Tat Wood

The standard response to Tat Wood's revised edition of this volume (more revised editions are due in the coming years) is that less really should have been more. I don't entirely agree, as I'm very attracted by the phrase "exhaustive". Let's be honest, if you're going to a printed book in 2022 to gain insight into an old television series, you're not doing it just to get some facts and figures. Between Wikipedia, the Blu-Rays, and the enviable array of Doctor Who websites, any casual or part-time fan will be more than sated. These books are an old-fashioned idea, to etch an astonishing array of facts and theories in stone, and Wood has successfully carried it out.

The sense of humour about the flawed side of the program is enjoyable, while the detailed examination of the series in light of cultural context is highly valued. For those of us who weren't there in the 1970s or are from across the seas (or both, in my case), it can be easy to forget that most episodes of the program - like most works of fiction in general - played very differently to its original intended audience, who carried with them a head full of symbols, images, social assumptions, tropes, popular culture linkages, actors' names and faces, political understandings, bromides, fairy tales, religious concepts, and attitudes, not to mention being "locked in" to a Saturday evening timeslot in the way that modern viewers to a TV program are not. I think the About Time series is the best overall work to hold one's hand through the experience of diving deep into Who.

(This review is based entirely on the first three volumes, so I cannot speak as to whether the wheels will give out when Wood reaches the oft-criticised 1980s seasons, nor whether his alleged cruelty toward the new series will be warranted.)

Of course, it's not perfect, and the flaws do matter. First of all, as others have noted, lots of little facts are not quite as factual as one would like. There is an entire thread on Gallifrey Base devoted to this, exposing what are mostly minor niggles (surnames of historical figures misspelled, dates slightly incorrect) but do sometimes extend to historical situations being misinterpreted or misrepresented, which is a problem given the book's schoolmasterly tone. Second, could we acknowledge that occasionally the dives go too deep? Sure. There may be one too many footnotes, and one's eyes roll automatically when the footnote is merely explaining a joke made by Wood rather than relating anything to the program. Third, it’s clear that Wood owes a debt to that pioneering 1990s volume on the subject, The Discontinuity Guide, and adopts something of its tone in the intro to each serial. But whereas that volume was written at a time when many fans were unable to see every story, this is the era of streaming and home media (and easy piracy). The entry on “Inferno”, for example, rather beguilingly reads as if it were made for someone who has know hope of seeing the program. I’d like to know of even one reader who decided, in this modern age, that the book was all they needed!

And fourth, yes, it must be said: "schoolmasterly" is how I described the tone, but others might go for "snotty". Whether lecturing us on the music of Stockhausen or the relationship between Wales and its parent, the United Kingdom, Wood has chosen to approach this book like an expert introducing new immigrants to a culture. Often that's welcomed, as I mentioned earlier, when it places the program into its context. But by the time he's explaining what "beans on toast" are (thanks, Tat!), it's a tad dispiriting. Yes, my American partner wouldn't understand baked beans, but in this situation it is a thoroughly unnecessary interjection designed to make English culture sound like something thrillingly esoteric. It makes for a discombobulating experience, as he clearly wants to write for both ignorant millennials like myself and interested armchair Who scholars of his own generation. Sometimes, thus, he leans toward the "this funny thing happened in 1971 and, no, I'm not lying!" while other times he casually mentions multiple television programs or bands with the expectation they'll be familiar to us. It's an uneven mix that comes from his desire to write a book that is all things for all people, which perhaps also explains its length.

Those are not complaints, just honest criticisms. I'm having great fun revisiting the series in its entirety for the first time since I discovered it back in the late 2000s; it's a privilege to have Wood by my side... even if I'm reminded sometimes of how my partner's eyes glaze over when I rabbit on about the exact order of Shakespeare's plays. This book replicates the feeling of having an excessively nerdy friend tie you to a chair and not let you leave until you've listened to his entire PhD in one hit. Indeed, my relationship with Wood is rather how I imagine the Doctor felt about K-9: it's exceptionally nice to have you here, I appreciate what you bring to the team, and I couldn't survive without you. But when you're not required, please go back in the cupboard. There's a good dog.… (más)

https://fromtheheartofeurope.eu/about-time-9-by-tat-wood-and-dorothy-ail/

Latest in the magisterial set of books about Doctor Who (I have previously read volumes 1, 2, 3, 3 (revised), 4, 5, 6, 7 and 8), this covers Series 4 of New Who, the season with the Tenth Doctor and Donna, and also the 2009 special, with a side order of the Proms concert Music of the Spheres, The Wedding of Sarah Jane Smith and the animated Dreamland story. This actually came out in 2019, but I only got it in August, and with David Tennant and Donna Noble about to return to our screens, it’s a timely read.

As usual, there is lovely detailed analysis of each story, including all the sections familiar from past volumes plus a new one, “English Lessons”, explaining cultural allusions which may not be as clear to the non-UKanian reader. None of these stories has yet been covered by the Black Archives, so you can’t really compare and contrast, but I feel comfortable that the two series are doing different things and both doing them well. In particular, the chapters on Silence in the Library / Forest of the Dead, Midnight and The End of Time were very good.

I’m sorry to say that I did not feel the same way about the sidebar essays accompanying the analysis of each story. There are two standout pieces in the middle of the book, one on the history of the online spinoffs of the show, and one asking “Why Can’t Anyone Just Die?” in the Moffat version of the show, a valid question answered in forensic detail. But in general the companion essays seemed to me a notch or two below the very high standards set in previous volumes, most of them dedicated to exploring obscure rabbit-holes of continuity which I find it difficult to care about.

However, it’s comprehensive on the actual episodes, and the Black Archives you would get for the same price would cover a fraction of the material. So I would still recommend it to the analytical fan, just not as highly as some of the earlier volumes.… (más)

https://nwhyte.livejournal.com/3103526.html

This concentrates purely on the 2007 series (the one with Freema Agyeman as Martha Jones), starting with the 2006 Christmas special (The Runaway Bride) and finishing with Time Crash, the 2007 Christmas special (Voyage of the Damned) and the animated Infinite Quest. Counting (arguably) three two-parters and not counting Time Crash, at 340 pages that's about 26 pages per story; Counting The Infinite Quest as a single episode, and including Time Crash this time, it's 21 pages per episode. Compare with less than nine pages per story in Volume 4 and a shade over two per episode in Volume 2.

This is the season that includes my personal favourite episode of New Who (the Hugo-winning Blink), Paul Cornell's excellent two-parter based on his own novel (also a Hugo finalist), and the return of the Master in the shape of first Sir Derek Jaobi and then John Simm. David Tennant then encounters his future father-in-law Peter Davison in the first multi-Doctor story of the new era. The low points are the awful two-part Dalek story and the final episode's failure to deliver on the buildup of the two previous ones. It also has to be said that Martha's character arc is not the most elegantly executed (though, come on, at least she doesn't get sent to stay on Sir Charles' country estate), though I rate Freema Agyeman very highly indeed.

I wrote about these stories both at the time they were first broadcast (The Runaway Bride, Smith and Jones, The Shakespeare Code, Gridlock, Daleks in Manhattan, Evolution of the Daleks, The Lazarus Experiment, 42, Blink, Utopia, The Sound of Drums, Last of the Time Lords, Time Crash, Voyage of the Damned) and again when I did my rewatch in 2013 (The Runaway Bride, first half of main season, second half plus Infinite Quest, Time Crash, Voyage of the Damned). In general, Wood and Ail's assessment of the stories is pretty similar to mine - they are even tougher than I am on the Dalek one, saw more in The Infinite Quest than I did, and perhaps less enthusiastic about the high points than I am. As usual, the commentary is pretty brutal about the Things That Don't make Sense plot-wise, but normally sympathetic to the constraints of production (grim accounts of David Tennant struggling with a heavy cold but still putting in long days and night shoots).

There's surprisingly little exploration of the roots of individual stories, a strength of earlier volumes, but I did gain a new appreciation for the extent to which Paul Cornell draws on Neil Gaiman. The big gap here is that Torchwood and the Sarah Jane Adventures were already well under way, and it's a bit tricky to analyse Tennant-era Who without bringing them into the mix as well. However, the accompanying essays as usual are well worth the cover price in their own right, tackling inter alia New Who's (or at least RTD's) approach to race and sexuality as displayed on screen, and also a fascinating piece about the online extras.

My usual gripe, magnified this time: 65 endnotes (I hate endnotes), including two numbered 14, the first of which is located between notes 7 and 8, so that it's not at all clear what text it is referring to.

I still think the About Time series is the standard by which other critiques of Who should be judged.… (más)