Doctor Who Live

Vorgenson: ”And still no word from the Doctor.”


Not since Sir Laurence Olivier’s Akash in Time has there been a stage show which depended so heavily upon a star whose part had been entirely pre-filmed.

Doctor Who Live toured the UK in autumn last year, featuring all the best-known monsters from the series, some of them to music.

I would even have gone to see it myself, but I knew that would be setting myself up to go see every other Who theatre production in the future, and it’s really the TV episodes that I like.

After all, just where does a live performance fit into the actual Doctor Who canon? Every night is different, so which one is the official version? Do the public – who form a part of events – actually laugh when the Diet Cybermen threaten to upgrade them, and if so why? Maybe some nights they didn’t laugh. Which was it? Heck, what does the true audience look like? For that matter, which seating layout is the real one?

All credit to Matt Smith then, for presumably shooting each of his scenes 30-odd times for each individual performance, and I gather repeating all his lines absolutely identically on every single take. Imagine how long that must have taken. “Sorry Mr Smith, but when you said cool that time, you blinked only slightly. And your hair’s growing again.”

As you know, you can’t copyright a live performance (because it’s not copyable), which is probably why they asked everyone not to film it. (because video files are copyable) But then, despite the name, this event wasn’t purely live anyway.

As well as Smith’s component, the whole night proved to be a huge clips-show of the series – a few excerpts making it in twice. Consistent with so many episodes of the most recent season, this even enables the appearance of William Hartnell in the title role, despite the minor handicap of his having been dead for 35 years. Disappointingly, neither Jon Pertwee's nor Colin Baker’s flashbacks are taken from the 1989 tour of The Ultimate Adventure. Aside from the limited amount of footage from that show available, maybe they just couldn’t decide which version was the theatrically canonical one.

The enormous applause that Tom Baker's clips got was eclipsed only by the even bigger one that Christopher Eccleston garnered, which was itself then drowned out by the shots of David Tennant. The subsequent montage of Matt Smith, uh, sustained the volume. Everybody loves Matt Smith. Well, nobody dislikes him.

McCoy got booed. :( Well. That’s just rude.

Quite how collector Vorgenson had managed to acquire these moving historical images in the first place wasn’t really covered in the version that I saw. Maybe there was a line in there about his Minimiser also boasting a Space-Time Visualiser app, however the audience’s appreciation of this sequence made sure that I didn’t ask any questions. (had I done so, I would have expected Steven Moffat's input to ensure that I immediately received some answers)


Anyway, for a show that required actual lead actor Nigel Planer to spend 90 minutes not playing any incarnation of the Doctor, it looks like they all did a pretty effective job.


When the final scene features the Doctor confronting the Daleks on stage in front of the video screen, it’s clear that the writers have thankfully sat down and tried to do this the difficult way. That and the extended length of the Doctor’s appearances make this one piece of conjuring that surely worked its magic on audiences.

Doctor: "You’re having a party – a very big party. Why wasn’t I invited, or am I already there? I’m not dancing am I?"


Still, I’m disappointed that no-one has released this on DVD yet, or I would be getting it. Goodness knows there were enough cameras present to film it, not just shooting live feed for the stage's giant video-screen, but the audience's many cameras too. And I should know because, as mentioned above, I wasn’t there.

Doctor Who Live was a somewhat accurate title, given that Doctor Who is not the name of the character, but the TV show, from which so much of this had been recorded earlier. Had they entitled it The Doctor Live then a lot of parents might have justifiably asked for their money back.

It is a tad inevitable however that Doctor Who Live now denotes a story which can only be seen on YouTube.

Well, there are enough missing episodes of Doctor Who already, without adding yet another one to the pile.


Available... oh.

(with thanks to... oh, so many enterprising strangers)

Shrek The Third

On 6th June 2007 I happened to be at the New Zealand premiere of this movie, but only because I was going into the next screen to see Hot Fuzz.

Still, the hubbub in the Newmarket foyer outside made me almost sorry that I was not a part of the Shrek fan club. It’s hard to forget the sight of a giant Shrek making his way through the crowds of excited fans.

As with earlier instalments, Shrek the Third is not so much about the story as the gags. The King is dying, and speaks of an heir whom Shrek, Sid Marty Donkey and Puss In Boots must go on a short quest to find. Along the way, all manner of insanity invades events, which is a good thing too given the constant threat of babies. (babies cripple comedies)

As expected, my viewing of this film did suffer from the previous chapter’s revoicing of some characters for the UK. When Doris (voiced by Larry King) showed up, I just wasn’t sure if this was the same character as in the previous film, simply because she wasn’t voiced by Jonathan Ross. It later turned out that despite being PAL, the New Zealand DVD contains the US version of the film, not that there’s any way to tell from the box before buying. Perhaps there was a foreign English language option that I missed?

Queen Lillian: ”What? You didn't think you inherited your fighting skills from your father?”

Not so crazy. We’re still waiting to hear who Fiona inherited her American accent from…

Also, one of the DVD extras features Merlin, but not voiced by the film’s Eric Idle. That’s Monty Python’s Eric Idle, who sadly gets no dialogue with John Cleese. Despite a fantastic cast, the actual casting is disappointingly miscalculated.

Still, as I said above, the non-stop gags smooth over everything.

Donkey: "Look out! They got a piano!"

Merlin: "Sorry, kid, I don't do that stuff anymore. How about a hug? That's the best kind of magic there is!"

Prince Charming: "You! You can't lie! So tell me puppet... where... is... Shrek?"
Pinocchio: "Uh. Hmm, well, uh, I don't know where he's not."
Prince Charming: "You're telling me you don't know where Shrek is?"
Pinocchio: "It wouldn't be inaccurate to assume that I couldn't exactly not say that it is or isn't almost partially incorrect."
Prince Charming: "So you do know where he is!"
Pinocchio: "On the contrary. I'm possibly more or less not definitely rejecting the idea that in no way with any amount of uncertainty that I undeniably do or do not know where he shouldn't probably be, if that indeed wasn't where he isn't. Even if he wasn't at where I knew he was. That'd mean I'd really have to know where he wasn't."

My favourite laugh though would have to be the gingerbread man seeing his life flashing before him. That little biscuit’s led such a full life!

(with thanks to Brett and Kristen)

(some version or other of it (good luck figuring out which) available here)
Related reviews:

Shrek
Shrek 2
Shrek The Halls
Shrek Forever After

Doctor Who: Music Of The Spheres

AKA Tempo Fugitive. ;)

In the TARDIS, the lone tenth Doctor (David Tennant) is scribbling away composing a symphony, when a Graske drops in and hijacks a space portal to invade the Royal Albert Hall during the Prom.

When it comes to the canonicity of these miscellaneous sketches, I guess everyone draws the line in a different place.

In favour of this one's inclusion is that it features the official Doctor Who credits on the start, comes from the production team of the day, and isn't actually impossible within the universe(s) of the series.

Standing against it is that it's an insert in another programme, is quite short, and is just too silly. The audience at the Royal Albert Hall take the interruption to their show (presumably not a Doctor Who-themed one) so obligingly.

Me - I'm just on the side of waving it through, but mainly because the tenth Doctor's era was often written in such a throwaway manner anyway.

After so much high-profile activity recently, the Doctor and the surviving population of Earth really ought to be on speaking terms by now, as evidenced by not just the audience's recognition of him, but all the kids with Police Box and sonic screwdriver toys. The astronomical coincidence required for the wormhole to appear in those two places and times - while the Doctor is composing, and a performance is in progress - are par for the course at this point too.

I'd discount anything before or after these minutes in the actual evening, not least because they feature a Cyberman and Freema Agyeman, although they might just both be more of Martha's identical twin cousins.

Not sure what to do about the live shots of the Doctor through the portal that aren't from the portal's perspective though, other than maybe try to re-edit this. And the orchestra is out of sync… oh all right I'll stop.

If nothing else, seeing the tenth Doctor one more time is always going to be a delight, although I admit that this is the only occasion on which I've ever found him annoying. Perhaps because there is so little else going on to dilute him.

After all, a mini-episode specifically about music requires the rest of the soundtrack to be contrastingly empty of it. (the actual music of the spheres here is more of an atmosphere) Therefore for this one episode only, we can actually hear what's being said. The opening moments have such clarity to them that, on headphones at least, it really makes you feel as though you're inside the TARDIS. So that's what the new TARDIS interior sounds like - I've never heard it before. If only they would learn to mix the regular episodes this way again.

Ironic then that the Doctor's beautiful closing monologue about how great music is, should be so at odds with what makes this mini-episode stand out well.

The Doctor: "Music isn't just orchestras and pop stars and special people with albums and downloads and concerts - it's you. 'Cause the music of the spheres… is all around you. When you're on your own, just close your eyes, and you'll hear it. Music. Inside your head. 'Cause everyone's a musician. Everyone's got a song inside them. Every single one of you. Bye."

Doctor Who - season 7 review

If I were drawing a venn diagram of Doctor Who seasons and their strengths, I might create a set labelled "serious tone". I might also have another set labelled "great casting". Maybe another "well-written scripts", and still another "captivating direction".

Wherever they all overlapped, would be where I would place season seven.

It's a series like no other. Actually I'm wrong, there are other series that are like it, but none that quite recapture its achievements.

It was the series when they relaunched the show with a fresh cast, fresh concept, and even fresh colour-scheme. The following series it would lose some of these elements, gain some new ones, and begin to reclaim some of its earlier premise, but this year had a vision for the series all of its own, and it stuck to it.

Following Patrick Troughton's departure, its sense of humour was turned right down too, resulting in a run of stories which assumed that you were as intelligent as the characters.

Everything is set on Earth. Arguably only two episodes (out of 26) feature an alien monster. Stories 2-4 all revolve around the need for a bigger, more respectful worldview. (or universeview) This metaphor for real-world globalisation is a strong one, yet subtle enough not to get spelt-out.

How would you negotiate peace between different species? Or work around an actual government conspiracy? Or convince strangers both that they are about to die, and also that they should help you to escape alone? Well, these guys are trying to figure it out on the hoof too.

Special mention has to go to Caroline John as Liz Shaw. She joined at the start of this series, and left at the end of it, effectively sealing her place in Doctor Who history as one of the better-written companions. She definitely wasn't that much of a protagonist, but she was treated by the writers with much more respect than her air-headed successor Jo Grant who, um, well, didn't prove quite so able to help.

As everyone who's not a TV executive knows, retooling a successful series is always a disaster, however this season would be the exception that disproves that rule. It's even better than the last series! Maybe they should never have brought back the TARDIS.

Best. Doctor Who season. Everrr!

(in your extra terrestrial face, season six!)

Spearhead From Space
Doctor Who And The Silurians
The Ambassadors Of Death
Inferno

Doctor Who: Inferno

I enjoyed a review of another Pertwee Doctor Who adventure on YouTube a while back, which spent the ten minutes quoting production trivia and saying how great everything was.

Now I have no argument with that. Cheap and cheerful shows inevitably attract those of us who are interested in the film making process, and if the viewer actually enjoyed watching the story also, well then so much the better.

But you know what? I was a bit irritated that the guy had nothing to push back with. Surely, I thought, he should really be balancing all this praise with some, or even any, criticism?

When writing my own reviews, I've observed that I tend to have plenty of opinions about the negative aspects of a particular story, but very little to say about the good. Because, y'know, good is the way that everything is really supposed to be. Good is even the goal which the programme-makers themselves were aiming for, in all areas. When something is good, it robs me of the opportunity to suggest what I think might have been a better alternative, and I wind up with nothing to say. And what's the point of a review that has nothing to say?

Therefore, I worry that all my reviews tend to err on the side of sounding negative.

When I watch a story as excellent as Inferno, it leaves me quite literally lost for words. Let me have a quick go anyway.

It looks very bleak, which perfectly conveys the tone of the entire story. The whole seven parts feature the Doctor constantly losing ground. Even his saving Earth in the finale is at a terrible overall cost. The overcast film location work segues well into the videotaped studio scenes, which feel every bit as oppressive, and isolated.

Special mention must go to the sound on this story, which likewise never lets up the tension. There is GREAT atmos at the drilling site, which has the whole cast shouting their lines over it right through to the final episode.

I was watching the VHS release, which seamlessly includes episode five's deleted scene of Jon Pertwee's dual role as the radio announcer - another bleak moment which I find it hard to imagine the episode's original transmission without.

The story's look and sound are obviously down to the directors, Douglas Camfield and Barry Letts. When the first episode jump-cuts from a victim about to be struck, to a hammer banging a nail, we know we're watching something of quality.

Even the script pulls no punches, uncompromisingly confronting us with a Doctor who abandons the whole of an alternate planet Earth to die, whilst still appealing to its doomed inhabitants for help to save his own one.

It's not just the plot though - there's also the well-defined and well-played characters, not to mention their gem-laden dialogue.

“The safety margins are for cautious old women like Sir Keith.”

“We have no proof of an emergency situation.”

“An infinity of universes. Ergo an infinite number of choices. So free will is not an illusion after all. The pattern can be changed.”

That last line brings me onto the meagre push-backs that I can come up with. To me, an infinity of universes in which every choice is played out suggests no free will for their inhabitants, who must follow whichever alternate choice their universe is there to accommodate. Granted though, we could probably argue about this forever, but only if we were in the right universe for it.

With all the political, hierarchical and ecological challenges for our heroes to wrestle with and overcome, the inclusion of a set of green zombies seems an unnecessary embellishment, and I admit that both times I have watched this, I have not quite processed what was going on there.

There are a couple of weak effects that stand out, but only really because the rest of this epic sucked me in so effectively.

These were the film effects of the TARDIS console in episode one, which jar with the surrounding VT shots, and in the case of the Doctor's sudden materialisation was surely unnecessary. The other was the cliffhanging final shot of episode six, but even that couldn't overcome the intensity and sheer exhaustion of the preceding 24 minutes.

My only real criticisms would be the usual ones about parallel universe yarns - that there's no acknowledgement of the principle character's double, nor the realisation that in such a divergent history there really ought to be different people in these roles, but meh. Given an infinite number of universes, any scenario can play out, no matter how unlikely.

The whole thing finishes unthinkably - with the cast laughing at a joke that is actually funny! Now I ask you - in this genre, how often is that successfully achieved? It's a comfort when you bear in mind that this sadly turned out to be Liz's final scene, unless you count… come to think of it the list of her return appearances is longer than I thought.

For me, the bottom line is that it doesn't get any better than Inferno. Except for all the other greatest Doctor Who stories ever.

Somewhere out there sits another me in a universe where every Doctor Who story was this fine. He doesn't blog at all.

Except maybe on YouTube.

July To The World!

18 years ago, in the UK, I presented a jokey Chrstmas Day radio show entitled The Christmas Day Summer Special. We had people doing lots of summery outdoor things, apparently oblivious to the bitterness of winter. That was the joke.

Years later I moved to the southern hemisphere and cribbed clips of this for use on my radio demo tape, chuckling to myself that, in a climate where Christmas was reliably hot, it might sound genuine.

Last weekend however, New Zealand played the same joke right back at me.


Local joy-filled dessert shop - Quirk Dessert - were running what they called a 'Midwinter Christmas' promotion, despite it being darkest July. After all, everyone here knows that Christmas is never cold. Confused yet?

Well, you'll never guess what Quirk's owner (and friend from church) Maree had Random Dave and myself doing all Saturday morning…


Never enter this place and tell them that you feel like a pudding.

For a whole hour - dressed as Christmas puddings - Dave and I marched up and down Picton Street, spying punters who looked like potential customers, and offering our leaflets to them. In I think every instance we were greeted with smiles!

"We are Christmas puddings, and we are available to be eaten at Quirk Dessert on the corner of Wellington Street - happy Christmas!!!"


When we had exhausted the flyers, we spent the next hour standing outside the front doing whatever we could think of to attract even more attention to ourselves. Dancing, fighting, playing tennis… we did some of our best material out there. Drivers honked us, the cops kept their distance, and only one person called us freaks, but that was only the local pastor, no doubt appalled at Howick's spiralling respect for the actual religious festival. Christmas is hardly about joy, dammit.

Presently, it was time to return inside from the unChristmassy cold, change back into our civvies, and seriously reduce our waistlines. (ironic in a café that only sells desserts) I think employee Dave had some actual serving to do (I was just a volunteer), so I wished him and Maree well, and headed out to the newly renamed Countdown to get in some shopping of my own.

Along the way, I noticed that something had changed. The people who I was passing in the street. Nothing was wrong exactly, but something was missing from their countenances.

As I approached, none of them were breaking into a smile any more.

:(

Numbers 20: 1-13 (NIV)

Reading at cession church in Auckland tonight, part of our series The Amazing Race.

With thanks to Daniel.

Rest of the service here.

Taranaki, You Are Da Bomb

Does anyone else think that Egmont National Park looks like a giant cartoon bomb, complete with burning fuse?

Get Smart (2008)

In almost every instance I think remakes are a bad idea, but even I will concede that there comes a point when I can at least understand why they do them.

After all, Don Adams has hardly been available to continue playing Maxwell Smart since his sad passing in 2005.

If it were up to me, I'd call time on the character and leave the canon to spin-offs and prequels, if that, but in Hollywood, money is understandably a higher priority than creative integrity.

So, ignoring everything that has gone before, and certainly any original premises that might otherwise have got filmed instead, we wipe everything out and start all over again back at the beginning, exchanging 60 hours of comedy for just a few.

On the one hand, this footnote in the history of Get Smart is as inept as its title character. The original 30-year canon, as far as I am aware, was family entertainment. Here it gets positively bawdy in places.

99: "I'm just a woman with a dusty old uterus."

Admittedly The Nude Bomb may have seemed similarly extreme in its day.

However ignoring that as aspect of its tone, this reboot pays tribute to its predecessor so well that I have to wonder why they didn't just make this a continuation of the original history. Steve Carell doesn't so much bring a fresh interpretation to the role of Max, as do an excellent job of building upon Don Adams' version.

And all the old running jokes are here to be enjoyed again too - the shoe phone, the cone of silence, and "Would you believe…?", not to mention of course the whole walking down the corridor through all the closing doors thing.

In fact, overall I found this movie to be great fun. Those who remember the original though - ie. those to whom the title unavoidably aims this film - may well hate it.

So why not just start something completely new instead? It's arguably a little more respectful to the series than pointing at 99's uterus.

(available here.)
(with thanks to Flatmate Dave)

The Amazing Race: Entry Into The Wilderness

Sketch at church tonight, inspired by Numbers 14. Team-members: Jon, Brett, Caleb, DaNae and Rob.

Rest of the service here.

Jaded

Electronic Catch Phrase

Fig. 1: Taken in such a hurry that we forgot to include the actual game.

Another games night, this time back at its traditional home at Chris and Kylie's. (last time I was here was when I learnt Rummikub)

Catch Phrase, aka Electronic Catch Phrase, is pretty much what I call charades in electronic form. A machine tells you the phrase that you have to mime, or at least verbally allude to, and you do the rest. There are headings which you can choose from too.

Handily Random Dave and I seemed to have a bit of telepathy going on once we'd hit upon the idea of describing things in TV terms, eg. "Babylon 5 had a lot of aliens on it who were…" (ambassadors, as I recall)

My favourite instance of this though would have to be when I successfully conveyed the phrase 'martial law', by simply declaring "This town! Is now! Under…"

Don't panic.

The Politician's Guide To Dirty Tricks

Sketch wot I wrote at cession church in Auckland tonight. With thanks to Nigel.

Did-dee, did-dee, diddley-dee, powww