**Spoilers** Series 9, Episode 6 - "The Woman Who Lived"

pixelburp

So last weeks was a bit divisive in terms of whether it was a good episode or not, and sure enough the truth of Maisie Williams' character wasn't a patch on peoples' imaginations Am curious to know how much of the episode will be dedicated to the emotional fallout of the Doctor's actions.

Also, tonight is the half-way point of the season - already! Erp, time flies 'n all that jazz

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GIDPzKZVqAQ

corkie

Enjoyable episode!


Maisie Williams played a strong part of the episode, not having Clara Oswald in the episode gave more screen time for Williams!

As they didn't kill the character off, still possibility of recurring role for Williams in future seasons!

Nice that the doctor mentioned Captain Jack!

FloatingVoter

Leo the Lion was a pathetic villain but he wasn't really the point of the episode anyway.
Good to have

Maisie Williams as a possible recurring character getting into mischief with Captain Jack.

Eugene Norman

I thought it was great. The only oddity was the monster of the week. They could have had the immortal discussions without that.

OU812

Two of the worst episodes I've ever seen. Seriously, what was the point of them? They were abysmal.

I hope they're not setting her up to be a companion, obviously now that she's immortal, she can be a recurring character (until she starts to age).

Very diapointed in the direction the season is going. Was a great couple of episodes at the start and then right downhill

FloatingVoter

Maisie Williams isn't going to be a companion. No more than Alex Kingston. Both have bigger fish to fry in their respective careers than BBC TV productions. Popping up for cameos every once in a while if available is the best you can hope for / need to dread.

TICKLE_ME_ELMO

Agree the giant cat man was pretty terrible, but like last week's episode it was just dressing on the serious issues.

I did wonder why the Doctor didn't just take her with him as his perma-pal but the reasoning he gave was pretty good. I liked how ambiguous they left it too, friends but quite sinister too.

Not looking forward to having that awful bint with the glasses back next week.

These last few episodes make me wonder how they're going to write Clara out. She's showing zero signs of even considering walking away from The Doctor so she's either going to get killed or he's going to force her out.

FunLover18

Pretty poor episode and for all its focus on death and immortality I felt Rufus Hound was poorly cast and the scene with his hanging was taken completely in the wrong direction tonally. As was the weird romance they hinted at between his and Maisie's character, is she even 17? EDIT she's 18 and he's 36 but it's still a little weird even if her character is technically over 600

Not looking forward to the return of UNIT and Osgood next week either, Moffat has annoying habit of finding characters that work well in a once off and then using them to death, see River, and the lizard lady and companions.

TICKLE_ME_ELMO

Williams' character

is back in the finale, or one of the two parts anyway

BuffyBot

I actually quite liked it. I think it had some great interplay between Capaldi/Williams and let the characters explore the issues coming out of last weeks storyline. The adventurs story this week was always just background decoration for that.

the "he'll get around to you, eventually" line about Captain Jack was perfectly deadpanned by Capaldi

corkie

TICKLE_ME_ELMO wrote: »

Williams' character

is back in the finale, or one of the two parts anyway

Face the Raven (21 Nov. 2015) Episode 10

IMDB link <<<< Spoiler Info! Can not have links in spoiler tags!

pixelburp

I thought the episode was pretty average, preferred last weeks, if only because it felt more like a straightforward encapsulation of a standard Dr. Who adventure. This second part instead felt like an elongated conversation about immortality, broken up by a fairly rote / token villain and tonally deaf 'comedy' highwayman plot (it's probably best not to go near material Blackadder aced so perfectly 25 years ago). I think the worst you can say is that it was offensively average, but nowhere near offensively bad. Not in a world where 'Fear Her' exists.

The strongest material was certainly the quiet moments between Capaldi and Williams, a strange dynamic that grew over the 40 odd minutes and one that's definitely worth revisiting. Will Ashildr be Earth's new protector I wonder, conflicting with the Doctor's own status or methods? It feels like the Doctor's constant pronouncements of being the warden of Earth has gone unchallenged (bar the more organised, para-militaristic approach ala Torchwood), there's opportunity there to address that. The scenes in the library, Ashildr recalling her tragic history & loss, was heartbreaking.

Going back to the Lion character though: anyone else find themselves thinking perhaps the family-friendly template is beginning to restrict the scripts a little? Feels like things like the Lion-man / Portal plot was thrown in as an obligation, simply because modern Dr. Who decrees there be a funky alien for the kiddies to go 'oooh' at, with some suitably apocalyptic threat to keep the stakes artificially high. the real meat of that story was without question that of Ashildr's journey, yet we kept stopping to deal with the requisite extra-terrestrial threat. Am I right in thinking there's never even been a historical episode of new-Who that hasn't featured aliens? The story could have worked perfectly well just as a historical adventure.

TICKLE_ME_ELMO

pixelburp wrote: »

Going back to the Lion character though: anyone else find themselves thinking perhaps the family-friendly template is beginning to restrict the scripts a little? Feels like things like the Lion-man / Portal plot was thrown in as an obligation, simply because modern Dr. Who decrees there be a funky alien for the kiddies to go 'oooh' at, with some suitably apocalyptic threat to keep the stakes artificially high. the real meat of that story was without question that of Ashildr's journey, yet we kept stopping to deal with the requisite extra-terrestrial threat. Am I right in thinking there's never even been a historical episode of new-Who that hasn't featured aliens? The story could have worked perfectly well just as a historical adventure.

A huge part of the reason I find myself enjoying the show so much more since Capaldi took over is that it feels like a slightly more grown up show. Every now and then though they throw something like these last two episodes in I remember it's still a "family" show if not a kids show.
I agree the historical setting would have worked fine by itself and Ashilder's desire to go with the Doctor should have been more than enough to drive the drama for the episode, especially when coupled with her anger/pain/resentment from the life she's led because of him. Throw in the Doctor's growing concerns about Clara's attitude and his fear of losing her and how that tied in to Ashildr's life and you've got a pretty solid episode, although probably way to dark and wordy for the "family" show.

Wibbs

pixelburp wrote: »

it's probably best not to go near material Blackadder aced so perfectly 25 years ago.

SNAP! :eek::pac::pac: Exactly my first thought PB.

Antar Bolaeisk

Really strong episode to begin with and then the lion man from planet lion shows up.

FloatingVoter

Antar Bolaeisk wrote: »

Really strong episode to begin with and then the lion man from planet lion shows up.

Yeah, I think everyone agrees he was a bone to throw the younger members of the audience while the dialogue heavy two hander took place between Capaldi and Williams.
Those of us who watched the Highlander TV series know all about the dangers of creating immortals at too young an age. Seriously, this heavy philosophical discussion took up many a weed filled night in the 90s. There can be only one and all that.