Who?

[Mumpo]

Who?

Etienne wrote:

I thought it was good, but waiting for part 2 for final judgement.

My sentiments also. But in the meantime, please tell me they used New Young Pony Club's track Stone on Confidential at some point?

[Ginger Yellow]

Who?

I liked it a lot - the angels are clearly the best Doctor Who monsters ever. But I could never work out why they went through the catacombs in the first place. Why not fly up to the ship?

[ian.64]

Who?

I thought it was very good. I was a touch put off by the start of it, thinking it was going to kick off as another action-orientated RTD-style pile of lively yet preposterous frantic muck, and it ends up being an atmospheric and fascinating exercise in tension that kept things bubbling under rather than going all over the shop. Blimey.

Good design and model work for the catacomb city - very impressed - and the acting was all tinged with a nifty sense of wit, with Smith getting better by the episode. Fucking hell, even Murray Gold's orchestral yarblings have been reduced - thankfully - to effective atmospherics instead of the usual 'Blaring Soundtrack Now Available In Stores' gubbins. After the somewhat jumbled content and feel of the last two episodes, last weekend's offering was a good value example of what happens if you settle down and let the story breathe a bit. Hoping that the conclusion is just as good.

I had expected there to be a hailstorm of disapproval regarding the Over The Rainbow trail splattered on screen right at the most dramatic point of the programme.

Allow me: I'm of the opinion that, of all the people who should burn in hell (and there are many candidates), amongst them are the fuckbags who insist on 'branding' everything in sight, or instigating idents and trails on almost every moment of television time. Or crushing end titles to tell us what's on next, when most of us have figured out what's on next because we saw last week's telly, or simply because we've got the fucking Radio Times! Television executives are greater observers of mankind than we know, more perceptive than Desmond Morris or Kenneth Clark, as they have determined that the population now has a mass case of Attention Deficit Disorder and must now be informed of what's coming up next, lest they wander around their living rooms dribbling and mumbling at the toxic shock brought on by not knowing what's on after Emmerdale. These cunts, shitting themselves at the thought that there's someone in Smethwick who might want to go out for a walk instead of watching the loads of wank that passes for entertainment that they screen, now plonk on trails minutes before the fucking programme ends.

So when you're wrapped up in how a drama ends, you're a bit waylaid by a strip of yellow brightness saying that Feel My Arse With Ant and Dec is on next. Human activity is reduced to the level of a bloke training his dog - here, boy, Feel My Arse With Ant and Dec is on in a minute! Sit! Stay!

I'm all for branding though. It's the kind where you hold down a media communications bod, take off his pants and thrust a hot metal iron against his bum cheeks, leaving the legend 'I'm A Cunt' sizzling in large red letters across his arse parts. Coming Up Next: Stinging pain and piercing screams.

Lovely.

[Etienne]

Who?

Magnificent.

[Ginger Yellow]

Who?

Or crushing end titles to tell us what's on next, when most of us have figured out what's on next because we saw last week's telly, or simply because we've got the fucking Radio Times!

Have you seen Brooker's rant about this? It's excellent. He makes the point that BBC programme makers are now forced to make sure their end credits are suitable for being crushed and talked over, to add to the insult of viewers not being able to read the credits. Not that I particularly care about reading credits, mind, but they're not for me, they're for all the people who worked on a show.

I think it's this clip, but I can't check as I'm at work.

Here's a text version from Screen Burn.

Anyway, until now some programme makers have been able to find a way round the squeezing. I know this because I did it myself. On my BBC4 show Screenwipe, we deliberately fill our credits with jokes or footage or dialogue, partly because we're trying to make a show with at least a vague whiff of personality, but mainly because it stops "them" messing with it. But now, thanks to the new rules, we won't be able to do that any more when the show returns in the autumn.

Instead, "end credits should run over visually interesting graphics or live action but the content must not be editorially critical to the integrity of the programme or include speech... programme trails, solicits or helplines [within] end credits are no longer allowed."

Why? Because from now on they're going to cram the credits into a teeny box and fill the rest of your screen with squawking exhortations to stay tuned for Judge John Pissing Deed. Every. Single. Time.

[Guest]

Who?

I just received a review copy of the Myths & Legends DVD set. the press release says one of the stories involves a machine called TOMTIT.

[ian.64]

Who?

Have you seen Brooker's rant about this? It's excellent. He makes the point that BBC programme makers are now forced to make sure their end credits are suitable for being crushed and talked over, to add to the insult of viewers not being able to read the credits. Not that I particularly care about reading credits, mind, but they're not for me, they're for all the people who worked on a show.

I did indeed - my complaints are a weak echo of his much more pointed grievances. I'm not a fan of reading long lists of credits myself, but to reduce the names of those who've worked on such shows to microfilm-sized blurs isn't just an affront to them, but another triumph of small minds to reduce identity and distinction to generic, dull, colourless sameyness, to squash any originality out of the picture all to establish a 'brand'. It's happened to ITV, where the end credits are all of the same typestyle against the same background.

Remember that Simpsons episode where all the kids are given grey uniforms and walk around with numbed, robotic gazes? This 'branding' shit is almost that concept made flesh, with a concerted avoidance of that episode's ensuing situation, where it rains and the dyes in their uniforms run into rainbow colours, causing maximum sensory overload and chaos. To breed distinction, originality and uniqueness, even in bleedin' end credits, is to open the door to viewers thinking for themselves and opening up broader horizons in their minds.

It's also - and I think Brooker also touched upon this along with musician and actor Matt Berry - caused the demise of the Theme Tune, a sacred art kicked into touch by edited highlights of last week's episode crammed into the first few minutes of a show, thereby reserving no time for what used to be the saving grace of many a programme.

The war on imagination has begun - and all because of some arsewipe in a telly station boardroom somehow thinks that his viewers are the equivalent of seals, whacking their fins together while wailing for the next fish.

Count to ten. Count to ten.

[David Agnew]

Who?

Brooker's tweet on Saturday summed it up for me:

Charlie Brooker wrote on Twitter:

Why don't the BBC just wipe shit all over the screen during the final scene of Dr. Who next week?

[David Agnew]

Who?

Lyra wrote:

I just received a review copy of the Myths & Legends DVD set. the press release says one of the stories involves a machine called TOMTIT.

You're in for an indescribable treat.

[Guest]

Who?

[evilC]

Who?

I presume this has already been posted?

[Purves Grundy]

Who?

Phoebe wrote:

Lyra wrote:

I just received a review copy of the Myths & Legends DVD set. the press release says one of the stories involves a machine called TOMTIT.

You're in for an indescribable treat.

Ingrid Pitt in a bodice that the studio heads at Hammer would have baulked at.

[evilC]

Who?

They cloned Persis Khambatta before she died?

[Wyatt Earp]

Who?

I think this is the Brooker link. Sound warning.

Very good it is too.

[Guest]

Who?

all the people who worked on a show.

I don't do a lot of TV work these days but I have done in the past. usually you make your own credit which gets broadcast as a teletext subtitle so never used to get squished to the side in the same way. (Granada &c have been doing this uniform squishable credits thing for decades). We used to jazz up our credits, for fun. different colours. sticking it at the top of the screen.

then some bastard would write in complaining about you personally about something minuscule and you'd wish you hadn't bothered.

[ian.64]

Who?

I think the idea (pioneered by Chris Morris, I think, for Jam) of having the entire credits online for perusal is a neat one, but I've never felt the need to jump straight to a PC after a show's ended to see who did the catering. Stick 'em on the telly and give 'em a bow.

End credits aren't a subject on which the fate of the world hangs on, but I'm the old-fashioned sort who thinks they add an element of completeness to the whole enterprise. If we had the 'squishy titles' way back then, the legendary line 'Rostrum Camera, Ken Morse' might never have come into the consciousness of old bastards like me.

Anyway, Doctor Who. Very scary. Good fun. You may continue.

[Lucy Waterman]

Who?

I think the idea (pioneered by Chris Morris, I think, for Jam) of having the entire credits online for perusal is a neat one

It's great if you're someone like Chris Morris, not so great if you're (for example) one of his co-writers. I couldn't with any certainty name any of the co-writers for Jam, and I'm sure the credits have something to do with this - it leaves the "auteur" impression, although I wouldn't suggest this was what Chris Morris intended.

If it had happened in the last few series of Doctor Who, it would certainly have been used as a stick to beat RTD with...

[boris]

Who?

ian.64 wrote:

Fucking hell, even Murray Gold's orchestral yarblings have been reduced - thankfully - to effective atmospherics instead of the usual 'Blaring Soundtrack Now Available In Stores' gubbins.

Actually, this was the first episode of the new series where I found the music to be really noticeable and off-putting.

Having said that, at the bit when Amy was alone in the spaceship with the angel on the screen, my kids said that the music made it even more scarey, so I guess that's a plus.

[Disco Child Ballads]

Who?

That bit with the angel on the video screen scared the crap out of me, it has to be said. Still, there was something slightly disappointing about that episode as a whole. In 'Blink', there was more to the angels than just "being scary"; there was also their ability to mess around with time and send people back into the past which was unexplored in this story. I guess I'll reserve judgement until the 2nd Part is broadcast.

[Ray de Galles]

Who?

Disco Sea Shanties wrote:

In 'Blink', there was more to the angels than just "being scary"; there was also their ability to mess around with time and send people back into the past which was unexplored in this story.

Well, their usual method of despatching people by sending them back in time was referred to (although they broke the soldiers necks rather than sending them back in time for reasons the Doctor explained but I couldn't quite follow) but they were also said to be worse then the Blink angels because they were old/losing power or something and "just scavengers".

[David Agnew]

Who?

Be careful if you go an any DW sites that show the press releases for future episodes, because the one for the episode in a fortnight's time isn't just a short thing saying who is in it, or the setting of the plot - it contains a huge fucking spoiler regarding something that's going to happen this week or next.

[Purves Grundy]

Who?

Must have been in an odd mood last week. That was terrific.

[hobbes]

Who?

Blimey, that was good. Not family of blood good, but good none the less. Moffat does dialogue so much better than RTD. And by god I wish I could be on the receiving end of a pass like that from Pond...

[David Agnew]

Who?

I've got one complaint about it.

Not the plot, because the plot was fantastic. The Angels, and the escape from the Angels weren't always the focus, but in the meantime, Moff carries on developing the main characters. When was the last time that a companion was developed past their opening story as Amy has been? (The closest was probably Sarah Jane who went from hard-nosed feminist investigative journalist to Playschool presenter, although we were never really given any reason why she changed) The Doctor continues to evolve too. He's not the most confident of Doctors, and he's prone to bursts of anger, but above all he is very, very Doctory.

Not the dialogue, because the dialogue was excellent. The highlight was Octavian's death scene, but everything else fit into place, and the dialogue that wasn't needed, wasn't throwaway.

Not the ending of the Angels story, because the teleport was needed to bring the clerics in the first place, the crack has been important elsewhere, and while there are so many hints about the relationship between River and the Doctor (is she his wife, his mother, his murderer, or even the Rani?), nothing is clear cut, and gives lots of room for manoeuvre.

Not the ending of the story, because we've seen enough with Amy's teasing about River to know that she's not in love with him, it's just sheer lust - she's getting married in the morning, and this is her only chance to ever fuck an alien. The Doctor's response is brilliant, because they're different species (and considering the nature of the relationship between Rose and Tennant, a little fuck you to RTD).

And it's not the effective Retconning. As the Doctor said - that's how you get a massive Cyber King in Victorian London, and no-one remembers it. In some respects, it's a reset button, and therefore a bit of a no-no, but RTD changed the whole view of the world in respect to alien life, that whoever took over either has to try and out-RTD RTD, or find a way of retconning everything with the most plausible explanation possible. And the "You can rewrite time!" excalamation seemed a bigger fuck you to RTD. Which is fine by me.

No, the complaint I had, was that Amy has to keep her eyes closed, which is making a scary situation scarier, the Doctor gives a massive hint about what he's about to do, as he refers to the gravity of the situation. Then, with the three of them hanging on for grim death, Amy with her eyes closed, scared out of her wits, is hanging off the rail they're using to keep themselves alive, but she's hanging off it really nonchalantly, like it's the easiest thing in the world.

That's my complaint. And if that's the only thing wrong in 45 minutes (well, 90 considering the two episodes are one story), then everything's all right, as far as I'm concerned.

[Taylor]

Who?

Well unless I missed something, I thought the one thing "wrong" was Amy stumbling through the Angels with her eyes closed, "walking like she could see" like that was going to fool them. I thought they just knew when you couldn't see them? Then again, like everyone else who watches on SD with the 5.1 audio folded down into stereo or whatever it is, I missed bits of dialogue because of the terrible sound mix, so perhaps there was an explanation for that.

Other than that, it was bloody great. Watched it with a non-Who fan who hadn't seen episode one, who put away their laptop and got really into it before ten minutes had elapsed. "This isn't suitable for children, surely! This is really scary!"

Proper Who again - this was the closest thing yet to the "new Hinchcliffe" thing a lot of (naive) folk expected from Moffat. I was watching it thinking "this is what they wanted 'Planet Of Evil' to be like, but they only had 5p and a hack scriptwriter." But of course, if that Dalek bollocks is anything to go by, this series looks like it's going to go up and down a bit, and next week's vampires-in-venice thing (a non Moffat-script) may well be shit again. Still, I'm at the point now where I'll watch anything with Smith in it. He's fantastic. That speech that ended with "get a grip" had me laughing out loud, just at his delivery. He's too good for Daisy Lowe, you know.