnail And I? Still it's good to give him a proper regeneration and a decent send-off. At least it would be if they did that. Instead, the TARDIS materialises in the middle of a gang battle, the gangsters then unload their automatic guns into the TARDIS doors. The Doctor then steps out and is, predictably, shot a fair bit. We don't know what happened between Survival, the last story in 1989, and now but whatever it is, the seventh Doctor clearly went senile or suicidal. "Hmmm...sounds like someone just unleashed a load of bullets into the TARDIS door, I'll just stick my head out the door and find out who could be doing that." DEAD! "What's that? Pick the Master up from the Dalek homeworld? Well I've got 20 minutes, and I can't see this going wrong, why the heck not?" DEAD!

That said the Madame Butterfly death scene on the operatin - oh by the way, I'm ignoring that whole Snake-Master thing because that's just plain weird. The scene in the hospital with Madame Butterfly and the Doctor waking up mid-operation is really good. I love that scene. The contrast of the music and the quite horrendous operation is really good. The Frankenstienesque regeneration is pretty cool too, I'm not sure they needed to intercut it with the bloke from the morgue watching the film on a telly - the only purpose for that bit seems to be to prove how clever they're being. And the new Paul-McGann Doctor sits up and then there's this shot:

Maybe it's pinikity to complain about one shot, but Where is that light coming from? He's locked in a drawer! The thing that really frustrates me with this movie is how many little silly things happen that are so easily avoidable. It's very cool and stylish but it makes no sense at all - like Heroes or the world of banking.

Now, although I'm very critical towards this film here, I want to make clear that I will not say one word against Paul McGann as the Doctor. I think he is an excellent actor and a great Doctor. I would really love to have seen more of him and am glad that he's done so many series with Big Finish. Actually, I will say one word against him. (Falls to knees) "Who...am...I? Who am I? WHO! AM! I!?!" is an awfully done, over-the-top stupid bit. But then I really don't know how you ever make that line not-stupid.

If terribly stupid things float your boat though, then this scene is definitely for you. The hospital administrator has come to see Dr. Grace about this double exposure thing (The Doctor's two hearts which turned out not to be a double exposure) he is fuming and burns the X-Ray to leave behind no evidence of the hospitals incompetence because "I have to keep this hospital open." Not ridiculous in itself, but as this scene comes a minute after we've seen The Doctor walking though a room with smashed-in windows, a leaky roof, flowers all over the floor, beds thrown everywhere, creepy kids toys all over the place and a big pile of smashed up shards of mirror, why is he bothering about a damn double exposure. Surely even the NHS must realise that the room the Doctor's in is unacceptable. Even the hospital administrator in Diagnosis Murder is less laughable than this guy and he's the comic relief (that says as much about the jokes in Diagnosis Murder as it does about the drama in this).

The Doctor steals his new outfit from the hospital changing rooms. So did his third and eleventh incarnations. That's three times he's stolen clothes from a hospital! I'm starting to think this guy just calls himself a doctor to avoid the queues in Primark.

As I said, Paul McGann is fantastic in this movie, full marks on his performance as the Doctor. But what of the new Master? The Master not getting human stuff is funny ("HAHA You kill me man!!" "You want me to kill you?"/"You're sick!" "Thank you.") It's a little bit let down by the fact that if Russell T. Davies wrote an episode of Torchwood where Captain Jack had to team up with Dale Winton in order to battle this incarnation of the Master, The Master would be the camp one.

Those little Master-not-getting-human-things lines are very good though and fit the Master's character well. I also really like The Master: "Gengis Kahn?" Chang-Li: "What about him?" The Master: "That was him." And the writers capture the Doctor perfectly in these bits. The slightly crazy scenes where he follows Dr Grace to her car trying to remember where he knows her from are superb. "I was with Puccini before he died...it was sooo sad," is such a Doctor-ish thing to say, it's bang-on for the character. And this line...this line is wonderful, a contender for best bit of the film:

And yet the problems and stupidness persist. For example, why does Chang-Li believe that the Master is not evil and the Doctor is the bad-guy just because the Master tells him so? The master has evil green eyes, speaks with a scary snake-like voice when he gets annoyed which is a lot, possesses Grace, calls himself The Master, has stolen a body and "What's in it for me?" "You get to live." All classic good-guy traits. Why on Earth would you trust this guy?

I love this gothic TARDIS design. I think it's really awesome. But then we see the bats and the dead leaves. Like the light on the Doctor's eye these are kinda stylish, but who has bats on a spaceship? To be fair, the TARDIS is infinite and it wouldn't surprise me to find that the Doctor is the kinda madman who likes to keep bats in his spaceship because it looks cool, if that happens in series 7 I could live with that. But I don't think that's the reason they're included here. I think they're in this film because the director thinks they look cool, but it's not justified in the script or in logic at all.

I probably haven't picked quite so many nits as this since infant school - I was very scruffy, in hindsight bath time isn't so bad - but this is a kinda big-stupid one. The Eye of Harmony only opens for Chang-Li because it needs a human eye. So you're saying if an all-knowing Timelord needed to open the Eye of Harmony for some reason they couldn't, but if Rory dropped his pen into the hole and bent down to have a look he could accidentally destroy all of time? Why would the Timelord's ever design that? I know Americans like their sci-fi to have a man with pointy ears going on about how illogical it all is, but this is just nuts.

This is where the line "The Doctor is half human" comes up. I wont get involved in this debate too much. Personally, I don't think the line needed to be in there. I don't see what it brings to the story. We can connect with the Doctor perfectly well if he's an alien and I like him best when he's oddly not-human. That said, if Moffat or someone chose to confirm or deny the half-human claim one way or the other, I wouldn't care. It doesn't make as much impact on the show as some fans seem to think. Personally, I think, until someone says other, he's 100% Timelord coz that's cooler.

Who cares? We don't have time for this half-human debate now! The Eye is open and that means that the world will end at midnight. I'm not gonna complain about this too much, because I never could resist a ticking clock, but I don't understand why midnight. There's not any real reason for the world to end at 00:00 on 1/1/2000. All I can think of is either 1) The writers thought it would be cool to tap into that late 90s millennium excitement, but neglected to come up with a reason to explain it in the story OR 2) The Eye Of Harmony infects everything with the millennium bug, which with hindsight is far less scary or exciting than it sounded.

The Master correcting Dr. Grace's grammar is a lovely bit, very Masterlike. The Master then vomits all over Grace and his vomit burns her flesh. So the Doctor sprays the Master with a fire extinguisher at which point the Master squirms and starts speaking in tongues and shouting "get it off me" in a silly voice. I want to make this a semi-proper sensible review with a bit of wit to it, but there are times when WTF? is really all I can say, and this is one of them.

The next bits are genuinely very very good and I would like to list the things I like about them:

1. The Doctor threatening to kill himself rather than the cop. Funny and brilliant.
2. "This planets about to be destroyed and I'm stuck in a traffic jam."
3. The music for the chase (and to be fair, the film in general) is very good. You can tell it influenced Murray Gold who composes the music for the new series.
4. "Yes, we're a...team."
5. Aside from the Master voming on some more people and turning them into statues (because that makes sense) all the business at the party is decent and witty and entertaining.
6. *Sets off fire alarm* "Why did you do that?" "Liven the mood." These lines make you realise how good this film could be. They've got the Doctor written perfectly.

The Doctor and Dr. Grace get back to the TARDIS and a police motorbike with no brakes comes zooming round the corner drives into the TARDIS and then, after a comedy pause, drives back out. There is a prize for the first viewer to tell me the relevance of this. Why is it there?

Inside the TARDIS, Grace knocks the Doctor out, I guess because the Master has some power over her because he threw up on her, it's never made entirely clear but the Master's vom seems to have odd powers. The Doctor is strapped to a table and the Master enters in full Timelord robes.
The Master: "I always like to dresssss for the occasion." Very Masterlike, good characterisation, but very camp.
The Doctor: "I'm glad you're aware of the gravity of the situation." Good Timelord banter.

Things get worse when the Master forces Grace to look into the Eye of Harmony and she goes blind. Even though when Chang-Li did it earlier he was fine. Bloody hell! This film doesn't even follow it's own continuity let alone that of the series as a whole!

Now here I have a really big question, because it's kinda crucial to everything. I've seen this film loads of times now, because there's a lot to really like about it, but for the life of me, I haven't a clue how they save the day. Can anyone explain what happens at the end? I know Grace rewires the console in some way (because you know, everything about her suggests she's an expert in Gallifreyan engineering, I'm sure she knows how to rewire a TARDIS, who doesn't? (hope the sarcasm comes over there)).

With the universe saved (probably, I don't have a clue what's going on at this stage), Grace helps the Doctor escape to fight the Master. The Master kills Grace and Chang-Li in unneccessarily graphic and brutal ways - I don't mind that, bit horrible for the kiddies but as a grown-up I liked it. Then the Doctor and The Master fight and trade cutting insults ("You want dominion over the living and yet all you do is kill" is a favourite line. "Life is wasted on the living" makes me laugh everytime.) and I LOVE that the Doctor tries to save the Master, this is the most right thing about their whole relationship in this film. Perfect.

So universe saved (somehow), Master defeated, the TARDIS decides to bring back Grace and Li, because it's a "sentimental old thing." Is that a bit of a cop out? To be fair, it did the same for Captain Jack in The Parting Of The Ways but why just those three companions? Of all the people the Doctor has known and lost, why only those? I guess the TARDIS must have been as fed up with Adric travelling inside it as we viewers were.

Final word: Lot's to enjoy, but lots of wasted potential, silly mistakes that just needn't have been made, and a baffling ending. Great theme tune and fantastic Doctor though.

PS. 2 mins, 38 seconds into this clip. The room that the hospital administrator isn't worried will get them closed down:

Doctor Who: The Movie Part 2: And Now In Colour

Steven Moffat promised his Twitter followers the other day: "To clarify: any Doctor Who movie would be made by the BBC team, star the current TV Doctor and certainly NOT be a Hollywood reboot." I think I think this is good news, but as I said, it could mean IF there is a movie, that the TV show will be off air for a couple of years while they film it. That would be not good. Anyway, as I'd all ready started looking at the previous movie attempts, I thought I'd share some thoughts anyway. Fandom always has room for one more critic. Let's start with the 1960's Dalek movies:

The Daleks

First criticism: The Doctor isn’t called ‘The Doctor,’ he is a Doctor whose surname happens to be Mr Who, which is blatently stupid and insane and clearly the show is called Doctor Who because the character is shrouded in mystery not because of....Look it’s just clearly stupid and makes the character sound like the punchline of a joke...Yes, I know the TV series did this on occasion, but it's idiotic.

The Doctor is also human and living in a quite horribly decorated house in England. I have no problem with this to be honest, the word Timelord hadn’t even been heard in the series in 1965 and even if it had, it doesn’t ruin the character to make him an eccentric human inventor who builds a time machine.

Actually, the opening shot shows his granddaughters reading science text books while he’s getting ‘most excited’ by a comic, which is more like the character we know and love today than William Hartnell’s portrayal was on the show. Ian is also a bit of a slapstick eejit in this version, rather than the hero who often saved the day on the TV show, so he is more like Mickey or Rory. Not that there’s anything wrong with the TV’s interpretation of the roles, in fact I like Hartnell’s grumpy Doctor and heroic-Ian just as much as silly-old-Cushing and daft-Ian, but it’s interesting to note how Who echoes these films in some ways more than the 1960s TV show. I do prefer though, that it is the Doctor who comes up with how to persuade the Thals they need to fight the Daleks, not Ian. The Doctor taking the chocolates clearly meant for Barbra and manoeuvring them so Ian sits on them is much more cheeky-Troughton than serious-Hartnell who was the Doctor in the TV original. Interesting to note too that they make Susan a much younger kid, again how many Moffat episodes put a kid at the heart of the action? (A: Lots). And watch Ian seeing inside TARDIS for the first time and then watch Rose seeing the inside of the TARDIS for the first time, Ian isn’t quite as hot but other-than-that spot-the-difference? (A: None) (Is that a little Weeping Angel in the garden? (A: No (But nice thought eh?)))

It seems odd to have a DVD in my collection that boasts that it’s “Glorious Technicolor” but for fans in the 60s, it must have been very exciting to see Doctor Who in colour. I guess the only 21^st century equivalent for a film would be to do it in 3D. I hate 3D though, so I hope not. But it would be cool to see it in a new light. And here the multi-coloured Daleks look great. It makes you appreciate what they were trying with the Victory Of The Daleks look.

The Daleks and their control room look pretty good on the higher budget, but there is still something reassuringly crap and dated about it all (that dead Dalek hand is just naff, as are the many attempts when Daleks try to push buttons with their claws, they are just plain rubbish). They’ve clearly got a bigger budget but don’t let it mess too much with the story – David Yates take notice! I mock it’s daftness a bit, but also I love that this is a movie where Daleks are beaten by pushing them down a lift shaft or shoved into walls. It’s barmy, silly and fun, in other words it’sDoctor Who.

At 1 hour 20 minutes, it is also considerably better paced than the original 174minute TV version. It’s hard to see what they’ve edited out. The plot remains almost totally intact. They’ve just tightened up the script and got rid of the tiny little bits that matter less. These days with 45 minute or, at most, 90 minute episodes this won’t be an issue with the new film, but it does mean that if I had some time to kill before work or something, I’d probably choose this over the awesome TV story.

Different but equally valid and brilliant performances from the original make this a great film. The fact that so little changes but everything just looks that little bit better is what the new movie should take from this.

Dalek Invasion Of Earth

Most of what I said about the last film is true of this one too. Slightly better looking sets and spaceships, held up with ultra-realistic pieces of string. And Robomen have the least effective crash helmets ever – just saying. There are two totally new companions in this one proving that 1) Doctor Who movies can develop their own characters and 2) Bernard Cribbins is an absolute legend - Playing a great down-to-earth slightly silly companion, so similar but also so very different from Wilfred Mott. Again they make the male companion a bit of a comedy character, but again it’s funny so...meh. It’s hard to complain about things that are funny, unless you write letters to the Daily Mail.

Unfortunately, this one doesn't perform quite so well in some areas. Those epic shots of Dalek's in deserted London from the TV show are missing. Those are brilliantly atmospheric and chilling. So it's a shame. Also, because of Susan's age and time constraints, the whole David/Susan love story and that heartbreaking conclusion when Susan leaves is gone. In a way, the emotional subplot had to go to make a tighter film, but that subplot was one of the main reasons Dalek Invasion Of Earth is my favourite Hartnell-era story and I really miss it when I watch this film.

Doctor Who: The Movie: Part 1

The big news this week is that there is going to be a Doctor Who movie. There was also some stuff about Saif Gadaffi, the government capping benefits in a way that will screw the poor, the eurozone going into meltdown, Burlesconi quitting - which is great for the people of Italy but bad for hookers and topical comedians - David Cameron going to Germany and asking their chancellor what the word for Bazooka is in German - clearly the "don't mention the war" memo never reached him - but we all know the real important story is there is going to be a Doctor Who movie. As in actually there might be this time, not just some sad fangirls/John Barrowman going "oh, there should be a movie with David Tennant coz I miss his face," starting rumours.

David Yates, the director of Harry Potter and The Order Of The Phoenix, which is definitely in my top 8 favourite Harry Potter films (top 9, if you count puppet pals, which I definitely do)*, announced to Variety magazine that he was "in talks" with BBC Worldwide about a potential Doctor Who movie. Lots of fandom have decided that this is terrible news, for a show that's had 11 leading men, Doctor Who fans have very little tolerance for change. To be fair though, I think this time there is a case for doubting this film. David Yates said "It needs quite a radical transformation to take it into a bigger arena...Russell T Davies and Steven Moffat have done their own transformations, which were fantastic, but we have to put that aside and start from scratch." Words like "Radical" and "transformation" can be a bit worrying especially since they seem so needless.

If the late, great Doctor Who Confidential (God rest it's soul) were still with us, I'm sure they'd be interviewing somebody who says "every episode of Doctor Who is like a mini-movie" anyway. An entire drinking game could be built around the number of times people say that on confidential:
1 shot every time someone says "it's like a mini-movie",
2 shots every time someone explains green screen,
A pint when Steven Moffat has to slowly and carefully explain his plots,
Half a pint whenever Matt Smith and Karen Gillan seem to be having too much fun,
A vodka for every time it seems Christopher Eccleston is taking it too seriously.

As for ignoring what RTD and the Moff have done with the show, well what they did was make an unloved show that was treated by most people as a joke and turned it into the biggest show in the UK that doesn't have Simon Cowell in it. They made a clever and emotionally engaging TV show fit for the 21st century that is loved by loads of people worldwide. By all means take it in your own direction, RTD did that, The Moff gave it his own spin, but he didn't just brush aside what had come before.

The implication is this is gonna be separate from the TV show. Made by BBC Worldwide and Hollywood, it will have it's own Doctor, its own companion and its own writers. I have no problem with that. The same thing was done in the 60s, when 2 films were made with Peter Cushing as the Doctor allowing the series to carry on churning out episodes. If it was to star Matt Smith and be written by the Moff - who are my favourite Doctor and favourite writer by the way - it would mean they're tied up making it for 2-3 years, and we'd have no TV series in that time. Fans are all ready not happy with having to wait till Autumn for the next series, so imagine waiting 3 years! Personally I think the TV series should always come first, it's just so damn good. And how exciting would it be to go into the 50th anniversary year in 2013, knowing that a film is just around the corner.

It's kinda hard to judge it at this stage. I think Yates leaked the news far too early. It's only under consideration. We don't even really know that Yates will direct it although it's a safe guess. It's only a little bit more substantial than fangirl/John Barrowman led rumours at this stage. I wont condemn or get excited for this film yet. I suspect this will change with announcements of actors, writers, plots, villains etc. But for now:

Things I Want To See In This Film

• Darker stuff. Doctor Who should never be too dark, and I'm not looking for anything scary like The Hills Have Eyes or as bleak or grim as The Waters Of Mars but I think doing a film that's separate allows them to go a bit more mature and scary, but still keep it a kids film.
• Plenty of references to 'real' Doctor Who. Not so many that it's annoying, but maybe a few jokes for the fans in the know. Something akin to the 11th Doctor phoning the Brigadier in The Wedding Of River Song would be nice too.
• British talent. Harry Potter had loads of British stars in it, so I'm hoping he brings that to this film. An all-American Doctor Who would be naff. And don't make this another Torchwood: Miracle Day where you say it's 50:50 but all the good parts go to Americans and the British parts are extras or people we've seen before.
• Steven Moffat's name in the credits as "adviser." I know the film needs it's own identity and all, but it would be great to get some official seal of approval or at least get someone in the know to proof-read the scripts.
• Something that establishes it's own continuity but respects the shows past. I'm happy for them to start with a new actor and call him "the first doctor" and for him not to be like William Hartnell's Doctor, but he has to keep the basic characteristics common to all Doctors

Things I don't Want To See In This Film

• A prequel where the Doctor becomes a timelord/leaves gallifrey/anything like that. The TV show has always been ambiguous about his past. It's part of the character's appeal. Hints are fine, but don't tamper with the myth of the character.
• The Time War. This is always mooted as good idea for the film, but is it? As the people at Big Finish productions put it: "How can you show a time war? 'Firing time-onic missile' 'oh no the past is coming out of my ear!'" Fans love to imagine what the time war would be like, but how do you make it that epic on the screen. David Tennant's Doctor talks about saving Davros from the jaws of the Nightmare Child and mentions "the horde of travesties, the could-have-been king with his army of meanwhiles and never-weres" excellent metaphors, but difficult to live up to.
• With the exception of characters who regenerate, no new actors playing existing parts. I don't want them to decide that Rose Tyler was popular so they're gonna bring her back played by Lindsay Lohan. For that matter, I don't want to see Billie Piper playing Rose Tyler, stop being lazy and write your own damn characters.
• Anything that's not true to the series and it's tone, message and philosophy. The Doctor is not an action hero, he shouldn't hold a gun. At most he can be like Pertwee was, that's as action hero as he gets.

*I have since learnt that David Yates directed other Harry Potter films, including my favourite the last one. Also he's working with Jane Tranter who was partly responsible for Doctor Who returning to TV in 2005, so....

And in tribute to the way movies seem to work these days. This blog is being split into two parts in the hope of making more money. Next time, I'll be having a look at the previous attempts at Doctor Who films to see what we can learn from them.

Books

Been meeting celebrities at Cheltenham Literary Festival this week and has got a job. So here's a literary themed quiz.

• One book you’re currently reading:

I'm about half way through Doctor Who: The Taking Of Chelsea 426. It's about the war between the Sontaran's and the Rutans invading the Chelsea Flower show. Pretty good stuff. Three years of a creative writing course has made me cringe when I read stuff we were told not to do - there's some pretty bad writing techniques and cliches in this book - but the story is decent.

• One book that changed your life:

I'm not sure any one book has. Lots of books have influenced my writing style. At uni the books I credited in essays on my writing style include The Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy by Douglas Adams, The Talk Of The Town by Ardal O'Hanlon, Martin McDonagh (he wrote plays not books, but I did credit him a few times). In terms of writing guides The Writers Tale by Russell T Davies and On Writing by Stephen King.

• One author’s works you’d be stranded on a deserted island with:

Who was it who wrote 'A Beginners Guide to Raft Building'? It would have to be Douglas Adams. Hitchhikers Guide is just brilliant and I think the Dirk Gently books are underrated because people compare them to the Hitchhikers books. I really liked the idea for the book he didn't finish writing when he died: "Dirk Gently is hired to investigate a crime that is never stated, by someone he never meets. So starts interviewing people at random." Really mental idea, would have been good.

• One book you’ve never been able to finish:

Ron Manager, Marvellous. Paul Whitehouse is a good comedian, but a bad writer and Fast Show characters never work in anything longer than a two minute sketch.

• One book that made you laugh:

Lots. That Mitchell and Webb Book made me laugh on nearly ever single page. Tony Hawks Around Ireland With A Fridge makes me laugh a lot too. It's released on DVD as a film (and I think available free on his website), it's not been selling to well and promoters aren't helping him much so do check it out. It's good but the book is better.

• One book that made you cry:

I don't think any books have made me cry. I don't tend to read sad stuff. Rob Pope's textbook about Creativity was so tedious the thought of it makes me cry. We had to read it for our course.

• One book you keep rereading:

I don't often read books again, but The Hitchhikers Guide trilogy, Tony Hawks' books, Paul Merton: My Struggle are all books I revisit.

• One book you’ve been meaning to read:

I regret to say I've not read any Sherlock Holmes, but I now own the whole set so I will get around to it soon. Or, just because of the title, The Hollow Chocolate Bunnies Of The Apocalypse by Robert Rankin.

• One book you believe everyone should read:

How To Cheat At Cooking by Delia Smith. Because it's practical.

• Finally, grab the nearest book. Open it to page 17. What is the fifth sentence?:

Icarus realised that the world could be changed for the better by relocating things. (Waiting for Godalming by Robert Rankin)

Tedious Details Of My Boring Life

Right, not much really happened this week. Doctor Who is over until xmas, so can’t bang on about that. My housemates have all been away or employed. My “night out” Monday was a total disaster. To be fair, I knew it would be, it was a spur-of-the-moment thing. At 12:30am my housemate got back from work and invited me out to a club. I, not unreasonably, shat all over the idea. But after a while, I gave into the part of me that always shouts unhelpful things like “don’t be so negative, give it a go, it’s got to be more fun than bumming around the house, trolling the internet” - it’s that kinda thinking that caused me to buy the excellent Sopranos DVD box-set having not seen a single episode. But also that made me give the remake of Conan: The Barbarian a go, so swings and roundabouts.

Actually just as an aside, is the “the barbarian” bit of that film title really needed? Are there other films “Conan: The Librarian”? “Conan: The Waiter”? “Conan: The PE Teacher”? All of which are just about unnecessarily violent people in those professions and then a giant octopus turns up in the libraries ‘biographies’ section or by the restaurants salad bar near the end of the movie with no rationale or explanation what-so-ever.

So anyway, I got dressed and ready quickly and we headed to a club about 1am. By the time we got there, they were refusing to let anyone in any more and the people we were going out to meet were heading home, quite wisely as it was clearly the end of the night out, not the start! So we came home, but I got a Burger King so I was happy, even if I was over dressed for fast food.

Then on Thursday, I went to see National Theatre Live’s production of The Kitchen in the cinema. I hadn’t been to one of the NT Live things before. It was really good actually. Surprising how filmy it felt, with close ups, pans and everything, clearly a lot of thought goes into the filming. The play was incredibly good. Had it’s funny and poignant bits in equal measure, extremely well choreographed (probably a better word than directed given how much movement went on with 30+ actors entering/exiting all over the shop), they also mimed cooking very well. According to the interview with the director, that was a little treat for us cinema viewers during the interval, they actually learned to prepare meals and were actually properly miming cooking. That’s good acting there. Back when I acted in school, if you had to be cooking in a scene you’d just pretend to stir for the whole scene. No real main-character in it as such, more ensemble, but Peter was my favourite, because Tom Brooke was very very damn good at the ol’ acting. My friend Ben reviewed it better: http://www.theupcoming.co.uk/2011/10/04/what-happens-in-the-kitchen%E2%80%A6/

Bearing in mind, I didn’t have much to say in my blog, I thought I’d read the papers and try and do something topical. This didn’t work so well, as I’d just read the papers and then write angry tweets shouting at the Daily Mail. All it really achieved was made me feel tremendously sorry for Amanda Knox. The papers loved hating her, she was a foreigner who killed a Brit in a foreign place and was a bit fit. Except then it turned out this week, that she hadn’t killed a Brit. Which kinda fucked with the whole persona the British press had built up for her. The Daily Mail were particularly shocked as, in a move that confirmed their status as the shittest newspaper in Britain (at least the Sport is just full of pictures of tits, it isn’t written and edited by them), they were quick to post this breaking news story on their website That article goes on to explain how Foxy Knoxy broke down into tears as her family hugged and comforted each other in the viewing gallery. It adds that the prosecution said “justice has been done [although] it is sad that two young people would be spending years in jail” and that Knoxy would be put on suicide watch for the next couple of weeks in prison. Clearly none of which happened. Luckily the Mail noticed this error before the next days edition went to press, meaning that it carried a headline about how much money Knox would make out of being proved innocent (yeah, I think she definitely planned it all. She wanted to go to jail on a false charge, it’s obvious!) while the other tabloids had a go at her for simply being happy about it. To put it mildly, bastards!

Saturday was mildly exciting in that I met Frank Skinner. But I don’t really have any stories relating to that, other than repeating the jokes he did on stage. He did have some interesting things to say on the nature of comedy, how he’s changed as a performer since Badiel and Skinner, and so-called “offensive comedy.” To illustrate his point, he retold a joke involving an impression of a disabled person’s walk (but not taking the piss out of it. The walk was not the punchline) it was funny and a well made point, but there was a lot of tension in the middle class Cheltenham Literature Festival audience about it. Difficult to have a proper discussion about “offensive” comedy and where the line is drawn when people are so on-edge about it, sadly. Yesterday I met Dave Gorman too. Nice guy, he remembered meeting me before, though I barely remembered it myself. Briefly passed him at a recording of the radio showChain Reaction is all. Maybe he thought I was someone else, maybe he did remember me. Either way: nice guy. Unless he was just saying that to everyone.

Too complicated?

Well last time I did Torchwood so really I have to do something about the original, best and slightly controversial Doctor Who series 6.

Following Doctor Who, I actually realise how much it’s grown and evolved and bettered itself every year since The Doctor first took Rose Tyler’s hand back in 2005 and said “Run!” And it’s not just the show itself that has bettered itself so consistently, the tabloid press’s relentless knocking of the show has also got more sophisticated. Back in series 1, the mindless complainers were all over the place. The episode Dalek was criticised for the line “Canoodle or spoon or whatever you British do.” Canoodle?! Before the watershed! What has happened to standards? I heard someone say “fiddlesticks” on Blue Peter the other day too!! Next up, the BNP (and I suspect the Daily Mail agreed, if not publicly than privately) had a go claiming that Doctor Who was “promoting multicultural relationships” because Rose was going out with Mickey. 1) That’s so clearly not a bad thing. 2) It’s so clearly not true. Rose lives in a tower block on the Powell Estate. Mickey on the other hand lives in the next tower block along on the Powell Estate. Two TOTALLY different cultures…that share a Post Office…living literally hundreds of seconds away. Finally in the first series, The Sun decided that Captain Jack’s character was awful and sleazy, an argument rather ruined by being on the third page of the paper next to a sexy woman in her pants standing in a pool of water up to her thighs (I don’t remember if she was or not, but 95% of the time that’s true). BTW, if Doctor Who or Torchwood are worried about Jack being a bit sleazy, why not put a speech bubble above him with an awfully well-informed opinion in it that he clearly has never said, I think that makes it ok.

In 2010, when Matt Smith took over as the Doctor, the criticism from the papers was primarily that “he’s too young.” He’s playing a 907-year-old! Were they expecting William Kempe or Christopher Beeston to come out of retirement, death and decay to play the part? Other popular criticism was that “It’s just not the same without David Tennant, he’ll never be as good as David Tennant.” As a fan of nostalgia I liked this one, because it took me back to the good old days of “He’ll never be as good as Christopher Eccleston” in 2005. Or that “Amy Pond is too sexy,” okay, I concede that one, but is it really a criticism? It’s like saying Dominoes Pizza is too tasty or Have I Got News For You is too funny.

So the criticism for the current series has been, comparatively, very good. It’s still utterly wrong and silly though. “Doctor Who is too complicated.”

Is it?

I mean, yes it’s complicated. Doctor Who Confidential spent 13 minutes explaining River’s story the other day. There are overlapping, interwoven plot strands that don’t happen in the right order, and copy-cat cloning craziness. But TOO complicated? You have to focus on what’s going on. It’s the kind of show that you can’t update twitter while you watch it, or you’ll miss something. It expects you to keep up with it, to notice things, and not to go and make a cup of tea, that’s just good TV, shouldn’t all TV be aspiring to do that? When we talk about a good book we want a “page-turner” (or “button-pusher” if you have a kindle) or a quote from a newspaper/magazine saying “you literally wont be able to put this book down.” Aside from the appalling misuse of the word literally, this is what we should expect from our TV and Doctor Who delivers that.

Follow it closely and you should understand it. Well “get” it anyway, understand is perhaps an inappropriate word for a Steven Moffat script. After all this series did end with all of time happening at the exact same minute that could only be put right by the Doctor getting married and kissing River Song. While the last series ended with all of time being destroyed in 102AD but took place largely in a museum in 1996 that survived by being close to the heart of the explosion. Stephen Hawking downloaded the episodes onto his wheelchair’s computer and it crashed as he tried to get his head around it. But actually, it does kinda work. Not scientifically, but the show always has reasons and lines to explain why it works, it’s all there for you to find.

I am now definitely an adult - this was made abundantly clear to me when I went out with friends on the first day of Fresher’s week - and Doctor Who is a kids program. As going up to small children in the street and engaging them in conversation can get some odd looks - wearing a bow tie, eye-patch and fez to make my motives clearer only made parents drag their children away faster - I can’t really speak on behalf of the target audience and how complicated they find it. So it shocks me that so many morons feel that they can and write to the RadioTimes and give opinions to newspapers to say that it is definitely too complicated for kids. One woman wrote to the RadioTimes to moan that after the show her kids would come to her with questions about it that she couldn’t answer. I want to assure her that there comes a time for every parent, and it must be sad but it’s perfectly normal, where their kids realise their mummy doesn’t know everything (sorry mum), but I’m sure they’ll still respect you. At least I assume that’s the bit you’re worried about, because it would be mad if you were complaining about your growing children engaging with, questioning and analysing what they see on TV.

I’m sure there are children out there who don’t understand it, and for the younger ones especially I concede it may be too complicated. But I don’t like that grown-ups assume that kids wont get it, the notion that kids are all thick is a horrible lie. For the kids who aren’t old enough to appreciate the complexity though, there’s still plenty of Doctor Who to enjoy. Look at the scary monsters. Look at the funny man in his daft hat. Watch the first 20 minutes of any episode written by Steven Moffat and you’ll realise he spends months dreaming up as many mad ideas as he can and then packs them ALL into the first 20 minutes of an episode. Leading to lots of crazy running about, monsters, live chess, a Sontaran nurse, fish-fingers and custard, a man in a fez carrying a mop appearing out of nowhere, a trail of post-it notes leading Amy to a big box that contains her future self and the cave of skulls. For a younger viewer some of the story may get lost, but you can’t deny it’s fun and engaging for them.

Doctor Who has always worked on different levels for different people. I would hope that no children got the dirtiest lesbian joke you will ever see pre-watershed in A Good Man Goes To War (Lesbian #1: “I don’t know why I stay with you.” Alien-Lesbian whips out her amazingly long tongue and uses it to zap a tied up guard). That’s nothing new though, David Tennant’s Doctor joked about Ronnie Biggs and rubber fetishes, all of that probably went over the kids heads. Back in The Sun Makers during the Tom Baker days, kids probably had no idea why it was funny that in an episode about a planet being heavily taxed, the bad guys were called the Inner Retinue or why they run down the P45 corridor. Grown-ups like the jokes about the Inland Revenue. Kids like the running down corridors. It’s the way Doctor Who has always been.

The woman who wrote to the RadioTimes, who I’ve decided to call Miss Guided-Fool, mentions not knowing the answers to questions. That’s because she wrote into the RadioTimes around the time of The Impossible Astronaut/The Day Of The Moon ie. 2 episodes into a 13 part series. The papers would like to have us all complain that it’s far too complicated and therefore awful but, this is the series I’ve discussed most with my friends. After most episodes I’ve phoned my friend Luke to discuss all our thoughts and theories and in the final weeks, Me, Luke and Lee have been sat up until the early hours going through everything we know trying to work out how the Doctor will not die given that we’ve clearly seen it happen. It’s complicatedness is what makes it so much fun for us, trying to second-guess Moffat, then realising Moffat will be expecting us to second guess him so we have to third guess him and so on, until it’s 5am, we’ve 100th guessed Moffat and we know he’ll do the 101st thing that we can’t work out.

Working it out is the fun of a good story arc (although Moffat has indicated that next series will be less arc-y). It sadly does mean that episodes that don’t directly relate to the arc feel a bit of a waste of time. I think even if it was relevant the pirate episode might still have felt like that, but for the most part those episodes are still fun, and enjoyable if you haven’t been following the series as a whole. If you do follow the series properly like I do though, you realise all your confusion and hours of sleep loss trying to piece the plot together are worth it. Watching without distractions has paid off, and it’s full of back references and exciting “Oh it’s him again!” moments. I was really cheered by Charles Dickens’ brief appearance in the finale, and Churchill’s back, and that guy’s dead which means this is…the robot from Let’s Kill Hitler! I think this was best done in series 5 finale where Episode 12 opened with Van Gogh (from Episode 10) painting a pic which arrives on the desk of Churchill (from Episode 3) who calls River (from…it’s complicated) who steals it from Liz 10 (Episode 2), then later the Doctor goes back in time to that weird bit where he’s got a jacket on (Episode 4) and to when Amy waited for him (Episode 1). Yeah, that is all, a bit complicated, but each time one of those came around I jumped up higher than before when I realised what was going on.

If there is one area in which I would say Doctor Who is getting too complicated, it’s too complicated for it’s timeslot. I don’t mean Saturday tea-time, I mean the fact its 45 minutes. After loads of episodes this series, I felt they needed an hour to live up to the full potential of the story. Take Night Terrors for example, a good concept with really creepy dolls. Lots of scary build up and beautifully directed (the TARDIS appearing in the puddle deserves an award), but let down by an ending that takes about 2 minutes and leaves too many loose ends. It’s like they can’t have as much fun as possible with the dollhouse and leave time for a good resolution. It’s the same with Closing Time a hilarious episode, that script is packed tight with jokes and so many excellent scenes. But then the Cybermen are defeated far too quickly in a kinda-been-done twist. I think the episode does a classic villain a bit of a disservice, by making them easily defeatable and under using them, something that might have been avoided if the story had longer to play with. Especially annoying as earlier in the series The Doctor blows up an entire Cyberlegion before the titles just to make a point. I will never criticise that moment, because it is so very very cool - Moffat pre-titles sequences are the best - but when you do it twice in one series, you do think “What’s all the fuss about these metal guys? They seem easy.”

Speaking of endings, the series finale. I’ve watched it twice now and it is an odd ol’ episode. I really really like it. I like it a lot. But I don’t know that I think it’s any good.

I think that’s because it promised us a lot, but didn’t deliver much of what it promised. We get the classic Moffat opening 20mins. Live chess, dinosaurs, trains in the Gurkin, the Let’s Kill Hitler robot, the cave of skulls, and the turning point when the Brigadier dies (Lee was watching it with me, I had to try hard not to cry). Awesome moments like: “It’s ok as long as there’s only a few of them” *looks at other arm,* “It could activate at any moment,” “It has.” and “An office/train!,” the wedding, and we get the resolution of the Doctor’s death at Lake Silencio fromThe Impossible Astronaut. But something just doesn’t feel right, and I think the reason is, that this wasn’t a finale, it was just dressed to look like one. It was a crew of tiny people in a robot disguised to look like a finale. We were told “Silence Will Fall.” It didn’t. We were told “Silence Will Fall when the question is asked.” It wasn’t asked. We got no goodbye scene with the companions, except that was kinda in The Impossible Astronaut right at the start when he invites them so he has them there when he dies and again when he leaves them behind in The God Complex. The Doctor’s “death” merely introduces us to the idea that he’s now going to be much more low-profile and let most of the universe believe he’s dead. This isn’t the end of a story, this is just the next installment in a bigger story. It plays the same role as say A Good Man Goes To War gives us some answers but pushes forwards a bigger plot. Silence Will Fall, just not yet. It’s changed who the Doctor is and how he operates. It’s still a big game changing episode, just goes about it in a very strange way. And yeah, it probably is good. Looking forward to the fall of the eleventh!

PS. River's Timeline explained