Episode 138


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To save Clara, The Doctor explores the heart of the wounded TARDIS ("Journey to the Centre of the TARDIS"). And, following that, they team with the Paternoster Gang to bring down a mad old woman and a boob-sucking alien ("The Crimson Horror"). [ 1:10:45 || 34.2 MB ]

To listen, click here: http://www.earth-2.net/podcasts/biggerontheinside/episodes/bigger_138.mp3

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Personally I find Journey to the Centre of the TARDIS is a massively wasted opportunity. If you are going to set a story in the TARDIS then it should have some decent money spent on it. The writing is just appalling, I have no idea how the hell Stephen Thompson keeps getting writing jobs for this and Sherlock. I can only assume he has some compromising photos of Steven Moffatt giving an echidna a handjob or something. Apparently he's coming back for the new series as well and part of me is considering skipping that episode entirely because it will probably be as shit as his other two. (He's also the creative mind behind Curse of the Black Spot)

The Crimson Horror on the other hand feels like Doctor Who at it's most gleeful. Gatiss is clearly having a ball getting to essentially write his take on a Hinchcliffe/Holmes era story and the cast throw themselves into it. Dame Diana Rigg is something of a British national treasure up there with the Crown Jewels and the full English breakfast and she completely commits to the character. A lesser actress would have played it tongue-in-cheek but the fact that she plays it straight helps overcome the rather silly looking Mr Sweet and helps to sell it as a threat.

I do like how every story this season seems to be deliberately riffing on past Who. The machine attacking London being controlled from a new London landmark is basically a retread of The War Machines. Cold War as noted is a Troughton style base under siege story. Hide is very much a Pertwee science Vs the Supernatural, Journey to the Centre of the TARDIS has the feel of the Davison era where we saw a lot more of the TARDIS and Nightmare in Silver could easily be a McCoy story with the TARDIS crew visiting a theme park that has now become a sinister place a la The Greatest Show in the Galaxy.

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Hate to break it to you, Dan, but even though Matt Smith is from Northampton, the "northern" accent he was using was not his native accent. For the simple fact that Northampton is not in the north of England. Pandy lives in Northampton and he's pretty much 200 miles south of where I live, which is still in England (albeit, I live in the northern-most city in England - suck it, Carlisle).

And if you hate the Tom-Tom joke, you are dead inside. And I don't think I'm overstating that.

And if that's the case, why clip it?!? You doddery old men make no sense to me....

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That's it exactly Dan. You've firmly grasped the central concept of British geography. Except Bristol, which is exactly level with London.

This is the most ignorant thing I've ever read. And I own 3 Jordan autobiographies*.....

*No I don't, but the sentiment is that strong.

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Ah, Journey to the Centre of the TARDIS. When listening to your intro clip, I actually got sucked into thinking that this might have been a gripping story after all - I honestly think that the setup is perfect for a story. But there is just so much wrong with it - and these are my main problems:

1) The reset button, obviously, and the questions you raised about how it works. If you guys hate reset buttons, I'm looking forward to hearing The Edge of Forever covering Voyager...

2) The History of the Time War - who wrote it, exactly? The Doctor? If so, why does he write his name - which is supposed to be an awesomely powerful secret - in it? And I thought he didn't like to remember being in the Time War anyway, with the whole War Doctor situation going on, which is addressed just 2 episodes down the line. And in any case, what is it that Clara recognises about his name? 'So that's who...' - well, who could it possibly be???

3) The brothers are all acted horribly. The mystery of why Ashley Walters keeps getting acting work is as baffling to me as why Steve Thompson keeps getting writing gigs.

4) So.... one of the brothers thinks he's a robot. And somehow they manage to convince him that robots go to the bathroom sometimes to take a robot dump. As the Doctor Who Magazine reviewer said at the time, the writer clearly never gave this 'hilarious' concept a moment of thought.

The only thing I can say in defence of your criticisms is that I think there was a point made about getting a second chance to be a better brother, and far from resetting the 'robot's' memories, when time got reset I think the point was that they never played that joke on him in the first place. I don't remember exactly, I haven't seen this since it went out, and I think it might be the only one I don't mind that about. Ridiculous.

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The part about villains in "Crimson Horror" reminded me of Mark Hamill. When he was hired to do a voice in the English dub of "Nausicaa of the Valley of Wind" he admitted that it was a challenge for him to play a sympathetic villain. He was so used to playing the just evil villain like the Joker or Muska in "Castle in the Sky."

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