Davis did a great job bringing back the Doctor. He set the tone that kept the reboot relevant for its duration.
On the other hand, some of the scripts from his first era were pretty dodgy. I frequently got the sense that Davis & Co. pushed out a lot unpolished rough ideas just to make a deadline. Whenever they had a weak script, they counted on David Tennant's bottomless reservoir of charm to carry it off.
After bowing out gracefully, Davis should have kept his distance.
Gatwa, like Colin Baker in the '80s, was hamstrung by a flailing writers room and showrunners who were marking time.
Eccleston and Capaldi were my favorite doctors. I liked the Smith era--it was wild and exciting! Capaldi, I think, hit me more emotionally. The entire episode he carried himself where he was trapped inside a time dial was an entirely satisfying hour. I laughed. I cried. I went through a catharsis. It was good. So was the 50th anniversary movie. We watched the 1st season of Gatwa but not the second, but that was mostly because I hyper-fixate and I had just discovered Colombo. My husband, 10 years older than me, grew up with Tom Baker on the television. I think his first crush was Sarah Jane Smith.
It was feeling old and tired, and they tried to bring in concepts from earlier series, but I don't know, the payoff wasn't there. The Doctor will always travel the world and can come back whenever they like. Hopefully, in a few more years, a new showrunner with some fresh ideas will come along and breathe new life into the series. Its ok to take a rest. We watch a lot of Who on PlutoTv. Ideally, it'll remain there for a long while for those curious.
Also, I will say, and I don't know if this is because everything is so diffusive, the advertising for Gatwa's doctor was terrible. I hadn't even known the season had started until someone posted something on tumblr!
I was a nerdy child in the 1980s, who devotedly watched the old show on PBS. I got a lot of mockery for it as a kid, too, so as an adult, it was really gratifying to see the reboot become a worldwide phenomenon. And very, very gratifying to see my beloved Sarah Jane Smith come back and then get a (good) show in her own right (RIP Liz Sladen). But 20 years is a long run; you run out of ideas (excellent point you made about the change from Troughton to Pertwee being a huge reinvention for the original show). I haven't watched the current show in years. I'm sorry it's run is over, but I think it'll be back, some time from now. The lovely thing about the concept is that the good Doctor can come back looking like anyone, having had many adventures we didn't get to see in the meantime, and it'll be just fine. A really brilliant idea, and it only took the writers of the original show, what, six seasons to come up with it? :) It'll be fun, in my senior years, to see what a new crop of science fiction/fantasy writers do with it.
Elon Musk sees DEI everywhere and reacts with untamed fantasies of global apartheid. I'd love to know what the actual fuck is wrong with him that even a trillion dollars couldn't erase. (Not myself a Dr Who fan but loved Ncuti Gatwa in “Sex Education”)
We watched from Eccleston through most of Smith and kinda dropped out in the Capaldi era. Billie Piper again? I'm glad I missed it.
I was going to ask, since you are in the UK, if you were planning on going to the DW Experience in Cardiff, but apparently it closed and is now a travelling exhibit. Which is currently in San Diego.
Davis did a great job bringing back the Doctor. He set the tone that kept the reboot relevant for its duration.
On the other hand, some of the scripts from his first era were pretty dodgy. I frequently got the sense that Davis & Co. pushed out a lot unpolished rough ideas just to make a deadline. Whenever they had a weak script, they counted on David Tennant's bottomless reservoir of charm to carry it off.
After bowing out gracefully, Davis should have kept his distance.
Gatwa, like Colin Baker in the '80s, was hamstrung by a flailing writers room and showrunners who were marking time.
Eccleston and Capaldi were my favorite doctors. I liked the Smith era--it was wild and exciting! Capaldi, I think, hit me more emotionally. The entire episode he carried himself where he was trapped inside a time dial was an entirely satisfying hour. I laughed. I cried. I went through a catharsis. It was good. So was the 50th anniversary movie. We watched the 1st season of Gatwa but not the second, but that was mostly because I hyper-fixate and I had just discovered Colombo. My husband, 10 years older than me, grew up with Tom Baker on the television. I think his first crush was Sarah Jane Smith.
It was feeling old and tired, and they tried to bring in concepts from earlier series, but I don't know, the payoff wasn't there. The Doctor will always travel the world and can come back whenever they like. Hopefully, in a few more years, a new showrunner with some fresh ideas will come along and breathe new life into the series. Its ok to take a rest. We watch a lot of Who on PlutoTv. Ideally, it'll remain there for a long while for those curious.
Also, I will say, and I don't know if this is because everything is so diffusive, the advertising for Gatwa's doctor was terrible. I hadn't even known the season had started until someone posted something on tumblr!
I was a nerdy child in the 1980s, who devotedly watched the old show on PBS. I got a lot of mockery for it as a kid, too, so as an adult, it was really gratifying to see the reboot become a worldwide phenomenon. And very, very gratifying to see my beloved Sarah Jane Smith come back and then get a (good) show in her own right (RIP Liz Sladen). But 20 years is a long run; you run out of ideas (excellent point you made about the change from Troughton to Pertwee being a huge reinvention for the original show). I haven't watched the current show in years. I'm sorry it's run is over, but I think it'll be back, some time from now. The lovely thing about the concept is that the good Doctor can come back looking like anyone, having had many adventures we didn't get to see in the meantime, and it'll be just fine. A really brilliant idea, and it only took the writers of the original show, what, six seasons to come up with it? :) It'll be fun, in my senior years, to see what a new crop of science fiction/fantasy writers do with it.
Elon Musk sees DEI everywhere and reacts with untamed fantasies of global apartheid. I'd love to know what the actual fuck is wrong with him that even a trillion dollars couldn't erase. (Not myself a Dr Who fan but loved Ncuti Gatwa in “Sex Education”)
Musk is the poster boy for the old saying that money can't buy happiness.
In his case, it seems to serve to just make him more miserable.
We watched from Eccleston through most of Smith and kinda dropped out in the Capaldi era. Billie Piper again? I'm glad I missed it.
I was going to ask, since you are in the UK, if you were planning on going to the DW Experience in Cardiff, but apparently it closed and is now a travelling exhibit. Which is currently in San Diego.