Day 08 of Doctor Who Awesome

Companions:

The Doctor likes to travel with an entourage, they may be humans, they may be aliens, they may even be tin dogs!

Of course the Doctor adores his companions now and will do anything for them.  But back in 1963 poor Ian and Barbara were pretty much kidnapped to stop the secret of his ship getting out to their 'friends'. the best thing about these early eps was the change we see in the Doctor, with the help of the bond between Ian and Barbara and the Doctor's granddaughter Susan, we see him change from an anti-hero, a selfish and un-sociable alien into a caring old man who comes to love his companions. What Ian and Barbara (and all one's other companions) do for him is the most important thing because without them he would not be the Doctor he is in 2011.
As the Doctor regenerated to his second incarnation he would have even more companions, particularly a close bond with a companion from the past, a very close relationship apparently!

The Doctor's companions in the 70's especially during Tom Baker's era tended to be attractive young women and he travelled with a range of humans, aliens and even a Timelady in two of her incarnations.

in the 80's there was a lot of team TARDIS again during Peter Davison era but this ended with much of the 80's being attractive young girls again.

in the revival we have been treated to an assortment of different companions who play very significant roles in the Doctor's life as they did back in 1963, perhaps maybe a bit too much as the time goes on. I mean how many comanions can do things as extreme as absorbing the heart of the TARDIS, saving the world from the Master, becoming part time lord or most recently....giving birth to...who we learn is River Song?

Companions make Doctor Who what it is nearly as much as our Doctor and without them he definitely wouldn't still be around saving worlds. each companion has their own merits and bad ass moments and even though we all have faves I hate bad mouthing any of them because they have all impacted the world of the programme we love.

Be seeing you...

Day 07 of Doctor Who awesome

The Daleks

Dortmun in the Dalek Invasion of Earth described them as motorised dustbins whilst they've also been compared to evil pepperpots and nazi like machines created by Davros (and created in real life by Terry Nation and Ray Cusick who was the designer of the iconic look) They are definitly the number one Doctor Who villiain/monster and with no emotions, remorse or reasoning, they are the ulitmate in hatred whose only aim is to wipe out everyone who is not a Dalek; pretty strong stuff and plenty of nightmares for children!

The First glimpse of the Daleks: Ian is paralysed temporarily.

White Daleks: with Ace and Seven

Suicidal Dalek: with Rose in the aptly titled episode Dalek

I-Daleks: the latest look (and one im not fond of)

I read somewhere that Steven Moffat's giving the Daleks a break for a while and I'm glad, I mean I love them but after stealing the earth and trying to destroy reality itself and everything; it must be hard being quite as epic. See you in a few years maybe fella?

Day 06 of Doctor Who Awesome

Cheaper Budget= Bigger Imagination and better storytelling:

Us Doctor Who fans are not ones to worry too much about DIY aliens and carboard scenery, if your like me you're more interested in the story, actors etc. in fact if you're noticing the set more than anything else than I think the story isn't engaging you.

CGI is a good thing in some instances but our reliance on it today is so frustrating. I noticed yesterday on Doctor Who Confidential the crew waflling on about they needed it to be big and epic like Star Wars...um no it doesn't, I like Star Wars but I never want Doctor Who to be that extreme.  They kept saying that the hangar they filmed in needed to look vast and military like, personally I rarely noticed it as I was too busy eager to discover River Song's identity and what was going on with Amy's baby. To me it looked no different than a set.

I love the 60's eps as you can gather from this blog. I love the imagination that goes into them when faced with a criminally low budget, directors and designers have to be so much more creative under those circumstances.  the new eps look awesome but they have seem to forgotten that it isn't essential for Doctor Who.  My Dad for example thought the sweeping American Scenery in The Impossible Astronaught was a waste of time as he thought it was CGI and anyway as far as I'm concerned I don't need to be shown American landscape to know that that's where they are, heck an American flag would have done the same storytelling.  it almost feels they want to shoot movies not TV where obviously emphasis is on style and visual but TV is not supposed to be that way, it is character driven and inventive and a way to make statements about ourselves and our world.

Anyway bit of a rant, don't get me wrong I love any era of Doctor Who I just wish they wouldn't act like early episodes were 'oh they're good for the time I suppose'. NO they're great full stop, they're great now as they were then because the storytelling and acting is there and the creepy sci-fi is the most important thing.

Ooh really want to watch classic Who now.

Be seeing you.

Day 05 of Doctor Who awesome

Anything is Possible- Time and Space

With Doctor Who there is no end to the realms of possibilty and many of them have been done too; from time windows, to parallel worlds, to alien invasions, other world revelotuions, quests, monsters, bugs, time travel, alien disease, cyber malfunctions, tombs, black holes, ghosts, werewolves, vampires, mummies, robots, strange new worlds, time loops, dinosaurs, virtual reality, moon landings, space crews, underwater creatures, interplantery war, witches, fairytales, living mannequins, killer plants, clone doctors, loch ness monsters, pirates, telepathy, mulitiple Doctors, space decks, arks, spiders, crabs, gravity, mutations, shrinking, rockets, teleports, living statues, volcanoes, slavery, wasps, human colonies, doppelgangers, wars, battles, civil wars, war games and so many more...

sorry for the long list; I just wanted to emphasise the scope and awesomeness...

Day 04 of Doctor Who Awesome.

Doctor Who Historicals

Doctor Who in 1963 used history and science to educate its 8-14 target audience and used Ian and Barbara as ways to do this (Them being history and Science teachers at Coal Hill)

In the early years the historicals were brilliant but less loved than the sci-fi, these days I think we have a real interest and love for the history and the 60's had great ones. unfortunately for us history lovers the history eps were phased out in the 70's and 80's but thankfully in the revival; history, or at least pseudo-history and comedy and the Doctor meeting famous people exist for us to enjoy.

Particular faves of ours are the  comedy based historical The Romans, pure historical Marco Polo despite the fact it only remains as tele-snaps and audio whic makes me weep inside

The Doctor and Vicki visit the court of Caesar Nero.

The missing episodes of Marco Polo

 Modern faves are the Fires of Pompeii which is definitely psuedo-historical because of the inclusion of the Pyrovillia and the Doctor's involvement in the eruption of Mount Vesuvius; and Vincent and the Doctor because it's emotional and deals well with depression.

Karen Gillan as a Soothsayer in Pompeii.

Amy and The Doctor meet troubled Vincent.



Overall I love historicals but feel the new eps tend to focus on famous authors etc rather than specific time periods, would also love to see a pure historical where our time travellers go back to say a Civil War and there is no alien threat, only humanity.

Day 03 of Doctor Who awesome

Different eras, constant change

With every new Doctor or executive producer or decade or whatever, Doctor Who gets a revamp, which can be wonderful, change is always good and there is different styles to suit everyone. What other programme can do this? Star Trek yes had different ships, crews, captains etc but Doctor Who is a continuation.

Barbara and Ian in The Aztecs

In the 1960's, the black and white really helped to creat a eerie atmosphere in the episodes with cybermen, Daleks or on other worlds. The brilliant historicals were also a huge part of the deal in the early days but were phased out later.

The Doctor works with The Brig and Liz on earth.

The series has a fun and different feel when the Doctor is exiled to earth and works at UNIT. Most episodes were also set on earth.

 Six and the cybers!

The colourful eighties! A direction that some people didnt take to but I personally like the Colin Baker eps.

Series 5- Doc and Amy.

With Matt as the new Doctor and Steven Moffat as the new exec producer, the show has a more fairytale style and vivid cinematography.

Lots of different styles, Doctor's and changes but ultimately the same great show!



Day 02 of Doctor who Awesome.

Re-generation

Ok so it started as a way of keeping the series going after poor William Hartnell got too ill to maintain the role but the idea to have a character literally chnage his entire physicality and personality but retain his memories and Doctor-ish qualities was a stroke of genius allowing the programme to grow, change and live on and on for us all to enjoy.

And with every re-generation comes a wondeful British actor, it takes awesome actors and lets them bring their own style and acting ability to the programme. every Doctor has been excellent and it has defintely got unknown actors noticed!  You never know who or what he might re-generate into next which leaves a fantastic suprise element as the years pass by.