Eruditorum Presscast: Smile
Another Thursday, another Eruditorum Presscast, this time with Daniel Harper and I talking about Smile, which neither of us disliked particularly, and which both of us found loads to complain about.
If that sounds fun, listen here. If that doesn’t sound fun, LISTEN ANYWAY OR WE’LL TURN YOU TO FERTILIZER.
April 27, 2017 @ 8:01 pm
“Like I said: once.”
April 29, 2017 @ 5:30 pm
I think that the season is going to get a lot better than what it has been. I mean, you said this, but look at the start of every Capaldi season: stuff that either is just fine, or is disappointing but gets better on rewatch. In addition, I think that this season has talent far more evenly spread out. You get fine-Moffat and Boyce at the start, but then Dollard, Bartlett (our Gaiman for this season), Maitheson, the massive showpiece trilogy (hopefully Whithouse won’t screw up, but gives a crap-Moffat and Harnass are always a win), Munro (who’ll be this season’s doing-their-own-thing person), Gatiss, and gives a crap-Moffat on the end. Talent seems evenly distributed across the season (probably only one real concern for crap at the middle). I mean, Season 8 worked because of escalation, and Season 9 was the most anthology-like season since 2. Capaldi seasons don’t have consistent logic to them.
May 3, 2017 @ 8:24 am
Do you know I think this may just be me, but I really prefer EP when it’s finding new and interesting things to say about its subjects and getting excited about them. The prolonged moan about faults feels very trad-fandom? Which isn’t to say that Smile was great by any stretch of the imagination. I think the faint praise verdict was right – it was fine. But I’d argue with many of the actual critiques landed on this podcast. I think it was clear what Cotrell-Boyce was trying to land – he wants to write modern fairy tales, that tell a story while evoking a set of associations that give it weight and atmosphere. He wrote one last year about forests/ fairies/ children/ our relationship with nature. He bit off far more than he could chew. This year he wanted to do the future/ spaceships/ robots. He did it, it was fine, the story basically worked unless you really want to nitpick. He also gave us a big chunk of time with the Doctor and Bill, which was lovely. There were lots of character bits for Bill that seemed pretty spot on considering – the two hearts sequence, ‘I’m on a real spaceship’. That said, it didn’t really ever sing in the way really good DW does, but it did ok…
May 6, 2017 @ 9:47 pm
Yeah, well, let me get some lens of history to see what’s new and interesting versus not about a thing and I’ll get right on that, but this is the podcast, not the TARDIS Eruditorum entry.
May 9, 2017 @ 3:09 pm
Indeed, fair enough.
March 3, 2020 @ 8:38 am
This is so fun! What a great idea. Also I love how authentic you seem to here
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