Thasmin really reminds me of when RTD was talking about the Bi representation in Loki and said "He said the word ‘prince’, and we’re meant to go, ‘Thank you, Disney! Aren’t you marvelous? It’s a ridiculous, craven, feeble gesture towards the vital politics and the stories that should be told". Obviously Mandip really tried to "make fetch happen" and absolute respect to her for that but there just wasn't enough there.
Yeah. Characters should be characters that we care about. You can have gay, bisexual and trans characters without that being their major/only character trait of note, because that just devolves them into talking soap boxes for the writer to pander through and paints those groups in a very bad light as a result.
Funny story, the whole 'flesh-eating water' plot point genuinely angered my sister to the point that even now, 4 years later, the mention of it is enough to send her into a legitimately furious mood, and to be honest I can't really blame her. Setup and payoff is such a simple concept, and seeing a writer who's been working in the business for the better part of 20 years continually cock this up is absolutely staggering. With that kind of track record, it's no surprise that Thasmin came off as such a half-baked and underdeveloped plot thread that got negligible setup and went absolutely nowhere
The worst part about Yaz's departure is that the whole plot of Power of the Doctor seemed to be building up to a voluntary decision to leave: meeting Tegan and Ace, seeing the Doctor's forced regeneration into the Master, visiting the new UNIT headquarters (she wouldn't be the first companion to join UNIT)... Everything seemed to be building up to a similar exit to Martha's - and then it just didn't happen and she was instead just left on the curb. The only time they did proper actual set-up and they didn't even use it lmfao I was so angry
Genuinely absurd that Chris Chibnall, a massive doctor who nerd, thought an episode where the doctor defends space amazon was even slightly acceptable. Kerblam is the worst thing in his, or any doctor who.
Even more frustrating since _one season before Kerblam_ , the Doctor has TWO EPISODES in which they criticize the exploitation of workers by people who only care about profit
I don't get why Chibnall put Thasmin into Flux and the specials if he wasn't going to do anything with it. I guess I didn't expect the resolution in LOTSD to be it. It felt like Chibnall wrote POTD before the rest of Series 13 when he hadn't decided on Thasmin. You could genuinely skip the other two specials and go straight from Flux to POTD and not be confused.
Absolutely loved this! I feel very seen by your frustration over this era, and Yaz as a character, turning out to be so much less than they could've been. If you'd told me five years ago that I'd be on the other side of an era of Doctor Who featuring a female doctor and a sapphic romance with a companion and that I'd feel absolutely nothing about it I wouldn't have believed you, but somehow here we are. Would love to see more videos about Doctor Who, or whatever else you might want to write about!
I was royally peeved off about Grace's death. I fell in love with her immediately and felt like she was stripped away from me😥. Also, the whole fridging thing and the "bury your gays" trope - thank you for bringing these up and addressing them. Can't believe these are still being done in any media. Ugh...🙄😤
I guess I'm thinking about all the other incidental characters killed in Doctor Who in order to establish a threat and wondering why black women and queer(sic) people are so special as to make their deaths a unique trauma. Like "Proper Dave", do I as a cis white man get to be upset that his corpse being puppeted around was exclusively for the purpose of scaring other people?
@@CowMaster9001 you can’t compare cis white male characters to people of color or LGBT+ characters because of the relative numbers. Cis white males have literally a hundred years of representation in media. There’s a near-infinite variety of characters fitting that description. But despite recent advancements, people of color and LGBT+ characters are relatively few in number. So killing them off for cheap drama will always hit differently. Not to mention that it will take a relatively less common character type out of circulation.
Funnily enough, the ‘why’ remained up in the air for so long that I’m not still not sure it ever actually landed. Anyway, fantastic video Audrey! Very well constructed, argued and consistently engaging and funny.
the not liking conspiracies line only superficially conflicts. like, the doctor loves suspicious mysteries to solve, but also doesn't like the sinisterness of those mysteries. I think that's pretty valid. She likes conspiracies coz it's what she deals in, but she deals in them coz they need sorting out.
Really enjoyed this video! I'm not normally interested in discussion around ships in media but appreciated your analytical and academic approach (and the dry sense of humour!)
I've watched this video several times now, I really enjoy how you broke down all the instances of non-set up in the Chibnall era in order to talk about why thasmin falls flat. I couldn't believe this was the only video essay on your channel, I look forward to seeing more!
Also for someone responsible for Broadchurch (a gut wrenching story rife with character developement and personal conflict) it's so weird that 13 has no real issues to work through. She isn't interested in finding Gallefrey, working through her "social awkwardness," or maybe developing some empathy for all the pain she causes. She suffocated spiders, blew up suposedly sentient AI, and fed the Master to Nazis. If it's out of sight, it's out of mind to her. If that weren't just a symptom of bad, unimaginitve writing, I'd say that would be an interesting aspect of her character that could be challenged by the narrative or her companions. Instead she's unchallenged and unchanged by the end of her run. No personal conflict. Just nothing. Awesome video btw! Will be sure to tune in for more!
I've never seen Broadchurch but I know from other people talking about it that Jodie absolutely has the range to play a better version of the Doctor, she just... didn't get to
Great video! These last few series have been frustrating to watch but at times I haven’t been able to put my finger on why. So this video is really good for pointing out specifically what has been bothering me. After the finale and the lack of ANY thasmin payoff I’m just glad this era is over unfortunately
Thasmin was an afterthought shoe-horned on to Eve of the Daleks and Legend if the Sea Devils. There was no evidence of romance between the pair apart from one scene in Flux. Yaz appears in more episodes than almost any other companion, yet has almost zero development.
The whole you comparing the character information that we get in this era to video game flavour text is something I've been complaining about for ages. The fact that we get told things about these companions but none of them actually affect the narrative. Like we get told by Yaz that she's been struggling with her feelings towards the Doctor but we never see her struggle with them till the last minute or the fact that we get told that Yaz is muslim (I think?) but it doesn't seem to affect her behaviour at all; she doesn't even pray (to my knowledge, I skipped Series 12 so maybe I missed an episode that she did actually pray in) so why does it matter? The answer is it doesn't; these are just things thrown in for whatever reason without any effort being put into it,
Great video! Really thorough analysis, and helps clarify a few of the issues I've had with the Chibnall era as a whole. One thing I noticed you mentioned a couple of times: Doctor Who (and pretty much all British TV) doesn't use a 'Writer's Room' model. The scripts are commissioned by the producer (RTD/Moffatt/Chibnall), then they will usually request changes (or in Russell's case rewrite half the thing to match the tone of everything else). So the writers across the season don't see or contribute to anyone else's scripts... which is a problem when your head writer is Chibnall.
They actually did, apparently, use a writer's room model in Series 11! Which makes all the inconsistencies there just extremely weird. From what I can tell though that didn't carry on past into Series 12. Presumably because it was a mess.
Myself I really don't like Thasmin. To me, their relationship feels abusive because the Doctor has so much more power than Yaz but at the same time is very closed of to her, and lies about what's going on even though she's the only person Yaz has to guide her through the SciFi settings they travel in.
omg thank you for this, I hardly see it commented on with how imbalanced their relationship has been. like sure it's happened in previous eras with companions idolising and wanting to prove their worth to the Doctor, but the writers gave us actual repercussions for those character choices and made it a part of that connection. with thasmin it makes me feel oddly sick especially with the fact that Yaz idolises her, and as we saw with her scene with the police officer wants to prove herself to other 'saviors'. its jarring that in one scene the Doctor is dismissive and speaking down to Yaz and in the next they are joking and Yaz has loving eyes towards the Doctor, it feels unearned and manipulative. sure, characters can be flawed but the lack of depth with chibnall character writing makes this just seem off :/
I'm not prepared for part two but I'm really looking forward to it after watching part one🤩. This was a really fantastic, thoughtful and well put together breakdown. I appreciate the time and work that must've gone into it. 💙💙 (Lastly, sorry about your Princess - lovely dedication at the end. Rest in paws 🐈🐾)
dr who doesn't really have a writers room. most uk based shows are single writer, which means whoever is credited as writing the episode, had a laptop in their kitchen, and walked into the bbc with the script they'd been commissioned to write. the showrunner/script editor/headwriter (the roles are combined in modern who but most shows usually have them seperate) will oversee, brainstorm, and make sure everything is consistant, but overall there's no room of writers who make up the plot for the episode. basically the failings of the show in consistancy can be directly attributed to chibnall. although another note is that most co-writen episodes in the chibnall are are just chibnall rewriting an element on a script to fit an arc, then putting his name on it as a co-writer. something generally looked down upon in writng. not the show runnner changing a script, but claiming co-writing credits because of it.
I basically never comment on youtube videos but Id like to say that this one was so good I WILL. I hope life and motivation allows you to eventually make a second video because Id eat it up immediately. Your voice feels super nice to listen to, as well as the simpler video style, this was entertaining, funny, well-spoken and just generally so good. If you ever have the means and wish to make more doctor who content like this, be it reviews or whatever comes to mind, thatd be really cool. Thanks for this treasure of a youtube video 🫶
Chibnall has some cool ideas but isn't able to deliver on most of them at all. Shame about Thasmin too, I was rooting for some kind of closure there but I think I was hoping for too much there.
"Halloween! Trick or Treat :D" *Scary orchestra hit and horrified Doctor* Possibly the most unintentionally funny moment in Doctor Who. When I think that the BBC saw the show and decided to bring back RTD to revive it, it brings me hope that at least they knew this was awful as well; there's SOME self-awareness. I feel so bad for all the actors, set designers, prop masters, Segun etc for the hundreds of hours poured into something where the end product was so terrible. It must be so disheartening. As for us as an audience, it's been a long 5 year wait for good story telling to return to Doctor Who, but it will feel amazing when it does. I'm so excited!!
The "flesh-eating water" doesn't need to have a moment where someone else falls victim to it. It's a looming threat. It's purpose is to loom. Spot on analysis of Kerblam. Though by all accounts what we know of the writers room is that it just generate the initial ideas of a story; developing it basically falls then to the named writer. Still, at the end of the day, Chibbers was the one to sign off on that abomination. Interestingly, I never put that whole sequence with Yaz running away as being about depression per se. It was so vaguely worded as to what exactly it was that caused her to leave, that you could combine it with her "I want more of everything to do with the Doctor" outburst, and the central importance of the female cop to resolving it that she became a figure of ideation for her, that the flashback was all about Yaz first realising the truth about herself and her (or most likely the people around her) reacting poorly to it. Especially with Demons establishing that the member of Yaz's family she displays the most physical connection to also had a romantic relationship outside the cultural boundaries she was supposed to be constrained by. ,Yaz's mum uncritically asking about the possibility of a sapphic relationship screams the trope that Dan later picks up on of our friends knowing us better than we admit to knowing ourselves.
"Spot on analysis of Kerblam. Though by all accounts what we know of the writers room is that it just generate the initial ideas of a story; developing it basically falls then to the named writer. Still, at the end of the day, Chibbers was the one to sign off on that abomination." Stargate also worked like that. But they were producing 20+ episodes per year (in two years it was near 50 episodes per year). Here we get 10 episodes per 2 years
I love this! It's so gratifying to see all of the errors and inconsistencies properly explored and outlined. It's just been so badly written- and almost as though it's a radio show, as everything is explained out loud. They describe everything to the audience as if they don't trust us to see clues and make sense of the acting and plot ourselves. I've hated the theatrical acting too sadly. I just think they've departed so far from what it used to be. The queerbaiting and lack of direction/planning and character development in the chibnall era has been nuts
Haven't watched Doctor Who in years, since I was like a kid watching Matt Smith. I had heard the last few series was bad but wow. This is really, really, really bad. Fantastic video, got a few good laughs out of me, can't wait for more!
Remember when chibnall borrowed the plot line of a robot becoming self aware, calling for help from humans and being killed by the actions of the hero from Silicon Valley, where the robot is being raped. Yeah that was a weird callback
Love your video! Love how you broke it all down. The only thing I disagree with is you liking "Demons of the punjab". I HATED it. Probably more than that "Orphan *insert number" episode. Being a punjabi Muslim I was hoping to feel something, but instead I felt empty and annoyed. They squandered some deep, dark and life changing history! Such a shame!!!
Of course Yaz and the Doctor wasn't set up. This Doctor is too distant and childishly quirky to start a romance, in my opinion, but even aside from that, it's only mentioned offhandedly twice. It's something some fans would want, but fans will ship from no evidence, so that doesn't matter. (All of this is also ignoring my own opinion that the Doctor shouldn't be with anyone, since they and any Earthling are fundementally too different to be a match.)
Chibnall's problem is that, like Moffat, his companions are throwaway concepts marketed as characters-no development going on, no substance, just there to take up space making moon eyes at the Doctor. As the son of a gay man, I'm offended that Moffat and Chinball portray LGBTQ+ characters as either disposable jokes or villains whose sexuality is depicted as a sign of how evil and insane they are. And when they're not doing that, they're using them as empty, cardboard cutouts masquerading as people. The actors and actresses are given practically nothing to work with.
Hey please start a patreon or something - I’d love to support your UA-cam channel and (upcoming) video essays! Please can you maybe do a video on older doctors/companions too, like Ace or Sarah Jane?
i disagree with your point about character development, not neccesarily because i think the chibnall era has any. it doesn't. but because i feel the argument about race here isn't really important to the themes of the arc, and there's only really a single line in which Grayham is a dick to ryan, which more goes under a lack of consistency than a bad character arc. it's not really a consistent thread. and the arc itself doesn't really have anything to do with the race's of the characters, the idea that you keep mentioning that the fact Greyham is a white man is important to the arc in any way is kinda irrelevant to the overall themes attempted. I do agree that the Ryans dad stuff is horrid though.
i think chibbers era has been a horrid time for the show, and a mid time for the fandom. horrid for the show because Chibnall's writing ranges from mind-bendingly incompetent at worst, and a generic and surface level copy of his 2 predecessors at worst. a man who can reliably write mediocre television under the watchful eye of other writers given control over a national institution. and it's been mid for the fandom because of how scattered the show seems to have become in its marketing, and promotion have become, creating pointless division within the fandom for seemingly no reason. I don't think the last era was an absolute trainwreck, unlike some poeple i feel jodie is a perfectly acceptable doctor, that given better writing that doesn't feel like a boomer desperately trying to appear young and cool without understanding what makes dr who so appealing to many of those young people its trying to promote itself to, her and her companions could have been some of the best in the show. but the fact is the 3 or 4 notably decent episodes, only 1 of which i personally think passess above a 7/10, are all written by outside writers. all this prelude to say that thasmin struggles with the exact same issue. it's chibnall realising that his audiance is dwindling as a result of mediocre episodes with horrid quality series arcs. (being that it goes from non existent in series 11, to overbaring, pointless and out of character the next series, then to nonsensical a series later.) and desperately tries to appeal to the thasmin shippers, the part of the audiance who might actually be willing to add somee positive feedback regardless of quality as long as he adds some queerbait (ik that term is controversial but inserting surface level lgbt relationships into media blatantly and purely just to appeal to audiences is queerbait) which feels like a generic retread of the unfortunate new who trope of shipping the doctor with people thousands of years their junior.
Off topic: the frustrating thing is I genuinely cannot tell if Jodie is a miscast actress not fit for the role, or if the writing and directing just brings out the worst of her acting. On the one hand, she did practically nothing with what she was given. But on the other hand, she wasn't given much to begin with so I really don't know.
And I am firmly skeeved out by the Doctor having a romantic attraction to humans. I felt that way about 9/10 and Rose and I feel that way about "Thazmin". We're just so much less than Gallifrians. It's like a human/chimpanzee romantic relationship.
Kablam killing Kira to teach Charlie a lesson is very old testament. Like the Egyptians keep the Hebrews as slaves so God sends an angle to kill the sons of the perpetrators.
Thasmin really reminds me of when RTD was talking about the Bi representation in Loki and said "He said the word ‘prince’, and we’re meant to go, ‘Thank you, Disney! Aren’t you marvelous? It’s a ridiculous, craven, feeble gesture towards the vital politics and the stories that should be told".
Obviously Mandip really tried to "make fetch happen" and absolute respect to her for that but there just wasn't enough there.
Yeah. Characters should be characters that we care about. You can have gay, bisexual and trans characters without that being their major/only character trait of note, because that just devolves them into talking soap boxes for the writer to pander through and paints those groups in a very bad light as a result.
Funny story, the whole 'flesh-eating water' plot point genuinely angered my sister to the point that even now, 4 years later, the mention of it is enough to send her into a legitimately furious mood, and to be honest I can't really blame her. Setup and payoff is such a simple concept, and seeing a writer who's been working in the business for the better part of 20 years continually cock this up is absolutely staggering. With that kind of track record, it's no surprise that Thasmin came off as such a half-baked and underdeveloped plot thread that got negligible setup and went absolutely nowhere
Flesh eating water? I don't even remember that
Chekhov's Gun is not a straitjacket. Writers are allowed to build out scenes with elements that are not exploited in an obvious way.
@@niauropsaka they're allowed to... It just doesn't make for a well written story
The worst part about Yaz's departure is that the whole plot of Power of the Doctor seemed to be building up to a voluntary decision to leave: meeting Tegan and Ace, seeing the Doctor's forced regeneration into the Master, visiting the new UNIT headquarters (she wouldn't be the first companion to join UNIT)... Everything seemed to be building up to a similar exit to Martha's - and then it just didn't happen and she was instead just left on the curb. The only time they did proper actual set-up and they didn't even use it lmfao I was so angry
Kerblam sure was a wild one huh 0_0.
omg I COMPLETELY forgot about the Yaz and Ryan romance set up
Genuinely absurd that Chris Chibnall, a massive doctor who nerd, thought an episode where the doctor defends space amazon was even slightly acceptable. Kerblam is the worst thing in his, or any doctor who.
Even more frustrating since _one season before Kerblam_ , the Doctor has TWO EPISODES in which they criticize the exploitation of workers by people who only care about profit
I don't get why Chibnall put Thasmin into Flux and the specials if he wasn't going to do anything with it. I guess I didn't expect the resolution in LOTSD to be it. It felt like Chibnall wrote POTD before the rest of Series 13 when he hadn't decided on Thasmin. You could genuinely skip the other two specials and go straight from Flux to POTD and not be confused.
As someone that basically did just that (I honestly only missed one of the specials) you're completely right
none in flux really!
@@TheDailyCrumb2 There is some hints in Flux. It's just not explicit.
Right now, vore is more powerful than most video essays...
I'm also only about ten minutes in, but I gotta comment on how nice your voice is
Absolutely loved this! I feel very seen by your frustration over this era, and Yaz as a character, turning out to be so much less than they could've been. If you'd told me five years ago that I'd be on the other side of an era of Doctor Who featuring a female doctor and a sapphic romance with a companion and that I'd feel absolutely nothing about it I wouldn't have believed you, but somehow here we are.
Would love to see more videos about Doctor Who, or whatever else you might want to write about!
“I DID NOT EDIT THIS” 😂
I was royally peeved off about Grace's death. I fell in love with her immediately and felt like she was stripped away from me😥. Also, the whole fridging thing and the "bury your gays" trope - thank you for bringing these up and addressing them. Can't believe these are still being done in any media. Ugh...🙄😤
I guess I'm thinking about all the other incidental characters killed in Doctor Who in order to establish a threat and wondering why black women and queer(sic) people are so special as to make their deaths a unique trauma. Like "Proper Dave", do I as a cis white man get to be upset that his corpse being puppeted around was exclusively for the purpose of scaring other people?
@@CowMaster9001 you can’t compare cis white male characters to people of color or LGBT+ characters because of the relative numbers.
Cis white males have literally a hundred years of representation in media. There’s a near-infinite variety of characters fitting that description. But despite recent advancements, people of color and LGBT+ characters are relatively few in number. So killing them off for cheap drama will always hit differently. Not to mention that it will take a relatively less common character type out of circulation.
Funnily enough, the ‘why’ remained up in the air for so long that I’m not still not sure it ever actually landed.
Anyway, fantastic video Audrey! Very well constructed, argued and consistently engaging and funny.
“or you’re wondering if I just mispronounced ‘theremin’…”
Instant subscribe.
Also, almost everything to do with dyspraxia feels to someone with dyspraxia asa slap to the face.
the not liking conspiracies line only superficially conflicts. like, the doctor loves suspicious mysteries to solve, but also doesn't like the sinisterness of those mysteries. I think that's pretty valid. She likes conspiracies coz it's what she deals in, but she deals in them coz they need sorting out.
Really enjoyed this video! I'm not normally interested in discussion around ships in media but appreciated your analytical and academic approach (and the dry sense of humour!)
I've watched this video several times now, I really enjoy how you broke down all the instances of non-set up in the Chibnall era in order to talk about why thasmin falls flat. I couldn't believe this was the only video essay on your channel, I look forward to seeing more!
Also for someone responsible for Broadchurch (a gut wrenching story rife with character developement and personal conflict) it's so weird that 13 has no real issues to work through. She isn't interested in finding Gallefrey, working through her "social awkwardness," or maybe developing some empathy for all the pain she causes. She suffocated spiders, blew up suposedly sentient AI, and fed the Master to Nazis. If it's out of sight, it's out of mind to her. If that weren't just a symptom of bad, unimaginitve writing, I'd say that would be an interesting aspect of her character that could be challenged by the narrative or her companions. Instead she's unchallenged and unchanged by the end of her run. No personal conflict. Just nothing.
Awesome video btw! Will be sure to tune in for more!
I've never seen Broadchurch but I know from other people talking about it that Jodie absolutely has the range to play a better version of the Doctor, she just... didn't get to
Pretty much sums up my feelings exactly. Great one, Audrey!
Watching, I was amazed to realize that this video wasn’t made by someone with a big channel! Great work, and I can’t wait to see what you do next :)
Great video! These last few series have been frustrating to watch but at times I haven’t been able to put my finger on why. So this video is really good for pointing out specifically what has been bothering me. After the finale and the lack of ANY thasmin payoff I’m just glad this era is over unfortunately
banger
This was phenomenal, am super excited to see more videos!!! Really entertaining
I love how organized it’s structured too with the title cards and also how you broke down the analysis , so interesting lol
Brilliant stuff, Audrey, very well put together and argued!
Thasmin was an afterthought shoe-horned on to Eve of the Daleks and Legend if the Sea Devils. There was no evidence of romance between the pair apart from one scene in Flux. Yaz appears in more episodes than almost any other companion, yet has almost zero development.
Redeemed partially in The Power of the Doctor.
This is brilliant! Please do more Doctor Who video essays!
"Doctor Who is still on." Now that's good banter.
Good stuff, looking forward to part two!
The whole you comparing the character information that we get in this era to video game flavour text is something I've been complaining about for ages. The fact that we get told things about these companions but none of them actually affect the narrative. Like we get told by Yaz that she's been struggling with her feelings towards the Doctor but we never see her struggle with them till the last minute or the fact that we get told that Yaz is muslim (I think?) but it doesn't seem to affect her behaviour at all; she doesn't even pray (to my knowledge, I skipped Series 12 so maybe I missed an episode that she did actually pray in) so why does it matter? The answer is it doesn't; these are just things thrown in for whatever reason without any effort being put into it,
Great video! Really thorough analysis, and helps clarify a few of the issues I've had with the Chibnall era as a whole.
One thing I noticed you mentioned a couple of times: Doctor Who (and pretty much all British TV) doesn't use a 'Writer's Room' model. The scripts are commissioned by the producer (RTD/Moffatt/Chibnall), then they will usually request changes (or in Russell's case rewrite half the thing to match the tone of everything else). So the writers across the season don't see or contribute to anyone else's scripts... which is a problem when your head writer is Chibnall.
They actually did, apparently, use a writer's room model in Series 11! Which makes all the inconsistencies there just extremely weird. From what I can tell though that didn't carry on past into Series 12. Presumably because it was a mess.
@@audreyarmstrong8520 Oh I didn't know that! Which definitely makes the inconsistency even more baffling.
Myself I really don't like Thasmin. To me, their relationship feels abusive because the Doctor has so much more power than Yaz but at the same time is very closed of to her, and lies about what's going on even though she's the only person Yaz has to guide her through the SciFi settings they travel in.
omg thank you for this, I hardly see it commented on with how imbalanced their relationship has been. like sure it's happened in previous eras with companions idolising and wanting to prove their worth to the Doctor, but the writers gave us actual repercussions for those character choices and made it a part of that connection. with thasmin it makes me feel oddly sick especially with the fact that Yaz idolises her, and as we saw with her scene with the police officer wants to prove herself to other 'saviors'. its jarring that in one scene the Doctor is dismissive and speaking down to Yaz and in the next they are joking and Yaz has loving eyes towards the Doctor, it feels unearned and manipulative. sure, characters can be flawed but the lack of depth with chibnall character writing makes this just seem off :/
Screaming into a pillow - SO relatable 🙉
absolutely fantastic video, you've summed up my thoughts and feelings so well. thank you!!!
I'm not prepared for part two but I'm really looking forward to it after watching part one🤩. This was a really fantastic, thoughtful and well put together breakdown. I appreciate the time and work that must've gone into it. 💙💙
(Lastly, sorry about your Princess - lovely dedication at the end. Rest in paws 🐈🐾)
dr who doesn't really have a writers room.
most uk based shows are single writer, which means whoever is credited as writing the episode, had a laptop in their kitchen, and walked into the bbc with the script they'd been commissioned to write. the showrunner/script editor/headwriter (the roles are combined in modern who but most shows usually have them seperate) will oversee, brainstorm, and make sure everything is consistant, but overall there's no room of writers who make up the plot for the episode. basically the failings of the show in consistancy can be directly attributed to chibnall. although another note is that most co-writen episodes in the chibnall are are just chibnall rewriting an element on a script to fit an arc, then putting his name on it as a co-writer. something generally looked down upon in writng. not the show runnner changing a script, but claiming co-writing credits because of it.
I basically never comment on youtube videos but Id like to say that this one was so good I WILL. I hope life and motivation allows you to eventually make a second video because Id eat it up immediately.
Your voice feels super nice to listen to, as well as the simpler video style, this was entertaining, funny, well-spoken and just generally so good. If you ever have the means and wish to make more doctor who content like this, be it reviews or whatever comes to mind, thatd be really cool. Thanks for this treasure of a youtube video 🫶
Chibnall has some cool ideas but isn't able to deliver on most of them at all. Shame about Thasmin too, I was rooting for some kind of closure there but I think I was hoping for too much there.
"Halloween! Trick or Treat :D"
*Scary orchestra hit and horrified Doctor*
Possibly the most unintentionally funny moment in Doctor Who. When I think that the BBC saw the show and decided to bring back RTD to revive it, it brings me hope that at least they knew this was awful as well; there's SOME self-awareness. I feel so bad for all the actors, set designers, prop masters, Segun etc for the hundreds of hours poured into something where the end product was so terrible. It must be so disheartening. As for us as an audience, it's been a long 5 year wait for good story telling to return to Doctor Who, but it will feel amazing when it does. I'm so excited!!
The "flesh-eating water" doesn't need to have a moment where someone else falls victim to it. It's a looming threat. It's purpose is to loom.
Spot on analysis of Kerblam. Though by all accounts what we know of the writers room is that it just generate the initial ideas of a story; developing it basically falls then to the named writer. Still, at the end of the day, Chibbers was the one to sign off on that abomination.
Interestingly, I never put that whole sequence with Yaz running away as being about depression per se. It was so vaguely worded as to what exactly it was that caused her to leave, that you could combine it with her "I want more of everything to do with the Doctor" outburst, and the central importance of the female cop to resolving it that she became a figure of ideation for her, that the flashback was all about Yaz first realising the truth about herself and her (or most likely the people around her) reacting poorly to it. Especially with Demons establishing that the member of Yaz's family she displays the most physical connection to also had a romantic relationship outside the cultural boundaries she was supposed to be constrained by. ,Yaz's mum uncritically asking about the possibility of a sapphic relationship screams the trope that Dan later picks up on of our friends knowing us better than we admit to knowing ourselves.
"Spot on analysis of Kerblam. Though by all accounts what we know of the writers room is that it just generate the initial ideas of a story; developing it basically falls then to the named writer. Still, at the end of the day, Chibbers was the one to sign off on that abomination."
Stargate also worked like that. But they were producing 20+ episodes per year (in two years it was near 50 episodes per year). Here we get 10 episodes per 2 years
Hey, nice video! I think you have a bright youtube future ahead of you. Good luck!
Really great video essay!!!!
I love this! It's so gratifying to see all of the errors and inconsistencies properly explored and outlined. It's just been so badly written- and almost as though it's a radio show, as everything is explained out loud. They describe everything to the audience as if they don't trust us to see clues and make sense of the acting and plot ourselves. I've hated the theatrical acting too sadly. I just think they've departed so far from what it used to be. The queerbaiting and lack of direction/planning and character development in the chibnall era has been nuts
I can't wait to see your next vid!
Agent O is dumb, but i chose to interpret it as an attempt at the anthony ainley master's terribly thin disguise schtick.
its pretty telling that your segment on demons of the punjab doesn't mention the thijarians at all
Great video 👌👌👌
New subscriber 🇨🇦
Haven't watched Doctor Who in years, since I was like a kid watching Matt Smith. I had heard the last few series was bad but wow. This is really, really, really bad. Fantastic video, got a few good laughs out of me, can't wait for more!
Remember when chibnall borrowed the plot line of a robot becoming self aware, calling for help from humans and being killed by the actions of the hero from Silicon Valley, where the robot is being raped. Yeah that was a weird callback
Love your video! Love how you broke it all down. The only thing I disagree with is you liking "Demons of the punjab". I HATED it. Probably more than that "Orphan *insert number" episode. Being a punjabi Muslim I was hoping to feel something, but instead I felt empty and annoyed. They squandered some deep, dark and life changing history! Such a shame!!!
Of course Yaz and the Doctor wasn't set up. This Doctor is too distant and childishly quirky to start a romance, in my opinion, but even aside from that, it's only mentioned offhandedly twice. It's something some fans would want, but fans will ship from no evidence, so that doesn't matter. (All of this is also ignoring my own opinion that the Doctor shouldn't be with anyone, since they and any Earthling are fundementally too different to be a match.)
Chibnall's problem is that, like Moffat, his companions are throwaway concepts marketed as characters-no development going on, no substance, just there to take up space making moon eyes at the Doctor. As the son of a gay man, I'm offended that Moffat and Chinball portray LGBTQ+ characters as either disposable jokes or villains whose sexuality is depicted as a sign of how evil and insane they are. And when they're not doing that, they're using them as empty, cardboard cutouts masquerading as people. The actors and actresses are given practically nothing to work with.
Hey please start a patreon or something - I’d love to support your UA-cam channel and (upcoming) video essays! Please can you maybe do a video on older doctors/companions too, like Ace or Sarah Jane?
I'm working on setting up a Patreon quite soon! And I'd love to do more videos on a bunch of Doctor Who topics, so you can definitely expect that lol
i disagree with your point about character development, not neccesarily because i think the chibnall era has any. it doesn't. but because i feel the argument about race here isn't really important to the themes of the arc, and there's only really a single line in which Grayham is a dick to ryan, which more goes under a lack of consistency than a bad character arc. it's not really a consistent thread. and the arc itself doesn't really have anything to do with the race's of the characters, the idea that you keep mentioning that the fact Greyham is a white man is important to the arc in any way is kinda irrelevant to the overall themes attempted. I do agree that the Ryans dad stuff is horrid though.
i think chibbers era has been a horrid time for the show, and a mid time for the fandom. horrid for the show because Chibnall's writing ranges from mind-bendingly incompetent at worst, and a generic and surface level copy of his 2 predecessors at worst. a man who can reliably write mediocre television under the watchful eye of other writers given control over a national institution.
and it's been mid for the fandom because of how scattered the show seems to have become in its marketing, and promotion have become, creating pointless division within the fandom for seemingly no reason. I don't think the last era was an absolute trainwreck, unlike some poeple i feel jodie is a perfectly acceptable doctor, that given better writing that doesn't feel like a boomer desperately trying to appear young and cool without understanding what makes dr who so appealing to many of those young people its trying to promote itself to, her and her companions could have been some of the best in the show. but the fact is the 3 or 4 notably decent episodes, only 1 of which i personally think passess above a 7/10, are all written by outside writers. all this prelude to say that thasmin struggles with the exact same issue. it's chibnall realising that his audiance is dwindling as a result of mediocre episodes with horrid quality series arcs. (being that it goes from non existent in series 11, to overbaring, pointless and out of character the next series, then to nonsensical a series later.) and desperately tries to appeal to the thasmin shippers, the part of the audiance who might actually be willing to add somee positive feedback regardless of quality as long as he adds some queerbait (ik that term is controversial but inserting surface level lgbt relationships into media blatantly and purely just to appeal to audiences is queerbait) which feels like a generic retread of the unfortunate new who trope of shipping the doctor with people thousands of years their junior.
yes
Off topic: the frustrating thing is I genuinely cannot tell if Jodie is a miscast actress not fit for the role, or if the writing and directing just brings out the worst of her acting. On the one hand, she did practically nothing with what she was given. But on the other hand, she wasn't given much to begin with so I really don't know.
Are you still making a part 2?
I am, just very slowly (chronic illness makes it hard!)
And I am firmly skeeved out by the Doctor having a romantic attraction to humans. I felt that way about 9/10 and Rose and I feel that way about "Thazmin". We're just so much less than Gallifrians. It's like a human/chimpanzee romantic relationship.
Hmmm. Literate, darkly funny and very well constructed. Only a Canadian could do that.
Fine work young one
dam you're based af, subscribed
Kablam killing Kira to teach Charlie a lesson is very old testament. Like the Egyptians keep the Hebrews as slaves so God sends an angle to kill the sons of the perpetrators.
tragic thasmin
Chibnalls just really bad at at giving any payoff in general.