Deep Breath : Doctor Who Episode Review
WARNING!!! This article contains spoilers for the 2014 Doctor Who episode "Deep Breath". If you want to share your own opinions on this or any of the Doctor Who episodes, please email us at [email protected] Thank you.
As the days drew closer to the airing of Deep Breath and more promotional material came out I felt a little worried. Not because it looked bad, but because it looked good: The trailers, the teasers, the week long video countdown. I was scared because I started to expect the new season to be GOOD. A dangerous situation with Doctor Who nowadays, with it's constant disappointments.
So on Saturday night, my family and I sat down and turned on BBC 1 which was showing the end of the new gymnastics programme “Tumble”.
"Don't go anywhere” smiled the presenter “Because next up, is Doctor Who!”. The studio audience whooped and applauded...
The normal BBC One channel card came up on screen with an aerial view of hundreds of cyclists going round a roundabout. An unexpected Dalek lazer fired across the screen and Capaldi's stern face flickered into view for a few seconds, glaring at me through the screen as if to say “I'm Peter Fuckin Capaldi. I've won BAFTAs and now I'm playing the lead in the oldest Sci-Fi show on telly. Put your doubts to one side kid, this can't possibly go wrong.”
Reluctantly, I began to feel excitement... Who knows, maybe it'll be better this time round?
“When the Doctor arrives in Victorian London he finds a dinosaur rampant in the Thames and a spate of deadly spontaneous combustions.” That's the episode description on iPlayer. It sounds like an epic plot line but there are issues with this. There is brief dialogue mentioning of various cases of individuals burning but we never see it. The T-Rex has barely five minutes of screen time within the first eighteen minutes, by which time the poor creature itself explodes without any explanation of how the episode's villain managed to achieve this. The strange thing is, apart from being mentioned briefly afterwards the T-Rex really didn't have any impact on the episode. Heck, it would have saved an awful lot of time and money if they'd removed the VFX shots of this creature from the script.
The plot mainly revolves around the newly regenerated Doctor struggling to understand both the situation in London and why his face seems so familiar. Clara naturally feels scared and rather distrustful of this new man as Vastra and Jenny work to rebuild the friendship between the Human and Timelord. During this process they run into a crew of clockwork droids from a crashed ship named the SS Marie Antoinette which has been burried beneath the surface since the age of the dinosaurs. This is sister ship to the SS Madame de Pompadour, a reference to the 2006 episode “The Girl in the Fireplace”, also written by Steven Moffat and a personal favourite of mine.
This time the droids weren’t just repairing the ship, but also themselves with human parts. Stealing eyes, skin and other organs to keep themselves functioning over the ages. The concept is very interesting. If you replaced a robot parts with human parts, would that robot then start to become human?
It was the characters that interested me most. I personally felt Capaldi's first few scenes were a bit shaky acting wise, although that might have been because of the script. As the episode went on though, he began to grow into the role. The scene of him shouting at the tramp in the ally honestly made me scared of the madman with a box, and the scenes of The Doctor and Clara talking in the restaurant/larder were honestly the highlights of the episode for me.
We're starting to understand the relationship between Vastra and Jenny a lot more clearly. Each episode we see them in, the more we get to know what a working detective lesbian relationship between a human and a lizard from the dawn of time is like in Victorian London #onlyindoctorwho ! I hope these characters continue to be developed in future.
I'm starting to feel concerned however about Strax. His scenes are funny, obviously, but they just feel rather out of place in the episode. I would have really liked to see a more “human” (if that's the right word for a Sontaran) side to Strax, showing a bit more concern for Clara in the situation. This would have made a brilliant change from his usual slapstick and it would let us warm to him like we have with the other characters in this episode. This being a new incarnation for the Doctor would have been the perfect time to do such a thing with Strax... but they haven't. I really hope they add some depth to him soon, otherwise he's very quickly going to become the Jar Jar Binks of the Whoniverse.
Overall, the episode was... alright. There were some good (if jumbled) ideas in play but the strong acting talent and chemistry between characters is really what kept me watching. I was just annoyed that I let myself get hyped as the show certainly didn't live up to my hopes and expectations and I went away feeling rather disappointed. Watching it through a second time though it has it's merits and I'm able to enjoy it, although it pails in comparison to the first episodes of Chris, David and Matt who all had excellent writing for their first time on screen.
On a final note. I'd like to mention the new title sequence and what I think the story behind it says about the state of the show.
The new intro was heavily “inspired” by a concept sequence created by motion graphics designer and long time Doctor Who fan Billy Hanshaw which was uploaded to his YouTube channel last September. I use the quotation marks around “inspired” as it's pretty much the exact same sequence despite some small changes. Steven Moffat chose Billy's sequence saying “It was the only new title idea I'd seen since 1963”.
Don't get me wrong, working with the fans is fine. I'm all for it normally and I'm really happy that Billy's work has got the attention it deserves, but the situation of Who is different. Fans normally think they know best (here I am as a prime example) but here we have a talented person creating something way better than the BBC has done in years, and the producers admitting to this fact. Should we be excited that fans are making stuff this good, or concerned that a crew of paid professionals can't live up to the standards they are setting? I'll guess time will answer that question. If only I had a TARDIS...
Next episode is “Into the Dalek”! Sounds like a promising title. I'll be reviewing this whole season here on SKARO so please make sure to check back here next week. Thanks for reading!
If you are interested in writing news, review or speculation articles about Doctor Who for www.skaro.co.uk, feel free to email us at [email protected]. We love hearing from you and we may even ask you to be part of our writers team!
romaincrisis
blakekathryn
turnnoffyourmind
stormborns
gummygunk
tangentwithtanner