Doctor Who Series 5 - Big, Flamboyant and Frustrating
Looking back at series 5 there is no denying how refreshing and revolutionary it was for the time, there is this intoxicating sense of 'new' with Moffat's takeover and I appreciate that but upon revisiting I really struggle to enjoy it. I've got to preface this by saying the 'Smith Era' is my least favourite NuWho era, I understand the appeal but it often does the opposite of what I want I personally enjoy, you are entitled to love it and I am going to try my best to explain my issues with this era. Bare with me in places and understand this is my personal subjective opinion. It is going to be an extremely controversial opinion but at the forefront of my problems with this series is Matt Smith's Doctor. I find him incredibly irritating and I desperately struggle to enjoy any time spent with him, his boyish silliness just gets on my nerve and because so much time is spent with his ridiculous childishness I can't take him seriously at all. I find him to really lack gravitas, there are scenes in which he is meant to be intimidating but ultimately I can't take him seriously and it undermines a lot of the series. I do enjoy the feel of series, there's something otherworldly and fairytale-like about the whole series and Murray Gold's score is probably my favourite here, the visual design feels unique and I think it adds a lot to the series. I've said it before and I'll say it again, I don't think Steven Moffat is a brilliant writer, he has glimmers of really amazing ideas but in reality, I find him to be just an idea man, someone who can come up with a concept or scene that I could never imagine but he always tends to drop an idea when coherently combining these ideas. Every single episode of this era has this scene: The Doctor mumbles something impossible like "unless the door is not a door?" and the score swells, the audience is fixated on this creepy idea and then half an hour alter the idea is abandoned and revealed to be inconsequential. I really love some of what he does but this trope makes him incredibly frustrating and the series is ultimately one that I wish I enjoyed more.
The Eleventh Hour
There is a core narrative that I enjoy a lot underneath a hell of a lot of faff in 'The Eleventh Hour' and I appreciate the odd glimmer of good a lot more than what Moffat spends half the episode with his attention on. The episode feels like a sketch show of ideas Moffat has been desperately wanting to show just chucked at the audience and I find it to be distractingly smug in places and confused in other places. People cite this as one of the best episodes of the era but I find it like 'Doctor Who' with ADHD, constantly just chucking something new at the audience and hoping they will latch on. The structuring is so disorientating, we start with a good twenty minutes doing a comedy routine with Smith adjusting to regeneration which I find exhausting and then the Prisoner Zero storyline arrives and then fizzles away into nothing. The stakes are too high and there are too many things going on for me to really focus on. Amy Pond functions as an interesting companion structure but I think a whole episode could be dedicated to the genuine emotional consequences of this, take how 'Aliens of London/World War Three' is split into two parts to let the consequences of Rose being gone for two years be explored and balanced with the Slitheen story. Moffat is juggling with this alien prisoner story, a new Doctor, a new companion and I find ti kind of really disorientating and unlikable. We could spend forever on how someone would react to the trauma of The Doctor's appearance but Moffat doesn't and I find myself wanting to keep focused on that. Moffat seems much more interested in 'wow' moments rather than the ideas I personally care about, I want to spend more time on who Prisoner Zero is, I want to spend more time in who Amy Pond is, I want to know and understand who this new Doctor is but instead we get just a collection of things that I find smug and irritating. The comedy is downright terrible, it screams of immature with the kissogram joke and the 'internet history' and it often takes away from some scenes that should have more levity. It feels like an episode Moffat clearly has wanted to make for so much time but it needs restraint and focus with less obsession on showing off. There are ideas I really enjoy, I like the concept of The Doctor being angry at the Atraxi and telling them off, I like the tone of the Amelia Pond segments, I enjoy the design of Prisoner Zero and Olivia Colman is criminally underused, but the problems are still irritating.
The Beast Below
If you have managed to keep reading, Thank you! I have a lot of problems with this series and I don't love being negative about a show I love but I genuinely really liked 'The Beast Below'. There's something so surreal and insane about 'The Beast Below' that I find it purely magical, it tends to hypnotise me and I don't understand why Moffat cites it as his least favourite script. It feels like a dream and a bit more subdued than other episodes of this era, the episode revolves around a central idea and the simplicity is important to why I enjoy the episode. Of course, this is a blueprint for a Doctor Who episode as it shows a new Doctor and new companion in a difficult moral situation to test their characters and I think it honestly was incredibly needed for Smith and Amy. I love the idea of a society hiding the truth from themselves, the idea of people finding out the truth and then wiping their memory is a horrifying ingenious sci-fi concept. And then the third act kind of trips around and is a bit of a mess but I enjoy it for what it is, I think the moral decision is really quite interesting and I like testing these characters. It is an episode with one single idea that it fleshes out, rather than a jumble of ideas that don't really work at all, we get a conversation about the greater good and what is it worth. It is a tough, dark and in places viciously depressing episode and I enjoy that because everything feels toned down, Amy is more relatable and gets time to build as a character separately from The Doctor, her arc up until this point is completely reliant on her relationship with The Doctor rather than who she is as a character. Smith is much more toned down, his goofiness is a bit more self-aware, he makes jokes rather than being a joke, however, I don't love how he snaps as Amy, I think it is out of character and bizarrely mean. There are some problems, the third act is a bit disorientated, mostly due to Smith not being able to carry the weight of the more serious scenes and the conclusion is a bit too convenient but the ideas are valuable and interesting.
Victory of the Daleks
Gatiss is back! And this time with a whimpering disappointing Dalek story. Moffat's era has a fascinating relationship with The Daleks, he tends to really dislike using them and their appearances always feel like a chore (whether or not this is due to them trying to keep the rights is a debate for another time). There's nothing to really latch onto in this episode and it almost feels like a roundabout way to sell more Dalek toys, it doesn't bring anything that exciting to the table which Gatiss is known for. The whole episode works around this undercover Dalek mystery, we spend so much time questioning what the Daleks are doing and if they are truly evil or not and in the end the big reveal is that they are evil. The episode is 20 minutes leading to the reveal that The Dalek's are evil and water is wet. It is genuinely just a really forgettable episode and kind of pointless, to seems bizarre that they return this soon after 'Journey's End' in such a gimmicky inconsequential way. The second and third acts revolve around another defeating the Dalek's story but it isn't an exciting idea at all, it is just another Dalek episode. I really don't have much to say about this episode, its a shame that the Daleks are treated with such disregard from now on, RTD used them as the big baddies and everytime they were used the stakes were high and personal. But here they are just generic villains, The Doctor barely gets to really delve into the effect of them returning instead Smith has a tantrum at a pale initiation of 'Dalek'. The power ranger Daleks are probably the single most misguided decision of the show (perhaps just below something that's going to happen in a couple of episodes) they were clearly a marketing ploy and disappeared quicker than they arrived. It's an embarrassing episode in so many areas and I think it's fair to say that people often ignore the fact it ever happened.
The Time of Angels/ Flesh and Stone
I tend to have a bit of a love/hate relationship with this two-parter, on one hand, it is like the big sci-fi horror brother of 'Blink', feeling grandiose, tense and with such a brilliant pace to it, however, I am in the camp that firmly believes the Weeping Angels should have never left 'Blink' and here they are kind of drained from their effect. There is this annoying idea in these episodes that adding more abilities and lore to the Angels makes them scarier when I think it is the exact opposite, my favourite part of 'Blink' is that it doesn't offer any explanation to what is happening making them feel genuinely terrifying because of the complete reliance on the fear of the unknown. It comes down to personal preference but I strongly believe the Angels should never be seen to move and the Angels certainly should not talk. There are some fantastically tense moments, the design of the catacombs is classicly unnerving and there are glimmers of some true horror genius ideas. But my main issue is that it doesn't need to be a story containing the Angels as Moffat very rarely relies on the brilliant aspects of 'Blink', instead making the Angels feel like any other generic enemy and dampening the impact of their genius design. It also screams of so many elements that I grow so tired of in this era, the opening is a good 15 minutes of faff, it is this over stylised pointless roundabout way to reintroduce River and start the plot, it feels like filler in a story that has too much going on to afford to waste this much. River Song is a fun character in the context of each appearance but Moffat's consistent reliance on teasing her importance, every five seconds River says something frustratingly vague that is only meant to tease that reveal as to who she is. This episode also treats Amy Pond terribly, she spends half the episode being angsty and irritating and then she becomes a damsel in distress and has very little agency in the plot. And then we see one of the biggest missteps of the whole show with that awful scene with Amy assaulting The Doctor that everyone continentally forgets when discussing this era, upon rewatching Amy is treated horribly in this first series and really ages the whole era when she is consistently sexualised and consistently obsessed sexually with Smith. I do think the two-parter as a whole has a really nice feel to it, unsettling and scary at times with a third act that is experimental and full of a lot of ideas, I believe the Crack works brilliantly in the context of the Angels but there are so many elements that scream of overall issues with this era that I struggle to ignore.
The Vampires of Venice
It is weird how devoted Moffat is to his long-running arcs and ideas. they take up half to the third act of the last episode yet there are so many times when the series pace is put to a complete halt in order to faff about with episodes like this. Don't get me wrong 'Vampires of Venice' is a lot of fun and has a few things going for it but it is shamelessly dumb. I really enjoy Arthur Darvill in the role and I think he does a lot but my god is Rory treated with such disrespect throughout his appearances and this is one of the worst examples of diminishing a character for so-called 'comedy'. Amy treats Rory terribly and it's one of those examples where it is played of as 'charming' and an amusing comedic trait for her character when it just comes off as mean spirited and reductive, she is borderline abusive and is consistently arrogant towards him. They don't feel like a married couple at all because we have seen Amy consistently hit on The Doctor and almost forget that Rory even exists, yet here we are meant to just forget that and laugh as Amy treats her fiance with no thought or care. This has been a point of debate for a while and I strongly agree that Moffat writes women with this unlikable arrogance, he tends to misinterpret arrogance as creating a strong female character, 'Amy is strong because she doesn't care about Rory' isn't good character writing. This is my main gripe with the episode as I kind of really enjoy this hokey dumb vampire story with this light-hearted tone that is balanced well with how low-key Whitehouse always writes his ideas. It is filler by nature but less arrogant and self gratuitous than previous episodes, the actual alien design and feel are really compelling however Smith once again is just confusingly written and unlikable. His dismissal of Rory comes off as insecure and macho, he at one point shouts at Amy for no reason and he spends the first two acts treating the stakes like a joke. You can and in many ways should skip this episode as it does nothing for the overall plot and treats its characters with such frustrating disregard, even if there is a fun alien story hidden enough.
Amy's Choice
And out of nowhere we get this surreal unusual existential horror masterpiece in a series that I find so irritating it blows my mind when we get genuinely brilliant episode like this. It is such a brilliant concept that stays focused on this one bizarre idea throughout its runtime and I adore how it focuses on this one uniquely 'Doctor Who' idea. Now that being said I love the tone, core idea and surreal feel to the episode much more than what it pivots to be more focused on which is something that I touched on in the last episode. It fizzles out in the third act as writer Simon Nye gets distracted by the want to make this episode about Amy choosing between married life and The Doctor. It almost parades as character development by creating this elaborate story to reinforce the basic idea that Amy loves Rory. The thematic conclusion for her character is her proving that she loves Rory which is something that doesn't need to be the focus on, it is weird how Rory is made to be a bit unlikable by his obsession with the Leadworth reality. I called this episode a masterpiece purely because it is brimming with unique ideas and a brilliant feel, the moral decision is forgettable in the context of the more impressive idea and feel to the rest of it. I am probably incredibly biased because I adore Toby Jones and an actor and he genuinely makes this episode as good as it is, I can't stress enough how impressive he is as The Dream Lord. This snarky, snivelling and cocky otherworldly being is really entertaining to watch and to hate as he consistently mocks our protagonists and you just can't help but love watching him. I really think these characters needed a villain like this to take them down a couple notches, it's nice how he interrogates The Doctor's childish facade and how he deconstructs Amy's treatment of these two men by rightfully pointing her out as being wrong. It is such a compelling mystery with a bit of a faulty third act but such a brilliant core set of ideas and I love what it does to make it feel like a unique story.
The Hungry Earth/ Cold Blood
This is one of those episodes where if it wasn't written by a certain someone we would never ever think twice about it, but due to what we have seen of Chris Chibnall's writing this episode screams of so many faults that ring true throughout his career. It is such a forgettable set of episodes that honestly I don't think are terrible they just don't offer anything interesting to really grasp on to. It reminds me a lot of the Sontaran two-parter from last series because it thinks that replicating a classic villain is enough to carry the episode so the rest doesn't need to be focused on. The Silurian are this really interesting Classic Who concept of an ancient race that were the first inhabitants of Earth but here Chibnall doesn't use them in any interesting way. It just feels like 'paint-by-numbers' Doctor Who with not a single scene that sticks in the audience's mind, I don't hate this episode but I often just skip it or struggle to keep focused on it. Chibnall doesn't really bring anything new to the table which is evident throughout most of his episodes but here seems to genuinely just steal from other episodes. The side characters are really kind of forgettable, there is this obsession with realism so none of the characters feel that charming or entertaining, especially the family which are outright completely forgettable. I do quite enjoy the idea of a disrupting this ancient civilisation but the 'Doctor trying to organise a treaty between two warring factions' is a trope as old as the show itself, there is a kind of loose psychological idea being occasionally bounced around but nothing that interesting. I don't know, just a really dull two-parter that feels like filler, it's so stretched out and genuinely sort of boring, the ending is an interesting cliffhanger and although completely separate to the rest of the plot is a fascinating mystery.
Vincent and the Doctor
This is why I love 'Doctor Who' after a series of episodes I really dislike an episode like this comes out of nowhere and blows me away. There is a strong reason why this is often recognised as one of the greatest episodes of the show and I can not deny that as Richard Curtis proves that he is not only an excellent writer but can adapt to writing an interesting episode of 'Doctor Who'. It's not often that we get a historical episode that focuses this much on a really tough and upsetting theme but maintained specifically on Vincent himself, combining so many perfect elements to hit the audience with what is probably the most emotional scene in the whole show. Vincent Van Gogh is one of those true historical characters so drenched in tragedy that it requires a real sense of delicate intimate writing when exploring him and I think Curtis approached this story in a perfect way. It honestly is incredibly charming yet devastatingly dark at times, I really like how Eleven and Amy feel like whole new characters here, treating Vincent with such respect and a surprising level of maturity for these characters. It is a story uncompromisingly about depression, the alien threat is clearly intended to be a metaphor for Vincent's own inner turmoil and my only real complaint is that the episode tends to get distracted by the alien shenanigans when it works better if the focus is kept on Vincent. A monster that only Vincent sees, terrifying him, making him question his own mind and driving him slowly insane is a tough and emotional perspective that Curtis doesn't hold back on. My favourite aspect is that incredible ending, Tony Curran gives an incredible performance as he sees his work, his suffering has value and knowing that all his pain is not in vain will make even the strongest people shed a tear, but I love how dark the realisation that this doesn't easily fix his mental illness which is a brave and really honest emotional gut-punch. I can't say enough good things about 'Vincent and the Doctor' because it never fails to move me and make me appreciate the possibilities of 'Doctor Who'.
The Lodger
Honestly, I'm not going to hold anything back when I say I hate 'The Lodger' so much and I find it to be the shows most insufferable, irritating and painful episode. I have never understood the appeal behind James Cordon and I certainly don't understand why we get a whole episode devoted to him. It is everything I dislike about this era and it drives me completely insane when I rewatch it. A good 3 quarters of this episode is dedicated to faff, it feels like a parody of this era as we spend so much time with the punchline 'Eleven is bad at being normal' which I hate. I think it is somewhat out of character for The Doctor to act this way, there are so many moments where The Doctor comes off as an absolute idiot just for comedic effect. Smith does comedy well, he always has, but so much of this episode is dedicated to him doing something silly for a bit that I find it incredibly exhausting and draining of The Doctor's power if he fails to be able to act normal. There is an alien plot the length of a blurb hidden underneath what is essentially a rom-com that honestly is offensively underdeveloped. There is nothing to get out of this, it doesn't introduce an interesting sci-fi concept, the villain is a crashed ship malfunctioning and accidentally killing people as it tries to repair itself. So much time is dedicated to this one mystery which just revolves around a really boring third act with a 'power of love' convenient ending that just drives me crazy. I'm a big fan of Daisy Haggard but I hate when 'Doctor Who' does a rom-com in the background and this is one of the worst examples. The thing I find frustrating is that people defend it as a 'rom-com' style change of pace but I don't find it funny and the romance is so ridiculously bare bones I can't appreciate it at all.
The Pandorica Opens/ The Big Bang
Can we all collectively agree that this two-parter is nowhere near perfect and should not be held in such high regard in retrospect? There is a brilliant mystery at the forefront of the episode, this is what people tend to latch on to but I can't help but fixate on the pay-off of this mystery which is ultimately really disappointing. 'The Pandorica Opens' is 45 minutes of The Doctor and Co. standing around a mystery box and the next episode is Moffat fumbling around his loose ends and trying desperately to make a cohesive explanation for any of this. The writing just chucks mystery after mystery at its audience in order to keep them entertained which I just find irritating and frustrating because I know the pay-off in retrospect. At the time it is incredible to see all these elements come into play but the mystery is only as good as the answer and here Moffat just tends to chuck a lot of ideas at the audience to keep you from actually thinking about what is happening. The cold open tracks through guest stars of the series, then finding a way to get River to meet The Doctor in this convoluted spectacle which is once again just faff before the actual episode begins. There is no character arc or cohesive narrative in 'The Pandorica Opens', Moffat even chucks in a pointless Cyberman action scene to give the illusion of action and pace but it doesn't have anything other than mystery going for it. Seeing all of the villains team-up together to lock The Doctor up is a brilliant spectacle and one hell of a cliffhanger but I find it to be a messy conclusion as to what the Pandorica is, it diminishes the effect of each one of these villains and comes out of nowhere in the context of the show's continuity.
'The Big Bang' is an absolute mess of nonsensical Moffat plotting that is quite fun to watch but is ultimately just nonsense. I like when the show gets to play with time travel but I find this to be beyond convenient and just really noisy and insubstantial for an episode that is tackling so many mysteries. It is an entertaining watch but it parades as being the cleverest thing the show has ever done, the reveal as to what the cracks are is messy and confusing. The TARDIS exploding and restarting the universe is a nonsense sentence that is not a satisfying answer, the thing is that no answer would be satisfying for this mess of a mystery. What are the cracks? How is Rory back? What has Amy got to do with this? are a series of questions that are brought up time and time again in this repetitive fashion that give of this effect of being much more important than they are. Moffat writes with a focus on mystery, he consistently teases the audience with the impossible questions that seem really clever but this is his own undoing when he struggles to answer them. It is somewhat impressive how he unwinds the cliffhanger but that is essentially half an hour of the episode, it is such a bombastic cliffhanger so in order to unravel it half the episode revolves around untying it and it feels uninteresting for me. Seeing Eleven jump around time fixing it is entertaining but feels far too convenient and the rest of the episode just fizzles out into nothing with this ending that is over-written and frustratingly vague. Complicated isn't necessarily clever and here is the big example of how often these two get confused.
A Christmas Carol
Now it's no secret I am not a fan of this era but I do kind of really love this Christmas special for what it is. It is an unwritten rule that Nuwho Christmas specials are usually kind of really bad, RTD made them feel like on-off stories you turn your brain off for an hour on Christmas Day. However 'A Christmas Carol' is this really captivating and interesting sci-fi Christmas time-travel story that has such a beautiful feel to it. I love how it works around this one specific concept, The Doctor must teach an old scrooge to be a better person in order to turn off a storm that may result in a ship crashing containing Amy and Rory. For a Christmas episode, it knows what it is and priorities making a delightful Christmas story adapted to the sci-fi concept and it knows what exactly it is doing without an obsession on being clever. It doesn't rely on being irritatingly over-filled and smug, it is a surprisingly simple genius idea that is actually developed and focused on in an interesting and entertaining way. Something about seeing Smith 'Christmas Carol' someone is such a genius idea and really emphasises Moffat's fairytale and whimsical writing style whilst also really focusing on some really emotional moments. It knows exactly what it is and I appreciate that it does it in a confident but not smug way, the attention is always on making a story that feels Christmassy and endearing for the audience whilst also just based on an idea that is genuinely ingenious. Michael Gambon is an incredible actor and he brings so much to this role, you can tell he is genuinely really committed to making this character believable and sympathetic. It tells you the solution to the conflict immediately and takes the audience on this journey without teasing something clever to come and instead choosing to tell the story in an earnest and unique way. It isn't perfect, it can get a bit silly and a bit too whimsical in places but for what it is I absolutely adore it and think it is still to this day the best Christmas Special.
I want to say a big Thank You for sticking with me in this review. I know Series 5 holds a very special place in a lot of people's hearts but I struggle with it on so many levels. It is a complete matter of individual taste, I prefer my stories smaller and more personal with a sense of modesty rather than showy-off spectacle. I struggle to separate seeing the patterns in Moffat as a writer and it plagues revisiting his work, it works in the heat of the moment but on revisiting feels muddled and you start to see through the layers. Of course, the beauty of 'Doctor Who' is that everyone has there idealistic perspective of what it should be and because the show is consistently changing and consistently reinventing itself you can bear with it and enjoy whatever moment of 'Doctor Who' you want,
Thanks for reading!