Emma Talks Nerdy About: Doctor Who: "The Snowmen"

WARNING: THIS REVIEW HAS SPOILERS

This review previously appeared on my other blog emmahyam.wordpress.com, also this is an abbrivated review due to Christmas time overindulgence. 

I’ll come straight to the point with this review and say that I feel that with “The Snowmen” that the Doctor Who Christmas Special has finally come of age. This was an episode that struck the ideal balance of humour, scares and pathos so that it was not only a great hour of family entertainment but a fabulous episode of Doctor Who first and foremost.

Matt Smith, striding about Victorian London Town looking like an overgrown Artful Dodger was his usual excellent self, Vastra, Jenny and Strax were not only very welcome comic relief but also served as a great foil for a Doctor in the depths of grief over the fate of the Ponds. Special note must be made of the striking performance of Jenna Louise Coleman. Whether being a prim and proper governess or bouncing off the Doctor as a cheeky London barmaid she simply flies off the screen. Moffat has triumphed once again in setting up a fabulous little mystery to kick off the second half of series 7. Also for the old fans we have an interesting origin story for The Great Intelligence, foe of The Second Doctor.

I’m looking forward to seeing if they reoccur, Moffat is the only producer of the show to really play with causality in Doctor Who and really treat out main character as existing outside of time. With all sense of restraint thrown off, he’s freed to do anything. It also helps when the show seems this effortless and the dialogue so witty, It shows the incredible popularity of the show these days that within minutes of the episode finishing “it’s smaller on the outside” t shirts were available to buy online. Once again the wait for spring and the return of Doctor Who seems a very long way away.

Emma Talks Nerdy About: Friday the 13th Part 3 (1982)

The theatrical poster showcases the awesome 3D

This review previously appeared on my other blog "When Franchises Attack!" 

After another enormous box office success in Friday the 13th Part 2 the inevitable decision to make a second sequel was made, keeping the same director and kicking off a mere day after the latest massacre at Crystal Lake Friday the 13th part 3 tells the story of Final Girl Chris dragging her mates to the location where she was nearly killed by Jason once already to be horribly massacred along with a couple of hippies and the worlds most ineffectual biker gang. Nice one Chris.

eye popping FX at work there

In the hallowed tradition of many of its horror fellows the third installment of the Friday the 13th series is filmed in glorious 3D, watching the film 30 years on most of the pleasure in this comes only from spotting where the filmmakers chose to exploit the chance to have things pop out at the audience. For that statement read "every damn time they could find even the most tenuous excuse to do so". You are treated to such delights as a washing line pole, a yo-yo and even a joint flying out of the screen however its in the kills that the 3D proves most entertaining, Rick's eye being crushed out of his skull and flying out at you must rank as one of my favourite Jason maneuvers of the series.

You may detect from the tone of my review thus far that I'm not overly enamored of this movie, and you'd be correct, in comparison to its predecessors Friday the 13th Part 3 is a much more generic piece of work, the kills, apart from the use of the 3D, have stopped being innovative and interesting and slipped into being workman like. Characters like the aforementioned silly biker gang, the random religious nutter and the pair of hippies are there just to be chopped up by Jason instead of being a sympathetic and likable bunch of youngsters like in the previous films. For the first time in this franchise you get served up characters who you think "oh my God I can't wait until Jason kills you dead!" rather than "oh my God I hope they get away from him!" The acting by the entire cast is poor and Chris in contrast to her Final Girl compatriots is just downright dislikable and dumb as a post, why on Earth would you go back to a place where not only were you were nearly murdered but where a mass killing literally just happened and for all you know the killer is still on the loose in the area?

It's at this point where the films begin to resemble what the critics always said they were, gruesome for the sake of being gruesome, overly sexualised and mean spirited. The kills stop being scary and instead become laughable, unlike the previous two films where the violence, although it was explicit or unpleasant drove the plot and was there for a reason, in Part 3 the set piece kills seem to have been dreamed up first and then a film filled in around them. There is virtually no tension to be had, the direction is very flat in comparison to the director Steve Miner's work on Part 2, he seems to be bored of the whole enterprise and his film reflects that.

well... ow

Despite this there are some positives to take away from this film, Jason finally gains his hockey mask and is quite physically intimidating, although I've complained about the kills they are fun to see and if you want to just sit and enjoy a silly horror movie in the wee small hours with a group of mates, this is the one of the series I'd pick. I mean come on, Andy being cut in half while doing some hand walking and stuck in the rafters is silly but pretty awesome.

EMMA'S SCORE: 35 out of 100

Emma Talks Nerdy About: Friday the 13th Part 2 (1981)

Poster for Part 2

This review previously appeared on my other blog "When Franchises Attack!" 

Having helped solidify and codify the slasher genre with its first installment, it was inevitable that Friday the 13th part 2 would be the very definition of the quick and dirty slasher sequel. With the amount of profit the first film made the sequel was turned around and on the drive in screens inside a calender year. Arguably this is the first film in the series which is a true "Friday the 13th" as Jason takes over the serial killing duties from Mommy as after quickly dispatching the last movies final girl with an ice pick to the temple he goes back to the shores of Crystal Lake where five years after the events of the first film a training camp for counselors  has been set up.

Jason, rocking this seasons must have "Homicide" look

With a scant 87 minute running time it's a film that doesn't hang around, it knows what you want to see and gets straight down to business with a much larger body count and more gore to boot. The film is rather derivative to say the least, with a lot of the kills being copies of ones seen in the first film and the speedy turn around of the film means that problems with the plotting didn't get fixed, Ginny's escape is conveniently brushed over and Paul just disappears out of the film, fate unknown as Jason escapes into the woods. Also unexplained is Jason's growth in a mere five years from lake dwelling child to a hulking 7 foot tall hillbilly with the physique of a UFC fighter and a charming shack (death altar off the bedroom and lake views to die for). The unnecessary T&A synonymous with the horror genre is very much on the agenda here, Terry being subject to lingering shots of her rear.

Pamela, looking a bit worse for wear

These issues aside there is a lot to enjoy in this film, the kills are well directed and cool, with the ability to shock, Mark's brutal death a stand out. It takes a brave film to kill off the charming, handsome paraplegic with a machete to the face while the annoying camp clown survives. Ginny is for me the most likable final girl of the series and her fight with Jason is tense and exciting, I particularly like her attempt to fool Jason by donning Pamela's rather tatty jumper and trying to talk her way out of trouble. Jason is perhaps his most intimidating in this installment, wearing a burlap sack instead of his iconic hockey mask with dungarees and a plaid shirt he is the definition of every demented woodsman of many an urban legend. I touched on the decision to kill off Alice from the previous film and that, oddly, might be the best idea the franchise ever had. Friday the 13th had accusations of being a direct rip off of Halloween leveled at it after the first film and that's something I explored in my review of it. By killing off Alice rather than making her the heroine of the series, like the Halloween series did with Laurie Strode, it made it's own mark on the genre and strode off confidently in it's own direction, This is reinforced by the murder of poor old Crazy Ralph and the rise of Jason, it's a series unafraid to break it's own rules.

sadly, this is an edge Mark did not enjoy

While Friday the 13th Part 2 could certainly be viewed as a cheap and nasty remake of the first film, done solely to grind out a further profit for the studio there is plenty to admire in this film and while for me it's not as good as Friday the 13th, it has an enjoyable edge that can't be denied.

 EMMA'S SCORE: 65 out of 100

Emma Talks Nerdy About: Destination Star Trek London

My tickets for the event

This post previously appeared on my other blog "When Franchises Attack!"

This weekend I was lucky enough to attend what has turned out to be the biggest Star Trek convention ever, Destination Star Trek London, I chose to visit over two days, Saturday and Sunday and this post will be an overview of my adventure and my impression of the organisation of the event.

Saturday started for me at the frankly ridiculous hour of 6:30 am as I rose to get myself down to the ExCel Center for when the event opened. Although I knew this was going to be a big event the actual scale surprised me, I've been to quite a few conventions in my time but when I arrived and was ushered into an enormous aircraft hangar to wait for the doors to open at 9 am I found myself in a queue of at least 2000 people, a lot of whom were in full costume, an awesome sight,

Once I finally got inside the venue I had a quick circuit of the main hall to get my bearings then got down to the serious business of grabbing some merchandise while the stands were fairly quiet. Once that was all done I checked out the museum exhibits from a private collection then settled myself at Stage "C" for the "Meet The Producers" talk with Brannon Braga and Ronald D Moore. They were both on good form and spent most of their time on stage taking audience questions on many subjects such as at Kirk's death in Star Trek: Generations, Braga saying "Kirk should have died on HIS bridge not on A bridge" (to great applause), the future of Star Trek on TV and flaws of Star Trek Voyager. Braga intriguingly saying that he had originally planned an arc for 7 of 9 that after her discovery that she couldn't feel full emotion without it killing her in "Human Error" and feeling stuck between two worlds, unable to be "fully human" and not wanting to return to the Borg Collective she would have sacrificed her life so the crew would be able to get home in the final Voyager episode "Endgame".

Sir Patrick onstage

After a bit more wandering around and sitting down for a coffee and a chinwag with friends I took myself off for the main event of my day, the talk with Sir Patrick Stewart. He came on stage to rapturous applause and much like other guests he launched straight into taking questions from the huge audience. Luckily the questions he took were excellent and so he was able to riff off the answers, he spoke movingly about his long friendship with Brian Blessed, told an amazing anecdote about having his comb over forcibly cut off by a director friend and his wife in the middle of restaurant and expressed how proud his was to run the Olympic torch through Croydon. After Sir Patrick had left to stage I grabbed a quick dinner and headed home to prepare for Sunday...

On Sunday I elected to have a lie in and rolled into the convention center around midday, one of my friends had managed to get tickets to the afternoon's free talks, so after a quick visit to the DVD stand to pick up a couple of bargains and check out some snippets from the upcoming Next Generation Season 2 blurau (which looks absolutely stunning) we plonked ourselves down for the Deep Space Nine crew talk. Stage B was packed to the rafters as Andrew Robinson, Cirroc Lofton, Rene Auberjonois, Nana Vistor and Chase Masterson came on stage. After telling us a little bit about what they're up to these days they took audience questions. They ranged from some fairly serious as an audience member asked if in a post 9/11 world a character like Major Kira would be in Trek to the fairly silly as Andrew Robinson was prompted to do a headstand! After they departed it was time for co-star Micheal Dorn to step up in a solo talk, he launched immediately into taking questions and although he refused to do a "Worf voice" he gave us a blast from what he revealed to be his favourite post Trek project "I Am Weasel", told us about the culture shock of moving from The Next Generation to Deep Space Nine and of his evening round at Patrick Stewart's flat with Brent Spiner and Scott Bakula. 

The Grew holds court

After this I went straight into my final event of the weekend, Kate Mulgrew's talk and what a way to finish the weekend off, The Grew was on sparkling form and had the crowd roaring with laughter as she told anecdotes about being wound up by her co stars, having to live in the trailer next Robert Duncan McNeill's and how she wished if anyone on Voyager had been gay that it would have been 7 of 9 before raising a saucy eyebrow! 

So as I made my way home, out into a dark, rainy Sunday evening I thought over the whole weekend, Showmasters and Media 10 did a great job getting big names over to the UK for a convention and attracting more that 17,000 fans over three days. There were some problems, the access to Stage B in particular, there  was nowhere near enough capacity for the crowds that wanted to see their heroes and the queuing system broke down to the point that I heard some people had stood in line for over an hour before staff members finally told them they had all gone for the day. The decor of the show hall left a lot to be desired and while The Klingon and Federation Zones were a nice idea they looked cheap didn't have any activities going on to amuse people, games tables or video games would have nice. Also the amount of ambient noise they created  caused problems for the guests, The Klingon Zone was right next to Stage B and had a huge gong which was being constantly banged to the point where guests couldn't hear audience questions. I also wish that more fanclubs, merchandise sellers and podcasts get invited along next time as I felt they were sorely underrepresented.

These niggles aside I had a wonderful time at Destination Star Trek London, I really hope that the huge attendance of this event will mean that another will take place in the near future and if it does, I'll be there!

Goodbye DSTL, hope you come back real  soon

Emma Talks Nerdy About: Friday the 13th (1980)

The theatrical poster

This review previously appeared on my other blog "When Franchises Attack!" 

It could be argued that before Friday the 13th there was no slasher genre. The concept had been explored in many a important date themed slice n’ dice flicks that flooded the drive-ins in the early eighties. Thanks to word of mouth and the groundbreaking special effects from Dawn of the Dead‘s Tom Savini, the movie’s reputation quickly grew.

The makers Friday the 13th were always the first to admit how many ideas they stole from John Carpenter’s Halloween, and watching the movie with a critical eye the similarities certainty show through, you have as faceless killer, the promiscuous kids and the prophet of doom, here in the shape of Crazy Ralph. The thing the thing that sticks out most to me is the use of the camera to show us things that the characters don't know, like the phone lines being cut. The camera is also a voyeur, putting us not only in the position of the killer, spying on teen sex but also in the position of the victims.

well, that's going to ruin his day

On the surface Friday the 13th seems to be a cheap exploitation film directed by a businessman for a relative tuppence to turn a quick profit, the part we all watch horror movies for, the kills, are surprisingly low key, 30 years on what once caused moral watchdogs to collectively foam at the mouth now may cause a giggle rather than a gasp with a couple even happening off screen but they are elevated beyond the ordinary Tom Savini's remarkable effects work. The deaths of Jack (arrow through the neck) and Marcie (ax to the face) still made me wince, even though I must have seen them a dozen times. The fact that the cast are genuinely likable  unlike a lot of its horror fellows does much to elevate the film above its peers.

Pamela attacks!

Alice proves to be a suitable final girl, even if she has no less than three opportunities to kill Pamela before finally relieving her of her head. When I watched the film with a more analytic eye I found myself starting to feel quite sorry for Mommy Dearest, far from being a rampaging monster (that ironically her son would become) she's been driven insane by grief and guilt, while this doesn't excuse her appalling actions it gives a welcome layer of complexity and for me it played a massive part in why Friday the 13th went on to huge success and many a sequel. However once you start to think about it too hard the idea of a small woman overpowering healthy young people and being able to chuck them through windows makes the film feel slightly ridiculous and for me diminishes its power. Moving the mantle from mother to son them becomes a very wise decision.

The other factor for me is the final twist which is unique and unpredictable and promises so much more to come. Its shortcomings aside, Friday the 13th is an inventive and enjoyable movie and unlike most of the films that followed, Friday the 13th felt fresh and fun and still feels that way today.

EMMA'S SCORE: 85 out of 100

Emma Talks Nerdy About: Doctor Who "The Angels Take Manhattan"

WARNING: THIS REVIEW HAS SPOILERS

This review previously appeared on my other blog emmahyam.wordpress.com

Scream, cry, kick the house down in excitement and reach for a box of tissues its time once again (all too soon it seems) for another Doctor Who mid series finale.

And what a finale, Moffat promised us a blockbuster every week and the past four episodes certainly stuck to that promises, going into this show it seemed we were being set up for an Al Capone type noir adventure full of tommy guns and fancy cars but as always The Moff put a swerve on us. This was very much an emotional story about our core four characters of Amy, Rory, River and The Doctor with everyone else pushed out to being somewhat extraneous characters, there to get our heroes to the right place at the right time.

That seems to be my main criticism of Who these days, if you can call it one, that we never seem to have quite enough time, I wish we could have spent some more minutes with Grayle and The Weeping Angels, surely Moffat’s finest monster creation, they were horrifyingly creepy as always with those nasty little cherubs another nice, if skin crawling addition to the monsters pantheon. That being said they felt a little bit off their game here, not quite as scary or horrible as they have previously been in stories like “Flesh and Stone”. I even began to feel a tiny but of sympathy for the one Grayle had been torturing, it reminded me somewhat of the eponymous Dalek from “Dalek”. I think the Angels are something that works best if they’re kept to being an occasional treat rather than a once-a-series regular, here’s hoping we don’t see them again for a little while.

On to the main meat of the episode then, The Ponds, as Moffat promised there were tears a plenty as Amy and Rory went to happily “live to death” courtesy of the Angels, never to see The Doctor or their daughter, River again. Blimey didn't it seem a dark prospect, not many Saturday evening family telly shows where a couple commit suicide together! It all came good for them in an odd sort of way though, they got to live a long, happy life together and Moffat gave us a wonderful coming of full circle as we finally got an explanation for that odd little moment from “The Eleventh Hour” with the young Amelia. What he takes away with one hand he gives back with the other, it was a remarkably bitter sweet but fitting ending. That’s not to say that the episode had the air of a funeral as some previous departure episodes have had, there was plenty of humour and running around to be done, I particularly liked the sniping between The Doctor and River and their behavior towards each other raised a smile from me, check out The Doctor fixing his hair before he sees River again.

Our core regulars gave marvelous performances across the board, Alex Kingston was smashing selling River’s combination of grief and happiness at the fate of her parents, Karen Gillan and Arthur Darvill continued their good work from the previous episodes as did the wonderful Matt Smith, being particularly effective at portraying The Doctor’s rage and loneliness as once again The Doctor is left alone, albeit with River’s warning not to stay that way for long.

So what next for the good Doctor? It’s on to the Christmas Special and once again we've got the prospect of an unsettled, dark Doctor left to forge on through the universe alone, The Doctor says he hates endings and while its all said and done for The Ponds The Lonely God must move on and I for one can not wait to see what adventures and scrapes he gets himself mixed up in next. Roll on December.

Emma Talks Nerdy About: Doctor Who "The Power Of Three"

WARNING: THIS REVIEW HAS SPOILERS

This review previously appeared on my other blog emmahyam.wordpress.com

Three: it’s the magic number, it’s a hat trick and according to Pythagoras it’s the noblest of all digits but what can it do for The Doctor and his companions? And more importantly what on Earth has it got to do with a plethora of small black cubes? The Power Of Three,  is an extremely good episode, that benefited from a lighter feel than the morality play of “A Town Called Mercy”. There were two story threads at work, the mystery of the cubes and the everyday life of Amy and Rory.

Chris Chibnall has come in for sometimes heavy criticism for his Doctor Who work in the past, something I touched on in my review of “Dinosaurs on a Spaceship” but once again he has come up with another Douglas Adams like idea of an extermination via the medium of small, black cubes, at first bewildering as the populace search for meaning in them but then slowly they are integrated into everyday life, only when people accept them as part of the furniture that the cubes strike. It turns out that the cubes are just as avatar of the Shakri, a Timelord fairy story made real come to wipe out the plague of Humanity. Bill Hicks once memorably described people as “a virus with shoes” and it seems the Shakri feel the same way, you wonder why, with the Shakri able to perceive all of time, Earth is due for the exterminators. It struck me as a little simplistic that the episode turned into another “are humans all that bad?” argument. I wonder if this is something that we will be revisiting at some later date? Especially as humanity is supposed to spread throughout the cosmos, as seen in Series One. I hope so. It’s a shame that Steven Berkoff’s baddie felt thrown away in the speed of wrapping everything up.

Chibnall gave the viewer plenty of treats, the now traditional celebrity appearances in the shape of ubiquitous cool science guy Professor Brian Cox and perpetually grumpy Sir Alan Sugar and for long time Doctor Who fans Jemma Redgrave led the return of UNIT to the show, and it was a lovely touch that it turns out she’s The Brig’s daughter. However as I mentioned to my other half, does this mean that “Dimensions In Time” is now canonical? God forbid. The dialogue was mile a minute, almost verging into screwball comedy in some of “lounge” scenes as The Doctor, Amy and Rory affectionately yelled at each other and it was just as laugh out loud funny.

Then there’s the other side of the episode: Rory and Amy, and a glimpse into their lives. Given that the pair are soon to leave the TARDIS, this was a chance to see what they do when the Doctor isn’t around to dump an Ood in their loo and run off again. It turns out The Doctor has been in their lives for ten years, a fact that actually took me back a little, it makes you wonder just how long some of his other companions knocked around the universe with our favourite Timelord. It’s probably not surprising then that a more domestic existence has appeal and an urge to settle down permanently has arisen. we also see the consequence that Rory and Amy’s lifestyle has on the people around them. We’ve had the families of companions taken into account before, but to spend some time deepening their lives was a great move, it’s nice that Rory’s career as a nurse, a flipping good one at that, is given plenty of airtime.

Hauntingly though we got Brian Williams’ realisation of what may be ahead. It was lovely to see a parent react to The Doctor without giving him a slap, unlike previous parents, Brian believes The Doctor is worth the risk but in between some excellent comedy work that sense of foreboding lingers. Mark Williams has for me been the revelation of this mini series of  Doctor Who. In just two episodes, he’s had a real impact on me. Matt Smith was fabulous as always, like the cubes I’m beginning to take him for granted, the episode asks lots of different things of him. He shows off his excellent physical comedy skills once again and in his delivery of the dialogue, for example when he’s getting in a grump about being bored, he’s mesmeric. As well as comedy he also manages to get across things like loneliness, guilt and sadness without any of the changes seeming clunky or forced.

There was a problem with the episode, for all of it’s quality ” The Power Of Three” just had a bit too much going on, it hit a stumbling block come the end of the episode. It felt there was plenty here for a two parter, the slow invasion storyline is wrapped up ridiculously quickly in a simple “reverse the polarity” solution. That being said “The Power Of Three” was enormous fun, very much in the manner of “Dinosaurs on a Spaceship” I feel kindly enough towards the sheer fun of it all to excuse the plot wobbles.

Now though begins the wait for the mid-series finale. The promised tear jerker in our series of blockbusters. This is the end of  The Three, the Doctor, Amy and Rory are apparently closer than they’ve ever been. And with The Moff around that’s a sure sign that things are about to go horribly wrong.

Emma Talks Nerdy About: Doctor Who "A Town Called Mercy"

WARNING: THIS REVIEW HAS SPOILERS

This review previously appeared on my other blog emmahyam.wordpress.com


Amongst the best episodes of the last series of Doctor Who was for me Toby Whithouse’s The God Complex, a beautifully made piece of television that was happy to steer the Doctor towards much darker places. Whithouse has history with Doctor Who, having also previously written School Reunion and The Vampires Of Venice. But with A Town Called Mercy, he’s put together something very rare, a Doctor Who Western which actually works, the previous attempt in the shape of  ”The Gunfighters” is not an all together well regarded effort, this is a vastly superior episode.

And this is a slightly darker proposition, too. After the comparable lightness of Dinosaurs On A Spaceship, A Town Called Mercy pushes the Doctor to more uncomfortable emotional places than we’ve seen this series thus far. The cracks and strain on the Doctor are starting to show. Series 7 has demonstrated the comedy skills of Matt Smith extremely well and we also get to see his strengths when things go more serious. Smith is just terrific, his faux swagger as he asks for something strong (a cup of tea with the bag left in) while he nearly chokes on this toothpick is in wonderful contrast to his rage at Jex (him shouting at him to sit down nearly caused my eyebrows to fly off my forehead). Its also interesting to compare Jex and The Doctor, deep down they both seek the same thing. The Doctor, being shown this reflection of himself can’t cope and does something that may make some fans uncomfortable, it takes a simple statement of “this isn’t how we roll” from Amy to bring The Doctor back to Earth and to remind us that The Doctor seeks his redemption through the actions of his friends.

Gillan and Darvill are still at their best, with another unspecified period away from The Doctor our companions relationship seems once again to be on an even keel but if the episode has one major flaw its that Amy and Rory don’t get a great deal to do, this very much being a tale of The Doctor’s conflicted nature.  This being said it does bring Amy Pond a little further forward than we’ve seen her the past week or two. It also exists pretty much as a standalone piece, even though there’s the odd hint of undercurrent developing, Jex’s comments on motherhood being both touching and ominous.

The production values ate absolutely terrific, Doctor Who has taken on three different genres this series so far, and each of them has looked outstanding. That’s no small feat, and A Town Called Mercy looks the best of the lot so far. The wild west landscapes look appropriately sunblasted and desolate, A Town Called Mercy is the most cinematic of the three episodes we’ve seen this series to date.

As for the episode itself, Whithouse certainly knows his onions when it comes to westerns. He throws in a few more ingredients, too, with a sense of The Terminator in places, and a tip of the hat to the mighty Westworld in The Gunslinger with a healthy dose of humour chucked in, the horse who really prefers to be called Susan especially amusing. The early part of the episode, where he’s having fun with the genre and exploring it, is arguably when A Town Called Mercy is at its strongest, as the episode progressed I found myself wondering why The Doctor didn’t just use the TARDIS to solve the whole problem, this is addressed somewhat within the episode however its a little dissatisfying, much as in “The God Complex” Whithouse tends not to let a slightly shonky plot holes get in the way of the message he’s trying to get across.

There is a small sense for me that there was a slightly better episode that could have been made out of the mix of ingredients here. That’s not to say A Town Called Mercy is a bad piece of Saturday night telly, far from it. As it stands, though, A Town Called Mercy is a very good episode, with some excellent moments, all draped in utterly lush visuals, another success for the much vaunted “flexible format” of Doctor Who and another blockbuster delivered with confidence and appropriate Wild West swagger.


Amongst the best episodes of the last series of Doctor Who was for me Toby Whithouse’s The God Complex, a beautifully made piece of television that was happy to steer the Doctor towards much darker places. Whithouse has history with Doctor Who, having also previously written School Reunion and The Vampires Of Venice. But with A Town Called Mercy, he’s put together something very rare, a Doctor Who Western which actually works, the previous attempt in the shape of  ”The Gunfighters” is not an all together well regarded effort, this is a vastly superior episode.

And this is a slightly darker proposition, too. After the comparable lightness of Dinosaurs On A Spaceship, A Town Called Mercy pushes the Doctor to more uncomfortable emotional places than we’ve seen this series thus far. The cracks and strain on the Doctor are starting to show. Series 7 has demonstrated the comedy skills of Matt Smith extremely well and we also get to see his strengths when things go more serious. Smith is just terrific, his faux swagger as he asks for something strong (a cup of tea with the bag left in) while he nearly chokes on this toothpick is in wonderful contrast to his rage at Jex (him shouting at him to sit down nearly caused my eyebrows to fly off my forehead). Its also interesting to compare Jex and The Doctor, deep down they both seek the same thing.

The Doctor, being shown this reflection of himself can’t cope and does something that may make some fans uncomfortable, it takes a simple statement of “this isn’t how we roll” from Amy to bring The Doctor back to Earth and to remind us that The Doctor seeks his redemption through the actions of his friends. Gillan and Darvill are still at their best, with another unspecified period away from The Doctor our companions relationship seems once again to be on an even keel but if the episode has one major flaw its that Amy and Rory don’t get a great deal to do, this very much being a tale of The Doctor’s conflicted nature.  This being said it does bring Amy Pond a little further forward than we’ve seen her the past week or two. It also exists pretty much as a standalone piece, even though there’s the odd hint of undercurrent developing, Jex’s comments on motherhood being both touching and ominous.

The production values ate absolutely terrific, Doctor Who has taken on three different genres this series so far, and each of them has looked outstanding. That’s no small feat, and A Town Called Mercy looks the best of the lot so far. The wild west landscapes look appropriately sun blasted and desolate, A Town Called Mercy is the most cinematic of the three episodes we've seen this series to date.

As for the episode itself, Whithouse certainly knows his onions when it comes to westerns. He throws in a few more ingredients, too, with a sense of The Terminator in places, and a tip of the hat to the mighty Westworld in The Gunslinger with a healthy dose of humour chucked in, the horse who really prefers to be called Susan especially amusing. The early part of the episode, where he’s having fun with the genre and exploring it, is arguably when A Town Called Mercy is at its strongest, as the episode progressed I found myself wondering why The Doctor didn't just use the TARDIS to solve the whole problem, this is addressed somewhat within the episode however its a little dissatisfying, much as in “The God Complex” Whithouse tends not to let a slightly shonky plot holes get in the way of the message he’s trying to get across.

There is a small sense for me that there was a slightly better episode that could have been made out of the mix of ingredients here. That’s not to say A Town Called Mercy is a bad piece of Saturday night telly, far from it. As it stands, though, A Town Called Mercy is a very good episode, with some excellent moments, all draped in utterly lush visuals, another success for the much vaunted “flexible format” of Doctor Who and another blockbuster delivered with confidence.

Emma Talks Nerdy About: Doctor Who "Dinosaurs On A Spaceship"

WARNING: THIS REVIEW HAS SPOILERS

This review previously appeared on my other blog emmahyam.wordpress.com

Like a lot of fans, when I heard the title of this episode, I said “really? Dinosaurs… on a spaceship? What is it actually called?” but no that was the title, so amid many raised eyebrows this episode bursts forth, and how, within minutes you've been whipped through multiple timezones and settings at such a dizzying pace that you feel slightly overwhelmed, but that’s Doctor Who these days, keep up or turn over and watch The X Factor instead.

This may read as a criticism but it is not, with an episode this bonkers you need an appropriately bonkers start to hurl you straight in, the madness reflects the chaos that is The Doctor and the whirlwind that is his existence, but anyway on with the episode as The Doctor assembles a motley crew of an Egyptian queen, a big game hunter and the Ponds plus Dad to save a ship full of dinosaurs from being blown up by the Indian Space Agency. This is most definitely a story aimed at the family audience rather than “The Fans” but is that really a bad thing? It’s hard to be cross with an episode that is just this much fun, the humour doesn't always hit, some of the ‘Carry On’ style jokes will have you groaning but the more subtle joking raised a laugh from me, in particular the lovely touches of the ship being powered by waves from an internal beach and the tantrum throwing useless robots, beautifully voiced by comedy duo Robert Webb and David Mitchell.

The tone is also helped along by the guest stars playing it absolutely straight, it would have been easy for them to mug at the camera, falling about and overacting but they’re extremely believable, I particularly enjoyed Amy taking on the role of The Doctor with two ‘companions’ in Nefertiti and Riddell. Our regulars are on excellent form as always with Arthur Darvill really getting his teeth into the comedy aspects, Matt Smith is great, his face is mesmerizing to watch but also subtle, check out his little smirk when he goes unidentified by Solomon’s scanner, however the stand out performance in the episode is that of Mark Williams as Rory’s Dad Brian, I think we may have found a new Wilfred Mott in him, a man obsessed with golf who carries a trowel with him at all times who in the end of the episode just wants to sit quietly with a sandwich and a cup of tea and gaze down at the Earth, wonderful.

My fears that this episode was just using the Dinosaurs was just a gimmick were quickly allayed by the clever touch of having the ship be a Silurian ark invaded by a sneering villain in the shape of David Bradley’s Solomon and here in lies some of the problem with this episode, while it’s a ton of fun while our heroes are running about the ship, riding on very nicely realised dinosaurs once it gets down the core the episode becomes less interesting, Solomon is a pretty generic baddie, all full of threats and concern only for profit and the ending is a little pat with The Doctor casually blowing up his ship. Chris Chibnall has had a somewhat checkered history with Doctor Who, writing the good but not great “42″ and the underwhelming “The Hungry Earth/Cold Blood”, not to mention being largely responsible for the atrocious Torchwood series one. That being said I believe that this is his best work so far, a good, solid episode that’s lots of fun but with some nice, deeper moments being mixed in, the little exchange between Amy and The Doctor sends hair standing up on your arms and gives us some heavy foreshadowing of what is to come and I’m ever so grateful he resisted the temptation of having someone say “ I've had it with these *expletive deleted* dinosaurs on this *expletive deleted* spaceship!”

This is a story which is most reminiscent of episodes like “The Unicorn and The Wasp” and “The Lodger”, an entertaining romp perhaps let down slightly by not having much of a plot to pin it all on to, that being said I enjoyed watching it tremendously and as a slice of Saturday night entertainment it can’t be beat, I’m very much looking forward to watching it over again to pick up the little bits of dialogue I missed. In a series where Moffat promised us a blockbuster every week this episode certainly delivers.

Emma Talks Nerdy About: Doctor Who "Asylum of the Daleks"

WARNING: THIS POST HAS SPOILERS

This review previously appeared on my other blog emmahyam.wordpress.com

I’m beginning to think Steven Moffat might be some sort of  evil genius, thank goodness that The Moff has turned his mega mind to writing Doctor Who because if not, he’d have probably hollowed out a volcano and held the world to ransom by now. It’s not often that a sofa full of cynical Doctor Who fans, all of over 20 years standing, are shocked into total silence by what they've just seen.

We had been lead to believe that we wouldn't be seeing Jenna-Lousie Coleman, the incoming Doctor Who companion until the Christmas episode but as always we had forgotten the mantra of Matt Smith’s tenure “Moffat Lies”. Companions have gotten out of  tight spots before, but it’ll be interesting to see how Coleman’s character, going by the name of Oswin here, manages to get out of being a Dalek, but is she even the woman we think she is? I expect we will find out soon enough but what another marvelous Moff creation, all full of snarky cracks about the Doctor’s chin and throwaway lines about sexual experimentation (“Actually it was Nina – I was going through a phase…”) there’s a deeper vulnerability there too, which makes her
eventual fate in this episode genuinely upsetting.

Meanwhile back with our regulars Arthur Darvill and Karen Gillan are on top form, delivering scenes of the like we've never seen between Doctor Who companions before. They sell the fact that the horrors that Rory and Amy have been through have both torn them apart, and left them inseparable. They've both actually needed each other as much all along, and only on the precipice of them splitting once and for all can Amy finally admit that to him. Those complaining about a lack of consequences from last year get something meaty to chew on here as it’s reveled that Amy cannot have any more children, heavy stuff for a Saturday evening. You also get the feeling that having reunited them, Moffat is about to put them through the ringer all over again. Matt Smith was once again brilliant as the Doctor, imbuing him with whimsy but also ancient, suspicious and struggling with guilt, look at his reactions to the Daleks throughout, he hates them not only because of what they do, not only because of what they did to him but also because of what he did to them as a consequence of his actions in the past.

I was impressed by everyone’s favourite malevolent pepper pots here, the Asylum is a genuinely unsettling, that the insane Daleks are almost being kept as a exhibition of beauty by the others as well as it being a handy prison, wrapped up in that is the implication that The Dalek’s perversely find The Doctor’s hate beautiful. Having The Daleks forget The Doctor is a wonderful idea, much like the beginning of the series in 2005 where some of the shackles of past continuity were thrown off we get to start all over again with the Daleks, opening up new story possibilities. For me this was very much Moffat’s take on the episode “Dalek” trying to inject tension and pathos back into them. If I have one complaint for this episode its that we didn't get to see enough of the Daleks, with old models like The Special Weapons Dalek only being glimpsed in the background, it would have been amazing to see them in action again. Mind you the aforementioned sofa full of cynical old git Doctor Who fans were punching the air at the shout outs to past Dalek encounters, the worlds of Spiridon (Planet Of The Daleks), Kembel (Mission To The Unknown) and (The Daleks’ Master Plan) and Exxilon (Death To The Daleks).

It was an impressive opener, it’s a confident, ambitious, bombastic start to a big series for Doctor Who. It packs a lot in, and you can sense that there’s been a real effort to deliver the kind of one-off weekly blockbuster that we've been promised and we have to the Oswin questions. Amy, at one point in the episode, has her mind clouded, and sees people where there are actually Daleks. Has the Doctor fallen prey to that, too? Is that why he can hear Oswin’s voice, rather than the sound of a Dalek? How is she going to get from the inside of a Dalek to the Christmas special? Mister Moffat it’s over to you, and I can’t bloody wait.