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March 28, 2024, 10:40:54 AM

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Doctor Who Series 12B: The Timeless Chibnall (Xmas special & pre-Series 13 chat)

Started by Blinder Data, March 03, 2020, 03:28:32 PM

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Mister Six

Quote from: Cloud on March 09, 2020, 07:13:16 PM
As above, sorry if I didn't get it across properly (I obviously failed miserably) but - maybe this is just an unfortunate pattern these days - see also Star Trek Discovery, what people say has happened to Star Wars, apparently Terminator (admittedly not seen those two but it sounds much the same) etc.  It's not that it's PC/woke/whatever in and of itself but it the way modern "woke writers" seem to be... well.... a bit shit, like Chibnall.

The latest Terminator film was the best since T2. It was overstuffed and overproduced, but had half a good film there, and a lot of good ideas. I don't think wokeness was a problem.

Discovery did the Rey-from-Star-Wars thing of writing an impossibly perfect, idealised Strong Female Hero who's the centre of everything and never wrong (even when she fucks up, it's because she did the right thing and nobody listened). Maybe it got better past the middle of season one; I gave up on it. But I think that's more of the Rey/Captain Marvel thing of straining so hard to be noble and create good representation that you end up sapping away all drama and character and turning it into a beige nothing.

(I mean, Star Trek's always kind of had idealised characters but they usually had some kind of flaw or were fallible to some degree; Michael was just endlessly correct about everything.)

Mostly I think the problem is that all these franchises are worn out and boring anyway, and their revivals are half-hearted and trading on nostalgia and assumed appeal rather than trying to tell a story that needed to be told. The woke stuff definitely leads to characterisation issues (more obvious in franchises where there are male characters who are allowed to be oafish/incompetent/self-destructive/neurotic/otherwise imperfect) but mostly the flaws run deeper than that.

Quote from: Mango Chimes on March 09, 2020, 08:14:00 PM
This is bollocks, and comes with the implicit suggestion they should leave it to the white men.

It's not bollocks - Hollywood is absolutely stuffed to the gills with white men, and because they got the lion's share of jobs over the past few decades, they also make up the majority of experienced/prominent directors, writers, crew etc.

And it doesn't presume it should just be left to white men to direct. All I'm saying is that we're going to go through an awkward period where people who made low- or microbudget indie films are suddenly put in charge of massive $100-million-plus movies, and don't have the experience or authority needed to control them. And, increasingly, some of those people are being hired primarily because their race or gender fits.

This problem will hopefully go away in the coming decades as POC and WOC who worked their way up organically through TV or several indie/mid-budget films take over blockbusters with a more assured vision. Although it also requires studios to back the fuck off, which not all of them do (Marvel is good for this, mind you).

We'll hopefully see opportunities for more varied, interesting and human female/POC protagonists once there are more of them, and it's not enough to just have the main character go "GIRL POWER! MEN ARE USELESS, RIGHT LADIES?!?!?!" before an ironic dubstep version of "Barbie Girl" plays over the heroine smashing up a bunch of leering perverts and sexist soldiers.

QuoteNo. Favreau's not an appropriate example, he'd worked his way up from Made through Elf through Zathura. Zathura's half the budget of Iron Man, but still a big effects-heavy adventure. Colin Trevorrow and Gareth Edwards are your men, catapulted from a single mico-budget film straight to megablockbuster with nothing in between, churning out dogshit. Where was the holding out there?

All right, fair point, but that kind of backs up what I'm saying - how many female, non-white Jon Favreaus are there? How many women (and especially women of colour) were helming mid-budget-to-high-budget sci-fi adventures between, say, 1980 and 2010?

There's no way you can hire a man to direct a woman-led mainstream superhero movie any more, or a white person to direct a POC-led film. You're just asking to be #cancelled. So your hiring options are already hugely limited. And chances are that most of the people in the pool aren't going to have even a couple of midbudget FX movies under their belt, as Favreau did.

This is a consequence of the inequality in the system, but it will - I hope - pass.

kidsick5000

My own Wish list for Series 13.
All unlikely but  I can hope

1. Switch the lights on in the Tardis. There's a reason everyone oohs and ahhs at the retro console. Because it looks inviting. It's clean. It's safe. A clean area of calm well established. Outside = chaos. Tardis = calm.

2. Let the Doctor be mean. We saw glimpses of it in Ascension and it felt like the character had been found. There's been too much insistence in Jodie being a kid's presenter/big sister. Jo Martin was a more convincing Doctor from the off. Irascibility is a part of the Doctor

3. Give both Doctor and companion things to do other than explain who/what historical characters/ situations were.

4. Don't be in a rush to replace companions. Mandip Gill needs the space.

5. Have more happen than one plot per episode.

6. Lay off exploring the lore. The idea of previous Doctors needed a steadier hand and a clearer mind on it. Currently it makes less sense than Ruth being a Time Lord engineered 2.5 regeneration. Sort the basics of what has spilled but only that. There needs to be damage limitation. What has been put forward is not translating to that thrilling mystery chasing for fans of "what could this mean?"
It's more, "That makes no sense."

7. But if you're going to come up with a solution, get Jo Martin back. She's ace and it should be two Doctor's either side of a mind wipe heading out to find things out. Detective style (seeing as that seems to be Chibnall's forte)

8. But really. Turn the fucking lights on in the Tardis


Norton Canes

Or preferably just start from scratch and design a much better set. First thing to go can be that risible cock of rock thrusting up from the middle. Then come up with something better than that tiered seating to get the characters away from the console.

Not sure I've ever been a fan of a brightly-lit console room, to be honest. I guess it was dazzlingly impressive back in the b/w era but since the advent of colour in the classic series it always looked very grey and drab; the orangeness of the RTD version was an improvement but for me the best version was Capaldi's multi-layered room, because it let the protagonists escape the limitations of having to constantly act around the console. Having a central console might have seemed a good idea at the outset, and when done right it makes for an impressive centrepiece; but there's a reason that, for instance, the Captain's command throne in the various iterations of Star Trek is centre-stage - it gives focus to the actors, letting them express a variety of body language instead of constantly having to dodge a huge, rooted monolith. Even Blake's 7 realised this and added a lounge area to the Liberator bridge, which might have looked faintly innocuous but meant the actors had space to behave far more naturally.


Thomas

Quote from: Norton Canes on March 10, 2020, 08:53:12 PM
Or preferably just start from scratch and design a much better set. First thing to go can be that risible cock of rock thrusting up from the middle.

Now this is what I call pedantry, but I don't there have ever been as many time rotor continuity slip-ups as in Jodie's TARDIS. Between shots its variously on and off.

I like the incongruity of delicate antiques in the scientific, mechanical console room. It's a fine tradition that stretches right back to Hartnell, with that chair, the clock, and those brass columns, and, more recently, the warm library elements of Capaldi's perfectly fitting console room. Even the 'grunge phase' maintained a hatstand (I always liked the foam cable-tied to the railings, too). Turns a control room into a weird homely environment.

The new set only seems to allow for a wide shot from a single angle, which is fine as I don't like looking at it anyway.

Cloud

Capaldi's TARDIS was great, and really gave a sense of scale.  I still get a little surprised when people notice it's "bigger on the inside" with Jodie's.

Quote from: kidsick5000 on March 10, 2020, 07:27:59 PM
It's safe. A clean area of calm well established. Outside = chaos. Tardis = calm.

This seems to be something Chibs has retconned as well.  Now anyone can just beam into the TARDIS wherenever and whenever they want, it's no longer a safe place.  Shame as it always worked well that way IMO - when peril is required you can always just separate the gang from the TARDIS in some way but it was a predictable Safe Space to return to afterwards.  I'd love in season 13 to see someone like Jack or River to turn up and say "what the hell Doctor, you knocked the shields off just for Kerblam deliveries and now you have Judoon beaming in and snatching you whenever they feel like it, you bloody cretin.  Flip your shields back on and land your TARDIS at the shops like a normal Timelord"


Ballad of Ballard Berkley

Chibnall, despite being a lifelong Doctor Who fan, doesn't think about any of these things.

Ambient Sheep

As I mentioned in a previous post, I find it surprisingly distressing.

Norton Canes

It happened reasonably often in the classic series - especially the colour era - but there were usually mitigating factors. Sutekh and The White Guardian got in using their cosmic super-powers. The Sontarans in Invasion Of Time had the help of the Time Lords themselves. Some adversaries, like Eldrad in Hand Of Fear or Professor Sorenson in Planet Of Evil, were invited or conveyed into the console room by the Doctor so they could be transported to other locations; and some, like the Cybermen in Earthshock, had the Doctor hostage.

In The Masque Of Mandragora, doesn't the Helix get into the ship simply because the Doctor leaves the door open? Bit careless that. Worse one is probably the Invisible Enemy, where the virus, which is basically a cloud of germs floating in space, not only breaches the TARDIS defences but travels through the console and infects the Doctor.

Norton Canes

I like that the Malus in The Awakening projects a miniature psychic copy of itself into the console room just so it can puke up a load of green gunge.

olliebean

Quote from: Ballad of Ballard Berkley on March 11, 2020, 12:01:47 AM
Chibnall, despite being a lifelong Doctor Who fan, doesn't think about any of these things.

I mean, he does, because it was mentioned in Spyfall:

QuoteYASMIN: I didn't know things could get into the Tardis like that.
DOCTOR: Neither did I.

Except when he doesn't. It's the incosistency I find so hurtful.

mjwilson

Quote from: Mango Chimes on March 09, 2020, 07:22:01 PM
I disagree with this. The first bit anyway: It wasn't a stupid idea, it was fine. And it was done well. Their outlines in the first episode are good. Everyone gets a little moment, everyone has a character. There's a lot of promise.

The problem is that it not only never progressed or built on that, but actually regressed. Ryan was a wannabe YouTuber, a bit of a loner, angry at his dad and Graham and himself, frustrated and aimless. Yaz was an impetuous trainee police officer, wanting more excitement, precocious and ambitious. Graham was dealing with the fragility of his own life, the loss of his wife, was a bit spiky towards Ryan.

All of this was just lost, replaced with nothing, a three-headed nodding dog asking Doctor what's happening. But the start was solid.

We also had a little bit of character work for Yaz this season, with the backstory about running away from home, possibly with suicidal thoughts.

Thomas

Just watched Utopia. Still get chills when the fob watch is revealed. Great performance by Freema, and also by Jacobi of course. I love that John Simm screams during his regeneration. The climax of the episode has a whirlwind of a score - love all that series 3 music.

Blinder Data

Quote from: Thomas on March 11, 2020, 10:08:47 PM
Just watched Utopia. Still get chills when the fob watch is revealed. Great performance by Freema, and also by Jacobi of course. I love that John Simm screams during his regeneration. The climax of the episode has a whirlwind of a score - love all that series 3 music.

Jacobi's "I. Am. The Maaaaasttterrr" and then thrusting the wire into the camera is the best moment of NuWho, don't @ me

Thomas

I love the way he shouts 'that is not my name' as blue alien keeps calling him 'professor'.


Kelvin

Yeah, I also think of that reveal as the most exciting sequence in all New Who, the execution of it all is perfect.

Jacobi's a truly awful actor, but his hamminess actually works for The Master.

Thomas

If only the John Simm reveal at the end of World Enough and Time had been successfully witheld. I would have pissed mesen.

Ballad of Ballard Berkley

Quote from: Kelvin on March 12, 2020, 05:54:12 PM
Yeah, I also think of that reveal as the most exciting sequence in all New Who, the execution of it all is perfect.

Jacobi's a truly awful actor, but his hamminess actually works for The Master.

He's an odd one, old Jacobi. I saw him playing King Lear on stage once and he was brilliant, as that's his forte: big theatrical Shakespearean acting. But unlike yer Oliviers and McKellens or whoever, he's never been able to temper that style for the more low-key demands of film and television. He always looks like he's ACTING, even when playing an ordinary contemporary bloke in Last Tango in Halifax.

Anyway, I agree. That moment at the end of Utopia was magnificent, and hammy old Jacobi was well cast as Yana and the Master. 

Mango Chimes

Quote from: Thomas on March 12, 2020, 06:22:04 PM
If only the John Simm reveal at the end of World Enough and Time had been successfully witheld. I would have pissed mesen.

I knew he was in the series but still somehow didn't recognise him in disguise and hadn't contemplated it even was a disguise, so that reveal was thrilling. Chibnall's "Man Lies About Running Ability, Contradicted Offscreen" reveal, less so.

Replies From View


Blinder Data


Norton Canes

More likely he'll rush-release a two-minute webisode that kills of the Doctor and finishes the show for good

Replies From View

Quote from: Mango Chimes on March 12, 2020, 07:30:44 PM
Chibnall's "Man Lies About Running Ability, Contradicted Offscreen" reveal, less so.

I still can't get my head around that.  I mean, if it happened in an improvisation workshop you'd say it came out of nowhere, but you'd cut it some slack because in a live improvisation you can't go back and add details in retrospect to properly set everything up.  (But as an improviser you'd also hope to improve over time at the process of setting up and reincorporating stuff along the way.)

But it's like Chibnall doesn't know that after a first draft you can actually go back and add details to earlier scenes.  It's as if he reached that final scene in the writing process, only then realised that he wanted O to be the Master, panicked because nothing had been seeded to make the reveal resonate, shoved in something random as a placeholder, and then just left it!  It's so weird.

Small Man Big Horse

Quote from: Blinder Data on March 17, 2020, 11:37:09 AM
Silver lining of the Coronavirus: no more Chibnall Who?

The Christmas Special's already been filmed and the next series isn't due to begin shooting until September, so it won't be affected unless there's another wave of the virus.

Replies From View

Quote from: Small Man Big Horse on March 17, 2020, 05:34:55 PM
The Christmas Special's already been filmed and the next series isn't due to begin shooting until September, so it won't be affected unless there's another wave of the virus.

Depends as well if it mutates somehow so that those of us who had it this year can get it again.  Otherwise we'll all be in our ivory towers chortling at the 20% who are yet to get it.

olliebean

Quote from: Small Man Big Horse on March 17, 2020, 05:34:55 PM
The Christmas Special's already been filmed and the next series isn't due to begin shooting until September, so it won't be affected unless there's another wave of the virus.

The current plan is I think regular waves of suppression until a vaccine is available. So a September shoot could easily be significantly postponed. I wouldn't count on seeing series 13 next year.

Replies From View

Quote from: olliebean on March 17, 2020, 10:05:09 PM
The current plan is I think regular waves of suppression until a vaccine is available.

A neat summary of the Chibnall Masterplan.

Mango Chimes

Quote from: Replies From View on March 17, 2020, 05:33:52 PMBut it's like Chibnall doesn't know that after a first draft you can actually go back and add details to earlier scenes.

I think when he became a big writer he bought a copy of Final Draft, but misunderstood its title.

His bad improv extends beyond his own scripts. It's exactly how he's dealt with everything Moffatt did.

"Hello, I'm the Master. I've just spent a series developing a sense or what's right, finally sacrificing myself in the name of the Doctor."
Yes, and... No you didn't. You're purely evil, always have been.

"Hello, I'm Gallifrey. Lost for several series, I'm now back."
Yes, and... No you're not. You're all blowed up.

Moffatt did a bit of this too.

Pranet

Anybody listen to any of the Incomparable podcasts?

I do sometimes depending on subject matter. They just did an end of season round up episode on Doctor Who, and it was really positive. I mean, they aren't idiots. So I don't understand how positive they were about it. They do mention a lot of the flaws and everything. But I suppose I like Picard, which is an opinion I'd be shy of sharing on the relevant thread here for fear that it would come across as trolling. What am I saying? Don't know.

Replies From View

Quote from: Mango Chimes on March 18, 2020, 09:36:17 AM
His bad improv extends beyond his own scripts. It's exactly how he's dealt with everything Moffatt did.

"Hello, I'm the Master. I've just spent a series developing a sense or what's right, finally sacrificing myself in the name of the Doctor."
Yes, and... No you didn't. You're purely evil, always have been.

"Hello, I'm Gallifrey. Lost for several series, I'm now back."
Yes, and... No you're not. You're all blowed up.

Yes his relationship to everything left by previous writers is absolutely to just pop it in the bin and do whatever he imagined when he was 15 years old (with seemingly no development in writing skill since then, if I may say so).

"Ah it is so nice to be eating breakfast with you on this glorious morning!"
"No it isn't breakfast!  It is an evening dinner and we are eating curry!"