Doctor Who Cares?

[DanaC]

Umm. It doesn't. They're completely different genres. Probably the only comparison would be they're both very British. Whatever that means...


Spaced was a two series comedy show (a bloody good one!)
Doctor Who is ... part sci-fi, part fairytale and has been around in one guise or another for 47 years.


[eta] actually, thinking about it there are some similarities in the humour. Doctor Who jumps from serious to cheeky humour/cheesiness. The people who made Spaced were very influenced by Who (Pegg's a huge fan and has played in quite a few Doctor Who audios). I guess it shares a kind of atmosphere: but Spaced was aimed at adults. Who is family viewing, with the emphasis on making the growups laugh/engage, whilst scaring the kiddiewinks. Most Brits my age (and therefore the people who made Spaced) have some memory of 'hiding behind the couch' (or cushions) when the Doctor Who baddy came on screen.

Davros (the creator of the Daleks in Who mythology) used to scare the shit out of me when I was little. The Daleks scared me, but Davros made me hide :P

[DanaC]

@ Merc: watch seasons 1 and 2 (of the new Who), they're excellent. The first series is Chris Eccleston and was the relaunch after a long absence. It creates a lot of the underlying pathos (and depth) of the later series. Eccleston's Doctor is the last (recent) survivor of a war that wiped out his people. Second series Tennant took over the role and the relationship between the Doctor and his female companion, Rose, starts to take on greater resonance. The ending of that season was brilliant and heart breaking.

Those two series are, amongst other things, a love story, and set the paradigm which later series followed, of the Doctor as a tragic (as well as chirpy, cheeky and brilliant) character.

Here's a clip of Eccleston's Doctor from the first series of the re-imagined Who, one of my favourite episodes: the Empty Child.
The kids are streetkids who gather together in the houses of the better off and eat their food whilst they're all in the air raid shelters.

[Happy Monkey]

Originally Posted by DanaC

The people who made Spaced were very influenced by Who (Pegg's a huge fan and has played in quite a few Doctor Who audios).

More than that: Pegg played a villain, and Hynes played the Doctor's lover.

[DanaC]

Oh yeah; i forgot about Pegg's villain. He was that TV controller guy was't he?

Hynes (I believe she's now called Stephenson or somethng) was wonderful as his lover, when he was 'human'.

Lots of British actors have guested in Who. Even back in the 80s with its shaky sets and monster suits it used to get a lot of very respected actors in guest roles. Doctor Who is an institution over here, not just a show :P

[xoxoxoBruce]

This link will take you to a video compilation of all the women who have been in Dr Who.

[Sundae]

Originally Posted by TheMercenary

The episode was where the people were trapped in the Library

The owner of The Library - or at least his descendant - was a fat faced man with a dimpled chin. That was Steve Pemberton, one of my favourite actors/ writers/ crushes. Just so you know.

Originally Posted by HungLikeJesus

I've never seen Dr. Who. How does it compare to Spaced?

Originally Posted by DanaC

...The people who made Spaced were very influenced by Who (Pegg's a huge fan and has played in quite a few Doctor Who audios).

Edgar Wright (Director of Spaced, Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz) is also a huge Who fan. At the time Spaced was written/ broadcast, we were still in a Who desert. Therefore there are far more references to Star Wars - Tim was supposed to be an obsessive but not completely a geek. Or at least not such a hopeless geek that he revered a programme that had burnt out (during the first series of course - second series addressed the new trilogy of Star Wars).

Had Dr Who not been on hiatus during Spaced I'm sure there would have been more references. But as Dani says, they are horses of a completely different colour.

The League of Gentlemen (shoehorned in again) for example were all fans (Pemberton is a Gent) but never referenced it. Mark Gatiss has written Dr Who novels, episodes and appeared in one (as Professor Lazurus) but still, in a series heavy on film and TV references from their childhoods, there was no Who. But if you listen to their commentaries (esp the guest commentary on The Blood on Satan's Claw which makes me laugh even now) you can tell what a big fans Gatiss and Dyson are.

[Spexxvet]

Syrup - growing up - Log Cabin. Adult - rela 100%. Old fart - sugar free.

Pertwee is one of the funniest names ever.

[DanaC]

True....but beaten into second place by Christopher Lillycrap.