Why don't you like Matt Smith as the Doctor?
- Thread starter shedra
- Start date
I don't like him because I don't think he's a very good actor. I've also never really watched the old series so I don't have much more to compare him to than Eccleston and Tenant.
Really it seems to me like he has two settings 'manic pixie girl' and 'bellowing at the top of my voice.' And his bellowing mode often has me laughing at how silly it looks.
I like to compare Eccleston and Smith yelling at a Dalek.
In Dalek Eccleston looks like a man terrified at the return of his old enemy, then suddenly exuberant as he realises that it is completely powerless. His voice, his body language, his face, all change to reflect the shift in the dynamic between he and his enemy.
In Victory of the Daleksp Smith hits the Dalek with a wrench in a scene that could have been taken straight from Fawlty Towers while bellowing 'YOU ARE MY ENEMY, AND I AM YOURS!' He looks like a fifteen year old drama student trying to reenact the you shall not pass scene from LoTR.
Basically my family refuse to watch Doctor Who with me anymore because I am prone to burst out laughing whenever Smith tries to do 'serious face.' Also, I really am on the verge of not watching Doctor Who anymore unless there is a dramatic upshift in quality when it returns.
Really it seems to me like he has two settings 'manic pixie girl' and 'bellowing at the top of my voice.' And his bellowing mode often has me laughing at how silly it looks.
I like to compare Eccleston and Smith yelling at a Dalek.
In Dalek Eccleston looks like a man terrified at the return of his old enemy, then suddenly exuberant as he realises that it is completely powerless. His voice, his body language, his face, all change to reflect the shift in the dynamic between he and his enemy.
In Victory of the Daleksp Smith hits the Dalek with a wrench in a scene that could have been taken straight from Fawlty Towers while bellowing 'YOU ARE MY ENEMY, AND I AM YOURS!' He looks like a fifteen year old drama student trying to reenact the you shall not pass scene from LoTR.
Basically my family refuse to watch Doctor Who with me anymore because I am prone to burst out laughing whenever Smith tries to do 'serious face.' Also, I really am on the verge of not watching Doctor Who anymore unless there is a dramatic upshift in quality when it returns.
he's cool, i just find his eyebrows.... unnerving.shedra said:I see a lot of people who dislike Matt as Doctor.
I don't fully understand why. I'm thinking that there may be a certain resentment of him for replacing David T. That would be stupid of course, David quit, he wasn't fired or replaced against his will. To my understanding.
People have said to me that he's too funny looking.
That's silly too. Almost every Doctor has been funny looking.
People have said they don't like his slapstick/ humorous take on the Doctor. Well I've never seen a Fifth Doctor episode, but he's wearing a stick of celery. I can guess that he wasn't all that serious either. Did everyone harp on Doctor Five about it too?
Some people may have good reasons for not liking him, but I don't see what they are.
He's as ugly as sin. Now Christopher Eccleston (first guy on the last image row) looks like he means business (plus he was that excellent creepy Army Commander in 28 Days Later). He's just made of meaner stuff rather than an effeminate chimp and a whole tree of ugly.
Didn't really like DT. Mostly the stories (with some exceptions) and companions. Not to mention, the whole 'I don't want to go' thing soured me on his entire tenure - after the 5th and 9th Doctor sacrificed themselves to save friends, Tennant should have just manned up.
OT, though, I love Smith. He's quite close to how Troughton played him, and that's an awesome thing in my book. Amy and Rory are cool too.
Yeah, he's pale, though. Spending too much time in East Anglia'll do that to you (speaking from experience).
OT, though, I love Smith. He's quite close to how Troughton played him, and that's an awesome thing in my book. Amy and Rory are cool too.
Yeah, he's pale, though. Spending too much time in East Anglia'll do that to you (speaking from experience).
Matt Smith= best of the new doctors, Tennant was a gurning chimp who pussyfied the Doctor (although some blame falls on Mr Davies as well), Matt Smith's Doctor is as close to my personal view of him as Ive seen yet- brilliant, enthusiastic and plain good fun whilst being a ruthless, genocidal pragmatist.
I only know a few people who think this way... and they only think it because "he's not as hot as David Tennant".
I like Matt Smith for the main reason that he really reminds me of Sherlock Holmes, which is basically what Doctor Who is, Sherlock in space. And Smith has the most 'Sherlock-esque' acting style (out of the three doctors I've seen)
But he's wearing a stick of Celery. He didn't seem that serious in "Time Crash". I'll take your word for it though.ravensheart18 said:
I see your point, but at the same time it is a new life. As far as 11 in concerned he hasn't been alive that long. He's only got memories of someone who has been alive for 900 years. That's how it looks to me.
That's why I'm okay with the new childish demeanor of the character.
Start here.Averant said:
Doctor who had a new start up in 2005. Starting with that guy. There are five seasons following him, we're currently on the sixth, featuring Matt Smith as the Doctor.
The show gets much better after the first few episodes, I swear.
This comment annoys me somewhat, because 9 kind of just got back from war (it's even implied that he was a general), let alone the one that killed off his entire race. Of course he acts like a soldier!CounterAttack said:
Also, 3 was extremely militaristic and got into fights all the time. 2 didn't hesitate to steer an army into a sun in one episode. 4 (and he's the Doctor) has tried to wipe out the Daleks on one occasion. And 6 was extremely bipolar and violent.
Where I'm going with this is that the Doctor (as a collective) isn't a pacifist so much as a righteous man. Each one has a different way of going about bringing about the greater good. Tennant was more of a 'take a third option' kind of person, always finding or attempting to find a peaceful resolution that ends well for everybody (unless you count the Family of Blood).
I personally love Matt Smith, but I think most peoples' beef with the new series is not so much the actors (unless you're shallow enough to just want Tennant eye candy) but more the new direction it's been taken by Stephen Moffatt. Not only is it darker and grittier (in terms of the the cinematography at least), not only has the story pretty much gone 'forget the first 4 seasons never happened', but the way Doctor Who is presented has changed (and definitely in the new season).
For example, the story has become less about a mishmash of ideas and motifs than it has become part of a massive overarching plot. In Seasons 1 through 4, there were allusions to the finale (in order: Bad Wolf, Torchwood, Mr. Saxon and Pretty Much Everything) but they never got in the way of the segregated stories. In 5, the season became increasingly more dominated by the cracks, building up to (rather than alluding to) a big climax. In 6, aside from the Pirates episode (which was the worst so far IMO) it has been almost entirely about the grander scheme. 11's death, River Song and the war in the Doctor's future have taken centre stage, and the shift in storytelling method is definitely irritating people, whether they're aware of it or not.
Doctor Who isn't new to this - the most famous Doctor Who story was the Key to Time arc - so this isn't necessarily a bad thing. However, it also means that we'll need to see this story reach its conclusion to achieve a solid verdict as opposed to taking smaller stories in bite size chunks.
Anyway, I could go on this massive TL;DR essay about Doctor Who and its shifting storytelling and how it affects reception, but that might just have to wait for another day. Needless to say, that up there is a good chunk of my answer to the OP's question.
