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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

It's because Doctor Who Day falls on a Monday this year. But, yeah, I'd have been happy for them to go 'close enough' and put it on the Saturday.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

She's met the Cybermen, the Sontarans, the Weeping Angels, the Carrionites and more, plus Benny, Martha, UNIT, got involved in the Time War... It's probably a bit late to decide her meeting people you wouldn't have expected her to is over the line, when it's a good portion of all she ever does.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

Like I said, they've already been in one story in this series so I don't see why this is 'too far' and 'desperate' if their previous appearance was part of it 'never missing.' All in all, this is at least their fourth meeting.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

She's already met the Daleks in the Big Finish range's first boxset, and Circuit Breaker does say she's had a mindwipe already. She now seems more like Gallifrey's Winter Solider - used until she rebels then 'reset' in an endless cycle rather than just getting one mindwipe on 'retirement.'

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

They can be! As with any of these things it depends on the mix of players you get. But there's usually *something* batshit happening. And almost all versions have fabulously wicked hosts - Claudia in the UK, Alan Cumming in the US, Siobhán McSweeney (Derry Girls' Sister Michael) in Ireland...

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Ah, a 1% Club fan... I mean, it's a game show based on a popular party game. It's the modern Give Us a Clue. Looking for depth from the spiritual successor to Lionel Blair is probably asking a bit much.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

I mean, it's got Bella Ramsey swimming through a sunken galleon, a paranoid Ross Kemp freaking the fuck out everytime someone brushes against him, Richard E Grant cackling like he's an actual supervillain, and James Blunt rubbing butter on his nipples. What more could you want?

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

No, there can't be a connection because his departure was announced in January, and this was filmed in May. Except, perhaps, that he signed up in the first place to lift his profile with audiences before going indie.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

As for the TARDIS, it's the same TARDIS, the same dodgy chameleon circuit and the same liking for Police Boxes. So what? If you read Jo Martin's The Kaleidoscope (arguably the best original Who novel of the decade) it fundamentally deepens our understanding of the Doctor/TARDIS relationship

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

It really didn't. You're literally pointing out times it re-established he wasn't the first as errors because it's *later* contradicted. (There's also times where the Doctor says he's had "several" regenerations.) So it didn't coalase around that at all. (And bear in mind I was there

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

It's the otherwise continuity error riddled Arc of Infinity in 1983 claiming that Davison is definitely the Fifth that introduces the discrepancy, not Morbius. That leaves the wiggle room that the experiment never actually happens so Davison could be wrong/lying about having 8 regenerations left.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Bear in mind it was always the intention, from Troughton's introduction, that Hartnell wasn't the first incarnation. It even says so in the script (but not the dialogue) of Tenth Planet. Morbius was just doubling down on that.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

I do wonder if this is a misunderstanding along the way, and the actual intent is to use the 16th century pronunciations and accents.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

One of the only companies to say out loud they're going for it are World, who seem to specialize in regional productions (Line of Duty in NI, Vigil in Scotland) so I think there's every chance it will go one of those places if they win, or stay in Wales per BBC preference.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

The nixing of the special seems to have come from the BBC side, based on the realization that they couldn't start tender prep while Bad Wolf were in production and making one episode would basically cost them almost an extra year before the next full season.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

So, all in all, the target suggested by the tender doc of the show being broadcast in late 2028, or maybe as late as March 2029, seems pretty reasonable.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

Two things, I guess. The BBC are saying the financial year 2028/29 so that's any time up to April 2029. Secondly, the last 2 times restarting from scratch took 2 years BUT the tender applications will involve doing some early stages *before* Mar 2027 so will likely be shorter this time.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

As an aside to the whole Ed Sheeran thing, multiple parties want to give Sheeran and some who've never lived in or maybe never even visited Ireland but with one Irish grandparent the right to vote in Irish Presidential elections. A timely reminder the next time that comes up of just how dumb it is.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

BWAHAHA! Someone just blocked me for pointing out RTD didn't invent the "companions telepathically hear everyone speaking English" answer, because it got in the way of their rant about modern TV increasingly spoon-feeding viewers. What's that they say about altering the facts to fit your views?

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

Yes, it is. The answer to the question "why does everyone seem to speak English?" is that the Doctor telepathically alters their brain so they hear everyone speaking English, and that's been the answer since the 1970s. Adding the detail that the TARDIS is part of the circuit doesn't change that.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

It actually happened during the SDLP's annual party conference in Belfast and party leader Clare Hanna broke the news to the audience and immediately quipped he was obviously "not as orange as he looks."

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

But the modern series just recycles the same explanation from the classic series? it has long been established in the 1970s that companions had been telepathically given the ability to understand the local languages and nobody is 'really' speaking English.

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Reposted by Peter Nolan

Alex Andreou @sturdyalex.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

This German comedy sketch (with English subtitles) perfectly captures so much of what is going on right now in the UK, the US, and across Europe. "Playing the 'Nazi Card' in the Third Reich", by Browser Ballett.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 13/09/2026

Ooh, it doesn't have the dark centre you'd expect from an image of Tom, and there is a LOT of blue in S11.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 13/09/2026

Let's not get carried away. Let's say for 20 minutes or so.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 13/09/2026

Now you just have to decide whether to be Rezzie or Kang.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

I think the mechanism here is the conflict between the beliefs (a) racists are bad people (b) only racists ever do/say racist things and (c) I am a good person, leading to a conclusion "nothing I do can be racist." But with them, B and C are, to some extent or other, faulty premises to begin from.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

My favourite metaphor for this is that it's like breeding faster and faster race horses, confident that sooner or later one of them will give birth to a motorcycle.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

Imagine being a band promoting a comeback album, and deciding to do that by adopting 'edgy' political opinions, but it turns out it just reveals 99% of people think the most relevant thing about you is a beloved actor once said he liked one of your songs. Gotta sting.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

The audacity of Sky listing off Noel Clarke's various projects for other channels, and completely failing to mention that when this all came out he was in a co-production partnership with *them.*

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

Everyone always seems so serious in my gym. Even just my tendency to have a little toe tap and head bop between sets makes me practically the wildest, goofiest person in there. Gyms need more goofy, I think.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

You'll never guess which billionaire author wrote a 2015 book with a whole subplot about people faking disabilities 24/7 because it made them feel 'special' to use the disabled toilet. Ah, what am I saying. You'll guess. You'll absolutely guess first time.

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Reposted by Peter Nolan

Dr. Sandra Duffy Golden @sandraduffy.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

I don't know if it's just that this UK government missed the context of growing up in Ireland in the 90s, but they should probably be aware that gangs of lads in balaclavas don't have the best intentions for the public.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

Amazing to see Reform marks trying to defend this with "but the Unions!"

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 02/09/2026

The best thing about Lanterns is that I may finally be able to start wearing my GL t-shirt again without people thinking it's a bloody Big Bang Theory reference.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

Wow, I've never even heard that name in *years.* I didn't even know he was still a thing. Sounds like he's getting desperate for attention.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 29/08/2026

Every now and then I'm reminded of Swear Trek's epic, gifing every scene of Spock's Brain, but in the captions replacing every instance of "brain" in the script, with this one word. And every time, it makes me happy.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 28/08/2026

Del Toro's The Strain series? It has one particular recurring plot tic I find irritating and falls apart a little in the final run of episodes but overall a good, creepy, dark little twist of the vampire and zombie genres with a great cast.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 27/08/2026

Today I learned that a recording of the Curry/McKellan Amadeus exists, but the New York City Library which holds it, doesn't allow viewings, which kind of sucks. (Up there with the BFI having a recording of Tom Baker's acting debut in their vault, which they've never screened.)

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

I've seen most of the great man's essential works, I think, but somehow this one always slipped me by. Finally fixing that tonight.

Raising a whiskey glass to Tim Curry's name in the titles of Clue.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 25/08/2026

I should like a hat like that.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 21/08/2026

It's very good, mostly, though you tell the writer's heart isn't in it in the final season, but up until then it's good, creepy, gothic fun. Succeeds where the Universal Monsters universe failed, creating a shared universe of classic monsters. Piper makes a very good Bride.

Harry Treadaway as Victor Frankenstein, Billie Piper as the Bride of Frankenstein, and Rory Kinnear as the Creature, posing in Frankenstein's lab. Frankenstein and the Bride look to camera, but the Creature looks longingly at the Bride.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

Most people saying the Vervoids in Doctor Who look suggestive haven't even seen the BTS footage of an FX guy manipulating one's, um, 'opening' with his mouth.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

The idea behind this cross-media events is that someone who's a fan of Big Finish, for instance, might pick up the Circuit Breaker audio drama story and then get their first book, or comic, or whatever. Basically it's encouraging fans to sample media they usually don't get their Doctor Who through.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

The structure's like a reverse scavenger hunt (the Doctor trying to put random objects back where they should be) but the main throughline is the tough, cynical, Fugitive's regrets about her time in Division and growing more into the Doctorish role we know.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

It's a 12 part series that, like a lot of seasons, has an ongoing plot strand throughout otherwise standalone stories. But some chapters are free online short stories, some are books, others are games, and some are audio dramas.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

There's a Victorian manor house around the corner and the owner's idea of renovating it unfortunately mainly involves every few months looking around the grounds and going "Nope still too many trees," and cutting some more down. I find it surprisingly irritating despite not being my business at all

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 17/08/2026

I really need at least one of the big American Doctor Who cons to hold on until after the Restoration of Sanity so that I can actually go to it.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 16/08/2026

The plans for the third one actually involved giant killer crabs attacking an isolated island off the English coast and Dr. Who trying to help a Brig type character defeat them. Mostly just because the rights holders also owned the rights to the novel Night of the Crabs.

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Peter Nolan @nuallain.bsky.social · 11/08/2026

Not that I'm supporting Devlin's bid in any way. Just saying there are well established ways for foreign studios to get around the requirements. The main thing the BBC want is a guarantee of British jobs generated in British regions.

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