im currently watching doctor who almost done with season 3 of the newer ones and i have to say its been. i really enjoyed the first 2 seasons but this season has been sorta blah to me.
Finally wrapped up the Troughton era in my ongoing marathon to re-watch all of Doctor Who. No more missing episodes and no more black and white from here on in.
I was actually a little disappointed in Troughton's run. After hearing so much about it, I really thought I'd come out it with a new contender for favorite Doctor. While I still think Troughton is one of the best actors to ever take on the role, I feel that weak, repetitive stories undermine it all. He's trying his best, but week after week of aliens invading a base gets old fast. And the rest of the show never quite embraces the crazy, anarchic Doctor he's trying to deliver. It's easy to see why he packed it in after three years.
That said, if you've ever put off watching his final story, The War Games, because it seems daunting at ten episodes - go ahead and watch it. Having seen it this past weekend for the first time in twenty years, I found it to be one of the most exciting stories of the '60s, with surprisingly little filler to round out the running time.
Finally wrapped up the Troughton era in my ongoing marathon to re-watch all of Doctor Who. No more missing episodes and no more black and white from here on in.
I was actually a little disappointed in Troughton's run. After hearing so much about it, I really thought I'd come out it with a new contender for favorite Doctor. While I still think Troughton is one of the best actors to ever take on the role, I feel that weak, repetitive stories undermine it all. He's trying his best, but week after week of aliens invading a base gets old fast. And the rest of the show never quite embraces the crazy, anarchic Doctor he's trying to deliver. It's easy to see why he packed it in after three years.
That said, if you've ever put off watching his final story, The War Games, because it seems daunting at ten episodes - go ahead and watch it. Having seen it this past weekend for the first time in twenty years, I found it to be one of the most exciting stories of the '60s, with surprisingly little filler to round out the running time.
I'm watching the first five episodes of The War Games for this coming Friday's recording session. As we have done with previous story arcs that are longer than six episodes, we're splitting up our review over two podcast episodes. The previous story arc, The Space Pirates, was excruciatingly difficult to watch. Five out the six episodes are lost and the reconstruction of the missing material was borderline unwatchable. I was so glad to finish that story arc, for The Space Pirates part six marked the last of the lost episodes. From here on out, I won't have to contend with missing material. The War Games is complete, but I was really pissed to learn that it's not readily available. It wasn't on the major streaming services (e.g. Hulu+ or Netflix), and the region 1 DVD is out of circulation and ridiculously priced. Netflix offers the DVD for rental, but other than the Netflix DVD or unauthorized methods (Dailymotion etc.) the series is inexplicably out of circulation. After finally reaching a point where there are no more missing episodes, the last thing I was expecting was to have to contend with material that exists but, for whatever reason, is difficult to legitimately come by.
Patrick Troughton certainly has his ups and downs. I really enjoyed The Enemy of the World and The Web of Fear, but stories such as The Krotons and The Space Pirates, were no where near as fulfilling. Having now seen all but the aforementioned The War Games story arc, I can definitely see what people mean when they say Matt Smith patterned much of his Doctor's persona after Patrick. The second Doctor's hobo reputation is well-earned, but beneath the goofy exterior is a Doctor that is a force to be reckoned with. The second Doctor excels at giving those he meets a false sense of security by exuding the outward pretense that he's a bit of an ignoramus, when in fact his mind is just the opposite. I like that about him, and I liked it when Matt Smith took a similar approach with his portrayal of the Doctor.
I really need to start listening to that podcast. I downloaded a bunch of episodes, but after going through podcast burnout a couple years ago, I've found it difficult to pull myself away from listening to music on my iPod. I'm looking at my iPod now, and I'm just now realizing I don't even have my podcasts syncing up to it.
I liked Troughton's portrayal of The Doctor, but unfortunately by the time we get to a long block of episodes that aren't missing, he seems to have lost interest and goes more for laughs than play the mysterious schemer persona he developed in most of seasons four and five. There are times in season six when you can tell he's given up, and it's easy to see why he opted to not continue. He pulls things together for Mind Robber, Invasion, and War Games, but the whole time I watched The Dominators I found myself trying to guess when was the moment he decided he'd had enough.
Seasons five and six, although often fun, are also the seasons most geared towards children, with a monster invasion every week, and I think that format sells the show short. Yeah, I know the Pertwee era is pretty much going to be that plot every week, but at least the writers then seem to working with a more complex set of morals. In two stories I'll be watching The Doctor accuse the Brigadier of committing genocide for attacking the Silurians, which is a far cry from Troughton's Doctor helping a bunch of humans kill aliens every week.
The recon I watched for Space Pirates was brutal. I didn't catch this myself, but I'm told it used images from sources as random as Earthshock from the '80s in an attempt to give us some visuals. It even used a still photo of a character from the previous story to represent someone, the same photo every time. As missing stories go, that one is very missing. I suspect it's not as bad as people think, but unless more episodes turn up, we'll never know. As it stands, watching it feels like listening to a funny accent contest for two and a half hours.
Williams is coming. Maisie Williams, who plays Arya Stark in the popular HBO Game of Thrones adaptation, will have a guest stint on Doctor Who series 9.
You know, for all the talk of how garish Colin Baker's costume was, as I look at this image today, I find myself thinking it really didn't have that far to go. Obviously, Baker's is far worse than this, but Davison's outfit hasn't aged that well for me. It's not terrible, but it looks more like a costume than something one would actually wear. But that's kind of how everyone looked in that era. Unless you think it's normal that Adric would wear the same clothes for two seasons, or that Tegan would want to run around in an airline stewardess uniform for an extended length of time.
Next Thursday, Wit4D's coverage of Patrick Troughton's big sendoff begins. Due to The War Games being an exceptionally lengthy story arc, we'll be partitioning it over the course of two podcast sessions.
It feels good to finally hit the end of the lost episodes and the onset of Doctor Who in glorious color (or "colour", if you prefer).
It gets a lot easier once you hit the color episodes (and shorter seasons, as well). It took me a couple years of starting and stopping to get through Hartnell and Troughton. After a couple months I'm already nearing the halfway point of Pertwee's era.
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Oh well, if I'd been asleep, I wouldn't have made this.
This is a day I have both hoped for and dreaded. :D
I was actually a little disappointed in Troughton's run. After hearing so much about it, I really thought I'd come out it with a new contender for favorite Doctor. While I still think Troughton is one of the best actors to ever take on the role, I feel that weak, repetitive stories undermine it all. He's trying his best, but week after week of aliens invading a base gets old fast. And the rest of the show never quite embraces the crazy, anarchic Doctor he's trying to deliver. It's easy to see why he packed it in after three years.
That said, if you've ever put off watching his final story, The War Games, because it seems daunting at ten episodes - go ahead and watch it. Having seen it this past weekend for the first time in twenty years, I found it to be one of the most exciting stories of the '60s, with surprisingly little filler to round out the running time.
Patrick Troughton certainly has his ups and downs. I really enjoyed The Enemy of the World and The Web of Fear, but stories such as The Krotons and The Space Pirates, were no where near as fulfilling. Having now seen all but the aforementioned The War Games story arc, I can definitely see what people mean when they say Matt Smith patterned much of his Doctor's persona after Patrick. The second Doctor's hobo reputation is well-earned, but beneath the goofy exterior is a Doctor that is a force to be reckoned with. The second Doctor excels at giving those he meets a false sense of security by exuding the outward pretense that he's a bit of an ignoramus, when in fact his mind is just the opposite. I like that about him, and I liked it when Matt Smith took a similar approach with his portrayal of the Doctor.
https://www.facebook.com/wanderin4d
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Oh, and now for the reason I popped in here in the first place.
I liked Troughton's portrayal of The Doctor, but unfortunately by the time we get to a long block of episodes that aren't missing, he seems to have lost interest and goes more for laughs than play the mysterious schemer persona he developed in most of seasons four and five. There are times in season six when you can tell he's given up, and it's easy to see why he opted to not continue. He pulls things together for Mind Robber, Invasion, and War Games, but the whole time I watched The Dominators I found myself trying to guess when was the moment he decided he'd had enough.
Seasons five and six, although often fun, are also the seasons most geared towards children, with a monster invasion every week, and I think that format sells the show short. Yeah, I know the Pertwee era is pretty much going to be that plot every week, but at least the writers then seem to working with a more complex set of morals. In two stories I'll be watching The Doctor accuse the Brigadier of committing genocide for attacking the Silurians, which is a far cry from Troughton's Doctor helping a bunch of humans kill aliens every week.
The recon I watched for Space Pirates was brutal. I didn't catch this myself, but I'm told it used images from sources as random as Earthshock from the '80s in an attempt to give us some visuals. It even used a still photo of a character from the previous story to represent someone, the same photo every time. As missing stories go, that one is very missing. I suspect it's not as bad as people think, but unless more episodes turn up, we'll never know. As it stands, watching it feels like listening to a funny accent contest for two and a half hours.
This is what I came up with.
Maisie Williams, who plays Arya Stark in the popular HBO Game of Thrones adaptation, will have a guest stint on Doctor Who series 9.
It feels good to finally hit the end of the lost episodes and the onset of Doctor Who in glorious color (or "colour", if you prefer).