The Wheel in Space episode 2 discussion:
Sp: I think that the “Jarvis” from this episode should switch places with the “Jarvis” from the Iron Man movies. The space station could use that much calm and Tony just tune the dude out.
H: So, I’ve kept quiet about the big reveal in this episode. Was everyone surprised.
Most everyone: Yes.
K: No. But I knew already too.
H: Well good.
Sp: It seemed like those spheres that were hitting the hull were like tee-tiny. So, are these the most adorable Cybermen ever?
R: Gotta catch ’em all!
H: The two in the ship grew, but we’ll found out in future episodes how tiny whatever comes out in those bubbles are.
Sp: The horror. Many knees were assimilated that day.
K: So. Zoe Heriot… most precocious character on Doctor Who ever?
E: Yes. Yes, my god, I love her.
R: So far.
P: And genius too.
R: This is time travel, but although Adric is more precocious, Zoe is more adorable.
H: Adric merely had a medal for mathematic achievement. Whereas Zoe is more all around.
P: I just figured she’d memorized stuff real good working in the library.
H: Heh. So, did anyone recognize the actress playing Tanya?
P & R: I think so, but I don’t know where I’d seen her before.
H: She’s an old TARDIS project favorite.
Sp: Oh, did she play one of the insect people in the Web Planet?
H: No.
P: Was she a Dalek?
H: Nope. She was… Naneena!
[laughter]
K: Ah yes, the Savages. I don’t remember her having quite the accent in that.
Sp: She doesn’t either.
R: “Na-neeee-nah!”
[laughter]
K: She’s matured a bit.
R: This is the actress, not the character.
K: Yes. We know.
H: Did you also recognize the space suits from the guys walking over to the rocket ship?
A: They did look familiar.
H: They were reused in a couple of films called Star Wars and the Empire Strikes Back. One of them was Bossk’s suit.
K: And the other was probably the guy in the space suit in the cantina. It was tough to tell going black and white in this to color in Star Wars. But I can see that. Neat.
H: Again we’ll see them again a few times, worn by various people in this story.
R: Again, Australian censors blah blah blah weird things cut blah blah blah.
H: The fact that we have a little footage is really down to episodes 3 and 6 being available and Loose Cannon with the editing.
K: So they just took appropriate shots from those and clipped them in. I did love the “egg” moving over and bumping the other egg like “Hey, George. Wake up! Ready to go!”
Sp: The space walk scene and the air lock entry were really well choreographed and acted.
R: Agreed.
P: Also for once they showed a companion putting thought into saving the day.
K: I really thought the signal was Morse Code for a bit.
P: Me too. But how was a 18th Century Scottsman supposed to know Morse Code.
K: He could have picked it up with his travels with the Doctor.
P: You’d think the Doctor would have a guide in the TARDIS for how to survive as a companion longer than most.
Sp: Step one, this is a door.
P: Do not open while traveling.
H: This (figure one) is a key.
K: It was hard to follow the…
Sp: The first third of the episode, yes.
K: Yes. Pretty much anything on the bridge.
Sp: Too much cross talk and jargon.
[we digress for a bit]
K: Anyway.
Sp: So, final thoughts?
R: Hey!
H: Well?
R: It looks like we have another nicely overtightened admin nut job in Captain Jarvis.
H: Almost as if this was a formula.
R: Wait, you mean this is a base?
[laughter]
P: Under siege?
R: If I see a jungle I am leaving.
H: There’s no jungle. Remember, no more Terry Nation in the project.
P: I don’t know. Think there’s still a bunch of those trees lying around.
Sp: The seeds in the lab!
R: Seriously though ever fourth utterance out of his voice is this sort of husky unintelligible shout. “THERE CAUN’T BEEEE!” We should have an over-under on when that blood vessel in his temple is going to burst.
K: Yeah. What is it with crazy leaders over and over again.
H: Again, almost as if it was a formula.
Cz: People in the future are cuh-RAY-zee.
R: I have to admit I hope that Lethbridge-Stewart guy shows up again. The science in this one… well… there actual was science.
H: I think we said that last week too.
R: Yep. But the whole “he turned down water” that whole conversation I thought was really brilliant.
K: I like the doctor. Corwyn. She was cool. That was a good scene.
H: And how about Jamie coming up with that Pseudonym looking at that medical equipment. I’ll bet that never gets a call back in the show.
K: This isn’t the first time they’ve used John Smith?
H: This is the first time.
K: Cool. It won’t be the last. Or even close to the last.
R: Some random stuff – as the doctor was examining Jamie “now breathe in, now breathe out, now breathe out as slowly as you can… yup, you’re drunk!”
Sp: Or Scottish.
K: But we got to see Jamie’s chest.
A: Would have been better in live action, though.
P: Yeah, the censors might have cut that one, man.
K: Alas, they clearly didn’t, or we would have gotten to see it moving.
R: I really liked the interchange between Zoe and Jamie and Bill Duggan. “What’s your friend a doctor of? Neurology? Psychology? Biology? Etymology?” “Yes.”
H: Yes. That was fun.
Sp: Was Patrick sick this week?
H: He was on vacation. In fact, in the recon they used a still of him lying on the bed. In the actual episode the person lying on the bed had his face turning to the wall and it was a stand it.
Sp: A “stand-in” or a “Lie-in?”
[groans]
P: So then is this the third episode we have seen without the Doctor so far?
K: At least the 7th. Without Pat.. I’m not sure.
[we try counting… maybe closer to 9… but we’re not sure.]
P: Alright. Start over. We have to track that.
H: Unearthly Child next week.
[groans]
K: No.
H: Are we at final thoughts?
Sp: Have been.
EG [8 year old]: I thought that I did not know anything except that there was a giant monsters are going to attack them all, and… yeah.
H: Did you enjoy it?
EG: Otherwise than not understanding the whole episode? Yes.
MS [nearly 10 year old]: It was pretty good. [says over computer game] I haven’t seen Doctor Who in a long time, [not since before Christmas break – about a month] but it was pretty good tonight.
H: Anything else?
MS: I love how it ends with the mini-Cybermen. To me, those were one of the scariest ones that I’ve seen in the Doctor Who old series so far.
H: Cool.
E: Zoe. Just Zoe. Okay, I do have more. There were some really good conversations in this episode. I really like how the dialog was written. It felt really natural. It was also really engaging to watch as well, like the conversation about “Well, he asked for water, and that’s a precious thing out here. He must be a stowaway.” There were some really good dialog in this episode.
H: I would agree absolutely, with one exception. Those nose for trouble conversation.
E: That was so corny.
K: Yeah. That was bad. I was waiting for her to say something like “my fake synthetic nose can smell aliens” or something cool. Not “for trouble.” Oh my god.
H: I knew it was coming. I’d seen this before. And yet, all I could think of “oh, David Whittaker, no! You were doing so well!”
E: Well, we had to have the yang for the yin somewhere.
A: I enjoyed the banter between Zoe and Jamie, and I look forward to more of that.
Sp: Does Zoe have some… how do I put this… PC glow on her.
H: We’ll find out.
A: Cybermen balls.
Sp: There are children here, thank you.
A: And one of them inspired that when he said “Yeti balls” thank you.
P: I was, again, pretty impressed with Scotsman doing all the work. I enjoyed the conversation about him not wearing ladies clothing. I did not see the Cybermen coming.
E: Me either!
H: Success!
P: And I really like Zoe. As a character and a person. And I thought it was Awe-Some.
Sp: [thinks] We got the first half non-sense. We’ve covered Jamie’s clothing and contributions. The nose lady. We’ve got Cybermen – surprise Cybermen. Surpisermen. Covered the lack of Doctor.
P: Which, by the way, you didn’t feel like it. To me.
H: That’s a decent point. When Hartnell wasn’t there it felt like a very different show. But Jamie is a strong enough of a protagonist maybe, that it doesn’t feel like there’s a Doctor shaped hole.
P: It helps that there were a good five strong characters in this episode.
R: It also helps that it’s not “oh crap, Billy’s fallen over again. Find out some way that the Doctor can be invisible this week.”
K: That one happened once.
H: I feel… I remember us always commenting when Hartnell was gone about how much the episode suffered without him, with one or two exceptions, like the Time Meddler. I’m not saying that it felt like they wrote him out because of an emergency. There was always a reason to write him out. I don’t know.
Sp: Well, to both Photobug and Ronelyn’s point, I think the reason that it seems seamless in this episode is that they didn’t have to split up lines or story telling duty that normally would be the Doctor to other characters. Everybody’s contribution felt natural for this stage of the story.
H: Well… there were Hartnell episodes where he was missing that had the same thing, where it was obviously written with the intention of him not being there, but we still felt his absence more. I feel like the strength of Jamie’s character has something to do with it here, but I’m not sure.
K: I agree with the Historian here…
H: Mon Dieu!
K: I know. I’m not supposed to agree with you.
Sp: It’s okay. I don’t agree with him. You’re covered.
K: But anyway. I adore Jamie, so it was nice to have an episode that mostly focused on him. Dialog written for him. I did miss Patrick, because he’s so much fun. But it’s nice, once it a while, to focus on a favorite companion. It’s only one episode out of a six part story. That’s fine. I’m looking forward to Patrick back next week. But it was nice to focus on Jamie for a bit, especially with fun dialog.
H: Getting back to your final thought, Spoo.
Sp: Not a fan of this one. It didn’t hold my attention like last episode did…
H: That’s because there was no servo robot.
Sp: eh… yes and no. Last episode was a smaller story and had more mystery and was a little bit different in tone and plot / mysteries than we’ve seen in a while. This episode felt much more like conventional Doctor Who setup episode with a bunch of NPCs that I couldn’t really follow, and an NPC with that PC glow on her, and some amusing things for the companion to do, and we start learning place names and people names and Uh Oh! Cybermen, and scene!
H: Yeah. That’s fair.
Sp: Didn’t grab me. But it’s a perfectly cromulant use of one part of a six parter. I’d object if the next episode was like this too, because the bad guy’s here and they really should get going.
K: Yes, we haven’t seen anybody die yet.
H & Sp: Nope.
H: Ronelynnnnnnn.
R: [Scottish accent] “So, where was that department you wanted me to go to again?” [scientist] “It’s the parapsychology library. Oh, don’t worry, it’s not real science.”
K: You were the psychology major there, Ronelyn.
H: I get the feeling they’re not using parapsychology as we use parapsychology. Not ghosts, but…
Sp: Exopsychology.
H: Not exactly. Zoe has been specifically trained in disciplines like having photographic memory and doing quick calculations. It’s not the same thing that we use to describe parapsychology today.
K: I’m just sitting on things I can’t say. This is a tough one.
H: I know.
P: As an outsider this is interesting to hear. I have no experience with this character in Doctor Who.
A: I only know the name.
P: I didn’t even know that until now.
K: So, my turn? I did enjoy this one. I admit, it was a lot because of looking forward to Zoe and getting to see those scenes. I adored the scenes with Jamie. Bit on the bridge were pretty unbearable, but thankfully short. I agree with Spoo that it suffered from early part of long story heavy on exposition syndrome. And I am getting kind of sick of base under siege. I expect I will be comparing this one to the Moon Base, and various other early Cybermen stories before this story is done. But I am enjoying it and looking forward to more.
H: I enjoyed the episode, but I will certainly agree with Spoo that last week was much more of a change in pace, and this week is much more of what we’ve been seeing the entire year. I can totally understand why you feel that way. And now that the big bad has been revealed I don’t have to be coy about that anymore, and that’s a relief.
E: You need no longer hide your secrets from us.
H: Well, some of them.
Sp: I know some of his secrets. Yes, he does.
K: And now the body count gets to go up.
Sp: Yay!
H: We’ll find out!
