Doctor Who

[Drunk Monk]

I'm bored on a rainy Saturday when I was planning to go to Kung Fu, so I'm launching this even though I don't know how long I'll hang with this show. It's such an overwhelming amount of eps. 

Doctor Who - I've watched a few odd episodes over the years, including most of one season with Baker, but I never really followed it. Tara got into it recently to check off that box in her nerd-dom but only the recent seasons. Brit Box has the 1st 27 seasons. I just watched the 1st 2 eps from 1964. Fascinating. B&W. Might cherry pick a few more. Open to suggestions.

Re Dr Who: baker was the best. Davison (all creatures guy) was good. For the reboot, eccleson and rose were very good. Tenet too, tho I didn’t like his post-rose companion. Mike Smith was also very good (fezzes are cool! Bow ties are cool!) tho I started to lose interest around here and stopped watching about the time Capaldi came in.

Go back and watch Troughton and Pertwee episodes if you can find them. The pertwee’s are funny as he didn’t have the tardis and drove around in a yellow antique motorcar.

—tg

Good tip, tg, thanks. I might look into it. I've been thinking I'll just watch all the season premieres and finales...maybe. 

Re: Dr. Whom. The reboot is the way to go. Start with the Eccleston version. If it doesn’t pull you in in a few eps, just shine the whole franchise. I thought the writing was quite good and Ecc played a weary, battle-scarred Dr quite well. I stayed with them through Tennant and much of Matt Smith, but bailed before Capaldi came on board.

Didn't see much of Capaldi. On board for the Jodie Whitaker incarnation. It is hit or miss for me.

The one thing I saw on Brit Boxx that I might watch is the Rob Lowe series with him as a local cop.

Well alright then. I can see Who is the best Doctor Who? might be worthy of its own indie thread. I watched a few of the Hartnell eps but couldn't quite get through the because they were slow and dated. I was amused that the first companion was his granddaughter Susan but I didn't hang with it long enough to get into that. Hartnell was okay I guess. He seemed bound in his time period which is ironic for a timelord.

And then for S3, it rolled over to some pretty slick animation, clearly not from the 60s. On doing some research this morning, it seems many of the early episodes were lost, so these are reconstructions. The animation was B&W and in that flash-driven style, which came off as appropriately surreal. It somewhat explains the transition to Troughton. 

The one thing I've always luved about Dr. Who is the opening theme song.

[Drunk Monk]

Cherry picked a few eps with Troughton, the Cosmic Hobo. He was an interesting character actor. It's a shame so many of his episodes were lost. The animated reduxes were an interesting recovery. The original Daleks & Cybermen were so primitive. I liked Jaime - the kiltwearing Scot, and he won extra points when he was returned to his period, drew his claymore and charged into rifle fire. 

Just started with Pertwee. The shift from B&W to color is a little jarring.

[thatguy]

For further viewing:

For the 50th anniversary, BBC did a dramatization of the Dr. Who "origin" story. Maybe that's still available on BritBox...




--tg

[Drunk Monk]

I'm not sure (I moved your post off the Brit Box thread). Brit Box has 27 seasons but given the animated season 3, there's some time warpage. And rightly so.

[thatguy]

Dr. Who Spinoffs:
- K9 and Company - Kids show...skip it. I never liked that dog
- The Sarah Jane Adventures - Sarah Jane Smith, IIRC, a companion from the Pertwee/Baker era made a reappearance in one of the reboot Dr. Who episodes. Then came back in her very own spin off. Definitely a kids show, but very Dr. Who and I loved her car. Sadly, she (the actor) died of cancer and the series was canceled.
- Torchwood - definitely not a kids show, pretty good, but jumps the shark a bit

--tg

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[thatguy]

Some inspiration:



--tg

[thatguy]

particularly good Dr. Who reboot episodes:
- Blink (Tennant) - written by Steve Moffat



- The Doctor's Wife (Smith) written by Neil Gaimen


--tg

[Dr. Ivor Yeti]

TG’s recommendations are spot on.

[Drunk Monk]

Now we see who the Who fans are. 

tg - I appreciate the recs but it’s way too much. I’m just nibbling at the transitions to get a sense of the different Docs. I’m not invested enough to watch that much of it.

[Dr. Ivor Yeti]

Come on, one episode written by Neil Gaimen. What could possibly go wrong? I still even remember one line from it, and I’ve only seen it once: “Biting is like kissing, only somebody wins”.

[Drunk Monk]

True but Brit Box only has the classics, not the reboot series. 

BTW, Tara and her apt mate worked their way through the reboot. She proudly told me she had seen all of Doctor Who. I said ‘no way, that show is older than me.’ Her gen was completely unaware of the classic series.

[Dr. Ivor Yeti]

True but Brit Box only has the classics, not the reboot series. 

BTW, Tara and her apt mate worked their way through the reboot. She proudly told me she had seen all of Doctor Who. I said ‘no way, that show is older than me.’ Her gen was completely unaware of the classic series.

Take that, Whippersnapper!

[thatguy]

If only they had a time machine, they could watch them all!

--tg

---

I thought of a funny spin-off idea:

A lesser time-lord who's TARDIS is NOT bigger on the inside than it is on the outside. And every episode has a point where all of the companions have to cram into a telephone-booth sized box while they travel hither and yon, complaining all the while "Are we there yet?!"

Hilarity...

--tg