The Empty Child 

When a spaceship crashes in the middle of the London Blitz the Doctor, Rose and the enigmatic Captain Jack Harkness find themselves investigating a plague of physical injuries and a little boy in a gas mask.

Director:

James Hawes

Writer:

Steven Moffat

Stars:

Christopher Eccleston, Billie Piper, Kate Harvey

Cast

Episode complete credited cast:
Christopher Eccleston	...	Doctor Who
Billie Piper	...	Rose Tyler
Kate Harvey	...	Nightclub Singer
Albert Valentine	...	The Child
Florence Hoath	...	Nancy
Cheryl Fergison	...	Mrs. Lloyd
Damian Samuels	...	Mr. Lloyd
John Barrowman	...	Jack Harkness
Robert Hands	...	Algy
Joseph Tremain	...	Jim
Jordan Murphy	...	Ernie
Brandon Miller	...	Alf
Richard Wilson	...	Dr. Constantine
Noah Johnson	...	The Empty Child (voice)
Dian Perry	...	Computer (voice)

Storyline

Rose and the Doctor find themselves in 1941 London when the TARDIS receives an emergency signal from another time-traveling vehicle. While the Doctor tries to determine where the object may have landed, Rose goes off in search of a child she can hear calling for help. When she gets herself into a precarious situation, she's rescued by the rather handsome RAF Captain Jack Harkness, who owns a time machine of his own. The Doctor meanwhile meets Nancy who has an interesting way of arranging meals for homeless children. They are also being chased by the child Rose heard calling. The Doctor determines that human DNA is being rewritten but it's not obvious why or by who.

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Plot Keywords:

london air raid | gas mask | time machine | doctor who | ninth doctor | 

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Genres:

Adventure | Drama | Family | Mystery | Sci-Fi

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Certificate:

TV-PG

Details

Country:

UK

Language:

English

Release Date:

5 May 2006 (USA)

Filming Locations:

Barry Steam Railway, Plymouth Road, Barry Island, Barry, Vale of Glamorgan, Wales, UK

Company Credits

Technical Specs

Runtime:

45 min 45 min (50 episodes)

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital (Dolby 5.1)

Color:

Color

Did You Know?

Trivia

The little boy repeating "Are you my mummy?" recalls a scene from Steven Moffat's previous series, 'Jekyll,' in which the "Hyde" persona taunts the "Jekyll" persona by asking "Are you my daddy?"

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Goofs

Barrage balloons used during the Blitz were tethered with steel cables, not ropes.

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Quotes

[first lines]
Rose Tyler: What's the emergency?
The Doctor: It's mauve.
Rose Tyler: Mauve?
The Doctor: Universally recognised colour for danger.
Rose Tyler: What happened to red?
The Doctor: That's just humans. By everyone else's standards, red's camp. Oh, the misunderstandings! All those red alerts, all that dancing.

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Connections

Featured in Doctor Who Confidential: River Runs Deep (2008)

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Soundtracks

Moonlight Serenade
Written by Glenn Miller and Mitchell Parish
Performed by Glenn Miller

User Reviews

Good Production Values But Not The Masterwork Claimed

It's impossible to mention this two part story without discussing its popularity within DOCTOR WHO fandom . This was the most popular story from season one and some fan forums included surveys that considered the Eccleston series as the twenty seventh season where The Empty Child /The Doctor Dances is considered one of the top three greatest Who stories to have been broadcast since the show's inception in 1963 . I have to disagree because it's nowhere that good

Looking at the good points you genuinely believe The Doctor and Rose have visited 1941 London . Imagine this being produced in the old series where we'd see a closed camera in close up trying and failing to convince us that the Tardis has travelled back in time ( Also watch Dalek invasion Of Earth and Frontier In Space for failed futuristic equivalents ) and the production team deserves much praise for the night filming . Can anyone else name a location based story that took place entirely at night ?

Where the story fails in some places can be attributed to writer Steven Moffat , a scriptwriter who has a large fan base but a writer who I have never warmed to . In every story this series there's a line which previous producers would never have got away with , in this one there's two lines , one where a young boy makes blatant assertions to have been abused by a paedophile while another insinuates that one of the supporting characters is gay . There's also a bit too many easy escapes for the heroes: " Go to your room ! "

All in all a fairly good story which casual viewers will remember as " The one during the Blitz " but for more hardcore fans it will be remembered as one of the high points of British television since its creation and I'm something at a loss to know why