Counting Down

First off, a change of Chathamological pace.
Drew that in a bored moment several weeks ago. Probably should post the next episode, where the Big N indulges in seduction, sadism and something else beginning with S (no idea... hang on, SPIRITUALISM, that's it). The bit where he goes Varos on the school bully should be exciting.

What else?

I've definitely gone off the boil over The End of Time. Sorry, Rusty, but you can only milk it so long before I just stop giving a shit. And it's been over a year promised, and frankly, it's not worked. At all. The gap year is a spectacular failure by any real judge. I enjoyed The Waters of Mars, but would have been impossible to do as part of a normal 13 episode run? Oh, and RTD's claim that the Tenth Doctor is "cured" of his insane goodhood at the end of the story is transparent garbage. If so, why's he acting like such a prick in all the scenes offered to us? And seriously, Rusty, do you think anyone was really enjoying your exclusive preview of the story which took the form of David Tennant seemingly being threated with gang rape by some OAPs of both sexes? June Whitfield might carry it off, but that old bloke is more disturbing than Dayna's boyfriends...

Whenever I've been asked why I chose Santa Claus as a career, I never once considered the answer of "you get to see folk naked". Well, consider that option locked in, Eddie, at least under "why you should NOT do it".

First some hairy mutant with a leer tried to outstare me and then, over the course of half an hour, slowly turned around and dropped his pants to allow me to admire his even hairier backside, and then a Benny Hill skit ensues with a recalicitrant toddler, unwilling to leave his mother's arms, decides to rip her dress off when the father takes hold of him. Just goes to show, no matter how hot it is SEMPA UBI SUB UBI - always wear under wear.

(I won't go into what this might mean about the mysterious brown substance spattered over the green "lawn" where my throne is placed... mainly because I'd throw up.)

Next off, I'm sure there's at least ONE person who's watching Doctor Who for the first time on ABC2 and thus thoroughly boggling as the Doctor's adventures with Donna on Monday are spoiled by his solo jaunts on Friday, where he's being all lonely and emo. So while there are points for trying to show Doctor Who on Christmas Day, showing Planet of the Dead of all things is terrible. And not because it's the wrong religious festival (I remember them screening The Vicar of Dibley Easter Special at Christmas, three years after it was made, so we all knew which main character would die in it...)

Speaking of TVs to avoid, my TV died on Sunday. Leave it for one day and... mind you, it HAD been on the way out. The remote didn't work, and for quite a while we had to turn it on hours ahead of time so the screen would focus properly and warm up. Then one day, no picture. Everything else worked, so whatever was wrong was bloody fundamental. So, I think, typical - a TV dying the week before Christmas, when they're at their most expensive.

So, I decide to replace it with the TV from the dining room, a TV given to me by my grandfather in his will (and it's a bloody good TV too). We wire it up... and it doesn't understand how to work with a DVD player. Despite it working fine with the one in the dining room. So I swap the machines round. That works. But that leaves me bereft of TV while cooking or food preparing, so... out of sheer "what the hell" ness... I try wiring up the TV from my bedroom, over ten years older than any other TV in the house. I've tried on innumerable occasions to get it working with a DVD player in my bedroom, never worked once. And this time... IT DOES!

I have no idea why. Guess the old ones are the best.

Oh yes, and I dreamed of another episode of Son of Dr Who. Well, another episode of The Daleks would probably have driven me to suicide and Oak & Quill would have left me insane. No stuff about downloading it or anything, just the fractured narrative in my head.

"Curtis" lands his TARDIS (shaped like one of those planet hoppers from The Ark) in a deserted city, and is pretty pissed off as he has no idea where or when he is - and he needs to know to plot a course. He wanders around the city, looking for someone to tell him such details, but nothing. Then he finally enters this arcade of statues (freaky abstract stuff, no weeping angels) and sees another man at the end of the arcade, who seems almost catatonic and afraid of him. "Curtis" puts on the charm... very badly... and tries to chat to the guy and find out little things like where the hell are they and where the hell is everyone else.

The man runs away and finally Curtis catches up to him and is forced to be even more diplomatic. The man, slightly calmer, explains he lives alone in the city and has been building the sculptures for want of something to do. There is no one else there, no one to talk to. "They went away," he keeps saying simply and soon "Curtis" twigs the guy is saying all he knows. Despite being a typical 60s silver metropolis of technology, nothing works. There's power, but the lights don't glow and the doors don't slide open, and there's nothing but silence.

Working out it's a colony of some kind, "Curtis" goes back to the TARDIS to try and fix position by the stars and the man, having nothing else to do, follows him. He is calm one moment, almost normal and slightly self-deprecating, the next he's a wide eyed freak staring in silent horror at things we can't see. "Curtis" has little or no patience and, taking a sextant from his ship, heads out the city to look at the sky... but there's no sky, just a mess of feedback howlaround. "It's been like that since everyone went away," the man explains sadly.

"Curtis" is freaked out and decides to cut his losses and run, but the man gets disturbingly creepy at this point, effectively bitching that "Curtis" has a choice about how to leave and will never stay and face anything he doesn't care for, whether he deserves to or not. "Curtis", a bit insulted, offers to take the man with him, but the man refuses to leave the city like everyone else. Indeed, he starts to suspect that "Curtis" may not actually be real, but some sort of ghost.

"Curtis" tells the man to stop his whiny-ass cry-baby impression and decides to explore the city for answers - like why the man chose that arcade for his artwork, when he could have chosen anywhere. He soon finds lots of cables lead to that arcade, and the head artwork is actually covering an electric chair of some kind. This arcade was the execution yard. "And your frankly unhealthy obsession with it speaks volumes," "Curtis" broods. "So who are you? The executioner? Or the one who would have been executed?"

A disembodied voice calls out across the arcade. Oh, and the sun has set (I know there's no sky, tell my dream that) and since the city has no lights everything's gone dark. "Curtis" accuses the man of lying and storms off to find the owner of the voice, despite the man's desperate efforts to stop him. Finally "Curtis" loses his patience and just decks the man and heads off with a pen torch, searching the corridors. The voice rambles on about punishment and not being able to give freedom or rehabilitation. "Curtis" finds the room the voice is coming from, but when he manages to get the door open... the room's empty.

Deciding this is all some Scooby Do shite, "Curtis" head back to the TARDIS. He finds a hooded figure barring his way. Furious, "Curtis" tells the reaper to get the fuck out of his way and the figure lifts the hood to reveal the man, but his face is painted white, his eyes are screwed shut and his mouth open in a scream. "Curtis" flinches as a cheer is heard and, looking away for a second, the figure is gone.

"Curtis" returns to the arcade and finds the man sulking, ignorant of the vision. "Curtis" is fairly certain that he knows what's going on - the ghost is the man, who was executed at this very spot. At that point "everyone went away" and he was left alone in the city. Somehow, everyone except him perished in some ghastly rewiring accident. But that doesn't explain the sky, does it?

Things blur at this point. "Curtis" works out the truth. The TARDIS landed at the exact same second the electricity was turned on, and has royally buggered up time: the city is frozen in a split second, which is why everyone has vanished and nothing works. Only the man, at the heart of the chaos, is left, in the split second between life and death. The "weight" of the TARDIS is keeping reality paused, allowing the man to be free.

"Curtis" decides to leave, setting the TARDIS in motion, even though this will cause time to snap back and the man to be executed. "Curtis" coldly ignores the man's pleas, insisting that his own society chose for him to die - who is "Curtis" to argue with such a legal system. "I have already been scolded for interfering in the affairs of others," he announces, powering up the TARDIS.

The man falls to his knees and begs for mercy.

"I think, my friend, you are confusing me with someone else," "Curtis" says icily, (clearly referring to the Doctor) and dematerializes the TARDIS. The man fades away, reappearing in the electric chair in front of a crowd who cheer as he is fried alive. In the TARDIS, "Curtis" chuckles to himself. "There may be some satisfaction from inaction after all!" he laughs.

And, the episode at an end, I fell out of bed and eventually woke up.