Doctor Who: The Caretaker

So here’s what The Lodger might have looked like if Peter Capaldi was in it.

So yeah, I really enjoyed this one; there were a few things that annoyed me, but other wise another pretty good episode. I’ve noticed that Steven Moffat seems to be credited as an assistant writer on almost every episode this series, which is pretty good. I know some people don’t like his writing, but regardless of that, the series fell apart under Davies because he let so many other writers get involved, meaning that when it came to writing the finales for the series he oversaw, the plots always felt rushed and endings tacked on with poor excuses.

Moffat putting creative influence into every episode is a mark of someone taking care to make sure the show stays on track.

But anyway, this episode opts to go for the big meeting of the Doctor and Danny Pink. The concept is set up pretty well with Clara now in what I believe can be termed a “Facebook official” relationship with Danny, but still secretly running off with the Doctor every few days. Opting for comedy with an opening montage gets the audience ready for the overall tone of the episode. Like I said it’s the same as the Lodger; comedy, with dottings of seriousness.

Capaldi takes to this very well, seeming legitimately surprised that Clara recognizes him in his disguise as John Smith, despite the fact that he’s wearing a completely different coat.

Clara’s is actually a control freak for once  - this is something that’s annoyed me for a while, the writers keep referring to Clara as a control freak, but I don’t really see it most of the time. I mean this episode shows it, with the open hostility she shows to the Doctor for appearing in part of her life where he doesn’t belong. But otherwise she seems fine.

Danny also gets over the Clara’s-best-friend-is-an-alien thing pretty quickly, which he has to for the purpose of the plot, but his whole “he’s an officer” thing seems to come of the blue. It’s one thing for him to be taken aback by an alien, but delving into the more militaristic parts of the Doctor’s personality isn’t something one could reasonably do based on five minutes knowledge of someone.

This week’s villain is also very underused and serves simply as a tool for getting Danny and the Doctor in the same room. It’s a but disappointing that they’ve opted for the Michael Bay approach of focusing on the human characters rather than getting a really good baddie in.

Missy makes another appearance after a three episode absence. Although this absence is neatly folded into the story with her helper (who I’m calling “Space-Ollie-Reeder”) explaining that she’s “busy.”

Conclusion:

Good episode, good acting, keep up the good work!

Doctor Who: Time Heist

A version of the future where the universe is run by the banks…wherever did they get this idea?

Yet another good episode, with stellar performances all round and Stephen Thompson (with the assistance of Steven Moffat) delivering a nice little parody of our financial culture.

The episode opens with the remnants of last week, as Clara attempts to go on a second date with Danny Pink. That’s quickly put on hold when the TARDIS phone rings and she and the Doctor find themselves in the bowels of the Bank of Karabraxos, with no memory and two new friends.

The best thing about this episode is that it has major strengths and minor strengths. The major strengths flow from the A plot, with the heist mystery remaining entertaining throughout. The minor strengths come from the smaller bits of dialogue, such as the Doctor pointing out that if he had the TARDIS with him he could just land it in the vault. In the past there would have been some nonsensical reason for it not being there (revolving around “fixed events” or something). Having the small question and explanation put together really elevates the episode.

 On the point of time travel, Steven Moffat is credited as a second writer on this episode and I think he may be responsible for this week’s time loop. Last week relied on an event in the Doctor’s past that would cause him to go on a madcap investigation into perfect “hiders.” This ended with him (and Clara) accidentally entering his own past and causing the original event. So the Doctor’s investigation caused the event in his past that would make him start the investigation in his future.

This episode relies on the same sort of thing, with the reveal of Madame Karabraxos on her deathbed phoning the Doctor (using a number he gave her when he broke into her bank) to ask him to break into her bank and give her his number and to correct her greatest regret. I could criticise the way that it’s basically the same thing, but I have to say that I like the way that a program about time travel is actually using time travel to set up the plot, rather than as a way of getting somewhere cool.

As I said before, the performances are all very good. The stand out for me is Keeley Hawes. As Madame Karabraxos she gets the standard detached rich person role, but  as the brutal (yet bureaucratic) clone Ms Delphox, she really gets to shine. My personal highlight is her telling a man that he’s going to have his brain sucked out in the same you’d imagine her using to tell someone they’d been denied a loan. She’s pretty instrumental as to making this a good parody of a banking culture.

I also sense the hand of Moffat in the idea that the episode effectively starts with everyone losing their memoires. This has been a theme for this series; The Doctor can’t remember where he’s seen his own face before etc. Is this a hint? So far the theories are that Missy and the Promised land are things from the Doctor’s future or far flung past. Could they actually be things from the present that he’s forgetting? Are we seeing events from the Doctor’s perspective? Is Missy actually with him the entire time and just being erased from his memory? Is she the perfect hider?

Doctor Who: Listen

 Well that was creepy.

So the last episode of who that aimed for the horror angle, kind of fell apart as soon as the Doctor figured it out. This episode avoids the same mistake, by keeping the mystery going up until the end.

This allows time to develop the Clara/Danny love plot, without the episode getting boring. On that point, the Clara/Danny date Moffat makes the date realistic with Coleman and Anderson delivering the awkwardness of a first date pretty well. It seems a bit contrived that Clara seems to take any opportunity to get angry with Danny, who then takes any opportunity to get angry with her. They go from trying desperately to impress each other to acting like a long-term couple having a spat.

Aside from that plot, we have the Doctor seeking out the perfect hiders; creatures that would be so good at hiding that no one would ever know they existed. At first, I thought that Moffat might have been trying to one up his own creations The Weeping Angels, with another villain who moves and kills you without you or anyone ever seeing.

I can see the revelation at the end, that it was all his imagination and that he would rather go all the way to the end of the universe and nearly get blown out of an airlock that “admit he’s scared of the dark.”

Incidentally, there’s a bit of classic Moffat misdirection in that the teaser promised “a boy who doesn’t want to join the army.” As a young version of Danny Pink features, we’re natuarally supposed to think he was forced into the army and that’s one of the causes of the possible PTSD from which he suffers.

However, it’s actually a young version of the First Doctor, who is about to be forced  to join the army (by his parents?) who don’t believe he’s got what it takes to make it through The Academy and thus become a Time Lord. It’s a good piece of misdirection for the episode, but the Clara-haters will be very pissed off that Moffat’s essentially pasted her in as the person who assures the young Doctor that he does have what it takes.

I really don’t have much more to say; it’s a good episode, creepy and gives some more backstory to the Doctor.  

Judge Rinder

So we now know what Judge Judy would look like if she was a man.

So we’ve had a series of Judge Rinder now and it’s been met with an overall positive response.

Filmed I the studio next to The Jeremy Kyle Show, this was always a risk. Television judges have worked so well in the United States given that America has always had a more public forum approach to court proceedings in general.

The criticisms that have come up about this show seem to be centered around the failings of the court set and costumes not reflecting the British court system properly. While it is true that at small claims level, a judge in the UK will not be robed and will not generally hear the case in a full court (but rather in their chambers), I think this show is pretty much exactly what we need.

Yes, this show is not accurate in it’s representation of what a genuine small claims courts looks like in the UK, but let’s focus on the point of “courts” like this one. To give some context, like Judge Judy, Judge Rinder is an arbitrator, which is to say, he is someone who can settle legal issues outside court (arbitration being a form of alternative dispute resolution). I find it very strange that legal professionals have been criticising the mise-en-scene of program, while ignoring the fact that it’s dealing with an issue which every lawyer from student to Supreme Justice knows. The courts in this country have to hear too many cases. Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) is something the courts have been encouraging heavily in order to reduce their groaning workload and ensure that smaller cases can be dealt with faster. It also means that the really stupid cases can be heard outside a court and act as a kind of educational video to people who are considering suing people over really dumb issues. There was one case that Rinder heard in which a man had bought a pedigree Alsatian on some sort of finance deal and then accidentally got the thing killed when he threw it’s ball into the road and it was it by a van. Not only had this man refused to pay off the remainder of the finance, he was trying to recover the £12 he had spent on a spade to bury the animal, from the breeder in a counterclaim. Can you imagine what a waste of time it would have been for that to have been heard in a real court?

Yes, a small claims judge in a real court would not be as dramatic as Rinder is, but keeping the shows ratings up is the best way to ensure it survives. As long as the show survives it can keep doing what it’s doing. I can’t say I’m a fan of someone shouting (and in my opinion mispronouncing) the word “stupid” at litigants. But I’m even less a fan of morons who waste court time on trivial and ridiculous cases and would much rather see them turned into daytime entertainment.

As to the criticisms from the legal profession, I’m a bit confused by them. Why whine about the set and costume design, when there’s plenty of legitimate complaints to make. To name a few; we’ve got a criminal law specialist deciding cases of a purely civil nature; the fact that ITV pays any settlement awarded could undermine the interests of justice; the show is always weighted in the defendant’s favour, given that they have no financial loss no matter the outcome.

But no; let’s moan about the set design and the fact that he’s wearing robes over his suit; that’s probably the best way to avoid looking arrogant and antiquated.