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Re: Doctor Who is awesome, yeah?

Sure, if it a work is created to do a particular thing and fails, then it probably isn't good.  If a a creator makes nothing but easy, obvious choices, the final product will probably be mediocre. 
But if someone makes strong difficult choices and creates a polarizing work that some of the audience loves and some of the audience hates, then how can that work not be said to be great?

Re: Doctor Who is awesome, yeah?

I've intended to write down my feelings about each episode in this series, but every time I do, the post reaches tl;dr territory and I lose interest before I can hit "Submit."

And I think that's the greater sin.

Sure there have been a buttload of problems in every episode, but they're also kinda boring. There's definitely a gem of a good (or even great) idea in each one, but the execution is so lackluster that it's hard for me to even complain.

"Kill the Moon," though, is probably my favorite. I don't think it's good, just better than every other episode so far. For one thing, the better elements of this episode reminded me of the better elements of "The Beast Below," but instead it's the Companion who's angered by dreadful decision she's being forced to make. The story is also simple enough that it doesn't feel rushed over the 40 minutes, which I've found to be a frequent issue for much of Moffat's time as showrunner.

The astronaut, Lundvik, really worked for me. She reminded me of Adelaide Brooks from "The Waters of Mars." I also like Courtney. I like how the dynamic between her and the Doctor played. Although her actress isn't the greatest, Courtney feels like she would be well suited to travel with the older and very prickly Doctor. Certainly it makes more sense to me than Clara and the Doctor. I've never cared much for Clara, but from what we know of her character, I don't see how she can abide the Twelfth Doctor. Her blow-up in this episode would have made more sense to me if we'd been seeing her struggle to get along with Twelve despite the phone call from Eleven at the end of "Deep Breath." But their differences have largely been glossed over in the jumbled mess of episodes that followed. Now she's angry, and while I like her anger, the build-up to it just wasn't enough for me.

That really is my major problem with this episode. Rather than building up to this dramatic choice Clara has to make, it should have been building up to Clara getting totally fed up with the Doctor. The stupid giant germs were a distraction and the resolution with the second moon egg felt like a cop-out, but it's the inconsistent character work that bothers me most.

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Isaac wrote:

Can we agree that it is possible for something to be great even if it doesn't work for ourselves at all?

No.

Unless I misunderstand your meaning. I read your comment as "Some people say it is a masterpiece and thus you can agree even though it does not work for you." This is not how it works in art. Rather, you apply a set of guidelines for a work to be a "masterpiece" and, admit it is a masterpiece (in this technical sense), but you can also note that it does not move you or work for you. But, this is a story. The technical requirements for a masterstory or 'perfect story' may vary.

Example: Show
I will never call 'Gravity' a masterpiece as a story as it is utterly implausible to me: NASA does not send grieving mothers into space. NASA does not send anyone into space without proper training. And, astronauts are fully prepared to act on behalf of experts who are on the ground. They have done so in adverse conditions many times in the past. The premise of the story fails in the first few minutes as I do not believe in the protagonist and her situation. Other people have other views but I feel a story set 'in the real world' should show the real world. If it is instead a fantasy or fairy tale or action movie with giant, fighting washing machines then it should be made clear. Fight Club, for example, does a very good job of establishing a 'real-ish' tone. This is not true of the episode.

The mass of the moon cannot change without introducing a source for more mass. No one is shutting off the power grid for entire countries in the middle of the night (who would even see that broadcast?). There is a long list of problems and any of them could be addressed with a single line of dialogue (ex: "It seems to be *BABBLING* from *BABBLE* to grow"). Star Trek TNG had an entire writing team whose sole job was filling in science nonsense in the script. All I ask for from Doctor Who is that the existence of basic science be acknowledged.


Worse, as stated earlier, the episode once more tries to double-feint the audience. The story looks like a monster story but builds to a 'wonderful' and 'magical' ending with a special, fancy creature and la-la-la. Then *Whoosh*, Clara is angry! Surprise!

Yes, it is a surprise. But, I don't understand it. I didn't understand why Clara (who gave her life for the Doctor in the previous series) was ready to leave after his regeneration. I don't understand why she is pissed at the end of this episode. I thought his explanation adequate and a compliment to her for standing up for her principles. I fully agree, she was introduced as a strong, independent, and willful woman. She can leave the Doctor at any time for any reason.

So, how do we go from him asking if he is a good man to her leaving without a warning? He called her his conscience. But, she wasn't upset about that. There was a problem with her boyfriend but that seemed resolved to her satisfaction. She clearly has no problem with nearly dying on a regular basis or seeing people killed when they are standing next to her. The only reason I saw given was she demanded he tell her what to do and he said it was her decision. And that, to me, was out of character for her. But, she has been written so inconsistently this season that I don't even care. If we had a few episodes that ended with Clara glaring at the Doctor's back as he walked away, I would understand. If the next episode begins with another F*CKING pointless cold open and Clara is infected with a mind parasite, I would understand that, too. I suspect that is not the case and will not be waiting to find out.

Last edited by Jp12x (2014-10-10 04:14:20)

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Re: Doctor Who is awesome, yeah?

JP12x,

Let's toss out "masterpiece" and instead stick with "great work of art."  I wouldn't call Kill the Moon a masterpiece, because what does "masterpiece" mean within the context of television, but I would call it great and I would do that because I watched it, received it on the terms that it established and was stunned by perhaps the greatest episode of Doctor Who I have ever seen (to be fair I haven't seen the back half of classic Who).  The fact that many, many other people were similarly taken with this episode suggests that, yes this episode was indeed on to something.

When you say that a story cannot be great if it does not work for you, how can that be interpreted as anything other than you, Jp12x, are the final arbiter of what is great and not great.  I truly don't mean to be antagonistic, but how else can one read that? 

I would also add that you frame the discussion in terms of Kill the Moon (and Gravity) as being a "story."  To that I say, that television shows and movies are "films."  The difference being that the former term emphasizes the narrative aspect of the work while the latter acknowledges the importance of the visual aspects. This isn't hyper-relative to the discussion at hand, but I would suggest that by focusing on the narrative aspects of a work of film, one limits the myriad of ways in which movies and (to a lesser but increasingly more common extent) television can create different modes of expression.

Clearly (Cotterpin's damning faint praise aside) I am the only one posting here who actually feels good about this episode, and I felt very good indeed about it.  When you are the lone voice in a group, either you end up on the defensive, or you are a troll.  I hope I'm not coming off as either, as I respect that for most of y'all this is a disappointing episode of a show that you care quite a bit about.  I just loved it so damn much.  It's a great episode, it just happens to be a great episode with fairy tale science (and a complicated abortion subtext).

Re: Doctor Who is awesome, yeah?

I think the main problem comes from the fact that you believe this:

Isaac wrote:

But if someone makes strong difficult choices and creates a polarizing work that some of the audience loves and some of the audience hates, then how can that work not be said to be great?

While I (and probably most of us here) think this is just laziness. I really, really do not believe for a minute that the writer made strong difficult choices. It's the opposite. To me, the bad science and inconsistent characters are only the result of going for the easy choices, and the fact that, as you said, many other people liked the episode is to me what proves there is a basis for a great story, and it might just be enough for them. I am not judging them or you - this forum being one of the last places on the Internet where discussions don't end with "No, your opinion is wrong", but I really can't look at this episode and feel anything other than shame, because it's not polarizing work; it's only incompetence.

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Re: Doctor Who is awesome, yeah?

My counter to that is:  Do you not think that Peter Harness and Steven Moffat knew that giant spiders as germs and a a baby that immediately hatches an egg the size of the egg it hatched from is not literally plausible?  A conscious choice was made to unapolgetically have implausible science in this episode.  That's a bold choice.  This season has made the choice to revert to an older, crankier, meaner, more alien Doctor after seven seasons of young swashbuckling doctors.  That's a bold hard choice. 

As for inconsistent characters, I'm a bit at a loss.  Clara seemed wholly in character this episode and the Doctor seemed consistent with how he has been portrayed this season, which granted  is a different focus than the last three doctors, but not out of the blue, and definitely not out of character with the Doctor's 50 year history.  Or so it seems to me.

Whether or not one likes these choices, I would argue that  these choices were made with care and with intent.  Let me be clear on where I'm coming from:  I am not giving this episode's "problems" a  pass because I really like the idea of a moon-egg.  I like this episode more because of the fairy tale tone.  I love this episode because Clara is being true to her character and expressing her outrage at the character traits of this new doctor in a way that elevated her character and justified (again, in my eyes) the current take on the doctor. 

Clearly, I have watched a different episode than Saniss, Jp12x, C-Spin, Withkittens, Tomahawk Ellingsen, Bigdamnartist, and Cotterpin Doozer watched.  Again, I'm not saying you guys are wrong for not liking it.  However, I maintain that this episode was great and I am far from the only viewer who walked away from that episode convinced they had viewed something truly special.  I'm not trying to make any of you like this episode, but it would be nice if anyone would grant me that given how many people  are convinced they saw something great, maybe there is something to our point of view.

Re: Doctor Who is awesome, yeah?

Isaac wrote:

My counter to that is:  Do you not think that Peter Harness and Steven Moffat knew that giant spiders as germs and a a baby that immediately hatches an egg the size of the egg it hatched from is not literally plausible?

I don't think they cared one way or other. They aren't choices, they're mistakes or concepts that they either don't care enough to make work, or think we won't give a shit about enough to care about. It's at best lazy writing, and at worst down right insulting to the audience.

As far as characters, the entire problem this season (Hell the last couple of seasons frankly) is that none of the characters have A CHARACTER, they have like 6. And the writers just sort of bounce around between them whenever it suits whatever particular story point they need to hit. Okay Clara trusts the Doctor here because...because we need her to trust the Doctor here great. And Clara hates the Doctor here because... we need her to hate the Doctor here." (And no, just because a character is consistently inconsistently written, doesn't mean they are consistently written. Unless a major plot point of the series is that all of of the characters are Tyler Durden. ")

It's just sloppy writing that shows a complete and utter disregard for the fans, the characters and the show in general.

EDIT:

Actually let me ask you this. What would have actually changed about this episode, on a thematic or character level, if the science had been good (or at least on the better side of what Doctor Who is known for)? Would it had have ruined it? Would it have made it a less bold choice? Is there anything about this episode that would have suffered by including that extra little bit of scientific thought?

Or on the flip-side, can you give me a reason that the science being awful and wrong is actually helping the episode? Is there any reason why it's absolutely vital to the this episode that the science be so mind numbingly, face palmingly wrong, outside of it being a bold choice?

Last edited by BigDamnArtist (2014-10-10 08:14:39)

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Re: Doctor Who is awesome, yeah?

I'm gonna chime in just so Issac doesn't feel alone in his corner.

I'm a fan of this episode. Maybe not as much as Issac, but it definitely seems that I liked it more than most here. Then again, I am a bit of a Who-apologist.

Does it have it's flaws? Sure, of course it does. But honestly, it's pretty much all fridge logic to me. When I was actually watching the episode, I thought it was a really fun and enjoyable 45 minutes. I loved the idea of the moon as an egg (the idea more than the execution) and whilst I was a tad iffy with how it was all resolved, it certainly didn't seem any worse than usual.

I do find it very interesting how split the reaction to 'Kill The Moon' has been though. Every now and then you'll get what could be considered as a 'bad' episode and you'd have the usual fringe of people trying to defend it, but outside of this forum it seems to me like this one is split much more in the towards the middle.

I've not put much thought in to this, but this just popped in to my mind, so I'll throw it out there and see how it goes. Perhaps a lot of the negative reaction to this episode is not specifically due to the episode itself and it more just the boiling point for those who haven't been a fan of how Moffat has been running the show as of late? If this had occurred earlier in the run (and obviously for that to work, the whole Clara/Danny thing would have to be altered), would the reaction have been different?

As I said, these have only just popped in to my mind, so I don't have any sort of responses to my own questions just yet. I'm not even saying I believe this to be the case, but the thought does intrigue me.

Last edited by Owen_Ward (2014-10-10 15:11:53)

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Re: Doctor Who is awesome, yeah?

BigDamnArtist wrote:

Actually let me ask you this. What would have actually changed about this episode, on a thematic or character level, if the science had been good (or at least on the better side of what Doctor Who is known for)? Would it had have ruined it? Would it have made it a less bold choice? Is there anything about this episode that would have suffered by including that extra little bit of scientific thought?

I had thought about diving into this -- the Moon is an egg? Really? Do we even need to get into how dumb that is? - but this note actually steered me in another direction. There's basically no way to make the science "work" without drastically altering the storyline. You'd have to come up with some other reason that the Moon is breaking apart.

So just brainstorming for about 10-15 minutes, this is what I came up with...not just with that episode, but the overarching story of the season:

For "Kill The Moon", instead of a monster growing inside of the moon, it's some sort of mass increasing bomb. You can technobable that away as like "creates a miniture black hole that pulls in matter from another dimension at a higher rate than from this one" or something similar. Whatever, that's not outside the realm of Dr. Who level non-science.

So our heroes head for the Moon for fun but arrive in the future as investigation astronaut squad gets there. They find out the mass of the moon is increasing (a nice "that's not possible! oh wait it is! technobable!" moment for the Doctor). He of course figures out it's a device of some sort and they go to investigate, heading down a crater impact that leads to underground caves. They run into some booby-traps, which takes out some of the astronaut team to let us know the danger. The Doctor says something's up and he/Clara/Courtney(?) go back to the TARDIS while the team keeps searching.

The Doctor is doing his "working things out" thing, when they hear back from the astronauts that they found the device deep underground in a cavern, so the Doctor locks onto their signal and flies the TARDIS in. He looks at the bomb, has some revelation, notes that it's essentially building up energy and will really "go off" soon, shattering the moon apart and destroying Earth with the debris, then he goes to leave. Clara, obviously confused is like "hey, defuse this fucking bomb dude" and he responses with "I can't do everything for you. I assure you that all the knowledge and skill to defuse this bomb is in this cavern without me." Then he bolts, leaving everyone pissed and, you know, afraid they are about to die. We get a countdown clock thing for dramas sake, but in the end they figure out how to defuse it (doesn't matter how, just that they come up with some clever way to do it).

The group heads back to the shuttle, where the Doctor is waiting. Clara does her "I'm super pissed at you" thing, which makes WAY MORE SENSE since instead of leaving a decision up to her, he basically left her and the school girl to die if they didn't get themselves out of a situation he put them in (note: this fits Danny Pink's "he'll push you too far" warning pretty darn closely, as well).

He tells Clara that he knew they could handle it, maybe with a touch of arrogance that he was helping her become more independent/capable or something. This continues the rift between them, could add depth to the idea that the Doctor feels he's preparing her for their eventual break, maybe with a touch of trying to drive her away.

In either case, he tells her that he left because he realized that the bomb was put there in order draw the Doctor there -- the entire situation was a set up to get the Doctor to save the day. He left because he wanted to see if he could find out who was watching the situation play out. He remembers the Earth history of the event (catastrophes due to the Moon's mass increasing, the the resulting changes in Human progress after, blah blah), but he had no idea that he had a part in it and suspects that someone went through a lot of trouble to make it all happen.

Basically it plays with the idea that the Doctor has sort of invisibly helped shape human progress from time to time with only select people getting glimpses of him...whereas this seems like a glimpse of someone who's doing the same thing to Doctor. This "who's setting up these situations for the Doctor" mystery would be a recurring thing, making him question what things he done in his years of travelling were his own or pre-planned for him to do by this outside agent. It also plays into the "am I a good man" aspect, in that he isn't sure if he's actually causing the issues by being who he is (the Batman/Supervillian dilemma), also it makes him wonder if he's actually good or if it's all just a manipulation. Maybe THIS is what Missy is up to? Maybe it's someone trying either lead him to Gallifrey, or prevent/distract him from find it? Who knows? TUNE IN NEXT TIME!

Anyways.

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Re: Doctor Who is awesome, yeah?

BigDamnArtist wrote:

Or on the flip-side, can you give me a reason that the science being awful and wrong is actually helping the episode? Is there any reason why it's absolutely vital to the this episode that the science be so mind numbingly, face palmingly wrong, outside of it being a bold choice?

That's a great question Artist.

Okay, here is how I read this particular episode.  When the moon spiders turned out t be germs, and not only germs but giant germs that could be killed with household disinfectant.  My reaction was “that's ridiculous!” Which on some level told me that storybook logic was in place.  This was reinforced by the gravity stuff and by the time we get to “the moon is an egg” I am able to react to that in the context of “this episode is a fairy tale”.  I have already had the “that's ridiculous” reaction and can now accept the poetry of that notion in a very different way than if I was approaching it in default Doctor Who “pretending to be a science fiction show” mode.  It makes that reveal hit very differently and much better... at least for me and those like me. 

There are other things gained too. Making it more like a fable makes everything more off kilter than a normal episode which puts Clara out of her comfort zone.  It muddies what the “rules” for this dilemma which makes the Doctor's behavior even more angering for Clara.  And it let's the story end with a lyrical “and it hatched another egg”  which is beautiful and elegant if you accept the story book rules.

Re: Doctor Who is awesome, yeah?

So, having not seen the episode, here's my question: WHO CARES IF THE SCIENCE ISN'T REAL. None of this is real!

"The Doctor is Submarining through our brains." --Teague

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Who cares if the characters behave consistently and have believable motivations, they're not real people.

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Re: Doctor Who is awesome, yeah?

Isaac wrote:

Okay, well I am of the school that says Doctor Who is not science fiction, but fantasy that uses the trappings of scifi.

That's true of all science fiction. Even Gravity and Moon feature central plot points that are flatly impossible.

My problems with "Kill the Moon" (and much of this season) are that it's central premise is not just impossible but silly, and I don't care about Clara's problems. I think it's idiotic to have Clara (or Amy before her) gallivanting off on adventures that repeatedly nearly kill her when she's made a life for herself outside the Tardis.

Last edited by Zarban (2014-10-10 16:38:56)

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Re: Doctor Who is awesome, yeah?

C-Spin wrote:

Who cares if the characters behave consistently and have believable motivations, they're not real people.

There's a difference between believable and consistently. Doctor who has always had unbelievable science, and has been quite consistent in that. It got so you dreaded the writers discovering some new scientific term, as it would be abused horribly. 70's Who was much like Next Gen Trek in that regard smile

Haven't seen any of the new episodes, but if the Doctor wasn't scared of giant spiders I'll be very disappointed. They killed his third incarnation, after all.

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Re: Doctor Who is awesome, yeah?

Isaac wrote:

I'm not trying to make any of you like this episode, but it would be nice if anyone would grant me that given how many people  are convinced they saw something great, maybe there is something to our point of view.

There is something to your point of view: the ideas behind the episode's story are great. The episode itself is absolute garbage.

Isaac wrote:

Can we agree that it is possible for something to be great even if it doesn't work for ourselves at all?

My answer is yes, absolutely. I know of movies, books, TV shows I can say are great but are just not to my taste. I have no problem with this idea; we all have different opinions and preferences. But if you're asking me "Is Kill the Moon great but just does not work for you?", my answer is no. Something I should have mentioned earlier is that the bad science surrounding the story is far from being the only thing that made me angry about this episode.

Absolutely everything made me angry.

As said earlier, the characters made me angry. Clara and the Doctor are inconsistent in themselves and thus inconsistent in their relationship (and I'm talking here about the entire season, not just Kill the Moon). Clara should be a response to Capaldi's Doctor being a prick. But is he a prick? Sometimes he is, sometimes he's not. I have no idea who this Doctor is. I perfectly know who Eccleston, Tennant and Smith were. I loved them for being so well defined, and so different between themselves. Capaldi's has no particular personality. I want to say he's a grumpy old man (which would be perfect with Capaldi, and the Doctor feeling old after Smith an interesting theme), but when I think about him, it's just not the way I feel. At times he's the grumpy old man, at times he's the crazy time traveler alien, at times he's something else. He's too random. As BDA said, he's what the episode needs him to be. It should be the opposite. And it's the same with Clara. Is she a strong-willed woman who can be the perfect response to the grumpy old Doctor? Not really. Sometimes. Not always. I am perfectly aware that human personalities are complicated and multi-layered, but I look at Clara and see someone different every sequence. Her story with the Doctor is forgotten completely, for the benefit of Pink who we still don't care about after seven episodes. She's so random that Jenna-Louise Coleman's acting only angers me (which it shouldn't; I think she's formidable, and Capaldi too).

And of course, we have the supporting characters, Lundvik and her team... who are complete morons. Moronic astronauts, yes, of course. Please don't ask me to explain why it makes me want to pluck someone's eyes out. Lundvik herself is completely bland. I don't know the actress and I don't want to be a jerk, but unless she was specifically instructed to be so boring people will actually start to fast-forward her every line, there's a problem.

Let's not forget Courtney, who apparently has no issue whatsoever processing the TARDIS, the Doctor and all the space-time thing. Because we have seen it before DOES NOT mean you can dismiss it completely, Moffat. Make your characters believable, for God's sake. Especially children. Oh, and the "Do you really think I'm not special" thing? I almost stopped the episode there (at 2', which could have set some sort of record). And of course we have oversized spiders which don't really seem to freak her out more than regular spiders.

Let's talk some more about the bad science, too. Doctor Who has a habit of showing me crazy things from the future and other civilizations and feed me technobabble until I accept it. Here we spend the whole episode be showed things from our present world we know and understand and have them do stupid things. It cannot be technobabbled. Doc Sub said none of this is real... but in that case, it is. Because the average viewer might not know much about these things doesn't mean you can go bananas with them. The power grid moment was downright idiotic. The idea driving it could have been interesting, but even in a fairy tale I wouldn't buy this.

Last but not least, the visuals. This episode looked especially bad. I'm not asking much, but please, someone explain to the VFX guys that the Earth and the Moon ARE LIT BY THE SAME FUCKING THING.

http://i.imgur.com/xenfi1sl.jpg

Owen is right, I reached the boiling point. But this episode worked really hard for it. Robots of Sherwood wasn't great, but the dialogues and setting saved it for me, which it didn't for BDA. There's not a single part of Kill the Moon I would salvage.

Either Moffat and his writer are lazy, or they're actually making a strong choice and completely failing at it. There's no silver lining here. I can't forgive something this insulting.

Last edited by Saniss (2014-10-10 21:26:51)

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Re: Doctor Who is awesome, yeah?

I'm going to build myself a uterus just so I can have Saniss' baby. Everything he said was spot on.

And people can say the bad science doesn't matter, it's a fairy tale, it's fantasy... but this is a show for children. When it was created the intent was for it to function in a somewhat educational capacity. After The Daleks they pulled back on that some, but it was never fully abandoned. When you're dealing with made up shit like Time Lords and TARDISes you can make up whatever the fuck you want. When you're dealing with real things I feel like you have an obligation to present them with some semblance of accuracy, and as I've whined about extensively here... not one damned thing is right. As adults we have the capability to say "gigantic single-celled bacteria, that's fucking idiotic, but this is a fairy tale so it doesn't matter." A child does not.

Last edited by C-Spin (2014-10-11 01:08:43)

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Okay, I think I'm done, at least for this episode.  I've said my piece, most anything else would be repeating myself. Kill the Moon was a staggeringly good piece of television, I'm genuinely sad that so many of you didn't get what those of us who love it got out of it. 

I'm glad that this is a space where even though when opinions are heated, the discussion can stay respectful (largely) and and the arguments can avoid cheap shots (largely.)

Re: Doctor Who is awesome, yeah?

C-Spin wrote:

Who cares if the characters behave consistently and have believable motivations, they're not real people.

That's a slightly more legitimate complaint, although I'd argue that no movie or tv show should be held to rigid standards of "reality." They AREN'T reality, that's why we like them! The whole point of film as a medium is that it can communicate ideas more clearly by functioning outside of what's possible in the real world.

Judging a piece of film on how close it is to reality is like judging an apple on how much it tastes like an orange.

"The Doctor is Submarining through our brains." --Teague

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There's a difference I feel between what people mean when they say "it's not real" when talking about sci-fi and stuff like this, and what it's usually interpreted as.

Obviously film/movies/tv/video games/poetry whatever the fuck isn't REAL, those characters don't actually exist in any real physical way in our world that is meangingful, obviously, duh. But that's the pact we sign when we watch or read or listen to any of those art forms. We are granting the author that minor suspension of disbelief to let them convince us that these words on the page or these actors are actual characters doing things that MATTER, to let them convince us they are "real" (real to the viewer/reader mind you).

And whenever we get into a conversation like this, the immediate argument is "it's not real so stfu", which fine if there's a massive tornado headed right for your door and your brother is having an existential crisis over Jacob vs. Edward. Then yeah sure, that's a perfectly valid thing to say to him. But in the context of this discussion, about a piece of art, I think it's a giant cop-out. Obviously whatever we're talking about isn't REAL, we all understand that, but so what? We're having a conversation that exists inside the world of that thing. I mean we're all nerds for the gods sake, whether you like it or not, this is kinda what we do.

So when we say "the giant moon egg baby thing doesn't feel real." We don't mean well that could never happen in our real world, so fuck it! What it means is that in THAT UNIVERSE. Inside Doctor Who, according to everything we've seen before, every giant monster, every multidimensional portal, every living plastic creature, everything. THIS doesn't feel real. It doesn't fit the universe, it's just wrong, and has no place here. It doesn't feel real.

Some of my absolute favorite shows/novels/anything are filled with things that could CLEARLY never exist in "our" universe. But they make absolute sense in that universe, the author blends in them with the reality, the characters react believably to whatever is happening (And I don't mean, like a human being would, characters can exist outside of "what it means to be human", that argument is one of the primary reasons I never understood peoples absolute disbelief that a talking tree and Raccoon could be main characters. Just make them damn characters and have them react like they would to the world around them, and people will buy it. And lo behold they did, and it worked, magnificently.) , it never feels forced or out of place, it's just a part of the universe, it feels real in that universe. And that's why I love it, it's playing with things that could never exist, but it makes me FEEL like they could, it's keeping me inside my suspension of disbelief. Whereas with almost everything DW is doing this season are things that are so entirely out of the realm of plausibility it immediately snaps suspension of disbelief, it never even tries to earn the bullshit it pulls either before or after, and then on top of it all, it doesn't even try to have it's characters (main or minor) convince me it's real. They're all just running around in their own little schizophrenic worlds reading off lines and standing on the cue that leads to the next story point, entirely oblivious to what's actually happening or how they behaved last episode, or frankly 10 seconds ago.

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Re: Doctor Who is awesome, yeah?

But in a world filled with so much absurd, ridiculous, patently UNSCIENTIFIC things, what makes this any different? Why are you all getting so upset about the scientific plausibility of this episode and not about the scientific plausibility of literally anything else that happens on this show?

Here's my thing about this line of thinking: Saying "this doesn't make sense in that universe" doesn't make sense because...it happened in that universe. It's on-screen, it happened. Saying "that character would never do that" makes sense, assuming that you're talking about an action that contradicts what we know about that character. Saying "a person would never do that," well, that's a whole other story. I don't see the value in questioning the logic of character action in a fictional work, unless, like I said, it goes against what's already been established about that character. The person isn't a real person, nothing they're doing is real. Who are we to argue with whatever they're doing or saying? They're under no obligation to follow the rules of our world.

Same goes for the idea at hand here. If there's a reason why it doesn't gel with the other ridiculous things on this show, then fine. But if the argument is "it's not scientifically accurate" then there's no ground to stand on. Our science is incomparable to DW science, and as far as I know there's nothing in DW canon that implies that this particular law of physics/biology/whatever carries over. And saying that something "doesn't fit with the rest of the universe" implies that you're applying a real-world framework. Why doesn't it fit? What about the DW universe suggests that this thing can't exist? That's not rhetorical, I'm really interested, since you all independently reached the same conclusion.

"The Doctor is Submarining through our brains." --Teague

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Re: Doctor Who is awesome, yeah?

Doctor Submarine wrote:

Same goes for the idea at hand here. If there's a reason why it doesn't gel with the other ridiculous things on this show, then fine. But if the argument is "it's not scientifically accurate" then there's no ground to stand on. Our science is incomparable to DW science, and as far as I know there's nothing in DW canon that implies that this particular law of physics/biology/whatever carries over. And saying that something "doesn't fit with the rest of the universe" implies that you're applying a real-world framework. Why doesn't it fit? What about the DW universe suggests that this thing can't exist? That's not rhetorical, I'm really interested, since you all independently reached the same conclusion.

Doctor Who's universe is ostensibly our own in so much as it shares the fundamental laws of our own. People saying scientific gaffs like this happen all the time in Doctor Who... DO they? I can think of plenty of fantastical devices and locations and creatures, but I'm having a hard time thinking of any majorly blatant violations of what our reality is that you can't wave away with technobabble. Except for the TARDIS which gets them to the adventure, in this episode there is NO technology that doesn't exist right now, in this exact moment. So you lose the ability to technobabble your way out of things instantly.

We know gravity exists in Doctor Who and functions the same way ours does. So allowing that the moon has gotten heavier because a creature is now inside it... why does Courtney randomly float, and why is she the only human in the room to do it? The Doctor's explanation is that the moon is unstable. That's a fine explanation for the tremors going on and the collapsing terrain, but that would have NO bearing on gravity's pull.

We know things in Doctor Who are made of cells that work the same way cells do in our universe. The Doctor explicitly calls the spider a "germ," a "prokaryotic unicellular lifeform." We KNOW those can't be the size of a badger. We know if they were they wouldn't look anything like spiders. And they wouldn't leave anything like cobwebs.

The law of conservation of mass exists in our universe, it must exist in the Doctor Who universe. An egg is a closed system and CANNOT increase in mass, no matter what sort of biological changes go on within. All they needed was ONE hand-wavy line about craters in the moons surface really being pores that absorb space nutrients or some bullshit and I can maybe let this slide. But they don't, so I can't. I'm not bringing ANY of my own concrete when the rest of the episode is blatantly moronic.

If you're not willing to agree with me that Doctor Who should at least strive to adhere to the fundamental laws of our reality, then we're never going to agree on anything. I don't just expect this of Doctor Who, I expect this of most of my dramatic fiction. There's a very narrow niche of content that can get away with violating these rules and still expect me to invest.

And even if the science were up to snuff, this would still be a mediocre episode at best, for all of the character and plotting issues brought up previously in the thread.

Last edited by C-Spin (2014-10-11 02:05:26)

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Re: Doctor Who is awesome, yeah?

EDIT: C-Spin sniped me, but I agree with everything he said.

I'm gonna have to take some time on your last question since I'm not such a Who nerd that I can just pull exact examples at will.

But to your earlier point about questioning a character inside the the universe, and the idea of a character being canon simply by being written. And I always come back to the thought of "What if I were in this universe watching things happen?" As Saniss has pointed much more eloquently than I the characters are written all over the place, they're up, they're down, they're mad, happy. A lot of the time for seemingly inexplicable or simply non-exsistant reasons. So then here's me, in this universe watching that character. Personally I'm going to be wondering what the hell is wrong with them? Are they mentally ill? id they get hit on the head really hard and everyone else is just refusing to acknowledge it? Because as Saniss has also pointed out, the characters, Clara in paticular, since we have comparison points for her from last season, is all over the place, completely unlike how she was written last season (In this same universe). The Doctor on the other hand, is also all over the place, but hey, new Doc, that could be just the way he is now...except no one actually really comments on it, it's just absorbed and accepted, in a way that feels unnatural to the characters around him.

In a weird way it ties into the idea of Hanging a lantern. These characters are all over the place, but no one in universe ever goes "Gee's guys, are you okay? You're actin all manic depressive-y over here." If they had that, idf they could at least acknowledge that the characters are acting weird, and not try to keep trying to convince us that "this is how they are guys, no seriously", I'd be fine with it, cause supposedly they'd have a reason for it. But as is, it comes off as nothing more than lazy writing.

And to your first point. It's been touched on here and there in here. But Doctor Who is about the universe, there is WEIRD SHIT out there man, but it's alien, it's bizarre, there are things at work we can't understand this far out on the edge. But through all of that Earth is shown to be... Earth. Plain and simple. Earth is earth, it's the place we know, weird stuff sometimes comes and visits, but by and large the fundamental physics that we all know still govern this area of space. So when DW just decides to stroll into our neighbourhood and tries to tell us that actually no, one of those core scientific understandings we have about our section of the galaxy actually doesn't hold true, and we aren't even going to give you a reason why, just go with us. We have to call bullshit. I mean we can literally see Earth from the moon, this isn't some far distant weird section of space where physics behave differently. It's the frickin moon for pete's sake.

It's THE primary issue I have with the Robin Hood episode you all seem to love so much. The entire environment of that episode is so completely and entirely unlike that era of earth, that it completely undermines the entire point of the episode.

Basically...you can't say you're showing me my backyard and tell me there isn't a shed there. I know there's a frickin shed there, I built it, I can literally see it there. Stop trying to tell me my shed isn't there, you're making yourself look like an idiot.

Last edited by BigDamnArtist (2014-10-11 02:08:05)

ZangrethorDigital.ca

Re: Doctor Who is awesome, yeah?

Very good points. I think I understand what you're talking about now.

"The Doctor is Submarining through our brains." --Teague

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874

Re: Doctor Who is awesome, yeah?

I'm joining the party late. Not really sure what has been said... but I will chuck in my two cents about Dr Who all the same. Loved Ecc and Ten to the point of weirdness... Matt smith is good... but, I lost interest under his reign. Is it a him thing or a me thing? I am bestt mates who work at 'The Farm' and work on Dr Who. Talented geeza hi is but he can't help my weigning love for the show.

The difficult second album Regan

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875

Re: Doctor Who is awesome, yeah?

BigDamnArtist wrote:

we're all nerds for the gods sake


That made me laugh. Awesome.


BBQ: Great story rewrite. I would have had a chance to better enjoy the story. I still don't think I would, but at least the non-science would not be slapping me in the face repeatedly.


Isaac wrote:

When you say that a story cannot be great if it does not work for you, how can that be interpreted as anything other than you, Jp12x, are the final arbiter of what is great and not great.  I truly don't mean to be antagonistic, but how else can one read that?

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If you quoted me you could have had my words right there for reference when you typed. I will explain: 'Masterpiece' or 'great' or whatever you call it, means you have applied a standard for saying so. An 'masterpiece' was once a work that demonstrated fitness to join a guild (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masterpiece) and the work had to meet certain requirements. If you believe there are generally accepted principles for judging a certain thing, it is possible to agree a work fits that standard but you still don't like it. Even if you don't believe in such standards, you still apply a personal standard (otherwise you call every single thing you see "brilliant!" or whatever). My personal standards will not be the same as yours or those of most people. I am a depressive, hyper-critical, grumpy a$$hole. My standards are very high and rarely met. I thought it was obvious that, as there is no universally-accepted set of objective guidelines for judging the quality of a TV show, I use my personal standards. No matter if the entire world disagrees with me (see my signature), I reserve the right to say something is not 'great' and I don't like it.

I think the writer lacks a basic understanding of the physics/etc involved in the episode. I say this because it is generous. Otherwise, I have to assume he knows and does not care. It is also very common for people to not understand things like the fact that the moon is 238,900 miles from Earth (The Red Hulk and Thor have a fight that takes them to the moon and back in a single fight) and the trip typically takes NASA four and a half days. I fully understand that the episode works better if you watch it without a critical eye or if you are taken in by the 'fridge logic'. Unfortunately, I notice that crap as it happens and it messes with my suspension of disbelief.


But, set aside the non-science. I still didn't like the story. 

Here is the plot as I understood it. It is not great or magical but, at best, preachy:

The moon is an egg.
The Earth is a$$holes.
One person ignores the rest of the planet.
The egg hatches and no one dies.
The person yells at someone for some reason.

Call it bravery or an abortion metaphor or whatever you want. I haven't really enjoyed Dr Who since Smith's first season. I refer you to Red Dwarf:

Rimmer, can't you tell the story is not gripping me? I'm in a state of non-grippedness. I am completely smegging ungripped.

Last edited by Jp12x (2014-10-11 04:44:37)

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