Doctor Who's Tragical History Tour

Christmas Comes But Twice a Year

-- DSW — Mon, 23 Aug 2010 01:04:43 +0000

Consider yourself lucky. Most folks think that there's only the one Christmas. But we lucky few know diff'rent don't we? Beginning with the return of the show in 2005, Doctor Who fans get, in essence, to have Christmas twice. The second time of course is alongside everyone else as it has quickly become a Christmas tradition, but the first time comes with the resumption of production on the next season of the show, most years ostensibly for the Christmas special, and the on-set pictures that begin trickling out.

I say most years because 2009, in addition to the general paucity of production, had production of Tennant final stories complete by this time of year. Instead the first days filming on Series Five, beach shots for The Time of Angels and Flesh and Stone filled the gap quite nicely. 2010 does not disappoint either, as the accompanying image for the yet unnamed Christmas Special attests.

It's way, WAY too early to put up the countdown clock for "A Doctor's Carol" (our thoroughly unofficial title, with apologies to the late, great Federation) yet. But it is tempting…

Come Pond Along

-- DSW — Tue, 17 Aug 2010 09:33:07 +0000

Third Posting over @ the THT Rand-o-pix of the Day…

Flamin’

-- DSW — Mon, 16 Aug 2010 09:35:38 +0000

The second post over @ the THT Rand-o-Pix of the Day is up and running.

Random pic of the day… begins

-- DSW — Sun, 15 Aug 2010 16:42:52 +0000

Today we begin a new experiment extending the reach of the Tour. I'm filling in for the regular admin at moff_era_daily! this week and so it seems an ideal time, what with this being the off-season as it were, to try something we've been tempted to do for quite awhile, which is to post one completely random picture from the Tour a day.

The Tour has had for many years a Randomizer function built into it for looking at whole story galleries. This new effort, with the exception of this first week to kick things off, moves the random function down to the individual image level.

This week to begin we'll confine ourselves to the Matt Smith era in keeping with moff_era_daily. Here we go…

We'll crosspost these for a few days but after that these can be seen here.

I Go, You Go, We all Go , to LEGO

-- DSW — Sat, 07 Aug 2010 11:51:29 +0000

Even if you consider yourself an experienced Doctor Who fan, let alone internet maven, some aspects of Doctor Who fandom can occasionally take you, and delight you, by surprise. Such was the case with another YouTube find. Yes yes I know there's too much video linking on an image-based site but heck it's the off-season people…

Tell me you weren't smiling after that… Turns out there's a lot of LEGO Doctor Who out there. Truth be told after seeing this I went and re-watched the last 12 or so minutes of The End of Time Part II and all of the old feelings came swarming back.

BTW we had a major site update on August 2nd. Check out The Master List to see what's new.

Doh! Ties are Cool

-- DSW — Mon, 02 Aug 2010 22:19:52 +0000

Never accuse us here at THT Worldwide of being on top of current events. In news that's probably about two weeks old, someone has given Matt Smith "the Simpsons Treatment." Interesting how little animation was required to Simpson-ize him.

The reason we're so far behind? We've just completed a massive site-wide image update, the first since Matt Smith's inaugural season has gone in the books. The time around we've added 3000 images bringing the overall image count to almost 95200 with many, many more images being improved. As always check out The Master List to find out what's changed.

More changes for the Tour are in store moving forward toward the site's 13th Anniversary. 100000 images is now in sight as well as other structural changes in keeping with evolving visitor tastes and capabilities. Thanx again for everyone's patronage (especially through our occasional hosting trevails).

The View from the Moff

-- DSW — Sun, 25 Jul 2010 20:25:08 +0000

It's SD Comic-Con weekend here (somewhere lying about ) in the tundra, an embracing of all things both geek-ery and creak-ery and, if the blog-trocrasy had it's way, fast approaching a national holiday of sorts on the level of the Super Bowl or even (gasp!) Valentines Day. Anyway it allows us here at THT Unlimited to indulge a very rare foray into video with an extended panel that Steven Moffat did at SDCC in July 2008. Mind you this was after he had accepted the job but prior to actually taking over in any true sense of the word, and four or months minimum before Matt Smith was auditioned and cast.

What's fascinating about this 30-minute panel clip, although it really shouldn't be in hindsight, is what a clear vision he had for his Producer-ship of Doctor Who even then. Watch it, then reflect on Series 5 and ask how close to his 2008 vision he strayed and what that might mean going to forward to Christmas 2010 and into 2011.

BTW there's a gi-normous site update coming August 1st…. Stay tuned.

Last Past Mast(er)

-- DSW — Sat, 24 Jul 2010 11:54:36 +0000

Now that Matt Smith's first season has concluded, there's time enough to indulge other eccentricities, notably in the case of the THT Brain Trust, vintage 1970's ITV fare. It's always a joy to occasionally see actors wither before or after their association in Doctor Who. It's as if Doctor Who were the gateway drug leading ones curiosity further into the realm of British television.

Such was the case with The Zoo Gang, a short-lived series made in 1973 and broadcast in 1974. Only six episodes were made, with the (typical) cross-continental cast including Brian Keith and Barry Morse. Episode 4 was 'The Lion Hunt' and it featured Roger Delgado in what turned out to be (according to IMDB and everybody else) his last performance before his untimely death during a film shoot in Turkey on June 18th, 1973 (the picture shown here is not from that appearance). He appeared as Pedro Ortega, a South American revolutionary whose accidental arrest in France brings him to the attention of the regular cast who proceed to bust him out of prison. It was fun escapist ITV fare.

Delgado's last Doctor Who appearance was in episode six of Frontier in Space on March 31, 1973 so given the vagaries of television production it's not unreasonable to assume he went to do The Zoo Gang immediately after his work on Frontier in Space was finished.

Other Masters in Doctor Who have come and gone of course, but for us here at THT Worldwide he was the definitive article. Go watch him in Terror of the Autons to see for yourself.

Going out with a …..

-- DSW — Sun, 27 Jun 2010 17:00:06 +0000

Upon first viewing of The Big Bang here at THT Worldwide, the consensus in the room was that while we liked it, we also wondered aloud if the general public would "get it." We then undertook a second, more defined, viewing sharpened all of the marvelous detail that had been laid in not only in the story, also through the season. Although the change in tone from The Pandorica Opens to The Big Bang couldn't have been more stark (just as it was earlier with The Time of Angels / Flesh and Stone) the conclusion here was so satisfying that it vaulted both stories to the top of this years Dynamic Ratings Table.

Matt Smith was faultless once again. The Young Man with Old Eyes shone both when speaking to Amy strapped into the Pandorica and when telling a sleeping 7-year old Amelia to love Rory and have a good life. The Piggly-Wiggly Timey-Wimey-ness to get the Doctor out of the Pandorica in the end amounts to something of a cheat, but it was carried off with such panache by Smith that it didn't matter in the end.

The tone in the episode ranged from funereal to whimiscal, and Smith moved through it all amazingly well. More thoughts to come later in the week. The Tour will begin to shift gears back into off-season mode soon enough but for right now… Images and caps for The Big Bang are now online.

Room Without a View

-- DSW — Sun, 20 Jun 2010 17:00:41 +0000

So here we are… at the precipice of a season-ending (triple) cliffhanger. There are so many story threads dangling, not just from The Pandorica Opens but from the season itself, that it's hard to know what to feel, except that you want "The Big Bang" to come sooner rather than later. Of course any fan from the 2005 onwards also has been informed by RTD-style season finales which always promised more in the first-halves of stories than were delivered in the latter-halves, but with Moffat now there's a different feel this time around, and the sense that it will all in fact make sense in the end.

As such our grades for The Pandorica Opens are scoring it high in the 2010 Dynamic Ratings Table, but this feeling could well swing well up or down based on next weeks conclusion. We can't wait.

There was one unusual thing in this episode however that took the THT Brain Trust (temporarily) right out of the story, and it touches on a Tour pet peeve. Matt Smith has, relatively speaking, quite an asymmetrical face. It's always bothered us when stills are released in publications that have clearly been reversed, mostly to keep drawing readers eyes towards the center of a page. Peter Davison images are infamous in this regard. In The Pandorica Opens there are whole scenes where for whatever reason the picture has been reversed. Once you notice the part in Matt Smiths coif oriented the wrong way it becomes quite distracting, and it happened more than once. When capping this episode we simply couldn't let this stand so caps from the clearly reversed scenes have been corrected. See if you can spot where these have occurred.

Images and caps from The Pandorica Opens are now online.