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And so I finally get to writing my review of The End of Time and the last adventure for the 10th Doctor (not counting future appearances in charity or anniversary specials obviously ).

In true RTD form, for the 10th Doctor’s finale we were treated to a huge epic spectacle, with returning Time Lords, a super-powered Master, Laser Turret-toting Wilf and a high-diving Doctor.   However where this 2-parter truely shined was in the smaller moments, and I suspect they’ll what’ll be remembered in years to come more than the big, epic stuff.

I’ll be honest.  On first watching part 1, my immediate reaction was “oh dear”.  The Master’s resurrection just seemed far too magical for Doctor Who, and his subsequent super-jumping around I didn’t like (even if I did get the explanation for it).  The head-shaking effect didn’t really work for me either (funnily enough most of these complaints I can link to Last of the Time Lords.  I similarly didn’t like the sped up Doctor effects for his hyper-aging or the flying, super-powered Doctor from that story’s conclusion).  The Vinvocci seemed out of place as silly comedy aliens, and the Obama stuff also seemed a drawn out joke purely for the punchline of the Master being President of the US.

But where I think all of this stuff fell down was that it was purely setup.   None of these things were meant to be taken in the context of that single episode.   And once part 2 was on air, everything clicked into place.  The Vinvocci’s importance to the story clicked in and the Master’s plan provided part of the mechanism for tracking the drumbeat and the return of the Time Lords.  Part 2 was a superb episode and I loved it to bits.  In context of the whole story, part 1′s sole failing really was that it was a setup episode, moving everyone into place for the bigger events of the second part.  Perhaps part 1′s running length could’ve been trimmed a bit, however taking the End of Time as one whole story, it all comes together.

However as much as I disliked some of the bigger elements of part 1, the one scene I hear people referring to time and again is the cafe scene between the Doctor and Wilf.  Where The End of Time really, really shines is the scenes between these two characters, as both actors really take all the great character pieces they’re given and raise them to even greater heights.  The way the Doctor is so close to breaking down when he’s telling Wilf of the mistakes he made is powerful stuff.  We’ve never really seen the Doctor this defeated before, and his reaction to his upcoming death is powerful.  I liked how he’d interpreted the prophecy as his actual death, not regeneration (which, of course, we the audience knew it would be).  But even then he explains how regeneration will still be like death for him, knowing he’ll change so much that he’ll be a new man and cease to exist as he is.

This theme of Wilf and the Doctor playing off each other is the story’s true strength, and continued into part 2, be it Wilf trying to convince the Doctor to take up arms against the Master, or the final revelation when Wilf is revealed as the source of the four knocks.

David Tennant is at his most powerful in these scenes as well.  From his breakdown in the cafe, to the wonderful change in his expression when he thinks he’s survived, only to hear the four knocks, it was hard not to be affected by his performance.  Its truely heartbreaking when the Doctor realises that the moment has come, and even though he rails against the injustice of it, there’s never a moment’s doubt that he’s going to jump into the booth to save Wilf.  Tennant really makes the most of the material he’s given in his last episode, and for one last time reminds us of just how good an actor we’ve had playing the Doctor these last four years.  His final line of “I don’t want to go” was not only powerful, but I suspect reflected the feelings of most of the audience at that point as well.

Of course, the Time Lords came back, and that’s worth mentioning.  Many had speculated that it was going to happen, with the Time Lords being reinstated for Steven Moffat’s era and Matt Smith’s Doctor.  However what we got instead ended up emphasising that they shouldn’t come back (well, at least not just now).   The return of the Time Lords served to draw a line under the Time War as we discover that the Doctor’s been sugar-coating his memories of them ever-so-slightly.

Of course, those fans who’ve watched the old episodes were already aware that he was looking at the Time Lords through rose-tinted glasses, although the degree to which he was doing it, and the fact it was deliberate, came as a shock.

It turns out that the Master wasn’t the only Time Lord resurrected during the Time War, as its revealed that the mysterious narrator throughout part 1 isn’t only President of the Time Lords, but is also Rassilon (the assumption being that it’s THE Rassilon).   Sadly, it also quick becomes apparent that the rumours the 2nd Doctor referred to in the Five Doctors were true and he’s a bit mad.  Ever since Eccleston’s run, its been established that at the end of the Time War, the Doctor pulled the trigger on both the Daleks and the Time Lords.  I’ve always assumed that the loss of the Time Lords was an unavoidable side effect of getting rid of the Daleks, something the Doctor had no choice to do, in order to rid the universe of a great evil.   Now we know that that’s not the case.   When the Doctor got rid of the Time Lords, it was to stop them specifically, as they’d been hideously corrupted by their great power and the war, and were planning the destruction of all reality.  So while the Master is overjoyed to have brought the Time Lords back (granted, for his own purposes), he doesn’t understand why the Doctor is truely terrified by their reappearance.

It was interesting on more than one level.  The Doctor’s reaction to the Time Lords coming back reminded me very much of the 2nd Doctor’s reaction to them back in the War Games.  There, same as here, there was a real fear of these all-powerful beings (although the Time Lords back then weren’t nearly as blood-thirsty).  Seeing the Doctor terrified like that is a nice way of underlying just how powerful the Time Lords truely are, as its not often you see The Doctor that afraid.  Its also interesting, that for a storyline most thought would see the Time Lords restored, it in fact accomplishes the opposite, with the Doctor once again having to come to terms with his decision to end his race, and for the fans showing that, for now, the Time Lords are something that are gone, and should remain that way, hopefully ending the speculation as to when they’ll return.

(Of course, eventually a show-runner will have a killer idea involving non, or at least not-as, evil Time Lords and they’ll be back again, but for now its a done deal.)

So Steven Moffat’s first series will actually start with the Doctor in much the same Last of the Time Lords situation as he has been since the show returned, albeit I hope that this story will put a lid on the Time War and its impact on the Doctor, allowing Steven Moffat to explore the character in whole new ways.

Talking of which, it wouldn’t be fair to close out this post without mentioning Matt Smith’s first short scene as the Doctor, which I thought was brilliant.  It was nice how it called back to David Tennant’s first scene in the Children In Need short, as well as The Christmas Invasion with the comment about wanting to be ginger (after all, we know that he becomes a red-haired Merlin one day).    While very short, I was still impressed, and I’m really looking forward to seeing what Matt Smith brings to the role.  Watching Confidential it really gives you an impression of how he was thrown in at the deep end as well.

All in all, I was extremely happy with the End of Time.   RTD gave us a great conclusion not only to the 10th Doctor, but also to his era as a whole.  And for his finale, David Tennant gave us some of his most powerful acting, and found himself surrounded by superb actors, only further proving what a big name Doctor Who has become, and what a television event this finale was.

I’ve always viewed an A-Team remake as a fairly bad idea.  It always struck me as the kind of action, adventure show that you probably wouldn’t get away with making these days.

However, with some very good casting choices, and now this trailer, I’ll be darned if its not looking like they’ve pulled it off.  Obviously trailers tend to reflect the best of the film, but I’m really looking forward to this now.  They’ve really sold me with the parachuting tank scene

Yikes.  I’ve gotten a bit behind on my blogging.  Needless to say, there’ll be a full post on the End of Time coming soon (short version, I loved it), but in the meantime, here’s the trailer for Matt Smith’s first series coming later this year.   I’m really looking forward to seeing what it brings

I haven’t really talked much about Merlin on this blog for some reason, but with the second series having come to a close this weekend, it seemed like a good reason to revisit it.

For me, this series has undoubtedly been a big success.  Its an interesting world it inhabits.  We, the viewers, know that eventually Arthur and Merlin emerge to lead Camelot into a new golden age of general goodness.  However aside from that knowledge, the world of the show is filled with shades of grey.  Uther’s campaign to wipe out all magic undoubtedly paints him as the villain.  And certainly more than a few times he’s created the very enemies he’s been trying to wipe out (Morgause and the Druids for example).

However often these people are portrayed as the villains, while Merlin and Arthur fight to preserve the status quo of Uther’s anti-magic reign. From the point of view of Arthur this makes sense, and Merlin’s been told of his destiny by the dragon, so you can understand him backing up Arthur.  However it does make you question who exactly in the right sometimes, which is nice.  Granted, the Druids etc are usually heavy-handed enough with their desire to dethrone Uther that they’re as bad as he is, and therefore understandable that they be stopped.  But how this will be tackled next year, with Morgana could be very interesting indeed.

And regarding Morgana, what a great turn of events that was.  Her distancing from Uther after discovering her own magical talents was built up over the course of the series, alongside her growing allegiance to the Druids.  The viewers of course, could also see her being manipulated by various parties throughout the series, but none-the-less her stance against Uther is entirely justifiable, and to actually have her used by Morgause, resulting in Merlin poisoning her was a brave move by the series.  All the actors played those scenes exceptionally well, and it adds an edge to Merlin’s character, in what he was willing to do to save Camelot.  And nicely sets up Morgana to want revenge against him (even if it was Morgause using her as the anchor of the spell that led to Merlin’s actions).

The second half of the series definitely saw things moving forward.  Arthur and Merlin’s friendship is well established now, and Merlin’s usual port of call when things got out of hand, the dragon, is now gone from Camelot (although did at least seem grateful Merlin spared him).  Hopefully this will lead to Merlin having to stand more on his own two feet in series 3.  Also we have Morgana’s situation turned on its head, with her now in place to return as a villain, or perhaps, not even a villain.  Just someone who justifiably wants Uther removed from power.

I’m hoping things regarding Merlin’s secret will also move on next year.  If Morgana does return and target Merlin, then she may well discover his magic.  However I’d also like Gwen to find out as well.  Granted, Arthur finding out might make a bit more sense from the larger view of their destiny and the legend, however I can’t help but think the show won’t go quite that far yet.  Gwen finding out, would give Merlin another ally in the palace, and someone his own age he can confide in.

We’ve also got some recurring villains to hopefully look forward to.  Mordred, despite his age, is being shown as someone to be feared, and who has no problems with who gets in the way with removing Uther.  Morgause will also hopefully be back, and likely linked to Morgana.  Certainly a mistake I felt the show made in the first series was killing off Nimueh, so I was glad to see them not repeat that here and leave Morgause alive to return.

That’s just some random musings regarding Merlin.  The show is a lot of fun, but has some interesting layers to it.  This year, I did feel the two-part silly story with the Troll was a bit much, however having seen how dark the later episodes were (and how the events with the Troll also drove a more hardline stance from Uther, resulting in him calling the Witchfinder etc) going for a couple of comedy episodes makes sense, even if I wasn’t keen on them.  Given the excellence of the final episodes though, and that they were just two episodes out of thirteen, they’re easily overlooked, and I find myself very excited to see what the show will bring with its third series.

One of the new shows I’ve been really enjoying, which just finished its first season on Sci-Fi UK is Warehouse 13.

A Syfy original program, it follows Secret Service Agents Peter Lattimer and Myka Bering who find themselves reassigned from their normal duties to work for Artie Nielsen in the top-secret Warehouse 13 where supernatural artefacts are stored away to protect the general public from their dangers.

On the surface, the show comes across as a kookier version of the X-files, without the Government Conspiracy stuff.  However where the show really shines is in the dialogue between the various leads.  Peter and Myka are really well written as the banter flies back and forth between them and its a lot of fun to watch.

Another thing that really makes the show stand out is the steampunk styling given to most of the Warehouse and its associated technology, with most of it being said to having been created by Thomas Edison, Nikola Tesla and MC Escher as well as their main video communications devices, the Farnsworths.  It really helps give the show a unique feel compared to most other Sci-Fi shows currently airing.

As the show goes on, despite the seemingly goofy tone, its not afraid to build up arc plots.  Some, primarily the threat of rogue Warehouse Agent MacPherson, are built up heavily across the season, whereas others such as Artie’s mysterious past and the exact nature of the Warehouse and who runs it are left bubbling under the surface to be built upon as the show goes on longer term.  We know this is the 13th iteration of Warehouses that stretch back to the Library at Alexandria, which is said to be the first Warehouse.  This raises all kinds of questions regarding the group who run the Warehouses and the influence they must have.

Overall, I found this to be a really strong first season, and I’m keen to see what the second brings.  While the show may not have grabbed the immediate cult fame of some other shows, it strikes me that Sci-Fi have a nice little sleeper hit here.  The majority of the episodes allow you to drop in and out of the show, so there’s easily scope to pick up additional viewers as more people find out about it.

With last night’s episode Justice, we’ve hit the halfway point in the first season of Universe, so I thought I’d jot down some of my feelings so far.

After a strong opening with Air, after a few episodes, I was starting to feel the show was getting a bit bogged down by its character-heavy approach.  Specifically in terms of the stones and the frequent communication with Earth.  It seemed a bit frustrating that we had this group stranded on a nigh-self-aware ship, surrounded by probably the oldest Ancient technology we’d ever seen, and yet every episode involved someone popping home to have some angst with their loved ones.  I think part of the problem is that aside from the Destiny not getting much focus, there are various moral and ethical questions over the use of the communication stones that have so far been pretty much ignored by the production team.   Hopefully they’ll get addressed more in the second half of the season, but now that some of the relationships and personalities have been established, I’m really hoping we see a bit less of the stones.

That said, things definitely have evened out as things have gone on, and despite feeling the Stones/Earth stories were being overplayed, I thought Life was a superb episode, no doubt helped by giving us a glimpse into Wray’s character, someone who we hadn’t really seen much of yet was also present in the background.  This made for some freshness compared to another round of Eli or Chloe heading home.

SGU is doing a great job with some of its side characters.  While Rush and Eli undoubtedly steal the show at the moment, I’m really starting to find Wray and especially Greer very interesting indeed.

The discovery of the chair on the Destiny has really made things interesting onboard, and we’re starting to get hints towards Rush’s motivations.   Of course, this week saw his scheming and his antagonistic relationship with Young come to ahead, resulting in his framing Young, and Young subsequently leaving him abandoned on an alien world.

What happens next with Young should be very interesting.  He’s been abandoned next to a crashed alien ship, so you have to assume that’ll feature into however he gets back to the Destiny, and I can’t see it being a good thing for the other passengers.  Either he manages to get the ship up and running, in which case he’s got his own ship or, and I think more likely, someone comes looking for their crashed ship.  You can only hope if they do, that they’re friendly (and we know at least one other alien race has been in contact with the Destiny, from Air part 3), because we know that Rush will probably sell out Young and the rest of the passengers in a heartbeat to get back to the ship.

Aside from the obvious problems with Rush, there’s also a nice undercurrent of the problems on the ship between the military and the civilians.  Since arriving on the Destiny, the military were quick to take charge of the situation, but they’re on dubious ground with the civilian population, who are essentially finding themselves under military rule, subject to room inspections whenever something happens onboard and all signed up for bootcamp so Young knows they’re all in shape to take part on away teams to whatever planets the Destiny takes them to.  Given their situation its easy to see why the military taking charge makes a certain amount of sense, however over the last few episodes (again, especially Justice) its been nice to see Young become more aware of the divisions in the passengers and move to find more of a balancing act by subjecting himself to the same searches and stepping down and putting Wray in charge when he realised the rest of the passengers were losing faith in him.  Although whether this is enough, I doubt and I can see there being a huge bust up soon where the civilians and the military are going to have to learn to work together more effectively.  Currently its really only Eli how seems to exist comfortably with both groups (and I suppose, Rush is equally disliked by both, so that’s common ground as well).

So overall, perhaps a slightly wobbly, but none-the-less impressive start to this first season.  Despite only being 10 episodes into the show, I’m really feeling we’ve got strong feelings for who most of the characters (both main and recurring) are.   Unlike Atlantis, which remained pretty solidly the Sheppard and MacKay show up until the end, I can see other characters in this show easily starting to move to the forefront of things and rival Rush and Eli’s initial pushes.  The Destiny remains an interesting setting and I really hope that the second half of the season will see a lot more exploration of the ship and life aboard it.

This series of Sarah Jane Adventures has really flown past.  I guess that’s the effect of the two episodes a week format, but I couldn’t believe it was already the finale.

And this year, it was the return of those favourite monsters, the Slitheen.  While their appearances in the parent show have always been controversial (I like them, but even I’ll happily admit that Aliens in London was a mess and the fart gags were too much), they seem to have found a much happier home here, and its really nice to see new monsters returning and being a big deal rather than just the classics like Daleks, Cybermen, Sontarans etc (I feel similar about seeing the Judoon turn up again in the Stolen Earth, and here in the series opener).

Of course, it wasn’t just the Slitheen who turned up, but another family from Raxacoricofallapatorius, the Blathereen, who were more than happy to help Sarah Jane and co deal with the Slitheen, and then offered them the hand (claw?) of friendship in the form of a plant that could end world hunger.

Needless to say, the plant isn’t what it seems, and it doesn’t take long before its spores are infecting all of London and Luke is ill from exposure to them.

The nice thing is that pretty much everyone gets the chance to shine in this finale.  Well, ok Luke ends up ill, but he still appears more than he did in half the stories in this series, and I’m willing to put his illness down to Tommy Knight’s exams again (he may have been present, but it cut down on the number of lines he’d have had to learn at least).   Separating Clyde and Rani to deal with events at the school with K9′s help, while Sarah Jane and Mister Smith deal with the Blathereen worked really well.

All in all, I think Sarah Jane Adventures continues to improve with each series.  I can’t think of a single duff story this year, and its interesting how some of the less publicised stories (specifically the Haunted House one) actually emerged as some of the strongest this year.  From a rights point of view, it’ll be interesting to see if they manage to keep K9 around for series 4, and I certainly hope they do, as his snarky relationship with Mister Smith has been great fun, and I’d love to see more of it.

A great series.  Roll on series 4

With his presence noticeably absent for the last few stories, this two-parter gave Luke some much-needed focus this series.

That said, I’m not entirely sure it worked. I didn’t entirely buy his falling out with Sarah Jane although the idea of Luke becoming more like a normal teenager is an interesting one that deserves a bit more focus I think. And the way he finally saved the day by tricking the Mona Lisa into summoning K9 was quite clever I thought.

There’s been a lot of chatter online rotating around the main aspect of this story. The Mona Lisa. Be it the painting itself, and whether or not the story contradicts City of Death, or the portrayal of Mona Lisa the episodes attracted a fair amount of discussion.

For the first, I don’t see that it did contradict City of Death. We know that Leonardo painted seven copies of the painting for Count Scarlioni. There’s nothing to say that all seven weren’t painted with the tainted paints and wouldn’t have reacted in the same way once they got close to the Abomination. We never saw the blank canvas of the painting either, so its quite possible “This is a fake” was still written underneath.

I loved Suranne Jones as the Mona Lisa. Personally I loved that they played the character completely against expectation.  It was a great laugh and very entertaining  I also liked the visual of the characters trapped in the paintings.  It was similar to what was done in Fear Her, although I think here the idea was a bit more successful, and removing Sarah Jane from events to allow the kids to shine made for a nice change of pace.

Now that was rather good.

The production team had previous said that Planet of the Dead had deliberately been a light-hearted runaround to compensate for how dark the remaining specials were going to be, and Waters of Mars did not disappoint.

From the outset it was obvious we were in for something different, as from the moment the Doctor realises where and when he is, he’s desperate to leave, but at odds with his own curiousity and tendency to interfere.  This eventually builds up to a wonderfully powerful scene with the Doctor walking away from the base, haunted by the chatter of the base crew trying to escape from the Water, and in some cases, failing.  The pain on the Doctor’s face there is very affecting, and leads directly into his subsequent actions.

And what a surprise they were.  I was expecting the Doctor to surprise us, but to the extent that he does, was downright scary.  We’re presented with the Doctor having a breakdown, and the responsibility of being the last of the Time Lords finally weighs on him too much and pushes him over the edge.

Back as far as New Earth, the 10th Doctor has set himself up as the ultimate authority in the universe and here that is his undoing.  He’s on  his own and (as Donna said in Runaway Bride) needs someone to stop him, and more than that, just keep him grounded and give him a friend.  Donna’s eventual fate affected the Doctor briefly and has put him on this slope where he’s pushed away all those that could’ve helped him.  We can only hope that his realisation of what he’s done, combined with the glimpse of Ood Sigma has led the Doctor to realise just how much he’s hurting and needs help.

I guess back in the day, the Doctor could always be more relaxed in his interference.  Despite his protests, there would’ve been a reassurance that should he push things too far, the Time Lords would’ve stepped in.  The loss of those Time Lords have finally forced the Doctor to face up to the responsibilities he always ran away from, and perhaps now the Time Lord’s policy of non-interference doesn’t look so nonsensical.   Perhaps the reason they ignored all those evils in the universe, was simply because they knew that eventually they would be tempted to abuse their power in the way the Doctor now has, and ultimately become much worse than anything they’d previously stopped.   Much easier to have the Doctor running around, who they can clamp down on should they need to.

The other aspects of the story were equally successful.  The water monsters were creepy, and terrifying in the way that a single droplet of water would turn people into them.  The most effective deaths by far being Steffi’s (as she is trapped in the room with the water pouring in, watching a video message from her children knowing her fate is inescapable) and Roman’s, as he tells the others to go on without him after a single drop falls on him.

And there was even a nod to the Ice Warriors

This was a superb setup for the final two-parter.  I can’t wait to see what they’ve got planned, and I’m very glad to see the return of John Simm as the Master.

Following on from The Wedding of Sarah Jane Smith was always going to be a tough job.   How do you follow up having the Doctor guest star?

With a really solid story apparently.

This was a pretty standard haunted house affair.  Sarah Jane, Clyde and Rani head out to help Professor Rivers investigate a haunted Manor where people have seen ghosts and disappeared for years.  It soon emerges that at the centre of things is Erasmus Darkening, an Alchemist from the 17th century.

This was a really nicely done story for one thing in particular.  Its atmosphere.  The production team weren’t afraid to really build up a creepy atmosphere in the house as they piled on the mysteries of who (or what) Erasmus Darkening was, why do the ghosts keep appearing, and what is prowling around the grounds of the Manor?  The whole production really relished the haunted house aspect of the story, and was all the more enjoyable for it.

Noticeably absent though was Luke.  I’ve noticed him getting sidelined quite frequently throughout this series (especially noticeable during the Mad Woman in the Attic) and its down to the real life issues of Tommy Knight having to sit his GCSE’s.  With the actors playing Clyde and Rani being a bit older, exams aren’t an issue for them, but it does still leave a slightly strange feeling to a story, when Sarah Jane is heading out on adventures and leaving her son behind.

Fortunately it didn’t detract too much from this story though.  There was a great supporting cast (with the possible exception of the Professor’s assistant, a character I didn’t think worked well at all and felt out of place in this production), and it was nice to see Smallville’s Major Zod, Callum Blue in his guest role as Lord Marchford, the restless ghost working against Darkening and longing to be reunited with his children.

Another great story in this series of Sarah Jane Adventures.  And I can’t finish off the review without mentioning the nice little nod to the upcoming Dr Who specials, when Clyde and Rani are trapped in the shed, and the creature knocks on the door four times