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Dr Who on Round up

26 replies

Jux · 12/05/2011 17:47

Can someone let me know whether Dr Who is on Saturday or Monday. On the Round up, it says it's on Monday 14th May, which implies it may not be this year. Unsurprising I suppose; he is a Time Lord.

Seriously, I'd like to know. DD will not forgive me if she misses it and we don't have one of those fancy box-things which does everything for you.

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MigratingCoconuts · 12/05/2011 18:16

my sky+ is set to series record and is showing its set to record episode 4 on saturday at 6.30pm.

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Jux · 14/05/2011 16:15

Thank you.

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Jux · 14/05/2011 16:16

(er, is there a reason why the Neil Gaiman episode is important?)Blush

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MigratingCoconuts · 14/05/2011 16:29

I don't know specifically why this episode would be important but I do know why Neil Gaiman is an important writer:

stardust

caroline

good omens

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Jux · 14/05/2011 19:39

Yeah, authors aren't necessarily good script writers though. I enjoyed this episode, as it happens. Perhaps I'm being terribly snotty. I don't want to wander over to any existing Dr Who threads as I've found them a Little Overwhelming; it was the Time of the Tennant though, so it may be different now.

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MigratingCoconuts · 14/05/2011 20:20

I enjoyed it too! I thought Neil gaiman did a good job in it but then I enjoyed 'stardust' as a film (not sure if he wrote that screenplay as well as the book Hmm)

i'm enjoying the whole series. I think steve Moffat has taken it in a direction I personally like (Tennant had a tendancy to monologue too much!)

anyway, emergency has cropped up...DH has put on eurovision!!

AitchTwoOh · 14/05/2011 22:12

i have no idea why that happened with the date, sorry Jux, i filed it with the Saturday written on it... many apols, it must have got mixed up when HQ were 'making it into a bit of the internet'.

i LOVE neil gaiman, HUGE crush, and was utterly confident that Moffat and he would have knocked up something great. (this is presuming that Moff is running things the way RTD did, which is to say major, major script input, uncredited).

certainly of this series i felt like this was the best, most self-contained (while no doubt having implications we do not yet understand etc etc pace the Moff) and most interesting ep yet. exploring the relationship between the tardis and the doctor... brilliant idea.

AND MICHAEL SHEEN was the house... crusharama.

Oakmaiden · 14/05/2011 23:19

Jux - Neil Gaiman isn't JUST an author!!!

{faints in a heap. Picks herself back up again.}

He does loads of different writery stuff - as far as I recall he started out in graphic novels, then wrote several novels (including the amazing Good Omens, with Terry Pratchett) and also wrote the TV series Neverwhere. He also co-wrote the film Beowulf, amongst others, wrote at least one of the Babylon 5 episodes and Stardust and Coraline (two of his books) have been made into films.

Plus he does this steam-punky thing that I love completely...

edam · 14/05/2011 23:25

I was a little Hmm when Moff, on Confidential, said Gaiman was the no. 1 fantasy genre author. That would be Mr Pratchett, IMO (their collaboration on Good Omens was brilliant but it's Pratchett every time for me).

But it was a great episode. Loved the idea of tackling the relationship between Doctor and Tardis by personifying the Tardis and they did it so very well. Best idea in New Who since the one with all the companions together with the Doctor flying the Tardis (after the set designer having pointed out the console looked like there should be eight people there).

Suranne Jones was a surprise, too, had never really rated her but she was fab.

Oakmaiden · 14/05/2011 23:31

That is a tricky one, actually edam. Pratchett is brilliant, but his books are VERY different to Gaiman's - for all that they collaborated on Good Omens. I think, on balance, I prefer Gaiman's writing though.

Interestingly I heard a rumour that Good Omens is being made into a TV series. I can't see how that could possibly work - the BEST thing about Good Omens is the little asides to the reader, and I can't think how they could possibly get that feel into a TV show....

Oakmaiden · 14/05/2011 23:32

Sod it - off to read Good Omens again. It is my all time favourite book!

edam · 14/05/2011 23:41

Pratchett is beyond compare IMO but Gaiman is v. v. good. Have you read Pratchett's Nation? I was in floods...
Am going to have to dig out my copy of Good Omens as well now. And the Unadulterated Cat as I have a feeling that was another NG and TP collaboration. May have that one wrong, though.

MigratingCoconuts · 15/05/2011 08:25

Grin I have been thinking it was time to read 'Good Omens' again too!! I love that book...I think it played to the strengths of both writers

SagaciousCloud · 15/05/2011 10:15

I thought this was a wonderful episode - for adults. My DD, who has previously loved Doctor Who even the scary bits, has been completely switched off by the episodes in this series. She actually refused to watch last night - which is so sad.

I like Matt Smith and Arthur Darvill, but am less enamoured of Karan Gillan. So the acting isn't the problem.

I think that my biggest issue with Moffat's Doctor Who is that it is mostly serious and scary with some fun bits thrown in. Where as it should be (and used to be) mostly fun with some scary and serious bits.

I wonder if Moffat has not quite grasped what children get from Doctor Who? I know that everyone raved about (and he won awards for) the first Weeping Angels episode, but I thought that it was not a good episode for children.

And surely thats the whole point about Doctor Who, it should be for families to watch.

AitchTwoOh · 15/05/2011 10:49

i reckon that's true, tbh. i'm not sure i care Wink but i reckon it's true.

MigratingCoconuts · 15/05/2011 11:03

I think thats why I'm enjoying it more...but then my kids are too young for Dr Who anyway.

AitchTwoOh · 15/05/2011 11:04

it bodes terribly well for sherlock, imo. cannot WAIT for that.

sayithowitis · 15/05/2011 11:43

IME Dr Who has always had storylines that were scary - when I was younger, that was part of its appeal. If you, like me, can remember as far back as patrick Troughton's Doctor, he had many 'dark' stories, and wasn't as sympathetic a character as Matt Smith. Also, Jon Pertwee and The Daemons? That was about as scary a story as I can remember. Kids loved it. I guess it depends on how old the children are of course, but I really don't think that it is any more scary today than it was years ago.

foxinsocks · 15/05/2011 11:52

I never really understood it fully as a young child tbh.

Dd, 10, seems to have totally 'got' this series and is loving it.

I still think (personally) that Weeping Angels was one of the best Dr Who episodes ever written.

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Jux · 15/05/2011 11:58

Ah yes, Neverwhere. I read that a long time ago and found it terribly disappointing. Then I remembered I'd seen it on TV and it had been disappointing there too.

Pratchett beats Gaiman hands down imo. I think I've read Good Omens (I've read so much Pratchett...) but I have tended to avoid his collaborations.

OK so I'm obviously thoroughly ignorant as to Gaiman's many pies Blush. I enjoyed Stardust though, but again thought at first it was lacking coherence though that was more than adequately made up for by De Niro's performance and the ghost princes. Sorry, it wasn't/isn't one of my faves. I'm not saying Gaiman's not good, he's certainly good enough, but I wouldn't put him at first rank.

Aitch, don't worry about it as I came on here and got the day, and we didn't miss it!

I much prefer this Dr to Mr Tennant. I hate that River woman as I think she's a lousy actress. I was getting sick of the Doctor when the scripts were playing on the fantasies of mums watching (he's sooooo loooooooonely) bah humbug and Faugh. Crap. He's a fucking alien, he's like a god who zooms in, sets things right, saves the world and then zooms off again. He's not some prurient version of Batman.

Oh dear, I've got a bit carried away.Grin Please forgive me. I've watched Dr Who since the very first episode with William Hartnell. I gave up with Peter Davison and the following few, who were all terrible. I seem to feel more passionate about it than I had realised! GrinGrin

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Jux · 15/05/2011 12:52

It was a childhood ritual that you hid behind the sofa/armchair at some point during Dr Who, peeking out in terror! We all did it. My biggest terror was The Slither. You never saw it, on the last episode you saw it's shadow. I had nightmares Grin

Patrick Troughton was my fave Dr as he looked rather like my dad's best friend, so was rather comforting but I was under 10.

Weeping Angels still scares dd who is now 11.

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foxinsocks · 15/05/2011 14:07

I found Weeping Angels White scary tbh and I'm not that easily scared

Dd and I were screaming DON'T BLINK at the tv lol!

foxinsocks · 15/05/2011 14:07

Quite not white ffs

meditrina · 15/05/2011 14:17

Blink is simply one of the best episodes ever.

The DCs found Midnight to be the scariest recently, followed by the Girl in the Fireplace and the Vasta Nerada episodes. (All of which tap into human atavistic fears, rather than depending on scariness of the monster per se).

But from childhood, the scariest for me was with the third doctor. The Green Death.

edam · 15/05/2011 19:01

Yup, Blink, Midnight and Vashta Nerada scored very highly for scare factor round here, too. And yes, it is about tapping into atavistic fears rather than inventing a new monster.

Sagacious, BBC used to do a fear factor rating for upcoming episodes that we found quite useful for ds - their panel of kids includes different ages so we could check what the person his age had said. Can't remember where it is now but have a rootle around the CBBC and Doctor Who websites.

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