Closing Time

[Pooka]

Okay.

I would have been more impressed with this episode if the last five minutes hadn't been an elaborate set-up for the next episode. What Who has tended to do with grandiose climaxes is stretch them out into two-parters, filling in time with banter and special effects if they're not long enough, which is fine by me. As next week's climax is one episode long, somebody has probably realised, "holy sh*t, we need to remind viewers of the plot, quick, shoehorn something in at the end of this sort episode!", and so they did.

I don't particularly like the whole River Song Silence Will Fall Impossible Astronaut story arc anyway, but this just felt clumsy.

The main episode was fine though, it was good to see James Corden back (as I liked him in The Lodger) and the whole setup, happening in Colchester (as opposed to somewhere fanciful) was a good plot set-up too. Cybermen are always good to see. Underused a bit in this episode, and the whole "killed them with love" thing was a bit schmaltzy, but it was good to show Corden's character having a bit of strength - enough to fight off the mindwiping influence of the Cybers.

I liked the little mouse thing too. It was cute.

Humour in this epsiode was very good - the bemused but well-meaning shop assistants, the Doctor's "shh!" thing, "Stormageddon", the Doctor translating baby talk, the whole gay "partner" thing. It was all quite gentle humour but made me laugh.

One bit that stood out for me was the brief showing of Amy and Rory. I love Amy and Rory, but I'm kind of glad they weren't in this episode (consider the last James Corden episode, where Amy's role was just to sit in the TARDIS and give advice). Any unanswered questions about what they're doing for money since they were dropped off can be answered simply - Amy is a model now. Nice and easy... and also believable.

So all in all I really liked this episode. Sadly, it did feel like a bit of a filler, but may have done less so if they hadn't tacked that unrelated bit onto the end. Since that was there, it really does seem like someone just got given a spare episode to write and put James Corden in it to have a bit of fun. Real shame there.

[HStorm]

Afraid I haven't bothered reviewing any episodes since before the halfway-hiatus. Reason? They've been so boring, predictable and infantile ever since A Good Man Goes To War that, frankly, C.B.A. And I still can't. If the makers don't feel like making an effort, why should I? I'll give a few thoughts, but not a proper review.

This season, just like last year's, started so well and has since sunk into the mire of a whimsical, self-indulgent, infantile ideas-void. We've known since week one that the Doctor faces an appointment with destiny in the final part, we've known since about week eight that River Song is the likely murderer, and so ever since, the season has been frantically treading water, trying to find ways of filling out its episode-run before it's allowed to drag itself back to the inevitable. This is an indictment of the story arcs that modern Dr. Who has become so dependent on. It counts on its audience being so eager to see how the running theme plays itself out that they'll keep coming back to watch subsequent episodes regardless, so it feels it doesn't have to bother with making individual stories any good. The impression I get though is that this is not the case. The signs are that a lot of story-starved fans, myself included, are so exhausted with the meandering season-arcs, the crowbarred over-emotional exposition, and the zany smugness that permeate the series that they are on the brink of deserting it. Most of the crudeness of the RTD era is thankfully gone, but little else has improved, at least not to a consistent standard.

As for this episode itself, about the only thing I liked about it was the subtle tribute to Patrick Troughton's lines in The Three Doctors/The Five Doctors ("Been doing up your flat? I don't like it at all." - only a rough quote there, as I refuse to re-watch the episode and get it right). The puerile attempts at homoerotic humour would have made the cast of the Carry On films go red in the face, and the "killed them with love" trash near the end made me want to throw up. I don't want to sound like some testosterone-fuelled, soldier-boy macho-pants, but bloody man the hell up a bit, Dr Who!

In fact, this was so bad, even my mum, who's usually an unashamed squueeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee-shrieker for the rebooted series, admitted she found it tiresome and childish. Normally you'll never hear her speaking up for the old series in favour of the new, but I was sure I heard her muttering, "Bring back Colin Baker..." at least once while the story failed to progress.

Rubbish, just utter rubbish. 3/10.