Doctor Who - Kill the Moon (A Month of October - October 5)
Kill the Moon might be my least favourite episode so far, although it's apparently got rave reviews everywhere else (okay, not from certain people on my flist... *g*) I liked the idea of it, and it should have been good, but I didn't like:
- the whole Courtney dilemma at the start, which didn't resolve into anything. Is she a rebellious schoolgirl or isn't she? The Doctor took her into space and then brought her back and she's playing up - brilliant - but the answer can't possibly be, as Clara seems to think, just to tell her she's special after all. That's not going to solve the problem of being motion-sick when you're travelling in time and space, cos how humiliating is that? That no one else (as far as you know) has travelled in time and space before, and you're so rubbish that you get sick when you try it? I much prefer the Doctor's solution, which is to take her back up and give her something to be special for. But that said, I don't really believe that any kid, no matter how scared by a giant bacteria-spider, would resort to playing on her phone if she's been painted to be as "bad" as Courtney's supposed to be. Also there's a reality-gap - how in the world have Courtney and Clara been interacting at school?It would be a discipline-disaster! So in the end I don't believe in Courtney...
- the incompetent British astronauts. Cos... what? We've been here before, we know there are competent British astronauts (okay, they specified 2049 which isn't far off, but I still can't believe they're that incompetent. Did you know that the space industry is the one actually really booming industry in the UK? And globally? Employing increasing numbers of people, not fewer and forgotten...) And why were they talking about NASA rather than ESA, if they were Brits? And how in the world did the first bloke to be killed ever qualify for the mission if he didn't know how to prime the bombs they were sent up to use? No, just... couldn't buy it. Granted it didn't help that the leader of the astronauts will always be Karen from Coldfeet, for me... *g*
- of course the world voted to kill the alien, it was by far the most practical decision to make, and humans are often stupid, but again not that stupid... Yes, they're stupid enough to kill aliens before even trying to talk to them or ask why they're here in many other episodes, but if it's a question of relatively certain death, according to local knowledge (no tides, already huge disasters and death from that, every other thing humans rely on being affected and the world presumably being devastated because the moon's no longer there) or else survival if one creature is killed, then it's no surprise they all turned off their lights. And I hate that the best reason for not killing it that Clara and Courtney could come up with was "awww, but it's a baaaaybyyyy"... Not good enough! All lives are innocent! What, as Karen the astronaut asked, about the thousands of other babies being born on Earth who would all die through letting this one live? I don't mind at all that the Doctor had inside knowledge that this wouldn't happen - but I do mind that the feted decision was made on something so much more sickly-sentimental and illogical. And it really bugged me that we had a cast of women, and what was their big decision? A decision about a baby.
- I quite liked the Doctor swanning off to see what decision Clara and the world would make - it sort of fits his uncertain am-I-a-good-man? persona (and I don't think it's the first time he's done it, though don't ask me when... *g*). He's interfered in the Earth for so long, and he's been so unsure about being god-like in his recent incarnations, that I like him being rather erratic and spiky and so on this time. I even like that he got it wrong, and that humans weren't ready to be left to such a big decision - despite (or maybe because) of their lack of knowledge. It even made sense that Clara was cross about it, but she's such a madam and a princess about things that I want to smack her... Cos it goes the other way too - she doesn't know the Doctor well enough to react that way, to distrust his motives so much, or to call him patronising. She should know him by now (and he can be patronising!), but she's always so focussed on herself, that I can quite see why she doesn't. She seems to have no curiosity about time or space or anything outside of her own tiny world. Which doesn't make her interesting to me, because the Doctor's doesn't seem to be sorting her out, he seems to be going along with it, and I do wish he wouldn't!
- And then happily-ever-after we get another moon after all. Which... just... no, too pat. It might have been fun if it turned out that we got two new moons - or even three or four - but just replacing it seemed too easy. Presumably we'll get our tides back now, and uncover all the cities that were wiped out... well, except that they'd still be wiped out.
- and there was other stuff too, because it just didn't seem to hang properly together this time (and again it should have been much longer, for the story - I've not thought that over the last couple of seasons, but I'm thinking it this season...)
So... I shall hope for better things next ep!