Doctor Meh
WARNING Some spoilers in the rant ahead. If you don’t want to know anything about Doctor Who, what are you reading this for anyway?
Over the last 6 or 7 months, I’ve been spending some quality time with the older two Grumpy Metal Kids watching (and for me, re-watching) Doctor Who. Over the years, we have chosen a series of some sort to work our way through, watching an episode before bed, after chores and various forms of bodily cleansing are complete.
Doctor Who was chosen in part because the kids were curious about it, having seen it plastered all over TV and media. Also thought, it was because I was a big Doctor Who fan back in the Pre-Grumpy Pre-Metal days. I started watching in the Tom Baker1 era, and remember eating dinner on a fold-out blanket in the lounge, laying down and spooning food into my mouth while distracted with what was happening on-screen.
Like most people who were fans back in the day, the combination of atmosphere and storyline were what attracted me to the show. I suspect, having not re-watched the older era, that there’s an element of Rose-Glasses-ism going on here, and that the effects were probably so bad that had I been older, I would have cringed and been put right off. Still, memories are what they are, and are hard to shake.
I also collected the novelisations. Terrence Dicks spearheaded the writing of a large number of books, most coming in around the 170-200 page mark from memory. I think I ended up collecting about 50 or 60 of them, and would typically pick one and read through it in an evening in bed before turning the light off. I’d also get some of them out from the local library if I didn’t already have them, and read through those too.
So yes, I think it’s fair to say that I was a big fan going into the 2000s.
A New Era… Back In Time⌗
I’d watched the new era of Doctor Who from when it launched in 20052 until roughly the second season with Peter Capaldi. After that point, I stopped watching, primarily due to various Grumpy Life Changes that were going on at the time, but also what the fuck is going on with that guitar. Generally, I had fairly good memories of it, and thought it was a good thing to watch through again.
I may have been mistaken.
To be fair, the Christopher Eccleston era got things off to a reasonable enough start. First episode, not amazing, but I really enjoyed watching the second episode (The End of the World), which felt like a return to proper sci-fi, apart from one thing. And that thing was a sign of things to come that would make the series worse and worse as it has gone on.
That thing is Britney Spears. More specifically, the song Toxic.
Now, this may come as a bit of a surprise, but this Grumpy Metal Guy doesn’t actually mind the song. My Grumpy Metal feet can be found tapping along to it if it appears in some form. So the song itself isn’t a problem. What is problematic is the fact that it’s in an episode of Doctor Who.
When the hell did Doctor Who become more interested in being cool or hip? When did cheap giggles referring to current pop stars warrant a place in a prime-time TV series with such a storied history? Although Motörhead made a fun appearance in the Young Ones, the episode in which ABBA made a surprise appearance in Doctor Who as an out-of-luck intergalactic band of entertainers has slipped my mind.
This only appears to have gotten worse as the series has continued. Pick a current pop or soap series star for the ever-present Christmas special, or references to other TV shows (Big Brother? Really? My kids didn’t get the reference, and it was key to the “humour” of the episode), and gain instant credibility with the audience in an attempt to boost ratings and keep things “cool”.
The Most Feared And Terrifying - Hey, Let’s Just Talk It Out⌗
That is only one of the big problems though. The second is some of the key plot devices used in the show. Again, full disclaimer here - I’m not remembering the intricacies of the pre-2000 shows3, which may well have suffered from the same issues.
The Daleks are meant to be feared. They’re supposed to be terrifying. All conquering. Barely defeated in the great Time War. And yet, all it seems to take is one person talking at them for more than five seconds in a matey manner to completely confuse them, or to stall them, or make them do something stupid. Or they see a helpless human, and spend 15 or 20 seconds describing how terrible they are and how they will EXTERMINATE them. Repeatedly. Without exterminating them. Just chatting really. How’s the weather? Have anything good for dinner? Conquer any interesting worlds recently?
When, let’s face it, they could just shoot people. Straight away. No waiting around. Just blast them and get on with their plans to conquer the universe. They’re so obsessed with telling everyone how evil they are that they stop being evil, and become incompetent instead. All of the bad guys seem to suffer from this fatal plot flaw. They’re all so quaintly naughty that the gaping holes in the storyline start making me Grumpy.
What Time Is It Anyway?⌗
The other major plot issue is the whole time travel thing. The Doctor travels in a machine that, minor technical issues of operational efficiency aside, can go anywhere, any time. That renders pretty much most plot points moot. I know they’re trying to portray the timeline as a sacred “can’t mess about with it” kind of structure, but that’s pretty much all the Doctor does, intentionally, while muttering that they “really shouldn’t be doing this”. It’s like they suffer from a kind of intentional amnesia, when it only crops up from time to time that they could actually use time travel to solve the problem at hand.
I get that these plot “issues” are part of the charm of the series. But on re-watching the latter era Who, it’s all just a bit too clever at the same time as being a bit too dumbed down. The plot drama often hinges on there being “just no way to fix this”, when anyone with five brain-cells and a rudimentary recollection of the fact that the Doctor has a time machine could work out a solution. Grump levels have been rising the further I get into it.
A Few Gleaming Gems In Something Of A Pile Of Crap⌗
So, with all that said, there are still a few good moments in it. For me, 4 seasons in at this stage, the biggest (non-Grumpy) surprise has been Catherine Tate playing Donna Noble, and realising that she can actually act. I’d always associated her with cheap laughs on bad comedy shows, but the end of her season-long story was genuinely sad, and she played it well. I think part of this comes from my own perspective on time changing as I get older, but the thought of having a chunk of significant, life-altering memories just wiped out, as if they’d never happened, makes me cherish my own happy memories that much more.
Some episodes held up pretty well after re-watching. The Bad Wolf twist in season 1 was pretty nifty. Blink wasn’t as scary as I remembered it being, and was pretty fun to watch. The Waters of Mars managed to address the whole “Hey, I’m a Timelord, eat my TARDIS” thing pretty well, and I’m glad it ended the way it did.
For me, the good episodes generally make up around 30% of the first 4 seasons. The rest are all effectively throwaway, with no real re-watch potential. And that’s a real pity, as when it gets it right, those few episodes are still as good to watch today as when they first screened. There’s just not really that many of them.
It’s All Relative⌗
Many people still bang on about the new series special effects not holding up particularly well. I’d say that’s a feature, not a bug, as this has never been a show about fancy special effects. It’s always been about the story, good or bad, and that hasn’t changed with the latest Doctors. Sadly, for this Grumpy Metal Fan, it’s leaned more towards the bad than the good, and that’s a real shame, as this is a great vehicle for trying to get some good quality sci-fi on the small(ish) screen.
Will it stop me watching? Not for now, as the Grumpy Metal Kids are still enjoying it. Although I’ve got the Matt Smith years to suffer through now, which I’m really not looking forward to. And then there’s that fucking guitar…