TV: Doctor Who Series 7 - The Name of the Doctor

This series of patchy episodes seems to have flown by and here we are at the much hyped finale. Doctor Who has never been so high profile, with success on both sides of the Atlantic, a tribute at the Baftas, and stories in the press of how this episode was accidentally leaked in America. It seems we can't get enough of Doctor Who yet I approached this latest 'best episode ever' with a certain amount of trepidation and even ambivalence; Moffat may be a great writer but his writing has certain consistent flaws that, to my mind anyway, make his version of Doctor Who as much annoyance as enjoyment. Series 6 was where his shortcomings as a master plotter were shown up with a convoluted and unsatisfying arc that gave too much airtime to supporting character Professor Song, that many fans have dubbed that series River Who. Will the resolution of companion Clara's 'impossible girl' storyline be any more satisfying? And of course there's the title of this week's episode; can the Doctor's true name really be revealed? Won't it make the title of the show a nonsense? More importantly, does anyone apart from people with very pale skin, thick glasses, a huge broadband bill and poor personal hygiene actually care? In the end once again Moffat cheated but this time, he ended up offering us something even more tantalising.

We start with a fangasm moment as Clara is spinning through some gold swirly stuff, complete with a voiceover that recalled Rose and Doomsday. We then see her, in some tremendous outfits from various decades, looking in on the past Doctors (via digital trickery). There's a guy in the background who looks like Colin Baker (is it Sylvester in a wig?), there's Tom from The Invasion of Time, Peter from Arc of Infinity, Bessie! Best of all, there's Doctor Bill, about to get into his stolen TARDIS for the first time with Susan. It's a marvellous and fondly put together montage - Moffat's way of letting us know that, while he doesn't believe in bringing back all the old actors, he knows that we should at least see the classic Doctors in this 50th Anniversary year. Thank you, Moff, it was really appreciated.

With his friends, the Paternoster gang, kidnapped, the Doctor must go to the one place he should never go - Trenzalore, mentioned as the location of 'the fall of the eleventh' at the end of Series 6. Clara receives the tip off via an ancient letter (shades of The Impossible Astronaut) and a magic candle that allowed her to have a dream conference with the Paternoster Gang and a dead River Song. Yes, you read that correctly. Here we have one of the finest examples of Moffat's annoying traits - his wilful disregard for anything that even resembles logical sense. A magic Silurian dream candle?! Bloody hell. We did get one great line however, as Clara and River meet where Clara revealed that of course the Doctor mentioned a Professor Song but she hadn't realised she was female. Priceless. The Doctor is soon blubbing about having to go to Trenzalore. Whatever happened to the Doctor's stiff upper lip? Jon Pertwee might have rubbed the back of his neck, Colin Baker may have looked out at the camera and shouted "Nooo!!!" but Doctor 11 loves a good sob. He's the Wallander of Doctors and, great as Matt Smith is, it's a device used too often. When a single tear rolled down Chris Eccleston's face it was electrifying but now we just think - he's off again! Perhaps his name should be revealed to be Boo.

Doctor (Boo) Who

Anyway, I digress. The good Doc and Clara head off to Trenzalore, a place that resembles the Genesis Planet from Star Trek 3 from a distance and a Gothic Cemetery on the surface. Trenzalore is the place the Doctor should never go to because he dies there, in the future, and is buried in his tomb, the TARDIS, which has grown on the outside to be a huge monument to the fallen hero. What an irresistible idea; a shame it isn't Moffat's. Back in the 2000s the excellent writer Lawrence Miles wrote a similar concept, with aliens bidding to buy the Doctor's future corpse in Alien Bodies. It's still a knockout concept and one that gave the episode a properly serious and funereal feel. Thankfully both Moffat and Smith realised that such a weighty topic meant the Doctor had to tone down his more zany moments, making this one of Smith's more sombre and effective performances ever. He was utterly compelling from start to finish this week.

Our heroes were menaced by the Whispermen, a new foe but one that felt rather underwhelming. In appearance they were the Trickster from The Sarah Jane Adventures in a top hat and had a hissy thing going on that recalled classic tale Fury From the Deep. They were basically foot soldiers for The Great Intelligence, still in the guise of Doctor Simeon (Richard E Grant) who had orchestrated the kidnappings to get the Doctor to say his name to open his tomb. OK - how arrogant would you be, once dead, to allow your very dangerous tomb to be opened by someone saying your name? Why? It made little sense, other than to tease us fans that his name would be revealed. In the end, River (present in a ghostly form by her link to Clara from earlier) said it out of earshot. Once inside we find that the Doctor didn't die and leave a body but a pretty light thingy in the centre of the TARDIS that was kind of Time scar tissue from all his various meddlings over the centuries. The Great Intelligence jumped in and set about erasing the Doctor from History.

By now it was pretty obvious that Clara would have to jump after him and, in the process, go about saving him all over time. It was a cute explanation of the Impossible Girl but also a little unsatisfying as well. Why could only the First and Eleventh Doctor see her? Are we meant to believe that thousands of Claras have been splintered throughout time just to save him? Are there alien Claras on Skaro and Klom? As usual with Moffat's big concepts, it didn't really add up when you really think about it. Wouldn't all these additional Claras totally mess up the Web of Time or something? Oh well, let's be honest, Doctor Who has never made sense over its 50th years. Best not to nit pick. Just sit and enjoy our Clara watching previous Doctors race about. Of course, this is quite reminiscent of The Parting of the Ways, where Rose, instead of splintering herself, seeded the clue Bad Wolf throughout Series 1. Anyhow, a newly restored Doctor raced into his own time stream to save Clara who had turned up in some spooky caverns with extras dressed as Doctors running around as if they were late to work.

Preview tapes had omitted the last five minutes and Moffat's little grenade in time for the anniversary special. There's a Doctor that Clara doesn't recognise, or us for that matter. Our Doctor doesn't even want to acknowledge him. Looks like Paul McGann's Eighth, whom fans had hypothesised had been the one to destroy the Daleks and Time Lords in the Great Time War, was innocent and we have a new Doctor, the real Ninth, that we never knew about. It's a simple yet brilliant idea and fulfils all Moffat's aims of producing a big hype worthy twist and to muck about with the fans, probably driving some to total collapse as they discuss what to now call Chris Eccleston's Doctor. As played by John Hurt, this Forgotten Doctor looks set to be a key part of the November special. Fair play Moffat - that was a great moment. Now build upon it.

John Hurt is the err, Ninth? Twelfth? Forgotten?

In the end, how effective was this closer? I think I've written at length about the expected plot holes that riddle this episode but it was a very engrossing 45 minutes of Who. Smith was on top form and Coleman's Clara was engaging and likeable, something she hasn't always been in this series. River Song too managed to return and not be irritating in the extreme but a poignant ghost, left to a shadowy half life in some computer data base by the man she loves. The fact that the Doctor could see her all the time but failed to acknowledge it as it would hurt him too much showed us a truly callous and selfish side of the great man and was as dark as anything we saw the Seventh do. The Paternoster Gang were also well used this time out, the expected humour being balanced by some real jeopardy and emotion. Moffat's Who, in my mind, has always struggled to recreate the truly emotional highlights that Russell T Davies' version could do in its sleep but here there were some genuinely affecting scenes, not just the Doctor/River moment but also Vastra, robbed of her partner Jenny and facing attack from her friend Strax as the Doctor was eliminated from Time. Moffat's Who is a flavour I sometimes find hard to love but this time out he produced a truly memorable episode that will be talked about for years. Bring on November.

GK Rating: ****

Audio: Doctor Who - The Juggernauts

Poor old Scott Alan Woodard gets saddled with a huge list of elements to include in this adventure: not just Davros, but also the Daleks and one off robots the Mechanoids from The Chase. It's not in itself a bad play but it doesn't offer much that is new, rehashing previous Dalek tales and recent Big Finish play Davros.

The Doctor and Mel (Colin Baker and Bonnie Langford) are separated - while Mel ends up on a colony world, working for the sweet Professor Vasso, the Doctor has been kidnapped by the Daleks. However, the Doc is amazed to find that the Daleks want his help. Professor Vasso is in fact Davros, creator of the Daleks. In a nod to the classic tale Genesis of the Daleks, the Daleks want the Doctor to be their agent and stop whatever scheme the mad scientist is up to that could risk the future of the Dalek race. Reluctantly, the Doctor agrees. But is Davros actually doing some good, converting some old Mechanoids, robotic former foes of the Daleks, into mining droids for the good of humanity? The Doctor doesn't believe a leopard can change its spots, but Mel is not so sure...

 The Juggernauts makes for an enjoyable enough listen and Colin Baker and Bonnie Langford make an engaging TARDIS team. On TV, Mel got seriously short changed and there's a real attempt here to give her a bit more character, utilising her computer programming talents and giving her a romance with fellow worker Jeff. She also gets to show a steelier side later on. Terry Molloy, a seasoned radio actor, always gives a great performance as the mad Davros, giving us his more manipulative side as well as the occasional expected rant. The trouble is that nothing here is original. This isn't always a problem - on TV, The Planet of the Daleks was a basic rewrite of the first Dalek tale but was still a lot of fun. Here, however, the similarity to past Dalek tales and especially the similarity to the recent Davros play, where the scientist also ingratiated himself into a society and manipulated them, is too close. There's also not much good you can say about the Mechanoids (or Juggernauts as they're called here). They look stupid, which isn't a problem on audio but they sound stupid too. In the end we just end up with Nicholas Briggs talking to himself again as robot pepper pots and robot golf balls shoot at each other a lot.

GK Rating: ***

Audio: Doctor Who - The Next Life

I've been fairly underwhelmed by the last two seasons of the Eighth Doctor adventures from Big Finish with the whole Divergence storyline leaving me cold. C'rizz, the new alien companion, has been dreadful and the stories have too often placed experimentation over entertainment. So when I noticed that the final part of this storyline was another Alan Barnes/Gary Russell multi disc epic my heart sank, their last 'huge epic' Zagreus being absolutely self indulgent and awful to listen to. Maybe they've learnt or maybe my expectations were sufficiently lowered as I found The Next Life, while large and sprawling, mostly fun and enjoyable.

Having his TARDIS back, the Doctor (Paul McGann) and his two companions Charley and C'rizz (India Fisher and Conrad Westmaas) have been having adventures in the Divergent Universe. However, the TARDIS suddenly ceash lands on a strange blue planet with just one island. While Charley and C'rizz find themselves rescued by Rassilon (Don Warrington), the Doctor has found himself with the enigmatic and beautiful Perfection, wife of Daqar Keep, the richest man in the galaxy and here on the blue world to try to solve its mysteries. Also with Keep is Guidance (Blake's 7's Paul Darrow), someone known well to C'rizz. With Guidance, the Kro'ka and Rassilon's words leading to the Doctor's two friends questioning him and with the Doctor and Perfection being hunted to the death by Keep and his forces, can the Doctor solve the mystery of the Divergent Universe, keep his friends and escape back into the real Universe?

Barnes and Russell have a bit checklist of things they need to tie up in this tale and at times it shows. The final episode especially has lots of standing around and explaining things that go back right to the end of the second series of McGann audios and, like TV's LOST, you get the sense that the pair have scrambled around for solutions to problems they posed earlier on. The play also gets off to a bad start with yet another dream like world, this time bringing back Charley's mum (played by old Who companion Anneke Wills) and L'da, C'rizz's drippy fiancée. Things pick up when we join the Doctor and Perfection. Played by his only TV companion Daphne Ashbrook, the chemistry they shared in their brief screen time is faithfully recreated here and Ashbrook is obviously having a ball and is highly enjoyable in this. Stephane Cornicard is fine as Keep if a bit hammy. As for Darrow, as expected he is suitably theatrical, unfortunately he imbues Guidance with a mock Charlie Chan like delivery, going for inscrutable but ending up borderline offensive.

With so much to answer, the seams stretch at times but the writers should be commended for managing to just about tie up all the loose threads. The play suffers a little from villain overload, with Rassilon, Keep and Perfection (who turns out to be the embodiment of anti-Time beast Zagreus) but we do get resolution. C'rizz's origins are also described in more detail with the nice alien being given a decidly darker side. Unfortunately, Westmaas's acting skills are not up to showing this convincing, C'rizz always coming across as an ineffectual grammar school boy, not a potential murderous monk. At the end, however, the Divergent storyline has been wrapped up and our trio are back in our Universe and slap bang up to their neck in it with Davros and the Daleks!

GK Rating: ***

TV: The Apprentice 2013 - Week 3

Week 3 and the pressure is showing - especially in the bizarre cross dressing of Jordan, having his toenails painted black by the girls, and Myles in a pair of lacy knickers (or maybe that was Uzma). Thankfully Lord Sugar phoned and gave them a great task - design an innovative new piece of flatpack furniture.

The boys, winners of the past two tasks, were led by Jordan, the lovechild of Gok Wan and Bilbo Baggins. Alex from Wales suggested what looked initially like a deckchair but ended up as the Foldo, a chair that turns into a table. Nick commented that it reminded him of the electric chair 'Old Sparky'. Apart from it being made for giants, it looked credible and was certainly better that Kurt's bizarre suggestion of a chair you throw decomposing food matter down (isn't that a toilet?). Watching Alex, Jordan and Jason designing the chair was a hoot, especially when Jordan went to sit down, causing Jason to utter: "not you Jordan, someone average sized!" He also at one point, while folding the Foldo said: "that goes Clickity Boo!" God, I love him. While their design was promising they made hard work of the pitches: Jez, who looks like a slimy used car salesman pitches like one too, while Myles got his facts wrong. it didn't help that, at one point, the boys seemed to be pitching to what looked like Mr Spock's mum from Star Trek.

The girls were led by Natalie who wishes to get Lord Sugar to join her in a design venture. Uzma, who claimed to be in "the good look business", took a lead in the design. As usual there was a free for all and the usual breaking up into two distinct factions. Women must watch this show with their head in their hands. Their idea of 'a multi-functional cube' turned into an bloody ugly grey box on wheels with a lid and a chessboard scored in the side. It was absolutely hideous. What was hysterical was how they all knew it yet none (bar some bleating from Rebecca, broken by the others last week) had the courage to say it. As one lot were sourcing materials in B&Q, the design team were still changing the concept. "Are we table or lid or chair?" young Sophie wailed in the cushion aisle.

The box was named the Tidy Sidy but you can't polish a turd - it was a bloody ugly grey box on wheels. When one shop demurred, the dishy Doctor asked if the Tidy Sidy might be better suited to a different room; "a part of the house you couldn't see?" suggested the retailer. At Argos the girls went on a total charm offensive, much to the delight of the older men who look at pieces of wood all day, but you can flash all the leg and cleavage you like - it's a bloody ugly grey box on wheels and no-one wanted to buy it. An easy win for the boys.

In the boardroom the Tidy Sidy looked even worse. Lord Sugar declared it the 'Wishy Washy Poxy Boxy' which had a great ring to it. The girls, true to form, turned on each other before singling out their victim of the week, in this case Uzma. Give Uzma her due, she obliged by giving a boardroom performance that would have anyone sacking her, going on about her design skills when she had just made a bloody ugly grey box on wheels. Her inability to take blame or responsibility for
anything is also wearing in the extreme. Natalie however, had volunteered for PM because of her love of design. Hmmm. In the end, poor little Sophie, young and nice and vaguely embarrassed by the behaviour of the others, dug her own grave by telling the truth - she can't sell or design or pitch. Umm, what does that leave Sophie? The others couldn't believe their luck when Alan showed her the door.

Another great episode. Next week, the teams set up farm shops. Bring it on.

GK Rating: ****

Audio: Doctor Who - Caerdroia

Lloyd Rose is one of a select group of female Dr Who writers and one who wrote some of the very best novels of the BBC Eighth Doctor range, especially City of the Dead, one of my favourites. It's a shame then that, while her debut audio has its moments, it's underwhelming and more than a little muddled.

Still trapped in the Divergent Universe, the Doctor, Charley and C'rizz (Paul McGann, India Fisher and Conrad Westmaas) spy a way of escaping the Crucible World they have been travelling through and to find the fabled home of the Divergence, Caerdroia. This means taking on their jailer, the Kro'ka (Stephen Perring). After a mind duel, the travellers find themselves in a bizarre realm, with aspects of all their pasts and worlds on it. There's a Garden of Curiosities, a clock tower without hands and a labyrinth complete with minotaur. To makes things even stranger, the Doctor has been split into three versions, each with an aspect of his personality (rational, whimsical and dark). Can the travellers find their way through the maze and, if they do, could the TARDIS really be at the centre?

This release is not without its pleasures, especially McGann getting to channel three very different aspects of our hero. He does this remarkably well, being like Tigger for the jokey one and quite unnerving as the darker Doctor. It's like a multi-Doctor story but with the same actor playing all the parts! There's also a good face off between the Doctor and the Kro'ka, a villain who has been all talk and little action. Speaking of 'all talk', Caerdroia suffers from being written by a novelist - it's overwritten and wordy and mistakes movement for action. It doesn't help that, thematically, this is yet another release in this Eighth Doctor range to have a dream/imaginary/construct world and that, in many ways it resembles too closely Fifth Doctor TV tale Castrovalva. On the bright side, we finally hear chief villain Rassilon (Don Warrington) again and the Doctor is reunited with his TARDIS. However, with the Divergent Universe arc being wound up in the next issue there are still many unanswered questions and one can't help but admit that the entire storyline has been rather flat and dull. Let's hope the next one at least finishes things off well.

GK Rating: ***

Doctor Who - The Last

Consistency continues to be a problem for Big Finish with the last excellent play being followed by this dreary, overlong plod. The Doctor, Charley and C'rizz end up in a world ravaged by nuclear war. With the inhabitants dead, the Doctor and Charley end up in the underground bunker of mad leader Exclesior and her two ministers. Meanwhile C'rizz falls in with apparent survivor Requiem and his party. However, when C'rizz brings his friends to the bunker no-one else can see them. Are they figments of his imagination or ghosts? Meanwhile, Charley has been paralysed in an accident and all hope seems lost. With the planet dying around them death seems like a certainty. Can the Doctor solve the mystery of 'the Last' and, if so, be prepared to take a giant leap of faith?

Bless Gary Hopkins - he tries hard but The Last is a pretty awful listen. In his sleeve notes Hopkins explains that the aim of his play is to make the Doctor face a hopeless situation, to make it seem like everything is lost, but it doesn't make for an especially enjoyable or dramatic listen. Part of the problem is that many of the elements seem more mystical than science fiction with no satisfactory explanation given for what appears to be ghosts. Killing off Charley and C'rizz (they'll be back) is potentially interesting but Hopkins writes the Doctor's reactions as almost nonchalant. There's a decided lack of incident and the sound design is wanting, especially with the exact same sound effect used for every rockfall or crash.

Worse is the character of Exclesior. Written as a very unsubtle version of Mrs Thatcher, this pastiche is made even worse by guest artist Carolyn Jones's over the top rendition. It doesn't help that Thatcher has already been lampooned way back in 1988 in The Happiness Patrol. Did Hopkins never see it? Coming in at over 2 hours long, The Last is a poor play and best avoided.

GK Rating: **

Audio: Doctor Who - Faith Stealer

The fourth series of Eighth Doctor adventures kicks off with a witty and enjoyable opener. The Doctor, Charley and C'rizz (Paul McGann, India Fisher and Conrad Westmaas) are still in the Divergent Universe moving from zone to zone searching for the TARDIS. The trio end up at the Multihaven, a settlement that applies market forces to Religion. While the Doctor meets the Multihaven's administrator the Bordinan, a traumatised C'rizz (he mercy killed his partner a while back) falls in with The Church of Lucidity, a cult that is attracting converts at an alarming rate, threatening the diversity of the Multihaven. What is Miraculite? What is causing the Sleep Riots? Why can the Doctor keep hearing but not seeing his ship? Soon, the whole of the Multihaven is under threat from 'So Much Lucidity!'

After a dodgy season of new universe plays a few months ago, this new run gets off to a much better start. There are some great ideas here, about religion, faith, identity and the competitive market and writer Graham Duff balances these well and with a wonderfully light touch. There's something of Douglas Adams about some of Duff's situations and dialogue, especially the rather marvellous Church of Serendipity, that believes in happy accidents and worships the God Whoops! McGann seems to be having fun again and C'rizz gets a bit more of the action, even if Westmaas is still the weak link in the current travelling trio. A very entertaining start to this new mini run.

GK Rating: ****