100 Reviews: 26
Jul. 20th, 2012 06:01 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jedi_of_urthOkay, so I was feeling a bit too disoriented (for some reason) to write this afternoon, so I watched some DW instead.
Doctor Who: 1x11: Boom Town
I like this episode...kind of. I want to like it a lot more than I do, but I still like it okay. Basically I think the ideas and characters are solid, and the plot okay, but the writing lets some of the air out of it.
In some ways I feel like the episode doesn’t know what it wants to be. A fun romp with our new threesome? That as seen from the eyes of Mickey? An opportunity to deal with the Rose/Mickey issues? A slow philosophic story about the Doctor’s nature? It’s all of those, but it’s all thrown together into a pile without much care. All the elements are fairly interesting and/or entertaining, but to put them together needed more refining.
I think the plot that gets the worst of that haphazard structure is what is more or less the main plot, the one with Blon. The scenes between her and the Doctor want to be rich and compelling and come so close to pulling it off, but they feel kind of forced and blunt rather than subtle and moving the way I think they could have been if they had more time to breathe. RTD is really good at writing meaningful conversation scenes between characters, and I can see what he was going for which was a brilliant collection of ideas, but the end result didn’t really pull it off.
The Rose and Mickey scenes are...again there’s nothing wrong with them and it’s really good that RTD kept dealing with that issue, but part of the problem is just how much time we seemed to have missed between TEC/TDD and this episode. With the amount of time we seem to have missed it feels especially awkward to find Rose and Mickey back in the same roles as always. And while I can see how that might be part of the point, that they’re both changing yet trying to force their relationship to stay the same and just pick it up whenever they get around to it, it’s awkwardly done, and not in the good way where things are awkward between them.
I’ve also always been unhappy with the way Mickey was written in the first half of the episode, which makes the serious relationship issues of the second half feel awkward (though there some definite grinding of the gears between the two halves of the story on all fronts after they capture Blon). It seems to disregard the character growth Mickey had, as well as the growth in the way he was written, in his last appearance and is back to writing him as a nitwit who brings nothing to Rose’s life. Which makes it awkward when he *is* written with that growth in mind come the second half of the episode; when we need to take him and the R/M relationship seriously.
The parts that do work, while they last, are just the scenes of the characters having fun. The Doctor/Rose-Jack (plus Mickey for here) fun times really give a sense of how good a time they had together, that it isn’t all bad times and life and death situations, even if they do end up in one here. They’re laid back, telling story and making jokes and enjoying themselves. While I get why we don’t see those times, it’s good to have reminders that they happen.
Thematically this episode is important in the lead up to the finale, but unlike in later seasons it isn’t directly part of the final arc. The revelation of the Heart of the TARDIS aside, I suppose, which I’m meh on its use here. It’s good it was set up, but I don’t find Blon an interesting or compelling enough character (especially after her last scene of threatening everyone) to quite justify it being revealed for her story.
Next time:
Hmm, I am kind of looking forward to BW/PotW, but I might go for something else too.
Got something you want reviewed (by me)?
Doctor Who: 1x11: Boom Town
I like this episode...kind of. I want to like it a lot more than I do, but I still like it okay. Basically I think the ideas and characters are solid, and the plot okay, but the writing lets some of the air out of it.
In some ways I feel like the episode doesn’t know what it wants to be. A fun romp with our new threesome? That as seen from the eyes of Mickey? An opportunity to deal with the Rose/Mickey issues? A slow philosophic story about the Doctor’s nature? It’s all of those, but it’s all thrown together into a pile without much care. All the elements are fairly interesting and/or entertaining, but to put them together needed more refining.
I think the plot that gets the worst of that haphazard structure is what is more or less the main plot, the one with Blon. The scenes between her and the Doctor want to be rich and compelling and come so close to pulling it off, but they feel kind of forced and blunt rather than subtle and moving the way I think they could have been if they had more time to breathe. RTD is really good at writing meaningful conversation scenes between characters, and I can see what he was going for which was a brilliant collection of ideas, but the end result didn’t really pull it off.
The Rose and Mickey scenes are...again there’s nothing wrong with them and it’s really good that RTD kept dealing with that issue, but part of the problem is just how much time we seemed to have missed between TEC/TDD and this episode. With the amount of time we seem to have missed it feels especially awkward to find Rose and Mickey back in the same roles as always. And while I can see how that might be part of the point, that they’re both changing yet trying to force their relationship to stay the same and just pick it up whenever they get around to it, it’s awkwardly done, and not in the good way where things are awkward between them.
I’ve also always been unhappy with the way Mickey was written in the first half of the episode, which makes the serious relationship issues of the second half feel awkward (though there some definite grinding of the gears between the two halves of the story on all fronts after they capture Blon). It seems to disregard the character growth Mickey had, as well as the growth in the way he was written, in his last appearance and is back to writing him as a nitwit who brings nothing to Rose’s life. Which makes it awkward when he *is* written with that growth in mind come the second half of the episode; when we need to take him and the R/M relationship seriously.
The parts that do work, while they last, are just the scenes of the characters having fun. The Doctor/Rose-Jack (plus Mickey for here) fun times really give a sense of how good a time they had together, that it isn’t all bad times and life and death situations, even if they do end up in one here. They’re laid back, telling story and making jokes and enjoying themselves. While I get why we don’t see those times, it’s good to have reminders that they happen.
Thematically this episode is important in the lead up to the finale, but unlike in later seasons it isn’t directly part of the final arc. The revelation of the Heart of the TARDIS aside, I suppose, which I’m meh on its use here. It’s good it was set up, but I don’t find Blon an interesting or compelling enough character (especially after her last scene of threatening everyone) to quite justify it being revealed for her story.
Next time:
Hmm, I am kind of looking forward to BW/PotW, but I might go for something else too.
Got something you want reviewed (by me)?
