New Year, New Exterminations
I'm still not used to Doctor Who being on at New Year's instead of Christmas. I'm kind of wondering now whether it'll keep this schedule under RTD2 or go back to the old Christmas specials or do something else entirely.
Anyway!
I enjoyed that one, in a pleasant, refreshingly uncomplicated way. A time loop is a very fitting plot idea for New Year's, somehow, and the whole thing was just good, simple fun. Decent enough story, really great quest characters, and quite a few moments where I laughed out loud. It's not particularly deep or anything, but that may be pretty much what I was wanting out of the show right now, so I'm happy enough.
A few random thoughts:
I spend about the first 20 minutes trying to figure out who that Irish lady was and where I knew her from before I realized that it was Aisling Bea, and I knew her from Taskmaster. She was great on that, and great in this. Just delightful.
I do wonder a bit how, if the time loop was only affecting that building, Sara was able to communicate with her mother elsewhere and have those interactions change (if only slightly) from loop to loop, but as far as elements of time travel plots that don't make logical sense go, that one was fairly minor.
After the Significant Looks following that comment about weirdos with good hearts being keepers, I found myself saying, "Wow, they're not even pretending they're not leaning into the shippiness now, are they?" And, sure enough, by the end of the episode the subtext was fully textual. I must say, I'm not in general a fan of the whole human-companions-pining-after-the-Doctor thing, but of the examples of that we've seen so far, I think this one works the best and is the least annoying. Although I reserve the right to change my mind about that if it goes badly from here, in whatever time we have left. (Although, hmm. It occurs to me that I've been sort of vaguely assuming we'll get a complete change of companions when we change Doctors and showrunners, but I suppose that's not remotely guaranteed, and I haven't heard any announcements on the subject yet one way or another.)
One very tiny uncomfortable note for me: the stuff about how everyone else is partying and Sara is annoyed at being left out, and the Doctor's remark about how it's New Year's Eve and they can find a party somewhere... It all just feels a bit to me like we're awkwardly tiptoeing around an elephant in the room, given what year it is. I know people have, indeed, been having parties, but it's hard to ignore the voice in the back of my brain screaming that they're probably all better off staying away from big gatherings, anyway, and one of them really ought to bring that up. (Although admittedly, this was probably filmed a while ago and it's not exactly reasonable to expect anyone to have anticipated the omicron surge.) In any case, though, this does strike me as a very nice way to deal with filming in the age of covid. You just take five people and some Daleks running around one large-ish building and create something clever and cute around that.
This entry was originally posted at https://astrogirl.dreamwidth.org/1021410.html. Comment here or there, whichever you like.
Anyway!
I enjoyed that one, in a pleasant, refreshingly uncomplicated way. A time loop is a very fitting plot idea for New Year's, somehow, and the whole thing was just good, simple fun. Decent enough story, really great quest characters, and quite a few moments where I laughed out loud. It's not particularly deep or anything, but that may be pretty much what I was wanting out of the show right now, so I'm happy enough.
A few random thoughts:
I spend about the first 20 minutes trying to figure out who that Irish lady was and where I knew her from before I realized that it was Aisling Bea, and I knew her from Taskmaster. She was great on that, and great in this. Just delightful.
I do wonder a bit how, if the time loop was only affecting that building, Sara was able to communicate with her mother elsewhere and have those interactions change (if only slightly) from loop to loop, but as far as elements of time travel plots that don't make logical sense go, that one was fairly minor.
After the Significant Looks following that comment about weirdos with good hearts being keepers, I found myself saying, "Wow, they're not even pretending they're not leaning into the shippiness now, are they?" And, sure enough, by the end of the episode the subtext was fully textual. I must say, I'm not in general a fan of the whole human-companions-pining-after-the-Doctor thing, but of the examples of that we've seen so far, I think this one works the best and is the least annoying. Although I reserve the right to change my mind about that if it goes badly from here, in whatever time we have left. (Although, hmm. It occurs to me that I've been sort of vaguely assuming we'll get a complete change of companions when we change Doctors and showrunners, but I suppose that's not remotely guaranteed, and I haven't heard any announcements on the subject yet one way or another.)
One very tiny uncomfortable note for me: the stuff about how everyone else is partying and Sara is annoyed at being left out, and the Doctor's remark about how it's New Year's Eve and they can find a party somewhere... It all just feels a bit to me like we're awkwardly tiptoeing around an elephant in the room, given what year it is. I know people have, indeed, been having parties, but it's hard to ignore the voice in the back of my brain screaming that they're probably all better off staying away from big gatherings, anyway, and one of them really ought to bring that up. (Although admittedly, this was probably filmed a while ago and it's not exactly reasonable to expect anyone to have anticipated the omicron surge.) In any case, though, this does strike me as a very nice way to deal with filming in the age of covid. You just take five people and some Daleks running around one large-ish building and create something clever and cute around that.
This entry was originally posted at https://astrogirl.dreamwidth.org/1021410.html. Comment here or there, whichever you like.