The Parting of the Ways

We have had wonderful penultimate Series episodes, The Pandorica Opens, Dark Water etc, all brilliant, but all followed up with slightly lesser conclusions. The Parting of the ways is the exception to the rule, it's a glorious finale.

The Doctor rescues Rose, meets the Emperor and discovers the Daleks are insane and hate their own skin. Several lives are lost, Lynda, Broderick, the TV bosses, and seemingly Captain Jack. Rose is satisfyingly heroic and saves the day in a wonderful ending.

The music is glorious, Murray Gold's scores are so good and fit beautifully with the show. The episode manages to maintain and build on its epic feel. We get a re-worked Dalek Emperor, such a good creation. The Daleks now have a true element of menace about them, they're back on good form. Jo Joyner is brilliant and seemed like she was being primed for more appearances, so a big surprise when she was cut down. The effects are superbly done, the mass Daleks look very realistic.

I literally cried at the time watching Chris Eccleston regenerate into David Tennant, I felt robbed, it was a feeling of 'He's brought the series back to life and now he's going, it will surely end?'

The Parting of the ways has the lot, it is a perfect 10/10.

Fantastic is a positive and versatile word used to describe something that is exceptional, extraordinary, or beyond what one would normally expect. It is often used to convey enthusiasm, excitement, and admiration for a particular thing, person, or situation. The word can be used as an adjective, adverb, or noun, and is commonly used in literature, art, and everyday conversation. Overall, the word fantastic is a powerful term that is useful in a wide range of contexts and conveys a sense of joy and pleasure.

The word fantastic derives from the Latin "fantasticus," meaning "imaginary" or "visionary," and has evolved to include things that are great, amazing, or outstanding. It intensifies an adjective or adverb as an adverb and can refer to something imaginative as a noun.

That it all. This episode was Fantastic.

Following on immediately from 'Bad Wolf' this episode opens with The Doctor rescuing Rose from the Daleks. In the process he learns how they survived the Time War... or more precisely how they were recreated by their emperor, who is now their god. Returning to Satellite 5, The Doctor formulates a plan to defeat the Daleks. He then puts Rose in the Tardis and sets it on a one way course for Earth in 2005. Rose is determined to return to him but the Tardis appears to be dead. Back on the station it becomes apparent that if The Doctor's plan to wipe out the Daleks succeeds it will also exterminate everybody on Earth... a price worth paying to rid the universe of the Daleks?

I enjoyed this episode more than I expected; there was plenty of tension, several exciting scenes, emotional intensity and we finally learn why the words 'Bad Wolf' kept appearing throughout the season. The number of deaths is quite surprising; particularly in the case of one character although he does 'recover'. Having The Doctor send Rose away along with a message saying he didn't expect to survive worked well; it showed us just how far each of them was prepared to go to try to save the other. Christopher Eccleston was on fine form as The Doctor; he may only have been in the series for one season but he was a fine first Doctor for the new era of the show. Billie Piper and John Barrowman were impressive as Rose and Captain Jack; the former bringing real emotion to her role. The Daleks made an impressive enemy; I especially liked how the say they survived the Time War slightly changed them. The final scenes serve to indicate that the next Doctor will have a distinctly different personality.

The Emperor's mutant Daleks begin their first attack, while the Doctor builds a Delta Wave from bits he's found to hack. The blue box is sent into hiding, with a flower trapped inside residing, and the knowledge she will never be allowed to come back. However, a wolf is paradoxically created, a brave return quickly dictated, with the atoms of the Daleks dislocated, severely negated, un-replicated, evacuated - and a fallen friend immortally resurrected, reinstated, and then finally isolated.

The Doctor first crossed my personal time line during the Tom Baker years; science fiction in general (with the exception of the first Star Trek series on television) with the fourth volume of Isaac Asimov's "Foundation Trilogy in 1981." I must admit that I was at best a tepid fan of science fiction before discovering Dr. Asimov's page-turners and of the Doctor's before discovering David Eccleston's intense, intensely sexy Doctor (not to mention John Barrowman's Captain Jack and the remarkable dramatic comedy of Annette Badland's Cardiff Mayor Margaret! While she was last seen as the collapsed skin suit on the floor of the Tardis, I do hope some way will be found to have *her* time line cross the future or past of one of the Doctors or Captain Jack) in 2005 in the admirably written, reconstituted series.

The "modern" Doctor Who series (and Torchwoods) have gone on from strength to strength, but if a parallel can be drawn from an earlier series, just as the overwhelming quality and technological shift from the original Star Trek to the Next Generation made going back to appreciate the simplicity of the earlier series difficult, after Eccleston's new "First Series" with the often over-rated CGI effects (in that, well executed as they are, they threaten to overwhelm and distract from the vastly improved writing!), all previous Doctor Who episodes and stories became decidedly "BACK numbers." Calling the all too brief Eccleston Season "The First Series" as the DVD release does, is hardly hyperbole. In a very real sense it is a practical reality and a great new starting point. Bravo.