Doctor Who - Rise of the Cybermen
May. 13th, 2006 10:58 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ravenSo, everyone else is grouching over the football overrunning and Doctor Who starting twenty minutes later. I am not. I am very grateful for this fact. Why this is will shortly become clear.
My night began, as expected, at twenty past six, when I was supposed to meet![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
foulds outside John's, with the underlying logic that if ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
ou3fs were watching Doctor Who at St Anne's to take into account Wyrd Sisters rehearsals, I would undoubtedly get lost on the way there. Sadly, I emerged from college to find it was raining. No minor downpour this; the sort of rain which leads to a permanent two-inch puddle over every flat surface and bubbling madly as more rain floods into it. Not very nice. I had no socks, a pair of slip-on red shoes and viral sinusitis. I also had a hat, a large red cotton polka dot thing which I originally brought with me for keeping off the sun. Still, ever-resourceful and all that, and after a minute Jon appeared with a large black umbrella and a determinedly cheerful expression. Battling on through the rain for the sake of the Cybermen seemed the order of the day.
And battle we did, through rain and clouds and the sort of puddles that insisted on filling my shoes and onwards through adversity until we washed up, literally, at the wet greenery of St Anne's. Seeing as how this was the best-thought-out plan ever, we wandered around the grass looking for something that resembled a) a TV room or b) a Wyrd Sisters rehearsal. We failed miserably. After a pause by the gate to ponder the next move, we ran intochrisvenus. Back across the fork onto St Giles - at which point I stepped into a puddle, drenched my skirt and started coughing again - Jon wanted to know what it is I have, again.
"Viral sinusitis," I reminded him.
"So, let's get this straight. I arrange for everyone to meet and drag a sick girl out into the pouring rain to watch Doctor Who only to cock it up and drag her back through the pouring rain to where she started."
I put my hat back on. "Yep."
"I am scum."
He sounded so despairing that I hastened to comfort him that at least he was gentlemanly scum - he was, what with his twirling umbrella and everything - which I promptly regretted when he suddenly decided that this was Not His Fault. "Why?" I wanted to know.
"The giant killer bees! We didn't watch it at St Anne's because of the GIANT KILLER BEES."
"I didn't see any giant killer bees."
"They're in disguise."
"As a five foot four Asian woman in a big red hat?"
"Yes!" Chris agreed. "Because giant killer bees aren't bigger than five foor four. That would just be silly."
Once we'd made it into St John's, matters improved. We'd discovered the football was running late, Jon found the TV room of his own college almost on the first try, and the only two people we found in there were also desperately trying to watch Doctor Who. I say "desperately", because as the telly insisted on telling us, there was a technical fault with the channel. And every other Sky channel. And every terrestrial channel. And there were no batteries in the remote. It was ten past seven. Panic time. We went across to the other television room - because John's have two, seeing as how they own half of Europe - only to find some misanthropic soul had booked it from eight to twelve. Leaving out the obvious question of what the hell they were watching for four hours, it was time to make a move.
Jon took us out the back door, and we were on the Parks Road. While I took a moment to splutter about how the fuck we could be on the Parks Road, he was musing about whether the whole scenario was some sort of mass improvement on Sky digital press-the-red-button. "Instead of watching Doctor Who," he said, "it's interactive! They make sure all the TVs don't work and send you around the place being the Doctor."
"Or maybe," I said, "all the televisions in the country are working except the ones in Oxford colleges, and everyone else is tuned in and watching us." There was a pause while I digested this thought. "Which of us is the Doctor?"
They both looked at me as though it were obvious. "You, of course."
"And I," said Jon magnificently, "am the tin dog."
"I'm the companion," saidchrisvenus, "who looks confused."
We could, I suggested at this point, watch it at Wadham. But a quick survey led to companions looking confused and proved conclusively not one of us knew where the Wadham TV room was. "Onwards to Balliol!"
And onwards to Balliol it was, through puddles and undoubted impending pneumonia, where one might recall I started this journey of lunacy. I led the way, feeling quite understandably that someone had to be the Doctor, and four colleges later, we sat ourselves down in front of Strictly Dance Fever. Two minutes to spare, at that!
I put my hat back on.chrisvenus looked at it, and me, and said, "It's worrying how easily I can picture you as the Doctor, now..."
Jon said, "The hat helps you fit in with alien societies everywhere."
"Yes," I said, "everywhere I go I'm in fancy dress."
Anyway, we made it in the end, so Rise of the Cybermen! I don't have untmitigated squee for this episode. I figured we were overdue a plotty one, given the character stuff of previous weeks, but still, I don't think one was perfect. That said, I'm reserving judgement until we've seen the concluding part. Right now, stuff I liked:
-Oh, Mickey. They're leaving him out and that can't be nice. It's a little silly after last week, though, when he seemed to fit in perfectly. Bad episode-in-season placement, maybe?
-the many shots of the Doctor's face in some sort of coloured unearthly light. That actually never gets old; it's a good way to show him asprettypretty shadowed, alien. Simple, but it works.
-the "death" of the TARDIS. The Doctor's grief is always understated, and even though you knew he was going to get it back to life, it was still painful to watch. I particularly liked the moment where Rose says they can fix it, and he asks, so quietly, "What with?"
-London! Bless you Mickey for having the balls to look outside. And I immediately cottoned on to ooh, alternate London, because they are standing in front of Carfax. Yes, they are. If they're not, they're standing in front of something that looks very like it, but I prefer the former theory. And Carfax, as has been previously noted, is in Oxford. Huh. Maybe I'm just seeing things.
-I'd have liked the Zeppelins more if we hadn't had a dose of them last year, but still, they were cool. So was the whole alternate setting. I liked the details, such as the Underground logo in the background of a shot, the skyline that's unchanged but has Zeppelins. "London with an international Zeppelin festival!" Snerk.
-the Doctor telling Mickey about the fate of Gallifrey, and the nice canon titbits about what the time vortex was, and what's happened to it. In fact, fittingly claustrophobic imagery about walls closing in around the Doctor. Awww, don't cry, emo Time Lord! we snuggle you. we make it better. yes.
-Poor Doctor as they head off in different directions and he can't stop either of them. And poor, sad Mickey, who's right about the Doctor choosing Rose over him!
-Okay, why, why does the Doctor let Rose go and see her father again? Do neither of them remember what happened last time? Yes, there are extenuating circumstances. But you can't help but wonder why the Doctor doesn't check it out himself or take Mickey or something.
-Backstory for Mickey, finally. I love Rose's laughing, affectionate description of Mickey's gran, and oh, it just makes so much sense, that he thinks he's useless because he thinks it's his fault his gran died! Poor sweetie. And it's about time he got depth.
-The white hats, I must say, I found faintly unconvincing, mainly because of "Ricky"'s dreadful, dreadful attempt to look sinister through face contortion. Mickey was slightly better, what with the whole wtf? thing he had going on. Still, I preferred the Doctor and Rose's turn in the party itself. They always end up as domestic staff, seems to me.
-"The Lion Sleeps Tonight" with a background of screams was funny and macabre and rather chilling. Effective.
-Trigger, too, was unconvincing, but through no fault of his own, bless him. He was a tad too pantomime-ish, to begin with, and that bothered me quite a bit. But later on, he would have been convincing if only I hadn't looked at him and thought, yeah, Trigger. Such a shame.
-Jackie cutting Rose off as "staff" was unexpected, and hurtful, but absolutely apt. It would have been very odd indeed if Pete and then Jackie had opened up to a complete stranger.
-the President! I loved him. Absolutely loved him. He was clever, he saw through things, he was compassionate, he was fab. And his death scene looked bloody painful. The Cybermen are scarier in the half-light and the night than they are in the party, but still, they're nicely done. And miles better than the old-skool ones, who were probably scariest in black and white.
And it's a great cliffhanger. The Doctor's trying to surrender, poor guy!
Anyway, we shall see about next week, at which point I will attempt more coherent, less sleep-deprived commentary. Also, I hope next week to actually sit down and watch it without wandering around four colleges first. I bid goodbye to Jon at the door, where he entreated me to blame it all on the giant killer bees and not at all on his organisational skills. So yes, none of it was his fault. It was all the fault of the really big bees. And I am secretly the Doctor, with my TARDIS hidden on the Ashmolean roof, and now I must gowatch Dogma and eat cheese on toast SAVE THE WORLD.
My night began, as expected, at twenty past six, when I was supposed to meet
foulds outside John's, with the underlying logic that if ou3fs were watching Doctor Who at St Anne's to take into account Wyrd Sisters rehearsals, I would undoubtedly get lost on the way there. Sadly, I emerged from college to find it was raining. No minor downpour this; the sort of rain which leads to a permanent two-inch puddle over every flat surface and bubbling madly as more rain floods into it. Not very nice. I had no socks, a pair of slip-on red shoes and viral sinusitis. I also had a hat, a large red cotton polka dot thing which I originally brought with me for keeping off the sun. Still, ever-resourceful and all that, and after a minute Jon appeared with a large black umbrella and a determinedly cheerful expression. Battling on through the rain for the sake of the Cybermen seemed the order of the day.And battle we did, through rain and clouds and the sort of puddles that insisted on filling my shoes and onwards through adversity until we washed up, literally, at the wet greenery of St Anne's. Seeing as how this was the best-thought-out plan ever, we wandered around the grass looking for something that resembled a) a TV room or b) a Wyrd Sisters rehearsal. We failed miserably. After a pause by the gate to ponder the next move, we ran into
chrisvenus. Back across the fork onto St Giles - at which point I stepped into a puddle, drenched my skirt and started coughing again - Jon wanted to know what it is I have, again."Viral sinusitis," I reminded him.
"So, let's get this straight. I arrange for everyone to meet and drag a sick girl out into the pouring rain to watch Doctor Who only to cock it up and drag her back through the pouring rain to where she started."
I put my hat back on. "Yep."
"I am scum."
He sounded so despairing that I hastened to comfort him that at least he was gentlemanly scum - he was, what with his twirling umbrella and everything - which I promptly regretted when he suddenly decided that this was Not His Fault. "Why?" I wanted to know.
"The giant killer bees! We didn't watch it at St Anne's because of the GIANT KILLER BEES."
"I didn't see any giant killer bees."
"They're in disguise."
"As a five foot four Asian woman in a big red hat?"
"Yes!" Chris agreed. "Because giant killer bees aren't bigger than five foor four. That would just be silly."
Once we'd made it into St John's, matters improved. We'd discovered the football was running late, Jon found the TV room of his own college almost on the first try, and the only two people we found in there were also desperately trying to watch Doctor Who. I say "desperately", because as the telly insisted on telling us, there was a technical fault with the channel. And every other Sky channel. And every terrestrial channel. And there were no batteries in the remote. It was ten past seven. Panic time. We went across to the other television room - because John's have two, seeing as how they own half of Europe - only to find some misanthropic soul had booked it from eight to twelve. Leaving out the obvious question of what the hell they were watching for four hours, it was time to make a move.
Jon took us out the back door, and we were on the Parks Road. While I took a moment to splutter about how the fuck we could be on the Parks Road, he was musing about whether the whole scenario was some sort of mass improvement on Sky digital press-the-red-button. "Instead of watching Doctor Who," he said, "it's interactive! They make sure all the TVs don't work and send you around the place being the Doctor."
"Or maybe," I said, "all the televisions in the country are working except the ones in Oxford colleges, and everyone else is tuned in and watching us." There was a pause while I digested this thought. "Which of us is the Doctor?"
They both looked at me as though it were obvious. "You, of course."
"And I," said Jon magnificently, "am the tin dog."
"I'm the companion," said
chrisvenus, "who looks confused."We could, I suggested at this point, watch it at Wadham. But a quick survey led to companions looking confused and proved conclusively not one of us knew where the Wadham TV room was. "Onwards to Balliol!"
And onwards to Balliol it was, through puddles and undoubted impending pneumonia, where one might recall I started this journey of lunacy. I led the way, feeling quite understandably that someone had to be the Doctor, and four colleges later, we sat ourselves down in front of Strictly Dance Fever. Two minutes to spare, at that!
I put my hat back on.
chrisvenus looked at it, and me, and said, "It's worrying how easily I can picture you as the Doctor, now..."Jon said, "The hat helps you fit in with alien societies everywhere."
"Yes," I said, "everywhere I go I'm in fancy dress."
Anyway, we made it in the end, so Rise of the Cybermen! I don't have untmitigated squee for this episode. I figured we were overdue a plotty one, given the character stuff of previous weeks, but still, I don't think one was perfect. That said, I'm reserving judgement until we've seen the concluding part. Right now, stuff I liked:
-Oh, Mickey. They're leaving him out and that can't be nice. It's a little silly after last week, though, when he seemed to fit in perfectly. Bad episode-in-season placement, maybe?
-the many shots of the Doctor's face in some sort of coloured unearthly light. That actually never gets old; it's a good way to show him as
-the "death" of the TARDIS. The Doctor's grief is always understated, and even though you knew he was going to get it back to life, it was still painful to watch. I particularly liked the moment where Rose says they can fix it, and he asks, so quietly, "What with?"
-London! Bless you Mickey for having the balls to look outside. And I immediately cottoned on to ooh, alternate London, because they are standing in front of Carfax. Yes, they are. If they're not, they're standing in front of something that looks very like it, but I prefer the former theory. And Carfax, as has been previously noted, is in Oxford. Huh. Maybe I'm just seeing things.
-I'd have liked the Zeppelins more if we hadn't had a dose of them last year, but still, they were cool. So was the whole alternate setting. I liked the details, such as the Underground logo in the background of a shot, the skyline that's unchanged but has Zeppelins. "London with an international Zeppelin festival!" Snerk.
-the Doctor telling Mickey about the fate of Gallifrey, and the nice canon titbits about what the time vortex was, and what's happened to it. In fact, fittingly claustrophobic imagery about walls closing in around the Doctor. Awww, don't cry, emo Time Lord! we snuggle you. we make it better. yes.
-Poor Doctor as they head off in different directions and he can't stop either of them. And poor, sad Mickey, who's right about the Doctor choosing Rose over him!
-Okay, why, why does the Doctor let Rose go and see her father again? Do neither of them remember what happened last time? Yes, there are extenuating circumstances. But you can't help but wonder why the Doctor doesn't check it out himself or take Mickey or something.
-Backstory for Mickey, finally. I love Rose's laughing, affectionate description of Mickey's gran, and oh, it just makes so much sense, that he thinks he's useless because he thinks it's his fault his gran died! Poor sweetie. And it's about time he got depth.
-The white hats, I must say, I found faintly unconvincing, mainly because of "Ricky"'s dreadful, dreadful attempt to look sinister through face contortion. Mickey was slightly better, what with the whole wtf? thing he had going on. Still, I preferred the Doctor and Rose's turn in the party itself. They always end up as domestic staff, seems to me.
-"The Lion Sleeps Tonight" with a background of screams was funny and macabre and rather chilling. Effective.
-Trigger, too, was unconvincing, but through no fault of his own, bless him. He was a tad too pantomime-ish, to begin with, and that bothered me quite a bit. But later on, he would have been convincing if only I hadn't looked at him and thought, yeah, Trigger. Such a shame.
-Jackie cutting Rose off as "staff" was unexpected, and hurtful, but absolutely apt. It would have been very odd indeed if Pete and then Jackie had opened up to a complete stranger.
-the President! I loved him. Absolutely loved him. He was clever, he saw through things, he was compassionate, he was fab. And his death scene looked bloody painful. The Cybermen are scarier in the half-light and the night than they are in the party, but still, they're nicely done. And miles better than the old-skool ones, who were probably scariest in black and white.
And it's a great cliffhanger. The Doctor's trying to surrender, poor guy!
Anyway, we shall see about next week, at which point I will attempt more coherent, less sleep-deprived commentary. Also, I hope next week to actually sit down and watch it without wandering around four colleges first. I bid goodbye to Jon at the door, where he entreated me to blame it all on the giant killer bees and not at all on his organisational skills. So yes, none of it was his fault. It was all the fault of the really big bees. And I am secretly the Doctor, with my TARDIS hidden on the Ashmolean roof, and now I must go
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
on 2006-05-13 10:09 pm (UTC)But yeah, despite the fact that Cybermen scare me and my muses absolutely to hell, we managed to enjoy it too :D
And the only reason I griped about it starting early? Was because I know I'm frightened of cybermen, and wanted to watch it before I changed my mind and ran for my life instead. Honest to doggles.
And I think you and your friends would indeed make a good episode of Who XD
xx
no subject
on 2006-05-13 10:10 pm (UTC)you're at Oxford? So am I
*smiles*
What year are you - I'm a very scared finalist - and Doctor Who fan!
SSx
no subject
on 2006-05-13 10:16 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2006-05-13 10:18 pm (UTC)*cries for joy*
no subject
on 2006-05-13 10:28 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2006-05-13 10:29 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2006-05-13 10:36 pm (UTC)Not for the RPS, you understand, or the gradual erosion of what little brain I have, but because they went to The Other Place.
no subject
on 2006-05-13 10:37 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2006-05-13 10:46 pm (UTC)I think, basically, the stereotype is Cambridge is full of Communist gayboy spies and may, just may, have the intellectual edge (*dies of shame*)
Oxford has the socialites, the religious (Anglo-Catholics, now unfortunately outnumbered by OICCU)and the dress sense. We also held for Richard III in the Wars of the Roses. Hurrah!
no subject
on 2006-05-13 10:48 pm (UTC)Plus, we won the Boat Race, which brooks no argument, since obviously it's more important than anything else. Obviously.
What's your subject?
no subject
on 2006-05-13 10:49 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2006-05-13 10:51 pm (UTC)(Sorry for filling up your post, Iona; I have a tendency to initiate conversations in other people's comment threads. *apologetic*)
no subject
on 2006-05-13 10:54 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2006-05-13 11:02 pm (UTC)You are so the Doctor! Can I come travelling with you? Can I? 'Cos the TARDIS needs a Smith on board, you see! *g*
I personally loved the episode too much to see flaws, though I see the ones you've pointed out now, along with some of my own. But I am basking on the loveliness of a very old school Who episode. :)
Also, David Tennant in a tux! Mickey in, um, nothing much at all! (Having his legs shaved and/or waxed, one of my friends suggested...)
no subject
on 2006-05-13 11:59 pm (UTC)I might die of Squee.
no subject
on 2006-05-14 01:16 am (UTC)no subject
on 2006-05-14 01:17 am (UTC)no subject
on 2006-05-14 01:18 am (UTC)no subject
on 2006-05-14 01:19 am (UTC)no subject
on 2006-05-14 01:21 am (UTC)It was old-school, wasn't it? And when I was writing the review, I realised I liked it more than I'd thought, if that makes sense. Very much fun. And shaving/waxing was my immediate thought, too!
no subject
on 2006-05-14 01:21 am (UTC)no subject
on 2006-05-14 06:42 am (UTC)"Or maybe," I said, "all the televisions in the country are working except the ones in Oxford colleges, and everyone else is tuned in and watching us." There was a pause while I digested this thought. "Which of us is the Doctor?"
It all makes perfect sense. Oxford (or at least my AU Oxford) is blatantly a weirdness magnet. Love the story of you as the Dr too.
no subject
on 2006-05-14 09:27 am (UTC)no subject
on 2006-05-14 10:59 am (UTC)xx
no subject
on 2006-05-14 11:39 am (UTC)no subject
on 2006-05-14 03:56 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2006-05-15 12:39 am (UTC)no subject
on 2006-05-15 12:41 am (UTC)cocked it upsaved me from the killer bees, it would have been good to see you! If there are any sort of concrete plans for next week, you must come along, it'll be lovely to have you.no subject
on 2006-05-15 12:43 am (UTC)Ah, I'm not sure about that. The settings couldn't be more different, so I'd be happy to overlook that; I don't think I noticed it before you mentioned it.
no subject
on 2006-05-15 12:43 am (UTC)no subject
on 2006-05-15 09:28 am (UTC)I missed the one last term, where Taruithorn & OU3FS tied for first.
no subject
on 2006-05-15 04:23 pm (UTC)