I think it's because it sells well enough as it's already presented in little story arc sets.
Once the cash flow from that format slows down, then they'll release as a seasonal item.
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I think it's because it sells well enough as it's already presented in little story arc sets.
Once the cash flow from that format slows down, then they'll release as a seasonal item.
I was just watching the "Adventure in Time and Space" special (that doco-drama of the start of DrWho in 1963), and it was quite fascinating. Well worth the watch if a fan of DrWho and wanted to see how it all began... with a bumpy start that almost ended after just the first story.
It was nice to see how they made some of the special effects noises, like the Tardis materialising noise and the opening credits visuals.
The accuracy of something that happened 50 years ago is questionable, especially since most of the people involved are now dead... but if true, it was nice to see that William Hartnell had a respect for the audience - noting that he had to be consistent with how he did things (like where the door lever was on the Tardis console) because the kids watching would pick up on any contradictions. (like in any fandom)
Despite being a grumpy old man, it's possible (from that doco-drama) that he was invested into the show and its fiction to make sure it worked.
I came across this earlier in the year, which might be repetitious to some, but fascinating to watch and listen to - all the different opening themes, showing the evolution of the opening credits and music over the 50-ish years.
It's surprising to see that the signature riff/tune is the same since 1963, but just recorded in different ways over the 50 years. Even Star Trek didn't keep their signature tune, over their almost-50 years... and that's probably the next longest lasting TV/movie universe.
And for anyone really keen, the second part has themes from spinoffs and specials.
They are official, so looks to be taken off some special release DVD from the BBC.
This other video by the same youtube user appears to be done by that person (not an official video), which is an anthology of the regenerations (up until 2010)... which is likely to be updated soon with the three new regenerations shown this year. (and it noted a regeneration from McGann to Eccelston, which we now know doesn't happen)
While I'm at it, for anyone who wants to immerse themselves into some fringe "non/conjectural canon" of DrWho, here are some short videos I recommend....
The Curse of the Fatal Death (1999 charity special) - Rowen Atkinson leads several stars playing several incarnations of the Doctor. (including Richard E Grant, who also featured in a 40th Anniversary animation as the Doctor, but was also in the 50th Anniversary season as the as the puppet of the Great Intelligence)
Dimensions in Time (30th Anniversary charity special) - The Rani is trying to capture the various Doctors, featuring Pertwee(3), Baker (4), Davison (5), Baker (6), McCoy (7) and several various companions from just about every Doctor. Plus some outtakes and edits posted on youtube by one of the writers.
Time Crash (2008 charity special) - David Tennant meets Peter Davidson as Doctors (they probably meet in real life quite often, since they are related - Tennant married Davison's daughter three years after she played the Doctor's Daughter in the series)
2007 charity special - David Tennant and Catherine Tate (Donna) in a classroom as teacher and student (respectively).
2005 charity special - an extended version of David Tennant's introduction as the new Doctor... explaining how Rose seemed so quick to accept him before the next episode, and why they weren't in Barcelona, or why the Doctor was having side effects to the regeneration in the Christmas Invasion.
1985 charity special - Doctors 2, 3, 5 & 6 and about 12 companions presenting donation cheques to the charity.
How about some outtakes to finish things off?
While it's tentatively Doctor Who connected, I love this clip and have watched this so many times I know it by heart. Including the sonnet.Quote:
2007 charity special - David Tennant and Catherine Tate (Donna) in a classroom as teacher and student (respectively).
While I can't say I'm a fan of the show (never held any interest, never really watched it, might really enjoy it if I had the time to add it to the ever-long list of things to check out), that theme is haunting as hell, and that YouTube video was awesome!Quote:
Originally Posted by griffin
So initially Moffatt said that the regeneration count hasn't changed, but then he's since changed his mind and now says that not only does the War Doctor now count as the 9th Doctor, but that both of Tennants regenerations do indeed count. So now it is apparently:
+ Hurt = 9th Doctor
+ Eccleston = 10th
+ Tennant = 11th and 12th Doctors
+ Smith = 13th Doctor
+ Capaldi = ????? :confused: ?????
---------------------------------------
I'm curious to know what other people's opinions are on this. Would you rather the story just discard the 12 regeneration rule for the Doctor and just accept Capaldi as the 13th Doctor, or would you prefer something else that somehow maintains the 12 regen rule in tact? I'd prefer the latter. I'd personally like to see the Doctor actually die and get buried on Trenzalore, and have Capaldi come in as an entirely new and separate Time Lord (possible now that Gallifrey has survived) who perhaps assumes the title of the Doctor (perhaps even actually call himself "Doctor Who" as to differentiate himself from the Doctor) and carries on his legacy. Not sure how you'd allow a new Doctor to inherit the old Doctor's Tardis though, since we do see the Doctor being buried in his own Tardis. The idea of a new Doctor simply setting his Tardis to look like an old British police box seems silly to me.
According to the serial 'Brain of Morbius', what we consider the 1st Doctor, is actually the 9th incarnation.
Personally, I ignore the whole 12 regeneration limit. It's not like they can't hand wave it away anyway.
You've left out Eccleston.Quote:
Originally Posted by GoktimusPrime
It would make it:
+ Hurt = 9th Doctor
+ Eccleston = 10th
+ Tennant = 11th and 12th Doctors
+ Smith = 13th Doctor
+ Capaldi = ????? :confused: ?????
At the end of the day it doesn't matter. It has been established long ago that Time Lords can be given additional regenerations. The Master's whole thing used to be that he had used up all of his and wanted to steal the Doctor's remaning ones. The Valeyard was pretty much the same only he was an off-spring of one of the Doctor's regenerations (the penultimate one according to the Master).
There are also a couple of moments they could use to write their way out of this problem.
When River poisons the Doctor in 'Let's Kill Hitler' she then later heals him using one of her regenerations and could have given him more.
The Master then died and was brought back to life by the Time Lords. After that he has more regenerations again. He uses one to turn from Derek Jacobi to John Simm. This would imply that when the Time Lords restored him they either gave him 12 new regenerations or he regained them naturally as a result of being brought back to life.
If the latter is true then the Doctor could have naturally had the count reset when he was brought back to life after dieing in 'The Night of the Doctor'
Or they could just say that the elixer he drank not only triggered a regeneration but gave him more.
You missed Eccelston in that list (see my revised listing - and if Tennant counts as two, that makes Capaldi 14).NEVER MIND - GP BEAT ME TO IT BY 4 MINUTES.
I think the "12 rule" is a good plot device, to encourage urgency and fear, to find a way of getting a new cycle before he dies (like the Master tried at one stage). And if the Morbius episode is to be included as fact (before they brought in the "12" rule), it could be explained as a previous cycle... in that this isn't really his first set of 12 lives. (we certainly know that Moffatt is one who likes retconning things... so who knows what new twists he'll create that re-writes everything fans have relied on all these years)
Just a question: Do they ever go into any detail just how The Daleks and The Time Lords were destroying the rest of the universe with their war? You see all these races show up that talk about how they lost their planets during the time war but I've yet to see/hear anything about Time Lord space fleets or armies marching across globes. Did they just fight it with Tardis's or what? I know the end game was that either only the Time Lords would survive or the Daleks would, but what happened during the war? How were these battles fought?
From the article in Gok's posting...
POSSIBLE SPOILERS
If this is a warning of the next episode, Moffatt has now suddenly retconned the order again. If Tennant used up two regenerations, why not make mention of it before now... unless that's the point - The Doctor thought he had a life left, so didn't panick about it yet.Quote:
Asked about the Christmas episode and the regeneration of Doctor Who, Moffat confirmed Matt was the 13th Doctor and told the Mirror: "The 12 regenerations limit is a central part of Doctor Who mythology - science fiction is all about rules, you can't just casually break them.
Still, if that other Tennant "regeneration" was something he knew was a regeneration, why keep it from the fans for the last three years?
Retconning the order twice in one year, to shuffle Smith from 11 to 13, is a bit much.
Since he wrote it into the most recent episode that Capaldi was number 13, it shows that Moffatt has only JUST retconned it for the next episode... contradicting his own work in the last episode.
If he is now making Capaldi as number 14, he missed the opportunity of the Valeyard story between the 12 & 13th Doctors. :(
Waitasec... I just looked at the dates of the two articles - 24th & 25th. So in the space of a day, after fan feedback/reactions to "Day of the Doctor" he changed his mind about the numbering.
On the 24th Moffatt said...
On the 25th Moffatt said...Quote:
‘If you worry about such things, and I do, then I specifically said John Hurt’s Doctor doesn’t use the title. [Matt Smith's Doctor] is in his 12th body
Quote:
Asked about the Christmas episode and the regeneration of Doctor Who, Moffat confirmed Matt was the 13th Doctor and told the Mirror: "The 12 regenerations limit is a central part of Doctor Who mythology - science fiction is all about rules, you can't just casually break them.
"So if the Doctor can never change again, what's Peter Capaldi doing in the Christmas special?"
:confused:
I almost forgot the new DR Who episode tonight. (Already started on ch 2 in VIC & NSW)
Hope they don't retcon anything else, or go with the recent bit about this really being the 13th doctor.
Can't say I liked this Christmas special. Nothing about it was Christmassy.
At least we scored a new doctor out of it.
Considering the Doctor was just over 900 when he got his last body, then had had it for a few hundred years already before he went to Trensalor, THEN was on Trensalor for Primus-knows how many centuries (300 years minimum but prob around 5/600), he must have doubled his age just using his 13th incarnation. At least he looked after that one a while ;)
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The most interesting part of this episode was the basic admission that Matt Smith is indeed the Thirteenth Doctor and at the very end of his regeneration cycle. Story ended with the Time Lords granting him a new life cycle, so I guess this means he has a whole new thirteen set of lives. But what's also intriguing is what this might actually mean for the Doctor... the very end of this episode seems to suggest that this new regeneration is a lot "deeper" than previous ones - probably because it's a "reset" regeneration. The new Doctor mentions having new kidneys, so the change appears to be a lot more than just 'cosmetic.' He also seems to have lost his knowledge on piloting the Tardis, but I'm not sure if that's actual knowledge loss or post-regenerative trauma, which the Doctor has experienced before.
Ssooo... if this is a 'lifecycle restart,' does it mean that Capaldi is the New First Doctor or is he the Fourteenth Doctor? :confused:
I actually preferred this episode because of that. I've never been fond of stories that see extra-terrestrial aliens 'randomly' observing human rituals... and why just Christmas? If the Doctor has come to love Earth so much that he wants to adopt human customs, why don't we also see him observing Ramadan or Eid or Passover or Kwanzaa or Diwali or Sol Invictus or the Lunar New Year et al.? :confused: Having a town called Xmas that happened to be in a permanent state of Xmas on the planet Trenzalore was already asking the audience to massively suspend disbelief. Besides, we still had that thing in the background of the Oswald's Xmas dinner being in wait. Not to mention the whole Churchy reference with that Borg-Church. :pQuote:
Originally Posted by CBratron
John Hurt became 9. Eccelston 10. Tennant 11. Smith 12.Quote:
Ssooo... if this is a 'lifecycle restart,' does it mean that Capaldi is the New First Doctor or is he the Fourteenth Doctor?
Capaldi 13. The Gallifreians even say, "all thirteen regenerations are here..." in Day of the Doctor.
I think you're looking a little too deeply into the new kidneys thing. Every cell in his body undergoes regeneration so he gets new everything each time.
My dislike for this special probably stems from my general dislike of Matt Smith just because he's not Eccleston or Tennant. From "fishfingers and custard" the hate was set.
Like i said. I'm glad we have a new doctor.
Tennant regenerated twice though, and Smith's Doctor did explicitly explain this to Clara in tonight's episode and said that he was the thirteenth and final Doctor. He was only able to regenerate at the end because after Clara pleaded with the Time Lords through the crack, they granted the Doctor a new life cycle. But if they hadn't had done that, then Smith's Doctor would've been the thirteenth and final Doctor, which is why:Quote:
Originally Posted by SMHFConvoy
1. We see the Doctor age instead of regenerating
2. We see the Doctor surrender to the Daleks at the end with what he expected to be his dying breaths, daring the Daleks to kill him. Then the back smiling crack in the sky granted him a new life cycle.
Perhaps the Time Lord who said "all thirteen regenerations are here" wasn't aware at that exact time (they were under pressure ;)) that Tennant's Doctor had regenerated twice.
Fair point. :) Yeah, not sure if what's happening to him is just standard post regenerative trauma or signs of a new regenerative life cycle. :oQuote:
Originally Posted by CBratron
I don't hate Matt Smith's Doctor, but I'm not hugely fond of it either. Baker and Tennant are still by far my favourite Doctors. :DQuote:
Originally Posted by CBratron
I think between writing D.o.t.D. story and T.o.f.D. story, Moffat had a new idea that contradicted something that was already filmed... and looked/sounded good for dramatic effect.
If he had already decided that Smith was the 13th, he wouldn't have included that line, or the glimps of Capaldi's eyes in DotD... as it makes no sense to include it. There was no need for it to be included, or quoted, as fans would have seen all the previous ones, and the story/plot would have been the same, without fans needing to see Capaldi as a teaser.
The thing that bugs me (now, even more than it did when I first whinged about it a few months back), is how Moffat suddenly had the Doctor age 300 years just to set up the plot device in DotD (to have enough time to do the calculations in his Sonic Screwdriver, and in his head) without him physically aging... and yet in this episode Moffat has the Doctor age 300 years (quoted in the episode) before Clara returns (stuck to the Tardis) and he is looking very aged.
So for one plot set-up of 300 years, Moffat doesn't make the Doctor age a day, but then a second plot device of 300 years, he's a withered old man who needed a walking stick.
Moffat doesn't make a good Editor, if he has to contradict himself as if it was the only option to resolve one plot device in DotD... and keeps retconning things, to the displeasure of fans who have now "lost" two regenerations. All those fan stories and theories of who the next two Doctors would be, not to mention the guidebooks, and web resources... all made useless in the space of two episodes.
As for the episode itself, it had some uncomfortable moments (unnecessary nudity plot device), and some funny bits (the Smith Doctor certainly likes making friends with former enemies)... and good wrap up of the Transalore plot device from N.o.t.D. but the timing of the story felt clumsy.
And just like the Pandorica episode, we have all these warring races together at one time and space, when most existed at differing time-periods to each other (based on when the Doctor has defeated or seemingly eradicated them). And again with the endless Daleks - they seem to be like a virus, that keeps coming back no matter how much it looks like the new Series has destroyed them.
He's also put way too much emphasis on the Time Lords being a dangerous race... as in, it is in the best interest of the universe that they remain lost, even though the Daleks are taking over, and the Time Lords are the only ones who could possibly stop them.
Bring them back, and if they really have the power of time, then prevent the Kaleds becoming Daleks in the first place (like the 4th Doctor was supposed to have done).
And one last fan-rant :p if a Time Lord can cause that much devastation when regenerating (according to the new Series), then why wouldn't it be used as a weapon against the Daleks. A couple Time Lords could destroy the whole fleet by sacrificing a couple of their regenerations. (and if the rest of them have the power to restart a Life-Cycle, they could just get a recharge later)
So many holes for this poor tragic fanboy... :o
Stop over thinking it. It's fiction, science fiction :D
It's not like they're going to cancel a successful TV show :D:D
I thought he aged this time cause he spent that time without the TARDIS. So maybe the Tardis helps with the aging. May not be true, but it helps made it work in my head.:D
I liked this, not as much as the 50th special though. I did appreciate the way that all the overarching 11 Doctor storylines got pretty much neatly tied into a (timetravelling) bow.
When the wooden Cyberman appeared I thought "great this explains..." and then I paused. When was that exactly? Then I realised the mysterious wooden robot was from MTMTE (and still hasn't been answered) :o
I had the same thought. Travelling in the Time Vortex is probably very good for your skin. The Doctor keeps running, because if he stays still, stays in one place for a long time, he grows old. He'd grown old before he stole the TARDIS afterall. The Time Vortex boost from "Bad Wolf Rose" keeps Captain Jack looking young despite him having several centuries of life too.Quote:
Originally Posted by VERT
The physical aging thing bugged me for the same reasons griffin mentioned . . . then I accepted it after Smith Doctor explained to Clara that he was the last regeneration. For me, when the War Doctor "broke the promise of being the Doctor," it somehow 'dropped' him from the Doctor's life cycle, but after DotD reestablished the War Doctor as the 9th, then it bumped up the regeneration count, stripping Smith Doctor of his final regeneration.
Aargh... fans shouldn't have to try to make awkward explanations... the story should make sense within itself. :(
The nudity thing was weird, but Michael Bay has desensitised me to such subtle acts of lewdness. :p I did quite like Handles. Poor Handles. :(Quote:
Originally Posted by griffin
Not all of his regenerations were so dramatic though... perhaps it's unpredictable as to whether or not a regeneration will expel massive amounts of energy (if at all); as in one of those "individual results may vary." But something I did wonder about when I watched DotD was, during the scenes of the Daleks invading Gallifrey and shooting down Gallifreyans soldiers and civilians... why didn't any of them start regenerating? Or why didn't the Daleks use disintegration weapons? We see their bodies fall rather than disintegrating. Surely if you're at war with a species who can regenerate, then you'd use disintegration weaponry! Or at very least head-shot each fallen body?Quote:
Originally Posted by griffin
But yeah, if some of them would've regenerated, you'd think at least a few of them would be destructive enough to damage the Dalek Fleet. Heck, send crews of Time Lord commandos to storm Dalek ships -- as they fall they'll regenerate, and some of them should do so while expelling a good amount of destructive energy - they get up again and continue fighting. Being a Time Lord soldier must be like being a soldier in a computer game because you get to freakin' respawn! :p
Yeah but good scifi/fantasy should make sense in the context of it's own world - e.g. Tolkien, Bladerunner, Beast Wars etc.Quote:
Originally Posted by SMHFConvoy
^This. ;) The new Doctor Who series have become more like Michael Bay's Transformers... great when you first watch them, but things fall apart when you think about the story/plot in detail. :(Quote:
Originally Posted by SMHFConvoy
Come to think of it, where did Handles come from? I tuned in at 7:30 to find it'd already started. Did he get picked up in the first five minutes or something?
The story makes sense within itself. Ask the millions watching who aren't captial F "fans" (the who know Doctor Who back to front) and it wouldn't be confusing to them. The Doctor stayed on Christmas for hundreds of years and grew old fighting a war to protect people.Quote:
Originally Posted by GoktimusPrime
If you're a fan, it also makes sense. If you're a Timelord fighting wars is not good for you, it ages you, makes you tied and your exterior appearance reflects that. The War Doctor grew old in the Time War too. The Doctor doesn't stay in one place for a long time and here's why. He grows old. Adventures in Time and Space in the TARDIS preventing/retarding ageing is not an awkward explanation... it makes sense and is not particularly inconsistent with anything we've seen? *
* Unless you count the sentence in the third paragraph on the 124th page of the tie-in novel that was published by the BBC in 1967 and is therefore canon. :rolleyes: The sentence has a typo, it was obviously meant to be semicolon
While I have an interest in Dr. Who and enjoy following the series, I'm by no means a fan. I should've just said "audiences" in my last post rather than "fans." Your reasoning is sound, but it wasn't apparent to me at the time that I was watching the episode. Perhaps something like a quick line to remind audiences about how the War Doctor had aged during the Time Wars might have been helpful.
I'm not going to lie -- I didn't enjoy the Xmas special. I've only been a casual fan since the series started again, keeping abreast of most of the major stories and so forth, but something was amiss for me.
It said that the battle on and above Trenzalore wiped out every species except the Daleks, so in the future, only the Dalek's are left..?
In this ep? The other aliens gave up and went home (the Mother Superior said) except the Daleks.
Quote:
Originally Posted by GoktimusPrime
People tend to forget that most iconic piece of Dr Who history which fully explains why he can have more than 13 regenerations. In an alternate reality the Doctor (played superbly by Rowan Atkinson) went through his last half doz regenerations in about 3 minutes. But then 'even the universe was not ready to loose the Doctor' so time and space itself gave him another regeneration -
- complete with Dalek bumps! :p
In regards to the Doctor aging, he has done that before. When the Master had the 10th Doctor captive he aged him with his Laser Screwdriver by hundreds of years and he became an old man. He did it again but by a lot more and he became this little gnome thing.
They also did a time skip on the Doctor twice in Time of the Doctor. The first time they specifically mention it had been 300 years and he had aged a bit and needed a cane. The next time (when the Doctor had help from the Silence) they do not mention how long it had been. It could have been another 300 years, if not longer, which would explain why he looks so old by the end.
They say that the danger of the Time Lords coming back wasn't because of the Time Lords themselves, but because of the Daleks restarting the Time War with them. Even if the Time Lords came came back in peace, the Daleks would open fire and the Time War would start all over again.Quote:
Originally Posted by griffin
That being said, it has been shown in the past that some of the Time Lords (like the High Council) are also pretty dangerous. Remember that the High Council's final plan included the destruction of all of creation (a dick move in my books). They have also tried to screw over the Doctor by rigging a trial against him and bribed the Valeyard (a being spawned from the Doctor's penultimate regeneration) with the offer of more regenerations (another dick move in my books). The High Council has shown that they are also dangerous because of their arrogance and contempt for other species.
It has been established that a Time Lord can have the regeneration process stopped or be killed in a particular way that prevents the process starting. The 8th Doctor died in a space ship crash. River died when both her hearts were fried. The Silence also knew they could kill a Time Lord mid-regeneration by 'killing' them again. The 5th Doctor was concerned the disease he had picked up could stop the regeneration process implying that there were diseases that could. River almost killed the Doctor with a poison that would prevent a regeneration (that being said if they knew he didn't have any left they wouldn't have had to bother.)Quote:
Originally Posted by GoktimusPrime
Since the Dalek's weapons appear to be an instant-death-beam for other species, you could assume it is the same for Time Lords, hence the no regenerations seen.
That was part of the danger that I was referring to - that their very existence would make them a target or catalyst in creating a war. But that's not logical, as the Daleks were waging war against the entire universe anyway, and would conquer it quicker without a force powerful enough to at least hold them at bay (the Time Lords).Quote:
Originally Posted by Golden Phoenix
Just because the "Doctor Who" story universe only focused on the Daleks targeting the Time Lords, it doesn't mean they were the only race they wanted to destroy... it's not like the Daleks would be a quiet peaceful race if the Timelords never came back.
And yet other races blamed the Timelords (according the Moffat), for being caught up in the crossfire of Timewars... but they would have died at the hands of the Daleks anyway if the Timelords didn't exist to fight back. (that was another flaw of the T.o.t.D. as the Church were trying to prevent a war by keeping the Timelords out of this universe, but in reality it meant no one would then be left to stop the Daleks from taking over the universe)
Apparently from a British TV guide...
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Heh, funny cos it's true
I can't believe Bianca is put out by Nikki's arrival in East Enders
Oh and the Doctors description is funny also :p
Rather enjoyed Matt Smith's parting episode, I enjoyed it all the more after a 2nd viewing. :cool:
His parting speech was quite the emotion-jerker, as for me at least this is the 1st Doctor I've had an opportunity to sit through from start to finish and seeing Amelia's visage impart those farewell words really drove the whole thing home. :o
Capaldi made a brilliant entrance I feel, not liking the colour of his new kidneys made me chuckle quite a bit but I am quite curious to see what happens next though. :D
When we saw Child Amelia running around the Tardis, I noticed that they kept obscuring her face... to me it looked like a different actress from Caitlin Blackwood (the original actress who played Child Amelia and Karen Gillan's cousin IRL). Caitlin Blackwood would be thirteen now - perhaps she's grown too tall to play Child Amelia? IMO she's growing to look more like Karen Gillan now.
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Well she is her cousin
It was definitely a different actress playing young Amelia. Caitlin was having to explain it to people on Twitter.
Yeah I thought that might've been the case - Not to worry, I think they conveyed what they were trying to get across. ;):)
I understand why they did it. She is growing up. It happens to kids quite fast