The Doctor Who Thread

[Lantern of Gallifrey]

So I looks like all classic Doctor Who is now on Tubi. I am gonna watch the crap out of this over Thanksgiving.

[Lantern of Gallifrey]

So I watched the newest trailer and It actually doesn't look bad. I don't know if it will be bad but from first impressions it might not suck.

[Deadpool]

I'm done with Doctor Who. I realized that although nuWho got me into Who, I'm much more of a fan of classic Who. There's too many retcons for me to care. Hope you stick around, though, Deadpool.

That's valid, some people are just naturally more suited to classic than nuwho. Last episode gave QUITE a few nuggets to classic fans mind, and with the logo reverting to the 70s one today, it's possible there may be more treats for classic fans in the 60th, hopefully they find the perfect balancing act to appease fans of both eras.

[Space Cop]

I'm done with Doctor Who. I realized that although nuWho got me into Who, I'm much more of a fan of classic Who. There's too many retcons for me to care. Hope you stick around, though, Deadpool.

[Deadpool]

Ok, it's been a couple of years since anyone's spoken about Doctor Who on here (at least a year since I've even attempted to speak on this forum in general) but I thought after yesterday's episode it would be a good time to do so. I was pretty sure I had discussed my views on at least the early part of the Jodie Whittaker era on here but from the looks of things I've been awol since the tail end of the Capaldi era, so I'll give a rundown on my thoughts of the era as a whole.

For starters I wasn't on board with the gender change for the Doctor, I was pretty firmly on the "Doctor is a man" bandwagon. I do however fall into the category of fans who have changed their mind during this era, I am now very much more of the mindset of the Doctor can be anyone, I just wish the first mainline female Doctor was a far better fit for the role (Jo Martin would have been a phenomenal 13th Doctor, another choice that sparks to mind is Katherine Kelly who starred as Ms Quill in the Class spin off). I do prefer the Doctor being male, but in the same way as I prefer the Doctor being older rather than younger, Jo Martin for example though has shown me what would essentially be the ideal female Doctor for me. I'm more concerned with the actual character and portrayal of the Doctor than any specific arbitrary demographic traits.

Series 11 was and to my mind currently still is the worst season of Doctor Who ever produced. It was an absolute worst case scenario for me where I liked quite literally nothing about it. The tone, writing, characters, storylines, plots, "monsters" if you can call them that, absolutely nothing worked for me and this will hopefully always remain the low point of the show (any lower would probably mentally break me). The best element of it was Bradley Walsh's Graham companion but compared with other NuWho companions he falls pretty flat for me. Whittaker's 13 I also found grating, irritating and poorly acted. The whole "message of the week" vibe of this series and parts of Series 12 just grated heavily on me too, I was a bit "Doctor Who has gone PC" at the time but I think in retrospect it's more just Chibnall wanting to be as politically pointed as the Pertwee era whilst lacking the talent to make it anything other than glaringly in your face, and I feel from Series 13 onward the PC element of the show almost entirely disappeared, whereas the #NotMyDoctor crowd are still lamenting the show as "WOKE" and the casting of Ncuti as so too.

Series 12 is still a fairly low point of the show for me but unlike Series 11 had a few things I actually liked. Whereas Series 11 felt absolutely nothing like Doctor Who, the 12th series at least did to some degree and it had less of the dreary soapy moments of Series 11 iirc (it still had some egregious examples but series 11 took the biscuit). There were actually some somewhat alright episodes and dare I say one or two actually decent ones? I particularly enjoyed Ascension of the Cybermen. The reveal of Sacha Dhawan's Master took me entirely by surprise which leads me onto my favourite thing about the Chibnall era, it's actually brilliant for surprises and unexpected twists, which is something I had wanted from the show for years. Dhawan is by far my favourite modern incarnation of the Master too so a big win there. I'm also quite fond of Jo Martin's Doctor, although I am not at all a fan of the Timeless Child revelation, I was very close to quitting the show over it and for not enjoying the past couple of seasons.

Series 13/Flux is definitely the strongest of Chibnall's three seasons, it feels the most like Doctor Who and actually has some episodes I do enjoy, episodes 2-4 are fairly solid watches for me, even though Whittaker's Doctor still grates me the wrong way. She always seems to be at her best when the Master is around, which sadly only happens fairly sparingly in this era. Again, not a fan of the Timeless Child stuff but by this point I just resigned myself to dealing with it and ngl I will probably just continue to try and ignore it where I can, especially as since Flux it's not really been built upon at all. Chibnall's era has still sadly been for the most part poorly written and executed with only a few examples of good episodes, I'm stuck between this or the Graham Williams era being my least favourite, Chibnall's has way more lows but a few more highs for me, particularly the Dhawan Master and Ashad.

This brings us to The Power of the Doctor. Definitely the best episode of the run, I had a solid time throughout and Whittaker didn't really rub me up wrongly at all. Actually a good send off for her, I'd say the best regeneration episode since 9s departure imo.

Very much looking forward to the new RTD era, both Tennant and Ncuti look great, Ncuti I'm praying feels more distinct from previous incarnations than the last few we've had. If that 6 second clip of him is anything to go by, then we're in for a treat!

[Lantern of Gallifrey]

I'm with Space Cop. I haven't been really happy with Doctor Who for awhile. Not to mention from some of the stuff I've heard the newer stuff doesn't pay attention to cannon or continuity.

[Parrylakks]

Yeah, to explain it...

the doctor isn't a time lord, or at least not like the others. The history of Galifrey was a lie set up by the first time lords, who were Galifreyans given the ability to regenerate through a process crafted by the research of one person. That research was centered around figuring out how the timeless child, an orphan found on a distant planet, regenerated. The group that came to be known as the time lords then created time lord society as we know it, and hid the true origins away from everyone, including the timeless child, who's origins remained unknown. That timeless child was, of course, the Doctor, and the select few of time lord society entrusted with protecting the lie would erase the Doctor's memories every 13 regenerations to do so. So everything we know of the Doctor's "first" life, and all the regenerations since is true, but the things said about the time lords' history isn't. It also goes on to purport that there are many many versions of the Doctor out there, always stealing a TARDIS and taking the moniker, always being hidden from themselves by the secret society of time lords, on and on.

It's incredibly interesting, in my opinion, but I can see how some may feel like it cheapens everything. I personally think it enhances the mystery, and I can't wait to see where it goes. As it stands, we've already seen one "other," not counting those seen during the research scene, so we may end up with a lot more in the seasons to come.

[Space Cop]

^Yeah, that’s the thing (I heard something about the eternity of the Doctor or something) that got my LCS manager so mad.

[Parrylakks]

If you disliked the gender retcon so much that you stopped watching, you'd probably hate the finale of season 12, as it presents a massive retcon that even the Doctor is thrown off by.

It makes total sense in the grand scheme of things, mind you, holding everything we've seen as true (so it's not a geoffcon), but it is still by definition a retcon, and leaves pretty much everything moving forward as a great big question mark. That said, it gives a lot of answers concerning the origins of the time lords, but with those answers comes the great new mystery.

It is exceptionally interesting, all things considered, but if retcons turned you away, you likely wouldn't be won over by another.

[Space Cop]

Well, for my part, the gender retcon was just the last straw for, but I hadn't enjoyed DW for quite some time. The manager at my LCS is quitting too. He watched all of the last season and hated it.

Truthfully, it's classic Doctor Who that I'm a fan of (though I haven't yet seen it all like you). Rather like Star Trek and Star Wars, the current stuff doesn't represent what I always liked about them. I've even considered selling my DVD collections of seasons 1 and 2 just to make it an official cut off in my collection.

[Parrylakks]

Season 11 of the revival may have been really rough, but Season 12 was phenomenal. Jodie Whittaker is a fantastic Doctor, and the season finale is one of the best episodes of the whole franchise, in my opinion (and yes, I've seen it all, save for the episodes that have been lost).

[Lantern of Gallifrey]

So I know Doctor Who sucks now, but I came across this audio drama from Big Finish.
They brought back the original actress that played Susan. I really want to listen to this.


It's great to see that somewhere in the world good Doctor Who is being made.

[Lantern of Gallifrey]

So I just found that on the Pluto TV app there is a Classic Doctor Who channel

[Lantern of Gallifrey]

Oh yeah most definitely done. It's sad but true. I'll be here when it gets good again.

[Space Cop]

Everything reinforces my decision to quit.

Comic-Con trailer for season 11:

+ YouTube Video

And Nerdist's reaction:

+ YouTube Video

Really? They're proud about getting through a season with no recalls to classic villains or companions? Ugh.