After his regeneration, the Doctor arrives in Victorian London and finds a dinosaur running rampant in the Thames. While adjusting to his new body, he becomes aware of a spate of deadly spontaneous combustions and tries to work out the link between the two.
Comments
@likwidsolutions I did not complain about the numerous callbacks because they were fanservice, I liked that aspect as I mentioned in my post. The ones I do worry about were specifically those establishing the potential season arc, as I worry about Moffat retconning more of the past in order to have it his way, which is of course only my opinion and I specifically -don't- want to ignore the past.
I also never said anything about the Doctor being mysoginistic, just that the last regeneration sexually assaulted people. As in male, female, didn't matter (neither did their consent), he just did. His intent doesn't matter. I would think that a person that jumps you and kisses you out of the blue that you are completely and entirely not sexually interested in would at the very least make you feel uncomfortable too, likwidsolutions? It doesn't matter why people do what they do, what matters is if they hurt or completely ignore personal boundaries of others with what they do.
And again, not every person the last Doctor kissed (without a prior relationship) was happy about it - most weren't.
If say your father forcibly kissed you on the mouth because you made a great comment, would you like it?
Last but not least thanks for calling me ignorant I suppose even though yes, I watched all of Classic who back when it aired, not that it has anything to do with the discussion at hand which is people getting outraged about facts (kissing without consent is sexual assault, intent is not magic). I am not saying any of that is special, it happens in most shows, really, its just one factor that I didn't like about the last Doctor. Seriously though, how is it not obvious to you or az25 that 11 ignored peoples social boundaries very frequently and without regret, especially in the cases when they actually reacted in a negative way in response? Its your perogative, of course, but please be so kind as to accept mine as well since I suspect we will never truly agree. :)
@Tante
Also the fact that Clara and the Doctor were estranged most of the episode allowed you to kind of empathize with the Doctor, because he was so alone and scared at the prospect of being alone again for a long time and frustrated that whenever he changes, he barely recognizes himself, so it's probably doubly painful to not have the ones you love around you look at you like a stranger. And it's easy to see Clara's perspective too as we have dealt with this before in the S2 Xmas special. In fact, the episodes "villain", wasn't even much of a villain but for the sake of adding an MotW aspect that it has keep since the re-inception of the show. It was more about getting to understand the new Doctor and Clara learning to accept it. I wasn't sure I liked the new Doctor but then I realized I felt just like Clara towards the Doctor, I didn't know who he was. So once I stopped judging him for how he has composed himself in recent incarnations, and starting accepting him for the person (or rather personality) that his new body brings, I enjoyed his performance much more, and could empathize with both the Doctor and Clara.
@Tante
I hardly call 11s behavior as 'sexually assaulting', nor any others. The kiss between Rose/9 was way too forced. However, the only time I notice when 11 kisses someone is when it's a romantic interest but usually it's when someone has come up with a brilliant idea and it's like an exclamation of gratitude from him, not to mention that he's kissed men as well as women, so it's not like he's a misogynist, it's just his way of saying "THANK YOU!" but with an action. It may not be normal, but it's not like he's taking advantage of them or intending to kiss them intimately. Plus 11s demeanor was very childish, always running away, very lighthearted for the most part, and seems like a child almost which makes it less creepy even if his character is over 1200 years old. It would definitely look creepier if it happened with the new Doctor.
As for your complaints about callbacks to RTDs era, because god forbid we call back something from S2, 6 years ago! Obviously you didn't notice the countless references the Doctor blathered about when he was confused, especially OldWho references aplenty; besides, this show has been around for over 50 years, and there have been 100s or 1000s of references to earlier series'. We can't ignore what has happened in the past 7 series', just as we can't ignore Classic Who series', otherwise Christopher Eccleston is the 1st Doctor in which case we don't watch the same show. I think it was a perfect way to show that the doctor wasn't quite himself and kept slipping up thinking he was in a different time/place and especially a former versions of himself.. You should def know what you are talking about before assuming stuff, it just makes you look ignorant.
@Woutah Rose or The Eleventh Hour, both episodes start fresh with a new doctor and a new companion. But if you start with TEH you will miss the best doctor ever...ten!
Is this a good point to start watching? Or should I start from "Rose"?
@az25 I am not making a joke. If you count forced kisses (which the law does as far as I know, correct me if I am wrong) the last Doctor did sexually assault people and the worst response he got if I remember correctly were slaps which he of course ignored. Not specifically talking about Clara, she was just a mystery to him that he needed to solve imo.
You don't kiss people on the mouth just because you want to and without their consent, and please don't go with the 'he is an alien' defense, he has been around long enough to know this.
edit: I -think- he even kissed Madam Vasthras (sp?) wife once and she slapped him in response and was clearly pissed off about it. No apology even then, but hey at least the scene later I believe also included the sonic screwdriver 'rising' comically to suggest that the Doctor was turned on *sighs*. Plus she is someone who clearly isn't even heterosexual (not that it should matter if they are, its still assault). It was in one of the later episodes where she freed him from the red goo stuff, not sure which one, sorry.
edit2: Apologies for keeping on editing, but I just want to clarify that Doctor Who is not especially horrible about this kind of thing or anything (like romcoms, now -those- are horrible about stalker behavior, emotional manipulation and much more... ) and I still enjoy the episodes. They just have the occassional bad content like most other shows unfortunately still have.
Difficult to judge this episode somehow (slight SPOILERS ahead, you have been warned). A lot of it might just be due to the sickness Timelords and -ladies get after regenerating.
I liked that 12 genuinely apologised to the Dinosaur, never had that with the child-incarnation. I liked his awkwardness with hugs and how he can be what I would call 'soft' for lack of a better word. I very much like that the Doctor isn't sexually assaulting anyone so far like the last one did. I hope that stays that way (though we do have an obsessed villain, it seems).
Didn't like the ambiguousness of the death in the episode, I don't want another Doctor that is good or even fine with murdering someone without remorse and how he presented himself other than this scene does indicate to me that he is not that type of person, but we will see. Didn't like the jokey sound-effects along with the slapstick jokes, although they were few (go to sleep and newspaper, mostly). I am very worried about the several callbacks to 10's era, I had hoped Moffat was done completely retconning everything that happened in RTD's time and yet the Madame de Pompadour + the definite callback to the 'Vulcano' episode indicates otherwise.
Other than that, the relationship between Madame and her 'Maid' felt very off this time... So far it has always been very much in love and respectful with a dab of intelligent conversation, this time it felt like a married couple that really didn't like or respect each other very much, constantly quietly fighting underneath the surface of the words that were exchanged - very strange.
Overall, it was an okay episode. Some scenes with the Doctor made me squee (yes, even the callbacks once I made the connection which was easily made I think), some scenes made me frown and inwardly and sternly say "Moffaaat..." and we'll see how it goes from here.
Yeah, I was disappointed too. The episode sort of lacked all of the excitement you had with 11's first episode.
Besides that, Doctor Who is well-known for the horribly bad VFX. Seeing it in cinemas made it even clearer, again. Severely lacking "3D" stuff. They shouldn't do those things in episodes they rate "important". The BBC has excellent set decorators, make use of those instead.
@rorypondicus Right? I feel like Moffat is fine in small doses but him still being in charge of the entire show? It's awful. I think he has very little grasp on his characters, he's just very focused on catering towards fan boys, with very little interest in sound/complete plots??? I wish he'd left with eleven and I sort of hope that when the show gets a new show runner, that maybe it's a woman? Or at least a duo of man/woman. Maybe we won't ever have a female Doctor, and I so get that ---- but that doesn't mean we can't have more female writers.
"I wasn't. I didn't need to, that was me talking"