Er, so, I saw it a bit ago but haven't posted anything in re: final Dr.
Er, so, I saw it a bit ago but haven't posted anything in re: final Dr. Who episode of this batch. Few enough of you probably care, but ok.
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Short version: lots of good ideas that had little to do with each other crammed into a single episode that lacked any cohesive story.
I still have no idea who Peter Capaldi's Dr. is. I mean, irascible, inconsistent, dark clothes that aren't nearly as specific as people keep claiming they are, at least, not to my eye. They keep occasionally toying with Guitar Hero Dr., which is the closest to anything I've seen that might be a thing. Dr. who writes with white chalk a lot? Meh.
Speaking of which, other than the fact that I immediately sussed out the supposed big reveal on the skulls being the Dr. in the prior episode, likely a strong reason why I thought the whole thing was a bore, I have a persistent question. Why did he have to keep bashing on the impervious adamantine surface with his bare hands? I mean, ok, I'll give him 2 cycles of the stupid-go-round cheesy fun house to figure out he ought to hang on to or stash the shovel and the spoon somewhere and use those to bash away to Gallifrey. Whatever. Don't understand the people who think that was Best Episode Evar.
Back to the finale.
1) Western Showdown Dr. - great idea, goes nowhere.
2) The Dr. was a war hero - used, but unexplained and goes nowhere.
3) The Dr. and Rassilon have a Thing - unexplained, goes nowhere.
4) I like the Sisterhood of Karn, but why were they there? Good idea, goes nowhere.
5) Time Lords keep their knowledge in the basement, along with anybody who goes down there and gets imprisoned (cue cameos for all the baddies) - speaking of which, is somebody on the show redoing their basement, or something? Because Daleks in the Sewers is pretty similar to Enemies in the Basement. Also, goes nowhere. It's just a way to make it even more difficult to get out of Gallifrey. Like, a new DM wrote this and hasn't quite got the hang of it. Maybe the doctor needs some graph paper.
6) The Hybrid - never explained, means nothing, what was the point, really? Especially stupid. I died countless times over billions of years to protect the secret of ... well, there wasn't one, really, but you totally believe that I knew it was the Time Lords all along and that I was just being stubborn to out stubborn them and you had to believe I was insane for a reason that you totally bought and you totally believe that was the only way to get to Gallifrey, right?
7) Big surprise - Clara's not dead. I mean, so she's leaving the show, big deal. Did anyone actually expect Moffat to really kill her off? Speaking of which, if you'd like me to feel some sort of pathos, here, you've wasted how many seasons not developing any character for Clara and basically nobody cares and what relationship between her and the doctor? I have seen nothing that makes me believe that of all his companions, this is the one the doctor would go insane over and completely off the range to save.
8) Bringing back the original Tardis - ok, that was cool, although life would have gone on without it since it, too, was a pointless, unconnected good idea. Speaking of which,
9) Cowboy Feng's Space Bar and Grill has now been co-opted by Clara and Ashildr/Me. Which is to say that this ends with Clara and Me flying off on the long way round to go back to Gallifrey in the original Tardis disguised as the diner in the desert last seen in The Impossible Astronaut. Great idea, but if this isn't going to turn into a spin-off parallel Thelma and Louise get Doctorates, what's the point? Actually, if I bought any of the Clara stuff, I suppose this, too, might have been a good idea that could have simply been a great ending that wasn't supposed to be a spin-off. That would have been ok.
10) All of space and time are going to end because the doctor brought Clara back from the dead (nevermind the wibbly-wobbly technical business). Yet she is not back on Gallifrey, and not dead at the end of this episode. So space and time should be imploding, yes? I mean, wasn't there this whole thing with River Song and things blowing up and having to be fixed a few seasons ago? But Clara is more specialer? Don't buy it.
Basically, an exemplar of this season. Makes you more hopeful than last season, but hasn't really got any cohesive idea where it's going.
S
P
O
I
L
E
R
S
Short version: lots of good ideas that had little to do with each other crammed into a single episode that lacked any cohesive story.
I still have no idea who Peter Capaldi's Dr. is. I mean, irascible, inconsistent, dark clothes that aren't nearly as specific as people keep claiming they are, at least, not to my eye. They keep occasionally toying with Guitar Hero Dr., which is the closest to anything I've seen that might be a thing. Dr. who writes with white chalk a lot? Meh.
Speaking of which, other than the fact that I immediately sussed out the supposed big reveal on the skulls being the Dr. in the prior episode, likely a strong reason why I thought the whole thing was a bore, I have a persistent question. Why did he have to keep bashing on the impervious adamantine surface with his bare hands? I mean, ok, I'll give him 2 cycles of the stupid-go-round cheesy fun house to figure out he ought to hang on to or stash the shovel and the spoon somewhere and use those to bash away to Gallifrey. Whatever. Don't understand the people who think that was Best Episode Evar.
Back to the finale.
1) Western Showdown Dr. - great idea, goes nowhere.
2) The Dr. was a war hero - used, but unexplained and goes nowhere.
3) The Dr. and Rassilon have a Thing - unexplained, goes nowhere.
4) I like the Sisterhood of Karn, but why were they there? Good idea, goes nowhere.
5) Time Lords keep their knowledge in the basement, along with anybody who goes down there and gets imprisoned (cue cameos for all the baddies) - speaking of which, is somebody on the show redoing their basement, or something? Because Daleks in the Sewers is pretty similar to Enemies in the Basement. Also, goes nowhere. It's just a way to make it even more difficult to get out of Gallifrey. Like, a new DM wrote this and hasn't quite got the hang of it. Maybe the doctor needs some graph paper.
6) The Hybrid - never explained, means nothing, what was the point, really? Especially stupid. I died countless times over billions of years to protect the secret of ... well, there wasn't one, really, but you totally believe that I knew it was the Time Lords all along and that I was just being stubborn to out stubborn them and you had to believe I was insane for a reason that you totally bought and you totally believe that was the only way to get to Gallifrey, right?
7) Big surprise - Clara's not dead. I mean, so she's leaving the show, big deal. Did anyone actually expect Moffat to really kill her off? Speaking of which, if you'd like me to feel some sort of pathos, here, you've wasted how many seasons not developing any character for Clara and basically nobody cares and what relationship between her and the doctor? I have seen nothing that makes me believe that of all his companions, this is the one the doctor would go insane over and completely off the range to save.
8) Bringing back the original Tardis - ok, that was cool, although life would have gone on without it since it, too, was a pointless, unconnected good idea. Speaking of which,
9) Cowboy Feng's Space Bar and Grill has now been co-opted by Clara and Ashildr/Me. Which is to say that this ends with Clara and Me flying off on the long way round to go back to Gallifrey in the original Tardis disguised as the diner in the desert last seen in The Impossible Astronaut. Great idea, but if this isn't going to turn into a spin-off parallel Thelma and Louise get Doctorates, what's the point? Actually, if I bought any of the Clara stuff, I suppose this, too, might have been a good idea that could have simply been a great ending that wasn't supposed to be a spin-off. That would have been ok.
10) All of space and time are going to end because the doctor brought Clara back from the dead (nevermind the wibbly-wobbly technical business). Yet she is not back on Gallifrey, and not dead at the end of this episode. So space and time should be imploding, yes? I mean, wasn't there this whole thing with River Song and things blowing up and having to be fixed a few seasons ago? But Clara is more specialer? Don't buy it.
Basically, an exemplar of this season. Makes you more hopeful than last season, but hasn't really got any cohesive idea where it's going.
I've been mostly watching out of both inertia and because of its proximity to The Last Kingdom (which is actually not bad, veering into halfway decent, for all that I don't like the lead actor.) I don't think I disliked it as much as you, but it sure wasn't good. It reminded me so forcibly of the end of Russell T Davies' run that I had to go back and make sure he hadn't been put back in charge.
ReplyDeleteThe reason you can't tell who Capaldi's Doctor is (in my opinion) is half because Moffat doesn't know himself, and half because when Moffat does know, it is not terribly consistent with what's gone before and it's dialed up to eleven every damned time. He can't just be sad that Clara is gone, he has to be the saddest he's ever been, and by extension the saddest of all the sad muppets who ever sadded their way through a TV series. Clara can't just be a friend or a companion, she has to be the best and the most importantest soul matey soul mate that ever set foot in the TARDIS.
In this respect, he's almost as bad as Davies. Davies' run ended in a self-indulgent wreckage as the Doctor had to display the heights of every emotion at the same time, but at least Davies built up to them. Moffat seems to want all the emotional highs, and has to keep topping them (which only cheapens them, really) but doesn't have the patience to lay the ground work. So we (or at least I) was left wondering why the fuck Clara was important enough to spend two and a half billion years punching through a diamond wall, breaking the universe, and killing another Time Lord (right, right, regeneration, not really dead, fuck off Twelve you shot him!)
It ended up being a Time Lord Temper Tantrum. And Moffat knew it was a Time Lord Temper Tantrum because several of the other more sane-seeming character mentioned it to each other and to him.
Oh, right! How do you go from the I don't shoot people doctor to the I shoot them out of pique doctor like it's not grossly inconsistent with the whole canon? Would I be way off base to wonder if this was an excuse to say, See? More female time lords! And a minority, too! I may be cynical.
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