Time to complete the reviews of this past season of DOCTOR WHO…
Part 1 of 2
Written by Matt Jones
Directed by James Strong
“The beast and his armies shall rise from the pit to make war against God.”
For the first time I can remember, an episode of Doctor Who induced some rather disturbing dreams. THIS is the episode responsible!
I’m referring to the scene where archeologist Toby (Wil Thorp) Zed, possessed by something sickening & malevolent, stands outside on the surface of a planet with no atmosphere. As one of his colleagues watches, terrified & surprised, he turns to look at her. His face is covered in ancient writing, his eyes are blood red, and he has a smile on his face — a smile that has oozed out of the deepest pit of hell. He beckons to her…accompanied by the most mournful violin solo I’ve heard outside of Lord of the Rings.
Oh dear lord, this entire episode is disturbing on a scale I can’t begin to describe! A research station barely maintaining integrity, perched on a rock orbiting a black hole…the crew is on edge…the Doctor loses the TARDIS — stranding himself and Rose on the edge of oblivion…and then the computer locks on the doors start saying things such as “HE IS AWAKE….HE BATHES IN THE BLACK SUN.”
Oh, and let’s not forget the Ood: a gentle, squishy, tentacled slave race that, in one breath, announces that “THE BEAST SHALL ARISE FROM THE PIT TO MAKE WAR WITH GOD”…and, in the next breath, hopes you enjoy your dinner!
Speaking of Lord of the Rings, let’s not forget the discovery of an ancient civilization, ten miles below the surface, complete with giant statues, crumbling edifices…and a sealed hellmouth that Buffy the Vampire Slayer would have KILLED to possess!
This is an epic, whose sole purpose is to seal a group of people inside the toughest situation they can imagine…then send it merrily on the way to hell, via lashings of Alien and The Exorcist. The music is positively legendary, the acting is magnificently neurotic, and the budget must have been smashed to hell along with the story, because it looks more expensive & more fantastic than Doctor Who has ever managed to be on-screen…and that includes the entire previous season! The Impossible Planet takes the old Doctor Who plot stand-by of the base-under-siege, and sends it to hell…figuratively AND literally. Backed by the voice of Gabriel Woolf — the man responsible for THE scariest voice in all of classic Doctor Who (in 1975’s Pyramids of Mars) — the Ood are possessed…Toby is re-possessed and announces that the Beast has returned…the gravity field holding the planet begins to die, sending it towards the black hole…AND the pit begins to open.
Did you get all that? Because it’s only the beginning…so hang on to your adrenal gland!
10
Part 2 of 2
Written by Matt Jones
Directed by James Strong
“If I kill you, I kill her…except that implies, in this big grand scheme of gods and devils, that she’s just a victim. But I’ve seen a lot of this universe. I’ve seen fake gods and bad gods and demigods and would-be gods. And out of all that, out of that whole pantheon, if I believe in one thing, just one thing… I believe in her!”
How do you follow up a story where the gates of hell are opened? Journey down towards it, of course…
One half of The Satan Pit is a mini-version of Aliens: conduit chases, panicking people with guns, a pursuit by remorseless creatures…it’s all pure adrenaline & visceral terror.
The other half of the story is empty and quiet: as silent and still as the black pit into which the Doctor lowers himself…
The Satan Pit is all about the idea of hell, and its various manifestations. Hell given shape and form in the persona of the Beast. Hell given icy life, via the Beast’s pointed psyche-out of each of the characters, and a tidbit revelation of their secret, hidden demons. Hell as the ultimate goodbye: losing your friends, unable to help them, escaping with your life because it’s the only thing left to do…a hell Rose finds she is unable to escape. Hell as a celestial nightmare, as the black hole finally awakes, no longer held back by the gravity funnel: a hungry, gaping maw, drawing everyone and everything towards inexorable oblivion.
Faced with hell as a series of real, tangible items, we have what could be David Tennant’s finest performance. In the shadow of one of the most terrifying & spectacular images ever brought to the screen by Doctor Who, Tennant is by turns manic, astonished, contemplative, resolved…he reduces hell and the Devil to its basic constituents: ideas and feelings. He defeats a being of pure, emotional turmoil with reason and humour…and then throws in a little faith & love into the bargain. Has there ever been as triumphant and heart-warming a conclusion as seen here? The discovery of the TARDIS & the Doctor’s laugh, the rescue of the rocket ship, the joyous reunion between the Doctor and Rose…breathtaking, epic storytelling on as grand a scale as the series has ever attempted.
The stuff of legends, indeed!
10
Written by Russell T. Davies
Directed by Dan Zeff
“Let me tell you something about those who get left behind. Because it’s hard. And that’s what you become…hard. But if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that I will never let her down. And I’ll protect them both until the end of my life. So whatever you want, I’m warning you…back off!”
Doctor Who has a tradition of “odd-ball” stories — stories that attempt to be witty, clever, play with expectations, and take the mickey out of life in general, and fandom in particular. Across the years, stories such as The Celestial Toymaker, The Mind Robber, Carnival of Monsters and The Happiness Patrol have sharply — and vocally — divided fandom.
Love & Monsters is no exception. It has raised the biggest, loudest, and sharpest arguments in Doctor Who fandom since 1988…but I have one message for the people who dislike it:
Get over yourselves!
What is it? Take your pick! A sweet, charming, gorgeously written essay about what it means to be a Doctor Who fan. A pointed, hilarious examination of how companionship and friendship can be ruined by the officious world-view of those consumed with facts and lists, rather than feelings. A hilarious and philosophical examination of the myth of the Doctor & Rose from the point of view of the greatest everyman character to appear in Doctor Who in decades: Marc Warren’s warm and vulnerable Elton (quite the achievement, considering that he’s best know as a smarmy, oily con-man on Hustle).
We also get comic genius Peter Kay, tut-tutting with his cane & worried about his eczema one minute…then running around as a Blue Peter-winning absorbing green blob, with a mohawk and a jockstrap, chasing people as if he were trapped in a Keystone Cops film, and shouting “Aarrgghh!” And we’re witness to Camille Coduri’s finest performance as Jackie, revealing a great deal about the burden she carries as one of the one’s left behind. Throw in a great ensemble cast (Shirley Henderson in particular), some pointed wit, a dash of contemplation, the dirtiest joke EVER in Doctor Who (“Please Elton, there’s no need to get into that.”)…and the end result is like nothing you could have ever expected.
There are people who hate this episode. The Doctor and Rose only present for about 10 minutes? The comedy is too broad at times? Its depiction of fandom is mean-spirited? It’s too different from what people “expect” a Doctor Who story to be?
Stuff them all! It’s a story that takes the grand, epic themes of The Satan Pit and reduces it to a meditation on those few souls who peek through the crack in the door…and are rewarded with only the most fleeting glimpse of the mythic, magnificent, and terrifying nature of the Doctor and his magic box. So what if the Doctor and Rose are barely in it…their presence is felt throughout the episode.
This is as sweet and charming and sublime as Doctor Who gets ? pity those who don’t understand it.
9
Written by Matthew Graham
Directed by Euros Lyn
“I’ve given you friends and you still moan. Moan, moan, moan. You’re lucky. You’re all together. You don’t know what it is to be alone. If you did, you’d be thanking me!”
Fear Her has magnificent bones. The script is delicious in its presentation of suburbia — outwardly calm, pleasant and very homogeneous. But underneath, we have batty old ladies no one will listen to, frightened & angry residents hurling accusations at “strangers” to the neighbourhood, and riffs on the cliches of officialdom (“council vans”, “council pick-axes” and “spaceships…but not a council spaceship”). There are even a few lovely Inspector Morse jokes.
The actors put in top notch performances, in particular Nina Sosanya as Trish, the nervous mother, trying to keep it together, and Abisola Agbaje as the possessed & obsessed Chloe. As for David Tennant and Billie Piper, they’re such a well oiled machine by this point that they effortless breeze through the investigation into the alien creature and the disappearing children.
The concepts are also fascinating: a child stealing other children, and putting them into drawings; scribble creatures that attack people; the loneliness of the Isolus; the entire spectator population of Olympic Stadium disappearing into Chloe’s drawing. There’s even a decent attempt to touch on adult themes of abuse and abandonment with the drawing of Chloe’s dead father in the closet — most of which succeeds without the need for a preachy soap box. The audience is far too sophisticated for “moral of the story” endings…
Yet…it doesn’t quite live up to its potential. Euros Lyn should have directed with more verve and energy, but he seems a bit lifeless here…especially compared to his early season masterpieces Tooth and Claw and The Girl in the Fireplace. On the occasions he does try something different (the juddering camera technique most commonly used in modern day police and detective dramas), the end result is more irritating than artistic. Fear Her needed a black humour and vision more akin to Tim Burton than to Prime Suspect.
In spite of being less than the sum of its parts, Fear Her remains an enjoyable, idiosyncratic respite between two mammoth story arcs. In particular, it has three moments I adore:
(1) “FINGERS ON LIPS!”
(2) The Doctor’s delight at eating edible ball bearings…
And best of all:
(3) The line that once more throws the cat among the pigeons of fandom: “I was a dad once.”
So…far from a total loss. And as for what was to come…
7
