Once Upon a Geek

Here are some cool Doctor Who related items I’ve come across in the past week.  Be warned, these contain SPOILERS for The End of Time.

• Check out the Doctor’s and the Master’s Facebook pages. Hilarious!

• io9 contemplates some of the lingering questions from The End of Time.
• RTD reveals the answer to one of the questions.
• io9 dissects the Matt Smith season five trailer shot by shot.  Some good insight here.
• Finally, the BBC has released a new promotional of Matt Smith as the Doctor.

Let’s face it, we’ve all had them before… New Doctor Jitters.  I don’t think there has ever been a name given to this condition, but now we have a label for it – New Doctor Jitters.  When the Doctor regenerates, we find ourselves skeptical after seeing those first few moments featuring the new actor.  It’s only natural.  We’re wrapped up in our emotions as we say goodbye to an actor we’ve come to accept as the Doctor, and then in the middle of that emotional turmoil his replacement appears.  It’s so jarring to switch from a sad departure to a grand entrance.  It’s difficult to accept someone new while we’re still reeling from the departure of the previous actor.

I remember my reaction when Tom Baker regenerated at the end of Logopolis.  After transforming from Tom Baker into Peter Davison, the new Doctor sat up and the episode ended.  That’s all we got until the first episode of Castrovalva.  It didn’t matter.  In those few seconds of screen time I had already decided that I hated Peter Davison as the Doctor.  I couldn’t stand him.  There was no way I was ever going to accept this new guy as the Doctor.  Forget it.  No way.  No how.  … Well, that opinion changed after seeing Castrovalva.  I eventually realized I didn’t have an issue with Peter Davison, I was just unhappy that Tom Baker was leaving and wasn’t ready for some new actor to take over.  In fact, Peter Davison quickly became my favorite Doctor and remained so until David Tennant came along.   It just goes to show that it’s not fair to judge a new Doctor on his first appearance.  9 times out of 10 we end up loving each and every Doctor after just a few episodes (sorry Colin, but you’re brilliant in the Big Finish audio adventures).

I think it’s reasonable to be nervous or skeptical.  However, some people have already passed judgment on Matt Smith.  They’ve decided they don’t like him based upon what they’ve seen so far.  They say his hair is too crazy.  He’s too young.  His chin is huge and his eyes are sunken.  He uses his hands too much.  If we actually had a TARDIS, we could go back in time four years and hear those same people talk about David Tennant after The Parting of the Ways but before The Christmas Invasion.  They said his hair was too crazy.  He was too young.  He was too pale and thin.  He was too geeky to be a hero.  Sounds kinda familiar doesn’t it?  Gotta admit, Tennant’s first few lines didn’t exactly fill us with confidence. “Hello.  Okay… New teeth. That’s weird.  So where was I?  Oh that’s right, Barcelona!”  Those lines were no indication of how amazing he was going to be as the Doctor.  As another example, just imagine being a Doctor Who fan in 1974 after getting your first glimpse of Tom Baker in costume.  The scarf, the big smiling teeth, googley eyes, and crazy hair. Those fans were probably convinced Tom Baker was going to be terrible.  So again, it’s not fair to judge a new Doctor before he’s had a chance to really play the part. Who knows, maybe Matt Smith will be the best Doctor ever!

I watched The End of Time Part Two with my ten-year-old step son.  When the credits started to roll, he turned to me and said excitedly, “This new Doctor is going to be fun!”  I think my step-son’s got the right attitude.

Sure I’ve got New Doctor Jitters, but I’m also eager for the next season to begin.  I’m ready to jump in with both feet.  Geronimo!

If you can’t see the embedded video above, please click here.

I just finished listening to an excellent Doctor Who audio book entitled, The Forever Trap.  I’m typically more of a full-cast audio drama fan, but this particular audio book really impressed me.  The story was written by Dan Abnett (yes, that Dan Abnett of Marvel Comics Nova, Annihilation, War of Kings, etc), read by Catherine Tate (Donna Noble on Doctor Who), and features the Tenth Doctor and Donna.  This two-disc story was released in the same format as the other BBC Books Tenth Doctor Adventures audio book adaptations, but this one was released exclusively to audio.  It is the second of its kind, preceded by Pest Control and followed by The Nemonite Invasion.

I’ve listened to Pest Control, which was read by David Tennant, but it failed to impress me.  Even with David Tennant reading the story, it still didn’t feel like proper Doctor Who.  Needless to say, after that I didn’t have high hopes for The Forever Trap.  As I had expected, I was disappointed within the first few minutes of The Forever Trap.  Right out of the gate, Catherine Tate provides an unbelievable voice for the role of a holographic salesman.  I was so turned off by that voice, I gave up listening for a while.  A few days later, I started the audio book again.  Wow!  Sure, that salesman voice isn’t great, but the rest of the audio book was fantastic!  I could visualize the Doctor perfectly thanks to an excellent script by Dan Abnett, and Catherine Tate totally nailing David Tennant’s speech patterns.  Did I already say “Wow”?  Well, I gotta say it again.  WOW!  This is proper Doctor Who.  Abnett clearly gets the Doctor and Donna both.  Also, his talent for writing good science fiction really shines through.  Kudos to Catherine Tate for doing such an outstanding job!  She effortlessly switches between the abrasive Donna, the energetic Doctor, and a wide array of other characters.  I didn’t realize what an amazing range she has.

I thoroughly enjoyed listening to this audio book, more so than most other Doctor Who audio books.  Apparently The Nemonite Invasion is also read by Catherine Tate, so now I’m gonna have to track that one down too!

I finally got my copy of the Doctor Who: Adventures in Time and Space Roleplaying Game, and turns out I’m in it!  Well… I’m not exactly IN the game, but I am mentioned in the credits and some of my playtesting group’s contributions made it into the game!  Sorry to subject you to what follows.  I’m not trying to brag, I’m just sharing my excitement!  Here is a picture of me going all Gollum with my new prize.

I’ve only just started flipping through the set, but I gotta say this is a truly gorgeous game!  Each book has glossy, full-color pages.  There are several loose character sheets, each printed on heavy-cardstock.  There are punch-out cardboard tokens for Story Points.  It’s just well put together and beautiful.  For a video walk-thru of the box set contents click here.  For a seven-page PDF preview of The Player’s Guide, click here.  I’ve only scratched the surface of the contents and can’t wait to read it cover-to-cover.  For now though, here are a few things I’ve noticed that relate to my playtesting group…

CREDITS

Here are the credits listed on the inside cover of The Player’s Guide.

And a close up on the Playtester’s paragraph…

Hooray!  My thanks to Cubicle 7 for the shout-out!  My group, called THE UNIQUE GEEKS, consisted of Sterling, SGhoul, Scott C, Shavenger, and myself.  We read through early drafts of the rules, ran a few adventures, and created lots of characters and gadgets.  Then provided feedback to Cubicle 7 on all of this.  I’m happy to say some of our contributions made it into the final draft!  Now, I hope I’m not breaking some unspoken playtester rule by talking about which contributions were from my group.  If so, I deeply apologize to the almighty playtester gods and humbly offer to sacrifice myself on the altar of the omniscient 20-sider.  Additionally, I’m not trying to take anything away from David F. Chapman or the folks at Cubicle 7.  They’ve created a great game and deserve to be praised for everything they did.  They did all the heavy-lifting creating the game from scratch, we just came along and piggybacked on their ideas and made a few suggestions.  I’m honored to have been invited to the playtest and honored that the folks at Cubicle 7 thought some of our suggestions were good enough to include.

GADGETS

For one particular adventure, I developed four different gadgets.  Gadgets are unique devices or tools characters carry with them for specific purposes.  While going through the new box set, I was blown away as I stumbled across two gadgets I created printed right next to the Sonic Screwdriver and Psychic Paper!  Wow!  I created the “Engineer’s Mate” and the “Engram Eraser”, both shown below.  Click the image to enlarge.  I created these gadgets for an earlier draft of the rules, so some of the stats have changed since I came up with the concepts.  However, the gadget name, traits, and purpose remain the same.  My compliments to whoever wrote the descriptive paragraph.  They did a great job taking the idea and explaining it succinctly and effectively.  Nicely done!

You can’t tell from this scan, but each gadget on the page below is perforated so you can pop them out of the page!  So cool!

TRAITS

One of the areas we provided lots of feedback and suggestions on was “Traits”.  I’ve noticed looking over the new box set that several of the “Traits” we suggested have been incorporated.  Now it’s quite possible that several other playtesters suggested the same particular “Traits” that we did, so I’m not claiming that we’re solely responsible for these.  “Traits” we suggested that appear in the final game include: Sense of Direction, Animal Friendship, Owed Favour, Unattractive, Owes Favour, Argumentative, Dark Secret, Impulsive, and Selfish.  Again, my compliments to whoever wrote the lengthy descriptions for each of these.  We just shared a germ of an idea from a game mechanic perspective, whereas someone at Cubicle 7 beautifully wrapped explanations and examples around it.

That’s it for now.  I’m going to take a deep-dive into these books and savor every detail!  In fact, I may be so wrapped up in this game that I fail to post here for a few days. 

The Doctor Who: Adventures in Time and Space role-playing game by Cubicle 7 Entertainment Ltd was released a couple weeks ago in England, and I should finally get my hands on a copy today!  I ordered the game through my LCS, which is getting it from Diamond Comics Distributors.  Diamond has it listed on their shipping list for today!  Hot dog!

I’ve posted about the game previously, but again I gotta say how impressed I am with the package they’ve put together for this game.  First off, it’s a box set.  How cool is that?!?!  What game company has put out a decent RPG box set in years?  Everyone just publishes hardbacks nowadays.  Also, this box set is packed!  Check out the video below done by my buddy The Acrobatic Flea.  He posted this on his excellent blog, HeroPress, to demonstrate how nicely this box set was put together.  It’s even got a hinged cover!  Way to go Cubicle 7!  Even if you don’t care for Doctor Who, you gotta admit this is a well-designed product.

Click here if you can’t see the embedded video above.

Below is a list of the contents as you saw them in the video:

• Player’s Guide (86 pages)
• Gamemaster’s Guide (144 pages)
• Adventure Book (30 pages)
• Character sheets (including pre-generated characters for the series cast)
• Dice
• Blank Character Sheets
• Gadget sheets
• Story Point Tokens

You can purchase a PDF version of the box set right now from DriveThruRPG by clicking here.  You can also join the discussion forum for the game by clicking here.

Upcoming supplements to the game include: Doctor Who Gamemaster’s Screen; Aliens and Creatures; and Defending the Earth (U.N.I.T. box set).  Also, next summer they’ll release a Matt Smith/11th Doctor themed edition.  It won’t be an all-new edition, mostly just updating the visuals and the branding.

Finally, I’ve heard a rumor that there is a credit to me and my playtesting group inside – Shag (and the Unique Geeks).  I’m totally stoked about that!  I got mentioned in an official Doctor Who publication!  My life is now complete! 

Here are the first three minutes of Doctor Who: The End  of Time Part One.  While I’m not looking forward to David Tennant’s departure, I’m am looking forward to this story and what lies ahead for Matt Smith.  This episode airs in England on December 25, and on BBC America on December 26.

If you can’t see the embedded video above, click here.

Additionally, the BBC just finished broadcasting the animated Doctor Who: Dreamland story which you can probably find on the internet (if you know where to look).  Finally, here is a good article listing five lessons we hope Russell T Davie’s has learned from his past Doctor Who epics.

I’m closing out my DragonCon 2009 coverage with my favorite costume photos. Some have been shown here previously, but they bear repeating. To see all of my DragonCon photos, be sure to visit my Flickr page. If you have a favorite costume that I left out, be sure to mention it in the comments. A small handful of these photos were taken by folks other than me. In those cases, I’ve linked to their original photo.

A really great Bumblebee from “Transformers”

These ladies were having a blast in their gender-bender “Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band” costumes.  They were totally in character and so were the screaming fans!

Cookie Monster Michael Jackson.  Really funny, but is it too soon?

The Convention Vixens return to DragonCon.  You can find more on the ConVixens by clicking here.

Star Wars Jedi impaling a Clone Trooper.  This was a really neat and creative costume.  The lightsaber was connected to the trooper on both sides and was lit up.  Impressive, most impressive.

A really good Snake Eyes from “GI Joe”

Is this the future of Marvel Comics now that they’ve been bought by Disney?

The Ghostbusters!  This group won the Hall Costume Contest for Best Movie Group.  The detail on their costumes is amazing!

The popularity of the new “Star Trek” film inspired quite a few simple, yet effective costumes.

The most in character group at the convention! Tony Stark (from “Iron Man”), his assistant Pepper, and his security guards.  Tony was dead-on and never broke character. The security guards actually frisked anyone who wanted their picture with Tony.  Pepper was sure to inquire if you had an appointment.  Brilliant!

The most creative costume at the convention in my opinion.  The two-person AT-AT from “Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back”!

With the popularity of the “Blackest Night” comic book this year, there were quite a few different Lantern Corps represented.  Here is a member of the Sinestro Corps…

… and here is a member of the Red Lantern Corps.

A really great Supergirl!

The second most creative costume at the convention in my opinion.  He perfectly captured Peter Parker’s Spider-Sense tingling from the comics.

An astonishing “Doctor Who” look-a-like.  Several people were doing double-takes to ensure it wasn’t really David Tennant.

An impressive Catwoman from the “Batman Returns” film.

Spaceman Spiff from “Calvin & Hobbes”.  Notice the stuffed tiger on his shoulder!

“Watchmen” – Thankfully Doctor Manhattan went for the briefs, rather than what was shown in the movie.

Amethyst, Princess of Gemworld

An impressive Silver Surfer from “Fantastic Four 2″

A really well done “Barbarella”

If you’ve never seen “Logan’s Run”, then go rent it right now.

A recreation of the famous picture taken in Times Square at the end of World War II

Really clever way to represent the video game “Mario Cart”

The Harry Potter/Hogwarts bad-girl thing continues to be popular.  Understandably.

Remember, the Visitors are our friends.

A really obscure Boba Fett costume from Star Wars.  This particular version of the costume was only used in his first appearance in the animated portion of the 1978 televised “Star Wars Holiday Special”.  Like I said… really obscure, but also really neat that someone took the time to make this particular variation.

An eight-foot Sasquatch from the Alpha Flight comic book!

A fun Stormtrooper variant in the parade – the Indianapolis Colts Trooper!

And finally Max from “Where the Wild Things Are”.  This young lady was having a blast hopping around as Max!  She mentioned that lots of people didn’t know what her costume was supposed to be.  That surprised me, but I guess they’ll all figure it out next year after the movie comes out.

Here are a few Doctor Who items floating around the interwebs currently…

Tennant & Davies Interview About The End of Their Run

Below is an outstanding video interview with David Tennant and Russell T. Davies, the outgoing star and executive producer of Doctor Who.  This was produced for Boing Boing and the interviewer is Richard Metzger.  Well worth your time.

If you can’t view the embedded video, click here.

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Doctor Who Takes the Cake

Wow!  I’ve seen those competitive cake baking shows on the Food Network, but I never thought I’d see Doctor Who cakes!  Well… except my own Groom’s cake. Here are a few, but click here to visit the Cake Wrecks post full of Doctor Who themed cakes.

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The TARDIS Console Room Gets a Facelift

A few weeks ago I mentioned that Matt Smith’s TARDIS looked brand new from the outside.  I even speculated whether the inside might have been updated.  Well, rumor is the inside will be different when Matt Smith takes over.  From io9 (and they got it from a Gallifrey Base poster):

A poster at Gallifrey Base claims to have gotten a good look inside the new TARDIS set, which we’ll see in 2010. Supposedly, the interior of the TARDIS will have two different levels, joined by a spiral staircase, and we’ll be seeing a console room, a lab area, a sitting room, a long corridor, and “numerous other little nooks and crannies.” The set is designed to be modular, so that pieces of the set can be moved around and double as other parts of the ship, when we visit other rooms inside the TARDIS.

The console room itself is a shaped like a hexagon attached to a square rather than being circular, the color theme is mostly silver and gold, and the coral finish has been replaced with marble. The roundels decorating the walls are now inverted hemispheres, and while they appear throughout the set, they do not appear on every wall. The roundels have different color schemes for each room: gold in the console room, silver, gray, and blue in the lab, and brown in the sitting room.

You should, of course, take this with several truckloads of grains of salt.

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Doctor Who Ranks #2 on io9’s Top 100 Science Fiction/Fantasty Shows

Last week io9 ran a listing of what they consider to be the Top 100 Science Fiction/Fantasy Shows of all time.  Doctor Who came in at #2 (just behind Star Trek).  They described it as, “One of the most iconic shows on television – period – let alone science fiction TV”.  That’s pretty cool!  Additionally, while reading through the list I discovered that Terry Nation (the creator of the Daleks) worked on MacGyver!!!  Turns out that Nation was a producer on MacGyver for six episodes.  Doctor Who & MacGyver – two great tastes that taste great together!!!

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My thanks to Ed for directing me to most of this information.

At the San Diego Comic Con they showed trailers for The Waters of Mars and The End of Time.  The second one isn’t very clear, but it’s the best copy I could find.

The Waters of Mars (later this year)

If you can’t see the embedded video above, please click here.

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The End of Time (Christmas 2009)

If you can’t see the embedded video above, please click here.

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Finally, if you just can’t wait for new Doctor Who, then check out the free online short story Blue Moon that was written to commemorate the 40th anniversary of Apollo 11 landing on the moon.  Click here to read the prologue.

Here is a fantastic two-page spread from IDW’s Doctor Who: The Forgotten #6. The story was by Tony Lee and the art was by Kelly Yates.

Such a cool image!  Click to enlarge.