The End Of The World

The moment the episode began, I knew that this would be the episode which secured the series' future. I was worried that this story might effect the new viewers' opinions.

However, I though that the episode was surprisingly good. It was unfortunate although, that there was not much plot to it. In my opinion, in order to cater for the modern audience, the stories have become less complicated, because as a modern audience, people do not seem to have an attention span anymore. This may not be the case, it may be that R.T.D was still trying to develop a relationship between the Doctor and Rose before the real adventures start.

As you would expect, the special effects were spectacular. The effect used to make Cassandra was like nothing that I have ever seen outside a cinema before. I feel sure that the quality and quantity of the new series' special effects should make sure that younger viewers continue to watch for years to come. I am afraid however, that like in cinema, television is possibly becoming too dependent on visual effects. This again links in with the fact that many viewers seem not to have an attention span.

I thought that the majority of the music in this episode was very well put together. However, I feel that the music used for the "little blue men" was entirely inappropriate. I enjoyed in particular, the way in which two pieces of pop music were woven cunningly into the episode (Tainted Love and Toxic), however, we must not forget that this has been attempted before in Doctor Who, in stories such as "Remembrance of the Daleks", where pop music has been included in the soundtrack, and thus has made DVD and video release very difficult.

I have always believed that in Doctor Who a pre-titles sequence always seems to work very well. It seems to be a technique which is being used more and more today in modern television and seems to be a good way of setting the story. This is probably the best structure, particularly for stories of just one episode. I also like the "Next week" section at the end of each episode, however, I only think that it works with one and two part stories and no more than that. If something like this were attempted in the original series, it would almost certainly have undermined the cliff-hanger.

The make up in this episode was also spectacular, it is good to see monsters and aliens who aren't just latex into which and actor has been encased. It also gives us a chance to see the actors performing. Even with Cassandra, instantly I knew which actor was playing her part because of the tremendous special effects used to create her. Although she was almost completely 2D, it retained some of Zoл Wanamaker's distinguishing features.

All in all I enjoyed this story, and am really looking forward to episode three - The Unquiet Dead, because I have always felt that the historical stories make the best of Doctor Who's plot.