"The Space Museum", Part 4

As the episode opens, we find that Ian has fund the Doctor in the midst of being processed into a display.  He is told that the Doctor is "as good as dead".  Then we find Vicki aiding the rebels in starting their revolution.  She returns to the Museum accompanied by one of the rebels, and Barbara comes to in the midst of the gas.  The Doctor comes to after the processing was reversed, and he claims he understands what is going on, and he and Ian are recaptured.  Barbara leaves the museum and is captured, but quickly rescued by Vicki, only for the two of them to be recaptured.  The companions discussed whether or not their actions have been enough to change the future and the Zeron rebellion manages to free them, and the Doctor remarks that the future doesn't look too bad at all.  The Doctor took a souvenir of the museum ... a time and space visualizer and Vicki departs reluctantly.  The episode ends with a Dalek reporting the movements of the TARDIS ....

The Space Museum, Part 3

The episode picks up where we left off, with the Doctor being taken to the preparation room and the museum staff gathering around the TARDIS.  Ian and Barbara discuss the relative merits of making changes to the future.  They listen at the door as the soldiers discuss their capture outside and they are found by a soldier who approaches them from behind.  Ian confronts the soldier and attacks him and Barbara and Vicki run.  Ian overcomes the soldier and another soldier who tried to help capture him as Barbara and Vicki get separated while running from their pursuers.  Vicki is grabbed by the rebels as Barbara is inadvertently locked in a storage room.  One of the rebels finds Barbara and the two of them encounter a gas released into the building to flush them out.  Vicki goes to the armory with the rebels and tries to help them overcome the electronic lock. Barbara and her companion are overcome by the gas.  Ian captures the governor and forces them to take him to the Doctor.  The episode end with us seeing Ian's reaction when he sees the Doctor, but we don't see the Doctor ... yet.

The Space Museum, Part 2

It has been a while since I watched part 1 of this story, and sitting down to part 2 was a welcome diversion from my hectic days.

The second episode starts with two staff persons discussing their jobs, when they are told of the arrival of the TARDIS.  A group of rebels discusses the arrival of the TARDIS travelers.  The Travelers discuss their course of action, and they start trying to find their way out of the museum.  The Doctor is grabbed by the rebels and taken away from the others.  Barbara, Vicki and Ian argue what to do in the Doctor's absence, and the Doctor escapes from the rebels by hiding inside a Dalek display, but is captured by the museum staff.  He is questioned by the governor who uses thought projection device to read the Doctor's mind.  The Doctor resists the questioning and the governor decides that he would be more useful as an exhibit.  As the episode ends, the guards arrive to take the Doctor to the preparation room ...

I will continue watching and blogging on this episode in the not too far future.

The Space Museum, Part 1

Since there will be such a long wait for more new Doctor Who, I have decided to watch the odd classic episode here and there and then watch and comment on the odd new series eisode as well. In that vein, I am watching an episode I have never seen before, The Space Museum. The DVD restoration of this episode is phenominal. The video and sound quality are great, approaching modern digital quality.

The TARDIS materializes and Ian is concerned because they are n longer in the clothes that they dematerialized in. Vicki gets a glass of water for the Doctor and drops it, and the glass returns to her hand intact. The travelers realize they are at museum, and they are baffled by the fact that they are not leaving any footprints in the dust. They are further baffled by a lack of soounds, and a pair of guards walk within a few feet of them and don't take notice of them despite Vicki sneezing loudly as they walked by.

Inside the museum two museum staff walk by talking, but the travelers did not hear any sound. Vicki discovers that they can't touch any of the displays, and a cuple more museum staff walk by and look right at the travelers but don't see them. They find a display containing the TARDIS and their bodies. Vicki realizes that they are out of time, ahead of their own time track. The Doctor deduces that they should wait for themselves to arrive, and then they will be back in synch. Once they are in synch, they need to prevent whatever occurance end with them as a museum display. Suddenly, the display vanishes, and they are back on track with the time stream...

The Wedding of River Song

Time for a new episode, and I am actually going to watch it live.  Woohoo!  I am watching the final few minutes of Closing Time, and something just hit me, when River sees the Silence, she says who are they and eye-patch lady tells her that they are "her owners."

Wow, what is with time being all mixed up?  WTF?????  The Doctor?  OK, this will be an interesting trip!  OK, so the Doctor goes on a quest to find out why the Silence want him dead.  OK, talking to Dorium Maldovar's head ...  weird.

OK, the mention of the Brig dying ... that was great, kind of a tribute to Nicholas Courtney.  Amy with the eyepatch?  And she shoots the Doctor in the head??? Moffatt is starting to piss me off.  OK, stun gun!  I am not that pissed any more .... The eyepatch is actually a time filter (?) ... interesting.  And the Doctor REALLY needs a haircut!  OK, so it is an eye-drive.

So the Doctor is trying to fix time by getting back to the moment where River kills him and make it happen.  Looks like the Silence are about to break free ... and the eye-drives start to zap the hell out of people.  The Doctor and River get married!  Booyah!

Then my screen froze and I missed everything until Rivere and Amy are drinking wine.  The Doctor Lives!

OK, waiting for Christmas!  Maybe I will go back to my idea of watchign classic Who until it comes back in the Fall (less the specials).  Christmas and from what I hear, an Easter special, then new Who in the fall of 2012.

"Closing Time"

So today I am doing a Doctor Who double feature to get caught up and hopefully be able to stay live to wind up the season.  The flickering lights are never a good sign, and the Doctor showing up at Craig's house and finds that Craig is now a stressed out father.  Meanwhile, a shop girl discovers a Cyberman in the dressing room ... I wasn't aware that they were known for their keen fashion sense.

The Doctor starts working in a shop to investigate the strange power fluctuations, and he and Craig end up in the Cyber-ship via a teleport hidden in a shop elevator.  The Doctor and Craig get mistaken for "partners."  The Doctor is doing well investigating, but Craig ... not so good at it.  I like the alien "shhh power."  They are looking for a "silver rat," in actuality, a cybernate (another nod to the old series).  In the shop, the Doctor sees Amy and Rory shopping and sees a little girl ask Amy for her autograph.  He turns around and discovers that Amy has become a model.

The Doctor captures a Cybermat, and whoa, I have never seen a Cybermat with teeth before.  While the Doctor is talking to the baby, the Cybermat reactivates and starts stalking the Doctor.  Craig gets attacked, and the Doctor manages to deactivate it again.  The Doctor is feeling alone and melancholy.  He feels like his life is coming to a close and he is questioning wether or not having companions is a wise choice.  He goes off on his own to face the Cybermen, and Craig hurries off to help him, because the Doctor NEEDS his companions (Think back to "Turn Left" in series four).

The Doctor discovers that the Cybermen were on a ship that crashes centuries ago, and they were trying to rebuild.  They are defeated by the power of a father's love and instinct to protect his crying baby.  The Doctor swans off tidys up the house for Craig before Sophie returns and he takes some TARDIS blue envelopes from Craig's house, and as a partaking gift, Craig gives him a stetson hat.  This leads me to wonder how much time has passed in-between "The God Complex" and "Closing Time" because remember that the Doctor who died in "The Impossible Astronaut" was 200 years older than the current Doctor.

The Episode ends with the eye-patch lady and the Silence coming for River Song and encase her in the astronaut suit to set up the events of "The Impossible Astronaut."  The Season Finale is next week, and I can't wait!  Of course, then we have to wait until autumn 2012 before the next season begins.

"The God Complex"

I am still a little behind.  I am finally watching last week's episode, "The God Complex."  The opening  promises that this will be an amazing episode, scary and creepy.  After all, who hasn't had nightmares about a haunted hotel?  Each room has something someone fears, and everyone goes form room to room until they find their worst fears.  All of the pictures feature people and what their worst fear was.  The Sontaran's greatest fear was defeat, and the young lady cop was that horrible gorilla from the pre-credits sequence.

Apparently , the blogger's greatest fear is a room full of attractive females.  Heck, that is my wildest dream!  I loved his theory about the CIA and underground cities in Norway.  Rory get's a great line here, saying that he came up with an explanation more bizarre than what was actually happening.  Of course, Joe gets taken, and all of the repetitions of "praise him" are slightly disconcerting.

Personally, I think that Rita would make a great companion.  She has a confidence that would make the Doctor's travels slightly more interesting.  The Doctor works out that the hotel is the hunting grounds of an alien monster that feeds on fear.  Of course thinking of a basket of kittens banishes all of my fears too!

The Doctor faces the monster and tries to reason with it, but the geeky blogger (I'm terrible with names) gets in the way and the creature is on the rampage again.  I like that Rita isn't automatically impressed by the Doctor and it will be sad if she buys it!  The Doctor found his room, and while we don't see his greatest fear, we hear the TARDIS cloister bell ringing.  The Doctor finally works it out, that it isn't fear that the monster feeds not on fear, but on faith, and in order to save Amy, he has to break her faith in him. While it works and the monster backs off and eventually dies, we get our first possible glimpse of Amy and Rory leaving the Doctor.

The monster turns out to be another look back at the old series as the Doctor tells us that the creature was related to Nimon from the Fourth Doctor Story "The Horns of Nimon."  I think one of the great things that Moffat has done is he has incorporated references to the old series several times now.  It really makes old-school fans like myself feel like we are appreciated for sticking with it.  I haven't seen "The Horns of Nimon" in several years, so maybe I will have to watch it.  I wonder if it is on my DVD library?

The episode ends with the Doctor dropping Amy and Rory back off at their house and heading out on his own.  At least Rory gets a car out of the deal.  It is kind of a sad ending with the Doctor alone in the TARDIS.

The Girl Who Waited

Wow, it has been a while!  Somehow I managed to miss two weeks worth of Doctor Who and am finally watching "The Girl Who Waited" from my DVR.  Thinking of Amy as a companion, this episode is obviously intended to shine a light on her and develop her character some more.  The companion-centered episode is a peculiar development of the new series, starting with "Turn Left."  In the old series, there really wasn't much need to develop the characters of the companions (or the Doctor for that matter).

In the early years of the series, when there were 42 episodes per year, different episodes would be written in order to allow the principal actors to take a week off here and there.  Now they write an episode with minimal involvement of the primary characters, or rather different primary characters at different times.

Amy being trapped in a separate time stream as a method of quarantine is almost genius.  Moffat is, if nothing else, able to create a great story, even if he tends to write a very confusing season.  Karen Gilliam really shone in this episode, showing her versatility in showing us an older, harder, less innocent Amy Pond.  An Amy who was abandoned and used the things she learned from the Doctor in order to survive.

Rory forces Amy to face herself, and we see the image of Amy the way that Steven Moffat sees her.  She starts out as an innocent scottish girl, left behind and waiting for the raggedy doctor, to being the fulcrum which pivots the Doctor's life and travels, to being the mother of the person who murders the Doctor (according to the little dudes in the person-ship during "Let's Kill Hitler," but  I still have my doubts).  Of course, seeing older Amy swinging away with a sword and stick ... hmmm ... makes me wanna be more manly.

Rory being forced to make a choice was a great moment, especially when he told the Doctor "you're turning me into you."  After all, that is what the Doctor does ... he makes decisions.  It was fun to watch him force someone else to make the decision for once.  But what was with him sticking his tongue out at Amy?

Night Terrors

Time to watch Night Terrors and get caught up!  Of course I won't be home this coming Saturday night, so that will be blogged off of my DVR again too.

Gotta love a little kid who can psychically call the Doctor across time and Space.  Amy Intro .... BOOO!

A child's bedroom is the scariest place in the universe?  Wow.  Whoda thunk?  I kinda feel for the kid, laying there with his flashlight.  I don't think I have EVER been as scared as this kid looks.  Of course, Rory and Amy's elevator ride to hell looks scary too.  Plus a little old lady getting eaten by a pile of trash bags ... hrm.

OK, the dollhouse, kinda saw the coming, and it reminds me just a little bit of another First Doctor story, Planet of the Giants.  Of course, in that case the TARDIS screwed up and shrunk everyone down, and in this case we are talking about an alien kid who sticks people in a dollhouse in the cupboard, but hey, go with it, eh?

Of course as this episode draws to a close, all's well that ends well ... of course with Stephen Moffat, one never knows ... especially with The Doctor obsessing over his own death.

Let's Kill Hitler! Ooooh, please, please, can we?

NO!

"You cannot change history, not one line! ... What you are trying to do is utterly impossible! Believe me, I know, I know!"  Those were the words that the First Doctor said to Barbara when she told him that she intended to convince the Aztecs to end the ritual of human sacrifice so that Cortez would not destroy their civilization when he arrived.  So when I saw the title, "Let's Kill Hitler," well, it kind of made me wonder if this was going to be another one of Moffat's misdirections.  But then again, in "The Fires of Pompeii," the Tenth Doctor explains to Donna that some events are fixed and others are in flux ... the fixed ones tend to be the ones where the event shapes the whole of history after it, and lets face it, Hitler is one of those fixed points, so we are kind of stuck with him.

This turns out to be one of those wonderful "wibbley, wobbley" episodes.  you know, the ones where you need to use your TV TARDIS (aka, your DVR) to go back and satisfy your "did he really just say/do that?" curiosity.

The episode revolves around the addition of Amy's friend Mel, a juvenile delinquent all growed up, and the title comes from what I think is one of the most brilliant lines in the episode: "You've got a time machine, I've got a gun, what the hell, lets kill Hitler."

I am going to try to go with a lot less detail from now on, but I think that the progression of Amy's life with Mel and Rory growing up was ... fun.  Especially the fact that Amy thought Rory was gay for so long.

Temporal Grace ... does it exist or not?  Well, it did once upon a time.  It definitely worked back in the Fourth Doctor's era, but then by the time the Fifth Doctor came along, it didn't seem to work.  In the books after the original series ended, the Seventh Doctor said that the temporal grace circuit needed looking at.  Apparently he never got around to it, and he started using Temporal Grace as a "clever lie" to convince people not to fire their weapons in the TARDIS.

The Antibodies are cool, they would make awesome hall monitors in a school.  No pass?  Zap 'em!  Oooh, and Hitler delivers a wicked right cross on Hitler.  Rory really comes into his own in this episode.  I am starting to like him now.  The fake man with the little men inside ... Brilliant!  Mel is shot and regenerates in to the River Song we know and love, except, she is not quite so lovable in this episode.  Call it the redemption of River Song ... or the redemption of Melody Pond into River Song ... or ... ok, you get the idea.

The rest of the episode focuses on River going through her post-regeneration trauma (oh, and she poisons the Doctor along the way).  And what is the cruelest form of warfare?  Warfare of the heart.  When River is being evil, she is totally badass!  By the way, love the sonic cane.

In the end, Amy and Rory are rescued, River gives up her remaining regenerations to save the Doctor, and she is set on the path she must travel to become the River we know.  Hang on tight, the rest of the season is looking like it will be quite a ride!

That TARDIS DVD Cabinet ...

A Series of pictures showing the adding of the doors to the TARDIS video cabinet:

So here we go ... raw lumber ...

Doors made!

Doors hung!

Doors painted!

DVD Collection in its new home!

I still need to add the plexiglass and the sign top and door hardware. I also need to pull out my plane and fix a little sticking on one of the doors. Then, on to corner posts if I am feeling adventurous. And that is ONLY an if ...

Back to the Beginning: "An Unearthly Child"

So I was on a trip to Washington DC last week. on one of the evenings, instead of going out and exploring, I sought the refuge of my air-conditioned room and some very old friends. It is hard to believe that Doctor Who first appeared on TV screens in 1963. This is especially true since I was born in 1968. They say that our experiences make up our reality, and the reality is that when I was born, Doctor Who was into its fifth season, second lead character, and thirteenth companion. The current serial airing when I materialized on this planet was "The Invasion" (hmmm, I have that in my DVD archive, maybe I will have to review that one next).

"An Unearthly Child" was a four-part serial, airing from November 23 to December 14, 1963. It was the first Doctor Who story, and at that point, nothing was known about the Doctor. Just that he was a cranky old man in a box with his granddaughter, and a couple of people he picked up along the way. The Doctor's backstory evolved as the show went on, and so did the story telling. That being said, if you have never seen this serial or read the Target Books novelization, here, for your reading pleasure, is a summary of the first Doctor Who story to grace our screens:

It all began in a junkyard as they say. The first part of the serial opens on a foggy London night, and a patrolman checks the gate at I.M. Foreman Scrap Merchants, 76 Totter’s Lane. He walks away, and the gate opens and the camera enters the yard and settles on a police box as we hear a distinct humming noise. Fade to Coal Hill School, where two teachers, Barbara Wright and Ian Chesterton are talking about a student named Susan Foreman. They are bothered by the fact that she seems absolutely brilliant, but astoundingly dull in other ways. Barbara had tried to visit her grandfather, a “doctor,” but found that the address on file with the school office was the junkyard at 76 Totter’s Lane. They decide to follow her home and try to solve the mystery that is Susan Foreman. The teachers leave Susan and she picks up the book and immediately upon starting to read exclaims “that’s not right!”

The teachers watch her entering the junk yard and follow her in. They discover the police box, and soon encounter an old man. They hear Susan‘s voice inside the police box and argue with the old man about it, thinking he knows something about it. Susan opens the door and Barbara and Ian force their way in, discovering that they are not inside a police box, but a very large, complex machine with Susan inside.

The old man instructs Susan to close the door, and Ian argues with the old man about wanting an explanation how a police box can contain a vast room such as the one they are in. Susan calls the ship they are in the TARDIS, which stands for Time And Relative Dimensions In Space. The old man tells them that he and Susan are exiles, cut off from their own planet without friends or protection. He talks of them being wanderers in the fourth dimension of time. Ian tries to leave and gets shocked by the console. The old man and Susan argue about letting them go, and Susan tells him that if he tries to leave, she will leave him and the TARDIS. He activates the controls and the TARDIS takes off and lands in a rocky wilderness area. The first part of the story ends with a shadow looming menacingly near the TARDIS.

The second part opens with the same exterior scene of the TARDIS and the menacing shadow. The shadow is cast by a cave man who looks at the TARDIS in disbelief. The scene switches to a tribe of cave men where one of them, Za, is trying to make fire while being ridiculed by an old woman. Za and a woman talks about who will be leader of the tribe and whom her father will give her to. The scene switches to inside the TARDIS, where Barbara and Ian regain consciousness after having been knocked unconscious by the TARDIS’s trip.

Ian argues with the old man, calling him “Doctor Foreman,” to which the old man replies “doctor who?” They talk about the ship having gone back in time, but Ian is skeptical. They all exit the TARDIS, and Ian is dumbfounded, and the old man is wondering why the TARDIS still looks like a police box. Everyone starts exploring, Ian, Barbara and Susan exploring separating from the old man. Barbara refers to him as Doctor Foreman and Ian says “That’s not his name, who is he? Doctor Who?” The Doctor lights his pipe, and is attacked by a caveman named Kal who thinks that the Doctor can show him the secret of fire allowing Kal to take over the tribe. Susan, Barbara and Ian go to his aid and find that he has been taken. They take off in search of him as the scene shifts to the cave.

Za is having a hard time keeping his position as leader in the face of a challenge from Kal, and as Kal returns to the cave carrying the Doctor. Kal convinces the tribe that if he can bring them the secret of fire, that he should be leader. The Doctor awakens and tells the tribe that he would make fire for them, but he can’t make fire without matches. This adds to the conflict between Kal and Za. Kal threatens to kill the Doctor, but is interrupted by Susan, Ian and Barbara. They are overpowered by the tribe and imprisoned in the cave of skulls. Za and the woman’s father discuss her being mated with Za. As the second part ends, the four travelers discover that the cave gets its name from being littered with skeletons and skulls and that the skulls have all been split open.

In the main cave, an old woman of the tribe departs while the others are sleeping. In the cave of skulls, the travelers use a sharp edged stone to try to cut their bonds, and the Doctor tells them to use a sharp piece of bone. The old woman leaves the main cave and is seen by the woman, Hur, who wakes Za and they follow the old woman. The old woman comes into the cave of skulls, and tells the travelers they will not make fire. Hur tells Za that the old woman went to kill the travelers, and they go to follow her, overhearing her telling them that she will she them free if they do not make fire. The old woman frees them, and they escape through a back entrance to the cave of skulls.

The travelers escape into the forest at night and are pursued by Za. The travelers stop to catch their breath and Barbara is startled when she trips over a fresh corpse of an animal. They are being stalked by a wild animal, but they are saved by Za, who kills the animal, but is gravely wounded in the fight. Barbara goes to help the wounded Za, followed by Susan. Hur resists their help, and Ian tells them he is their friend and wants to treat his wounds. They argue over helping Za, and they make a stretcher to carry Za. Kal goes to the cave of skulls and questions the old woman, and Kal kills her.

While building the stretcher, the Doctor picks up a rock, and is stopped from killing Za by Ian. They begin to carry Za back to the TARDIS. Kal wakes the rest of the tribe and leads them out to stop the travelers, blocking hem from reaching the TARDIS as the third installment ends.

The final installment of this first serial starts with the travelers being taken prisoner once again. In the cave, an argument breaks out over who killed the old woman, Kal accusing Za. The Doctor tricks Kal into showing the tribe his bloody knife, forcing him to confess. The Doctor and Ian provoke the tribe to drive Kal out, and they are once again imprisoned in the cave of skulls for their trouble. They make fire for the tribe believing this to be their ticket to freedom, and give the fire to Za. Za is attacked by Kal, and in the fight, Za kills him. They ask to be set free now that they have given Za fire, but Za keeps them prisoner, forcing them to remain and join the tribe.

As the tribe celebrates the return of fire, the travelers use the fire to trick the tribe into believing that they are dead and escape. The tribe follows when they discover the deception and give chase, but the travelers reach the TARDIS and escape as spears are thrown at the vanishing TARDIS.

TARDIS DVD cabinet starts to get off the ground!

So here is the starting point. Phase 1 of the project was to build the inner cabinet. I decided that the base should be put on right away too. The main construction is pine, but I used a heavy particle board for the base in order to give it more stability. Once I got this much built, I took it outside and started in on it with my can of "TARDIS blue" spraypaint. I think that the results speak for themselves.

I am debating on what to do next, the doors or the top. I will also need to add a back to it. The plan (at this point) is to use 1/2" plywood for the back, and 1/4" plywood for the doors. The top will be kind of tricky to build, as will the corner posts. One TARDIS DVD cabinet project I had

seen included corner posts that would themselves open up. I don't know

if I am up to that level of woodworking yet. Heck this is only my second "major" project. As it is, it currently stands five feet tall and the final product with the top will be 5'6" tall.

The doors will be rather tricky, as will mounting them in such a way that they don't get hung up on the corner posts when I open them. The amount of detail on the doors, especially the windows will make this a difficult project. As always, I will post updates as I finish things, however it will be a while before I can continue to work on it because next week will be pretty busy for me.

Until next time, might I recommend taking in a little classic Doctor Who while we wait for the next half of the season?

Everything has a beginning ...

Welcome to the first day of summer vacation! So far I have worked around the house a bit, watered plants and played videogames for three or four mind-numbing hours. I now have a headache, and I am going to put up a nice blog post about beginnings. Everything has a beginning.

For instance,my TARDIS DVD cabinet has a beginning:

I know it just looks like a pile of wood right now, but trust me, there is a TARDIS lurking in there somewhere, waiting to hold my Doctor Who DVD collection! If it turns out, I already have a request for one.

Doctor Who had a beginning too. Doctor Who premiered on November 23, 1963. If I had been born ... and in England .. I would say it was a birthday present three days early. Alas, I had another five years and three days before I would make my premiere. It just so happens that Doctor Who premiered the day after President Kennedy was assassinated. Talk about your coincidences.

I started watching Doctor Who in the early 1980's and the home video market had yet to develop, so my first exposure to the serial that started it all was through a Target Books novelization:

I now have the episode on DVD as a part of a Box set called "The Beginnings":

Anyways, in honor of beginnings, summer vacation, my TARDIS DVD cabinet and Doctor Who, my next post will be a nice look at "An Unearthly Child," the story that started it all! Stay tuned!

WTF??????

Ok is it just me or are the story lines getting really strange? I know that I keep saying that I'm old school....but come on......I just can't handle all of the cliff hangers.

So we start with the Dr.(s) trying to help everyone stay calm. But if you are a true fan you know that won't last to long. I did like the fact that the two Dr.s switch shoes. Matt did a really good job at this one. We really couldn't tell which one was which.

I did think that Jennie was a human, but that didn't last long. Of course none of our questions where answered-again-just have more questions. I'm reallying starting to hate the new writer. He reminds me of Chris Carter(X-Files). Takes a lot away and then gives you nothing. But I'm rambling again......

I just don't know what to say about this one. I was so confused after watching it. I called Jim and asked him WTF!!! So until the next one, I hope that we get more answers then questions this time. But River Song is back!!! I can't wait to see who she is (I hope).

"A Good Man Goes To War"

After a long wait, I am finally watching the mid-season finale of Doctor Who. We got ourselves ready for it by watching the repeats of "The Rebel Flesh" and "The Almost People". Of course, we ended with the Doctor using the sonic screwdriver to dissolve Amy into a puddle of flesh after promising to find her. Somewhere along the line, she was replaced, and the real Amy Pond is in labor somewhere. Amy is about to have the baby ... but who is the baby? What about the little girl who regenerated at the end of "Day of the Moon." I know we find out just who River Song is. Does she start traveling with the Doctor? Will we be treated to a regular dose of the very awesome Alex Kingston? Watching the end of "The Almost People," I can definitely say that Matt Smith is finding his voice as the Doctor. And who is the woman with the eye patch? And dagnabit, this had BETTER not be to be continued over the summer! It is about to start, so lets find out together what is about to happen!

Awww, look at the little baby. Amy is holding her baby and is surrounded by armed troops. OK, the cloaked people look like Autons ... and the "Last Centurion," Rory is definitely the father according to Amy. Rory faces down the Cybermen, and seems to have become a man in his own right. OK, anoying Amy intro is over and the show is moving forward at a breakneck pace. The hot soldier chick KNOWS the Doctor. The monks are "the headless monks," ok, I guess they aren't Autons. It was how they held their hands that made me think that. Looks like the fat one is about to lose his head ... really, he should try to be more cool, calm and collected.

The Doctor can be anywhere in time and space, and in old London, the TARDIS arrives in the home home of a Silurian? A Sontaran nurse? What the heck? River Song breaking IN to prison? And she is looking rather OLD. The Doctor is getting people together to find Amy, and River Song can't be there until the very end because today is the day that he finds out who she is. The Dorium Maldovar [I initially identified him as the Duke of Manhattan] ... is he behind all of this? Or is it that he is just someone people come to for advice? And it looks like he is about to go to war for the Doctor!

The leader of the troops is giving his army a pep talk. The hot soldier visits Amy and tells her that she met the Doctor when she was a little girl. The headless monks actually ARE headless, but of course one of the cloaked figures is the Doctor. One of the headless monks is killed and the Monks kill a couple of the troops in response. The Doctor heads out, and I suddenly remembered "The Time of Angels" last season where the army was made up of priests. The Siluruans, Sontarans and the fighters from "Victory of the Daleks" last season have joined the fight for the Doctor. Wow!?!?!? Former enemies fighting on the Doctor's behalf?

Eye patch lady is trying to leave with the baby, and Rory and the Pirates have taken control of her personal ship. The Doctor wants the colonel to order his men to run away. Rory is having problems working the sonic screwdriver, and he calls her "Mrs. Williams" ... love it. A crying Roman with a baby ... definitely cool! Melody Pond ... love the name.

The Sontaran is starting to freak me out. He produces vast quantities of lactic fluid? Yikes. Oooh, the Doctor's own cradle. Spiffy! Now it's time to find out who it is that wants the baby. The baby is part human, part Time Lord?!?!?!? So Amy's baby may have been conceived in the TARDIS while it was traveling in the time vortex. The Doctor is facing the possibility of a new "Time Lord" being born, and eye-patch lady reveals that this is a long war against the Doctor, and now the time has come for the counter-attack.

Whoops, Dorian Maldovar just lost his head. The battle starts, and the baby was a ganger. Looks like eye-patch has the baby. Amy blames the Doctor for losing the baby, and Lorna (the hot soldier) dies. River Song arrives and confronts the Doctor, telling him that he needs to change his ways before Doctor ceases to mean healer and instead means destroyer. She tells him who she is ... and he runs off on his own, leaving River to take everyone home, revealing that she is Amy's daughter! Holy CRAP! Now we have to wait a really, REALLY long time before we get a fresh infusion of Doctor Who.

So, during the break, we will spend some time walking down memory lane, building a TARDIS DVD cabinet, and generally being online Doctor Who buddies! Stay tuned!

[CORRECTION: The character I identify as the Duke of Manhattan is actually Dorium Maldovar, the person who sold River Song a vortex manipulator last season in "The Pandorica Opens." Thanks for the assist Sarah!]

"The Almost People"

"Trust me, I'm the Doctor." The ganger Doctor is having a wee bit of a crisis because of what he inherits from the Doctor's past regenerations. Maybe this will be a chance for Steven Moffat to tell is whether or not Paul McGann counts or not. Hearing the Doctors complete each other's sentences is a little confusing. One of the Doctors is wearing the wrong shoes. The Doctors are working their brains trying to get everyone out, and the gangers are engaged in a philosophical discussion about their lives and existence. There are a few instances when I am not sure who is a ganger and who isn't. Is anyone else confused by this? Rory is definitely not too sure about Jenny: is she a ganger? Isn't she? Is there more than one ganger Jenny? The survivors from the mine along with the Doctors and Amy are being choked to death by acid fumes in the tunnels and head for the evac tower. Ganger Jenny comes to the other gangers (sans Rory)and tries to inspire them to lead a revolution against the humans.

Amy is having problems with two Doctors, and she definitely has a preference for the actual Doctor instead of the ganger Doctor. The Doctors get power back and the crew calls the mainland to request evac and destruction of the gangers. Amy heads toward the wall, seeing/sensing the woman with the eyepatch. The Doctor dismisses it as nothing, but Amy isn't convinced. She tries to mend fences with the ganger Doctor, and she tells him about seeing the Doctor killed in "The Impossible Astronaut". The ganger Doctor snaps and assaults Amy. The ganger Doctor starts to explain what the flesh wants, but they cut him off and don't listen to him. Rory hears Jen calling for help and finds Jenny and ganger Jen together. I am starting to think that there are two ganger Jens.

Jen fights her ganger, and tosses her into a puddle of acid, killing her. Amy wants to go find Rory, and the Doctor sends the ganger Doctor, and Jenny has Rory help her to turn a valve, but first uses his hand to activate the override (she is a ganger, I am sure of it). The gangers intercept the shuttle and the ganger foreman guesses the password. Jenny and Rory find a pile of discarded faulty copies, and she talks about who the "real monsters" are (I SO know that she is a ganger now). The ganger Doctor finds human Jenny (I was right) and he gets knocked out.

OK, the doctor and the crew so through a hallway full of eyes. Rory finds them and leads them into a trap, and he learns that he has been tricked. The other gangers turn on Jen, and she runs off hoping to start her war against mankind.

The Doctor and the crew are trapped with one of the acid vats, and Jimmy is splashed with acid and dies in his ganger's arms, asking his ganger to carry on for him and take care of his family. He talks to his son on the holo call. Everyone goes to depart, and Jen blocks their exit, transforming herself into a predatory creature The TARDIS drops in. The ganger Doctor blocks the door so that they can escape, revealing to Amy that they had switched shoes so that they could use Amy to learn about the flesh.

The Doctor delivers everyone to where they need to be and sends the foreman on a mission to solve the problems of the flesh. The Doctor, Amy and Rory go abck into the TARDIS as Amy starts having contractions. The Doctor zaps Amy with the sonic screwdriver, saying that she hadn't been there for a long time and she dissolves into flesh. He promises to find her, and the episode ends with Amy in a white room on a medical table going into labor...

To be continued .... next week, in the mid-season finale!

Blogging late again this week.

Because of school commitments, I will be blogging late again this week. While our new episode is airing, I will be running sound for our school play entitled "The Good Doctor," If you can believe that. It is a Neil Simon play, and our performances are tonight and tomorrow night (Doctor Who night). So My plan is to watch the new episode, "The Almost People" and blog about it on Sunday morning. Wish me luck!

Bought some wood and some TARDIS blue paint ...

I am one woodworking project away from starting project number two! My first woodworking project is an air-conditioner insert for my bedroom window. I will probably finish that tonight. My second will be to start my TARDIS DVD cabinet. I will thoroughly document the construction in this blog.

I will be building it in four phases. Phase 1 will be the interior shelves themselves. Phase 2 will be doors and a base. Phase 3 will be the "police box" sign along with interior lighting. Phase 4 will be the corner pieces and top.

The final product will be scaled down to stand 5'6" tall (minus the dome light, which I have not decided wether there will be one). Wish me luck in this grand building adventure!

A week without WHO ...

Doctor Who fans rejoiced this year when BBC America committed to airing the episodes on the same day as they are aired in Britan. No more waiting, knowing that there was Who out there you haven't seen yet. No more resisting the temptation to peek online for spoilers. Now, we are offset by a week thanks to Memorial Day of all things!

The folks at BBC America are not stupid. They know a ratings cash cow when they have one, and Doctor Who has consistently gotten stellar ratings for the BBC's U.S.-based cousin. But what happens to crop up in the run up to a spectacular mid-season cliffhanger? A blasted U.S. holiday that signals the start of the "get off your lazy butt and go out and do stuff outside" season while network TV is in reruns. Rather than compete with a hiloday weekend filled with barbeques and beach outings, they decided to delay Doctor Who by one week in order to preserve their viewing numbers.

Uhhh, ok ... good idea. The fans come second to advertising revenue, and a bad showing in the middle of the season would mean that BBC America might lose a few hundred thousand in ad revenue per week next year. But ... since it is ad revenue that keeps Doctor Who on the air ...

Let me start over: BBC America made the wise scheduling move of delaying the broadcast of Doctor Who, thus improving the shows long term survivability....

More later this week with "The Rebel Flesh," and I promise not to go online and find out who River song really is and ruin it before "A Good Man Goes To War" airs in two weeks.

"The Doctor's Wife" Season 6 Episode 4

Finally, I am writing about this episode! Of course, I am re-watching it in order to write this. Of all of episodes of the new season, this one was for me one of the strangest, but it also answers some long-standing issues about the series.

We start in a junkyard, there are three humans, Auntie, Uncle and Idris, and an Ood called Nephew, and Idris is about to get their brains sucked out. Shift to the TARDIS. A knock on the door in flight reveals a flying glowing cube. The Doctor utters a line that exemplifies something that is starting to bother me about this series of Doctor Who. When have we ever known the Doctor to say something like "Come here you scrumptious little beauty"? The Doctor's got mail? It is a Time Lord emergency messaging system. It is reminiscent of the cube assembled by the Second Doctor to ask for help from the Time Lords with returning combatants to their rightful times and places in "The War Games." The Doctor takes this to mean that there is a living Time Lord out there called The Corsair and he has to pilot the TARDIS out of the universe to get there, accomplishing this by jettisoning parts of the interior of the TARDIS, again harkening back to a classic episode, "Castrovalva," in which they jettisoned parts of the TARDIS to escape the Big Bang. Suddenly Idris awakens and she is overflowing with energy ... actually, it looks like the start of a regeneration scene. Cue the annoying Amy intro ...

They are on a junk planet outside the Universe. Well, they are in a pocket universe Think of it as a little soap bubble clinging to the side of a big soap bubble, the Doctor says. The Doctor is assaulted by Idris, first kissed, then bitten. She calls him a thief, saying that he has stolen her. The Doctor repairs the communication ball of the Ood, and he suddenly hears the voices of Time Lords in trouble. The Doctor demands to find out who else is there, believing there are multiple Time Lords on the planet.

In a cage, Idris is wondering about herself, and the asteroid they are on turns out to be sentient. The Asteroid tells the Doctor that there have been many Time Lords and Travelers on the planet and that he fixes people when they come to visit him. The woman who is known as "Auntie" touches Amy and the Doctor notices that she has two different hands. The Doctor sends Amy to the TARDIS for his screwdriver, and then when she calls him, he uses his screwdriver to lock them in. The Doctor finds a cabinet containing multiple cubes, the final messages of many Time Lords. He confronts Uncle and Auntie, pointing out that Uncle is made of of spare body parts, and the arm of Autie is the arm of The Corsair, revealing that the people there were created by patching the body parts of others together. The Doctor confronts Idris as a green fog envelops the TARDIS.

He talks to Idris, and she says that that she is the TARDIS. She tells the Doctor about how they first left Gallifrey, and she reveals that as much as he stole the TARDIS, the TARDIS stole him. Now we enter the strangeness of this episode. One of the newer ideas in the new series is that the TARDIS is alive. In the classic series, the TARDIS is just a machine, but now they are living sentient things. The shift was first explained that the TARDIS has a telepathic field that gets into your head and translates alien languages ("Rose"), and he eventually explains that the TARDIS is alive ("Boom Town"). In "The Impossible Planet" the Doctor indicates that TARDISes are grown, not built. The Living memory o the TARDIS was removed and placed in the body of a human woman so that House could feed on the TARDIS. In the TARDIS, the cloister bell is ringing, and Amy and Rory are still trapped inside as the TARDIS dematerializes and heads for the rift back into the universe proper. House speaks to them asking why he shouldn't just kill them. Auntie and Uncle die, and TARDIS-woman is also dying. He asks her name, and she tells him that he calls her "Sexy." Rory and Amy attempt to explain to house why they should be allowed to live. The Doctor heads out into the junkyard and starts scavenging TARDIS parts to build a working TARDIS console to go after the TARDIS and Amy and Rory.

House is tormenting Amy and Rory, and the Doctor and "Sexy" start arguing. He accuses her of being unreliable, never taking him where he wanted to go, but she replies that she always took him where he needed to go. This explains why the TARDIS's steering never quite worked properly in the early series, with the steering growing more and more reliable as the series progressed. Amy and Rory are being tormented by House, and Amy is made to believe that she has abandoned Rory for two thousand years. "Sexy" reveals that she wanted to see the universe so she "stole a Time Lord" and the Doctor was the only one crazy enough to run off with her. She powers the console for him and they dematerialize in a ball of energy and she sends a telepathic message to Rory to go to one of the old control rooms. "Sexy" reveals that she archived each control room, and that she has about thirty of them now (ala the secondary console room from season 14 in the Tom Baker era). House seems to primarily take pleasure in tormenting Amy through psychic attacks. In the TARDIS corridors, Amy and Rory encounter Nephew, the Ood from the Asteroid.

In the Vortex, the Doctor calls Idris "you sexy thing" and she asks if that is her name, and he responds that it is. They enter the other control room, which happens to be the Ninth and Tenth Doctor era control room, which had been destroyed in the regeneration from David Tenant to Matt Smith. You know, it would have been nice to see an old school console room in this scene, but they were never really big enough for something big like this to happen. The Doctor tries to convince House not to kill them and tells him to delete rooms, and House deletes the control room they are in, causing them to be instantly transported to the main control room due to a failsafe mechanism that protects the TARDIS's passengers. The body of Idris dies and the matrix, the soul of the TARDIS is freed in the control room, and she re-takes control of the TARDIS, defeating House. She appears as an apparition and says her last words to the Doctor telling him she has found the word she has wanted to say to him the whole episode, the word being "hello".

The Doctor installs a firewall around the Matrix to protect her form future attacks. Rory tells the Doctor that at the end, she kept repeating to Rory that "the only water in the forest is the River" and that they would need to know that soon. He tells Amy and Rory he would make them a new bedroom since the House deleted all the bedrooms. Amy requests that they not have bunk beds in their new room, but the Doctor replies that bunk beds are cool, because they are a bed with a ladder. Amy and Rory head off to their new room, and the Doctor talks to the TARDIS hoping she hears and understands him, and she responds by throwing a lever for him. The TARDIS flies off and the Doctor runs around the console room like a happy madman.

So the Doctor's wife is ... the TARDIS. What do they say about men and their toys? We also get a little more of a glimpse of the dichotomy of the TARDIS as both a machine and a living, sentient thing. It is almost enough to make your head spin...

Well, until next week, when we have the second part of "The Rebel Flesh".

Emilie says hi!

First I would like to send a big thanks to Jim for letting me post on his blog. Thanks Jim!!

As I was sitting and watching the new episode, I was thinking to myself "Not again with that new opening!!!" I'm sorry but it just doesn't work for me. I'm old school. But I do like the new logo ( want that on a jacket, just what I need another jacket lol). But now I'm doing what Jim tells me "I didn't ask for how the clock works, just what time it is" lol.

So as I was saying......I was watching the new episode and as I heard Buzzer (Marshall Lancaster) voice, I know that I saw him in something else......it took me a few sec. to remember, but I remembered, He played on Life On Mars and Ashes to Ashes as Chris Skelton. Now some of you Doctor Who fans may remember that the new Master (John Simm) also was on Life On Mars as Sam (great show!!) I do hope that they bring John back as the Master, I really like him.

So I know that Jim said a lot of cool things on this one so I won't go into a lot of stuff. I just want to say a couple of things that I thought was kinda cool. First, when I saw the Doctor with the "Flesh" I was thinking 'how much do you want to bet that they are going to make a second Doctor". Then when I saw the lips saying trust me I know that there would be one. The CGI is getting really good, but you would think that they could do better then a snow globe for the Doctor checking the storm. I mean really!! Couldn't they come up with something a lot better.

"The Rebel Flesh" S6Ep5

Before we begin this week's blog, I actually DID watch "The Doctor's Wife" last week, but it was cuddle time on the couch for Emilie and I, so I didn't blog while watching it, and I always meant to go back and re-watch it and blog it, but I still haven't gotten around to that, so I hope to do so this week. I have also invited Emilie and my friend Katrina to join me as bloggers here. Emilie is a fan from the Jon Pertwee days, and Katrina has just started watching Doctor Who in the past three weeks and I figured she would be a great addition to the blogging team here with a fresh view of the show and fresh ideas. I am looking forward to their contributions! Now, on with this week's blog!

We open with a fly-in shot of ... is that Alcatraz? Where are Sean Connery and Nicholas Cage? Ooh, big threatening tank ... and what do they do? They open it of course. Like the Doctor, I really love the human race. Oops, someone is soup. Hello Amy Intro. I know, I know ... Steven Moffat believes the show is being watched by more new viewers than people who know what the heck is going on, but still.

Darts in the console room ... and the Doctor is STILL obsessing about Amy's pregnancy/non-pregnancy. The TARDIS s caught in the vortex ... I really like the fact that they can make with the really great vortex CGI in the new series. Dusty Springfield playing in a monastery... how novel. Aw, come on .... spears? Ooga-chaka, ooga-chaka! Now I am starting to notice that Matt Smith is sorta channeling Sylvester McCoy with his characterization ... kind of the roaming expert who manipulates the people he meets: "show me your critical systems", "which ones?", "you know which ones."

A tub of "flesh", made by taking a "weaving". Kind of reminds me of the novel "Lungbarrow" just a little bit. OK, the Doctor monitors a solar storm with a snow globe?!?!?! Huh???? The solar storm effects are great. And of course, the Doctor runs off to prevent tragedy, and what happens? He gets zapped, and acid starts to eat away at the TARDIS (actually the dirt beneath the TARDIS as the TARDIS Shouldn't be affected by the acid).

Wakey, wakey! Everyone got knocked about by the solar storm. Rory is just pissing me off. Dress him in a red shirt and kill him off already. The gangers are all alive, now they are seeking to figure out their "lives". Matt Smith is both old and young at the same time. He is young, but he has really old-looking eyes. Jennifer barfs flesh into the wash-basin ... and then she does the head on a snake thing ... I am thinking T-3000 from Terminator 2, here.

The Doctor figures out that the boss is a ganger instead of the real person. Ganger Jennifer seems to have taken a shine to Rory. Everyone is splitting up ... I thought Rory was a believer in the Doctor's cardinal rule: "don't wander off." Now he goes off and follows ganger Jennifer around. Dummy. Rory starts to really show how dumb he can be, getting roped in by ganger Jennifer.

LOL, the Doctor walks into a puddle of acid and finds the TARDIS buried almost to the signal light. Aww, come on ... show us what he sneezed up ... betcha he is a ganger too. The half-formed gangers remind me of Odo on Deep Space Nine. Hate to tell ya Rory, you are far luckier than Amy is! You know, seeing a ganger do a full-on exorcist twist was rather disturbing. Rory brings ganger Jen to Amy, and we now have an interesting twinge of jealousy from Amy ... the girl who ran off on her wedding night to travel with and hit on the Doctor. And why is it that the Doctor seems to be taking the ganger's side?

Sacred life? The storm causing the gangers to become independent life forms is an example of "sacred life"? The setting up of the simple binary equation of two sides, "us and them" is pretty simple. And of course, now we have a ganger of the Doctor starting to wander around. And of course, the ganger workers have the acid suits and they want to deal with the human crew. Doctor versus Doctor as the credits roll. We have to wait two weeks for the conclusion! Damn.