fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #2302 ]

[ SECRET POST #2302 ]

⌈ Secret Post #2302 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 03 pages, 065 secrets from Secret Submission Post #329.
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Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
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What would you recommend for someone who is interested in getting into Doctor Who, but is intimidated by the massive amount of canon and has no frickin' idea where to start?

Old Who or New Who?

Both? :)

Well, I don't know if you like the style of new who or old who better, but if you want to get into both at the same time...hmm...

If I had to pick five good episodes that would immediately give you a really broad impression of and/or introduction to the general themes and ideas and style of New Who that aren't too atypical or confusing but will kind of make you want to see more to understand them better, I'd go for The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances, The Runaway Bride, Gridlock, The Fires of Pompeii, and The Eleventh Hour. Especially Gridlock. The level of Who-ish insanity there is ridiculously entertaining and will kind of make you prepared for anything without being too dumb. After you've dabbled a bit, go to the beginning and watch it in order because the character arcs are quite awesome.

For Old Who...oh man, a lot more to choose from there. There isn't huge amounts of continuity, so I'll just throw out some variety: The Empty Child is the very first episode, so you might want to check it out, but the rest of that serial is really dull. So...The Aztecs, The Romans, The Dalek Invasion of Earth, Tomb of the Cybermen, The Mind Robber (TOTAL CRACK), The Invasion (part of it is missing but there's an animated reconstruction of the missing parts), Spearhead from Space, Inferno (but only watch this if you've seen at least one serial from season 7 first - it's characterization-heavy), Day of the Daleks, Terror of the Autons, Robot, Pyramids of Mars, Genesis of the Daleks, The Talons of Weng-Chiang (beware facepalming racefail among the win), The Androids of Tara, City of Death, Kinda, Arc of Infinity, Remembrance of the Daleks, Battlefield...

After getting more acquainted with the characters, I'd also try The War Games, The Green Death, The Caves of Androzani, and The Curse of Fenric.

Start the New Series (series 1, with Rose). That's what I did, and worked my way up until I finally caught up. Then I saw the Doctor Who movie featuring the 8th Doctor (takes place directly before the new series starts).

I'm currently finishing up one of the the spin-offs, Torchwood (recommend watching this after s3), but as soon as that's over with I intend to start on Classic Who. I tried to start the classic series first but found it way too dry. Hopefully it will be easier now that I have more of a feel for the DW universe.

Seriously, though, just start from New Who.

No. Do not start with Rose. Rose is a terrible episode and really gives a weird impression of the show.

I'd start with a small variety of scattered episodes to get the feel for the show first. The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances. Gridlock. The Fires of Pompeii. Smith and Jones. The End of the World. The Impossible Planet/The Satan Pit. School Reunion. Dalek. The Eleventh Hour. The Rings of Akhenaten. The Runaway Bride. Pick a few of those.

Then go back to Rose, and watch it in order.

No. Do not start with Rose. Rose is a terrible episode and really gives a weird impression of the show.

Interesting... care to clarify? I was a fan before I saw "Rose", so I might not have noticed the "weird impression" stuff since I already knew the ins and outs of the show. Plus, it's been awhile since I've seen "Rose", so maybe I'm forgetting some stuff.

What? Well, maybe this works for some people but I personally have to start a series from the beginning. Watching a few scattered episodes when you don't have background info is awful.

If you do prefer to do it this way, OP, I suggest watching "Father's Day" or "The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances" first. "The End of the World" and "Dalek" is also good.

"Aliens of London/World War 3" are to this day some of my least favorite episodes, and I don't recommend starting off there at all.

i agree, i have a friend who was started on the runaway bride (mentioned above) by another friend, and it turned her totally off Who until i convinced her to start again with Rose

...um, lol. This is awkward, but I had a friend who thought Rose was so stilted and awkward and dumb she'd make fun of me for watching the show until I forced her to sit down and watch The Runaway Bride, which she thought was "two parts hilarious and one part mind-blowing," to quote her.

At first I thought it might be just that she preferred Ten to Nine, but once she started watching she loved Nine too, so it wasn't that.

Hey, hey OP? OP! *waves* I think carma-bee's comment combined with mine pretty much sums up the fanbase of this show perfectly :D Everyone's opinions are unbelievably contradictory, and IMO you're best off just reading promo blurbs and watching whatever episodes sound cool to you.

Re: WHOVIANS OF F!S

carma-bee.livejournal.com - 2013-04-23 00:40 (UTC) - Expand

Watching a few scattered episodes when you don't have background info is awful.

....

....

....

*does not compute*

*error*

How can you live? I cannot comprehend how anyone can be like this. Not knowing the background at first is half the magic of getting into any show. But there I go with my rigid opinions too :)

But I'm sure the OP wouldn't've have asked for recs if they could only enjoy watching things in order.

Whereas this really doesn't make sense to me. If I come into a show cold in the middle of the series, I spend most of the episode thinking, "What's going on? Who are these people? Why should I care about them?" The first episode is meant to introduce the viewer to the characters, the setting, and the premise, so that everything else that happens after that will make sense and you don't have to waste time being confused when you could be enjoying the story.

I mean, YMMV certainly, and you should enjoy things how you want to enjoy them, but I don't get being *confused* by wanting to understand what's going on.

Re: WHOVIANS OF F!S

intrigueing - 2013-04-23 02:20 (UTC) - Expand

Um...Well, speaking as someone like this...I *like* knowing wtf is going on plot-wise. It can give a really weird sense of a show if you take something from near the beginning, then jump to something closer to the end because character development tends to happen. It's not *quite* as bad with Dr. Who...but it can still give a weird sense of things.

And yeah - you are being a bit rigid there :P

I just cannot do that. The very first Doctor Who episode I ever saw (The Runaway Bride, actually) was awesome and interesting and yet I couldn't enjoy it half as much as when I actually started watching NuWho form the beginning and had a better feel for the plot and the characters. Otherwise nothing makes sense, and it's no spend wasting time trying to figure why a character reacted a certain way, or said something weird, etc.

You lose too much when you just jump episodes. For instance, that episode where Ten was wearing a gas mask in "The Poison Sky" (4.05, i believe)and asked "Are you my mummy?". It wouldn't make a lick of sense unless you've seen the s1 eps "The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances".

I don't recommend skipping episodes at all the first time you watch the series. Not all the episodes are amazing (but isn't that so with every series?), but more often than not what pops up in any episode will pop up again.

Re: WHOVIANS OF F!S

(Anonymous) - 2013-04-23 15:24 (UTC) - Expand

yeah all of this. though imo you only have to watch the first two seasons of torchwood. ask for ep recs for classic who if you catch of with newwho

though i actually started with new earth (s2e1) so that's totally possible too as long as you know the general story of the show beforehand

Browse a gallery of the Doctors, and pck one you like the look of. Start with his first episode. Or do the same thing, but with one of the companions.

I'd suggest starting with Season 1 of NuWho, since it's intended as a good jumping-on point for people not familiar with the Classic Who canon. Then if you want to go back and watch some of the Classic series, grab whatever Doctor or companion looks interesting, or whatever serial is recommended to you. Normally I'm a big fan of watching things in order, but because some episodes of Classic Who have been lost, it's impossible to do the completionist thing, so you may as well jump around to whatever looks neat.

This video gives a primer one some good Classic episodes. While not even close to all of the good ones (he only names five), I agree what all these episodes are 1) really good 2) milestones in the series. There's a lot of snark and some swearing, but it's really fun.

I know several people who started at different points to me (somewhere in the Classic era, Ten's episodes, and Eleven's episodes), and they still very much love the series, but I think if you are starting now, the most logical place to do it would still be where I did, with episode one of New Who - providing you are willing to give the series a chance if that ep doesn't wow you. (I loved it when I saw it, but not everyone does.) This is because they were rebooting the show for an entirely new generation of viewers at this point, so I'd name that the easiest point to get into it, you are not expected to know anything about it to watch it. The first episode of Classic would be even better for that of course, but I've heard the old serials can be rather slow, so.

tl;dr: I recommend you start with 'Rose'.

I agree, start with Rose. I started watching the series in October and that's what I did. No regrets.

Although I caught part of Blink on BBCA before seeing any other episode. For the love of god, don't watch this episode first LOL.

Key to Time series. (Tom Baker)

The Deadly Assassin. (Again, Tom Baker)

Really, you can't go wrong with anything Four.

/I may be biased

Huh. I found Four's serials pretty boring until I had explored some of the other Doctors who were less detached and gotten emotionally invested in the character across incarnations. (They are very good plotwise, though).

ayrt

To each their own. I don't need to be "emotionally invested" in DW, I just want to escape into the story. Which became progressively more difficult with Nu!Who as the show wore on. And on and on and on. (I'm the same anon upthread who no longer watches.)

I've always been unable to compute with people who have this opinion (I mean, with some shows I understand enjoyment with no emotional investment. Doctor Who, not so much), but hey, yeah, different strokes ;)

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