Hello, dear listeners and welcome back to Flight Through Entirety
the only Doctor Who podcast who shoves ferrets down your
trousers.
I'm Brendan.
I'm Nathan I'm Todd.
Richard for this one.
Ah, hooray.
And we've made it to the end of another doctor and he's the last
doctor for a while.
It's the Sylvester McCoy retrospective.
Yay!
I've been around.
What did I say, guys?
I'm going crazy, oh.
Oh, heaven help me.
Because he didn't sound like Kirth McCullen.
On that note, Richard.
Snob marry a void.
Right in there.
Not even a little bit of warm water in the bath.
Not straight in.
Dominic Glynn, Mark Ayers, or Kef McCulloch?
It's so easy, isn't it?
I'd like to actually see Dominic Glynn and Mark is in a pillow
fight, stripped down, but jumping around on the bed with Keth
McCulloch with the CO2 cannister, and he can just pour that down
his own throat.
But I am seeing a whole kind of Bill Murray walking in going, yep
this is definitely lost in translation for Doctor Who.
Who would you snog?
Yeah, no, no, I'm sorry, that's the best I could do on that one.
That's fine.
You know, you never quite answer them, but I want to, you know, all
really good.
But Marcus was, you know, cut his jib nicely in his day, so I
think him doing a Tom Cruise jumping up and down as a sort of lost
in translation Japanese hotel room scene would work really well.
I think he's the cuddly one.
I think you probably want to marry him.
Dominic.
You can have him.
It's more of a night of passion.
Yeah, I'm happy to rent them, so...
Excellent.
Yeah, I agree with Nathan.
So, Brendan.
Yes.
Sorry.
I just have to do this one.
As an old man again.
Oh, am I that cliche?
Small Mario Void, the Candyman, the ancient one or the Destroyer.
So just a bit then.
Right.
Okay.
Look, I would look, I'd have to snog the candy man, because, you
know, it tastes really nice.
I think that's filthy, but I'm not sure why.
And, you know, you couldn't marry the Candyman because every time
you come home, every... time do you call this?
Marry, I'd have to marry the destroyer because it's Marok bloody
Anton under there.
Which means I'm avoiding the ancient one because he's a bit
sludgy.
It's a she too.
Oh, she.
I beg your pardon, she was a lady person.
No, she's a bit sludgy.
Needs a cream for that.
Sorry.
Nathan.
Snug Mario void.
Lady Painfort, Helen A, or more gain of the Fay.
He always gets the best words.
I have to be kind because he may not be kind later when I start
talking about a certain season.
Well, I'd avoid Helen A because she kills half a 1000000 people in
that entire story.
Including men wearing pink triangles, you know?
Yeah, she's well and truly worth keeping away from.
So it's a question.
I think that I would have to snog Lady Payne for it because she's
so crazy. she's probably contact with her is probably best kept to
a minimum. 400 and something year old teeth, though.
But I'd be totally happy to marry Gene Marsh, you know, Pert, we
did and look how that turned out.
Excellent.
Right.
Well, I might do Snog Mary avoid myself.
Time in the Rani Paradise Towers, and Joshua the Bannerman.
So I would definitely snog time the Rani.
Because it initially has brightness and colour and pizzazz, but
then you just lose all interest.
I'm avoiding Paradise Towers because it's just awful.
And thus of the three, I'm actually going to marry Delta Vannerman
because there are actually things that I actually like in Delta
Vannerman.
Despite... much that I don't like.
And so, yeah, there you go.
That's my.
Have we talked about your Delta and the Bannerman history on the
podcast?
Yes, you've mentioned it many times, then we're not going...
We are not going there at this point because I'm not ready to talk
about it.
We are going to hear it from your mouth at some point, yes?
Yes.
Good.
No other parts.
Yes, very much so.
All right, so here we are at the end of the era.
And so what do we think of these 3 years of Sorghast?
What have you got out of it?
What's new for you?
When I was a little boy in the 1970s?
I know.
Used to take ¢10 piece and go to the corner shop.
Sometimes even before school because I was that lower middle
class.
Sophie Aldred.
And you could you could get something called a mixed bag of
lollies.
And within them, you didn't pay much for them.
You didn't have high expectations, and a lot of it was really just
sweet and colourful, but some of them were gobstoppingly
brilliant.
I think I'll just park that there.
Because that's what it's been like for me.
I think it's an extraordinary Renaissance, and it takes a while to
kick in for them to work out what they're doing.
But the show under Eric Saywood, was a bit of a grind, creatively
you know, just kind of, It varied between dull and horrific, I
think.
And suddenly someone new comes along, solves the problem that
Doctor Who had had all throughout the 70s and early 80s, which was
getting people to write for the program.
I think the 70s had like a reliable stable of people who could
produce a story each season.
But it was always a bit tight, I think.
And I think Andrew Cartmel is the 1st person to come along and
just find all of these young writers.
Fresh new, interesting people.
Yeah, so there's only Pip and Jane Baker in the entire era who've
written for the program before.
And so they get people who have a sort of memory of Doctor Who, but
none of them write about space corridors and none of them write
you know, be, you know, like just big dull gun battles.
There's the odd big dull gun battle.
I'm looking at you battlefield, but basically it's taking the show
in directions that had never gone before like the recent past.
You know, there's a lot more stuff set on earth.
It's feminism.
Yeah, it's so much more interesting than it's been for such a long
time.
Politics.
Okay, we did see Mind of Evil.
I think I think that's a really good thing.
It's so much more cutting edge and pushing boundaries and going in
new directions.
I mean, if we go a long way back to, like, perhaps Barry Letts
with all the ecological stuff in the 1970s, where it was
referencing stuff that was going on.
Here, there is this new wave, and listening to you guys talk about
the show even when I, you know, on certain shows I don't
particularly like.
I understand.
Andrew Carton or, is he's the biggest revelation.
And it's also a revelation how much John Nathan Turner also takes
a step back, but he allows that space for that man to implement
his vision, whereas he really didn't allow that prime.
And that and that's huge.
I mean, we said before that, that, say, would sought to be
apolitical and you can't be apolitical.
If you're trying to be apolitical.
You supporting the status quo.
And so there's an unpleasant militarism and just a kind of
thoughtless, you know, reactionary kind of feel to the show under
him. once we decide to become explicitly political.
And once we have a target in Thatcher, we actually have a show
that says interesting things again in a way that it hadn't for a
long time.
The extraordinary thing that seems to happen with Andrew Cartmel
is, um, Season 18, we had Christopher Hamilton Bidmead, who was
strong on ideas.
And the story then came from the scientific idea.
With the advent of Eric Saywood, and according to what Eric
Saywood says in documentaries and interviews.
JNT was sort of sticking his nose in with the story.
So Eric would commission a story and then JNT would come in and
say, oh, well, no, we'll do this and you must have a monster here
et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.
And it sounds like there was a fair bit of interference there
which Andrew Cartmel doesn't seem to have encountered.
And I think what may have been the turning point was actually, say
would leaving halfway through trial, leaving JNT to then script
edit the last 6 episodes and possibly JNT going, story is really
not my thing.
So, and of course, the revenge.
The reason he did trial was because the show was in trouble and he
didn't want to abandon it, but he honestly wasn't expecting to
come back for season 24 to the point he was told, no, you're not
coming back.
He went off on holiday, came back and was told, no, you are.
So I think at that point, he no longer wanted to be involved in
story.
And that, with the producer role as it was then, that's actually a
really good thing.
It's good for the producer to have an idea of these are the kind
of stories I want to tell, like Barry Letts did, and he
occasionally wrote some as well, or Philip Hinchcliffe.
But Philip Hinchcliffe didn't write stories.
He said to Bob, I want this kind of tone.
I want this kind of feel.
Bob Brief, the writer, and that's the way it worked.
JNT script interference in the Silveira.
It seems to be mainly limited to give me some monsters in ghost
light, make the cheetah people big furry leopards.
Yeah, yeah.
Put the master in survival.
So I think probably the difference that we identify in Nathan
Turner's approach.
I mean, we don't know.
And we'll never know he's gone.
The say would account of the era is so partisan.
You know, that I don't think we ever will get to the truth there
but it's not inconsistent with the terrible relationship between
Saywood and J and T meant that J and T suggestions are now
retrospectively characterised as, you know, intolerable
interference.
Whereas Carmel never experienced them in that way.
And that he still made suggestions and story suggestions, but that
they weren't received in the same way as they had been during the
Sabre era.
Yeah, so they would seem to look at suggestions like, hey, let's
put the master in us.
Oh, God, not again.
Whereas Cartmel would go, oh, okay.
Well we need to figure out a way to make that organic to the
story.
Even with ghost light, where the animal husks of Josiah don't
really make a lot of sense.
No, and they contradict, for instance, as I said, they contradict
what happens to control.
Yeah, exactly We don't see her husks.
But they are they are de-emphasized enough.
You know, they're put in there to give us the 1st episode
Cliffhanger.
And then when they're dispatched in the last episode and they're
blowing up, the doctor says some rungs have gone on his
evolutionary ladder, it gives us, it gives us a joke about them
know what I mean?
It's not like the gum. which to me is kind of the the ultimate bad
idea of let's just put a monster in to have a monster in there.
The magma creature?
Well, the magma creature.
At the very least.
Robert Holmes taking them.
Yeah, but the thing is, they shoot they shoot around the magma
creature, whereas the garm gets all these bloody close-ups.
The idea of the gum isn't bad, but the execution is.
Whereas something I found watching so through because, of course, I
watched it all through with Rod, and then I watched it over 3
days.
Live tweeting, everything in a row.
It is a mixed bag as you say, Richard.
But there is also a consistency of chewiness.
Yeah, yeah, there is a consistent density of blue aliens.
They're all blue.
All blue.
And texture to the stories, you know, even if we've got one which
is played a bit more farcically, like Paradise Towers compared to
something more serious, like Curse of Fenrick, it's very clear
from the visual look that they're the same show.
There's no story in these 12, in my opinion, that looks
significantly cheaper than the others, like say time lash or
terminus or time flight.
But they're dealing with shorter seasons and budgets easier to
control.
And so time-wise, it's easy to control.
But it still feels like you've seen 6 years in three, doesn't it?
Just in the leaps, technically narratively, not, and not just
production, but in performance as well.
That's very true, Richard, I agree with you.
And I think there's just this layering in this building every
every season for me.
And although I think there's missteps in that 1st season, they'd
learn it from them, and you can see in Sylvester's performance
like in Paradise Towers, I can still see his doctor from, like
that's my favourite performance of his in that, in that season
since 24.
And I see flashes in that that then are there to the forefront at
the beginning of 25 and just, he's like a ability, his likeability
is something, I can't explain it.
I just I like him.
I like his quiet moments.
I like the moments when he's building with not only with ace, but
with other characters that he has, like whether it be the
inspector in Ghostlight, or whether it be another female character
like who's the blue, who's the secondary red Kang that's not Julie
Brennan?
Fire escape?
Oh, yeah, well, she, they have a...
Sorry, Ben Liner.
Not Fire Escape, because she's terrible.
Binliner.
Binliner. and there's moments with her and it builds.
He's an inability to shout is something that I will, you know, it
just irritates me.
Although there is a moment in ghost night where he shouts and it's
not that bit.
Sorry, that was really bad.
I was doing the whole hand movement thing.
There's there's one challenge annoying.
There's one shouting bit in that story where it actually shouts
and I actually go, oh my god, you've got it right.
After 3 years you've got it right, you know?
Is comic stuff, sometimes it's absolutely phenomenal and other
times I think, oh, please just point back.
But I really like him and I really respect him so much.
Oh, wow.
So I, people who I know who just gave up on the series in 24 and
have just written him off as, you know, the worst doctor.
Like, I'm there going, well, no, he's a really good doctor.
In terms of an actor, perhaps I think because of the production in
the scripts and that sort of thing.
I don't necessarily think that his 2 predecessors and the 80s had
to deal with a lot, I think, badder situations that they had to
try and dig this show out of.
So I kind of, like, you know, I'm not saying that he's a worse
actor than them, but I'm just saying that he's had less sort of to
deal with in that sort of respect.
Generally, I get what you mean.
But I really like him.
I really like him and his relationship with Sophie Aldred.
Like in that one scene, at the end of Dragonfire, there is more
chemistry there than with Bonnie Langford in the entire previous
13 episodes.
Like it's just incredible.
Now, you were going to ask...
I was just going to ask, how do you think it would have gone if
the roles had been flipped and Sylvester had played the 6th and
Colin had played the 7th because I don't know that Sylvester would
have necessarily been able to pull together.
And my knowledge of Colin's ear is still not full, but pulled
together 22 and 23 in the same way.
What do you think?
I don't think even Colin...
It's not an...
But he was towards the end there.
23.
Look, it's so hard because now going back and looking backwards.
Defaults in the stories that Colin had to deal with are
immeasurable.
Yeah.
And and I think his performance throughout the lot is actually
phenomenal. what he's had to deliver.
I don't want to go back and rehash all of that.
Can I see some of this to doing that in the same respect?
It's an impossible question to ask because he's dealt a different
hand, and he's got a script editor who's with him, and they've got
a vision together, and he's actively working to his strengths.
I just can't say, you know?
Imagine Colin in 24 to 27.
I think we would have very much had a big finish, 6th dog.
Well, I think, I think you can't do, say what you're, Colin in
those stories.
Because the stories are structured around the doctor.
A different character.
Well, he lurks on the periphery of things. and Colin can't do that
in that code.
I mean, he can't even turn up on earth in the present day in that
outfit.
I think we would have seen changes.
Yeah, well, I think so.
He would have had to play it like the Stranger and Miss Brown or
something. you know, where he pulls it back in and he would have
been, I mean, he would definitely have been up for that, I think.
I would think it would have been interesting.
But I think the Sylvester McCoy era benefits from sitting back a
bit and saying, all right, what do we want the doctor to be?
We can't just do the thing that we've done?
with Pete and Colin and just react against the previous actor.
So, you know, the brief for the 5th doctor was he mustn't have
curly hair?
Do you know what I mean?
I mean, that was that was actually a thing.
And then Pete was not.
Like, I don't know who watches that 3 years of Doctor Who and
thinks that Pete Davidson's doctor is nice because he's snarky and
and it was kind of angry and dismissing.
Passive aggressive, really.
So we have to go nasty.
So we have to go nasty with the next doctor.
We have a doctor who puts in a subtle performance.
So we have to go big.
They don't do that Whistlevester.
They don't say let's have someone who's not Colin.
They say, what is this character like?
And you've brought up, Brendan.
Uh, you know, Sylvester's thoughts about the doctor's sort of
sadness.
And I think Kartmel has thought about how the doctor solves the
problems that he finds himself in.
And I think we've got memories of trout and not coming in and
hogging the limelight.
And even just his look, the whole thing is just thought about it
bit more carefully.
Yeah, and it's still Pat Godfrey.
The last 3 doctors, same designer.
Yeah, yeah.
Well, I think that Colin was just pointed in the direction of the
studio and told to do something, but I don't think he was given
much of a brief about what his doctor was like.
I think another difference between the way Sylv and Colin played
the role.
They both passionately love the character.
There is no doubt about that.
But if you look at Colin's stories and also the way Colin talks
about his stories, all of Colin's stories pretty much have a sci
fi conceit.
You know, where moving planets to change time zones, where
rewriting history, people turning into plants, that sort of
thing.
Whereas all sylves stories.
They have more of, This is the shape of a society idea about
them.
And I think that also reflects the actors' approaches because when
Colin talks about his scripts and why they didn't work.
He talks about logical inconsistencies in the scripts.
Whereas when Silv talks about his scripts, he talks a lot more
about emotional, a lot more about feeling, and he famously says in
interviews things like, you know, I didn't understand the science
stuff, which is why I gave so much of it to Sophie, because Sophie
loves science, and, you know, I just trusted the writers to get it
right.
Whereas Colin would say things like, well, hold on, no, this isn't
how time travel works back on page two.
You know, you can't change that now.
We need to, we need to sort this out.
So I think possibly if Colin had stayed around, we would, even
with Carmel coming in, who likes sort of world building, I think
we would have had a lot harder sci-fi, and I don't think that's
necessarily good or bad, but that's Colin's passion.
And with Cartmel being such a collaborative writer and, you know
working with his actors and what do you want to do with your
character?
I think, It would have been really great for Colin to work with
Cart Mill, because he had such strong ideas about the character
which weren't quite executed well enough because you also had a
script editor who wanted to make a very dark show.
Whereas Cartmel wants to make a hopeful show that still has
darkness in it.
I think you both touched on some really wonderful things.
You said sadness and sorrow in the character, and that is
something that that just resonates when I watch it, and I watch
those moments with those sad moments that Sylvester has. getting
emotional.
Like, this is, you know, this is what one of the greatest things
about being on this journey is discovering this, you know?
Even stuff that I didn't like.
I can appreciate.
And it's just been a revelation, these last 2 seasons, even
aspects of season 24.
I don't think Sylvester is a terrific actor.
I think he's compelling to watch, but he has strengths and that
quiet, reflective, allergic thing that he does and he does it.
He starts doing it in season 24, I think.
Is there a moment?
That stands out for you?
for him, that appended by his doctor or moments that you would say
there he is, that's, that is him.
He's kind of indomitable speech.
You know, Tom arrives in that indomitable space in space.
I like him hugging the electric guitar at the end of Delta and the
Bannerman.
I don't think it's a particularly well-written scene, but it's
such such a different choice from any of his predecessors.
You know, he's hugging it and saying love has never been known for
its rationality and stuff.
And it's not a deeply sad thing.
Like I don't believe for a 2nd that, you know, that gives us some
insight into the doctor's character.
But it's such a nice choice and it probably is the 1st sign that
he's not just going to be the clown that he is in time Rani.
It's the contrast.
It's the mixed bag again.
You get the acid drops with the really fantastic juicy fruits.
And then my juiciest fruit for here is probably, again, in
battlefield.
You've got the terrible moment that Brendan I'm hoping will recap
for us.
Okay.
There we go.
But you've also got just get that out between your teeth
listener.
But he also has that speech, which I think only goes for 25
minutes with he and Gene Marsh at the end when he talks about
pressing the button.
That's an extraordinary moment for any doctor and I think he
delivers it superbly.
It really, for me, it's his greatest moment.
There, there, there are 2 moments for me because I love that big
speech and I love his speech about consequences in remembrance and
confronting Davros and what have you.
Um, there are 2 moments for me and they're very, very quiet.
One is blink and you'll miss it.
It's actually in time in the Rani, because I think towards the end
of shooting time in the Rani, Silv starts to get an idea of where
he wants to go with this.
And it's when Bayes, Donald Pickering says, no, I'll stay.
And the doctor pushes Faroon out of the room and just looks at
Bayes with this mixture of shock and respect and sadness.
And it's just this very quick moment.
We then get the bit outside where he does the whole.
Oh, you know, Bayos was wonderful speech, which was shot 3 weeks
previously.
But that just little exit, you know, it's not just a turn and run
doesn't even get a close-up.
And I didn't I didn't properly notice it until this time around.
The other moment for me that does it is, and I've said before that
Silver Nemesis is my least favourite Silver Story, but there's
that bit where he and Ace are wandering through the woods and Ace
says she's actually scared.
And the doctor's immediate reaction is, I'm so sorry.
I didn't even think about this.
Do you want to go back to the TARDIS?
And she just says, no, no way.
I'm coming with you and walks off and he just looks utterly
bemused, like what just happened?
And it emphasises his compassion, but it also emphasises his
alienness because he thinks he knows what she wants.
But actually she doesn't.
He doesn't, rather.
There is so many little moments to his character, but just that
one in Silver Nemesis really sticks out for me, possibly because I
enjoy a lot of the story less.
But yeah, it's just that familiarity, yet unfamiliarity with human
nature.
They're all lovely, lovely moments.
I mean, I still like him in the cafe with in remembrance of the
dark.
With John.
I still love that.
I love that.
I talked about last week, the ending of Ghostlight, where he says
weekend.
Like it's just sublime.
But there's another moment and it's in Paradise Towers when he
looks down at his watch, you know, when he's, the rule book thing
and he looks down at his watch and, like, you know, making up the
time. that's actually the moment where he becomes the doctor for
me.
Yeah, yeah.
So it's really that moment.
And I kind of thought, okay, okay, I've endured, I'm during this.
But I can, but there's something in you.
My brother said the exact same thing.
And also, I mentioned the other week that when this 1st came on in
1987, as soon as Ace appeared and started calling him Professor
Rod stopped watching.
He's like, they're disrespecting the character now.
Now they're making the character into a joke.
We then went to a convention where Silv was and anyone who's seen
Silv at a convention is just a force of nature.
Like, actually, I went to one convention where the interviewer
didn't show up and it was for Silva, Nick Courtney.
It was meant to be sil for 15 minutes and then Nick would come
in.
And so Silv was there for 5 minutes and just picked up the
microphone and said, well, right, I don't think he's coming.
Let's do this.
And just wandering around and Nick Courtney comes in, Sylvester
what's, uh, what, what, what, what's happening?
And Sylvester turns around and he's got an eye.
Well, Nicky's not turned up.
So we're just doing this.
I said, oh, you're wandering about.
Do you mind if I sit up here?
No, darling, you sit up there.
Who has a question for Nicholas?
He's superb at this.
Yeah, so when Rod saw him at a convention and we were up to, I
think, pert we by that point, he said, okay, I'm looking forward
to Sylvester now.
And for him and my brother, that moment in Paradise Towers that
you just mentioned was the moment where they went, oh, I see what
he's doing.
My brother's perspective on Sylvester is very interesting because
Sylvester and Tom are his 2 favourite doctors and he says he likes
both of them because they both do the exact same thing.
They walk into a room.
And they might be standing at the back of the room for 10 minutes
but as soon as they...
Quietly breaking wind.
Just offending everyone else on.
They work the curse of fending.
Are they working at what's going on?
They're working out what's going on.
But the moment they speak, all eyes turn to them.
And he's like, that's what I like.
And he said, Tom Baker does it because Tom Baker is 6 foot 2 and
in a giant coat.
And he says, that's why I think I like Sylvestermore.
Because Sylvester's 5 foot six.
He tiny.
He's in silly clothes.
And yet he just stands at the back of the room and says, no, I
don't think we're going to do that.
You know, that's classified information, heaven, eh?
And that's a big thing.
And that's what he does in the Paradise Tower scene.
It's just he's been sitting there for a while.
He's been cogitating and there's even a bit in that scene where he
kind of goes, I'm bored with this now.
Let's go.
Like, there's just this look on his face of, yeah, done everything
I can do here.
Time to get out.
It's also an extremely doctor-ish moment because, you know, if
that Holmes idea that the doctor's enemy is bureaucracy.
Yes, yes.
And so it's him defeating bureaucracy by telling clever or even
not particularly clever lies.
And so it is a super doctor-ish moment.
And I think the thing you identify, Todd, is that the lie is super
obvious because he looks at his watch in order to make up a time
that's in the rule book.
So he's not even bothering to tell a convincing lie at that point
but the caretakers are so dumb that they fall for it anyway.
And it's also the fact that after he tells the lie, he closes the
book.
So if they want to look it up, they're going to have to look
through the whole damn book.
Which, even though, you know, they lived it by the book.
I think the implication is there like some other people who live
by certain books that they haven't actually read it.
Ah.
You asked me a question, Richard, about imagining the 2 doctors in
the different areas.
Now here's the question.
Bonnie Langford could have stayed on for season 25.
She was deciding whether or not to stay or not.
Can you, any of you, a mansion?
Like a season 25 with the character?
So you've said, Todd, that you like Bonnie and Sylvester on Big
Finish.
That's the linch because you don't need to imagine you can hear
especially in the latest ones, now they've paired her up with Ace
how male is, much more sophisticated.
She's playing Bonnie's playing itself, clever.
And and if we'd been able to have that.
But the character at the time, the way she was booted and written
no, it couldn't it wasn't working.
The big problem is she arrives massively overcharacterized.
But with no base.
No.
So we don't get to see her meet the doctor.
I do think that's a problem.
And like her 1st full story is written by Pip and Jane Baker.
We get one episode by Bob Holmes.
Another episode by Pip and Jane Baker, another story by Pip and
Jane Baker, and they can't write convincing dialogue.
And so she decides to play it really big and theatrical because
it's so unnaturalistic.
And I just don't think she ever pulls her performance back from
there.
And I think her best story is Delta and the Bannerman.
And that's because on earth, somewhere recognisable and she is not
in the studio.
And for once, the costume and hair kind of works with a scenario
where it's never worked before.
So that's as close as she gets to doing a normal person.
But, you know, she's got no origin, no proper characteristics.
I just don't think that she works as a character.
I think she's absolutely lovely and I really enjoy watching her.
But like I'm not totally sold on some of the choices that Sophie
makes throughout her era, but I think rebooting, you know, like
the traditional screamer girly, which is what she was designed to
be, was never going to work properly in the caramel era.
Yeah, not even in the in the 80s.
It just wasn't it was an odd choice. a terrible idea.
You know, I see why JNT pitched her at that level because and
really, for the 4 years he was producer after Tom left.
He was making a decent show.
You know, there were misfires, but I still think that in those 4
seasons, there's more hits than misses.
Yeah, it wasn't his 1st concept, Janet Fielding's character.
Wasn't his 1st concept, Tegan Javanka.
It's a pretty strong premise.
Yeah, exactly.
But then the show gets taken off for 18 months.
He's never really given a satisfactory reason.
Like he's told it's more violent, but yet on the other channels.
You've got Buck Rogers and the A team killing it in the ratings
which are more violent than Doctor Who.
So he goes back to 1st principles.
He's like, give us a Susan or a Vicky star character.
I agree it's completely wrong for the time, but I can kind of see
where that comes from.
Now, as for keeping melon in season 25.
I've always said I would have loved to see that because You've got
the doctors, the head.
Ace is the hands, like, you know, the Jamie.
Are we going with this?
And Mel's and Mel's the heart.
So you got brains brawn and heart.
Ah, but nothing to sit on.
But would they have taken on Ace?
Like if she said no?
Well, yeah, I think if they didn't take on Ace, that would be a
big mistake.
You see, when I think about this, I always think about keeping the
3 of them together, as big finish do now.
But I think the other problem is Mel is so good in Big Finish
because Bonnie Langford has had an extra 15 to 30 years acting
experience.
And, you know, she's become a household name again and she's given
a variety of amazing performances and has then brought that
experience back to Big Finish.
In order to fit Mel into the cartel vision of the show, we would
have definitely gotten more, say, computer programming stuff
because, of course, Ace has brought in as this aggressive
character who likes explosives.
And so suddenly we get these stories with explosives and ace's
scientific knowledge, having a basis in the plot.
So we would have had more of that with Mel, which would have
grounded her more.
But if we had have had Mel and Ace, where I'm worried is, If we
had have had, say, Mel in remembrance of the Daleks, we've got
then no plot role for Professor Rachel Jensen.
In Happiness Patrol.
We've got no role for Susie Q. We've got no role for mags.
We've got no role for Kathleen Dudman.
So when they write out Mel, they write in these surrogate
characters each week and it's something we commented on, it helps
ground the doctor in the world because he's directly affecting
characters whom we care about.
And those audience identification characters were quite often
lacking in the later Peter Davidson and Colin Baker eras.
I think, you know, the closest I can think of in trial is kind of
Janet.
And even then, you know...
Splendiferous coffee.
Even then she's very sketchily drawn.
Yeah, exactly.
And the actress brings something to it to make it more than what
it is.
Yeah, exactly.
You know, compare Janet to Susan Q. In happiness patrol.
There is no comparison and it's not.
I mean, Leslie Dunlop is a great actress, but I think Yolanda
Palfrey.
So it's a great job with, as you say, very little.
And I think that would be the problem with keeping Mel on, as much
as I love Bonnie, and as much as I love Mel.
I do think that it would have made the series more insular again.
Okay.
So, of course, her replacement is Sophie Aldred's ace thoughts
comments.
I'm not convinced that she's the best actor to ever play a
companion on Doctor Who.
I'm with you on that one Again, like we said with the doctor
there's been some attempt to think about what this character's
going to be like.
And she is still a very sort of TV version of an 80s teenager.
Yeah, but it is still much closer to being grounded than anyone
has been for ages, you know.
Like maybe since Tegan.
Yeah, you know, I think also there is a comparison to be made to
Sarah Jane Smith.
And of course, during the production of this at one of the many
Doctor Who junkets that JNT, like to send the actors to.
Sophie Aldred and Elizabeth Slayton met.
And Sophie Aldred said to Elizabeth Slayton, oh my god, it's so
good to meet you.
I'm, you know, I'm trying to bring what you did in the show and
I'm such a fan of it and Elizabeth Swade and turned to her and
said, but darling, you're doing so well. you're out there beating
up Daleks and explosions and I think you're wonderful, which is a
lovely story, but I think it is just like Sarah Jane was a TV
version of a feminist with a career.
Yeah.
Yeah, it's the same kind of thing.
It's very broad strokes.
I think possibly by the 80s we were ready for more sophisticated
characterisation, which would have included the accent and even
Sophie's gone on to say, of course, that she would have played it
a little less.
Tish.
I always put that out of my head.
I was actually thinking she's the really only likeable companion
since the last upper middle-class character, which was Romano.
You know what?
Yeah, I mean, I mean, did you like any of the ones in between?
That's the thing.
You say you like Mel now, but she wasn't really a rounded.
She was just a cypher.
Yeah, the companions between Romana and Ace really range from
being unlikeable to inoffensive and it's because we've snobs and
we only like upper middle-class companies.
I love Tegan, so you can both shut up.
The thing is, I do kind...
Yeah, possibly with the exception of Tegan, who I think, you know
it shows real vulnerability as well as as well.
And, you know, I like Turlow.
I like Nissa.
I have a soft spot for Adric, but I don't think he's particularly
well written or mostly well played.
Nicola Bryant does the best she can do with really quite an
obnoxious character.
Well, I don't think she's obnoxious.
I think the way she's treated is obnoxious.
Yes, you know, that's upsetting.
And in fact, the more likeable she is, the more horrific the way
that she's treated seems.
Yeah, maybe I could actually say that this is the 1st companion
since Romana treated with respect by the production.
Yeah, I'd agree with you there because, you know, even even Turlo
who got a really good intro on a really good outro just gets
locked in cupboards whinging.
There's a title.
Rockting cupboards whinging.
It might be me after I go through season 24.
Yeah, I think Miss Sophie's, or with Ace, is that, you know, she
starts off very much a character concept and very tomboyish.
And by season 26.
In all those stories, she gets to be a woman.
Like, and I know, like, I mean, wear womanly things, not just, um
the tomboy type of things.
And yeah, she's still aggressive and has that strength to it, but
she has this other side, this maturity, I think.
And I think what's important there is, as you say, she starts off
as the vision of a tomboy, whereas by season 26, she is combining
societal, masculine and feminine expectations.
Does she ever actually escape the confines of the comic book?
She does feel like a Lee Sullivan sketch of an Alan Moore
character.
She's very late 80s comic.
Sorry, graphic novels.
It a proper art form. action figures, not dolls.
There's that moment in Curse of Fenwick, where the doctor is
slightly disappointed by the fact that she wants to go and look
after Kathleen and the baby and he sort of objects.
He says, you know, you once would have dropped everything for a
little bit of excitement and she goes off to look after them.
And I think that that is fantastic.
And if we'd had Mel being the heart of the show, she wouldn't have
had the opportunity to do that, that's sort of proper maturity.
I like that Yeah, it's what we will see later in the new
adventures where they turn Ace into, quote, hardened space bitch
unquote.
Oh so bad.
It's such an awful misunderstanding of the character.
And yeah, that's the thing.
It would have been Ace was all action, all drawn, all guts, all
beating people up, but instead she gets to have a heart and she
gets to have emotion.
And, you know, I can't quite put my finger on it, but there's
something about her costume in survival with the red blouse and
the black jeans and Chesterton school tie as a belt.
Go back and have a look.
Is it green and black?
I think it is.
You know, with her bomber jacket as well.
It makes her look so much more grown up than she did in
Dragonfire.
It's this kind of weird thing of, you know, back in Dragon Pie, we
discussed it.
She doesn't really look 16, but it's like you put her, a picture
of her in Dragonfire up against a picture of her in survival and
you're like, you know what?
That could be 2018.
Definitely.
I think that, um, this character and the growth and what you see
there is something that we see in the new series with the
companions, whether they're there for a season or two.
Is there some sort of arc for them and some sort of understanding
whether Martha, for example, standing our own 2 feet and not just
being in love with the doctor and that sort of thing.
And that's very now.
Yeah.
And I think that that was always a good thing.
I'm mystified by people who complain that there are real emotions
instead of just, you know, space guns and people in rubber suits
you know, why do we have to have boyfriends and mothers and
stuff?
I don't understand that criticism at all.
And it does start with A's, who she's still a TV person.
She's not really a proper person, but like they make her the
jumping off point for a number of the stories.
And I think it's a really really good idea.
And also, I think she gets the perfect length to develop her
character.
It's 9 stories here, but if we look at the new series, Martha
Donna, Bill, all really get one season.
So far, we don't know what's happening with Bill in the future, but
they all get one season. stories have a clear beginning, middle
and end.
Whereas if you look at, say, Billy Piper as Rose.
Now she had to stay on for season 2 in order to have some
continuity with Christopher Eccleston leaving.
But by the end of season two, you really want to see her go.
Yeah, you do. tooth and claw.
But the whole point of their characterisation in the 2nd season
they said this is, you know, the doctor and rows are getting too
big for their boots. to be brought down a bit.
Amy and Rory ending that 1st season with their wedding and it's
triumphant is wonderful.
And then look what happens in season 6.
And then look what happens.
The ridiculous stupid ending in season 7 that makes no logical
narrative or emotional sense with being stuck in New York.
For God's sake, get on a boat.
Clara.
Clara's ending in last Christmas is perfect.
You know, she's had a, she's had a long life.
You know, she kind of says, I never found another man to love
after Danny or the doctor, but I had a brilliant life and I
travelled and I've had fun and that's lovely compared to what we
get in series nine, which is still dramatically interesting.
But I think that sort of length of a character is good.
And remember, Sophie and Andrew Cartman have said, she would have
only stuck around for another half season.
And they had planned her ending.
She was going to go to Gallifrey and stir up the time lords, which
for a script editor who's like, we're getting away from the time
lords and we're getting away from Gallifrey is very interesting.
But I think what it would then open up is a few years later, you
can bring a lord president, Dorothy Dravatrelunda.
You know, but yeah, I think the reason she's so good is because
they're like, we don't have much time.
We've only got 14 episodes a year, we've only got 4 stories.
We need to give our leads something to do, and the best thing to
do is just show them growing as people and caring about each
other.
And you go through the companion and I don't think it's ever been
as much growth in a companion in the classic series as this
character.
We've had the Mara stuff with Tegan, but then when you look back
Joe did grow, but it's just not quite the same as what this is and
centuring it around her story.
Yeah.
Well, I mean, even if you look at Joe's growth, Joe doesn't grow
that much in her 1st season.
I've met Cody, she's tiny.
You know, even in the Damons, where she, where she throws herself
up and says, you know, take me instead.
She was doing that back in Terror of the Autons.
It's her, it's her last 2 seasons, 10 stories, where she actually
grows and uses her escapology course and uses her karate and
knocks out guards and takes on giant maggots and things like
that.
Yeah, I think sort of that story length, 10 storylines is a really
good, is a really good length for a companion.
And look at big finish.
Big Finish did a few solo stories with Ace and the 7th doctor and
then straight away introduce another companion, Hex, but really
he's Ace's companion.
Hex and the doctor don't have, they have a relationship.
They don't have much for a relationship.
It's more about the relationship between Hex and Ace.
See, my thing is it had the series going on for another season.
You know, I feel that they've sort of wrapped up Ace's story.
What could they really have done with her and I would have been
afraid that they might have decided to kill her off, which I think
would have been appalling.
Where could she go from there?
Do you know what I mean?
Like, I really think they needed to have a new companion.
I know, of course, big finish have done this season 27 that never
was.
Birth Charmers's Reign.
But, you know, I've tried to listen to 2 of those things and I've
just gone, this, to me, just doesn't flow with what I, I don't
know in my head or what was going to happen next and I've just
given up.
It's fascinating because, of course, I'm doing my new adventures
blog.
And, of course, bread.
I've read Warhead by Andrew Cartmel, and he has very interesting
ideas about narrative.
Narrative Structure.
I think that's part of the problem with those big finish season 27
stories is that Cartmel has a very heavy hand in them and I think
he's a writer who is a really good script editor.
Like he really works well with writers and honing their ideas.
But I don't think he's necessarily as good a writer as he is a
script editor.
Warhead.
I really enjoyed reading, but I was frustrated because it's kind
of like, literally, I think it's 50 or 60 pages before the doctor
or ace appear.
That's a new adventures trove.
But it's also an SF writing trope, and we have come to this show
via media and film and other and other TV shows, but we haven't
really talked about science fiction writing.
And really, I'd say Kartmall is a big fan of Neil Stevenson's work
Kryptonomicon, which absolutely is about the Turing period.
Well, it's got tearing in it.
And also Werner Vinge, Werner Vinge, who was winning lots of Hugo
and Nebula Awards back in the day.
Big soaps about big characters doing very complex things with
other boys, and the girls that would come along would be feisty
and fun and interestingly racially mixed and not wearing terribly
much, and like Lara, blah, blah, comic.
That's the one, Lara Flynn Boyle slashcroft.
They're all the same.
But yeah, these boys were reading books by other straight boys
about things like this, and it is very much based in science
fiction.
Good, very good science fiction writing.
Kim Stanley Robinson is another one with his Mars series.
So, yeah, that it's Stronghandecedents.
It's just not things that probably most people who are listening
to this podcast are indeed watching Doctor Who necessarily go to.
Doctor Who is not, I feel at base, a totally guns SF fan base.
No, not at all.
Red Dwarf would have more of that than we do.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
So, Nathan, you mentioned that like we've had all these new
writers.
So putting it out to the team, is there a writer that you believe
stands out in this era?
Oh, I might jump in.
Yeah, yeah.
Let's open anybody.
We're all staring at Nathan now, aren't we?
You know, as much as Ghost Light is probably my favourite sylve.
I think I think I might say Stephen Wyatt is the writer who really
stands out for me this season because he's camp as things on a
bull, isn't he?
But, you know, Paradise Towers, even if the execution doesn't work
the script in its purest form straight away gets to what Cartmel
wants to do.
He wants to do social commentary with jokes and grotesque
characters.
And he talks like Charles Hawtrey in the interviews.
What's not to like?
And you know, then we've got greater show in the galaxy.
And Cartmel has confirmed that, yeah, Stephen Wyatt would have
probably come back again.
The only reason he wasn't in season 26 is his only 4 stories a
season. wouldn't that have been amazing?
Yeah.
Cartwell kind of says he literally could have done season 27 with
4 completely new writers that he had on his books, including Robin
Mukerji, who wrote a storyline for a three-parter called Elixion.
And whose solo went to number one when the NRL played them last
week on iTunes, yeah.
You had Robert Perry and Mike Tucker, who later wrote the book
Illegal Alien.
Yes, their proper guns, boys, aren't they?
That was pitched for season 26.
And what happened was Ben Aronovic was giving them notes on it and
said, I've just found out Cartmel's looking at a World War 2
drama.
If you put this in there, you know, it's not going to get
through.
Submit it for season 27.
And we know what happened there.
But yeah, for me, Stephen Wyatt, I think, really captures the
spirit of this era.
So it's Stephen Wyatt, Ian Briggs, and Ben Aronovic, who write 2
stories each for this era.
Yes.
Then you got Mark Malcolm Cole.
Graham Curry.
Graham Curry, Pipin Jane, Kevin Clark, and Rona.
Monroe.
I think that Ronan Monroe's script is the best script of the era.
In some senses anyway.
I think it's complex and interesting.
It's high, it's high art complex stuff.
I don't know visually it comes across as the strongest story or I
don't even think viewer satisfaction.
It's the most compelling to watch.
No, and there is a lot of sort of standing around spouting poetry
at each other.
Much like our action figures do in our own quiet performances, do
they not, Brendan?
Yes.
Little window into our lives there, dear listener.
Shut up So I'm thinking Aronovic. who manages to take sort of
elements of Doctor Who Law, like Unit and the Brigadier and the
Daleks.
Proper bugger them sideways.
We do interesting things with them.
As you might prefer to put it.
Yes.
Aaronovich is just superb.
And he's messy.
He's a really messy man in everything that he does and he's riding
everything else and the way he talks. love him.
That novelisation of remembrance is spectacular.
And it got recognition at the time as an SF book.
Yeah.
And, you know, it helps launch the new adventures.
It helps make us think that we can do original Doctor Who fiction
not based on the TV show once it ends.
And Battlefield is a mess, but I think that's mostly the
production and not the script at all.
I think it was too optimistic.
So I think there is some problems with the script, like having a
helicopter ride that goes on for...
There's a lot of great set pieces, but I think it needed...
There's a lot of standing around in medium shot yelling at each
other.
I mean, that's the production, isn't it?
But I think I'm not convinced the Cardinals are great script
editor in the sense that he can get a script and produce a series
of 25 minute episodes.
Do you mean hands on?
That's true.
Yeah.
There's a lot of stuff here. 30, 35 minute episodes.
Yeah, well, this is us true.
But are you saying, as he is systematically or as he is simply in
the performance of production, or are you saying as an ideas man?
Oh, no, I think he's a great ideas, man, I think he commissions
great stories.
I think he has a really good idea of where the show's going.
But I just mean the kind of nuts and bolts of, you know, all of
the scripts run long.
You know, there's all kinds of pacing problems all over the
place.
It's how they do it now. a dramaturk.
If he were working for an opera company or a theatre production
company, his role is very much defined.
They needed a 3rd wheel.
They needed someone else to actually be script editor.
Yeah, when you consider how the new series does it.
You have your executive producer, who's your executive producer
your head writer, and really, what we would call the script editor
now, whereas the script editor role on the new series is that 3rd
person who goes, right, I need to get this down to 50 minutes as
well as providing technical notes and saying, this is logical
inconsistency, et cetera, et cetera.
But, yeah, I have to agree, Battlefield's, the script for
Battlefield is great.
And like you said earlier, Richard, the speech about the child
looking up into the sky and their eyes turning to cinders.
And there's also lovely moments in there, like when Bambera can't
find the keys and Anselm figures out that's what she wants and she
still says, no, that's not what I wanted.
Yeah, any scene with the 2 of them.
I think that story creates a world that's really a fun place.
It does feel like a day out at school. doesn't it?
It's a lovely excuse.
It's really enjoyable, but I think the production is a horrific
mess.
It was fun at the time though.
I think it's a really good choice.
I think he's he's a good Doctor Who, right?
I think so. agree with you.
Look, I'm going to choose Graham Curry as a one-off because I just
think that story is just sublime.
Happiness Patrol. is my favourite of the era.
I thought it was going to be Ghostlight, but it's not.
Well, I, look, I'm, you know, my favourite period of the year.
I'm just going to put up the silver tinsel tree and stick silver
nemesis on the top of it because I don't care. really enjoy it.
No, no.
I mean, this is the lovely thing about the mixed lolly bag is that
there is something no matter what you want and you can put that
one aside and enjoy it later if you don't.
It's extraordinary that in just 12 stories, we've got such a
complete range of ideas.
I think the closest rider who's come next to it.
I know he's, you know, you can argue fast superior writer, but
Philip Pullman does things with tone.
He's got his new ones out, the new of the dark materials. his next
trilogy.
Yeah, 1st one's just out.
That's my pick But of the week. the turnality and the
differences.
And Kartmore really understood what a show needed to be.
I just wish we'd had another either extended seasons with the old
budgets and more time or just another 2 or 2 or 3 seasons with
these people would have just been lovely to see where they went.
Sylvester's costume changes over the time.
And so we have the initial one with the wrong scarf and then we've
got the season 25 costume with question mark umbrella.
Then we've got season 26 with the darker coat and the pullover.
Then we've got the linen suit in the books.
And then we've got the telly movie, that costume in the hair.
So which one of all of those?
So I missed any costumes?
Which one of which one do you think?
I don't like on a costume?
Because I think in the end it's less of a costume like Peter and
Colin.
It's, you know, he can wear it around the place and not look like
a complete. was the idea, wasn't it?
From a distance.
It's only when you get up close.
I love the season 26 one with the overcoat. the dark.
I love the duffle coat.
Yeah, yeah.
I think it's a relief not to have a jacket that goes to your
knees.
You know, like we've had that for so long.
Look, I don't think the costume works.
It's got a nice sort of 50s and this mid-20th century thing to
it.
It isn't Collins costume, but like I hate the question mark
pullover and watching survival, like he just about passes, doesn't
he?
Oh, in the street, in the street. you know, and the trousers are a
nice kind of hark back to sort of trout and I guess.
So, you know, like I don't think it's super offensive.
I still think, though, the problem of the era where we're sort of
proleptically designing the action figure when we design the
doctor's costume.
I think that's a problem.
I think they were still doing it with Matt Smith.
Of that final season, Matt Smithing was ridiculous.
It was such a fan art idea and put him in purple because, you know
that's what all fans into, you know, some of us here as well.
It's what we all kind of favour.
Yeah, so everyone's looking at me.
But yeah, I think designing is always the wrong idea.
It should be brickolage.
Pete's idea was correct.
But it was Silv's hat.
And the fair aisle idea.
You know, he walked in with that Christie Panama hat.
And the lovely, the Ferrari thing.
I actually love the telly movie idea, even though it's the San
Francisco designers or, you know, the US designer's idea of what
an English gentleman looked like.
I just really like it.
But I love the silhouette and I love that.
No, it's gorgeous.
Love it.
I'd wear it.
Yeah, the telly movie is exactly what Silv wanted the...
He said.
Like, he said, you know, a waistcoat instead of instead of the
question mark, pull over.
He might have been happy with the time.
It was, and Armani needed time. yeah, lovely.
But don't forget, Armani also designed for Blade Runner in 81.
They were his.
So those little knitted overcheck.
Right.
Oh, okay.
Um, in terms of the costume.
Silv has said, I mentioned earlier, the whole thing about, he
signed on for a 3rd year, but knew that that obliged him for a
4th.
Well, the way he rationalised that to himself is right at the end
of year three.
I'm going to say to them, right, I've agreed to do your 4th year.
We're getting rid of the question mark pull over.
So in the last season, he would have had a fair, fair aisle
pullover or a waistcoat or something like that.
He loved the umbrella.
He thought the umbrella was actually subtle and it is.
He said it's his idea whether or not that's the case, but because
you know, if you put your hand over the joint, it doesn't look
like a question mark.
Personally, as a kid, I never had a problem with the pullover.
I don't particularly have a problem with it now because as you say
it's that thing of from a distance.
You can't see there's anything strange about it.
And even close up, you're looking at self's face.
So it's like a surrounding detail that you'll notice that, for me
anyway, that you'll notice later.
I know a lot of people say they just can't get past it.
And it does go against the bricolage idea of that is bespoke.
You're not just going to find it somewhere.
But everything else is bricolage, like the field jacket and the
duffle code, of course.
The accent.
Doing it now.
The hat, the trousers, the shoes. must have own teeth.
You know, so I think the reason the pullover kind of works is that
everything else around it, while eccentric is essentially a normal
piece, which you put it together and it creates something
strange.
What do you think about the question?
Well, actually, sorry, your question was favourite version of the
costume?
Season 26.
Yeah.
But I can I can digit a pullover like for the waistcoat from the
telly movie quite happily.
Yeah.
I'm happy when he gets rid of the mashed up season 24 hat and just
gets a hat that hasn't been mashed up.
And so, you know, sometimes when he puts his hat on in season 24
it's so mashed up that he just looks like an idiot, the Paradise
Towers, there are a couple of really atrocious hat moments.
But I have to agree with Alan Waring, who tries to get rid of the
hat and the umbrella, you know, at the 1st possible opportunity
and so he doesn't wear them in ghost light because he's not an
animal and he's inside.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
But also, very interestingly, it goes like, he waits to take them
off until a servant takes them because that's what you do in
polite society.
It's not your responsibility to take your hat off.
It is the host's responsibility to have a servant take your hat
part of the welcoming, right?
That's why I'm still wearing my hat now, Brendan.
Yeah, but that's because I don't like you.
I do like the cherries though.
I think they're quite become it.
Yeah, no, it was Missy's idea.
May week was in June.
I think I'm going into a food coma after eating.
I'm only halfway through.
The cake.
The cake job.
Okay.
Don't panic.
This podcast.
I guess I need to drag myself back into some sort of, um, not food
coma and I'll have to talk about season 24.
I had promised to rant.
I don't feel like doing a rant because I'm in a room with people
who love this and I'm feeling very...
That should just be encouraged.
This is a safe space.
This is a safe space. can I walk back?
I think that we were enthusiastic about those stories, and I think
that for me, season 24 came as a relief because it was doing
things the show hadn't done before.
And and I agree with you.
There's a huge relief that it's no longer sober, and it's no
longer 14 episodes.
And that's obvious in the 1st 2 episodes of the season.
And I really like...
I like Hadamara playing Mel, which I didn't like as a kid, and the
doctor having amnesia for those bits.
I hate all the pratforms and the spoon playing.
We get to the scene where the doctor meets Mel for the 1st time.
And I know Brendan loves that sequence, but I think it's one of
the worst sequences ever perpetrated by a lead actor and actress
in the history of Doctor Who.
And from that moment, I actually really enjoy it too.
From that, it's no offence.
Of course not, dying. enjoying this.
But from that moment on, the whole story just falls apart for me.
I don't like the big performance of the Rani.
I just want to get that nose ring and rip it out of her nose.
I hate her TARDIS.
The, the, the, the pet traps really hurt.
The tet traps, I just are a waste of space, wider their eyes
connect to scanners.
I don't know.
They're only really there for the Pip and Jane Baker ending so she
comes showing up in that crap tartar set.
God, I was disappointed that it was not the original one and I
know why it wasn't.
I'm not an advocate for genocide, but, but, but I will say this
that I've never wanted a species to be killed more than the
locertians.
And when and when he falls that foot out, I go to bed at night
dreaming that those bugs in that globe, get a released and they
all just get stung to death.
Like, I don't want that to happen.
Many of us said that at the fan community at the time.
I like his performance. like his performance.
It's good.
My Kona's performance is good.
Farun, I mean, honestly, it's either your daughter or your husband
who was dead there, you stupid woman, just standing there and then
your husband decides to commit suicide because he's a
collaborator.
I just completely disagree with everything else that you guys had
to say on that.
And I just, the last 2 episodes were just combined with the music
almost turgent.
But there's a 7 out of 10 in that 1st part of the story.
Then there's Bonnie Langford.
I would like to go to one language and say, did the director tell
you to look at everybody like they've got a 3rd eye in the middle
of their head throughout the entire story?
the entire story.
Does she not look at anybody in the eye?
I'm going to have to look.
She looks here all the time and I'm going, for God's sake, please
just, just look, look, look, look at them.
I thought we were doing the cave monster.
I do laugh. when all of the Tetrats come out and Mel just keeps
having to scream, scream, and scream, and goes into Bay Assam to
just laugh at that.
And there's a great cliffhanger. one when she's in that bubble.
But of course, I wish to God that it exploded and she's just a
skeleton. that's how I feel.
So, so, but the story has improved dramatically for me.
I just want to say that.
I think there's a 7 out of 10 in there and I really enjoy that 1st
episode and a half .
Again, all the jokes that Sylvester does all the way through to
the end, like they're getting to do all those stupid puns.
It should have just stopped after the amnesia stopped.
It's just terrible.
Okay, so it's time in the money for me.
It's not in my top 3 worst Doctor Who's of all the time.
It's now number five.
I'm going somewhere that should be...
Then we have Paradise Towers.
A really good script.
What the hell the director was thinking. do not know.
The Kangs.
Oh my god, Julie Brennan is just shrill and awful.
I like the other one and she gets better throughout and has a nice
relationship with McCoy.
And again, I've said that I like Sylvester's performance generally
through this.
The music is horrific.
I get a headache.
The lighting is appalling, and I know we're trying to do some
lighting, but God knows it just doesn't work.
Oh, the caretakers, whatever, the residents, whatever. except for
Tabby and Tilda, who I quite like, but not as much as I thought.
I like the one that goes cooey, cooey, like...
She is...
And if this had a different pitch to it, she would be just, oh
amazing.
The cliffhanger with Mel with that bat toasting fork.
Toasting fork?
I have never wanted a moment in Doctor Who history for somebody to
go Game of Thrones on us and just stab her in the throat so that
in the next episode she just drops dead.
I've never wanted it more in my entire life.
I'm inching towards Richard Mel?
I have to say that Pex and Mel completely destroy this story.
What's going on in Paris, Toast Towers?
Well, I can tell you, honey, if we edit out all your scenes in the
corridor and in that lift, it would be just so much better.
You guys mentioned the stuff about the fact that it was like a
pantomime and she's a pantomime princess and he's like the comic
sidekick.
Well, that's great.
Just doesn't work and it's, it's a horrific performance.
Horrific.
Where am I going with this?
I'm going with this breath.
No, no, no.
I'm not even there yet.
Oh, Richard Bryce.
Well, I mean, if that doesn't take the cake, I don't know what
does.
He is just appalling throughout the entire thing.
Yeah, we did say that.
I agree with you.
But it's the tone.
Everybody's tone is different.
And I do think that, for me, the biggest disappointment here is
the fact that the script is good and I can recognise that and
recognise it in the book and it's just the performances and I just
really dislike Melon Pecks, just take the cake.
And again, you love the scene where he rips that thing off the
wall and I just kind of go, are you kidding me?
My eyes are rolling and I just want this thing to stop.
And you know, I respect you for, and I can understand, but it's
just like, like, this is now on the pedestal of the, it's going
for gold in the 3 worst Dr. 2 stories of all time.
Who's the director?
Nicholas Mallon.
But what else does Nicholas Mallard do?
The curse of Benrik.
Yeah, yeah.
And is it because he's out of the studio that suddenly he... and
he does and he also does Mysterious Planet.
You know?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
So it's like Peter Moffat on location is so much better.
Except in 2 doctors.
Okay, go on.
So that, so now I like one episode and the other 7 so far. crap.
All right.
Delton the Bundman.
This, when it came out in 997 became my gold standard of the most
hated Drop 2 story of all time.
And it held that banner for like, 1987, probably 15 years, 16
years.
You refused to buy the DVD.
I refused to buy the DVD. refused.
I would have I just refused.
Didn't James buy it for you in the end of four.
Someone gave it to me, I'm sure.
Anyway, the worst thing about children's Batman. is Delta and the
Bannerman.
She is so shrill.
I just want her to die.
In fact, I'm not an advocate for genocide, but again, but I just
want the shimmer dead.
I want her and her child to be destroyed.
I could not agree with Gavrock more.
I agree with Richard where he says, Oh, Billy, I mean, he's just a
waste of space.
But you were saying like they were going to eat him.
I actually had it the other way around where he takes that stuff
and becomes like Mark Gatis in that doctor episode where it
becomes that whole scorpion thing just to consume them.
Oh my god, I hate that woman so much.
Then flames.
Then you've got, you've got the Bannerman.
The moment they stick out their tongues. just want to reach for a
bucket.
And then you were telling us, Brendan, that it was Gavrock's idea
Don Henderson.
I can't stand him.
He looks like he's from an old person's home where he's been
allowed to sit in his own faeces and I just...
I just can't.
And when he speaks out that piece of ham, I'm just thinking, oh, my
God, just die.
And that old beekeeper.
That beekeeper.
I just have all of this manuka honey to fall all over him and put
a 1000 bees to sting him to death.
Does he have to hammer it home one more 2nd that she's going
through some sort of metamorphosis?
I don't know.
And on top of all of that, people.
You then got the worst incidental score in the history of Doctor
Who.
I know you love it, Nathan, but I just think it just, it adds no
suspense, nothing, nothing at all to the show, and I discovered I
really hate late 1950s rock music.
I like 1960s pop so much more.
So throughout this entire production of Delta and the Man, these
things, in my face that I'm going, I know why I hated this.
You still give it a solid 8 though. don't they?
Give it a six.
Six.
But, and this is what I discovered when I last watched it.
Ken Dodd is fantastic.
Yes.
It really is.
Burton is one of the best characters in the history of Doctor Who
and I just adore him to death.
And the other person who I think is just stunning is the bus
driver Murray.
Horrific end.
He's lovely.
He's just lovely.
He is the biggest revelation.
And those 3 people.
And one other, keep me watching this show.
Oh, who's the other?
Bonnie Langford.
I think it's her best performance.
I agree.
And episode one, that outfit, everybody goes on about the other
one, the denim one, but that blue and white thing that she's
wearing is just stunning.
It's super on trend for 1987.
She's so good.
Unfortunately, she gets to scream at a green baby and she gets
saved again.
Yes.
And she gets to say that immortal light.
I never won anything before in my life, making her such a loser.
I hate it when TV coaches do that.
I hated this story for so long.
And then we did watch it together.
And I did find myself enjoying it.
And those aspects when I rewatched it this time came through.
So it's this thing that you guys were saying about the tone of
this season, the inconsistency in performance and tone.
I really have a problem with.
And for me, incidental scores actually really set a tone for all
things and not having, and I think that actively works against
more enjoyment, I think.
Three stories in a row with Kev McCulloch's music.
I mean, you I know you really love the Delta.
Well, I'm not sure I don't like that.
But I don't.
And so it really, by that point, you know, it's really, really
tough.
We then get Dragonfire, and I agree with you all that it's not the
best script.
In fact, I really don't like a lot of the cafe scenes and that
woman and that little girl.
I've never wanted the ogre back more.
You get my meaning and fans true fans will.
But it's much more consistent in tone in terms of the villains.
And I like Kane, and like all of his henchmen, they all have some
sort of little story, all those cards, and you get that.
I like the autumn water mix of Mel and Ace.
And Brendan, you talked about the I spy stuff and all those
sequences.
I just chuckle through them. fantastic.
Um, Sylvester's generally good except when he doctor decides to
commit suicide and then climb all over um, glitz, which I just
roll my eyes going, please.
So for me, it wins out for the season because it's more consistent
2 other aspects that I've mentioned is the incidental score.
And I just think it's phenomenal in this and it knits this story
together, right?
It really does.
And the other thing is, is Tony Serby is several on glitz.
I used to dismiss him as glitz light, but he's just got a warmth
team and in every scene that he's in, I just watch him and he
brings it all together.
Sylvester is still trying to find where he's at.
Sophie's new at it.
Bonnie's dealing with, well, you know, the character that is no
character.
And there's just something about him in this.
So, in the end, no, I don't really like watching a lot of it.
Yes, I can watch it, right?
Thank God it's not Eric Saywood. thank goodness we don't have to
sit through 14 episodes for no resolution.
We get changes every 4 weeks.
I can see glimpses of Sylvester.
The fact that we don't have the past.
Jonathan Turner allows, Cardinal and the team.
They don't get it right.
Sometimes you miss the ball's eye, but you eventually will hit.
And it will hit for the next 2 years, and especially the next
story.
Sorry, I do apologise if I've offended anybody in my rant.
You know, Dr. Manarin is no longer my worst, least favourite Dr
Story of Time.
It probably is in the bottom 10 because of various things, but
there's characters in there that I enjoy.
I mean, I think that season 24, as we said, is a relief, and I
think script wise, it's just streets ahead of anything we've had
for years.
But the show at this time, it's only 14 episodes a year.
It's shot entirely on videotape.
It really does take on a children's television aesthetic.
And certainly, I've said this on the podcast before, that I was
horrified by the 1st episode of Time and the Rani when I 1st
watched it on broadcast, because in Australia, it was 5.30 in the
afternoon, remember, it just seemed like a children's show set on
a game show set, you know, and...
Yeah, and I agree.
And I thought it was horrific, and I thought, I can now see what
Monnie Langford is trying to do in all those sequences.
She's given the worst dialogue ever, and she's trying to inject
life and stuff into it with Icona.
And previously they had superseded her and Pex.
But now I can see what she's trying to do.
Yeah, no, I think he's very good.
Yeah, I think he is.
And so, you know, like I think it's production problems more than
anything else and it's teething issues.
But just there's so little cannibalism in that sense.
You know, and and there's...
There is crochet.
We're not looking backwards.
No, we're looking outwards.
Yeah, yeah.
There's a relief.
When you watch, you bring back the emotions you had at that time
as well, and I'm fighting those.
Yeah, yeah, smarting from Collins dismissal.
Yeah, yeah.
And so when you see a script like Paradise Towers and you know
what it could be.
Yeah.
I think another thing is, you know, we talked about, well, I
talked about with Bonnie being kind of a return to 1st principles
of, you know, what is it, what is a companion?
What is their function in the show?
A problem the show has had since Douglas Adams is it's trying to
appeal to children and it's trying to appeal to adolescents and
it's trying to appeal to adults.
And I think in the 80s it started to skew things more towards the
appealing to adults.
No, I think it's appealing towards to like teenage boys.
Yep, fair enough.
But that's the thing.
Until season 24.
It's been a few years since we've had something that appeals to
children 12 and under.
But I think it's also appealing to adults.
Like, I think that your parents wouldn't watch the Colin Baker era
because it's all space corridors and kind of unmotivated cruelty.
This, I think the, the, um, the Delta and the Bannerman is
precisely the sort of thing that you could watch with your mom.
Yeah, absolutely.
But I think what they do with Time and the Rani is.
Andrew Cartmel kind of writes time in the Rani off, he's like, look
I can't really put my stamp on this.
You know, we're too deep into scripting it.
So time and the Rani is squarely aimed at children.
Being frank.
And I watched it when I was seven.
It was perfect.
Very quickly.
We start getting into Doctor Who where, right?
something for the kids and there's something for the teenagers and
there's something for mum and dad just like it was with Tom
Baker.
And I think by Delta they do hit that.
Well, I think one of the ways that we see the show inching towards
the new series is that the new series becomes family viewing again
and it's not just the sort of thing that bookish teenagers want to
watch.
And point of controversy that I often have with dear JR Southall
over at Blue Box, is I do wonder in the last 2 seasons of Peter
Capaldi, how much is in there for children?
You know, it's, the general viewer.
It's going to be a big challenge for the new showrunner
considering his comments on record, back in 1986 regarding Peter
Jane Baker on the state of the show.
Because he doesn't want that to come around and bite him in the
bum.
Yeah, well, as I said, you know, Chris Gibble takes the advice.
If you don't like it, you drive very seriously.
Okay, so top 3 stories.
Mind changes each week.
I would have to put happiness patrol up there.
I would have to put Greater Show in the Galaxy up there.
I would.
Uh, I'm kind of inclined to put ghost line up there, but that
obviously leaves some really incredible stories that I haven't
even mentioned, you know, there's more than 3 stone cold classics
here.
And ask me next week and it'll be different.
Are they the best ones or the ones I enjoy the most?
No, the 2nd one.
I think the ones that I had the most fun with, one from each
season, I'll be I'll partition it that way.
The ones that I had the most fun with at the time and still do.
Delta and the Bannerman, Silver Nemesis.
I just love it. so much fun.
I laugh all the way. really do.
I would stick it on my Christmas tree in whatever metaphor you
want.
I really do. just adore it.
I even find Battlefield a lot of fun to watch, but I think Fenwick
just because it's set in World War 2 and everything about it is
beautifully made.
But if you're going to say, what's the most fun for me of the 3rd
season?
Um, yeah, it's probably bad. is incredibly fun.
My personal top three, and it's not necessarily stories, I give 10
out of 10 two, but actually, I'm going to do what Richard did
which is one from each season.
So, Ghostlight, which I just think is sublime, and even with the
stuff cut out, but still works, unlike Fenrick, uh, greater show
in the gallery.
No, sorry, sorry, happiness patrol.
Happiness patrol for the 2nd season. so angry and sad and +and
angry.
Again, and...
Look, for the 1st season, this one is entirely subjective, it's
time in the Rani.
Yay.
It's by no means the best story of that season.
You're a little person.
I was a little person.
It's still not that big.
And it's the, it's when I pressed record for the 1st time.
Oh, that's why.
That's the thing.
I have memory of being like 10 centimetres away from the screen
and pressing the button and just sitting there while Mel got
diffused from the bubble until my mum came into the room and told
me to get back from the television.
Like, just because that cliffhanger, I'm like, I need to know.
I've been at school all day.
What's happened?
Yeah, so those are my three.
Time and the Rani.
So time in the Rani for the nostalgia, happiness patrol for the
politics and ghostlight fruits script.
All right, my top 4 are in this order, coming forward.
Coming 3rd ghost light, coming 2nd remembrance of the Daleks and
1st Happiness Patrol.
They are sublime, and I can barely fault.
Any of them.
Yeah, it's amazing that that's the 1st time.
Anyone's side of remembrance because that's the one we always go
back and watch.
Yeah.
Yeah, I think with me with remembrance.
It's kind of like, that's a given.
Yeah, it's actually too easy.
Okay.
Bottom three.
Oh, okay.
Planet of the bottoms, curse of the fatal bottoms.
They sound great.
Yeah, no, it's everyone we know.
Don't have to give bottom 3 if you don't think there is.
No, I'm going to do one from each season again.
So I'm going to say Dragonfire, not because it's actually bad, but
just because I think that evenness of tone that it has compared to
everything else makes it less interesting. interesting in itself.
Second season, it's silver nemesis, which I've said before.
Again, I don't think it's bad.
It still gets a 6 out of 10 from me, but just it's surrounded by
so much good stuff.
God, the last season this is hard.
Look, I can't pick, but it's between Battlefield for poor
execution and Fenrick for poor editing.
I think, yeah, it probably goes to Battlefield because even the
special edition of Battlefield doesn't get around the Poor
Direction, whereas the special edition of Fenrick solves the
problems with the editing.
So, yeah, Dragonfire, Silver Nemesis, Battlefield.
I think my bottom 3 are probably coincident with Richard's top
three.
I would have to say that I probably actually would have to agree
with Brendan, in that I think probably Dragonfire is the worst of
the era, just because it's in essential, not because it's poorly
made or offensive in any way.
But just that it is kind of forgettable.
And then I think Silver Nemesis is a mess and not necessary in a
season that has remembrance of the daleks.
And then battlefield is so spoiled by the direction and the music
as Todd said last week that it's my least favourite of that
season.
But they actually...
Like Bo Silver Nemesis and Battlefield are enjoyable to watch.
And I think if you have an era, yeah, if you have an era where
there, your turkeys.
Do you know what I mean?
then you're doing pretty well, I think.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Like, I agree with you.
I enjoy battlefield, but it has a lot of faults.
Yeah, yeah.
But I'm not going to put into my bottom three.
Nemesis, I just can't stand any sequence without fan of Walker and
the skinheads.
I mean, that just, what's his name?
You are the giants and weird.
We are the Superman, whatever, he's just appalling.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Like, you can literally cut...
I'd like somebody out there to actually tell me in terms if you
actually added up the timing for Fiona Walker's on-screen
appearance.
Does that give us one full enjoyable episode to see what it is?
and 2 of Turkey?
It's either that or greater show, which I always find a
disappointment and I really don't like a lot of episode four.
So my bottom 3 are nemesis, time in the Rani and Paradise Towers
in that order.
Okay?
Dalton Madam didn't get there, people. get there.
Well done.
If you have to.
You don't have to.
You can say, you can say you don't want to.
Look, again, it comes down to narrative enjoyment and plotting and
production, and I do actually think the performers in it and
whether that's the directors or whatever, but yeah, I have to do.
I do have to mention Paradise Towers is clunky and difficult to
watch, even though it's so there's so many good things in it.
Um, I agree, Dragonfire, it still has moments that I laugh and
enjoy, but it is clunky again and difficult to watch, perform.
It's mostly down to performances, not meeting the requirements and
they're being big gaps.
Big black holes to fall into.
And the other one is greatest show, simply because I don't think
the performances are really consistent or even working within
their own work and there's a lot of padding.
I agree with you, Richard.
A lot of padding.
It looks so good.
The outside stuff. it does.
It would have worked really well as a three-parter.
You know what I would have loved?
I would have loved an episode where Happiness Patrol went over by
10 minutes and then Greatest Show started.
Like just to just to mess with all the fans.
Like, because I think it later showed being condensed a little bit
and having this a bit more wonderfulness.
It just would have been, you know, but that comes back to script
editing or not script editing.
We do have to wrap things up.
So looking forward to the next year, huh?
which is the Paul Magannia, right?
I remember next year it was like just years and years of waiting
for Doctor Who to come back.
Yeah, well, we're not doing the new adventures.
But are there any expectations going into the town?
Well, I've heard so much coming up with it, I can't wait to see
you know, Seaview, SV, DSS 19, you know, in a sense, 90210
whatever it's going to be.
The next era was watching Star Trek, the Next Generation.
It was, it actually was.
I'm really looking forward to the spider.
Alex, that leaked footage looks amazing.
Is there footage?
I saw the drawings.
There's like a there's like a 52nd VFX reel that's very, very
grainy.
Urah.
I'm glad that they're making Barusa, the doctor's father.
Yes, that can only go well.
I really like the fact that in the new series, the Doctor Who, the
tochlophane, they bring back the chocolate fane from the telemedia
because the chocolate fane are at the beginning of the
television.
Don't you hear their voices?
And, you know, I think, yeah, they've got to redesign the TARDIS
and a pair of wrapping lips on the console with the voice of
Nicholas Courtney is the way to go.
All of these listeners are things that were actually suggested.
That's just rude.
But you know what?
We're a few years away from the 30th anniversary.
So I'm sure we'll get some really great anniversary special that
we can talk about during the telly movie commentary.
God, we're not watching that, are we?
No, no, no.
I'm not doing that to you.
Although...
If I didn't know what was coming.
What I would want is just...
I'd want more of the same.
And that's the 1st time I've said this when you've asked that
question.
You know, because kind of each year of Doctor Who, even if you
haven't been sick of it by the end, which generally you're not, but
it's kind of like, okay, I'm ready for something new now.
You have used your safety word, at least on one account.
We're moving into the genocide. moving in the right direction.
Exactly.
It's like, I just want more of this, even if it's with a new cast
even if it comes back in a few years.
I want a doctor who is mysterious and a bit sad and I want a
companion who is a driving force in the story and has her own
wants and ambitions and desires.
A love of opera and an annoying boyfriend called Brian.
And a trumpet.
Yes.
And a John Lennon haircut.
But yeah, that's my other career.
That's what I want next doctor to have a wig.
Billy's wig was fantastic.
We haven't had a doctor with a wig for a long time.
And I think a big old unconvincing wig would really sell the next
doctor for me.
BBC?
I like some sort of clock.
What kind of clock can we have?
Oh, every different...
An atomic clock?
The most accurate atomic clock in the world.
Maybe some sort of beard that I think it has to be a ginger
beard.
Yes.
Something called Gareth.
Well, listener, that's all the time we have for Alsevist McCoy
retrospective, but we'll be back next week, watching the Bloody
Telly movie.
I can't tell you how exciting it was 21 years ago.
Does it hold up?
Come back and find out.
Spoiler alert?
No.
This is, I might or might not be back depending on, if I'm locked
being locked in a cupboard after this.
Well, we're just a bit worried about whole genocidal thing, Tot.
You can find us online at flightthroughentirety.sexy, flight
through entirety on Facebook and Apple Podcasts and at FTE podcast
on Twitter.
Do leave us a review over on Bondfinger.
That is bondfinger.com, bondfinger on Facebook and Apple Podcasts
and at bondfingercast on Twitter.
Gentlemen, nominations for your Sylvester McCoy commentaries
please.
I'm going to nominate time in the Rani.
Golly, Silver Nemesis, obviously.
That's awesome.
I'm going to nominate the Happiness Patrol.
God, somebody's done something of quality because I'm going to
nominate battle fool.
So that is the Happiness Patrol.
Battlefield, Silver Nemesis, and Time and the Rani.
So do vote on that on our website.
But until next week, may nobody play the spoons on your cleavage.
Thank you, Sylvester.
Thank you, Sophie.
Thank you, Bonnie, Andrew, and JNT, and thank you all for
listening and good night.
Good night.
See you soon.
Thank you.
That was Flight Through Entirety with Todd Bealby, Nathan
Bottomley, Brendan Jones and Richard Stone.
Theme arrangement by Cameron Lamb, logo designed by Anthony
Wells.
This episode, Advocate for Genocide, was recorded on October the
7th, 2017.
The next episode will be released on November 26th.
We wish to dedicate this episode to the memories of Dudley Simpson
Patty Russell.
Why not pull out your copy of Pyramids of Mars, wrap yourself up
in bandages, and have a go on the Marimba.
The Sylvester McCoy retrospective...
Sorry, retrospective.
Thank you, I can't do that. 7th of October.
Really?