With apologies for the delay, last week’s Doctor Who episode.
Cast and Crew
David Tennant as the Doctor
Billie Piper as Rose Tyler
Camille Coduri as Jackie Tyler
Marc Warren as Elton Pope
Shirley Henderson as Ursula Blake
Peter Kay as Victor Kennedy/Absorbaloff
Moya Brady as Bridget
Simon Greenall as Mr. Skinner
Kathryn Drysdale as Bliss
Bella Emberg as Old Woman
Written by Russell T. Davies
Directed by Dan Zeff
Originally aired on the 17th of June 2006 on BBC One in the United Kingdom.
Synopsis
Elton Pope, a young man determined to find the truth about the Doctor, narrates an account of his encounters with the Time Lord.
High Point
- ‘You upset my mum!’
Low Point
- I felt that the Doctor’s explanation and the recovery of Ursula were the wrong way round. One can’t help but thinking that more success could have been had that way.
The Scores
It’s an original touch for Doctor Who to tell an episode entirely from somebody else’s perspective, although other series have done it. Five out of six.
The effects were quite sufficient. Tricky to handle the Abzorbaloff of course. Four out of six.
I liked the story. It’s unusual in that we really have no idea what the Doctor and Rose were doing at the start of the episode, but it doesn’t matter because we were more interested in Elton anyway. I felt that Jackie’s character came through particularly strongly in her defence of Rose. Five out of six.
The acting was superb. Six out of six.
Emotional response comes through well despite largely dealing with the feelings of unknown characters with our major cast on the periphery. Five out of six.
I don’t think the production team had anything enormously challenging this week outside the special effects, but it was done very well, particularly Victor’s first appearance. Five out of six.
Overall a very good episode. Five out of six.
Love and Monsters receives a total of thirty-five out of forty-two. One of the best of Russell T. Davies’ episodes.
Nah…
They lost me at the Scooby-Doo scene, that just put me way off this episode. I didn’t hate it, the high points really where excellent, but I came away disappointed.
Re: Nah…
I too was very put off by the scooby-doo scene, definitely the low point. It’s also quite a stretch to believe these people would fall into line as Victor’s "soldiers" for so long, if at all. He had nothing over their heads, they had no reason to obey him. He wasn’t even all that charismatic or commanding of a presence.
The way Ursula ends up is not satisfying either, and I wonder if it was not thrown in at the end merely for special effect show-off, because didn’t she wave to the camera at the beginning of his home video? I did enjoy most of it, though. Elton, Ursula, and the older guy were delightful.
Re: Nah…
i think lots of you folks are looking at this the wrong way. we were seeing the story through elton’s eyes. alien fanatics are known to embellish stories. things probably wouldn’t have happened exactly the way we saw them. but that is the point. we are seeing these events through a strange little man who lives in a tiny apartment and hangs out with a few strange people like him.
i liken it to some of the silly x-files episodes. i think it works quite well really and i liked this episode.
Re: Nah…
Yeah, it felt a little bit like the one with Alex Trebek :D
Re: Nah…
Yes she did, and Elton still didn’t know what had happened to his mother at this point. That was an on-camera flashback for him, probably filmed before they met Victor, as opposed to the rest of his home movies where he’s telling us what happened after the fact.
Pants
Sorry, but this one didn’t work for me at all. I found it very hard to suspend my disbelief. Nothing much wrong with the acting, effects etc, just the story and the script seemed more like a spoof of Dr Who than the real thing. Russell T. Davies at his most self-indulgent.
I agree, I hated it
I agree, I hated this episode. The scooby-doo bit was cute, but as the episode went on, it was just usless and worse represented only a few more minutes where we saw Rose and the Doctor. They were hardly there at all!!
I know it was a different take on an episode of Dr. Who. But for me it just plain didn’t work.
I thought I was taking so long to post this review was because it was such a bad episode.
Where’s the love?
I loved this ep. The Fat-Bastardy Absorbalof, the wacky space-monster Scoobydoo shenanigans (remember, this is from the point of view of an overwhelmed Elton, who probably describes the scene like that), the creepy allusions to his sex life at the end. The fact that everyone who gets close to the Doctor suffers terrible loss…
The foreshadowing of Rose’s impending doom was also appreciated, as was the mention of Torchwood’s missing files on her due to the "bad wolf virus".
I’m kinda hoping we’ll see Elton hang out with Rose’s mum in the future, they’d be good mates… Once she got over him being manipulated by an alien monster into getting close to her, that is.
Loved it
I think the scooby doo thing was great fun, and I agree that this was Elton’s exagerated account. I doubt his computer really blew up when he searched for Dr Who websites.
The part that scared my kids the most was to see that thing running around in just a speedo. Brrrrr. :)
I found Moaning Mrytle’s final state rather goofy but I can live with it. Could have done without the implied oral sex however. Since she doesn’t age, she might show up in the future. Hey, perhaps the Dr can make her the next companion (joke).
Re: Loved it
!!!
Thanks
The Worst Episode Ever…
… of any TV series. Well, almost. Enterprise had a few episodes worse than this one but not by much. We had to wait a YEAR for this in Canada.
I am totally a fan of the new Doctor Who series and loving most of what they are doing with it (except for the relationship between Rose and The Doctor) but I couldn’t believe how bad this one was.
It was just boring. There were a few funny moments with Jackie and "spilling" her wine but that was it. I noticed it was a Davies episode and was not surprised. Yes, original but not in a good way for me.
0 starts out of a possible 5. Boooo…