lidar2
Castellan
You know, now that you mention it, I actually do rather like Attack of the Cybermen ...
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Post by lidar2 on Jun 11, 2018 10:50:32 GMT
A fantastic release, which seems even better when compared to the rest of the MR in the year in which it was released in 2 ways: 1. The only 7th Dr story in 2004, giving it a novelty/rarity value. 2. Arrangements for War and this were the only 2 10/10 releases in 2004.
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Post by Ela on Jun 11, 2018 14:20:10 GMT
This is without a doubt one of my favorite Hex stories - an amusing and endearing introduction to the character of Hex.
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Post by Deleted on Jun 11, 2018 16:27:30 GMT
I'm not the biggest Hex fan in the world but The Harvest is definitely his best story, and despite the clues I remember being completey surprised at the reveal of the 'enemy' back in 2004. (!)
The Harvest is a very good Seventh Doctor story and it really was a great way to introdce a new audio companion.
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Post by whiskeybrewer on Jun 12, 2018 12:27:33 GMT
Continues the early role of great intros to new BF Original companions (Not counting C'rizz lol)
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Post by Ela on Jun 12, 2018 17:43:20 GMT
Continues the early role of great intros to new BF Original companions (Not counting C'rizz lol) I liked C'rizz.
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Post by omega on Jun 12, 2018 20:50:54 GMT
Continues the early role of great intros to new BF Original companions (Not counting C'rizz lol) I liked C'rizz. C'rizz was monstrously mishandled. He had all the makings of a memorable companion, being from another universe, his limited ability to change his appearance, his emotional sponge aspect and the fact he heard dead people. Very few of these get more than a single story where they are highlighted (Other Lives is the only story to utilise that he can't pass for human), and he comes off like a third wheel in the post-break up Doctor and Charley relationship (which comes off like a romantic relationship in a rocky period). Much like the story arc he came from, there wasn't much planning around C'rizz's character arc. Seeds are planted in Creed of the Kromon, but the Divergent Universe arc didn't play these out organically and had to hastily resolve them for The Next Life.
Hex meanwhile benefits from being an everyman, someone who can be written into a story without juggling too much backstory baggage unless the story is specifically written around that baggage. The team of the Seventh Doctor, Ace and Hex is brilliant, with a number of dynamics to keep things interesting, at least until Hex goes off at the Doctor for the hundredth time about his secret keeping (that's prime for a drinking game in the later stories).
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Post by Deleted on Jun 12, 2018 23:55:18 GMT
C'rizz was monstrously mishandled. He had all the makings of a memorable companion, being from another universe, his limited ability to change his appearance, his emotional sponge aspect and the fact he heard dead people. Very few of these get more than a single story where they are highlighted (Other Lives is the only story to utilise that he can't pass for human), and he comes off like a third wheel in the post-break up Doctor and Charley relationship (which comes off like a romantic relationship in a rocky period). Much like the story arc he came from, there wasn't much planning around C'rizz's character arc. Seeds are planted in Creed of the Kromon, but the Divergent Universe arc didn't play these out organically and had to hastily resolve them for The Next Life.
Hex meanwhile benefits from being an everyman, someone who can be written into a story without juggling too much backstory baggage unless the story is specifically written around that baggage. The team of the Seventh Doctor, Ace and Hex is brilliant, with a number of dynamics to keep things interesting, at least until Hex goes off at the Doctor for the hundredth time about his secret keeping (that's prime for a drinking game in the later stories).
I feel as though I've gotten to know C'rizz a lot more through JohannesVIII's artwork; the artist behind the most excellent Caerdroia comic book. They're little vignettes, sure, but nice. The Harvest, from the man who brought us Alien Isolation and a couple other Alien pastiches in Who comics (worth checking out), comes a really great Cyber-story about transformation. But not in the way we're expecting. What can I say that hasn't been said already? Brilliant release. Some really great worldbuilding and a new perspective on the Cybermen which we haven't really seen since. I love the grey area of why the C-Programme exists -- to give the Euro Council that extra leg up in this emergent Space Age with their astronauts -- it feels so uncomfortably real. In fact, I think you could sum up this entire story with those two words "uncomfortably real". And a great listen.
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Post by omega on Jun 13, 2018 1:39:17 GMT
C'rizz was monstrously mishandled. He had all the makings of a memorable companion, being from another universe, his limited ability to change his appearance, his emotional sponge aspect and the fact he heard dead people. Very few of these get more than a single story where they are highlighted (Other Lives is the only story to utilise that he can't pass for human), and he comes off like a third wheel in the post-break up Doctor and Charley relationship (which comes off like a romantic relationship in a rocky period). Much like the story arc he came from, there wasn't much planning around C'rizz's character arc. Seeds are planted in Creed of the Kromon, but the Divergent Universe arc didn't play these out organically and had to hastily resolve them for The Next Life.
Hex meanwhile benefits from being an everyman, someone who can be written into a story without juggling too much backstory baggage unless the story is specifically written around that baggage. The team of the Seventh Doctor, Ace and Hex is brilliant, with a number of dynamics to keep things interesting, at least until Hex goes off at the Doctor for the hundredth time about his secret keeping (that's prime for a drinking game in the later stories).
I feel as though I've gotten to know C'rizz a lot more through JohannesVIII's artwork; the artist behind the most excellent Caerdroia comic book. They're little vignettes, sure, but nice. The Harvest, from the man who brought us Alien Isolation and a couple other Alien pastiches in Who comics (worth checking out), comes a really great Cyber-story about transformation. But not in the way we're expecting. What can I say that hasn't been said already? Brilliant release. Some really great worldbuilding and a new perspective on the Cybermen which we haven't really seen since. I love the grey area of why the C-Programme exists -- to give the Euro Council that extra leg up in this emergent Space Age with their astronauts -- it feels so uncomfortably real. In fact, I think you could sum up this entire story with those two words "uncomfortably real". And a great listen. The man who would later bring us Alien Isolation, which came out ten years after The Harvest. Both the Cybermen and the Alien franchise have the justaposition of gleaming clinical and grittiness. The ideal and aesthetic vs the grim and grimy reality of survival. As this story shows, the gleaming plastic parts that need the less savoury and pleasant knowledge in order to use and maintain them. The basic concept of the Cybermen is a race of humans who abandoned emotions in order to survive, and require ruthless cunning in order to reproduce using the bodies of other people, indeed much like Xenomorphs. Both have a hierarchy with a leader, the Cyber-Leader or Planner and the Queen. They don't use flowery language or need to lie, it's all straight to the point and in aid of the overall objective.
I've remarked about the similarities between Xenomorph and Wirrn before, but there are also a lot of similarities between Xenomorph and Cyberman. For both the only way to stop them is to utterly annihilate them, and they have an insidious way of infiltrating groups of people or settlements. The story Sword of Orion owes a lot to the original Alien film, and features Cybermen.
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Post by slithe on Jun 13, 2018 19:32:02 GMT
The Harvest, from the man who brought us Alien Isolation and a couple other Alien pastiches in Who comics (worth checking out), comes a really great Cyber-story about transformation. But not in the way we're expecting. What can I say that hasn't been said already? Brilliant release. Some really great worldbuilding and a new perspective on the Cybermen which we haven't really seen since. I love the grey area of why the C-Programme exists -- to give the Euro Council that extra leg up in this emergent Space Age with their astronauts -- it feels so uncomfortably real. In fact, I think you could sum up this entire story with those two words "uncomfortably real". And a great listen. This is why I think the Cybermen work better than the Daleks. The Cybermen are *believable* and, to a certain extent, are based on real science (rather than pseudo-science). Kit Peddler knew about advances in medical science and just took these to their inevitable conclusions when he devised the Cybermen in 1966. This is evident in The Tenth Planet - the Cyber costumes are bandages around the face - and make the Cybermen look very akin to the early plastic surgery patients from World War I. Similarly, with transplantation of organs being developed in the 1960s, the Cybermen fit well into this niche. So, the idea that one day human technology could develop to the extent that flesh is replaced by machine parts isn't that remote. As our medical scientific knowledge continues to develop it isn't a foolish notion to think that one day we could end up with humans being sustained by far more mechanical technology than is currently the case. That then opens the question - at what point does a person 'lose' their humanity. Sadly, the Daleks don't have this element of realism. It is obvious (certainly from Terry Nation interviews and stories like 'The Genesis of the Daleks' and 'The Dalek Invasion of Earth') that the Daleks are 'Nazis in armour'. Whilst that is an interesting paradigm, it doesn't match the same realism as the Cyberman premise. Sadly, the human tragedy (the folly of medical development gone wrong) is rarely explored in Doctor Who and Cyber-stories suffer for it. The Harvest doesn't do this and plays to the strengths of the Cyber-race: eliminating weaknesses and trying to survive. The C-Programme shows that clearly - Humans desperate for the next advantage end up taking a step that looks great, but leads to severe consequences. Hopefully, the next Cyber release will take the best elements of the creatures forward.
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Post by Deleted on Jun 13, 2018 23:24:25 GMT
The Harvest, from the man who brought us Alien Isolation and a couple other Alien pastiches in Who comics (worth checking out), comes a really great Cyber-story about transformation. But not in the way we're expecting. What can I say that hasn't been said already? Brilliant release. Some really great worldbuilding and a new perspective on the Cybermen which we haven't really seen since. I love the grey area of why the C-Programme exists -- to give the Euro Council that extra leg up in this emergent Space Age with their astronauts -- it feels so uncomfortably real. In fact, I think you could sum up this entire story with those two words "uncomfortably real". And a great listen. This is why I think the Cybermen work better than the Daleks. The Cybermen are *believable* and, to a certain extent, are based on real science (rather than pseudo-science). Kit Peddler knew about advances in medical science and just took these to their inevitable conclusions when he devised the Cybermen in 1966. This is evident in The Tenth Planet - the Cyber costumes are bandages around the face - and make the Cybermen look very akin to the early plastic surgery patients from World War I. Similarly, with transplantation of organs being developed in the 1960s, the Cybermen fit well into this niche. So, the idea that one day human technology could develop to the extent that flesh is replaced by machine parts isn't that remote. As our medical scientific knowledge continues to develop it isn't a foolish notion to think that one day we could end up with humans being sustained by far more mechanical technology than is currently the case. That then opens the question - at what point does a person 'lose' their humanity. Sadly, the Daleks don't have this element of realism. It is obvious (certainly from Terry Nation interviews and stories like 'The Genesis of the Daleks' and 'The Dalek Invasion of Earth') that the Daleks are 'Nazis in armour'. Whilst that is an interesting paradigm, it doesn't match the same realism as the Cyberman premise. Sadly, the human tragedy (the folly of medical development gone wrong) is rarely explored in Doctor Who and Cyber-stories suffer for it. The Harvest doesn't do this and plays to the strengths of the Cyber-race: eliminating weaknesses and trying to survive. The C-Programme shows that clearly - Humans desperate for the next advantage end up taking a step that looks great, but leads to severe consequences. Hopefully, the next Cyber release will take the best elements of the creatures forward. Daleks, for me, are a lot like the xenomorphs from Alien. A large part of what makes them work is how they interact with those not like them. I don't think the Cybermen have culture or a civlisation, per se. Everything's very utilitarian, all for a purpose. If you showed a Cyberman a painting it wouldn't think twice on it. A Dalek, on the other hand, would actually muster something close to disdain. "How terribly un-Dalek," it might think. With their inferiority complex wired into their very genetic makeup, they do the only "rational" thing to a Dalek, they destroy it. Pit that kind of mindset against someone like the Doctor -- someone who values cooperation and reason -- and the clash makes for very good storytelling. They are something that cannot be reasoned with. Over the years, I think Daleks have evolved beyond "Nazis in armour" (although that's certainly still there) towards being more a stand-in for fanaticism in general. Fanaticism and sadism too (judging from Dalek Empire and Prisoner of the Daleks, among others), and unfortunately, those are still very human problems. Take a line from De Flores in Silver Nemesis and it could easily be said by a Dalek: "DALEKS DO NOT FEAR DEATH. ONLY THE FAILURE OF OUR DUTY." Frighteningly most of all, that's not bravado. They genuinely believe that. Their entire society is moulded around this xenophobic fear and hatred. Something so pronounced that they themselves eventually succumb to divisions of "purity" in their own ranks. They kill with the honest belief that it is the right thing to do. That's what makes them so compelling. If you brought Bernice Summerfield and the Dalek that killed her mother face-to-face, it's only response would be: "Summerfield, you deserved to die too." Cybermen have a very empathic sense of tragedy to them and tragedy offers depth. Daleks are tragic as well, but it's very difficult to feel sorry for something that wants nothing but to see you dead. The transformative power of a Dalek isn't necessarily in body, but in mind. It's very easy to become a monster to fight monsters and a Dalek will bring out the worst in whoever it's fighting. That's where the realism lies I think, what a Dalek does to those who are left. That's what makes a Dalek so scary.
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Post by chopper on Jun 13, 2018 23:34:40 GMT
7 and Ace really benefited from Hex. They were just irritating otherwise. One little thing that sticks out for me is that Hex was born in Manchester, despite the scouse accent, which of course tallies with his Mum’s Bolton accent. Very, very few people of Hex’s age would actually be born in Stalybridge though. The hospital which is nearby is in Ashton-under-Lyne. Which is where I was born
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Post by sherlock on Jun 15, 2018 23:16:41 GMT
A fantastic New Series style story, before the New Series even existed. Hex makes a strong debut, with the Doctor and Ace getting an interesting depiction through his eyes. The Cybermen are very creepy here and the whole plot is horribly realistic.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 11, 2018 7:52:44 GMT
Continues the early role of great intros to new BF Original companions (Not counting C'rizz lol) I liked C'rizz. So do I and i really enjoy those early McGanns and the divergent universe.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 11, 2018 11:32:30 GMT
Part 1 didn’t particularly inspire me but I thought it really picked up. The soundtrack is also very of its time. 4/5
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Post by Tim Bradley on Feb 23, 2021 19:02:14 GMT
In October 2021 (this year), Thomas Hector Schofield will meet the Seventh Doctor and Ace for the first time at St. Gart's Hospital!
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Post by Deleted on Feb 23, 2021 21:42:03 GMT
In October 2021 (this year), Thomas Hector Schofield will meet the Seventh Doctor and Ace for the first time at St. Gart's Hospital! Hope they've had their Covid jab!
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Post by number13 on Feb 24, 2021 0:27:04 GMT
Continues the early role of great intros to new BF Original companions (Not counting C'rizz lol) I liked C'rizz. 3 1/2 years late finding this post, but yes, so did I! I liked most of his arc too, one or two stories weren't so good, but mostly they were enjoyable and a few classics along the way. He really needed a better ending though, poor C'rizz.
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Post by Ela on Feb 24, 2021 2:31:48 GMT
3 1/2 years late finding this post, but yes, so did I! I liked most of his arc too, one or two stories weren't so good, but mostly they were enjoyable and a few classics along the way. He really needed a better ending though, poor C'rizz. Yes, agreed. He needed a much better ending then he got.
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Post by mark687 on Oct 12, 2021 9:03:58 GMT
Regards
mark687
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Post by Timelord007 on Oct 12, 2021 12:59:53 GMT
I feel as though I've gotten to know C'rizz a lot more through JohannesVIII's artwork; the artist behind the most excellent Caerdroia comic book. They're little vignettes, sure, but nice. The Harvest, from the man who brought us Alien Isolation and a couple other Alien pastiches in Who comics (worth checking out), comes a really great Cyber-story about transformation. But not in the way we're expecting. What can I say that hasn't been said already? Brilliant release. Some really great worldbuilding and a new perspective on the Cybermen which we haven't really seen since. I love the grey area of why the C-Programme exists -- to give the Euro Council that extra leg up in this emergent Space Age with their astronauts -- it feels so uncomfortably real. In fact, I think you could sum up this entire story with those two words "uncomfortably real". And a great listen. The man who would later bring us Alien Isolation, which came out ten years after The Harvest. Both the Cybermen and the Alien franchise have the justaposition of gleaming clinical and grittiness. The ideal and aesthetic vs the grim and grimy reality of survival. As this story shows, the gleaming plastic parts that need the less savoury and pleasant knowledge in order to use and maintain them. The basic concept of the Cybermen is a race of humans who abandoned emotions in order to survive, and require ruthless cunning in order to reproduce using the bodies of other people, indeed much like Xenomorphs. Both have a hierarchy with a leader, the Cyber-Leader or Planner and the Queen. They don't use flowery language or need to lie, it's all straight to the point and in aid of the overall objective.
I've remarked about the similarities between Xenomorph and Wirrn before, but there are also a lot of similarities between Xenomorph and Cyberman. For both the only way to stop them is to utterly annihilate them, and they have an insidious way of infiltrating groups of people or settlements. The story Sword of Orion owes a lot to the original Alien film, and features Cybermen.
Goodness me, he does waffle on & on doesn't he.
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