Doctor Who Series 13: Goodbye, Mr. Chibs

[JamesTC]

For Flux sake.

[Mister Six]

Every single episode of the new series is written by Mr Chibnall.

One episode is co-written with a new writer.

Not a new writer - Maxine Alderton, who wrote the pretty universally beloved Haunting of Villa Diodati last season. So at least that episode might be only partially shit (until Chibnall rewrites all the characters so everyone acts like a moron or a psychopath, and The Doctor is Always Right, even when she's Obviously Wrong).

[Midas]

I thought The Haunting of Villa Diodati, while noticeably better than any of the other Chibnall-era episodes I've seen, was still pretty terrible, sorry. ;))

[Alberon]

I think it got up to the giddy heights of passable, but no more.

[Endicott]

Apart from the very first two of Chibs run, it's the only one I've watched, chosen as it was described here as the best of the run. I assumed it had a decent rating simply because all the other stuff was off the charts awful. Passable is about right.

[Mr Trumpet]

I thought it was good, I always like the haunted house type stories

[Midas]

The problem for me was I'd actually been reading bits from Mary's diaries around the same time I first watched The Haunting of Villa Diodati.

So, to go from reading passages like this...

Monday, 6 March, 1815
Find my baby dead. Send for Hogg. Talk. A miserable day. In the evening read "Fall of the Jesuits." Hogg sleeps here.

Thursday, 9 March 1815
Read and talk. Still think about my little baby—'tis hard, indeed, for a mother to lose a child. Hogg and Charles Clairmont come in the evening...

Monday, 13 March 1815
Shelley and Clara go to town. Stay at home; net, and think of my little dead baby. This is foolish, I suppose; yet, whenever I am left alone to my own thoughts, and do not read to divert then, they always come back to the same point—that I was a mother, and am so no longer.

Sunday 19 March 1815
Dreamt that my little baby came to life again; that it had only been cold, and that we rubbed it before the fire, and it lived. Awake and find no baby. I think about the little thing all day. Not in good spirits.

Monday, 20 March 1815
Dream again about my baby...

My dearest Mary, wherefore hast thou gone,
And left me in this dreary world alone?
Thy form is here indeed—a lovely one—
But thou art fled, gone down a dreary road
That leads to Sorrow's most obscure abode.
For thine own sake I cannot follow thee
Do thou return for mine.

...to watching some actors getting chased by a Cyberman around a Scooby Doo mansion while Jodie shouted "WORDS MATTER!" just felt ludicrous, crass and offensive.

[Endicott]

Thought the story was fine, just that the companions seemed like empty vessels. And the Doctor was a bit, well, off. A bit aimless. I dunno, I'm never going to rewatch it so who cares.

[The Roofdog]

The ending of Villa Diodati is absolute dogshit, in the third act you can feel Chibnall creeping back into the script to wrench it into line with his shitty finale

[Mister Six]

Yeah, and the "ooh, ghosts are real" bit gets totally lost, because it's not connected narratively with the Cyberman stuff, unlike the very similar twist in The Unquiet Dead.

[mothman]

https://twitter.com/bbcdoctorwho/status/1449131719743787011

Trailer. Looks good. Apart from when anyone talks.

[Lungpuddle]

https://twitter.com/bbcdoctorwho/status/1449131719743787011

Trailer. Looks good. Apart from when anyone talks.

Incredible, an Ood and a Wookie share a trailer at last.

[mothman]

Incredible, an Ood and a Wookie share a trailer at last.

I heard there's going to be an Eastenders/Emmerdale/Corrie crossover, perhaps that's part of this too and it's like The Wedding of River Song when everything in history happens at once.

[mothman]

double post

[Mister Six]

https://twitter.com/bbcdoctorwho/status/1449131719743787011

Trailer. Looks good. Apart from when anyone talks.

The FX are good, and there are a few nice shots, like Dan falling through glowing light things, but aside from the "epic" moments, it looks like a generic Who trailer - classic series monster, nu-Who monster, historical bloke looking confused, explosion, lasers, Doctor saying something a bit quippy, companions reacting. would prefer some sense of the story, but Chibnall does like to hold back on that kind of thing.

I'm a bit concerned that this might end up like Spyfall Pt. 2 and just be a fairly incoherent string of big moments flitting across history without much of a story to back it up... but over six hours instead of two.

[pigamus]

Happier with the continuous storyline really. Less for Chinballs to fuck up. Just six episodes of pointless running about and explosions and then the turd is flushed. Fine. I'll take it.

(Oh are there specials as well? Well the point still stands.)

[Lungpuddle]

Am I being unfair in saying that, from that trailer, Dan seems to be more of a Ryan than a Graham? The way he delivered that line, he just seems a bit bored in the way Ryan always seemed a bit confused and bored. I probably am being unfair, it is only one line from the trailer. But it is a better trailer than any of the previous Whittaker series got, especially series 11. I liked the look of that man who says "our final fight has begun" (thought for a moment it was the Master) in particular. Does seem a bit gruesome for a family show, if I'm being honest.

[Mister Six]

Just the two specials, thank god.

Wonder if Dan will be in all of them? And will his departure reach the poetic and moving highs of:

DOCTOR: All set?
GRAHAM: Ready.
YASMIN: Yep.
RYAN: Nah. I think I'm going to stay here.
DOCTOR: Yeah.

[pigamus]

His "big episodes" are at least watchable. They're not good, and the fall apart like wet tissue paper afterwards, but you can be entertained up to a certain point. Beats are hit. Explosions go bang. Boredom at least held at bay. It's his ordinary episodes that you can't sit through.

[mothman]

Images: https://www.tvzoneuk.com/post/dwflux-firstlookpics-15oct



They've managed to rip off Wookies, Tellarites, and Gimli from Lord of the Rings, all at once!

[Mister Six]

Better than the cat woman that was just a lady with pen on her face, in Orphan 55.

[Malcy]

I'm looking forward to the Sontaran episode.

[Thomas]

The Sontarans look great. But I fear you might as well just enjoy the pictures of them for all the good a Chibnall script will do.

Can't tell from the trailer, but will the characters in this series have basic motivations, relationships, interesting flaws, and a consistent sense of morality, or will they be cardboard cyphers for boring storylines and piss dialogue? Can't wait to find out!

With only six episodes, hopefully Flux feels more like a second or even a third draft than an initial, unedited scribbling. Imagine how much better Chibnall's unseeded 'champion sprinter' reveal or his muddled 'starve the spiders' resolution might have been given five more seconds' thought.

[Replies From View]

His "big episodes" are at least watchable. They're not good, and the fall apart like wet tissue paper afterwards, but you can be entertained up to a certain point. Beats are hit. Explosions go bang. Boredom at least held at bay. It's his ordinary episodes that you can't sit through.

Beats are in no way hit.  He misses everything plotwise, stuff sprawls and makes no sense.  There is no natural rhythm or pulse to any episode he writes - it feels like he's following a plot-by-numbers children's book to make the mechanism work.  Every episode Chibnall writes, you can hear the man straining on the toilet.

[pigamus]

Beats are in no way hit.  He misses everything plotwise, stuff sprawls and makes no sense.  There is no natural rhythm or pulse to any episode he writes - it feels like he's following a plot-by-numbers children's book to make the mechanism work.  Every episode Chibnall writes, you can hear the man straining on the toilet.

Fair enough. But even with the Timeless Child, no it wasn't good, but at least I wasn't bored. I feel like I can be magnanimous towards him now he's basically dead man walking.

[Thomas]

it feels like he's following a plot-by-numbers children's book to make the mechanism work.

I'd honestly like it if he did that. Straightforward beginning, middle, end. I'm not a professional writer or an experienced critic, but an episode like Revolution of the Daleks really makes me wonder what he's even thinking about when he picks up a pen to write this flagship show.

The Doctor is in prison! Oh, don't worry, Captain Jack saves her immediately with no hassle. But look, Jack is here! And two companions are leaving! Let's see what Jack's presence adds thematically. Oh, nothing. Well, do we at least utilise his immortality, whether for some emotional character work or even just for a simple bombastic plot moment? No. And he says cheerio from offscreen.

What would compel you to write like that? He can't even get the Doctor right. Her ethics are irreconcilable from episode to episode. Morally, each story is standalone. There's no way to expect anything of the Doctor in a Chibnall ep - you just have wait and see what she arbitrarily reckons to guns/self defence/racism/Amazon warehouses this week.

[Replies From View]

To be fair, I gave up on Chibnall Who after series 12 so haven't seen that one.


I guess the template I'm thinking of is more along the lines of that series 5 Silurian two-parter, where Rory literally had to stand around doing nothing in a grave until the story needed him back.  And the fact there was such a contrast between Amy, Rory and the Doctor when Chibnall was writing for them, as opposed to Moffat or any of the other series 5 writers.  Dialogue for Chibnall is just what characters need to say to move the plot along, and his stories are always the most childish list of "and then, and then, and then" you can imagine.

[Mister Six]

To be fair, I gave up on Chibnall Who after series 12 so haven't seen that one.


I guess the template I'm thinking of is more along the lines of that series 5 Silurian two-parter, where Rory literally had to stand around doing nothing in a grave until the story needed him back.  And the fact there was such a contrast between Amy, Rory and the Doctor when Chibnall was writing for them, as opposed to Moffat or any of the other series 5 writers.  Dialogue for Chibnall is just what characters need to say to move the plot along, and his stories are always the most childish list of "and then, and then, and then" you can imagine.

Speaking of, remember at the start of the story when Amy looks over and sees herself and Rory waving at them from a hill? And you think, "Oh, that's interesting, I wonder why they will be compelled to go back in time and wave at themselves?"

And then at the end, Amy looks again, and it just her wavinng at herself now, having apparently stood there for 24 hours or something, and you realise Chibnall thought, "Oh, I'll need some visual signifier that Rory has been unwritten from existence," then put those two scenes in and didn't think any further about it at all.

He's either the nicest man ever or he knows where RTD and Moffat buried the bodies. Literally. Only close friendship or a deadly past could explain why two excellent writers would keep bringing the useless cunt back - with a "do not rewrite" clause in his script, too!

[Mister Six]

His scripts are full of that kind of thing. Remember in 42, where the doors have all been locked and need trivia questions to open them because everyone got drunk before the episode started and thought it would be a laugh, even though you'd think they would have just fixed it upon sobering up, and it seems unlikely that any professional space-miners would be that blasé about the ship that's stopping them from dying in the vacuum of space?

And it's all just so Martha has a reason to call her mum?

[Mister Six]

Can't wait till Chibnall fucks off, folks. Have I mentioned that yet?