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Elizabeth Sandifer

Elizabeth Sandifer created Eruditorum Press. She’s not really sure why she did that, and she apologizes for the inconvenience. She currently writes Last War in Albion, a history of the magical war between Alan Moore and Grant Morrison. She used to write TARDIS Eruditorum, a history of Britain told through the lens of a ropey sci-fi series. She also wrote Neoreaction a Basilisk, writes comics these days, and has ADHD so will probably just randomly write some other shit sooner or later. Support Elizabeth on Patreon.

17 Comments

  1. Anton B
    December 5, 2013 @ 5:47 am

    This comment has been removed by the author.

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  2. Anton B
    December 5, 2013 @ 5:51 am

    'While it’s true that Moore, who had not come close to establishing himself as a writer, took a genuine professional risk in quitting, the fact that he did so early in his career is the only remarkable thing here. It is, in fact, the first of many such gestures in his career.'

    In fact it happens rather a lot doesn't it? Are you going to propose any theories as to why? Given the depressing frequency that he does it it does strike me sometimes as quite an immature response. Like a kid stomping out of the playground saying "It's my bat and my ball and I'm going home!". I'm not suggesting that Moore is unjustified in his actions, just that every time he does it it becomes more depressingly predictable.

    As far as his work on the Doctor Who comic strips goes – at the time I loved that a writer was finally addressing what to me was the elephant in the room. Doctor Who is both about Time and Space and could, potentially, be as cosmic as the American comics I loved – Green Lantern, The Legion, Mar-Vel and the Kree/Skrull stuff etc. It's clear, in light of their later work, that that's where both Moore and Morrison's inspiration lay also.

    I thought the Order of the Black Sun was an intriguing mash-up of the Order of the Golden Dawn, the Order of the Knights Templar and the Black Sun imprint of Harry Crosby; Poetically conflating a black sun with a black hole and linking it to the Rassilon/Omega mythos to spark an interdimensional war was one of those throwaway strokes of genius that Moore would become known for.

    By the way have you any idea why he turned down the offer to write for the TV show?

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  3. Josiah Rowe
    December 5, 2013 @ 6:03 am

    My understanding (which may be inaccurate or incomplete) is that Cartmel's offer came around the time Moore was beginning to be disenchanted in his work for DC, and the prospect of writing for another character/franchise which he did not own did not appeal to him. Plus, he's on record as saying that all Doctors since the first have seemed like pedophiles to him.

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  4. Josiah Rowe
    December 5, 2013 @ 6:41 am

    You know, it hadn't occurred to me until Phil drew our attention to it in this post that Russell T Davies stole the notion of Rassilon shooting electricity from his fingers from Alan Moore.

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  5. Anton B
    December 5, 2013 @ 6:46 am

    Yes I've seen that quote before. It's just Moore being 'clever and controversial' though isn't it? It doesn't bear much scrutiny. If anything the first Doctor is the only incarnation who could possibly suffer from that accusation. Living alone in an East-End junkyard with his 'grandaughter', investigated by her teachers who he violently abducts. On his return to London a few years later without his 'grandaughter' but with another young girl he hangs around in a night club where his similarity to 'that DJ' Jimmy Saville is noted by a young girl and a sailor who he also abducts while the other young girl who was travelling with him also mysteriously disappears.

    Anyway I'd love to see a Doctor Who story written by either Moore or Morrison. I wonder, now Gaiman's done a couple, whether that's more or less likely?

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  6. Nyq Only
    December 5, 2013 @ 7:49 am

    I think either Moore or Morrison would be good but I suppose both of them would really only shine if they write some major plot arc.

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  7. Theonlyspiral
    December 5, 2013 @ 8:03 am

    That's it! You Win! I'm calling him "Doctor Who" from now on.

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  8. Anton B
    December 5, 2013 @ 8:35 am

    What? Isn't that his name? Seriously, I thought the boat had sailed on that piece of elitist fanwankery ages ago. Extra-diagetically 'Doctor Who' is both the name of the show and the protagonist. Within the narrative (apart from the non-canonical Cushing movies) the protagonist is called the Doctor, the Caretaker, the Valeyard, The Oncoming Storm, The Curator, Theta Sigma, Grandfather or John Smith. Not so seriously – I laugh out loud every time Phil does that in the 'Albion' posts.

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  9. pmcray
    December 5, 2013 @ 8:51 am

    "Christopher Priest, a “proper” literary writer, made extensive use of causality paradoxes in Sealed Orders, his abandoned script for the television series written around the same time as Moore’s comics."

    Does anyone know of good sources of information about Priest's two scripts? I keep hoping that they might turn up as Big Finish Lost Stories. This might be more likely now that Baker I is doing audios, although I wouldn't be surprised if Priest weren't interested.

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  10. Daibhid C
    December 5, 2013 @ 11:18 am

    Ever since Phil said he was writing the Doctor Who references in a way designed to wind up fans, I've been waiting for a reference to "Whovians".

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  11. Anton B
    December 5, 2013 @ 12:27 pm

    and 'screaming assistants'.

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  12. ferret
    December 5, 2013 @ 2:28 pm

    'wobbly sets'

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  13. Josiah Rowe
    December 5, 2013 @ 5:24 pm

    One problem with Big Finish doing "Sealed Orders" is that it was written as Romana's exit story, and its plot is closely tied in to that. Big Finish tends to try to keep their "Lost Stories" roughly consistent with existing continuity, don't they? Would they do a "Lost Story" that contradicted a story broadcast on TV for a major character?

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  14. Bennett
    December 5, 2013 @ 6:05 pm

    Another problem is that Big Finish have announced that they are ending the Lost Stories range with the next release (The Mega). I remember hearing that they have run out of scripts/treatments that are workable and clearable, so I assume that Sealed Orders has already been considered and dismissed.

    Then again, I never thought they'd be able to get Ward and Baker teaming up at all – so anything's possible.

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  15. pmcray
    December 5, 2013 @ 11:50 pm

    It would probably be possible to align "Sealed Orders" with the TV/BF continuity with a little tweaking. Now that Ward is back, the possibility of a full audio of SO does present itself. There's also "The Enemy Within", Priest's Davison's story that would have seen the exit of Adric, so that one wouldn't be particularly easy to work into the continuity either. I suspect though that Priest has been asked and has said no, which is understandable given the appalling way he was treated in the early 1980s, even though neither JN-T or Saward have anything to do with BF. I'm a big Priest fan and would buy SO and TEW in a heartbeat should they be produced.

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  16. Kit
    December 6, 2013 @ 1:50 am

    Morrison has actually pitched to the current production team.

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  17. Unknown
    December 11, 2013 @ 5:08 am

    The Wardog comment is a reference to an exchange between Lord Uxbridge and the Duke of Wellington at the Battle of Waterloo. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lord_Uxbridge's_leg

    Reply

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