Doctor Who: Season 4

[Maltaran]

[quote name='potsherds' post='1341379' date='May 4 2008, 06.45']Ok, I wanna know from the folks that've watched Doctor Who for decades...who the hell is the mother of his daughter? Or is she some sort of clone-type thing? Or is she from a future uh, pairing (Rose? she's got blonde hair...)? I'm struggling with whether or not this was really a good move, adding children of the Doctor into the show. Now, I know when it first started, the Doctor apparently had a grand-daughter, but I personally never figured out if this was true in actuality, or simply the story the two of them stuck to...in other words, was it later retconned? (Did I spell that right?)[/quote]

No idea. Possibly Romana?

The reason Susan was the Doctor's granddaughter was because the producers back in the sixties thought that an old man and a young girl travelling together would be creepy if they weren't related.

[Sir Thursday]

[quote name='potsherds' post='1341379' date='May 4 2008, 06.45']Yeah, I saw that it was Rose shouting "Docta!!!!" (British accent included in the word. :P)

Ok, I wanna know from the folks that've watched Doctor Who for decades...who the hell is the mother of his daughter? Or is she some sort of clone-type thing? Or is she from a future uh, pairing (Rose? she's got blonde hair...)? I'm struggling with whether or not this was really a good move, adding children of the Doctor into the show. Now, I know when it first started, the Doctor apparently had a grand-daughter, but I personally never figured out if this was true in actuality, or simply the story the two of them stuck to...in other words, was it later retconned? (Did I spell that right?)

C'mon folks. This ep was decent enough I want people posting in this thread and answering my questions! :pirate:[/quote]

I really hate the way all the companions seem to have been told to pronounce "DOCTOR!" the same way when they're yelling it at the top of their lungs. It just sounds fake to me for some reason.

It would seem far more logical to me that she was some sort of clone than that she was his actual daughter. I seriously doubt the writers would dredge up some backstory from aeons ago for this, and I don't think there's been any getting it on between the doctor and anyone we've seen in the modern reincarnation. So given that it's not an exact clone of the Doctor, I can only assume that some advanced people the Doctor has come into contact with took some of his genetic material and spliced it with someone elses. I'm going to go ahead and wildly speculate that they saw two travellers coming out of the Tardis and took material from both, just to be sure and that his companion at the time was Rose. Thereby creating the Daughter we saw in the preview. That would mean probably bringing back something from one of the first two seasons...perhaps the first episode of Season 2? They were in a medical lab then...


Sir Thursday

[potsherds]

[quote name='Maltaran' post='1341495' date='May 4 2008, 11.42']The reason Susan was the Doctor's granddaughter was because the producers back in the sixties thought that an old man and a young girl travelling together would be creepy if they weren't related.[/quote]
Yep, I know. I was wondering if that was ever retconned, though.

[quote name='Sir Thursday' post='1341515' date='May 4 2008, 12.59']It would seem far more logical to me that she was some sort of clone than that she was his actual daughter. I seriously doubt the writers would dredge up some backstory from aeons ago for this, and I don't think there's been any getting it on between the doctor and anyone we've seen in the modern reincarnation. So given that it's not an exact clone of the Doctor, I can only assume that some advanced people the Doctor has come into contact with took some of his genetic material and spliced it with someone elses. I'm going to go ahead and wildly speculate that they saw two travellers coming out of the Tardis and took material from both, just to be sure and that his companion at the time was Rose. Thereby creating the Daughter we saw in the preview. That would mean probably bringing back something from one of the first two seasons...perhaps the first episode of Season 2? They were in a medical lab then...[/quote]
Ok, this honestly makes the most sense.

[Sir Thursday]

Well, I kind of liked that episode. It was slightly too predictable what with Jenny getting shot and everything, but they definitely did the right thing in keeping her alive - to be honest I was rather sorry that it wasn't Tate who took the bullet so we could be rid of her and just have the Doctor travelling around with his daughter instead. You'd still get the non-romantic dynamic, but with someone far more agreeable (both in personality and looks).

I'm still slightly confused as to how the Tardis got dragged there...at the end the Doctor mentioned something about the hand taking them there, but that still seems a little wishy washy. It sounded like he was trying to suggest that there would have been some form of time paradox if she hadn't died, but I don't see where it would arise from. Maybe they were trying to set up some plot point about the paradox of Jenny's existence causing the universes to begin to bleed into one another? [/grasping at straws] If so, they didn't do it very well.


The thing that bugged me the most was that Martha could understand what her Hath friend was bubbling on about - made no sense and wasn't properly explained. 7 days does seem a bit dubious for such memory loss to have gone on for, but I suppose it's possible if they were going through 20 generations a day...you'd think it would be possible for someone to survive for a week though.

Anyhow, Agatha Christie next week. Perhaps the Doctor is going to be the inspiration for Poirot? Does seem a bit farfetched...


Sir Thursday


EDIT: And they went with the "Oh, we're not a couple" thing again...definitely a running joke now. Surprised they didn't slide it into the Sontaran two parter at some point.

[Tsoert]

Twas a decent episode but yet again, whenever Catherine Tate was onscreen I wanted to stick needles in my ears and gouge out both ears. Thank god they're bringing back Rose eventually this season.

I would think that the reason they all sound the same when shouting "DOCTOR" is that they're all cockney. If you had a Northerner, rather than "DOCTAAAA" it'd be "DOCTEEEEEEER". Maybe new version of Dr Who prefers the Londoners?

[Lightsnake]

I'd take Donna over Rose any day. I was so disappointed that annoying little Sue didn't bite it in season 2...

[Derfel Cadarn]

Not a bad episode. Interesting in that the Doctor's reference to having had children is the closest yet to a confirmation that Susan was his biological granddaughter. Also interesting is that Jenny having two hearts shoots down the theory that Time Lords only grow their second heart after their first regeneration (in response to heart singular being used in reference to the first doctor).

/endgeek

[potsherds]

So, er, she came back to life...from the terraforming gas-stuff? Or have I simply never noticed that Timelords exhale/inhale (?) multi-colored gases when they come back to life...and if so, why didn't she regenerate then? :huh:

Seven days was soooooo lame. I mean, seriously. A month or two would be much more believable. Hello, [i]someone[/i] must've survived long enough to know how the whole damned thing started, like that old general. Folks didn't come out of those magic test-tubes at 50 years of age, you know.

Anyone got any guesses when little miss Timelord shows up again? I'd say either somewhere in the last four eps of this season.

[felice]

Yep, magic terraforming gas can do anything. This show doesn't even try to make stories that stand up to the lightest of logical scrutiny 8(

[Sir Thursday]

Well I thought that last episode was the best of the Season so far. Light hearted and entertaining, it was full of homages to Agatha Christie's works - I liked the way the characters continually put the names of her novels into the dialogue. There were some hilarious bits - like when the characters were giving their alibis (the bit when the Doctor sits down in the chair and starts to reminisce was awesome too: "I was hunting Charlemagne after he'd been captured by an insane computer..." :D) and the poisoning scene. The structure was reminiscent of Agatha Christie's format as well, especially with the reveal at the end. The Doctor really needs to work on pointing at the right person :P.

And the next ep. was written by Stephen Moffat, so it's bound to be good - IMO he's written some of the best episodes of the new series ([i]Blink[/i],[i]The Girl in the Fireplace[/i], the WW2 two parter from Season 1). Things are looking up :).


Sir Thursday

[Jon AS]

I thought this episode was pretty good as well, but I think they should try to break out of their formula sometime. Not every episode that takes place in the past or present must include aliens (well, except for a certain timelord, obviously) to be interesting and fun.

[potsherds]

Yeah, this ep was ok. I'm still waiting for a 'good' ep though, which hasn't happened yet.

[williamjm]

[quote name='Sir Thursday' post='1359634' date='May 18 2008, 16.00'](the bit when the Doctor sits down in the chair and starts to reminisce was awesome too: "I was hunting Charlemagne after he'd been captured by an insane computer..." :D)[/quote]

That bit was definitely amusing. Overall it was entertaining I guess, although the plotting was excessively silly even by Dr Who standards and the charades scene was painfully bad.

[Sir Thursday]

[quote name='williamjm' post='1359875' date='May 19 2008, 00.28']That bit was definitely amusing. Overall it was entertaining I guess, although the plotting was excessively silly even by Dr Who standards and the charades scene was painfully bad.[/quote]


I didn't think the plotting was all that bad. The problem they were always going to have when doing something like this was one of time - when you see an adaptation of a Christie novel on screen, it tends to be more in the region of an hour and a half as opposed to 45 minutes, because that's how long you need to get all the motives and the like in and to throw a few red herrings about the place. Given the constraints, I thought they followed the Christie formula very well - they introduced the characters, murder, found some clues, another murder, had an attempt to mislead (or in this case get rid of) the sleuth, then went into the group reveal scene at the end. The Vespiform's motivation was rather sketchy, I suppose, but apart from that it all hung together fairly well. As I said before, the Doctor's delivery was not up to Poirot's high standards, but it just about worked.

In terms of obviousness, I had it pegged as soon as they'd gone through their alibi visions (the Reverend (Film and Movie News Guy from Broken News! Awesome!)(Nested Parentheses for the win!) being the only one whose vision matched up with what he was saying). But they sprinkled just enough peripheral stuff in to keep it interesting, though they could have done with a little more (the Unicorn needed a bit more development, and probably the gay guy as well).


Sir Thursday

[Amras]

All my favourite Dr. Who episodes are written by Steven Moffat. "Blink", "Girl in the Fireplace" et cetera... which is why I'm glad he's taking over for Davies as the [url="http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2008/may/20/bbc.television2"]show's executive producer[/url].

[potsherds]

[quote name='Amras' post='1362235' date='May 20 2008, 18.26']All my favourite Dr. Who episodes are written by Steven Moffat. "Blink", "Girl in the Fireplace" et cetera... which is why I'm glad he's taking over for Davies as the [url="http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2008/may/20/bbc.television2"]show's executive producer[/url].[/quote]
Thank the gods. I hope that means some general improvement in the show, because this season is way to slap-stick stupid for my tastes, without an ounce of sense.

[williamjm]

[quote name='Amras' post='1362235' date='May 20 2008, 18.26']All my favourite Dr. Who episodes are written by Steven Moffat. "Blink", "Girl in the Fireplace" et cetera... which is why I'm glad he's taking over for Davies as the [url="http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2008/may/20/bbc.television2"]show's executive producer[/url].[/quote]

It does sound like good news - [i]Blink[/i] in particular shows a much better understanding of how to make a good Dr Who episode than 95% of the rest of the rest of the seasons more episodes of that quality would make the show a lot better (although obviously they'd have to have the Doctor in them more than Blink did).

[potsherds]

[quote name='williamjm' post='1362694' date='May 20 2008, 21.43']It does sound like good news - [i]Blink[/i] in particular shows a much better understanding of how to make a good Dr Who episode than 95% of the rest of the rest of the seasons more episodes of that quality would make the show a lot better (although obviously they'd have to have the Doctor in them more than Blink did).[/quote]
"Blink" and "Girl in the Fireplace" were two of the best eps that easily come to my mind. I'll take more of their ilk, even with less of the Doctor. Seriously, even [i]he[/i] is starting to annoy me this season.

[Sir Thursday]

I'm hoping that with Moffat in charge we might see some original villains that last for more than one episode. Russell T. Davies has relied on the 'classics' too much, the Daleks in particular. I want to see some new bad guys, and I think Moffat can deliver that, or at least is far more likely to deliver. Whether or not the quality of the average episode will improve, I don't know - Moffat's not going to be writing every episode after all.

In lieu of this announcement, it makes slightly more sense that Moffat was able to change the script to allow the Doctor's Daughter to survive - if he's going to be taking over the show, presumably he wants to have a recurring character there already. Perhaps we're going to see more of Jenny in Season 5? (I think she'd be much better than Tate, but then pretty much anyone would).

Sir Thursday

[Dornish]

[quote name='Amras' post='1362235' date='May 20 2008, 12.26']All my favourite Dr. Who episodes are written by Steven Moffat. "Blink", "Girl in the Fireplace" et cetera... which is why I'm glad he's taking over for Davies as the [url="http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2008/may/20/bbc.television2"]show's executive producer[/url].[/quote]Favorite doesn't enter into it. The best five episodes of the new series are as follows (reverse chronological order):
1. Blink - Moffat
2. Human Nature/Family of Blood - Paul Cornell
3. Girl in the Fireplace - Moffat
4. The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances - Moffat
5. Father's Day - Paul Cornell

I'll grant that Cornell's emotional style doesn't appeal to everyone, but anyone disagreeing with the Moffat episodes is wrong. This is the best thing that possibly could have happened to the show and I'm completely giddy over it! I'm grateful for what RTD did to revive the series but he needed to move on, and the sooner the better.