Futurekind Airlines
6x11 The God Complex
Hey, I'm back and since my flight was 90 minutes late on Saturday, I spent the time writingwhite whines about the flight delay down my thoughts on this Shiny episode. And now I'd typed in all the crap from my notebook.
Next I'll write about Dr Faustus, 'cos it was BRILLIANT, and you definitely don't hate me enough and if you all rage-delete me for bragging about seeing it for the millionth time and I won't have any readers left, I won't feel embarrassed when I write about stuff that's soooo last fortnight.
Welcome aboard, this is Futurekind Airlines. We are currently stuck at the airport because of some mechanical error or somesuch, so we'll be entertaining ourselves by reviewing last week's episode of Doctor Who.As well as laughing at the toddler in the seat behind me, he reminds me of my goddaughter.
So, the God Complex, the most hyped episode of the half-series. Hands up everybody who'd expected The Shining references! Wait, you didn't put your hand up? Liar.
Stuck in an 80s hotel full of monsters, apparently lead by some evil power. Yeah, that doesn't sound like The Shining at all.
Shots of long, empty hotel corridors, monsters in every room... the only thing missing is Jack Nicholson with an axe.
But wait... what are this rag-tag team of losers doing here? Oh, they're this week's guest characters, straight from Redshirt Agency.
Geez, it's bloody hot here, by the way, the air conditioning is off, it's about 40C in here, the toddlers (and there are quite a lot of them) are in hysterics.
Nonetheless, let's see these redshirts. Our numero uno contestant is Ms Perfect, she's so bloody clever and skillful and awesome that I want her dead.
Oh my gods, one of the toddlers is running around in nothing but a diaper. It is HOT.
So our second contestant is Mr Conspiracy Freak. I wanted him dead ASAP. He was 14-year-old unbearable me with screentime, an unfunny Connor Temple, Mulder without Scully and Samantha. all he did was gob on about secret government experiences and he did NOTHING ELSE. Aaah, air, the air conditioner's finally on. I wanted to whack him over the head every time he opened his mouth because he was a walking-talking trope.
Our third contestant is the Chap who Looked Like a Homeless Sontaran. I was funny at parts when he talked about invasions or whatever, but let's see what he did... nothing, nothing, more nothing, sacrifice one of his allies to save his own skin and then lie about it, nothing, nothing. I just couldn't care for him, either, so that whole thing about him escaping and rattling on about his home was lost on me. Oh, he escaped? Fine, whatever.
And our final contestant... the gambler. Well, that's almost as good as an alcoholic abusive father, but he didn't do much apart from dying. Yay, they fixed the engine that wasn't wrong after all. So, on the whole, the problem with the guest characters was that I couldn't care for any of them, not at all. Hell, I wanted two of them to go to hell to begin with, and, if possible, take the highway. I don't think they were properly developed. I can just label them, the Perfect, the Coward, the Gambler, the Mulder. It might've worked with John Hughes but he gave his characters personality traits of their own, even if they seemed completely cliché at first, they turned out to have some unique qualities.
Look at the guest characters in The Good Man Goes to War. Yes, I know, it's unfair to compare mortals to demi-gods, but Moffat's side-characters had minimal screentime yet their dialogue and actions hinted of rich personalities. Here, on the other hand... the gambler guy is nothing but a gambler. With shiny gambler trinkets. Hey-ho. OK, fine, he was already barking mad, wrong example. Then let's see Nerdy Boy. He's the very model of a model conspiracy freak. All he talks about is conspiracies, more conspiracies, blogging about conspiracies...
Damn, it's hot again and we've been sitting here for 90 minutes, this is torture, why couldn't we just go back in the terminal?
And, wait for it, his greatest fear ever is... GIRLS. Are you fucking kidding me?
The only character we got to know beyond the surface was Little Miss Perfect. But unfortunately that didn't make her any more likeable. I was hoping she would turn out to be evil because only a twist like that could've redeemed her character. We get it, Wesley's clever, stop rubbing it in our faces thrice a minute. But noo, not only is she really just SO DAMN GOOD, she even gets to make a Heroic Sacrifice. What a twit.
Oh listen to the choir of crying babies. Poor things, this plane feels like the inside of a frying pan. And on top of all that, my cup holder is drenched in some goo that looks like half-digested baby food. YAY we're moving!
And the problem with the character depth brings up the next problem I had with the story: (duh-duh-doom) everybody's greatest fears. As far as greatest fears go, they were rather laughable. Seriously? A gorilla? A grown-up person's greatest thing ever is a particular hairy mammal going 'roar' that she saw in a book? It might be all the hype about the fear thing, but I was rather expecting some psychological drama, not cheap scares, yet everybody's greatest fears were ridiculous.
AT LAST, WE'RE OFF, WE'RE FLYING!
Back at Futurekind Airlines, we're finally in the air, I've just got bored of the scenery, and it's really no one's fault that the aeroplane's computer is rubbish and rang a false alarm, but we're 90 minutes late and I'll have already missed the bus by the time we arrive, that's bloody £14 down the drain.
Were was I? Yes, yes, greatest fears... you might be terrified of a gorilla in a book, but if I take your most instinctive, archetypical fears, they definitely won't be gorilla-shaped. If they are, it'd better be a blood-sucking, soul-crushing, heart-munching Cthulhu of a gorilla that radiates pure despair and feeds on the nightmares of monsters. On the surface you're afraid of the gorilla, but in your nightmares you look down at your feet and realise what you thought was the ground is in fact the gorilla because the gorilla is the planet and as he opens his Asia-sized mouth you smell the putrid smell of the death of the universe and see ten thousand rows of teeth glint in the sunlight. I honestly can't believe someone's greatest fear is something as cheesy as that.
Omg, the flight attendants are distributing free O2 sim cards. Actual bloody sim cards. Now that's what I call advertisement. And the kids have finally gone quiet as the temperature dropped.
Even Amy's greatest fear is wrong. Yes, it's Little Amy again, yes, Caitlin is still cute, yes, I know how important the Doctor is to Amy and how this scene served to connect the episode to the conclusion, and I would've perfectly accepted this scene - in Series 5.
But since Series 5, Amy was supposed to have had character development. She used to be the girl who waited but now she's grown up and she's a mother. The current story arc is supposed to be about her searching for her kidnapped daughter.
Yet they've just stopped that with Hitler. There was the prequel and the teasers and all and Amy continuously begging the Doctor to find Melody. And then they find a sociopath adult version of her who almost kills the Doctor and suddenly it's all right and no worries, and you know, we don't even want the baby back now that we know that after decades/centuries of being a lunatic assassin she will hook up with you, Doctor. Suddenly both Amy and Rory seem completely oblivious of being PARENTS.
Three episodes ago Amy was leaving frantic messages on the Doctor's ansaphone, now her greatest fear is that the Doctor will abandon her. I'd at least have expected to see River sitting on a throne made of human skulls, picking her teeth with a bloody katana while holding a big damn gun in her other hand, laughing satanically and killing them all.
But instead of that, I got an ending where Amy's depressed because the Doctor refuses to take her on any fun-rides. And when she finally brings up the Melody-conundrum, she simply goes, 'Oh, you take care of the daughter I'm never gonna see grow up (for the first time, anyway) or ever again, kthxbai,' while in the background Rory's all, 'Oooh uuuuh, a car for a daughter, that's brilliant, I need a fizzy drink to celebrate this deal.'
Amy, Rory, I'm disappointed in you. Even though I'm certain you're coming back, because this ending was, as I've already mentioned, awfully anti-climatic, weird and without the slightest sense of closure, and since the executive producer's name ain't Russell T. Davies anymore, I'm sure we haven't seen the last of them, but still... They'd better develop some parental feelings by then.
Oh and about the Doctor's greatest fear. That's obviously too big a fish for a stand-alone episode to aim at for five minutes of entertainment value. It would be like revealing that the Doctor's name is Tobias Tiffany Worthington. He's supposed to be a mystery man, a man built of archetypes, the warrior, the trickster, the sage, you can't just barge in and say he's mortally afraid of running out of hair gel. They need to be very-very careful about the bits of information they reveal about his secrets and fears.
The religious context was cool, but the ending was sort of disappointing. Because the monster was cool, but he was a second-class character in the episode, and instead of getting a more complex answer than, 'Oh, it's a hologram. You know, like Star Trek. 'Cos he eats people, but only those who worship him. 'Cos, like, eeer - look, Rory the Redshirt's bonding with Redshirt of the Week!' I wouldn't've minded it had I liked the redshirts, but since I couldn't care less about the dead and the monster thing didn't end satisfyingly, I felt a little disappointed, even though the monster was actually cool and I loved those silly worship monologues. And even more Kubrick-y! Kubrick-y looked great! I loved the hotel set.The Doctor could go see the War Room and ride a bomb with a fez on.
And so concludes the journey with Futurekind Airlines, hope you enjoyed your flight, we would like to apologise once again for crash landing into a volcano and killing you all. Don't forget we're better connected with O2, even in the next world. This is Nick sounding off from somewhere above Germany, I suppose. According to the original schedule I should be landing in Luton right now. /Five minutes after I wrote that the first officer told us we were somewhere above Germany indeed. I'm awesome. But I missed my bus nevertheless./
Hey, I'm back and since my flight was 90 minutes late on Saturday, I spent the time writing
Next I'll write about Dr Faustus, 'cos it was BRILLIANT, and you definitely don't hate me enough and if you all rage-delete me for bragging about seeing it for the millionth time and I won't have any readers left, I won't feel embarrassed when I write about stuff that's soooo last fortnight.
Welcome aboard, this is Futurekind Airlines. We are currently stuck at the airport because of some mechanical error or somesuch, so we'll be entertaining ourselves by reviewing last week's episode of Doctor Who.
So, the God Complex, the most hyped episode of the half-series. Hands up everybody who'd expected The Shining references! Wait, you didn't put your hand up? Liar.
Stuck in an 80s hotel full of monsters, apparently lead by some evil power. Yeah, that doesn't sound like The Shining at all.
Shots of long, empty hotel corridors, monsters in every room... the only thing missing is Jack Nicholson with an axe.
But wait... what are this rag-tag team of losers doing here? Oh, they're this week's guest characters, straight from Redshirt Agency.
Geez, it's bloody hot here, by the way, the air conditioning is off, it's about 40C in here, the toddlers (and there are quite a lot of them) are in hysterics.
Nonetheless, let's see these redshirts. Our numero uno contestant is Ms Perfect, she's so bloody clever and skillful and awesome that I want her dead.
Oh my gods, one of the toddlers is running around in nothing but a diaper. It is HOT.
So our second contestant is Mr Conspiracy Freak. I wanted him dead ASAP. He was 14-year-old unbearable me with screentime, an unfunny Connor Temple, Mulder without Scully and Samantha. all he did was gob on about secret government experiences and he did NOTHING ELSE. Aaah, air, the air conditioner's finally on. I wanted to whack him over the head every time he opened his mouth because he was a walking-talking trope.
Our third contestant is the Chap who Looked Like a Homeless Sontaran. I was funny at parts when he talked about invasions or whatever, but let's see what he did... nothing, nothing, more nothing, sacrifice one of his allies to save his own skin and then lie about it, nothing, nothing. I just couldn't care for him, either, so that whole thing about him escaping and rattling on about his home was lost on me. Oh, he escaped? Fine, whatever.
And our final contestant... the gambler. Well, that's almost as good as an alcoholic abusive father, but he didn't do much apart from dying. Yay, they fixed the engine that wasn't wrong after all. So, on the whole, the problem with the guest characters was that I couldn't care for any of them, not at all. Hell, I wanted two of them to go to hell to begin with, and, if possible, take the highway. I don't think they were properly developed. I can just label them, the Perfect, the Coward, the Gambler, the Mulder. It might've worked with John Hughes but he gave his characters personality traits of their own, even if they seemed completely cliché at first, they turned out to have some unique qualities.
Look at the guest characters in The Good Man Goes to War. Yes, I know, it's unfair to compare mortals to demi-gods, but Moffat's side-characters had minimal screentime yet their dialogue and actions hinted of rich personalities. Here, on the other hand... the gambler guy is nothing but a gambler. With shiny gambler trinkets. Hey-ho. OK, fine, he was already barking mad, wrong example. Then let's see Nerdy Boy. He's the very model of a model conspiracy freak. All he talks about is conspiracies, more conspiracies, blogging about conspiracies...
Damn, it's hot again and we've been sitting here for 90 minutes, this is torture, why couldn't we just go back in the terminal?
And, wait for it, his greatest fear ever is... GIRLS. Are you fucking kidding me?
The only character we got to know beyond the surface was Little Miss Perfect. But unfortunately that didn't make her any more likeable. I was hoping she would turn out to be evil because only a twist like that could've redeemed her character. We get it, Wesley's clever, stop rubbing it in our faces thrice a minute. But noo, not only is she really just SO DAMN GOOD, she even gets to make a Heroic Sacrifice. What a twit.
Oh listen to the choir of crying babies. Poor things, this plane feels like the inside of a frying pan. And on top of all that, my cup holder is drenched in some goo that looks like half-digested baby food. YAY we're moving!
And the problem with the character depth brings up the next problem I had with the story: (duh-duh-doom) everybody's greatest fears. As far as greatest fears go, they were rather laughable. Seriously? A gorilla? A grown-up person's greatest thing ever is a particular hairy mammal going 'roar' that she saw in a book? It might be all the hype about the fear thing, but I was rather expecting some psychological drama, not cheap scares, yet everybody's greatest fears were ridiculous.
AT LAST, WE'RE OFF, WE'RE FLYING!
Back at Futurekind Airlines, we're finally in the air, I've just got bored of the scenery, and it's really no one's fault that the aeroplane's computer is rubbish and rang a false alarm, but we're 90 minutes late and I'll have already missed the bus by the time we arrive, that's bloody £14 down the drain.
Were was I? Yes, yes, greatest fears... you might be terrified of a gorilla in a book, but if I take your most instinctive, archetypical fears, they definitely won't be gorilla-shaped. If they are, it'd better be a blood-sucking, soul-crushing, heart-munching Cthulhu of a gorilla that radiates pure despair and feeds on the nightmares of monsters. On the surface you're afraid of the gorilla, but in your nightmares you look down at your feet and realise what you thought was the ground is in fact the gorilla because the gorilla is the planet and as he opens his Asia-sized mouth you smell the putrid smell of the death of the universe and see ten thousand rows of teeth glint in the sunlight. I honestly can't believe someone's greatest fear is something as cheesy as that.
Omg, the flight attendants are distributing free O2 sim cards. Actual bloody sim cards. Now that's what I call advertisement. And the kids have finally gone quiet as the temperature dropped.
Even Amy's greatest fear is wrong. Yes, it's Little Amy again, yes, Caitlin is still cute, yes, I know how important the Doctor is to Amy and how this scene served to connect the episode to the conclusion, and I would've perfectly accepted this scene - in Series 5.
But since Series 5, Amy was supposed to have had character development. She used to be the girl who waited but now she's grown up and she's a mother. The current story arc is supposed to be about her searching for her kidnapped daughter.
Yet they've just stopped that with Hitler. There was the prequel and the teasers and all and Amy continuously begging the Doctor to find Melody. And then they find a sociopath adult version of her who almost kills the Doctor and suddenly it's all right and no worries, and you know, we don't even want the baby back now that we know that after decades/centuries of being a lunatic assassin she will hook up with you, Doctor. Suddenly both Amy and Rory seem completely oblivious of being PARENTS.
Three episodes ago Amy was leaving frantic messages on the Doctor's ansaphone, now her greatest fear is that the Doctor will abandon her. I'd at least have expected to see River sitting on a throne made of human skulls, picking her teeth with a bloody katana while holding a big damn gun in her other hand, laughing satanically and killing them all.
But instead of that, I got an ending where Amy's depressed because the Doctor refuses to take her on any fun-rides. And when she finally brings up the Melody-conundrum, she simply goes, 'Oh, you take care of the daughter I'm never gonna see grow up (for the first time, anyway) or ever again, kthxbai,' while in the background Rory's all, 'Oooh uuuuh, a car for a daughter, that's brilliant, I need a fizzy drink to celebrate this deal.'
Amy, Rory, I'm disappointed in you. Even though I'm certain you're coming back, because this ending was, as I've already mentioned, awfully anti-climatic, weird and without the slightest sense of closure, and since the executive producer's name ain't Russell T. Davies anymore, I'm sure we haven't seen the last of them, but still... They'd better develop some parental feelings by then.
Oh and about the Doctor's greatest fear. That's obviously too big a fish for a stand-alone episode to aim at for five minutes of entertainment value. It would be like revealing that the Doctor's name is Tobias Tiffany Worthington. He's supposed to be a mystery man, a man built of archetypes, the warrior, the trickster, the sage, you can't just barge in and say he's mortally afraid of running out of hair gel. They need to be very-very careful about the bits of information they reveal about his secrets and fears.
The religious context was cool, but the ending was sort of disappointing. Because the monster was cool, but he was a second-class character in the episode, and instead of getting a more complex answer than, 'Oh, it's a hologram. You know, like Star Trek. 'Cos he eats people, but only those who worship him. 'Cos, like, eeer - look, Rory the Redshirt's bonding with Redshirt of the Week!' I wouldn't've minded it had I liked the redshirts, but since I couldn't care less about the dead and the monster thing didn't end satisfyingly, I felt a little disappointed, even though the monster was actually cool and I loved those silly worship monologues. And even more Kubrick-y! Kubrick-y looked great! I loved the hotel set.
And so concludes the journey with Futurekind Airlines, hope you enjoyed your flight, we would like to apologise once again for crash landing into a volcano and killing you all. Don't forget we're better connected with O2, even in the next world. This is Nick sounding off from somewhere above Germany, I suppose. According to the original schedule I should be landing in Luton right now. /Five minutes after I wrote that the first officer told us we were somewhere above Germany indeed. I'm awesome. But I missed my bus nevertheless./