Friday, December 4, 2009

8th Doctor - Other Lives (i)

Serial 8Z – Other Lies
An Alternative Program Guide by Ewen Campion-Clarke
Twenty-Sixth Entry in the EC Unauthorized Guide O' French Farce

D O C T O R W H O

Serial 8Z – Other Lies -


Part One – The Great Inhibition

Aboard the TARDIS, C'Rizz writes an angst-ridden poem describing his thoughts, his feelings and above all, his perverse sexual fantasies involving Felicity Kendall. He is about to risk his life in the most dangerous and spectacularly violent manner impossible.

He's going to interrupt the Doctor and Charley's 'privacy time'.

He barges into the room as Charley exclaims that she never realized the Doctor's Martian-skin posing pouch was bigger on the inside than the outside, and the contents are far more impressive than she remembered and the Doctor is trying to look modest.

When 'Lizard Boy' enters, he manages to stave off an incredibly agonizing and squealing demise by waving a space-time telegram he's collected and which the Doctor demanded he be informed about, no matter what, even this.

The Doctor concedes that C'Rizz was in an incredibly difficult moral position. However, the Doctor and Charley were in an incredibly satisfying IMMORAL position, and so the Eutermisan is beaten senseless with a cricket bat for his pains.

The telegram reads thusly:

"DOCTOR STOP

THE DUSTBIN EMPIRE HAS ANNIHILATED ARCADIA STOP LETHAL SHAKE'N'VAC UNBALANCING THE STRUCTURE OF REALITY STOP HIGHER BEINGS REVERTING TO GASEOUS MANIFESTATIONS STOP IT'S WELL FUCKED UP AND NO MISTAKE STOP

GET YOUR ARSE BACK TO GALLIFREY STOP THE BATTALIONS OF THE TIME RANGERS WILL BEGIN OPERATION: MORALLY-JUSTIFIED KILL-ALL-THE-METAL-BASTARDS-AND-LET-RASSILON-SORT-IT-OUT STOP

YOUR CIVILIZATION NEEDS YOU STOP

SO STOP SHAGGING APE GIRLS AND DO YOUR DUTY STOP

ALL MY HATE,
PRESIDENT ROMANADOVRATRELUNDER (MRS.)"

The Doctor snorts, tears up the telegrams, chews it up and swallows it. Charley and C'Rizz are very impressed at this display of courage, brovado and bad-ass maverickdom, but the Doctor admits it's probably just due to his brain not working particularly fast.

Finally, the penny drops and the Doctor has a massive, hysterical panic attack and collapses, twitching.

The Doctor is a regeneration-long draft dodger in the last two Temporal Differences of Opinion and refuses point blank the idea of aiding the Time Rangers rigidly structure the universe according to one linear time line – mainly because he hates fan historians and loves seeing Lance Parkin break down in tears every day.

Charley points out that no matter how high minded their ideals, they have absolutely no chance of escaping the Conscription of Rassilon, let alone horrible (but clean) death at the hands of a revitalized Dustbin army who are tougher than ever after the events of Dustbin Umpire III: This Time, It's Even More Personal Than Before.

The Doctor concedes this, but admits during his infamous question mark fetish and grandmaster of chess on a thousand boards phase of the 1990s, he set up a kind of time traveler witness protection program. The three of them must part company and assume new identities in 1851 London, and live out the rest of their lives in a shallow temporal backwater until the Dustbins and the Time Lords and the Moxx of Balhoun blow the undying shit out of each other.

C'Rizz, however, thinks this reaction a bit extreme. "Can a Temporal Difference Of Opinion REALLY be that bad, Doctor?"

"C'Rizz, the last time I served under Gonjii 'Mad Knife-Wielding Fucker' Iborotrix, my personal timeline was tangled so much cause and effect collapsed in on themselves!"

"So? How bad could that be?"

"C'Rizz, does the phrase 'Season 6B' mean NOTHING to you?!"

Suitably shaken, the trio agree. The Doctor is certain that their new identities will give them a sense of normality and reassurance that will make the rest of eternity seem bearable.

The Doctor's new identity is...

Eddie Farlowe, a bearded lounge lizard sponging off a rich uncle, living with a vallium-addicted Cecil Pollard!

Charley is a bit pissed off at that, especially when she finds her new identity is...

Madame Du Roch, male impersonator and full time prostitute!

C'Rizz meanwhile is...

The Fierce Kerizzo, the half-man/half-beast in Jacob Crackles' Museum of the Freakishly Deformed and Sickeningly Erotic!

As Elton John plays a sad version of the Doctor Who theme tune, the Doctor materializes the TARDIS in an enormous iron and glass building, the Crystal Palace, in Hyde Park. Which has curiously been relocated to Cardiff for some reason.

The TARDIS crew decide to split up in the huge crowds that will visit it, knowing the sight of all the unkempt humans will put off any Time Lords watching this with their various time monitors.

Leaving the TARDIS as an exhibit in a display of foreign musical instruments, the three companions have a teary farewell.

"Bye," says the Doctor, running off into towards the Osler Fountain.

Charley takes time to reveal to C'Rizz that she seduced his girlfriend, L'da. C'Rizz admits he always knew about. He was handcuffed to the bed during the whole thing.

Charley shrugs and wanders off. C'Rizz composes a palindromic haiku about the statues, textiles and gigantic telescopes, forgets what he's thinking about and wanders off for a slash.

He passes the Iron Duke, throat-slashing Duke of Wellington who marches into the Crystal Palace, shouting very loudly and repeatedly punching his aide, Fazackerley in the face, for dealing with all the problems that could possibly occur in the palace. With 300 police officers on duty in and around the Palace, Fazackerly doesn't need to worry about anything and is thus standing idle. This insolence prompts another near-fatal beating from the Duke.

The Doctor passing by, offers to hold Fazackerly down while the Iron Duke kicks him repeatedly in the ribs. This inflames the situation, especially when the Doctor corrects the Duke's bone-snapping kicks for maximum impact.

As he leaves, Charley arrives and tries to seduce the Iron Duke. Although, in his own words 'anyone who soils a Wellington puts his foot in it', the Duke is nevertheless in awe of her beauty and well as being pleasantly shocked by her disgusting behavior with several wooden fertility idols on open display.

The Iron Duke is able to keep control of himself by sadistically jumping up and down on Fazackerly's exposed neck.

C'Rizz passes two visiting French aristocrats and mocks them for the scum that they are, before wandering off. Remember, boys and girls, the French are total bastards and in no way like normal human beings.

The Doctor, meanwhile, is outside and mugging passers-by with a knife, trying not to admit he's already missing the indescribably naughty, dull, predictable and over-expositional adventures he's been having ever since he left San Francisco.

C'Rizz pops outside and, checking the address for Jacob Crackles' Museum of the Freakishly Deformed and Sickeningly Erotic, strides out of the building, screaming 'BOOGA-BOOGA-BOOGA!' at any humans that get too close to him. This sends several laudanum-addicts into psychotic episodes but, as C'Rizz points out, "Reality's overrated."

The Eutermisan passes the Doctor pistol whipping a violinist and there is an awkward moment as they catch up with what they've been doing for the last few minutes and how they probably won't see each other again.

The Doctor snatches up the violin and plays the Sad Tune, admitting that while he would never count C'Rizz as a particularly pleasant or interesting companion, and certainly would never be mentioned in a canonical Welsh TV revival, the Doctor wants to say, here and now, that he secretly thought some of C'Rizz's poetry wasn't total shite.

"Really?" C'Rizz gasps.

"I'm not saying they were particularly great," the Time Lord adds hastily, "but compared to the electro-pop crap that made Marilyn Manson famous, you're freaking brilliant. Enormous Earlobed Girl, that was brilliant. Ode To A Small But Nasty Yeast Infection I Got Off My Girlfriend And Needed A Course of Antibiotics To Cure? Better than anything Bono ever did. Mixed Up Vanir Lyrics To The Recorder Solo in "California Dreaming"? I want to get it off my chest, that was GENIUS!"

Overcome with non-gay emotions, C'Rizz embraces the Doctor passionately, until the Doctor screams and runs away.

I should point out this is in no way homophobic, or intolerant, but that a Eutermisan's incredibly sharp and bony exoskeleton means getting a hug from one of them is like trying to shag an iron maiden.

Charley meets the French couple and, denouncing them as envoys of Louis Napoleon, she forces them, at gun point, into another part of the Crystal Palace...

C'Rizz is slightly put out. The address he has gone to is the right one, but there is no freak show, no caravans, no cages or indeed anything you'd reasonably expect. At that moment, a man appears – this is Rufus Nipplesqueeze, C'Rizz's contact. Although shaken at the Eutermisan's form, the man is confident that 'there's always one odd customer' and takes him for a meal.

The Doctor meanwhile is striding through Hyde Park, quoting Shakespeare loudly and throwing empty bottles of booze at picnickers. Just then a man drops out of a tree, catches the Doctor with a net, knocks him unconscious and drags him away.

Upon arriving at her address for her new life as a chartered prostitute, Charley is surprised to find a lower-upper-lower-middle class Victorian terraced house rather than the bath house, opium den and youth hostel the Doctor promised.

But when the door is answered by her own sister Celia, stark bollock naked... well, not bollock naked, more sort of... anyway, Charley realizes what has happened.

They've all inconveniently gone to the wrong addresses!

Gazooks!


Part Two – Duller Lives

The Doctor is woken up when a bucket of water is thrown over him. He finds himself in chains and sees Jacob Crackles looming over him with a
threatening whip. He is ordered to remove all his clothes and put on a thong, whereupon he is thrown in a cage with only straw to keep him warm. The Doctor can only boggle and mutter that Victorian domesticity isn't half like it is in BBC period dramas.

C'Rizz has got wasted and stuffed himself at an expensive restaurant while Rufus stares adoringly into his eyes and admits that, while at first he was repulsed by the chamelonic armor and Hawaiian shirts, he knows sees a beauty in C'Rizz better than any human woman.

"Any port in a shtorm," C'Rizz hiccups at the first of many improper suggestions made to him that evening.

The Doctor is shocked to discover his old fag, Drax, is also part of the sideshow due to his incredible Yahoo-Serious-style orange afro. The two Time Lord discuss this humiliating work, but after all – it beats front line work against armor-plated cleaning machines, it's easy work and when the Hens' Nights turn up, it's fantastic!

Charley meanwhile, is sulking in the front room with her sister and there's a general animosity between them – back in their heady youth, both girls tried to seduce the Fifth Doctor and Nyssa of Traken. While they failed, Charley ultimately fell in with the Eighth Doctor, while all Celia's managed to do is join up with the Nazi party and then be shot through the head repeatedly by Romana, Leela and K9, leaving her paradoxically alive and well fifty years before she was born.

Charley snaps it hasn’t been easy street for her. She's fought Dustbins, Cybermen, Leonard Nimoy, been cast out into another universe, given birth to Richard E Grant and was forced to listen to Enya songs until her ear drums detached themselves.

"Life's a bitch," the sisters agree.

The Doctor performs an Alan Bennet-style monologue. In chains. In a cage. As the audience gasps with horror at his alien form which looks just like a human form except for the strange gills in his arm pits which allow him to breathe whenever anyone strangles him.

Elsewhere, Rufus Nipplesqueeze is getting a lot of complaints from the clients of his whorehouse about his new 'lovely', C'Rizz. The rough sex is great, but does he HAVE to read out those damn poems? How many times can any poet use the phrase 'Compost of Lust' anyway?!?

At the freak show, the Doctor has rotten vegetables thrown at him by a big-eared Northerner in a leather jacket and a blonde in a Union Jack waistcoat. "Trust me," the Northener says, "one day you'll see the funny side to this! The irony's FANTASTIC!"

Jacob Crackles whacks the Doctor over the head with a kettle and tells him to be scarier. The Doctor asks Drax to back him up, and gets violently kicked in the groin until he falls unconscious. After a moment, Drax stops, blinks and says:

"Sorry, Thete, I think I musta misheard ya?"

Meanwhile, the Iron Duke realizes that the visiting French officials have disappeared so utterly there might be war with France – which is just the news he likes to hear! He decides to present Napoleon with their corpses, an insulting note, and some milk chocolates.

When Fazackerley points out he has no bodies to provide, the Duke of Wellington smashes his aide's head against the floor repeatedly, then forces him to dress up as a French woman. If this is some cunning substitution plot or just plain kinkyness, we never know...

Meanwhile, Charley is relaxing and writing up her sequel to How To Be A Complete Slut, What To Expect When You've Slept With The Population Of The Entire Universe. Celia decides that Charley will have to pretend to be the Doctor pretending to be Edward Marlow in order to fool his domineering African uncle, a violent Rastifarian mon called Cosmic Raymond who wants his precious boomerang back.

Egad!


Part Three – The Body Electric

Due to a curious incident involving some inferior amphetamines, a rigorous production schedule and an attempt to turn Captain Jack's spin off show "Touchwood" into "Surrender to Your God With Matthew Hopkins and Nigel Verkoff", part three was never written, recorded, produced or released. There is therefore no need to write in and complain.

Instead, we present The Body Electric, a one off half hour cartoon made in 1985 written entirely around following Rush songs:

"Red Sector A"
"Hemispheres: Cygnus"
"2112: Overture"
"Cygnus X-1"
"Different Strings"
"Jacob's Ladder"
"Fountain of Lamneth: The Fountain"
"Xanadu"
"The Body Electric"
"Working Man"
"Fountain of Lamneth: Didacts and Narpets"
"Marathon"
"Hemispheres: The Sphere"

The plot involves a blonde berk with a metal arm called Woody hooking up with the only cartoon woman ever to take her knickers off on children's television. This morally bankrupt couple finally notice their utopian civilization has come to a grinding halt because the Little Fat Kid from Hey Dad! has taken over an army of androids. Due to budgetary limits, this takes the form of one robot extra that screams a lot. Finally the main characters leave the domed city as it self-destructs and find it was in Nebraska the whole time.

Why it never made a series is a mystery to this day.

Oh, wait, I know! IT WAS TOTALLY SHITHOUSE! THAT'S WHY!

With that mystery solved, we return you to Doctor Who: Other Lies...


Part Four – Identity Crisis Point

Celia knows that even a brain-fried Jamaican octogenarian will able to spot that Charley is not a bearded McGann brother, so they must find the genuine Doctor and somehow sort that out. But, to pad out the episode, there is some kinky incestuous pillow fighting.

Meanwhile, the Iron Duke strolls along Rotten Row, shouting and making 'Baaah!' noises before deciding he needs a right royal seeing-to and heads to the red light district where the mysterious Madam Lizard Boy is having his phone number and the phrase 'for a good time call' being scrawled over walls.

This is a true testament to C'Rizz prostitute skills – the telephone has yet to be invented in 1851.

Back at the Picadilly freak show, the Doctor's finally lost his edge. The bearded woman and the siamese triplets are more popular and his quotes from Whitnail & I are lost on 19th century audiences. Desperately, the Doctor tries to tell passers-by he's a prisoner in Pig Latin. However, a priest believes he is speaking in tongues and beats him unconscious with a crucifix. Drax joins in.

In a seedy hotel room, the Iron Duke and C'Rizz share a post-coital cigar while applying some torniquets and bandages. The Duke admits he's 82 and he knows he won't live for much longer, especially considering how bad C'Rizz is at staunching flesh wounds.

Realizing that his lover is from beyond the stars, the Duke asks C'Rizz what's going to happen to his country 50 or 100 years ahead, and C'Rizz just shrugs. "Around 2005 some rubbish bins take over the planet, invade France and run away pretty quickly. I'm still pretty new to this universe. Fancy another quick one, Wellington?"

Ten minutes later, C'Rizz admits that in future years the Great Exhibition will be seen more as a curiosity than a force for change as was intended. However, C'Rizz at least will remember the Iron Duke as a great shag.

Meanwhile, Celia opens a newspaper and sees a picture of the Doctor in an article called POSSESSED NEANDERTHAL THINKS SHOES FIT PERFECTLY!

Snatching a meat clever from a kitchen drawer, the Pollard sisters run out of the house as Pulp Fiction-style music plays.

Pulling up outside the freak show in a hansom cab, the sister introduce 19th Century Cardiff to the concept of the drive-by shooting. Five minutes later the Doctor is free and Jacob Crackles and Drax are tied to chairs as 'Stuck in the Middle With You' plays in the background on a Hatichami Jog Person.

The Doctor starts dancing and switches on his sonic screwdriver. "I'm gonna go Reservoir Dogs on your ass!" he vows.

Charley interrupts, explaining he has to have dinner with Cosmic Raymond to allow them to keep living in the mansion lest he decide they are all goblins and kills them all in rabid blood lust fever.

"Aaaaw!" the Doctor complains. "Can't I just chop off ONE ear? Just ONE?!? I'll make it quick!"

C'Rizz finds the next naughty game the Iron Duke wants him to play is to dress up as a French diplomat and make a speech to the public about how the wealthy and titled should remain in power.

C'Rizz doubts he could pass for a Frenchman and the Iron Duke grimly agrees – C'Rizz is far too normal looking and humanoid. But the public will just have to be fooled into thinking Frenchmen are not the complete Lovecraftian monsters everyone knows they really are.

It seems that the more dangerous things get, the more excited
the Duke becomes. C'Rizz speaks with an atrocious French accent, and the two star-crossed lovers make out once more.

Hastily scrambling hastily back to the house, the Doctor admits the row from the Pollard sisters is disturbingly erotic. Anyone would think they were actually married!

At that moment, Cosmic Raymond arrives and rips off his dreadlocks and rubbery face to reveal he was Rufus Nipplesqueeze all along! And he would have got away with it too, if it weren't for all these cross-dressing time lesbians!

"Preaching to the choir, buddy," the Doctor sighs.

Bored, the Doctor heads back to the freak show and blows it up with some nitro-9, a truly cathartic experience, totally cleansing his troubled soul... and not a cheap cop-out ending, no way at all.

It is then he bumps into C'Rizz, who admits that although the life of a Regency Prostitute is all it's cracked up to be, he actually believes his poetry is a higher calling. Why, the number of human beings unable to stay in the same room at the sheer intensity of his genius has convinced C'Rizz once and for all he is destined for better things.

Charley then spots the real Edward Marlow and realizes that there is a very simple way to save the day. Bludgeoning him unconscious, she dumps him in the TARDIS with the two Frenchies and sends the time machine to Gallifrey. The Time Lords will use THEM as front line troops against the Dustbins and the TARDIS Crew will remain safe.

The Doctor congratulates her on this brilliant bit of manipulation and base animal cunning before grabbing her by the neck and screaming she forgot the bit where the TARDIS comes back! THEY ARE STRANDED IN 1851!

The TARDIS reappears.

"SWEET ONION CHUTNEY! Who'd have thunk it?" C'Rizz marvels and they hurry inside the TARDIS to find...

Gonjii 'Mad Knife-Wielding Fucker' Iborotrix, Commander of the Allied Battalions of the Gallifreyan Time Rangers!

He knew the Doctor would try and escape conscription that way – Gonjii himself uses it himself every Temporal Difference of Opinion. Which is why he is now going to send the Doctor, Charley and C'Rizz to the front line in his place.

This twist, coming so soon after the TARDIS crew have been mistaken for harlots, thrown themselves at the Duke of Wellington, impersonated missing French aristocrats, been kidnapped, stripped, chained up, tormented and force to do a low budget recreation of the Crying Game, proves too much for the Doctor. Or maybe just Paul McGann.


The Doctor sculls an entire bottle of Dustbin Bubblebath in five seconds fat and then falls over to lie very, very still.

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