It's your 50th year in the business and you are about to appear as the Doctor in the 50th anniversary of Doctor Who. Both of you have had lots of reinventions. Is there a neat link there?
I'd never thought of that, but let's use it! Oh yes, there's a huge link definitely. But I had no idea that Doctor Who had got so huge; I just thought, "Brilliant, I'll be a Doctor!" I was suddenly – what do they call it? You start "trending". This is all new to me!
Is it a relief you can talk about your role, now that the costume designer let slip to the Prince of Wales that you play a "dark Doctor"?
Of course you have to remember that the Doctors are all one person, so I'm not outside of that. I can't talk about it, but I will say I was really impressed when I did it. Both the previous doctors – Matt Smith and David Tennant – boy, are they good at it. Whoa-wee! They are so quick, and there's a huge amount of learning and no time to learn it in. All that fake scientific nonsense. Terribly difficult to learn.
Have you met the Whovians?
I've done a couple of conferences where you sit and sign autographs for people and then you have photographs taken with them and a lot of them all dressed up in alien suits or Doctor Who whatevers. I was terrified of doing it because I thought they'd all be loonies, but they are absolutely, totally charming as anything. It's great fun. I'm not saying it's the healthiest thing – I don't know whether it is or isn't – but they are very charming.
I was really disappointed in most of Season 6... it might be my least favorite complete season of the entire new series. It gets off to a good start, and there's an episode or two in there I really enjoy (A Good Man Goes to War and Closing Time), but on the whole it didn't excite me much.
Season 7 has me conflicted... I enjoyed most of the first half up through the Christmas special, and the second half kicked off well, but everything after that mostly fell flat for me.
I was really disappointed in most of Season 6... it might be my least favorite complete season of the entire new series. It gets off to a good start, and there's an episode or two in there I really enjoy (A Good Man Goes to War and Closing Time), but on the whole it didn't excite me much.
Season 7 has me conflicted... I enjoyed most of the first half up through the Christmas special, and the second half kicked off well, but everything after that mostly fell flat for me.
It pains me to say it because I loved his earlier work so much, but I have not been a fan of the Moffat era so much. I liked Matt Smith well enough, but was never a fan of Amy or a lot of the stories they did. I think Clara is a decent companion but season 7 as a whole was probably the weakest so far. Maybe the new Doctor will shake things up a bit.
I was really disappointed in most of Season 6... it might be my least favorite complete season of the entire new series. It gets off to a good start, and there's an episode or two in there I really enjoy (A Good Man Goes to War and Closing Time), but on the whole it didn't excite me much.
Season 7 has me conflicted... I enjoyed most of the first half up through the Christmas special, and the second half kicked off well, but everything after that mostly fell flat for me.
It pains me to say it because I loved his earlier work so much, but I have not been a fan of the Moffat era so much. I liked Matt Smith well enough, but was never a fan of Amy or a lot of the stories they did. I think Clara is a decent companion but season 7 as a whole was probably the weakest so far. Maybe the new Doctor will shake things up a bit.
I've been watching two recent shows with Peter Capaldi featured; Torchwood:Children Of Tommorrow, and The Hour. He's an intense, tightly wound actor, tempered with a very dry wit. Certainly has me interested to see how this energy effects the new shows.
I was really disappointed in most of Season 6... it might be my least favorite complete season of the entire new series. It gets off to a good start, and there's an episode or two in there I really enjoy (A Good Man Goes to War and Closing Time), but on the whole it didn't excite me much.
Season 7 has me conflicted... I enjoyed most of the first half up through the Christmas special, and the second half kicked off well, but everything after that mostly fell flat for me.
It pains me to say it because I loved his earlier work so much, but I have not been a fan of the Moffat era so much. I liked Matt Smith well enough, but was never a fan of Amy or a lot of the stories they did. I think Clara is a decent companion but season 7 as a whole was probably the weakest so far. Maybe the new Doctor will shake things up a bit.
Smith is my least favorite of the three Doctors I've watched so far.
OTOH, I really like the River Song storyline. (Probably why the filler episodes frustrate me so.)
Series 6 is when the pacing of the episodes began to feel off for me. The template set by that first series - episode introducing companion (if needed); followed by an episode in the future then one in the past (although at least once they flipped this around, but they still make sure to give us a pair of episodes re-establishing the two most common types of stories we'll be seeing); then the first two-parter; then a mix of lighter episodes, with an occasional more character-oriented one thrown in; then the next two-parter; then the Doctor lite episode, then the two-part finale.
Admittedly, it began to get predictable, but it worked. Series 6 felt disjointed to me, and Series 7 never built any momentum. I wish they'd bring back the two-parters. It gives the bigger stories room to breathe, and eliminates a couple of the single episode fillers that we've had to suffer through. I'd rather have seen The Wedding of River Song expanded to two parts than waste time with The Curse of the Black Spot.
@chrisW The problem is, many people were complaining about there being too many arc-driven stories in Series 6. That's why Series 7 was entirely single episode stories.
@chrisW The problem is, many people were complaining about there being too many arc-driven stories in Series 6. That's why Series 7 was entirely single episode stories.
I feel like series 7 still ended up dwelling on the Clara arc, even in stories that didn't seem connected to it at all, like "Hide".
I suppose the main storyline dominated a little bit more than usual in 6, but the new series has always had some sort of over-arcing plot throughout each season - Bad Wolf, Torchwood, YANA, Doctor-Donna, The Crack, etc. And the two-parters don't even have to connect to the arc. Perhaps the problem with 6 is that even the two-parter that seemed to be a standalone ended up being tied to the main plot after all. I recall at the time feeling like each story was required to cater to Amy and her baby somehow, making them seem less important on their own.
I read an interview with Moffat in which he said the second parts of two-parters often see a dip in ratings, and that they don't end up actually saving money, which is another reason he supposedly phased them out. I don't know if they need to go back to doing three of them a season, but I do think a couple could make the seasons feel less jumpy. I felt very detached from series 7, without the excitement I usually feel as we get closer to the finale.
My problem with season 6 (and Moffat's time in general) wasn't so much the overarching storylines, it's that they'd build up and build up and then the final reveal would be rushed and/or disappointing (Let's Kill Hitler, in which EVERY mystery surrounding River was revealed in the space of a single episode, most of it with the cheesy, handwaving explanation of "um, she was conceived in the TARDIS, that's why", is the biggest example of this).
And then there are the plot points dropped altogether, like who blew up the TARDIS, and whose voice was it saying "Silence will fall"?
My problem with season 6 (and Moffat's time in general) wasn't so much the overarching storylines, it's that they'd build up and build up and then the final reveal would be rushed and/or disappointing (Let's Kill Hitler, in which EVERY mystery surrounding River was revealed in the space of a single episode, most of it with the cheesy, handwaving explanation of "um, she was conceived in the TARDIS, that's why", is the biggest example of this).
And then there are the plot points dropped altogether, like who blew up the TARDIS, and whose voice was it saying "Silence will fall"?
I think the "dropped" plot points you mention will actually come back in the Christmas special since they both relate to the end of the 11th doctor and were heavily connected to Trenzalore, which we saw in the most recent finale. But as to your point I whole heartedly agree. The show makes big promises early one and doesn't deliver, or delivers so late that the interest has subsided.
My problem with season 6 (and Moffat's time in general) wasn't so much the overarching storylines, it's that they'd build up and build up and then the final reveal would be rushed and/or disappointing (Let's Kill Hitler, in which EVERY mystery surrounding River was revealed in the space of a single episode, most of it with the cheesy, handwaving explanation of "um, she was conceived in the TARDIS, that's why", is the biggest example of this).
And then there are the plot points dropped altogether, like who blew up the TARDIS, and whose voice was it saying "Silence will fall"?
Which is one of the reasons why I'd like to see the two-parters come back. Series 5 ended on a much more satisfying note than 6 or 7, and I think allowing the finale to extend beyond one episode is a big reason why. The Wedding of River Song crammed so much in that I've actually forgotten most of it already.
I suppose I should reserve judgment on The Name of the Doctor, since there's a chance the next two specials may expand on it, but at the time, I found that rushed as well, with little chance for the drama to build enough for me to actually be concerned by the end.
And Let's Kill Hitler was such a mess. I had my problems with Davies, but I think under his reign, the revelation of where River had been hiding since the '70s would have been handled a lot better. Meaning, maybe we would have actually encountered the character earlier, rather than see them introduced and their secret revealed all in one episode.
Which is one of the reasons why I'd like to see the two-parters come back. Series 5 ended on a much more satisfying note than 6 or 7, and I think allowing the finale to extend beyond one episode is a big reason why. The Wedding of River Song crammed so much in that I've actually forgotten most of it already.
And Let's Kill Hitler was such a mess. I had my problems with Davies, but I think under his reign, the revelation of where River had been hiding since the '70s would have been handled a lot better. Meaning, maybe we would have actually encountered the character earlier, rather than see them introduced and their secret revealed all in one episode.
The Season 5 finale was so much fun! That first season had a few awkward moments, but I think it has been the best full season of Moffat's run so far, and that finale was a huge part of that. The revelation of Rory, the Stonehenge speech (Smith has never been more Doctor-y), the Pandorica reveal, the fez, the Dalek's reaction to River, the Doctor's "farewell" to Amy... so much awesome Who just in the space of those two episodes.
See, guys? I can say positive things about the Moffat version of the show! :D
Let's Kill Hitler, though... ugh. So much potential built up by A Good Man Goes to War, and most of it just squandered (to be fair, Rory gets some great moments). I was really hoping we'd get to see "evil" River kick around for a little bit, which would have been an amazing monkeywrench to throw into the works for their already bizarre relationship... not only would the Doctor have to figure out where in their respective timelines they both were, but he has to figure out whether this one is still trying to kill him or not!
Speaking of River... do the rest of you assume, as I do, that she had another adventure or two (at least) with Tennant's Doctor that we just didn't see because they weren't televised? In Silence in the Library, she clearly recognizes him and at first doesn't realize why he didn't recognize her. And when we see Smith's first episode with her, he's very annoyed to be introducing her to Amy, in a way that I wouldn't expect if the last time he had seen her he watched her die.
This is probably a question for our local Brits...
I've been catching up on the "Stripped for Action: The History of Doctor Who Comics" documentaries from the classic series DVD (most of which can be found on YouTube), and it got me thinking that although the stuff from the late 70s on (when Marvel started publishing Doctor Who Weekly) has been well-reprinted by the likes of Panini, IDW, and Marvel themselves, have the pre-Tom Baker Doctors' comic stories from the likes of TV Comic, TV Century 21, Countdown, etc ever been reprinted in collected form? I'd love to read some of those, particularly the Troughton and later Pertwee-era material, but I've only ever seen brief sample panels (like when the Time Lord-controlled scarecrows come to regenerate Troughton into Pertwee).
Some of the pre Fourth Doctor comics were collected by Marvel in Doctor Who Classic Comics http://www.comicbookdb.com/title.php?ID=588 Sadly those have not been traded and are hard to find now.
This is probably a question for our local Brits...
I've been catching up on the "Stripped for Action: The History of Doctor Who Comics" documentaries from the classic series DVD (most of which can be found on YouTube), and it got me thinking that although the stuff from the late 70s on (when Marvel started publishing Doctor Who Weekly) has been well-reprinted by the likes of Panini, IDW, and Marvel themselves, have the pre-Tom Baker Doctors' comic stories from the likes of TV Comic, TV Century 21, Countdown, etc ever been reprinted in collected form? I'd love to read some of those, particularly the Troughton and later Pertwee-era material, but I've only ever seen brief sample panels (like when the Time Lord-controlled scarecrows come to regenerate Troughton into Pertwee).
I read this as a teenager (and I probably still own it somewhere), and it included some pre-Baker comic stories. The reviews indicate it only includes one each of the first three Doctors, though, and I recall that some of them were more along the lines of illustrated stories than comics. It sprung to mind, though, because it's the only place I've ever encountered the older stories, and I'm fairly certain that at least one or two, if not all three, of those early Doctor stories are actual comics. I could swear I remember reading a Hartnell comic, but I'm drawing a blank on Troughton and Pertwee.
Found two issues of the Doctor Who Classic Comics magazine at my LCS today (#s 3 and 4, I think)... thanks for the heads up on these! Flipped through them briefly, they're mostly Pertwee stuff from Countdown, but there's some Troughton TV Comic stuff, too, and a few pages in each issue from the TV Century 21 Dalek strip, which looks amazing... that feature alone deserves a nice, oversized, archival-style reprint volume! Some of those pages are absolutely suitable for framing.
Six of the actors who have played Doctor Who's companions - Billie Piper (Rose Tyler), Karen Gillan (Amy Pond), Freema Agyeman (Martha Jones), Louise Jameson (Leela), Katy Manning (Jo Grant) and Carole Ann Ford (Susan Foreman) - discuss their experiences of the long-running BBC TV sci-fi show
Comments
From the people that brought you those Marvel/DC figurines:
http://dw-figurines.com/
It's legit.
https://www.facebook.com/BBCOne
Season 7 has me conflicted... I enjoyed most of the first half up through the Christmas special, and the second half kicked off well, but everything after that mostly fell flat for me.
OTOH, I really like the River Song storyline. (Probably why the filler episodes frustrate me so.)
Admittedly, it began to get predictable, but it worked. Series 6 felt disjointed to me, and Series 7 never built any momentum. I wish they'd bring back the two-parters. It gives the bigger stories room to breathe, and eliminates a couple of the single episode fillers that we've had to suffer through. I'd rather have seen The Wedding of River Song expanded to two parts than waste time with The Curse of the Black Spot.
I suppose the main storyline dominated a little bit more than usual in 6, but the new series has always had some sort of over-arcing plot throughout each season - Bad Wolf, Torchwood, YANA, Doctor-Donna, The Crack, etc. And the two-parters don't even have to connect to the arc. Perhaps the problem with 6 is that even the two-parter that seemed to be a standalone ended up being tied to the main plot after all. I recall at the time feeling like each story was required to cater to Amy and her baby somehow, making them seem less important on their own.
I read an interview with Moffat in which he said the second parts of two-parters often see a dip in ratings, and that they don't end up actually saving money, which is another reason he supposedly phased them out. I don't know if they need to go back to doing three of them a season, but I do think a couple could make the seasons feel less jumpy. I felt very detached from series 7, without the excitement I usually feel as we get closer to the finale.
discussing the Big Finish 50th anniversary special
And then there are the plot points dropped altogether, like who blew up the TARDIS, and whose voice was it saying "Silence will fall"?
I suppose I should reserve judgment on The Name of the Doctor, since there's a chance the next two specials may expand on it, but at the time, I found that rushed as well, with little chance for the drama to build enough for me to actually be concerned by the end.
And Let's Kill Hitler was such a mess. I had my problems with Davies, but I think under his reign, the revelation of where River had been hiding since the '70s would have been handled a lot better. Meaning, maybe we would have actually encountered the character earlier, rather than see them introduced and their secret revealed all in one episode.
See, guys? I can say positive things about the Moffat version of the show! :D
Let's Kill Hitler, though... ugh. So much potential built up by A Good Man Goes to War, and most of it just squandered (to be fair, Rory gets some great moments). I was really hoping we'd get to see "evil" River kick around for a little bit, which would have been an amazing monkeywrench to throw into the works for their already bizarre relationship... not only would the Doctor have to figure out where in their respective timelines they both were, but he has to figure out whether this one is still trying to kill him or not!
Here's another fantastic fan-produced Doctor Who title sequence:
I've been catching up on the "Stripped for Action: The History of Doctor Who Comics" documentaries from the classic series DVD (most of which can be found on YouTube), and it got me thinking that although the stuff from the late 70s on (when Marvel started publishing Doctor Who Weekly) has been well-reprinted by the likes of Panini, IDW, and Marvel themselves, have the pre-Tom Baker Doctors' comic stories from the likes of TV Comic, TV Century 21, Countdown, etc ever been reprinted in collected form? I'd love to read some of those, particularly the Troughton and later Pertwee-era material, but I've only ever seen brief sample panels (like when the Time Lord-controlled scarecrows come to regenerate Troughton into Pertwee).
There's another useful resource on the history of Doctor Who comics at http://www.alteredvistas.co.uk/html/comic_strip_index.html
which has full listings of the comics and articles about the different eras.
Only occasional panels to look at though.
Some of the pre Fourth Doctor comics were collected by Marvel in Doctor Who Classic Comics
http://www.comicbookdb.com/title.php?ID=588
Sadly those have not been traded and are hard to find now.
Likewise the highly regarded Dalek Chronicles comic strip was collected by Marvel UK in 1980
http://www.comicbookdb.com/issue.php?ID=40007
Again that is pretty pricy now
I would like to get hold of some myself, especially as my podcast British Invaders is planning a pair of episodes on Doctor Who comics next year.
amazon.com/Doctor-Who-Journey-Through-Time/dp/0517479818/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1380034545&sr=1-1&keywords=doctor+who+journey+through+time