Take a Deep Breath and watch the season premiere of Doctor Who! Done?! Now you can breathe! After a long long wait, we finally got our first episode of season 8, with a new Doctor, running around in Victorian London, chasing a T-Rex and automatons.
The main thing of the episode is Clara’s choice on whether she’ll remain with the Doctor or not, and, as always when there’s a regeneration, to present to us this brand new Doctor. So, I’ll just say what I thought of the episode…
1. Why so much emphasis on the age, the grey and the old?!
Seriously, why? Was Moffat showing the fans that the Doctor can be old? Well, we know that, actually, he was always older, way older than Matt Smith, and most of them were better at it. So, why bother? Why have 75 minutes constantly reminding everyone of this point, when honestly it’s a mute point… it really shouldn’t matter!!!
2. Capaldi’s Doctor just might make my top 3!
Peter Capaldi just nailed it! Such a different, interesting, intense and darker Doctor. Exactly what we needed after so many years of silliness and jumping around.
Now we have one unexpected Doctor and an amazing actor behind him.
And the accent, I love the accent, I loved his reaction to it! Lovely to see him acknowledge his face, curious to see how they’ll resolve it.
3. Good Clara/Bad Clara…
I’m conflicted about this, see, for one hand, Clara has her best episode yet, she gets some development, she’s fierce, she holds her own (and Jenna Louise Coleman is just brilliant).
On the other hand, Clara seems to have forgotten that she’s met all the past Doctors, all of them, and decides that she doesn’t recognizes the Doctor in this one… well, this would be a normal and perfectly natural plot line if you had another “Rose”, or “Amy”, or any of them really, but you have Clara, the girl who not only knows their faces, but just a few months ago actually met 2 more, and come on, if she could get along with The War Doctor, how could she not recognize 12th? And she knew he was old, if anyone knows, she does, just this Christmas she saw a much older version of 11th and she didn’t react like this… Moffat, you failed on this one!
4. A T-Rex… just because!
I still don’t see the point!
They had done dinosaurs before, but this plot could have been achieved by any other creature really, why have a T-Rex in the middle of the Thames, just standing there?
Fun, but pointless!
5. Paternoster Gang… always fun
I love them, best part of the episode for me (apart from Capaldi) was these three. Funny, light, smart – I really loved Jenny on this one. Still, how do they know so much about the Doctor’s regeneration? When did they meet him? How they came to be? I love them, but I would like them to make some sense.
6. The references
This felt good and weird, somehow! The Girl in the Fireplace reference was obvious and welcomed. “It’s times like this I really miss Amy”… uncalled for and so not relevant! “Chips. Coffee. Coffee and Chips”, well sir she just wants the coffee… Rose would have taken the chips though.
7. The phone call…
I have absolutely no problem with Matt Smith’s Doctor, I loved him, not my Doctor, but loved him none the less. I do have a problem with that phone call! We had 1 year to get our minds around the idea that Capaldi was the new Doctor, we had 2 specials to say goodbye to Matt Smith, which we did, and they were such 2 big episodes… then we got 8 months to get used to the idea that 11 was not coming back (which is good, change is good!)… and then, when all the focused of the episode should be on Capaldi, here comes 11 again to convince Clara to help him?!
Really?! Moffat, are you having separation anxiety?! It surely fells like you are!
There was no need for it! She should have come to that conclusion alone. 12th’s speech should have been more than enough. Never on a first episode of a Doctor, should the previous one give the companion a call, never, ever, ever!
8. All’n All
Good enough episode, though I hope that the season brings a bit more. All that talk of age and perceptions kind of bored me, maybe because I was glad that this Doctor was older.
Curious to see where the season leads us, though I have to say, not very enthusiastic about the idea of “Missy” calling the Doctor her boyfriend, I really thought we were done with all that. The most popular theories are that she’s either The Master, The Rani or River – though let’s hope not River, if River Song ever returns, I want it to be as Alex Kingston.
Looking forward for next week and the return of the Daleks (and something tells me that the Cybermen will soon follow!).
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