The road less travelled...

I always have one day on a trip where my feet are killing me and today is that day. Still, at least it's over now.

I think part of the reason is that today has been surprisingly disappointing, probably because I had such high expectations of it. My destination was Cardiff and specifically the Dr Who exhibition there. I've been looking forward to this ever since this trip began looming on the horizon, but now I wish I'd thought more about what to expect.

Personally, I think it was the size that got to me. It was really small - way smaller than I thought it would be. I suppose I hadn't considered that they try to make all of the different museums have different displays and I'd anticipated that many more things would be on show from all of the different seasons of NuWho, and perhaps even remake some of the old stuff from OldWho.

Don't get me wrong, I loved seeing so many things from series 4 (in order of presentation - and please note that I'm doing links and not putting in the pictures to save the sanity of those with dial-up):
Staal-the-no-longer-undefeated and a UNIT costume
The Sybilline Sisters, one of the stone circuit boards and especially the costumes worn by Donna(the doll's bust wasn't nearly as impressive as Catherine's, so it looked a bit loose!) and Metalla
One of the Hath and Cobb's soldier's uniform
The computer terminal the Doctor used in the Library
A spacesuit and a Node as well as the security camera
Costumes from Jack and Donna's brown leather coat with the grey top underneath as well as Rose and Martha's clothes from SE/JE
Daleks
Rose's gun and the gun 10.5 made
The bomb that was going to be used to destroy the Ood brain
Ood Sigma and Donna's grey coat from Planet of the Ood
Donna's costume from Turn Left with the Time Beetle on her back
Costumes from The Next Doctor
K-9
Adipose pills, Donna's ID card, the Doctor's device he was using to locate the Adipose and Matron Cofelia's pen as well as the machine Matron Cofelia had in her office

Okay, so it looks like a lot when you put it like that, but apart from that, there was only:
The Doctor's PJs (left, The Christmas Invasion) as well as clothes from Rose and (right) Martha and the Doctor's blue suit
The TARDIS (door closed and with a different sign on the front from what we see on TV)
A Clockwork Droid and two of the tools they used to dissect people from Girl in the Fireplace
Two of the new Cybermen and John Lumic's chair
Dalek Sec
Costumes from Brother of Mine and Sister of Mine
Futurekind
Scarecrow
Journal of Impossible Things
A Heavenly Host and the bed they put them on to repair them
Costumes from Astrid and Bannakaffalatta
Weeping Angel (so far up the wall that the photos are rubbish)
Anne Droid and Davinadroid
Jack's original costume
The Lazarus machine

Again, it sounds like a lot listed like that, but you go through them awfully fast because all you can do is look!

So what was I expecting? Well, definitely more from seasons 1, 2 and 3. Way more of Rose considering she's had two seasons - although perhaps whoever designed the museum is sick of her too. Maybe other music than just the theme - perhaps Donna's theme. In fact, when I'd really expected was a series of small rooms rather than one huge space with a twisty path. I thought different spaces would have a different feel depending on the episode. I really, really, REALLY wanted a room that showed the inside of the TARDIS where you could hear the sound it made when the Doctor was using it. And I was super disappointed that there was nothing from my favourite episodes - The Runaway Bride and Unicorn and the Wasp (although all of the stuff from Partners in Crime helped.

In short, I wanted a museum rather than a snapshot.

Hence my disappointment.

I've been thinking during the afternoon about why it was done the way it was.

For a while, I thought the museum didn't have much in it because, really, Dr Who is designed to be a kid's show and there were things about the museum that would have been made so the kids weren't bored - lots of light and colour. But most of the displays were up on pedestals, which puts them above eye-level for children. And all the kids could do was look! How many young children are satisfied doing that for long? Wouldn't it have been smarter to have things for them to feel and touch? Maybe the bumpy body of a Dalek shell, or the tentacles from an Ood or some pretendy knobs and levels on the TARDIS console or SOMETHING.

But I suppose I'm being unrealistic. After all, it's not as if it's a huge, massive, worldwide success of a show that people would love to come and see a fabulous museum for, is it now....?

Erm...

And I know there are four museums so that things are spread around, but really, how many people will go and visit all of them? I'd have thought it would make more sense to have a bigger museum with duplicate objects in each of them and charge a bit more for entry.

I know, I should be grateful that I got the change to go, and people are jealous of me for that - but because of the hype surrounding DW, I was just expecting more. *sigh*

All of that aside, though, there are things I'm thrilled about. I bought a ticket for Forbidden Broadway, having got one of the CDs and laughed myself silly over it. I'm going tomorrow night and can't wait! The songs are really funny and I'll be interested to see how they stage them. I also got another book for my thesis, so my conscience isn't making me feel too guilty about this holiday week.

Tomorrow, my last full day in London, will be spent at Hampton Court Palace and then at the theatre. Absolutely perfect!

And now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to collapse and rest my poor footsies.

Nighty night!