Losing Who--Book 3 in the Loving Who series now available!

Losing Who
http://www.devinedestinies.com/losing-who/
(Book Three in the Loving Who series)

Cici Connors is losing her mind—or is she? She has vague memories of living another life where she time traveled and explored the universe accompanied by an alien with psychic abilities, but these memories can't be real, can they? Losing her job doesn't make her life any easier, so Cici decides it's time to grow up and give up Doctor Who fandom once and for all.

Alien time traveler John Smith had to leave Cici on Earth for the sake of clearing up Earth's muddy timeline. Now he vows to return to his adopted world--and return Cici's memories as well. But nothing is ever easy or simple where John is concerned. With the aid of his alien partners-in-crime, Captain Mac and Babbling Brook, John devises a clever plan to gain Cici's attention. Will hiring Cici to run John's sci-fi convention attract another invasion of Earth by artificially intelligent life forms? 

Excerpt--Cici and John Smith meet again, but she doesn't recognize him...

Cici blinked twice and took a long, shaky breath. Out of nowhere a rescuer had rushed to her side and helped her to her feet. The gentleman stood tall and thin with bright blue-gray eyes and a distinguished touch of silver in his graying blond hair. If she wasn’t mistaken, he had the most charming Scots accent. She gazed up into his questioning face and felt a connection. Had they met somewhere before? Odd, but she somehow thought they had. For the life of her, she couldn’t remember where or when.

“Y-yes, I’m fine,” she sputtered. “Just a bit breathless. Thank you.”

He nodded. “You’re welcome.”

She took a step forward and felt a sharp stab of pain in her right ankle. “Ow!”

“You’re injured. Here.” He took her hand and placed it on his forearm. “Lean on me.”

“You're so very kind.” 

“Really?” His silver eyebrows arched, and his eyes widened. “There’s a first time for everything.”

Cici did her best not to grimace as they hobbled together toward one of the few benches located along the trail. Her rescuer helped her to sit and then knelt in front of her foot to check for damage.

“You’re not a doctor, are you?” she asked, trying to make light conversation as the stranger gently manipulated her injured ankle.

“A doctor?” He smiled. “Funny you should say that, but some people do think I resemble one. Does this hurt?” He pressed along the side of her arch.

“Ow!” She winced. “Not too much. After the shock wears off in a few minutes I’ll probably be fine.”

“That’s a good sign when you can handle shock well. How about this?” He pushed her foot upward, her toes pointing toward her body. 

Cici bit her lip hard to hold back a scream. She saw stars and almost passed out from the pain. “Yep. It hurts. Lots.”

“I thought it might. It’s more than likely a sprain, but you might want to get it x-rayed to check for broken bones.”

“I can’t afford the x-ray, so we’ll go with the sprain, shall we?” Her new companion didn’t seem to get her dark sense of humor. His eyes bulged in his long face as he considered her reaction. “What’s wrong? Have I grown a horn in the middle of my forehead, or am I turning a particularly sickening shade of green?”

He smiled. He got it. “More pale than green, and the horn quite suits you. I like horns.”

“That’s good. I wouldn’t want to scare you off so easily.” Did I say that out loud? Get a grip! Flirting when you’re unemployed isn’t a good thing. You can’t afford new clothes and make-up to keep him interested.

“Don’t worry. I don’t scare easily.” Her savior stood and looked at her, thoughtfully rubbing the lapels of his navy jacket. “We just passed an access parking lot, but unfortunately I don’t have a car to take you home in to recuperate. What could we use to get you home without causing further pain?”

“Too bad we don’t have a little red wagon or a rickshaw handy,” she suggested.

“That’s a good idea. Very good indeed.” He spun on his heels and disappeared into thin air as quickly as he had appeared originally.

Cici blinked twice. Her tall and handsome Scotsman, in a rather dashing red-lined navy blue suit with a buttoned-up white shirt, had simply vanished. Just my luck. She waved at where he’d once stood. “Uh, thanks again for your help.”

What to do now? She took several deep breaths and tried to prepare herself for the hobble home up the trail. Perhaps she could find a tree branch strong enough to hold her wait while she limped? Unfortunately for her, it appeared the county parks’ groundskeepers had recently been in the area to mow and pick up fallen branches along the trail. Her luck this week had gone from bad to worse to dismal. Go figure.

“There’s nothing for it. Cowboy up, Connors.” With a groan of determination, Cici rose to her feet. “Ye-ow! Right foot, left foot, right foot, left foot…”

She had barely made it a yard before the distinguished Scotsman reappeared behind her.

“Hold it right there,” he commanded. “We’ve got to fit you into this contraption.”

Cici stared until she thought her eyes would pop out of her head. Was it really a rickshaw? “W-where on Earth did you get that?”

He frowned and scratched his head. “On Earth? Well, you could say a friend in China owed me a favor, so he let me borrow it.”

“A friend from China, you mean?”

“Yes, of course. That’s what I meant. From China. It is, in fact, an antique Chinese rickshaw.” He lay the cross piece down and stepped over it to help her. “All aboard.”

 

Losing Who is now available from Devine Destinies Books, Amazon (in print and Kindle format) and wherever fine books are sold online. And don't forget to check out books 1 and 2, Loving Who and Leaving Who, while you're at it.

Doctor Who--and Loving Who--Return!

Doctor Who--and Loving Who--Return!

It's been a while since I wrote about the Doctor, but this month I have something to write about concerning both the latest series premiere and the re-release of my original Doctor Who-inspired series, Loving Who.

My wacky sci-fi romantic-comedies, beginning with the novel Loving Who, are no longer in print from their former publisher (due to a change in business model). The good news is they will be re-released with new cover art and new editing in all new editions from Devine Destinies Books. I'm excited because I really enjoyed revisiting my old friends Cici Connors and the alien John Smith from Loving Who, Leaving Who and Losing Who. I know a lot of new Whovians will enjoy their wild adventures in time, space and fandom, too. I can't wait to introduce them to these new Who-fans.

I don't have an exact release date yet for the first title, but I'll let you know when I do. In the meantime, I'd like to ask you favor... Would you be interested in reading and writing a short review of Loving Who and then posting your review to Amazon and Goodreads? I'd sincerely appreciate it, as the old reviews posted there will no longer be associated with the new release. So, if you're interested, please email me at cynthianna @ hotmail.com (no spaces) and let me know if you're able to help me out with a review. Thanks.

Now onto the quickie review of the opening episode, The Pilot. I must say Peter Capaldi is looking great and  seems very relaxed in the role of the Doctor. His hiding out at a university and teaching physics seems up the Doctor's alley, and it gave me a flashback to the partially filmed Douglas Adams' story, Shada, where the Doctor met an old friend who was hanging out as a professor at an English university. The TARDIS in the corner of his well-appointed office fits the decor perfectly.

The reasons why the Doctor has settled down for a spell to teach--and why the alien Nardole is still with him--aren't given, but I'm willing to give it a pass for now. The university professor situation is intriguing,  and the young woman he meets and encourages to study science is intriguing as well. "Bill" isn't your typical college co-ed, as she's not officially a student, and yet she's bright and eager to learn. (After seeing say some rather dumb lines in the trailers, I wasn't sure if I would like her, but she's much more intelligent than those short blurbs indicate. Whew!) About the only criticism I have of Bill after the first story is her horrible taste in clothing and unkempt hairstyle. Nothing she wears is flattering for her body type, in my opinion. I hope the costume and makeup department get to work on improving her look.

We learn in snippets that Bill (Pearl Mackie) is a foster child and never knew her mother. She's a sympathetic character and seems to have the ambition to make something of herself despite her poor circumstances. The Doctor and Nardole (Matt Lucas) seem to be protecting a "vault" in the basement of the building where the Doctor's office is located, but for what reason and from whom are still a mystery. The opening story isn't overly complicated, but it flows at a good pace and introduces Bill and the audience to the TARDIS and the idea that the Doctor is much more than meets the eye. This is always a good way to restart a series after it's been in hiatus for a while.

I'm looking forward to episode two, and hopeful Moffat doesn't derail the more positive and helpful Doctor to bring back his morose persona of the past seasons. Peter Capaldi announced this will be his last year to play the Doctor, and I'd rather he go out on a high note than a low one, wouldn't you? Fingers crossed!

P.S. My short story, If You Give a Time Traveler a Cookie, featuring Cici and John from Loving Who, will also be available from Devine Destinies. Keep it tuned here for details.

The Lost Canon of (New) Doctor Who

"Sonic specs" beat out the "sonic screwdriver"?

The Lost Cannon of (New) Doctor Who

by Cynthianna

***Spoiler Alert! If you haven't seen this episode, you might want to wait to read this.***

We're almost out the door to attend two sci-fi conventions in a row--Archon and ConClave--where we'll be discussing Doctor Who (as well as writing/editing topics) with our fellow fans. I felt I should post my opinions before we left town, so here is my short (but not overly sweet) review of episode two, The Witch's Familiar.

Overall, it's an okay episode for Moffat's writing, but it's nowhere near the quality of his writing in Blink. (Honestly, I don't expect much better from him anymore.) There's nothing very original in the storyline, and there's a lot of padding once again, and the annoying Mary Poppins-clone called Missy is still about, but there's less of her lewd behavior this week and for that I'm grateful. Instead, we see maniacal Missy act sadistically by dangling Clara upside down in the desert of Scaro and sharpening a stick and threatening to eat the school teacher, but no sexual moves were made toward the Daleks that I could detect. (I had a hard time hearing the dialogue this week.) Nasty threats of violence and silly faces... What else is new? (Ho-hum.) 

Did Missy really need to be included in this look into the Doctor's relationship with the Daleks and their creator, Davros? Not really. The two-part story probably would have been much stronger without her childish and nasty/lewd antics and about ten minutes in length total. The story's focus should have leaned more to the Doctor's ongoing dilemma in regard to the Daleks--"Do I commit genocide and rid the universe of them or not?"--and away from the puerile gimmicks of  Michelle Gomez making her now trademark silly faces.

The strongest aspects of the script were the Doctor's confession that he did have compassion and could show mercy to an enemy. Jenna Coleman's character was given a chance to act this out when Clara finds herself imprisoned in a Dalek's casing and mistaken for being one of the ruthless killers. Quite telling is that when you say "I love you" through a Dalek's voicebox the word "Exterminate" comes out instead. That nice touch aside, Moffat throws out the long history of Dalek canon and informs us now that "Daleks never die" but they do turn into melting fudge or what could pass for the inside of a particularly nasty baby diaper whenever they cease to be active and go down to Scaro's "sewers/graveyards". Ugh... yuck! 

For some reason, Moffat can't seem to follow canon with either of the Doctor's most notorious villains, the Cybermen and the Daleks. For fans of the classic series, it can be disconcerting to say the least. The gross bits of oozing "poop-colored" buried Daleks sliming all over the shining metal Dalek casings didn't do much for me personally, and I rather wish the episode had stayed more with the "human" storyline of the Doctor caring for the ailing Davros.

But Peter Capaldi got a chance to shine this week as the Doctor and I sincerely appreciate that. But "sonic Ray Bans"? Really? Not making enough money on the Sonic Screwdriver toys because fans are building their own models? What a not-so-cheap shot at product promotion, BBC!

The Charm of Doctor Who

Our wedding cake was the TARDIS, of course!

The Charm of Doctor Who 

by Cynthianna 

 Before the new series of Doctor Who starts up again, I wanted to reflect back on the classic series for a moment. The world’s longest running science fiction/fantasy television show began in November 1963, the same day Kennedy was assassinated. These events live on in our imaginations, albeit for very different reasons. The young president’s death demonstrated the harsh realities of the human condition, while the wandering Doctor and his companions emphasized our capacity to overcome adversity through the use of science, with a splash of courage and derring-do added in for fun. Admit it—sometimes we long for a brief respite from the horrors of the world, a chance to catch our breaths and see the “good guys” win. This much desired escapism the classic series of Doctor Who delivered, and it’s why it continues to strike a chord within its fans. 

The First Doctor’s charmed us with his outwardly crusty mannerisms that hid his inwardly caring nature. London school teachers Barbara and Ian were the perfect foils to reveal how the Doctor wanted to make a difference without being seen as a superhero rushing in at the last moment to save the day. The First Doctor’s true charm was his sense of humility, his sense that he could advise and help others, but, in the end, they needed to solve their own problems and live life on their own terms. After all, he lived his life on his own terms when he took off in the TARDIS, leaving his home world and people behind. Why would he act disrespectfully by telling others what to do? 

The Three Doctors

The Second Doctor charmed us with his sense of endless curiosity. The universe—and its dimensions beyond—was this recorder-playing piper’s playground. He and his companions often found themselves involved in convoluted scenarios on planets they weren’t always welcome on. Ever the stranger, he soon became a trusted confidant to those he helped. In the end, his punishment was to be exiled and his closest friends’ memories of their adventures together—all except their first encounter—were taken away. What could be worse for a “cosmic hobo” than to lose his traveling buddies and their shared escapades? 

The Third Doctor charmed us with his James Bond-like skills of Venusian Aikido and his love of fast cars and boats. Both his crustiness and his caring heart were evident as he scolded the Brigadier and his friends at U.N.I.T. for their tendencies to shoot first and ask questions later. The Third Doctor felt trapped in his exile on Earth, yet didn’t take his frustrations out on his adopted people and planet, doing his best to help humans and aliens to live in peace and harmony. Was it really any surprise to him when they ignored his sage advice? 

The Fourth Doctor

The Fourth Doctor charmed us with his whimsical foresight. You could say he’d be around the block now in his four regenerations, and human beings and their self-defeatist antics didn’t faze him much, even though he often voiced his disappointment in our apparent lack of wisdom. The Fourth Doctor is sometimes seen as a clown in his long scarf, floppy hat with the ever-present bag of jelly babies (sweets) in his pocket, but his strength came in allowing his adversaries to underestimate him. His deep, caring nature and humility, along with the cosmic hobo’s sense of curiosity, drove him to do better, to help out, to become more involved—sometimes as the cost of his own safety. How would it feel to be seen as being something less than you really are, yet all the while you intuit others have come to depend upon you for so much? 

The Fifth Doctor charmed us with his athleticism and his uprightness. His crustiness and world-weariness revealed themselves in his reserved manners and tendency to preach to his young group of companions. But there was never any doubt the Fifth Doctor still cared for the human race—the sacrifice of his own life by giving all of the spider’s poison antidote to his last companion demonstrated his humility and caring. Would anyone expect less of the Doctor? Would the Doctor expect any less of himself? 

The Fifth, Sixth, and Seventh Doctors

The Sixth Doctor charmed us with his unexpected energy and driven disposition. Time was catching up with the Time Lord, and sometimes his rudeness showed his impatience with the fact that although he had changed, the occupants of the universe hadn’t. They gladly accepted his assistance, but they didn’t give credence to the good he did and often tried to undermine him. The Sixth Doctor continued to care and to serve in spite of his own people’s cruel betrayal by putting him on trial. Misunderstood and ridiculed, was the Doctor growing tired of helping ingrates who couldn’t see the compassionate individual behind his coat of many colors? 

The Seventh Doctor charmed us with his need to put things right. A long life wanderer throughout time and space, his travels had taught the Doctor that he had an obligation to clean up some of the messes left behind by him and others. Evoking his whimsical side with his question mark umbrella, he was seen as a clown, a role he used to great advantage. Underestimated and reviled, he continued to lend a hand wherever and whenever necessary, expecting and receiving neither honors nor acknowledgment. A hero to the end, was it his simple love of humanity that drove him onward in spite of insurmountable obstacles? 

The past year we’ve enjoyed watching (and re-watching) the remaining episodes from the classic series of Doctor Who. When you consider the great actors, writers and producers who created the series, is it any wonder its genuine charm hasn’t faded over the years? The new series of Doctor Who hasn’t quite lived up to this great wealth of good-feelings generated by the classic series character of the Doctor, alas. We wait to see if “Nu Who” can yet be redeemed, hoping it's not completely devolved into a teenage-oriented soap opera focused on photogenic young companions that doesn’t quite demonstrate the charm of the humble, caring, heroic original Doctor. 


What's your take on classic Doctor Who. Do you think the new series has come close to the charm of the original? Leave your comments in the comment section below. Thank you.
 
Some of my other essays on Doctor Who include:

Doctor Who: The Last Christmas Special Ever?

Doctor Who vs. Agents of SHIELD: Creating Strong Female Characters

The Death of Doctor Who

I Got the Doctor Who Let Down Blues

The Death of Doctor Who (As Engineered by Steven Moffat)

An excellent Doctor in need of a decent producer.

The Death of Doctor Who

(As Engineered by Steven Moffat)

by Cynthianna

After viewing Doctor Who’s final episode of the season, Death in Heaven, my husband said he could write a review of it in two words: Train wreck. I told him I could use only one:

Ugh.

Okay, okay I’ll explain myself: After eight months of anticipation brewing, we, the venerable sci-fi/fantasy show’s fans, eagerly looked forward to spectacularly talented actor Peter Capaldi gracing our television screens in the title role. Alas, many of us found ourselves rather disappointed in the twelfth Doctor’s rather weak presentation to the world in his debut episode (read my I Got the Doctor Who Let Down Blues). We didn’t lay the blame for its failure to inspire on the great actor or our beloved series’ basic premise, however. It was all too obvious the weak script poor Peter and company had been given to work with was to blame. I felt that the actors and craftspersons involved honestly did the best they could do with the material, but you could sense they were struggling at times. 

One of the better episodes not written by Moffat.

Holding our breath (some might say our noses), we, the long-suffering fans, continued watching the remaining episodes of the season hoping the quality of scripts would improve. After a few rare glorious moments, many fans felt we had caught glimpses of the magic from the earlier Doctor Who era—particularly in strongly-written episodes such as Mummy on the Orient Express, Flatline, and In the Forest of the Night. Huzzah! So, you could well imagine the crushing feeling fans like my husband and I experienced when we turned on the series’ two part finale… ugh. Not only had the beauty and strengths of the original source material and cherished characters been denigrated, but our hopes for a long run of the revived Doctor Who series have flagged.

Once again, my husband is right in saying our disappointment can be summed up in only two words: Steven Moffat.

Mr. Moffat is the show’s producer, to put it in American terms, or “show runner” to use the Beeb’s vernacular, and that makes him the person responsible for making editorial decisions. As a published author and editor myself, I know that responsibility for the success or failure of a creative venture rests with the person in charge of its editorial content. It’s up to the editor/producer to put his or her foot down sometimes and say, “We’re not going there.” Intelligently choosing scripts and hiring good scriptwriters to produce story lines is a big part of the job, in other words. It’s not a task to take lightly, especially when producing the fifty-plus year television milestone which is Doctor Who.

Alternate title: Mary Poppins Flies Again!

I’m not really the type of fan who has either the time or inclination to go around the Internet griping about the producers of Doctor Who (I’ve encountered fans who do), but I have to agree with quite a few of my fellow Whovians this year. We’ve been let down by Mr. Moffat. There’s not much positive one can say about the situation. There aren’t words enough to express how sad one feels watching what was promised to be a revival of the series’ special something, that je ne sais quoi, being flushed down the drain. And yes, it’s emboldened me to speak out before it’s too late.

For there is one other word that springs to mind apart from ugh to describe my reaction to Moffat’s Death in Heaven:

Disrespectful.

There’s a niggling sense of fan disrespectfulness in many Moffat-written or co-written episodes of Doctor Who, but perhaps they’re not all fully realized until this season’s finale. The fans’ sensibilities are once again taken for granted as the Cybermen’s genesis and motivations are co-opted in order to do a remake of Marvel’s Iron Man. Throw some very poor science into the science fiction—the part human/part cyborgs can now “grow” out of “pollen” that is “planted” into dead bodies—and one gets the feeling that Mr. Moffat doesn’t take the genre seriously at all. Zombies are all the rage now? Throw them into the mish-mash along with Iron Man!

“Look they can fly like Tony Stark can!”

You can almost hear Mr. Moffat laughing in the background… “Research? Bah humbug! Those silly Doctor Who fans don’t care about well-crafted sci-fi/fantasy. I mean, if they’ll believe a newborn space dragon can lay an egg the size of the moon a few minutes after it hatches (the premise of Kill the Moon) then they’ll believe anything. They’re all thick! They’re adults watching a kid’s show! We can do whatever we want and they’ll buy it.”

It’s a disrespectful attitude and insulting. Yes, another one word review: Insulting.

Whatever the failings of classic era producers and scriptwriters at least fans didn’t feel as if they were being talked down to, belittled or openly scorned for loving a family-friendly, sci-fi/fantasy television show. Yet Death in Heaven goes on to new heights of insulting fan sensibilities by turning the Doctor’s archenemy the Master into childhood icon Mary Poppins complete with the big hat and flying umbrella—because somehow ripping off recent zombie hits and Iron Man wasn’t enough. For the record, I’m not against the Master changing genders at all, but I am against a non-original and sexist interpretation of the beloved villain from the classic series. Which leads me to another one word charge that many, many female fans have leveled at Mr. Moffat:

Sexist.

"Love me--please?" (Or co-dependency is cool.)

There’s a great scholarly article on Sexism in Doctor Who (http://rebeccaamoore.com/2014/05/29/university-study-on-sexism-in-bbcs-doctor-who-infographic/) that I won’t reiterate here, but the author makes a very strong argument that many of the Moffat-written scripts fail the Bechdel Test—and fail it miserably. For the most part women in the classic series (1963 – 1989) were presented as strong, intelligent, reasoning individuals with distinct personalities, equal in ego-integrity to the Doctor. In other words, worthy companions. Sure, some female companions screamed at a monster now and then, but so did quite a few of the Doctor’s male companions. Nasty things jumping out from the shadows or dark alleyways can do that to a person of either gender.

Rest assured, the Moffat era of Doctor Who has put women in sci-fi firmly in their place—right where they belong beneath the men! Young, good-looking females are depicted as simply “girlfriends” who suffer from hormonal fluctuations of emotions which make them constantly fret about whether the Doctor is still their boyfriend or not (if he ever was) and occasionally even slap him. Careers? For women? Get real! It’s not deemed important to show the current crop of female companions as successful career women. The female companion’s career takes a backseat to all the worrying and fretting about the Doctor and her human lovers she is forced to do because of her inferior biology, just like it does for most twenty-first century women, right?

Angst-riddled dialogue and silly arguments abound among the romantic couples in Moffat’s Doctor Who, bringing back memories of the good ol’ days of seventh grade crushes and break-ups in the junior high cafeteria. Female companions need never mature to an emotional age of beyond twelve or thirteen it seems in Moffat’s fictional world. Ditto for their male lovers. The new era of Doctor Who has become an adolescent packed space opera—or is it simply a soap opera? Original Doctor Who producer Verity Lambert had it all wrong! (She was only a woman, you know.) Who needs intelligent characters working on solving problems intelligently using the scientific method?

A spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down...and down...

This is particularly true if you’re a brilliant male scientist and you find yourself regenerated into the body of a woman. The Master, formerly depicted on screen as a capable, dedicated and determined evil genius, once converted over to the female gender gives himself a girlie nickname like “Missy” and dresses up like every little girl’s favorite Edwardian nanny, Mary Poppins. He/she still wants to take over the world, but now she does it while wearing bright red lipstick and trying to stick her tongue down the back of the Doctor’s throat. How grown up!

Moffat seems to be giving a wink and a nudge to all the sexist male fans, intimating that once a mad scientist has lost his masculinity he certainly wouldn’t want to impress people that he was still an evil genius by acting like…well, like an actual genius. A person with a brain and intelligence and a plan...but hey! Once you’re wearing a dress and lipstick you can’t act any smarter than a seventh grader, right? Must be those girlie hormones!

Sarah Jane's bravery and intelligence--awesome to watch.

No wonder fans of the classic series of Doctor Who despair. Where are ace scientist Liz Shaw, investigative journalist Sarah Jane Smith, and master teacher Barbara Wright when you need them? Thank heavens for those of us who can receive the Retro-TV channel in the U.S. Episodes of the classic series are broadcast five nights a week, and you can see these strong feminist role models there, a breath of fresh air compared to the twelve year old antics of Moffat’s female companions.

Thank heaven indeed—which leads me to another word that describes Death in Heaven: Tacky.

Perhaps tasteless would work as well as tacky. At one point in the story, the Doctor tells the U.N.I.T. team that they don’t want Americans involved with dealing with the Cybermen crisis because all Americans do is “drop bombs and pray.” Asking for Divine Guidance is a big no-no apparently since only stupid people (women?) would ever think it was a good idea. And perhaps attracting and maintaining American viewers isn’t at the top of the BBC America’s list of profitable things to do, either? 

Tacky jokes cracked about the vast majority of TV viewers’ faith in a Supreme Being shows rather poor judgement on Moffat’s part. Sure, he can be atheist and anti-American, but he doesn’t have to be mean-spirited about it, does he? Didn’t political rhetoric, which insulted the conservative-minded BBC chairman, get the original series cancelled back in the 1980s? 

R.I.P. Brigadier

My husband found the idea of “resurrecting” the late Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart in the graveyard to be in extremely poor taste. Even if you don’t believe in an afterlife or heaven, why would you condemn a righteous and moral character such as the Brigadier to become a mindless cyborgs puppet for all eternity? There’s that ugh factor creeping in… Tasteless and tacky shouldn’t be words associated with a family-friendly show, but in this day and age of nasty trolling and snarky musings, I guess it was bound to happen to Doctor Who, too. So sad that Mr. Moffat couldn’t rise above it for the good of the series.

Because, in the end, it appears that Mr. Moffat wants out of Doctor Who. Why else would he risk insulting folks with tacky and tasteless quips, repeatedly show female characters in a stereotypically sexist light, and show outright contempt of the classic series and disrespect for the intelligence of the sci-fi fan base as a whole? Why would he do any of these rash and insipid things unless deep-down he wants the program to be canceled? Moffat’s production of Sherlock has done well in the ratings, and perhaps that’s where his heart lies. Certainly writing for a character such as his version of Sherlock Holmes, an autistic, emotionally-stunted savant, seems to fit better with Moffat’s outlook on life. He can express himself creatively there.

Disrespectful, insulting, sexist, tacky… ugh. I won’t even bother to point out plot holes, heavily-telegraphed plot points, and others inconsistencies in Death in Heaven. Nick Frost as Santa Claus—or should I say Father Christmas?--will probably fill them all in in the holiday special and tie things up with a nice big bow in a neat little package, right? For an atheist like Mr. Moffat to put so much faith in a saint (St. Nicholas) to perform such a miracle of scriptwriting during the one the holiest seasons of the Christian calendar is too bizarre to contemplate.

Time to move along, Steven.

Steven Moffat should depart Doctor Who and move on to pastures green, and he should do so now before the show loses any more support from the fans. Peter Capaldi’s portrayal of the Doctor deserves a chance to shine away from the dross of the Moffat era. Doctor Who deserves fresh air, fresh ideas, and maybe even some female writers and producers this next time out?

Are you listening, BBC?