tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-229215252024-03-07T15:57:48.543-06:00The Rued MorgueRoss Ruedigerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00796449359255091290noreply@blogger.comBlogger622125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22921525.post-28380500174709158942017-12-26T12:00:00.000-06:002017-12-31T10:23:56.352-06:00Doctor Who: Twice Upon a Time
“Memories. You’re talking about memories.” — Rick Deckard, Blade RunnerIt almost seems like a no-brainer that Steven Moffat should craft his final hour of Doctor Who — a finish line he crosses alongside leading man Peter Capaldi — as a meditation on the power of memories. Following the episode proper, Moffat revealed in the half-hour BBC America wrap-up special that he’d always intended to comeRoss Ruedigerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00796449359255091290noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22921525.post-34987055782889208062017-07-17T13:10:00.000-05:002017-07-17T13:10:03.693-05:00A Female ‘Doctor Who’ Is Exactly What the Franchise Needed
“I want to tell the fans not to be scared by my gender. Because this is a really exciting time, and Doctor Who represents everything that’s exciting about change. The fans have lived through so many changes, and this is only a new, different one, not a fearful one.” – Jodie WhittakerIt’s the groundbreaking casting decision that’s caused aftershocks to ripple across the internet: 35-year-old Ross Ruedigerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00796449359255091290noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22921525.post-53954580541920124382017-07-02T11:24:00.000-05:002017-07-02T11:24:08.838-05:00Doctor Who: The Doctor Falls
As I’ve written in past seasons, Steven Moffat two-parters tend to be composed of two very different types of episodes. While “The Doctor Falls” indeed follows that pattern, it was refreshing that the important plot points set up last week pay off; “The Doctor Falls” is indeed the second half of “World Enough and Time” in most every respect. The biggest questions I had (which didn’t even occur Ross Ruedigerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00796449359255091290noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22921525.post-10120300126851889222017-06-25T12:31:00.000-05:002017-06-25T12:31:46.433-05:00Doctor Who: World Enough and Time
“World Enough and Time” aims to grab your attention from its opening, pre-credits moments. The Doctor stumbles from the TARDIS into a frozen landscape, his hair longer and wilder than ever before, seemingly fighting against his regeneration. It’s a striking sequence, perhaps undercut only by that awful faux-regeneration in “The Lie of the Land,” an episode I’ve grown to despise exponentially Ross Ruedigerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00796449359255091290noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22921525.post-14012755036077879842017-06-22T14:29:00.000-05:002017-06-22T14:29:12.194-05:00Doctor Who: The Eaters of Light
Often in my recaps, I rely on the history of the writer while forming my thoughts and opinions of an episode. Doctor Who is very much a writers’ show, even though the head writers like Russell T. Davies and Steven Moffat get the most credit (as well as the most blame). Rona Munro, the writer of “The Eaters of Light,” holds a special distinction: She is now the first and only writer to have Ross Ruedigerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00796449359255091290noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22921525.post-78504126166823851692017-06-12T16:02:00.000-05:002017-06-12T16:02:07.077-05:00Doctor Who: Empress of Mars
Back in season seven, Mark Gatiss reintroduced classic Doctor Who villains the Ice Warriors in “Cold War,” an episode I was gaga over. A big part of my love revolved around its infusion of ’80s nuclear paranoia, which at the time seemed something of a distant memory. My, how just a few years can see us tumbling backward. “Empress of Mars,” which is in no way a sequel to “Cold War” (indeed, it Ross Ruedigerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00796449359255091290noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22921525.post-41979850770300532572017-06-04T11:13:00.000-05:002017-06-04T11:13:57.331-05:00Doctor Who: The Lie of the Land
The opening montage of “The Lie of the Land,” presented as an alternate history lesson narrated by the Doctor, is disturbingly effective. The Monks have insinuated themselves into our memories to the point that humanity believes they’ve been guiding and helping us since we first wiggled out of the oceans and sprouted legs. The video is intercut with imagery of an average family broken apart by Ross Ruedigerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00796449359255091290noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22921525.post-21411258196390708482017-05-28T11:38:00.000-05:002017-05-28T11:38:29.479-05:00Doctor Who: The Pyramid at the End of the World
As he did last season with a tension-packed Zygon two-parter, writer Peter Harness (with Steven Moffat taking a co-writing credit) again sets out to nearly destroy planet Earth, and again he skillfully takes us on a paranoid, politically-charged ride. Last time it was UNIT at the forefront of the battle; this time its three major world powers. Picking up in the real world from where we left offRoss Ruedigerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00796449359255091290noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22921525.post-78248333197749707282017-05-21T10:15:00.000-05:002017-05-21T10:15:29.240-05:00Doctor Who: Extremis
As most Doctor Who fans know, we’re rapidly approaching the end of Steven Moffat’s era. There’s no question his showrunning tenure has been a divisive one, but at least here in the States, it was on his watch that the show attained such immense popularity. He has scripted more stories and filled more minutes than any other writer in the show’s history. (Due to the classic series’ serialized Ross Ruedigerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00796449359255091290noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22921525.post-31388739401108822712017-05-14T02:31:00.000-05:002017-05-14T02:31:19.105-05:00Doctor Who: Oxygen
The Doctor: “Space … the final frontier. Final because it wants to kill us. Sometimes we forget that, start taking it all for granted — the suits, the ships, the little bubbles of safety — as they protect us from the void. But the void is always waiting.”Beginning with that darkly tongue-in-cheek voice over, the pre-credits sequence of “Oxygen” is quintessential Doctor Who. Two bodies eerily Ross Ruedigerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00796449359255091290noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22921525.post-80969153118644036452017-05-09T14:25:00.000-05:002017-05-09T14:25:09.993-05:00Doctor Who: Knock Knock
In this week’s episode of Doctor Who, Bill and her college peeps — Harry (Colin Ryan), Paul (Ben Presley, Galavant), Felicity (Alice Hewkin), Shireen (Mandeep Dhillon), and Pavel (Bart Suavek) — hunt for a place to live. The digs they check out are too pricey or too noisy or too cramped. Out of nowhere appears a strange old man (the always reliable David Suchet) offering them a place beyond Ross Ruedigerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00796449359255091290noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22921525.post-8505875786468629352017-04-30T00:26:00.000-05:002017-04-30T00:26:54.279-05:00Doctor Who: Thin Ice
Writer Sarah Dollard’s first contribution to Doctor Who was last season’s “Face the Raven,” an episode I was lukewarm on, though that had little to do with her script. Dollard was tasked with killing off Clara, yet not really. It was a tough sell because it happened so fast and without fanfare at an odd time of the season, so it was difficult to buy into at a point when believability was Ross Ruedigerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00796449359255091290noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22921525.post-85517485577089513442017-04-23T16:33:00.000-05:002017-04-23T16:33:58.843-05:00Doctor Who: Smile
Going into “Smile,” I was leery about two things: Emojibots and Frank Cottrell-Boyce’s writing credit. The former because, well, I’m a writer, and like many other writers I cringe at them instinctively. The latter because Cottrell-Boyce’s only other contribution to Doctor Who was season eight’s ambitious failure “In the Forest of the Night,” arguably the weakest offering of that year. Turns outRoss Ruedigerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00796449359255091290noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22921525.post-12210996277827780052017-04-16T12:27:00.003-05:002017-04-19T16:52:02.191-05:00Doctor Who: The Pilot
Two Christmas specials aside, it’s been a seemingly interminably long wait for new Doctor Who. A guy I know recently asked, “Is that show even still on?,” which cut me deeply. A strong, multi-episodic arc of Time Lord and TARDIS will make things right again, and “The Pilot” is rife with promise of greatness to come. As Steven Moffat-penned scripts go, it is refreshingly lacking in twists and Ross Ruedigerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00796449359255091290noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22921525.post-26019413092146355402016-12-28T23:14:00.002-06:002016-12-28T23:14:13.005-06:00Doctor Who: The Return of Doctor Mysterio
It’s been exactly one year since we last had any new Doctor Who. That’s the longest period of time the series has been off the air with no new material since it was resurrected in 2005. Given the awful year that was, perhaps it’s entirely appropriate that the Doctor’s heroics have been absent. Maybe 2016 just wasn’t designed for taking fanciful trips in the TARDIS. And what of 2017? Next year, Ross Ruedigerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00796449359255091290noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22921525.post-20448953439046186342015-12-26T10:55:00.002-06:002017-04-19T16:48:39.460-05:00Doctor Who: The Husbands of River Song
The first time I watched Doctor Who's holiday offering, it didn't go swimmingly. It was late and I was tired and cranky, and probably not in the mood for festive antics. The whole thing seemed loud and rather aimless, and at nearly 60 minutes (like all the holiday specials are), stretched too thin for the premise. There's always a very real danger of viewers being in similar frames of mind on Ross Ruedigerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00796449359255091290noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22921525.post-91846991287537138712015-12-06T01:08:00.000-06:002015-12-06T12:16:55.886-06:00Doctor Who: Hell Bent
One aspect of Steven Moffat’s writing that doesn’t get nearly enough praise is its unpredictability. In any given season, people develop theories about what will happen. Sometimes, in the broadest sense, a few folks correctly call a thing or two ahead of time. But nobody, anywhere on the planet, in any corner of the world that this show is viewed in, predicted that this season would end with Ross Ruedigerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00796449359255091290noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22921525.post-22994901996935393452015-11-29T13:20:00.000-06:002015-11-29T13:20:47.443-06:00Doctor Who: Heaven Sent
When you’ve been plotting and writing Doctor Who for as long as Steven Moffat has, you inevitably must stumble across an idea that’s so mad you have no choice but to see it through to its finish. What will the people who so often chant for Moffat’s dismissal from the series – those who claim he has run out of ideas – make of this intimately epic hour that delves deep into the psyche of the Ross Ruedigerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00796449359255091290noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22921525.post-51484562873646664352015-11-23T11:02:00.000-06:002015-11-23T11:02:24.107-06:00Doctor Who: Face the Raven
There’s no need to begin with talk of the first two acts here, when the last 10 minutes of “Face the Raven” are what most folks are currently concerned with, so let’s cut to the chase: Clara’s dead, which, unless you pay very close attention to internet scuttlebutt, no doubt came as a huge surprise. After all, in the modern era, companion exits tend to happen at the end of a season, accompaniedRoss Ruedigerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00796449359255091290noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22921525.post-44301168683629941832015-11-15T10:50:00.000-06:002015-11-15T10:50:23.146-06:00Doctor Who: Sleep No More
Gagan Rassmussen: “You must not watch this! I’m warning you. You can never unsee it.”Rassmussen could easily have been speaking about “Sleep No More” itself with that very first line of the episode. Well, the streak of perfection (or at least near perfection) had to end sooner or later, didn’t it? Season nine had been charging forward like some kind of long form narrative Roadrunner, and with “Ross Ruedigerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00796449359255091290noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22921525.post-78297561675369177512015-11-08T11:20:00.000-06:002015-11-10T19:12:16.714-06:00Doctor Who: The Zygon Inversion
After the thrilling real world cliffhanger of “The Zygon Invasion,” picking up events in Clara’s hazy Zygon dream state was unexpected to say the least. But then this second half is much different in its aims than the far more action-packed first half. Whereas “The Zygon Invasion” was concerned with the outer, “Inversion” is appropriately concerned with the inner, and as such, perhaps there wasRoss Ruedigerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00796449359255091290noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22921525.post-12799599415640535362015-11-02T23:59:00.000-06:002015-11-10T19:12:08.277-06:00Doctor Who: The Zygon Invasion
The Doctor: “This is a splinter group. The rest of the Zygons — the vast majority — they want to live in peace. You start bombing them, you’ll radicalize the lot. That’s exactly what the splinter group wants.”
And with that brief, impassioned speech, “The Zygon Invasion” arguably became the most important Doctor Who episode since “Vincent and the Doctor” tackled depression back in 2010. Ross Ruedigerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00796449359255091290noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22921525.post-18719526740346484952015-10-25T12:52:00.000-05:002015-11-10T19:11:49.399-06:00Doctor Who: The Woman Who Lived
Last week I referred to “The Girl Who Died” as the first half of a two-parter. It was pretty obvious even then that, along with “The Woman Who Lived,” this pair wasn’t a two-parter in the same vein as the previous tales this season. Not only are they entirely different settings, but they’re not even by the same writer. Catherine Tregenna is new to Doctor Who, but not to the Whoniverse. Ross Ruedigerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00796449359255091290noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22921525.post-2783778072052042132015-10-18T12:42:00.000-05:002015-11-10T19:10:16.800-06:00Doctor Who: The Girl Who Died
“The Girl Who Died” was possibly the most anticipated episode of season nine, not as much for the material, but rather for a crucial piece of casting: Maisie Williams of Game of Thrones fame. (Typed as though you didn’t know who she was, right?) We’ve had a number of casting crossovers between the two shows already, and yet this is surely the most exciting one yet, because, well, who doesn’t Ross Ruedigerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00796449359255091290noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22921525.post-53800572233751900872015-10-11T11:59:00.000-05:002015-10-11T11:59:23.261-05:00Doctor Who: Before the Flood
“Before the Flood” is the fourth episode of season nine. “Listen” was the fourth episode of season eight. Both episodes begin with the Doctor breaking the fourth wall. Coincidence? Such a gimmick shouldn’t work once, let alone twice, and yet here I found myself jumping around in my chair, punching the air with even more enthusiasm than last year. Much of it had to do with the return of the Ross Ruedigerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00796449359255091290noreply@blogger.com