Review

Or How to Depress a Dalek

This week delivered everything I ever wanted in a Doctor Who episode, an angry Doctor, actually scary Daleks and the Doctor using some sort of impossible object to save the day. I even enjoyed the most preposterous solution to a bomb ever. Also I have a new room-mate who would like to give its opinion, but let’s jump straight in:

PLOT

Well this week we were off to the time of the Second World War and the London Blitz, with the Doctor’s old friend Winne Churchill who has a brand new scheme to defeat the terrible Nazi menace, and their old friends of the Doctor, the Dalek’s but whatever could they be up to this time? In all honesty from the line old friends until this time could have been the description of the Dalek, Daleks in Manhattan and the Stolen Earth, so while I was interested to see what this new era would do with the Daleks, but I wasn’t jumping up and down about it (my room has a fan so that is inadvisable anyway). I really enjoyed the episode especially the whole subservient Daleks at the start was quite amusing, as was the whole set of scenes on the Dalek ship. There was just something about this episode that was engrossing, and as I previously stated I even liked the whole scene with the android Bracewell (Someone motioned to me that in this episode there was a Star Wars homage in the part where the Daleks shoot off his hand and say ‘No, we created you’, much like ‘NO, I am your father’) I will admit it made no sense, but the pure emotion of the scene and of Bracewell (Bill Patterson) made me believe.

THE DOCTOR AND AMY

This episode was quite Amy light, so I’ll get her out of the way first, Amy continued to shine as one of the doctor’s most useful companions, working out all the clever things we expect from the Doctor. Now for the man of the episode, Matt Smith showed his full range of the Doctor traits, the absolute frustrated fury he had for the compliant Dalek, the calm brilliance that was on display when he held them for ransom (with a biscuit, I challenge you to find another TV hero who can confront his greatest enemy with only a biscuit?) and the absolute terror of the rebirth of his worst enemy. While I still feel bad after yesterday’s Tennant review, I think Mr Smith (if only his name was John) has so far been brilliant, and seems to be getting better.

SECONDARY CHARACTERS

Let’s start with Mr Churchill, the whole buddy-buddy thing that he had going on with The Doctor was really nice, I felt like it was two old friends having a catch up (the whole handshake over the TARDIS key was a nice touch). There are some people who think that Ian McNeice conveyed the insurmountable pressure that Winston was under very well. And then there was Bracewell.. I thought he was the most human character in the episode; the emotion on his face during the bomb defuesal was completely believable, basically I thought they were both much better than last week’s offering.

ALIEN/ENEMY OF THE WEEK

Well lets all have a big welcome back for the Daleks, while there has been a lot of Dalek overkill during the RTD era it was nice to see them back at their fearsome best, with a new design and paint-job too. I also found the Daleks at the start, pretending to be compliant to the humans; hilarious asking the doctor as he tries to destroy it “would you like some tea”. And using the Doctor for their master plan how surprising and interesting was that (am I being sarcastic or sincere? You be the judge). Now to explain the depressed Dalek and my room-mate, on Thursday I purchased a small Dalek (Laser non-operational of course) and as we sat down to watch the episode (well he was strapped down to stop it trying to beat me to death) it was... upbeat?? Well it was yelling exterminate rather loudly so it seemed okay. However by the end it seemed almost depressed as it tried to now kill its self over its replacement, I’m not quite sure what to do with it.. I’m thinking of showing it the stolen planet, where the Dalek kills to doctor, to cheer it up (better not show it the genocide at the end though).

NEXT TIME

River song is back, and so are the weeping angels, hidden within a myriad of stone statues, will the doctor find it before something terrible happens? Also note that in the trailer there is an image of around five of them in a corridor, is this single angel on a rescue mission?

The Crack is back, I maintain that something this obvious must be a ploy to distract us from something else, could it be the final villain in the first episode Mister Moffat alluded to in a recent interview?? Also the Stolen Earth Reset, how will this play in?

Rating: 8/10

Favourite Quote: “Don’t mess with me sweetheart”