Doctor Who: S03 Ep13 - Last Of The Time Lords

What happened?

A year of The Master reigning over the planet, things are in a miserable condition. The Doctor, still in an elderly form, has been reduced to The Master’s pet, Jack remains a prisoner and Martha’s family are nothing more than servants. Only Martha has carried the torch of hope, having been walking across the planet spreading word of The Doctor amongst the population.

And so the time arrives when The Doctor, thanks to Martha, is able to use The Master’s own subconscious control system against him when the entire planet thinks of The Doctor and restores him to full vigour. Unwilling to see the last of his people killed, The Doctor vows to keep The Master with him in the TARDIS but The Master is shot dead by his bitter wife.

Martha elects to discontinue travelling with The Doctor, unable to stand being around him due to her feelings for him that are not returned. And so The Doctor returns to the TARDIS alone, and instantly crashes into the Titanic. . .

Thoughts

The one very refreshing thing this episode brought in to the fold was having a year have passed since the end of the previous one. It really gave a lot more gravitas to Martha’s declaration that she would return that felt somewhat melodramatic previously. Shifting the focus to Martha, and her extraordinary (unbelievable?) feat of endurance and perseverance in travelling the planet and spreading the word about The Doctor was impressive, and fitting. She has been a terrific companion, resourceful and brave and reliable, and it felt right that she would be the real saviour here, despite The Doctor leaping in at the end to take all the credit!

Beyond the jarring state of the world and Martha’s heroic efforts, there wasn’t really very much else I liked about this episode. I didn’t like the longterm plan The Doctor had set in motion (was that really the best thing he could come up with?) and I thought the undoing of The Master and the resolution to things was awfully twee. I know Doctor Who often strains credulity but this felt like a reach too far.

I also felt elevating The Doctor to this mythical saviour in the eyes of all humanity across the planet felt disingenuous in comparison to the sometimes egotistically dangerous character he represents (he is, basically, an unstoppable force that determines the fate of the entire universe!). Fundamentally it just felt weak.

It’s a shame The Doctor was reduced to a CGI wench throughout the majority of this episode, because seeing the sparks fly between him and The Master felt worthwhile of a series finale – the last of the Timelords locked in opposition. There was a better, grandstanding event more deserving of such an occasion, and I don’t think we got it here.

I suppose the episode wasn’t all bad. I did like the nice surprise at the end that heavily suggested that The Face of Boe was none other than Jack! That was really good, and if we never see or hear from Jack again in Doctor Who (I know he crossed over as a main character of Torchwood, which I’ve never seen any of) then it’s a cute, quirky sign off.

Aside from Martha and that, however, the rest of it was overblown and lacked drama.

What was the best part?

The best part was seeing The Master cavort around near the beginning of the episode, to music, lording it over everyone and revealing The Doctor had been forced to remain on all fours and live in a kennel. For some reason such behaviour kind of made The Master seem like a nastier villain than the usual foes that are simply out to destroy and kill – enslavement, torture and humiliation are far more inhumane than genocide!

What do I think will happen next?

End of a series, and farewell to another companion. Since this episode ended with the Titanic abruptly crashing through the TARDIS (I thought that thing was impregnable and indestructible!?) the next episode, a Christmas special, will feature the aforementioned vessel. (I do happen to recall watching this when it was first aired so I know it’s not the actual Titanic as it may first appear here!)

Doctor Who: S03 Ep12 – The Sound Of Drums

What happened?

Using Jack’s vortex method of time travelling, The Doctor, Martha and Jack land in London just in time to see Harold Saxon – The Master – having won his election (via subtly shifting the public perception in his favour by a low level drumming pulse embedded in mobile phone signals!) and become Prime Minister. His plan, 18 months in the formation, is to grab the world’s attention before unleashing billions of killer beings upon the planet.

The Doctor, Martha and Jack infiltrate his floating ship where he is staging the grand reveal to thwart him, but The Master is wise to their plans. He utilises aging technology on The Doctor, making him elderly, tortures Jack by killing him so he can rise again, and only Martha is able to escape whilst leaving her kidnapped family behind. She vows to return, as the aliens rain down on the planet and decimate a tenth of the population. . .

Thoughts

This mid-section of the three-part finale to the end of the series felt problematic to me. It just didn’t seem to flow right, or feel right – especially when set against the previous episode and the kind of edge and unease it generated. I suppose one key question that keeps cropping up with every episode that is set on Earth is: Why Earth? What is it about conquering that planet and attempting to wipe out the human race that is so compelling for all manner of aliens across the galaxies!?

It was explained, of course, that The Master had only been able to travel to Earth at the point when the TARDIS was last there but that was about all that made logical sense about The Master’s behaviour during this episode. He had got himself elected Prime Minister and immediately wiped out his cabinet, kidnapped Martha’s family, and announced to the world a new alien race was going to make its appearance the next day.

His grand plan, so far it seems, is purely to have got to the position he was in so he would have a televised audience watching him unveil his spherical alien race and see him kill the USA President and launch the attack decimating the planet. I have to assume this is so he can show the world who he is, what he’s done, so they will literally know he is The Master!

It felt rather convoluted. The mobile phone pulse to capture minds to vote in his favour just to destroy these same people just seems silly. But there is still a part 3 in the balance here, and presumably more revelations to come, that might answer some of my questions so far. Though I’m not holding my breath that there’ll be an answer to why he strapped a bomb to the back of Martha’s television. (If he could predict she’d be there why not just have his men capture her like the rest of her family? Again, seemed silly.)

The Master himself continued to provide good entertainment value, mind. His playful, cocksure psychosis makes for a very enjoyable villain, though it does come with the cost of sacrificing the sinister menace he possessed during those brief moments at the end of the previous episode in his awakened, older incarnation.

The Doctor, Martha and Jack weren’t really up to much during this episode. Their plan to thwart The Master wasn’t particularly clear (was the plan to put one of those things around his neck to stop his pulse signal to, what, snap the brainwashed masses out of the hold he had over them? So what? That time had passed!) but at least the idiocy of it was duly met with him turning the tables on them all.

Only Martha managed to escape, with a determined remark about how she’ll return, which I fully expect she will. Meanwhile The Doctor got hit with an aging process (courtesy of technology from Dr Lazarus, which was a half-decent attempt at tying previous episode’s events into proceedings here) that was uncomfortable to watch (something about the rudimentary effects employed made it seem horrible – I’ll give whoever was responsibly credit and consider it deliberate rather than a side-effect of low budget!).

The alien spheres that were unleashed were intriguing. The Master made a remark to The Doctor about how he knew what they really were. For some reason I wondered if they weren’t Daleks; it was just the idea that The Master would have allied himself to the very race that wiped out the Timelords could have been one that would so appal. Couple that idea with the strange ‘paradox machine’ that had been used on the TARDIS, which has perhaps been a part of explaining how the Daleks could be brought back, and that’s basically where my logic runs out. Beyond that I have no evidence for such a spurious pondering.

This mid-section episode really was about putting our characters in dire circumstances, defeated, before the final instalment will see them eventually triumph. It very much felt like a second act – robbed of the intriguing set up (even the climax to the previous episode was casually dodged by Jack warping all of them through time with barely a flinch) and lacking a climactic finish, it was an uninspiring halfway house that left me hoping they’d saved the good stuff for the last instalment.

What was the best part?

Probably the brief overview of life on Gallifrey, showing some of the trials the young Timelords went through. The mention of how they appear to have been self-entitled, so The Doctor called himself as much because he wants to help and save people – could have done with more elaboration, as that felt like a major revelation. The Doctor is always adamant that people just call him The Doctor, to be drip-fed information that suggested it was a name he provided for himself as part of his own moral ethos deserved more examination.

What do I think will happen next?

The Master will surely get thwarted, and I can’t help but feel like the exact nature of the alien spheres have greater significance. I’m still banking on Daleks! Otherwise I expect Martha will somehow return to the action and stage a rescue and perhaps The Doctor will snub her in some way, or something will happen to her family, and make her decide there is no way she can continue with him.

Doctor Who: S03 Ep11 – Utopia

What happened?

Landing in Cardiff to make a pit stop for the TARDIS, The Doctor notices Jack racing towards them and tries to elude him. However, Jack grabs the TARDIS and propels them trillions of years into the future, to a dying universe, where the last vestiges of humanity survive on a barren world, dreaming that the rocket under construction there will one day take them to Utopia.

A man known as The Professor is working on this rocket, unsuccessfully, but with The Doctor on hand a plan is forged to get it going. Utilising Jack who, as a result of Rose’s last act as ‘Bad Wolf’ is now immortal, frozen as a constant in time, they engage the rocket and it launches. However, Martha makes a discovery that The Professor has a pocket watch similar to one The Doctor used to store his consciousness in – and once opened The Professor’s true identity is revealed.

He is a Timelord. The villainous Master. He regenerates in a youthful form and escapes in the TARDIS, leaving The Doctor, Martha and Jack apparently stranded on the desolate planet whilst savages infiltrate the place and beat at the door. . .

Thoughts

What began as a fairly knockabout, faintly silly episode of Doctor Who ultimately unfurled itself to be one of the edgier instalments I’ve seen so far. I can’t quite put my finger on why but it managed to be unsettling in places; it’s not like I was scared, but unnerved might be a more precise description.

The silly aspect of the sharp-toothed human savages wasn’t overly convincing, with the production values of the episode really not selling them as a viable tribe. They were there to cause some trouble and get our heroes to the base, and then create mayhem during the rocket launch, but ultimately they weren’t the big draw here, which is just as well.

Setting the episode at the end of the universe was a good move. The Doctor’s fake panic about being that far ahead in time, at a point when nearly all life had been and gone, was probably a key reason why the episode contained such an unsettling vibe. The Doctor maybe powerful but even he can’t combat the end of the universe. I’ll be interested to learn where it is the rocket bound for Utopia was really headed!

The business with Jack initially confounded me. The fact that he appeared to be invulnerable had me confused since, the last time I saw him, I didn’t recall this being a part of his character. I remember him getting killed! I thought that maybe there was something I had missed, but then it got explained during the episode.

It was during that scene of explanation, with Jack, despite being immortal, seeming vulnerable as he handled the deadly radiation that The Doctor had a menacing edge to him. His wariness of Jack because he was an impossible fixture in time was an interesting idea, and there was a just an unsettling tone to The Doctor suggesting that another Jack might still be around in the universe, further emphasised by him questioning if Jack had ever wanted to die.

I actually find the character of Jack irritating – his constant flirting and arrogance are somewhat tiresome – but with this he’s being taken in an interesting direction that certainly makes him a more interesting proposition.

The Professor turning out to be The Master was another fine part of the episode, in its reveal of the pocket watch arriving after the his talk of “the sound of drums” that had been in his head all his life. Again, I’m not sure if this episode pre-supposes some former knowledge of The Master, because his announcement of himself certainly landed with dramatic weight. As far as I can tell he is a Timelord, but not a good one. (Arguably The Doctor isn’t strictly ‘good’, but he tends towards the preservation of life as his moral compass and, in that sense, adheres to what he believes is right.)

I can hazard an assumption at a backstory: The Master was hounded by his own people, presumably for being bad, and so went and hid himself into the far reaches of the future where he could not be found. To hide all traces he secreted his consciousness in the watch, like The Doctor once did, and there even forgot to himself who he really was. Only now he has awoken, now as one of only two remaining Timelords (The Doctor told him this, which is what forms my assumption he was a part of their species before the Time War). Now he has the TARDIS he can go back to whenever he wants – though I think we already know he goes back to Martha’s time, calling himself Saxon, since she made a remark that his voice was familiar.

God knows how The Doctor, Martha and Jack are going to get out of the situation they are in. But then that’s what makes for a great cliffhanger. Possibly The Doctor will recall the TARDIS somehow? Or maybe the ‘other Jack’ will show up and save the day? Maybe even The Doctor’s severed hand will somehow be used!

I did enjoy The Master once he had regenerated, too. There was a deliciously, devilish spiteful quality to him that relished wreaking evil. His remarks to The Doctor about enjoying the end of the universe with a chirpy ‘bye bye’ before exiting were entertaining. And it was also good to see the final words of the Face of Boe finally get some meaning, though I’m in two minds if the ‘YANA’ name being an anagram of You Are Not Alone was a stroke of genius or an irksome contrivance.

What was the best part?

It was two scenes that kind of merged together close enough for me to regard them as one best part. The first was The Doctor speaking with Jack, about how he was immortal, and whether he wanted to die. Tennant played the scene with a quiet darkness about his Doctor that I’d never seen before and it really worked well; I wondered if he was about to do something particularly harsh, especially when he asked Jack if he wanted to die.

Martha’s startled reaction to the pocket watch and the revelation that here was the ‘other Timelord’ the Face of Boe had once alluded to was also excellent – it was a well-executed reveal that I didn’t see coming and totally delivered a showstopper of a surprise.

What do I think will happen next?

I really don’t know how The Doctor and co are going to escape their predicament, but we can be sure they do. Furthermore The Master apparently expects it, since he was investigating The Doctor via Martha’s mother (if, indeed, he really is this Saxon fellow, which I am certain he is). Possibly The Master has got himself set up and, having learned that The Doctor is the only other Timelord, seeks a showdown? (If his goal is to be the only Timelord, however, then I can’t imagine he’ll do something to ‘rescue’ The Doctor so they can meet face-to-face.

However The Master and The Doctor confront one another, I suspect the notion that The Doctor is not too far removed from The Master will be played out, to make sense of this somewhat more reckless and destructive quality he has displayed throughout the series.

Doctor Who: S03 Ep10 – Blink

What happened?

Sally Sparrow, a relatively ordinary young woman, finds herself weaved into the fabric of The Doctor’s life when she wanders into an old house to take photographs and finds messages directed to her. She takes her friend, but her friend has a run-in with the Weeping Angels – statue-like beings that only move when not being observed – that sends her back in time, permanently.

Sally eventually finds messages from The Doctor embedded in DVDs, informing her about how the Weeping Angels are after her and that she needs to get to the TARDIS. The Weeping Angels close in on her, also keen on harnessing the power of the TARDIS, yet it disappears as they encircle it, catching them into looking at each other and freezing them in stone.

Thoughts

Now this is top notch stuff. This is the kind of episode that crops up during a series that stands out as being superior than the rest. Obviously I haven’t finished watching this series yet, but I find it hard to imagine an episode being better than this. Blink is perhaps the first great example of an episode of Doctor Who you could show to a total non-fan that they would enjoy immensely, despite themselves!

The Doctor, and Martha, being at the periphery of events is something that would make it easy for a newcomer to get involved as we see things from the perspective of just one of the people The Doctor meets in his life. It was a stylish way of telling the story, and it certainly helped that Sally Sparrow herself was so gorgeous in an innocuously cute way. When The Doctor and Martha did appear in person, at the end, it was amusing to catch them in the middle of another crazy adventure (presumably one we’ll never focus on directly during the show, making the assumption that The Doctor and Martha see and do things beyond what we witness during the series).

So the episode’s real strength was in presenting real people, identifiable and likable, and exerting the world of Doctor Who upon them. That exertion came in the form of the Weeping Angels that were a supremely simple yet fascinating creation. Having a foe that is harmless so long as it is being observed generated the impossible stalemate situation of having to stare at it, without blinking, to remain safe. In the space of a blink the Weeping Angel could dart forward, closer and closer. Very cool.

And their manner of despatching their victims neatly sidestepped the usual instant death scenario – casting a person back in time was a neat idea and one that was employed very well (even if it did have a Back To The Future-inspired feel to it all in people living out good lives in the past and sending messages by courier to the present day).

I know that Steven Moffat wrote this episode and he went on to become the showrunner for later series, and it’s clearly with an instalment like this that he distinguished himself. The characters and dialogue had that extra zip about them, a better layer of savvy . Doctor Who has a tough enough time selling itself as credible and cool, and I think it therefore needs to work extra hard at being sharp, harder than other shows might have to, in order to sell itself in this regard.

Doctor Who is always fast-paced and yet this episode still managed to find time for emotional interest to hold the pace, no more so than when Sally went to the bedside of the man she’d only just got a phone number for, to wait with him whilst he died. It was a bittersweet moment that was tenderly addressed. Again, I feel like it’s this extra sophistication that only benefits the show. I appreciate that Doctor Who is a family show, and it’s got younger viewers to cater for alongside the adults, but I think there’s scope for it to stray away from the cartoon japes and monsters for emotional depth.

I do believe that the Weeping Angels became a big favourite with the audience and they feature again, though not during the David Tennant-era. That’s good. It’s not hard to envisage them escaping their deadlocked stare in the basement; all that needs to happen is for them to be discovered and moved, for example! Or, more likely, for the lightbulb to go out and plunge the room into darkness once more to unleash them.

If the episode had a weak point it was in the bum note ending, that rather lamely flashed up images of various real statues, insinuating that these things you see on buildings and streets everywhere could really be these threatening ‘Weeping Angels’ just frozen whilst you look at them. Other people might not have minded but I found it a bit heavy-handed and undercut the subtlety and slickness of all that had preceded it. Hardly ruined things, mind.

New best episode ever? Yeah, I’d say so.

What was the best part?

The episode maintained a strong standard pretty much throughout, though I think the best part had to be the climax of the piece when Sally and her future boyfriend were in the house, staring off the Weeping Angels, before being pursued into the basement. They were fine whilst they kept looking but then, of course, the lightbulb started flickering on and off. . .

What do I think will happen next?

I’d like to be able to say we’ll see more of Sally Sparrow in future instalments – she was so lovely in both manner and appearance! However, alas, I suspect we’ll be back with The Doctor and Martha in more regular fashion, where the ongoing dynamic with Saxon and Martha’s feelings for The Doctor will continue to come to the boil.

Doctor Who: S03 Ep09 – The Family Of Blood

What happened?

The Doctor, believing he is a human named John Smith, manages to escape the initial trap of ‘the family’ and holds up at the school, commanding the boys to take arms and mount a defence. Timothy, a boy holding the watch that contains The Doctor’s consciousness, returns the timepiece to The Doctor and he wrestles with the decision of ‘killing’ John Smith and abandoning the potential life he could have with the nurse to become a Timelord again.

In the end he chooses to become The Doctor, and cruelly punishes ‘the family of blood’ by interring them in various prisons that leave them permanently trapped in time, living forever like how they planned but not in a way they would have wanted. The Doctor and Martha then return to the TARDIS and leave 1913, the nurse and the human world, behind.

Thoughts

A bit of a surprising episode, in some ways, and not all of them I am quite willing to say married very well together. There seemed to be quite a lot of ideas being thrown into the mix all at once and that had the effect of suddenly making the last five or ten minutes of the episode cluttered and weighty.

The actual business of the plot was relatively lightweight. ‘The Family of Blood’ were given very little further explanation beyond their motivation to become eternal and so grow and spread out across the universe. They were rather easily outwitted in the end, with The Doctor pretending to be human and stumbling around pushing buttons on their ship before making a run for it.

Whilst it was a thrilling moment once he revealed himself as The Doctor (that switch between ‘John Smith’ and The Doctor characters was really good work by David Tennant) the manner by which ‘the family’ were so easily bested makes you wonder why The Doctor considered them so deadly he had to hide his consciousness away in the first place.

As I expected, Martha didn’t fare very well here – entirely unjustified, too. She was an absolute heroine; stayed behind to allow everyone to make their escape, persuaded The Doctor to return, even declaring her love for him, and all for what? To be given a thank you and a hug at the end before off they went again.

The Doctor is actually starting to get on my nerves in this regard. When he had returned as The Doctor he still had the audacity to go to the nurse and basically invite her to come travelling with him as his companion. He said he would like that! I kept waiting for her to say she couldn’t, that he was already ‘with’ someone, but that didn’t get a mention. But she turned him down anyway, and so then he just strolled back to Martha with a hug and thank you and off they went!

Perhaps this is deliberate. They are making The Doctor behave so objectionably towards Martha as part of a series arc. If this is the case then I hope they justify it because, otherwise, I’m finding it really difficult to warm to The Doctor when he’s behaving so ignorantly disrespectful.

Better was the idea being explored here that The Doctor was a terrifying monster of a person, as well as being so wonderful. Timothy’s frightened reaction was also mixed with awe (and an eventual thankfulness by the finish) as he glimpsed images of The Doctor wreathed in fire and dispensing cold-hearted punishment. Indeed, the justice he meted out to ‘the family’, binding them in eternal, tormenting prisons seems way more monstrous than just killing them (or, in the least, letting them die as they were supposed to very shortly).

Is his treatment of Martha and the use of his powers as he sees fit being used here to paint a portrait of The Doctor as a kind of anti-hero? I see all this stuff and I am forced to wonder if it is intentional or just the product of what the particular writer of that episode was doing. It’s hard to imagine such scathing depictions were just allowed to slip through the net so I will have to assume it’s part of the direction the show is taking.

Of course, with the next episode, the reset button might just get pushed and The Doctor and Martha will get along like before as though none of this ever happened. That can sometimes be the danger with Doctor Who as a serialised drama that also caters heavily on standalone episodes.

The last thing to discuss probably encapsulates my general enjoyment mired in confusion this episode left me with overall. The moment where The Doctor, as John Smith, touched the nurse and allowed them both to see the life they could have had together was moving and yet incomprehensible. At least to me. The Doctor had a family with her, grew old and then lay on his death bed having apparently had a great life. It was a touching, interesting sequence – I just don’t understand what caused it, what it was supposed to be or what we were supposed to glean from it. It felt less like a glimpse into a possible future and more like a flight of fancy.

It seemed absurd. And yet I liked it. That’s pretty much my overwhelming feeling towards this episode.

What was the best part?

Whilst The Doctor’s glimpse of a happy human future was emotive stuff, and his ‘ta-da!’ reveal as really being The Doctor amidst ‘the family’ was sparkling stuff, the best part of the episode arrived at the end. Timothy, in World War I, managed to avoid his death. Somewhat mawkish, but in an episode that came laden with heavy referencing of the futility of war (way too overdone for my taste) the ending coda, with Timothy as an old man, a war veteran, paying respects on remembrance day was absolutely lovely.

The Doctor and Martha dropped by, just to catch him there, with Martha putting a poppy in The Doctor’s lapel. Timothy saw them, and smiled, and in that nice little wordless exchange a more powerful and touching chord was struck that the rest of the episode couldn’t get near.

What do I think will happen next?

No references to Saxon in this two-parter, so the only ongoing thread is the matter of Martha and The Doctor. She announced she was in love with him here, taking things up a notch. She was cool enough to play it down afterwards though I suspect there’s going to come the crunch when that coolness evaporates and she breaks down under the impossible strain of her feelings for him not just being returned but pretty much being bluntly disregarded. The girl is gonna fall hard.

Doctor Who: S03 Ep08 – Human Nature

What happened?

As a result of being pursued by an alien enemy calling itself ‘the family’, The Doctor is forced to turn himself human and hide in 1913, assuming the role of a teacher at a boarding school. With only dim recollections as to who he really is, it is up to Martha to keep her eye on him and open the timepiece watch, which will return all his memories, should a crisis emerge.

A crisis does emerge. ‘The family’ manage to overtake the bodies of various people around the school and village and stage an ambush at the dance. With the timepiece in the possession of a small boy with peculiarly intuitive instincts, Martha, The Doctor and the nurse he is striking a relationship have their lives held in the balance. . .

Thoughts

An extremely enjoyable episode that as well as offering up a refreshing twist on The Doctor’s character basically turns its attentions on Martha, and her relationship with him. It’s something the series has been clicking away with from the beginning and that’s really reaching a peak here.

Indeed, the scene where Martha bemoaned the fact that the one human The Doctor had decided to fall in love with wasn’t her pretty much nailed down what it is she wanted and what she’s never likely to get. I fear she’s in for a rather sad conclusion to her time as the The Doctor’s companion; unable to reconcile being with him on adventures to wanting more than he is willing, or even able, to provide in return.

I liked how the episode quickly threw us into the action – almost like we were coming in at the end of a previous episode with the two of them escaping into the TARDIS, dodging shots fired at them. Then the last ditch measure, that was barely explained, before we were snapped into 1913 England and The Doctor, with just one heart, fully in-character and oblivious as a teacher.

Only his book of stories and drawings gave away his subconscious understanding of who he really was. And I liked how Martha was integrated into proceedings – it wasn’t immediately apparent if she was also living under the same illusion as The Doctor, and was really of the belief she was a servant of the school.

Once it was clear that she was the same old Martha working undercover, and had been doing so for two months, it really helped settle the episode down and further defined her character. Considering the racist remarks she endured (the line about how she couldn’t tell things were clean due to her brown skin was deliciously nasty), alongside the frustration of seeing The Doctor she knows (and loves?) treating her as a nobody clearly display a genuine fortitude and strength.

‘The Family’ were a curious alien. The performances of the actors who were ‘inhabited’ really sold the otherworldliness of them, particularly the snooty schoolboy. The eerie cocking of the head to one side and deep sniffing were managed well; what could have looked silly worked out looking unnerving. Hopefully there will be more explanation about what they are beyond a nebulous form that, for some reason, The Doctor had to hide away from so drastically rather than somehow confront and thwart like how he does every other kind of enemy race!

Really fun episode, overall. Initially confusing but so fast-paced all you could do was hold on and take it in before frustration could set in. And then explanations emerged and before too long aliens had people hostage and The Doctor was forced into a difficult decision.

What was the best part?

It was really a short, near blink and miss it moment, but I really enjoyed when the small boy appeared to glimpse his own death in the trenches of World War I. What I really liked about it was his premonition actually took into account the fact that he had had the premonition! That, at the moment of his death, he knew it was about to happen because he had already seen it; we were just seeing the moment he first learned of it. I liked that detail.

What do I think will happen next?

An absolute certainty is this: The Doctor and Martha will both survive and get out of this situation! I suspect the only way out of the immediate standoff (and letting The Doctor off the hook of choosing Martha or the nurse) will be the smaller boy coming into the mix and opening the watch. From that point The Doctor should be back and he can then thwart ‘the family’ in some way before there’s a bit of heartache involved with him leaving the ‘human’ life and going back to the TARDIS.

It’ll be of most interest to see how Martha reacts. Maybe she’ll even bring up the point that he had fallen for a human woman? I envisage she’ll wind up feeling more despondent than ever, despite a successful escape!

Doctor Who: S03 Ep07 – 42

What happened?

The Doctor and Martha are propelled onto a cargo spaceship in dire distress; plunging into a sun and, at the time of their arrival, there’s approximately 42 minutes left to impact. With the TARDIS confined to a red hot ventilation shaft, The Doctor, Martha, and the handful of crew must somehow restore the ship’s damaged engines and auxiliary system in the short time available.

As if the situation wasn’t difficult enough, some strange entity is taking over members of the crew and with a fearsome cry of “Burn with me” is picking off the remaining people one-by-one. The Doctor eventually realises that this strange entity is the sun itself, attacking the ship for pillaging its energy as fuel.

The Doctor is almost killed by this energy but Martha is on hand to save the day, venting out the fuel and returning it to the sun before he dies. She is rewarded with her own key to the TARDIS in addition to the earlier gift she received; a universal telephone. Using this phone she had spoken to her mother and arranged to go and see her, unaware the call was under surveillance by people working for the illusive “Saxon”.

Thoughts

Let’s just say this now: Best episode of Doctor Who I’ve seen so far. Not just of this series, but stretching back to when Christopher Ecclestone was the main man (I don’t have any real awareness of Doctor Who prior to its modern revival). Aside from some fringe elements regarding Martha’s call home and Saxon, this was a stand alone episode that rarely relented from the moment it started and reached a near feverish level of intensity.

The title 42 referred to the number of minutes remaining before the ship crashed, which basically meant the episode ran in real time, adding to the drama. It’s a well-worn premise, seen countless times in films and TV: small group of people in a confined, contained position of jeopardy , getting picked off one by one to keep tightening the dramatic noose. It’s well-worn because, when done right, it makes for a top notch thrill ride.

What really helped this episode sail through was that the crew were a hardy, likeable bunch. We joined them at crisis point and they quickly accepted the sudden appearance of The Doctor and Martha and put them to use whilst they tried to save themselves. Between the devoted captain and wife, the lonely, disconsolate young man and the glass-half-full engineer they seemed varied and managed to bring a sense of history to their cookie-cutter collection of caricatures.

The monster of the week was more compelling when it wasn’t fully-explained. If the episode had a weak point then the monster itself, and most particularly the explanation as for why it was taking down the crew, was definitely it. The notion that this ‘sun’ was a living entity I was OK with, but the scooping out of its heart by this ship mining it for fuel and it then possessing them to drag them back to it. . . That was a bit hard to swallow.

I think it was the energy being classed as its heart that I got most hung up on. It’s not like my enjoyment was totally destroyed it just jarred me a little. But otherwise the ‘monster’ possessing the crew and intoning the deep-throated “burn with me” was imposing. Although it did become a little laughable that the threatening gesture of attack was a hand poised at the eye shield visor!

Minor niggles though, because for the majority the episode shone (pun intended) as a terrific jolt of adrenaline; it hit the ground running and then worked up to a breathless sprint. Even The Doctor seemed to get swept off his feet by it, with some interesting character traits fired out from him when he became possessed by the sun monster. He panicked when he was being put into the freezer, admitting that he was scared even, before trying to say something to Martha about his capacity for regeneration (frustrating, really, that it wasn’t quite clarified what he was trying to put across).

Perhaps most interesting was his strange manner at the end of the episode, back in the TARDIS. Martha was jubilant and rightly making a truthful joke about the fact that she had saved the day again and it was thus worthwhile her being around, but his reaction was momentarily cold and distant. Again, it was hard to gauge where his head was at during this moment.

Given this moment of coldness came just before he handed Martha the key to the TARDIS I can only figure it was almost like he’d been hit by a blast of realisation, that a) Rose was definitely gone and b) He had gone and found a replacement. In short, he was officially moving on from Rose.

Whilst that’s the best explanation I can summon, I must say I found his stern expression difficult to rationalise with that interpretation. Odd.

The episode closed out with another ‘cliffhanger’ surrounding the identity and purpose of this mysterious “Saxon”. Whilst I expect there’s going to be big reveal about this I have to say I am not as blown away by these Saxon-related stings as the show seems to think I should be. I simply cannot be stunned or excited by something or someone I don’t know anything about!

Martha has made arrangements to go and meet her mother on Election Day, but luckily she can travel in time so there’s room for a few more episodes of adventures yet, I am sure, before she drops by on that same day and, presumably, walks straight into whatever this Saxon character has waiting for them.

What was the best part?

The moment where Martha and the other guy crammed themselves into an escape pod that was then jettisoned prompted one brief moment of eerie silence. As the pod drifted helplessly towards the inferno, Martha and The Doctor looked at each other through the porthole windows, calling out to one another. It was a classy, emotional punch running counter to the high-octane pace of the rest of the episode.

What do I think will happen next?

Almost certainly The Doctor and Martha will return to Martha’s mother, on Election Day, as they discussed on the phone. There they will encounter these people that rerpresent Saxon, and presumably Saxon himself. Whilst I didn’t closely watch this series of Doctor Who when it was first-aired (in fact, having been re-watching, I am actually startled as to how few of them I watched originally – less than three so far) I am reasonably sure that this Saxon fellow will turn out to be The Master (though, I’ll be honest, his significance in the Doctor Who universe isn’t one I am aware of).

Doctor Who: S03 Ep06 – The Lazarus Experiment

What happened?

The Doctor is on the verge of finally dropping Martha off back home when they both see on the television that her family are to attend an event being run by an elderly man named Lazarus who claims to be all set on unveiling something that will change mankind forever. Unable to resist seeing, The Doctor accompanies Martha to the ceremony.

In front of his assembled audience Lazarus gets into a machine that fundamentally changes his DNA and makes him step out of it again much younger. Such tinkering, however, comes with side-effects; an abrupt metamorphosis into a giant, bug-like creature with an appetite for human flesh.

As the beast within Lazarus begins to take over it’s up to The Doctor, Martha and her sister to face him and stop him, culminating in a showdown at a church where a sonic effect in a belltower sends the monster plunging to its death. Another adventure over, Martha demands that if she’s to come along with The Doctor in the future she doesn’t want to be hanging on the promise of “one more trip” and instead wants to be his full-time companion. He agrees, and off they go.

Thoughts

Another solid ‘monster of the week’ episode of Doctor Who, although events were bolstered by the sense of progression in Martha being returned home and confronting the crushing sense of disappointment that her adventures were over, only to have herself eventually established as the ‘new Rose’. Indeed, the suggestion was that Martha wasn’t so much saddened to be left out of the travelling through space and time as she was to be apart from The Doctor. This series has been pushing her attraction towards him and, whilst at times it’s seemed a little forced, the point has carried over.

If anything it’s her open affection being rebutted by The Doctor that has painted him in a less than flattering light. He appears rather callous and I’m not sure it’s really being portrayed as entirely his absent-mindedness simply not noticing. Had Lazarus not appeared on the television would he really have not returned for Martha? The scene was played for a lighthearted joke, with The Doctor compelled to return because he just couldn’t resist seeing what Lazarus was up to, but there was the very real matter of Martha being pretty much dumped with little regard – albeit briefly.

And, again, at the end his casual disregard for her feelings when he asked her if she wanted to come along for another trip further displayed a rather arrogant and frankly boastful aspect to his character. It’s odd, because on the flipside – usually in moments of peril – he displays genuine concern for her safety and rousing admiration for how reliable and resourceful she can be in thwarting danger and surviving.

No wonder she’s confused with those kinds of mixed messages he’s sending out!

I enjoyed seeing Mark Gatiss take up the role of Lazarus; I’ve been a fan since his League Of Gentlemen days and I know he’s been a part of the writing ensemble for Doctor Who (having been a massive fan of the older shows). The only disappointment, I suppose, is that this would appear to be the one and only time he’ll ever be in it. It’s a shame – I would have hoped that an actor of his talent and standing on the programme might have seen him bag a more substantial, recurring role. Oh well.

I thought his performance as the old Lazarus was especially good; talking with his wife and really selling the age (all too often young people in old make-up look pretty much as they are: young people in old make-up!). Then, again, when talking with his wife as young Lazarus and coldly dispensing of her both emotionally and then physically was terrifically nasty.

Martha’s mother featured here and I thought her character wasn’t particularly well-handled. When she first met The Doctor she was immediately distrustful and pretty much outright hostile towards him. Fair enough, but in light of the fact that she would eventually be told in secret stuff about The Doctor that would cause her alarm for her daughter’s safety I thought it might have been more effective to have her be charmed by The Doctor first to make her panicked conversion more dramatic.

It is mentioned that a “Mr. Saxon” had informed Martha’s mother about The Doctor, though we don’t know who he is or what he said. It was only here, with his name given greater significance, do I recall that there have been previous brief references to Saxon. There was a poster in one episode stating ‘Vote Saxon’ and I am fairly sure he got a mention in The Runaway Bride Christmas episode. Maybe there have been other references to, and this Saxon is the equivalent motif of the “Bad Wolf” refrain that populated earlier Doctor Who series.

What was the best part?

Easily the scene between Lazarus and his wife when he was young. His coldness towards this woman we have to figure has been by his side for many years and who clearly doted on him was quite shocking. Whilst the scenes of the Lazarus monster weren’t actually bad, and above standard in both special effect and dramatic effect, chasing and eating people is run-of-the-mill compared to the evil cruelty Lazarus delivered upon his wife before he then killed her.

What do I think will happen next?

Well, Martha has been officially elevated to companion status which might settle some of those insecurities but, again, can only allow those affections she has for The Doctor to grow stronger. Also now ticking along is this “Saxon” element – probably a person and probably some kind of formidable foe that will present himself (I’d guess for the series finale). I’ll be looking out for any other references to him that might crop up.

Doctor Who: S03 Ep05 – Evolution Of The Daleks

What happened?

The Dalek-human hybrid marshalled plans to create more of his type. However, his leniency towards The Doctor, enlisting him to help realise his dreams, fostered mutiny amongst the remaining 3 Daleks who turned against him and set about their age-old plans of conquering and destroying.

The Doctor, Martha, and a few other people managed to prevent the Daleks from generating their own army, which resulted in two of the Daleks being killed. The Doctor confronted the last Dalek, offering him help to save their race, but the Dalek refused and made an escape into space and time. The Doctor and Martha left, with The Doctor certain he would meet that Dalek again, eventually.

Thoughts

A better episode to cap off this two-parter compared to the previous one. Whilst I did find I had some problems with it overall it managed to entertain me and restore some dignified menace to the notion of Daleks being The Doctor’s ultimate nemesis.

The biggest problem I had with the episode was The Doctor once again willing to sacrifice his own life. It’s arguable he took a calculated gamble in the first episode of this series in trusting Martha would save him, but here he offered himself to the Daleks and practically screamed at them to kill him.

He had absolutely no guarantees that the hybrid Dalek would intervene – indeed he was the most surprised of everyone that the unthinkable had happened. So this, for me is a somewhat troubling aspect to his character; his being so quick to press the self-destruct button on himself. Is this just bad writing on the show, or a planned and intended aspect to his character that will eventually be addressed?

Is the pain of losing Rose causing him to no longer have as much regard for his own life? Even though he is the last of his race, a point that he made such a big fuss about so much in this episode he was willing to help the last Dalek, the race that wiped out all his own kind. If this really is some new character flaw that will get picked up then this is terrific stuff; a sophisticated seeding of a deeper psychological insight.

I’ve got serious doubts that is what was happening, though.

The Doctor did save at least one ‘race’ from extinction in this episode though: the unfortunate human-pig slave Laszlo! I’ll be honest, if I was him, I’d rather have died. Instead The Doctor saved him and offered him a life in the slums of Hooverville where he could be stared and sneered at for the rest of his life. Gee, thanks!

The episode did have its good moments, though. I really liked the part where the leader of Hooverville gave a courageous speech to the Daleks, imploring them to find peace and co-operation, only to be greeted by the iconic “Exterminate!” and vapourised in a cheap special effect. It felt brutal, like old-style Doctor Who, undercutting cheesy expectations with nasty consequences.

How the Daleks were once again given a bit more power and respect was welcome here, as well. I thought the previous episode had rather undermined their stature and this episode went some way to regaining it. The confrontation scene with The Doctor and the last Dalek was good stuff. A last face off before the Dalek batted away any helping hand.

No doubt this lone Dalek has now gone off to hatch plans to generate more Daleks from somewhere and once again try to exterminate their way through worlds and destroy The Doctor, and I’ll look forward to seeing it/them again.

I’d be surprised if we see another Dalek in this series, mind.

What was the best part?

Easily the scene where the leader of Hooverville took a stand and made a speech to the Daleks and asked for their response. He got one. “Exterminate!” Classic.

What do I think will happen next?

Back to some stand alone episode, I should think. The ongoing issue with Martha and The Doctor’s relationship seems to continue to be one-sided and, as the episodes roll by, I don’t see much happening to stop that trend. Potentially there’s going to be something of a frustrated despair for Martha at how The Doctor won’t return her feelings. I know she’s not going to remain his companion for the next series so I anticipate their parting will be due to her just not being able to stand his inability to reciprocate her feelings.

Doctor Who: S03 Ep04 – Daleks In Manhattan

What happened?

The Doctor and Martha are transported to Depression-era New York, with construction of the Empire State Building almost finished. Investigating the disappearances of people, they discover that the Daleks have been taking humans and conducting experiments upon them. The majority of people have been turned into these slave, pig-like creatures, but the masterplan is to mould human flesh with the material Dalek form to create new human-Dalek hybrid creatures to allow their race to adapt and survive.

Thoughts

The revived Doctor Who has, I’ve thought, made a good fist of trying to remain faithful to the staples of old Doctor Who whilst bringing fresh things to a new generation. Sometimes I think they’ve been too slavish to the old material, and for me the continued re-appearance of the Daleks as the most formidable foe for The Doctor remains problematic.

The show can’t really dispense with them easily, of course. This is the race that wiped out all of the Timelords and have cropped up in some form or other in every series. The trouble is that the Daleks aren’t the terrifying force for audiences like they used to be and, in truth, they look and sound ridiculous. The moment they are on-screen it’s like the whole show is being dragged backwards, being taken down several notches in both sophistication and credibility.

Like the part in this episode where the Daleks were scanning people to determine if they were intelligent or not. It might have played out like a tense selection process. Instead it was just a line of people reacting to having a toilet plunger waved in their faces.

And, yes, the ending to the episode was also ridiculous. With the human-Dalek hybrid stepping out of the robot shell to announce itself, full on to camera – I just could not take it seriously. Fundamentally I think I was supposed to take it all really seriously, like this was a shocking new development in Doctor Who but the whole thing just felt overcooked and lacking in dramatic effect.

The idea that Martha has developed strong feelings for The Doctor was also being casually pushed along here, too. This is certainly something we’re being told about rather than shown, this time with Tallulah the dancer saying it was obvious from the way Martha looked at him there was something there. Only Martha’s retort about how he didn’t notice her sold the current state of affairs between them for me.

The construction work on the Empire State Building, with the top spire piece needing urgent completion, being coated with distinctly Dalek-like panelling. Outlandish as it seems, I can’t help but wonder if the plan isn’t to make the entire building into one enormous Dalek-shell and thereby convert all the people inside the building into Dalek-human hybrids. It’ll surely be something on a large scale for the Daleks to achieve their goals of domination.

Maybe, in fact, the Empire State will serve as some kind of generator pulsing out something across great distances that achieves the same conversion effect to produce Dalek-human hybrids?

Anyway, this was definitely one of the weakest episodes I’ve seen. It’s a shame, really, because absurd as they are anything to do with Daleks ought to see Doctor Who firing on all cylinders at the top of its game. Maybe the second half of this two-parter will deliver the punch that was lacking here.

What was the best part?

Curiously, the introduction to Hooverville as The Doctor gave Martha a quick history lesson over the plight of Americans stricken with poverty was really good. I’d never known anything about this before so I found that rather interesting. In fact I’d rather have seen the episode remain there and deal with the forgotten people living in the shadow of the looming Empire State as that appeared to be far meatier subject matter.

What do I think will happen next?

As stated, the Daleks will have some kind of plan for perfecting their evolutionary process onto a wider scale which, surely, must involve the ‘renovations’ they are undertaking on the Empire State building. The Doctor will surely thwart their grand plan. However, the Daleks here are the last few remaining so I’d be very surprised of The Doctor beat and destroyed them here, effectively wiping them out of the universe (again!). So, on some level, perhaps in their evolved form, at least some of the Daleks should escape to fight another day.

Doctor Who: S03 Ep03 – Gridlock

What happened?

The Doctor and Martha travelled into the future to New Earth, a planet The Doctor had visited previously with Rose (in series 2, New Earth). However, they find themselves in the underworld; a place little more than a slum. Martha is kidnapped by a couple who take her onto the packed traffic jam of a motorway, believing that 3 people in a car entitles them to take the fast lane. The Doctor investigates and discovers the traffic jam is endless, the motorway a neverending circle, beneath which lie ravenous crab-like creatures.

The Doctor makes it to the overworld to discover humanity has been wiped out, and all that remains is the Face of Boe struggling to maintain enough power to keep the underworld denizens alive. The Doctor finds a way to open the underworld’s ceiling and frees the people. The Face of Boe is then able to die but, before doing so, tells The Doctor he is not alone.

Martha asks what it means and The Doctor tells her the Face Of Boe must have been mistaken as he is the last Timelord.

Thoughts

I really enjoyed this episode. On the surface it had all the hallmarks of being a rather run-of-the-mill filler and yet as it unfolded it was mining some really clever ideas and themes that really chimed with me. Indeed, at first when I thought the underworld traffic jam gridlock was a deliberate ploy from the ‘higher ups’ to keep the masses occupied, I thought the show was really tapping into rather profound territory regarding social structure.

The idea that the masses could be drip-fed a fiction to keep them ticking over in their literal dead end, treadmill lives felt like a serious commentary on how the world works – the masses kept controlled and pacified in their position in life, blinkered to the reality and the larger scheme of things.

As it turned out Gridlock wasn’t attempting to be quite so politically cutting, and instead settled on a tragic situation where the people stuck in traffic were oblivious to a terrible disaster that had occurred. I was a tad disappointed, I suppose, but a return to the Face of Boe, and the promise he had made to reveal a secret as his last words to The Doctor was at least fulfilled.

Although his remarks that The Doctor is not alone are hardly offering up anything concrete to go off. The Doctor’s conviction that the Face of Boe was wrong didn’t seem overly-convincing – perhaps he doubts the belief he’s held for so long that he really is the last remaining Time Lord?

It’s certainly the most obvious conclusion to reach from the Face of Boe’s final remarks: that there is, somehow, somewhere, another surviving Timelord. But then the expression is cryptic enough to be moulded and interpreted in a whole number of other ways so, I suspect, such a clear-cut assumption won’t be correct.

The other good element to this episode was the relationship between Martha and The Doctor. I do get the feeling that she has rather fallen for him a little quick and it feels somewhat premature for her to have such absolute faith in his abilities to rescue her, and to extol his brilliance to other people. That being said, it was good that she demanded he speak to her properly and he acknowledged to himself that he hadn’t really been treating her fairly.

Good episode then, offering a solid storyline with character progression and even a dash of longstanding show mythology thrown into the mix. I certainly got a lot more than I expected!

What was the best part?

I am tempted to go with the moment The Doctor was questioning the nature of the traffic jam, of the validity of the information the people were receiving. However the close of the episode, with The Doctor rather reeling about the information he is not alone and admitting he had lied to Martha about his home planet and then plainly telling her what had happened and how it used to be. With the music and singing it verged on the cheesy, but I think it just about managed to get away with it.

What do I think will happen next?

I’d anticipate further clarification around the Face of Boe’s words (though I don’t expect that to happen within the next episode or two at the very least). My guess would be that perhaps The Doctor is a father? I do remember an offbeat remark he once made in the last series, about being a father. . . I’m a bit hazy on it, but I can only figure that somehow The Doctor isn’t quite the last Timelord in existence.

Doctor Who: S03 Ep02 – The Shakespeare Code

What happened?

The Doctor and Martha arrived in 1599, England, to see Shakespeare and his plays at the Globe in all their glory. Unfortunately a trio of Carrier Knights, very much like witches, have orchestrated the construction of the Globe to be a spot where a portal can be opened to free the rest of their race from their other-dimensional prison. With Shakespeare’s play, his words, being used as a means of unlocking the prison it’s up to The Doctor, Martha and Shakespeare to prevent it from happening.

Thoughts

I wasn’t enthused about this episode, but it proved rather enjoyable. The constant Shakespeare quotes, and running joke of The Doctor feeding ‘Will’ his most famous lines (paradox alert!), I did find somewhat tiresome, though. Clearly the writer of this episode knew his Shakespeare, both in work and in history, and many of the remarks felt like a kind of breaking of the fourth wall.

Like, for example, Shakespeare simultaneously flirting with both Martha and The Doctor, to which The Doctor quipped about a certain number of scholars being pleased. The in-joke being that speculation about Shakespeare’s sexuality has been pondered through various obscure references in some of his sonnets. That kind of thing breaks the suspension of disbelief for me.

Same goes for the use of Harry Potter-speak “Expelliarmus” at the end of the episode. “Good old, JK!” exclaimed The Doctor; such moments just totally snap me out of what’s going on and make me think of a scriptwriter being referential and communicating too directly with the audience.

But that’s just me. Maybe other people love all that. I don’t.

The monsters of the week for this episode were reasonably otherworldly whilst retaining a Shakespearean vibe, the three witch creatures calling to mind Macbeth (I felt certain a reference would show up and hammer that point and was rather happy it didn’t/couldn’t and was left more subtle). Not sure why they were called Carrier Knights, or quite what they were all about, but they served their purpose.

The interplay between Martha and The Doctor ticked along here. The episode started with him discussing how this was to be her one and only trip away with him, but there was no mention of that being the case as things were wrapping up. Of course she’s going to be around for a while yet so there’s no danger of that really happening, though I must say that The Doctor’s obliviousness of her is a little off.

I liked how Shakespeare observed the two of them, recognising the age in The Doctor’s young eyes and how Martha looked at him with a sense of surprise that he even existed. The show doesn’t quite have the energy to relive that sense of new excitement it once took the time to allow Rose to experience, but at least Martha was there to question cause and effect and consequences of time travel. The Doctor seemed wholly unconcerned with it, mind, which is probably subject matter that shouldn’t undergo too much scrutiny.

Doctor Who doesn’t quite subscribe to the ‘whatever happened, happened’ theory of linear time and yet allows whatever changes and alterations are made in history to not have a lasting effect on what has occurred. Perhaps earlier shows, years ago, thrashed out the specifics of the nature of cause and effect for The Doctor. Me? I’ll just go along with it.

Something of a one-off episode then, on which a Doctor Who series is mostly comprised of. Enjoyable enough as some light entertainment on TV but nothing really meaty to chew over in the grand scheme of things.

What was the best part?

I did like the bedroom scene with The Doctor and Martha. He very nonchalantly presented her with the option of sharing a cosy bed with him. Once she was in it all her sense of suggestion, about how small it was, went right over his head. I guess the point being made here is that The Doctor just can’t get passed Rose, can’t even see Martha as anything like an equal – and so when he talked about her it was the equivalent of slapping Martha across the face!

What do I think will happen next?

From this episode there were really only two potential ‘threads’ that I suspect will be either picked up again or continue to be pulled on. The first was Queen Elisabeth I showing up, hating The Doctor. Almost certainly this indicates an episode will feature her and result in her displeasure! The other was Martha and her evident attraction of The Doctor. Not quite sure where it’s come from so fast (the one kiss in the previous episode – must have been a heck of a kiss!) but The Doctor is so far ignorant of it to the point of obnoxious. Can’t he see that Martha is way hotter than Rose!?!

Doctor Who: S03 Ep01 – Smith & Jones

What happened?

Martha Jones, a trainee doctor, arrives at hospital for work on the day the entire building is transported to the moon by a race of police-like aliens called the Judoon. The hospital is enclosed in an airtight bubble, so whilst the Judoon begin hunting for their quarry (a shapeshifting Plasmavore) the oxygen for the stranded people in the hospital is running out. Luckily The Doctor is in the hospital, too, and alongside Martha Jones they find the alien Plasmavore and turn it over to the Judoon, who destroy it.

With the hospital returned to Earth in the nick of time, The Doctor catches up with Martha and shows her the TARDIS. As a thank you for saving him, after proving to her that he can travel through time, he offers her one trip with him through time and space.

Thoughts

My interest in Doctor Who used to be just a passing one. It is shown on Saturdays, early evenings, and if I happened to be in front of a television when it was on I’d watch it. However, I decided I’d return to the early days of the show and watch the lot since, in recent times, it’s become more sophisticated and improved as a drama series.

After the loss of Rose in the second series’ finale, this 3rd series has the burden of introducing a new companion for The Doctor. (I appreciate the recent Xmas special, The Runaway Bride, introduced us to someone that will eventually become a companion, which in retrospect makes the fumble of bringing Martha Jones into the mix even more bizarre.)

Martha Jones does make a good first impression here, though. She’s smart and has a very open mind. She’s the first to question how they can still breathe once on the moon considering the hospital building isn’t airtight, and yet doesn’t flinch when joining The Doctor to open the doors and step outside. Furthermore she has compassion, lingering to close the dead eyes of her doctor mentor, and a sense of humour as well as being very capable; she’s thrown right in at the deep end and has to save The Doctor’s life with mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.

In all honesty I didn’t like that The Doctor’s scheme basically involved him dying to save the day. When he was interrogating the Plasmavore with disguised naïve human ignorance it suggested he was merely loading up a surprise to spring. Instead he just basically allowed the Plasmavore to take his blood so the Judoon would know she was an alien. Fine in exposing her, but at the cost of his own life? It amounted to a sacrificial act and he’d only known Martha for five minutes – not enough time to establish she’d be able to save his life.

OK, the episode showed us she knew he had two hearts and had steely determination, so he could have predicted that outcome – but considering she could have easily succumbed to collapsing through lack of oxygen like pretty much the rest of the hospital’s inhabitants (her continued capacity to act was put down to sheer adrenaline which, to be honest, I didn’t really buy either) then it was a major gamble for The Doctor to take.

Those were my only nits to pick in the episode, which was otherwise a strong, confident opening full of the verve and energy that makes the show rattle along and seem to pack in so much character reveal and plot exposition that don’t seem possible in the running time. A bit like the TARDIS, Doctor Who episodes are bigger on the inside than they are on the outside – and it was fun to see that oft-repeated phrase used here when Martha first encountered the iconic police box time machine.

What was the best part?

I really liked the nifty opening, actually. Zipping across phone calls between Martha’s family, interrupted with The Doctor showing up undoing his tie (an event that would later be revealed as his proof that he could travel in time) it was a terrific way of introducing us to a major new character with an effortlessly light flair.

What do I think will happen next?

As this is Doctor Who the episodes are often standalone affairs. There is little indication about what the over-riding plot arc of this 3rd series will be (if there even is one). Ostensibly this episode paired up The Doctor with his new companion, Martha, and set them off on adventures together. The next episode preview showed me they’re going to see Shakespeare; I can’t say I am looking forward to it, really!