Dr Who marathon

papers/drwho/index.md

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+---
+title: Every Episode of Doctor Who
+---
+
+I'm going to try to watch every episode of Doctor Who, in order.
+Then I'm going to write up what I think.
+
+A few rules I'm setting out initially:
+
+* It's okay to skip an episode if I just can't handle it.
+* I don't have to write a big ol' treatise on each one.
+* I fully understand I lack cultural and temporal context for a lot of this,
+  and I'm not going to feel bound to try and attain said.
+* I will be viewing this though my personal biases.
+* I may create more rules later on.
+
+---
+
+* [Season 1](season01.md) - December 2021
+* [Season 2](season02.md) - December 2021

papers/drwho/season01.md

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+---
+title: Every Episode of Doctor Who
+---
+
+I'm going to try to watch every episode of Doctor Who, in order.
+Then I'm going to write up what I think.
+
+A few rules I'm setting out initially:
+
+* It's okay to skip an episode if I just can't handle it.
+* I don't have to write a big ol' treatise on each one.
+* I fully understand I lack cultural and temporal context for a lot of this,
+  and I'm not going to feel bound to try and attain said.
+* I will be viewing this though my personal biases.
+* I may create more rules later on.
+
+# Season One
+
+## Story 1: Cavemen and Fire
+
+I guess this first story pretty clearly established that they travel
+through time.
+
+### S01E01 - An Unearthly Child
+
+Oh man, the pacing is just slow.
+I like how they're exploring "what if a time-travelling alien disguised itself as a human and went to high school."
+
+Okay, there are two high school teachers, 
+and this highschool aged timelord girl who's the Doctor's grand-daughter.
+
+The doctor is kind of a jerk.
+
+
+### S01E02 - The Cave of Skulls
+
+Right, okay, cavemen. And of course they're all short-term-memory idiots.
+Okay, sure.
+
+### S01E03 - The Forest of Fear
+
+I forgot what this one was about,
+because I didn't decide to write things down until later.
+
+### S01E04 - The Firemaker
+
+The man teacher makes a fire because of course the man does that in 1963.
+And then the leader of the cavemen goes hunting.
+They make some skulls on fire to distract everybody,
+which is pretty cool,
+and then they escape.
+
+
+## Story 2: Daleks!
+
+Holy crap! I didn't realized the Daleks went all the way back to episode 4!
+Also there are some Dutch-looking people who are of course the good guys.
+
+### S01E05: The Dead Planet
+
+They find a dead city which, oops, high background radiation.
+Cool doors open up and some neat architecture.
+
+You know what, for the time and (I assume) paltry budget of the first season,
+this is pretty badass.
+
+This Doctor is a jerk. Faking a broken part to force everyone to do what
+he wants.
+
+### S01E06: The Survivors
+
+Daleks! It's cool that they waited until the second episode to bring them out.
+They're pretty clearly assholes right at the outset here.
+No moral ambiguity with the Daleks.
+
+The Doctor is pretty frail. Honestly, the rest of the crew seems more
+important than he is.
+
+### S01E07: The Escape
+
+I think we really meet the Norwegians here. I don't recall exactly.
+
+I'm pretty sure this is the one where
+the Norwegians try to meet up with the Daleks and forge a peace treaty,
+not knowing the Daleks are complete assholes.
+
+### S01E08: The Ambush
+
+They start taking out the Daleks. There appears to be some sort of
+creature inside, which can be taken out, and the dude teacher crawls in.
+
+This is actually pretty cool, I liked this one.
+
+### S01E09: The Expedition
+
+I think the guy teacher tries to convince the peaceniks to fight the Daleks,
+by presenting them with the possibility of him screwing up their stuff.
+
+The Norwegians traipse around through some cool looking sets to
+look like an alien landscape. 
+
+I think this is when the Daleks realize they need high background radiation
+in order to survive, because the Norwegians (the Thaals I guess) anti-radiation
+drug kills them. They plan to dump ionizing radiation onto the planet's
+surface.
+
+A Thaal dude goes to get water and gets sucked up by a vortex or something.
+
+### S01E10: The Ordeal
+
+Half the episode was watching people jump over a chasm in a cave.
+The pacing on this, holy crap.
+
+I think this is the one where the Doctor screws up their electrical grid.
+
+### S01E11: The Rescue
+
+Everybody runs around in the cave some more, and eventually they pop out
+in the Dalek city.
+The Doctor and his Grand-daughter
+are imprisoned and he volunteers to teach them about his ship and how to
+travel through time if they let him go.
+
+The Norwegians and teachers rain holy hell and kill all the Daleks.
+Everybody goes home.
+
+Honestly, man, for being written 60 years ago, I'm surprised by how
+compelling the Daleks were written when viewed by me today.
+
+## Story 3: A Tardis Button Gets Stuck
+
+This story was bathouse crazy.
+Part of it was probably that I wasn't paying full attention,
+but it was also just nuts.
+
+### S01E12: The Edge of Destruction
+
+People alternate between normal and crazy.
+There's a lot of screaming.
+Random weirdness takes place and it doesn't make sense.
+Everybody turns of everybody and then suddenly it's fine and dandy.
+
+### S01E13: The Brink of Disaster
+
+The Doctor starts piecing together some clues.
+Turns out the Tardis itself has been trying to send them a message
+by dropping obscure clues.
+He figures it out and unsticks the "go back to where you just were" button,
+which, because it was stuck down, sent them back to the origin of the
+solar system.
+
+You know, not awful.
+It felt pretty incoherent but I was willing to go along.
+
+## Story 4: Doctor Who goes to China
+
+I guess the film for this was lost,
+so it was sort of a slideshow playing over a radio drama.
+
+### S01E14: The Roof of the World
+
+I made it as far as them getting into a hut in Mongolia and meeting
+Marco Polo,
+and then I skipped to the next story.
+
+### S01E15: The Singing Sands
+
+More British people pretending they're in China, I presume.
+
+### S01E16: Five Hundred Eyes
+
+Skipped
+
+### S01E17: The Wall of Lies
+
+Skipped
+
+### S01E18: Rider from Shang Tu
+
+Skipped
+
+### S01E19: Mightly Kublai Khan
+
+Skipped
+
+### S01E20: Assassin at Peking
+
+Skipped
+
+## Story 5: Finding the Chips
+
+The Scooby gang has to find some microchips scattered around the planet,
+so a machine can be repaired to mind-control everyone into
+being peaceful.
+
+### S01E21: The Sea of Death
+
+This was the episode during which I decided to start writing this.
+
+It's really interesting how they kept the sort of stumbling around delivery
+of lines, rather than shooting another take. I kind of like it.
+It's like watching a play.
+
+LOL at the alien costume with swim flippers.
+
+Frickin' Susan is, disappointingly, pretty much a horror movie character.
+Just sort of blithely wandering around all over the place and screaming
+a lot. Amusingly, they just assumed it was her from her scream.
+
+Okay, got the main plot point. The dude needs to recover some keys so they
+can mind-control people to make everybody peaceful. I really hope they don't
+just accept this without question.
+
+Their mime acting could use some continuity work, LOL.
+
+### S02E22: The Velvet Web
+
+When the statue's eyes lit up and the creepy lady came out to put rocks
+on everybody's forehead, it really felt like a 1970s episode from when
+I was a kid.
+
+Aww yeah, brains in jars getting killed.
+
+### S02E23: The Screaming Jungle
+
+The Screaming Jungle, eh? Must be about Susan.
+
+For crying out loud, yep, she's screaming again.
+I read that this actress quit early on.
+I don't blame her. What a limiting role to have to play.
+
+Now Barbara's screaming. A statue grabbed her.
+
+Now she's screaming again. A net fell on her.
+
+Third time screaming. Some plants grabbed her.
+
+Apparently the scream in the jungle was mostly Barbara.
+
+### S01E24: The Snows of Terror
+
+Okay, now Ian and Barbara are cold. And a beardo has rescued them.
+
+Ian left for some reason, 
+and Beardo's giving off some really rapey vibes.
+Oh, sure enough, he's got all their junk.
+
+Susan and a blonde woman are in a cave.
+I've decided I don't like Susan at all,
+her sole role appears to be screwing things up and screaming.
+
+Oh boy. They're all in another cave, and they're going to explore it..
+Oh, okay, we don't have to watch that. They melt some ice and...
+Susan's screaming again as some dude with a cardboard sword wakes up.
+
+Great, they found another key.
+
+### S01E25: Sentence of Death
+
+The Scooby gang vs. the Japanese Criminal System, I guess.
+They assumed Ian is guilty and he has to prove he's not.
+The Doctor is going to be his defense.
+
+I've seen this episode at least three times on Star Trek,
+and once on the Brady Bunch.
+I might skip this one.
+
+Oh, neat, a dude who hits his wife.
+
+Okay, but you know what, I dig the costumes.
+
+### S01E26: The Keys of Marinus
+
+I don't like Barbara's hairstyle, though.
+
+Oh, snap! What a twist! I seriously was not expecting this one.
+I mean, I probably should have, from a casting standpoint, but I'm not
+really devoting a lot of mental energy to this.
+
+Okay, I guess they decided the mind-control machine wasn't so great.
+Kind of a naive take but whatever, it was a pretty fun story.
+
+## Story 6: Doctor Who goes to Mexico
+
+A bunch of white people pretend to be Aztecs, and explore the moral
+aspects of human sacrifice.
+
+To its credit, there is at least lip service to the notion that
+this is some other culture and maybe you can't impose your current moral
+structure over it.
+
+### S01E27: The Temple of Evil
+
+Oh goodie. Barbara's gone and gotten herself in trouble again.
+I'm not sure I can stomach this one.
+
+Yay, let's focus on human sacrifice. And let's frame it as summoning rain,
+because I'm sure that was the beginning and end of the philosophy behind it.
+
+LOL the sword fight.
+
+Haha, Susan's screaming desecrated an Aztec temple.
+
+### S01E28: The Warriors of Death
+
+Damn, the Doctor's pissed.
+
+Holy crap, the Vulcan Nerve Pinch! 2 years before it showed up in Star Trek!
+
+More 1960s dudes wrasslin'. But there's a twist, he got scratched.
+
+### S01E29: The Bride of Sacrifice
+
+Aha, the old Saffron maneuver, eh? Looks like the Doctor's gettin' hitched!
+
+The gang has a moral dilemma about altering the culture of the Aztecs by
+Barbara abusing her god status to outlaw human sacrifice. The Doctor gets
+married or engaged or something. Susan finally expresses an emotion other
+than terror:
+
+![well hello there](susan-well-hello-there.mp4)
+
+I'm back to being uncomfortable with the cultural framing here. I mean,
+maybe this is useful for viewing 1960s British culture, but that's still
+too recent for me to not feel squicky about it. The only reason I didn't
+skip this entire story is because Wikipedia said it was one of the best
+stories of the entire franchise.
+
+### S01E30: The Day of Darkness
+
+They found a tunnel or something, to get back into the burial chamber
+containing the Tardis. Susan is going to get married or sacrificed or
+something. Ian does the Vulcan Nerve Pinch on a white guy dressed as a
+brown guy, saving the white lady. They find a way to escape, and
+somebody gets sacrificed, and then Barbara gets to watch Susan get
+sacrificed or something, I'm not sure.
+
+Oh, more 1960s dudes fighting. I skipped it. I presume the British
+high school teacher beats the Aztec warrior who's been training his
+entire life.
+
+Barbara has some sort of moral quandry about her inability to change
+the past, which I guess was the point of the story. I sure hope
+they don't wind up on earth again in the next story.
+
+## Story 7: The Sensorites
+
+### S01E31: Strangers in Space
+
+They're in a spaceship, thank goodness. The lighting is pretty bad.
+
+Okay there are these sensorites messing with peoples' minds. Aw, crap,
+we're sort of on Earth. At least it's in the future.
+
+This is a cool premise,
+taking over a ship by manipulating everybody's emotions.
+
+### S01E32: The Unwilling Warriors
+
+Hey! Creepy!  I like this story.
+
+Susan is doing something! Nice!
+
+Susan makes a sacrifice
+
+### S01E33: Hidden Danger
+
+Susan needs to get out of this place! The Doctor's being a real jerk. Again.
+Seems like she's growing up and needs her own space.
+
+Anyway. The Sensorites are cool. And I'm glad Barbara seems to get an equal
+say in matters. Like, she just argued with Ian about something, and she was
+like "well then it's settled, we'll do it my way".
+Still can't abide her hairstyle, though.
+
+Ian seems really British. It's not difficult to imagine pretty much
+everything he does being done by an older dude with a brandy in his hand.
+He doesn't seem to get to grow as a character,
+he's already fully grown, I guess.
+
+I dig that the sensorites have internal debates.
+
+## Story 8: Dr Who vs the French Revolution
+
+I just couldn't get myself to care about another one of these.

papers/drwho/season02.md

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+---
+title: Doctor Who: Season 2
+---
+
+# Story 1: Honey, I shrunk Doctor Who
+
+## S02E01: Planet of Giants
+
+They're on Earth again, but they're tiny.
+I bet it was fun building the sets for this one!
+
+Pretty dorky but I'm enjoying it.
+Why in the heck do they not bring flashlights with them, I wonder.
+
+## S02E02: Dangerous Journey
+
+"Anyway, you keep away from it," Ian said, just before walking over to
+the pile of poisoned seeds he was referring to.
+
+LOL giant hymenoptera.
+Holy hell, Barbara faints!
+
+I can't stop thinking about how much fun it must have been to
+build this set!
+
+## S02E03: Crisis
+
+This is very cute.
+
+Yeah, just store that giant poison seed next to Barbara,
+who's suffering from poisoning.
+
+
+# Story 2: Earth. Again. Also Daleks.
+
+They go back to earth, and find a whole mess of Daleks.