Whotopia

Okay, I know next week’s episode of Doctor Who hasn’t arrived yet, but I feel like I’m already there. Three – count ‘em – three *good* episodes in a row. Now, I know we’ve been treated to that kind of hit rate before – last year’s early hat trick of Tooth & Claw, School Reunion, The Girl In The Fireplace - but a) based on this season’s form to date, I never imagined we’d get anything like that this year and b) these were not just *good*, they were *superb*.

Paul Cornell’s Human Nature/Family Of Blood and Steven Moffat’s Blink are different Doctor Who beasts, so I’m not going to choose between them. I’ll just applaud and thank the writers for showing how it’s done. In fact, right there is the strange reason why I held off slightly from blogging about the episodes here: I was wary of getting into the negative aspect of all this, i.e. just how starkly these stories have highlighted the shortcomings of other New Who offerings. Non Who people have had cause to comment to me just how much better these stories have been and – it will come as no surprise to anyone who’s kept up with my views here – I’ve only been able to nod and agree.

But there it is. That’s it. That’s the sum of the negative side, which is just an incidental side-effect of Cornell and Moffat having crafted such gems. Because the conversations that arose from those remarks just had me and the other participants bubbling with enthusiasm and praise - and positivity, both for these stories and for things to come.

The Human Nature/Family Of Blood two-parter was mature, intelligent, involving and hit an impressive range of emotional notes, provoking genuine tears (as well as a few laughs) and rounding itself off with some genuine poetry. All right, it was poetic justice, and there’s a harshness and cruelty to the sentences handed out to the Family by the Doctor, but it’s prompted by an anger that both David Tennant (who does an outstanding job as John Smith) and the writer make us feel – and that is human nature in action. (At the same time, it’s also symptomatic of this Lonely God syndrome of the Doctor’s, and we wait to see if there are any repercussions lying in ambush for him, just over time’s horizon.) The scarecrows were quirkily creepy, despite being introduced in broad daylight, and I think all the cast delivered strong performances, with special mention to Jessica Stevenson for Joan.

Any quibbles were purely that and I just include them here as examples: since the watch was so crucial to the Doctor’s restoration, why didn’t he leave it in Martha’s care instead of having it lying around on his sideboard? And I did wonder whether the whole thing might have been a smidgen better if we had been dropped straight in at the deep end. That is, flashbacks show us how Martha and the Doctor got into the situation, in any case, and for those of us not famliar with the book from which this was adapted, it might have made for a great sit-up and shout, ‘Huh?’ hook to draw us right in. But that’s not a complaint. That’s just a quiet what if, and I doubt it can be heard anyway above the sound of the rapturous applause. Merci beaucoup, Mr Cornell.

And woe to Mr Moffat, who was left in the unenviable position of having to follow that. Luckily though, Steven Moffat has the advantage of being Steven Moffat. Writer of The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances (previous two-part demonstration of how it’s done) and the slightly lesser The Girl In The Fireplace (sigh, all it was missing was that ballroom scene!) which I nevertheless loved.

Blink was clever, witty and creepy, and had its own share of emotion to offer - with more of those genuine tears to compliment the laugh out loud moments. Lots of twisty timey-wimey stuff that neither made my head hurt nor fell apart at a glance (there were questions, yes, but they fall into that same category of minor quibbles as those that occurred during Human Nature), a novel, interesting ‘alien menace’ played with to good effect, and a central character you could immediately fall in love with – just like Sarah Jane Smith. :) Seriously, Carey Mulligan was fab as Sally Sparrow, charismatic and someone you could instantly connect with – instant companion material and exactly what you need in a story that’s going to feature a largely absent Doctor. Peppered with lots of great Moffaty dialogue (‘It’s so ITV’) and brilliance (the Doctor and Martha rushing by on their way to some emergency, armed with bows and arrows) all rounded off with an entirely gratuitous montage of statues designed to freak out a few million kids. Whatever you do, don’t blink, but by all means, clap. Muchos gracias, Senor Moffat.

All this and next week, Sir Derek Jacobi. Utopia’s up against it, it must be said. It has the return of Captain Jack, a character much undermined by the fact that, ideally, he should still be dead and undermined even more by his involvement in the awfulness that is Torchwood. And it has to follow this triple whammy. But thanks to that triple whammy, I’m feeling a refreshingly positive buzz and I’m optimistic that, with John Simm – possibly maybe who knows as the Master? – we’re in for a tail end of Season 3 that will leave me wanting more.

And preferably, more like we’ve had these last three weeks. See, I’m relatively easily pleased, after all.