EMILY in Original Series: Season Twenty-Six: The Curse of Fenric: it's the best story of Old Who's best season.
Oh dear Lord, of all the silly things our moderator has ever said, the belief that season 26 was in any way the best season of classic Who is the most laughable.
I wouldn't say it's the worst (that would be season 24), but it's close.
For the record, season 7 and season 13 would give for may favourite seasons closely followed by season 18.
For the record, season 7 and season 13 would give for may favourite seasons closely followed by season 18.
Season 7:
Spearhead - disappointing. See it done RIGHT in Season 8!
Silurians: Grossly padded but basically excellent.
Ambassadors: dull, interminable and didn't even make any bloody sense.
Inferno: Padded but questionably brilliant.
Season 13:
Terror of the Zygons - just don't understand what the fuss was about, it's never done ANYTHING for me (well, the Doc n'Brig's costumes, obviously, but those aside).
Planet of Evil - like it but no one's gonna mistake it for a classic.
Pyramids of Mars - look, I'm perfectly prepared to accept that everyone's right and it's an all-time classic and sooner or later it'll click for me.
The Android Invasion - I adore it but I think I'm the only one.
The Brain of Morbius - yeah, fantastic.
The Seeds of Doom - dull, overlong and just not Whoy enough. Six episodes of running around followed by a cop-out ending.
Season 18:
The Leisure Hive - dull as ditchwater. Aside from that nasty little moment they dismember Tom.
Meglos - everything that went wrong in Season 17 combined with everything that went wrong in Season Eighteen. Awful aside from Cactus-Tom.
Full Circle - REALLY REALLY good.
State of Decay - also REALLY REALLY good.
Warriors' Gate - yeah, starts off tedious and incomprehensible as hell but gets better and better with every rewatching until it's an all-time classic.
The Keeper of Traken - I like it immensely but I don't rewatch very often cos I'm kinda scared that'll wear off.
Logopolis - strong on atmosphere, I'll graciously give it that, but tedious and incomprehensible as hell, also MURDERED TOM BAKER and not even in a heartbreaking 'I don't want to go' kinda way, he obviously got so bored with Logopolis he DID want to go, oh yeah, and way to ruin his legacy by have him accidentally wipe out half the universe, THANKS GUYS.
Whereas Season Twenty-Six...THEY'RE ALL BRILLIANT! Sure, Battlefield might not quite live up to the concept on-screen and I'm fighting hard to keep loving Ghost Light after a few dozen excruciatingly ghastly Marc Platt audios but basically, yup, still ALL BRILLIANT which is not something you can say about any other Old Who Season, in fact after rewatching Long Game recently I'm not sure you can say it about any New Who season either.
MURDERED TOM BAKER
For a murdered man, he makes a lively corpse, still working nearly forty years later.
surprise, surprise, Emily disagrees with me. I'm SHOCKED I tell you...SHOCKED!!
Ambassadors: dull, interminable and didn't even make any bloody sense.
Whereas I think it's a little padded (with a slightly rushed ending) but generally good fun.
Inferno: Padded but questionably brilliant.
Think you mean UNquestionably brilliant. Sorry, but those scenes in the alternate reality are some of the most harrowing things to come out of Classic (and most modern) Who.
Pyramids of Mars - look, I'm perfectly prepared to accept that everyone's right and it's an all-time classic and sooner or later it'll click for me.
Wait.... wasn't this the story that got you HOOKED ON WHO??!!!!
The Android Invasion - I adore it but I think I'm the only one.
Starts out perfectly moody and quite spooky but once the aliens are revealed it loses its lustre a little.
The Seeds of Doom - dull, overlong and just not Whoy enough. Six episodes of running around followed by a cop-out ending.
Nah- they got it about right by having two episodes in one location before four more in another. Chase is a great villain. Probably my favourite six-parter
And I'm a little embarrassed because I meant season 19 not 18. Season 18 is an absolute mess with a few good spots in it.
Whereas Season Twenty-Six...THEY'RE ALL BRILLIANT!
Well let me return the favour...
Battlefield- the best of a bad bunch. Hammy acting and a curtain doubling as a console room.
Ghostlight- no amount of pontificating from the writer and brow-beating by the makers of the DVD will change my mind that it is an incomprehensible pile of nonsense. Seen it so many times and it still seems like a 500 piece jigsaw with about 100 pieces missing.
Curse of Fenric- see my comments higher up for my thoughts on THAT one
Survival- Putting aside the fact that it involves cats, it just doesn't hold up to repeated viewings. The script is flimsy and is a total waste of the Master.
Harrison Chase is well acted but a bit one-note, Rodney. JMO.
Well you both speak more highly of The Android Invasion than I ever will.
And Rodney, you're really going to revise your answer to the season with Time Flight?
Mark me down as someone who also liked Android Invasion.
The only reason that Survival stands out is because it was the last story of Classic Who.
For a murdered man, he makes a lively corpse, still working nearly forty years later.
Well, of course I was using 'Tom Baker' as a synonym for our beloved Fourth Doctor but I can see that might get confusing sometimes...
surprise, surprise, Emily disagrees with me. I'm SHOCKED I tell you...SHOCKED!!
Actually we seem to be generally reaching a pleasing convergence on the audios, but I s'pose it might take you longer to come round to the correct point of view on some TV stories.
I think it's a little padded (with a slightly rushed ending) but generally good fun.
I DID recently give the thing yet another fair chance but even though I'm well used to coping with quite a bit of padding/rushed endings/making-no-sense, Ambassadors just failed to give me anything worthwhile to offset these problems, and it took SEVEN SODDING EPISODES failing, to boot.
Inferno: Padded but questionably brilliant.
Think you mean UNquestionably brilliant
I absolutely did. (Though must bear 'questionably brilliant' in mind as a phrase, there are bound to be plenty of stories that genuinely merit it.)
Sorry, but those scenes in the alternate reality are some of the most harrowing things to come out of Classic (and most modern) Who.
Hell yeah, though infuriatingly whenever I think of those stunningly-good episodes I always spend a few minutes worrying about why alt-Liz dyes her hair before I start relishing the world being destroyed in fire, unflinching portrayal of fascism, eye-patches, etc.
Wait.... wasn't this the story that got you HOOKED ON WHO??!!!!
Pyramids? Hell no. It was Hand of Fear.
I mean, there's this HAND. WRIGGLING ON THE FLOOR. ALL BY ITSELF.
Starts out perfectly moody and quite spooky but once the aliens are revealed it loses its lustre a little.
Absolutely fair enough but as Who monsters go the Kraals had great costumes and even if their characters lacked a certain depth and their Earth-invading plan was the stupidest pile of gibberish since Wheel in Space and they all just mysteriously disappeared at the end, they brought out the best in Tom Baker ('Don't go. Stay. Just for a few minutes. Then we can all go together!') so who the hell CARES.
they got it about right by having two episodes in one location before four more in another.
Pah, I find running around in snow even duller than running around an English country estate.
Chase is a great villain.
Yeah, it's a •••• shame he didn't have a story more worthy of him. And Tom. And Sarah. And Amelia. And - actually, all the characters were great weren't they, aside from the faceless UNIT lot.
Probably my favourite six-parter
You need to watch Talons again.
And I'm a little embarrassed because I meant season 19 not 18.
*Sigh*
Castrovalva - For many happy decades effortlessly making it into my Top Seven Stories, but it's now sliding down and down every time I see it, DAMMIT. So much wandering around corridors, so much wandering across boring fields, so much nothing-happening when they actually bloody get round to REACHING Castrovalva...still some brilliant concepts and visuals though.
Four to Doomsday - Just-about watchable if you're in the right mood I suppose, but would any of us really mourn if it was wiped off the face of the Earth tomorrow?
Kinda - I do my best, I think I've grasped why some people really like it, I just...don't. Its only purpose is as harbinger to our glorious Snakedance.
The Visitation - Even bending over backwards to give this the benefit of the doubt, it's a disappointment, adding up to considerably less than the sum of its parts.
Black Orchid - Weirdly, I alternate between rather enjoying it and considering it mediocrely pointless.
Earthshock - •••• but it's a classic. Who does action-adventure RIGHT for, gods, it's the one-and-only time in its entire existence, isn't it.
Time Flight - Come on, NO ONE IN ZE UNIVERSE really needs me to go into *shudders* detail about why Time Flight would disqualify ANY Season from being the Best Ever.
Season 18 is an absolute mess with a few good spots in it.
Actually it has four really-good-verging-on-excellent stories in a row which is, frankly, pretty bloody rare. Not enough to make up for the other three obviously, cos I'm a glass-half-empty kinda person, but credit where it's due.
Battlefield- the best of a bad bunch. Hammy acting and a curtain doubling as a console room.
I love the hammy acting! Who has a long and honourable tradition of such things. And why the hell shouldn't Sexy have fancied giving her roundels a nice...material-ish vibe for a change?
Ghostlight- no amount of pontificating from the writer and brow-beating by the makers of the DVD will change my mind that it is an incomprehensible pile of nonsense.
Yeah, but it's a GREAT incomprehensible pile of nonsense. It genuinely feels like it's a few steps beyond your comprehension rather than that it's suffering from Ambassadors of Death/Android Invasion/Wheel in Space type problems.
Seen it so many times and it still seems like a 500 piece jigsaw with about 100 pieces missing.
Try the novelisation, I bet it fills in a few gaps. (I don't actually REMEMBER, it's been a few decades, in fact I'm not 100% sure I've ever...hmm. I'll try the novelisation, hopefully then I'll be in a better position to convince you.)
Curse of Fenric- see my comments higher up for my thoughts on THAT one
OK *sigh* well, you TRIED, and you APOLOGISED and basically you'll just have to keep trying and apologising every few years until you develop a bit more taste.
Survival- Putting aside the fact that it involves cats
YOU LOVE THEM REALLY!
it just doesn't hold up to repeated viewings. The script is flimsy and is a total waste of the Master.
It (highly unusually for Old OR New Who) had EXACTLY the right amount of plot to fill the three episodes AND actually have a bit of character-exploration and it was the only time the Ainley Master was done RIGHT. (EVERY rubbish character should henceforth get injected with a bit of superior feline DNA to see if it improves 'em...)
Harrison Chase is well acted but a bit one-note, Rodney. JMO.
You're right but he was SO perfect at his one note. And if there'd been more going on around him than shuffling plant-pots for six episodes we probably wouldn't even have NOTICED.
Mark me down as someone who also liked Android Invasion.
We Are Not Alone!
The only reason that Survival stands out is because it was the last story of Classic Who.
It was the ••••••• BLUEPRINT FOR NEW WHO, what more do you want!!!
Pyramids? Hell no. It was Hand of Fear.
I mean, there's this HAND. WRIGGLING ON THE FLOOR. ALL BY ITSELF.
Heck- I misread the hand comment as referring to the "guest" hand behind Sutekh's chair...
they brought out the best in Tom Baker ('Don't go. Stay. Just for a few minutes. Then we can all go together!') so who the hell CARES.
Yes, I can't disagree here. I enjoy the story despite the lacklustre final two parts.
You need to watch Talons again.
You mean the one with the hideously racist casting and stereotyping plus a prop rat that even by Who's standards looks remarkably amateurish? Yeah no thanks...
Castrovalva - For many happy decades effortlessly making it into my Top Seven Stories, but it's now sliding down and down every time I see it, DAMMIT. So much wandering around corridors, so much wandering across boring fields, so much nothing-happening when they actually bloody get round to REACHING Castrovalva...still some brilliant concepts and visuals though
Whereas I read the novelisation first then saw the episodes about ten year later and didn't like it but it has improved with each watching for me.
Kinda - I do my best, I think I've grasped why some people really like it, I just...don't. Its only purpose is as harbinger to our glorious Snakedance.
Look, I get it. The concepts discussed are way above the average Who viewer and it is rather let down (in the original version anyway) by that awful snake at the end. But I enjoy Kinda much more than Snakedance.
Black Orchid - Weirdly, I alternate between rather enjoying it and considering it mediocrely pointless.
Whereas I see it as a pleasant pause between two very heavy stories.
Time Flight - Come on, NO ONE IN ZE UNIVERSE really needs me to go into *shudders* detail about why Time Flight would disqualify ANY Season from being the Best Ever.
I'm not going to lie and say that I enjoy Time-flight (especially after Earthshock) but it is a quirky little way to finish the season (especially with little money left in the kitty).
And why the hell shouldn't Sexy have fancied giving her roundels a nice...material-ish vibe for a change?
That has got to be the single lamest excuse for a cheap set I think I've ever heard from you. And I've heard some doozies.
Try the novelisation, I bet it fills in a few gaps. (I don't actually REMEMBER, it's been a few decades, in fact I'm not 100% sure I've ever...hmm. I'll try the novelisation, hopefully then I'll be in a better position to convince you.)
I might try the audiobook instead.
OK *sigh* well, you TRIED, and you APOLOGISED and basically you'll just have to keep trying and apologising every few years until you develop a bit more taste.
Like Doc11 walking past a Fez- neeeeever gonna happen.
It was the ••••••• BLUEPRINT FOR NEW WHO, what more do you want!!!
Would love you to elaborate more on THAT particular point....
I've never thought about what my favourite season is.
Ten is a contender (classic series). Terry Nation's contribution is the weakest link, and seeing it as part of an arc with Frontier helps, though Frontier goes down a notch with each subsequent viewing.
I'll wait till I've actually seen all of season five. I'll even accept animated reconstructions.
I like the idea of eight with a season-long arc, but some of those middle stories leave a bit to be desired.
Twelve is also let down by a few clunkers, despite two all-time classics.
Fourteen is a strong candidate. Madragora is a bit boring, and Hand is the story most ruined by nitpicking but which still manages to be fun. Robots doesn't hit me as the classic that others make it out to be, but it's still solid.
Sixteen starts well, gets (mostly) better, dips a notch but still very high, then peters out into boring, more boring and nonsensical.
Eighteen, which I'm currently working through, is good once you get past the first two stories, which are the reasons I'm still working through it.
Nineteen is mostly good but doesn't end well. Castavalva and Kinda are good but not upper echelon. Four is tedious, and Visitation and Orchid are bland. Despite these comments, it manages to be enjoyable.
After that, well, 26 probably is the best of the lot, but I'm certainly not going to sing its praises to the degree Emily does.
YOu realise now Emily will have to create a "what is your favourite season" discussion board otherwise whe'll start losing sleep over this off-topic "nonsense" on "her" precious Fenric board...
Yes. I was going to start it myself, but then I thought she deserved some extra work.
Looks like Emily followed Rodney's suggestion.
I like both Seasons Nineteen and Twenty, because, of course, Nyssa is in them (except for Dude, Where's My Nyssa?, of course).
Then there is Season Fifteen, because it has good old Horror Of Fang Rock.
Pyramids? Hell no. It was Hand of Fear.
I mean, there's this HAND. WRIGGLING ON THE FLOOR. ALL BY ITSELF.
Heck- I misread the hand comment as referring to the "guest" hand behind Sutekh's chair...
Ah, that would explain it, though you do my powers of observation way too much credit.
You need to watch Talons again.
You mean the one with the hideously racist casting and stereotyping
There was nothing racist about the casting. They got the best possible person for the job regardless of melanin levels, which is, in my book, the exact opposite of racism. (And, come on, it's WHO. Sometimes you've just gotta find someone with the wrong-colour skin and paint 'em blue or green or whatever. (The trick is using paint that will actually wash off...))
As for the stereotyping - try looking at it as the Doctor and Li - infinitely the smartest people in London - sharing a private laugh at the half-witted racist attitudes of the PC Plods and music-hall audiences.
I mean, it's not like the Doctor's making excruciatingly unfunny racist jokes about his name, a la Four to Doomsday (LIN FUTU: I am Lin Futu. DOCTOR: Well, I'd never have guessed it. You look in the best of health to me.)
plus a prop rat that even by Who's standards looks remarkably amateurish?
Yeah, and Turn Left has an appallingly fake-booking plastic beetle, and Gridlock has that rubbish furry pre-credits creature and Scaroth's head REALLY shouldn't fit into that mask, ALL the best stories have some delightfully amateurish prop, it's kinda like that slave who'd whisper 'Remember you are mortal' into the ear of Roman Emperors at their Triumphs...
The concepts discussed are way above the average Who viewer
I dunno about 'way above', I mean, sure, Buddhism is incomprehensible but that's cos it's a steaming pile of nonsense just like every other religion.
I see it as a pleasant pause between two very heavy stories.
That only works if you tend to watch stories in any kind of order.
it is a quirky little way to finish the season
'Quirky' is a useful euphemism, I must remember that.
(especially with little money left in the kitty).
Dammit, if they'd run out of money this badly in the Tom Baker era they could have just shut him in the console room and told him to improvise. We'd've got four FANTASTIC episodes virtually for free.
It was the ••••••• BLUEPRINT FOR NEW WHO, what more do you want!!!
Would love you to elaborate more on THAT particular point....
Well, FINALLY it had occurred to Who that the Companion was as important as the Doctor, and they'd hauled her home to a grotty patch of London to meet FRIENDS and have EMOTIONS and stop having such a masculine attitude all the bloody time.
Ten is a contender (classic series). Terry Nation's contribution is the weakest link
Whereas I find Planet to be ultra-trad at its most warmly enjoyable, whereas Three Docs is quarry-ing at its most disappointing.
though Frontier goes down a notch with each subsequent viewing.
I can certainly see why it WOULD, I'm just in the happy position of loving it each time for, well, no particular reason.
I like the idea of eight with a season-long arc, but some of those middle stories leave a bit to be desired.
Yeah, that's ten episodes in a row that are actively BAD.
Twelve is also let down by a few clunkers, despite two all-time classics.
Yeah, when you can only be bothered to do five stories you can't get away with TWO of 'em being a bit rubbish.
Fourteen is a strong candidate. Madragora is a bit boring
Mandragora is adorable!
and Hand is the story most ruined by nitpicking
Nitpicking should enhance your viewing pleasure, not destroy it!
Robots doesn't hit me as the classic that others make it out to be
YANA.
Eighteen, which I'm currently working through, is good once you get past the first two stories, which are the reasons I'm still working through it.
I don't want to be a killjoy, but you seem to have forgotten a certain something at the end of said season...
I still like Frontier in Space despite the number of times the Doctor and/or Jo spend in various prisons.
Nitpicking should enhance your viewing pleasure, not destroy it!
I agree, especially with the word should. Baker and Martin scripts, however, and this one in particular...
And no. I've always loved Logopolis.
I don't want to be a killjoy, but you seem to have forgotten a certain something at the end of said season...
The Fourth Doctor fought a battle with gravity and lost.
He should have challenged gravity to a rematch. Best 2 out of 3 falls. ;-)
What was your first "Wow" moment in Classic Who?
I may be with Emily here. That hand crawling on the floor.
Later, the regeneration in Logopolis because I didn't know it was coming and I didn't know that regeneration was a thing. A friend had told me he had used up three of his lives, but I didn't know that meant different actors were involved.
Yeah, when I first started watching Who, in 1979, I didn't know about regeneration either.
The first scene of Doctor Who I saw was of Pertwee Doc regenerating to Tom Baker Doc, so I was aware of regeneration from the very beginning.
It sure was different back then.
Today, Doctor Who is all synced up. It airs on the same day, at the same time (counting different time zones, of course) on Space, BBC America, and the actual BBC.
That didn't happen in the case of Classic Who, speciality channels such as Space and BBC America didn't exist back them.
In North America, we relied on PBS stations for Classic Who, and they were often a few years behind the BBC (Peter Davison's episodes didn't start airing over here until 1983).
So, some of us North Americans were a little out of the loop at times.
the regeneration in Logopolis because I didn't know it was coming and I didn't know that regeneration was a thing
•••• but I think I was BORN knowing about regeneration, I'd've loved to have experienced that sort of shock, just once in my life.
I sometimes imagine how I'd've felt if they'd managed to keep Eccy's betrayal n'abandonment under wraps. I'd've died at the end of Parting of the Ways, I WOULD HAVE JUST DIED, but what a way to go...
quote:An idea as good as Doctor Who doesn’t just happen. Like the building of a bridge, or the designing of a house, a great deal of thinking and work goes into a television series before you ever see it.
Autumn
Uh?
Indeed. How can such a intellect exist in such a puny mind? (thank you, Scaroth)
That whooshing sound you hear above your heads the joke you just missed....
Ah. It took a few hours, but I rejoice to say I get it.
Wish I did.
Whoooosh!
Thanks, Rodney, that's a big help.
The secret is to look at the title, not what people have just been posting.
Oh.
What does it say about me that I got it right away, before even clicking? I almost feel bad.
You should feel a K9-like smugness at your superior intellect.
Still autumn....
*Sigh*
Technically there could be a season consider the autumn season, just split the whole of Doctor who into fours.
300 stories into four seasons of 75 stories.
Unearthly Child to Robot (let’s call it Spring)
Ark in Space to Silver Nemesis (let’s call it Summer)
Greatest Show in the Galaxy to Doctor, Widow, and the Wardrobe (let’s call it Autumn)
Asylum to the Daleks to Power of the Doctor (let’s call it Winter)