Yeah, forgot about Eccleston's indie British film leading roles. I think he's pretty clearly the most high profile actor to take on the part. I'm not so sure about your other categorizations. Both Bakers were basically unknowns. Certainly, if we're talking Tom, "playing a smallish part as Rasputin in Nicholas &…

I don't have strong feelings either way for Town Called Mercy, though I remember it being my least favorite of that half season. But am I the only one who liked Dinosaurs on a Spaceship? I was just looking at rankings, and it seems to consistently rank as one of the worst stories of the Moffat era. But, I mean, it had…

Not really "more so during the RTD years" so much as "more so during the whole period before Moffat took over the show". The RTD years actually featured more "timey wimey" stories than the classic series, although those (Girl in the Fireplace, Blink) were mostly Moffat stories.

Season 7 was definitely not very good, and the Season 6 arc fell apart. But I think Season 8 was actually very consistent. In the Forest of the Night was probably the worst of the bunch, but even it had moments and did a good job advancing the overall themes of the season.

I understand that you liked the show better in the Davies era, which is certainly not an opinion you are alone in. I just have a hard time with the idea that virtually everything in the Davies era was better than anything last season, which I thought was pretty solidly enjoyable. If anything, the show has been very,…

How high profile were those lead roles? For Eccleston, isn't it basically "Our Friends in the North"? He was also a supporting actor in some Hollywood movies - Elizabeth, The Others, 28 Days Later - but those weren't lead roles.

Ah, got it. School Reunion I liked when I initially saw it, but thought it didn't really hold up, and that its characterization of Sarah was particularly embarrassing. Vampires of Venice was, um, fine? I don't remember having much of a reaction one way or the other. A Town Called Mercy, more or less the same?…

You think all of those episodes are better than anything last season? That seems mad to me.

I found 42 perfectly serviceable, but certainly not up there with the best that the show has done. I haven't rewatched it, though, so my opinion might change.

Terrance Dicks is generally going to be pretty solid. I think he's got some dubious rewrite jobs (Monster of Peladon, I believe, was mostly him), but the credited episodes - War Games, Robot, Brain of Morbius, Horror of Fang Rock, State of Decay, Five Doctors (I've not seen that one, actually) - are all pretty damned…

I think you're looking at the Davies years through rose-colored glasses if you think "most everything" was an A. I'll throw out Aliens of London/World War Three, The Long Game, Tooth and Claw, Rise of the Cybermen/Age of Steel, Idiot's Lantern, Fear Her, Shakespeare Code, Daleks in Manhattan/Evolution of the Daleks,…

Whithouse had heretofore written a grand total of one story since the God Complex, A Town Called Mercy. He didn't write anything in Season 7B or Season 8. So I'm not sure what you're talking about.

And Susan (sort of), and Rodan in The Invasion of Time, and Thalia in Arc of Infinity, and Flavia in The Five Doctors, and the Inquisitor in the Trial of a Time Lord.

As I understand it, Davison was pretty well known from All Creatures Great and Small when he was cast.

A "shit show" does not mean the same thing as a "shitty show". It means, per my google dictionary "
a situation or event marked by chaos or controversy."

I don't really get this. Of course the Doctor's not actually dead. That's not the point. But I'm nonetheless very curious to see how he ends up as a ghost.

Written by different writers, no? First part by Mathieson, second by Catherine Tregenna. I don't think there've been any two parters written by different writers.

He's more or less done that a fair bit. It's pretty much his default in the Fifth Doctor era. Five's always offering to show strangers the TARDIS to prove he is who he says he is.

Of course, Gennaro in the book was actually a voice of reason. Spielberg moved him back to "generic corporate asshole" territory.

Vampires exist! See "State of Decay"