mllelaurel (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
mllelaurel) wrote2007-01-06 10:02 pm
mllelaurel) wrote2007-01-06 10:02 pm
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Doctor Who - The Runaway Bride
- I found myself laughing out loud and cheering within the first fifteen minutes. Always a good sign, not to mention something I sorely needed today.
- The fake (yet convincing) tears, followed by the wink: that's when I knew I *liked* Donna. She is officially fab.
- The small reminders of Rose have so far been subtle, pertinent and lovely. I'm glad.
- So. Torchwood owns property. Competently, I hope; incompetently, I wager.
- The 'secret' floor's marked on the elevator? Some secret. (If this is a showcase of Torchwood competence, I'm going to laaaaaaugh.)
- Donna's a key? Well, her name *does* sound sort of like 'Dawn'... Thank goodness the two are actually nothing alike.
- Did I mention I adored Donna? Well, I do.
- I wonder if the planet's core thing is a callback to "Inferno"...
- Dude. Is that the extrapolator from Season 1?
- He finally said 'Gallifrey'! This fills me with unholy squeee! Yaaaaaay! If I analyze further, this probably says something about the Doctor, psychologically. I don't think he was able to refer to his home like that before. He can now. It's healing and it's progress.
- Ok, the snow thing is precisely what "The Christmas Invasion" undercut so beautifully last year. It's a bit disappointing to see Rusty resort to the cliche he once declined.
- I will say, I like the theme of the Doctor actually dealing. I could kiss Donna for asking for Rose's name. The Doctor's acknowledging the past now. Gallifrey. Rose. Sarah forced him to look back, in Season 2, and I bet Jack will do likewise in Season 3. *So* much more healthy than the dissonance our boy seems to prefer.
In conclusion, I quite enjoyed this, thanks mainly to Donna. There are, however, a few issues holding TRB back, making it not as good as the Christmas Invasion. For one thing, the villain brings the bwahaha and not much else. I just never found myself concerned over the fate of the Earth. Contrast that to the Sycorax. 'Bwahaha,' sure, but they also had an edge ('Sycorax rock'). Additionally, they showed no qualms about killing sympathetic characters and had an effective plan of conquest (the part where all those people are climbing up still gives me chills.) In contrast, the spider lady just didn't seem all that menacing or competent. I hate to sound bloodthirsty, but this is a case where more casualties really would have helped. Lance's death was too much just deserts to quallify.
We also had no reason to worry for the Doctor's wellbeing, but his illness in TCI isn't really something you can replay, so that's understandable.
My second qualm was the lack of secondary characters. I get that you can't have Mickey and Jackie without, well, having Mickey and Jackie. Still, I wish the people we saw in the first scene had wound up playing a bigger part. Donna's parents. Her bitchy friend (Nerys?). Lance's family - surely someone would have had to tell them that their son was evil and dead. It would have been heartbreaking, had it been dealt with on screen.
Regarding Lance himself, I do have to hand out a few kudos. He may have turned out to be a jackass, but his motivations were believable. We got where he was coming from.
Overall score: 2
However, this is a Doctor Who 2, rather than a Torchwood one. Higher standards; higher quallity. I'll very likely be rewatching The Runaway Bride, though I'll probably fast forward over the plot straight to the lovely Donna and Ten interaction. Here's hoping we get Donna as a guest star again. Hey, stranger things have happened.
Meanwhile, the previews look shiny! I'm drooling over the glimpses we get of the upcoming Season 3. Drooling, I tell you. Likewise for Sarah Jane Adventures (though I'm a bit scared of them using kid actors). Torchwood finale I'm both excited and fearful for, though I'll get a Tregenna episode along with it. That, and the preview actually makes "End of Days" look really intriguing, for all that it's Chibnall.
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Sarah Jane Smith Adventures (or whatever it's called) was kind of fun silliness. I enjoyd seeing Sarah Jane, but this one is so much more of a kids' show than Doctor Who. I don't really see Doctor Who as being for children, even though that's what they say- Sarah Jane's show definitely is. We'll probably keep watching though, as my husband is a big SJ fan from way back.
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