10th Doctor - Army of Ghosts (v)

Book(s)/Other Related -
Dr Who & The Big Lever of Unrealized Potential
Doctor Who and the Army Of Goats: You Have Got To Be Kidding!
Doctor Who 2006: It Didn’t Just Jump The Shark, It Got Stuck Half-Way And Humped The Shark!


Fluffs - David Tennant seemed a Cosmic Cowboy of Doom in this story.

"Didn’t I kill your brother, Cyberleader? No, wait, it was you. You’re your own brother. I think. Should we discuss this with your mother? Why don’t you ever call her? You never write..."

++See-that-party-blower-that-you-get-out-of-a-Christmas-cracker-that-makes-a-comedy-hooty-sound-when-you-blow-in-it-and-uncurls-in-a-comedy-fashion-with-a-small-pink-fluffy-feather-attached-to-the-end-of-it? That-is-your-death-ray-that-is.++
"SEE THAT KETTLE IN THE CUT PRICE SECTION OF LAST YEAR’S ARGOS CATALOGUE BECAUSE IT DOESN’T WORK PROPERLY AND PEOPLE KEEP BRINGING IT BACK AND ASKING FOR A REFUND? THAT IS YOUR CYBER-JUG-HANDLED-HEAD THAT IS."

"I’m here to get bubble gum and chew revenge and I just ran out of revenge!"

"You’re ~ meant ~ to ~ become ~ like ~ us. Fuck ~ do ~ I ~ have ~ to ~ go ~ over ~ everything ~ to ~ you ~ people ~ five ~ billion ~ times? And ~ you ~ wonder ~ why ~ I ~ say ~ you ~ need ~ to ~ be ~ upgraded..."


Goofs -
Touchwood’s HQ doesn't resemble any part of the interior of 1 Canada Square. I know, because I visited there, yet, strangely after that drink I forget what happened... where am I?

How the hell did Touchwood get a bloody big flying saucer in the lift? Come to think of it, how did they move an object that has no mass and does not emit any electromagnetic signature from the top floor to the basement? And how can we SEE the bloody Null-Sphere if it doesn’t have any wavelengths in the visible spectrum, huh?

Why do Rose’s breasts open an electronic lock set to Yvonne’s far-less-impressive fun bags?

How did Ricky manage to infiltrate Touchwood? Is their security so lax that they don’t notice somebody just turning up inside their operation? What am I saying, Coco the Clown could turn up inside their operation without anyone noticing...

There are six billion people on Earth, so even if there were five million Cybermen, they’re STILL freaking outnumbered and especially if they spend all their time breaking into homes? No wonder no one remembers this alien invasion, it’s total crap!

Rajesh ordered the sphere room locked down, so how did it lock down AGAIN when quarantine kicked in? Is he an idiot? If so, how does he know when he’s in the sphere room know that the Ghost Shift has started EARLY? What is WRONG with this guy?

Rose says that a ghost has been "elected MP for Leeds". However, Leeds has five constituencies. Does she means just as an MP in Leeds, or is she just taking the piss? Why am I even asking that question?!?

Surely the Taj Mahal would have been in darkness when the Cybermen stepped through the Rift? There’d been a Ghost Shift at noon, and another later in the day, so it must have been night-time in India by the third one. In fact, the sun is shown in exactly the same position in both Taj Mahal shots. Has it really been an entire day between the two shifts? MY GOD, TIME IS OUT OF JOINT! Oh cursed spite that I was ever born to set it right...

What’s the point of the levers? When Touchwood activate the ghost shift, both need to be pulled, but the Cybermen activate it entirely through the computer systems! Why does the sonic screwdriver kill all three of the people wearing earpieces when it is aimed at only one of them? Why didn’t JR Ewing’s Dustbin notice this adventure? How come Rose has overcome her amnesia? Why didn’t the Time Lords kill the Dustbins once they were locked up? How did Pete and the others observe events from Irth to a degree they can make dramatically ironic entrances?!

All in all, the plot to this story makes approximately ZERO sense and contains approximately TWELVE MILLION plot holes and explicite self-contradiction. Egad, that’s over 4,000 plot holes a second! Which, when you think about it, sounds just about right for an RTD script.


Fashion Victims -
Umm...what’s the point of wearing camouflage combat uniforms INSIDE an office building?

The heat in the lever room means all Touchwood operates tend to either wander around in their underwear or dress in lab-coats with nothing underneath it. It is only Yvonne’s insistence at an all-young-female staff that keeps this reviewer from projectile vomiting.

Rose’s TARDIS-roundel-patterned underwear wasn’t too bad either.


Technobbable -
"My Ship is not an ordinary object, dear me, no. it’s protected by all manner of alarms, springs and tumblers, specifically to prevent it falling victim to such forces. It’s centrifugal frequency is self-adjusting and everything! Jings, Rose, if it could survive a Temporal Difference of Opinion, it can certainly stand fast against some pissy little Welsh breach in space/time!"

Yvonne: Two imploding time streams can intermingle as long as the relative densities of the continuum are maintained by an outside temporal stabilization beam.
Jack: I love it when you talk technical. TAKE ME NOW!


Dialogue Disasters -

Jackie: WHAT are THEY?!
Jack: Man is a machine that produces manure. Cybermen are a machine that does different stuff.


Dustbin Leo: OH, SO IT’S GONNA BE LIKE THAT, TIN MACHINE?
Cyber-Harriet: It’ll ~ be ~ like ~ that ~ for ~ 0.5 ~ seconds ~ because ~ that’s ~ your ~ fucking ~ life ~ expectancy ~ trashcan!



The Doctor on Yvonne:
"Oh god, don’t come over here! Don’t come over here - ugh, I can SMELL the pheromones on her! Sex hormones, gin and Aqua Net hair spray! Begone, you evil harlot!"


Dustbin Leo: WE ARE THE FOUR HORSEMEN OF THE APOCALYPSE!
Dustbin Mike: HANG ON, WHO IS WHO?
Dustbin Leo: WELL, YOU’RE FAMINE, OBVIOUSLY. I’M WAR.
Dustbin Raph: I WANTED TO BE WAR!
Dustbin Leo: TOUGH. YOU HAVE TO BE DEATH.
Dustbin Don: CAN I BE PESTILENCE?
Dustbin Leo: SURE THING, DON. RIGHT, WERE WE WE?
Dusbtin Mike: SLAUGHTERING ALL LIFE ON EARTH.
Dustbin Leo: SO WE WERE. MIND LIKE A SIEVE. YEEEEEEEEEE-HAAAAAA!


Cyber-Harriet: Upgrade ~ the ~ Time ~ Lord!
Doctor: Doctor 10.1, eh? Can’t I just download a patch?


Ricky: Least the Dustbins still need you, Rose. Just think up ways of holding back the info they want and we’re safe.
Rose: But that’s the thing! The Temporal Difference of Opinion, they haven’t asked!
Ricky: Well, they ARE busy.
Rose: Ricky, I think they’ve discovered multi-tasking. Besides, they don’t NEED to question me, just... extract the info they need.
Ricky: Well, I’ve got this nifty teleport bracelet to transport me out of here... but it only carries one and I’m not leaving you. Seriously, if I was straight, I’d follow you anywhere.
Rose: You’re the bravest man I’ve ever met.
Ricky: Heh. What about the Doctor?
Raph: DOCTOR! DID YOU SAY "DOCTOR"?!?
Leo: RAPH, YOU ARE JUST GETTING PARANOID. MOVE ON, DUDE. MOVE ON.


Doctor: Oh, what are you worried about? I’ll find her. I brought you here, I’ll get you both out. You and your daughter. Jackie, look at me. Look at me. Jackie. Jackie. JACKIE. Look at me. Look at me, Jackie. Look at me. I’ve got one thing to say to you Jackie: I am the Lord of Time and nothing can stop me doing whatever the hell I want. [blinks] I’m not being psychotically arrogant again, am I? Is that who I am now? Psychotically arrogant and NOT ginger?


Rose: Five million Cybermen, easy. One Doctor? Now you’re fucked!

The Doctor and Yvonne discuss Touchwood sexual positions -
"We have done this a thousand times!"
"Then stop at a thousand! You’ll give yourself a hernia!"

Cyber-Harriet: Resistance-is-struggling. Struggling-is-useless.
Dustbin Don: AND YOU’RE USELESS ANYWAY! OH YEAH. I SO WENT THERE.


Random Survivor: Touchwood’s killed this whole city! Murdered millions of people because they’re so completely up themselves they think they can handle anything when they’re less competent than the average bus conductoress! BASTARDS!
Captain Jack: Try and be a bit more Buddhist about it.
Random Survivor: BASTARDS! BASTARDS! BASTARDS!!!!


Doctor: What would Brian Boitano do?
Jack: Yeah, what WOULD Brian Boitano do?
Rose: What would Brian Boitano do?
If he was here right now?
Ricky: He’d make a plan and he’d follow through!
Pete: That’s what Brian Boitano’d do!
Jake: When Brian Boitano travelled through time
To the year Five Billion and One
Esme: He defeated the Empire of the Trods
And thereby saved everyone!
Jackie: What would Brian Boitano do?
If he was here today?
Rose: I’m sure he’d kick an ass or two!
Doctor: That’s what Brian Boitano’d do!
Pete: What would Brian Boitano do?
Jack: He’d defeat all the Cybermen
Plus he’d beat the Dustbins too!
Esme: That’s what Brian Boitano’d do!
All: CAUSE THAT’S WHAT BRIAN BOITANO’D DO!


Captain Jack: A footprint doesn’t look like a boot. I worked that out all by myself. I am completely pissed. Did I mention that? Fargo versus Monday versus Earth. LET’S GET READY TO RUMBLE!



Dialogue Triumphs -

Rose: Doctor, they’ve got guns!
Doctor: And I haven’t. Which makes me the better person, don’t you think? They can shoot me dead, but the moral high ground is mine.
Rose: You don’t think you might be getting a bit too arrogant and end up killed, do you?
Doctor: Honestly, Rose. This isn’t the first time I’ve stepped from the TARDIS deliberately into the firing line of a dozen armed thugs!
Rose: And what happened the last time?
Doctor: Well. They shot me dead. But I still won, morally!


Ricky on the plot of the last two episodes:
"This is more twisted that Dan Brown’s latest book!"


The K9-versus-Cybermen sequences in South Croydon:
"Impertinent metallic life forms! Human upgrading is unnecessary! They’re irritating enough as short-lived anthropoids!"
++You-are-not-compatible. You-are-inferior-technology. You-will-be-deleted. Prepare-for-maximum-deletion.++
"Delete this, you tin fuckers! YIPPI-KAI-AY!!"
[Twenty dead Cybermen later.]
"Another happy ending. Ha. Ha. Ha."


Doctor: Again. They’re here AGAIN! Jings, what is it going to take? What is it going to take to get rid of these things – these tin pot dictators with sink plungers, and squeegees and silly sounding voices, and a ruthless desire to tidy the universe?
Rose: There’s only four of them this time. It shouldn’t be that hard.
Doctor: OK, but if I can destroy half a million and they’re STILL not gone, why should four be any easier? The truth is, they’ll never be gone. I know that now. It was foolish to even hope. The universe is a cruel place, and the Terry Nation Estate is even crueler. There’s no reason why either should take pity on me!
Rose: Ah, lighten up!
Doctor: This is my PUNISHMENT, Rose, for being so arrogant, so all-knowing! I will NEVER be rid of them! The endless rematches will NEVER stop!! Character Options will NEVER stop releasing New Series Dustbin Army Fargo Funpacks!
Rose: You done whining like a bitch, yet?


Jackie: If we end up in "Life on Mars", I’m gonna kill you.


Doctor: That's it then, the earth is doomed. Unless...
Rose: Unless what?
Doctor: UNLESS we can find a useless fraudulent specimen of humanity who deliberately exploits the fragile emotions of the bereaved for his own personal gain. If the Cybermen transplant the brain of such an odious individual into their joint personality matrix thingy they’ll all be overcome with such a feeling of self-loathing that they’ll instantly self-destruct.
Rose: Brilliant!
Doctor: One snag - where can we find such a pustulent charlatan?
Derek: [entering scene] Hello, there! I’m Derek Acorah!


Doctor: So, Pete... get killed by crazy drivers lately?


Jackie: You’re not a real Doctor?
Doctor: I did do some medical training, Jackie... in Glasgow... Dave Lister, 1888. I almost qualified.
Jackie: ALMOST?!
Doctor: I SHOULD be a doctor! I COULD be a real doctor, easy... if certain people would forgive and forget.
Jackie: Like who?
Doctor: Oh, my teacher. His sister. Her husband. Their aunt...
Jackie: I get the picture. You didn’t have a good success rate.
Doctor: No, but I keep trying.
Jackie: Not on ME you don’t!
Doctor: I’ll treat you like my own daughter.
Jackie: Is that what you said to your teacher?
Doctor: Yes, uncanny, were you there?



Doctor: Rose, baby, I’m burning up a sun just to be here for you!
Rose: You, um... made sure the system was uninhabited first, right?
Doctor: Hey! You wanna quibble about details or shall we forget the blood on my hands and get the hell out of here?


Dustbin Mike: HOW MANY WELSHMEN HAVE WE KILLED NOW?
Dustbin Leo: ABOUT FOUR OR FIVE THOUSAND BY THE LOOKS OF THINGS.
Dustbin Mike: ISN’T IT COOL THOUGH, WITH ALL THE LOCAL COMMUNITIES OUT THERE, ON THE STREETS, BEING MERCILESSLY SLAUGHTERED BY NEUTRON FIRE?
Dustbin Raph: I... LOVE... BEING... A DUSTBIN!!
Dustbin Don: ...NICE SHOOTING, DUDE.
Dustbin Raph: YEAH, THAT TEN-YEAR-OLD GIRL WON’T BE LEAVING HER ROOM IN MESS AGAIN ANY TIME SOON! HAHAAHAHAHAHA!!
Dustbin Mike: OH LOOK, HERE COME THE CYBERMEN AGAIN! HOORAY! THAT SHOULD GET THINGS GOING AGAIN...


Doctor: Dustbins. Sealed inside your casing. Not feeling anything, ever.
From birth to death, locked inside a cold metal cage. Completely alone. That explains your voice. No wonder you sound like Nick Briggs.


Cyberman: I-am-the-one-who-has-attended-Cyber-University-and-had-management-training. I-will-be-upgraded-to-Cyber-Leader. Fetch-the-black-paint-and-give-my-handlebars-a-nice-fresh-coat. I-will-log-onto-CyberUpdate-and-download-shared-files. Cyber-101-Introduction-to-Menacing. Cyber-105-Advanced-Menacing. Cyber-110-Studies-in-Elegance. Cyber-120-Cyber-Payroll. Huh. Authentic-copy-of-the-Cyber-OS-must-be-validated. Great. I-left-my-serial-number-on-another-planet. Darn.


Pete: Hello, Jacks.
Jackie: But you’re dead. You died twenty years ago, Pete!
Doctor: It’s Pete from a different reality that Rose created...
Jackie: Oh, you can shut up.
Doctor: Fine! Screw you, bitch!
Jackie: Oh, Pete... you look old.
Pete: You don’t. Mind you, you’ve gone down a few cup sizes. So. You were left on your own. You didn't marry again, or...?
Jackie: There was never anyone else. I was the town bike for twenty years, though. Look at me - I never left that bedroom. Did nothing with myself, but got everyone else to.
Pete: In my world, it worked. All those daft little plans of mine. They worked. Made me rich.
Jackie: How rich?
Pete: Very.
Jackie: Good enough me. Let’s split this joint!

The Doctor’s inner monologue for the painfully brief moment he thinks Rose is pregnant with his love child -
"Hang on, we DIDN’T, did we? I don’t know, I didn’t think so... well, there was that time we got drunk on Argolis... nah, I’m sure nothing happened... she WAS smirking next morning, wasn’t she? No, wait a minute, we can’t have done, I’d have remembered, I’m sure I’d have remembered... if we had, I bloody wish I COULD remember! Argh, hang on, I remember something involving handcuffs and a lot of kissing... no, wait, bad Doctor, that was Reinette.... oh crikey, I’m never going to live this down... I know! Blame Mickey. That’ll work. Not me, nothing to do with me, I was nowhere near Miss Tyler’s boudoir at the time... oh, it’s her mum’s. Oh, thank Rassilon! Hang on, that means Rose and me never did screw after all. Bugger."


UnQuotable Quote -

Yvonne: In the name of the Second British Empire, you weakling Scum!!!


Links and References -
This story tragically confirms that Silver Finish was canon by being a direct sequel to it. Due to a digital editing mistake there is a brief flashback to Rose’s first meeting with the Eighth Doctor when she ran him over in Ruse, the Dustbin from I, Dustbin and the temporal hell of Death Day. Jack and Rose continue to annoy everyone by their continual mention of the Gelth from The Presuming Ed. Pretty much every story with Touchwood is mentioned, particularly their hilariously stupid attempts to use Cyber Technology in The Sequel. The Doctor considers Eternals and Tractators as possible rebound companions he could use to get over Rose.


Untelevised Misadventures -
The Tenth Doctor and Rose visit a planet with strange rock formations and flying reptiles which the Doctor explains was terraformed to resemble a Yes album cover, specifically 1971’s "Fragile".

According to Yvonne, the Doctor once had a nasty encounter with Queen Victoria and a werewolf in 1879, which apparently hasn’t happened to the Doctor yet in what is clearly one of those wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey ontological paradox deals. God damn the predeterminism man.


Subtext? WHAT Subtext? -

Why does a Time Lord prison look like it was built by Dustbins? Is it supposed to be disguised? The only logical answer is that it’s actually a secret weapon of their own design, that could mass produce millions of Dustbins in minutes, and they didn't want the slightest chance of anyone finding out about its true nature. So when the Blue Dustbin’s sensitive hearing apparatus picked up the half baked rubbish Rose was telling Ricky, it decided to play along with her, however, the real reason why the Dustbins didn’t kill Rose was because they had learned from the brainwaves of the scientist they had fried, that Rose was the Doctor’s companion, and so they thought she might be useful as a hostage if things didn’t go as planned. Everyone who says otherwise is a complete lying bastard.
Or, you know, we’re just being racist and totally mistake Time Lord technology for cheap tatty Dustbin merchandise.


Groovy DVD Extras -
Two entirely unseen sequences. The first was an alternate ending where, furious at being dumped, the Doctor goes back in time to prevent him ever meeting Rose, a plan which works perfectly until the Dommervoy turn up and destroy reality as we know it. The other was a different cliffhanger revealing that the Cult of Fargo was lead by none other than the Supreme Empress President Servalan of the Terran Federation, leading to an up tempo show tune as she sang "Business is Business!".


Vortext –
A young, up and coming journalist working for the Daily Bung has the story of the century – "the story of Touchwood". Using his incredible amount of contacts and urban legends, the journalist puts together a whacking great conspiracy theory going back to Queen Victoria’s time and stretching to the Sycophant Massacre. However, the journalist is a completely naive and gormless tit who assumes that the most powerful secret agency in the country WON’T also be running the Daily Bung and before the front page can be printed he is put into a lunatic asylum by Captain Jack Harkness, who sexually harasses the journo on the way.


The Spite of Sparacus -
"Possibly one of RTD’s best episodes, but everything was so rushed. In the old series these events would have been done in stages, spanning out the excitement over six incredibly tedious weeks allowing more dialogue, more arguments between the Doctor & the Touchwood woman, more philosophical depth. But the goodbye scenes were awful, overcooked emotional soap-like stuff drenched in lowbrow soppiness that was highly immature and dumbed down in nature, like the death of Princess Diana. A more subtle goodbye with a degree from Cambridge, like Jo Grant, would have been fine! Now, if I’d written the ending it would have less false, shallow, transient and free of banal and superficial emotionalism:

Doctor: Bye Rose. I’m sorry it had to end like this but there was no alternative. You are a chav, and worse, you are not Adam Rickitt.
Rose: See you, Doctor. I’m really going to miss you. Thanks for changing my life. You won’t forget me will you?
Doctor: I’ll never forget you but we must go on. Take care.
Rose: Take care Doctor. I... I love you
Doctor: I’m afraid I can’t say the same about you. You see I am 900 years old and you are a simple human. As I Time Lord I would never fall in love with someone like you.
Rose: Will you be OK?
Doctor: Of course. You are merely the latest in a long line of companions. I didn’t get all emotional about them, so there is no reason I should get emotion about you. In fact I am quite looking forward to exploring some proper alien planets like I used to, and getting away from all this soap nonsense. Hopefully my next companion will be someone with a bit more intelligence and less chaviness.
Rose: Bye Doctor.
Doctor: Whatever.

See? I am not some cold-hearted iceman who sits, frowning with a deadpan stare. I can’t help the fact that I’m more intelligent than RTD! Anyway, it’s time I went to bed. I need my beauty sleep."