February 18: "Blink"

It is, of course, one of the best episodes Doctor Who has ever done -- it's been in fandom's collective top ten since its debut and subsequent years have done nothing to tarnish its luster.  It reinforced Steven Moffat's reputation as an A-list Who writer (a reputation that only began to falter once he was required to write more than one story a year), and it won the Hugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form -- Moffat's third win in as many years.  No mean feat for an episode that barely features either main character.

Sally with a bunch of creepy statues. ("Blink") ©BBC

But like last series's "Doctor-lite" episode, "Blink" exists in the Doctor's shadow -- not as much as "Love & Monsters" did, but with a strong influence from the Doctor, as he's the one who brings this episode's main character, Sally Sparrow, into events.  (Well, sort of; by the end we know it's not that simple.)  But the focus is on Sally (played by another person just before she made it big, Carey Mulligan), as she slowly works out what's going on, thanks to clues that have been planted decades earlier for her to discover right now.  It's one of those plots that seems like it would have come up before, but for a show about time travel, Doctor Who seems rather reluctant to play with time much (except for Steven Moffat, who seems far more interested in it than anyone else writing for the TV version) -- but we get some ontological paradoxes, as the Doctor tells Sally what to do based on things she's told him as a result of his telling her what to do.  Or as the Doctor says, in probably the best-known line from this episode (and possibly the entire show): "People assume that time is a strict progression of cause to effect, but actually from a non-linear, non-subjective viewpoint, it's more like a big ball of wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey... stuff."  ("Started well, that sentence," Sally remarks.  "It got away from me, yeah," the Doctor replies.)

But while the time hijinks are fun (and there's something incredibly wonderful and tragic about the old Billy Shipton meeting Sally again: "It was raining when we met," Billy remembers.  "It's the same rain," Sally replies), the thing that really elevates "Blink" above its peers is the sense of tension and terror it induces.  Moffat has hit upon a winning formula with his Weeping Angels creation -- a monster that only moves when you're not looking at it.  It plays upon the fear of being watched when you don't know it, and of things moving that you only see out of the corner of your eye.  (There's also a more mundane origin: Moffat was inspired by the children's game "Statues".)  It's a very effective and creepy adversary, and even the way it "kills" you -- by sending you back in time and feeding on the life you would have had -- is inspired.

So, an incredibly effective monster, a great cast (Carey Mulligan justly gets a lot of praise, but Finlay Robertson, as Larry Nightingale, does a lot with a somewhat thankless role -- and look, it's Louis Mahoney, from various David Maloney-directed Who stories, as old Billy), wonderful direction, and some clever fun with time travel mechanics and paradoxes make "Blink" a special episode indeed.  It's clever and smart and just about everything we want the show to be, and the Weeping Angels are probably the greatest creation of the BBC Wales run.  It's not hard to see why this captured the imagination of so many people.

February 17: "The Family of Blood"

Son of Mine and Mother of Mine gather their army. ("The Family of
Blood") ©BBC

Here's where the action is, as the Family of Blood start killing people and sending their scarecrow army against the public school John Smith is teaching at, all so that they can get their hands on a Time Lord and thus live forever.  To this end we get some good action moments, such as the boys shooting down the scarecrows and the Family bombarding the village to draw the Doctor out.

But ultimately, what this story wants to be is a character study of the Doctor: once you strip away all the "lonely god", "last of the Time Lords" stuff, what's left?  What is it that makes the Doctor tick?  Is the Doctor, at his core, a good man (to borrow one of series 8's promotional lines)?  The answer seems to be yes, but they try to have it both ways: to make a human Doctor still a good person, but all the while insisting that the full Doctor is one of the best things ever.  So what this means is that, while you might expect that John Smith has the basic traits and beliefs of the Doctor, that's not really what we get.  Instead we get the result of a human Doctor, and the result is...human.  Plain old homo sapiens sapiens.  He's not a bad man, but he's very much human, with all the failings and weaknesses that entails.

Here's a case in point: last episode, Tim starts daydreaming during machine gun practice, and so Hutchinson asks if he can go discipline Tim.  John Smith agrees without a second thought.  It's certainly in keeping with the time period, but it doesn't really match how we -- all right, I -- think the Doctor should be.  (A similar situation in the book gives John Smith pause, which might be why this sticks out to me.)  It is, however, a human reaction.

But so while the "Human Nature" 2-parter espouses the virtues of being human, it also details the benefits of being the Doctor -- best summed up in Tim's speech: "He's like fire and ice and rage.  He's like the night and the storm in the heart of the sun. ... He's ancient and forever. He burns at the centre of time and he can see the turn of the universe. ... And he's wonderful."  And that seems to be the point of this story: that it's good to be human, but it's also good to be the Doctor, even if he brings death and destruction with him.  The universe needs him.  But that's nothing new; that's been an underlying theme of the show for some time now.

And so here's the thing: this story is definitely firing on almost all cylinders -- there are only a couple odd moments, like the Doctor's rather vengeful punishments for the Family -- and David Tennant is incredible here, as he rages against becoming the Doctor.  It's also fascinating how much more distant he becomes once he's the Doctor again -- the scene between him and Nurse Redfern at the end is very powerful as a result.  The rest of the cast are excellent -- Harry Lloyd in particular is incredibly creepy as Son of Mine -- and the direction and design is gorgeous.  But I find that "Human Nature" / "The Family of Blood" isn't quite the story I want it to be.  It sometimes feels like there's a missed opportunity, a lost chance to see what really makes the Doctor tick.

The Discontinuity Guide uses a phrase to describe The Caves of Androzani: "brilliant but over-rated."  That pretty much sums up my feelings on "Human Nature" / "The Family of Blood".  It's wonderful, but I feel like it could have been even more wonderful.

February 16: "Human Nature"

"Human Nature" is the first part of Paul Cornell's two-part adaptation of his own novel Human Nature -- one of the best received of Virgin's New Adventures line, which continued the Doctor's adventures after Survival.  In the original novel it was the seventh Doctor and his companion was archaeologist Professor Bernice Summerfield, who posed as his niece instead of a servant, but the general plot beats are the same between the two (which, if you think the books are "canon" -- as much as anything in Doctor Who is considered canon -- leads to some interesting conversations about whether this storyline had happened before the tenth Doctor put his Time Lord-ness in a Chameleon Arch).

John Smith and Nurse Joan Redfern. ("Human Nature") ©BBC

What's most obvious about "Human Nature" is how good David Tennant is.  He manages to make John Smith a distinct character from the Doctor, yet still one who still seems like he might have the Doctor in there somewhere.  As such, his shy, awkward nature -- around Nurse Redfern in particular -- is quite entertaining to view.  It's fascinating to get essentially a different take on how to play this character, and Tennant is clearly relishing the opportunity to do so.  And while Tennant is playing at being human, Freema Agyeman continues to excel in the rather more thankless role of looking after him without trying to be too obvious about it.  It's interesting to watch her deal with racism and looking "a little familiar" with John Smith, and Martha frankly does a good job of keeping her head about all this.  These scenes are good, but my favorite ones might be when she heads into the TARDIS and views the video instructions the Doctor left her before he transformed -- the ones that give all sorts of instructions but utterly fail to describe what to do if the Doctor falls in love.  (Even if the line about how the Doctor "had to go and fall in love with a human, and it wasn't me" rings a bit of a sour note -- yes, this is clearly the direction they want to take Martha, but it never feels right, for a multitude of reasons (least of all that it reduces Martha's role to that of pining hopelessly after the Doctor, which is a great injustice).)

I said the plot beats are largely the same between the book and the TV version, but that's not quite true; the televised version has a much better reason for the Doctor to change (here it's because he's being pursued by aliens; in the book it was because he was worried he was too out-of-touch with humanity, and the aliens showed up later), and the urgency that this lends events is really nice.  It gives a much sharper purpose, and it gives us a lot more foreshadowing about what's to come that works well in this story's favor.  The inclusion of the scarecrows as monsters is also a nice touch, and the way the Family of Blood all tilt their heads and sniff as they try to find the Doctor is simple yet effective.  On the other hand, the MacGuffin that holds the Doctor's Time Lord nature is essentially stolen by Tim Latimer, which is a bit problematic in pure heroic terms.  (In the book, Tim finds the MacGuffin outside.)

Still, it's a really well done episode of the show, even if it is pure setup until the cliffhanger.  The question is, how will the second half hold up?  The "next time" trailer after the credits certainly provides some interesting scenes...

February 15: "42"

Seems we have a winner in the "shortest episode title" category (unless someone names an episode "X" or "?" or something)...

Here's the thing about "42": everyone involved in actually filming this episode is working almost flat out to make this work, and to their credit they just about do it.  It's hard to point at much in the episode we see on screen and be able to say, "That bit's terrible."  Graeme Harper is doing a great job of injecting action and tension in this, and David Tennant and Freema Agyeman have thrown themselves completely into this story.  The supporting cast is good, and the set design is pleasingly industrial (and in keeping with "The Impossible Planet" / "The Satan Pit", which is set in roughly the same time period).  So then why does the final product feel so underwhelming?

The thing is, a week ago we had something that looked perilously close at times to Doctor Who self-parody, with a giant monster chase serving as a substitute for an actual plot, much how the general public might think the show operates.  This week we get something that Doctor Who actually does: a "base-under-siege" tale, essentially, with an external force threatening to destroy everyone inside the base, and an intruder inside also wreaking havoc.  But "42" doesn't have a new spin on this sort of thing.

The Doctor is possessed by the sun creature. ("42") ©BBC

That's not the worst of sins, of course, but the other problem that becomes apparent once you stop to think about this episode is how much writer Chris Chibnall is throwing at this thing, hoping something will stick.  And so we get a bunch of locked doors (in what must be the stupidest security system ever -- incidentally, the answer about the most number one hits presupposes we're talking about British number ones, as the Beatles have the most number ones in the US), a sentient sun, possessed people (including the Doctor!), a situation with an escape pod, the real-time idea...  There are so many ideas that they're all jostling for attention, and thus none of them really get the attention they deserve.  And the thing is, there are some interesting ideas here -- the sentient sun should have probably have received a lot more focus, but instead it's just there to explain why the crew members are possessed.  And while the possession bit is actually rather well done (thanks, again, to the efforts of the people concerned with things that will show up on screen), with nice faceless masks that look properly intimidating, they never feel like too much of a threat -- partly because we then have to deal with the escape pod, and then the Doctor being possessed, and then the ship falling into the sun, and then...

(Oh, and if they didn't keep putting up the real-time countdown clock, you'd never notice.  Also, they cheat a few times -- such as between the first and second appearances of the clock.)

So there are lots of ideas, each potentially workable on their own but denied the development they deserve.  The result is a shallow, ultimately unsatisfying story, one that looks more like Doctor Who-by-numbers than something original.  That's a shame, because Chibnall has some interesting ideas here, as I said -- it's just that none of them get a chance to breathe.  To their credit, the cast and crew almost make something of this, but ultimately "42" is a rather disappointing tale.  (Even if it's better than Chibnall's series 1 Torchwood scripts.)

February 14: "The Lazarus Experiment"

So has writer Stephen Greenhorn ever actually seen Doctor Who?  Because "The Lazarus Experiment" looks a lot like what someone who had only ever been told about the show might come up with.  It looks more like the general public's conception of Doctor Who rather than what the show actually does.  And sadly, it doesn't even do that particularly well.

Professor Lazarus changes into a monster. ("The Lazarus
Experiment") ©BBC

The main problem here is that there's no underlying point for their monster story.  When the show has done monster stories in the past, frequently it's as an allegory for something else (such as the original conception of the Cybermen, which made Kit Pedler's fears about people slowly replacing their body parts and becoming less and less human as a result into an easy-to-visualize threat) or occasionally to keep the younger viewers happy while the older ones focus on the more conceptual problem that the story is worrying at (see Ghost Light for possibly the oddest realization of this).  But there's nothing like that here; instead the focus is on Professor Lazarus's meddling with nature, but there's nothing beyond that -- and as Lazarus is shown to be something of a lecher before he undergoes his transformation (observe the scene between him and Tish, and note also how all his assistants are pretty young women), they can't even go down the "good man overwhelmed by baser instincts" route (as seen in Planet of Evil, or Doctor Octopus in the movie Spider-Man 2).  No, the whole thing is an excuse for them to pull out their crap CGI monster and have it chase our heroes around for a while, justifying the exercise with some nonsense about "dormant genes" becoming active.

Then, bizarrely, they decide to lift the ending of Timelash (always a story you want to emulate) and have a second ending instead, in a move which looks designed to fill the remaining time rather than because of some story decision they wanted to make.  It doesn't take the story in a new direction; it just gives us another chance to see their crummy monster in action.  (And it really isn't a very good monster, is it?  The face in particular is a bad move as it never changes expression, making it look like something out of a PlayStation cut scene rather than a real world creature.)

It's not all bad; there are some good lines (such as "Really shouldn't take that long just to reverse the polarity.  I must be a bit out of practice") and Freema Agyeman continues to be one of the best things this series -- I love the way she brings up the DNA sample, or how she insists on being more than just a passenger in the TARDIS.  The Saxon subplot is also interesting -- it's the first time we get the impression that this is going to be more than a simple background clue, to remain slightly obscured until episode 12 of the series, and I also like the way Harold Saxon, whoever he is, is being set up in opposition to the Doctor.  (Although, worryingly, the lightweight nature of the main plot means that this Saxon bit is the part you're most likely to remember from the whole thing.)  But ultimately "The Lazarus Experiment" is a failure, an attempt to justify an episode-long monster chase with a monster that's not really up to the challenge.  This is the first out-and-out failure of series 3.

February 13: "Evolution of the Daleks"

Now "Evolution of the Daleks" -- that's a title!  Shame about the rest of the episode, though.

The Doctor talks to Dalek Sec. ("Evolution of the Daleks") ©BBC

All right, that's not fair.  There's a lot that this episode does right -- the "evolution" mentioned in the title is particularly interesting, and the suggestion that the Daleks might in fact dramatically change their way of life is fascinating.  "Do you trust [Dalek Sec]?" Laszlo asks the Doctor. "I know that one man can change the course of history," the Doctor replies.  "Right idea in the right place at the right time, it's all it takes.  I've got to believe it's possible."  In fact, for a while it looks like we might actually get a fundamental shift in the nature of the Daleks (or, alternatively, we're waiting for Dalek Sec to reveal his true colors and show that he's duped the Doctor -- but either way, drama), but the supreme nature of the unmodified Daleks takes over and we get a version of the original plan (make humans that are actually Daleks, even though they look externally human).  Still, the idea was fascinating for a while, and it's neat that they decided to push ahead with it as long as they did.  There's also an interesting subthread about the Doctor seeming to want to die (twice he basically orders the Daleks to kill him and braces for the shots that never come), as if he's finally decided that he's had enough and doesn't want to keep dealing with Daleks anymore.

The problem, however, lies in the sheer amount of technobabble that writer Helen Raynor (hey, our first female writer for the show since Rona Munro and Survival!) has to employ to get all her pieces in the right positions.  The DNA splicing between humans and Daleks is bad enough (and what, exactly, makes Dalek DNA spiky?), but fine, maybe there's some special chemical/technique we just don't about that would make this work.  But it's the moment where the Doctor is struck by a gamma radiation lightning bolt which passes his DNA down the cables to all the waiting would-be Daleks that makes you just throw your hands up in despair.  Unknown techniques are one thing, but electricity transmitting DNA sequences?  Those are two different things we know enough about to realize that they're completely incompatible.  That's a piece of technobabble too far, and it's so blatant a move to get us to a deus ex machina ending that it's incredibly frustrating as a result.

That's a shame, because for large chunks this story works surprisingly well.  We get some exploration of a new direction for the Daleks, we get some nice period stuff in New York, and a lot of the acting is top-notch.  But the resolution does overshadow everything, weakening the final product.  "Daleks in Manhattan" / "Evolution of the Daleks" is likely to be remembered more for that than any of the moves in its favor.

February 12: "Daleks in Manhattan"

So Martha's "one trip" has consisted of a trip to the past, a trip to the future... and now another trip to the past (albeit the more recent past) -- and our third extended visit to the United States (after The Gunfighters -- which is technically set in a territory, not a state -- and the TV Movie).  I'm not counting the brief American interlude in The Chase -- but maybe I should: that interlude included Daleks at the top of the Empire State Building, and it turns out we get the same thing here, even if it's 35 years earlier.  It seems the Daleks were involved in the Empire State Building's construction.

Of course, since we're talking the Empire State Building's construction, we're talking 1930 and therefore the Great Depression.  That brings us to one of the many shanty towns constructed around the country nicknamed Hoovervilles, after then-President Hoover.  It seems that people have been disappearing from New York's Hooverville in mysterious circumstances -- and all the while the construction of the Empire State Building is moving faster and faster.

The Daleks select people for processing. ("Daleks in Manhattan")
©BBC

But look!  It's Andrew Garfield as Frank, one of the Hooverville residents, right before he became better known as a movie star!  It's interesting to see him here in a minor role, interacting with David Tennant and Freema Agyeman as one of the people heading through the sewers.  Actually, I'd forgotten that he survived to the cliffhanger -- I'd thought the pig slaves had got him for good.

Oh right, the pig slaves.  It's not quite clear why they're around -- I think the idea is that the Daleks are practicing genetic manipulation on them before they do it to themselves, but that's never made clear.  Still, it's not a bad design, and it's certainly memorable.  Not quite as memorable as the cliffhanger, though, where the half-human/half-Dalek Sec steps out of his Dalek shell.  Now that's an image.

I like "Daleks in Manhattan".  There's a nice sense of building threat and mystery, and that cliffhanger definitely sends the story in a new direction.  I also like that we get a Dalek story that doesn't have any particular "event" significance attached to it -- it's just the next Dalek story (so it's like The Chase in another way).  We'll have to see how the second half is.

But let's be honest: "Daleks in Manhattan" is kind of a crap title, isn't it?