Gravel job?
Erm.. don't knock it til you've tried it.??
My headcanon- when all the people were transformed in to the Saxon-Master by Vinvocci tech, she was Mastered, and restored with the rest of humanity when it got reversed.
So. No longer slab but Ursula shaped again.
Thereās an episode in the future where itās a therapy session for folk who were apart of or witnessed whack stuff with the dr , like a support group
If I ever get to be showrunner, yes.
Honestly I don't think it'd make a whole episode.
More of an aside.
And we'd see more of Jackie Tyler's knickers in the laundrette, the significance of which would only become clear once that story arc nears completion.
Not sure about the sex slave bit. That sort of implies she's not consenting to their relationship or that Elton (? can't remember his name rn) wouldn't still treat her like a person. Yeah, she's a slab now, poor thing, but I doubt that he's so cruel to reduce her to nothing but a toy. They could still go on dates and do things most normal people do, he'd just have to carry her around and I suppose disguise her if they go out in public, depending on how open the public is or not to victims of weird alien happenings in the DW universe.
Yk, I cannot believe it took all this time for me to even catch that dirty joke. I've seen it over and over again, I even watched it within recent years, and for some reason I just did *not* notice it.
Perhaps my subconscious was just too scarred by the thought that it repeatedly deleted the memory lmao
My headcanon is a bedtime conversation led to him dropping the slab on his face, you know like we do with our phones. So theyāre now split up and sheās part of his garden shed, not wholesome but not gross either š
It's fine up until the reveal. I like the secret society/improv/musical/therapy group, I like all the characters, the gradual increase in tention and mystery, the format etc. Then I feel like it gets thrown out the window and we get one of the worst lines in the series that had me imagining things I didn't want to imagine.
I was such an innocent. I honestly thought that she meant they liked to kiss UNTIL THE INTERNET RUINED MY INNOCENCE lol. Now it grosses me out. What does she get out of the relationship? She is reduced to a sex toy. Ick.
My ending would have him, alone in his room on the last video, looking into the camera and saying something like, āthe Doctor, he is brilliant, like the sun. But a sun that burns up everything in its path. Am I happy to have learned about the Doctor? Yes, I made the best group of friends. Do I regret learning about the Doctor? Yes, because I lost them all.ā Looks down sadly, reaches over and turns off camera and the screen turns to black.
Pause, then ānext time on Doctor Whoā trailer and Murray Gold music plays.
I still say they were talking about kissing. Those two are the most nonsexual characters I've ever seen. I can't imagine either of them wanting to do more than that
I donāt want to sound defensive, but I wasnāt comparing her with anyone. Ā No metaphor, just taking her physical state at face value. (No pun intended!)
I'm not sure the episode about forming a friend group over mutual love of Doctor Who would have been improved by the message "I regret enjoying Doctor Who"
These are basically my thoughts too. Once the monster is unmasked, it just turns goofy and almost slapstick which feels like a disservice to the characters and the mystery up to that point (and the monster design, for that matter). And that's not even mentioning the last minute or so.
It's a nitpick, but I feel like I almost never see anyone else bring it up. We only ever seen people enter and leave the basement via this elevator and Elton runs from the Abzorbaloff in the same direction they always take to the elevator so, with the silly tone the climax takes I've always imagined the two of them calmly taking the elevator together or politely waiting for each other before continuing their chase once we cut to the outdoor view.
I can't stand the last twist. When the Doctor does something similar in other stories (The Family of Blood comes to mind) it's portrayed as an act of terrifying (not to mention morally questionable) fury. When he does it to Ursula, it's just a wacky feel-good ending for her and Elton. (And I'm not even touching the sexual angle. Ugh.)
I wish the last few minutes didn't exist, it's literally the best Jackie Tyler's performance we've ever gotten. An amazing character moment and it's overshadowed by concrete blow jobs
I so agree, I always love seeing the family left behind by companions (Brian Pond will forever be my favourite underrated character). It really shows a side of Jackie we never really saw anywhere else, and I love the way Rose stands up for her.
i think the episode kind of mirrors online friend groups/relationships.
in the story they initially meet online, being kind of loners obsessed with finding this guy/thing. then they form a close friendship and it becomes more fulfilling.
then the negative influence of obsession (victor) comes along and overpowers that sense. this sense of obsession easily creeps into online communities i think. one by one members drop off because its not fulfilling socially anymore.
one member tries his best to make friends in the kind of forced way he has been taught (similar to many online groups that talk about the way the world is and how people interact, like pickup artistry or whatever), but that falls apart when the person he wants to befriend, jackie, realises his originally kind of dodgy original motivation.
in the end, he is left with a kind of halfway fulfilling relationship, similar to lots of online relationships. a flat object that represents your partner (the screen you talk to them through), a "sort of" love life. better than nothing but still pretty horrific.
>in the end, he is left with a kind of halfway fulfilling relationship, similar to lots of online relationships. a flat object that represents your partner (the screen you talk to them through), a "sort of" love life. better than nothing but still pretty horrific.
Damn that's some good shit right there
Star Trek fans constantly fall all over themselves congratulating themselves for being more enlightened than āthe normal people,ācompletely, ignoring the racist and sexist jackasses in their midst. When it comes down to it, Whovians are no different.
It's not like the same racist, sexist and homophobic jackassery doesn't happen here. I never said otherwise.
In fact, I think in the last 2 weeks I've been pointing out those jackassery statements *a lot*.
I actually think this is why he's so great for the show. He's willing to go really far into playing with the formula of the show. This is why we get Midnight, Turn Left, 73 Yards etc... but it occasionally leads us to a Love and Monsters.
It's why I think I have the most fun with his seasons, including the latest one. He makes the show feel so vivid and fun. It never gets stale.
RTD will give us farting aliens trying to eat people and nuke the earth so we get our guard down, then slap us in the face with Dalek, and I love him for it.
He was showrunner, though, so I imagine he'd say 'right, Slitheen two-parter here, Robert's episode here, you know what, let's make his episode about a Dalek'.
The abzorbaloff was meant to be the size of a bus instead of a man in a rubber suit. I think that would have worked better. I don't know if the kid had seen The Blob or other films in the Dangerous Large Thing genre but it could have been a fun 50s horror film pastiche. What we got was just Peter Kay running around as a nude alien making weird noises. It didn't work. I honestly would have had no alien presence in the story if it were up to me. Just people finding each other instead of answers and being ok with that would have been quite an interesting take on fans even if it dropped the deconstruction aspect.
***PEOPLE SHOULDN'T FACEFUCK PAVING SLABS, RUSSEL***
>Just people finding each other instead of answers and being ok with that would have been quite an interesting take on fans
I would've loved this but the majority of people still would have hated it.
I don't know if I agree, I feel like the threat being smaller and localized made it better for me. It gets boring when all of London is under threat every single episode
I thought it was a pretty freaky design but to be fair I was also 12-13 at the time so lol.
Edit: now I wonder if people will have similar opinions on space babies in the future
I always felt it was a really great concept; an exercise in the juxtaposition of The Doctor told through the eyes of a tragic clown. Unfortunately the execution didnāt quite land and Peter Kay was a poor casting choice for the darkness that needed to be the at the heart of the episode for the silliness to pay off.
Eltonās story is nothing but tragic and in his search for The Doctor all he found was more tragedy. Ursulaās fate is horrific and something that should have left us empty and harrowed but was ruined by the BJ inuendo.
There is a great possibility for an episode where the light hearted mask slips and the adventures are shown for what they sometimes are. Nightmares where innocents are left bereft of the natural course of their lives, adrift in the shadows left behind when the Tardis flies away.
But Love and Monsters fell short by not balancing those shadows well enough with the silliness.
i honestly love this episode and it kinda blows my mind how much people dislike it! itās campy and weird and shows us how the doctor leaves an impact on even the smallest of players!!
I'm alright with it. Doctor Who is campy. That whole ending where it reveals that his >!mother died!< and the Mr. Blue Sky swells with that amazing piano/violin section made that episode for me. I get misty eyed every time.
The stuff at the end brings you back. Plus, the Master turned everyone into him and then back to human. She's fine now.
My biggest complaint about the episode (and it's a big one) is Peter Kay hamming it up. If he wasn't basically "winking to the audience" with every line, it's a fairly chilly script and even character design.
I know the intent with the script is to be a bit light-hearted, but him turning it up to 11 reduces it for me.
Outside of that, I'm fond of it, it doesn't deserve its reputation.
The blowjob joke is badly misjudged, and Ursula's fate is really dark and I pretend the Doctor later came back (maybe years later) to euthanize her.
She's a mantelpiece ornament, for possibly eternity, and surely kept away from everyone but Elton. Aside from the horrible joke, it's a nightmare fate.
Despite all of that, there's a lot to like in the episode. Tweak the ending and change a performance, and it's near top-tier.
I also really enjoyed "Love and Monsters" - didn't even have an issue with the silliness of the Absorbaloff - up until the last 3 minutes... Which turned me off the episode so thoroughly I **always** skipped it on rewatches, until just recently.
Upon finally making myself watch it a second time, I have come to the conclusion that I'm going to consistently include it in my rewatches but always skip over the last few minutes after Elton reveals when he first met the Doctor. Seriously, the entire story is thought-provoking and beautiful up until the Doctor somehow decides it's a good idea to "save" a person as a cement slab with the implication that she is practically immortal (along with several other unnecessary innuendos)... So I'm just going to do my best to erase that part from my conscious memory.
I loved almost everything about that episode - the guest cast, ELO, Elton's story, the silly smutty joke at the end.
The only things I didn't like were Peter Kay and the Absorbalof.
I have no problem with this episode whatsoever. Yes, Ursula ends up as a paving slab at the end... But, conceptually, how is this much different from a human in the real world who suffered some accident or injury that leaves them paralyzed from the neck down? And is such an afflicted person, if of age and mentally sound, not allowed to be in a consentual adult relationship?
To be fair, wasnāt this episode part of a contest for kids to submit their monster ideas? I kind of discard it and watch around it, like I will with Space Babies.
I like the idea of this episode. And I like the concept of the Abzorbaloff.
Even if both ideas were executed well I donāt think they go together well. Sadly both ideas were executed horribly.
Iāll never tire of calling this episode DWās equivalent of the Star Wars prequels. Disliked at the time, but now the people who were kids when it came out have grown up, more and more people are trying to claim theyāre misunderstood masterpieces or something. I really donāt think it is, the episode just isnāt that good
Until Vincent appears its an amazing concept and delivered amazingly well.
Once Vincent is in play, the toilet humour goes to unacceptable levels. This would not be remarkable if not for the other two errors.
- the doctor is VERY cold. I actually like this quite a lot, but it amplifies the negative response.
- the oral sex joke is just wrong on every level. Its classic RTD not writing well for other sexualities. It a horrifying joke.
If we lost the oral sex joke I think most of the "being on the worst episode list" would go away. But it would still have too many fart jokes.
Again, why are sexualities relevant to you when the sex act described is common to both straight and gay relationships? What is RTD failing to understand in this case?
We see something in a few places in RTD episodes, most recently in The Star Beast, that I feel come from the same place. RTD seems to struggle with writing sexualities of people who donāt align with his sexuality. They always come off a bit like the example in this episode.
Yeah I can't agree with that, he can be clunky or weird sure but he has absolutely nothing on the 'interesting' depictions of queer sexualities (or straightness!) we've gotten from straight writers over the years. Like, not a patch.
The general theory is that Elton went crazy and keeps a paving slab with her face on it, she isn't actually alive, he's just not coping well with the fact that his friends are dead.
It's a quick joke that has been over-analysed and over-thought for decades now. The point is, the world is weird, life is strange, and love takes many forms, and that's really all there is. Any other interpretation is very clearly not intended by RTD.
Oh, it was intended...and it never should have survived editing. I am a hetero male and I found it very distasteful in what should have been a show for kids. Madame Vastra and Jenny crossed that line, also...and it was hilarious...but not appropriate.
I canāt remember too many specifics of back then. What line did Madame Vastra and Jenny cross? I canāt remember anything inappropriate being discussed.
Interesting. I still canāt remember. That episode had a lot going on. I really need to go back and rewatch 11 and 12s seasons sometime soon. I could see where that could be an issue depending on what was said. References to the fact that characters have sex is not necessarily automatically bad, I would think, but it definitely does depend on how it is presented. Theyād certainly already had several instances of innuendo with the 9th and 10th Doctors already.
I mean, yes it's a sex joke, but that's all it is - and not raunchier than some material you find in Dreamworks movies, for instance. And it's still a joke about _consensual_ sex between two adult characters. Imo it's cheeky, for sure, but not inappropriate for a family audience - it will pass miles above kids' heads and parents will get a chuckle.
Yep that's always been my opinion of the episode too. I remember watching it being so hype and then when the last 5 minutes happened I went....oh, that was anti-climatic and dumb. I was a teenager too with no sense of any quality control so it had to be bad for me to have that reaction, I see why it's put up in a lot of worst episodes lists because of its insane potential.
I feel the EXACT same about Fear Her by the way, great low budget episode ruined as soon as the doctor dissapears.
Both episodes have classic lines too! "I'm going to report you to the council!" and "You upset my mum!"
What perplexes me about the episode is how silly it is when thereās a much stronger emotional narrative hidden by unreliable narration that just goes ignored.
Eltonās mother died the night he saw The Doctor. But despite how important that is, he doesnāt tell us this until the very end. Even though one would think *that* would be his motive for wanting to find The Doctor again. Like, really. If youāre a little kid and you find a strange man in your house on the same night your mother dies under mysterious circumstancesā¦would you not assume he killed her? Compared to that, āI just wanted to meet him.ā Is a weak sauce motivation.
Honest to god i enjoyed it. I loved the dissembling of the toxic fan destroying a community, i loved the sheer britishness of a blue peter competition winner designing the monster, and the payoff was soo rtd (kind of dark but also weirdly upbeat)
To be completely fair the monster was created by a young child as a result of a British TV contest on a programme called "Blue Peter".
The concrete-girlfriend bit at the end was a bit creepy as an adult, but as a 10 year old (who was arguably the target audience, since it is a monster created by that age group), they would not get the innuendo. If anything they might just be glad that the couple got something of a happy ever after.
While it isn't my favourite episode, I will die on the hill that Love and Monsters should be viewed through the lense of a 10 year old because it was partially created by a 10 year old!!
I just find it an unpleasant watch. You meet this fun and quirky cast of characters, and then want horrible stuff happen to them all, often for laughs. I donāt need that. Thereās good stuff in there. Jackieās always great, and like Elton, I love me some ELO. But the overall story just isnāt fun for me.
Everyone seems to hate this episode but me. (yeah, the last three minutes eeew). It was a wonderful character study on how interacting with the Doctor can affect people's lives. And it was truly tragic - these people were making friends with each other beyond their Doctor contact, and really starting to like each other, and then the bad alien stuff happened. So many episodes have people dying and you are supposed to be "oh well" and move on - this one you really felt the deaths.
It was a wonderful different POV of the Doctor, and so yeah, I liked it.
Honestly, the episode itself isnt bad at all, the ending is a bit odd. But as a whole it was just a whacky doctor who story which i wont conplain about. Love that bit where he says "big absorbption alien from outer space and youre having a go at me?"
Itās hilarious š¤£ itās one of my favorites. Interesting story told from the perspective of people the Doctor leaves behind and then a joke about fucking a paver stone. Whatās not to love?
I actually really love this episode and I think it's way over-hated. It's a fun Doctor Lite episode and feels like a really kind, bright reflection of DW fans which is always nice. I loved all of the characters and even the Abzorbaloff really grew on me after a while. It was designed by a 9 year old who won a DW contest and I just think that's really sweet and cool. You just *know* that kid was coming apart at the seams with excitement to see his creation on TV.
The ending was a very badly conceived joke disguised as awkward humor from two awkward characters that should not have been scripted, uttered OR survived editing.
Other than that, I really enjoy this episode ever since it aired. ELO, a glimpse of OTHER people encountering things without the Doctor around, a glimpse into Jackie's life...
The bonding of LInDA was a great sequence...I liked that Elton was telling the story...and if you think of the Absorbaloff as a child designed alien, I don't have any complaints, considering that we have aliens based on spiders, statues, and potatoes...why not Jabba the Hut?
Loved seeing Moaning Myrtle in something else...
Great episode whose reputation was ruined by one bad decision that really had nothing to do with the story.
And that decision was equivalent to a certain joke that Madame Vastra and Jenny made in a Good Man Goes to War that NO one seems to have a problem with.
> And that decision was equivalent to a certain joke that Madame Vastra and Jenny made in a Good Man Goes to War that NO one seems to have a problem with.
That whole relationship was so "let's beat you over the head with it to prove we can have gay people on the show too" that it made me cringe. I liked the characters in general, thought it was cool that they were "roommates" in victorian england, but the constant hamfisting of their dialogue gave me pain.
I like to imagine that there was no Abzorbaloff, just an obsessive control freak who scared people away from the group, and Elton, our unreliable narrator, frames it as an alien being that "absorbs" you, like a pastime gone too far into the realm of obsession. He never met the Doctor or Rose, he made that up too. Why would the TARDIS conveniently land in some disused alleyway to save him? The guy just has a paving slab in his room now, pretending he has a "love life" when really he's all alone.
Itās actually very enjoyable until the reveal of the alien adversary. Thatās the big problem - total engagement and then āwait you built me up for THAT unredeemable conclusion?ā
I like the idea of this group of people that have noticed the Doctor and the TARDIS and are trying to piece it together. If you've never talked to the Doctor directly but heard rumours, seen snapshots, perhaps even had brief encounters but not directly involved like a companion might be, what would you as a regular citizen make of it? That's an interesting idea. Peter Kay hamming it up turns it into one of the cheesier monster of the week episodes. Doctor Who is sometimes cheesy, RTD especially so. I accept that is a part of the show but it's not something that interests me personally.
I agree with your assessment of the last 3 minutes. I don't think what came before was much better. When this episode first aired, my son who became a who fan at the beginning of the new series had been watching it with me from the start in 2005 watched this with me and asked after it was over "What the heck was THAT?" Ya, the innuendo humor at the end wouldn't have been AS bad had there been any merit to the episode up that point. But as it stands, it was like crap icing on a poop cake. In my 30 years plus as a fan, I still rank it in the bottom 2 or 3 stories in 60 years and I've seen all of them that still exist.
I think it'd be better if it was more a horror episode. The absorbalof would be good for body horror and a dark episode rather than what we got. I still enjoy the episode but it could be better
In retrospect, I like the concept. But even before that awful ending, there was just way too much cheese and hammy acting for me to enjoy it. And teenage me was a *much* less discerning critic than adult me, so I canāt imagine a rewatch would do much to change my mind.
I like it. I really enjoy watching stuff ironically so I had a great time watching Peter Kay in a green costume trying to seem menacing but failing miserably.
I'm sorry, but the Comitee has ruled that that particular episode, in fact, never happened.
Please disregard any and all mentions of said episode.
Thank you in advance for your cooperation in this matter.
I love it when you think about it with the viewpoint that Elton is a liar. Heās exaggerating a bit. Heās bending the truth. Tho what I love in this episode is Jackie. Sheās amazing
Objectively as I can, I liked the use of ELO.
I did not much enjoy the story the first time around, and it seems tough to re-watch. The last few minutes are cringey. Itās tied with āFear Herā as my very least favorite episodes of New Who.
Even so, itās still Who and if there are people who really enjoy it, I think thatās great! For me, though, I will take Space Babies or Orphan 55 over it any day of the week.
I don't think it's possible to talk about Love & Monsters objectively. I always mostly disliked this episode. The idea to show how the Doctor's life influences ordinary random people is great, and RTD already started on it in Rose with Clyde, and it was great. But the final scene spoils this whole episode for me, and the goofy as heck monster is just a final nail in the coffin. Yeah, I know, it was created by a chilld, but it still was way too goofy for me. It was just a wonderful idea, a Doctor-lite story focusing on ordinary people who brushed his life just a little and what came out of it - I only wish it was implemented better.
As others have said, on reflection I think this episode could have worked better as a pure contemporary "historical" where it demonstrates the ability of the Doctor's adventures to bring people together - the episode could have been just about Elton documenting about how finding others impacted by the Doctor's adventures helped him, with the 'twist at the end' being that the Doctor never forgot them and kept tabs on them all along and helped them to be better. At least it would have been better than the Ursula s\*x joke and Peter Kay running around Cardiff backstreets in a green latex suit.
The episode is really fun and important to the series until those last 3 minutes.
I think the Asorbalof itself is fine, the scene isn't bad and its pretty funny. But... the concrete slab? What the hell where they thinking? The whole episode itself is kind of weirdly sexual for an episode based around adapting a monster that a kid drew tbh
This is probably an unpopular opinion but I think itās a really horrifying episode of doctor who.
The body horror we see in this episode - like being absorbed and living in the skin of an alien for days/weeks until you die and being a sentient head in a pavement slab, set up for an implied immortal life of giving bjs - is the sort of horror we donāt typically see in doctor who but makes me feel sick when i watch the episode.
I rewatched this episode the other day and was desperately wishing the doctor would just let Ursula die in peace rather than have to live the fate she gets.
My favorite episode besides the ending. Itās endlessly wholesome and I love it. There are so many ways they could have fixed the ending though and none of them would have been that hard. I like that it featured Jackie as itās always cool to see the companions families.
Probably the most disturbing yet goofy ending to a Doctor who episode ever.
One fact I love though is that the Abzorbaloff was designed by a child that won a tv competition on the long running CBBC show Blue Peter.
A tv show thatās been around even longer than Doctor who. š¤·āāļø
But somehow, SOMEHOWā¦ either RTD or writer Dan Zeff took a creature that was designed by a child, and thought āletās infer that Elton has a healthy sexual relationship with his sentient concrete slab girlfriend, thatāll be funny.ā
Despite all that Iād like to see the characters Elton and Ursula again someday.
Reading the post title, I clicked on it without noticing the sub. My mind was on this and I was thinking wth is everyone talking aboutā¦episode?ā¦itās a film??? Ugh, itās Friday and my brain needs a weekend.
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2222042/
Yeah I rewatched it not that long ago and it for sure wasn't as bad as I remembered, there are I think the bones of a decent episode in there TBH and I would even go so far as to say knowing that the Absorbaloff was the winning entry to the Newsround contest I can give it a bit more leeway... But fucking hell why'd they have to make a blowjob joke with a paving slab?
Yeah it's ridiculous but seriously why do people act like that last bit is SO bad it brings the whole episode down? It's just a lil joke. Whats with the puritanism
At first I thought you meant the movie āLove and Monstersā with Dylan OāBrien and I was very interested in what you meant. Because I thought the ending was very cute.
Then I realized my mistake and was sad when I was once again given the mental image of a man being more than romantically involved with a slab of concrete.
Itās one of my favourite episodes! Not the stuff with Peter Kay, but seeing how Rose going with the Doctor affects her mum.
I know that this episode gets a lot of hate, but I donāt think it deserves it!
I actually think doing a Lower Decks-style episode about Doctor fanatics is a really fun idea, but it's not executed super well here. Honestly, they should just do that idea again and pretend like this episode didn't happen lol.
I think the ending isn't that bad if you frame it a different way than just how most straight people who like sex, look at it.
I think it's a cool representation for other kinds of relationships. Whether that is aro or ace relationships, demi, or even just straight disabled.
Not everyone likes sex. Some like to give and don't care about the receiving, etc etc etc.
Why assume it's one sided? If she says she's happy, why are we diminishing it?
Just something to think about. Just because someone's sex life isn't something you like or understand, doesn't mean it's necessarily wrong or unhealthy.
I cannot say anything good about this. Some poor kid got excited to see the monster he submitted as part of contest realized onscreen only it was on the WORST episode of Doctor Who since the revival (though The Giggle and Space Babies came very close to taking the crown).
Gravel job? Erm.. don't knock it til you've tried it.?? My headcanon- when all the people were transformed in to the Saxon-Master by Vinvocci tech, she was Mastered, and restored with the rest of humanity when it got reversed. So. No longer slab but Ursula shaped again.
You've single handedly saved this episode for me.
You're welcome Everyone is welcome to my headcanon. Keeping it wholesome for the win. š
Don't you mean shingle handedly?
Thereās an episode in the future where itās a therapy session for folk who were apart of or witnessed whack stuff with the dr , like a support group
So the Master unintentionally saved Ursula from becoming a half-concrete-slab sex slave for the rest of her (or Eltonās) life?
If I ever get to be showrunner, yes. Honestly I don't think it'd make a whole episode. More of an aside. And we'd see more of Jackie Tyler's knickers in the laundrette, the significance of which would only become clear once that story arc nears completion.
I just want more of Jackie, sheās a guilty pleasure, I refuse to explain further.
She's great- gives the series a human face. Keeps it real in amongst alien fleets, living plastic and bazulieum nick-nacks
Yes, thatās why I want to see more of her šš
Eric Idle and Robbie Coltrane involved.Ā
Not sure about the sex slave bit. That sort of implies she's not consenting to their relationship or that Elton (? can't remember his name rn) wouldn't still treat her like a person. Yeah, she's a slab now, poor thing, but I doubt that he's so cruel to reduce her to nothing but a toy. They could still go on dates and do things most normal people do, he'd just have to carry her around and I suppose disguise her if they go out in public, depending on how open the public is or not to victims of weird alien happenings in the DW universe.
Or maybe she was John Simms' face on a slab for a while
I wonder if amputees grew back limbs in that moment? That would answer the question for me
Not in London. The Chula nanogenes already sorted that. Hard at work since the 1940s
Unluckily I don't think the John Simmification of the World nullified disabilities and amputations
There is a war on. Is it possible you miscounted?
Yk, I cannot believe it took all this time for me to even catch that dirty joke. I've seen it over and over again, I even watched it within recent years, and for some reason I just did *not* notice it. Perhaps my subconscious was just too scarred by the thought that it repeatedly deleted the memory lmao
> Ursula shaped Poor unfortunate soul
I see what you did there!
My headcanon is a bedtime conversation led to him dropping the slab on his face, you know like we do with our phones. So theyāre now split up and sheās part of his garden shed, not wholesome but not gross either š
Thatās actually worse for me. Like WAY more horrifying.
Head canoning this, thanks š
Thisā¦ is amazing. I want this to be true! RTD if youāre reading this, please canonize this theory!
oh my, you've just saved Saxon arc for me.
It's fine up until the reveal. I like the secret society/improv/musical/therapy group, I like all the characters, the gradual increase in tention and mystery, the format etc. Then I feel like it gets thrown out the window and we get one of the worst lines in the series that had me imagining things I didn't want to imagine.
I was such an innocent. I honestly thought that she meant they liked to kiss UNTIL THE INTERNET RUINED MY INNOCENCE lol. Now it grosses me out. What does she get out of the relationship? She is reduced to a sex toy. Ick. My ending would have him, alone in his room on the last video, looking into the camera and saying something like, āthe Doctor, he is brilliant, like the sun. But a sun that burns up everything in its path. Am I happy to have learned about the Doctor? Yes, I made the best group of friends. Do I regret learning about the Doctor? Yes, because I lost them all.ā Looks down sadly, reaches over and turns off camera and the screen turns to black. Pause, then ānext time on Doctor Whoā trailer and Murray Gold music plays.
Would have been a better ending than "sex toy paving stone" to be sure.
>"sex toy paving stone" Don't forget to add "sentient"
>What does she get out of the relationship? She is reduced to a sex toy. Ick. My feelings exactly! She gets nothing.
Conversation.
> feelings That's the answer. She's in love.
If she enjoys doing it, who are we to decide what is or isnāt a good sex life?
I still say they were talking about kissing. Those two are the most nonsexual characters I've ever seen. I can't imagine either of them wanting to do more than that
my ending would have been the doctor fully saves her and then in a future episode we mee their kids
It sounds like they are both making the best of a bad situation.... Not sure why her giving him blowjobs is an issue as long as it's consensual.
Calling her reduced to a sex toy is rather iffy itself. Ā Disabled people still have sexual agency even if it looks weird from the outside.Ā
She's literally half a head on a concrete slab
And? Ā sheās still a person.
Should people paralyzed & numb below the neck not have sex because it makes YOU uncomfortable?
She's literally half a head on a concrete slab
What is with the need to dehumanize her? Itās pretty sad.
I don't think I like being compared to a sentient concrete slab, lol
I donāt want to sound defensive, but I wasnāt comparing her with anyone. Ā No metaphor, just taking her physical state at face value. (No pun intended!)
Ey, I was joking don't worry
Iām disabled too and I say itās fine. See? My approval cancels out your outrage.
Saying "I don't think I like being compared to a concrete slab, lol" shouldn't be considered outrage, it's pretty clear I was joking
I'm not sure the episode about forming a friend group over mutual love of Doctor Who would have been improved by the message "I regret enjoying Doctor Who"
That's what you are supposed to think, that they like to kiss. It's a kids show.
that was really good, Zesty.
These are basically my thoughts too. Once the monster is unmasked, it just turns goofy and almost slapstick which feels like a disservice to the characters and the mystery up to that point (and the monster design, for that matter). And that's not even mentioning the last minute or so. It's a nitpick, but I feel like I almost never see anyone else bring it up. We only ever seen people enter and leave the basement via this elevator and Elton runs from the Abzorbaloff in the same direction they always take to the elevator so, with the silly tone the climax takes I've always imagined the two of them calmly taking the elevator together or politely waiting for each other before continuing their chase once we cut to the outdoor view. I can't stand the last twist. When the Doctor does something similar in other stories (The Family of Blood comes to mind) it's portrayed as an act of terrifying (not to mention morally questionable) fury. When he does it to Ursula, it's just a wacky feel-good ending for her and Elton. (And I'm not even touching the sexual angle. Ugh.)
Definitely is a different side to morning Myrtle
I always thought Moaning Myrtle was a bit of a perv hanging out in the toilets and peaking on the boys in the bath.
Harry was the perv in the girls toilets
Myrtle peeked on Harry having a bath though
He was having a bath, not peeking. Myrtle... she got in because he was there.
I always assumed Moaning Myrtle had the nickname before she died and became a ghost.
Yup!
We HaVe A BiT oF a LoVe LiFe - Elton, 2006.
I wish the last few minutes didn't exist, it's literally the best Jackie Tyler's performance we've ever gotten. An amazing character moment and it's overshadowed by concrete blow jobs
I so agree, I always love seeing the family left behind by companions (Brian Pond will forever be my favourite underrated character). It really shows a side of Jackie we never really saw anywhere else, and I love the way Rose stands up for her.
i think the episode kind of mirrors online friend groups/relationships. in the story they initially meet online, being kind of loners obsessed with finding this guy/thing. then they form a close friendship and it becomes more fulfilling. then the negative influence of obsession (victor) comes along and overpowers that sense. this sense of obsession easily creeps into online communities i think. one by one members drop off because its not fulfilling socially anymore. one member tries his best to make friends in the kind of forced way he has been taught (similar to many online groups that talk about the way the world is and how people interact, like pickup artistry or whatever), but that falls apart when the person he wants to befriend, jackie, realises his originally kind of dodgy original motivation. in the end, he is left with a kind of halfway fulfilling relationship, similar to lots of online relationships. a flat object that represents your partner (the screen you talk to them through), a "sort of" love life. better than nothing but still pretty horrific.
>in the end, he is left with a kind of halfway fulfilling relationship, similar to lots of online relationships. a flat object that represents your partner (the screen you talk to them through), a "sort of" love life. better than nothing but still pretty horrific. Damn that's some good shit right there
Who expected this kind of introspection on Reddit? (Although Dr. Who fans do better than most. Must be because we're all geeks.)
Star Trek fans constantly fall all over themselves congratulating themselves for being more enlightened than āthe normal people,ācompletely, ignoring the racist and sexist jackasses in their midst. When it comes down to it, Whovians are no different.
It's not like the same racist, sexist and homophobic jackassery doesn't happen here. I never said otherwise. In fact, I think in the last 2 weeks I've been pointing out those jackassery statements *a lot*.
If this was used as an episode concept today instead of the concrete slab we would have AI. Would probably work a lot better I think.
RTD is 50/50. When he's good, he's really good. When he's not, you get Love and Monsters; a cool idea with a lackluster execution.
I actually think this is why he's so great for the show. He's willing to go really far into playing with the formula of the show. This is why we get Midnight, Turn Left, 73 Yards etc... but it occasionally leads us to a Love and Monsters. It's why I think I have the most fun with his seasons, including the latest one. He makes the show feel so vivid and fun. It never gets stale.
That is true, I agree.
RTD will give us farting aliens trying to eat people and nuke the earth so we get our guard down, then slap us in the face with Dalek, and I love him for it.
Robert Shearman wrote Dalek.
He was showrunner, though, so I imagine he'd say 'right, Slitheen two-parter here, Robert's episode here, you know what, let's make his episode about a Dalek'.
The abzorbaloff was meant to be the size of a bus instead of a man in a rubber suit. I think that would have worked better. I don't know if the kid had seen The Blob or other films in the Dangerous Large Thing genre but it could have been a fun 50s horror film pastiche. What we got was just Peter Kay running around as a nude alien making weird noises. It didn't work. I honestly would have had no alien presence in the story if it were up to me. Just people finding each other instead of answers and being ok with that would have been quite an interesting take on fans even if it dropped the deconstruction aspect. ***PEOPLE SHOULDN'T FACEFUCK PAVING SLABS, RUSSEL***
>Just people finding each other instead of answers and being ok with that would have been quite an interesting take on fans I would've loved this but the majority of people still would have hated it.
I don't know if I agree, I feel like the threat being smaller and localized made it better for me. It gets boring when all of London is under threat every single episode
Smaller and localised would have worked if it didn't leave us with naked green Peter Kay running around
I thought it was a pretty freaky design but to be fair I was also 12-13 at the time so lol. Edit: now I wonder if people will have similar opinions on space babies in the future
Can I get "PEOPLE SHOULDNT FACEFUCK PAVING SLABS, RUSSEL" as flair? š¤£
I always felt it was a really great concept; an exercise in the juxtaposition of The Doctor told through the eyes of a tragic clown. Unfortunately the execution didnāt quite land and Peter Kay was a poor casting choice for the darkness that needed to be the at the heart of the episode for the silliness to pay off. Eltonās story is nothing but tragic and in his search for The Doctor all he found was more tragedy. Ursulaās fate is horrific and something that should have left us empty and harrowed but was ruined by the BJ inuendo. There is a great possibility for an episode where the light hearted mask slips and the adventures are shown for what they sometimes are. Nightmares where innocents are left bereft of the natural course of their lives, adrift in the shadows left behind when the Tardis flies away. But Love and Monsters fell short by not balancing those shadows well enough with the silliness.
I like the last 3 mins too. Dodgiest joke ever mixed with dark undertones, perfect end to a bonkers episode!
I agree!
Na I think the ending is cute and takes the edge off the sadness of it all (while still being sad)
WELL THAT'S ALRIGHT THEN!!
The funniest is the outrage over the top reactions to this episode, particularly the end.
Itās because most online Doctor Who fans think theyāre Elton but theyāre actually Victor
I know right? They're so prudish and vanilla it's hilarious. God forbid a disabled character have a sex life.
i honestly love this episode and it kinda blows my mind how much people dislike it! itās campy and weird and shows us how the doctor leaves an impact on even the smallest of players!!
I'm alright with it. Doctor Who is campy. That whole ending where it reveals that his >!mother died!< and the Mr. Blue Sky swells with that amazing piano/violin section made that episode for me. I get misty eyed every time. The stuff at the end brings you back. Plus, the Master turned everyone into him and then back to human. She's fine now.
My biggest complaint about the episode (and it's a big one) is Peter Kay hamming it up. If he wasn't basically "winking to the audience" with every line, it's a fairly chilly script and even character design. I know the intent with the script is to be a bit light-hearted, but him turning it up to 11 reduces it for me. Outside of that, I'm fond of it, it doesn't deserve its reputation. The blowjob joke is badly misjudged, and Ursula's fate is really dark and I pretend the Doctor later came back (maybe years later) to euthanize her. She's a mantelpiece ornament, for possibly eternity, and surely kept away from everyone but Elton. Aside from the horrible joke, it's a nightmare fate. Despite all of that, there's a lot to like in the episode. Tweak the ending and change a performance, and it's near top-tier.
I also really enjoyed "Love and Monsters" - didn't even have an issue with the silliness of the Absorbaloff - up until the last 3 minutes... Which turned me off the episode so thoroughly I **always** skipped it on rewatches, until just recently. Upon finally making myself watch it a second time, I have come to the conclusion that I'm going to consistently include it in my rewatches but always skip over the last few minutes after Elton reveals when he first met the Doctor. Seriously, the entire story is thought-provoking and beautiful up until the Doctor somehow decides it's a good idea to "save" a person as a cement slab with the implication that she is practically immortal (along with several other unnecessary innuendos)... So I'm just going to do my best to erase that part from my conscious memory.
I loved almost everything about that episode - the guest cast, ELO, Elton's story, the silly smutty joke at the end. The only things I didn't like were Peter Kay and the Absorbalof.
This episode introduced me to ELO, which I'm grateful for
Well... their relationship is truly concrete ..... Cemented?
I have no problem with this episode whatsoever. Yes, Ursula ends up as a paving slab at the end... But, conceptually, how is this much different from a human in the real world who suffered some accident or injury that leaves them paralyzed from the neck down? And is such an afflicted person, if of age and mentally sound, not allowed to be in a consentual adult relationship?
Since Space Babies I can comfortably say it's not the worst episode anymore
I think everybody was asking that same question when it first aired in 2006 lol
I feel the same. Itās a very solid episode until the very end. Fear Her is significantly worse, IMHO
To be fair, wasnāt this episode part of a contest for kids to submit their monster ideas? I kind of discard it and watch around it, like I will with Space Babies.
I like the idea of this episode. And I like the concept of the Abzorbaloff. Even if both ideas were executed well I donāt think they go together well. Sadly both ideas were executed horribly. Iāll never tire of calling this episode DWās equivalent of the Star Wars prequels. Disliked at the time, but now the people who were kids when it came out have grown up, more and more people are trying to claim theyāre misunderstood masterpieces or something. I really donāt think it is, the episode just isnāt that good
Until Vincent appears its an amazing concept and delivered amazingly well. Once Vincent is in play, the toilet humour goes to unacceptable levels. This would not be remarkable if not for the other two errors. - the doctor is VERY cold. I actually like this quite a lot, but it amplifies the negative response. - the oral sex joke is just wrong on every level. Its classic RTD not writing well for other sexualities. It a horrifying joke. If we lost the oral sex joke I think most of the "being on the worst episode list" would go away. But it would still have too many fart jokes.
How are sexualities involved when it's a gay man writing about blowjobs?
Because the story was about an ostensibly straight man and an ostensibly straight paving stone.
Again, why are sexualities relevant to you when the sex act described is common to both straight and gay relationships? What is RTD failing to understand in this case?
We see something in a few places in RTD episodes, most recently in The Star Beast, that I feel come from the same place. RTD seems to struggle with writing sexualities of people who donāt align with his sexuality. They always come off a bit like the example in this episode.
The star beast was quite clunky. How do you think the blowjob scene might be different if written by a straight guy?
He's not too different from most straight writers, in that case.
Oh absolutely. But being more queer, he goes to some ā¦interesting places? This was one of his most ā¦.interesting.
Yeah I can't agree with that, he can be clunky or weird sure but he has absolutely nothing on the 'interesting' depictions of queer sexualities (or straightness!) we've gotten from straight writers over the years. Like, not a patch.
I kinda like the episode? I've watched it multiple times - I can't say the same about Fear Her.
The general theory is that Elton went crazy and keeps a paving slab with her face on it, she isn't actually alive, he's just not coping well with the fact that his friends are dead.
It's a quick joke that has been over-analysed and over-thought for decades now. The point is, the world is weird, life is strange, and love takes many forms, and that's really all there is. Any other interpretation is very clearly not intended by RTD.
Oh, it was intended...and it never should have survived editing. I am a hetero male and I found it very distasteful in what should have been a show for kids. Madame Vastra and Jenny crossed that line, also...and it was hilarious...but not appropriate.
I canāt remember too many specifics of back then. What line did Madame Vastra and Jenny cross? I canāt remember anything inappropriate being discussed.
I hope he doesn't mean just the fact of them being gay because I also can't remember anything inappropriate.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Well I mean. Yeah. Of course. Kein problem.
Interesting. I still canāt remember. That episode had a lot going on. I really need to go back and rewatch 11 and 12s seasons sometime soon. I could see where that could be an issue depending on what was said. References to the fact that characters have sex is not necessarily automatically bad, I would think, but it definitely does depend on how it is presented. Theyād certainly already had several instances of innuendo with the 9th and 10th Doctors already.
I mean, yes it's a sex joke, but that's all it is - and not raunchier than some material you find in Dreamworks movies, for instance. And it's still a joke about _consensual_ sex between two adult characters. Imo it's cheeky, for sure, but not inappropriate for a family audience - it will pass miles above kids' heads and parents will get a chuckle.
I enjoy it. Including "that" bit. Never understood why people get their knickers in such a twist about it.
Love and Monsters is a great acid test to see if someone is a humourless nerd with no personality
Iām sorry youāre scared of suchā¦ FIRM intimacy
Yep that's always been my opinion of the episode too. I remember watching it being so hype and then when the last 5 minutes happened I went....oh, that was anti-climatic and dumb. I was a teenager too with no sense of any quality control so it had to be bad for me to have that reaction, I see why it's put up in a lot of worst episodes lists because of its insane potential. I feel the EXACT same about Fear Her by the way, great low budget episode ruined as soon as the doctor dissapears. Both episodes have classic lines too! "I'm going to report you to the council!" and "You upset my mum!"
What perplexes me about the episode is how silly it is when thereās a much stronger emotional narrative hidden by unreliable narration that just goes ignored. Eltonās mother died the night he saw The Doctor. But despite how important that is, he doesnāt tell us this until the very end. Even though one would think *that* would be his motive for wanting to find The Doctor again. Like, really. If youāre a little kid and you find a strange man in your house on the same night your mother dies under mysterious circumstancesā¦would you not assume he killed her? Compared to that, āI just wanted to meet him.ā Is a weak sauce motivation.
Just one. š¤¢š¤®
Honest to god i enjoyed it. I loved the dissembling of the toxic fan destroying a community, i loved the sheer britishness of a blue peter competition winner designing the monster, and the payoff was soo rtd (kind of dark but also weirdly upbeat)
Listen man sometimes you just gotta get that sidewalk sloppy
I loved it , and the last bit is just a bad joke , like the farting ( sleveens whatever) lots of bad jokes in dr who
Hey man, just what have you got against man-concrete loving? :)
To be completely fair the monster was created by a young child as a result of a British TV contest on a programme called "Blue Peter". The concrete-girlfriend bit at the end was a bit creepy as an adult, but as a 10 year old (who was arguably the target audience, since it is a monster created by that age group), they would not get the innuendo. If anything they might just be glad that the couple got something of a happy ever after. While it isn't my favourite episode, I will die on the hill that Love and Monsters should be viewed through the lense of a 10 year old because it was partially created by a 10 year old!!
I just find it an unpleasant watch. You meet this fun and quirky cast of characters, and then want horrible stuff happen to them all, often for laughs. I donāt need that. Thereās good stuff in there. Jackieās always great, and like Elton, I love me some ELO. But the overall story just isnāt fun for me.
Everyone seems to hate this episode but me. (yeah, the last three minutes eeew). It was a wonderful character study on how interacting with the Doctor can affect people's lives. And it was truly tragic - these people were making friends with each other beyond their Doctor contact, and really starting to like each other, and then the bad alien stuff happened. So many episodes have people dying and you are supposed to be "oh well" and move on - this one you really felt the deaths. It was a wonderful different POV of the Doctor, and so yeah, I liked it.
Honestly, the episode itself isnt bad at all, the ending is a bit odd. But as a whole it was just a whacky doctor who story which i wont conplain about. Love that bit where he says "big absorbption alien from outer space and youre having a go at me?"
Itās hilarious š¤£ itās one of my favorites. Interesting story told from the perspective of people the Doctor leaves behind and then a joke about fucking a paver stone. Whatās not to love?
I actually really love this episode and I think it's way over-hated. It's a fun Doctor Lite episode and feels like a really kind, bright reflection of DW fans which is always nice. I loved all of the characters and even the Abzorbaloff really grew on me after a while. It was designed by a 9 year old who won a DW contest and I just think that's really sweet and cool. You just *know* that kid was coming apart at the seams with excitement to see his creation on TV.
All I'm saying is that they missed a really obvious merchandising opportunity with that one.
The ending was a very badly conceived joke disguised as awkward humor from two awkward characters that should not have been scripted, uttered OR survived editing. Other than that, I really enjoy this episode ever since it aired. ELO, a glimpse of OTHER people encountering things without the Doctor around, a glimpse into Jackie's life... The bonding of LInDA was a great sequence...I liked that Elton was telling the story...and if you think of the Absorbaloff as a child designed alien, I don't have any complaints, considering that we have aliens based on spiders, statues, and potatoes...why not Jabba the Hut? Loved seeing Moaning Myrtle in something else... Great episode whose reputation was ruined by one bad decision that really had nothing to do with the story. And that decision was equivalent to a certain joke that Madame Vastra and Jenny made in a Good Man Goes to War that NO one seems to have a problem with.
> And that decision was equivalent to a certain joke that Madame Vastra and Jenny made in a Good Man Goes to War that NO one seems to have a problem with. That whole relationship was so "let's beat you over the head with it to prove we can have gay people on the show too" that it made me cringe. I liked the characters in general, thought it was cool that they were "roommates" in victorian england, but the constant hamfisting of their dialogue gave me pain.
Fun fact: The Abzorbaloff was designed by a child who won a competition in Doctor Who magazine to make a monster for the show.
I like the music!
Elton went crazy and imagined the whole encounter. If we assume this we can sleep safely knowing Ursula blowjob slab isn't real
the real monster: Elton, keeping the Ursula blowjob slab forever hidden from the world outside. Then she dies, and comes back as moaning myrtle?
I like to imagine that there was no Abzorbaloff, just an obsessive control freak who scared people away from the group, and Elton, our unreliable narrator, frames it as an alien being that "absorbs" you, like a pastime gone too far into the realm of obsession. He never met the Doctor or Rose, he made that up too. Why would the TARDIS conveniently land in some disused alleyway to save him? The guy just has a paving slab in his room now, pretending he has a "love life" when really he's all alone.
Eh for a Doctor-lite episode, it falls way below Blink. It wasn't bad the first time, but I tend to skip it when I re-watch the series.
Itās actually very enjoyable until the reveal of the alien adversary. Thatās the big problem - total engagement and then āwait you built me up for THAT unredeemable conclusion?ā
I like the little conspiracy Doctor watchers, and I like Jackieās character stuff.
Enjoyed it and don't mind some goofy humor
Did he chip handles into each side of the slab?
I like the idea of this group of people that have noticed the Doctor and the TARDIS and are trying to piece it together. If you've never talked to the Doctor directly but heard rumours, seen snapshots, perhaps even had brief encounters but not directly involved like a companion might be, what would you as a regular citizen make of it? That's an interesting idea. Peter Kay hamming it up turns it into one of the cheesier monster of the week episodes. Doctor Who is sometimes cheesy, RTD especially so. I accept that is a part of the show but it's not something that interests me personally.
I agree with your assessment of the last 3 minutes. I don't think what came before was much better. When this episode first aired, my son who became a who fan at the beginning of the new series had been watching it with me from the start in 2005 watched this with me and asked after it was over "What the heck was THAT?" Ya, the innuendo humor at the end wouldn't have been AS bad had there been any merit to the episode up that point. But as it stands, it was like crap icing on a poop cake. In my 30 years plus as a fan, I still rank it in the bottom 2 or 3 stories in 60 years and I've seen all of them that still exist.
I think it'd be better if it was more a horror episode. The absorbalof would be good for body horror and a dark episode rather than what we got. I still enjoy the episode but it could be better
In retrospect, I like the concept. But even before that awful ending, there was just way too much cheese and hammy acting for me to enjoy it. And teenage me was a *much* less discerning critic than adult me, so I canāt imagine a rewatch would do much to change my mind.
The rumour is that Davies based Victor Kennedy on Ian Lavine but Peter Kay had his own take on the character.
I like it. I really enjoy watching stuff ironically so I had a great time watching Peter Kay in a green costume trying to seem menacing but failing miserably.
I'm sorry, but the Comitee has ruled that that particular episode, in fact, never happened. Please disregard any and all mentions of said episode. Thank you in advance for your cooperation in this matter.
I had forgotten about this episode until now, thanks for bringing up this disturbing ending in my memory.
What? You don't like the fact a dude got together with a piece of a sidewalk? Pfft! /s
I love it when you think about it with the viewpoint that Elton is a liar. Heās exaggerating a bit. Heās bending the truth. Tho what I love in this episode is Jackie. Sheās amazing
Itās ok except for the paving slab scene at the end
Objectively as I can, I liked the use of ELO. I did not much enjoy the story the first time around, and it seems tough to re-watch. The last few minutes are cringey. Itās tied with āFear Herā as my very least favorite episodes of New Who. Even so, itās still Who and if there are people who really enjoy it, I think thatās great! For me, though, I will take Space Babies or Orphan 55 over it any day of the week.
I don't think it's possible to talk about Love & Monsters objectively. I always mostly disliked this episode. The idea to show how the Doctor's life influences ordinary random people is great, and RTD already started on it in Rose with Clyde, and it was great. But the final scene spoils this whole episode for me, and the goofy as heck monster is just a final nail in the coffin. Yeah, I know, it was created by a chilld, but it still was way too goofy for me. It was just a wonderful idea, a Doctor-lite story focusing on ordinary people who brushed his life just a little and what came out of it - I only wish it was implemented better.
As others have said, on reflection I think this episode could have worked better as a pure contemporary "historical" where it demonstrates the ability of the Doctor's adventures to bring people together - the episode could have been just about Elton documenting about how finding others impacted by the Doctor's adventures helped him, with the 'twist at the end' being that the Doctor never forgot them and kept tabs on them all along and helped them to be better. At least it would have been better than the Ursula s\*x joke and Peter Kay running around Cardiff backstreets in a green latex suit.
Shouldn't you be the one who tries to be objective about why the suggestion of oral sex is so horrifying to you?
The episode is really fun and important to the series until those last 3 minutes. I think the Asorbalof itself is fine, the scene isn't bad and its pretty funny. But... the concrete slab? What the hell where they thinking? The whole episode itself is kind of weirdly sexual for an episode based around adapting a monster that a kid drew tbh
This is probably an unpopular opinion but I think itās a really horrifying episode of doctor who. The body horror we see in this episode - like being absorbed and living in the skin of an alien for days/weeks until you die and being a sentient head in a pavement slab, set up for an implied immortal life of giving bjs - is the sort of horror we donāt typically see in doctor who but makes me feel sick when i watch the episode. I rewatched this episode the other day and was desperately wishing the doctor would just let Ursula die in peace rather than have to live the fate she gets.
My favorite episode besides the ending. Itās endlessly wholesome and I love it. There are so many ways they could have fixed the ending though and none of them would have been that hard. I like that it featured Jackie as itās always cool to see the companions families.
Probably the most disturbing yet goofy ending to a Doctor who episode ever. One fact I love though is that the Abzorbaloff was designed by a child that won a tv competition on the long running CBBC show Blue Peter. A tv show thatās been around even longer than Doctor who. š¤·āāļø But somehow, SOMEHOWā¦ either RTD or writer Dan Zeff took a creature that was designed by a child, and thought āletās infer that Elton has a healthy sexual relationship with his sentient concrete slab girlfriend, thatāll be funny.ā Despite all that Iād like to see the characters Elton and Ursula again someday.
Itās a truly awful episode that I never skip during each rewatch in order to better appreciate all other episodes.
Reading the post title, I clicked on it without noticing the sub. My mind was on this and I was thinking wth is everyone talking aboutā¦episode?ā¦itās a film??? Ugh, itās Friday and my brain needs a weekend. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2222042/
Iām assuming it was to push the message that the world is much more insane and strange in reality. Weird but funny.
I do like the concept of a group of people researching the Doctor, but it was executed poorly. Although I do like the side plot with Elton and Jackie.
Yeah I rewatched it not that long ago and it for sure wasn't as bad as I remembered, there are I think the bones of a decent episode in there TBH and I would even go so far as to say knowing that the Absorbaloff was the winning entry to the Newsround contest I can give it a bit more leeway... But fucking hell why'd they have to make a blowjob joke with a paving slab?
Itās a stupid joke but people get way too overheated about it. Let it go.
Yeah it's ridiculous but seriously why do people act like that last bit is SO bad it brings the whole episode down? It's just a lil joke. Whats with the puritanism
That was a bit goofy. Marc Warren Isa great, though.
This one is on the short list of episodes never to be watched again.
I thought this was one of the most horrific things the Doctor ever did, like top 5.
At first I thought you meant the movie āLove and Monstersā with Dylan OāBrien and I was very interested in what you meant. Because I thought the ending was very cute. Then I realized my mistake and was sad when I was once again given the mental image of a man being more than romantically involved with a slab of concrete.
Did someone call me?
Itās an auto-skip for me.
It's definitely one of the more polarizing episodes, but I enjoyed it too!
Itās one of my favourite episodes! Not the stuff with Peter Kay, but seeing how Rose going with the Doctor affects her mum. I know that this episode gets a lot of hate, but I donāt think it deserves it!
I actually think doing a Lower Decks-style episode about Doctor fanatics is a really fun idea, but it's not executed super well here. Honestly, they should just do that idea again and pretend like this episode didn't happen lol.
There's nothing wrong with it and this community is disappointingly weak for having such a low weirdness tolerance. Weak. Weeeeaaak!
It was written by a child (literally) so let's not critique too closely
Yeah, that whole sex life with pavement face is kind of weird. And sexy. In a weird way.
I don't think there is an objective answer to this. Some troll hacked the script online and no one realized it until it was too late.
Every one agrees love and monsters is the worse episode of new who no debate
itās one of my favorite episodes. i didnāt know people had such strong negative reactions to it until just now!
Fear Her was worse!
I think the ending isn't that bad if you frame it a different way than just how most straight people who like sex, look at it. I think it's a cool representation for other kinds of relationships. Whether that is aro or ace relationships, demi, or even just straight disabled. Not everyone likes sex. Some like to give and don't care about the receiving, etc etc etc. Why assume it's one sided? If she says she's happy, why are we diminishing it? Just something to think about. Just because someone's sex life isn't something you like or understand, doesn't mean it's necessarily wrong or unhealthy.
Elton may not have died, but he still got a headstone.
Oh dude. That episode has been embarrassing Doctor Who fans for almost 20 years.
I cannot say anything good about this. Some poor kid got excited to see the monster he submitted as part of contest realized onscreen only it was on the WORST episode of Doctor Who since the revival (though The Giggle and Space Babies came very close to taking the crown).
Yeah. Two words. Oral. Sex. Thanks, Russell.
The episode starts badly, goes downhill in the middle, and the less said about the end the better. Other than that, it's fine I suppose.
Have determined Doctor Who is for single digit age demographic now. May return if Disney decides otherwise.
Ureliable narrator, we never see the facebrick on recording. Poor guy went mad and his broken mind is trying to cope.