A Little Research Plz?

A little less than a week ago, my Beloved and I had a chance to enjoy the Doctor Who episode, Nikola Tesla's Night of Terror. All well and fine. The story was well-written, of course by a writer whose former employ was that of a script doctor... but there's still a few little quibbles that you might be able to guess by the title of this entry.

I am a self-confessed Tesla nut. I can recite off the cuff quite a few factoids about the inventor of the 20th Century and more than a few inaccuracies of the episode had me yelling at the screen.

1. Accent: Tesla was Serbian and there was no actual reason for him to be talking with a Very American Accent. They should have at least gone Vaguely Russian, which can pass for Serbian if you squint.
2. The Feud: Tesla and Edison did indeed have an extended quarrel while the both of them lived. The story I heard was over a million-dollar reward for an improved light bulb, which Tesla invented and Edison took 100% of the credit for. The whole ten-dollar raise versus digging in ditches thing is true, though.
3. The Feud part 2: Not a single mention of Edison paying the picketers outside of Tesla's workshop. Which he actually did, the dick.
4. The Earthquake Machine: Tesla claims to have done it, but there's no actual news reports citing a date and time of the test. You can bet money that Edison would have LEAPED on it if it was true. This is most likely to be Tesla trying to inflate his worth in his later years with apocryphal stories.
5. The Tower: The big tower that's a pivotal point in the story is sold to the audience as Tesla inventing radio. Not true! Well. Not quite true. Tesla's goal was to beam energy through the atmosphere for wireless transmission of electricity. Marconi then used the concept to create radio as we know it and Tesla wasn't even bothered.

It's the little things that get me in a lather, as you may have guessed. All those points above are strictly from memory, that's how much of a Tesla nut I am. The dude's fascinating. Honestly. If he was given Elon Musk money and all the tools he could want, we'd probably have interstellar travel by now. He's that kind of awesome.

But yeah, when you're doing an episode where you delve into real history and real people, maybe some digging is in order. Hell, I try to do at least some research into plausible things when concocting entirely made up worlds. Of course, there's other worldbuilding nonsense, but I generally attempt to adhere to all of the rules.

Well. The rules I write anyway.

Other than those nitpicks, I did enjoy what they did with what they had. I just had to get that much off my chest.

See you next week.