Review of The Sontaran Stratagem/The Poison Sky
Good old Auntie Beeb, they do try there best and this time I think they got it. TSS/TPS has to be the best of the first of the series two parters. It was witty, the characters were on brilliant form and there was a storyline that you could really get to grips with.
The story is very geekgasimic, with UNIT making a high profile return, as oppose to there slightly quieter appearances in The Alien's of London and The Sound of Drums. But since the Doctor had got Martha Jones a job with our boys in the red caps it would seem only a matter of time before they would make a full blown appearance.
They didn't disappoint, as fake as a ficitional miltary branch go. Ross Jenkins, the young man assigned to ferry the Doctor around was rather sweet, I thought, and he wasn't all brandishing his gun about all the time, although, seeing the Sontaran for the first time would be enough to scare anyone and it was a shame they killed him off - I thought he could have done more under the guidence of the Doctor.
Colonel Mace started out a bit 2D and overwhealmed by the presence of the Doctor, but by the second half he was well over it and promptly found a way to fight back, with use of the Valient, last seen in The Last of the Time Lords when it was used as the Master's base of operations. To top it all, Mace even bags himself a snog at the end of it.
This episode also saw the return of Donna's mother and gramps, Sylvia Noble and Wilfred Mott. Donna returns home under the advice of Martha to warn them about the ATMOS in the car and while she is there she spills the beans to Wilf, who then wishes to meet him and upon doing so, discovers that he has infact, already met the Doctor much to Donna annoyance (but only because Wilf didn't tell her, but Wilf didn't know). Also, the family fill in the gap, with a bit of dialogue that fills the gap with why Wilf wasn't at Donna's wedding and that Syliva remembered the Doctor, immediatly classing him as trouble, as do all the other mother's in the show.
It was good to have a member of Donna's family who is pro-Doctor from the outset and encourages Donna to see all these fantastic sights, but I fear that Donna will pay the price just as Rose Tyler did in the end.
However, Donna does seem to be slipping into her role as the Doctor's Companion very well and she is probably want we needed last year to help us get over Rose. Now, I find myself wanting Donna to stay and I am half forgetting about Rose's long awaited return, although, I am certain that when the day dawns for the episode in question I will be bouncing all off the walls.
The Doctor seems to also be back on form after last year's mopey performance, happily bouncing off Donna, who it seems he is very afriad to lose. As when she tells him she won't be going with him, he assumes she means she is leaving him, but really, she is just going home to warn her family about the ATMOS. It's fab that Donna was then able to take the mickey out of him. She also reacted well when the Doctor came back after pissing off to kill the Sontarans. Slap on the arm!! But it's nice to see that he has two companions that care about him, as it is such a sweet picture when Martha is hugging one arm and Donna is crouched the otherside holding on to his other arm. It's an awww moment.
Martha.
Well, she was kidnapped about twenty minutes into the episode and then reappeared at the end, but I think using her as an evil clone was good twist for the character, and I was very pleased to see that Martha really had moved on from the Doctor. A few fans that i know were hanging on to Martha's Love for the Doctor to stop the clone, but that didn't happen. Instead, the story allowed for the clone to do her bit before the Doctor put a stop to it, and this is slightly reminseant of the Doctor letting Cassandra take over Rose until he discovered the root of the antidotes, although, releasing Rose was far more difficult and led to him being possessed while escaping the patients of New Earth.
It's difficult to comment on the Donna/Martha dynamic, as they didn't have much screen time together though the double parter, and that doesn't look like it's going to be changing with next weeks episode, with Martha promptly getting kidnapped again. It was nice, however, to see that they didn't launch into a bitch arguement, as did happen when Rose encountered Sarah Jane in School Reunion. It looks like this case of 'every man's worse nightmare' wasn't that bad.
And I take we all saw this weeks Rose/Bad Wolf refs?
TSS: There is a red wold graffitti on to the fence near where the Doctor lands to meet Martha.
TPS: The American News Reader, Mal Lup.
TPS: Rose shouting for the Doctor on Scanner - which would have been far more effective if the Doctor had been the one to look at the screen instead of Donna.
Fave Moments? Well...
Wilf meeting the Doctor again and Syliva stating that the Doctor is trouble.
Donna and Martha meeting - 'you hug him and you get a paper cut'
Valient appearing from the skies.
Are you my mummy? Daft but funny.
Rose appearance!!
The Doctor appearing on the Sontaran Ship and the 'Oh' expression on his face
The Doctor walking out of the teleport device, grabbing Rattigan's gun and throwing it across the room.
Captain Jack reference (got the whole gang here)
Not so Great?
Well, I wasn't at all impressed with Rattigan, and glad he died in the end - seeing as it was he's fault the world was ending. Was not impressed with him temper tantrum when his students bugger off.
The commander of the Sontarans, who sounded more like he was going to ask for a cup of tea instead of kill an army.
So, looking forward to next week - where has this daughter of his really appeared from. Okay, I accept that this probably isn't a case of raunchy Doctor, but still, I did biology at school. You still need a male and a female to make little babies, be they little human ones or little time babies, and given all the red herrings and surprises the RTD has been dropping into this series, this could go anyway really.