tencrush | Who stuff...

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Who stuff...

I don't post about Who much anymore, because I hate what Russell's done to it, and I think everybody knows that by now. I was reading

who_secrets yesterday and I noticed there's something out that I've been hearing from sources around and about as well. I have no idea as to the accuracy, but if this stuff is even 10% accurate (and usually it's been okay-ish) I'm thinking of maybe just not watching at all. I'll start afresh with Moffat, yeah? How about that?

What I've been hearing:

As Russell has confirmed, there's no mention of the events of Children of Earth when it comes to Jack. There's no fix, there's no nothing, so don't get your hopes up on that one. Maybe there'll be a joke or two about his whoring ways?
As far as Donna goes, her involvement in the specials is about on the level of Martha in Children of Earth. She gets conversationally mentioned as being married and that's about it. (Though, again, maybe there'll be a funny joke in there somewhere about how funny it is that she's getting married what with her being hella old and ugly and that.) Again, really, seriously, don't get your hopes up for Donna in the specials. Don't do it. But at least she doesn't die.
Wilf dies. Indeed he does. The reason you're worrying about it now is because you know deep down that it's true. You really didn't think Russell would end his reign without killing someone, did you? It's dramatic, kids. DRAMA.

I'm pretty certain on all of these things. I'm not so certain on the spoiler story about Harriet Jones resurrecting the Master, though the more I think about it, the more plausible it sounds. Did anyone actually see her filming or anything? And nobody has yet been able to enlighten me on what exactly the fucking plot involves with the Master and the gate thing and the Time Lords, I keep hearing conflicting stories.

I'm going to hate the last specials, I can tell you that much for free.

Having said that, the kid still loves his Who and its related paraphernalia, so I made him some furniture related bits:
( Follow the fake cut to my other journal for the kiddie's Who bedroom stuff )

That is all.

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I was thinking the other day that I'm looking forward to Tennant's departure and Matt Smith taking over. That's not because of anything to do with Tennant, when I first heard Moffat was taking over I wanted Tennant to stay for his first season as show runner. The reason I'm looking forward to Tennant's departure is because when he goes RTD goes and I can't wait to be shot of him.

Point one was sadly always a given - see Utopia for proof. I really thought Donna was going to play a bigger part, I don't know.

I'm going to wait for someone to tell me to watch the special.

Oh for God's sake. Yes let's kill off Grandad and make the kiddies cry. I think, yes there will be jokes about Donna getting married BECAUSE THE DOCTOR DOESN"T FANCY HER. No he doesn't and if you didn't get it, they will underline it again. Because she is over 20 and a normal size and maybe not glamourous like Alex Kingston.

Oh I can't bear the idea of Jack being wasted yet again, and just being randomly cheerful.

Harriet Jones? That would be bloody cool and I hope she wins. Why not just kill the world, you know RTD wants to.

BECAUSE THE DOCTOR DOESN"T FANCY HER.

More important? SHE didn't fancy HIM. I think she loved him, but more in a sibling or good friend sort of way. It was a much healthier relationship than the ones the Doctor had with Rose or Martha. Which is why Donna is so much more awesome than those two.

I was being sarcastic. It drove me crazy. They clearly got lots of criticism for having two young girl companions who loved the doctor, and Martha was worse because it was cringeworthy, all the pining and unrequited love etc. So to make up for it, they choose an older companion, and then spent the whole series underlining in every episode that they didn't fancy each other and there was nothing between them.

GREAT. Now I am glad that CoE and the resulting press lowered my expectations to the point where I just don't care. I can wait for series 5.

Urgh, yeah that all sounds about right. Who needs continuity when you've got funny funny jokes and death. There needs to be death, it's the only way to create drama that I know of...

'I'm not so certain on the spoiler story about Harriet Jones resurrecting the Master, though the more I think about it, the more plausible it sounds.'
Please let Master number 7 turn out to be played be GDL (he needs a job).

... That would actually be awesome.

It would be. I thought Gareth did a great job with evil!Ianto in Adam, not to mention that the Master looking like Ianto would freak Jack out. And Ianto Jones is Welsh for John Smith.

So much brain whammy without saying anything, too bad looking like Ianto wouldn't do much to break the Doctor... :D

It's John Simm again. At least that's the rumour, and I think it's a pretty good one as it's been reported in the press, not just on fan sites.

and there are pics out there from the shooting.

RTD confirmed the Master and Lucy coming back at Comic Con.

I'm wondering where Captain Jack fits into all this. OK, he's on at least one of the remaining WHO specials and no CoE fix it (ddin't expect that really).

If the no crossover policy holds with Moffat, and the TW is Gwen-centric, where does Jack fit in? Who, TW, a different TW, none of the above?

Well, Jack comes from episodes that Moffat wrote, so he could be an exception to the "no crossover rule" (I could say more, but it would be a S5 spoiler). But yeah, until we hear what JB is doing in February onwards, the possibility exists that RTD has written him out as firmly as he wrote out Ianto. My toys! No one else gets to play with them I have SMASHED them!

'No one else gets to play with them I have SMASHED them!'
That confuses me so much. From all the interviews I've read RTD makes it sound like he's already written Torchwood series 4.

Depends on which interview - he's also said that when they did CoE they didn't know if they would be renewed and that they haven't even started talking about s4 (as of Comic Con)

'Depends on which interview'
Oh thanks for the info. I should have known, the reason why Ianto HAD to die changes from interview to interview too.

I don't mind a spoiler, but I can speak for anyone else. Any place I can find this, so those who don't want to know, won't be upset?

Do you belong to the Doctor Who Forum - the latest version of it is Gallifrey Base. There are spoilers in the photos from Series 5 Shooting posted there.

Thanks, I did check it out!

I would say that either Jack's not going to be in Torchwood (John has gotten a part (probably small) on Desperate Housewives, so it's not like he NEEDS Torchwood) or if he is on the show he'll show up just long enough to make the hard decisions so Gwen doesn't have to. RTD has said that 'The fact that [Gwen] has survived -- and that she hasn't become walking wounded -- really is a story in itself.' I can't see Gwen being the leader of Torchwood and not becoming the walking wounded.

The fact that Gwen is bulletproof is the problem, not the story.

Yeah. Maybe Torchwood should change their rule.

Torchwood: Everyone dies young (unless you're Gwen).

I agree. My prediction was that he would be reduced to a voice over a la Charlie Angels or a few small bits in the first eposide or so.

But didn't someone (here maybe?) mention a whole new Captain Jack series? Or was that just wishful thinking (or me hallucinating again).

'I agree. My prediction was that he would be reduced to a voice over a la Charlie Angels or a few small bits in the first eposide or so.'
Yep. RTD tried to sell a Gwen-centric show to the network before (Torchwood was supposed to be Gwen-centric in the beginning) so I'm guessing that Jack will have a little screen time as RTD can get away with.

'But didn't someone (here maybe?) mention a whole new Captain Jack series? Or was that just wishful thinking (or me hallucinating again).'
John has said in an interview that he would love to do a Torchwood series in the past so it was probably wishful thinking based on that.

I'm not so certain on the spoiler story about Harriet Jones resurrecting the Master, though the more I think about it, the more plausible it sounds.

even if russell wimps out and decides not to go for this, IT IS CANON IN MY MIND.

the only reason i can see for him shying away from it is that it would require some of the doctor's chickens coming home to roost in a really vivid, unpleasant way: ie, harriet jones would have to come back from the dead and give the doctor one hell of a kickass speech about how she created a golden age for britain when she was prime minister, and the doctor's deposing her (which he did on a fucking whim of post-regeneration pique, just because she defended her planet against an enemy she had no guarantee wouldn't come back in greater numbers; and let's face it, the skinny git can't be around to save us ALL the time) left room for harold saxon to take over and wipe out over a tenth of the entire planet.

tl;dr - that would be beyond awesome; but it would also involve something rusty is very bad at in his who writing: showing the consequences of the doctor's arsey behavior.

Like the Series 1 finale?

hrm. it's been a while since i've seen it...you mean what happened on the game station because he left it without an exit strategy? if so, then yeah, that's one of the VERY few times we've seen him own up to one of his mistakes. but he hasn't done it at all in his tenth incarnation, afaicr, and it pisses me off that rtd was reportedly going to put a little nod in 'last of the time lords' re: the doctor's moment of pique costing the planet one-tenth of its people and britain its golden age, but didn't.

what i'm really hoping to see in the finale - not holding my breath, mind, but it would be awesome - is something like what happened in the sandman: the kindly ones...ie, ten FINALLY starts to realize that his 'no second chances' approach is doing more harm than good, or that this incarnation really has some fatal flaws which he's blinded to, and that for the good of everyone involved, a change is definitely in order. 'maybe donna's right - i DO need to change' etc. five had a revelatory moment like that when tegan left at the end of 'resurrection of the daleks', so it would be nicely in keeping with the history of the show...only, you know, much more dramatic since this would involve the doctor literally changing himself to help everyone.

Well, from what I hear, the consequences of the Doctor's behaviour is exactly what the finale and regeneration is all about.

Which actually worries me more than anything, because if there's one thing CoE taught me it's that all those vague inklings I had throughout TW that Jack was a bit of a dick came to fruition in the finale, which proved that, yeah, he was a bit of a dick and we're probably better off with him flying off into the sky. From the things I'm hearing, it seems that this exact same thing will play out with the Doctor (Russell does like to rehash the same fucking points over and over), and all those vague reasons we had to dislike him will come into play and make us realise that we were right to dislike him. And while I had no real problem with Jack turning out to be a bit of a cock, I really don't want Who to be about the Doctor being a bit of a cock and making me happy to see the fucker regenerate. That's not what I fucking signed up to Who for.

i think it'll depend a lot on how it's handled, which is my biggest worry...rtd may have some fairly good 'epic' ideas, but nine times out of ten, he sucks mightily when it comes to actually executing them.

as i told o-c above, i'd really like to see something like what happened to five at the end of 'resurrection of the daleks': tegan's departure really made the doctor re-examine himself and his behavior, and motivated him to make a change (the bit where he went spare with the gun never happened in my canon, lalalalala can't hear you). and lord knows ten's got a HELL of a lot to examine: his treatment of jack and martha; his consolation-prize treatment of rose; his careless deposition of harriet jones; etc etc etc.

you're right about rtd and ten, though - the one thing i will never, ever forgive uncle rusty for is seeing how much of an unlikeable, borderline-sociopathic prick he can make my childhood hero into and still have the audience like him.

Word. Because as far as I'm concerned, Ten started off as an arrogant, petulant dick and just carried on from there. I've thought about all of this a lot, and what I really want is for RTD to stop writing in the Whoniverse, period. No more Who after the specials, thank god, and I wish he'd let go of SJA and TW too. Go off to the States and write your sequel to QAF or bad imitations of 24 or whatever, but leave the Whoniverse alone while some of these characters are still redeemable. I'm really hoping that Donna also gets the "yeah she's offscreen leading a happy normal life" ending the way Martha did, because that's pretty much as good as it gets, and certainly better than what we got in Journey's End, or other rumours I've heard around the netz. The Jack we got is so OOC compared to the Jack we had in To the Last Man or Adam or the radioplays that it's not like "oh yeah, Jack really is a dick" but "why is RTD writing Jack like a dick?"

i am utterly terrified of what rtd will do to donna in the finale. because if 'journey's end' is rtd's idea of 'fixing' a companion's unsatisfying ending in a previous story, then i don't want him coming anywhere near donna. what he had ten do to her in her last story was bad enough; if he somehow tries to 'fix' it then it might be ten times worse.

i mean, better an airheaded shallow anmesiac than Yet Another Lovestruck Female Companion who gives up her entire life if she can't be with the doctor. i'd almost rather rtd leave her be altogether* until another, better writer can come along and give her the treatment her character deserves.

*almost. i miss her. i really want to see her again, and will probably put up with rtd to do it. i am too easy.

'i am utterly terrified of what rtd will do to donna in the finale. '
I feel the same way about Ianto. As much as I would want him back, I would hate to see what RTD would do to a character that nine hysterical women make him bring back. I would love it if Ianto came back and was written by someone else.

I'm thinking of maybe just not watching at all. I'll start afresh with Moffat, yeah? How about that?

That's what I decided to do a month ago. I downloaded the first DW special, but didn't get around to seeing it yet and decided I'll just watch it after CoE. After CoE I deleted it off my computer and decided not to watch any of the specials, because I don't trust RTD. I'll most likely start watching again when Moffat and the new Doctor take over in season 5.

You haven't missed anything, the first special was fucking mediocre as fuck. The whole premise of it being "special" seemed to be that they got to go on holiday and film it in Dubai, when Devon would have sufficed as far as the audience was concerned, and it was marginally longer than an average episode, and therefore 10% more tedious.

I don't think the Donna one can be true because Catherine Tate was spotted filming several different scenes for the special. I know there was one scene witnessed about Donna having seen Verity's book and "coming over funny" which implies she's involved properly, not just mentioned in a jokey offhand way.

I'm dubious about the Harriet Jones thing only because it's one of those rumours that gets recycled every year.
Before both the S3 and S4 finales there were people swearing blind Harriet would be revealed as the enemy masterminding it all.

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