Doomsday

What a wonderful episode! It had suspense, drama, love, hard sci-fi, great acting, and the kind of war fans have wanted for thirty years. Put simply, what precisely did it lack?

Without a doubt, this is the best script RTD has written for the show thus far. The direction was also quite superb. While Graeme Harper may have thrown some of the fans, especially those in this forum, for a loop with the "Army of Ghosts," he returned true to form with this installment. The Daleks were vicious, callous, and powerful. In lieu of the insane creatures we met at the end of the 9th doctor's reign, these were the original, genuine article and it was a pleasure to see them in action doing what they were designed to do. For their part, the pan-dimensional-Cybermen were also a return to the past; they were cold, calculating killing machines whose pride and anger, as in past scripts, came out very strongly. The wonderful exchange between these two classic adversaries was brilliantly written. The Daleks referring to the Cybermen as pests and nonchalantly dismissing their destructive potential was fascinating, a distinct contrast to the ethical dilemmas faced by the humans in "Pete's world" who found it hard to blot out these metal monsters so carelessly. The humans, while opening the breach in both realities and helping spur the events of this episode and the prior one, were kind, strong, and compassionate, displaying precisely the qualities that endears the Doctor to his "favorite" planet.

RTD did his homework and maintained tradition and history. The Daleks recognize the Cybermen based on their form and function, describing them as lifeforms that "resemble" the Doctor's historical adversaries. The Daleks home planet of Skaro is referenced. The "background radiation" from series 1 that releases the Dalek from his shackles is elegantly woven into the fabric of this story and explained satisfactorily for the plot to be consistent and believable. And how about Pete's jeep? That was a U.N.I.T. vehicle, complete with camouflage!

For the sake of the young audience and heart-sick Whovians everywhere, it was a stroke of genius to reunite Rose with her family at the expense of traveling with the Doctor. She made her choice and the Doctor allowed her to stay and do what she wanted to do - the repercussions of which were due to the mission and not a well-meaning plan. It allowed both characters to remain true to themselves and to sacrifice for each other without some cheap, tidy ending.

My only qualms with the plot, minor as they may be, are: Why was there a Torchwood in Pete's reality since Torchwood was a consequence of the Doctor's involvement with Queen Victoria in a different reality? Why would the Timelords stick several million Daleks into a TARDIS-like prison instead of just obliterating them all? Or, put another way, couldn't the time war have ended a bit less disastrously if the Timelords had simply placed ALL the Daleks into one of these devices and then tossed it into the void?

Potential plot holes aside, this felt like classic Doctor Who. The love between the two main characters was palpable - not the kind of adolescent puppy-love found on American television but a true adult relationship. Seeing that adult relationship come to a close was hard to watch, partly because the "old team," as Rose put it, was a great one and partly because the breakup was inevitable.

Let's hope the strong characterization and high-quality scripts are continued in series 3.