Mark Berryman reviews the second episode of the newest Dr Who series
Apologies for taking so long to get this written. I’ve had very mixed feelings regarding the most recent episode of Doctor Who.
“Into the Dalek” sees the new Doctor and Clara miniaturized and sent into a Dalek who is claiming to be “good”, but needs a Doctor to fix him.
To be honest I found the whole episode a little pointless. While Capaldi and Coleman yet again shone together, I couldn’t find much else that I enjoyed. I found myself asking for the first part, how has the Doctor or anyone else not realised that if they “fix” the Dalek it will mean making it it’s usual bloodthirsty self, which of course is exactly what happened.
We’ve been here so many times before, the Doctor having to share his mind or his memories with one of his enemies and yet again proving that his mind is powerful enough to overcome any of his enemies. I will say that I thought the special effects were fantastic, some of the best they’ve produced so far. There were moments that I did enjoy. Clara referring to herself as the Doctor’s “carer” had me in stitches.
Then there is Danny Pink, the new character. I haven’t seen enough of him to make a decision about him. He doesn’t seem annoying or likeable yet, we’ll have to see more of him. I have said before, I’m never a big fan of more than one companion in the TARDIS. I love the chemistry between the Doctor and Clara already and I’m a little worried about that being damaged by another person being on board. Hopefully he’ll be a likeable character though, that would be nice.
I’m very much looking forward to this weeks episode, the first of the series to be written by Mark Gatiss. I do love Mark Gatiss!
I’ll write more about the next episode, the more I wrote about this episode the more horrible about it I became, so I’ll leave it at that! hahaha
In the first of an ongoing series Mark Berryman will be bringing his thoughts on the newest series of Dr Who and more importantly on the new Doctor himself.
Despite losing my favourite Doctor on Christmas day, I’ve been very excited for the start of series 8 of Doctor Who.
Having got used to the thought of Peter Capaldi in the role, I’ve been wondering exactly what he would bring to it. It’s no secret that he’s a huge fan, so I had the feeling he would be bringing his “A” game. That it turns out, is exactly what he did.
“Deep Breath” hits the ground running, starting shortly after “The Time of the Doctor“. The early addition of the Paternoster Gang, to help unsure fans ease into the episode, I think was an inspired choice for the episode. Helping to give people something familiar as we try to get used to this very unfamiliar face.
The Doctor finds much of the episode, as with any first new episode for a Doctor, finding out who he is. Capaldi (except for the tree moment, which was one of the bits I didn’t like) has done away with the more slapstick elements we’ve had over recent years. There is still a long way to go before he defines who his Doctor is but he showed us glimpses of what is in store; a darker side to the Doctor, much darker than we’ve seen since the show started again in 2005. Did he push the villain at the end or did he jump? My money is definitely on push! Capaldi for me has shown an instant chemistry with Jenna Coleman. This was one of the things I wondered about. Smith and Coleman were fantastic on screen together, it seems these two will be as well.
I’ve read a lot of posts complaining about how Clara handled the regeneration. I don’t think that it was that she didn’t understand what had happened, I think there was a lot of grief there for her. She’d just lost her best friend and was finding it hard to come to terms with this new face. I thought Coleman’s acting was fantastic, especially in the scene with Madame Vastra who purposefully pushed her to the snapping point to get her point across. The addition of Matt Smith at the end, I felt was a nice touch, although I thought it was for the fans more than Clara, the ones like me, who at one point had found it hard to come to terms with anyone new taking over. He’s still the Doctor, he’s still OUR Doctor, no matter what he looks like now. I doubt this is the last we’ll see of Matt Smith, he has already said he’s not finished with the role. I look forward to seeing the Raggedy Man again. But for now I’m excited to see what is to come from Peter Capaldi.
Asking more questions, as it should, “Deep Breath” was a fantastic opening episode. I hope the rest of the series can continue in this way.
One question, who was the woman at the end? My thoughts are that it is Rani and the “heaven” we saw was her TARDIS. Thoughts?
One final thing, the new opening credits? What were they thinking??!! hahaha
This beautiful trailer for the upcoming season 8 of Doctor Who – the first season Peter Capaldi will step in to the role of the great Time Lord himself – was produced by YouTube user John Smith and it has to be said; it looks amazing.
OK – so its only 15 seconds long but boy does it wet our appetite for the new season. We at the Order have great faith in Peter Capaldi making an excellent addition to the history of the Doctor.
Pictures released of Peter Capaldi filming at Aberavon beach, South Wales reveal him wearing a familiar orange spacesuit. It looks very similar to one worn by David Tennant first when facing “The Devil” and then later by Matt Smith. Is this just a reuse of previous props to save money or is there some link to these stories? All this has done is peak our interest here at the Order and increase our excitement for the new series.
A shop in Bridgend, South Wales are advertising these TARDIS equipped glasses
Wes Imlay spies something interesting on the horizon for Doctor Who fans and it’s not the new series.
Thanks to “Day of the Doctor”, the 50th Anniversary episode of Doctor Who, we got our first real look at John Hurt’s ‘War Doctor’ and we got our first glimpse of the Time War. There have been pockets of the Who fandom clamoring for the chance to see the War Doctor in action, and now it looks as though they are going to get their wish. The War Doctor is returning in the upcoming book “Engines of War” written byGeorge Mann.
According to the book description on Amazon:
“The death of billions is as nothing to us Doctor, if it helps defeat the Daleks.”
The Great Time War has raged for centuries, ravaging the universe. Scores of human colony planets are now overrun by Dalek occupation forces. A weary, angry Doctor leads a flotilla of Battle TARDISes against the Dalek stronghold but in the midst of the carnage, the Doctor’s TARDIS crashes to a planet below: Moldox.
As the Doctor is trapped in an apocalyptic landscape, Dalek patrols roam amongst the wreckage, rounding up the remaining civilians. But why haven’t the Daleks simply killed the humans?
Searching for answers the Doctor meets ‘Cinder’, a young Dalek hunter. Their struggles to discover the Dalek plan take them from the ruins of Moldox to the halls of Gallifrey, and set in motion a chain of events that will change everything. And everyone.
An epic novel of the Great Time War featuring the War Doctor as played by John Hurt.
We get the chance to read a story from the Time War and it appears we get a new companion as well! The book is set to release on July 31st, 2014.
As we get closer to the arrival of the new Doctor a new promotional picture has been released with Peter Capaldi taking center stage against the backdrop of the previous Doctors. But look closely. It’s missing one important member – John Hurt’s “War Doctor”. I don’t understand why they did this. You could argue that John Hurt was only a guest appearance and that this poster is for all those who have carried a series. But wait; Paul McGann is there and all he ever got was a tv movie and webisode.
In a single episode John Hurt got to portray one of the most important incarnations of the Doctor and as such should definitely be included in material such as this. There’s probably some boring legal reason he isn’t on there but whatever the reason it is a shame.
Anyway, we at the Order of Trinity are looking forward to seeing Capaldi in action. There has been a lot of reservation about having him as the next Doctor but we have a lot of faith in him to pull it off. Interestingly, he previously appeared in the episode “The Fires of Pompei” as a Roman. Someone else was in that episode who became a regular too – Karen gillan playing a Soothsayer. That’s two series regular actors who have emerged from that episode.
Mark Berryman recalls how despite coming late in to the Whovian Universe he now embraces it with open arms.
My earliest memory of Doctor Who was as a child watching it with my Dad. The only part of it I can remember was Peter Davison’s 5th incarnation squaring off against Davros, or Stavros as I thought it was back then. The next vivid memory I have is of sitting down to watch the ill-fated Paul McGann TV movie.
I would call myself a huge Doctor Who fan, I love everything about it. But most people are quite surprised to find out just how late I came to it all. My wife and I knew that the Doctor had regenerated from David Tennant into Matt Smith, but we had barely seen any of the new Who between us. So before the 11th Doctor hit the screens we decided we were going to catch up. So in quite quick succession we watched the fantastic Christopher Eccleston relaunch the Time Lord. He was great, I don’t think enough people give him the credit he deserves for just how well he played the character. Whatever his reasons for leaving were, none of us really know, it’s all just speculation, when he regenerated I was sad to see him go. But then came the man who would properly get me into Doctor Who. David Tennant and his cool hair began what would become the start of Doctor Who’s most successful time. I thought he was great, my wife loved him even more! He is still her favourite. She (we) still have a little cry every time we re-watch the show and he regenerates.
The first time we watched new Who live was the 11th Hour. My wife was not happy that someone new was going to be taking over, I was looking forward to seeing what this newcomer would do. By the end of the 11th Hour I had found my Doctor, the one who I think will always be my favourite. The thousand year old Time Lord who looked like a young man, but felt like an ancient time traveller. With Eccleston you could feel the bitter soldier, who had had to kill his entire race, he was angry and at times he struggled to contain it. Tennant I always thought had the weight of the world or worlds on his shoulders. The smile that millions of women fell in love with all over the world hid the pain he felt, but he had managed to do away with some, but not all of the anger. Smith managed to merge the two, while bringing in a new sadness to the role, a sadness that would haunt him all the way to the end of the Day of the Doctor. I always look at him when he is lined up with the other Doctors at the end and think, for the first time since he came back onto our screens, he was truly happy. He was a crazy science teacher, who wasn’t fully in control of his own body, but felt like a thousand year old man. He really was the old man in a young man’s body.
A lot of abuse has been thrown at Stephen Moffat, a lot of it I think unjustly, but whatever he threw at Matt Smith, he always played a blinder on screen. That is part of why he, I think, is my Doctor. Even if it was a not so good episode he stepped up and performed the part wonderfully. When he regenerated on Christmas day, I finally understood how my wife had felt when Tennant regenerated. She told me after that I really did embarrass myself during that episode, I may or may not have had a bit of a cry! Matt Smith had one hell of a job following David Tennant, but he did it so very well. I was at first a bit bitter towards Peter Capaldi, I’ve said many times the only person I wouldn’t have been bitter towards would have been James Callis, someone who I still maintain would make an amazing Doctor. But since the regeneration I have come to terms with the new face and to be honest I am quite looking forward to seeing what Capaldi brings to the part. I think he will be much darker than we’ve seen before and that will be great. With the divine Jenna Coleman still playing Clara and the rumours that Charles Dance (who for me saved season 3 of Game of Thrones) will be playing the Master, series 8 is one I am now very much looking forward to.
So long live Doctor Who. Whoever plays him in the future I will be watching and I hope enjoying until one day it reaches it’s inevitable end.
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