There’s an album by Roxette called “Don’t Bore Us Get To The Chorus”, and that very much sums up Russell T Davies’ “Doctor Who” – which is very much what this is, lest anyone still be in any doubt.

Admittedly, there’s little time for foreplay in 45-minute, self-contained episodes – and, to continue the metaphor, Davies has everyone’s kit off (almost literally in “New Earth”!) and down to business minutes into the episode.

One of the most-appreciable differences between the classic series and the 21st-century version is the lightning-quick pace at which the current vintage is generally delivered. And, if “New Earth” is anything to go by, Series Two is not only going to continue that trend – it’s going to be an even-faster ride.

On the story, had you read any of the previews or even paid a cursory visit to any spoiler sections, you’d have pretty much worked out what it was about and more or less how it was going to pan out.

At least the Doctor Who fan would have – I think the “average” viewer coming to the episode unfettered by too much knowledge (which is so much the best way, shame so few of us can wait) would have found the basics hugely entertaining.

A zip through to the Year Five Billion 23, a hospital run by cat nurses, an encounter with a familiar and popular enemy from the previous series, who body-swapped with both Rose and the Doctor, the revelation that the cats are in fact farming humans for medical research, a few chase scenes, and the Doctor cures the plague-ridden. “Everybody lives”, you might say – well, almost everybody . . .

Sounds great as a prйcis, and worked pretty well on screen. Having said that, I had a pre-series pecking order of the episodes I thought I’d enjoy and would fare best, and “New Earth” was quite low on it – lowest, actually.

Whether that holds true, only viewing of the next 12 episodes (none of which I have seen as I write) will tell. To equate it with an episode from last season in terms of popularity, I’d liken it most to “Rose” – erring towards style over substance, and you’d be surprised if better episodes weren’t on the way.

Yet, like “Rose”, “New Earth” was a tasty hors d’oevres.

The visuals were amazing – well up to, and I think well in excess of last year’s triumphant efforts. Loved the early scenes of New Earth, and the sheer scale of the hospital’s human “pens” was breathtaking for a TV series rather than a big-budget movie.

A huge bonus was the cameo of the Face of Boe. What an absolutely-stunning piece of visual effects that is, and well worth the return visit from last season’s “End Of The World”. Reminds me of a giant Yoda, except the voice has more - and the correct amount of - gravitas!

OK, you could argue the point about why did he feel the need to pull The Doctor all the way to the year Five Billion and 23, only to tell him . . . well, that he had something of great magnitude to tell him, but he wasn’t going to tell him after all.

Hopefully, the denouement will be fitting for a character which I’m sure originally was only a bit part, but has grown into the potential for something more substantial – both metaphorically as well as literally.

Is Boe going to be this season’s Bad Wolf? Possibly not quite – but I can’t wait for his “third” meeting with The Doctor, and it’ll be a great shame if, as he said, it is also the “last”. There is much I, for one, would like to know about Boe . . .

And what of the stars of the show? Hard to imagine anything less than excellence from David Tennant and Billie Piper, and they had loads of good moments here, courtesy of Davies, of course.

I preferred Tennant in “The Christmas Invasion” where, in retrospect, he set far too high a standard – he made a sensational debut in that, and really stole the show.

Of the big two, “New Earth” certainly belonged to Piper. Rose has grown a lot since her first meeting with The Doctor, and looked fabulous here. Piper’s portrayal of the Cassandra-possessed Rose was excellent, bringing Zoe Wanamaker’s character to life perfectly, changing her voice and mannerisms to suit.

Tennant also made a fine job of portraying the Cassandra-possessed Doctor. I’m not sure Davies would have written those scenes for Christopher Eccleston. Tennant would be the better of the two at “camp”!

Great snog between the Cassandra/Rose and the Doctor – and line of the show, “I’ve still got it”, from David Tennant. He really does deliver those plum lines!

I thought the “curing” of the disease-riddled humans by dousing one in the Five Billion equivalent of Dettol and having them “pass it on” was a quick way out rather than a particularly-clever way out.

And, the sudden acceptance of Cassandra that her time was up didn’t really reconcile with anything in the character up until that point – although it did make for a fairly-poignant ending.

I could see the logic in bringing back Cassandra as a link to the previous series and, although it was a pity the “trampoline” version didn’t have much screen time (understandable for cost reasons) she was really brought to life by Piper particularly and Tennant, based on Wanamaker’s original interpretation, of course.

All in all, “New Earth” wasn’t a classic, but a satisfactory season opener, with enough good moments to ensure it’ll be worth the odd revisit.

I believe I said last year at this time that the relatively lightweight story "Rose" was exactly what the series needed to start with, using the golden mantra of drama that goes "start small and build." I feel somewhat the same about this story, "New Earth." It's too early for a big emotional wringer sort of story like a "Father's Day" or a "Parting of the Ways," and it also sort of seems too early for a classic machinations sort of story ala "Empty Child." Instead we start with a bit of a romp, which as romps go is pretty entertaining, which is then lifted big time by some eye-popping direction and special effects work. This is the best "Doctor Who" has ever looked (bar one very glaring sore thumb of a moment I'll get to below)... up until next week anyway, and the week after that, and so on, as I have a feeling this high level is going to be maintained through the rest of the season. I might as well start there...

And my goodness those effects looked nifty. New New York and its air traffic was a spectacular outdoor vista of the sort we don't often see in TV or movie s.f. in that it looks amazing and cool and is at the same time a really great-looking place to live. Most of the time we're stuck looking at gorgeous enormous cities that look like they've forgotten how to maintain septic systems. This... wow... it looks like the sort of place saintly realtors go when they die, only much more crowded. Then we get inside the hospital and the interiors seem to match that look very well indeed, and then the Sisters of Plentitude turn up sporting what must be the best prosthetic make-up I've ever seen in anything. People who work on scifi shows that have a lot of this all seem worried about making it look good enough for the switchover to HD-TV, and based on this, "Doctor Who" shouldn't have to worry one little bit. I also very much liked the actress playing the Sister who was tending to the Face of Boe. Her voice and her performance made her character really come alive. And then on top of that there's loads and loads of extras all with boils on their faces during the plague zombie bits, and there's Cassandra again, and there's that sequence of zooming up and down the liftshaft. That all looked fantastic and at least as good as anything being done on any other show anywhere at the moment... certainly in these quantities.

The only thing about the look of the show that didn't work (which I alluded to earlier) is the scene when the Doctor and Rose/Cassandra head down into the "intensive care" area where all the zombie plague people are. It's extraordinarily obvious to me that they are reusing the same stairway in the paper mill that they used last year on "Rose" for the confrontation with the Nestene, and I can't believe they thought they could get away with it simply by painting the railings white. It completely wrenched me out of the moment and the plot. It's a gaffe in production worthy of those in the original series, and I really hope we don't see anything like this happening again. The reuse (for the second time!) of the above-the-lift footage shot for "Rose" for the lift here on New Earth should likewise be retired.

Now then... what about that story itself? Well, the best thing about it was that I couldn't spot how the Doctor was going to solve it until he did. There were all sorts of little things peppered throughout the episode that seemed to be just there for laughs or just details that filled out the world we're in, but most of these were in fact brought back at the end in the solution. Examples of this include the winch that's needed to hoist up the big fat man which gets used to get the Doctor down the lift and the disinfectant shower that's in the lifts. Cassandra's plot had this too, what with the film she's showing us at the start where she mentions the last time she was called beautiful, which turns out to have been herself doing so thanks to a lift in the TARDIS at the end. Another very good thing about the story was the medical plot with the plague zombies, and how for once, we get to hear just _why_ zombies go around trying to grab and fondle people... it's because this lot have never touched a human before in their lives and long for physical contact. That's very neat, as is the "laying on of hands" Christ-like solution to the plague which is very in keeping with an Easter weekend broadcast. The general premise of the hospital was OK too... not too original (the Big Finish audio "Project: Twilight" has a similar set-up in it), but topical. It reminded me a bit of "Terminus," only not nearly so depressing. And there were other nice little touches and details in names that Russell often drops in which I quite liked, like the Duke of Manhattan or calling Chip "Gollum" at one point, or the "NNYPD," or Cassandra's antique film projector, and especially the apple grass. Is it specially imported from Steve Jobs' front lawn? I do also like the legend surrounding the Face of Boe and how he'll tell the Doctor his secret someday... but not just yet.

The "average" thing about the story was the body-swapping stuff with Cassandra projecting her mind into Rose and the Doctor and others and possessing them. This is a very by-the-numbers s.f. cliche, which come to think of it the original series never actually did, but as these things go, it was made pretty entertaining, not so much by the writing but by the performances and impression skills of Billie Piper and David Tennant. I do wonder at Cassandra apparently being able to do this even when she's away from her equipment, and I especially wonder at how she takes over the Doctor, who is after all supposed to be able to place a barrier around his mind. He's no pushover when it comes to possession, but Cassandra's able to march in there and run him like she's Sutekh? There's also one enormous plot hole right off the bat where we're never told exactly why Chip and Cassandra were scanning the countryside with a spider-bot in the first place.... was it just on the off chance that Rose and the Doctor were going to turn up? It's a little depressing to see since it's a hole that could be so easily plugged as well.

Like I said earlier, there isn't really any big emotional journey for the Doctor and Rose (and the viewers) this week... just an average adventure for them, but that's exactly what we need in the first episode of the season before the meatier stuff comes later. And bar just a few gaffes here and there, it was a very fun adventure, and certainly wonderful to just stare at.

8 out of 10 for "New Earth" I think.

On initial inspection, ‘New Earth’ rather seems to have continued the upward trend in Russell T Davis’ writing for the series; this is a busy and blisteringly fast story (almost too fast – other reviewers have mentioned various components of the storyline such as the Doctor’s winch and the planets in the sky which I didn’t spot and have no memory of).

Nevertheless, the sound is still overly brash, bordering on incoherent, and the obligatory ‘cringe’ moments are still there, all right. Boy, are they there. This time around we have a fresh outbreak of Russell’s taste for mythic-sounding SF schlock (“the wanderer… the man without a home… the lonely God” – I don’t mind writers “bigging up” the Doctor, but not like this: with the subtlety of an atom bomb), capped with an almost masturbatory scene as Cassandra, invading Rose’s body using a psycho-graft, “inspects” herself. Poor old Russell – he just can’t seem to help himself. But the way this scene is lingered over when there’s such an overwhelming weight of plot and incident (this episode is surely more crammed with stuff than any before it) is not only crass, it’s a bit odd. And the effects remain gaudy masterpieces of unrealism, although I must concede that in their way they are attractive.

The one thing I was hoping against hope not be disappointed by in the week before ‘New Earth’ screened (and it’s a measure of how far Series 1 let me down that unlike in the pre-Rose furore of last year, I didn’t even think about Series 2 until a few days prior to the launch, and even then my pulse hardly spiked!) was David Tennant – the Tenth Doctor! Was I? Well, yes and no. From thinking that he’d be as bad as Eccleston in the final moments of the nightmare that was ‘The Parting of the Ways’, to suddenly realising during CiN that he could actually be brilliant, and then watching the Christmas Invasion coming to the conclusion that “he could do great things, if only he’d tone it down a bit in episodes to come”, I now find myself thinking – well, “he could still do great things, if only he’d tone it down a bit… etc.

This was DT’s least distinctive performance so far. It was by no means bad. In fact it was good. This Doctor is a lot closer to being ‘nice’ that Eccles, that’s for sure. But I’m a little uneasy about his tendency to chop and change between cheeky smirking and serious rage. I get the impression that the Tenth Doctor is meant to be scary, but there’s a clear line between moral outrage and madness: the Tenth Doctor, in ‘New Earth’, comes across as slightly unhinged.

Picture, particularly, his confrontation with the poor novice, whose good intentions, whether misguided or not, were plain to see: “I’m the Doctor and if you don’t like it, if you want to take it to a higher authority there isn’t one! It stops with me!”. This is more than eccentricity – the Doctor is talking the language of megalomania!

It’s not Tennant’s fault, of course, it’s Russell’s; it’s part and parcel of his ‘big idea’ of characterising the Doctor as the most arrogant man alive: “I’m the Doctor and I cured them. Pass it on”. In the Ninth Doctor, a Time Lord not exactly notable for his good qualities, this was unbearable – in the Tenth, it remains to be seen whether or not it can be sustained.

No actor can make a completely good impression without good lines and characterisation, and if David Tennant’s incarnation does end up falling as flat as Christopher Eccleston’s, it will, like as not, be Russell T Davis’ – if you don’t like it, if you want to take it to a higher authority, there isn’t one, it stops with him.

But what of the good? The most startling part of the story for me, apart from its engorged plot, was the proactive nature of the resolution – and, for the second time in a row – count them, TWO! – the Doctor does the work. And in style. This is big stuff; it sets a new record for the ‘Doctor Who’ revival. Never before has the Doctor played a decisive role in the story’s conclusion for two consecutive episodes. It is primarily because of this that I am willing to forgive the story its faults. If only they can keep it up, I will be quite happy, barring any unforgivable howlers such as, ooh, I don’t know, killing off Sarah Jane Smith or making the Cybermen stupid/comic/unthreatening.

The Doctor’s ability to “pull the cat out of the bag”, as one essayist put in relation to ‘Robot’, is seen again here, as he uses already-introduced plot devices and his own special ingenuity to achieve victory, providing the most extraordinary and welcome twist that RTD has given us so far: he takes an apparently irretrievable situation, and a bog-standard rampage of ‘plague zombies’, and gives us ‘The Doctor Dances’ Mk II (the not-nearly-so-effective-but-still-good sequel!). Not everybody lives; we don’t know or care for the incidental characters; and coming from a plot which replaces Steven Moffat’s sheer skill with RTD’s trademark breathless about-faces, the resolution isn’t so touchingly brilliant… but you have to admit, having the Doctor cure – not destroy, but CURE – the poor zombies was classic Doctor Who.

Fitz said of the Eighth Doctor, “God, you’re cool!” when he resurrected millions of people in ‘The Gallifrey Chronicles’. This was a comparable moment.

Cassandra, of course, warrants a mention. Her bizarre powers of mind-swapping without the psycho-graft needed a little thought, but it isn’t really important. What is important is that Russell’s compassion for the villains reappears (arguably, he cares more about the Cassandras and Blon Fel Fotches than he does the ‘good guys’!) – and strangely enough the apparent paradox of Cassandra meeting herself and dying in her own arms was far from cringeworthy. Instead it was a great idea, touchingly and not over-statedly redeeming Cassandra, as the Doctor, Rose, and the viewers see what could very well be the last spark of humanity and tenderness in her entire life. The moody final shot of the Doctor was great too, and helped the feeling that he is more in the centre of things than Eccleston was.

Redemption. I would rhapsodise about how beautifully appropriate it was for Easter, if only I thought that atheist Russell meant it that way.

Preposterous. Absolutely out of this world, unbelievably preposterous. In other words ‘New Earth’ is Doctor Who as it always was and should always be. The science maybe questionable (and hands up if you’re an expert on the year 5 Billion and 23?) but critics will be aware that this is children’s television and if they are entertained then Mr Davies and his team have simply succeeded where a number of other pretenders to the family programming crown have bravely failed. The reaction from my two children (9 and 6 respectively) gave the episode a firm thumbs up. Yes, they didn’t quite understand all of the sub-plots and yes, they had plenty of questions regarding certain themes, but they were thoroughly enthralled from the pre-title sequence right up to the end of the ‘Tooth and Claw’ trailer.

A new Earth and a new, new doctor accompanied by a surfeit of computer generated eye candy. The wide angle shot of the transporters homing in on the hospital of the future took my breath away and reminded everyone of how far Doctor Who has travelled, quite literally. When Rose gushed the words “I’ll never get used to this” you felt that 8 million viewers were probably sharing the same sentiments; at last the images on screen truly realise the ideas drafted on paper.

Tennant is a revelation. It may be premature to say so, but he has already stamped his authority on this most iconic of roles. A whole gamut of emotions were covered in forty five minutes and anticipation is high regarding what he can achieve during the course of Season Two. His interplay with Piper is just natural; they are both at ease with each other and clearly are having the time of their lives. Adding to the mix Wanamaker’s sardonically cruel Lady Cassandra was inspired and helps to give the story a welcomed lift. The turns from each of the three leads during the ‘body snatching’ sequences highlighted the talents on display. Absurb it may have been but as entertainment second to none.

The Sisters of Plenitude, with their utterly sinister and misguided mission, contributed to the spectacle. Full credit must go to the design team for producing aliens that Star Trek would have struggled to create so plausibly. Add to this the duped ‘patients’, carrying every known disease in the universe, breaking free and turning on their captors, you are already gripped by the ambition of this new series. It appears to be doing what it promised in the trailers and taking us further than before.

And that ending was poignant without being too wistful. Chip, as Cassandra, finally brings out the true human in his mistress. The Doctor and Rose linger for a moment witnessing the final embrace but have the dignity to take their leave and set the TARDIS co-ordinates for 1979; just in time for that Ian Dury gig……….

The sparky, sharply observed script confirms Davies’ credentials as a top-drawer writer (as if there were any doubts). It would be churlish to criticize references to 'Chavs' and hospital shops; it simply communicates seamlessly to the contemporary audience. Doctor Who has never professed to be serious high brow, up it's own derriere science-fiction. It is preposterous, however, highly entertaining fantasy made for children; on those notes it ticks all the boxes. Overall, a ‘text book enigmatic’ episode that bodes well for Season Two and indeed for the new, new doctor.

My nine year old son says:

“It’s a very good opening episode. The visual effects were fantastic. I especially liked the way in which Cassandra was re-introduced along with the Face of Boe. I find it interesting to see characters who were in Season One again; it makes for excellent continuity and the familiarity helps me to relate to the stories more immediately. The doctor’s new, the planet is new and even the city is new, new – this theme really made me feel that we were witnessing an exciting new stage in the series – I liked the pattern involved here. I loved the fact that Cassandra took over other bodies. The fear factor was high because the infected people and the Sisters of Plenitude gave me the creeps! But ‘Tooth and Claw” looks even scarier...

"The Christmas Invasion" seems to encapsulate Russell T. Davies' vision for "Doctor Who" better than any of the other episodes done thus far. It is by turns silly, scary, dramatic, epic, witty, and tragic, and then all of those things again in another order, and then again, and so on. Most of the time this works really well and that's what's made "The Christmas Invasion" such a great show to watch, and the one or two times that it doesn't quite come off aren't enough to totally derail it (but I'll mention those bits all the same).

The story owes much to one of RTD's favorite stories, "Spearhead from Space." It's got UNIT fending off a new alien invasion, Auton-like everyChristmasDay-looking robots, and a regeneration to contend with. He wisely chooses to mimic "Spearhead"'s structure by holding off on the full reveal of the new Doctor for a very long time indeed, and as a result all of the other characters (and by this time the audience) are in such a "we need the Doctor!" state by then that his grand entrance becomes all the more grand and we have a ball following him as he easily romps through the Sycorax plan and puts paid to it.

It's just as well then that the best thing in the episode is David Tennant's debut performance itself, or else all that build-up would've been a bit anticlimactic. But he really is tremendous, isn't he? He seems to get by on his one-liners alone for a good long while, like "You just can't get the staff" or roaring "I DON'T KNOW" back at the Sycorax leader, or his ramble about the "great big threatening... Button!" Or best of all, "Sorry, that's The Lion King." He seems to be going to be one of those Doctors that loves the humor-as-a-distraction tactic, where the tactic part is foremost in his mind. Although, come to think of it, he is just having a great old time some of the time too, such as when he regenerates his hand and exclaims "It's a fightin' hand!" in an American accent.

He has also got a very hard streak in him which should be fascinating to watch. This comes up twice... first when he sends the Sycorax leader falling to his death and saying "No second chances, I'm that sort of a man," and second and more fascinatingly when he tears down Harriet Jones after she uses the secret Torchwood weapon to destroy the retreating Sycorax ship. One need only look at the level of debate that's sprung up over this decision of his to see how fascinating this was, as everyone takes a side as to whether he was right or whether Harriet was. My take on it is that there's no question that each of them acted completely in character; Harriet made the human decision and the Doctor made the Doctor decision. Which one is the truly right thing to do though? Personally, I'm with the Doctor on all counts, as I usually am. His decision gets even more fascinating when you consider that his taking down of Harriet's premiership is a change to the history he's already told us about back in "World War Three," where he indicated she'd be PM for three terms. _That's_ how angry he was with her on this one... angry enough to break what would've been the First Law of Time if the Time Lords were still around, and that says to me that the Tenth Doctor will place his morals above everything and everyone else. This holds a lot of potential for great stories in the next two seasons (at least).

Going back to Harriet Jones for a moment, I was very heartened to see a level of political sophistication in the writing here that you don't often get in today's polarized media environment. I was among many who cheered her dig at the US President early on when she sent the message to him that "he's not my boss, and he's certainly not turning this into a war." The easy way to write this would've been to just leave that there to go on saying "our politicians should be better than America's," but then we get to the end of the story and Harriet herself makes that decision to destroy the retreating ship in the name of national/planetary security, the sort of decision we'd expect to see from the US administration, and here the script seems to be saying "most world leaders put in this position would also make the wrong choice." And I cheer at this piece of writing as well. This doesn't mean I'll be voting Republican anytime soon, or in fact ever, but I do appreciate the perspective RTD brings us here. There's a lot of anti-Americanism in the world today, and while that directed against our foreign policies is completely justified in my view, I bristle at the how knee-jerk and prejudicial so much of it is, as I suspect that whatever nation was in the no. 1 spot today would be making many of the same mistakes. RTD seems to get this too, and I thank him for writing that into this story.

Changing tack entirely, we have the story of Rose, Mickey, Jackie, and Christmas at home. This material was all a lot of fun even if some of the plot starts to creak here if you stare at it really hard. There was another balancing act to be done here of putting Rose back into the standard companion's role from where she was at the end of "The Parting of the Ways" while at the same time not making her seem like a weakling, and the story seems to have done that effortlessly. Or is it Billie Piper's acting that does it so effortlessly? Probably equally both, really. Piper's got this character down inside-out by this point, and at the same time the writing has her not just being a "companion" but showing more experience as any second-season companion should. She's long past the stage of making bad decisions and though she doesn't quite know what to do some of the time (because she's not got the Doctor's knowledge), she doesn't make any mistakes and keeps things together nevertheless, i.e. realizing immediately that there's something up with the sinister Santas and why they'd be after her and Mickey, or thinking to check both the Doctor's hearts, or realizing how dangerous his blood could be to history, or putting the sonic screwdriver into his hand during the tree attack, or taking everyone into the TARDIS for safety when all other options are bad. I also loved the bit where she has to play at being the Doctor herself and basically just quotes every alien name she can think of from last season at the Sycorax leader.

And what about those Sycorax and the eponymous Christmas Invasion? This was exactly the right mix of a great big epic Independence Day-style alien invasion and "Doctor Who" alien cheesy fun. It starts with that hysterical moment when the news footage is tuning in the space probe's transmission and the whole world sees "Raarrgh!" and just builds from there. They are by turns post-modernly funny ("Sycorax rock!") and really scary what with the whole genius idea of them getting every A+ blooded person up onto a roof or height to jump from if they don't get what they want (and didn't those crowd shots just look _amazing_?). This whole mix is wonderfully encapsulated in the moment when the leader starts to take his helmet off and Mr. Llewellyn says "they might be like us!" only to reveal a nasty-looking alien face beneath. And they've got this fabulously big-looking menacing "ship" that looks like they've just hollowed out a big asteroid and put some engines in it while at the same time they've got a pseudo-Klingon culture of trial by combat and champions and tactics that aren't really as nasty as they at first appeared (the blood control). I loved them, and I wouldn't mind seeing more of them again in another setting, perhaps their home planet or vs. some other creatures. Their bark was worse than their bite, and there's always more potential with a set of characters like this.

The direction was as top-notch as James Hawes' earlier effort... I particularly like his sense of scale when it came to the big outdoor shots, from the Sycorax ship hovering over London to the crowds of people first walking and then standing on the edges of buildings, to the fight scenes set against what looks like nothing but sky. The music by Murray Gold was some of his best as well. With just one rather glaring exception, I thought he nailed every scene right on the head this time (and more especially in the "Children in Need" prelude... I really loved what he did there).

As I've heaped so much praise already that the episode's about to go into a diabetic coma, I'll turn now to my list of mostly small quibbles with the episode. I'll start with that glaring music exception. Why does Murray Gold go for brass and trumpets in the scene where Rose breaks down and cries over the loss of her old Doctor? Trumpets don't say "sadness" in my musical vocabulary. Also, the swordfight choreography between the Doctor and the Sycorax leader didn't come off looking at all well. I liked the movement around the cave and then outside onto the edge of the ship, but the actual blows looked very clumsy by today's action standards, or even by those of the Pertwee era (although it still manages to beat that anemic-looking swordfight in "The King's Demons"). I didn't care for the teleport special effect either, as it looks far too much like that used in the "Power Rangers" shows. The CGI and effects were otherwise very, very impressive.. oh, except for the Guinevere One probe, which looked too computer-generated for my taste.

I've mentioned how the story so rapidly turns from funny to tragic to something else and so on, and most of the time that really worked, but the one time that it really didn't work is the only blight on the episode big enough for me to take a point off my rating of it, and that's the too-violent tonal wrench we're whiplashed through when at the end we go from Harriet's genocide and the Doctor's "just six words" bit to suddenly happy music as he finds his new clothes in the TARDIS wardrobe and then Christmas dinner at the Tyler's flat, and then back again to the awful aftermath of the genocide as "Schindler's List"-like ash falls on the area like snow and then back to fun again as the Doctor and Rose peer upwards at where they'll go next. I can't be having much fun at a mass funeral, I have to say, and I'm a little shocked that they let this go through as it is. This really jars.

And, one other note about this ending, with the alien ship's death throes being seen by the Doctor and company at Christmas... didn't we get this exact same thing in Big Finish's "Winter for the Adept"? Except that there it was written much more sensitively... or at least it was after Peter Davison objected to the original text and got them to change it. I'll give one point to Andrew Cartmel over Russell T. Davies on this occasion. :)

And I should also say a great big "hooray!" for the restoration of the middle-8 to the closing title music, even if we couldn't hear the music properly owing to the continuity announcer talking over it. I have already said that I don't care for how orchestral the closing music now gets though as I think it's now drowning out the Derbyshire radiophonic swoops sounds, but I now wonder if that's a transition that's in fact more gradual through the piece and we just can't hear the swoops earlier on because again the announcer was talking over them. The opening music has been redone as well, and there the balance is perfect.

Overall then, 9 out of 10 for "The Christmas Invasion," with only that strangely set-against-itself ending being a blight on the story to my mind. And welcome to the TARDIS Mr. David Tennant. I agree with your character, that it is gonna be fantastic.

After a great season finale, the wait is finally over. And, thankfully, us "Canucks" didn't have to wait as long as we normally do. This time, we got to see the Canadian transmission only a day after "the Brits" did instead of the usual two weeks we had to wait back when the Eccleston stories were being shown.

But, anyway you slice it, the conclusion of "The Parting of the Ways" has made this an eagerly-anticipated story. In much the same way as I found myself waiting for the different episodes of Star Wars to come out over these last few years, so were my feelings with "Christmas Invasion". But, as Lucas discovered, sometimes that anticipation can work against you. Sometimes, what the fans are expecting and what you can deliver is just too big a difference. And their own over-anticipation makes them impossible to satisfy.

And that was probably the biggest question hanging over the production teams' heads as they made "The Christmas Invasion" - would the audience feel it was worth the wait? And I'll even admit that my own sense of anticipation made me watch this tale with a far more critical eye than normal. "Rose", of course, had that same effect on me a few months previously!

So, was it worth the wait? Hmm.....

I will admit, it was a bit dodgy, at first. There were some very deliberate attempts to entertain us with wild eye candy rather than plot. Some of them, (ie: the TARDIS smashing into buildings as it lands and the killer Christmas tree) worked better than others (ie: mass evacuation of hypnotised people moving to the ledges of tall buildings - the effect went on far longer than it needed too, in my opinion). I understood why this was being done since it was a Christmas Special and needed to have a mass appeal to it - but I felt that "Rose" achieved similiar effects but in much more stylish and clever manners. This bordered a bit more on just "throwing the effects in our faces" as cheesy Hollywood summer blockbusters tend to do - and it just seems wierd to see Doctor Who doing that! Back in the old days, we endured the rubber outfits and monstruoulsy awful C.S.O. because we could justify it with the sheer inventiveness of the storytelling. But now we're being treated to some gorgeous effects and a somewhat cliched "alien invasion" plotline taken right out of Independence Day. This, as far as I concerned, was not what I signed up for when I became a Doctor Who fan. And I had to admit, by about halfway through the story I was starting to feel that unless I got some "real" elements of Who coming up soon, I was going to walk away a dissatisfied geek.

Fortunately, there were some nice nods toward something more "Whoesque" on its way as we referred, now and again, to the status of our new Doctor. His brief moment of consciousness as Rose begs him to wake was very effective and showed us that there was more of this to come. That the Doctor needed a bit of a rest first since he was weak from the regeneration. But that, when he was recovered, he would come out with sonic screwdriver blazing!

I, for one, was also glad that they maintained the tradition of making the Doctor a bit "shaky on his feet" for the first little while after his regeneration. It's a reflection of how the fans feel after a regneration, really. A bit unsettled. And I think it's a very effective way of allowing us to adjust to the new interpretation that the role is getting. Let the new Doctor stumble around for a bit - let us feel sorry for him in his weakness - then we can accept the new personality we have to adjust to.

I do think, however, that Russell made us wait just a tad too long for the Doctor to finally emerge and join the story. There was just a bit too much of a sag in the plot. And, although he offered us a neat subplot of Rose trying to stand on her own two feet without him, it just wasn't quite enough of a distraction. I found myself saying: "Just get on with it - wake the damned Doctor up!" about five to ten minutes before he finally rises. If memory serves, this story runs a bit longer than the normal episodes did during the Eccleston era. Perhaps this was a mistake.

Now, before you start thinking I was genuinely dissatisfied with this tale. Let me get to the good stuff. And there is plenty of it there.

Most of the really awesome moments occur once the Doctor does finally emerge from the TARDIS (clever build up with the alien language finally starting to make sense). To be quite honest, there isn't a moment in the episode after Tennant finally takes control of the situation where I'm not in pure fanboy ecstacy. Which more than makes up for the "sag" I felt the whole story was starting to have. Tennant isn't just brilliant as the new Doctor, but the crafting of this new Doctor through the writing and directing is magnificient too. Had the story kept moving in the sort of "Hollywoodesque" direction that it had been going, we would have been treated to some very over-the-top sentimentalism as Tennant emerges from those blue double-doors. Instead, we got that wild quirkiness we so love from earlier incarnations of the Doctor. The way he gets up in the Sycorax's face then tells him to wait a minute so he can have an extended chat with Rose, Mickey and Harriet about who he's supposed to be won me over instantly. I am reminded of that wonderful moment in the 96 telemovie where McGann rejoices because his shoes finally seem to be fitting properly. This is one of the wonderful things about the Doctor: he has a very unique sense of priority that, in the end, makes sense. But doesn't seem to right away. Only as the story finally concludes do we see that he was probably saner than everyone else around him. But because he is so much more in tune with the universe than us mere mortals, much of his ways seem eccentric.

And that's what Tennant and the creative team, in general, has brought back quite beautifully in those last twenty minutes or so of "Christmas Invasion". The truly eccentric or even erratic nature of the Doctor. And that's what more than saves this story. As the Doctor wakes, he is not just triumphant in the way he saves the day - he's triumphant in the way he has transformed into this new incarnation. Doctor Ten is awesome - in every sense of the word.

And as much as I thought Eccleston's Doctor was great - he wasn't allowed to be quite so quirky as Tennant was in this story. And that made sense from a marketting standpoint. I don't think audiences could've handled a "fully quirky" Doctor right from the initial get-go. But now that we've gotten used to the series' formulae again - Tennant can give us a bit more of what the Doctor used to be like. I can't help but notice that even his new outfit is much more reflective of the old Doctor's suits as opposed to the very "stripped down" look Doctor Number Nine sported. I'm beginning to really see just how much of a masterplan RTD has had going on with the show. That he saw the flaws of the McGann story and realised he had to make the series a bit more approachable first before really restoring it to what it was like "back when" - whereas the McGann story came across as a lot more dated because it tried to bring back "traditional Who" too quickly. I suspect that, even as Season Two rolls along, there will be some moments were Tennant reigns himself in now and again and doesnt' go too far with the "eccentric proffessor" portrayal. Perhaps, by Doctor Eleven we might get a full helping of that - with a nice Victorian or Edwardian outfit hopefully thrown into the mix with it! But this story definitely shows us yet more clues as to just how smart RTD is being with the program. And I feel he must be applauded for that. Particularly since so many fanboys are looking to just sling mud at him for the most unfounded of reasons, sometimes!

So, what's my final verdict? Just a bit shaky before the Doctor truly joins the story - but once he's in there, he more than makes us forget about that shakiness. This story stands up quite well and marshals in a whole new era of the show quite masterfully. I, for one, can't wait to see what Season Two has to offer.

Damn! More of that eager anticipation to contend with! Looks like I'll be watching the first story of the season with some more of that overcritical eye of mine!