So in the spirit of shameless self-promotion, and for any of my readers who care, I’ll make sure I post links up here to any Skaro reviews I do.

First up is the latest installment in the Doctor Who Adventure Games series: TARDIS, now available for free from the BBC website.

Read the review on Outpost Skaro.

Up until this year, I would probably say series 4 was my favourite.  David Tennant had playing the 10th Doctor down to a fine art, and in Donna there was a companion who I found a much better match for Tennant’s Doctor than either Rose or Martha.  The episodes by and large I found consistently good and the return of Davros, the icing on the cake.

So Steven Moffat certainly had a lot to live up to.  And straight from the Eleventh Hour, the new series hit the ground running, with possibly the best series opener yet.

For me, the real stand-out thing of the whole series was undoubtedly Matt Smith’s Eleventh Doctor.  The youngest actor in the role, and pretty much an unknown (not that David Tennant was really a household name prior to getting the role) there had been a fair amount of worry in fandom about how he would be in the role.  But it quickly became obvious why Steven Moffat had had so much confidence in him.  The initial scenes with Amelia won me over quickly, and over the course of the series he continued to impress, pitching his Doctor as much more of a mad professor than his predecessor, this portrayal really struck a chord with me, aided no doubt by the great quotable lines Steven Moffat kept feeding him, and his brilliant delivery of them. “Its a fez, I wear a fez now.  Fez’s are cool.”

This series also showed a willingness to experiment a little, obviously a sign of the new production team finding their feet.  The arc plot was greatly expanded in comparison to previous years, with the scene in Flesh and Stone that was later revisited in the finale, and the cracks appearing throughout the show.   The overarching threat of the Silence was left unresolved, and instead set things up for next year.   However we also had the Van Gogh episode.  An episode that could’ve so easily been a pure historical, focused solely on Van Gogh and his mental issues.  These were brave moves, and for me paid off.  Whether the more general audience bought into it I don’t know, but at least with the overarching plot, they’re promised a resolution next year, so don’t have too long to wait.

In Amy and Rory, again Steven Moffat took what RTD had done previously and built on it.  In some ways you can easily draw parallels to Rose and Mickey in the Christopher Eccleston series, but here things play out very differently.  Rose was obviously not as attached to Mickey as Amy is to Rory, and where the former couple ended up separating over Rose’s travels with the Doctor, here the Doctor gets actively involved in trying to help the couple, bringing Rory onboard the TARDIS and taking them away for a romantic getaway (how was he supposed to know there’d be evil fish-vampires there?).  This provided the middle of the series with a nice boost, and gave Amy a strong character arc for the series as she realises how much she loves Rory, only to lose him again in Cold Blood.  All this means that when he comes back in an Auton body, only to near-fatally wound Amy and then spend 2000 years guarding her in the Pandorica, its all the more powerful, and it all culminates nicely in their wedding.

Not just the actors and writers changed this year though, with various pieces of design getting make overs as well.  The new TARDIS console room went down very well with me.  I’m not a huge fan of the actual console itself (I’ve never been a massive fan of the bric-a-brac look), especially the central column which I think looks too cluttered making it hard to make out features like the blown-glass sculpture at the centre.   However the room is brilliant.  I love the multi-level aspect that’s been increased from the previous version, and it was really nice to see a return of the big viewscreen that was completely absent in the Eccleston/Tennant console.  The fact there’s various corridors and doors heading off really leads me to hope that at somepoint we’re going to finally explore more of the TARDIS in the new series.

The one makeover though that didn’t work for me, was the new Daleks.  They’ve been discussed to death in most places, but suffice to say, I greatly preferred the RTD versions.  I do though like the idea of the specific Daleks in certain roles marked out by their colour, and what role the Eternal will come to play should be interesting (my assumption is that it’ll end up like the Cult of Skaro, working separately from the others on its own projects to ensure the Dalek race continues and thrives).

Overall, this series has definitely been a big success for me.  I’m actually slightly surprised at just how much Matt Smith has won me over so quickly.  If I were doing a “best Doctors” list, he’d almost certainly be near the top.  Steven Moffat’s ambitious scripting paid off massively for me, and the high points of the series (The Eleventh Hour, Time of Angels/Flesh and Stone and The Pandorica Opens/The Big Bang) probably, for me, were even higher than those set by previous series.

I find myself eagerly awaiting the Christmas Special and series 6, but in the meantime we’ve got Matt Smith’s appearance in Sarah Jane Adventures to look forward to.  Sure to be interesting as Sarah and Jo meet the new Doctor, but also as we have Russell T Davies scripting the Eleventh Doctor for the first time, something I’m very much looking forward to.

Steven Moffat had certainly held true to RTD’s template for the first part of his finale.  All of reality at stake and lots of returning faces and everything screaming EPIC!   However for his finale, things suddenly get scaled back to become much more intimate as the focus is brought squarely on the TARDIS crew (and River) as they try to restore the universe and the TARDIS.

The opening was particularly effective, re-using the opening from Eleventh Hour, but with the twist that this is now the universe as seen at the end of The Pandorica Opens, where all other worlds have been wiped out, and the Doctor never crash lands in the back garden. Given how popular the Amelia/Doctor scenes were in the series opener, it was great to see her back, and the reveal of Amy being the one in the Pandorica was really nicely done.

Steven Moffat indulges his love of time travel here to great effect.  With the Doctor popping in and out throughout the story to help arrange his own escape, Amy’s resurrection via Amelia and the Pandorica and finally the resetting of the universe, all via the vortex manipulator seen last episode.   Its played with great fun, as the strangeness of the Doctor suddenly appearing in a fez and with a mop (fez’s are cool) sits wonderfully with Matt Smith’s take on the character.

As the Doctor takes a hit from a partially-restored Dalek, the story shifts to the Doctor, badly injured and having realised the only way to restore the universe is to use the Pandorica and risk trapping himself in the void on the other side of the cracks.   These scenes are where Steven Moffat brings back some of the emotion people have claimed has been missing from his run, as the Doctor, living his life in reverse, carefully figures out the way he can be restored, finding Amelia waiting for him in her garden, tucking her into bed, and telling his story of the old, yet new, borrowed box in the most brilliant blue.

It all built up to a brilliant “punch the air” moment, as the wedding day arrives and the Doctor’s story triggers Amy’s memories of him, allowing her imaginary friend to reappear slap, bang in the middle of the meal.  The Doctor emerging already dressed in his top hat and tails for the wedding was great, and it all built wonderfully towards giving us the great final moments of the Doctor, Amy and Rory all together in the TARDIS, heading off towards the Orient Express and the Christmas Special. The fact the old, new, borrowed, blue had been so expertly woven into the Doctor’s story worked beautifully, allowing the viewer to suddenly twig what the Doctor (and Steven Moffat) had done just as Amy’s figuring out herself.

I don’t think we’ve had an ending that upbeat since the series came back, as they’ve always had to deal with a main cast member leaving (9th Doctor, Rose, Martha and Donna), so it made a welcome change in pace, and allowed Steven Moffat to end the series in such a brilliantly happy way that RTD was always denied. But then, in fairness, RTD was exceptionally good at those emotional wringer endings, so this isn’t really a complaint, just a very nice change of pace.

Despite that however, I’m very tempted to say this was the strongest series finale we’ve had. Both parts held up as great episodes on their own, and Steven Moffat expertly weaved in finale aspects people were used to, while also allowing it to draw in things that had been setup throughout the series.

And there’s setup in place for next year as well. The Silence and whoever orchestrated everything by controlling the TARDIS remain to be revealed. Likewise, we’re teased that we’ll be finding out River Song’s story soon too. I like the fact neither of these reveals have been rushed, but I’m also glad its being indicated they will be revealed next year. I like the setup going across series, but this isn’t, and should never be Lost, so I’m glad we’ve got lots of good stuff to look forward to next year with the promise that it’ll actually be resolved.

Christmas can’t come soon enough

In many ways, Steven Moffat has stuck to quite an established format for the finale. The stakes are raised to “end of the universe” levels and there’s some big fanservice thrown in, be it Dalek fleets, Cybermen versus Daleks, or a massive Companion team up, RTD always new how to please the fans with spectacle. In that way, Steven Moffat has stuck to what people know, with a mammoth alliance of the Doctors old friends and enemies revealed towards the end of the episode, having joined forces in light of the oncoming universal extinction.

However he has also woven his own series feel in amongst this, with the fairytale theme of the series again present, in the form of a story about The Pandorica. An ancient box supposed to hold the most dangerous warrior in existence, having been tricked into it by a good wizard.

The destruction of the TARDIS and the crack, obviously take centre stage in this story, as we open with a brilliant sequence in which the high profile guest stars of this series all feature in which Van Gogh has a vision of the coming destruction, and his painting of it is passed down through the years, before finally retrieved from Liz Ten by River Song. It was a fantastic opening to the episode, that immediately showed the level of planning that’s obviously gone into this story arc. Previously RTD always focused more on hints and teases rather than actual story arcs (and understandably so – you don’t want to scare off casual viewers), but I think this opening showed that we’re not just dealing with a 2-part finale that’s been teased, but rather the culmination of a story arc that’s been carefully planned throughout the run.

From there, we get a superb build up to the final scenes, as River, Amy and the Doctor find the Pandorica surprisingly quickly. Instead Steven Moffat wisely uses the slow unlocking of the Pandorica to ratchet up the tension, adding in a Cyberman attack for good measure.

And talking of the Cybermen, while they look the same (and refer to “all universes” being at threat, implying they’re definitely the Cybusmen), they’ve been updated slightly to be more in line with the originals. The Cyberhead trying to attach itself to Amy, and the reveal of the rotting skull inside it was a great horror moment, and shows they’ve evolved from the “brain in a box” Lumic originally designed. Personally I’m very glad by this, as I always thought that made them too robotic, versus the body horror aspect of the Cybermen (and so well captured by Star Trek’s Borg).

By this point, Matt Smith seems pretty comfortable with his take on the Doctor, and as always was a joy to watch as he scrabbled around trying to figure things out. His Doctor immediately drawn the mystery of the Pandorica, a thing he previously thought only a myth (in a similar way to how the Tenth Doctor was drawn to the mystery of the Satan Pit). It made a heck of a lot of sense that the alliance knew this would be how to ensnare him, and those final scenes of him being dragged into the Pandorica, as he desperately tries to argue that only he can stop the TARDIS exploding made for a powerful ending.

And to wrap everything off, we’ve got the much-speculated return of Rory, but with one heck of a twist. Obviously, something related to the crack allowed him to be reborn into this Auton version of his body, but the reveal that that’s what he was, as he struggled to stop himself killing Amy. Wow.

The only downside I can see to this awesome first part, is how part 2 must now live up to it. These two-part stories tend to be better judged as a whole, and traditionally part 1 tends to be an excellent setup. The trick is in coming up with a believable way out of the universe-threatening peril. However, Steven Moffat has been responsible for more than his fair share of quality 2-parters throughout the show’s run (most recently, the superb Time of Angels and Flesh and Stone), so my hopes are high that Saturday could well be one of the best series finales we’ve had.

This was a really enjoyable episode.  Played mainly for laughs, Smith’s Doctor is the most alien he’s been.   Completely out of his depth having to live life as a human there’s a lot of broad laughs from the Doctor’s inability to fit in.  Despite the story’s origins as a Doctor Who Magazine comic strip, its still hard to imagine this story working with the 10th Doctor, who seemed so much more human by comparison.

In fact, in some ways, the  idea that this is the same Doctor who had Christmas dinner with the Tylers, and spent years exiled to Earth perhaps jars with the humour, but then it is pretty consistent for Smith’s Doctor, remembering his reaction to Amy’s pregnancy a few weeks ago.  Whereas the nineth to tenth Doctors saw a shift from a Doctor who barely tolerated other humans most of the time and loathed social interaction to one much more comfortable with it, the Doctor’s personality has now veered even further off in the other direction and he’s genuinely puzzled by it.

That being said, he’s not as entirely out of his depth as he looks.  He twigs to the feelings Craig and Sophie have for each other pretty quickly, and he’s certainly a dab hand at football (playing nicely to Matt Smith’s previous career).  I have to wonder how much of his dizziness is an act for other’s benefits.   Perhaps its not so much that this incarnation is worse at these interactions, perhaps he just finds playing up his alien-ness amusing?

James Corden is someone who’s on TV a lot these days, although I must admit I’ve only seen him in a few things.  Gavin and Stacey pretty much completely passed me by and I only caught the first episode of the much-maligned Horne and Corden sketch show.  Here though he was very much the straight man to the Doctor’s antics and I thought he came out of it brilliantly.   Corden’s relied very much on his comedic roles lately, so to see him playing a role straight was nice and underlined that he’s actually a good actor.

If I had one complaint though, it was mainly that I felt the script was much too heavy handed with the romance being Corden’s character of Craig and his friend Sophie.  As the episode went on, I started to find myself getting pulled out of it during these scenes, thinking to myself “Yes! We get it! They both fancy each other but are too scared to make the first move”.  That was probably the only bum note I really had with the story though.

The central threat to the episode was well done too.  The changing image of the figure beckoning people upstairs was creepy, and the reveal of the threat as an alien attempt at a TARDIS was fascinating.  Its perhaps a shame that it was so throwaway though.  This is the first time we’ve seen such a craft in the new series outside of the TARDIS, and even in the classic stories, the only race that came close to making a TARDIS were the Daleks (waaaay back in The Chase).    The fact a race has created something so very close, using the perception filter as a makeshift chameleon circuit, and even borrowing the central console design strikes me as worth a story in itself, rather than just a throwaway menace.

That being said, the alien TARDIS was a really nice piece of design.  And I loved how it echoed the McGann console room (my favourite) with the pillars that curved in towards the console.

The lightweight nature of the story probably means that it won’t be one of the standouts of the series.  Highlights like the Eleventh Hour, Time of Angels and last week’s Vincent and the Doctor perhaps draw attention away from this episode, but it was none-the-less a really enjoyable, fun story.   No doubt to give us a slight respite before we plough straight into the first part of the finale on Saturday, which if the teaser is anything to go by, looks very, very epic.

The second “celebrity historical” of the year, finds the Doctor and Amy discovering a monster in one of Vincent Van Gogh’s paintings, leading them back to visit him and find out what happened.

What follows is a particularly powerful story revolving, not around the mystery of the monster in the painting, but instead around the character of Vincent Van Gogh.  Here’s someone regarded as one of the best painters who ever lived, but in his own time, he’s a joke, thought mad by all that live around him, unable to generate even the slightest amount of interest in his work and his vision, and ultimately battling with the depression that this causes.

And its his unique vision which becomes the central conceit of the story.  He sees the world in such a singular way that he is aware of the things other people miss.  This is presented fairly literally (he can see the otherwise invisible monster) but also just as an eye for the details others overlook, such as when he sees the pain Amy is in, even though she herself has no memory of the loss of Rory (and there’s the wonderful look of remorse on the Doctor’s face when Vincent mentions this, a nice touch by Matt Smith).

The monster itself basically becomes an excuse for the focus on Van Gogh’s character and his struggles, although there is the nice twist that the monster itself was blind, another nod to Van Gogh’s vision being a focus of the story.

All this culminates in the great scene where the Doctor and Amy take Van Gogh back with them to 2010 to let him see his work being exhibited, and see how his art is loved and appreciated (with a great guest turn by Bill Nighy).  It was a surprising part of the episode for me, as I don’t think we’ve ever really see the Doctor do this before.  As Van Gogh starts to break down its hugely powerful, and then only underscored when they return and, despite Amy’s hopes that they turned things around for him, she discovers Van Gogh still committed suicide a few months later.  From the expression on the Doctor’s face, I have to assume he knew this would be the outcome all along, hence his willingness to give Van Gogh the little glimpse of the future.

This episode definitely stands out in the series so far for being a bit different to what we’ve had up until now.  With the monster taking such a major backseat to the guest star, it gave us a strong look into who Van Gogh was, I think this was possibly the strongest “celebrity historical” appearance to date, and it certainly gave us more insight into the man than, say, Churchill a few weeks before.

A great episode, and one that I think really stands out as a high point in the series.  The specific character-focused plot I think works particularly well as it provided a shift in tone from most other episodes, and there’s that magical moment where all the characters are staring at the night sky, and see it resolve into how Van Gogh sees it.

The Silurians have long been one of my favourite groups of Doctor Who monsters, and their return had been rumoured for a while.  The concept of a monster that’s not actually an “alien”, that previously was the dominant life form on Earth and wants it back is a strong one.  And with the advent of the Sea Devils, the idea of different types of Silurian was introduced, making them easy to be re-invented for the modern series.

This two-parter was interesting in how much it felt like a love letter to the Pertwee era.  The drilling project evoked memories of Inferno, and nicely used that same idea as a way to explain this group of Silurians waking up.  Part 1 also felt a lot like build up, with the Doctor’s net of cameras providing a great “A-Team moment”, but ultimately proved to be so much padding when it was immediately rendered useless.  A bit more successful in that regard was part 2, which provided the payoff for much of the setup, but then this is a common thing in 2-parters (most recently, The End of Time is a great example of a part 1 that was probably lacking when taken on its own, but part 2 brings everything together).

For the Silurians themselves, I found them incredibly well realised.  While I was initially disappointed that they looked more human than previous incarnations, their characterisation was spot on, and the lack of a full-head mask (as previous Silurians and Sea Devils had) certainly allowed the actors to shine more.  Indeed some of the emotion of the second part would’ve probably been lost if the actors’ faces had been buried under a tonne of latex.  The idea of the battle mask though I thought was a nice compromise in this regard.

A staple of the Silurian stories, the morality, was also present.  Be it the Doctor’s rage at the Brigadier blowing up the Silurian base, or Davison’s “There should’ve been another way”, the Silurians and humans meeting never ends well, and the same is true here, as the desperate mother is goaded into killing Alaya on the surface, while Alaya’s sister Restac is desperate to wipe out humanity even before she finds out about her sister’s death.  Neither side is in the right here, with the Doctor stuck in the middle,  and that’s something that rung very true for a Silurian story.  Unlike previous stories though, this tries to end on a more hopeful note, with the Silurians due to reawaken in 1000 years to try again with the hope that both sides will be more ready to live together.

Outside of the main Silurian plot though, we find the main arc of the series moving on as well.  The crack’s sudden appearance initially felt quite forced (although it does seem consistent that the crack only turns up after the Doctor and Amy have been in a certain place for a period of time – save the initial crack in Eleventh Hour) but it became vital to what happened next, as Rory was killed by Restac and then absorbed by the crack, wiping him from history.  It all felt incredibly quick and brutal, as the characters were also running from the gas, and the follow up scene with the Doctor forcing Amy to remember him was powerfully acted by both of them.

That said, I don’t think we’ve seen the end of Rory.  The idea that time can be rewritten is integral to the crack, so I suspect he’ll be seen again at the end of the series.  That the Doctor’s pulled what appears to be a piece of the TARDIS from the crack could point to things being changed.  Does that mean the TARDIS got destroyed?  I can’t see that happening in the finale.  So either that gets changed, or the piece of the TARDIS is a red herring (or the outer shell is damaged but is restored).  My money would be on the cause of the crack (TARDIS destruction) being changed though, which could have interesting side effects on the rest of this series (its been suggested before that we’ll revisit key points in the series in the finale causing us to see events in a new light).  Time changing is a big part of what’s going on here and I can’t wait to see how it all plays out.

The TARDIS crew are presented with two scenarios.  In the first, its five years later.  Rory and Amy have left the TARDIS and settled down to start a family when the Doctor drops back in for a visit.  In the other, they’re still onboard the TARDIS, but its hurtling towards a cold star, threatening to kill them all.    And a mysterious stranger called the Dream Lord says they must correctly figure out which is reality.

Episodes like this always have one major falling down point.  When faced with the two realities, of course the one in the TARDIS leaps out as the more likely to be real.  It seems unlikely that the writers would leave the companion pregnant for the rest of the series after all.   So straight away I was wondering about a twist.  Surely Doctor Who won’t leave it that straight forward?

And so I was immediately put in mind of an Outer Limits episode that stuck in my mind. The episode was Tempests and featured an astronaut jumping between two realities.  One in which the mission of mercy they were on was a success, and another in which while on that mission they’d crashed and he and the crew were trying to survive.  Eventually its revealed both are fake, the astronauts all having been captured by spiders which inject their victims which a hallucinogenic venom.

So oops, a pity that stuck in my head, since that was actually the twist here as well.  But anyway

This episode worked for me as I enjoyed how it helped resolve the Amy/Rory relationship (for now anyway).  By having Amy face Rory’s death (albeit only in one of the dream realities) it gave her the jolt she needed to realise how much she actually cares for him.  I mentioned before that I was glad to see this relationship being tackled head on, and so for me, this was very satisfying.  For now, the couple seem content to continue their TARDIS adventures before returning for their wedding, however I can’t help but feel that there’s a more permanent resolution looming in the future.  After all, Rory actor Arthur Darville isn’t in the opening credits, whereas Karen Gillan is.  So I assume the question of their relationship and the wedding is not quite finished yet.  However for now, this has formed a nice little mini-arc to help boost the mid-season of the show.

The other nice thing in this episode was the Dream Lord.  The Doctor recognises him for who he is straight away although isn’t in a hurry to share the information.  Its a nice touch that the Doctor puts it together so quickly, playing to both his intelligence, but also his experience.  The Dream Lord is revealed as a projection of the Doctor’s darker side, and this is something the Doctor knows only to well, whether it was recently terrifying himself when he went over the line during The Waters of Mars, or more interestingly, his dealings with the Valeyard during Trial of a Time Lord.  Like the Dream Lord, the Valeyard was a projection of the Doctor’s dark side.  However back then the Doctor didn’t recognise him for what he was.  Here he’s perhaps been able to recognise himself in the Dream Lord that much more quickly as a result.  The Dream Lord forms one of those nice characters that can be treated as a standalone villain, but also gives the fans a lot to discuss.

This was definitely a nice, and important episode.  It sees the relationship between the three TARDIS companions develop as Amy realises she doesn’t want to lose Rory, and allows Matt Smith’s Doctor to shine, showing off his intelligence, and drawing on the character’s darkness as well.

Its a great scene.  Well played for laughs, as the Doctor, bumbling through social interaction in a way his 10th incarnation never would have, decides that he’s going to try and fix Amy and Rory’s relationship, following her pouncing on him.  The Doctor’s confused reactions after telling Rory that she’d kissed him and that he should be happy because she’s a good kisser were brilliant, and helped underline that this incarnation seems more of a return to the “classic” Doctors.  I certainly could not have seen Tennant’s Doctor doing this.

And so they’re whisked off to Venice, where they quickly find the city in lockdown, and under the thumb of the House of Calvierri which holds an academy full of beautiful girls who have an aversion to sunlight and long pointy teeth.

But there’s a twist here.  Of course, long-term fans will know that vampires are longtime enemies of the Time Lords, with the Doctor himself killing the last great Vampire back in State of Decay.  However these aren’t actual Vampires.  Instead they’re a race of fish, hiding in human form thanks to perception filters, having had to escape their homeworld as the crack appeared on it, bringing the Silence.

This is us presumably seeing a shift from just the crack having focus, to the idea of a menace beyond it.  The Silence did get name checked in the first episode, but here its given the attention.  Was the Silence what was rewriting time and causing the Angels and Clerics to be erased from history?  I guess the suggestion is that its not the crack itself that was doing that, since various people, Prisoner Zero and the Saturnynians here, have been able to use the crack to move from one space and time to another.  I quite like this shift in focus though, as it progresses the arc along slightly, but its still not a major thing that might confuse casual viewers.  Its a subtle shift, but it prevents the arc plot from getting stale.

The episode itself was a bit of a mixed bag.  Still enjoyable, but it undoubtedly suffered from following on from the awesome Angels 2-parter.  It wasn’t helped by the ropey effects of the Doctor climbing the roof at the end (a resolution that brought to mind Evolution of the Daleks from three years ago), and the strangeness of the perception filter.  If the Countess is hiding her true form with one, how can she take off her clothes at the end?  And would the other Saturnynians in the water really not recognise her and eat her because of it?  Minor nitpicks I grant you, but they did jump out.

Most interestingly, aside from the arc plot, we see a smaller subplot stretching out across several episodes.  Amy’s run off from her wedding day, and jumped the Doctor, and so he’s trying to fix their relationship.  Its a nice little mini-arc, and its good to see their relationship being directly addressed, whereas Rose just took off and dumped Mickey, leaving him to be suspected of killing her for a year, and then leaving him hanging on even after that.  I was never much of a fan of Rose for that reason (although that selfish aspect of her character was obviously deliberate), so its good to see Amy’s relationship being directly addressed early on.

Following on from the Angels episodes was always going to be tricky, and I think this episode did a good job.  While it didn’t feel as solid as the Toby Whithouse’s previous episode (School Reunion) it was still an enjoyable episode with some great gags.  The Hammer Horror nod with the girls at the school was nicely done, and the location was nice and atmospheric.

Anyway, so a much anticipated double episode, with Steven Moffat bringing back two of his own popular creations, River Song and the Weeping Angels.

Here’s the Doctor and River’s relationship has clearly progressed since Silence in the Library.  It seems to be established now that they’re meeting each other in reverse order, (so River will gradually know the Doctor less and less with each appearance) however most interestingly, from the Doctor’s interactions with River, we can assume that Doctor #10 must’ve had at least one if not several off-screen adventures with River.  This is a neat trick to allow the script to pick up the characters without having to worry about the Doctor dealing with having seen her death the last time they met.

We also see the Doctor’s distinct discomfort with River.  He deeply dislikes meeting someone from his own future and you can’t help but feel its partly down to genuine concern about the time lines, but also a clever play on the Doctor’s arrogance.  He’s used to being the smartest one in the room, and when he’s paired up with River, he’s constantly on the other foot, as she teases him about “spoilers”.  This is summed up with the great scene where she perfectly lands the TARDIS (having been taught how to fly it by someone other than the Doctor, intriguingly – my personal reaction was to wonder if it was maybe Jack), admonishing him for always leaving the brakes on when he complains that it doesn’t make “the noise”.   From a fanboy point of view though, while it didn’t make the signature “wheezing, groaning”, we did get the return of the landing chime commonly used throughout the 80s which was a nice touch.

We also get a couple of hints about River.  That she’s already been there for the Pandoric opening (so we can expect to see her again in the finale), and that she’s in jail for murder.  The hints seem to point to her killing the Doctor, but I wonder how that would play out.  Perhaps in her first adventure she killed the Doctor, providing a nice symmetry to her dying the first time the Doctor meets her.  Of course, I don’t believe that she’s actually killed the Doctor.  I’d expect it to be just her believing that she did.  On the other hand, it does seem pretty obvious that it could be the Doctor, which would make me wonder if that’s what Steven Moffat wants you to think, while he prepares something else entirely.     There’s also the issue that a storyline like that would be so long term, its probably not practical.  So I’m expecting more twists when we next meet River.

The Angels were I suppose an obvious monster for Moffat to bring back.  Easily the most popular of the new monsters since Doctor Who returned, I had worried that bringing them back might detract from the superb Blink.  I’d need not have worried though, as they’re superbly used here.  The new wrinkles Moffat added just added to the terror, with the Angel emerging from the video recording, and culminating in the incredibly tense scene where Amy has to walk, with her eyes closed, through the forest of Angels, as they start to move when they realise she can’t see them.    Creepy, creepy scenes, and you’ve got to admire Moffat for making such a successful monster based around such a huge limitation of them being statues.

I also loved (if that’s the right word) the personality Angel Bob showed.  It was truely nasty and malevolent, getting Amy to count down for example, just for fun.  A monster that straight out nasty is not something we’ve seen a lot of in Doctor Who.

Of course, we were also treated to another surprise in the form of the crack reappearing, but also being explained to some degree.  It had been, up until this point, treated in the same way as the kind of teases we’d had in previous series (like Bad Wolf).  With this episode, Steven Moffat brings the crack front and centre, making it a big part of events going forward.  Its also intriguing to see that its causing time to be rewritten, but also more interestingly, the Doctor’s almost happy realisation of this.

From a plot point of view, Steven Moffat seems to be using the crack to clear the remaining decks, removing public knowledge of the various alien invasions and the like, to allow him to reset the Doctor’s world into something more like our own (albeit with UNIT presumably).   I really hadn’t expected this, but it raises up interesting questions for future episodes.  How much of what we’ve seen previously has been reset for example?  Would this mean that certain elements (such as Harriet Jones, Prime Minister) could make a return?  It certainly allows a degree of flexibility in continuity in the start of this new era.

Easily the strongest story since the Eleventh Hour (and possibly even stronger than that), what makes this story so amazing is that it was the first one filmed, yet you honestly couldn’t tell from watching it, with both Matt Smith’s Doctor and Karen Gillan’s Amy as confidently played as they have been from the start of this series.