By: jcdnhomep

jcdnhomep — Thu, 28 Apr 2011 00:51:34 +0000

By: Observer

Observer — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 08:15:08 +0000

Mmm Tenant and Duncan were genuinely great but even 10 can’t really look serious on a turbo-Segway, let alone the back of WALL-E. I was less impressed by the body of the episode (the final 10 minutes were interesting). The listing of the base crew was overlong and repetitive. Every time ‘The Flood’ were mentioned I thought of the game ‘Halo’ – it was like another series/genre trying to use the word ‘Cyberman’ to mean something other than the Dr Who enemy. There was a scene that was such a straight lift from ’28 Days Later’ it felt like plagiarism. My biggest concern, though is that, between them, RTD/SM might think that they have a ‘formula for scariness’ which is to take some mundane/natural habit and ‘load it with fright’. It worked brilliantly in ‘Blink’, was a little tired when counting shadows in ‘Silence in the Library’ and, truly, felt rather stale, particularly in the compressed single episode by the time we were told not to touch a single drop of water in ‘Waters of Mars’. Christmas afternoon could be spent with a twist on the ‘Who’s Line is it Anyway’ game ‘Party Quirks’ where the Doctor would guess the alien threat from guests’ behaviour (we could imagine ‘Don’t move’, ‘Don’t Speak’ and the devastatingly recursive ,,, ‘Don’t watch BBC Sci Fi’ …

Comments on: Doctor Who: November 2009 Special: The Waters of Mars Review

By: jcdnhomep

By: Observer