Wyvern
2nd Incarnation
Posts: 11
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Post by Wyvern on Feb 11, 2012 4:03:37 GMT
Given that many episodes of Doctor Who have elements of horror -- in the vein of classic monster movies -- it would be only natural to steal plot ideas from those movies. For instance, Forbidden Planet could easily be made into a Doctor Who story simply be substituting the Doctor and his companions for the starship crew.
Other movies that come to mind are Quatermass and the Pit, Village of the Damned, The Thing From Another World, Day of the Triffids, Them!... what else would you suggest? (I haven't seen that many classic sci-fi movies myself.)
Wyvern
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Post by Curufea on Feb 11, 2012 7:28:39 GMT
The Godzilla movies, the Blob, This Island Earth (actually most MST3K movies would likely be suitable)
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Post by brainsnaffler on Feb 11, 2012 8:18:53 GMT
Forbidden planet practically was made into a Dr who. Think it was called planet of evil.
50s and 60s movies I think would work quite well, such as the day the earth stood still, the fly and the thing was reimagined in the adventure games I believe.
Or millitary movies - ice station zebra?
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Post by cliffordjones on Feb 11, 2012 12:36:50 GMT
Forbidden Planet was, of course, based on Shakespeare's The Tempest so it's virtually pubic domain as far as plot 'borrowing' goes  I would say that survival horror is a genre ripe for idea harvesting. A lot of Who stories play out like zombie movies. Off the top of my head The Empty Child and Silence in the Library spring to mind as examples of this in nuWho. Pseudo-zombies are very 'Moffaty', I would also put the Weeping Angels in this category especially in The Time of Angels/ Flesh and Stone. In classic Who there always seemed to be some shambling menace steadily creeping closer to the camera just as the end title music kicked in. UNIT always seemed to be fighting running battles against some leisurely advancing space beasties. The bad guys never seemed to be in a hurry. I don't remember ever seeing a cyberman run. It was all very George A. Romero as I remember. The monsters marching relentlessly forward, slow and implacable, always threatening to overwhelm the good guys at any moment. So I would say that classic zombie movies are a good potential source of ideas. Maybe not whole storylines, and you seriously need to dial down the gore levels, but certainly for 'bits'. In particular zombie movies can give you good ideas for NPCs. In a zombie movie almost everyone has their own agenda and their own particular strengths and weaknesses. Understanding the people around you becomes a very important part of surviving whatever it is that you are up against. This, I think, is very Who. The Doctor is always trying to suss people out and to bring out the best in them.
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Post by garethl on Feb 11, 2012 16:49:05 GMT
Cliffordjones, your post reminded me why I find the Borg and the Cybermen effective monsters. They don't run, not because they can't but because they don't have to  As for inspiration: Wall-E ;D. A planet full of waste, a lazy consumerist society, "sentient" robots. |
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Wyvern
2nd Incarnation
Posts: 11
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Post by Wyvern on Feb 11, 2012 16:58:01 GMT
A lot of Who stories play out like zombie movies. Off the top of my head The Empty Child and Silence in the Library spring to mind as examples of this in nuWho. Pseudo-zombies are very 'Moffaty', I would also put the Weeping Angels in this category especially in The Time of Angels/ Flesh and Stone. Don't forget The Waters of Mars! Wyvern |
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Post by Craig Oxbrow on Feb 11, 2012 19:17:57 GMT
Lots of horror and SF stories work... "We only use original ideas in Doctor Who. Not necessarily our original ideas." Robert Holmes
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Post by cliffordjones on Feb 12, 2012 3:30:48 GMT
Cliffordjones, your post reminded me why I find the Borg and the Cybermen effective monsters. They don't run, not because they can't but because they don't have to The Borg have to be the ultimate space zombies. I used to like it when an away team beamed aboard a Borg cube and the Borg would just ignore them because they didn't perceive them to be a viable threat. This always led to some really tense and creepy scenes. Great stuff  Don't forget The Waters of Mars! Wyvern Oh yeah! That's probably one of the best examples of nuWho channelling Romero and it's not even a Moffat script. |
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Post by cliffordjones on Feb 12, 2012 15:48:43 GMT
I always really liked it when classic Who got all surreal and trippy. The Mind Robber is probably my favourite classic serial. It just has this great Lewis Carroll/Rene Magritte dreamscape aesthetic. I also really like what is left of The Celestial Toymaker although I know some people find it boring. I'm sure that it's just a coincidence that these episodes were made during the 60s when the recreational use of psychedelic drugs was such a highly popular pastime ;D The only episode of nuWho that has really attempted anything quite so far-out (IIRC) is Amy's Choice. The Dream Lord is a similar type of villain to The Celestial Toymaker, a cosmic imp, capable of shaping reality at will and only to be defeated by being beaten at his own game. (The final denouement, revealing the Dream Lord's true nature, doesn't diminish his role in the story, in fact, I think it rather strengthens it.) Anyway this is all a bit of a ramble but it made me think of some possible sources of inspiration for plot ideas, although none are actually movies... Firstly the original Twilight Zone TV series. Has pretty much all the same elements as Who - science-fantasy, horror, weirdness, satire - and just some truly brilliant storytelling. For cosmic imp stories I would heartily recommend old Superman comic books featuring Mister Mxyzptlk. Also, of course, any Star Trek episode featuring Q. |
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Post by olegrand on Feb 12, 2012 20:06:44 GMT
Several movies from the glorious 80s would work very well as DWAITAS stories. Let's start with...
LIFEFORCE - This movie feels so Who-esque... Alien life-draining vampires invading London, after infiltrating a Euro space shuttle named Churchill... not to mention Spooks' Peter Firth as the heroic man from SAS / UNIT / Torchwood. Speaking of Torchwood, Jack Harkness would make a unique opponent for those life-draining creatures (remember his stand against Abaddon ?)
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Post by olegrand on Feb 12, 2012 21:37:34 GMT
Some other great cinematic DW inspiration sources from the 80s:
Time Bandits
The Thing
Something Wicked This Way Come
The Purple Rose of Cairo
Big Trouble In Little China
The Philadelphia Experiment
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Post by zebaroth on Feb 23, 2012 18:52:18 GMT
what would the Doctor think about the map of the time holes in Time Bandits
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Post by imajica on Feb 23, 2012 19:52:33 GMT
I once ran a Who game using the old FASA set, picking events up part way through the movie. The PCs were the Time Bandits themselves, they'd lost Kevin to Agamemnon and found this strange blue box at the other end of a Time portal.
"That's not supposed to be there" were the first words out of Randall's mouth.
The Thing would make a superb Who story. It made a cracking Cthulhu adventure (complete with soundtrack LP).
For a while now I've wanted to run a series based on the old portmanteau movies - one arc story, three or four stories-within-stories. Or the "Worlds End" collection from Sandman. Lots of pregenerated characters...
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Post by lomythica on Mar 1, 2012 18:12:06 GMT
I am currently running a space horror episode, in the vein of 'Event Horizon meets Cthulhu'.. So far it's working quite well.. The Sisters of Karn are on a ship that is taking them to some other planet. To get there, they have to jump to 'hyperspace'. Once jumped to hyperspace, the ship will jump back to realspace, albeit light years away from their original jump location (near their destination).
Of course, once they jump, the Sisters sabotage the engines, and they're stuck.... Now the PCs have to try to fix the engines (before radiation leaks into the ship), stop the Sisters (worshipers of the Old Ones), and fight against crewmembers and PCs that have been possessed by the Old Ones.
The backstory: The Old Ones are trapped in Hyperspace and need a TARDIS to escape their prison.. Now that timelords are trapped in Hyperspace, force them to pilot the TARDIS away, releasing the old ones.
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