Drop RTD and take it from there, sanctimonious bore that he is.
Gatwa is alright but I wish he’d dial down the camp a notch or two.
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jonbob loves you, Sat 31 May 2025, 17:12,
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I just want RTD to have someone above him in the editing process.
He still has both amazing ideas and shit ideas, but then makes all of them. About 30 of them at once in tonight's episode alone. I mean, it's been very watchable since he's been back, but also frequently utter bollocks.
Really hope there is a new Writer's Tale, as I'd be fascinated to hear some of the thoughts behind a lot of the decisions.
Don't particularly mind the sanctimonious stuff, myself. Sci-fi has always been a good way to slip sermons in and I prefer RTD angry to soppy.
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monkeon schmonkeon, Sat 31 May 2025, 21:16,
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The trouble is that he has the subtlety of a brick to the face.
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jonbob loves you, Sat 31 May 2025, 21:28,
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Sometimes that works.
A mix of soap opera and unexpected profundity can really work if you get the balance right. Twin Peaks being another example.
He's been responsible for quite a few gut punches in his time. And also a lot of "oh for fucks sake!"s.
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monkeon schmonkeon, Sat 31 May 2025, 21:37,
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This.
For every Children of Earth there's at least one Miracle Day, so to speak.
Some of his rushed/compressed/dense hour-long 1-parters could be good in the classic 4-part 23 minute style, with space for characters to emerge and time for actors to act.
I think he needs a Terrence Dicks to his Barry Letts. Better yet an Eric Saward to his JNT. Possibly not a popular opinion, but I think the show could use some more gratuitous death scenes here and there. A bit more stark, depressingly hollow reality to contrast all the the camp positivity.
DW has always been woke sanctimony with a brick to the face. William Hartnell was constantly lecturing his companions about cultural relativism while guiding oppressed peoples to overthrow their authoritarian overlords, ffs. The satire has never been subtle, it's written to be understood by children.
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brb Monkhouse Stampede, Sat 31 May 2025, 22:54,
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Moral relativism is one thing.
'Everyone is going to die, but it's okay because they're all racist' is just fucking lazy, and they he doubled down with the teenager who says "girls can't do maths" (FFS), gets turned into a monster and, again, it's okay for him to die because apparently he was an evil incel all along.
The part with the segregated diner from a few weeks back where he just says something along the lines of "things were different back then"? That's how you do it.
'Half a million years in the future it's illegal for nurses not to know sign language because we still haven't cured deafness'? Heavy-handed to the point it makes me cringe. It's supposed to be entertaining, not a bloody sermon.
Rant over. Something tells me after tonight's episode I won't be watching new-Who again for a while. I think I'll try to find one of the old B/W Cybermen serials.
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jonbob loves you, Sun 1 Jun 2025, 0:44,
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I don't recall the stories in your first sentence, sounds like I'd like them though.
There are many ways to do 'it' and maybe it's good for you to be taken out of your moral comfort blanket from time to time...
There are deaf people living today who view the desire to cure deafness as eugenics, as kind of genocidal threat to their culture. It's not a stretch to imagine them existing...
..But the people in that episode were Lombardics, not humans. They'd never heard of Earth.
It is supposed to be entertaining and also a sermon.
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brb Monkhouse Stampede, Sun 1 Jun 2025, 2:56,
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The first is the one with the social media zombies from the last series and the second is the first episode of this series. Are you defending something you haven't seen?
If so by all means carry on; I'll take any excuse to put off watching the series finale. The Guardian already gave away that Gatwa was leaving at the end of this series (stop putting spoilers in the article's title for fuck's sake!), and then Aunty Beeb did the same thing with who he'll be regenerating into. I feel even more certain that I'll be skipping the next series now.
As to the deaf character, what monkeon said earlier is starting to make me wonder if she was there just because RTD wishes he'd thought of the subtitle badges* the last time he had a main character who was deaf. The episode with Greg Davies and the silently chanting ghosts.
* Which, to take a leaf out his book, are obviously ableist for assuming that deaf people can read. Or perhaps he was so keen to put his message across that he didn't have time to write a plot that makes any sense.
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jonbob loves you, Sun 1 Jun 2025, 3:53,
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I've seen every available episode (including the psy trance telesnaps), I simply didn't recognise your descriptions
because of the differences in our perception, I guess. I'd genuinely love an episode where the Doctor genocides a planet full of racists, but the closest thing we have to that would be the Time War arc...
The episode you're citing showed The Doctor in tears over the fact that the coddled and privileged RICH kids (for that is how they were described) refused help from an outsider and were basically killing themselves. It's baffling how some people interpret things with the subtlety of a brick to the face!
I'd only vaguely heard Gatwa was leaving, I hadn't heard who his replacement was, and I'm half convinced that we still haven't. "Introducing Billie Piper" is not the same thing as "introducing Billie Piper as The Doctor" and the last regeneration was a bit of a red herring too... But I'm fine with pretty much anyone playing the role as long as they're good and not a cunt.
Why do you say the assumption of literacy is ableist? Could you guide us through your thought process please?
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brb Monkhouse Stampede, Sun 1 Jun 2025, 14:02,
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The one that made us suck our teeth in slightly was when Ruby was sat with the people with disabilities that Conrad had ignored and they just assumed that she didn't have a disability because it wasn't visible.
But anyway, I'm hoping that Billie Piper is just a stunt cast for a christmas special. The regeneration was atypical.
Ncuti was great, let down by rushed scripts.
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antmulder Flick your icefloss, Sun 1 Jun 2025, 20:53,
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The first one was "They're going to double down and allow
themselves to die rather than allow a black person to save them", wasn't it? The Doctor did a big blub over them iirc.
And also "You didn't notice everyone was white in this episode, you big racist". Which I thought was smart writing.
Don't think anyone will be watching any new ones for a while (unless you count that Russell Tovey thing), or else they'd have announced when the next episode is.
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monkeon schmonkeon, Sun 1 Jun 2025, 9:12,
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But also
It was bizarre that he said in the Nigerian hairdresser episode that it was the first time he had been black and then 20 minutes in he was replaced by Jo Martin and I know there is canon that he can't remember being her but still...
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antmulder Flick your icefloss, Sun 1 Jun 2025, 21:09,
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