9th Doctor - The End of the World (ii)

Links and References -
The Doctor refers to various girlfriends who have similarly claimed to be 'impregnable' when they manifestly weren't ala "Gobot".

There is also some very obvious cut and paste dialogue from "The Mask of Zorro" (the Doctor explaining the universal translation thing), "Lighthouse Cutaway" ('I'm full of ideas of how to make things better and people in authority don't seem to like that sort of thing'), and "Death Comes To Tom" (gleefully telling someone their nearest and dearest is dead).


Untelevised Misadventures -
The Moxx of Baloon destroyed all the Time Lords, TARDISes and Gallifrey itself (not to mention the Nestle Consciousness) and has a blood vendetta against the Doctor. He claims this is a direct result of the Doctor once 'blanking him in polite society'.

Touchy little bastard, isn't he?


K9 Conspiracy –
The false Moxx, when speaking to the Face of Bond, twice mentions K9, including the sentence "Indubitably, this is the K9 scenario."

I'd tell you what this means but I have absolutely no idea and I doubt that the Face of Bond knew what he was talking about either.


Subtext? WHAT Subtext? -

At the episode's climax, the Doctor is seen to, effectively, enact vigilante justice upon Collins. While some have suggested that she might have survived, given that the brain in the tank below the skin does not appear to explode, the story is ambiguous on this point, and
the Doctor himself clearly believes that he is killing her.
GOOD! An amoral, vigilante Doctor is a kick-ass cool idea and Joan Collins is indeed a nasty piece of work. This does raise the question of whether it is right to kill any sentient being in cold blood.
The Doctor committing a brutal act of murder out of revenge answers this question with a resounding, "You betcha!"


Groovy DVD Extras –
The uncut musical sequences where the plot stops for five minutes as everyone dances wildly to a bunch of musicians that have mysteriously appeared in the middle of the room and then vanish just as oddly. These include Soft Cell's "Tainted Love" and Brittany Spears' "Toxic".


Psychotic Nostalgia –
"I heard somebody say 'Burn, baby, burn! Planetary inferno! Burn, baby, burn! Burn the orphanage down, baby! Burn, baby, burn! Planetary inferno! Burn, baby, burn!'... but I think it was a wrong number."


Viewer Quotes -

"Oh, man... Mary-Jane is the sexiest plant I've ever laid eye on. Look at her! LOOK AT HER! Sex on a stick! And Billie Piper being forced to strip due to the rise in temperature! Hah, MY temperature is rising at the moment, nudge, nudge, wink, wink, say no more. Oh my God! That's PC Honey Harmon painted blue! Right. That does it. I'm going to the bathroom. I may be some time."
- Nigel Verkoff (yesterday)

"This episode single-handedly has managed to rip off Farscape, Star Trek, Star Wars, Hitchhiker Guide to the Galaxy, the works of Michael Moorcock, Titan AE as well as a dozen previous Doctor Who stories! So why didn't it steal something GOOD from them?!?"
- Dave Carpenter (2005)

"THAT is the Moxx of Baloon? Well, bugger me sideways and call me Nagasaki." - Barton Luther Zachariah Robert (B.L.Z. Bob - 2006)

"I often pump away at the TARDIS console, grinning wildly at Billie Piper - or at least, the image of her."
- The Wanker, a lesser-known Time Lord (453/Jug/876)

"The ending of the story horrified me in its amorality. How dare the Doctor try to save Joan Collins. It's just as well Rose, the main audience identification figure, calls him up for it. I would have blown her head off, just to be sure. That woman just bugs me."
- Father James O'Malley (2005)

"Doddering, incontinent and old, fat git Tom Baker admits that, whilst he's never heard of Christopher Eccleston, he wishes the actor 'luck' in the role. How magnanimous – NOT! This proves that Baker's peripheral vision has been the bottom of a wine glass! How dare he miss the glaringly stunning performances from Eccleston in... in whatever he's been in. Oh, and anyone who says Eccleston is quitting is a foul, despicable heathen who deserves to be buggered to death."
- eyeofsauros.com.uk (2000)

"I want chips too." - Me. I'm hungry. It's my guide. Deal with it.


Billie Piper Speaks!
"You know, I didn't mind my music being used in this story. I did mind, however, the fact that all the aliens screamed in agony when they heard it, and Chris shouted, 'Surely I don't HAVE to mime to this crap?' But worst of all, it was scripted."


Christopher Eccleston Speaks!
"I never want to be involved in something that's just spooky escapism. I mean, I appear in The Others and Gone in 60 Seconds, but it doesn't mean I wanted to! Yeah, Russell came to me and insisted that social realism to spooky escapism was a ratio somewhere around 300:1. He later admitted he'd got that back to front. We never spoke again."


Russell T Davies Speaks!
"I remember the first draft of The Restaurant At The End Of The World. There was the best pre-titles scene ever ever ever. Then again, you could just play it and cut to scene 2. I wasn't sure so I decided to do both and justify it, artistically, on the evil power of the Moxx of Baloon causing a warp in space and time."


Trivia –
There is a lampshade in scene two which was involved in Doctor Who longer than Tom Baker. Its career started in 1966's Power-Vac of the Dustbins and was last scene in, well, this episode.


Rumors & Facts

Doctor Who has known many lunatics - Tom Baker, the Creator of the Quirks, Richard Briers. But none so truly off the wall as Russell T Davies. From an early age, RTD's only desire was to see the Doctor have nine colours of crap kicked out of him by the author's own creation - the Moxx of Baloon.

It is no surprise his one and only New Adventure, Domaged Goods, features the mysterous 'Moxx B' brutally bash the Doctor and companions unconscious as it causes chaos, terror and death in a housing estate where a handy Tyler family also happen to live.

For eighteen months, readers of Doctor Who Magazine had been slowly but surely going spare as RTD's "Production Notes" column drove them up the wall with paragraph after paragraph of -


"Yes, the Moxx of Baloon is going to be the biggest monster ever! The Bastard has nothing on this machiavellian master criminal who strides the cosmos like a collosus of unmitigated, blood-chilling TERROR! No audience has ever been prepared to behold the TRUE horror of the Moxx of Baloon - and nothing in the TV series, books, audios or comics will ever be the same after the Moxx passes...

Oh, by the way, we cast Chris Eccleston as the Doctor today.

Anyway, back onto the Moxx of Baloon, this bastard is going to blot out the sun! Dustbins! Pah! Those litterbins haven't a budgie in a microwave's chance of getting out of a fight with the Moxx of Baloon! The Moxx is so damn bastard hard, he's not afraid to take anyone outside! The Moxx could pleasure every woman on Earth for one week at a time, and he'd laugh while doing it! THAT'S the kind of guy he is..."


Unfortunately, Davies' rabid Moxxiphilia lead to a bit-part alien in the second episode, Douglas Adams 'Pastiche', being accidentally named the Moxx of Baloon. As said alien was a comic relief Mekon-piss-takery, RTD realized his lifelong dream of The Moxx of Baloon Strikes Back! was now in jeopardy.

RTD instinctive ditched the whole story and tried to rework the story The Restaurant At The End of the World to be set on contemporary Earth and feature the mysterious time traveler played by Nicholas Briggs arriving to kill the Doctor and save Earth from destruction, only to accidentally cause said destruction instead.

However, the script wasn't working out. Why? No idea. Maybe it was because it was shithouse. The Hitchhikers parody was re-commissioned at behest of special effects team The Mill. As this was the most effects-intensive episode of the season, requiring more than two hundred effects shots for its three-quarter-hour running time to be composed in just eight weeks, they suggested they just cut and paste it out of the HHGTG film and trust no one noticed.

Hastily, he rewrote the story so that, while essentially appearing to be a loveable blue midget who wants nothing more than to spread peace and joy throughout the multiverse he was, in fact, a twitching, bubbling, throbbing lump of pure evil the whole time.

Julie Gardner suggest they improve the reputation of the Moxx of Baloon by inventing a crap back story of the Moxx annihilating Gallifrey in a 4-dimensional war, cobbled together from various Amblin film proposals and Laurence Miles' royalties.

Davies quickly realized that the only way to make the Moxx of Baloon a credible, intelligent enemy for the Doctor was to make the Doctor a credulity-stretching, arrogant moron with a fetish for tree women.

It was brainstorming sessions like this that further convinced Christopher Eccelston to get out while the going was good – not mention the advice given to him by Paul McGann and the fact he had also met Tom Baker and knew what horrible fate awaited him.

Filming began in early September in Cardiff's only five-star restaurant, the Dia-Et Leak Noshorama, which was demolished and reconstructed in a Newport warehouse under cover of daylight.

The debut of The Restaurant At The End Of The World on April 2nd came as Doctor Who continued to be squarely in the public eye. On March 29th, when it became clear Doctor Who would be renewed for a second season AND a Christmas special Eccleston announced he would not be remaining for a sophomore season.

Initial BBC reports, apparently released to head off a leak to the tabloids, suggested that Eccleston was concerned about the grueling recording schedule and feared becoming too associated with the role of the Doctor. This is a bloody lie!

Eccleston was far more concerned about the increasing number of skin diseases he was contracting off cast members and his noted Welshophobia was in overdrive. He was also more concerned with staying associated as a gritty fly-by-night Northerner than any particular ongoing role.

He later revealed in his autobiography "I Am The North Made Flesh" that the main reason for his departure from Doctor Who was mainly because of people spelling his name 'Ecclestone'.

RTD and the production team dealt with this in a very mature and reasonable manner, as can be seen in the revised series trailer –

Doctor: D'you wanna come with me? Cause if you do, then I should warn you. You're gonna see all sorts of things. A Christmas special. A second series. The day I quit and pissed you all off. It won't be quiet. It won't be well-timed. And it won't be good for publicity. But I'll tell you what it will be. The anti-climax of a lifetime!


As had so often been the case in the past, controversy and speculation once again stalked Doctor Who like two giant stalking things.

---------
Next Time...
---------
"Now, you've screwed up the future, so let's screw up the past. 1970 – how does 1970 sound?"
"What happened in 1970?"
"We turned up!"
"I can't believe it! You've killed her! She's gone!"
"Er, not gone, Mr. Redpath, sir, honest! Merely sleeping!"
"Sleeping? She's dead!"
"No, she's just pining for the fjords!"
"Oh, no! The client's up on her feet and out there now! I need to take a happy pill! STAT!"
"Headhunter! For shame! How many more times?"
"I'm not addicted! I can stop whenever I want!"
"Excuse me, sir. Mr. Marwood? This is your call, sir."
"Use the Force, Luke! Find the old lady – or we're screwed!"
"I and my friend are what you might call Evaders from Bars."
"Oh my God, Doctor! This so-called youth hostel is really a bordello, bath house and opium den!"
"That sounds more like it!"
---------
...The Presuming Ed...
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BONUS! DOCTOR WHO AUDITIONS!

RTD was not so completely deranged when he cast Christopher "This Is Me Swanning Off!" Eccleston as the Ninth Doctor. A dozen other artistes were considered for the role and their audition tapes are transcribed here to show you the alternatives that made Chris Eccleston seem like such a sensible choice.

Giving up on reviving the Eighth Doctor, it was decided to cast the Ninth Doctor. Alan Davies was chosen with less thought than it takes to blink of an eye, but mysteriously had been fired within three hours. This is probably to do with Davies' fear of being typecast as Jonathon Creek and his rather unusual decision to play the part as per Paul McGann's suggestion of a black woman.

It should be noted that the Ninth Doctor – effectively a black and white minstrel in drag - also being deaf, partially-sighted, educational sub-normal, in her late fifties, with acute kleptomania and Tourette's Syndrome were Davies' idea as well.


Extract from "Doctor Who – Cataclysm Of The Apocalypse" Episode 1:

(Setting: The TARDIS control room. The Doctor [Alan Davies] and Rose [Billie Piper] are present. The time rotor is at rest.)

Rose: OK, Doctor, you insane harlot, what do we do now?

Doctor: (Cackles insanely) We explore, Rose!

Rose: We explore me?

(She backs away from the Doctor)

Doctor: No, no, not that! Full stop, we explore!

Rose: Explore? Explore what?

(The Doctor walks past the console and pointed at the central column.)

Doctor: When the TARDIS in flight is, there the time rotor oscilltilidebilitates... Up and down moves. As see you can, it is not much moving now. Means arrived we have somewhere!

(The Doctor puts on hir coat and wanders through a door. A moment later the Time Lord returns and leaves via the exit.)

Doctor: Wrong door.

Rose: (follows) Hey, wait up, Doc! You crazy transsexual wanker!

(Cut to: outside the TARDIS. The Doctor and Rose emerge in the garishly-decorated foyer)

Rose: Nice spot, Doc! Couldn't you have found somewhere a little easier on the eyes?

(The Doctor picks up a menu marked MILLIWAYS THE RESTAURANT AT THE END OF THE WORLD and starts reading it, ignoring Rose)

Rose: (Shakes head) You know, allowing me back into the TARDIS would have been nice. Taking me back home would be nicer. Giving me the racing results for the next three years would have been bloody polite an all!

(The Doctor spins around, nearly knocking Rose over. Hir shoves the menu in Rose's face)

Doctor: Think of that you what?

Rose: Why was it always questions with the Doc?

Doctor: Are you answering back, (Screams) BITCH WHORE ELEPHANT!!

(Rose sighs and looks at the menu.)

Rose: Where are we, Doc?

Doctor: Know I do not. Been here before? I cannot say.

Rose: Great. Just goddamned great. Are we in Vegas? Looks bright enough to be England. And hot enough.

(The Doctor jumps up and down and suddenly spasms uncontrollably.)

Doctor: Nope. Not Vegas. Not even Earth, lass, in fact.

Rose: Excuse me? What do you mean, 'not even Earth'?

Doctor: (Jumps into air again) Gravity is all wrong for Earth. Is much more to the universe than that one small planet, besides there.

(The Doctor puts an arm around Rose's shoulder. She squirms.)

Doctor: (Whispers) Know how much I have been to Earth, Rose? Nor I. But know I do to Earth I have been more times than any other one planet. It is time I think after itself the Earth looked for a change, don’t you?

Rose: Now hang on a minute there, Doc! What do you mean 'not even Earth'? I'll admit, your TARDIS is pretty cool, and yes, even that Nestle crap was trippy. But are you trying to tell me we are on another planet?

Doctor: Exactly what I am saying that is. Quite a concept it is I know, yes, but soon get used to it will your human mind. YOU FUCKING OVERWEIGHT SLAPPER! Hurt do not be, lass. Many companions in my time I have, and humans most of them have been. And each of them was about being on planets Earth other than a little shocked. But adapted well they, as you will I am sure.

Rose: You know, Doc, I wonder if I am still on a trip, or if this is some dream.

Doctor: Oh no, Rose, no dream.

Rose: No? It was a nice hope. But, hey, I will get used to it. I’m nothing if not adapt—

(Suddenly a huge shadow looms over them)

Doctor: ARGH! THE MOXX OF BALOON IT IS!!

Rose: Oh, we are *so* fucked.

Doctor: SHIIIIIIIIIIIIT!!!

(Machine gun bullets spray over our heroes....)