Things RTD did right

[burrunjor]

Just so we don't come over as too grumpy LOL, this is also for those of us who didn't mind his era in its own right, like Henshin, Zarius and of course our resident clown Rani. (Haha just joking Rani obvs I love you and Rob's fights.) 

What do you think RTD did right, even just compared to his two successors. 

Well sadly when it came to adapting the Doctor I don't think he did anything right. For me he always wrote him terribly out of character.

However I think his era is enjoyable in its own right, as either a remake, or just a sci fi series. I think as a drama and sci fi show it did the following things very well. 

1/ World building: The time war was a great idea, that not only had a lot of story potential, but helped to create the idea of the revival taking place in a sort of godless, bleak universe where the natural laws were twisted somewhat from the war, and all these eldritch abominations were left over from the battle. I also think more so than any before him, he helped create a sense of a shared universe within DW, IE where things felt a bit more connected, even just in small ways (though some might say that made everything seem smaller and that's true, but for his era it worked.)

2/ Mixing the supernatural in with sci fi: This is something DW did a lot in the JNT era, and it worked really well in stories like Fenric and Survival. It was something that DW could do, that other sci fi series like Star Trek couldn't. DW always had a slightly more whimsical, off beat aspect to it which could allow it to not only have more fantastical creatures, but maybe suggest that they were actually supernatural. 

The RTD era had plenty of great stories like this, such as the Satan two parter and Tooth and Claw and best of all Midnight. On top of that the Time War itself was a Lovecraftian nightmare filled with Demon like creatures such as the Nightmare Child that again left you wondering if the natural laws of the universe had been twisted. Also the technology the time lords and even the Daleks used at times seemed like dark magic too. 

At the same time however he never went too far. You could still rationalise the Beast and the Midnight Entity as just being funky aliens. 

3/ Mixing the American and British styles: Part of why I think the RTD era was popular was because it was like a mix of old British sci fi series like the Pertwee era and then modern American genre series like Buffy. On the one hand it had the more cynical, bleak approach of the British series, but on the other it had the melodrama and tropes of American series like story arcs and soap opera elements. 

This is the style that the next generation of British genre series like Primeval, Merlin and Being Human would all utilize to great effect. Ironically I think in this respect RTD was actually a very important figure in modern genre fiction, as he not only paved the way for all of these other series, but pioneered the style that they would use.

Obviously on top of all this, the RTD era holds up due to the strength of many great individual episodes too (though granted not always written by him LOL.)

Still all of this doesn't mean that my other criticisms of him aren't still valid, like not writing the Doctor in character, pioneering the all change is good crap, and getting too bogged down at times in soap opera tedium. 

Still I think it's better to take a more balanced approach and personally I'd say the above is a large part of why the RTD era was popular and why it still connects with a lot of people. 

[Deleted]

Got me interested in Doctor Who. That is all.

[mott1]

Unfortunately Davies' recent conceited and idiotic comments about his own talents and who should play what roles (and the media's gushing over the likes of 'It's A Sin' when they would barely have shown it any interest a few years ago) have meant any lingering respect for his era has long since been dashed.

When it came to the world-building he was all too quick to pull the rug out even by the end of the 1st series let alone the end of his reign, meaning the building only existed to trick the viewer. The supernatural led to some reasonable enough stories (The Satan Pit) and things like Midnight worked reasonably well on either a supernatural or alien level, but he never really explored the battle between religion and extra-terrestrialism the way that many of the Tom-era stories did so convincingly. There wasn't much intelligence in the RTD era by contrast.

And the mixing of American and British styles just became aggravating. Post-modernism was flirted at in the McCoy era, but never as egregiously as since 2005. Davies is open that Buffy was his main influence but whilst I like that show I never felt it blended well with the original Dr Who's drier, stagier style, popular as it became. As a standalone 'science fantasy' I felt it would have been a lot less jarring, personally.

[UncleDeadly]

He left.

...and he's gone and f*cked that up now, as well.

[Brian MK.II]

Made me appreciate the classic series even more....
And a proud uncle when my nephew admitted that the 60s Cybermen were far more scarier than the Cybusmen

[Monster X]

He wrote the Series 3 episode 'Utopia', which I include here simply because it (briefly) featured Derek Jacobi as The Master (particularly cool as Jacobi had already voiced the character in 'The Scream Of The Shalka'). We like Derek Jacobi very much (we also like 'The Scream Of The Shalka' but that's another matter).

BTW, the basic plot of 'Utopia' reminds me of a'60s film called 'The Time Travellers' - did Davies rip it off? .


 

[ClockworkOcean]

After reading a recent retrospective piece on Primeval in the Radio Times, I'm not sure how much credit RTD actually deserves for revitalising British genre TV. According to Tim Haines, Primeval was in the planning stages several years before NuWho began and would have happened anyway, possibly on the BBC rather than ITV.

www.radiotimes.com/tv/sci-fi/primeval-oral-history/

"I want to do something that’s fun, like Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I’d just watched all of Buffy, I thought it was a brilliant show. I wanted to do something with the same vibe, the same feel to it."

“When we started, there was no Doctor Who, and we thought it was time for something like Doctor Who. But then Russell T Davies started Doctor Who, and we were deemed to be too similar, so after what must have been about four or five years, the BBC finally turned it down.”

[burrunjor]

Oct 1, 2021 12:46:38 GMT ClockworkOcean said:

After reading a recent retrospective piece on Primeval in the Radio Times, I'm not sure how much credit RTD actually deserves for revitalising British genre TV. According to Tim Haines, Primeval was in the planning stages several years before NuWho began and would have happened anyway, possibly on the BBC rather than ITV.

www.radiotimes.com/tv/sci-fi/primeval-oral-history/

"I want to do something that’s fun, like Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I’d just watched all of Buffy, I thought it was a brilliant show. I wanted to do something with the same vibe, the same feel to it."

“When we started, there was no Doctor Who, and we thought it was time for something like Doctor Who. But then Russell T Davies started Doctor Who, and we were deemed to be too similar, so after what must have been about four or five years, the BBC finally turned it down.”

Thanks for that. Interesting retrospective. Enjoyed reading that. Good to see Dougie being more enthusiastic about the show too. Would have liked to have seen more from Flemying though. He was an amazing lead for the show and is a very underrated actor all around. His best performance might be in Pennyworth. He manages to make you feel sympathy for a fascist, right wing bastard that kills people, but Danny will always be my favourite character of his.

I suppose you could maybe say that Primeval took some of its style from Davies? Still you're right it does call that into question a bit to know that it was actually torpedoed by the arrival of DW. (It's also worth noting that Merlin was in production for a few years prior too. At one point Chinballs was almost made showrunner on it, but they threw out everything he did and fired him. I know you guys are not as hot on Merlin as I am, but I think you an all agree it would have been worse had he been allowed to stay on LOL.)

Are you a fan of Primeval Clockwork? If not you should definitely watch it. On my rewatch I was flabbergasted at how much of it came from Classic Who. Not saying it was a rip off, it did its own thing, but my god so many episodes had a touch of Pertwee. 

The plant monster one was basically, Seeds of Doom, The Silurians, and Inferno (right down to the fire extinguishers) rolled into one, then there's Helen's plan which ironically has shades of the Rani from Time and the Rani (Juliet Aubrey would have made a fantastic Rani btw.) Whilst season 5 had a Sea Devils style episode on the sub, complete with the petty jobsworth in authority, and finally the New Dawn arc was pretty much Inferno, with Philip Burton being a slightly more sympathetic Stahlman and the future taking the place of the alternate earth. 

[ClockworkOcean]

I remember enjoying the first two series back in 2007/8, but never got around to seeing the third and fourth just because life got in the way. I plan on re-watching the entire show soon. It's been so long that I don't actually remember too much, but the fact that it's still common to see insecure NuWho sycophants bashing it after all this time suggests that it has to be good.

[burrunjor]

Oct 1, 2021 13:59:55 GMT ClockworkOcean said:

I remember enjoying the first two series back in 2007/8, but never got around to seeing the third and fourth just because life got in the way. I plan on re-watching the entire show soon. It's been so long that I don't actually remember too much, but the fact that it's still common to see insecure NuWho sycophants bashing it after all this time suggests that it has to be good.

Trust me you are in for a treat. 

[Deleted]

Oct 1, 2021 13:59:55 GMT ClockworkOcean said:

I remember enjoying the first two series back in 2007/8, but never got around to seeing the third and fourth just because life got in the way. I plan on re-watching the entire show soon. It's been so long that I don't actually remember too much, but the fact that it's still common to see insecure NuWho sycophants bashing it after all this time suggests that it has to be good.

Wait you mean that all these years later the Nuwho idiots are trying to bash Primeval? Well they do it all the time with classic who so they might as well swing for other good shows to. And if they break their petty little fists on the shows awesomeness all the better.

[RobFilth]

Oct 1, 2021 13:59:55 GMT ClockworkOcean said:

I remember enjoying the first two series back in 2007/8, but never got around to seeing the third and fourth just because life got in the way. I plan on re-watching the entire show soon. It's been so long that I don't actually remember too much, but the fact that it's still common to see insecure NuWho sycophants bashing it after all this time suggests that it has to be good.

Oh mate, the last two are GOOD.

The new lead Matt is probably not as likeable as Danny and Series 4 takes a few episodes to warm up, but it develops into a satisfying story-arc and conclusion.

The best one is Series 3 however, that ones is a classic on every level.

The only one I struggled with was the Canadian series tacked on the end(Series 6), it seemed to lack the humour and excitement of the original series.

[Genkimonk]

NOTHING!!!!!

ASIDE FROM QUITTING.

[burrunjor]

Oct 4, 2021 0:42:57 GMT Genkimonk said:

NOTHING!!!!!

ASIDE FROM QUITTING.

You don't disappoint as always. LOL

[burrunjor]

Oct 3, 2021 0:20:14 GMT RobFilth said:

Oct 1, 2021 13:59:55 GMT ClockworkOcean said:

I remember enjoying the first two series back in 2007/8, but never got around to seeing the third and fourth just because life got in the way. I plan on re-watching the entire show soon. It's been so long that I don't actually remember too much, but the fact that it's still common to see insecure NuWho sycophants bashing it after all this time suggests that it has to be good.

Oh mate, the last two are GOOD.

The new lead Matt is probably not as likeable as Danny and Series 4 takes a few episodes to warm up, but it develops into a satisfying story-arc and conclusion.

The best one is Series 3 however, that ones is a classic on every level.

The only one I struggled with was the Canadian series tacked on the end(Series 6), it seemed to lack the humour and excitement of the original series.

Series 3 has the best variety of monsters. I was thrilled that they finally brought in a giant Dinosaur in 3.4. 

I also liked Sarah a lot. Leaving aside how gorgeous Laila Hotass is, I think she brought a lot to it with the mythological creatures angle and it was a shame that was never explored. Another season with the season 3 cast and Danny in charge would have been amazing. 

I think Danny was better than Dougie in two ways.

1/ He gave the other characters a chance to shine more. With Dougie it was kind of a Doctor set up, IE everyone had to gather round and be in awe of what a genius he was. With Danny however we tended to see the whole team go on missions, like the Terror Bird episode.

2/ Danny was more physical and allowed them to do more daring stories. For instance I couldn't imagine Dougie flying a helicopter into a giant Dinosaur. That also allowed them to have more extreme over the top creatures too. 

That said series 4 and 5 get a hard time from fans. The T-Rex rampage was my favourite part, though I also liked the Raptor rampage in Victorian London. I wish they had done more things like that, IE having Dinosaurs or monsters go on a rampage in a period of earth's past. 

I just finished the Canadian version and personally I think it was a lot better than people give it credit for. It did have some shocking moments, and some individual episodes were brilliant like the one with the plane trapped with the bugs in the future, or the Dinosaurs in the park. That said however it also had the worst episodes of any series. The Dinosaurs in the mall was so generic and boring. 

Still I think it should have got another series at least. Overall though at 6 series Primeval was the longest running of that generation of sci fi shows after New Who itself. (It outlasted Torchwood, Being Human, and Merlin.) To be fair though New Who was only popular and good for 7 years anyway LOL.

It's been as good as dead since Matt Smith left, like a walking corpse, so I guess between 5 and 7 years is about the average for genre shows of that generation overall LOL.