It is, of course, a commonly-known piece of Doctor Who lore that not every episode that was produced by the BBC can be seen today in its originally transmitted form. (See the previous essays for exact details on the many "lost episodes" of this long-running series.) But what is distinctly less known, and far more disquieting to some, is that certain episodes of Doctor Who were not, in fact, created by the BBC. These so-called "found episodes" created one of the biggest controversies in the history of the new series, and led to massive changes in the entire production of Doctor Who that still reverberate to this day.
The "found episodes crisis" began on Month DD, YYYY, late in the production run of Series Four. A series of production delays had caused massive disruption to the filming schedule; production documents indicate that the delay began when the make-up department ran out of styling gel, necessitating a costly stoppage of work as David Tennant's hair had reached the point where it could no longer hold up under its own weight. This stoppage, in turn, caused further disruptions as it meant that Catherine Tate became unavailable for shooting, as she had accepted a role in the soon-to-flop movie 'Gulliver's Travels', and needed to shed approximately 99% of her body mass in order to play her Lilliputian character. An attempt was made to create a CGI version of Donna Noble, but the budget for this expensive special effect had to be specially cleared by the BBC, and the Mill was already over-extended with their work on the highly elaborate "Billie Piper" sequences. (The actual Billie Piper had refused to return to the series, on the not-unreasonable grounds that it would mean going back to Cardiff again.) For the first time since Doctor Who had returned to the airwaves, it appeared that the two-part season finale would not be ready in time.
And yet, that evening, an episode did air. 'The Stolen Earth', as the title claimed, broadcast throughout Great Britain on Saturday night, to the absolute astonishment of everyone at BBC Wales. Frantic calls kept everyone in the production department awake late into the night, as they attempted to trace both the source of the broadcast and the source of the unexpected episode. Technicians at the BBC were utterly mystified--the show went out over their transmitters, but to this day they have not been able to determine how the episode was inserted into their archives. The entire cast has denied filming the episode, and although Davies has not made his original script available for perusal, he has made it clear to all concerned that even he wasn't about to bring the bloody Daleks back a third time in four seasons.
After a long meeting that took up most of Sunday, the top brass at the BBC agreed that they had no intention of publicly announcing that they took no responsibility for the most recent episode of their flagship series. It was decided that Davies would write a new script that followed on from the ending of 'The Stolen Earth', wrapping up the plotlines using as much footage as possible from the already-shot sequences of the season finale currently filming in Cardiff. Most of them had already been made aware of a potential delay in airing the episodes in question, and so a press release had already been prepared. It was modified to delete references to the "two-part season finale", and Davies sequestered himself in a hotel room in London to write the last episode of Season Four uninterrupted.
As with the original script for Part One of the season finale, Davies has never made the script for his version of Part Two available to the viewing public. Rumor has it, though, that it involved a hastily-invented “regenerative flux” to cover the fact that at that point, the Eleventh Doctor had not yet been cast. Davies planned to simply use special effects to “paint over” Tennant with a computerized regeneration effect for the entire episode, and was even looking into the possibility of reusing footage from previous stories to cover any odd gaps in scripting. The Mill was notified of the possible need to work extra hours to get the sequences done in time, and everyone prepared for several intensive nights of work. (Always mindful of the potential for leaks, Davies used his noted gift for understatement to inform the Mill of the problem with the code-phrase, “Trouble down’t the Mill.” The receptionist quoted Monty Python at him for a solid five minutes before Davies was able to get through to anyone who had actual decision-making power.)
Thankfully for the BBC, the press release announcing the delays to Part Two went entirely unnoticed in the week that followed. If anyone in the media had actually been in the habit of reading the BBC’s press releases, they would no doubt have spent the following Sunday asking why the season finale of ‘Doctor Who’ had gone out exactly on schedule the evening of XXXXXX. This was certainly a question that network executives were asking, and not in polite terms, either. No less than the Director-General asked why exactly they felt the need to bring back Davros, pull yet another deus ex machina out of nowhere, and end the season with Rose getting her own pet Doctor to take home with her.
Davies protested that none of this had been his work, but many of those involved had their doubts. For one thing, the end of Season Three made it difficult to believe his protestations that he wouldn’t do something like that. For another, his name was on the finished product as broadcast, and a production like this would be difficult to mount without the resources of the BBC…and seemingly impossible without the actors involved. For a third reason, the end of Season One and the end of Season Two. The showrunner found himself in a very awkward position…as did the star.
Publicly, the BBC announced a hiatus in order to allow Tennant to perform in ‘Hamlet’. Privately, they began a comprehensive investigation into the entire incident, locking down the BBC Wales production facilities to prevent any further unauthorized production of the series until such time as they had satisfied themselves that all transmissions would be of stories that met with management approval. Sir Patrick Stewart was retained, at no small expense, to watch Tennant twenty-four hours a day until the cloud of suspicion was lifted. (He posed as a member of the company performing ‘Hamlet’ with Tennant, since at the time, it was not commonly known that service to the BBC’s internal investigations division was a condition of knighthood. It was not until two years later that Sir Elton John’s shocking exposé blew the lid off of that particular state secret.)
For his part, Davies cooperated fully with the investigations; having seen the finished product that appeared onscreen, he had every reason to want to prove that he was not responsible for it. He provided the BBC with all the raw footage they asked for, as well as internal documentation of the entire creative process from start to finish for his entire time on the series. While this did appear to exonerate him from any blame for the mystery episodes, it did expose as a lie his claim that he was in a coma during the production of ‘Daleks in Manhattan’. As a result, the BBC began to look for a new showrunner.
A more immediate concern, however, was the question of what to do in place of the Christmas special. With Davies under virtual house arrest, and Tennant exiled to the stage, there was no chance of being able to continue the tradition of a Doctor Who Christmas story. John Barrowman was contacted in the hopes of getting a one-off variety show out of him, but he was unfortunately booked up with every other television series in existence, as well as a number of guest-spots in film, conventions, stage shows, and personally introducing himself to the entire population of Germany. Reluctantly, the BBC scheduled a re-run of the previous Christmas special, ‘Voyage of the Damned’.
But as most of you are already aware, that was not what aired on December 25th, XXXX. Instead, ‘The Next Doctor’ was seen by much of Great Britain that day, sending the BBC into a panic and changing the course of Doctor Who history. Because, as we can now reveal, David Morrissey was by that point already deep in negotiations with the BBC to take on the role of the Eleventh Doctor, with only a few details remaining in the negotiation over the character’s wardrobe. (Morrissey favored an eyepatch as part of the Doctor’s costume, for some strange reason.) Needless to say, the actor’s apparent involvement in what was rapidly becoming the strangest and most infuriating scandal in the programme’s history scotched any chance of him actually being the Next Doctor. His career at the BBC finished, he took his eyepatch and went to America.
The Christmas debacle proved to be the point at which the BBC officially lost patience with Davies and Tennant. Despite their denials, it was assumed by all concerned that they had somehow managed to stage a number of “guerilla productions” designed to reduce public confidence in the series at a pivotal point in the BBC’s relations with the British government. Many assumed that Davies had been paid off by Michael Grade, who had harbored a deep grudge against the series ever since a production mishap in the 1970s ended with the TARDIS running over his dog. The two ensuing specials, ‘Planet of the Dead’ and ‘The Waters of Mars’, only served to cement the ire of senior management. (Although, off the record, many of them agreed that they would have approved of Catherine Tate in a leather catsuit if the idea had been presented to them.)
Steven Moffat was approached to act as showrunner, and began production on a new series with relative unknown Matt Smith as the Eleventh Doctor. Moffat carefully scripted his season opener, ‘The Eleventh Hour’, in such a way as to accommodate virtually any kind of storyline that led into it. “I don’t care if it’s got the Doctor’s mum playing bloody peekaboo,” he famously stated. “Ours will work just fine.”
Nonetheless, the transmission of ‘The End of Time’ proved a shock to all concerned. The BBC spent much of the Christmas Day broadcast attempting to trace the use of their signal, but the only thing they could determine was that it came from within the BBC studios itself. Giving up on hopes of catching the culprit, they instead decided to spend the intervening week beating the mysterious pranksters at their own game, creating an audacious plan for a regeneration sequence that would go out “live”, breaking into the pirate signal with a pirate signal of their own.
At first, it seemed that this scheme was doomed to failure. With only a brief window of time between the beginning of the mysterious broadcast and the regeneration, they had little hopes of actually being able to interrupt the signal. However, luck was on their side. The pre-regeneration sequences of the Tenth Doctor visiting his former companions, one by one, took such an extraordinary length of time that not only were they able to film the regeneration sequence (with a cooperative Tennant reprising his role), they were also able to do a sound mix, a post-production edit, add full special effects, and do an elaborate wrap party with appearances by many of Britain’s best-loved celebrities. Then, after a leisurely dinner and a break to learn macramé, they proceeded to break into the signal with Matt Smith’s first appearance as the Doctor. And the rest, as they say, is television history.
To this day, nobody has come forward to take responsibility for the episodes produced in XXXX. They remain one of the enduring mysteries of a series that, though well-known, still has a few surprises about it.
Showing posts with label silly. Show all posts
Showing posts with label silly. Show all posts
Tuesday, September 10, 2013
Monday, August 26, 2013
A Glossary Of Doctor Who Fan Slang
It is well known that every fan community creates its own vocabulary to refer to the series, its tropes and ideas, and even the community itself. Whether you are a "Buckster" (a fan of Buck Rogers), a "Lostie" (a fan of Lost) or a "Starbuckster" (a fan of Buck Rogers who works at a coffee shop), you have no doubt created a language all your own to talk about the series with fellow fans. But how does a new fan of Doctor Who (or, as we call them, a "Whobie") learn these common slang terms? Below is a list of definitions that should help you get into a "slanging match" (a common Doctor Who term for a discussion of the series on an Internet forum) quickly and easily.
Frock: A Doctor Who story in which the characters wear elaborate, impractical outfits. Most people consider the "frock" style to have its apogee in the late Hinchcliffe era; 'The Robots of Death' and 'The Deadly Assassin' are both considered to be extremely "frockish" stories, with Zilda's outfit as the crowning glory of fashion absurdity. The term was later incorporated into the "rad" style of the New Adventures, primarily due to the influence of Kate Orman; she remains to this day a lifelong surfer, and she incorporated Australian surfing traditions into virtually all of her novels as an inside joke with her surfing friends. Since these traditions involved surfing while wearing floor-length evening gowns (the origins of the tradition are not known, but are presumably related to the Australian superstition that they confuse the sharks that infest most Australian beaches) the two terms became conflated for much of the 1990s.
Gun: A Doctor Who story featuring projectile weapons. Some fans consider only stories in which physical projectiles, propelled by gunpowder, are fired from guns to be "gun" stories; others expand the definition to include any type of weapon that fires from a distance without human power, such as energy blasters. The definition is constantly argued about, and the utility of the definition is always in question; however, most are in agreement that these are the antithesis of "frock" stories, primarily because there's no place to conceal a gun in an evening gown.
Monopticon: A science-fiction convention specifically geared towards Doctor Who fans. The first Monopticon occurred in 1966, in Longleat; the convention occurred at the height of the short-lived "Monomania" craze that popped up after the first appearance of the one-eyed, mop-topped monsters from 'The Ark'. Not only did Monomania tap into the same vein of fan enthusiasm as Dalekmania, it also synergistically fed from the Beatlemania then taking place throughout Britain--for a brief period, the Monoids rivaled the Doctor for popularity, until it was pointed out that (like the Monkees) the Monoids did not play their own instruments. With the rumors that the upcoming story 'The Smugglers' would feature Monoids disguised as pirates (with a scene where the pirates would remove their eyepatches to reveal an expanse of blank skin underneath) the fans were at a fever pitch of excitement, and several made plans to meet and watch Part One when it came out. The plans grew into a formal convention, called 'Monopticon I', and fandom has called Doctor Who conventions Monopticons ever since. The line, "I wouldn't dream of interfering with your Monopticon," from the Doctor Who serial 'Four to Doomsday', was intended as a sly dig at fans who feared that JNT's involvement in fan culture would lead to his co-opting it.
Quarrier: A true fan of the programme. The term is taken from a group of fans who decided, as a mark of their devotion, to visit each and every last one of the quarries used to film exterior scenes for Doctor Who. Normally, this is easily done, as it merely involves visiting each and every last one of the quarries in Britain (as well as one quarry in Spain that was used for some pickup shots on location for 'The Two Doctors') but in this case, they complicated matters further by wishing to a) visit the exact location where the TARDIS prop was placed during the filming, and b) visit them in the same order that the series depicted them. This meant months of intensive studying of the video footage, matching the types of rock visible and the approximate state of the quarry at the time of filming to photos obtained from the quarry owners (who agreed to assist them after extensive financial compensation.) After finally determining to within a span of two feet where the TARDIS props were placed, they set out on their pilgrimage; the tour involved criss-crossing the country several times in order to visit each quarry once for every time it was used in a BBC production. The group visited one quarry in Wales six times, each time going back to a spot within twenty feet of their previous trips, in order to avoid seeing any quarries out of order. And even though the group was committed en masse to a mental institution not long after the completion of their tour, their abiding love for the series has been immortalized in this charming slang term.
Rad: Short for "radical"; this refers to a Doctor Who story whose tone evokes the free-spirited and adventurous surfer sub-culture of the late 1980s and early 1990s. Common tropes in these Doctor Who stories include extreme sports like skateboarding and windsurfing, and an acceptance of the sublime beauty of nature ("sublime" in the classical Romantic sense, that is, evoking both wonder and terror simultaneously) as a part of everyday life. Paul Cornell came to exemplify both the "rad" and the "frock" Doctor Who story after the novel 'Human Nature', which he famously came up with while on an Australian beach with Kate Orman. The two of them had completed a marathon surfing session, both wearing the traditional Australian surfing gowns as they crested wave after fifty-foot wave, and they brainstormed the novel while drunk with the adrenalin rush of surviving the beach's shark-infested waters. The book inspired much of the tone of the New Series, although most of the surfing material was lost when it was adapted for television.
Soldeed: A fan who takes advantage of the convention atmosphere to enter into carnal relations with a Doctor Who professional (whether in front of or behind the camera.) (The professional, that is, not the action, although the latter is not entirely unknown either.) It is not entirely certain where the term comes from; some have suspected it to be a play on "entering the Power Complex", while others suggest that these fans, like the character that inspired their nickname, are entering into a relationship they can't talk about with someone both powerful and horny. The name is not gender-specific; there can be both male and female soldeeds. In all cases, the act of sleeping with a professional is known as "doing the dirty soldeed", and the return to the fan's hotel room the next morning, still wearing the slightly rumpled costume they wore the previous day, is known as "the Great Journey of Shame". Some fans have attempted to label Who professionals who seek out hook-ups at conventions as "nimon", but the effort has been bogged down in a debate over whether the plural of "nimon" is "nimon" or "nimons".
Trad: A race of monsters from early 60s Who. The Trad came from the planet Tradoon, and resembled (according to reports at the time) anthropomorphic insects with tufts of fur at each joint. Fan rumor has long held that these were repurposed Ice Warrior costumes, but as no episodes survive from any of the Trad stories and no photographs exist of Trad costumes, it's impossible to be sure. In fact, one of the most notable things about the Trad is how little material survives of their appearances; the original episodes were wiped (see the essay, 'The First Lost Episode Crisis') and the surviving audio recordings are so garbled and distorted as to be incomprehensible. Even when the Trad were licensed for an appearance in the old TV Comics, a printing error rendered the strips illegible. With no pictures, film or audio recording of the Trad, they have entered legendary status as an "un-monster"; only the very early fans, those who remember watching the episodes as they came out, have solid memories of these lost stories. These Trad fans hold up the lumbering, slow-moving, easily confused monsters as an exemplar of a kind of Doctor Who that is sadly lost to us forever.
VidFIRED: Removed from canon. In the mid- to late 1980s, the Doctor Who Appreciation Society was one of the earliest and most influential fan organizations; at the time, it was considered to be the singular voice of Doctor Who fandom. At the height of its influence, it decided to perform a comprehensive review of the first twenty-five years of the series' history, removing from canon any video, or "vid" that did not live up to the expectations of the fan committee (chosen from a slate of respected fans old enough to remember the stories at time of first broadcast.) The plan began auspiciously, with only three stories "fired" from the Hartnell era ('The Edge of Destruction', 'The Web Planet' and 'The Gunfighters') and two from the Troughton era ('The Enemy of the World' and 'The Space Pirates'). The group fell to dissention, however, when they reached the Tom Baker era. Some on the committee wished to VidFIRE the entirety of the Graham Williams era, while others pointed out that the Key to Time series deserved preservation. In vain, the group wrestled with the issue, eventually deciding to return to it once they had decided the fate of the rest of the series. It seemed that they had reached accordance once again when they unanimously decided to VidFIRE the entire Sixth Doctor era; however, the effort broke down entirely when a small but vocal contingent demanded to "preemptively VidFIRE Season Twenty-Six". It was this dispute that ultimately led to the fragmentation of British Who fandom. It seems like every fan has one or two stories they wish didn't exist, but nobody can ever quite agree as to which ones they are.
Voord: A Who fan's collection of merchandise, novelizations, videos/DVDs, et cetera. Supposedly, this term got its start from the infamous East End "Whooligans" fan club of the late Sixties, a band of rough-and-tumble enthusiasts of the programme who liked nothing better than a few pints of lager, a saucy lass, and a brawl over whether the first story should be called 'The Tribe of Gum' or '100,000 BC'. According to fan lore, one of the group obtained as the prize item in his collection a prop from the serial, 'The Keys of Marinus' (the title was decided on after an infamous riot that left twelve hospitalized.) In traditional Cockney style, he called his collection his "Voord hoard", which was abbreviated to his "Voord" in everyday conversation. As he boasted to other fans about his "impressive Voord", others took up the term in their counter-boasts, until it entered general currency today.
Whobie: A new fan of the programme. Most whobies assume this to be a portmanteau of "Who" and "Newbie", which is one of the things that mark them as a whobie; the term actually refers to a Doctor Who fan club that sprang up in the early 1970s among a group of naval personnel stationed in Britain. Most of the Seabees (members of the US Naval Construction Battalion) stationed on the base were seeing Doctor Who for the first time, and while enthusiastic, their constant questions about the history of the show irritated British fans. They started to assume that any fan unfamiliar with the programme must be a "Seabie" (as most British fans were unfamiliar with the written form of the term "Seabee", they assumed it ended in "ie") and they started to use "bie" as a general suffix for someone lacking in knowledge and experience. ("Whobie" for Who fans, "Corbie" for Coronation Street fans, "Tribie" for Triangle fans, et cetera.) Even though the suffix has passed out of general use, inexperienced Who fans are still known as "Whobies" to this day.
Frock: A Doctor Who story in which the characters wear elaborate, impractical outfits. Most people consider the "frock" style to have its apogee in the late Hinchcliffe era; 'The Robots of Death' and 'The Deadly Assassin' are both considered to be extremely "frockish" stories, with Zilda's outfit as the crowning glory of fashion absurdity. The term was later incorporated into the "rad" style of the New Adventures, primarily due to the influence of Kate Orman; she remains to this day a lifelong surfer, and she incorporated Australian surfing traditions into virtually all of her novels as an inside joke with her surfing friends. Since these traditions involved surfing while wearing floor-length evening gowns (the origins of the tradition are not known, but are presumably related to the Australian superstition that they confuse the sharks that infest most Australian beaches) the two terms became conflated for much of the 1990s.
Gun: A Doctor Who story featuring projectile weapons. Some fans consider only stories in which physical projectiles, propelled by gunpowder, are fired from guns to be "gun" stories; others expand the definition to include any type of weapon that fires from a distance without human power, such as energy blasters. The definition is constantly argued about, and the utility of the definition is always in question; however, most are in agreement that these are the antithesis of "frock" stories, primarily because there's no place to conceal a gun in an evening gown.
Monopticon: A science-fiction convention specifically geared towards Doctor Who fans. The first Monopticon occurred in 1966, in Longleat; the convention occurred at the height of the short-lived "Monomania" craze that popped up after the first appearance of the one-eyed, mop-topped monsters from 'The Ark'. Not only did Monomania tap into the same vein of fan enthusiasm as Dalekmania, it also synergistically fed from the Beatlemania then taking place throughout Britain--for a brief period, the Monoids rivaled the Doctor for popularity, until it was pointed out that (like the Monkees) the Monoids did not play their own instruments. With the rumors that the upcoming story 'The Smugglers' would feature Monoids disguised as pirates (with a scene where the pirates would remove their eyepatches to reveal an expanse of blank skin underneath) the fans were at a fever pitch of excitement, and several made plans to meet and watch Part One when it came out. The plans grew into a formal convention, called 'Monopticon I', and fandom has called Doctor Who conventions Monopticons ever since. The line, "I wouldn't dream of interfering with your Monopticon," from the Doctor Who serial 'Four to Doomsday', was intended as a sly dig at fans who feared that JNT's involvement in fan culture would lead to his co-opting it.
Quarrier: A true fan of the programme. The term is taken from a group of fans who decided, as a mark of their devotion, to visit each and every last one of the quarries used to film exterior scenes for Doctor Who. Normally, this is easily done, as it merely involves visiting each and every last one of the quarries in Britain (as well as one quarry in Spain that was used for some pickup shots on location for 'The Two Doctors') but in this case, they complicated matters further by wishing to a) visit the exact location where the TARDIS prop was placed during the filming, and b) visit them in the same order that the series depicted them. This meant months of intensive studying of the video footage, matching the types of rock visible and the approximate state of the quarry at the time of filming to photos obtained from the quarry owners (who agreed to assist them after extensive financial compensation.) After finally determining to within a span of two feet where the TARDIS props were placed, they set out on their pilgrimage; the tour involved criss-crossing the country several times in order to visit each quarry once for every time it was used in a BBC production. The group visited one quarry in Wales six times, each time going back to a spot within twenty feet of their previous trips, in order to avoid seeing any quarries out of order. And even though the group was committed en masse to a mental institution not long after the completion of their tour, their abiding love for the series has been immortalized in this charming slang term.
Rad: Short for "radical"; this refers to a Doctor Who story whose tone evokes the free-spirited and adventurous surfer sub-culture of the late 1980s and early 1990s. Common tropes in these Doctor Who stories include extreme sports like skateboarding and windsurfing, and an acceptance of the sublime beauty of nature ("sublime" in the classical Romantic sense, that is, evoking both wonder and terror simultaneously) as a part of everyday life. Paul Cornell came to exemplify both the "rad" and the "frock" Doctor Who story after the novel 'Human Nature', which he famously came up with while on an Australian beach with Kate Orman. The two of them had completed a marathon surfing session, both wearing the traditional Australian surfing gowns as they crested wave after fifty-foot wave, and they brainstormed the novel while drunk with the adrenalin rush of surviving the beach's shark-infested waters. The book inspired much of the tone of the New Series, although most of the surfing material was lost when it was adapted for television.
Soldeed: A fan who takes advantage of the convention atmosphere to enter into carnal relations with a Doctor Who professional (whether in front of or behind the camera.) (The professional, that is, not the action, although the latter is not entirely unknown either.) It is not entirely certain where the term comes from; some have suspected it to be a play on "entering the Power Complex", while others suggest that these fans, like the character that inspired their nickname, are entering into a relationship they can't talk about with someone both powerful and horny. The name is not gender-specific; there can be both male and female soldeeds. In all cases, the act of sleeping with a professional is known as "doing the dirty soldeed", and the return to the fan's hotel room the next morning, still wearing the slightly rumpled costume they wore the previous day, is known as "the Great Journey of Shame". Some fans have attempted to label Who professionals who seek out hook-ups at conventions as "nimon", but the effort has been bogged down in a debate over whether the plural of "nimon" is "nimon" or "nimons".
Trad: A race of monsters from early 60s Who. The Trad came from the planet Tradoon, and resembled (according to reports at the time) anthropomorphic insects with tufts of fur at each joint. Fan rumor has long held that these were repurposed Ice Warrior costumes, but as no episodes survive from any of the Trad stories and no photographs exist of Trad costumes, it's impossible to be sure. In fact, one of the most notable things about the Trad is how little material survives of their appearances; the original episodes were wiped (see the essay, 'The First Lost Episode Crisis') and the surviving audio recordings are so garbled and distorted as to be incomprehensible. Even when the Trad were licensed for an appearance in the old TV Comics, a printing error rendered the strips illegible. With no pictures, film or audio recording of the Trad, they have entered legendary status as an "un-monster"; only the very early fans, those who remember watching the episodes as they came out, have solid memories of these lost stories. These Trad fans hold up the lumbering, slow-moving, easily confused monsters as an exemplar of a kind of Doctor Who that is sadly lost to us forever.
VidFIRED: Removed from canon. In the mid- to late 1980s, the Doctor Who Appreciation Society was one of the earliest and most influential fan organizations; at the time, it was considered to be the singular voice of Doctor Who fandom. At the height of its influence, it decided to perform a comprehensive review of the first twenty-five years of the series' history, removing from canon any video, or "vid" that did not live up to the expectations of the fan committee (chosen from a slate of respected fans old enough to remember the stories at time of first broadcast.) The plan began auspiciously, with only three stories "fired" from the Hartnell era ('The Edge of Destruction', 'The Web Planet' and 'The Gunfighters') and two from the Troughton era ('The Enemy of the World' and 'The Space Pirates'). The group fell to dissention, however, when they reached the Tom Baker era. Some on the committee wished to VidFIRE the entirety of the Graham Williams era, while others pointed out that the Key to Time series deserved preservation. In vain, the group wrestled with the issue, eventually deciding to return to it once they had decided the fate of the rest of the series. It seemed that they had reached accordance once again when they unanimously decided to VidFIRE the entire Sixth Doctor era; however, the effort broke down entirely when a small but vocal contingent demanded to "preemptively VidFIRE Season Twenty-Six". It was this dispute that ultimately led to the fragmentation of British Who fandom. It seems like every fan has one or two stories they wish didn't exist, but nobody can ever quite agree as to which ones they are.
Voord: A Who fan's collection of merchandise, novelizations, videos/DVDs, et cetera. Supposedly, this term got its start from the infamous East End "Whooligans" fan club of the late Sixties, a band of rough-and-tumble enthusiasts of the programme who liked nothing better than a few pints of lager, a saucy lass, and a brawl over whether the first story should be called 'The Tribe of Gum' or '100,000 BC'. According to fan lore, one of the group obtained as the prize item in his collection a prop from the serial, 'The Keys of Marinus' (the title was decided on after an infamous riot that left twelve hospitalized.) In traditional Cockney style, he called his collection his "Voord hoard", which was abbreviated to his "Voord" in everyday conversation. As he boasted to other fans about his "impressive Voord", others took up the term in their counter-boasts, until it entered general currency today.
Whobie: A new fan of the programme. Most whobies assume this to be a portmanteau of "Who" and "Newbie", which is one of the things that mark them as a whobie; the term actually refers to a Doctor Who fan club that sprang up in the early 1970s among a group of naval personnel stationed in Britain. Most of the Seabees (members of the US Naval Construction Battalion) stationed on the base were seeing Doctor Who for the first time, and while enthusiastic, their constant questions about the history of the show irritated British fans. They started to assume that any fan unfamiliar with the programme must be a "Seabie" (as most British fans were unfamiliar with the written form of the term "Seabee", they assumed it ended in "ie") and they started to use "bie" as a general suffix for someone lacking in knowledge and experience. ("Whobie" for Who fans, "Corbie" for Coronation Street fans, "Tribie" for Triangle fans, et cetera.) Even though the suffix has passed out of general use, inexperienced Who fans are still known as "Whobies" to this day.
Friday, August 9, 2013
Top Ten Things Lawrence Miles May Have a Right to Be Upset About
It's no great secret that Lawrence Miles has issues with the new series; his blog lets you know in no uncertain terms that he thinks that Steven Moffat is doing things he already did decades earlier, and doing them wrong to boot. (Combined, charmingly enough, with complaints that the production team isn't letting him write for Doctor Who anymore because they have some sort of grudge against him. At some point, you have to wonder if Miles even knows what "people skills" are.)
And yet...I'm doing a re-read right now of Lawrence Miles' Doctor Who novels, and I have to say, if there's one person who could credibly get upset about the new series taking all of his old ideas and doing an extended "house mix" of them, it's probably Miles. To wit:
1) The Time War. It's Number One on the list because it's the most obvious, but it has to be said. In 'Alien Bodies', the Time Lords got into a big war with a mysterious enemy that was also time-active and capable of operating on their level, and they were taking it on the chin. In the new series, the Time Lords had gotten into a big war with a mysterious enemy that was also time-active and capable of operating on their level, and they took it on the chin. The only real difference was that Miles thought that it would be stupid if the enemy was just "the Daleks" at the end of it all. (Mind you, it's easy to act smug if you never had to admit that the Enemy was really the Voord or something.) It's worth pointing out, by the way, that the original plan for the TV show when they weren't sure if they could get the rights to the Daleks was to have the Toclafane act as the destroyers of the Time Lords...and that the revelation that they were the human race from the distant future would have been the big revelation to end Series Three. Worth remembering in light of Miles' comments that the Enemy "came from Earth".
2) The Time Lords. In 'The End of Time', you discover that the reason the Doctor killed the Time Lords along with the Daleks is that they'd become just as bad as the Daleks by the end--the War had twisted them into monsters. Between 'Alien Bodies', 'Dead Romance' and 'Interference', it'd be hard to claim that this wasn't something that worked its way into the popular conception of Gallifrey.
3) 'The Name of the Doctor'. Oh let's see...a story where the Doctor's eventual future death in some vast battle too terrible to be imagined became known to his present self, and in which his future remains turned out to be vitally important to the future of the universe because his biodata--the traces of his entire lifeline--was so special and unique. Huh. And we thought Moffat was dropping an 'Alien Bodies' reference in 'The Impossible Astronaut'.
4)River Song. There's a throwaway line in 'Christmas on a Rational Planet' about Benny's potential child being shaped by exposure to the environment within the TARDIS, and how she would wind up being a potential next step between the human race and the Time Lords. That was a full thirteen years before 'Silence in the Library'. Just sayin'.
5) 'The Runaway Bride'. And speaking of 'Christmas on a Rational Planet', the idea of the ancient Time Lords fundamentally altering the very structure of the universe to make it more fit for habitation by the Time Lords was echoed here, with the "huon particles" that hadn't existed since the beginning of time.
6) The Sycorax. Creepy bad guys who wear skull-masks and use blood control like "a cheap bit of voodoo". You could almost hear Miles' blood pressure racheting up when they showed up on screen.
7) 'School Reunion'. Sarah Jane comes back, but she's older and she's independently investigating a threat to Earth. She gets tangled up with the Doctor again, and winds up discovering that she has a lot in common with his latest companion, who's a fit young blonde woman. I'm not saying that Lawrence Miles was the only person to come up with that idea, but it was a pretty prominent "event" story right before the books lost their claim to being the Official Continuation of Who.
8) The Moffat openings. You know what I mean--'Bells of St. John's', 'The Pandorica Opens', 'The Wedding of River Song'...those really rapid-fire openings that start off with a spectacular set-piece moment that leads into the episode in a totally unexpected way. Now go back and re-read 'Alien Bodies', which opens with the Doctor playing chess with a UNISYC general who tries to have him killed because they found something in Borneo that proves he can die...only to have the Doctor escape by jumping into the TARDIS which is parked sideways halwfway up a building. Moffat was, I don't think there's anything wrong with admitting, influenced by the narrative style of 'Alien Bodies'.
9) River Song escapes by jumping into the TARDIS which is parked sideways halfway up a building. The only real difference is that the Doctor didn't land in the swimming pool.
10) 'The End of Time'. Rassilon's plan is pretty much exactly what the Celestis did. Word for freaking word.
There you go. Ten ways that Lawrence Miles was an incredibly influential figure in Doctor Who on a level all out of proportion to the current recognition he gets for it, and I didn't even mention TARDISes in human form. I think that's pretty restrained of me, to be honest.
And yet...I'm doing a re-read right now of Lawrence Miles' Doctor Who novels, and I have to say, if there's one person who could credibly get upset about the new series taking all of his old ideas and doing an extended "house mix" of them, it's probably Miles. To wit:
1) The Time War. It's Number One on the list because it's the most obvious, but it has to be said. In 'Alien Bodies', the Time Lords got into a big war with a mysterious enemy that was also time-active and capable of operating on their level, and they were taking it on the chin. In the new series, the Time Lords had gotten into a big war with a mysterious enemy that was also time-active and capable of operating on their level, and they took it on the chin. The only real difference was that Miles thought that it would be stupid if the enemy was just "the Daleks" at the end of it all. (Mind you, it's easy to act smug if you never had to admit that the Enemy was really the Voord or something.) It's worth pointing out, by the way, that the original plan for the TV show when they weren't sure if they could get the rights to the Daleks was to have the Toclafane act as the destroyers of the Time Lords...and that the revelation that they were the human race from the distant future would have been the big revelation to end Series Three. Worth remembering in light of Miles' comments that the Enemy "came from Earth".
2) The Time Lords. In 'The End of Time', you discover that the reason the Doctor killed the Time Lords along with the Daleks is that they'd become just as bad as the Daleks by the end--the War had twisted them into monsters. Between 'Alien Bodies', 'Dead Romance' and 'Interference', it'd be hard to claim that this wasn't something that worked its way into the popular conception of Gallifrey.
3) 'The Name of the Doctor'. Oh let's see...a story where the Doctor's eventual future death in some vast battle too terrible to be imagined became known to his present self, and in which his future remains turned out to be vitally important to the future of the universe because his biodata--the traces of his entire lifeline--was so special and unique. Huh. And we thought Moffat was dropping an 'Alien Bodies' reference in 'The Impossible Astronaut'.
4)River Song. There's a throwaway line in 'Christmas on a Rational Planet' about Benny's potential child being shaped by exposure to the environment within the TARDIS, and how she would wind up being a potential next step between the human race and the Time Lords. That was a full thirteen years before 'Silence in the Library'. Just sayin'.
5) 'The Runaway Bride'. And speaking of 'Christmas on a Rational Planet', the idea of the ancient Time Lords fundamentally altering the very structure of the universe to make it more fit for habitation by the Time Lords was echoed here, with the "huon particles" that hadn't existed since the beginning of time.
6) The Sycorax. Creepy bad guys who wear skull-masks and use blood control like "a cheap bit of voodoo". You could almost hear Miles' blood pressure racheting up when they showed up on screen.
7) 'School Reunion'. Sarah Jane comes back, but she's older and she's independently investigating a threat to Earth. She gets tangled up with the Doctor again, and winds up discovering that she has a lot in common with his latest companion, who's a fit young blonde woman. I'm not saying that Lawrence Miles was the only person to come up with that idea, but it was a pretty prominent "event" story right before the books lost their claim to being the Official Continuation of Who.
8) The Moffat openings. You know what I mean--'Bells of St. John's', 'The Pandorica Opens', 'The Wedding of River Song'...those really rapid-fire openings that start off with a spectacular set-piece moment that leads into the episode in a totally unexpected way. Now go back and re-read 'Alien Bodies', which opens with the Doctor playing chess with a UNISYC general who tries to have him killed because they found something in Borneo that proves he can die...only to have the Doctor escape by jumping into the TARDIS which is parked sideways halwfway up a building. Moffat was, I don't think there's anything wrong with admitting, influenced by the narrative style of 'Alien Bodies'.
9) River Song escapes by jumping into the TARDIS which is parked sideways halfway up a building. The only real difference is that the Doctor didn't land in the swimming pool.
10) 'The End of Time'. Rassilon's plan is pretty much exactly what the Celestis did. Word for freaking word.
There you go. Ten ways that Lawrence Miles was an incredibly influential figure in Doctor Who on a level all out of proportion to the current recognition he gets for it, and I didn't even mention TARDISes in human form. I think that's pretty restrained of me, to be honest.
Thursday, May 30, 2013
Top Ten Suggestions For the New Assistant
(Originally posted to the Doctor Who Ratings Guide on May 3rd, 2004. Someone had just posted "Top Ten Outside-the-Box Casting Suggestions for the New Assistant", which I think was shortened for "New Review" link to "Top Ten Suggestions for the New Assistant". I thought this sounded more like actual advice, and so I wrote my top ten suggestions for whoever Rose would turn out to be...)
Although Rose Tyler has not been cast, and as yet remains just an insubstantial wisp in our imaginations, already one person has suggested no less than ten people who could play the part of companion to the new Doctor. Which is nice of him, and all, but I can't help but think it'd be far more valuable to our putative Rose to have a list of suggestions on how to better prepare herself to be the Doctor's assistant. So...
1. Invest in a pair of sensible running shoes. Wear them whenever you leave the TARDIS. It'd probably also be a good idea to take up jogging as a hobby.
2. Talk to a physical therapist about exercises that strengthen the ankle muscles.
3. Practice your delivery of the lines, "But why, Doctor?", "I don't understand, Doctor," and optionally, "I can't believe you've betrayed us to the evil aliens, Doctor!" For the latter, it is recommended that you work with Sophie Aldred to get the exact pitch of shocked indignation.
4. Get some training on resisting hypnosis.
5. Learn how to pick locks. You'll be spending a lot of time in jail cells, and it'll only be longer if you don't know how.
6. In the unlikely event that you possess a stash of Janis thorns, hide them. High explosives are perfectly all right, as he will only express mock indignation at your ownership of them, but Janis thorns are right out.
7. Do not, under any circumstances, attempt to kiss him. He probably won't mind, but fans everywhere will try to kill you.
8. If it is at all feasible, purchase a pair of walkie-talkies, splitting them up between the two of you. This simple precaution will pay for itself within the first twenty minutes of your traveling with the Doctor.
9. Do not laugh at the appearance of the Daleks. Yes, we all know they look like salt-shakers. They're also very ill-tempered. In addition, despite their appearance, they can climb stairs... if the budget is high enough. Always check to see how much money the producers have spent on the TARDIS set before running up stairs to escape them. (If they've spent a sufficiently large sum, you may only hear their voices.)
10. Always remember, you are perfectly safe... unless you persist in trying to prove you're better at maths than a race of perfectly logical computer intelligences, to the point of passing up a perfectly good "get out of fiery horrible death" free card in the form of an escape shuttle just so that you can go play with the bomb attached to the steering mechanism. If you do this, you're going to die, and he's not going to come save you.
Although Rose Tyler has not been cast, and as yet remains just an insubstantial wisp in our imaginations, already one person has suggested no less than ten people who could play the part of companion to the new Doctor. Which is nice of him, and all, but I can't help but think it'd be far more valuable to our putative Rose to have a list of suggestions on how to better prepare herself to be the Doctor's assistant. So...
1. Invest in a pair of sensible running shoes. Wear them whenever you leave the TARDIS. It'd probably also be a good idea to take up jogging as a hobby.
2. Talk to a physical therapist about exercises that strengthen the ankle muscles.
3. Practice your delivery of the lines, "But why, Doctor?", "I don't understand, Doctor," and optionally, "I can't believe you've betrayed us to the evil aliens, Doctor!" For the latter, it is recommended that you work with Sophie Aldred to get the exact pitch of shocked indignation.
4. Get some training on resisting hypnosis.
5. Learn how to pick locks. You'll be spending a lot of time in jail cells, and it'll only be longer if you don't know how.
6. In the unlikely event that you possess a stash of Janis thorns, hide them. High explosives are perfectly all right, as he will only express mock indignation at your ownership of them, but Janis thorns are right out.
7. Do not, under any circumstances, attempt to kiss him. He probably won't mind, but fans everywhere will try to kill you.
8. If it is at all feasible, purchase a pair of walkie-talkies, splitting them up between the two of you. This simple precaution will pay for itself within the first twenty minutes of your traveling with the Doctor.
9. Do not laugh at the appearance of the Daleks. Yes, we all know they look like salt-shakers. They're also very ill-tempered. In addition, despite their appearance, they can climb stairs... if the budget is high enough. Always check to see how much money the producers have spent on the TARDIS set before running up stairs to escape them. (If they've spent a sufficiently large sum, you may only hear their voices.)
10. Always remember, you are perfectly safe... unless you persist in trying to prove you're better at maths than a race of perfectly logical computer intelligences, to the point of passing up a perfectly good "get out of fiery horrible death" free card in the form of an escape shuttle just so that you can go play with the bomb attached to the steering mechanism. If you do this, you're going to die, and he's not going to come save you.
Thursday, May 16, 2013
When 'Doctor Who' Fans Veer Off-Topic
(Originally posted January 8th, 2003 to the Jade Pagoda mailing list. And a shout out to excellent writer Mags Halliday for prompting the post!)
----- Original Message -----
From: "Mags L Halliday" <moosifer_jones@...>
> ObWho: which book companions could knot cherry stems with their tongues?
Roz can do it, but wouldn't ever admit to it.
Chris can't do it, and would at first wonder why it was such a big deal...then have the realization hit him a few seconds after everyone else had started sniggering.
TV Ace couldn't do it; NA Ace picked up the skill somewhere in Spacefleet.
And she probably used it to kill a Dalek somehow.
Grant Markham couldn't do it and even if he could, nobody would care.
Evelyn Smythe could do it, could do it much better than any other companion, and was the best at it back at college, and the Doctor really misses her skills at it, because she was such a great companion and a wonderful person.
Frobisher could do it, but would be cheating by growing little fingers out of his tongue.
Sam couldn't do it, and would be deeply offended if you asked her to try.
Dark Sam could do it, and would delight in demonstrating it to attractive men.
Fitz couldn't do it, but would be very interested in any woman that could.
Compassion would just eat the sodding cherry. Obviously.
Anji would probably slap you if you asked...but eventually, after much poking and prodding and sly looks, would admit that yes, yes she can. But never tell anyone.
Benny would claim to be able to while at a bar and fairly seriously drunk; she'd then spend the rest of the evening with a jar of cherries in the corner of the bar, getting increasingly drunk and frustrated, until she finally ties a knot in a cherry stem with her hands, puts it into her mouth, takes another cherry, tells everyone loudly that she can do it, puts the other cherry into her mouth, then inadvertently swallows both of them and has a coughing fit before they put her to bed. She wakes up the next morning swearing never to watch Twin Peaks again.
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