Dr. Who - where to begin

Christopher Eccleston didn't work as Dr. Who, but he was a critical part of the restart being successful. He gave the Doctor a new, distinctive character after the horrendously bland versions of Slyvester McCoy, Paul McGann and Richard E. Grant. He got beyond the funny scarves and velvet jackets of previous Doctors. And he wasn't posh.

Eccleston has been superb in The Shadow Line this year.

Michael Barnes wrote: Old Doctor Who? Any of the "Key to Time" stuff. Horror of Fang Rock. Androids of Tara. Caves of the Androzani. Carnival of Monsters. Pyramids of Mars. Most of the stuff available on Netflix is good.

Of what's available on instant (not that much), I'd add City of Death (4th Doctor) and, with some reservation, Curse of Fenric (7th Doctor).

Oh yeah, City of Death, definitely.

It's definitely worth taking a look at the one William Hartnell/First Doctor serial they have, The Aztecs. It's a very different approach, at the time the idea was that Doctor Who was going to be kind of like Sherman and Peabody, visiting historical events/personas and maybe teaching the kids something along the way. It's also even more shockingly cheap than the Baker years. As in, they couldn't even film a police box outside so they made a model on a diorama.

Do you know what villan was overused? The weeping angels.
Yes they have only appeared twice but they were a one story concept villan. Their second appearance had no idea what to do with them and they became an utter clusterfuck.

I haven't seen the second Weeping Angels show, but I completely agree with this sentiment. Part of what made them cool was how judiciously used, mysterious, and singular they were. I was hoping there weren't more episodes with them and they just left them at that...guess not though.

I totally agree with Sag to about how the best episodes are the ones with new threats...I love the mystery angle, the discovery process, and the solution. Even if the Doctor knows what something is, I like it when he's not encountered it. I love it in Tooth and Claw when he's so fascinated by the werewolf that he won't run out of the room with everyone else.

The devil was a pretty good adversary though.

Thanks everybody for your advice. I think I'll start with the beginning and the shop around if needed.

I just watched the end of Tenant's run and they SO frikkin' punted on the whole time war thing. He didn't kill jack. They were all in a bottle for safe keeping.

I'm not a stickler for keeping all the details correct but that's a pretty solid dose of softballing that didn't need to happen.

S.

Sagrilarus wrote: I just watched the end of Tenant's run and they SO frikkin' punted on the whole time war thing. He didn't kill jack. They were all in a bottle for safe keeping.

I'm not a stickler for keeping all the details correct but that's a pretty solid dose of softballing that didn't need to happen.

S.

I recalled similar feelings. I liked the emotional arc of Tennant's coda, but the whole plot with the Master and the Time Lords was disappointing.

Softballing? What, did you get the impression he machine gunned them all down?

Of course it was a time lock type of thing. How else are you going to kill a timelord?

I was thinking big-ass bomb or maybe even imploding a star. I'm serious. I envisioned a fight with lots of Time Lords (and whoever they were fighting) in space ships or on a planet and the Doc just lighting them all up to completely destroy both sides. There wasn't anything to support that view, but that's what I imagined at the time.

Time Lords can die. At least you used to be able to kill them. It used to be they were done after 12 lifetimes, but that's been dropped for the obvious reason. They weren't indestructible, just able to live 1200 years or so if they took care of themselves. Back in the Baker days the Doctor was on trial and due for execution. There were also a couple of storylines about The Master being done. His 12 lives were up and he was living in the remains of his final corpse. I believe it occurred when the original actor playing The Master died. The Master eventually stole someone else's body (Nyssa's father for those keeping track) to continue his existence, but it was essentially murder and considered very bad Time Lord form.

As far as why I thought he had killed all the other Time Lords, I suppose I took them at face value. It seemed pretty reasonable at the time considering they were rebooting the whole show.

I just finished watching The Water of Mars and they really had it going on. I was about to declare it the most intense episode ever and Tenant was bringing it. Then they bolted an American ending onto it. A razzle-dazzle finish. Needed a car chase. I'd wager they changed it to soften the ending (for the kiddies of course) because, had they finished it the way they should have, it would have really advanced Tenant's rendition of the character and been a damn-near perfect lead in to the falling action in his final episode. It was all there, but then they flinched. The helplessness that should have occurred in Waters of Mars would have made End of Time a much more compelling finale.

I need to be more forgiving considering it's a family show. Fiction rarely holds my attention anymore and Who does better than most, so I should be happy with that.

S.

Sagrilarus wrote: As far as why I thought he had killed all the other Time Lords, I suppose I took them at face value. It seemed pretty reasonable at the time considering they were rebooting the whole show.

Actually I think the whole 'time lords died in a war' thing comes from the audio books, which are meant to be in-continuity. You'll often hear Whonerds talking about that story being adapted to screen. So the whole "last of the timelords" thingwas actually established before the new series, and wasn't their idea.

I just finished watching The Water of Mars and they really had it going on. I was about to declare it the most intense episode ever and Tenant was bringing it. Then they bolted an American ending onto it. A razzle-dazzle finish. Needed a car chase. I'd wager they changed it to soften the story because, had they finished it the way they should have, it would have really advanced Tenant's rendition of the character and been a damn-near perfect lead in to the falling action in his final episode. The helplessness that should have occurred in Waters of Mars would have made End of Time a much more compelling finale.

Fair enough. I quite liked that run myself, if there was any softballing which I didn't like it was how Dona's storyline ended, which I thought was a cop-out.

Mr Skeletor wrote: Fair enough. I quite liked that run myself, if there was any softballing which I didn't like it was how Dona's storyline ended, which I thought was a cop-out.

Oh hell yeah. No clue why they contrived such a strange ending. Honestly I think they overthink the stuff too much. Any companion with half a brain would tell the Doc to bugger off after a couple of weeks on the road from the stress alone, and that's likely the best way to leave it so they can be sucked back into later storylines.

S.