The End of Time Review *EDIT* in OD

AKA: the entry where I lose/annoy some of my readers.

I do have to point out that there will be spoilers in this entry. If you haven’t seen the two parter in question, go read something else. Or go back an entry to ask me questions.

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So, here it is. The End of Time. The last adventure of the Tenth Doctor.

And, for what it was, it was quite good. The first part was your average RTD first parter. Some good ideas not properly utilised (loved the idea of the Grey Cloak over London, just would have built it up a bit more. Maybe have the Doctor have heard of it but not know what it was till Wilf explained.) The Master ‘rebirth’ scene should and could have been slightly better. John Simm, however, was in the finest scenery chewing mode as the Master. Which was refreshing to see, though it did make me wonder why he was so hungry all the time.

Big yay for Wilf making the step up to full companion (I think I said the idea gave me a happy in my geek place in TTZ) and, as usual, Bernard Cribbins was outstanding. Sadly, this did mean the return of Donna bloody Noble. Well, that’s not fair, as I actually quite like the idea of the character as a character. What I meant to say was it marked the return of Catherine bloody Tate. (Seriously, I’ve tried to suffer through an episode of her ‘comedy’ series, put up with her quiet or shouty and nothing inbetween acting method in DW and watched her on Never Mind The Buzzcocks and I have to ask what the fuck she is actually famous for? She seems to be fucking useless at everything.)

It’s ironic to me, when the Narrator said something about everyone moving to their places because that’s what most RTD two parter episode one’s feel like to me. He’s just moving the characters round in some vaguely interesting way till they are where they need to be for the ending he has designated, which usually involves a cool visual. Which he managed twice this time with both the Master race and the scene with the Time Lords.

Then, in part two, we got too many ideas, not enough time to fill them out properly. The return of the Time Lords and Gallifrey should have been fleshed out more. The talk between the Doctor and Wilf was a wonderful moment that I loved but also feel, with the way the parts were split up we could have done without. Personally, I’d have ended part one with the Master finding the diamond and the Doctor powering the ship back up.

The scene where the Doctor is tempted to go against all of his beliefs and shoot someone, therefore being directly responsible for their death rather than peripherally was good, as was the way he found to get out of it. The twist given to the ‘he will knock four times and then the Doctor will die’ prophesy was inspired.

Then we get to my main problem with the whole thing. And the bit that will probably alienate people. The last 10-15 minutes.

Look, maybe it’s because I’ve been a fan since the 80’s and had to live through about 15 Wholess years with only a semi decent TV movie to get me through. Maybe it’s because I was unlikely to be too upset at the tenth Doctor dieing because I’ve been there. But the only tears that segment almost moved me to were ones of boredom.

It was just RTD showing off. I know that some will say that it was the Doctor saying goodbye to people but it was just. Not. At. All. Necessary. And the fact that all but two of the characters in question first appeared in RTD episodes of the show proves that.

(The inclusion of Midshipman Frame was particularly out of place and seemed to only be there cos RTD seems to have a thing for Russell Tovey.)

We could just have easily done without it. It wasn’t the Doctor, or RTD, saying goodbye to the characters. It was RTD saying look what I did people! For me, it took away from the regeneration completely.

(Oh, and the fact that the regeneration was exactly the same as the one from the ninth Doctor to the Tenth slightly annoyed me as well. This is actually a deeply, deeply personal thing but, not only is it the first time that I can remember that that has happened, the regeneration is the first thing to clue people in to the fact that the character name may well be the same but the characterisation will be different. As I said, that is very much just me.)

Then we got the eleventh Doctor. I loved this scene, the stuff the Doctor was saying (‘still not ginger) and the trashing of the TARDIS interior to explain the new look. Matt Smith and Steven Moffat combining to prove that the future looks very bright indeed.

Will

*EDIT*

To all those complaining about the eleventh Doctors not ginger comment:

GET. A. FUCKING. LIFE!

Will