This is not really the place for this complaint, but maybe some BBC-ites are reading.
The whole series of Dr Who has suffered from the most appalling sound mixing. The music is way too loud compared to the dialogue. The last episode was particularly bad — at times the dialogue was almost inaudible under the music. I had to constantly adjust the volume — down when the loud music comes on in the action scenes, up when the dialogue (without music) comes back. For God’s sake re-mix the thing.
Mind you, the music itself was good.
The snarky little comment I was going to provide for the immediate-post Dr Who slot, had you not beaten me to it, was “Why ‘Bad Wolf’?”
A nice, scary episode. Bit tough on poor Jack, left alone on a space station full of dead people. Or did she resurrect all of them?
New report coming in: Sprog Major says, “It wasn’t scary at all. But it was good.”
I suggest muting the programme, or switch channels.
I refuse to believe we`re back to Dr Who.
Hey, you prefer the Balfour Declaration?
Heh – just four comments to get there this time, Natalie.
.
What the hell has this commentry on the Dr Who soapie to do with bias at the BBC? ……..Wake up good people, wake up.
Is this REALLY anything that the license fee should be spent on?
http://www.gamedev.net/community/forums/topic.asp?topic_id=326480
I think there must be something wrong with your TV…
I think the point about Captain Jack was that he is now going to lead what was left of the Humans into an empire or whatever it was that they were meant to form.
Worry not – Captain Jack will be back later in series 2. And it looks like 70s favourites Sarah-Jane and K9 will be returning in the Xmas special. Thank God for the BBC.
Oooh Ooooh!!! Thrilled American Who-fan here. I always did like Sarah-Jane.
And Doctor Who is *not* a Soap, it’s
Science Fiction!
Production values are suddenly a legitimate target of biased bbc?
Why?
What next? Reviews?
Actually the new Dr Who is a legitimate topic. I’ve detected a dash of typical BBC propaganda around the edges of the new series.
Off topic (Story in the Times)
In a stunning shock to all, Karl Marx is racing ahead of rivals to be considered the “world’s greatest philosopher”, just two weeks before
voting ends in the BBC Radio 4 discussion programme “In Our Time”.
Please, say no more. Just double the licence fee now. And also, let’s insist on less regulation.
OT
Stand by for some more Beeboid reporting from the Middle East. The trailer for Broadcasting House has just said that there will be some ‘moderate Israeli voices’ which we ‘rarely have the opportunity to hear’.
Two questions dear Auntie. Firstly, exactly WHY do we have so few opportunities to hear ‘moderate Israeli voices?’ After all, Israel and the Israelis are always there, and you don’t have to run the gauntlet of terrorism or a repressive regime in order to talk to them, now do you? (Unlike in the PA) Or are you implying that the majority of Israelis are rabid extremists wanting the extermination of Palestinians en masse? And therefore you’ve had to search far and wide before finding moderates?
Secondly, what you YOU call ‘moderate Israeli voices’? Can you mean Israelis who want to live in a Jewish State alongside their fellow Arab Israelis and Arab neighbouring states including a confident, friendly and cooperative Palestinian State without fear of antisemitism whoever perpetrates it?
Or do you mean Israelis who, because of the principles of Free Speech are free to vilify the existence of their own country and people in an orgy of self imolation and condemnation?
I await BH with uncontrollable longing ….
I for one cannot stand Doctor Who and am at a loss as to why this site keeps returning to it. It’s a kid’s programme for gawds sake.
And Natalie, each time you blather on about it, the female impersonation becomes slightly less believable. Akin to a baboon that has rifled through a woman’s handbag and eaten her lipstick, to quote Blackadder… much better Beeb show…
Yep, indeed, the sound mixing was awful – although that may have been an intentional attempt to disguise yet another cop-out denoument.
It’s all about that willing suspension of disbelief thing. VIewers who want something in the sci-fi/fantasy genre are prepared to cover some distance but the quid pro quo is that the writers need to stick to their own rules and keep internal conistency, insteadf of pulling rabbits out of hats in the last five minutes every time.
But is there any kind of bias connection ? Not exactly, but what folks like myself have always said is that the Beeb’s bias is more cultural than straightforwardly political. The Beeb has the mores and prejudices of North London, which affects everything it does. Hence the belief at the Beeb that sci-fi/fantasy is geeky rubbish anyway, so who cares if the scripts barely make sense ? They’ve probably got another gritty cop drama to do.
OT
The BBC is describing the election run-off in Irn as between a “hardline” Teheran mayor and a nice cuddly liberal, Rafsanjani. No reall attempt to state what they stand for.
Why not call them both nutters and hardliners, to judge by some of their actions and utterances ?
http://www.iranfocus.com/modules/news/article.php?storyid=2402
http://www.iranfocus.com/modules/news/article.php?storyid=2394
“And Natalie, each time you blather on about it, the female impersonation becomes slightly less believable. Akin to a baboon that has rifled through a woman’s handbag and eaten her lipstick, to quote Blackadder… much better Beeb show…”
What – Real Women don’t like Doctor Who?? That would come as a real surprise to about half the members of my DW club ‘The Guardians of Gallifrey’. One of whom had a baby last year. Surely that proves she’s a woman?
BTW we all love Blackadder too.
Sorry, Blackadder quote should have been, Natalie Solent is “the worst female impressionist since Tarzan went through Jane’s handbag and ate her lipstick”.
Your’re right Roxana, women can love Doctor Who, and I meant no offence. I’m just not so sure if Natalie is a chick.
I didn’t say it was a bias issue. Lighten up, will you? The world isn’t going to end if we don’t bash the BBC every five minutes.
(And no-one here gets paid, so if you don’t like the service, use the comment space to do some analysis of your own, as many of our more helpful commentators do.)
Portillo says (in the Sunday Times)scrap the Uk’s nuclear weapons.
That newspaper columnist’s view is, for some reason, significant enough to appear all day on Ceefax & at
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4109564.stm
Good articles John. Amazing that the BBC gets away with it – with seeming impunity. You’d think that some reporter or editor anywhere would make a story of it.
People I have been accused of being:
1) Patrick Crozier (because his name appears at the top of the comments section)
2) Susan
3) Rob Hinkley of Sporadic Chronicle
4) Verity
Given the protean variety of accomplishments that a posited hybrid of me and any of the above would possess, I take it all as a compliment.
And, as Scott says, please don’t take things so seriously. No one’s subscription money has been wasted since nobody paid any. A blog is free ice cream. If on some days you don’t like the flavour of free ice cream on offer, well, you don’t have to eat it.
Oh Bear of little faith,
The BBC is persuing the same policy as it always accused the US of following – He may be a bastard but he’s ‘our’ bastard. The BBC will support anyone it sees as opposing American ‘domination’ judging that a greater threat than almost anything else.
Sorry, did I say almost there?
I was forgetting the millions that were tortured to death in the Guatanamo gulag.
Forget the almost.
I have enjoyed the new Doctor Who, but the thing I have noticed about it is that it done in a very camp manner, and cannot seem to be serious for more than a couple of minutes.
It is almost as if RTD and the Beeb don’t want to lose kudos with their north London chums. Science fiction has always been loathed by the intelectual, critical, and media elites in the UK.
The best episodes of Doctor Who have been unafraid to be serious (The Unquiet Dead, Dalek, Father’s Day, The Empty Child, The Doctor Dances).
What was that one with satellite 5 controlling all the news? How is it the Beeb didn’t see the applicability to themselves? Liberals have odd blind spots. Our radical green treasurer thought it applied to Fox.
Please!
This could actually be a good move:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/low/entertainment/tv_and_radio/4111214.stm
At least he’s a bloke not afraid to put the boot, c.f. Andrew Marrtian who almost seemed to see himself as the herald of the enlightened.
Ouchey! Did I just say something nice about the Beeb ? Try this and see how little has really changed.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/low/talking_point/4110776.stm
Dog – did you think I meant a reporter or editor from the BBC:?::?::?::lol::lol::lol:
I can better imagine a catholic bear, or a pope shitting in the woods than the BBC really running itself as a news organisation, instead of the propaganda outlet it is.
Although I can’t comment on the sound mixing on the Dr Who series as I didn’t watch it, I have noticed the same problem (music too loud) on other programs, mainly documentaries about dinosaurs and asteriods!
I think this goes back to the first Alien film where the first twenty minutes or so of dialogue were kept at the limit of audibility with the intention of raising the anxiety levels of the audience.
It worked quiet well on Aliens, but as usual the BBC takes what was a good idea in one context, mis-uses it, abuses it and generally gets it wrong.
Of course it could just be down to poor sound engineering
The fact Natalie Solent writes under a pseudonym is bound to make people have a go at guessing. It’s natural.
no offence, like
None taken. I am just always surprised that someone would think I was likely to pretend to be a middle aged housewife.
Plenty of men do and have a whale of a time… 🙂
Rob, please explain how the pay model for use of codec at transmission time works, and why *you* think that work on another codec unencumbered by those royalties is a bad use of money.
Also, continue with a discussion of the quality-per-bitrate of the current (non)/ commercial codecs
Please focus on
a) VBR
b) reuse in multiple device scenarios
c) rebroadcasting
d) current player usage.
If they want to pretend to clean my dishwasher filter, good luck to ’em.
I’ll fetch me marigolds luv.
You can understand the Patrick Crozier line though, considering this is his Haloscan account. Surely sharing a Haloscan account is on a par with sharing a toothbrush?
I haven’t heard a genetic woman describe herself as a housewife for a while, thought that was a moniker that survived purely in male fantasy(bored housewives, Desperate Housewives etc).
Maybe that is just in the UK though, or a generational thing.
Genetic woman? WTF is that? And who (or what) is a non-genetic woman?
Hannah darling –
Don’t won’t your pretty little mind about it.
A genetic woman is like me Susan, ie born a female, rather than a trannie, gender bender or an online female impersonator.
Oh goodness, Hannah, I had no idea.
The simple act of being born female is now a candidate for a PC qualifier.
Another oppressed group of people for me to make sure not to offend: non-genetic women. Gotcha.
I honestly don’t know what you are fuming about now Susan. But you’re probably having fun in your crazy dream world so it’s all good.
I was merely suggesting that a real/genetic/actual woman might be less likely to describe herself as a housewife than some bloke online pretending to be a woman.
Hannah
Seems to me you have been posting a load of pointless gobbedegook.
Hannah dear,
I’m not fuming about anything. You could more describe my post as “bemused”, in a genteel Anglo-Saxon type of way, at the depths to which the politically correct amongst us will stoop to PC-fy our language. A situation rather ripe with possibilities for satire, don’t you think? (I say as I visualize yet more hilarious scenes to add to my possible future Broadway production, BBC: The Musical.)
In fact, the lyrics to a bit of froth entitled “Genetic Women” are already forming themselves in my mind. Thanks for the inspiration!
Speaking of satire, did anyone catch the short BBC World parody in Team America: World Police? I just rented it.
“in a genteel Anglo-Saxon way”… yes, how genteel a race we are.
… and remember no catty responses Susan, you are an Anglo-Saxon and you are genteel…not like those dreadful non-Anglo-Saxons…
Hannah dear,
Shouldn’t you be out canvassing your old boyfriends for story ideas, rather than hanging out here wasting time trading barbs with a middle-aged genetic woman like me? I mean that is what you get paid for, isn’t it?