Pull To Open
161 episodes - English - Latest episode: about 24 hours ago -There are many Doctor Who podcasts. Only one dares review the entire show... in entirely random order!
Join journalists Pete Pachal and Chris Taylor as they summarize stories in record time, play the Whomoji game, enter the History Corner, answer the Four Questions to Doomsday, and cower in fear before the almighty Randomizer.
New episode every Saturday! Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/pull-to-open/support
Homepage Google Podcasts Overcast Castro Pocket Casts RSS feed
Episodes
Axos & Allies (Sharpening “The Claws of Axos,” with guest Nathan Bottomley)
May 28, 2022 11:00 - 1 hour - 88.8 MBInvading the Earth used to be so simple: Either land or crash your spaceship in Britain, wait for the local Time Lord to show up, then coerce them into helping you by threatening the people they care about. But it gets a little complicated when two Time Lords show up, which was oddly the norm back in the UNIT days, what with the Master constantly trying to both one-up the Doctor and do some invading/conquering/destroying of his own. It’s enough to confuse even the most determined alien menac...
SPECIAL EPISODE: Who Is Ncuti Gatwa?
May 21, 2022 11:00 - 30 minutes - 27.8 MBIt’s official: Ncuti Gatwa is the Doctor. Sometime soon, Jodie Whittaker will bid farewell to the role and a handsome actor of Netflix’s Sex Education fame will take over — or so we think. All we know now is Gatwa will play the Doctor in Russell T. Davies’ renewed run as showrunner, but is he the 14th incarnation (which is incorrect numbering anyway) or something else? What is the deal with David Tennant returning — in a different coat — with Catherine Tate in tow, even though Donna had her ...
Tractator Pull (Bombarding “Frontios”)
May 14, 2022 11:00 - 1 hour - 94.4 MBWhen Doctor Who takes us to the far future, it’s often with a dystopian view. That’s certainly the case with Frontios, which isn’t content to simply plunge a scrappy group of refugees from a doomed Earth into a harrowing fight for survival. It also adds to the mix the twin horrors of giant insects bent on recreating the ugliest parts of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre and some of the worst spiked hair the universe has ever seen. (One of those things was powerful enough to destroy the TARDIS, but...
Spark Attack (Recharging “The Power of the Daleks”)
May 07, 2022 11:00 - 1 hour - 86 MBQuick, what’s the best way to mount an insurrection in your remote Earth colony? Right, exactly — befriend the mechanical creatures you’ve just revived from hibernation within a long-dormant capsule that crashed centuries ago and enlist them to be your muscle. Really, if you’re a marooned Dalek attack force, it’s good work if you can get it, especially if the annoying humans who think they’re in charge are hopelessly factionalized like they usually are. Feels like there’s some kind of lesson...
One Moor Time (Illuminating “The Eaters of Light”)
April 30, 2022 11:00 - 1 hour - 84.7 MBEver been to Scotland? Doctor Who sure has, and if you’re ever looking for the ultimate proof of that look no further than The Eaters of Light, an episode that seems designed entirely to showcase bad weather, Pict history, and very cross people. Of course, it doesn’t get much more cross than the 12th Doctor, but just how effective will a pair of epic eyebrows be against a squad of Roman centurions, a pack of star-eating transdimensional creatures, and Nardole’s constant scolding? More than y...
Dead Center (Skirting “Terminus”)
April 23, 2022 11:00 - 1 hour - 83.9 MBDoctor Who explains the Big Bang! That’s an ambitious idea, and not one you’d expect to be shoehorned into an episode about space lepers journeying to a vast space station that promises not just a cure for their disease but also the opportunity to play with the biggest dog you’ve ever seen. Still, Terminus goes for it, soldiering on through plot holes the size of a supercluster to explain how all of creation came into existence, plus how Tegan and Turlough can somehow command tons of screen ...
SPECIAL EPISODE: Into the Codex
April 16, 2022 11:00 - 17 minutes - 15.7 MBWe’re worried. In the two-and-a-bit years since we started Pull To Open, we’ve done commentaries on 42(!) individual Doctor Who stories. That constitutes only 14% of the entire onscreen canon, but we appear to have exhausted a much greater portion of the series’ most revered episodes: The Girl in the Fireplace, Inferno, The Day of the Doctor, and even Genesis of the Daleks. In this special podcast, Chris and Pete look back at PTO’ run so far, cracking open the official Pull To Open Codex to ...
Peak Villainy (Siring "Genesis of the Daleks")
April 09, 2022 11:00 - 1 hour - 108 MBIn the entire run of Doctor Who, there has never been a villain quite like Davros. Half-Dalek, half-somewhat crispy person, the character of Davros set a new bar for the "evil genius" archetype in his debut story, Genesis of the Daleks. His many speeches in that story produced some of the show's best scenes, creating so much great drama that no one minds that the story completely retcons huge swaths of Dalek history. There's so much reverence for Genesis, it's hard to watch it with a critica...
Telos Another One (Converting "Attack of the Cybermen")
April 02, 2022 11:00 - 2 hours - 125 MBWhen you're looking to literally change history to save your race, it's smart to stay focused. This really isn't the time for convoluted plans, extraneous plot threads that go nowhere, and long conversations with captured prisoners. But the Cybermen can't help themselves, it seems, and neither can Attack of the Cybermen, which seems utterly confused about which previous story it's a sequel to. It's almost inevitable that things get messy pretty quickly in Colin Baker's second adventure, but ...
Wasting Time (Embalming “State of Decay”)
March 26, 2022 11:00 - 1 hour - 90.8 MBIf you’re a powerful vampire running from the Time Lords, it’s easy to see why you’d pick E-space for your hideout. It’s small, it's full of delicious humanoids, it's hidden behind a CVE — not to mention bat-populated planets are seemingly a dime a dozen in this green-hued pocket universe. It's really just bad luck that the Doctor wandered in, but all the better for us since we get to see a traditional vampire horror story done through the lens of Doctor Who. The result is State of Decay, an...
Zings and Arrows (Lionizing "Robot of Sherwood")
March 12, 2022 12:00 - 1 hour - 82.8 MBHard to believe, but it took Doctor Who more than 50 years to get around to doing a TV adventure centered on Robin Hood. And like a speeding arrow splitting the shaft of another, Robot of Sherwood cracks your usual story assumptions: Instead of presenting an alien explanation for a mythical historical figure, the myth is offered up as historical fact. That raises a couple of notable eyebrows, leading the Doctor to take on a persona that's more cantankerous antihero than otherworldly savior, ...
Grin Reaper (Enlivening "Smile")
March 05, 2022 12:00 - 1 hour - 86.4 MBWhen you first start traveling with the Doctor, you've got to get your basics down, and a key item to tick off the list is traveling to the far future. Bill Potts got her future-events cred via a visit to the troubled human colony depicted in Smile, one of the most gorgeous episodes of the Capaldi era. Besides a wide-eyed new companion, the story features one of Doctor Who's most reliable antagonists: servant robots that have for some reason gone homicidal. Throw in a massive colony ship and...
Time Killer (Targeting "The Deadly Assassin")
February 26, 2022 12:00 - 1 hour - 89.1 MBSome Doctor Who episodes are good. Some are great. Some are pretty forgettable. And some are epics — not just riveting in their characterization and storytelling, but also in the way that they established or rewrote the fundamentals of the show. The Deadly Assassin is such an epic, completely up-ending everything we knew about the Time Lords at the time. The sheer amount of Gallifreyan lore on display is what the episode is mostly remembered for, but there's also that whole "plot to kill the...
Courting Disaster (Unearthing "The Mysterious Planet")
February 19, 2022 12:00 - 1 hour - 94.3 MBWhen Doctor Who returned after a forced hiatus in the mid '80s, the show had big plans for its return: The entire season would be a single arc that would see the Time Lords subject the Doctor to an epic trial for his meddling. The Trial of a Time Lord was an ambitious and compelling idea, and years before its time considering how serialized modern franchises have become. Trial's first story has a lot going for it — an interesting mystery, a rebooted Sixth Doctor, and the delight of Tony Selb...
The French Connection (Serenading "The Girl in the Fireplace")
February 05, 2022 12:00 - 1 hour - 89.1 MBWe know the Doctor has a family, but does he date? That's a bit inconclusive. Putting aside the numerous individuals he's invited into his, uh… box to explore the universe, some of the strongest evidence that the Doctor might have those feelings about someone is The Girl in the Fireplace. It's a mystery, it's a horror story, and it's a history lesson, but most of all this episode is a romance. It's rightfully remembered as a classic, but is it because it dared to touch on the question of the...
Game of Shadows (Cataloging "Silence in the Library" and "Forest of the Dead")
January 29, 2022 12:00 - 1 hour - 83.2 MBWhen is a shadow not a shadow? When it's in a Doctor Who story determined to reimagine a feature of ordinary life as a homicidal creature, of course. The team of Russell T. Davies and Steven Moffat created their fair share of everyday monsters, and the Vashta Nerada are one of the most memorable: Sentient shadows that consume the flesh of the living. That alone makes the one-two punch of Silence in the Library and Forest of the Dead memorable, and when you add in the first appearance of Rive...
Safe Arbor (Cultivating "In the Forest of the Night")
January 22, 2022 12:00 - 1 hour - 85.4 MBWhat do trees, the end of human civilization, and the psychological trauma of losing a family member all have in common? They're all ostensibly what In the Forest of the Night is about — one of the more epic-in-scale episodes of Peter Capaldi's first series as the Doctor. It's not well remembered, a pretty clear case study of a story's reach exceeding its grasp. But it does grasp something, and with some compelling ideas and the series regulars giving it their all, it may be time to re-exami...
Trouble in Store (Reopening "Closing Time")
January 15, 2022 12:00 - 1 hour - 76 MBIf there was ever a companion who wasn't a companion, it's Craig. He might not have ever traveled in the TARDIS, but he still somehow made his way into the Doctor's hearts — thanks in large part to the against-type performance of James Corden. Seeing him played against Matt Smith's Doctor at his most bonkers is one of the huge treats of Closing Time, the other being the return of a classic monster, the Cybermen... though that one doesn't go over nearly so well. Is the double act enough to ho...
Kingdom of the Insidious Skull (Exorcising "Image of the Fendahl")
January 08, 2022 12:00 - 1 hour - 71.6 MBAn ancient evil. Misguided scientists. If you're thinking, "Oh, we simply have to get these guys together," you might be a Doctor Who writer from the '70s. But if you're going to go ahead and mix this pair of volatile ingredients, it's probably best to throw in at least one wisecracking supporting character, a few paper-mâché monsters, and some ambitious ideas about the true nature of human evolution. Put it all into a delightfully sinister horror-movie backdrop on the English countryside, a...
Copy That (Echoing "Midnight")
December 25, 2021 12:00 - 1 hour - 63 MBWhen either the Doctor or his companion takes a break for an episode, you know you're in for something unusual. That's what you get with Midnight, an outing of Doctor Who that feels more like an Agatha Christie tale than the one with Agatha Christie. But beyond the mystery, what makes the episode so unexpected is the Doctor's usual toolbox of cleverness and a little bit of sonic doesn't help him one bit. It's a compelling premise, but does it work as anything other than a thought exercise? L...
This Is Maggot Country (Sanitizing "The Green Death")
December 11, 2021 12:00 - 1 hour - 95.3 MBIf you were looking for a single Doctor Who serial that encapsulates virtually all of the sci-fi tropes of the '70s — giant bugs, an evil sentient computer, mind-altering crystals — it'd be hard to find one that filled the bingo card as well as The Green Death. Of course, these are the tropes before they were tropes, and you can't help but admire how the story leans into them all with satisfying confidence, even when it's grossing us out with slimy maggots. But is it a worthy send-off for Jo...
Creep of Faith (Divining "The God Complex")
November 28, 2021 12:11 - 1 hour - 79.5 MBDoctor Who has a reputation for frightening its audience, but is it just as good if it creeps the hell out of them instead? That might be the most apt take on The God Complex: It's Doctor Who, but something about it is a little off, and we're not sure if we like it. An '80s hotel that seems strangely smaller on the inside, a guest cast curated to deadly perfection, and a monster that seems familiar, yet… not. The time has come for us to check into this very odd Matt Smith episode. We're sure...
Hybrid Theory (Disentangling "Hell Bent")
November 13, 2021 12:00 - 1 hour - 76.8 MBWhen a show like Doctor Who starts talking about a hybrid, you can bet it's not talking about the latest Prius. Peter Capaldi's second season cooked up a perplexing mystery around this vaguely defined being with a bifurcated background, which came to a head in the series finale, "Hell Bent." The episode pays off a lot of plotlines — the return of Gallifrey and Clara's journey, primarily — but it also throws in a bunch of extras for… fun, I guess? In any case, it's nice to see Ashildr, Ohlia ...
All Thirteen (Honoring "The Day of the Doctor," with guest Alisa Stern)
October 30, 2021 11:00 - 1 hour - 108 MBIs "The Day of the Doctor" a great Doctor Who episode or the greatest Doctor Who episode? It sounds like a tongue-in-cheek question, but in the case of Doctor Who's 50th anniversary special, we're as serious as UNIT nuclear protocols in the event of a Zygon invasion. Luckily, Pete and Chris have some help to find the answer: Alisa Stern, creator of Doctor Puppet, joins the podcast as we build toward a final verdict on the timeline-altering world-record-setting special. The Whoniverse may hav...
All Thirteen (Honoring "The Day of the Doctor")
October 30, 2021 11:00 - 1 hour - 162 MBIs "The Day of the Doctor" a great Doctor Who episode or the greatest Doctor Who episode? It sounds like a tongue-in-cheek question, but in the case of Doctor Who's 50th anniversary special, we're as serious as UNIT nuclear protocols in the event of a Zygon invasion. Luckily, Pete and Chris have some help to find the answer: Alisa Stern, creator of Doctor Puppet, joins the podcast as we build toward a final verdict on the timeline-altering world-record-setting special. The Whoniverse may hav...
Must Flee TV (Binging "The Idiot's Lantern")
October 16, 2021 13:03 - 1 hour - 67.8 MBA TV show that turns television itself into a monster? That's got potential. But if you're waiting for "The Idiot's Lantern" to deliver on that potential, you should probably just switch the damn thing off already. Or... dial back your expectations! This may not be the ultraclever send-up of TV culture you wanted, but as a period piece set against the backdrop of Queen Elizabeth's coronation, it convinces you to have some fun cruising on mopeds and pursuing faceless people through 1953 Londo...
A Little Bird Killed Me (Facing "Face the Raven")
October 04, 2021 10:55 - 1 hour - 67.7 MBCompanions come and companions go, but very few companions die. At least, death tends not to be the preferred exit from traveling with the Doctor, but it does happen, and Face the Raven is maybe the most dramatic companion death on record. It's perhaps a fitting end (but not really) to the arc of Clara Oswald, who was always more than your typical wayward-girl-who-stumbled-on-board-the-TARDIS. But does the story support the emotional weight of such an impactful moment? And what does "remembe...
The China Sin (Inspecting "The Talons of Weng-Chiang")
September 19, 2021 21:06 - 1 hour - 67.5 MBDoctor Who is sometimes notable for the wrong reasons, and sometimes it's legendary for the right ones. But what about when it's both, and in the same story? That's the case for The Talons of Weng-Chiang, which is rightly praised as a true classic Doctor Who story in every sense of the word, the culmination of producer Philip Hinchcliffe's ambitious era and the peak of Tom Baker's run of gothic horror stories. It's also an example of casually racist attitudes — not just of the Victorian era ...
On Air (Inhaling "Oxygen")
September 05, 2021 15:45 - 1 hour - 62.2 MBIf you're going to make an anticapitalist statement through a Doctor Who story, you've got your work cut out for you in making it distinct enough from all the previous stories that made the same statement. Good thing, then, that Oxygen subverts the show's entire sci-fi canvas by showing us a grittily realistic outer-space scenario where the title molecule is in short supply. Add elements of zombie horror and a compelling mystery, and you almost have a Who classic in the making. Just don't ge...
The Planet of Theatricality (Savoring "The Androids of Tara")
August 21, 2021 15:17 - 1 hour - 65.5 MBEven Time Lords need time off. After you've saved all of reality for the 117th time, it's refreshing to kick back and simply make sure the politics of a remote colony don't go off the rails, especially if you can do it with robots. But if a baddie should rise to resist you, at least make sure he's delightfully entertaining, with oodles of scenery to chew on. If you think about it, you couldn't order up a better holiday for the Doctor, Romana and K-9 in The Androids of Tara, but is this mid-K...
Antimatters of the Heart (Excavating "Planet of Evil")
August 10, 2021 11:06 - 1 hour - 79.5 MBGot antimatter? If you don't, swing by Zeta Minor on the outskirts of the known universe, and Professor Sorenson can hook you up. Never mind the invisible monster that will stalk you until you return any and all of the (oddly stable) particles that you remove from the planet — that's just the cost of doing business. It's not how this stuff is supposed to work, but if the Doctor and Sarah are going with it, why can't you? Let's book a one-way trip to the misnamed Planet of Evil to see if ther...
The High Brain Revolution (Crystalizing "The Krotons")
July 30, 2021 13:01 - 1 hour - 74.9 MBWhen you hear the words, "a Doctor Who monster created to succeed the Daleks," you know the chances of a train wreck are high. Sometimes you get something so bad it's good (hello, Mechanoids!), and sometimes you get The Krotons. The Krotons don't always attempt to influence primitive civilizations, but when they do, they're obsessed with finding high brains — which makes them a lot like today's Big Tech CEOs, just made of crystal and with a propensity to "disperse" those who don't meet the b...
SPECIAL EPISODE: What Cyberman Are You Wearing? (Celebrating 1,000 TikTok Followers)
July 25, 2021 02:08 - 18 minutes - 16.8 MBThe Cybermen have more looks than a rack full of fashion magazines, but... why? As of the 12th Doctor era, the show finally recognized that the Cybermen look different, and not just to the viewers. But it took a long time to get there, and what do the different "types" really mean? Pete and Chris explore the Cybermen's ever-changing appearance in this special mini episode, inspired by our amazing TikTok followers — which now number more than 1,000. Thank you all for listening, watching, enga...
The Strange Future World of 1986 (Defrosting "The Tenth Planet")
July 11, 2021 12:53 - 1 hour - 70.6 MBThe Tenth Planet is a big deal in the Doctor Who universe — remembered for the first appearance of the Cybermen and William Hartnell's Doctor regenerating into Patrick Troughton. What it's not remembered for is its depiction of 1986, a world where space exploration is managed internationally, American generals are walking stereotypes, and the South Pole is considered a good place to store a world-destroying bomb. It's still a promising plot, but perhaps it could do with… an upgrade? Chris an...
A Master Class in Plastics (Repackaging "Terror of the Autons")
June 27, 2021 15:15 - 1 hour - 84 MBBe sure to follow us on TikTok at @pulltoopen, and listen to this week's podcast to find out the prize for being our 1,000th follower! We all know there's a great future in plastics, but what about the past? The Randomizer brings us back to 1970s(-ish) Britain, where the Doctor is still in exile and those pesky store-window dummies are coming to life again. But retreading the same monster as last season's premiere isn't why we remember Terror of the Autons — it's the introduction of the Mas...
The Ex Factor (Attending "School Reunion")
June 12, 2021 16:35 - 1 hour - 59.9 MBTo many, Sarah Jane Smith is the best Doctor Who companion of all time — smart, feisty, kind, and loyal to the Doctor, almost to a fault. Kind of weird, then, that the guy kicked her out of the TARDIS and left her on Earth years ago, never visiting her again. At least that's what School Reunion says happened (presumably erasing The Five Doctors with some kind of memory wipe). We'll go with it because it finally lets the series zero in on the Doctor's relationships with his closest companions...
Sense and Sensorites (Exhausting "The Sensorites")
May 30, 2021 02:41 - 1 hour - 89.7 MBThe very first season of Doctor Who is a landmark for many reasons — the introduction of the mysterious Doctor and his granddaughter, the original story to feature the Daleks, and historical adventures involving the Aztecs and the French Revolution. The Sensorites, not so much. Still, there must be a reason the Randomizer sent Pete and Chris here — could this story about a race of telepathic weirdos with dad bods actually be a hidden gem? With some of the first references to Gallifrey's oran...
A Quiet Little Genocide (Liberating "The Rescue")
May 10, 2021 03:47 - 1 hour - 69.7 MBA crashed ship. An innocent girl. And an insectoid alien with its own hidden agenda. Naps. Yep, The Rescue packs a lot into two short episodes, not the least of which is the first "new" companion of the classic series. When William Hartnell's Doctor invites Vicki to join the TARDIS as the ostensible replacement for Susan, it's hard not to draw a parallel with where the Randomizer last took the podcast, since Mawdryn Undead had similar vibes with Turlough succeeding Adric. In this case, thoug...
2 Brigadiers 2 Furious (Exhuming "Mawdryn Undead")
April 26, 2021 01:27 - 1 hour - 85.8 MBIt has the Brigadier, a mysterious new companion, and a lot to say about regeneration — if Mawdryn Undead is anything, it's first-class fan service that's meant to appeal to longtime fans of Doctor Who. Strange, then, it's episode that long ago sparked one of our host's decades-long journey through time and space, ultimately leading to the podcast you're listening to now. Maybe that's why the randomizer took Pete and Chris here: to look at our own origins, a metaphorical "meeting of ourselve...
Pyramids, Lies, and Audiotape (Visiting "The Pyramid at the End of the World" and "The Lie of the Land")
April 14, 2021 03:03 - 1 hour - 98.9 MBAnother pyramid? Another fascist Earth? How could the same podcast happen to the same guys twice? Turns out it's not Osiran mummies or jackbooted thugs from someplace "sideways in time" — it's the Monks, and their plot to rule Earth naturally involves applying some corpse makeup just after they've parked their pyramid-shaped spaceship in a Central Asian country so remote it defies geography. But you could see how Chris and Pete could make that mistake, seeing as the Capaldi two-parter, The P...
That Fascist '70s Show (Deconstructing "Inferno")
April 02, 2021 14:15 - 1 hour - 88.6 MBAny science-fiction show that runs long enough will inevitably have its "parallel Earth" episode. Doctor Who hit that milestone in 1970 with Inferno, an action thriller that sees the Doctor "slip sideways in time" to an Earth with a taste for fascism and clean-shaven blokes. The series' last seven-part story is fondly remembered, but does it still hold up? And more important: Is it better than Pyramids of Mars? Ignoring all safety protocols, Chris and Pete accelerate the drilling into this e...
Are You My Mummies? (Disturbing "Pyramids of Mars")
March 22, 2021 02:55 - 1 hour - 72.7 MBDoctor Who doesn't reference ancient Egypt often. But when it does, the result is Pyramids of Mars, cited as classic by many for its chilling villain and additions to the show's lore (like the Doctor's age and the coordinates of Gallifrey). With brutish robots disguised as mummies, a powerful evil mastermind, and Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen at the top of their game, there's much to like. But does the story really stand on its own merits, or does it over-rely on its creepy Egyptian motif, ...
Are You My Mummies?
March 22, 2021 02:55 - 1 hour - 110 MBDoctor Who doesn't reference ancient Egypt often. But when it does, the result is Pyramids of Mars, cited as classic by many for its chilling villain and additions to the show's lore (like the Doctor's age and the coordinates of Gallifrey). With brutish robots disguised as mummies, a powerful evil mastermind, and Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen at the top of their game, there's much to like. But does the story really stand on its own merits, or does it over-rely on its creepy Egyptian motif, ...
Don't Listen to This Podcast
March 02, 2021 04:49 - 1 hour - 94.5 MBYou've been warned. We're still trying to make sense of the discussion that ensued when Chris and Pete revisited Sleep No More, the only episode in Doctor Who history that tosses out the opening credits and relies entirely on "found footage" to tell the story. We searched for rational explanations for how eye boogers could turn into carnivorous monsters or sleep dust could shoot in 4K, but instead found parallels to early '90s sci-fi literature and some of the best (and only) Peter Capaldi t...
Don't Listen to This Podcast (Reviving "Sleep No More")
March 02, 2021 04:49 - 1 hour - 62.5 MBYou've been warned. We're still trying to make sense of the discussion that ensued when Chris and Pete revisited Sleep No More, the only episode in Doctor Who history that tosses out the opening credits and relies entirely on "found footage" to tell the story. We searched for rational explanations for how eye boogers could turn into carnivorous monsters or sleep dust could shoot in 4K, but instead found parallels to early '90s sci-fi literature and some of the best (and only) Peter Capaldi t...
The Best Master Reveal of All Time (Eulogizing "Dark Water" and "Death in Heaven")
February 15, 2021 21:42 - 1 hour - 104 MBWe didn't want to go dark, but the TARDIS Randomizer forced our hand, bringing us to the two-part finale of Peter Capaldi's first season, Dark Water and Death in Heaven. With the return of the Cybermen and UNIT, the story already sets a high bar for itself, but the ambition keeps ticking up as the episode offers up the show's in-universe explanation for the afterlife(!) as well as the absolute best Master reveal ever. It's all quite epic, but is this really too much for family viewing? Join ...
The Best Master Reveal of All Time
February 15, 2021 21:42 - 1 hour - 106 MBWe didn't want to go dark, but the TARDIS Randomizer forced our hand, bringing us to the two-part finale of Peter Capaldi's first season, Dark Water and Death in Heaven. With the return of the Cybermen and UNIT, the story already sets a high bar for itself, but the ambition keeps ticking up as the episode offers up the show's in-universe explanation for the afterlife(!) as well as the absolute best Master reveal ever. It's all quite epic, but is this really too much for family viewing? Join ...
A Little More Magna, a Little Less Carta
January 31, 2021 22:22 - 1 hour - 143 MBAfter "Planet of Fire," the show bounces back to Kamelion's first and only other appearance in Doctor Who, "The King's Demons." What is it about this shapchanging robot from Xeriphas that's inspired the TARDIS Randomizer to make us take stock of Kamelion's onscreen life, but in reverse order? Regardless, Chris and Pete pull out their history books (as well as their Ahistory books) to decode drunk British history and epic hits from the Crusades, not to mention Anthony Ainley's beard. Also: Be...
A Little More Magna, a Little Less Carta (Abdicating "The King's Demons")
January 31, 2021 22:22 - 1 hour - 94.4 MBAfter "Planet of Fire," the show bounces back to Kamelion's first and only other appearance in Doctor Who, "The King's Demons." What is it about this shapchanging robot from Xeriphas that's inspired the TARDIS Randomizer to make us take stock of Kamelion's onscreen life, but in reverse order? Regardless, Chris and Pete pull out their history books (as well as their Ahistory books) to decode drunk British history and epic hits from the Crusades, not to mention Anthony Ainley's beard. Also: Be...
Rising From the Sexy Flames (Igniting "Planet of Fire")
January 16, 2021 21:54 - 1 hour - 98.9 MBLike a glorious bird on fire (there should really be a word for that), Pull To Open rises from the ashes of 2020 and swoops into 2021 with a new episode and a new mission: to revisit any and all episodes of Doctor Who — in random order. In our first podcast on this journey, the TARDIS Randomizer takes us to "Planet of Fire," the penultimate story of the Peter Davison era. With companions arriving, leaving, and just plain imploding, the adventure is more notable than most, particularly if you...