Vale Prince Philip

I was affected by Prince Philip’s death more than I was expecting to be. I’ve never met him, of course, but he has been a prominent figure in public life my entire life. Insofar as it is socially acceptable to have a favourite member of the royal family, Prince Philip was mine. I liked him for his sense of humour, his earthiness, his lack of pretension and his impatience with fuss and pomposity, the way he couldn’t give a toss about what was said about him, and the way he personified a certain kind of rakish English aristocrat of a former age (he was, of course, exiled Greco-Danish royalty, not English at all). Philip was an easy man to be fond of, as many were.

I suppose Prince Philip’s death affected me as much as it did because he was, in a way, family. For those of us for whose countries the royal family is our royal family, they are constant and familiar figures in our public life. For virtually all of us, the Queen and Prince Philip have been a presence, albeit distant, in our lives for our entire lives. We share in their family celebrations, as well as their tragedies and embarrassments. We know them like we know our own extended family. So, when one of them, one as familiar and beloved as Prince Philip, dies, we feel we have lost someone of our own.

At least, that’s how I feel. I appreciate not all of us in countries where the Queen still reigns will feel this way about the royal family, but many of us do. I would compare it to the way Catholics would feel when the Pope dies, but I think I should reserve that analogy for the death of the monarch. You get the idea, though.

I think Prince Philip’s death also affected me personally because it has highlighted the reality of death as a permanent end. A person was there one day, as he had been every day for 99 years, but then not there the next. And he is never coming back. That’s a really heavy thing to digest. Prince Philip is not the first public figure to die in my lifetime, but, being a prominent royal and therefore for all the reasons above, he is the first whose death has affected me in this way.

Prince Philip was a magnificent man and servant of the people. Again, I’ve never met him (though dearly wished I had), but by the stories that are being shared by those that have, he seems to have delighted and touched nearly everyone he met. He appreciated what a special thing it was to meet royalty, and made sure he left people with a memory to cherish.

He gave his life to serving his adopted country, the Commonwealth, and his wife, the Queen, in addition to the many causes and initiatives he patronised and founded. It is difficult for we ordinary people to comprehend the enormity of his service over a long and eventful life.

We have lost one of the greatest men of our times, and the world is a lesser place without him. Vale.

Chris Chibnall has purged Moffat’s writers. Is this good?

Chris Chibnall has released the names of the writers and directors who’ve been working on Series 11. They are:

Writers

• Malorie Blackman (Noughts and Crosses, Pig-Heart Boy)
• Ed Hime (Skins, The Incomplete Recorded Works of a Dead Body)
• Vinay Patel (Murdered By My Father)
• Pete McTighe (Wentworth)
• Joy Wilkinson (The Life and Adventures of Nick Nickleby)

Directors

• Sallie Aprahamian (Extremely Dangerous, The Sins, Real Men, etc.)
• Jamie Childs
• Jennifer Perrott (The Ravens)
• Mark Tonderai (The Five, Impulse, Lucifer, Gotham, House at the End of the Street, etc.)

To be honest I don’t recognise any of these names. Apart from Chris Chibnall himself, none of these names have worked on Doctor Who before. Evidently Chibnall has chosen to spurn Moffat’s stable of regular writers and directors (Sarah Dollard, Jamie Mathieson, Toby Whithouse, Rachel Talalay, etc.) for an all-new troupe. He seems to be intending on making a clean break from the Moffat era with a completely fresh ensemble of voices, talents and styles.

I can see reasons alternately to be excited and disappointed by such a decision. For one, a clean break and a fresh start after eight years of Steven Moffat’s version of Doctor Who is always going to be welcome. Staleness has always been Doctor Who’s bane, and a completely new lineup of writers and directors can’t help but reinvigorate and inject a much-needed dose of freshness into the show. I’m also always interested in seeing how Doctor Who is interpreted by new writers and directors who’ve never worked on the show before, and, under the influence of a new showrunner who seems keen do things differently, there are the makings of what could be a very creative and original series of Doctor Who.

On the other hand, I’m disappointed to see that some of the best talents unearthed by Steven Moffat recently — namely Jamie Mathieson, Sarah Dollard, Peter Harness, Toby Whithouse, Rachel Talalay, Daniel Nettheim — have not been asked to return for Series 11. It’s all very well wanting to make a clean break with your predecessor’s era, but when you have Jamie Mathieson at your disposal, eager to write for you, why in time and space would you turn him down? A new troupe of writers may well make for a fresh new Who, but it’s always going to be a risk entrusting your first series as showrunner to people who, while they may be highly accomplished in their own work, have never written for Doctor Who before and are therefore basically wildcards. Because Doctor Who isn’t like any other show, and writing for Doctor Who is different from writing for any other show.

If I were in Chibnall’s place, I’d have asked back at least one of Moffat’s writers, probably Jamie Mathieson — who is simply too good to turn down that I’m still floored as to why he wasn’t asked back — so I knew I had at least one experienced set of writing chops on board whom I knew I could rely on to turn in a competent Doctor Who script or two. Chibnall must know that there’s a lot riding on the first “female Doctor Who” series, so he must be quite confident that it’s not all going to be an unmitigated disaster if he hasn’t brought any of Moffat’s people back.

Interesting news about Chris Chibnall’s plans for Doctor Who

From Radio Times yesterday:

It looks like new Doctor Who showrunner Chris Chibnall is set to shake up the long-running sci-fi drama when he takes over at the end of the year.

In an interview with Television, the in-house magazine of the Royal Television Society, Chibnall says that all options are on the table for the programme, including a whole-series storyline of the kind he pursued on three series of Broadchurch.

Asked if this approach were possible, he replied “yes”, adding that “what the BBC was after was risk and boldness” when they approached him for the job.

Admitting that he resisted accepting the role “for a very long time”, Chibnall said the BBC had agreed with his ideas for the show – somewhat to his surprise.

“I had ideas about what I wanted to do with it,” he said. “When I went to them and said, ‘This is what I would do’, I actually expected them to say, ‘Ooh, let’s talk about that’, but they said: ‘Great!’”

Interviewer Mark Lawson writes in the same piece: “Chibnall’s general tone suggests that there may be a radical revamp of Doctor Who, which will please those who have suggested the show needs a kick up the Tardis.”

I’ll be writing my review of The Empress of Mars soon–probably tonight if all goes well–but I just wanted to comment briefly on this very interesting bit of news about Chris Chibnall’s plans for Doctor Who post 2017.

Basically, Chibnall appears to be toying with plans for a radical shake-up of Doctor Who’s format when he takes over. There’s a reference to the possibility of a series-long storyline à la Broadchurch in the article–which would be radical indeed, and if Chibnall is considering that, then it’s a pretty good indication that anything is possible for Series 11. Even more interestingly, it looks like the BBC is totally on board with any radical revamping of the show Chibnall is proposing to undertake.

I’m not exaggerating when I say that this is some of the most exciting Doctor Who news we’ve heard in a long time–and yes, that includes the return of John Simm and the Mondasian Cybermen. I was literally only thinking yesterday about how the best thing Chibnall could do for the show, other than produce great stories, would be to shake up the format. I actually didn’t think it was likely to happen, but an iconoclastic overhaul is exactly what the show needs right now.

I hate to say it, but as brilliant as the Capaldi era has been, at least for us diehards, the thing is just getting a bit stale. A bit passé. I was reflecting on that in my review of Extremis, where I struggled to be enthused by what was undoubtedly one of the boldest and most boundary-pushing episodes we’ve seen on Who. That the show has been sticking to the formula Russell T Davies employed when he brought it back in 2005 has a lot to do with that. Sure, there have been stylistic changes along the way–Moffat in particular has cycled through as many stylistic shifts as he’s done seasons–and the character of the fanbase has changed in tandem, but on the whole Doctor Who in 2017 remains the same show it was in 2005. And I think if it stayed that way any longer we’d all, even us diehards, get bored of it and it would get cancelled.

So, yes, the show needs to change to survive, and more than to survive, to remain interesting. The experience of the show’s first cancellation should be instructive: by 1989 the show had become repetitive, had become boring, had lost viewers, and was canned. The changes need to involve more than more two-parters or extending the format to 60 minutes (although both would be welcome changes). The experiment with a three-part story in the Monk trilogy was a welcome venture, even if that storyline rather flopped. The idea of a Broadchurch-style series-long storyline is even better.

I think I’d also want to see a major stylistic shift under Chibnall. Moffat made a significant stylistic shift away from Davies’ familiar (and relatively consistent) style when he took over in 2010, and has moved even further away from Davies’ style since then, but by and large the show still looks much like it did in 2005, and a casual viewer wouldn’t necessarily be able to distinguish between the two. Just compare televised Doctor Who to the audio Doctor Who Big Finish is making to discern how little the show has actually changed since 2005. Doctor Who is still by and large a soap opera clothed in science-fiction garb, admittedly with more emphasis on the science-fiction bit now than in 2005. There’s nothing wrong with that per se, but after 12 years it’s starting to feel stale. It’s hard to get consistently large numbers of people excited about the same thing you’ve been making for 12 years.

Doctor Who should feel fresh again. Series 11 should be a reboot in every sense except continuity. Series 11 should feel like 2005 again, not stylistically but in the sense of freshness and newness, in the sense that you’re seeing an old, familiar show totally remade into a new one. In 2005 the rebranded, revamped Doctor Who captured the attention of a nation–and it can do so again if it successfully does what it’s always been good at, and changes, regenerates.

I was starting to feel uneasy about the prospect of Chibnall as showrunner, given his indication that he was going to throw out all the current writers (even Mathieson and Dollard)–and I’m still uneasy about Chibnall on this front–but he’s just given me a very good reason to be excited about Series 11.

The Mondasian Cybermen are back!

The original Mondasian Cybermen from The Tenth Planet are returning in the Series 10 finale and oh my god you have no idea how freaking excited I am about this. I’ve wanted this for so long but I never thought Moffat would be bold or visionary enough to actually do it. I take back everything I said about Moffat phoning it in in Series 10, because this is some seriously meaty and ambitious and fan-pleasing stuff.

It was Peter Capaldi who once said he’d love to see the Mondasian Cybermen back on the show, but that Moffat has agreed that it would be a good idea to bring them back—in his last finale no less—shows that he’s interested in what the fans want to see (in this case the more nerdy and opinionated section of the fandom) and is engaging with the conversations we’ve been having, since the Mondasian Cybermen have been pretty high on so many hardcore Whovians’ wish lists. If Moffat brings back the Valeyard in the Christmas special he’ll have absolutely made my year (although I’m not expecting that).

For those who haven’t seen much of Classic Who and don’t get why it’s so exciting that the Mondasian Cybermen are being brought back, let me enlighten you. You could do worse than to read my paean to the Mondasian Cybermen in my review of the Big Finish audio Spare Parts. What The Tenth Planet gets right and what pretty much all subsequent Cybermen stories (especially in the revived series) have got wrong, and what Spare Parts tried to rehabilitate, was a conception of the Cybermen as a chilling reflection of ourselves. Look past the primitive costume work on the Mondasian Cybermen and see the compelling concept they’re supposed to embody: the Cybermen are us if we’re not careful about how far we take artificial augmentation of our bodies. The Cybermen are what we could become. They’re supposed to be tragic, not frightening, or frightening only in the sense that they should be a warning to us about what we could become. The Cybermen are not Daleks with legs—they’re not killer robots—as they’re regrettably portrayed in the modern series. They’re us. They’re literally the human race. That’s the reason why they’re supposed to be scary.

Even though the costuming and voices and movements of the Cybermen from The Tenth Planet are quite primitive and probably seem quite comical to us, I think those original models actually embody this concept of the Cybermen as humanity’s “dark mirror” really well. The zombie-like movements, the weird half-human, half-machine sing-songy voices, their chillingly human dialogue (actual rational argument, not “DELETE”), the creepy fleshy faces and hands. It all makes for a version of the Cybermen that I find so much freakier and creepier than the stomping killer robots in their Iron Man suits screaming “DELETE” that the show is afflicted with today. The Cybermen, true to their original concept, should really, as the Mondasian Cybermen did, evoke zombies, which are another human-but-not-human creature, rather than robots, which are human in no way at all. I really just hope Moffat gets them right.

If you haven’t already, I’d definitely recommend watching The Tenth Planet (which is also the First Doctor’s regeneration story!) to see the original Mondasian Cybermen at their freaky, zombie-ish, ‘Sixties best. After The Tenth Planet, listen to the Spare Parts Big Finish audio play, which sees the Fifth Doctor and Nyssa return to Mondas to witness the genesis of the Cybermen—which is an amazing Doctor Who story in itself, but also, in my opinion, the best Cyberman story ever precisely because it’s such a faithful portrayal of the iconic villain.

Peter Capaldi’s departure

So, for anyone who hasn’t heard the earth-shattering news, Peter Capaldi will be leaving Doctor Who after Series 10, to regenerate in the 2017 Christmas special. I wasn’t ready for the news to be honest, because it doesn’t feel that long ago that we welcomed Capaldi into the role. But, on the other hand, I was kind of expecting this. Peter’s not a young man, and the role inevitably takes its toll even on sprightly youngsters like Matt Smith and David Tennant. And three seasons, or four years, seems to have become the convention for an actor’s run as the Doctor these days. Anyway, here are some of the thoughts that have been running through my head since I heard the news.

On one level I’m disappointed. Peter Capaldi has been an absolutely fantastic Doctor and it was always going to be sad to see him leave. Although I admit it took me a while to warm to him after Matt left, over Series 9 I came to adore him, so much that I count him as my second favourite Doctor after Matt Smith, and Twelve and Clara have become my favourite Doctor and companion team after Eleven and the Ponds. Of course I knew that Peter had to leave eventually, but I thought (or hoped) that with Peter it would be different. I saw uniquely in Peter, unlike in Matt, the potential to become the next iconic Doctor Who, the show’s modern Tom Baker, if he stayed around for an extended run. I would have loved to have seen Peter establish himself in the role long-term. I would have loved to have seen his face and his name become synonymous with the Doctor, like Tom Baker was. Given how much Peter revered the show and loved the role, and given that he wasn’t a young actor like David or Matt with full careers ahead of them, I half expected him to do exactly that. But alas. It’s been a privilege to have had Peter at all, so I can’t complain that he didn’t stay for longer.

Peter has undoubtedly been the best actor ever to star in the role. He brought compelling gravitas, intensity and passion to the role. His Doctor was utterly bewitching to watch. Unlike most actors who take up the role, usually up-and-coming actors or relatively small names, Peter was a distinguished and widely-respected actor when he took the role. It’s probably not exaggerating to say Peter was (and is) one of the most distinguished British actors of his generation. The role was, frankly, below him, but he took it up anyway because he loved the show so much and it was his childhood dream to be the Doctor. Do we realise how privileged we are to have had him? Without at all detracting from Matt or David or Chris or any of the other actors who’ve played the role, Peter’s performances were just of a higher calibre than any who’ve come before him, as the tours de force of Heaven Sent, Hell Bent, Twelve’s speech in The Zygon Inversion proved. You could see how devoted to the role he was by the way he put everything into his performances, and it’s made for some of the best Doctor Who ever (in my opinion).

When Twelve regenerates we’ll get a new actor in the role, and that in itself is exciting, as sad as it is to see Peter go. The speculation has already started (and I’m going to join in soon—watch this space!) What’s already clear is that the calls for a female Doctor are louder than ever this time round. I’ve shared my reasons why I don’t want a female Doctor before, but since the topic has come up again I’m going to write another post on the topic soon reiterating my thoughts. I’m not sure what I would do if, come Christmas, Twelve regenerates and the Doctor is a woman, but I think I would keep watching, albeit begrudgingly. I would give it a chance, at least, but I can’t see it working.

In any case I think it’s unlikely that a female actor will be cast as the next Doctor. A new showrunner is taking over, and, with Peter (and probably Pearl, too) going at the same time, everything is going to be new. Like in 2010, it’ll practically be a reboot, and the show has to win its audience over all over again. I think, in those circumstances, Chibnall and the production team would consider that introducing a female Doctor would be too big a risk to take, because if the audience don’t take to a female Doctor and turn away from the show, the BBC might easily be tempted to make the decision that the show is finished and cancel it.

On the subject of Series 11, though, even though I would have loved to have seen Peter continue as the Doctor under Chris Chibnall and see a new showrunner’s interpretation of his Doctor, I’m also excited by the prospect of a 2010-style (soft) reboot. A totally clean slate. That means, I guess, Pearl would have to go, too. I realise it might be uncharitable to Pearl to advocate for her to leave before we’ve even seen her, but I have a feeling that she’s only staying around for one series anyway, since Series 10 is Moffat’s final series. Maybe Chibnall would have preferred to have some familiar faces around him when he started, maybe not, but the opportunity to totally reinvent the show, with a completely clean slate, is too good to pass up. I think Steven Moffat’s total overhaul of the show in 2010 was immensely successful in breathing new life into the show and ushering in an exciting new era. I’m looking forward to seeing how Chibnall recasts Doctor Who in his vision.

Now, let’s start preparing ourselves for another emotional regeneration. What am I saying? You know you’re going to cry, you may as well accept it. At least we’ll get to see Twelve with Clara again… *lip quivers*