Dr. Who is a lot of shite, and everyone knows it
It's purpose is now to sell toy sonic screwdrivers to kids.
Doctor Who to unwrap new sidekick in Christmas TV special
A ghostly tweet has arrived from the outer reaches of Gallifrey - OK, more like the BBC canteen in Cardiff: Richard E Grant will star in this year's Doctor Who Christmas special in which fans will see the Time Lord's newest companion for the first time. The latest series of the hugely popular sci-fi telly drama is in …
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Wednesday 8th August 2012 08:34 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: Oh no it isn't.
"thrilling adventures of the fictitious Time Lord"
I think the "fictitious" was a bit redundant there. Unless you think there are real time lords out there in which case I suggest you put down the remote and go outside for some air.
As for thrilling, sure , if you've never read any decent adult sci fi in your life.
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Wednesday 8th August 2012 08:13 GMT Semaj
Re: Dr. Who is a lot of shite, and everyone knows it
You are right - it was BBC'd to death and they just keep raping it for all it's worth and will continue to do so till the money runs out.
It's sci-fi for plebs - dumbed down, family friendly, PC crap. Which is why so many people like it but those of us who enjoy real sci-fi hate it. Then there are the crowd of older people who liked the old ones and feel obliged to watch and defend the new ones even though they are NOTHING like the old ones. They may as well have made it a different series but it's a common tactic to crowbar a new idea into an old successful one to make more money.
Also I think the next doctor should be Stephen Fry ;)
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Wednesday 8th August 2012 08:40 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: Dr. Who is a lot of shite, and everyone knows it
"efend the new ones even though they are NOTHING like the old ones"
Lets be honest , the old ones were utter tripe too and it wasn't just because of the low budgets. The scripts and acting were appalling. Dr Who has always been a kids program and always will be and IMO there's nothing sadder than an adult pretending its on the same level of sophistication as sci fi written by say Ian M Banks or Neil Asher or Heinlein. Its not even fit to lick the boots of those authors. The sort of people who think Dr Who is amazing are the sort of people who wouldn't recognise real science fiction if it shot them in the head with a plasma gun,
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Wednesday 8th August 2012 10:39 GMT Cameron Colley
Re: Dr. Who is a lot of shite, and everyone knows it
Had to upvote the OP.
I have watched most of the new Dr Who episodes as a "Passing a Sunday afternoon (The long, dark teatime of the soul)" kind of thing and they do offer some amusement. Sadly the amusement is working out how weak the plot devices will be -- well that and the assistant can be easy on the eye. Oh, and let's not forget Alex Kingston.
As proper Sci-Fi Red Dwarf is superior -- it's also superior as entertainment.
The Sci-Fi aspects of Dr Who are more like children's fantasy like Harry Potter with rules made up arbitrarily to shunt the plot along rather than real self-consistent Sci-Fi.
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Wednesday 8th August 2012 17:44 GMT Cameron Colley
Re: real sci-fi
Arthur C Clarke*, Isaak Asimov**. William Gibson***, Neil Stephenson****.
Yes, real Sci-Fi does exist and it is entertaining and the premises are real rather than fantasy.
*Geostationary satellites.
**No need to mention.
***The internet being a very important medium where people can be screwed (and more).
****Not a prediction but many MMORPGs based upon his work. Also, data havens and law are much discussed.
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Wednesday 8th August 2012 18:01 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: Dr. Who is a lot of shite, and everyone knows it
Obvious troll is ... apparently not sufficiently obvious.
Dear Reg commentators: Everything you like is crap, all of your opinions are infantile, and everything you think you know is wrong. Now get it all out at once and then stop responding to flamebait, eh?
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Tuesday 7th August 2012 15:00 GMT thegrouch
Richard E Grant
According to Russell Davies, R.E.G. gave such a phoned-in performance of the Doctor in his animated debut that he guaranteed he'd never be considered for the real thing.
Now if they can get Ecclesdoc and that excitable fellow back for a 50th anniversary special, then I'll be interested.
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Tuesday 7th August 2012 15:03 GMT Chad H.
Re: Richard E Grant
RTD again proves he doesnt know what he's talking about. REG Gave a better performance than that Eccleston guy could dream of. A depressive Doctor was more suited to follow the fall of Gallifery than that exitable "I just drunk all the red cordial" performance we got instead.
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Tuesday 7th August 2012 20:06 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: pre-watershed....
"..so no actual unwrapping."
Thank goodness, given the gay-fetish nudity that prevailed in Torchwood. Proof of course that the Bee won't chase an audience:
"We need some nudity to distract from a weak plot this week!"
"Real, brightly lit, extensive full frontal nudity?"
"Yes!"
"Has to be Eve or John"
"Barrowman. We don't want anybody to enjoy it too much."
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Tuesday 7th August 2012 18:21 GMT Naughtyhorse
Re: Not too fond on the recent incarnations,
or, as we are having Withnail, and have had &I... what about uncle Monty as the Dr with Jake (complete with eels) as the assistant.
'I intend to have you, davros, even if it is to be burglary!' try getting that aired before the watershed.
Mines the uber-cool full length leather
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Tuesday 7th August 2012 17:01 GMT h4rm0ny
Re: Daleks?
No - it's a bad thing. I liked the big colourful Daleks.
But apparently the decision was more to do with budget than anything else. Personally I'm just saddened to see them back. I like the Daleks, but under RTD they just got silly. One Dalek was a deadly threat. Then you got five Daleks and they were more easily dealt with. Then you got hundreds of Daleks and they were barely a threat. Then you got millions of Daleks and they were dispatched by the thousand. The more Daleks you got, the less deadly they became.
I'll retract my opinion if they actually become scary again, but I fear more RTD-style "Daleks are scary because I tell you they are, even though they never achieve anything".
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Tuesday 7th August 2012 18:49 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: Daleks?
How is it down to budget? They've already made a whole bunch of Tellytubby Daleks, and may even have more in stock than the old ones. So surely it's just a matter of choosing which models you pull out of storage and film?
The scene in the trailer with thousands of Daleks is probably CGI, so again it doesn't matter which model they used.
The new & improved Daleks went down like a cup of cold sick with the average viewer, not just the nerds who get worked up by any kind of change to the show. It was an attemt by Moffat and his team to put their own mark on the show and separate it from the RTD era. Like new Coke, it failed and they brought the old one back.
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Wednesday 8th August 2012 08:21 GMT h4rm0ny
Re: Daleks?
"How is it down to budget? They've already made a whole bunch of Tellytubby Daleks"
They made five - one of each colour. They had to destroy two of them to create the stone Daleks in Pandorica Opens / Big Bang which leaves four. I presume they have more of the old ones. That's all I know anyway - I just read a news story saying that with how tight the budgets are in the BBC now, they had to go back to the old ones if they wanted to do them again any time soon.
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Tuesday 7th August 2012 17:51 GMT Anonymous Coward
What I do hope for...
Is a new twist when it comes to the storyline. So; putting the focus a little more back on the doctor and not so much the companion(s). It was fun, and I liked the first 'Amy Pond season' which all evolved around a weird crack in time in her bedroom.
Also I hope they will now let go of the idea to build up and re-run the whole thing in the finale of the season. It was surprising with the season mentioned above. It was nicely executed in the last season with the Silence but much less surprising because you already somewhat expected it to happen... Personally straight from the first episode when we had "2" doctors.
So I really hope they'll do something new on that part. No complaints, just a suggestion.
And I surely hope they'll let Matt Smith do what he does.. During the first episodes I kept the feeling he was trying to mimic Tennant (who I considered a very good doctor). But as the episodes progressed I have to admit he really managed to put his own 'touch' on the character.
SO; is it xmas already? ;-)
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Tuesday 7th August 2012 18:48 GMT Anonymous Coward
UK TV seasons are short
When Doctor Who came back, I was surprised it would have 13 episodes per series, as most UK TV shows have no more than 2 episodes per season, as illustrated in The Simpsons.
So after all this crap about splitting east series into two parts so that "kids are never more than a few weeks away from new episodes whilst growing up", are we now ready to realise what has really gone on? The BBC have had to cut budgets everywhere, and Doctor Who is no exception.
They've basically reduced the number of episodes per season. For all intents and purposes, Doctor Who now has 6 episodes per season, with a Christmas special, with each 'season' not being tied to the same time of the year.
It must be over a year since we last got a new regular episode, and whenever it does finally come back, we'll probably get 6 or 7 episodes before having to wait until late 2012 for half a dozen more, plus a few additional shows such as a docudrama about the creation of the show and some 'greatest hits' compilations on BBC3. All the other shows have been effectively axed, and the various magazines appear to be disappearing too.
The question is whether Doctor Who has ridden the crest of a wave over the last 7 years but has now run out of momentum, or whether dicking with the normal flow of the show, beginning with Tennant's year of 'specials' and continuing with what's going on since Series 6, has led to the public losing interest.
I know some smart arse will now reply saying the ratings have never been better or something, but there was clearly a second wave of 'Dalekmania' when the show came back, during which even the biggest clangers of episodes were fawned upon by the press (well, apart from the Daily Mirror who strategically hated the show from the start, and Gary Bushel who seems to dislike any man who doesn't grunt, support West Ham, swig lager and scratch his nuts), and the show seemed like the biggest thing on UK TV. That's no longer the case, which is why the overnight ratings are so low, and the 7-day viewing so high. And with such big gaps between so few episodes, there will inevitably be an ongoing number of viewers who end up not bothering setting their PVRs either.
Basically, between messing with the scheduling during Tenant's last season and the sporadic commissioning over the last couple of years and henceforth, Doctor Who appears to have become a second class citizen within the BBC.
Just like Top Gear.
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Tuesday 7th August 2012 21:12 GMT oregonensis
Please no more Christmas specials
A heartwarming Christmas story now and again is alright, but the most recent one had no discernible plot line. Jolly, jolly, jolly. When can the Doctor be a grumpy old bastard and when can he have more of a mental workout by solving his problems some way other than with the sonic screwdriver. It just does screws! My theory as to why the Doctor has become so stupid is that the brain damage he suffered at the end of Planet of the Spiders never fully healed. As Baker the Greater it was a loveable goofiness but by the time Baker the Lesser rolled around it was horrible clowning around. Or is all the trouble with present day Who that Moffat is emotionally stunted and/or writing for 7-year-old audiences?
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Wednesday 8th August 2012 09:51 GMT jon 72
Never mind all that
Is hiding behind a sofa going to stop a death ray?
When we were younger this was the question and now as adults until we believe once again that it will save us,
the adventures of the Doctor will always disappoint in some way. Kids of course fully understand the mullti-diemensional physics of the helical steel springs in granny's sofa cause a reflective phase inversion making it impervious to everything.
PS: If any of the shows writers read this I dare you to work it into the plot next season..
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Friday 10th August 2012 11:18 GMT 2Fat2Bald
It IS rubbish
Sorry - but Dr Who was good when re-launched with Chris Ecclestone, great with David Tennant. But with Matt Smith - it's a shadow of it's former self. I don't think it's just Matt Smith, though, I think the writers and producers are more used to doing Eastenders than Sci Fi and the whole thing has a "designed by a committee" feel to it.
It was much better before the show started to believe it's own publicity and vanished up it's own chuff, quite frankly,.
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Biting the hand that feeds IT
