Main Menu

Doctor Who (13th Doctor)

Started by JamesC, 09 November, 2017, 02:30:49 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

von Boom

Quote from: Tiplodocus on 02 January, 2020, 11:49:16 AM
The chase was spectacularly stupid... it ended and everyone seemed to forget they had just been in a chase.
Worst chase scene ever.

The last five minutes pulled the episode out of its arse. I can't wait to see what happens on Sunday.

Dandontdare

Quote from: Tiplodocus on 02 January, 2020, 11:49:16 AM
The chase was spectacularly stupid... it ended and everyone seemed to forget they had just been in a chase.

You wanted them to stand around saying "wow, that was some chase we were just in!"? Okay it wasn't Bourne/Bond in it's thrillpower, but it made sense - They chased him to his private airport and then followed him onto the plane - what's the problem?

I thoroughly enjoyed it, it had more menace, mystery and the Doctor actually doing things than the whole of the first series. I've got some ideas about the reveal and the line [spoiler]"everything you know is a lie" - these aren't alien invaders but the doctor and companions from an alternate univese - when that one came into the farmhouse and was captured it was clearly somebody (the Doctor?) in a spacesuit, hence the reason it 'rescued' Yas.[/spoiler]

Good start, I'm encouraged that they've ironed out some of the faults of S:1.

JamesC

I didn't enjoy that episode but I still quite like Jodie Whittaker as The Doctor. She went full-on Su Pollard as Gladys a couple of times in this episode though. I kept expecting her to talk about Miss Cathcart.

Bradley Walsh is still the best thing in it. Lenny Henry was pretty good. Yaz is less annoying than she has been in the past.

I've never liked [spoiler]any nu-Who iteration of The Master though. Intead of exuding the cold menace of Master's past there's always a load of wild gesticulating, clapping, silly voices and general bellend-ness.[/spoiler]

shaolin_monkey

Quote from: JamesC on 03 January, 2020, 03:06:52 PM

I've never liked [spoiler]any nu-Who iteration of The Master though. Intead of exuding the cold menace of Master's past there's always a load of wild gesticulating, clapping, silly voices and general bellend-ness.[/spoiler]

I always thought [spoiler]Missy captured some of that coldness and ruthlessness, which was probably last seen from the Master in The Keeper of Traken, and Logopolis. Plus also Derek Jacobi, when we got the reveal that he was the Master, did a star turn at being an evil arsehole.[/spoiler]

As for Whittaker, she's fast becoming my second or third favourite Doctor of all time.

IndigoPrime

What are Lenny Henry and Paul Rudd injecting into their eyeballs, in order to age backwards?

Colin YNWA

Oh that was a shame.

Thought that was pretty poor. By the end it made sense - kinda - but up to that point it was lots of discontected stuff jammed together with the tease of a clever way to pull it all together but no sense of a thread or threat to make it feel worth the wait...

... which the end wasn't either.

And there were bits that just amde me cringe.

IndigoPrime

Mm. Weaker than part one. A bit flabby. Rather than cramming an hour into 40 minutes, it felt like 40 minutes stretched out. Still: an interesting reveal, perhaps. Here's hoping the series can finally get a handle on what and who this Doctor is.

TordelBack

Lenny Henry's apparent discovery of the fountain of youth (and solid performance) aside, I though this story was slow, disjointed and generally a bit rubbish. A series of 'cool' set-pieces that were barely strung together into a story, and another wasted outing for [spoiler]the Master[/spoiler].

Despite being somewhat lampshaded, Graham's relentless stating of the bleeding obvious and general griping about every course of action left me disliking the character for the very first time.  I also struggled to understand what the Doctor was up to half the time (e.g.: having just seen Stephen Fry's character being zapped in the middle of Vauxhall, survived a hail of laser blasts herself and run away from invisible/phasing baddies, she quickly agrees to leave the two Ozzer cops protecting O's shack by peering vaguely into the dark armed with handguns: in effect leaving them to die).



JamesC

A very weak two parter to kick off the series.
I still hold out hope though - the cast is pretty strong and I quite like some of Chibnall's ideas even though his scripts are a bit crap.

Tiplodocus

I didn't like the Bill and Ted resolution for the plane and somehow it simultaneously felt pretty thin and with too much jammed in. It just wasn't particularly compelling (a problem with last season) until the very last minute. I dunno if I can justify carrying on watching it other than out of a sense of obligation.
Be excellent to each other. And party on!

wedgeski

Too many ideas, distractions, and contradictions for the plot to be very successful. Keeping the Doctor confused meant that the evil master plan was revealed way too late. I liked the idea that the aliens were themselves portals into their own realm. Very cool. However what they actually wanted, and whether they were all in on it, is muddy.

I think the blueprint for modern Who has been well established here, with big set pieces and zany zippidy-doo-dah skips through time. I am okay with it, mostly because JW's Doctor is so watchable. I enjoyed her first serious intersections with Whovian lore -- a  good payoff for keeping that on the periphery in her first year. And having the Doctor actually visit Gallifrey to confirm the Master's story rather than doing it off-screen or pushing it back to the series finale was a welcome change (also a good take on the Master, IMO).

IndigoPrime

Same old, same old, with Doctor Who and much modern telly: a desperate lack of decent script editors with the power to make major changes. For Who specifically, that's been true right from RTD's first series.

JamesC

The tone seemed a bit strange to me.
They seemed to be courting younger viewers with the lame slapstick comedy (laser shoes) but then other sections were very slow and talky.

von Boom

Quote from: Tiplodocus on 06 January, 2020, 10:49:42 PM
I didn't like the Bill and Ted resolution for the plane and somehow it simultaneously felt pretty thin and with too much jammed in. It just wasn't particularly compelling (a problem with last season) until the very last minute. I dunno if I can justify carrying on watching it other than out of a sense of obligation.
Thank you for echoing my thoughts exactly. What made it worse was how banal they made it. Bill & Ted would call it bogus.

The only thing that really caught my interest in this episode was the Gallifrey references. I can see the series will revolve around what happened there and what the Doctor is going to do about it. I only hope they can make it interesting enough to make it worth the effort to watch.

JamesC

I wish they'd just bring Gallifrey back properly.
Surely a powerful Time Lord society which may take an interest in The Doctor's activity offers more story opportunities than the 'last Time Lord' angle.