Hello, dear listener, and welcome back to Flight from Entirety, the
only Doctor Who commentary podcast that thinks that nothing is
more festive than widowhood, child labour, and violently
electrocuting a bunch of old white men.
I'm Nathan.
I'm Brendan.
I'm Todd, and I'm a hastily put together copper kettle with one of
Katie Manning's old black stray cats, hand me downs draped all
over it, much like this podcast.
So it's Christmas in July.
Uh, and uh, as is now traditional uh, at Yuletide.
We've all gathered together in order to look at the 2008, I want
to say, Christmas special, which is the next doctor.
So we have taken a bit of a break and we will continue to take a
bit of a break.
We're going to be back later in the year with the rest of the
specials.
But for now, what could be more Christmassy than July and some
sort of faux Victorian stuff and some even faux snow?
Victorian values All right.
So we have our Blu-ray on the menu screen. and I'm going to ask
Brendan to press play and the viewer to press play when I next say
our code word.
And what is our code word?
Our code word is mercy.
So when I next say that word, I want everyone at home to press the
play button, all right, here goes mercy.
We'll need it. we're off.
Yeah, this looks super fake, doesn't it?
Whooshing.
Peter Bush.
Oh, so do we want to talk about what was going to lead into this
at the end of...
Well, drunkenness, I think, about the speed which it appears to
have been written in.
So I think Nathan is referring to the fact that there was a
cliffhanger ending filmed for Journey's end where the doctor is
travelling in the TARD. having dropped Donna off and 2 cybermen
appear behind him.
And he gets to say what, what, what?
And he gets to say, what, what, what?
And the 1st scene of this was then going to be the sidemen fading
away, the doctor realising they were in the vortex and following
them, Russell quite rightly decided to get rid of that before this
was shot.
Um, so, uh, look, I love this opening scene. because the last time
we have seen the doctor, you know, he is heartbroken with what he
has had to do to Donna, and this scene just tells us, you know, we
are not going to have another year, like with Martha, where he's
pining for his lost companion for 13 episodes.
No, we are straight in and we are having fun.
Well, except that we are pining for his companion in this.
We will lace to discover. but you're right And the viewer is?
Well, I mean, how many weeks is it?
Is it months between?
Oh, it's months.
It's now months.
So we're allowed to have forgotten Donna.
Oh, look.
So this is Rosita.
She is absolutely superb.
What do you think Todd?
Yes, I like her a lot.
Rosita.
Yeah.
Oh, and look, it's the new doctor.
It's it's CBS's answer to Dr. Pin Medicine, where you're 1996.
Oh, really?
Well, I'm just saying like if CBS were going to cast somebody, they
would cast David Morrissey in that coach and everything and call
it Doctor Who, time traveller.
I think he works for me.
He's got a very old young face.
Yeah, old face.
No, he's got a very old kind of a classic doctor kind of vibe to
him, you know, it's a big, it's a big performance.
It's a sort of Colin Bake-ish performance.
I think it's a bit Jack D on uppers.
He's got, if you know, the current host of, I'm sorry, I haven't a
clue in everything else that he does.
I like David Morrissey from what I've just seen of all .3 seconds
of him is because he's a lot naughtier and bigger than how he's
playing it.
I think he'd be one of those rambunctious, bit more Tom.
What's his favourite thing you like to do, Dr. Pubs?
like doing pubs?
Oh dear.
Meeting ladies in pubs.
Yes.
That is I want to say it's crap, but I have a cat that does that.
But it's not even a cat, like that is actually quite shocking, that
cyber shade thing.
It feels like Shilly Bassie's comeback. don't know why.
I just think it's...
I just think as an Taryn Woodbeast, that Sidemen had picked up and
then slapped on a mask.
My head pennon is that it is a cat.
Um, but which is why it has has um, brass hands so that it can
climb things.
And so later on it can, you know, drive a hansom cab later.
But the whole cyber kind of process floods it with hormones and
turns it into a person in a sort of gorilla suit.
I haven't seen any of this.
I'd like to think Russell is having a go at the Tyron Woodbeast.
I really liked, and it wasn't just that he wrote it at 3 AM in the
morning after 2 bottles of whiskey.
I also think it didn't turn out the way it originally intended.
And the names cyber shade suggests this, that they were going to
be sort of more ghost.
Raston warrior skin suit thing.
But I mean, this is fun.
This is Christmas and we're already pissed, you know, like this is
fun.
Ow, ow, ow, ow.
And we've got like, you know, we're having David Tennant's bums
you know?
That's really hurting.
We're not going to burn through our... trousers at all.
Yeah.
No, but, you know, like a scene where David Tennant... that
hurts.
Good.
I've wanted that for 3 years.
Morrissey is completely unconvincing as the doctor.
I don't mind it a bit.
No, I think so too.
I think this is the big problem.
He's your dad's idea of who Doctor Who is. exactly.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
He was never going to be the next doctor because he's not cockney
and he doesn't know pop culture and it was never, ever going to be
this.
But I think we didn't know that.
Did we or did we?
No, no, we didn't.
We absolutely didn't.
They kept it under wraps.
As soon as confidential comes out, you know, Russell says, of
course, he was never going to be the doctor, but because we'd just
done this fake out regeneration a few weeks ago.
And because everyone knows that David is leaving by now.
So between that, um, actually, no, it was before, um, Journey's
End went out that it was announced that Tennant was leaving, which
is why that regeneration had such an impact, um, they're playing
with it again here.
And I think Richard, in terms of him being unconvincing, it is, as
Nathan says, because he is the public's idea of what the old
Doctor Who's are.
And to the point that as opposed to tenet, he is very sexless.
And there are a couple of moments here and there where Rosita kind
of looks at him and he's completely oblivious too to any romantic
overtures because he's a classic Doctor Who.
But he said that he actually went and looked at like the 1st 4
doctors.
That's who he studied to come up with this.
But I like the fact that he is so unconvincing because we know
that he's not the doctor and the doctor's half fooled by it, you
know?
Yeah, should we have moments of honesty?
These were the days when several of us were being very careful to
not look at the giveaways, weren't we?
I think Brendan, you and I were.
I thought he was.
You did.
Yeah, well, I didn't believe as such.
Pretty handsome in that shot.
It's dashing.
I mean, he can see incredible.
I can see him coming emerging erectly from a mill pond and
exciting 18th century young ladies in Bordices.
He's a lovely pile, you have, Mr. Arcy.
He is a plausible choice to cast for the next one.
It's a plausible choice.
Yeah.
And he's dashed, and looking, he's doing he's doing scrute.
He's doing pert we stare?
He's kind of lovely.
He's just so enormously Irish.
I'm not being racialist.
He's just enormously Irish.
I actually think that the best thing about him is him being sort
of, you know, a bit lost.
And then later on, I think he does a great job, you know, when he
finds out who he is.
But it does, I mean, this is supposed to be, you know, the hook
for the story, isn't it?
Like it's called the next doctor.
That's what all the publicity was about.
He was appearing on chat shows and people were saying, are you the
next doctor and stuff like that?
Like it was a thing, but I just don't know that it works as a
hook.
Well, maybe initially, but it becomes very obvious that he's not
the next doctor.
Yeah.
I think it's the moment where he says the cyberman landed onto
London or appeared onto London or something.
It's kind of like, you haven't really mastered the whole kind of
lingo thing.
He's a little bit too Victorian, I think.
Well, he's probably hung over.
Oh.
Yeah, something I love about this story is bat cyberman.
The way the cybermen are directed.
There's although there's all those shots from beneath.
We've got the cyber leader with, you know, the black carapace and
brain, brain.
Yep.
Big black Teflon cyber crotch.
Hello.
This is directed by Andy Goddard.
I think this is the only Doctor Who he does, but he does 6
Torchwoods.
Is that why did he not?
Oh, just cause torchwood.
I like that he's doing a lot of interesting woo-woo, as you were
saying.
It feels very much how you would film now rather than even 5 years
ago.
Yeah.
And I think also, possibly part of the reason he doesn't go on to
do more is, of course, very few, if any, um, directors from
Russell's era go on to the Moffatt era, Ashley Way does, I know
who, um, uh, he did Attack of the Grasp.
But I think it's not so much a conscious choice of, I don't want
these people, but more probably more a choice of, I know I want
these people.
Um, so I don't think it's a JNT thing of, I don't want anyone more
experienced than me because I think, you know, Moffat was so
established as a producer that I don't think he would have thought
that.
And of course he gets writers back, certainly, from the Russell
era.
But I think it's probably a matter of Moffatt going, I know, I
know the directors I want to work with and bring them on.
And also people like Eros Lynn have kind of said, you know, when
Russell and Julie went, they were my team.
So I learned as well, et cetera.
Yeah me too.
Yeah.
And certainly no directors from the Moffeteer I have thus far
directed for the Chibnol era.
I think, you know, like, when you take over making a big change to
how the show looks, and both mop it.
Both Moppet and Chiefnell have done that.
So you're going to have your own directors rather than bringing
back people who have a certain style associated with the previous
showrunner.
Well, I think this Sonic joke. love it.
I love it.
Um, I just, I just find this episode so much fun and it, it hangs
on the chemistry between these 2 who had worked together. before
in Blackpool.
The TV series, not necessarily the location.
Yeah.
I'm getting a bit of a vibe that they've both snogged and both
decided to put it behind them and never mentioned it again.
It's that kind of chemistry element, yeah.
Also, girls not getting much of a look in.
No.
So this scene is the one where Russell on the commentary says
actually, this is not our Doctor Who style.
The camera's too, um, you know, it moves too much.
It's a little bit more modern.
This is what we do in torture.
Doctor Who's house style doesn't actually do this.
Yeah, it's all handheld.
Yeah.
It is quite different.
Whereas it's that, you know, stylised hyper real thing that Doctor
Who normally does in this era.
But yeah, I like the uneasiness of this camera work.
It works for the plot because we don't know what's going on and
the viewer themselves are uncomfortable and uncertain, but I don't
know whether that's a conscious creative choice or not.
I think, you know, I think that this is the sort of thing that
Moffatt would have done better than Russell, because all Russell
is going to come up with is it was a tech thing that did it.
Do you know what I mean?
Whereas you would have to think that Moffatt, you know, when he
creates a mystery.
He properly pays it off and does something that, you know, is
incredibly clever, that you feel like you would never have thought
of.
And Russell will Russell said later that as soon as he watched it
on broadcast, he realised what he got wrong about the ending.
Yeah, I love that bit with the pocket watch.
It's just a broken pocket watch.
I still wasn't convinced.
Does anyone else remember their 1st viewing of this?
I do, actually, because it was the 1st episode I viewed when I
moved to the UK.
Oh, and I was at my then boyfriend's house.
Hello, Lee, if you're listening.
His family house, right, because they took me in for Christmas
which was lovely.
On the doorstep in a tiny basket.
He's not...
Dear listener.
He doesn't take up a lot of space.
But yeah, you know, this, this, as Nathan says, we're all, you
know, we're already drunk watching this, this is the perfect
episode to watch in a large crowd of people.
We've had fans and non-fans.
Yes.
Oh, hello.
Yeah.
I'm getting little.
Do you sensing that this is already the 4th album and they're just
trying to go.
They're just going over the highlights and past successes.
Well, no, because I mean, I think this is different from the
previous Christmas specials.
I mean, all of the other previous Christmas specials were set.
What, in earth, like on earth in the present day?
Did I, is that crazy?
No you're right.
Yeah, they're all, and so this is the 1st one in the past.
Yes, exactly.
And so it's the perfect time.
Moffatt's going to get, you know, like in 2 years time when he
gets his 1st go at the Christmas special.
He's going to produce something, you know, beyond incredible. love
Moffatt's Christmas specials.
I love all of them.
I know that's not a popular.
I love all of them, but I do love the 1st one.
I love them all except for the 1st one and the last one.
Oh my god.
Oh the last one's absolute nonsense.
Is that the one when they all get married to River song again?
No, no, that's good.
I love that one. the one where they all get married to David
Bradley.
Yeah, that's shockingly bad.
I'm not going to comment on that.
Because I like them all except for that horrible widow wardrobe.
You don't like that one?
I love that one.
That's my favourite.
She's the worst.
Gasp.
But I don't particularly like this one.
I didn't like it very much on the first viewing.
Like, I think it's the weakest of the...
I want some darker humour.
This should be, it looks like a set from Black Garder if they'd
had some money, but it's also a bit black books.
Oh, hello.
That's pretty good.
That's pretty good. door.
And we've got Tams and Greg on set again.
She was very tall.
Did you realise how tall?
as it actually is.
There she is again.
Yeah, I just think the problem is that it doesn't know what it's
doing.
I mean, the 1st one is, you know, the Christmas invasion, a big
giant invasion with all of the people that we love waiting for the
doctor to come and save them.
You know, the 2nd one is Donna, for God's sake, what else do you
need?
And the 3rd one is the Titanic.
Panic with Kylie.
Yeah, yeah.
And what's this?
I mean, I think that he thinks, or that he must have thought that
the David Morrissey thing would be big enough to be the thing.
But there's nothing else around it.
But, but hang on, you mean, you have to have to say that, you know
the last 3 or 4 episodes of the show in series 4 has gotten bigger
and bigger and bigger.
And so where do you go from there?
Yeah, no, that is true.
But I don't mean that it's the stakes aren't high because, I mean
in a way they are.
It's just like, what are we doing?
Like, what are we supposed to be, you know, feeling or how do we
some, you know, like, what's the elevator pitch, you know?
And particularly since this mystery here.
Who are they listening to?
Tragedy.
I can't go on.
Only time we can afford that this episode.
It was a Jason Donovan USB stick.
From a few from ouch.
Look, I think it, I think the other thing that it has going, Fred
apart from Morrissey, um, is um, the villain and we'll talk about
her when she comes because I think she's something.
She's a bit telly-scaled Diana Rigg, isn't she?
Well, I think she's great.
Yeah, I think she is, you know, one of the best villains of the
year.
Until we get tired, Rick.
The thing is, though, and I was discussing this with someone on
Twitter this morning, today, this week, I should say, where they
kind of said Diana Rigg was completely wasted in the Crimson
Horror.
I'm very sorry.
I greatly respect you.
I think I think it might have been Will Maddox.
Um, But I said, Diana Rig. turns up and instead of being glamorous
like she even is in Game of Thrones.
She goes, no, I am going to go completely arching over the top
like I've never performed anything before.
And to me, that is respecting the part to play so against her
type.
Well, speaking of arch and over the time.
Actually, no, I think this red dress and her whole look is
fantastic.
This is Dynasty Colby's, isn't it?
It's even Nancy Reagan Red.
It's Coronation Street, 1851.
Is she Pat Phoenix?
This, I mean, this is very strange in that, of course, it's, you
know, being shot, what, in August or something.
And so it's not a very hot day.
I think they've probably done a better job with it than they did
with a runaway bride.
Still very bright, isn't it?
It is very bright, though, isn't it?
It is.
Yeah, and the snow is very localised.
She is so great. d'oeuvre curve, I think.
She is great.
She's apparently now in Big Finish.
She's now doing the...
The Miss Partican 4 box set.
Make it a new Miss Quill?
She's a new Miss Quill.
Oh, really?
Yeah, yeah.
Could they get her back?
They got her for the original one, yes, for the 1st lot.
Oh, and they she regenerated into...
And I can kind of hear it in her inflections and tone and that
sort of thing.
I can see that and choice.
Yeah, very good choice.
It's clear that she's a former prostitute.
Uh, well, she she talks about men, men asserting themselves
against her in the night.
Which could just mean.
And she calls out the guy who recognises, like, who knows her last
name.
One of these old men knows her last name. and she calls him a
cheeky boy.
I love this.
I loved the Cyberman coming through the snow in this.
That was my one of my favourite things.
Yeah, it's 10th planet.
I mean that's what Russell's doing.
She is the David Bradley of this episode.
Yeah.
That's a great shot.
Look at that.
And I think there is...
Possibly a deliberate choice here that the person who confronts
her is the priest because, of course, D'Euveau Kirvin's breakout
role was in Ballet Kiss Angel, where she falls in love with the
priest.
And she then left that show to do Good Night, Sweetheart, as the
original Phoebe.
She left that show after one series and was replaced with, if I
may say, an actress who was much better for the role and I very
much prefer the 2nd Phoebe in that show.
Oh.
Now, see, you have to enjoy this.
These are people who run workhouses and priests and they all
deserve to die.
And so this is a massive triumph.
Yeah, and the Tyron would beasts are involved.
They are involved as well.
Mr. Cole and Mr. Scones could be referenced to Doctor Who Author
Stephen Cole, and...
The Historian... an author.
Paul.
I was going to say Paul Scones, yes.
Paul Scoon.
But I think there was a visual effects assistant.
But Ian Scones was just a model maker and not I don't mean just
but everyone, you know, everyone liked his work.
Yes.
He built the fabulous, come on, invasion of time.
Varden Starship.
Out of an old vacuum cleaner. pretty much like the acting style of
this episode.
She's so good, isn't she?
And this line, which really drops like a brick, but let's go for
it.
The point is they'd all still vote for her.
They will give them another 100, what, 30 years?
Yeah, just a blink of another.
The sexless here.
Rosita hugs him and he admonishes her very gently, but like, oh, a
little decorum, darling.
It's also a very Victorian thing to do.
How did she get to know him again?
He saved her again from 2 men who asserted themselves against her
in the night.
Oh, no, they were Cybermen though, weren't they?
It was the Cyberman.
I believe she talks about it later, but I could be wrong and I
could be conflating that with later when Miss Hartigan says, I
don't think he's paid you to talk.
Yeah, so that is a very dark line from Russell.
But remember when, when she talks, where Miss Hardigan later talks
about the cyberman will rise and then she says, so like a man, and
it's clearly a reference to, you know, sort of downstairs.
And, and so both of them, both Rosita and, um, Miss Hardican are
like, at least kind of hinted at as being prostitutes, right?
And see, what I think is super interesting and maybe the only
properly interesting thing about this episode is that Miss
Arctican is an absolute genius who is one of the most powerful
minds on the planet who is able to assert herself over the cyber
king.
All of that.
And because she's a woman, there's no way that that brilliance and
superbness could ever be recognised or acknowledged, and she lives
in this sort of society where she's sort of condemned to cleaning
the floor of workhouses or whatever.
And no one sort of comments.
No one says, you're just a woman or you're just a, you know
scullery, wench or whatever.
How can you be such a genius?
And I think that's, that's perhaps the only kind of interesting
thing happening.
Hmm.
Yeah, I think, yeah, there's some very interesting stuff happening
with with Rosita and Mercy.
And you're quite right, Nathan.
She just said there that a cyberman. came out of the shadow.
So Jackson Lake here is set up exactly the way Christopher
Ecclson's doctor met Rose, you know, saving her from a monster, a
man made of plastic, a man made of metal.
Yeah, you know?
Do you think she's gone to the Bonnie Langford school of hair?
It's very curly.
It's fantastic.
Her hair is fantastic.
She just looks amazing.
She is like, she looks stunning.
Before we started recording Todd, you said she hasn't done much
acting work since.
She's done some things, but it seems to be quite sporadic.
It's a shame because I really like her in this.
This is a great moment.
It's a balloon, Penelope.
And he's wearing a perchwee style kind of cape thing, too.
Yes.
Keep.
Yes.
No, you're right.
Heartigan.
What's her name?
Doran...
Yeah, Hardigan.
Yachenachen.
Yeah, that actress does bring this.
But no, Morrissey, together.
They've got great warmth and they mirror each other.
Oh, I know.
Very pretty, Jeb.
Vala Tubishire, I believe, is the actress playing Rosita.
Yeah.
Who's this person?
So this is Jake.
Oh, Jeb.
Jed, Jed, you're right.
Jed?
Jed or Jed?
J Jed.
Just got to write this down.
I've got to do research, you see.
Rospectives and things.
Yeah, that's right.
He's the he's the nardol of this story.
Oh, oh.
She's the bill and which makes him the...
That reminds me of Ian Chesterton's sort of cloak from Marco
Polo.
Yes.
Did Z was built for two?
Morrissey brings human warmth to this and it's pretty much the
giveaway that it's not the doctor.
Yeah, there's and I've got to admit, much as I'm, you know
probably not a great fan of Tenet.
He does give otherness.
Yeah.
And he also plays this one with humility.
This is beautiful, wasn't it?
Yeah, he's not lording it over. this other person who he already
suspects might not be the doctor, but he's...
No, he knows. because he's listened to his heartbeat in an earlier
scene.
That's the moment at which he definitely knows.
Yeah, he's so gentle with him.
AirPods.
Oh, sorry.
Snap.
She is the Jacqueline Pierce of this season, isn't she?
Oh, yes.
Yeah.
She's so jolly though.
She would have been great if she'd been like a recurring villain
for the season.
Oh, look at that smile.
She's so good I will come in a rescued woman.
Yes.
I think travel, go for the next story.
Sorry, friend.
I was just gonna say, I will come back to the possibility of her
returning later, Todd.
Someone else who they considered...
So Russell, sorry, Russell wrote this script in about 6 days
recovering from chickenpox.
Yes.
Is that what he called it?
And something else.
I do have it written down here.
But yeah, he was pretty much really poorly.
They had to extend the schedule by a week because this is
effectively the 15th episode in the production block because they
started with Voyager the Damned and just went straight through.
And, you know, it took a toll.
The they had already planned to do a sort of gap here to let the
next producer who ended up being Stephen Moffatt get his stuff
together.
But the BBC was so scared of taking it off the air for a year
basically, that they almost overruled Russell.
And there was a new controller at the BBC and they're like, this
is our most popular thing.
We don't want to get rid of it.
But yeah, so long ago.
Yeah, Jane, yeah.
Jane Jane Tranter and Julie Gardner basically argued, no, you know
what we're not taking it off the air, we are rationing it.
So when the new doctor starts and when Stephen Moffatt starts
they're going to need people hungry for it.
Event television, I feel, really works for Doctor Who.
See, I feel the opposite.
Yeah, and I think I said this.
I think I probably said this in the retrospective, because Doctor
Who is a different thing each week, and so...
That's why I think it has a polarity.
And you can reverse that.
But if you so choose.
But it does.
It's a new, it's a new heavenly sphere every time it appears.
I agree with you on that.
The freshness of it, but I think that can be spaced out just as
well.
I don't need to see it every week to be excited.
Yeah, I just, I guess I like the sort of change from week to
week.
You know, you don't know where you're going to go next week.
I guess you can kind of spread that out.
But I think in practice what we discover from 2009.
And maybe it's just the series of events around 2009 that caused
this, that it isn't that successful.
I absolutely adore this because this is the 1st time.
Here we go. in Russell's Who, where all of the old doctors are
directly referenced.
Cannon.
Yep Paul is Canon.
He nearly wasn't in queer as folk, remember?
Now, if only they put that cutaway of Jackson Lake in between Paul
McGann and Christopher Eccleston, we could have an explanation as
to why we don't see John Hurt.
He wasn't invented yet.
No, no.
Time war.
No, he was still, wasn't he still a CG dragon in Merlin?
Was that happening yet?
Yes.
It was?
See, this is like, um, what's the, uh, what's the bond title
sequence where they're um, projecting films onto the bodies of
naked ladies?
That's probably right.
Yeah, with a golden wank.
Yes.
Yeah, because that's happening here, isn't it?
Oh, the Morris Binder.
And actually wasn't Bindu who came up with that. was that other
bloke.
Oh, and that's a lovely bit of teleacting there.
Yeah.
And yeah, I again, I just love how gentle the doctor is here.
He's like, yes, you're not who you think you are, but you have all
your achievements are still yours.
He's still smart enough to know that there's something coming
doesn't he?
And I love how the doctor solves her because a lot of the earlier
stuff was about the void and all sorts of science fiction, you
know, claptrap.
And here it's just, you have too much luggage for one man.
I'm sorry.
It's lovely.
Yeah, isn't that so good?
Well, as I said in retrospective, David Tennant is terribly
underrated at times and I have actually enjoyed him, very much in
the moment, despite ticks and clicks that we talk about.
I find him very watchable.
I do wonder if it's because usually the companion, especially
Catherine Tate, is given the duty of being compassionate and the
listener. while David Tennant is allowed to gnash his teeth at
things.
So you take away the companion and Tenant has to do that and he
does it brilliantly.
Very nicely.
Well, normally those, you know, sad, soulful eyebrows are reserved
but sort of are reserved for his own man pain.
Or the women he's about to disappoint. on so many levels.
And in the show.
Oh here we go.
I think Maurice is doing a wonderful job Yeah.
I love fear in this whole sequence.
You know, the fake doctor thing is fun, but this is this is
properly good, I think.
And, you know, he Doctor Who does therapy, sorry.
That doesn't happen very often, though.
He is a smaller version of the doctor.
You know, he has saved his companion from a monster.
The doctor lost Gallifrey and the Time Lords Jackson has lost his
wife.
Jackson is heroic, even though he doesn't really have a sonic
screwdriver or gadgets or a property.
Sonic.
But you know what I mean?
He's heroic without all those things.
There's no payoff to that, though, is there?
And that's a problem.
It's coming. coming.
Because, because, you know, I know a lot has been said about the
timeless children, but...
Can we not talk about that?
It has a similar element to this in that being the doctor is less
about, you know, having 2 hearts and being from the planet
Gallifrey, and the constellation of Custurbus and it's more about
being heroic and compassionate and kind.
Well, I mean, that's the that's the RTD era, though.
He's constantly inspiring people to do that Everyone talked about
how Eccleston doesn't solve the problem.
He just inspires someone else to solve the problem as if that's a
bad thing.
Also extremists, you know, where you can be, where you can be the
doctor even if you're really just sort of Mario.
I love extremes.
So do I. Yeah, it's good.
Before we started, before we started recording, I was rather
surprised, your listener, I believe my fellow podcasters in this
room really don't think highly of this story, and I'm curious to
know from each of you what you think is, what's the central
floor?
Todd.
Maybe it's the stakes.
I don't know.
I think after the end of last season.
I can't answer that until again, but I just feel like What's
happening?
Like we're having a lot of little stuff, but, but I'm, I don't
know.
Is it the how it builds?
I'm not sure.
Like, it feels like an operetta without the songs.
Definitely there's a bit of G and S in this.
Yeah.
Even like this with the little kids being marched into a thing.
Even the way they're moving about.
Brendan, I don't think it's necessarily awful.
Like, I just not in love with it. fair enough.
Yeah, I just think, as I've said, I don't think it has a central
thing that it's about.
And I think that, you know, we're halfway through and we've
ditched the Jackson Lake thing completely.
And so, you know, what are we doing now?
Here are all the timeless children.
They're all the doctor all the time.
I'm warming to the cyber shades, though, I'm just saying.
I thought you had a theory that every showrunner has one crap
cyberman thing.
Yeah, yeah.
So that it's the cyber shades here.
And the dad.
And the cyber dad, I guess.
Although I actually will forgive the cyber dad when it comes.
I think what's Moffat's one?
Oh, it's cyber brig, isn't it?
Well, that's what I called it, the cyber deck.
Oh, I thought you meant James Corden.
Well, that's almost forgivable as well.
And he invents the cyber mites as well, remember?
Oh.
I love all those things.
Brendan and I are on the same page on so many things, right?
Not that.
I like the cybermites and I like the cyber James Corden.
I wonder if it's that Doctor Who at Christmas is not Doctor Who.
It's a different show.
Well, you know, the cyber James Corder.
The fact that he sells everything by love or whatever.
That's awesome But here, she overpowers the Cyberman by her by
just being her being brilliant. by being superb.
So being an impressive person. there is a precedent for it.
Yeah.
I'm warming to the idea.
Yeah.
I do I do love that she hasn't been converted.
She is choosing this.
Yeah, liberation.
But see, there's also the thing.
And I don't quite know how to...
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
I don't think you paid you to talk.
I don't know how to feel about it because the idea is that she's
full of rage and revenge and abuse and stuff.
There's that line that the doctor, you know, characterises her.
And so that's why she's evil.
Um, you know, as a result of kind of patriarchy and and the class
system and Victorian values, essentially.
But that turns her evil and she's sort of a villain.
And like, why aren't we on her side?
You know?
Well, I think some of us are.
I think possibly the answer to that.
And I agree. it's not fully developed Oh, an evil flesh.
Yeah, I think possibly the answer to that is that she and Rosita
have pretty much had the same experience.
As you say, they're both implied to be ladies of the night, and
they have both been oppressed by men because it is this society.
Rosita sides with the hero and she sides with the villain.
They're 2 sides of what can happen.
And I think possibly the reason it doesn't work is Rosita is given
so little to do.
Because the doctor and Jackson Lake are the centre of the plot.
I love glad to have been part of your very last conversation.
What were you going to say, Tom?
No, I can't remember.
So this is the heroic thing where he comes back.
He's got a headache.
Part of it, certainly.
It's a great hero shot, isn't it?
With the smoke clearing.
CBS 1996.
Yes.
Oh well done.
Can I say I completely disapprove?
I stole that line when I was the doctor for Planet Scara Audio's
and I changed it to, basically, we had a Boris Johnson style Prime
Minister in 2011 when we made these and my assistant punches him
in the face and I say, normally I would completely disapprove, but
in his case, I shall make an exception.
He does look smart in Jan Chapel's belt.
Lanyard.
Someone posted on Twitter this week that Trevor Hoyle actually
explains what the Time Squad were in his novelisation of Blake 7
and the Time Squad.
Oh, there's a relief.
Yes.
They were always called the finders fiends because they, they were
like, frozen fishing.
They weren't fit, were they?
Oh, the little fascinators, not really.
Are you looking at my cerebellum?
The ascension.
So it's Ascension of the Cyberman.
Mr. Milligan, he looks like Spike Milligan.
Sorry.
So the brain, I think Russell has said before that he has a very
strong childhood memory of Tomb of the Cyberman and the cyber
dude's brain.
What sort of cyber thing was he?
He wasn't a cyber controller.
What was he?
He was a cyber controller.
He was the cybercontroller.
Yes, the big Chrome dome.
Yeah, yeah.
Because, you know, he thought it was the brain because it has
those veins crawling up the inside of it or whatever.
And so that's why the brain is visible there and it's got little
kind of, you know, things.
That is that child is 40.
The other scale doesn't...
Well, it's worked wonders.
It really does need songs, doesn't it?
It does.
But what is this for?
Like, I don't know what's happening here.
These children are being oppressed, but what are we saying?
That's the source from the doctor's daughter, that globe that went
along.
Like we're saying is it's Christmas.
So we need suffering orphans.
Yeah, well, maybe that's it.
Maybe that's it.
But wouldn't be Christmas without children in need.
But don't you think there's a version of this that's not too far
away where these children exist to fuel something, you know, it's
called a cyber king?
It has factory chimneys coming off the back of it.
We get a reference to the sort of 2nd industrial revolution from
Miss Hardigan.
You know, like it's so close to saying something about sort of
class or empire or colonialism and it just doesn't do it.
Look, it's Chibnalls Dalek emperor.
That's it.
It's like Der...
Sure it is.
You watch.
I think I think the script needed another week in that regard.
It was, it was Russell going, and I'm go, and I'm going to have
like, um...
I'm going to have children in workhouses.
What are they for, Russell?
To have children in workhouses.
The Victorian era.
You need to finish it a week earlier.
Walk away.
Come back.
Yeah, and do another.
Because it nearly is things.
Like it seems to hint at something about, you know, the Victorian
era.
Does Mickey theorise that there's a cyber king in doomsday or
something like that?
Yes, he mentioned the word.
Yeah, yeah.
That was designated a lot.
That is a great line.
Promises to aliens have no validity.
That's not quite posh enough. getting a bit rough, is it?
It's still Nick Briggs, isn't it?
Doing all the voice.
Well, who's playing Cyberleader for this one?
I suspect it is...
Paul Casey.
He's usually the lead.
Is he doing the vodcha?
No, it's Briggs doing the vot, isn't it?
Yeah, always.
Yeah.
I like how this is designed for her hair.
And again, I love the sort of cyberpunkness to it, like as if
they've constructed it out of stuff that they have available.
So it's a sort of beautiful brass, you know, cyberpunk excitement
thing.
And now she's Queen Amadala.
Queen Amygdala?
She might just be clever enough to have bypassed, I hope so.
Ooh, those look painful to wear.
Or do you think they're CGI?
No, they are contact lenses.
Yuck.
Yeah, just like Daphne.
That's the same shot of that globe going.
Just like Daphne Ashbrook had to wear.
Oh, yeah, that's horrible.
And Marine the Surtees in a few scenes of things.
Ooh.
In conundrum.
Oh, that looks a bit fake.
It looks a bit Capaldi opening titles, doesn't it?
No, it looks like a candy kitchen.
It does.
All about your talking.
Where are the bees in the therament?
Yeah.
Yeah, like it should look like that because it should be a sort of
fairy tale thing.
You know, like it's Christmas and it's orphans and stuff.
So it's supposed to look like that.
I like that.
But I just, what's it for?
What's it for?
Yeah, no, I'm being Tom in Pirate Planet.
What's it for?
Yes, and all coming soon, Mary Tam in the pirate planet sort of
action figure.
Do your top up, Mary. 20th of July, apparently now, Richard.
Oh, to be out by now.
Yes, yes.
Yeah, see, she's not having any of that Sidemen crap.
Not your naunch.
I miss Hardigan.
No Cyberman pain.
Yeah, she's stronger than the conditioning like James Corden is
later on.
Yeah, but she's it's because she's brilliant.
You know, she's been sidelined by this society, but she's better
than anyone else in it.
But it's only hint of that, do you know?
She's so good See, in a way, I wish that the cyber king and her
escape through the vortex to come back in a sequel. yeah.
They could have been in the girl who waited.
Zap.
They could have been in last season's finale.
Wow, that would have been awesome.
Well, yes, it would have been awesome.
Except that this story never happened.
We actually find out in um series 5.
We find out in series 5 that the cracks in time, wipe this story
out because there's a really interesting thing here.
When the doctor arrives in 1851, he says, oh, this is very dull
and nothing ever happens.
And then Jackson Lake at the end will say this is something that
will be talked about for centuries.
So the doctor goes, oh, funny that.
And then it's never followed up.
Matt Smith does mention it.
It's never followed up by Russell Oh, I bet.
And then and then Moffat comes in and makes it clear that's what
happened.
That's why the cyberkink's not ever remembered because this whole
story gets swallowed up by the cracks.
The elderly children are rescue.
Now, we have coming up the worst performance in the episode.
Oh, that Gormless child actor standing at the top who needs to be
rescued.
God.
He is wearing so much.
I mean, I don't want to shame him.
Do you know what I mean?
But he's wearing a lot of mascara.
Yeah, and, you know, the implication is that he's not like these
poor children.
He's a rich child who has been caught up in the workhouse, but
it's just too he's too polished.
I'm getting ahead of myself because I thought we might actually
cut to him, but no.
No not yet.
You know, look, I love the fact that they commit to the cyber
shades, despite the fact they look a bit rubbish.
Oh, me too.
No, no.
And I am absolutely on board with the one that drives the hansom
cab.
I think that's a bird.
Yeah, why not?
Yeah, I just wish they'd been more shade-like and ethereal. rather
than just gorilla suits.
Yeah.
I mean, yeah, look, let that one.
Howard that one's 40.
They're ill- favoured poor children, aren't they?
That's a hobbit.
Okay, that's a few hobbit.
Oh, dear.
Some great flashback acting there from Morrissey.
It's these children.
They ruin the episode.
Oh, wait.
Wait.
There we go.
So that's some acting from the kid?
Yeah, I know.
That shot of Morrissey where he looks up puzzledly.
Oh, God.
My God, the child is terrible.
No, the chance okay in the flash bag.
Yeah, Charm is terrible.
But look at it.
Look how much mascara he's got on.
Like, why he has no emotion upon seeing his father.
Well, he's traumatised.
Oh, but God, just push.
None of the other children are traumatised.
They all run.
I suppose they're all pre-traumatized from being workhouse. they're
poor people.
It was okay for them to be put to work.
But, yeah.
Anyway.
Oh, here we go.
Now, when I was watching this at the time, something I had said to
my boyfriend of the time in the week before, you know what, Doctor
Who's never done, Transformers.
You got your wish.
I did.
So why does Jackson Lake?
If he's the doctor.
If we want to show him being heroic, why does he not get to do
this?
Yeah, no, I agree.
I agree.
It's just a mistake.
I think.
Tenant's the star.
But Tenant gets to...
So, but Tennant gets to wipe out the cyber king and save Fred.
And I think that David Morrisey's doctor has to do one of those.
Like he just has to do one of those, but all he does is sort of
stand there looking up into the sky weeping.
And then later on he does a sort of fair amount of kind of talking
and looking up into the sky weeping again.
You know, like he doesn't get his proper hero moment.
And I don't think him running in with a bandoleer full of, you
know, USB sticks really kind of cuts it.
Would have been great, don't you think?
No, I totally agree.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. totally agree with you.
Yeah, and the thing is, just, you know, just swap the 2 swap the 2
roles in that scene.
It's simple.
Or or get him to be clever enough to have learnt enough to save
you know, to defeat the cyber king.
Now, as the cyber king was rising there, we had a poster of Lee
Sen Chang in the corner, there it is. despite the fact that this
is almost 50 years before the talent of Wang Chang.
He was a char prodigy.
That is so great.
It's fantastic.
Todd, you like the cyber king, the look of the cyber king or not?
I like the look of it.
I don't understand why it is.
Yeah, yeah.
That's fair enough.
Like, I mean, if I'm invaded planets, aren't you wasting resources
building something like that?
Wouldn't you be that it looks cool?
It does.
And it's something that you've brought up time and time again, this
past series that, you know, Russell likes to do things that are
fun, right?
And sometimes I forget about the fun over, over...
Oh, does it make complete sense, but it doesn't.
It doesn't, but it's... yeah, it's fun. is fun.
And I'm surprised, you know, like I wondered, and I think maybe at
the time I wondered whether the fact that this is, you know, like
a great sort of history breaking event, you know, how come none of
us know that a giant thing, you know, like that this happened in
1851 on Christmas morning.
Um, like that that was going to feed into all of these sort of
time Lord Victoria shenanigans that ended up happening, but it
just gets dropped.
I'm glad that Moffatt picks it up.
It's one of my bits of evidence that Moffatt loves RTDs, Doctor
Who.
Oh yes, yes, absolutely.
And yeah, yeah, the doctor runs off into Danger here because he's
got nothing to live for.
Yeah, he's escaped to danger.
I remember at the time with that being annoyed that Moffat was
being, you know, putting his imprimada over the entire history of
Doctor Who, but considering what we've seen in the last 2 years.
I think I got off lightly.
Yeah, that's right.
That's very true.
Look, I actually like it because I think it is picking up a plot
thread that was deliberately kind of, you know, that annoyed
people like us.
No, no, but I think that Moffatt that Russell might have followed
up.
You know, because he deliberately kind of comments on it.
He sticks it out. there.
It's not something that Moffatt thought of.
He does recommend.
I can see Freddie Mercury playing this part. the same rostrum.
Don't you think it reminds you of the end of time where you've got
wrestling and you've got the 2 women either side and the other
other tunnels?
Yeah, but I like this.
That's very true.
This should have been a musical.
I think that's why I think this is why it's annoying us because
this is prog rock.
Really, this is a 70s album coming in this whole thing.
Jeff Wayne would have done it and opens up into a bifold and
you've paid far too much for it, but it's great.
No, no, it needs songs.
I want songs.
Yeah, well, look, Russell talked about doing a musical all the
time, and I agree with you, Richard.
This would have been perfect because we have all these heightened
people's ultra-saturated.
That's the category.
Thank you.
Thank you, Netflix.
Oh, no, she turns, she turns.
She's not liking something on the screen.
Oh, it's that child.
Yeah, look, I so very love the cyberkick.
It's utterly impractical.
Oh, it's brilliant.
Does it make tea?
It does look like it might make tea.
Revel's tea tea's made.
I think the cat's going to unplug the mixing board.
I think we're okay.
And look, see, he gets to see the Tartars fly, but he should be
flying at them.
It's a shame because all a tenant does is do his usual, I'll give
you one chance and then sort of fires a whole heap of kind of
special effects at her until everyone goes away.
You know, it's not a great resolution.
I can see why RTD chose to do it this way.
He wants David's going.
He wants to make let him be the star.
Yeah, it's like it's like Planet of the Spiders.
Yeah, yeah.
Well, I guess so.
There's no flying car, damn it.
I want the flying car, back.
Wouldn't that be great?
Chippers off, we give you everything if you bring back.
I'm sure hair trembles with emotion.
Yeah, that's a meme.
Well, that shot wasn't great in the upscale.
I reckon the thing looks surprisingly good in the upscale.
No, no, no.
It was the balloon basket.
Yeah.
Oh yeah, like the, yeah, tenant hanging in the balloon against
black drapes is not good.
It's, it's very Trouton.
Yeah, see, this, this, give me some politics, Russell.
Yeah.
See, this is the scene where Russell watching at home at Christmas
as he was watching this, said, I made a mistake with the ending.
So what does he say should happen?
What he says should happen is, and look, I'm pressaging it because
I forget how long this chat goes on for.
So he's about to set Miss Hartigan free, at which point she
screams at the sidemen and they blow up and the thing starts
falling over and the doctor has to zap it into the vortex.
And the thing is Russell watching it at home went, no, he should
have set her free and then she sends it into the vortex.
She saves London.
Yes.
That was what Russell thought was wrong.
And that way, you know, she gets redemption.
Yeah, I'd have liked redemption.
Yeah.
Because she just explodes into, like, it's only her frock left.
It's fabulous, actually.
It's fabulous, but it makes less sense than the Cyber King
itself.
But it is that idea.
Like she's supposed to see what she's become and this is her doing
that.
Is it no?
Not yet.
But it happens in a sec, but then she doesn't do anything with
that except explode everyone.
Yeah exactly.
And then we get another different special effect where the doctor
attacks the cyber king with the title sequence.
Yes.
Yeah, here she is.
Yeah, I'm sorry.
He's completely right at this point.
She needed to.
Yeah.
Redemption.
Oh, and she's acting a socks off.
Oh, yes, yes.
But yeah, it's that thing of, you know, Russell clearly didn't
have distance from the script as he usually would because he had
to write 15, Well, not write 15, but produce slash write 15
scripts in the time he would usually have for 13.
Oh, and there you go.
There's a frock.
Yeah.
So, and now it's going to fall on Rosita and everyone.
Yeah, so, like, he's now the, he's the Greek chorus.
Now the doctor's just, I mean, yeah, Morrissey's just get, you
know, reduced to telling us what we just saw in the previous
scene.
It's Prometheus, run sideways.
Looks great doesn't it?
I mean, it's an absolute cartoon, but who cares?
Oh yeah, here we go.
I mean, yeah, I mean, Russell's starting point is, anytime you
well, you said this as well, Nathan, anytime your resolution is
the doctor fires a gun at something. rewrite.
Yeah.
It's the same problem that I had with Rise of Skywalker.
It's just who is able to project the most lightning from their
things, wins.
You know, it's just not very interesting.
Yeah, I think I think I'm not really satisfied by it.
I think that's the thing.
Yeah.
It's, there's some nice elements, but, yeah.
It's average.
Like I give it I give it 7 out of 10.
0.4.
I give it a six.
0.6.
No, I think I'm with you.
It's like a, it's it's just not that memorable.
Yeah.
It's, look, I would argue of these specials.
The only one Russell really gets right is the waters of Mars and
end of time 2.
End of time one, I think is the worst episode Russell writes for
the show.
I think there's a lot going for episode one, but it is him kind of
running on empty and kind of riding out the clock a bit.
Yeah.
I'm looking forward to see what I think of Planet of the Dead
because I have a little bit of a soft spot for it.
Planets of the Dead, I find is like this.
It's like there's nothing I pointed and go, that's absolutely
disastrous, and it's like, I enjoyed the last hour, but I'm not
you know, it's not extremists, let's say.
But I mean, it is a season opener.
We'll get to that. later on.
Oh my god, a child just showed emotion.
Yeah, I mean, what's this shot?
He's staring into the dead air of the conversation.
Oh, and here we are back in the thing.
And I mean, I think this seems quite agreeable as well.
Yes, yeah.
Yeah, see that's spoken of for centuries to come, you know.
Yeah, what's great about Moffat is that Moffat gives Um, no less
than 3 explanations in his 1st 2 years as to why people don't
remember things.
Yeah, no, well, he wipes out the two-part season finale of series
four.
Yeah, that never happened.
Yeah, yeah.
There's cracks.
And then he resets the universe twice.
Yeah, yeah.
I kind of like that.
Oh me too.
But we'll talk about this over the next number of years.
It's his approach to the show is not to create a coherent world
for it to happen.
He's interested in telling different types of stories.
Don't let the cat sit on the remote.
No.
That was a good leap Netflix, which is bad.
Yes, it's in Chesterson's coat from Marco Polo..
Oh, hello, this is a bit beautiful.
Yeah, isn't it?
Yeah.
And I'm pretty sure that's the same archway that they park in in
the Unquiet Dead.
Yeah, I think I was thinking that too.
Yeah.
In Swansea.
You lied to me, Jackson.
There is a Swansea.
I've got this toy now.
I've got the toy of this.
Have you?
It's beautiful.
It's really easy to put together.
It struck me watching this too, how much that stuff above the
central column looks like a balloon.
Yes, yes.
Yes, it does.
I love this reaction.
It's great, isn't it?
Like, he loves it.
He's not distressed by it, but that's enough.
Oh, and there's the, yeah, that's lovely.
Now, to me, this is Jackson's heroic moment.
Yeah, maybe you're right.
Yeah.
Because like everyone in Journey's end lets the doctor walk away
because they think someone else is looking after him.
Yeah, and Jackson refuses to accept that.
And I just think that's beautiful.
Um, yeah.
And again, tenants doctor, you know, he's, he is in pining mode
here, but he's not whinging about it the way he does over rose.
He's he's resigned to it and he's accepting it.
He's expecting Jackson to say, oh, that's so sad. off you go.
Yeah.
Yeah, I guess I would have liked a proper, proper hero moment.
I get that.
And I agree, especially rescuing a sound.
And sometimes they break my heart.
Yeah, that's sort of. you think he looks tired?
15 episodes.
That's right.
There's our 1st reference to Donna.
Yeah.
He's accepting Christmas dinner here just like he did with
Jackie.
Yeah.
Yeah, well, people call Jack.
He likes them.
Yeah, good.
Remember to close the door.
I'm always really anxious when you're fine.
I can't bear it when I do. in classic series when they don't do
it.
It's like, oh, really?
That's how you...
Planet of that.
Ah, well, there we go.
That was a happy Christmas.
Tremendous cars.
Paul Casey's, in fact, the cyber leader?
Yep, of course he is.
And a lot of people that worked very hard.
Yeah, well, a lot of people.
Well, they're allowed to do proper credits now.
Yes.
Yeah, well, they've slowed the credits down again in Doctor Who.
It's a bit jiggery, though.
I mean, that's a jigger jigger, I think.
Yeah.
Well, do we have closing statements or do we think we've more or
less exhausted this?
It's an agreeable hour.
Yeah.
I think that's fair.
It's totally okay, but I'm not I'm not in love with it.
I liked elements as we were watching it, but, you know, I'm going
to forget about it in, by the time I drive home tonight.
It's perfect Christmas repast.
I don't believe it sets out to do any more than it's required to.
In the end, it's, have I been given truth?
Do the performers believe in their own actions and there's no one
in this that lets me down?
I know what you're saying about the children, but I would have
liked...
Maybe, yeah, maybe as a two-parter with some spinning up, but it's
for Christmas.
So we just get high notes.
There's a lot of sugar in this.
Yeah.
Hence, we're all going to do a shot of insulin to go.
Another one of these cakes.
Vicious cakes.
Thank you, Richard.
Bringing them back to the podcast.
That's brilliant.
Little angel cake, was it?
Well, I guess all that remains is for me to say, well, dear
listener, that's all we have time for this week.
We'll be back in a few weeks time for a somewhat fly-blown trip to
Dubai in Planet of the Dead.
In the meantime, you can find us wherever you get your podcasts
and you can keep up with us at Flightthrough Entirety on Facebook
at FTE podcast on Twitter, and on our website
flightthroughentirety.com, where you'll find links to our other
podcasts, Bondfinger, and Jody into Terra.
Until next time, remember, always to be nice to the help.
It's the only way to ensure your invitation to one of the Cyber
King's garden parties.
Thank you very much for listening and good night.
Good night.
See you soon Good then.