Doctor Who IV - Everything Whovian - Would you like a jelly baby?

[ChrisIII]

I wonder if Chibnall has perhaps put in a sort of possible way for future writers-or even himself-to restore the time lords a second time.

We know that their bodies are intact, although partially converted, and although the time lords are 'dead' the Cybermasters are a******ish. In "Dark Water" and "Death in Heaven" it's already been elaborated that the dead can become Cybermen, so this isn't exactly new...and they can regenerate. Some have noted that it seems like the Master and at least some of the CM managed to escape.

Maybe the Doctor can somehow use her possibly endless regeneration energy to somehow revive them apart from the conversion/death? Kind of worked for the Daleks....plus at least Gallifrey as a planet is still intact, even if the citadel is in ruins, which makes it a bit easier to bring back the TL from a time lock/pocket universe/end of time situation that made it hard to find it the first place. After all the Curator seemed fairly optimistic about Gallifrey's future.

Again, mainly just speculating here.

[Zero Hunter]

Is Chibnall in any danger of being replaced? This season was progress from the first one but they need someone of a higher caliber. How about Phoebe Waller-Bridge?

I am not sure how you can call it progress when the rating keep dropping. It has been a steady drop from pretty much the first few episodes of his run. This last series had some of the worst ratings in the entire history of Doctor Who. More and more people keep checking out with each episode because most of it has been very very bad. It's not Whitakers fault either it is all on Chibnall and his horrible "I have a point to make over good storytelling" attitude.

[ChrisIII]

So apparentally the animators for the Faceless ones put the Delgado and Dwahan masters on an airport wanted sign as a sort of in-joke. While the reconstructions by their nature can't be 100% faithful to the original episodes, I imagine this might no go over well with some fans.

[Matt]

I wonder if Chibnall has perhaps put in a sort of possible way for future writers-or even himself-to restore the time lords a second time.

Oh, there's essentially endless ways for it to be done.

In the novels, when the Time Lords were facing off against The Enemy in that version of the Time War ... well, they went and created temporal duplicates of Gallifrey (seven, I think) so that if one Gallifrey fell, it wouldn't be a catastrophic loss. They installed a different type of leader on each Gallifrey so that the Enemy had to counter seven different tactics at once.

It could simply be a case of that.

[Matt]

It's not Whitakers fault either it is all on Chibnall and his horrible "I have a point to make over good storytelling" attitude.

Jodie has done a fine job with what she's been given.
I do not agree with your 'point to make over good storytelling' line, though. Doctor Who has been VERY blatant about making political and social commentary throughout it's entire run. It has never been subtle about it.
Galaxy 4 - sexism
Sun Makers - taxation and greed
Anything to do with the Daleks - fascism.
Vengeance on Varos - dangers of a disengaged and ignorant populace/electronic entertainment
Green Death - environment
Inferno - environment

It's not about having a message. It is, I'm afraid, all about poor storytelling - and that's the main issue with Chibnall's run so far. The scripts themselves have not been well written.
And the continued budget cuts aren't helping either.

[Indian Ink]

I've been surprised by the viewing figures. I expected the finale episodes to get higher ratings and also for there to be a bit of a bounce back at the start of the series to just a little higher than the last of the previous. Instead it's been pretty much a slow downward slide for all of Chibnall's run. It hasn't "Fallen off a cliff" but there's no upward momentum. It's like a hot air balloon that's expended it's fuel and can now only look down at the landscape that gets slowly but ever closer, as the wind (and time) blows it onward.

I expect the next season to get into sub three million about halfway through. At it stands, UK viewers getting to close to half a million in number, are changing channel when DR Who comes on and then changing back to the same channel when it's finished! That's not a good sign.

[Zero Hunter]

Jodie has done a fine job with what she's been given.
I do not agree with your 'point to make over good storytelling' line, though. Doctor Who has been VERY blatant about making political and social commentary throughout it's entire run. It has never been subtle about it.
Galaxy 4 - sexism
Sun Makers - taxation and greed
Anything to do with the Daleks - fascism.
Vengeance on Varos - dangers of a disengaged and ignorant populace/electronic entertainment
Green Death - environment
Inferno - environment

It's not about having a message. It is, I'm afraid, all about poor storytelling - and that's the main issue with Chibnall's run so far. The scripts themselves have not been well written.
And the continued budget cuts aren't helping either.

It has been there in the past true, but it was sprinkled in here and there and not every episode one after the other like it has been these last two seasons. Chibnall was just the total wrong fit for this show.

[Loki]

It's not about having a message. It is, I'm afraid, all about poor storytelling - and that's the main issue with Chibnall's run so far. The scripts themselves have not been well written.

Largely agreed. Having a message isn't a problem in and of itself. It's how the message is delivered (allegory beats heavy handed preaching), and which aspect the writers prioritise: good storytelling or the message. Even if the message has good intentions, if good storytelling is sacrificed to deliver it then the whole venture fails.

For example, compare the following: The Oh, God movies starring George Burns; the TV series Highway to Heaven; the TV series Bibleman; the God's Not Dead movies. All four have the same basic pro-Christianity message underlying them, but:
The Oh, God movies are well written, funny and, while not entirely subtle with their message, deliver it without any sense of malice towards people of other faiths or atheists. It's "having faith isn't a bad thing, and treat everyone nicely, including those who don't share your faith." Making the movies enjoyable makes people more likely to watch the others in the series, and that increases the chance of the message getting across.

Highway to Heaven is (from the admittedly relatively small number of episodes I've seen) a little less well written - some episodes are good, some mediocre - but again the delivery held no malice towards other faiths or atheists, and the overall message of "faith can help you, and be nice to others regardless of their beliefs" seemed very much the same. I don't seek it out, but I've found it watchable when I've stumbled across episodes (back in the days before on demand TV); thus, less successful at delivering its message than Oh, God, but not disastrously so.

Bibleman (and I've seen even fewer of these) is cheesy in the extreme, and frankly hard to watch. However, what little I've seen doesn't have any sense of mean spiritedness towards non-Christians - various characters representing sinful behaviours are the villains, and faith is presented as the answer, but not sharing the Christian faith doesn't make you a villain on the show (at least, not in any portion I've watched). I wouldn't seek the show out, and if I stumbled across it while channel hopping I'd keep going looking for something better, but I don't actively dislike the show. For all its flaws, it seems to hold to the same underlying message as the two prior examples, but it's less likely to succeed in getting it across because the show is so painful to watch; even if you are Christian and so already agree with the message, its laid on so thick you soon cry "enough already!"

God's Not Dead is badly written and presents atheists and people of non-Christian faiths as the bad guys, and one-dimensional straw men bad guys at that. Here the last part of the underlying message is different: it's "Christianity is good, and those who aren't Christians are bad people." If you are atheist or of a non-Christian faith, its quickly a case of "screw you for painting me the bad guy of this", and even for those who are Christian and so agree with the first part, that mean-spirited second part actively works against the message.

For me at least, past Doctor Who stories with underlying messages mostly fell into "Oh, God" or "Highway to Heaven", and while maybe we once in a while got "Bibleman" we never got "God's Not Dead." The last couple of seasons under Chibnall it feels like we've got "Bibleman" the majority of the time, with one or two "Highway to Heaven." Worse, the response by many sites to fans who criticise the current show, painting any and all of them as bigots of one stripe or another (racist, misogynist, etc.) who are only having a go because they hate *insert group*, shifts things into "God's Not Dead" territory.

It has been there in the past true, but it was sprinkled in here and there and not every episode one after the other like it has been these last two seasons. Chibnall was just the total wrong fit for this show.

Agreed. Going back to my examples, they all had their message every episode / movie, but there that was the whole point and any viewers knew that from the outset. However, if you take a series that does messages occasionally (and usually with some subtlety) and ram it into every episode, expect viewers who remember it before it went that way to speak up.

Or, to put it another way, if you watch Sesame Street, you expect every episode to push educational messages; if you watch The Muppet Show, and suddenly every episode is "A Very Special Episode", expect complaints and falling ratings.

Looking just at this season, and we had two environmental message episodes almost back to back with one another. For my money Praxius had some genuine menace and the message, while hardly subtle, wasn't rammed down your throat as ineptly it was in Orphan 55. But that was the problem - it came right on the heels of Orphan 55's sledgehammer to the face approach, leading me to react to Praxius' message with "Again? So soon?"

[Indian Ink]

I could never be a politician, even when the trends are in front of me, I can't read them. I expected the consolidated view ratings to bump up a little due to all the fuss about the latest episode.

Nope. New Doctor Who has just scored it lowest consolidated UK viewing figure of 4.55m. The lowest overnight is still held by a Capaldi episode, but that still gained more viewers during the week to a figure of 4.71m.

[Matt]

Do you have a link to said figures?
Or a chart that you could post?

[ChrisIII]

I think the UK ratings have generally lapsed a bit since Tennant/RTD left (With a few big ratings , although the show really made it's American breakthrough during Matt Smith's era.

[Indian Ink]

Do you have a link to said figures?
Or a chart that you could post?

If you google 'Doctor who ratings accumulator' they're at the top of the page at the doctorwhotv.co.uk site

[Celgress]

An interesting examination of various continuity errors and plotholes created by the Series Twelve finale -

[Somecrazyaussie]

So apparentally the animators for the Faceless ones put the Delgado and Dwahan masters on an airport wanted sign as a sort of in-joke. While the reconstructions by their nature can't be 100% faithful to the original episodes, I imagine this might no go over well with some fans.

The animators have been getting slightly better with each new one they've done. Look at Shada and look at the Faceless Ones. There is noticeable improvement. But they did take some liberties when they did The Macra Terror. Out of all the animated reconstructions the one I like best was The Moonbase. Which was handled by Planet 55. Which has Gary Russell and Jason Ellery at the helm.

I don't mind certain changes. Animation can be used to add things that Who simply didn't have the budget for back in the day. Marco Polo is a great example of a story where animation can be used to improve the scope. Instead of one or two horses they can now do as many as they deem fit to enhance the Caravan as it traverses the Desert. My ideal is animation that is realistic enough to pass for the actual footage, but in a way that helps enhance the story.

[Somecrazyaussie]

I think the UK ratings have generally lapsed a bit since Tennant/RTD left (With a few big ratings , although the show really made it's American breakthrough during Matt Smith's era.

They really only began to lapse during Capaldi's era. Again, no fault of the cast or crew. But it was evident that Moffat was a bit past it by that point and a lot tuned out because it wasn't as accessible to the causal audience member. RTD had enough nods to continuity and Who lore to satisfy die hard Whovians. But he always ensured that it wasn't enough to alienate those who aren't. It is a pit the show fell into in the Mid 80s as well. Attack Of The Cybermen was, essentially, a "greatest hits" of past Cybermen stories. It was like they made a list and wrote a story to accommodate it. We are talking stories that were thought long gone like Tomb and Tenth Planet. Stuff that was close to 20 years old at that point.

The show needs to cater to both.