Dr. Who - Hell Bent

[Percysowner]

He also didn't have JMS's fortitude to fire someone either. Clara's story was over and done at the previous Christmas Special, then the actress changed her mind at the last minute and wanted to stay. JMS would have put the foot down and told her no, but Moffy let her stay. Clara ought to have been over and done long before this point.

I totally agree. I was never a HUGE Clara fan, but if she had left with Last Christmas, it would have been a satisfying end to her story and I would have thought more fondly of her.

In a to be fair moment, the rumors have been strong that Moffet wanted Victorian Clara to be the companion and the BBC insisted that he had to have a modern companion instead. I thought Victorian Clara was a far more interesting character than the modern version. It was a missed opportunity. It wouldn't have reined in his tendency to rhapsodize over "one special girl", which was his forte, but at least Victorian Clara would have been someone that I cared more about.

[Wolf359]

8:45 doesn’t Janeway have a vibrating throne made of skulls? I’m almost certain she’d have a castle too!

15:01 I feel like that scene should end with the kid running off to buy the biggest turkey in the butcher’s shop, but hey, it’s not like it’s Christmas or anything...

[Sailor Nimue]

Agree, plus nothing ever came of Clara and Ashildir, I can only guess everyone else at BBC realize that be uninteresting and more trouble than it worth.

Agree with you fully on that point. Also, I think I remember Ashildir's actress said she would rather not play the character again. I could be misremembering however.

I think we all know exactly the future review Chuck's alluding to near the end. I hadn't thought about the similarity, but now it's unmistakable.

[BBally81]

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).

[Sailor Nimue]

Big Finish also made Rassilon a villain if I remember correctly.

[clearspira]

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 only know what they have put on TV and the Rassilon in ''The Five Doctors'' came across as rather ''Old Testament God'' in that he had no problem with petrifying people fully conscious for eternity but he was doing so for what he believed to be peoples' own good.
(And in my continuing belief that the Doctor is an asshole, he once did the very same thing to a woman by turning her into a paving slab so in many ways they were not dissimilar back then).

[LordUltimus]

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.

[Jonathan101]

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?

Moffat is definitely the planner type. His issue is he figures out the big overall plan, the twist or hook that makes it all come together, but doesn't quite have the details in the middle, or the nature of running a show itself gets in the way with actors leaving sooner or later than the actual story demands, and he doesn't really have a method to work around that the way say, Babylon 5 had outs for every major character..

River Song is a pretty clear example of where he knew the ending (he started with it after all) and probably knew the beginning and some of the tentpole events... but didn't know the middle which is why you end up with things like River's previous regeneration being a character the cast knew but that we had never met prior to that. Or that her casting was clearly meant to play mostly off Tennant, and not off Smith who was 20 years younger than her.

Similarly, and I've said it before, but its really REALLY clear from certain pacing issues around the 50th anniversary that he thought he'd have Matt Smith for one more year than he did, he was setting up an entire season arc to go find Gallifrey again and deal with the Silence and play wtht he fact we now knew Smith was the "last" regeneration wince we were now counting Tennant as two regens and War ... but didn't want to burden the next actor with those story arc points or meaty bits, so rushed through a season's worth of material in one episode to do the handoff. NO ONE would have written the ending to the 50th the way he did if they knew it was going to be resolved in the very next episode. And probably would have glossed over Tennant having used one up if he'd thought he could get that mileage out of Capaldi instead.

Similarly, with every companion in his era, he gave them fantastic send offs, endings he'd clearly thought long and hard about... but then the actors changed their minds and wanted to stay around longer... so they then just get partial seasons with no idea what to do with them and much more lackluster sendoffs.

Being a Gardener does not have to mean that you don't know where you are going.

George R. R. Martin identifies as a Gardener (and he actually coined the terms Gardener / Architect in the first place) but he's always maintained that he envisioned the ending to ASOIAF years and years ago, and a few story beats along the way. He just doesn't like to outline his plans or plan in too much detail.

With Moffat, I always felt the issue is more that he likes to "subvert our expectations". He likes to set up big, action packed finales with a classic Dr Who villain or villains...and then runs off in a different direction that shifts the focus to more character centric musings on the nature of life and death or whatever, revealing those villains to be plot devices in service to the themes he REALLY wants to explore, and resulting in two-parters that start off strong and fail miserably in the end.

[CrypticMirror]

(And in my continuing belief that the Doctor is an asshole, he once did the very same thing to a woman by turning her into a paving slab so in many ways they were not dissimilar back then).

I thought we were all choosing to believe that was Elton having a minor psychotic break to cope with the horror of Peter Kay's budgie smugglers. And his girlfriend's ghost went on to haunt a minor public school in Scotland somewhere?

[FlynnTaggart]

I thought we were all choosing to believe that was Elton having a minor psychotic break to cope with the horror of Peter Kay's budgie smugglers. And his girlfriend's ghost went on to haunt a minor public school in Scotland somewhere?

I'm down for that. Body horror like that, completely being rendered helpless is one of the most horrific things imaginable to me (probably why I was weirded out by the "eel" scene in the Witcher tv series) and why I felt the what the Doctor did to the Family of Blood was so horrifying. To be fully conscious and unable to do anything, completely reliant on others, your body gone, all is left is a mind in an alien form, atleast Ursula had a mouth to scream. And give BJs apparently.

Being a ghost making problem pee'ers have even more problems sounds like a far better way to end up. Probably less dicks involved despite it being a bathroom.

More on topic, I had a bit of trouble even just starting the review because of how disgusted I got with Dr Who towards the end. I know some people joke about being able to watch Chuck read the phonebook but a phonebook isn't going to annoy you. Whatever the reason Dr Who to me went down in quality a great deal. Wasn't just Clara getting annoying, the whole show to me felt dumbed down and just unenjoyable. Who works bests as an exciting adventure with smart (or atleast enjoyable) stories with clever and/or likable characters. Who by 12 had little of that, the "old man" Doctor was Scrooge dialed up to 11 (or rather 12) which is a little funny considering a previous Doc encountered Scrooge, Clara was just never interesting and got just plain annoying as time went on, and the writing was depressing or just not intelligent to me.

And considering I cannot write anything not chock full of cliches and barely disguised "borrowed" elements from other works if something seems unintelligent to me (the guy writing a story based upon the concept what if old tombs in Elder Scrolls were actually really old bunkers from Fallout) you are doing something wrong. Like the guy who manages to eff up making Ramen noodles saying you are even worse at cooking then he is.

Not blaming the actors or actresses, they when they had some stuff to work with did fine just most of the time the writing wasn't good enough. And from what I heard the show is continuing that trend despite a new writer. Not blaming the actress, from what I've heard despite some complaints about the rule 63ing the Doctor Jodie Whittaker is pretty great but like Capaldi before her is saddled with less the stellar writing. And more effed up "mercy" with apparently a permanent coma saddled on some villain because killing is teh bads but hey making someone in a state worse then death so long as they aren't dead is freaking okay.