Series 12

Zarius wrote:Mid-season trailer

What's up with the shit trailer music?

Ratings have dwindled further to 4.04 million views.

Changes at the top coming to the BBC this summer. Lord Hall steps down

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-51176588

Bernard Marx wrote:Ratings have dwindled further to 4.04 million views.

The words, "Come on Ace, we've got work to do..." spring to mind.

Tanmann wrote:

Bernard Marx wrote:Ratings have dwindled further to 4.04 million views.

The words, "Come on Ace, we've got work to do..." spring to mind.

They actually did promote Sophie Aldred's Ace book at the end of the episode last night too

Bumsex wrote:

\"Bumsex wrote:Spyfall 1. = 4.9m
Spyfall 2. = 4.6m
Orphan 55. = 4.19m
Nikola Terror. = 4.04m

I actually thought that Nikola Tesla's Night of Terror was pretty good. Still had flaws, but overall enjoyed far more than last episode and even most of Series 11/12 stories. For one thing, no man-bashing SJW nonsense, so that boots the episode up. They also didn't make either Tesla or Edison to be over-the-top caricature versions of themselves, Tesla is written to be a completely believable character that is judged not by his white ethnicity or the fact that he's Croatian, but rather on his different methods of creating inventions. It almost feels like this episode was written by someone outside of the Chibnall crew, because the writer did some great stuff with its side characters.
The main cast though... Whittaker is still too over-the-top and annoying, but I do like the scenes where she bonds with Tesla, as the writing never makes it feel patronising. However, the three companions get fuck all to do, the whole 'three companions feel too crowded' argument now doesn't hold weight, considering that before it was only one out of the three that got shafted, but here (and by extension, Series 12 as a whole), none of the three do anything besides spout off exposition or say some one-liners (although Graham calling Tesla and Edison AC/DC was pretty funny). The pacing was pretty solid overall, although the editing felt off at the beginning. So, the Doctor and Tesla have to escape from the not-Rachnoss' minion, so they close the door on him, and then... it just cuts to a scene with them on a train. That's just bad continuity editing, and just makes the minion look like 'oh no, doors, my only weakness'. And the CGI with the spiders and some New York shots look dated even, by a few days ago standards. Besides that, I mostly enjoyed this one quite a bit. It's far far more tolerable than Orphan 55.

Under 4 million for next week? Come on, Jodie, I believe you can do it!

iank wrote:Under 4 million for next week? Come on, Jodie, I believe you can do it!

Perhaps it's her way of driving away the toxic white male patriarchy.

SomeCallMeEnglishGiraffe wrote:I actually thought that Nikola Tesla's Night of Terror was pretty good. Still had flaws, but overall enjoyed far more than last episode and even most of Series 11/12 stories. For one thing, no man-bashing SJW nonsense, so that boots the episode up. They also didn't make either Tesla or Edison to be over-the-top caricature versions of themselves, Tesla is written to be a completely believable character that is judged not by his white ethnicity or the fact that he's Croatian, but rather on his different methods of creating inventions. It almost feels like this episode was written by someone outside of the Chibnall crew, because the writer did some great stuff with its side characters.
The main cast though... Whittaker is still too over-the-top and annoying, but I do like the scenes where she bonds with Tesla, as the writing never makes it feel patronising. However, the three companions get fuck all to do, the whole 'three companions feel too crowded' argument now doesn't hold weight, considering that before it was only one out of the three that got shafted, but here (and by extension, Series 12 as a whole), none of the three do anything besides spout off exposition or say some one-liners (although Graham calling Tesla and Edison AC/DC was pretty funny). The pacing was pretty solid overall, although the editing felt off at the beginning. So, the Doctor and Tesla have to escape from the not-Rachnoss' minion, so they close the door on him, and then... it just cuts to a scene with them on a train. That's just bad continuity editing, and just makes the minion look like 'oh no, doors, my only weakness'. And the CGI with the spiders and some New York shots look dated even, by a few days ago standards. Besides that, I mostly enjoyed this one quite a bit. It's far far more tolerable than Orphan 55.

You're right, Orphan 55 was worse than last night's tale but I enjoyed O55 far more because it was so ridiculously bad, so unintentionally embarrassing/funny - an absurdist TV nightmare. Nicky Tesla's Scary Night (or whatever..) was perhaps the perfect example of a bland, generic NuWho episode - everything you'd expect it to be, everything the general public expects of Who and an episode so mind-numbingly predictable, it could easily have been a middling Tennant-era filler.  The Alien Scorpion Queen was a very poor copy of The Alien Spider Queen from The Runaway Bride (Both were pure pantomime performances). Why rip-off/pay homage to something so naff in the first place?  This is what modern TV writers think Doctor Who is- historical figure + campy aliens+ wacky Doctor and friends + preachy ending.  
Entirely unremarkable.

Latest from Liza...series 12 has now dropped lower than Capaldi's final series


Series 10: 6.68m (Ep1), 5.98m (Ep2), 5.61m (Ep3)
Series 12: 6.70m (Ep1), 5.91m (Ep2), 5.25m (Ep3)

https://mobile.twitter.com/lizo_mzimba/status/1219261438713307137

So I think this means Jodie is performing worse in her second series than Capaldi in his third and final.

Which doesn't sound good to me but then may be I am missing something e.g.:

Why are we focusing on viewing figures? The show is about social injustice now, teaching the audience how to think correctly and saving the planet for a brighter, more caring, more female future generation so we can be the best of humanity and not the dregs. What has viewing figures got to do with that?

Sunday nights ... Well it's Sunday innit. Apples and pears. Like with unlike. Nuff said.

No context. Its the relative position in the ratings table that counts.

The competition is too strong. The misogynist, woman hating, all white BBC don't care about the show. Up against Dancing on Ice? Ridiculous!!! All Davies had to compete against was Ant and Dec, a show with the most unpopular hosts ever who have never won any sort of TV award.

The audience can't cope with the intellectual weight of Chris ' scripts. Too high concept. Very clever chap Chris.

The audience have outdated, bourgeois, elitist - nay virtually fascist - ideas of good quality production values rangng from plot development, witty and scintillating dialogue, good acting, directing and value for money. But no one asks the fundamental, legitimate question: WHY? Flies eat shit. We are only asking that they watch it. Once a week. That's all. No ingestion required. And if the audience like it, remember that the bcc show lots more of it any other time of the week.


Alternatively can we PLEASE cancel this rubbish now.

Doctor Who’s Timeless Child mystery has become the biggest talking point of the current series, with the ongoing arc inspiring all sorts of theories and predictions from fans and critics alike.

Is the Timeless Child a Time Lord, a former version of the Doctor (Jodie Whittaker), a being responsible for the power of the Time Lords or something else entirely?

https://www.radiotimes.com/news/tv/2020-01-20/doctor-who-ian-gelder-timeless-child/

I personally think they should not count the dvr figures to add more ratings

Wouldn't it be funny if a BAME candidate - June Sarpong would be ideal, with her current role as promoting diversity in the BBC on-screen - replaced Lord Hall... then cancelled Nu Who for shit audience ratings and viewing figures.

The woke brigade would go from ecstasy to agony!

I wouldn't trust Nerdrotic or his followers to know good Who, even if mini LCDs were transplanted into their eyes and they were forced to watch Season 12 & 13 on a permanent loop.

The fact they hate the current and last era is meaningless because they also think Tencunt and and Mr. Soft were the absolute pinnacle of show.

Mott1 wrote:June Sarpong

Her voice is my Kryptonite. It's like a nasally stoner being played back on an ageing tape deck.

Boofer wrote:I wouldn't trust Nerdrotic or his followers to know good Who, even if mini LCDs were transplanted into their eyes and they were forced to watch Season 12 & 13 on a permanent loop.

The fact they hate the current and last era is meaningless because they also think Tencunt and and Mr. Soft were the absolute pinnacle of show.

That is true indeed (and the fact that Nerdrotic claimed that Who was never a particularly intelligent or demanding series is quite telling- I wouldn’t describe the likes of Warriors’ Gate as easy or dumbed down viewing- so I suppose the RTD era is what he is mainly familiar with), although this is sadly the case for most of outspoken Who fandom outside of this forum. The RTD and Tennant era is still regarded as the bloody golden age within mainstream fandom, as I said myself on another thread, and I fear that this perception will cast a dark cloud over the entire programme even if the current fucking shite gets cancelled.

Dominic Cummings has called upon the end of the BBC in it's present form and replaced by a news service that would be the British equivalent of Fox.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/boris-johnson-news-live-brexit-trade-pmqs-labour-leadership-today-latest-a9295921.html

Boofer wrote:I wouldn't trust Nerdrotic or his followers to know good Who, even if mini LCDs were transplanted into their eyes and they were forced to watch Season 12 & 13 on a permanent loop.

The fact they hate the current and last era is meaningless because they also think Tencunt and and Mr. Soft were the absolute pinnacle of show.

If he really does believe that the RTD era is the pinnacle of Doctor Who then that's disappointing, but I'm happy to unite with the more reasonable NuWho fans against our common enemy for the time being. The priority right now has to be on getting this current disgrace off the air and making pariahs of its insane fanbase. After that, we can focus on convincing people like Gary that early NuWho isn't all it's cracked up to be. I suspect that a lot of them are only clinging onto it due to nostalgia or commitment bias, and would be quite easy to win over with rational argument, especially once they're fully informed about the complicity of the writers they praise in getting the show to this point - something many don't seem to be aware of.

ClockworkOcean wrote:

Boofer wrote:I wouldn't trust Nerdrotic or his followers to know good Who, even if mini LCDs were transplanted into their eyes and they were forced to watch Season 12 & 13 on a permanent loop.

The fact they hate the current and last era is meaningless because they also think Tencunt and and Mr. Soft were the absolute pinnacle of show.

If he really does believe that the RTD era is the pinnacle of Doctor Who then that's disappointing, but I'm happy to unite with the more reasonable NuWho fans against our common enemy for the time being. The priority right now has to be on getting this current disgrace off the air and making pariahs of its insane fanbase. After that, we can focus on convincing people like Gary that early NuWho isn't all it's cracked up to be. I suspect that a lot of them are only clinging onto it due to nostalgia or commitment bias, and would be quite easy to win over with rational argument, especially once they're fully informed about the complicity of the writers they praise in getting the show to this point - something many don't seem to be aware of.

At the end of the day, fans are always going to have the soft spots they do for the stories they like. Especially the ones they first fell in love with the show through (or in the case of New Who, fell in love with the show all over again through). And they're not really going to change their mind no matter what reasons you give them to.

I've been denouncing and poking holes in the JNT stories for years, but at the end of the day, other fans who liked them are still going to do so and be resistant to being swayed. They're always going to prefer to agree with those who speak to what they like about the era than what fans like me don't. And the RTD fans are going to be pretty much the same.

Tanmann wrote:

ClockworkOcean wrote:

Boofer wrote:I wouldn't trust Nerdrotic or his followers to know good Who, even if mini LCDs were transplanted into their eyes and they were forced to watch Season 12 & 13 on a permanent loop.

The fact they hate the current and last era is meaningless because they also think Tencunt and and Mr. Soft were the absolute pinnacle of show.

If he really does believe that the RTD era is the pinnacle of Doctor Who then that's disappointing, but I'm happy to unite with the more reasonable NuWho fans against our common enemy for the time being. The priority right now has to be on getting this current disgrace off the air and making pariahs of its insane fanbase. After that, we can focus on convincing people like Gary that early NuWho isn't all it's cracked up to be. I suspect that a lot of them are only clinging onto it due to nostalgia or commitment bias, and would be quite easy to win over with rational argument, especially once they're fully informed about the complicity of the writers they praise in getting the show to this point - something many don't seem to be aware of.

At the end of the day, fans are always going to have the soft spots they do for the stories they like. Especially the ones they first fell in love with the show through (or in the case of New Who, fell in love with the show all over again through). And they're not really going to change their mind no matter what reasons you give them to.

I've been denouncing and poking holes in the JNT stories for years, but at the end of the day, other fans who liked them are still going to do so and be resistant to being swayed. They're always going to prefer to agree with those who speak to what they like about the era than what fans like me don't. And the RTD fans are going to be pretty much the same.

I don't think that's true at all. I like the JNT era overall, but I can acknowledge that Warriors of the is bollocks. Similarly I can also acknowledge flaws in the JNT era. Too many companions, companions not being as well developed (until Ace, there is a happy medium of course between Nyssa and Rose who takes over the show.) Too many pointless returns of old monsters who didn't need an encore etc.

I'm sure most people here can do the same. As for RTD era fans well who knows I've met some reasonable RTD era fans, who openly admit that it wasn't like the Classic era, but that it was good comic book fun anyway. (TBH that's my assessment of it at its best too.)

Its the Mofftwat fans that I feel are the worst. They ironically tend to treat you as an idiot for not seeing the hidden genius of his turgid scripts.

Tanmann wrote:

ClockworkOcean wrote:

Boofer wrote:I wouldn't trust Nerdrotic or his followers to know good Who, even if mini LCDs were transplanted into their eyes and they were forced to watch Season 12 & 13 on a permanent loop.

The fact they hate the current and last era is meaningless because they also think Tencunt and and Mr. Soft were the absolute pinnacle of show.

If he really does believe that the RTD era is the pinnacle of Doctor Who then that's disappointing, but I'm happy to unite with the more reasonable NuWho fans against our common enemy for the time being. The priority right now has to be on getting this current disgrace off the air and making pariahs of its insane fanbase. After that, we can focus on convincing people like Gary that early NuWho isn't all it's cracked up to be. I suspect that a lot of them are only clinging onto it due to nostalgia or commitment bias, and would be quite easy to win over with rational argument, especially once they're fully informed about the complicity of the writers they praise in getting the show to this point - something many don't seem to be aware of.

At the end of the day, fans are always going to have the soft spots they do for the stories they like. Especially the ones they first fell in love with the show through (or in the case of New Who, fell in love with the show all over again through). And they're not really going to change their mind no matter what reasons you give them to.

I've been denouncing and poking holes in the JNT stories for years, but at the end of the day, other fans who liked them are still going to do so and be resistant to being swayed. They're always going to prefer to agree with those who speak to what they like about the era than what fans like me don't. And the RTD fans are going to be pretty much the same.

I can’t say I agree entirely there. As someone who was introduced to the series via NuWho and fell in love with it via the show’s central premise, my stance has certainly changed over time due to my obtaining a more critical perspective. Hell, it did so at a much younger age than I currently am, and I was capable of recognising NuWho for what it was by 2012. As a result, even the stuff I really enjoyed at the time and got me into the series (the Smith era) has been gradually dwindling in my estimations over time, to the point where I am less an advocate for it now than I was when I first joined, and why I am starting to actively dislike large portions of it. I think it’s perfectly possible for people to change their minds upon discussing such eras objectively, regardless of whatever bias they may have- it won’t always happen, but for those open minded enough, it’s certainly a possibility. I’ve also come away disliking films I initially really liked after listening to arguments elsewhere arguing for their lack of quality (The Force Awakens being a prime example).

Besides, there’s also the case of having a soft spot for a certain era, whilst also recognising it for potentially being utter shit. I can enjoy a story rather a lot whilst still recognising it to be rubbish (The Keys of Marinus, Creature from the Pit, Silver Nemesis, etc). Concerning the JNT stories- after discussing them with you on this forum, and recognising the inherent narrative failures of particular stories (mainly Warriors and Resurrection), my opinion of them has indeed lessened, and these sort of discussions can provide clarity to one’s perspective that someone may not have considered before. Of course, this doesn’t mean that upmost flexibility is a good idea- discourse and discussion should be overt on both sides of the argument- but I think it’s possible for certain fans to be open to listening to different perspectives, regardless of their own prior stance. It’s easier to speak to those who agree, yes, but not impossible for one to be open to new perspectives.

burrunjor wrote:I don't think that's true at all. I like the JNT era overall, but I can acknowledge that Warriors of the is bollocks. Similarly I can also acknowledge flaws in the JNT era. Too many companions, companions not being as well developed (until Ace, there is a happy medium of course between Nyssa and Rose who takes over the show.) Too many pointless returns of old monsters who didn't need an encore etc.

Yes, and those are things you accept and make deals, allowances and compromises for, because when it comes to an era like that, you essentially have to take the whole package, and view it as essentially an important part of the greater package of Classic Who. Viewing it as a ruined package that spoils the apple cart as I do, doesn't appeal because, well we all like packages to be as complete as possible, especially if we're already invested in them.

I think a lot of fans of RTD's era see it the same way. They were onboard for the whole ride and really welcomed the peaks of Dalek, Empty Child, and Blink, and they become the part of the sum of the whole that tips that package in greater favor, and they just accept the sillier stuff along the way was part of it all too.

Its the Mofftwat fans that I feel are the worst. They ironically tend to treat you as an idiot for not seeing the hidden genius of his turgid scripts.

Well indeed. I think we remember a few of those from IMDB.

Moffat's era was one I certainly was on the gravy train with at first. But I do find that fans either had a wake-up moment where the illusion shatters and they realized it was a mess... or they plain never will. And they will still defer to his most arrogant notions and disdain those who don't see it. It's a very elitist era.