Filed under: Doctor Who Series 6
Okay, this isn’t so much a review of this weeks Doctor Who, more my thoughts on Steven Moffat and the direction this new series is taking.
Firstly, this week’s episode was every bit as good as last weeks regarding script, direction and performance. No problems there then. So why did I have to watch the second episode of the new series twice before posting a review? No, it wasn’t because I didn’t understand it. No, it wasn’t because I was blown away by sheer scope of the production values. To find the answer you need to go to Blackwell’s staff room. And more specifically last Tuesday.
During a discussion about Doctor Who we all concurred the first episode of series 6 was great and vastly enjoyable. However, two observations stuck in my mind as being both true and potentially dangerous. Dave Hartley and Peter Huxley both noted that Steven Moffat has a tendency to shoe horn too many ideas into his scripts and often starts a story with seemingly disconnected events that come together at the end. We all agreed at the time that this was just a facet of his writing and not a major criticism.
However, It was watching this week’s episode that I noticed another facet of Steven Moffats writing creeping through more and more. An obsession with leaving several questions unanswered is now starting to interfere with the roundness of his scripts. Back in the Russell T Davies days the Bad Wolf mystery was always kept in the background. Only rising to the fore after slowly brewing over several series. Steven Moffat throws these unanswered questions and sub plots right to the front, running alongside the main story line. Without doubt the two episodes of series 6 are as good, if not better than anything from series 5, as Steven Moffat takes Doctor Who into his own creation , rather than the Russell T Davies hangover that was series 5. The scripts are better. The direction is better. The acting is better. The story archs are getting more complicated…….hmm, maybe too complicated. I’m starting to think of Steven Moffat as some kind of Brian Wilson figure, hard at work on his own Smile creation. And just like that legendary ‘lost’ album, will Steven Moffat forget how all the pieces are supposed to fit together? Or indeed if they ever actually could. An unanswered question in a story is only clever writing if the circle is eventually completed. If the circle remains broken it’s surely just an invitation for further ideas to be shoe horned in. Yet more unanswered questions.
Steven Moffat has started this series with two strong episodes, taking Doctor Who into dark territory combined with vastly increased production values. But Moffat needs to be careful. What made these episodes so great could very easily pull the series apart. Keep up the good work Steven, but be warned, I am taking note. Sometimes the simplest ideas are the best ones.
8/10
Leave a Comment so far
Leave a comment
