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"Before the Flood" Grading and Discussion Thread

How do you rate "Before the Flood"?

  • Excellent

    Votes: 20 27.4%

  • Very Good

    Votes: 29 39.7%

  • Good

    Votes: 17 23.3%

  • Decent

    Votes: 6 8.2%

  • Rubbish

    Votes: 1 1.4%
  • Total voters
    73
I quite enjoyed part two and overall thought this two-parter better than the first two-parter of the season.

I also quite liked the guitar theme tune and thought to myself an electric guitar theme tune is quite good and brought back happy memories of the season four theme tune.
 
I thought the teaser before the credits was really breaking the 4th wall. I have very mixed feelings about this episode. I just am not sure how I feel.

Did anyone pick up on the easter egg. The name on the amplifier was the Magpie as in the episode "The Idiot's Lantern."

20 minutes into last week's episode I tagged the Doctor as being the one inside the casket...

5/10

BTW the dam might flood the town but how can it stay flooded? Water recedes over time... doesn't it?
 
JoeZhang said:
The Wormhole said:
More importantly, how could he operate the equipment?
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I am trying to think - does operate anything that isn't software? In other words, when he *appears* to be pushing a button, it's just the software working and that is a visual effect.

(if he lifts something solid that I forgot about, that blows that theory)


Random fact - the roar of the Fisher King is provided by the lead singer of Slipknot Corey Taylor.
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He waves his hand over the control panel as I recall. Doesn't touch anything.
 
The teaser doesn't need to be fourth-wall breaking. At the end, Clara understands his "who wrote Beethoven's Fifth?" question so you could just assume the teaser was us seeing him talking to Clara from her perspective.

As for the Doctor's ghost being able to manipulate the base equipment, well the Doctor is viewing those events as they happen via the iPhone link... It wouldn't be beyond him to set up an override from the stasis chamber (or the shuttle) to the base equipment, triggered to go off at the exact moment he saw his "ghost" do those things...
 
matthunter said:
The teaser doesn't need to be fourth-wall breaking. At the end, Clara understands his "who wrote Beethoven's Fifth?" question so you could just assume the teaser was us seeing him talking to Clara from her perspective.

As for the Doctor's ghost being able to manipulate the base equipment, well the Doctor is viewing those events as they happen via the iPhone link... It wouldn't be beyond him to set up an override from the stasis chamber (or the shuttle) to the base equipment, triggered to go off at the exact moment he saw his "ghost" do those things...
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"We set up the gun and we set up the key"

Nothing wrong with bill and ted logic in principle, but Dr Who is heading for a narrative existential crisis with this nonsense that will take it off the air faster than a punch up with the producer.

Not liking where the show is going.
 
I liked this one a lot. The chracters were sympathetic and not cardboard-like, the Doctor was wrestling the whole time-changing thing and the pacing was really nice. This wouldn't have worked as a single-episode story nearly as much.

Best two-parter of the season, IMO. So far...

Evil Headhunter said:
Deliberate or not, I liked how The Doctor's dire resistance to preventing someone from dying in a fixed situation echoed more Big Finish's Storm Warning (and the overall Charley Pollard paradox) than The Waters of Mars. Or maybe that's just me because I love the former and loathe the latter.
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How can I love both? :D

Good point, btw.
 
If you spend enough time alone, it's actually more stupid and crazy not to speak out loud every now and then rather than always be thinking screeds and screeds of thought.

How embarrassing would it be if you went so long without talking, that by the time that it was actually pertinent for you to break the silence, the sound of your voice frightens you to death?
 
matthunter said:
The teaser doesn't need to be fourth-wall breaking.
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That doesn't work in the slightly for a number of reasons - he maintains eye-contact with the omnipresent viewer through out - Clara simply couldn't exist at all those points. Look at the first scene in the Tardis, he's looking directly at you, he turns 180 and is still looking directly at you


At the end, Clara understands his "who wrote Beethoven's Fifth?" question so you could just assume the teaser was us seeing him talking to Clara from her perspective.
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No she doesn't - we never see her reaction to that statement and moreover at the end when he explains it to Clara who is he is turning his head to when he turns around, looks directly down the camera and shrugs?

I'm sure people will come up with all sorts of bollocks to explain it away but its clearly meant to be fourth-wall breaking.
 
The breaking-the-fourth-wall moment wasn't so incredible, I think. I mean, he's talked to himself before, hasn't he? I mean, he certainly has in The Deadly Assassin and several other Tom Baker serials back in the old days.

Its really not a big deal. I don't remember, for one, making this kind of fuss with last year's Listen, where the Doctor talked to himself about his theory of fear.
 
I liked the two-parter. The second part was a little less exciting but that's not unusual.

There was a lot of classic who-feeling and it was nice to see some doctor who without the pseudo-profound self-centered character reflections that seems to dominate every second episode.

edit: Oh, I forgot: I didn't like the Beethoven thing at all. if this show goes on for another 50 years, will there be artists left that did their work without the doctor's help? And Beethoven wrote more than symphonies and concertos.

Still, comparing to the other episodes it deservers 6 stars. (edit 2: oh, only 5 ... then 5... :D)
 
Of course, let's not forget the end of The Feast of Steven. Breaking the fourth wall has been around since the beginning. No big deal.
 
Did I miss something, or who blew up the dam? Also, I didn't really get who took the power cell, and why it would matter.

My unconcentration aside, I thought the episode had some good moments.
 
Emperor-Tiberius said:
Its really not a big deal. I don't remember, for one, making this kind of fuss with last year's Listen, where the Doctor talked to himself about his theory of fear.
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Because he wasn't talking to himself. Or do you think he was telling himself to Google Bootstrap Paradox?

And Listen didn't segue into the Doctor playing the theme tune of his TV show over the credits...
 
Marten said:
Did I miss something, or who blew up the dam? Also, I didn't really get who took the power cell, and why it would matter.
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The first half of your sentence answers the second.

The Doctor blew it up with the power cell.
 
Marten said:
Did I miss something, or who blew up the dam? Also, I didn't really get who took the power cell, and why it would matter.

My unconcentration aside, I thought the episode had some good moments.
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The Doctor took the power cell and used it to blow up the dam and kill the Fisher King.

The real big problem with the teaser isn't breaking the 5th wall, it's the fact that it's just a bit of padding which actually totally spoilers the episode by telling us how it's going to pan out!
 
I'm sure people will come up with all sorts of bollocks to explain it away but its clearly meant to be fourth-wall breaking.
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Perhaps the sequence takes place in the Doctor's head.
 
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