Steven Moffat’s two-parter, like “The Unquiet Dead,” it had a very “Talons of Weng-Chiang” feel to it, not only in it’s dark tone but also in it’s more light-hearted moments. All in all, the story is another classic – and I mean classic – right up there with “Caves of Androzani,” “City of Death,” et al.

The opening scene of "The Empty Child" throws us right into the action with the Doctor and Rose chasing the Tula ambulance. I had to laugh at the Doctor’s little digs at humanity; “red is just humans,” and how “you can’t go anywhere in the universe without bumping into Earth.” I thought the latter comment especially funny, as by the looks of things we don’t get a single episode in this series set away from our Solar System, except “Parting of the Ways” perhaps? Wishful thinking! Even this budget will only stretch so far.

When the TARDIS lands, a month too late as per usual, I loved the quick succession of brilliant scenes we had to enjoy. We had the Doctor wander into the nightclub with his immortal line asking “if anything had fell from the sky”, followed by Rose first hearing the Empty Child’s voice, following him up onto a rooftop then being swept away by a barrage balloon! When the Doctor comes out of the club to find Rose gone, he strokes a cat (how 6th Doctor!) telling it how he wishes he could find someone who got the “don’t wander off thing.” Brilliant! The ringing phone was also a nice touch, and the introduction of Nancy was also wonderfully done. What is she hiding?

As for the scenes of Rose, Union Jack T-shirt and all, hanging from a barrage balloon from the sky in the middle of the Blitz… well. What can you say? On a TV budget the special effects were superb. More importantly, it introduced us to John Barrowman’s fantastic character, Captain Jack Harness. If you can forgive him for saying “excellent bottom” instead of “nice ass” or something american (which after all, he is a time agent posing as an american… I think) his introductory scene is brilliant. I loved how the “cellphone” creeped into the story again, and I couldn’t contain my laughter when he told her to turn it off because it was interfering with his tractor beam!

The Doctor stumbling onto Nancy’s air raid feeding frenzy was my favourite scene in the episode for a number of reasons. First off, both the Doctor and Nancy are brilliant in the scene. The Doctor’s dialogue is superbly written in fluent ‘northern,’ right from “good here innit” (a catchphrase of my brother’s) to his line about looking for a blonde in a union jack – well, a “specific blonde.” I loved his line about him not being sure whether it was “Marxism in action or a West End Musical” – mirroring the audience’s thoughts exactly! Trust him to take two slices as well! When the child arrives, causing everyone to scarper, it is a truly chilling scene. There is something about a gas mask that is really, really frightening. Put a child in one and as far as horror and creepiness goes, you’re onto a winner. I was impressed with how the Doctor was the only one who opened the door to the child; still after all he’s been through the optimist. But, aha, the child has gone.

The Doctor follows Rose to the site where the Tula ambulance crashed and another wonderful tete a tete ensues. Again the dialogue is dazzlingly written, “my nose has special powers,” says the Doctor when Nancy asks how he was able to follow her. “Do you ears have special powers to?” is Nancy’s savage reply, which isn’t just funny because the Doctor’s ears are quite big, but because of all Rose’s jibes that he should be more ‘Spock!’

Incidentally, I thought the Spock jibes were a great idea and worked brilliantly in the context of the story. Doctor Who has always been about good stories and characters, not too heavily reliant “alien tech.” No disrespect to the Star Trek franchise which I’m also a huge fan of, but they’ve always had far more money to spend on such things and it’s great how Rose – a typical child of the late 20th century – sees the Doctor as quite lo-tech and so when the flash Captain Jack comes along… crush!

“You want to know about the bomb? You need to talk to the Doctor,” says Nancy. Spoiler free-people must have thought “what?” and for a moment thought they were going to bring in Tom Baker, Davison, Colin Baker, McCoy or even McGann but no….

Meanwhile Captain Jack is entertaining Rose on the roof of his Tula warship, dancing with her, flirting and setting her up to be conned. It’s blatantly obvious how much Rose has fallen for the dashing Captain, especially with all his flash alien tech and champagne, not to mention his dancing. “Finally a professional.”

The Doctor and Nancy have another wonderful scene together. Somehow he knows she lost somebody, reasoning that is why she looks after all the kids, in a way making a comparison with himself. Then we have an epic and Doctor-like speech about the German war machine, “one damp little country says no…” Fantastic stuff. “I don’t know what you do to Hitler, but you lot frighten me.” Who’s he mis-quoting?

Finally we meet the mysterious ‘Doctor’, Doctor Constantine, played by the superb Richard Wilson. In his brief appearance he conveys a sense of disparity in keeping with the episode, and his line about before the war being “a grandfather and a father” and now being neither, “but still a Doctor” reminds us very much of a nameless Doctor we know – and I don’t mean the starship Voyager’s E.M.H. The premise of “physical injuries as plague” which becomes apparent as the Doctor examines all the victims is a very original idea for the show, and the big reveal – “what was the cause of death…. They’re not dead” – when all the zombies sit up is a classic Who moment.

Doctor Constantine’s horrific transformation reminded me of the nightmarish imagery in Pink Floyd’s “The Wall” movie. As I said earlier, gas masks are somehow inherently disturbing and see one grow out of someone’s throat… bone chilling stuff. I bet that scene put many a child behind the sofa. And to think this episode was shown EARLIER than usual!

When Jack and Rose find their way into the hospital the confused Jack is pleased to meet “Doctor Spock,” before realising that they aren’t “time agents” after all and so he can’t con them. Instead, he insults them by calling them “Flag girl” and “U-boat captain” (how many times can the Doctor’s appearance be attacked in one episode?)
Before he bleats out apologetically, almost pleadingly, “I’m a conman. That’s what I do.” The Doctor, of course, takes an instant dislike to the flash Captain.

Then we get the second cliff-hanger of the season, much more understated than the first, and all the better for it. The zombies advance on the Doctor, Rose and Jack, while the Empty Child closes in on Nancy… “are you my Mummy? Are you my Mummy…” So, how are they going to get out of this one? The Doctor is going to give the zombies a telling off. “Go to your room!” Fantastic, though as the Doctor pointed out, it’s a good job it worked because they would be crappy last words, especially compared to “it’s the end… but the moment has been prepared for,” “…it’s time to say goodbye… might regenerate…” and the like.

As "The Doctor Dances" begins proper, Jack reveals his con and the plot starts to come together. The interaction between Jack, the Doctor and Rose is superbly written and performed here. Jack’s “Volcano Day” joke is wonderfully turned on it’s head by the Doctor (does anyone else think that would have been a better title than “The Doctor Dances”?) and the whole banana joke was brilliantly executed, especially the Doctor implying he blew up the weapons depot where Jack got his gun, then switching a banana for Jack’s weapon! “Bananas are good.” Immortal words. The banter goes on as the Doctor is too embarrassed to say that his sonic device is a ‘screwdriver,’ and it’s Jack’s weapon, ironically, that saves them from the marauding hordes of zombies on their tail. When Jack takes the mickey out of the Doctor for having a sonic screwdriver the Doctor comes out with another classic “you ever been bored? Ever had a long night? Ever had a lot of shelves to put up?” Absolutely brilliant script-writing. It looks like this menage a trois is going to be a lot of fun to watch.

I also enjoyed the scene where Nancy returns to the house she’d taken the children to eat at only to be caught by the obese householder. Nancy’s gall is impressive as she blackmails him not only into letting her go, but into getting her some wire cutters, some more grub and letting her have a Johnny Cash before she leaves!

The scene with the Doctor, Rose and Jack in the Empty Child’s room where the tape runs out is the first of two brilliantly terrifying scenes. The young child’s voice is awfully harrowing “I’m here can’t you see me?” The way he ‘sings’ everything makes him even creepier.

Shortly after, Jack does his most Spock-like trick of all and is ‘beamed up’ to his ship. At this point we are still wondering about this intergalactic conman… has he taken off and left the Doctor and Rose to their fate, or will he really help them?

The second creepy scene of the episode sees Nancy go back to tell the children she is going to the bomb site because the Empty Child isn’t following them, it’s following HER. Just as Constantine implied in the previous episode, only Nancy knows why the Empty Child is stalking her, and at this point most of us are still guessing. The typewriter being controlled by the child is executed beautifully. It’s directed so well you get used to the noise of it in the background, then when you see the little boy who was writing the letter isn’t operating it anymore it’s a big shocker. Very creepy indeed.

The Doctor gets sulky as Rose goes on and on about Jack’s good looks, how he saved her life and how he’s like the Doctor, but with dating and dancing etc. The Doctor makes an effort not to be insulted, but just like with Jo Grant and her bloke all those years ago in “The Green Death” he’s seething. “…you just assume I don’t darnce…”

“You got the moves? Show me your moves. The world doesn’t end because the Doctor dances,” Rose says, holding out her arm to the Doctor. Of course, he doesn’t dance with her, just examines her hands disapprovingly as he realises they’ve been healed and the pieces of the puzzle start fitting together in his head. His line about Rose “setting new records for jeopardy friendly” was another nice line; as I keep saying the dialogue by Moffat is brilliant.

As Jack comes to the rescue, ‘beaming up’ the Doctor and Rose, we realise it’s possible he’s not all bad, just like when Han Solo returns to help Luke blow up the Death Star in “Star Wars.” Still, he’s no angel as he’d be the first to admit, and he does, boasting about how he stole his Tula warship from a gorgeous lady. We also get the first big reveal about his character here – he was a ‘Time Agent,’ whatever one of those may be, and the ‘Agency’ wiped several years of his memory. He wants them back. This memory block gives his character a real edge. The good looks and charm we saw in “Empty Child” were okay for an episode or two, but if they’re making him a regular he needs the kind of depth something like this gives to his character. I hope it gets a good payoff and he wasn’t just a “nice guy” during those missing years. It is also in this scene the Doctor first sees the nanogenes and pieces it all together. Watching “The Empty Child” I thought the premise of “physical injuries as plague” was a unique idea, and it is nice to see it being backed up with a scientific explanation that seems half-plausible!

Meanwhile Nancy is captured trying to re-enter the bombsite. She is chained up and left under the supervision of an soldier showing the first symptoms of “Empty Child Syndrome.” His commanding officer, who I think was called Algie (presumably the same officer Jack spoke to in “The Empty Child”) leaves Nancy in his custody despite the solider calling him “Mummy!” Florence Hoath as Nancy once again puts in a wonderful performance, pleading with the solider to let her go, trying to reason with him. When he is completely overcome by the Syndrome, she cleverly byes some time by singing a lullaby to him…

I love the shot of the Doctor, Jack and Rose walking through the bomb site. The lighting is superb, Murray Gold’s score is as epic as in “Dalek”, it’s a shame the scene couldn’t have lasted a second or two longer.

I only have one real complaint with this two-parter, and it’s all the bi-sexual innuendo which is a bit over the top. Fair enough if you want to imply that “51st century guy” Jack is bi-sexual, but why make the Army officer, Algie, gay too? Even the man who’s house Nancy stole food from was “messing about with the butcher.” I think for something watched by kids and families it’s a little bit too much.

When the Doctor realises the plague has now become airborne as we see Algie transform horrifically, it becomes obvious we are building up to the story’s climax, though like in “World War Three,” it does feel a little early. Luckily, the climax here it stretched out right until the episode’s end.

As the zombies march relentlessly towards the bombsite we are treated to a delightful scene between Rose and Nancy, very similar to “The Unquiet Dead” scene with Rose and Gwyneth. This one is probably even more profound; how can Rose convince a girl who looks up into the sky and sees a devastating war raging, that the world isn’t about to end? The look on Nancy’s face when she realises who wins is priceless. It’s a really beautiful scene.

I love the ending of the story. So far it has been a dark story in almost every sense, from the lighting to the setting to the plot to the horrific imagery shown. At this point everything is bleak, the Doctor is giving a trademark speech about how unstoppable the nanogenes are and how they will turn the whole human race into zombies, and even Jack realises what his con has led to. He even appears to feel guilty.

“There’s never been a little boy born who wouldn’t tear down the world to save his Mummy… and this one can…”

But just as a fate worse than death is about to take all out heroes, the Doctor finally works it out. Nancy is the Empty Child’s Mother. “Are you my Mummy? Where is my Mummy?” The Doctor persuades a reluctant Nancy to admit the truth to the Empty Child, Jamie, her son who she’d always claimed was her brother to protect herself from society’s scorn. “Yes, I am. I am your Mummy.”

The Doctor is rubbing his hands together, looking up at the sky. “Gimme a day like this please… clever little nanogenes!!!” then we are treated to a rarity in this series – even the Doctor cannot believe it – an old fashioned Hollywood happy ending!

“AHA!!! EVERYBODY LIVES ROSE! THIS TIME EVERYBODY LIVES!”

Normally I hate such things but it just works so well. Even Doctor Constantine and his patients are saved when the Doctor takes the nanogene “software patch” and, let’s say ‘manually’ “e-mails the upgrade,” with particularly humorous consequences as the nanogenes not only restore all the zombies’ humanity but heal all their injuries… one woman’s leg even grows back. “Perhaps you miscounted?” suggests Constantine, Richard Wilson’s comic timing still perfect.

So the Doctor is running into the TARDIS, waving his arms all over the place, laughing and grinning like a Cheshire cat. He even has an 8th Doctor-like “I know everything” moment when he tells Rose what she got for Christmas when she was twelve. “I’m on fire!” he exclaims. “But what about Jack?” asks Rose.

Jack has taken the “Splichter Wolf” (‘Bad Wolf’… sigh) bomb into space and is now facing certain death. He’s very cool about it though, supping his drink and reminiscing on his sexual misadventures with his executioners… but of course, it really is a happy ending and the TARDIS arrives to save him just in the nick of time.

The story that began in the darkness and despair of 1941 London in “The Empty Child” ends as “The Doctor Dances,” albeit with a bit too much bi-sexual innuendo (still!), but at least it’s the Doctor and Rose who have the last dance.

“All things considered, fantastic!”

The new series seems to be starting out much like the first year or two of Big Finish did where we have a very high number of stories either on or near Earth. On the one hand, I can't complain with the resulting good stories they're getting, but on the other, I think it's getting to be about time we went across the universe and did as the aliens did. So, my heart sunk just a bit when we saw Earth as the destination at the beginning.

It didn't stay there long though as we plunged headlong into London during the Blitz and what's definitely the creepiest set-up we've had yet, and one the older episodes rarely if ever matched. One might think that during a war that the scariest thing that's going on is the war itself and the doomed future one's nation might have should it lose (I've been thinking that almost every day since 9/11/01). This story managed to find two stories of fear that are even better than that. One is very personal (to do with Jamie and Nancy) and one is a threat even greater than what the Axis powers were up to (zombie-fying virus going airborne and ready to turn the whole world into gasmask people). So, well done to Steven Moffat for being so creative and punching WWII both above and below the belt.

Speaking of below the belt, how about that Captain Jack, eh? He's ready, willing, and able to "dance" with anything that moves so long as it looks excellent to him. (And is it really coincidence they went for an actor who looks so much like Tom Cruise? ) Fortunately, his relaxed and futuristic sexuality is kept in proportion with the rest of his character, which is an oh-so-smooth con man with a terrific wit and a mystery or two, yet who seems friendly enough. I'm really warming to him, and I'm glad he joined the TARDIS crew at the end. If the one-liners he spouted in this story keep coming, I'll be very pleased. Top of them all has to be "Who looks at a screwdriver and says, 'ooh. This could be a little more sonic.'?"

The other main character who was introduced but regrettably didn't get to stay on was Nancy. Streetwise is too weak a word to describe her... more like streetgenius, the way she organizes the starving kids into stealing food from the house of someone she can blackmail, and in a big way. Streetstrong might be another one, since the war has hit her really, really hard, and yet she hasn't let how despondent she is about it all cripple her. She just gets on with things. I like that the Doctor and Rose twice try to cheer her up out of this... the Doctor with his patriotic speech and Rose by telling her that they're not going to lose the war. The first doesn't really work on her as far as we can see... the second sort of does since by then she's believing in anything. Getting her son back alive at the end of the story and seeing the whole plague end as well must have really turned her back around. The Doctor boasts later of having a really great day (where for once, no one died), but I think Nancy's got him beat here. Jamie, Dr. Constantine, and the others didn't do too badly either.

On now to plot matters, and Moffat's ingenuity shines again (except for one niggle I have for the end). If you make a list of the sci-fi elements in this story, they're actually not that great on paper. There's con man Jack setting up a little temporal con that's not all that original... and there's the nanogenes inside the Chula war ambulance that are lifted from either "Star Trek the Next Generation" or the SciFi Channel seasons of "Mystery Science Theater 3000"... and then there's Jack's own warship with the invisibility and the teleporter that only works for one person (except when it doesn't)... none of it's really that new. What made it all work so well was the way they're all presented and revealed, where in the first episode we both have and haven't got all the clues we need to figure out just why people are turning into gas mask zombies or why Jack's there and son on. Few of us successfully guess at the motives of this story because there are in fact no logical motives behind what's going on, but rather, three mistakes. "Make mistakes and confuse the enemy" as the Doctor once said, and it works on audiences too. The mistakes I speak of were a) Jack's mistake in thinking the ambulance was empty and bringing it there, b) what Nancy considers to be her own mistake in getting Jamie killed, and c) the nanogenes mistake in how they try to fix people up wrongly, with their gruesome consequences. The Doctor asks at the end of part one "What's the point?" and the reason he and we can't work it out is that there isn't one. It was just a series of unfortunate events. And that's why the story was so entertaining.

As for our regular characters, the Doctor and Rose, this is a story that achieved perfect balance between them. Rose gets to have her thrilling adventure, travelling over London by barrage balloon (even if it's a stretch that she didn't look up to see what the rope was attached to) and meet Captain Jack and swoon over him and banter with psychic paper and so on. Meanwhile, the Doctor gets to do some real investigating and uncovering of secrets like he always used to but doesn't seem to get as much time for in the new series, mostly because "part one" is missing from most of the stories. That wasn't a problem here, and Chris Eccleston really gets to shine as a result. The relationship between the two characters gets a chance to grow too, particularly in "The Doctor Dances," and some of that chemistry we were told these two were having before the series began really began to cook here in a way it perhaps hadn't before now... at least not as much as that between the Eighth Doctor and Charley. Again, I suspect this is a function of the time it takes to tell these moments in a story and how there just isn't enough in the one-parters. Anyway, I really enjoyed how Jack's presence gets the Doctor to have to come out of his own shell and be more approachable with Rose and actually try to dance with her, which he finally does at the end. His response line to Rose's invitation earlier is another classic. "Show me your moves," she says, and the Doctor answers, "Rose, I'm trying to resonate concrete."

It's almost like Steven Moffat has experience writing stuff like this. Hmm.

On to more superficial matters...

I _love_ James Hawes' direction, and think it's the best we've seen in the series so far. I'm very glad to hear he's coming back for more with at least the Christmas special to come. The ultra cold weather on the shoot actually helped as it made Nancy look even sadder than she would've normally done since you can see it in her face so well.

The music was much stronger than in earlier episodes, and in particular the scenes at the end where Nancy tells Jamie she is his mummy. At last Murray Gold is starting to prove the faith the producers had in him to give him the entire series to do. Maybe this is just a function of his having a little more time to work on it?

The CGI was _exceptional_. I can't recall ever seeing the Blitz shown on TV or film in such an awesome way anywhere else... I'm sure someone will correct me here and point out a film where it was done better, but nevertheless it was wondrous to behold. Kudos to the Mill!

I've only got two problems with the story... both in "The Doctor Dances," and they're both minor enough for me not to dock much from the point total below. Just a tenth I think. Anyway, the first one is the historical glitch where they had a magnetic tape player and recording of Jamie's therapy sessions in the hospital, several years before the first one was available in Britain. Maybe this is the Bad Wolf's doing in the same way that the errors in things like "Invaders from Mars" were the NeverPeople's doing, but somehow I doubt it. The other story issue I had is with Captain Jack at the end and the German bomb. Why didn't he fly his ship to an uninhabited area of Earth rather than into outer space? Had he done so, he could've just got out of the ship or teleported out of it and let the ship blow up with the bomb without having to worry about the fact he had no escape pod on his ship. This point needed some more work.

All in all then, 9.9 out of 10. Probably a classic in fact.

Introduced as “the scariest Doctor Who story yet”, can The Empty Child live up to the hype?

The first thing that struck me about this two-parter is the visuals. After the ordinariness of Father’s Day, the grand depiction of the Blitz looks absolutely epic, and whilst the shots of Rose on the end of a rope aren’t quite convincing, the views of war-torn London are breath-taking. Doctor Who usually works best on a smaller scale, with narrow corridors and claustrophobic sets. This is a radical departure, and it works incredibly well. The shots of Jack in his spaceship and Jack and Rose in front of Big Ben are both beautiful and iconic.

However, as the 1996 movie proved, pretty pictures alone do not good Doctor Who make. So what of the script?

It’s well-structured, allowing for lots of character moments, and stylishly sets up all the clues you need in part one to work out the resolution, without being obvious about it. There are comedic moments aplenty – my personal favourites including Jack and Rose’s awkward moments with the psychic paper; the Doctor asking if anything has fallen from the sky; and his exchange with Captain Jack about his sonic screwdriver. As promised, though, there’s also a lot of very creepy moments indeed, especially in the first part. Add to the mix Nancy’s touching revelation about Jamie, the Doctor’s “mouse in front of a lion” speech, Rose’s emotionally charged scene where she tells Nancy about the future, and a particularly joyous Doctor at the story’s resolution, and you have an intelligent piece of drama which engages the full range of emotions.

The acting is also wonderful throughout. Richard Wilson is his usual dependable self, and his lines about no longer being a grandfather but still being a doctor are delivered perfectly, and clearly resonate with a certain Time Lord. Florance Hoath as Nancy is also wonderful at portraying this most imaginatively-conceived yet realistic and sympathetic character. And then we have Captain Jack. John Barrowman is charming, dashing, a rogue, and (so I’m told) quite handsome to boot. His relationship with the Doctor promises an interesting dynamic for the TARDIS crew, and I look forward to the final few episodes all the more as a result.

In all, what we appear to have here is a classic. Funny, scary, precisely crafted and gorgeously directed, this has to be one of the very best Doctor Who serials ever.

10/10.

One of the things that annoys me most about the new series is Russell T. Davies's refusal to take his job seriously: he fills his scripts with unsubtle subtexts, gives planets and monsters comedy names and has a general nudge-nudge-wink-wink-aren't-I-postmodern attitude. One good by-product of this though is that when another writer is allowed to pen an episode it very often looks doubly good-and that is exactly what has happened now, for The Empty Child two-parter is one of the scariest and best episodes of Doctor Who that I've seen for a long time.

As no other episodes are written by Steven Moffat or directed by James Hawes I had very little idea what to expect, but I was generally optimistic. This was paid off very quickly with one of the best directorial touches I've ever seen in the series: Rose sees the child perched on a rooftop and the camera cuts jerkily closer towards the eerie figure, much as James Whale did for Frankenstein. What follows is a truly spectacular piece of effects work as Rose dangles helplessly from a barrage balloon; a lot of the time with Doctor Who I find myself defending scenes that, while ambitious, are a bit too much for the budget to manage (I'm thinking The Web Planet here); now I can happily say that producer Phil Collinson, the Mill and of course Billie Piper rose to the occasion (no pun intended) in superb form.

Moving on like a roller coaster, we are then introduced to the new companion, 'Captain' Jack Harkness, excellently played by John Barrowman. He seems like a more interesting character than Rose: although nobody is criticising Piper's skills as an actress the whole working-class-girl vibe is hardly original. Now we get a rogue time-travelling con man with his own memory-loss story arc being set up, which looks to be very interesting. He is given an excellently designed ship (which feels more like the TARDIS than the TARDIS does), and the scene with it tethered to Big Ben is brilliant, if a little indulgent.

Meanwhile, the Doctor, with Christopher Eccleston playing him to his usual standard, has been investigating the mystery of the Child. He meets the kind-hearted Nancy, beautifully played by the lovely Florence Hoath, whom I would say is the best guest star in the series since Simon Callow in The Unquiet Dead. A very sympathetic character, with the idea of her helping out the street kids through the loss of her brother (more on that later) being very touching. From her we come to Albion Hospital and an excellent cameo from Richard Wilson, who delivers a huge amount of plot. Although subtle exposition has never been one of the programme's strong points here it works well through a combination of acting, writing, and an exceptional core idea. This culminates in one of the programme's scariest ever scenes, where Richard Wilson's face transforms into a gas mask in a truly horrific moment. It is exactly the kind of thing that used to scare me as a child, and is in fact so frightening that the BBC's decision to tone down the sound effects seems rather pointless and tokenistic. In truth this scene has provokes less outcry than I was expecting, and I must stress that I am in no way criticising it: I thought it, like all the rest, was brilliant.

This is, in truth, a very scary story. It is a real contender to the title of Scariest Story Ever, which for me still goes to The Curse Of Fenric (it's something about the Second World War, I swear). The two stories have a lot in common, such as the flawless period detail, the lovely scene where Ace / Rose comforts Rev. Wainwright / Nancy about the uncertain future, and ordinary people being converted into monsters. This seems like a good point to mention the monsters: like the Autons in Rose and the Reapers in Father's Day they aren't actually named on screen, so I've been thinking of them unofficially as the Plaguebearers, which seems to fit the bill. They are seriously frightening, as gas masks always look slightly grotesque at the best of times. What makes the Plaguebearers scary is the concept behind them, the knowledge of their dreadful internal injuries, and the aforementioned transformation scene. They are very original spin on the traditional zombie, and it takes an excellent writer and director to turn "are you my Mummy?" into a genuinely chilling line.

With the Doctor reunited with Rose we move on to part two, The Doctor Dances. It gets off to a strong start with a superb line about famous last words, proving that comedy writers are indeed the best people to write comedy. It then resolves the issue of the cylinder fired to Earth by Captain Jack hitting and killing a child, which is something I'd had a problem with after part one. I'd been a bit sceptical about part two as the first episode had been largely carried on the sense of mystery, and I was wondering if it would stand up to repeated viewing once the plot was explained. I needn't have worried, with the mystery giving way to some superb dialogue and a race-against-the-clock feel that I always find exciting.

This leads on to its dramatic climax, which fulfils all the criteria for something epic: out heroes stand by an alien device in a disused railway station while German bombs fall and the Plaguebearers advance. This leads to a final twist revelation followed by an unexpectedly moving resolution. The enormous optimism of the finale makes the lighter moments of the episode, such as the dancing Doctor, fully justified as opposed to an episode like Inferno where the pessimistic tone makes the jokey ending seem inappropriate.

The only thing that worries me is the proposed return of the Slitheen next week; I can't think of any other episode that I'd least like to see a sequel to. How about a third episode of The Empty Child? I don't want to end such a positive review on a negative note, so to sum up then, on behalf of fandom I would like to thank everyone involved in production for giving us a quite brilliant story that along with Dalek is surely going to stand as one of the highlights of 21st Century Doctor Who, for however many years it lasts.

It’s an odd thing, reviewing. Writing bad reviews is easy, you just let loose with your critical cannon, taking smug pot-shots at easy targets and winching up the bitch factor until you come off looking cool. Writing good reviews, on the other hand, is a right pain in the word-processor, because there isn’t really anything to say beyond “Good this, isn’t it?”.

For that reason, and for that reason alone, I despise The Empty Child. I have nothing to say about it whatsoever. It is, quite simply, magnificent.

After apparently leaving not a dry eye in the country in Father’s Day, Russell T’s meticulously planned season moves to the opposite end of the anatomy, threatening the safety of children’s mattresses everywhere with the most deliberately frightening story since Tom Baker’s gothic heyday. That it does so with little more than an air-raid siren, a toy monkey and a kid in a gas mask says all you need to know about the talent behind this show. But that it combines the fear factor (“Chilling” to “Terrifying”, according to the BBC’s adorable clique of fear forecasters) with drama, intrigue, a fiercely-paced plot, laugh out loud comedy and enough emotion to bring tears even to the eyes of a reviewer irritated by not having anything complain about… That tells you what you really need to know. This isn’t just good; it’s a classic.

The script comes courtesy of Stephen Moffat, author of, among other things, the Dr Who sketch The Curse of Fatal Death and the hit sitcom Coupling (recently exported wholesale to the US, with the only changes being the accents, the location, and the substitution of ‘hit’ with ‘cancelled’). Justly famed for his use of complex narrative devices in the tired old genre of sitcom, Moffat has a real eye for structure, with the result that this is by far the most strongly plotted story of the season. With comedy and drama being essentially the same but for the nature of the punchline – it’s all about disguising the set-up so you can’t see the pay-off coming – The Empty Child is as well constructed as one of his jokes, combining terror, action and mystery in a story that intrigues as much as it scares, and keeping all the subplots and elements balanced until the crucial resolution. When the end arrives it turns out to be feel both surprising and inevitable, the mark of true storytelling - and after two episodes spinning from chills to thrills to witty banter, it still manages to find new emotional territory, hitting an emotional high by finding a conclusion that not only works, but matters. It can’t be easy creating a fresh character arc for the regular cast when you’re ten episodes into the season, but Moffat manages it, by putting a romantic comedy at the heart of a horror story, and then not playing by the rules of either. If only it hadn’t worked, I could have had a bitchy reviewing field-day, but no – his whole script is flawless, gripping and beautiful. Damn his eyes.

Mind you, the visual side of things was even worse, in the sense of being even better. Even a great script can be ruined by rubbish execution, which would have been handy for me, but no, there are remarkably few flaws on display. The taut, gripping direction is absolutely terrific, conveying a creepy, shadowy view of night-time London, and keeping the sense of menace only barely hidden in the background even during the lighter scenes. Use of point-of-view camera feels like a genuinely frightening way of telling the story rather than a budget-saving measure, and the lighting – or rather the darking, in most scenes – adds a real sense of cinematic scope. The period setting is exquisitely realised, with studio sets and location work combining perfectly to bring a rainy night in the Blitz to life, and even the budget-stretching cgi dogfights over London only marginally straining the credulity. It comes to something when you can’t even rely on Murray Gold to cock up the score, instead delivering a subtle, haunting soundtrack that adds to the tension, underlines the emotion and effortlessly fleshes out the scale of the piece without ever overpowering it. Even the bloody editing is great.

Bringing life to all this is a genuinely exceptional cast, led by Christopher Eccleston’s glorious Doctor, who after being arguably somewhat neglected in recent stories is, to every reviewer’s irritation, once more back on top form. His handling of the complex, layered emotions of many scenes is a joy to behold, and his own joy at the conclusion a truly moving moment, only surpassed by the insanely un-Whoish, gloriously perfect closing minutes that round off his character arc. This more modern Doctor had already beeen accepted on an equal footing with the technobabble-spouting, frock-coated fops of older generations; after his performance in The Empty Child, it’s hard not to say he surpasses them.

The fabulous guest cast is, gallingly, equally good, from Richard Wilson’s gravelly cameo as Doctor Constantine (it’s a credit to him that he never once comes across as ‘that bloke from One Foot in the Grave) to John Barrowman’s masterful Captain Jack. Even the scenes with the de-evacuated children, which could so easily have become a stage-school-accent bloodbath or a Twin Dilemma disaster, either one a reviewer’s wet dream, remain instead utterly naturalistic, thanks in large part to the stabilising presence of Florence Hoath, whose phenomenal performance as Nancy threatens to steal every scene she’s in.

Unfortunately even that doesn’t count as a criticism, as Billie Piper is on hand to steal it right back again, starring in sweeping, FX-laden money shots (of which there are ridiculously many) and acting her little socks off in funny, intimate scenes with the Doctor and Captain Jack. John Barrowman, meanwhile, is every bit as charming and attractive as Rose seems to think, which won’t do the ratings any harm, and his more-doctor-than-the-doctor characterisation is, contrary to my initial hopes, actually great fun, making the Doctor come across as all the more human and, by highlighting his flaws, much more ours.

There was a faint hope, between the showing of the two episodes, that in competition with Jack’s fancy-schmancy wrist-held computer thing the sonic screwdriver had become far too useful, able to double up now as a Star Trek medical scanner, as well as a pen, a computer-pad stylus, a radio jammer, a lock-pick, a spot-welder, a gun and even at one point, rumour has it, as a screwdriver. If it turns out the Cybermen are allergic to it too, I planned to bitchily point out, the props department won’t have anything left to build. But then they go and make a plot point of exactly that, and it turns out not to be a criticism but a glorious piece of witty, clever storytelling.

As the last minutes of The Doctor Dances played out, all hopes that this might turn out to be a Stones of Blood anti-climax faded away. This is a cast-iron classic to the end; terrifying, suspenseful, hilarious, gripping, uplifting, pacey and perfect. As a reviewer I hate it with every bone in my body. As anything else, I want to have its babies. But I still don’t have anything to say.

Good, isn’t it?

Now, THAT's what I call a two parter! This blitz-based chiller has to be right up there for highlight of the season. With its suspense-filled resistance to revealing the nature of the threat until the very last, some excellent film-noir direction from James Hawes, and some lovely comedic vignettes, this story is as close to the gothic classics of the Hinchcliffe era.

Its both Doctor Who and the "What if?" genre of SF at their best. Nano-technology has been in the scientific headlines a few times in recent years, and like the Cybermen, Pan Global Chemicals and others before, we have a superb cautionary tale of what can go wrong with supposedly safe & helpful advances.

The inclusion of Captain Jack is inspired. He's like Sabalom Glitz with style! At every stage of his characterisation, you're thrown off in unexpected directions, convinced he's not a good guy, until, on the verge of a heroic, selfless act, he is brought aboard the TARDIS. Maybe we'll never know whether he would have found a way out, or whether he would have gone through with it. It doesn't matter. The Doctor now as a companion that, like Turlough, neither he nor the audience will be able to trust implicitly. If this is Doctor Who for the Buffy generation, ladies and gentlemen, may I present to you the series' equivalent of Spike.

Richard Wilson is convincing in a role that, initially, you may think he is going to feel out of water in. Offhand, I can't recall any genre appearances from him before.

The war-urchins are definitely better than the usual child extras we get on British TV, and their situation genuinely tugs at the heart-strings. The intelligence of Nancy shines through, and we have a genuine heroine in the young mother, hiding her past, but nonetheless striving to ensure a future for herself and her charges.

Eccleston manages to put some genuine warmth into the character as he almost preys for the nano-genes to put right their mistake. I have a feeling that Eccleston's most perfect portrayal will end up being in "The Parting of the Ways".

My only complaint about this "Classic Nouveau" is the "NEXT WEEK:" stinger. My thoughts on the Slitheen have been recorded here previously, so I approach Boom Town with a sense of exhaustion and dread. If next week is anything like as poor as "Aliens of London/WWIII", it'll be following the highest peak of quality in the run.

See you in Cardiff.