Hello, dear listener, and welcome back to Flight Through Entirety
the only Doctor Who podcast that checks its lagomorphs carefully
before monologuing at them.
I'm Nathan.
I'm Brendan.
I'm Todd, and I'm John Hurt under a dust cover for this one.
Well, we all know what happened 59 years ago today, but 9 years
ago today, we were all experiencing a day that will be forever
written on our little fanboy hearts.
So let's see what we remember about what happened on the day of
the doctor.
Do you remember the first time you saw this?
Where were you when you saw this for the first time, Todd?
Was I in the UK?
I think you were, yes.
Yes, because I'd been to the 50th.
I'd been to the 50th anniversary event and then we were back at, I
think, I think it was Peter's house actually.
Yeah, we were watching it as a group and I just remember
struggling with the cat because I'm allergic and so I was battling
battling sore eyes and and a constricted throat, but I was still
you know, loving what I was saying is what I could say.
That's where I was.
Yeah, okay.
Do you remember Brendan?
Yeah, because I had to work, like it was on in cinemas here before
it was on telly, and I did have tickets booked for like a 930
screening, but then I was doing a job on The Voice, and it was an
audition tour.
So, you know, I couldn't exactly take a day off because that was
what it was scheduled for.
So I had to give up my cinema ticket, switch my phone off so no
one texted me about what was in the episode and then rush home
afterwards and watch it on iview.
Did you remain unspoiled?
I mean, there's one or 2 things that you don't want to be spoiled
not for you.
I'm finding it hard to remember.
I think I knew about Tom.
Okay.
But I think I knew about Tom before.
You know, I think he had been somehow seen or something like
that.
But I could be wrong.
And then I went to the cinema the next day to see it.
I moved my ticket or I forfeited or gave it to someone or ate it
or something.
Do you have any memories from 9 years ago at all?
Just a number, isn't it?
as we say at our age.
I thought we all saw it at the cinema together.
So my memory is that I went to James's place and we had bubbly.
We had some bubbly Shiraz at sort of 6 o'clock in the morning or
something and then watched it on iPlayer.
It's Ribena for Adels.
You know what?
That's why I switched my phone off because you guys texted me
saying we're watching it now.
I love you and I trust you, but I don't trust you.
But then James and I went to the cinema later that day and saw it
in 3D. And it still does work without 3D, but I do like that it, it
was just James and me, I think.
Yeah, it was in 3D. Was it in 3D?
Yeah, yeah.
I think Richard, you and I went the next day.
Because I think I saw it with you in the city.
Definitely remember cinema. cinema.
So in a blur.
So the... wept.
We wept.
I did not know Tom was coming.
No, I needed to keep my poodra very much on a high shelf.
I didn't know either.
Like, it's just that lump in the throat.
Well, it's when you hear him, the brilliance of hearing him
before...
Britain, Britain.
Yeah.
Actually, I definitely saw it with Richard because I've been to
several Doctor Who cinema screenings with Richard and Richard has
this thing where if something surprising happens like Tom Baker
turning up suddenly my arm is in a vice.
Yes, I bring one with me.
And for those of you who haven't seen Richard and I together in
person, I'm 5 foot four, Richard 6 foot three. 6 foot two, I beg
your pardon.
Let's not ever extend it.
And he's a very solid gentleman.
He actually dressed as a lumberjack today and looking the part.
Didn't bring my own lunch, but.
But yes, no, it, yes, I do remember squealing audibly.
I think there was some of that Yes, yeah, yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
God, it was good, wasn't it?
Yeah, I've only read the Target novel.
I have to say, for this audio commentlair.
Yeah, I didn't watch it. because that's what we used to do as
young people.
We read the book.
So I'm coming to this as a 10 year old, yeah.
I mentioned the book actually in yesterday's episode provided I
don't decide to cut that beard.
And it is amazingly good.
I read it on Nathan's recommendation originally.
So you just got to buy this.
Oh, I can't be.
Oh, and I didn't.
Ooh.
And it takes a bit longer.
And it does some lovely nods to Douglas Adams and to, well, really
the whole history of Doctor Who writers.
There's lots of little ticks to Terence and Malcolm in his, some
of his wordplay, which just made my spine go funny in a good way.
I was talking to Simon and Peter about this. and about the 3 big
celebrations. which are, of course, an adventure in space and time
the 5-ish doctors reboot and this.
And which one do you like the most, which one do you have the most
love for, and why?
And we were talking about like we're classic series fans, we just
absolutely adore an adventure in time and space.
Obviously, the 5 doctors reboot has so many classic people in
there.
And then I sort of made the generic comment, oh, you know, it's
the classic stuff that really gets to me.
But it's more than that.
It's actually the interaction between classic and Yuhu.
That the stuff that gets to me.
It's when David Bradley looks at Matt Smith in that, and I sort of
break down in tears, and it's when you hear Tom's voice and that
whole sequence and interaction with Matt Smith in this, that
you're well up and you get tears.
Five Shock's reboot is a bit different.
Like, I didn't sort of get tears, but it's all that interaction
how it's so interlinked with new who.
And that's the stuff that, not to say, there's other stuff that I
don't love in this, I didn't interact.
I always love having doctors interact with each other, but it's
all the pictures in the background of the classic companions and
all that, that as a classic fan.
It's just magical.
And I don't want to say that if you're a new who fan, then that's
going to mean anything less because if you go back and watch it
all and have watched it all, then you're a fan of Doctor Who.
But it's just something that has struck me.
Yeah.
Well, I think it's El Sandefer, who is the one who said that this
is the show that heals the breach of the wilderness years by
bringing classic Doctor Who back and letting the new series kind
of encompass it.
And I think maybe it's not super obvious, but I think maybe the
best representative of the classic series is in some ways John
Hurt.
You know, he's older, he's posh, he's got the posh accent, David
Tenner, he's fun of it.
Yeah, he's had a career before, and he doesn't really like the
younger members of the cast.
There's a lot of historical truth in this.
It's the thing where he looks at the 2 doctors from the new series
and can't believe how kind of stupid they are. you know, like how
they speak like children, how they wave their.
I mean, I can imagine Simon criticising the new series doctors for
waving their sonic screwdriver around like a water pistol and here
is John Hurt doing that.
So he's a classic series doctor that we've never kind of heard
of.
It's really out of the obelisk, isn't it?
Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly.
So he's invited onto the program to make fun of how stupid it is.
And one of the things that he does is that he notices what those
doctors do despite their weird, unimpressive appearance and that
makes him make the decision.
But I think that that's a place and maybe an overlooked place
where the classic series interacts in this episode.
It's really interesting because I'd heard rumours at the time that
you know, some people felt this whole war doctor concept was a
misbegotten sort of idea and, you know, couldn't get Eccleston.
BBC didn't want McGann, who I think both could have stepped into
that.
Is that why I did not know that.
That's what we think.
And I think that McGann could have done this.
I think he would have been prudent.
And I personally don't think it would have mattered who had done
that role.
Yeah, Stephen said he'd finished writing it from again. yeah.
I think at this point, the audiences with Doctor Who, everything
is built up to this moment, right?
So if it had been McGann, I don't think you would have got any
less viewers.
No, if it had been John Hurt.
Like, I just don't think there's any difference.
I mean, I mentioned when we were doing time with the doctor for me
when John Hurt appeared.
It was like, oh, well, great.
But it didn't really mean anything to me.
I was not blown away by that, that.
I mean, it's interesting now coming into this, like he was built
as the doctor at the end of that, but we've had the night of the
doctor where he's actually build as the war doctor.
So as a fan, you know that's where this is, where this is coming
from.
I think you're very right about how the performance is very
classic series.
And I think it is, I think it's wonderful in it.
And I think it works so well and it's really interesting.
When I went into it, I was not determined not to like it like I
normally am.
But I was deeply concerned about the concept, Brendan. about this
war doctor and how it wouldn't work.
But Stephen Moffat is a very clever man.
Yes, he's up against it with all of the constraints and having to
tie everything together and come up with this and it works.
And you know how I like all my teas to be crossed and eyes to be
dotted.
And if they're not, then I'm really not happy.
I'm very, very happy.
It just he's just splendid.
Yeah, it just, look, it just works.
And the sort of tying back of John Hurts, the classic series mode
of doctor, when Eccleston declined to do it and they couldn't get
Paul McGann, Stephen Moffatt had to come up with this idea and his
starting point was the 5 doctors, but not necessarily in the way
you might expect.
Richard Herndle.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Android.
Well, the thing is, he was considering for a while not doing a
multidoctor story because he's like, you know, that's a bit of a
misnomer.
Not every anniversary has a multi-doctor story kind of thing.
But yes, then he thought about Richard Herndle.
And he thought about, and we discussed this on the podcast before
how Richard Herndle's 1st doctor isn't actually all that much like
William Hartnell's 1st doctor.
It's almost like he's this entirely new incarnation with
adventures you haven't seen.
Oh my god, I've just saved the 50th anniversary, said Stephen
Moffat.
So he went to the BBC with this idea and said, but this will only
work if we get a big name actor that bypasses people going, but
they were never the doctor to go to.
I don't care that they were the never the doctor because they're
John Hurt.
And that it actually melds another idea he had in a fit of madness
because after the end of series 7, Jenna Coleman was the only
person contracted.
Yeah.
So Matt Smith's contract ended, his initial contract ended with
name of the doctor, and he hadn't said, I won't do more, but he
was getting film offers.
He actually leaves this and immediately flies to America to do a
film, and that's when he shaves his head and has to wear the wig
for time of the doctor.
Or the Adric inheritance as a team in this group.
Yeah.
Like, Tenant came off one thing onto this and immediately onto
another thing.
So it was hard to get Tenant.
So Stephen Moffatt did initially have this idea that the 50th
anniversary would be Clara meeting a bunch of different
celebrities playing the doctor and basically the doctor would
change every few scenes and he's like, Joanna Lumley, Miriam Mogli
Serene McCallen, da da.
The sofa of reasonable.
Yes, exactly.
Exactly.
But, you know, that was Stephen Moffat going, I don't have a
doctor.
I have all the doctors and he's kind of said in an interview since
that would have been awful.
Well, we've seen it.
There wasn't that bad.
It's amazing how John Hertz doctor comes out of a period of
adversity because they were they were close to getting Eccleston
and then he's just like, no, I'm just not ready to go back and do
that again.
Yeah, especially seeing as we've since found out how painful it
was for him to leave and how he felt he was blacklisted afterwards
and what have you.
It's amazing. you know, there's multiple sides, of course.
But it's amazing he even considered it, in my opinion.
But yeah, we get John Hurt, who's who's lovely and sweet, but you
totally believe will blow up half the universe.
Yeah, I mean, he is quite lovely almost immediately.
So when he turns up, when those when those men turn up to look for
the doctor who has bewitched Queen Elizabeth I and they say
something about, you know, we want the doctor's head or something
like that, and John Hirche smiles broadly and says, well, this has
all the makings of your lucky day.
Yes, it's wonderful because he has been so sombre and so solemn up
until that point.
That's the point where for me he became the doctor, I think.
I always think it's such a shame that he only calls himself the
doctor once at the end. and he doesn't get to be really called the
doctor very much at all.
But you know, that's just an observation.
I think it's also quite funny that the 2 companions, and I put
that in quotes here, Clara and Rose, or Bad Wolf, or the moment.
The only 2 actresses that thus far in you who have actually
witnessed a generation or are going to witness a generation from
one doctor to the next.
But to be fair, we have also witnessed that with Billy's teeth.
The moment was, could have just been a box on a something else. was
an entirely different head.
I actually really like her as the moment.
Is this the moment?
She is the best thing in the special.
She can act the box off and out of any of the others.
No, and she actually, those scenes with her.
You can actually see him.
Just my opinion.
You can actually see him rise a little bit in standard too.
He's not just doing grumpy Grandpa Panto.
You can actually see.
She's got the spark.
She's the Claudia Winkleman of Doctor Who.
She's the strictly come dancing of Doctor.
If you know Claudius.
Anyway, Claudia Muinklemanon strictly has a very manic, yet
controlled manner that is charming and yet completely random.
And Billy has a manic quality in her eye in this that, I don't
know whether it's years with Chris Evans, but I can believe
everything she says.
She has a psychotic joy about her.
She's extraordinary and hurt rises to that.
Yeah.
And she also has real proper feelings.
Like, we're we're told by the general that the weapon is so
powerful. its operating system developed a conscience and she is
absolutely engineering and permitting this to happen, giving the
doctor the chance to do a redo and get the decision right.
And she, when the doctor goes back, when the war doctor goes back
with a renewed determination to blow everyone up, it seems like it
hasn't worked, she's really heartbroken and she really sells it.
And, you know, there's no character to hang that on.
It's not like Rose, who is an identifiable sort of TV character.
She's playing the moment, which is what the hell is that?
And she absolutely kills it.
She's funny and silly and manic, as Richard said, but also sombre
and really, really desperate to ensure that the weapon isn't used
the way that it was the 1st time through.
Is this special actually as good as it is because we get the
legacy of Russell and Andy Pryce and Phil's?
I guess Julie, but just their understanding of what good casting
is.
Because just to throw it in there.
I mean, Matt is lovely.
Of course, he's lovely and everyone else is lovely.
And maybe it's nostalgia, but the real punches on the screen are
everyone that's from Russell's 1st few years.
I think too, that this engages with Russell's Doctor Who really
very thorough going.
Maybe we were just as well.
Yeah, maybe we were just missing it in the same way that audiences
in 73 must have been missing Pat.
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, I think that's I think that's right.
He does a very good version of David Tennant.
He's written for David Tennant before, obviously.
He picks up Queen Elizabeth Gag from End of Time, part one. just
love the way he keeps insulting her all the time.
She's great too.
She is Joanna Page, yeah.
She's lovely in this.
Stacy from Gavin and Stacy.
Oh God, and she's so good.
I think Stephen Moffatt is actually the best rider for tenants
doctor.
Yeah, yeah.
Well, yeah.
Like the stuff that he wrote in Russell's era was superb
everyone.
He got him.
He also got Eccleston.
I would have loved to have seen him write for Eccleston.
Look, there are storyboards of the soldier, give me your gun
blasting away no more in the wall.
There are storyboards of Eccleston in that moment.
So that's how far along they got in pre-production, thinking we
might get him.
And, you know, Stephen Moffatt sort of has his post
rationalization of, you know, the good thing about bringing in
John Hurt is that if your favourite doctor is Paul McGann or
Christopher Eccleston, you don't have to square them being your
favourite doctor with them being a genocidal warrior, you know
because now you've got this other one we can project onto.
Yeah, you know.
And when we have talked about the doctor doing questionable things
in the past and immediately springing to mind is the twin dilemma
one of the things we talked about back then was how uncomfortable
that made us because this is our hero.
So the war doctor gives us that out.
And John Hurt then subsequently did the War Doctor series with Big
Finish.
And there was always that tension with the character of doing
quote unquote the wrong thing for the right reasons.
And of course, unfortunately, John Hurt is no longer with us.
But that was a really nice perfect series of 12 plays and no
disrespect intended to the newer ones they're doing with Jonathan
Carly, who does an amazing version of the character as well.
And then this as sort of his finale because this does end up being
the War Doctor's finale.
But it's amazing how well the character works just by himself.
You know, when we come across the 10th doctor, the 10th doctor is
in the midst of his own adventure somewhere between the waters of
Mars and the end of time.
You know, because he's ended the waters of Mars going, I'm really
sad.
And so I'm going to go off and find out Queen Elizabeth's Zigon.
Yeah.
In fact, it is a little bit of a cheat.
It is a little bit of a coincidence that Tennant is at one end of
the Zygon invasion and Matt is at the other end.
So they both turned up at the same time in the same invasion.
And so we have kind of 2 stories, don't we?
We have the Zygon invasion story with them hiding in the paintings
and bursting out.
And then we have the moment interrupting that story in order to
persuade the war doctor not to push the button.
And both of those stories are quite simple, which I think really
works, because it does give us what we want, which is time hanging
out with those characters, I think.
It's gonna go back to what Richard was saying about, like, all the
Russell characters and that, and them shining perhaps more.
I don't necessarily agree with that point of view.
I actually think it's one of these things where like in the 3
doctors, like John Pertuis is very competent, but as you were
saying, it's like suddenly having Pat and William coming down in
his bubble, like that gives you, like, you sort of connect with
that.
Yeah, that's the rasmataz.
So having these people back, you're sort of looking at that
sparkle.
I think Billy is extraordinary and all the cutting with her there
not there and the lines that hark back to things with tenet and
kissing and all that. you know, it's all just icing on the cake.
But I actually think that Matt is extraordinarily good.
He's the glue that holds everything together.
Well, perhaps it's actually Jenna, who's the glue that holds
everything together because she is interacting with all 3 doctors
at various points.
And the moment she begins to cry or tears get in her eyes at the
end, it always gets to me.
She really sells it.
I don't know other people say that she's cold or whatever. she's
the witch in the well or whatever she happens to be.
But I actually think she's absolutely perfect in this.
Again, I think she's an extraordinary actress and Clara is just
the right thing.
We were talking about, in our season 7 retrospective.
We had questions about whether Clara's time should have been
done.
Well, no.
Yeah, she's magnificent enemies.
And she's the one who saves the day.
I mean, the moment fails.
She takes the doctor forward to see how Matt and David actually
manage to save the world by using their experience of having
destroyed Galifray as a kind of a warning or a moral lesson.
And so when the war doctor goes back, he's going to push the
button, because he sees that their regret has spurred them on to
save people.
And that's absolutely the wrong message, that's not the message he
should have taken.
And it's Clara. is the one who intervenes and says that you just
can't do this.
You can't be killing 2.800000000 children.
And because she's us, she's the audience, you know, and she's
Moffat in a way too, I think.
I don't think Moffatt likes the idea that the doctor killed
everyone on Galifre.
And so he fixes it so that it didn't happen.
It's a very clever way he does it.
Like, he always has.
He introduces stuff. during an episode that you don't necessarily
see how it's going to link to the ending, like the whole, the
picture in the painting and I think all that's extraordinary
having that moment.
But also I think the other thing is his whole take on the war, like
it's very interesting.
It's much more, this is a battle for the 2nd Arcadia, like the 2nd
city of Galifre.
It's all very much we're seeing gala frames and children and just
the Daleks and that.
Whereas previously, Russell had talked about in the final episodes
of tenant, what were all those, the hordes of whatever, you know
you know, has-beens or whatever, the could have been king and the
army of his never was.
A nightmare children.
So things that in my head are concepts that I can't really get my
head around.
Whereas here it's a much more, the war is much grittier and
realer.
Like it's just more grounded as opposed to something out in space
where I just imagine sort of ghouls and things flying through the
air and just not just shooting lasers, which appears to be.
Yeah.
So Russell actually describes the war in more detail in his
novelisation of Rose, and he has like replica earths and gala
phrase being recreated out of different times and hurled as
missiles.
And, you know, like it's an absolutely bizarre and unfilmable
conception of the war, and that works very well.
But once you've decided to depict it.
What do you do?
it becomes just gun.
Like the time war becomes incredibly gun.
And that's why the doctor doesn't fit into it.
You know, that's why the doctor doesn't belong there because it's
just people with guns.
I think also we're meant to believe it's something of a war of
attrition because in the sort of secret vault.
They say, we've used all the weapons, except for the moment.
You know, we've used all the fancy weapons that we can't depict on
screen conveniently.
So now we're down to lasers.
Nemesis statue.
Yeah, yeah, statue.
Like, I just have her flag around Galifra.
That would have been so funny.
The decorative milk crate, that's all we've got.
Just have her fly up to the Daleks.
I am beautiful You are not.
But it's the one thing that I do have a slight problem with is
that what is depicted is not quite what was in my head.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah, and it's his takeoff.
The best thing about this is the five-ish doctors, and I've got to
say listening to you or speaking, I'm having to run through my
head going, was that in the special or was that five-ish because
to me it's the same?
You know, Stephen may not have those 3 doctors or 4 doctors in the
special, but they couldn't have done what they did without his
assistance and permission and love for the show and action
figures.
Yeah, I mean, he must he must have shared with Peter. what the
script was because Peter inserts those 3 doctors into the scene in
the undergallery because they're, they're hiding under the sheets
that the cycle are hiding under.
I think that what I've heard is Pete sort of said to Moffatt, is
there a scene where we could be hiding in the background?
You don't have to tell me what it is.
And so, 1st of all, they're like, well, we'll put you in 3 dalek
casings, you know, 3 paradigm daleks who were never seen in the
special.
And then it's like, oh, well, actually, we've got these statues
and you can hide as statues.
And I do understand there are some shots where it is.
It is them.
Yeah, in like in the background of one or 2 of the Ingrid Oliver
shots.
Apparently.
It is those three.
Well, in actual, apparently so.
Like, just, just, just, just, just, a stormtroopers.
I've seen it before.
Totally.
That's kind of nice.
You know, one of the things I really love about Stephen.
He has such a love for the show, and he's such a fan, and, you
know, he has his own take on it, and he works everything in
without denigrating anything that Russell's done. you know?
Yeah.
And, you know, that's one of the joys of his writing is that he
actually builds everybody up and he doesn't take swipes and or he
does things in a lovely way.
And I think it's often overlooked at how clever and how thoughtful
he actually is in many ways.
I just think it's so clever taking what Russell's done and not
negating it or saying it's wrong or trying to rewrite it or just
throw it out and say, well, that didn't happen.
But integrating it into his canon and just bringing everything
together.
Yeah, I mean, we've had all of the previous doctors in the
previous episode to one degree or another, we've just seen them in
action or in Collins case walking behind someone in a corridor.
But at least he does, at least he does get in the bubble, you
actually do see him at the concert.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And here they are all back. they're all working together to solve
the same thing.
And that's that's the clever thing.
And he's done this before.
He's pulled this before, right?
We're in the Tower of London, the moment tells the war doctor that
all of the Sonic screwdrivers are the same software, different
case.
And so he scans it with his, he scans the door with his uh, Sonic
screwdriver and because it's been 400 years, Matt Smith's, Sonic
screwdriver can immediately um, destroy the door, not that he
needs to because this.
It's not.
It's not long.
I love how it's, oh, we're so clever, says Matt Smith, and then
Clara bursts.
And then the moment says same software, different face.
And of course, the same thing happens.
Matt has the idea of what to do because he's had 400 years to
think about it in the meantime.
And that's the same trick that he pulls in time crash, isn't it?
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, where Pete learns how to defeat the whatever the hell the
thing is.
Belgium.
Yeah, by seeing.
Yeah, that's right.
By seeing the 10th doctor do it.
And so when he's the 10th doctor, he remembers being the 5th
doctor, seeing the 10th doctor to it.
So so he has pulled that before, it's not new, but it's done so
tremendously well here, I think.
In terms of the doctor's decision to change his mind at the end.
Yeah, it's an absolutely beautiful scene and Clara's inspiration
of him.
She actually originally had a much longer speech, right.
Which I'm glad they cut down, but pretty much Matt Smith says we
have to do this.
And David Tennant says, for we are the oncoming storm.
We are the car, Ferric Gartry.
We are the bringers of darkness.
And John Hurt says, this is what I was born to do.
To which Clara responds, no, you weren't.
No one's born to do anything.
That's just stupid.
That's what mad people say.
How many children did you say?
247000000 stuck on a planet surrounded by monsters and waiting for
someone to save them?
For God's sake, this time there's 3 of you.
You can stop being a bringer of darkness or a storm or a legend or
a hero or any of the stupid things you tell yourself you are, just
be you, just be a doctor.
And so what we get is the same effect as that.
And I'm glad they shortened it.
Because something I've been finding reading on the script
development of these is Moffat definitely overwrites at the
beginning.
He usually writes a lot of like sexy jokes in there.
As Clara wanders into the Tartars at the end before she says, by
the way, the curator of this place was looking for you.
She was meant to look at where the tennis doctor's TARDIS was and
say, you know, you used to be really sexy to which Matt Smith says
which one?
Which one are you talking about?
You know.
But that's another great thing about Stephen Moffat.
As much as he pays tribute to what came before, he's absolutely
not afraid to go, you know what, I need less here.
Yeah.
And I need I need to just let the actors do more because that
whole bit with the 3 doctors watching gala phrase the moment
brings it around them is so good.
And it has so much less dialogue than was in the original script.
Yeah.
All you needed.
Well done.
All you needed was that be a doctor.
Do what you've always done.
Be a doctor.
And that's the other thing that's really striking and that has to
happen.
This is the 50th anniversary celebration, so it needs to be about
who it is that we're celebrating.
And so all that that speech to the never cruel and cowardly
speech.
This is what the doctor is.
This is why we love him and we get to go back and fix the one time
where he failed to do that.
And I think it's fantastic.
It's magnificent.
I mentioned the other day, when we were doing night of the doctor
that I had a theory as to why this works so well, despite it being
a simple story.
And that is, especially in the 1980s, you had all these stories
where someone was deliberately out to get the doctor.
And it ends up being not terribly interesting.
And I'm kind of like, well, why isn't it terribly interesting?
It's like, well, it's not terribly interesting because the
doctor's not going to die.
Or, you know, be massively hurt or anything like that.
You know, there might be a regeneration.
But it's like even in Lagopolis, the doctor thinks it's about him
and it's not.
This is still a story about the doctor, but it's not a story about
the villain out to get the doctor, but it's about the doctor's
personal growth instead.
So it's kind of like the doctor's soul is at risk.
And that's far more interesting than the Borad going, Oh, well, you
know, doctor, you turned me into this, now I'm going to be
horrible to you.
Or Roger Delgado coming in and just mucking the doctor around.
You know, I've got no other purpose.
I'm just going to tease you this week.
And that's why I think you need to have a sort of quite simple
story with the Zygon thing because in a way, that simple story is
interrupting what we really want. in a very Stephen Moffatt kind
of way.
And if you look back in Stephen Moffatt's tenure to say Amy's
choice.
If that had been about the doctor, that would have been far less
interesting because it's about Amy, there's actual risk involved.
And because it's about something that we have been told for the
last 7 series has happened.
You know, right back with Eccleston, he says, I watched it
happen.
I made it happen.
Matt Smith says, I killed all the time, Lords, in the doctor's
wife, you know.
And everything we know about Doctor Who tells us that this is
inevitable, except for the Wedding of River Song, has told us
actually, this kind of thing can be changed if you're very
clever.
Yeah.
It's a little bit like the way this story rewrites the end of the
previous season as well, where the doctor has a destination that's
trendsalore.
He has it right up until the very end where he's saying goodbye to
David Tannen and that's a bad ending.
And so what Moffatt does is he lets the doctor rewrite it.
And so now his purpose is to go hunting for Gallifrey and the idea
that he's inevitably going to end up at Trezilore is gone.
And it's just a sort of super moffety thing to do, is to say
actually, we're not going to tell this story.
We're going to do something different.
And I think it's really great.
Yeah, sculler free or home the long way round.
Yeah.
It's something that will permeate through a number of series now
sort of the end of his time as showrunner.
The story being so simple.
And about being the doctor's soul, as you said, Brendan, just
touches our soul, right?
And I just think that works so well.
And the monsters become sort of periphery to that.
You know, he's never, Stephen's not really interested in writing
Daleks, like a lot of the time, they're here, but they're just a
means to an end.
They're on the periphery.
The Zygons.
Well, we adore them from the classic series.
If we know them, if they're new to us, this is what they are and
what they do, they're there for some jokes, and they're there for
that ridiculous scene where Gemma Regave has to spit out that, that
that, when she changes back for no reason at all, that I can see.
Do you guys like the zygons in this?
I do.
I think that they were the monster that was most in need of coming
back.
Every one of us thought, you know, the Zygons are the best one off
monster that Doctor Who has ever done and we need to see them
again.
And, you know, Moffat during his time will bring back the ice
warriors.
He will bring back the great intelligence.
He brings back all sorts of things and gets a redo of them.
And here I think the zygons.
I don't think they look quite as good.
No, they're Bite T cartoon versions.
But it's the same thing.
I think Todd's hinting at as with the Daleks.
You aggrandise them when you bring them back and they lose that
foetal fragility.
The Daleks and the Zygons in their 1st stories are both very
similar.
They're impounded and they have that claustrophobic sense, which
we...
It's also really a significant story because we see the doctor
commit, as far as we know genocide.
We don't know how many colonies survived.
And Tom so gleeful, yes, blew them up on the beach.
And even at 12 I thought this is terrible.
This is a terrible thing to do.
So maybe they did deserve some legacy, but they're not the same.
Well, they're not the same because like the actors who are playing
themselves aren't playing the Zygons.
Yeah yeah That's a shame, actually, you know.
I would have banned, you know, Paddy managed to bandage up Tom as
a as a mummy and tell him, oh, you know, it's Veritas, Tom, just
because she was sick of him and wanted to show up.
I think we could have done Impyramids of Mars.
I think we could have done the same very easily.
With Gemma.
I think Gemma would have been up.
No, but she's great.
But really as a zygon?
Yeah, I think she would have been fantastic.
I mean, she's the modern Glinda Jackson after all.
No, she is.
Jim, it really is.
And considering in the original terror of the Zygons, the actress
playing Sister Lamont does voice her Zygon counterparts.
Whereas here and not begrudging the man, but they're all Nicholas
Briggs.
And it's kind of like, you know, you know what?
Nicholas Briggs's Daleks, absolutely.
I wish they'd bring in Alastair Lock occasionally to mix it up, but
he hasn't played them even for Big Finish for a while.
But for me, I really like the Zygon design except for one factor
the new one.
The new one.
Not the teeth so much.
Richard's doing rabbit teeth acting.
Father pins.
No, it's the eyes.
They're very different.
And I think what it is, is on the original.
They have very heavy browse, which put the eyes into shadow.
And the new heads don't have the same protrusion, so the eyes are
more human.
Do you know, for me, it's the translucency?
The rubber of the Zygon suits... rubber of the...
Like it was slightly translucent.
Yes.
Yes, you're right.
Yeah, it's quite beautiful.
Yeah.
So, and that fragility, because they're sort of foetal and they
look sort of fragile and stuff.
Whereas here they are a little bit more kind of robust and they're
a little bit more monstrous.
They also don't strut around the same way with their little
thoraxes push forward. miss that.
I do like the fact that Queen Elizabeth kills off her
counterpart.
There's feeble as people.
Well, that's a famous quote from Queen Elizabeth I. I may have the
body of a weak and feeble woman.
I think Miranda Richardson does the same quote.
It is a great shame I wasn't Miranda. imagine that.
I just kept thinking there's an account by like a French
ambassador or something and I'm going to get the details wrong of
meeting Queen Elizabeth when she's much older.
And of course, sugar becomes a thing during Queen Elizabeth's
lifetime and her teeth are shockingly bad.
Like they're really black and horrible by the time.
Old wooden teeth, I believe she was...
But you remember her at the end of the Shakespeare code, which is
a sequel to this story.
Yes, yes.
Queen Elizabeth's concern.
She's not happy, is she?
But she has terrible teeth as well.
So all of that stuff about David Tennant saying how she's got
breath that would stun a horse and stuff like that.
All of that is kind of historically accurate eventually.
Speaking of which, Kate Stewart, um, and unit, of course, are in
here with Osgood as well.
She was previously introduced a little while ago during season
seven.
Power of 3 and unit is back here with the Black Archive.
I just laughed the fact that that poor man at the theatre.
It's his 1st day every day for 10 years.
Yeah, look at Severance 9 years early. isn't it?
I mean, the thing is, does he go home every day and say to his
husband, my 1st day went well.
You've been saying that for 10 years.
What a divorce.
But it's interesting how he works that all into the show and for
those that know, Dr. from the beginning, you know, that's it's
quite a big payoff.
I mean, it's nice to have that in there in the reference to the
brigadier.
I guess if you're newer, does it really, does it really matter?
No, it probably doesn't.
They just a, you know, military organisation, but it's, I find
that it's nice nods.
I know a number of people on the podcast, maybe not this team
don't particularly like Gemma Redgrave's performance as Kate
Stewart, but I always think that she does, I like her.
I actually really like her.
What else is she going to do with it?
And Osgood.
A nod back to a character from which one is it?
The demons. from the demon. right?
Who's not to say that she is a relation?
Yeah, yeah.
Sorry, his daughter.
Hang on, for the young people here.
Which one isn't is Osgood in the demons?
Osgood's the kind of science-y one who is operating the thing that
peers through the heat barrier.
Oh, God, of course it is.
Yeah, Alec Lindstead.
The Woo thing with the glasses and the white coat. of a fan.
Yeah, yeah.
Who is later Jellicoe in Robot?
and Arthur Stengos Dalek in Revelation.
Oh my goodness.
Yes.
It's interesting.
He's now got these new playthings.
I think Oz could make such an impact.
She's so good.
Gosh, she's good.
That he's going to keep bringing her back.
Yeah.
And you look back on his time as showrunner and you see that, you
know, when Stephen finds new things to play with, he lets go of
his current playthings.
And I'm sort of referring to the part of Nostergang, who I adore
and think should have done more episodes, but it's sort of like
okay, they're back, spoiler alert one more time, but then Case and
Osgood are back for a bit and then he finds new play things.
But she is a joy in this with her whole Tom Baker scarf.
She even does the Tom Baker thing where the Zigon is standing on
the end of the scarf, which is on the floor and she yanks it and
the Zigon falls over.
Like she absolutely does that.
And that incredible moment at the end, where the 2 Kate Stewarts
have lost their memories, and there's that interaction where one
of the Osgoods coughs and the other Osgood gives her the inhaler
and they both realise which one is human and which one is Zigon
but they decide not to wreck it because they do want this
negotiation to go ahead and succeed.
It's really good.
That's really good. picked up on, right?
Because then he, of course, cedes that for the next story in a few
seasons time, but that is it's just interesting, that little
moment.
It's very...
And also I think going back to at the end of David, tenant's time
in the, I want to say the dead planet.
Oh, Planet of the Dead.
Say words, different order.
Planet of the dead planet.
Yeah, I know.
You do have unit, and you've got Malcolm, who's another scientist
from unit who's in love with the doctor, which is wonderful.
And here we've got Osgold again, and I think they tried to do it
with that. maybe they didn't really do it with that guy back in
the power of 3 who was a bit of a nerd.
I can't remember who she was talking to.
Yeah, I can't remember.
But Malcolm does get name checked twice in this episode.
So he's the one who's responsible for ensuring that the, is it the
Ravens of the Tower of London, have their batteries?
Tell Malcolm to change the batteries.
And then Malcolm is also the one who is supposed to analyse the
stone dust at the bottom of the under gallery.
So that's definitely Malcolm.
Yeah, you know.
And again, it's this thing where Moffat loves Russell's Doctor Who
and constantly references it. in a positive way.
Something I really love about Gemma Redgrave's performance is she
has Nicholas Courtney's quality of underplaying certain moments.
She's not terribly earnest all the time, but yet there are layers
to the performance and she does get excited or scared or
concerned.
And, you know, at the moment of we only have to agree to live.
Well, unfortunately, we can only agree to die.
It's like, okay, yeah, like, no, I believe you will blow up London
actually.
You know, despite the fact, you know, the whole time we've seen
you've been kind of charming and walking in and going, oh, hi, Rory
nice pants, you know.
Interesting thing about Kate Stewart, though.
The BBC consider her a legally distinct and original character
compared to Kate Lethbridge Stewart of the spinoff media.
So that way they don't have to pay the Hazman Lincoln estate for
her.
Oh boy.
And we were talking about with a great intelligence a couple of
weeks ago.
It's like, you know, Daleks created by Terry Nations.
So, Tarans created by Robert Holmes.
So Loren's created by Malcolm Hook.
Does it say the Zargans are created by?
Oh, I think it does.
I think it says Zigon's created by Robert Banks Stewart, but it's
like great intelligence.
No, we don't need to credit anyway. barely a thing There was a
thing with, was it Mervyn Hasman and Henry Lincoln?
Yeah, no, there was a big kind of thing going all the way back
with yetis and reusable yetis.
And do you remember?
That kind of falling out. a bit of drama.
So yes, that's why.
My favourite Ingrid Oliver thing, which has nothing to do with
where we are at this point in the conversation, is it's
Penthesilea in the BBC radio for Earth.
What's it called again?
Earth Sea.
I can't believe.
Earth search?
Earth search is no, that's good as well.
I'll find you the title.
She plays a warrior, princess in a metal bra, and it's a piss take
of Lord of the Rings.
That's what Stephen Mangan as a fantasy writer, and he's Labrador
who gets sucked into an alternative dimension, and the Labrador
personifies as the chosen one, although he still likes sticks and
sniffing button.
And there's and it's a tiny dwarf and there's a tall elf who's, you
know, not quite sure where he is in the world, shall we say?
And it's really, really, really funny.
But everything in Ingrid Oliver does is completely different from
everything else Ingrid Oliver does.
And she's superb.
And I would have liked to have seen her as they do with the
Zigon.
And the book that Stephen Moffat has done really plays on that so
nicely.
And she actually saves the world in the book in a different way
because of the empathy that she and her doppelganger creates and
that the Zygons learn about.
They love swimming in the mind of a huge pool, even it's the
TARDIS swimming pool, isn't it at the time as well?
swimming in the pool of her mind and how much that goes on there.
And the Zigons actually, yeah, achieve empathy by being Ingrid
Oliver.
So she's absolute.
I would have really liked to have seen her do as a Clara thing.
I think I might, no, I'm not going to go there. she would have
made a good companion.
I'll just say that Yeah.
You know what?
I would be amazed if they didn't ask her at one and I get the
impression with Ingrid, Oliver, that, you know, like you say
Richard, she does different thing every time, but she doesn't do
it for long.
You know what I mean?
He's very busy.
Yeah, exactly.
And quite right.
Working, darling.
Yes, I am.
Thanks for asking.
You know, and I 1st saw her in Watson and Oliver, which was her
sketch comedy series with Lorna Watson, and there's a particular
one where Ingrid Oliver has found out that the new James Bond is
down to 2 names, her and Daniel Craig.
What?
Lorna Watson's like, 0 god, that's so nerve-wracking.
This is like when David Tennant beat me out for Doctor Who.
And then they do this whole Bond musical number with Ingrid Oliver
in a tuxedo.
It's amazing.
If we can find it on YouTube, we will link it in the show notes
and I'm looking at Nathan because he has to do that.
I would possibly go as far as saying that Osgood may be Stephen
Moffat's most successful recurring guest character, recurring
guest character.
And, you know, even 2 or 3 years ago when the Lonely Assassin's
video game was made.
She's the main voice in it.
Her and Finley Robertson returning as Larry Nightingale.
But it's it's um Osgood guiding you through the game and like she
even returns for some of the found footage sequences and she's
running around Wester Drumland's house and setting up probes and
things.
And I think she's got celery on her lapel of this stuff.
Elvin Quest.
Alvin Quest.
Oh, I haven't found it.
I just looking into it.
She's also in Penny Dreadfuls, she plays songs.
Have you heard that one on the radio and she plays a super spy
warrior kitty thing?
19th century and she's sort of like a, like a, as if Gemma
Redgrave was playing in appeal.
Everything she does is fantastic yet.
So she was offered, do you think she was offered a companion
piece?
I would be very surprised if she wasn't offered more.
Yeah.
Yeah, she feels like one of those ones.
We drop her in when we can get her.
Well, is that thing that Moffatt does actually, despite not going
to the lengths that Russell does to create people for the doctor
to hang out with a no?
He does what Todd says, he invents little groups of people that he
can bring back and rely on.
You know, as a sequel to this and in some ways a kind of rerun of
its major kind of moral point.
The Zygon inversion invasion is really quite terrific and her role
in it is absolutely crucial, isn't it?
Her role in that is wonderful.
And you want her to join the crew at the end, which is a shame
that, you know, that's the last time we see her.
Yeah.
And could he have made it any better?
Could we have got Captain McGumbo?
There is a photo of her on the on the, you know, paranoia board.
Yes, yes.
I love that paranoia.
Why we have it.
I'm quite sure, but Mikey Yates and Gene Marsh are there in the
photo for some reason.
And and you get like Ian and Barbara and Susan and...
And, and, I think, and Turlo and Chameleon.
Yeah, Chameleon.
What would we do without missa, okay?
Stephen Moffat inspecting that conspiracy board. actually turned
to the visual effects department and said, Sarah Kingdom and
Mike.
Yeah, but that's how can that happen?
And the head of the arts pump said, Steve, didn't you create a
whole new doctor for this special?
And Stephen's like, oh, people can invent stories for them?
Yes, Stephen.
I actually really like, also, at the beginning, Clara's in her new
setting at Old Your School.
Isn't that sweet?
And her character's getting rewritten.
I'm just assuming it's another Clara.
It's actually how many have we had now?
Yeah, it is a lot of them. 18 or something.
There's actually about 16 just in the greater London area.
I think it's incredibly confident and amazingly cinematic and it's
them just saying, all right, we're pulling out all the stops and
that shot of the helicopter with the TARDIS dangling from it
flying over London, like, hooray.
London's back.
You know, we're shooting in Trafalgar Square.
It's...
Awful weather.
It looks so cold.
Yeah, the wind's blowing.
It's really bad.
But it just looks incredible.
It looks so spectacular.
It's such an event And the movie style opening credits and
everything.
It's huge, this.
Don't they have I am Foreman as well?
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
You just got to throw it away, don't you?
It's kind of like, yeah, scrapyard this way. head teacher, I
Chesterton, head of governors, W.
Coburg.
Yeah.
So good.
For that TARDIS flying sequence, Matt Smith did as much of the
hanging as he was allowed to under-insurance purposes.
See, he was only a few feet off the ground.
The way he told, and also Jenna tells her, he was about 80 or 90
metres in the air. dangerous.
Like totally attached.
Yes. you know, so that like, I think there is behind the scenes
footage of him going up and him actually not holding on to the
handles.
Right You know, he's he's on a harness, which they painted out and
what have you, but he's like, no, no, I wanted to do as much of it
as physically possible, apparently, like the stuntman was saying
that's as high as he's allowed to go.
Stop it now.
Not holding the handles.
Oh my goodness.
Yeah, yeah.
But that is very mad.
The whole beginning is so great.
And it's exactly what Russell does for, say, the runaway bride
where you get the TARDIS as a physical object doing something
different from what we've seen before.
And so having the doctor hanging from the Tartars.
I just think it's so good. it's so tremendous And their 1st
interaction, like when she drives into the TARDIS, and she is as
cool as anything and so is he.
And they're kind of doing a Steed, Mrs. Peel thing. ironic
detachments.
No, that.
Very, very much so.
And I don't think Stephen Moffat's kept it a secret that he's very
much an admirer of that time on the Avengers.
Yeah.
And of course, like the Avengers film, which we've discussed
originally opened with before it was cut, Emma Peel driving up to
a phone box in the middle of nowhere to answer a ringing phone to
get her mission.
And that was completely cut, but photos exist and some footage of
it is in the trailer.
So visually, it is actually very similar.
And it is intended to be the same bike as the Bells of St.
John.
Right.
The gravity bike.
Little bites.
We always think that it went for longer, didn't it?
Because they're just moments of great serotonin oomph.
Which series was she in?
Serotonin.
One of my favourite lines comes from that scene and it's the will
there be cocktails line?
It's, you know, the doctor gives a little mini Florana speech to
her and that's her response.
Will there be cocktails?
And then all that sort of song froid just drops and they hug one
another and they're super happy to see one another.
But it's really terrifically good.
Very, very true.
I think the way in which Clara's written in this episode in the
next. sort of, it does make you want more of these 2 together, like
for another mini run of 8 episodes. you're left wanting more, which
is a good thing.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
But it wouldn't have hurt to have had a few more episodes of them
together in that sort of M appeal, Steve sort of relationship that
would have been quite a lot of fun, I think.
And odds on and fairness to all the writers.
It's actually a Myrna lawyer and William Powell screwball comedy.
Well, it comes from Thin Man series and no doubt before that, but
Carol Lombard and Clark Gable.
We've talked about this a lot.
Hitchcock does it perfectly in 39 steps with Madeline Carroll and
Donut, Robert Donut, which is one of my favourite films of all
time, but they're actually tied up at the end of the bend and she
has to get her stockings off.
And it's 1934.
Britain didn't have a haze code.
But the same banter and the whole, we're having a lot of sexual
tension here, but we're actually talking about the weather or the
latest diabolical mastermind, whatever.
And there's that lovely, as you said, the songfight of the
dissonance between intention and article.
And that's what Stephen Moffatt.
Stephen Moffatt really understands tension in dramatic interplay
and how, but give it to us, give it to us, as we're always saying
to him.
I'm just going to put that over there.
So you'll think it's coming and you might see a tinge of it, but
I'm actually going to throw something else entirely at you.
That's what day of the doctor is.
It's not at all what I expected, but I enjoyed it all.
And in my head, well, it's still five-ish doctors.
But in my head, there's a whole lot of other things that have
happened, and each time we go back and watch it, it's slightly
different again, because again, you notice his minutiae and
marginalia on the sides of the screen, but you also get the sense
of, I'm still surprised.
Even after all this time, I'm still surprised.
Yes, I was picking up new things all the time.
Back to what you're saying about Clara entering the TARDIS with
the motorbike.
It gets to show off that magnificent set, but we also get to, of
course, see David set and we get to see the in-between set, which
with all the round things which they love.
It's so good.
And yours to get Tom, even in the curator scene, where you've got
all of the on the wall.
Patrick's bedroom, you know.
I love that something that modern who can do.
Yeah.
You know, we've got the budget. can do it.
Well, so that set still existed, didn't it, in Cardiff at the
Doctor Who experience?
Yeah, exactly.
They actually shut down the doctor experience for a day to film
the scenes in David's in David's house.
Yeah, absolutely.
And then for the John Hurt, TARDIS, the round things walls had
been built for an adventure in space and time.
So they are the reproduction Billy Walls.
Right, yeah.
Reproduction Billy.
The paint is still wet.
Yeah, I love Tenant and the Smith fanboying about the round
things.
Yeah.
It seems that by all reports, because really there's 4 doctors in
this, because Tom turns up as well.
It sounds like Matt Smith is kind of the glue in that David
Tennant said to Stephen, look, I'm going to come in, but I'm going
to let Matt take the league because it's his show.
And of course, you know we're both fans, you know what it's like
in the old show when other doctors came on.
And apparently 1st day on the Tartar set.
Just before they started shooting, Matt walked up to Dave and said
now, look, I'm going to be doing controls over here and whatnot.
But I don't want to hog the flying duties.
If you want to do a bit of dialogue and flick a few switches as
well, you're the doctor too.
You're adorable.
Yeah.
And, you know, John Hurt, who knew nothing about Doctor Who after
William Hart, all hadn't watched it, said in an interview, you
know, he said, yeah, I know what it is, but I don't know what it's
about.
He said, I have a career for goodness.
But he said, I have such respect for Matt and David.
You know, they're such good actors.
And they can do all the science-y talk.
They haven't given me much science-y talk.
I'm glad to say, but those 2 just rattle it off while being sad
and happy and all this.
He's so generous, isn't he?
You know, he bumped into Eccleston not long after this.
And he said, we've no, no, John Hurt?
No, John Hurt?
But I'm into Eggleston, because Eccl still talks about how hurt he
was.
Not no pun.
I'm sorry, intended.
But, you know, and he's riffed with Russell.
It goes very deep.
But he came and patted him on the back and said, oh, Chris, we're
comingled now.
We mingled together.
We are a mingled entity.
And that's sweet.
But that is interesting that he just regenerates. there on the
spot.
Like, it's done, so I'm going to regenerate.
Maybe you buy it more than me.
I think that what is happening is that Moffatt is filling in the
gaps and so we get to see those 2 doctors who we haven't seen
regenerate, we get to see them.
Oh, yes, because in the night of the doctor, we've got that as
well.
And I think possibly narratively you could hand wave it as, you
know, he was the doctor who had to find the time war, the time war
is over now so he can go away.
It is just convenient to fill in the gap.
And interestingly enough, you know, people have gone, why didn't
they go further with the visual?
And there's some fan versions where they do go further?
But Stephen Moffett was asked about that a few years later?
And he said, given that Chris said he didn't want to appear in it
he said, I can do it as a hint, but I felt going fully into
Chris's face would be disrespectful.
And the interviewer said, so did you ask Chris about that?
He said, no, no, no.
I feel asking him would have been pressuring him to allow use of
his likeness.
Chris has said he has a lot of respect for Stephen Moffin.
Yeah, totally.
Well, I mean, Stephen Moffatt wrote that incredible two-parter for
him to be in, so he has acted a Stephen Moffatt script.
I think also that it's telling that he's the only doctor who's
TARDIS we go into.
So we see all of the doctors on the screens in the Galafray war
room, but we do actually see Chris saying the thing from inside
the Tartars.
Yeah, totally.
I'm nicking off and you can marry whoever you like, you loose
bloody children, you cleaned that up.
But then we also get 13 doctors.
We also get that little snippet of Capella.
What did we think of that?
Do you remember?
Do you remember your reaction?
Did you gasp?
I can't remember.
I guess, but I grabbed Brendan.
Yes, exactly, he did.
Grab your Brendan's gender.
After 9 years, Are you okay?
The bruising's gone down.
Yeah, and the swelling...
I think I did.
I think, yeah, because then they would have had to get him in to
film that little bit.
Yeah.
And he wasn't yet filming and was he not yet filming?
No, and we only see his eyebrows partly because that works.
That's actually all he is though, isn't he?
Also because they haven't worked out what his costume's going to
be at the time.
Wasn't he still filming Musketeers or?
Yes, yeah.
Mouseketeers?
was that?
No, he was.
It was Musketeers.
So he filmed this on the same day he filmed his side of the
regeneration.
Oh, okay. for time of the doctor.
And if you look at time of the doctor, even though he peers at
Jenna, they're never in the same shot.
Oh okay.
So they did that to fit in with his schedule.
So it was this weird thing of Matt actually had to match him when
he came to film it.
So Jim wasn't there.
He wasn't there with Jenna in...
Oh, that's a shame.
I think not.
I'm thinking back and obviously I haven't rewatched Time of the
Doctor for the podcast yet, but I think Capaldi and Jenner don't
actually appear in the same shot, but I could be wrong.
And if I am wrong, it means that yes, they brought Jenna in.
Right, right.
But yeah, so that's that's when they film that.
And yet that was a moment in the cinema.
No, unintended.
No, I remember there was a fricking roar from that.
Because if you didn't know that Matt was going, you'd be going
what the hell is this?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
It's it's the same thing.
You know, the paratext is important.
The trailers, all of that stuff can be assumed knowledge.
And we'd had that special, hadn't we?
Yeah, in August.
Yeah.
So Tom Baker's involvement was treated like a big secret.
He was picked up at 130 in the morning in a Hessian sack in a
Hessian sack.
Driven driven to Cardiff to arrive at 430 in the morning, taken
out of the Hessian sack and put in makeup and a costume and what
have you.
And the way Tom tells it is apparently, you know, everyone was
very attentive and got me in costume and got me cups of tea and
things, but he's like, no one talked to me.
There was no conversation and I was just, they were getting it
ready and I was just standing on the side of feeling like this sad
lonely old man who's just been wheeled out for the coronation or
whatever.
And then he said, then this tall man with a with a chin and a nose
and big and big hair came out of the shadows and Tom, how
wonderful to see you.
Thank you so much for coming.
And as Tom puts it, my gloom was lifted by the arrival of Matt
Smith, who welcomed me so enthusiastically that I began to think
life was worthwhile.
That's so lovely.
Speech, holy crap, it's so perfect.
Yeah.
Was it just him and those 2 on set?
It was just those 2 on set.
Like that's why Jenna walks off.
It's like, let's have as few people on set as possible.
The witch has to attend her well.
Sorry, I just love that joke.
So good.
Well, it's from Hyde.
That's one of the names of the ghost in high.
That's how forgettable hide is.
So lovely. just makes me love this even more.
We're at the end of this, seeing all the doctors standing there is
such a wonderful iconic moment.
We've had lines from each of them their final lines, like, over
tenant.
I want to go, something that...
He always says that.
That is correct.
All 2 times.
Like, you can't wait.
I don't like it.
Yeah, yeah, like Stephen just knows what these lines.
I can't wait for Jody to say, I'm letting the door bang me ass. on
the way out.
Wait, okay.
But just that just that whole iconic shot of them all standing
there.
Beautiful. beautiful.
In a way, it doesn't quite end up paying off, I think, because it
does promise something different, and it only vaguely promises it
because he does say home the long way round, but the circumstances
under which he goes home are very different from what these
anticipates, I think.
Yeah, definitely, definitely.
It's a little bit like the end of the 5 doctors where, you know
the doctor goes on the run again. you know, and so we've got a
sort of new start to the show after that special and now we get it
again with the 50th, you know, he's got a new lease of life.
He's not heading inevitably towards Transilore.
He's got some other mission.
Yeah, well, that's the thing.
It gives the fact that they were able to change the past tells him
you know, then the 10th doctor says to him, we need a new
destination.
And it's like it's something we can change.
You know, I know, Nathan, for instance, that you and I disagree on
Lake Silencio, whether the doctor originally died or not.
You say, yes, he did and then the past changes, whereas I'm like
it's always been this way.
But this is a situation where I'm like, no, no, no, he did
definitely blow up Gallifrey the 1st time. and then needed to grow
and heal in order to realise there was a better way.
But because John Hurt isn't going to remember it, It still leads
to the same growth.
That is such a clever bookending.
I hadn't thought that the 2 related before.
Yes.
Todd, what were you thinking?
Oh no, I just love the fact that John Hare can't retain things
because the time streams are out of sync.
It's something that we always say when doctors meet each other and
now it's been verbalised.
So that helps me cross the T's and dot the I. Although I quite
like Matt Smith's other theory, which is that David Tennant's just
not paying attention.
Look, in the end, this is, I just think, joyous and Stephen does
an extraordinary job and it's near perfect, which is why I give it
a 9 out of 10.
Well, Delicious, that's all we have time for.
For now.
We'll be back, basically, immediately, with another episode of
Flight through Entirety, in which we discuss the day of the
doctor.
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 FT Podcast on Twitter, and on our website, FlightthroughEntirety
com, where you'll find links to our other podcasts, Bondfinger
Jody Interterterra, maximum power, and untitled Star Trek
project.
Until next time, may you fail doing the right thing, as opposed to
succeeding in doing the wrong one.
Thank you very much for listening and good night.
Good night.
See you soon.
Well, I won't be speaking to it. of you ever again after what
you've just said, but yes.
That was Flight Through Entirety, starring Todd, but it'll be
Nathan Bottomley, Brandon, Jones, and Richard Stone.
Theme arrangements by Cameron Lamb.
This episode, the glue that holds everything together, was
recorded on the 24th of July 2022 and released on the 23rd of
November.
So, you've now heard what the original flight through Entirety
Cast have to say about the day of the doctor, but stay tuned to
your podcatcher of choice. where you'll find a 2nd episode with
our new series cast discussing the same story.
I'll see you over there.
So August 2013, they announced it was Peter Capaldi.
Yeah.
Because when they were filming this, Matt was still under talks to
possibly do series 8.
Right.
And I actually wonder, um, and, you know, where I'm flashing
forward, but we have mentioned foreshadowing Danny Pink that, um
there's also a teacher in there who sort of floppy haired and has
a bow-time one.
Well, the guy who runs in to tell Clara that her doctor called is
floppy haired and a bit Matt Smith-ish.
So I wonder if Moffatt was already thinking ahead of, hey, if I
can get this guy back, they obviously went down a different path.
Yeah, and I do, I do, knowing what I know now, I did, I did wonder
watching that scene.
It's like, he's a bit Matt Smithy and a bit breakfast, a bit
breathless.
Also for breakfast.
All right.
I think we need an out.
Um, look, I don't know.
We're at the end. of this.
Seeing all the doctors standing there is such a wonderful iconic
moment.