Month: November 2014

In stealing our identity, the FBI tarnishes that reputation, belittles the value of the free press rights enshrined in our Constitution and endangers AP journalists and other newsgatherers around the world. This deception corrodes the most fundamental tenet of a free press — our independence from government control and corollary responsibility to hold government accountable.

But I meant to answer that question about The Sound of Drums, because sometimes, I swear, I can sit and watch things like a viewer, like it’s all happening as new right in front of me. I can watch my stuff and get this disconcerting draught of… well, of how it must look to other people, sometimes. Of how unplanned it all seems. Like I’m making it up as I go along. I’m refusing, on screen, to do all those normal things that would make an episode more coherent, with a beginning-middle-and-end wholeness. It really struck me when the Doctor discovers the Archangel Network. That comes completely out of the blue. I mean, completely! It could have been foreshadowed – Saxon could have been talking to the Cabinet about his satellites, for example. More significantly, with the entire world hypnotized, it’s interesting how little the Doctor even asks, ‘How is the Master doing this?’ Technically, that’s a major plot strand, but I’m more interested in running on, to find new things. You’re left with a Hugely Important Network that is only discovered … in the exact moment that it’s revealed to be Hugely Important! No warning, no ground-laying, nothing. Then, to make it even odder, it’s dispensed with in the same scene. And I’m being casual with a plot element that, next episode, saves the entire world. That’s bordering on reckless! It’s the same with the discovery of the TARDIS on board the Valiant. The Doctor opens a door … and there it is! But actually, look back, when did the Doctor last worry about where the TARDIS is? I’m not sure he’s even mentioned it at all. And neither has the Master . And then we discover that the Master has turned it into a Paradox Machine … well, we had no sign of that, did we? Where were the traditional scenes of the Master plotting with Lucy, or with the Toclafane? ‘Soon my Paradox Machine will be complete,’ etc. I don’t use any of the available opportunities to explain anything, or to make the structure clear, or to reassure people that there’s a plan at work here.

… What I’m saying is, I can see how annoying that looks. I can see how maddening it must be, for some people. Especially if you’re imposing really classical script structures, and templates, and expectations on that episode, even unconsciously. I must look like a vandal, a kid, or an amateur. No wonder some people hate what I write. Of course, I’m going to win this argument. (Did you guess?) Because the simple fact is: all those things were planned. All of them were my choice. They’re not lazy, clumsy, or desperate. They’re chosen . I can see more traditional ways of telling those stories, but I’m not interested. I think the stuff that you gain from writing in this way – the shock, the whirlwind, the freedom, the exhilaration – is worth the world. I’ve got this sort of tumbling, freewheeling style that somersaults along, with everything happening now – not later, not before, but now, now, now. I’ve made a Doctor Who that exists in the present tense. And I think that’s exactly like the experience of watching Doctor Who. It’s happening now, right in front of your eyes! If you don’t like it, if you don’t join in with it, then… blimey, these episodes must be nonsensical.