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Post by shallacatop on Feb 21, 2019 14:58:38 GMT
To be honest, I wouldn’t be surprised if it was considered and they felt it was too obvious. As I said, everything I suggested for a Time War Susan is already in the story and it leads you to believe that’s what it could be. What we got was a misdirection of sorts, but I felt it was so lacking that I didn’t really see the point.
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Post by aemiliapaula on Feb 21, 2019 23:14:14 GMT
The Phoenicians, loved it. We had just read the Dido and Aeneas story at school that week. I told the students about the 400 year difference, that Dido/Elissa and Aeneas couldn't have met. One said "that makes me sad", another said "Dreams, crushed." I like the idea of Ian being Aeneas, I thought of it right before it was revealed. This way the story can still be "true".
Susan got to have some good ideas and move the plot along. The whole thing with the watch still being on London time was a nice touch. I loved the Amazon with her eagle and elephant friends.
Tick tock world, it was OK. It was a lot of timey wimey, (I also watched Mawdryn Undead the same day). I'm getting more used to the alternate Susan now, she did a great job. The monsters were a bit hard to visualize.
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Post by barnabaslives on Feb 22, 2019 8:57:40 GMT
Great idea about an older Time War Susan. So much better than what we got with this disappointing story. I'm still very much hoping for an older Susan to appear in any of the Time War releases.
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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 Mar 21, 2019 14:04:11 GMT
The Phoenicians was great. One of Marc Platt's better scripts.
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Post by nottenst on Jun 19, 2020 18:49:11 GMT
Great idea about an older Time War Susan. So much better than what we got with this disappointing story. I'm still very much hoping for an older Susan to appear in any of the Time War releases. I have not yet listened to Susan's War which features just that. I think I may put that next in my listening queue. I hope all the people here who were asking for it have enjoyed it. I just listened to these two this week and enjoyed them. I did have to jump into Wikipedia to see how much of the Phoenician history in the story was real. Quite a bit more than I expected. I had a friend in grade school who was very interested in Phoenician history. Tick-Tock was a bit weird and "timey-wimey" to the extreme. If the whole time problem was caused by the accident in the TARDIS, including what was going on with the other people it would be interesting if this crew came across Nocta, Horl, and Katta in their proper timeline.
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Post by Kestrel on Apr 24, 2021 1:32:57 GMT
The Phoenicians - This was a really fun story, huh? Okay, full and proper disclosure: I am a huge fan of the ancient world (Hittite Fanboy, reporting!) and I will never not enjoy stories in these settings. That The Phoenicians is also a legitimately good story is just icing on the cake.
But before I comment on the story, I am legally obligated to say the following: Bronze Age Collapse story when? Seriously, how is this not already thing? It's a literal, civilization-destroying apocalypse! Makes Pompeii look like a mild sunburn.
So, anyway, I think there's a lot to be said about the very unique stylistic approach Big Finish has taken wit the 1DAs, equal parts faithful to the originals 1960s TV show, while also sometimes startling bold and modern. The Phoenicians really straddles this line well--many scenes feel ripped from the screen, and the era, whereas others--and the sheer scope and scale of the narrative--meet or exceed even the wildest ambitions of the 21st century show. This is one of those brilliant historical--unlike, say, The Great White Hurricane--that would be impossible to film.
Functionally it's very much a modern take on the classical epic--the Odyssey or Illiad--not just in terms of content, but pacing, as the TARDIS crew effectively travels from adventure to adventure across one sprawling saga.
I loved it.
Especially I adored the brief exploration of historicity, and how unreliable histories can be. It's a lovely thing to see in a franchise that all-too often adheres closely to established historical narratives. The great weirdness of history is that the further back in time we go, the less concrete our knowledge. Especially considering that our modern form of deliberately objective historiography (yes, I'm well aware of the white supremacist criticism of this objectivity, but it remains the standard approach) is a relatively recent history. Much of the written records we use to construct our models of the past were written generations after the fact, and often to suit specific political realities. Which is all to say that a knowledge of "history" would not necessarily be a boon to a time traveler--how we remember the past is, of course, a very different thing to how the past actually was.
And, of course, this gives stories set further in the past a delightful level of freedom: writers can do almost whatever they want, secure in the knowledge that unreliable historians will still, theoretically, be able to reconstruct an incorrect, but more familiar tale.
That said, I do have one minor qualm with this story: I found the performances of the two guest-stars (the King and his sister) to be pretty over the top. Almost cartoonish. I think their performances reduced some of the narrative's dramatic capacity, if that makes sense. To possibly date myself horribly, their characters felt more like someone out of a campy show like Xena: Warrior Princess than Doctor Who.
Also, and perhaps this goes without saying, but I'm gonna say it anyway: David Bradley's First Doctor continues to steal the show.
Tick-Tick World - This one, sadly, didn't do quite as much for me. The plot was pretty much just a sideline--there's no sooner way to rob a Doctor Who story of dramatic tension than to blow up the TARDIS--with the main attraction being Carol Ann Ford as an older, future version of Susan.
And, I mean, I appreciate the 1DAs doing more timely-wimey stories, and I generally like time travel in my Who, but this one just wasn't very interesting, even before the generic "time monsters." Part of what has made the 1DAs so compelling to me, in part, has been the fact that they eschew many of the tropes that were codified after the 1st Doctor's era, like the monster-of-the-week. Thankfully this story also functions as a character piece for the Doctor and Susan, and in that aspect it's pretty engaging.
It also helps that both Bradley and Ford are exceptionally good actors and bounce off each other very well. Unfortunately Ford's performance here serves to highlight just how much of a compelling character Old Susan is, and how much Young Susan isn't. I think I've spoken before about The Problem With Susan, so I won't get into it much here. I do understand that Big Finish is trying to hew closely to the characterization of the TV show, and there's only so much they can do, but even so I'd really love to see them push Susan into a more interesting direction. It doesn't even have to be the delightful alien-ness of her character in the pilot, just something, anything other than the whole "teenage damsel and exposition vehicle" she usually is.
Still, Ian and Barbara are great and it's very easy to see how this first TARDIS team made the show a success in the first place. I'm really glad I decided to give this range a shot, because (with only the one exception) it has greatly exceeded my expectations. Can't wait to see where they take the 1st Doctor next!
....
Also, I gotta say, the real highlight of Tick-Tock World, for me, wasn't anything in the story itself, but rather the BTS track. Listening to Carol Ann Ford talk about recording this 1DA with David Bradley, after so many years, and her memory of William Hartnell was... quite something. I'm not sure what the best word to describe it is. Nostalgically bittersweet, perhaps?
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