Series 10: Episode 1 - "The Pilot"

Earlier this evening saw the welcome return of Doctor Who to our TV screens after a prolonged absense, when the first episode of Series 10, "The Pilot", aired on BBC1 at 7.20pm.

This is the beginning of not only Peter Capaldi's final series as the Doctor, but Steven Moffat's final series as showrunner. We're also introduced to the new companion, Bill Potts, a "canteen lady" at a university, who has, for some reason unknown to her, somehow been called up for an interview with one of the university's most prestigious and popular professors, who just happens to be the Doctor, ably assisted by his rather strange companion, Nardole. After her interview at the Doctor's office, he becomes her "tutor".

Much of the episode focuses on Bill and her personal life (she may not be the first openly gay companion in the series - that honour goes to Captain Jack Harkness - but she is certainly the first gay, black, female companion). She starts a relationship with a student called Heather, but things immediately take a turn into the twilight zone when Heather shows Bill a weird puddle, which gives "wrong" reflections of the people who look into it.

The puddle is actually an alien "space oil" entity that eats/absorbs Heather and proceeds to chase after Bill in a watery form that mimicks Heather. First to Bill's flat, then to the Doctor's office, where Bill, the Doctor and Nardole are forced into the TARDIS, which jumps first to some kind of locked, guarded vault (which I reckon we'll see a lot more of later in Series 10). Then it's to the other side of the world, to Australia (where the Doctor has to explain about himself to Bill). The Heather-water thingy follows them there.

Next the TARDIS travels to a planet on the other side of the universe, twenty-three million years in the future. The Heather-entity finds them even there. The damned thing can time travel. It can go anywhere that the TARDIS can go. Finally, the TARDIS lands in the middle of one of the greatest space battles in all of time and space, between the Daleks and Movellans. The Heather-entity follows them there as well. Bill, against the wishes of the Doctor, decides to confront her pursuer, and realizing that the Heather-entity is only following her because of the promise that Heather had made to Bill that "she would never leave her", Bill releases Heather from the vow, and the entity just melts away and vanishes. It hadn't been following Bill to harm her, but to invite her to join it (unfortunately she would've ceased to exist as a human, just as Heather had). The TARDIS returns to the Doctor's office, where he tries to wipe Bill's memory, but she refuses to let him, and leaves, only to meet him waiting outside with the TARDIS, inviting her to join him.

Overall, I quite liked "The Pilot". It wasn't Earth-shatteringly brilliant, but it was a pretty decent story, and although quite subdued and relatively low-key, it served as a good introductory episode for the new companion. It was a nice "character" episode, and I thought that the whole introduction of Bill thing echoed strongly the very first episode of NuWho ("Rose") very nicely indeed. The entire exciting chase sequence later in the episode only lasted a few minutes, but was pretty effective, and I loved the very short "blink and you'll miss it" cameo of the Daleks vs the Movellans, giving us our first short glimpse of that famous war first mentioned way back in the Peter Davison era.

The short sequence with the Dalek blasting away (totally ineffectually) at the Heather-entity was quite chilling, with it just standing there ignoring the Dalek laser blasts as if they were nothing, and repeating "Exterminate!" every time the Dalek screeched it. It was a strong reminder that there are lifeforms out there far more powerful than even the Daleks. The Heather-entity assuming the Dalek's likeness makes me wonder what happened to the poor old Dalek. Did she destroy and absorb it, or did it crap itself and scarper? :) The scene where Bill touches the Heather-entity and it shows her all of time and space was also pretty well done. That was a tough one for Bill to turn down, but I reckon the dying and being absorbed thing kinda put her off a bit. :)

Anyway, a good start to Series 10. Roll on next week and the second episode, "Smile".

The Witch's Apprentice is On TV Tonight!

The Witch's Familiar, Part Two of the Doctor Who season opening double-parter, airs on BBC One at 7.45pm tonight. It'll be interesting to see how things turn out for Clara (Jenna Coleman) and Missy (Michelle Gomez), and how the complex relationship between the Doctor (Peter Capaldi) and Davros (Julian Bleach) may or may not have begun. And the Daleks. Oh, yes, let's not forget the Daleks! :)

Given how good Part One, The Magician's Apprentice was, I'm really looking forward to tonight's episode, while hoping that it lives up to the potential of the first one. In general, I greatly prefer two and three-parters to single episodes, as they are less rushed and give a lot more scope for story and character development. However, an unfortunate tendency of the Moffat-era two-parters is that they have great first parts, but slightly disappointing second parts, which almost always fail to live up to promise of the first episode.

Here's hoping that The Witch's Familiar does not fall into that trap, and turns out to be a cracker.

New Series 9 Episodes Listing

Saturday past gave us the first episode of the new Series 9 of Doctor Who, The Magician's Apprentice, and a cracking start it was too. Peter Capaldi and Jenna Coleman reprise their roles as the Doctor and companion Clara Oswald, and this first episode alone gave us a cracking story and a whole bunch of guest stars, including Missy (played by Michelle Gomez), Davros and Daleks. Lots of Daleks. How's that for a great start?

In the spirit of avoiding spoilers, I'll leave a more detailed analysis of the story until a later date. I'll say only that it was the first episode of a two-parter (unusual in itself, as two-parters are almost always season-enders - I don't recall any season ever beginning with one), and to say that I'm REALLY looking forward to Part Two is putting it mildly. I hope that it lives up to the first episode, as these two-parters have an unfortunate tendency to start off brilliant in the first episode, but fade away disappointingly in the second.

I've been going out of my way to avoid seeing any spoilers on the internet, on TV or in magazines, which can be incredibly hard to do, especially when you spend as much time online and read as many magazines each month (including Doctor Who Magazine) as I do. I've been trying to come to the new series knowing absolutely nothing in advance, for maximum impact and surprise. Until I saw it on television, I knew absolutely nothing about the first episode, other than it had the Doctor, Clara, Missy, Davros and the Daleks. I don't want to know the storylines or synopses in advance. So I'm trying to avoid anything like that like the plague.

Anyway, here's a listing of the episode titles for Series 9, with zero spoilers.

Episodes:

• 01. The Magician's Apprentice
• 02. The Witch's Familiar
• 03. Under the Lake
• 04. Before the Flood
• 05. The Girl Who Died
• 06. The Woman Who Lived
• 07. The Zygon Invasion
• 08. The Zygon Inversion
• 09. Sleep No More
• 10. Face the Raven
• 11. Heaven Sent
• 12. Hell Bent

Roll on Saturday and The Witch's Familiar!

Series 9 Starts Today!

I'm looking forward to the rest of this evening, just sitting here, eagerly awaiting the start of The Magician's Apprentice, the very first episode of the new Series 9 of Doctor Who, which begins very shortly, at 7:40pm, on BBC1.

Peter Capaldi and Jenna Coleman return as the Doctor and Clara, and I won't give away much, other than to say that this one features both the Daleks AND Missy/The Master, and the Doctor goes missing, leaving Clara forced to do the almost unthinkable - team up with Missy to find him! So it should be pretty interesting, to say the least.

Roll on 7:40! :)

Plaything of Sutekh #4 Is Now Available

As a follow-up to my last post, I'm now happy to report that Plaything of Sutekh #4 is now available, after what seems like an eternity since the last issue. :)

As the details on the Plaything of Sutekh blog state, the new issue features articles on:-

• Pacifism in Doctor Who - a look at how The Daleks and The Dominators gave turning the other cheek the thumbs down.
• The Ark vs The Ark in Space - David Rolinson looks at the similarities between these two stories.
• RTD & Religion - Sean Alexander examines a key aspect of the series under Russell T's tenure.
• E-Space - Jez Strickley spies a dystopian slant in this Season 18 trilogy.
• Secret Who - we look at two underrated stories The Claws of Axos and The Time Monster
• Changing Times - a look back at Peter Capaldi's first season.
• Doc Top Ten - one writer looks at his favourite Who comic strips.
• Gateway Drug - Stephen Wood confesses how it all started with him and Who…

For those who aren't familiar with it, Plaything of Sutekh is a professionally produced, traditional A5 print Doctor Who fanzine - yes, a real paper zine, not an electronic download, a website or a blog. It is brought to you by Richard Farrell, John Connors and their Merry crew - Richard also edits the very excellent Gerry Anderson fanzine Andersonic. Both zines are among the best fanzines currently available, especially considering that the traditional print fanzine is an endangered species in the increasingly electronic and online modern era.

Issue 4 is 36 pages, fully illustrated with colour covers and black & white interiors. It only costs a mere £2.20, which also includes free postage within the UK (check the blog for postage outside the UK).

To find out more details or order the zine, either go to the Plaything of Sutekh blog, or simply send a Paypal payment directly to playthingofsutekh@mail.com - with your address in the 'notes' section. You can also pay by cheque, please email for the payee details.

Issue 3 is also still in print. All self-respecting Doctor Who fans should run along sharpish to the Plaything of Sutekh blog and buy these two issues before they're sold out.

Doctor Who DVD Marathon Session

I'm having a bit of a quiet night in tonight, watching a few Doctor Who DVDs with a couple of mates. We have four DVDs on the menu tonight, and they're all Tom Baker stories, among them three of my all-time favourite DW classics from the Hinchcliffe era.

We're starting of with Image of the Fendahl (nearing the end of Episode 2 right now), followed by Terror of the Zygons, Genesis of the Daleks, and finally Destiny of the Daleks. The first three stories are all in my Top Ten classic Doctor Who Stories list. Destiny is pretty decent too, if not quite up to the standard of the first three.

Tom Baker has always been my favourite Doctor, and the Hinchcliffe era by far my favourite era ever of Doctor Who. The underlying horror, more subdued Baker humour, excellent acting and extremely high quality of the scripts in Baker's first three seasons have never been equalled, let alone surpassed, either in the classic or the new series.

We're in for a very enjoyable evening. :)

"Into the Dalek" - Some Thoughts

Into the Dalek, the second episode of Season 8, is definitely a stronger story than Deep Breath. It's also less light-hearted, definitely more serious, with less humour. The new Doctor has ironed out most of the regeneration craziness (although a few quirks still remain), and Peter Capaldi is settling nicely into the role, confirming my initial impressions that he will make a very good Doctor.

Clara is better written this episode, back to her brave, feisty self, especially in the scenes where she's helping to reawaken the Dalek's memory banks, while the troopers try to hold off the "antibodies". She's definitely interacting much better with the new Doctor, with no more of that ridiculous out-of-character nonsense that we had from her in Deep Breath. It also looks like there's an interesting relationship brewing between her and Danny Pink. There also seemed to be a bit of an interesting "soldier" sub-plot going on with both Clara/Danny and the Doctor/Journey Blue in this story. I dunno what the new Doctor has against soldiers. He's certainly fought alongside enough of them in his time. :)

Obviously the really big thing with this episode is that it is a Dalek story. It's only the Capaldi Doctor's second story, and he's already encountered the blobby little terrors, his most dangerous enemies. One would think that Moffat is doing a re-run of the First Doctor, William Hartnell, as they also featured in HIS second story. After all, Peter Capaldi is the new "first" Doctor, in this new cycle of incarnations, so maybe this was a conscious decision by Moffat.

The story itself is well-plotted and exciting although the whole premise of a "good" Dalek isn't a totally new one. Also, the Fantastic Voyage journey through the internals of a Dalek has also been done before in Doctor Who, both in the classic and the new series. And it has also been done many, many times before in other sci-fi series and films. But none of them ever had antibodies like those nasty little Dalek mofos.

But more than anything, Into the Dalek in some scenes reminded me so much of the classic Christopher Ecclestone story Dalek, particularly during the Doctor/Dalek interaction scenes, that parts of it seemed to be just lifted from the earlier story and rehashed in this one. A tribute? Yes, maybe. But a bit more originality might also have been appreciated (by me, anyway).

50 Years in Space & Time (Part 12)

Here's the final part of my look back at Doctor Who's 50th Anniversary, with the final two of my list of favourite dozen best 50th Anniversary items:

• Doctor Who: Monsters and Villains Weekend
• Doctor Who: The Doctors Revisited

13. Doctor Who: Monsters and Villains Weekend

The three-part Doctor Who: Monsters and Villains Weekend, which aired on BBC3 over three nights from the Friday-Sunday, 15th-17th November, was a celebration of the various monsters and adversaries that the Doctor has met in the new series. It starts in reverse order, from the Judoon in tenth place, down through the Silurians, the Ood, Clockwork Droids, the Ice Warriors, the Cybermen, the Silence, to the final big 3-2-1 of the Master, the Weeping Angels, and the Daleks. Lots of monsters, and LOTS of fun.

14. Doctor Who: The Doctors Revisited

The Doctors Revisited originally aired as individual episodes between January and November, and was reshown in omnibus format on Watch on Saturday 16th November. It is an 11-part series featuring each of the previous incarnations of the Doctor from the first to the eleventh. Some classic clips featuring the Doctor and his adversaries, and interviews with creators, cast and behind-the-scenes contributors and crew, make this a worthwhile viewing experience for all Doctor Who fans.

All in all, a great 50th Anniversary. Not a bad item on the list, although the first four or five were undoubtedly, for me at least, the best of the bunch.

50 Years in Space & Time (Part 9)

Here's the next part of my look back at the Best of the Bunch from Doctor Who's 50th Anniversary:

• The Night of the Doctor - mini-episode prequel
• The Last Day - mini-episode prequel

8. The Night of the Doctor

Commemorating Doctor Who's 50th Anniversary, and the first of two very good mini-episode prequels to The Day of the Doctor is The Night of the Doctor, which was released on Youtube and BBC iPlayer on 14th November. At less than seven minutes long, it is an excellent swansong for the Paul McGann Doctor and as an introduction to the War Doctor. It was also nice to see the Sisterhood of Karn make a reappearance again, as we hadn't seen them since the Tom Baker era. Both McGann and the Sisterhood should have been given more airtime in past Doctor Who series, so it was nice to see them again, and particularly in McGann's case, to see him have a nice, much-deserved regeneration scene at last.

9. The Last Day

The second of the two mini-episode prequels to The Day of the Doctor, and, at under four minutes, even shorter than The Night of the Doctor, is The Last Day, which first appeared on YouTube and BBC iPlayer on 21st November. Seen from the point of view of a Time Lord soldier wearing a headcam, this one elaborates on the "fall of Arcadia" during the Time War. The sequence with the commander bragging about the supposedly impenetrable "sky trenches" and Arcadia being "the safest place on Gallifrey" illustrates the overconfidence and complacency of the Time Lords. When the Daleks burst through in large numbers, I was almost cheering them on. :)

To Be Continued...