Dr Who was the missing member from Spinal Tap…clearly…
Okay...if you havent seen Saturdays episode of Dr Who...look away now.
Still here?
Ok, then I'll assume you want to read this.
First of all, I rather liked it. There wasn't much messing about, at its heart it was a very simple story, and one that played well with the ongoing theme of the Doctor being old, tired and generally bummed about all the things hes seen and done. There was some good dialogue between him and the appalingly named Professor Lazarus (only a sci-fi show thats trying to be referential would name him that), and for the most part the action and so on was pretty good. It had a fun Spinal Tap moment (the Doctor having to put the setting on the Organ up to eleven) and resolved the issue over whether or not Martha is actually going to stay with him. So far so good.
But..they need to sort out their CGI. The monster looked fine...except for the Scorpion King problem..and by that I mean that the face they gave it looked awfull, and so obviously bad CG that it wouldnt have been out of place on a Playstation 1. It would have looked better if they hadnt tried to give it a face that looked like the actor.
And Martha's mum....how dumb is she? Her son has been concussed by a monster created by an experiment funded by Mr Saxon...and the Doctor is trying to stop it...so when some bloke come up and says "Mr Saxon says the Doctor is dangerous"..she just goes along with it. Um...if it were me...id be saying "Mr Saxon is the frickin dangerous one...hes going around funding dodgy science projects!".
Anyway...Jacks back sometime in the next few episodes...which will be cool.
Oh...and "Mister Saxon" is an anagram, by the way...quite an interesting one. Im not the only one who's noticed it, according to the Dr Who Wiki....give it a go. You'll see what I mean.
May 7th, 2007 - 18:08
I dunno, they’ve done a fair job so far of establishing that a) Martha’s Mum is prone to over reacting, quick to judge and criticise, and more than a bit blinkered when something fails to match her own world view, and b) Mr Saxon, mysterious though he is from the perspective of the viewer is a high profile respected public figure with a lot of power in Martha’s time/universe (I can’t make my mind up wether Martha’s supposed to be from a couple of years into our future or just a parallel version of now)
May 7th, 2007 - 18:09
… you’re bang on about the CG though: far too CBBC for a high budget prime time show.
May 7th, 2007 - 19:59
Right – as far as I know Martha is from the ‘universe’ Dr Who is set in. Same time stream as the Dalek/Cybermen dealie that wiped out parts of London supposedly. And it was her cousin in Torchwood tower, which is how they’ve gotten around the whole ‘she’s supposed to be dead thing’.
Martha’s mom is a typical mother that’s brought her children up from nothing. Expects total obedience and can’t see outside the construct they’ve made, so namedropping can and does usually bring them onside. Not to mention they are playing into her fears (Matha never had THESE problems before she met the Dr (though, I have to say, she’s been gone less than 12 hours according to the Dr, so why her mother flipped her lid, I’ll never know – iron grasp perhaps?) and has always been contactabl;e, answered her phones etc. And of course, as Torchwood tower happened for them, it’ll have come out that the Dr was involved, somewhere. But that leap of assumption is a bit beyond ANY TV show character, and involves lots of messy things, which is a huge mistake of the writers, IMO. But perhaps there’s stuff in the press that we’re not getting to see in thier universe.
Anyway, I’ll rant more on my own blog – I don’t wanna hijack Keith’s one do I?
May 7th, 2007 - 20:01
They explained that on Dr Who Confidental (yes, I’m a Dr Who geek – I’ve got an excuse
) – though I thought the excuse was lame. They’re saving thier budget for other stuff was the impression I got from the conversation, and if it hadn’t had that stupid face on it, I think it might have been ok. Not brilliant, but at least passable.
May 8th, 2007 - 15:27
Mapping of faces onto digital models is not an easy task and heavy on the budget (take a look at Spidey3′ Sandman effects even that didn’t loo quite right when his face was on CG), it would have been a lot better if they dropped the human face and went for something else, that being said it was not the worst CG I have seen in a TV show.