Doctor Who etcetera.

Firstly, apologies (again) for later-than-promised updates. Keeping up with all of Euro 2008 for the CDB Pod means about five hours of my day have to be devoted to that (it’s such a hard life, eh?), which has cut into time for the CDB Desk. Fear not, however, as I’m here to cover some things I’d been wanting to, but for the rest of the championships I’ll probably only have time to review Doctor Who each week. So, in about two and a half weeks, I should be able to settle in to a decent steady rhythm on both blogs. Go me.

So, better start with the Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead two-parter that aired over the last two Saturdays. And wasn’t it bloody brilliant! Coming just after the news that writer Steven Moffat is replacing Russell T. Davies as showrunner from season five onwards was released couldn’t have been a better time – we’ve been reassured completely with these two episodes that the show is in safe hands.

Where to start? The shadow monsters, the Vashta Nerada, were genius, playing tricks with lighting rather than huge special effects for maximum scare value. That throwaway line about being able to see the Vashta Nerada as the specks in sunlight was typical Moffat, finding little ways to terrify small children, like he did with statues in last season’s stunning Blink.

I guess we’ve also been successfully hoodwinked, myself included, by the line in Planet of the Ood warning that “the Doctor’s song must end soon”. Originally, as documented here, I’d thought that meant imminent regeneration for the Doctor, but no – clearly, the word song had a capital S, and I’m hugely looking forward to seeing River Song’s next (or technically first?) appearance sometime in the future. Is she a future companion, or, seemingly more likely, a future wife? Brilliantly played by Alex Kingston, her death scene in particular was heart-wrenching.

My favourite episode of the relaunched series ever? Probably.

A quick word on the Britain’s Got Talent and Pushing Daisies finales – I might have done more if I’d had time closer to their broadcasting, but such is life – rather good. I’d been rooting for dance group Signature in BGT since their audition (if you haven’t seen their first audition, YouTube it. It’s hilarious), but considering some of the dross that was in the final (Cheeky Monkeys anyone?), George Sampson was a worthy winner. I may now tune in for 2 minutes of the Royal Variety Show later this year (OK, no I won’t). Pushing Daisies has flown by, though, and I will be tuning in to season two (that’s assuming ITV don’t drop even more episodes). I’d like to see them pushing the format as much as they can, though, as I suspect more of the same may grow tiresome very quickly – mind you, I said that about the series as a whole after watching the pilot, so…we’ll see. I’m still, of course, in love with Anna Friel.

It ain’t over ’til the Ood sings

So that’s it – David Tennant’s time as the Doctor is coming to an end. Or, at least, that’s what we were just given a huge, very unsubtle hint towards at the end of tonight’s episode, which I just finished watching not 5 minutes ago. It does seem something of a shame to start with something that really had very little to do with the episode, which by the way was excellent, but this is clearly the biggest news to come out of it. If the Ood’s statement that the Doctor’s song (in context of the episode, a metaphor for his life) will soon end is to be taken as truth, that surely means that the regeneration into the Eleventh Doctor will occur at the end of this season rather than after the four specials that will be shown next year, meaning that whoever takes on the mantle next will have a much more difficult task stamping their name on the role as quickly as Eccleston or Tennant have done.

By not giving Eleven a weekly season next year, I suspect that it’ll take much longer for the audience to get used to the new actor (or actress, but that’s 95% certain not to happen) – a job made even harder by the fact that following Tennant is going to be an unenviable task (well, not that unenviable – you’re playing the Doctor, for crying out loud). As fascinating as Christopher Eccleston’s one-year stint in the part was, it’s Tennant who has really defined the role for the new audience, particularly the younger generation who won’t have seen much, if any, of the original show (myself included). Of course, now the inevitable avalanche of guesses as to who will be the next to play the Doctor will now begin, and we’ll have to endure it for seven or eight weeks before somebody will leak the news despite Russell T. Davies’ best efforts. (I’m sure he’s got it sorted out already, he did much the same thing when Eccleston decided to leave and he’ll have been aware if Tennant was considering packing it in.)

So, naturally, I’ll start by venturing a couple of guesses of my own. Well, not really actual guesses – I’m pretty certain these won’t happen – but, for example, I think it would be so quirky and fantastic if John Simm took over. Aside from the obvious acting talent and energy he’d bring to the role, it would just be so ironic if the Doctor regenerated into the spitting image of his nemesis (though that would possibly rule out a future comeback of the Master in his most recent form, and I loved Simm in that role too much).  Alternatively, I’m sure that after the London mayoral elections, Boris Johnson will be looking for a new job.

I do think it’s a shame, though, that for the second week running much of the individual episodes has been overshadowed by a couple of lines of premonition and foreshadowing for later in the series. Once I can handle, but to do this sort of thing so overtly I feel undermines somewhat the early episodes. Today’s, as I said, was a very good one with a good twist that it’s actually us humans who are the baddies – I enjoyed the political subtext in this one, and Tim McInnerny was delightfully nasty as the token baddie, though this fate at the end was…a bit weird. Catherine Tate was, unfortunately, still very annoying. I shan’t miss her when she’s gone.

On the bright side – next week it’s Martha! Hooray! Also, UNIT and the Sontarans! Hooray! I wonder what part of the finale they’ll spoil then?

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Some housekeeping now – a heavier work schedule leading up to the start of my A-level exam period has already started constraining my ability to write as often as I’d like and will probably continue for a good month or so. I’ll certainly be updating weekly and will do more than that when I can, but bear with me.