Doctor Who (crossposted to the LJ DW group)

[dalekboy]

So, Eccleston is leaving Doctor Who after one season as the Doctor.

I am sad to see him go. I've only seen his first story Rose but I enjoyed his performance. I'm going to cherish the next twelve episodes (and the Christmas special) and do my best to fully appreciate and suck the juice from him over the next few months.

It's similar to what I did with Hartnell, when I watched through his existing stories in order, listening to audios of the missing ones. Many of them I was seeing/hearing for the first time, it was essentially new Doctor Who. And I adored it.

One episode a night.

I'd eagerly grab the video or audio tape of the next unseen story, pop it in the player and immerse myself in story for the next 25 minutes. Even while writing this now, a couple of years later, I can feel the excitement of it thrumming in my chest.

I approached some stories with rather a lot of trepidation. For years people had been telling me how bad and how boring they were. And some of them are stories with flaws.
Sensorites is slow, but watched one episode a night it worked okay. It has some interesting ideas and a few very odd ones.
Web Planet is insane. The production team wanted to present an entire alien ecosystem and some unique cultures/creatures on a 1960's TV budget. The Optera come across as a bit silly but hey, at least they tried something totally new and different. As far as I'm aware, the next production in any english speaking medium to attempt to world-build to this degree was Jim Henson's The Dark Crystal, featuring no human characters at all.

I'm getting a little off topic. What I'm trying to say is, even these supposedly flawed stories had value, especially when veiwed episodically rather than watching them all in a lump.

We all have that chance again. So Eccleston is only going to be around for a season? Does it matter? The show is going to be around for at least two and I for one am looking forward to it.

Oh, I may deconstruct and complain about some of the stuff they did later... but for the time being, I am going to cherish it and love it and be thankful. Because I waited for this and I wasn't sure I'd ever see it again.

New Doctor Who!

Cheers,
Danny

Comments

[i-ate-my-crusts.livejournal.com]

do my best to fully appreciate and suck the juice from him over the next few months

Ooo Err.

I know I'd do my best to fully appreciate and suck the juice out of Chris Eccleston if I had him handy for a few months.

[angriest.livejournal.com]

"The Web Planet" is just one big six-part disaster of hilarious proportions. It's like the production team took a bunch of drugs.

I love Hartnell, and wish "The Massacre" existed on video so more people could find out how startlingly brilliant it is - based on the audio recording, anyway.

[llbatt.livejournal.com]

You'll be pleased to hear that 'The End Of The World' is pretty bloody good indeed.

Hartnell was good, but for me it's been a real tragedy that we have so little Truughton left to us. From the stuff they showed on the ABC recently, the show hit its straps in so many ways during that run.

[angriest.livejournal.com]

The tragedy of Troughton is that of the stories that do still exist, half of them are absolute clunkers.

If I was given the choice to change history, and swap the survival of "The Dominators" for the survival of "The Enemy of the World" or "The Power of the Daleks", don't even think I'd hesitate...

[smofbabe.livejournal.com]

I was lucky enough to see the premiere while in the UK for Eastercon. I believe the kerfluffle about Eccleston is that they are hoping to build a viewership among people who had not followed the original show and a continuing cast helps people have an investment in watching every week.