Doctor Who: Time Heist

'Time Heist', the episode where the Doctor, Clara and two augmented humans rob the most secure bank in the galaxy without knowing why they're doing it or even what they're after. Doctor Who revels in being able to dramatically change tone and genre every week and 'Time Heist' takes the basic formula of a heist movie and twists it into a unique take on the genre that's miles away from the atmospheric thriller we got last week. Moffat said his goal for Series 7 was to make a blockbuster every week ('Take your best movie idea and give it to the Doctor to fill 40 minutes')  but I feel he's accomplished that a lot better with Series 8. The scripts haven't felt short-changed due to the running time and the ideas are much more fleshed out this time around. Speaking of Moffat, 'Time Heist' is the second episode of this season to be co-written by him, the first being 'Into The Dalek' which he co-wrote with Phil Ford. This time around he's splitting the writing duties with Stephen Thompson, who's Doctor Who past hasn't exactly had the best track record. 'Curse Of The Black Spot' and 'Journey To The Center Of The Tardis' were really mediocre stories, probably the worst out of their respective series. Not here though, the writers manage to pull off an entertaining script that zips along and manages to tie up every loose end satisfactorily by the time the credits roll. I'm not sure if the slight increase in quality is due to Moffat having a more active role in the script but this is nonetheless a solid episode.  

'Time Heist' gives the pre-credits zinger for last week's episode 'Listen' a run for it's money by segwaying from the TARDIS's ringing telephone to the Doctor and Clara stranded in a room holding memory worms with a briefcase on the table in the front of them. Two other people are also present, they're also holding memory worms and according to an audio file they've just consented to having their minds wiped. After some confusion the case in front of them clicks open revealing a tantalising gold light shimmering inside....cue the intro. If that doesn't immediately draw you in then what will? The silent star of the past two episodes has been director Douglas Mackinnon. Between 'Listen' and 'Time Heist' he's shown a wide variety of range that's made Doctor Who look really slick. The intro here for example and the slo-mo shots of the gang walking into the bank a few minutes later look really impressive and the Teller is a great, if misplaced practical effect. Contrast this with the slower, more moodier 'Listen' I think he's a real asset to the show and is definitely a director to watch considering what he's accomplished. I certainly hope they bring him back for Series 9!

Up until now the series has put a strong emphasis on Clara's POV but here the 12th Doctor is very much taking the reins. I'm fine with the companion taking a back seat for once and letting Capaldi do his stuff, because again he's having a ball with the role. We return to the less-caring side of his character seen in the first few episodes, his cold exterior once again unsheathing itself as he brushes a character's death to the side. What's interesting is that despite what the Doctor is saying Capaldi's performance is clearly stating the opposite, as *SPOILERS* death definitely had an impact on him. So maybe he's repressing his emotions now? This adds to my confusion about his character because in 'Into The Dalek' he is very clearly a grade A arsehole. I still can't get a latch onto who this Doctor is, which may be intentional or just the result of the writers not finding their feet with him yet. I'm hoping the Malcolm Tucker side of him keeps coming out though, his 'Shut up, shut, shut, shittity up!' is basically a PG-13 version of 'Fuckity bye!' from the Thick Of It and I am loving every second of this Doctor we see on screen.

Once you get past his mind rape abilities he ain't so bad, honest!

The supporting characters for this episode weren't bad either. Psi and Saibra were both decently sketched out characters considering the amount of screen time they had and were well acted by Jonathan Bailey and Pippa Bennet-Warner. Saibra is a carbon copy of Rogue from X-Men, wanting to get rid of her powers so she can 'touch' again. She's ok but Psi is probably the better of the two, his speech to Clara about 'seeing no-one' when his life flashes before his eyes was surprisingly powerful. I did grimace when he pulled out a USB key to display a hologram of the bank's interface though. Look, it's clearly a USB key guys, couldn't you have covered it up with something? It's a tiny thing but it took me out of the fiction for a second. 

My problems with this episode stem from the two 'antagonists': Ms Delphox is moderately entertaining as a villain but her character is just another amalgamation of all the previous female villains on the show: Miss Foster, Madame Kovarian, Ms Kinslet from last year, they're all pretty much playing the same confident business woman in a suit and it's starting to get repetitive. Why isn't there more variation with female villains on this show? Actress Keeley Hawes is great in the role but feels a little bit wasted because of her thin character. As for the 'monster' of this story, the Teller has a great look but ultimately comes off as a tad goofy. When I think of a monster that can turn my brain into soup a snail headed bull doesn't immediately come to mind. It's a nice design but he just wasn't very intimidating for me, and the effect of him actually caving someone's head in was a gruesome image but looked really fake. The radio waves emanating from his head everytime he uses his power also looked naff. Admittedly there was one really good jump-scare but that wasn't enough to convince me this being was going to hunt down and slurp everyone's brain out...but considering the ending to this episode that is probably for the best.

Also the most secure bank in the galaxy appears to be surprisingly pregnable despite what the episode tells us. How come they've got ridiculously large human size vents that you can use to get right to the main entrance of the vault? And what's with the endless line of corridors with different mood lighting? Why the endless (unguarded) corridors if the deposit boxes head directly down into the vault? In a universe with Time-travel and miniaturisation devices you'd think they would have put some sort of defence around the vault, right? The bank also seems vulnerable to attack, surely they would know in advance that a solar flare was coming to wipe them out? Most of these are nitpicks of course that never actually occurred to me while watching the episode but I would have at least liked an explanation about that solar flare that literally came out of nowhere! 

Where have I seen you before?

Nitpicks aside the best part of the episode is that ending, which pulls several twists out of it's sleeve. Two of them I saw coming a mile away, like the identity of the architect and the fates of Psi and Saibra, but the other two were smartly put together. There's also a massive clue in the title, once again showing what Doctor Who's unique brand of science fiction can bring to heist movies. Capaldi was fantastic during all of this, perhaps putting his best performance to date as the Doctor in his confrontation with the Teller. These handful of scenes elevated the episode a lot, a mystery is only as good as it's resolution and 'Time Heist' delivers.   

'Time Heist' is another great edition to Series 8, an enjoyable ride that never lets up thanks to a watertight script and great direction. I do have a few grumbles but nothing that majorly impacted my opinion of the episode. Five weeks in and 'Into The Dalek' aside we're still going strong. Bring on 'The Caretaker'!

Positives:

+ It's Doctor Who's take on a heist movie
+ Slick presentation, even pacing
+ Great pay-off 
+ Better than average supporting characters
+ The Teller was a great practical effect

Negatives:

- Ms Delphox was a paper thin villain
- The Teller wasn't as frightening as the episode wanted it to be 
- The bank itself could have been developed better
- A lot of repeating corridors 

Overall Score: 7,5/10

Doctor Who: Listen

SPOILERS ahead...

'Listen' is driven by two things: the Doctor's obsession with finding a monster that will literally take him to the end of the universe and back, and Clara's weird relationship with Danny Pink. It's also an episode about fear, the kind of fear that gave you nightmares as a kid. The nightmares about the monsters under your bed, the boogyman, that kind of stuff. It's a minimalist episode that is laser-focused on these three main characters and how (thanks to time travel) they impact each other's lives. If all of this is ringing a bell then you'd be right in saying that 'Listen' is basically a collection of Moffat's greatest hits:

- A monster that preys on a basic human fear? Check.
- Timey-wimey? Indeed.
- Lot's of moody/atmospheric settings? Lot's.
- Time travel severely impacting the lives of the protagonists? Ditto.
- An obsession with finding more about the Doctors past? Yep.
- Lot's of awkward relationship banter? Uh-huh
- Multiple versions of the same character? You guessed it.
- Any extended scenes involving children? YES.
- Twists? Revelations? They're all here.

Like it or hate 'Listen' is the ultimate Moffat episode, encapsulating in 45 minutes his take on Doctor Who. Even if he's been using the same recipe book for quite a while now he can bake a darn good cake and this episode was incredible in quite a few aspects. 

In every season of NuWho there's always a couple of episodes that stand out from the pack, ones that immediately make you want to jump out of your seat and clap. 'Listen' is one of these episodes. Like 'Blink' and 'Midnight' 'Listen' tries really hard to scare the crap out of you by exploiting your fear of the unknown, taking a common fear and questioning whether or not it has a tangible physical form. It's masterfully presented in the opening minutes as the Doctor speculates how one could discover a creature that's perfected the art of hiding. He correlates this idea with a recurring nightmare every human being has supposedly had about a monster under the bed. What if there was a monster underneath our bed, one that has perfected the art of hiding? The Doctor might just be going a bit mad after being alone for to long but then who wrote LISTEN on his chalk board? Did he just forget he wrote it or was it something else? It's pure psychological horror, freaking you out without an ounce of gore or violence. It's also an extremely juicy premise, and while playing with similar idea's (The Silence anyone?) it manages to reinvigorate itself by not actually showing the monster at all. That's right, this is one of the few Doctor Who episodes that has (supposedly) no monsters whatsoever in it. It's entirely up to you whether it's just a bunch of coincidences or there really is a monster under your bed! Do even need to explain why this is such a brilliant idea? 

Bad hair day?

Director Douglas Mackinnon recognises that a creak in the floorboards is far more terrifying than any slasher villain and he makes sure to milk every last drop he can out of the the Moffat cookbook. A lot of the work is done already with Capaldi's Scottish accent whispering creepy nursery rimes at the camera looking absolutely terrifying but Mackinnon still manages to bang all of the doors, rattle all of the pipes and crank the mood lighting up to 11. Add in Murray Golds soundtrack and you've got pure nightmare fuel on your hands. A silent figure under a red blanket is the first time I've been legitimately scared watching Doctor Who since 'Blink' (I was 11). Well done sir.

Not content with just being the 'scary' episode 'Listen' also provides an insight into both Danny and the Doctor's lives. There's a surprising amount of meat to chew at here, not least of all the Doctor's obsession with the supposed monsters under the bed. As I've said before Capaldi's performance is unnerving, we still don't know quite know which side of the bed his Doctor lies on. One minute he's giving these batsh*t crazy grins that would make Tom Baker blush and five minutes later he's dispensing jokes about finding Wally. When asked why he's going to such extreme lengths to find the truth, he simply states 'I have to know!' like he's got a mental disorder. And Matt Smith's Doctor would certainly not steal someone's cup of coffee, that's just plain cruel. His portrayal of an extremely flawed Doctor continues to be fascinating, where is this going? 

And then there's Danny, an ordinary bloke who's past and future is tied with Clara. Samuel Anderson is good at portraying an ordinary bloke but I'm still not sure where exactly we're heading with him. This episode strongly hints that both he and Clara will eventually hook up. In fact they pretty much confirm it, so...now what? If we know they're getting together and (eventually) having a kid then where do we go from here? Danny's past as a soldier must have something to do with something, right? There is an unsettling element of pre-determined destiny at play here as well. Thanks to a mishap with the TARDIS we end up visiting Danny as a child in the 1990's. It turn's out he's an orphan called Rupert (what, ANOTHER kid with no parents?) and Clara unintentionally inspires his later name and his career choice when Rupert names a toy soldier Dan. This is reinforced when, after the Doctor uses his telepathy to send Rupert to sleep, he reveals that he has wiped his memory of the events and left him only with a dream of being 'Dan the soldier man'. Clara also massively impacts the Doctors future later so no one seems to have any free will in this story, everything seems determined in advance thanks to time travel. That to me feels slightly disturbing and I'm wondering if this was intentional or not. Either way time travel can F*CK you up!

A lot of mood lighting going on here...

Despite Capaldi's manic eyes threatening to consume the audience this was Jenna Coleman's episode through and through. The Doctor's obsession fuels the scares and the plot forward but it's Clara who has to do the heavy lifting, and holy crap does she deliver. This is Coleman's best performance to date, once again demonstrating a variety of emotions that if nothing else just confirms how much growth the character's been given in the new era of the show, to the point where she's basically the main character now. Despite the age difference she challenges this Doctor a lot, becoming the voice of reason in an almost maternal way. In 'Listen' she's a parental figure for both the Doctor and Danny. The Doctor/companion dynamic this season is super interesting, and not just because of that twist...

Wow. Who could have seen that ending coming? While the specifics of how she got there are murky the reveal was fantastically handled and really put a cherry on top of this magnificent cake (yes, I'm continuing with the cake metaphors). It's also a really ballsy move, once again revealing an aspect to the Doctor's past that's barely been hinted at previously. When Moffat eventually leaves the show no one can say he hasn't left his mark, in the past year alone we've had a new regeneration cycle, an entire arc based around the title of the show, the major Time War conflict resolved AND a secret Doctor unearthed. Now add the Doctor as a child to this list! The reveal has gone down rather well with fans, it's the idea that Clara has single-handedly shaped the Doctor's life into what it is that ruffles up some feathers. In that one scene she instilled into the young Doctor his trait of being 'the soldier without a gun'. She's already fractured herself throughout his entire timeline and convinced him to think of another way to end the Time War, maybe this is a step too far? It definitely seems like too much power to bestow on any single companion, but for the purposes of this particular story it's too good of an idea not to include. Please though, we've seen enough of the Doctor's past for the time being, can we move on? We've discovered more about the Doctor these past few years than the other 48 years combined!

'Listen' is also ballsy enough for implying what drives the Doctor: his fear of the dark. Clara's speech about fear being a superpower was wonderful (although didn't she get that from the Doctor? PARADOX), I loved the way it dovetailed back into the 50th Anniversary with the barn. Why would the young Doctor go and hide there anyway? It looked like it was in the middle of nowhere! And that final shot of the toy soldier? Chills man, pure chills. It's hard to see how Moffat can top this. 

No matter how you look at it 'Listen' is an ambitious piece of work. It has an amazingly ballsy script, sleek direction that makes Doctor Who legitimately scary and an ending no one is going to forget anytime soon. For a standalone episode it's impact on the show as the whole will be felt for a long time to come. Bravo Moffat you smart ass: 9,5/10.

Positives:

+ It's scary as hell
+ Ending twist that reveals a lot about the Doctor's past
+ Brilliant performances from Capaldi and Coleman
+ Fantastic direction from Douglas Mackinnon 
+ Ballsy script from Steven Moffat
+ More insight into Danny's life
+ Ambiguous monster  

Negatives:

+ Clara is perhaps a little to proactive when it comes to shaping the Doctor's past
+ The story is a little fragmented

Overall Score: 9,5/10

Doctor Who: Robot Of Sherwood

Now this is more like it!

'Robot Of Sherwood' is the token historical figure episode of Doctor Who. We've had Charles Dickens, William Shakespeare, Winston Churchill, Vincent Van Gogh and now...Robin Hood?! Really? Well I guess he does technically count as a historical figure...

'Sherwood' your quintessential Robin Hood tale shrunken down to fit 45 minutes with the Doctor and Clara stumbling into the middle of it. Yes it looks too sunny, yes Robin Hood is an extreme caricature and yes everyone looks clean, but all of this is immediately poked fun at by the Doctor who spends the entire episode refusing to believe that the man in the green tights is real. He's right, there is of course a clever sci-fi twist (can we go ONE episode without aliens?) that's literally in the title of the episode. I think it's safe to say hilarious hijinks ensue, and several of the Robin Hood 'iconic moments' are evoqued. You've got it all really: a climactic hero/villain sword fight, an archery tournament, the band of merry men, the Sheriff plundering the land for it's wealth to fuel his evil schemes...a lot of it is covered here. Nothing is done is an original way (a lot of this stuff has been adapted loads of times over the years) but if you're curious about what a goofy Robin Hood themed episode of Doctor Who would be like then 'Robot Of Sherwood' is right up your alley. 

It's comes as no surprise to see that Mark Gatiss is on scripting duties here, writer of 'A Crimson Horror' from Series 7. His latest episodes revel in the slightly sillier aspects of the show, esquing the seriousness for some frothy campy fun. The tonal shift is welcome after a couple of rather bleak episodes and allows Capaldi to stretch his comedy muscles, which are sublime. 

The Doctor subtlety giving Robin Hood the finger. I love Doctor Who

They should just rename this episode to 'The Capaldi Show' because he stole every single scene he was in. Whether it was the spoon fight, the arrow contest: 'This is getting silly...' or the best buddy cop duo since Bad Boys 2 (omg the banter between the Doctor and Robin was hilarious) he excelled at being the grumpiest git around. I mean just look his facial expressions, the guy's a comedic genius. It's taken us a couple of episodes but we're finally seeing the lighter side to this incarnation. Jenna Coleman continues to be great as well, her ability to inject every scene with boundless enthusiasm is infectious and she continues to run circles around the men: Clara's shtick of getting the bad guys to reveal their evil plans seems to be her insta-win card. I mean out of the three episodes so far she's managed to outsmart the villain twice AND put the Doctor in his place on several occasions (definitely the signs of a closet control freak...). She's quickly becoming an extremely likeable and head-strong companion without resorting to the damsel in distress stereotype that even the best companions fall stray to occasionally. In short: I like her a lot better now.

Guest starring this week are Tom Riley and Ben Miller, both of them great in their roles. Riley's take on Robin is more spiritually linked to the men in tights version then the more recent Russell Crowe adaptation, with a few echoes of the Disney version sprinkled in at the arrow contest (notice the floppy hat). He's very much an idealised and larger than life depiction of the character just like Gatiss's depiction of Winston Churchill in 'Victory Of The Daleks'. Riley puts in a solid effort, and looks the part. This Robin isn't quite three dimensional though, it's a shame his character is only really explored in the scenes where he interacted with Clara. Ben Miller's Sheriff was another pleasant surprise. Right down to the facial hair he's a dead ringer for Anthony Ainleys Master and seems to be parodying him at points: 'First Darby, then....Lincoln. And then....THE WORLD!!' He's an entertaining villain that's threatening enough to at least be taken partially seriously. It's a shame they cut the *beheading scene though, I hope it will be on the DVD as it added quite a lot to his character and actually explained the title. Both of these actor's ham it up but don't quite take it to the point of ridiculousness, the script is adept enough to put a fine line just before we reach the point of absurdity.  

Filming pic: now all we need is a moustache twirl...

While the more serious Who fan in me was hoping for a more realistic approach to the legend (the tear-heavy Vincent Van Gogh episode comes to mind) this episode was so much fun and the performances where so charismatic you kinda get over it after a while. The episode is smart to provide both viewpoints through the main characters. You can side with the Doctor's viewpoint: that all of this whiffs of sterilised Disney bullsh*t, or embrace the larger than life goings on with Clara. Either way you're going to be laughing with or at Capaldi as he's essentially the straight man of the story. The plot goes halfway into explaining why everything is the way it is, suffice to say alien tampering has altered events a little. The robot beings in this story are note for note the same as the robots in 'Deep Breath': we're not told anything other than the fact that they're robots and they want to rebuild their crashed ship to escape to the promised land. It's LITERALLY the same plot, so it has to be intentional right? Where is all this stuff with heaven building to? People are apparently aware of it's existence but why do robots want to get there so much? This is utter speculation on my part but Cybermen have been confirmed to feature in the finale....cyborg/robot team-up anyone? Other than the copy/paste extra-terrestrial element, I found the resolution to be lacking. It's complete bullcrap and makes little to no sense at all but...*LOOKS AT WATCH* 'OH NOES! I'VE ONLY GOT TWO MINUTES OF EPISODE TIME LEFT! I'VE GOT TO WRAP THIS UP QUICKLY.....TIME TO DEPLOY NONSENSICAL SOLUTION THAT DOESN'T INVOLVE THE SONIC SCREWDRIVER!'

....yeah, I'm guessing that's exactly what happened. Props for making fun of the screwdriver though. 

While not exactly a classic, 'Robot Of Sherwood' is nonetheless a greatly entertaining bit of fluff to spend 45 minutes on. Quite like Gatiss's previous story 'The Crimson Horror' it's an expert blend of humour and wit wrapped up with a golden bow.

Positives:

+ 12th Doctor giving Robin Hood the finger
+ More of grumpy 12
+ More great Clara moments
+ Campy fun
+ Ben Miller hamming it up as the Sheriff!
+ Tom Riley hamming it up as Robin Hood!
+ It's really funny
+ The tournament scene

Negatives:

- The nonsensical resolution to the villain's plot
- Might have preferred a more serious take on the legend

Overall score: 9/10

*For those not in the know, Robin originally lopped the Sheriffs head off during the fight...revealing the Sheriff as a robot! His talking head (rolling onto the floor) claimed that his Robot pals had to rebuild him after their ship crash-landed on top of him, and after a brief altercation his head was then put back in it's rightful place and the fight continued as normal. It's only a minute or two and it's a shame that the recent news events prevent us from ever seeing this in the finished episode. Maybe for the Blu-Ray/DVD release?

Doctor Who: Into The Dalek

'Into The Dalek' takes place in an unspecified future where the Combined Galactic Resistance have stumbled upon a damaged Dalek that hates other Daleks. In a cross between 'Fantastic Voyage' and 'Journey To The Center Of The Earth' the Doctor and Clara (+ a couple of redshirts) get shrunk down and have to go inside the Dalek in order to discover what makes a 'good' Dalek. It's an interesting and fairly ambitious premise squandered by poor special effects and lame character stereotypes. Well okay, it wasn't completely terrible, it had some cool Dalek action and I generally liked everything to do with the Doctor and Clara. Everything else....kinda fell flat on it's face.

Phil Ford and Steven Moffat penned this episode. Fords last Doctor Who credit was the brilliant 'The Water's Of Mars', one of my favourite Who episodes ever. It was phenomenal TV, so it's a shame his latest story isn't up to scratch. Because there's two writers it's difficult to ascertain who wrote what, but the 12th Doctor had some killer lines in this episode. 'He's on the top layer if you want to say something' had me guffawing rather loudly. And how does the 12th Doctor open the TARDIS? He kicks the door open of course. Capaldi was amazing in every scene and his take on this supposed 'darker' Doctor feels really refreshing. He comes off as a grumpy bastard, and I do like a bit of bastard in my Doctor...

His actions are certainly questionable at times, he basically lied to Redshirt No 1 with the radiation pill and then joked about his death afterwards. He was also pretty rude to Clara in this episode, commenting on her 'manly' physique (she does give him a well deserved slap later, so they're mostly even). It's not something Doctors 10 or 11 would even consider doing, perhaps echoing the War Doctor's comments about both of then needing to grow up? Either way I can't see Capaldi's Doctor being put onto school lunch-boxes any time soon.

The new Doctor is aware of his increasing lack of empathy however. He questions Clara about whether she considers him 'a good man'. Clara responds at first by saying 'I don't know...' but later on she revises this to '...but I think you try to be, which is probably the point'. So yes, this new Doctor does come off as a total d*ck but his heart is still in the right place I guess. He's not 'darker' per-se, just really grumpy. Capaldi's reign seems to be making this aspect of the Doctors psyche much more pronounced again (both the first and sixth Doctors can be classified as grumpy at times). Clara's role so far this season has been a moral compass for the Doctor, she's the one keeping him in check. I'm interested to see how this particular TARDIS due will develop, it's a companion/doctor dynamic that we haven't really seen since the days of Rose and Christopher Eccleston and once again feels really fresh. They're both a shining light in an otherwise bland episode. 

This Doctor has issues...

Now for the negatives...

Read that premise, doesn't that sound awesome? On paper it sounds great: Dalek antibodies, walking up the signature eyestalk, protein vats, memory banks, the giant kaled inside writhing it's tentacles around, a mini-nuclear reactor...there's a lot of good stuff to play around with here. It's a shame then that (aside from a few establishing CGI shots) the physical sets don't seem to really do it justice. The camera is constantly zoomed in on the actor's faces and we never get a sense of the space they're in. The designs are rather uninspired as well: the Dalek antibodies look generic and are very similar to the ones from the Tesselecta, the memory banks are a bunch of super fake looking clean plastic tubes. The space sequence in the beginning also looked super naff despite the CGI being relatively okay looking. And that fight between the Daleks and the Galactic Alliance soldiers? While some very pretty explosions were going off (nice to see Daleks exterminating again!) the crappy laser effects and the soldier actors made some aspects look laughable as well. 

Look I get it, ALL of these issues can be put down to budget, but Doctor Who can look like an expensive show. Remember the battle sequence in 'The Day Of The Doctor'? Even the last Dalek story, 'Asylum Of The Daleks' also looked pretty amazing visually. Effects and set-wise this episode dropped the ball. Some of it looked painfully bad, like Capaldi standing in front of the giant Dalek animatronic or the projected Dalek images behind Capaldi. It's extremely difficult to take Doctor Who seriously as a modern TV show with dodgy effects like these, I hope this doesn't set the standard for the rest of the season. This jankiness does have a weird positive effect though, something about the crude set design harkened back to the charm of classic Who in a....good way? There was something very old school about 'Into The Dalek' and I'm not just talking about an older Doctor. Even the score by Murray Gold (who is still knocking it out of the park) felt like a tribute to past Dalek stories. 

YAY! PEOPLE ARE DYING IN DOCTOR WHO AGAIN!

Presentation aside, I still have a few issues with the script. Danny Pink is a new recurring character this series and his introduction here came off as being extremely awkward and forced. What was up with that scene with the secretary, am I missing something? And that random kid in class who made him cry? They were both very cliché scenes that didn't really have anything to do with the episode. I would have left the backstory bits for later and just included the conversation with him and Clara, which felt awkward for the right reasons. We'll just have to wait and see where they go with him in future episodes...

The supporting characters for this episode were also pretty flat. From what I've seen of Michael Smiley (Reverend Green in 'The World's End') he seems like a good actor, so why did they waste him in a generic colonel role? You can only appear on DW once, don't waste it. Zawe Ashton's character Journey Blue didn't do anything for me either, her bid to travel with the Doctor at the end kinda came out of nowhere. The other two redshirts were exactly that, redshirts. They barely had any lines or characterisation beyond the stereotypical sacrifice archetype. 

Another teething issue is that quite a few of the story beats echo 2005's 'Dalek': It features a lone damaged Dalek who turns good and the Doctor's hatred for the Daleks gets the better of him. Even the 'YOU WOULD MAKE A GOOD DALEK' line gets repeated, and perhaps not as good as the first time around. The episodes are similar enough that they probably contributed to a strong sense of deja vu I got from this episode. 

While I like what the story achieved (there's probably going to be a rebel faction of Daleks hovering around now) everything else in the episode was extremely underwhelming. It's not for lack of trying, but like 'The Bells Of Saint John' it's another one of those episodes that left me cold the whole way through. 

Positives:

+ Some great scenes with Capaldi
+ Clara continues to develop
+ Interesting premise
+ Lot's of witty dialogue
+ Some good shots of Dalek's blowing up stuff
+ The 12th Doctor is an A-hole

Negatives:

- Set's aren't very convincing
- Poor special effects, most likely due to budget
- Supporting characters are lame stereotypes
- A LOT of repeated idea's
- Really forced scenes with Danny Pink
- Feels like this episode was let down in execution

Overall score: 5/10