Tooth and Claw was a nicely written piece.

sure I concede that was one of his better offerings. then he undoes it all with Love & Monsters.

Why are you guys fighting. There are still 2 weeks to go. Save it for then

It could have been really good except for the bad scipting for Rose and the Doctor

great 'gothic' piece but the Rose and the I am not amused angle became a bit laboured after a while, similar to how the farting gags became. funny to begin with but then tiresome as used once too often. an example of one person thinking it is funny and assuming everyone else will.
Last edited by Black Guardian : 18-03-2007 at 23:59

I actually thought that Love and Monsters was better than Tooth & Claw, and one of the best episodes of the 'new' series.

I'll get me coat.

pleased you liked it Chris. afraid it just didn't work for me on any level.

Hated Love and Monsters.

Love and Monsters. You know the one story I had problems with. We had nothing like it before. The concept of it was fantastic but several things let it down. The opening 'Scooby Doo'sence, the Peter Kay Monster and the stupid paving slab sex joke at the end.

"Tooth And Claw" was rubbish. An alien werewolf virus? An order of monks -- monks who move like they are in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon -- dedicated to infecting the British monarch with the virus for no apparent reason (other than that they are complete nutters, I suppose)? Queen Victoria's husband and another man inexplicably had foreknowledge of the diabolical plan in store for Queen Victoria, and knew just how to stop it? What a great plan -- it required a Time Lord from outer space to figure everything out, and the alien had to get the Queen to the one (small) place on earth where there is a weapon that could destroy the werewolf, and the big diamond needed to power this weapon just happened to be there at the same time? Just because a script is being written for a science fiction show, doesn't mean it is permissable for it to be a tissue of hopelessly illogical nonsense.

The much-derided "Love & Monsters," on the other hand, has real merit, because all its nonsense is INTENTIONAL. It is an outright black comedy, which of course humourless Doctor Who fanatics could not stand precisely because their revered object of obsession -- the Doctor Who series -- was taking the piss out of itself for once. The X-Files was at its most brilliant when it ventured into comedy that amounted to self-satire, and "Love & Monsters" represented an attempt (even if an unwitting one) on the part of Doctor Who's producers to go down a similar avenue.
Last edited by MoreTears : 19-03-2007 at 09:27

Vive la difference!

Brilliant, another few years of companions besotted with the Doctor, slapstick villains and a new Love and Monsters each year. Best news I've had since my football team was relegated last season

Me thinks you were being a bit sarcy there Rooks. I've actually no problem with the odd comedy story but it has to be done right or it will look silly. Most long running sci-fi and indeed drama series will offset intense drama with comedy elements or comedic episodes but it is very hard to do. Full marks for trying with Love and Monsters but they didn't nail it for me.

Mebe we will get a musical episode... everyone needs a musical episode...

Well you see I hated Buffy. I know I will get torn to pieces for saying that but I did. People think the musical thing was good but it didn't do anything for me. Why try and make Doctor Who like Buffy? It has it's own style, own history, own universe. Sure you can experiment and try out new things but don't fully copy other series otherwise you will be an inferior copy of that programme.

Hmm yeh erm my comment was like a joke... ooh nice and relaxed here as usual isn't it!

It's been a long weekend Tegan, I'm in one of those irreverent moods

I'm going to sound really harsh here but do you honestly believe RTD has it in him to make Doctor Who outside of the Buffy model?

I agree that elements of Buffy's style have been incorporated into the Doctor Who reboot, but to say that it's been fully copied is going a bit far. After all, Doctor Who is still about a time travelling alien, rather than a schoolgirl with superpowers. As far as I can see, most of the things that have been copied (for want of a better term) from Buffy have been positively received:

The feisty female - Rose was well liked in the first series at least, and by many in the second series as well.

The season-long story arc - phenomenally popular in the first series with 'Bad Wolf' (I did wonder whether that was a sly reference to Buffy's 'Big Bad'). Yes, they cocked it up in the second series, but it could be argued that was because they departed from the Buffy template.

Wisecracking dialogue - didn't always work, but some of the banter in series 1 in particular was great fun. I think the general standard of scripting has been way above the latter years (Colin Baker onwards) of the original series. And yes, I include RTD's scripts in that!

The odd 'comedy' episode - not strictly cribbed from Buffy, certainly the X-Files did it first. As, I've said, I loved Love and Monsters. Obviously it's not everyone's cup of tea, but was only a one-off. Maybe they'll do better next time.

All of this has been done whilst retaining the essential elements that make Doctor Who what it is. So, it's a positive balance in the Buffy bank for me.

Hey Liquid, you may well have been joking but believe me when I say others may think it a good idea. Throw in some dancing Hitlers and you have 'The Producers'.
As for me I am nice and relaxed thank you. I just love a good debate. As you can see your comment has done just that but everyone seems to be enjoying themselves. So chill and enjoy it too.

I agree with what you say Chris and whatever elements taken have been moulded to suit Doctor Who and on the whole are OK. I just wanted to make the point that I want to watch Doctor Who, not Buffy or anything else. So they have to be careful how far they push things. I agree 100% that the new series, even at it's worse is better than most of the late 80s Doctor Who and have said so on several occasions. However I beleive we should compare Doctor Who to it's very best and how that's achieved not it's very worse. If we do the latter we can excuse bad stories with "well it''s not good but it's better than xxx"

It's clear to me that RTD really wanted to write for Buffy. We have our teenage female hero Rose and her older, knowledgeable advisor "The Doctor". Each week they battle evil (and in season 2 it seems they decided to do a lot of supernatural-like stories), often making pop-culture references and quips. Even the end of season 1 was 'heavily influenced' by Buffy. I liked Buffy, I really did. Some episodes rate as some of my favourite television of all time. But when Doctor Who mimics Buffy it just doesn't work for me. It should be forging it's own identity rather than being Buffy with aliens.

For the love of "Are you there God, it's me Margret", can we have this word added to the word filter or something because this got old in 2005 and for some reason it's STILL trotted out as a good punchline...

Anyway, surely this should be seen as good news....Doctor Who will be continuing until at least 2010 and probably beyond....

Hmmm...I wonder how many spin off series there'll be by then.....(WARNING A slightly less original joke there, but it's quite new so I'll just use it six more times before dropping it! )

Excellent news - I've really enjoyed the first two new series, love the format the show is taking.

I'll carry on watching!

you will. Daleks In Manhattan..big musical numbers and dance extravaganza as the Daleks do their take on the Muppets in Manhattan