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lizbeeHands: still sore. Joints are all very swollen, especially on the left hand. Have to type very slowly, with frequent breaks. Off work until Thursday. Got a referral to a specialist, but as I have $24 until I get paid next week (or my tax refund comes in, whichever happens first, but let's not count chickens.) that will have to wait.
In lieu of fresh content, here is something I had sitting on my hard drive, waiting for completion.
101 Reasons Doctor Who is Awesome
(This is a personal list. My reasons may not be your reasons. After about the first five, they're in The Order That I Thought Of Them. Features pictures, YouTube clips and completely random good times.)
1. The TARDIS.
"Okay, guys, we really can't afford a space ship. The budget covers ... a room. And some kind of easily-available prop."
Seriously, who gets from there to "time travelling Police Public Call Box? GENIUS.
2. Regeneration. It keeps your show alive.
3. "City of Death".
Some people say it's overrated. Those people are dead inside.
4. Romana.
I SAID THIS WAS MY OWN PERSONAL LIST. People talk about identifying with companions, and I always say I never do. Except that Romana was a l33t academic who was amazing at the book learning, and then semi-unwillingly left it behind to do other things with her life and discovered the world didn't cave in if she didn't get marks out of ten for everything she did. Saving planets is probably >>>> retail, but I bet it gets the same reaction at Romana's 200 Year Academy Anniversary. "You ... save planets? How ... novel. Still single? No Time Tots?" (Later, in a carrying whisper to someone else, "Well, it just goes to show that SOME PEOPLE who EVERYONE thought were BRILLIANT are NO BETTER THAN THE REST OF US. If not a bit worse!" While Romana orders another round of Eyes of Harmony and contemplates seducing Braxiatel.)
She also has adorable outfits, and lovely shoes, and many stylish hats. And is witty and bitchy and sexy and brave. (Note: I've stopped with the identification thing at this point.) So yes, she is my favourite.
5. MESH.
Or, as the rest of the universe knows them, Sea Devils. This serial is quite good in its own right, what with having Three and Jo being brilliant, the Master being hilarious and evil, the Sea Devils being a bit amazing, and some, um, remarkable acting from the guest stars. But really, if you're not seeing it in company with the House o'Squid, you're missing out in a big way.
6. Matt Smith
Who thought that Yet Another Young, Skinny White Guy With Stupid Hair would so perfectly embody the Doctor? From one moment to the next, he seems to veer wildly from youth to extreme age. Not since Tom Baker has the Doctor been so alien, and yet his performance seems to owe more to Hartnell and Troughton than the more modern Doctors. AND YET, he is completely and perfectly contemporary. Between you and me, I think he really is an alien.
7. BARBARA WRIGHT
Every single new companion is introduced amidst a rainbow of sparkly claims about how she's the VERY FIRST COMPANION WHO'S REALLY AN EQUAL TO THE DOCTOR. And we'll know, because she won't take him at face value, and will question him, and stand up to him, and blah blah fishcakes.
(Apparently Mary Tamm never got the memo, because, just before "The Ribos Operation" aired, she gave an interview with a fanzine that went, basically, "Yeah, I was promised this amazing character, but actually she sort of falls into a rut halfway through the season. So ... meh." Ah, the good old days, when actors weren't expected to blindly parrot the production party line. Like that c.1998 interview I read with Bill Mumy last week, where he bitched about Lennier's season 5 storyline. Bless.)
And while I respect the right of producers etc to promote their product, they are all wrong, because Barbara got there first. Whenever the Doctor waxes rhapsodic about humanity, he's thinking of Barbara.
8. LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMS! They're just funny. Oh '90s fanboys and your hilarious horror of women. "Time Lords aren't born from vaginas, because that's icky, and the Doctor is further removed from vaginas by an extra layer of fanwank. PS SUSAN ISN'T REALLY HIS GRANDDAUGHTER SHE'S JUST SOME KID HE PICKED UP! OH NO, A GIRL TOUCHED ME! WHAT IF I GET A DISEASE?"
Lungbarrow is some serious crack, man. I especially enjoy watching n00bs explain that it is 100% canon, oblivious to the fact that RTD has been painstakingly dismantling its ideas since 2005. Bonus points if their explanation include phrases like, "I don't know which episode it was in, I think it was a Seven episode." No, kids, Cartmel Masterplan aside, the Seven era was more concerned with toppling Thatcher than explaining in painstaking detail how the Doctor has never known anything so icky as the touch of a woman.
9. Amy Pond. She is slightly mad, slightly brilliant, has a flexible relationship with reality, has more agency than any of the New Who companions so far, and all in some amazingly short skirts. She brought the Doctor back with her imagination. SHE BROUGHT THE DOCTOR BACK WITH HER IMAGINATION. I expected to like her, but not to love her. Silly Liz. I always did enjoy the crazy ones.
10. "The Time Monster"
Some fanboys will tell you this is rubbish. Those fanboys are blind to its cracktastic brilliance, on account of how it features a series of great female characters, and women are icky and scary. Time is a woman, and she loves the Doctor a little. Jo Grant saves the universe. The Master flirts with heterosexuality. Actors run veeeeeeeeery sloooooooooooowly to simulate actual slow-mo. THERE IS NOTHING HERE THAT IS NOT BRILLIANT.
11. The Brigadier
In some ways, the biggest disappointment of the Ten-era was that he never met the Brig. (They tried for "The Wedding of Sarah Jane Smith", apparently, but Nicholas Courtney's health did not permit.) At first blush, you would wonder why the Doctor would count a sharp-tongued career military officer as one of his best friends across incarnations, but there is so much trust and affection and admiration between them -- and, you know, disagreements, like that time the Brig blew up a settlement of Silurians -- that it all becomes clear.
12. The Sarah Jane Adventures
"Spin-off of family show aimed at younger kids" shouldn't be a recipe for any kind of success. And yet, SJA provides the silly, emotionally-strong, light-on-epic-douchebag-angst that the parent show was missing. This year's guest stars have me even more excited.
13. MARTHA JONES
Another character who had a certain plan for her life which didn't quite survive meeting with the Doctor. In a lot of ways, season three was the best of RTD's era, marred only by uneven writing and uncertain characterisation. But nothing can take away my love for Martha, who achieved things she never even dreamed she was capable of, and had the guts to walk way.
14. "Judoon platoon on the moon." Some things just make me smile. "Judoon google spoons and runes."
15. Braxiatel. More ruthless than the Doctor. More competent than the Master. More facial hair than the Rani. (...Okay, why has no one written Brax/Rani? PLEASE RECTIFY THIS OVERSIGHT AT ONCE.) He'd be Romana's greatest ally, if she could trust him any further than she could throw him. Hobbies include: collecting art, protecting the universe, messing with Bernice Summerfield's head. His relationship status on Facebook is set to "It's complicated", on account of how, sooner or later, everyone who knows him wants to kill him. And not in the nice, affectionate way they want to kill his little brother. Oh, you know his brother? Slightly mad, travels in a stolen TARDIS shaped like a police box? Yeah, that guy.
16. Bernice Summerfield, the little spin-off companion who could. Could what? Let's see, save planets, teach, write a book -- the follow-up will be out any eon now, she promises! -- fight Daleks, raise a son on her own, and drink a Cyberman under the table. All without ever appearing in the actual TV series.
17. Tom Baker.
Until Matt Smith came along, he was my number one candidate for Actor Playing The Doctor Most Likely To Actually Be An Alien. And frankly, I'm still not certain they're not in it together, lulling several generations of children into a false sense of security before unveiling their evil plans.
I, for one, welcome our new overlords.
18. Tom Baker's anecdotes.
"I am used to being mistaken for Miriam Margolyes; Private Eye noticed that, and once I was even taken for Gertrude Stein. But that was at Chelsea Flower Show where uncertainty of identity is in the air."
Also, his story about the time he tried to murder his father-in-law (...not Lalla Ward's father, I hasten to add) is, um. Is there a word for when you're laughing, but also cringing, and also hoping this is actually just the recounting of a very strange dream brought on by too much cheese before dinner?
19. Allegedly inspired Babylon 5. Or so JMS claimed, in a discussion of great arcs in science fiction television. Doctor Who fandom is still trying to figure out what the hell he's talking about, but if it means our show can take credit for B5, I guess we can live with it.
20. Delgado!Master. He's suave like Jack Harkness seducing James Bond. And he kills people with inflatable chairs.
21. Ace McShane.
It's a myth that [insert companion who is not Barbara here] was the first to stand up to the Doctor, but it wasn't until Ace that the series was inverted so that the companion's emotional story took precedence. There would be no Rose, Martha, Donna or Amy if Ace hadn't done it first.
22. The Kandyman. Because in the '80s, Doctor Who fought Thatcherism with absurdity.
"YOU'LL FEEL THE BACK OF MY KANDY HAND!"
23. Daleks. Homicidal pepperpots that house hate-filled mutants.
24. Leela. Louise Jameson was one of the most talented of the Classic Who actresses, and she brought dignity and intelligence to a role that could have been thankless and exploitative. Leela never got the arc that her creator intended, but her journey from jungle-dwelling savage to resident on the most advanced planet in the universe is still sort of brilliant.
25. Jo Grant. Often overlooked, or dismissed as a bimbo. Jo occasionally suffered from bad writing, but at her best, she was clever, self-aware and incredibly brave, and her growth from wide-eyed acolyte of the Doctor to a saver-of-the-world in her own right is great.
26. "Ghost Light". Fiendishly complex, yet fundamentally logical. Old fashioned, yet contemporary. Scarier than a simple ghost story. Try the soup.
27. The "Warrior's Gate" novelisation. Beautifully written, and contains all the Doctor/Romana scenes that should have been in the final version, but weren't.
28. Mary Tamm. Along with Freema Agyeman and Karen Gillan, part of the triumvirate of Most Traditionally Beautiful Doctor Who Companions. Also, while she's no Judi Dench, once she'd relaxed into the role, she brought a lot of spark and wit to Romana, and it's a great shame she only got the one series.
29. That time Lalla Ward married Tom Baker.
I shouldn't laugh. But I do.
30. Frobisher. Because your series hasn't really passed through the event horizon of crack until the hero has had a shapeshifting penguin for a companion.
31. Torchwood: Children of Earth. In terms of quality of writing, the absolute best thing to come out of RTD's involvement with the franchise. Except for Ianto's death scene, which still makes me laugh in its sheer generic mediocrity. Also pretty much the only good thing about Torchwood.
32. William Hartnell's line fluffs. A reminder that the show was first filmed in the days where editing involved the expensive and time consuming process of actually cutting up bits of tape, and since they couldn't afford the time or the extra tape required, they just kept on going.
I get quite cross when people suggest that the line fluffs mean Hartnell was a bad actor, or unprofessional, or drunk, or senile. 'Cos, you know, around 2005, the BBC did a live broadcast of a Quatermass story, and David Tennant was right there, messing up his lines with the best of them.
33. Verity Lambert. Even today, a 23-year-old woman as executive producer for a TV show is a bit out of the ordinary. In 1963? Her win; it is epic.
34. Ian's cardigans.
One does not normally think of the humble cardigan as the clothing choice of sex gods. AND YET.
35. RIVER SONG, BITCHES. Because she's smart, brave, funny, not afraid of self-promotion. And she trusts the Doctor utterly and absolutely. Which doesn't prevent her from giving him a metaphorical kick in the pants when he needs it.
36. Zoe.
She can kill you with her brain.
37. Two/Jamie. Shipping it would be like shipping apple pie and ice cream -- totally redundant. They simply are.
38. "Just this once, Rose, everybody lives!" So much joy.
39. Grace Holloway. Yes, she's the '90s TV stereotype of the Brittle Career Woman, but when the Doctor trots out his "come with me" line, she's the only woman before or since who invites him to come with her. Because her life is an adventure, too, and she's not overcome by a sense of inferiority just because she doesn't have a time machine.
Also, she performed surgery in an evening gown, and I'm sorry, laugh all you want, but I really love the clip of her running through the hosptial corridors in slow-mo with her dress billowing around her.
40. Nitro-9! It's a can of deoderant that registers 9 on the Richter Scale. What's not to love?
41. "I always DRESS for the occasion."
Next to Delgado, I think I like Roberts!Master best of all. Sorry.
42. Gifs from this year's Doctor Who Confidential
I think I might actually have to watch this year's season. I mean, one day.
43. Season 18
Season 17 is easy to love. It has Douglas Adams, Paris, Daleks, Nimons.
Season 18, though, has these big themes of entropy and loss and moving apart. And Adric. But I think, in a way -- a really big way -- season 18 represents some of Doctor Who's most thematically coherent storytelling. And it's weakest story is about a sociopathic cactus, so you can't go wrong there.
44. Liz Shaw, a companion too clever and independent to spend her life handing the Doctor test tubes and saying how marvellous she is. And in skirts that make Amy's outfits look like nuns' habits.
45. Professor Amelia Rumford. The finest companion who never was.
46. Peter Davison. Oh, The Beige, you are the subject of so muchcreepy love in our house.
47. Matt Smith and Karen Gillan. Young, talented and mad as hatters, the pair of them. I actually think I might be entertained just by watching them read a phone book.
48. Kroll. It's a giant squid. No, GIANT. Like, miles across. Of course I love it!
49. “I suppose it’s some sort of neutral environment, an isolated space cut off from the rest of the universe.”
“He should have told me that’s what he wanted. I could have shown him Brisbane.”
IT'S FUNNY BECAUSE IT'S TRUE.
Disclaimer: I'm allowed to say that, because I come from Brisbane. Only proper Queenslanders with mango and Bundy rum flowing in their veins are allowed to diss BrisVegas!
50. "Kinda". When you're sitting down to watch a kids show from the early 1980s, you really don't expect a complex and compelling story about Buddhist mysticism and colonialism.
51. Colin Baker. It's a tragedy that he got some of the worst scripts the series has ever seen, because when he's good, he's really, really good.
Also:
52. The Rani. As smart as the Doctor, as amoral as the Master, twice as competent as the two put together. She's the Hermione Granger of Prydon Academy, if Hermione was played by an ex-Dynasty actress.
OMG I LOVE HER SO.
53. So many women!
Seriously, sometimes I see people complaining that there aren't enough men in DW, or we need a male companion for a while, and I'm like ... why? Because men are seriously underrepresented in mainstream television? Doctor Who without a female leading character is unthinkable to me, and I get a weird thrill from seeing the parade of actresses who have held that position over the decades.
54. Bessie. A SLAP IN THE FACE TO DOCTOR/TARDIS SHIPPERS EVERYWHERE. But she's so yellow! THE HUSSY!
55. Wilf. Honestly, I did not expect to love his character as much as I did. And when Ten was pissing and moaning about dying to save someone as "unimportant" as Wilf, I wanted to slap him in the face, because if Wilf doesn't deserve to be saved, who does?
56. The TV Movie.
Well, up to the last 45 minutes, anyway. I view it like a remix, an American remix of a British product, as strange and silly as the original product, but with an awkward '90s TV makeover.
57. Season 7. In which Liz Shaw saves the world a whole lot. There is not a dud story in this entire season. It takes the challenge of recreating Doctor Who in a new style and format, and succeeds brilliantly.
58. "The Sensorites". Like most Hartnell-era stories, this is incredibly theatrical, but it's also beautifully written and acted, and rather haunting.
59. Ood. OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOD. I didn't really see the need for them to become the random soothsayers of the latter Ten era, but really, I can't say no to an alien who looks like a squid's growing out of his mouth.
60. Weeping Angels. Overgrown garden gnomes with a thirst for blood. HOW IS THAT SCARY? I don't know, but I give statues a wide berth these days.
61. Tiny!Carey Mulligan. One day she's the guest star of the week in an iconic episode of Doctor Who. Next day she's nominated for an Oscar. The world is a strange place.
62. Narvin. When you're a cynical, opportunistic, racist Time Lord, and you're one of the most reliable and likable people of your species ... well, maybe Gallifrey deserved to die. But even Leela could find a good word for him by the end. His specialties: manipulating time, hoarding temporal weapons, pricking egos.
63. K9. He's a very good dog.
64. Gwen Cooper. Despite being totally indifferent/mildly hostile in season one of TW (okay, the four episodes of season one that I saw before I gave up), I stuck with most of season two because I really liked Gwen. I watched CoE because I liked Gwen. I think it's the mixture of common sense, idealism, jokes and comedy faces.
65. The Giant Clam
One of Doctor Who's mollusc highlights.
66. The kiss in "Shada". From the script:
(....And then the Doctor lights up. He gets up.)
DOCTOR: Romana?
ROMANA: Yes Doctor?
DOCTOR: Romana,
(Crossing over to her.)
I want you to do something for me. Stand there. Romana, I want you to where this.
(The DOCTOR reaches into one of his voluminous pockets and takes out a colourful little medal of honour, which he pins onto ROMANA's dress. He tells her he wants her to wear this. He then mimes kissing her on each cheek, and the two salute each other smartly. [On the script - the medal says "I AM A GENIUS"])
DOCTOR: (Takes a deep breath.) Well, now I can think.
67. Lisa Bowerman. She acts. She directs. She takes photos. She turns up at cons and takes people out drinking. What's not to love?
68. Doctor Who killed Snarry.
69. Jacobi!Master. In which a thespian master decides to take a little ham with his scenery, and the world is a better place for it.
70. The Chameleon Arch. Foundation for two great stories. Inspiration for a million fics and [character x] is really [insert Time Lord here] theories. Singlehandedly increased the sale of fobwatches to nerds.
71. Cricket.
72. Decorative vegetables.
73. The Mighty Trout. My grandfather insists to this day that he's the only good Doctor.
74. "Mark of the Rani". If anyone ever tries to tell you there are no good Six stories, make them watch this. It has drama! Humour! People being turned into trees!
75. Ainley!Master. After years of ham, suddenly there was "Survival", and it became obvious that he was actually really quite good.
76. E-Space.
77. "You're a very beautiful woman, probably."
78. Breaking the fourth wall. YES, I'M LOOKING AT YOU, TOM BAKER, AT LEAST HARTNELL HAD THE EXCUSE OF IT BEING THE '60s! I believe Matt Smith does it for a second in "The Beast Below", too.
79. "Dimensions in Time". Yes, it's rubbish, but it does have Lalla Ward's last-ever television appearance. Which is ... well, it's a bit sad, really.
80. Multiple novelty songs.
81. Brainy specs.
82. "That'll never work. He's gay and she's an alien."
83. Mike Yates.
You know, I'm not actually sure why I included this in the handwritten draft of this list. Not that I've anything against Captain Yates, but he doesn't really come to mind immediately when I'm listing the things I love most about Doctor Who. Well, obviously, he came to mind 83rd.
84. The Dream Lord. You might think the Doctor's dark side would be cool and handsome and sexy. But no, he's a sarcastic, portly middle-aged man who voices every petty insecurity you never want to hear said out loud.
85. Sylvester McCoy.
Well, no, that's Britney Spears, but it just goes to show that not everyone can pull off a silly pattern and a small hat. (OKAY, SHE CAME UP WHEN I GOOGLED "SYLVESTER MCCOY" AND I THOUGHT IT WAS FUNNY, OKAY?)
They say you never forget your first Doctor. Mine was McCoy, and I believed very firmly that, while the Doctor was there to protect us from the monsters, Mel and Ace existed to protect us from the Doctor.
86. He loves them all. Not always in the same way (unless you want to argue that he loved Jo the same way he loved Adric), but in all his different ways, the Doctor loves and cares for everyone who travels with him.
Except Adam, obviously.
87. Jon Pertwee's inappropriate sexiness.
PUT IT AWAY, PERTWEE.
88. "From beyond the GRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAVE."
I like Doctor Who for its realistic and subtle dialogue. NO, REALLY.
89. "Come on, Ace, there's work to be done."
90. Hating Thatcher. What the McCoy era was all about.
91. "Ooh look, rocks!"
92. The TARDIS has a swimming pool. Sometimes it's in the library.
93. PR1ME computer ads! I don't know what's better, the canonical Four/Romana shipping, or the sexy way Lalla Ward remarks on its ability to talk to other computers.
94. "Human Nature/Family of Blood". I love this two-parter, what it says about the Doctor and his idea of humanity, Martha's courage, all these people limited by their era and culture, suffering and dying because the Doctor made a bad choice. And continues to make bad choices, with the eternal imprisonment of the Family of Blood. It's not an easy story to watch, but I find it amazing nonetheless.
95. Liz X. She's the bloody queen, mate.
I would like a spin-off called In Her Majesty's Secret Space Service, in which River Song fights crime on behalf of Liz X.
96. Karen Gillan's clothes. Brightly coloured vintage dresses with worn leather boots. Confections of black lace and green taffeta. It's not just that she has the sort of figure for which clothes are made, it's that she has a great eye for an ensemble.
97. Lalla Ward's books. I don't know what blackmail she used to get Louise Jameson to model her bird jumpers, but I feel the world is a better place for it.
98. It brings out Kylie Minogue's inner nerd.
99. THIS.
100. All the Doctor Who squee on Tumblr.
101. YOU, you silly fandom!
In lieu of fresh content, here is something I had sitting on my hard drive, waiting for completion.
101 Reasons Doctor Who is Awesome
(This is a personal list. My reasons may not be your reasons. After about the first five, they're in The Order That I Thought Of Them. Features pictures, YouTube clips and completely random good times.)
1. The TARDIS.
"Okay, guys, we really can't afford a space ship. The budget covers ... a room. And some kind of easily-available prop."
Seriously, who gets from there to "time travelling Police Public Call Box? GENIUS.
2. Regeneration. It keeps your show alive.
3. "City of Death".
Some people say it's overrated. Those people are dead inside.
4. Romana.
I SAID THIS WAS MY OWN PERSONAL LIST. People talk about identifying with companions, and I always say I never do. Except that Romana was a l33t academic who was amazing at the book learning, and then semi-unwillingly left it behind to do other things with her life and discovered the world didn't cave in if she didn't get marks out of ten for everything she did. Saving planets is probably >>>> retail, but I bet it gets the same reaction at Romana's 200 Year Academy Anniversary. "You ... save planets? How ... novel. Still single? No Time Tots?" (Later, in a carrying whisper to someone else, "Well, it just goes to show that SOME PEOPLE who EVERYONE thought were BRILLIANT are NO BETTER THAN THE REST OF US. If not a bit worse!" While Romana orders another round of Eyes of Harmony and contemplates seducing Braxiatel.)
She also has adorable outfits, and lovely shoes, and many stylish hats. And is witty and bitchy and sexy and brave. (Note: I've stopped with the identification thing at this point.) So yes, she is my favourite.
5. MESH.
Or, as the rest of the universe knows them, Sea Devils. This serial is quite good in its own right, what with having Three and Jo being brilliant, the Master being hilarious and evil, the Sea Devils being a bit amazing, and some, um, remarkable acting from the guest stars. But really, if you're not seeing it in company with the House o'Squid, you're missing out in a big way.
6. Matt Smith
Who thought that Yet Another Young, Skinny White Guy With Stupid Hair would so perfectly embody the Doctor? From one moment to the next, he seems to veer wildly from youth to extreme age. Not since Tom Baker has the Doctor been so alien, and yet his performance seems to owe more to Hartnell and Troughton than the more modern Doctors. AND YET, he is completely and perfectly contemporary. Between you and me, I think he really is an alien.
7. BARBARA WRIGHT
Every single new companion is introduced amidst a rainbow of sparkly claims about how she's the VERY FIRST COMPANION WHO'S REALLY AN EQUAL TO THE DOCTOR. And we'll know, because she won't take him at face value, and will question him, and stand up to him, and blah blah fishcakes.
(Apparently Mary Tamm never got the memo, because, just before "The Ribos Operation" aired, she gave an interview with a fanzine that went, basically, "Yeah, I was promised this amazing character, but actually she sort of falls into a rut halfway through the season. So ... meh." Ah, the good old days, when actors weren't expected to blindly parrot the production party line. Like that c.1998 interview I read with Bill Mumy last week, where he bitched about Lennier's season 5 storyline. Bless.)
And while I respect the right of producers etc to promote their product, they are all wrong, because Barbara got there first. Whenever the Doctor waxes rhapsodic about humanity, he's thinking of Barbara.
8. LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMS! They're just funny. Oh '90s fanboys and your hilarious horror of women. "Time Lords aren't born from vaginas, because that's icky, and the Doctor is further removed from vaginas by an extra layer of fanwank. PS SUSAN ISN'T REALLY HIS GRANDDAUGHTER SHE'S JUST SOME KID HE PICKED UP! OH NO, A GIRL TOUCHED ME! WHAT IF I GET A DISEASE?"
Lungbarrow is some serious crack, man. I especially enjoy watching n00bs explain that it is 100% canon, oblivious to the fact that RTD has been painstakingly dismantling its ideas since 2005. Bonus points if their explanation include phrases like, "I don't know which episode it was in, I think it was a Seven episode." No, kids, Cartmel Masterplan aside, the Seven era was more concerned with toppling Thatcher than explaining in painstaking detail how the Doctor has never known anything so icky as the touch of a woman.
9. Amy Pond. She is slightly mad, slightly brilliant, has a flexible relationship with reality, has more agency than any of the New Who companions so far, and all in some amazingly short skirts. She brought the Doctor back with her imagination. SHE BROUGHT THE DOCTOR BACK WITH HER IMAGINATION. I expected to like her, but not to love her. Silly Liz. I always did enjoy the crazy ones.
10. "The Time Monster"
Some fanboys will tell you this is rubbish. Those fanboys are blind to its cracktastic brilliance, on account of how it features a series of great female characters, and women are icky and scary. Time is a woman, and she loves the Doctor a little. Jo Grant saves the universe. The Master flirts with heterosexuality. Actors run veeeeeeeeery sloooooooooooowly to simulate actual slow-mo. THERE IS NOTHING HERE THAT IS NOT BRILLIANT.
11. The Brigadier
In some ways, the biggest disappointment of the Ten-era was that he never met the Brig. (They tried for "The Wedding of Sarah Jane Smith", apparently, but Nicholas Courtney's health did not permit.) At first blush, you would wonder why the Doctor would count a sharp-tongued career military officer as one of his best friends across incarnations, but there is so much trust and affection and admiration between them -- and, you know, disagreements, like that time the Brig blew up a settlement of Silurians -- that it all becomes clear.
12. The Sarah Jane Adventures
"Spin-off of family show aimed at younger kids" shouldn't be a recipe for any kind of success. And yet, SJA provides the silly, emotionally-strong, light-on-epic-douchebag-angst that the parent show was missing. This year's guest stars have me even more excited.
13. MARTHA JONES
Another character who had a certain plan for her life which didn't quite survive meeting with the Doctor. In a lot of ways, season three was the best of RTD's era, marred only by uneven writing and uncertain characterisation. But nothing can take away my love for Martha, who achieved things she never even dreamed she was capable of, and had the guts to walk way.
14. "Judoon platoon on the moon." Some things just make me smile. "Judoon google spoons and runes."
15. Braxiatel. More ruthless than the Doctor. More competent than the Master. More facial hair than the Rani. (...Okay, why has no one written Brax/Rani? PLEASE RECTIFY THIS OVERSIGHT AT ONCE.) He'd be Romana's greatest ally, if she could trust him any further than she could throw him. Hobbies include: collecting art, protecting the universe, messing with Bernice Summerfield's head. His relationship status on Facebook is set to "It's complicated", on account of how, sooner or later, everyone who knows him wants to kill him. And not in the nice, affectionate way they want to kill his little brother. Oh, you know his brother? Slightly mad, travels in a stolen TARDIS shaped like a police box? Yeah, that guy.
16. Bernice Summerfield, the little spin-off companion who could. Could what? Let's see, save planets, teach, write a book -- the follow-up will be out any eon now, she promises! -- fight Daleks, raise a son on her own, and drink a Cyberman under the table. All without ever appearing in the actual TV series.
17. Tom Baker.
Until Matt Smith came along, he was my number one candidate for Actor Playing The Doctor Most Likely To Actually Be An Alien. And frankly, I'm still not certain they're not in it together, lulling several generations of children into a false sense of security before unveiling their evil plans.
I, for one, welcome our new overlords.
18. Tom Baker's anecdotes.
"I am used to being mistaken for Miriam Margolyes; Private Eye noticed that, and once I was even taken for Gertrude Stein. But that was at Chelsea Flower Show where uncertainty of identity is in the air."
Also, his story about the time he tried to murder his father-in-law (...not Lalla Ward's father, I hasten to add) is, um. Is there a word for when you're laughing, but also cringing, and also hoping this is actually just the recounting of a very strange dream brought on by too much cheese before dinner?
19. Allegedly inspired Babylon 5. Or so JMS claimed, in a discussion of great arcs in science fiction television. Doctor Who fandom is still trying to figure out what the hell he's talking about, but if it means our show can take credit for B5, I guess we can live with it.
20. Delgado!Master. He's suave like Jack Harkness seducing James Bond. And he kills people with inflatable chairs.
21. Ace McShane.
It's a myth that [insert companion who is not Barbara here] was the first to stand up to the Doctor, but it wasn't until Ace that the series was inverted so that the companion's emotional story took precedence. There would be no Rose, Martha, Donna or Amy if Ace hadn't done it first.
22. The Kandyman. Because in the '80s, Doctor Who fought Thatcherism with absurdity.
"YOU'LL FEEL THE BACK OF MY KANDY HAND!"
23. Daleks. Homicidal pepperpots that house hate-filled mutants.
24. Leela. Louise Jameson was one of the most talented of the Classic Who actresses, and she brought dignity and intelligence to a role that could have been thankless and exploitative. Leela never got the arc that her creator intended, but her journey from jungle-dwelling savage to resident on the most advanced planet in the universe is still sort of brilliant.
25. Jo Grant. Often overlooked, or dismissed as a bimbo. Jo occasionally suffered from bad writing, but at her best, she was clever, self-aware and incredibly brave, and her growth from wide-eyed acolyte of the Doctor to a saver-of-the-world in her own right is great.
26. "Ghost Light". Fiendishly complex, yet fundamentally logical. Old fashioned, yet contemporary. Scarier than a simple ghost story. Try the soup.
27. The "Warrior's Gate" novelisation. Beautifully written, and contains all the Doctor/Romana scenes that should have been in the final version, but weren't.
28. Mary Tamm. Along with Freema Agyeman and Karen Gillan, part of the triumvirate of Most Traditionally Beautiful Doctor Who Companions. Also, while she's no Judi Dench, once she'd relaxed into the role, she brought a lot of spark and wit to Romana, and it's a great shame she only got the one series.
29. That time Lalla Ward married Tom Baker.
I shouldn't laugh. But I do.
30. Frobisher. Because your series hasn't really passed through the event horizon of crack until the hero has had a shapeshifting penguin for a companion.
31. Torchwood: Children of Earth. In terms of quality of writing, the absolute best thing to come out of RTD's involvement with the franchise. Except for Ianto's death scene, which still makes me laugh in its sheer generic mediocrity. Also pretty much the only good thing about Torchwood.
32. William Hartnell's line fluffs. A reminder that the show was first filmed in the days where editing involved the expensive and time consuming process of actually cutting up bits of tape, and since they couldn't afford the time or the extra tape required, they just kept on going.
I get quite cross when people suggest that the line fluffs mean Hartnell was a bad actor, or unprofessional, or drunk, or senile. 'Cos, you know, around 2005, the BBC did a live broadcast of a Quatermass story, and David Tennant was right there, messing up his lines with the best of them.
33. Verity Lambert. Even today, a 23-year-old woman as executive producer for a TV show is a bit out of the ordinary. In 1963? Her win; it is epic.
34. Ian's cardigans.
One does not normally think of the humble cardigan as the clothing choice of sex gods. AND YET.
35. RIVER SONG, BITCHES. Because she's smart, brave, funny, not afraid of self-promotion. And she trusts the Doctor utterly and absolutely. Which doesn't prevent her from giving him a metaphorical kick in the pants when he needs it.
36. Zoe.
She can kill you with her brain.
37. Two/Jamie. Shipping it would be like shipping apple pie and ice cream -- totally redundant. They simply are.
38. "Just this once, Rose, everybody lives!" So much joy.
39. Grace Holloway. Yes, she's the '90s TV stereotype of the Brittle Career Woman, but when the Doctor trots out his "come with me" line, she's the only woman before or since who invites him to come with her. Because her life is an adventure, too, and she's not overcome by a sense of inferiority just because she doesn't have a time machine.
Also, she performed surgery in an evening gown, and I'm sorry, laugh all you want, but I really love the clip of her running through the hosptial corridors in slow-mo with her dress billowing around her.
40. Nitro-9! It's a can of deoderant that registers 9 on the Richter Scale. What's not to love?
41. "I always DRESS for the occasion."
Next to Delgado, I think I like Roberts!Master best of all. Sorry.
42. Gifs from this year's Doctor Who Confidential
I think I might actually have to watch this year's season. I mean, one day.
43. Season 18
Season 17 is easy to love. It has Douglas Adams, Paris, Daleks, Nimons.
Season 18, though, has these big themes of entropy and loss and moving apart. And Adric. But I think, in a way -- a really big way -- season 18 represents some of Doctor Who's most thematically coherent storytelling. And it's weakest story is about a sociopathic cactus, so you can't go wrong there.
44. Liz Shaw, a companion too clever and independent to spend her life handing the Doctor test tubes and saying how marvellous she is. And in skirts that make Amy's outfits look like nuns' habits.
45. Professor Amelia Rumford. The finest companion who never was.
46. Peter Davison. Oh, The Beige, you are the subject of so much
47. Matt Smith and Karen Gillan. Young, talented and mad as hatters, the pair of them. I actually think I might be entertained just by watching them read a phone book.
48. Kroll. It's a giant squid. No, GIANT. Like, miles across. Of course I love it!
49. “I suppose it’s some sort of neutral environment, an isolated space cut off from the rest of the universe.”
“He should have told me that’s what he wanted. I could have shown him Brisbane.”
IT'S FUNNY BECAUSE IT'S TRUE.
Disclaimer: I'm allowed to say that, because I come from Brisbane. Only proper Queenslanders with mango and Bundy rum flowing in their veins are allowed to diss BrisVegas!
50. "Kinda". When you're sitting down to watch a kids show from the early 1980s, you really don't expect a complex and compelling story about Buddhist mysticism and colonialism.
51. Colin Baker. It's a tragedy that he got some of the worst scripts the series has ever seen, because when he's good, he's really, really good.
Also:
52. The Rani. As smart as the Doctor, as amoral as the Master, twice as competent as the two put together. She's the Hermione Granger of Prydon Academy, if Hermione was played by an ex-Dynasty actress.
OMG I LOVE HER SO.
53. So many women!
Seriously, sometimes I see people complaining that there aren't enough men in DW, or we need a male companion for a while, and I'm like ... why? Because men are seriously underrepresented in mainstream television? Doctor Who without a female leading character is unthinkable to me, and I get a weird thrill from seeing the parade of actresses who have held that position over the decades.
54. Bessie. A SLAP IN THE FACE TO DOCTOR/TARDIS SHIPPERS EVERYWHERE. But she's so yellow! THE HUSSY!
55. Wilf. Honestly, I did not expect to love his character as much as I did. And when Ten was pissing and moaning about dying to save someone as "unimportant" as Wilf, I wanted to slap him in the face, because if Wilf doesn't deserve to be saved, who does?
56. The TV Movie.
Well, up to the last 45 minutes, anyway. I view it like a remix, an American remix of a British product, as strange and silly as the original product, but with an awkward '90s TV makeover.
57. Season 7. In which Liz Shaw saves the world a whole lot. There is not a dud story in this entire season. It takes the challenge of recreating Doctor Who in a new style and format, and succeeds brilliantly.
58. "The Sensorites". Like most Hartnell-era stories, this is incredibly theatrical, but it's also beautifully written and acted, and rather haunting.
59. Ood. OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOD. I didn't really see the need for them to become the random soothsayers of the latter Ten era, but really, I can't say no to an alien who looks like a squid's growing out of his mouth.
60. Weeping Angels. Overgrown garden gnomes with a thirst for blood. HOW IS THAT SCARY? I don't know, but I give statues a wide berth these days.
61. Tiny!Carey Mulligan. One day she's the guest star of the week in an iconic episode of Doctor Who. Next day she's nominated for an Oscar. The world is a strange place.
62. Narvin. When you're a cynical, opportunistic, racist Time Lord, and you're one of the most reliable and likable people of your species ... well, maybe Gallifrey deserved to die. But even Leela could find a good word for him by the end. His specialties: manipulating time, hoarding temporal weapons, pricking egos.
63. K9. He's a very good dog.
64. Gwen Cooper. Despite being totally indifferent/mildly hostile in season one of TW (okay, the four episodes of season one that I saw before I gave up), I stuck with most of season two because I really liked Gwen. I watched CoE because I liked Gwen. I think it's the mixture of common sense, idealism, jokes and comedy faces.
65. The Giant Clam
One of Doctor Who's mollusc highlights.
66. The kiss in "Shada". From the script:
(....And then the Doctor lights up. He gets up.)
DOCTOR: Romana?
ROMANA: Yes Doctor?
DOCTOR: Romana,
(Crossing over to her.)
I want you to do something for me. Stand there. Romana, I want you to where this.
(The DOCTOR reaches into one of his voluminous pockets and takes out a colourful little medal of honour, which he pins onto ROMANA's dress. He tells her he wants her to wear this. He then mimes kissing her on each cheek, and the two salute each other smartly. [On the script - the medal says "I AM A GENIUS"])
DOCTOR: (Takes a deep breath.) Well, now I can think.
67. Lisa Bowerman. She acts. She directs. She takes photos. She turns up at cons and takes people out drinking. What's not to love?
68. Doctor Who killed Snarry.
69. Jacobi!Master. In which a thespian master decides to take a little ham with his scenery, and the world is a better place for it.
70. The Chameleon Arch. Foundation for two great stories. Inspiration for a million fics and [character x] is really [insert Time Lord here] theories. Singlehandedly increased the sale of fobwatches to nerds.
71. Cricket.
72. Decorative vegetables.
73. The Mighty Trout. My grandfather insists to this day that he's the only good Doctor.
74. "Mark of the Rani". If anyone ever tries to tell you there are no good Six stories, make them watch this. It has drama! Humour! People being turned into trees!
75. Ainley!Master. After years of ham, suddenly there was "Survival", and it became obvious that he was actually really quite good.
76. E-Space.
77. "You're a very beautiful woman, probably."
78. Breaking the fourth wall. YES, I'M LOOKING AT YOU, TOM BAKER, AT LEAST HARTNELL HAD THE EXCUSE OF IT BEING THE '60s! I believe Matt Smith does it for a second in "The Beast Below", too.
79. "Dimensions in Time". Yes, it's rubbish, but it does have Lalla Ward's last-ever television appearance. Which is ... well, it's a bit sad, really.
80. Multiple novelty songs.
81. Brainy specs.
82. "That'll never work. He's gay and she's an alien."
83. Mike Yates.
You know, I'm not actually sure why I included this in the handwritten draft of this list. Not that I've anything against Captain Yates, but he doesn't really come to mind immediately when I'm listing the things I love most about Doctor Who. Well, obviously, he came to mind 83rd.
84. The Dream Lord. You might think the Doctor's dark side would be cool and handsome and sexy. But no, he's a sarcastic, portly middle-aged man who voices every petty insecurity you never want to hear said out loud.
85. Sylvester McCoy.
Well, no, that's Britney Spears, but it just goes to show that not everyone can pull off a silly pattern and a small hat. (OKAY, SHE CAME UP WHEN I GOOGLED "SYLVESTER MCCOY" AND I THOUGHT IT WAS FUNNY, OKAY?)
They say you never forget your first Doctor. Mine was McCoy, and I believed very firmly that, while the Doctor was there to protect us from the monsters, Mel and Ace existed to protect us from the Doctor.
86. He loves them all. Not always in the same way (unless you want to argue that he loved Jo the same way he loved Adric), but in all his different ways, the Doctor loves and cares for everyone who travels with him.
Except Adam, obviously.
87. Jon Pertwee's inappropriate sexiness.
PUT IT AWAY, PERTWEE.
88. "From beyond the GRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAVE."
I like Doctor Who for its realistic and subtle dialogue. NO, REALLY.
89. "Come on, Ace, there's work to be done."
90. Hating Thatcher. What the McCoy era was all about.
91. "Ooh look, rocks!"
92. The TARDIS has a swimming pool. Sometimes it's in the library.
93. PR1ME computer ads! I don't know what's better, the canonical Four/Romana shipping, or the sexy way Lalla Ward remarks on its ability to talk to other computers.
94. "Human Nature/Family of Blood". I love this two-parter, what it says about the Doctor and his idea of humanity, Martha's courage, all these people limited by their era and culture, suffering and dying because the Doctor made a bad choice. And continues to make bad choices, with the eternal imprisonment of the Family of Blood. It's not an easy story to watch, but I find it amazing nonetheless.
95. Liz X. She's the bloody queen, mate.
I would like a spin-off called In Her Majesty's Secret Space Service, in which River Song fights crime on behalf of Liz X.
96. Karen Gillan's clothes. Brightly coloured vintage dresses with worn leather boots. Confections of black lace and green taffeta. It's not just that she has the sort of figure for which clothes are made, it's that she has a great eye for an ensemble.
97. Lalla Ward's books. I don't know what blackmail she used to get Louise Jameson to model her bird jumpers, but I feel the world is a better place for it.
98. It brings out Kylie Minogue's inner nerd.
99. THIS.
100. All the Doctor Who squee on Tumblr.
101. YOU, you silly fandom!
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Date: 2010-08-02 01:53 am (UTC)I must get around to watching more of the old serials. I saw a bunch on telly as a kid but it's good to actually see ALL the episodes IN ORDER rather than waiting for the ABC to repeat them to find out the end, the storylines make much more sense that way (although, like Neon Genesis Evangelion, they don't always make as much more sense as you'd expect).
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Date: 2010-08-02 05:08 am (UTC)The strangest and yet possibly most true thing anyone has ever said about Doctor Who. OMG.
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Date: 2010-08-03 01:28 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-02 02:12 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-02 02:13 am (UTC)As for #7, I think of my naive self in 2006 who just started watching New Who and was totally buying into the propaganda that Rose was the first companion to have a personality, to stand up for herself, to do more than scream and make the Doctor look good. I was interested in finding out about Classic Who, but went into it resigned to how I would have to put up with these pitiful, useless companions of old, because that's just the way it was back then. It took me not long at all to realize, "Hey, wait ... I think I've been sold a line!" Instead I was discovering this bounty of fantastic female characters the likes of which I had never found in any other fandom. All the way back to Barbara being awesome from the get-go. I love her so much.
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Date: 2010-08-02 06:39 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-02 02:17 am (UTC)OMG YES, PLEASE.
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Date: 2010-08-02 06:39 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-02 12:59 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-02 03:19 am (UTC)DOCTOR WHO <333
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Date: 2010-08-02 03:57 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-02 04:17 am (UTC)WHY DID YOU MAKE ME CLICK ON THAT OH DEAR SPAGHETTI MONSTER WHYYYY
No. 99
Date: 2010-08-02 05:05 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-02 05:09 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-02 07:34 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-02 10:07 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-02 10:45 am (UTC)The Brig is a lovely man. Did I ever tell you I had drinks with him once? It's true!
no subject
Date: 2010-08-02 12:04 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-02 03:07 pm (UTC)I've been struggling to get rings on for the last 3 weeks, and it's pretty tender. Between that and the very icky ulcerated chilblain on my toe I should be getting an emergency appointment with my rheumatologist, but I haven't got time and I don't want to go on the prednisone and blood pressure meds.
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Date: 2010-08-02 08:06 pm (UTC)Hope you can afford to see a specialist soon, and that the week off does your hands good!
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Date: 2010-08-02 08:27 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-02 09:21 pm (UTC)Hey, you didn't put Lalla on the list, ahem!Yes! I agree with almost everything in da list.I do believe Tom Baker tried to kill his mother-in-law (along with himself), though.
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Date: 2010-08-03 04:03 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-03 07:20 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-03 09:07 pm (UTC)And I would watch the hell out of a Liz X spinoff. That would be amazing.
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Date: 2010-08-07 08:30 am (UTC)It amuses me that with RTD making such an effort to do this, The Doctor's Daughter happened on his watch. The only new-born Gallifreyan we ever see in the series, and she emerges fully-grown from a loom.
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Date: 2010-08-10 01:04 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-11 01:08 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-11 05:27 pm (UTC)YES. OH MY GOD, THEIR LOVE WOULD BE SO BITCHY AND POSHLY-ACCENTED AND AMORAL.
And the Brig and Romana and Aaaaace and McCoy and the Baker/Smith alien overlords! LOOOOVE.
no subject
Date: 2010-08-14 02:44 pm (UTC)Your Seven love feels a lot like my Four love. Although I wish you had more SJS love. But I totally understand the devotion anyone has to their first Doctor and companions. Like many from the US, Four and Sarah were mine and they live on together in my heart at "the best," of course.
no subject
Date: 2011-04-07 12:09 am (UTC)(Also? 'Actors run veeeeeeeeery sloooooooooooowly to simulate actual slow-mo.' OH SHOW... *g*)