Ten of the Beast

Being in a positive frame of mind, at the present time, and given that we seem to be heading towards some sort of conclusion to the first four seasons of new “Doctor Who”, I thought it might be an appropriate moment to consider which have been the highlights of the first forty-five episodes, since the programme’s resurrection. My selection seems obvious to me, but you may beg to differ…

From Season One, in chronological order, three stories over four episodes…

1: “The Unquiet Dead” written by Mark Gatiss, directed by Euros Lyn - originally broadcast on 9th April 2005 with Christopher Eccleston as the Doctor and Billie Piper as Rose Tyler

The Doctor shares a carriage with Dickens (Simon Callow) while Rose is touched up by undertaker Gabriel Sneed (Alan David), when she’s unconscious! And, they call this a children’s show? Meanwhile, the Time Lord is taken in by a plea to “Pity the Gelth”. He does and his gullibility costs the life of servant girl Gwyneth (Eve Myles).

2: “Dalek” written by Robert Shearman, directed by Joe Ahearne - originally broadcast on 30th April 2005 with Christopher Eccleston as the Doctor and Billie Piper as Rose Tyler

A strange way to reintroduce the Doctor’s deadliest foe, with only one of the scallywags from Skaro, but, in retrospect, it’s a tough little story, totally at odds with all the emoting going on elsewhere in the series! Who would ever have thought we’d feel sympathy for a “Metaltron”? Rose’s white t-shirt indicates she’s a Dalek virgin!

3 & 4: “The Empty Child” & “The Doctor Dances” written by Steven Moffat, directed by James Hawes - originally broadcast on 21st & 28th May 2005 with Christopher Eccleston as the Doctor, Billie Piper as Rose Tyler and John Barrowman as Captain Jack Harkness

Doctor Constantine (Richard Wilson) grows a gasmask on his face while a little boy, in a similar predicament, asks of everyone he meets, whatever their gender, “Are you my mummy?” - That dubious honour belongs to Nancy (Florence Hoath) who’d, obviously, do absolutely anything to meet Graham Norton! Rose’s Union Jack t-shirt indicates with which Captain she’d enjoy an association!!

From Season Two, one story comprising two episodes…

5 & 6: “The Impossible Planet” & “The Satan Pit” written by Matt Jones, directed by James Strong - originally broadcast on 3rd & 10th June 2006 with David Tennant as the Doctor and Billie Piper as Rose Tyler

Beam me up Scooti Manista (Myanna Buring) was, no doubt, on many a male’s mind before the wee lass was sucked into a black hole above the rocky landscape of Krop Tor! Nothing Ood about that, let me assure her!! Well, you know what they say, “The beast and his armies will rise from the pit”. While the Doctor hitches a lift to the bottom, Rose attempts to keep hers covered as she gets carried away to Zachary Cross Flane’s (Shaun Parkes) escape rocket… when she’s unconscious!

From Season Three, two stories over three episodes…

7 & 8: “Human Nature” & “The Family of Blood” written by Paul Cornell, directed by Charles Palmer - originally broadcast on 26th May & 2nd June 2007 with David Tennant as the Doctor and Freema Agyeman as Martha Jones

Doctor Jones dons a maid’s uniform just so schoolteacher John Smith can show her and matron Joan Redfern (Jessica Hynes) his “Journal of Impossible Things”! I know all about his sort, the dirty little scribble monster! Oh, that’s from a different episode altogether - silly me!! Surely, that kind of thing is best left to the Marquis de Sade? Some of the kinky devils are even dressing up… as scarecrows!!!

9: “Blink” written by Steven Moffat, directed by Hettie Macdonald - originally broadcast on 9th June 2007 with Carey Mulligan as Sally Sparrow, David Tennant as the Doctor and Freema Agyeman as Martha Jones

Well, I have to say, I’d do bird to make the acquaintance of young Miss Sparrow! I can hear her song now, “Sally, Sally, pride of our alley, You’re more than the whole world to me…” Why the Doctor didn’t fly her away in his TARDIS, I’ll never know!! They could’ve done time together!!!

And, from the first three episodes of Season Four, one single-episode story…

10: “Planet of the Ood” written by Keith Temple, directed by Graeme Harper - originally broadcast on 19th April 2008 with David Tennant as the Doctor and Catherine Tate as Donna Noble

This final selection certainly provided fOod for thought! And, the Ood were prepared to sing for their supper. The script required many things, not least… plenty of brains. So quite what Donna was doing on the Ood-Sphere, in the year 4126, remains a mystery. I think she keeps hers in her hindquarters!!

The observant reader will notice I haven’t chosen a single episode written by Russell T. Davies, nor have I chosen any that feature companions’ familial ties! That’s a feat in itself!! I wonder if the two are synonymous? Considering numerous instalments of new “Doctor Who” feature harmonious mothers, melodious brothers and dynamic lovers, it may suggest these are default choices, which isn’t the case. I do, genuinely, like the episodes detailed above. Those are my favourites, which ones are yours?

When Nancy Upset Bill!

Everybody who saw her, everywhere, remembers Nicola Bryant’s opening episode, as American botany student Peri Brown, in “Doctor Who”! And quite right, too!! It’s recently come to light that an “inappropriate” underwater scene involving Freema Agyeman stripping down to her underwear has been cut from the new series. It might have been better, and more professional unless trying to elicit a little extra publicity, had David Tennant not mentioned it in the first place, then fans would’ve been none the wiser. As it is, many feel we’ll be missing out on something or other! Removing one’s clothes to go in the water sounds perfectly reasonable to me!! It does rather smack of double standards, though, when you consider there have been innumerable occasions, in the last couple of years, when inappropriate dialogue has been broadcast in the programme. God forbid “Doctor Who” should ever resort to the language of all-time greatest TV drama “The Sopranos”! So, is seeing a pretty girl in a bikini or in her underwear really so upsetting? Is visual really more offensive than verbal?

I’d like to spotlight three different instances of such inapposite discourse, in the first season alone, and unfortunately in its three best stories, which I would’ve script-edited out to make the show more suitable for a family audience. The three offending examples are 1) Rose accusing undertaker Gabriel Sneed of groping her while presumed unconscious, in “The Unquiet Dead”, 2) Henry van Statten’s supposedly throwaway line suggesting Adam and Rose indulge in a spot of spooning, in “Dalek”, and 3) Nancy’s threats of blackmail to family-man-and-homeowner Mr Lloyd over homosexual adultery (with the butcher!) in order that he might acquire black market produce during a time of war-induced austerity, in “The Doctor Dances”. Imagine the confusing messages the latter, quite complex, example gives to young children, always assuming said children are paying attention - which you have to assume they are.

Supposedly ace-writer Steven Moffat wrote the third example, unless Russell T Davies added it at a later stage, and it’s by far the worst example in season one. I don’t think Steven intended Nancy to come across as a nasty piece of work but here she is just as amoral as Lloyd, he not because of his homosexuality (although, being illegal at this time in history, it would’ve generally been regarded as such) but because of his infidelity, trading sex for culinary favours, of all things! It’s almost as though Moffat is deliberately trying to provoke and shock a conservative audience by compounding the deceit when all he achieves is to leave a bad taste in the mouth and spoil an otherwise interesting story. All three offending examples are about the personal and thus totally parochial and pedestrian. Classic “Doctor Who” was about universals, and better for it. Much better. None of these three illustrations bother me, as such. Moffat’s would certainly not be out of place in an adult drama such as “Queer as Folk”, or something similar. I just feel sympathetic to any parent trying to explain any, or all, of these ideas to their eight-year olds!!!

“Doctor Who” is lauded as a family show. The BBC keep banging on about how “Doctor Who” has revived family viewing, early evening, on Saturdays. It’s easy to rewrite the aforementioned examples out of a final script before production even begins. Why did the writers even think of including them in the first place? As the scribes that create our favourite show weren’t able to think of anything more suitable, all it displays is a severe lack of imagination. I recently read a letter describing new “Doctor Who” as smug and I thought the writer had a point. To be frank, if it’s perceived as OK to repeatedly include adult sexual inferences and connotations in oh-so-with-it and trendily-modern “Doctor Who”, then why are its producers so frightened about putting the fear factor back into the programme too? Instead of concerning ourselves with domestic issues, which every other show already does amply well, let’s escape from the “real” world for forty-five minutes a week and inappropriately “scare the kids shitless” just like Robert Holmes used to do!