Hello, dear listeners, and welcome back to Flight Through
Entirety.
The only Doctor Who podcast who may not be with you corporeally
but we are enjoying ourselves immensely.
I'm Brendan.
I'm Nathan I'm Todd, and it's time to wrap up this trial with the
final segment known as the Ultimate Foe.
It's been a long, long 14 weeks to get to this point, or 572 weeks
depending on how you look at it.
Yeah, so we have this two-parter, which was shot third.
It was shot before Terror of the Belvoids.
These 6 episodes were shot as a 6 parter, which is why we get all
this lovely location work in the industrial museum with all those
lovely buildings and pride in every cog and piston.
So this is Bonnie Langford's 1st work on the show chronologically
and also, as we know, Robert Holmes' last work on the show, as he
passed away while writing the final episode.
Yeah, so that's that's pretty much the background of this one.
I think it is a giant mess.
And I think it exhibits all of the problems that we've talked
about with the trial before, that they didn't go into it with any
coherent plan about what was going on or how the bits of evidence
fitted together.
And so, at the end, it just becomes kind of clear that no one is
on the same page.
And the whole thing is just massively exacerbated by Holmes's
death.
He doesn't finish episode 14.
He writes episode 13, which I think is probably the best single
episode of the trial.
He doesn't get to write episode 14.
Say would write a script for episode 14, but then has a giant
dummy spit and walks taking it with him.
And who else do we get in to do a sort of a sudden patch up job at
very short notice with very short turnaround time than Pip and
Jane Baker?
Question about episode 13.
I thought Bob did a pass of it, and he was ill, and I thought
Popplewick was actually Eric Saywood's creation.
That's quite possible because Eric Saywood does massively rewrite
the script from the moment the doctor enters the Matrix.
So the plot, if you like, is Robert Holmes and some of the
dialogue might be, but from various reports, it looks like from
halfway through the episode, it's 90% Eric Saywood.
And Robert Holmes' name ends up on it for 2 reasons.
One, it was still frowned upon at the BBC for script editors, too
commission themselves.
And also Eric had such deep respect for Robert Holmes and took the
attitude that if he could have finished writing it, he would have
done.
The reason that Eric's part 14 doesn't end up going on screen is
the reason that Eric left the show and gave that explosive
interview in Starburst where he called everyone horrible.
And that is in the initial conception of the season.
Spoiler alert, the Valiard is a future incarnation of the doctor
or as he ends up being a distillation of the doctor's evil impulse
somewhere between his 12th and final incarnation.
But in the initial thought, which was agreed to by Eric, by John
and by Robert Holmes, the doctor in the Valiard, we're going to
end up in a sort of Reichenbach fall situation where they fall
into something and there's a season cliffhanger as to whether the
doctor gets out or not.
Now, it's never been confirmed, but it's been suggested that part
of the reason for that is JNT knew that this was meant to be his
final year again.
And he also knew that once he left, people could make whatever
changes to the show they wanted.
So in JNT's mind at that stage when they were 1st scripting
everything.
If they decided they wanted to get rid of everyone, including
Colin, you can have a regeneration offscreen and do that.
During the development of the season.
JNT realised that you were going to have 13 weeks of cliffhangers
followed by another cliffhanger.
And thought, well that's not very fair to the audience.
You know, originally when I'd heard rumours of what, say, what's
initial script for episode 14 was like, I thought that, you know, a
giant cliffhanger liked that at the end would have been terribly
exciting, but now I think it would have been a terrible mistake.
I think you've put us through all this nonsense for 14 weeks and
you're going to leave us there like that.
It's just not really good enough.
And it's sort of say word drama.
Do you know what I mean?
Oh, we'll kill the companion.
Oh, you know, we're going to be very gritty.
The doctor's going to be off his face on Vox, Nick.
You know, we're real grown ups here.
But in fact, it is a sort of cheap and sort of rather dismal end
to something that's been going on for a long time, and I think the
audience probably deserves something better than that.
Agreed.
The audience deserves answers, you know, and it deserves a proper
conclusion.
But the problem is, as we've discussed, the trial was never really
set up properly anyway, to resemble a real trial.
And I think another problem is the fact that they give themselves
just 2 episodes to do it in.
And when you watch that big expose on the DVD for the last
episodes of trial about the whole making of it, He goes into the
fact like the 1st story is not actually supposed to be a trial. an
inquiry.
You know, I really think that should have been 3 episodes, and
then 4 episodes with Perry's death in the middle, 4 episodes, and
then give us 3 episodes at the end of actual, you know, time to
actually process everything and give us answers and actual
danger.
Like, you know, we haven't had real danger.
And this is why I think I like this episode the best out of all
the season.
Like the fact that suddenly the doctor is put into danger and is
not in a box in a room commenting on the TV.
You know, I look back and I can't give it to a single Pip and Jane
Baker episode.
I have problems with the 1st story, you know, with all the
terrible puns on Neckajard and all that sort of stuff and I think
episode 4 and episode 5 have the worst bits of that in it.
Then you've got the two episodes in middle of mine, where the
doctor, Izzy, or isn't he, and I think that's a problem.
And then you've got all the, the last episode of mine will wear
all the dialogue for the inquisitor should really be the valley
yards.
So I think by default, this episode, because it gives us some
answers, right, to a degree.
And there's and there's real danger happening, ends up, I think
probably been the best written.
And then this whole concept about the value I'd been, this
distillation between the 12th and final incarnation, the doctor
like came in.
Well, how did that come about?
Did the timelords create him?
Because he found out about Ravelocks or was it some sort of future
experiment that's gone wrong with the master?
You know?
There's no answer.
I actually don't mind that so much.
I think, you know, we've kind of seen things like Choji and the
Watcher and stuff who are kind of adjuncts to a time lord around
about the time of their regeneration and we can kind of sort of
squint and see that maybe the valleyard's the same thing.
And I think any kind of real explanation would be a little bit
leaden.
I don't think it's any coincidence that the Valiard hasn't found
his way into Doctor Who mythology, really.
He does get a throwaway reference in a Matt Smith episode, I
think.
Yes, in the name of the doctor.
Yeah.
So he does get reference there.
But, you know, the new adventures deliberately went out of their
way to avoid him as a kind of, it's a bit of a mess.
He doesn't really make his way into our mythology.
And I think because he is sort of slightly half baked.
I think the thing that makes the Valiard good is Michael Jason's
performance, but he's not, he's either master.
I think the masters are kind of terrible character that's only
saved by some of the actor's performances.
But essentially he's just, or she is just someone who's evil for
no particular reason.
And the same with the valiard.
I think, in fact, it's not where the valiard comes from sort of
metaphysically, but why the doctor's evil impulses are kind of
lawful evil, as it were.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
He's not a maniac and he's been sitting around for the last 12
weeks going, I'm going to go through this charade of a trial.
You know, he's not insane.
No.
And the doctor is someone who rebels against bureaucracy and laws
and strictures, and that's a particularly homes-in conception of
what the doctor's about.
Whereas the valiard's quite the opposite of that.
It's not just that the valiard's evil, but the valiard is
interested in procedure and rules and laws and all of those kinds
of things.
So he's the doctor's opposite.
But, you know, like the doctor secretly fantasises about filling
in lots of forms and stuff. you know, is that is that what we're
to understand?
It doesn't really make any sense.
And it's not helped by the fact that we have a change of writers.
And Pipp and Jane Baker have to write that script in 3 or 4 days.
And so they put their own take on it.
So he goes from wanting the future incarnations to suddenly, you
know, wanting to destroy all the time lords in the trial room
which is going to cause the downfall of the high council.
Like it makes no real sense.
Like, has have Gallifrey all been watching this trial from the
beginning?
It seems to indicate that when insurrectionists are running a Mark
on Gallifre, Well, they could only have been watching this trial
because, you know, the high counsellor corrupt and the doctor is a
champion of the people.
Do you know what I'm saying?
Yeah, and it's terrible word peril as well.
I mean, nothing could be less interesting than insurrectionists
running a mark on Gallifrey, I think.
But we don't even see that.
You know, it is just something that's said by someone to up the
stakes and it really muddies the water of what the trial's about.
In fact, I think it's a perfect metaphor for the trial.
No one making the show had any idea what the trial was about.
And so bringing Pip and Jane in at the last minute to kind of
wreck it kind of works on some level.
Yeah, there's even a line early on from the Inquisitor in one of
the earlier stories where she says that this is a secret tribunal
and yet everyone on Gallifrey seems to have been watching it
sitting in Zorak's box on their laptops, you know what I mean?
Something I do love about this particular episode.
So we've had...
We've had Doctor Who basically adopt this new structure and it's
not even terribly good.
It's 3 people sitting in a room commentating on the action.
So what they do in episode 13 is the master turns up and breaks
the show, which is what the master is meant to do.
That light, you know, where the inquisitor says you have no part
in these proceedings and he says, no, but I'm enjoying myself
immensely.
He just turns up and wrecks everything because when he comes in, he
sends glitz there to give us the exposition of what was happening
in the 1st story and why the doctor is on trial.
And even though it's an info dump, because it's glitz, kind of
just giving the information off hand, because he doesn't think
it's important, that makes it interesting.
And then when the master makes the big reveal that the valleyard
is actually the doctor or a distillation of the doctor or whatever
again, it's just conversational because I don't care, you know, but
we don't care because we don't care about this program.
So are you saying like it's like they don't really care?
No, no, I'm saying it's really good because it kind of
reestablishes the master because a big complaint we've had about
the Ainley master is at his worst, he just turns up to kill the
doctor and that's his raise of d'etre, whereas here he's seen the
doctor is in trouble and he's just like, oh, while he's in trouble
and everyone's looking that way, I can go in and plunder the
matrix.
Oh, and by the way, he's your evil twin, didn't you know?
Anyway, I'm off.
Yeah, it is a throwaway line, is it?
It's a throwaway line and it helps to establish that he's got his
own stuff going on.
It's not just about you, Colin.
I think that's a good take.
Like, I mean, when I watched it as a kid.
Like, it's just his throwaway line. going, what?
What?
That's how you're going to reveal this, you know?
Now I think it does work in that way.
Yeah, well, I think how it kind of works is that the masters
turned up and he takes control of the show for a bit.
And then after that reveal, Colin stands up and he's just
incredibly still and he repeats the information and we're back on
him now.
So that episode, there's kind of a bit of a tussle for control of
the show, but it works.
I think Colin's really good when he learns that the Valliards him
that Revelation should halt this trial immediately.
I really like that line and I think that's quite tense.
For an episode, that has mostly been people standing around and
talking.
And of course, the Italian gets away because the guards are just
standing there doing nothing.
I think that's one of the things I kind of think, you know, I've
commented about the black studio floor before.
And I used to think it was like supposed to be like a big abyss or
something like that, but instead it's like, oh, no, we're just
going to have you run across the front of the camera and then
around the back, you know, the limitations of this trial room.
But of course, you know, Anthony's also under contract to do his
appearance for the seasons and they have to work him in
somewhere.
Well, they could just pay him and not have him appear.
They do that sometimes.
Well, they did that for Colin and Nicola last year.
Well that's it.
Colin got paid for a whole extra season.
So we do get 2 witnesses, right?
We get Sabalong glitz.
And I do love it when they're in the Matrix and that spear comes
out of nowhere and just goes straight into his stomach.
I always laugh my head off.
But it is again a rewriting of the whole Matrix concept that you
can physically go into the Matrix.
But in a sense, I don't care very much about that.
I actually think it's better to have them go through a door than
it is to have them lie down on a bench and strap a big thing to
their head.
You know what I mean?
That's boring.
So that never really worried me.
I think that this version of the Matrix is obviously vastly less
interesting than the one we got in episode 3 of The Deadly
Assassin, which was really tense and sort of terribly
interesting.
This is a lot of running around and a lot of sort of fake out
peril and things that make no sense, but not in a sort of weird
kind of fabulously surreal kind of way.
It's kind of like poison gas and quicksand and, you know, the
whole thing kind of just falls to pieces.
And that's why I'm not sorry that we only have 2 episodes of it
because once we leave the trial and everyone's just sitting around
the trial room kind of watching everything else on telly.
What actually happens in the Matrix isn't all that good, really.
Well, I just love the fact that the doctor's out there and in
peril and at least something's happening, at least when not just
you know?
But I think Melanie comes off worse for wear in this one.
I mean, it's her 1st story, but things like Melanie known as Mel
and she goes, that's it, doc.
Now we're getting at the dirt, like just lines of dialogue that
just don't really add to her character.
Well, they don't work because they're written by Pip and Jane
Baker, you know, a lot of the time.
Or Eric Saywood. or Eric Saywood.
We're never sure.
And the other thing is, of course, that we said last week, the way
that Mel performs it, the way that Bonnie Langford chooses to
perform it at this stage is very theatrical and very big.
And so she's unable to rescue those lines, just by acting.
And we know that she is a good actor.
And we've seen her have moments of it, but her standard way of
presenting herself at this stage really does the dialogue kind of
no favours at all.
She does get very good moments, though.
I actually, it's a bit too large, but I love the moment with the
fake trial and her objection to that.
And she sums it up really well with, The doctors convinced he must
sacrifice to himself and you're prepared to let him do that.
I think she plays the disgust of that very well.
Again, it's a bit too loud.
Getting back to something you said earlier about this interior of
the Matrix, I actually like it more than the Deadly Assassin
because, you know, we're told that this is the Valeyards domain
and he's creating it.
So it is more disciplined and more structured.
And I think all the stuff in the sort of Victorian steamworks is
in a way critiquing the show because the doctor has always had
this Victorian or Edwardian sensibility.
And the Valiards using that against him.
He's using all this grand grinol, as the 6 doctor says, which the
doctor loves so much. and turning it in on itself and he's using
bureaucracy as well, which he knows the doctor hates.
I think it's actually not quite taken far enough.
Yeah, especially the bit on the beach then has no connection.
No.
It's striking visually.
It just has no connection.
Well, it's not that striking.
It's like the world's most miserable day at the beach.
But the wind and the sort of desolation with the valley are then
popping in and out of reality, and his lines start before he pops
into reality, and it kind of breaks what you would expect to
happen, which is he would appear, deliver a line of dialogue, and
then have to stand very still while they line up the film and
disappear.
And this time because they're working on video and they have that
stability, instead of working on film, they're just like, no, we're
just going to do it this way.
And there's some really good shot composition there as well.
Like when Glitz is suggesting insults for the doctor at the
valleyard creeps up behind him over his shoulder.
Oh, microbe.
I do love that sequence.
And obviously that's Spip and Jane Baker at the beginning of
episode 14, but I also love it when they go through the waiting
room and the doctor says, this is a very odd waiting room.
I just love that particular one.
I like the 2nd waiting room where I think Mel opens the door and
there's a dragon.
It is fabulously silly and random, isn't it?
Yeah, yeah.
And, you know, Colin and Bonnie are great together.
And to Colin's great credit.
When Bonnie comes into the trial room, he plays it differently
than he plays it in vervoids, because in vervoids, they've known
each other for ages and they have kind of verbal shorthand
together and they bounce off each other, whereas here he's
actually really wary of her.
He calls her Melanie rather than Mel because he hasn't met her
yet.
And when he goes into the Matrix.
He takes glitz with him.
He doesn't take Mel because of Perry's death.
And he knows Glitz and doesn't know Mel.
Yeah.
But also because Mel's a girl and we just need her to stand around
rather than getting involved in the action.
There's that hilarious bit, right?
Where the keeper trips her over and you think, oh, that's a bit
rubbish.
But that is brilliantly cut down sort of 2 things later where he
tries to trip her over again.
It looks really pleased with himself and she kicks him in the shin
and nicks the key.
I really love that because you're like, that 1st one was crap.
And she's like, well, full me once, shame on you, full me twice.
I won't be fooled again.
I love the fact that you love all that.
It's just so stupid.
I actually think they're going, really?
We're kicking each other.
This is how we get into the matrix.
And, you know, a few minutes ago we talked about these wonderful
lines that she has, like, she goes, you know, when the master goes
one must destroy the utterance.
She goes, how utterly evil, how utterly over the top.
And then she goes, the value has taken...
Advantage of the doctor's romantic nature.
I just want to vomit at this.
I actually think that there's there's another remember the
Megarian who forgot to switch on his translator.
There's another one of those scenes, which again makes no sense
but Pip and Jane clearly think is sort of terribly clever.
When it's the fake trial room, uh, and we pull back and we're in
the real trial room watching the other trial room in the trial
room.
I just want to say before we go on criticising that, that's a
beautiful shot, but she says that the doctor refuted the charge of
genocide and then later on the doctor says, but that's how I knew
it was all a simulation because you weren't there and you wouldn't
have made that mistake.
And you kind of go, well, actually, she wouldn't have made that
mistake.
How could she have made a mistake by accidentally remembering
something that she didn't see?
I mean, it all just kind of really makes no sense.
And then, of course, it gets taken out in that sort of tumbl
through the Victorian streets.
You'd have to think the doctor would have twigged by then that he
was in the Matrix if he's, you know, in a horse drawn carriage
somehow on Gallifray.
It's all just a bit inconsequential and all a bit of a runaround
and it doesn't really go anywhere.
And the moments that try and talk about the nature of the trial
don't come off, that whole sort of sleepers thing, the reveal that
Glitz does in episode 13 about Ravelocks and the sleepers and all
of that makes just literally no sense at all.
And there's no way that the valiard would have chosen that bit as
a segment of prosecution evidence, if it contained all of this
sort of stuff that was going to implicate the high council.
No one's motive is clear.
We're running around and escaping and falling into quicksand and
stuff and it all just sort of falls to bits, doesn't it?
Well, yes, I guess it does, but I can't help but like it.
Oh, no, no, that's those 2 things aren't in any way
contradictory.
I actually really enjoy these 2 episodes, all the runaround, the
fact there's action, and I like a lot of the visuals, and you also
have like the keeper of the Matrix, played by James Bre, um, Oh
what a stupid fool he is.
Matrix, my Matrix?
Please.
And Popplewick, who I really love Popplewick.
Yeah, I think Popplewick seems homes in, but we reckon he's by say
we're doing.
By the time the character was written, it was Saywood, but there
was always that character in there.
Do you think he was always going to be revealed as the valleyard
in a latex mask, though?
I, you know what, I think probably not.
But a lot changed from sort of conception to execution because in
Robert Holmes' initial idea.
The master was behind the whole trial.
And Eric Saywood gave him the same advice he gave Terence Dix in
the 5 doctors where he said, well, everyone's going to expect
that.
So, like in the 5 doctors, it was, no, let's have Barusa is the
evil one rather than the master, and in this, say, it was like
well, A, if as soon as the master turns up, everyone thinks he's
created this, when he's actually just taken advantage of it, and B
no, we've been establishing the Valiard as the villain for 12
weeks.
So that's what we need to have.
And I think that's a very wise decision.
Because as I said earlier, it gives Anthony Ainley's master, the
rare opportunity to actually have a life outside of wanting the
doctor dead.
We get to see Anthony Ainley's master in his Tartars.
Is that a different set?
Like, or is it just like?
No, it's the same set, painted black.
So, um, what, they come in and they just planted the white set
black?
Yeah.
And then paint it back again.
Which is insanity.
I believe that is also what they had to do on this occasion
because this was filmed before vervoids.
And vervoids was the 1st time we had seen it this season.
We haven't seen it in the previous 2 stories.
We also get to see in one of the worst props ever, which could
have come out of a panto, which is the pirate treasure that glitz
seems to be really enamoured with.
It's just so rubbish. sort of plastic, rudely spray painted gold.
Yes, yes, I just kind of go, oh, really?
We have learned at least that the BBC budget does run to paint
though, which is nice to know.
Although, the whole thing with the pantomime chest is the master
says, will this appeal to your crass soul?
He knows he's dealing with someone who likes shiny baubles.
I love the mastering glitz together in this.
I mean, I think they're pretty good, but again, they're part of
the plot involves sort of hypnotising the doctor and all sorts of
really tiresome things that we've seen 100s of times before.
And then Paul Pip and Jane Baker have to pull all of this stuff
together, right?
having not really been involved.
And so we end up changing the premise where they're going to
destroy all the time laws in the trial room, which is apparently
going to cause this insurrection on Galifre, and the doctor
discovers a megabyte modem.
I don't even like, what is that?
Did she have one of those in her house?
Her modem.
She was connected to the internet by a big steampunk wooden box
with sort of flashing lights on it.
If you watch their interview on the...
Pip and Jane's box set.
They go to great pains to say that they rang up some computer
scientist people who came up with this wonderful idea for them
right?
But of course, we didn't have modems back then.
So they've gone, well, we've got a thing called a modem, and then
we know this term called megabyte, right?
We're just going to put them together and Pip and Jane won't know
the difference and, you know, there it is.
Do you remember back in the day when on the back of exercise books
on the back cover, they would have common computer terms and it
would be things like cobalt and, you know, what a bite is and
stuff like that.
Yeah, I reckon someone...
Yeah, yeah, they've just picked 2 of those words at random and put
them together. it doesn't actually go anywhere.
I mean, I guess the idea is to establish Mel as a computer
scientist.
Although, so she says computer-y things.
Computery things.
That's right, but it's not that at all.
And then I don't understand what's going on.
Like, it does seem that something happens in the trial room and
all of these sort of video effect spidery things come out to
attack everyone in the trial room and we have to evacuate the
trial room and then something happens back in the Matrix and then
we cut back.
But instead of evacuating the trial room, they've all just sort of
fallen over on their desks.
Yeah, because they can't move in those collars.
Yeah, maybe that's they're there for the day.
There's a ray phase shift.
Is that?
It's triggered a ray phase shift.
And so are those rays coming out of that thing?
And so the screen's going to explode and all they can do is bow
down and have their their special Time Lord helmety things protect
them.
Oh maybe that's it.
It's Galafrand, duck and cover.
That's what those are for.
Yeah maybe that's it.
But then it doesn't disseminate anyway.
I mean, the valliard just kind of falls over and stuff.
It doesn't get... pulls over and puts his hand out as if to say, ah
yeah, no, it's...
Which is another good shot.
Yes, I agree.
Okay, how I understand that scene, and I totally get that, it
frustrates people even to this day.
So Mel opens the cupboard and she says, it's a megabyte modem.
And the doctor comes in and says, it's amazing.
I think the missing word is there no.
No, it's amazing.
Yeah, that's the thing.
She's meant to get it wrong because part of her character brief is
despite the fact she's a computer programmer, she can't work the
TARDIS.
So she doesn't know Gallifran technology.
Why she would think a modem with her, you know, even if you look
at a 56 K modem from the 90s, the lights are not that big.
No, they look like they're from the top of a police car.
Yeah, it's ridiculous.
So it is amazing, which is another acronym that Pip and Jane Baker
liked to educate us.
Yeah.
Well, Maze's were an established thing, especially in Japanese
science fiction.
Kaiju films, Godzilla, Gamera, had mazes and were matter
amplification through stimulated emission of radiation.
It's a laser, but instead of using light, it uses matter.
I suppose in Star Trek that might call it, a particle beam.
Maybe.
Yeah, it's meant to disseminate.
And the doctor realises that the matrix screen is the conduit.
So, again, I think it's a slight attempt to be a little bit
metatextual in that the television is now dangerous and the
television will send rays out, which will get you, which was
something horror films were doing at the time, Halloween 3 season
of The Witch, and the Nightmare on Elm Street in particular have a
few television related deaths in them.
You must have felt that way about the television screen towards
the end of your sort of marathon live tweets. story.
The thing is like Todd, I watched these last 2 episodes and it's
actually a wonderful romp and the energy really picks up.
And if you look back on it later, you go, what's a megabyte
modem?
Why wasn't anyone disseminated?
And I think the whole thing with the ray phase shift is actually
related to black holes and singularities.
When light is stretched through a black hole, that is related to a
ray phase shift.
So the idea is that in, to quote, to quote Stephen Moffatt.
The megabyte modem slash mazer will not only explode, it will
implode.
It really does look like just here's a random assortment of half
understood scientific terms, which we're going to throw at the
dialogue at this point.
Yeah, I mean, episode 14 is 5 minutes over.
It's almost 30 minutes long.
Yeah.
It was originally, I think, about 42.
So I think a lot of the explanation is cut and it is just made a
Doctor Who thing off.
It's going to explode and that's bad and there's going to be
little squiggles.
But at the same time, I can kind of watch it and go, okay, I can
see what you're trying to do.
I don't think you quite pull it off.
But I think you don't quite pull it off in a much better way than
terminus doesn't quite pull it off with the whole, if we don't
move this lever back to the start, with a dog robot, then the
universe will be destroyed.
Yeah, that's peak word peril right there, isn't it?
So then we get the ending.
Where 2 things.
First of all, Perry is living as warrior queen with Yakanos.
And I think we did talk about that when we did Mind Warp.
I think it doesn't help and it's just, you know, adding insult to
injury at this point.
But it's also one of the reasons why Eric Seyward also left
because John Nathan Turner wanted happy endings and that was not
part of the original breed.
Yeah, yeah.
I think Eric's exact words were panto walkdown ending.
Why couldn't it have been something a bit different?
Like she could have got back to earth.
Well, because we don't know all of that stuff could have been all
you know, faked.
The ending of it could have been the doctor did actually save the
day and Perry said, I've had enough return me home.
I think it is what we said the other week.
It's Andrew Hodson's contract casino or whatever we said.
Contract roulette.
That was it.
It's just she happened to be with Jokanos at the end.
You know, they had a nice scene together.
We decided very ill advisedly that that was the basis for happy or
indeed acceptable marriage and will tinged the screen a bit pink
and everything will be okay.
The novelisation of Mind Warp does it much, much better.
So the final chapter of the novelisation ends with the courtroom
actually emptying and the doctors just left there standing alone
and utterly distraught by himself with no one to comfort him.
The epilogue is then Perry is back in the States and a time storm
whipped up.
She's back there with Yakanos.
She doesn't know how she got back there.
She doesn't know what's happened to the doctor.
She hopes he's okay, but she's his wrestling manager.
She's Yukanos' wrestling manager and she's just had to explain to
him, no, you don't actually kill people.
It's just pretend, but he's very happy because people seem to be
happy with it.
And you know, sometimes she thinks about the doctor.
And in that ending as well.
There's a hint of romance between them, but it's not really
overtly stated.
It's just that she's very fond of Yukanos.
And so we get our cake and we eat it as well in that ending
because the doctor doesn't know what's happened to her.
So we get the emotional impact of her death.
But then we find out that she's had an unconventional ending.
She hasn't just been married off, which was Nicola's like one
demand was don't marry me off.
And she's happy.
Um, there's there's a great bit on the DVD where they record a
commentary just for that reveal scene at the end with Colin and
Nicola.
And I think it's called a fate worse than death, i.e. being
married to Brian Blessard.
Nicola all the way through is just like, yeah, yeah.
Yeah, they decided to do this.
Oh god, yes.
Okay.
Colin's laughing his head off.
And then we've got the 6th doctor and Mel going into the TARDIS
with, of course, his last lines, characters, characters
characters.
But there's no attempt to even say, well, well, I need to return
you home.
Look, as a fan, as a continuity person, I just kind of go, look
couldn't he have returned to home, like, because we've only got 2
episodes, we don't even have time to do that.
I also think it is just that they don't care.
And it probably has something to do with the fact that there's
this sort of hastily rewritten ending, we weren't going to have
the doctor and Mel get into the Tardisan leave originally at the
end of the trial, but now we have to do it and any dialogue about
returning her would have been kind of a bit leaden and
uninteresting at the end.
But there is this sense we don't get to see Mel meet the doctor
you know, next year when she leaves him, she leaves him for no
reason at all.
Her contracts are.
And so she's really kind of poorly served, I think.
And her backstory makes no sense at all.
Gary Russell wrote a novel called Business Unusual, in which he
tried to kind of write a story where they meet that was in some
way consistent with the kind of character outline that had been
written.
The thing is, though, even the ultimate foe, isn't consistent with
the character outline that was written because in a character
outline, she meets the doctor during a story involving the
master.
And in the ultimate foe, she sees the master and says, who's
that?
Yeah, yeah, she's never heard of him.
And not only that, but he sent her there.
So as it says in the discontinuity guide.
It appears that some force has been involved.
He didn't just ask her to get into the casket nicely.
That's it.
None of it, none of it makes any sense at all.
And they don't care.
It's just, we've got Bonnie Langford in.
She's the Doctor Who girl now.
We don't really care about her as a character in a drama.
It's a bit of a throwback to, you know, the late heart and all
era.
Or, you know, the 60s where they're just sort of dumping people
left, right?
And centre in the middle of a story when their contract ended.
Or, you know, that terrible Graham Williams thing where he kind of
forgets to contract anyone except for Tom for season 17.
So, you know, I think it's pretty unfortunate.
And Mel suffers not only from that because we don't know what
she's like as a person before she meets the doctor.
And she suffers from the fact that of her 1st 10 episodes, 9 of
them are written by Pip and Jane Baker who can't do dialogues.
So it's unfortunate.
I like her.
I think she's very charming and she's got a lot of charisma as a
performer, but she doesn't get to be a character really at any
stage.
Yeah, the only thing that really saves me as a character is Bonnie
Langford.
Because, and the strange thing is, other actors who have come into
Doctor Who have approached it with reverence and not necessarily
done so well.
You know, I'm thinking maybe of Matthew Waterhouse, who was very
reverent to the program, but was given, I would say, character
material as deficient as the character material Mel is given.
And yet not constructed as clear a character because even though
Mel doesn't get much character in her dialogue, you know, you look
at Bonnie and the way Bonnie plays her, she's like, right, I'm
enthusiastic, I'm prone to being scared, but I recover quickly.
There are distinct elements to her personality you can pull out
whereas Adric, you're like, oh, he's a bit sulky, and then you
wonder, well, is he being sulky, or is Matthew Waterhouse being
sulky?
But I mean, think about Adric, and even think about Nissa and
Tegan, all of whom are really foregrounded in their 1st story.
We get to see them in their own world, in their own context before
they join the doctor.
And season 18 is very, very careful about the introduction of all
of those characters.
And then who's the next person to be introduced?
Turlow, again?
You know, even though he's really sketchily outlined.
You know, we don't know really where he comes from or anything
very much about him.
A lot of care is taken to introduce what kind of person he is.
That's very true.
You know, we're we're recording this the day before.
Can I say this?
We're recording this the day before the pilot comes out
introducing Pearl Mackey's character, Bill.
And we know from just all the pre-publicity stuff that the 1st
episode is very largely going to be about introducing her and
giving her an in into the doctor's world.
And that's the right approach.
I think, think about the 1st episode of Doctor Who, which is all
about Barbara and Ian discovering the doctor and ending up in his
world.
And we don't bother to do that anymore.
Yeah, and really, there was no reason that terror of the vervoids
couldn't have been written with Mel as the stewardess aboard the
Hyperion 3.
You know, she didn't have to be the 1980s computer programmer.
If she's a stewardess aboard the Hyperion 3, a 1000 years in the
future, it'd be quite understandable that she would have some
computer knowledge.
Yeah she'd know what a megabyte modem was.
Yeah, exactly.
And then she stows away at the end and the value I could say, ah
well, you've taken another companion.
The doctor says, well, it wasn't my choice.
You know, you can see she stowed away and then she turns up in
there and we have an introduction story for her.
And you know what?
That has never occurred to me before.
I just came up with that in the last 10 seconds he was talking.
As for what we get instead where he wanders off with her at the
end, you know, I thought for years, okay, the reason they haven't
done a drop Mel back off with her own doctor is, you know, they
have to set up a scene and do that and blah, blah, blah.
And again, I just thought, well, no, put Colin in his verboids
costume, and while the doctor is talking to the inquisitor in the
courtroom, Another 6 doctor pokes his head around the door in the
vervoids outfit and says, oh, Mel, I've been looking everywhere
for you.
Come on.
And as she runs out, the inquisitor is just like, what?
Well, she is from my future, you know.
Time for me to be off, and the other Colin leaves as well, and you
get like maybe 2 Tartises next to each other disappearing at the
same time.
And that, I think, gets the idea across without having to set up
this whole scene and without having to have the leaden dialogue of
come along, Mel.
And with the resources they have, they don't have to hire any
other actors will build any extra sets.
I had to see that vervoid tie again, though.
Oh, no, no, no, I don't want to go back there.
And then we get the very typical Pip and Jane Baker ending where
they like to end on some sort of cliffhanger note. right?
Where, of course, you know, everything's wrapped up, the
inquisitor, I think, is going to take charge of Gallifrey or
whatever she's going to do.
And I really do love Linda Bellingham in these 2 episodes.
It's nice to see you actually walk into the out of the trial room
and then back into the trial room rather than just sitting behind
her at desk.
Poor love.
And then we get the final sequence of the keeper.
And then him turning to the camera to reveal.
It was the van.
Do you think he was the val all along?
I always thought he came out on one of those squiggly line
things.
Because as he collapses, you see one go into his face and fly out
of his face.
So you reckon he just smacks James Bre on the head, you know, and
took his clothes.
Maybe there's a naked James Breed trussed up in a cupboard
somewhere on that space station.
Don't tell Richard Franklin.
Maybe now.
Maybe even now.
I don't know what to say.
Look, the master alludes to the valiant's got control of the
matrix.
So why can't he then be like the keeper of the Matrix?
Like, I'm thinking back to the pirate plant.
You know, you have like that old queen and then her young nurse
projection, like that sort of thing.
That's how I've always thought of it, like a projection of him, but
with just with a different face.
And then when it comes to it, you know, he has escaped because
he's in control of the Matrix and he's from the Matrix.
And I do think that Michael, Jason does a great James Bri voice
you know?
Because when he goes, yes, my lady.
I actually thought it was like, yeah, yeah.
Yeah, you think there's something odd about his voice, but you
don't immediately think it's Michael Jason.
And Todd, I think you might be onto something there because...
The keeper is constantly denying the possibility that anyone's
broken into the Matrix, and he's constantly denying the
possibility that someone can be based in the Matrix, and when it
happens, he just goes, oh, I'm terribly surprised about that.
Yeah, maybe you're right, Todd.
Maybe he's not the stumbling buffoon he appears, but he's just
another popplewick style servant of the valleyard.
Maybe.
I think it's a cute ending.
I do like it.
Like, it's great that, you know, throughout the trial, we've had
so many zooms on the doctor's face, you know, constantly
constantly, and in episode 13, you know, you've got the, no, when
he's going to the centre.
Oh, I hate, but here.
Sorry, go on.
But it still ends.
On the doctor's space.
Yes, it's just a different face.
It's brilliant.
The reason I hate that.
Is Colin's fat tongue?
Well, no, no.
That's fine.
Colin sells the danger well in that moment.
But you're just like, oh, for goodness sake, fortify yourself
man.
You've had a train barrelling down on you in the Matrix and you
didn't scream.
No.
You're just sinking, for God's sake.
And, you know, you've distributed your weight.
Don't struggle.
Certainly don't wiggle your butt into it the way you do.
You're not gonna sink if you remain calm.
If you just stand there screaming. when your spats get covered in
mud.
It's a mess, that scene. really poorly realised.
I think it's poorly directed.
Like, because Paul Colin has to collapse down and then you see him
actually move one of those hands to grab his side.
Much like that creature in mind where, you know, where he has to
move his hand to make it obvious with the gun, the URAC or
whatever.
It's the same sort of thing where it's like it's the direction
letting down what has to happen.
Yeah.
So, um, ratings wise with this, um, 4.400000 viewers tuned in to
episode 13 and then 5.600000 for the final episode, coming 80th.
So the highest rating of the season is the last.
And it's the only time that the show preceding Doctor Who, Roland
Rattle, whatever it was, was actually in the top 100.
Right?
So the only time it gives it a bit of a boost.
But it is interesting that, you know, I think there is viewer
fatigue after 12, 13 weeks that you suddenly go from 5.2 or 5.3
the end of vervoids, then there is like literally almost a 1000000
viewers less.
How are we promoting this, the final 2 episodes of the trial that
people are going, well, we're still at another week, we can tune
in next week, I guess, to see.
And it's back to the whole argument that this whole concept of
having one story just doesn't lend itself to having new people
come in during the season.
And the one I described is that I think the ratings are soft
right?
There's some episodes that are higher than five, but then you'll
get one that does dip down to the mid fours.
You can't just draw a line of best fit to say that the audience is
actually increasing week to week.
The overall rating for the season is 4.8 million, right, which is
2200000 down from last season.
Like next year, we're going back to what, you know, they said
they're going to go do a traditional format this year.
Next year, they're going back to individual stories.
And what you get is you get 5.one coming in to see the new
doctor.
Then there is a drop to 4.24.3.
And episode one of Power.
Power gets 4.5.
But episode 2 gets 5.2.
Right.
So people are going into work in school and talking about it.
And then indulge in Banham, 5.3 for episode one for Dragonfire, 5.5
and all of our episodes from that 5.2 onwards are above 5000000
except for the last episode of the season.
If you draw a line of best fit, you can actually see this gradual
increase.
It's a new story.
You can tune into a new story.
It's not this.
Oh it's still going on business.
Yeah.
A big problem I have with this story and you've both just touched
on it now.
It feels very enclosed and private and claustrophobic.
You know, we do have guest cast.
But 2 of the 3 guest cast.
The mastering glitz are characters we've seen before.
And Popplewick is a cypher.
He's not really a character for plot reasons.
Whereas the previous 3 stories, there has really been an attempt
and I would argue some success in creating distinct identifiable
worlds which these characters live in.
You know, we praised, for instance, the characterisation of
Katrika and Humker and Tandril and even Murdine.
You know, these were people we believed in.
In mind warp, we spoke about Madame Katrona and Crozier and Frax
and how each time we watch it, we kind of come away with a bit
more appreciation.
Sils in that, I mean...
Yeah, of course.
And Lord Kiv as well, you know, dead worse than that.
Paul.
In vervoids, you know, it's a mystery story, so we have to have
people with readily identifiable character traits like the
belligerent one and the mad one and the mercantile one and what
have you.
But still, they're really well performed.
And, you know, the Commodore and Lasky and Brookner and Kimba, you
know, they're memorable, they're memorable characters.
We come to this and certainly they're a memorable visuals, but it
just feels, it feels so insular.
It's the same problem I had with hell bent, which I really
enjoyed.
But because, you know, we're on Gallifrey and all the characters
we meet at people we've met before.
You lose a bit of interest.
I still enjoy it, and I don't really fault it on that, but it's
just like, this doesn't feel as much fun as the other ones because
I'm not learning anything new.
And I guess we're split between a room that we're already
thoroughly sick of and a location that isn't real.
Yeah.
So there's something inconsequential about it.
And if it had been a venue for all sorts of really thrilling
political intrigue based on the trial, which is clearly what
they're attempting to do, but failing to do, then perhaps they
could have pulled it off.
But as it is, it's just a sort of fairly standard bunch of running
around and being hypnotised and having harpoons shot at you and
stuff, but nothing, nothing really actually happening.
And so I think it does fall to bits.
But, you know, overall, I really enjoy this.
I enjoy it.
Like, I mean, I give this 8 out of 10.
Like, I mean, I mean, in that sense, insane despite, despite, you
know, all these problems with the script and what it's doing and
all this sort of stuff, I can sit there and I feel like at the end
there's a weight being lifted from this trial thing that's sitting
there and, you know, you know, we aren't getting resolutions, I
guess, you know, and we're not just sitting in a trial room for
the 2 episodes.
But, you know, I've just given it 8 out of 10.
So I kind of, you know, have made it my favourite story.
But it's not really like it gets it because it's wrapping up
everything else before it.
I don't know if I'm making much sense there.
No, no.
And in the end, for me, for the trial, the trial still comes back
to being 7 out of 10.
Like, even even if my schoolers are above that.
But the lightness that Colin brings into the role this year is
something that I think that you, Nathan, have pointed out.
And there's just lots of things that I've really enjoyed within
the stories, but then all this sort of trial stuff that's crap.
With some exceptions, I like the tone of this better than I like
the tone of season 22.
I think that they have learned some things, but I also think that
we're still in a show where all these tunnels look the same to me
and more so because Eric Sayard really doesn't know what he
wants.
Or John, Nathan Turner, really, either of them.
Yeah.
I do think that had John Nathan Turner had a different script
editor or had Eric Saywood had a different producer.
In either situation, they each would have produced better work.
As much as I do believe the failings of the last 5 years of Doctor
Who can mostly be ascribed to Eric Saywood.
I am not going to say that J and T is without fault for these
flaws.
I think it's something that we can discuss perhaps in the
retrospective because I've come to the same conclusion.
We've lampooned Eric Seywood, but there's underlying decisions
that are made that have put him in this situation and they come
from J and T. and other people in the BBC.
I have to agree with your scoring though, Todd.
I actually give this two-parters 9 out of 10.
And the whole trial.
I give a 7 out of 10.
I enjoy this in the same way you can enjoy earth shock in that, you
know what?
It's great fun and it's fantastic.
Just don't try and think about it too hard.
But there's 2 other cool bits that I have forgotten to mention
earlier, I'm looking back over my tweets from our hashtag FTE
trial marathon.
I will be doing this again for season 24 all in one day.
There's the bit where the master mentioned summary execution and
the rhubarb rhubarb of the time lords sitting around is they all
turn to each other and whisper summary execution.
And there's also the bit where Glitz is holding Popplewick at
gunpoint and the Dr. and Bella having a conversation and walk
between them.
And at 1st you might think, strategically wise, that's a really
terrible move.
It's like, no, these 2 are bloody cooler than you.
Shut up.
It's nice shot.
It's a very nice shot.
You know, I love these 2 together.
I wish we'd gotten another year of them together, Colin and
Bonnie.
I think they get the chemistry so right, including in this.
There's that great scene where she runs up to him and has that
horrible line you're not signing on as a martyr yet.
But it's kind of like opera.
Don't listen to the words, listen to the emotion and listen to
them arguing the next second, like the doctor saying, I knew what
was going on.
You're never feeling the tension that you feel between Colin and
Nicola as the doctor and Perry.
It is that kind of playful arguing sibling arguing that they were
trying to go for.
And I don't think it's the fault of the actors that it didn't work
before.
I think the emphasis was wrong and I think the emphasis has
changed now and Colin and Bonnie play that perfectly and they're
so visually striking together because he's huge and she's tiny.
And I haven't even mentioned a fabulous outfit in this, all that
blue wispy stuff for the blue high heeled boots, the patent
leather boots.
She looks amazing.
You know, we used to complain about Nicola's character not
dressing like a student.
Whereas Mel really dresses like someone in a crappy, light
entertainment science fiction show, doesn't she, really?
I hate her hair in this actually.
Yeah, awful.
Awful.
I think it's yeah, it's certainly my least favourite of all of her
hair.
Why I'm concentrating on that.
I'm still laughing about.
Don't go through that door.
Every time I watch that, that just cracks me up when she opens
that and it has to be that big dinosaur guy.
Todd, shall we reenact it?
Now you be Colin, I'll be Bonnie.
Don't go through that. door.
It's such flop that, you know?
Oh, I'm gonna give this nine.
And the season still gets a seven.
But what was needed was a nine, but you know.
So what's your score out of 10?
I don't give a.
You don't give score if you just give us.
Yeah, no, it's tiresome.
Right.
Speaking of tiresome things, it's time for Jenny Laird awards for
most puzzling creative choice.
So I have one.
Um, I was speaking last night on chat to Stephen Busanovsky. friend
of the podcast.
And I think we agreed that there's a creative choice here, which
is not only puzzling, but actually catastrophic, and I think it is
the decision to kill Perry at the end of Mind Warp.
And in Mind Warp, we said that we thought it was technically well
done and that the whole kind of ominous, doom laden atmosphere of
episode 4 of Mind Warp was really masterful.
But killing a companion's a bad idea, I think, generally, I think
you just get away with killing Adric because, you know, he's a
jerk.
But also because he's part of an ensemble as well.
But when you have the single character who we've been travelling
with for a long time, who the doctor kind of sacrificed his life
for, who is supposed to be, you know, an audience identification
figure, I think that it comes from a place of a complete
misunderstanding of what Doctor Who is, what its tone should be
what its audience is, what it's for, why it's lasted all this
time.
You know, I think you can kill Tasha Yar in season one of Star
Trek, the Next Generation, but you can't kill one of 2 regular
characters.
And doing it in such a horrific way, a way where her body is taken
over by a creepy old man, a way that just utterly reflects the way
that she's been manhandled and mistreated and drooled over and
lusted at and sexualised for her entire time on the show.
I think it's awful and probably one of the worst things ever to
happen in the run of classic Doctor Who.
The only comparable thing that I can think of that is just as
appalling, just as terrible.
You know, something that should never, ever have made it to screen
is Amy Pond's baby turning into a big pile of sick in a good man
goes to war.
I think that's horrific and indefensible.
And I think that this is similar.
It should never have happened.
It's, say, we're trying to be edgy and adult. and failing and
simply being cynical and nasty.
And it's my puzzling creative choice for the entire run of the
classic series.
Wow, yeah.
My creative puzzing choice is the trial.
It is the fact that Eric thought it was a good idea.
John was sold on the idea.
The powers that be up above, let it pass, but they're not
supporting the show. they stopped caring.
They'd stop caring.
Like, they want it gone.
So, oh yes, go ahead with this.
But the fact that they took it to the table.
Colin expressed concern.
And you're not going to listen to your leading man.
The whole concept of the trial is just my credit puzzling choice.
My puzzling creative choice.
When Colin was going around during production for Mind Warp asking
am I really bad here or am I pretending or is the Matrix lying
what's actually happening here?
My puzzling creative choice there, I can forgive Ron Jones for not
knowing the answer.
Directors of Doctor Who aren't there to change the story, as they
might end a Hollywood film or in any film.
I can forgive Eric Saywood for not knowing.
You know, the job of a script editor at this stage is not to
impart meaning.
The job is to make sure the script is workable and can be filmed.
My puzzling creative choices why Philip Martin couldn't answer
that question.
I actually think you're letting people off the hook, because I
think the script is pretty clear on what's happening that, you
know, he's initially zonked by the cliffhanger to episode one, but
essentially what he eventually decides is the case, that the
emphasis is being changed.
And the bit where he torments Perry on the rock is not what
happened.
Like, I think that's clear from the script.
And I think it's Collins' job to read the script and understand
it.
It's Eric's job to read the script and understand it.
And for God's sake, it's the director's job to read the script and
understand it.
So he can put it on screen.
I think they're all culpable.
It is fairly clear what's meant to be happening.
Yeah, but I think the buck stops with Philip Martin because Colin
asked Ron, who said, I don't know.
He asked Eric, who said, I don't know, and via Eric, he asked
Philip Martin, who said, ask Eric and Ron.
And at that point, I think the message from Ron was just, oh, play
it how you think, darling.
Well, I think he gets it wrong.
I also think too, maybe Philip Martin's annoyed by the changes
that have happened to his group because of the trial.
Look, I don't I don't really know.
I mean, in one of the interviews, Con actually says that he asked
Eric and he asked wrong, but he couldn't get in contact with.
Oh okay.
Which is a different take than what he says at other points in
time. like the memory cheat.
So maybe he did speak to him, maybe he didn't.
But ultimately, the script goes through the script editor.
The script editor should be able to give some direction to the
lead actor.
Yeah, right?
Yeah.
And Colin's struggling with this.
And I agree with you that the director should also be able to to
an extent work it out as well.
And I think it is this time through, I found it clearer.
Sorry, we seem to be dishing your creative puzzling choice.
That's fine.
I'm fine with that because it is a problem in that story is that
different scenes are played different ways and it makes it and
I've struggled with it for years.
Yeah.
Yeah, and, you know, I probably agree with you both.
I'm looking for one person to blame.
But no, it's a team effort.
You right. all 3 of them.
Okay, pics of the week.
I've got two.
My 1st pick of the week is the novel Matrix by Robert Perry and
Mike Tucker.
Mike Tucker, of course, who was a special effects person on the
last few years of classic Doctor Who and also new series Doctor
Who.
It's a 7th doctor novel dealing with uh, what happens to the
Valiard?
after the trial?
It is a fan wanky use of the concept of the valeyard, but it's
also really well executed. and tries to explain who and what the
Valiard is without kind of going into wrestle on imprimarches and
that sort of thing.
It's an enjoyable novel of its own right.
The science fiction concepts are science fiction concepts, they're
not just Doctor Who concepts, and it also plays with ideas of
identity and memory.
So it's very good.
My 2nd recommendation is the big Finnish audio parry and the
Piscon paradox, which attempts to reconcile what we saw happen in
Mindwarp.
What we heard happened in the ultimate foe.
What we read about in the mind warp novelisation and bad therapy.
And tries to give us some closure on Perry's departure.
It's a companion chronicle.
So it's mostly Nicola Bryant, but the special guest voice in it is
Colin Baker.
I won't spoil it too much, but the ending I found particularly
emotionally affecting.
Actually, the ending of both halves because it's kind of like 2
connected 2 partters.
And especially the ending of the 1st half as narrated, not only
narrated by Nicola, but as told by Perry, and you find out in the
2nd half, there's one kind of one important piece of information
that Perry doesn't have when she's narrating that 1st half that
really makes it resonate even more.
So Perry and the Piscon paradox written by Nev Fountain.
I think last season I recommended that people read Evelyn Wars, the
loved one, which, if you haven't read it, you really should.
It's truly tremendous, the BBC has just come out with a three-part
adaptation of Evelyn Waugh's 1st novel, Decline and Fall, written
in 1928, and I've seen the 1st 2 episodes to date, and it's really
really terrifically funny.
Have you seen or heard the 1st 2 episodes?
Did you say it was?
No, no, it's a TV show.
Oh, I bet terrific.
It stars Jack Whitehall as Paul Pennyfeather.
Oh, I love Jack Whitehall.
It has the late Tim Pigott Smith in what must be one of his last
roles because he only just died sort of fairly recently as we
record.
And he's in the opening scene and he's really sort of terrifically
funny.
It's brutal and horrible like all of Evelyn Moore's stuff.
He's gleefully cruel to all of his characters, and it also
features a fantastic Star Turn from the wonderful Eva Longoria, who
you might remember from Desperate Housewives, and she's super
super glamorous in it.
It's some laugh out loud, funny.
I've really really been enjoying it.
And so if you want to break from cardboard sets and mazes and
megabyte modems, there's no robots in this, there's no
pteroreptils in it, even though it is said in 1928, it is really
really terrifically funny and I can recommend it wholeheartedly.
I've got one.
Do you know what I'm going to recommend?
I recommend Beauty and the Beast.
It's a wonderful movie about a plucky American girl and her
wrestler, Warlord.
No, we don't go with that.
It's a pretty good recommendation, though.
It's even got a gay in it. like James Bree.
I recommend the new CW show Riverdale, because I think that's full
of nice young things and lots of angst.
Everyone's very attractive.
I'd recommend any big finish audio with Bonnie Langford and Colin
Baker in it because I really do think they are that well written
for that pair.
If I had to pick one, I'm not going to pick a pick one of those.
I going to pick the Wiran aisle.
Oh, yes.
Which is which is a 6 doctor with the Wiran and his companion
flip.
And I really enjoy that one and so, yeah, just for something
different, one of the 6 doctors, alternative companions and I
think it's a really good story.
It also uses the Weiran in an unexpected way.
I found that.
Yeah.
That's by William Gallagher, who's written some very good big
finish.
Well, dear listener, we're not quite finished with the Colin Baker
era yet.
Do come back next week for a very special episode, and the week
after that, we'll be having our big finished special, so you still
have time to listen to the one doctor.
Doctor Who and the Pirates.
Jubilee, and the brink of death from the Doctor Who, the Last
Adventure box set.
All of those are available from bigfinish.com.
Don't forget, you can vote in our Tom Baker commentary, and the 4
options are, The hand of fear, The sun makers, The stones of blood
And the horns of Nimon.
You can find a link to the poll in the show notes and also at
flightthroughentirety.sexy.
Over on Bondfinger.
We have recently said goodbye to Timothy Dalton after only just
having said hello to him in license to kill, and we also have
commentaries for all the Roger Moore films and Sean Connery films
and unlike that lawsuit, because there's a lawsuit at the moment
because the 50th anniversary Bond set says it has every Bond movie
but it doesn't have Casino Royale 67 or never say never again.
Well, we do.
So you don't have to sue us.
So there, isn't that wonderful?
Until then, you can find our websites, flightthroughentirety
sexyandbondfinger.com. bondfinger.com as well has a secret address
at the moment and we're not going to tell you what it is, but it's
a word that Nathan invented during our living daylights
commentary.
So if you type in that word.com, you will be redirected to
Bondfinger, you can find us on Twitter at @bondfingercast and at
FTE podcast and over on Facebook.
Just search for Flight through Entirety, our Bondfinger, same as
iTunes.
Until next week, may your matrix get a bit more maintenance than
once a millennia.
Thank you very much for listening and good night.
Good night.
See you soon.
That was Flight Through Entirety, starring Todd BLB, Nathan Bodley
and Brandon Jones.
Theme arrangement by Cameron Lamb.
This episode, Gallifrey and Duck and Cover, was recorded on the
15th of April 2017.
The next episode will be released on the 28th of May.
Now that we've discussed the entire Colin Baker era on television
we'll be travelling back in time to return Todd to the 30th of
December 2014, so he can record his 1st ever appearance on the
podcast.
See you soon, Todd.
Um...
And today is...
Boobidiboo of April. 15th.
April.
April Diggity.
I'm gonna turn off all of my things.
I failed hullabaloo. editing the episode 107 and I interrupt your
thing with my watch to tell me to drink water.
Okay.
Oh, Todd, just hold your microphone at a bit more of an angle.
I was getting breath, that's all.
We do get a bit of Todd breath from time to time.
It gives us life.
Okay.
Is that better?
That's better, thank you.
Okay, I'll just remember.
Oh my god, Todd's breathing through his nose.
He's angry.
Not only.
Not yet.
I want to be angry.
I wanna be happy.
Can I be happy?
Okay.