Thursday 26 December 2019

BOOK OF LISTS: CHRISTMAS SPECIALS - FROM WORST TO BEST: PART 5

At last, we have reached the conclusion of our latest end-of-year countdown. These last few stories are strong enough that I don't even view them with the sort of lowered standards that I have for most Christmas Specials. We've got some plots that are strong enough that they would've worked just fine as actual "proper" episodes. Number One, in fact, is such a strong story that I might almost label it a Classic. 



PART FIVE: THE TRULY EXCEPTIONAL STUFF

These are the Christmas Specials that can truly stand on their own two feet. We don't need to say: "Well, it's Christmas - let's be a bit forgiving." They really are very strong stories that can be viewed with little or no context. They're just genuinely enjoyable.



The Christmas Invasion 

One of the rare instances where RTD takes a genuine chance with a Christmas Special. For the most part, the Specials he wrote had little or no bearing on the general canon of the show. Most years, you can skip the Specials and it would have negligible effect on what was going on in the proper seasons.  But Christmas Invasion introduces a new Doctor for the very first time in New Who. To do something at a time when casual viewers might be tuning in just for fun was quite bold. While I am only so happy with a lot of the output from his era, I must applaud him on this occasion.

Christmas Invasion does feel a lot like Castrovalva. Much of the story hangs on the point that the Doctor is very weak and can't really help out with what's happening. That, if anything, the companions must take care of him. I particularly enjoy this sort of reversal of the formula. Most of the time, the Doctor is in control and saving the day. The rare instances where he must rely upon the care and diligence of his companions makes for some interesting story-telling. It's nice when the show decides, once in a while, that he's genuinely ineffectual for a time and must rely on the tender mercies of his friends.

Naturally enough, the Doctor does come back to consciousness at just the right moment. This is what earns this story a lot of its points. Even as he emerges from the TARDIS, it's quite exhilarating (thanks Murray Gold). The next twenty minutes or so might be the coolest introduction to a new Doctor, ever. Tennant is pretty damned amazing here. He jumps between dealing with the Syrorax Leader and various personal and/or vanity issues with such smoothness that we can't help but be amazed. RTD writes him a very tricky scene but he knocks it out of the ballpark. His fast-paced delivery is absolute perfection. The jokes are great fun too (love when he realizes he's quoting The Lion King!). His hand growing back after its been chopped off is sheer coolness. This really is all very solid. For the New Who fan that is experiencing regeneration for the first time, this scene must have put their worries to rest. Even if they did fall in love with Eccleston, this new guy seems pretty awesome.

Christmas Invasion's only real sore point is that it, perhaps, takes a bit too long to get to this magnificent sequence. It's that usual problem of not quite having enough story to fill the hour so we have to watch Rose keep pleading with the Doctor's unconscious form to wake up.It might have been better to just make the story 50 minutes long and have the Doctor wake up sooner.

Quite honestly, if this one problem had been corrected at the writing stage, it probably would have made it to Number One on this list.



Last Christmas 

We could very easily dismiss this story as just being a hybrid of the movie Inception and the Aliens franchise but it is so much more than that. If anything, it's delightfully bizarre. Could an actual Doctor Who adventure starring Santa Claus be anything else?!

Well, if we want to be honest, it could be one other thing: it could have been really stupid. But Moff does this great job of keeping Santa fictional without actually admitting to the younger viewers that he might not be real. All the jokes with Santa and the elves all seem to land quite well and really add to the story. There is a lot of comedy to this Special because of this. But it never seems to get truly out-of-hand. There's also plenty of drama to counterpoint it all. Clara getting one more Christmas with Danny is especially touching. Danny explaining what Christmas is truly about is actually genuinely profound. The sleigh ride they take as they re-gain consciousness is another nice moment that tugs at the heartstrings. Discovering that one of the characters in the dreamscape is actually wheelchair-bound in real life really plays upon our emotions. I was both dismayed and impressed by Moffat's sadism as this revelation is made.

Of course, the real thrust of Last Christmas is the characters trying to escape from the shared dream they are trapped in. Like Inception, they get several layers deep and must struggle multiple times with determining whether or not they are finally back in the real world or still dreaming. The plot device does come perilously close to being abused but I do find it's just a bit shy of going too far with it. If the scene with Clara as an older woman had gone on any longer than it had, I might have gotten tired of the whole thing. But Santa popping in like he does and dispelling the dream happens at just the right moment. And it is kinda cool to watch the Doctor shrug off his face-hugger one more time and save Clara who is now at her normal age.

I suppose fans who weren't enjoying Clara as a companion were probably not happy with that last scene of her returning to the TARDIS - but I quite liked it. The end of Series Eight with both Clara and the Doctor fibbing to each other and parting ways was beautiful. I don't feel, however, that their reunion in the Christmas Special cheapens that moment. If anything, it would have been a bit of a shame if things had truly finished that way with them. Santa helping to bring them back together genuinely worked for me.

Most importantly, though, Last Christmas is a really solid story. It executes a great balance between comedy, absurdity, drama and creepiness. The plot doesn't become too complicated for a Christmas Special but we also feel like we're getting a real episode rather than a fluff-piece. This makes me happier than anything, really. There's enough content to fill the running time. Which is especially impressive since it does all move at a pretty damned brisk pace.

It would be a shame to conclude this without giving Nick Frost huge props for his portrayal as Santa.Claus. Not only does he have the perfect name for an actor to play Santa - but he really does magnificently with the role. Yes, he's very smarmy most of the time - but he still gives some softer edges to the character where it's needed. In many ways, he's the perfect interpretation of a modern-day Saint Nick. Everyone who has stopped believing in him because they think they've become too cool are made to feel uncool. In fact, throughout the entire episode, Santa is the coolest guy in the room.

And that's the way it should be.



A Christmas Carol 

When Russell T. Davies brought Doctor Who back, he made a number of bold changes with the format. Perhaps the biggest one was to give certain episodes a lot more emotional resonance. Or, as we prefer to say, he gave the show more "feels". This met with limited success. We did have stories like Father's Day where I am still reduced to a quivering mess every time I watch it. But we also got stories like Fear Her - an episode that clearly seems to say: "We've run out of budget. Maybe, if we get everyone to cry, they won't notice!"

As Moff took over as Head Writer, he made sure to not throw the baby out with the bathwater. Doctor Who would still have emotional episodes, but they would be more carefully crafted. A Christmas Carol is an excellent example of this. This is a story that succeeds mainly on the premise that it plays a lot with our feelings. But, unlike some of the tales during the RTD era, it still makes sure to have a real plot on top of that. It's not an extremely complicated storyline, but it's still there. And it drives the episode along so that the more emotional aspects of the adventure can take center stage and work well.   

As has been often pointed out by people who made the episode, the big difference between Kazran and other baddies in Who is displayed in that crucial moment where he stops himself from striking a child who has raised his ire. The Doctor realizes, when he sees that happen, that he is not dealing with a proper Who villain. Kazran is someone who is not beyond redemption and must, therefore, be handled in a new way. As he hears Christmas Carols a short while later, he is inspired with an outlandish strategy. 

Re-writing Kazran's personal history is a great little ride. This is Matt Smith's first Christmas Special and he really has a great time with it. He is particularly enjoyable in the sequences with Kazran as a young boy. In fact, it's hard to determine who the actual child is! As their Christmas tradition continues, the Doctor takes on an almost Santa-like quality in the story. The tale becomes more and more tinged with sadness as Kazran does like we all do with Santa and outgrows him. 

Like Last Christmas, much praise must be heaped on to the main guest actor. Michael Gambon does such a good double-role in this story that we forget that he is playing his own father in flashback sequences. His most impressive work in the story, however, is when he starts looking through the old pictures of a past he never had. This is an extremely abstract sequence for an actor to execute. He is a man who is, literally, getting a soul. But Gambon handles it with incredible talent and presence.

It's during those scenes where Kazran starts to get his past re-written that the Special starts to "turn on the waterworks", for me. While RTD tends to be a lot more "shmaltzy" when he tries to hit us in the feels, Moff really shows some genuine maturity. He appeals to the adult in all of us in those scenes. We think of our own moments where we may have lost a bit of our soul as we grew up and how, maybe, we also need to make similar efforts to restore ourselves. It's a sentiment I never expected to see expressed in a Doctor Who story. Which is part of what gets this Special to rank so highly for me.

And then we finally get to the story's climax. Moff cast a vocalist in a key role and takes full advantage of that choice. The Doctor fidgeting with the sound gear as Abigail starts singing and Kazran looks on sadly really is an iconic moment. To me, if this sequence doesn't reduce you to tears, then maybe you're suffering from the same problem Kazran had. Maybe you need a soul.


And... that's it. We made it through all the Christmas Specials and ranked them. I'm not sure how much you may have agreed with these choices, but I hope you enjoyed how I explained them. 

It's Boxing Day as I wrap this up so I wish all off you a Happy New Year. Thanks, as always, for coming to this site. The hits I see always warm my heart! 

Missed the other installments? Here's Part 1: 
https://robtymec.blogspot.com/2019/11/book-of-lists-christmas-specials-from.html

Part 2: 
https://robtymec.blogspot.com/2019/11/book-of-lists-christmas-specials-from_24.html

Part 3: 
https://robtymec.blogspot.com/2019/12/book-of-lists-christmas-specials-from.html

Part 4: 
https://robtymec.blogspot.com/2019/12/book-of-lists-christmas-specials-from_19.html










Thursday 19 December 2019

BOOK OF LISTS: CHRISTMAS SPECIALS - FROM WORST TO BEST: PART 4

We're finally getting to some Christmas Specials that have assailed the more common pitfall that most of them fall into: there's actually enough plot to sustain the hour! Also, I think you'll notice a fairly obvious common theme between the next two stories that are listed.    



PART FOUR: THE REGENERATION SPECIALS

Deciding to regenerate the Doctor during a Christmas Special is a pretty bold choice. As I've mentioned several times already, there's a certain amount of "fluff" that's required in these episodes. Plenty of people who don't follow the show consistently are suddenly tuning in to enjoy it on Christmas Day. They're watching because it's become a bit of a Christmas tradition rather than the fact they're legitimate fans of the show. So things have to be kept fairly accessible. 

But regenerating a Doctor is all about fan service. We're saying goodbye to the latest incarnation and getting a glimpse of what the new one has to offer. Not a process you want to put in front of a casual viewer. And yet, Moffat took that risk twice with Christmas Specials. 

Astoundingly enough, I'm very pleased with both his efforts. They were great send-offs that still maintained that basic appeal that all Christmas Specials must have. In both of these stories, he maintained an excellent balance between those two polarities. 



Time of the Doctor 

There's a lot riding on this particular Special. On a personal level, Matt Smith is my favorite New Series Doctor (thus far - read about my Eleventh Doctor Love here: http://robtymec.blogspot.com/2016/12/book-of-lists-doctors-from-worst-to_31.html). I needed to see him get the send-off that he deserved. For me, the story required some real weight. I was going to legitimately grieve his passing so I felt that there needed to be some solid gravitas going on as he took his final bow.

But, beyond my own personal predilections, there was a certain level of build-up that Moffat had created for fandom regarding the Eleventh Doctor's departure. His era was heavily influenced by events that were meant to take place during his final days. For three seasons, we had heard all sorts of foreshadowing concerning Cracks in Time, the Silence and Trenzalore. References made to these things had been enigmatic, at best. Time of the Doctor had to finally give us some answers.

It came as no surprise that Moff subverted expectations a bit. We were all presuming this final story would be huge and epic. In some ways, it was. We got appearances from some of the Doctor's greatest enemies, Gallifrey really was returning and all these great questions that had been teased out for several years were getting, more or less, answered (some got clearer answers than others).

But, rather than get too epic, Moff gives us a very different point of emphasis in this tale. Time of the Doctor, more than anything, is about the Doctor's simple choice to defend a small town for as long as he can. I'm quite glad that our Head Writer made this choice with this Doctor's departure. It proudly displays the core issues of the Doctor's ethos. He doesn't, necessarily, expect to save the entire universe all of the time. But if he can make a bit of a difference to even some people, if he just saves even a small handful of lives - that's reason enough for him to stay. The scene where he explains this ideology to Clara is truly beautiful. Quite possibly, one of the best moments Doctor Eleven gets during his entire reign. 

Watching him legitimately stop and stay in one place was, in many ways, quite shocking. But, once more, there's a beauty to all this.We watch him age but he still seems content. He's living out the ideology he expressed to Clara and it's all quite moving. We see some interesting aspects to the character that are often concealed because of his endless wanderlust. For once, the Doctor doesn't just take off after the Big Mess is cleaned up. He's staying for good.

Which leads to what I probably love best about this Special. As much as I enjoy "the feels" of this episode, the fanboy in me is still what cries loudest. And Moff satisfies him in the most impressive of ways. Our Head Writer stares straight into the face of a major continuity issue and deals with it.

With the creation of a "secret incarnation" in the Time Wars and the very silly regeneration that RTD does in the Series Four finale, the Doctor was now on his final life. This needed to be addressed. Moff could've chickened his way out and said the Tennant regeneration didn't count. Or he could have just hoped none of us were keeping track. But he didn't. He came up with a solution to extend the Doctor's lives indefinitely (who knows, for sure, how many regenerations the Time Lords have given him?). More importantly, he wrote a story where the Doctor comes to terms with his mortality and makes a profound choice on how he'd like to spend his remaining days. He accepts his destiny for the sake of protecting a group of people in a terrible situation. Not only does this summarize the character in a wonderful way, but important canon gets taken care of at the same time. As a geek, I couldn't ask for anything better.

Is there anything about Time of the Doctor that rubs me the wrong way? Regeneration energy being able to take out a huge Dalek Mothership does seem a little on the improbable side. I suppose since it is a whole new regeneration cycle, I can - sort of - accept it. A new cycle might have a lot more energy, I guess. It still comes across as a bit ludicrous. But, how else do you get rid of a Dalek Mothership with only minutes left in the episode?!

But I'm still very happy with a lot of this Special. It is a very good send-off for my (so far) favorite New Series Doctor. His final speech is definitely way better than the intensely angsty: "I don't want to go."!



Twice Upon a Time 

Another Special that had a lot riding on it. Not only does it send off Capaldi's Doctor, but it also says farewell to Steven Moffat and his entire production team. It's even the last story for Murray Gold. A lot is coming to a close, here. As the final tale in what I felt was a definite Golden Age for the show (others might argue, of course - but they always do!), I needed to see something glorious before it ends once and for all. 

Twice Upon a Time steps up to the plate quite nicely and delivers what the end of an era needs. While it may have made the show a little inaccessible to the casual viewer (which seemed to reflect in the ratings), I do like that Moff really goes fanboy as his era wraps up. Not only do we get a multi-incarnation story in the last episode, but the two episodes before that feature a Genesis of the Cybermen stoyline with two incarnations of the Master also re-uniting. As someone who has a great love for the whole history of the show, I couldn't ask for much better. 

Because I'm such a hardcore fanboy, I fall in love with this particular Special right from its opening sequence. The combination of original and re-created footage from Tenth Planet is, pretty much, a sheer work of art. The rest of the story could have been complete crap (and some would say it is!) and it would still probably rank pretty highly on this list just because of that opening! 

I do enjoy what we get in the rest of the episode, though. Mark Bradley re-creates the First Doctor magnificently. Like Hurndall, he puts a bit of his own spin on the character but it still remains a loving tribute that would have made Grumpy Old Bill proud were he around to see it. I really liked the idea of having both incarnations making a conscious decision not to regenerate. It was a very interesting character nuance. I also think Capaldi delivered the best "final speech" a Doctor has ever given. The bit about children sometimes being able to hear his name was particularly beautiful. To me, it says so much about what Doctor Who is truly about. Most of us first encounter it when we're kids. Some of us "get it" and fall madly in love with it. It's a very clever piece of writing that Capaldi does a great job of bringing to life.

The fact that there isn't actually a proper villain in Twice Upon a Time, to me, was particularly brilliant. We've had stories where there were antagonists more than villains creating conflict (Inferno springs particularly to mind - Stalhman is an asshole but I wouldn't call him full-on evil), but we've never had something where there just isn't a true baddie at all. The whole plot is just a misunderstanding between good people. It does feel ever-so-slightly threadbare but the novelty of it all helps to make up for it. 

There were quite a bit of complaints from fans about the first Doctor's sexism. The truth of the matter is, however, that he did have some pretty conservative views, sometimes. Moff using the "smacked bottom" threat was a good way of reminding us that he wasn't making this up. He had actually made a similar threat to Susan. If I was bothered by anything - it was how hard this trait was pushed to the forefront. Yes, Doctor One could be a bit narrow in his views from time-to-time - but he never made so many comments of that nature in so short of a time. This is where I find Moff's depiction to be inaccurate. In his actual era, this incarnation was a bit sexist. In the Special, he comes across as a huge chauvinist.

My only other complaint about this story is quite petty. I'm not particularly fond of the score, in places. I would have been happier if Murray Gold had tried harder to compose more original music and not tried so hard to give us a sort of "greatest hits" of his most popular themes. This feels especially poignant as Jodie's Doctor emerges. I would preferred something new and different in that moment rather than "Flavia's Lament". As I said, it's a pretty minor quibble.

In the end, though, Twice Upon a Time beats Time of the Doctor in this little competition because it feeds my inner fanboy just a little better. A regeneration is a spectacular thing to watch when you're in love with the show as much as I am. But a regeneration and a multi-Doctor adventure is even more enjoyable.



The final three Christmas Specials in this countdown will all be featured in one post. If you bother to work it out, of course, you know which stories still haven't been reviewed. The Big Question is: how do these three stories rank? You'll find out soon. Hopefully, just in time for Christmas....

Part One: 
https://robtymec.blogspot.com/2019/11/book-of-lists-christmas-specials-from.html

Part Two: 
https://robtymec.blogspot.com/2019/11/book-of-lists-christmas-specials-from_24.html

Part Three: 
https://robtymec.blogspot.com/2019/12/book-of-lists-christmas-specials-from.html















Sunday 1 December 2019

BOOK OF LISTS: CHRISTMAS SPECIALS - FROM WORST TO BEST: PART 3

Our end-of-the-year countdown is well underway. We're just plowing through it. We are now moving into Christmas Specials that are, very much, middle-of-the-road. By no means are they breathtaking works of televisual art. But I wouldn't say they were bad, either. Pretty decent stories, overall. 



PART 3: BECOMING HALF-DECENT

By virtue of their lightness, a Christmas Special will seem a bit "vanilla". They're meant to be more of a fun experience on Christmas Day rather than a valuable contribution to the series. In some ways, I do actually lower my standards for stories of this nature. Truthfully, if these were episodes in the actual season, they would get much more harshly criticized.

Taken in their context, however, I can find this particular set of adventures quite enjoyable. Nothing spectacular - but enjoyable, nonetheless.


The Return of Doctor Mysterio 

In my opinion, Moff actually took a pretty big risk in the writing of this tale. As I said in my last entry, part of what works against Voyage of the Damned is the fact that it is trying to pay tribute to a cinematic genre that is, essentially, pretty awful. When the source material you're paying homage to is poor, you stand a good chance of also creating a poor episode of Doctor Who. Stephen Moffat, however, doesn't seem to learn from this lesson.

The very first Superman movie back in the 80s was one of the best of all the attempts to make the comic book hero into a movie franchise (Superman Two is better - But One does well, too). However, it's still a pretty cheesy piece of 80s cinema. Truth be told, I just don't think Superman translates well into film. There are far better movies the Head Writer could have referenced from that era if he really wanted to do a tribute like RTD did.

Having said that, Return of Doctor Mysterio manages to turn out pretty good. Mainly because it only tries so hard to emulate Superman and still remembers to be a Doctor Who story. Voyage probably pushed the disaster movie theme harder than it should. The main mission of Mysterio, however, is to have the Doctor defeat a sinister alien plot to take over the world. It just happens that there is a secondary adventure that involves a superman-like character going on at the same time. The emphasis in this particular tribute story is better skewed.

I also think the Doctor and Nardole work great together in this story. This constitutes the only adventure we see where it's just the two of them. Which is a great pity, really. I love Bill in Series Ten, but I do wish we had seen more of this duo before she joins the crew. Nardole is a greatly underrated companion, in my opinion. I love that he has a whole side adventure in the TARDIS that we never see before he shows up to rescue the Doctor. It's a really fun moment. And he looks great in that outfit!

Another really strong point to this episode is the contribution it makes to the show's canon.   The Doctor is on the road to recovery from losing his wife. This is handled with far more maturity than the incredible angstiness we endured when he lost Rose. I also like that we learn more about the Winter of Harmony Shoal that we first saw in Husbands of River Song. It was great to see them get expanded upon a bit. The tease we get that they might return for a third appearance was very nicely ominous. I would like to see more of them. They're a fun alien species.


The Husbands of River Song


It's pretty evident that this Special and Return of Doctor Mysterio were written in that gap year where Moff was taking time off from Who to concentrate on Sherlock. Both tales are acceptable - but a bit below his standards


Husbands of River Song comes across as a bit of a tribute, too. Although it doesn't try as hard as Mysterio to imitate what it's referencing, it is still attempting to be a bit of a "caper movie". Perhaps, even, a second stab at doing something like Time Heist. It's just not so convoluted and focuses harder on rompiness.


I suppose your enjoyment of such a tale hinges greatly on how you feel about River Song, herself. There are quite a few fans out there who can't stand her. If you're one of those people, you're really going to hate this one. Some River Song stories put her more in the background. Husbands, however, really brings her to the forefront. In many ways, the plot really is all about her. The Doctor almost takes a back seat in the whole thing.


Since I quite like her, the story sits well with me. There's some nice dramatic irony going on throughout the better part of the adventure. River has never met this particular incarnation of the Doctor and he ends up having a bit of fun with that. The Doctor also discovers just how much River gets up to behind his back. This also makes for quite a bit of fun. 


There is just a bit of Runaway Bride effect going on in places. The comedy does feel like it's being pushed a little too hard sometimes. Hydrofax is the biggest culprit, here. He's just a little too over-the-top in places. But it's hard not to go there when you're being asked to play an angry decapitated intergalactic tyrant. The role lends itself to campiness


Like Mysterio, this tale also earns extra points for what it does for the Greater Scheme of Things in the show. This one's a doozy. The famous last date of the Doctor and River is finally upon us. The Time Lord gifts her the sonic screwdriver that will save her (quite literally) during his first encounter with her. The cycle is finally complete.


It's a genuinely touching ending. Which makes it beat Mysterio in this particular ranking system. Up until that final scene, I consider the stories to be of about equal quality. But Husbands of River Song does get me to mist up ever-so-slightly as its reaches it conclusion. The fact that it plucks at my heartstrings gives it that extra edge and causes me to like it that little bit more.    



The Snowmen 


This one almost shouldn't be in this category. In fact, it is nearly strong enough to measure it by "normal episode standards".

The Snowmen has a cracking little pace with a lot of fun characters in it. Clara is magnificently introduced in this story and is made into a very colorful and interesting character. Doctor Simeon is a magnificently chilling villain. And, while it's sad that Sontarans are now more of a comedy act, Strax is a great laugh, too.

The story is also chocked full of really imaginative and amusing sequences. Clara discovering the Doctor's secret base in the clouds is quite enchanting. The Doctor failing miserably at being Sherlock Holmes is hilarious. But my favorite moment is, easily, the Doctor saving Clara and the kids through puppetry. I love how he even smacks the puppet for kissing him. It's one of those beautiful scenes that works almost exclusively for that particular incarnation of the Doctor. Matt Smith is an absolute delight during that sequence.

Again, we have the Doctor going through a grieving process. Broken by the fact that he has lost Amy and Rory, the Time Lord seems to have withdrawn completely from the Universe. Once more, it's the Doctor dealing with difficult feelings in a way that doesn't seem like complete histrionics. Thankyou Steven Moffat for handling a personal loss in the Doctor's life in a way that doesn't get us to cringe.

Then, finally, we have the wonderful surprises of The Snowmen. This was supposed to be the proper introductory story of Clara but it's not. This version of her dies at the end and it's revealed that another Clara, somehow, exists in our time period. It's quite the shock and we need to learn more....

But, for this fanboy, the even bigger shock was the revelation that the Great Intelligence was behind it all. There it was, under my nose the whole time, and I missed it. The "GI" logo. The actual title of the story! The clues were everywhere and I did not catch any of them. As far as I'm concerned, that's some really damned clever writing. I was genuinely impressed.

So why is The Snowmen only considered half-decent if I'm singing so much praise for it? There are probably two key factors that drag it down into this category:

Like most Christmas Specials, the plot is just a little too simple. The Great Intelligence is about to build an army that will take over the world. He needs to be stopped. There's also the Doctor grieving the loss of two beloved companions. That's all we really get for a story. It's just not quite enough to make it a genuinely solid episode.

The other big problem is how the Great Intelligence is finally dispatched. It's a bit over-contrived and even slightly confusing. I think the Doctor's trick with the memory worm should have been the proper solution. After Doctor Simeon is drained, the Great Intelligence becomes a disembodied consciousness that will eventually find its way into Padmasambhava. Clara can still die and we can head into the second half of Series Seven with her mystery to solve. I really do think this would have been the better way to conclude it. All the other stuff that does happen seems just a bit "off" - for lack of a better term. It's not a terrible ending. But when you can clearly see a better one it does weaken the whole adventure.

These two problems are just bad enough to bring what was otherwise a great story down to something not quite as amazing as it could have been. It's a bit of a harsh judgement, I know. There were still a lot of awesome aspects to this story. But, in the end, it's ranked where it is because of a few crucial mistakes. It was still pretty good. But I am forced to admit: it could have been so much better. 




And thus concludes our reviews of the Half-Decent Stuff.  We have two more tiers to tackle in this countdown. Both of them will deal with stories that I felt were genuinely strong. So, as we move on, there will be  far more praise than criticism. 


Part 1: 
https://robtymec.blogspot.com/2019/11/book-of-lists-christmas-specials-from.html

Part 2: 
https://robtymec.blogspot.com/2019/11/book-of-lists-christmas-specials-from_24.html


















Sunday 24 November 2019

BOOK OF LISTS: CHRISTMAS SPECIALS FROM WORST TO BEST: PART 2

With Christmas Specials now a thing of the past, I've decided to list them all in order of preference. In the first entry,we tackled the Specials that weren't to my liking at all. That, in my opinion, were genuinely poor. I felt kinda bad for spewing such vitriol and am glad that I can list some stories that I like a bit better. 


PART 2: WEAK, BUT STILL ENJOYABLE

There still won't be a lot of glowing praise for the next few stories I'm listing. But I am, for the most part, quite happy with them. They are problematic in places. But not so bad that they are completely ruined.  



The Runaway Bride 

I'm pretty sure a lot of you would have put this one in Part One. It did not garner a lot of admirers when it first came out and hasn't, necessarily, aged well either. I can even see why so many dislike it.

It's not so much the fact that Runaway Bride goes for a lot of laughs that makes it difficult to enjoy. I feel it's more the fact that it's trying too hard to go for a lot of laughs. A lot of the comedy - particularly in the first few minutes - seems a bit too forced. Tennant and Tate are pushing their delivery a little too hard to be funny. The loud farty music that Murray Gold is playing in the background doesn't help in the slightest. The score, like the acting, feels ridiculously overdone. The story is really off to a bad start because of this.

Admittedly, when Donna becomes more melancholy, she becomes more likeable. The interaction between her and the Doctor improves and we're no longer feeling annoyed by what we're seeing on the screen. We can even sense some of that chemistry emerging that will make them such a great duo during Series Four.

Runaway Bride does still feel quite clumsy in places. It seems to misfire a lot. Moments of comedy happen when it might have been better to go serious. And it actually tends to become dramatic during times when it might have been better to go for a laugh. The writing does come across as very counter-intuitive, in places. This is definitely another big problem that makes me see why some fans are so displeased with it.

There are a lot of really enjoyable moments to the story, too. The kids cheering from the backseat as the Doctor saves Donna from the cab. The Doctor summoning the TARDIS just before evil robots pepper them with bullets. Donna telling the Doctor he shouldn't travel alone cause he needs someone to ground him. I find these moments are strong enough to drag Runaway Bride out of the Bad category and into something more passable.

Overall, it is a fun romp. It just tries a little too hard in places to be fun. 



The Doctor, The Widow and The Wardrobe 

For the most part, I find Moff did a much better job with Christmas Specials than RTD. Oftentimes, he was much more careful about just how "Christmassy" the Specials would be. He tended to write something that just happened to involve Christmas a bit but still told a decent story. Many of RTD's scripts seemed to suffer at the expense of the Christmas theme. Runaway Bride is a good example of this. It would have been much easier to just have it be about a woman who is accidentally abducted from her wedding because of an alien plot gone wrong. Much of the Christmas stuff that's actually in it feels very shoe-horned. Which mars our enjoyment of the whole thing.

The Doctor, The Widow and The Wardrobe is the one exception to this rule. Moff misfires quite a bit, here. It's difficult to determine what exactly hurts the story the most. The plot is, perhaps, a bit too threadbare. While the comedy in Bride feels forced, I find there are both funny and dramatic moments that come across as quite unnatural in this Special. And then, of course, there's "humany wumany". I wonder if Moff actually wishes he could travel back in time and stop himself from writing that line....

I also think the story suffers from a sort of Caves of Androzani/Twin Dilemma Effect. A Christmas Carol was a pretty damned amazing Christmas Special (you'll eventually see where it ranks on my list). Whatever had to follow it the next year was just going to tremble in its shadow. It's almost as if Moff tried too hard to write a script that was equally moving when, maybe, he should have just gone for something different, altogether. Maybe just make something light and fun that had a strong plot. Or maybe an action and/or horror piece. Basically, anything but what we actually got.

Who can say for sure what exactly makes this story fall so short. But I shouldn't harp on the problems too hard if I'm claiming the story is still enjoyable. Matt Smith does very well with what he's served. We like him just as much here as we did in Carol. He does a great job at being a big kid who is over-excited that it's Christmas. That does a lot to save the story.

Doctor, Widow, Wardrobe also does a similar thing that Hand of Fear did in the Classic Series. It has a really good ending that helps us to forget a lot of the problems that existed in the rest of the story. The Doctor making the decision to go back and find Amy and Rory was very touching. Particularly when he sheds that tear of happiness. We're also really damned happy that Amy and Rory have returned to the show. They were great companions that weren't quite ready to be written out. We needed just a bit more of them. This particular Christmas Special stands up a bit better because it brings them back into the TARDIS. It's definitely a saving grace.


Voyage of the Damned 

Things are almost starting to get pretty half-decent on this list. Voyage of the Damned has a nice pace going on. There's just about enough plot, too. I know Christmas Specials are always trying to stay pretty light and uncomplicated - but they don't have to be pure spectacle. As we move up this list, we'll see more and more concentration actually being paid to the story. And that concentration does seem to start here.

The ending has some nice twists to it, too. Max Capricorn is certainly highlighted quite nicely throughout the tale - but I still didn't see it coming that he was the mastermind behind it all. I also like the courage RTD showed by killing off certain likeable characters and allowing nastier ones to survive.

Probably the biggest problem with Voyage is its dedication to pay tribute to a series of popular disaster movies that came out in the 70s and early 80s. It certainly does a good job of emulating them. My question is: do you want to imitate something that was really quite awful and cheesy? Just by virtue of this, the episode feels very "off". Even somewhat bad, in places. Its original source material could be quite crude and tasteless - so now Voyage of the Damned, itself, takes on that tone.

The camp sensibility of it all goes a little too far in places, too. Like a simple plot, another core element of any Christmas Special is to go a bit for the laughs. Some stories go for it a little too much, though. And we're left with something that we almost don't want to admit is a part of canon because it's just a bit too silly. There will be other Specials higher on this list that will also do this - but not to the extent that this particular adventure does.

There are some pretty vocal fans that detested this story, but I'm pretty happy with it. There's some good fun with the angel androids (that didn't turn out to be Axons!) and it is great that the Doctor found his Alonzo.



Well, that's three more off the list. There are quite a few Christmas Specials so we still have a ways to go. But my reviews will start sounding more and more favorable from hereon in. The Truly Bad and the Somewhat Weak are over with. Now we'll be moving into the Pretty Decent... 

Here's Part One: 
https://robtymec.blogspot.com/2019/11/book-of-lists-christmas-specials-from.html









Tuesday 19 November 2019

BOOK OF LISTS: CHRISTMAS SPECIALS - FROM WORST TO BEST - PART 1

Well, it looks like the Age of Doctor Who Christmas Specials is well-and-truly over. At least this will probably be the case while Chibnall is in charge of things. I know some fans are outraged by this decision but I actually back it. The Doctor coincidentally having adventures in and around Christmas time over and over was starting to get just a bit ridiculous. He should have almost started having some sort of "Bad Wolf suspicion" about the whole thing. Like there should have been a moment where he started questioning why the TARDIS kept taking him to Christmas so much. Did another companion who really likes Christmas stare into the Heart of the TARDIS?!   

With the Christmas Special now being a thing of the past, I thought it might be fun to make my end-of-year countdown about Christmas Specials. The era seems properly cemented in the past so I can safely document it and not worry about having to alter the list, someday, because of future Christmas Specials that have come out. 

Now, there have been a lot of Christmas Specials. To try to give each of them its own entry might be just a bit too lengthy of  a process. I had a similar problem when I counted down Doctors from Worst to Best a few years back. So I listed 2 to 5 incarnations per entry. I thought I would do the same thing with Christmas Specials. 



PART 1: THE GENUINELY BAD

I'm going to get just a bit mean-spirited, here (call me a Grinch!). There were a few Christmas Specials that genuinely missed the mark.  We're going to review them in this section. And we're not going to be that kind to them.


The Next Doctor

Not only the worst of all the Christmas Specials, I consider The Next Doctor the worst episode in the entire New Series (thus far - a new episode might come out someday that's actually worse. But Next Doctor is hard to beat). Its biggest problem being that it's built around a central premise that is just a bit stupid.

But before we get to that gripe, let's look at some other stuff that makes the story so bad for me. I have quite a bit of trouble with even the first few minutes of this episode. The Cybershades look and act in an embarrassingly stupid manner. They're meant to be a product of Cyber-technology. So they should be emotionless. Instead, they react in erratic and even savage ways. That seems a contradiction in terms. Add to the fact that they are, basically, men in masks and fun-fur suits crawling around on all fours and we've got something, here, that is Myrka-worthy. I can accept something like the Myrka in Classic Who because of the terrible budget limitations. We should not be seeing nonsense like this in the New Series.

Then we get to a chase sequence that seems to ignore a lot of basic physics. The Doctor and Jackson Lake get dragged across a wooden floor for quite some distance. They manage to stay on their butts for the whole ride (which is, sort of, impossible in itself - they should have fallen over onto their stomachs). When the ride is over. They are laughing at the whole jolly adventure and feeling a bit stiff. They should have been in endless pain. Their clothing and flesh being dragged along a wooden surface for so long and so quickly should have been torn to shreds from the friction and actual splinters that such a journey would have produced. While we point out such obvious inconsistencies, lets also mention that Rosita would have never had the time to make it to that window sill with the ax. The Cybershade had scaled the wall by the time she noticed the ax. He was running quickly across the floor while Rosita would've been running up several flights of stairs and then getting over to the far end of the building. No matter what sort of logistics you apply to this, she's just not able to get to that window anywhere near fast enough.

So, in just the first few minutes, we're ignoring important elements of aesthetics, logic and even basic physics. It's pretty hard to bounce back from this. But if the rest of the story had been amazing - I could've forgotten these problems.

Unfortunately, the plot is pretty uninteresting and even a bit preposterous. Why would the Cybermen build a giant mech to take over the world? It seems to me there's about a hundred more effective ways to convert a primitive human population. Slowly but surely just abducting people and converting them until you have the advantage of numbers would be the smartest most logical way to go about things. A big nasty dreadnought traipsing around seems almost kinda stupid. Humans everywhere will see the giant from miles away and flee. Is this really what you want when you want to zombify a species?

And then there's the whole central conceit of the story. Is Jackson Lake actually the Doctor? We don't know, at first, of course. But RTD had a track record, at this point, of teasing us and then revealing that the tease wasn't what it seemed. He had foreshadowed the death of both Rose and Donna during Series 2 and 4. But then, as the seasons ended, he gave us a big "Just kidding!" and arranged their departure from the show in a different manner that only seemed, sort of, like death. So when he's suddenly hinting that we're going to meet the next incarnation of the Doctor before the current one regenerates - we're pretty sure he's going to use the same tactic.

I might have been okay with any other tactic to dismiss the next Doctor except the one he uses. RTD could have actually made him a future incarnation - but from an alternative dimension or an aborted timeline. Or he's a special clone or even an android. Or maybe he's an alien superfan trying to assume the Doctor's identity. I would have been okay with any of these ideas. But an 18th Century human in a fugue state that somehow had an info stamp backfire into him seems over-contrived to the point of being ludicrous. It might have just been easier to just cast David Morrissey as the next Doctor and made this a proper multi-incarnation adventure. It would have been pretty awesome, actually, if RTD had not tried to subvert expectations and, for once, delivered on what he'd promised. But, instead, we got this mess.

Re-watching Doctor Who is one of my favorite pastimes. But Next Doctor ruins even this. The real central premise of the story is finding out whether or not this man that's claiming to be the Doctor is actually him. The Cybermen stuff is actually pretty peripheral to the whole thing. So, once it's revealed that this isn't the next Doctor, there's little appeal left to the story. With the mystery solved, there's not a lot of motivation to ever watch this again. This is the problem with giving a Doctor Who adventure a sort of tabloid appeal. Once we find out that the attention-grabbing headline isn't the truth, there's little purpose in wanting to re-visit the article. It was all just a dumb trick. Why remind ourselves that we fell for the sensationalism? 

Sadly, there's more that I could go on about. But this review is already getting long enough. So I'll try to find a positive point in my final paragraph:

Is there anything I enjoyed about Next Doctor? It's the first story to use a flashback sequence showing all of the Doctor's previous incarnations. That was nice.

Other than that, I got nothing.





The End of Time - Parts One and Two

During my Top Doctor Who Story Countdown from Days Gone By, I wrote an extensive entry on why I love Logopolis so much. To help illustrate its effectiveness, I compared it to The End of Time -  a story that had to accomplish the similar task of writing out an extremely popular incarnation of the Doctor. You can read what I said here: https://robtymec.blogspot.com/2015/12/book-of-lists-top-ten-who-stories-10.html..

Just in case you bother to read it, I'll try not to do to much of a re-tread, here. I will also include both parts - even though the second episode was, technically, a new year's special.

The End of Time, for me, was probably the weakest of all the "swansong stories" for an incarnation of the Doctor. As I did mention in the review of Logopolis, it relies too heavily on just being a big sentimental event and doesn't give us enough plot. We're just meant to be content with watching the Doctor run around and be angsty. We're not supposed to notice that there's really not much of anything going on. Gallifrey is trying to return and the Master wants to take over the world. Both end up failing when there's still a good twenty minutes left in Part Two. So we end the story with just a series of pained expressions on the Doctor's face as he visits different people from his past but doesn't say much to them.

The story handles the Master in a pretty horrible way, too (something I go on about in my Ranking the Master series - https://robtymec.blogspot.com/2017/11/book-of-lists-ranking-masters-part-2.html. Again, I'll try not to re-tread too much). Flying through the air as the Renegade Time Lord shoots power beams from his hands just doesn't seem like the sort of thing you're supposed to have in a Doctor Who story. It all feels really out of place. I don't even blame John Simm for going so OTT in the story. How else can you perform that sort of material?

There are other little nitpicks I have. Donna being able to produce what appears to be a wave of regeneration energy that knocks all the approaching Masters on their asses requires more explanation than it gets. Time Lords being able to smell each other also seems really silly. Even Part One seems to lack enough content to fill the episode and we have to stare at endless shots of carbon-copy Masters overtaking the world.

Was there anything I enjoyed? The scenes with the Doctor and Wilf chatting were brilliantly performed. The Doctor's mother getting him not to make the wrong choice with Wilf's gun was very moving. The final revelation of what "He will knock four times" means was quite clever too.

And this is why End of Time ranks a bit higher than Next Doctor. It does have a few strong moments in it. Not enough to redeem it. But at least I can enjoy certain sequences.



As you can see: those Specials in 2009 didn't, necessarily, sit too well with me! 

In the next entry, however, I will become a bit kinder. I'll be listing some Christmas stories that I consider fairly weak but are still, overall, enjoyable. Naturally enough, as we get closer to the top rankings, my praise will get stronger....















Thursday 14 November 2019

COMPLETE AND UTTER SILLINESS: THE CAPTURE-AND-ESCAPE HALL OF FAME

POINTS OF DEBATE is not the only new entry that I have introduced over the last year. COMPLETE AND UTTER SILLINESS was premiered on my latest Anniversary Special. After introducing fans to the concept of a frotnok. (don't try to look it up - it's my own special creation. Although, really, it should start turning up in fan reference material), I felt it was time to have some more fun with my favorite show. Rather than always just taking it way too seriously all the time!

I'm not presenting another outlandish theory, this time. Instead, I'm going to look at a somewhat over-abused writing device that was used in the Classic Series and assign fictitious awards to the grossest examples of it. We'll even have specific categories. 


CAPTURE-AND-ESCAPE: THE ULTIMATE PLOT FILLER

New Who tends to move very quickly, these days (some might even say too quickly). Many stories are resolved within the same episode they started in. We get the occasional two-parter, or even three-parter (or are they really three parters? - read about the debate here: https://robtymec.blogspot.com/2019/09/points-of-debate-what-constitutes-three.html), but even they tend to fly along at breakneck speed. Our "ADHD Culture" that loves YouTube clips that don't last longer than 5 minutes can't tolerate a story with any kind of real sag in it. Our interests must be constantly held or we turn our attention elsewhere. 

Keeping us focused in New Who has sometimes occurred at the expense of good writing. Points in a script that should have been better explored get brushed aside in the name of Maintaining Momentum. In some cases, actual plot holes have been glossed over because the author wanted to keep the story moving. Perhaps they could have fixed the issue with the story if they had been allowed to examine things a bit more closely. But, again, Momentum wouldn't let them. They had to maintain a flow. This seems to be the priority in modern-day television. 

Classic Who, of course, frequently did the exact opposite. Classic Who could contemplate its navel all day. Especially when you consider that it frequently indulged in longer stories that ran for six episodes. It also dipped its toe into seven parters - or even longer! 

Doing the reverse of New Who does not mean all problems were eliminated. Instead, we were introduced to all new set of writing obstacles. On certain occasions, a writer was assigned more episodes than they had story for. Rather than ask for less episodes (and, subsequently, less pay), they tried to come up  with "filler" or "padding". These were tricks an author might use to intentionally slow the plot down so that it would properly fill the assigned episodes. 

One of the most obvious devices used by the writers in Classic Who was the "capture-and-escape" technique. Your protagonists could easily get from Point A in a plot to Point B - but that would not eat up enough time to fill your episode count. So you have them get caught and imprisoned in some way by the antagonists of the story. The main characters now have to spend some time trying to figure a way out of their jail cell. Time gets wasted and episodes get filled. 

In a lot of cases, "capture-and-escape" should actually be called "capture-and-escape-and-re-captured" -  but that it is too much of a mouthful. It is what most frequently occurs with this device. After some great struggle is spent getting out of jail, the protagonists then get re-captured a short while later and are thrown back in their cell with increased security now being used against them. This is, of course, the ultimate filler. For several long minutes, absolutely nothing was really achieved in the story. But the writer goes to bed that night happy to have gotten a nice paycheque for their efforts.


TECHNICAL DEFINITION?

I was going to go for one of my big, wordy definitions where I make totally sure that we're all clear on what a capture-and-escape is. And then I was like: "Rob! Lighten up! This is supposed to be something funnier. Take a chill pill, dude!"

So, yeah. Pretty straightforward. If the Doctor or a companion (or the entire TARDIS crew) gets caught and then has to spend a bunch of time getting out of their trap rather than propelling the plot forward - that's a capture-and-escape. The escape can even include a rescue rather than them completely getting out of it on their own. Although, probably at least a few minutes get wasted with them trying to escape of their own volition. After all, the whole point of the process is to eat up time.

WARNING!! 

I will admit, outright, I consider this a really cheap device. The author should have created more subplots or character conflicts to mark the minutes. To just incarcerate the main characters and then have them struggle to find freedom is very lazy writing.

I will be discussing certain well-loved stories that exploit this technique quite a bit. Because of this, they're not so well-loved by me. So, brace yourselves, I may be taking the piss out of a few stories you really like.

Okay then, with all that out of the way. Let's get to the awards:



Most Blatant Use of the Device 

There are two stories that use this device so obviously that I have to say they tie. So I will list both:

The Three Doctors
During Part Two of the Tenth Anniversary Special, the Doctor, Jo and a Professor Dude Who Got Accidentally Embroiled Into the Story (who is played by an actor who will play yet another Professor Dude Who Got Accidentally Embroiled Into the Story during Hand of Fear - he must love Doctor Who's casting director!) are being marched through the strange, alien-looking palace of Omega. There seems to be a few minutes that need filling as the episode nears its end. Professor Dude suggests they try to make a break for it. The Doctor argues against the idea. The debate, itself, eats up a good minute or so. Finally, Professor Dude pretends to submit. Then, suddenly, makes a break for it! Another minute or so gets wasted as he charges around the palace and gets intercepted by the giant jelly monsters that are roaming about. Slowly but surely, they press him back towards the Doctor and Jo. "Well, that was a waste of time!" he woefully admits as he re-joins them.

Yes it was Professor Tyler. Which was the whole point of the exercise. Nice of you to be obvious about it!

Talons of Weng-Chiang
A very popular story among fans. This is one of those tales, however, that I've never really seen why it's got such mass appeal. Making up a white guy to look Asian certainly gets it to look very offensive by modern-day standards. Although, really, even in the era it was made - it seemed pretty offensive!

But, rather than ruffle too many feathers with my many objections to this story, let's get to the real topic. As we're nearing the end of this Six Parter (that really only needed to be four parts), Bob Holmes seems to be getting desperate to mark time. He has his latest double act incarcerated in a manor of some sort by the evil Magnus Greel. Jago and Lightfoot spend a good few minutes investigating a dumb waiter and debating whether or not they could employ it as a form of egress. At last, we watch them awkwardly climb in and descend together to another level of the building. Clumsily, they climb back out - consuming as much time as possible in the process. Just when freedom seems apparent, a whole gang of actual Asians (as opposed to white people pretending to be Asians) descend upon them and force them back into their prison.

A huge screeching halt that we could, easily, fast forward through without causing any real damage to the story. It's almost embarrassing, really.

Talons ranks so highly because it is such a well-regarded story so it almost makes the capture-and-escape more famous. Three Doctors ties with Talons because it, outright, announces that it was a waste of time!



Story That Abuses this Device the Most

Without a doubt, this particular category goes to the notorious Frontier In Space. There's a lot of things I like about the writing of Malcolm Hulke - Frontier In Space, however, is not one of them!

Yup, he's given us another alien species that is not completely good or evil. They're just like us. Yup, their masks look really good/ Even by modern-day standards, it's a fairly good costume. If they returned in the New Series, there would be little need to alter the original version. It's also a bit cool that the Master teams up with the Daleks. Although the team-up is woefully short.

Otherwise, that's really about it for the qualities of Frontier In Space. I would say there's enough plot for about two episodes. But Hulke needed to give us six. So it is capture-and-escape after capture-and-escape after capture-and-escape.

I bothered to re-watch the story and actually count all the times the device is used. I had actually expected one capture-and-escape per episode (which, when you think about it, is still pretty bad!). I was wrong. Part One has two capture-and-escapes. The Doctor and Jo get imprisoned by the pilot and co-pilot of the bulk freighter they land on (are they really shipping flour to a colony world?! There really is no way for the colony world to just make its own flour - it needs to be imported?!). They escape only to have Jo imprisoned again by the Ogrons. We'll be merciful and include the cliffhanger of Part One (the Doctor and Jo now being captured by Earth Authorities) as the capture-and-escape for Part Two. In Part Two, the Doctor escapes Earth Authorities only to be captured by the Draconians. Who he escapes a short while later (in one of the most ridiculous methods of egress I've ever seen. Did you really need to flip over backwards in an art-deco chair, Jon?!). The Doctor is then re-captured by Earth Authorities only to escape again into the hands of the Ogrons at the cliffhanger. So, yeah, that's right. Three capture-and-escapes in Part Two. So, in just two parts, that's five capture-and-escapes!

Things slow down in Parts Three and Four. Only one capture-and-escape per episode. The Doctor tries to escape from the Lunar Penal Colony (woah! That gets referenced in Bad Wolf! Except that Bad Wolf takes place a good 100 000 years or so after Frontier In Space. Was the Moon a prison that whole time?!) in Part Three. He is delivered to the Master and tries to escape from him during Part Four. Now, if you thought the chair flip was silly in Part Two, the escape attempt in Part Four is way more ridiculous! Why did he need to do a space walk?! Couldn't he have just gone down the hallway and snuck up on the Master that way? The door between the room with the cage and the bridge didn't seem to be locked.  And wouldn't some kind of instrumentation on the bridge register that airlocks are being opened and closed all over the place? Was the War of the Worlds book so engrossing that the Master just wasn't registering these notifications?!

Herein lies the problem of an endless array of captures-and-escapes. In order to keep things varied and interesting, the escapes need to become more and more outlandish. Frontier In Space definitely illustrates this problem quite clearly.

Part Five, amazingly enough, has no true captures-and-escapes. I say "true" because my definition stated it had to be a main character who tries to escape incarceration. There is a capture-and-escape of an Ogron - but I won't count it. Just as I didn't count the capture-and-escape from the Ogrons at the beginning of Part Three because it happens so quickly that it doesn't truly mark any time. It was there, moreso, to create a cliffhanger and give us a little bit of suspense. Even though it really just came across as Micheal Kilgarriff (or, quite possibly, Stephen Thorne - it's hard to tell!) running around in his Ogron costume as he smashes his way through bulsa wood doors that are meant to be metal.

Part Six, makes up for the absence of true capture-and-escapes in Episode Five by giving us two. Jo does one from her prison cell but is tricked by the Master and re-captured. The Doctor then gets captured and escapes a short while later by using the "mini-Keller Machine" that Jo stole (does no one check a prisoner's pockets before throwing them back in jail?!). There is, again, a super-short capture-and-escape right at the very end of the episode. But I'll let it slide. Again, it doesn't really mark time. If  I was giving out awards, however, for most poorly edited scenes in a Doctor Who story, the last couple minutes of Frontier In Space would get first prize. You almost can't tell what happened at the end of that adventure because the editing is just that bad!

So, if I'm being nice, Frontier In Space has a total of nine capture-and-escapes. If I want to include the super-short ones and the Ogron capture-and-escape - we're up to twelve! There is no story in the history of the show that abuses this device more. Which is why I rarely watch Frontier. In fact, this was the first time in years. I only put it on to do this count. And to laugh at the super-obvious strings that hold up Jon Pertwee during his space walks!!





Story That Abuses This Device But We Tend To Ignore It Because It's A "Classic"

Now, I gave a warning that my opinions in this essay might offend some of you. I'm sure a few of you are already upset about what I've said about Frontier In Space. It does seem to hold a special place in the hearts of certain sectors of Fandom. You might have even gotten a bit mad at me for the things I said about Talons of Weng Chiang. This is a greatly-adored racially-offensive tale and no one should ever say anything ill of it.

But now you're going to get really mad at me!

For many, Genesis of the Daleks is their all-time favorite story. I had heard legend of it before watching it. Perhaps my expectations were just a bit too high because of it. When I was finally able to view it, I was pretty disappointed. I didn't think it was absolutely horrible, of course. But I definitely don't consider it the best story ever.

There were a couple of things about it that I found downright silly. Can you really escape a landmine like that? Pretty sure once you step on it, you're done for. Sarah Jane falling off the scaffholding only to fall back on it, pretty much, constitutes the worst cliffhanger resolution ever. Yup, the end of Part One of Dragonfire is pretty bad, too - but this one might be worse. I also think the famous monologue about Davros contemplating releasing a virus is pretty silly. Would someone really get that over-excited about cracking open a vial?! It's just a little too OTT for my liking.  But it's funny how we never seem to talk about how bad certain elements of  Genesis of the Daleks are. Almost as if we're not allowed to because the story is so highly regarded. Genesis almost reminds me of a dysfunctional family where a parent is a severe alcoholic but we're not allowed to talk about it because they're also a prominent figure in the community!

But the thing that really made me lose respect for Genesis of the Daleks is its abuse of the capture-and-escape device. While not as bad as Frontier In Space, there is still not enough story here for a Six Parter. At best, Terry Nation could have comfortably filled four episodes.

We know we're in trouble when Harry and the Doctor do a full capture-and-escape-and-recaptured with the Kaleds in Part One. We're not even through the first episode and there's a need for padding. Things continue to go bad when Sarah Jane gets captured by Thals in later episodes. The failed attempt to climb to the top of the dome is as painful to sit through as the Third Doctor's space walk in Frontier. There's still a bit more capture-and-escaping in the last few episodes when the TARDIS crew return to the Kaled bunker. To his credit, though, Nation does find other ways to pad things out in the latter half of the story. Davros delivering an impassioned-yet-boring speech to a group of Kaled scientists and soldiers we don't give a rat's ass about that we know will become gunstick fodder in just a few short minutes was an interesting alternative to just one more capture-and-escape.

Again, the tallying of capture-and-escapes is a fairly subjective process. But it does look like there's about five of them in Genesis of the Daleks. As I've said, though, we never acknowledge this flaw in the story. Or any other problem, for that matter. Because we're not allowed to. It's Genesis of the Daleks, damn it. The best Doctor Who story ever. Supposedly.




Earliest Example of a Capture-and-Escape 

The capture-and-escape device seems to have a long history with the show. But just how far back does it truly go? 

Believe it or not, we can trace it all the way back to its most humble of beginnings. Even Unearthly Child (or 1 000 000 BC - or whatever you want to call it!) takes advantage of it a bit.

Some of you older fans are, no doubt, familiar with the works of Dicky Howett. A great little comic strip artist who was, obviously, a big fan of the show. Dicky drew some great strips involving Who that were clearly geared at people who knew the show inside and out. While other comic strip artists might make a bit of fun here and there by drawing pictures of Daleks that can't climb stairs or other easy jokes like that, Dicky went for the more obscure stuff. It's great to see that a T-shirt company has used some of his images and I catch the occasional New Who fan wearing them. Howett's legacy lives on.

At one point, Dicky released an extended strip that was his own version of Unearthly Child. It had some great jokes in it. One of the ones I liked the best was his own acknowledgement of the capture-and-escape device. The basic gist of the gag is that Howett suddenly inserts a panel near the end of the strip that proclaims something to the nature of: "Six Capture-and-Escapes Later...". In the next panel, the Doctor, Susan, Ian and Barbara are racing towards the TARDIS with cavemen chasing them.

It's an exaggeration, of course. But then, comedy will do that for effect. But Part Three of the story is one big capture-and-escape-and-recaptured. It's just difficult to notice because it's still, actually, a pretty well-written episode. The scene where Ian, Susan and Barbara teach compassion to Za and his girlfriend is quite compelling. That is the same scene, of course, where Ian stops the Doctor from attempting to kill Za. Which is a crazy moment to watch retrospectively. To see someone who is your hero be that heartless in his earliest days can really throw you off.

And that's the thing about capture-and-escape: if it's well done, we're not bothered by its attempt to mark time. There are some other problems with Unearthly Child. But I don't believe its use of capture-and-escape is one of them.

Which leads us to our next award:



A Story That Creates Such a Compelling Capture-and-Escape That We Don't Mind It

As I just tried to illustrate in the last award, there are times when a capture-and-escape doesn't actually drag the story down. If done cleverly, it can really lift the story and create some legitimate tension.

I picked pretty hard on Terry Nation for Genesis of the Daleks - so now I will sing his praise. While Planet of the Daleks is a bit of a Daleks (or The Dead Planet - or whatever you want to call it!) re-tread, it also does do a good job of doing a huge capture-and-escape that we don't mind at all because it is really well-conceived. The Doctor getting captured by the Daleks and being hauled off to their base on Spiridon starts feeling like that stereotypical: "Oh boy! It's a six parter and we only have story for four!" moment. But I find it really fleshes out nicely. So much so, that some of it even gets referenced in Remembrance of the Daleks.

Getting out of his cell and running into some other Thals that are stuck in an ice vent keeps the pace going nicely. The "ice slime", in fact, is a pretty nice effect. As they figure out a way to use the hot air rising through the refrigeration vent to their advantage, I really find myself impressed by the cleverness of the whole thing.

For years, the episode that featured all this capture-and-escaping was cut out from the story because it only existed in black-and-white. They finally colorized it and put into the DVD release. It is interesting to note that the story does do pretty well without the episode in it. Which shows off quite nicely that it was meant to just eat up some minutes. But, with the episode back in, I find myself enjoying the action that takes place within it. Yes, it's largely superfluous to the overall plot - but it's still a damned good episode!

The TARDIS being able to run out of oxygen, however, is still pretty weird. Not sure what that was all about!



Story That Could Have Abused Capture-and-Escape But Didn't

Obviously, a longer story is far more likely to take advantage of the capture-and-escape motif than, say, a two-parter. Totally awesome Classics like Inferno had seven parts to fill. So the Doctor does end up breaking in and out of captivity a few times when he's trapped in a fascist parallel universe.

With this in mind, a story like The War Games would be more-than-justified to be peppered with capture-and-escapes to fill up its ten episodes. Amazingly enough, it doesn't seem to resort to this tactic half as much as it could have. Parts One and Two do use this device a fair amount. But then it actually settles down and finds other ways to fill up the bountiful episode count. Some of these devices work better than others. The subplot of David Troughton having to guard a War Lord, for instance, is a fairly decent piece of drama. The Doctor and Jamie trying to blow open a safe while Carstairs deals with a surprise visit is another very enjoyable moment. These are storylines that do little to advance the main plot but still provide us with lovely distractions. Other moments, like trying to explain to a converted French soldier that he's being exploited by an evil alien race, don't necessarily work as well. But they are still far more effective than just chucking the Doctor and/or his companions in another jail cell and letting them try to find a way out. It's almost like Terrance Dicks and Malcolme Hulke sat down and said: "Let's try to find as many other ways to pad this out than just capture-and-escape."

War Games is still longer than it needs to be. And it does abuse capture-and-escape a bit. But I do recognize it as a story that could have used the device a whole lot more. Because of some of the creative choices that get made by the authors, the story ends up working quite well. It could have plodded along horribly and made Troughton's send-off absolutely tedious. But it gives us something quite masterful, instead. And I think some of that is due to the fact that Dicks and Hulke decide not to be lazy writers.

If only Hulke had maintained that same level integrity for Frontier In Space!



An Actual Example of Capture-and-Escape in the New Series

I did say in those introductory paragraphs that New Who tends to move really fast and doesn't use this device anymore. But we are a good eleven seasons into the show, now. That's a lot of stories. Couldn't just one of them have used that device somewhere?

Truthfully, it's probably happened a few times. But the one that seems to stand out the most would be the "three Doctors in one jail" scene from Day of the Doctor. It's almost as if Moffat is using the anniversary special to pay tribute to the great capture-and-escapes of yesteryear. While Clara's plotline does continue to move and develop, the Doctors' is brought to a grinding halt as they are thrown into a medieval cell by the Queen. There's much discussion and debate about where the Doctor has been going since the Time Wars and two different escape plans get hatched at once. And then we find out the door was unlocked the whole time!

To all intents and purposes, this does sound like a bit of a time-eater. Just like the old capture-and-escapes were. But, upon closer inspection, we see that Moff is setting up some crucial character development that will affect the Doctor as the story reaches its climax. Some of what gets covered in the prison cell will even bleed into Time of the Doctor a bit (the scene does start to foreshadow what's waiting for him on Trenzalore). It also sets up the basic premise of what will stop the Doctor from destroying Gallifrey in the Time Wars. So, on the surface, this may actually seem like yet another capture-and-escape. But there's quite a bit more going on there than you think. It is actually a very important scene on several levels.




Well, I have to admit, I enjoyed doing that. There's a few other conventions the show has used that I find quite silly that I might set up award ceremonies for, too. I definitely want to tackle the Cast Slaughterfests of Seasons 21 and 22. I could have some fun with that one!

I do hope some of my opinions on certain stories that I know are greatly loved didn't offend you too much. Some fans get very distressed by the fact that I don't think Genesis of the Daleks is that great! I also hope you noticed that I didn't just take the piss out of my favorite show for the entire entry. I intentionally pointed out some good stuff, too. Certain stories do resort to this tactic to mark time but end up doing it in a very effective way. I wanted to highlight that a bit too. 



Like COMPLETE AND UTTER SILLINESS? Here's the first entry in the Series. Learn all about the frotnok:    
https://robtymec.blogspot.com/2019/03/complete-and-utter-silliness-was.html






















Thursday 31 October 2019

ANALYTICAL: GOING BEYOND: A GUIDED TOUR OUTSIDE THE UNIVERSE - PART 2

Analyzing the strange things that exist beyond our Universe continues. In this second part, we will examine a few of places out there that seem a bit more rare. We'll also keep looking through their various predominant traits to help us better understand their mechanics. 

I finished off Part One with a Special Note about Anti-Zones: a special extension of the Void that helps to protect our version of reality. Because they don't occur often, they should, perhaps, be listed here. But I decided that, since they also relate to the Void, I thought it might be better if I put them in the first part. However, there are a few more Special Notes that need to be listed about some other rare phenomenon that we see out there.  




*A SPECIAL NOTE ABOUT THE REALITY OF BATTLEFIELD 

To all intents and purposes, it would seem that the beings who cross over into our dimension in the story Battlefield are from a parallel universe. One where the Arthurian Legends turn out to be true. Certainly, we hear this other dimension described in similar fashion to the way other parallel realities are described. Of particular note is the way the Doctor talks about how the distress call came from "sideways in time". Sounds quite a bit like the way the Doctor Three talks about being "slipped sideways in time" during Inferno.

I would contest, however, that this is not a parallel universe. Based primarily on the idea that a parallel reality is created by a choice. I'm not sure what sort of choice suddenly causes magic to exist. To me, this other dimension is a place inhabited by a humanoid species that is capable of using magic. It is not a reality that is the same as our own that broke off into a schism caused by a decision someone made within it. Magic is a genuine and accessible energy in this other dimension. The beings from this other reality can even bring some of that magical energy into our own universe and use it. But, since magic doesn't already exist in our dimension, I'm not sure how this could be a parallel universe.


*A SPECIAL NOTE ABOUT SINGULARITY POINTS

Similar to the Void and anti-zones, the Singularity Point in The Three Doctors seems to be a special place existing between two universes that acts as a sort of buffer. In this case, it is a crossing zone between our universe and the universe of anti-matter. It's not quite in either of these universes, however. So this gets us to believe that it is another crossover point between the two.

In many ways, a Singularity Point fits this particular category. However, because such a place seems to require a strong willed being to sustain it, we might wonder if a Singularity Point might also be a pocket universe of sorts (we'll be learning about them in just a few short paragraphs). I would be more inclined to believe that this is a sort of hybrid dimension. A place outside our own universe that possesses the characteristics of two different types of realities.


PART TWO: THE LESS COMMON STUFF

With those Special Notes covered, let's now move on to some things out there that don't seem to occur that naturally...


POCKET UNIVERSES

While pocket dimensions only seem to receive that label in stories like Hide and The Doctor's Wife, we can assume that, like the Void, there have been examples in the Classic Series that just weren't given that name. I would think that the Celestial Toymaker's dimension (sometimes known as the Celestial Toyroom) and the Land of Fiction were also pocket universes.

It seems that one of the most predominant traits of a pocket universe is that they require a being of enormous will power to sustain them for any real amount of time. The "plughole universe" - as the Doctor calls it - in The Doctor's Wife is given a very short life expectancy once House has left it. Which leads us to believe that he was holding it together. The Celestial Toyroom depends even more greatly on this principal. It collapses the moment its Master is defeated in the Trilogic game. The pocket dimension in Hide is in the process of collapsing when the Doctor enters it. More than likely because there is no central will sustaining it. A special machine seems to have been built for the Land of Fiction, that can allow a normal human to be hooked up to it and have their will amplified to the point of holding reality together. Once the machine overloads, of course, the universe collapses.

One could even say that the Solitract is a sort of sentient pocket universe. It sustains itself through its own will power. A bit of a different process from the other examples we've listed but still similar enough in principal to lump it into this category. 

Size: As the title implies, a pocket universe is much smaller in size than our own reality. Oftentimes, it appears as merely a tract of land made of very limited space. Probably the largest example we've seen was in The Doctor's Wife. House had grown into a small asteroid of junk that seemed to fit within the dimension. Everything else we've seen of these universes has been considerably smaller.

General Aesthetics: While existing on a smaller scale, pocket universes seem to resemble our own. The one in Hide, in fact, is sometimes referred to as an "echo dimension". Which implies, even more, a similar aesthetic to our own. To some extent, one must assume that the appearance of a pocket universe depends on what its Master chooses it to look like. Hence the Land of Fiction being a place that is inhabited by fictional characters and fairy-tale-like buildings and structures. Or the Celestial Toyroom being made up of characters and places that have an infantile aesthetic to them.

Entry Points: Pocket Universes seem to have, at least, one naturally-occurring rift that leads into them. The Land of Fiction and the Solitract do have buffer zones that help separate them from us. But, even within those zones, rifts seem to exist. Some of these rifts seem easier to pass through than others. But this does seem to be the only way into a pocket dimension.

Level of Incursion: With the exception of Hide, we spend a considerable amount of time in pocket universes whenever they are introduced into a story. Even in Hide, we get quite a few solid minutes within this special dimension. But most stories spend far more time within these realities than we see in Hide.


E-SPACE - THE GREATEST EXCEPTION TO ALL THE RULES

Finally, of course, there's E-Space. Easily, the most interesting of all places that exist beyond our Universe. Because we spend a total of twelve episodes in this other universe, a lot of details are given about it.

E-Space doesn't quite fit into any of the other categories we have discussed so far. And yet, it does seem to possess several of their traits. Most obvious is how it is mentioned several times that E-Space is considerably smaller than our reality. Which makes it seem like it might be a pocket dimension of sorts. We also get told that E-Space is negatively charged while we live in a positively charged universe. Which vaguely implies anti-matter. There's also quite a bit of jargon regarding "parallel coordinates" as they try to work out the problem with the image translator in Full Circle. The Doctor and Romana are meant to go to Gallifrrey. Instead, the end up on Alzarius. A planet in the exact same place where Gallifrey is meant to be. One almost wonders if there might be hints of a parallel universe going on here, too.

Regardless of all these similar characteristics, E-Space is still very much its own unique reality. We do wonder if there are other universes like it. We, apparently, inhabit N-Space. Could there be other dimensions of this nature with letters for names? We're never given any proper evidence, but it's an interesting theory to ponder....

Size: It is clearly stated in multiple instances that E-Space is much smaller than our universe. This, in fact, helps the Doctor to navigate through it more accurately and to accomplish "short hops" with better efficiency. As he does in State of Decay.

General Aesthetics: While life on its various planets seems quite different from ours, it still greatly resembles our universe. A human-like species does dwell on some of these worlds. We also see the TARDIS travelling through space in certain shots. While considerably smaller, E-Space is still large enough to have constellations. It is a very similar universe to our own.

Entry Points: To the best of our knowledge, the only way into E-Space is through artificially-created Charged Vacuum Embointments (CVEs, for short). The Doctor and Romana accidentally passed through one created by the Logopolitans. But my guess would be that other CVEs have been created over the years and that some exploration has been done in E-Space. Otherwise, how would the Doctor have as much knowledge as he does about this reality? It may not be him that's entered this universe before, but he has read up on the discoveries of other explorers who have.

Level Of Incursion; Full Circle spends almost all its time in E-Space. Its first few minutes are in N-Space and then they pass through the CVE and are stranded there for the rest of the story. State of Decay takes place entirely in E-Space. I'm led to believe, however, that Warrior's Gate takes place in the Void.



We have now itemized and analyzed every type of place that seems to exist outside of our Universe. Or, at least, I'm pretty sure we did. I try to be as thorough as possible but Doctor Who is a pretty long-running show. Lots of content to cover!

We're moving towards the end of the year, now. Which means another countdown from my BOOK OF LISTS will be on the way soon. I will, however, try to slip one more entry in that isn't so opinion-based before we get to the countdown. Not sure what I'll cover, yet. But I'll come up with something!   



Here's Part One if you missed it:
https://robtymec.blogspot.com/2019/10/analytical-going-beyond-guided-tour.html







Friday 18 October 2019

ANALYTICAL: GOING BEYOND - A GUIDED TOUR OUTSIDE OUR UNIVERSE

After a deliberate attempt to boost my new POINTS OF DEBATE topic (which seemed to do quite well as it sparked quite a bit of discussion - which is the whole point of the topic!), I've decided to do a two-part ANALYTICAL essay for the month of October. This is a topic I've been meaning to tackle for a while, now. It's something we've seen in both the Classic and New Series so it will enable me to do a lot of cross-comparison and other tasks of that nature that geeks so love to do! 


OUTSIDE OF OUR UNIVERSE

The Universe is truly a mystery. It's meant to be infinite. We're told it's still expanding even as I write this. It seems to have a very definite beginning (Castrovalva) and a final end (Utopia). It's also come very close to being completely destroyed on several occasions (Logopolis, Terminus, Stolen Earth/Journey's End just to name a few). On those occasions, it's often been the Doctor that stopped the cataclysm from happening.

Part of what makes the Universe such a mystery (or more a conundrum) is the fact that such an infinite space also seems to have boundaries. It is possible to go beyond the Universe to places that exist past its confines. How it's able to be infinite but you're still able to go to places outside of it seems like a pretty big contradiction of terms. And yet, that seems to be the way the Universe works. At least, that's how it goes in Doctor Who reality.

According to various stories we have seen throughout the entire series, there are several different places lurking beyond the Universe's boundaries. Let's actually look at all of those different things that are out there and even quantify them a bit by cross-comparing them to each other.


PART ONE - SOME OF THE MORE NATURAL STUFF

Let's look at some things floating around just outside of our Universe that we've encountered in several stories over the years. The frequency of these encounters leads me to believe that they are a bit more "natural". They happen more often so they're less unusual.

In order to make categorization more easy, we'll analyze certain traits each of these places possess. We'll give a general description of these places and then analyze their more specific qualities.


THE ANTI-MATTER UNIVERSE

The Chancellor on Gallifrey probably described the Anti-Matter Universe best by stating it is "equal and opposite to our own". Which creates a very dangerous rule about the nature of anti-matter. Should it come into contact with anything in our universe, it results in a violent explosion. We see the best example of this with the second Doctor's recorder at the end of The Three Doctors. There seems to be a way of shielding anti-matter, though. Q-star alloy is one of the more popular materials that can do this - but it decays rapidly.

It also appears that the Anti-Matter Universe has a guardian of sorts that will protect its material should people from our universe try to steal energy from it. Having said this, though, we do seem to find a way to develop anti-matter generators. In stories like Earthshock and Tsuranga Conundrum, we see ships being powered by the substance.


Size: Since it is equal and opposite to our own universe, we can assume the Anti-Matter Universe is the same size as ours 

General Aesthetics: Things appear very different in the Anti-Matter Universe. And yet, the same. Everything looks like it's been shot through an old fashioned film camera and we're looking at the negatives. Where things would be white, we see black. Which makes this particular reality a pretty dark-looking place.

Entry Points: For a place that is lethal to our own universe, it is surprisingly easy to enter. In fact, entrances seem to appear almost naturally. Certain types of Black Holes or Super Novas can take you into the Anti-Matter Universe. We even saw a portal that seemed to form naturally on the planet Zeta Minor. Although the fact that Zeta Minor seems to be located in the far reaches of the cosmos might have something to do with it. Perhaps because the planet is on the edge of our own universe, this might create a sort of instability which causes these sort of breaches to occur. 

Level of Incursion: We've actually not seen much of the Anti-Matter Universe. More often than not, creatures from that reality come into out own. It's difficult to determine if we've actually seen anyone from our end fully enter anti-matter. The Singularity Point in The Three Doctors seems to be at the edge of the Anti-Matter Universe. I'm also lead to believe that when the Doctor falls into that pit and confronts the Guardian Creature during Planet of Evil , he's standing at the threshold of the universe rather than properly entering it. It's also interesting to note that we've yet to venture in or near the Anti-Matter Universe in the New Series. It's only been featured in Classic Who stories.


PARALLEL REALITIES

In some ways, it almost doesn't feel like we've left our universe when we step into a parallel reality. Everything looks so much the same as our own. But this is a completely separate universe. Somehow created by a choice someone in that reality made that was different from the option the same person in our universe took.. Which means there are an infinite number of parallel realities out there stacked up against our own version of things.

Like the Anti-Matter Universe, there is a certain level of danger involved with crossing over to parallel realities. During Inferno, the Doctor states it's catastrophic for the same person from two separate realities to encounter each other. We almost get the impression it's the same sort of scenario as a person from two different timelines meeting themselves (ie: the Brigadier from Mawdryn Undead). However, in Rise of the Cybermen/Age of Steel, we do see Mickey cross paths with Rickey - the alternative reality version of himself. Nothing particularly nasty seems to happen when they do come together. Nor does the Doctor make a big fuss about the matter when he sees that the two of them have met

It should be noted that there is a difference between a parallel reality and an aborted timeline. Parallel realities are fully formed places that are distinct from our universe. When you venture into an aborted timeline, I think you are still here. When the timeline, at last, resets itself - things return to normal. A parallel reality can be destroyed, of course.But when it does, it doesn't change back to our reality. It is just gone from existence. The two should not be confused.

Size:  Since it is just a different version of our reality, a parallel universe is relatively the same size as our own.

General Aesthetics: As mentioned previously, a parallel universe looks very similar to our own. However, it is not a perfect copy. The schism created by the choice someone made in this different reality seems to have social implications that alter things. In Inferno, Britain appears to have become some sort fascist republic. In the reality the Doctor has nicknamed Pete's World, Britain has also appeared to have moved in more conservative directions. Technology seems different from ours, too. People use earbuds rather than cell phones to communicate. The Super Rich also appear to live in zeppelins. The wealth gap seems to be a bigger problem in Pete's World than in ours.

This seems the common trait in parallel realities. Society has evolved in a different way, but it is still very close to being identical to our own. Again, because this is a reality created out of choices, certain events can happen at a quicker or slower pace. In both Inverno and Pete's World, things seem to be moving a bit ahead of time to our own reality.

Entry Points: While these universes are near identical, passing from one to another does not seem that easy. Or, at the very least, it has consequences every time you do.  TARDIS technology can facilitate this process. In both Inferno and Rise of the Cybermen, it's a malfunction of some sort in the Doctor's ship that transports him to this other universe. It is interesting to note that the Doctor claims in Rise that when the Time Lords were still around, crossing to these universes was a simpler thing. We've never seen any kind of evidence of that nature during the Classic Series so it's difficult to understand what that statement means.

We do start seeing other types of technology that make travelling between the two universes possible, but they seem to actually do damage to the realities when you use them. Denizens of Pete's World use dimension jumpers and Rose mentions a dimension canon during the Series Four finale.  But crossing through parallel universes does not seem like an easy thing to accomplish. So far, it has only been done through technological means. There aren't natural portals like we see for anti-matter.

Of course, the Daleks' attempt to use their Reality Bomb caused the walls between all dimensions to dissolve for a bit and passing between parallel realities became much easier.

Level of Incursion: Unlike the anti-matter universe, quite a bit of any story involving parallel universes spends a considerable amount of time in them. There is usually some crossing back and forth between both realities, but we are exposed to the alternate one for an extended period of time. Particularly in Inferno and Rise of the Cybermen/Age of Steel. Other ventures into Pete's World in stories like Army of Ghosts/Doomsday and Stolen Earth/Journey's End are considerably shorter. But, again, this isn't like the Anti-Matter Universe, we still get considerable exposure to these other universes. 


THE VOID (OR BUFFERS OF THAT NATURE)

Little is known of the Void. We've been given a few vague-but-eerie descriptions of it in a select number of stories in the New Series. It seems to act as a sort of natural boundary between what's in our Universe and what's beyond it. A sort of border crossing, if you will. In  the process of passing through to what's out there, you have to also go through the Void. Which might be what makes leaving our reality so difficult. The Void seems to work as a bit of a shield - protecting us from what's out there. But that could go both ways. What's out there might be protected from us by the Void, as well.

If we go by dialogue alone, we've only heard of the Void in the New Series. It seems to only act as a shield between parallel realities. But, if we're willing to postulate a bit, we've seen the Void on several occasions during the Classic Series - it just wasn't given a name. It has also worked as a buffer for other things besides parallel dimensions.

Possible Void Examples In the Classic Series: 

The Mind Robber: The white space the TARDIS crew are trapped in during all of Part One is,very much, in keeping with the descriptions given of the Void in New Who. In this case it is a very powerful buffer between our Universe and the Land of Fiction - which is probably a Pocket Universe (more about them in Part Two of this essay). It is such a strong buffer in this instance that it causes the TARDIS to, temporarily, break apart before it can pass through to the Land of Fiction.

Inferno: That brief moment in Part One where the Doctor goes all stretchy in that weird shadowy set is, most obviously, the Void. New Who already indicates that the Void exists between parallel realities and the Doctor was very close to crossing over to one in that instance. He obviously got stuck in the Void, instead.

Planet of Evil: Near the beginning of Part Three, the Doctor briefly visits a very dark shadowy place to speak with the Anti-Matter Monster. I think this is also the Void. Especially since matter and anti-matter can't really enter each others' universe. They used the Void as neutral territory. 

Warrior's Gate: The entire story seems to take place in the Void. The Tharils have built portals from them to cross through to other universes.  But this is, essentially, Void Land. It helps that it resembles the set of Mind Robber so much. It creates a nice sense of consistency. In this case, the Void acts as a buffer between our reality and E-Space (more about that place in Part Two of this essay, too!). 

There might be one or two more examples of the Void in Classic Who - but these are the most prominent ones. 

Size: The dimensions of the Void are a bit tricky. Width-wise, I imagine it's quite narrow. You could probably walk from one side of the Void to the other in about twenty minutes or so if you're only crossing the width. It's a bit of a hike - but not much. However, it is also my belief that the Void acts as a sort of envelope around our entire Universe. So, if you try to walk the length of the Void, it would take you forever. The Universe, after all, is meant to be infinite. So walking along its skin would take an eternity.

General Aesthetics: If we go by it's Classic Who appearances, the Void seems to take on two different forms. It is either a very dark shadowy dimension or a white-washed place of nothingness. It could be that different parts of the Void look different. Perhaps, where the Void needs to be stronger, it takes on a lighter tone. Or there might even be some sort of night and day in the Void. 

Entry Points:  Portals into Void seem to occur both naturally and artificially. Although, in most cases, some sort of technology is needed to cross through . TARDISes can access it but it seems like a fairly bumpy ride for them. Void ships have also been created - they might be powered by something known as a dimension vault (since the Cybermen stole a dimension vault from the Daleks when they were all trapped in the Void after Doomsday, I assume that was the Void ship's engine). The Tharils seemed to use a technology that resembles magic to enter the Void. Their ability to ride the Time Winds must grant them all sorts of special powers which they used to access the Void. 

Level of Incursion: If we go by New Who alone, we never see inside the Void. It only gets talked about. But if we include the Classic Who references that never actually name the Void - we spend a whole lot more time there. In some stories, it's still quite brief. But then we also have Warrior's Gate - which, pretty much, spends its entire time there.




*A SPECIAL NOTE ABOUT ANTI-ZONES

In some instances, the natural protection the Void provides is not enough against certain outside threats. On these occasions, the Universe will actually create something known as an anti-zone. The Solitract was, obviously one of those dangers that merited such action

An anti-zone seems to come with it's own terrain and eco-system. It is a very dark labyrinthine cave network that can even get a bity misty.. Living creatures also dwell there. We saw rats, birds and flesh-moths. And, of course, there was Ribbons of the Seven Stomachs. An actual sentient being that appears to have just been created when the anti-zone sprang into existence.

Regardless of the strength of the anti-zone, the Solitract was still able to create portals in it. The portals weren't actually big enough for the Solitract to pass through - but it still used them to lure other sentient beings into its reality and keep it company. 



And so concludes Part One of our study into Things We Find Outside Our Universe. I purposely stuck to the dimensions that seem to occur more frequently or "naturally". In Part Two, we'll look at slightly rarer places....