Written by Russell T. Davies
Directed by James Strong
”If you see a big blue box, flying up there in the sky…you shout for me, gramps. Oh, you just shout.”
SPOILERS FOLLOW…You’ve been warned!
Here are some random thoughts about Partners in Crime, the Doctor Who 4th series opener…
(1) Someone took at re-run of The Sarah Jane Adventures pilot - Invasion of the Bane - and decided to re-make it as a Doctor Who season opener. All they did was (a) replace Samantha Bond with Sarah Lancashire; (b) divided Sarah Jane’s nosiness between Penny & Donna; (c) replace gooey tentacle creatures with gooey little fat creatures…and (d) the tone is very much similar to Doctor Who’s sister show: fast-paced, slick, and full of very broad humour. There’s even another new sonic device to join the growing compliment of screwdrivers, blasters & lipsticks: a pen!
(2) Hmm…I couldn’t help laughing at the guest appearance by the Close Encounters of the Third Kind mothership…complete with welcoming musical boom!
(3) Speaking of aliens…the Adipose fat creatures could well be the cutest little creatures to ever appear in a Doctor Who episode. They threaten to be too cute…but once they appear in massive numbers, the strangeness of their presence tends to make it rather appealing (and I’m a sucker for cute aliens…Ewoks excepted).
(4) The Bugs-Bunny-inpsired death of Ms. Foster aside, the comedy does manage to rise above the level of children’s television on several, inspired occasions: Donna sitting at the kitchen table, tuning out her nagging mum, being one of them. But the best is the simply amazing silent reunion between the Doctor and Donna through the office windows of the Adipose Corporation…sheer brilliance.
(5) David Tennant and Catherine Tate are wonderful together - all nervous energy, blunt-force friendship trauma & giddy happiness. Tate is especially good at treading the fine line between poignancy and out-and-out farce. As for Tennant, he provides some wonderful moments of lonely, last-of-the-Time-Lords melancholy.
(6) Bernard Cribbins, fresh from Voyage of the Damned as the patriotic old news agent, is revealed to be Donna’s alien/futurist grandfather…and he’s the best thing in the entire episode. He steals every scene he’s in!
It’s the weakest plot since last season’s Dalek two-parter (even some of the re-used stock music tracks seem tired), but it does have an edge: some great acting, decent comedy, a wonderful return for Donna to the TARDIS (love the ready-to-go luggage), and that FINAL SCENE with…
…ROSE! Yes…ROSE! I wasn’t imagining it…though she did fade away…
ARGH!
Oh boy, are we in for some fun this year…
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