Bad Wolf

I'm trying very hard not to overload on the superlatives, but "Bad Wolf" feels like the episode I always knew RTD had in him, but which he hadn't been able to deliver.

Put quite simply, my view is that this epsiode was possibly the most perfect episode of Doctor Who of the series, and even perhaps of all 30+ years of Doctor Who. It was packed full of humour, pathos, excitement, drama, questions and satire. The pacing was terribly well judged and as the climax built you knew that any moment that famous 'Dr Who' scream of the theme music was going to come, and you kept willing it to stay away for as long as possible. And then the post-credit sequence allowed an exciting glimpse of next week's episode and then suddenly next week seemed such a long way away. I punched the air with excitement and then I just had to sit there for several minutes before I could pick my jaw up off the floor, and the adrenaline subsided. Suddenly I was 10 years old again, watching Tom Baker in Genesis of the Daleks. It was a riveting and dramatic episode.

For the first time in the series, I honestly think that RTD has done virtually nothing wrong. There is a question mark about how the transmat beam was able to move people out of the previously impervious TARDIS. (For what it's worth, my own view is that The Doctor's been involved in The Long Game for rather longer than he thinks - and that the Daleks have had him trapped, playing this game for some time, possibly to keep him out of the way) and that the TARDIS isn't the TARDIS, but a VR reconstruction - all part of the game.) Othewise, I found the episode utterly flawless. It's the first time I've watched an epside again straight after its first viewing (the only episode I have watched more than once was "Dalek" but it was several days before I felt that I wanted to see it again). I can hardly wait for next week's season finale - the worst thing about is that my girlfriend is dragging me off to a folk music night (oh dear!), so I've got to sit through all that music and wait until we get home before I can see the episode. It feels like torture! I think that The Parting of the Ways will be the best episode of the year. I really hope that RTD writes more episodes like this next year. If he does, we're in for an amazing second season.

For the record, I'd like to say that my view is that the man saying "the Daleks survived through me" is Davros.