I’m going to make a more general post about the show later but for now I want to get some thoughts of my chest. I’ve just polished off the 4th series of Doctor Who and it was, well, interesting.
I did enjoy the series. But not as much as the previous ones. It really felt like a new series and so the criticisms I have of the new series really came through in this one. I prefered the first few series of the revival because they tended, or at least felt like, they had more mini off world adventures. I know the show has always spent a lot of time on Earth but these days it feels like it’s too focused.
The problem with the revived show is that every week it’s the end of the world. There just isn’t some problem on a distant world The Doctor has to take on, he has to stop some mad invasion force from destroying the fabric of reality. Also, I think it is far too open and well known these days. There is massive news coverage of what is going on. The whole world knows that there are alien invasions and that The Doctor saves them, which I don’t think is a good thing, it kind of ruins the magic.
Also nobody dies. The problem with doing some huge world ending story lines is, it is supposed to end something. Fair enough if you have a skirmish with the Darleks or the Cybermen and then they later return, that’s fine. But when they are wiped out of existence and then come back, that is just bad storytelling.
Finally, the whole thing is just a bit cheesy. I mean, bringing everyone back for one final happy ending? Come on, it’s just awful. The Doctor has a companion for a series and then moves on. They don’t just keep getting pulled back again and again in some kind of sitcom style guest appearance, it just looks tacky.
So that is what I didn’t like. But then I guess that is to be expected with Doctor Who being a BBC One show which needs to score ratings. I suppose I can live with such flaws because, as I said, overall I have really enjoyed the new series, including series 4. And I now have something to look forward to at Christmas now.
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Tags: doctor who, tv
This entry was posted on Sunday, October 5th, 2008 at 11:25 pm and is filed under Distractions, Thoughts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.