Doctor Who 30.12: "The Stolen Earth"
Jun. 29th, 2008 10:36 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
annathepiperTo echo some of the sentiments I've seen going around about this weekend's episode, "Russell T. Davies, you bastard!"
Also, I must now also admit that the first words out of my mouth after the intro were, "The Earth has been STOLEN, GIR!" (Okay, surely I couldn't have been the only person flashing on Invader Zim while watching this?)
This episode had a whole fleet of boatloads of cool going for it. First and foremost: the Shadow Proclamation and the Judoon warriors who were there. I still have no earthly idea what the Shadow Proclamation actually is, mind you, but it was pretty cool to see it on camera after hearing it mentioned a few times in the course of this series.
Second: the Medusa Cascade, another thing we've heard mentioned before. Stunning effects shots in the bits when the TARDIS materializes there.
Third: Effects shots in general, with the 26 (!!!) planets in the sky over the stolen Earth, and the fleet of Dalek ships swarming all over London.
And speaking of which: ZOMG DAVROS. He really was pretty much the only other major Doctor Who villain we had yet to see in the new series, and yet, even as it's bitchin' cool to see him on camera, it does lead to the very point raised by![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
spazzkat after we finished watching this episode:
To wit, the finality of the Time War doesn't seem particularly... final at this point. ;)
I mean, seriously, this makes what, three separate groups of Daleks who have managed to escape the Time War? And we haven't yet had a whisper of any Time Lords escaping, aside from the Master. Though... I have to admit I'm halfway wondering whether we're going to get some more Time Lords showing up on camera in Part 3, just because that would be a super-cool thing for RTD to pull off on his last episode.
Some more interesting stuff with foreshadowing for Donna, while she was at the Shadow Proclamation. Her loss yet to come: the Doctor getting killed, or something else? Her humanity?
Meanwhile, planetside, most of this episode wound up being about getting all the Companions to touch bases. I am resigned to the fact that I am woefully behind on Torchwood; I haven't even watched the episodes involving Martha yet. So I'm clearly missing backstory there. But! HARRIET JONES! *squee* Her organizing the subwave network was one of the shining points of this episode. And, sniffle, when the Daleks stormed in and she turned and faced them and WAAAAH.
Great mileage with Sarah Jane, because of all the Companions in the episode, she was first up with experiencing the Daleks. That look on her face was just piercing. So was the look on Jack's face, for that matter--and he sure as hell has reason to flip right the fuck out at the Daleks swarming over the Earth. After all, last time, he died fighting them.
And yet, even in the face of this, we still had some great little bits with Jack getting ogled. Hee. And hitting on Sarah Jane, bwaha! And Donna ogling him too even as the Doctor sternly ordered her to back down.
And, of course, Rose.
Really loved the shot of her bamfing in at the beginning with that enormous gun. BOOYA. I need that as an icon. And watching the Subwave find her along with the others, though she wasn't able to patch in... AIGH! I kept going AIGH! on her behalf as she kept mumbling "hey, what about me?!" comments and reacting to Martha and everything.
And oh. My. God. The reunion. I was wondering if we were going to have Rose finally make it to the Doctor just in time to see him regenerate and ZOMG I was RIGHT...
And WTF REGENERATION BUH?!
This is me now wondering what the hell. I haven't heard any confirmation one way or another about whether Tennant will be back for Series Five; all I know is that he is supposed to be in the four specials through the course of 2009, and Series Five is supposed to be in 2010.
Operating on the assumption that Tennant is keeping the role, this of course leads to the question of how the HELL are they going to keep him from really regenerating?
I noticed his remark about the Medusa Cascade being out of sync with the rest of Time, so I'm wondering if that will affect things somehow... and I also caught that babbled remark from the crazy Dalek, something about a "threefold man" or something, though I didn't quite get the exact quote. I'm wondering if that's also a clue. Or, if the walls between universes and Time in general is being all weird and stuff, enough that Rose was able to hop worlds and come back, maybe that'll be a factor.
Waaaah! Hurt Doctor in Rose's arms. Sniff. I don't want Eleventh Doctor yet. I'm not READY for Eleventh Doctor. So this is me desperately hoping that they'll come up with a way that he'll just reset or something... though now I'm also wondering whether they'll pull something along the lines of, Doctor gets "killed" twice more in part 3, tying into Crazy Dalek's babblings, and he stabilizes once Time is normal again... only then, Rose has to go back to the other universe. That's how I'd write this, anyway. We'll see how RTD did it!
AIGH!
And... OOH OOH OOH, I have a theory. A really easy way for them to keep Tennant and to have it fit what we've seen in the canon so far is to have the Doctor simply finally learn how to control his own regeneration. If we go back to Romana's controlling her on-screen regeneration, we know that a Time Lord/Time Lady can presumably try on different shapes if desired. And if we tie Romana's actions on screen with the 15-hour regeneration cycle established when Ten came on camera, we could therefore conclude... it would be possible, as long as the Doctor does it fast enough, to simply make his body keep the same shape.
And here's the kicker... if Rose begs him not to change, maybe that'll be enough impetus to get him to fight to control the whole process.
That's what I'll be hoping for, anyway!
AIGH!
Also, I must now also admit that the first words out of my mouth after the intro were, "The Earth has been STOLEN, GIR!" (Okay, surely I couldn't have been the only person flashing on Invader Zim while watching this?)
This episode had a whole fleet of boatloads of cool going for it. First and foremost: the Shadow Proclamation and the Judoon warriors who were there. I still have no earthly idea what the Shadow Proclamation actually is, mind you, but it was pretty cool to see it on camera after hearing it mentioned a few times in the course of this series.
Second: the Medusa Cascade, another thing we've heard mentioned before. Stunning effects shots in the bits when the TARDIS materializes there.
Third: Effects shots in general, with the 26 (!!!) planets in the sky over the stolen Earth, and the fleet of Dalek ships swarming all over London.
And speaking of which: ZOMG DAVROS. He really was pretty much the only other major Doctor Who villain we had yet to see in the new series, and yet, even as it's bitchin' cool to see him on camera, it does lead to the very point raised by
spazzkat after we finished watching this episode:To wit, the finality of the Time War doesn't seem particularly... final at this point. ;)
I mean, seriously, this makes what, three separate groups of Daleks who have managed to escape the Time War? And we haven't yet had a whisper of any Time Lords escaping, aside from the Master. Though... I have to admit I'm halfway wondering whether we're going to get some more Time Lords showing up on camera in Part 3, just because that would be a super-cool thing for RTD to pull off on his last episode.
Some more interesting stuff with foreshadowing for Donna, while she was at the Shadow Proclamation. Her loss yet to come: the Doctor getting killed, or something else? Her humanity?
Meanwhile, planetside, most of this episode wound up being about getting all the Companions to touch bases. I am resigned to the fact that I am woefully behind on Torchwood; I haven't even watched the episodes involving Martha yet. So I'm clearly missing backstory there. But! HARRIET JONES! *squee* Her organizing the subwave network was one of the shining points of this episode. And, sniffle, when the Daleks stormed in and she turned and faced them and WAAAAH.
Great mileage with Sarah Jane, because of all the Companions in the episode, she was first up with experiencing the Daleks. That look on her face was just piercing. So was the look on Jack's face, for that matter--and he sure as hell has reason to flip right the fuck out at the Daleks swarming over the Earth. After all, last time, he died fighting them.
And yet, even in the face of this, we still had some great little bits with Jack getting ogled. Hee. And hitting on Sarah Jane, bwaha! And Donna ogling him too even as the Doctor sternly ordered her to back down.
And, of course, Rose.
Really loved the shot of her bamfing in at the beginning with that enormous gun. BOOYA. I need that as an icon. And watching the Subwave find her along with the others, though she wasn't able to patch in... AIGH! I kept going AIGH! on her behalf as she kept mumbling "hey, what about me?!" comments and reacting to Martha and everything.
And oh. My. God. The reunion. I was wondering if we were going to have Rose finally make it to the Doctor just in time to see him regenerate and ZOMG I was RIGHT...
And WTF REGENERATION BUH?!
This is me now wondering what the hell. I haven't heard any confirmation one way or another about whether Tennant will be back for Series Five; all I know is that he is supposed to be in the four specials through the course of 2009, and Series Five is supposed to be in 2010.
Operating on the assumption that Tennant is keeping the role, this of course leads to the question of how the HELL are they going to keep him from really regenerating?
I noticed his remark about the Medusa Cascade being out of sync with the rest of Time, so I'm wondering if that will affect things somehow... and I also caught that babbled remark from the crazy Dalek, something about a "threefold man" or something, though I didn't quite get the exact quote. I'm wondering if that's also a clue. Or, if the walls between universes and Time in general is being all weird and stuff, enough that Rose was able to hop worlds and come back, maybe that'll be a factor.
Waaaah! Hurt Doctor in Rose's arms. Sniff. I don't want Eleventh Doctor yet. I'm not READY for Eleventh Doctor. So this is me desperately hoping that they'll come up with a way that he'll just reset or something... though now I'm also wondering whether they'll pull something along the lines of, Doctor gets "killed" twice more in part 3, tying into Crazy Dalek's babblings, and he stabilizes once Time is normal again... only then, Rose has to go back to the other universe. That's how I'd write this, anyway. We'll see how RTD did it!
AIGH!
And... OOH OOH OOH, I have a theory. A really easy way for them to keep Tennant and to have it fit what we've seen in the canon so far is to have the Doctor simply finally learn how to control his own regeneration. If we go back to Romana's controlling her on-screen regeneration, we know that a Time Lord/Time Lady can presumably try on different shapes if desired. And if we tie Romana's actions on screen with the 15-hour regeneration cycle established when Ten came on camera, we could therefore conclude... it would be possible, as long as the Doctor does it fast enough, to simply make his body keep the same shape.
And here's the kicker... if Rose begs him not to change, maybe that'll be enough impetus to get him to fight to control the whole process.
That's what I'll be hoping for, anyway!
AIGH!