Midichlorians

[00:28]

Hello, dear listeners, and welcome back to Flight Through Entirety, the only Doctor Who podcast, who, once we're released from bondage, will be irresistible.

I'm Brendan.

I'm Nathan.

And I feel like I've swallowed traces of glucanol.

It's time for the Chris Boucher.

Or is it Agatha Christie Classic, The Robots of Death?

This is... close to my favourite Doctor 2 story of all time.

I'm gonna say this.

I love Pamela Salem Pilot 2s.

She's fantastic.

She was my kindergarten teacher, Mrs Gauge.

She was my first class teacher, Mrs. Marx.

She was my third class teacher, Mrs. Fletcher.

I adored her in all of her incarnations and every time I watched her and for me, she just makes this show.

I just I'm just in love with her.

This is really unusual for a Hingecliff story in that there are two women in it, and they get to speak and they have characters.

[01:32]

And I think there's more than that, actually, because so often, like, I'm really starting to get irritated with a Hingecliffe area and the adulation that it receives.

Normally, the guest cast in a Hinchcliffe story are a bunch of men in uniforms, with no actual personalities to speak of beyond, you know, the performances of the actors.

But here, you know, everyone is dressed sort of lavishly with this sort of fantastic makeup.

And, you know, in episode one, you get that scene on the sand minor where they're all kind of talking and stuff.

And very, very economically Boucher establishes their character, so you get Chub teasing Vorg.

Vorg, I want to say, Borg.

Borg, sounds Swedish, and you get, you know, Uvanov being terribly driven, and everyone being kind of dismissive of Uvanov, and it's all done really well. desk is very logical.

And all of the characters are so well delineated and so well defined.

And it makes such a change.

It's great to see, like, with such a large cast, there are very few weak links.

[02:36]

I mean, I think Zelda is possibly the weakest link in terms of actors.

I think the director keeps her under control quite well, initial scenes, it's just her breakdown and crying before she dies, that is really quite diabolical.

Yeah.

But, you know, back to like the costuming and the makeup and all that art deco stuff.

Like imagine if this was done like, I don't know, Planet of Evil with, you know, base sets and sterile corridors and like just nondescript uniforms.

I mean, that is part of the character of this story, that this society has this about it.

Yeah.

And it works thematically too, because it's a revolution, isn't it?

And so the people, the humans that we see are upper class.

Do you know what I mean?

And they have slaves and servitors who they order around.

So straight away, they're all lying on couches in absolute luxury playing games of chess and sort of lying languidly and sort of firing hilarious bolmos at each other.

But they're also massively dismissive of the robots.

And even tooths who we absolutely adore.

[03:39]

I think it's in episode 3, where 7 comes to her quarters and stuff, and she's just really rude to him. like massively, absolutely.

But classism is a big part of the story because you've got the different classes of robots for a start.

But you also have different classes within the human characters, and that's established early on as well when they start going on about the founding 20 families.

Yeah, yeah.

And something I really like about Russell Hunter's performance is in moments of extremist, his accent slips.

In episode 4, when they're going robot hunting...

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Or Liverpool, doesn't he?

I think it's deliberate.

And he has already said he's not from one of the founding families.

I think he is a small town, a small town boy made good.

Every planet has a Liverpool.

Every planet has Liverpool.

So he's developed this accent and then he slips back to what he once was a small kid.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[04:40]

Yeah, and I think it's just a little detail that was probably worked out between writer and between writer, director and actor because the line that he's not one of the 20 families is in there.

But the accent is with the performance.

Yeah, no, I love all of those touches, you know, throughout the story and I also love the fact that Boucher is writing for his character of Leila again.

And there's just so just wonderful stuff from Louise Jemison in here.

And I think we forget, like, it's her 2nd time round, and it's just the way she moves and just different lines.

He gives like creepy mechanical men and, you know, they do not bleed or whatever, you know, things like that.

You know, it's just all of wonderful little moments.

It's sort of this unusual thing where it's written very much for her.

I mean, he creates the character.

He writes her first eight episodes.

We'll get that later with Mel, where Pip and Jane Baker write a lot of initial episodes.

But not to mention Johnny Byrne. and Nissa because she's so well written in Arc of Infinity.

[05:45]

Yeah, brilliant.

So all of the stuff about the robophobia and that uncanny valley that the robots in habit where they kind of look human, but they don't feel human.

And the stuff where Poole's body language gives him away, the importance of body language to just the sort of, you know, as one of the themes of the story plays right into Leila's strengths.

And so, um, rather than being stupid, which Leila will very quickly become spoiler alert for next week's episode, she's very smart and very competent but in a different field from the doctor.

Yeah.

And the doctor is still being quite dismissive of her intuition because Leila feels something is about to go wrong before the sand minor crashes at the cliffhanger of episode two.

And the doctor dismisses it.

But when it comes true, his 1st reaction is, don't say I told you so.

So he begins to accept it.

But he is a rat, if you like, a rational intelligence, whereas hers is an intuitive intelligence.

[06:52]

Can I just sidetrack us briefly and say, why does the Zan minor crash at the end of episode two?

I think Desk sabotages it and then fixes it immediately?

Yes.

Right.

To throw suspicion off himself.

Okay.

Yes, maybe he senses that we're 23 minutes into the episode.

Well, you know, there is that constraint we have to construct that we have to live with.

Look, I'm going to criticise one performance in this story, and it's one that a lot of people, university, universally love, and that has to be cool.

The problems that you have back in arc in space with the commander.

I have the same problem with his performance here.

I think it's just too over the top after his robophobia breakdown.

And as a kid, I really, really loathe the performance.

Even now, I mean, I can see why he has, he's got literally 3 scenes to go from I've got a robophobia thing to complete an utter breakdown, but I just kind of, you know, as a kid, I just kind of went, oh, look, what is this?

Why is it so over the top?

And I really disliked David Collings performance so much is that when he suddenly turned up in Modern Undead, I recognised his face and went, oh, no, not him.

[08:03]

And so straight away I was totally against that performance in that character.

So even now when I watch it, I can see what he's doing.

And I'm glad that the character is then sidetracked and sort of, you know, is gone by that point.

Right?

His performance up to that point.

I don't have a problem with.

But then I just don't like it.

I just think it's too much.

I think that's a pretty reasonable assessment, actually.

It is kind of over the top.

And, you know, David Collings has got a great voice and a great presence and all of that sort of thing, but it is a bit actorly that breakdown, isn't it?

It's not very convincing.

And even earlier on, and, you know, generally I like David Collins's performances, I love him in Sapphire and Steel.

But even earlier on, there's one line that he says that always sticks in my head as, I don't quite believe that. when he's explaining about Zelda.

And it's just a line.

The dead man was her brother.

There's just something about the way he delivers it.

I can't quite put my finger on it, but it's, it's, It's like he's making sure the back row in the theatre hears it.

[09:07]

I'm so relieved that we're all on the same page with this because I thought we weren't going to be, so yeah.

As I say, you know, generally I like him, but I think there are some deficiencies.

Where, and I would argue that his deficiencies in his performance are actually worse than the deficiencies of Zilda, as played by Tanya Rogers, because Zilda is kind of ropey for a line, and really, when she gets on the comms and shouts, you did it, Ivanov, you filthy murderer.

I like that.

It's just the crying idea.

Yeah, the crying is bad.

The interaction between her and Ivanov is great where he's like really, really close to her face and like he clearly fancies her.

Do you know what I mean?

He really does.

No, I think that's the strength of his acting as opposed to hers.

Like I actually think in a number of those scenes where I watch her.

I think she's struggling to maintain the same quality as the rest of the cast.

That's just my interpretation of it.

I just kind of think you're not really that good and you're just there.

That's how I feel when I watch a performance.

[10:07]

What do you think about Brian Croucher?

I actually really like Brian Croucher, and it's funny.

It's like, He's the young virile Brian Croucher before he goes to Gooless.

I think there's a, we know how they age rapidly and sort of degenerate like overnight.

So between this and Blake 7, like, it's like Cordaro and Blake 7.

Like, season one, young Fitborough, season four.

Oh my goodness, what the hell has happened?

He's eaten a lot of space pies.

But yes, I think he's great.

Yeah, I think he's very good hair as well.

And I think he's much better than he is as Travis, simply because... terrible as Travis, isn't he?

Yeah, but again, we've got we've got the classism here.

And Borg is clearly not one of the founding 20 families as well.

Like Chubb's from one of the founding 20 families, but Borg clearly isn't because, you know, Borg's a bit rough and Cockney and whatnot.

And that's precisely what didn't work for Travis because Travis is kind of meant to be like Hannibal Lecter. you know, he's meant to be cultured.

[11:07]

It was Stephen here.

Stephen Griff was terribly posh.

Yeah, exactly.

And then suddenly it's, then if I'm guilty of murder, of mass murder, then so are all of you.

You know, he's terrible.

Whereas that really suits Borg.

And especially that wonderful scene where the doctor offers him a jelly baby.

And he has a reaction which is anger, fear and disgust all in one, just with 2 words and whacking the jelly vapours out of the doctor's hands.

And the wonderful look of Tom's face of being utterly heartbroken that someone has rejected a jelly paper.

It doesn't amazing.

A simple no thank you would have sufficed.

And he spends like the next 20 seconds or so sulking.

Like we listen to you, okay, yes, I'm fine.

He's really hurt We've mentioned the robots.

I love the different classes of robots.

I love that as a kid.

I just thought that was so wonderful.

And, you know, D84. one other D, don't we, I think?

Yeah, there's one D in the robot morgue.

There's one other dump.

And I think so, they've only got the one costume in black.

[12:08]

But again, just the look of them.

And if the theme thing is that uncanny valley thing where they look enough like people to be off putting, but not convincing.

And we see that, do you know what I mean?

in gaming and VR and stuff these days?

But the way it's done, you know, like it's a beautiful sort of deco design, but with, you know, lips and eyes and all of those details, which, you know, the quarks didn't have.

Or Styers robot.

Yeah, yeah.

And so that works thematically, but they just look gorgeous and those fabulous newsreader voices that they have.

You know, I will kill all the others.

You know?

It's what's his face?

So again, what's his name?

The guy who plays SV 7.

Oh, SV7 is Miles Fothergill.

Miles Fothergill. one hell of a name.

And he's, of course, in a Blake 7 episode as well, in the web.

Well, let's not advertise that.

No, but again, he has that same kind of flat, slightly camp newsreader delivery and it really is, it really is terrific.

[13:14]

And of course, then we have Gregory Depolme, who just goes one up on the name game from Miles Fothergill as D84.

I want a D84 to become a companion.

I know, yeah.

I mean, imagine D84 and Henry Gordon Jago next week.

I think we'd have only worked if D84 was wearing Leila's skin.

Does anybody actually comment that she's wearing those skins at all in this?

No, I don't think they do.

And, I mean, I suppose when you look at their outfits, no one is in a uniform.

Certainly there are commonalties in design, you know, in the same way that Todd, you and I are both wearing a polo style shirt.

Mine has a collar. yours is collarless.

You both look lovely, by the way.

Thank you, dear.

So do you.

Your little millennium falcon.

But everyone is sort of going around in their casual gear.

So I think that's why they don't kind of bat an eyelid.

It was just like, oh, that's what she wears.

All right, fair enough.

And that is a big relief.

[14:15]

I mean, that the attention to costumes and just the attention to character just lifts this so enormously because it is.

I mean, in a very real sense.

It's very standard plot wise.

It is a base under siege.

With the difference that the call is coming from inside the house, I guess.

But, you know, it is a story.

It's a bit like next season's horror fang rock where you have a group of people in a confined space being picked off.

Yeah, yeah.

There's nothing particularly inventive about it.

But I don't think it has to be.

No.

And I think it's done, it's well acted, it's well directed, it's stylish.

You know, all of these elements just come together, you know?

I think it's the characters too.

And I think it is the Angatha Christie influence where, you know, the characters all have these dark secrets, so pools from the company, you know, Zilda is investigating the death of her brother, you know, Uvanov has this thing in his past as well.

And all of that stuff which Agatha Christie uses to sort of texture her plots and to create red herrings and stuff.

[15:15]

That's all there, but it works so tremendously well because, you know, this isn't Vashinsky and Dahan and all of those terribly boring people from Planet of Evil.

It's a bunch of really kind of well drawn, interesting characters.

You know, they're not subtle, they're not photorealistic or anything like that.

But they're enough to keep us going.

And, you know, last season, when we were talking about Brain of Morbius, which I had previously not really liked very much, that benefitted enormously from the same thing, by having just a kind of group of well drawn, fun, interesting characters interacting with each other.

And I think it's what Hinchcliffe lacks.

Possibly.

There's something that you mentioned then about red herrings.

Were you actually taken in by the red herrings, did you actually work out as a kid who was actually killing everybody off really quickly, or did it take a while?

Do you know, I can't remember, and watching it now, of course.

I mean, partly because we've seen it hundreds of thousands of times.

But also, it just seems really terrifically obvious.

[16:18]

So they do the trick that they do in the Deadly Assassin, which is have the character who is the villain whispering for no reason.

So in order to disguise who they are.

But they're on that screen with that sort of top of the pops video affair.

Yeah, and it's not so obviously, dad.

And Dask is, you know, established as the guy in charge of the robots and he's the guy who thinks like a robot, you know, like in the very beginning when Chub is tormenting Borg about the massage, the robot massage and tells that hilarious story about the robot twisting the guy's arm off.

I heard it was a leg.

I love that.

The whole thing is so terrific.

He's the one who spoils the fun by being all logical and kind of technical about it all.

So it is a bit of a giveaway.

And then later on, you know, like his performing laser surgery on their brains or something like that in his little cupboard and he's wearing a bag over his head.

So for no reason other than to prevent the audience knowing who it is. not like anyone's there.

[17:20]

And he doesn't want them to see his, you know, his silver painted face makeup that he needs to put on because he's a villain of the face.

And he's one of those great villains, exactly, who midway between sort of episode 3 and four, like cancer while we're doing Blake's.

We should do lots of Blake 7 references because this is Doctor Who, the Blake 7 years.

Yeah, it is.

So just when cancer goes off to do a hair and makeup so she can come in at the very end to Menace even.

Here, Taryn Capel disappears off to put some green makeup on and stuff.

The camp old thing.

He will be irresistible when he releases his brothers from bondage, won't he?

so that he can do his final attack.

See, but all of that stuff, silly and cliche, is it is just doesn't spoil this story in any way.

That's true.

Even the ending, which I find quite rushed.

And, you know, it's obvious in that final sequence, Yvana and Tusa, you know, getting strangled.

And it's not clear that they're going to live, and it's just an overdub from Tom saying, oh, yes, they'll recover.

I remember as a kid sort of missing that line and thinking how they dared or are they alive?

[18:22]

And then we don't even see them at the end and suddenly, you know, there's a line that, you know, they're waiting for rescue or whatever.

I think the ending's a bit rushed and I would have liked a scene with them with...

Just something, you know?

I just think, conversely, at the other end of the story, at the beginning of the story, we do see Leela in the Tartars, we've got time there, you know, with her yo-yo, and then what I think is just wonderful.

The explanation about why the TARDIS is bigger on the inside than the outside.

This is one of, which obviously I think has to be a Bob Holmes thing.

He's already tried to address earlier in the season speaking different languages.

And so here we've got the explanation that really is not an explanation.

And you sit down and you think, well, I think it's really great visually and it makes no real sense, but it makes sense and you accept it.

And I love that in science fiction when you get these explanations that you accept, but they really don't necessarily work, but we don't have to hear about mini chlorines and some sort of huge technical jargon that's going to lock you into kingdom come about what the concept is here.

It's like, I always accepted it.

Yes, that makes perfect sense.

[19:24]

You know, it can be that far away and yet still inside, but, well, hey, I'm not going to think about it.

I accept it.

It's such a sparklingly good scene, that one too, because it's got the 9 times out of 10 thing where the doctor gradually revises the number of times that he can that he can pilot the TARDIS correctly down from 9 times out of 10 to 5 times out of 10.

Then you've got that line about if people see that you don't want to hurt them, they never hurt you.

And then he says 9 times out of 10.

It's really like the dialogue, and maybe it's homes, but Boucher, you know, again, in Blake 7, takes all of these sort of fairly bland terry nation scripts and just makes the character into play, again, between sort of bitchy characters who don't like each other very much, which we saw at the end of face of evil as well, I think.

Yes, yes.

It's something that he does really, really well.

And so that whole thing is just really enjoyable.

I'm with you.

I think this is one of the absolute greats of classic Doctor Who.

And it irks me a little bit to follow received fan wisdom on this.

[20:26]

So I will make up for it next week.

But I think this is really truly something special.

You know, I compared this, like, to my favourite stories for the past 2 years.

Like, I've had to take seats of doom from last season and arc in space, and it's like, you know, here are these 3 stories.

What am I going to put as my penny called doctor?

Yeah.

I think all 3 of them are up there.

In a way, it's a shame that Philip Hinchcliffe has moved on at the end of this season.

I mean, I'm with you, Nathan, in that I do not think he is the beal and end all, or rather his era.

You know, I can't put all the decisions down to him.

But I do believe that at the end of this season, he's just hitting his stride because in this season we have really a run of quite good stories.

I mean, Deadly Assassin has its problems, hand of fear has its problems.

Marcus Mandraga is a great historical face of evil is brilliant.

This is brilliant.

I know we're going to talk about talons next week.

Nathan.

I'm in Nathan's category.

But yeah, in a way, it's a shame he's moved on because with this representing some of his best work, and it addresses the problems with women in the last couple of seasons, in my opinion, it addresses the problem with violence as well.

[21:39]

It presents violence as I'm far more responsible in appropriate manner than, say, Pyramids of Mars or Deadly Assassin.

I mean, as we've explored.

It's not a terribly complex plot, and it's not terribly complex characters, but it proves you don't necessarily need complex things, but you need the things you do to be well done.

And I think that's where this story succeeds.

Yes, but I don't necessarily think that's Philip Hinchcliff's influence at all.

I think that's Chris Boucher as a writer.

And what he brings to the table as opposed to relying on Robert Holmes and Robert Holmes vision of things, which we've had for the last 2.5 years.

So, you know, as much as you say, you think Philip's hitting his stride, I think he's been and peaked and it is probably time to go.

The characters thing is the Hinchcliffe weakness, there just aren't that many memorable characters, and there's these endless stories, with small guest casts, where the people are just not very interesting.

And, you know, like, people like the horror, and it's well made.

It's got a budget, do you know what I mean?

Like, the stories generally look good, they generally hang together.

You've got Tom and Liz and then Tom and Louise, and, you know, both of those are tremendously great pairings.

[22:45]

You know everything is going well.

But, you know, I think that what's important is interesting guest characters, and we mention seeds of doom, and it's got Scorbi.

Do you know what I mean?

who I think is terrifically memorable and a great performance.

I think Solon, Philip Maddox, Solon in Brain of Morbius is another great one.

Kate Grenville's character, in Brain of Morbius, you know, like they're great.

But then you look at stories like Hand of Fear, where there are no characters that are very interesting.

You're struggling to find an interesting character in Planet of Evil.

I mean, again, the reason we like Genesis of the Daleks is Nida, Danfrost, you know what I mean?

No one's tuning in for Ronson or Carvel, or, you know, um, so, so, characters are really important, and we'll see next week, how, you know, the presence of really interesting characters really lifts the story in fan estimations.

But all too often, Hinchcliffe is just content to have men in uniforms or a guest cast of 4 people or something like that.

[23:51]

And I just don't think that the production values and the scary premises and stuff are enough to make it great, Doctor Who.

I will agree with Brendan.

In fact, that Philippine strip, as a producer, is not willing to accept shoddy production.

Yeah.

You know, and he will overspend and do whatever and stand up to whoever to ensure that it looks quality.

You know, poor Graham Williams has to, you know, reap the benefits of those rewards next year where, you know, he has to accept less than, you know, acceptable standards, in my opinion.

Yeah, yeah.

And even though I think Pat is a producer, what he wants out of the characters and the show is probably better, you know, um, in the long term than what Hinchcliffe is delivering.

On that side of things, I think, um, Philip Pinchcliffe, you know, if he had stayed in the role, I don't think we would have necessarily had the, the look and the feel of what's about to eventuate, you know?

I'm just thinking back to something you said a few minutes ago, Todd, about the difference between Henchcliff and Boucher.

[24:55]

And Robots of Death was one of the 1st Doctor Who stories released on DVD.

And it was the 1st one, but at least, with what we would consider today to be standard special features, such as commentary.

And the 1st commentary it had, because it's been rereleased since, was Philip Hinchcliffe and Chris Boucher.

It's a really boring commentary, isn't it?

It's really boring, but there's a very telling moment in it when they're talking about the origins of the character, Leila.

Oh, okay.

And of course, one of the bases for her character is Layla Khalid.

And Philip Hinchcliffe, I believe, says the terrorist Layla Khalid, and Boucher jumps in with freedom fighter.

Yeah.

And, you know, I don't know enough about the background of the real person to comment either way on that, but they both, there's a tense moment and they sort of agree to disagree, and I think it's Boucher actually says, well, one person's terrorist is another person's freedom fighter.

And they move on talking about how wonderful Louise Jameson is because that's something everyone... everyone can agree on that.

[25:58]

But yeah, that's one of the commentaries where they decide thereafter that they have to have an actor in the commentary.

Otherwise it's just too boring.

Either that or Toby Haydoke.

Yeah.

Because Toby Haydock chairs some very good 60s commentaries which are entirely production staff.

And they are actually hilarious.

Like Sonya Markham and Doug, the Vision Mixer and people like...

I forget his surname.

I'm sorry if you're listening, Doug.

We talked about the design.

Do you know what I mean?

And Doctor Who Often falls down when it comes to models.

And these models are not terrific.

Do you know what I mean?

But for once they've learned that if you shoot the model from low down, that it looks big, you know, so rather than seeing an aerial view of this sort of tiny mechanical thing going across the sand, because we shoot it from, and that opening shot, there's a wonderful opening tracking shot, where the sand minor goes past the camera, and there's these rocks that fall down, and they follow the motion of the camera and continue to motivate the shot.

[27:01]

And I think every time that that appears, it works, it does work really well.

And we've seen some terrible models over the years.

But I think, you know, this is quite well directed.

Yeah.

I also want to talk about the bridge set.

I've been watching Wonder Woman. 1970s, a TV series of varying quality.

And in the show, every, when it begins, every in like 6 or 12 episodes, they have this concrete dungeon set.

But as it goes along, the concrete bunker suddenly becomes every like, you know, 4 episodes, every 3 episodes, and we're just redressing where the door is, and this sort of thing.

So here in this story, I'm watching, I'm going, look, this bridge set, this sort of design of it with the, sort of, the stairs up, I've sort of seen this somewhere before.

And then I kind of thought, oh, my goodness.

It's like Planet of Evil, when you've got the bridge set going up to their plastic, you know, thing, and then I've been watching head a bit.

And then I was I was sitting down going, I'm what, I'm trying to get through this terrible story.

Underworld.

[28:01]

Correct.

And I'm going, oh, my goodness, you've got this sort of A frame up to the bridge set, which they use twice, of course.

And then, I'm sitting watching some sort of pirate captain and somebody going to jump off a plate, and I'm going, hang on, here's another, like, a frame set up to the top.

So watch out for that.

I'm just going to say something that does pop up a few times.

It's really much better in this story than it is in Planet of Evil.

I mean, this is a story that outshines planet evil in every respect, but even the sense that they're just sort of shamelessly reusing are dressed in such a way as to reflect that sort of deco opulent sort of thing that they've got going.

My point was that suddenly it was something that I just recognised and suddenly it popped up a few times and go, okay.

Now, if this was modern Doctor Who, the split level set would be the end of season villain, because it's been used so much in between.

Ooh, sound of drums.

But I will, I will say, you know, with sort of updating the look of Planet of Evil.

It's amazing what you can do with just beige and tape.

[29:03]

Wow.

Because they're the main colours.

I think if my life has a motto, that's it, really.

Well, that's all the time we have on the sand miner.

It's getting out just in time.

None of us have been hideously murdered, thankfully.

And also, none of us have had hands thrown at us.

I noticed we failed to mention that.

We will be back next week to discuss fan favourite, but possibly not a favourite in this room.

Talons of Wang Chiang, so please do join us for that.

Until then, like us on Facebook and share us there.

Follow us on Twitter and retweet us and also find us on iTunes and maybe review us.

Thank you very much for listening and good night.

Good night.

See you soon.

That was Flight to Entirety with Todd Beelby, Nathan Buffley, and Brendan Jones.

This episode, Midi Glorians, was recorded on the 22nd of August, 2015.

[30:05]

The next episode will be released on October 18th.

This episode is respectfully dedicated to the memory of Derek Ware, photo ranger, stuntman, and guest artist on Doctor Who's 1st 10 years.

Apropos of nothing here.

We watched End of Time this week.

We finished off tenant.

And it turns out that most of what I dislike of tenant is just in those 2 episodes.

I thought I really dislike tenant, but actually the rest of his the rest of his era.

I love him.

I was really pleasantly surprised.

So, um, how did it how did it go down?

Oh, end of time is utterly stupid.

It's one of those things like if you read the writer's tale and you can see how often Russell is just absolutely close to the line and desperate and flailing and stuff.

Yeah.

You know, despite being a complete genius.

The end of time is just that, you know, it's the worst example of that, where it's a draft.

You know, it's full of set pieces and stuff, but it's not really a story.

[31:09]

Yeah, exactly.

And who the hell is Naismith and who the hell cares?

Yeah, yeah, it's terrible.

It does have great bits though, and the cliffhang is spectacular.

Yes is truly, truly tremendous.

What's a cliffhanger?

Everyone in the world gets transformed into...

Oh, yes, yes, that is good.

Especially people mid-coitus.

Well, there you go.