New ideas for Phoenix

Two new ideas are being mooted in our Sim Proposals forum. Brandon is tabling a mecha-style sim and that purveyor of quantity, if not necessarily quality, Silent Hunter is looking to do a 1960s-spy sim in the style of classic British television.

Phoenix Roleplaying to boycott SciWorld 2013

Phoenix Roleplaying today announces that it will officially boycott the 2013 SciWorld Convention in protest over the procedure of awarding it. No Phoenix representative will attend; although all members are free to choose to attend if they so wish.

Months ago in September of last year, we declared our interest in a talk page on SciWorld in hosting this important event and were completely ignored by the board of SimEnc, who arranged privately among themselves to award the convention to an insider. The explanation given was unsatisfactory and the ‘apology’ was nothing of the sort.

We do not feel that SimEnc is well served by its current direction; its well-intentioned policy failed utterly in the execution and its unjustified banning of a key member has resulted in the loss of much valuable information. This latest failure merely confirms our fears about its leadership.

We expect a sincere apology, better from SimEnc, and hope to host FallFest later this year.

Silent Hunter
General Coordinator
Phoenix Roleplaying

30 April 2013

Big Reset Button (Review: 'Doctor Who' 33.10, "Journey to the Centre of the TARDIS")

The Doctor and Clara run into a trio of salvage merchants, as the TARDIS comes close to destruction…

I didn’t come into this with any real expectations, but I was pleasantly surprised at the interesting things that went down this episode:

• Noises in space really irk me – I know it’s expected of the genre and a show not always known for scientific rigour, but it still irritated me.
• This has to be the first ever Doctor Who episode where the entire guest cast were from an ethnic minority – and it wasn’t even mentioned on screen. For one thing, it was completely irrelevant.
• We got to see some interesting TARDIS rooms, but there was still an awful lot of corridor action.
• The Doctor really doesn’t want people to know his real name, does he?
• Clara (contains Lancashire and sass) was again superb. The revelation of her true identity is going to be a cracking one, that’s for sure. Mind you, if that dress was any shorter we could have ended up with a panty shot.
• For the second time in two episodes, everyone did something that is usually associated with the tales of one Steven Moffat.
• The back and forth between the leads is great; you see that Smith and Coleman have real chemistry.
• The snippets of audio from past Doctors was a lovely touch, as was having the Seventh Doctor’s umbrella make a brief appearance.
• The Van Baalens’ were OK, but not brilliant – I see there have been complaints about their acting on Gallifrey Base.
• Next week looks like it could be rather fun – Diana Rigg in particular.

Conclusion

An enjoyable tale, but lagged a bit at times and pressing a literal reset button did seem more than a bit of a cop-out. I had enough of that with Merlin.

7/10

You'll be dying to read it (Review: 'Doctor Who: Festival of Death', 2000)

BBC Books cover (2000 edition)

 

The “Eleven Faces” series continues with my second Fourth Doctor work and this time, it’s about time… and zombies.

 

As part of the 50^th anniversary celebrations, the BBC has done new editions of some of their novels, one for each Doctor. For the Fourth Doctor, they picked Festival of Death from 2000 – and I can see why. It’s a classic tale that could easily fit into the modern show.

 

Where we’re at

 

This is a Fourth Doctor, Romana II and K9 novel, set during the Williams era of the show (i.e. Season 17) and emulating its style considerably.

 

The plot

 

The Doctor and Romana arrive on the G-Lock space station in 3012, a former liner that got stuck in the exit from hyperspace – its crew and passengers mysteriously vanishing. This is home to “The Beautiful Death”, where people can experience what it is like to be dead… but something has gone wrong and its participants got turned into zombies… The time travellers arrive after the disaster and its containing, where they are thanked for saving the station. Which they haven’t done yet… They also learn that the Doctor died in the process…

 

Thus begins a tale of mad scientists, dimensional interfaces and timey-wimeyness…

 

What works

·         The main villain is utterly vile, but has a strong tragic streak to him.

·         The regulars are captured excellently; their voices are authentic and you never feel they’re saying things they wouldn’t say.

·         There are some superb supporting characters, including a suicidal computer that would not be out of place in a Douglas Adams novel. In fact, this owes a good deal to Adams.

·         The timey-wimey plot is done very well indeed – it was planned with the aid of a big diagram for one thing.

·         There are a couple of lovely little references to other works – including a mention of Murgatroyd (a cat-like creature from Murray Leinster’s Med Ship series, which I’ve read) and a planet from the Elite computer game.

 

What doesn’t

·         There are some slight pacing issues here and there.

·         I found some of the plot a little hard to follow and didn’t get one factor of the zombies.

 

Conclusion

 

An excellent novel that has received high praise from fans – and will also get high praise from me.

 

9/10

 

March newsletter released

The delayed next issue of 'The Burning Question' can be downloaded here.

Who you gonna call? (Review: 'Doctor Who' 33.9, "Hide")

(I was supposed to have these go up 48 hours after UK airing – my apologies. This will hopefully not happen again)

 

This one was clearly meant to be a spookier tale and might have been better watched live or late at night; I watched it at 11am on a Sunday morning (day trip), so this might colour my judgement.

 

·         A lot of great dialogue in this between the Doctor and Clara; the “Ghostbusters” joke at the start was brilliant.

·         I can’t help but notice there were only five actors in this episode – one of which wore a monster suit.

·         Matt Smith’s Eleventh Doctor was on even better form than usual; he’s great when he’s speaking at a thousand miles a minute, going on tangents in a middle of a sentence.

·         Clara was also superb – it’s not escaped attention on Gallifrey Base that her weakest performance was in the episode penned by Steven Moffat, who should be the best at writing her – as he created her!

·         I liked the orange spacesuit (which has been worn by the Doctor before), but the Metebelis Three crystal seemed a bit tacked on. When did he get that one?

·         The ‘ghost’ had a science fiction explanation – this is common for the show and worked better than if it was an actual ghost.

·         The TARDIS Voice Visual Interface was fun for a one-off gag, but let’s not have it too often.

·         The Alec and Emma relationship is clearly meant to partner that of the Doctor and Clara – although the names are rather reminiscent of The Avengers or Sapphire and Steel.

·         The overall twist was good; but it’s the sort of thing this show has done a lot.

·         It’s been a while since we’ve had so much TARDIS travel in a single episode – we didn’t even get an interior scene in last week’s episode.

 

Conclusion

 

While there were a lot of enjoyable moments, this kind of lost something towards the end. Not the best ‘spooky’ story by a long chalk.

 

7/10

Small screens and small audiences ('Doctor Who': online and direct to video)

What might have been the future of the show…

 

Previously, we covered the better-known spinoffs from the BBC’s long running science-fiction series, Doctor Who. In this post, we cover some of the lesser-known ones; those that either appeared on that much-loved pornography delivery system or (mostly) on black cassettes…

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The BBC’s official Doctor Who website did a number of online “Flash”-style animations over the hiatus years – basically audio dramas with pictures. They can be found here. While other online productions have been made for the new run – such as the TARDISodes from Season 28; these are so linked with on air episodes that they will not be covered separately.

 

Canonicity from this point in for the EU is a matter for the individual fan.

 

Death Comes To Time (2001-2, 5 episodes, no longer accessible on BBC site, but able to buy)

 

Originally pitched for Radio 4 and rejected – this audio starring the Seventh Doctor, Ace and original companion Antimony was instead put online, where it gained over a million visits. The ending of this story renders it non-canon, although it did produce an online spin-off called The Minister of Chance.

 

Real Time (2002, 6 12-minute episodes)

 

Involving the Sixth Doctor and Evelyn Smythe[1] as they look for two missing survey teams and run into the Cybermen. Notable for debuting a blue version of the Sixth Doctor’s costume (for ease of animation) that got used in the Big Finish continuity as well – for one thing it looks better. An extended version was released on CD.

 

Shada (2003, 6 25-minute episodes)

 

A production of the unfinished Fourth Doctor story for the 40^th anniversary, changed to feature the Eighth Doctor and Romana II. It’s quite good in fact.

 

Scream of the Shalka (2003, 6 15-minute episodes)

 

Another 40^th anniversary production, this starred Richard E Grant and Sophie Okendo[2], the former as what was then pitched as the Ninth Doctor. However, the announcement of the revival two months before this started put its status into question – apart from an online short story and novelisation, no further works were made and the “Shalka Doctor” became non-canon.

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Next we go onto the direct-to-video releases that were produced by Reeltime Pictures between 1987 and 2004. The intellectual property of the Whoniverse is a complex affair, with various writers (or more often their estates) part-owning many of the classic monsters and characters of the classic-era show. Reeltime were able to licence various elements of these for original spin-off dramas, albeit with some difficulty. They also produced a series of non-fiction interviews, not covered here.

 

Many of these are only available on VHS in second-hand stores and I’ve never seen any of these. Runtimes are put when known

 

Wartime (1987)

 

The first video spinoff, this one featuring Sergeant Benton (it’s the first to actually give him the first name John). A revised version was released in 1997, adding among other things a voice cameo from the Brigadier.

 

Shakedown: Return of the Sontarans (1994, 55 minutes)

 

Set on a space yacht, this features Sophie Aldred and Carole Ann Ford, as well as two regulars from Blake’s 7, this features the Sontarans, albeit redesigned as the design belongs to the BBC (the creatures belong to the Robert Holmes estate).

 

Downtime (1995)

 

Featuring the Brigadier, Sarah Jane, Victoria and the Yeti in modern day England.

 

Mindgame (1998, 30 minutes)

 

A Draconian, a Sontaran and a human are put in a cell… The unnamed human is played by Sophie Aldred and implied heavily to be Ace.

 

The Mindgame Trilogy (1999, 80 minutes)

 

Three short tales featuring the characters of Mindgame after that story.

 

Dæmos Rising (2004)

 

The only one to get a DVD release, this tale has the Brigadier’s daughter Kate (later to appear, played by someone else, in “The Power of Three) and the Dæmons.

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Finally, we have some more video releases, these ones produced by BBV Productions between 1994 and 2008.

BBV produced a number of works featuring Doctor Who actors playing other roles, including with Colin Baker as “The Stranger”, but that character was later stated to be not the Doctor and TARDIS Data Core (the main Doctor Who wiki and a valuable source for this) excludes many of the dramas from eligibility for articles. Those excluded will not be covered here. In fact, they were never allowed to use the Doctor himself.

 

P.R.O.B.E. (1994-1998)

 

Liz Shaw and the Preternatural Research Bureau investigate various things in four films (all with 15 or 18 ratings), that feature a number of regulars from the show in different roles.

Auton trilogy (1997-9)

The Autons face off against UNIT, with all original characters for the latter – Nick Courtney’s health was not up to playing the Brigadier.

 

Do You Have A Licence to Save This Planet? (2001, 30 minutes)

 

A comedy spoof featuring Sylvester McCoy as “The Foot Doctor”, released to celebrate BBV’s 10^th anniversary.

 

Zygon: When Being You Just Isn't Enough (2008, 60 minutes)

 

As the name implies, the Zygons are in this, but this isn’t the most notable thing about the film – it’s the 18 rating it received for nudity, gore and language.

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From screen, we now move onto the medium of sound, where the sets are built by your imagination and sound effects…

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[1]An elderly history professor, with extensive appearances in audio – this was her sole ‘live’ appearance.

[2]Both would later appear in the Matt Smith era in different parts. David Tennant also makes a cameo appearance.