When did you first realise New Who wasn’t what you hoped it’d be?

Generally speaking, what was the instance in New Who’s run when you guys experienced that moment of revelation that New Who wasn’t actually very good? Was it immediate, or was it a more gradual conclusion you reached over time?

I think it was World War III.

The ridiculously on the nose moment where the Slitheen Prime Minister gives his speech to the TV cameras about 'massive weapons of destruction'.

That's when I knew this show was going to be nowhere near the level of BF audios like Jubilee, and that the audience were being treated like idiots, and that this was a show that only made sense if you assumed everyone on the planet was hopelessly stupid.

Isn't there a thread for this already?

Anyway series 2 was where it started. New Earth was one of the worst things I'd ever seen.

iank wrote:Isn't there a thread for this already?

Anyway series 2 was where it started. New Earth was one of the worst things I'd ever seen.

Fuck- I just found it! There’s one which asks what the Hive initially thought of New Who at the time. I keep doing this.

I'd say it hardly matters. We've had quite a few accidental 'take two' threads that ended up surpassing the first.

Aliens of London / WWIII. Especially when they chased and caught a pig dressed in an alien spacesuit and the aliens kept flatulating everywhere. Stupid, child-ish, cheap humour at the expense of what should have been a tight, gripping, dramatic script.

But I have since kept giving show runners second chances: "Next year it will be better". The biggest let down was season 8. I am sure the season was preceeded by claims that the show would be a return to old Who or sthg like that. But i misheard or i am thick. What Moffat actually said was "The next 3 years will be the biggest shit-fest ever and you can't stop me cos i'm in charge. Fuck you all!!!"

For me was not immediate, but gradual.
I genuinely feel that I gave it the best possible chance.
Aliens of London was the first really obvious sign, but I chose to ignore it and press on under the delusion that the show was trying to find its feet.
I actually liked quite a few episodes from that first year, Unquiet Dead, Dalek, Empty Child, even Parting of the Ways. But I was ignoring all the crap bits and burying my head in the sand as to general tone and direction in which things were going.
When Tennant came along it all started to get much more difficult to only focus on the positives. But I hung in there because there was still something in me that wanted to like it.
During series 2 and 3 I was gradually sliding towards indifference, and after the body blow that was Last of the Time Lords I really don't know how I kept going through series 4.
It had become something that I watched out of habit and what I now see as misguided loyalty. The 'specials' were such a low point that I can barely remember anything about them. I was watching, but I wasn't interested anymore, it had become just a background noise.
I think it was only the fact that Tennant was going and Moffat was taking over that kept me hanging on, in the hope that it would improve.
And it did improve, but ultimately not enough. And the  'improvement' was limited to certain aspects,  and soon enough Moffat's own shortcomings and personal vision and direction for the show would soon engulf those improvements with so many other aspects that made the show almost inconceivably worse than ever before.
I remember when early Matt Smith was thought to be 'channelling' Troughton, and I was excited about the potential of the show for the first time since 2005. But soon enough, Smith gradually seemed to slip into channelling Tennant rather than Troughton, and Moffat's increasingly smoke and mirrors scripts and aforementioned overall vision of the show, eventually took so much of a toll that he succeeded where RTD had almost, but not quite succeeded. I stopped watching.
To this day I've never seen any Matt Smith episodes after Asylum of the Daleks, and I feel not unlike someone who has freed himself of herion addiction. I know that Dr Who will never be any good again. My only lapses have been when Capaldi took over I watched his first 2 or 3 episodes. Surely, an older doctor and actor of reasonably good calibre could bring something good to the show? Well no.... The penny finally dropped that it's really nothing to do with with the actor. If anything, early Matt Smith showed what an actor could do if he was given the right direction.
My curiosity caused a final lapse with Magician's Apprentice two parter,  and there was nothing there. Absolutely nothing. I've not been tempted back. I've been clean ever since. Lol

Probably after early series six it was going quite downhill and it got worse and worse

Death in Heaven was it for me.

I hated New Who when it first started. I couldn't understand why people who claimed to be life long fans were praising Anne Robinson robots, farting aliens, weepy Daleks and the Doctor getting off with someone three years older than Susan!

As time went on I did warm to Tennant however as an actor and a person, and Matt Smith won me over. Even then there were still things I was unhappy about like River Song, but by the 50th I had revised my opinions on New Who.

I felt that even if it got off to a ropey start it had more or less gone back the way, with Matt being a proper Doctor and Capaldi on the way who was sure to avoid Davies era trappings like lusting after his companion, or being a big pussy around his enemies, or starring in tedious soap opera dirge.

Then of course it all came crashing down with the moon being an egg, trees saving the world, and the ultimate abomination herself, Pissy Missy.

After that I still tried to be positive with series 9 and find good things even in shit like The Magicians Apprentice and The Witch's Familiar, really more because I liked Ingrid Oliver and I wanted to see her get more roles LOL. After a while though I realised I was kidding myself and that my initial opinion back in 2005 was correct.

New Who was always, barring a few bright spots like Matt Smith's first series, a shallow, poorly written soap opera with a sci fi setting. It was NEVER an attempt to bring back the original, or even reboot the brand. It was a cynical way for those behind it to boost their career and launch their own projects, like Torchwood.

By this stage I couldn't consider ti canon even if I wanted too.

If I'd had any sense at all, I would have realized from the very moment Eccelston uttered the line: "Nice to meet you, Rose - run for your life!", but no, I stuck with it hoping it'd get better but it actually got worse. It was a gradual realization but I'd say roughly around the time of 'Voyage of the Damned' - Davies' brave new series was proving to be the very opposite of what I believed Doctor Who should be.  

On a less serious note, I thought Eccers would/should be dressed something more like this:

Kaijuko wrote:

On a less serious note, I thought Eccers would/should be dressed something more like this:

Actually, lose the hat and tie and it's not that bad. I've seen worse anyway.

Ronnie wrote:

Kaijuko wrote:

On a less serious note, I thought Eccers would/should be dressed something more like this:

Actually, lose the hat and tie and it's not that bad. I've seen worse anyway.

Like the actual costume they gave him.

burrunjor wrote:

Ronnie wrote:

Kaijuko wrote:

On a less serious note, I thought Eccers would/should be dressed something more like this:

Actually, lose the hat and tie and it's not that bad. I've seen worse anyway.

Like the actual costume they gave him.

I think the leather jacket could've worked temporarily if they'd written the character as someone trying to not to stand out, but yeah it didn't really reflect the character of the Doctor per se.

Ronnie wrote:

burrunjor wrote:

Ronnie wrote:

Kaijuko wrote:

On a less serious note, I thought Eccers would/should be dressed something more like this:

Actually, lose the hat and tie and it's not that bad. I've seen worse anyway.

Like the actual costume they gave him.

I think the leather jacket could've worked temporarily if they'd written the character as someone trying to not to stand out, but yeah it didn't really reflect the character of the Doctor per se.

Indeed. I heard a rumour that Davies, being keen on the Pertwee era, wanted to dress Eccleston in velvet jackets, frilly shirts and such, but old Chris wouldn't have any of it.  CE neither looked nor acted the part and I really can't decide who's the least Doctor-like; Eccers or Saint Jodie.

Kaijuko wrote:I really can't decide who's the least Doctor-like; Eccers or Saint Jodie.

I haven't had the 'pleasure' of Jodie. So to speak.
It's not about Jodie, because I stopped watching the show a few years ago. They could cast the greatest actor ever and it would still be shit.

Ronnie wrote:

Kaijuko wrote:I really can't decide who's the least Doctor-like; Eccers or Saint Jodie.

I haven't had the 'pleasure' of Jodie. So to speak.
It's not about Jodie, because I stopped watching the show a few years ago. They could cast the greatest actor ever and it would still be shit.

Neither are Doctorish at all, though I find Eccleston considerably more tolerable than Jodie, who gives the worst Doctor performance of all time as far as I’m concerned.

But yes- every actor in New Who is prescribed to follow a rather egregious template for their performance, although Smith deviated from this template in his first season, and I’d also argue that Capaldi tried to deviate in his first year though very quickly had his character changed to suit the Tennant template (except that Capaldi’s first season was basically pure shite the whole way through anyway, with possibly the worst finale of all time tied with Hell Bent, which, after the likes of Doomsday, Last Of The Time Lords, Journey’s End and The Wedding Of River Song, is really saying something).

Bernard Marx wrote:

Ronnie wrote:

Kaijuko wrote:I really can't decide who's the least Doctor-like; Eccers or Saint Jodie.

I haven't had the 'pleasure' of Jodie. So to speak.
It's not about Jodie, because I stopped watching the show a few years ago. They could cast the greatest actor ever and it would still be shit.

Neither are Doctorish at all, though I find Eccleston considerably more tolerable than Jodie, who gives the worst Doctor performance of all time as far as I’m concerned.

But yes- every actor in New Who is prescribed to follow a rather egregious template for their performance, although Smith deviated from this template in his first season, and I’d also argue that Capaldi tried to deviate in his first year though very quickly had his character changed to suit the Tennant template (except that Capaldi’s first season was basically pure shite the whole way through anyway, with possibly the worst finale of all time tied with Hell Bent, which, after the likes of Doomsday, Last Of The Time Lords, Journey’s End and The Wedding Of River Song, is really saying something).

It was the kind of morbid curiosity that makes someone look at a car accident that made me watch The Magician's Familiar.
The car accident analogy works because you wish you'd never looked....

And to continue to analogy, you're now painting a picture of a motorway pile up and making me want to look.

Ronnie wrote:

Bernard Marx wrote:

Ronnie wrote:

Kaijuko wrote:I really can't decide who's the least Doctor-like; Eccers or Saint Jodie.

I haven't had the 'pleasure' of Jodie. So to speak.
It's not about Jodie, because I stopped watching the show a few years ago. They could cast the greatest actor ever and it would still be shit.

Neither are Doctorish at all, though I find Eccleston considerably more tolerable than Jodie, who gives the worst Doctor performance of all time as far as I’m concerned.

But yes- every actor in New Who is prescribed to follow a rather egregious template for their performance, although Smith deviated from this template in his first season, and I’d also argue that Capaldi tried to deviate in his first year though very quickly had his character changed to suit the Tennant template (except that Capaldi’s first season was basically pure shite the whole way through anyway, with possibly the worst finale of all time tied with Hell Bent, which, after the likes of Doomsday, Last Of The Time Lords, Journey’s End and The Wedding Of River Song, is really saying something).

It was the kind of morbid curiosity that makes someone look at a car accident that made me watch The Magician's Familiar.
The car accident analogy works because you wish you'd never looked....

And to continue to analogy, you're now painting a picture of a motorway pile up and making me want to look.

If you want to understand how crap Death In Heaven is, either check out any of burrunjor’s posts on it (they’re brilliant), or check out the review I recently wrote on the ‘Which Who stories have you watched lately’ thread.

Ronnie wrote:

Kaijuko wrote:I really can't decide who's the least Doctor-like; Eccers or Saint Jodie.

I haven't had the 'pleasure' of Jodie. So to speak.
It's not about Jodie, because I stopped watching the show a few years ago. They could cast the greatest actor ever and it would still be shit.

Lucky you .  

Anyway, back on topic - I couldn't stand CE by the end of the second episode ('The End of The World') - I thought he was miscast and the whole episode diabolically bad (though I did kind of fancy the tree lady..). Also, to complicate matters, we'd just found out that Eccers had already relinquished the role, so I hoped for a more suitable replacement and soldiered on with the rest of Series 1.  Series 2 was generally awful and by the time of Tennant's overdue exit, I'd all but given up.   However, thinking perhaps that Moffat's era would produce stuff that more resembled the classic series (or at least provided intelligent, engaging science fiction stories), I found myself dreadfully mistaken and after enduring the truly execrable 'Victory of The Daleks', it finally sunk in that this reboot was definitely not or me. The fact that it took me so long to realize this is not something I'm particularly proud of.

Bernard Marx wrote:

Ronnie wrote:

Bernard Marx wrote:

Ronnie wrote:

Kaijuko wrote:I really can't decide who's the least Doctor-like; Eccers or Saint Jodie.

I haven't had the 'pleasure' of Jodie. So to speak.
It's not about Jodie, because I stopped watching the show a few years ago. They could cast the greatest actor ever and it would still be shit.

Neither are Doctorish at all, though I find Eccleston considerably more tolerable than Jodie, who gives the worst Doctor performance of all time as far as I’m concerned.

But yes- every actor in New Who is prescribed to follow a rather egregious template for their performance, although Smith deviated from this template in his first season, and I’d also argue that Capaldi tried to deviate in his first year though very quickly had his character changed to suit the Tennant template (except that Capaldi’s first season was basically pure shite the whole way through anyway, with possibly the worst finale of all time tied with Hell Bent, which, after the likes of Doomsday, Last Of The Time Lords, Journey’s End and The Wedding Of River Song, is really saying something).

It was the kind of morbid curiosity that makes someone look at a car accident that made me watch The Magician's Familiar.
The car accident analogy works because you wish you'd never looked....

And to continue to analogy, you're now painting a picture of a motorway pile up and making me want to look.

If you want to understand how crap Death In Heaven is, either check out any of burrunjor’s posts on it (they’re brilliant), or check out the review I recently wrote on the ‘Which Who stories have you watched lately’ thread.

No disrespect. I have skim-read some of the stuff here, but my indifference is now pretty strong.
If anything would tempt me to watch an episode, it would be my fascination with Dalek episodes that still lies dormant in me.

Ronnie wrote:

Bernard Marx wrote:

Ronnie wrote:

Bernard Marx wrote:

Ronnie wrote:

Kaijuko wrote:I really can't decide who's the least Doctor-like; Eccers or Saint Jodie.

I haven't had the 'pleasure' of Jodie. So to speak.
It's not about Jodie, because I stopped watching the show a few years ago. They could cast the greatest actor ever and it would still be shit.

Neither are Doctorish at all, though I find Eccleston considerably more tolerable than Jodie, who gives the worst Doctor performance of all time as far as I’m concerned.

But yes- every actor in New Who is prescribed to follow a rather egregious template for their performance, although Smith deviated from this template in his first season, and I’d also argue that Capaldi tried to deviate in his first year though very quickly had his character changed to suit the Tennant template (except that Capaldi’s first season was basically pure shite the whole way through anyway, with possibly the worst finale of all time tied with Hell Bent, which, after the likes of Doomsday, Last Of The Time Lords, Journey’s End and The Wedding Of River Song, is really saying something).

It was the kind of morbid curiosity that makes someone look at a car accident that made me watch The Magician's Familiar.
The car accident analogy works because you wish you'd never looked....

And to continue to analogy, you're now painting a picture of a motorway pile up and making me want to look.

If you want to understand how crap Death In Heaven is, either check out any of burrunjor’s posts on it (they’re brilliant), or check out the review I recently wrote on the ‘Which Who stories have you watched lately’ thread.

No disrespect. I have skim-read some of the stuff here, but my indifference is now pretty strong.
If anything would tempt me to watch an episode, it would be my fascination with Dalek episodes that still lies dormant in me.

Yeah- I wouldn’t blame you for said indifference. I just find the whole car crash affair so fascinating in how so much can go wrong.

Bernard Marx wrote:I just find the whole car crash affair so fascinating in how so much can go wrong.

I do get that as well. But then I get: 'Why am I doing this?'

Ronnie wrote:

Bernard Marx wrote:I just find the whole car crash affair so fascinating in how so much can go wrong.

I do get that as well. But then I get: 'Why am I doing this?'

I’ll probably feel the same way soon.
I’m finding it cathartic at the moment, given I’ve only recently joined the forum, though I’ll probably get sick of it eventually. Although I only properly re-evaluated New Who over a year ago after my passion for the classic series was re-invigorated after the New Who brand left me feeling indifferent (I realised how monumentally crap most of it really was only then), so I’m slowly realising just how much of a car crash it really is.

On the note of quitting the addiction, I did briefly stop watching a few times during Series 3 (mainly because Series 2 had been so toxic).

Meaning I missed the first half of Shakespeare Code, all of Gridlock, Human Nature, Blink, Utopia, often because I decided I had better things to do with the day than piss myself off. Though I ended up watching the Dalek story for the sake of the Daleks, and was drawn back into the habit for two more weeks after, and I think it was morbid curiosity in the end that drew me into watching the Sound of Drums/Last of the Time Lords finale.

Then I think I decided to watch Voyage of the Damned, with it in mind that I would part with the show there on a hopefully less bitter note.

But by the time I got to Series 4 I was part of a local fan group, and it soon became difficult for me feeling left out of conversations about the latest episodes, so after about two or three weeks I ended up catching up on past episodes and was back to viewing regularly. And for the most part the show didn't feel as obnoxious that year.

But I carried on being a regular viewer then. 2009 was a bit of a rocky year for me so I craved the escapism of the show more. Then I saw hope with Moffat taking over, and even when things went pear shaped with Series 6, I held out hope that Moffat could still return to form and be great again. So I stuck with it until the end of Series 8 just killed my last hope.

For some reason force of habit made me watch Last Christmas on the day even though I thought I was done. Then I caught a bit of The Magician's Apprentice on a pub TV on mute, and became sadly intrigued enough to want to know what was going on. So I caught up with that, and then watched the following week's. Then I heard other fans tell me Under the Lake was quite good so I tuned into that, but was left disappointed by the followup.

After that I did give up. I tuned into Face the Raven just to see Clara's departure, perhaps because I didn't want how she left to be spoiled for me before I got to see it for myself. I missed the finale on broadcast, but again morbid curiosity made me check it out anyway.

Husbands of River Song I watched, perhaps because a strange part of me missed some of the more fun River episodes of Series 5 and 6. But it was a bloody headache largely.

Series 10 I missed in its entirety and still haven't watched. But I did watch Twice Upon a Time. Quite a few clips had been floating around youtube and I kind of wanted to see what the story was all about.

A part of me felt it was only right to give Jodie a chance before writing her off,   so I did watch a few of her early episodes. Few of them really held up, but I think it was Arachnids where I just decided to chuck in the towel again, realizing the makers didn't have a clue what they're doing. I checked in a few more times out of curiosity, on the India partition episode (as I was interested in the subject), It Takes You Away (to see what had pissed off bowlestrek so much about it) and Resolution (because the trailers got me suckered). The latter was probably the only remotely 'fun' of the three, but it was dwarfed by more of the glaring writing holes.

Aside from maybe the French-set world war II episode they've announced, I don't think I'm at all interested in Series 12.

Well Bernard. if you've read my post above you can see how long it took me to get to this stage, so no worries, I quite understand.