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thedreadvampy · 1 year ago

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so me and Sam FINALLY watched the last season of Capaldi's Who

and tell me how, after literally over a decade and for perhaps the first time in his fucking career, Steven Moffat wrote a not just tolerable but really actually good two-parter and fully stuck the landing. like the editing and pacing were still a bit off but the storyline was original, fun, interesting and emotionally invested, and most importantly, rather than ending on a damp fart or the most furious autofellatio in history, the final part didn't fumble it and ended in a way that felt emotionally satisfying and like it made sense for the characters. like the last time he successfully wrapped up a multiparter in a way that didn't feel cheap and hollowly disappointing to me was literally The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances, and a) that was in 2005 and b) tbh The Doctor Dances is about a tenth as compelling and memorable as The Empty Child.

so after 12 years of either hackery or great ideas that fall apart in the second act, Steven Moffat writes what I would genuinely consider to be a memorable Good Doctor Who serial. it ends with bittersweet pathos, a solid closer for all the main characters, and sends Moffat's showrunning career out on a genuine high despite failing ratings and budget cuts (and the fact Doctor Who hasn't been consistently good since about 2009). good job Steve. with grudging respect I admit you pulled it out of the bag on this one.

wait what's this there's one more episode left? and it stars Mark Gatiss? and you literally spend the whole episode inexplicably just shitting all over the legacy of Doctor Who by inventing a version of the First Doctor that bears literally no resemblance to the character that William Hartnell actually played, just so you can spend the whole episode saying misogynistic things to run yourself off to how much more Totally Feminist your version was than the version you made up in your head of what Doctor Who was like in the 60s? and it added literally nothing to the season except to take all the wind out of the sails of the actually good finale you already wrote?

even when he writes a good episode this fucker still finds ways to disappoint me.

#red said #as I remembered it is by a LONG shot the best that Doctor Who has been under Moffat and I do think giving Capaldi more creative control #helped a lot. cause he's a massive nerd and also he approximately knows how to construct a story.#bill is the first female companion Moffat has ever written with an actual fucking personality #(even if being mean that personality is maybe kind of just what you'd get if you put rose Martha and Donna in a blender)#(at least she's not a blank slate with the words SASSY. SEXY. written on it)#matt Lucas is genuinely surprising bc despite hating the man it's kind of impossible to not like Nardole by the end??#michelle gomez finally gets some room to get her Anthony Ainley on and be the Master PROPERLY #i was hooting and clapping my hands at the John Sim Master's dumb disguise #like the cast is GREAT #(and while he still can't shut the fuck up about her at least Moffat isn't shoving River fucking Song down my throat 24/7)#buuuuuuuut uhhhh the politics are. incoherent and the vibes are rancid in a lot of the episode plots.#they clearly WANT to do Social Commentary but weirdly keep bringing up colonialism and capitalism and then taking the side of the baddies?#how are you doing to do a piece about the British Empire colonising Mars with a posh villain and a whole comparison to the British Raj #then come down on the side of the British state? same with the ninth legion piece? and the zombie spacesuit one is fun #but it wraps up with 'and then they complained to upper management and capitalism ended forever the end'#uhhhhh in the one with the microbot colony again we conclude the Morally Correct Answer is colonialism #don't get me started on the monks plot which is a) literally just ripping off the Year That Never Was but without the emotional impact #but also b) has some really weird and genuinely fucked up ideas about both geopolitics and uhhhh consent????#so yeah the philosophical core is either incoherent or Fucking Horrendous in almost every episode #it's frequently derivative but tbh that's often to its benefit bc it vibes like trying to figure out what actually makes episodes memorable #and the budget is clearly cut to the bone bc the visual effects look worse than 2005 and the post edits are really weird and janky #like the pacing and ordering is weirdly off and a lot of the shot to shot transitions are awkward or confusing.#plus the sound design in the first few eps is. unhinged. it sounds like offbrand versions of standard stings it's all just Slightly Wrong #but for real i liked it more than I've liked any other season of Moffat Who. it's messy incoherent and often politically INFURIATING #but it has some actual heart and energy. and it feels like doctor who. and i would say moffat is spending like 10% as much time #wanking over his own past triumphs (and Alex Kingston)#and a lot more time like. trying to write something which works. he's not like successful 100% of the time. or even 50%.#but there's a lot more warmth and creativity. mackie capaldi and lucas have actual chemistry as a core cast #and i think it helps that everyone in the core cast is SO PSYCHED TO BE THERE. like it just wasn't a slog like all Moffat's other seasons.

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