Human Nature

Now this is more like it; a beautiful, properly-paced old-style adventure that really shows up the frantic one-episode runarounds like 42 and Lazarus as the empty vessels they are - and this story actually has a decent central premise that makes it both unlike anything that's been attempted before, and oddly remensicent of the slow-burning more surreal adventures of early Davison.

A lot of the reason this 2-parter works so well, I think, is that it is finally structured like an old-school 4-parter (so far at least). Whereas some of the previous doubles have just been extended episodes 1 and 4, with the first half all slow build-up and the second collapsing into 45 minutes of frantic resolution, as it stands Human Nature is a perfect tradational 1 and 2, with the scary scarecrows arriving at almost bang-on the half way point in time for what would have been a cliffhanger.

Oh yes! It's all just so wonderful up to that point. The acting, the atmosphere, the delicately woven plotting, the nostalgic nods to the show's past. And just when you think it can't get any better, a bunch of scarecrows turn up and start rampaging about with their own patent Wizard-Of-Oz-gone-bad lollop. There's nothing scarier than animated scarecrows, not even clowns, so why it's taken them so long to mine this particular source of kiddy nightmares is a mystery.

Another important reason this story is such a triumph is that it's just so different. I've recently been bemoaning the profusion of urban-set adventures and lack of anything rural during RTD's reign, and bingo - a little English village, country folk, woodland... I've also been getting a bit bored by the regularity of alien invasions and large landmarks becoming illuminated, so again this is looking very promising in that respect. Only "The Family" themselves feel a bit standard, shooting innocent bystanders like the Judoon and generally over-acting in their first scene (all very high school drama class, the weakest moment for me), chewing their dialogue like any number of other invaders.

While we're on weak moments, the bit with the piano was silly but didn't overtly bother me. Only yet more Rose-based mooning soured the cream a little, but only a little. It passed quickly enough.

David Tennant was at his best yet, playing the likeably vague school teacher with total conviction; the scene with our hero coolly overseeing the machine gun practice, and authorising the young lad to be beaten by his colleagues were chillingly out of character. Two honourable special-mentions for me must go to Spaced's Jessica Hynes, who would make a wonderfully different companion were she allowed to stay on - the most enjoyable companions from the original series were often those from very closeted backgrounds having their eyes gradually opened by their travels with the Doctor; and a straight-laced woman in her mid-30s in the TARDIS would be a delight - and an unexpected left-field treat in the form of Murray Gold's score, not the usual metallic pomp and bombast at all. The strange piece of music which accompanied Martha's visit to the TARDIS sounded like a Burt Bacharach instrumental from the 1960s, while the waltz at the village dance was just lovely. Not to everyone's taste, of course, but I like that kind of thing.

So, on to the references. Nods to the past in Doctor Who have a habit of seeming either crassly smug (the horribly misjudged "new science fiction series" moment in Remembrance Of The Daleks), or just shoehorned in for the sake of it. Here they were perfectly balanced; the nostalgic trawl through memory lane combined with the Doctor-becoming-human plot, this almost felt like what the last episode ever would be like. I'm sure I haven't spotted them all, but these are the ones I noticed:

The biggest reference has to have been Mawdryn Undead: a regular character, having taken a post teaching in an all-boys public school, loses all memory of his past adventures; meanwhile one of the pupils is not all he seems. On the same track, the scene between "John Smith" and the young boy is very very reminiscent of a similar scene towards the start of An Unearthly Child. Then there's the cricket ball stunt from Four To Doomsday. The gag about Gallifrey being in Ireland is a reference to at least one Tom Baker adventure (I forget which). There's a musical nod to Remembrance Of The Daleks with the little girl. And the cockle-warming namecheck for Verity Lambert and Sidney Newman, which could have been toe-curling in the wrong hands. I'm sure there were many others too, and I'm equally sure other reviewers will point them out.

I'm almost nervous to watch next week's episode, I desperately don't want them to blow it. As it stands, I would say this was the best Doctor Who episode since the Davison era, perhaps even Hinchcliffe's Tom Baker years. I'm told this story comes from a spin-off novel predating the RTD era; if so it shows in the depth and richness of the adventure. The only depressing thing is that they could and should have been making stories of this calibre sooner. This is how it's done!