Voyage of the Dammned [spoiler free at the moment]

popebenny16

6.50 Pm on the Big day get to see the Titanic, Kylie, DT, this and that.....

I'm only posting this because its a bit earlier than last two years and I have Christmas Day down to a fine, by the second, art form.

Much prefer St. Stephen's Day.

popebenny16

press launch is on the 18th, lots of spoiler stuff going around the place - undoubtedly the place to avoid is the Sun newspaper next week as they seem to love telling you everything that is going to happen.

Stark

Here is my review: Meh. Another RTD running and explosions episode. Like "The end of the world" but without the charm. The sooner Fatty is replaced with Moffat, the better.

Dirk Gently

I can't believe they

killed kylie

iMax

It was lavish & entertaining (mostly) but that's about it. Kept looking for the parrot (Douglas Adams Starship Titanic), all a bit panto (as opposed to pants) really.

Catherine Tate better be good otherwise I'll give up.

ixoy

Ah I thought it was the best of the three Christmas specials - not saying a whole lot in and of itself, but this one at least featured the Doctor centre stage without an annoying companion.
I quite liked the idea London deserted itself after the last two Christmas specials, even if it's a tad OTT. Amusing enough.

Now the plot itself was dumb and the robots reminded me a little too much of "The Robots of Death", a classic Season 14 episode, although these weren't as good or as menacing (and too clearly marked as the bad guys from the beginning ). Also, and maybe I missed this (good bit of background aka family noise), but what was with this alien ship that was just passing Earth naming itself after an ancient Earth ship and celebrating Christmas?

As Stark says, there was an awful lot of running around and having the Doctor shout that he's the Doctor and he's gonna save them etc etc. Par for the course with an RTD script. Didn't grate so much this time and I appreciated that he didn't save them all (although I'm terrified that we'll have to listen to him moan about not saving another person next season).

Pretty enjoyable over all - forgettable enough, but it worked as a Christmas special whilst not being all that special itself. Good effort but can always do better (by, for example, taking away Fatty's keyboard next time).

Stark

I thought it was the best of the Christmas specials as well tbh. It gets a bit tiring hoping for slightly above the bottom of the barrell though. If it wasn't for the Cornell and Moffat scripts in Season 3, I would have stopped watching entirely by this point.

mike65

Whats this, the natives are restless?

I only saw one episode of last series (the one where everyone is on the freeway to nowhere) which I greatly enjoyed. This was entertaining enough, I trust everyone understood they were watching a Mad magazine version of The Poseidon Adventure.

Mike.

Stark

Btw, is it just me, or did they remix the opening title sequence music?

dazberry

ixoy wrote: »

Now the plot itself was dumb and the robots reminded me a little too much of "The Robots of Death", a classic Season 14 episode, although these weren't as good or as menacing (and too clearly marked as the bad guys from the beginning ).

Yep that's what I thought too - so it got the expectations up a bit - alias it wasn't to be. Don't get me wrong - I did enjoy it (with the brain switched to neutral) - but nothing to get excited about.

D.

BuffyBot

Stark wrote: »

Btw, is it just me, or did they remix the opening title sequence music?

Nope it wasn't just you.

The Poseidon Adventure's copyright holder should come knocking for some royalties. All is in all it was fairly average - as has been said, you couldn't expect more from a RTD script, really.

Gavin W

ixoy wrote: »

Also, and maybe I missed this (good bit of background aka family noise), but what was with this alien ship that was just passing Earth naming itself after an ancient Earth ship and celebrating Christmas?

It wasn't just passing, it was a theme cruise where the ship was deliberately designed and named after the Titanic and the passengers had shore leave to visit Earth and experience it's customs, i.e. Christmas.

I agree it was the best of the three Christmas specials so far, but disagree with all the "...but that's not saying much" caveats. I thought it was absolutely bloody brilliant, best bit of Christmas telly by miles. I can't understand all the moaning on this and other forums - it got ratings of 12.2 million (highest since the new series began! :eek:) and an AI rating of 86, so they must be doing something right!

Mahatma coat

Bollixology of the hgighest order.

I expected something decent, there wasnt one character that I would have in anyway cared about, seemed like kylie was just phoning it in, what sort of a baddie was that, when I first saw him I was thinkin ' but they killed Davros ages ago'

hi tech teleportation devices at their disposal and still they use aul bad datsun forklifts:rolleyes:

RTD must die, or at least have his fingers cut off so that he cant create anymore atrocious scripts.

Sleepy

Awful episode, only made worse by the fact I was looking forward to it so much.

I'm dreading Tate as companion next season.

Teh Russ

It was perfectly watchable, but not great (textbook RTD episode). But, let's face it, most Who fans would only have been watching it for the series 4 preview at the end... and that, at least, looks promising... Romans, Sontarans, giant wasps, mysterious extreme close-up of an alien face (Davros?), Ood galore, Saxon's wife with a sonic screwdriver, Martha, and, yes, Catherine Tate being annoying. Looks good, but the Torchwood series 2 trailer that was on afterwards looks even better.

Gavin W

Teh Russ wrote: »

It was perfectly watchable, but not great (textbook RTD episode). But, let's face it, most Who fans would only have been watching it for the series 4 preview at the end...

Well I loved it but was actually slightly disappointed by the season 4 trailer, it didn't seem to get across the huge variety and diversity of settings in the way that previous trailers did.

and that, at least, looks promising... Romans, Sontarans, giant wasps, mysterious extreme close-up of an alien face (Davros?),

That was a Sontaran. The trailers only have clips from the first half-dozen or so episodes and if Davros is in it next year then he probably won't turn up until near the end.

Ood galore, Saxon's wife with a sonic screwdriver, Martha, and, yes, Catherine Tate being annoying. Looks good, but the Torchwood series 2 trailer that was on afterwards looks even better.

That wasn't Saxon's wife, it was Sarah Lancashire (better known as Raquel from Coronation St.).

Have a look on YouTube for the American Torchwood trailer (not sure if I could post the link here), it's even better again.:)

I love all this "RTD must die" nonsense. You should adore the man. He made Doctor Who popular again and in so doing gave Moffat et al the opportunity to write the, frankly, excellent scripts for the show we have all enjoyed (Blink is a personal favourite as was Human Nature and the Family of Blood) but the overall direction of the series comes from Davies.

Season 1 of the new Doctor Who was what made the entire show viable again and the lion's share of that was written by Davies who, acknowledging the depth of scriptwriting talent at his disposal, now restricts himself to one or two episodes and the series finale.

So give RTD a break. I think the direction he has taken the Doctor in is fascinating. I for one hope he revives the idea from the Runaway Bride that Paul Cornell hinted at in Family of Blood that the Doctor is someone to be feared and that the reason he has a companion is to hold him back.

Stark

Deleted User wrote:

I love all this "RTD must die" nonsense. You should adore the man. He made Doctor Who popular again and in so doing gave Moffat et al the opportunity to write the, frankly, excellent scripts for the show we have all enjoyed (Blink is a personal favourite as was Human Nature and the Family of Blood) but the overall direction of the series comes from Davies.

And now he should step back more. He's become a hack who just writes scripts so he can get giddy about throwing his favourite toys, like Cybermen vs Daleks and Kylie in.

Deleted User wrote:

Season 1 of the new Doctor Who was what made the entire show viable again and the lion's share of that was written by Davies who

Ah yes, where would we be without the Slitheen.

Deleted User wrote:

So give RTD a break. I think the direction he has taken the Doctor in is fascinating.

I suppose granted, a direction towards the exploding wouldn't have done the character much good.

ixoy

Deleted User wrote: »

I love all this "RTD must die" nonsense. You should adore the man. He made Doctor Who popular again

I love all the RTD apologist nonsense

What I dislike is his generally weak scripts that he clearly thinks are excellent works that appeal to more himself than many others. Of all the good episodes that have come out from the show in its three new seasons, none of them are, to my mind and all others that I know of, penned by RTD. He doesn't show much skill in creating a more dimensional Doctor for example (that'd be Cornell) or having some intelligence in his plots (that'd be Moffat amongst others).

Instead, we're forced to watch his episodes seem almost constructed around a template - have the Doctor run around a lot, shout out that he's the last of the Time Lords, jump past an explosion, and save the day.

He also forces an unrequited love interest into the show. It was bad enough with Rose, but then he repeated it with Martha. He didn't strike the correct balance between Doctor and Doctor's companion and, in his day, he let Rose take too much screen time away from the Doctor, effectively weakening the role of the star of the show.
and in so doing gave Moffat et al the opportunity to write the, frankly, excellent scripts for the show we have all enjoyed (Blink is a personal favourite as was Human Nature and the Family of Blood) but the overall direction of the series comes from Davies.

So give RTD a break. I think the direction he has taken the Doctor in is fascinating. I for one hope he revives the idea from the Runaway Bride that Paul Cornell hinted at in Family of Blood that the Doctor is someone to be feared and that the reason he has a companion is to hold him back.

See I don't see that he's taken it in any direction as such, beyond the love interest. The concept of the Doctor as something more, larger, is hardly new. In fact this was something that was going to be explored in much greater depth with the original run's seventh Doctor - plans cut short by its initial cancellation. One of the reasons this darker Doctor is evident in "The Family of Blood" is because it's adapted from the Virgin novel "Human Nature", which was a continuation of the Seventh Doctor's adventures into the Cartmel masterplan of a Darker Doctor spun back in the late '80s and early '90s. It wasn't RTD's idea.

ixoy

ixoy wrote: »

It wasn't RTD's idea.

Never said it was. However, he is still the primary creative force behind the show and I hope he decides to expand on the areas which the other scriptwriters have excellently incorporated into their episodes in the overall direction of the show.

Of all the good episodes that have come out from the show in its three new seasons, none of them are, to my mind and all others that I know of, penned by RTD. He doesn't show much skill in creating a more dimensional Doctor for example (that'd be Cornell) or having some intelligence in his plots (that'd be Moffat amongst others).

Personally I thought Army of Ghosts and Doomsday were pretty good, both penned by Russell T. as was Bad Wolf and The Parting of the Ways, another great season finale IMHO.

And now he should step back more. He's become a hack who just writes scripts so he can get giddy about throwing his favourite toys, like Cybermen vs Daleks and Kylie in.

I seriously think this is the oddest thing I've ever read. Have you any idea how many episodes he is actually writing for the next series? Look here under series 4 to see how dumb that comment is. Plus I loved the Dalek v Cybermen element and, I might remind you, it is hardly the first time they have appeared in the same episode. The Five Doctors anyone? Even the Master was in that episode!


I am fully aware of RTD's scriptwriting shortcomings. However, I fail to see what it is exactly that you achieve by insulting the man who revived the Doctor other than gaining some minor feeling of importance for yourselves. Newsflash: you couldn't do it better than RTD. His scriptwriting ideas may have run their course in terms of writing an entire series but he is still at the helm of a very successful ship.

He himself has realised that the show may run out of steam if not properly done, hence the annual breaks the show will take from now on.

I hope you enjoy taking out whatever frustrations you have on RTD but I simply cannot agree with your over-simplified take on his and others frankly magnificent work.

Stark

Deleted User wrote: »

Have you any idea how many episodes he is actually writing for the next series? Look here under series 4 to see how dumb that comment is.

4. And he's taken both the pilot and the last 3 episodes for himself again.

Deleted User wrote: »

Plus I loved the Dalek v Cybermen element

You would.

Deleted User wrote: »

Newsflash: you couldn't do it better than RTD.

Yes we could. Ixoy posted the template, you just need to steal in the in between pieces from other works like the Poseidon Adventure and Peter Pan pantomimes. "Everyone, think of Tinker belle, I mean Doctor at the same time!". Throw it some titillation and we could have a Torchwood crossover.

Deleted User wrote: »

He himself has realised that the show may run out of steam if not properly done, hence the annual breaks the show will take from now on.

That's more to do with freeing up David Tennant for other acting jobs than anything else.

Deleted User wrote: »

frankly magnificent work.

You might enjoy pantomime but you could hardly call it "magnificent work".

mike65

Geeks tbh.

Mike.

ixoy

Deleted User wrote: »

However, he is still the primary creative force behind the show and I hope he decides to expand on the areas which the other scriptwriters have excellently incorporated into their episodes in the overall direction of the show.

There's a touch of ambiguity there - do you believe the other writers are fleshing out his ideas or that he's going to flesh out theirs? What exactly big ideas has he really brought?
Sure we had "bad wolf" in S1 but even then that went more towards Rose than the Doctor, an angle I was never happy with. S3 brought us the Master and yes, it's nice to have had the references threaded through the show but that's hardly an example of an almighty work - throw up a few Saxon posters in one episode, have the Doctor heavily mention how he's the last of the Time Lords, etc.
I'm not really seeing a grand design in these seasons and I'm not really sure there should be at this stage. If there isn't really one though, what are we hailing RTD for as there really doesn't seem to be a direction behind the whole show, only season arcs. And if the next season's one is Davros, I'm going to cry.

Personally I thought Army of Ghosts and Doomsday were pretty good, both penned by Russell T. as was Bad Wolf and The Parting of the Ways, another great season finale IMHO.

I disagree I thought there was too much focus on Rose as the saviour and not enough on the titular Doctor saving the day. Still they're examples of his better work and pretty enjoyable in their own right - I just never liked the companion dynamic that Rose and the Doctor enjoyed and I think we'll just agree to disagree on that aspect.

Plus I loved the Dalek v Cybermen element and, I might remind you, it is hardly the first time they have appeared in the same episode. The Five Doctors anyone? Even the Master was in that episode!

Seriously, quoting the 20th Anniversary special as justification? I see that as more akin to the Christmas special - a celebratory hurrah to the show rather than a focus on its quality. Also they had limited interaction within that as there were too many other baddies to fling about.
I think that putting them together was more of a fanboy idea - I can see why you'd do it but I don't think it was executed all too well (I'm not sure that it could have been executed all that well by anyone to be honest). It just struck me a little of RTD going "wouldn't it be cool if we had this and that and this other thing", like a kid trying to make a dinner by picking all his favourite foods and not realising that the result wouldn't necessarily be a tasty dish. In this respect I think that he doesn't live up to the role of a series creator as he cannot temper the quality of story aspect with the need to please.

Newsflash: you couldn't do it better than RTD. His scriptwriting ideas may have run their course in terms of writing an entire series but he is still at the helm of a very successful ship.

I hate this response to critical arguments. You could leverage it at anyone who ever criticizes a work of art in any form - "Well you couldn't do any better".
Whether I could do better or not is an unknown quantity. It's also immaterial - as head of the show, he should be maintaining a high standard. I don't believe he is but I believe there are others who have ably demonstrated an ability to do so on the staff.
Also since you openly admit his shortcomings as a script writer and that he may be running out of steam, what exactly is he doing now for the show that's worthy of defence? Do we know what alterations he's making to scripts (the one I know of, for "Family of Blood" is not one I agree with).

He himself has realised that the show may run out of steam if not properly done, hence the annual breaks the show will take from now on.

Umm that's because DT wants to do some theatre work.

I hope you enjoy taking out whatever frustrations you have on RTD but I simply cannot agree with your over-simplified take on his and others frankly magnificent work.

We're not insulting others work (some of which is indeed magnificent). I just am not seeing why RTD should be venerated any more when he's producing weak scripts and not showing any signs of producing quality for the last few years.

ixoy

ixoy wrote: »

I hate this response to critical arguments. You could leverage it at anyone who ever criticizes a work of art in any form - "Well you couldn't do any better".

This point is absolutely fair, it is an incredibly juvenile argument but I was just a bit frustrated with the tone of some of the others tbh. It doesn't matter how good you are, only how good he is.

I take incredible exception to Stark's "you would" comment about my liking the Cybermen and Dalek element of season 2's finale. It is a personal preference Stark. I have acknowledged your right to dislike the work of RTD but you seem unable to acknowledge my converse right to enjoy it. The sign of a simple mind I fear. I can choose to defend his artistic right to do with the show as he will, but I do not expect to have to defend myself against arrogant, ill-thought out comments from someone who can do no more than mock a thoroughly enjoyable television programme for being too simplistic. Personally I have loved the show for years and I don't ever remember it having an Aaron Sorkin-esque attention to scripting and dialogue. I remember it being riddled with cliches and pompous dialogue from the Doctor (see his speech to Davros in Remembrance of the Daleks for a perfect example of the latter and Anthony Ainley's Master for the cliches - that awful evil laugh) So his "running around saying he is a time lord and I am going to save you" is really just a modern progression of that. If the BBC could have done better explosions in the original series they surely would have.

Moffat himself made fun of the old series in his Comic Relief spoof with Rowan Atkinson as the Doctor. He was aware of them and, like everyone else here, I would love to see more of his work in the show.

However, my ultimate point is that Doctor Who was always about fun and a scary adventure and it still is.

ixoy

I'm fully aware that the original series has its somewhat less-than-stellar moments and the plots weren't exactly awe-inspiring. Part of its charm has always been its kitsch values - some of that was a product of a tiny budget but a lot also down to scripts that were quickly thrown out and ranged highly in quality ("City of Death" to "The Horns of Nimon").

I think though that there's a strong contrast in the show - RTD writes more simplistic adventures, with the Doctor running around and lots of explosions, etc. They're not deep but I can see how you might enjoy them in the spirit of being quite like some of the older stuff.

What I find far more intriguing is how Moffat, Parkin, Gattiss, and others can have that action but add additional depth - make it more cerebral. Rather than have a simple storyline with action in one era, why not fracture that storyline and still have the human pathos - as we saw in the excellent "Girl in the Fireplace". The Doctor's longings and loneliness were far more brilliantly explored in "The Family of Blood", with a greater degree of subtlety, than the heavy-handed Rose farewell we saw in "The Parting of the Ways".

I appreciate that we got a range of genres in the original show and that you could argue that RTD himself has set up his own contributory niche - the family action-adventure and leaves some of the more heavy stuff to other writers. I just honestly believe he could be a lot better at it, not rely so much on a cookie-cutter approach, and still retain the strength of the show without falling to its weaknesses (as he has, and many others have before in the shows previous incarnations).

Finally someone making some sense.

You won't really find much argument from me about the previous post because in most aspects I agree with it. I do think, however, that the show needs a break from the more cerebral episodes from time to time to touch base with its fundamental purpose as a family action/adventure. I'll be far more inclined to re-watch the non-RTD episodes on DVD (with the exception of the 2 series finales from Season 1 & 2, I was very disappointed with season 3's finale - mostly because the music was rubbish) but every now and then I just want to watch the Doctor run around and save everyone while shouting he's a timelord. Cause you get bored of filet mignon all the time, sometimes you just need a hamburger to change things up.

Mahatma coat

OK I rewatched the Christmas special today.

whilst (to continue on the theme of the previous posts) 'Girl in the fireplace' & Blink were prime cuts of steak

this years Christmas special was akin to being slapped in the face with a bag of raw mince.

the acting was awful, the characters were wooden, the dialouge was (to call it poor would be an insult to poor dialouge) well words fail me as to how bad it was, and over all I've seen better scripts on an episode of 'Badly Dubbed Porn'.

Doctor DooM

It wasn't great but in its defense we're not going to get some deep, dark episode on Christmas day. The episode did what it said on the tin.

For someone who worked professionally as an actress, I thought Kylie was shockingly bad, I got to say.

Is there a thread for RTD discussions? It seems to be what every DW boards lights up on...

popebenny16

SDooM wrote: »

Is there a thread for RTD discussions? It seems to be what every DW boards lights up on...

I'm sure we had one before, but off you go.

I think we all get too worked up by these christmas specials. For one thing, you have to remember that they go out at 7.pm on Christmas day, feet up time for most of the family, sort of half asleep watching it stuff. This years figures put viewership at around 11-12 million and this is the most essential thing. You wont get 11-12 million for any Who story (unless its the one where he finally, definitivlely, dies perhaps) so the vast majority of viewers just want a simple action story with Kylie there to keep old farts like me interested :rolleyes:.

In effect, RTD is given a show of his own to rule over, for payback he delivers to the BBC a ratings killer for three christmasses in a row. He also gets to wallop Harry Potter every Easter for good measure. Thats the payback, and in this years show there was plenty of payback. There is a very accurate comparison with all of the multi-Doctor reunions, apart from the last two CIN specials and The Two Doctors. They and the Christmass specials all are just a fun day out. The real day job stuff is in the serials.

As for RTD as a writer, whilst you can use the Time War and its effects on the Doctor as a possible excuse for his sudden desire to get with Billie Piper, and any other reasonably attrictive woman (poor old Clife Swift lol), the fact that he never bothered to even extrapolate that line of thought just shows that his aim for the show is really "wouldn't it be great if we could have Shakespere, or erm, Agatha Christie or more Daleks or Cybermen or Kylie, or Sissors Sisters playing in the background. While I'm at it, lets completely ignore thirty years of the Masters Character and introduce some crappy 1st year cod child loonie stuff and keep talking abount drums so I can play Voodoo Child coz, like, thats wot on my car CD at the mo, yeahhhhhhhh"

His role is to come up with ideas and then assign them to scriptwriers (Eg, the pompeii story this year) and he also writes one quater himself. Problem is, when all the real good scrpits are by other people and the head writers ones are all crach-bang-wallop meets Hollyoaks it's a bit self evident where the failings are, gov.

And, yes, Kylie phoned in her performance (who was expecting a BAFTA anyway) and yes, she looked her bloody age, which made my wife very happy.

Finally, please stop throwing catty insults at each other or there will be bans. As for Mike, you really should come out of your Who Closet, son.

Oh, happy new year.