Tagged: Doctor Who

Mindy Newell: Outlander

“It’s just a big story, you know? The book is a big tale. It travels a lot and it goes to a lot of different places. And as I looked at it… the rights holder initially was trying to do it as a feature and I knew that it was never going to be a feature. You would lose everything that was special about the book once you stripped it down to two hours. And still, if you want to do the story justice, if you want to actually enjoy the experience the way the reader enjoys the experience, you have to take your time. You have to sort of drink in the landscape. You have to get to know the people. You need to let the moments breathe. You need to let the story just unwind a little bit. And to create that feeling in television, it just required a bigger spread of hours.” Ronald D. Moore, Executive Producer, Outlander, A Starz Original Series based on the book by Diana Gabaldon.

First, a confession.

I’ve never read the Outlander series of books by Ms. Gabaldon.

I’m not sure why. Certainly all the ingredients are there:

  • Time travel: As those of you who regularly read this column already know, and as any newbies are about to learn, mention a time travel story to me and my mouth starts watering like Pavlov’s dog – Doctor Who, various episodes of various Star Trek shows and movies, Connie Willis’s series of short stories and novels concerning the time-traveling faculty of a future Oxford University;
  • A woman protagonist who is not only a registered nurse, but a combat nurse in World War II – for those of you who don’t know, I’m an R.N., as was my mom, who served in the Army during the war, and my dad was a fighter jock in the China-Burma-India (CBI) theatre of operations, first piloting P-40s and then, for the majority of his time in service, flying the ultimate war plane, the Mustang P-51. (Okay, the Brits may argue with me on that one, defending the very worthy and impressive Spitfire, in which the R.A.F. pilots won the crucial Battle of Britain.);
  • History and great historical fiction, especially the incredible history of the British isles and the great historical fiction about our cousins across the pond – I don’t know if I’ve mentioned this before here, but I’m sort of a British royal history geek, reading everything from Shakespeare’s plays to Anne Weir and Eric Ives to Jean Plaidy and Phillipa Gregory and watching every movie from The Private Life Of Henry VIII (starring Charles Laughton and directed-produced by Alexander Korda) to The Lion In Winter (starring Peter O’Toole as Henry II, Katherine Hepburn as Eleanor of Aquitane, Anthony Hopkins as the future King Richard “The Lionhearted” I, and Timothy Dalton as France’s King Phillip II) to various Masterpiece Theatre productions – Glenda Jackson in Elizabeth R – to Cate Blanchett and Helen Mirren’s turns as the Virgin Queen. Not to forget Ms. Mirren in the 2006 movie The Queen.

And there was a time when I loved what are commonly referred to as “bodice-rippers,” i.e., romance novels. You know the ones I mean, the one with the covers of some impossibly gorgeous man of a past era with impossibly gorgeous pecs holding a beautiful, sensuous, and amply endowed woman dressed in a disarrayed bodice (hence the term “bodice ripper”). Also referred to as “soft-porn,” these books are formulaic, usually involving a young and innocent heroine and a rich, powerful man who she initially and distinctly H-A-T-E-S, but with whom she eventually, and eternally, fall in love. The seduction of the heroine happens frequently, and, I have to admit here, that some of the sex scenes are I-N-C-R-E-D-I-B-L-E, giving Fifty Shades Of Grey a run for its money; I can heartily recommend, for those of you interested in “genteelly” getting your rocks off, The Flame And The Flower by Katherine Woodiwiss, Sweet Savage Love and its sequels by Rosemary Rodgers, and the hottest, most licentious, incredibly sweaty and sexy Skye O’Malley series by Bertrice Small.

But The Flame And The Flower was first published in 1972, Sweet Savage Love in 1974, and Skye O’Malley in 1981. IM-not-so-HO, these were the books that really started off the craze, but since then the romance genre has been flooded with thousands of knock-offs by, again, IM-not-so-HO, too many really, really lousy writers incapable of really, really, sweat-inducing bedroom (and other places) scenes, and, again, IM-not-so-HO, the genre has suffered.

In other words… I was turned off. Not turned on.

Which is why I never picked up Outlander.

Which, BTW, was in a sub-sub-genre of bodice rippers called “time-travel romance,” which was a sub-genre of bodice rippers called “science fiction romance.”

Yeeeccch!

But…

When I read that the adaptation of Outlander was being exec-produced by Ron Moore – he of some of ST: The Next Generation’s best episodes, including “Best Of Both Worlds Part I,” and of course, of the reboot of Battlestar Galatica, my “on button” went green.

So this past Saturday, August 9th, at 9 P.M., I turned on the TV and went to the Starz channel.  And guess what?

Not only wasn’t I not disappointed… I was intrigued.

First off, the production is shot on location in Scotland. Scotland is beautiful, eerie, and full of history.

Second, Mr. Moore introduces us to the heroine, Claire Beacham Randall, at work in the field hospitals of World War II. Mr. Moore added this scene, which apparently is not how the book opens; it should have. Right away the viewer knows who this woman is: brave, resourceful, knowledgeable, and able to stand on her own two feet.

Third, the first half-hour is dedicated to the relationship between Claire and her husband, Frank Randall, a historian. They have been separated by five years of war, and are trying to reconnect through a holiday in Scotland. And by watching them reconnect, we connect to them. Plus there is some hot sex between the pair, including a scene in which Frank goes down on Claire in an ancient, ruined Scottish castle.

Fourth, we believe Claire’s reaction to being thrust back into time and what initially happens to her there because, as I wrote, we already have a sense of what type of person Claire is, and we have become connected to her through the first half-hour.

Fifth, the Scots whom Claire meets speak Scottish as well as English; a nice bit of reality.

And, finally, that ancient, ruined castle pops up again. Only it’s not ruined, it’s not ancient, and its flags are flying over the turrets; a nice bit of foreshadowing by Mr. Moore…and, I’m presuming, Ms. Gabaldon, since I haven’t read the book.

But I will.

I just ordered in on Amazon.

Now I just have to decide if I want to read it before the next episode of Outlander airs this Saturday night.

 

Classic Doctor Who Debuts Monday On Retro TV

  • News
  • August 3, 2014

Starting Monday, August 4, digital television provider Retro TV will be presenting the surviving “classic” episodes of Doctor Who weekdays at 8PM.  the series will start as it should with William Hartnell as The Doctor in An Unearthly Child, and will continue in order, right through to the Sylvester McCoy series.

When broadcast television switched over to digital, stations received a bonus two digital sub-channels thanks to the extra ability to compress data.  Most stations had no plan of their own to utilize these stations, which allowed for the rise of third party programming providers like Retro, Me-TV and many more.  Offering mostly reruns of classic television, these channels have greatly expanded the number of classic shows available.  While most classic TV station were only available through cable subscriptions, these new channels are available over the air, allowing everyone to enjoy them.

Retro TV scored a double-hit this summer for science-fiction fans.  In addition to the adventures of the renegade Time Lord, they brought the travails of a man in space forced to watch cheesy movies with his robot friends back to the air when they premiered Mystery Science Theater 3000 earlier in the Summer.

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Retro TV brought MST3K back to the air earlier this summer.

“Bringing MST3K and Doctor Who to Retro TV has been a passion project,” explains Matt Golden, Vice President of Production,  “not only for myself, but others in the organization that love the shows and are thrilled to be able to share them with our audience. It’s for fans, by fans.”

Although the original broadcasts of Doctor were without commercials, Retro is doing everything possible to keep from editing the episodes.  “A few of the episodes will be slightly edited for time. That said, it’s the minority.” Matt Golden clarifies.  “For instance, of the first batch of episodes processed, there are only 20 out of those 121 episodes that are longer than we can support and thus need to be trimmed.”

“For the few that are over our prescribed durations, we’re making extremely judicious cuts, with careful consideration toward content and flow. Moreover, we’re not making any cuts that aren’t absolutely necessary, and the ones we have to make range from 30-60 seconds. We won’t be utilizing time compression, as episode-length speedup is more distracting and detrimental than subtle edits of a few lengthy establishing shots.”

This is not out of the ordinary.  Back in its original foray into American television, the Tom Baker episodes were cut for commercial content, not mention adding explanatory narration by Howard DaSilva.  Even BBC America edits episodes of the current series after their initial broadcast to accommodate ads.

retroWhoRetro TV plans to bring the show to the fans by way of attending major Sci-Fi conventions as well. “We had a great time a couple of weeks ago at Con Kasterborous in Huntsville, AL, where we spoke with Sylvester McCoy, Andrew Cartmel, and several groups of fans, clips of which will be making their way onto TV and social media in the coming weeks as we roll out Doctor Who. We plan to continue doing so, and are in the midst of finalizing the details for another couple of cons this year”

In the area of genre programming, Retro had fallen behind ME-TV, which carries the original Star Trek, Lost in Space and many more.  But with these two additions, Retro makes it clear they’re back in the game, with more to come. “I have a great love of sci-fi, fantasy, and horror, and feel that those genres have been somewhat underserved in our particular arena.” says Golden. “It’s all about the response, though, so if fans want to see more, they can help us out by making some noise: following us on Facebook and Twitter (and now on tumblr), calling stations in their markets to demand Retro TV, etc.”

Check the  Retro TV website for local affiliates in your area, and with your local cable company to see if they carry the channel.

John Ostrander: To Be A Hero

Doctor Who has aired a new trailer for the upcoming season that starts August 23rd*. You can see it here. It’s our first real glimpse at the new Doctor played by Peter Capaldi and I think it all looks very promising. He’s very different from the past few Doctors. In some ways, he’s more reminiscent of the first one.

Something bugged me, tho. At the end of the trailer, he asks his companion, Clara, if he is a good man. She seems a bit flummoxed by this and answers, “I don’t know.”

My first reaction to the question was “I do. The Doctor is a good man. He’s a hero. He has saved the planet, the galaxy, all of reality about a bazillion times.”

Then I thought about it some more. Do you have to be a good man in order to be a hero? You don’t have to be a good person to be the protagonist; many good stories have been told using someone bad or even evil as the center of the story. Hero, on the other hand, is a different matter, isn’t it? A hero needs to have certain moral values – honor, nobility, courage, self-sacrifice and so on. They may have these qualities from the onset of the story or acquire them along the way. They can rise up as heroes as the story progresses or the qualities they already have can be tested.

The hero is something we might want to emulate. Superman in my youth was a big blue Boy Scout. Even Batman, for all the fact that he dresses more like a villain, was more of a hero in a traditional sense.

Then Marvel came along with its more complicated set of heroes. Spider-Man had a lot of hang-ups. At the same time, they were heroes because they rose to the challenges. They exhibited a certain honor, nobility, and so on.

The anti-hero seems more in tune with modern society. He or she is the protagonist of the story but not the moral center. Typically, they are in it for themselves and what they can gain or they are simply tossed around by life and not masters of their own fate. Kafka’s Joseph K in The Trial is an anti-hero because his choices simply do not matter. He is a victim and cannot change his own fate.

I tend to write more towards the anti-hero side of the scale. I like the moral complexity they present; it interests me as a writer. Even a good person will struggle to find the right thing to do in a given situation. J.K. Rowling in one of the Harry Potter books has her character Dumbledore say that the time is coming when people will have to choose between what is right and what is easy. There’s always a cost involved to do what is right.

Can you be a hero without also being a good man or woman, at least to some degree? I don’t think so. It may be difficult for the character to make the “right choice” but they need to have somewhere inside of them a degree of courage, empathy, honor and so on. George Bailey in It’s A Wonderful Life has to struggle with his frustration and sense of helplessness. He lashes out in anger towards the climax of the movie against people he loves. Yet even in his deepest despair, he will jump off a bridge to save what he thinks is a drowning man.

So, is the Doctor a good man? He certainly is a hero and, whatever his failings, he is a good man. The fact that he asks the question makes him a good man; a bad man wouldn’t care.

* Also coming to a handful of movie theaters, probably not near you. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

To See Or Not To See, That Is The Question

  • News
  • July 16, 2014

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So, as you may have heard, first the scripts from the first five episodes, and then a work print of the actual first episode of Doctor Who leaked last week.  And those fans with access to the internet (also known as “all fans”) all felt like Pandora, wondering whether or not they should take just a peek…

Now for a moment, let’s play conspiracy theory.  Back when Titanic was in the planning stages, it was largely predicted it’d be a colossal failure that would make Heaven’s Gate seem like a boutique release.  But then Harry Knowles got an anonymous tip (from what was certain from Cameron’s office) that there was to be a preview screening in the Twin Cities.He immediately sent out the word, and made sure the screen was packed with his readers.  And lo and behonl, the reviews came back glowing, and just like that the buzz did a reversal.  Contrariwise, we’ve been hearing stories that all the rumors concerning the Batman V. Superman movie have all been from a fake script, written by Kevin Smith, and deliberately leaked to throw people off the scent.

In short, people know how to manipulate the fans to get them ginned up about whatever they like.  So what are the odds that this work print, missing (sorry, allegedly missing) most of the effects, in black and white, and with no new credits, was leaked out there do give the dedicated fans a look at Peter Capaldi’s portrayal of The Doctor, but in a rudimentary form that it’ll only whet their whistles to see the final version on August 23rd?  Not likely…but not quite impossible.

The fans who sought out the print are doing a good job of keeping quiet, as the BBC has requested.  And those who have asked to hear more don’t really want to know what happens in the story.  The real question that everyone wants an answer to is, “Is it good?”  More specifically, “Is HE good?”  Because the various interviews Moffat has given, talking about how the show needs “an edge” and needed a change, had a lot of fans worried that the show might change so radically that it wouldn’t be fun anymore.  They feared an older Doctor might remove some of the energy of the show.  They don’t want to have anything spoiled, they just want to know “Is he good?”

So…is he good?

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Welcoming Peter Capaldi

peter-capaldi-doctor-who-9338210“And his name is The Doctor. He has saved your lives so many times and you never even knew he was there. He never stops. He never stays. He never asks to be thanked. But I’ve seen him, I know him… I love him… And I know what he can do.” – Freema Ageyman as companion Martha Jones

My geek is in overdrive.

Doctor Who’s premiere is on August 23rd on BBCAmerica this side of the pond (that’s the premiere date for much of the rest of the world, too) I’ve been hitting BBCAmerica’s website for news and sneak peeks. I’ve binge watched Matt Smith’s last seasons as the Time Lord. I’ve held off doing something else – like raiding the refrigerator or even going to the bathroom – during commercial breaks while watching the channel in case there’s a new teaser. And I switched my ringtone from Buffy The Vampire Slayer to the show’s opening music.

I was one of those who was sincerely pissed off and sincerely mourned the passing of the torch by David Tennant to Matt Smith – Tennant was just so superb (and sexy!) as the Time Lord; he brought so much to the role; humanizing (if you’ll excuse the expression) the alien. I wasn’t ready for him to leave – and as Tennant so brilliantly played his regeneration scene, it was obvious that his Doctor wasn’t ready to leave either. When he said, “I don’t want to go” in “The End of Time – Part 2,” I parroted (along with millions of fans, I’m sure), “I don’t want you to go, either.”

And to be honest, Smith’s premier episode, the one with the “fish and custard,” really didn’t do anything for me; Smith was so different, and the whole “going through this kid’s refrigerator” scene felt forced, not funny. But of course, Matt more than proved himself to me, so much so that I still feel that his Doctor was cheated out of a truly emotional regeneration scene – well, okay, Karen Gillian’s cameo as Amelia Pond (“Raggedy Man, good night.”) was brilliant and definitely teared me up, but overall too much time was wasted on destroying the Daleks…again snnnnore. Smith – and the fans he brought in, fans who made the show a truly worldwide phenomenon – deserved so much more.

But I did love Peter Capaldi’s first words (“Do you happen to know how to fly this thing?”) and Jenna Coleman’s – as companion Clara Oswald – horrified “what the fuck?!” look.

I didn’t know that much about Peter Capaldi – not that it bothered me, because I didn’t know Tennant or Smith either before their respective runs as the Time Lord. Well, let me rephrase that. It was more one of those “I know I know Peter Capaldi, but from where?” type of deals. Meaning that I didn’t recognize him as the actor who played the British Home Secretary John Forbisher in Torchwood: Children Of Earth. I didn’t realize that was he playing Caecilius in the Doctor Who season 4 episode, “The Fires of Pompei.” And it took a Google search to discover that he had been in one of my favorite films, 1983’s Local Hero, which starred Burt Lancaster and Peter Riegert. But I have been watching and mucho appreciating him as Cardinal Richelieu in this summer’s The Musketeers on BBCAmerica (Sundays at 9:00 P.M). In fact I think he’s brilliant in the role, and it’s whetted my appetite for his debut as the 12th (13th?) Gallifreyan.

So I’m ready to love Peter Capaldi, if no other reason that I don’t want the show to go away, to be cancelled, to end.

But I don’t know how the younger fans, most of who came in with Matt Smith’s Doctor, will react to him. Will the show lose that part of its fan base? My niece Isabel’s first words about Mr. Capaldi after seeing him for those few moments as the end of “The Time of the Doctor” were quote “He’s so old!” unquote.

Isabel will be fourteen in August.

I remember Mike Gold saying to me once, “Everybody loves their first Doctor best.” Or something like that. And it’s true. My first Gallifreyan was Tom Baker (I thrilled and tingled when he made a cameo appearance at the end of “The Name of the Doctor.”) My first companion was Elisabeth Sladen. (I loved her return as Sarah Jane Smith during Tennant’s run, and how she immediately recognized him despite his changed appearance,) It took me a long time to “catch on” to Jon Pertwee, who, although he came before Baker, was my second Doctor. (It took me even longer to get hip to a new companion – not until Billie Piper. That’s a long time.)

So I get it, Iz. Matt Smith was your first Doctor. And he was cute and funny and resourceful. You’ll always have a special place in your Whovian heart for him. You’ll naturally feel some resentment to Capaldi for daring to take the controls of the TARDIS.

But remember, Iz, without regeneration, you and me, and a whole generation or two, would never have even met the Doctor, never would have traveled in the TARDIS, never would have known Sarah Jane Smith or Rose Tyler or Amy Pond and Rory Williams, never would have known the Daleks or the Cyberman or The Master.

And remember, Iz, like I told you that day, and as I reiterated here, I didn’t like Matt Smith at first. But I grew to love him.

So, Iz, give Peter Capaldi a chance.

I will.

 

Jen Krueger: Permanent Pop Culture

My friend Dave has decided to get a tattoo of a Recognizer from Tron. It’ll be his first (and probably only) tattoo, and I wasn’t at all surprised that’s what he wanted when finally making the plunge into getting ink. But while it’s far from the first time I’ve encountered the idea of a pop culture tattoo, Dave’s Recognizer is the first instance of a pop culture tattoo that hasn’t made me cringe a little bit.

Don’t get me wrong, I love tattoos. It’s just that, oxymoronic as it may sound, I’m kind of traditional when it comes to them. I dig the old maritime culture of tattoo designs that are like badges of particular skills or experiences, and while I don’t have anything against the idea of getting ink just for fun or decorative adornment, I tend to look at tattoos today more as an opportunity to represent something meaningful and personal. So no matter how well done the tattoos themselves are, whenever I’ve seen photos of Marvel back pieces, Disney sleeves, or Nintendo chest pieces, my first reaction tends to be an assumption that they’ll one day be regretted. As much as I may love certain comics, movies, or games, I’ve found it hard to imagine someone would really want the Avengers, a collection of princesses, or a bunch of video game bosses on them forever.

That being said, I didn’t bat an eyelash when my friend James decided on a Fahrenheit 451 tattoo. Ray Bradbury is his favorite author, and Fahrenheit 451 his favorite Bradbury work, so the burning paper man illustration from one of the Fahrenheit 451 covers struck me as the perfect choice for James when it came to putting an image permanently on his body. But if it’s this easy for me to understand getting a tattoo that references a book, shouldn’t a tattoo referencing a comic, movie, or game be just as easy for me to understand? After all, they’re all pieces of entertainment, and I’m sure there are people who love the Hulk or Ariel or Mario just as much as James loves Bradbury. If I cringe at the idea of a pop culture tattoo but like the idea of a literary one, am I being a snob?

I don’t think so. Because I don’t think it really has anything to do with the content at all. It’s actually about the relationship to the content, and how likely that relationship is to change.

Get me talking about Doctor Who and it’s immediately apparent I’m a huge fan. It’s definitely my favorite show, has been for a number of years at this point, and I’d even go so far as to say the Doctor is one of the best television characters I’ve ever encountered. But no matter how much I love Doctor Who, I’d never consider getting a Who tattoo. Even though I’ll likely always love the episodes I do at this moment, the still-evolving state of the franchise means I can’t be sure I’ll always love the show as a whole. If I put a TARDIS on my arm today and next season goes in a direction I hate, I not only get disappointed by a show I love, I also get a permanent reminder of that disappointment. Comics and video games go through the same amount of (if not more) evolution as TV shows, and though non-franchise movies are less likely to be subjected to it, the popularity of the reboot is high enough that I’d be hard-pressed to be positive a movie I love won’t end up mangled in the future with a remake or sequel.

Books, on the other hand, are obviously much less fluid. Sure, a series of novels can go through as much evolution as a TV show, comic, movie franchise, or game franchise, but with fewer hands at the helm of a series of novels than tend to be involved in most other forms of entertainment, I find it easier to assume I’ll like the next book in a series than I do to assume I’ll like the next offering of something I’ve previously enjoyed in one of these other fields. Shift the focus to stand-alone novels, and I can say with certainty that whenever my feelings about a book have changed, they’ve only become more positive over time. If there was an obvious and simple visual to be pulled from my favorite book, I probably would’ve gotten a tattoo of it years ago because I can be so confident my love for it is a lifelong love.

So what was it about Dave’s Recognizer tattoo idea that kept me from cringing? Knowing that for him, the tattoo is about more than Tron. His love for the movie stems not just from the film itself, but also from the fact that his first experience with it was special because of who shared it with him. This kind of love for a piece of entertainment is the caveat I was overlooking in the past when considering pop culture tattoos, and it’s made me realize there may have been more meaning to some ink I’ve seen and assumed wasn’t very personal. From now on, I’ll look a little harder for the story behind these kind of tattoos. But if there isn’t one to be found, I won’t feel bad about reverting to a cringe.

Jen Krueger: Fan to Fan, or Performing Doctor Who for Fellow Whovians

  • News
  • March 25, 2014

doctor-who-live-at-comikaze-550x550-6345618Thinking about my favorite of the Doctor’s adventures, one that immediately comes to mind is his journey to Tudor England. Crossing paths with an aging Henry VIII on the verge of a final marriage, the Doctor stumbles on a Dalek plot to kill him while companion Brianna is killed by the King’s Guard. Resurrected by the Pope, Brianna saves the day by brokering peace between Henry and the Catholic church, and using her love for the Doctor to melt the Dalek in disguise. If you’re a fan of Doctor Who but don’t remember this episode, that’s probably because this adventure was presented for the first and only time in Los Angeles for a single night in September of 2013. Also, it technically wasn’t an episode of Doctor Who. It was an installment of Doctor Who Live!, an improvised version of Doctor Who that I perform in twice a month.

As a Whovian for several years and an improviser for even longer, I was really excited when I was invited to join a group that would allow me to bring together two of my favorite things. I thought doing a show that would let me transform the things I wish the Doctor would do from idle thoughts into reality (albeit reality limited to 45 minute non-canon installments) would be a blast. After all, every fan has opinions on how the object of their fandom could be improved or expanded upon, but how often does any fan get the chance to actually play out those opinions by dictating what their favorite fictional characters will see, say, or do? Almost never, at best. I was pumped. So, so pumped.

And then, the pressure hit me. Because the more I thought about how cool it was going to be to make up and play out an episode of Doctor Who, the more I realized how difficult that would really be. Walking on stage with nothing more than the TV show’s conventions as a bare foundation on which to build comedy with twelve other people means there’s as much of a chance for failure as there is for success. I’m strictly a 2005 and on fan, so there are decades worth of episodes that I know nothing about yet, our audience may expect to see references from. Thankfully, a lot of the cast knows classic Who, so I can count on them to catch me up quickly in the wings if the audience’s suggested title for our episode contains something I don’t know much about, like the Sea Devils (and man, does our audience love to bring up the Sea Devils).

But my worries about representing Doctor Who faithfully went beyond just nailing the right references. Knowing how strong my feelings about the TV show are, it seemed fair to me that our Doctor Who Live! audience could hold us to the same standard they have for the real thing. We promise an improvised episode of the TV show and the TV show is phenomenal, so we’ve set an incredibly high bar for ourselves and have to figure out how to clear it. Before my first performance with the group, I was a bundle of nerves thinking about falling short of that bar. I wanted the show to be perfect because I didn’t want to disappoint myself or the audience. And with all this worrying going on, I was overlooking a very crucial fact: in that theater, we’re all fans.

After all, while it takes an awful lot of fandom to put on an improvised episode of a TV show, it takes even more to watch an improvised episode of a TV show. And Doctor Who Live! isn’t just lucky enough that there are big enough fans of Doctor Who to make doing our own version of it viable, but luckier still to have fans of our own. We have wonderful audience members who come regularly, encourage our silliest bits, and even let us be part of their birthdays by celebrating at our show. If we didn’t all love Doctor Who, none of that would be possible. I have to admit that despite regularly performing in front of audiences in various forms of improv for the last five years, it always feels weird to me to be recognized for a show I’ve done since improv is, by nature, so fleeting. But I’m starting to enjoy getting recognized for Doctor Who Live!, because being remembered as part of that group is, by nature, being recognized as a fan of Doctor Who, and usually leads to conversations about the real show. Now what kind of Whovian would I be if I didn’t like that?

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This just in: Doctor Who’s Peter Capaldi is the sweetest man ever

No man stands so tall as when he stoops to ask a child dressed as a Dalek if he can be The Doctor.

There’s lots of cool moments in  this video of Doctor Who filming at Mermaid Quay, like the first scenes by new recurring castmember Samuel Anderson as Danny Pink.

But right at the end, there’s is a moment of new Doctor Peter Capaldi talking with a little girl who came all the way from Aberdeen to see the shoot.  While security tried to get him to keep moving, he took the time (along with signing endless autographs) to make her feel better about what is surely her first case of New Doctor Angst.

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I’m not crying; I’m smiling so hard the corners of my mouth are squeezing my tear ducts…

Jen Krueger: The Little Things

dw-gpk-014-212x450-3596526A few weeks ago, I was idly browsing a store that carried everything from as-seen-on-TV products to Halloween costumes on deep discount. I didn’t really expect to find anything worth purchasing, but just as a bored salesperson mumbled in my general direction that everything in the store was 30% off, I came upon an aisle with [[[Doctor Who]]] merchandise and figured a quick perusal couldn’t hurt. It was all stuff I’d seen before, mostly TARDIS hats, scarves, lunchboxes, and keychains, but then a rack of random packs of micro figures caught my eye. I already had two such micro figures on my desk at home, a Centurion Rory and a Tenth Doctor that had both been gifts, and I liked the idea of getting an Eleventh Doctor or an Amy Pond to join them. But as I thought about making my first micro figure purchase, I realized that despite my vast love of Doctor Who, I hadn’t actually bought much merchandise related to the show. Wondering how that could possibly be true, I grudgingly admitted to myself that my merch buying experiences haven’t been very good.

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Tweeks Review & React To Dr. Who Christmas Episode

doctor-who-14-2959363-7114134Having had a few days to process The Doctor’s regeneration, The Tweeks share a recap heavily peppered with opinions. Do you think Maddy will help Anya move past the pain of losing Her Doctor?

 

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