Class series one discussion thread (spoilers)

[Christopher]

So we all now realize that the reason there's no Doctor Who this year is because of Class, right?

Correlation does not imply causation. The existence of Torchwood and The Sarah Jane Adventures didn't keep Doctor Who from coming out in the same years. Class has a different writing staff, it's aimed at a different age group, and it's aired on a different channel, BBC Three instead of BBC One. So there's no reason it and Doctor Who couldn't coexist.

According to the BBC press release, the professed reason for not having new Doctor Who in 2016 (other than the Christmas special) was to avoid competing with major events of the year such as the Olympics and a major European football/soccer championship. Since Series 10 is Moffat's swan song, they say they wanted it to be a big event free from other distractions. Other sources suggest that the delay is to accommodate Moffat's Sherlock schedule, so that he doesn't have to rush the writing of Series 10 and can take the time he needs to do it well.

 

[Emperor-Tiberius]

I'll faster believe the Sherlock story than anything sports-related. And thats still a lot of wishful thinking.

But then, I really do think this is a mistake. Not a grand one, but an unreasonable gap year? Not even the infamous RTD gap year was that empty, you know - there still were six episodes released basically, animated treat included. I just don't know where the pull will come from for viewers to tune in to this program after its been out of the air for a year for not a halfway decent reason.

 

[Christopher]

But then, I really do think this is a mistake. Not a grand one, but an unreasonable gap year? Not even the infamous RTD gap year was that empty, you know - there still were six episodes released basically, animated treat included. I just don't know where the pull will come from for viewers to tune in to this program after its been out of the air for a year for not a halfway decent reason.

Those of us who were fans of the original series endured a gap of 16 years with only one TV movie about halfway through. So don't expect me to feel any sympathy about having to wait a measly one year for more Who. The show's been an institution for more than half a century. It's not suddenly going to die just because it's away for a little while.

 

[Emperor-Tiberius]

I don't expect to feel sympathy, although it is a grossly unrelating event - the show coming back was a vague promise that became an uncertainty in the old days. Whereas this is a gamble to put the show on hiatus for a year, expecting decent numbers in return.

The situation most applicable would've been the 18 months between Colin Baker's first and last series.

 

[Christopher]

I don't expect to feel sympathy, although it is a grossly unrelating event - the show coming back was a vague promise that became an uncertainty in the old days. Whereas this is a gamble to put the show on hiatus for a year, expecting decent numbers in return.

I don't see it as a gamble. If Doctor Who's popularity were that fragile a thing, it never would've come back at all.

And it's not that unusual for British shows to take hiatuses and come back, is it? Sherlock has had gaps of a couple of years between seasons more than once. The 2006 Robin Hood series skipped a year between its second and third seasons. Only two of Blackadder's four seasons came out in consecutive years. Red Dwarf's 11 seasons have run from 1988-9, 1991-3, 1997, 1999, 2009, 2012, and 2016. In America, putting a show "on hiatus" is usually a euphemism for cancellation, but it's pretty common for British shows to go on hiatus and then return. I used to speculate that this was why the English tend to refer to a year's worth of episodes as a "series" rather than a "season" -- because each one is essentially treated as a separate whole, commissioned one year at a time, and so it doesn't make that much difference whether a subsequent "series" comes the very next year or a couple of years later. Although I'm probably reading too much into that.

The situation most applicable would've been the 18 months between Colin Baker's first and last series.

Except that hiatus was due to the head of the BBC at the time hating the show (or Baker), while this hiatus seems to be mainly about accommodating Moffat's schedule.

 

[Starkers]

Series 10's ratings will be dented I think, but the BBC are committed to series 11 and Chibnall. I suspect there will be a new Doctor, even if Capaldi wants to stay, just for the added buzz. Then again it depends what the Beeb's secret focus groups report. I can never quite get a feel for how popular he is with the not we

 

[Iamnotspock]

Except that hiatus was due to the head of the BBC at the time hating the show (or Baker)

Very much both.

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[diankra]

I'll faster believe the Sherlock story than anything sports-related.

The Olympics line comes dirdctly from the BBC1 Controller. But I would suspect that the big issue was that an Autumn run hadn't worked in 2015, as Who had be scheduled around Strictly, and ran too late in the evening.
So with the Olympics in August, Who had to move back to 2017 unless they could make a season in time for an Easter 2016 start.

 

[The Wormhole]

Well, I finally got around to watching episode 3. Not bad. A definite improvement over the first two, but the show still has plenty of room for improvement. The characters are becoming better defined. Quill's still the best by ten miles, but the others are at least starting to make a better impression than they did last week. The alien vine/soul sucker things were somewhat meh, though I accept they were mostly just a means of allowing insight into the characters by taking on forms of dead loved ones.

Not really clear though, were these things spread all over London? If so, how did the power stay on? If not, why weren't there any emergency services trying to deal with this, or more to the point, where was UNIT? Even if all of London was affected, there was plenty of time for other UNIT forces outside of London to respond.

 

[Starkers]

I thought it was just in the local vicinity. You do wonder why UNIT aren't aware of the rift though.

And yeah, Quill is the best thing about it by far. Although

Spoiler: potential hypothetical spoiler

I have a horrible feeling she won't make it to the end of the season, I follow Katherine Kelly on Twitter and she seemed to finish filming some time before the others, which may be nothing more than how the scheduling works but...

 

[The Wormhole]

Another thing to consider, at least so far she does seem to have less screen-time per episode compared to others, so as you say it could just be how scheduling works out.

 

[Starkers]

I hope that's the case.

 

[Timelord79 (he/him)]

Was there no new episode this week?

 

[Guy Gardener]

Yes, there was. It was a marked improvement.

The episodes are not self contained.

They bleed into each other.

I like that.

 

[Timelord79 (he/him)]

I judt wondered because it's not already downloadable at iTunes and there wasn't any comment here. Thanks.

 

[Pindar]

I am enjoying Class more than I expected too, the Quill/Governors story line is more interesting to me than the kids adventures though.

 

[Starkers]

I thought episode 4 veered from laughable to quite good. The Shadowking getting all horny because Alice and Ram were having sex was cringe worthy, and for all its vaunted sex/violence etc. the show still seems quite tame, all the kids seem quite like a nice/well behaved lot who get on ok with their parents and don't have problems with bullying, anorexia, drugs, sexting or anything like that.

 

[The Wormhole]

I didn't particularly care for episode 4 much. It started off kind of interesting, but just got draggy in the middle, and by the end I didn't much care. The Shadow Men or whatever they're called really aren't that interesting villains, meanwhile Charlie's gone from really bland to becoming an unlikable jerk. The stuff with April's dad seemed a bit heavy-handed, they're just depicting him as a total creep and not really providing any reason for why April or her mother should give him another chance. Maybe that's the point, but it would have been more interesting if he were generally sorry or something. Instead "you're ignoring me, don't ignore me! Oh, shit, alien swords?!" Even the Quill storyline was a bit meh, this week, we don't learn much about the mysterious Governors, and the alien flowers with tribble-like reproducing abilities are more just a background thing. The idea that the Governors can free her from servitude to Charlie is an interesting idea, though I imagine it won't be until the finale at the earliest before we see anything in that regard.

 

[diankra]

Some not-really-spolierish background from ep 5.
The governors were all replaced when Coal Hill became an academy (so no Ian).
The Shadowkin are little league Fendahl: an evolutionary dead-end.

 

[Starkers]

Some good bits to ep 5, and the flowers became quite threatening in the end, but god the pacing was terrible! People complain about Moffat era Who being just about monologues but that has nothing on this, three groups of people stood around talking about doing things but not actually doing them despite time being a factor. Charlie’s activation sequence of the weapon was terrible, I’ll never complain about Ten’s inability to tell Rose he loves her in Bad Wolf Bay ever again because that was ADHD compared to this, and whilst Alice and Ram’s “Don’t say you love me I’ve only known you a month” conversation was amusing (and shows Ness’ strengths I think) it was again pretty ludicrous that they could have a love-in whilst the Shadowking was waiting to fight Alice!

Did love the regicide line though.

It strikes me that the problem with Class may well be that however good a writer Ness is, he’s not experienced television writer. Going by his wiki page Class is his first television work, and only his second scripted work—he’s also done the script for A Monster Calls—and I do think it shows. It’d be like asking Moffat to write a novel, yes he’s a writer but it’s a very different kind of writing.

also some of the adult acting is a bit ropey, Ram's dad especially. "Don't touch her she's an alien!"