DOCTOR WHO Series 7 - The Story So Far...

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So then, at long last Doctor Who has returned to our screen and the 50th anniversary is well under way. However before we have a look at the opening episode of the second half of Series 7, let's take a spoilery look back at what has come before...

First up, while some fans have up in arms about the new split season format, I'd have to say that personally I've liked the scheduling of Series 7. To begin with we got Who back on the screen in the darker autumn nights - Doctor Who is best enjoyed I think when it's not blazing sunshine outside - and then it was a fairly short wait for our next fix with the feature length Christmas special. Of course, then it was only a short hop in the calendar until The Bells of St John. All in all, a rather more preferable arrangement to getting a thirteen week dollop of the show and then the best part of a year before the TARDIS opens its doors for business again. 

But of course all of this does mean that the rest of this year is going to be somewhat Who lite, albeit with the big anniversary special slated  for the autumn. However I'll be happy enough if Series 8 repeats the split season pattern of two halves in spring and autumn, giving regular fixes through out the year. 

And what did the opening half of Series 7 actually deliver? Well, it promised a blockbuster every week and indeed it largely made good on that promise, serving up a fun set of pretty much stand-alone adventures. Admittedly there was some connective tissue between the stories focusing on Amy and Rory's relationship and setting up their departure, but it was more a running theme than a true story arc. Some said it was all too light weight and bitty, but then again folks had said that Series 6 was too dark and too much of an integrated story arc, so you pays yer money and takes yer choice. 

The show's great strength is its flexible format and obviously not everything they do is going to please everyone. But the important thing is, while the internet foams at its collective mouth and endless bickers over the fine details, it's a good thing the show is evolving and changing. And despite the often bitter arguments boiling away in fandom, viewing figures and audience appreciation scores remain solid, which sharply high-lights the difference in the way fans and ordinary viewers watch the show I feel... And I plan to examine this in more detail with a State Of The Show Address at some point nearer the anniversary. 

So then, let's have a quick run through the episodes, throwing in some spoilery remarks absent from my original reviews and a reassessment with the benefit of hindsight. First mentions of the title will have links to said original reviews. All set? Good, let's go then...

The series opened with a bang with Asylum of the Daleks. Now generally you can't do wrong with the Daleks... yes, even when they are in Manhattan! Basically even if the story is bobbins, there's just a rock solid level of fun from seeing the genocidal pepperpots misbehaving! Now this particular offering wasn't the great outing for Skaro's finest but it did give us an interesting look into their organisation and the concept of there being Daleks who are too far gone even for the Daleks is a fascinating one. 

However like many old time fans, I was a little disappointed with the episode - chiefly because it was trumpeted that it would feature every model of Dalek ever seen. And indeed, it did alongside some nice references to their past appearances. However the trouble was, it was a case of blink and you'll miss them. Now I appreciate that this would be largely because the old models wheeled out of storage, museums and private collections would look horribly tatty in HD and hence their screen time was kept to a bare minimum  But it still felt like a bit of swizz!

But that disappointment was more than balanced out by the coup pulled off by the Doctor Who team - namely managing to keep quiet the fact that this episode gave us our first appearance of new companion to be Jenna-Louise Coleman. I don't know how they stopped the news leaking in this day and age of internet  chatter, but it was a delightful miracle! And what's more, it left us with many questions as to how Oswin who had been converted into a Dalek was going to join the Doctor on future travels. Intriguing stuff indeed! 

There was also another revelation at the end of the episode too - that now thanks to Oswin's hacking of their collective databases, the hordes of Skaro had now completely forgotten who the Doctor was. Obviously this  is a huge change to the mythos, and one some fans may well feel is vandalism. And in truth, I had mixed feelings about it - the Daleks not knowing their arch enemy any more? Surely a terrible idea! 

But one reflection, two things occurred to me. Firstly, as we have observed, Doctor Who is always a-changing and I seriously doubt that the Daleks won't very quickly identify the Doctor as a major threat once more. More importantly though, it winds down the Doctor again from the Lonely God Everyone-knows-me-and-I-can-anything figure the Davies years had built him up too. And that in my book is a good thing, scaling our favorite Time Lord back down to the anonymous eccentric who turned up at various points in space and time and quietly sorted things out. 

And it's a good thing for the Daleks too. The new series stories featuring the deadly dustbins have revolved around the Time War and Getting The Doctor very heavily. While the Time War served well to re-establish the history of the Doctor and the Daleks, it is now time to move on and I for one welcome the opportunity to go back to more old school stories where the Doctor turns up and throws spanners in the works of their latest campaign for dominating the universe. 

Moving on to Dinosaurs on a Spaceship, well, it does what is says on the tin! Still great fun to watch - star studded cast, right amount and right type of humour (reminiscent of Douglas Adams), just solidly entertaining.  It might be fluff but who cares, it's great fluff! Plus bonus points awarded for a nice touch of making the titular spaceship and dinos part of a Silurian ark in space - another nice nod to both old Who and Adams there. Furthermore, and racking up more bonus points, this episode introduced us to the amazing Brian Pond, Rory's dotty dad, played with aplomb by comedy veteran Mark Williams. All highly entertaining and for my money the best rendition of the blockbuster every week concept this half series delivers. 

I don't have too much more to add to my initial thoughts on A Town Called Mercy except that it remains a solid little episode with a good moral dilemma at its heart. Although I will say it'd be nice to see the Doctor and co. visit Earth's past a little more often. So then, moving swiftly on to The Power of Three... 

...Well, actually again, not masses to add to the original review. But what I can mention now with the spoiler embargo lifted is that  it was lovely meet another new character Kate Stewart (Jemma Redgrave) who turned out to be the daughter of the Doctor's old friend Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart, who has followed in her father's footsteps and become the head of U.N.I.T. It was also pleasing to hear the Zygons name-checked, and more so now we know that this wasn't just a reference of the old fans but foreshadowing their return later this year. 

However The Power of Three, although filled with some nice little moments and more Brian Pond magic, is still the slightest of the five episodes. But also it's the episode that now feels weaker on rewatching, mainly because of what transpires in The Angels Take Manhattan, and it's this final episode I have the most problems with. 

Now the half-series finale isn't a bad episode per se - it's nicely creepy, with some fun time twisting and a dramatic finale which sees the Ponds stranded in the past. And while it was a good resolution of their sometime strained relationship, with Amy (rightly) chooses to be with Rory in the New York of yesteryear, after some reflection it has started to trouble me. 

Now I'm not talking about nit-picking the mechanics of why the Doctor can't just pop back to a slightly later or earlier year and pick them up (although I would say that that was a logical loop hole that a single line could have fixed - namely that the Doctor can't cross Amy and Rory's time lines again with unraveling history). Nor am I carping about the feasibility of the Statue of Liberty going walkabout - , it was a visual gag, nothing more, let it go! 

No, my problem is that although it played out nicely, the end of the Ponds' story just wasn't the right one in my humble opinion. After The Power of Three, I think it would have been more satisfying for the Ponds to decide to give up travelling with the Doctor rather than being forcibly separated. The episode could have played out the same right until the very end where I feel it would have better a more fitting conclusion that Amy and Rory after a very close shave decide the risks of carrying on travelling in the TARDIS were too great and as we saw in The Power of Three, they would be happier with a quiet life. 

And what's the Doctor going to say to poor Brian eh? 

The more I think about it, the more I feel the trapped in time twist at the end was an unnecessary bit of tragedy. Now I know there was a foreshadowing of something bad happening to the Ponds through these five episodes but it would have been more satisfying if that had turned out to be them deciding to leave the Doctor. And he could have still gone off to mope in Victorian London... 

Which brings us neatly to the Christmas special, The Snowmen which I didn't get around to writing a review of. Now partly that was due to having something of a bumpy festive season, the details of which I shall spare you, but also it was because I felt in danger of turning out a very similar review to the previous ones I have done for preceding Christmas specials. 

You see the thing about the annual Christmas Day episodes of Doctor Who is that they are designed to be seen through a haze of sugar, booze and seasonal cheer. And being so, they tend only to make sense when watched in that festive fugue on Christmas Day night - an enjoyable romp full of daftness, sentiment and Yuletide tropes. Generally I'd say they provide good Christmas night viewing but aren't usually very good Doctor Who in the strictest sense. And The Snowmen fits this pattern to a tee - it's a lot of fun but will come across as loosely plotted and too full of silliness if you are watching at any time other than Christmas night. 

But that said, this year's Christmas special did seem to be closer to 'proper' Doctor Who than previous Yuletide outings, as apart from the general Dickensian atmosphere, it wasn't playing around with Christmas themed stories has previous years had. And there were other factors in play too - firstly it turned out the intelligent snow was actually an old enemy from the Second Doctor's time, The Great Intelligence, making this story effectively a prequel to The Abominable Snowmen and The Web Of Fear. Secondly, we had some more recent familiar faces appear with Madame Vastra, Jenny and Strax filling out the supporting cast. 

Finally and most importantly, we had the return of Jenna-Louise Coleman, this time as a seemingly different character, the governess Clara. Or rather she's the same character but in a different point of space and time... most mysterious! And that mystery is undoubted going to form the story spine for the rest of the series. Hence rather than being just an interlude between seasons - as the Christmas special usually is - The Snowmen was effectively the beginning of what I'm thinking of as Series 7B.

For I think it's fair to say that this series is really probably going to pan out as two mini series, with Series 7A being the last of the Ponds, and from The Snowmen until the thirteenth episode, or even possibly even up to the 50th anniversary special, forming Series 7B. Of course, I am  now playing that most dangerous game of second guessing Moffat - and coming episodes may well draw on or call back the first five episodes and unite the halves... But we'll worry about that later!

However having seen The Bells of St. John, the Christmas special looks now even more less stand alone... But more about that very very soon!

DOCTOR WHO 7.04 - The Power of Three

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So then, let's get the obvious facetious remark over with first... Why was The Power of Three, the third episode? Come on Mr Moffat, you KNOW how obsessive us SF fans are! Having it as the fourth offends our geeky love of numerical symmetry! You're stirring a wasps nest here! 

However on the plus side, there was plenty in this episode which would delight the long-time Who fan, with a  delicious sprinkling of links and references to older stories and characters. And it's a good mix of allusions and callbacks too with nods and winks for both the classic old school series and the rebooted modern show.   Indeed in some respects, as Mr Danny Davies remarked upon the Twitters last night, this is one of the most RTD-esque stories we've had since the Moff took over. 

So then, we have a story that is about the mysterious appearance of odd little black boxes all over the world, complete with montage shots of said enigmatic cubes dotted around famous landmarks and famous faces  playing themselves as talking heads appearing on various TV broadcasts through the story. Furthermore however, this is an episode more concerned with characters and emotion than delivering big action and timey-wimey plot twists. Hence the so called 'slow invasion' of the little black boxes plot-line was largely just a MacGuffin to set up the real concerns of the story; the exploration of  the relationship between the Ponds and the Doctor.

And all of this works rather well. Yes, it's light and frothy fun for the most part, with Mr Chris Chibnall turning in another entertaining script and a character he introduced in his previous outing this series Dinosaurs On A Spaceship making a welcome return appearance. However while there is fun and games with spaceships, aliens and explosions, this is the same kind of romp as the earlier interplanetary prehistoric malarkey we had a fortnight ago. There's a lot more sentiment but thankfully a tad more humour to keep the story from drifting into the jagged candy coated reefs of sickly sweetness. Hence we have some very nice scenes between Matt Smith and Karen Gillan and Arthur Davril, which range from very funny to rather touching. And the story of the boxes is deftly threaded through the episode too, weaving together neatly the humour and the character work.

Now it would be easy to see this as a throwaway episode; a less expensive bit of running about in between the more blockbustery stories which relies on character and comedy rather than big special effects. It's a nice little story, possibly a little forgettable but there's nothing wrong with that... However I suspect other forces at work here, which may be considered spoilerific! So then...

POSSIBLE SPOILER WARNING FOR ALL THOSE WHO HAVE BEEN FROZEN ON TELOS, ASLEEP, ON THE NERVA BEACON, OR TRAPPED IN THE SATAN PIT AND HAVE SEEN NO DOCTOR WHO NEWS FOR... OOH... LET'S SAY... THE PAST 18 MONTHS OR SO

Then as previous mentioned in reviews for this series, the Moffat credo for this series of Doctor Who is "a blockbuster every week"... and indeed that phrase is becoming the Bad Wolf of these reviews. However if the first rule of travelling with the Doctor is "the Doctor always lies!", then so too the first rule of watching Steven Moffat-era Who is "Moffat always lies". 

Now I'm not casting cheeky aspersions on the blockbuster quality of this run of episodes, although it's fair to say that The Power of Three has been the least cinematic of the four so far shown. But I am casting doubt on the idea Mr Moffat has been bandying about that there isn't a big story arc to this season. 

And my reason for this? Well, firstly this is a series in two parts - five episodes now, Christmas special, and the rest in 2013. And what's special about 2013 for Doctor Who? Well it's only the 50th anniversary of the show... and can you really see there NOT being a big story to lead up to this momentous birthday? 

Secondly, and more pertinently to The Power of Three, we know that the Ponds are leaving the show during this run. And throughout the episodes show so far there's been a running theme looking at the Doctor and his relationship with his companions, not to mention some subtle hints that our favorite Time Lord suspects, or possibly knows, there is dire danger in the future for Amy and Rory. And considered in this light, this week's episode suddenly doesn't look quite so throwaway after all...

Indeed I may well be wrong, but I rather suspect that the events of this fun and frothy story may take on a greater significance when we understand its place in the overall story arc. And indeed some of the sweetness on display here may well be the last moments of light this trio of characters enjoy...

DOCTOR WHO 5.8/5.9 - The Hungry Earth/Cold Blood

Spoilers ahoy

The Silurians have a long and illustrious history in Doctor Who; they are one of the iconic monsters of the classic series, who have returned many times to bother the Doctor. They first appeared in 1970 in the Third Doctor’s first season, and in their seven parter debut those pesky humans roused them from their slumbers by inconsiderately building an experimental nuclear reactor in the Wenely Moor caverns. Having gone into hibernation to survive a global catastrophe and overslept due to hurriedly implemented technology, this colony of homo reptilia were none to pleased to discover their planet was now over run with apes. But despite attempts by the Doctor to broker a peace treaty with the more moderate factions of the Silurian colony, they sought to rid the Earth of its primate infestation and consequently were blown up by UNIT.

However a few years later, they were back albeit in a different form. 1972’s The Sea Devils saw the introduction of an aquatic species of Silurian. This time the ancient beasts were deliberately roused from their slumber by the Doctor's arch enemy the Master, who intended to use them as an army to conquer the earth. Once again the good Doctor attempted to persuade the awakened former masters of the Earth to make peace with the apes. But human retaliation for their boat scuttling and the Master's counter arguments saw the Sea Devils deciding that making war was the only way. Hence the Doctor was forced to destroy them before they could reactivate the other colonies of their sleeping brethren.

1984 saw the TARDIS fetching up on Seabase 4 in the year 2084. Warriors of the Deep saw the Silurians and the Sea Devils appearing together at last - something many a fan of the Pertwee era had dreamed of. This time around the Earth reptiles Were seeking to exploit a power struggle between two super powers in order to get rid of the human race. Once again the Doctor cannot negotiate a peace between homo reptilian and homo sapiens, and once again it all ends in tears … well genocide by hexachromite gas at least. As the Davison Doctor ruefully says at this story's close - "there should have been another way..."

And in this story, both species had had a make over. While retaining the same basic design there were several tweaks: the Silurians now had organic body armour and it was now clearer that the round orifices on their faces were mouths not snouts - as a child looking at still in various Who reference tomes I honestly thought they were noses! The Sea Devils also looked different; aside from ditching their string vests and were romping around in battle dress complete with nifty samurai style hats, they were a silvery grey rather than green and brown. Plus they looked, well, a bit desiccated; withered and somewhat worse for wear from kipping in dodgy freezers perhaps?

However you can’t keep a good monster down and the Silurians have made several other appearances in other Doctor Who media. They have appeared in two Big Finish audio adventures; in Bloodtide crossing paths with the Sixth Doctor and Charles Darwin, before tangling with the Brigadier and UNIT in UNIT: The Coup (which is available as a free download here).

The Virgin range of novels which kept the show’s torch burning in the years between the classic and new series also revived the ancient reptilians twice. Firstly in 1993, Blood Heat by Jim Mortimore saw the Seventh Doctor landing in a parallel universe where the Wenley Moor Silurians were not defeated and now rule the planet along with their pet dinosaurs.

And in 1996, Virgin released a Missing Adventures novel The Scales of Injustice by Gary Russell (which you can read online here) in which the Third Doctor and Liz Shaw discover another colony of Silurians. This novel bridges the gap between the Pertwee stories and Warriors of the Deep whose script suggested an unseen on television encounter. Additionally it also explains the design differences in the creatures' past appearances. Basically it's down to different sub species and this tale features a new sub species that were a hybrid of Silurian and Sea Devil.

The Earth Reptiles also made several appearances in several other novels and comics (visit here for a more in-depth history) and no doubt you’ll be pleased to hear that by the 30th century human and Silurian were living in peace at long last – at least according to these stories. And although their “canonicity in relation to the ongoing television series is open to interpretation” as Wikipedia would put it, this latest outing pleasingly does nothing to contradict them. However long before those happy future days where the Myrka will lie down with the lamb, comes The Hungry Earth/Cold Blood…

Now writer Chris Chibnall also has a long history with Doctor Who. Rather infamously he appeared on the BBC discussion show Open Air in 1986 as a representative of the Doctor Who Appreciation Society and gave The Trial of A Time Lord a bit of a pasting. And this incident from his youth came back to haunt him when he penned 42 for series 3 of new Who and many episodes for Torchwood - some fans with long memories muttering about the relative blackness of pots and kettles.

However I am not one of them. Actually I have a bit of a soft spot 42, a decent story that suffered from appearing at the same time of Danny Boyle’s Sunshine (which featured a not dissimilar set-up) and the miscasting of Michelle Collins in the lead role. And while it is true some of his episodes for the first series of Torchwood were a little ropey, that was true of all of that series which was hurriedly made in a hasty nine months. Plus the second season of Torchwood was a marked improvement on the first with the Chibster turning in some decent stories, and more tellingly perhaps, serving as head writer and co-producer. So I have no real problems when I saw his name on the writers' roster.

But before we see how well his latest scripts have panned out, let’s address the dinosaur in the room – the Silurians’ new look. As we've already seen, this race’s design has been altered in every television appearance, and so a change is not entirely unexpected and can be easily rationalised as a new sub species. However homo reptilia's new look is a radical make-over and takes some getting used too. On one hand, I can’t help feeling that the new look makes them too humanized. I can understand the decision to go for a drastic revamp in order to make the characters capable of more expression but they have lost the prehistoric otherness of the original designs. To sum it up in a sexist nutshell, I’m sure you shouldn't be able to look at a Silurian and think ‘nice legs!’

The change is so different that I felt that the script needed to explain it a little more other than alluding to them being a different tribe to those previously encountered. While I don’t require massive exposition bombs hurling continuity shrapnel everywhere and confusing the majority of viewers who aren’t Who obsessives, some little touches such as having them refer to themselves as the ‘high Silurians’ or some similar or showing a few old school reptiles in storage would have been enough for me.

However despite these niggles, I did warm to the new look quite quickly. And when you look a little closer at the reimagined designs, you see clear links to the classic series versions. Seemingly the designers have took a leaf from The Scales of Injustice as the new look is an amalgam of classic Silurian and Sea Devil features. Furthermore the costumes meld the vintage Sea Devil netting with the later Japanese armour stylings and even their weapons are look like they are the products of the same civilization; for example compare the new Silurian rifles with the iconic circular guns of the first Sea Devils. But most importantly, the new make up looks fantastic and really does allow the actors to emote properly and convey distinct and different personalities – something crucial for this tale’s success.

But was this two parter a success? Though there were a few missteps, on the whole this was a highly entertaining outing and another two parter that delivered the goods instead of floundering in the second half. But before dishing out the brownie points, let’s address the weak spots first.

Firstly the voice-overs at the beginning and the end were a bit superfluous. Although the opening narration verged on becoming an integrated spoiler, they weren’t that terrible, but equally they really didn’t need to be there. And I’m sure I’m not the only one who got a sinking feeling as Cold Blood started; the last time they used an opening narration we got the messily scripted The End of Time and as soon as Stephen Moore started speaking the bad memories came flooding back... But in fairness, that’s RTD’s fault not Chris Chibnall’s.

Secondly, I did feel that Amy was somewhat underwritten for most of the time. Her scenes and the beginning and at the close of the adventure were spot on, but while she was gallivanting about at the centre of the earth, her dialogue did descend into a series of quips. And while there were some amusing retorts and remarks, there were a few too many.

Finally some of the CGI was a bit ropey. The tongue attack in The Hungry Earth didn’t quite cut it for me. It looked far too blatantly digital and way too long to be plausible. I couldn’t help feeling that a practical effect would have worked better. However the similar attack in Cold Blood came off pretty well. And there was another rough spot in the effects work in the first part too – when the Silurian shield blocked out the light. Here though, it was more the way it was presented; like in Vampires in Venice the lighting in the preceding scenes and the effects shots we were shown quite didn’t match up smoothly. Rather than having expanding black spots sprouting over the force field, we should have just had the dome slowly and evenly darkening.

I know that a certain amount of dodgy effects are inevitable in television sci-fi, particularly in Doctor Who which needs to do a lot more than the average telefantasy series requiring fresh sets, costumes, monsters and effects nearly every episode. But on balance, so far this series has done far better in not overextending its reach than it did in the RTD days, and this story is a good a example of that – yes, there may be the odd moments where you can see the money and time running out but they are minor niggles rather major annoyances.

All in all though, all of the above are small criticisms and the story had more than enough highlights to make up for them. To start with, although this adventure is set in 2020, there was a delightful dollop of 1970 in the proceedings as Chibnall has included numerous nods to the Pertwee era. Obviously we have the return of the Silurians, but also we have drilling to the earth’s core (Inferno), a Welsh village (The Green Death), a force field preventing escape (The Daemons) and even a creeping bodily infection (The Silurians and The Green Death) – all that was missing was an appearance by UNIT.

And Chibnall nicely captures the feels of those Third Doctor days too, in both atmosphere and by having the plot hinge on properly explored moral dilemmas. In fact the story was so redolent of the 1970s, I was concerned that the second part would see a straight retread of the original Silurians story. As it turned out though, The Hungry Earth/Cold Blood worked beautifully as a sequel to their previous outings yet was still stand alone enough for the causal viewer. While some viewers may have felt a little let down there wasn’t a massive kick off in the second part, I personally applaud the decision to keep the story focused the individuals, with fears for family and paranoia mirrored in the two races. The Silurians have never been just another race of homicidal maniacs and it was great to see a conflict with humanity filled with shades of grey.

And speaking of which, Chibnall’s epic continues to build the Eleventh Doctor’s character – rather than the Lonely God know it all, this series is showing us a Doctor who is more fallible, who does make mistakes and isn’t nearly as sure of himself as the Tenth, which is all for the better. Similarly it was good to see humanity messing up for a change and the Doctor being disappointed rather glowing with pride. As well as delivering all kinds of sci-fi eye candy and action, this story had great emotional weight too, with satisfying consequences and pay offs for all the characters. And while I would have liked to have seen more exploration in some areas, but there is a limit on the running time after all and I’ll happily trade off a little depth for the well rounded story arcs we got for all the cast.

To pick up on some concerns from previous stories, I did actually finally buy the Rory/Amy relationship in this story. Although they only had a few short scenes together, the relationship did click with me this time round and it was also good see Rory proving himself to capable adventurer rather than just a the bumbling comic relief. All of which made Rory’s death all the more poignant. Now I never expected him to stick around; previous form (Adam, Captain Jack, Mickey) suggested he’d have a couple of travels then leave the TARDIS but I didn’t expect them to kill off, never mind erase him from time completely!

And while it seemed a little too in keeping with the RTD period to have a third person onboard just for a couple of stories, it was so much better handled here. Plus it is actually integrated into the series’ story arc; indeed the whole relationship triangle plot line actually means something in the ongoing narrative of this series rather than just having been thrown in to provide the odd bit of emotional content. What I am really enjoying about this Moffat season, is that there is a strong continuity between the stories; there are proper consequences to whatever happens in any particular episode, and previous events are built on in subsequent instalments.

And I particularly like that even when a story concludes, we are often still getting a cliff-hanger – and by the Hand of Omega Cold Blood has a classic! The whole Cracks business is building up nicely to a highly intriguing series finale. Given this series’ proclivity to do the unexpected, I really wouldn’t be bet on Rory being resurrected at the series end either.

And don’t think Moffat and co. won’t trash the TARDIS either. It’s been done before - the Time Lords effectively broke it when they exiled the Third Doctor to earth, and in the BBC range of Eighth Doctor novels, the TARDIS got such a pasting it took a century to repair itself. We could be getting a stranded Doctor story arc for Matt Smith’s second season, although I’d put my money on Moffat doing something far more mental than just dusting off the old exile routine…

But getting back to the latest Silurian outing, The Hungry Earth/Cold Blood was a great slice of Doctor Who; Chris Chibnall neatly blended the flavours and themes of classic series with the stylistic and dramatic sensibilities of new Who which resulted in an adventure that was packed with intelligence and fun in equal measure. And while it may not be the strongest story of the season, there was something for everyone to enjoy in this one.