Rate and Discuss: Cold War

[SiHart]

It's 1983 and there's a sinking submarine and something in the cargo...

The Doctor and Clara land on a damaged Russian Submarine in 1983 as it spirals out of control into the ocean depths. An alien creature is loose on board, having escaped from a block of Arctic ice. With tempers flaring and a cargo of nuclear weapons on board, it’s not just the crew but the whole of humanity at stake!

What did you think of this episode and the return of The Ice Warriors?

[Nyder]

I'll let you know when I watch it tmw! Time to keep off this thread and Twitter.....

[SiHart]

WOW!

Absolutely brilliant!

[J.R. Southall]

Hmmn, not so convinced!

[Dino]

I'm thinking this will become a classic Matt Smith episode.
It's even more exciting than Asylum Of The Daleks. In think it's won the best of series 7. And certainly in the top three of all nu-Who.
10.

[SiHart]

Nice review JR, though I don't necessarily agree with you. For me, Clara showing a bit fear and a bit of doubt about what she's doing and how's she's coping with it, made her feel a whole lot more real to me as a person than the wise-cracking, quipping version of her we've seen so far. He fear felt real. I completely believed that she was terrified this week and we're seeing what was hidden underneath.
I also really, really liked the slightly less frenetic than usual Doctor we had this week. It seemed to fit what was a tense and atmospheric story. I loved the slower pace.

[J.R. Southall]

Actually Si, didn't you think that was three weeks in a row with a slower pace? Not that I mind (and like I said, I did still enjoy the episode a great deal), it just seems odd that we're having such a low-key series just as the anniversary arrives.

[J.R. Southall]

...speaking as someone who thoroughly enjoyed the madness that was Series Six, of course!

[Andrew Curnow]

I'm afraid it's my turn to be the Victor Meldrew this week - for me, it took it committed the worst sin that a Doctor Who story can commit: it was dull. JR's right when he says it seems like a rework of Dalek (or even, heaven help us, of Cyberwoman) but I just found it, rather like the Ice Warriors themselves, very plodding.

I also found myself thinking that they hired an actor of the quality and calibre of David Warner, an actor we've all wanted to see in Who for years... and yet they just gave him that. BBC Cardiff should be ashamed.

Sorry guys.

[Larry]

simply loved it an episode in the best traditions of those base under sieg that Doctor Who has always done so well for me this was not only the besy episode of this current series but the best written by Mark Gattis, and wefinally got to see what an Ice Warrior looks like. As for the Ice Warrior I'm very pleased that they they did not give it a radical re-design and pretty much have kept to the original design and only gave it a few tweeks here and there.


Though have to say at the end was a big blooper when the Captain, Doctor and Clara are standing outside on top of the tower now considering they were all drenched tand in the middle of the Artic they should of frozen to death in seconds.

[Mike Saville]

Well. The best of series 8 so far. Mostly by default however.

Some stuff worked really well. The cold war (ice warriors, geddit?) setting was good, and they sort of pulled off the submarine quite well. The slight redesign of the Ice Warriors was just enough to make it effective. The removable armour was great in principle (I recommended it in the 50th anniversary thread after all), but was poorly imagined and poorly CGId. The back story of the great legendary Ice Warrior was excellent too.

I agree David Warner was wasted in this, though it was great to finally see him and he was exceptional. He's part of the reason I gave it a 7.

I expected as much from Gatiss to be honest though. Victory of the Daleks started as the best Dalek story and degenerated into the worst.

And once again with the sonic screwdriver. Lose it Mr Moffat. Pleeeeeeease!

[Alex]

Hmmm, I quite liked this but it didn't quite have enough going on to deserve a mark higher than 7 for me (though that's still a very positive mark in my book). The Ice Warrior made for an impressive threat whilst suited and booted but the slithery thing that we never quite saw all of left me a little bored at times, I've seen that kind of thing done so many times before, and, I'm afraid, far better. There was a lot I liked though, David Warner was an enormous amount of fun (and whoever thought we'd witness him singing Duran Duran songs in Doctor Who?!) and Clara was outstanding in this. I really loved Amy but as of this episode I'm no longer missing her, and I felt Clara's reaction to this nightmarish situation was beautifully pulled off and was what stopped the episode from being rate far lower. I love the idea that she's in it to save the world too, rather than see the Universe like so many other companions.

[NoraBrimstone]

It felt a bit like an empty episode to me. I don't think anything really happened. What was the point in the whole TARDIS vanishing for a whole episode and just brushing it off with a joke about it being at the South Pole in the end? That last bit felt like it was added as an afterthought during filming.

Also, what was with ripping off Independence Day in a few scenes?

I'm not impressed. At all. Hmm.

[Si Hunt]

I need to watch it again. It looked tremendous, and the whole vibe of getting straight into the adventure, the Clara stuff taking a back seat etc. was what we've been looking for. I've no problem with the TARDIS dissapearing at the start, this is what we needed last week to get around the plot hole of why they didn't just use it to sort everything out. The Warrior was re-imagined brilliantly I thought.

If I have one nagging issue it's that, yet again, I haven't really felt this was a fully formed story with a beginning, a middle and an end. It was, essentially, humans have found a Warrior, they look for it, Warrior escapes. A bit like "Victory of the Daleks" it's more an extended pre-credits sequence than a proper story, leading up to something that may or may not appear. Nothing or no-one was really changed by events, no-one went on a journey, there were no big twists.

But maybe I'm being unfair. It was very exciting and a whole lot better than last weeks. It looked very expensive. Next weeks looks good.

SI.

[Zbigniev Hamson]

How could anyone have ever thought that a man-sized thing in a block of ice was a mammoth?

[Mike Saville]

No Dougal. This mammoth is small. And that mammoth is far far away...

[Andrew Curnow]

Another niggle I have (again, sorry) but for an episode set aboard a sunken & leaking submarine, not enough IMHO was made of the setting. Whereas Fang Rock makes good use of its lighthouse setting, this one could almost have been set anywhere - a better story might have been the Doctor's frantic efforts to save the crew by raising the submarine against impossible odds while being hampered by the presence of a disgruntled Ice Warrior, rather than just the Doctor meets a disgruntled Ice Warrior. Even if they'd just had a member of the crew going hysterical at the thought of asphyxiating/drowning in the sub, to which the Doctor could have cheerfully reassured them that wouldn't happen because the Ice Warrior would be bound to slaughter them first; something to highlight and reinforce the jeopardy of the setting would have been a help.

I just found it a real letdown - I know he seems to divide opinion, but for me Gatiss has been a consistently good New Series writer, with the exception of a similarly disappointing Victory of the Daleks back in 2010 (I also enjoyed his Baskerville tale the most out of the 3 Sherlock episodes in series 2). So maybe it's just that sense of heightened expectation has caused a sense of exaggerated disappointment, I don't know.

Ah well - there's always next week!

[Llordllama]

I rather enjoyed it as a whole, although that's largely in comparison to the previous two episodes so maybe I set my standards a bit lower. Thought the set, cast and plot much improved. Also really, really liked the Ice Warrior in his armour...a little less so when out of it.

Clara's still doing nothing for me as a companion - bring back Adric I say!

Doctor WHeasel's take on it over here.

[Larry]

, David Warner was an enormous amount of fun (and whoever thought we'd witness him singing Duran Duran songs in Doctor Who?!) s.

Or the Ultravox classic Vienna - It was quite funny when he found out that Clara was from the future of all the things he could ask all he wanted to know was if Ultravox were still together..

[duncan]

I've just watched it for the second time. Brilliant, brilliant, brilliant. This is probably the best single episode since the show returned and just how I like my Who to be.

I loved the setting, the Ice Warrior (in and out of it's "shellsuit"), Matt was excellent this week, Jenna was good too but I wish she'd slow down when she speaks. She talks a bit too fast at times for my liking. The supporting cast were great and I too liked the "Ultavox! Have they split up?" line.

It was all creepy and "Alien" like. More of that please.

9/10 and I didn't think I'd be scoring it like that after the last two episodes.

[Nyder]

Beware the Sirens of Time! That's all I could hear when Mr I Warrior spoke. But in fairness to Nick Briggs, the voice was menacing with just the right amount of hissing! It's pity we only saw the sonic weapon only being used once. It was brill! And I Warrior sans helmet was a very scary proposition - if that was my 6 year old self watching that I'd be paralysed with fear! The "scuttling" sound didn't half remind me of a Triffid!

I loved the whole tension of the story, although I could have done without the Ultravox & Duran references ramming the point home that this was the 1980s. So for me, much better than last week, but the week before is still my favourite from 7B so far!

[Nyder]

Wow that last paragraph I wrote was confusing! I meant The Bells of St John was still my fave 7B story at the moment.

[J.R. Southall]

Of all the things he could ask all he wanted to know was if Ultravox were still together..

To me, that's the problem with Gatiss' script in a nutshell, though.

"Do they split up?" might have been the funniest way to phrase the question, but it was also the least realistic. If it had been you or I in that situation, we'd have asked "How long will they stay together?"

And unfortunately, that was how the episode went, sacrificing verisimilitude and replacing it with whatever Gatiss found most amusing. I found I couldn't believe in the characters and therefore couldn't care less about their plight.

[Dirk Gently]

"Do they split up?" might have been the funniest way to phrase the question, but it was also the least realistic. If it had been you or I in that situation, we'd have asked "How long will they stay together?"

Actually no, that isn't a better way to phrase the question.
The first suggests an option of the band staying together until they can't perform (Like The Rolling Stones now), which is what a fan of a band wants to know, where as the second infers they will split up at some point.


So I for one would have said "Do they split up?"

[Dirk Gently]

I really quite liked this story, much more than the first 2.
Clara is more realistic in this, she is less flippant & far more realistic. She has suddenly realised that this isn't a game, it's real life & it's dangerous.

I thought that Matt over did the glasses at the start, when he realised they were on a Russian Sub & put them back on again. But that's a minor niggle.
I liked Matt's slightly less manic showing here, much better in this situation. Although I do agree that if there had been the peril of trying to save the Sub/crew & stop the Ice Warrior then the tension would have been much tighter.

I loved the H.A.D.S introduction, it's been a long time coming.
I thought the Sonic Screwdriver was going to be side-lined when the Doctor lost it, but it returned far too early for my liking, it would have been funny if David Warner's character had returned it to the Doctor at the same time as the Doctor mentioning that the TARDIS was at the south pole at the end.

I'm not sure if I'd say this was an all out classic but it's certainly a step in the right direction.