Netflix!

[eve11]

I got a Blu-ray player and a netflix subscription for Christmas, which is fab. Last night, I watched the Curse of Fenric, as I realize Seven is the only Doctor I've not watched any episodes for (although I've listened to all the audios), and Fenric was the only Seventh Doc episode that was on instant download:



Wow, that was a bit crazy, wasn't it? After watching it, I'm pretty sure of two things:

1) There was a cool story in there somewhere
and
2) It would have scared the pants off me as a child

The murderous Haemavores, the storms, the rampant killing of characters they did try to get us to know, the surrounded-by-zombies claustrophobia, the leaving of soldiers to die... all added up to something that I would actually think twice about showing to anyone under the age of eight, to tell you the truth. There were some seriously adult themes in this one, culminating with Ace's love/hate relationship with her mom, and a very symbolic diving scene at the end.

At the same time, for at least the first 40 minutes of this episode I was shaking my head going... "Wait, what? What? Where? What the hell is going on?" Also did I miss a past episode where the Doctor trapped this Fenric thing with a puzzle, or was all of that done off-screen? Was there a past episode (that I missed) that dealt with Ace's relationship with her mom?

Really, can you imagine the writer's meeting for this one? "Okay guys, we have an hour and a half to tell a story. Let's make sure we incorporate all of the following:"

- Vikings
- Vampires
- Nazis
- Mentally unhinged commanders
- Code-breaking Computers
- Russian spies
- Killer fish aliens
- Oriental Treasure
- Poison gas
- a Firing Squad
- Vicars with a crisis of faith
- Creepy Swimming Holes with Bad Reputations
- Ancient evil bodysnatchers
- Scientists with a tumultuous past
- Secret Laboratories
- Babies

And I'm sure I've missed a few.

Also let's make sure we fully develop and grow the character arcs for:
- *the Russian Captain
- the Widowed War Bride
- *the Crippled Scientist
- *the Crazy Commander
- *the Vicar
- *the Killer Fish Alien
- *the Two Girls from London
- the Bolshevik and the English Soldier
- Ace

(*) We will also kill them off

We will also have a few other characters strewn around (like the old lady and the nurse) to further the character arcs of these guys. So, now we're off to tell a coherent story!

Right. So I think they might have bitten off a little bit more than they could chew with this one. Some things worked well, I think. But because there was so much going on, I don't think they had enough time to develop anything to the point where it made sense in the bigger picture. Why did the Russians let the Doctor and Ace go? Why did the Doctor not warn the Brits about the Russians (and thus let all those soldiers get killed)? What was up with the undersea welding clamshell things? How did the Doctor get from the poison hangar bay to the fish monster to tell it about fenric? What was that bit about the Russian dude also being a viking? Why did the fish monster kill the rest of the haemavores?

There were a lot of mini character stories floating around that seemed in one sense tacked on: the vicar, the war bride, the Russian commander's friend, the professor being humiliated at the hands of his nurse, the backstory between the professor and the commander. On the other hand, they certainly made it more impactful when each of those characters (aside from the war bride) met with an unsavory end. I must say, the Haemavores were genuinely scary, when they were not complete and utter camp (thinking about the girls luring that Russian into the water, lol). I loved the zombie-apocalypse feel that they had, and the shot of all of them rising up and coming out of the water was totally creepifying, as was their inexorable thinning of the human characters.

I would have liked to have seen more about the Doctor and Ace; I particularly liked the part where she challenged him about never telling her what really was going on, and how she kept undermining the Doctor's plans without knowing (explaining the logic diagram to the professor, giving up the solution to the puzzle at the end). But on the other hand, why try to cram so many stories into just that one story? It seems like the conceit was that all the pieces should have slotted into place at the end, but for me it still seemed like a bit of a jumble. Partly I think this was due to direction and editing, but part of it was just due to the fact that they threw the catchall drawer and the kitchen sink into this one.

Comments

[astrogirl2.livejournal.com]

Ah, welcome to the 7th Doctor era! Frequently brilliant, frequently WTFish, and very often both at the same time. Fenric is one of he highlights, really. There is, indeed a lot of stuff going on in that ep, which means that rewards thought and re-watching. Even if, yes, it is also a little bit of a mess. (It's the nonsensical solution to the chess problem that always trips me up a bit. Thematically, it's beautiful, but it in no way relates to anything I though I understood about the game of chess.)

To answer your question, there was no earlier episode with Fenric, no. (I heartily recommend the novelization of the episode, by the way, which was written by the same person who wrote the script and, unlike most of them, actually expands the story instead of just transcribing it. That does tell the story of the Doctor and Fenric's earlier encounter, as I recall.)

As for Ace's antagonism towards her mother, that was previously established, although it was not the focus of an episode before this one. I really do see Ace, by the way, as in many ways the prototype for new series companions. She, not Rose, was the first to feel to me as if she were as much the focus as the Doctor. Man, I love Ace, and Ace's interplay with the Doctor, so much.

[eve11]

All of my knowledge of Ace and Seven currently comes from the audios, which are really wonderful. What's amazing is that Sophie Aldred sounds nearly exactly the same in the audios as she did in the series! It's uncanny! I mean, you listen to the eps with Five, Peri, Nyssa, or Tegan, and they just sound older (even Seven to some extent), but not Ace. Actually she really holds her own against Seven in the audios even more so than what I saw in Fenric, because I think she's portrayed as more of an adult than a child. Still has the tough destructive streak, but there is less of the Doctor telling her what to do, if that makes sense.

Anyway, yeah, this one might bear some re-watching but I got it via streaming, so it's actually not that straightforward to re-watch it piecemeal without getting the discs. I might take your advice and get my hands on the novelization.

[astrogirl2.livejournal.com]

I suspect it's out of print, but you probably shouldn't have too much trouble hunting down a copy, anyway.

[thisbluespirit]

Curse of Fenric! I did watch this when I was 11 or so, and it went down in family legend as the Scary One.

But redstarrobot has said pretty much what needs to be said. There are few DWs without holes here and there, but Fenric is marvellous, one of the very best of Seven's run - and it does make sense and is well worth rewatching. Or watching an episode a week, so that it breaks your heart when the vicar is killed. (Did I say I watched this when I was 12?)

My favourite is Ghostlight, which is the one everyone says doesn't make sense, but I don't see that. But then I adore pretty much all Seven's run, especially the ones that you need to watch and rewatch, because that's so how I like my telly to be and I have spent the rest of my life searching for something as good and scary and weird and layered as Seven era DW, and there are very, very few things out there that come close.

Seven is my Doctor. Can you tell? :-) Perhaps if you found Fenric a bit much, then something like Remembrance, or even Dragonfire would be a better starting place? (Remembrance is a good newbie ep). Battlefield has a more traditional feel to it, and much to love, although it isn't quite as good as the rest of S26. But it has Bambera, Ancelyn, Morgaine, and the Brigadier, which makes up for everything. Fenric is much better watched after a couple other eps to see how the relationship between Seven and Ace is taken to breaking point in both Ghostlight and Fenric.

But what do I know? I'm a hopeless case, who thinks Silver Nemesis is good fun...

Nice presents though - have fun!

[thisbluespirit]

Sorry. I posted my comment in a thread by accident...

[eve11]

no problem :) I did like the episode, it was just not quite what I was expecting. I think it told a good story in spite of the direction and editing and stuff. I am quite good at seeing what is intended and not what is wrought. Hell, I liked Time Flight if that tells you anything ;) Soap bubbles and all! :D

[thisbluespirit]

Heh, cool. And, I thought ep 1 of Time-Flight was great, and the rest was rather amusing; some nice Tegan stuff. (Loved the commentary and Peter Davison's claim that he had just reached the point of hysteria by this point in the season... And Janet promising to find something good to say about it.)

Seeing what is intended is rather a vital watching-DW skill!

But, yeah, Seven is my childhood Doctor so I am totally biased towards him.

[redstarrobot.livejournal.com]

You've about covered it! Gosh, I love Seven and Ace. And I adore the density of Fenric (and of Ghost Light); full of great characters and character commentary, virtually no throw-away lines, very rich storytelling.

(It's the nonsensical solution to the chess problem that always trips me up a bit. Thematically, it's beautiful, but it in no way relates to anything I though I understood about the game of chess.)

That's why it's the solution; if it made sense in the context of chess rather than in the context of life, Fenric would have solved it. It's because it breaks the rules of chess to make a point about life that it's the Doctor's solution. :)

Anyhows, questions:

Why did the Doctor not warn the Brits about the Russians (and thus let all those soldiers get killed)?

It wouldn't have mattered if he had warned the Brits; they wanted their code stolen, to plant disinformation after the war when they were up against Stalin instead of his allies, and didn't want the Russians to know it was a plant. IIRC, the Brits were expecting the Russians.

What was that bit about the Russian dude also being a viking?

Everyone was; Ace, the base commander, the scientist, the Russian dude... they were all descendants of the people cursed by Fenric, arriving in the right place to free him.

Why did the fish monster kill the rest of the haemavores?

Because the Doctor convinced him that he was helping to create the doomed world that he came from, and that he could undo his own doomed future from ever happening if he turned against Fenric.

[eve11]

I follow you except for the fish monster killing the haemavores: I thought that possessed-professor-judson told the fish monster to kill them...?

[redstarrobot.livejournal.com]

Oh, you're probably right. I haven't seen it in about ten years, didn't remember quite how they went down. It was about picking the moment to turn on possessed!Judson; that moment was after his reinforcements were disposed of, rather than while he still had a vampire army at his command. Plus they really didn't belong in that world anyway, and he was into self-sacrificial doing-the-right thing in a big way at that point in the story. Dude was committing suicide to undo an entire future, getting rid of some of the less ethical pieces of collateral damage early wasn't going to make much of a difference, except to his ability to get Judson alone.

[thisbluespirit]

Okay, excuse me butting in, but you have a Cally in a Christmas hat icon, and you have all the right opinions on Seven era Who, so I had to insert some admiration for your good taste here. :-)

[redstarrobot.livejournal.com]

Oh, feel free to butt in; so few people publicly acknowledge the inherent awesomeness of a Cally Christmas icon. Also, the correct opinions about Seven are rare, so allow me to return your sentiments. :)

[thisbluespirit]

Yes, the right opinions on Seven are sadly very rare! :-(

Cally in a Christmas hat is self-evidently awesome. I expect she was trying to honour Earth customs, and the rest of the crew had no idea what it was about. Except for Vila having some garbled versino, of course. In fact, given some of their more random outfits, they would probably fail to notice anything odd...

[auntiemeesh.livejournal.com]

Those sound like good Christmas gifts. One of these days I'm going to get back to watching old Who. I think I've pretty much finished up Five, so it's on to Six for me.

[singeaddams.livejournal.com]

Many people appreciate the spoiler cut even if the ep is nearly 30 years old! There's so much Classic Who to wade through...whew!

a very symbolic diving scene at the end

I'm intrigued.

[leaper182.livejournal.com]

I will admit that the Seventh Doctor was my second absolute favorite. I vaguely remember two scenes from the Horns of Nimon that we ended up watching at 2am on PBS when I was a kid, so I can't say that Seven is my first Doctor. As for Seven being my second absolute favorite, Two won me over quite a bit, so he and Seven are vying for the top spot.

My Doctor Who fannishness aside, I freely admit that Seven's storylines were full of, "HUH?" I mean, if you look at "The Happiness Patrol" (which is apparently an allegory for the Thatcher years?), it looked as though someone took a hit of marijuana, snorted a few lines of cocaine, and then sat down in front of a typewriter or a word processor or whatever and thought, "This is the coolest shit EVER."

Ace's relationship with her mother doesn't really get fleshed out, mores the pity. "Curse of the Fenric" was filmed second, but was supposed to be aired before "Ghost Light", which takes place in a house that Ace had burned down to the ground 100 years in the future. "Ghost Light" is full of WTFery, and we never get to see Ace burn it down. Just the rampant WTFery.

There was a lot that was thrown into this story that never really gets explained, but I did like Seven being his chessmaster self with Fenric, and then the scene where he breaks Ace's spirit. It's quite epic, really.

If the two of them had been given more stories that (A) made sense, and (B) were actually kind of cool ("Battlefield" really felt like a return to what Doctor Who used to be like, to me), I think the show could've kept going, but we know about DW's thorny history, so let's skip those details. Raar.

Either way, Seven and Ace are really quite awesome, and while I haven't had a chance to get to know them in the BF audio series outside of one or two stories, they really are one of my favorite teams. I just wish their storylines weren't so full of crack on the show. Blah.

(It'd be interesting to see Eleven bump into a very old Seven and Ace, but at the same time, Moffatt doesn't seem inclined to do that kind of thing, mores the pity.)

(Granted, I totally want Eleven to swing by 1700s Scotland/America/wherever, pick up Jamie McCrimmon and take him around the galaxy again. I miss Jamie like burning.)

[eve11]

LOL at your icon :D

You might enjoy the continuing adventures of Six and Jamie in the trilogy that starts with City of Spires. I liked it a lot :)

[leaper182.livejournal.com]

I totally listened to that. It was very cool, but at the same time... the ending! Whyyyy? Nooooo.

I think what was worse was that when I was listening to the CD extras, it was all, "We really didn't know what to do with Jamie, because the way he acts on the show isn't realistic," and I was sitting there going, "Dear sweet Jesus, people, he's JAMES ROBERT MCCRIMMON. A COMPANION WITH A MIDDLE NAME. COME ON."

So. Yeah. Frazer was rather awesome at Dragon*Con.

[redstarrobot.livejournal.com]

The reason we don't see Ace burn down the house is because it's a story about change, but particularly about Ace changing and growing up - nearly the whole season is about different aspects of Ace growing up from the teenager she is when she meets the Doctor to the adult she is at the end. (Three of the four S26 episodes revolve around Ace's past and are basically the Doctor throwing her into various rites of passage.) The point of Ghost Light, from a character development perspective, is that Ace isn't that scared, angry kid any more, she's becoming an adult who understands herself and the world better than she did.

[leaper182.livejournal.com]

What I really would have loved to have seen was the Cartmel Masterplan. Apparently, Ace was actually going to be enrolled at Prydon Academy on Gallifrey to become a Time Lady.

And Seven was going to end up regenerating due to mental strain, because of some extreme chess-type deal.

But yes! You make very good points about Ace and how S26 was really about her growing up. :D

[redstarrobot.livejournal.com]

They reused a chunk of the Cartmel Masterplan for a few New Adventures novelizations - there were a bunch of throwaway comments in S25 particularly about the Doctor knowing people he shouldn't have known on Gallifrey, and having some secret past that he didn't want revealed (and also the crazy Gallifreyan stuff he shouldn't have had access to when he did), which were designed to retrofit this more mysterious, slightly mythic past. One of the script-writers did a couple of novels where they wrote that bit up. (They also sort of tried to do the Ace bit as best they could, being somewhat hampered by the alternate stuff the novels had already done with her by that point. Overall, though, not that satisfying how they handled Ace in the end, in the NA novels.)

[leaper182.livejournal.com]

I remember hearing about the novelizations, and also hearing about what they did to Seven and Ace, and even I could find any of them to read, I don't think I'd want to? I don't want Seven and Ace to break up that way. :(

[redstarrobot.livejournal.com]

Some people feel that way, for sure. I'm cool with Who as a multitude of possible canons, and don't feel too tied to the reality of it. It was Who with a very mid-to-late-90s sensibility, they basically did that to kick up the gritty action!grrrl quota, which at the time was a bit more fashionable for its own sake. (I personally think it came off as trying a bit too hard, but I see why they were doing it.) And they don't quite break up; it's more sort of on-again-off-again (after a few good old-fashioned 7/Ace adventures). And then they try and end it with a nod towards the Masterplan, where Ace does kind of take up a little Doctorish apprenticeship thing.

[leaper182.livejournal.com]

I dunno, I guess I'm more tied to the TV canon, and what the people had intended for the series and that kind of deal. Just hearing about Seven and Ace having troubles in the novels made me frown a bit. Granted, if you were looking at their relationship realistically, there would come a point where Ace would get tired of the manipulations and such -- Curse of the Fenric really could be seen as a beginning for that kind of behavior, especially if Seven went unchecked. The trouble is, I would've wanted Ace to act as a check for that, because she's one of the few companions that likes saving the universe and getting into trouble.

[clocketpatch]

I'm squeeing at your icon just a little bit. Do you know if it's up for grabs or not?

[leaper182.livejournal.com]

It's one of my favorites, but I end up not using it because I don't want people to get the wrong idea when I post a comment with it? Ack. This is me, not explaining myself well.

If you'd like to use it, just use the credit I used in my LJ icons (http://www.livejournal.com/allpics.bml?user=leaper182)? (I didn't create it, so I'm guessing the creator would appreciate it. :D)

ETA: Your icon is quite, quite awesome. I see that explosion, and I keep thinking about how Sylvester McCoy was all, "Okay, we have one shot to get this right. I won't screw it up." And my God, he pulls it off with style. <3

[clocketpatch]

Style is the word. There's a reason that scene gets spliced into every Seven fanvid ever. It is teh epic. (I love the icon caption that goes with it so much. I found it on dwicons, so it's up for grabs with credit if you want it)

I ended up nabbing the Seven icon your using above too; it's just very pretty. And several of the hamsters. I try to ask first so I don't accidentally yoink a graphic that was specially made for someone's birthday or is of a beloved family pet or something. :S

[leaper182.livejournal.com]

Hamsters! I like hamsters. The only icons that I'm a tad leery about other people having are the "I'm a badass hamster" one and the "OMG!" one, because friends ended up making those for me. But the other hamsters were mostly found around the internet, so feel free to take-with-credit kind of deal. :D

The Greatest Show in the Galaxy was filled with pure WTFery, but that explosion was totally awesome. Seven has more important things on his mind than your WTFery and piddly explosions. <3

[redstarrobot.livejournal.com]

I, too, admire your icon. Gosh, I love Seven. He went from clowning to serious-and-scary-and-cool-and-sad so fast. (Which I think was totally unexpected. They hired a goofy comedian, and he turned out to be amazing at serious.) And Sylv and Sophie doing their own (increasingly explosive) stunts so gleefully is sort of adorable.

[penwiper337.livejournal.com]

Yes, the Seventh Doctor era is... interesting. They had all these grand sweeping ideas that ran into zero budget, cramped timeslots, and were filtered through 80s design sensibilites, so it's a miracle that they're watchable at all. "Ghost Light", for instance, makes "Curse of Fenric" look like a Dick and Jane story in terms of making sense. That said, I really do enjoy a lot of Seventh Doctor stories, and I would highly recommend both "Remembrance of the Daleks" and "Battlefield".

[jjpor.livejournal.com]

One of my favourites! XD I love it quite a bit, not as much as Remembrance of the Daleks or Happiness Patrol or Survival, but it's up there, somewhere... I totally agree about there being a hell of a lot happening - I think it rewards rewatches, as do quite a few of the Seven stories, which is arguably a failure on the part of the writing. It's positively transparent compared to Ghost Light mind you! ;D

Another thing I strongly agree with is that there should be more Seven n Aceiness - there should ALWAYS be more Seven n Aceiness! ;D

I think Remembrance might be a good one to watch, though, if you want to get into Seven. It's ace, as Ace would say, with Daleks and fake-UNIT and stuff, and possibly clearer on a first view than some of the ones that came after.

People say Season 24's bad - I agree it is subpar compared to S25 and S26, but it has its moments.

I am, however, an enormously biased Seven fanboy, so take anything I say on the subject with a healthy pinch of salt! :)

[redstarrobot.livejournal.com]

Man, I love Ghost Light, too. Right up there with Fenric. Ghost Light was just a fantastic thematic exploration on the nature of change. That, I think, is part of what makes the pacing hugely different on a lot of Seven stories, particularly the later ones; they're not straight action stories, but very allegorical and doing a great deal through implication and allusion, so they read very differently from other seasons of Who. It's fantastic storytelling, some of the best I've seen on a TV show - but what I love about it is that it's super-dense and keeps you on your toes about actively interpreting what you're watching, with a huge amount of thematic and character development. So I don't personally think it's a failure for it to reward rewatches; I think it means they're doing it right. :) (S25/S26 is, in many ways, the Sandman or Watchmen of Doctor Who, and I think, from interviews, those were actually conscious influences on how they were changing the storytelling from a straight time-travelling SF show to a much more experimentally mythic, allegorical, meta-aware/pop-culture-aware/politically-aware show.)

I would also recommend Remembrance as the gateway drug of Seven; it's sort of an homage to Who, being the anniversary episode, so it's a bit nostalgic in content and structure, and, as the first real Seven/Ace story, it's a much gentler sort of intro to the type of storytelling they ended up doing. Much as I love Ghost Light, it probably does deserve some warning labels, because it does contain a fairly high level of insanity. :)

[eve11]

OMG you're a boy??? ;) j/k I knew that.

I am definitely going to track down more of these via DVD. Possibly even in the right order. I am now intrigued by Ghost Light... or maybe I'm just a glutton for punishment.

[redstarrobot.livejournal.com]

I would recommend going in order if possible; it's not strictly necessary, because they're not strongly story-arced, but it does work better that way, because they are revealing some character stuff throughout.

Ghost Light is fantastic, but it definitely makes Fenric look straightforward. (Partly because the version that was aired was about 25%+ shorter than they'd planned, so it moves damn fast; partly because it's sort of an elaborately woven-together story anyway. Fenric is really a very classic British WWII drama at its core, despite all the vampires and added genre nonsense, but Ghost Light is one-of-a-kind.)

[londonkds.livejournal.com]

Glad you're getting into Seven. I don't know which version of the story is being streamed but I suspect it was the original broadcast version - the expanded version on the DVDs adds some deleted material and reshuffles some scenes that were already in the broadcast version, and I think it's a lot more coherent.

[eve11]

I think it's the DVD version actually. It's whatever was released on DVD by the BBC.

Love your icon! :D

[clocketpatch]

SEVEN AND ACE! SEVEN AND ACE!!!

I love those crazy kids to bits (and their audios are damn excellent too. Gotta love Hex).

To possibly make you less (or more) confused some explanation:

Fenric ties back to Ace's first episode Dragonfire. Basically, Ace got caught in a time storm in her bedroom and got transplanted to an alien planet in the future where she met the Doctor etc. etc. He said he'd take her home, she got very put out, he winked and said he'd take the long way.

Then in Fenric it's explained that Fenric was the one orchestrating the time storm so that the Doctor and Ace would meet so that she would, uh, do something to make the Doctor lose his cosmic chess game.

Oh, and the baby is Ace's mother. xD

...there is coherency in there somewhere, I swear, though it's masked by an awful lot of WTF, as is most of the best Who. Seven and Ace are what make it worth watching though. Like Ten and Donna, they just come together to make everything better.

If you're looking for more Seven, my favourites are Remembrance of the Daleks (Ace is bad ass! It's really scary! Seven is also bad ass! The butler from Fresh Prince of Bel-Air randomly shows up to have a philosophic discussion with Seven!) and Survival (It has the Master! It also has people in really dorky cat suits!)

:D

Sorry for the ramble rant. Seven and Ace made me do it with their awesome.

[redstarrobot.livejournal.com]

If you're looking for more Seven, my favourites are Remembrance of the Daleks (Ace is bad ass! It's really scary! Seven is also bad ass! The butler from Fresh Prince of Bel-Air randomly shows up to have a philosophic discussion with Seven!)

Oh god, now I want to see Remembrance again. The degree of bad-assery is pretty high. It's a pretty rare Doctor/companion relationship, he's totally cool with his 16-year-old companion being a violent badass for justice (and maybe enables her a bit... maybe more than a bit).

(That was my second episode of Who ever. What an introduction to both a new Doctor and a new show.)

[ladymercury-10.livejournal.com]

Haha, you have identified characters I didn't even realize were in the story, there were so many people in this thing. Also, I never figured out why the Russians were actually there in the first place, let alone why the Doctor didn't warn the British that they were. :P

[eve11]

I still can't get over the fact that this post is almost 2 years old.

redstarrobot answers the question about the Brits and the code above:


It wouldn't have mattered if he had warned the Brits; they wanted their code stolen, to plant disinformation after the war when they were up against Stalin instead of his allies, and didn't want the Russians to know it was a plant. IIRC, the Brits were expecting the Russians.


Which means she was following a lot more closely than I was. ;D

[ladymercury-10.livejournal.com]

Oh, okay. So the Russians wanted to steal the Ultima machine, and the Brits wanted them to steal it. I remember the part where they wanted them to steal it because they put the poison grenade inside it, but I didn't connect that to the Russians being there to steal it in the first place. :P