Brig Fun

I've kind of forgotten about this secondary blog, to the point of never even having got round to writing about last Christmas' Doctor Who special, which climaxed in Peter Capaldi's regeneration into Jodie Whittaker. But it's nearly time for Whittaker's first series proper, so I watched "Twice Upon a Time" again to see if I was more inspired to write about it.

"Twice Upon a Time" by Steven Moffat, directed by Rachel Talalay. Spoilers after the cut.

Raven? See, moan.

So after Doctor Who Series 9's only single-part story we go into a concluding three-parter, but a stealth one, a bit like "Utopia" was a stealth way to reintroduce the Master. In this case it's the Time Lords who are reintroduced, and they're grumpy about... something, because the Time Lords are always grumpy about something.

"Face the Raven" / "Heaven Sent" / "Hell Bent" by Sarah Dollard and Steven Moffat, directed by Justin Molotnikov and Rachel Talalay. Spoilers after the cut.

Your face looks Familiar

Everyone got - rightly - excited about Michelle Gomez returning so quickly to Doctor Who, Missy's "death" hand-waved away as promised, but there was another returning name I was excited about: Beautiful Thing director Hettie Macdonald also came back for the opening two-parter. Given her only previous episode was "Blink," you'd think it would have been commented on more.

"The Magician's Apprentice"/" The Witch's Familiar" by Steven Moffat, directed by Hettie Macdonald. Spoilers after the cut.

Santa Clawed

I know I've grumbled a lot about the last few series of Doctor Who, but even I think some people must be automatically programmed to complain about it, given the stream of insults I saw hurled at "Last Christmas" on Twitter the minute it ended - I actually thought it was one of the best Christmas specials in ages. Of course, one of my friends turns out to have some kind of notoriety among Whovians, as the person who more or less invented complaining about Doctor Who in the 1970s, so perhaps it was inevitable I'd hear grumbling.

"Last Christmas" by Steven Moffat, directed by Paul Wilmshurst. Spoilers after the cut.

I don't think that was even a real nursery rhyme

A bit late with my Doctor Who post this week - that's what happens when you have ALL THE THEATRE to see. Still, here we are with an episode that gets another of the regular BBC One idents given a Doctor Who twist - I liked the Dalek on the roundabout but the TARDIS going underwater with the hippos is a good addition, hopefully over the weeks they'll all get the same treatment. And I guess kudos for not starting with the obvious choice of the Moon rover one.

"Listen" by Steven Moffat, directed by Douglas Mackinnon. Spoilers after the cut.

The Good Dalek Guide

Second week into a new series of Doctor Who and I'm not massively annoyed by anything yet, so that's pretty good going all things told.

"Into The Dalek" by Phil Ford and Steven Moffat, directed by Ben Wheatley. Spoilers after the cut.

The marital McMarrieds of Marriagetown

It's been creeping around the schedules every year but, to coincide with the arrival of Peter Capaldi, Doctor Who is back to the traditional autumn run it's obviously been being nudged towards for the last few years. Hopefully this means no more of the on-and-off scheduling that made it feels simultaneously as if Matt Smith had been the Doctor forever, and like he'd barely got there before he was gone.

"Deep Breath" by Steven Moffat, directed by Ben Wheatley. Spoilers after the cut.

Let Zygons be bygones

Yes, this post did take a little while for me to get round to. Still, I got there before the next episode aired (just.)

It's not often people on the internet agree about anything, let alone Doctor Who, but it seems to have worked in the case of "The Day of the Doctor," the 50th anniversary special - and indeed all the surrounding programming spread around the BBC.

"The Day of the Doctor" by Steven Moffat, directed by Nick Hurran. Spoilers after the cut.

On a Clara day you can see forever

I can pretty much guarantee nowadays that if I don't watch a new Doctor Who episode "live" as it goes out, by the time I catch up Twitter will have informed me that it was both the best episode EVAR and the worst. Maybe we should just accept that the old "you can't please all the people all the time" adage applies with a vengeance, even to national treasures like Doctor Who. Right then, we're back with the second half of the 50th anniversary series, except the actual anniversary episode won't air until November, and I'm not entirely sure splitting it up into a fractured mess has really worked and etc. This year is basically going to be remembered like the year of "specials" that ended David Tennant's run, but with the specials all clumped together weirdly, isn't it? Anyway the "mini-movie" idea for the series is still going, complete with movie posters, and the idea behind "The Bells of Saint John" was apparently that this would be the Bond movie of the series.

"The Bells of Saint John" by Steven Moffat, directed by Colm McCarthy. Spoilers under the cut.

Cold front

A week late with my Doctor Who Christmas Special review, but then it took me that long to get round to watching "The Snowmen" for a second time, and you know I like to  give Doctor Who a second look. Obviously, despite that second look I continue to be distracted from the actual programme by the credits and TARDIS redesign. Both of which I like, and with the anniversary looming it's nice that the opening credits have acknowledged that the iconic 1970s titles weren't the only titles the original series ever had - although I preferred the slightly sinister, previous Moffat/Smith era titles to the Davies/Eccleston/Tennant ones that came before it, they were both basically exactly the same idea. Whereas while these new ones do reference the 1970s Time Vortex titles at the end, they're mainly a modern version of the 1980s flying through space titles, and there's even the odd moment reminiscent of the original 1960s/early 70s expressionistic shapes. And, of course, there's Matt Smith's face in the credits, harking back to all of those eras and something we've been waiting to see revived for a long time - I thought the way it worked out in the end, with his face just briefly visible, avoided the trap of looking cheesy. And a modern-looking sequence that calls back to all those that came before it is exactly what you'd want in an anniversary season that looks set to do just that.