Doctor Who

:confused: Um, I haven't seen this show yet, but I would say that there is a huge difference between "raz[ing] entire forests for the sake of profit" and being able to "use _any_ energy source" etc. Plus, Hermit of Archenland, insinuating that Copperfox wants to raze forests is not kind! I am not a mod or even a very active or long-time member, so I don't know what it is appropriate for me to say, but I think that that was unkind and certainly off-topic if nothing else! (not that this is much better; sorry!)

Well, now trying to be on topic: from what I have heard, it sounds good that they only superficially involved Narnia. To me, Doctor Who is not a show that can take place within the Narnian world, but, hey, everything could benefit from a little touch of Narnia, even if only superficial! I did see the preview where the Doctor used that quote from the professor about what do they teach in school these days, and I really liked that! It just seemed to fit in perfectly with the character of the Doctor, and it gratified my Narnia-fan-ness (or whatever that should be called) :D .
 
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Laurel, I was not suggesting Copperfox wanted to raze any forests; I was just pointing out the double standard he seems to employ. Both Lewis and Tolkien have touched on the theme of the destructive effect of human greed on the natural world. But they are Christian authors so they get a free pass; Doctor Who is a secular series so the very worst motives are assumed.

Many Christians rightly criticise contempory society's lax attitute to sexuality but appear much more tolerant of those two other great idols of modern life, money and power. They are eager to tear down the temples of Aphrodite but only too willing to prostrate themselves before the altars of Mammon and Caesar. Doctor Who often has produced stories that criticise the ethics of big business, but in my view such criticism is entirely justified. If the series has any overaching moral message it is the destructive effect a purely scientific and technological approach has on both nature and human society.

If I've caused any offence I apologize but I doubt Copperfox is offended. He and I have different viewpoints and sometimes disagree sharply on a number of issues but I still very much like and respect him despite that
 
I didn't like it at all. Not a huge surprise, I can't hate Doctor Who under Moffat.

As for the Narnian influence, it was utterly superficial. Moffat does not have a clue what actually made LWW so brilliant. For instance, the Pevensie parents never appear in LWW- it is all about the children having an adventure on their own without parents being there. There is also no sense of wonder and excitement about the forest world in The Doctor, the Widow and the Wardrobe; it just feels bleak, desolate and menacing. And then on top of this mangling of the Narnia influence we get the Mary Poppins version of the Doctor clowning around and making everything alright for everybody.
 
Okay, SyFynet holland is broadcasting Dr Who everyday. Around 4pm they broadcast it with Tennant and at 6pm they broadcast it with Smith. I am going to give it a try and watch it to see if I like it. If I do you will find me posting here more often but if it is not my show well I am out :D
Strange they didn't show any Christmas specials about Dr Who here :confused:
 
Yes, the Pertwee episode was the one that made out geothermal energy exploration to be better. The solar energy theme came in an episode ot the new show. In an episode whose title was a number, a spaceship was powering itself with energy from a star, and EVEN THAT was bad, because it offended an energy-being that lived WITHIN the star. So again, what will they leave us that we ARE permitted to use?

>> You believe then that it's OK for entire forests to be
>> razed for the sake of profit? Somehow I think both
>> Lewis and Tolkien would disagree!

First, it's misleading to say "for the sake of profit." The making of profits by businesses does not exist in isolation--it is connected with MAKING THINGS PEOPLE NEED. People have uses for wood, paper and cellulose; you get these things from trees. Are you prepared to live the rest of your life NEVER again using ANY product that came from a cut-down tree? And if that seems like a loaded question, it's no more loaded than suggesting that I approve of _entire_ forests being destroyed.

Second, in the real world, countless businesses ALREADY HAVE gotten wise about environmental concerns. They don't just cut trees, they also PLANT MORE TREES. But the Doctor Who series doesn't give the business world credit for this; rather, it keeps on and on making one-sided stories about how the EEEEEE-vil businessmen are destroying everything.

If you can identify EVEN ONE Doctor Who episode in which something like a major manufacturing enterprise WASN'T portrayed as evil or stupid or both, I will be surprised and relieved.

As for it "only being entertainment": makers of entertainment still bring their worldview to it; and audiences STILL DO object when they see a worldview that rubs them the wrong way. If I made a TV show that showed the Ku Klux Klan as noble and heroic, if I portrayed race-based lynchings as good deeds, NO ONE would cut me any slack for my saying "It's only entertainment." Nor should they. So I need not give a free pass to entertainment which intentionally attacks the very idea of free enterprise.
 
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Hermit of Archenland said:
If I've caused any offence I apologize but I doubt Copperfox is offended. He and I have different viewpoints and sometimes disagree sharply on a number of issues but I still very much like and respect him despite that
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Wait! So you followed him to this here thread to disagree with him again? I don't think I've seen you post here unless CF posts first. Can you post something YOU think about the show without having it to be a disagreement with someone? Are you a multiquoter too? lol!

I do happen to agree with CF on this seeing that what he is saying seems to be the norm these days. Most shows nowadays are loaded with liberal and leftist leaning garbage and I have no expectations for Doctor Who to be any different. I still watch it, but to be honest, it's going in a direction that I don't really like (not for what it's being discussed here, but for other reasons) so I will check and see how the new series is. If I like it I might continue watching, if not, I don't think I'll be such a fan after.

I was ready to throw my shoe (a la middle eastern tradition) at the TV with all that River Song nonsense this past series was having. It was beginning to drive me crazy.

Ok, now to the Christmas Special. I agree that the resemblance to LWW was only marginal, which to me was a good thing as these two series are completely different from each other. A small reference to LWW is ok so I'm glad there wasn't much of it in this special. It did lack any excitement previous specials had but the happy for the English family was nice (yes, finally a happy ending).

ah, more to say but I'm feeling lazy right now.
 
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Thank you very much, Barbarian King; I'm glad I'm not the only one to see the negative side of Doctor Who. On the other hand, you needn't fear that I'll come away with an obsessive resentment against H-of-A. Mister Lewis himself enjoyed warm friendships with people who had fiercer disagreements with him than this one.
 
amdd97 said:
umm. I bought a DW t-shirt today.AND I've finished series 6. good day:D
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What does the t-shirt look like? tell us!! Oh, have you gone back to series one or two yet?

Miss D:
That is the t-shirt I want! I just shopped at Think Geek for t-shirts but I didn't pick that one cause I didn't shop for me. They were gifts.
 
BarbarianKing said:
What does the t-shirt look like? tell us!! Oh, have you gone back to series one or two yet?
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It's the t-shirt from Hot Topic. It's black, has the 11th doctor logo, and the TARDIS.

Yes! I LOVED series two, it's my favorite series. So Now I have seen all of the DW episodes since 2005.
 
amdd97 said:
It's the t-shirt from Hot Topic. It's black, has the 11th doctor logo, and the TARDIS.

Yes! I LOVED series two, it's my favorite series. So Now I have seen all of the DW episodes since 2005.
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That's a cool shirt.
And yes! Series 2 was one of the best and one of my favorites two. The ending was terribly sad though. ugh! I don't even want to remember it.
 
I just finished watching the Christmas special. It was weird. o_O But I LOVED the ending, when The Doctor went to visit Amy and Rory. *dies of delight* It was so sweet.
 
I've come up with a way to try to learn about Doctor Who without actually watching it, since my local PBS station shows series 5 over and over and over and nothing else, I don't have BBC America, and then I just really am not a person who likes spending time watching TV--though I do spend a lot of time reading! So, I found that there a decent number of scripts of Doctor Who episodes available online at BBC and a few other places (which really are legal! Some aren't, but there are some that are!), which I am now reading on my fancy new Kindle! For me it's definitely a win-win: I get to read it instead of watch it, which I prefer: I get to read it on my Kindle instead of having to watch it on TV, it's free and readily available, it only takes me about 20 minutes to read a script of a 45-minute show, in short getting all the benefits of reading instead of watching TV, while still being able to "watch" Doctor Who--all of which are good things! :D When I come across someone who seems to be a major character who I haven't heard of, I search them in Google Images to help form a mental picture of them before I keep reading about them.

The only downside is that I can't reproduce their British accents in my head! :p
 
Laurel said:
I've come up with a way to try to learn about Doctor Who without actually watching it, since my local PBS station shows series 5 over and over and over and nothing else, I don't have BBC America, and then I just really am not a person who likes spending time watching TV--though I do spend a lot of time reading! So, I found that there a decent number of scripts of Doctor Who episodes available online at BBC and a few other places (which really are legal! Some aren't, but there are some that are!), which I am now reading on my fancy new Kindle! For me it's definitely a win-win: I get to read it instead of watch it, which I prefer: I get to read it on my Kindle instead of having to watch it on TV, it's free and readily available, it only takes me about 20 minutes to read a script of a 45-minute show, in short getting all the benefits of reading instead of watching TV, while still being able to "watch" Doctor Who--all of which are good things! :D When I come across someone who seems to be a major character who I haven't heard of, I search them in Google Images to help form a mental picture of them before I keep reading about them.

The only downside is that I can't reproduce their British accents in my head! :p
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That's really cool, I would love to read some of the scripts!
 
BarbarianKing said:
Wait! So you followed him to this here thread to disagree with him again? I don't think I've seen you post here unless CF posts first. Can you post something YOU think about the show without having it to be a disagreement with someone? Are you a multiquoter too? lol!
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Considering I've actually started several threads myself which Copperfox only posted in much later that's hardly fair. I visited this thread because I was curious what people thought of the episode.

Copperox, both the Pertwee story and the more recent one about the star were specific and highly fanciful situations. In order to interpret these as polemics against the use of geothermal or solar energy in general you really have to WANT to see those messages. It's very easy to detect 'leftist and liberal' propaganda in anything if you are determined to do so.

And no, I don't want to do without paper or wood. I am though prepared to pay extra for them to be sourced responsibly; something I suspect both Lewis and Tolkien would have approved of.

Any company that appears in the series (and there haven't been that many) needs to be fictitious for legal reasons. if they go to the trouble of inventing one it will be a major part of the plot so will almost certainly either be the villian or under the control of the villian, like the plastics factories in the Auton stories. That's just part of the logistics of a series like Who.

And yes, the ideals and values of the people who create entertainment will have an effect, but it's much more suble and complex than the simplistic 'liberal conspiracy theory' you appear to be advocating. There have been a variety of diferent producers, who have had a variety of script editors who have commisioned different writers for each story. Mainly they have been preoccupied with producing entertaining science fantasy but moral messages to sometimes slip in. Mainly this is just provides an excuse for adults to watch what was considered a kids' show and pat themselves on the back for being clever enough to spot the 'hidden meaning.' Usually though it's just fortune cookie morality; slavery is bad (Warrior's Gate) watching too much violence on TV isn't good for you (Vengence on Varos) we should be sympathetic to people who have horrible diseases like leprosy (Terminus)
But there is really no overal moral theme the series has followed, except perhaps the general ones that freedom is a good thing and over reliance on technology is dehumanising
 
amdd97 said:
I cried, I also cried at series 4. I miss David so MUCH!!
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David is everyone's favorite, just so you know.

MissReepicheep said:
I just finished watching the Christmas special. It was weird. o_O But I LOVED the ending, when The Doctor went to visit Amy and Rory. *dies of delight* It was so sweet.
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Considering he almost always declines spending Christmas with someone, that was nice.


Hermit of Archenland said:
Considering I've actually started several threads myself which Copperfox only posted in much later that's hardly fair. I visited this thread because I was curious what people thought of the episode.
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Fair enough. I'm just saying what it looks like from here. We've had our share of members who join just to come in and disagree on most topics. They are experts on multi quoting lengthy posts and fill them with disagreements. I tend to ignore them mostly. So yeah.
 
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