Doctor Who 50th anniversary and beyond

Well I think the last time I talked about Doctor Who I talked about Season 7, since then we've had the 50th Anniversary special, Matt Smith's final episode and series 8 featuring Peter Capaldi as the newly regenerated Doctor. Starting with the 50th which had three special shows. The first I will talk about is An Adventure in Space and Time. This was a TV movie about how Doctor Who first started and about William Hartnell who played the first Doctor. Now I must admit I've only seen a few clips of classic Doctor Who never mind of the first Doctor but that said it was very interesting to see how it all started. David Bradley does a good job portraying William Hartnell, although his voice is obviously different.

Next up, the main event the Day of the Doctor., the 50th anniversary special. There was a lot of hype built up for this, a lot of expectation, there was also controversy when the first trailer was exclusively shown at San Diego comic con and not put online after. We did eventually get a proper trailer which raised hype levels even more. There was also the great surprise of a mini-prequel episode called Night of the Doctor, unfortunately the surprise twist in it was probably spoilt for most people like it was for me but it was still great. The day of the doctor itself ended up being a major event being shown world wide at the same time both on tv and in cinemas. I personally stayed at home and watched it on tv with my parents. If I had to review it one word I would say brilliant!  I won't spoil anything but I will say it manages to be both epic but with a surprisingly simple story, it has lots of great individual moments, many references, for the fans of classic Doctor Who certain tropes of modern Doctors are poked fun at and there are some great surprises as well. Its hard not to wonder though since Steven Moffat (showrunner/head writer) claims they did the 3D on a 2D budget, whether or not it could have been longer and or/even more epic if they had just scrapped the 3D in the first place which in my opinion is a bit of a gimmick anyway. Also I cannot express how disappointed I am that Christopher Eccleston did not make even a cameo appearance, no matter how he feels about his time on the show he should have done it for the fans.

Finally the third and smallest part of the 50th anniversary specials was a bit of a nice surprise. It is called the five(ish) doctors reboot and was written by Peter Davison aka the fifth doctor. It is a comedy about the classic era Doctor Who actors attempting to be a part of the 50th anniversary episode. It focuses on Peter himself, Colin Baker who played the sixth doctor and Slyvestor McCoy who played the seventh Doctor. It also features appearances from a whole load of people involved in Doctor Who currently or in the past as well as some other special cameos. Overall it is very funny so kudos for the BBC for making it part of the 50th anniversary when originally it was just a fan project by Peter Davison.

Now onto Matt Smith's final episode, The Time of the Doctor which aired on Christmas day 2014. Unlike David Tennant who got a double episode send-off, this was just a 60 minute special. It's been a while since I've watched but I can remember feeling a bit disappointed by it. It had a lot of great ideas, some of which could have been the plot of episodes themselves (for example a town where nobody can lie) as well as some great acting especially from Matt Smith but it felt too rushed. It had the main plot of the episode, the introduction of Clara's family (which didn't add anything to the episode and we never saw them again apart from the gran in the season 8 finale) as well as the wrapping up of plot lines from way back when Matt first started as the Doctor. My family ended up watching it with me and it was rather awkward because despite the fact that it was a Christmas special which generally attracts more viewers than who would normally watch it, it relied on you being up to speed on the whole of Matt's time as the Doctor. It was also confusing for established fans with the introduction of this new important character who the Doctor knew very well and who seemed awfully like another main character in the show but apparently wasn't, we've still not gotten an explanation who she really was. It was disappointing to see so many plot lines answered quickly after so much build-up though in fairness you wonder if Matt was expected to do another season before he ended up getting movie offers and deciding to leave the show.At least Matt's final scene as the Doctor was great, much better than David Tennant's whining.

As for season 8...well I have to say that I'm envious of the people's who's comments I read saying that its the best season of modern Doctor Who yet and that Capaldi is an amazing Doctor because that's certainly not how I felt. I should clarify that I'm not bashing Doctor Who for the fun of it, I'm a big fan of Doctor Who, I've been watching it since 2005, I watch a lot of different tv shows and it has been one of my favourites over all these years. I should start with the positives, they've made some positive changes this season, its less rushed, they've toned down the music and there has been less use of the sonic screwdriver to save the day. Now for the negatives, firstly this season they have seemingly forgotten how to show us things, instead we are just told things HE IS THE DOCTOR, Clara is a CONTROL FREAK, Vastra and Jenny are MARRIED, two characters ARE IN LOVE etc. We get Daleks again after having only one episode between the 50th anniversary and Time of the Doctor which both featured them..Endings of episodes which ended up just being stupid or rushed. Major plot holes. A nasty unlikeable Doctor. Way too much focus on Clara. It tried to be too sentimental at times which just didn't work. And finally I feel I should highlight Kill the Moon, a promising episode which turned into the most annoyingly stupid episode of Doctor Who. I simply cannot understand why the writers made some of the decisions they did and its the one episode I did not go back and watch again because it annoyed me so much. I feel I should say that whilst I have been very negative I did watch every episode. The christmas special was fine not bad but not amazing either.

I'd also like to add, after all the praise the new costume got, he rarely wore the flipping thing!

In conclusion I think there needs to be change, Steven Moffat is great at writing individual episodes which is evidenced in the fact that he has written the majority of the best modern Dr. Who episodes whenever Russel T. Davies was in charge. The problem is that whilst the quality of the production, the effects etc. has increased season after season the writing hasn't. I think I didn't mind the not so great season 6 and the decent but not amazing season 7 because it all seemed to be leading up to something but then The Time of the Doctor happened and it was a bit of a waste. The problem is that Moffat seems to want to have his cake and eat it, he has so many ideas but instead of focusing on one or two of them he uses all of them and it doesn't make great results.Filming has already started on season 9 so its too late to change now but I really hope after this season they bring in someone who is respectful and a fan of the show but who brings new ideas and takes the show in an exciting new direction.

Let's face it no matter what happens I will probably keep watching anyway.