The annual L.A.-based Doctor Who convention “Gallifrey One” (Feb. 15-17th) has come to a close, and my wife and I were in attendance (as we have done for the last five years). We arrived at our hotel (the Residence Inn, across from the convention) late Friday afternoon, and it was pouring rain (yes, this is…
Tag: #DoctorWho
Doctor Who’s New Year’s “Resolution” feels a little half-hearted…
Doctor Who breaks with over a decade of traditional Christmas specials to deliver a New Year’s special instead. Technically, this isn’t the first time a DW event has taken place around that holiday, since the 1996 Paul McGann DW TV movie took place around the last day of 1999. The 1996 Doctor Who TV-movie used…
Doctor Who S11.10; “The Battle Of Ranskoor Av Kolos” ends less than triumphantly…
The 11th (new) series finale of Doctor Who is upon us, and like the rest of this somewhat uneven year’s offerings, it is (once again) a decidedly mixed bag. This season has hit brilliance with “Rosa” and “Demons of the Punjab,” only to fall flat with “Kerblam!” and “It Takes You Away.” Renewed Doctor…
Doctor Who 11.9, “It Takes You Away”…
The latest Doctor Who episode (S11.9), “It Takes You Away” doesn’t exactly have the most original central story idea to date, though a few heartstring-pulling (and genuinely bizarre) moments make it better than it could’ve been. ****TARDIS-SIZED SPOILERS!!**** If one is a Star Trek fan, then tonight’s Doctor Who should be familiar to those who’ve…
Doctor Who: “The Witchfinders” works some practical magic…
Continuing season 11’s tonally mixed bag, the latest Doctor Who has a bit of Halloween-creepiness and also feels very much like a lighter, 1980s-era episode of the classic series (the Peter Davison-era stories “The Visitation” and “The King’s Demons” come to mind). Not an inordinately important or deep-message story, “Witchfinders” quickly sheds much of its…
Doctor Who S11.7: “Kerblam!” delivers a mixed bag…
As Jodie Whittaker settles quite nicely into the role of The Doctor, the series itself seems to be taking an alternating pattern of light and heavy; going from serious, deeply topical material one week to lighter, frothier adventures the next. After last week’s powerful and original “Demons of the Punjab,” I was prepared for this…
Doctor Who’s “Demons of the Punjab” is one for the ages…
Following a completely lackluster episode (the instantly forgettable “Tsungara Conundrum”, which felt like a patchwork of Doctor Who cliches), the series rebounds strongly with “Demons of the Punjab”; an episode that is easily on a par with “Rosa” and may even find its future status among the series’ all-time best episodes. Written by Vinay Patel (take a bow)…
Doctor Who times two; a friend’s review of “Rosa,” and my own review of “Arachnids in the UK”…
“Doctor Who”’s new showrunner/writer Chris Chibnall and new Doctor herself Jodie Whittaker continue to impress in this latest season, which feels quite fresh and distinct from the Russell T. Davies/Steven Moffat years of the show. The latest two episodes demonstrate the variety of the season so far, with a potent historical drama about US Civil Rights hero…
Jodie Whittaker’s Doctor truly sticks the landing in “The Woman Who Fell To Earth”…
You may be hearing things like the following in Doctor Who fan circles over the coming days; ‘Jodie Whittaker is brilliant’, ’Jodie Whittaker is born to play the Doctor,’ ‘Jodie Whittaker will bring in new audience members,’ and ’the show feels new.’ The reason you’re going to be reading these repeated phrases ad infinitum is because they’re true….
Searching for Spock, and the issue of recasting…
News broke earlier this week that “Star Trek Discovery” has recast the role of “Spock” yet again, and the actor they’ve chosen is Ethan Peck (grandson of legendary actor Gregory Peck). This isn’t the first time “Star Trek: Discovery” has recast a previously established role for the new series. Mark Lenard was the original actor to play…
Doctor Who’s “Shada”; a reassembled Douglas Adams classic finally materializes in the US…
While it’s been released on DVD/Blu-ray in the UK for nearly nine months now, the BBC-reconstructed version of the Tom Baker-era Doctor Who story “Shada” finally arrived in the US via BBC-America, and will be released on DVD/Blu-ray as well on November 6th, 2018. Why the long wait between UK and US release? Can’t say. Was it…
My long relationship with science-fiction television…
The way it was. When I was a kid there was an emergent wave of science fiction and fantasy films in the multiplexes. “Star Wars,” “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” and “Superman: The Movie,” as well as countless lesser-quality imitators of each, such as “Starcrash” (an exceptionally awful movie), “Hangar 18” (a dumbed-down “X-Files”…