links for 2009-04-15

 by Martin Belam, 15 April 2009
  • "I remain convinced that just one steward or police officer directing fans to the side entrances, away from the central pens, could have saved many lives that day. Every day since, I have wondered if I could, and should, have done more."
  • "A system built to oppress and not to protect. A callous disregard for life. Lie upon lie about the events with complicit friends in the media. Sounds rather familiar, doesn't it? The only difference is the number who died, but whether it is one death or 96, it is indefensible."
  • "The cover photograph from February 1940 shows Luftwaffe chief Goering cuddling baby daughter Edda in a warped version of the kind of 'tough but sensitive man' images often seen today". As opposed to the warped kind of newspaper that just six years previously in 1934 had mixed news with fascism, in editorials like "Hurrah for the blackshirts". I bet you couldn't make up which staunchly British newspaper was congratulating Hitler on invading the Czech lands and urging him on to Romania...
  • 200+ comments, most of which say "Rubbish - plot-light, played for laughs, not proper sci-fi, driven by the ego of the lead actor", and then try to hark back to a classic Doctor Who era when....erm....well, you get the picture. I still think that if you can't see that Doctor Who was always an enjoyable romp which 7-12 year olds took seriously, and that adults suspended disbelief to enjoy, then your are not a "fan". You are just stuck getting stroppy because it isn't as good as you remember watching Tom Baker when you were a kid.

And apologies to those of you who were repeatedly spammed with this set of links via RSS or email - Delicious went bonkers today.

1 Comment

Exactly. There seems to have been a general sense of humour bypass in regards to Planet of the Dead, even more so than The Next Doctor.

My particular bugbear is the repeated comment that the characters on the bus were underwritten and lacked depth. RTD & GR only had an hour.

They're just there to offer some jeopardy and they were a down sight more developed and sympathetic than the cannon fodder in the average Hollywood film, and if we're being unfair, many Doctor Who stories of the past.

You don't bother fleshing them out because they're not that important to the story. And I thought people were developing a better knowledge about the language of television, but sometimes it really seems not.

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