251: Totally Who-Less

In under a minute, you will be transported to a bizarre and fantastic new age. Hi, I'm Malcolm McDowell. You're listening to Movie Meltdown. So just keep listening. Movie Meltdown.

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What's up and welcome to Movie Meltdown. I am Brian. I'm Greg. I'm Ben. I am Posh Dave.

I'm Marlena. I'm Lucy. I'm Dave the Conduit, I suppose. See, there you go. Sporty Dave could not be here this week.

I tried. I wanted to get as many Daves as possible. But you come preset with your own nickname, so we don't even have to make up a ridiculous one for you. That's true. Ben and I are from the Tower of Technobabble.

Actually, this is a hostile takeover. I don't think so. You tried to pull that last time, and this time we totally outnumber you. He's going to do all the work. Don't.

Don't mess up a good thing. As we mentioned before, you can only claim the show if you're also going to edit the show. I am a guest here, an honored guest. I will put my shoes back on. That always takes care of that issue.

I always get to claim every show because I'm the only one who will ever piece it together. We are coming to you live via digital recording from Baxter Avenue Theaters, hidden somewhere deep in the bowels. Of the theater. Haunted. I just found out this place is haunted.

You don't hear clicking projectors because they quit using those a long time ago. It's much quieter up here. So, yeah, this is sort of a crossover episode with Tower of Technobabble. So Ben and Dave the Conduit are both from there. So do you guys want to give a little shout-out to yourselves?

Not really, no. Do you? Where do you find it, at least? You find it at toweroftechnobabble.com. But, you know, since we might as well.

Mark it while we're here. Cross-promote, dammit! Cross-promote! Cross-promote! Well, you go triple W, because you've got to do that.

If you don't do that. We're the best kept secret on the internet. The best show you're not listening to. Oh, wait, I thought that was ours. All right.

We're going to run for the money. It's a battle. Racing toward the bottom. Battle royale. There can be only one show no one listens to.

Ira Glass has nothing to worry about. Screw that guy. Nowhere near him. So for this week's geek activities, this week we're focusing on Doctor Who, and this. Was all sort of orchestrated by Ben.

Yes! I thought, you know, Ben, you are. The resident Doctor Who geek. You came up with this crossover episode. So I thought to kick things off, before we get into the movie, we would give people an idea of where you're coming from on this concept and your history with Doctor Who.

So we'll start with there. How old were you when you first came across Doctor Who? I was in high school, actually. I'm a late bloomer. We're still waiting for you to come around.

I know, I know. What do you want to know about it? See, I don't want to be all. that guy i think we just needed to go back to like where you're pulling from because that's as you will find out listener um pretty much everybody on our end we're not doctor who fans so i was gonna that that's sort of our response is to see if non-doctor who fans will watch this and take something from it or have you know what their perspective is but you you are the one that's from the other side you were there before this came around you were watching it on The PBS? Yeah, yeah. Right now, it's very weird for me because when I first got into Doctor Who, it was something you didn't really mention in mixed company.

If you thought it was bad being a Star Trek fan trying to go to high school, you did not mention this at all. I was in the closet. I didn't... I hid all my books. I didn't talk to anyone.

I thought I was the only one in the entire state of Indiana that had. Ever actually heard of the show. And so it's so weird to me now that that it's been remade it's come back and the hipsters love it and it's so weird for me now because like you know the big uh hipster thing is to say oh you think it's good now well i was watching it back then and the thing is i was watching it back then and i can't say that now or i'll sound like a hipster dude so i'm damned if. I do see if i don't on your recent doctor who episode you you had a really Cool little setup. I like it.

You guys should go and listen to it. Your guest was awesome, who is actually from Doctor Who land. Yeah, he was from England. He lives in England. The magic of the internet brings him to you.

His accent was real. Yeah, he wasn't even faking it like we do on every episode. But, no, I thought that was a really cool episode. But midway in, I was just listening to your telling some version of that story, and I'm like. I don't know, Vince kind of is the hipster.

Because it's come full circle. You've become one of those people that doesn't like something because it's become popular. But doesn't that make you the hipster? You want to be cool and like things that are uncool. That makes you the hipster.

I still like it just as much as I always have. But the thing is now because it's so popular. You're back in the closet. I'm so in the closet. I brought my little toy TARDIS out of my closet. tonight to put on the desk here to kind of set the mood.

Were you hiding it under your coat walking through the parking lot? I have a shoebox right here. And, you know, since we're going to talk about him, I also, you know, I got my little action figure, the guy we're going to talk about tonight. That's the hipster scaredy guy I am. I'm looking at it from the back.

I'll put him in the target. I'm looking at him from the back. It kind of looks like Johnny Depp's Sleepy Hollow action figure from there. Ben just brought an action figure with, what, 16 points of articulation? Exactly.

But does his finger fit in the trigger of a gun? Because that's the mark of quality with the old McFarlane toys. He doesn't hold a gun? I know. What a lame action figure.

He doesn't go in the TARDIS because of his stance. That's lame. He's not an action figure. He's a thought figure. Well, we don't like that at all.

We don't support thinking. Well, anyway, to get back to what you're saying, it was a show that was on public TV here, which is how most people in America of a certain age found out about it. I guess it was the late 80s when it started playing here in Louisville, and my brother was watching it, and I was. I kind of walked into the room and I saw what he was watching and I started giving him hell for it because it was goofy as shit. I mean, it's like.

They had a very minimal budget. Yeah, it's like whenever you watch the Star Trek show from the 60s, you can kind of see the wire. On this show, you could see twine string. It was huge. You could see him holding it up.

There was a guy in the background holding it. Yeah, yeah. You could see the guy making the thunder noises because the mic booms on it. So I was giving my brother hell for watching it. And I sat down.

And because we didn't have cable, there was nothing else to watch. And I didn't have a driver's license. And I just got sucked in like you wouldn't believe. It was so fun. That's the bottom line.

It was absolutely fun. It was so well written. What era were they showing? This was Tom Baker. Tom Baker.

That was pretty much what. They looped, I think, in this era for years. I always liked the Tom Bakers. Yeah, it's good stuff. Whenever it was first being shown here, PBS, WKPC, they had bought the Tom Baker era, which roughly ran from...

It was seven years. It started in the early 70s and ran until 81 in Britain. And they were just looping it. And I. I just got sucked in.

It was sort of love at second sight because I was ridiculing it at first. And I just can't describe what it was about it. It's like at that time, all of the big action shows on TV, you know, it was all kind of pseudo-macho-manly-like. I don't know. Sometimes the 18 pick flowers.

Yeah, but it was all, I'm solving problems with this. And this was a guy who was solving problems by talking his way out of situations. He was smart. He didn't give a damn what anyone thought about him. And I guess as an impressionable little teenager, I saw more in that show to like than in Star Trek Next Generation, which is what I, in theory, should have been really embracing but it was so I felt like on Star Trek you had to go to school and you had to get straight A's and you had to join the military before you ever got to go see any kind of an alien and on this show you just walked in into a phone booth and went off so yeah so so i but anyway i and so eventually kbc they bought all of the series and I was videotaping in.

I eventually got the whole run after a couple of years because they were just constantly playing them every Saturday. And it was my little secret. No one else. I tried mentioning it to a couple of friends. They had never heard of it.

And I didn't want to rock the boat or get pounded, basically. So it kind of stayed my little secret for a long, long time. And then in 2005, or the show ended in Britain in 89 because it had gotten really, really bad. It had gotten embarrassingly bad. I think what they said, the BBC really didn't even support it anymore.

Towards the end, even they were cutting the budget, which they had no budget. They were trying to kill it. They were promoting it. They were trying to kill it slowly. It had been a part of their culture since, what, 1963?

Yeah. So that generation had grown up, and there didn't seem. To be anyone around to pick it up. Part of the problem was the people that loved it in the 70s... they had grown up with the show so the people making it in the 80s were trying to appeal to this fan base that had grown up and they kind of forgot that they need to make it for the 8 year olds and instead they were trying to placate these teenage fans and you know teenage fans are the worst well obviously you didn't look at this episode because this was supposed to do this happened before you know it's insanity and they just kind of lost the spirit of it they lost the fun of it and the BBC got embarrassed by it, and it's too long to go into here.

But basically, also, the guy running it kind of had a flair for the overly dramatic. There's this concept in Britain called panto, and we don't really have it here. Are you guys familiar with that concept? It's something like a big garish play, like they'll do a Pinocchio featuring some B-list star. It's this big musical, and over the top.

Here it's called the sci-fi channel. Yeah, basically the guy running it, he was really into that. So all the costumes suddenly became really loud and overlid. And at the same time they were trying to make it gritty and teenage and just nothing was working. The BBC were sick of it.

And they actually did cancel it in 1985. There was this huge fan backlash. They brought it back. went on for about four more years, and then instead of canceling it, they just said, well, we might make it next year. Well, we might make it the year after that. And they just let it go.

Just shh. Don't forget about it. From what I understand, the way that TV series run in England, it's not like it doesn't have to be consecutive. You know, like there's series one of The Office, and then they cannot make it, and then they can make it three years later. It's not like. set to run every season.

Yeah, they don't get picked up for a continuous run. Yeah, that's the way I understand it. That is the new way. And back then, it was a little bit different. And Doctor Who had ran every single year. at that point, for like 25 years straight without a break, except for that little 85 hiatus.

Can you imagine writing that? Yeah. It's like The Simpsons now. It's like, what do we write about? We've done everything three times.

We just kind of cycle stuff through. The daylights would come on, and then they'd go away, and then they'd bring them back. If the ratings are lagging, let's bring those guys back. That's always working. And when it started in the 60s, everything was done in-house at the BBC.

It was kind of this old boys' club. Mm-hmm. Because the show had been going on for so long, by the time it got to the 80s, when that TV scenario happened that you were talking about, everything was pretty much being done by these outside production houses that could do that, except for Doctor Who. It was the only one that was still kind of being done the old way. And ABC were just wanting to get.

Rid of it. Yeah, they had in-house effects guys and everything else. One of them was a guest a couple years ago at Wonderfest. This guy that designed... k9 he brought you he brought k9 to the show yeah oh wow it's pretty. Cool very cool um wow i didn't know about that um so that was the show that i liked and when i was in high school not so much those later 80 years yeah it was the the shows that were made in the 70s is what pbs was showing first and that's when it was just still really it was cheap but it was entertaining And it was fun.

That's the bottom line. It was just fun. That's the only thing I really knew of it. As a kid, I think I would always see the intro coming on, and I'd be like, this is that show that seems like it's going to be scary, and then it's not scary. Because that intro is creepy.

It seems like something's going to happen, and then. You're like, oh, this is just a guy in a scarf. If you were six years old in Britain and you didn't have anything else to watch, it was terrifying. Or if you were a sad kid in high school in Indiana, it was terrifying. But then later I was supposed to be doing the movie stuff for the Joe Bob, and they sent out whatever movies they wanted.

At one point they released those, I guess this one was almost like a, remembering whatever anniversary it was for Tom Baker, because they did, at the time, it was like a two-tape set of him going through all of his years, because he was on there forever. I just sold that tape on eBay. And I watched that one, and that was like my only, because they played clips from all of his years. So I did get sort of the sampling of the whole run that he was there and kind of what was going on, but it was weird coming totally cold. I mean, coming in like not having hardly any concept of what was going on.

But the funniest thing about that. Specific tape is he was already, like, he's still out there, isn't he, Tom Baker? Because he was already getting up there in years then, and this has been a while ago. But it's funny that every time they, because they were actually playing the clips while he was sitting there, and it's just him sitting in a chair, like, watching them and then responding to the camera. And almost every time he would go, I.

Don't really remember that one. His brain was already going, I guess, because every other clip, I swear he'd go, don't really remember when we shot this one. The really interesting thing about that setup was it was done before DVDs, and before the whole concept of a DVD commentary came out. So it was kind of a unique thing, showing an actor. Sitting there.

Examples of the work that he has done, and ask him to comment on it. And without seeing these clips in context, yeah, you're right, he was lost. He was like, what are we doing here? But now... He's been on several commentaries of his old shows, and he's just larger than life and hilarious and just still insane and great.

He thinks that he is Doctor Who every now and then. He still gets to hold the title, right? Nobody else has done it that long. Yeah, I think he's kind of the definitive Doctor. Well, for America, he's definitely the definitive Doctor.

I first saw it back when Louisville first got cable, which would have been around 80, 81. And if you lived in the city, you got cable. If you lived in the county like me, you didn't get it for a couple of years. Good luck. They might get it to you.

But I lived like, you know, two miles from the city limit, so I'd go visit friends. And they had WOR out of New York, and they were running Doctor Who on Saturday, like mid-morning or afternoon, and it was Tom Baker. And I finally got to see some of it. It was fun. Like you said, it's fun.

I think the biggest thing Doctor Who had going was charm. Yeah. Absolutely. And Tom Baker is a very... charming performer because he combines that fun and that whole I don't give a shit attitude which it worked I really enjoyed it well you. Compared it to the old Star Trek and to me I mean that's kind of I mean they had pretty minimal budget for what they were trying to do especially for Network so it's like to me that was always what worked about the original and you're not watching it for the effects and the cheap sets it's that they were written pretty well and they were meant to be you know kind of a new bar set for sci-fi especially on television for mainstream people in that era and And I think Doctor Who was kind of doing that same thing.

It's like nobody was writing, especially that consistently, nonstop for years. And that is. Kind of what had to carry it because they don't have money. So it's just charm and being kind of intelligent. And I also think something with these old shows, like even in movies from the 50s, sci-fi movies then, it kind of goes through stages where it comes out first, it's popular.

Then maybe 10 years go by, and people are embarrassed by it because it looks cheesy and it looks silly. And then maybe another 10, 15 years go by, and people reevaluate it, and it's still cheesy, but they see it as something very, very charming. The nostalgia factor kicks in, too. I mean, we do that with everything. So that's how the 60s Trek is now, and that's how.

Old Doctor Who is now. British television was rich with a lot of good... kids' genre stuff. You look back then, you had all those Gerry Anderson shows on. You had the Mysterians, you had Thunderbirds, you had all that stuff being produced for kids in Britain with high production value. You had Doctor Who.

It's not something we really had here. We had cartoons or imported shows like Ultramarine, occasionally Thunderbirds or something. We had Stingray on when I was a kid. That's a British show. So, you know, it was kind of rare that you got it into the market.

So, for... Free TV. Well, they don't have free TV in Britain. You still have to pay for it. Yeah, which is weird.

But for network-type television, they had a lot of stuff going on that we didn't have. We hadn't lost in space or we hadn't Star Trek. It never lasted very long. I was still watching all of it. It's intermission time.

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Our courteous attendants are ready and waiting to serve you with a wide and wonderful variety of good things to eat and drink. Who, slew Auntie Rue, is the whisper of death that stalks along shadowed corridors? Won't everybody leave me all alone? Aunt Rue will be so lonely. Don't leave me.

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It's time for Sofa Theater. Planet Earth, 1999. He's back, and it's about time. Who are you? I am.

I'm the Doctor! In the fight for eternity. At midnight tonight, this planet will be pulled inside out. There can only be one master. I never liked this planet, Doctor.

Paul McGann is Doctor Who. Don't panic! Everything is under control! Monday, the 27th of May on BBC One. MUSIC Thank you.

We're going. To get into the movie. Here. Okay, well. So the show ended in 89, and it was really kind of sad, because by that last year, they had kind of figured out, oh, we need to sort of not look at this and do this other stuff, and it finally started going into a really good direction, and then it was canceled, basically, in 89, and it kind of sat dead for Many, many years.

And in America, there was a fan named Philip Siegel, S-E-G-A-L. And he grew up in Britain, and he was a huge fan. And he got it into his head that he wanted to somehow bring it back and bring it back to America. And at the time, he was working for Amblin, which is Steven Spielberg's company. And this is like 82, 83, no, I'm sorry, 92, 93.

And he's developing TV shows for Amblin and Spielberg, like Sequest. Do you remember that? Oh, yeah. I avoided that every week. He was working on that one.

But the whole time, his pet project was to somehow get Doctor Who made, because he hated the way that it ended, and he wanted to bring it back and make it like it was in the 70s whenever he was a kid. And Spielberg was like, okay, whatever, if you want to try it. It's no 10-10, but all right. Don't bother me, kid, I'm busy. Go and make my submarine show.

I have no idea what Steven Spielberg sounds like. Just like that. So the story goes that an executive, I think actually the controller of BBC One or BBC Two, was on set at Amblin. And he was going to take a tour of the Sequest sets. Because they were trying to decide whether or not BBC wanted to buy the show and show it there.

And Segal found out that this guy was there. And he offered to do the tour personally. Usually he'd hand it off to some intern, you know. But he went and he gave the tour to this guy. And the whole time he was talking about Doctor Who and how much he loved it.

And, hey, wouldn't it be great if we did a joint thing and. And basically because he was name-dropping Spielberg's name, BBC got interested. Of course. Because remember, at the time, BBC was still embarrassed by Doctor Who. It was a laughingstock.

No one mentioned it. It was a forbidden topic, pretty much. But the thing is, the BBC also isn't just one company. It's a bunch of little companies. It's not one big mega-corporation.

And there was a branch of the BBC called BBC Worldwide, and they were selling videotapes for Dr. Who Like Crazy. They are the ones that made that videotape that you saw where they got Tom Baker to sit there and look at all of these old clips. And they were selling really, really well. So they wanted to get in on this, and they wanted this to happen.

And again, Spielberg's name. So they got this deal going where they started to develop a new show that was going to be in America. and they were going to start from the ground up, and they were going to completely redo it from scratch. And I've seen this script. I don't like it. I get down on my hands and knees and thank the Lord above that this didn't get made.

I'm so glad, because it was basically, it had very little to do with the Doctor Who that I loved. It was more like a Stargate thing almost. Nice. But the funny thing is Spielberg saw that script, and he thought it read too much like Indiana Jones, and he lost interest. I remember that, yeah, because they traveled back to World War II, and they're fighting Nazis, and I'm like, you can't do that and have Spielberg involved.

And also, he was on a quest for his father, and his father was named Ulysses, and they think that he was the Ulysses from the Greek, and so it kind of had this Sean Connery vibe to it, too, and it really was not Doctor Who, basically. And so Spielberg lost interest, and... Seagal actually got a different job, and he left Amblin, but Spielberg said, eh, you can take this Doctor Who thing with you if you want. Take this on your way out. So the thing is, Universal owned 50% of everything that Amblin did, so Universal still had a stake in it.

BBC still wanted to do it. BBC Worldwide still wanted to do it. They just needed a TV studio. So they started developing more scripts, blah, blah, blah. They asked CBS.

They said no. NBC said no. ABC said no. Fox said no. But then this other guy who ran the Fox movie of the week department said, yeah, why don't we do this?

The problem was the BBC wanted a series. they didn't want a movie of the week. So Seagal worked out this deal where if it did really, really good, it could be what he called a backdoor pilot. And it would turn into, it would be like a sneaky. Pilot, basically. Because he knew that it was going to do great, and they were going to want to make more of it.

And Fox would be like, yeah, that was great. Let's make 26 episodes. And that led to the 1996 movie, which we're going to talk about tonight, which was supposed to be a whole new intro for American audiences who had never seen it, and that's basically the backstory. With that, I guess we can do the full intro here. So, as you said, this week's Sofa Theater feature is Doctor Who, is all it is titled at, according to the old IMDb.

The year is 1996, director Jeffrey Sachs, and the plot, according to that IMDb, is the newly regenerated Doctor takes on the Master on the turn of the millennium, December 31st, 1999. I think it's good that they clear up when the millennium is. I like that they throw that in at the end, in case you were wondering. December 31st. You gotta tell us which millennium we're on right now.

We're making a choice. That's right. With that, spoiler alert, we don't want to ruin this for you, so I guess go seek out the 1996 Doctor Who movie, because we'll go forward here and ruin. It for you, so. Well, it has been 17 years.

That does not hold up. People will complain, movies in the 30s, if you spoil them, you are in trouble. So, where would you like to be in with Doctor Who? We know the backstory of how it got there. Now, what do we want to do with what was on the screen?

I've heard it said that this movie is sort of like, like the story of how the movie got made is almost more interesting than the actual movie. That might be true. He literally went through hell. He had four movie studios who all had their little motivations and they all wanted certain things. So it was like four cooks in the kitchen.

And he's often said that he couldn't really be as creative as he wanted to because he was trying to keep four partners happy. He had Universal, Fox, BBC, and BBC Worldwide. And. With that being said, it's kind of amazing that it's as good as it is. Some people think it's bad.

Some people think it's good. It's definitely not. I'm amazed that it got made. Sounds like a recipe for success to me. I thought it would be interesting because it is technically a movie.

And it was meant for people who had never seen the show. Yeah, it's a reboot more or less. So I'll just put it out here. You guys had never seen it. What do you guys think?

Where do we begin? Which one of those partners wanted Eric Roberts to be? Right. But when your big name is Eric Roberts. That's a problem.

Hey, don't talk bad about the star of Sharktopus, all right? Damn it. Well, there's a funny story there. Universal wanted big stars to be a big draw, and Fox did too. So they were throwing out names of typical action stars of that day, and the BBC insisted that it be a British actor.

That was one of their big, big things. So to compromise, Universal said, okay, the Master's going to be an American quote-unquote name. And the biggest name they could get for the money offering was Eric Roberts. And I've actually got a list of the other people. And his wife.

Well, he was fresh off the success of Best of the Best, Best of the Best 2, and Best of the Best 3. I believe. Quality products. There is a best of the best. Yeah.

I called it like the bestest of the best. Most bestest. Did you hear who they were trying to get before him? It might be on here. There were a lot of people.

There was a huge, huge list. And I kind of wrote down some of the ones that I thought were interesting before. The ones that Universal considered to be a name in 96. And there was Damon Wayans. Wow.

But that was Fox. Yeah. That would be Fox. Randy Quaid. Leonard Nimoy.

Leonard Nimoy. That one, they actually were supposedly shooting stuff. Did you see that? Yeah. Yeah.

Ernie Hudson. Okay. Jim Belushi. Henry Winkler, your Halloween costume. Wow.

Great. Great. Rick Moranis. That would have been amazing. For The Master?

Yes. Steve Bush. That would have been also amazing. Chevy Chase, who was not interested. Then they went the music route for a while.

They approached Roger Daltrey, Nick Jagger, Art Garfunkel. Wait, wait. Did they not get to Lucy, your favorite? I believe they did Adam Ant at one point. Really?

He was for one of the two roles. I've lost track. He was for The Doctor. He was for The Doctor. What is better than Eric?

You hardly ever dress up like Eric. They approached Sting, who actually had a recording conflict. I can see them approaching Sting. The director, Jeffrey Sachs, personally contacted Tom Selleck. Tom Selleck turned it down.

Get this, Tim Curry. Now that would be good. He turned it down because he, quote, did not like Doctor Who. Which is modest to me because you'd think, oh. I thought that would be a shoo-in.

Yeah. He would have camped that up. Tim Curry's British, though, right? Right. Was he for the British part?

I'm wondering if. For the master. For the doctor. He was for the master. I guess it.

Just didn't matter which one was British and which one wasn't. Yeah. See, it would make sense if the Master were American since he's moving into an American. Like, that's the role. Why would they even question that unless whoever they cast was then going to do an American accent?

But I was kind of thinking maybe he said he didn't like Doctor Who because at that time, Doctor Who was a joker. It's a different era. And the one they really wanted was Christopher Lloyd. That's the one I saw. But he was too expensive.

But did you see the rest of that? Eric Roberts is the biggest name that. They could get. What it said, what I read was they initially wanted Christopher Lloyd. He was considered, I think he even kind of wanted to do it, but Universal wouldn't put up the money for him.

They got Eric Roberts and ironically he turned out costing more than Christopher Lloyd. Somehow the deal got screwed up and It's like, oh, man. He was the biggest, cheapest star they could get. You know, Christopher Lloyd ended up doing Cyberchase episodes and wouldn't do Doctor Who. He's in Toronto.

He did. You stop seeing Christopher Lloyd because he priced himself out of a lot of books. Until lately. And now he's like, oh, shit. He'll do commercials.

Now. I think Roberts did a fine job as much as anybody would have. It's just the cheese factor. Yeah, there's a lot in there. He definitely played...

The Terminator. He really tried to be the Terminator. He watched that a few times that day. The reason for that, I've heard, is the original idea was the Master Essence, whatever, was going to get inside the body of the ambulance driver. And the ambulance driver's body was technically dead, and it was going to decay and fall apart throughout the whole movie.

And Roberts was... either allergic to the makeup or too much of a prima donna. So the compromise was the big leather jacket, and he wore the sunglasses because the contact lenses made his eyes. well and everybody would realize he looks like a giant lizard yeah you'll notice that whole fingernail falling off thing that alluded to it they started that and then he got pissy and they were like. Never mind so basically he lost one finger. Yeah it didn't make any sense because they didn't finish it but because i saw that and i was like oh no now they're gonna go the fly route and he's just gonna be a big mess by the time Comes dragging into the TARDIS. I kind of think that would have made the snake thing make more sense.

Kind of. Or if he was just shedding his skin and, like, had to get a new body. Because of that. That would make more sense. Not the master.

I mean, it's two, though. This is pre-zombie. I mean, now it would have been great. Hey, zombies are all good. Decomposition's in.

I guess. It was made in Canada. Maybe they didn't have it. I don't know. But.

I kind of, I know it's, he's so camp by the end. I kind of, like, that one brought it around for me, actually. Like, there's midway in when I'm like, I don't know that I will play in the, would I watch this game? And I'm like, midway in, I'm like, I don't know. This is pretty, like, it's badly piecing this stuff together.

And by the time he gets the robe on and he suddenly becomes a villain from Power Rangers, I'm like, oh shit, I might tune in for. This every week. If it gets this level of campy, I'm like, I would have fun with that. I wanted him to wear that the whole time. Yeah, that was awesome.

I think, again, that's why I kind of like him as the master, because he... He wasn't like mustache twirly evil, and he wasn't sadistic thug. He was kind of a fun evil. By the time he got out of the Terminator mode, when they really let him play, he's pretty fun. I saw this interview with him where he was talking about this movie, and he said that he was basically playing it like an eight-year-old who had the biggest gun.

It wasn't evil, it was like a Halloween type of evil. Kind of gleeful. Gleeful, that's a new word. Because there's so many moments in there where... he's almost having fun. You know, like, he pats the kid on the cheek.

He's like, you get to live. Good for you, man. No, my favorite is when the kid's like, you kill me. He's like, you want me to kill you? Yeah.

I'm like, okay, that was just funny. You're just doing material now. No, no, no. You're funny. I think my favorite, one of my favorite scenes is when they're in the ambulance and they're going to the institute to get the clock and the big science institute place and They're in the traffic jam.

And the doctor is hopping up and down, all impatient, going, come on, come on, come on, come on, you know, which was his character perfectly. Grace, she's basically talking to the master, who she thinks is the ambulance driver, and saying, kind of winking at him, like, yeah, he's crazy. Crazy. Whatever. And the master's just sitting there, grinning, taking it all in, and he even corrects her.

Grammar? Her. Grammar, yeah, and it's just, I mean, you can kind of, because the back story in the old show is that the Doctor and the Master were friends. And at some point, they had a big falling out, and one went evil, one went good. But the way Eric Robert plays it, you can kind of see where they would have been friends whenever they were kids playing pranks on their teachers.

They kind of both have the same kind of fun. I did spend a good majority of the movie playing that game of like, okay, what is supposed to trace backwards? And what am I supposed to know? Or what are you drawing on? I mean, there's many a time where I'm like, I guess this would be a lot easier if I knew tons of backstory.

Cause that's the thing. They bring the master in and I'm like, is he an established character? I'm like, I don't know. They're selling it like that, but sometimes that's the reboot idea is we're going to give you this backstory that even the fans didn't know about. So it's like the whole time I'm trying to piece together what the deal is with the master backstory.

And the one I was going to ask you about, like the eye thing, how much was that tied to the previous show? In name reference only. Because that's the thing. They're like, we've never opened it before. I'm like, it's an eye.

That's the whole point, isn't it? Why would you name it the eye if you're not going to open it? It's probably never a good idea to open something. Called the eye. Why would you name it that if you're not going to open it?

Come on. I think you guys are kind of putting your fingers on why it failed as a pilot. Well, one thing I noticed, I mean, if you're rebooting this for an audience that you have to consider has never seen this, it's an American audience. So they start off with Scarrow. the Master, the Doctor, Regeneration, and the TARDIS within the first 30 seconds. And it's like, whoa.

And dogs. And dogs. In the background. So, yeah, it's an odd place to start off right knee-deep. So you guys have never seen Doctor Who at all.

I've seen a few episodes. Okay, that first minute or two, what were you thinking when all this info-dub stuff happened? enjoying it or were you just i gotta watch this because it's my homework it. Was definitely a homework vibe i mean now i feel like you've done a disservice to the entire series just by having this be my entire perception. But this was the reboot but this would have been you in 96 right you were the target audience. Hop on on low tide i've seen i'll put it this way i've seen everything 2005 on.

And that's thanks to bits. Thanks to bits. This was recently. And I've seen bits and pieces and maybe eight episodes of the old stuff. And I was almost bored to tears.

With this one, you're saying. I feel a lot better. I did have to let it start in a stretch. This was like, it was like, we're going to be edgy 90s. We're going to be, it's almost like a procedural.

We're going to throw a little ER in there. And some camp in there. And there was, to me, the only fun of it was Eric Roberts. It was like the bad scenes of... Like the shoot-em-up gang scene at the beginning was like the bad human scenes from the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

That's exactly what I thought. When they start running down the street, I'm like, I'm getting a real Ninja Turtles vibe here. This is like the worst parts of that movie. It's what I felt like. I think the worst dialogue is how many... streetwise Chinese thugs say, give me a five.

It's San Francisco, man. Come on. And it just, it was too, playing up too much to that, it's dark, brooding 90s feel. Well, that's the aspect that's so American. And that's why it doesn't work.

You can always feel Canada to me. Oh, it was San Francisco. It was still Canada. I didn't know initially that when I was young that you can't do that on television was Canadian, but I knew something was. Off about it.

I was like, this isn't ours. This is foreign, like another... Another planet kind of thing. Do you get that vibe when you watch early years of the X-Files? The early years of the X-Files are kind of lame to me.

Fun fact, they were making the X-Files in the same area. They used the same hospital. To me, it wasn't lit right. When you talk about the old Doctor Who, there was not a lot of fun to it. From the first episode in 2005, It was serious, it was a little scary, and it was a lot of fun.

Is that the one with the mannequins chasing her? Every bit of that is... My kids immediately were like, let's watch another. They were like, this almost scared me, let's watch another. Not nightmare level scared, but fun level scared.

And the only reason that they watched this with me. And I interviewed my son afterwards. He should have brought him on. He did. He actually interviewed and sent me an email to report what his son did.

Nice. And he was like, I was like, well, did you like it? Well, yeah. And I'm like, well, you don't have to tell me. In the kid way where you just kind of like everything?

You don't have to tell me you liked it just because it's Doctor Who and because I know you like the rest of it. I said, he goes, well, it's okay. And I said, would you. Watch it again? No.

That's how you know that it's... Because, like I said, when I was. They've seen every episode, and they'll come home, and they'll turn on Doctor Who now. And they were watching a Christmas episode on my way here, just because it's fun. They'll put it on and do crafts or whatever, and they're just, you know...

It's on TV. It's like the thing to do for them. It's funny, this 96 movie, the people that remade the show for 2005, they looked at the 96 movie and almost step by step they did the opposite of what the movie did. It kind of became a lesson in how to not make a successful TV pilot. And the weird thing is, because...

At the time, whenever they were making it, they were trying to please everybody. They were trying to please people who had never seen it. They were trying to please people who were these diehard... I mean, if you guys think Star Wars and Star Trek fans are insane, Doctor Who fans in England are... I think that might be one of the reasons why I liked the show, too, is because I didn't have all that fan culture here because it really wasn't known.

Like, over there, if I had lived in Britain, I probably would be like Tim Curry. I would probably be like, I don't like this show because the fans ruined it. I'm sick to death of you people. So the weird thing is, as a fan, I probably would have been devastated if they hadn't done all that fan service stuff. I mean, I can look at it now and realize, oh, that was wrong.

They shouldn't have done that. But at the time, I was like, they have to do all this because I want it to be just like the old show, which was completely wrong. When they did it subtle, it was good. Like, when he's going through the locker and he pulls out the scarf and he's like, no. That was clever.

Like, that was just sort of a nod to the old series, but without hitting people over the head who don't know what they're doing. I think everything in this that is British works. Yeah. Everything that is Americanized and homogenized doesn't. It's like the difference between British cheese and American cheese.

American cheese is just flat. British cheese isn't even individually wrapped. I think this guy did a good job. I like what they did with the TARDIS in this. They made it, for me, a much more homey, fun place to be.

I tell you, as a fan who grew up watching the old, over-lit cardboard sets, the TARDIS interior was just... It was mind-blowing to see that. That's what I will give them credit for. This had a good budget. You can tell they pulled in American finance. and they went, okay, let's throw some money at this thing.

They were steampunk a decade before steampunk. I really like that. The touch is where he had his chair and he was listening to his phonograph and there were clocks everywhere. You can see where an aged doctor... He's like, I'm going to put my comfortable stuff in here.

I like that. And I wanted more of that. Sounds like you saw the guy who stole the body. He was wearing a shroud and a GED tag on his toe. Somehow, I don't think the second coming happens here.

Right. You think he's going to go to a better hospital? It's funny. In some ways, they had money. And in some ways, they ran out of money.

Right. Well, they blew it all at the beginning of the set. They spent a ton of money on the set. And Eric Roberts. Yeah, hoping they could keep using it.

Yeah, and bringing in Eric. And the scene where the ambulance gets stopped in the traffic jam because the chicken truck had turned over. Like, you know, it happens. The guy, the director actually wanted it to be some sort of a circus train scene. derailing and there was going to be these wild animals and all that's a different tv movie all they could afford were chickens. Well you know chickens got the job done they stopped the ambulance that's all you.

Need it's right i kind of like you know chickens made the world then but there's this one pass of the camera where it does a close-up on the uh chicken and the clucking noises is actually the director doing it off camera. He did a lot of that dubbing after the fact didn't he because there's two or three other times they cited it well it's actually the director's voice they added in. And But you know what? It's like. In the beginning, it's...

I really sympathize for you guys who hadn't seen it. And you're like, what's going on? Because to me, one of the best aspects of the show is the TARDIS. And the whole... Do you guys know in the middle of the movie where the Chang-Li, the kid, he goes to the police box.

He has the key. He walks inside. It kind of shows his point of view. Or not his point of view. It shows him walking through the door.

Looks, walks back out, walks around it, and then goes back in. That should have been the first introduction to the TARDIS. Because in the beginning, it's just you see this blue box flying, and then it cuts to this library. And I don't think people who had never seen it before would get that this library is supposed to be inside this box. And that's one of the most neatest ideas about this whole show, and they completely get it wrong in the first minute.

That's hard to do in the introduction, I guess. But, I mean, you're right. That does. I think I knew just because I know that's the deal with Doctor Who. But if you were going in totally cold, like, yeah, I don't think you would piece that together.

And that's the way the reboot in 2005, or the show coming back in 2005. They don't show the inside of the ship until about halfway through. And it's because the girl... She basically does the same thing that the kid in the 96 movie did. It shows her walking inside, shows her face, the look of shock.

She goes back outside, walks around it, and then runs in, and the camera pans back, and it's this huge... interior. It's kind of almost, now that I think about it, it's almost shot in the shot of how they did it in the 96 movie. One thing they did in the 2005 reboot is it's from Rose's point of view. You meet the Doctor through Rose. Rose is the audience surrogate, so you don't have to explain everything.

You don't have to front load it. You can just see through her eyes. She sees the TARDIS for the first time when we see the TARDIS for the first time. That would be a better approach for a reboot. The whole first season is through their holding your hand and walking you through.

They don't front load all the You. Know, you're in a weird way alluding to one of my biggest complaints about this movie. The whole notion that he's half-human. And I hated that with a passion. I still hate it as a fan.

That was never in the old show. That was basically the American studios trying... They were afraid that the American audiences would not relate to this aliens. He's an alien. He's already British, and that's bad.

So, like, we'll make. Him like Spock. The kids really like that Spock guy. We'll make him half human, half alien. Everybody likes it.

And the whole point of having a companion is that is your, that is the person you're supposed to relate to. And the companion is relating to the doctor. And I absolutely hated that half human thing so much. And so much so, everyone else hated it, that when the show came back in 2005, it was never even mentioned. they were basically like la la la that didn't happen la la la and we'll never speak of it yeah it is interesting spoken of. Ever that that is technically that's what i think is interesting is that they do at least they have canonized this now it is part of the lineup he is a doctor this storyline did happen more or less so it's weird when they do these little offshoot americanized or weird you know whoever wrote this nonsense and now they have to sort of gloss over them or retcon them in one.

Or the other. Well, and they are kind of really pulling all that back in now because there are other doctors that, at least one other doctor, that we're trying to forget about. Right now. So that's a good thing. Well, we don't have to tell you all of our past.

Speaking of the other doctor, it opens up with a guy who is not him. And for you guys who never seen it, what was that like? seeing someone who you think is the hero and then he's not. What are your impressions of that? I don't know if I necessarily had an impression of really anything. I did.

I was let down when he came back. I kind of like the old guy. As a girl, you're like, oh, he's younger and more attractive now. I mean, honestly. They were trying to get the audience.

That was more attractive? Well, one of the big complaints that people had or they said was a problem was the movie starts out and there's this older guy who is established to be the hero and then the hero dies and he changes his body and his personality like 25 minutes in yeah and they felt like how can anyone really you know it would it would lose. People it well it wouldn't make any sense if you don't know that i mean going completely cold once again it's like you would be what like you don't understand that they do that so the fact that he just comes back and sits up and starts. Talking and you're like wait So now it's a vampire movie? I don't know.

You've got to go with something else we don't. Some other thing. Did that work for you at all? The whole movie was very disorienting. I came into it with an assumption that there were set rules that I just didn't know.

So when something happened, I was like, well, clearly I didn't know that was feasible in this universe, but it's something. That is, which is kind of an interesting. I mean, it was a very lawless sort of film as a standalone because everything. Everything. Was constantly changing.

The stakes were changing. What was possible and impossible were changing with no real background at all. So it was sort of a surreal viewing experience. Not entirely displeasurable. But not an oddity.

Not entirely displeasurable. That's what they were going for. What were some that you liked? Was there anything that you liked about it? Besides the hot young guy?

I don't get that. I'm sorry. I like Will Sasso. Yeah, Will Sasso. That's right.

Will Sasso. The disorderly, orderly Will Sasso? Yeah. I'm sorry, when he walked out of the booth that time and we got the whole flowing hair look at him, I was just like, somewhere there's a Whitesnake cover band. That's lost its lead singer.

He looks way too much like a bad David Coverdale wannabe. I can't handle it. He's like a British Jesus. I don't know. I just thought he looked very Beethoven-ish when he put the outfit on.

I thought that's what they were getting at because she was obsessed with classical music and opera. I thought That's what they were getting at, but I feel like that kind of. I don't know. I don't get that. A fun fact that he's wearing a wig, and the actor absolutely hated the wig.

So did I. Whenever he got hired, his hair was a little bit longer, and at the time, everyone's idea of what a Doctor Who should look like is kind of Vic Torian or Edwardian. They always wanted him to look all old-fashioned with long hair. And Paul McGann had just come back from doing a World War I movie, and his head was shaved, basically. And he went up to the producer, and he's like, hey, wouldn't this be great to have a completely different look?

You know, we should totally do this. And the producer's freaked, because to their mind, it was impossible for him not to have long hair. So they made him wear that wig, absolutely hated it, and they made him wear the outfit i. Didn't hate the outfit i kind of like the. Outfit a hardcore you said vicious punk doctor i think that'd be.

Cool so when 2005 happened and you got that hardcore buzzed haircut leather jacket was. Like yeah i was i don't know i was just not sold on him in general i don't i i i think I don't know. He's not engaging, really. The thing is, I was sad when the old guy died, because I was like, I think I could have been on board with that guy. I think he seemed like he would have at least been interesting.

He's not going to pull in the young female audience, obviously, but I was like, he had more of the fatherly figure kind of thing, and I guess that's why they wanted to go a whole 180 degrees. We want somebody, which they kept saying younger. I'm like, how old is this guy? He's not really, you're not, he's not like they pulled in. Like now they were cast up until recently.

They were casting younger. And like, that made sense. Like this way they were acting like this guy was young where he wasn't really. But again, it's like he wasn't the old guy that the other one was. He's got the wannabe rock star hair.

It looked like it was somebody behind a desk going, we need to do something different than what we've been doing. Come on, let's bring it. Eric Roberts can't pull in all the ladies. And he would. Those dreamy green reptile eyes.

So, I don't know. I think I felt like they were, he, like, maybe some of it was his acting. Maybe some of it was them behind the desk. choosing all this stuff, but I felt like he was very programmed to be different from the last guy, and to me, he just didn't pull you in at all. Keep in mind, there were four studios saying, do this, do that, don't do that. I sympathize with them with this whole thing, and I think it has its good points, but.

You alluded to the guy that we had on our show from England, and his theory is that Paul McGann was cast because he was the least offensive to all four partners. Yeah. I can see that. Safe casting, sort of. Sort of.

As a longtime fan, I don't know about the canon when it comes to how many Doctors. I think we're up to, what, eight or nine now? Eleven. Eleven? Okay.

Maybe. Do they count Peter Cushing? Yeah. No, they don't. I wondered, because he did.

One or two movies? Was it one or two? He did two. Two movies, which I saw when I was a kid, and I enjoyed them. He did one more movie than the Paul McGann, who is considered canon.

And it's a long story. Why? why Peter Cushing is not considered canon, but. They're holding the Death Star against him. I mean, as a fan, I absolutely love that the old Doctor was in it and turned into Paul McGann, because to my eyes, that made him legitimate. That kept the line of Kings going, basically.

But Peter Cushing is not considered canon because the movies that he did were basically remakes of TV episodes. Earlier shows, okay. And They do the character different. Like, he's actually human. He's more like an inventor.

Yeah. His name is Doctor Who. That's his last name. He's Mervin Who. It's odd that they chose to do that.

Doctor Hosea Who. And it's like, he's never been considered canon. Whenever you see flashbacks of all the guys in the show, he's never in it. But Paul McGann from the 96 movie is. Yeah.

Because in Britain they were doing a lot of stuff like that. They would do a TV serial or series, and then they'd later make a movie. They did that with Quatermass. Yeah. Where all those Quatermasses were originally TV shows, and then they came along and did them as movies at Hammer.

And borrowed a little bit for Doctor Who. You could see that lineage going on a little further down. But it's just something they did out of habit. Yeah, that's where I had to go. Again, I didn't know when I was watching it, but I thought, at least knowing how the regeneration works, I was like, okay, so they're bringing in the old guy.

I was like, is that actually the old guy? And then I was surprised it was the original guy that they brought back. And then in reading, they didn't even want to use him. The studio wanted it to be Tom Baker. Because they were trying to get American audiences.

That was the only Doctor Who anybody in America knew. God, that would have been such a continuity. But that would have, yeah, I'm like, how do you do that? Philip Segal was enough of a nerd to know that it would have blown the continuity of it. For Doctor Who fans, continuity is everything.

And I know I struggle with it myself. It's my secret game in my closet. I'm like, how does this work? You would have been a co-fifth Doctor. I mean, I've completely reconciled the whole half-human thing in my head.

I'm not going to go into it now. It's so inside space baseball. Ben explained it to me. It actually makes sense from a certain perspective. You are quite upset about that.

It's funny. The only thing I'm really nerdy about is Doctor Who and Bigfoot. Everything else, I'm kind of like, I don't get comic books, I don't get superheroes, cars, nothing. But Doctor Who, for whatever reason. It got me.

I'm curious, what did you guys think of the other characters, like Grace and the kid? What were your thoughts on them, if any? How bored were you? I didn't find the movie, like Lucy said, completely unenjoyable. But it's just so forgettable.

I don't have an opinion, good or bad. It's just basically like a filled an hour and some minutes. Is that bad that it's not completely terrible that you can't enjoy the terribleness of it? It's so mediocre. We've watched great movies and we've watched terrible movies.

Everyone usually has a lot to say about them either way. But I just like, I don't have anything to say about this movie. I have nothing to say. The lady reminded me of my friend Kim. That's the only thing that I could think of as I was watching this movie.

I was like, when she has all her makeup on, she really looks like my friend Kim. That was all I thought. I wasn't like, oh, her performance is amazing. Or like, wow, this is really working. Or this isn't really working at all.

It was just like, that was all I was thinking. Wouldn't that be full? I don't think so. Jesus, I think so. I know you.

You're tired of life, but afraid of dying. There was music. Madam Butterfly. You were there. I saw you last night.

It wasn't me. I don't know who I am, but I know that you know me. Please go away. Please. You're my only hope.

I'll call security. Do you know who I am? I don't care who you are. Leave me alone. Please, you must help me.

You're a doctor. Yeah, well. My oath just expired. I didn't like her when I first saw it. and as the years have gone on, I've thought more about it. Certain aspects of her I really like now, but things like, okay, she's a surgeon, and she's on call, so she goes to the opera wearing the big, huge ball gown.

Which is what you wear on opera, apparently. Yeah, and then she's with this guy who she's living with. Brian. Brian, yeah, and. It's like, apparently, whenever they go out to the opera, she's always on call and she always gets called off.

And this was like the last straw. I've had it with you. Somebody is dying from a gunshot wound and she's going to stand me up at the opera one time too many. I'm taking all my stuff out of the house. I'm moving out.

But they're having to call her during this emergency. During surgery. And distract her from the case at hand. Right. To tell her how displeased I am.

Grace is a jerk. I feel like if you're getting a surgeon, you're either on board or you're not. Yeah. You can't just change your mind. Can't have both ways, Brian.

I didn't, I, I, in terms of Kim, I did find her unappealing. I'm sure Kim's lovely. But, but not to the point that it was problematic. I mean, I didn't, I wasn't invested in anybody doing anything. Please, don't, just because I'm a stupid, stupid man, don't feel like you have to hold anything back.

If you hate it, just say it, really. No, I mean, I would have, I would have enjoyed it more if I'd hated it. I think. See, to me, that's almost more damning. Yeah, it's just bland.

It's hopelessly pedestrian. And that's why I think, as a fan, the things I love about it are the connections to the bigger overall picture. But if you're new and just coming into it, you're not going to know those connections. You're not going to care about those connections. And it's going to just completely blow the.

Lap as well. There are comparable examples. Look at Star Trek, the motion picture. Yeah. Look at how boring.

They did not know how to bridge that into movies until 2. They do Wrath of Continence while it's like you're back on the TV show. The people are the same people. The situation's there. The humor's there.

It worked. This was an example of a reboot where they tried to get a little too smooth. They didn't try to bring everybody in who'd never heard of it. They just said, okay, you'll catch up or you'll get it if you like it. We'll do it enough where some people liked it in the first place, so let's just do what we did then and try to bring it in.

I think this goes back to There's just a baseline of make something good. Don't try to please people. If it's good, people will appreciate it. They will. Producers never think that way.

I'm sorry, Ben. This was not good. I love Doctor Who. I wanted that link between old and new so that we can start going back in. I've taken it upon myself to go back into older episodes and watch them.

But it just, it was almost painful. Like, okay, here's my geek TARDIS moment. I like, you know, you're told and believe things about the TARDIS, that there are all these extra rooms and almost infinite places within the TARDIS. I like knowing that they're there, but I don't want to see them. This, I liked, I like when you see the main room, maybe you see a little hallway, and that's it.

I don't like seeing... The eye, that was all campy, cheesy stuff. I didn't like seeing any of that. See, I like that set at least. I liked seeing it, but again, I don't have the history.

The eye, that was actually a holdover from one of the many early scripts. One of the early plots was going to be the eye would be open, and it was going to start bringing in ghosts from San Francisco's past, and San Francisco was going to be full of ghosts. This is Ghostbusters 2! Awesome! Bernie Hudson!

Rick Moranis. And Rick Moranis. It's all starting to come together. It's a great movie. I see this working out.

I think that's the problem for me is watching it. Again, we mostly do theatrical stuff. So trying to do something, again, I'm not hardcore about it. If it's a movie, we'll work it in. But I think with this one, that was almost the kiss of death as it trying to be a movie is it felt bad. very TV-sized.

Which again, you're dealing with something that was a TV show that went on to be another TV show. So it maybe would have worked in some sense had it been written better. But it's just like they were trying to do things that... And that's the other thing. It also felt like it was pieced together from stuff other stuff.

They were just piecing stuff together. They get the evil slug alien thing that just felt like it was ripped off of a lot of bad straight-to-video horror movies. For a second, I thought it was going to do body jumping, and I was like, oh, at least it'll be like The Hidden, because The Hidden's awesome. And I was like, I kind of was waiting for that, and then it didn't really do that. It's like, if the whole. thing of the master wanting to steal the doctor's body.

Why didn't the snake thing just jump into the doctor's body? You know, that's one part that my kids loved is the snake part of it. And that's maybe the cheesiest part of the whole thing. I thought the goo was a little too... jizzy to put a specific term on it jizzy is that it's no it's. Space yeah it was a little ectopic again back to our.

Ghostbusters it could have been green or something else or purple it didn't have to. Be like or if nothing else if you're going to take it down that perverse road then it's just taken from Alien because there's icky goo all over Alien movies and it's meant to be perverse that's you know you're dealing with gear He is perverse. I'm kind of thinking back to the years before 2005 and the TV show came back. It's called The Wilderness Years among Doctor Who fans. And it's like.

Oh, the inside geekery. It's like we were so wanting Doctor Who, any kind of Doctor Who, to come back. And. For a while there, the Paul McGann movie was called the George Lazenby. Yeah, kind of.

Unfair. And because this one pilot movie came out and nothing happened, everyone kind of thought, well, that's it. That was our last chance. It's the nail in the coffin. And so because of that, I would watch it over and over again. trying to love it you know I was trying to make myself love it and I'd find these little bitty moments.

It's still gonna come back it's still gonna come back it's still gonna work it's still. Gonna work yeah so it's to me that's like listening to some of the bad later REM albums or it could be like a Star Wars fan wanting to love Phantom Menace trying to find the good bits. I really want to know about trading and governments it's the best sword fight. Ever I swear they can blockade a whole planet. With a few ships they can but Thank God we have the Imperial Senate or whatever the hell.

I want to hear more debate. So now it's like this odd, you know, thing that I just love just because it's so odd because I see it in the context of the bigger overall 50 years. And there's just things, again, like I keep coming back to Grace. So much of what she did was ponderous to me. Like, God, like the scene where she's running down the hallway in the ball gown and, you know, the girls are kind of out.

And it's just... And I was like, you know, that's not the most cleavage that's ever been in Doctor Who. There's a show called Planet of the Fire, Google Image of Kids. One of the sad things was, Brian, was that her boyfriend? Yeah, Brian.

Yeah, he basically packed all of his stuff and left, including the sofa. He was always going to leave. Yeah. See, Grace, and that was my response. You asked what we thought about her, too.

That's what I felt like as soon as she came on the screen. I went, she looks familiar. And that's what she'd done a ton of TV at that time. And that's why, maybe why it just started to feel more and more TV-like. Because then she's, like, running around and she's, like, most of the really bad lines come from her.

Like, she's the, finally meet a guy and he's from another planet. I'm like, is that a holdover from Starman or Power of the Duck? I don't know. Take your pick. I was so confused when she said that because I'm like, wait, you were trying to get him to the hospital because you thought he was crazy?

And now he's, like, the guy for you? From another, yeah. Yeah, like, she wanted nothing to do with him. And then she was like, kiss me again. And I'm like, She seems.

To be a little bit dense because she's found out that he actually has two hearts and walked through a plate glass window. That buys him a little bit of, you know, I'm from another. Planet, juice, I would think. Suspend disbelief a little bit. It's not that I didn't buy her, like, as an actress.

It's just I didn't buy her as a surgeon. No. She would have never made it through medical school at this rate. Like, you maybe might get a job at, like, Pottery Barn? Probably didn't go through metal.

Fox was hoping that this would be a big hit, and you can kind of see they were like, hey, a red-headed doctor, Dana Scully X Falls, that's real big, let's make her a red-headed doctor. We're filming in Canada? What the hell? She is no Dana Scully. Sorry, I won't put up with that.

The producer, he was saying that with all these different entities and partners pulling at him every way, it Again, it got to the point where he couldn't be creative. He was a referee more than anything. And it just, like, the ending, I hate the ending. And it's because it was the one ending that all four could live with and could agree with. The ending sucks because if you can just go back in time and save everybody, why doesn't he do that every episode?

Yeah, that would be every episode. At least that final battle scene is the most entertaining because Eric Roberts is chewing up the scenery. I think it's everything before. That middle section is kind of grueling to me. The Tom and Claude party.

Before that, that is the most low stakes motorcycle chase I've ever seen. He drives between two trucks. That was the most action. He jumped over the curb once. I was like, shit, this is crazy.

Fans in Britain hated that because they said they were making an American action movie. You can see it. They hate that. It's just like Chips. But yeah, it was like the budget of a Chips episode.

I think one of the biggest problems, too, is something that American fans always love about the old show is because it was so British. There was this Britishness about it. And there was actually a lot more humor in this script. more British-style humor that was taken out because Fox thought it wasn't funny or it was cheesy. You know the point where the motorcycle cop, they're trying to get the keys from the motorcycle, and he takes the gun, he points it at himself, which I kind of like because that was different from anything you'd see on A-Team or MacGyver. He's like, I'm threatening to kill myself if you don't give me this.

Like, he's saying, give me the keys. And the cop's like, no. And then they cut this scene where it pans back. And there's this big crowd of onlookers. And they go, give him the keys.

Like the scene in Holy Grail where he goes to get on with it. And the studio made him cut it out because they thought it was too silly. Stuff like that would have been great. More of that would have made a huge difference. That was one of many times I said what at least probably everyone in the American audience was saying is you don't take candy from strangers.

Then I went back and checked. I was like, there's got to be backstory there. Of course it is. It's referenced to the old second season or something. It was years and years ago.

They're referencing the candy thing. That was a Tom Baker thing. I thought even the second Doctor did it. I thought it was a carryover from a couple, but it was from 20 years ago. It was mainly Tom Baker with the scarf.

Which is one of those aspects that made me fall in love with the show. It's like he would go, he would meet somebody new, and rather than be like, a federation red shirt and try to shoot them he would offer him candy say hi i'm the doctor you want a piece of candy. That's where this version dropped the ball though because you're sitting at home going i don't know what the hell that means like why like there's got to be if you're gonna you know find that way to sort of piece it together and bridge the old fans you know into this new thing you also got to do it from the aspect of okay and you've got people coming in cold and don't know what they're doing so i don't know there's just there's a several of those things that were just like totally fell flat for people that didn't know what they were doing, which, again, they were trying to bring in new people.

So you can't really do that. Oh, Dave, you're a big Universal Monster fan. What did you think of the Frankenstein bit? I'm trying to remember the Frankenstein bit. When he wakes up.

I was skipping around a bit. He was regenerating. Will Sasso was watching Frankenstein on TV. I thought, yeah. Clever.

Once again, that's Universal getting their marketing. That was something that they could actually afford. We have the rights to that. It's free. They've never shied away from merchandising those aspects.

That's the thing. The movie's odd in that it's 1996, yet it feels like 1986. I'm looking at X-Files being produced at the same time. It's been on for a few years. I'm seeing a level of production that I'm not seeing in this film.

It's all because of that mishmash approach Like I said, if there had been more of that stuff, if there had been more self-consciousness throughout the whole thing with the humor and the little homages, I would have enjoyed it much more. And I think American audiences would have just found it quirky and maybe more amusing. But they go with that safe, weird path. Yeah. And it just makes it.

That leads to a mess. But who, okay, this is the question I'm asking. A pilot you can show in an hour after another show that's on TV. And I might say, oh, I've heard of Doctor Who. Oh, they're restarting it.

I'll watch it after X-Files. Would have been a perfect show. But I'm not going to sit down for a two-hour show. of something I've never seen. Well, they were trying to, I guess, multi-market it. It got theatrical release, I think, some places.

I read that somewhere. But, you know, I heard it actually went over fairly well in some markets, but not in the U.S. Yeah, that's what I was going to say. In England, they really liked it. Well, again, Greg, I think the problem was they were trying to get a series made.

They were trying to do a straight pilot with the series, and no TV studio wanted to do it. So the only place that would buy it was the Fox Movie of the Week department. So they were trying to make it a pilot. Any way they could. And again, they were trying to mishmash it into something that it wasn't.

And it's funny. All the things that you guys are saying are reasons why it failed. They're very good reasons. At the time, they blamed the failure in America because it was being shown opposite the episode of Roseanne where Dan has a heart attack and dies. And they said, that's why nobody.

I think I was on that then. Dan dies? I don't know. I was watching the Doctor Who. That was too far into Roseanne.

Never mind. Yeah, that was like the part of Roseanne that everybody had already stopped watching. Yeah, including me. But that was the reason why they gave to the British fans who were like, but it did 10 million viewers here. Why aren't you making a series?

And the reason that the BBC kept going back to it was, well, there was this popular sitcom on. It was a pivotal episode. Nobody in America watched it, so the Fox studio. Didn't want to do it. That kind of intentional...

Cross-programming goes on. Oh, yeah. If there is no love from studio for a product, they will sink it like that. They do it in movies all the time now. And on television, I'm sure it's a way of life.

I've seen that happen to a lot of pilots and things. Let's put it on opposite the most powerful powerhouse thing on TV. Well, you see it fail because it's like, no, they didn't want to go on. They didn't want to keep spending the money. They didn't have the confidence.

With Firefly. Yeah, sure. It was on against the World Series. Let's move it to a worse spot. Torpedoed Firefly.

Yeah. So it goes on. They did it with Freaks and Geeks as well. Yep. They would put it on against Good Things.

And they kept moving it. Then they put it to ABC Family. I'm like, this is the best show on TV. It is. I can't even find it.

Yeah. It just gets lost. Okay, I have a question for, I guess, everybody. I guess, hopefully, you'll have a little more insight, Ben. Is there a reason she becomes possessed all of a sudden?

What the hell is that? Well, in the ambulance, he kind of throws up goo at him. and a little bit gets on her wrist. But is that a thing in the series? Is that something that was established? And why did it take 45 minutes of the actual movie, which was like a day?

I guess it was because it was just a little bit and it was working its way up. Because those other guys were covered in it. See, that's a moment where I gave it undue credit because I just assumed that it was something within the mythology of the series that the Master has the capability of. That at any key moment you could turn evil for no good reason. Except it fits the plot right here and now.

This is where it needs to happen. I don't understand why this movie was set three years in the future. Like, we're going to do a movie about the future. 19 well I was. Going to make sure is the only because I forgot that it was 96 as like I guess they should it was coming out around that time and I went back and look I'm like no they know somebody were.

Guessing we were going to get the 99 so I. Had seen strange days yeah and they just all do that will make it for. You all stealing from other stuff is a lot of that they completely. Missed the whole y2k paranoia that was nowhere this. Yeah yeah where was the news going.

On I know I mean It is a show about time. It is a moment in time to turn a millennium. But I feel like they just didn't work that in enough for it to be important. I mean, the clock and things like that, I understand. But at the same time... that clock could have been made in 1996.

Just the same, you know? That was the most lame New Year's party. Do people do costume New Year's parties? That felt forced, too. I actually kind of liked that bit.

I thought it was fun. Yeah, but. With Will Sesso just dancing around. Again, well, Sasso's a dork, so that was entertaining. Again, this is me trying to find little things that I liked about it.

I will love this. I will. I swear I'll love this. I love Nixon, and I love this movie. They're like, there's a scene at the party when he's going to turn on the clock, and they can't get the clock going, and the guy turns around and he looks up at these techs, and the one is just shrugging his shoulders.

I mean, I love how it was this little throwaway moment, and Something that wasn't part of the old show that they did in this movie and they've never done since, they kind of do this thing where because he's a time traveler, whenever he meets you, he can kind of see a little bit into your future and a little bit in the past. He doesn't see your whole life story. He just gets a bit of the now. In a weird clairvoyant kind of way? Yeah, so every time.

He meets someone, he'll do that whole thing. Oh, don't answer the second question on your phone. Answer the third. They never did that in the old show. They never did it in the new show.

I kind of like that. It could be cool, but again, that's one that becomes confusing. Because at that point, the one where he gets super specific, I'm like, So are we to think that in some past travel, he's run into this guy and. He will actually, it feels like that. Like he knows who he is because he's met him in the future and he knows who he's going to be.

And then because of that, but obviously that's not the case. He's just like, yeah, he doesn't need to tell him. He's just psychic. It's equally as weird. He was going to take a test in like a week or so.

So he can kind of see a little bit, a little bit back. But again, they don't explain it. This is me thinking about it in my head since 96. Oh, that must mean, you know. That totally makes sense.

Again, this is me in my closet clutching my dog. He's like, I will love this. I will love this. He's furiously polishing turds. Shine, damn you, shine.

Oh, Lord. Oh, that's great. I did want to ask if you felt this was very specific. Sure. I thought it was weird.

Again, what little I know of the run of the series, no sonic screwdriver, pretty. Much the whole movie. Do you feel like that was a conscious choice because people weren't going to know what that was and they wanted to leave it out of the loop until this got picked up and then he's like, oh, I've got it back. Now I can use it every five minutes. Around 1982... the producer who was way into stage shows and stuff and kind of ruined the show for a lot of people.

Jerk. He decided he didn't like the Sonic screwdriver anymore. He thought it became a magic wand, get out of jail free card. Yeah. So he had an episode where some lizard alien shot it and blew it up.

And. from then on out he never he he never had it he never went down to space lows and bought another one he never. Made a laser hammer but nothing yeah and so he just never he just never really had it so this was the first time we had actually seen. It reappeared 1980 rebooting the sonic but again why reboot it and not use it the entire movie like he locks the thing with it which by the way didn't work so it's like at that point they never use it again the entire rest of the movie. Well it Nowadays, it's become a magic wand to all. It's basically like an iPhone, and it has all these apps, and it can do everything.

But then it was still kind of. Still updating when he said excruciating. So, you know, like, he didn't have his keys, he didn't have his yo-yo, he didn't have his pocket watch, and he didn't have his screwdriver. They were all in the bag that the kid had. So he was working without it, basically.

But again, do you think that was on purpose? I think... They were trying to allude to the Tom Baker Doctor as much as possible, because that's the one that the Americans knew, and that's the one that the producer really, really loved. So I think they were going to bring back all that stuff if it had gone to a series. I'm sure.

But yeah, it just seemed very specific that everything that he's known for, we're not going to give him, because you guys don't know what that is anyway. So it felt very specific. But, you know, we're going to show it because we really want the old fans to love it, stay with us, bring in the numbers, you know, so. But a long time ago I've learned to just give in to its little quirks and charms that I as a fan can enjoy. I love it.

But I was just really curious because this is the 50th year. It started in 63. It went solid for about 25, 26 years and then it had this long hiatus with a one year reprieve in 96. And now it's come back in 2005. It's bigger than it's ever been.

So That's why I thought it would be interesting for people who had never seen it to see something that was made specifically to bring in new fans. And you guys are kind of justifying what happened. Still unsuccessful. I will say that while. The movie did not capture my attention, this conversation has, so I am interested in exploring it further.

I have several DVDs and books. He's got some literature he'd like to share. I think a. Lot of it's on Netflix still, right? Oh, yeah. patchy but yeah oh well the new show yeah.

Would you say the 2005 is for people who are like most people here and haven't seen it would you say don't go back and watch the old stuff just start at 2005. Start at 2005 as long as you know that it's 2005 right because there are it's that i know it only sounds like a little while ago but it's already. A little bit dated It doesn't take long anymore. It is different. But again, the writing is so much better.

The characters are so much better. Actually, this would be interesting for you guys to watch the pilot of the 2005 and compare it to this. Because they're both trying to do the same thing. The 2005 one works, and they do everything right. For people listening, it's called Rose. it's 2005 and uh they just oh they just introduce it right they take their time it's through the eyes of the companion you don't get 50 years of backstory in the first two minutes they don't even do backstory until halfway through that first year and even then it's just mentions because basically the thing that makes the show so good is it's just this wacky guy in a phone booth going through space usually with a pretty girl and uh That sounds so sexy.

Oh yeah. I think I rented that one. Like back in the old field show, that was their thinking. It was like, we need to have a pretty girl there to get all the dads watching. That's, that's what I was going to ask you is like, why is it within the story?

Cause it's like, I understand from the programming standpoint, we don't want this old dude by himself. Like let's have a girl in there too. We got it. Plus it, it opens up the demographic of now it's especially now it's funny how much this works now that, a huge portion of this new fan base is girls. So it's like, regardless of whether the girl's there, now it also helps that the doctors are cute guys.

But, you know, I don't know. To me, it seemed very structured from the studio standpoint, but what is the story for the actual story itself? I'll tell you something. When Grace and the doctor kiss, that was hugely controversial in fan circles because... Up until that point, it had always been an old guy and a pretty girl wearing a miniskirt, usually.

And they never even hugged. They never touched because the BBC was afraid of it. Coming off as this old perv flying through space. Coming off like it was. With a hot girl in a miniskirt.

Here's some candy. Get into my phone? You've got that whole. So over 26 years, they never alluded to the doctor being sexual at all. He was always... completely chased.

It never got anywhere near there. And then America got in there. So in 96, they were trying to appeal to a new fan base. Let's make it romantic for the people who haven't seen it. Which actually made sense.

It seems weird that that never happened before. I'm like, the doctors. But the point is, people in Britain flip that. Oh yeah, I can see that for old fans. Nobody here mentioned it.

Nobody here said it was weird that he and Grace kissed. Because... It's not a big deal. In Britain, it's always the possibility that something might happen eventually. I mean, look at my favorite British show is The Avengers.

Okay. Oh, Diana Rigg. And look at Diana Rigg. And during the entire run, there was always a little tension, a little tension. Let's allude to this for 26 years.

Until the last show. And I think that was very appealing for the British audience. It was far sexier. From a story perspective, I mean, he's from a more advanced species, so it'd be like the doctor and his very attractive chimp are going to make out. Hey, there's some hot chips.

I'm not saying there's not. But lipstick on a chimp? I mean. In a weird way, you guys were saying how now, you know, girls really like the show. And in those wilderness years or in the 80s, it was pretty much just.

Boys were the only ones who liked it. Yeah, total little sausage business. I could always spot them. And in a weird way, it was always... certain type of very introverted, maybe not. Beaks.

Yeah, you know. And so they, in a way, really liked that the Doctor wasn't sexual because they weren't having any sex. It was science fiction to them. He had a cool vehicle. He had a cool vehicle and he had a girl who was a friend of his.

So they could hope that one day they would be friends with a hot girl. He knew a girl. He could go to parties and it looked like he was with a girl. There wasn't any pressure to get all sexy. So now it's like one of the great triumphs is that they do play up the... the relationship more, and girls do like it.

And that sounds so sexist to say it's girls as boys. It's for everyone. It works better now, yeah. Well, okay. The episodes that I've seen of the older, the females aren't very savvy.

Yes, yeah. And in the new ones, especially from after Rose, all of them are super smart, or capable, or. The doctor's evil, almost. Extremely capable. And it's very empowering for the females, I think, or for the girls.

I think they've done a good job of recognizing that the companion is not just a companion. He needs them more than they need him. You know how I was saying with this movie, I'll pick and choose to find moments that I can latch on to and love? For female fans of the old show, they have to pick and choose... moments of the females on there where they can choose to look. Because, by and large, they were written to be mini-skirt-wearing screamers who were, boy, that sounds great, who could be ditzy, could be a little out, and it's just, so they have to look for these moments that are few and far between where the girls are actually really doing something good.

Instead of just potential hostages. Yeah, it's funny, it's like, One of the cliches of the old show is whenever they went to an alien planet, it was in a quarry. Because they had a quarry. And it was in Britain, so it was always cold. The girls always had to wear miniskirts.

So the actresses at conventions are always telling stories about how, oh, my knickers, my knees were blue because I had to wear the miniskirt, and everyone else was wearing coats, and I'm there, but. I thought it was interesting how in this movie, Grace is actually all bundled up. That's the first time you ever see a girl on Doctor Who all bundled up. And that's the one who actually gets to kiss him. He wasn't into all the mini skirts and the sexy hey, hey, hey.

He liked. hey, you're warm. You're a little bit smarter than all those other girls. Come here. Have some candy. So my question though is, and I'm still trying.

To figure this out, like from a legit doctor who standpoint, like why is it that they have to have a companion? And that's my question is, if it's never been romantic up to this point, why has it always been a girl? Why couldn't... Well, I know in the beginning they were still making up their mind, but as they got into it and they made it a thing, why was it always a girl if it was not going to be romantic? Or even if it was, can't he pick a guy?

Who are we to know? The very first doctor was an old, white-haired guy in his late 50s, and he seemed to be ancient. And the first girl was his granddaughter, basically. And the first companions was a man and a woman who were school teachers. And throughout the first six years, it kind of stayed where the Doctor is this older guy, and the companions were always a male and a female.

It was always two of them, pretty much. When it got to be in the 70s, the Doctors kept getting a little bit younger, and they kind of streamlined the show to where the companion was just a girl. And the thinking was... The kids are going to watch it because they like all the crazy monsters. The moms are going to watch it because they like the kooky, sexy doctor.

And the dads are going to watch it before the football scores come on because there's a mini-skirting girl there. So it was kind of like, it kind of became the formula. See, I get it from the marketing standpoint, from their standpoint behind the scenes. But how do you then work that into the show? Number one, why does he always have to have somebody with him?

And number two, why. Is it always a young, attractive girl? It's convenient to the screenwriter is what you're saying. I understand it as a formula. I'm trying to put it in the context.

He's lonely. He's lived for so long and he's just lonely. And he also tends to spin out of control if he doesn't have somebody to ground him. Yeah, yeah. But there's never been a reason why it has to be a young, attractive girl.

In the show, like in the mythology of the show, it just seems to always happen that way. See, it doesn't even make sense. Like in a quality show like Voyagers. Okay, go Google that, kids, because nobody knows that reference. How come every time on Knight Rider, every town that Michael Knight pulled into, there was always some hot, sexy, available girl there?

Because Michael's a slut. And every town he goes to, he sleeps with some girl. Kids seats go all the way back. I won't put punches on Michael Knight either. On Supernatural, every girl who has a ghost problem is some hot babe.

Yeah, where's grandma with a ghost problem? I'll call out everybody for this bullshit. Those are just the ones I care about. They're like, oh, I saw this in the paper. That a hot girl.

Has a ghost problem. On Knight Rider, slutty chicks like firebirds. That's true, but the ones that he had. They weren't the big-haired girls that probably really liked Firebird. You know, in the new show, there was a companion named Donna that at first people didn't think they were going to like because she was not the stereotypical hot, teeny little teenager.

She was brassy. She was an older woman. She was a little curvy. She had some meat on her bones, you know, and She was just the best thing that had happened in that show in a long time. And it kind of broke the mold in a weird way.

But then they kind of went back to the mold because... hey, they need the ratings. Ratings are ratings. What I liked about her was she would call him on bullshit. She wouldn't just, oh, okay, Doctor. She didn't put him up on a pedestal.

Exactly. I'm really interested for you guys to see. the first episode of the new series compared to the movie i've seen the first episode oh you did oh do you remember much from. It um yeah where rose is like at a mall or someplace and then all these mannequins come after and she thinks they're like automated and then he saves her and it's been a couple of years since i've watched it but um i. Mean did it feel mediocre like this did or. No, I mean, I liked it.

I watched, like, I think the first season of the 2005. But, I mean, I don't remember much of it. But, I don't know. I mean, it almost, like, the movie kind of stands alone. I know it's the same thing and it's, like, a continuation.

But all I have, like, my only opinion of Doctor Who, like, I've not seen any of the David Tennant ones or, like, the most recent ones. So it's just, like, I just know it as that. So it feels just different. Yeah. I mean, if I've watched all of them and I know that there's a regeneration process and I'm used to the concept of there being multiple doctors, then I could piece it together but have this and then a few episodes of the first 2005 reboot.

So it just doesn't really... It's like non sequitur. That's cool. I mean, it's not for everyone. You're not even saying that you dislike it.

It's just... I'm just amazed that people watch it now, I think, more than anything. I really, really am. And as a closeted fan from the 80s, it's ponderous to me that it's popular. It's a different culture now, though.

I mean, it is not only okay to be geeky, it is encouraged by. Everyone around you. Remember the pain. I know, it's different. I'm an old veteran.

I know all that stuff. I walked into, you know, FYE the other day, and there's a whole section called Get Your Geek On. That's disturbing. And you felt at home, and then you felt shame. Oh, no.

I want to be weird. Okay. So, like I said, in the last year, I've been consumed by Doctor Who, I guess is the right way to put it, with my children. And so, to me, everything is, and you start to know. Okay, like, I'll give you the similar situation.

Like, when you are finally engaged and going to get married, it's like all of a sudden you start noticing that there are all of these bridal magazines and a bridal show and like everything is like oh this is a whole world that exists I was blind to that before I was ever engaged same thing with this I was blind to. Doctor Who really until he was like no you have to watch. It until you married him and it was right and it. Was everywhere it was everywhere and then like a few weeks ago I walk into Hot Topic because my daughter has said she's now 10 and said I want to go in there because they said there's something there so we go. In and There's a whole section of it.

Yes, there's a section of it. But at the same time, we take our kids out for Halloween, both of them dressed up as Doctor Who characters. And very well, like a Doctor Who fan would instantly go, yes, that's a Doctor Who. They were adorable, by the way. But they, one person.

We went trick-or-treating three times. One person knew who they were. The problem was they didn't have a piece of plastic that said Doctor Who on their chest like they're supposed to. One person thought he was Pee Wee Herman. This was Matt Smith, right?

He's kind of Pee Wee Herman-like. Again, it's nerd cool now. It's okay. You know, you just made me think of something. The whole thing, one of the character traits of Matt Smith is he wears a bow tie and the first year that he was on, his companion, the hot girl in the miniskirt with him, was giving him hell because he was wearing a bow tie constantly.

And, you know, it's like, now you see this resurgence of bow ties in geek hipster culture. And not that long ago, bow ties were, like, in this 96 movie, the wacky professor who was awkward, he's wearing a bow tie because it's a symbol of being uncool. It is. And yet, It's hard to tie a bow tie. Well, hey, when the 96 movie came out, you never saw t-shirts that said, Cravats are cool.

It just didn't work, man. It just didn't work. Like I said, it's penetrated a lot of culture. That's going to be the next movie meltdown show. Cravats are cool.

I feel like maybe one of the reasons that I've never gotten super into Doctor Who is because it's so polarizing. You're either a super fan or you hate it. And I just feel like I can't commit to it. So I'm just like, eh. I completely understand.

There's 50 years of this crap you've got to deal with. See, that's my thing. It's too much of an undertaking. I don't want to get started because I know it's an avalanche of stuff you need to catch up on. I wonder, we have to look this up on the internet at one point, how many combined hours are there?

Like how long, if you wanted to watch every Doctor Who episode and movie that's ever been made, How many hours would you have to end this? How many years of your life? It depends on how geeky you want to go with it, because some nerds listen to old audio. Find a calculator, I can tell you. 1,587.3.

Well, I think there have been. Like, what is it, 80 episodes of the new season, of the new Doctor Who? Yeah. So it's, it's a lot. I mean, we're, we're talking.

You've at least spent like an entire year of your life. It's been a, it's been an entire year for me. I mean, I mean like, like, nonstop. Like an actual. Like hour for hour.

My job is watching Dr. Who. Get up in the morning. I also wouldn't recommend watching the old show first. I, I really think the best thing to do is if you're at all, it should start with that 2005 series because it is a much better introduction and the characters are so much better.

Here's a, Well, how about this? Since I know, I'll give this. For Marlena, since you watched it and you're like, eh, jump to season three. Oh, I was going to say Blink. I've heard Blink from multiple people.

That's an entry point. It's not even a Doctor Who episode. It sort of is. It's just well written. Yeah, it's well written.

Have you seen it? No, but I've heard that from several people. Like, you can just watch this one-off not knowing anything. If anything is going to win you over, it's. Going to be Blink.

Well, I think David Tennant's kind of cute. Everyone's like, if you. I really like David Tennant. That's the thing. And I haven't gotten into this, but just as I've seen interviews with him, he's what makes that Fright Night movie so damn good.

He has so much fun with that character. David Tennant kind of became the Tom Baker of the new show. Yeah, what you're saying is right. It's in the third series. It's called Blink.

And it was actually written to be a show where the Doctor didn't show up much because they were doing so much filming, they needed more of a standalone. So he's hardly in it. But it's easily one of the best ones that they ever did. And not because he's hardly in it. It's good because it's so well written.

And the actress they have as the lead in it is really good. Carey Mulligan? Carey Mulligan. Before she became Carey Mulligan, she was the. Lead in it.

She's cute. I mean, just Plays a great, cute character. Yeah, ten minutes after that show aired, the internet was like, make her the new companion. So it's like, sorry, I'm here for showtime. So since the regeneration mechanism is in place, can you kind of jump in anywhere?

I'm still a little confused as to how all this works. Okay. I would say the start of a new person, I guess, is a new entry point each time. I guess that's what I'm asking. Yeah.

And how long are the companions there? Because they really got rid of Grace, it seems like, if they were planning on this to. Be a series. Yeah, I kind of was thinking she was going to be. She was like, nah.

And he's like, okay, that's cool. This isn't going to get picked up. Never mind. The idea was if it became a series, he was going to go back. I kind of thought that's where they were going to go.

You could almost, at the start of the Matt Smith years, you could start from there. That's a pretty good start. That whole season is a story in and of itself. It's almost like a book, a chapter, like a book that you can go, okay, this is the new book of this series, and you can watch it, and they're going to tell you. In fact, at each episode, as they get into it, they even tell you, walk you through, this is who I am, this is what's happening, here you go.

As someone who had never seen it, and you watched this 96 movie. Did the regeneration thing, did it make sense to you? Did you understand what was going on? I just felt like I was always sort of playing catch-up. I was always five steps behind, and then I was like, oh, well, I guess this is what I just watched.

Because the whole idea of regeneration was one of the best ideas they ever had, because. Again, it was a practical idea. Okay, I was saying how the first doctor was this old man, basically. And he was sick. And he had trouble remembering his lines.

I can't remember what the name of the disease was. But he was in it for about three years. And towards the end, it just had gotten really, really bad. But the ratings were still good. Britain loved it.

So they were going to replace him. And The thing that you think they would have done is they would have found someone who looked just like Tim, dressed him up in the same clothes. The part of the doctor is. Now being played. Well, now being played.

Exactly, yeah. And instead, they kind of had this idea of he's an alien, so maybe when he dies, he gets a whole new body. They're kind of reaching at this point. So, when he dies. So.

They had this episode where... he kept saying how his body was getting a bit thin and you know he's like oh this old body is wearing out and at the very end he gets real kind of sick and frail and he falls over there's this flash of light and he becomes a completely different person has a different personality and It was brilliant because the new actor didn't have to play it like the old one. He could put his own spin on it. And the idea was it's still the same man, still the same memory, still the same personality, but because all of his cells got re-energized and rearranged, it messes up his psyche a little bit. Different things float to the top. Interesting.

So each time it happens... you get a completely new actor, a completely new take on the part. It's still the same guy, just different facets of his personality come out. And in a way, now, whenever a lead actor is going to leave a show, people are like, no, we don't want him to go, we don't want him to go. This is the one show where people are like. Yeah, let's see who the next guy is.

What's next? People love it. And lately, they recently announced that Matt Smith is leaving. They got a new guy coming in. I think can't wait to see the new guy.

Yeah, but there's been sort of a girl fan backlash. Yeah, because he's not young and cute. He's an older guy, so I've watched some pretty funny YouTube videos where the girl fans are watching the big reveal. And they're like, he's old! No!

They're shrieking at the screen. It's a good actor. Does the companion change? Did Rose carry on to David Tennant? She was on for two years.

She was in the first year with David Tennant. And in the old show... what happened when an actress got tired or their contract ran out, they would get married. Because they were married, they could no longer go on space travels. Wow, this is an old. Show.

One of the funniest things about the new show is the companion for Matt Smith, his first one, at the end of that first year, she got married, but her and her husband went on with him. And I was like, that's so funny. It's so inside funny. It's so great. But usually they find reasons for him to leave.

A couple of them get tired of all the violence. Some just don't want to do it anymore. But it's always interesting when they leave. That's kind of another simile to the Avengers, because Steed always had a female companion. I think they ended up going through three during the run of that show, Diana being the most popular.

I mean, that at least there's somebody. in the story programming okay this is your maybe they want a female operative for you know those kind of missions i mean again that makes sense it's just it's funny that this always happens this way and yet i guess they've never really addressed it within the story. And it's funny because it's one reason why i like doctor who and that the show completely changes every two or three years yeah like everyone playing the the elites are completely different it's not like a Star Trek, where you got all this continuity, but everyone has to wear the same uniforms, and it kind of has to... Like, when they redid the J.J. Abrams movie, people were so upset, because they were recasting Captain Kirk, and you can't do that.

I was used to it, because on Doctor Who, every three or four years, everything's different. Even the people running the show are different, and it's going to happen here now, coming up soon. They're going to have a whole new Doctor, and I can't wait. It's completely different, and. Okay, I'm sold.

Well, that's the thing. I mean, as off as this movie was, it hasn't put me off of the whole idea. I would still like to at least go into the new ones. I've heard good things about all three of the guys who have been the Doctor since they rebooted it. So, yeah, this movie didn't kill it for me.

Like, I'm still interested in the idea of it. I just think this movie had a lot of problems. In terms of this movie being a pilot, Did you watch this and think, I kind of want to see where this goes. I want to see where this library in space goes. Like I'm saying, that little campy part at the end was fun, but even then, I don't know that I would tune in every week.

It might be one of those, if I'm home, I'll turn it on, whatever. But midway in, there's no way I would have come back for the bad motorcycle chase show. It felt like the. Story ended, you know? I wasn't like, oh, what's going to happen next?

I was just like, oh, that's what happens. Cool. I wouldn't have come back after the first commercial break. When I saw the first commercial break happening, I was like, I really wish I could turn this off now, but I can't. Thank you for watching.

You can do it. He gave me something to talk about. Yeah, I wanted to love it. We watched the first half one night and I had to force myself to watch the second. Oh, you had to split up over two nights?

I think in a weird way, too. To run with kids and school. This might be my little subversive hipster backlash, too. Especially with the 50th year. In the office I work at, there's little Daleks and TARDISes on everybody's desk.

Not me, because it's still in my closet. I ain't even told the people I work with. I'm a fan of the show. You've got the real British stuff, man. Yeah, and...

It's like, so, of course, on November 23rd is going to be the 50th anniversary. There's going to be this big thing in theaters, all this. And everyone's going on, oh, it's the best show ever. Great, great, great. And that sort of sits wrong with me.

So I kind of wanted, for this podcast, look at maybe something that. Didn't quite work. But I still love it because I'm a fan. I was in a doctor who before it was cool. Right.

So hip. So hip. All right. I think we've thoroughly covered at least this movie. There's still more.

Doctor Who universe to go into, but we won't touch that. We'll come back. I just want to say one thing. That's a real thing. You just admitted to being a hipster, so that nullifies the contract you were in.

That's true. You're even going about being a hipster wrong. I hope you're happy. Way to go, man. Alright, so any final words for the geeks out there, Ben?

Do you need to pass something on that we haven't already covered? About Paul McGann and the 96 movie? Sure. Love it for the little things. He went on to. appeared in some radio versions and it's so much better but i wouldn't recommend you guys listen to it because it's steeped in continuity even more than this movie was so for me he's a legitimate doctor and i love him i just i see the good things and i just go whenever the bad shit happens so yeah.

I have that about certain other properties so i certainly understand. The phantom menace of dr who. No wonder I don't like it. So Eric Roberts is Darth Maul? He's the only good thing in it.

I think the kid was more of the Jar Jar. Yeah, that's true. Good point. Alright, I think that wraps up the old Doctor Who insanity here. Otherwise, that about does it.

We will return next week. Same geek time, same geek feed. Thanks for listening. Listen, girl, to what I say About the man from Califrey. He can show you the planets He can show you the stars He.

Can love you more because he's got two hearts Whatcha gonna do? Whatcha gonna do? From the nearest world to the farthest, he'll take you there and he'll start it. Who will you find? Are you a mistaker?

Will it be David Tennant or Colin Baker? Whatcha gonna do? Whatcha gonna do? Doctor Who, Doctor Who Hey! Guitarist, Doctor Who Hey!

Doctor Who, Doctor Who Doctor Who, Doctor Who Doctor Who You are, you. Are, you are, you are. And go! Hey! Oh, wait, I have a question.

So he only has 13 lives within that body, and then he gets a new body? Then what's the point? He can. It's like a cat with diamond. In the old show, the rule was he could only do it 12 times.

He could only regenerate 12 times, so he had 13 bodies. And this was his eighth body. Okay, so are they going to have to stop? Yeah, that becomes a question. What are they going to do?

How good is Peter Capaldi, the new doctor, is going to be? I'm sure they're going to find a way to write out. I'm sure you can loophole that one. Because with John Hurt, how many does that push us up to? Actually, the whole reason why the master... is the little snake thing is because technically he was on his last body and he had died so technically he should have stayed dead but because he was so evil in the old show he kind of got this alien technology.

I'm too evil to die. He was hanging on to life basically. That's why he wanted a new body because he was completely out. Yeah, because the whole initial premise is just kind of hanging on the doctor doing something dumb. Like, I'll take the body.

And what they should have done... In the old show, when they introduced him, he was on his last body, which was stupid because the idea of the master was so good. They should have had him regenerate just like the doctor regenerates. But now they had to have this convoluted fan wink where, oh, he's on his last body, but he becomes this magic snake with goo and he can change that way. You know, it's just.

They made it too weird. How did he get in the series? Because he's been on the series. Yeah, and on the series, on the series, they basically, again, was like, la, la, la, didn't happen. He's just a Time Lord.

Because of the stuff over here you didn't see, this is happening. There's only one master, and he's on Buffy. Damn it. And really, there's a little part of me that always thinks Lee Van Cleef will always be the master. Lee Van Cleef will always be the master.

That's just me. Best ninja ever. Best old man ninja ever. And Van Patten will be his new skirted companion. There you go.

See, finally a doctor who gets a guy. Just let him have a guy. What do we care? Actually, in the old show, he had a male companion for three years, and he was Scottish, so he wore a kilt. Still wearing a miniskirt is what you're saying.

This episode is a production of Movie Meltdown, produced and edited by The Oddity Studios. with opening music performed by the Empires. For more on how to sponsor or support the show, email producer at moviemeltdown.com.