Doctor Who: 05:01: The Eleventh Hour

I want to say put your fears away, that Steven Moffat has successfully taken Doctor Who into a new era. That he has, in the season opener, put some doubts on how -and if he could- make the show work after the four year, successful run of both Christopher Eccelston and David Tennant as the Doctor. That he could replace Russell Davies as show-runner.

You could say that he has.

With The Eleventh Hour, the fifth season begins just after the events of the fourth season finale, The End of Time. The Doctor, having regenerated, is trying to save the TARDIS, which is plunging towards Earth, out of control and severely damaged by said regeneration of the Time Lord. The TARDIS crash lands in the back garden of seven year-old Amelia Pond in the small English village of Leadworth. Amelia takes him inside and helps him satisfy his strange food cravings before taking him upstairs to show him the crack in her bedroom wall. There the Doctor discovers a crack in time and space itself, and on the other side is a prison run by the Atraxi. The Atraxi deliver a warning to the two: “Prisoner Zero has escaped.”

Pondering the situation, the Doctor thinks this Prisoner Zero is somewhere in Amelia’s house, but before he can help further, the TARDIS Cloister Bells go off, and he warns that if the engines of his TARDIS are not stabilized, it will incinerate. He promises Amelia he will return in five minutes, and leaves. She packs and begins to wait for him. Unfortunately, 12 years pass and Amelia Pond -now known as Amy - is working as a kissogram when she encounters the Doctor again.

Realizing that Prisoner Zero has been hiding in Amy’s house, the Doctor also figures out that he has 20 minutes to save the Earth.

From the word go, Matt Smith’s take on Doctor is familiar -he has the same sort of energy of David Tennant’s version - yet he also makes him a bit more kooky, I guess. There is the mad energy of the second and even the fourth Doctor, but there is some sweet whimsy of the ninth Doctor as well.

Then there’s the near perfect introduction of grown-up Amy, played by Karen Gillan, as the Doctor’s newest companion. The actress brings depth and warmth to Amy, and she never shy’s away from the apparent "mad man with a box" that has come into her life. And while Rose was also pretty much fully realized companion in the first season, Amy’s is done much better here and one hopes they’ll make her even more fully rounded as Rose eventually became.

There are some weaknesses, though. Mostly with the visual effects. The Prisoner Zero in its true form is rather disappointing, and the story itself is rather pedantic. But, perhaps, that was not what this season opener was about. Moffat’s seems to have decided to concentrate of the characters of both the Doctor and Amy, and there he is more successful.

Finally, I must comment on the new opening and theme. It’s a rather jarring difference between the fourth and fifth season title sequence, with a more darker look to it. Gone is the bright oranges and reds of Eccelston’s and Tennant’s eras, replaced by angry clouds and lightening and a huge flow of yellow energy. The score returns back to the early days of the original series, bringing back the ghostly whistle of that era (and reminding me of where The X Files theme came from).

In the end, that is what makes Doctor Who unique: it’s ability to change as the years pass, to renew itself, to be different, yet the same. Its comforting that after 47 years, the show can still surprise you.

Doctor Who star David Tennant to guest star on "Sarah Jane" spin-off

In what is perhaps a shrewd move on the BBC part, Doctor Who star David Tennant will appear as the Doctor in a two-part episode of the series spin-off, The Sarah Jane Adventures.

Elizabeth Sladen has already crossed over play Sarah Jane Smith a few times since the revival of the series back in 2005. Now this will be the first time that the Doctor will guest on her show. Of course, this entitles the fans to seeing Tennant a few more times before his swan song as the Time Lord at the end of the year. Plus, one assumes, The Sarah Jane Adventures -heading into season three - should see it's highest ratings yet, if only because while the character has been mentioned on SJA and the other spin-off, Torchwood, the Doctor has actually never appeared on them.

Tennant returns as the Doctor in The Waters of Mars this November, followed by the two-part finale this Christmas and New Years. His appearance on SJA will air in September, however.

Other news comes that indeed, a motion picture version of Doctor Who is in the works. The same production team running the show, will produce a big screen version of the series. However, there is no timetable for release of said film or if it would involve current Who star David Tennant or incoming 11th Doctor, Matt Smith, or something else completely.

BBC names 11th -and youngest - Doctor Who

Little known British actor Matt Smith, 26, will take over the lead role of the Doctor when the series returns for a 5th season on the BBC in spring of 2010. After numerous rumors that the role would go to an older, more seasoned actor (or potential actress) the announcement of Smith has surprised fans. At 26, he is three years younger than Peter Davison -the 5th Doctor - when he took over the role in 1981. And while Davison had a fan following with his work in All Creatures Great and Small, Smith's work at the BBC began in 2006, with the adaptation of Philip Pullman's The Ruby in the Smoke, which starred former Doctor Who companion Billie Piper. He has also acted opposite Piper in the follow-up, The Shadow in the North, and in ITV2's Secret Diary of a Call Girl. In 2007, he had a leading role in BBC Two's political drama Party Animals, in which he played a parliamentary researcher.

For some fans, their casting of someone so young seems to confirm that the BBC is more concerned with the tween audience -especially girls - than anything else. Of course, like here in Hollywood, the younger you are, the better demographics you get, the better profit you make. In theory anyways.

Still, one hopes that despite his age, the series can be pulled from the doldrums by new showrunner Steven Moffat, who'll have a year to make the fifth series the best since the show was brought back in 2005. He is, perhaps, a better writer than Russell T Davies, in the effect that his scripts are filled with more depth and with better dialogue. Davies was great for bringing huge set pieces to the show, but if you look too close at his scripts, you find its way too fanish and lacks a lot of substance.

There is to be three more specials of Doctor Who featuring outgoing David Tennant, with the next one to be aired around Easter. A third will probably air in late summer, while the fourth, and last of the 10th Doctor, will air Christmas Day of this year.