Voyage of the Damned: | ||
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| – | The Titanic's direction of orbit is all over the place, most noticeably at the start of the episode: right before the opening titles, the Titanic is clearly orbiting East to West (starboard side facing Earth), then immediately after the titles, for no apparent reason it has turned 180 degrees and is now orbiting West to East (port side facing Earth). |
| – | When the Doctor first speaks to a Host, it seems to answer his questions about the Titanic in the wrong order!
Doctor: "Titanic. Um... who thought of the name?" Host: "Information: it was chosen as the most famous vessel of the planet Earth." Doctor: "Did they tell you why it was famous?" Host: "Information: all designations are chosen by Mr Max Capricorn." [Presumably they re-edited the conversation to accommodate the "M..M...Max" joke at the end — a nice little nod to Max Headroom for those of you who were around in the 80s!] |
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| – | It's clearly night-time when the Doctor, Astrid and the tour party teleport down to the London street. But just a few minutes later, after they teleport back to the ship and we see a long shot of the meteors approaching the Titanic, Britain is visibly on the "light side" of the Earth, which would make it broad daylight, not middle of the night! |
| – | If the Titanic is in orbit above the Earth (i.e. above the atmosphere) at the time the meteors strike, the approaching meteors shouldn't be "flaming"... that requires friction, which requires, yes, an atmosphere! |
| – | When Midshipman Frame shuts the bridge door, cutting off the Host's hand, he is wearing his white shirt, having taken off the jacket he was wearing previously. But just a minute later when the Doctor talks to him on the radio, he's gone to the trouble of putting his jacket back on, despite supposedly being in agony from his gunshot wound.
[Was he feeling a bit nippy?] |
| – | Speaking of Midshipman Frame, his gunshot wound heals pretty rapidly as the episode went on. At first when he talks to the Doctor, he can barely stand and every time he moves he moans in agony. But by the end of the episode he's standing up straight and saluting — his saluting hand on the same side he was shot!
[Maybe the inhabitants of Planet Sto heal faster than humans?] |
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| – | We're never told exactly how many decks the Titanic has, but it must have about 60, since "Deck 31" is roughly in the centre of the ship when the Doctor views its location on the computer. The problem is that earlier, when Midshipman Frame was reviewing the life-signs on board the ship, the schematic on his screen had nowhere near 60 decks — maybe a dozen at most! |
| – | So when the survivors get to the "rickety bridge", one minute they're carefully inching themselves across as it sways and crumbles with every move... and the next second they're pulling bits off the bridge to use as weapons. Is that wise?? Even worse, then they start using the bridge as a firm base to plant themselves on as they swing at flying halos, with nary a wobble to be seen...! |
| – | A related problem with the "bridge fight": the Doc and company wield the metal rods like baseball bats, swinging at the halos with all their might. Can you image the strain that would put on the bridge? Why not be more sensible and just hold the rods up to deflect the halos?
[But that wouldn't be as dramatic, would it?] |
| – | Also, while the Hosts are attacking the Doctor and co. on the bridge, why do the robot meanies hang back, content to throw halos from a distance? If I was a Host, I'd have just flown over there and pushed them off the bridge! |
| – | While the Hosts' detachable Halos of Doom™ are somewhat nifty, if you stop and think about it, you never see any halo-less Hosts walking around, and the halos never appear to be even slightly bloodstained. So clearly the Hosts have to go to a lot of trouble retrieving and cleaning their halos after killing someone! Not very efficient way of killing a cruise liner full of people, is it? |
| – | As a cyborg, why would Bannakaffalatta have a whacking great EMP device located in his chest — i.e. a device that can basically kill him...?! (And indeed, eventually does) |
| – | When the Doctor asks one of the Hosts why Max ordered the survivors killed, it replies "no witnesses", but how would the Host know this? When you're programming a robot (or any kind of computer), you only tell them what to do. You don't tell them why! |
| – | Besides, why should Max have been worried about witnesses? Since he was planning to crash the liner into Earth all along, the passengers would all have been killed by the crash anyway! |
| – | So Foon sacrifices herself to kill a Host — very noble and brave, right? Nope, completely pointless! Consider: Hosts can fly. Also consider, Foon is clearly not holding onto the rope as she and the Host fall. So it's plainly just the rope tied around the Host's chest that's preventing it from flying (i.e. Foon's extra weight is not a factor). So Foon didn't have to sacrifice herself: why didn't she simply push the Host off the bridge after tying the rope?
[Though let's go easy on the poor woman — she'd just lost her husband, so probably wasn't in the most rational state of mind] |
| – | So, when the Doctor and co. first get to the "rickety bridge", the Doc uses the sonic screwdriver to seal the door behind them. Then after they finally get across the bridge and out the other side, the Doctor gives Rickston the sonic (and very clear instructions on how to use it). Then he has a quick snog with Astrid before heading back the way he came — we see him start to run across the bridge, but don't see what happens next. Probably just as well: how in blazes did he re-open that sealed door without a sonic?
[Does he have a bag of them in his pocket, like jelly babies?] |
| – | Why does Max have to be on the ship for his plan to work? Couldn't he just trigger the Hosts (and hence the engine shutdown) remotely? OK, maybe you need a nearby humanoid to give orders to the Hosts, but he's a villain for heaven's sake, doesn't he have any henchmen he can delegate this to? (He had the Captain, for example.) |
| – | As the Doctor and Max face off, Max discovers that the engines are still running and hence his plan is behind schedule. So why doesn't he order the engines to be shut down immediately? Surely if it's so critical to his plan, he'd be keen to do that as soon as possible? But no, he just sits there listening to the Doctor prattling on. Then, after a spot of banter, Max reveals that he can shut the engines off remotely himself. So why didn't he do this himself earlier instead of just trusting that it would happen?
[Was he busy doing something else in that impact chamber? Watching telly perhaps? Having a snooze?] |
| – | So when Astrid tackles Max with the forklift, what does he do? Shout orders to the Hosts to kill her? Offer her wealth and luxury if she stops what she's doing? Curse in frustration? Nope, we don't hear him say a single word until Astrid hoists him over the edge! |
| – | OK, the Hosts cut the brake line of the forklift, so Astrid couldn't stop it — but why doesn't she make any attempt whatsoever to jump out when she gets Max to the edge? It should have been pretty easy to do: forklifts don't travel very fast and obviously they don't have any doors to get in the way of a speedy exit! |
| – | And when Astrid and Max are plummeting to their doom, notice that the engines still seem to be fully ablaze. But... hadn't Max just turned them off? |
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[Granted, Tennant is a skinny creature and probably weighs about as much as a hamster... but STILL!] |
| – | So the characters spend most of the episode unable to send any kind of SOS, but during the episode's climax the Doctor can simply pick up the phone on the Titanic's bridge and call Buckingham Palace? Huh? |
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| – | During the episode's climax, the newsreader mentions "dawn rising over Great Britain", and sure enough the shots of Buckingham Palace show it to be daytime (maybe a little bright for "dawn" but we'll let it slide). But a moment later, when Wilf runs out from his newspaper stand to shout "don't you dare" at the Titanic, even though you can't see the sky in this shot, he's clearly standing under street lights (i.e. he casts a shadow both behind him and in front of him). So, er... not daytime, then! |
| – | The Doctor tells Mr Copper that 50 million credits is worth one million pounds. Fair enough, but earlier in the episode, Morvin and Foon were worried about their 5,000 credit phone bill, which (a) Morvin says would take "twenty years" to pay off and (b) Foon says "I might as well have paid for the tickets", suggesting that's roughly what tickets on the Titanic cost. OK, using the same maths as the Doctor, 5,000 credits would be worth.... £100! So, twenty years to pay off £100? How little do these people earn?? And only £100 for an interplanetary cruise? Bargain! |