Dr. Who - Hell Bent

[Nevix]

This is a repeat of The Waters of Mars.

It's not even original, it's just a repeat of The Waters of Mars... only with a "smarter" companion, and the companion lives instead of dying to protect time.

And that's AFTER copying the whole "Wipe her memory so she can survive!" thing with Donna Noble.

Moffat has about 3 stories, and he keeps recycling them. That's one of my biggest problems with the New Who series. It's too repetitive.

[turbo_sailor67]

https://sfdebris.com/videos/doctorwho/s35e12.php

I feel a little weird being the one to start the topic, as I've never been a fan of Dr. Who despite wanting to be one. I thoroughly enjoy Chucks reviews of them though, and I think this might be the way I can enjoy the series, via proxy. I hope someone adds The Key to Time arc to the queue, as that also seems like it would be a great story arc to review.

Now, after that paragraph which has nothing to do with the episode or the review - I think this story does look like it has interesting ideas - I actually like the idea of the Dr. being someone who starts others out to begin the same journey as he is on, someone who ignites a fire in them and then allows them to leave to inspire others and explore on their own - but as Chuck said it looks like it doesn't follow through on the promises made in Heaven Sent, and ignores what he could do to help other companions from previous regenerations. I think this might have to do with Mr. Moffet's approach to plotting. Gardeners - writers who write by the seat of their pants, and so typically have vibrant and believable characters - usually don't plan the ending in detail when they write, while Architects - planners - typically do and so can foreshadow and make their endings live up to the promises. Does anyone know Mr. Moffet's style?

Also, I've been meaning to ask, but does anyone know the version of the Dr. Who theme Chuck uses in these reviews?

Good question! I've been a fan of Doctor Who since I was a kid, and I've since collected on a combination of DVD, iTunes, and Blu-ray all of the DW serials that I enjoy and personally deem worthy of spending my time and money collecting, although I have watched every single episode of the classic series and only skipped over Matt Smith Doctor.

I have almost never enjoyed anything of Moffet. Everyone raves about "Blink" but the punch of the Weeping Angels is not even a love tap to me. Instead of killing you they just send you back in time? Not the worst thing to ever happen to you. Never found them scary or thrilling even in concept.

The only thing I liked of his was the girl in the fireplace. I hate everything he did with Matt Smith, trying way to hard to amp up the idea that the Doctor is a flippant, ignorant but horny nutty, wacky professor with a Magic Wand. That was the entire basis behind JNT in the 80's doing away with the sonic screwdriver, was because it had become a magic wand to solve all problems instantly.

Then the ratcheting up the companions with Matt Smith being the most important companions and besteset evar! Why the Doctor LOVES them so much it's implied he'd like to have a threesome with them! The Doctor is so BROKEN when they're gone he just can't live without them! I mean, it isn't like the Doctor has EVER lost a companion before!

Ugh. Then the WORST companion in my opinion pops up, Clara the "impossible" girl because she's impossible to tolerate. Somehow she's smarter and more capable than the Doctor at all times. I get the impression that there was a distinct effort made to tone down the competency of the Doctor after "Deep Breath" and start making him more and more pathetic. One example is in the Robin Hood episode where the Doctor and Robin Hood are supposed to be doing the "oh you stupid pathetic men fighting to show whos more of a man to impress the woman" bit and when they get captured it's up to magic girl Clara to save them because she asks the Doctor if he has a plan to get out of their bonds and he says he does, to which she asks him if he can say/do it without the sonic screwdriver, and he's somehow dejected and at a loss.

W.T.F.

The Doctor got out of numerous scraps both before the sonic screwdriver was invented, and after. It hit its peak with Tom Baker, whom I really like but got to the point where everything was so effortless because of K-9 and the sonic screwdriver and Romana, that it was boring.

The best Doctor Who writing to me, is using the Doctors impressive cunning and wit. He doesn't need to be the most powerful, (that's why initially there was a male companion to provide the muscle) and he's certainly had capable, and/or intelligent female companions before (Zoe, Liz, Sarah, Leela, Romana 1, Tegan and Nyssa, Ace, etc.). It looks like the powers that be felt that the only way they could have a "strong female character" was to undercut the male one.

I don't know what happened to Doctor Who, but I skipped Doctor 11 after his first season and had no interest in returning until his finale, and while I thought 12 was awesome and a return to form at first, it quickly dissipated when they tried turning 12 into a "it's your cool dad! he plays in a band and wears his sunglasses at night!". That fisher king two-parter was pretty good, but yeah anytime I saw an episode with Moffets name on it, then it's a pretty good indicator that it's aloof magic detective and magical girl nonsense trash.

I only know he does that Sherlock show with Mr. My name is Kahn cabbage patch guy and I'd rather just watch him do Doctor Strange even with that off putting accent.

[Thebestoftherest]

I do think that I people didn't like his former works they might not be as patient with him as they were.

[Senko]

I admit I dislike watching all the Clara Episodes she's just unpleasant as a character and this ending where she gets immortality, a tardis and to mindwipe the doctor just rubbed me the wrong way. I took great satisfaction from the implied death of a later episode even if it did mean she got brought back temporarily again.

I like New Who but it has done a great disservice to the character of Rassilon, the character had flaws judging by the non-TV canon before the revived series but New Who writers really him over the edge to outright antagonist after he was resurrected (with only a Twelfth Doctor comic story attempting to redeem the character). In my headcanon, I prefer to think that somehow when the Timelords tried to resurrect him, something went wrong that corrupted him whether a faulty resurrection or corruption from an outside force like the Black Guardian or the Faction Paradox (the latter is no longer part of Dr. Who canon since the original author retained the rights to the FP license as long as he doesn't use any part of the Dr. Who canon even though original the faction consisted of renegade timelords who wanted to create paradoxes).

I think there's a novel that has ressurected Rassilon be upright and noble at first, but trillennia leading the Time Lords in the Time War warped his mind.

Actually my headcanon is that there are two Rassilon's. One is the real Rassilon we see in the classic series ruthless yes but controlled, wise a genuine legend come to life. The other is the equivilent of the Valeyard because he's regenerated too much and been brought back when he shouldn't. This is the one who fights in the time war loses control of himself on occasion, cruel, a powerful and charismatic leader yes but not a legend because his traits and personality are twisted and warped. I've even adapted an idea from the game so that this is a known hazard of the older TARDIS's where there was insufficient protection against certain temporal energies which caused this problem in combination with regenerations and there's a whole slew of warped timelords imprisoned because this happened to them and that's where they retrieved this Rassilon from.

Ugh. Then the WORST companion in my opinion pops up, Clara the "impossible" girl because she's impossible to tolerate. Somehow she's smarter and more capable than the Doctor at all times. I get the impression that there was a distinct effort made to tone down the competency of the Doctor after "Deep Breath" and start making him more and more pathetic. One example is in the Robin Hood episode where the Doctor and Robin Hood are supposed to be doing the "oh you stupid pathetic men fighting to show whos more of a man to impress the woman" bit and when they get captured it's up to magic girl Clara to save them because she asks the Doctor if he has a plan to get out of their bonds and he says he does, to which she asks him if he can say/do it without the sonic screwdriver, and he's somehow dejected and at a loss.

W.T.F.

The Doctor got out of numerous scraps both before the sonic screwdriver was invented, and after. It hit its peak with Tom Baker, whom I really like but got to the point where everything was so effortless because of K-9 and the sonic screwdriver and Romana, that it was boring.

The best Doctor Who writing to me, is using the Doctors impressive cunning and wit. He doesn't need to be the most powerful, (that's why initially there was a male companion to provide the muscle) and he's certainly had capable, and/or intelligent female companions before (Zoe, Liz, Sarah, Leela, Romana 1, Tegan and Nyssa, Ace, etc.). It looks like the powers that be felt that the only way they could have a "strong female character" was to undercut the male one.

I don't know what happened to Doctor Who, but I skipped Doctor 11 after his first season and had no interest in returning until his finale, and while I thought 12 was awesome and a return to form at first, it quickly dissipated when they tried turning 12 into a "it's your cool dad! he plays in a band and wears his sunglasses at night!". That fisher king two-parter was pretty good, but yeah anytime I saw an episode with Moffets name on it, then it's a pretty good indicator that it's aloof magic detective and magical girl nonsense trash.

I only know he does that Sherlock show with Mr. My name is Kahn cabbage patch guy and I'd rather just watch him do Doctor Strange even with that off putting accent.

I agree with that. Its not just Dr who either there's a lot of shows/movies that seem to wind up insulting both women and men because rather than having a strong female character instead they have dumb male character or girl so man she acts like one and it just leaves me shaking my head. Which is insulting because it implies a girl can only be a strong character if the man is useless and cut down to allow it while the later is more her trying to imitate men rather than being strong as a woman. Of course you also get both like the ghostbusters remake bleh. Give me someone like Ripley, Buffy, Sarah Conner, Laurie Strode, Matilda, Lizzie Bennet, Jo March or Princess Cimorene. A girl can be strong and female without needing the man to be incompetent.

[Sir Will]

I like Clara, but this was a terrible way to end her run and only makes people hate her more. And the finding of Galifrey was so completely wasted! And we haven't gone back since. Ugh, so bad.

[sandangel]

I didn't watch the whole run, so take my opinion with a grain of salt, but I think part of the problem with both Clara and Ashildr is that, once their initial storylines were completed, there wasn't as much story material as they thought for all the buildup they got. So the writers were left with overhyped characters and nothing interesting to do with them. Whether this was the fault of the writers or someone above them, who knows, but the end result was that they had these dangling threads, and no idea how to fix them.

Doesn't excuse the bad writing at all, hype is fine but overhype is a problem.

[Nightbeat74]

hay does anyone want to know a nice twist on the hybrid it is rassilon !

[Thebestoftherest]

I didn't watch the whole run, so take my opinion with a grain of salt, but I think part of the problem with both Clara and Ashildr is that, once their initial storylines were completed, there wasn't as much story material as they thought for all the buildup they got. So the writers were left with overhyped characters and nothing interesting to do with them. Whether this was the fault of the writers or someone above them, who knows, but the end result was that they had these dangling threads, and no idea how to fix them.

Doesn't excuse the bad writing at all, hype is fine but overhype is a problem.

I can see that. I mean it been years and I don't think anyone ever said they wanted to see Clara and Ashildr story continue. Not once.