David Tennant is back as the Doctor, and Simon and Eugene look at his first outing in this special episode of Fusion Patrol.

Computer-generated Transcript. (Errors may exist)

[00:00:10.01] Eugene: You're listening to Fusion Patrol, a Lister-supported podcast. Each week, we take a single episode of a science fiction TV series, movie, or audio, and overanalyze it to within an inch of its life. Welcome to the discussion. Hello and welcome to a special episode of Fusion Control, I'm Eugene.

[00:00:39.15] Simon: And I'm Simon.

[00:00:40.63] Eugene: And we are looking at the 2023 Children in Need Doctor Who special with David Tennant and David Tennant. I'm not even gonna give you a recap. It's on YouTube. Go look for it. The Doctor lands on Scarra right after being regenerated, meets the Mark III travel machine, and you can... So, what did you think of this interesting little special, Simon, that they put out?

[00:01:09.05] Simon: I mean, I wasn't sure how seriously to take it, and I guess that you could accept this as part of Doctor Who continuity. It was quite fun. I mean, it was a comedy. Yes, and yet it was not. was also quite sort of, it was, you know, you had Davros on Skaro and all the rest of it.

[00:01:33.71] Eugene: Nider's voice in the background there is portrayed by Nick Briggs.

[00:01:39.15] Simon: Oh, I missed that. I saw a comment about... Right, okay, yeah, that makes sense. I need you to come and check something.

[00:01:48.36] Eugene: Yes, it's not handcuffed. Peace.

[00:01:50.62] Simon: Scott Hancock said that he thought that Briggs sounded like... Oh God, I've forgotten the name of the actor who played Nyder, but yeah.

[00:01:57.32] Eugene: Yeah, I'll think that's what he was going for.

[00:02:01.04] Simon: Who was the actor who played Davros?

[00:02:05.67] Eugene: It's Davros. It is... Julian Bleach? Something like that?

[00:02:11.14] Simon: Right, who played Davros in 2009.

[00:02:16.24] Eugene: Yeah, all of the all of the new series. Yeah, uh, Capone era as well.

[00:02:21.42] Simon: Yeah, fair enough.

[00:02:22.49] Eugene: I'll fight with him, and that's why he sounded very much like him.

[00:02:25.05] Simon: What I did, what I, yeah, except I'm not used to listening to him because when I'm listening to Davros, it's, it's... Oh, terribly. Roy because it's big finish. So even when I'm watching Genesis of the Dalek and it's Daleks and it's Michael Wisher I'm thinking it doesn't sound quite right because I've got so used to Terry Roy doing it. The thing that didn't seem to... me quite right was that they were at this point in the in the genesis of the dialect. Ass. Davros is not in his chair.

[00:02:56.54] Eugene: Yes, yeah, yeah, um, yeah. That is RTD. It's 2023. We do not equate people in wheelchairs with evil, and if I ever have Davros, he will not-- the production crew all felt that Davros should no longer be in a wheelchair.

[00:03:18.14] Simon: Okay, that's interesting.

[00:03:19.87] Eugene: Though I applaud his, again, progressive representation and, you know, it is a negative stereotype. You put him in the wheelchair and you make him the villain. But it's not just that. I mean, the reason the Daleks look like the Daleks is because Davros is creating them image, in a way, and so why do they look like they do now? I don't know if that means he's actually ever going to have Davros in his episodes. Well, yes. If I ever do.

[00:03:56.43] Simon: Guess he's just had it. never I mean I don't know ever again be.

[00:04:01.87] Eugene: In a wheelchair.

[00:04:02.81] Simon: I don't know how I feel about it. I've not read anything by any kind of wheelchair user or anyone in the disability rights activists saying that Davros was a problematic character from that point of view. I have seen stuff about the way in which Davros was dealt with in the Peter Capaldi episode. I forget its title. Something to do with a witch?

[00:04:29.73] Eugene: Yeah. The magicians are present.

[00:04:32.00] Simon: Well, the image-- practitioner's apprentice, whatever, anyway, whatever it was called, because there are scenes where he is thrown out or pulled out of his chair and the doctor sort of almost mocks him and that looks very problematic now, and I can't remember what we said about it at the time, but it surprises me that that wasn't a bigger issue then. Whereas simply the fact that someone who is in a wheelchair and who is a genius might also be evil. I mean I get it, it's like there are not that many people on TV who you see in a wheelchair. Yep. not a positive thing if a very high proportion of them are evil geniuses rather than either geniuses or just not evil. But yeah, I'm okay. I need to think about it. But I knew City-wise.

[00:05:26.71] Eugene: It's a bit of a mess. I think if my memory serves correct, this is a Mark 3 travel machine, and I believe when Tom Baker gets here, they introduces the Mark 4 travel. I'll cut it. So this is earlier, um, I, it's a comedy. I was definitely amused by the whole thing where the doctor keeps saying things like giving them their name, saying Genesis of the Daleks. I exterminate you. Yeah, yeah, it was funny. So I enjoyed it and I hope it made a lot of money for children in need, which is its goal, and I think, you know, when we talk about whether or not this is canon, the curse of the fatal death is definitely not.

[00:06:14.44] Simon: That was a new release though, wasn't it? I think the rule is children in need is bad and comic relief is not.

[00:06:21.57] Eugene: Oh, was that a different one? I thought that was Children in Need. I don't know. Yeah. Well, there was Peter Davis and that was probably Children in Need.

[00:06:30.17] Simon: I was chosen in India. Yep, time crash. Interesting. Oh that did have a title.

[00:06:36.37] Eugene: Yeah, I did. because credits I've yet I don't remember this. I've heard somebody call this by a name. Something of the Daleks. Ha ha ha. Origin of the Daleks. I don't remember what it was, but I don't know if that was official and I don't recall seeing it on the screen. So, um, because I think they wanted to hold it off and not, uh, you know, not give it away. >> Before the doctor. arrives. You know, it's like, "Oh, that's, uh, oh, dear. That's a Dalek. Yeah. Um, anyway. I just, it, wanted to see if you were amused by it and what your thoughts were, but apparently you had not picked up on the, uh, because I, I did see an awful lot of people cheering the, the non-ableist viewpoint that RTD has put forward. on this and I thought I didn't get that when I watched it I just thought this was earlier before he had been damaged but but frankly even that doesn't make sense because you know we know so much about Davros from say Big Finish and Well... It's not new that he's in that wheelchair.

[00:07:37.80] Simon: That's what I was trying to remember. Is there anything in Genesis that suggests a kind of timeline in terms of where the development of the Daleks was at the point where he was injured? Because a lot of my kind of backstory of Davros comes from the big Finnish audio play Davros and the extremely brilliant spin-off, Idav. which goes into all of this in quite a lot of detail, and I would say on the whole is it contains fewer laughs than the children in the She's fresh. but it will but it's

[00:08:15.01] Eugene: I think Finish now have to change Davros from this point forward.

[00:08:17.58] Simon: Good question. - Javros walks into the room. Well, this is just a quick thing 'cause we didn't want to let that bit of celebration go by without mentioning it.

[00:08:26.39] Eugene: But do you have anything else on it?

[00:08:28.91] Simon: No, I think we've talked for longer than you, probably twice as long as the episode went on now.

[00:08:34.92] Eugene: I think so. Anyway, let's... we've done that before. Maybe... Maybe even about... Yes. Maybe even about the Starbeast.

[00:08:43.20] Simon: That is true.

[00:08:45.16] Eugene: Thank you. Simon, thank you for joining me.

[00:08:47.60] Simon: It's a pleasure, as always.

[00:08:49.43] Eugene: Listeners, I hope you'll join us all again next time on Fusion Patrol. You've been listening to Fusion Patrol, thanks for listening. If you've enjoyed this episode, we hope you'll consider supporting us at BuyMeACoffee.com/FusionPatrol or Patreon.com/FusionPatrol. For our monthly Patreon subscribers, we're currently running a special series on Babylon Come join the conversation in the comments section of this episode at FusionPatrol.com. You'll also find there over a decade of past episodes. You can find some of our other works at SoundCloud.com/FusionPatrol. Our music is "Fight the Future" by Amberwolf. This has been a Lone Locust production.