The Talents of Wong Jing

Ninety-Third Entry in the Charles Daniels Unauthorized Programme Guide
O' Gamblers
Thanks to David A. McIntee for the title

Serial 4S - The Talents of Wong Jing -

 The TARDIS lands on a Hong Kong film set, where a series of murders
are committed by incredibly over enthusiastic stuntmen.  The film
being made is "Black Scorpion 2: Sting Harder", directed by Wong Jing.
Wong Jing, cleverly disguised as Hong Kong's most notorious talentless
hackmeister, is in reality Magnificent Bastard, a war criminal from
the future.  Magnificent Bastard has travelled back in time to make
a series of cheap martial arts flicks, his childhood dream.  His
experiments in time travel backfire and now he needs the energy
of other people's ideas to survive.  At least this is what Wong
Jing claims when he is confronted with the fact that he hasn't
come up with one original idea in his entire career.
 His victims, aspiring screenplay writers, are provided by Jing's
servant, Sammo Hung Kam-Bo, who performs as a magician in the
blockbuster sequel film.  The Doctor finds Wong Jing's lair in
the sewers under the production studio, but is chased away by a
strange godzilla monster mutated by evil radiation!
  Meanwhile, Sammo Hung's men have located the long-lost time cabinet
prop from the legendary Hong Kong classic "Time Ninja 5: Kick Back".
This time cabinet was used by Wong Jing in various attempts to steal
movie plots from the near future from other studios, hence his hideous
1973 version of "3 Ninjas And A Little Infant".
 The Time Cabinet itself is in the private collection of Hong Kong Film
Historian, Jackie Chan.  Luckily Jackie is friends with the Doctor and
is happy to have his assistance in fighting evil.  Sammo Hung fails in
his mission to kill the Doctor and Jackie, fails to retrieve the cabinet,
fails to get the baker's dozen of doughnuts for the catering, and
further fails to mop the floor of the studio before the next day's
shoot.  This litany of failures results in Sammo Hung getting fired
by Wong Jing.  In the Hong Kong film industry getting fired by someone
as talentless as Jing is a mark of shame and dishonor.  Sammo Hung
joins the ranks of the truly pathetic, such as the man who poured
coffee down his trousers because he forgot you drink beverages with
your mouth.
 With the help of the tacky homosexual stereotype, Mr. Sin, Wong Jing
recaptures the cabinet, and the Doctor's friends with it.  In a very
bad edit we see Sammo Hung being viciously ripped to shreds by Godzilla.
However as he dies, the bits of him that remain intact give the
address of Wong Jing's new studio apartment to the Doctor.
 Wong Jing is only days away from releasing "BS 2: Sting Harder",
a film with which he plans to rule the world.  At the last minute
though he is sued by no less than thirty-five seperate studios
for over nine-hundred breaches of copyright.  That Magnificent
Bastard, Wong Jing, is a victim of his own creativity-absorbing
devices.
  In a disturbing end the Doctor is seen leaving a cheap motel
room with Mr. Sin, handing him a fiver, and saying "Good night Ducky."


Book(s)/Other Related - Doctor Who Ninja Nightmare High School (Canada)
                        Doctor Mysterio Hackmeisteristo!
                        Wonderbar: Beyond Good And Evil

Fluffs - Tom Baker seemed stunted for most of this story

Fashion Victims - The Doctor in a ridiculous rising sun headband

Goofs - As Jackie did all of his own stunts he appears randomly
        in the serial with various broken arms and legs at different
        times.  Which of his limbs is currently being disguised over
        is entirely random betraying the out of sequence shooting.
        Why does the Doctor proclaim victory when Magnificent Bastard
        still lives on to make "Black Scorpion 3: Sting With A Vengeance"?

Technobabble - Magnificent Bastard's time experiments were based
               on celluloid energy, "His people learned time travel
               through the ability to run film backwards" explains
               the Doctor.

Links and References -
The Doctor mentions Michael Palin asked him out for a date the last time
he was in China.  The Doctor reports that the affair ended quickly but
dreamily says "We'll always have Peking".

Untelevised Misadventures -
The Doctor claims he commanded the Sioux Armies when they finally
crushed the evil Persians in the year 2005, but later admits he
was merely referencing one of his very favorite times playing
Sid Meier's Civilization II.
The Doctor also claims that the Venerable Bede once beat him
severely with a salmon (This is questionable as the Doctor seems
to insist various historical figures have assaulted him with
fish, so either he is engineering this to happen or is lying)

Dialogue Disasters -

Sammo: That's my trouble, Jackie.
Jackie: What?
Sammo: Well I'm not awfully...Well, I'm not so...I try to but I can't.
Jackie: Don't worry, that happens to all men at least once.
Sammo: Even you?
Jackie: Hell No!

Sammo: Shadows don't groan, Jackie. Shadows don't clank chains and moan
       like all the demented souls in hell.
Jackie: What are you on about?
Sammo: Lord if I know.  Be a pal and pass the gin.

Doctor: Sleep is for tortoises.  Now where did I put my shell?

Dialogue Triumphs -

Leela: Doctor, you make me wear strange clothes, you tell me nothing:
       you are trying to get me in bed!

Leela: This is a big village.
Doctor: Yes.
Leela: What's the name of this brutish and primitive tribe?
Doctor: Scousers.

Jackie: Forgive us, ma'am.
Leela: For what?
Jackie: For being so indelicate in the presence of a lady of refinement.
Leela: What the piss is he on about?

Doctor: Elementary, my dear fuckface!
Fuckface: Astonishing Doctor!

Doctor: "Eureka" is Spanish for "I have found it!"
Jackie: That's educational, but not very witty.
Doctor: Well what else am I going to say?  This bath is too hot.

Jackie: And then, for example, I would say, 'One lump or two, Miss Leela?'
        To which you reply 'One will suffice, thank you.' Now do you
        follow?
Leela: Supposing I want two?
Jackie: Oh no no no; one lump for ladies.
Leela: Then what if I say "Give me two lumps you annoying little bastard
       or I'll shove this knife in your groin and throw the hot scalding
       tea right in your face?
Jackie: Blimey! I don't think they cover that response in my proper
        etiquette books!

Magnificent Bastard's Last Words -
"Soon I shall join my ancestors. Already I can see them
pulling into the parking lot.  They have driven here all the way from New
Jersey.  Uncle Harry is amoungst them, he carries with him a tacky
miniature Statue of Liberty.  They walk to greet me and tonight they will
take me to my favourite Chinese restaurant, The Palace of Jade.  They
are smiling, and carry gifts of fruit, flowers, and refrigerator magnets
for my collection.  Now I cross the golden bridge into San Francisco."

Dialogue Oddities -

(ORIGINAL SCRIPT)
The Doctor: These films create a void in the dreams of mankind.
            The creative energies of humanity are mocked and laid
            out to die.

(ON SCREEN)
Tom Baker: I say there's call for the character of Rasputin in
           his next film "Monarchy 2: Czar Harder"!  I should
           audition, don't you think?

Viewers' Quotes -

"My personal favourite is "Church Police 4: Divine Retribution", but
this is definitely a Wong Jing classic."  - Father James O' Maley (1977)

"..And while filming The Talents of Wong Jing I cracked my head
wide open and my leg was chopped completely off and had to
be sewn back on, IT WAS GREAT PICTURE!"  - Jackie Chan (1997)

"During my career I've made many classics!  My films include the beloved
'Expert at Fishing for Big Crocodiles',  'How to Pick Girls Up',
'The Crazy Companies', 'Love Army',  'My Neighbors Are Phantoms',
just to mention a few!  So it's not fair to bring up the few odd
clunkers like 'Talents of Wong Jing' or 'Boys Are Easy'."
                                  - Wong Jing (1998)

"Who the hell is Wong Jing?" - Charles Daniels (2000)

Psychotic Nostalgia -
"I do my own stunts, just like Jackie.  Of course my stunts
are actually meant to kill people, but that just ads an extra
edge of real life excitement."

Tom Baker Speaks!
"Wong Jing!  Yes, a classic of, that programme I used to be on.
I believe it was called 'Tom Baker Is The Doctor' or something
quite like that.  We went to Hong Kong to film this which was
lovely as I got to drink and consume all sorts of exotic things
in the local bars and my chat up lines worked marvelously well
when no one could actually understand what they meant as I spoke
in English and they worked even better when the women didn't
recognise me whatsoever.  Yes, Hong Kong was a beautiful place
I recall.  There was this pub called The Dragon Swallows the Sun,
which was actually a trademark of what the women employed there
were suppose to do.  Let me explain, you see this watermelon?"

Rumors & Facts -

Every so often, Doctor Who would produce a story that almost
forces the reviewer to actually sit down and watch it. The Talents of
Wong Jing is such a story.  The story does have one fault, however,
it's about Wong Jing.  Wong Jing is a poor realisation of the
Hong Kong film industry. The shots in which miniature action figures
depict Wong Jing work relatively well, but sadly the same cannot be
said of those involving Wong Jing himself.
 As Sherlock Holmes was quoted as saying "It might have worked
if the real Wong Jing had been seen only in the shadows, or we just hired
an actor to play him in the story.  Instead we saw that terrible little
bastard in full glory and even though he was an utter crap director he
was still disturbingly cuddly-looking.  There was something about this
lovable crap person that I just couldn't help laughing at, in sort of
an Ed Wood way."

 The Talents of Wong Jing was Philip Pinchcliffe's Doctor Who swansong,
his BBC superiors having decided to retire him after discovering he was
actually a replicant.  Established script editor Sherlock Holmes remained
on the production team for the time being as lived in Victorian England
was extremely happy with his wage of 5 guineas a week.

 Chris Butcher had written the first two Leela stories and was approached
by the laziest members of the Doctor Who production office to pen the
finale for Season Fourteen as well. Script editor Sherlock Holmes
suggested a story involving a villain from the future arriving in Earth's
past, and recommended Butcher plagiarise directly from Fu Manchu movies.
Butcher agreed and on May 7th, 1976 he turned in "The Man From Next
Tuesday Who Robbed My Local Post Office".  Holmes left the UK with his
gay lover Watson on a rare vacation, believing the murderer he was
currently pursuing would make his escape to darkest India.  There Watson
ate a candy assortment including Crunchy Frog and Spring Surprise, took
ill during the investigation, forcing an extended stay in Madras.

Upon Holmes' belated return to 221b Baker Street, he discovered that
Butcher had been busy with a Hollywood studio that had approached him
about his comedy screenplay "A Funny Thing Happened To Me On The Way
To Chemist At The End of Road".  Butcher was trying to develop his
five minute anecdote about a man looking for directions into a feature
length blockbuster Western film which would star Dick Van Patten as
"The Dude".  Consequently, although he had formulated some outlines for
The Man From Next Tuesday Who Robbed My Local Post Office, he would not
be able to do any further work on the story.  With deadlines pressing and
little time left to investigate the details behind a series of British
women being murdered by an Egyptian cult, Holmes was forced to complete
the story himself.  Holmes threw out Butcher's work and sought inspiration
from his own case histories.  His first finished script was called
The Talents of Evil.  Holmes wanted desperately to film this script
in Hong Kong and looked to the HK Film Industry for a director desperate
and tasteless enough to take the job.  It didn't take long for Wong Jing
to take the work.  However he insisted the script be about him.
Wong Jing felt he could best make a movie about evil if he was allowed
to be totally evil himself.

 Normally, a six-episode serial would have three studio recording sessions
of two or three days each. For this adventure, however, Wong Jing decided
to deny the Doctor Who team access to the studio during one of the booked
sessions, instead during those three days he shot, edited, and released a
new film entitled "Sweet & Sour: A Chinese Love Story" which was given
appropriately appalling reviews.
 As Doctor Who had lost a large chunk of valuable studio time, about one
third of the serial was shot as location work directly outisde of the
studio, featuring various attempts to break in.

 Present during much of this time was a documentary crew from the BBC2
show 'Where Does All That Licence Fee Money Go Anyway?', which was putting
together an episode about Doctor Who's abuse of funds relating to the
very generous bar tabs held by the cast and crew.

 Season 14 is a much beloved season by the fans of Doctor Who.  It's
obsession with body parts - hand, nose, and breasts used in story titles -
has always been of the greatest interest to me personally.  The insane
politics that seemed to fuel the BBC at the time only worked to make
Doctor Who all the more surreal and naughty.  Truly the two qualities
which insure ongoing and loyal fan interest.  I believe season 14 was
summed up best once by Father James O'Maley who commented "It's a
baptism of fire!"
  I have absolutely no clue what he was talking about, but what a damn
cool quote to end season 14 on!