Current Events > Peter Capaldi and Jodi Whittaker deserved better writers

(+) Yeah! (+)

Especially Capaldi. He had everything necessary to be the best Doctor since the Fourth, but the writers failed him

The writing had nowhere to go but downhill when Douglas Adams left, in the 70s.

Dude, Broadchurch was dope

Heaven Sent was an amazing episode, at least.

Ps2Twilight posted...

Heaven Sent was an amazing episode, at least.

Yeah it was. And Hell bent too.

Capaldi sputtered at first but he really was dynamic as the Doctor with the right script/episode .

I also feel like Capaldi being so jarringly not Matt Smith at the beginning of his run make for a rocky transition. If that makes sense.

They really did deserve better.

My understanding is that Capaldi's run was so rough at the start because he was told what kind of Doctor he was supposed to play, rather than being allowed to put his own spin on it. From his second season onward he was allowed to be his own Doctor and had a lot more fun with the role, which made it much, much better in general.

Season 9 was great.

[LFAQs-redacted-quote]

RTD also had some of the best episodes, Midnight was a masterpiece. That's what's been missing, the moments of brilliance.

Whoever writes for the show since Jodie joined actually made me stop watching and I've seen everything available before that. It was just so atrocious. I thought Capaldi was decent though. The one episode he has with the mondasian cybermen before they ruin it by bringing in the new designs is one of my favorites

Totally agree.

Peter Capaldi's first episode showed incredible promise. He was confused and traumatised and scared. He was angry, he stole a homeless guy's coat after yelling at him a bunch. It was kind of upsetting to see this character of the Doctor in such an unfamiliar and uncomfortable situation.

But frankly, I thought that was one of three times his Doctor really shone. His first series had him being an angry asshole, and eventually he became president of the world because Moffat's gonna Moffat. Seeing such an unlikable Doctor so often was kinda hard to watch for a whole season, which I think they realised. Then they handwaved that away with his second season, where after a long absence from Clara, he's become kinder in the interim. Clara takes a job at the school that Susan goes to in the first episode of the series, which felt like a weird detail to just throw in there, and the Doctor was just kind of there. People like the Heaven Sent/Hell Bent thing, but I wasn't a fan tbh.

Then they had to do a light reboot for his third season because they took a year long hiatus. This had some more interesting moments like the Doctor being blind, and I also thought the patch job they did during his regeneration where he spent his entire run finding out what makes him the Doctor and passes that on to Thirteen was a cute touch, but it was too little too late. I didn't really like Matt Smith all that much, and Peter Capaldi was a shot at a fresh start and an interesting new turn for the show - but he was bland and inconsistent, and the potential of the run was wasted.

Jodie Whittaker, on the other hand, carried her entire run on her back. Chibnall's writing was consistently weak, and he insisted on writing for like half of the episodes during his run. He wrote the Flux season by the seat of his pants, which is why the villains are dogshit and there's no actual point to any of it or any satisfying resolution. Some of the episodes were my favorites in years - Demons of the Punjab should go down as one of Chibnall's best episodes, as should Village of the Angels. But no matter how weak the episode was, Jodie was a consistent highlight. Her Doctor was fantastic, and I loved her performance. It had a very Davies-esque energy, very bubbly and techy - I liked her season one characterisation the best, where she had this passion for learning and being able to give people the information they needed to draw their own conclusions. It was a really exciting and wholesome time.

Orphan 49 or whatever it's called is the worst episode of the modern show, period. And there have been some real stinkers. People point to Love and Monsters as the nadir of modern Who, but as silly as it is and as unrelated to the show as it is, I think it's batshit insanity has aged kind of well?? Like it's not a good episode, but even being as slapshot as it is, it's kind of entertaining to behold. Moffat had an episode where he was patting himself on the back for having a non-binary actor portray a non-binary character, but the character was a non-gendered clone race of warrior grunts who spoke in vague mouth-noises who the other characters treated more like a pet than a person. He also had a "mind virus" episode that seemed like a tired cribbing of a creepypasta, which was the absolute low point of Capaldi's run. Orphan 49 is worse than both of them - it's like a SyFy original movie, with the cheap army costumes and the CGI they use for the one monster suit they had for the episode, and the gritty urban sets later in the episode. The twist comes at you from miles away, and the characters barely have anything to do.

Despite Thirteen's run having my least favourite episode of the show, she's still one of my favorite Doctors. I absolutely agree, Jodie Whittaker deserved better material. The shit she was given for at least half of her run wasn't flattering. But I'll give her this: she portrayed the Doctor as best she could, and her character elevated the show through thick and thin. The run is mediocre because of Chibnall, not because of Jodie. She was the best part of it. Episodes like Village of the Angels show how good she could have been with the right material - imagine a whole season with Russell T. Davies.

Remember when they decided to replace the iconic sonic screwdriver with those dipshit sonic sunglasses

TMOG posted...

Remember when they decided to replace the iconic sonic screwdriver with those dipshit sonic sunglasses

Remember when the Doctor told the audience about the grandfather paradox, then told them to Google it?

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People always bring up Love and Monsters and Fear Her but those were two dark spots in an otherwise fantastic run. Moffat and and Chibnall's runs have had an episode or two at least that bad per season and some that are central to the plot.

MrMallard posted...

Totally agree.

Peter Capaldi's first episode showed incredible promise. He was confused and traumatised and scared. He was angry, he stole a homeless guy's coat after yelling at him a bunch. It was kind of upsetting to see this character of the Doctor in such an unfamiliar and uncomfortable situation.

But frankly, I thought that was one of three times his Doctor really shone. His first series had him being an angry asshole, and eventually he became president of the world because Moffat's gonna Moffat. Seeing such an unlikable Doctor so often was kinda hard to watch for a whole season, which I think they realised. Then they handwaved that away with his second season, where after a long absence from Clara, he's become kinder in the interim. Clara takes a job at the school that Susan goes to in the first episode of the series, which felt like a weird detail to just throw in there, and the Doctor was just kind of there. People like the Heaven Sent/Hell Bent thing, but I wasn't a fan tbh.

Then they had to do a light reboot for his third season because they took a year long hiatus. This had some more interesting moments like the Doctor being blind, and I also thought the patch job they did during his regeneration where he spent his entire run finding out what makes him the Doctor and passes that on to Thirteen was a cute touch, but it was too little too late. I didn't really like Matt Smith all that much, and Peter Capaldi was a shot at a fresh start and an interesting new turn for the show - but he was bland and inconsistent, and the potential of the run was wasted.

Jodie Whittaker, on the other hand, carried her entire run on her back. Chibnall's writing was consistently weak, and he insisted on writing for like half of the episodes during his run. He wrote the Flux season by the seat of his pants, which is why the villains are dogshit and there's no actual point to any of it or any satisfying resolution. Some of the episodes were my favorites in years - Demons of the Punjab should go down as one of Chibnall's best episodes, as should Village of the Angels. But no matter how weak the episode was, Jodie was a consistent highlight. Her Doctor was fantastic, and I loved her performance. It had a very Davies-esque energy, very bubbly and techy - I liked her season one characterisation the best, where she had this passion for learning and being able to give people the information they needed to draw their own conclusions. It was a really exciting and wholesome time.

Orphan 49 or whatever it's called is the worst episode of the modern show, period. And there have been some real stinkers. People point to Love and Monsters as the nadir of modern Who, but as silly as it is and as unrelated to the show as it is, I think it's batshit insanity has aged kind of well?? Like it's not a good episode, but even being as slapshot as it is, it's kind of entertaining to behold. Moffat had an episode where he was patting himself on the back for having a non-binary actor portray a non-binary character, but the character was a non-gendered clone race of warrior grunts who spoke in vague mouth-noises who the other characters treated more like a pet than a person. He also had a "mind virus" episode that seemed like a tired cribbing of a creepypasta, which was the absolute low point of Capaldi's run. Orphan 49 is worse than both of them - it's like a SyFy original movie, with the cheap army costumes and the CGI they use for the one monster suit they had for the episode, and the gritty urban sets later in the episode. The twist comes at you from miles away, and the characters barely have anything to do.

Despite Thirteen's run having my least favourite episode of the show, she's still one of my favorite Doctors. I absolutely agree, Jodie Whittaker deserved better material. The shit she was given for at least half of her run wasn't flattering. But I'll give her this: she portrayed the Doctor as best she could, and her character elevated the show through thick and thin. The run is mediocre because of Chibnall, not because of Jodie. She was the best part of it. Episodes like Village of the Angels show how good she could have been with the right material - imagine a whole season with Russell T. Davies.

I agree. Jodie basically took a legit bad show and made it at least tolerable, and that's actually quite an accomplishment.

MrMallard posted...

Remember when the Doctor told the audience about the grandfather paradox, then told them to Google it?

That's actually one of the things I liked about him. There was a certain meta, almost fourth wall breaking attitude to Capaldi's doc that just worked. Ironically for being older than the previous recent doctors, he actually came across as a bit younger, sassier and just a little bit bad. Still a good guy, but a bit more on the antihero side of things from time to time. There were several points in his tenure where he directly talks to the viewer, or if nothing else is basically showing off to himself.

Only Capaldi's first season was weak, IMO (and even then it had a cracking finale) - I think it suffered from a one-two punch of them going in too hard with the story arc or him not being sure that he's a good man, and too much Clara/Danny drama each week. Both of those aspects were necessary for the finale to work, but they were both handled so very badly, with the result being that pretty much every episode had at least one scene where The Doctor was just an irredeemable dickhead and at least one scene with Danny and Clara that didn't fit in and murdered the pacing.

His other two seasons were brilliant, though, and I was especially fond of the Twelve/Bill/Nardole team. Capaldi rivals Tom for my second favourite Doctor - my answer as to which of the two I prefer would probably change on a daily basis.

I'm still not sold on Jodie, though. There's absolutely no question that she has had some diabolical writing that absolutely has hampered her cause, but her seasons have improved each year, too, and Flux was actually genuinely very good, but even then she's still not really managed to pull off the more dramatic and serious moments. She's a great actress, and off-camera she's been absolutely superb as the face of the franchise (suiting up as The Doctor and filming a message in-character from her own bedroom cupboard to comfort all the kids who would have been scared when Covid was ravaging the country was a beautiful thing to do), but I'm still not convinced that better writing would have made her a better Doctor. She just didn't manage to capture the darker, steelier side to the character that all of the other Docs have had under the surface. The better writing as the Chibnall era went on did wonders for Mandip Gill, though, with Yaz going from being in the background with nothing to do for most of her first season to being a genuinely brilliant companion by Flux.

Capaldi was so good it's ridiculous. Exactly who we needed after a couple of emotionally hurt boyfriends.

Capaldi has the best episode and the best speech in the franchise.

Capaldi is definitely my favorite and I feel like he perfectly represented the Doctor after Smith spent 900 years on Trenzalore.

I know people prefer younger Doctors, but to me, it was about time we went back to an older one, especially after the events I mentioned.

Whittaker was pretty good, but Chibnall really ruined it from making any of her run as "great".

I'm excited for the next Doctor, but I still want an older man or woman's spin again.

Capaldi is my favorite. I loved all the ones prior to him, but he just was absolutely perfect for what I wanted in the Doctor.

I don't know if this is a particularly popular one or not, but Capaldi has one of my very favorite scenes.

"I was lost a long time ago. She was saving you."

Capaldi's snarky / smug Doctor was just enough Sixth Doctor crossed with Fourth Doctor that it just worked.

Capaldi's last season might be my favourite season in all of Doctor Who.

FurryPhilosifer posted...

Capaldi's last season might be my favourite season in all of Doctor Who.

Nardole being a clever smartass was so good

I've seen some people act like Whittaker's Doctor is main reason the series is crashing - but honestly I think she's absolutely fine. She has a nice mix of Tennant and Smith - manic and nerdy like Tennant but with Smith's social awkwardness.

One of the few things I like about this era is the Master. I don't like him as much as Missy, but he's got a lot of charmingly chaotic evil Tennant-era Master.

Although my personal favorite is Delgado's. The suave, sophisticated, gentlemanly Master was just sublime.

DarkRoast posted...

I've seen some people act like Whittaker's Doctor is main reason the series is crashing - but honestly I think she's absolutely fine.

That's just "anti-woke" rabble, who's going to double the fuck down with the next Doctor. It's the worse-than-Colin-era writing that tanked the show.

I thought I hated Colin Baker until I heard him in the audio episodes. Sixth Doctor was a legit unit with good writing.