New Who Easter Special: Planet of the Dead

[strange_complex]

Yep, I enjoyed that!

Sure, so there was quite a lot of silliness - particularly the Magic Flying Bus. I wasn't too convinced by the concept of the Swarm making wormholes in space by flying round and round planets REALLY FAST, and Christina de Souza was a bit of an all-round cliché. But this is a Special - so long as it delivers the laughs, the thrills and the squees, it's done its job.

My particular squees were:

• Malcolm Taylor (the UNIT scientist) squeeing over the Doctor like a great big meta-referential fan - especially when the Doctor asked him if his favourite of the stories in the Doctor's file was the one with the giant Robot, and he then turned up at the end to give the Doctor BIG HUGS wearing a scarf! Oh, the Four-love...
• The stuff with the Doctor having to communicate with the Tritovores in their own language, because the TARDIS was not there. And that whole issue was nicely clarified, too, when he said that he spoke 'every language' - so we now know for sure that it is basically his (telepathic?) abilities that allow him to communicate in any language, and the TARDIS that then extends that to his companions.
• Psychic paper as Oyster card.
• Christina telling the Doctor that 'the Doctor' isn't a name, it's a psychological condition.
• A black woman running UNIT, and telling the white guy (the police chief) where to get off when she comes to take control of the tunnel and the wormhole.
• The Queen not minding when the Doctor parks the TARDIS in the Buckingham Palace gardens.
• And of course exciting pointers towards the remaining specials courtesy of the psychic lady at the end. "He will knock four times," eh? The Master?

In short - that will do nicely, thank you. MOAR PLS!

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Comments

[davesangel.livejournal.com]

I loved it too - some silliness, I found Lady Christina a bit annoying but that was of course the intention, I'm sure.

Personally, and perhaps because I'm such a fan of the episode, I liked the little reference to Midnight - the line about how it wasn't the first time that a bus load of people had hated him/turned against him (can't remember the exact words but that was the gist anyway).

The foreshadowing was very interesting...and I will admit becoming a little sad because now we know that this Doctor really doesn't have much time left. In this vein, I loved the bit where he was calming all of the passengers down by relating to them on a very human level - which is just how Tennant has portrayed his Doctor from the start, and that's something that I will miss.

I think it probably will be The Master, and have my own theories on exactly what knocking four times entails but don't want to speculate too much because I'd rather not think about it and then be utterly spoiler-free by the time it hits our screens :)

The trailer for the next special looks unbelievably fantastic - very exciting. I cannot wait!

[strange-complex.livejournal.com]

Ah, I didn't catch that line about Midnight. I did notice the similarity in the settings, and was slightly sorry that this was a different kind of story, with the more traditional focus on action adventure instead of all the personality clashes explored in Midnight. But it's nice to know there was a little nod towards the alternative way of treating that kind of scenario, then.