For fuck's sake, Gabriel Chase

Unrecognized Scumbag Nutters of Doctor Who Fandon
#987
Gabriel Chase

The owner of Gabriel Chase's Saturday Teatime http://members.fortunecity.com/tylorhan/Index.html?, the site's banner of being exclusively for "the discerning Doctor Who fan" hints at a social snobbery that is hard to match. It boasts not to tell you what to think... as long as you think Peter Davison was crap and JNT killed Doctor Who with his bare hands.

While it's not uncommon for fans to dislike the new series, or to disown it entirely, this site goes even further. Nothing after Survival exists... AND THAT IS OFFICIAL! Recently, however, an update to the Parallel Universe section was made, more likely to show the website is still current rather than any interest...

DOCTOR WHO - SERIES 1 (13 episodes)
26 March 2005 to 18 June 2005; written by Russell T.Davies, Mark Gatiss, Robert Shearman, Paul Cornell, Steven Moffatt; BBC Wales

Following an aborted plan to shoot a second pilot with Paul McGann
...which goes to show just how much thought goes into this as it was never on the cards. Paul was willing, but Alan Cummings was the only contender...


Doctor Who went into TV hibernation for almost nine years before a group of self-confessed fans
A rather strange distinction. Surely anyone who creates a TV show is a fan on it by definition? Would Doctor Who ever have been brought back by a production team that hated it? Well, we saw a team run by Eric Saward, so maybe there is a precedent. Still a bloody odd turn of phrase...

working in the TV industry engineered another revival. With BBC Television now producing just three or four drama serials in-house, production was taken over by BBC Wales in Cardiff, although the resultant new series was heavily promoted by the BBC as the natural successor to the original series.
This seems to suggest that the post-McCoy years can never be "real" because they are not filmed in the usual studios... which makes Horror of Fang Rock amongst others similarly non canon...

With narratives obviously influenced by fifteen years of original novels
Really? Fascinating. Bar the nebulus concept of a war with the Time Lords (which was on the cards in 1988 for crying out loud), you won't see much in the new series that was ripped screaming from the books. Since GC clearly never read the books, he is bitching about stuff that he doesn't know about.

(the style of which had alienated many fans of the TV original)
See?

rather than resurrecting the original format
A crime also committed by Season 22, and if anything the interlocking narrative, untrustworthy Doctor and emphasis on human beings links Season 1 and Series 1 more than you'd thgink.

, the visual side owed much to the American pilot - in particular the design of the Tardis interior (also reminiscent of the Tardis seen in the Sixties' films - the doors being visible on the inside for instance)
Is this good or bad? It's impossible to tell.

, the opening titles, the overall dark, brooding atmosphere, and the Doctor's propensity towards kissing his companions (both sexes!)
OK, the Doctor snogs Rose once in season one and is kissed by Captain Jack. The implication the Doctor is pashing everything that moves is not fair. Is it?

- and was a glossy, hi-tech adventure serial with impressive special effects, a lot of talking (Boom Town features a section lasting almost 25 minutes where nothing happens!)
Which means it wasn't glossy or hi-tech but the sort of paced characterization he wants. Right?

and more than the occasional lapse into schoolboy humour (a belching wheelie-bin, farting aliens).
Well... hard to argue there. But seriously, those moments were rare.

Christopher Eccleston starred as a newly regenerated Doctor, with former pop starlet Billie Piper as his new companion, Rose Tyler. Eccleston's "Ninth" Doctor (though it is never made certain)
Except for the time we saw he had nine DNAs and was five Doctors past Tom Baker, and, you know, RTD practically tatooed this information of the foreheads of people so they'd get the fact.

was more than reminiscent of Colin Baker's portrayal during the "Mindwarp" section of The Trial of a Time Lord
Ah, so, he was an illusion by the Matrix. Learned Inquisitor, GC is saying more than he realizes.

being frequently arrogant,
Like most Doctors.

sometimes condescending
Like most Doctors.

often cowardly,
What? Refusing to slaughter humanity? Being a bit freaked at being trapped in a basement with a Dalek that wants to kill him? Gosh!

and strangely reluctant to commit himself to resolving crises.
Which is just stupid. Strangely?!? The fact is he was reluctant because of the whole Time War backstory. It is as plain as GC's bigotry - and proof this whovanologist isn't paying attention.

Nevertheless, the new series was an immediate hit with its 21st Century audience (most of whom didn't know any better!)
Isn't odd how some people automatically assume previous generations were automatically less intelligent and future generations will be whingers who never realized the good stuff they missed?

despite provoking only lukewarm responses from the likes of former Doctor Peter Davison
A bald-faced lie.

and former script editor Chris Bidmead.
A bald-faced truth. In the sense "it could be better, but I still watch it." Hardly damning testimony is it?

Five days after the first episode, Rose, was broadcast to an expectant nation, Eccleston announced his retirement from the show "to avoid being typecast"
A slight rewriting of events. Eccleston's departure was leaked. It's not the same thing.

forcing a hasty rewrite of the final episode to introduce David Tennant as his replacement.
Another lie. The circumstances of Eccles' leaving are still foggy, but the episode's first draft featured a regeneration. Such factual errors will become common.

THE CHRISTMAS INVASION
25 December 2005; written by Russell T.Davies; BBC Wales

Back in 1965, a Doctor Who "Christmas Special" (episode 7 of The Dalek Masterplan) was more an accident of scheduling than a positive decision to celebrate the Festive Season. Forty years later, Christmas specials were a necessary obligation of every serial screened by the BBC.
I can't argue with this but "were"? Does GC know the truth of oncoming years when this status quo changes?

David Tennant's first full outing as the "Tenth" (?)
Yes. Tenth. I mean, it's not particularly difficult to the wealth of stuff saying "David Tennant is the Tenth Doctor!" Does GC deny the moon landings as well?

Doctor featured all the usual elements of the Eccleston series, including the Slitheen
No it didn't you lying bastard! He didn't even watch this, and has misheard the name of the monsters!

and Penelope Wilton as Harriet Jones (now promoted to Prime Minister), and a particularly violent group of Father Christmases. All-in-all, a rather tacky demonstration of how Doctor Who had become part of the upper-middle-class Blairite vision of 21st Century Britain.
Sparacus? What in the name of wonders are you doing here?!


DOCTOR WHO - SERIES 2 (13 episodes)
15 April 2006 to 8 July 2006; written by Russell T.Davies, Toby Whithouse, Steven Moffatt, Tom MacRae, Mark Gatiss, Matt Jones, Mathew Graham; BBC Wales

A second series of the "adapted for vacuous 21st Century viewers"
Yeek! You have a lot of friends, don't you GC?

version of Doctor Who featuring more of the same from writer Russell T.Davies and selected cohorts.
Now, is that really how you describe an official writing team?

Tennant's version of the Doctor was more likeable than Eccleston's but had a tendency to be overshadowed by the established Piper. In fact the second series was more "Rose Tyler" than "Doctor Who", the rather annoying habit of 21st century scriptwriters to include friends and relatives of main characters leading to Rose's mother and boyfriend appearing in practically every episode.
Wait for it...

Okay, so the original series featured Victoria's father, Leela's father, Adric's brother, Nyssa's father, Tegan's aunt, cousin and grandfather, Turlough's brother, Peri's stepfather and Ace's grandmother and mother (as a baby), but these only ever appeared in one story. They weren't regular fixtures.
Unlike say, the UNIT era?

In a further attempt
Which suggests it was unsuccessful.

to forge links with the original series, Sarah-Jane Smith, K9 and the Cybermen were revived, the design of the latter heavily influenced by Andrew Skilleter's illustrations in the 1988 Cybermen book
Another lie. Anyone who has seen them will realize the hulking bodybuilders of the book are not a bit like the armored Cybus suits. In fact, they rip of DWM's The Horde if anything. Another criticism cobbled up about misheard information.

, yet plots rarely strayed far from the "alien invasion of Earth" theme
Apart from New Earth, Tooth and Claw, Girl in the Fireplace, The Satan Pit and Love & Monsters.

that had dominated the first series.
And the previous twenty-six.

The series reached a climax with a parallel-universe Earth under threat from a combined force of Daleks and Cybermen, with Piper's departure leaving the way clear for a new, black, companion, whom the 'papers were quick to point out was Doctor Who's first (although the comic strip Doctor Who had featured a black companion in the 1970s).
Now this really is troubling. As it suggests that I am insane and Noel Clarke is, in fact, a white man.

Also, the comic strip companion SHARON DAVIES (GC, take note) was in 79/81, not really a 70s companion.

Once again, a triumph of style over substance
Well, Idiot's Lantern wasn't THAT bad...

, visual appearance more important than adventurous stories.
...

You sure we're watching the same thing?

Why waste money on creating alien landscapes when you can have extravagent visual effects to detract from the fact that the plots are so basic and bland? Rather like buying a classic E-type Jag, giving it a flashy new paint job and sticking in a modern 1000cc engine.
Oooh, feel the anger! This is from the same bloke that has built a chart linking the cut out faces of every Doctor Who character with every other character they met.

How long the show will last without the obvious celebrity gossip magazine attraction of Billie Piper is anyone's guess.
Oh, I've killed people for less.

THE RUNAWAY BRIDE
25 December 2006; written by Russell T.Davies; BBC Wales

After the second set of thirteen episodes, the inevitable second Christmas special.
Inevitable?!? The masses were stunned at the revelation and a third Christmas special is still in doubt!

With Billie Piper now having graduated as a serious actress (apparently),
OK, fuckwit, outside. Now.

David Tennant was ably supported by the Trendies' favourite BBC comedienne, Catherine Tate, as the eponymous runaway bride, thankfully without recoursing to any of the monotonous catchphrases from her trendy (and relatively unfunny) BBC3 sketch show.
Believe it or not, this suggests GC actually liked it.

Yet another spectacular mix of extravagent special effects and mawkish chit-chat which seem to typify Davies' Americophile scripts
Racism, snobbery and luddite tendencies! This guy is a Doctor Who villain!

, underlining yet again that the current series has as much in common with the original series as a leg of lamb does with a cabbage.
I know a few biochemists that would argue about that.

As this was screened, the first series of Torchwood was coming to an end on BBC3 (naturally).
Naturally? What the hell does that mean?

Squeezing as much potential out of the current, hopefully short-lived, craze for Davies' version of Doctor Who
Dear dear. Did Davies not return your valentine?

And RTD clearly doesn't want to do that, else we'd have seen a spin off with Rose Tyler by now.

, Torchwood is a spin-off from the parent series featuring Captain Jack Bannerman
Oh for fuck's sake. A) he's mixed up Jack Harkness with John Barrowman and B) he's got Barrowman mixed up with Bannermen. Does this suggest someone who should be listened to over your own opinions?

and a group of psychic investigators hard at work in Cardiff
Once again, A) they are definitely not psychic investigators and B) hard at work is a contravention of the trades description act when it comes to Torchwood.

, which is fast rivalling Manchester as the Trendies' favourite city.
And this is bad because...?

Also announced was another spin-off starring Lis Sladen as Sarah-Jane Smith, which must set some kind of record if you regard the ill-fated K9 and Company as the original pilot, no less than 25 years having elapsed between that Sarah-Jane-based offshoot and the new Sarah-Jane Adventures!
A real vote of confidence there.

Statisticians amongst the Traditionalists may like to know that 7.143% of the Welsh series' episodes have been transmitted on Christmas Day compared to just 0.144% of the original series.
37% of all statistics are useless.

The fact is, had the opportunity been around for Christmas Day episodes existed in the original run, you couldn't have moved for them...