Doctor Who 4.01 and 4.02
Since I never got around to doing a reaction post for Partners in Crime, there's stuff on both that and The Fires of Pompeii in here.
First of all:
*munch munch munch* Mmm, tasty. That's me happily eating my words regarding Catherine Tate being a companion. I like Donna, a whole lot, because
Interesting swing between the two episodes between cute and funny to dark and angsty - I wasn't expecting them to go quite so harsh on only the second episode of the series.
Partners in Crime was a romp and I loved it. The Adipose babies were totally adorable (I also would like a cuddly toy) and Sarah Lancashire rocked as the Nanny. The best bit hands down is the mimed conversation through the windows between the Doctor and Donna. I laughed my head off and that is probably the exact moment when I decided that I was going to like Donna after all. I liked it as well when she asks about Rose and the Doctor tells her about both Rose and Martha and how he destroyed half of Martha's life. It's nice that he has learned some lessons and makes the effort to let her know how bad it could be upfront rather than pretending life with him is all hijinks. Plus the whole "mate" conversation was pretty funny too. Their interaction is a lot different from the dymanic with Martha or Rose and I think a lot of that comes from how the Doctor and Donna met; she saw a much darker and more alien being from the start and so knows more about what she is choosing. Rose got a stranger who saved her life and intrigued her with a larger mystery and excitement, Martha got a flirt who charmed and kissed her and neither of them got to see him as the ruthless non-human until later on. Donna is starting off on a completely different footing.
The Fires of Pompeii was... not a romp. Some funny lines as always (I particularly liked "I'm Spartacus", "So am I") but definitely not a light episode. There were probably more lines I would have liked but I found it very difficult to distinguish the words at some points, especially some of the early stuff in the street. I swear DW and TW have the same disease of mixing the dialogue too low and the music and background noise too high (there were a few TW eps where if I hadn't known what Jack said in the intro bit, I wouldn't have been able to make it out at all). Ahem. Back to the actual episode, we got another example of the Doctor landing somewhere completely different than he was planning. Either that's evidence that the TARDIS takes control sometimes and puts him where he's meant to be, or he's just really crap at steering the thing. Oh, another good Donna moment when she spots there's a blooming big mountain on its own rather than 7 hills. And then we were straight into morality and hard choices as Donna gets thrown in the deep end and discovers being a Time Lord does not always mean saving people's lives - sometimes it means letting 20,000 die to keep history on track. I really did like how she argued with him about that and the explanation she finally got was interesting and actually seemed to make sense (though I'm not going to think about it too hard).
I thought the Sybilline Sisters were pretty cool, especially the eyes on their hands, but they lost out in creep factor to the scene between the Augur and the girl when they just start pulling all that information on the Doctor and Donna out of the air. The line about Donna having something on her back was the creepiest, I think. Lots of vague references to come together over the series as well.
I thought the scene where the Doctor realised it was him that set Pompeii off by stopping the Pyrothingies was really, really good in a very angsty way, and boy did it let Donna step up and be amazing (see bullet above). But the prize for darkest moment goes to the bit where the Doctor looks at the family cowering as the ash falls and just walks away to the TARDIS while Donna stares in tears of horror. Chilling, and it led to more angst while Donna asked about Gallifrey burning and the Doctor had to explain that "I can't, I can't go back, I can't". I think Donna begging him to save just one person was as much for him as it was for her (though I don't know whether that was intentional on her part), but wow, I'm glad he did because the shots of the clouds of ash covering the city were bad enough - if the Doctor had left the family to die at the end, it would have been an incredibly harsh and depressing ending to the episode. It was nice to hear the Doctor acknowledge at the end that Donna was right and he did need someone with him.
So overall:
Partners in Crime = wheee!
The Fires of Pompeii = meep
First of all:
*munch munch munch* Mmm, tasty. That's me happily eating my words regarding Catherine Tate being a companion. I like Donna, a whole lot, because
- she came up with a plan to find the Doctor, stuck at it and it eventually worked like gangbusters
- she actually kept all her luggage in the car just in case she met up with him
- she used the exact same method to get into Adipose Industries as the Doctor and did it just as well as he did
- she doesn't let the Doctor get away with "because I'm a Time Lord and I said so" as an answer to her questions
- she spotted the English writing in Ancient Rome and asked an interesting question about the TARDIS translations
- she threatened to put the Sybilline Sister's eyes onto the back of her head instead of freaking out about them trying to sacrifice her
- she kept trying to get people to evacuate right to the end
- she said "Never mind us" when the Doctor said they wouldn't survive Vesuvius going up, and then helped him push the lever so it wasn't just his responsibility
Interesting swing between the two episodes between cute and funny to dark and angsty - I wasn't expecting them to go quite so harsh on only the second episode of the series.
Partners in Crime was a romp and I loved it. The Adipose babies were totally adorable (I also would like a cuddly toy) and Sarah Lancashire rocked as the Nanny. The best bit hands down is the mimed conversation through the windows between the Doctor and Donna. I laughed my head off and that is probably the exact moment when I decided that I was going to like Donna after all. I liked it as well when she asks about Rose and the Doctor tells her about both Rose and Martha and how he destroyed half of Martha's life. It's nice that he has learned some lessons and makes the effort to let her know how bad it could be upfront rather than pretending life with him is all hijinks. Plus the whole "mate" conversation was pretty funny too. Their interaction is a lot different from the dymanic with Martha or Rose and I think a lot of that comes from how the Doctor and Donna met; she saw a much darker and more alien being from the start and so knows more about what she is choosing. Rose got a stranger who saved her life and intrigued her with a larger mystery and excitement, Martha got a flirt who charmed and kissed her and neither of them got to see him as the ruthless non-human until later on. Donna is starting off on a completely different footing.
The Fires of Pompeii was... not a romp. Some funny lines as always (I particularly liked "I'm Spartacus", "So am I") but definitely not a light episode. There were probably more lines I would have liked but I found it very difficult to distinguish the words at some points, especially some of the early stuff in the street. I swear DW and TW have the same disease of mixing the dialogue too low and the music and background noise too high (there were a few TW eps where if I hadn't known what Jack said in the intro bit, I wouldn't have been able to make it out at all). Ahem. Back to the actual episode, we got another example of the Doctor landing somewhere completely different than he was planning. Either that's evidence that the TARDIS takes control sometimes and puts him where he's meant to be, or he's just really crap at steering the thing. Oh, another good Donna moment when she spots there's a blooming big mountain on its own rather than 7 hills. And then we were straight into morality and hard choices as Donna gets thrown in the deep end and discovers being a Time Lord does not always mean saving people's lives - sometimes it means letting 20,000 die to keep history on track. I really did like how she argued with him about that and the explanation she finally got was interesting and actually seemed to make sense (though I'm not going to think about it too hard).
I thought the Sybilline Sisters were pretty cool, especially the eyes on their hands, but they lost out in creep factor to the scene between the Augur and the girl when they just start pulling all that information on the Doctor and Donna out of the air. The line about Donna having something on her back was the creepiest, I think. Lots of vague references to come together over the series as well.
I thought the scene where the Doctor realised it was him that set Pompeii off by stopping the Pyrothingies was really, really good in a very angsty way, and boy did it let Donna step up and be amazing (see bullet above). But the prize for darkest moment goes to the bit where the Doctor looks at the family cowering as the ash falls and just walks away to the TARDIS while Donna stares in tears of horror. Chilling, and it led to more angst while Donna asked about Gallifrey burning and the Doctor had to explain that "I can't, I can't go back, I can't". I think Donna begging him to save just one person was as much for him as it was for her (though I don't know whether that was intentional on her part), but wow, I'm glad he did because the shots of the clouds of ash covering the city were bad enough - if the Doctor had left the family to die at the end, it would have been an incredibly harsh and depressing ending to the episode. It was nice to hear the Doctor acknowledge at the end that Donna was right and he did need someone with him.
So overall:
Partners in Crime = wheee!
The Fires of Pompeii = meep