Doctor Who review blog...

Post Reply New Topic

REVIEW: The Pandorica Opens/The Big Bang by Steven Moffat

SERIAL: PB6, 5.12/5.13, 2 X 50 minute episodes

SEEN IT BEFORE?: Yes


After the entire series, Steven Moffat not only had to bring in a threat to test the Doctor's mettle, but also wrap up the threads of the series. Between cracks in time and space, Amy being apparently central to events, and whispers of the Pandorica, something had to be resolved...

In the last days of his life, the tormented Vincent van Gogh paints a disturbing painting: The Pandorica Opens, depicting the TARDIS exploding. River escapes from prison after she is called by Winston Churchill, who saw the painting. River then steals the painting, and brings the Doctor and Amy to 104 AD, Britain, near Stonehenge, where River has managed to deceive a group of Roman soldiers. They learn that the Pandorica is nearby, buried under Stonehenge, a prison that is claimed to contain an evil creature of legend. But with his oldest enemies gathering in the skies above Earth, and Rory revived as a Roman centurion, the Doctor soon learns that everything centres around Amy. For her mind was used as the basis for a trap for the Doctor: the Pandorica is empty, awaiting the Doctor as its prisoner. The reason? An alliance of his enemies believe that he is responsible for the TARDIS exploding, and potentially wiping out all creation. But with River in a TARDIS hijacked by an unknown force, the Doctor is now trapped, unable to prevent the end of the universe, with the Earth at the eye of the storm. Can the Doctor, Rory, and Amy save reality itself?

The major complaints that I have with this story is that one: it feels disjointed, with two very different episodes, and two: the ending, as with the previous two finales (Journey's End and The End of Time, Part Two) goes on for too long. But I found my opinion of this story improving on a second viewing. The first episode in particular is an excellent one, with a genuine mystery surrounding Rory's miraculous revival and the identity of the prisoner of the Pandorica. The second part is rather bleak and apocalyptic, but spreads the story too thin and uses too much incident rather than plot. But there's some wonderful dialogue, and some foreshadowing of the future, even if those responsible for the destruction of the TARDIS are never quite identified (and I somehow doubt whether it was actually the Silence from the next series, despite the hints). We even see some things that were hinted at much earlier in the series, and the resolution is at least hinted at well before the conclusion, enough so that it isn't a deus ex machina.

Matt Smith does a good job as the Doctor, with an excellent speech and a rather heart-rending series of moments as his timeline unwinds, while Karen Gillian has some of her better moments as Amy, particularly when she remembers Rory, and her speech at her wedding. Arthur Darvill makes a welcome return as Rory, even if for most of the story he is an Auton Replica (why can't they use the word 'Auton'?), and Alex Kingston as River gets some moments, including one with a Dalek that foreshadows her future in series 6.

The production does fairly well, with the special effects working well enough, including the spaceships swarming above Stonehenge, the sun/exploding TARDIS, and the total event collapse at the end of the first episode. And Murray Gold chooses the exact right moment to have the music cut off into silence at the end of said episode. The stone Dalek is an excellent conceit, and does well.

It may take a while to get used to, but this story is actually quite a fitting end to the fifth series. Nice and good, but leaving too many questions unanswered, as well as being a little too uneven.


SCORE: 9/10

PROGRESS REPORT THIRTEEN: NEW SERIES FIVE: A MADMAN WITH A BOX

STORIES: Total for this era:

Cumulative total: 152. 15 William Hartnell, 6 Patrick Troughton. 17 Jon Pertwee. 37 Tom Baker. 20 Peter Davison. 11 Colin Baker. 9 Sylvester McCoy. 1 Paul McGann. 1 Spin-Off. 10 Christopher Eccleston. 36 David Tennant. 10 Matt Smith


TIME: Total for this era: 8 days

Cumulative total: 184 days

PERCENTAGE NEVER WATCHED BEFORE: 1/10, or 10%

Cumulative total: 43/173, or 25% (Wait, may have to revise this figure...)


MILESTONES:

First hints of the Silence

First hints of River's history


COMPANIONS: Amy Pond, Rory Williams, River Song


THOUGHTS:

Steven Moffat, writer of many a gem from the new series, took over as showrunner after Russell T Davies left the series. Many would have thought this a winning decision, especially when Moffat decided to bring things back to a fairytale air for the series. But reality can bite and bite hard, and with its first three episodes, two written by Moffat, one could be forgiven for thinking that the preconceptions were wrong.

Part of the blame, indirectly, can go to Moffat, or more specifically, his position as a showrunner. With less time to work on his scripts, and a need to contribute more of them, it's understandable that quality would drop, and he certainly put the effort in for the later stories he contributed to the series, both the two-parter Weeping Angels story, and the disjointed but good season finale. But one has to examine the curious choices made. The character of Amy Pond is really a child that never grew up, and while that could have worked in some regard, Amy doesn't work all the time, coming across as flat, though due to no fault of Karen Gillian, who proved in some key sequences that she could act. And the character's importance and competency soon turned out to have a very real reason behind it.

The magic of the series has, at times, been lost to spectacle that works to entertain but not always to involve. To be fair, the same could be said of some stories from Russell T Davies' era, or at least that the sentiment was laid on thick with a trowel. But even if they didn't manage to capture the fairytale feeling they were going for consistently, after the bumpy start, the fifth series picked up steam. Stories like The Time of Angels/Flesh and Stone, The Hungry Earth/Cold Blood, Amy's Choice and Vincent and the Doctor showed where the series had been, and where it can go with great elan.

A new Doctor at the helm could also mean trouble, and while Matt Smith may not be anywhere near my favourite Doctor, he still manages to capture both the youth and the age of the character. And despite the rocky beginning of the series, Moffat warmed to me as a showrunner. The tone of the series may not be quite right, but the spirit is still there, still going. And let's hope that it does continue that way...


BEST STORIES: The Time of Angels/Flesh and Stone, The Hungry Earth/Cold Blood

WORST STORIES: The Eleventh Hour, The Beast Below, Victory of the Daleks

REVIEW: A Christmas Carol by Steven Moffat

SERIAL: PB1, 6.X, 60 minute special

SEEN IT BEFORE?: Yes


When I first watched this story, I hated it. Not because it was a ripoff of the famous Charles Dickens story, but rather because it seemed almost pointless at the time, with the Doctor trying to redeem a bitter misanthropic miser. So now that I come to series 6 of the new series, and watching it again, will it remain bad, or will it improve on further viewing?

On a planet in the future, the weather and the world of a distant colony is controlled by the misanthropic miser Kazran Sardick. Unfortunately, the electrified fog created by his weather machine causes a spaceliner with Rory and Amy to start plummeting to the ground. With less than an hour to save them, the Doctor tries to appeal to Sardick, the only man who can save them, who rebuffs him. But although he initially intends to stop Sardick by force, he sees in Sardick's trappings and mannerisms a damaged old man, and decides to save the soul of Sardick, in order to save the lives of everyone on the spaceliner. But as the Doctor works his magic, inspired by A Christmas Carol, changing Sardick's history, he may make an even bigger mistake. In introducing the young Sardick to Abigail, a woman his father froze as collateral for loans, the Doctor may have doomed his companions, and Sardick's soul...

Leaving aside the plagiarism of Dickens' story, this special has two major flaws: the flying fish, and the fact that it is hard to give a flying f**k about the older Kazran Sardick. The flying fish seem like something that came to Moffat in a fevered delusion, and stretch the boundaries of credulity for Doctor Who too damn far. But leaving those rather substantial criticisms aside, A Christmas Carol actually improved on second viewing, for me. It's a cleverly plotted story, even if a bit too sentimental and a nasty ass-pull to prevent the Doctor from winning too easily. But there's a clever use of the Ghost of Christmas Future at the end.

Matt Smith is in his element as the Doctor, although I thought it a bit remiss of the Doctor to not inquire further about Abigail's counter. And while Karen Gillian and Arthur Darvill have some decent scenes of comedy (though Amy is, as usual, somewhat flat), it is the actors playing Sardick that deserve praise. Although older Sardick (despite what the Doctor says) seems beyond redemption to me, Michael Gambon nonetheless plays him well, especially in the moments when older Sardick is happy. Ditto with the actors playing his younger incarnations, Laurence Belcher (poor kid, unfortunately named) and Danny Horn, although the younger Sardick is far easier to give a crap about.

Production wise, well, this is sort of run of the mill. Nicely done, but nothing distinguishing, save for the intercutting between Kazran's past adventures with the Doctor and his present day recollections. Although the effects of the fish are rather blatantly false (and couldn't they make the fish look a little more alien than just having them swim through the air?), the other effects are good.

I didn't expect A Christmas Carol to be any good watching it again, but really, all it needs, I think, is the right frame of mind to watch it. Some story issues and character arcs mar what could have been an excellent special...


SCORE: 8/10


And now, the trailers for series six...

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qpe1Ywz8azM[/youtube]

REVIEW: The Impossible Astronaut/Day of the Moon by Steven Moffat

SERIAL: PB2, 6.1/6.2, 2 X 45 minute episodes

SEEN IT BEFORE?: Yes


Season openers to the new series aren't always so good. In fact, they are usually average at best, and the previous season's The Eleventh Hour didn't quite cut it. So, with a second season of Doctor Who to begin, and continuing the story arc of the Silence, could Steven Moffat buck the previous trend with a two-part story, filmed partly in the US?

Two months since they were left at home, Rory and Amy are keeping an eye out for any word from the Doctor, only for it to arrive unexpectedly in the form of an envelope, inviting them, River, and an old man called Canton Everett Delaware III to Lake Silencio in Utah. There, they meet a 1103-year old Doctor, who has invited them to a picnic on the shore of the lake, and he says that they need to go to 1969, something involved with Apollo 11. But something clad in an Apollo spacesuit rises from the lake, and murders the Doctor, preventing his regeneration. Burning the body, they soon learn that this Doctor has invited his past self to take Amy, Rory, and River to 1969, but they cannot tell the Doctor about his fate, a difficult proposition, as the Doctor is distrusting. In 1969, they find a younger Canton, a former FBI agent, asked to help Richard Nixon deal with a mysterious child who calls the White House, begging for help. But even as the Doctor and his companions help, they soon discover that there is more to the situation than they first thought. Aliens calling themselves the Silence are everywhere, but people forget about them as soon as they are out of sight. What are the Silence, and what is their agenda? What connects the child to a NASA spacesuit like that the Doctor's killer used? And what is the terrible secret Amy Pond has to tell the Doctor?

Whoo! This story is an excellent one, starting the series off with a bang, with the Doctor killed in his personal future, the return of River, and the introduction of a creepy new alien. While this story makes a lot more sense when viewed in context with the other key episodes of the season, it is still an excellent stand-alone episode. The Silence are, while not quite as immediately horrifying as the Weeping Angels or the Vashta Nerada, extremely creepy, getting under your skin with their "you can only remember them when you see them" gimmick, and the ending is well used. The only issue with this story, I feel, is if the Silence have the technology to build a sophisticated life-support suit in the first place, not to mention their space-time craft (last seen in The Lodger), why the hell do they influence humanity to go to the Moon? Oh, and how does the US get dwarf star alloy at a stage when they are only just going to the Moon? Not to mention many unanswered question that will later get answered in the series. But there's some excellent shocks, not to mention the ending.

Lovely performances all around. The regulars do well, with Amy getting some better moments than usual, and ever better stuff for Arthur Darvill's Rory. Matt Smith's Doctor is getting better with each episode. Alex Kingston as River gives perhaps one of her better performances here, with a heart-rending speech to Rory about her strange relationship with the Doctor. Mark Sheppard as Canton's younger self and Stuart Milligan as Nixon round up the good performances, with Nixon having a more sympathetic portrayal at this point in time.

It seems that this time around, they pumped a lot of the production values into the opening story, and it shows. Brilliant location filiming in Utah and Arizona help sell the American setting, and the set design completes that. The effects are on the dime, and the direction helps with both action and suspense. The Silence are a brilliant design, a sort of bastard hybrid between Munch's The Scream, the men in black, and Gray aliens, suitably creepy and sinister.

Save for a few imperfections, this story bucks the trend of average season openers. Not only does it establish the overall story to come in the series, but it is an excellent story by itself, establishing a creepy new enemy for the Doctor, and beginning to offer some answers, and even more questions...


SCORE: 9.5/10


And now, the next time trailer for The Curse of the Black Spot...

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k5D9HzurXDE[/youtube]

REVIEW: The Curse of the Black Spot by Stephen Thompson

SERIAL: PB4, 6.9, 1 X 45 minute episode

SEEN IT BEFORE?: Yes

Doctor Who has dealt with piracy and the high seas before. During the events of The Smugglers, the Doctor dealt with pirates near Cornwall. In The Highlanders, Ben was nearly taken on a boat to become an indentured servant in the aftermath of Culloden. And while not on the seas, The Space Pirates had the Doctor fighting against ruthless space pirates, as did The Infinite Quest. With the revival of the pirate movie with Pirates of the Caribbean, it's about time that the series revisited the setting...

The pirate ship Fancy has been becalmed in strange waters, and the captain, Henry Avery, is troubled. Whenever one of his crew get so much as a scratch, a black spot appears on their hand, a mysterious siren appears, and disintegrates the afflicted crewmember. And the arrival of the Doctor and his companions don't help matters. Their claims of having intercepted a distress signal makes no sense to Avery, and they are just more mouths to feed and water when supplies are low. But when the siren appears after Amy fights the crew to save the Doctor and Rory, the Doctor soon learns that there is more to this than meets the eye. Why is the siren attracted to the wounded and ill? Who is the other stowaway? And what is the true meaning of the curse of the black spot?

Okay, when I first watched this story, I had more reservations about it. But on further viewing, I found that it wasn't bad as much as too straightforward, run-of-the-mill. The story is almost a repeat of Moffat's earlier story The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances, but with pirates and sexier alien medical technology. This doesn't make it bad, but it lacks inventiveness, and the story just doesn't excel. Plus, the ending takes so long to get to the point.

The regulars do well enough, with Amy getting to fight off pirates with a sword in an amusing sequence. But the others...well, Lily Cole is a strangely apposite choice for playing the Siren, as she looks alien enough. And Hugh Bonneville is quite good as Captain Avery, but with the exception of Oscar Lloyd's Toby, there isn't that much meat on the other pirates, who are all pretty much interchangeable.

The production values are pretty good, managing to film on an actual ship, always a good idea when you're doing a story like this. But it doesn't help when later, the alien spaceship looks like the modern equivalent of the el-cheapo spacecraft sets used in the classic series, looking like an abandoned warehouse was dressed up and used. The special effects work, though, enhancing the eeriness of the Siren.

The Curse of the Black Spot is not the best story in the series, nor is it the worst. It's rather run of the mill, average, its biggest drawcards being pirates and a Siren, but nothing much else to stay for...


SCORE: 8.5/10


And now, the next time trailer for The Doctor's Wife (I am looking forward to watching this one again...

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zn_KhjnAui8[/youtube]

REVIEW: The Doctor's Wife by Neil Gaiman

SERIAL: PB1, 6.3, 1 X 45 minute episode

SEEN IT BEFORE?: Yes

Way back in season 21, then-showrunner John Nathan-Turner wanted to find a leak in his office to the Doctor Who fans, and posted, in place of the scheduled The Caves of Androzani, The Doctor's Wife. Over two and a half decades later, this was the title given to a story written by famed fantasy writer and fan of the show Neil Gaiman. But could Gaiman live up to the hype that would inevitably come about of him writing for the show?

A Time Lord hypercube arrives at the TARDIS, notifying the Doctor that one of his Time Lord friends has survived, trapped in a bubble universe. Travelling into it, the Doctor and his companions receive a rude shock when the TARDIS loses power, and its Matrix or soul. Venturing out into the lone world of the bubble universe, they discover that it is a sentient asteroid called House, who admits to having encountered Time Lords before, but there are none at the moment. But amongst the other inhabitants of the asteroid include a woman called Idris, who seems to know the Doctor, calling him her 'thief'. Sending Rory and Amy back to the depowered TARDIS for safety, the Doctor soon learns the truth, that House eats TARDISes, and uses Time Lord hypercubes as lures. And knowing now that the Time Lords perished in the Time War, House hijacks the TARDIS, leaving the Doctor stranded. Can Rory and Amy survive being the playthings of House? Who is Idris, and why does she know the Doctor so well? And can she help him save Rory and Amy? The Doctor is about to truly meet his oldest companion for the first time, and it might be the last...

What could have been a gimmick, getting Gaiman to write for the series, turns out to be one of the best guest writers to ever write for the program. We have the Gaiman hallmarks of fantasy, horror, and a certain amount of humour, but also an intriguing concept that, while explored in spin-off media (like the Big Finish audio play Zagreus, or the graphic novel The Forgotten), has never been explored in the TV series: what if the TARDIS could talk directly to the Doctor? The show even draws on elements from the distant past of the series, like the Time Lord hypercube from The War Games, or the mind games in the TARDIS from The Edge of Destruction. The only minor quibble is that the ending seems to come out of nowhere, but it's a lovely story about a Time Lord and his TARDIS. And despite the compromises Gaiman needed to make, it still works well.

This story showcases Matt Smith's Doctor at one of his best times, with the Doctor going through all sorts of highs and lows. Karen Gillian gets some nice moments as Amy, particularly when Rory 'dies' (how many is that now? I count four times by this point in the series), and Arthur Darvill is, as usual, great as Rory. Michael Sheen as House is marvellous in his menace, but the real star is Suranne Jones as Idris, both before and during her possession by the TARDIS Matrix. I'm not sure whether anything better could have been done, short of getting Helena Bonham-Carter for the role, but she brings about the manic nature of the TARDIS, suiting the character, and we get some interesting new interpretations of why the TARDIS acts like it does.

Once more, the series films in a quarry, but thanks to the set dressing, it looks wholly appropriate. The effects work well enough, and the costumes for Idris and the Patchwork People look suitably like something out of Gaiman's The Sandman graphic novels. There's some rather dull TARDIS corridors, but this is more than made up for with the return of the original new series console room, and the makeshift TARDIS (though the latter was designed by a Blue Peter viewer for a competition).

The Doctor's Wife goes to show that not only can the magic be maintained in the series, but that new and fresh angles can be found on established continuity. Not only that, but sometimes celebrity writers can live up to the hype, and more...


SCORE: 10/10


And now, the next time trailers for The Rebel Flesh and The Almost People...

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UbE2waEsfks[/youtube]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3eh24ZTyyrY[/youtube]

REVIEW: The Rebel Flesh/The Almost People by Matthew Graham

SERIAL: PB3, 6.5/6.6, 2 X 45 minute episodes

SEEN IT BEFORE?: Yes


Having written for Doctor Who previously, for the second new series episode Fear Her, Matthew Graham (cocreator of Life on Mars and Ashes to Ashes) returned to the series for a two-part story, designed to lead into the mid-season finale. But with a tale of acid mines, instant clones, and identity crises, could he pull it off?

The TARDIS is hit by a solar tsunami, and ends up crash-landing on Earth in the 22nd century, near an acid mine in an old monastery. The workers there use a programmable matter called the Flesh to create duplicates who are expendable, called Gangers. But the Doctor suspects that the Flesh is becoming aware, even sentient. The workers dimiss this idea, but when the main wave of the solar tsunami hits, the surge of energy causes the Gangers to become sentient, gaining the memories and personalities of the humans that piloted them. With the humans and their Gangers at each other's throats, the Doctor tries to solve things, but he now has a Ganger himself. Why is the Doctor so interested in the Flesh? Can his Ganger be trusted? Can they stop a war between humanity and the Gangers? And what dark secret links the Gangers to Amy, and the mysterious, eyepatch-wearing woman she keeps seeing?

This two-parter has an intriguing story that could have come from the pen of Malcolm Hulke rather than Matthew Graham, exploring identity and new technologies. It's a fairly standard Doctor Who story with some nonetheless excellent twists, and some nice moments of horror. There's even some uncertainty, until the end, as to which Doctor is the Ganger. It nonetheless manages to work very well, and the twist ending, while hinted at throughout the series, is nonetheless very startling.

One of the areas that is let down is the characterisation. Although most of the parts are decently cast, most of the actual guest characters, with the exception of Mark Bonnar's Jimmy, aren't that well characterised. Raquel Cassidy's Miranda Cleaves doesn't have enough consistency, Marshall Lancaster's Buzzer is a bit dull, and while Sarah Smart evokes sympathy as Jennifer at first, she devolves too swiftly into a bog-standard crazy villain, and why she got the worst of it than anyone else, I can't tell. And what cut-rate talent agency did they get for Jimmy's son Adam? The kid has less acting ability than a lump of wood. Matt Smith is a delight as the Doctor and his Ganger, clearly enjoying himself, and Arthur Darvill's Rory gets protective over Jennifer, presumably because of his own experiences as an Auton. But Amy gets really bitchy in the second episode, and you'd think after so much travel, she'd be far less antagonistic to the Doctor. I may be going too far with this, but her fate seems to be payback for her close-mindedness.

Production wise, there's some excellent direction, making the monastery/factory nice and gloomy, adding to the atmosphere. The make-up for the Gangers are suitably grotesque and eerie, but manage to do so without losing sympathy for them when they seem human. Some of the CGI is excellent, like the solar tsunami and storm at the start, as well as the initial Flesh sequence, but the 'Fleshpile' and Jennifer Lucas' final mutation are both examples of excellent designs, but bad execution.

This two parter, then, is quite a good story for the series, with some excellent themes and a twist ending. Only some crappy CGI and characterisation mar what could have been a better story.


SCORE: 9/10


NOTE: I will be reviewing A Good Man Goes to War and Let's Kill Hitler separately. I'm also using the latter title to see if WP still filters it.

REVIEW: A Good Man Goes to War by Steven Moffat

SERIAL: PB4, 6.7, 1 X 45 minute episode

SEEN IT BEFORE?: Yes


Although Doctor Who had mild hiatuses mid-season, ever since the first classic series, this is the first time that a series has been split into two with months between stories. So a mid-season finale seems to be in order, and what better way to do so than to finally reveal one mystery plagueing the series since the fourth new series: who is River Song? Some fans, however, saw it coming...

Amy Pond has been kidnapped by an organisation, assisted by the Clerics and the Headless Monks. Their purpose seems to be centred around Amy's newborn daughter, Melody. But as those defending Demon's Run prepare for the arrival of the Doctor, the Doctor and Rory begin preparations, recruiting allies from across time and space, all to storm Demon's Run and rescue Amy. But taking over Demon's Run may turn out to be only half the battle. Why does the organisation, represented by Madame Kovarian, want Melody Pond? Can the Doctor save not only his companion, but her daughter? And why won't River Song join the battle? Demons run when a good man goes to war, but this may be a war the Doctor is fated to lose...

A Good Man Goes to War is not a particularly strong plot, being basically a romp where the Doctor recruits his allies to rescue Amy, but it has some excellent points to make about the Doctor's reputation. It states that not only is he the origin of many equivalent words for healer, but also in some cultures, he's the name for a mighty warrior. What's more, Melody was kidnapped because someone wants him dead. The revelation that Melody is River was something a number of fans saw coming, myself included (though I held out hope that Moffat actually had a different thing in mind), but it's still very much a game-changer and an excellent surprise. Still, the whole story feels like more of a vehicle to continue the story arc of the season.

Here, we see the Doctor at his most impish, awesome, and dark, with Matt Smith laying it on thick. Karen Gillian gets some good material as Amy, and Arthur Darvill as Rory gets some real great moments in battle, and showing what he can be when pushed. It's also welcome to see Neve MacIntosh and Dan Starkey return to roles as Doctor Who monsters, albeit ones allied to the Doctor, a vigilante Victorian Silurian called Madame Vastra and Commander Strax the Sontaran nurse respectively. Frances Barber gets her first full story as the sinister Madame Kovarian, and while rather too much of a singular villain, vicious and smug and not justifying River's reveal of the fears towards the Doctor, she is nonetheless quite good. Simon Fisher-Becker as Dorium, Danny Sapani as Colonel Manton, Christina Chong as Lorna Bucket, and Catrin Stewart as Jenny round out the guest stars, doing their roles fine enough.

Production values are fair, with the special effects working well enough, and some great costumes, but Demon's Run doesn't look militaristic enough, and despite the epic nature of the story, it does look once again like they used the same old locations for Demeon's Run as they have for other installations. But there's some good fight scenes that work well, and it's nice to see the Silurian and Sontaran costumes brought out again.

A Good Man Goes to War is a rather average story, and doesn't quite work as a mid-season finale. Even so, the ending and final revelations work in hooking in viewers for later on in the season...


SCORE: 8.5/10


And now, the trailer for the rest of series 6...

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WM7AMK[/youtube]

REVIEW: Let's Kill Hitler by Steven Moffat

SERIAL: PB7, 6.8, 1 X 50 minute episode

SEEN IT BEFORE?: Yes


With the revelation of River Song's true identity in the mid-season finale, Moffat needed a big hook for people to watch for the rest of the season. Quite appropriately, the story had one of the most audacious titles in Doctor Who history: Let's Kill Hitler. As far as intriguing titles, and a concept about whether time travel and the infamous Nazi leader mix are concerned, it's a good hook. But are there meat on the bones?

Amy and Rory get the Doctor's attention after a long hiatus in their travels. But the Doctor hasn't found Melody Pond yet, and soon, Amy and Rory's delinquent childhood friend Mels turns up, and hijacks the TARDIS. Mels blames the Doctor for all the disasters he never prevented, and so decides that killing Adolf Hitler may be a good start to rectifying this. But they are not the only ones in 1938 Berlin with Hitler in their sights. The Tesselecta, a time-travelling shapeshifting robot, crewed by miniaturised humans, intend to punish Hitler, only for the crashing TARDIS to accidentally intervene. In the ensuing chaos, Hitler is shoved into a cupboard, but not before he shoots Mels, who reveals that she is actually Melody Pond. She regenerates into the woman who would later become known as River Song, but she doesn't know who River is yet, and she poisons the Doctor. As Melody flees into Berlin, pursued by Amy and Rory, the Tesselecta follows, having found that for her killing the Doctor, she is an even greater target than Hitler. With the Doctor dying before he is fated to die at Lake Silencio, and Melody Pond about to be executed before she becomes River, time is beginning to run out...

Okay, so this isn't exactly a deep and meaningful story, just a wonderful romp that explains away not only River's origins, but also some other elements of her story, even if they haven't been fully resolved. But this is rather too straightforward a story, with less examination of what TV Tropes calls the Hitler Time Travel Exemption Act (Hitler even gets locked up into a cupboard before the story gets anywhere near halfway through), and a rather blatant, if still workable, retcon showing how Mels (aka Melody Pond's second body, after the events of Day of the Moon) influenced Amy and Rory's life. It also seems rather vicious what Amy and Rory do on the Tesselecta on the Doctor's instructions. But there's some very funny dialogue (like Melody taunting a squad of Nazi soldiers) and some touching scenes.

The regulars, as usual, are pretty good, with everyone getting something to do (my favourite being Rory punching Hitler!). Nina Toussaint-White as Mels is wonderfully psychotic, as is Alex Kingston as pre-River Melody, and Kingston seems to be enjoying herself just a little too much. The crew of the Tesselecta are fine, but not exactly distinguished. Albert Welling makes an unusually understated Hitler.

Production values work in this story. The period drama capabilities of the BBC are shown off again, showing pre-war Berlin and Nazi Germany. The effects also do their job, with spectacular usages of regeneration energy, and the interesting transitions of the Tesselecta. The Antibodies are a bit duff, though, not looking quite menacing enough. Other than that, though, not a bad production at all.

While a decent enough opening for the rest of the series, Let's Kill Hitler draws people in on the title, but leaves one wanting. Average by the standards of Doctor Who, it nonetheless manages to wrap up a few loose ends...


SCORE: 8.5/10


And now, the next time trailer for Night Terrors...

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cbhGsj9ftVM[/youtube]

REVIEW: Night Terrors by Mark Gatiss

SERIAL: PB1, 6.4, 1 X 45 minute episode

SEEN IT BEFORE?: Yes


A decision was made during production to swap two episodes of the sixth series, Night Terrors and The Curse of the Black Spot, in production order, in order to give a certain variety of stories in the first half of the series. This meant that Night Terrors would eventually be transmitted in the second half of the season. Written by new series regular writer Mark Gatiss, this story would explore childhood fears...

George is the eight year old son of Alex and Claire, living in a housing estate, and terrified of many things. So much so that somehow, his pleas for help to save him from monsters reach the Doctor's psychic paper. But as the Doctor finds George, Amy and Rory, who are still looking for George, end up somehow in an old 18th century house, but with the weirdest additions. And as people around the housing estate begin to disappear, the key to the mystery may be George, and what he hides in his cupboard...

As a story, this is very reminiscent of the new series 2 episode Fear Her. A child with unnatural powers, able to trap people in an otherworld? Here, though, the story is a lot more psychological, but it doesn't have quite as much meat as it should. There were some missed opportunities, as other reviewers have noted, about children overcoming their fears, and it feels a bit thin on the ground, but there's a nice twist at the end, even if there is little mention of the story arc.

The regulars do fine, with Matt Smith getting more of the juicy stuff as the Doctor with his 'old eyes' speech. Daniel Mays, who previously played the diabolic Keats from Ashes to Ashes, transforms himself into worried father Alex quite well, and Andrew Tiernan plays a particularly vile landlord. While George is written okay, I find myself not impressed with James Oram's acting. It seems rather flat, and if I didn't know any better, I would have said he didn't look very frightened at all.

The production is dark and atmospheric, but not particularly distinctive. The dolls are creepy, but don't seem quite malevolent enough, despite their abilities, to be taken seriously. More eerie is the lullaby used throughout the episode. There's some excellent special effects, though, such as when the landlord sinks into the floor of his flat. But otherwise, the story feels rather run-of-the-mill.

Night Terrors is an interesting, but ultimately average story. The potential was there to make it great, but in the end, it is average by Doctor Who standards.


SCORE: 8.5/10


And now, the next time trailer for The Girl Who Waited...

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aCm-ff5Hqec[/youtube]

REVIEW: The Girl Who Waited by Tom MacRae

SERIAL: PB5, 6.10, 1 X 45 minute episode

SEEN IT BEFORE?: Yes


I have to confess that Amy is one of my least favourite companions in Doctor Who. And there are times that I wonder why Karen Gillan was cast in the role. After all, Arthur Darvill seemed to be a better actor as Rory. But then came a story that changed my position on Amy, and more specifically, on her actress...

Heading to the planet of Apalapucia for a much-needed holiday, the Doctor and his companions end up in a medical facility used to quarantine patients of Chen 7, a disease that affects beings with two hearts. The Doctor and Rory end up in the area for the visitors, while Amy ends up in an area for the patients, with her time compressed and moving faster. With the Doctor unable to enter the patient's area, it's up to Rory to track down Amy and help rescue her. After all, the medical robots present only have medicine for aliens, and if she's given the medicine, she'll die. But the Doctor got his calculations wrong. Rory has arrived 36 years of compressed time too late, and Amy, while alive and kicking, is an embittered woman who holds a grudge against both of them for not rescuing them...

The Girl Who Waited has an inventive story, involving interesting usage of time travel, and a good plot device to keep the Doctor out of the action. There's even the Doctor being at his most alien for some time, and the story is filled with wonderful sentiment with a heartbreaking ending. But like the not dissimilar A Christmas Carol, it has one major flaw that brings it down badly: it is hard to give a flying f**k about older Amy. If they had written her much more sympathetically, then the story would have been so much more better, despite other flaws (can't the Two Streams facility have safeguards against accidental visiting by alien visitors, for example?).

This story is very much that of Amy and Rory. Karen Gillan, although she had some good moments in previous stories, shows in this story that it is not her acting ability that is at fault, but rather, the material given to her. It is hard to feel any sympathy for the older Amy, especially as Rory had to put up with far worse as 'the Last Centurion', as Amy is supposed to have a virtually unshakeable faith in the Doctor, and to have that and go into this old b***h mode is rather jarring. Gillan, however, still invests a lot of effort into the character, and it shows. Arthur Darvill as Rory is, as usual, excellent, getting a great scene where he calls the Doctor out on the reckless nature of his time travel. Matt Smith gets to be at his most alien as the Doctor, having to lie to his companions in order to get what needs to be done, done.

The direction is rather good, if flashy and sentimental. The design is stark and simplistic, and suits the nature of this story, being set in a hospital, with the only blip being wherever they filmed the 'reception' sequences, which looks more like an airport than a hospital. The Handbots are creepy, but something about them doesn't have quite the right scare factor needed.

It's a real pity that the character of older Amy wasn't handled better, because if she was, then The Girl Who Waited would have been much more than it is. But it goes to show that the problem with the character of Amy is not the actress at all, but rather, her material...


SCORE: 8/10


And now, the next time trailer for The God Complex...

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jPaqUSqA91M[/youtube]

BTW, I've been mispelling Karen Gillan's surname as Gillian. Oops.

REVIEW: The God Complex by Toby Whithouse

SERIAL: PB5, 6.11, 1 X 45 minute episode

SEEN IT BEFORE?: Yes


Fear is a pivotal part of many of the most successful Doctor Who stories. In The Mind of Evil, the Doctor struggled against a machine containing an alien creature that externalised people's fears. In The Deadly Assassin, Chancellor Goth assaulted the Doctor with primal fears while they were fighting in the Matrix. And losing his fear was the Doctor's weapon in defeating the Mara in Snakedance. So, a hotel filled with the worst fears of everyone should be a winner, right?

Arriving in what appears to be a dodgy Earth hotel, the Doctor and his companions soon learn that they are trapped there, along with a group of frightened people, including medical intern Rita, conspiracy theorist Howie, cowardly alien Gibbis, and the now possessed gambler Joe. The hotel's rooms are filled with the worst fears of people who had been trapped there before, and there are rooms for every new arrival. And something deadly stalks the corridors, something that seems to feed on fear. The Doctor makes it his mission to try and save everyone, but can he save everyone from themselves?

I actually enjoyed this episode. Not only was it an interesting premise that seems to owe something to Mark Danielewski's novel House of Leaves, but it's weirdly atmospheric, and also pinpoints the fact that the Doctor has a God complex (in that he has to try and save evryone). It's an exploration of faith and fear, with an unexpected nod or two to Doctor Who's past, such as the Nimon being a cousin of the story's Minotaur, or the Doctor breaking Amy's faith in him in a softer, but similar manner to the way he did to Ace in The Curse of Fenric. The plot may be a little thin, but it's done in a way that it is unobtrusive and enjoyable.

The regulars all get some good stuff to do, and the farewell is nicely done with a good rationale, even if a little abrupt. Amara Karan is excellent as Rita, and Dimitri Leonidas as Howie and Daniel Pirrie as the deranged Joe are good as well. Gibbis is a rather singular and uninteresting character who fails, even if his inclusion is good for a fear-based plot, but David Walliams nonetheless acts well in the role.

The direction doesn't quite play up the psychological horror angle as much as it really should, but otherwise managed to get it down enough. The sets all look normal enough for the horror to work. The Minotaur is both threatening and ugly in appearance, but it is nonetheless not malevolent-looking enough to prevent sympathy being felt when it dies. Gibbis' make-up also works well in giving the character a timid-looking edge.

The God Complex is one of the best stories in this era, in my opinion. A blip too many prevents it from being perfect, but hey, it's a good story, an exploration of the Doctor's nature, and an interesting end to Amy and Rory's travels with the Doctor...


SCORE: 9.5/10


And now, the next time trailer for Closing Time...

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BlyRHbl-fvQ[/youtube]

REVIEW: Closing Time by Gareth Roberts

SERIAL: PB6, 6.12, 1 X 45 minute episode

SEEN IT BEFORE?: Yes


After The Lodger from series 5, Steven Moffat decided to bring back Gareth Roberts to write a sequel story, featuring the Doctor before he finally decides to face his fate. But The Lodger was a story that didn't require a sequel. Could a sequel actually work? Or would it drag down the ending episodes of series 6 of the new series down?

Now free of Amy and Rory, and preparing to meet his end in Utah, the Doctor heads to Colchester as part of a farewell tour. There, he calls upon Craig Owens, who now has a baby boy, Alfie. Although the Doctor resists the temptation to interfere when he learns of disappearing people and electricity centred on a nearby department store, he eventually gives in. With Craig's help, he investigates, finding that the Cybermen are involved. But why are they only draining energy from a department store when they could presumably access a nuclear power station? And can the Doctor prevent Craig and Alfie from being killed?

The Lodger, as I said, doesn't require a sequel. But this story, while not actually great, is a nice one. It's nice and sentimental, with a bit of nice humour, and the Doctor showing how close he is to his end. Unfortunately, not only does it feel like a repeat of the plot of The Lodger in a few respects, but it also doesn't use the Cybermen as well as it could have. And the ending was a bit of an ass-pull, to be perfectly frank. Okay, Cybermen are affected by emotions, that's been established as far back as The Invasion, but you'd think that they'd be able to stop one man's paternal instincts from harming them.

Matt Smith as the Doctor does well, as he usually does, showing the sadness and fear he has at his approaching demise. James Corden makes a welcome return as the hapless Craig Owens, struggling to be a good father, and Lynda Baron makes an unexpected return to the series as the shop assistant Val. It's not a great story for characters per se, but it's still a decent one.

The production values are decent. Not outstanding, just average for Doctor Who. The Cybermen look suitably damaged, and we have a hint (in the form of the lack of a Cybus logo) that these may be Mondasian Cybermen who have adopted the look of the Cybus Cybermen. The return of the Cybermats is also welcome, with a new redesign that manages to combine cuteness and horror. Otherwise, it's rather average.

Closing Time is beginning to close the series out now, and while not spectacular or brilliant, it does do its thing. But now we come to the Doctor's death, and the falling of the Silence...


SCORE: 8.5/10


And now, the next time trailer for The Wedding of River Song...

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3LN6LBteGmA[/youtube]

REVIEW: The Wedding of River Song by Steven Moffat

SERIAL: PB7, 6.13, 1 X 45 minute episode

SEEN IT BEFORE?: Yes


In Moffat's previous season finale, space began to collapse, with history never happening due to the Doctor being imprisoned in the Pandorica. But now comes the season final, a single part story that is meant to wrap up all the disparate plot threads of the past couple of seasons, like the Silence, the death of the Doctor, and the fate of River Song. But in just one episode, could Moffat pull it off?

It is 5:02 pm on the 22nd of April, 2011. And it is always that time. Pterosaurs are pests, Charles Dickens is discussing his latest Christmas special on BBC morning shows, and Winston Churchill is the Holy Roman Emperor with a royal mammoth, a Silurian doctor, and a soothsayer he locked in the Tower of London called the Doctor. Summoning the Doctor to him, he demands to know why the Doctor is saying that there's something wrong with time, and the Doctor relates the tale of how he intended to die. How he tracked down agents of the Silence, as well as the Teselecta and the head of Dorium Maldovar, and how Dorium revealed that the Silence want the Doctor dead. The Silence believe themselves to be guardians of history, and want to prevent the Doctor from uttering the answer to the First Question, which he is fated to do in the future. The Doctor goes to his death, but River, his erstwhile assassin, has other ideas. But her interference in a fixed point in time causes time to collapse and disintegrate, with all of history happening at once. The only hope for history to get back on track is for the Doctor to die, but River is willing to sacrifice all creation to prevent herself from murdering the man she loves...

While somewhat rushed and not exploring all of the implications of time collapsing, The Wedding of River Song is still a good season finale. It certainly wraps up enough of the storylines, as well as showing that, despite the Doctor needing to die, he is (contrary to what River stated in A Good Man Goes to War, albeit to explain why Melody Pond was abducted) still beloved by many in the universe. There's a lovely poignant scene where the Doctor learns that the Brigadier, stalwart friend, has died. We also finally have an explanation of the First Question hinted at in Let's Kill Hitler, hidden in plain sight. The question? Doctor who? It's a good hook for seasons to come, as well as an oblique hearkening back to the Cartmel Masterplan, designed to bring some msytery back to the Doctor. And we have the Teselecta being used as the copy to save the Doctor. I expected a Ganger (or rather, for the original Doctor to die and the Ganger to take his place, potentially getting around the looming regeneration problem), but it's still a good surprise.

The regulars, as usual, do well with characterisation, though Amy and Rory are a little sidelined. Amy does get a nice moment where she deliberately puts Madame Kovarian back into a lethal situation, as well as a nice moment of shock when she realises that she is the Doctor's mother-in-law. Alex Kingston as River is perhaps at her best in this story. There was a wasted opportunity to bring some more backstory to Madam Kovarian, but Frances Barber still does well. We also have welcome returns from Simon Callow and Ian McNiece as Dickens and Churchill respectively, as well as Mark Gatiss as new character Gantok and Simon Becker-Fisher as Dorium.

Production-wise, the story is fine. Not impressive. There's some nice special effects, though some don't work, and others are cheesy. But the direction helps this story where it needs to. The music is used fine, but does get a little too bombastic in the opening scenes, making that sequence rather cheesy. Other sequences are quite atmospheric though, particularly in the pre-Lake Silencio sequences.

The Wedding of River Song is a very good finale to the sixth series of the new Doctor Who. Not perfect, but it certainly gets things done, and drops some hints for the future...


SCORE: 9/10

PROGRESS REPORT FOURTEEN: NEW SERIES SIX: SILENCE WILL FALL

STORIES: Total for this era:

Cumulative total: 164. 15 William Hartnell, 6 Patrick Troughton. 17 Jon Pertwee. 37 Tom Baker. 20 Peter Davison. 11 Colin Baker. 9 Sylvester McCoy. 1 Paul McGann. 1 Spin-Off. 10 Christopher Eccleston. 36 David Tennant. 22 Matt Smith


TIME: Total for this era: 13 days

Cumulative total: 197 days

PERCENTAGE NEVER WATCHED BEFORE: 0/12, or 0%

Cumulative total: 43/185, or 23% (Possibly not accurate, please wait...)


MILESTONES:

First appearance of the Silence

Revelation of River Song's identity


COMPANIONS: Amy Pond, Rory Williams, River Song


THOUGHTS:

After the more tentative feel of the fifth new series, having the season start with a bang, almost literally, was the best way to go. Within two episodes, we have the Doctor dying in the future, a mysterious astronaut, the Silence appearing as an alien species, and a plotline revolving around a mysterious girl and a potential pregnancy as Amy. Overall, this plot arc for the season feels better done than some previous seasons, even if the revelation of River Song's identity and her target was rather predictable. I had hoped that they would reveal it to be someone other than Melody Pond.

Even so, there's some stories that excel. Neil Gaiman's first contribution to the series was a superb one, revising what we know about the TARDIS and 'her' relationship with the Doctor. We have the uncertainty of identity of the Gangers, and of fears both adult and childhood. We have many of the oldest adversaries of the Doctor fighting alongside him to save Amy and Melody, and we have River both berating the Doctor for becoming a fierce warrior, and yet also, even at the epicentre of the destruction of time, that he is still beloved by the universe, even if some fear him. And we have the beginnings of what might very well be a new question about the Doctor, the oldest: Doctor who?

It seems that Moffat has finally found his feet as showrunner. It's still a very different flavour to the Russell T Davies era of the new series, and may not be for everyone, becoming ever darker, but it's beginning to clamber back into favour. Time will tell whether Moffat will bring it to ever greater heights, or whether silence will truly fall...

BEST STORIES: The Impossible Astronaut/Day of the Moon, The Doctor's Wife, The God Complex

WORST STORIES: A Christmas Carol, The Girl Who Waited

Anyway, before long, I will be reviewing the next lot of stories to catch up on, which will be: The Daemons, The Face of Evil, Nightmare of Eden, Dragonfire, The Happiness Patrol, and The Doctor, The Widow, and The Wardrobe.

So, as a sneak peek, here's the trailer for The Daemons...

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MLe084pddBM[/youtube]