Limericks to make Rick Smile or as Milk Cries

There once were some nanogenes from deep space
Who landed and misread the human race
With magical employ
They masked a small boy
But read the dominant gene with such grace.

Here were scenes of magical quality
As the Mill healed with versatility.
With golden light suffused
And a Doctor enthused
With euphoric acting quality.

There once was a chilling tape reel to reel
Bringing horror needing my nerves of steel.
With typewriter tapping
And my comfort sapping,
Due to a superb atmospheric feel.

There now is a Tardis musical hall show
Full of warm banter where insults will grow.
Heated male rivalry
To impress Rose nicely
Will develop characters and the show.

There once was an accidental error
Where the son filling his Mum with terror
Was seen walking away
Yet “to your room you stay,”
Was to the same wall breaking junior.

There once was a Captain Harkness
Who with good gadgets did impress.
But why keep the bomb so
When with beam he could tow
And dump it in the ocean with finesse?

There was once a Moffat so rare
Who gave us hope, love, and despair.
Dancing on Tardis floor,
Characters to care for,
And a Doctor mature - full of care.

There once was a seminal marked spot
Where writing, effects and acting hot
With direction true,
Combined to a brew
Potent and strong as the series best plot!

There once was an actress called Florence
Who gave an enthralling performance.
This actress will do
For assistant TWO
And should not be her last appearance!!!!

There now are themes homosexual in kind
Not adding to plot but testing my mind.
Dancing as metaphor
For a gay Doctor?
I hope issues, like guns are left behind!

10 episodes in and I have a serious problem.

I'm running out of superlatives to describe just how good this show is.

I'm now going to commit an act of profound blasphemy, and state that TEC/TDD is now officially my favourite number-one Doctor Who story of all time. Even both 'City of Death' and 'Weng-Chiang'. Why? Because it takes everything that made the classic series so appealing, and adds a new layer of modernity to it that doesn't compromise what makes Doctor Who so great.

For instance, the solution to the cliffhanger is the most inventive resolution I've ever seen - "GO TO YOUR ROOM!". Brilliant. Not to mention Jack's sonic disruptor, and what the Doctor did to the factory at Villengard. And that "Sonic envy" dialog features the funniest mention of the Sonic Screwdriver I've ever heard. And those references to "Dancing" during the episode. It took me two viewings to finally understand what the characters were referring to. "The world doesn't implode if the Doctor dances". Maybe the Doctor wouldn't, but I might.

Only two episodes in and I'm sold on Captain Jack Harkness as a potential companion. He adds a totally new dynamic to the Doctor Who-Rose relationship, especially considering his romantic predilictions can go either way. And John Bannerman brings a real charisma and charm to the role. I'm not entirely sure what'll happen next regarding these 3, but I'm sure it will be interesting.

Apart from having great leading actors, this new series has also had outstanding actors in the supporting roles. As of now, Florence Hoath is definitely my favourite supporting actor in the entire series thus far. The role of Nancy turns out to be incredibly central to the plot and its resolution, and having an actress that can bring real passion and life to the role is incredibly important. And Florence Hoath does just that, and more. We care about what happens to Nancy, and for that reason the resolution to her situation is incredibly uplifting and optimistic.

And the resolution to this episode is the icing on the cake. May I respectfully suggest that RTD send these episodes to Steven Spielberg, just to show him how it's done? The ending is uplifting, cathartic and optimistic without being overwhelmingly schmaltzy or sugary. It's the perfect resolution to everything that's happened before that point, without being contrived or pandering to the audience. Full credit to Steven Moffatt and RTD for conjuring up a great ending.

This two-parter is definitely the highlight of the entire season. It is a great example of what Doctor Who is capable of, when you have a group of talented and creative cast and crew working on this show.

Magic, absolute magic...

I had terrible forebodings about this one. As Steven Moffat was the writer, he of the nevertheless excellent "Coupling", I was expecting something lightweight and comic, and I feared the worst even after the excellent Empty Child. How wrong. This episode brought all the best elements of the new series to the boil, and how.

As mentioned in my Empty Child review I was concerned that Captain Jack might be an intrusive and OTT presence, but the interaction between the Doctor, Rose and Jack is excellent, skipping blithly over the occasional duff line knowing an excellent follow up is never far away. The exchanges between the Doctor and Jack regarding blasters and screwdrivers is simply a delight. Even the potentially stomach churning stuff at the end involving dancing works a treat. Don't remember much bisexual tension in the original series... plus ca change!

Speaking of the 'classic' series, one of the key elements was fear, and this two-parter wrung about as much as could be hoped for; even for someone way beyond his childhood years, the hairs stood up on the back of my neck both when our heroes realise the tape has run out and the child is actually in the room, and even more when Nancy points out that an invisible presence is working the typewriter. This is Doctor Who as I remember it, and more; thrilling, intelligent, emotionally involving, darkly comic and SCARY.

The climax, as Nancy admits her dark secret and the Doctor wills the nano-genes (is that the right spelling?) to recognise her DNA as she holds her son, is emotionally tense and thrilling, and what could have been sentimental and cloying is instead gripping and truly euphoric. And we the viewers get an extra bonus; following that fabulous climax, we get Captain Jack waiting for impending death having rescued everyone by removing the German bomb in his spaceship - a wonderful scene, deftly played by John Barrowman, who far from being the embarrassment I expected, makes one root for the character and add another delicious slice of last-minute tension to the mix.

Bit concerned about next week from the teaser... haven't been too impressed with RTD's writing contributions save the first two episodes, and can't see why they are resuscitating the Slitheen, of all the new characters introduced... but I'll wait and see.

As a continuation of the previous episode Empty Child, this was all about maintaining the excellence that was displayed then. I had rarely enjoyed any single episode of Doctor Who as much as Empty Child В– and I was expecting the same kind of atmosphere, the same kind of excellent period detail, the same kind of imaginative SFX, and the same kind of wonderful character interplay. Especially between the 3 leading wonderful characters В– the 9th Doctor, Rose and Captain Jack.

Thankfully and brilliantly The Doctor Dances was as good as The Empty Child, and in quite a few ways better. Everything about Empty Child that I liked В– Characters, WW2 atmosphere, dark Blitz streets, creepy Hospitals В– were all here again.

3 things distinguish it though:-

Captain Jack and the Doctor interaction.
Stories magnificent resolution.
The Doctors joyous final scenes.

The Doctor was always going to be suspicious of Captain Jack. The obvious attraction from Rose towards Jack would have stirred things up plenty, but with Jack also being a fellow Time Traveller В– well, thatВ’s going to impact on the Doctor too. Thankfully thereВ’s no excessive childish jealousy exhibited by the Doctor В– and Rose is sensitive enough to deal with both the men in her life in this story. Captain Jack is a very good character, charmingly played by John Barrowman. ThereВ’s plenty to like about him, whatever age or sexuality you are.

The story is brilliant from Steven Moffatt. If ever there was a story this season that you wanted to spend more time with, that deserved to be fleshed out, it was this. The episodes were magnificent, with sparkling dialogue throughout. But it is that scene with the Doctor, the child and Nancy at the end that epitomized the excellence present here. Christopher Eccleston has never been as good as he was right there. The sheer joy of his solving of the puzzle. The sheer happiness when it all turned out wonderfully. It was hearwarming, and I felt like punching the air in delight.

It wasnВ’t only this scene that brought the episode into the upper realms though. The one that followed it, with the Doctor, Rose and Jack in the TARDIS almost equalled it in boldness and love of life. Has there ever been a Doctor/Companion team so suited to one another as the 9th Doctor and Rose? They will have a wonderful season together soon, and it has been a tremendous friendship. Yes, it would have been nice for it to continue, but what we have is great.

IВ’m beginning to feel rather sad that things are coming to close. We now have only 3 shows left. There are all by Russell T Davies, and the next 2 episodes donВ’t sound nowhere near as exciting as this Blitz story. It will be wonderful to look back on the season as a whole, and I am looking forward to resolutions of certain story arcs. But personally I virtually always prefer these kind of isolated stories. ItВ’s wonderful that Steven Moffatt has already been confirmed for the 2nd Series.

The sheer excellence of this 2 parter, and the previous Historical of the Season Unquiet Dead, proves beyond doubt that Doctor Who works better in the past, with futuristic elements. I love the diversity of the season, with its past present and future storylines В– but it is the Past that I adore on DW. More please next season.

It occurred to me the other day that we are missing something with new DW В– books. DW was always just as much about enjoying the books, as enjoying the TV. The same stories in both, and I enjoyed them both too. ThereВ’s no sign of books for the new TV series, apart from original novels. ThatВ’s pretty good, for the first time original books featuring the characters currently on TV. And in this day of DVDs, well past Videos even, novelizations of TV episodes probably arenВ’t as relevant. Personally though I would love to see them В– especially this 2 parter В– how brilliant it would be to go into great detail about the Doctors adventure in the Blitz.

I really didnВ’t think the 1st episode (Empty Child) could be topped В– but the season has done it yet again. Better, bolder, more inventive В– brilliant Doctor Who. 10/10

This review is for both the Doctor Dances and The Empty Child.

All I can say is wow!!!

These episodes really took me back to the old days. It was spine tingling, dark, action packed, and ontop of that a fantastic story!

When I first heard that Steve Moffat was writing this episode I had mixed emotions, mainly because I had only known him to have written the Curse of Fatal Death, the Doctor Who spin off staring Rowan Atkinson as the Doctor, which was very funny and just took the mickey out of the series, so I wasn't to sure whether these episodes were going to be any good. But I am so glad I was wrong.

What I love about these episodes is that the Empty Child gives us all these questions, what is the child? what kind of disease does this? etc and then the second part answers them beautifully. And for the first time this series we have a brilliant cliff hanger where for the first time we have no idea how the Doctor is going to get out of this one, whereas the other cliff hangers in the new series are very predictable, and very typical like in the Aliens of London where the Slitheen is walking up very slowly towards Mrs Tyler when it could've just run up and killed her. The direction for this episode was marvellous as well, so well done, as was the acting minus Captain Jack.

The idea for the Captain Jack character was a very good one, a character who tries to use his charm and good looks to win over Rose in an attempt to complete his mission. I just feel that John Barrowman played the character quite badly, there wasn't alot of dimension to the character, he seemed to be very 'plastic' in appearance and movement. I thought there could've been some better casting.

I do love the transformation scene though, when the gas mask appears on the actors faces, done beautifully, and really is quite incomfortable to watch. Just love it!

At the end however I would've liked to have seen Captain Jacks spaceship blow up, thought that would've been a good conclusion.

Now I have got nothing against homosexuals, however I think in this episode we have a few to many references to homosexuals in this episode. Firstly we had the officer who was always flirting with Jack, which I thought was probably not necessary, and quite annoying. And also the Doctor uncovered that the reason why a family received such generous proportions of meat from the butcher was because the father was in fact giving the butcher some extra meat if you know what I mean. I thought this was not necessary also, and may make the younger viewers confused.

Apart from this it was a really fantastic episode, great cliff hanger, great acting (minus John B), great directing, certainly one of the best episodes of the series so far (new series, not old) but still doesn't beat Dalek for me. I am glad however to see that the series has finally begun to establish itself, we have had some really fantastic stories recently and I do hope that we are not going to go back to stupidity with the next episode which happens to be an RTD episode.

Having really enjoyed В‘The Empty ChildВ’, I thought there was a danger that В‘the Doctor DancesВ’ might come as a let down. Thankfully my fears were unfounded as this was another stunning episode, and a fitting conclusion to the story, which made nice use of things set up in the last episode, such as the nanogenes. Also while the questions that were of most pressing importance to the story were answered, the episode raised some puzzles for future stories to address regarding JackВ’s back story to accompany another В‘Bad WolfВ’ reference.

For once everybody wins in this story, to the DoctorВ’s obvious delight. This is important because it a)shows us how much the Doctor really cares about the people he tries to help and b) it gives Christopher Eccleston a chance to act what will be remembered as one of the Ninth Doctors defining moments. Indeed there are several lovely scenes in this episode: Nancy confidently blackmailing Mr Lloyd, Dr Constantine being confronted by a woman demanding to know why her leg has grown back,- which is comical, but thankfully not played for laughs- and best of all the scene where the TARDIS crew are listening to the recording of the childВ’s voice, but suddenly notice that the tape has long stoppedВ…

Again the cast all produce sound performances, with Eccleston stealing the show. In addition to the scene of his excitement on saving the day, we see his DoctorВ’s ability to calmly take charge of a situation when he orders the zombies to go to their room. There is also nice interplay between him and Rose regarding his dancing. Also excellent was
Florence Hoath who gave a totally believable performance as Nancy, and John Barrowman and Billie Piper put in solid efforts as well.

The special effects and design for the story were also of a high standard. Indeed all aspects of the production were fine, although the incidental music for this episode, and indeed the series as a whole is nowhere near as good as in the 1970s or early 1980s. Also some of the dialogue about the sonic devices was approaching the border with silliness, but thankfully did not cross that boundary.

Otherwise this is close to being a faultless production.