Series 7 of the new Doctor Who launched this past weekend, and now that our long-weekend is over I suppose we have to talk about it, right? Alright.
As a note, spoilers are certainly discussed. Big ones at that. You’ve had a few days to watch the episode, but if you have not watched it yet you might want to turn away.
So as Series 7 of Who kicks off, we’re put some time in the “future.” Time is relative in this series, of course, but we know that enough time has passed that Rory and Amy are getting divorced and that the Daleks — who last time we saw them were but a small determined force — have now regrown in size after the destruction that came at the end of Series 4, and they’ve got a new trick to go with it. As it so happens, the Doctor, Amy and Rory are “captured” by the Daleks for the purpose of infiltrating a planet full of insane Daleks, and so our story begins.
Of course, the big pull of this episode is the inclusion of Jenna-Louise Coleman, our soon to be New Companion, which was a surprise to many. Unfortunately for us, however, not only is her name different in this episode (it was originally revealed as Clara, although now it’s Oswin) but it turns out she’s been made into a Dalek. This basically means that Clara/Oswin will be the Doctor’s companion before this happens, and inevitably we will grow to love her and be destroyed by this eventual moment in her timeline.
This is where the problem essentially lies: for a while now, Moffat’s basic “hook” with his run of the show is the emphasis of how it’s just so clever. The show’s pace has been ramped up to eleven and everything is a twist upon a twist from a curveball over sneak attack. The Oswin/Dalek reveal falls into this same show trap that other big “twists” have had previously, and while it’s sad because Oswin is infinitely likable, the moment plays out a bit hackneyed when all wraps up. It’s not smile-inducing clever anymore, but rather groan-inducing due to the fact that this only means more mysteries and more “crazy” twists, and it begins to seem that Moffat can’t have an ongoing story that takes several episodes (or a whole season) to wrap-up without any subtlety like Davies had with things like “Vote Saxon” or “Bad Wolf,” or even the Face of Bo.
Nevertheless, Coleman is fantastic in the episode. While it’s impossible to say what the “old” Clara/Oswin will be like, the current iteration of the character is charming, sharp, witty and heroic; she’s basically a mix of previous companions, with elements of Rose, Martha and Donna, although less of Amy. While Oswin’s role is certainly limited through the episode, it speaks wonders about Coleman’s performance with the character in that she immediately hooks the viewer in. Here’s a character who spends the majority of the episode as a voice over speakers or a girl in a chair, and yet from just the vocal performance she’s compelling and sympathetic, and the motion she provides in a limited space gives her a powerful presence. It was an interesting way to debut the character (as opposed to in the Christmas Special, like we’d previously heard), but it certainly is a great way to ramp up the excitement of seeing some change.
In fact, Coleman is pretty much the best part of the episode. Oh, sure, it’s certainly a grand opening to the new season and it’s a lot of fun, but she’s a scene stealer to events that pretty much seem par for course. In fact, the show gets a bit meta on the viewer as Amy recalls the Doctor’s patented way of showing up just in time to fix everyone’s problems in ways only he can, which is in turn marked with a fix of his bow tie. Everything else is very much par for course: Matt Smith is still charming as the frantic and over-the-top Eleven, Amy is still a diva, Rory is still the best man in the universe who gets no credit for being the best man in the universe, and the Daleks still have annoying voices (although a clever moment is given in the episode with the “eggs” scene). The characters have certainly grown over time, but it is beginning to get a bit stagnant and formulaic. Not to the point where it’s not enjoyable, but Moffat has clearly reached a comfortable place with this version of the show, and he’s definitely going to milk that for a few more episodes.
Credit certainly also has to be given on one singular aspect of the show, and that’s how well Moffat is able to manipulate things. Yes, I did just knock his habit of trying to be clever all the time, but if you look at the character and mythology of something like the Doctor in comparison with someone like, say, Peter Parker, it’s amazing that that character can still be going strong with new things still happening through admittedly old circumstances. It’s not exciting conceptually to hear that the Doctor is once again fighting the Daleks even after a previous writer sort of “ended” that storyline (see Series 4), but Moffat found a way not only to bring the Daleks back but to reinvent them — and now we see that beyond a color scale. The Daleks are implicitly a rather dull thing when looked at objectively (a chic trash can with a plunger attached), and yet they manage to be surprising (the new Dalek/human conversions) and terrifying (the scene in which the Doctor saves a hallucinogenic Amy). If that’s not the most impressive aspect of the show overall, I’m not quite sure what is.
So overall the episode marks for a strong debut, but that shouldn’t be a huge surprise all things considered. In the realm of sci-fi television, Doctor Who has managed to stand out repeatedly since the Davies relaunch, and while Moffat’s approach is getting a bit tired it should be fun to see him try ad pull the rug out from under us in the new series. The episode plays out more like a short film than an episode, which seems very much to be the overall point, and that’s a nice way to kick things off as we move towards the exit of the Ponds and the “first appearance” of Clara/Oswin. It’s very much the Who we’ve come to know and love, with some big moments and a lot of clever lines over a series of improbable events that still mange to work out well, and while parts of the episode (particularly the Rory/Amy stuff) feels a bit rushed and the final moment in which the Daleks question the identity of their former predator is certainly one of those “We get it already, Moffat!” moments, when viewed as a whole it’s nice to have Who back.
