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Spoilers Orphan 55 grade and discussion thread

How do you rate Orphan 55?

  • Total voters
    74
Australis said:
When it comes to writing, I was always under the impression the showrunner set the arc up, came up with an episode description, say about a page long, then handed out the assignments.
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The showrunner can do it whatever way they want. Like the X-Files guy would write the important alien episodes, season starters and finales and the good episodes would just be one offs in between. I have a feeling that's how Doctor Who is done now with maybe just a hint of season long arc in it.

(I'm really bad at names.)
 
bigdaddy said:
The showrunner can do it whatever way they want. Like the X-Files guy would write the important alien episodes, season starters and finales and the good episodes would just be one offs in between. I have a feeling that's how Doctor Who is done now with maybe just a hint of season long arc in it.

(I'm really bad at names.)
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The X-Files guy is Chris Carter, and he didn't always and only write the Big Important Episodes. Other people contributed, and I believe even wrote a couple themselves, while he also wrote, and directed, a couple of really good one-offs, The Post-Modern Prometheus and Triangle. Never understood the need to demean the creator of a show (see also: Gene R) as much as some do; without them, where would we fans be?

I have doubts about Chibnall, but I'm willing to wait and see how this season plays out before drawing any serious conclusions.
 
Chris Carter deserves some of the shit he gets. The revival of The X-Files was horribly handled and he claims that the idea for the 11th season would have been the same if there wasn't a 15 year break. 1. That's a lie because the cast was different when the show ended. 2. You can't just pretend like nothing has changed in 15 years when your main character was a criminal at the end of it's original run.

I'm hopefully, we still have 7 episodes left, even though tonights episode look... ehhh. I almost wished for nearly a full season of Spyfall Part 2 with the time jumping and kick ass women.

And a little more of point. Are the episodes aired with commercial breaks in the UK? I'm watching on BBC America and the commercials make the episodes almost unwatchable. I used to watch the show on Amazon Prime after the fact but they lost the rights so none of the Whitmore episodes are on it.
 
The Wormhole said:
No. BBC does not do commercial breaks. At all.
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I figured. It's so bad with commercials. I almost gave up on on all three episodes this year because there was literally 3.5 minutes of show and 5-6 minutes of commercials and where they added them made very little sense.

So my reviews will be a bit more harsh because the episodes are more disjointed.
 
bigdaddy said:
The showrunner can do it whatever way they want. Like the X-Files guy would write the important alien episodes, season starters and finales and the good episodes would just be one offs in between. I have a feeling that's how Doctor Who is done now with maybe just a hint of season long arc in it.

(I'm really bad at names.)
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^^this

I do believe Chibnall HAS read some feedback from various sources - the fact he had

Lenny Henry spouting some potentially 4th wall breaking youtube references in Spyfall is more than a nod
and suggests he had.

The fact series 12 is such an overall improvement so far - Chibnall's traits are still there - suggest this as well. The stories seem a lot more taut (even the (blech) that "Orphan 55" largely was) and he's done some impressively bold things, especially in "Spyfall". The Doctor still has the Tennant and Smith mannerisms but the more serious side to the character has clearly been given more prominence and it's exactly what was needed.
 
Cyanide Muffin said:
I never watched the last season of X Files did Mulder turn into a criminal?
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The season 9 finale ends with him being arrested for infiltrating a military base and killing a soldier. After a trial he's found guilty and sentenced to death, though Scully and others break him out, then they (just Mulder and Scully) are on the run. This gets glossed over in the 2008 film I Want to Believe with the FBI willing to drop all charges in exchange for Mulder and Scully's assistance on the case being investigated in that movie, then in season 10 (first of the revival) Mulder and Scully are reactivated as FBI agents and begin investigating X Files once again.
 
The Wormhole said:
The season 9 finale ends with him being arrested for infiltrating a military base and killing a soldier. After a trial he's found guilty and sentenced to death, though Scully and others break him out, then they (just Mulder and Scully) are on the run. This gets glossed over in the 2008 film I Want to Believe with the FBI willing to drop all charges in exchange for Mulder and Scully's assistance on the case being investigated in that movie, then in season 10 (first of the revival) Mulder and Scully are reactivated as FBI agents and begin investigating X Files once again.
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Well that explains that. Thank you.
 
I didn't hate this nearly as much as most people here, though after the Spyfall this was a pretty drastic drop in quality. It was pretty run of the mill Who filler episode. Now, the environmental message bugged me. Not because I don't want Who to deal with the topic, I very much do. I just think the issue would have deserved much more thoughtful treatment. Now they just tagged it on this mediocre monster story.

Also, animals cannot evolve to use carbon dioxide like that.
 
Just now watched this one. Not great, but not as bad as a lot of you said. Slightly above most of last season (eps 1 & 10 were good, 2-9 were meh).

Pretty typical running about and running away from monsters, with the obvious twist of what planet Orphan 55 was.

6/10 for me.
 
Ar-Pharazon said:
The Five Masters? Maybe three, they could do three...or four.
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The Big Finish audio play will have Eric Roberts, John Simm, Michelle Gomez, Geoffrey Beevers, Derek Jacobi, Alex Macqueen (original to Big Finish), Mark Gatiss (the Unbound Master), and Milo Parker (original to this story). So...The Eight Masters. At least. It's entirely possible Beevers could be playing more than one version of The Master.

As for the show, there's no reason why it can't be at least Roberts, Simm, Gomez, and Jacobi joining Sacha Dhawan. And who knows, maybe even Beevers and Macqueen, too.
 
The Nth Doctor said:
The Big Finish audio play will have Eric Roberts, John Simm, Michelle Gomez, Geoffrey Beevers, Derek Jacobi, Alex Macqueen (original to Big Finish), Mark Gatiss (the Unbound Master), and Milo Parker (original to this story). So...The Eight Masters. At least. It's entirely possible Beevers could be playing more than one version of The Master.

As for the show, there's no reason why it can't be at least Roberts, Simm, Gomez, and Jacobi joining Sacha Dhawan. And who knows, maybe even Beevers and Macqueen, too.
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I doubt we'd see anyone from BF on screen. Roberts was the Master for exactly the length of the TV Movie as far as on screen evidence (different on audio?). Similar with Jacobi, another case where BF explains a lot more that what we saw?

Any number of Masters would make for a great two-part episode, if the Beeb ever had that much inspiration.

It would make a great comic too, like that 10 Doctors thing from several years ago.
 
This episode is better than most claim, but please leave out the end of show preaching speech. The message was already there. It is much more effective when just presented in the course of the plot. Classic Who frequently did that, and did it well. We do not need the message spoon fed to us. We are smarter than that.
 
Ar-Pharazon said:
I doubt we'd see anyone from BF on screen. Roberts was the Master for exactly the length of the TV Movie as far as on screen evidence (different on audio?). Similar with Jacobi, another case where BF explains a lot more that what we saw?
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Yeah, Big Finish has featured both of them and Jacobi has is own series going on right now. They both could easily appear on screen using the same or different explanation as Big Finish if all parties were interested.

I agree that it's unlikely we'll see any of the Big Finish originals. That's just a pipe dream of mine.
 
Lonemagpie said:
Is that furry person in the orange suit in tonight's Dr Who meant to be a relative of Barf from Spaceballs?
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I was thinking this the entire time. Now Spaceballs is canon in Doctor Who!

Otherwise, pretty dire. Easily the second worst episode of the era, BUT I did enjoy Jodie a lot, for the first time. Problem is, she is writeen to be like the Tenth still, minus the arrogance.
 
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