The Satan Pit

As I'm sure my review of 'The Impossible Planet' demonstrated, I loved last week's episode. I was slightly concerned, however, that this week's resolution would not live up to the potential of part one's setup.

I needn't have worried, since 'The Satan Pit' was possibly even better than its predecessor.

With the Doctor and Rose separated for the episode, the danger of repeating events from part one was bypassed and the danger of last week's cliffhanger was averted in a nice, action-packed opening ten minutes where the Ood were overcome by the crew of Sanctuary Base 6 and Miss Tyler. What then followed was, if anything, even darker than what had come before.

The biggest surprise this episode threw up was that the baddie was, indeed, the devil. Maybe an alien creature responsible for the origin of the story, but certainly not anything posing as the Beast (my biggest worry about the possible resolution of the story). The Doctor was forced to accept the fact that such a being could, in fact, exist. The explanation for the black hole and Satan's prison were clever, and wonderfully tied-in to a re-establishing of the relationship between the Doctor and Rose. To send the Beast into the black hole, the Doctor has to be prepared to let Rose die. In a lovely twist, however, we see that the Doctor has learned since The Parting of the Ways that Rose is nobody's victim, trusting in her to look after herself.

There was just so much to love about this episode.

The Beast CGI was excellent and I was easily able to forgive the slight shakiness of superimposing David Tennant over a matte background for the sense of scale the image gave us.

Once again, the depth of the supporting characters in the two-parter was shown in the nice nod to Danny's claustrophobia, Ida's family background, Zach's pained sense of responsibility and Jefferson's touching death.

What really makes this episode so special, though, is that it is all payoff - not only for part one, but for everything which has happened so far since the show relaunched. My biggest complaint about the episodes after 'The Girl in the Fireplace' was that they felt a little static in terms of character development. Here, though, we see how the Doctor is not as all-wise and infallible as he can appear, and how the honeymoon is over for Rose's travels, with the danger surrounding her growing massively. Will she 'die in battle'? Well, I thought Mickey would and got that wrong, but leaving us unsure whether she is alive or dead would certainly fit the suggestion that this season ends on a cliffhanger ...

With season 3 looming, the moment when the Doctor questions all he believes and falls into the pit bodes well for a tenth Doctor who could be set to lose some of his chipperness and have some real darkness to deal with for the first time since he took off that leather jacket.

This is the season 2 I wanted - bigger, more epic but keeping the underlying sense of something sinister which served season 1 so well.

Next week? Well, I'm a little unconvinced, but if we get a character piece in the mould of last year's pleasantly surprising 'Boom Town', I'll be happy.