What Who Are You Currently Watching?

[Jonno]

Well, I've finally unsealed the KTT boxset and watched the first two episodes tonight - full thoughts to follow on the relevant thread in due course.

[Andrew Curnow]

Having discovered that I taped over the last two episodes of The Sea Devils about 8 years ago (just call me Pamela Nash) I started watching Logopolis this evening. I've had the DVD set since June/July, but have been saving this one till last. It looks superb.

[Antony Cox]

Hi Pamela!

[Jonno]

Strange interlude from Ant there!

Back to Andrew's point - come on, even I've watched Sea Devils once in the last 8 years! I think it was 2001 on reflection.

[Antony Cox]

Strange interlude from Ant there!

Well, Andrew did insist that someone call him Pamela Nash...

[Jonno]

Oh, I see! I thought you were waving at Pamela Rae aka Pamela Avenger!

Meanwhile, back on topic, I should be watching the second half of Operation Boris tonight.

[FlyingBeastie]

I finished Time and the Rani-it was like a bad episode of Lexx but McCoy isn't a bad Doctor, I have to see more of him to get a good opinion of him, but that might not happen for some time, cos', well, Paradise Towers is next and I hear it ain't so great

[Andrew Curnow]

Depends who you ask

[FlyingBeastie]

Really? How do you find the episode as being? I'm just going by what I've heard, and that's that McCoy's first season was awful.

[Andrew Curnow]

It does have a really bad rep, but rightly or wrongly I love it. Except for the last story which is very poor, I really enjoy McCoy's first season. But they do seem to be real 'love them or hate them' stories.

[Captain Tancredi]

Having finished 'Destiny of the Daleks' earlier today (and contrary to what people have been saying about them, I wouldn't have known that Suzanne Danielle married Sam Torrance without them) I'm at a bit of a loose end for the mo. Still carrying on with 'The Box of Delights' on Mondays and the Beginning episodes on Fridays, though.

[MacNimon]

Really? How do you find the episode as being? I'm just going by what I've heard, and that's that McCoy's first season was awful.

You'll find many PS members thoughts on this season here, Beastie!

[Zbigniev Hamson]

I have to admit I thought it was rubbish at the time, but having watched them all in order a couple of years ago I found the McCoy stories a breath of fresh air. Quite a few of the performances are dodgy in Paradise Towers, but quite a lot of the ideas, and indeed the whole central concept, are very imaginative and a blessed relief after the rather generic corridors/guns/monsters stuff that was being churned out under Saward when he couldn't be bothered anymore. In fact the only one of Season 24 that I thought was really rubbish was Time and the Rani, and you seemed to have enjoyed that...

[FlyingBeastie]

Omigosh, Time and the Rani...lol. I fell asleep during it actually. I heard Eric Saward left cos' he didn't like the choice of Bonnie Langford as Mel. I don't hate her, or dislike her, I just feel bad for her. Especially after that Peppermint Christmas Jumpsuit Disaster they made her wear in TATR lmao.

[Rob McCow]

Especially after that Peppermint Christmas Jumpsuit Disaster they made her wear in TATR lmao.

And they made Kate O Mara wear it too!

[Si Hunt]

We're doing "Destiny of the Daleks". It's never been a favourite, and watching it again I'm sadly reminded why. It's so very cheap and ill-considered; when Davros leaves the bunker having been rescued by the Daleks, he bounces off the edge of the door like a bumper car. His mouth doesn't open! It makes the character sound like someone trying to escape from a sack. And why is the Kaled mutant a small blob of putty? I've always thought that the scene where the Daleks exteriminate slaves until they get their own way was one of the most powerful, but Mr R has pointed out that some of the slaves smile just before they get shot. And would they really not make a sound when faced with death?

It's an odd one; the ghost of "Genesis" stalks it to remind us where all the money has dissapeared. Still, it's not dull, it has that at least.

Sorry, I know a few of you like this one, but it's dissapointed me on this viewing.

Si.

[Larry]

watched Army of Ghosts on BBC3 last night - even now despite many viewings the Daleks emerging from the Void ship is still a punch the air moment..

[Stuart Wallis]

Finished Medicinal Purposes at last! Not quite as good as I'd remembered it; lots of running around, the threat to the universe is glossed over, and the ending's rather simple. DT and Leslie Philips are good though.

[Captain Tancredi]

We're doing "Destiny of the Daleks". It's never been a favourite, and watching it again I'm sadly reminded why. It's so very cheap and ill-considered; when Davros leaves the bunker having been rescued by the Daleks, he bounces off the edge of the door like a bumper car. His mouth doesn't open! It makes the character sound like someone trying to escape from a sack. And why is the Kaled mutant a small blob of putty? I've always thought that the scene where the Daleks exteriminate slaves until they get their own way was one of the most powerful, but Mr R has pointed out that some of the slaves smile just before they get shot. And would they really not make a sound when faced with death?

It's an odd one; the ghost of "Genesis" stalks it to remind us where all the money has dissapeared. Still, it's not dull, it has that at least.

Sorry, I know a few of you like this one, but it's dissapointed me on this viewing.

Si.

I think I'd agree with that in general although it does have its plus points- it also feels as if it doesn't know which direction to go, and while the story would have been very different if it had been made according to Terry Nation or according to Douglas Adams, it tries to do both and neither at once and gets bogged down that way.

Incidentally, when people comment about the Daleks apparently becoming robots, my take on that is that it's what the 'Destiny' of the title refers to- after all, when they're entombed at the end of 'Genesis' there are only so many Kaled mutants and genetic material left, and while they do seem to have techniques for reproducing themselves, as military creatures perhaps at some stage the post-Genesis Daleks concluded that the organic component of a Dalek was a liability. It would fit in with 'Resurrection' (the Movellans defeating the Daleks using a virus which attacks the mutant creature) and Davros's subsequent researches into using other species (primarily humans) to restore the organic element.

[Andrew Curnow]

I watched part 2 of "Logopolis" this morning. The set for the planet is pretty naff, the Master's pot-plant TARDIS is daft, but for all its blatant shortcomings it still, as always, sweeps me along - I really feel I've been to a planet where the people in the streets mutter calculations, and when Tom foretells "a chain of circumstances that threaten to fragment the laws that bind the universe together" I totally believe him. Still stunning.

[Pip Madeley]

Shame about the big gaping hole in the plot.

[Andrew Curnow]

What we really need, a propos of nothing, is a "Talk to the hand" emoticon...

[Andrew Curnow]

Anyway, I think at some length we've previously established that the whole flushing thing isn't a gaping hole in the plot, it's just very very silly.

[Pip Madeley]

Very very very silly.

But like you, I enjoy Logopolis. Not least for its high ratio of TARDIS hopping action

[Si Hunt]

It never really struck me as that silly. It's a bit drastic, but I always imagined the Doctor would open the doors, water would rush in, him and Adric would hold their breaths and wait for the Master to get washed into the console room. I guess then if they closed the doors the water would all drain away into the deep bowels of the TARDIS and they'd be okay. It's not a great plan, but it's not that silly.

The big question is why, when they're going to open the doors to let the water in, he and Adric then try and hold them shut.

Si.