Russell T. Davies Returns to Doctor Who as New Showrunner

[jaime]

Fine. But stop picking the scab or it'll never heal, and we'll get pissed off at you moaning about the scab and all the blood.

I do try to talk about it in a… constructive criticism kind of way. Though I am very ticked off at some of the almost objectively bad choices being made to the detriment of certain aspects. Particularly Ncuti’s introduction. And the sub-sixth-form handling of the societal commentary that is often flatly contradicted at the same time. Particularly in the sub text. Chibnall was like that too.

 

[matthunter]

I do try to talk about it in a… constructive criticism kind of way. Though I am very ticked off at some of the almost objectively bad choices being made to the detriment of certain aspects. Particularly Ncuti’s introduction. And the sub-sixth-form handling of the societal commentary that is often flatly contradicted at the same time. Particularly in the sub text. Chibnall was like that too.

None of this is constructive.

It's actually sub-sub-Sixth Form.

 

[jaime]

None of this is constructive.

It's actually sub-sub-Sixth Form.

When I am not making jokes, I identify specific problems. I use examples. I don’t resort to insults particularly, not to posters, nor to actors, writers, nor production team particularly. I may drift a little close, but tend not to.
To offer you an example of something annoying I have mentioned before — Jodie into Tennant had the clothes regenerate. So that it wouldn’t look ridiculous. (Shortly after Sacha Dewan had them on, but that is by the by) Tennant into Ncuti? No trousers for you I am afraid old chap.
Why is that?
The possible answers aren’t all exactly pleasant, and nor are the optics.
Let alone the heir and the spare situation going on.
Or the ‘Trans person is the result of Time Lord Magic’ in the same episode as Beep the Meep in particular.

But all that aside, you must have been to a very posh sixth form.

 

[matthunter]

No, just one where we learnt stuff.

 

[jaime]

No, just one where we learnt stuff.

Not how to read a sub text though. Or you may have thought ‘hmm, maybe *don’t* go all in on a Trans issue story at the same time as an ‘things aren’t simply what they appear to be, that pretty thing is evil” story, Russell, you’re confusing the polarity’.

 

[The Wormhole]

Interesting bit here for those still wedded to the idea that RDT will never, ever reference the Timless Child again.

At this point, anyone who thinks the Timeless Child will never be mentioned again is just engaging in wishful thinking.

 

[jaime]

At this point, anyone who thinks the Timeless Child will never be mentioned again is just engaging in wishful thinking.

I’d like it to be mentioned again, and treated in roughly the same way it treated a ton of stories that came before it. They can call it ‘Retcon of the Doctor’. No need to be subtle.

 

[matthunter]

What if they did that, but in an episode full of other subtext that gets up your nostrils?

 

[jaime]

What if they did that, but in an episode full of other subtext that gets up your nostrils?

Depends how they do it really. At least it would be doing one useful thing. Maybe don’t mess it up as mixedly as Spyfall — I didn’t like them hitting the reset on Missy, but appreciated they wanted a Master, and liked how Dhawan and Whittaker reminded me in a way of Ainley and Davison. Then they nallsed it up by having the Doctor essentially send some Asian people gift wrapped to the actual Nazis. (One of whom was a real historical figure.)

I think the key thing is the production team recognising when they are doing it — if Sylvester can get the finger of Omega dropped and talk a Dalek into exploding because he noticed the disconnect, in 1988, then I am pretty sure someone can have sharp eyes on a script in 2023. Though apparently, not for quite a few years now. Which is *odd* because subtext is something they are alright at when they intend it, but seem blind to other bits.

Nor is it about my ‘likes’ so much. Common sense helps. Not contradicting one with the other (unless they are trying to have their cake and eat it…) would also help. Or even line to line.

And at the end of the day… I do wonder if fixing things would be enough of a draw to get me to watch again. Probably. I sat through power of the Doctor, and didn’t hate it. Though I could have written a better ending for Yaz and The Doctor than that. Which is… a low bar.

 

[DigificWriter]

@jaime You can't retcon Doctor Who because there's no explicit continuity to 'fix'; every bit of lore, story, or media that has ever been produced by/for the IP is both simultaneously relevant and irrelevant depending on the whims of the people in charge of it.

A future Showrunner hypothetically choosing to ignore the Timeless Child story won't suddenly erase or 'fix' that element of lore.

 

[jaime]

@jaime You can't retcon Doctor Who because there's no explicit continuity to 'fix'; every bit of lore, story, or media that has ever been produced by/for the IP is both simultaneously relevant and irrelevant depending on the whims of the people in charge of it.

A future Showrunner hypothetically choosing to ignore the Timeless Child story won't suddenly erase or 'fix' that element of lore.

um.
Isn’t that *exactly what the TC did* in the first place?
On the Morbius Doctors pretext?
And I wouldn’t be so crazy as to go for every bit of media. Though The Gallifrey Chronicles did alright for that. (The second one.)
But to undo the TC in continuity? Easy. Any half decent writer could do that.
Start with ‘It was the Master’ and work from there.

 

[DigificWriter]

um.
Isn’t that *exactly what the TC did* in the first place?

No, because every bit of lore about The Doctor that was true before the introduction of the Timeless Child story is still true even if future Showrunners follow RTD's lead and choose to build on the Timeless Child lore.

The entire Doctor Who franchise is one big Schroedinger's Cat paradox in which everything that we know - or think we know - about it is both true and false simultaneously and both does and does not exist simultaneously.

 

[jaime]

No, because every bit of lore about The Doctor that was true before the introduction of the Timeless Child story is still true even if future Showrunners follow RTD's lead and choose to build on the Timeless Child lore.

The entire Doctor Who franchise is one big Schroedinger's Cat paradox in which everything that we know - or think we know - about it is both true and false simultaneously and both does and does not exist simultaneously.

It really isn’t. Things have built on top of other things, but by and large it absolutely has a sense of continuity. And has done for some time. The odd wrinkle here and there sure, but the problems with the TC in part stem from changing something fundamental about the character and their motivations. Now, you can argue that wasn’t in place with Hartnell, but at the very least from The War Games on, there was a very *specific* motivation and reason for The Doctor to function as they do. And the problem isn’t so much that that is gone — arguably it changed subtly, and was gone with Gallifrey in 2005 — but that it has been presented *to have never been a thing in the first place* . Then it basically also retconned a chunk of well-liked Modern Who, and now we are in Post-Modern Who where bi-generation and other such ning-nongery has reduced coherence to nought.

It all went with the trousers, I’d imagine.

 

[David cgc]

Now, you can argue that wasn’t in place with Hartnell, but at the very least from The War Games on, there was a very *specific* motivation and reason for The Doctor to function as they do. And the problem isn’t so much that that is gone — arguably it changed subtly, and was gone with Gallifrey in 2005 — but that it has been presented *to have never been a thing in the first place* .

That reminds me, I saw an interesting post a few weeks ago about when the Doctor adopted the name "the Doctor," rather than just other people calling him that, which I've been meaning to link to here. Turns out, it took a while. It makes for an interesting retrospective character position, combined with future writers' establishments on what the name "the Doctor" means to the Doctor. Moffat's perspective that calling themself the Doctor is a promise, his off-screen remarks that he thinks that, in the Doctor's hearts of hearts, they consider the Doctor a made-up fairy-tale character who they strive to live up to even though its an unattainable ideal, and deep down, they themselves still feel like they're Grandyfine Blundersnache or whatever their government name is, and they put on their garish trousers on one leg at a time like everyone else. (Stipulating that this slow character evolution and that the Doctor doesn't embrace their persona as "the Doctor" until season nine is wholly and completely retconned away by "The Five Doctors" and "Twice Upon a Time" where the First Doctor proudly asserts himself as "the Doctor.")

 

[jaime]

That reminds me, I saw an interesting post a few weeks ago about when the Doctor adopted the name "the Doctor," rather than just other people calling him that, which I've been meaning to link to here. Turns out, it took a while. It makes for an interesting retrospective character position, combined with future writers' establishments on what the name "the Doctor" means to the Doctor. Moffat's perspective that calling themself the Doctor is a promise, his off-screen remarks that he thinks that, in the Doctor's hearts of hearts, they consider the Doctor a made-up fairy-tale character who they strive to live up to even though its an unattainable ideal, and deep down, they themselves still feel like they're Grandyfine Blundersnache or whatever their government name is, and they put on their garish trousers on one leg at a time like everyone else. (Stipulating that this slow character evolution and that the Doctor doesn't embrace their persona as "the Doctor" until season nine is wholly and completely retconned away by "The Five Doctors" and "Twice Upon a Time" where the First Doctor proudly asserts himself as "the Doctor.")

That was always part of my problem with the TC.
It made it seem like being ‘The Doctor’ was penance for their time with Division.
But it also made it so that they were The Doctor *when* they were in Division. Which made it seem like their code name, and somehow the only thing they remember.
It undid all the name of the Doctor stuff in a weird way as well, stuff that had been explicitly stated and worked fine in the Moffat era, and basically *all* the stuff that came before.
And then, just to be extra special, the Tardis wasn’t a police box because it got stuck on 1960s earth anymore either. Another Division thing. (There’s no way a Police Box was a valid disguise whenever the fugitive Doctor got plonked on Earth, and more confusingly — The Judoon are after her. So… what? The entire Shadow Proclamation know of at least one pre-Hartnell Doctor, and at *no point* did this ever come to The Doctors notice? No one ever mentioned it? Nor was it erased when The Doctor took himself out of common knowledge across the universe? And it was built back in by the Amy Pond backup? Nor, when the Doctor was in the Matrix, or when he was in charge of the Matrix, at any point did *anything at all catch his eye* — he didn’t Google himself? And, and, and ad infinitum.)
But that’s the previous lot, this lot have whole new mistakes.

 

[Sketcher]

I might be misremembering, but it didn't really seem like the Fugitive Doctor wanted to be part of Division, she'd rather be out having adventures as, well, the Doctor. Hence using the Chameleon Arch to hide. But like future incarnations (mainly 3 and 4), the Time Lords draft her to do their dirty work for them. To borrow a quote: "All of this has happened before and it will happen again".

 

[David cgc]

From the Timeless Child infodump, it sounded like the TC had been recruited into Division from when they reached adulthood, which isn't consistent with the idea that the Fugitive Doctor (or her prior regenerations) was Doctoring around outside for her time with Division and had time to acquire a name, freeze up a TARDIS chameleon circuit in a quirky shape, and develop a code against shooting people despite being a spy fighting in the war (oh, God, I'd almost forgot) between Space and Time.

 

[jaime]

From the Timeless Child infodump, it sounded like the TC had been recruited into Division from when they reached adulthood, which isn't consistent with the idea that the Fugitive Doctor (or her prior regenerations) was Doctoring around outside for her time with Division and had time to acquire a name, freeze up a TARDIS chameleon circuit in a quirky shape, and develop a code for shooting people despite being a spy fighting in the war (oh, God, I'd almost forgot) between Space and Time.

I had forgot.
Sigh.
Which time they reached adulthood?
Cos they do it again later, when the Master gets his Jungle beat implant, and when Clara tickles their toes or something.
They just threw *so much stuff at the character* for no good reason. They didn’t so much ‘re-inject the mystery’ as ‘cover it all in shite’.
Can still be fixed. Maybe.

 

[Sketcher]

How much time are we talking about from the Timeless Child being found and the 1st Doctor going on the run? The 6th Doctor said Gallifrey had been in power for millions of years, which even for a Time Lord is an extremely long time. Enough to work for Division, and do Doctor stuff too before turning into baby Hartnell?

 

[David cgc]

That gets into my issue with the TC plot, making the Doctor have a spectacularly more interesting and epic life that took place long ago that we’ll never see, so much so that their current adventures (defining “current” as Hartnell-on) pale in comparison.