Christian Cawley's Blog, page 127

New Clothes, Nominations, Women’s Day and Funereal Daleks

James Lomond is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

It’s News Blast time, Kasterborites, in which we pull together some of the more interesting-yet-trivial Doctor Who-related news items and present them to you in bite sized form. Like The Long Game‘s frozen vomit, really, but without the icky.

Doctor Who Meets Star Trek (Again)

Excellent news, Kasterborites. Set your humour circuits to fusion as Trek Today have announced a comedy comic bringing together the original crew of the Enterprise with David Tennant’s Tenth Doctor. This isn’t the first flirtation the two cultural icons have enjoyed in print with IDW’s Assimilation bringing together the Eleventh Doctor and Star Trek: The Next Generation‘s crew to battle the Cybermen and Borg (also featuring a flashback to the original Trek crew and Tom Baker’s Fourth Doctor). Written by David Gerrold the comic will retail at USD $29.95 – follow the links to find out more but chop chop – the initial signed print run is limited to 500 copies…

International Women’s Who

Last Sunday 8th March was International Women’s Day 2015 – promoted by the UN and this year helpng to celebrate 20 years of the Beijing Declaration. To celebrate International Women’s day, the BBC released an image of the women involved in the production team for Doctor Who series 9 including Coleman and Gomez as Clara and Missy.

The Doctor’s New Clothes

The latest edition of Doctor Who Magazine features an explanation for how the Twelfth Doctor’s costume came about with Steven Moffat offering his thoughts in an extensive interview we mentioned in an earlier news post. But for a far more inventive answer, you can take a look at The Doctor’s New Clothes, by Eoin McAuley and illustrated by fine artist Osin Roche, which you can read at DownTheTubes.net. It features a “witty little knitter” mentioned by the Fourth Doctor in Classic story The Ark in Space (highly, HIGHLY recommended if you haven’t seen it).

Doctor Who & Jenna Coleman Nominated

California’s Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror Films, founded in 1972 to honour work in genre entertainment will be holding the 41st Annual Saturn Award on 25th June this year – and Who is in the running. Nominated in the Best Youth-Orientated (eh?) Television category, Doctor Who is up against the likes of Supernatural and Teen Wolf. Also nominated is Jenna Coleman in the Best Supporting Actress category, an appropriately so. Details can be found though the link through to their website.

Dalek Bruce Sings

Last Saturday, Tyneside’s Hebburn Community Centre was descended on by Daleks and other familiar characters for the monthly Scifair event. This specific event was titled “Dalek Day” – a Day of the Daleks, if you will, and proved very popular. The next event is on 4th April and entry is free – take a look at the Shields Gazette article for further details, and watch the video below to make sure you’re making the right decision…

Writer Claims Newspaper Age Error

A curiously bee-coloured Dalek has accompanied Who-writer Dan Blythe to Danum Academy Upper School in honour of World Book Day. Blythe has contributed to the world of Doctor Who fiction since the early 1990s with The Dimension Riders (Virgin, 1993) and more recent offerings such as 2009’s Autonomy featuring the Nestene Consciousness in familiar humanoid form. He took part in creative workshops for students and discussed the history of Who…

And finally…

On a more sombre but wonderfully spirited note, a remarkable woman who died from ovarian cancer last month, Shoshanna Manch, had a Dalek attend her funeral. With the Doctor Who theme and smoke issuing forth, it proceeded down the aisles and led the mourners out after the service. Manch’s family arranged the visitor from Skaro given her love of scifi and cosplay, acting on instructions that she wanted people to enjoy themselves at her wake. I do believe that might be a first, and what a brilliant tribute. It seems this show can touch people in  a number of ways with this and all the Who-themed marriage proposals out there.

It surely says something about the heart(s) of the show when it’s icons and characters are chosen to mark some of the most important events in our lives and deaths.

The post New Clothes, Nominations, Women’s Day and Funereal Daleks appeared first on Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews.

050 – The War Games

Prof. Julius J. Smudge is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

It’s been said before, but I’m happy to say it again: Doctor Who would never have survived 10 years, let alone 50+, without the pivotal work of Patrick Troughton as the Second Doctor. Yes, William Hartnell was excellent in the role and established the character with aplomb, but he physically could not have continued playing the Doctor any longer than he did. Rather than cancel the show when the lead actor’s health failed, Producer Innes Lloyd took the unorthodox step of leaning on the character’s mystery and alien background to throw the audience a curveball with the concept of regeneration, or rather “renewal” (the only description given at the time).

Perhaps the cruelest irony in all of Doctor Who history is that Troughton’s groundbreaking run is the set of stories hit hardest by the BBC’s ruthless video recycling program. Several of the most important Second Doctor stories are, to all appearances, completely destroyed by Auntie Beeb’s short-sighted “efficiency”. His debut in Power of the Daleks is missing, as is his first meeting with his most loyal companion, Jamie McCrimmon, in The Highlanders. Only a handful of episodes from his first season are available at all.

So thank the lords of luck and happenstance that we can actually watch every gorgeous episode of his final story, The War Games!

At 10 episodes, this tale merits the use of words like “epic,” “sprawling,” and “massive”. It’s the second-longest story in the classic run (or possibly third, depending on whether you actually consider the Sixth Doctor’s Trial of a Time Lord season to be a single tale). The other serious contender is The Daleks’ Master Plan, which features the First Doctor and clocks in at 12 episodes, most of which are missing. But what remains of Master Plan shows it to be very episodic — not really a single story so much as a sequence which has been lumped under a single name for convenience’s sake.

By contrast, The War Games is definitely a unified story … indeed, a HELL of a story. Criticism is often leveled at the Classic Series that the pacing is slow and off-putting for “modern” television audiences. The War Games does not suffer from this problem at all. Director David Maloney and writers Terrance Dicks and Malcolm Hulke keep the viewer guessing every step of the way toward a conclusion that not only changes the actor playing The Doctor, but changes the show’s entire narrative structure for years to come.

The Doctor is every bit as aware of the emotional weight of this scenario as the audience would have been, but Jamie and Zoe, both from distant times simply don’t get it!

Viewers in 1969 would certainly have known that Troughton was about to leave Doctor Who, but they would not have known what kind of story to expect when they tuned in. When the TARDIS materialized in the middle of a trench-ridden war zone, they would have (mistakenly) felt themselves on familiar narrative ground. The British had been telling tales of World War I for generations, and the idea of dropping the Doctor into the midst of the infamously brutish “war to end all wars” must have seemed like a brilliant (indeed, almost inevitable) move.

All the standard tropes are honored here: tin helmets, barbed wire, gas attacks, spirited lady volunteers in trenchcoats and can-do soldier boys making the most of a wretched situation. The funny part is that while the Doctor is every bit as aware of the emotional weight of this scenario as the audience would have been, Jamie and Zoe are both from distant times and simply don’t get it! While the Doctor instinctively feels the significance that invests a string of barbed wire, Jamie just sees “wee spikes”.

Naturally, Jamie, Zoe and The Doctor are almost immediately suspected to be spies and brought to see the local General at a dilapidated “chateau”. (Incidentally, this is a particularly lovely and detailed set, worthy of a feature film.) Though suspicious of the newcomers, all the soldiers up the chain seem to be exhibiting standard British charm … until we get to General Smythe. This stern figure is not your standard “military issue” overlord either. He seems able to completely control his underlings simply by putting on his wire-frame glasses and informing them that these are definitely the droids they are looking for. If that weren’t strange enough, his office has its own theme song – a percussive tune that sounds like it should introduce the evening news in The Twilight Zone. Throughout the story, this theme is used to alert the audience that something in the picture is amiss, out of place … or flat-out alien. In its first appearance, it underlines the fact that Smythe seems to have Skype set up in his office.

After checking in with whoever is on the other end of the video call, the General steers our TARDIS travelers through a mockery of a court martial (using his psychic spectacles to ensure the cooperation of all involved military) and sentences Jamie and the Doctor to death. (Not Zoe, though. She is apparently too cute to die.) But Smythe didn’t count on the Doctor’s resourcefulness or the all-around jolly-goodness of Lieutenant Carstairs and Lady Buckingham, companions in all but name. By the end of episode two, this intrepid team has commandeered an ambulance and penetrated the mysterious mist that seems to surround the war zone. Suddenly they find themselves about to be overrun by a phalanx of Roman soldiers.

When the Doctor stumbles into town, we learn that the War Chief is actually a TIME LORD!

By this time, it should come as no surprise to regular viewers that WE ARE NOT REALLY ON EARTH! Soldiers from many different wars in Earth’s history have been pulled to this not-Earth place to unknowingly participate in a grand experiment called “Best Man Wins”. The absolute roughest and toughest of this lot will make up an invasion force for an unnamed race of expansionist aliens, because “man is the most vicious species of all.” Ain’t we though?

As it turns out, this is not the work of a single megalomaniac enemy, but rather of an uneasy alliance of power. There are two representatives of the alien invading race (who call themselves the Security Chief and the War Lord) and a third person who apparently brings time technology to the table. The Security Chief and the magnificently-bearded War Chief absolutely do not trust each other, and each is vying for the support of the War Lord (played with chilly confidence by Philip Madoc, who would later play mad scientist Solon in The Brain of Morbius). When the Doctor stumbles into town, we learn that the War Chief is actually a TIME LORD! This isn’t the first time we’ve met one of the Doctor’s race, but it is the first time we hear them called by name, and by the end of the story, we end up actually meeting the big boys … much to the Doctor’s distress.

So, obviously, there’s a lot going on here. In addition to all the timey-wimey mayhem, the viewer is treated to some very creative Age of Aquarius production design. Yes, the file-cabinet-shaped SIDRAT machines are a bit clunky (although they do feature the latest in shower-curtain-based paneling, and are apparently green), but you also get a massive spiral decorating the wall of the interrogation chamber (or as I like to call it, Groovytown).

But one of my favorite aspects of the design is the vision motif. Obviously you’ve got the different kinds of control optics wielded by the commanders, from wireframe spectacles to the mind-bending monocle. But when we get to the base of operations, everyone on Team War Lord is wearing peculiar glasses seemingly made of white plastic with different cut shapes for lenses. When the Doctor and Zoe infiltrate the base and wear these glasses, they are apparently made invisible (or at least uninteresting) to the residents. Every one of the aliens wears some kind of eye covering, some with coke-bottle-thick lenses and some frosted so that only the center shows through. This means that the eye-bald War Chief always stands out in a crowd.

When the Time Lords finally make their presence known, they are as frightening and unnerving as they have ever been in the series, spittle-flecked Timothy Dalton notwithstanding. They wear simple robes and speak softly, but carry absolute authority and can apparently remove an entire alien race and planet from the fabric of space and time without lifting a finger. Of course, the Doctor stands firm in the face of his seemingly omnipotent accusers, but even he must succumb to their judgment, and the final image of the show and the season is of Troughton’s gurning face apparently being painfully subjected to mandatory regeneration.

Many fans, myself included, are fond of the “Season 6B” theory that suggests that the Doctor is NOT immediately changed after the fade to black, but instead goes on confidential missions for the Celestial Intelligence Agency. This would account for Troughton’s later appearances in the show sporting grayer hair and a surprisingly non-memory-wiped Jamie. The only other explanation for this would be writer laziness and a complete disregard for continuity, and isn’t it much more fun this way?

Roll on, 1970, Jon Pertwee, UNIT, and colour!

The post 050 – The War Games appeared first on Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews.

Doctor Who Series 9’s “Second Companion” Rumours

Andrew Reynolds is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

The rumour mill is churning once again and this time the potential spoiler concerns a dramatic shift in the TARDIS dynamic. While we already know Clara will return for the whole of Series 9 after a sudden change of heart, could there be another companion about to join her and the Doctor? Could it be someone we’ve seen recently?

Digital Fix are reporting from numerous unnamed sites that from The Magician’s Apprentice onwards, Michelle Gomez’s Missy will be joining the Twelfth Doctor full time as a new companion.

‘Why?’ I hear you cry (although probably not all for the same reason) well, it turns out an as yet unseen, brand new evil force is intent on wiping out the Time Lords; uniting these two long standing foes in an attempt to save the doomed Gallifrey.

Just what this new dynamic will mean for Clara remains to be seen but it would fit earlier comments made by Steven Moffat about a ‘…real – often exciting, sometimes a bit dangerous,’ relationship between the Doctor and his companion – whoever that may be.

Perhaps the reason why Steven Moffat is promising a lighter, ‘funny’ Doctor this season is because the stories themselves will become darker – forcing Capaldi out of his natural inclination to amplify the gloom – which somehow feels more like the Doctor; a devil may care Doctor.

The abrupt announcement that Michelle Gomez was returning so soon after the events of Dark Water/Death in Heaven certainly seems to confirm that she won’t be the main antagonist this season – especially given how, in the past, the very identity of that foe has been the overall arch of the series.

The idea of ‘The enemy of my enemy is my friend’ isn’t a large stretch of imagination from Dark Waters/Death in Heaven‘s dramatic refrain that ‘we’re not so different, you and I’ and it’s certainly not a new development in the Doctor/Master relationship; be it each other or uniting with another enemy, the Master in particular is a veteran of conflicting allegiances and self-serving needs.

The most interesting development is brand new threat; just what kind of alien beast has the power to master Time Lord technology and wipe out Time Lords? Omega? The Daleks? Rassilon (can we have Paul Cornell’s vampire Rassilon please)?

 

While you should definitely take this rumour with an absolute tonne of salt, it does throw open the idea of other companions joining the Doctor and Clara this year; so who should board the TARDIS?

The obvious first choice is Shona McCullough; the brief flirtation in Last Christmas with this brief companion proved that there is a definite dynamic there between the Doctor and a more down to Earth companion – wouldn’t it be interesting to see the Doctor once again pluck someone from the doldrums, show them all the wonders of universe and have them not weaponised. It’s time to celebrate normal again…Plus she can bust a move.

What perhaps isn’t as obvious is recasting Faye Marsay as another character. It isn’t outside the realm of possibility – just look at the guy with his hands on the TARDIS console.

How about Orson? There’s still the issue of, you know, his existence but there’s no reason the Doctor couldn’t pick him up for a jaunt in the TARDIS. As constant reminders of her partner’s death, he’s certainly made of the right stuff, right?

Speaking of the recently departed; who is to say that we won’t see Danny again? If Missy is to join the crew of the TARDIS, the issue of her part in the fate of Danny will inevitably come up; could Missy manipulate Clara with the promise of a return from the dead for Danny?

So what do we think of this Missy rumour? An interesting idea or a tired cliché? And who else should join the TARDIS crew?

The post Doctor Who Series 9’s “Second Companion” Rumours appeared first on Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews.

Freema Agyeman Stars In New Sci-fi Series ‘Sense8′ on Netflix

Rebecca Crockett is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

The movie and TV production landscape is changing. Gone are the days when the Beeb or the big US networks controlled all the airwaves. And now even the days of the cable giants like HBO and AMC getting all the attention are swiftly coming to an end. As the internet has grown, so has its reach. And now the likes of Netflix and Amazon are getting in on the act, creating their own shows and movies in an effort to not just sell and recycle content, but to gain more customers with new offerings.

Netflix has had a number of critical successes with the shows it has created, with some of them having even been nominated for Emmy awards, something that was unheard of a decade ago. From House Of Cards to Orange Is The New Black, Netflix has firmly established itself as a contender.

The online streaming site has recently released the details of the new content they are working on for this summer and among the offerings is a sci-fi show staring DW’s own Freema Agyeman!

Sense8, from Babylon 5 creator J. Michael Straczynski and the Wachowskis, the creators of the Matrix trilogy,

“…follows eight characters around the world who, in the aftermath of a tragic death, find themselves linked to each other mentally and emotionally. They can not only see and talk to each other as though they were in the same place, they have access to each other’s deepest secrets. Not only must they figure out what happened and why and what it means for the future of humanity, they must do so while being hunted by an organization out to capture, kill or vivisect them.”

Filmed across the globe in multiple cities like Chicago, London, Berlin, Mumbai, and Seoul, the international cast includes Naveen Andrews (Lost) and Daryl Hannah.

Netflix plans to roll out the ten-episode series on its services in both the US and the UK on Friday, 5 June.

I’ll admit that I’m probably one of the last people on Earth who hasn’t actually watched any of the service’s new programming, mainly because I’ve already got so many other shows I need to catch up on, but this one sounds interesting, especially the combination of the creative minds of Straczynski and the Wachowskis. Plus Freema!

Are you planning on catching Sense8?

(via Cultbox)

The post Freema Agyeman Stars In New Sci-fi Series ‘Sense8′ on Netflix appeared first on Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews.

Titan Comics’ Ninth Doctor #1 Variants Look Amazing

Philip Bates is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

Well, hasn’t time just flown by?! We’re now so close to Titan’s Ninth Doctor comic launching, the excitement is palpable. And the company has revealed the variant covers for Issue #1, a collection of fantastic art from across time and space.

Written by Cavan Scott (Who-ology) with art by Blair Shedd (IDW’s Doctor Who), Weapons of Past Destruction sees Eccleston’s Ninth Doctor teamed up with Rose Tyler and Captain Jack Harkness soon after The Empty Child/ The Doctor Dances, tracking down Time Lord technology from the Time War being sold on the intergalactic black market!

As well as these variants (one riffing off The End of the World), here’s what’s coming to a store near you:

So a lovely looking array of piccies there. We started with the Diamond UK Photo Cover; the BBCShop cover by Andrew James; the Strange Adventures store cover by Warren Pleece; Barnes & Noble exclusive; Comics to Astonish store variant by Mariano Laclaustra; Happy Harbor Comics store by Brian Williamson and Luis Guerrero; Gifts for the Geek cover by DWM favourite Lee Sullivan; More Fun Comics and Games variant by Jake Ekiss; and finally, the Newbury Comics exclusive by interior artists, Blair Shedd!

Picking a favourite is tough, but I’ve a love for the Comics to Astonish one which is a tribute to Amazing Fanasty #15, ie. the first appearance of Spider-Man.

If you’re in the UK, #1 can be ordered from Forbidden Planet, where Cavan Scott is signing copies in the Bristol branch on 1st April (take note: a change of date). Signed copies of Doctor Who: The Ninth Doctor #1 can also be purchased online if you’re can’t get there on the day.

The Ninth Doctor #1 is out on Wednesday 1st April.

The post Titan Comics’ Ninth Doctor #1 Variants Look Amazing appeared first on Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews.

Now Get Out Of That!

Nick May is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

For some, the most exciting news about the forthcoming season is not that Jenna Coleman has decided to stay, which is a welcome development, nor the news that Missy is set to return (which isn’t), it’s the news that Steven Moffat is reintroducing two-part stories.

A common criticism of modern Who is that too much is crammed into too little time, to the detriment of the story.  Many of the gems of the new run have been the two-part stories: The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances, Human Nature/The Family of Blood, Flesh and Stone/The Time of Angels… all proof-positive that some stories need the space to develop towards a successful final pay-off. For longer-term fans, the cliffhanger is Doctor Who, the thing that kept us tuning in week in, week out growing up.  Two of my earliest Who memories are of cliffhangers- the spiders emerging from the fruit in Full Circle and the Doctor imploring Tegan and Mace not to open the cages of infected rats in The Visitation.  One cliffhanger, The Deadly Assassin Part Three, was deemed so horrific that it no longer exists in its original format.

Here, in defence of the art of the cliffhanger, is my choice of the weird, the wonderful and the edge-of-the-seat episode endings the series has employed to keep us tuning in every week:

The Invasion Episode Six

For me, the quintessential epic Who cliffhanger.  Shamelessly aped at the end of Dark Water, the original sees director Douglas Camfield take four extras, some tight editing and half a dozen Cybermen to create the impression of, well, an invasion.  The sequence where they march down the steps of St Paul’s is still something to behold, and it shouldn’t have been repeated.  By anyone.  Ever.

The Caves of Androzani Episode Three

Something else the series needs to get back to is regeneration stories like this: ones where things spiral of control and aren’t going to end well for our hero.  Things are already looking pretty grim for the Doctor (Spectrox poisoning, firing squads, keeping a straight face with the Magma Beast) by the time he tries his hand at landing an unfamiliar spacecraft by nosediving it at the ground.  Graeme Harper plays the tension like a violin throughout the story, building up to the grim events of the final episode with this seemingly terminal-looking encounter.

The Face of Evil Part Three

A prime example of the show at its most bonkers, as the Doctor is subjected to the ultimate temper-tantrum by a schizophrenic computer that doesn’t want to acknowledge him anymore.  The final shot of the Doctor curled up on the floor surrounded by images of his own face as a child’s voice repeatedly screams ‘Who am I?’ is almost Kubrick-esque and must rank as one of the series’ most novel cliffhangers.

Inferno Episode Six

A story with more than its fair share of strong cliffhangers, Inferno builds to possibly the ultimate ‘now get out of that’ moment when the Doctor and his parallel universe allies come fact-to-face with the end of the world.  Fittingly for this doom-laden story, the solution isn’t clear-cut, as Section Leader Elizabeth Shaw and co have sacrificed themselves to the lava in order for the Doctor to return home to stop Stahlman making the same mistake here.

The War Games Episode Nine

The Time Lords are coming to sort out the mess created by the War Lord and his cronies.  They’re the Doctor’s people, so why isn’t he happy about involving them?  The War Lord intimates that no good will come of it, but by then, the TARDIS regulars and Lt Carstairs have gone back to an eerie, deserted 1917 Zone.  Suddenly, Carstairs just disappears.  As Dudley Simpson’s eerie church organ score kicks in, the air is filled with a strange screeching.  The Doctor and friends struggle against an unseen force to return to the TARDIS but are seemingly overcome – the Time Lords are coming!  What happens next will shape the show for the next twenty years and beyond, but at that point, the mystery of the Doctor’s past provides one last tantalising moment of peril…

Vengeance on Varos Part One

Surrounded by ninety minutes of flatly directed, hammily acted, poorly scripted tripe, the denouement to the first episode of this story is a cleverly self-referential moment.  If it had gone to the credits on the word ‘Cut!’ over the Doctor seemingly dead on the floor, it would have been great, but director Ron Jones chose to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory with some evil laughing to underline the point that the baddies had the upper hand.  Close, but no marsh minnow.

The Empty Child

Proving that the new kids can hold their own against the classics, the Moff’s 2005 two-part debut has many great moments (my favourite bit is still the moment they realise the reel-to-reel has run out of tape) but the cliffhanger in particular is a corker.  The show may be faster-paced and more self-aware than in the days of yore, but for tension and suspense, nothing is better for building up the tension than having your regular cast backed into a corner by a horde of gas mask-faced zombies.  The resolution to it is amazing, too.

There are, of course, many other examples and everyone will have their favourites.  Equally the show has given us some of the least cliffhanging cliffhangers ever committed to videotape.  An Ogron in a chair- sitting!  The Master in danger- isn’t that meant to be a good thing?  And let’s not forget the legendary “Nuzzink in ze vurld can shtop me now!” from The Underwater Menace, though I really wish I could…

Love it or loathe it, triumph or turkey, the cliffhanger is part of the series’ DNA and it’s great that it’s coming back to resume its place as a staple of the show.

The post Now Get Out Of That! appeared first on Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews.

Moffat on Paternoster Gang Spin-off: “The Beeb would do it in a heartbeat”

Christian Cawley is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

We’ve featured a few gems from Steven Moffat’s interview in the latest issue of Doctor Who Magazine in the past few days, but here’s one that will likely cause some interesting reactions.

Chatting with DWM editor Tom Spilsbury, the conversation – looking back at Doctor Who Series 8 and forwards to Series 9 – turns to how Deep Breath is similar to Robot in that both stories introduce “an alarmingly different Doctor”. This is when Moffat makes the slightly surprising claim…

“I’m always slightly worried that you can’t keep repeating the joke. And there’s always talk of the spin-off, and the Beeb would do it in a heartbeat… but… I dunno. The moment you start relying on something, you should probably throw it away. I always kind of feel that nothing should stay in the Doctor’s life. You can have River for a few years, but then River has to go.”

So, Moffat reckons that the BBC would commission a Paternoster Gang spin-off series – but what do you think? Would they, and would you watch? Who, indeed, would watch it? Let us know what you think.

The post Moffat on Paternoster Gang Spin-off: “The Beeb would do it in a heartbeat” appeared first on Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews.

Yes, She Can Do That Too: Karen Gillan Sings

Christian Cawley is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

She can act. She can model. She can even do comedy. And, it seems, the talents of Karen Gillan don’t end there.

The former Doctor Who companion can also sing, as evidenced in this clip from the now-cancelled Selfie, a 21st century updating of the Pygmalion/My Fair Lady story.

Click play above to see the former Pond singing Sia’s Chandalier, nominated four times for a Grammy. Then compare it with the original in the player below.

The general reaction to Selfie seems to have been of a series that started poorly but finished quite strongly, but sadly it seems as though that horse has long since bolted for Karen. Let’s look forward to some more roles for the actress that allow her to demonstrate her quite stunning (and authentic) singing voice.

The post Yes, She Can Do That Too: Karen Gillan Sings appeared first on Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews.

Steven Moffat Confirms Multiple Doctor Who Series 9 Two-Parters

Jonathan Appleton is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

Steven Moffat has pointed to a significant change in the structure of the next series of Doctor Who, with two-part stories making a comeback. Interviewed in the new issue of Doctor Who Magazine, the showrunner says:

“Yeah, we’re changing the rhythm of it quite a bit. For a long while, those 45-minute stories were the backbone of Doctor Who. They felt new and fresh and different. It just started to feel to me, that as a member of the audience, you were getting too acquainted with the rhythm of it. Do you know what I mean? You sort of think ‘Well, now it’s about time for the music to come up.’ Writing the first two-parter that I had done in years [Dark Water/Death in Heaven] I just thought, ‘I’m liking this. This feels more unpredictable.’ Because you don’t know how far you’re going to get through the story…”

We already know that series 9 will kick off with the return of Missy in a double-bill written by Moffat himself, followed with episodes 3 and 4 which will be another two-parter by Toby Whithouse. And Moffat’s comments indicate that decision to go with longer stories is designed, at least in part, to shake things up and confound viewers’ expectations of what a Doctor Who story should be.

Many people will surely welcome the move. The closing episodes of series 8 may not have been to everyone’s taste but there’s no doubting that they were a good illustration of how a strong cliff-hanger can grab people’s attention and generate that all-important anticipation for next week’s show. Some of the most highly regarded twenty-first century stories have been two-parters (Moffat’s own The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances; Army of Ghosts/Doomsday; Human Nature/The Family of Blood) and if they haven’t always quite hit the mark (The Hungry Earth/Cold Blood; The Rebel Flesh/The Almost People) they have at least allowed things to proceed at a less frenetic pace, with more time to get to know guest characters.

One of the most common gripes about the series since its 2005 return, from casual viewers as well as more dedicated fans, has surely been that the 45-minute format leads to rushed endings, with insufficient time to allow the story to develop. Television had undergone some major changes in the years the programme was off the screen, of course, and the producers may have been justified in thinking that modern audiences just weren’t inclined to follow the same story from week to week (although long-form drama could hardly be said to have died a death). But Moffat is clearly trying to ensure that the series stays ahead of the game, and is frank about the risks involved in repeating the same tried and tested format from year to year.

It won’t come as a surprise to followers of Moffat’s work to read a fairly heavy hint that he’ll be using this new approach as a way challenge assumptions about what’s coming next. Just because a story has been labelled as a two-parter doesn’t necessarily mean everything will be wrapped up by the end of part two:

“The rule I’ve got is that you won’t be absolutely certain whether a show is going to be a two-parter or not. And sometimes something that looks like it’s going to be a single isn’t a single. I think the nice thing is not having the feeling of ‘It’s five minutes until the end of Doctor Who, so he’s bound to start running now.’ You should exploit the fact that there’s a week’s gap. And with each of the two-parters we’re doing, there’s a substantial difference between the two halves.”

So what do you think? Is Moffat right that it’s time for a shift in the format? Or has Doctor Who been doing just fine in recent years with mostly one-parters? Let us know!

You can read the full interview in issue 484 of Doctor Who Magazine, available now across the galaxy!

The post Steven Moffat Confirms Multiple Doctor Who Series 9 Two-Parters appeared first on Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews.

New Ark In Space Audiobook To Be Read By Jon Culshaw

Andrew Reynolds is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

Jon Culshaw, perhaps the finest Fourth Doctor impersonator this side of Kasterborous, France, will be lending his dulcet tones to the audiobook adaptation of the indomitable Doctor Who and The Ark in Space.

Ladbroke audio played host to the Dead Ringers star as he recorded his very first audiobook over two fun, epic days as he brought Ian Marter’s novelisation of Robert Holmes’ 1975 serial to life.

It’s not long before the crew of the TARDIS find things going suspiciously wrong, and the station under attack from the giant Wirrrn, deadly creatures who, in their lust for power, now threaten the future of the whole Human Race.

We think you’ll agree that this news seems like the perfect excuse to watch this…

…and this…

…and most definitely this again…

The story sees the Fourth Doctor, Sarah Jane and Harry on an automated ark ship far off in the future; on board and frozen in suspended animation, a selection of humanity awaits the day the craft returns to Earth.

It’s not long before the crew of the TARDIS find things going suspiciously wrong, and the station under attack from the giant Wirrrn, deadly creatures who, in their lust for power, now threaten the future of the whole Human Race…

The first novelisation by Marter brought about several changes to Holmes’ original scripts including altering the ending, changing the spelling of ‘Wirrn’ to ‘Wirrrn’ and removing the line “Well, my doctorate is purely honorary, and Harry here is only qualified to work on sailors,” entirely.

These aren’t the only changes; as Michael Stevens, Commissioning Editor of BBC Audio, told DWM: “Jon is of course famous for his uncannily accurate impression of Tom Baker as the Doctor, and so he’ll be bringing his aptitude for the Doctor to book! Jon is also a keen fan of the programme himself, and has been delighted to immerse himself in the adventure on Terra Nova, as Nerva Beacon is renamed in the book.”

Culshaw is no stranger to Doctor Who; he appeared in the webcast Death Comes to Time and audio drama The Kingmaker. In the latter, he got to perform his Tom Baker impression “for real” (voicing tape recordings of the Fourth Doctor), although his nominal part was that of Earl Rivers.

In November 2013, Culshaw also appeared in the one-off 50th anniversary comedy homage The Five(ish) Doctors Reboot.

Doctor Who and the Ark in Space: A Fourth Doctor Novelisation is available to pre-order on CD now for release on 3rd September for £20.00.

The post New Ark In Space Audiobook To Be Read By Jon Culshaw appeared first on Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews.