Doctor Who?

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Stopwatch

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Re: Doctor Who?

Post by Stopwatch »

mangaluva wrote:
GinRei wrote:Been marathoning the Matt Smith series. Finished series 5, on disc 4 of series 6. Just got to the reveal of River Song, and holy crap. The hype! The hyping hype!
None of it's quite as good as the RTD era, in my opinion. The reveals about both River and Clara both kinda piss me off.
I liked some of the time travel stuff in series fnarg because you could actually piece it together (for example, the scene where the Doctor apparently returns to Amy to talk to her in the angels two parter has him wearing a different watch and suit which quite a few people picked up on) but the River stuff was kinda obvious (though I'm taking this from the perspective of someone who glanced in on several discussion threads during the weeks between episodes which probably affects things) and I'm not entirely sure if the Clara thing had enough solid hints to allow it to be properly figured out (if we're talking about the same reveal here). I feel like it wasn't fair play, I guess?

Still, the idea of bringing in River with Ten's era and continuing onto Eleven was pretty neat and Moffat's episodes within the RTD era were some of my favourite.

Imo, the thing with RTD vs Moffat is that RTD went for the human drama and added in deus ex machina in order to accommodate that; Moffat goes for Rule of Cool at the expense of characterisation and occasionally, plot. Also, he's more hands off in terms of editing other's scripts (which can easily be a good or bad thing). The way RTD edited other scripts the episodes were more regular and the same tone (including I would guess, making sure characters fit better) cutting down on the differences between different writers (I think I remember either in an interview or something that apparently Moffat was one of the few who had their scripts left relatively untouched but the rest could have theirs changed about quite a bit). With Moffat individual writers have their original tone preserved, but as it seems Moffat doesn't give much instruction in terms of characters (so they didn't really know much about Clara's personality) that can lead to the characterisation being slightly contradictory and leaving in some things episodes would be better without. Both of them have their flaws and their good sides, but I dislike saying that overall one is better than the other because the fandom is so split over it and makes it into a war at times.

EDIT: I will say this though, if there were two people with slightly different views in charge, instead of just one at any one time I think that quite a few of the flaws could be balanced out.
Last edited by Stopwatch on July 9th, 2013, 3:24 am, edited 1 time in total.
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GinRei
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Re: Doctor Who?

Post by GinRei »

Yeah, gotta say the deus ex machina in series 5 was a bit jarring. Time travel that only works because it's predicated on the future happening before the past, despite that future needing the past in order to exist. But beyond that, I've enjoyed it. The Vincent Van Gogh episode was my favorite thus far.
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Re: Doctor Who?

Post by Akonyl »

GinRei wrote:Yeah, gotta say the deus ex machina in series 5 was a bit jarring. Time travel that only works because it's predicated on the future happening before the past, despite that future needing the past in order to exist. But beyond that, I've enjoyed it. The Vincent Van Gogh episode was my favorite thus far.
I'm perfectly fine with time loops, but yeah the plot devices (time travel included) in Moffat's stuff has just felt very wishy-washy, made to serve the plot rather than trying to keep some sort of consistency.

Besides, (anime name spoiler)
Spoiler:
you liked Steins Gate, didn't you? That whole series is a time loop. :P
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Re: Doctor Who?

Post by GinRei »

Yeah, but that wasn't as bad as this in terms of looping. This created a huge plot hole, but whatever.
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Re: Doctor Who?

Post by mangaluva »

It's less the plots and more the characters that differentiate RTD and Moffat for me. I like David Tennant's Doctor better than Matt Smith's, no question, but I also liked companions better. I was never a huge fan of Rose, but I liked Martha a lot and Donna is one of my all-time favourite people ever. I liked Amy initially, but she had a lot of scenes that bothered me (like trying to jump the Doctor on the night before her wedding---what the hell, girl?--the odd lack of any long-term reaction to Melody being stolen from her and Rory--"oh, okay, she's a future assassin now, and at least we got to grow up with her which is totally the same thing as getting to raise and love your child yourself, cool, let's go see space"--and the weird short-lived divorce subplot) and I have to admit that I still find myself not giving a crap about Clara. She's not a character, she's a walking plot device and I have lost all hope of ever being emotionally invested in her, sorry.

Also, I have to say that, personally, I find Matt Smith and Alex Kingston to have even less chemistry than the "romantic" subplot in Now You See Me, so never been particularly invested in that "relationship" either.

All just IMHO, but I liked RTD's characters much better.
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Re: Doctor Who?

Post by GinRei »

Well, those aren't on Blu-ray, so I won't be seeing them most likely. :P
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Re: Doctor Who?

Post by GinRei »

Finished series 6. Really enjoyed the end. And since it seems like people didn't like series 7, I can easily pass on it and still feel like I have a complete story.
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Re: Doctor Who?

Post by mangaluva »

GinRei wrote:Finished series 6. Really enjoyed the end. And since it seems like people didn't like series 7, I can easily pass on it and still feel like I have a complete story.
At the very least, I do recommend watching "The Doctor's Wife". It's the single most brilliant Matt Smith episode and was written by Neil Gaiman, with all the brilliance that implies.
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Re: Doctor Who?

Post by GinRei »

That's series 6, so I did watch that. :P
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Re: Doctor Who?

Post by mangaluva »

GinRei wrote:That's series 6, so I did watch that. :P
Derp, so it is. Yeah... not missing much with season 7. Even the second Neil Gaimain-penned episode was... eh.
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Re: Doctor Who?

Post by Iwamoto Yuri »

but... but clara D:
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Re: Doctor Who?

Post by Stopwatch »

mangaluva wrote:
GinRei wrote:That's series 6, so I did watch that. :P
Derp, so it is. Yeah... not missing much with season 7. Even the second Neil Gaimain-penned episode was... eh.
The first one he'd literally spent months or something preparing it so it makes sense that the quality would be extremely high. I'm guessing the second one he didn't have any where near as much time which explains the drop in quality.

I have very mixed feelings regarding series 7, though I generally think part 2 was better than part 1.

Also, I honestly liked how the time loop thing had been worked into series five (with the finale Doctor outright talking to Amy, and all the other hints) though it annoyed me at the time that it left stuff hanging about the Silence.
Terry Pratchett wrote: The trouble with having an open mind, of course, is that people will insist on coming along and trying to put things in it.
bash7353 wrote:I kind of always assumed that Haneda's parents might've had names.
Spoiler: Box full of stuff
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Some year's SS by Abs. :D
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DCW SS from Anime Girl 4 Eva]
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Thanks, cinna ^^
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Re: Doctor Who?

Post by Iwamoto Yuri »

It's official, the 12th doctor will be announced on Sunday
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Re: Doctor Who?

Post by Kaito Lady »

Yuri Iwamoto wrote:It's official, the 12th doctor will be announced on Sunday
:O!!!!
hype!!!
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Re: Doctor Who?

Post by Iwamoto Yuri »

Kaito Lady wrote:
Yuri Iwamoto wrote:It's official, the 12th doctor will be announced on Sunday
:O!!!!
hype!!!
Oh believe me, I'm HYPING OMG I'M NOT SURE IF I SHOULD GO LOOK MONDAY MORNING OR JUST BE LIKE NO I'LL WAIT TILL CHRISTMAS FHDTDGSVVGHV
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The Doctor wrote:Remember: Hate is always foolish, and love is always wise.
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