Doctor Who - Waters of MarsFollow

Finally a new Doctor Who, we've had to wait long enough for it

The story started out bugging me quite a bit, it's perhaps symptomatic for the current Doctor Who as it all just seems the same thing done over and over again, they run, something happens, they start to run again, ...

SpoilerThe story was seemingly similar to a two-parter of the second season, the episodes where they are near a black hole and they seem to have released the Devil himself. It's similar as it's a group of people, on a hostile planet (ie: in a space station) and one of their members is taken over by a hostile entity. The rest of the episode is basically trying to figure out how to escape and just what happened.

But at least this time, they added a bit more to it. The dilemma the Doctor faced was interesting and as there was no companion to play his conscience, it's quite interesting how they finally sort of made him snap.

My biggest regret is ofcourse that they didn't make his "Time Lord Victorious" attitude last longer, perhaps make it the basis of his ultimate death, which is ofcourse just one episode away. I will miss Tenant as the Doctor, he's done it with flair! Can't wait for that episode though, the return of my favourite villain, again but who's counting?

All in all, a good episode, dark and interesting.

Hard to say, it's possible though, it makes for spectacular shows although I didn't care much for that Torchwood episode (nor entire season for that matter).

I haven't really dug for any info on the next Doctor, apart from who it is. Apart from the fact that the Doctor is getting younger and younger, I don't know what direction they're going to take.

I don't know for sure if I am right but how are they going to go about keeping Doctor Who going? Aren't they kinda hurrying through doctors with how many reincarnations he has left?

The Time Lord council gave the Master several more lives through some sort of machine so he could fight in the Time War. Since Dalek Caan managed to break into a time-locked event to rescue Davros, the Doctor may be able to get in to use the device if needed. Or he could siphon off the Master's remaining lives since he refused to regenerate with them.

The only Doctor whose tenure was actually short in any real sense was Eccleston's Doctor (the 9th one, Tennant's immediate predecessor), since if you include the audio plays that McGann did following the movie, then he was around for several years as well. Tennant gave his primary reasoning for wanting to leave the show was because he didn't want to stay on as the Doctor long enough that it felt like a chore to play the part rather than it being the thrill that he was experiencing with it so far.

Short of him being in a dire and immediate situation to where he'd absolutely need to come back following his 13th incarnation's death (an imminent universal of sorts), I highly doubt that the Doctor will ever allow himself to undertake any more regenerations (if that is something even available to him anymore, since it was something that might have faded entirely with the annihilation of the Time Lords). In the past he had been offered a similar deal that the Master had been offered in the storyline "The Five Doctors", which was a new series of regenerations, and he had turned it down. Although he has shown fear of dying prior to several of his regenerations in the past, he has still demonstrated a constant theme of loneliness and a sort of desire for it to come to an end, so he doesn't need to travel alone anymore, to pick up companions only to know that he'll outlive them in the end, etc. Granted, he's not one to just up and commit suicide, but he does give off that feeling that when he's at the end of it all (dying in his final incarnation) that he'll accept it as such.

Back to the Waters of Mars story, I felt that it was a very nice way of showing a different side of the Doctor and at the same time showing that time itself has no true master, regardless of how much a "Time Lord" may want to try and change that.

Yep, it's a real nerd thread

(next part is all about the End of Times episode last night, do not read as it basically sums it up in two sentences.

SpoilerDoctor Who End of Times isn't bad, way to kill off the entire human race! 7 billion Masters, might be enough to beat the newly arrived Time Lord society! Somehow I don't really see Timothy Dalton as the leader of them though. Ah well, one more week to see the conlucion of that. It does really show the Doctor's lack of being able to properly deal with things, apart from running of course.

Just watched the second half of "The End of Time". SpoilerWas a good watch, but nothing really happened. Everything ended up exactly the way it was before, except this time the Master might actually be dead. The annoying circular story aside, I found Tennant's last line to be a bit silly. It would have been more fitting if he wasn't leaving the show by choice.

In reference to the questions/comments asked in spoilers above, Spoilerit was confirmed by executive producer Julie Gardner that the woman that appeared to Wilf and then was shown as one of the "Weeping Angel" Time Lords was indeed the Doctor's mother. That explains why she voted against the plan to restore the Time Lords (which would in turn result in the death of her son) and came to Wilf in visions multiple times to help him save the Doctor (for the same reasons)

As for the team writing for the 11th Doctor, the primary writer is going to be Steven Moffat, who was responsible for several of the episodes during the revived series (Blink, The Girl in the Fireplace, etc). Because of this, it'll likely still have a strong sense of familiarity to the fans.

Aside from the fact I don't think he could pull off a convincing British accent, he's busy.

Edited, Jan 8th 2010 10:25am by Turin