Thursday, 26 April 2012
Wednesday, 25 April 2012
Doctor Who Review: The Beast Below
After a brilliant
start in The Eleventh Hour the new
team behind Doctor Who brought us the
story of the eleventh Doctor and Amy’s first trip in the Tardis. The first trip
of a new companion has always seemed to bring a rather good story with it, see The Shakespeare Code, Fires of Pompeii, Tomb
of the Cybermen, etc; although this is probably more of a coincidence than
anything else. So does this episode keep with this tradition? Well,
unfortunately not. In fact looking back on it, this might well be my least
favourite episode of Series 5. So, what went so wrong here? Let’s examine.
Visually, this story is a mixed bag. It’s clearly made by someone who knows how to place a camera for a good looking shot, but the problem is that it’s all rather, subtle shall we say. And with the rest of the story being rather boring a bit of flair in the direction would have been nice. It looks very nice and doesn’t detract from the story (except for a horrible, out of place Star Wars screen wipe) but it hardly adds a lot. The actual designs in the story are also problematic. They have good ideas behind them, but they don’t make sense. The design of the Starship UK is rather striking and the idea of it all resting on the back of the (rather cartoonish) Star Whale seemed fitting. But then you think about it and realise that if the Tardis had flow under the ship instead of above, the story would have been over in about five minutes. Also, the Whale’s mouth is free in space, which doesn’t match up with the earlier scene in the beast’s mouth. The Liz 10’s mask looks fantastic, then you realise it is the worst disguise since Clark Kent’s glasses. The Star Whale’s spiky tentacle things, although not the best CGI ever, seem like a clever idea, implying a creature that is infesting the ship with its roots all through it, until you think ‘why would the Star Whale have these?’ or ‘why couldn’t we see any of these when we saw the Whale or it’s diagram on the computer?’. These all SEEM clever, but as soon as you look at them in any kind of detail they entirely fall apart.
That seems to be the main flaw with the plot too. Take the booths for instance. If you protest, you die. So that means 1% could never protest, they’d all be dead. This means the government is evil. This means that we can hardly feel for them. So we don’t really care about the people. The whole story is leading up to a dilemma to choose between the humans and the Star Whale for the Doctor. This is a dilemma we should care about. But, we don’t care about the Star Whale. We’re told it’s beautiful and brilliant, but it never does anything in the story and we don’t even see it until the very end, so why should we care? The humans are just as bad. Liz 10 is one of those characters who are only made watchable by the performance. The actress is good, but a cockney queen who’s in a terrible disguise to spy on her subjects and never finds anything unless it helps the plot and has taken 10 years to discover stuff the Doctor worked out in the first two minutes and knows the Doctor for no reason. I like the actress, but the character is dull. Same with the little girl, she really doesn’t bring anything to the plot. So when we don’t care about the characters, why should we care about the dilemma, or the story being told at all? We shouldn’t really, and we don’t. This episode, above all its other flaws is just boring. It’s not filled with horrible ideas, it’s filled with good ideas that don’t work and end up being disappointing, making for a very dull and uninteresting story.
So, you’d think that’s my conclusion. 2/5, some good ideas, but badly executed. Well, it would be, if it wasn’t for one thing. The ending. The ending treats the audience like they’re stupid. The Doctor mentions the death of the Time Lords in the episode. Some people complained he skimmed over it, but I think it actually shows some character growth from the start of the new series that, while not wanting to talk about it a lot, can accept it instead of being as upset as the 9th and 10th Doctors were. This is good. What it leads to is bad. The dilemma I talked about leads to nothing. The Doctor doesn’t have to make a moral choice; Amy just comes up with a third cop out option. After whining a bit about how the bad thing she did wasn’t bad because she didn’t remember it. Every episode I seem to like her less, but that’s an issue for another time. She realises the Doctor and the Star Whale are similar and there are clips to show this, and they play for so long that even a really stupid child would feel they were being patronised. And then afterwards, she says it again, in case we didn’t get this really complex theory. If you’ve seen the episode you know exactly what I mean. If you’ve not, then, I would maybe skip this one. It has some good ideas, but they don’t work, we don’t care about any of the plot or characters, the Doctor and Amy act in erratic yet not very interesting ways and the ending thinks you’re an idiot. Oh and it started the stupid children singing rhymes tradition in Moffat Who which isn’t creepy or interesting, it’s just annoying. And you can’t make a character say the line “did he do the thing?”, because however mysterious you think it makes it seem, it’s actually just an awful really fake mess. Anyway, enough ranting, final verdict, it’s bad.
1/5
Visually, this story is a mixed bag. It’s clearly made by someone who knows how to place a camera for a good looking shot, but the problem is that it’s all rather, subtle shall we say. And with the rest of the story being rather boring a bit of flair in the direction would have been nice. It looks very nice and doesn’t detract from the story (except for a horrible, out of place Star Wars screen wipe) but it hardly adds a lot. The actual designs in the story are also problematic. They have good ideas behind them, but they don’t make sense. The design of the Starship UK is rather striking and the idea of it all resting on the back of the (rather cartoonish) Star Whale seemed fitting. But then you think about it and realise that if the Tardis had flow under the ship instead of above, the story would have been over in about five minutes. Also, the Whale’s mouth is free in space, which doesn’t match up with the earlier scene in the beast’s mouth. The Liz 10’s mask looks fantastic, then you realise it is the worst disguise since Clark Kent’s glasses. The Star Whale’s spiky tentacle things, although not the best CGI ever, seem like a clever idea, implying a creature that is infesting the ship with its roots all through it, until you think ‘why would the Star Whale have these?’ or ‘why couldn’t we see any of these when we saw the Whale or it’s diagram on the computer?’. These all SEEM clever, but as soon as you look at them in any kind of detail they entirely fall apart.
That seems to be the main flaw with the plot too. Take the booths for instance. If you protest, you die. So that means 1% could never protest, they’d all be dead. This means the government is evil. This means that we can hardly feel for them. So we don’t really care about the people. The whole story is leading up to a dilemma to choose between the humans and the Star Whale for the Doctor. This is a dilemma we should care about. But, we don’t care about the Star Whale. We’re told it’s beautiful and brilliant, but it never does anything in the story and we don’t even see it until the very end, so why should we care? The humans are just as bad. Liz 10 is one of those characters who are only made watchable by the performance. The actress is good, but a cockney queen who’s in a terrible disguise to spy on her subjects and never finds anything unless it helps the plot and has taken 10 years to discover stuff the Doctor worked out in the first two minutes and knows the Doctor for no reason. I like the actress, but the character is dull. Same with the little girl, she really doesn’t bring anything to the plot. So when we don’t care about the characters, why should we care about the dilemma, or the story being told at all? We shouldn’t really, and we don’t. This episode, above all its other flaws is just boring. It’s not filled with horrible ideas, it’s filled with good ideas that don’t work and end up being disappointing, making for a very dull and uninteresting story.
So, you’d think that’s my conclusion. 2/5, some good ideas, but badly executed. Well, it would be, if it wasn’t for one thing. The ending. The ending treats the audience like they’re stupid. The Doctor mentions the death of the Time Lords in the episode. Some people complained he skimmed over it, but I think it actually shows some character growth from the start of the new series that, while not wanting to talk about it a lot, can accept it instead of being as upset as the 9th and 10th Doctors were. This is good. What it leads to is bad. The dilemma I talked about leads to nothing. The Doctor doesn’t have to make a moral choice; Amy just comes up with a third cop out option. After whining a bit about how the bad thing she did wasn’t bad because she didn’t remember it. Every episode I seem to like her less, but that’s an issue for another time. She realises the Doctor and the Star Whale are similar and there are clips to show this, and they play for so long that even a really stupid child would feel they were being patronised. And then afterwards, she says it again, in case we didn’t get this really complex theory. If you’ve seen the episode you know exactly what I mean. If you’ve not, then, I would maybe skip this one. It has some good ideas, but they don’t work, we don’t care about any of the plot or characters, the Doctor and Amy act in erratic yet not very interesting ways and the ending thinks you’re an idiot. Oh and it started the stupid children singing rhymes tradition in Moffat Who which isn’t creepy or interesting, it’s just annoying. And you can’t make a character say the line “did he do the thing?”, because however mysterious you think it makes it seem, it’s actually just an awful really fake mess. Anyway, enough ranting, final verdict, it’s bad.
1/5
 |
| Yeah Doctor, that's how I felt too. |
Monday, 23 April 2012
Tuesday, 17 April 2012
Sunday, 15 April 2012
Doctor Who Review: Voyage of the Damned
Today is 100 years since the Titanic sank, so I thought I’d do something to commemorate that. Could I watch an animation with a rapping dog, or with a giant octopus? Those are real films by the way. But, I just really don’t think I could sit through the whole of one of those messes, and anyway I had a much better choice, watch a Doctor Who about the Titanic. In space. Did I say better? Cause I was very wrong.
Right, last time I had to describe the Doctor before the review, but we all know this one, David Tennant, Christmas, 2007. Hell, probably more than half the people reading this will have seen the episode I’m talking about. If you haven’t quick description of the plot, there is a replica of the Titanic as a cruise liner for aliens above the Earth, its robot servants go bad and it gets hit by a meteor strike and the ship is crippled. The Doctor and his merry band of misfits have to get to the bridge before the ship falls out of the sky and solve the mystery of who’s behind the disaster and why. So far, so a bit too far. Replica of the Titanic? Why? Oh well, it’s Christmas, let’s move on. This is one of Tennant’s solo stories where he gets a companion just for the one episode. While David gives a solid performance (although not one of his best and we’ll look at the mess of the Doctor’s storyline in a minute), his companion is played by Kylie Minogue. Say what you will about her as a musician, she’s not really an actor. Well, a good one. Kylie can’t act and she’s annoying in this story. In fact she doesn’t really do anything useful until the end. But we’ll get to… I have to stop saying we’ll get to that, let’s look at the characters’ stories.
The Doctor keeps telling people he’ll save them then fails but he doesn’t give up until the end and then he’s all annoyed at who lived and died. It seems as though there’s a message or some kind of deep emotions going on here, but there isn’t. It’s just a bit pointless. The Doctor and Kylie, or Astrid Peth if you want to give her her absolutely ridiculous name, are meant to have a deep bond. But the actors have no chemistry and the script doesn’t give anything other than forced moments that are really awkward. The Doctor seems to bond as much with the old man as Astrid and you don’t see them having a snog. It just seems unnatural. As I said she doesn’t do anything except look excited at stuff and be nice to an unnecessarily weird lame alien who is a very unnecessary weird lame metaphor for homosexuality until the end. Then she goes to meet the Doctor and kills herself to kill the lamest villain in Doctor Who since that one with Peter Kay. He’s basically a head on top of a box that’s made of spare machine parts like a really rubbish Davros rip-off. And she kills him with-in 5 minutes of him being on screen being hammy and unthreatening with a forklift truck. Forgetting ‘how does she get out of the truck for us to see her fall, but not just jump to save her life’ plot holes, it really just removes any emotion from the scene when we see the villain’s gurning face and a forklift. It’s just too ridiculous and it doesn’t work. Even on Christmas. Then the music swells, as it has throughout the episode, the music being good but put into scenes in a rather clunky way suddenly starting, stopping or changing, and the Doctor walks away from an explosion without flinching in the worst most over the top sequence in the episode. Then he’s lifted up by angels. No wonder people love David Tennant. No I’m only kidding, but really? Russell T Davies has always tried to make the Doctor seem like a god, but he does it in the bluntest and least effective ways possible. Anyway, the Doctor gets to say something fun; he flies the Titanic over Buckingham Palace and the Queen waves at him. I’m getting tired of trying to find new ways to say this is over the top. Then they try to save Astrid and she turns into some weird ghost and the Doctor kisses her and there are no words to explain how this makes no sense and is only there to make us feel better after they killed off the companion on Christmas Day, and then we have a happy scene to make us all feel better and that’s it. Goodnight. The End. You think you’ve watched a happy piece of fun and try and forget it makes no sense and is just generally awful and a bit depressing.
Depressing you say? Well, let’s have a look. The Titanic gets smashed up and loads of people die. But we don’t see them so whatever, who cares. Then the random sailor guy dies. Then the fat people die, for like no reason except they don’t fit in the plot anymore. Did they need to die for the story to work? No. Did it add anything? No. Then that red guy dies. But he was irritating even though the story seemed to be going out of its way to make me like him. And then the companion dies. Merry Christmas everyone! I’m not against a dark story, but this one was just dark for the sake of it and there was no need for it.
So in the end, you can ignore all this if you want to see David Tennant do a speech about how he’s a Time Lord, a scene that seems to be from a different story and just awkwardly shoved in as the music and direction have to change when it turns up. But except for that, there’s really nothing on offer here. It’s too dark to be fun and it’s too over the top to be dramatic, so it just ends up being a bit boring and rubbish. Out of all the Tennant Christmas Specials, this is by far the worst, and I’d very much advise you to give it a miss.
1/5
OH and happy Titanic day. Because I forgot I’d written about the Titanic by the time I got to the end of the review. Why was it on the space Titanic? IT DOESNT MAKE SEEEEENNNNSEEE.
Right, last time I had to describe the Doctor before the review, but we all know this one, David Tennant, Christmas, 2007. Hell, probably more than half the people reading this will have seen the episode I’m talking about. If you haven’t quick description of the plot, there is a replica of the Titanic as a cruise liner for aliens above the Earth, its robot servants go bad and it gets hit by a meteor strike and the ship is crippled. The Doctor and his merry band of misfits have to get to the bridge before the ship falls out of the sky and solve the mystery of who’s behind the disaster and why. So far, so a bit too far. Replica of the Titanic? Why? Oh well, it’s Christmas, let’s move on. This is one of Tennant’s solo stories where he gets a companion just for the one episode. While David gives a solid performance (although not one of his best and we’ll look at the mess of the Doctor’s storyline in a minute), his companion is played by Kylie Minogue. Say what you will about her as a musician, she’s not really an actor. Well, a good one. Kylie can’t act and she’s annoying in this story. In fact she doesn’t really do anything useful until the end. But we’ll get to… I have to stop saying we’ll get to that, let’s look at the characters’ stories.
The Doctor keeps telling people he’ll save them then fails but he doesn’t give up until the end and then he’s all annoyed at who lived and died. It seems as though there’s a message or some kind of deep emotions going on here, but there isn’t. It’s just a bit pointless. The Doctor and Kylie, or Astrid Peth if you want to give her her absolutely ridiculous name, are meant to have a deep bond. But the actors have no chemistry and the script doesn’t give anything other than forced moments that are really awkward. The Doctor seems to bond as much with the old man as Astrid and you don’t see them having a snog. It just seems unnatural. As I said she doesn’t do anything except look excited at stuff and be nice to an unnecessarily weird lame alien who is a very unnecessary weird lame metaphor for homosexuality until the end. Then she goes to meet the Doctor and kills herself to kill the lamest villain in Doctor Who since that one with Peter Kay. He’s basically a head on top of a box that’s made of spare machine parts like a really rubbish Davros rip-off. And she kills him with-in 5 minutes of him being on screen being hammy and unthreatening with a forklift truck. Forgetting ‘how does she get out of the truck for us to see her fall, but not just jump to save her life’ plot holes, it really just removes any emotion from the scene when we see the villain’s gurning face and a forklift. It’s just too ridiculous and it doesn’t work. Even on Christmas. Then the music swells, as it has throughout the episode, the music being good but put into scenes in a rather clunky way suddenly starting, stopping or changing, and the Doctor walks away from an explosion without flinching in the worst most over the top sequence in the episode. Then he’s lifted up by angels. No wonder people love David Tennant. No I’m only kidding, but really? Russell T Davies has always tried to make the Doctor seem like a god, but he does it in the bluntest and least effective ways possible. Anyway, the Doctor gets to say something fun; he flies the Titanic over Buckingham Palace and the Queen waves at him. I’m getting tired of trying to find new ways to say this is over the top. Then they try to save Astrid and she turns into some weird ghost and the Doctor kisses her and there are no words to explain how this makes no sense and is only there to make us feel better after they killed off the companion on Christmas Day, and then we have a happy scene to make us all feel better and that’s it. Goodnight. The End. You think you’ve watched a happy piece of fun and try and forget it makes no sense and is just generally awful and a bit depressing.
Depressing you say? Well, let’s have a look. The Titanic gets smashed up and loads of people die. But we don’t see them so whatever, who cares. Then the random sailor guy dies. Then the fat people die, for like no reason except they don’t fit in the plot anymore. Did they need to die for the story to work? No. Did it add anything? No. Then that red guy dies. But he was irritating even though the story seemed to be going out of its way to make me like him. And then the companion dies. Merry Christmas everyone! I’m not against a dark story, but this one was just dark for the sake of it and there was no need for it.
So in the end, you can ignore all this if you want to see David Tennant do a speech about how he’s a Time Lord, a scene that seems to be from a different story and just awkwardly shoved in as the music and direction have to change when it turns up. But except for that, there’s really nothing on offer here. It’s too dark to be fun and it’s too over the top to be dramatic, so it just ends up being a bit boring and rubbish. Out of all the Tennant Christmas Specials, this is by far the worst, and I’d very much advise you to give it a miss.
1/5
 |
| This is ridiculous. |
Tuesday, 10 April 2012
Monday, 9 April 2012
Doctor Who Review: The Dalek Invasion of Earth
This time we travel back to a very early time in the history of Doctor Who. It’s the time of the first Doctor (William Hartnell), a crotchety old man who travels with his granddaughter Susan and two of her teachers, Ian and Barbara, who he kidnapped when they discovered his ship in 1960s London. They travel through time seeing wonderful things and trying to get home, and end up in adventures more by accident than by choice. It’s Doctor Who unlike any other period, where things aren’t set in stone; anything could happen and filled with mystery.
I’ll go into the rest of the story in a little less detail for two reasons. One, it is six episodes long, so it would take me all day to go into it all. But secondly, and more importantly, when I talk about the new series I expect anyone reading to have seen the episode, but here, most if not all people won’t have seen it. So instead of ruining it all, I’d like to try and persuade you to give it a look up and see what you think. Obviously there are some things that will seem strange to a modern audience for example, the awful saucer effects, the strange Dalek voices, the Doctor’s trousers, some fluffed lines and the Doctor being an old man, who doesn’t get as involved in the main story as some of his companions. But don’t let these put you off; there are a lot of good things here.
As I said, the Doctor is less involved than in later years, but William Hartnell still gives a fantastic performance, the highlights being his indignant attitude to the Daleks when they meet (this is before the Daleks know of the Doctor, so they view him as just another human, yet he still talks them down), and the ending where one of the companions leaves. This ending is still touching, without having to be over the top. His companion has just outgrown the Doctor, and has a new path in life, she doesn’t get trapped in a parallel universe, or get her heartbroken, or lose all her memories or die. This makes the departure seem more real and sadder. All of the companions give one of their best performances here, Susan with her touching falling for David, Ian and his mix of strength and light hearted fun and Barbara who’s intelligence and will in this story really show why this is one of the best sets of companions in Doctor Who history. The supporting cast all give good performances and have well rounded, real characters as well, each with their own interesting story to tell.
As for the plot, the major Dalek plan is a bit ridiculous, but then again, when is it not? However the way this story is told, with the different paths with different characters and the many varying locations provide a rather grand scale to the proceedings. It’s almost like a war story, with the resistance, the oppressors, the underground bunkers and the work camps, all very reminiscent of the Second World War.
Not only do we have good acting, good script (with the exception of a line where the Doctor tells Susan she deserves a “smacked bottom”) and a good story, we also have a very good looking story. Some effects don’t hold up today, but for the most part all the studio sets and props seem very convincing and impressive. The Daleks themselves look particularly good in this story with their strange disks on their backs that never returned, and their human slaves, the Robomen have a very striking almost zombie like design. One thing that really stands out though are the exterior shots. This was the first Doctor Who story ever to have parts shot on location, and they are magnificent. Seeing the Daleks at the London landmarks is brilliantly creepy and the way all these sequences are shot, especially an early chase with Barbara seems more suited to a stylish film rather than a BBC TV show.
So basically, this is one of the greatest Doctor Who’s ever. It is very well made and very entertaining. It also contains the first recurring villains, the first locations shooting, the first ‘monster’ and the first ever companion departure. Not only is it a great adventure, it also holds a place in Doctor Who history and I’d strongly recommend you give it a shot.
5/5
This story involves the Tardis arriving in London in the 22nd century where the crew find the city in ruins and silent. Although the rest of the story is very good, I would definitely suggest the first episode is the best part and a good example of why the slower pace of the classic series of Who works so well. The whole episode very little happens; the Tardis crew is trapped out of the ship and search around to find tools to get back in. However what makes it work is a gloriously creepy atmosphere. The silence and the chilling soundtrack make this episode incredibly effective, with the audience on the edge of their seat waiting to see why the place is so empty and why there are dead bodies everywhere. In fact, the episode starts with a man committing suicide, setting a terrifying mood. And then we come to a problem. This story is released on DVD as The Dalek Invasion of Earth, so to us it’s obvious that the Daleks would be in it, however at the time each episode had a different title and this one’s was World’s End. This meant that none of the audience knew the Daleks would appear, especially as they had only ever appeared once before in which they seemed to be totally destroyed. The shock of seeing one rolling up out of the Thames would have been thrilling, and while it’s somewhat lost on us, it’s still a very strong image.
I’ll go into the rest of the story in a little less detail for two reasons. One, it is six episodes long, so it would take me all day to go into it all. But secondly, and more importantly, when I talk about the new series I expect anyone reading to have seen the episode, but here, most if not all people won’t have seen it. So instead of ruining it all, I’d like to try and persuade you to give it a look up and see what you think. Obviously there are some things that will seem strange to a modern audience for example, the awful saucer effects, the strange Dalek voices, the Doctor’s trousers, some fluffed lines and the Doctor being an old man, who doesn’t get as involved in the main story as some of his companions. But don’t let these put you off; there are a lot of good things here.
As I said, the Doctor is less involved than in later years, but William Hartnell still gives a fantastic performance, the highlights being his indignant attitude to the Daleks when they meet (this is before the Daleks know of the Doctor, so they view him as just another human, yet he still talks them down), and the ending where one of the companions leaves. This ending is still touching, without having to be over the top. His companion has just outgrown the Doctor, and has a new path in life, she doesn’t get trapped in a parallel universe, or get her heartbroken, or lose all her memories or die. This makes the departure seem more real and sadder. All of the companions give one of their best performances here, Susan with her touching falling for David, Ian and his mix of strength and light hearted fun and Barbara who’s intelligence and will in this story really show why this is one of the best sets of companions in Doctor Who history. The supporting cast all give good performances and have well rounded, real characters as well, each with their own interesting story to tell.
As for the plot, the major Dalek plan is a bit ridiculous, but then again, when is it not? However the way this story is told, with the different paths with different characters and the many varying locations provide a rather grand scale to the proceedings. It’s almost like a war story, with the resistance, the oppressors, the underground bunkers and the work camps, all very reminiscent of the Second World War.
Not only do we have good acting, good script (with the exception of a line where the Doctor tells Susan she deserves a “smacked bottom”) and a good story, we also have a very good looking story. Some effects don’t hold up today, but for the most part all the studio sets and props seem very convincing and impressive. The Daleks themselves look particularly good in this story with their strange disks on their backs that never returned, and their human slaves, the Robomen have a very striking almost zombie like design. One thing that really stands out though are the exterior shots. This was the first Doctor Who story ever to have parts shot on location, and they are magnificent. Seeing the Daleks at the London landmarks is brilliantly creepy and the way all these sequences are shot, especially an early chase with Barbara seems more suited to a stylish film rather than a BBC TV show.
So basically, this is one of the greatest Doctor Who’s ever. It is very well made and very entertaining. It also contains the first recurring villains, the first locations shooting, the first ‘monster’ and the first ever companion departure. Not only is it a great adventure, it also holds a place in Doctor Who history and I’d strongly recommend you give it a shot.
5/5
Wednesday, 4 April 2012
Review: Streetdance 2/The Pirates! In an Adventure with Scientists/Mirror Mirror/Wrath of the Titans
STREETDANCE 2
THE PIRATES! IN AN ADVENTURE WITH SCIENTISTS
MIRROR MIRROR
WRATH OF THE TITANS
THE PIRATES! IN AN ADVENTURE WITH SCIENTISTS
MIRROR MIRROR
WRATH OF THE TITANS
Sunday, 1 April 2012
Poundcorner: 2001, A Space Odyssey
This time we look at some trashy sci-fi movie no-one cares about.
ps. April fools.
ps. April fools.
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