Doctor Who v. Patrick Troughton

[BlobVanDam]

Beast Below was weaker imo. Silly clown thingies and kids, and I didn't like the twists (which I won't spoil for now). I preferred Victory of the Daleks. haters gonna hate!

[GentlemanofDread]

Then... Victory of The Daleks?

[El JoNNo]

It had the opposite effect on me: After watching it, I'm dreading what the show might become. I have little confidence at this point and you're not helping.

Honestly, Doctor Who is all over the place. You might just be watching episodes you don't like. I didn't like a lot of David Tennent's run, I found most of his companions annoying much all of these damn kids appearing in Capaldi's run.

[Jamesman42]

Eh, don't worry, the 11th Doctor will hook you slowly. I also wasn't sold the first time when I watched The 11th Hour. I do like the episode now, but at the time I first watched it I wasn't as impressed.

Then again, I had just came off of binging season 4, still my current favorite season of DW. You just gotta accept that the episode is taking DW in a new direction (much like Capaldi is now, which is amazing).


Still need to watch last night's, but I have very low expectations based off of the trailer.

[Scorpion]

@Bolsters: Moffat's way of of story-telling isn't everyone's cup of tea, and there are indeed quite a few that prefer the RTD era. There's nothing wrong with that, I just think that you'll find yourself in the minority on this forum if you think that. Though definitely keep watching, Season 5 is just great all around and I wouldn't even place Eleventh Hour in the Top 3 (though I really like it, so your mileage may vary).

About the episode: it was STUPID STUPID DUMB and had lots of elements that I didn't like: stupid stupid "science", so many children, plots left dangling all around, an ending that made no sense - but strangely I didn't dislike it as much as Robot of Sherwood. I don't know why, really, that one wasn't as stupid as this one, but I was just kinda apathetic towards this, whereas RoS just made me rage... even though, on paper, it's a vastly superior episode (and still quite abysmal).

1. Listen
2. Mummy on the Orient Express
3. Flatline
4. Kill the Moon
5. Deep Breat
6. Into the Dalek
7. Time Heist
8. The Caretaker


















9. In the Forest of the Night
10. Robot of Sherwood

[ariich]

I don't understand the hate for Robot of Sherwood, it's one of my favourites of the season.

I get why some adults won't like Forest though, it was definitely a children's episode.

[masterthes]

It was alright, but it was the weakest episode of the series so far

[Kotowboy]

It doesn't seem like 10 episodes - but seeing all the titles there - i've definitely watched them all

[Onno]

Just watched In The Forest Of Night. It was okay to watch, definitely not my favourite of this series so far. Maybe even my least favourite.
The 'Next week' preview of the series finale was amazing. I probably will watch both episodes back to back though; I can't stand having to wait a week between two parts of a double episode 

[bout to crash]

Yeah, this last one wasn't my favorite but it wasn't TOO bad. I agree with some of what's been posted, like too much of Clara and Danny's little world. I was mostly stimulated by the preview at the end and wondering wtf is going to happen next. I won't be able to watch next week so I'll be staying out of here til I catch up.

[BlobVanDam]

Just watched In The Forest Of Night. It was okay to watch, definitely not my favourite of this series so far. Maybe even my least favourite.
The 'Next week' preview of the series finale was amazing. I probably will watch both episodes back to back though; I can't stand having to wait a week between two parts of a double episode 

That's a nice idea in theory, but I know I couldn't possibly have the willpower to do it. I'm gonna be right here after seeing the first episode speculating away on the finale.

I much preferred Robot of Sherwood to In The Forest of the Night, because it was only the ending of Robot of Sherwood that really let it down. The rest was fun, with a lot of good comedy moments from The Doctor. In The Forest of the Night was flawed from start to finish, and The Doctor was mostly useless in it. I think Kill the Moon was a bit better than In the Forest of the Night. So I suppose that would make it the weakest of the season imo.
I'll hold off on the obligatory ranking until the season is over.

[Bolsters]

Well, I just watched both The Beast Below and Victory of the Daleks, and they were both pretty good. Not at all like The Eleventh Hour. I think the slapstick elements, serious/cold tone, and sluggishness of that episode just threw me off. These two episodes weren't like that at all, so I guess I can just consider The Eleventh Hour to be an anomaly and I can get back to enjoying the show. Even the music was a lot better.

Essentially:

Am I overreacting? Probably.

[BlackInk]

I didn't really care for The Eleventh Hour the first time I saw it either. Something was just off about the whole thing, it felt sort of bleak. But I did enjoy Smith's introduction, and thought he did a fine job. And of course, Amy in that "police" outfit looks pretty damn good.

[ariich]

I'm surprised by those comments. I mean, it's not my favourite from that season, or even one of my top ones, but it's widely loved and many people consider it the best DW episode. And frankly that season is just so damn good.

[Jaq]

And now the case for the defense for Forest.

One of the reasons I loved it so-and I did, even with the wonky science and the kids and the odd plot hole-was that it did something that hasn't really been done in a while. It reconnected Doctor Who to its roots, to the traditions of fairy tales and magic that infused so much of the early series, before the Doctor became clarified as a Time Lord from Gallifrey and all that muckety muck. It connected Doctor Who to what it more truly is. See, when RTD brought the show back, it was a colossal gamble, and so RTD had to couch it in terms that were familiar to cult/sci fi viewers, to make it appeal to the sort of people who watched what the BBC thought Doctor Who would be. And so you got arcs and romances straight out of Buffy the Vampire Slayer (come on, where did you think the Doctor loving Rose came from?) and when you managed to get away from Earth for five seconds you were presented with Star Trek lite episodes and everything clicked on that level and people liked it and we're here talking about it today.

But that's not what Doctor Who is, nor is it what the Doctor is.

You know what the Doctor is?

The Doctor is a wizard. Don't believe me? Just look at him. Man speaks every language in the universe. Can go anywhere. Anywhen. Lives in a magic box. He even has a magic wand that can do bloody anything. The Doctor is a wizard of Time and Space. And this episode restores some of that to him. Come on, when an episode starts with a little girl running through the forest to find the man in the magic box to ask for help, you should know what you're in. All the signals and symbols are there. You're in a fairy tale. You're in a fantasy. If you're watching it via the prism of what cult TV is supposed to be, well, you're looking at the wrong symbols. Of course it's preposterous that a forest of trees grew up overnight to protect the world from a solar flare if the logic system you're approaching the show with is Star Trek (though you'd be okay with Buffy.) If you look at it as what it is-a fairy tale-it's doing precisely what it's supposed to. It's got a wizard, it's got a chosen child, it's got a brave heroine and hero to help with the kids, it hits all the marks.

That's why I loved it. It's the best example of Doctor Who as Fairy Tale-and you got that a lot way back when-you're ever going to see. It's a lousy bit of science fiction, yes, but the notion that Doctor Who does one thing and one thing only is so wrong headed it amazes me. Doctor Who does EVERYTHING. That's why I've loved it for thirty-five years.

[ariich]

I completely agree that Doctor Who is a fairytale story rather than sci-fi (which is why I love it, and something I think Moffat has particularly embraced), and I think a lot of people don't really get that (see my previous comments on arbitrary complains about bad science). However, where I think this story falls down a bit in that regard is that the Doctor is a bit of a passenger.

I've seen some reviews which say that he's completely pointless because if he hadn't been there, everything would have been fine, but people who say that weren't paying attention because he was the one who realised that the trees were good and got the humans not to stupidly kill them all. So in that moment he was pretty pivotal. But he did feel a little incidental for much of the story.

[bout to crash]

Yeah, I totally see what you're saying but him being incidental doesn't bother me. In the beginning Clara's all like "Kids, this is The Doctor. He's gonna fix everything." And that's usually the formula, but here it wasn't and that's actually kinda cool. Sure, he was the one who figured out the trees weren't dangerous but do we really think the humans would've had time to wipe out a significant enough amount of them out to nullify their effect?

[ariich]

Yeah, I totally see what you're saying but him being incidental doesn't bother me. In the beginning Clara's all like "Kids, this is The Doctor. He's gonna fix everything." And that's usually the formula, but here it wasn't and that's actually kinda cool. Sure, he was the one who figured out the trees weren't dangerous but do we really think the humans would've had time to wipe out a significant enough amount of them out to nullify their effect?

Yeah the principle doesn't bother me at all, like you say it's kinda cool and it's good to have a bit of variety. I think it's probably more the writing generally, and I didn't feel the story held together that well.

I didn't dislike the episode by any stretch, I just didn't think it was that great really.

[bout to crash]

Yeah, I hear you. I didn't love it, but it was fine.

[BlobVanDam]

I've seen some reviews which say that he's completely pointless because if he hadn't been there, everything would have been fine, but people who say that weren't paying attention because he was the one who realised that the trees were good and got the humans not to stupidly kill them all. So in that moment he was pretty pivotal. But he did feel a little incidental for much of the story.

As I said earlier, whatever the humans were doing would have had basically no impact in the grand scheme. I got the impression they were only hearing about this happening in England anyway. The trees were covering the entire planet, including the oceans (you could clearly see the world covered in green), and in that time, they could only have covered a tiny blip in the time until the flare in the best case scenario.
But the scenario was much worse, that the planet was covered in trees. They couldn't have possibly gotten a plane up, because there would be no runway or opening. They might barely have gotten a helicopter up through the trees by chopping them down or something (I didn't see them try it, but I don't see why that wouldn't have worked), which would be slow and cover no ground. Or if they had to do it by ground, forget about it. That's all assuming they had something ready to go that would kill the trees. They didn't have the time to really test anything, and it would have taken time to work, likely much longer than the short time until the solar flare. Given the timeframe, they may not have even gotten into the air yet. I doubt the magical tree pixies know the exact formula for calculating how many trees are required to save Earth from an oncoming solar flare, but the margin of error would be far larger than the fraction of a percentage the humans could have impacted in that time.

The whole contrivance with the kids stopping the chemicals was only so it felt like there was a neat resolution to the story, and to make the kids appear useful with an environmental message. No wonder The Doctor let them do it, because it was pointless.
The episode was just poorly thought out from start to finish.

[El JoNNo]

You know, I had a thought that I wouldn't mind if Missy was some how River Song. It would be a way to redeem the woman that married the Doctor and make her less annoying.

[BlobVanDam]

Please no. If River Song is never in the show again, it would still be too much River Song.

Theoretically, it would have to be the virtual River Song, as I don't really see how else it could work with her timeline. It's been implied that Missy was the woman who gave Clara The Doctor's number in the shop, which if that's the case, I don't think it could work. Also it would seem too obvious with Missy saying she's The Doctor's girlfriend (or whatever it was).

I've seen a lot of fan theories for other characters she could possibly be, everything from River Song to The Master, but I'm hoping Missy isn't an existing character at all, and is just a new character that will be explained in the finale.

[Shadow Ninja 2.0]

River Song was awesome.

I know nothing about the current season of DW. Just gonna interject that and then go.

[El JoNNo]

Please no. If River Song is never in the show again, it would still be too much River Song.

Theoretically, it would have to be the virtual River Song, as I don't really see how else it could work with her timeline. It's been implied that Missy was the woman who gave Clara The Doctor's number in the shop, which if that's the case, I don't think it could work. Also it would seem too obvious with Missy saying she's The Doctor's girlfriend (or whatever it was).

I've seen a lot of fan theories for other characters she could possibly be, everything from River Song to The Master, but I'm hoping Missy isn't an existing character at all, and is just a new character that will be explained in the finale.

I don't think its the case at either. I'm just saying I wouldn't mind it. River for most of her run was such a shit character but the concept of her was great.

[BlobVanDam]

I thought the concept was great too, but I didn't think it was well executed, and I never bought that they had a real relationship that was based on more than predetermination. And even though she met The Doctor many times, and her first episode was with 10, it feels like something that should remain an 11 thing. At least she'd be age appropriate for Capaldi though.

[Mister Gold]

I'm really excited for the finale. Moffat was the guy behind the best Cyberman moment in Modern Who (that brief bit in The Pandorica Opens) and it sounds like an interesting concept. Plus it's the first two parter in quite some time.

It's time for the Cybermen to get a chance to properly shine.

[BlobVanDam]

This is the first two parter since the middle of S6, right?
I'm super excited for the finale too. I wasn't a big fan of Nightmare in Silver, and I like the Cybermen the most when they're overrunning Earth rather than somewhere in space. And the episode all around just looks amazing. Every bit of it.

[ariich]

Yeah, first two-parter since Rebel Flesh/Almost People.

I mean, in some ways the Name/(Night)/Day/Time of the Doctor was a sort of trilogy, but not so directly connected - I assume this will be a more traditional two-parter.

[Kotowboy]

Right. So I plan to miss next weeks episode ( I still haven't watched the forest episode )

Then download both of the finale and watch the entire thing on one evening. Saves waiting.

[Onno]

Right. So I plan to miss next weeks episode

Then download both of the finale and watch the entire thing on one evening. Saves waiting.

Same here. Gonna do it with some friends, should be fun!

[MrBoom_shack-a-lack]

So I come here as a total n00b on the show. Never watched the original show and haven't watched a single episode on the revival show. Is it necessary to have some knowledge on the original show before you start on the revival because i'm a bit overwhelmed by the amount of seasons I have to get truth on just the revival.

[BlobVanDam]

So I come here as a total n00b on the show. Never watched the original show and haven't watched a single episode on the revival show. Is it necessary to have some knowledge on the original show before you start on the revival because i'm a bit overwhelmed by the amount of seasons I have to get truth on just the revival.

I've only watched the modern series, and I had no trouble following it. I think it's pretty self explanatory if you start with the modern series, as they want to bring in new fans. There are references to older Doctors and episodes and enemies, but they're not essential to understanding and enjoying it. The Doctor's companion is sort of a proxy for the audience, so a lot of that stuff gets explained as they encounter things for the first time.

All you really need to know is The Doctor is an alien who travels through time and space in the TARDIS, and when he dies he regenerates into a new body.

[Onno]

Fully agreed with Blob! Have fun watching!

[MrBoom_shack-a-lack]

Great guys!  I will soon begin.

[ariich]

Oh and a word of warning - the way it starts is pretty low-budget in terms of effects, and the very first episode is quite cheesy in terms of style/direction. Those things may not bother you at all anyway, in which case great, but if you're a bit unsure, stick with it because in those regards it gets (mostly) better and better.