Doctor Who: Face the Raven

That was awesome.

So this episode came from the mind of Sarah Dollard, most well known (in the BBC that is) for her contributions to Merlin and Being Human. It’s more the Being Human experience that’s used here, with supernatural elements, explained with “science.”

Dollard also has a talent for making the audience want to see the darker side of the characters. Where most writers would play it safe and shoehorn in the “we must  be better than them” message, Dollard has us begging for the Doctor to unleash The Valyard.

To give a brief overview, Maisie Williams returns as Lady Me (now Lady Mayor) who is preciding over a hidden street of alien refugees in London. Trouble arises when Rigsy (another returning character) falls foul of the residents of the street and calls the Doctor for help.

Spoilers to follow.

So it turns out that everything that happens is all part of some elaborate plan by Lady Mayor, operating under threat from some unknown enemy, to teleport the Doctor away for punishment. Oh and the big twist; Clara’s essentially caught in the crossfire of their maneuvering and dies. This is apparently Jenna Coleman’s exit to the series and comes as full on shock. Usually, the Doctor would pull out a way to save a companion in these circumstances, but no; she’s dead. I mean I hope she’s dead; I like Clara as a character, but after the whole Osgood thing, I cannot get behind some characters being invincible.

Clara’s exit is marked perfectly by Capaldi. The Twelfth Doctor does not cry (like the 10^th and 11^th) or make empty threats (like the 9^th). He tells Lady Mayor that he is going to destroy everything she has built and ruin the lives of everyone she has saved. I get the impression that his promise to Clara (that he wouldn’t seek revenge) is the only lie he told throughout the whole monologue. As soon as Clara’s gone, he essentially tells Lady Mayor that the next time they meet he’s going to kill her. None of the other Doctors (of the revived era) could have delivered that message the way Capaldi does. that performance does take focus slightly from Coleman, as she acts out Clara's final moments.

The episode’s not perfect; Clara’s adrenaline junky phase is just annoying and laid on far too thick.

But those are minor quibbles in terms of a fine episode.

Doctor Who: Sleep no More

Err that was ok.

I’ve never been 100% on board with Mark Gatiss; his work on Sherlock is pretty good, but his Who scripts have been largely unfulfilling. He’s a good writer, but I’ve never really seen why people have him pegged as the next Executive Producer of Doctor Who.

This episode is the first hint that he might be up to the job. It’s a bit like Moffat creating the Weeping Angles or the crack in time out of something that crops up in every day life; namely, sleep.

The monsters are made of sleep dust…ok. Once you get past the initial silliness of that principle, the episode is alright.

I had no love for the found footage method of shooting, until Gatiss worked it into the story, both with the explanation of why it was there and the twist at the end. That was neat; it stopped it from just being a gimmick.

The supporting cast are fleshed out and not and Capaldi and Coleman are on usual form, particularly when they have to talk directly to the camera.

It’s not without fault; the basic principle is that anyone who has been inside the Morpheus machine gets a point-of-view camera installed in the corner of their eye. That’s all very well, but I’m fairly sure we see plenty from Chopra’s perspective, when it’s made clear that he’s never used the machine. They do make an effort to make his perspective more of a helmet cam than a point of view. But why would he have a helmet cam when none one else in the rescue team did?

Also, the twist at the end kind of just rips off The Ring, without any explanation of how it works and the episode in general is quite slow until about ten minutes in.

Aside from that it’s perfectly serviceable; a nice improvement from last week.

Doctor Who; The Zygon Invasion Part 2

Stop trying to make this show about everything! For Pete sake; was this salvaged from a Gene Rodenberry script?

 

The Doctor, Clara and Osgood looking bored....like the audience

Yes IS are bad. Trouble is I came here to watch some aliens shoot lightning at a Scottish guy who’s wearing sunglasses in the dark.

Up until this point, this series has been in the category of “a tad too wordy.” This episode crosses the line into stage play levels of dialogue. I’m not looking for blockbuster explosions here, but there’s a talking scene (without so much as some music) that feels like it goes on forever. Incidentally, during this scene, the Doctor makes the same point about 3 times. I’m no expert, but I think they could have shaved some time off that scene, by having him make it once.

Oh, and that point that he makes; we should just try to talk and negotiate to avoid more killing. If we all just learnt to get along, we’d all be safe and sound.

Thank you Mr Harness and Mr Moffatt; but please explain further this “negotiation” thing of which you speak; I don’t think we’ve ever heard of it.

I get that there are children watching this and we have to keep the more weighty messages simple, but does it have to come at this cost? The message of this episode is so patronising; everyone just sit down and talk and work this out. I think the real situation that this is drawn from might be a little more complex than that.

What would have been so wrong with giving the Zygons a religious motivation and highlighting the need to end religious influence over politics in all corners of the Earth? What would have been so wrong with suggesting that UNIT was trying to control the Zygon population and caused an uprising?

The revealed Zygon motivation: they’re just angry young people with no long-term plan. Because that’s what they needed to do, patronise the younger audience too.

The one good thing about the episode is the casual reveal that this is the sixteenth time that this has happened and the Doctor has been wiping everyone’s memories. I mean, it’s only good given that the comical delivery of the line by Capaldi makes you forget what a stupid solution it is.

And finally, “what matters is that Osgood lives.”

Go away; I’m fighting not to type some profanity here. I’ve always like the way that Moffatt gives characters the George RR Martin treatment and this line of fan pandering is really unacceptable.

Why should I care about any character in this show, when I know that death isn’t the end for them? I mean unless they’re Danny Pink (because it sucks to be Danny Pink). As long as the fans moan enough, they’ll be back.

This episode is disappointing, patronising and the exact thing that nearly sank Star Trek the Next Generation.

Doctor Who: the Zygon Invasion

Peter Harness presents 24, WITH ALIENS!!

A consistent problem with this series format has been the decision to make every episode a two-parter. While it gives Moffat and his team more time to develop story, it has lead to 30 minutes of snoozing for every opening episode.

Case in point, The Zygon Invasion should be an all out action episode, but Harness has to stretch it to two making it entirely too wordy for a family show. Other issues show themselves through this problem; the world is in peril so the Doctor abandons the TARDIS for the far slower UNIT plane, with some stupid explanation. He could get inside the Zygon base in a matter of seconds in his ship, but he decides to take a plane for the sake of meeting the episode’s run time.

Look, I’m sure that this is going to pay off in next week’s episode, but I’m really tired of that being the way it is. Why should I, or any loyal viewer, have to sit through a load of set-up lines and plots that are going to end up making up 50% of the series? The stupid thing is that this is the mid point of the series and actually the ideal place for a two-parter. But as it happens, I’m now so fed up “to be continued” that I can’t tell you whether or not the episode suffers majorly for this issue.

No, scratch that actually I can tell you; I would not be complaining about the two-part nature of this episode, were it an isolated incident. Harness does everything right for a continuing story; he sets up the stakes, he delivers a cliff-hanger and he establishes the villains. But the whole thing is undermined by the notion that you as a viewer are just going through the motions; it makes it task to sit through the episode.

I take major exception with some other issues in the episode too. Osgood is back, which I see as an incredibly cowardly move by Moffat. In American TV shows like Arrow, Smallville and Star Trek, titular and popular characters have what are referred to as character shields. This basically means that an extra can be killed with one punch, but Oliver Queen can get impaled and survive (spoiler alert by the way). I didn’t expect such lazy fan-pandering from Moffat and I was very disappointed when it was announced that Osgood would be returning. This isn’t because I didn’t like her, but precisely because I did like her. Killing off a character you like is a really good way to keep the audience emotionally involved (look at Game of Thrones).  Aside from that there’s a pretty significant alteration to the way that the Zygon abilities operate that’s also given a premium BS explanation.

But, like I said, these are things I could probably get over were I not aware of the annoyingness of the format.

Not really much else to say; ably performed by the cast and crew; not a bad episode by any stretch, but suffering for the larger decisions at play.

Doctor Who: The Woman who Lived

Refreshingly dark.

This episode is an adventure comedy rolled up in a dark parody…and it’s awesome.

The Doctor stumbled across a thief who turns out to be Maisie William’s Ashildr (though she doesn’t even remember that name) from the previous episode; now immortal. This is where it really comes into its own; in the Davies days, she would be an amazing saint like figure, courtesy of the Doctor and if the Moff was penning the script she’d be some sort of impossible mystery courtesy of some time travel stuff. But with one of the big men long gone and writing about fruit and vegetables for Channel 4 and the other on proof reading duty, Catherine Tregenna gets to explore the darker side of immortality.

Ashildr (now renamed as “Lady Me”) is now so old that she requires several journals in order to remember her life; though it’s hinted that, much like the 11^th Doctor, she simply can’t bear to remember all the nasty events that have befallen her. It’s especially brave of Tregenna to explore the fact that Ashildr has now outlived her own children. This whole concept was kind of explored before with Captain Jack Harkness (who gets a shout out), but this was in the days of the Tenth Doctor, where saying he’s done anything bad or irresponsible was strictly forbidden in the writing room.

Capaldi and Williams have good chemistry and do a pretty good job of building a mentor to learner relationship.

The episode is not without fault; we’re supposed to like Rufus Hound’s Sam Swift, for some reason and his gallows humour stand up show seems a bit contrived. The main villain is so irrelevant that I can’t remember his name and the fact that someone as assertive and clever as Ashildr/Lady Me would be taken in by his lies doesn’t fly for me.

The selfie at the end (with what must be a competition winner?) also feels shoehorned, but I suppose there are only a few ways that you get across that Lady Me is still about.

On that point, I doubt it’s the last of character; she doesn’t say who told her all about the Doctor, but she uses more than one of Missy’s nicknames for him, so I expect they’ll both be in the finale.