"It feels different this time..." - The new Doctor Who Thread

[SpoonyBard]

The more I think about Conrad's motivations in this episode, though, the less sure I am of what they actually were.

Spoiler

Did he or didn't he believe in aliens? We know he saw the TARDIS vanish as a child so if he doesn't belieive in them he's clearly rationalized away that incident. But then if he doesn't believe in them then his big ambush of Unit with the fake Shreek does not make sense.

If he believes aliens are fake and UNIT is staging all of them, then why did he seem to expect they would fully mobilize for the phony Shreek he made up? He couldn't have known they would, so maybe that whole thing was actually just to embarrass Ruby and he got really lucky UNIT showed up and was just good at improvising and took advantage of it?

The other alternative is that he did always believe the aliens were real and was just pulling a grift on his followers, putting on an act for their donations and ad revenue. I thought this is the take the show wanted us to come away with, initially, but this also has a problem, because if it all was just a grift to him then his storming of UNIT tower makes no sense. His grift would have made more sense if he just kept needling them from afar, but storming into the heart of their operations, if he did believe it was all real, was the stupidest thing imaginable.

Of course that brings us to the third, most likely, option. He's just a narcissistic bullshitter who doesn't believe in anything, and wears whatever mask is needed at any given moment. And like all narcissists he believes everyone else is doing the same thing, so of course even if he believed aliens were real he'd ALSO believe UNIT was taking advantage of it because that's what he would do.

Definitely made The Doctor's tearing down of him hit a bit harder, because Conrad really was just an amalgam of the Petersons, the Rogans, the Joneses, and the Limbaughs of the world.

 

[Johnny Unusual]

Yeah, it's definitely number three

Spoiler: Spoilers

We really live in a world where people are just lying to lie and get attention until the lies don't really make sense. It gets to the point where the lies barely benefit you in any other way aside from attention. It's not just the pundits, it's Trump, who is just saying things about how great he's doing and how his enemies are both strong and weak and so forth. In the realm of fiction it would seem to make his motivations nonsensical but when held up to the real world monsters, it makes so much sense.

Which is why while I think the speech rings so true, I really didn't like the "the tide is turning back to UNIT in terms of public perception" element because the events are removed from the people who can imagine it being a big lie and Conrad being a victim, despite the fact that on the scene he's constantly waffling and switching the nature of his narrative based on his needs. Yeah, a lot of people will catch on but I think the nature of it also makes it really easy to develop more conspiracy theory narratives. I think the show just needed a quick fix and there are aren't a lot of quick fixes in the age of disinformation and people really hunkering down to protect their shitty worldviews.

 

[Octopus Prime]

Still a couple weeks behind on the current season but…

In my brash youth, I had thought Robot Revolution was the most Octo-ass episode of television the series has ever produced.

Now I am grown, and it is time to put away such childish notions, because it’s actually the episode immediately after that.

 

[Kirin]

So I haven't been commenting in here on the new season but it's not because I haven't been enjoying it, I just got started a week late and then have been watching the latest episodes a day or two later with friends so most of what there is to say has been said by the time I'm ready to stop avoid spoilers and pop back in the thread.

But I just wanted to say that, while I agree it's not the strongest episode in the season (which is happily a high bar!), the latest ep was particularly memorable due to the circumstances, of watching it on a big projector screen in a friend's basement during a bad thunderstorm. The lights had already flickered a few times before we got started which made Ruby's retelling of the Screech attack strategy way too in-the-moment. And then, at almost the end of the episode, right *exactly* after the Doctor says "You want spoilers? I'll tell you your future. You die." *bam* power goes out, total darkness, show over.

So that was creepy as fuck, lol. (We went home and watched the last, like, two minutes an hour or two later. I don't think my friend's house got power back 'til early the next morning.)

 

[Kazin]

That rules lmao

 

[Kazin]

I thought today's episode was incredible.

I don't even feel qualified to talk about so much of this episode. I'm too white. It was Black as hell and was fascinating and good and emotional. Even down to the story taking place in a barbershop, it works on so many levels.

 

[Vaeran]

Yeah, this was amazing, and it feels like one of those episodes I'm going to have to watch again to absorb everything. I'm sure the usual contingent will be screaming about Doctor Woke or whatever but it's their loss.

When RTD announced that the series would have magic and supernatural elements going forward, I was a little unsure about the whole endeavor, and continued to be unsure after The Church on Ruby Road and its goblins, as entertaining as they were. The Pantheon have been fun villains but I don't think the promise of that change had been fully realized until The Story & The Engine. If opening the doors to magic leads to rich and creative storytelling like this, then they can take the doors off their hinges as far as I'm concerned.

 

[Kazin]

I missed amongst everything in that episode that apparently the creepy kid Belinda saw was Captain Poppy from Space Babies, played by the same actress, and credited as "Poppy" in the end credits.

So that's something.

EDIT: Oh, and here's a prequel to the story, written by the episode's writer, Inua Ellams.

 

[Vaeran]

I missed amongst everything in that episode that apparently the creepy kid Belinda saw was Captain Poppy from Space Babies, played by the same actress, and credited as "Poppy" in the end credits.

So that's something.

I would not have guessed that if you gave me one million guesses.

 

[Johnny Unusual]

Yeah, this has probably been maybe the most consistently great season I can think of? Of course, part of that is simply it's a shorter season but also Davies is a good writer who has... interests I often don't like and I feel like everything here is much more is working to his strengths. I also think that a season that is consistently doing a meta-theming could be exhausting but thankfully somehow it has managed to hold together (though it isn't unusual for his finales to kind of fall apart a bit).

Interestingly writer Inua Ellams is a playwright and poet who also wrote a lauded play, the Barber Shop Chronicles, which is set across six different barbershops in six different cities during a hyped football (the soccer kind) game.

Bottle episodes can be tricky, especially in Doctor Who because it's a series that can be people standing around talking. And I don't have a problem with that but sometimes it feels exposition heavy when the story should play out on it's own. But the Story and the Engine manages to be gripping throughout even though it is characters talking thanks to the acting, directing and writing. The stuff that is revealed isn't just the mechanics of the story but beyond that is about character and it doesn't feel like talking in place of action. Not that the series needs to be action heavy but there are definitely times in it's weaker moments the show talks out solutions in ways that feel like a wikipedia entry rather than a story with a "aha, that means this and that and all I have to do is press this deus ex machina button that was conveniently here the entire time". It's interesting that most of the gods we meet are gods of art. Even Sutekh actually fits into this... he's the god of endings (and perfect that he was killed by the Doctor, the story that doesn't end). And the episode is about a black experience but it is also an episode ABOUT how Doctor Who (a show with a white protagonist for most of it's history) is designed to keep going. But also it's about the idea that influence of black art is often undermined by a white society who appropriates it for themselves. It's a lot to unpack and I have no doubt there are messages within that I am missing due to my own cultural ignorances.

Man, there are three more episodes not to drop the ball and it seems like the last two could be the easiest. I hope it keeps it up.

 

[Kirin]

Loved that episode. Loved it!

 

[Phantoon]

though it isn't unusual for his finales to kind of fall apart a bit)

That's... generous

I'd say that they crash horribly under the weight of their own excess. I'm trying to think of an exception and I'm struggling.

 

[Kazin]

I like Parting of the Ways, Journey's End, and even The End of Time, flawed as they are. I actually think Empire of Death was one of his weakest, frankly.

 

[Kirin]

Crazy coincidence related to the previous week's episode -

I was browsing around on some streaming platform, and in one of the silly "On Now" listings that have been cropping up lately evidently to placate people who miss live un-timeshiftable TV programming (??????) it had a Classic Who stream, from the Fourth Doctor era as the splash screen had Tom Baker and the Brigadier, and while it had no episode or serial title, the blurb was: Harry Sullivan is sent to infiltrate Think Tank to discover the truth.

!!!!!

I gotta be honest, I'm kinda surprised none of you Who grognards pointed out that Conrad's little movement was actually a callback (to... something, I dunno, I didn't have time to actually watch the classic episode that was already in progress).

 

[Johnny Unusual]

The End of Time

The End of Time has problems but some of the elements are great. The farewell is so good, and I think it's my favourite Master plan. It's great because he's an attention hound for the Doctor, knows that the Doctor loves humanity, so it makes so much sense for the character to become everyone (isn't this also the plan in Shada? Anyway, it still works here specifically because of the nature of the character).

 

[Phantoon]

Dobby Doctor being turned into Magical Love Jesus Doctor through the power of Doctor Who fandom managing to not be the most self indulgent thing in a Doctor Who finale never fails to impress me.

I'd say The Stolen Earth / Journey's End are the worst of all of them. It's a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. Empire of Death doesn't have the benefit of nostalgia and I think it's being judged more harshly than some of the others as a result, but I think RTD took on two of Moffat's foibles (here's a retcon and it was like this all along and also the twist you were expecting was nothing all along) and made them even more outrageous

 

[SpoonyBard]

Really liked the callback to The Fugitive Doctor this week. They had better actually follow up on that someday!

I was honestly expecting this week to turn into a battle against another member of the Pantheon, but it didn't and I think the episode is better for it.

 

[Kazin]

Crazy coincidence related to the previous week's episode -

I was browsing around on some streaming platform, and in one of the silly "On Now" listings that have been cropping up lately evidently to placate people who miss live un-timeshiftable TV programming (??????) it had a Classic Who stream, from the Fourth Doctor era as the splash screen had Tom Baker and the Brigadier, and while it had no episode or serial title, the blurb was: Harry Sullivan is sent to infiltrate Think Tank to discover the truth.

!!!!!

I gotta be honest, I'm kinda surprised none of you Who grognards pointed out that Conrad's little movement was actually a callback (to... something, I dunno, I didn't have time to actually watch the classic episode that was already in progress).

It's a reference to Robot, Tom Baker's first serial. I'll admit, I didn't catch it, and never would have, had I not read about it elsewhere. Tom Baker's first serial is a weird holdover from the Pertwee era, and the Think Tank is just the name of the baddies' group in it. I don't really remember the details of who they are, but they never come up again (until last week, anyway).

The End of Time has problems but some of the elements are great. The farewell is so good, and I think it's my favourite Master plan. It's great because he's an attention hound for the Doctor, knows that the Doctor loves humanity, so it makes so much sense for the character to become everyone (isn't this also the plan in Shada? Anyway, it still works here specifically because of the nature of the character).

I'll even defend the "reward" segment - while overindulgent, it works for me, Mickey and Martha's weird relationship aside. Particularly the Human Nature/Family of Blood callback. Gets me every time.

I'd say The Stolen Earth / Journey's End are the worst of all of them. It's a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. Empire of Death doesn't have the benefit of nostalgia and I think it's being judged more harshly than some of the others as a result, but I think RTD took on two of Moffat's foibles (here's a retcon and it was like this all along and also the twist you were expecting was nothing all along) and made them even more outrageous

The Stolen Earth/Journey's End is super dumb pretty much from start to finish, but it is fun. It certainly has it's problems, but I will take that over literally any Chibnall finale, at the very least (damning with faint praise, I know, but I do like TSE/JE!).

Really liked the callback to The Fugitive Doctor this week. They had better actually follow up on that someday!

I was honestly expecting this week to turn into a battle against another member of the Pantheon, but it didn't and I think the episode is better for it.

I was expecting the latter, too, and I wonder if the events of this episode are going to come up again later on given the engine we see... Seems like a decent Chekhov's Gun given all they're doing this season, but I am notoriously bad at predicting where this show will go so I'm probably wrong (to my delight, frankly. Surprise me, Doctor Who!).

 

[Johnny Unusual]

It's a reference to Robot, Tom Baker's first serial. I'll admit, I didn't catch it, and never would have, had I not read about it elsewhere. Tom Baker's first serial is a weird holdover from the Pertwee era, and the Think Tank is just the name of the baddies' group in it. I don't really remember the details of who they are, but they never come up again (until last week, anyway).

I sort of remember this serial but I only really remember the robot and not the baddies. I would not be surprised if despite promising Conrad will tie into this seasons plot if Davies decided to turn this weird little obscurity and turn it into an Earthbound non-alien threat to the Doctor for following seasons, like evil UNIT.