Doctor Who: Planet of the Dead reviewed

[quarridors]

Planet of the Dead was this year's Doctor Who Easter special, the first of four 'gap year' specials taking us up to David Tennant's Tenth Doctor's regeneration into Matt Smith's Eleventh Doctor. Billed as the Tenth Doctor's last hurrah, we were told during Russell T Davis' interview on BBC Breakfast to expect a fun romp before the dark end - and that's exactly what we got, lots of fun! I let the story flow over me, had fun and found I laughed more often watching this than I did during the first episode of the new Red Dwarf premiered the night before. It seems that this episode went down extremely well with the non-fans, the 'not wes'. I was surprised by how many people on Twitter were saying this was the best Doctor Who they'd ever seen, and I heard later that this episode had one of the highest audience appreciation figures ever recorded for a Doctor Who and the highest for a New Who special. This was also the first ever high definition episode of Doctor Who. I signed up for a HD service on the promise of this episode and I wasn't disappointed - it looked absolutely amazing! Details like the pores on the doctor's face, the amazing sand dune vista, and the detailed CGI Tritovore ship were all crisp and stunning on my HD TV. It seems I wasn't alone; this episode also gave BBC HD their highest ratings figures to date. Supposedly this was the 200th Doctor Who TV story (if you ask Doctor Who Magazine), if you count The Trial of a Timelord as 1 story and not 3 and count Utopia as the 1st part in a 3 part adventure and not a standalone (as the production crew did), you reach 200 at this episode (if not, you reach 200 at Midnight or The Next Doctor). In some ways, this was the 'anti-Midnight'. Like the previous story, the Doctor's on a stranded bus or coach (numbered 200) and in a dangerous situation, but this time there's an ally and a way out - literally - there's none of the previous story's claustrophobia or paranoia as the bus doors can be opened at any time. In a way, the Doctor has another chance and puts right what once went wrong. (Also note, as with last time, the main employee doing their job on the bus ends up dead and unnamed). The story was packed with fun moments and witty dialogue, sometimes from a character perspective, something more knowingly about the tropes of the show and its fans. Particular highlights were:

• The Doctor's detector gizmo and it's little dish that didn't go around
• The references to the Doctor being a lord, 'it's quite a big estate'
• A nod and a wink towards complaints about humanoid aliens: 'You look human' 'You look Time Lord'
• The first ever French reply to the Tenth Doctor's 'Alonsy'
• Captain Magambo saluting on the phone: 'Did you just salute?' 'No'
• Malcolm's 'I've read all your files!' 'Really, what was your favourite, the giant Robot?'
• Barclay's watch: 'It is gold' 'Ooh they saw you coming'
• Malcolm hanging up on the Doctor: 'Not now, I'M BUSY!'

I also liked that Christina couldn't understand the Fomasi-style Tritovore language having not travelled in the Tardis, but the Doctor could - is this because of the Tardis' influence or a Time Lord ability? Note, the Doctor has to make the clicks and whistles to talk back at first. I though the concept of the Swarm, a species that acts on instinct but its actions result in a sci-fi scenario, was a very clever and original idea. I loved UNIT's Scientific Advisor, Malcolm's fanboy behaviour towards the Doctor and pleasure at being complemented by an idol - You could see Malcolm melt when the Doctor says 'You ARE a genius!'. It's very endearing, and funny as I'm sure many fans would do the same if we met David Tennant! I liked the dynamic of the Doctor and Christina. I could imagine them having a 7th Doctor and Ace dynamic - the Doctor makes a big deals of disapproving of Christiana's thevery until something needs stealing, just like with Ace and Nitro 9 explosives. So, yes, there was a lot to like, and at this point I'll stop and give it a rating of 4 out of 5 stars for doing exactly what it said on the tin - A fun romp. However, as with a lot of Russell T Davis Doctor Who, there's a lot of the plot that's *extremely* convenient or doesn't make sense if you stop to think about it for a moment. I initially thought that the biggest problem was why didn't UNIT put a tank or armored car through when the Doctor called them? We were told that a metal bus kept the characters alive going through (and as others have pointed out, going back it didn't sustain any additional damage) so why couldn't a tank, truck or armoured car do the same? But, as Kev F Sutherland's Scottish Falsetto Sock Puppet Theatre pointed out, UNIT actually had the Doctor's Tardis at the end of the episode, so why not send that though? As long as its shields are on, it's pretty much indestructable! That seems like the biggest flaw of all to me (and could easily have been avoided by not including it in the episode).

• The Tritovores - literal bug-eyed monsters! - seem to have evolved from flies, but ended up with all the downsides of those creatures and none of the benefits (like extra limbs or the ability to fly or walk on walls)
• There are humanoid earpods on a ship for a race with no ears who wouldn't be able to use them
• The Swarm are more like a Primeval menace than a Doctor Who monster - especially as they're acting on instinct and only a small number get through the wormhole
• The Doctor stops Christina exactly in front of the *extremely* convenient big red button even though the sonicing goes on for quite some time
• The clamps around the ship's crystal not only come in 5 parts that exactly fit a bus's 4 wheels & steering wheel but can be used to make a two dimensional wheel control fly a bus in three dimensions.
• The psychic paper is used as an Oyster Card even though this should only work on minds, not electronics (although I let this off for being funny)
• As a unit of measurement, Malcolms should be Taylors, named after the character's surname - Malcolm even refers to 'Mr Watt'
• The extra 15 minutes of running time seems to be mostly filled with lots of goodbyes. There's endings after endings, almost as bad as Lord of the Rings: The Return of The King

But my biggest problems were, first a pet hate: Psychic characters who are psychic for no plot reason. I suppose by now Russell T Davis has established that some people in the Who universe are a little psychic or 'sensitive', so I should drop the point. But what really gets me is the way psychic characters regardless of their background, time period or species, always say the same things: 'Bad Wolf', 'There's something on your back', 'The Darkness', 'Your song will end soon'. Surely actual pyschics would be interpreting visions, describing what they see. The only way the current dialogue makes sense if they're reading off some kind of psychic teleprompter scrolling over the character's foreheads! I also felt the Doctor was acting out of character with Sontaran Strategem/The Poison Sky by suggesting the young male characters, Nathan and Barclay, should join the military. This personally bothered me but seemed extremely jarring in the narrative straight after what would be their commanding offer had essentially ordered them killed along with everyone else on the bus by closing the wormhole. Captain Magambo's behaviour pulling a gun on Malcolm also had no later plot consequences, Malcolm had no hard feeling and of course the Doctor has no idea. I can't imagine the Brigadier would ever do something like that. And finally, although I loved Malcolm, the way Lee Evans played the character was extremely familiar - Take a look at Colin the fawning over-enthusiastic caretaker and inventor with a dubious Welsh accent from Chris Barrie's The Brittas Empire. The portrayals are near identical and ironically the first result on YouTube for 'Colin Brittas Empire is Colin repeatedly saying 'I love you' to Mr Brittas! But this is still a 4 out of 5 story for me as I had fun and didn't let the details worry me while it aired. It's a very enjoyable, witty story with lots of rewatch value due to the sparkling dialogue. It looks stunning on a 42" TV. I think we may have seen a template for what a big screen Doctor Who blockbuster movie might look like.