The Doctor Who Cut-Away

So, Raymond Cummings of the blog Voguing to Danzig has this thing going on called "TV Loves You Back March" and I did this piece on Tom Baker-era Doctor Who and it's many reasons for being awesome but namely, the theme song's greatness and the way the show always ended with this mad-abrupt cut-away:

So, there's some show on the Sci-Fi channel by way of BBC called Doctor Who and it's liked by the same fans as the old show, but seriously, this metrosexual doctor that's the wrong kind of ironic riding the Tardis all around doesn't really feel right but really, other than the Fourth Doctor, played by Tom Baker, none of the Doctors feel right or feel as right. This is a post about the brilliance of Doctor Who but it's really about the Tom Baker years, in which it seems like everything weird and awesome about the show totally aligned.

The show makes for some of the best TV ever when Tom Baker's on the screen, as he's ideal for the time (mid to late 70s) with goofball style (Willy Wonka perm, super-long scarf) and a kinda wizened post-Vietnam sardonism about him. Certainly too smart for whatever problem he's stumbled into, Baker's Doctor has a kind of Byronic meta-charm about him. He never seems threatened and treats say, an evil deformed despot like Davros in the definitive episode(s) "Genesis of the Daleks" like he's just some asshole in a rubber suit squawking and croaking about destruction...