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Reviews
Doctor Who: Aliens of London (2005)
S1 EP 4: Aliens of London (Director: Keith Boak)
Aliens of London is the first episode of the NuWho era to take up the two-parter format. It's also where the series feels like it's no longer in warm-up. It's an episode with a lot of attention paid to the classics. It's more than a little goofy, over-the-top and the plot feels like it has definitely been done a few times in various forms over the years.
That being said, it does subvert the typical format somewhat with the reveal that the crash landing was a fake. This is an episode that goes to a lot of effort to build up suspense as to what the aliens will be, only actually revealing them at the end of the episode, even using a red herring with the pig creature. And I tend to appreciate when the show uses some subtlety when it comes to the creatures, The idea is somewhat muted with the cheesy acting and gaseous noises but it's the effort that counts and I would say it works overall.
As for the creatures themselves, I have mixed thoughts on the Slitheen. They certainly have an interesting design, and they can be threatening but I often find them difficult to take seriously. They're a little too campy, even for Doctor Who. They're very much a product of their time. I can enjoy their presence as villains, but I think they could've been handled better.
One thing I really like about the episode however is the family drama element. A lot of people complain about the show focussing too much on the companion's lives but I'm rarely ever one of them. Rose's year-long disappearance pushes her relationships in some interesting ways. It's also just good to see Jackie and Mickey again after two episodes largely without them. Especially Mickey, who has some great scenes here. This is also the episode to introduce Harriet Jones, one of the best reoccurring characters in the Tennant series.
Aliens of London is a very ambitious episode, and it gets enough of what it needs to right. It's a fun, cheesy episode that does have some legitimate stakes and tension. I feel it can be quite disorganised and messy but overall, it does enough to win me over and just enjoy it for what it is.
My Rating: 7/10 (Good Watch)
Doctor Who: The Unquiet Dead (2005)
S1 EP3: The Unquiet Dead (Director: Euros Lyn)
The Unquiet Dead is the first of many of what are known as "historical" episodes. And as the first historical, it sets up the trend that would continue across the show. That being that historical episodes aren't very good. Usually, the historical will be one of the weakest episodes of whatever series it's a part of. That being said, The Unquiet Dead is one of the better historicals in the grand scheme of things.
It does suffer from the same problem most future historicals do though, that being that the pacing is very slow. Historical's tend to be slow-burn episodes. Doctor Who is a show that thrives with fast, energetic pacing so slowing the show down for pretty much a whole episode tends to be extremely hit-or-miss. Another consistent trend of historicals is that the villains are rarely that memorable, and this definitely applies here. The Gelth are pretty generic and the twist of them actually being evil was predictable from miles away. The idea of them is interesting. Spirits that manifest themselves in corpses because their home world was destroyed. That sounds like it could've worked great but it's wasted here.
What really salvaged this episode for me was Simon Callow's performance of Charles Dickens. It's not unusual for a celebrity to guest-star in DW, especially as a historical figure, but this is one of the more stand-out appearances. The one downside is that his character doesn't do that much important for the plot. He's sort of just there. Alan David also gives a solid guest performance but that one unfortunately tends to get overshadowed.
The Doctor and Rose do get a reasonable amount of screen time, but they take less of a dominant role this episode. They do however have a great conversation towards the end of the episode when they think all hope is lost. There's another good moment where Rose has a talk with one of the side characters, and another one when the Doctor talks to Dickens about his legacy. Yeah, this episode has a lot of good character interactions between the TARDIS team and side characters.
The Unquiet Dead is a perfectly watchable, often enjoyable episode with a lot of flaws. It's not skippable because this is the first time, we see the "Bad Wolf" piece of lore which is very important in Series one but it's not worth skipping necessarily. It's a likable episode but there's not a whole lot of substance.
My Rating: 6/10 (Decent Watch)
Doctor Who: The End of the World (2005)
S1 EP2: The End of the World (Director: Euros Lyn)
The End of the World is a great follow-up to the already great Rose. I love the fact that the writers decided to go for the destruction of Earth as a plot-point in only the second episode shows a level of gumption I just have to admire. We get to see more character growth between Rose and the Doctor. I love that moment at the end where we see the duo go and get chips. For a literal space alien, it's such a humanising moment. This is the episode where we get the reveal that he's the last of the Time Lords, which ends up being extremely important as it goes on. It's also the first time we see the psychic paper, and you'll certainly be seeing that again.
This is the first real adventure for the Doctor and Rose, given that the first episode was purely on Earth, and it's a great note to start things off on. We get more instances of Eccleston's wit as well as a good bit of serious talk. As I stated before, I love how big the stakes are for what is the second episode. Talk about starting as you mean to go on.
The villain for the episode is one of my absolute favourite original creations for NuWho. Cassandra absolutely steals every scene she's in and her design is instantly recognisable and striking. Plus, she poses a pretty interesting question as to what makes a human a human and whether a character like Cassandra would qualify as human anymore. It shows how people tend to obsess over their look so much that they begin to lose touch with themselves. Cassandra is essentially that idea taken to its logical extreme. The Adherence of the Repeated Meme and the robotic spiders are pretty cool side-villains too, if a little understated.
The alien designs are pretty strong overall in this episode, as is the set design for Platform One. The special effects admittedly aren't great but that's somewhat typical for NuWho, especially from this early into the show so I won't dock too many points for that reason. You could call it gimmicky, but I do like the way the show uses pop music in this episode. The jukebox seems like a completely believable thing for Cassandra to bring, and it does make certain scenes more fun with them.
The End of the World is another fantastic episode and similar to Rose, it sets up a lot more to come. It's a tightly crafted, fast paced piece of science fiction, and thoroughly engaging throughout. One of the quintessential episodes of Eccleston's run and a classic in its own right.
My Rating: 9/10 (Essential Watch)
Doctor Who: Rose (2005)
S1 EP1: Rose (Director: Keith Boak)
Rose is a great episode to begin the entire show with. We get introduced to the Doctor, to start with. Christopher Eccleston is perhaps the most underrated doctor of the 21st century. He's cheeky and sardonic but you always get the impression that he's to be taken seriously. And then there's the companion, Rose, one of my favourite companions of the NuWho era. Her down to earth nature gives her a great contrast with the Doctor, but she also has a sense of humour that bounces well off of the Doctor's. Fantastic duo.
One thing I like about the episode is that it's paced really well. It starts pretty much immediately with a chase scene, introducing both Rose and the Doctor in the first five minutes. A reasonable amount of the episode is dedicated to seeing Rose do some investigation work, which gives us some interesting reveals about the Doctor as well as some fun moments with her boyfriend, Mickey. I love how over the episode; we gradually get to see Rose learn to trust the Doctor more in a very believable way. It also gives us some good moments for the Doctor to do his typical monologues, and some of his best ones at that. The moment where he starts talking about how he feels the world spinning round is downright iconic, and for good reason.
The Autons are quite an obscure villain but a great one to choose to use for the first episode. With it being set on earth rather than out in some distant planet, the show needed a creature that was more down to earth and the Autons perfectly fit that mould. They're relatively normal looking but still intimidating and pose an interesting question. What if shop mannequins actually did come to life? It makes something commonplace a threat, which is a trope this show will definitely use again, and one that I personally quite like.
Rose sets the mould for seasons to come and introduces a lot of the qualities that make the show great. Fun interactions between the Doctor and the companion, great villains, big action scenes, thought provoking and clever dialogue. It's all here in some form or another and while it would get refined later in the series, it still works very well here.
My Rating: 9/10 (Essential Watch)