Actually this brought up a completely buried memory for me. For a few years I lived in the same neighborhood as him – at the time, cool guy that I was, I had a Starfleet badge on my coat, and one day I was at the grocery store and had an awkward moment with him where our carts got sort of wedged together negotiating the too-narrow checkout lanes. He saw my pin and gave me a Vulcan salute as he moved into his lane. He seemed nice and a bit sheepish. The staff at the coffee shop I used to go to told me he was extremely lovely.

My kids are dying for this thing. If anyone is at SDCC and feels the desire to make some little girls happy, I will Venmo you to buy this and ship it to me so I can stop hearing about it 😂

As much as I love the new series, I haven’t liked the new screwdriver, but I think I’ve realized it’s just the colors I don’t like. I do actually enjoy seeing it look and feel more like a tricorder, and having the little display that slides out does make it feel more like something the Doctor can actually interpret. For some reason, while I’m totally on board for tentacle aliens and killer candy robots and giant space eyeballs and moon eggs, the scenes where the Doctor uses the old style screwdriver and stares at the handle like he’s reading it always felt a little silly to me.

Yeah, all of the recasts have been spectacular with this one exception; I’m fully stumped by Paul Wesley and his take on the character. I don’t need anyone aping Shatner and I love the idea of highlighting the more bookish actual Kirk as opposed to the pop culture image of him, but Ozempic Kirk spends 90% of his time looking bored out of his mind and 10% of his time doing a terrible Han Solo impression that just comes off as creepy. I cannot understand spending so much time on him when literally everyone else on screen sparkles and he has the charisma of wet felt.

I have never seen such cursed content

Breaking the fourth wall is a Doctor Who tradition - the First, Fourth, Sixth, Seventh, Eleventh, and Twelfth Doctors all directly address the camera in addition to the Fifteenth, as do River Song, Martha, Clara, and various Classic villains. I don’t understand why people suddenly need some sort of in-universe explanation for it. It’s a narrative technique, and Doctor Who is a goofy camp show that’s always been flexible enough, playing with various tropes, that it works. Davies explains it perfectly in the link: “I mean, you would [be taken out of the story by it] if it was Pride and Prejudice, that would be odd. But there’s something showy about Doctor Who, there’s something proscenium arch about it. There’s something arch about it, full stop.”

This sort of needing an in-universe explanation for every theatrical device or inconsistency is how you get garbage like Trek’s Klingon augment virus.

I’m not sure I can think of another modern companion that would have carried that episode that well, especially as their first week of work. Donna’s the most complete companion for me, but she’s a very different vibe. Billie Piper’s also really good when she’s given the chance but I don’t know that Doctor Who ever gave her that much chance. Clara by the end but it took a few series I think.

Probably because he sucks

Oops you just explained all of Enterprise

I rank Space Babies pretty highly too, because while I really enjoyed the episode, my daughters LOVED it. They’ve been obsessed with Doctor Who after seeing it –– my five-year-old made me call her Captain Poppy for a full week.

There’s got to be something with her and companions. At this point she’s got the Pond-River-style name (thank god at this point she doesn’t seem to be part of another tedious River Song storyline), she wore Clara’s Face The Raven outfit and called the Doctor a “clever boy,” and she ended the episode in Romana’s fur coat. I’m fully down with her trolling the Doctor/us like this - I just hope she’s not the Master again. There is no character in Doctor Who I’m as sick of as the Master.

(My outside bet is maybe the Meddling Monk? But that’s probably wrong.)

I wish we had a few more Jackie Tyler opportunities for Carla and Cherry. I was sort of bummed we didn’t get a hero moment for Carla in the finale — and Ruby going on about her “real mum” with Carla right there made me feel just awful for her.

It’s gratifying to see how much the fandom — however split people are about this season — has embraced Mille Gibson, because she’s truly phenomenal.

I was worried when people ran with the “she’s being replaced” story (which they thankfully clarified) and started to go with a classic sexist “she’s hard to work with” story (which turned out to be that she got tired on night shoots, being basically an actual child when they started filming) that the fandom would pile on her, and I’m glad that people are recognizing her talent. However the character turned out, she was pretty flawless in the role. Delivering a performance like 73 Yards on your first week at a new job when you’re eighteen years old is pretty impressive.

She also said the “clever boy” thing while essentially wearing Clara’s Face the Raven outfit, then ends the episode in Romana’s coat. She’s definitely trolling the Doctor/us but who knows why. I’d be fine with any reveal as long as it’s not the Master - I would be perfectly happy for him to stay in that gold tooth forever.

This is heart-shattering because I would do anything to see the goofy bug people from The Web Planet make a return

I love this show, but I do not understand how they cannot create a uniform that doesn’t look like pajamas (the Cerritos-style uniforms Janeway and her crew wear look great though). The weird gray they seem to be enamored with looks so silly.

Just upfront, hopefully not here (you never know) but definitely elsewhere, you’re going to run into a lot of the usual bigots telling you that DOctor wHO EnDED wiTH cApaLDi. Coincidentally, the end of Capaldi’s run basically dovetails with when social media algorithms started giving these people brain worms, so everything after that is wOkE gArBaGe while everything before it, with exactly the same messages and techniques, is galaxy brain stuff. They can’t deal with a woman or Black man being on screen so just ignore them, please. (That said, the Thirteenth Doctor’s run is…not great, but certainly not because of those reasons.) If you are concerned about things like a “woke agenda” then Doctor Who is very, very much not the show for you - this has been an important part of the show’s DNA since the 60s.

I’ve loved Doctor Who for thirty years, and seen nearly every episode of every Doctor. The thing about Doctor Who is that it’s goofy and campy, and that ends up with it being dated sometimes, sometimes moreso than other shows. This isn’t a bad thing! It’s charming and fun, but depending on the kind of viewer you are, that might mean that you want to start with the current series (it’s loads of fun and the current Doctor and companion are exceptional), and then watch the older ones in context.

However, that’s going to get you only about six episodes so far. If you really want a project, I’d say start with the 2005 series (the Ninth Doctor) and go from there. You’re going to run into quite a bit that’s very early 2000s, but the fun, camp, and drama, are all on display. I know others will say you can start with the first series of the Eleventh Doctor, but to me you’ll run into a really turgid arc of the showrunner tediously and self-referentially mystery boxing over and over far too soon. This is stuff you ignore when you’ve been watching for a while (or can skip) but it might demoralize you to get into it and then get to molasses so soon.

The classic series are very different - not in terms of story, but format. I love them, I started with the Fourth Doctor, but it’s not to everyone’s taste. They are shorter arcs or four or six twenty-minute episodes, with drastically lower production values and slower pacing. One of the best stories involves the Doctor fighting essentially spray-painted green bubble wrap on a set that sort of looks like a bathroom. If you’re up for it, it’s wonderful, but it’s very different visually and structurally than modern shows.

I’ve seen people suggest adding alcohol, but I think the idea is to simulate that Klingon coffee would have a sharpness or bite to it, rather than assuming that raktajino on the show would actually have alcohol. I played around with some recipes for fun and I actually mixed a few together and found something pretty delicious. I mix Turkish coffee, a small amount of whipped milk, cayenne pepper, cinnamon, and a little honey.