Feb
17
2019
Can I tell a story about today that has nothing to do with Doctor Who or treadmills? Ok, cool. So, my son is autistic. He is also a Disney geek. In particular, he has kind of a thing for Snow White. Nearly seven years ago, when Snow White's Scary Adventures closed permanently, he had a very special encounter with her, which you can see here:
This afternoon Ben and I were at Epcot, where he likes to go every Sunday to take pictures of characters. At the Snow White meet & greet, it turned out to be the very same Snow who had visited with Ben in the video above. Ben recognized her immediately, and was delighted. She was also overjoyed to see Ben again for the first time in years. She couldn't break character, but she did all kinds of verbal flips and twists to express just how much that day had meant to her, and how happy she was to see Ben again. It was just an amazing encounter all around. How cool is that?
Anyway, getting back to Doctor Who...
Kerblam!
(TARDIS Data Core recap)
Fun bit of trivia: this is the first televised Doctor Who story to have an exclamation point in the title. So there's that. The story is a thinly-veiled commentary on the Amazon economy. And by "thinly veiled" I mean that the veil is made of the thinnest available kitchen cling wrap. In a nutshell, the Doctor receives a surprise package from the Kerblam! Man that includes a plea for help, and so the TARDIS Team heads off to the warehouse moon of Kandoka, home to Amazon Kerblam!, the largest mail-order retailer in the galaxy.
Most of the warehouse is automated, but for some reason human workers are disappearing. There is lots of pointed commentary on the drudgery and inhumanity of corporate warehouse work, with a big swerve at the end where the episode comes out surprisingly in support of the System. Very unusual for this show.
On the whole it is a perfectly enjoyable episode. Not nearly as good as the previous one, not nearly as bad as the stupid spider one, it is just kind of "middle of the pack" for this season. There are some very nice performances by the guest actors, and the robot designs are fun with a somehow simultaneous "non-threatening" and "ultra-creepy" vibe. I particularly liked the bit where the Doctor exits a scene by saying "Toodles!" and then immediately deciding to never say that again.
Tomorrow: another historical, but nowhere near being a Pure Historical. And that's okay.
STATS:
Doctor(s): Thirteenth
Companion(s): Graham O'Brien, Ryan Sinclair, Yasmin Khan
Episode(s): Kerblam!
Steps Walked: 7,172 today, 4,443,543 total
Distance Walked: 3.54 miles today, 2,327.40 miles total
Push-ups Completed: 0 today, 11,000 total
Sit-ups Completed: 200 today, 5,665 total
Weight: 264.26 lbs (five day moving average), net change -43.04 lbs