Well.
That.
Sucked.
Official Blog of author R. K. Bentley
Category: Doctor Who
I’m happy to see a ship in the bottle episode in the TARDIS. Last season’s Doctor’s Wife was more psychological while this was more action oriented I thought. It is the one type of episode that could easily be stretched out into a multiple episodes and I wouldn’t bat an eye since Doctor Who has been around for 50 years and after 900 years the Doctor must have an metric ton worth of baggage and possibly even a stowaway civilization on board.
The set designers pull off some nice rooms: the observatory, the aforementioned pool, the library, a giant tree that can manufacture anything you want and the TARDIS’s engine room which impressed me more than her center.
Unfortunately, it’s the leaps in logic that’s making me re-watch the last five minutes and I’m starting to agree with my mother: Is this half of the season sucking.
“There something in the mists!”
This episode started really well and the last five minutes just boggles my mind.
It was a dark and stormy night in 1970’s on the moors in your a-typical British Manor where there is a ghost afoot and Dougray Scott and Jessica Raine are on the case as Professor Alec Palmer and Emma Grayling.
They are investigating the resident spook story of a woman haunting the home for several hundred years when the Doctor and Clara arrive to help in this moodier than normal episode that harkens back to The Unquiet Dead when the ghost turns out to be something quite different.
Like last week’s episode this is a bunker episode until the Doctor Who goes Poltergeist to solve the problem and everything turns out fine when we find out why the ghost was haunting the house only to find there’s something else that needs to be fixed too at the last minute of the episode.
It’s a C plot really and while it’s nice have the monster of the week not being the monster of the week it just felt like the writers were trying to stick too much into one 45 minute episode.
“Hungry like the wolf.”
The Ice Warriors return and so does the hysteria that was the Cold War during the 1980’s…
“I don’t know where I am.”
So begins the 2nd half of the seventh series (season) of Doctor Who and the introduction (again) of the new TARDIS control room and the new companion, Clara Oswald played once again by Jenna-Louise Coleman.
Thank you for a scary Doctor Who Christmas Story. In previous years it’s been cute but we have scary since Christmas Invasion and for the most part it works.
Unfortunately, it doesn’t hold together well in the end because the villain while able to make snowmen with teeth doesn’t hold up and turns out to be a possible plot thread for the rest of season 6.
Good use of River Song, Angels and saying goodbye without having to use a Russell T Davies 2 part season finale.
Hopefully the Christmas Episode will contain less sugar than the previous Christmas Episodes.
Spoiler post tomorrow.
Dinosaurs was a fun episode but for the fun I think it squeezed too many people into 43 minutes.
It has been 10 months since the Ponds saw the Doctor and things seem to be on the mend in the household. Meanwhile the Doctor and Queen Nefertiti just saved her people from locusts and before long she and the Doctor are off so quickly you wonder if the Doctor is going to continue light hearts afire across time and space.
See there is a problem in the 24th Century, a giant ship is about to crash into Earth and the International Space Agency has summoned the Doctor for help and he in turn goes back in time to get a big game hunter, Riddell played by Rupert Graves and the Ponds in under two minutes and while the audience tries not suffer from whiplash the TARDIS arrives on the spaceship only to find Dinosaurs!
Cue the credits.
I enjoyed this Christmas Special better than last years and the year before and the year before. Ever since Christmas Invasion the tone of these specials has been old over the map from the stupid Racknoss to the loud and over blown Titanic Episode to the Scrooged-eseque episode from last year. The Christmas Ep with the fake Doctor wasn’t so shabby until Temple of Cyberman showed up with their giant steampunk Cyberman Robot.
“The death of time…”
Like last years season finale this was on a small scale and brought about some great situations that come from a science fiction show. I mentioned in the past, alt reality episodes have become the bread and butter of most programs, Fringe has embraced it all of last season and last night’s episode was a perfect example of how to do it right.