(698) The End of the World

So after the initial buzz of the reboot, now we get to the meat of the new series which is whether it could stand up with new stories and new monsters. It’s interesting that the Doctor is basically turning into a galactic taxi driver, asking Rose where she wants to go. The Doctor ends up taking Rose to the day that the Earth dies. Literally the end of the world. The Doctor isn’t quite the cheeriest person to go on a trip with. The Doctor delivers a nice bit of exposition where he talks about how there is a trust that has kept the continents of Earth and now the money has run out its being left to blow up. Rose brings up a nice point that the continents drift and being five billion years in the future then surely they should have moves, she even mentions that she saw something on Newsround Extra.

This episode introduces the Psychic Paper which is a great creation from Russell T Davies as it becomes the new series version of the Sonic Screwdriver. I think the problems that people have with the screwdriver is the same problem that I have with the Paper. It’s just too convenient for my liking. It’s amusing at first but after five years of seeing it, the prop becomes too simple a plot device. This is an episode which introduces Rose to aliens and in a way introduces new fans to the sort of aliens that they are This episode sees the first appearance of The Face of Boe which having watched the show since it returned I know now that this is in fact Captain Jack Harkness if you believe that nonsense. I can remember being disappointed with the Moxx of Balhoon because when I first saw the picture of this creature I thought that it would be the new series version of Sil but in fact he’s a bit of a disappointment.

The visual effect of Cassandra is something that is astonishing. In fact this entire episode is very astonishing. The engine room set is particularly impressive because its looks so vast. Zoe Wanamaker is the voice and makes the character work. It’s hard to like her but that’s why she is such an effective villain. There is a question of who bought the spiders on board and its obvious that it was Cassandra. That was rather disappointing from Russell T Davies. Another that doesn’t quite work is the rather clichéd fact that a switch that would save raise the shields just before the Earth burns is at the end of a very long path with a lot of propellers. I heard that this film has more visual effects than the film Gladiator. It’s clear that this was a very expensive episode and it needed to be to pull it off. I loved all the external shots and also the effect of the earth blowing up looked stunning.

The phone call that Rose and her mom has is quite nice and I don’t find Jackie as annoying even though she’s only in it for less than a minute. Rose becomes a proper companion in this episode when she gets put in danger.

This episode feature the first mention of Bad Wolf which is the first series story arc. It’s a sort of blink and you’ll miss mention but it’s there. This episode starts the backstory for the Doctor. We learn in this episode that he is the last of his race and that there was a Time war. The moment when Eve calls the Doctor a Timelord seems to motivate him quite a lot which was a nice moment. The moment when the Doctor announces this is a fantastic scene and it’s delivered superbly by Christopher Eccleston. It’s a huge bombshell and I can remember thinking that its perhaps the biggest change in the show for quite sometime. I remember actually thinking that this does back the show into a corner which it was going to find difficult to get out of.

The music in this episode is rather interesting. We have Tainted Love by Soft Cell (or a different version of it) and Toxic by Britney Spears. When I first started watching Doctor Who, I never ever thought that I would hear Britney bloody Spears in Doctor Who. It’s a sign of the times perhaps.

Christopher Eccleston is again very good in this episode. He seems to be having fun when watching Rose meet all the aliens for the first time and when Jabe dies it changes the Doctor and he becomes rather more aggressive. He manages to get Cassandra back and allows Cassandra to die. “Everything has its time and everything dies” is a line that I wouldn’t have expected from the Doctor but it ties in with the new more hardline Doctor which has become the norm now but wouldn’t have worked in the 1980’s. After being sidelined to an extent in the previous episode, this is where Eccleston gets to show us his Doctor and its great to see.

This has been a good episode but it doesn’t quite have the energy that the opening episode had but again this episode did what it needed to do and introduce a new audience to what the show is about. Now the enxt episode is going back into the past and I think it will be another example to new fans about what the show can do.