DOCTOR WHO: SEASON-BY-SEASON - SEASON NINE

Just in case you didn't check out my Season Eight Review (https://robtymec.blogspot.com/2022/10/doctor-who-season-by-season-review-of.html), I'll re-state: we are now in my least favorite period of the show. I find much of it to be far too formulaic. Particularly when the Doctor is stranded on Earth and working with UNIT. The writing feels almost paint-by-numbers during these sort of adventures. The same plot elements occur again and again to the point where some stories seem nearly interchangeable. Different names for the characters - but everyone's doing, pretty much, the same thing! 

I don't completely hate this era. There are some qualities to it that I appreciate. It is great, for instance, for the Doctor to finally have an arch-nemesis. The battles we first see between Three and the Delgado Master would echo on for the rest of the series. While I do have some issues with how this incarnation of the Master is actually treated by the writers, I still love watching the first shots being fired in this great, ongoing war between the two bitterest of foes. 

I will confess: I was pretty damned harsh with Season Eight. Which may have been upsetting for some fans who read it. Many do see it as one of Pertwee's better seasons. But, since it was the birthplace of many of the tropes I would greatly dislike about this period, it was hard for me to be kind. 

Season Nine is less difficult for me to get through. There are substantially more things about this run of stories that I like. There will still be some problems, though. So, if you're like most Doctor Who fans, you're not going to like some of the things I'm going to say, here. But this should, at least, be easier for you to digest than my Review of Season Eight. 

OFF TO A GOOD START

I'm very happy with Day of the Daleks. If you go back to my Season Seven Review (https://robtymec.blogspot.com/2022/10/doctor-who-season-by-season-season-seven.html) this story uses a convention that I felt would be very helpful in stopping the show from becoming too repetitive under the restraints it had imposed upon itself. The Doctor's exile would have worked much better for me if he had still been allowed to make the occasional jump in time while still remaining trapped on Earth. This is what Day gives us. We still have a good chunk of the action going on during the 20th Century, but we also dip into the future (or, more accurately, into an aborted timeline). This finally gives us just a little bit of variety to the formula that has been lumbering the show down for the last few years. It's a bit of a Too Little, Too Late scenario. But still, it's better than never getting the variety at all! 

The complexity of Day of the Daleks' plot is also quite refreshing. Unlike most Classic Who stories, it's actually taking a serious look at time travel and it's various ramifications and consequences. And it does this quite nicely. Aside from never giving us the follow-up to the Doctor meeting himself in Part One (it would have been nice to have a scene later in the story where the Doctor and Jo head back to the lab and meet themselves again!), all the tangled plot threads that a good time travel adventure creates are neatly tied up. 

There is a subtler quality to this tale that I also quite like. Doctor Who, at this point, is still in a stage where you can really "feel" the episodes in each story. Oftentimes, an episode tells its own smaller plot with a proper climax (usually somewhere near the cliffhanger) that will, along with the parts both before and after it, tell a larger adventure. You can really see this when you watch a story from the 60s or early 70s in its entirety. Things feel almost disjointed as tension flows and recedes within the context of almost every episode.  This is due, largely, to the fact that the whole format of the show was partly inspired by the old adventure serials people used to watch in movie theatres when film was first invented. 

Day of the Daleks is one of those stories from the early days of the show that feels a lot more cohesive. It's more like four parts coming together to form a whole story. The plot contains just one real solid climax in Part Four with the other three episodes steadily building up to it. The show would eventually evolve into doing this on a regular basis. But this is one of the first times that it does it. There are other stories from earlier days that work in a similar manner (The Krotons would be another example of this) but Day of the Daleks stands out because it accomplishes the task extremely well. 

Curse of Peladon is also quite the curiosity. It should feel herrendously dated by this point. The whole plot is an allegory of a situation that was going on in European politics at the time. To add to the "datedness", most of the creature costumes now look like something you could buy from the bargain bin at a Halloween costume store. And then of course, there's the actual pace of the story. It doesn't move all that fast and has little action in it besides the pit fight with "Pertwee" (in quotation marks cause it's mostly a stunt man) and Grun. For the most part, Curse is just a lot of characters talking. 

And yet, I quite adore this story. I wouldn't even consider it a Guilty Pleasure. All the standing around in the Royal Court of Peladon is very well-executed on every level. Good writing, acting and direction. It all makes for some very compelling drama that I am quite happy to watch again and again. I might even say this is one of my favorite Third Doctor stories. It really is a great little treat. I can see why Peladon gets revisited in a later season (even if that effort doesn't go quite as well!). 

So the first eight episodes of Season Three make it look quite promising. Sadly, that's all about to change. 

A TURN FOR THE WORST

The Sea Devils reminds me of The Daemons. Both of these stories baffle me. I often wonder if I am viewing a special edition of these stories that only I ever see and everyone else is watching a much better-made version. Most fans speak fondly of both these tales. I actually think  they're both pretty awful. 

I've done a sufficient rant about Daemons in my last Review, of course. So let's focus on Sea Devils. As a sequel to The Silurians, it's a bit of an abomination. The first of these two tales dealt with complex issues and well-crafted characters who weren't entirely good or evil but had valid motivations for the things they were doing. The Sea Devils, on the other hand, is just a silly little monster romp. Aside from a brief period in Part Five where the Sea Devil Leader contemplates the Doctor's offer for peace, the titular creatures are completely two-dimensional. All the beautiful groundwork Malcolm Hulke creates in his first story with this species is, pretty much, thrown out the window. 

The storyline involving the Master feels a bit rubbish, too. For a man who was deemed so dangerous that they considered executing him, his "maximum security prison" seems more like a charming holiday spot! It's especially ludicrous when Jo can wander in and out of the building so easily during a latter episode and rescue the Doctor from the chair he's handcuffed to. 

Just to make the prison seem even less credible: we have Trenchard. He is the absolute worst possible person to be the head of such a facility. I mean, I get that you might not, necessarily, give the job to the brightest, most promising candidate. It's not a particularly illustrious position to hold. But the Master is still a very dangerous criminal. The person running the operation needs to have something more than the mental competence of a squirrel! 

But these sort of ridiculous conventions need to be in place to get the plot to move along in any kind of way. Although we can barely call it a plot. Moreso it is just a series of those abused tropes that have plagued the era so much, already. Once more, for instance, we get a bumbling minister who comes along and creates enough complications in the story to get all six parts filled. There's another ridiculous chase scene, too. This time on sea-doos! The Master crafts another difficult-to-believe escape at the end. By this point, these types of  plot devices have almost become a sort of list that needs to be checked off before you wrap the story up. It's quite the pitiful mess. 

I could go on endlessly about the problems I have with this story. But I will simply conclude by saying that there is little that I like about The Sea Devils. I sincerely hope Malcolm Hulke left this one off his resume!

FREEDOM FROM EXILE DOESN'T GO SO WELL, THIS TIME

For the second time this season, the Time Lords have a mission for the Doctor. This is great news, of course. At this point, the more the Doctor gets away from Earth and UNIT and suchlike, the happier I am. I don't claim to completely despise the Earthbound stories of this period, but there are certain elements of them that I am getting quite tired of. Having just gotten through The Sea Devils, moving away from Earth in the 20th Century is a welcome break!  

While Colony in Space was quite decent and Curse of Peladon excellent, our third excursion offworld doesn't go so well. Like The Web Planet many years ago, The Mutants actually looks quite  good on paper. The plot is fairly solid and plays with a lot of interesting ideas. The Solonians are an interesting alien species. I do love that they appear to get a cameo in Brain of Morbius!  I also really like that humanity isn't particularly pleasant in this tale. It's always interesting when science fiction goes in that direction. Rather than always making us the good guys. 

Like Web Planet, The Mutants tends to fall apart in its execution. Right from the first scene, we're off to a bad start. We appear to be getting the "It's Man" from Monty Python's Flying Circus rather than the dark, morbid hunting scene that we're meant to have. It doesn't bode well when your dramatic opening sequence looks comical when it's meant to be serious.. 

The biggest problem with The Mutants is just how flat so much of it feels. There is an abundance of really wooden acting, here. Without naming anyone specific (I try to be nice to actors since I am one, myself), I'll just say that about 80% of the guest cast seems almost stoic in their delivery. I'm not sure if the director wanted everyone to be holding back so much or if he just intentionally assembled a lot of actors that don't emote much! Whatever his choice, it made much of the story feel largely uninteresting.

On the other end of the spectrum, we have a few cast members who go really over-the-top in their roles. Having the OTT actors thrown into the mix makes the whole thing feel very skewed and off-kilter.

The Mutants also shows off another prominent problem that occurs in Pertwee-Era Who from Season Eight, onwards. I haven't really discussed much, yet. So I'll bring it up, now:

I always found it particularly odd that Season Seven produces multiple seven parters that, for the most part, hold together quite well. But most of the six-parters that come after tend to sag all over the place! Quite often, the third or fourth episode of a Pertwee-Era six-parter is just a useless runaround that fills time and accomplishes nothing. I really do think it would have served the show better if they had just produced more four part stories. 

Impressively enough, The Mutants resists padding itself with a lot of captures-and-escapes or other tricks like that. There is enough plot to fill the six parts. But, overall, the story still feels too drawn out. As is often the case with six parters in this period, I'm just losing interest as we get to Parts Five and Six. 

The Mutants did show a lot of great potential with some interesting ideas at work within it. But it comes together very poorly and would have done much better had it been trimmed down an episode or two. It doesn't stink quite as badly as The Sea Devils, but it still means we've spent twelve episodes suffering, now. Those eight episodes that went so well at the beginning of the season are becoming a fading memory... 

I REALLY SHOULD HATE THIS ONE!  

And then, finally, we get to The Time Monster: The type of Pertwee-Era story that I should be dragging through the mud. Those much-maligned tropes are there in great abundance. The Master is meddling with powers he can't control. The Brigadier is exceedingly dim. Sargent Benton is having some of his worst luck ever. I should completely and utterly hate this one. 

A lot of folks aren't fond of this tale. But there also seems to be a weird undercurrent of fans that have a strange love for it. Oddly enough, I am part of that second group. After all the bitching and moaning that I've done about how much the formulaic nature of the show irritates me, I actually find myself enjoying most of The Time Monster. 

I think it's the earnestness of the story that impresses me. It is milking the whole UNIT family premise for all its worth and is unabashed about it. Somehow, I can actually respect that. 

There is something about the way the UNIT family works in this story that feels more comfortable. The chemistry between the Doctor, the Brig, Jo, Benton and Yates is way better than usual. Interactions among UNIT characters in previous stories could, sometimes, feel strangely forced. Whereas, here, it really does feel like they've become an actual family! Many of their scenes together have a lot of charm. 

Time Monster is also one of those rare 6 part Pertwee Era stories that fill up half-decently. Episodes Three and Four do have a bit of a drag to them but it's not as bad as usual. The techniques used to fill time are less obvious than on other occasions. The Master using TOMTIT as a time scoop  to try to slow down Captain Yates' caravan, for instance, is far more interesting and entertaining than the usual trick of just locking a few main characters up for a bit, then having them escape and get re-captured.   

Finishing up the last two episodes in Atlantis was also a very good move. Introducing a different location and establishing several new characters gives the story a nice tonal shift. Again, my desire to see the Doctor travel in time but still remain on Earth is fulfilled. It's a great way to give us some variety in the story-telling. The whole adventure becomes a sort of Classical Greek Myth rather than just being a total UNIT runaround for the entire six parts. 

Is Time Monster an absolute classic? Not particularly. As mentioned, there is still a drag to it in places. And, while its shamelessness to abuse formulas has a  bit of a charm to it, the tropes do still grate a bit. 

But, overall, I think it's a decent little yarn. After some significantly weak adventures like Sea Devils and Mutants, it gets the Season back on track and finishes things off quite solidly. 

Fortunately, the days of the Doctor's exile are about to end. While there will still be some problems in the narrative once he is free, things still improve significantly. 

    

 

 

DOCTOR WHO: SEASON-BY-SEASON - A REVIEW OF SEASON EIGHT

Warning: 

The next few reviews will be from an era that is greatly loved by most - if not all - fans. 

Except me. 

While I don't completely despise the rest of Jon Pertwee's Era, I'm not all that fond of it, either. Basically, I view it as a bit of a creative low-point for the show. 

These next few reviews may incense some of you to no end. How dare I speak poorly of The Great Jon Pertwee/Barry Letts/Terrance Dicks Era?! Clearly I am a heretic and should be stoned or hung or burnt at the stake. Or a combination of the three with a severe beating or two worked in just for good measure. 

This is why I am posting this warning. So that you may be braced for my heresy. You can take a deep breath before reading any further and focus on remaining calm as I spew my unpopular opinions. 

I know I should be even more responsible and encourage you to just skip the next few entries. That would be the kinder, more responsible thing to do. But the truth is: I like getting a lot of views on these posts. So, instead, I ask you to merely focus on remaining calm as you take in a slew of comments that you will, more-than-likely, savagely disagree with.     

KEEPIN' IT SIMPLE WITH SOME ENUMERATION

In my usual ongoing effort to introduce variety into these reviews, I'm going to simply list all the things that have their beginning in Season Eight that go on to mar my enjoyment of the rest of the Pertwee Era. 

My biggest objection to this period of the show is how formulaic it became. And much of that formula started here: 

1) The UNIT Family has Too Many Tropes: This concept didn't truly begin here, of course. We can even see hints of it that go all the way back to Web of Fear. The problem is that, in Season Eight, the use of UNIT in a story becomes a series of somewhat overused traits. As this Season begins, we now have the Brigadier, Captain Mike Yates and Sergeant Benton firmly established. From this point onward, there will always be certain moments that we see over and over.  Every story, for instance, will involve Yates doing something cheeky, Benton having a spot of bad luck and the Brig having to yell at them both. Of course, every attack that UNIT attempts through sheer military force will prove completely useless. It will always be science that saves the day! And various other recurring ideas of this nature. For me, it starts getting tiresome.quite quickly. UNIT could have been used so much more effectively in this era. But, instead, it just becomes a redundancy. They are just the same plot device continuously used in the same way. 

2) The Master is Always up to the Same Thing: I've brought this up before when I discuss Delgado's Master. Magnificent portrayal, don't get me wrong. The actor excelled at laying the foundations of the character. But the writers really could have come up with some better storylines for him. Pretty much every story involving this incarnation is just the Master meddling with something that he thinks he can control and will give him great power. The Doctor warns him that he's out of his depth. The Master doesn't listen and the powers he's tampering with become his undoing. It happens five times in a row in Season Eight and continues to play out this way almost every time we see the Master in future seasons. 

3) The Return of the Damsel in Distress: I loved Liz Shaw on so many levels. A great companion who really should have stayed on. But then, Caroline John did warn them that she only wanted one season! With the introduction of Jo Grant, the female companion goes back to being largely useless. This will even continue on with Sarah Jane Smith. Ironically, she talks quite a bit about feminism, but does little to actually demonstrate it in her stories. But it starts with Jo Grant in Season Eight. Time and again, she just seems to get into some sort of trouble that the Doctor will need to, constantly, get her out of. 

4) The Brigadier Becomes a Joke: In Season Seven, the Brigadier and the Doctor would butt heads from time-to-time. But, overall, they have a great respect for each other. Lethbridge-Stewart does any number of very helpful things for the Doctor. He even shows genuine friendship for him during scenes that are legitimately touching. One of my favorite examples of this is in Ambassadors of Death where he takes a moment to say bye to the Doctor before the Time Lord heads off into space. 

But all that changes in Season Eight. The production team decides they must absolutely mock the Military Mentality every chance they can get. And they do it by making the Brig look like a total buffoon. We see it for the first time right in Terror of the Autons. The Brigadier is trying to stage a briefing during Episode Three. The Doctor treats the whole moment in a way he never would have in the previous season. He seems to have little or no respect left for the man, now. Things continue to get worse for the character, of course. He's, pretty much, an absolute idiot in The Three Doctors. But the poor treatment of the character from the writers begins here. 

5) Pertwee Starts to Phone it in: Again, we go back to Season Seven as the basis of comparison. As I mentioned in my Review of that period, Pertwee is less certain of himself as an actor. Which means he tries much harder to make the character seem very real in every scene he performs in. Which causes the audience to fall madly in love with Doctor Three. 

But it does almost seem like the success of his first season may have gone to his head. He appears to be putting less effort into the role as we enter Season Eight. Admittedly, there are still times in this year where he is definitely injecting something new and interesting into the role. But, overall, his interpretation of the character becomes far more calculated, To the point where Doctor Three almost feels sedate, at times.  Pertwee is just using a series of reactions that he has employed over and over in earlier stories. He doesn't offer much to expand the interpretation of the character. From Season Eight onwards, he just keeps giving us more of the same.   

Jon Pertwee is still a very gifted actor with incredible amounts of charisma and presence. But it does seem that, after Season Seven, he starts to rely a bit too heavily on those traits and not enough on actually applying himself as an actor by finding new and interesting things to do with his character.

THINGS THAT OCCUR EXCLUSIVELY IN SEASON EIGHT THAT ANNOY ME

Just a little bit more enumeration to engage in. Having discussed negative attributes that began in Season Eight and continued for the rest of the Pertwee Era, I'd also like to point out a few problems that happen exclusively in this set of stories. 

1) An Adventure That Would Have Worked Great Out-of-Context!  Fans seem to have a lot of mixed feelings for Claws of Axos. Most seem to find the story to be a bit of a low point in the season. Whereas I think it's a tightly-written little four-parter. The aliens are quite interesting. The Master is well-used. Guests like Chinn and Filer are quite fun in their supporting parts. There's even some interesting themes at work: The Axons exploit humanity for their greed and the Doctor uses the same trick against them as they seek to gain time travel from him. I even love the fact that this is the first time the show introduces us to the concept of a Time Loop. 

So what bothers people so much about Claws? I think it's the fact that, while it is a well-put-together adventure - it's re-hashing sooo many things we've already seen in the Jon Pertwee Era. Once more, there's an alien invasion in progress on Contemporary Earth (so many attempts to take over the Earth happen in such a short period of time!). Again, we're at a nuclear reactor that might go critical at any moment. We're dealing with another government minister that, for the most part, is just causing problems. There are strongly-dedicated scientists working on important projects. The Master is back yet again. And so on... 

If Claws of Axos had existed in a vacuum, we would appreciate it so much better. But because it's relying so much on conventions the show has already abused so heavily, it receives a lot less appreciation. It's a very strange phenomenon that really burdens the story and the season, in general. 

2) Way Too Damned Much of the Master: Speaking of the redundancy of the Master in Claws of Axos, we need to talk about just how overused he is in this season. 

To be honest, the production team nearly gets away with it. He is a great villain and I almost don't mind that he's in all five stories that year.  But I do still recall the first time I saw this season. As we get to the revelation of who the new Vicar is in Episode One of The Daemons,  I really did find myself thinking: "Not again!" 

It probably didn't help that I really didn't like The Daemons. It's about 3 episodes longer than it needed to be. The fact that The Awakening told, more or less, the same story in just two parts certainly helps to re-enforce my point!    

But even if the final story of the season had been outstanding, it really did feel like I'd had enough of the Master. Terror of the Autons and Mind of Evil tell decent little stories that are linked together by the Doctor stealing his rival's dematerialisation circuit. Once that saga had been complete, the Master should have disappeared til the end of the season. A return appearance by that point would have not felt too excessive  Of the three other stories of that season, Colony in Space would have been the one I would have kept and used to wrap up the year. The third and fourth story of the season should not have involved the evil Time Lord in the slightest. 

SOME RAYS OF SUNSHINE... 

Thus far, I haven't been very kind to this season. So let's get into some stuff that I, for the most part, enjoyed. Enumeration has been fun, so let's keep it going: 

1) The Mind of Evil:  I've actually gone on quite a bit about this one in an Unsung Classics entry I did a while back: (https://robtymec.blogspot.com/2021/03/unadulterated-boorish-opinion-unsung.html). As usual, I will resist repeating myself too much. Go to the link I posted if you want something more detailed. 

Much of the story feels like a throwback to Season Seven (written by the same guy who gave us Inferno - which is probably why a reference is made to it). Season Seven is how I would have liked the entire Pertwee Era to have worked. It still uses some of those conventions I dislike that Season Eight gave birth to, but it also maintains a lot of the standards of quality of its predecessor. It's also probably my favorite Roger Delgado Master story. Aside from slipping endlessly on a puddle of water, he's really great, here! 

2) Colony in Space: The story does not always get the greatest amount of love from fans. I can see some of their points. It runs into a lot of the same problems that many Pertwee 6-parters have. But it does set a very important precedent: 

The Doctor can escape his exile, sometimes.

Season Eight, to me, was showing that trapping the Doctor on 20th Century Earth was really not working. So when Colony begins with the Doctor getting his TARDIS working again and sending him off to a fairly half-decent adventure, I'm quite ecstatic! It represents an escape from a formula I was getting quite tired of. I was so glad that the Time Lords would continue to send the Doctor on missions. The more time he gets away from his exile, the less I have to deal with the core problems I have with this latest iteration of the show! 

3) There is still some variety: While I have complained quite extensively about how formulaic Pertwee Who becomes in Season Eight, there is still some degree of diversity that makes it enjoyable. Even just the general plots of each story have a pretty good range. Yes, Terror of the Autons and  Claws of Axos are straightforward invasion stories - but the methods of invasion are quite different. Mind of Evil is a political intrigue. The Daemons is about an ancient evil that has been with us throughout history. And Colony in Space, as already stated, is just-plain beautiful because it gets the Doctor off Earth! 

So there is still a degree of creativity going on, here. I can't just totally slam this season for its lack of originality. 

FINAL VERDICT

While I have just given this season a few compliments, they were scant. There are a lot of things about Season Eight that I'm not particularly pleased with. 

Would I call it a legitimately "bad" season like I did Season Four (https://robtymec.blogspot.com/2022/07/doctor-who-season-by-season-season-four.html)? I don't think so. I wouldn't quite go that far with my criticism. But I will say that Season Eight comes perilously close to being a bad season. 

The quality of the stories is a bit tenuous. Terror of the Autons.is a fun adventure - but very troubled, in places. There are certain elements of the story that make little or no sense. Mind of Evil is the jewel of the season. Colony in Space is half-decent too (but would have worked better as a four-parter). Claws of Axos has that weird out-of-context appeal to it. 

And then, there's The Daemons. This one baffles me. It seems to get a lot of love - I'm not sure why, though! To me, it's just a pretty big mess! 

I'll admit: It's off to a decent start. There's a very nice homespun charm to it during the first episode or so. But, somewhere during Part Two, it just starts to drag...  And drag... And drag! Azal makes three appearances when he only needs one. He does so for the plain and simple reason that the story needs padding out. Osgoode is horrifically baffled by what the Doctor wants him to build so that it will also buy a bunch of time in the plot. I'm, pretty much, done with the Master by this point in the season. I also think it's quite ridiculous that they actually gave him a cliffhanger. The helicopter chase scene also feels, for the most part, pretty silly. There's just problem after problem, here. And yet, every fan seems to speak of it with great nostalgia. 

The ultimate resolution of the story is the silliest part. You're really trying to convince me that Azal, a being that has lived for countless years, has never witnessed self-sacrifice before? And that it confounds him so much that he self-destructs?! It's a pretty damned cheap cop-out if you ask me! 

The last few minutes with the May Dance does bring back some of that charm that we were getting at the beginning but there are just too many episodes where this really is a poorly put-together story. The Bookends can't save it. 

I went to the trouble of digging a bit deeper into Daemons because it really symbolises so many problems that occur over the bulk of the Third Doctor Era. During the Classic Who Days, fans loved using the term "pantomime" whenever they disliked a story. For the most part, the term was too harsh. However, I do think this particular period comes closest to giving us that. A mustache-twirling villain who is overused (he even dresses in black and has a goatee!). A pretty damsel in distress. Characters and plot elements that work to a complete formula every time. If this doesn't feel like panto, I don't know what does!   

Overall, the qualities of Season Eight do outweigh the negatives. But the balance is very precarious. And it will continue to be on shaky ground for the duration of the era. Things will look up a bit when the Doctor breaks free from his exile but there are still problems that persist even after the show returns to its old format. 

Everyone has a period of the show that they enjoy the least. For many, it's the late 80s with Six and Seven. Or, in New Who, it seems to be the Chibnall Era. This, however, is where I feel Who is at its lowest point. Yes, it was very popular when it came out and fans that weren't around when it was on the air seem to be quite fond of it when they watch it retrospectively. I, however, am not one of those people. There are certain things that I really love Doctor Who for. This era seems to have thrown most of those things out the window and given me quite a bit of the stuff that I genuinely dislike about science fiction.  

I will gladly defend Pertwee's first season with all my heart and soul. But, from Season Eight, onward, I'm not happy with a lot of what's going on. 

So, brace yourselves, Fans of Three. The next few reviews are going to be a bumpy ride!       

 

 

UNADULTERATED BOORISH OPINION: THE SILLINESS OF GENERAL FAN CONSENSUS - PART THREE: THE "WOKE MYTH"

SPECIAL NOTE: So I actually wrote this quite some time ago (back when there were only two seasons that Chibnall had created). At the time, there were lots of folks going on about how they considered the show to be "too woke". So I decided to do an essay addressing the issue. I never ended up posting it for two principle reasons: 

1) I had a feeling this would just incite the wrong kind of debate. People were just going to get mad and/or overemotional. The topic was, essentially, too delicate. 

2) The essay just seemed to go on and on and I couldn't figure out, at the time, where to make the appropriate cuts! 

Some time has passed. Opinions have cooled and I became detached enough from what I wrote that I can finally do the necessary editing! So I thought I would dig it back up and post it: 

It's time, once more, to bite the Hand that feeds me as I compose yet another installment in my SILLINESS OF GENERAL FAN CONSENSUS  series. Every once in a while, I feel the urge to address an opinion I hear over and over again from fans that just isn't really making sense to me. 

Every time I do this, of course, I run the risk of legitimately pissing off my readership. But I feel I must do it, anyway. It could be my sense of integrity. More than likely, however, it's my need to self-sabotage. 

WHAT IS THE "WOKE MYTH"?    

It's a stupid term that I've come up with on my own, really. But it describes a phenomenon that I see going on in fandom since Chibnall has taken over as Head Writer. So, yes, brace yourselves: This is going to be another one of those entries that I like to write from time-to-time where I actually defend what he has been doing with the show. Where I'm going to, basically, accuse fandom of being ridiculously over-critical.

Even before a single second of the Chibnall era was transmitted, there were fans that were already ranting about this notion that he was making the whole show feel "too woke". Because he'd cast the lead as a woman and made one companion a non-white male and another companion a non-white female, certain fans were sure that the show was now going to bombard us with constant messages about "checking our privilege". That everything was going to be about Political Correctness and the importance of being a Social Justice Warrior (or "SJW" as the cool kids like to call them). That it was no longer going to be about telling exciting science-fiction stories- we were just going to be made to feel guilty about ourselves if we were straight white males. 

The fact that this opinion was being expressed quite heavily before any of his episodes even aired points, already, to its ludicrousness. By the time we were actually viewing any of his content, many fans had already made up their minds. Chibnall was cramming his Left Wing Agenda down our throats at the expense of good story-telling. 

This is why I like to refer to it as: "the woke myth". It works in much the same way as traditional mythology works. Back in the day, a few influential Greeks said: "Hey! I bet there's a whole pantheon of gods looking down on us, right now, and toying with our fates!" Before long, the rest of their civilisation was like: "Yeah! That makes a lot of sense! I bet there must be gods up there that are in charge of war and wine and love and other stuff like that! Let's start worshipping them!" 

The truth of the matter is: there were no gods of this nature. Apollo and Zeus didn't hang out together in Olympus and talk crap about Hades and Poseidon. But, for a good long time, a lot of people believed these gods to be real. They built shrines for them and everything. Sadly, under the right conditions, unfounded opinions can spread like wildfire and come to be accepted as absolute truth. 

So, the point of this essay will be to prove that Chibnall's version of Doctor Who is not "too woke" - as some fans are trying to lead us to believe. That it is, essentially, the same sort of programme we've been getting since it first began. It's not suddenly trying to push an agenda or trying too hard to educate us on certain social issues. It's just being the show it's always been.    

SOME CLARIFICATION

As usual, it might be good to get a few definitions out before we get too far into this. Especially for a topic this delicate. The most important one would be: What does it mean to be "woke"?  

My impression of the term is that it is an awareness that certain groups in our civilisation have been systematically marginalised (or even wholeheartedly persecuted) by one predominant demographic. That segment of the population that keeps trying to assert its dominance is referred to as "privileged" and needs to be frequently reminded of the unfair advantages it has had throughout history. Only by being reminded of their privilege on a regular basis can they consider themselves' "woke". 

It would follow that if you are in one of these marginalised and/or persecuted groups, that you are just naturally "woke." Because of the advantages you have been denied, you are constantly being reminded of the injustices you suffer. 

Being "woke" is, essentially, being aware of discrimination. Most forms of discrimination that "woke" people rail against are the notorious social "isms". They include Racism, Sexism and Classism (discrimination against someone for their financial status). Homophobia, though not an "ism", would be another topic that is frequently denounced by "woke culture" On the other end of the spectrum, they are usually very strong supporters of Environmentalism. . 

There are some less talked-about atrocities, that "woke" people will sometimes still highlight to us. Ageism or cultural misappropriation (sometimes known as gentrification) would be two stronger examples of this. They don't get mentioned as much, but they are referenced on occasion. 

JUST A BIT MORE CLARIFICATION

I do hope that the definition I just composed did not come across, in any way, as being sarcastic. Some of you may have been consciously looking for that tone but I was doing my best not to imply it. The truth of the matter is: I do feel that we all need to be a bit woke. Some take the concept to an extreme, of course. They are the ones who become a bit of an embarrassment for those who are trying to represent the whole ideology fairly. But I do believe that it is important for me to recognize that, as a straight white male, I have had a lot of opportunities handed to me. I even feel that certain things do need to be done to re-dress the balance a bit. 

So we have a fairly clear definition of what constitutes "being woke" and I have stated my own personal stance on the whole philosophy. Let's make one more thing very clear: I am not going to say that Chibnall's version of Doctor Who is not being "woke" at all. 

The truth of the matter is: Doctor Who has always been a bit "woke". Although the term that would have probably been applied to it back in the day would've been "progressive". With the Doctor being the sort of character that fights injustice, he's bound to come across as a bit of an SJW from time-to-time.  He will even handle certain relevant social issues with an opinion that leans slightly to the Left. Which tends to be the camp that woke culture resides in.  

Even in the very second Doctor Who story, ever, we can see that being displayed just a little bit. It's not hard to see those Daleks as evil rampaging conservative capitalists that are up to no good (they're certainly meant to represent fascism - which is, pretty much, all those political ideologies taken to an extreme) and the Thals as peace-loving socialists who are just trying to work together for a better future. Quite clearly: Right is bad, Left is good. And, as I said, it took only one story before such an agenda started to show itself. 

We should remember this is a show that started in the 60s. Back then, TV was, essentially, being run by old white men.. Nonetheless, one of the more progressive old white men chose a woman to be the producer. It's very first story was directed by a non-white gay male. To have people from these demographics creating a show during such a period made it almost inevitable that these sort of leanings would come out quite quickly and define the show for the rest of its existence. And I'm pretty okay with that. Because, for the most part, Doctor Who did not try to beat us over the head with its politics. 

Which leads me to my real point: Chibnall's Doctor Who is a bit "woke". I'm the first to admit that. But then, as I just said, the show has always been that way. What I aim to prove in this particular essay is that the programme has not become "too woke". Even though certain elements of fandom would have you believe otherwise. 

HOW DOES ONE BECOME "TOO WOKE"?! 

So, probably just one more definition to cover, here. But, really, all this "defining stuff" is actually already re-enforcing some of my points so we are legitimately getting into the meat of the essay. This isn't like the "Visually Comedic Doctors" series that I did last month where I had to spend a whole entry just defining things! 

Being "too woke", of course, is highly subjective. Some would even say that being "woke" at all is "too woke".  People who think this might even be the sort of folks that are launching these "too woke" accusations at Chibnall's Doctor Who. But, as I've stated previously, if you're mad at the current iteration of the show for being "woke" - then you really shouldn't be watching the series at all. Because it's always been this way. 

I should probably try to point out the differences between "woke" and "too woke".  In my opinion, there are two basic ways in which a person becomes "too woke". Let's break them down: 

1. Bringing up social issues too often

This is the most blatant way of exhibiting this particular flaw. A person is literally being too woke because you can almost measure it in a quantitative manner. The atrocities of racism or sexism or other such things are brought up so frequently in discussions with them that their whole campaign to "educate the privileged" has become counter-productive. The frequency of their rhetoric is starting to annoy us so much that we stop listening to what they have to say. 

If, for instance, the Doctor was always bemoaning the fact that she is now a female and that she is constantly being denied opportunities - then I would say Doctor Who has become too woke. I don't feel that this is happening, though. Sometimes, when she has gone into the past, she has been discriminated against. We saw this very clearly in The Witchfinders. Quite literally, the Doctor's hands become tied on certain occasions during that story because she is now a gender that does not get equal rights. This makes sense, however. That era of history was particularly oppressive towards women. Yes, some men were found guilty of being warlocks. But, most of the time, it was witches who were burned and/or dunked. During that period, possessing a female reproductive system not only restrained you greatly, it actually put you in greater danger! 

What I do appreciate is that there are other times when the Doctor has slipped into the past and very little emphasis has been placed on the stigmas she must, sometimes, suffer. When she gets transported back to 1834 with Ada Lovelace in Spyfall, only the briefest of mentions is made to Ada (not even the Doctor) about "how a woman is meant to behave". Ada very quickly skirts around the problem and saves the Doctor from the Master. Basically, there is a quick acknowledgement of the sort of stereotypes against women that existed at the time - and then the plot moves on from it. Chibnall does not dwell on the point, though. In my opinion, if he had been too woke, the entire sequence that takes place in the 1800s would have droned on endlessly about the horrors of the values that existed at the time. Ada and the Doctor would not have been capable of doing anything without ridiculous levels of opposition from male characters (which, in all honesty, would have been a fairly accurate depiction of that era). But Chibnall decides not to take this slant. He doesn't ignore the sexism that existed during that period, but he doesn't go on about it too much, either. 

There are other stories that take place roughly in this period that handle sexism in a similar manner. The Haunting of Villa Diodati is another good example of this. Certain social stigmas that women suffered at the time get vaguely mentioned now and again. But, for the most part, the plot focuses on a crazy haunted house being attacked by a weird Cyberman. Which is exactly where the focus should be. 

Again, I'm hard-pressed to find examples of content in the last two seasons of Who that were too woke. Certain social injustices do get acknowledged when they need to be. Were they not mentioned, at least, in passing - then the story would actually seem unrealistic. But, at no point have I found that these topics were being brought up too frequently. Even in something like Rosa - a story that takes place in a society where racism has gone to a ridiculous extreme - there's still time to tell an exciting science fiction story and even develop some characters a bit. It's not just "look how terrible racism is" for an entire hour. There's plenty of other stuff going on, too. 

2. Decisions that are made purely for the sake of "wokeism"

This one is a bit more subtle. The easiest way for me to illustrate it would be to discuss casting decisions.

I did go out with a woman for a while who really enjoyed (trying not to retch as I write this) Hallmark Christmas Specials (had to to take a break from writing this to do a bit of vomiting!). She pointed out, one time, how she was watching one where the main character was from Texas. She was getting married and all her old sorority friends were going to be in her bridal party. The protagonist looked like a stereotypical Texan girl who would go to a sorority: Tall, blond-haired and blue-eyed. Among the rest of her extensive bridal party, however, not a single white female was to be found. This struck the woman I was going out with as being almost a bit silly. Women of this particular cultural background were going to be predominantly white. Perhaps one non-white individual in the bridal party was believable. But all of them being minorities smacked of a casting director with an agenda! 

Decisions that come across as legitimately impractical and are made mainly for the sake of appearing politically correct would be something that I would label as too woke. Are we seeing this sort of thing in Chibnall's Doctor Who? I don't think so. 

I look at the way the TARDIS crew had two visible minorities travelling in it for the last two seasons. With both characters, their racial background had a significant bearing in certain stories. For Ryan, it was Rosa. For Yaz, Demons of the Punjab. So they were not just written into the show so that Chris Chibnall could show off that he wasn't a racist. He didn't just, arbitrarily, decide to make them Black and Pakistani.There were actual reasons for having them be the races that they are. 

Truthfully, he didn't even really need to go to such trouble.  As far as I'm concerned, he really could have just put Yaz and Ryan in the show just to improve diversity. Way back in the day, the show definitely had a tendency to cast a little too much on the white side and the balance does need some re-dressing..But I do like that Chibnall goes to the trouble of actually justifying why he made his casting decisions. This definitely appears to me to be someone who is not trying to be too woke.   

There are, of course, a few other methods people might use that would insinuate too much "wokeness" on their behalf. But we don't see this happening all that much. The examples I just gave are the two most obvious traits. 

POINTING OUT THE FLAWS IN PEOPLES' REASONING 

(MY FAVORITE PART)

At last, we get to the best section of an essay like this. This is where I look at what fandom seems to be saying on a certain subject and poke holes in their theories. Basically, everything I've been writing so far has been leading up to this moment!

Just as there are two basic ways to be too woke, there are two main flaws that I see in this Doctor Who is too woke opinion. Or, perhaps it might be more accurate to say that when people are claiming that Doctor Who has become too woke, I see them making the same two mistakes over and over. 

Once more, we'll break things down: 

1. Skewing things 

This is one of the most common errors people make when trying to make a point. They're building a hypothesis and trying to back it up with facts. They suddenly realize there's just not enough of those facts to really make their opinion look solid. So they start twisting the context of things. Or, in some cases, they full-on lie. They're hoping, of course, that you don't go back and do some research of your own. That you'll just accept that what they're bringing up is accurate.  

People who say Doctor Who is too woke seem to do this a lot. Here's a fairly clear example: 

I was listening to a podcast a while back where they were having a discussion about Series 11. They all agreed that the season had too many stories about racism. This confused me. The only story that really dealt with the issue was Rosa. Is one story about racism too much? 

As I bore with them (and it really was tough to hang in there. It wasn't the easiest podcast in the world to listen to!), I learnt that they also considered Demons of the Punjab to be a second story in the season that preached against racism. 

There are, at least, two flaws that I can see in their reasoning. The first one being that, if Demons of the Punjab really was about racism, that really is just two out of ten episodes that brought up the subject. Is that really too much? I mean, if there had been, say, seven episodes out of the season that dealt with the matter, I might say: "Okay! Okay! I get it! Racism is bad. Can we talk about something else, now?!". But can we really consider two episodes to be too much? I don't really think so. I think the podcasters were skewing a bit. Trying to make it sound like 90% of the season's content was talking about racism when it was really only twenty. 

The second big problem with this opinion is a much more serious one. Demons of the Punjab is not actually about racism. It's about religious persecution or extreme nationalism. But it's not about racism. 

Stories involving racism display one race attacking another in some way. We could even say that an episode like The Doctor's Daughter fits such a description. The central thrust of the story is about humans and Hath hating each other. Even if one of those races are fictional, the story is displaying the evils of racism. 

But Demons of the Punjab is about people of the same race fighting amongst each other. It's Hindu against Muslim. But everyone is, essentially, Indian. Even when Indian characters are expressing their discontent about what the UK has done to them, they always refer to them as "British". Not white. So, really, this is either religious discrimination or the horrors of colonialism**. 

So, I'm sorry podcasters, but I'm not really seeing racism, here. Your statement is similar to reviewing a film involving Irish Catholics fighting Irish Protestants and saying that it's about Sexism. Clearly it's about two religions not being able to tolerate each other.  Not about one gender denying opportunities to another.  

In many ways, the podcasters made themselves sound a bit ignorant. They saw a story that didn't have a whole lot of white people in it so they assumed it must be about racism. 

So often, this is what I'm seeing when people try to present "facts" to back up the idea that Doctor Who is now too woke. A little error here and there is understandable, of course. We all get minor facts wrong from time to time. But there's some serious misrepresentation going on with people perpetuating the Woke Myth that is, oftentimes, not even that hard to spot. But a fan that's looking for something to complain about isn't going to question the data too hard. They're just going to jump onboard. I'm sure any number of other people that listened to the podcast just agreed with them without really thinking through their claim.. It's like those Ancient Greeks who never bothered to say: "Well, have we actually ever seen any evidence of these gods?!" Instead, they just went ahead and started building those shrines!

**If you bother to do some historical research, you'll see that colonialism has little to do with racism. Britain attempted to colonise any number of places where the population was as white as white can be. They weren't really trying to racially persecute anyone, they just liked to conquer stuff!

2. Forgetting the Past

In many ways, I've brought this up quite a bit, already. But I do think it's good to take a healthy dive into it and really pick it apart. The basic idea is that if you despise Chibnall's era because it's too woke, then you should really be hating the show's entire 38 seasons and a telemovie. Because it's all, pretty much, as woke as the current era. In some instances, the show has been even more woke than it is now.  

Again, it's best to go with an example. If you're a keen reader of my blog, you'll notice I've actually brought this one up before. But it is a really good one. So I'll use it again. In fact, I'm so lazy that I'm just cutting and pasting the whole thing from its original entry:  

Case in Point:  A friend of mine claimed after Praxeus that Chibnall was talking too much about LGBTQ culture. He was referring to the fact that two of the supporting characters in that story were in a same-sex marriage. Admittedly, if you're paying careful attention, you will also notice incidental characters in two other episodes from Series 11 and 12 mention they are in relationships with someone of the same gender. Because of this, he feels Chibnall is pushing an agenda too hard.

"You do realize," I responded, "That RTD had a bisexual character who was a companion for a bit and then became a recurring character. And Moff had a lesbian companion for an entire season. Compared to them, Chibnall practically looks like a gay-basher!"

Again and again, I see this from the Chib-haters. They make all these claims that he's executing all sorts of unprecedented changes in the show that have ruined it. The idea that Chibnall is making Doctor Who too woke, of course, is usually their biggest beef of this nature. They swear that the show was telling simple science fiction stories before this era that never tried to get political. They seem to have forgotten that the show was plenty woke before he ever went near it. 

Admittedly, this is one of my favorite arguments when I do these sort of entries. I will point out that he's not really doing anything that hasn't been done before by other Showrunners. And yet, when his predecessors did it, no one got angry with them. In some cases, they were even praised for the choices they made. Which is why I level my whole over-critical accusation at fandom. Why is it okay for someone else to do it? But, suddenly, when that someone is named Chris Chibnall, they're "killing the show"? 

CONCLUSION:

So, basically, if you're going to claim that Chibnall has, somehow, introduced new things that we've never seen before into the format and turned Doctor Who into something it isn't, you might want to do a little re-watching, first. I know, in some cases, it's difficult to look back into a show that has run as long as this one has - but you should still do your homework before you state such strong opinions. 

Which is why I love, all-the-more, my little example of my friend complaining about LGBTQ representation in the Chibnall era. If you have only watched New Who, you can still dispel his opinion quite easily. 

The fact of the matter is: Of all the Showrunners in New Who, Chibnall has given the least amount of representation to marginalised groups. In this respect, he actually seems less woke than his predecessors. We can keep going down the line with various other issues that woke culture loves to harp on about and see that, for the most part, RTD and Moff dealt with it far more than Chibnall did. With the exception of a few minor points. 

Once more, we'll work in twos. There are probably only two areas where Chibnall might be a bit more "woke" than his predecessors: 

1) Casting a TARDIS crew that was a bit more racially-diverse than most. 

2) He does love to go on about the environment!  

Otherwise, if we're being really objective: Doctor Who has actually become less woke during his period. 

Okay, I do seem to be going down a bit of a rabbit-hole, here. Apparently, I have much more to say on this matter than I had originally thought. So, before I blather on any further, I'm going to end this entry and work on a second part. Hopefully, you've enjoyed this rant and will continue on with me. 

In Part Two, I'm going to do a genuine "woke count" for both of Chibnall's seasons. I will look at each individual story and see how much it deals with topics that woke culture likes to bring up (or, in several cases, if they deal with these subjects at all!). With that same meter, I will show that there are, in fact, other eras of the show that are actually more woke than this current one. I'll probably cover a few other things along the way as I do seem to be full of opinions on this subject.

Well, full of something, at least!    

ANOTHER SPECIAL NOTE:  Having written this a year or two previously, I really don't remember much of what I intended for the second part. However, if you really liked the topic I was exploring, let me know. If enough of you want to see it, I'll go to the trouble of writing a Part Two. I'll even bother to include Chibnall's third season. Which, quite honestly, is so much less "woke" than his other two seasons. 

UNADULTERATED BOORISH OPINION: HOW I THINK THE 60th ANNIVERSARY WILL "WORK"

Taking another break from Season Reviews to indulge in something that I always seem to fail miserably at: Speculating. I'm going to take a shot, anyway, on how I think the next few episodes of Doctor Who are going to play out. You can, at least, enjoy the post and then laugh at me when all my predictions prove wrong!  

Once more, it's an interesting time to be a fan. We have a couple of huge episodes coming up back-to-back. As I write this, The Power of the Doctor is coming out any day, now (and, like so many other fans, I sure would be a whole lot happier if the Beeb could actually give us a release date!). This looks to be a pretty huge-scale last story for Thirteen. Lots of returning villains and heroes with a strong emphasis on the idea that the Doctor is finally dying rather than regenerating. 

And then, of course, in the far-flung future of 2023, we're getting a whopper of a 60th Anniversary Special. We've all seen the leaked location shooting photos of David Tennant in a costume we've never seen before with Catherine Tate at his side. And we're like: "What's all this about?!"

Like a lot of other fans, I'm kinda foaming at the mouth, here. What does all of this mean?! How will these vague glimpses at upcoming episodes actually play out? How much of a bitch will I cry like when Jodie goes? Should I continue to keep my mouth shut that I'm not  really all that excited about RTD returning (oops! I guess I just blew my cover!)?!  

For this particular entry, I thought that I'd take a genuine shot at interpreting some of the stuff they've been showing us. Basically, I'm going to share my theories on what I think will be happening to the Doctor in the next two episodes.

IN THE IMMORTAL WORDS OF THE BLACK GUARDIAN: "FOCUS"

Based on the little teases we've gotten, there's a lot to speculate about. Those scant few images have tremendous implications behind them. Rather than try to explain every little detail of where I think these two stories will go, I'm going to try to home in on just few of my notions. I will discuss some general concepts of what I think the main plot of the stories will be. But, more importantly, I'm going to try to figure out how Jodie Whitaker is going to turn into David Tennant. 

While I do think both of these tales will be amazing (Chib-bashers, of course, have probably already decided that Power of the Doctor will suck!), there's no point in trying to figure out too many specific details of the plot. No doubt, there will be twists and turns in both adventures that I will have absolutely no hope of accurately anticipating. Some of the images we've seen, I think, are just meant to genuinely confound  or even mislead us. So I just don't see a point in embarrassing myself that much with wildly inaccurate predictions. Instead, I'll just make a few major ones that will, hopefully, only cause marginal humiliation.. 

I also really don't think people want to read about every single little theory I've been building up inside my furiously-spinning brain. There have been all sorts of things that I've been wondering about: Why is the TARDIS crew running around in space suits? What's up with Yaz holding a gun?! Why does the Master look like Rip Van Winkle in one shot? 

I have come up with my own answers to such nagging questions (as I'm sure many of you have), but I'm pretty certain no one in my readership wants to take that deep of a dive. 

So I'm just going to focus on a few of the bigger issues. The really urgent questions like: What's actually going to happen to Thirteen that causes her to suddenly become Ten in a weird outfit? 

THE BASIC PLOT OF POWER OF THE DOCTOR 

After waiting 96 years (I may be exaggerating slightly - but it's certainly felt that long!), we finally get a proper trailer (but still no release date!) for Power of the Doctor. We did, of course, also get that teaser at the end of Legend of the Sea Devils that displayed a vague idea of some basic plot points. When it came out this week, the trailer didn't really reveal much more about what the story was actually about. But, in all honesty, I didn't really expect it to. In fact, I hate when a trailer does show too much. I have been quite amused by fans complaining that the trailer is just showing us some enticing images and not really telling us anything. I couldn't resist making comments to the nature of: "You do know what the actual purpose of a trailer is, right?!" 

From the teaser, alone, I had gathered most of what I needed. As expected, the Master escaped Gallifrey before the Death Particle could go off  at the end of The Timeless Children. This was no huge surprise. We could, after all, hear him yelling to his entourage that they need to get out as the Particle was about to be released. When the Doctor actually has a conversation with Time at the end of The Flux, she makes a massively unsubtle hint that the Master is soon to return. Finally, of course, there's the plain and simple fact that this is the Mater we're talking about. He always finds a way out (guy got burnt to cinders and still survived, somehow!).

At least a few CyberMasters have appeared to escape with him. He, now, seems to have formulated a plot to eliminate the Doctor once and for all. The Daleks and Cybermen appear to be involved in it or they may be a side-plot of some sort. It's difficult to tell. UNIT and a few other old friends seem to be helping the Doctor to defeat the menace. Ultimately, however, it looks like the Doctor is about to die. The energy swirling around her as she calls out Yaz's name in that one shot doesn't look that much like it's been caused by a regeneration. But, rather, something more fatal. 

The trailer does seem to elaborate slightly. Somehow, the Master appears to have devised a way to completely erase the Doctor from Time. We get a better look at the shot I just mentioned and she does appear to be in some sort of death chamber. The Cybermen seem to be involved in the whole operation as we see both a CyberMaster and a regular Cyberman in the background of that shot. 

We still don't know if the Daleks are also part of this plan or are up to something entirely different that, perhaps, only vaguely relates to this particular plot-strand. All the weird cross-fire going on between multiple planets might be something the Skarosian Tyrants have engineered that the Doctor must also deal with as she fights the Master. Or this might all be part of a much bigger plan that results in her destruction at the Master's hands. It's too difficult to tell from what we've seen. 

Whatever the case, the Master seems to be succeeding in his latest sinister plot. It appears as though the Doctor has been, somehow, trapped into facing her execution and had no choice but to enter the Death Chamber. From what we can see, the Doctor is definitely going to be eliminated as the story reaches its conclusion. 

But then, this is the Doctor we're talking about. She always finds a way out. 

HOW SHE MIGHT GET OUT....

I really do think that Power of the Doctor ends with no actual regeneration. The Doctor will just be executed and completely removed from Time. More than likely, she'll just wink out of existence (in some glorious manner that will involve quite a bit of CGI!). To all intents and purposes, her existence will end.  

But then, along comes Neil Patrick Harris! Or, more accurately, whatever character he appears to be playing for the 60th Anniversary Special. The Big Opinion Among Fandom is that he will be the Celestial Toymaker. Which does seem to make sense on several levels. He's a Classic villain who would look nice returning for such an occasion. Harris, somehow, seems to have a similar vibe that Michael Gough once gave to the character (presumably, the Toymaker can change shape at will so that it can be a new actor in the role). And, like Gough, he is also garbed in  period costume. 

So there is some evidence to support this idea. Not a lot, but some...

Whether or not he's the Toymaker, he will still be one of those god-like beings that inhabit the Doctor Who Universe that will have the ability to, somehow, rescue the Doctor from being erased from her timeline. But restoring her to reality will be conditional: The Doctor must succeed in a game he's devised.  

The Neil Patrick Harris God won't be able to deal with the current version of the Doctor - she's too recent. Her part of the timeline is too close to when she was deleted. So past Doctors will have to come forward and face various challenges. If they succeed, the Doctor will be restored to the Universe.

That's what I think will be the basic premise of the Special. We will see various incarnations with their companions dealing with different types of crises created by Neil Patrick Harris' character. Some of them might involve some past monsters so that Daleks, Cybermen, Sontarans and suchlike can be involved, too. All of it will culminate in the different incarnations succeeding and the Doctor being brought back into existence. 

This idea especially supports the notion that Harris is the Toymaker. This is just the sort of game he would play with the Doctor. Rather than just save the Time Lord, he will make him compete for his existence. Yes, the Toymaker is pretty malevolent. But, like most god-like cosmic entities, he's probably pretty amoral, too. He lives for all eternity and craves entertainment. While he probably resents the Doctor for beating him all those many years ago, he would still enjoy the opportunity to play this sort of game against him. 

It's still possible Harris isn't the Toymaker. He could be another Immortal we've seen before or even one we've never met. But all these eternal beings tend to have similar temperaments. They are bored and seek sadistic ways to amuse themselves. Putting the Doctor through a major challenge to save his existence would be right up their alley! 

HOW TENNANT FITS IN

Now, there's all kinds of discussions going on about who else will be in the 60th Anniversary Special. We know, for sure, that David Tennant, Catherine Tate and Bernard Cribbins will all be in it. We've seen the pics of the location filming, of course. So it can't be denied. 

Other actors who have played the Doctor are being somewhat vague about their involvement. Or, in some cases, are swearing they won't be in it at all. Naturally, those who are saying they don't have a part could be lying through their teeth! There's been a tonne of disinformation going on regarding which Doctors are coming back. More than likely, some of it has been completely intentional. 

I do seem to recall Tennant saying in an interview or two (and I'm pretty sure it wasn't in print, either, we actually heard him speaking) that he and Catherine were photographed because they were the only ones that had outdoor shooting. That there were plenty of other returning actors that haven't been sighted because they were in a closed studio. He seemed to insinuate (and this could be my own wishful thinking altering my recollection!) that it wasn't just returning Doctors - but companions, too.  

This would fit my theory of separate Doctors facing different challenges from the Toymaker nicely. We only see Tennant and Tate because they are on their own mission. Other incarnations with their companions are doing their own thing but they were shot indoors away from prying eyes. There will probably be some scenes where all the Doctors meet. Something akin to the Tomb of Rassilon sequence in The Five Doctors. The incarnations will unite for a few moments, probably argue a bit and then go their own ways. Having beaten the Toymaker's Challenge (there will probably be some extra treachery involved on the Toymaker's part that one of the Doctors will anticipate and nullify), the Doctor will be restored to the Universe. But it will still come at a cost. The Doctor will have to lose another life. Jodie Whitaker will be brought back in for the final minute or two and regenerate into Ncuti Gatwa. The Adventure will continue. Hopefully, at least, for another 60 years!    

BUT WHY DO TENNANT'S CLOTHES LOOK DIFFERENT, ROB?! 

There might, of course, be some variations to the storyline I just provided, Neil Patrick Harris, for instance, might actually be a benevolent god-like being that really wants to help the Doctor and is putting the past incarnations on special quests that will create the conditions to save him. Those quests might just be something that has been running through the Doctor's lives all this time and we've just never seen this plot thread up until now (like all the Doctors coming to save Gallifrey in Day of the Doctor). So it's not the Doctors, so much, being pulled out of time by Harris' character as it is something the near-omnipotent being just threaded through his whole timestream.  

The possibilities of variation on my basic premise are, of course, huge. But the core essence will remain the same: Harris is a god of sorts that has recruited past incarnations to ensure the Doctor has a future. 

There is just one more issue to deal with. A certain incongruity that could put a whole new complexion on it all:  

Why is Ten wearing an outfit we have never seen him wear before? 

The answer could be quite simple. For whatever reason, the Doctor decides to wear a different costume just this once. He might even need it to, somehow, blend in a bit better with whatever it is he's up to in his particular story thread. Once the adventure is over, he never bothers to wear it again. It really could be that plain of a reason. 

Or it could be something more: What if we are seeing Ten in a different costume because he's not quite the Ten we know? What if he's actually Ten from a parallel universe? 

Let's put one more twist on this whole Game of the Toymaker concept: The Doctor has been completely erased from this Universe. There is no way the Toymaker can issue his challenge to past incarnations. But what if he went into alternative realities and got a version of the Time Lord from there to participate in his shenanigans? He approaches Ten from a dimension where, perhaps, the Series Four finale didn't happen (or happened differently) and he is still travelling with Donna. He explains how he can help save himself in another Universe if he participates in the Game. He does this with several other Doctors from other realities, too. 

It would certainly add an interesting new dimension to a multi-Doctor story if RTD went this way. Rather than just ask the actors to come back and reprise their roles, they get to put a slightly different spin on the character. We. as an audience, get the added bonus of enjoying the new interpretation of the part. We also have the fun of trying to figure out what happened in the parallel universe that is causing this previous incarnation to behave in a different manner. Imagine, for instance, an Eleventh Doctor that Amy does leave Rory for. Maybe Rory still travels with them and is trying win his fiance back. Even a slight twist like that gives us a whole new dynamic to enjoy. 

Of course, it really could be the much simpler explanation of: The Doctor just decided to wear a different outfit! 

"WHAT HAPPENED TO ALL OF THOSE GLORIOUS PREDICTIONS?!" 

So, there you go. My ultimate idea of how I think things will go over the next few episodes. If I'm to be honest, I'm actually really excited about it all. To be even more candid, I'm more enthusiastic about Jodie's last episode than I am about the Anniversary Special. I know there are dissenters out there, but I think this has been a fantastic period for the show and am sad to see it over. But, at least, this final story looks incredible. Whereas, I did find RTD's era to be a bit hit-or-miss and am, therefore, slightly leery about his return. 

But this is my own personal theory of how things fit together from what we've seen, thus far. When Power of the Doctor actually comes out, I may have to re-think things. She may just regenerate into David Tennant after all!  

But it wold be cool if, just this once, a prediction proves correct. What I came up with for the Anniversary Special might be entirely wrong, But I would be thrilled if I was, at least, a bit right and we really do see the Doctor die, once and for all, at the end of Power of the Doctor. 

Did I just say I would be happy to see the Doctor die?!!!

SPECIAL NOTE: As I completed this, we finally got a release date for Power of the Doctor. I was tempted to do a re-write but it's much more fun to leave all my complaining in!

DOCTOR WHO: SEASON-BY-SEASON - SEASON SEVEN

After only a short break to try to determine whether or not Adam Mitchell  is a companion, we're back into Season Reviews. We embark upon 70s Who as we venture into Season Seven... 

Season Seven: Another one of those seasons that receives some pretty high praise amongst Fandom. There is tremendous nostalgia for Jon Pertwee's first season. Although, really, Pertwee gets quite a bit of reverence for all of his work on the show. But Season Seven seems to get the highest level of appreciation. 

Of course, how something is regarded by Fandom has little bearing on my own tastes. I am the guy whose favorite Doctor is the Sixth and whose-second favorite is Thirteen. The guy who thinks Genesis of the Daleks is mediocre, at best. The guy who not only enjoys the writing from the eras of his two most-loved Doctors - but their costumes, too! I'm the guy with two hearts. You can't miss me. 

Sorry! My brain just naturally goes to that quote whenever I start seeing the word "guy"! 

So where do I stand with Season Seven? Does it live up to its hype? Shall I try to keep you in suspense as I did with my Season Five Review and not tell you how I truly feel about its popularity until the bitter end? 

Nah. I'll just say it up front: 

Season Seven is amazing. A work of Televisual Art. Doctor Who at its very best. 

ODD MAN OUT

The first story of  Season Seven sticks out like a sore thumb. What makes it most incongruous, of course, is the fact that it has only four episodes while the rest of the stories of the season have seven. But the differences don't end there. In fact, the differences seem to go on almost forever! To the point where Spearhead from Space almost feels like it belongs in a different season. 

This is probably due to the fact that, rather than letting newcomer Barry Letts do it, the story was, instead, put together by the final producer from Throughton's period . Which gives us a great example of just how different of a vision producers can have from each other. In many ways, Spearhead feels like it's more of a Second Doctor story. There are even moments where Pertwee seems a bit Troughtonesque in his performance. 

None of this, however, detracts from the fact that this is still a really great adventure. One of the better tales that introduces a new Doctor. There's some sequences that still look disturbingly creepy to this day. The various scenes where we watch Autons come to life were hauntingly effective. Not just the shop window dummies in Part Four, but the cliffhanger to Episode Two is also quite terrifying. The fact that the whole story was shot on film really enhances the atmosphere, too. 

Spearhead  works really well. There is a great balance between letting Jon Pertwee find his feet in the role and building up a very sinister invasion plot. It also needed to introduce Liz Shaw and get UNIT more firmly established in the show's formula. It's a very similar situation to whenever we see a new Head Writer step into the Revived Series. The whole slate seems to be wiped clean and we get a bunch of new characters and premises. I would say Spearhead  handles the transition just as well as when this sort of harsh change occurs in New Who. Maybe even a little better. 

Do I have any objections? Not a lot. But Spearhead does introduce one trend that bothers me quite a bit throughout a significant part of the Third Doctor Era. It seems almost trivial. It's one of the few aesthetic issues that I will hold against the show. Because it could have been very easily fixed without incurring any bigger expense on the budget. A courageous director just needed to say: "Are you really going to make that face, Jon?!" 

I am speaking, of course, of what I like to call The Pertwee Gurn. We see it for the first time near the end of Episode Four of Spearhead from Space. There's a tricky enough visual going on at this point, already. Foam tentacles and dry ice spew out from the machine that is meant to be creating a body for the Nestene Consciousness (a process that seems to also involving pulsating clear plastic bags filled with colored liquid). The very comical expression that Pertwee wears as the tentacles attack him really kills any drama the moment was meant to have. Yes, Pat Troughton was swanning about melodramatically in soap bubbles on a few different occasions throughout his era (and performed various other silly antics during certain instances of high tension). But he, somehow, got it to work. Oftentimes, scripts were just written in such a way that enabled the moment to be both dramatic and humorous. But in Spearhead, we are at the climax of a very dark and scary tale. And Pertwee's ridiculously wide eyes just seem to be taking the piss out of the whole thing. The moment falls a bit flat because of this. 

Unfortunately, this is just the beginning. He makes those silly eyes several more times throughout the course of the next season or so. It does seem like, eventually, someone tells him he should really stop using that expression. But it takes a while.  We have to watch several more potentially suspenseful moments get ruined, first, before the very absurd reaction is finally abandoned. 

I told you my objection was pretty trivial! 

THOSE GLORIOUS SEVEN PARTERS 

With Spearhead done, Barry Letts is now allowed to properly step in as the show's producer. The season takes a gigantic tonal shift. The new formula for the show is radically different from anything we've seen before. 

This is not a bad thing, however. The stories of Season Seven have simply moved from one strength to another. 

Spearhead was both scary and fun. A great way to start the season. But, from this point onward, we enter into the Great Seven Parters. Three stories that produce twenty-one of the best consecutive episodes the show ever made. 

I'm not exaggerating, here. This really is some great content. What probably impresses me most is just how maturely-written all the scripts are. With such long stories to tell, the characters populating the plot are very three-dimensional. The themes and messages the stories introduce are thoroughly explored. Everything works so beautifully on so many different levels. There are some nice moments of levity here and there that are done in a very thoughtful manner, but the sense of drama in these tales is magnificently-executed. Some very intense moments occur throughout the seven parters that very firmly establish that Doctor Who can no longer be considered the childrens' show it was once labeled as.This is now a show for adults that kids are still capable of appreciating. 

The very first Seven-Parter of the season illustrates all of this perfectly. The Silurians (or Doctor Who and the Silurians for all those pedants, out there!) is probably one of the most sophisticated and intelligent stories the show has ever produced. It still remembers to have some action and intrigue where it needs it - but it has so much more going on than just subjecting the Doctor and his friends to peril and danger. This is, without a doubt, Malcolm Hulke's best script. 

On so many previous occasions (with rare exceptions like The Sensorites waaay back in Season One), the Doctor tends to choose a side. He sorts out who's the bad guy and who's not and then does battle to defeat the oppressors. It was so beautiful to have a tale that deals with shades of grey rather than black and white. There is good and evil on both sides so the Doctor addresses it. He makes an effort to mediate between the two. 

More importantly, time is taken to show why the various supporting characters on either end of the conflict are adopting their stances. Dawson, for instance, thinks the Silurians should be wiped out because one of them ended up killing Doctor Quinn. Her experiences with them cause her to believe they are brutal monsters. So we understand why she has such disdain for the Homo-Reptilians. 

This is such an important element to the Seven Parters. We are able to empathize on some level with most of, if not, all the characters . No one is truly a mustache-twirling villain or whiter-than-white hero. All have flaws and redemptive qualities. I love how, for instance, the Young Silurian still elects to stay behind to save the lives of all the other Silurians that are going back into hibernation. He's done some pretty nasty things as the new leader of his people. But he still lives up to the ultimate responsibilities of leadership when his back is against the wall. We find a new level of respect for him in that moment. Up until Season Seven, it's not often that our feelings for a supporting character in a Doctor Who story can change like this. Most of the time, good guys and bad guys get established pretty quickly and we just follow the fight between them to the bitter end. 

Those trends continue in Ambassadors of Death. Again, the Doctor doesn't really pick a side. He tries to fix things between the two opposing forces. Even someone as cold and brutal as General Carrington gets an explanation for his behavior. As the story reaches its conclusion, we understand why he has become so unhinged.  

The endings to both Silurians and Ambassadors are magnificently poignant. The Brigadier still blowing up the Silurian base was a brutal final image before the credits roll. And it's actually quite beautiful the way the Doctor chooses to humor Carrington just before he's carted off to jail. Usually, someone like him gets told off by the Time Lord during a moment like this. It was a very nice surprise to see the Doctor resist the moral high ground and try to comfort the story's antagonist. 

The fun little visual gag afterwards with the alien ambassadors is also quite cute! 

AND THEN ALONG COMES A TRUE CLASSIC

Season Seven was already doing excellently with its first three stories. Had it delivered something equally-solid as a final tale, that would have been just fine. I would still hold it in high regard. 

But, instead, it goes above-and-beyond the call of duty and brings us Inferno. 

Way back in the 1940s, I wrote a whole series of entries detailing my Top Ten All-Time Favorite Doctor Who stories. Inferno didn't quite make it onto that list. But it came pretty damned close (probably would have been in twelfth place - just after Warrior's Gate!). It is, without a doubt, the best story of the Pertwee Era and the Crowning Glory of Season Seven. A brilliant adventure with one of the most inspirational moments in the show's history. 

No one makes better use of the seven part format than this adventure. The first two episodes take place in our reality, establishing what the secondary characters will be like for this particular yarn. And then the Doctor "slips sideways" into a parallel reality for the next four parts. This is the first time the show uses this particular plot device. At the time, exploring a more fascist version of our own society still wasn't too much of a worn-out trope. So it all works very well. Alternate versions of the more regular characters were especially enjoyable to watch. Particularly the Brigade-Leader. Nicholas Courtney does a magnificent job of being a total dick. Caroline Munro, though, is equally-impressive. It is great to watch her as she slowly shrugs off the effects of a lifetime of conditioning and chooses to save the Doctor at the most crucial of moments. 

The return to our reality for the final part wraps up excellently. The tension that mounts as the Doctor must recover in time to stop Project Inferno in our dimension is done excellently. I genuinely wondered how they were going to make a full episode of the whole thing. I had no idea how they could take any longer than five minutes to get the Doctor to halt the drilling. But they really got it to work without feeling like we were just getting a bunch of padding! 

Of course, that inspirational moment I mentioned also takes place in Part Seven. No review of Inferno is complete unless you mention: "So, free will isn't an illusion, after all!" When you consider how often New Who tries consciously to engineer these sort of things, this scene is all-the-more impressive. Inferno is busy with telling its story. It just happens to throw that moment in at the best possible point in the plot. It then goes back to resolving the main conflict without dwelling on things any longer than it needed to. That, in my opinion, is the way to create an inspirational moment in a Doctor Who adventure! 

THE REGULARS 

A good season of Doctor Who, of course, is more than just well-written scripts (although they are a crucial foundation). There are always other factors at play that should get mentioned in Reviews such as these. 

There are, essentially, three "leads" in this particular season. Characters that were not only in every single episode but also had a strong presence in them (Benton could almost be a fourth character of this nature but, for some odd reason, he doesn't seem to actually start showing up in anything until mid-way through Ambassadors of Death). The actors that played these three leads, I feel, were instrumental to the success of this season and deserve a few paragraphs of praise before I wrap this up. 

Up first is Caroline Munro. In many ways, she deserves the most respect. She did the best she could with what she was given. Back in the 60s, female companions did not get the best of treatment from the writers. For the most part, they just screamed a lot and needed rescuing. Even women that either came from advanced civilisations or were meant to be unusually intelligent still never really did much beyond getting into terrible situations that the male characters saved them from. 

Admittedly, "smart girl companions" were becoming more and more useful as the series progressed. Zoe does do some legitimately clever things in certain stories of Season Six that really do help the plot along. (ie: her advanced trigonometry takes out a Cyber Fleet in The Invasion). Whereas poor Susan, who probably should have been about as clever as Zoe, is largely useless during Season One. 

Liz Shaw tends to get even better treatment as she gets introduced. However, there are still quite a few "damsel in distress" moments for her throughout the course of the season. We barely notice them, though, because Munro is just so damned articulate  in the role. Other "smart girl companions" would come along after her that would be better-written. But her performance makes us almost not notice that the progression continues. She seems just as smart as anyone that followed her. 

Nicholas Courtney is also amazing in his portrayal. It helps that Lethbridge-Stewart is very well-written in Season Seven. In later seasons, Courtney recognizes that the Brig oftentimes becomes the butt of the Doctor's jokes and plays the role accordingly so that he can be properly made fun of. But, in Season Seven, he's allowed to take the role much more seriously. He also remembers to soften the character now and again and make him a bit more personable than just a tough-as-nails military officer. He really does give some great dimensions to the Brigadier that will, sadly, disappear in the years to come. 

And then, of course, there's Jon Pertwee, himself. Up until Who, he tended to not have much confidence in himself as an actual dramatic actor. He'd done a fair amount of comedy or worked as a presenter on shows. Actually portraying a character that he had to play fairly straight was, apparently, quite daunting for him. 

I actually think his insecurity worked to his advantage in Season Seven. It does seem that, because he's so unsure of himself, he puts a tremendous amount of effort into every line he delivers. Which, in turn, gives some gorgeous layers to his Doctor during his first year. A great example of this is on display when he goes to visit Doctor Quinn's cottage for the first time during The Silurians. He knows Quinn is hiding a Homo-Reptilian there. In the span of just a few scraps of dialogue, he goes from someone playing the fool to someone offering sincere help to someone condemning Quinn. Those shifts in emotional tones are executed with a near-mathematical precision that makes the whole scene so much richer than it probably looked on paper. Pertwee is constantly performing this way throughout the season. Making every moment his Doctor has onscreen as strong as possible. It really does enhance the overall effect of all four stories. Because of this, he makes an enormous contribution to the Season's success. 

ANY PROBLEMS? 

Quite naturally, nothing in life is perfect. Season Seven is no exception to the rule. Aside from The Pertwee Gurn, there are one or two other problems that plague this most excellent year of Doctor Who: 

The most significant would be that, even though they're brilliantly-written, the 7-parters don't always fill up so well. There is some padding in each story that's so blatant that it does create a bit of a drag in the plot. Interestingly enough, I find this is less of a problem as the Season goes on. To the point where Inferno's drag is nearly unnoticeable (Petra's problems with re-wiring the nuclear reactor in Part Six is only so much of an extra runaround!). It seems to me that, if they had continued doing such long stories in the future, they would have worked just fine. Season Seven had hammered out the kinks. 

The other problem we see in Seven is one that persists throughout the Pertwee Era and even affects the Fourth Doctor a bit. Whenever he's on Contemporary Earth, the writers keep sending the Doctor to similar settings that have the same conflicts going on. The best example of this in Season Seven would be places that have nuclear reactors. And, of course, the reactors experience different problems that may even cause a full meltdown. This sort of plot trend will run all the way to Hand of Fear in Season Fourteen. Yup, seven seasons later, the Doctor is still showing up at nuclear reactors that almost blow up! 

Inferno, at least, presents the scraps of an interesting alternative to this problem. The Doctor goes to a parallel universe for a bit. He's still stranded on Earth, but it's a different version of it. I think the show should have done similar things in future seasons. Keep him on the same planet but alter the location slightly. They could have let the Doctor partially repair the TARDIS, for instance, and allowed him to travel in time a bit. A couple of nice period pieces with Doctor Three would have been far more interesting than another visit to a nuclear reactor! Or perhaps the TARDIS even takes him to some other strange dimensions that might be out there. The actual journey opens a rift into those places and creates an access point for some evil beings that inhabit that realm. They attempt to create an invasion bridgehead that the Doctor thwarts. We could have gotten much more interesting stories that would have still, technically, maintained the Doctor's exile.  

THE FUTURE NOT SO BRIGHT

Just to conclude: Season Seven, in my opinion, lives up to its nostalgia. This really is the show at its absolute best. The stories, though unusually long (or, in the case of Spearhead from Space, strangely incongruous), are absolutely brilliant. Written with a maturity, sophistication and genuine sensitivity that you don't normally see in 70s sci-fi television. The acting is top shelf. I gave great praise to the leads, but all the supports pitch pretty perfect performances, too. Nothing Zaroffian going on, anywhere. Hell, even the effects are quite decent. Everything is on 20th Century Earth so we didn't need as much otherworldly stuff to be created. Which meant we were less likely to be embarrassed by certain shots that the show usually had to do in previous seasons. 

If Doctor Who had continued this way (with the inclusion of my goofy idea of keeping the Doctor on Earth but getting him out of the contemporary setting), I would have the exact same love for the Pertwee Era that other fans do. Sadly, that's not what we get. More tweaks will get made to the formula in Season Eight that I really didn't end up enjoying. 

But we'll get to that later.... 

Got some ideas for more entries that aren't Reviews, so I think we'll go there, next. 

We'll hold back for a bit on my Pertwee Era grievances!