(764) The Hungry Earth

At the end of the Silurians’ last adventure, the smile was well and truly wiped off their happy looking faces which would explain why it’s taken 158 episodes (or 9,595 days) for them to return. This is the last story to feature the Silurians as a threatening menace because after this story the Silurians become friendlier which is one of the problems with Steven Moffat. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not going to jump on the Anti-Moffat bandwagon but this is one thing that does frustrate me about new Who. Normally I can remember what episode is coming up next and whilst I knew that the first Silurian story was next, I just couldn’t remember what the episode was called. I think that it’s because it’s a rather average name for an episode. I can remember the name of the second part (Cold Blood) but this one always escapes me.

This episode features people drilling into the earth and if Doctor Who fans have learnt anything then its that drilling is never a good thing. The pre-title scene ends with the dad being sucked into the earth. It’s a good effect and works just as well when Amy in pulled into the hole.

There are somethings in the episode that occasionally don’t make sense. For example, Rory steps out of a Police Box and Ambrose and Elliot assume that he’s the police. I’m sorry but that is just a bit silly. Sadly with this being a two-parter it means that there is time to keep this going for longer than we would normally be on screen for. Another is what is achieved in the twelve minutes before the drilling upwards comes to an end. Elliot is able to draw a very detailed map in a short time and I also cant believe that even a gifted youngster would be able to draw a map like that as good as he did.

The introduction of the Silurian is slow and well done. It doesn’t appear when its daytime but waits until things have gone dark before it strikes. This would be the perfect time to talk about the new design because whilst I liked the 1970 version and thought that the 1984 version was terrible, there is something to really like about this version. It looks organic and the make up is truly superb. The Silurian we meet is played by Neve McIntosh who plays Alaya. I like how she tries to goad Rory, Ambrose and Tony. It is just frustrating when I remember what the character becomes.

It could be argued that this story slightly rehashes the idea from Doctor Who and the Silurians. The Doctor is trying to stop a war between humans and the Silurians. This is something that is started in this episode but its quite late when it does start so its clear that this is what the focus of the next episode is going to be.

The city that the Doctor and Nasreen discover looks really good and implies that we are dealing with more than just one Silurian. However I don’t know whether it was impactful enough to form a cliffhanger. It’s rather limp if I am being brutal because it isn’t really enough to make people come back the following week. After being away for over a quarter of a century, their return was something disappointing. It’s not terrible by any means but when it’s a classic series monster returning, anything other that superb is going to be a disappointing.