science fiction | the m0vie blog

Doctor Who: Attack of the Cybermen (Review)

Posted on March 1, 2013 by Darren

To celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of the longest-running science-fiction show in the world, I’ll be taking weekly looks at some of my own personal favourite stories and arcs, from the old and new series, with a view to encapsulating the sublime, the clever and the fiendishly odd of the BBC’s Doctor Who.

Attack of the Cybermen originally aired in 1985.

We realise this must be confusing for you.

– Threst tells it how it is

There is a tendency, these days, to be more sympathetic in appraisals of the Colin Baker years. Everybody – including Baker – accepts that his tenure could have gone a lot smoother. Watching Attack of the Cybermen, I can’t help but feel sorry for just about everybody involved. Rewatching Colin Baker’s first season, I can’t help but feel that the problem with this period of the show wasn’t that the production crew were making new mistakes or deviating from good ideas. It seems quite apparent that a lot of the major problems were embedded during Peter Davison’s time in the role.

The problem with Colin Baker’s first year on the show was that the writers and producers allowed those already significant flaws to attain critical mass.

A crushing blow…

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Filed under: Television | Tagged: arts, Attack of the Cybermen, bbc, Colin Baker, Cyberman, cybermen, Dalek, David Banks, doctor, doctor who, DoctorWho, fiction, Jon Pertwee, List of Doctor Who items, Peri, science fiction, Susan Foreman, tardis, Tenth Planet, Unearthly Child | 2 Comments »

Doctor Who: The Age of Steel (Review)

Posted on February 28, 2013 by Darren

The Age of Steel originally aired in 2006.

Human race. For such an intelligent lot, you aren’t half susceptible. Give anyone a chance to take control and you submit. Sometimes I think you like it.

– oh, Doctor, you kinky so-and-so

I really don’t like Rise of the Cybermen. I think it’s a waste of a potential origin story for one of the Doctor’s most iconic adversaries. However, most of the problems with this two-parter are front-loaded. The set-up, quite frankly, is relatively pedestrian. It’s Doctor Who on auto-pilot. The follow-up, Age of Steel, actually works a bit better. That’s not to suggest that the script is any smarter or any tighter. Indeed, this is very much Doctor Who in big blockbuster mode. However, Age of Steel does have one massive advantage. It has director Graeme Harper working on it.

At least they’re stylish…

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Filed under: Television | Tagged: arts, bbc, Caves of Androzani, Cyberman, cybermen, Dalek, doctor, DoctorWho, Graeme Harper, science fiction, tardis, The Age of Steel, torchwood, Unearthly Child | Leave a comment »

Doctor Who: Rise of the Cybermen (Review)

Posted on February 26, 2013 by Darren

Rise of the Cybermen originally aired in 2006.

Delete. Delete.

– the moment the Cybermen realise they are second-rate Daleks

I’ll freely concede that I am sceptical of the Cybermen. Okay, that’s not fair. I actually really like the early Cybermen stories. However, it seems like Doctor Who really forgot how the Cybermen worked when it turned them into a recurring “once per Doctor” sort of threat. However, they are part of the show’s iconography. The image of the Cybermen marching down the steps of St. Paul’s Cathedral from The Invasion is important enough to earn them a sacred place in the show’s history.

So the return of the Cybermen was inevitable, even before we caught a glimpse of one of their silly helmets in Dalek. Russell T. Davies has generally done a great job revitalising old concepts for the revived series, so Rise of the Cybermen has that in its corner. Unfortunately, I’m not convinced that Rise of the Cybermen approaches anything resembling the quality of Dalek, and I think that Rise of the Cybermen manages the rare feat of turning most of Davies’ strengths into weaknesses.

March of the Cybermen…

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Filed under: Television | Tagged: arts, bbc, Cyberman, cybermen, Dalek, Davies, doctor, DoctorWho, Pete Tyler, Rise of the Cybermen, Roger Lloyd Pack, rose, russell t. davies, science fiction, tardis, Tenth Planet, Time Lord, Vitex | 5 Comments »

Doctor Who: The Infinite Quest (Review)

Posted on February 15, 2013 by Darren

The Infinite Quest was originally broadcast in weekly instalments on Totally Doctor Who in 2007.

… And then I’ll have my revenge! Revenge! REVENGE!

– just in case you didn’t get that Baltazar was evil

The Infinite Quest is a 45-minute animated episode of Doctor Who that was broadcast as part of Totally Doctor Who in 2007, during the third season of the revived show. It was written by Alan Barnes, who has written a number of Big Finish audio plays for Doctor Who, and was directed by Gary Russell. The animation was produced by Cosgrave Hall, who animated the missing episodes of The Invasion for its 2006 DVD release. So there’s a fairly considerable amount of talent involved in this project, which is notable as not only the first full-length animated Doctor Who episode to be broadcast on television, but is the first fully serialised story to be told since the show was revived. It was originally broadcast in chunks of three-and-a-half minutes.

Flight of fancy…

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Filed under: Television | Tagged: Ark in Space, arts, bbc, david tennant, doctor, doctor who, DoctorWho, Douglas Adams, Freema Agyeman, Infinite Quest, Key, Last of the Time Lords, Martha, matt smith, science fiction, Shopping, Starship Titanic, Story arcs in Doctor Who | Leave a comment »

Doctor Who: Shada (2003) (Review)

Posted on February 14, 2013 by Darren

Shada originally broadcast on the BBC website in 2003.

Doctor, a fool would realise that it was written in code!

Skagra, this thing is written in code!

– Skagra and the Doctor have some communication difficulties

Has a failed Doctor Who story every haunted the collective consciousness in the way that Shada does? There’s a wealth of adventures that were proposed and never produced, from the last Master story that never happened in The Final Game, through to the laundry list of unproduced adventures that would have made up Colin Baker’s second season if the show hadn’t been parked by the BBC. However, Shada is something different. So different, in fact, that it has been told quite a few times. In fact, it might be the only Doctor Who story I end up covering twice.

This was a webcast version, a very simply animated version of the tale produced for the BBC website, using an audio play adapted from Douglas Adams’ original script by Big Finish, the fan collective who produce a range of celebrated audio plays for the classic series. Starring Paul McGann, the Eighth Doctor who never really got a chance to develop the role in live action, it’s an interesting glimpse at what might have been.

Lost in time…

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Filed under: Television | Tagged: Adams, arts, bbc, doctor, doctor who, DoctorWho, Douglas Adams, Five Doctors, Gallifrey, Graham Williams, Horns of Nimon, John Nathan Turner, Malcolm Hulke, paul mcgann, science fiction, Shada, tardis, Time Lord, Tom Baker, Unearthly Child | Leave a comment »

Doctor Who: Real Time (Review)

Posted on February 11, 2013 by Darren

Real Time originally broadcast on the BBC website in 2002.

Why do you talk so much?

You never know who is listening.

– Cyberwoman Savage and the Doctor discover why he lends himself to audio

It’s remarkably how much energy went in to keeping Doctor Who alive for those years when it was off the air. There was, of course, the fiction produced outside the BBC. Virgin produced The New Adventures in book form, there were comics and various “spin-off” projects. However, these lacked the sort of gravitas that came from having an iconic performer in a classic role. So Big Finish began producing a range of audio adventures (“full cast dramas”) centred around the show. More than that, though, they actually managed to recruit some of the actors. Paul McGann, for example, has had a great run in audio despite only appearing in one televised adventure. Colin Baker has arguably reinvented his take on the Doctor, free from the dodgy writing and behind-the-scenes turmoil that rocked his two-season tenure.

At the same time, the BBC was trying to figure out what to do with the property. There had long been talk of resurrecting the Timelord, the failure of the television movie notwithstanding. BBCi had even produced an official webcast with Sylvester McCoy from writer-director Dan Freedman, named Death Comes to Time. However, while I’ll admit that Death Comes to Time has its strengths, there was something missing. When the time came to do a second webcast, BBCi teamed up with Big Finish, with Big Finish founder Gary Russell stepping up to write and direct an adventure especially for animation.

The result is Real Time. While it’s pretty far from perfect, it is intriguing, smart and fun. More than that, though, it supports the oft-heard argument that Colin Baker has been vindicated by his involvement in these projects. In fact, I didn’t want to strangle the Sixth Doctor once while listening to Real Time. It might even inspire me to check out some of the Big Finish range.

Face off…

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Filed under: Television | Tagged: bbc, Colin Baker, Cyberman, cybermen, doctor, DoctorWho, Gary Russell, paul mcgann, Realtime, science fiction, Sixth Doctor, Sylvester McCoy, tardis | 1 Comment »

Doctor Who: The Vampires of Venice (Review)

Posted on February 8, 2013 by Darren

The Vampires of Venice originally aired in 2010.

Tell me the whole plan!

…

One day that will work.

– the Doctor

The Vampires of Venice is interesting because it looks very different in 2013 as compared to when it was originally broadcast in 2010. In 2010, it looked a bit overly familiar, a collection of the tropes and storytelling tricks that we took for granted in the show under Russell T. Davies. The elements felt, at the time, a little over-familiar. Indeed, it seemed like Toby Whithouse’s script owed a great deal to his earlier adventure School Reunion.

However, Doctor Who looks very different in 2013. The show has definitely radically changed, so that these familiar plot points don’t seem quite so familiar any longer. Whereas The Vampires of Venice didn’t feel so strange after five years of Russell T. Davies, it does seem a bit more unique after three years of Steven Moffat. It doesn’t seem so much an attempt to repackage these story elements as it does one final celebration of them, a fond farewell to many of the narrative bits and pieces that we’d come to take for granted.

How times change.

A late-night bite…

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Filed under: Television | Tagged: amy pond, arts, bbc, christmas, Davies, doctor, DoctorWho, Earth, Eleventh Doctor, Parting of the Ways, Philip Hinchcliffe, rory, rory williams, russell t. davies, science fiction, steven moffat, tardis, Time Lord, Time War, Unearthly Child, Vampires of Venice | Leave a comment »

Doctor Who: Tooth and Claw (Review)

Posted on February 7, 2013 by Darren

Tooth and Claw originally aired in 2006.

I want her to say “we are not amused.” I bet you five quid I can make her say it.

Well, if I gambled on that, it’d be an abuse of my privileges of traveller in time.

Ten quid?

Done.

– Rose and the Tenth Doctor are “cute”

There’s something quite interesting at the heart of Tooth and Claw, which might be the best “historical celebrity + monster” mash-up of the Davies era. It’s a wonderful pulpy genre hybrid run-around with Queen Victoria, ninja monks and a werewolf, but it’s also a quite interesting vehicle to explore the way that the show deals with historical characters. After all, Queen Victoria is a British icon, a monumentally important part of the British Empire. It would be tempting to reduce her to a bunch of catch-phrases and a stiff upper lip. It’s a testament to Davies as a writer that he can flesh her out a fully-drawn character.

However, there does seem to be something quite strange about a show that opens with a cheap shot at Margaret Thatcher only to wallow in the iconic status of Queen Victoria.

This year’s Bad Wolf is in Torchwood…

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Filed under: Television | Tagged: arts, bbc, British Empire, Dalek, Davies, doctor, DoctorWho, Ian Hanmore, John Conroy, literature, margaret thatcher, Muppet Movie, Parting of the Ways, Pauline Collins, Queen Victoria, rose, rose tyler, russell t. davies, science fiction, tardis, thatcher, Unearthly Child | Leave a comment »

Doctor Who: Horror of Fang Rock (Review)

Posted on February 6, 2013 by Darren

Horror of Fang Rock originally aired in 1977.

So you found the trouble then?

Yes, I always find trouble.

– Vince and the Doctor

The show was on something of a hot streak when Horror of Fang Rock aired. While producer Philip Hinchcliffe’s tenure on the show is roundly praised, and is a personal favourite, the standard of the show had been particularly high. The beloved Talons of Weng-Chiang had closed out the previous season, following hot-on-the-heels of the well-regarded Robots of Death – both classic and iconic stories that stand as the very best of Tom Baker’s time in the lead role. Horror of Fang Rockis right on up there, as perhaps one of the best gothic horrors that the series has ever produced.

Something wicked this way comes...

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Filed under: Television | Tagged: art, bbc, British humour, Doctor (Doctor Who), doctor who, DoctorWho, fiction, Horror of Fang Rock, Jon Pertwee, Online Writing, Paddy Russell, Philip Hinchcliffe, Pyramids of Mars, science fiction, The Horror of Fang Rock, Tom Baker, William Hartnell | Leave a comment »

Doctor Who: The Talons of Weng-Chiang (Review)

Posted on February 4, 2013 by Darren

The Talons of Weng-Chiang originally aired in 1977.

Ah! Eureka! Do you know what that is?

You ask me so that you can tell me.

That’s right. It’s a trionic lattice, an integral part of a time cabinet. It’s impossible to open it without it.

You mean it’s a key.

Yes. He’s not only a scientific fool, he’s an absent-minded one.

Perhaps he has another eureka.

No, eureka’s Greek for “this bath is too hot.”

– the Doctor and Leela

The Talons of Weng-Chiang is generally agreed to be one of the (if not the) greatest Doctor Who adventures ever produced. It tends to hover around the top of various official polls, with only Caves of Androzani and City of Death coming close to it in public opinion. As such, I feel a little bit guilty when I confess that it doesn’t rank as one of my absolute favourite adventures. I like it a great deal, I think it embodies a great deal of what works about the Philip Hinchcliffe era of the show. However, if I’m looking for a dark pseudo-historical adventure, I am more likely to pick either The Pyramids of Mars or The Horror of Fang Rock.

I can see why a lot of people respond to The Talons of Weng-Chiang, and it has a lot to recommend it, but there are a number of minor problems that hold the serial back from the cusp of perfection, in my opinion.