From: blueshirt@indigo.news
For today's walk down RADW memory lane, and tie-in to the
forthcoming re-appearance of the Sea Devils this weekend,
we go back to their last appearance in 2022... this is how
"Legend of the Sea Devils" went down here amongst our
regulars.
(Looking back: It's been a long three years!!!)
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From: "solar penguin"
Subject: Re: Legend of the Sea Devils
Date: Sun, 17 Apr 2022 20:07:53 -0000 (UTC)
Message-ID:
Well, that was flawed but fun.
The pacing was a bit off, almost as if it had been written
for an hour-long slot and then cut down by executive meddling
by BBC bosses. (At least, I really , really hope that was
the case, and not just Chibnall having trouble structuring
the plot again!)
The biggest flaw was that the young man seemed just
a little bit too eager at the end to forgive the pirate queen
for killing his father. Agreeing not to kill her in revenge,
that makes sense. Joining her crew, not so much.
I didn’t mind that the Sea Devils’ culture and technology
had changed again. After all, the seventies and eighties
Sea Devils were nothing like each other except for general
appearance and origin story. This fits quite happily in with
that lack of continuity.
The Sea Devils’ plan didn’t seem to make much sense
though. Why not just make a new keystone to replace
the lost one? And how does reversing the Earth’s magnetic
field cause stars to move before it’s even started happening?
It’s probably just best to take it on trust that they’re doing
Something Bad and that’s what matters.
The Thasmin stuff wasn’t too embarrassing, even if it did
feel a bit stuck on as an afterthought.
And according to the trailer, the centenary episode is going
to be full of fanwank. Even more fanwank than we expected.
Should be interesting.
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From: "The Last Doctor"
Subject: Re: Legend of the Sea Devils
Date: Sun, 17 Apr 2022 21:24:31 -0000 (UTC)
Message-ID:
Should have been about 75 minutes I reckon, but there were some
obvious cost cutting measures as well - fight scenes where you
couldn’t see both combatants, not showing the sea monster
clearly so that we couldn’t se how crap it was, only one fully
animated Sea Devil (and they still couldn’t get its mouth to
move).
> The biggest flaw was that the young man seemed just
> a little bit too eager at the end to forgive the pirate queen
> for killing his father. Agreeing not to kill her in revenge,
> that makes sense. Joining her crew, not so much.
Yes, there was clearly meant to be a romance there that got left
on the cutting room floor, or edited out of the script
completely.
> I didn’t mind that the Sea Devils’ culture and technology
> had changed again.
Yes but the Doctor lampshaded it, by pointing out how honourable
they were in the future … and that their technology seemed to be
a bit on the advanced side. Would have been better to comment
that Eocene societies were as complex and varied as modern
humans.
> The Sea Devils’ plan didn’t seem to make much sense
> though. Why not just make a new keystone to replace
> the lost one?
How did they lose it in the first place?
> It’s probably just best to take it on trust that they’re doing
> Something Bad and that’s what matters.
Yeah, the science was as ropey as it’s ever been. The bit that
irritated me the most was that Dan could still talk to the
Chinese when he was hundreds of years from the TARDIS. This show
could really use a babelfish solution for the language issues.
Writing wise. the plot resolution point being the same as in the
Timeless Children was just lazy (Doctor makes a universe saving
McGuffin that requires sacrifice, guest star of the week makes
the sacrifice for her).
> The Thasmin stuff wasn’t too embarrassing, even if it did
> feel a bit stuck on as an afterthought.
I thought it was done quite well considering it was now
inevitable. Fairly subtle and interweaved in a low impact way.
But the Doctor seems to be suffering serious premonitions that
her incarnation is ending, and we haven’t been shown a good
reason why. So it feels like she’s using it as an excuse for
holding back.
> And according to the trailer, the centenary episode is going
> to be full of fanwank.
All in the one show; Daleks. Cybermen, including the half-formed
one that was miniaturised and exploded in the last destruction
of Gallifrey. The Master. Vinder. And of course, the heavily
signalled regeneration - or at least the first half of it.
Plus Tegan Jovanka and Ace McShane (the modern era’s been hard on
companions, only Martha Jones was left safely on contemporary
Earth Prime with her memory intact - all the others are in other
universes, dead but now alive again in the distant future, or
sent back into the past and now dead). So despite it being 40
years, these are 2 of the 3 most recent available companions.
Fanwank indeed!
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From: "The True Doctor"
Subject: S13E08 Legend of the Sea Devils
Date: Sun, 17 Apr 2022 21:14:27 GMT
Message-ID:
Once again the audience (or what's left of it) is witness to the
writing of a 6 year old child that doesn't have the remotest
clue or understanding of the concepts of story, plot, plot
development, characterisation and character development.
The entire opening sequence was incomprehensible on first pass
and I had to rewind it to figure out who characters were, what
they were doing, what their motivations were, and whose side
they were supposed to be on, because none of this was set up at
the start, due to the fact Chibnall and his co-writer for this
episode, Ella Road, are soap-opera hacks and political
playwrights who do not know how to write any form of speculative
fiction or adventure story.
Some Chinese guy speaking with a northern English accent and his
son, again speaking with a northern English accent, are supposed
to be protecting something, and some northern English Chinese
woman with a sword is about to do something to it. Do something
to what, and what for, protecting what and why? You're supposed
to establish that at the beginning, not at the end, and if you
don't have time to do that then you jump straight to the action
part where the woman is hacking at the statue and it starts to
crack (with a bad special effect) and the man is trying to stop
her, not pad it out with totally useless soap-opera at the
[continued in next message]
--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)
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