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Judging from Twitter and YouTube, it seems that most people enjoyed Doctor Who's 50th anniversary more than I did. I didn't hate it, not at all, but to me The Day Of The Doctor was just an average late Smith era Doctor Who story that happened to feature multiple Doctors, and late Smith-era Doctor Who has been lacking.
I wasn't very impressed. The Zygon plot just stopped without a resolution, undoing the burning of Gallifrey undermines the Doctor's character arc, it often felt like officially licensed fan fiction, and as Linkara pointed out, it felt more like a celebration of eight years of New Who rather than fifty years of Doctor Who.
Steven Moffat's contribution to the 50th anniversary was a disappointment, in my opinion. Which is sad, because he used to be one of the shows best writers before taking over as showrunner. Making such gems as The Girl In The Fireplace, Blink, and Forest Of The Dead/Silence In The Library, he was amazing. And his first season as showrunner was quite good as well, the show could have ended after The Big Bang and it would have been perfect.
Steven Moffat's contribution to the 50th anniversary was a disappointment, in my opinion. Which is sad, because he used to be one of the shows best writers before taking over as showrunner. Making such gems as The Girl In The Fireplace, Blink, and Forest Of The Dead/Silence In The Library, he was amazing. And his first season as showrunner was quite good as well, the show could have ended after The Big Bang and it would have been perfect.
But ever since the second half of Series Six, episodes that he writes have been, not that good, and generally messed around with stuff that worked fine. Overcomplicating the show, introducing temporal shenanigans that make it very hard to follow the plot, killing characters over and over again, throwing the numbers off with a hidden Doctor(though maybe that's just me), and retconning the Doctor's tragic past in a way that makes Nine and Ten's regret over it meaningless.
I will continue to watch the show, and I hold out hope that it will get better. Which brings me to today's subject, the Christmas special, entitled The Time Of The Doctor, also written by Steven Moffat.
The story of the Eleventh Doctor's final days spent defending the town of Christmas from all his foes, to keep the Time War from starting anew, is fortunately a welcome improvement. It's not great, there hasn't been a great episode since The Girl Who Waited, but it's a good one. We have some great performances, the usual expected level of high production values, and some good moments.
The acting, top notch, it's amusing to see Matt Smith, the youngest Doctor in both age of the actor and personality, playing an old man, and doing so well. Jenna Coleman is enjoyable as Clara, Kayvan Novak is endearing as the voice of a Cyberman head that the Doctor takes on as a companion, and Orla Brady is well excecuted as an ally of the Doctor that runs the Order of The Silence.
Speaking of which, villans for this episode. We have Daleks which are, not bad by any means, but you could have had the Master taunting Eleven about his lives running out and it wouldn't have made much of a difference. The Cybermen show up allowing for an entertaining one off character in Handles the detatched Cyberhead. The Weeping Angels make a pointless if well shot cameo scene with no impact on the plot and only show up to make the trailer more interesting, and the Silence turn out to be genetically engineered priests, and we FINALLY get conformation that they are the ones that blew up the TARDIS in Series Five.
Lastly, no they didn't have Matt Smith be the final Doctor.* Doctor Who is a cash cow, flagship show for the BBC, and I doubt they will ever let it end. Instead the Time Lords give him a new set of regenerations through a crack in the universe, and with a thunderclap he becomes Peter Capaldi. How is he? That's hard to say. He is only onscreen for about thirty seconds, and it won't really be possible to gauge his Doctor until the show returns in August. But I liked him as Caecillius in The Fires Of Pompeii, so I'll probably enjoy his Doctor.
The acting, top notch, it's amusing to see Matt Smith, the youngest Doctor in both age of the actor and personality, playing an old man, and doing so well. Jenna Coleman is enjoyable as Clara, Kayvan Novak is endearing as the voice of a Cyberman head that the Doctor takes on as a companion, and Orla Brady is well excecuted as an ally of the Doctor that runs the Order of The Silence.
Speaking of which, villans for this episode. We have Daleks which are, not bad by any means, but you could have had the Master taunting Eleven about his lives running out and it wouldn't have made much of a difference. The Cybermen show up allowing for an entertaining one off character in Handles the detatched Cyberhead. The Weeping Angels make a pointless if well shot cameo scene with no impact on the plot and only show up to make the trailer more interesting, and the Silence turn out to be genetically engineered priests, and we FINALLY get conformation that they are the ones that blew up the TARDIS in Series Five.
Lastly, no they didn't have Matt Smith be the final Doctor.* Doctor Who is a cash cow, flagship show for the BBC, and I doubt they will ever let it end. Instead the Time Lords give him a new set of regenerations through a crack in the universe, and with a thunderclap he becomes Peter Capaldi. How is he? That's hard to say. He is only onscreen for about thirty seconds, and it won't really be possible to gauge his Doctor until the show returns in August. But I liked him as Caecillius in The Fires Of Pompeii, so I'll probably enjoy his Doctor.
In conclusion, it's pretty good. Let's call it a 7.8/10
Happy Holidays.
Greg.B
*That fan-theory about the Doctor's severed hand that became a clone (don't ask, it's confusing) counting as a regeneration, that's canon now.
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