This is beautiful. Nothing I can say beyond that is really necessary. You can stop here if you like. Still here? Well, let’s see. I didn’t think this was beautiful the first time through. Even if we grant, as some fan theories have conjectured, that…
Once again it’s easy to see the antecedents for this episode. There are a few intentional shout-outs to the Third Doctor’s era — the “Hai!” karate-chop (“Venusian aikido,” he used to call it), the Miniscope theory. You might also think fleetingly of classic season 11’s…
Well, let’s get these out of the way: “Planet of Giants” (1964): miniaturization “Carnival of Monsters” (1973): miniaturization, crawling around inside a machine “The Invisible Enemy” (1977): miniaturization, crawling around inside a person trying to cure him “Resurrection of the Daleks” (1984): human soldiers vs….
Change isn’t hard. Doctor Who depends on it. If you count the very first story, in which viewers in 1963 had to get used to an eccentric, cranky old professor whose first adventure took him to prehistoric Earth and saw him apparently willing to murder…
It’s not bad. My first reaction was that it was somehow both too fussy and too plain, and definitely too much like a costume. The purple jacket from season 7B was getting to be a little much already, and this is in the same self-conscious…
This Christmas, the time of one of my favorite Doctors drew to a slightly disappointing close, with a potentially moving elegy buried beneath an avalanche of eh. But let’s have one more go at picking apart yet another overstuffed Moffat finale, five minutes at a…
Doctor Who anniversary specials have a narrow line to walk. The line is operatic on one side, marking out some grand story about Time Lord past, present, or future, something with currents as deep as you want to go. “The Three Doctors” had the story…
Number 1 on my Doctor Who favorites list is City of Death. This is a solidly uncontroversial choice. There are some people who prefer the guns, germs, and steel of “The Caves of Androzani,” and some new-series devotees who reckon Doctor Who is best when…
Number 2 on my Doctor Who favorites list: Kinda. My first exposure to this Fifth Doctor story was running across the novelisation in a bookstore. The title was written as “Doctor Who — Kinda” and I thought: so, it’s kinda Doctor Who and kinda not?…
Number 3 of my Doctor Who favorites: Enlightenment. It’s such an obvious idea it’s amazing Doctor Who hadn’t done it before: sailing ships in space, crewed by hypnotized humans, captained by aliens. But what makes it really sing is that the aliens are Eternals, immortal…