No, haven’t seen “Planet of the Dead” yet, thanks for asking.
I watched “Waters of Mars” last month, but before I get too caught up in “The End of Time (But the Moment Has Been Prepared For)”, I figured I’d better put down at least a few thoughts on soggy Martians.
The ceefax of the matter: Ugh. Double-ugh. And not at all proper Doctor Who at the end.
For the detail, you’ll have to venture beyond the cut.
Most of “Waters of Mars” was okay. Nothing spectacular, for sure. RTD seems to have fallen into a rut, writing “spectacular” Doctor Who, so it’s a good thing indeed that the door is about to formally slap him on the bottom on his way out. Oh, and what does his rut consist of? Thought you’d never ask.
- Giving all the expendible characters one character moment that’s supposed to make you care about them before they get killed off.
- Killing off most of the guest cast, just to Heighten the Drama and Inject a Sense of Urgency.
- Making a horrific threat to an entire civilisation that could wipe them out forever and ever.
- Sacrificing the Lead Chick in a noble (or, once, if you consider “Journey’s End,” a Noble) way, because, hell yeah, any Lead Chick Who Isn’t Rose would off herself just because it’s for the Doctor’s ever-growing emo.
- Ending the mess with the Doctor being even more emo than before.
All those elements were present in “Waters of Mars,” along with plot points stolen from previous RTD episodes. Still, Rusty seems only able to plagerize himself these days, instead of coming up with something new. (Sure, there are only so many plot points in the world, but his self-canabilization is ridiculous!)
But, you know, I was pretty willing to forgive the usual RTD “spectaucular” tale– and the needless running back and forth between domes that had to have been an hommage to the Pertwee era– because the visuals blew me away. Doctor Who has never looked so breathtakingly eerie and creepy before this story! The impact to the eyeballs more than made up for the sameness of story.
Well, until the “Time Lord Victorious” crap came along.
W.
T.
F??????????
Things were going along smoothly, and then BAM, the Doctor’s suddenly possessed by the Emo Misagenda of Andrew Cartmel. *shudder* I abhor the Dark Doctor of the last McCoy series and of the New Adventures books; I see it as no more than catering to twenty-something fanboys who are embarrassed by still liking a family show, and so have to make it more acceptable by making the show’s main character more emo, more depressing, more “grown-up” like themselves. That’s totally not my take on what Doctor Who is, and it’s that interpretation of the Time Lord that pretty much drove me out of active fandom for awhile twenty years ago.
This whole sudden “Oh, hai guyz, I’m the last of the Time Lords and I’m going to put things right like I’m a god ’cause I can” has pissed me off. I don’t care if it’s perhaps an attempt to get us to be glad to see the Tenth Doctor go. I don’t like it!
I’m not even going to go into how Adelide’s somewhat on-camera suicide was all kinds of inappropriate for a family show in general, and Doctor Who in particular. It left a really, really bad taste in my mouth.
At this point, I am going to watch “The End Of Time As We Know It” for Wilf, for Donna, for Sarah’s cameo, and for John Simm chewing up the scenery (which always rocks my world, and was the only thing that really saved “The Last of the Time Lords” for me). I’m thinking I’m not going to get much enjoyment over seeing the last of the Tenth Doctor, because I already want there to be Eleven, with Moffat in charge, becuae Moffat gets the show in a way RTD really can’t.
Posted by JennAK in Ongoing Storm