Doctor Who

A bit light on character stuff for my liking, but a very very intriguing mystery, and one I'm looking forward to see continued to be solved next week.

Review. Probably counts as 'spoilered'

http://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/tvandradioblog/2015/oct/03/doctor-who-series-35-episode-3-under-the-lake

The comments have some interesting WMG about Cass.

For those who might be interested, The BBC did an article on Sophie Stone (Cass) a year ago as an up and coming Deaf actress.

Link

So the TARDIS brings the Doctor to underwater bases when She's unhappy.

...Makes sense, given last time.

EDIT: I prefer my interpretation.

Review.

edited 3rd Oct '15 7:00:32 PM by unnoun

Well, they aren't ghosts this time either huh?

If I were the Cybermen, I'd sue.

Until next week tropers!

edited 3rd Oct '15 7:06:34 PM by HandsomeRob

One Strip! One Strip!

On the Bechdel test, how does that work with one character signing and thus speaking though a translator. So do we count the commander lady's dialog to other female characters as women to women dialog or man to women? Considering that the man in the situation is purely providing translation.

On the black guy dying first, it seems that they decided to make a conscious move to put minorities in leadership positions in this episode, as like most episodes like this they kill off the original leader, which helps explain why the Doctor is able to take command. So they either don't kill the leader (thus devaluing the threat, also leaving them with the choice of killing nobody, killing one of the two women, killing one of the two other minority men, or giving the asshole white guy a heroic death), or make a white guy the leader of the group (which has its own set of bad implications).

edited 3rd Oct '15 9:54:39 PM by Silasw

“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ Cyran

I'd say it's woman to woman since the man is just an intermediary.

Anyway, thoughts: I wasn't too thrilled with the last two episodes but I liked this one a lot. It seems a bit weird to immediately have another two parter though. One thing that bugs me is the explanation for the sword. That's just...no. Come on writers, you should realize how stupid that sounds. I'm also a bit confused by why the Doctor ghost didn't do anything until the very end. Those are ultimately minor points though.

edited 3rd Oct '15 9:18:09 PM by Kostya

Oh and my favourite bit of dialog. You think the army would just lose a prototype weapon?", "you're new to the military aren't you son?"

Another thought on the accusation of it evoking black dude dies first. Isn't that about when the only minority is killed off? Because that's what the trope page says, and you'll notice that by the end both white men are dead (though we know it won't stick for the Doctor) and we're left with 3 women (one of whom is disabled) and two ethnic minorities. That's not exactly killing off the one ethnic minority.

edited 3rd Oct '15 9:41:15 PM by Silasw

“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ Cyran

Ooh, I quite liked this one. Very exciting. The tension came less from people being killed off and more from wondering just what the heck is going on, although I actually did think that someone would die in the chase scene. I'm curious what's up with that one guy, Cass' interpreter (I forget his name). The ghost didn't kill him, and the preview shows them doing...something to him. Come to think of it, Cass wouldn't let him on the ship, would she? I mean, even if she thought it was dangerous, she didn't object to anyone else getting on. I wonder if she knows more than she's letting on...

I loved the cliffhanger, and how it greatly changes the premise. When he said "before the flood", for some reason I thought the Doctor was going to go back to the base before the ghosts started showing up. I hadn't realized that he meant that they were going back before the town flooded - that makes things very interesting.

I did like how they had a deaf woman as the base's commander for a majority of the episode, though yeah, invoking Black Dude Dies First was unfortunate. I am glad, though, that the episode didn't feel the need to have a huge body count...yet, of course. Things could easily change, and it looks like there's going to be a massive flood, so...

I actually thought the card gag was kind of funny, but I knew some people wouldn't be too fond of it.

edited 3rd Oct '15 10:06:49 PM by KarkatTheDalek

Oh God! Natural light!

If you read the page for Black Dude Dies First you'll see that it wasn't evoked, the trope says that it's about when it's the only minority character. In fact the playing with page notes specifically that the trope is subverted when there's a mixed race cast (as there is in this case).

As for why the translator guy wasn't killed, it's because he's never been in the ship and thus never seen the words, thus he's useless to the ghosts, same as Clara and the Doctor were at the start. It's also why he was surprised by the words (notice that he raises his hand when the Doctor asks if anyone was surprised.).

edited 3rd Oct '15 10:21:17 PM by Silasw

“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ Cyran

Oh, good point, I missed that.

Is there a reason why Cass didn't let him, specifically, on, though?

One last thing: Clara once again didn't have much to do, but going by the Next Time trailer, I think that will change next episode. It helps that that Clara and the Doctor are now separated (with the Doctor seemingly dead), and unlike "The Witch's Familiar", Clara has a very solid claim to being the dominant force of personality in her group.

edited 3rd Oct '15 10:28:45 PM by KarkatTheDalek

Oh God! Natural light!

Our definition isn't universal (and honestly, doesn't really make sense to me.)

When most people say "black guy dies first" they mean it literally.

That aside, I enjoyed this episode a lot. Though I'll say I am immediately noticing the drawback of a season that consists almost entirely of two-parters: If you don't like the setup, you have to wait a whole two weeks for something new, rather than just one.

"It's so hard to be humble, knowing how great I am."

Moved the page for the upcoming spinoff Class to Series/Class2016 because of the CBBC programme of the same name. This is going to be confusing.

I had a dog-themed avatar before it was cool.

Well, next week promises a dramatic shake-up in the action, so that might be worth something.

Oh God! Natural light!

Pretty sure the Doctor just said "Hello, sailors". My life is now complete.

Anyone else suspecting that The Doctor is in the stasis pod and the TARDIS freaked out that he might be going to open it?

Also, See Hear has a special about Cass if anyone's interested.

It seems quite possible , but that raises its own share of questions.

edited 4th Oct '15 2:11:05 AM by KarkatTheDalek

Oh God! Natural light!

Of course.

Another Doctor Who, another rambling What's your point Sandifer review. I don't understand why he's the link people post.

Cass may know more than she's letting on. She kept her signer away from the words. Cass-andra? How would that play out, time for some Classics reading.

The coordinates thing was a bit ropey, but given the crap TV serves up about actual facts (CSI anyone?) its just a macguffin: just assume they were saying something sensible, unless it turns out there is another explanation and the Doc is wrong.

Am I the only one who didn't really like this episode? Because that's what it's sounding like. It was a Base Under Siege which, as it's written, doesn't do anything new or interesting for the formula or the program, and spends too much time on trying to figure out the mystery as opposed to developing our band of stock characters, who seem to be there either to just be killed off or otherwise be used as plot devices. They could have a taken a good 5-10 minutes to flesh them out a bit, which you'd think would be one of the advantages of having a two-parter, but that just wasn't the case. This might have flied back in the 60's or maybe even the early 70's, but this is 2015, not 1965, so what worked then isn't going to work now. The episode just doesn't have enough to really sink your teeth into without any interesting characters to get you invested in it aside from the Doctor and Clara, (who's once again underserviced here anyway,) because all it is is setting things up for the real story in the second episode. I wouldn't mind it if I could just watch both episodes back to back on Netflix, but I don't really have that option just yet. It wasn't a bad episode, but it wasn't very good either. Hopefully, the second part can salvage something out of it, because as is, it's just mediocre, which to me is one of the worst things you can be in Doctor Who.

Also, 1.Having the commander be a deaf-mute was a nice touch, and 2.The Sword of Orion explanation was as BS as everyone says it is.

I rewatched the episode on ABC iview (only up to about the 18 miute mark, because it's quarter to 3 am. I'll watch the rest tomorrow), and wrote some stuff down while watching it.

I didn't hear in the first watching that the valley flooded in the 1980's.

I liked the bit where the Doctor's asking the TARDIS why she's unhappy (I like little bits like that)

When I was first watching it, the writing looked like numbers, "14 41 14 514". Having rewatched it (on a screen that's both smaller and closer to my annoyingly short-sighted-even-when-wearing-glasses eyes) they don't quite look as much like numbers (although the 41 also looks like 37).

I feel like the lead someone mentioned that's lining the faraday cage will be plot-relevant.

I didn't really realise what he was saying when I first watched the episode, but that's pretty much what happened with Jack, isn't it? Maybe he installed the hand brake after that happened (or after Utopia) to stop her leaving when she sees Jack . I also noticed that there were noises not unsimilar to the angry TARDIS noises from Hide when the Doctor was leaving. It's now my headcanon that she set off the cloister bell to say "HEY! I wanna go!" and those noises were "nooo don't leave I wanna gooo."

edited 4th Oct '15 8:51:10 AM by thekikoperson

So what does everyone think of cass? Personally I think she's an amazing character, really good representation and stuff. I watched the episode with some friends and we came to the conclusion that it was a pretty good episode. Not an instant classic but fun and scary in an enjoyable way. The others didn;t like the cliffhanger for some reason but I'm not gonna judge it until I see next weeks episode. Cliffhangers have definitely come a long way since aliens of london in my opinion.

The internet is a waste of time, and that's exactly what's right about it-William Gibson

I enjoyed Cass's character. The sci-fi snarker in me was wondering why hearing-enhancement technology apparently hadn't advanced much in 100 years, though. Cybernetic implants? Microchips that stimulate the hearing centers of the brain? Barring that, the need for a signer might be eliminated is she could be neurally connected to a device that could hear and speak for her; we're not far from stuff like that now. But then, these folks are working with an oil company, so maybe I'm thinking too hard. The future on Doctor Who frequently looks a bit old fashioned. All that aside, she's an interesting character.

edited 4th Oct '15 10:08:19 AM by Robbery

I loved Cass.

On another note, is this the first time the psychic paper has cut the crap and just told people who the Doctor is?

I believe what the paper shows depends on what the person holding it is thinking.

It may reflect the less silly nature of 12 that it jumped straight to Unit employee (which is still more honest than everything else he's claimed to be).

One Strip! One Strip!