Steven Moffat’s Top 10 (Part 2)

A few days ago I began counting down my top 10 Doctor Who stories written by Steven Moffat (Part 1 here). Because I wanted to build up suspense and anticipation, and because I’m too lazy to do the whole list at once, I cleverly and conveniently split the list into two separate parts.

So, here it is: my definitive ranking of Steven Moffat’s five best Doctor Who stories.

5. The Eleventh Hour

You really can’t beat The Eleventh Hour as a new Doctor (and companion) introductory episode. There is really no understatement in saying that the first episode of Matt Smith’s run, and of the Moffat era as a whole, is the prototype against which all other introductory episodes will be measured. It does everything it’s supposed to do—introducing the new Doctor and companion, ushering in the new era, and serving as a concise and engaging introduction to the show in general—exemplarily. Sure, the plot itself, about the Atraxi, is a bit insubstantial and generic, but the focus of this episode is, emphatically, not on the plot but on the elements I’ve just mentioned, in particular the introduction of the new leads, which it does sublimely. Its most important moments, therefore, are not the scenes dealing with the Atraxi threat, but the scenes in which we get to learn who our new leads, the Eleventh Doctor and Amy Pond, are, such as that magical, timeless scene between the newly-regenerated Eleventh Doctor and little Amelia Pond.

4. Heaven Sent

It’s been over two months since Heaven Sent aired as the penultimate episode of Series 9, and I’m still reeling from how utterly amazing it is, as an entire package—a piece of writing, production, acting, directing, even music—but especially as an outstanding work of screenwriting. As a one-hander featuring (for all intents and purposes) only one speaking character, the Doctor himself, it is possibly the most experimental and avant garde episode of televised Doctor Who, and certainly on Moffat’s resume. You’d have to go back to the most surreal years of Hartnell and McCoy to find something as remotely experimental as Heaven Sent. The gamble undoubtedly paid off, though, as Heaven Sent is a masterpiece of writing and, indeed, in every department. It’s simply a mesmerising 55 minutes of television, a constellation of screenwriting genius with the equally impressive talents of Peter Capaldi, Rachel Talalay, Murray Gold and others. It proves that, even nearing the end of his Doctor Who writing career, Steven Moffat is capable of creating breathtaking and artistic stories.

3. The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances

There was a time when Moffat was known as the master of terror, a sadist among the Doctor Who writers who delighted in terrifying children. The reputation probably stemmed from this skin-crawling pair of episodes in Series 1, which live up to Moffat’s caricature. These episodes traumatised a generation of pre-adolescents, including myself: I saw these episodes when they first aired when I was 10, and they frightened me so much that I was put off Doctor Who for years, and also caused me contract an irrational fear of gas masks (I’m still a bit uneasy around them). They contain some of the creepiest and most unsettling scenes in the show’s history, and it’s clear, watching them, that Moffat is a master of fright and freaky at work. Apart from the fear factor, though, this story is just exceptionally well-written: never mind great Doctor Who, it’s great television, full stop. It’s a totally absorbing and atmospheric story, and features fantastic instances of characterisation, unarguably deserving of a place among the best Doctor Who stories ever made.

2. Blink

If anyone you know is in doubt of Moffat’s abilities as a television writer, just show them Blink. Justly acclaimed as one of, if not the, best Doctor Who story ever made, it’s a timeless classic whose veneration among fans has not diminished with time by one iota. Nearly a decade later and it’s still as chilling and exhilarating as ever. It’s another perfect exemplar of great Doctor Who as great television in general, a fantastic screenplay and a fantastic piece of sci-fi writing. Blink, of course, introduced Moffat’s ingenious creation, the very creepy Weeping Angels, the most successful and popular Doctor Who monsters since the Daleks, and which, at one point, looked like they might even pip the Daleks for the status of Doctor Who’s signature monsters. Somewhat ironically for one of Doctor Who’s most popular episodes, Blink is Doctor-lite, but instead we get the brilliant character Sally Sparrow, one of the show’s great could-have-been companions. In fact, the conspicuous absence of the Doctor’s presence lends the story exactly the atmosphere of claustrophobia and intolerable suspense that makes Blink such a successful episode. It’s an outstanding credit to Moffat’s creative genius.

1. Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead

Why Silence in the Library over Blink (or any of the other episodes)? Good question. I agonised over this choice, trying to weigh the episodes’ respective attributes and consider the varied factors that would play into a choice of what makes “the best” Moffat episode. But I always came back to the fact that whatever my choice, it would always be completely arbitrary and subjective, and there is no objective way of choosing a definitive “best” episode. So, in the end, I just went with my favourite.

Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead is a testament Moffat’s ability to take an idea for a fairly standard base-under-siege story (shadow monsters in a giant library) and develop it into as bold, moody, surreal and emotional a masterpiece as this. Silence in the Library is a perfect showcase of the many tropes of Moffat’s Doctor Who writing that have by now become quite familiar to us. There’s a freaky new monster, the Vashta Nerada, whose fear factor lies in a clever psychological gimmick; intricate and intelligent plotting that ends up blindsiding the audience with a well-executed twist; bold, creative narrative experimentation, including some truly surreal sequences while Donna is stuck inside CAL’s virtual hard drive; and involving and emotional character drama, including the first (and best, at least until THORS) appearance of Moffat’s signature character, River Song, and the beginning of the legendary onscreen relationship between the Doctor and River Song. It all comes together in a thrilling narrative symphony, making for, I believe, the very best of Steven Moffat.

So, in summary…

My ten picks were:

1. Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead
2. Blink
3. The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances
4. Heaven Sent
5. The Eleventh Hour
6. The Pandorica Opens/The Big Bang
7. The Impossible Astronaut/Day of the Moon
8. A Christmas Carol
9. The Day of the Doctor
10. The Time of Angels/Flesh and Stone

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How does your list compare to mine? Wanna fight about it? If so, leave a comment below.

Ranking the finales (Part 2)

I began counting down the best finales since 2005 here. Here’s my final four.

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4. The Sound of Drums/Last of the Time Lords (Series 3)

I suppose your opinion of the two-part Series 3 finale depends to a large extent on your opinion of John Simm’s interpretation of the Master. Those who dislike Simm’s Master see the character as over-the-top, manic, comical and pantomime. But that’s just why I love him. There are a number of things in this finale that make me cringe, but I think it all pales in comparison to John Simm’s mesmerising performance as the Master. Truly, it’s genuinely impressive that Simm managed to make the character at the same time hilarious and freaking awesome, but also intensely menacing and unsettling—something, by the way, I feel Michelle Gomez has emphatically succeeded in replicating.

Apart from my view that the Toclafane, while a disturbing and gruesome concept, were far too comical (those voices… ugh) to constitute a convincing threat, I thought the script itself was very well crafted. It was thrilling to see the Doctor defeated for once, and to be defeated so completely. I think that doesn’t happen often enough, and in this finale it made the Doctor’s eventual victory all the more satisfying and emotionally powerful. Moreover, the Doctor’s defeat at the hands of the Master shifted the onus onto Martha, who, in her last adventure with the Doctor, proved what a truly extraordinary person she is by essentially single-handedly saving the world. She proved that she’s made of very stern stuff indeed, and how much, to be honest, the Doctor didn’t deserve her. I’ve always had a soft spot for Martha, and slightly resented the Doctor for the way he treated her during her time, and thought her departure, while understated, was fitting for her character, leaving on her own terms after saving the world.

Full review here.

3. The Stolen Earth/Journey’s End (Series 4)

There’s a great deal of nonsense in the Series 4 finale, but somehow, through the impressive writing abilities of Russell T Davies, the finale managed to bring together all that nonsense to form an epic, absorbing, breathtaking coup de grâce to Series 4 and, to an extent, to the Russell T Davies era as a whole. It feels like everything, kitchen sink and all, was thrown into this finale—every companion of the preceding four years, Rose, the Torchwood and Sarah-Jane Adventures crews, bazillions of Daleks, Davros, and two (three?) Doctors—the scale of the thing was epic, and understandably so: this was a big, extravagant celebration of everything Russell T Davies had created. At the same time, it never feels like it’s overblown or over-the-top or over-saturated. It’s a commensurate, dazzling script, and a fantastic way to finish the last regular series of Doctor Who under that team.

The Series 4 finale gave us so many amazing, memorable moments. I’ll pick out a few of my favourites. Some malign the DoctorDonna deus ex machina resolution, but I totally adore it. To be honest, it gives me the chills every time, and Catherine Tate, essentially just doing what she’s loved for—being gobby and witty—is a captivating presence in that scene. Exemplary instance of playing to your actors’ strengths. The dialogue between the Doctor and Davros was electric, goosebump-inducing stuff. The scene where the Doctor and all his friends pilot the Tardis together, towing the Earth home was just wonderfully ecstatic and jubilant, an ode to friendship and companionship. Finally, Donna’s exit, in my opinion, was the most heartwrenching of all the companion exits. It was pure, piercing tragedy, one of the most genuinely uplifting character developments the show has carried out completely, horrifyingly reversed—it never fails to move me.

Full review here.

2. Bad Wolf/The Parting of the Ways (Series 1)

The phenomenal two-part finale to the first series of Doctor Who, back from the grave, still stands as the archetype of how a modern Doctor Who series finale should be done: big, expansive, high-stakes, emotional and featuring some iconic enemy at their fearsome best. Ten years on, I still think only one subsequent series finale has bested Series 1, and even then it’s a close call. Although the Daleks (a Dalek) first returned earlier in the series in Dalek, Bad Wolf was our first story featuring the Daleks as they’ve traditionally appeared — en masse. To me it’s still the Daleks’ best appearance in modern Doctor Who, which is in no small part due to the script’s understanding that the Daleks, always in danger of verging on the comical, are most effectively menacing when they’re shown to be lurking in the shadows, manipulating events behind the scenes. Moreover, I think you’d be hard-pressed to point to a story, apart from Dalek, which has more chillingly portrayed the Daleks’ cold ruthlessness.

But more than the superb use of the Daleks, it was just an exceptional script altogether. The way it moved from its fairly innocuous initial setting in a futuristic Big Brother House, revealing more and more of the threat and the stakes until the malignant presence of the Daleks was uncovered, duly building up the suspense, was an ingenious device, echoing the frequent use of the same narrative device in many early 1960s serials. No less part of the success of this story was the foregrounding of the emotional plot in the second half, exploring how far Rose’s and the Doctor’s respective character developments have brought them both, culminating in Rose’s returning to the Game Station, possessed with the time vortex, disintegrating the Dalek fleet and saving the world. And of course, this was the finale that gave us the first regeneration of the revival—the most understated, to be sure, but still just as memorable, emotional and effective as Ten’s and Eleven’s.

Full review here.

1. The Pandorica Opens/The Big Bang (Series 5)

And the winner is… the sensational Series 5 finale, The Pandorica Opens/The Big Bang. It was the first finale of the fresh, brand new era of Doctor Who under a new showrunner and a new Doctor and remains, in my opinion, not only the best finale penned by Steven Moffat, but also the best finale since the show returned in 2005. Maybe sentiment has a lot to do with my choice, as I’m an unabashed Moffat and Matt Smith (and Amy Pond) partisan, but I think few would dispute that Pandorica is a superlative finale.

I think part of the genius of this finale is that, for its first half, it pretends to be one thing, throwing a giant red herring our way about a a big scary monster escaping from its box, but at the halfway point, in an agonising cliffhanger, turns the story on its head and morphs into something entirely different, and so much bigger. Steven Moffat really lets his penchant for the timey-wimey run wild with a riveting story about all of time and space imploding because of an exploding Tardis. I mean, this finale could be described as “Steven Moffat with the stabilisers off” — which is no criticism, by any means.

It also carries a profound emotional quality, and manages to be unusually character-centred for a narrative of such scale and intricacy. It’s punctuated by touching moments like Amy finally remembering her fiancé, Rory pledging himself to stand guard over Amy for 2,000 years, the Doctor’s pathetic goodbye to little Amelia in her bedroom, and, of course, Amy, at her wedding, conjuring the Doctor back into reality in the thrilling coda to the finale. That last scene always gives me goosebumps, surely ranking up there as one of the more chilling, powerful Doctor Who moments.

How else can I explain my choice? I guess, to me, it’s a masterpiece. It’ll be a while before Moffat, or, indeed, anyone, matches the quality of Pandorica in a series finale again.

Full review here.

So to recap…

My choices were:

1. The Pandorica Opens/The Big Bang
2. Bad Wolf/The Parting of the Ways
3. The Stolen Earth/Journey’s End
4. The Sound of Drums/The Last of the Time Lords
5. The Wedding of River Song
6. Hell Bent
7. Dark Water/Death in Heaven
8. Army of Ghosts/Doomsday
9. The Name of the Doctor

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What do you think of my choices? What’s your favourite finale? Am I raving mad to think The Wedding of River Song worth watching? Share your thoughts below.

My top 5 Tardis teams

Now that Clara’s snuffed it, and the Doctor-Companion team of the last two years has come to a tragic end, I feel like I ought to assess where Twelve and Clara figure in my personal game of Doctor-Companion top trumps.

Here are my five favourite Doctor-Companion teams of the last 52 years.

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5. Four and Romana

Technically this is two Tardis teams, but I really couldn’t choose between the two Romanas here. Romana (both of them) is probably my favourite classic companion, and I thought they both had superb, highly watchable dynamics with Tom Baker’s aloof, alien Doctor. To be honest, Tom Baker’s extraordinary and mesmerising Doctor makes any Doctor-Companion team he’s part of delightfully engaging to watch, but I adored most of all watching him with Romana.

His relationship with the first Romana, played by the beautiful Mary Tamm, was brilliant because it seemed like the Doctor had finally met his match in a companion. Unlike the succession of dim humans he’d taken to travelling with, who awed at his intelligence and obediently did as they were told, Romana considered herself his equal, if not his superior: she was just as intelligent as he was, if not more, and made a point of reminding him of her superior academic accomplishments. She rarely took orders from him without argument and was generally something entirely new to the Doctor. It was brilliant. Nevertheless, they had a great friendship and, despite their prickly moments, were a joy to watch together.

The Fourth Doctor with the second Romana, played by Lalla Ward, was a warmer and more intimate relationship, Romana less icy and prickly towards the Doctor, more fond of him and more appreciative of his experience. Four and Romana II had a more traditional Doctor-Companion relationship of uncomplicated friendship and mutual love of adventure, but the team of two Time Lords still made for a very unconventional and distinctive dynamic. Romana was still, in many ways, the Doctor’s equal, and, accordingly, her relationship with Tom Baker’s Doctor was nothing like that of Sarah-Jane or Leela. It was intellectual and clever and very alien. I loved that. It also helped that there was romance between Tom Baker and Lalla Ward offscreen, manifesting itself onscreen in wonderful chemistry between the Doctor and companion.

I think my favourite Four-Romana moment might have been the Doctor and Romana gadding about Paris in City of Death. They were too cute, and Romana looked just lovely in her schoolgirl outfit.

4. Ten and Donna

Ten and Donna were surely the definitive Doctor-Companion pairing of the Tenth Doctor’s era. Ten and Rose were sweet, but Ten and Donna were genuinely fun. Like Twelve and Clara, Ten and Donna were just two best friends romping around time and space, having the time of their lives together. They were just great mates, and that was their irresistible charm. It helped that Catherine Tate was hilarious, and that Tate and David Tennant had positively electric chemistry together. The banter was — literally — out of this world.

We all remember Ten and Donna fondly for the banter and the comedy and the great friendship between the two, but one of the most memorable and significant Ten-Donna moments was surely Donna’s pleading with the Doctor in The Fires of Pompeii to save Caecilius and his family. It showed how important Donna was to the Doctor personally, that she was more than just a good friend to him. To an extent I don’t think Rose or Martha would have been able to stand up to the Doctor like Donna did in that episode and cut down the Doctor’s Time Lord pretensions the way she did.

3. One, Susan, Ian and Barbara

The original Tardis team. These four were a quirky and eclectic mix of characters, but they were the most endearing and lovable group you could find. There was the tetchy, spiky First Doctor, who nevertheless exuded a certain magic and twinkle that made you love him, and who mellowed over time, under the influence of his companions, into the whimsical, charming, compassionate figure we now recognise as the Doctor. There was Susan, the Doctor’s sweet teenage granddaughter, a rather helpless figure at first, but who eventually came into her own, and eventually left in Doctor Who’s first ever heartbreaking companion exit, the beginning of a beloved tradition. Ian and Barbara, Susan’s abducted schoolteachers, were the most lovely pair, bringing a human groundedness to the first years of the show that could easily otherwise have been very alien. Together they were like a family, albeit a very odd family, all were written so well that you couldn’t help feeling a strong connection to them.

Part of the charm of their unique dynamic was that they were all stuck together, thrown together under unfortunate circumstances (the Tardis was malfunctioning), traipsing across time and space together trying to find a way out of their situation. None of them, except perhaps Susan, was particularly enamoured with the situation they had all found themselves in together at first, but they all grew so close and fond of each other over time. Even the Doctor, who was positively antagonistic towards Ian and Barbara at first, became very fond of them, and came to appreciate the little family he had found himself with, and, when Ian and Barbara eventually found a way to return to Earth, he was very upset and saddened to see them leave.

2. Twelve and Clara

Now that I’ve seen two series of Twelve and Clara, I can say confidently that I love them more than any other Tardis team save for Eleven, Amy and Rory. Clara herself is kind of a middling companion for me — I like her, and she’s grown on me immensely in Series 9 — but she isn’t among my favourites. That said, though, I think Twelve and Clara are nothing short of perfect together. They’re an odd couple, the old man and the pretty young woman, but it works so well. These too are as close as any Doctor and companion can be; they’re not lovers, like Ten and Rose, but just best friends, inseparable friends, who are each other’s entire universes, enjoying each other’s company while they explore the universe together. They’re, frankly, adorable to watch together, and I’m going to miss them so much now that Clara’s gone.

Basically any scene where Twelve and Clara are having fun and enjoying themselves together is vintage Twelve-Clara. Take your pick. A particular favourite of mine was Twelve lecturing Clara on the use of the word “space” before things in Sleep No More. But also the final moments of Last Christmas were terrific, Clara and the Doctor gazing fiercely, almost lovingly, into each other’s eyes, the spirit of adventure taken hold of them both, their connection stronger than it’s ever been.

1. Eleven, Amy and Rory

What can I say? Eleven is my favourite Doctor and Amy is my favourite companion. Eleven’s era is my favourite era of the show, in no small part because of the wonderful characters of the Eleventh Doctor, Amy Pond, and her long-suffering husband, Rory Pond Williams. Amy and Rory were just the most adorable, romantic couple, and their relationship with the zany, wacky Eleventh Doctor made them an irresistible Tardis team, and a positive joy to watch together.

I have a sentimental attachment to these three, because, having only started watching the show in earnest during Eleven’s era, they were my “first” Tardis team, the first Doctor and companion team I followed week-to-week. I think they might have been a major part of the reason I became a fan of this show, because I adored these three wonderful characters so much.

Some of my favourite moments with these three include their reunion in The Pandorica Opens — the Doctor’s hilarious reunion with Roman Rory, and Rory’s touching attempts to get through to Amy. Also, just watching these three muck about was magical, as in episodes like The Power of Three, otherwise a fairly unremarkable script.

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What are your favourite Doctor-Companion teams?

Thoughts on: Turn Left

The producers probably couldn’t have done anything more recklessly audacious than to follow up the dark, depressing Midnight with the possibly even grimmer Turn Left. This is surely one of the darkest televised stories Doctor Who has ever produced, a bleak “what if?” following the trail of events that would ensue if the Doctor had never met and been saved by Donna Noble at Christmas in 2006. And a world without the Doctor is truly terrifying. So many of the catastrophes the Doctor averted were allowed to occur, as were all the deaths the Doctor would have prevented, and the death toll is enormous. Particularly grievous was the crashing of the Titanic into Buckingham Palace on Christmas Day 2007, making all of south England uninhabitable and turning the country into a giant refugee camp. The social and economic strife that ensues stokes the flames of extremism and ushers in fascist rule over the green and pleasant lands of England, the country that in living memory fought to deliver Europe’s salvation from the Hitlerite scourge. The scene where the Colasanto family are being carted off to a concentration camp was spine-chilling in its bleak, emotive power, surely one of the most confronting things Doctor Who has ever shown. It’s even more depressingly shocking when one realises that this is only one planet that the Doctor’s absence has so profoundly affected; think of the rest of the universe—indeed, if Rose is to be believed, all universes. All this from one fatal, seemingly unremarkable decision by Donna to turn right. It could have been overblown and unconvincing, but it was all so believable, and chillingly so.

This story was also about Donna. We were brought back to Donna, the uncultured, uncouth temp from Chiswick, and followed her transformation as her world was swept from under her feet and her life thrown into turmoil. Her mother descended into depression and defeatism. Her grandfather fell back on his wartime spirit. Donna got angry at the world but summoned up something profound inside her, a will and a strength to keep going and beat away the bad, bleak world around her. This was particularly brought home to me in that intimate little scene in the Nobles’ billet house where Donna was trying to assure her mother, albeit vainly, that she would find a job and get them out of their sad situation. Personal crisis on this scale brought out the extraordinary person in Donna that she truly was, mirroring, in a rather more unhappy way, Donna’s personal development throughout Series 4 into the very thoroughly changed person from who she was in The Runaway Bride, even in Partners in Crime. Ultimately Donna had got to the point where she had resolved herself to sacrificing her own life for all of Creation, to leaving this world to restore the world that had never been but should have been. In doing so she showed herself to be the remarkable, amazing person Rose insisted she was, almost certainly more than Rose thought, even more than the Doctor thought I’d daresay. Catherine Tate’s acting throughout this episode was simply astounding. Tate hasn’t really been given scripts this series that have allowed her to show off her acting talents, but in Turn Left she delivered an emotive, intense, heartwarming and heartbreaking performance.

Rose was a bit… odd… in this episode. Don’t get me wrong, it was fantastic to see Rose again, but she was written very strangely. Rose, of course has developed, too, since we first met her, and doubtless she’s changed even more during her time in her parallel universe, but she was strangely… alien in this episode. She was something of an enigma, flitting in and out of Donna’s life and talking in cryptic riddles like a Christmas ghost. Even when Donna finally agrees to accompany Rose and Rose can speak more openly, she seems distinctly alien, ostensibly enjoying watching Donna traumatised and close to breaking point first over seeing the creature on her back and then over having to accept what she’s expected to do, Rose even deliberately provoking Donna at one point. Rose is unsettlingly callous in the face of Donna’s stress and angst while Donna needs someone to soothe her and give her support. This is very unlike the Rose I know. Maybe I’m missing something, but I was a bit unnerved. If I didn’t know better I’d think Rose didn’t particularly care about Donna, she was just using her to fix the universe and get to the Doctor…

Nevertheless, that cliffhanger was electrifying. This episode in general was outstanding. The only other criticism I’d make would be that it was a bit oddly structured. It didn’t flow as naturally and effectively as it should have, which made following the story just slightly disconcerting. In any case, in general it was an exceptional story.

Rating: 9/10.

Thoughts on: Midnight

The genius of this script lies in its simplicity. It’s a group of people in a room talking for forty-five minutes. That’s really it. The simplicity of the script facilitates the intimate study of these people that made up this story. What happens when you put a group of ordinary people in a locked room with an unseen monster? That was the question this phenomenal script set out to explore. A disturbing study in group psychology, this captivating story presented us with a grisly vision of humanity in stark contrast to Doctor Who’s usual gushing celebration of our species, showing us how a group of ordinary humans can turn into a lynch mob. When the ship first stops, we initially see the Doctor trying to reason with the confused group as it starts to become hysterical—and successfully manages to calm them all down… at first. When the creature makes an appearance, thudding on the exterior of the ship and eventually taking over Sky, the Doctor increasingly loses his control and hold over the group as their fear drives them to become ever more hysterical. The Doctor struggles to reason with them and keep them calm. Their fear took them beyond reason, however: the critical moment came when the Hostess suggested, “We should throw her out.” At that point, the group had gone beyond the point of no return, and the Doctor’s vain pleading was not going to prevent the inevitable lynching; their fear was too powerful.

I’ll say it again, this is a truly disquieting and compelling study in group psychology. The group’s increasing fear and hysteria took them so beyond reason and inhibition and sensibility such that they were driven to almost commit murder, almost two murders. The sight of the helpless Doctor being dragged by Biff and Professor Hobbes through the shuttle, egged on by others—particularly that odious Val woman screeching “Throw him out!”—was exceptionally powerful and chilling. The group, in their fear, had talked themselves into a frenzy, feeding off each other, bringing themselves to the point that they resolved to do something none of them would normally ever contemplate. They turned on the Doctor when he tried to persuade them out of their murderous frenzy. Here we see what fear makes humans do when they’re scared and in a group. Even Jethro, easily the most reasonable and level-headed of the lot, in the end succumbed to the collective hysteria of the group, almost committing murder alongside his father and Professor Hobbes. Only the Hostess’s heroic act of self-sacrifice stopped them from throwing the Doctor to his death, and it was obvious the group were horrified to realise what they’d almost done. Who was the real monster here?

This script relied on a cast of convincing, realistic, fleshed-out characters, and that’s what we saw: seven well-developed, relatable characters whose dialogue made for a chillingly realistic playing-out of events. We were familiarised effectively with all of them at the beginning of the story: charming, if flawed, but essentially ordinary people. We saw them transform into monsters over the course the episode. It was all the more disturbing, watching these people become frenzied murderous animals, when you remembered how charming and quaint and normal they all seemed at the beginning. The acting all-round was just superlative, the passion and the fear and the hysteria of the characters was all eerily believable. Lesley Sharp as Sky was particularly captivating, her facial acting as she played Sky possessed by the creature genuinely chilling. David Tennant, needless to say, was magnificent—easily one of his best performances yet.

I think this is probably Russell T Davies’ best script. It’s certainly his tightest. It’s powerful, compelling and unnerving. It’s one of the few times Doctor Who in the revived series (or at all, really) has ventured beyond its standard formulas and into genuinely provocative, creative territory. It’s one of the most bracing and thought-provoking stories Doctor Who has ever done. Who would have thought such a simple concept could be realised so powerfully? Its simplicity is its genius: it’s simply humanity laid bare, naked, in all our ugly glory. Warts and all.

Rating: 10/10.

Thoughts on: Silence in the Library / Forest of the Dead

Once again Steven Moffat has delivered an absolute triumph of a story. This two-parter was exciting, scary, beautiful, tear-jerking and completely engrossing. It exercised the nerves like only a Moffat story can, and was also generously laden with absorbing character drama, electric dialogue, and some of the most beautiful moments ever in this show. It featured a cast of wonderful characters, including the enigmatic River Song, Moffat here setting up one of the major story arcs of the Matt Smith era. I don’t know how Moffat does it, but, in each of his four stories that I’ve watched in this marathon, I’ve always been left quite blown away by what I’ve just watched. He’s an exceptional writer who has arguably produced more outright classics for the Doctor Who corpus than any other writer, and this is one of his best and one that I personally adore.

The setting for this story was ingenious, the largest library in the universe, spanning an entire planet. The Library is easily one of the most interesting worlds which have featured in Doctor Who, and I’d imagine if the show had had a bigger budget, this story could have been visually spectacular. The immediate mystery that strikes the Doctor and Donna, of course, was where all the people were in this enormous library. In classic Moffat style, the story is scarcely underway before the air of conspiracy and spookiness descends when the talking statue urges them, “Run. For God’s sake, run.” An altercation with some shadows and a rendezvous with an archaeology expedition later, and it becomes clear that they are dealing with the Vashta Nerada, which are, in truth, a bargain-price monster if there ever was one, but not that that detracts from their scariness and menace at all. In fact, the gimmick—that they can be “any” shadow—makes them more effective. I was too old to be genuinely scared by the Vashta Nerada when this story was first broadcast, but I’m sure if I had been a few years younger I’d have been properly creeped. That said, their devouring of the sweet Miss Evangelista, and her subsequent “ghosting” through her thought patterns stored on her communication device was surely one of the most disturbing things Doctor Who has ever shown. It was heart-rending and, as Donna said, quite horrible.

It becomes clear that the little girl, Cal, is somehow connected. I think the plotline around Cal and her absorption of people into the virtual world of the Library computer was marvellous writing which elevated this script from what would have been a fairly standard, albeit creepy, runaround to a true triumph of storytelling and drama. Cal in her living room seeing visions of the Doctor and the Library and controlling it all with her television remote was intriguing enough, but the virtual world that she created for Donna and, assumingly, everyone else she “saved” was just spellbinding viewing, and truly interesting experimental television. The sequences showing Donna living in her fictional world were really quite unsettling. When Miss Evangelista showed up, whom I initially thought was a Dementor, telling Donna that her perceived life was a lie, it all got very Matrix—in a good way—it was terrifically chilling: by the time Donna tore off Miss Evangelista’s veil, revealing a freakish distortion where that pretty face of hers used to be, I was totally mesmerised. The revelation of what CAL was, and how the little girl was connected to it all, was really well done. CAL’s identity, and the purpose of the Library, was touching. Cal, by the way, was played really well by Eve Newton, easily one of the better child actors we’ve seen yet on Doctor Who.

I wasn’t altogether impressed by the explanation for what would happen to the Vashta Nerada. I’ve read the transcript and I’m still not sure what happened to them, perhaps this story’s sole fault. Nevertheless, the resolution, with River’s sacrificing herself in the Doctor’s place to restore all the people downloaded to the computer’s hard drive, saying her heartbreaking farewell to the Doctor, was tear-jerking. It contained some of the most beautiful dialogue Moffat has written.

River: “If you die here, it’ll mean I’ve never met you.”
Doctor: “Time can be rewritten.”
River: “Not those times. Not one line. Don’t you dare. It’s okay. It’s okay. It’s not over for you. You’ll see me again. You’ve got all of that to come. You and me, time and space. You watch us run.”

I thought all of the scenes between River and the Doctor in this story were incredibly touching, particularly the moment River uttered the Doctor’s name in his ear; that was spine-chilling, and Tennant’s acting when River did that powerfully conveyed the Doctor’s utter stupefaction. Moffat couldn’t have done better to set up River’s story arc. Further, it was obvious how painful it was for River for the Doctor not to recognise her. We were seeing at the same time the beginning and the end of a love story, the love story of two time travellers travelling in opposite directions. How tragic is it to see a lover pained by the love of her life seeing her and not knowing her? Perhaps equally as tragic as it was elating when the Doctor bounded furiously through the Library when he realised he could save River, restoring her to the Library’s virtual world with her friends, his first act of love for River. That was a genuinely stirring, heartwarming sequence, and I’m not ashamed to say I got a catch in my throat when I watched that. It was beautiful.

Another astounding script from Moffat, pulling off the feat of employing Moffat’s traditional talent for scares and chills at the same time as delivering a script with more than one memorable moment seized with emotion. Although Moffat has delivered superior scripts, this one certainly ranks among his best, and to an extent I love it more than any of his others; there’s just something about which plays on the emotions and makes one remember it so fondly. It’s a classic to be sure.

Rating: 10/10.

Thoughts on: The Unicorn and the Wasp

A story idea about Agatha Christie and a giant wasp is naturally going to incite scepticism. It just sounds too silly for words. Remarkably, though, this story managed to play out that idea totally convincingly and without a hint of self-conscious irony. Admittedly, the giant wasp was the most problematic aspect of this otherwise fantastic episode (as a giant chicken was in a subsequent story about a historical figure)—some other alien form could surely have been used?—but the story itself was so enjoyable and well executed that the ludicrousness of a giant alien wasp didn’t overtly detract from the quality of the story. The story premise of a murder mystery in a 1920s aristocratic house featuring the investigative team of the Doctor and Agatha Christie was inspired, and was played out onscreen as thoroughly enjoyable and entertaining viewing. Excellent use was made of classic Agatha Christie motifs in tribute to the latter’s stories: the charming setting of a party at an upper class country house, the interrogation of witnesses (who are all lying, of course), the dignified dinner scene in the midst of murders, the scene where the investigator gathers the witnesses and suspects to reveal the murderer…

Agatha Christie was played really well by Fenella Woolgar, who captured the novelist’s character perfectly. It was endearing seeing Christie cope with her insecurities about her works and her personal life, especially when she seemed irritated when the Doctor and Donna kept praising her works. Donna’s intimate conversation with Christie was especially touching. Seeing that side of Donna, caring and compassionate, always brings a smile to my face. The investigative partnership of Christie and the Doctor was excellent: the ultimate detective duo. I also liked how Christie, that paragon of respectable Englishness, was shown to be opening her mind to the weird and wonderful due to the Doctor’s influence, much like Charles Dickens did.

I didn’t have particularly much to say about this episode, just that it was an enjoyable and successful tribute to arguably the greatest crime novelist of them all. That said, there should definitely be a story in which the Doctor meets Arthur Conan-Doyle…

Rating: 8/10.

Thoughts on: The Doctor’s Daughter

The Doctor’s Daughter was both a fun and powerful story, managing to insert solemn and compellingly-explored moral themes into what was at the same time a fun romp about the Doctor’s cloned “daughter”. Jenny was simply awesome. Apart from being completely gorgeous, Georgia Moffett’s character was sweet, adorably exuberant, feisty and spirited. Who, honestly, watched Jenny seduce the guard to steal his gun, or somersault her way through the laser beams, without a broad grin on their face? (By the way, where did she learn to seduce like that? Surely she didn’t get it from the Doctor…?) I think the audience would have been left exceedingly fond of Jenny by the end of the episode, looking forward to seeing her begin travelling with the Doctor. I was, at least. She would have made an excellent companion to the Doctor, I think. At the very least, her character had too much potential for nothing more to be done with her, especially given that very suggestive final scene. It’s an enormous shame that her character has been all but forgotten about ever since, and too much time has passed for something substantial to be done with her. Even a one-off appearance would have been nice (would still be nice?)

Another great aspect of this episode was its exploring of the Doctor’s feelings about the Time Lords and his lost home. The Doctor at first refused to accept that Jenny was a Time Lord, considering that to call her a Time Lord would be an insult to the memory of his lost civilisation. “You’re an echo, that’s all. A Time Lord is so much more. A sum of knowledge, a code, a shared history, a shared suffering. Only it’s gone now, all of it. Gone forever.” Tennant portrayed, as always, the Doctor’s pain and suppressed trauma over the loss of his planet and people really powerfully, saying so little but expressing so much. Tennant does that very well. The Doctor warmed to Jenny when he saw that she was more like him than he realised, although uncertain how he would deal with being constantly reminded of the Time War if Jenny were to come with him. The Doctor admitted something very telling when he agreed with Donna when she said “You talk all the time, but you don’t say anything.” The Doctor grieves in private. From the rare instances where we see the Doctor open up about the Time War, it’s obvious that his grief and pain is simply too much to bear talking about, to even bear thinking about. So what do you do when you’re in emotional suffering but find things to distract yourself with? That about sums up the Doctor of the revived series.

Donna was exemplary in this episode. Again she showed what a caring and compassionate person she is when she made the Doctor see Jenny for who she is, his daughter; and in her not unsuccessful efforts at getting the Doctor to open up about his feelings (something I think Martha would not have had success in doing). The writers have really put a lot of attention into making Donna a quality companion whom the audience cares about, and Donna truly is a great companion to the Doctor as a result, in every sense of the word. Donna also showed her resourcefulness in figuring out the mystery behind the numbers printed everywhere, showing she’s more than just a good mate to the Doctor.

The setting was really intriguing, and the war between the humans and Hath made for a great opportunity to discuss the futility of war and the morality of fighting. I sometimes find it remarkable that, after all this time, the Doctor still holds to his lofty, some would say naïve, pacifistic ideals. Surely after 900 years and having seen war and bloodshed everywhere he goes, and having engaged in his fair share of violence himself, he would be jaded and resigned to the reality of an unrelentingly violent world? I think, in this story, we’re given a compelling answer to that particular question: it’s exactly because of all the violence the Doctor has seen and done that he continues to so abhor it. He said, very tellingly, to Jenny: “The killing. After a while, it infects you. And once it does, you’re never rid of it.” He’s as good as admitting that his own experiences in war, probably one war in particular, caused him to develop a terrible revulsion of violence, and repelled him from ever contemplating violence again. Excellent writing in any case, particularly the very powerful “I never would” moment. Wonderful stuff.

Rating: 8/10.

Thoughts on: The Sontaran Stratagem / The Poison Sky

The one thing this story did fantastically was the thing it substantially set out to accomplish: to re-introduce the Sontarans. I would confidently say this story was the Sontarans’ best, in the sense that the Sontarans were portrayed the best. This story was hugely successful in re-introducing the Sontarans, perfectly encapsulating what they were and what they were about: a race of clone soldiers who glory in war and violence. The Sontarans in this story were intimidating and fearsome, as well as somewhat comical, but not in such a way that detracted from their menace. I wasn’t as impressed with the story on the whole. The plot, concerning the mystery of the Sontarans’ uncharacteristically reticent invasion of Earth, was fleetingly interesting, but not so interesting to keep me gripped for the full ninety minutes of this fairly run-of-the-mill alien invasion runaround story. “Aliens are invading (21st Century) Earth” has become such a hackneyed trope in modern Doctor Who that stories employing the formula are invariably wont to be repetitive and tiresome. This one is no exception. As far as alien invasion runarounds go, it doesn’t particularly stand out: swap the Sontarans with any hostile alien species and one would scarcely be able to tell the difference.

Apart from the effective deployment of the Sontarans themselves, the only thing that redeemed this story was the characters—specifically Martha and Donna. Donna continues to endear herself the audience, showing what a very complex person she really is under that bluster and snark. She showed her insecurities about travelling with the Doctor in her dialogue with Martha, her concern for protecting her family, particularly her loving grandad, Wilf, from being hurt by her association with the Doctor. Although she’s not my favourite, Donna showed herself to be a unique companion in other ways: she’s not the perfect Mary-Sue that Rose and Martha were, she was petrified when the Doctor asked her to sneak through the Sontaran ship and activate the teleport pods. In a way that certainly makes her a far more relateable companion that Rose or Martha were, who both proved themselves to be extraordinary people. Although Martha spent the majority of the story locked in a basement while her clone gallivanted around pretending to be her, the little screentime real Martha got was wonderful, such as the touching dialogue between Martha and her clone. Wilf was also excellent. He’s becoming a really strong character in his own right, and easily the best friend-and-family-of-companion character we’ve had yet. One can’t help but think he’s inadvertently sending his granddaughter into danger so he can live vicariously through her…

The Doctor was good in this story, although the material he was given in the script didn’t exactly lend itself to a display of Tennant’s acting abilities. I did, however, find the Doctor a little too sanctimonious in this story—not only his frankly prejudiced aversion to soldiers (from an organisation he used to work for, no less), but his insistence on sacrificing himself at the end to “give them a choice”. How more idiotically pious could you get? The Doctor’s moralism is a central part of his character, but sometimes it goes overboard, as here. The Doctor would have known that there was approximately zero chance of the Sontarans’ backing down, so he was essentially knowingly embarking on an unnecessary suicide mission. Just not good writing, I think. I did, however, like the way the Doctor was shown to callously “use” Donna, putting her into danger for his own ends. That’s the morally-questionable-and-sometimes-outright-Machiavellian-but-essentially-good Doctor I know.

Some final thoughts: I thought Luke Rattigan was a really well-written character. He was a tragic villain in many respects. His motivations and objectives were so unforgivably selfish, but yet you can’t help feeling sorry for the snotty little oik, who was driven to make a terrible pact with the Sontarans out of resentment and grievance at the way the unappreciative world had treated him and his obviously vast genius. I hated the little git, but I also, in spite of myself, sympathised with him. That’s testament to very able acting on the part of Ryan Sampson, in any case. I thought UNIT were poorly portrayed in this story. They seem to have gone from being the beneficial and equal alliance of military and science for common endeavour that they were in the classic series to being a substantially militarist affair in this story. Finally, I thought the Doctor’s whipping up of the atmosphere converter to dispel the Sontarans’ poison gas could have been better explained; it looked like the Doctor just cobbled together a few bits and pieces from Rattigan’s laboratory that just happened to be the right components he needed.

Rating: 7/10.

Thoughts on: Planet of the Ood

Planet of the Ood is one of my favourite stories from Series 4, a morbid but also exultant and beautiful story featuring one of the best of the revival’s new alien species. It’s a cerebral tale bringing into intelligent relief some important real-world issues. Donna, the uncultured Londoner, was forced to contemplate uncomfortable parallels with the captive Ood in her own world, the phenomenon of sweatshops and third-world labour, when confronted with the revelation that the human civilisation of the future is built on the backs of an enslaved alien species. The episode’s discussion of slavery and the tyranny of profit, when untempered by morality, was done effectively and intelligently with the invocation of the imagery of concentration camps and racialism. Moreover, the PR girl Solana’s hesitant assistance of Ood Operations represented the way reasonable, ordinary people can become accessories to horrors just by being passive and permitting abuses to take place.

The episode itself was expertly produced, cranking up the emotiveness in all the right places to produce a beautiful, artistic work of television drama. The Ood were particularly good, and are one of the most well-conceived new alien species the revival has introduced. There’s something distinctly unnerving about them that belies their peaceable and docile nature. I tend to see them as a race of philosophers, a profoundly intellectual species that have been outrageously abused by other races out of prejudice. They’re a bit like the Jews in this way. The sequence showing the Ood singing in exultation when the Doctor destroyed the forcefield inhibiting their connection with the Ood Brain was truly stirring, the ecstatic high-point of the episode, and a genuine triumph of production. The music was also an excellent feature of this episode, and Gold was given the reins to produce something wonderful for the singing aliens.

Donna was excellent in this episode. As in The Fires of Pompeii, Donna shows what a caring, passionate person she is when confronted by the moral repulsion of humanity’s enslavement of the Ood. The poignant scene where Donna reacts to the Ood’s depressing “song of captivity” is the most powerful moment in the episode, not only in relation to the plight of the Ood, but for Donna’s characterisation, too, representing the moment where Donna’s romantic and naïve preconceptions about travelling with the Doctor were shattered, rudely thrust aside by the confronting reality. Additionally, Halpen was also a very well-written villain, who was played very well by Tim McInnerny. Halpen was made a three-dimensional, layered character who didn’t conform to the caricatured image of an evil, greedy, morally-deficient slave-driver. If Halpen was made a pantomime villainous figure, as would have been tempting, this episode almost certainly wouldn’t have been as effective as it was. The point of making Halpen an insecure, flawed, layered character rather than an unreal, crude caricature was to demonstrate that it’s not just evil men who can be implicated in evil. Much evil is prosecuted by otherwise decent people, like Halpen, who don’t think they’re doing any wrong.

Rating: 9/10.