GerPOLLimo! Best Matt Smith Doctor Who story

If Vincent and the Doctor wins this I will go on some sort of hideous rampage of destruction.

That said, I'm not sure what I'll vote for.

A Good Man Goes to War/Let's Kill Hitler

Weren't these two separate stories?

Anyway, gotta go for "The Girl Who Waited". An interesting sci-fi concept, good performance from Karen Gillan, cool art design, loads of the sort pathos Dr. Who excels in.

Top five for me:

Eleventh Hour
Angels two parter
Girl Who Waited
The Doctor's Wife
Day of the Doctor

Honourable mentions: Amy's choice, Pandorica/Big Bang, God Complex, Snowmen, Name of the Doctor.

Shortlist:

The Lodger
Night Terrors
Dinosaurs On A Spaceship
The Crimson Horror
The God Complex, maybe?

Damn, looking at the list like that it's a shitty epitaph. His whole era reads like writers in decline and missed opportunities.

The Eleventh Hour
Amy's Choice
The Doctor's Wife
The Girl Who Waited
Asylum of the Daleks - the single most beautiful piece of cinematography in MoffatWho (spinning dancer).

Looking at this list, so many of these are funny and memorable. Though admittedly, the first season is the best. But that one is pretty clearly the best nuWho-season so far. I don't get the hate for MoffatWho, don't get it at all. Even the boringest episode will have snappy dialogue and probably a twist or two to liven it up. While boring DaviesWho was just running by numbers and then an alien farted a lot. MoffatWho is still SO MUCH BETTER than what came before, and I'm baffled as to why people can't see that. Like, I get frustrated and challopsy. Take an episode like A Christmas Carol, which I voted for. Has so many great twists and that perfect scene where the doctor travels into the old recording while the old man looks on, and on top of that there is flying sharks and Rory and Amy dressing up and so much more. It's just so much better than anything from the first four seasons, except the ones that Moffat wrote, of course.

A Good Man Goes to War/Let's Kill Hitler

Weren't these two separate stories?

― Tuomas

I've always considered them one story, but you're right, they're listed as separate on Wiki and imdb. My mistake.

Wife
Lodger
Day

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Watched a repeat of Vincent and the Doctor earlier on Watch and have to admit I blubbed a little at the gallery scene, not proud of this.

I like the bit about forcing the Doctor to wait and experience time in the correct order.

wow, I can barely remember what any of these are even about.

The Lodger
The Dcotor's Wife
The God Complex
A Christmas Carol

and I guess the Rebel Flesh was interesting?

Rebel Flesh is underrated imo.

It's amazing how good so many of these are, and yet Victory of the Daleks manages to be one of the five worst episodes of the show since the revival

wow, I can barely remember what any of these are even about.

The Lodger
The Dcotor's Wife
The God Complex
A Christmas Carol

These are four of the most individual and distinctive episodes of the series!

heh, those are my picks for the best ones! the whole list is what gave me trouble remembering.

My picks from what i can remember, looking at the list:

The Eleventh Hour
Time of Angels/Flesh & Stone
Amy's Choice
The Rebel Flesh/The Almost People
The Girl Who Waited.

Quite liked Night Terrors and Journey to the Centre of the TARDIS as well, though neither quite worked.

Time of Angels/Flesh & Stone is by some distance the best one here, most of these aren't particularly memorable and I've never felt the slightest urge to watch many of them a second time. Journey to the Centre of the TARDIS was a fun story in an otherwise mediocre season though.

Why does anyone like the Lodger? That is the one with punchable shitface James Corden and the excruciating football-playing Doctor, right? That rivals even Vincent and the Doctor for awfulness. In fact, it might beat it.

Probably my favourite Doctor Who episode of all time.

Yeah, it's great. Also, the hatred for Vincent and the Doctor makes me sad I didn't vote for that one. That scene at the museum is so great, even though the music is too much.

"punchable shitface James Corden"

I know nothing about that guy but I really like him on Doctor Who, he's like an english Andy Richter.

Pick is either:

11th Hour
Lodger
The Name of the Doctor
The Snowmen
Girl Who Waited
or maybe Angels Take Manhatten (only for the ending though)

James Corden is one of the more widely disliked UK celebrities FYI.

Separate the artist from the art!

The James Corden/football episode is actually less hateful than it looks on paper, whereas the Van Gogh one is way way worse (until you see 'Written by Richard Curtis' in the credits at least).

Off-topic, I know, but why is James Corden disliked? He has seemed perfectly amiable in what little I've seen him in. Not particularly funny, I guess, but not unlikable either.

widely disliked by ILX doesn't necessarily equate to widely disliked by anyone else.

the van gough episode sucked. disappointed. how far has richard curtis fallen? he was so good once.

Every opinion I've heard expressed about Corden irl has been one of dislike.

Here's one reason to hate the unfunny wanker:

https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-tK7xOU5Yr1o/TYLKHkT1GcI/AAAAAAAAA1k/yvoYGmnC0-c/s320/01.jpg

Probably my favourite Doctor Who episode of all time.

― boney tassel (sic)

This is baffling, by the way.

I liked "The Lodger" too. I've no idea what the guy in has done elsewhere, but he was perfectly good in that role, and the romance between him and his roommate was cute. And the Doctor playing footy was some cheesy fun! The whole ep was a fun breather between some serious stuff, it gave Matt Smith a chance to chew the scenery, and the chemistry between him and the other guy worked nicely... I wouldn't call it the best ever episode, but I can't see why anyone would hate it either, unless you really feel that one actor's performances in some unrelated works ruins it fo you?

"what the guy in this episode has done elsewhere"

It is perfectly reasonable to hate things because of the presence of untalented irritating sexist twats, but I note that nobody has yet defended the terrible cringe-making football scene. I mean, unless possibly this is all to do with foreigners exoticising the worst parts of British culture? Because both Corden and that football crap make me want to throw up.

But why is he an irritating sexist twat? Like, I don't know the guy. I don't remember the football scene, but I don't care that much about it. Matt Smith looked goofy, football scenes are always bad.

but I note that nobody has yet defended the terrible cringe-making football scene.

Tuomas did.

I think it's fun too, and not incongruous with the rest of the episode - the Doctor taking to something in "everyday" Earth life with brio that overrides his incomplete understanding of it, Smith getting to show off his IRL football abilities is cute and far less aggrandising than Pertwee insisting on riding any motorbike, fancy automobile or hovercraft that a location crew passed, going from sporty exuberance to awkwardly airkissing each cheek of other players is bathetically amusing in Smith's performance, it provides a great escalation of Craig's frustration at the Doctor surpassing him in every aspect of his life - now in front of more people, of friends, of "opponents" that he might feel differently shamed by.

I don't know that having a kickabout in a park is really an exotic aspect of foreign culture to marvel at, but even if it were, you're not providing any actual arguments against the scene that anyone can counter, let alone on narrative grounds.

11th Hour
Angels 2-parter
God Complex
Pandorica Opens

God Complex is a favourite, perhaps a triumph of direction and set design as much as writing. The Shining corridors are genuinely spooky, the ventriloquist's dummies...

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

you're not providing any actual arguments against the scene that anyone can counter, let alone on narrative grounds.

Well, likewise, neither are you. You're saying it's "cute", I'm saying it's "cringe-making". Those properties are both contingent and non-provable. I'm not sure how a discussion of our favourite and least favourite Dr Who episodes is really supposed to be based on logical argument, unless someone is actually making a factual error (like, for instance, someone completely missing a sentence in Tuomas' post, oops).

neither are you.

not incongruous with the rest of the episode - the Doctor taking to something in "everyday" Earth life with brio that overrides his incomplete understanding of it

provides a great escalation of Craig's frustration at the Doctor surpassing him in every aspect of his life - now in front of more people, of friends, of "opponents" that he might feel differently shamed by.

not sure how a discussion of our favourite and least favourite Dr Who episodes is really supposed to be based on logical argument

then don't complain/crow/whatever that people aren't refuting your unmade arguments tbf

Haha, I failed to vote in the end but it wouldn't have changed the result.

I don't get the attraction of Eleventh Hour, it seems to me to be loved for many of the same reasons that are being criticised in The Lodger - assuming people are voting for the interaction with Li'l Amy because the invisible snake stuff is crap really.

There was a time, a few years back, when James Cordon was not only ubiquitous on UK TV, but loud, boorish and obnoxious with it. Turn on the box, and there he'd be: bellowing into the camera and shrieking with laughter at his own jokes. Always barging in.

That said, I thought he was perfectly fine in The Lodger. I just didn't think the episode was particularly funny or interesting.

xp Oh no an unconvincing monster!

I think in general it's a good script done well - Moffat's pretty good at scaring the crap out of kids, and the opening section is an excellent example of the nearly-lost art of matching knockabout silliness with a creeping dread. The missing 12 years is a good twist, and I think the extra room in the house is another example of well-played dread (on top of the dread of the time crack and what does it mean).

But the episode doesn't exist in a vacuum, it's tied to the context of being the first show with a new Doctor and a new show-runner, and I think it's AMAZING at that - it hits a lot of notes all at once, and while I like that it has a line about the Doctor rushing into someone's bedroom and convincing Global Science Heads (on someone's porn laptop) to take him seriously by giving a proof of faster than light travel "With two diagrams! And a joke!", I love that Matt Smith can actually deliver it as a thing that the Doctor would do. And the legacy of Doctors (including McCann) is part of that remit too.

Plus of course it's blatant emotional manipulation - I'm not sure he would have run it in 'Rose's slot, but it's clear that Moffat wants us to know that he understands what it means to wait for the TARDIS, and to hear the engines again after you've nearly given up hope.

But that said my vote, if I'd noticed, would have stock The Pandorica Opens / The Big Bang into 2nd place: The first is a great overblown story (briefly taking the piss out of 'I am the Terrifying Doctor' to admit that it would only buy them a few hours) with a good twist, but The Big Bang is just nuts from the word go (the best pre-credits line?), and only slows down for Matt Smith's best acting, old as time - before the great ending, which hits a similar note as the Eleventh Hour, the Doctor summoned back from oblivion by memory and faith.

OTM

Yeah, Pandorica Opens/Big Bang is clearly the best season finale of nu-Who, it has big moments and big emotions, but they also know when to tone it down (especially with the more quiet Doctor/Amy scenes), so it doesn't turn into sentimental mush, like most of the Davies finales (particularly "The End of Time"). It's just that it seems to be a rule for Who that season finales are never as good as some standalone episodes.

Name of the Doctor was really good; if you consider that the seasons finale

I sort of consider Name, Day and Time to be a season-closing trilogy; first two great, third vastly overegged.

Christmas Episodes are Christmas Episodes - far happier sticking the Night of the Doctor in instead:)

agreed (xpost).

It is perfectly reasonable to hate things because of the presence of untalented irritating sexist twats, but I note that nobody has yet defended the terrible cringe-making football scene.

It has precedent in the old Who episode Black Orchid, where the Doctor gets to be a cricket star, another episode (and scene) which is a favorite of mine. I like it when the Doctor is on Earth just doing stuff that doesn't involve dealing with crises or companion emotional upheavals. I liked scenes in Boom Town for the same reason, which had its own cringe-inducing return of the farting alien menace but you take the good with the bad. Plus the Lodger's main story was really interesting, even if it got pretty stupid at the end.

wait how was the soccer scene terrible and cringe-making

we're talking about a show that featured an episode where human beings had their faces removed but somehow didn't die of oxygen deprivation and yet the thing we're complaining about is that the Doctor is surprisingly good at soccer?

I thought that was the gag: based on what he's like, you expect the Doctor to totally suck at football, so it's funny when he's actually really good at it, and his reaction to being so good is just endearing.

(also f. hazel OTM re: Black Orchid; bring back the pure historical episode IMO)

I searched for the scene on youtube. It is very much terrible and cringe-making, but I'd still claim football scenes always are like that. The Doctor just runs and twirls around while all his opponents throw themselves on the grass, then the keeper jumps out of the way. It's really badly made.

before the great ending, which hits a similar note as the Eleventh Hour, the Doctor summoned back from oblivion by memory and faith.

Are you sure you mean the "Eleventh Hour" and not "The Last of the Time Lords"?

As for cringe-making because of execution issues -- doesn't that keep with the low-budget charm of the original series? The thought struck hard with "Into the Dalek" with the glossy production values and how disconcerting it was to see sets and props that didn't wobble when actors touched them.

Are you sure you mean the "Eleventh Hour" and not "The Last of the Time Lords"?

He's talking about how Amelia's stubbornness and imagination is a metaphor for the show's being kept alive in the minds of fans/NA authors/etc for sixteen years and then brought back to TV

No, that's a fair point though, and one I hadn't thought of before - the planet saying 'Doctor' at the same time, and a wave of love turning Dobby!Doctor into Space Jesus, also works as a metaphor for that. There may also be something to be said for a telling difference between "The planet brought him back" and "One special person brought him back".

Speaking of Metaphors, there's a reading I've seen around - I thought on ILX - that the Lodger is a statement that Moffat is tending towards to the old style of companions, where they have given up their ties to the rest of the world and the TARDIS is their home while they're on it, and away from the Rusty Years of having a family / friends / Bernard Cribbins to tether them to earth. So this would show hat the Doctor doesn't 'do' normal.

back to the Corden discussion:

http://www.broadwayworld.com/article/Its-Official-Tony-Winner-James-Corden-Named-Host-of-CBSs-LATE-LATE-SHOW-20140908

I suppose now the US can have an opinion of him.

Only know him from Gavin and Stacey and Doctor Who, but would have preferred Rob Brydon to take over for Craig Ferguson if that was the talent pool they were picking from, you don't want Corden shouting and being frantic at you that late in the evening, Brydon is much more relaxing before bed and it's time America learns what Welsh people sound like.

I thought that was what Torchwood was for.

I'm not sure anyone A. realized they were in Wales or B. watched the show

enough ppl watched Torchwood in the US that Starz did Miracle Day

that's B, what about A?

It was set in Wales? I thought it was Cardiff.

/murkin

I feel like "Cardiff" was said every other word on that show and Rhys at times felt like he wandered in off of the set of the fictional show Oh Look, It's A Welshman but I realize that may be just me

xp: lol Leee