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Post by Deleted on Jun 29, 2017 18:44:23 GMT
Spare Parts *ducks for cover* I'm with you. I think it's okay, but nothing special. And I know Mondas was like a reverse earth, but an underworld 1950's cockney London? Presumably set in the distant past in Earth terms. Weird decision.
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Post by Deleted on Jun 29, 2017 19:00:26 GMT
I think - and I'm sorry to say it - that Big Finish's Jubilee is overrated. {Spoiler} The lone Dalek idea is excellent and such a sense of humanity within the metal machines has fuelled a whole host of stories ever since. But, well, everything is I find a little underwhelming. The characters played by Martin Jarvis and Rosalind Ayres commit all their atrocities because they're ... mad? Really? And that's it?
Under-rated Big Finish? Time-Reef. I love that, yet no-one mentions it! Television-wise, I felt that the most recently under-rated story is Under the Lake/Before the Flood, which I think is just brilliant in every way. A terrific story, and it seemed to pass virtually without comment. The most over-rated recent story is Heaven Sent. Lovely idea, beautifully acted, but the story - ridiculous! (I realise I am in the minority here.)
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Post by Deleted on Jun 29, 2017 19:23:19 GMT
Spare Parts *ducks for cover* I'm with you. I think it's okay, but nothing special. And I know Mondas was like a reverse earth, but an underworld 1950's cockney London? Presumably set in the distant past in Earth terms. Weird decision. My main problem is that you spend the best part of 3 episodes waiting for any glimpse of body horror (mind you, when it hits it is great), also, 90% of the characters are Nick Briggs with a funny voiceover, with each virtually indistinguishable from the last. There's also a load of nonsense with a jealous brother and pompous nun. I mean if you're going to do forced conversion of multiple characters I'd at least ask them to be stretched slightly beyond their general archetype. God, I feel mean now
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Post by Barnacle Crawlins on Jun 29, 2017 20:41:56 GMT
This may be controversial but I find 'Terminus' underrated; it has its flaws, like some slightly underwhelming direction, some weird choices in line delivery from the generally Dominic Guard (who was in one of my favourits 'Picnic at Hanging Rock' from 1975), the Garm looking too friendly (shock horror... he is!), Nyssa thinking a cure for the plague is to strip!?! But I do like the setting of the "leper ship where lazars go to die" Terminus itself and I like the bleakness as 'Doctor Who' had become too fluffy and too safe and it needed stories like 'Terminus', 'Keeper of Traken, 'Warrior's Gate' (by the same writer as 'Terminus') and 'State of Decay' to show that 'Doctor Who' wasn't just some cosmic comedy for wee bairns. In its favour it does have interesting concepts (even if the big bang was very over-used in Davison's era), some good designs what with the muscle and sinews armour of the Vanir (which look like a forerunner of the Necromonger armour from 'Chronicles of Riddick' topped with Sutton Hoo style helmets), the dark grimy corridors and holding areas and the "centre of the universe". Even the 50s style of the raiders doesn't really bother me as the light aesthetic contrasts well with the Vanir and Terminus. To the raiders this was just an ordinary cruise liner that they were to rob and then go about their merry way, but they were wrong; their costume just highlights that they don't live in a grimy plague ridden world, they are 1950s style space swashbucklers! I think the reasons it has such a bad rap are partly because how dark and grim it could be, we have to remember that there was a section of the the fanbase who still missed Tom Baker and the 'Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy' style show his run had become under Williams and Adams; and were looking for failure and 'Terminus' was that failure, it *IS* flawed. I just can't bring myself to see it as that flawed.
"Come on, quickly. Now, we know, don't we? Now, we know what it's all about. This is Terminus, where all the Lazars come to die. We're on a leper ship"
Now for all the flack I'll get for attacking a "classic" after defending the much reviled 'Terminus'...
If I had to pick overrated I'd go with (and everyone will hate me for this) 'City of Death' which I find the usual unfunny, unexciting, badly plotted, thin-storied mess that was the mainstay of Season 17. I'm sure some do like it sincerely but I am sure with most it is an 'Emperor's New Clothes' sort of thing; it had the highest ratings so it must be great! I'm sure the other reason is because it is at least the best of a bad bunch; 'Destiny of The Daleks', 'Creature From The Pit', 'Nightmare of Eden', The Horns of Nimon and the un-completed 'Shada' are hardly highlights of the show. Actually I don't think 'Doctor Who' would get as made as this again until maybe McCoy's first season in the role. It doesn't even live up to its lurid title. And don't get me started on Scaroth's massive onion-bhaji head that he somehow keeps under a Julian Glover mask that is at least six times smaller. It isn't all bad though; it has Julian Glover (a nice eccentric man in real life), Catherine Schell, Romana's uniform (as silly as it was) and some nice location shots of Paris.
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Post by Deleted on Jun 29, 2017 22:34:10 GMT
I'd also like to mention BF's Master as something that doesn't get anywhere near as much love as it should do, in my book.
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Post by Deleted on Jun 30, 2017 1:08:36 GMT
'the interminable TARDIS padding and the weird lack of foreshadowing' - yes, in both cases. An underrunning story and no money to do anything else to fill the time accounted for the first unfortunately. As for the second, the script needed more polishing but according to the production notes there was a general lack of time because of work being done on other stories. It could have been a successful serious story, but as it stands I don't try to watch it as such, simply to enjoy the ride and chortle tolerantly at the points where things don't work. Wish I could do that. Three years of film/television training at university makes it really hard not to pick things apart at the seams at shuffle them back together. I don't even realise I'm doing it half the time. I think The Underwater Menace might come close to a story where I just lie back and chuckle.
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Post by constonks on Jun 30, 2017 3:57:51 GMT
Timelash is very underrated in my opinion. The script sprawls and some of the 'effects' are unintenionally hilarious (the Arm of Morlox and the interior of the Timelash mainly), but I still like the story very much - it's fun and that wasn't always true in the oh-so serious 'Doctor Who' of the 1980s. - Colin Baker is terrific - The Doctor is not pleased at getting stuck in a Time Corridor (again), and when this Doctor is displeased, or irritated by would-be companion Herbert, it shows! And a great line in insults. (“Microcellaphic apostate!”) - The host of Wells references, far more than I realised in 1985, including a clever nod to Wells’ satirical take on spiritualism from ‘Love and Mr. Lewisham’ where the hero challenges a fraudulent spiritualist. - The BlofeldBorad - Brilliant performance and makeup and surely the way he is introduced to viewers, seated in a chair and filmed in close-up without revealing his face, is a tribute to Bond villain Blofeld? The Borad is seen stroking not a white cat, but his own flipper!, and one of his lines sounds like a nod to Goldfinger. (Goldflipper?) “Choose your next words carefully, Doctor. They could be your last!” - Paul Darrow’s enjoyment of his role as the scheming Tekker is obvious. Not everyone liked the style here, but I think it’s great fun - “Save your breath for the Timelash, Doctor. Most people depart with a scream!” - Dean Hollingsworth is excellent as all the Borad’s sing-song voiced androids (but only one at a time, for obvious reasons) with a cleverly acted, contemporary 1980s ‘robo-dancing’ style. - Herbert. {Spoiler} Bubbling with enthusiasm at the idea of time and space travel and irritating the Doctor severely, he's H.G.Wells as if from the Unbound Universe - and again, he's fun.
And how can you not love the story which gave us the immortal line “He’s dangling on the edge of oblivion!”? I'll throw my hat into the "Timelash is good dumb hokey fun" ring any day. It's always struck me as a poor choice for the bottom of the list, when there are many other stories that commit the much-worse error of just being boring.
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Post by omega on Jul 1, 2017 11:18:57 GMT
Timelash is very underrated in my opinion. The script sprawls and some of the 'effects' are unintenionally hilarious (the Arm of Morlox and the interior of the Timelash mainly), but I still like the story very much - it's fun and that wasn't always true in the oh-so serious 'Doctor Who' of the 1980s. - Colin Baker is terrific - The Doctor is not pleased at getting stuck in a Time Corridor (again), and when this Doctor is displeased, or irritated by would-be companion Herbert, it shows! And a great line in insults. (“Microcellaphic apostate!”) - The host of Wells references, far more than I realised in 1985, including a clever nod to Wells’ satirical take on spiritualism from ‘Love and Mr. Lewisham’ where the hero challenges a fraudulent spiritualist. - The BlofeldBorad - Brilliant performance and makeup and surely the way he is introduced to viewers, seated in a chair and filmed in close-up without revealing his face, is a tribute to Bond villain Blofeld? The Borad is seen stroking not a white cat, but his own flipper!, and one of his lines sounds like a nod to Goldfinger. (Goldflipper?) “Choose your next words carefully, Doctor. They could be your last!” - Paul Darrow’s enjoyment of his role as the scheming Tekker is obvious. Not everyone liked the style here, but I think it’s great fun - “Save your breath for the Timelash, Doctor. Most people depart with a scream!” - Dean Hollingsworth is excellent as all the Borad’s sing-song voiced androids (but only one at a time, for obvious reasons) with a cleverly acted, contemporary 1980s ‘robo-dancing’ style. - Herbert. {Spoiler} Bubbling with enthusiasm at the idea of time and space travel and irritating the Doctor severely, he's H.G.Wells as if from the Unbound Universe - and again, he's fun.
And how can you not love the story which gave us the immortal line “He’s dangling on the edge of oblivion!”? I'll throw my hat into the "Timelash is good dumb hokey fun" ring any day. It's always struck me as a poor choice for the bottom of the list, when there are many other stories that commit the much-worse error of just being boring. At least Timelash has oversized audibly spangling smurfs.
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