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’Doctor Who’ forges new start by recapturing glory days.
elcome to the Disney
era of “Doctor Who.”
Once upon a time,
there was a globally popular,
decades-spanning sci-fl TV se-
ries about a mythic alien trick—
ster who changed into different
lead actors every few years and
who traveled through space and
time in a disappearing blue box
that was bigger on the inside
than on the outside.
As the narrative became
less accessible to casual view-
ers, due to the compounding
complexity of its many backsto-
ries, it only took a handful of
ill-considered revisions to that
established canon, presented
during less-than-deftly written
episodes, to diminish the fan—
dom enough for the show to go
on hiatus.
Then, a showrunner named
Russell T. Davies brought “Doc-
tor Who” back with a big heart
and some big-screen-size stylis-
tic ambitions.
That was how “Doctor Who”
returned to the BBC in 2005,
following a 1996 TV movie on
FOX failed to restart the series
after its end in 1989, and it ap—
pears to be how RTD (as he’s
abbreviated by fandom) is re-
vamping the Show with a trio
of weekly streaming specials on
Disney+, after its last regular
season in 2021 trailed 011‘ into a
string of specials during 2022.
The original “Doctor Who”
from 1963 through 1989 was
limited by a modest production
budget, occasionally hastily
written scripts and a touch of
over-reliance on dated contem-
porary genre tropes.
When Davies reintroduced
“Doctor Who” in 2005, he was
praised for injecting it with a
fresh sensibility, similar to that
of J oss Whedon’s “8tu the
Vampire Slayer” TV series, by
turning a more in-depth focus
on the personal lives and rela—
tionships of the human charac-
ters whom the Doctor adopted
as his traveling companions.
What Whedon and Davies
wound up doing was to outline
what became the subsequent
DARK REVIEWS
Marvel Cinematic Universe
formula by mixing snarky, self-
aware comedy and manipula-
tive familial drama with stag-
gerineg apocalyptic stakes,
well—suited for widescreen
visuals.
That’s what Davies’ “Doc-
tor Who” was about for five
years, until he amenably ceded
custody of the series to other
hands in 2010. Based on “The
Star Beast” — the first of Da—
vies’ three “Doctor Who” spe-
cials on Disney+, which began
streaming Nov. 25 — that’s the
RTD who came back for this
go-round.
Davies is joined in all three
Disney+ specials by his pri-
mary incarnation of the Doctor
(played by David Tennant, who
remains one of the most popular
“Doctor Who” lead actors in the
series’ history) and Donna N o-
ble (played by Catherine Tate),
who rzmks among the most be—
~ loved of the doctor’s companions
in the post-2005 era.
After watching “The Star
Beast,” I can reassure fellow
fans of the Doctor/Donna pair—
ing that Davies retained both
characters’ distinctive voices
while writing their dialogue.
Tennant and Tate spark off
each other as though they’d
never left the show.
For those who haven’t seen
“Doctor Who,” I can reassure
you that Davies’ storytelling
brings new viewers up to speed
on the key points of who the
Doctor and Donna Noble are,
what they mean to each other,
and what the stakes of their
Thursday, November 30, 2023 — Shelton-Mason County Journal - Page 13
David Tennant as “Doctor Who” proves that, if you invite a
cockatieI-haired space-wizard
into your home, you should expect some drastic interior renovations.
Courtesy photo
reunion will be.
Even if you have no taste for
fantasy-flavored adventures,
the Doctor’s chaotic interactions
with Donna, and her family,
should appeal to those who rel-
ish the rapid—fire farce of Bruce
Willis and Cybill Shepherd’s
verbal duels in “Moonlighting,”
albeit without any of David
and Maddie’s more adult~rated
chemistry (the Doctor and
Donna really are just very good
friends).
Beyond that, “The Star
Beast” should be an effective
litmus test for the degrees to
which you’ll find RTD’s “Doctor
Who” either endearing or diffi-
cult to endure. Like George Lu:
cas and Ray Bradbury, Davies
is a “science-fantasist,” rather
than a “hard-SF” storyteller,
who uses the genre as a vehicle
for social commentary and
(mostly) well-done melodrama. '
If you love cryptic but bla-
tantly telegraphed teases for
multi—episode story arcs, gra-
tuitous strings of meaningless
but semi—scientific-sounding
jargon, and well-intended and
frequent vague “Power of Love”
resolutions that lean on the cos-
mic equivalents of “Care Bear
517 Franklin St. 0 Shelton (Across from Safeway) - www.3heltoncinemas.com
24 Hour Movie Info (360) 426-1000
MA©B© MQCEWEE
How the Grinch Stole Christmas (2000)
Friday 12/1 at 3:45
The Marvels
'Stares,” you. are going to adore
Davies. I’m not even criticiz-
ing. When measured out cor-
rectly, his tropes make for great
ingredients.
However, if you head into
RTD’s “Doctor Who” expecting
it to be free of what you might
consider “woke” messaging, as
the “South Park” ski instruc-
tors would tell you, “You’re
gonna have a bad time.” Davies
is openly gay, and his stories
have always been unabashedly
inclusive of not only LGBTQ,
but various other spectra of
diversity.
Davies’ outlook reveals itself
in the most basic aspects of his
tales, because when you begin
from the premise that it’s OK
to be different, then it naturally
follows that appearances aren’t
always what they seem. What
might look like scary monsters
are actually good guys.
For those new to “Who,”
the black—clad paramilitary-
uniformed troops we see on the
scene are part of U.N.I.T., aka
the United Nations Intelligence
Taskforce. In spite of their sin—
ister attire in “The Star Beast,”
they’re typically allies of the
Doctor (when they’re not being
Daily at 4:30 6:45
Plus Sat/Sun matinee at 2:15
manipulated by villainous forc-
es). Ruth Madeley is a welcome
new addition as Shirley Bing-
ham, the group’s latest scien-
tific adviser (a post the Doctor
himself once held). ’
For fellow longtime Who-
vians, the new central console
room ofthe TARDIS is already
my all-time favorite, as it com-
bines the pristine, streamlined
futurism of the original’series
with the open-ended complexity
and expansiveness of the mod—
ern TARDIS interiors, most no—
tably the Eleventh Doctor’s “e1-
egant mess” of a jack-o’-lantern.
I love the Spiraling catwalks
and the multiple portals, per-
haps as much as writers Pat
Mills and John Wagner, and
artist Dave Gibbons, appar~
ently appreciate how well'“The
Star Beast” adapted what was
originally their 1980s comic
strip story for “Doctor Who
Weekly” magazine.
Look for parts two and three
of this trilogy “Wild Blue
Yonder” and “The Giggle” —— on
the Saturdays of Dec. 2 and 9
on Disney+, which should cul-
minate with Ncuti Gatwa tak-
ing over as the newest “Doctor
Who.”
1
m rm Alum mwumm u m
Trolls Band Together
Daily at 4:40 6:40
(No 4:40 showing Friday 12/1)
Plus Sat/Sun matinee at 2:30