I didn't know Sixie wore fine Rubin Brothers suits!
Tales of the Tardis
- Thread starter Rich Watson
- Start date
So Sixie and game show hosts now have something in common!
As a fan of Charles Nelson-Reilly and Brett Somers, I got a hearty giggle out of that.
Because the show did say it plain out early on that the Doctor wasn't able to control it. By 1988, it was clear he was able to control it thanks to that fan-renowned story "Silver Nemesis". Arguably earlier, with the Doctor simply forgetting to be precise in piloting the thing. Until the 80s, the show had an amazing record of keeping the Doctor from being able to pilot it for plotting sake.
The first and third Doctors both referred to the telepathic circuits far differently, and even the third in "Planet of the Daleks" citing the Time Lords piloted the TARDIS as a result of his using the telepathic circuits to contact them over the seriousness of the issue. The first also referenced the machine very distinctly in 'The Edge of Destruction" that also counters Modern Who's newfound claims, with "think not as you or I do", which quickly rules out anthropomorphizing. In-universe, it's not due to any AI magically doing shtick. There's greater plausibility. That, or the Doctor had no clue, since day one, despite having notes on how to work the machine until those were lost, that the computer apparently liking it when he calls her "Sexy" ("The Doctor's Wife") -- yup, it's fantasy and Gaiman is an accomplished writer in the Fantasy genre. "Neverwhere" is something of a classic, even the television adaptation...
Yes, which is exactly what leads to the idea that the TARDIS was choosing where to go. Think about it. In the early years, there were no gaps between the serials. The end of one led directly into the start of another. That means that every time the TARDIS landed somewhere, it was in the middle of a dangerous and important situation. There's no way that would plausibly happen by random chance. Some guiding hand must have been taking the TARDIS to those places intentionally, and if the Doctor wasn't in control, that only left the TARDIS.
Anyway, you claimed the idea was fantasy, not simply that you disagreed with it. Saying it's fantasy means it's an impossible or nonsensical idea. I say it's just the opposite -- the Doctor landing at the peak of danger every single time by random chance is impossible and nonsensical, while the TARDIS subtly guiding the Doctor to where he's needed makes it logical.
Besides, when has Doctor Who not been fantasy?
I really don't get what your point is in any of this. Whether the TARDIS thinks the way we do has nothing to do with whether it thinks at all and is able to exert its own will. A horse can't converse like a person, but it still has its own mind and will and doesn't necessarily go where the rider wants it to, unless the rider is good enough and has enough of the horse's trust that they're on the same page.
Look -- the Doctor stole the TARDIS. At first, he had no clue how to control it, so in his first two incarnations he could basically just take off and wait to see where it landed. The TARDIS was pretty much steering itself, and it always chose a dangerous or important destination, which hardly seems random. In his third incarnation, during his exile on Earth, the Doctor worked for years to find a way to reactivate the dematerialization circuit and escape, which gave him plenty of time to tinker with the TARDIS's systems and learn more about their workings. So by the time he was freed from exile, he'd learned enough to set a destination, but it was hit-and-miss whether it actually arrived where he was aiming, since he still wasn't very good at it. By late in his fourth incarnation, he'd gotten good enough (perhaps with Romana's coaching) to set it for small jumps and was pleasantly surprised when he succeeded. By his sixth and seventh incarnations, he had effectively perfect control and could take the TARDIS wherever he wanted without any uncertainty. (One of the unmade Sixth Doctor stories written for the cancelled season opened with the Doctor at loose ends because he'd finally fixed everything in the TARDIS and had nothing to do.) By that point, he'd fully embraced his heroic role and no longer needed the TARDIS to nudge him toward heroism by taking him to places where people needed help.
Of course, the new series brought back the idea of the TARDIS's steering being unreliable, but it had been through the Time War and gotten very old, and he couldn't very well pop back to the garage on Gallifrey to get it serviced, so it's understandable that maybe the old girl didn't work as well anymore.
Fair points about how the TARDIS could end up taking the Doctor where civilizations needed help or when companions had to be hauled back home until the next time they're ready for another (usually offscreen, but not always, adventure)... and that's another reason to revisit the unmade season 23 (which story was it? I loved the novelizations of the first three, and there was the Bidmead audio that was okay... I know there were a couple others that I need to check out for sure...)
The new series ended up on modern day Earth so often that it became hard to tell, at least for the first few years. Especially as the Doctor grins and states he loves it there, while seven previous incarnations generally griped over "Earth, again" as budget issues meant the show had to take place on Earth for 50% of the time. Last I recall, the classic era was on Earth for about 50% of the time. The modern era was so far above that percentage for the longest time that it'd be too easy to forget, and I don't give an owl over Jack and the gang laughing in a fast food joint talking about their fun on planet Zovirax. "Show vs tell", as people kept bringing that up in Chibnall's era when it was a definite issue from previous eras all the same. But I digress - Whitaker's era started out with the notion that it couldn't, but the makers weren't consistent. Arguably couldn't be... with the new credo of how the machine can haul the Doctor around, it may as well be a write-off. The classic era was so good at not having to deal with these issues yet still come across credibly, even despite the slow pacing of the otherwise zany-and-swingin' 60s at times...
And, yes, it has always been fantasy - as well as sci-fi. But the tone has clearly been different. And that's where maybe I and other fans are conflating "fantasy" for "tone" or "content". Especially when people refer to "the brakes" regarding the TARDIS's landing procedure in the modern series, when the classic one had the Doctor chiding how "this doesn't roll along on wheels you know" - that's one fun example and without even mentioning "The Pirate Planet", back when the classic era was almost at its most tired and silliest, based on UK media articles circa 1979/80... Various producers invariably come in and change the tone and not all fans like all the changes.
And, yes, there have been improvements to the show that do transcend the annals of time. Casting is a big plus. Pacing is arguably too rapid if not rabid nowadays, but compared to some of the sloggiest episodes from the 60s, padding to extend the budget, that's a fair point.
But even Andrew Cartmel has opined against the sonic screwdriver's overuse. That magic wand was belittled in the late-70s, to the point JNT took notice and took the thing out of the show... now it's back, and used more and more, right down to stupid scripting stating "It's my swiss army sonic" to do anything right on cue. I know the show has used it before, and deus ex machina, but the last I checked, most fans who hate those things now have been equally against the classic era's overuse and/or misuse of its original intent as well. Nowadays, it's clearly a flanderized lampoon, to the point people balk at it. It'd be ironic if they are derided as having a metaphorical stick up somewhere since there's a joke about the sonic screwdriver just waiting to happen about that as well.
I'm not going to cite every last source, but here's a couple:
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/Flanderization
(yup, what works on characters can work on plotlines, props, you name it. The sonic is a flanderization and has been since 2005 if not 2006 and has only gotten a magnitude worse since.)
https://www.doctorwhotv.co.uk/andre...-depletes-the-mystery-of-doctor-who-93918.htm
I think I posted it recently anyway, but Cartmel - who did a ton of work for the show's final two years, which have aged quite well - is definitely on point. It's a timeless issue. (and, yep, I'm not as much up in arms over "the timeless children" as others, partly because Jo Martin's interpretation of the rule really hit the mark (she made a snark about the magic wand as well and that was eminently refreshing as far as scenes go), and also because as something had to be done to get rid of the regeneration limitation problem that was introduced in the 70s - for which nobody can blame JNT for killing the show in that regard when Robert Holmes put in a deliberate "use by" date of sorts, even if there was an ultimate climax that was to be built upon that plot point that never got reached. Supposedly; I've read on other issues (e.g. cyber time lords introduced for the unused script "The Six Doctors" - which isn't a bad idea either, IMHO), but not as much exists definitively for the Holmes/Hinchcliffe masterplan...
The new series ended up on modern day Earth so often that it became hard to tell, at least for the first few years. Especially as the Doctor grins and states he loves it there, while seven previous incarnations generally griped over "Earth, again" as budget issues meant the show had to take place on Earth for 50% of the time. Last I recall, the classic era was on Earth for about 50% of the time. The modern era was so far above that percentage for the longest time that it'd be too easy to forget, and I don't give an owl over Jack and the gang laughing in a fast food joint talking about their fun on planet Zovirax. "Show vs tell", as people kept bringing that up in Chibnall's era when it was a definite issue from previous eras all the same. But I digress - Whitaker's era started out with the notion that it couldn't, but the makers weren't consistent. Arguably couldn't be... with the new credo of how the machine can haul the Doctor around, it may as well be a write-off. The classic era was so good at not having to deal with these issues yet still come across credibly, even despite the slow pacing of the otherwise zany-and-swingin' 60s at times...
And, yes, it has always been fantasy - as well as sci-fi. But the tone has clearly been different. And that's where maybe I and other fans are conflating "fantasy" for "tone" or "content". Especially when people refer to "the brakes" regarding the TARDIS's landing procedure in the modern series, when the classic one had the Doctor chiding how "this doesn't roll along on wheels you know" - that's one fun example and without even mentioning "The Pirate Planet", back when the classic era was almost at its most tired and silliest, based on UK media articles circa 1979/80... Various producers invariably come in and change the tone and not all fans like all the changes.
And, yes, there have been improvements to the show that do transcend the annals of time. Casting is a big plus. Pacing is arguably too rapid if not rabid nowadays, but compared to some of the sloggiest episodes from the 60s, padding to extend the budget, that's a fair point.
But even Andrew Cartmel has opined against the sonic screwdriver's overuse. That magic wand was belittled in the late-70s, to the point JNT took notice and took the thing out of the show... now it's back, and used more and more, right down to stupid scripting stating "It's my swiss army sonic" to do anything right on cue. I know the show has used it before, and deus ex machina, but the last I checked, most fans who hate those things now have been equally against the classic era's overuse and/or misuse of its original intent as well. Nowadays, it's clearly a flanderized lampoon, to the point people balk at it. It'd be ironic if they are derided as having a metaphorical stick up somewhere since there's a joke about the sonic screwdriver just waiting to happen about that as well.
I'm not going to cite every last source, but here's a couple:
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/Flanderization
(yup, what works on characters can work on plotlines, props, you name it. The sonic is a flanderization and has been since 2005 if not 2006 and has only gotten a magnitude worse since.)
https://www.doctorwhotv.co.uk/andre...-depletes-the-mystery-of-doctor-who-93918.htm
I think I posted it recently anyway, but Cartmel - who did a ton of work for the show's final two years, which have aged quite well - is definitely on point. It's a timeless issue. (and, yep, I'm not as much up in arms over "the timeless children" as others, partly because Jo Martin's interpretation of the rule really hit the mark (she made a snark about the magic wand as well and that was eminently refreshing as far as scenes go), and also because as something had to be done to get rid of the regeneration limitation problem that was introduced in the 70s - for which nobody can blame JNT for killing the show in that regard when Robert Holmes put in a deliberate "use by" date of sorts, even if there was an ultimate climax that was to be built upon that plot point that never got reached. Supposedly; I've read on other issues (e.g. cyber time lords introduced for the unused script "The Six Doctors" - which isn't a bad idea either, IMHO), but not as much exists definitively for the Holmes/Hinchcliffe masterplan...
Well, in the Hartnell era, at least, since they alternated between historical and sci-fi serials. Later on, it wasn't that systematic. In Troughton's second season, for instance, only the first and last serials were in space, bracketing six consecutive ones in Earth's past, present, and future. Conversely, in the next season, "The Invasion" was the only serial set entirely on Earth, while "The Seeds of Death" was on future Earth and the Moon and parts of "The War Games" were on simulations of Earth.
Naturally, the Third Doctor's era took place mostly on Earth, since he was exiled there for the first three seasons and still spent a fair amount of his last two seasons there. The Fourth Doctor's first four seasons are a mix that leans somewhat more toward space than Earth, while his last three seasons were mostly in space, with only one serial each set primarily on Earth (though it would've been two in his penultimate season if "Shada" had been completed). The Fifth and Sixth Doctors spent significantly more time on Earth, though the "Trial of a Time Lord" season is pretty much entirely on other worlds (if you count a planet that's believed to be an alien world but ultimately turns out to be the abandoned Earth of the very far future). The Seventh's first two season are about half and half, but the final classic season has all four serials set entirely or primarily on Earth.
Looking back, and there's a common theme, I'm also starting to second-guess myself. Might not be a bad thing. Is it possible that all the companions are now pawns of the Toymaker? Or the Doctor imagining everything we saw in the Tales snippets? People have mentioned Donna being one, but if the Doctor is being toyed with (which leads to other rumors and theories, including his "14th" persona being Toymaker interfering with the Doctor's own memories...
Or I'm thinking into it too much... but at face value, it's a bit sappy and naff so I'd hope there'd be more to it. That would be admittedly brilliant, if RTD has set up all these specials in culminating into something truly big...
Or I'm thinking into it too much... but at face value, it's a bit sappy and naff so I'd hope there'd be more to it. That would be admittedly brilliant, if RTD has set up all these specials in culminating into something truly big...
I watched these yesterday and enjoyed them. I got a bit teary with 5 and Tegan.
If you want to quibble about a Memory TARDIS, Fitz Kreiner would like to kick your arse, then light up a fag and be kidnapped by Laurence Miles' fetish for voodoo.
The regen limit was already explicitly fixed by Moffat. The entire finale of the Eleventh Doctor revolves around him being the thirteenth, and then getting a top up and reset. It was done and dusted, even if the Master hadn’t already blown the concept to pieces throughout that characters at . (Which is why it would work better, and definitively still would work better, if the actual Timeless Child was the Master. The only downside being that he has already been made into a tragic figure of victim turned evil both onscreen and offscreen, with marginal success. Something that probably couldn’t be allowed by someone who thought Davros was bad representation as opposed to a cautionary tale.)
The Cartmel era, and the literature that followed it, is by far the most plundered and ever-so-slightly bastardised era of Who, and to an extent the modern TV production *is still doing it* with diminishing returns.
A reset... but just handed a new set of lives to later run out of again?
Definitely agreed that the Master should have been the timeless child. Makes more sense that way...
The Cartmel era - definitely agreed on all counts. But there is no going back to the wandering of old, it seems.
Not necessarily. In "Kill the Moon," the Doctor speculated that he might've gotten more than twelve regenerations, and that he could potentially get shot over and over again and never actually run out, and in "Hell Bent," Rassilon confirmed it when he said when he said even he wasn't sure how many regenerations the Time Lords gave the Doctor, but he was more than willing to zap him over and over until he stayed dead. An ambiguously existent, but unfixed, limit, so a future writer could play with the idea of the Doctor being on their last life at some point, but wouldn't necessarily have to, or have it imposed on them. Something we avoided, since Moffat decided to get it over with as soon as the opportunity presented itself with the invention of the War Doctor, even though it suggests the Doctor himself was surprised the Tenth Doctor's abortive regeneration counted and didn't realize he was out until the first time he really tried to do it (or, alternatively, that there was another secret incarnation even he didn't remember and he assumed it was because of the abortive regeneration, if they decide to slip the Renegade Doctor in between Two and Three).
Good points, thanks for mentioning!
At least "The Timeless Child" solidifies the 12th Doctor's hazy memory and speculation.
It's amusing, the interesting speculation placed in one of the otherwise oddest stories every conceived. At least in terms of sci-fi. Accepting it as all-out wild fantasy, however, then the idea of a big spider egg as the moon in "Kill the Moon" isn't as bad.
But after remembering that Doctor Who was already partitioned as "1963-1989" and "2005-2022", now add "2023-????" due to the specials plus rebranding the upcoming episodes as "season one", part of me now wonders if there's a parallel universe where the show didn't end in 1989, and was allowed to conclude by the late-90s or early-2000s with no other hiatuses, or reboot, and, why not, the makers of Babylon 5 helming the final era in this parallel universe...
I can immediately think of an exception to that - The Romans. Yes, the TARDIS lands and topples over, but it is well-overgrown with the team settled in a villa before the 'action' begins.
And the Gunfighters has her delivering them to a dentist for the Doctor's toothache - who just happens to be Doc Holliday...
Otherwise, with or without the Randomiser on, she happily delivers them to where they need to be - not always where they want to be.
Maybe the TARDIS just figured the crew needed a month off to recover their energies for future do-gooding.
As far as I am concerned, the Doctor (almost) always had complete control over where the TARDIS went and has simply been lying (most of the time) whenever he said he didn’t.
Much of the Doctor’s strength early on was in having his foes (and friends) misled about his abilities so as to underestimate him.
Much of the Doctor’s strength early on was in having his foes (and friends) misled about his abilities so as to underestimate him.
It has been used to blow locks…maybe act as a remote for instruments actually mounted on the TARDIS itself, perhaps.
What puzzles me are things it hasn’t been used for…
Has it ever been used to shatter glass?
I don’t remember it having been so used—and that would seem to be the most obvious application.
Shattering glass would have been a cool effect, and apropos to the original device's intent. Just think of how much different "City of Death" would have been if they used the screwdriver to do that, instead of undoing the lock of a glass door. But then we wouldn't have the thrill of Duggan smashing it to set off all sorts of alarms...
As a remote/extension tool via the TARDIS channeling it for some functionality, it's something one can buy into... and need to, especially as self-contained stories do require things to be resolved more quickly. it still suffers from the same basic trope: 1. Introduce it in a way that generates ooh and aahs. 2. Find ways to extend its use while keeping true to the original premise/idea. 3. Extend it even more, bending the rules. 4. Its use gets overused and to the point people stop being excited about it or taking it seriously. Reminds me of the Borg and later their Queen... the bigger and better Borg ship with bigger shields and nanobots got so overused that even in "Dark Frontier", they had to have Queen say they're sending two ships to stop a species that was more or less on par with the Federation.
Yes, in the David Tennant episode "Doomsday". He used it to demonstrate how repeatedly opening a dimensional portal could "shatter" reality. He aimed his sonic at a glass "partition" which initially "fractured" and then with another "buzz" fully shattered, shards raining upon the floor.
A new episode of Tales of the TARDIS will drop just prior to the season finale. No word on what classic story will be focused on.
https://www.radiotimes.com/tv/sci-fi/doctor-who-tales-of-the-tardis-classic-story-newsupdate/
https://www.radiotimes.com/tv/sci-fi/doctor-who-tales-of-the-tardis-classic-story-newsupdate/
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