Never let it be said that Doctor Who fans are lazy and don't go to extreme lengths for their spoilers! When the cast and crew of Doctor Who headed to Croatia to film the latest Pseudo-historical story, featuring Van Gogh and a "yellow alien", I don't think any of us would have been disappointed if we didn't get to see any filming. Nobody complains when there filming happens in places that are unaccessable. Nobdody moans when we simply don't know where filming is happening. And nobody can be expected to go all the way to another country to (hopefully) catch a climpse of the team at work.
And, by the looks of things, Arthur Darvill's "Rory" seems to have hitched a ride into the past with the Doctor and Amy, adding to the theory that he is the second companion to travel with Matt Smith's Time Lord. Series 5 is shaping up nicely now. We know a fair bit about a good few of the episodes despite Steven Moffat's apparent "War On Spoilers". These photos are an astounding 'Fans 1 - 0 Moffat' I'm not sure, though, just how Amy's lovely fishnet tights and boots will go down with the locals! I guess we'll just have to wait to find out! The bad news is (and I never thought I'd say THIS) we have to wait for that Tennant chap to get out of the picture first!
Once upon a Christmas, the Doctor was teleported to Earth on Christmas Eve and something was wrong. Everyone was gone... Well, almost everyone. The Queen had stayed behind, not allowing herself to be cared by the threat of alien happenings on Christmas - AGAIN! And someone else was hanging around London too, holding vigil with Her Majesty.
When Donna absorbed the Doctor's mind during the metacrisis in Journey's End the Doctor had no option but to wipe her mind of all traces of him and her adventures with him. The speed and care that the Doctor took in taking Donna home, to the Chiswick home she shares with her Mother, Sylvia, and her Gramps, connected Wilf and the Doctor forever. Two wise, knowledgeable old men taking on the world together. There is mutual respect there. The Doctor trusts Wilf. He charges him with the task of making sure Donna never remembers her time in the TARDIS. And Wilf promises not forget the Doctor and to think of him whenever he sees the stars.
So, after months and months of waiting and wondering just how the BBC will decide to show the two parts of David Tennant's epic finale The End Of Time, we finally have an answer! Some of you will be happy, most of you will go "Oh, I thought we knew this" and a few of you will complain that you have to wait too long between parts one and two...
Well folks, this is it. The last episode of Dreamland has arrived. Mrs Grey and the Doctor are rushing to get the genetic weapon back to Mr Grey. Cassie and 'Steppenwolf' are speeding toward a sticky encounter with a Viperox army and Lord Azlok ain't giving up until he's wiped the Greys out of the Universe. I loved this last installment. Full to bursting of lovely little Whoisms and a couple of beautifully animated 'Flying Saucers', the Doctor (obviously) saves the day and finally gets the chance to eat! He's gone off the chili though, not surprisingly. A real war rages in the skies, helicopters vs. Viperox, but Rivesh Mantilax (Mr Grey) is saved just in time. Oh, go and watch it... I'm not doing it justice. My only complaint is that this wasn't the same length as Episode One. At 7 minutes this does suffer a little from dues ex machina syndrome a bit. But never let it be said, with a sound system like that, that the TARDIS is a bad place for a party.
One thing we now have to accept though people. As greatly enjoyable as this series was, it is the LAST time we will see Ten in his blue suit and the last Doctor Who until The End Of Time on Christmas Day. Scary, huh? And THAT will be the beginning of the end for Tennant. As Azlok mentions to him, before being sent packing by the wonders of sonic technology, "Your day will come, Doctor!"... "Yeah, so they say" replied the Doctor, carelessly. All I hope, with all my heart, is that this "cartoon Doctor Who" thing is done again, with Matt Smith as the Doctor. And you know what? I'm even going to say this; use the same animation style. It certainly wasn't as bad as we all thought it would be and, to be honest with you, I kinda fell in love with it by the end.
So! Episode five starts a few moments after Lord Azlok vowed to turn America "to dust beneath our feet!" and flew into the sunset, cackling. During the struggle, poor Mr Grey got caught up in the scuffle and lies dying on the steel floor of Lab 51. You know I love this series to bits, but today I'm going to talk about something that does bother me a bit. Firstly, though, what happens in Episode five? Well, claiming that she can save her husband's life, with an artifact from her ship, Mrs Grey (I'm not even going to bother writing her real name in, like) asks to be lead to it. So, while she and the Doctor trek into the bowels of Area 51's vault together Cassie and Chief Running Sore (or whoever) are sent to recover the TARDIS from the roadside. However, Lord Azlok has requested reinforcements from the Viperox Queen and gets them!
As the sun sets over Nevada the deadly Viperox Hoards surface (in a stunningly exciting sequence worthy of praise here) and cause untold damage to nearby villages. The Viperox invasion has started, and it's up to the Doctor (stuck in a box) to escape the (somewhat shoehorned in) hungry Skorpius Flies and get Mrs Grey back to her husband. But will Cassie and Mr Shitting Bull succeed in escaping the Viperox and getting the TARDIS back to base? Tune in tomorrow folks, etc. And now, the catch. I've ignored this so far, it hasn't been too much of a bother to me - until now. During the chase in the vault, the Doctor and Mrs Grey escape to the wonderful tune of The UNIT Theme. WHY?! IT DOESN'T FIT!!! But that's all I can find fault with... Oh, and the fact that Tennant's thumb looks like a willy at the 5.10 - 5.25 mark. But that's funny!
When we last left the Doctor and his faithful yankpanions, he was trying to uncover the secrets of the alliance between Colonel Stark and the vicious Viperox. It seemed that maybe the lovable Grey aliens weren't as harmless as they appeared. Could it be that the Viperox hoards are the good guys here? Well, episode four held the answers! I've given up on trying to avoid spoilers here, you know the score. Go watch the bloody episode first. Bloody brilliant episode it is, too. The answer, then, to that question about the Viperox, is no. They are not nice aliens. They are chasing a weapon which could be used against them in the war with the Greys, remember the space-junk in the diner? Yeah, that. And Colonel Stark and the US Army are looking to use it for themselves, to rid the world of "The Reds", yep. RUSSIA! Fear of nuclear war is inspiring Stark to get rid of the enemy using an alien bio-weapon created by the Greys. NOT A GOOD IDEA because, as the Doctor knows, the cold war is... well, cold. Nobody shoots, nobody wipes anyone out.
So the Doctor steals the weapon, heads to the roof and is chased by Stark, who explains a bit about the plan, about what the deal is... But when the ever knowing Doctor explains that the Viperox are cunts (I'm paraphrasing here), Colonel Stark decides to act with him. But is it too late?! I can't give this series enough praise. It's going to be brilliant seeing it as a 45 minute stand-alone. I can't wait for it to be shown on December 5th, 5pm on CBBC Channel and BBC Two. It has everything! Suspense, fear, humour, bad-ass aliens, good-ass aliens, a companion apparently dressed in the get-up of The Fifth Doctor (see the link there, fact fans?)
So, despite all the apprehension I was feeling about this mini-series, based on bad animation and an idea that has been done to death, I have to admit that Dreamland could possibly be the one thing we should have had in the so-called Gap Year. Not only does it have a killer alien race, a pair of fun companions and a nice little conspiracy feel, it also has some really touching, funny little moments that out-do (in my humble opinion) some of the emotion in Doctor Who Proper. Today, part three offered up a thrilling chase through abandoned mine shafts, an encounter with robot-alien-cleaner-uppers/Men In Black and another lovely little cliffhanger.
Granted, the cliffhangers are on a par with "Sarah Jane falling down the hill" in The Five Doctors (episodically broadcast version) when it comes to the threat level how they are solved, but knowing we only have to wait one day for the resolution means we don't mind so much, right? So... little time is given to us to debate and speculate about what Colonel Stark meant by "You've just helped me save the world!" prompting the Doctor to worry that, for the first time in 900 years, this is 'bad news'. Also, without spoiling too much for you (remember, I'm trying to do this spoiler free. And failing, evidently) if you like traditional looking "Grey" aliens, then this episode is for you.
Oh wow! So, episode two of Dreamland was released on the BBC Doctor Who site today, the next installment of the Doctor's new animated adventure. And fair play to the writers! What a fun, action packed little series this is turning out to be! STILL the animation is "unfamiliar" but I think that's all it is, it's not really as bad as we first thought. Once you get into the story (which is pretty good, actually) you find yourself overlooking the computer game graphics. As @ahremsee mentioned on Twitter today, Dreamland is like "an audio play with pictures". It's lovely. It's funny. It has one hell of a nasty alien! Menacing, intelligent and genuinely scary, the Doctor has rarely encountered such a beast.
The Viperox, a battle-savvy race of green insectoid monsters, are awesome! Given the right design they could work very well in Doctor Who Proper. They've arrived on our planet with a purpose, but that seems not to be invasion. "We seek an enemy of our kind" hisses the Uber-super-duper-Viperox Prince or whatever... but we don't yet know who or what! and this episode, like the last one, has a snappy little cliffhanger ending too... I promised myself not to post spoilers of any of this series, so all I'll say is this; NEST. Who'd have thought that such a quaint little red-button experiment like this would turn out to be so enjoyable! Especially after all the bad comments it's received from us lot.
Today saw the release of the most recent Doctor Who project, Dreamland, on the BBC Red Button service. A story in six animated parts, a pre-released clip from Dreamland divided fandom into two groups; those who hate the shitty animation and refuse to watch and those who hate the shitty animation but will watch anyway. I was always part of the latter (more loyal) fan-group. However, I take back my harsh comments about the shitty animation. It's not actually all that bad. It's nice, in fact. This is bound to be a colourful romp through Area 51 - that's fine by me!
The story seems straight-forward enough so far. The Doctor visits a Nevada diner 11 years after the Roswell crash and notices that an alien artifact is being displayed as a piece of the damaged ship. Some Men In Black turn up, then a big green alien, then the army. General Stark decides to wipe the minds of the Doctor and his new "companions" but the Doctor is too good for them and decides instead to escape and explore... There is a twist, so click here to watch for yourself. Then again, the photo to the right kind of spoils it. But hey, it's still fun. Georgia Moffett's (previously the Doctor's daughter, Jenny - now Cassie Rice) accent is terrible but that's okay too. All in all, this is a very welcome little treat to help shorten the wait between now and Christmas.
Firstly, the idea that the Doctor has to walk away from the happenings on Bowie Base One. The deaths there must always happen, for the future of the human race! Not a nice thought. And something that an audience of children would have mixed feelings about. They know the Doctor can't change evens. That's wrong. They also know, however, that he is there to help people, it's why he travels! And if that wasn't conflicting enough for the poor kiddy winks the Doctor then (after walking away, finally) changes his mind, becomes arrogant and develops a kind of God Complex - he become a Doctor that many children won't like! Many children may even be scared of him! This is dangerous territory for Doctor Who.
Mars. November 21st, 2059. Captain Adelaide Brooke and her crew are the first people to found a base on the Red Planet. Our dear Doctor arrives on the very same day, just sightseeing. But on meeting the crew of Bowie Base One (nice, eh?) he remembers that the members of it's crew are not famous just for being the first to Mars. Something else happens today, something that MUST always happen to assure the progression of the human race. Bowie Base One and all of it's crew are doomed. An interesting idea. Like the Pompeii episode of Series 4 The Waters Of Mars deals with those times in history that MUST BE. Fixed points in time. Only, this history hasn't happened for us yet. And it is within this "fixed point" that the drama lies. True, there are some nasty monsters... There's something in the water which infects the humans with only one drop. They go from mild mannered Mars-Gardeners to viscous, water-spewing zombies within seconds of contact with the water. This was how the threat factor of the episode was sold to us. Scary, ugly monsters on Mars. And they were. Scary I mean, very scary. But this wasn't the threat!
You see, the Doctor has always been one for saving things. People, planets, it's what he does. So when faced with a situation that doesn't allow for his meddling - whether saving lives or not - he's faced with a dilemma he rarely has to think about. Adelaide Brooke MUST die. Her death is what inspires her granddaughter to follow in Nana's footsteps and explore the heavens. Susie Fontana Brooke is the one who will lead humanity into the stars. She even, we are told in a throwaway line, creates a whole new species by falling in love and having children with an alien prince. Humanity needs her. And she needs Adelaide. Unfortunately, it's her death that's the clincher here.
Que some running down corridors, avoiding water and trying not to get infected while at the same time trying to evacuate the base! If one drop of this infected water reaches Earth, that's it. The End. So... evacuation is the chosen option. But time has other ideas. A series of unfortunate events - the infection/death of a few more crew members (beautifully acted by a stellar cast) and the loss of the rocket that was to take them home (in one of the grandest shots ever to grace out screens... Seeing a suited Doctor blown forward by the destruction he has decided to leave behind him is beautiful) means that the fate of the base and it's crew is sealed. They are stuck. Only one option remains, detonation.
...And it is remembering these words that we see him change. Our Doctor - Our Doctor - changes completely. The realisation that he is the last Time Lord hits him and the next fifteen minutes of the episode are where The Waters Of Mars becomes REALLY scary. How are children meant to react when they see a situation like this? They know he should save the crew. But they have also been told, by Their Doctor, that he cannot. And now? He decided that the laws of time are his "and they will obey me!"
