Simon’s Incoherent Blog

Doctor Who: Series 8, Episode 10 – In the Forest of the Night

“The forest was in all the stories that kept you awake at night. The forest is mankind’s nightmare.”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

“A long time ago, when we all lived in the forest and no-one lived anywhere else…”
Much has been made of Doctor Who’s tendency, under the aegis of Steven Moffat, to veer explicitly into fairytale territory. Stories like The Doctor, the Widow and the Wardrobe (also largely set in a forest), overtly recall the sometimes darkly magical tales we’re all told as children. However, In the Forest of the Night is an interesting attempt to not only evoke a traditional fairytale forest, but to analyse and explain the archetype and its place in folklore.

Continue reading “Doctor Who: Series 8, Episode 10 – In the Forest of the Night”

The Walking Dead: Season 5, Episode 2–Strangers

“People are just as dangerous as the dead, don’t you think?”
“No. People are worse.”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

After last week’s slam bang season opener, this week’s Walking Dead was, as I expected, a slower-paced affair, allowing the characters room to breathe. After last week’s slate-wiping exercise, it also had to set up a new bunch of ongoing plots, along with a new major character – that’s a lot for an ep2 to do. Not that it was bereft of shocks and horror; having learned from the dreariness of season 2, the show never forgets to chuck in some gruesome Walker action at least once an episode. Sometimes it’s gratuitous, but sometimes, as it was here, it’s actually relevant to the plot.

Continue reading “The Walking Dead: Season 5, Episode 2–Strangers”

Doctor Who: Series 8, Episode 9 – Flatline

“I am the one chance you’ve got of staying alive. That’s who I am.”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

On writing duties for the second week in a row, Doctor Who newbie Jamie Mathieson is on a roll, producing yet another excellent episode after last week’s Mummy on the Orient Express. Presumably serving as this year’s ‘Doctor-lite’ episode, Flatline boasted an imaginative and scary monster of the week concept, some well-fleshed out guest characters, and most interestingly, thrust Clara into the spotlight as a Doctor-substitute, allowing the script to examine (and gently poke fun at) the Doctor’s usual method of operation.

Continue reading “Doctor Who: Series 8, Episode 9 – Flatline”

The Walking Dead: Season 5, Episode 1–No Sanctuary

“You’re either the butcher – or the cattle.”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

Hallowe’en being nearly upon us, ‘tis the time of year for a new season of AMC’s The Walking Dead. The last season was frustratingly uneven, with a first half that seemed to pack in all the plot and action and a second half that can best be characterised as aimless wandering around the countryside and sometimes encountering zombies. The first half was thrilling, the second half thoughtful; ideally you want a season (like the one before that) which balances both more evenly.

Continue reading “The Walking Dead: Season 5, Episode 1–No Sanctuary”

Doctor Who: Series 8, Episode 8 – Mummy on the Orient Express

“There’s a monster on this train that can only be seen by people about to die. If you do see it, you only have 66 seconds to live.”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

Fun fact – the very first horror movie I ever saw was set on a train. 1970’s Horror Express is a chilling tale of a preserved prehistoric monster menacing the passengers of the Trans-Siberian Express (including, inevitably, Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee), in the early years of the 20^th century. It’s not the best horror movie ever (and certainly not the most scientifically accurate), but it still works very well due in large part to that setting – a moving railway train on an epic, lengthy journey from which there is no escape when the monster comes for you.

Continue reading “Doctor Who: Series 8, Episode 8 – Mummy on the Orient Express”

Doctor Who: Series 8, Episode 7–Kill the Moon

“An innocent life versus the future of mankind. We have forty five minutes to decide.”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

It was another moral dilemma for the Doctor this week – he seems to be getting a lot of them of late. In the past, this was the show’s way of presenting the philosophy of its hero; perhaps the most notable example being the Fourth Doctor’s agonising decision over whether to save the universe from the Daleks by committing genocide against them before they were even created. As a moral dilemma, it’s hard to see a ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ answer to that one clearly, and in fact the script for Genesis of the Daleks cheats by having the choice almost immediately taken out of the Doctor’s hands.

Continue reading “Doctor Who: Series 8, Episode 7–Kill the Moon”

Doctor Who: Series 8, Episode 6–The Caretaker

“You can’t do this. You cannot pretend to be an actual person among real people.”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

When an episodic TV series has been running (on and off) for fifty years, it’s hardly surprising that some episodes instil a feeling of déjà vu. Terry Nation, notoriously, wrote the first Dalek story again several times, changing a few names and locations but keeping the same basic plot. That same feeling of déjà vu was very much present in The Caretaker. The concept of the Doctor trying (and comically failing) to fit in with everyday life on contemporary Earth has become a bit of a trope in recent years, most notably in the work of Gareth Roberts, who set the template with The Lodger and revisited it with Closing Time.

Continue reading “Doctor Who: Series 8, Episode 6–The Caretaker”

Cars I have owned – 1970 Bond Bug 700ES

A return to a theme I haven’t explored since I wrote about my beloved Ford Popular 100E – another tale of… cars I have owned!

Many and varied were the jokes made (mainly in the 1980s) about quirky British car manufacturer Reliant. For those unfamiliar with this now sadly deceased marque, their stock in trade was twofold – they made a plush grand tourer called the Scimitar, endorsed by no less a personage than Princess Anne; and they made small three-wheeled cars that were the reason for all the jokes. Continue reading “Cars I have owned – 1970 Bond Bug 700ES”

Doctor Who: Series 8, Episode 5 – Time Heist

“Today is a good day to be a bank robber.”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

One of the things I’ve been noticing about this season of Doctor Who is that there’s been very little unanimous like or dislike of any of the episodes. None have achieved the near-universal acclaim of Blink, or the near-universal derision of Fear Her. Even last week’s Listen, which was pretty widely acclaimed, has a number of fierce critics among my friends, either for its ambiguity or its deliberate slow pace.

Continue reading “Doctor Who: Series 8, Episode 5 – Time Heist”

Doctor Who: Series 8, Episode 4–Listen

“Question – why do we talk out loud when we know we’re alone? Conjecture – because we know we’re not.”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

After last week’s love-it-or-loathe-it comedy episode, this week saw Doctor Who back on more familiar ground with an outright horror story. The show’s always traded on an ability to scare small children, and in the post-2005 run, arguably nobody’s been better at that than Steven Moffat. Before he became showrunner (and subject to vitriolic brickbats from those who disliked his style), his episodes for Russell T Davies traded on being ‘the scary ones’ – The Empty Child, Blink, even Girl in the Fireplace, with its organ-harvesting clockwork droids that hid under children’s beds.

Continue reading “Doctor Who: Series 8, Episode 4–Listen”