Doctor Who 2008: Sontarans cometh, RTD Ood 'ave 'im etc.

It was wonderfully directed as well.

His dialogue is still a bit Disco Dad in places and sub-Lucas in others, but that was just fine. Enjoyed that more than anything since Blink.

ANd see this is the sort of thing I've been complaining abuot. You don't need lots and lots of CGI (three matte shots in this?), you don't need clumpy aliums, you don't need OOH I'M SO CLEVARR I HAS BEEN DROPPING HINTS FOR WEEKS (although HI DERE to Lost Moon of Poosh and Billie in Series Arc territory and you definitely don't need DEUX FUCKING EX MACHINA.

You just need a good script, good acting and good direction. It's not fucking hard.

All those things are actually quite hard, hence the problem.

Well they seem to be when Rusty and his mates do it.

Or rather, they seem to be when Rusty doesn't know what they are (which appears to be almost all the time).

Also, did we notice Gay Agendar this week? "She left me, went to another planet." Didn't spot Atheist Agendar, will wait for the experts to do that.

Ah, come on aldo, it's not like old who had those three things very often either. (Also aldo, I agree that it'd be good if you could ease off with the spoilers here a bit (wrt to your upthread comments re Captain Jack, etc)).

I think this episode might still be a hint of what's to come - there have been a couple of flickers of it earlier in the series but the Doctor going "ooh I'm so clever" and then being led to the brink of death by something he totally failed to get the measure of only to be bailed out by something else might certainly be foreshadowing of whatever happens to him next week.

I love the hint dropping and big clumpy aliens though and am not ashamed. This series has been better at getting the balance right than most though.

They've definitely toned down the All Powerful Jesus Doctor this year THANK FUCK, maybe they realised they went a bit overboard on it last time round and Newly Falliable Doctor is the result.

Is it a spoiler if the BBC have formally announced it?

That's the thing, the old series did have them that often. It had masses of clunkers too, I'm not denying it did.

When the angry mob were saying how up himself the Doctor is, you were kind of thinking OTM, and I think you were supposed to.

Loved this, but it does seems like half this series so far has ended with a minor character’s heroic self sacrifice on behalf of the doctor saving the day.

I love the hint dropping and big clumpy aliens though and am not ashamed. This series has been better at getting the balance right than most though.

One of the things I love most about Doctor Who is the amount of different types of story it can act as a vehicle for, it's almost multi-genre (or multi-subgenre, at least).

Is it a spoiler if the BBC have formally announced it?

Oh. Um, dunno then, technically. But I didn't know about it, so it's a spoiler for me.

Well, doesn't matter, not like it'll hurt me to just avoid this thread for a few weeks, if need be. Or, you know, you could just flag them anyway, to be on the safe side, and then everyone's happy.

Also great about this one: Doc goes off without companion and gets into all sorts of trouble. Nice way to reinforce the idea that he needs his companions, and that they're not just there to ask daft questions for us.

so strange to this american viewer, who's used to commercial breaks! i was waiting for a moment to go to the bathroom.

What about HBO?

This was good. Don't agree that it was all that well directed though. The mob-mentality crescendos felt very stagey. Nice Billie-build-up on the screen, and that guy from A Very Peculiar Practice. Oh! Didn't realise till now he was Patrick Troughton's son. There's something of the Russell T Davies about him, too.

Also, morality in episode seemed to be that murder is bad, unless you kill yourself in the process? SUICIDE BOMBERS' CHARTER.

sean pertwee unavailable for the dalek finale?

what i meant was that there weren't any breaks or shifts, no moment to nip out for a second, it was just full-on the whole time. even without commercial breaks there's usually a place or two where everything settles and you know you can safely skip out, but this episode just kept turning the screws.

agree about stageyness of mob mentality build-up but that may have been down to time limits

still i thought that was really superb! one for the corridor-running haters.

I liked this, and yeah, they were able to do quite a lot with only direction, editing, and lighting.

Anybody else catch your standard RTD-style harridan mum?

Not bad! RTD's best since that traffic jam one (which I thought was better, but never mind me).

I never thought Rusty was bad, he's just been noticeably not as good as he was in the first season.

Also: isn't Donna so much better the straighter Tate plays the role? She's certainly the first nu-Who companion who seems to improve, rather than get more annoying, as the season goes on...

woooo creepy as fuck. so good.

and I realized this episode how much I love Donna and miss her when she's not on-screen. really hope catherine tate sticks around for a bit.

Really really liked that one, and was surprised. Almost no CGI, no visible alien, just acting. Ace.

OK, don't know if this is a spoiler or not, but in that next episode preview, all that stuff about WHAT'S THAT ON DONNA'S BACK looks more like this to me than anything else...
http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/40230000/jpg/_40230819_spiderdrwho270.jpg

Especially given the whole spideriness of the first aliens Donna Noble met.

Is it a spoiler if the BBC have formally announced it?

If it's not yet gone to air? Of course it's still a spoiler.

I hope nobody mentions Rusty leaving then.

I guess I'll stay away from here till the series ends.

Without question the best episode of the season. Genuinely unsettling. Finally!

(Not being all prissy here btw, I just genuinely don't understand the difference between something which is in a trailer and hasn't been on screen yet and something which was in a press release and hasn't been on screen yet so it's best if I keep out of it.)

Almost no CGI, no visible alien, just acting. Ace.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/norfolk/content/images/2008/02/04/doctorwho_sophiealdred_ace_203_203x152.jpg

aldo, I do see your point, but the difference between a showrunner changing and the reappearance of a major character in episode 12 is pretty stark.

Actually, by the trailer I meant where somebody yesterday talks about "the daleks arriving early" without any comment.

So, see you next month.

:(

Okay well if you're still seeing this, the Dalek was on BBC1 and Captain Jack's reappearance wasn't. Please correct me if I'm wrong.

Captain Jack reappearing is not even remotely a spoiler seeing as he's been in all but one series and is played by an actor who is ALWAYS ON THE TELLY I'd say it was a foregone conclusion. No one got like this when we talked about Mike reappearing in Lost.

MIKE REAPPEARS IN LOST?!??

I see your point about foregone conclusion btw, but yeah.

That's cos the Lost thread said SPOILERS in the title though Matt.

and not really a fair comparison anyway since michael is named in the credits in every episode before his appearance plus he appeared at comic con more than five or six months before season 4 to say he was going to be back.

it is pretty obvious jack was going to be back on, as you said, but i think the bothersome bit was knowing exactly in which episode he was going to turn up on.

^

Aye, would agree with that.

Really enjoyed this one a lot, though it did suffer for lack of Donna. Billie's cameo on the screen was exactly the same as when she turned up during that other one on the wall of the tardis. The mob mentality and paranoia worked really well as a greater source of fear than Lesley Sharp sitting talking to herself (I really like Lesley Sharp and hoped she might have been a companion way back in the day, when i assumed every part was going to go to Rusty-faves)

Were there missing bees in this one? I keep forgetting to try and look for references to this.

I quite liked lack of Donna - without his ally the doctor seemed more in danger?

Oh, I thought it was important that Donna wasn't there in terms of the storyline - one of her strengths seems to be the ability to connect with people and calm them down and she'd had been able to convince the rest of the travellers to trust the doctor, no doubt about - but I just like having her around and missed her when she wasn't there.

Yeah that and they're giving the actor a bit of a break. Looks like the next one will be all Donna and very little Doctor.

I think that unlike her first appearance in the Christmas special, Donna's actually been kind of underwritten as a character. It's helped a lot because it's allowed Tate to shape the character for herself, and bounce off Tennant in her own way and the chemistry between the two actors is very very good.

If you watch any of the 'Big Question' clips on the BBC Who site, you can tell Tennant and Tate get on amazingly well IRL, which must help loads.

Tennant seems to develop a rapport with everyone. Either he's just like that or it's put on.

He's just like that.

^_^

He's just like that.

Certainly seems so from the (admittedly Tennant-filmed) video diaries on the box sets--seems a very likeable chap, to be honest.

He is.

You know him, ailsa?