1)And now we come to what I like to think of as the Doctor Who answer to Crisis on Infinite Earths, with the Doctor and all of his spin-offs fighting a twisted guy with his army of faceless drones who wants to destroy all of the universes. Geez, they brought everybody back for this except Adam Mitchell. Would of been a good time to have him redeem himself/bump him off if they'd had a mind to. Of course, it did make the story pretty "busy". Imagine if they'd all stayed on at the end - talk about a "crowded TARDIS"! Heck, they even name-checked Mr. Copper.
2)One of the big things in this story is the return of Davros. I thought Julian Bleach did a pretty good job in this. I still think of Michael Wisher as "being" Davros, but Bleach was believable in the role. They did a pretty good job with maintaining old series continuity without it being too overwhelming for the newer fans. I liked that they remembered that Orcini had blown his hand off in the Colin Baker days, and I liked his interaction with Sarah Jane: "You were there on Skaro at the very beginning of my creation." He had some good line reads as well - he managed Davros' combination of Hitler rants with occasional faux amiability: "And...oh,, the end of the universe has come." Could've done without the shot of Davros' insides, though. Yuk.
3)The other big thing was the departure of Donna. In the end, we got a cheat on the "one will die" bit, as only her memories of her time with the Doctor "die." I can't say as I was wild about the way her character departed - I'm not necessarily against a "sad" ending for a character, although, sentimentalist that I am, I never like them. I didn't mind the "Davies ex machina" of her suddenly - and somewhat improbably - becoming "SuperDonna". In the end, I guess it just didn't seem fair that she had to go back to being the way she was before. One likes to think that bits of who she became during her travels with the Doctor will subconsciously seep into her personality over the years. Or that some future Doctor will show up and say, "Oh, by the way, I found my old bio-meta-crisis fixer-up thingy in the TARDIS junk closet. Sorry about that, I really should clean that out someday. Anyway, your memory's all fixed now and your head won't blow up if you remember me, so have a nice life, I and this young chippie I've replaced you with have to go fight some space weasels or something."
Oh, and Donna is the one who chases after Jack? What, he's too good for her?
4)Ah, the Daleks - the Supreme Dalek was well-designed, I thought. Lots of callbacks to "The Dalek Invasion of Earth" in this one:
- "Daleks are the masters of Earth!"
- "Someone tried to move the Earth once before - long time ago."
- "All humans will leave their homes - the males, the females, the descendants."
- And the very presence of Bernard Cribbins creates a quasi-connection to the movie version of this story.
"Daleks do not accept apologies." - yeah, you generally have to spring for roses and some chocolates.
It was interesting to hear the Daleks speaking their native German.
The whole Reality Bomb was an interesting idea - one does wonder what the Daleks planned to do if they'd won - just sit around an empty universe playing checkers? Also, was there no other planet they could use than the Earth? Maybe one that wouldn't automatically draw the Doctor's attention if they messed with it? Also, when Pyrovillia, Adipose II and the Lost Moon of Poosh were returned, were they returned to the time frames they taken from? Wouldn't that have undone "The Fires of Pompeii" and "Partners in Crime" and at least altered "Midnight"? If they were returned to some other time, what time did the Doctor choose to return them to?
5)"Annihilate UNIT!" Good to see Martha again - poor thing got stuck with the Osterhaagen-Dazs Key. I liked the scene with her and the German lady - what was good was the even though I don't speak any German, I was still able to understand what was going on there.
6)"Exterminate Torchwood!" I haven't seen any Torchwood, so I can't really comment on how Gwen and Ianto were handled here.
7)At the time, I hadn't seen any Sarah Jane Adventures, and I've only seen two stories since, so I can't say much here, either. Nice to see K-9 again, though, and I can never get enough Elisabeth Sladen - it's a funny thing, bu tit was actually quite affecting to finally see her name in the opening credits.
8)Mickey didn't get to much to do, but I did like how at the end, he could see what was coming, and decided to stay in his home universe. Interesting that this show's male characters tend to be more likable than the female ones.
9)Of course, we had to see Rose Tyler one more time, and she finally gets what she wanted - a toy Doctor to play "house" with. Still, as Jeff Pl. says, if they want to bring Tennant back for a vist in ten years time, bringing back Doctor 10.2 would be a good excuse for why he looks so much older.
10)I liked that to the end, Sylvia never really warmed to the Doctor the way Jackie, and to an extent, Francine did.
11)As for Francine - nice to see you, Adjoa, thanks for stopping in.
12)I liked Wilf's salute at the end. Wilfred Mott is in my opinion the best character RTD created for this show - or maybe Cribbins is just that good of an actor. I also liked the sight of Wilf with the cricket bat, shouting at the aliens.
13)We finally get to see the Shadow Proclamation, which turns out to be staffed by rhinos and albinos. And policing out the winos, I suppose?
14)"The abomination is insane." Actually, the real hero of the piece was poor old Dalek Caan, since he apparently set it all up - although how he managed that considering the state he was in, I've no idea.
15)Nice to see Harriet Jones again, although as far as I can tell, RTD brought her back just so's he could trot out the "We know who you are" joke a few more times. It was funny the first fifty times, Russell, the second fifty times, not so much.
16)Uh-oh! Jackie Tyler with a raygun!
17)Oh, and those people the Doctor flashes back to - it seems to me that they didn't all exactly die "in his name".
18)I seem to recall Jeff Pl. saying that the scene with the TARDIS towing the Earth made him think of some Kirby comic - The Hunger Dogs, maybe?
19)Do they still have milkmen in Britain?
20)Cliffhanger for "The Stolen Earth": The Daleks invade Torchwood, some other Daleks are going to shoot Sarah Jane, and the injured Doctor starts to regenerate! Resolution: Some timelock thing that hasn't been mean mentioned before saves Gwen and Ianto, Mickey and Jackie just happen to pop in in time to save Sarah Jane and the Doctor pulls some kind of shenanigans that prevents the regeneration! Wow, the "Davies ex machinae" are coming fast and furious here!
21)Some quotes:
- "You can put that stuff down or run for your lives!" So, if they don't put it down, they're OK?
- "They have a message for the human race." And it's not "Happy Birthday!"
- "Are you saying bees are aliens?" "Don't be so daft - not all of them."
- ""My vision is not impaired." According to RTD, the paintball gag was Cribbins' own idea.
- "The children of time are moving against us." "The Children of Time" sounds like a 70's Swedish pop band.
- "I have only one thing to say to you - BYE!"
- "It's you!" "Oh, yes!" "And you're naked!" "Oh, yes."
- "You're the Daleks' pet!" Be funny if he'd had a little water dish that said "Davros" on it.
- "What was the end of that sentence?" "I like ham."
Overall:
By and large, a fun story with a few glitches here and there - it has the advantages and disadvantages of the huge "Let's throw in everything we possibly can" epic story. I find it bears occasional re-watching. Lots of fanboy "moments", an RTD specialty.
[Part of list of Doctor Who episodes here.]
Replies
Geez, they brought everybody back for this except Adam Mitchell. Would of been a good time to have him redeem himself/bump him off if they'd had a mind to. Of course, it did make the story pretty "busy".
Can you imagine someone suggesting bringing back Adam to RTD, and he's, like, "Oh, no, that'd be TOO MUCH!"
Wilfred Mott is in my opinion the best character RTD created for this show - or maybe Cribbins is just that good of an actor.
Amen to that.
We finally get to see the Shadow Proclamation, which turns out to be staffed by rhinos and albinos.
And, IIRC, made out of whitewashed cinder blocks. The Galactic Powers That Be may have signed on to the SP, but it was an unfunded mandate.
I've been watching TORCHWOOD and I note that the rift in Cardiff no longer features in series 3 and 4. Since they use the energy from the rift in this DOCTOR WHO two-parter--I think this is the last place where it's featured--I wonder, did those actions seal up the rift?