Doctor Who season 15

 The second, and already last, season of the Doctor under the Disney umbrella (hoozah), starring Ncuti Gatwa as the doctor.

 

And while a short season numbering 8 episodes, let's go and watch this classic franchise! 

 

It kicks of after the christmas special from 2024, Joy to the World, when a nurse, Belinda Chandra, is kidnapped from her home by robots and brought back to a planet carrying her name.  Here they have enslaved the human population, as it turns out it is ruled by her ex-boyfriend who got there due to a fracture in time.  The Doctor saves her, but the TARDIS is unable to land on her moment of departure in 2025, so they have to take a detour.  They land in Miami in 1952, investigating the disappearance of 15 people in a cinema, who where taken by the God of Light.  

 

After overcoming Lux, they arrive on a planet in the far future, investigating a mining colony that went silent due to a monster hiding in the shadows of people.  The Doctor realises this is the planet formerly known as Midnight, and he encountered the entity before, but the strange thing is nobody ever heard of a planet called Earth.  We then meet up with Ruby again, who has a new boyfriend, Conrad.  However, he is out to expose the Doctor and aliens and all as fraudulent news, but after Conrad is put in prison Mrs Flood appears again and sets him free.

 

They travel to Lagos to boost the signal of their device to get back to Belinda's time, as well as going to the intergalactic Song contest, but they learn in the end that Earth ended on the day Belinda was taken.  Mrs Flood, somehow also present at the songfestival, bi-generates, revealing her to be none other then the Rani.  She sets out to start her plan of destroying Earth and creating an alternate future, all to bring back the Timelords and Gallifrey by releasing Omega, it's founder.  The Doctor manages to restore reality by triggering his regeneration deliberatly, but at the cost that he will regenerate, and now looking as his former companion Rose Tyler...

 

But how that pans out, we will have to wait a while, as the whole BBC / Disney deal unravelled and it will take about 2 years apparently before a new season will be released... luckily, time is a timey-wimey ball... 

Doctor Who season 14

 And here we are, the first season starring the new, 15th, Doctor, Ncuti Gatwa.

 

Airing in 2024, the series counts 8 episodes, and we are off for the adventures of the newest Doctor and his fresh companion, Ruby Sunday!

 

Their adventures start off by going to a space station, where they find a crew of talking babies, genetically enhanced who where ordered to be abandoned when the colony project was cancelled.  Later on, they meet one of the Toymaker's fellow godlike being, the Maestro, after a student in 1925 summoned her.  When the Doctor and Ruby arrive to see the Beatles, they notice music is not bringing joy to anyone anymore, and in the current day this has led to Earth being a barren wasteland.  The Maestro is defeated due to a christmas carol embedded in the essence of Ruby, but she warns the Doctor of "One Who waits".

 

When landing on the wartorn planet of Kastarion 3.where they encounter the warmongering company Villengard.  They move on to Wales, where they accidentally break a fairy circle, causing the Doctor to disappear and Ruby being followed at exactly 73 yards by a strange lady, who turns out to be her elderly self going through time to warn them from breaking the circle.

 

One thing this series does, is seriously criticise the smarthphone dependant generation, and this is especially clear in the episode where aliens eat teenagers so addicted to a smart "bubble" they can't even walk anymore without the device's directions.  After encountering a group of shapeshifters in 1813 England, they dive into the Legend of Ruby Sunday, as the Doctor is trying to help out finding who is the mysterious lady seen the evening he brought baby Ruby to the church, and pointed directly at him.

 

Thinking it was her mother, the TARDIS suddenly behaves strangely.  It turns out his old enemy Sutekh has been atatched inside the TARDIS all those years, awaiting his time.  Now that he manifests, he sets out to destroy all life in the universe, sparing the Doctor and Ruby as he also can't deduct the identity of the mysterious lady.  The Doctor overcomes him, and Ruby's mom is found... a completely average 35 year old who had to abandon her child due to teenage pregnancy.  Ruby is reunited with her, and the Doctor leaves her behind, telling her to enjoy her new found luck, and that he will be back one day...

 

And as such the first season ends, with the Companion already seemingly leaving the Doctor for a happy ending.  Not the best of seasons, it weighs a bit weak against the Tennant / Smith / Capaldi era, with not really a menancing overarcing story this season in my opinion...

 

 

Doctor Who: Joy to the World

 Following the first season of the 15th Doctor's adventures, there is of course the christmas special tradition.

 

And the special this time was called Joy to the World. 

The Doctor arrives at the Time Hotel, a place that has rooms to all area's in history, where he enlists the aid of Trev, one of the hotel employees.  He is investigating a man with a briefcase that is handcuffed to his hand.  But when a new person is tricked in taking the case from them, the previous carrier disintegrates, when Trev's Silurian manager arrives in the room of Joy Almondo in 2024 London, the Doctor following him.

 

With Joy now being the new carrier, the Doctor opens the case and finds a strange device inside.  He prevents Joy being disintegrated with the help of his future self, and the future Doctor takes Joy along.  The current Doctor takes a job at the hotel, working there for a year and befriending Anita, the hotel manager.  When he arrives at the point of his future self before, he takes Joy along to a point 65 million years in the past.  Opening the case they learn the contents are actually a star seed, a bomb that creates a new sun, created by the Villengard weapons company from the past season.

 

A T-rex eats the case, but he is contacted by Trev, who now had 65 million years time for his conscience that has been connected to the device, to figure out a way of contacting the Doctor.  That way they manage to find the case again, but as the Doctor wants to take the case outside Joy merges with the star seed.  She assures him the device has overcome the Villengard's programming, and that she will become a new star in the sky, becoming the Star of Bethlehem but not before advising the Doctor to find a friend to battle his inert loneliness.

 

A typical christmas episode, it connects to the previous season of the franchise, while laying the seeds for things to come in the upcoming one.  It's worth the watch, and best to do so to connect some dots...

Doctor Who: The Church on Ruby Road

The 2023 Christmas Special of Doctor Who, this is also the very first adventure of the 15th Doctor, portrayed by Ncuti Gatwa.

 

Normally the Doctor tends to regenerate at the end of a series, but in this case the 13th Doctor ended the previous season, and the 15th began the new.  And the 14th?  For that you need to have a look at the 60th Anniversary specials!

 

This christmas special, featuring the first real outing of the 15th Doctor, focusses on him meeting his new companion, Ruby Sunday, an orphan who lives with her adoptive mother Carla and grandmother Cherry.  She was abandoned at the church on Ruby Road, hence where her name came from, and is looking to find her birth parents to no avail.  A new baby arrives at her fostermom's, Lulubelle, but is kidnapped by goblins.

 

Ruby chases them over the roof, with the Doctor also in pursuit and meeting her as such as they board the goblin airship.  When the baby is about to be offered to the Goblin King, who feeds on babies and causes back luck on those around, but after saving them a crack appears in the ceiling of Ruby's house causing a change in her foster mom's personality and no-one recollecting Ruby.  The Doctor realises the goblins must have gone back in time to kill baby Ruby, and saves her in the past, impaling the Goblin King in doing so.

 

He brings baby Ruby to a church on Ruby Road, to ensure the parson finds her, and setting the timeline right again.  Together with Ruby, they step into the TARDIS of to new adventures.

 

So a fun intro to the new characters, with a very catchy Goblin jazzband singing about their plans for babies, it was definitly a great fun special.

 

Doctor Who: the 60th anniversary specials

 The specials of the 60th anniversary certainly had a twist, as it was not Jodie Whittaker that stepped out of the Tardis, but none other then David Tennant himself, the 10th Doctor, as she regenerated back into him at the end of her final season.

 

Yet, he comes out stating "why this face", so what is going on in this three part specials series, each running for about an hour?

 

Compromising of three episodes titled The Star Beast, Wild Blue Yonder and The Giggle, with not only David Tennant returning, but also Catherine Tate as Donna and Russel T. Davies as the show's writer!

 

Following his regeneration, the 14th Doctor lands in London where he comes across Donna Noble, her mind erased from ever meeting him all the way back in the episodeJourney's End from 2008.  He also meets her teenage daughter Rose and husband Shawn Temple.  When a spaceship crashes, he goes to the site and meets with UNIT and thier scientist Shirley Anne Bingham, and the Doctor believes the events of his reincarnation in this form and meeting Donna are connected in a way.  

 

Rose finds an escape pod near their home, meeting a furry cute creature called The Meep, hiding it but Donna discovers it.  The Doctor arrives and they learn of The Meep that it is being hunted by bug-like Wrarth Warriors.  When possessed UNIT soldiers and the Wrarth start fighting, the Doctor notices the aliens not using lethal force, and confronts them with the Meep.  This reveals the true nature of the furry beast, killing the Wrarth and being the one controlling the soldiers.  As the Meep threatens to destroy London, the Doctor is forced to reawaken Donna's memories, as with Rose's birth she had passed on a part of the meta-crisis energy into her.  More Wrarth arrive, taking the Meep into custody, and Donna goes on a last trip with the Doctor, though by spilling coffee on the TARDIS console causes it to malfunction, landing in Isaac's Newton garden accidentally causing an event he would name "gravity".

 

The TARDIS flies off to a spaceship on the edge of the universe, and vanishes while the Doctor and Donna explore the corridors.  They find an old robot slowly walking through the main corridor, as the rest of the ship periodically reconfigures itself.  They encounter dopplegangers of themselves, who lacking the concept of size and shape call themselves the Not-Things.  

 

The Doctor and Donna realize these slowly take their thoughts and forms to become copies, making it hard to tell each other apart, and the Doctor tries superstition with a line of salt to keep them back.  He realises the ship's captain killed himself to prevent these beings copying him and taking control of the ship, and set in motion a trap, a low speed self destruct with the robot being the trigger.  Just as the vessel would be destroyed, the TARDIS reappears, allowing them to escape, though the Doctor regrets the fact he invoked superstition at the edge of the universe.  They meet with Donna's grandfather just as a riot starts and a plane crashes near Candem Garden.

 

The Doctor and Donna are taken the UNIT headquarters, as the world's population has become violent.  He is reunited with Shirley, head of UNIT Kate Lethbridge-Stewart and his former (Sixth and Seventh) companion Melanie Bush.  The Doctor determines the cause is the recording of a giggle from the doll Stooky Bill back in 1925 and embedded in every television signal ever since.  Travelling back to that era, they learn it is the Toymaker that sold the doll, and he traps the two in his domain.  He plays humanity for a never-ending game of debate in which everyone thinks they are absolutely correct in their beliefs.  The Doctor and the Toymaker play a game of cards, the latter winning but the Doctor stating they are now tied due to him winning their last encounter.  

Returning to the present day, the Toymaker resolves to have one final game with him, attacking UNIT before taking control of the galvanic cannon, mortally injuring the Doctor, triggering his regeneration.  However, the Doctor splits in two incarnations due to the mythical "bi-generation", and as such introducing the 15th Doctor to the audience as well, Ncuti Gatwa.

 

Both Doctors work together, beating the Toymaker in a game of catch and banishing him from existence.  Aboard the TARDIS, the 15th Doctor advises his predecessor that he needs to recover from the extensive trauma's he has been through, and that he looks like the 10th die to being emotionally exhausted and subconsciously recognised the need.  She invites him to instead stay with her family instead of travelling constantly, the 15th creating a second TARDIS as his reward for beating the Toymaker, the 14th settling down while the 15th continues to travel the universe...

 

And so the series of specials made for the 60th anniversary ended, great stuff and truly an adventure through time and space, while reconnecting with the 60s as well.  This bridges the gap between the relaunch all the way back with Christopher Eccleston and the generation of Doctor Who viewers before that, which ended with Paul McGrath.

 

Really worth the watch!

 

 

 

 

 

Doctor Who Flux (season 13)

 Time for some more Time Lord adventures, and the final season of Jodie Whittaker as the Doctor.

 

 

Numbering only 6 episodes though, it will be followed by a series of specials, more of which when I get to them of course!

 

But first, let's dive into this season, which for the first time since the 80s is one long story instead of episodic in nature, and the title screen is labelled as such as Flux, the overarching title of the season.

 

The Doctor and Yaz meet Dan Lewis, a tradesman from Liverpool who for some reason is being chased by the Lupari Karvanista.  But the Doctor is suffering from visions of the mysterious Swarm, a galaxy devouring force that claims to share a connection to her.  They also meet Claire, a woman from their future, who is tossed back to 1965 by a Weeping Angel.

 

Karvanista tells them his race are actually trying to save humanity from the Flux, a force that is destroying the universe and has Earth on it's path, and in the chaos the Sontarans decide to stage a new invasion on Earth as the Tardis is swept away in the Flux with the Doctor and her companions.  They wake up in an altered past, where the Sontarans have become the dominant species on Earth, but as they manage to destroy the Sontaran shipyard, the timeline resets.

 

 

The Swarm is about to kill Yaz and a man called Vinder, as the Doctor jumps into the Temple, the last remnant of Time, and learns of an incarnation of herself, the Fugitive Doctor, who she can't remember ever having been.  She learns this incarnation is part of The Division, a Time-lord black ops operation erased from memory, in her past.  The Doctor returns to the present, fixing the timestreams, before a Weeping Angel brings the Tardis to 1967.  Here they meet Jericho, a professor investigating the paranormal.

 

Weeping Angels besiege his house, but the Doctor discovers one of them is actually hiding inside Yaz and is the target of the attack, as they want to retrieve it.  The Doctor is captured instead, the others being send back to the village in 1901, as it has been disconnected from time to serve as a sort of prison.  The Doctor is brought before Tecteun, who is her adoptive mother that found her all those years ago on Gallifrey, and the founder of The Division, which also orchestrated the Flux in order to kill the Doctor, for interfering with their plans. 

 

 

Tecteun is disintegrated though when the Swarm arrives, and the Doctor is split into three copies due to a time distortion.  Together with her friends, she goes around fixing the timestream in all her incarnations, as she deposits her lost memories deep inside the Tardis...

 

A great overarching story, that revisits a lot of the Doctor's old enemies, as well as giving us some more knowledge of the "Child of Time" that she is.   Being also the last series of this incarnation, we are now gearing towards a series of specials, that will wrap up this tenure and bring forth the next, 14th, Doctor, so time to binge some more classic british sci-fi!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Doctor Who special: Revolution of the Daleks

 Set between seasons 12 and 13, this special features Jodie Whittaker as The Doctor, and follows directly on the season 12 finale.

Which does make it a sort of required viewing between those two...

 

Becuase it begins with the Doctor still in the Judoon prison, while back on Earth a reconnaisance Dalek shell is intercepted by Jack Robertson to fund a defence drone program.  Graham, Ryan and Yaz confront him about it, but they are revoked as it is for a government contract to make the UK safe again.

 

One of his scientists, Leo, discovers organic cells in the remains of the Dalek, and clones it into a creature which escapes and takes control of him.  In the meantime, the Doctor is sprung from jail by Jack Harkness and rejoins her companions, being away far longer then she thought she had been.  The Dalek's reveal their plan to take over Earth, causing the Doctor to send a signal and lead a Death Squad of Dalek's to Earth, who are only looking to make the Dalek race free of impurities.  They destroy the cloned models, but as Robertson tries to make a deal, he reveals the Doctor is on Earth as well.

 

 

The Dalek's give chase to her, but she manages to trick them using the Master's old Tardis, and sending them into the Void.  Once calm has returned though, Ryan and Graham say their goodbye's to the Doctor, having found their purpose and go off to pursue their new life goals.

 

And so we are ready for season 13 when the Doctor returns, and up to date with the changes that this has brought along compared to the season 12 finale!

Doctor Who season 12

 It's the second season of Jodie Whittaker as the Doctor, and this has been one hell of a rollercoaster ride season for sure!

Though, the downside is that it lacked some "lighter" episodes that are often around in seasons of Doctor Who, the 10 epsiodes brimmed with dark and gloomy arcs this time.

Because we get to see Jack Harkness return, but aslo the Cybermen, a strange unknown incarnation of The Doctor and the secret of the Timeless Child.  But it all starts when the Doctor is summoned to MI6, after secret agents from various agencies have been put in a coma that is rewriting their DNA.  Their only lead is Daniel Barton, the CEO of a multimedia company, as they seek out Agent O who has been monitoring extraterrestial life.  It turns out that the cullprits are an alien race called the Kasaavin, but that Agent O is in charge of it all, being none other then a returned and regenerated Master.  

Captured in the aliens dimension, the Doctor meets Ada Lovelace, and they both go back to 1834.  Through circumstances though, they end up in Paris during world war II, where the Doctor meets with the Master who tells her Gallifrey has been destroyed.  The Master is exposed to the Kasaavin, and they take him away as the Doctor goes to see the destroyed Gallifrey for herself, and learns from a recording by the Master that their lives are based on lies.

On an uninhabital world, the Doctor and her companions come into contact with Dregs, who are out to kill all the inhabitants of a spa located there.  Even though a few people are rescued by the Doctor, this was an episode that had serious "Alien" influences, and perhaps the grimmest of the series.  They next need to ward of an alien invasion with the help of Thomas Edison and Nicola Tesla, as later the Judoon arrive looking for a fugitive.  Her companions are snagged away to a spaceship, piloted by Captain Jack, who sends them back to the Doctor with the warning from the future.  As Ruth, the target of the Judoon, regains her memories, she and the Doctor unbury the Tardis near a light house, as Ruth is seemingly a reincarnation of the Doctor, but neither can remember the other, and the mystery of the two Doctors remains unexplained.

With an ecological crisis averted next, they are faced by a nightmare inducing alien that claims to be an ancient god, and who tricks them into freeing his companion.  But they manage to turn the tables on them, as they go to 1816 afterwards meeting Mary Shelly.  

 

 

There the words of Captain Jack come into being, as a lone cyberman called Ashad is looking for the Cyberium, containing all the knowledge of the destroyed empire of the Cybermen.  Arriving at the last outpost in the future of humanity, they must face and stop the reawakening Cybermen empire, and they learn of a portal carrying people to safety.  Opening it, it brings them to Gallifrey, where the Master reappears and imprisons her in the Matrix of Knowledge.  It reveals to her that she is actually an orphaned child from another dimension, and through genome extraction her finder created the race of Time-Lords.  The Master absorbs the Cyberium as Ashad and the Cybermen arrive, and converts dead Time Lords into special Cybermen, the CyberMasters.  Ruth reappears, helping the Doctor escape the Matrix, and together with the last rebellion soldier from the Cybermen war the Master is stopped.  But as they return to Earth, Judoon appear, putting a personality crisis suffering Doctor away in a prison far in space...

And so the season ends, and it was one with a lot of twists and turns for sure.  Now seperated from her companions and in prison, the Doctor not only has to figure out a way to get back, but also to figure out who or what she actually is.

Guess we get to see some answers to those in the upcoming Christmas Special then!

Doctor Who series 11

Well, by the "new count" at least since the series was restarted...

And the first series with the female doctor, Jodie Whittaker, who does a good job though for me she isn't a Tennant...

Compromising 10 episodes (and a new year special, which I only recently saw and hence this rather half year after date view on the series), the series is marked by some VERY strong episodes.  While the "chnge of the guard" on the series, with a new producer, lead Doctor and all has been having quite and impact, there are true jewels in this year.

And for me, without a doubt, Rosa was the episode that stood out by a mile.  How her companion Graham is forced in a position that will define history was heartbreaking.  but also The Demons of Punjab was a very strong episode, where they couldn't be allowed to interfere because it would cause a change of the timeline for one of them personally had a really tearjerking ending. They reminded me of my alltime favorite episode of the new series, the episode featuring Van Gogh of a few years ago...

Of course, like any season, these strong episodes where offset by weaker ones, but in general the series had a high level of quality, and the team of companions (like the 5th Doctor, she has a group instead of a single companion joining her on her travels) isn't to bad at all.
Not really one stands out yet like Rose or Clara, but the synergy is there at least, now they just need to be developped as the series stands on Jodie's energy and charm.  This gives the 55th year of Doctorin' still a good vibe, but in my opinion they really have to step up with the sidekicks themselves a bit... and that for me can make the next series a make or break deal.

But all in all, the series continues strong and the 13th Doctor does a great job following the impressive Capaldi footsteps...

Doctor Who season 10

The final season of show writer Moffat and of Capaldi as a most excellent Doctor ended this weekend, and contrary to speculation, he hasn`t regenerated yet.

Though it has begun already, and we know he won`t be able to stop it in the end with the Christmas Special.

But for me, Capaldi was a fantastic Doctor, even though the young whovians, high on the tenures of a Tennant or a Smith, think he was to old.  Peter Capaldi can deliver speeches I don`t see the younger ones succeed in, due to his age and "regality".  The one in the Zygon episodes, the one just this saturday with Missy and The Master... this is an actor with experience.

The season was a really good one, some say even the best of the Capaldi era, and we did indeed get some fantastic episodes.  For me the best, personally, was Knock Knock, which featured David Suchet (I grew up on his Hercule Poirot portrayal) and had that Gothic Horror feel to it, together with a strong duo of "episode leads".

The season saw some strong linked episodes, both with the monk invasion on the Earth, and the two part finale resulting in how the actual Cybermen where created.  This ties Capaldi to the first doctor (remember, ever incarnation has one of the pre-reset doctors they mirrored themselves to, for Tennant this was clearly Davison for example, the 5th, based on the actors own childhood "doctor") and the christmas special seems to be going to take place at the moment the first Doctor will regenerate - watch The Tenth Planet for getting the reference of the closing moments of the finale.

It was a highly enjoyable ride, and Clara was replaced firmly this season with the companion duo of Bill Potts who brought the awe in the role, and Nardole, who brought the comic relief and tech wizz. 

Now to look forward on who will become the newest Doctor!

Doctor Who: The Secret Life of Monsters - Justin Richards

While the cover features Peter Capaldi, this book details a lot of "staple" monsters from the Doctor Who franchise that appeared up and to the Matt Smith years.

It`s a reference book, that details both onscreen details as behind the scenes information on some of the most iconic aliens that appeared on the show during it's long run, starting all the way with the first Doctor's Dalek`s and Cybermen.

This takes us along the beasts that debuted during the "in colour middle ages" like the Silurians and the Ice Warriors, and so to the modern day monsters like the Ood or the Weeping Angels.

Making use for the "in story" details of UNIT files, newsclippings and witness stories, we get to learn some background about the races.  The Behind the Scenes mostly detail how the costumes where made, and how many (especially in the early years) the actors had at times to get into the suits and actually see something.

It was an enjoyable read for sure, and I liked the behind parts the most, as those are things you don`t find often.

Doctor Who Christmas Special: The Return of Doctor Mysterio

It has become a time-honoured tradition that our favorite Time Lord graces the screen on Christmas Day in a television special.

Somethimes it hints at new companions, sometimes he gets a one time one (like Kylie Minogue in the Tennant era), but it is always a good fun and christmas story combination.

And this year, we find ourselves in New York, and the culture of comics and secret identities.  The Doctor meets an 8 year old named Grant, and the kid accidentally swallows a gemstone.  This imbues him with the power that he wished for, being in his case the power palette of Superman himself.

When Harmony Shoals, a secret cover for a brain-like alien species, is starting to secretly invade Earth, the Doctor, his new companion Nardole (cut free from Hydroflax and great performance by Matt Lucas) and a reporter named Lucy investigate.  But it is the interference of a masked hero named The Ghost that turns the tables.

This is none other then the now 24 years older Grant, the kid the Doctor met years ago.  He is in love with Lucy, and is her Nanny.  He becomes a primary target for the Harmony Shoals, but as the Doctor unravels the plan of the aliens, including dropping a derelict spaceship on New York to stage an alien invasion, Grant reveals his identity.

All ends well of course, as this is a Christmas special, but we learn also from the trailer for the spring 2017 series that not only will the Doctor get a new companion, but Nardole remains on the team as well in what is said to become Capaldi's final season.  For producer / writer Steven Moffat this was the wave off, and it was a nice and exiting episode to end his cycle with!

Rating: 6.5 / 10

Doctor Who: Festival of Death - Jonathan Morris

A novel adventure for the Fourth doctor, this book was reprinted as part of the 50th anniversary of the franchise.

While it contains many elements that became "common" in the restarted series, back then the time-hopping and multiple time versions of one self was rather new in the story of the Doctor.

Plot

The Beautiful Death. The ultimate theme-park ride. For twenty galactic credits, you can find out what it's like to be dead.
But something has gone wrong. Visitors expecting a sightseeing tour of the afterlife have been transformed into mindless zombies, set on a killing rampage.
The TARDIS arrives in the aftermath of the disaster and, to the Doctor's baffled delight, he is immediately congratulated for saving the population from certain and terrible destruction.
The only problem is, he hasn't actually done it yet.
Aided and abetted by a drug-addled hippie lizard, a hard-hitting investigative reporter and a suicidal ship's computer, the Doctor has no choice but to travel back in time and discover exactly how he became a hero.
And then he finds out. He did it by sacrificing his life.

Opinion

The book is actually a nice rollercoaster ride, as time and time it gives the impression you`ll be jumping to the "correct time" to break the cycle, only to get yet another layer put over the whole storyline.  In total you have about 4 main Doctor timelines, of which two seem to converge every time, leading to close calls and as such putting in motion yet another one, but that turns out to be what was supposed to happen anyways.
While that sounds more complex then it is, think of the Matt Smith season that ended with the complete resetting of the universe, and how everything through the season hinted at that moment in the end.

Rating: 6 / 10

The Haul Report # 27 - What a week!

What a week indeed, as it was filled with great hauls and some very, very rare items.

Of course, there was the May the 4th VIP event, which I already posted about this morning and you can read about here, but that was by far not everything I found this week.

The week started with the delivery of a store display I found, those tubes you have in stores and are normally not for sale.  But sometimes, they do pop up and then it`s just a matter of being at the right place at the right time, and so I got this City Police display in my hands.

I also visited my local Lego store earlier this week, to shop for some PAB parts, and the little thingies left or right.  This also left me with a Mr Freeze polybag, so far this year this is turning out to be one of the most sought after in fact, so that is great for a future exchange.

I also did some trading with the kid earlier this week, exchanging some of my Star Wars figures he is now after for some of his Lord of the Rings figures, and a Pirates of the Carribean redcoat.

A local toy store chain is now running an action that when you buy any sort of Star Wars set, you get a free polybag of the TIE Advanced with it.  So I picked up two microfighters earlier this week, each granting me an additional polybag.  I also managed to get a Dimensions Chima character at last, so now each and every game world is open to me.

BrickLink wise, I got a small order in for a voucher that was about to expire, and I grabbed a Gringott`s Kobold, for something you`ll see in about two months time on the exactly why I needed that little fella ;-)

These two Silver Mine Shootouts from the Lone Ranger range have been standing at discount on the shelf of a local toystore for ages now.  So I pulled on my brave boots, went in and said I "wanted to liberate them of the sets, what can you do for me?"  Well, let`s say they where very glad to move them at last, and the discount they already had was about doubled.

Talking finding old retired sets at discounts, these also came into my possession when I came by a small time store who quit doing Lego years ago.  Some nice things amongst these if you ask me, especially the Friends set is a high value roller!

Another Dimensions purchase this week was when I was out strolling with my mum, looking for sets for a mate (to no success) but I finally completed my Dimensions Lord of the Rings sets, who just hadn`t been purchased before for no evident reason.

The final Lego haul was yesterday evening, when I managed to obtain these polybags with that mate in a trade for a Hulkbuster set and some loose figures.

Oh, and I found this dvd on the very cheap as well, to have something to watch while sorting out my loose bricks the coming week...

So yes, this has been quite a spectacular hauling week for me, now to get trading around and build out more of my Tolkien material :-)