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My brain is swirling in cirlces of squee!
A real mixed bag, this episode. A shaky start for Martha on her first alien planet, which was A) not very alien at all, and B) very, very reminiscent of the beginning of series one's "The Long Game." Quite a bit of the plot strained credibility. Traveling ten miles in 6 years? You can walk faster than that, for cripes' sake! Why would millions of people keep trying to drive?
And although it was all kinds of cool to have the Macra get a namecheck, I was surprised at how little they actually mattered to the story. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, it's great to have character-driven stories where the monster isn't the focal point of the plot, and considering how more often than not the aliens the Doctor runs into are ones he's familiar with, it would only be a matter of time before those aliens would also be ones the audience have seen before. Still, once again the 'aliens' are nothing more than space versions of terrestrial creatures, but since they're from a Troughton story, I'll let it go.
I was equally surprised at the overtly religious elements of this story. I was singing along with all those New New Yorkers during "Old Rugged Cross," and it did actually bring a tear to my eye. What a strange, deeply affecting moment! On the other hand, I'm really getting tired of the "Don't worry, the Doctor will save us!" worldview on display here. Martha's line, "You've got your faith....and I've got the Doctor," troubled me particularly. Part of the Doctor's heroism is his ability to spur those around him into taking responsibility for themselves. I, for one, thought Harriet Jones had a very good point in the Christmas Invasion when she explained, "I'm sorry, Doctor, but you're not here all the time. You come and go. It happened today. Mr. Llewellyn and the Major died right in front of me while you were sleeping. We have to defend ourselves." The Doctor is not God, and it will only hurt us in the end if all we know how to do is wait for the Doctor to come to our rescue.
But the second half of the episode is where things really started to get quite good. The devastation of New New York was very "Serenity," but since I love that kind of thing, I was getting all kinds of chills about it. And the Face of Boe! I couldn't believe it when he delivered his last words. As someone on OG commented, "[The production team] are surprisingly excellent at blatanly lying." If this isn't setting up the return of the Master, then I don't know what is, and despite my earlier misgivings about the new series bringing back said baddie, I have to say I'm really getting excited about it now. The Master hasn't been a proper Time Lord since at least "Keeper of Traken," (assuming he wasn't previously stripped of the title because of his general evildoerness), and I can't think of anyone who better fits David Tennant's cryptic assertion that, "The Face of Boe isn't lying, but the Doctor isn't wrong either." Master!Squee!
And, oh, the Gallifrey references! Such gorgeous imagery, and delivered with such subtle emotional gusto by David Tennant that I was nearly in tears again. It reminded me of Nyssa's short monologue about Traken in Spare Parts. Definitely sheer emotional porn, but I loved it. I loved Martha's heels-dug-in attitude about the Doctor's mystery, even though her character arc in this episode was nearly a word-for-word clone of Rose's in "The End of the World." But as RTD wrote "The End of the World," "Long Game," and "Gridlock," I shouldn't be surprised to find him repeating himself by now.
So a weird, uneven, emotionally stirring adventure for the Tenth Doctor. Not as strong as "Smith and Jones," but a terribly exciting glimpse of where the series might be going.
P.S. I'm already donning my Bad Accent Shield in preparation for next week! *cringes*
A real mixed bag, this episode. A shaky start for Martha on her first alien planet, which was A) not very alien at all, and B) very, very reminiscent of the beginning of series one's "The Long Game." Quite a bit of the plot strained credibility. Traveling ten miles in 6 years? You can walk faster than that, for cripes' sake! Why would millions of people keep trying to drive?
And although it was all kinds of cool to have the Macra get a namecheck, I was surprised at how little they actually mattered to the story. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, it's great to have character-driven stories where the monster isn't the focal point of the plot, and considering how more often than not the aliens the Doctor runs into are ones he's familiar with, it would only be a matter of time before those aliens would also be ones the audience have seen before. Still, once again the 'aliens' are nothing more than space versions of terrestrial creatures, but since they're from a Troughton story, I'll let it go.
I was equally surprised at the overtly religious elements of this story. I was singing along with all those New New Yorkers during "Old Rugged Cross," and it did actually bring a tear to my eye. What a strange, deeply affecting moment! On the other hand, I'm really getting tired of the "Don't worry, the Doctor will save us!" worldview on display here. Martha's line, "You've got your faith....and I've got the Doctor," troubled me particularly. Part of the Doctor's heroism is his ability to spur those around him into taking responsibility for themselves. I, for one, thought Harriet Jones had a very good point in the Christmas Invasion when she explained, "I'm sorry, Doctor, but you're not here all the time. You come and go. It happened today. Mr. Llewellyn and the Major died right in front of me while you were sleeping. We have to defend ourselves." The Doctor is not God, and it will only hurt us in the end if all we know how to do is wait for the Doctor to come to our rescue.
But the second half of the episode is where things really started to get quite good. The devastation of New New York was very "Serenity," but since I love that kind of thing, I was getting all kinds of chills about it. And the Face of Boe! I couldn't believe it when he delivered his last words. As someone on OG commented, "[The production team] are surprisingly excellent at blatanly lying." If this isn't setting up the return of the Master, then I don't know what is, and despite my earlier misgivings about the new series bringing back said baddie, I have to say I'm really getting excited about it now. The Master hasn't been a proper Time Lord since at least "Keeper of Traken," (assuming he wasn't previously stripped of the title because of his general evildoerness), and I can't think of anyone who better fits David Tennant's cryptic assertion that, "The Face of Boe isn't lying, but the Doctor isn't wrong either." Master!Squee!
And, oh, the Gallifrey references! Such gorgeous imagery, and delivered with such subtle emotional gusto by David Tennant that I was nearly in tears again. It reminded me of Nyssa's short monologue about Traken in Spare Parts. Definitely sheer emotional porn, but I loved it. I loved Martha's heels-dug-in attitude about the Doctor's mystery, even though her character arc in this episode was nearly a word-for-word clone of Rose's in "The End of the World." But as RTD wrote "The End of the World," "Long Game," and "Gridlock," I shouldn't be surprised to find him repeating himself by now.
So a weird, uneven, emotionally stirring adventure for the Tenth Doctor. Not as strong as "Smith and Jones," but a terribly exciting glimpse of where the series might be going.
P.S. I'm already donning my Bad Accent Shield in preparation for next week! *cringes*
