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Into the Dalek
I initially thought I was confused by this because I watching with a (not so) small child. However, it would seem, everyone else was as confused as I was.
Having, heroically, spent 9 years resisting any suggestion that they should watch Doctor Who with me (with the exception of Midnight) no-longer-so-small child has become a convert (and is particularly impressed by the coolness of school teacher's under fire). This is all very well but does mean the viewing experience is interrupted by a stream of questions for many of which the answer is "I don't know, maybe if we wait and see, we'll find out."
So, on viewing, Into the Dalek, I assumed that vital questions like who are the soldiers and what is their relationship to the Dalek? and if the Dalek is only good because it is broken why did you think fixing it wouldn't stop it being good? and why do the soldiers want to fix the Dalek anyway? were all answered but I was too distracted to notice.
On reading several reviews it turns out that no-longer-so-small child has no responsibility for my confusion at all.
I feel this was almost very good. It had a very clear idea about what it was trying to achieve. Like Dalek it wanted to compare the Doctor and the Dalek, in this case, focusing on their capacity or ability to be good. The idea of the miniaturised journey into the interior of the Dalek is rich with both visual and thematic imagery. This has been done before on Doctor Who in The Invisible Enemy (which features a miniaturised journey of clones of the Doctor and Leela into the Doctor's own brain), a much derided story so there was probably no harm in trying the general idea out again. But it was let down by the somewhat confused story telling and a much less tight focus on drawing parallels between the Doctor and the Dalek. Dalek's strength, I think, was that fixity of view, removing pretty much everything from the plot that was not in the service of that particular parallel. Into the Dalek was trying to do a number of other things and lost clarity as a result. Once it became sort of muddy and confused, it ceased to be anywhere near as good.
Incidentally, I was left with the feeling that we were maybe destined to revisit this particular conflict where more would be revealed. In particular, given Danny Pink is set to be a recurring character-cum-companion, possibly Journey Blue (his counterpart in many ways) is also destined to reappear. If that is the case, I suspect, again, that the attempt to lead into something larger was conflicting with the parallels the story wanted to draw out.
The Doctor has a rule against soldiers? Can I dignify that with a raspberry sound? Because, well, obviously not. He has a problem with a lot of soldiers, particularly those with a rigid mindset. But he has got along well enough with enough soldiers (mostly notably the UNIT regulars), that the best that can be said for the idea is that this Doctor seems a bit confused about his past.
I don't know. Dalek is a hard act to follow and I'd be inclined to say it was unwise to attempt the same kind of story a second time. The confused explanation of the set up didn't help at all. Much like Deep Breath I didn't dislike this and I'm pleased something this season of Who is doing has captured the imagination of no-longer-so-small child but I wish I could feel more personally excited by it all.
Having, heroically, spent 9 years resisting any suggestion that they should watch Doctor Who with me (with the exception of Midnight) no-longer-so-small child has become a convert (and is particularly impressed by the coolness of school teacher's under fire). This is all very well but does mean the viewing experience is interrupted by a stream of questions for many of which the answer is "I don't know, maybe if we wait and see, we'll find out."
So, on viewing, Into the Dalek, I assumed that vital questions like who are the soldiers and what is their relationship to the Dalek? and if the Dalek is only good because it is broken why did you think fixing it wouldn't stop it being good? and why do the soldiers want to fix the Dalek anyway? were all answered but I was too distracted to notice.
On reading several reviews it turns out that no-longer-so-small child has no responsibility for my confusion at all.
I feel this was almost very good. It had a very clear idea about what it was trying to achieve. Like Dalek it wanted to compare the Doctor and the Dalek, in this case, focusing on their capacity or ability to be good. The idea of the miniaturised journey into the interior of the Dalek is rich with both visual and thematic imagery. This has been done before on Doctor Who in The Invisible Enemy (which features a miniaturised journey of clones of the Doctor and Leela into the Doctor's own brain), a much derided story so there was probably no harm in trying the general idea out again. But it was let down by the somewhat confused story telling and a much less tight focus on drawing parallels between the Doctor and the Dalek. Dalek's strength, I think, was that fixity of view, removing pretty much everything from the plot that was not in the service of that particular parallel. Into the Dalek was trying to do a number of other things and lost clarity as a result. Once it became sort of muddy and confused, it ceased to be anywhere near as good.
Incidentally, I was left with the feeling that we were maybe destined to revisit this particular conflict where more would be revealed. In particular, given Danny Pink is set to be a recurring character-cum-companion, possibly Journey Blue (his counterpart in many ways) is also destined to reappear. If that is the case, I suspect, again, that the attempt to lead into something larger was conflicting with the parallels the story wanted to draw out.
The Doctor has a rule against soldiers? Can I dignify that with a raspberry sound? Because, well, obviously not. He has a problem with a lot of soldiers, particularly those with a rigid mindset. But he has got along well enough with enough soldiers (mostly notably the UNIT regulars), that the best that can be said for the idea is that this Doctor seems a bit confused about his past.
I don't know. Dalek is a hard act to follow and I'd be inclined to say it was unwise to attempt the same kind of story a second time. The confused explanation of the set up didn't help at all. Much like Deep Breath I didn't dislike this and I'm pleased something this season of Who is doing has captured the imagination of no-longer-so-small child but I wish I could feel more personally excited by it all.
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Into, on the other hand, I enjoyed. Plot holes you could drive Mondas through but this Doctor is still cooking and maybe his memory hasn't quite fallen into place yet. Entire episode looked gorgeous. ---that's my Doctor, right there. And : it's a cheap, fourth-wall-breaking, blushing acknowledgement of the concept's flaws, but we laughed, didn't we?
I have heard other people complain that the Doctor has a rule against soldiers now. I don't see it as breaching continuity (which Doctor Who doesn't have etc). That this Doctor is racist against soldiers doesn't mean that the whole Three/Brig bromance never happened. Let's see where it leads. And if it goes nowhere, let's just say it was residual post-regeneration grumpiness brought on by having only recently met John Hurt.
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I'm interested that you like the look of the thing, a lot of people have complained that the interior of the Dalek could have been a lot more interesting than a set of fairly generic corridors.
The Caretaker puts an interesting spin on the Doctor's hatred of soldiers - more a case of his own self-loathing at the part he has played.
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This was the bit I couldn't get past. Why would you fix the Dalek when you all but said outright that it was only good because it was broken?
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We really enjoyed the Robin Hood one, at least it knew it was being silly.
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The script was crowded with incident, but rarely seemed to think things through or develop an idea properly. I don't feel I understand the workings of a Dalek any better now than before, except that I now know the inside of a Dalek looks a lot like stereotypical Doctor Who corridors (for running down, inevitably).
And, as you say, the idea that the Doctor has a rule against soldiers is nonsense. It's one of those fan ideas that reflects how certain people in the audience would like him to behave more than how he actually behaves.
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10 years or less
Similarly, I feel pretty certain that "Into the Dalek" was butchered. Phil Ford is simply a better writer than what showed up on the screen.
I bet that it will be quite a lot less than 10 years before someone (maybe Ford himself) spills the beans.
Re: 10 years or less
Unless the weird pro-monarchy vaguely divine right subtext in Nightmare In Silver was grafted on post facto, I would say the story had issues which were not just about its compression into 45 minutes.