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Wednesday, 20 November 2013

"Father's Day" Podcast


Here is the podcast on "Father's Day"
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Tuesday, 19 November 2013

#SaveTheDay Countdown: The Fourth Doctor--Tom Baker


As a countdown to the upcoming 50th Anniversary of Doctor
Who, TARDIStyle will be showcasing one Doctor a day.

Tom Baker was born 20 January 1934 in Liverpool. His mother was a cleaner and his father was a sailor who was rarely home. Baker attended Cheswardine Boarding School until the age of 15, when he decided to be a Roman Cathloic monk. He lived in the lifestyle for six years, but lost his faith and left. From 1955-57, Baker served in the Royal Army Medical Corps. It was then he started acting, first as a hobby, and became professional at the tail end of the 1960s.

Baker was a member of the National Theatre Company, from the late 60s until the early 70s. His first big film break was as Grigori Rasputin in Nicolas and Alexandra in 1971. For the performance, he was nominated for two Golden Globe Awards, one for Best Actor in a Supporting Role and the other for Best Newcomer. In 1973, Tom appeared in The Vault of Horror as Moore, an artist whose paintings had voodoo power in them. Also in 1973, Baker played Koura in The Golden Voyage of Sinbad.

He accepted the role of the Doctor in 1974 and stayed until 1981, making him the Doctor with the most hours of footage. Like most Doctors, Baker has no trouble finding roles after leaving the show.

Tom has two sons, Piers and Daniel, from his first marriage to Anna Wheatcroft in 1961. He and his sons lost contact until Piers found himself in the same pub as his father in New Zealand. He married Doctor Who co-star Lalla Ward (Romana II) in 1980, and divorced sixteen months later. Baker has been married to Sue Jerrard, an assistant editor on Doctor Who since 1986. She and baker lived in France between the years of 2003 and 2006. They now reside on the East Sussex countryside. Baker describes himself as irrelgious or Buddhist, but he is not anti-religion. He is skeptical on the concept. Politically, Baker has expressed dislike for both the Conservative and Labour parties.

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Monday, 18 November 2013

#SaveTheDay Countdown: The Fifth Doctor--Peter Davidson


As a countdown to the upcoming 50th Anniversary of Doctor
Who, TARDIStyle will be showcasing one Doctor a day.

Peter M. G. Moffett was born on 13 April 1951 in Streatham, London. His father was an electrical engineer, originally from Guyana. Shortly after his birth, the family mover to Surrey. There, he became a member of the Byfleet Players, and amateur theatre company. Before he started his career as an actor, Peter obtained three O-levels at Winston Churchill School. He also took odd jobs, including one as a mortuary attendant.

Peter attended the Central School of Speech and Drama. His first theatre job was the assistant stage manager of the Nottingham Playhouse. To avoid confusion with the actor/director Peter Moffatt (with whom he would later work), he adopted the stagename of Peter Davison. Peter's first television appearance was in The Tomorrow People, a children's sci-fi show. He co-starred with Sandra Dickinson, whom he married on 26 December 1978. The couple would stay together until 1994.

Peter had a hard time finding jobs in the mid-1970s. He worked 18 months in a Twickenham tax office. The lull came to an ent in 1976 when Davison was offered a prominent fole in the ITV mini-series Love for Lydia. In 1978, he was cast as Tristan Farnon in All Creatures Great and Small. It was through this programme that he became a household name. He has said that he was cast because he bore a resemblance to Robert Hardy, who played his older brother in the series. In 1981, Davison played  the Dish of the Day in a television adaptation of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. In 1984, he and his wife had a daughter, Georgia Moffett.

Davison became the youngest actor to play the Doctor in 1981 at age 29. By this time he was already well-known. He heeded the advice of Second Doctor Patrick Troughton to leave the show after three years. Peter had a fear of being type-cast after playing such an iconic role. He also believed that he was too young to play the Doctor, as all his predecessors were over the age of 40. In 1999, Davison lent his voice as the Doctor  to over 50 Big Finish audio adventures.

After the role, Davison found much success in the film/television industry and also appeared in numerous live theatre roles. He currently is a regular on Law and Order UK as Henry Sharpe, co staring with Tenth Doctor Companion Freema Agyeman

Davidson is politically active. He was one of 48 celebrities to sign a letter warning voters against a Conservative Party policy towards the BBC in 2010. Also in 2010, Davidson spoke in a Labour Party election broadcast. 

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Sunday, 17 November 2013

#SaveTheDay Countdown: The Sixth Doctor--Colin Baker


As a countdown to the upcoming 50th Anniversary of Doctor
Who, TARDIStyle will be showcasing one Doctor a day.

Colin Baker was born 8 June 1943 in Waterloo, London. Early in his life, his family moved to Rochdale. He attended St. Bede's College where he studied to become a solicitor. At age 23, he decided to change careers and enrolled at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Arts (side note, the author hopes to take classes there once she moves to London in 2016).

One of his first professional acting jobs was in 1970 as a supporting role in a three-part BBC adaptation of Jean-Paul Sartre's The Roads to Freedom. In 1972, he returned to BBC airwaves as Anatole Kuragain in War and Peace. From 1974-76, he played one of his most prominent roles: Paul Merroney in The Brothers. He also appeared in the last episode of Fall of Eagles, was a guest star in Blake's 7, and in a BBC production of A.J. Cronin's The Citadel.

Before playing the Sixth Doctor, he appeared in Doctor Who as Commander Maxil in Arc of Infinity in 1983. Maxil was one of the few characters to actually shoot the Doctor (Peter Davidson).
Outside of acting, he became an avid supporter of awareness of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome after the death of his son, Jack, in 1984.

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Saturday, 16 November 2013

#SaveTheDay Countdown: The Seventh Doctor--Sylvester McCoy


As a countdown to the upcoming 50th Anniversary of Doctor
Who, TARDIStyle will be showcasing one Doctor a day.

Percy James Patrick Kent-Smith was born 20 August 1943 in Dudoon, Scottland. His father was killed in the Second World War a couple of months before he was born, and he was brought up by his mother, his grandmother and aunts. He attended St. Mun's, a local Dunoon school.

Originally, he wanted to be a preist or monk, but gave it up and then worked for a theatre box office. Here, he was discovered by Ken Campbell. Campbell offered him a role in "The Ken Campbell Roadshow." In that, his best known act was a stuntman named Sylveste McCoy. A reviewer of the show mistakenly called him Sylveste McCoy, and he adopted it as his stagename, and years later he added the "r" to the end.

He is adept at playing both the xylophone and the spoons. He can also juggle and once gained a reputation for stuffing live ferrets down his trousers.

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Friday, 15 November 2013

#SaveTheDay Countdown: The Eighth Doctor--Paul McGann


As a countdown to the upcoming 50th Anniversary of Doctor
Who, TARDIStyle will be showcasing one Doctor a day.

Paul McGann was born 14 November 1959 in Liverpool, England. His parents encouraged he and his brothers to develop their talent for acting from an early age. He attended Cardinal Allen Grammar School, where one of his teachers, encouraged him to apply to the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts. He followed the advice, and has had quite the career since.

McGann's first major role was in Give Us A Break, a television series about an exceptional snooker player (his character).

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Thursday, 14 November 2013

"The Night of the Doctor" Reaction



"I'm a Doctor...but probably not the one you're expecting."
#WhatYouDidThereISeeIt
You have to hand it to them--I had no idea Paul McGann was going to pop up in this.

There we have it. Undeniable proof  that the speculations were correct: John Hurt is a Doctor. Or, as the credits put it, he is "The War Doctor."

But what does it all mean? I don't know. But I'll try to make sense of it as I write.

Cass, a sassy young girl who wants to see the universe (Clara??), is pretty much about to die. But then her salvation comes in the form of the Eighth Doctor, Paul McGann. He looks a lot different since we saw him last--different hair, different clothes, but his personality remains the same.

Cass denies to go aboard the with the Doctor as soon as she hears that it's bigger on the inside. Because it's a TARDIS and he's a Time Lord. She snatches her wrist out of the Doctor's hand, "Don't touch me!!"

He knows exactly what her reaction was about and explains: he's not a part of the war and never was. But she doesn't care. He rebukes, "at least I'm not a Dalek!" She slams on a button to close the bulkhead and says, "who can tell the difference anymore?"

What had the Time Lords done in the Last Great Time War (LGTW) to make her react like that? To call the Doctor a Dalek? While we do see similarities to the Doctor and a Dalek in S1E6, "Dalek," (topic of that week's podcast), that's far in the future.

Then, they crash on the the planet Karn, home to the Sisterhood of Karn. This is a callback to the 1976 episode, "The Brain of Morbus." The Sisterhood was once ruled Gallifrey until the Time Lords booted them from power. So they are a crucial part of the history of Gallifery, which I predict we will learn much more about in "The Name of the Doctor." The leader of the Sisterhood, Ohila, sees the crash and says, "Here he is again...the man to end it all."

What is he going to end? Cass pointed that a lot of the universe had been destroyed with the war. Is he the one to end the universe? No--I think they imply that he is the one to end the war.

The Doctor critiques the Sisterhood--they are the Keepers of the Sacred Flame of Eternal Life (or eternal boredom, as the Doctor says...) That means two things. One, he's starting to think--Ten put it best-- that "a Time Lord lives too long..." (End of Time pt 2). And also--confirmed by the fact that Ohila talks about the improvements of regeneration--that the Sisterhood is responsible for making regeneration possible for Time Lords. Plus, one can now choose what the regeneration will be like.


Then, Eight does something. He takes Cass' belt, thinks about how he couldn't save her and says to Ohila, "Warrior...I don't suppose there's any need for a doctor anymore." Before drinking the elixir, he asks, "Will it hurt?" Ohila respond that it will. He says, "Good." He wants pain. Why? Why does he want to be in pain?He says the names of companions from the audio adventures (so they are officially cannon now!!), salutes his friends and companions...then apologises to Cass. He says, "Physician, heal thyself," a proverb from Luke 4:23. The common explanation of the proverb in context of the Bible is that, during Jesus' resurrection, he expects for people from Nazareth, his home, to use this phrase to criticise him, and that the people of Nazareth expect him to do miracles there like he has done other places. For the Doctor, it translates to saying that he is being expected to end the LGTW. The parallel could not be more striking, especially comparing the resurrection to regeneration.

He drinks the elixir then and regenerates. The first thing he does is touch Cass in sorrow and then he puts on her belt, prepared to fight with the memory of the the woman he killed.

The reflection of the newly-regenerated "War Doctor"
What happens next is key. He says, "Doctor no more," which corresponds directly to the end of "The Name of the Doctor" when Eleven says that what the War Doctor did was not in the name of the Doctor. We see his reflection, and it is younger than the white-haired John Hurt we are used to (but by the voice and credits we know it is supposed to be him). What does that mean? It means that this "War Doctor," as the credits put it, has, when we see him in "The Day of the Doctor," it has been quite some time--as the War Doctor we see then is more wrinkled and has white hair. So this has to mean that Time Lords do age some, visually. But how much time does it take to make the one in the reflection the one in the 50th? I guess only time will tell (see what I did there!).


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#SaveTheDay Countdown: The Ninth Doctor--Christopher Eccleston


As a countdown to the upcoming 50th Anniversary of Doctor
Who, TARDIStyle will be showcasing one Doctor a day.

Christopher Eccleston was born on 16 February 1964 in Langworthy, England. He is the youngest of three brothers, Alan and Keith. They are twins, eight years older than him. Eccleston became head boy at Joseph Eastham High School. 

At age 19, he was inspired to become and actor by television dramas such as Boys from the Blackstuff. He did a two-year Performance Foundation course at Salford Tech, and then trained at the Central School of Speech and Drama. He was influenced by Ken Loach's Kes and Albert Finney in Saturday Night and Sunday Morning. Christopher quickly developed a love of preforming classics, such as Shakespeare, Checkhov, and Molière. He was 25 when he made his professional stage début in the Bristol Old Vic's production of A Streetcar Named Desire. He found himself underemployed as an actor, and found work in strange places (for an actor) at supermarkets, building sites, and as an artist's model. 

Christopher finally got the roles he was looking in for in 1991 as Derek Bentley in Let Him Have It. He became a regular staple of drama quickly. His film career was successful as well, cast in many action/adventure films like Gone in 60 Seconds, and 28 Days Later.

On 2 April 2004, the BBC announced that Eccleston had been cast as the Ninth Doctor. He was the first actor to play the role born after the series began. On 30 March 3005, stating that he was leaving the role because he did not want to become typecast afterwards. The statement was released without his concent. He later said that his decision was influenced by the "environment and culture" of the production had in the studio, but he was proud to have played the part.

Christopher is married and has one child, Albert, who was born in February 2012. He is an atheist. He ran marathons regularly until 2000 and is a fan of Manchester United. He is greatly involved in charity work. He is a Mencap charity ambassador and and supports the British Red Cross.

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Wednesday, 13 November 2013

#SaveTheDay Countdown: The Tenth Doctor--David Tennant



As a countdown to the upcoming 50th Anniversary of Doctor
Who, TARDIStyle will be showcasing one Doctor a day.

David John McDonald was born 18 April 1971 in Bathgate, Scotland. His father, Sandy, is a prominent (now retired) minister of the Church of Scotland and was the Moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland.

At the age of three, David decided that he wanted to be an actor to play the role of the Doctor. He pursued acting, as he put it, "absurdly single-mindedly," although his parents tried to steer him to a more practical profession. Tennant attended Ralston Primary and Paisley Grammar School, where he had an English teacher by the name of Moira Robertson, who  was among the first to see David's potential in acting. David participated in school productions in primary and secondary school. He had his first "real" role in a production at age 11, and actress Edith MacArthur saw him perform and told his parents that their son was destined to become a brilliant performer. David took Saturday classes at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama. He passed an audition in the Academy's BA program in Acting at 16, becoming one of their youngest students. He graduated the program at 20 and was flatmates with actress Louise Delamere at the program. The two are still friends.

David's first professional role post-graduation was the play The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui and his first major television role was Campbell, a bi-polar patient in the 1994 series Takin' Over the Asylum. When David joined the British Actor's Equity Union, he assumed the stagename David Tennant, after Pet Shop Boys' leading man, Neil Tennant, as the name David McDonald was already in use in the Union. David's extensive CV includes many Shakespearean roles, but none more acclaimed than his Hamlet in 2009 with the Royal Shakespeare Company

David is married to Georgia Moffet. They have three children together. A little-known fact is that David wears contacts on screen as he needs corrective lenses.

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Tuesday, 12 November 2013

#SaveTheDay Showcase: The Eleventh Doctor--Matt Smith


As a countdown to the upcoming 50th Anniversary of Doctor
Who, TARDIStyle will be showcasing one Doctor a day.

Matthew Robert Smith was born in Northampton, England on 28 October 1982. He attended Northampton School for Boys.  Throughout his childhood, Matt aspired to be a professional football player and played on the Northampton Town, Nottingham Forest, and Leicester City youth teams. He sustained a serious back injury resulting in spondylosis in his late teens. After the injury, his drama teacher signed him up to be the tenth juror in Twelve Angry Men--against his will. He reluctantly participated, as he identified as a football player and thought acting was not right for a sporty guy. He did, however, refuse to go to a drama festival that the same teacher had signed him up for. The teacher was a persistent fellow, and eventually Matt joined the National Youth Theatre in London. There, he played Thomas Becket in Murder in the Cathedral and Basoon in The Master and Margarita.

His performance in The Master and Margarita found the interest of an agent and landed him his first professional roles in Fresh Kills and On the Shore of the Wide World. His new-found talent began to conflict with his studies of drama and creative writing at Univeristy of East Anglia. He arranged an agreement with the university so he could partake in the roles and graduate in 2005 without attending lectures his final year.

Before being, for all intents and purposes, "discovered" in Doctor Who in 2009, Matt appeared in The Ruby in the Smoke and The Shadow in the North as Jim Taylor, the political drama Party Animals, and Moses Jones as DS Dan Twentyman.

Matt Smith directed Cargese, a short film that débuted on Sky Arts in May 2013. He is an atheist. Matt's favourite band is Radiohead, and he has refered to them as an inspiration. He roots for the Blackburn Rovers.

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Monday, 11 November 2013

#SaveTheDay Showcase: The Twelfth Doctor--Peter Capaldi


As a countdown to the upcoming 50th Anniversary of Doctor
Who, TARDIStyle will be showcasing one Doctor a day.

Peter Dougan Capaldi was born 14 April 1958 in Glasgow, Scotland. His mother's family is Irish and his father's family is Italian. He attended St. Teresa's Primary School, St. Matthew's Primary School. He developed a love of performance at a young age when he put on a puppet show. While at St. Ninian's High School, he was a member of the Antonine Players and performed at the Fort Theatre. He went on to be a student at the Glasgow School of Art. While he was there, Peter was the lead singer in a punk rock band, named Dreamboys. Craig Fergueson was their drummer.

Peter's first major acting role was in 1983, in Local Hero as Danny Oldsen. In 1985, he played Ozzy in an episode of Minder. Peter had roles in The Lair of the White Worm and Dangerous Liaisons in 1988. In 1990, Peter stared in a four-part BBC2 thriller, Chain. He won the 1995 Academy Award for Live Action Short Film for his film Franz Kafka's It's a Wonderful Life. He also wrote Soft Top, Hard Shoulder in 1995, which won the Audience Award at the London Film Festival. Capaldi's first television starring role was a closeted gay man, Luke Wakefield, who imagines he witnessed a crime in the BBC series Mr Wakefield's Crusade.  It was in 2005 that Peter was cast in one of his best-known roles to date, Malcom Tucker, in The Thick of It, a BBC comedy. He won a BAFTA for Best Performance in a Comedy Role and won two British Comedy Awards for the role. Capaldi also appeared in Skins as Mark Jenkins in 2007-8.

A life-long Doctor Who fan, Peter made his first appearance in The Fires of Pompeii in 2008 as Caecilius. He also played John Frobisher in Torchwood: Children of Earth.

Capaldi also found work in the audiobook industry, narrating several works of Iain Banks. He appeared in The Fifth Estate as the editor of The Guardian, Alan Rusbridger, alongside Benedict Cumberbatch.

Aside from the entertainment industry, Peter is also a patron of the Association for International Cancer Research and Aberlour Child Care Trust, a Scottish children's charity.Peter lives in Crouch End with his wife, Elaine, and their daughter, Cecily.
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Saturday, 9 November 2013

NEW PODCAST "The Long Game" S1E7



Brittany, Daniel, Ley, Mary, and Sam cover "The Long Game." We discuss Adam's function in the episode and try to give an answer to the Editor's question: "Is a slave a slave if he doesn't know he's enslaved?" 

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My Predictions for the Doctor Who 50th Anniversary Special #SaveTheDay


"Original British Drama"
Those may not be the first words to come to mind when you think of Doctor Who, but they are the first words in the show's official 50th Anniversary Special Trailer.

As this is a post fraught with spoilers, click here to read at your own risk:

Sunday, 3 November 2013

PODCAST: Dalek and Important Update


Due to unforeseen constraints of our previous podcast hosting service, the TARDIStyle podcast has been moved. Please note that if you had subscribed via iTunes that that specific feed will no longer be updated. Instead, you can re-subscribe here.

With that said, I am proud to announce the episode that I think has been the best so far: Dalek! It is avalable here. Please note that plot through "The Name of the Doctor" is discussed in this podcast.


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Wednesday, 23 October 2013

Aliens of London/World War Three Podcast Avalable


Hey! The podcast for "Aliens of London"/"World War Three" is up! Give it a listen here. Cheers!

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Saturday, 19 October 2013

#SaveTheDay :: Doctor Who 50th Anniversary Trailer!


So, because of the regulations on BBC Worldwide's YouTube channel, I sadly cannot embed the trailer here. But I CAN paste the link. Here is it, what we've all been waiting for:


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Wednesday, 16 October 2013

New Podcasts!


It's just occurred to me that I haven't been posting when I upload a new podcast. So you know, as of tonight we have covered "Rose," "The End of the World," and "The Unquiet Dead."

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Thursday, 10 October 2013

Classic Who Episodes Found!

Hi there, resident classic-Who quasi-expert Seth here! Yes, yes, I know, I've been a long time gone. I've been busy. Doing what, you ask? Well, I'll get to that in a later article. In the meantime, Who novelist Lance Parkin has been nice enough to break the BBC embargo on the missing episode news that was announced today via his Facebook page. What did we find? What does it mean?

Well, first of all, the nine episodes found today were from the Patrick Troughton era, dropping his count of missing episodes from 62 to 53 and the overall count of missing episodes from 106 to 97, officially dispelling long-held conventional wisdom that we'd never have fewer than 100 missing episode. Good news all around, really, but especially for Troughton fans, who have long suffered not just from missing episodes but from most of those episodes being scattered about different serials, leaving us with very few complete stories.

Hot Pat-on-Pat action!
Thankfully, we now have one more--all five missing episodes of six-parter The Enemy of the World were found, a hallmark for a number of reasons. It was the last story to have series co-creator Sydney Newman directly involved, for one. It was the first serial directed by Barry Letts, who would go on to run the show for all of Jon Pertwee's five years and cast Tom Baker as his successor. And it's the penultimate serial written by the show's original script editor and resident genius-alchemist-madman, David Whitaker. Of course, for all of you who don't care about the behind the scenes nitty-gritty--well, you also get Patrick Troughton's Doctor match wits with ruthless megalomaniac conqueror Salamander, who is also played by Patrick Troughton, and they fight in the last episode via splitscreen. I don't doubt that'll be a lot of fun to watch.
Finally, you can get the Yeti off your loo
and back on your telly!
(Sometimes I'm only amusing myself.)

Not complete, but now only missing a single episode instead of five, is another six-parter called The Web of Fear. It's the first appearance of Brigadier Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart of UNIT, who would go on to be a lead during Pertwee's era and the show's longest-lasting recurring character (besides the Doctor himself, of course.) It's also the second appearance of the Great Intelligence, and the last one of the classic series. The site's spoiler policy means I can't be too explicit, but those of you who were following the show this past year should be pretty familiar with that guy, and now you'll be able to know first-hand
what that whole "London Underground" speech in the Christmas special was about.

These apparently weren't the only episodes found, with more news due out soon. I'll post more as events warrant.

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Wednesday, 2 October 2013

TARDIStyle to be Featured in Doctor Who Exhibit


Did you know that England's National Media Museum will have an exhibit on Doctor Who? The event is called Doctor Who and Me: 50 Years of Doctor Who Fans. Well, now you know.

Another "did you know"? A quote from TARDIStyle will be featured there! It will be in the section "Why I Love Doctor Who". The quote is taken from this article. It is:
“One thing Doctor Who is about is embracing your inner darkness
so that you can stand in the light of your truth.”

Have something you want to submit? eMail them at drwho@nationalmediamuseum.org.uk. It's kind of cool because when they eMail you back your inbox says you're gotten an eMail from Dr Who.

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Wednesday, 25 September 2013

UPDATE: Big News!


Hey everyone! My apologies for not having posted in quite some time. I recently went back to college and have been busy with that. That, and there has not been any new episodes. I do have some big news, though!

1: As you can see by the counter to your left, TARDIStyle hit 20,000 views recently! I want to thank you all so much. I never imagined this would be as successful as it is.

2: TARDIStyle will be starting a podcast! The Alternate Realities club at my school (gaming, anime, etc) is letting me do a Doctor Who nights. We will start with "Rose" next Wednesday, 2 October. The basic structure is that we, as in the people who come to the event, will watch a story and then discuss it at an intellectual level. The podcast will not include any information about episodes we haven't watched, so no spoilers! At the moment, I think the link for the podcast will be TARDIStyle.podbean.com, although I'm still not sure that that will be software we will be using. There will definitely be more information in the weeks to come. That said, don't forget to follow us on Twitter, Facebook, and Tumblr!

Don't forget to tell your friends about our site!