Rate and Discuss: The Almost People

[SiHart]

Two Doctors! Gangers! Is the flesh rebelling or are they almost people?

And more to the point, was this a good pt 2? You tell me, later!

[Zbigniev Hamson]

Come on it's been 20 minutes, did no-one watch it?

[shada pavlova]

We haven't stopped convulsing from the brilliance yet.

Well, I haven't anyway.

[Zbigniev Hamson]

Was it brilliant then?

[Si Hunt]

Get with it, everyone time shifts these days.

Si.

[Paul Monk]

I thought that was superb. In fact I've really enjoyed both parts. It was a pretty good story. As for the end, well I hadn't seen that coming. And it sort of starts to answer some questions whilst asking another big one. Just when did that happen? (Sorry, being vague for spoiler reasons).

[Zbigniev Hamson]

Get with it, everyone time shifts these days.

Si.

I didn't think time travel had been invented yet? Though I suppose if it ever gets invented at all, then in a sense it's always been invented.

[Jason Thompson]

That was a vast improvement over last week, with the story proper getting started now. The scenes with Gangers and originals were much better, and there were some good plot developments. The acid still remains as silly as it was last week. There are so many other things that would add the same level of peril and make a LOT more sense.

The only down side for me was that unfortunately the cliches of a story with doubles are all there. I was not at all surprised when both Jennifers turned out to be Gangers, nor with the 'we swapped shoes' revelation. It did neatly lead to the revelation about Amy, which made for a good cliffhanger. The bit that did surprise me in a good way was the TARDIS dropping through the ceiling. Liked that.

And I believe this is a longest run of consecutive episodes not to feature a returning monster/enemy. Is anyone missing the old familiar enemies?

[Paul Monk]

Is anyone missing the old familiar enemies?

I managed to make my peace with the acid this episode.
The Doctors swapping shoes was a cliche but it means two things.
1) Amy told the real Doctor about his death.
and more importantly
2) the Doctor has his proper shoes back, albeit ones made of Flesh which now I think about it probably fell apart when he used the sonic screwdriver at the end. Oh well, I'm sure there's another pair in the TARDIS somewhere.

[duncan]

I thought that was sheer brilliance and it was nice to hear Tom's voice at the beginning too. Great twist at the end which should wrap up the argument over the eye patch woman being shoehorned into every episode.

[Si Hunt]

Okay, here are my thoughts!

The bulk of the episode, the "Let's face it, it's the back end of a two parter" bit struggled manfully against its status. On the downside, at times (especially near the start) my attention wandered. I began to realise that essentially what we have here are lots of human people running round a castle. Bar the odd moment where one of them wears the wobbly face make-up, it's just a load of people. Imagine if the Doctor and co had been on the run from Zygons or Robots of Death! The trappings of a really good base under seige scare-fest were there, but no proper monsters. That was what this was - a monster story without any monsters!

BUT to be fair, when the Gangers had their faces on they looked excellent (although notice how sparing they were with it on Matt Smith!). The episode tried really hard to be better. There were moments of real cool - the wall of eyes, the pile of melted gangers, the bit where Jen's mouth 'expanded', her death in a pool of acid, even the cliched stuff with the bloke and his son. I liked the character of Jen and her trickery of Rory was good, most surprisingly when Amy finally brought up the subject of the Eye Patch woman and the Doctor dying I found myself hugely interested; it was a really good scene, a feeling of getting to the bones of the story of this season. So it wasn't a huge disaster; it was, however, still Part 2 of a not enormously interesting adventure but it tried very hard. It was a lot better than it could have been, it was five times as good as last years dreary Silurian two-parter and it was a lot, lot better than Fear Her.

A couple more negatives: the Doctor curing the brain clot as an afterthought with a test tube of Magic Red Stuff was awful. Horrible, awful, horrible. Insulting to people who have lost people that way, and insulting to the series, which really should be better than that with its plot resolutions, and not trivialise such a matter either.

Also, maybe it will happen this way maybe it won't, but the fact that there could very well be a disposable identical flesh-made Doctor double out there sort of takes the sting (i.e all the drama) out of this seasons big opening "shock" death of the lead character. If this is how they get out of it, it's now made it very predictable. If it isn't, having the double Doctor in this story was a very odd move.

Why did Jen turn into the Lazarus Experiment Monster near the end? Wasn't quite sure why she did that!

The ending - on the positive, it continues this season's trend of a neater, more complex and satisfying "arc". I do love all this twisting and turning, the sense of a clever, higher plot. On the downside, again it was telegraphed so far in advance that I was expecting more. People need to learn the difference between a "spoiler" and a "plot twist". "Warning" us so dramatically against this ("GET OFF THE INTERNET!" hollared Doctor Who On-line on Twitter) ensured I was firmly expecting the Cybermen, the Master or the Vervoids to rock up near the end. In the event, it was instead a nice curve-ball of a plot twist that occurred, but not something we really needed warning that much about. For a start, the fact that Amy has seen a "window" to an outside world every episode this year makes it pretty likely that her adventures in some way arn't taking place in the "real world"; the Doctor ruminating over a pregnancy test result every episode makes it bloody obvious she is up the duff! So there was no great spoiler, it was just the moment it all came to fruition.

Here's a thought though - imagine we'd not seen the eyepatch woman every week, and the first we knew about it was when Amy was liquified by the Doctor this week and then woke up somewhere else. Wouldn't that have been an amazing twist? But it seems the production team have found a cast iron way to avoid us all having the story twists ruined by the press this year - they just do it themselves first.

In summary, an above average two parter and a very interesting season is emerging. Considering previous form, this adventure was no disgrace at all.

Si.

[Si Hunt]

And I believe this is a longest run of consecutive episodes not to feature a returning monster/enemy.

Well the Ood were back the week before last...

Si.

[Dino]

Here's a thought though - imagine we'd not seen the eyepatch woman every week, and the first we knew about it was when Amy was liquified by the Doctor this week and then woke up somewhere else. Wouldn't that have been an amazing twist? But it seems the production team have found a cast iron way to avoid us all having the story twists ruined by the press this year - they just do it themselves first.

Si.

I would have preferred that a lot more.
As it was, still haven't marked it, it wasn't a huge disaster. But it wasn't that brilliant. I'd still rather have this than last year's "Silurian Families" one.
I can't get myself to get excited or annoyed over it.

[Jason Thompson]

OK, forgot the Ood.

But yes, Si, I agree. That twist with Amy dissolving and waking up somewhere else would have worked perfectly well without constant appearances of the eyepatch lady and without regular views of the pregnancy scan. Like I said, we don't need to be reminded of these things every single week, and would new viewers have been any more put off by that than by the apparently random, nothing-to-do-with-anything-that-episode appearances that have occurred every week?

[brandynigma]

I love that Rory trusts the Doctor utterly, and that the trust Idris places in him would seem to imply that the TARDIS has suspected Amy for some time.

[Paul Monk]

If it isn't, having the double Doctor in this story was a very odd move.

Or is it? Firstly we see the double Doctor melt down as he takes a stand against the Jen monster meaning that he's not around anymore and secondly maybe the production team want you to think that thats how the Doctors death will resolved, in order to find something far more ingenious. So I don't think its an odd move at all.

[Andrew Curnow]

Although in fact a lot of this was a bit of a 'keep it going for 45 minutes' runaround, I actually enjoyed it a lot, lot more than last week - how much of that is down to just feeling more charitable to it this week, as opposed to it actually being better, I don't know, but I definitely liked it!

Agree totally with Jason, though - not signposting 'Franny B' and the pregnancy every week would have made tonight's cliffhanger absolutely amazing.

[Si Hunt]

So I don't think its an odd move at all.

Well by odd move I meant because now we'll all be thinking there's a safe way out of that situation, so if that's not how it's resolved then it's sort of robbed the concept of its tension for nothing! For me, anyway.

Si.

[Paul Monk]

Even if that is the way out of the Doctor's death situation it still doesn't answer the question of why the Doctor was killed or any of the other questions.

[Si Hunt]

True!

Si.

[Alex]

I missed the first episode last week as I was away staying at friends who aren't fans (I know, I know, but shockingly some exist!). But I'd heard a lot of mixed reviews over the past week so I was expecting to be disappointed and thought it might be akin to The Hungry Earth / Cold Blood - there'd be nothing particularly wrong with it, but it'd be nothing that exciting either. So I decided to wait until the second half had aired, and watch them together in the hope that it might work better as a whole, but I've stopped watching briefly just to comment as I really enjoyed the first episode.

I knew nothing at all about the storyline, but I think they've pulled off a fascinating idea really well, and put a cool new spin on it. It's been incredibly atmospheric, the location is a fantastic one which they've filmed very effectively so it's been really tense and nerve-wracking at times. The music I thought was really beautiful too, quite unusual for the show and not overloud, and he dialogue was very well written (unlike in Fear Her, imho), with lots of nice lines that weren't "showy" in the way that Stephen Moffat is sometimes guilty of. Plus Rory had a reason to exist again, which is nice, replacing Amy as the moral centre of the story for once.

Right, off to watch the second episode now - I just hope I'm not disappointed by the conclusion...

Yep, absolutely loved it, even more than the first episode. There were lots of great little moments, mostly between the Two Doctors, but also the wall of eyes, and Amy finally telling the Doctor about eyepatch lady. It was a shame that Rory had a smaller part this time around, but sod that because having the two doctors together was just joyous from start to end, for me at least.

The supporting characters were well played too (Raquel Cassidy, who I've been a longterm fan of, was especially superb) and given much depth (or were really well fleshed out, you could say!), but rarely in an over the top manner. The whole thing with the Scottish fellow and his son was a bit predictable perhaps, I saw his death coming a mile off, but it was nicely handled and the guy's such a good actor I'm not going to complain too much.

Overall I'd give the first episode 8, and the second 9, but because of that ****ing amazing cliffhanger the story as a whole gets a high 9 out of ten from me overall, this has been one of my favourite stories of the new series. If I'd paid to see this at the cinema I'd be raving about it, and telling everyone to go and see this really cool low budget* sci-fi film that would no doubt be coming a cult classic in years to come.

Oh, and apologies if this has already been bought up in the first episode thread but I haven't read that yet - but does anyone have any theories on "Morpeth Jetsan"? It just sounds a bit too odd to me - and I looked it up on an internet anagram machine and it came up with "Phantom Jester"...



*Compared to the Hollywood types which cost 100 times the amount Who does at least.


Edit: For those with kids, out of interest how did they react to the cliffhanger? It freaked me out completely, and for the first time in ages I thought it was a bit strong for a family show. Then again, waking up pregnant is pretty much my biggest fear

[Darren]

2 out of 10

That is largely for the cliffhanger.
The rest of the episode followed on from last week. It felt quite disjointed, the moments after the previous cliffhanger were handled very badlly, it felt as if they'd cut something out. The "would you like a jelly baby" bit was silly, maybe better with Smith's own voice instead of Tom's.

The biggest problem was characterisation. There wasn't any. I honestly watched not caring who lived or died feeling no tension or suspense. The scene with the bloke who had a son (see, I can't even remember their names, did they have any?) cradling, er, himself was emotionless. And psychologically, what would watching yourself die from a melted heart do to someone? And at the end, why was the boy on a beach by himself?

[Darren]

Red Stuff was awful. Horrible, awful, horrible. Insulting to people who have lost people that way, and insulting to the series, which really should be better than that with its plot resolutions, and not trivialise such a matter either

I agree. He should have taken her to New Earth.

I was firmly expecting the Cybermen

I am positive the Doctor mentioned Cybermats at one point.

[Perry Vale]

Ten word review....please don't let Matthew Graham write for Doctor Who again.

I'm obviously going to have to come back to this, as skimming through this thread I see many people seem to have really enjoyed it. For me it was the worst episode of DW since Moffat took over (and possibly a bit further back) by a distance of a new phrase to be invented to replace 'by a country mile'.

Absolutely awful, I'll wait until I've calmed down to rate it.

[Jason Thompson]

I am positive the Doctor mentioned Cybermats at one point.

Yes, he did. It was while attempting to test the Flesh Doctor to see if he really did have all his knowledge and memories.