Before I start todays review I just wanted to say something
that I hadn’t spoken of in yesterday’s episode. The cliffhanger was really good
and a better one than in Aliens of London. The people in the hospital walking
towards the Doctor, Jack and Rose mirrors what’s happening to Nancy back at the
house. They solved the problem of the
NEXT TIME trailer in a two parter. They held it over to after the credits
finished which is now the norm. Being so bothered by the Jack/Rose romance that
was beginning. I hadn’t commented on what the point of Jack was in the story
and he is basically a con man thinking that the Doctor and Rose were going to
make him an offer. He basically is the one that caused the problems that are
happening in this story.
I remember that there seemed to be a bit of annoyance when
the title for this episode was revealed. I think that people imagine that it
was going to be a Doctor Who version of Strictly Come Dancing which was clearly
never going to be the case. RTD might be mad but even he would do that sort of
stunt in the tenth episode of the reboot. The cliffhanger being done in the
pre-title scene is something that I like about the new series and the Doctor
manages to save the day by just acting like a parent and telling them to ‘go to
their room’.
Unlike World War Three, this episode actually delivers on
what was set up in the previous episode. The spookiness continues in this
episode. I love the scene where they are in Room 802 with the drawings and all
the carnage. It’s the sort of room that appears in the found footage films
which take place in abandoned hospitals. It’s lit perfectly and James Hawes
keeps the shots tight to hide the arrival of the boy in the gasmask. The bit
where the tape ran out and yet the boy still talks and the typewriter still typing
when the kid isn’t sitting next to it are two great moments.
I like how the Doctor is annoyed at Jack because of what he
was doing. It’s a nice contrast with the love in from Jack and Rose. There was
a bit more innocence in the previous episode. Due to the change, there is less
stuff to find annoying in this episode about Jack and so it doesn’t bother me
so much that he becomes part of the TARDIS crew. There is a shot of the three
of them coming towards the camera and to me it works and this is the moment
that I think they work as a trio. The scene where Jack joins the TARDIS crew is
a good one and one that I didn’t think I would like when I started watching the
two episodes.
Billie Piper isn’t as annoying as she has been for several
episodes. Her best scene comes when Rose is talking to Nancy about the future
of the country. Nancy’s truth is revealed at one of the tenser moments of the
episode. In the previous episode we learn that the boy was Nancy’s brother but
in fact he is her son. I like how Nancy hugging her son is what saves the day
and for the first time means that there weren’t any deaths in a Doctor Who
story.
The nanobots from the previous episode actually have a
purpose and that is they are the one that caused the gasmask on everyones
faces. Ok I would really liked to have blamed Captain Jack but on this occasion
it was the nanobots. They think that the boy is how all humans should look like
and be like and that is why everyone else is walking around saying mummy. It’s
a great idea from Moffat and as a result this two part story is one of the strongest
of the series.
After a rough couple of episodes, it feels like the show is
back on track with a story that didn’t wallow in family back story and despite
my mis-givings about the romance between Rose and Jack in the previous episode
I think that this adventure is one of the strongest stories so far.
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