^^^Have you tried subtitles? I watched the whole of Sylvester McCoy's era without a clue to what was going on, but in many shows I don't zone out so easily with subs.
Another vote for loving The Girl Who Waited and the Moffat era in General. Oh, and A Christmas Carol was the best Regular Series Christmas Episode, IMHO (Not including End of Time, it lumps in with "The Year of Specials" for me, not The Xmas Specials)
@ Green Lantern: With all due respect, aren't you still like 15 or something? You'll appreciate the more mature "complicated" plotting as you get older. I'm not a huge Moffat fanboy, but he has had more hits than misses, and The Girl Who Waited in particular was brilliant. In a relevant example, Star Trek DS9 ended when I was your age. I watched it and convinced myself I enjoyed it, but truth be told I appreciated TNG reruns more and some of the themes were lost on me. Later, when I watched DS9 again at 22, I was bowled over and appreciated it like never before. And really, TNG opened up for me, too when I was older. Moffat's Who still has that popcorn zaniness sometimes but the themes are a cut above the RTD era, and the plotting more nuanced. You might see things later that are lost on you now.
Agree about A Christmas Carol. It's delightfully grotesque. And it's the one with the most content for the extra runtime. Like The End of Time as a surrealist culmination of the era's themes. It's not crudely mechanical like Series 4.
I don't know if you're aware of this, but what you're asking for does exist. RTD ran a spin-off series called the Sarah Jane Adventures. In its fourth season, he did a two-parter called "Death of the Doctor" which was effectively Russell (as in, not Moffat) writing Smith for an hour.
Hey this is the internet, for all we know GL is a 65 year old spinster called Doris And, imo, RTD didn't write Smith anywhere near as well as Moffat and other writers do.
It's not though, just because you don't understand it, doesn't mean lots of people don't. The fact you claim it's complicated and thus you don't understand it and you don't like it is more telling about you than anyone else. As for the Girl that Waited, that was one of the single most excellent episodes of Who.
I don't have any problems with Moffet's stories and I personally think Moffet's story arcs are a lot more interesting then RTD's.
Does "Start date last week in Aug 2014" mean that's when it'll start airing? If so, I call bullshit on that now. BBC wouldn't have a specific week locked in yet, not that far in advance. Sorry, I probably come off as a bit too harsh. Not my intention.
I certainly hope it's bullshit. Because that's too long a wait. Also, people are acting like a few small films means Matt Smith is some huge star now. I'm sure he's leaving sooner rather than later but I doubt as if the BBC will have to fight to keep him because he's so in demand. He's certainly not George Clooney circa 1998.
I'm not going to call shenanigans on this. If the BBC intends to do away with the split seasons, which I believe they do for various reasons, then the end of August would be the earliest a full run could air given what we know of when series 8 will begin filming. Short of filming a standalone Easter special, the calendar is against them showing anything between the New Year and late summer. I should say that I don't know that there will be an Easter Special. I've seen speculation about it on Twitter, but I think it's nothing more than wishful thinking. If there's no regeneration this winter, a special is likelier than if there is a regeneration; the Beeb would prefer the marketing splash that comes from a big run of episodes with the new Doctor, not dribs and drabs that trickle out over months. Also, I don't see any problem with locking in broadcast dates that far ahead. First, this was an email to Worldwide, so it's not unlike the Toyfair poster in that it's to let people know when they need to have merchandise on the shelves. Worldwide has plans to form and money to make; when Doctor Who will be airing is vitally important to them. (This is the reason I doubt there's an Easter Special; Worldwide would need to know about that before they knew about next August. ) And second, locking in dates gives the production side a hard deadline they have to hit or else. In short, assuming the email that Levine claims to have seen is legit, I see no reason to dispute it.
I'd give The Snowmen the nod. Christmas Carol would get second place. Rest are uh... all pretty shit.
To clarify, I would not be surprised if we did end up waiting until August 2014 for the new season. I just doubt BBC is already eyeing a specific week that's already over a year away as the premiere date. No one plans out a TV schedule that far in advance.
I don't find that especially hard to believe. After "Let's Kill Hitler" and "Asylum of the Daleks," end of August/beginning of September is the established timeframe for autumn premieres of Doctor Who. Setting it as a tentative week for series 8 to begin is no more surprising than setting Easter Saturday for a tentative spring premiere. And where Doctor Who goes establishes where other series planned for Saturday in the second half of the year go, so it's not really unlikely that they're thinking about it already. Scheduling ideas for the late 2009 specials were being tossed around in early 2008. Nothing is going to be locked in, but I wouldn't be surprised if there's a tentative date already, just so production and marketing have a target to work toward.
Yea, I agree, they have to have some kind of plan and stick the dart somewhere close to where it will actually end up, they just don't typically share it with the Viewing public until a few weeks away from actual airing (other than this last set of episodes, where they gave an apparently unprecented 2 or 3 month warning as to premiere date)
Autumn 2014 is almost certain and in TV scheduling terms the end of August just about counts so it's not a wild stretch by any means. And I know Matt said in one interview that "we" start shooting Series 8 in late 2013 early 2014 but with a notable lack of Official confirmation of his return, I'm swinging back round to a Christmas departure with no shooting until January so we get the first "surprise" Regeneration. Though, as with John Hurt's role and the whole plot of TNOTD, I'm sure all the details will leak in advance. Assuming it isn't Ben Daniels after all.
Given what we know from what Matt Smith said about filming late 2013 or early 2014, this fits in nicely. So, fairly expected air date. Hopefully it's true that the season isn't split. I also think it's clear from Matt Smith's comments that he'll be back. I suppose he could be lying, but hopefully not! I think the odds are very high that he'll be back for the 8th. Mr Awe
The part of the Ben Daniels rumor that I can't quite make sense of is the rumor that he's already filmed his regeneration scene. Though I suppose it's possible that Smith regenerates at the end of the Anniversary Special, and Christmas will be Daniels' first full episode, but location filming in September for the Christmas special would give that away if Moffat wants the "surprise" regeneration.