Let There Be Light (1946): A Review

LET THERE BE LIGHT

A Light in the Dark Night of the Soul...

The agony of veterans returning from World War II was not something that made for feature films.  In fact, the first one that I can think of that touched on the post-war lives of WWII veterans was The Best Years of Our Lives.  Even in that film, there was a layer of romanticism that made its still jarring images of disabled veterans palatable. 

Let There Be Light was the third in director John Huston's trilogy of documentaries made for the United States government after Report from the Aleutians and The Battle of San Pietro. The film was suppressed for many decades due to its unflinching imagery of psychologically troubled veterans and their recovery.  Let There Be Light still has a great impact in seeing how these men go from extremely troubled in the hospital to a slow recovery.   

Walter Huston's distinct voice narrates Let There Be Light. We start from when the soldiers and sailors return from the front.  In a prologue we learn that 20% of casualties are neuropsychiatric (read: mental). With hypnosis and narcosynthesis (using drugs to create a hypnotic state), there is a concerted efforts to cure those suffering from what is now termed "post-traumatic stress disorder" but was then called "shellshock".  

The film proceeds to cover what it calls "casualties of the spirit". Here, we see the various men interviewed by psychiatrists. The interviews are sparse, with only the interviewer and subject on screen. The veterans are aware of the cameras but are told on arrival to pay no mind to them. They are there, they are told, to merely chronicle their experiences.  

They are all soft-spoken, almost hushed in how they speak.  They talk about the dreams they have, seeing others die, and one breaks down in tears, apologizing for it.  They are all troubled men, frightened even, by their experiences in conflict, which life did not prepare them for.

As we continue, we are introduced to some remarkably tough cases during the eight to ten weeks in treatment the narration tells they will go through.  While we never heard the doctors refer specifically to patients by their names (and neither did the elder Huston), I thought I heard the name 'Guirardi', and his case was shocking.

Even though, we are told, he is perfectly healthy physically, his psychiatric health has literally left him almost completely unable to walk.  With some treatment from the doctor speaking to him and using sodium amytal (the so-called 'truth serum) to get the patient to think he can walk, this patient does indeed walk normally, and the doctor leaves the patient with the post-hypnotic suggestion that he is perfectly able to walk.

As time progresses, the patients we are following continue other types of therapies: occupational (where they paint or create hobbyhorses), play sports and conduct group therapy sessions where they are able to discuss things freely. 

The use of hypnosis is strong in Let There Be Light: one amnesiac from the battle of Okinawa who has forgotten not only the battle, but his name is brought back to the present due to it.  As the film continues, we see the patients slowly coming back to a sense of themselves pre-war.  We are shown footage of how they were when they first came in intercut with the men playing a spirited game of baseball.  Let There Be Light ends with an optimistic note, as they are given their discharge papers and head on out, presumably to better lives.

As one looks on it perhaps the film's high endorsement of hypnosis and sodium amytal may no longer carry the same weight today than it did in 1946.  We also don't go into who these men were or might have been before they were forced into intense and difficult situations where death was only one mistake away. 

However, especially with so many veterans coming back from Iraq and Afghanistan, films like Let There Be Light show that the treatment of PTSD is nothing new and that war causes injuries that are not visible to the naked eye, things to ponder especially with a high rate of suicides among veterans today.  Films like Let There Be Light are time capsules to a time when these issues were treated seriously, if not by the general public (which understandably wanted to forget almost everything to do with the war), at least by the military (which understood that men damaged psychologically by war would make poor civilians).

One can see why the government kept Let There Be Light hidden from the general public: images of trembling as a result of war might make a nation pause about the effects of war on those hailed as heroes. 

Our Heroes Don't Tremble or Break Down in Tears.

That would be the traditional narrative of men coming back from war, to just take it and move on.  Sometimes that isn't possible, not without great injury to themselves, and perhaps to others. Even though the film was made in 1946 (curiously the same year The Best Years of Our Lives was released), the sight of these young men is still at times agonizing.

Let There Be Light delves, briefly (at 58 minutes, it is a short film), into a subject people may not have wanted to know about (even today) but which necessitates exploring. Perhaps it might be a little simplistic to suggest that with some baseball, art classes, and hypnosis a soldier would or could be cured from PTSD.  Its optimistic ending might be something from a Hollywood film.  However, Let There Be Light is a searing look (or as much of a searing look the late 1940s would allow) into the hidden wounds of battle.                 

DECISION: A-

The Death of Doctor Who Episode Five

Before it all went to Hell...

Now we have reached the end of this particular retrospective, trying to find the causes of why a show that was so good and that had a successful revival to where it will be able to celebrate its 50th Anniversary should perhaps be cancelled. 

We've covered how Doctor Who appears deaf, dumb and blind to referencing anything pre-Rose.

We've covered how NuWhovians don't appear to ask questions or investigate anything pre-Rose.

We've covered how supporting characters and story arcs are drowning the stories and forcing the main character to play a supporting role on his own show.

We've covered how the current Doctor, Matt Smith, is making a mockery of our titular hero and turning him into a joke.

Now, we've come to the climax, The Number One Thing Killing Doctor Who...

Guess which one is deadlier to The Doctor...

1.) STEVEN MOFFAT

I understand Moffat has written great stories both for and outside of Doctor Who.  Now, I never saw Coupling (and from what I understand, neither did the rest of America) but I'm told it was pretty good.

When one thinks about it though, Coupling is about the only original thing Moffat has ever done that has achieved note in America.  He had Jekyll, a series based on something written before he was born.  He now is being celebrated for Sherlock, which again despite his champions is not an original creation.  He finally has Doctor Who, which was created in 1963 or 2005 (depending on who you ask).  

At first he just wrote for the series.  He has some pretty good stories in there.  However, once he achieved ultimate power, like some mad dictator, he decided that controlling this iconic show wasn't enough.  He was going to recreate it in his own image.

Sadly, that image looked like her. 

It didn't have to be this way.  Steven Moffat wrote Blink, which is ranked among the Greatest Doctor Who Stories of All Time.  He has done some good work.  However, that doesn't invalidate some unspeakable decisions Moffat has taken.

He's built up his "mistress" River Song to this Iconic figure when she has nothing to offer except 'spoilers'.

He's created stories that don't make any sense because of his fixation with said "mistress".

He's diminished the Doctor to almost a guest star on his own show.

He's become more focused on the secondary characters than on the main one.

He's decided that every story has to be connected even if they work better without there being a connection.

He puts in comedy where it doesn't work (whole episodes worth in some cases).

He alters long-established Doctor Who icons for a cheap joke (as when River pilots the TARDIS without the 'whooshing' sound because as she puts it, "you always leave the parking brake on.")

THIS irks me more than a lot of the bills of complaint.  The 'whooshing' is a long-established part of Doctor Who mythology.  It was created by the BBC Radiophonic Workshop deliberately.  Brian Hodgson described it as 'the sound of time itself tearing apart, going and coming at the same time'.  All incarnations of the Doctor, and even Time Lord Companion Romana (the only other person I know of who could pilot the TARDIS better than The Doctor) had that whooshing sound effect. 

However, Moffat decided it would be funny to show it wasn't needed and give a chance to show off just how clever River Song was.  He failed in both respects, and guess what?  That whooshing sound is STILL THERE!  If we go by Moffat's thinking, the Doctor STILL hasn't taken off the brake.  How stupid can he be (either the Doctor or Steven Moffat, take your pick)?

Steven Moffat focuses too much on HIS creations and not on the main character.

Steven Moffat goes to ridiculous lengths to jam his characters into idiotic situations... just how often HAS Rory Williams, Rory Pond...whatever you call him now...DIED? 

Steven Moffat insists on making everything part of the whole rather than individual parts, resulting in some embarrassing plot holes that would be laughed out of a basic writing course but which NuWhovians don't even bother to think out (River Song Regenerates!  River Song can remain a child for almost twenty years so as to grow up with her parents!).

Steven Moffat decided that the Doctor was now going to be a joke, someone to laugh at rather than admire or respect...the Doctor now lays down backing vocals and bursts into people's bedrooms, unaware of what married couples do there. 

I should note that so far in my reviews of Doctor Who stories 1963-present, out of the Bottom Ten, SIX are from the Matt Smith Era.  I'm sure there are some truly great shows coming, and that some of the ones I don't think highly of are loved by others.  Par for the course I grant you.  However, I will also say that so far not one Matt Smith Doctor Who story has earned a score higher than an 8.  That's still good, but when you think that the First, Second, Ninth and Tenth Doctors have all had 10/10 stories, one wonders whether creatively, on the cusp of Doctor Who's 50th Anniversary, the creativity is all gone.   

Now that Steven Moffat is in full charge of the show, all I can see is more comedy, more nonsensical storylines, and more of that DAMN RIVER!

Doctor Who's last original producer, John Nathan-Turner, once said in an interview that he feared going down in history as the man who killed Doctor Who.  Sadly, JNT died in 2002, three years before Doctor Who was resurrected.  I think the revival of Doctor Who would have served to give him some peace about how Doctor Who was left in shambles at the end of its original run (some things not his fault, some things most certainly his fault).  Yes, JNT can be blamed, rightly, for a lot of decisions that brought down the series, but he also was the only thing that kept it going until the very bitter end with Survival. 

If he had lived, he would have seen that he hadn't killed the series.  He would have seen it was Steven Moffat who was going to earn that title.

All I can think of when I think of Steven Moffat is that Linkin Park song, "We're building it up to break it back down/we're building it up to burn it down."  That might be Steven Moffat's Theme for his version of River Song (Formerly Known as Doctor Who).   

The Death of Doctor Who Episode Four

Before it all went to Hell...

Now we get closer to the source of the issue, the thing that is destroying a once-great program.  The refusal to acknowledge Doctor Who's epic history is a culprit, NuWhovians willing to play along and not ask questions are party to it, and the focus on secondary characters is yet one more nail in the coffin of a show that is getting closer to irrelevance. 

Now we turn our sad and tired eyes to the Number Two Thing Killing Doctor Who...

2.) Matt Smith as The Doctor

Alas, yes.  One Matthew Robert Smith.  Matt Smith is killing Doctor Who.  Now, you might think, this guy's really gone off the beam.  Why, Matt Smith is one of the BEST things about Doctor Who.  He's one of the most popular Doctors ever according to Entertainment Weekly (only his predecessor David Tennant and Fourth Doctor Tom Baker bested him).

 

My answer to that is that Matt Smith is popular among NuWhovians the same way Jar Jar Binks is popular with those who watched the second Star Wars trilogy before watching the Original Star Wars trilogy.  The older fans hate Jar Jar but the younger ones love him.  Similarly, the fans who know Doctor Who only from Ninth Doctor Christopher Eccleston onwards would love him, but I suspect those who have seen or remember the Doctors from 1963 through 1989 (and 1996) might take issue with how Smith is taking on the character.

 

I at first was a staunch defender of Smith, who at 27 was considered too young to play the part.  I was first impressed with him in Series/Season Five and thought he was keeping a strong balance between being serious and being funny.

 

Now I think I was suffering from a Who version of Stockholm Syndrome. 

 

As I watched Series/Season Six, and started seeing how the Doctor was getting lost in all the River Song mayhem, I started noticing that "the madman in the blue box" was becoming quite insane.  I remember with disgust his goofy wedding dance at the wedding of Amy and Rory Pond (might as well join the "Pond Brigade"), but hoping that perhaps this was just excessive exuberance.

 

Alas no, things kept getting worse.  Smith has become more frantic and frenetic in his interpretation of the Doctor, more manic, more crazy. 

 

 

I just rolled my eyes when I saw him emerge from the TARDIS in River's Secret Part 2 (Let's Kill Hitler), in that tux and top hat, asking, "Doctor?  Doctor Who?"  OH GOD WAS THAT AWFUL.  Of course, that really was just the tip of the iceberg.  Everything about his manic interpretation just smacked of farce.  One never got the sense that this man could marshal the forces of good against the Silence or why Amy and Rory or anyone really would follow him.

 

 

In fact, from what I see Matt Smith has decided to make his Doctor into a goofball, someone not to take seriously.  This isn't like Tom Baker offering jelly babies to villains.  This is someone who doesn't look heroic because he doesn't act heroic.  He acts like this is all done for laughs.

 

Take both times he was with -poly Craig Owens (The Lodger and Closing Time).  In each I can only imagine that the episodes were done as a joke, not tying into much of anything.  Certainly in the case of Closing Time,  you had bits that might have been funny in the 80s: the Doctor trying to convince Craig that he was 'in love' with him, the whole "we're not gay but everyone thinks we are" bits, the "I blew them up with love" method of solving the problem with the Cybermen...how I hated it all. 

 

I don't think that could have been endured well, but Smith's performance overall is a major part of the problem.  His take on The Doctor isn't as a man of action  or as someone who will come to a great/intelligent way out of the predicament.  Instead, Smith plays the Doctor now as a man unbalanced, someone who stumbles and bumbles his way into and out of predicaments.

 

So, in Series/Season Six, he knows he's going to die.  He opts for a farewell tour (and a visit to roly-poly Craig Owens), but he really doesn't solve his predicament.  Instead, he finds a convenient way out (one that I had predicted easily, so easily I thought it would HAVE to be another way because the way out was so obvious). 

 

I am beginning to despair about how Smith's take on the Doctor as a man more of mockery than a man of intelligence is affecting the show.  His habit of using his hands in a nervous manner, his rapid-fire delivery that seems more in place in a screwball comedy than a science-fiction series are all dooming Doctor Who. 

 

As much as I keep saying it, no one appears to listen: you can't take a hero seriously if HE doesn't take either himself or the situations seriously.  He behaves as though he doesn't understand what he's doing, as if he's completely divorced from reality.  Nothing captures this better than the mini-sodes Pond Life (again, since when was Rory's last name Pond?).

 

 

 

If I judge these little clips, the Doctor apparently doesn't realize one shouldn't break into a couple's bedroom in the middle of the night, has never seen a naked woman (frankly, if I had to see River Song nude, I might want to block that out too, but I digress) and dances around as he lays down 'backing vocals' on a rap song.  These are not the actions of a rational person.  I can't imagine any other Doctor behaving this odd (or Ood if you will).  These are all the actions of someone not grounded in reality, someone who poses a danger to himself if not to others. 

 

As much as Smith's 'gee I'm a kid mentally' routine is starting to wear thin, he really isn't all at fault.  He is an actor, and as such performs the parts as they are written and directed. 

 

How lovely that this should lead me to...

 

You'd trust the Universe to THIS kid?

     

The Death of Doctor Who Episode Three

Before it all went to Hell...

In our last episode, I had mentioned about how there is a particular character that I find rather odious. This character is someone who has done a great deal of damage to Doctor Who merely by her ubiquity on the show.  It seems almost that this particular character is the star of Doctor Who, not the Doctor himself. 

In short, this character has so overtaken the series that they ought to rename the show.

She's known for two insipid catchphrases that Reason 4 think are a sign of genius.  While she may not do this, I will now do what said character never does...

 

I'LL GIVE YOU SPOILERS.

The Third Thing Killing Doctor Who...

3.) River Song

I have never understood the cult that has been built around this slut.  Why she is so beloved by certain Whovians (even by The Nerdist Himself, Mr. Chris Hardwick), is a total mystery. 

Let's go over her history (as much as I can make out of it).

She is 'destined' to both marry AND kill The Doctor.  She is the daughter of the Doctor's Companions Amy and Rory (surname a subject of debate), who was conceived by the power of the Holy TARDIS (that WILL be important later on). Her birth name was Melody Pond (Melody=Song, Pond=River), despite her father's surname being Williams.  She is taken by The Silence as an infant to train her to be a master assassin with the Doctor as the only target (a Manchurian Alien?), but somehow doesn't actually do it despite her constant protests that she will kill 'the best man she's ever known' (which rules Daddy Rory out, since he's a milquetoast).

Well, somehow our little out-of-tune Melody as a little girl manages to regenerate in January, 1970.  She also manages to become childhood friends to Amy and Rory when Amy and Rory were kids who were born in the 1980s.  She manages to regenerate in front of her parents into the woman we all know and love/hate...while they recognize her as their grown daughter, she at first doesn't appear to recognize them (I think: River's Secret Parts 1 & 2--A Good Man Goes to War/Let's Kill Hitler is such a blank I can't recall). 

Despite her training to kill The Doctor she opts to save him, using all her remaining regenerations in order to do so.  She gets locked up for murdering The Doctor but gets out every so often to join him on some adventure.  In fact, River's been with him so long she knows how to operate the TARDIS better than HE does.  That whoosing sound?  Well, that happens because he always leaves the brakes on.

In that whole recap of the saga of River Song, did anyone notice something? 

Well, here's what I noticed: few things in it make sense!!!

Sorry Chris, I love you dearly as a Champion of Nerds everywhere (even if I can't qualify for full Nerd status because I don't play video games and never read comic books).  You seem like a witty and fun guy, but on your love for River Song, we must part company and I must show you the error of your ways.

Let's just start with the obvious.  IF the little girl who regenerated (and this is an important point here) in Day of the Moon Part 2 (Day of the Moon) IS indeed River Song, then how could she also be Mels from River's Secret Part 2 (Let's Kill Hitler)?  Day of the Moon makes clear the child's regeneration took place six months after the lunar landing (July 29, 1969).  That puts her regenerating in January or early February 1970. 

Amy and Rory were born in the late 1980s.  I put Amy's birth around 1989 (Karen Gillan, who plays Amy Pond, was born in 1987, so it's plausible) and Rory's around maybe 1985-87 (Arthur Darvill, who was born in 1982, should be a bit older as Rory).  In order therefore for Mels to be their childhood friend, she would have to pass as someone close to their age. 

HOWEVER, she had been around for almost TWENTY YEARS by the time she came around to go from the events of Day of the Moon Part 2 to those in River's Secret Part 2.  In other words, River Song by this time would have been old enough to be her own mother's mother! 

You can't explain any of this through some timey-wimey subterfuge (although you can..such as the Silence picked up River right after she regenerated, froze her for those twenty years, planted her among her future parents--having arranged to eventually get Amy and Rory together AND have them conceive her in the TARDIS, intergalactic matchmakers so to speak, and got her to become their troublesome friend). 

I don't know about you, but that all seems rather grandiose and elaborate for something as simple as a plot point. 

I just think the entire backstory is illogical to the point of being insulting to the audience, but Reason Num. 4 just goes along with it, not caring whether it makes sense or not.  They just think it's awesome, damn the logic, so we have to live with it.    

If that weren't the only thing that gets on my nerves about River Song, it's this whole 'regenerating' business that should send any sensible Who fan straight over the edge and have them scream for Moffat's head (metaphorically speaking).  Before the NuWho, only Time Lords themselves could regenerate (change their appearance when they come close to death).  Now it seems any Tom, Dick or River can regenerate so long as their parents did a little bump and grind aboard a TARDIS.

Am I the ONLY one who thinks this entire storyline 'tis an entire pile of shit?  Since WHEN did the TARDIS give powers for those conceived within it to regenerate?  THIS IS NONSENSE.  Again and again I've said that if the Doctor wants new Time Lords, all he has to do is turn the TARDIS into a whorehouse and pick up the children conceived within it and voila: a new Gallifrey.

The ONLY reason River Song has received this build up, this power to do something only Time Lords up till now could do is because like Pygmalion, Steven Moffat has fallen in love with his own creation.  He has become so obsessed with River Song that nothing will dissuade him of the idea that she is beloved by all Whovians, that we see her the same way he does: as this iconic Doctor Who figure that the show simply cannot do without. 

Hardwick, alas, appears as enamoured of River as Moffat, but at least the latter has the excuse that he created her.  I don't understand why Hardwick or any of his Nerdist crew doesn't bother to even raise some of the plot holes her storyline creates.

My biggest beef with River is above all else, that she becomes the central character in almost all the stories she is in.  She just can't be a supporting character.  NO...she has to be what the entire STORY revolves around.   Why do you think I named the two-part story A Good Man Goes to War/Let's Kill Hitler "River's Secret Parts 1 & 2"?  Because it was All About River: her Birth and Transfiguration.  I think I read somewhere that the entire Series/Season Six revolved around River Song: her identity, her creation, her mission, and her marriage (hence, The Wedding of River Song...note that it wasn't called The Doctor's Wedding or any variation thereof).  

Moffat wants us DESPERATELY to see River Song as this Icon, this Brilliant Creation, and Hardwick is happy to play along for reasons of his own (unfathomable to me).  Damn the critics, says they: SHE IS GENIUS.

The truth is she just sucks...and sucks everything out of any Doctor Who story she is rammed into.  The focus turns to her, not him.  I have long argued that River Song becomes the central character and the Doctor is a supporting character on his own show.  In fact, I now refer to the show as River Song given the prominence she is handed.  No Companion before River has been such a central part of the stories: not Susan (who was the Doctor's GRANDDAUGHTER for Heaven's sake), not Jamie, not Jo Grant, not Leela, not either Romana.  Not even Sarah Jane was allowed to be anything other than a supporting character.  It was always clear the Doctor was the star of Doctor Who. 

Today, that is highly in question.  Granted, there was a greater emphasis on Ace during the last season, but at least the Doctor was acting as her mentor/protector, not her lover.  With the NuWho, the emphasis has shifted more towards the Companions: it's Rose's story, it's Donna's family, it's Captain Jack Harkness' spin-off, and less and less on the Doctor himself. 

River merely represents the nadir of this Companion Complex (putting the focus on the Companion rather than the Doctor).  In almost all the stories she is in, River becomes the central character.  River in almost all her appearances (perhaps even Forest of the Dead Parts 1 & 2: Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead which I have yet to see for reasons too long to explain) is built up as this major part.  She is vital to the Doctor's timeline (so the story goes) and she is needed especially so in Series/Season Six.  Note the Doctor turned to HER for aid rather than the other way round.  How can one be the hero of a television show when said hero can't do something without some minor character?

Oh God, when will this woman go?

As it stands, Daddy Dearest isn't any better, and represents something just as insidious as River Song and the Companion Complex.  It's history repeating itself: just as Mickey Smith, Rose Tyler's boyfriend, was such a wimp for most of his time, so Rory Pond is, only more so.

How pathetic IS Rory?  He is so weak...HOW WEAK IS HE...he's so weak that he is stripped of his last name and he doesn't appear to object.  In the publicity for Season/Series Seven there was this constant talk of "the Ponds".  It was going to be farewell to "the Ponds".  River Song was really a child named Melody Pond.  The mini-sodes on the BBC website were called Pond Life.  There is only one problem...

His Name Is Rory WILLIAMS. 

I know that today married women don't have to take their husband's surnames.  My views on such matters is immaterial.  However, Rory (The Eternal Roman, the Man Who Waited) is perhaps the first time the husband has taken the wife's name...with the exception of Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, who at least COMBINED his and her surname before boffing news reporters on the side. 

I think Arthur Darvill doesn't care that he's thought of as "Rory Pond".  He gets his paycheck, that's all that matters.  I truly hadn't given it much thought until The God Complex where the Doctor refers to them as "the Ponds".  Mild eccentricity of the Doctor's, I thought.  Later on, I noticed more and more how often they were referred to as "the Ponds".  Even in the Pond Life stories Amy herself calls him "Mr. Pond" TO HIS FACE.

If I were married, I would not allow my wife to call me Mr. Whatever.  Maybe it's the Hispanic in me, but I find this insulting to him.  I disliked how Amy was so dismissive of Rory's protests that his daughter should be called Melody Williams, and even more so of how quick Rory was to just give in.

Despite all he's gone through for someone as ungrateful, selfish, and inconsiderate as Amy Pond is (having his name stripped, not having his daughter as part of his life, not having his daughter carry his name, having his wife pine over technically their son-in-law, waiting for her for thousands of years), Rory has never developed a backbone. 

And STILL, the stories on NuWho almost always revolve around the Companions and their family issues.  Rose's separation from her mother and weak boyfriend.  Donna's grandfather.  Now the domestic marital problems of "the Ponds". 

Now I know why they are divorcing.  I would have left Amy Williams a LONG TIME ago.

Even that I imagine could have been endured, but not the Number Two thing killing Doctor Who...       
  

Why yes, I DO enjoy
kissing Steven Moffat's ass. 
Why do you ask?

The Death of Doctor Who Episode Two

Before it all went to Hell...

On our last episode, we chronicled how the NuWho production crew appeared stubbornly determined to make people almost pretend that Doctor Who had no history apart from the one they wanted us to imagine.  That of course meant that all the focus was going to be on what came between 2005 and today, not between 1963 and 1989 with one moment in 1996.

This isn't to say that those of us who keep the Eye of Harmony burning bright can't appreciate the truly great work that came between An Unearthly Child and Survival (or see that some of the Classic Who stories are best left forgotten).   It also doesn't mean we can't see just how good some of the NuWho stories are.

However, as I kept watching the NuWho, I grew disillusioned with what I was watching.  I know that times change and that what worked in Who's heyday doesn't translate for today's shorter-attention span audiences.  Something like The War Games would have been a season/series long today, and even now, watching a story that can run around FOUR HOURS long can be a bit punishing.  

It isn't the program itself that I found harder to enjoy, it was the structure.  Ever since the revival of Doctor Who with Rose, I find that there is insane penchant for making the entire series/season one very long story arc rather than have an adventure followed by another with not much connecting them.  Now, I think that history should be recognized. 

In Who's early days, stories were connected: the cliffhanger or closing of one story led straightaway to the next story.  Certainly I think there was nothing wrong with this, and if NuWho followed this template then I would support it.  However, the main difference between Classic Who and NuWho is that the various seasons/series with perhaps two exceptions (The Key to Time and Trial of a Time Lord seasons), the various stories weren't connected to what happened before. 

For example, the ending of An Unearthly Child led to the beginning of The Daleks, whose end brought us to Inside the Spaceship and then on to Marco Polo.  None of these stories, however, were connected to each other like the NuWho seasons.  Series One had Bad Wolf, Series Five has The Crack in Time, Series Six had...well, to say more...SPOILERS.  On occasion you would revisit something from before (such as The Monster of Peladon being a sequel to The Curse of Peladon), but those are the exceptions.   Even when there were efforts to tie things together in one large overarching story, there was individuality within them.

The Key to Time series had six distinct stories where the only thing tying it all together was the search for the six segments to said Key to Time.  I digress to say that this led to another story arc, the Black Guardian Trilogy (Mawdryn Undead, Terminus, and Enlightenment), where new Companion Turlough was being brainwashed by the Black Guardian to kill the Doctor.

SORRY RIVER SWEETIE. HE GOT THERE FIRST.

Bet the NuWhovians have NO IDEA who HE is.    

And so, I present the Second Thing That's Killing Doctor Who.

4.) The NuWho Fans

This might be SHOCKING.  THE FANS ARE KILLING THE SHOW?!  C'est impossible!  Blasphemy you might say. However, allow me for a moment to make my case.

Note the picture from a Chicago Who convention.  Note those wearing the costumes.  See something?  Almost all of them without exception are echoing NuWho.  I see many Tenth Doctors, I see many Eleventh Doctors, I think I see some Captain Jacks, but I see only ONE who has a costume referencing the Classic series.  On the far bottom left, I see a long scarf that is from the Fourth Doctor's costume.

I bet at many Who or Comic-Con type conventions, you will see endless Amys and Roses and (horrors, Rivers), Ninth, Tenth, Eleventh Doctors, Captain Jacks.  You would also see people dressed as the Silence, the Weeping Angels, the really clever ones as Cybermen or Daleks or TARDISes/TARDI, but when was the last time you saw someone dressed as Jamie McCrimmon or Peri Brown or even Dr. Grace Holloway?  Seen any Sea Devils lately?

When was the last time a convention featured someone in Romana garb or Zoe's catsuit or Ace's jacket?  It's highly unlikely, because the fans themselves are just as incapable of exploring Doctor Who's past as the production team.  They know there was something called Doctor Who from the 60s, 70s, and 80s, but as far as they are concerned, that's a mysterious netherworld that 'can't be as good as something like Love & Monsters or Closing Time'. 

Why bother with Leela, they would say, when we've got River Song?

The stubborn, willful ignorance of NuWhovians is astounding.  In fairness to these people, who do have both Eight Doctor and Brigadier members, it should be pointed out they are British and thus more familiar with Who than Americans who think it started with Rose. 

I remember watching one of those BBC specials about Doctor Who.  It was probably about the fans or Doctor Who at Comic-Con.  They were asked to name a monster or villain they'd like to see the Doctor fight.  Among the answers were "dinosaurs" and "another Time Lord other than The Master".

It was obvious that these NuWho fans had never heard of Invasion of the Dinosaurs (self-explanatory) or The Time Meddler (the Time Lord known as the Meddling Monk) or either Mark of or Time and The Rani (with the villain in the title).  Of course, with Dinosaurs on a Spaceship, many NuWhovians will finally see the Doctor fight dinosaurs (or see it again, judging from one's perspective), and if the Wild West-themed A Town Called Mercy DOESN'T make reference to the First Doctor story The Gunfighters I may just quit watching Doctor Who altogether (granted, it was a terrible story, but that's not the point: the point is he's been to that setting before.  Pretending it never happened is insulting to long-time fans and a disservice to new fans).

If that weren't bad enough, NuWhovians REFUSE to question anything that Russell T Davies or Steven Moffat put out there.  They behave like Autons (which they SHOULD know, given they were the first monsters of the NuWho after Spearhead From Space and Terror of the Autons), thinking everything is perfect. 

The fact that River Song is a horrid creature whose storyline makes no sense?  No, she's a stroke of genius, with her "Spoilers" and "Hello Sweetie".

The fact that Rory is pathetic, so much so that he's been stripped of his last name?  No, it's all good.

How The Doctor at times becomes a supporting character on his own show?  Irrelevant. 

The fact that sometimes the overarching storyline is completely illogical?  NO, it's all good.

The fans, in particular the NuWhovians, don't question anything about Doctor Who: leaps of logic, rushed stories, even mocking iconic parts of the show that pre-date the fans (such as the whoosing sound the TARDIS makes being the point of a joke soon forgotten) are all gleamed over by the NuWho fans. 

This is my cri de coeur, my lonely fight against this onslaught of people who don't appear bothered by the fact that The Doctor at times was eclipsed by Captain Jack or River Song, who constantly rank NuWho Companions, stories, and monsters higher than what came before simply because they refuse to acknowledge or learn anything about the past.  I do have some allies (in particular the I Hate River Song Club on Facebook), but I feel I'm fighting a losing battle.  Those of us who have seen truly great episodes such as The Caves of Androzani, The Aztecs, The Tomb of the Cybermen, or The Talons of Weng-Chiang are in danger of being squeezed out by those who prefer The Lodger, The Curse of the Black Spot, or anything revolving around River Song.

Which leads me to Episode Three...

 

Love you guys, and welcome to the party, but seriously...there were a couple of Companions B.R.: Before Rose. 

Midway (1976): A Review (Review #435)

MIDWAY (1976)

Sunset Comes to the Empire of the Rising Sun...

Midway at first would appear to be just another war movie about the critical sea battle that turned the tide (no pun intended) toward an Allied victory in the Second World War.  However, there is an added element in Midway: a love story subplot.  Now, what's so special about that?  Don't many war films have stories about soldiers and sailors leaving their wives and sweethearts on the home front?  Well, yes.  However, Midway might be the first one to feature an interracial romance that addresses a still little-known and shameful part of American history. 

The romance angle of Midway is a love story between an Anglo pilot and a Japanese-American, with the added complication of her and her family being forced into an internment camp as a result of American paranoia over native-born citizens of Japanese ancestry or naturalized Americans of Japanese extraction being 'fifth columnists'.   The fact that the film acknowledges internment camps quickly elevates Midway about other rah-rah war films and tries to give voice to a low point in the treatment of citizens whose only crime was being the wrong ethnicity. 

The Japanese had devastated the American fleet at Pearl Harbor, and the Doolittle Raid (the fabled 30 Seconds Over Tokyo) was the response.  The Japanese fleet under Admiral Yamamoto (Toshiro Mifune) have opted for a plan to knock out the Americans: another surprise attack on Midway Island while misleading the Americans into thinking they will aim for the American West Coast.  What the Japanese don't know is that the Americans, thanks to Commander Joseph Rochefort (Hal Holbrook) have managed to break the Axis codes and now are fully aware of their plans.  Admiral Nimitz (Henry Fonda) decides to gamble his remaining aircraft carriers on his hunch that they are really heading to Midway and meet them there. 

If he's wrong, he will leave the entire Pacific coast (Alaska, Washington State, Oregon, and California) vulnerable to a Japanese invasion.  It's a tough decision, but he, along with Rear Admiral Raymond Spruance (Glenn Ford), with a little help/prodding from an incapacitated Admiral Bull Halsey (Robert Mitchum) decide to go with their instinct that the enemy is going to Midway.

Into the mix comes Captain Matt Garth (Charlton Heston).  He will be part of the planning of the Midway defense and oversee the pilots, one of whom is his son, Lieutenant Matt Garth (Edward Albert).  Tom asks his father for a favor: his girlfriend Haruko Sakura (Christina Kukubo), has been locked up along with her parents on suspicion that they (along with all other Japanese-Americans) will aid the enemy.  Tom begs his father to pull some strings to let her and her parents out.  Matt is first unhappy to be put in this position (telling Tom he and Haruko had 'lousy timing) but promises to see what he can do.

Captain Garth's plate is pretty full: he is helping plan the battle while the Japanese continue to sail towards Midway.  Out of the Japanese naval command, Yamamoto appears at first reluctant to act without full assurances that the Americans know nothing of the plan.  The Japanese are firm to the point of arrogance about the success of their plan.  Midway then shifts between Captain Garth's visit to the interment camp (where he sees the injustice of the camps) and the actual battle itself (some footage of which was culled from other films, including the Oscar-winning documentary The Battle of Midway).  The film ends with both Garths making sacrifices for the cause of freedom.

Midway is epic in its size and in its all-star cast (Heston, Fonda, Holbrook, Mitchum, Mifune, along with appearances by James Coburn, Robert Wagner and early appearances by future TV stars Erick Estrada and Tom Selleck). It takes its time going over the planning of the battle, and once we do get to the three-day battle the sequences (both filmed for Midway and from other films) are quite thrilling, giving that sense of immediacy and horror of the battle.  Granted, Midway is a long film but I rarely noticed that it dragged.  You can put it to the fact that I'm a history buff but I found that the film moved relatively well.

In regards to the love story, it is a hit-and-miss matter.  We don't really see Tim and Haruko together until the end and it almost seems to be an afterthought among the mayhem of war.  However, I think Midway deserves major props for even attempting to acknowledge interment camps and the complications of interracial romances.  Credit therefore should be given to screenwriter Donal S. Sanford for introducing this complication to Midway and drawing from actual history.  People today still aren't as fully aware of interment camps and the violation of the rights of Americans by their own government, so while Midway might still have not delved as deeply as it could have on the subject, just by raising the subject it takes a positive step forward.

I think the acting almost all around was strong.  Heston knows how to project authority, and seeing him work with Fonda (who specialized in strong characters who also had doubts) is a great treat.  I would argue that only Albert was particularly weak with his younger Garth, but he really wasn't given much to do.  One thing that is pleasing is seeing Toshiro Mifune make an English-language film (even if it clear that his voice was dubbed, in this case by Paul Frees).  It might have worked better for Jack Smight if he had directed them to just put subtitles and make it easier to have someone like Mifune speak in his native Japanese.

We also have an added bonus of having John Williams write the score.  He knows how to put music that enhances the scenes. 

Midway might not be the best film about this crucial battle, but on the whole the film moved well and took a bold step by bringing up a subject that is still a bit hush-hush.  Not a great film but an entertaining one.

DECISION: B+

The Death of Doctor Who Episode One

 

Before it all went to Hell...

In a little while, I will be watching Asylum of the Daleks, the first episode in Series/Season Seven of Doctor Who, or should I say, the revived or NuWho as opposed to the Classic Series which ran from 1963 to 1989 with a 1996 television movie that is part of the canon. 

I am a Whovian, have been for a long time.  In fact, to misquote Barbara Mandrell, I was Whovian before Whovian was cool.  I endured the taunts of the Trekkies who dismissed my show as cheaply-made and with rubber monsters.  Now, however, I find that I was on the vanguard, keeping the light burning before Doctor Who was revived in 2005.  Doctor Who today is all the rage, especially among Americans, who find something great in the adventures of the Gallifreyan Time Lord and his Companions/Assitants (being old-school, I will always refer to the characters who travel with The Doctor as Companions and see no reason to change).

However, as time has gone by I find that Doctor Who is no longer the show I once loved and admired.  In fact, it has become a shadow of itself.  Granted, not all of the original show's stories were good (some, like The Web Planet or Timelash, are simply awful) and some of the NuWho stories are brilliant (The Unquiet Dead, Dalek).  I'm not about to throw the baby out with the bathwater. 

However, the last season had some truly appalling episodes and some ghastly decisions that in terms of story just don't make any sense.  In terms of programming, there comes a time when any show either runs the danger of 'jumping the shark' (when a series so runs out of steam creatively that it goes into embarassing stunts to try to stay fresh) or has actually encountered this phenomena. 

Doctor Who has reached such a point, and now I will make my case as to why I have grown so disillusioned with Doctor Who.

5.)  Ignorance of History  

The entire arc of Series/Season Six revolved around...well, we'll get back to one thing that it revolved around that is something else that is killing Doctor Who, but for now let me focus on a big, fat part of Who's problems (and no, that isn't a James Corden joke).  Part of the larger story was about the Doctor facing his own upcoming 'death'.  As part of that, he does a 'farewell tour', visiting people from his past.  As part of said 'farewell tour', he goes to roly-poly Craig Owens, a character we saw in The Lodger and who now makes a return appearance in Closing Time.

I thought The Lodger was a pretty bad episode, but Closing Time was one of if not the worst of the entire run of Doctor Who (classic and NuWho combined).  Still, what troubles me most about NuWho is that for a show that is coming up on its 50th Anniversary, there is a stubborn refusal to acknowledge that anything came before Rose.   THIS, I think (as well as a special fondness for Corden) was the reason roly-poly Craig was brought back for another appearance in a story that was even worse than the first.

Allow me some thoughts.  Let's say that all this is real and this character, the Doctor, really is making some sort of farewell tour to visit all his old companions and friends before dying.  Here is a list of people he could have picked: Ian Chesterton or Jamie McCrimmon or Jo Grant or Tegan Jovanka or Peri Brown or Ace or the piece de resistance, Susan Foreman. 

These people who were not only involved with Doctor Who's original run but are still extremely popular with classic Who fans (some of them are ranked among the Greatest Companions ever) I imagine would welcome having a chance to make a guest appearance on Doctor Who.  Imagine the possibilities: this impossibly young-looking man reuniting one last time with his very first Companion Ian or his granddaughter Susan, a touching nod to the original series from the New Series. 
What Magnificent Stories Those Would Make!

Alas, it won't happen, because NuWhovians would say, "Who are THESE old people?"  "The Doctor had a GRANDDAUGHTER?" "I thought Amy was the Doctor's first Scottish Companion." The Doctor had AUSTRALIAN and AMERICAN Companions?"  "You mean apart from Sarah Jane, the Doctor had Companions before Rose Tyler?"

I am convinced of this.  No show ignores its own history and insists on referring to only things that came after the revival, not before.  THIS is why roly-poly Craig Owens was selected rather than ANY of the above.  Now granted, Sarah Jane did have Jo Grant as a guest star on her spin-off The Sarah Jane Adventures, but apart from her has the NuWho ever touched on the Doctor's long history, or is it thoroughly obsessed with its own six-year span?

We see this in all the BBC Specials promoting Doctor Who.  In The Women of Doctor Who, we had an endless parade of people talk about how great all the broads on the show were.  There was talk of Amy and Rose or Martha and even River Song.  The Nerdist Himself, Chris Hardwick, someone who I imagine knows as much about Doctor Who than any American sans moi, and his crew waxed poetic over these women (like Donna).  However, with the exception of Sarah Jane Smith, there was no mention of any other female Companions pre-2005.  Sarah Jane only got mentioned because she was on the NuWho and thus, is familiar to the NuWhovians. 

As a result, there's no room for Ace or Romana I or II simply because they are not as familiar to NuWhovians as they are to those of us who know both Classic and Revived.

There just is something totally screwed up when you can give a profile to Lady Cassandra from The End of the World and New Earth but can't be bothered to mention someone like Leela of the Sevateem.   As far as NuWho is concerned, none of that ever happened.

Same goes for The Monsters of Doctor Who.  You had the Daleks and Cybermen and Sontarans and Silurians, but you also lavished attention on The Silence and the Weeping Angels.  Apart from the Weeping Angels I don't think many new monsters will be among the greatest.   So there are no Sea Devils, no Black Guardian, no Meddling Monk, no Rani. 

This might explain why NuWho fans think River Song is so brilliant, why roly-poly Craig Owens is so brilliant, why they are the Ponds rather than the Williamses.

Either that, or they are stupid.

In short, despite the wealth of history Doctor Who has, there is a concerted effort to downplay or ignore all that has happened before.  Why this is I don't know.  There is among NuWhovians this vague idea of there being something before, but I suspect most of them don't know or don't care.

Now that leads us to The Death of Doctor Who Episode Two.   



SERIOUSLY?  You prefer River Song over HER?