Mars Attacks!: An Overanalysis of "Cold War"

SPOILERS!

"Stalked in the forest too close to hide

I'll be upon you by the moonlight side

High blood drumming on your skin it's so tight

You feel my heat I'm just a moment behind"

- "Hungry Like the Wolf" by Duran Duran

Apparently nobody in this episode knew the real lyrics or melody to this song.  Unless they had to cover up the fact that they didn't have the rights to it.  Still, it was an interesting song to use, thematically.

The classic series monsters don't really look very scary anymore, at least not without some upgrading. The Daleks have never been redesigned because the fans would mutiny if that ever happened.  Moffat did a good job of making them a little scarier with those Dalek eye stalks that grew out of peoples' foreheads, but the basic design of the Daleks can never be changed.  The Cybermen were redesigned for the new series, but that's mainly because they were redesigned with every single new appearance they made on the classic series.  (Also they were "alternate universe" Cybermen in the new series.)  The Silurians needed to be redesigned so they didn't look utterly ridiculous, but I never got the idea that they were never meant to be scary.  The Ice Warriors, however, got the greatest redesign of any alien in the history of Doctor Who.  That Ice Warrior was 10 time scarier than any of the classic Ice Warriors.  That's how you make a big monster scary.

He didn't hiss as much as the old Ice Warriors, though.  I missed that.

Not to mention, fucking gruesome!  While we weren't able to see the entire bodies that Skaldak dismembered, we saw one arm sticking out.  I wouldn't be surprised if the BBC got some letters about that.  While the violence was off-screen, we knew what it was, and we knew it was fucking brutal!  It's just how Doctor Who should be:  family oriented, but juuuuust disturbing enough to scare the hell out of children.  And maybe to disturb the adults a little bit.

It's true that the Ice Warriors have never appeared outside of their armor on television, but they've appeared without it in expanded universe a few times.  They don't look exactly like Skaldak looked like without his helmet, but they were close enough to call it consistent.

Some people on message boards have been complaining about the removal of Skaldak's helmet, saying that they preferred to simply imagine what the Ice Warriors looked like under their helmets.  I get that (what I'd call the "Greek Tragedy" argument, in that everything should take place off screen because they imagination is scarier than anything that can be shown), but I thought, in this case, Skaldak's face was significantly scarier looking than anything I've ever imagined when I saw the real Ice Warriors.

I do love when war-like races from other planets begin to find something about human military tactics that they respect.  Like "mutually assured destruction."  Sure, it's a pacifist show, I'm not supposed to admire the war like elements of the show, but I love when Sontarans or Daleks or Cybermen begin to understand our war tactics and respect them.  They realize we're not necessarily a force to be taken lightly.  Still, I admire the fact that the show is about trying to find peaceful solutions.

Now, as for clues...I didn't see any.  Unless the Ice Warriors are going to come back in some other capacity.  As my friend Spak pointed out, Moffat tends to bring back enemies he's introduced (or reintroduced) in a completely different capacity.  "Let's take a Silurian and a Sontaran and make them the Doctors' sidekicks."  I would not be surprised to see an Ice Warrior become a good guy in a future episode.  It's happened before, back in the 3rd Doctor era.  As this episode reconfirmed, even though the Martian civilization has long since crumbled to dust, that doesn't mean that the Ice Warriors themselves aren't out there in full force.  They're just wandering the universe without a home.

Mars will rise again, I promise you?  That's what the Doctor said.  Does he really know about a time in the future when the Ice Warriors retake their home planet?  If so, isn't that going to be a little dangerous having a war-like race right next to Earth?  I'd be a little scared.

Clara is still as badass as ever.  She not only volunteered to talk to Skaldak on her own, but she moved  closer to him when the Doctor told her not to because she knew that she was somehow safe, despite all evidence to the contrary.  She didn't scream when Skaldak grabbed her.  And she was good at negotiating with Skaldak and appealing to his kinder heart that she knew was in there.  Clara is fearless and is an excellent contrast to the weak-willed scream queens the Doctor has travelled with in the past like Jo Grant and Peri.

I know that I've been badmouthing Mark Gatiss a lot lately, and I don't take back my assertions that he's a very mediocre writer, but he turned out a pretty good one here.  Granted, I chalk most of that up to the direction.  It wasn't Gatiss's writing that turned Skaldak into a brilliantly terrifying set of glowing red eyes with abnormally long claws.  That was all the direction.  But at least the internal logic of this episode made sense, which is more than I can say for "Victory of the Daleks."  The ending wasn't as satisfying as a good Moffat ending.  Gatiss isn't good at twists or bringing the internal logic of the episode back around to defeat the villain, the way that Moffat can.  Gatiss's episodes are usually resolved by an emotional appeal, which can work very well sometimes, but isn't satisfying if every episode works that way.  Overall, I'd say that this is still one of Gatiss's better episodes, but it's not enough for me to be comfortable with the fact that he might be taking over the show next. #anyonebutgatiss

I wish I could make this more than a review.  My intention in these write-ups is to tie things back to the classic series to give it context, but also to make predictions about what's to come.  I can't do that with this episode, because it didn't give us a lot of clues.  The HADS system is a throwback, but nobody really gives a shit (Can we get a ride to the opposite pole?  Really?).  Overall, this was a pretty self-contained episode.

And where the hell has the Great Intelligence disappeared to?

The Ice Warriors: A Doctor Who Book Report

SPOILERS!

This week, the long awaited return of the Ice Warriors!

I can't say that I've done as much research on the Ice Warriors as I did on the Great Intelligence.  One reason is that I remember a little more about the Ice Warriors than I do about the GI.  The other reason is that they have a few more episodes.  Also, there's a ton about them in expanded universe, so many of the things we know about them are outside of actual canon.  But they're a very interesting villain.  They debuted in "The Ice Warriors," a 2nd Doctor episode.  While we have not seen the Ice Warriors since the 3rd Doctor era, interestingly enough, we haven't actually seen them as a villain since the 2nd Doctor era.  In both of their appearances in the 3rd Doctor era ("The Curse of Peladon" and "The Monster of Peladon"), they were a neutral force.  Seeing them come back this season is going to be interesting because, it seems, they're finally back as a villain.

So, who are the Ice Warriors?  Well, they're the ancient inhabitants of Mars.  How exactly did the barren planet of Mars ever produce life?  Good question!  In the Doctor Who universe, there was a huge, wonderful, thriving society on Mars.  The society existed millions of years before any life of any kind formed on Earth.  So by the time the Human Race developed the ability to even look into space, any sign of the ancient Martian civilization had long since been ground to rubble.  It's interesting that, in the 1960's, they came up with this plot, as decades later it would be proven that there are traces of there once having been water on Mars, and that there are signs of at least bacterial life having existed on Mars.  The show, strangely, predicted this correctly...sort of.

The early episodes depicted Ice Warriors who had managed to survive the destruction of their planet and wanted to restart their society on another planet.  In "The Ice Warriors," the Earth had undergone a massive temperature shift and was beginning to become an ice planet, making it a perfect planet for the Ice Warriors to try to conquer.  In the two "Peladon" episodes in the Third Doctor era, they had become a part of the Galactic Federation, meaning that somehow some of them survived and decided to become upstanding members of intergalactic society.

In deleted dialogue from "The Waters of Mars," it was explained that the virus that got into the water was something left behind by the Ice Warriors, possibly as a trap for anyone who would choose to disturb the remains of their civilization.  Regardless of that dialogue not being in the episode, there's no denying that the Ice Warriors are the unspoken ghost presiding over the episode.  Those infected by the virus had the ability to understand ancient north Martian, a language that, undoubtedly, was the language of some era of the Ice Warriors' culture.  They may not have appeared in the episode, but they were a major part of it.

They're a great classic villain, and they're properly creepy.  There are some similarities between them and the Silurians, in that both are cold blooded, reptilian, war like, and both want to take over Earth, not out of some sort of vain desire to rule a planet, but simply for the survival of their planet.  It's possible that the reason that we haven't seen the Ice Warriors in a while is because they are too much like the Silurians.  But, personally, I find the Ice Warriors really creepy, in a way that the Silurians could never hope to be.  And the way they speak is awesome!  There have been unfulfilled promises to bring the Ice Warriors back for several decades.  If there had been a season in 1990, there would have been an Ice Warriors episode that took place on a college campus in the 1960s.  Thankfully, they're finally back!

If only the episode was written by someone other than Mark Gatiss.  #anyonebutgatiss

The Great Intelligence: A Doctor Who Book Report

SPOILERS!

In the midst of two conference papers, trying to move, being sick and needing a lot of rest, and attending a conference in town on media reform, it’s been hard to find time to rewatch all of the Great Intelligence’s past episodes.  It doesn’t help that, while there are only two GI stories in official canon (one in questionable canon), the two stories are in the 2^nd Doctor era where they were perfectly fine with saying “Yes, we’ll split this into six half-hour episodes.”  The two stores were each 3 hours long.  And both of them have been mostly lost to the BBC purge, with cruddy looking recons taking their place.  Plus, while it’s technically two 6-part stories, the two stories are intertwined, making it an unofficial 12-part episode.  If you throw in the one questionable canon film (Downtime), it’s practically a trilogy. So it’s been tough to go back and do the research.  But I got it done.  So now, a little bit about the Great Intelligence:

This is how the 2nd Doctor explained the Great Intelligence to (then Colonel) Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart:

"Well, I wish I could give you a precise answer. Perhaps the best way to describe it is a sort of formless, shapeless thing floating about in space like a cloud of mist, only with a mind and will."

The 2^nd Doctor first met the Great Intelligence in Tibet in the 1930s.  He landed at a monastery where he hoped to meet an old friend, the head monk there.  Also hanging out at the monastery was a man named Professor Travers, who had gone to Tibet to find the elusive Yeti, a.k.a. “The Abominable Snowmen.”  They found a good share of Yeti, but it turned out that they were actually robot Yeti.  The Yeti were being controlled by a few of the monks, but the monks were being controlled by the GI.

The Great Intelligence showed an ability to take over the minds of humans, much like Kizlet and her minions in “The Bells of Saint John.”  Although it seemed to be a different type of mind control in “The Bells of Saint John.”  Most people who were controlled by the Great Intelligence in the 2^nd Doctor era were a literal mouthpiece for the Great Intelligence.  He (or it, not sure how you refer to it) seems to have found some subtler form of mind control.  Although Dr. Simeon, while subject to some subtle mind control for most of his life, after he had been attacked by the memory word was turned into a GI mouthpiece.

What was interesting was that, in the Great Intelligence’s first episode, “The Abominable Snowmen,” the GI’s plan was not really revealed.  He was trying to create a small army of robot Yeti, but we didn’t know what it was about.  We just heard, from one of the possessed monks, that the GI was doing this simply as an experiment.  A pilot project, preparing for something bigger.  While not a satisfying ending, there was a reason for that:  they already had its second story prepared.  In a strange move for the history of Doctor Who, three stories later, in the exact same season, the episode “The Web of Fear” picked up the story 30 years later, after Professor Travers has brought back a Yeti robot for a museum, and his attempt to figure out how to reactivate one without the GI’s control attracted the Great Intelligence to come back.  That’s when we saw what its real plan was.

The Great Intelligence had been following the Doctor through time and space, observing how brilliant the Doctor was.  So he had created a machine specifically to drain the Doctor’s mind out of his body, leaving the Doctor with the mind of a child.  The Doctor crossed the wires on the machine so that, when the switch was thrown, the Doctor would absorb the Great Intelligence’s mind instead of the other way around.  This would have killed off the Great Intelligence, but the Doctor failed to inform his companions of his plan (he still needs to work on that), so they rescued him from the machine before the Doctor’s plan was carried out.  So the Great Intelligence was left alive.

Downtime is hilariously dumb.  My first impression was that this had to have been directed by someone who was moonlighting from his day job where he directed instructional videos for driver’s ed classes.  But, I looked it up, and it turns out that the director was actually a very long time director who had directed episodes from all the way back in the 1^st Doctor era through to the 4^th Doctor era.  The episode was very silly because the Great Intelligence’s plan was much stupider:  he just wanted to take over the world.  He had started a college that was a very thin front for a cult that worshiped him.  He managed to control their minds not unlike the way he controlled Kizlet and her minions.  The episode was interesting in that it brought back the Yeti and Professor Travers, as well as the Brigadier, who had been introduced in “The Web of Fear” before becoming one of the most iconic characters in the history of the show, and Victoria, the Doctor’s companion both times  he met the Great Intelligence.  It also had Sarah Jane Smith just because people love Sarah Jane.

Downtime may be silly, but what I do know for sure is that Moffat has seen it.  Two reasons why:  The first is that he brought Kate Lethbridge-Stewart back (well, he didn’t write the episode, but he was showrunner when she was introduced).  Kate appears in Downtime, played by a different actress, but it’s believable that they could be the same person.  Strangely in Downtime she was a single mother living in a trailer and not doing well.  How she went from that to heading U.N.I.T. is beyond me.  But her character was introduced in Downtime, and came back in another questionable canon film (Dæmos Rising), then appeared in two novels.  “The Power of Three” was her first officially canon appearance, and it appears that that means that Downtime is now official canon.  The other reason it’s clear that Moffat has seen Downtime is because in “The Bells of Saint John,” the Great Intelligence knew what U.N.I.T. was.  U.N.I.T. was originally formed in response to the Great Intelligence’s attack on London in “The Web of Fear,” but that happened after the episode so he couldn’t have known what it was unless he met them in Downtime.

I’ve noticed a few strictly aesthetic similarities between the 11^th Doctor’s Great Intelligence episodes and the 2^nd Doctor’s.  The first is that, where the 2^nd Doctor met the Great Intelligence as it was controlling “Abominable Snowmen,” the 11^th Doctor met it when it was controlling regular snowmen.  The name of the episodes were surprisingly similar:  “The Abominable Snowmen” and “The Snowmen.”  Funnily enough, “The Snowmen” is the first time the Great Intelligence didn’t have the Yeti as his army (at least in visual media, but I refuse to read the novels just for research).  The beginning of “The Bells of Saint John” featured the Doctor in a monastery, which is where the 2^nd Doctor first met the Great Intelligence.  And, finally, “The Bells of Saint John” seems a lot like another pilot project.  Like the Great Intelligence was just experimenting for something much, much bigger.

How much the Great Intelligence remembers of the 2^nd Doctor now is somewhat unclear.  It didn’t seem to recognize the Doctor in “The Snowmen,” but it certainly knew who he was in “The Bells of Saint John.”  It almost seems as if we’re looking at a different creature called “The Great Intelligence.”  (But, of course, that isn’t the case.)  The Doctor seems to have trouble remembering what the Great Intelligence is because, at the end of “The Snowmen,” he simply says that the name sounds familiar.  But don’t for get that it’s possible that as much as a millennium has passed in the Doctor’s timeline between the 2^nd and 11^th Doctors.  I can’t remember all of my friends in high school.  I don’t know how I’d remember anything from a millennium ago if I could live that long.

The blog Life, Doctor Who, and Combom, recently brought to my attention the fact that BBC South Africa recently released the one-line descriptions of all the plots of the episodes this season.  The last episode of the season, the title of which has yet to be released, is described as such:

“Someone is kidnapping the Doctor's friends, leading him towards the one place in all of time and space that he should never go.”

I think it’s pretty obvious that this means someone is trying to bring the Doctor to the fields of Trenzalore where he’ll be forced to say his name when it’s asked.  I have no doubt that that’s what this description means.  But is it the Great Intelligence who’s going to be leading him there?  If so…why?

Singers in the Hands of an Angry God: An Overanalysis of "The Rings of Akhaten"

SPOILERS!

I think what we really learned here is that, just because your episode is brilliantly imaginative, that doesn’t mean that it’s even remotely exciting.  While I wasn’t really into the action anywhere in this episode, the concept of this episode was unbelievably original, and truly beautiful.  I was not expecting to like this one because it looked like it was going to be a mummy episode.  Mummies are boring as horror villains.  I don’t think actual mummies, like when I see them in museums, are boring.  But I don’t understand what’s so scary about a zombie wrapped in bandages.  Thankfully, that wasn’t what this was.

I think part of what made this less exciting for me was the fact that it was so focused on the Clara mystery.  As much as that fascinated me in “The Snowmen,” by the time we got to the end of “The Bells of St. John,” the Great Intelligence was starting to peak my interest much more than Clara’s weirdness.  Then again, there’s a pretty good chance that the two are linked.

I thought it was very interesting that the TARDIS doesn’t “like” Clara.  This seemed to make a lot of sense.  The TARDIS tried to shake off Captain Jack because it didn’t “like” him, and that was because he was a temporal anomaly.  He should not exist because he defies the laws of time.  Obviously, Clara is the same way, which would explain why it doesn’t like her.

Although, the fact that she couldn’t get in isn’t necessarily a sign that it doesn’t like her as much as it is a sign that she doesn’t have a key yet (he gave it to the 19^th century Clara, but not the 21^st century one).  What is a bigger sign that the TARDIS doesn’t like her, and which I’m surprised the Doctor never mentioned, is the fact that the TARDIS translator isn’t working very well for Clara.  She couldn’t understand most of the creatures.  The TARDIS translator can translate anything in the universe (except that writing on the wall in “The Impossible Planet”).  It should have easily translated everything that was being said to Clara.  I can’t believe that the Doctor didn’t notice this.  Unless he's trying to hide the fact that this is unusual.  But I feel like he would have reacted somewhat, even if he tried to hide that reaction from Clara, and that didn't really happen.

It was interesting to see that the Doctor went back in time and still couldn’t explain how Clara was born into the late 20^th Century.  This was confirmed by the prequel to “The Bells of Saint John,” but this expanded on it a little bit:  She didn’t just spawn into a new century.  She had parents.  That’s extremely unlikely.  And they met because of that one leaf that happened to fall off the tree.  That sounds like a manipulation of the timelines to me.  Something is ensuring that, in each generation, a series of events happens to come together to create a genetically identical person with the same exact name.  How?  A woman who has become fractured or splintered across time is easy to explain.  A girl who has real, human parents who met and fell in love and had a baby in multiple centuries is as bizarre of a phenomenon as you could think up.

And, if it was someone manipulating the timeline to make sure that that leaf landed in her father’s face, then that someone has to be non-corporeal, or else someone would have had to pull the leaf off of the tree with their hands.  What non-corporeal being has been pretty active in the series lately?  I’ll give you a hint:  its name rhymes with Trait Vintelligence.

Speaking of things that seem suspiciously similar to the Great Intelligence, what about “Grandfather,” a.k.a. “The Angry God” or “The Old God”?  It’s a creature that lives off of people’s memories.  The Great Intelligence feeds off of their brains.  That sounds somewhat similar, doesn’t it?  I don’t think that Grandfather was the Great Intelligence, as that would mean that the Great Intelligence is dead, and obviously that’s not the case.  But they seem…related, somehow.

There have been a few people who have complained that, in this episode, the sonic screwdriver was overused.  There were two complaints:  the first was the way it was used to hold the door open, the second being that the way he used it to fend off the attacks from the "Eggheads" (the best name I've heard of for them) made it seem like a weapon.  First of all, I don't give a shit about the door.  The door made perfect sense.  I felt a little iffy about it being used as a sort of a weapon against the Eggheads, though.  However, some have argued on the forums that, since it was defensive, it wasn't really being used as a weapon.  I can see that argument.

Shooting the Cybermat in "Closing Time" still stands as the most weapony use of the Sonic Screwdriver ever.

The Doctor's list of stories was rather interesting.  When he brought up having been in universes where the laws of physics were devised by the mind of a madman, my first instinct was that he was talking about the 2nd Doctor's best episode by far, "The Time Meddler" (which would mean that this half of the season is shockingly heavy with 2nd Doctor references).  However, some people on the Doctor Who Wiki pointed out that this could just have easily have been a reference to the 1st Doctor episode, "The Celestial Toymaker," or the 10th anniversary episode, "The Three Doctors."

The Doctor also mentioned he had secrets that must never be known, which presumably referred to the secret of the Doctor's name.  Isn't that something he shouldn't be passing on to evil, planetoid monsters?

Also, don't forget:  the first ever direct mention of Susan in the new series.  The Doctor mentioned coming to Akhaten with his granddaughter!  Susan is coming back!

Clara is still an amazing companion.  She might have already surpassed Amy in my book.  I understand that that may make me sound fickle after I recently called Amy and Rory the best companions in the history of the show.  But, if Doctor Who is being done right, each new companion should be your favorite.  Each new Doctor should be your favorite.  Each new episode should be moving us forward while still looking backwards at the same time.  So yes, Clara should be able to replace the last companion as your favorite, because Doctor Who lives as much in the present as in the past.

Clara's initiative is almost unparalleled.  There aren't a lot of companions like her.  And she's smart.  Last week she figured out how to locate Kizlet's office.  This week, she figured out that the leaf could overfeed Grandfather because it held an infinity of possible stories.  In both situations, she found the solution when the Doctor was stumped.  How does her mind come up with these things?  She's not only holding her own, she has the intelligence, imagination, and ingenuity to come up with creative solutions.  Even Sarah Jane, the yardstick against which all other companions are measured, never demonstrated herself to be this clever.  And Clara is not afraid to throw herself into danger.  In contrast to the scream queens we saw in the classic series, Clara doesn't seem to be terrified and screaming all the time.  She's ready to charge forward and face whatever is coming at her.

We may be witnessing the beginning of something very special in Clara.  Perhaps something that will be looked back on as a landmark moment in the show's history.

Next week we have a very interesting episode in that we're finally seeing the return of the Ice Warriors. After decades of just talking about it, someone is finally actually doing it and bringing them back.  Unfortunately, the episode was handed over to Mark Gatiss, the most consistently mediocre writer on the staff (#anyonebutgatiss).  So we'll keep our fingers crossed that he wrote another "Night Terrors" and not another "The Idiot's Lantern."

I'll be bringing you a little bit of history on the Ice Warriors later this week.  As well as a little book report about the Great Intelligence.

See you then!

Everybody Hates Chris: An Operation Blue Harvest Update

SPOILERS!

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/tv/news/ninth-time-lord-christopher-eccleston-turns-down-doctor-who-return-8561822.html

It's been announced that Christopher Eccleston will not be returning for the 50th Anniversary special.  Now, this could be just another one of those little lies that makes up what I've been calling Operation Blue Harvest, but this one is probably true.  Eccleston has been very adamant about not wanting to come back since the beginning.

Let's be honest, Eccleston was never really that interested in Doctor Who.  Tennant was a hard core Doctor Who fan from childhood.  Matt Smith had never seen the show when he started, but he watched a lot of past episodes as research for the role.  Eccleston not only had never watched an episode, but refused to ever watch any past episodes to make sure that he wasn't influenced by other people's performance, which is the worst possible way to play the role.  When asked why he wasn't going to put on a more elaborate outfit, like past Doctors, he said it was because his Doctor wasn't going to be a "tosser."

There are some Doctors who, when put up next to each other, are hard to believe that they're the same person.  11 and 1.  6 and 4.  8 and 2.  But when you watch them all in order, there's a kind of natural progression of his personality that makes sense, so you can kind of understand how these different incarnations are actually the same person.  But if you put 9 up against any Doctor, even the ones immediately before and after him, it's almost impossible to believe that he's supposed to be the same person.  Even 10 and 9 don't seem like the same person, nor do they seem like they would like each other.  9 would find 11 insufferable.

Eccleston didn't take the role out of any interest in sci-fi or Doctor Who.  He actually took the role because he wanted to work with Russel T. Davies.  I don't think he knew what he was getting in to.  I don't think he understood that Doctor Who is a huge franchise with fervent fans who devour the expanded universe media and who want to see the past characters and actors come back.  I don't think he realized that anyone would want him to return after he was done.  He also had some difficulties with Davies behind the scenes, which have only been referred to very vaguely.  Hence his early departure.  No matter how much the fans want him back, I doubt he'll ever make another appearance on the show at any point.  There aren't going to be audio stories about the 9th Doctor.  Eccleston isn't interested in being a Doctor for the rest of his life.

However, the fact that Moffat met with him tells us that they're trying to do a big Doctor special.  Especially if Eccleston and the show parted on bad terms, the fact that anyone would consider calling him means that they were very interested in doing the special with multiple Doctors.  I'm frankly shocked that Eccleston even took the meeting.

If it's true that they intend to use footage of past Doctors, its possible that they're shooting to have an Eleven Doctors special after all.  As "The Five Doctors" proved (and, to a lesser extent, the super non-cannon "Dimensions in Time"), you don't need all the actual actors around to make it a multi-Doctor special.  I know there are those who really love Eccleston and want to see him back, but I think fans of the modern Who will be fine with just the Matt and Dave show.  And the classic fans will be happy with anyone from the classic series they can get (well, almost anyone).

And if Tom Baker comes back, then all will be forgiven.

Lies, Damn Lies, and BBC Announcements: An Operation Blue Harvest Update

SPOILERS!

This week it was announced that England's answer to Britney Spears, Billie "Call Girl" Piper, and England's favorite Scottsman, David Tennant, would be returning for the 50th Anniversary special.  Also, John Hurt--whose role as the first guy to die in Alien Moffat once used as a metaphor for childbirth in an episode of Coupling--is appearing for some reason.  Also, Gavin and Stacey star Joanna Page is going to be in the special, which is very exciting news for Joanna's parents, who are probably the only people on Earth who know who she is.

In another announcement, the BBC said that the Zygons are going to be in the special, which is kind of like marketing a major motion picture as a star vehicle for Abe Vigoda.  The Zygons appeared once in a 1975 serial called "Terror of the Zygons," although, if you can find it, I much prefer their appearance in the Eighth Doctor audio drama, "The Zygon Who Fell to Earth."  The Eleventh Doctor also mentioned them in "The Power of Three" as having been responsible for an adventure that he had with Rory and Amy offscreen.  I'll bring you more information about this really obscure villain as the special approaches.

The BBC is suddenly very forthcoming with information, and I still highly doubt that this is all of it.  Billie Piper and David Tennant are the [i]only[/i] ones coming back?  I'll believe that when Daleks can climb stairs.  You can't have a 50th Anniversary special with only two Doctors.  And I'm still not sold on their claims that the episode hasn't begun filming yet.  Tennant's Facebook page is showing pictures of him and Matt Smith after the table read for the special, which they claim just happened.  I still really don't buy that they're cutting it this close, unless the show is going off the air after "The Last Cybermen" and returning with the special for the actual anniversary date itself, November 23rd.  If not, then we're looking at the 50th Anniversary special in about 7 weeks, and that means the episode has to have been in the can for months now.

Here are some possible scenarios I'm seeing:

1.  "The Eleven Doctors":  Even if they can't get all the living actors together (of which there are 8), you could probably still make something called "The Eleven Doctors."  Just throw in some sort of reference to the first three Doctors being trapped in a void somewhere, maybe splice in some stock footage, or have some extra seen only from the back in a Moe Howard wig.  There's a million ways you could do it.  But I'd say you'd need at least 5 of the actors to pull this off.  In "The Five Doctors," for every Doctor they couldn't get, either due to death or stubbornness, they made sure to get one of that Doctor's primary companions.  That wouldn't be that hard to pull off, either.  Carole Ann Ford, Frazier Hines, and Katy Manning are all alive and well and would all probably be up for a guest appearance.

2.  "The Modern Doctors":  Tennant, Smith, and Eccleston.  The three of them could pull off a hell of a special.  Although Rose might get pretty confused having both 9 and 10 around.  I always wondered how, in multi-Doctor episodes, the current Doctor wasn't already aware of what was going to happen because his earlier self already went through it.  You'd also think that all of the Doctors would know what their future regenerations look like from the multi-Doctor episodes.  I feel like a Moffat-written multi-Doctor episode might actually address that (he did address it in "Time Crash).

3.  Matt and Dave:  This is the worst case scenario, that it really is nothing but Matt Smith and David Tennant.  Don't get me wrong, they're my two favorite Doctors.  But you can't really celebrate 50 years of a program with less than 20% of the actors to play the role, and none of the actors from the classic series.  It's just wrong.

In conclusion, I'm thrilled that Tennant is officially coming back (although I had no doubt that he would), but it's not enough.  You need at least one other actor, preferably more (and preferably at least one Doctor from before Eccleston) to make this good enough for the 50th Anniversary.

And of course, the other big question:  If the Zygons are the villains for the special, then how does the Great Intelligence fit in here?

Wireless in the Blood: An Overanalysis of "The Bells of Saint John"

Okay, so much is happening that I can't possibly explain it all in just one blog entry.  Besides, I'm trying to start marketing this blog to a wider audience, and I can't write 10 page dissertations on each episode without scaring everyone off.  The breaking news that's just come out will have to be covered in a separate entry (assuming that it doesn't turn out to be an April Fools joke), and I'm even going to have to expand on the villain a little later.  Don't worry.  I'll get to everything.  Now, on with the show...

SPOILERS!!!

On November 18, 1993, Nirvana, the kings of grunge, appeared on MTV to record an episode of the show Unplugged.  What ensued was the most popular recording in the history of the program, and possibly the most iconic moment in the history of MTV.  Refusing fans' requests for them to play their hits, like "Smells Like Teen Spirit," the band intentionally did the opposite, playing mostly older songs and covers.  They promised they would bring on a special guest artist to perform with them.  People speculated that it would be Rod Stewart or David Bowie or something.  Nope.  They brought an obscure underground band they were friends with:  The Meat Puppets.  But it was, in a large part, because they blatantly refused to do what was expected of them that their recording became such an important part of American popular culture.

In "The Bells of Saint John," Moffat showed us very early on that a recurring villain was going to be behind it all. Where we expected the Master, Davros, the Rani, the Meddling Monk, or maybe the Valeyard, Moffat gave us an obscure, Second Doctor villain:  The Great Intelligence.  In other words, Moffat gave us The Meat Puppets.

It's brilliant, but I'm still a little pissed about it.  It fucks with my plans and, I swear to God, Moffat's doing this to me on purpose. I start this new blog. I go to a lot of effort to start promoting this new blog. I figure this blog will be something very easy to write in my free time because I already have an encyclopedic knowledge of Doctor Who, so it won't require research or anything. The first episode I write about, Moffat stumps me and I have to do "research" for my blog post. Fuck you, you wonderful, brilliant man, you.  I'm writing two conference papers!  I don't have time to go back and rewatch both of the Great Intelligence's episodes from the Second Doctor era, not to mention Downtime, the semi-official spin-off movie from the 90's about the Great Intelligence.  Thus, I'm going to write this post based on what little I remember of the Great Intelligence, and then supplement it later with a longer post about the GI.

Moffat has stated publicly, many times, that he doesn't want to dip back into the past too often because the point of [i]Doctor Who[/i] is to move forward.  Therefore, most of his episodes are about villains he created, occasionally throwing in Daleks, Sontarans, and Cybermen as supporting characters, never the central menace.  "Asylum of the Daleks" was unique in that it was the first time Moffat ever wrote an episode in which the primary villain was one that was created in the classic series.

Moffat has also publicly stated that he hates the black and white era of the classic series.  He said that the first episode was fantastic, and everything after that was rubbish.  So it seems really odd that, for his last two episodes in a row, he not only brought back a classic series villain, but a classic series villain from the black and white era.  Plus there's the fact that the two serials that the Great Intelligence appeared in in the black and white era were thrown out in the great BBC purge where they got rid of episodes of old shows that they never thought they'd need in the future, failing to anticipate the lucrative DVD aftermarket that would develop in the 21st century.  Therefore, the only way to watch the first two serials about the Great Intelligence is through fan reconstructions where they use photographs, existing audio, and whatever video does remain of the episodes, to recreate the episodes.

What this all amounts to is that the Great Intelligence is a really strange choice for a recurring villain.

What I think happened is that Moffat created this arc where a sinister, non-physical force would stalk the Doctor throughout time and space.  The BBC then told him that, since it was the 50th anniversary season, he should make the overall arc about a recurring villain instead.  So he just slapped on the name of the first classic series villain he could think of who resembled the villain he was trying to create:  The Great Intelligence.

But enough about GI for now, let's talk about this really fun episode.

About halfway through the episode, I checked to see how much time was left, because I was hoping there was a lot more time left than there actually was.  Partially because I was having so much fun with this episode, but also because I was afraid they wouldn't have time to wrap this up in a satisfying way.  What I loved was that, at the end of the episode, the solution made sense.  It wasn't as perfect of an ending as "Flesh and Stone" or "Blink" or "Day of the Moon," but at least the internal logic of the episode made sense, unlike something like "Asylum of the Daleks" or "The Angels Take Manhattan." And, unlike "The Angels Take Manhattan," it didn't feel like a 2-parter that was uncomfortably shoved into a 1-parter.

Clara's a little badass, isn't she?  The Doctor did spend some time "protecting" her, but she held her own a little, too.  At the point in the cafe when Clara said she'd find where the people were being uploaded to and she told the Doctor to go away while she did her work, I said to my girlfriend "It takes a great companion to tell the Doctor to shoo while she takes care of things."  She said to me "Or the Doctor needed to leave so that she can be captured and, thus, advance the plot."  A few minutes later, she was proven right.  But remember, Kizlet gave Clara the computer skills, but the idea of using the webcams to figure out where the headquarters was was more than just computer knowledge.  That was a clever tactic that the Doctor didn't think of.  That's what you need in a good companion:  someone who can add something, not just someone who's just along for the ride (Peri, Mel, Tegan, etc.)

Weren't the spoonheads such wonderfully terrifying villains?  Now I know what those things were in the broken glass poster that looked like a gas pump with an oval coming out of it.  Moffat said the point of this episode was to make kids scared of wi-fi, because it's about time that they were.  So, for this episode, I tried to view it through a child's eyes, and yeah, it looked absolutely terrifying.  Sure, as adults we're jaded enough that we don't see that when we watch the episode.  But, if I was a small child and I watched that episode, I might have trouble sleeping, knowing that wi-fi networks are all around me, in the air, and there's nothing I can do to hide from them.

Another little snippet of my conversation with my girlfriend as I watched this:
Her:  I find it hard to believe that so many people would click on a wi-fi network they don't recognize.  Don't they know that's dangerous?
Me:  ...I do that all the time.
Her:  Why?
Me:  Sometimes you're in an unfamiliar place, you want to get online, so you steal a wi-fi connection that's nearby.
Her:  That's dangerous!  For this exact reason!

She's right, but it's still something we all do.  Right?

The plane crashing was awesome, but it was only a small glimpse at what a wi-fi monster could really do if unleashed on the public.  There were a lot of other great things they could have shown.

Although, the thing with Kizlet talking through people, that was a brilliantly imaginative idea.  Multiple appreciation threads have popped up on the Gallifrey Base message board for the last guy Kizlet spoke through, who is being referred to as either "Man with Chips," "Man with Sandwich," or "Man with Beard."  A man eating sloppily as he walked down the street who suddenly stops to threaten the Doctor in a very effeminate voice is apparently a very popular idea.

Some people have complained that this episode was too much like "The Idiot's Lantern."  The have a point.  But there's one thing about this episode that makes it much better than "The Idiot's Lantern":  It wasn't written by Mark Fucking Gatiss (#anyonebutgatiss).

The episode raised more questions than it answered, and really didn't address the Clara mystery very much.  What it did do, though, was demonstrate to us that the Doctor and Clara aren't just meeting coincidentally.  Something very specific is drawing them together.  In the prequel video, we saw the Doctor in the 20th century trying to find Clara, accidentally finding a 6 year old version of her instead, not knowing who it was.  In this episode, she managed to turn the police box...into an actual police box!

Moffat said at one point that we had heard the bells of St. John before.  This was a cute misdirection that left us wondering what he meant.  Clearly what he meant was that it's the second time someone turned the TARDIS into a working police box.  The first time was in "The Empty Child," where the boy was able to call the TARDIS's phone, which it isn't even supposed to have.  The TARDIS is supposed to have a phone inside, at the console (entirely Moffat's idea), but it's not supposed to have a working phone outside.  It's not even supposed to have a phone on the outside for display purposes.  It's not a phone box.  The fact that her call could create a phone where there shouldn't be one shows that there's a very significant connection between them.

Not to mention that she reached him by calling a number that "a woman at the shops gave her."  My initial instinct was that it was either Amy or River.  Or maybe Jenny (Vastra's Jenny, not the Doctor's daughter).  Maybe it's a future version of Clara herself.  It could have been an agent of the GI that gave her the number, but considering that this mystery woman told Clara it was the greatest helpline in the universe, I'm guessing it was someone who admires the Doctor.

I got the feeling that the Great Intelligence wanted Kizlet to fail for some reason.  The main reason I thought this was that the Great Intelligence warned Kizlet about the Doctor, but not the TARDIS.  Kizlet and her minions had no idea why the TARDIS disappeared, or how two people fit inside of it.  I asked some people on the GB forum if they had any thoughts on why the GI didn't warn them about the TARDIS.  One person said that, just because it's a "Great Intelligence" doesn't mean it's an "all knowing" intelligence.  However, another person pointed out that, in the Second Doctor episode, "The Web of Fear," the Great Intelligence saw the TARDIS, so it should know what it is.  Then again, the Great Intelligence didn't seem to recognize the Doctor in "The Snowmen."  Maybe its memory is limited?  Maybe this is farther back in its timeline than the one who met the Second Doctor.

Or maybe he set up a plan that was supposed to fail.  It felt like some sort of test case.  A pilot study.  Something to test the waters while on the way to some much bigger plan.  He fed off of the minds of all those people, yes, but he clearly has something bigger in mind.  Now, what is the GI planning?  There's not enough to guess yet.  But I have a feeling that the GI is going to be the one who finally asks the Doctor his name at the Fields of Trenzalore.

Or he'll be the one that asks the Doctor[i]s[/i] their names if the Fields of Trenzalore are going to be part of the 50th Anniversary special, because I think it's going to be.  Moffat said that, in the finale, the Doctor would reveal his biggest secret, which we all know is his name.  And he can only say his name on the Fields of Trenzalore, where no one can speak falsely or fail to answer.

And, of course, River has to be there to hear his name since she knows it in "Silence in the Library."  She told him her real identity.  She showed you hers, Doctor, you have to show her yours.

And River loves to play Doctor.