February 18, 2012

Ten Observations on Day One at Gallifrey

I’m sitting in the lobby at the LAX Marriott where, mere hours before, hundreds of Doctor Who fans were assembled for the unofficial gathering known as “Lobbycon”—AKA the time where you drink and hang out with other fans and argue the merits of A Good Man Goes To War…

I had to miss out on that last night—I had back problems that sent me to bed early!—but I intend to be there tonight and report on it then.

I was, however, around for Day One of Gallifrey, so here’s some random observations in no particular order:

1) Friday is the “off” day for Gallifrey, ie. the day when fewer people are present. It was packed.

2) In the opening ceremonies, William Russell got a longer round of applause than Paul McGann. Respect.

3) Paul McGann explained what the deal was with that “alternate”, unofficial costume he debuted at con in New Zealand. As I suggested at the time, he was sick of the same limited amount of photos of his Doctor from 15 years ago on the covers of Big Finish audios and, with the help of some fans and the people at WETA, designed his own new costume. He tried to arrange with the BBC to use the costume in promotional materials using his Doctor, but found his requests fell on deaf ears.

4) There was much effort to come up with a collective noun of Amy Ponds, given the sheer number of Amy cosplayers. Suggestions included “A Lake of Ponds”, “A River of Ponds”, “A Nuisance of Ponds”, “An annoyance of Ponds” and others.

5) Best costume of the day: someone dressed as Sarah Jane in her Nerva space station outfit from The Ark in Space.

6) Biggest sign we’re through the looking glass based on a visit to the Dealer’s Room: There’s now an Image of the Fendahl action figure playset.

7) Funniest, but oddest, opening speech: Torchwood: Miracle Day actor Danielle Favilli, who apparently offered to cook for every convention guest because he’s Italian…

8) A friend of mine was in the lineup for Starbucks in the lobby when she discovered the person behind her in line was Paul McGann. It’s that sort of a con.

9) The panel discussions continue to have a high quality of discussion on all things Who.

10) The most bizarre moment still remains to be passing by someone you think is a Jackie Tyler cosplayer and realizing, actually, it’s Camille Coduri...

Posted by Graeme on Saturday, February 18 at 9:55 am

(2) Comments

February 17, 2012

Gally Day One

Gallifrey One technically begins today, over the years the lead time has become increasingly short with attendees now arriving on Thursday, Wednesday and, even in some cases on Tuesday.  Those coming from any distance use the excuse of easing into the inevitable jet lag but the real reason is it’s just too much fun to stay away.  While today held a full spate of programming including Kaffeeklatsches (informal get togethers with writers, producers, artists, etc), interviews and discussion panels, the real show began Wednesday night as fans from across the globe congregated in the lobby of the Los Angeles Marriott .

Even if you can’t be here in person there are any number of podcasters producing daily podcasts including Canada’s own Radio Free Skaro who opened today’s programming with interviews with Camille Coduri, Barnaby Edwards, Toby Haynes, Simon Fisher-Becker and Gary Russell as well as a stirring ode to Gally by Chip from the Two-Minute Time Lord Podcast.
So while Graeme and I will do our best to keep you up to date with some of the more amusing happenings please check out Radiofreeskaro.com and download the their daily episodes for fantastic interviews and commentary on the convention.

Meanwhile I’m going to try to get a picture of Graeme by the 1996 Television Movie Console.  Because I know you all want to see that!

Posted by Deborah on Friday, February 17 at 9:12 pm

(0) Comments

February 16, 2012

The Doctor Who Blog Goes to Gallifrey!

Well, one of us is already there. The other of us posting from the convivial United Club lounge at Dulles airport enjoying a bourbon and the wi-fi while waiting for a connecting flight to LA.

Throughout Gallifrey, your humble correspondents, Deborah Stanish and myself, Graeme Burk, will be blogging about what’s been happening at the world’s biggest Doctor Who convention. Expect all the gossip from the con floor, drunken ramblings during lobbycon and much, much more!

Posted by Graeme on Thursday, February 16 at 11:58 am

(2) Comments

February 10, 2012

NOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!

NOOOOOOOO
OOOOOO!!!!!

Posted by Graeme on Friday, February 10 at 1:14 pm

(15) Comments

February 08, 2012

YouTubing It #30

As Enlightenment’s DVD reviewer, I have had to watch, way, way too many Doctor Who DVD text commentaries. Which is why the mad genius Andrew Orton’s latest and greatest video is so unbelievably funny…

WARNING This is probably not completely work safe. Also, if this is your first time watching Dimensions In Time the Doctor Who Blog, the Doctor Who Information Network, its employees and affiliates are in no way responsible for any cerebral damage you may experience while watching it…

Posted by Graeme on Wednesday, February 8 at 3:09 pm

(0) Comments

February 06, 2012

YouTubing It #29

One of my favourite versions of the Doctor Who theme is the version used for the Doctor Who audios by David Arnold (him of the brilliant post-John Barry James Bond scores and the man who did the theme to Sherlock). Indeed, often I found David Arnold’s rendition of the theme to be better than the actual Paul McGann audios.

I’ve always wanted to see what they might look like on screen. Well thanks to an enterprising fan, some video editing software and disparate elements from other title sequences, we can see what it might have looked like on screen.

Posted by Graeme on Monday, February 6 at 3:02 pm

(1) Comments

February 02, 2012

The 3rd Doctor, Sara Kingom and Dr. Who - Classic Footage circa 1955!

Yes, that is our dapper, debonair dandy of a 3rd Doctor Jon Pertwee, pictured in 1955 with then-wife Jean Marsh (who played three different roles in Doctor Who, the most notable of which was companion Sara Kingdom in The Dalek Master Plan, a role she has recently reprised on a number of occasions for Big Finish audio productions). The photo is a still from recently released (and quite wonderful) footage of a “Waistcoats for Women” fashion gala which can be seen at the British Pathé website. If one Doctor wasn’t enough, the footage also includes 60’s movie “Dr. Who” himself, Peter Cushing. When looking at the footage, one can see that Jon Pertwee’s choice of dress as the Doctor didn’t exactly come out of nowhere!

Posted by Luca on Thursday, February 2 at 8:23 pm

(2) Comments

THE BATTLE OF THE BODY PARTS! -  UFC EXCLUSIVE EVENT ANNOUNCEMENT

One Match Card.  One Headliner. Two Different Bouts. 

In this UFC Exclusive two of the universe’s most feared creatures will face-off in this Single Entity tag team match!  Alter Egos.  Flipside of the same coin.  Same persons.  Two Different Incarnations! 

Entering into the Octogon this spring: THE HAND OF FEAR!  Eldrad’s sentient torso free appendage -VS- THE BRAIN OF MORBIUS! The tyrant TimeLord’s disenskullified grey matter (brain stem included)!  This Battle of Body Parts is a must see pay-per-view event.  Who has the edge?  The unmanicured manos of Eldrad?  Or the squishy oozy floating brain of Morbius?  Literally the physical vs. the mental.  Mind over matter! 

AND THEN… if you think it couldn’t get any more insane both Eldrad and the Morbius monster will take center stage and duke it out for the championship!  With the kid gloves off, and the body parts reattached these two will see who is truly the boss of bosses! 

The 150 million year old, former hero of Kastria, Eldrad knows no fear as having been destroyed by King Rokon’s obliteration module once already is more than enough to banish all trepidation and give her the nickname The Hand Of Fear.  Eldrad, a creature of few words had but 6 to say at a recent news conference. “Eldrad must live.  Morbius must die”.

The Timelord Morbius from the House Dvora, The Scourge of Gallifrey, leader of the Cult of Morbius, master of the Death Zone, member of the Order of the Weal, and the King of Karn is now free and in control of the Solon Monster.  This deadly creature was created by Dr. Mehendri Solon, cobbled together out of sundry alien parts such as the lungs of a Birastrop, Condo’s left hand, Justin Bieber’s buttocks, Abe Lincoln’s feet and Lobsterboy’s Right arm!  The creature defiantly and eloquently called out his opponent, and espoused his philosophy on life, warfare, art, beauty and single combat: “Arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrgggggggggggggg”. 

Arg.  Arg indeed.  It will be a brilliant battle.

On Tavern TeeVee.

ORDER NOW!

-Rod

Report Filed by Rod
for DWBlog Sports

Posted by Rod on Thursday, February 2 at 4:06 am

(1) Comments

February 01, 2012

50th Anniversary Dreams#1

With the time flying by (its already February 2012….where did January go?) before we even know it we will probably know the extent of the BBC’s plans to celebrate the 50th Anniversay of Doctor Who next year. This is the big one - a milestone that should be celebrated like nothing else before, for which we will probably not have the same opportunity. Chances are, whatever they are planning will be exciting in itself, but the chances are that it won’t be exciting as all of the things which we might like to see happen. So until the announcements of what will happen occur, let’s take our chance to dream about what we might like to see happen. I’ll start off with the following.

1. Let’s get the obvious out of the way - a multi-Doctor special featuring all surviving Doctors, and re-use of old clips for the Doctors 1 to 3 and possibly Eccleston (assuming he refuses to take part - they can use deleted scene footage from his season, which would actually be new to us), with a clever Moffaty-way to incorporate the old clips into a new plot (you can see fans doing a half-decent-looking job of this sort of thing for fun on youtube - the BBC should have the money to make it look fully-decent).
2. Since Steven Moffat has hinted that there is to be more than one 50th Anniversary special, here’s my most unrealistic dream scenario (which I full expect not to happen) -  in addition to (or instead of) a multi-Doctor story featuring all of the Doctors, a new television story for each of the surviving Doctors, to be concluded with the Matt Smith one, with each being connected in some way. Explanations as to the older and fatter appearances of the older Doctors can be taken care of with a single line (just like it was in Time Crash). Ideally these new adventures should be written by a writer who wrote for the Doctor during their Doctor’s era (though in the case of Paul McGann, the choices are rather limited so we can count the audio adventures as his era) - for example - 4th Doctor Chris Boucher, 5th Doctor - Chris Bidmead, 6th Doctor - Eric Saward, 7th Doctor - Rona Munroe 8th Doctor - Rob Shearman, 9th Doctor - Russell T. Davies, 10th Doctor - Paul Cornell 11th Doctor - Steven Moffat. Well, a fan can dream, can’t he?
3. Two completely missing stories (one for each Doctor) animated and broadcast on television on one of the three BBC channels (who can help fund the project to make this feasible) - ideally I’d suggest Marco Polo and The Power of the Daleks as the earliest one for each, but if the funds were only available for a 4-part story, The Massacre and The Highlanders would do nicely. Both stories to be released on DVD & Blu Ray with extras after the broadcast.
4. Here’s one which is entirely realistic to happen. Both surviving original cast members of Doctor Who - Carole Ann Ford and William Russell - to appear in the main Anniversary special. Not with old clips, but as they are now. Before the continuity complainers come in and object that all of the Time Lords are dead so Susan can’t come back, that (just like the appearances of the older Doctors) can be fixed with one line. And we can safely ignore the suggestion made in The Sarah Jane Adventures that Ian (and Barbara) are immortal and never age, since there’s not anything in Doctor Who (the tv series that is) which indicates why that should be the case and even in the SJA episode in question it’s only suggested to be an internet rumour. We shouldn’t let trivial continuity issues like this get in the way of what would be a wonderful moment, as we would be very fortunate to have any original cast members to appear in Doctor Who 50 years later.

We’ll be back with some more dreams soon…...but in the meantime feel free to suggest some of your own in the comments section.

Posted by Luca on Wednesday, February 1 at 12:37 pm

(6) Comments

January 30, 2012

The 2012 Timelash Awards - Part Five

We’re almost at the end of our awards for the good, the bad and the Rills of 2011. Here we give some love (and scorn) for the spinoffs…

read more....

Posted by Graeme on Monday, January 30 at 9:25 am

(1) Comments

Page 1 of 70:  1 2 3 >  Last »