Spoilers Revolution of the Daleks grade and discussion thread

[jaime]

If they regenerate back into a male, they can do a speech about The Doctor not being comfortable as a woman, and felt he had regenerated into the wrong body, and felt much better now he was ‘himself’ again. Yaz can be unhappy about this, and the Doctor can explain how lucky he is that he had a relatively easy option to change...if you ignore the whole dying thing... and that it’s a shame more people don’t have that option.

It would be perfectly in keeping with the ‘had an upgrade’ jokes of the current doctor after all, and make a valid identity allegory that would be on message. On the other hand it would also piss a lot of people off. (But then, under Chibnall, this Doctor has repeatedly weaponised bigotry and racism, so people should already be pissed off, what’s a few more?)

This is of course me making a snarky joke at the current bad writing and fumbling attempts at being ‘right on’ in the current set-up. It’s really fucking poor. Anyone who liked this one needs to go and watch the last two Dalek serials of the eighties. Remembrance is particularly good, and handles the ‘not pure in their blobbiness’ so so so much better. Cartmel Who was just so much better with its messaging. Soooooo much better.

 

[jaime]

What a load of buillshit?

Better to ditch the crappy writers they have like Chris Chibnall, or maybe buy him some writing classes.

It’s too late for him. I think he weeps into a mirror wearing an Hawaiian shirt and apologising to a photo of JNT at night. He was a prototype ‘not my doctor’ in the eighties.

 

[Starkers]

Given how lauded Broadchurch was it's disingenuous to suggest Chibnall needs writing lessons. I don't think Chibnall is a terrible writer. I've enjoyed many episodes he's written. He's just not a great writer the way RTD and Moffat are. He's the guy you get to write a perfectly enjoyable episode 7 of the season. He isn't the guy you get to write 4 or 5 episodes a year including specials, premiers and finales.

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

Given how lauded Broadchurch was it's disingenuous to suggest Chibnall needs writing lessons. I don't think Chibnall is a terrible writer. I've enjoyed many episodes he's written. He's just not a great writer the way RTD and Moffat are. He's the guy you get to write a perfectly enjoyable episode 7 of the season. He isn't the guy you get to write 4 or 5 episodes a year including specials, premiers and finales.

Was that him?

I can't believe he writes for Broadchurch that's such a good show.

 

[Gov Kodos]

Neither of them are coming back, as they both feel their time on Doctor Who is done. Indeed, Moffat even invited RTD back to write for every season he produced, and RTD always refused.

They need a Five(ish) Doctor series for the show runners. The BBC trying to get Moffat or RTD back and their antics to avoid being found or roped into the job. The main character is a hapless BBC exec trying to get the various past cast involved in all sorts of ridiculous schemes to get the magic back.

 

[Starkers]

Was that him?

I can't believe he writes for Broadchurch that's such a good show.

He created the show and wrote every single episode with the exception of one that he co-wrote with someone else.

 

[The Nth Doctor]

If they regenerate back into a male, they can do a speech about The Doctor not being comfortable as a woman, and felt he had regenerated into the wrong body, and felt much better now he was ‘himself’ again. Yaz can be unhappy about this, and the Doctor can explain how lucky he is that he had a relatively easy option to change...if you ignore the whole dying thing... and that it’s a shame more people don’t have that option.

It would be perfectly in keeping with the ‘had an upgrade’ jokes of the current doctor after all, and make a valid identity allegory that would be on message. On the other hand it would also piss a lot of people off. (But then, under Chibnall, this Doctor has repeatedly weaponised bigotry and racism, so people should already be pissed off, what’s a few more?)

This is of course me making a snarky joke at the current bad writing and fumbling attempts at being ‘right on’ in the current set-up. It’s really fucking poor. Anyone who liked this one needs to go and watch the last two Dalek serials of the eighties. Remembrance is particularly good, and handles the ‘not pure in their blobbiness’ so so so much better. Cartmel Who was just so much better with its messaging. Soooooo much better.

No.

 

[jaime]

No.

You only read half the post if you thought it was a serious suggestion, as opposed to a mickey take of how the show is written these days.

 

[jaime]

They need a Five(ish) Doctor series for the show runners. The BBC trying to get Moffat or RTD back and their antics to avoid being found or roped into the job. The main character is a hapless BBC exec trying to get the various past cast involved in all sorts of ridiculous schemes to get the magic back.

We had that for real in lockdown, with new moff and RTD stories knocking Chibnall s efforts into a cocked hat. Then we had timelord victorious.

 

[jaime]

Given how lauded Broadchurch was it's disingenuous to suggest Chibnall needs writing lessons. I don't think Chibnall is a terrible writer. I've enjoyed many episodes he's written. He's just not a great writer the way RTD and Moffat are. He's the guy you get to write a perfectly enjoyable episode 7 of the season. He isn't the guy you get to write 4 or 5 episodes a year including specials, premiers and finales.

I actually kind of liked the power of 3. I suspect the bits in dinosaurs on a spaceship that I liked were written by moffat.

 

[Romulan_spy]

I have a better idea: get rid of Chibnall and keep Jodie!

What a load of buillshit?

Better to ditch the crappy writers they have like Chris Chibnall, or maybe buy him some writing classes.

I would get rid of Jodi and Chibnall and all the writers. Get rid of them all. They all suck.

 

[Starkers]

I would get rid of Jodi and Chibnall and all the writers. Get rid of them all. They all suck.

Nonsense
Get rid of Maxine Alderton who wrote The Haunting of Villa Diodati
Get rid of Vijay Patel who wrote Demons of the Punjab and co-wrote Fugtitive of the Judoon
Ed Hime who wrote It Takes You away (ok he did write Orphan 55 as well...)
Pete McTighe who wrote Kerblam and co-wrote Praxeous

These are enjoyable well written episodes. Even if there were a new showrunner I'd hope they'd consider keeping Patel and Alderton on at the very least.

 

[jaime]

Nonsense
Get rid of Maxine Alderton who wrote The Haunting of Villa Diodati
Get rid of Vijay Patel who wrote Demons of the Punjab and co-wrote Fugtitive of the Judoon
Ed Hime who wrote It Takes You away (ok he did write Orphan 55 as well...)
Pete McTighe who wrote Kerblam and co-wrote Praxeous

These are enjoyable well written episodes. Even if there were a new showrunner I'd hope they'd consider keeping Patel and Alderton on at the very least.

I think they were sub-sawardian tripe. Apart from maybe demons, because I didn’t bother with most of that season.

 

[captainkirk]

Just like the last special, I feel that there is actually a good Dalek story hiding in there, it's just completely lost in all the other generic stuff going on. The Daleks feel nothing but hate and were intended to act as a Nazi allegory, having them become police enforcers to control riots could provide interesting social commentary. But instead, it just becomes a by the numbers Dalek story that offers absolutely nothing new.

I'd take out all the stuff about cloned Daleks and getting the two armies to fight each other. Instead, show that they are being programmed with racial profiling and other forms of prejudice until they become true Daleks. It then becomes a cautionary tale with lessons that can be applied to the current world.

 

[SolarisOne]

I'd take out all the stuff about cloned Daleks and getting the two armies to fight each other. Instead, show that they are being programmed with racial profiling and other forms of prejudice until they become true Daleks. It then becomes a cautionary tale with lessons that can be applied to the current world.

As fun as the Dalek civil war was, your idea is much better.

 

[The Nth Doctor]

You only read half the post if you thought it was a serious suggestion, as opposed to a mickey take of how the show is written these days.

The problem is you thought what you wrote was funny.

It wasn't even close.

So, no.

 

[diankra]

Given how lauded Broadchurch was it's disingenuous to suggest Chibnall needs writing lessons. I don't think Chibnall is a terrible writer. I've enjoyed many episodes he's written. He's just not a great writer the way RTD and Moffat are. He's the guy you get to write a perfectly enjoyable episode 7 of the season. He isn't the guy you get to write 4 or 5 episodes a year including specials, premiers and finales.

Thing about Broadchurch is that (he said in a radio interview) he wrote it for himself, after a bad experience on Camelot, not expecting it to sell.
So good when he just writes, but as a hired writer (which includes the weaker 2nd and 3rd seasons of Broadchurch) not so good.

 

[Starkers]

Thing about Broadchurch is that (he said in a radio interview) he wrote it for himself, after a bad experience on Camelot, not expecting it to sell.
So good when he just writes, but as a hired writer (which includes the weaker 2nd and 3rd seasons of Broadchurch) not so good.

Maybe, he might have just had lots of time to polish BC! I guess it being just one huge story likely helped (still never actually seen it) or maybe he's just better at writing some things than others. I think most writers are like that. I just get annoyed at the binary assumption that writers are either brilliant or shit with no in-between. I think Chibnall is a perfectly serviceable writer who's occasionally good, the trouble is that he isn't in the same league as RTD and Moffat who are good writers who are occasionally serviceable.

I had hoped that his experience as a producer/showrunner on other things would have at least made him a good showrunner but it doesn't appear so.

I can see why he hired Jodie, but he hasn't made the best use of her. Someone on Twitter described it as a laid back Doctor played by a gentle actor which sums it up. You could make that work, but not if you don't give her decent material, not if you swamp her with companions and keep partnering her up with actors with more screen presence (Walsh, Martin, Dhawan, Barrowman)

 

[Evil Robert]

Same here. Although that's apparently a blasphemous opinion, too.

Having just binged TNG and DS9 last year, Klingon episodes where the only one I struggled to watch and often fast forwarded through (especially Worf Klingon Honour shit).

Thank Jeebus there was only like two B'Elanna episodes in VOY that dealt specifically with Klingon shit.

 

[jaime]

The problem is you thought what you wrote was funny.

It wasn't even close.

So, no.

Of course it wasn’t funny. Except maybe a little. It was pretty close to precisely how badly handled the writing in Chibnalls run has been. This episodes ending ‘football fans are having a riot, let’s call in the national front to kick shit out of them because they are mixed race’ shows it perfectly. The fact the ‘Dalek civil war’ and ‘Dalek racial purity’ had been done before (including fairly recently in Victory of the Daleks’) and without leaving such a nasty taste just highlights it.

The ham-fisted not thinking things through is why an Asian Master is sent to prison by the Nazis, the first Black British Doctor is a gimmick, etc etc.
You may like the current writing, but I am not the only one noticing these problems.

It would be perfectly in keeping for Chibnall to put a surface pro-trans speech in the Doctors mouth, (post regen, like in my little satire) without thinking how that works in relation to everything else about the first female Doctor. He does the ‘I had an upgrade’ speech every few episodes, without thinking that through.

It’s very poor.