Smith and Jones

No doubt there was a time when a whimsical pun would have been relegated to the closet of odd working titles prior to a more suitable title for a Who story being thought up. Instead, we get the working title for the title, while the far better one, Baptism of Fire, is filed away.

Smith and Jones then kicks of Season Three in fairly typical RTD fashion: an impossibly far-fetched plot interspersed with utterly irrelevant and irritating contemporary soap, lots of running up and down corridors (ironic, as that's often what the classic show was criticised for), some token flirting with (new) companion, a totally inappropriate snog with said companion, equally inappropriate sexual innuendo (re the ?fetish' aspect of the all-leather androids), big chunky aliens with no back-story (whose leather-clad bulks just beg the question, why not just bring back the Sontarans, rather than a bunch of Rhinos with a stupid language?), lots of spectacle and explosion, a wacky, near-demented, Jarvis Cocker-Doctor who seems perpetually cranked into a post-regeneration personality crisis, and, well, everything else?

In the scenes with the Doctor sat up scrawny and bulging-eyed like a medley of Charles Hawtrey and Kenneth Williams in one of the hospital Carry On films, I kept thinking, what is it about Tennant's obviously enthusiastic and quirky attempt at portraying the Timelord that jars with me? I still can't quite put my finger on it, but I think he's falling into the trap that Colin Baker fell into (also, interestingly, a Who fan prior to playing the part): overt enthusiasm. This isn't good. The brilliance of Tom Baker, for instance, was that he didn't make his enthusiasm so obvious, and actually originally often underplayed the part, frequently subdued and convincingly alien for that, so when his occasional quirky outbursts came, they resonated all the more for the contrast. Tennant's mistake is that he cranks up the wackiness and eccentricity too much and too frequently, so that one almost itches with irritation, just aching for his Doctor to play a bit for subtlety now and then. He does sometimes, and when he does, he is at his most likeable and convincing. Unfortunately, for a Doctor who resembles a slightly geeky Science under-graduate, there really is no need for extra eye-bulging, limb-flailing, and general impersonations of a stick-insect on speed. Tone it down, David, for God's sake.

The continual hyperbole regarding Tenant's portrayal must, I think, be taken with a large pinch of salt: it's all spin, something New Who has in common with New Labour, and the attempt at sexing-up the Doctor is part of this pumping up of the part, and its current incumbent. David Tennant is certainly a good Doctor, when he's allowed to be, but anyone with any remote knowledge of the classic series will know that on many levels his incarnation falls far short of at least three or four of the old Doctors. Compared to Troughton, Pertwee or Tom Baker, Tennant is still in the playground in terms of portrayal ? he is still promising in places, but his exaggerated youthfulness in appearance and approach sits as awkwardly with ?attempted gravitas' as McCoy's clownish physiognomy and clumsy articulation once did (though the latter eventually mastered the darkness of the part in stories such as The Curse of Fenric). Tennant could also do with a touch of Davison's well-gauged subtlety and underplaying too.

The hype is already spreading about the new companion Martha, possibly due to insecurity at the ? in my view, belated ? departure of Billie Piper. So far Martha seems to me a fairly run-of-the-mill companion, whose apparent special ?something' in actress Freema Agyeman (sic) coincides with almost air-brushed good looks. Time will tell. But let's have less of the teenagery flirting with the Doctor.

Good touches this episode? Not many, sadly. A bit of a New Earth-syndrome going on here: too much of a potpourri of only half-explored ideas and concepts thrown together into a bit of mess of a plot (a potpourri plot indeed) ? ironic considering RTD referred to Dickens' The Old Curiosity Shop in the same way. Mmmm, what is it the philosophers said RTD? Know thyself? The upwards rain was a nice touch, the Judoon (very Star Wars-sounding name again) looked convincing if a little bit like extras from Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy, with a very Vogon-like bureaucratic approach and lumbering sense of ?justice'. Roy Marsden led a bit of dramatic leaven to proceedings, though was sadly under-used and killed off too early by a very Rezzie-esque Anne Reid as a plazmavore whom we never actually see in her true form ? having to make do with a weird old lady in pyjamas with a straw in her mouth. The straw was a bit of a silly touch I thought, so very RTD in that sense.

So, not much else to say on this rather ludicrous episode of New Who except that which was ominously chanted ten years previously by New Labour: Things Can Only Get Better? surely?

3/10