Now you see it …

Doctor Who – The Stolen Earth

[USUAL SPOILER ALERT]

So, did you get it? Bad Wolf meant the daleks are back! Just when you think they could never possibly return, there they are – again!

Having got the message from Rose, the Doctor rushes to check that the Earth is ok – it is, but while he is in the tardis while he is back in the Tardis checking things, it disappears. Now people can’t just go around stealing planets, so he goes to the Shadow Proclamation (who’ve been mentioned on and off from the beginning of the new series 4 years ago. Was it all building to this?) to find out what’s going on. They tell him that it isn’t just the Earth that’s gone, there are lots of lost planets; 27 if you include the ones taken out of time as well as space. There’s a lovely moment where the Doctor points out that some one tried to move the Earth once before … (a nice nod back to Dalek Invasion of Earth) The Doctor asks Donna if anything strange has been happening on Earth and she mentions the bees disappearing. It turns out this is important (told you it was) so the Doctor and Donna follow the trail left by the fleeing bees to find the Earth, only for the trail to run out at the Medusa Cascade.

Meanwhile on the moved Earth Torchwood, Martha and Sarah Jane try to figure out what’s going on , as does Rose, who’s appeared and is trying to find the Doctor. They all use their various resources to find out what’s going on – there’s something at the centre of all the plants, and ships are heading towards Earth. The message comes through from the ships – “Exterminate”. They all recognise it and know that there’s nothing they can do. Except Rose, who knows that Daleks can be defeated. She heads off to find Donna’s family, as wherever Donna is, that’s where the Doctor will be. Suddenly there’s something coming through on all their various computers. It’s Harriet Jones, former Prime Minister (yes, we know who you are) using a sub-wave network created by the mysterious Mr Copper Foundation. She gathers the forces of all the Doctor’s former companions to amplify Martha’s phone signal to the Doctor.

The Doctor picks up the signal and gets to Earth. But while celebrating seeing everyone again, he also finds Davros who’s been rescued from the Time War by Dalek Caan (who’d gone mad in the process and is now foretelling the future). The Doctor lands and everyone rushes to him – Donna points out Rose and they run towards each other, only for the Doctor to get shot by a lone dalek. Donna, Rose and Jack get him in to the Tardis where he starts to regenerate – Donna is confused, Rose is just about to loose the man she loves, again. What a great cliffhanger. But more importantly, what’s going to happen to Sarah Jane and Ianto? They’re about to get exterminated!!

There were some lovely, funny moments, as there always are from Russell T Davies – Harriet Jones  greeting the daleks, only for them to respond with the same “we know who you are” as everyone else. Mr Smith’s fanfare, which annoys everyone (even Sarah Jane, it seems). And there was some great banter between Sarah Jane and Jack when they were all gathered, with him flirting (as usual) and her saying she avoids Torchwood, “too many guns” with a nod towards Luke.

And my tip for next week? Watch the hand …

Go the other way

Doctor Who – Turn Left

[USUAL SPOILER ALERT]

After last week’s episode where the Doctor was without Donna, this week’s focused on Donna.

The story took the staple sci-fi idea of a parallel world created by someone making a different decision. Donna in the ‘present’ time is persuaded by a fortune teller on another planet to go back and change her decision to take the job at HC Clements, turning right instead of left, and so not meet the Doctor. This has catastrophic effects in the alternative reality which is created – the Doctor dies facing the Racnoss (because Donna isn’t there to save him), and both the Torchwood team and Sarah Jane Smith are killed trying to save the world in his place. The Titanic crashes on London, America is paralysed by the massacre of its population by the Adipose, Atmos devices kill large parts of the rest of the world. Then the stars start to disappear …

All the time Donna keeps meeting a blond girl (who we know is Rose Tyler, but who never tells Donna her name) who appears and disappears randomly. She explains that Donna is important, just as important as the Doctor, and that she must go back and change her decision and turn left instead of right to save him. Rose and the remainder of UNIT have harnessed some of the Tardis’s power to time travel, but also use it to show Donna that this world is a false creation – she has this beetle on her back (various people have been able to see this – even the soothsayer in Pompeii said “there’s something on your back”, but was this referring to these alternative future events?). Donna agrees to go back and change things, even though Rose has told her she’s going to die.

Although it was a rather complex episode, with a very bleak Doctor-less future, I really enjoyed it. It not only highlighted the importance of the Doctor in this world, but also tied in the spin offs of both Torchwood and the Sarah Jane Adventures to the same world. The re-introduction of Rose was very carefully done, so that she didn’t dominate the story (as it was very much Donna’s story), but she was crucial to it. And it seemed to set up the potential for a very exciting two part finale.

And the final outcome of all this alternate reality? Rose whispered two words to Donna to tell the Doctor. At the very end of the episode those two words were everywhere – Bad Wolf. And we know what that means …

Repeats

Doctor Who – Midnight

[WARNING ABOUT SPOILERS AND STUFF]

If ever anyone had any doubts about Russell T Davies’ writing for Doctor Who (and I didn’t, but I know people who did), then this episode should dispel all of those doubts and more and place him up there with the best. It was a real character driven episode with the Doctor and seven other passengers trapped on a shuttle (he’d left Donna at the Pleasure Palace). There’s something outside, or is it inside Mrs Silvestry? But the real scariness wasn’t the thing outside, or in, but the real human fear and the savagery with which that fear can manifest itself. The way the other passengers turned on one another was far more frightening than statues that move when you don’t look at them, or killer swarms in the shadows. These were people you could meet anywhere, and so could just as easily turn on you.

I suspected it was going to be a good episode from the cast – Lesley Sharp and Lindsey Coulson are both great actors and bring great realism to any parts they play. Also I was more than a little excited about the inclusion of David Troughton in the cast. Not only is he a very great actor, but he has more Classic Series connections than you can shake a stick at.

Also huge praise must be given to the sound team for this episode. It wasn’t until watching the Confidential episode that I appreciated how much work they had had to do to make the dialogue perfectly in sync. But it was well worth the effort. I know I was watching the episode thinking how good an audio adventure it would make.

[just a note to say that I'm posting this late as I've been without internet for a week!]

In the Library with the Screwdriver

Doctor Who – Forest of the Dead

[WATCH OUT FOR THE SPOILERS]

 Part two of this story saw the Doctor and his companions escape the inescapable by blasting a hole through the shelves. Somewhat cheating, I felt, but I’ll let it pass as the rest of the episode was still so good.

While the Doctor, River and the remainder of the team were dashing about in the library trying to avoid the Vashta Nerada, we found out what was happening to Donna. She was living a different life, one where she didn’t know the Doctor and was doing ‘normal’ things like getting married and having children. Was she really dead and this was some kind of afterlife? Or was it a virtual reality? She started to spot strange things, like in dreams where one scene jumps to another. This was highlighted to her by Miss Evangelista, but even when she was aware that it wasn’t real, she couldn’t do anything about it.

 The Doctor was eventually told by Lux that CAL was the computer with a little girl wired in to it, that looked after the library (Doctor Moon was to look after her). All the people who had tried to teleport at once to escape the Vashta Nerada had overloaded the system and had been ’saved’ onto the computer and were all living in the virtual world with the little girl and Doctor Moon. The Doctor figured out a way to save them, but it would mean sacrificing his own life. River stopped him and sacrificed herself instead.

We still didn’t find out who River Song was, although she knew the Doctor’s name and whispered it to him to prove she was someone he could trust. As the Doctor pointed out, he never tells anyone his name, apart from under one circumstance. What that circumstance was we weren’t told. But the Doctor worked out that by giving her his sonic screwdriver he managed to save her, so downloaded her into the library computer so she could ‘live’.

The one problem I had with the episode was how the Doctor overcame the Vashta Nerada. They had been this terrorising force over two episodes when suddenly the doctor confronted them and told them to check the books for who he was. They did and suddenly became fearful of him, so allowed 24 hours for everyone to be evacuated from the library before they reclaimed it. Now the Doctor has been held as someone of power who is to be feared in the past (Fenric, Morgaine), but why didn’t he confront the Vashta Nerada sooner? Very frustrating.

Being the Audience

Friday evening I took a lovely drive round the lanes of Oxfordshire. Pretty though my journey was, it did have a purpose. A little while ago I’d spotted that there was to be an arts festival in the village of Leafield and one of the events was “An Evening with Graeme Garden”. Well, how could I not accept an invitation like that, which was practically on my doorstep? So with C for company, and to help with navigation (not that I don’t trust my satnav, but it does take interesting routes to places), I set off on a lovely drive on a beautiful summer’s evening.

Arriving at the church where the event was being held, we had intended on sneaking in and sitting at the back. However, this was very badly scuppered by the sight of a very familiar face as we walked through the door! But we took a pew at the back anyway and settled, waiting for the evening to begin.

 After a slightly muddled introduction, the show got underway. It took the form of questions from the audience, which Graeme answered with some wonderful stories and anecdotes. There was a good mix of questions about comedy influences, writing, performing and the origins and rules of Mornington Crescent. C even asked about Pocket Orchestra (finally!). I didn’t ask a question (although I thought of quite a few after the event – typical!), but Graeme did mention the lovely Goodies fans in Australia and the few in the UK, mentioning that there were two sitting at the back! (We did find another one after the show who’d come all the way from Sheffield!)

There was, of course, the inevitable question about the future of I’m Sorry I Haven’t a Clue, which made me cringe a little when it was asked. But Graeme answered in beautifully by not actually saying anything specific, other than they’d like to carry on at some point.

Afterwards we went to say a proper hello to Graeme and as we were talking the ‘official’ photographer was taking pictures which he promised to send to us (and of course I wouldn’t post them all over the internet! Honestly!!). There was just time for a quick hug before it was time to find my car and head home.