Rate And Discuss 3.7: 42

[Milky Tears]

Some good stuff from Lawrence Miles this week (well, until he deletes it):

http://beasthouse-lm.blogspot.com/

He's spot on about sci-fi fans.

[Jon Masters]

Just about to watch 42, so I'll let you know.

Got about half way through that Lawrence Miles blog before i realised I had a life and could find 37 better things to do with it. Like all his books it was (a) longwinded (b) repetitive (c) fundamentally flawed and (d) filled to the brim with his own sense of self- importance.

Someone should tie him to a chair and make him listen to an endless loop of Graham Norton reading his Interference books.

[Alex]

I've only just watched this as I had to go out tonight and have a meal with my Aunt and Uncle. Grr...Anyway, I've got to say I've mixed feelings, I thought it started off well enough, but then lost it's way a bit. I wanted something more from it, but I'm not sure what it was. Perhaps a bit of mystery and intrigue rather than yet more running about all over the place - though I didn't mind that in The Lazarus Experiment at all.

Part of the problem was that I thought the sun infected people were a bit silly, they moved so slowly and it was so obvious when they were going to open their little hatches in their helmets (steady now) that I just didn't find it menacing in the slightest. The locked doors with the password system just seemed a bit weak, and like some others have mentioned, the characterisation of everyone bar the Doctor and Martha was a bit rubbish. I think that's my main problem with it really, I really liked Mark Gattis' portrayal of Lazarus two weeks ago, but here I didn't find myself caring about them at all.

Having said that, I did really enjoy the last 10 minutes or so, especially when the doctor became infected, and it felt very tense right up until the final moment. Seeing the Doctor in that amount of pain made me forget for once that of course he's going to survive, which if an episode manages to make me do this is always a good sign, and the Saxon bits were cool too.

I only gave it 5/10 though, but I wouldn't say it was a bad episode - just not a very good one.

[WhiteCrow]

I just posted this comment on the other thread - but i'll repost it here...

hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm, well Christian enjoyed it, but it was too much like The Impossible Planet really. I was a bit underwhelmed by this one.

Substitute Sun for Black Hole, Demon posession for Alien posession, and yellow pressure suit for red space suit. You kind of have it.

Also felt a lot like I would have enjoyed this had I not seen Event Horizon - heck even the ship looked similar from the outside and an airlock bit.

Overall I rated as average because it felt like a lot of bits of "things" I'd seen before mixed all together like a really bad direct to video thing. I even guessed the "baddies" to be some kind of hydrogen gas alien sucked up by the ram scoop as soon as it was mentioned.

Doctor Who can come up with brilliant ideas, and provide new twists. But this wasn't anything new at all. In fact for some moments I thought I was watching Voyager. Moment of silence please ...

[Jim]

I enjoyed bits of it, but it was by far the weakest of the season. Most of the visuals saved it and kept the episode moving to a pace that would satisfy a one off viewing.

The escape pod scenes were well played and nice in presentation, Freema being the most interesting thing about the whole thing on reflection. Tennant was a notch down but im inclined to think it was the writing.

The story itself felt unoriginal (planet of evil/impossible planet/alien etc) but as a bit of entertainment it ticked the boxes. It just felt a bit soulless. I can see the Torchwood vibe! What was a big boo boo was that the characters lacked conviction and Collins has always been quite overrated imo.

Shame - the 42 real-time idea felt promising. It was by no means a disaster but I think the realisation to screen probably saved it.

[WhiteCrow]

Shame - the 42 real-time idea felt promising. It was by no means a disaster but I think the realisation to screen probably saved it.

I think it would have worked better without the obvious alien posession. You know a group of people all blaming each other for things going wrong, and the alien posession only revealed towards the end, who a bit of a whodunit over who is the sabateur on board.

[Jon Masters]

Hmmm - gave it 5 / 10. Story wise it was no great shakes, and there were holes a plenty in the script (like how Ms Collins managed not to freeze her arms off whilst killing the guy in the stasis chamber for a start). Most of the ideas have appeared in DW books or even Red Dwarf before. Production and direction saved this from being far worse though, and the time factor was a nice addition.

But OMG - the dialogue was appalling ! It would be difficult to find a 30 second slot that wasn't ruined by such trite feebleness. Along with some pretty plank-like acting I wondered at times whether it was some amateur fringe theatre production. Even DT seemed at times to have been infected by it. Seriously, the guy can't write realistic dialogue for toffee. And a big for basically repeating the whole EOTW mobile phone bits, and for ramming Saxon down our throats in a story that didn't need it at all.

Last question - Martha leaves section 1 of the ship and arrives in section 22 to meet up with the Doctor and it takes about 10 seconds. Was the ship only in fact about 150m long ?

[Captain Tancredi]

Hmm, a whole lot of nothing special, I'd have to say. Take away the real-time gimmick and you're left with a fairly straightforward story and characters it was occasionally difficult to tell apart let alone care about. Admittedly I'd been on my feet all day and went to bed after it had finished, but about ten minutes from the end I realised that I was only watching for next week's trailer.

[Si Hunt]

It was like the 'action' part of a movie wuthout all the other bits - and it was also quite difficult to work out what was going on. I watched it with my Mum and she had to keep asking. We must have missed the (very) brief line where they explained just why they had to keep going through the doors and it wasn't mentioned again for half an hour. I don't think anyone said at all why the Doctor was trying to get outside the spaceship or how he was planning to bring back the escape pod. And why did the possessed people have those helmets? When there was another one of them, we thought it was just bad editing.

Above all else, it was 'running around' without any grace, wit, emotion, exposition, comedy, explanation or intrigue. It's Doctor Who for fans who are in denial of everything that makes Doctor Who magical, and who just want to show it to their mates and not be embarassed because, like, it looks really cool and expensive.

And this is without mentioning that all the bits that were actually show-offable were done almost identically in one of last years episodes anyway!

Si.

[Rob McCow]

How bizarre. I like that Doctor Who can look really cool and expensive one week and tell a silly but smart and fun little story the week after.

Though I'm yearning for another comedy episode this year! Are we getting another Boomtown, or Love & Monsters?

Bitchfest time!

Above all else, it was 'running around' without any grace, wit, emotion, exposition, comedy, explanation or intrigue

Grace: the direction was outstanding. It may have lacked ballet dancers though.
Wit: It was a bit short, but the explanation about the happy primes was brilliant. And the scorched body outlines were hilarious! (that may have been unintentional)
Emotion: There was the whole 'I'll save you!' bit in the escape pod, which again was fabulous. Martha's rings tapping on the glass and the bit where it goes all quiet were excellent touches.
Comedy: Well, it wasn't a comedy episode, but the bit where Martha phones her mum up was pretty funny. And then it got creepy.
Explanation: It's all there, but everyone was speaking quickly. Turn the TV up, Grandpa!
Intrigue: It was lacking in intrigue. Most of the things were explained as it went along, although the revelation that it was Michelle Collins' fault was interesting.

There was loads of Technobabble though! Stasis booths, sedatives, bio-scans, fusion scoops... that was annoying.

[Si Hunt]

Turn the TV up, Grandpa!

Funny you should say that, Mum turned it down a bit more than I'd liked and there was occasional talking and wine. But perhaps episodes should be resilient to family viewing atmospheres and not require you to be crouched by the speaker to get a basic idea of what's going on.

Si.

[Andrew Curnow]

Got about half way through that Lawrence Miles blog before i realised I had a life and could find 37 better things to do with it. Like all his books it was (a) longwinded (b) repetitive (c) fundamentally flawed and (d) filled to the brim with his own sense of self- importance.

I agree with Jon about Mr Miles (although I foolishgly read the whole thing). His main point seems to be 'RTD's Who is like JN-T's Who but is done better' - I think frankly we'd all worked that out ages ago!!

Going back to "42" I'm surprised it's had such a muted reaction, at least on its premiere viewing. I love Doctor Who's range and variety, and the fact that this week it can be a knock-off of big-budget space movies, and next week something quite different, is all part of its appeal. I don't think either myself (at 36) or Claudia (at 10) failed to follow last night's plot, and we certainly weren't crouched by the speakers. And, regarding the doors, I think they reiterated that they had to get to level 1 and restart the engines about 3 or 4 times.

If the only real complaint is that "it's a bit like Event Horizon/Aliens/whatever" then that's no complaint at all - it was also a bit like Planet of Evil, which was a bit like Forbidden Planet, which was a bit like The Tempest. And don't get me started on the source material for most of the Hinchcliffe era...

Really, all I can say is that I enjoyed it, and oddly with this year's batch in particular, that's all I want. I've not really hated any of them (although I was a little disappointed with the Dalek tale, perhaps having got my expectations up way too high for it) but equally I've not rushed to rewatch any of them either (Lazarus being the only one I've watched in its entirety twice). Was/is "42" a classic for all-time? No. Was it even the best story this year so far? No. Was it an entertaining, 45 minutes with nothing actually wrong about it as a piece of drama that kept us here held and interested and involved and diverted? Yes.

[Larry]

"Allons-y!"


It wasn't scientifically accurate (once again, my anal thermometer went flying across the room)

-42/10

true a space ship that was only 42 minutes from falling into a sun would surely of burnt up long before it even got that close but to all those dissapointed by this episode next weeks Human Nature looks fantastic.

[Matthew T]

I presumed the spaceship was 42 minutes from the point where it would begin to burn up, rather than 42 minutes from the sun itself, which would just be silly.

[Andrew Curnow]

Agreed - and indeed that would be what the visuals showed, as it clearly wasn't about to literally hit at the end.

[Simon R]

They should have called it "42 to Doomsday".

Ra-ra.

What is all this irritating "alonsy" business? It's been in a few episodes an I missed whatever it was supposed to mean.

[Pip Madeley]

Allons-y means "Let's go there". It's just a saying.

I saw the 'highlights' of 42 whilst I was getting ready to go out last night, but it looked alright from what I saw (nice Mill sun), although I did keep thinking it was a big Planet Of Evil rip-off, tut tut at the Chinball Wizard. I'll post my proper thoughts when I watch it properly tonight, proper like.

[Jonno]

Allons-y! It's French for "Let's go!" I guess it's just his catchphrase, a la "Fantastic!" for his predecessor.

[Stuart Wallis]

I liked this one rather a lot, even though it's a bit of a retelling of something we only saw last year. This is definately the better of the two versions of said tale, perhaps because 42 benefits from being a one-parter, and therefore better-paced. Michelle Collins' death was a bit predictable once we found out that she was married to one of the possessed, but seeing her and Freema in those vests, well, I was past caring. I actually came close to being a bit emotional when she spoke to Hubby when he started recognise her, and when Freema phoned home. And DT was very good, particularly when he was possessed.

Did anyone else think of Cyclops from X-Men when the possessed men raised their visors, or when the Doctor's eyes glowed?

[P-Bal]

It's fairly ironic that on some level the Michelle Collins character died from sunburn. "Sunburn, I'm getting sunburn..." join in!

My side was definately the loudest.

[Stuart Wallis]

You're supposed to sing from your mouth though, surely!

[P-Bal]

What do you mean he's loud, she's loud, I'M LOUD!!!

[SiHart]

It was good, but not great. tense, exciting, but really rather shallow. The conutdown added more tension than would otherwise have been there, but lifting the plot of Planet of Evil is not really something to be applauded in my book.

7/10

Si xx

[P-Bal]

Freema should have worn a denim Sladen tribute.

[Allllie]

9/10 from me - it was tense! It was exciting!

Though I suspect Graeme Harper did a turning-shit-into-gold job on it.

The characterisation was pretty naff, but that was beside the point, this was about excitement! And what's going on with Martha's Mum! 45 minutes of pacey fluff, entertaining space opera for a Saturday evening. Super duper!

What he said!