(no subject)
I'm having suspicions about the Doctor Who s4 series arc. Good suspicions.
Doctor Who 4x02 The Fires of Pompeii
Yeah. It was good. It's weird - I like the Ancient Rome era, I love the whole seer thing, but I just was kind of bored by this episode until the last 15 minutes. It just felt like the story was plodding along and we were getting nowhere. We learned most of the information we needed really quickly and then the characters were just running around pointlessly. To me anyway. Maybe I need to watch it again.
But the episode does get a 4.5 / 5 from me jut for the last couple of minutes. I LOVE it when DW uses the timey-wimey thing. It's a show based on time travel but they exploit time travel so very little, except for the obvious - going to the past/future. This is why I loved Blink, The Girl in the Fireplace and Father's Day so much, because they played around with the rules of time travel and totally suverted them. WHen something cracky like that is added into a regular action / adventure run around episode, it makes it much better in my opinion.
So when the Doctor and Donna go down into the volcano, and they find out that the rock alien (Pyro... something) is going to take over the world, and they realise that THEY are the one who trigger the Vesuvius explosion, and that they HAVE to do it - it's either the entire human race, or 20,000 people. And they are the executers. That was awesome, just awesome.
Donna was the best. Just the best. Seriously. I think she had some of my favourite companion moments ever. Her reactions were heartbreaking, especially when she found out 1) the Doctor wasn't going to warn the townspeople or get them out, 2) that they were the ones who exploded Vesuvius and 3) after the explosion when the townspeople are running the wrong way and Donna is pleading and screaming at them to go the other way.
I actually cried during the scene where the Doctor is leaving in the TARDIS and Donna's in the family's house, torn between helping them and going onto the TARDIS. When she finally runs in and talks to the Doctor and she's looking so devastated, I was crying along with her. I didn't think he necessarily needed to go back for the family. I wouldn't have minded a sad ending. I mean, okay he saved those 4 people but thousands died. Just because he happened to get to know them, they lived, but the other townspeople weren't so lucky.
Also, STOP WITH THE DOCTOR-IS-JESUS IMAGERY. First we've got the whole world believing in him and then he rises up from the (almost) dead in a bright glowy light in Last of the Time Lords, and now we've got the Doctor holding his hand out of the TARDIS with a bright white light behind him (and what exactly was that coming from anyway?) and then the family's household gods being the Doctor and Donna at the end. GIVE ME BREAK. The Doctor is far from a god in my opinion. He varies between being a pissy little boy and an angsty teenager. Some noble race those Time Lords were if this is their final representative. Sorry. A bit ranty. I just don't like the lonely god thing the production are shoving in our faces.
I think there's a reason why RTD etc haven't said what the arc word is - or have they? Not as far as I know. Because maybe, like that episode 12 title yet to be revealed, telling us the arc word, or mentioning it very obviously in an episode is too spoilery for the finale. Telling us that say perhaps, the arc word is lost planet, may conjure up Gallifrey and make us wonder if it's really lost....
So far, in two episodes, we've had two alien races invade Earth, and both of their planets have specifically been said to be 'lost' and a character has also asked how that happened, how someone loses a planet. Well, okay the finale's all about the daleks and their creator Davros, or so I hear, and that's got to be tied to the Time War if they're back again.
Maybe the lost planet refers to Gallifrey - they didn't have much reason to show us the planet in flashback last season and yet they did, maybe it was a precursor. Or maybe the lost planet's Skaro, the daleks planet. I don't think anyone's ever said, but was that destroyed in the War like Gallifrey? Maybe it was 'lost' instead, and that's how more daleks are back - they were on the 'lost' planet, which presumably the Doctor finds again. I don't know. I just know the phrase 'lost planet' means something.
Also - anvil much? 'She is returning.' Yeah, thanks we've already seen HER. And his message to Donna, 'there's something on your back.' I did hear that right didn't I? Was that meant literally, as in there's a big monster on your back, or more metaphorically, like a burden to carry... I don't know.
Also, in both Partners in Crime and Fires of Pompeii, the Shadow Proclamation is mentioned. That's nothing new, it was mentioned in series 1 and the Xmas Invasion - but it being mentioned twice in a row, for no apparent reason means something. Maybe RTD's actually thought of a purpose for some random thing he wrote way back when. Maybe the Shadow Proclamation is why these planets have disappeared... maybe all those races we've met before and these two aliens in 4x01 and 02 whose planets were 'destroyed in the Time War' or lost.. aren't actually gone, they're just hidden, or moved by order of the Shadow Proclamation... Yeah. I have no idea.
I haven't read anyone elses reviews / theories yet since 4x02... is everyone thinking mostly this or am I completely cracky?
Doctor Who 4x02 The Fires of Pompeii
Yeah. It was good. It's weird - I like the Ancient Rome era, I love the whole seer thing, but I just was kind of bored by this episode until the last 15 minutes. It just felt like the story was plodding along and we were getting nowhere. We learned most of the information we needed really quickly and then the characters were just running around pointlessly. To me anyway. Maybe I need to watch it again.
But the episode does get a 4.5 / 5 from me jut for the last couple of minutes. I LOVE it when DW uses the timey-wimey thing. It's a show based on time travel but they exploit time travel so very little, except for the obvious - going to the past/future. This is why I loved Blink, The Girl in the Fireplace and Father's Day so much, because they played around with the rules of time travel and totally suverted them. WHen something cracky like that is added into a regular action / adventure run around episode, it makes it much better in my opinion.
So when the Doctor and Donna go down into the volcano, and they find out that the rock alien (Pyro... something) is going to take over the world, and they realise that THEY are the one who trigger the Vesuvius explosion, and that they HAVE to do it - it's either the entire human race, or 20,000 people. And they are the executers. That was awesome, just awesome.
Donna was the best. Just the best. Seriously. I think she had some of my favourite companion moments ever. Her reactions were heartbreaking, especially when she found out 1) the Doctor wasn't going to warn the townspeople or get them out, 2) that they were the ones who exploded Vesuvius and 3) after the explosion when the townspeople are running the wrong way and Donna is pleading and screaming at them to go the other way.
I actually cried during the scene where the Doctor is leaving in the TARDIS and Donna's in the family's house, torn between helping them and going onto the TARDIS. When she finally runs in and talks to the Doctor and she's looking so devastated, I was crying along with her. I didn't think he necessarily needed to go back for the family. I wouldn't have minded a sad ending. I mean, okay he saved those 4 people but thousands died. Just because he happened to get to know them, they lived, but the other townspeople weren't so lucky.
Also, STOP WITH THE DOCTOR-IS-JESUS IMAGERY. First we've got the whole world believing in him and then he rises up from the (almost) dead in a bright glowy light in Last of the Time Lords, and now we've got the Doctor holding his hand out of the TARDIS with a bright white light behind him (and what exactly was that coming from anyway?) and then the family's household gods being the Doctor and Donna at the end. GIVE ME BREAK. The Doctor is far from a god in my opinion. He varies between being a pissy little boy and an angsty teenager. Some noble race those Time Lords were if this is their final representative. Sorry. A bit ranty. I just don't like the lonely god thing the production are shoving in our faces.
I think there's a reason why RTD etc haven't said what the arc word is - or have they? Not as far as I know. Because maybe, like that episode 12 title yet to be revealed, telling us the arc word, or mentioning it very obviously in an episode is too spoilery for the finale. Telling us that say perhaps, the arc word is lost planet, may conjure up Gallifrey and make us wonder if it's really lost....
So far, in two episodes, we've had two alien races invade Earth, and both of their planets have specifically been said to be 'lost' and a character has also asked how that happened, how someone loses a planet. Well, okay the finale's all about the daleks and their creator Davros, or so I hear, and that's got to be tied to the Time War if they're back again.
Maybe the lost planet refers to Gallifrey - they didn't have much reason to show us the planet in flashback last season and yet they did, maybe it was a precursor. Or maybe the lost planet's Skaro, the daleks planet. I don't think anyone's ever said, but was that destroyed in the War like Gallifrey? Maybe it was 'lost' instead, and that's how more daleks are back - they were on the 'lost' planet, which presumably the Doctor finds again. I don't know. I just know the phrase 'lost planet' means something.
Also - anvil much? 'She is returning.' Yeah, thanks we've already seen HER. And his message to Donna, 'there's something on your back.' I did hear that right didn't I? Was that meant literally, as in there's a big monster on your back, or more metaphorically, like a burden to carry... I don't know.
Also, in both Partners in Crime and Fires of Pompeii, the Shadow Proclamation is mentioned. That's nothing new, it was mentioned in series 1 and the Xmas Invasion - but it being mentioned twice in a row, for no apparent reason means something. Maybe RTD's actually thought of a purpose for some random thing he wrote way back when. Maybe the Shadow Proclamation is why these planets have disappeared... maybe all those races we've met before and these two aliens in 4x01 and 02 whose planets were 'destroyed in the Time War' or lost.. aren't actually gone, they're just hidden, or moved by order of the Shadow Proclamation... Yeah. I have no idea.
I haven't read anyone elses reviews / theories yet since 4x02... is everyone thinking mostly this or am I completely cracky?