"Doctor Who" The Poison Sky (2008)

Director:

Douglas Mackinnon

Writers:

Helen Raynor (written by)
Robert Holmes (character: "The Sontarans")

TV Series:

"Doctor Who" (2005)

Original Air Date:

3 May 2008 (Season 4, Episode 5)

Genre:

Adventure | Drama | Sci-Fi

Plot:

With planet Earth choking under the poison sky, the Doctor must stop the Sontarans' threat to the planet. |

Plot Keywords:

Alien | Time Lord | Tardis | Companion | Doctor Who

Cast

David Tennant	...	The Doctor
Catherine Tate	...	Donna Noble
Freema Agyeman	...	Martha Jones
Billie Piper	...	Rose Tyler
Bernard Cribbins	...	Wilfred Mott
Jacqueline King	...	Sylvia Noble
Ryan Sampson	...	Luke Rattigan
Rupert Holliday-Evans	...	Colonel Mace
Christopher Ryan	...	General Staal
Dan Starkey	...	Commander Skorr
Clive Standen	...	Private Harris
Wesley Theobald	...	Private Gray
Christian Cooke	...	Ross Jenkins
Meryl Fernandes	...	Female Student
Leeshon Alexander	...	Male Student

Runtime:

45 min (50 episodes)

Certification:

UK:PG (DVD rating)

Filming Locations:

Margam Castle, Margam, Neath Port Talbot, Wales, UK

Company:

BBC Wales

Trivia:

When preparing for the nuclear strike, all countries with known nuclear capabilities check in, except for Russia. The very last to check in is North Korea, of which it is disputed they have nuclear weapons, at which point the Colonel looks very surprised.

Goofs:

Revealing mistakes: At the beginning of the episode, Donna's mom smashes the front window of their car. However, car's windows are triplexes: 2 layers of glass, glued to a single layer of plastic, so they don't simply collapse, as shown. (The whole point is to prevent the crash and minimize injury from glass cuts.)

Quotes:

[looking at the Sontaran Clone version of herself]
Martha Jones: Oh, my God. That's me!

Movie Connections:

Features "Tommy Zoom" (2007)

It's the scale of it

"It's the scale of it". This quote from Wilf, who is fast becoming my favorite character of the new series who isn't an alien who hops around time and space in a police phone box, perfectly describes my problem with this episode and with much of the new series. Perhaps for lack of a budget, the classic episodes rarely if ever dared set up a catastrophe on this scale. I really hate the idea of humanity being threatened every couple of weeks while the Doctor saves them. It's better if he's stopping plans that are being laid early or something of the sort. It's like the Pertwee era on steroids or something. At least the aliens didn't hover over London with nobody noticing them again.

However, there was much to love in "The Poison Sky" with the Sontarans getting their butts kicked, more Wilf action (the only reason I'll be in favor of more Earth stories this season is seeing Bernard Cribbins in the role again), and some fine action scenes and special effects.

The best part of the episode though, was what some would term 'fanwank' and those were the references. They weren't too obvious, after all, why WOULDN'T the Doctor mention the Brigadier?! (Stranded in Peru? Could we be seeing the return of the Brigadier sometime?) The rest of the references were pretty funny too, in particular "Are you my mummy?" If you didn't laugh at that you're either not a fan or you just don't have a sense of humor.

I liked this episode quite a bit, and this story as a whole. It is definitely the weakest Sontaran story but the competition is strong so I'm not complaining. Good stuff, just wish we could have fewer stories where the entire universe is in peril (just Earth, eh? Still too big a scale).

7/10