A review of Big Finish Audio drama 25
Written by: Steve Lyons
Directed by: Gary Russell

Sylvester McCoy (The Doctor), Sophie Aldred (Ace), David Tennant (Feldwebel Kurtz), Toby Longworth (Hauptmann Julius Schäfer), Nicholas Young (Flying Officer Bill Gower), Peter Rae (Timothy Wilkins), Tracey Childs (Klein).

Colditz takes place during World War II, and as one can probably easily piece together from the title, it has to do with the infamous prison camp Colditz Castle. While Americans are not as familiar with this legendary facility, The UK has had decades of documentaries, Television shows, and even board games based on the many escape attempts of it’s prisoners. The camp was basically set up to house officers and other high ranking people who tried to escape from other camps, so it was almost seen as the Alcatraz of it’s time. Over here, we have tons of versions of the Steve McQueen movie The Great Escape which is based on an escape from a polish POW camp, so you get the idea.

The bad guys in this are Nazis, and if there was any “Tardis team” that has a good chance of being able to deal with Nazis, it’s definitely Ace and the seventh Doctor. We have seen their influence in Curse of Fenric, The Silver Nemesis, and one could argue that The villains of The Fearmonger were essentially some type of right-wing Neo-Nazi types. Because of this, I actually chuckled when Ace mentioned “not Nazis again, I hate Nazis!”. I’m not a huge fan of science fiction having Nazi bad-guys because it usually ends up being the lazy Star Trek “Space Nazis!” trope, but thankfully this isn’t the case here. These are regular Nazis in their correct time line.

I’m a big fan of historical episodes that do not involve some sort contrived alien involvement, and this one is almost entirely of that sort. In fact, The Doctor himself is the only real alien involvement we see here which is refreshing. The plot of this episode centers around The Nazis confiscating a CD Walkman from Ace and creating a paradox in which they reverse engineer it and win World War II. This plot is more-or-less in the background, but it’s the way they a new anti-hero character named Klein is introduced. You see, Klein’s from this alternate time line in which the Nazi powers have taken over the rest of the world. As far as she’s concerned, her world is the better one; as a child of German parents growing up in England, she welcomed the Nazi victory. I know from looking at Wikis that Klein’s story is fleshed out more, and can’t wait to fill the gaps in.

Perhaps the most notable thing about this story is that the main villain of the story, Kurtz, is played by none other than a young David Tennant in his first Doctor Who related piece of entertainment. Kurtz is an awful piece of work, the sort of character that one really hopes will come to an early death. He plots behind the backs of his superiors, tries to hold information for his own gains, and even tries to take advantage of inmates in unspeakable ways. Kurtz is definitely a Hollywood Nazi archetype, as is another character in Schafer – the sympathetic Nazi. While these character tropes aren’t bad they reek of being historically inaccurate to some degree.

My only downside to this audio seemed to be the sound mixing, which shocked me because Gary Russell directed episodes are usually very well done. There were many scenes within the interior of Colditz Castle that had weird foley work such as footsteps that sounded as if everyone was wearing concrete shoes on metal floors. I have a digital file for this audio, so perhaps I got a bad download? I’m not sure, but it sounded off in places. Perhaps somebody with the CD could chime in on the comments page. This didn’t take me out the play by any means, but there were times where it got distracting or drowned out a bit of dialog.

All-in-all this was a great story, and considering people think that I’m too harsh on 80’s Doctor Who, this is the second McCoy/Aldred story in a row that I’ve really enjoyed. I do wish that the audio mix would have been a bit better, but it’s still a hearty recommendation to every Doctor Who fan. Upon listening to this, I also have a strange feeling that I should watch Chicken Run for some reason.

The Monday Meme: New Coke

Something To Watch This Weekend: Quatermass Experiment (2005) on Hulu

Looking for something to watch this weekend? How about the 2005 remake of the classic Nigel Kneale tele-play The Quatermass Experiment! Starring John Flemyng and David Tennant, this is a remake in the truest sense of the word. Using old scripts and LIVE FILMING, they went the extra mile to re-capture the sixty year old magic that basically kicked off UK science fiction as we know it today. Hulu keeps adding more BBC stuff every once in a while, so I’ll keep you posted if more gets added. And don’t be surprised if I do a review of this pretty soon!

Video: All Regenerations From Hartnell to Smith (Including Hurt and McGann)

Here is a fitting tribute to the one time every few years that Doctor Who fans both dread and anticipate the most – The regeneration. This video includes ALL of the regenerations minus the fake-out one with David Tennant where he displaced the energy and simply healed himself. That’s right, you see both John Hurt and McGann in here! I am confused by the inclusion of Matt Smith’s Doctor and his “death” at the hands of “The Impossible Astronaut”, but I didn’t make the video. And without further ado…

Revisited: The Top Ten Things I wanted to see in the 50th Anniversary Back in March 2012

Doctor Who 50th Celebration - David Tennant toy — Doctor Who 50th Celebration – David Tennant toy (Photo credit: p_a_h)

Almost twenty months ago, I made a few predictions, or at least some sort of wish list for what I wanted to see with the Doctor Who 50th anniversary celebration. Here it is:

Top Ten Things I’d like to see (Or Not) With the Doctor Who 50th Anniversary

There has been a lot of chatter on podcasts and fansites where people want to know how fans felt about what we got, and more specifically want we wanted in the first place. This mostly came up because there was a vocal minority that whined about “how BBC were handling things” in relation to “the 50th.” I think looking back at my ramblings from then would be fun, since I do have such an article . I will re-list each segment of the original article, then follow it up in a different color with commentary on how it turned out, why It didn’t happen, or why I was full of crap.

Red words = I got it wrong

Blue words = I got it right

(I apologize if the color formatting does not work well in your reader)

What I would really LOVE to see is Paul McGann reprise his role as the eighth Doctor. Many fans see him as an overlooked part of the saga, and he is still technically a “current Doctor” as his regeneration has been only seen off-camera. We don’t know how old he was before the time war, I mean heck, he could have had white hair before it was all said and done. Unlike other older titular actors, McGann isn’t much older, so they do not have to come up with a terrible explanation about why the Doctor has aged forty years. This brings me to:

NAILED IT – This turned out better than I expected. Not only did we get a new “Three Doctors” essentially, but all twelve incarnations – no make that all thirteen – Doctors had appearances via computer effects and well placed stock footage. One can’t forget the awesome inclusion of The Night of The Doctor(READ THE REVIEW!), starring Paul McGann to make this 100% on the ball.

9. Cameos from older actors – The above problem is one that I hope they don’t have to discuss as one only has to watch something like Dimensions in Time to see how weird it is to see a former “doctor” that has aged so much. Of course I’m speaking of Tom Baker, and the silly half-explanation about why he was old, overweight and had grey hair. Yes, age happens, and I’m sure Moffat is a more than capable writer to pull something like this off, but why waste tape? Why not have as many actors as one can get, that want to take part, and have them be there in cameos? Maybe we can have a scene of some sort of government body like the Parliament composed of actors from the older show. This would be good to showcase the older actors, and not get too over the top. If they were to bring back an old companion, like they have done with Sarah Jane, Jo Grant, and the Brigadier, why don’t they bring back:

NAILED IT – Aside from Tom Baker’s awesome appearance, there was a veritable “who’s who in Doctor Who, if you factor in things like Adventures in Space and Time, Night of the Doctor, and The Five(ish) Doctors Reboot. Tom was the only “classic Doctor” to appear in the main special in the flesh, and it was explained with tongue-in-cheek vagueness to avoid my main concern. “The Curator” is such a mysterious character that nobody really knows the intention. Could he be an aged Fourth Doc? Is he another Timelord? Is he a future incarnation? The other specials had brief cameos cameos from just about every living person that wanted to be involved, from John Barrowman to Matthew Waterhouse!

8. The Return of Susan – what better way to look back at fifty years of this amazing show than to have the first companion come back? I have no idea how this would be pulled off, but having Carol Ann Ford reprise her role as the Doctor’s granddaughter Susan Foreman would be awesome, even if it was a brief appearance.

NOPE! – Unless you count her portrayal in an Adventure of Space and Time, and the cameo of Carole Ann Ford, the actual character never appeared in any return. She was mentioned, and we saw a picture of her in U.N.I.T.’s black vault, but that’s about it.

7. No “every villain teams up” story – Since we’ve already had this kind of thing happen in “The “Pandorica Opens” and “The Big Bang” it would be boring to have the same thing crop up in the special. I know it would be an easy idea to go along with, but this needs to be special, and to copy something from two seasons prior would not be so great.

NAILED IT! – although this does appear to be the plot of the Christmas Special.

6. The Return of the Master – I’d love to see the master come back, especially if they decide to do a regeneration scene. While I think John Simm did well in the role, albeit being in two serials that I did not particularly love, I’d love to see new blood. Maybe Bennedict Cumberbatch will have free time?

NOPE! Not even close!

5. No metafiction drenched “breaking the fourth wall” stuff – Red Dwarf: Back to Earth was a solid few episodes of Red Dwarf, although fans were torn on it just a tad. A lot of that came from the plot, which seemed to make the distinction that the guys onboard the titular mining ship, were in fact on a TV show. While this made for an interesting story, it was almost on the verge of “jumping the shark” plot-wise, I mean where would they have gone from there had they kept that revelation part of the show? It would be too easy to write an episode where someone makes a TV show out of the Doctor’s exploits, but I hope we don’t see that. If they are going to think of something similar though….

NAILED IT – although the chances of this happening were pretty slim. There was a tiny “fourth wall” breaking scene with Tom Baker that rivaled the infamous “merry Christmas to all of you at home!” scene from the sixties “Congratulations (Wink)!”, but that wasn’t as bad as it could have been.

4. Load us up with “special features” – I know Doctor Who Confidential is gone, but we need some documentaries produced, sort of like the one they made right before the 2005 re-launch just re-tooled to hype up the anniversary and rebirth of the show. This stuff would make some fans appreciate a show’s heritage that they may have never known about before 2005-6 and make any DVD set that much better.

NAILED IT! – As you can tell, by my recent reviews, this was more than done.

3. “Making of” Movie – A real kicker would be a drama production of the story of the production of the show. Many fans do not know the uphill battle the show had before it became an icon of British scifi. Lorded over by a female producer (Verity Lambert) and an Indian Director (Waris Hussein) in a world of old white guys, the show definitely had an uphill battle at the beginning, not to mention its terrible ratings the day it first aired, the day JFK died. As Picard would say: “Make it so..”

NAILED IT- Not only did I predict the movie, An Adventure in Space and Time, I predicted half of the plot! I did base my earlier post on my knowledge of Gatiss’s earlier proposal from a decade ago (the 40th anniversary special that BBC scoffed at), but had no idea that this literal scenario was going down.

2. More than one episode – I know we have half of the seventh season to look forward to in 2013, but I hope they do something like David Tennant’s final “season” where we get multiple long form episodes, just as long as they aren’t as unspectacular as what we got then. I’m not saying they were terrible or anything, but they definitely were at the bottom of Davies’ caliber as a writer.

Nope! but I will say that long form episode in the theaters and in 3D made it a much better pill to swallow.

1. No Regeneration – while I bet this would get the papers really rolling, add to viewership, and keep everyone buzzing, this would overshadow the actual anniversary if it would happen. If Matt were to leave soon, I hope he stays on until the eighth season. Not only would that make him have the traditional “four or so years” but keep that season exciting as well.

NAILED IT – Although the Christmas Special says “hi!”

So, to answer the question above, I got almost EVERYTHING I expected and more. I was fairly pessimistic going into the second half of series 7 for some reason, and the top quality of those episodes and the 50th itself more than made up for my reservations. If anything, I’m more excited about the show than I was two years ago because of how much I’ve enjoyed the the 50th.

The Five(ish) Doctors Reboot (2013) (anamericanviewofbritishsciencefiction.com)
TV Club: Doctor Who: “The Day Of The Doctor” (avclub.com)
Doctor Who: Day of the Doctor delivers (smh.com.au)
Doctor Who: The Night of the Doctor (Online) (takingtheshortview.wordpress.com)
Paul McGann reveals that he would like to return to Doctor Who following mini episode (express.co.uk)
Doctor Who: Steven Moffat clears up the whole Doctor regeneration problem… sort of (metro.co.uk)
‘Doctor Who’ 50th Anniversary Spectacular: Talk about ‘Day of the Doctor’ here! (popwatch.ew.com)
9 amazing surprises to be found in The Night of the Doctor mini episode (mirror.co.uk)
Paul McGann Returns To Doctor Who For Pre-Anniversary Short, Fans Renew Hope For More Cameos (contactmusic.com)
The Night of the Doctor rewrites Doctor Who history for the better (metro.co.uk)

Doctor Who: The Day of the Doctor (2013) 50th Anniversary Special

Be warned, there are spoilers below:

This has been a real hard weekend for me because I had to wait until 10:00 Monday night to watch The Day of the Doctor while most everyone else saw it over 48 hours ago. This was because my wife and I scored some tickets at a (relatively) close theater in order to watch the special in 3-D on the big screen. We almost missed our chance because the original 7:30 showing sold out in a few days, leading the company to create a second showing. This wasn’t just an isolated case either, my area (the greater Kansas City area) had around 6-7 theaters that were ALL sold out.

The reason I was initially slow at getting tickets was that I stupidly underestimated the popularity of the show in 2013. This is of course because I recall being one of the few people that had ever heard of the show back in 2005-6, and assumed I could roll in late and still get tickets. Back then, I was basically mocked for liking “a show nobody has heard of” from a few people that shall remain nameless (You know who you are!). I’m so happy that Doctor Who seems to have such a large dedicated fanbase here in The States today. I should have known that younger folks enjoyed it, as you often see tons of cosplayers at anime and comic conventions in the area. Thanks to AMC and their events company for opening a second showing, that was a great thing for the fans (and AMC’s cash tills!).

When we got there, a huge line suddenly appeared about 60 to 90 minutes before the showing, and I have never seen so many fezzes in one place in all my life. There were cosplayers of a few Doctors (mostly Matt Smith) including someone rocking an awesome First Doctor costume. We were there super early, and chatted up some of the other people in line. We got to hear some pretty good theories and even some pretty ridiculous ones from everyone, but all in all it was a great crowd.

I figured I’d go into the general theater experience, since people may want to know what was different, and how the crowds were. Any UK readers will be happy to know that we seem to have got the full experience over here as well. When we were finally seated, the usual asinine movie trivia on the screen was replaced by Doctor Who trivia. In many instances you could hear people in the audience participating, and it was cool seeing some of the younger fans, or at least newer fans, gasping at some of the answers. One in particular was a question like “which of these rock bands appeared in the 1960’s episode, The Chase?” When it was revealed to be The Beatles, you could hear a sudden enthusiastic murmur, where one could tell that minds had been blown.

There was a funny moment where there was a ridiculously long pause before the 3D “reel” was switched on (I’m aware they do it with hard drives now), and about 25 sonic screwdrivers suddenly appeared from fans, young and old, attempting to fix the problem. This atmosphere was awesome to behold. I’ve been to midnight releases and special events in the past, and the most you’d ever see might be the odd clapping at the end of the film. These fans let out many “squees” during the episode itself, and I’ll later post what got the biggest reaction. You could tell that many saw this as a “once in a lifetime” experience. Everyone was excited, energetic, and happy.

Before the show, we did get treated to two short intro videos that I’d assume were not on the TV broadcast. One involved everyone’s favorite Sontaran warrior Strax briefing the audience on general theater rules. He apparently brought his own clone batch to the theater and wanted to make sure there would be no trouble from us “flesh creatures”. He reminded us not to use our cellphones, and showed what happened to the last guy he caught with one. He walks by a man trapped in restraints on a wall behind him. Accused of sending spy messages to his field commander, this man was not in good shape after Strax got done with him. Another complaint was “talking during the film” which was illustrated as having a similar punishment. Strax did approve of our cultures obsession with torturing “small corn creatures” until the exploded, then eating their fluffy bodies. He remarked how the “tiny screams” of the popcorn made him happy. The audience seemed to love Strax, and this vignette.

The second mini-episode, if you could call it that, was one of Matt Smith and David Tennant (in character) hyping up the crowd. It opened with Smith’s Doctor in a white room congratulating the fans on making it to this “100^th anniversary special, in amazing 12-D” someone came out and reminded him that this was only the 50^th anniversary, and he seemed bummed. Apparently 12-D is something to behold, and mere 3-D is quite boring. The Doctor assumes it has something to do with budget cuts and apologizes. We get some banter from Smith and Tennant in the form of instructions on how to use the 3-D glasses and a special warning that Matt’s chin “could be unnerving” in 3-D. Eventually they both ask “wait wasn’t there supposed to be a third dimension” as John Hurt appears facing the other direction. You could have heard a pin drop in the audience after the initial GASP of shock on seeing “The War Doctor.”

There was also a “making of” featurette after the credits, narrated by Colin Baker, it was really good, but wasn’t anything earth-shattering.

NOTE: Before I talk about the actual episode, I’d love to hear if anyone else had similar theater experiences, feel free to drop a comment! Man, I’ve written quite a bit already for not actually talking about the episode!

Right from the opening seconds of The Day of the Doctor I knew I was in for a treat. Instead of the new opening title sequence that we got used to seeing throughout series seven, the episode opens with the original 1963 opening titles. The camera pans over the shadow of a policeman, and a sign that reads “I.M. Foreman, 76 Totter’s Lane” advertising a local scrap merchant. For those that do not know, it’s basically a remake of the very first scene of the very first episode, An Unearthly Child! To completely drive it home, we even see that Clara has some sort of teaching position at Coal Hill School, yet another callback – that was the school Susan attended, and Ian and Barbara taught at. According to a sign inside Ian Chesterton has even been promoted to a governorship in the school! At this point, I knew that this episode was going to be an “Easter egg hunt” for little tidbits that look back at the show’s past.

Before I get to far into this, I’ll mention the 3D. I’m generally not a huge fan of 3D in movies because it often distracts from the film. I loved Avatar, Coraline, and Tron 2, but those are exceptions that used the effects well. Usually studios have a tendency to abuse the effect and make films nearly unwatchable. I’d say The Day of the Doctor uses it pretty well for the most part. Some scenes seem overdone like the helicopter scene and others use the effects to add depth to the picture. Sort of like having the picture be “bigger on the inside” 😛 I’d say it wasn’t necessary to see this in 3D, but it helped the theater experience immensely.

Right from the very beginning, one can see that The Day of the Doctor seems to have a noticeable budget increase over it’s normal TV brethren. It looks expensive (but not flashy), important, and movie-like, if that makes any sense. Just the way the opening titles are presented, the Tardis being airlifted to Trafalgar Square via helicopter, seems like the opening of something like a James Bond film. I think seeing this in a theater was a great decision on my part, because you can tell it was designed for it.

The story follows The Eleventh Doctor as he is summoned to The Tower of London by U.N.I.T.’s very own Kate Stewart. She has special instructions from Elizabeth I of England, to have The Doctor check out a secret stash of Timelord art. It appears that Timelords create moments of time preserved in stasis that take the form of “3-D pictures” in frames. It seems many “paintings”in this gallery have been smashed from the inside, implying that something has escaped the pictures themselves. With this we are shown a painting called either ”No More” or “The Fall of Gallifrey” that depicts the final day of the Great Time War. This was the very day that The Doctor’s unmentionable past incarnation “The War Doctor” (John Hurt) ended the time war.

I loved this scene because the “Time War” has been so vague in the past, that seeing the Dalek invasion of Gallifrey’s “second city” Arcadia was awesome. It is at this point that we see “The War Doctor” steal a devastating super-weapon from the Timelord armory, one that has the power to annihilate entire galaxies.

This weapon, called “The Moment” is classified as a “Galaxy Eater” and was locked away because it gained sentience and could not be controlled. With this weapon, “The War Doctor” heads to a desert and plans his ultimate sin against his own people. Suddenly a manifestation of “The Moment” appears, looking exactly like Rose Tyler, and rips holes in space and time in order to show “The War Doctor” his own future. This causes cracks to appear near The Eleventh Doctor and “War Doctor” causing them all to end up in Elizabethan England, the exact place where “The Tenth Doctor” is trying to stop a Zygon invasion. This is where everyone puts it all together and realizes that The Zygons are the ones that escaped the paintings using Time Lord Technology.

Once the threat is eliminated in a peaceful manner, “The War Doctor” goes off to activate “The Moment” as he believes his ultimate sacrifice causes peaceful things to happen such as the end of this Zygon invasion. He is headed off by Ten and Eleven, and they all discuss the situation. All incarnations after “The War Doctor” hated what happened, and blamed this forgotten incarnation for all sorts of bad things. They decide to help him not be alone in his decision, to lessen his burden. That is until Clara’s tears inspire a new choice: not killing everyone on Gallifrey. Eleven proposes that they could conceivably lock the entire planet of Gallifrey away, much like those paintings, and only make it appear that it was destroyed.

This following scene is one of the best scenes in all of Doctor Who in my opinion, and involves a co-operative effort by these three Doctors to save their planet. The Arcadian leadership seems less than thrilled to find out that they have been targeted by three versions of one man they really can’t stand, and are even more annoyed when they find out “All twelve of them are here”. This cuts to a scene where you see twelve TARDISes heading into battle, and footage of EVERY SINGLE DOCTOR helping out. This was of course stock footage pulled from old episodes like the trick used in The Name of The Doctor, but it was still awesome. I nearly teared up at this point, probably because I had something in my eye, but held it back like the badass dude that I am. I was shocked when one of the Gallifreyan higher-ups said “No, Sir all thirteen”, since I had no idea that Peter Capaldi was going to make a “teaser” appearance in this. I have no idea how the internet kept this quiet, and I thank all of you.

The Doctors Thirteen saved the day (hopefully) and went their separate ways. Happy in the fact that he did the right thing, “The War Doctor” starts regenerating from all the stress he had and we briefly see a glimpse of Doctor number Nine. It sucks that Christopher Eccleston didn’t want to help with the anniversary, but I’m glad we have finally seen all of the regenerations now.

Everything winds down and fans are treated to the cameo of all cameos – Tom Baker’s return to the show. He is introduced as “The Curator” and seems to have a bit more knowledge than he should about the Doctor, Gallifrey, and Timelords in general. This character is kept fairly vague as to his true nature, but it was pretty great seeing Tom back after all these years. Finally, there is one more shot to hammer the point home that we saw something special:

It may have been the atmosphere, it may have been the theater experience, and it may have been the 3D, but I feel that this was the most fun I’ve ever had at the theater, and it may have been the best episode of Doctor Who I’ve ever seen. It had awesome side characters, although there were very few. Elizabeth I was cool, and I loved seeing Kate Stewart and her assistant Osgood, and hope they show up more often in the show. I love multi-Doctor stories, but generally find them somewhat confusing and borderline nonsensical. That wasn’t the case with The Day of The Doctor, it all fit together, filled in some plot holes leftover from the Davies era, and made me excited for season 8’s search for Gallifrey!.

As Promised, here are the biggest audience reactions of the night:

The first scene with David Tennant got a big “Squee” from some fangirls.
Seeing Billie Piper got a similar reaction.
A lot of big laughs in certain scenes like “The Wedding”, The Banter between Doctors, Clara opening an unlocked door etc.
When the fans saw 12 TARDISes in in the climax there was some cheering, then it exploded once you saw Peter Capladi say “Make that Thirteen”. I was happy because some fans are concerned female fans will reject him next year.
The scene with Tom Baker went over VERY well.
The final scene involving all 12 Doctors standing together got cheers.
The end credits exploded in cheers and applause.

Doctor Who: The Day of the Doctor 3D Cinema Review (blazingminds.co.uk)
Review: Top 13 Things in THE DAY OF THE DOCTOR (nerdist.com)
Doctor Who’s 50th anniversary broke ratings records by enlisting the internet (gigaom.com)
Doctor Who on ABC Extra – the official rundown (blogs.abc.net.au)
Doctor Who in numbers (theguardian.com)
Doctor Who recap: The Day of the Doctor (theguardian.com)
Doctor Who’s 50th anniversary episode reminds us why Matt Smith and David … – Daily Mail (dailymail.co.uk)
You: Review: ‘The Day of the Doctor’ marks 50 years of ‘Doctor Who’ (latimes.com)
What to watch this weekend (gameofscreens.wordpress.com)

Top Ten Things I’d like to see (Or Not) With the Doctor Who 50th Anniversary

As with any list of this type, I know that choosing what I want to be in the 50^th anniversary spectacular is both “fanwank” and unlikely to actually materialize in any capacity. Keep in mind that I do not want all ten of these to happen in one episode, that would result in the most horrendous non-sensical mess ever! This fact doesn’t keep me from coming up with a list of ten things that I would love to see happen.

10. Multi Doctor Story with at Least McGann and Tennant – I know that some fans bemoan such an episode, but I think it goes without saying – the best way to celebrate the long run of Doctor Who is to run a “multiple Doctor story” like past episodes such as “The Three Doctors”, “The Five Doctors”, “Dimensions in Time” etc. The old saying goes “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it!” so why not – why break a tradition that has been around for decades. This coupled with the fact that David Tennant has basically said that he is going to have something to do with the anniversary, I think It’s a shoe-in that we will see something like this, even for a short cameo.
What I would really LOVE to see is Paul McGann reprise his role as the eighth Doctor. Many fans see him as an overlooked part of the saga, and he is still technically a “current Doctor” as his regeneration has been only seen off-camera. We don’t know how old he was before the time war, I mean heck, he could have had white hair before it was all said and done. Unlike other older titular actors, McGann isn’t much older, so they do not have to come up with a terrible explanation about why the Doctor has aged forty years. This brings me to:

So there we have it, hopefully some of this stuff happens, but what do I know? I bet what we actually see will be so much better!

Trust Me, I’m The Doctor’s Tattoo…

Found this on the Cheezburger Network:

Review – Doctor Who: The Marian Conspiracy

Big Finish Audio “Quick Review”

Synopsis: Tracking a nexus point in time, the Doctor meets Dr Evelyn Smythe, a history lecturer whose own history seems to be rapidly vanishing. The Doctor must travel back to Tudor times to stabilize the nexus and save Evelyn’s life. But there he meets the Queen of England and must use all his skills of diplomacy to avoid ending up on the headman’s block…

It’s no secret that the exploits of the sixth Doctor in the form of the original TV series were met with mixed reviews. Many felt that the show was on its last legs at the time, and a few higher ups over at the BBC seemed keen on axing the show forever. When I got into watching a lot of the classic stories, I really liked how Colin Baker played the Doctor despite his costume and the somewhat rough scripts he was sometimes handed. As I’ve stated before these Big Finish audio dramas are where Colin seems to be at his best as the Doctor. I would even say that his episodes are usually among my favorite.

This episode at hand, The Marion Conspiracy, is one of the better ones of this line up to this point, as it contains a few things that really set it apart: the introduction of a NEW companion, a historical timeframe, and time travel consequences. The plot follows The Doctor and a history teacher named Evelyn Smythe as they try to figure out why Evelyn is seemingly being written out of time. This dynamic is usually one of my favorites as I love when The Doctor takes in a companion that is a bit older and has wide-eyed enthusiasm AND wisdom; I think that’s why I liked Wilf so much in the last few David Tennant seasons.

The story follows The Doctor and Evelyn as they travel back to Tudor times to figure out exactly what Evelyn is disappearing from existence. There are a few misunderstandings where they both assume that they are in Elizabethan England when in fact they are at the court of Queen Mary. They both get embroiled in a plot to kill Mary and ultimately try to stop it. All in all, this was a very good audio drama, and is one of the better ones that I’ve listened to so far. The acting, plot, and pure historical awesomeness, all click in such a way to make me the most happy.

click here to listen to a trailer

My rating 4 out of 5

UK News: Doctor Who stamps to mark show’s 50th anniversary (GALLERY) (walesonline.co.uk)
Doctor Who ‘The Snowmen’ Review (ramblingsofageekgirl.wordpress.com)
Marian Price Interned in Isolation ! (fiannaiochta.wordpress.com)
New Look For Big Finish’s Doctor Who Range (theconsultingdetectivesblog.wordpress.com)
Doctor Who #400: Revenge of the Cybermen Part 1 (siskoid.blogspot.com)
TV REVIEW: Doctor Who Christmas Special – The Snowman (geeksunleashed.me)
“Doctor Who: The Snowmen” Christmas special 2012 teaser (panarmenian.net)
UK & World News: Doctor Who stamps to mark show’s 50th anniversary (GALLERY) (journallive.co.uk)
Royal Mail reveals Doctor Who stamps (bbc.co.uk)

TV Review – Doctor Who: The Eleventh Hour

The Eleventh Hour wasn’t just a good episode; it was a great episode, and possibly one of the best first episodes for a doctor ever.

In the year leading up to this “re-launch” of Doctor Who, many fans were acting in polar opposites. On one hand, we had a cult beginning to form around Steven Moffat, the new show runner and head honcho of production. Fans of his previous work in the series including The Girl in the Fireplace, Blink and many other episodes began to see him as some sort of savior- a man who could do no wrong. Others were being alarmist calling for Moffat’s head after initial casting announcements and the departure of David Tennant. Now that The Eleventh Hour has aired, is the show in good hands? In short, the answer is a resounding yes!

A new Doctor, a new Tardis.

Immediately, one can tell that this is not the same vision that former Executive Producer Russell T Davies had for the show. Much like his previous episodes, Moffat takes care in making his characters and locations seem straight out of some sort of dark fairytale. In short, the story of this episode is nothing spectacular, but does a wonderful job of establishing a new Doctor, a new companion, and a new style to the show.

I will even go as far to say that this version of Doctor Who seems more in line with the classic show, or at least an evolution thereof. This especially rings true when thinking of the lighthearted playfulness of some of the classic Tom Baker episodes from the 70’s (especially under the helm of Douglas Adams), a sign that the show didn’t take itself too seriously to not let the fans have a bit of fun every once in a while. We see nods to this playfulness right from the beginning as we hear a small girl praying by her bedside:

“Dear Santa, thank you for the dolls and pencils and the fish. It’s Easter now, so I hope I didn’t wake you but… honest, it is an emergency. There’s a crack in my wall. Aunt Shy says it’s just an ordinary crack, but I know its not cause at night there’s voices so… please please can you send someone to fix it? Or a policeman, or…”

Amelia trying to satisfy the Doctor’s food cravings.

This crack, as a plot device, furthers Moffat’s plan to make any insignificant inanimate object in my house scary to me. It seems to pay off as I could feel creeped out by it from the get-go. Let’s face it, Amelia is having to deal with a crazed lunatic that fell from the sky, crushed her Aunt’s shed, and is demanding food from her, and she is totally unfazed. As the Doctor says “Must be a hell of a scary crack in your wall.”

The Doctor messes up and disappears for 12 years after promising to be right back, only to meet his young friend again as an adult. Amy now questions whether the Doctor even existed, and was sent to therapy because of her encounter with him. The theme of this episode seems to be trust, as Amy isn’t sure if she can trust the Doctor. What follows is a wild romp to stop Earth’s destruction at the hands of the Atraxi, a race of giant eyeball creatures who are looking for an escaped monster called Prisoner Zero.

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A simple thing like a voice mismatched to a person

is made horrifying with Prisoner Zero.

Matt smith breathes new life into the Doctor’s character that I feel was much needed. Not to knock David Tennant, as he still is one of my favorite incarnations of the Doctor, but I felt that his portrayal started to feel tired towards the end of the 2009 TV specials. Many have pointed out that Matt Smith has supposedly based his take on everyone’s favorite Timelord on that of the late Patrick Troughton who played the Doctor in his second incarnation.

I can see this to a degree, but can see many mannerisms from a multitude of actors that have played the role. That’s not to say that Smith’s portrayal is simply a pastiche of previous actors roles, but he obviously wants to pay homage to those who came before. Smith also brings a lot to the character with the way he talks, his odd appearance, his almost arrogant demenor, and his eccentricities (i.e. licking a shed to date the wood). Some were worried having an actor so young playing the Doctor, but all of that was put to rest for me as we see him step out from a projection of David Tennant’s face late in the episode; we see that he simply IS the Doctor.

Next up is the sultry adult Amelia Pond, or Amy as she is calling herself these days, as played by Karen Gillan. Karen portrays Amy as a confident strong female character. Gone are the days of the female companion that only yells “oh Doctor”, twists her ankle, and gets captured in every episode of the classic series, but Amy even seems different from the modern “unrequited love for the Doctor” companions.

When we first see Amy, she even knocks the Doctor silly with a cricket bat, thus proving that she may be the toughest or at least the strongest willed companion in a while. Even though Amy is seen to fancy the Doctor a bit, she is by no means smitten with him. I think this comes into play for two reasons: she’s engaged, and she sees the Doctor as her “imaginary friend” as she saw him as a child.

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The supporting cast, such as Rory here, were great as well.

I feel that Moffat wrote her introduction perfectly, as we don’t have to deal with another “prospective companion has to prove themselves” storyline, as Amelia already did that as a child. I always dislike when the Doctor is made to not trust his companion, and a situation like Martha Jones was not what I wanted to see. For those who do not remember, Martha was basically only taken onboard the Tardis so that the Doctor could try to forget about Rose, but was left in the cold about 99% of the time. The Doctor treated her sort of badly, and didn’t even make her a true companion until half-way through the show. No wonder the character decided not to stick around.

The only real bad thing I can say about the episode is that the Atraxi and Prisoner Zero were not that compelling as villains, but that seems to be the point. By concentrating on the building relationship between Amy and the Doctor the episode prepares us for the whole season and the new production style 100% as the story ends.

The Eleventh Hour wasn’t just a good episode; it was a great episode, and possibly one of the best first episodes for a Doctor ever. Rather than have the Doctor lay around sick all episode or try to kill his companions, we are given a Doctor forced to take on an alien takeover with only his mind, a biff difference from what usually happens. Through the strong performances by Smith, Gillan, and the supporting cast, I can see that this season will be truly great.

My Rating: 4.5 out of 5

I now leave you with a clip of the new theme as well as a trailer for the season, and yes I loved the new theme!