Doctor Who 4x10: "Midnight"

Oh RTD. I wish you didn't know how to quit me. Seriously, this was such a breath of fresh air. No wonder RTD was so smiley on the commentary for Forest of the Dead... he knew THIS was coming up. "Oh Steven Moffat, let me show you how it's done."

Far and away, my favorite episode of the new series. I'm probably one of the very few people who didn't fall to pieces over "Blink," and the reason I didn't was because that episode, while being a very good one, could have been an episode of any science fiction series. It just so happened to be Doctor Who. It was a standalone that was good but didn't develop or explore any of the characters on the actual show. I liked Sally Sparrow, but this isn't her show. With "Midnight," we get a look at what the Doctor is like without a companion there to relate him to other people. That's an important question that hadn't ever been addressed. Without someone there, he's helpless - here, that's taken quite literally.

It was so simple, but still very scary and still very interesting. I loved how easily the characters on the plane (rocket? space bus?) were developed and how quickly you got to know them. The scene where they all turned on the Doctor, and he starts freaking out... that was the greatest thing. And Skye was BY FAR the scariest villain on Doctor Who this season. Or maybe even ever. She didn't look any different, which was the worst (and best) part. And the fact that the Doctor didn't know what it was, and didn't find out - there's no name for it. I know that "the fear of a name increases fear of the thing itself" and all, but what do you do when there's no name for it at all?

I was initially worried about Donna not being around so much in this episode, but I think that even contributed to the story. It wasn't just that Catherine Tate probably needed a little R&R away from the set. As I mentioned earlier, without a companion that knows him and trusts him there to back him up, the Doctor is pretty helpless. There's no go-between, no one there to explain that everything's going to be okay. As amazing and wonderful as the Doctor is, he's not actually the best at comforting people. He's too fascinated by everything going on to make everyone feel okay about it. He wanted to know about the new alien thing and everyone else wanted to kill it, because it frightened them. Without Donna, not only was there someone there to calm everyone else down, but there wasn't someone there to make him see it the human way. I think this episode really proved how important Donna is. I loved their hug at the end. He didn't even have to say anything, she just knew - something had gone wrong, and he was depressed about it, and he'd missed her because nobody there had understood him. Every time someone almost did, they went and changed their minds again. Not one of the Doctor's best days.

At the end, when the Doctor said "no, no... don't do that" after Donna repeated him speaking Italian. I LOVED that little touch. It took me a second to get it though, because I'm slow. I was like, "Doctor, why are you being such a jerk, she pronounced it fine and she's not embarrassing you in front of anyone famous - " and then I was like "Oh. Because he just spent the entire episode with this scary alien thing repeating him and stealing his voice. No wonder he's not going for it. Sorry I called you a jerk just now." This is just another way RTD schooled Moffat - it was self-referencing (the Doctor does the same thing to Rose in "Tooth and Claw" and then to Martha in "The Shakespeare Code"), yes, but it didn't reference ONLY episodes that he'd written, and it actually made sense and contributed to the story. Unlike when Moffat does it, and it's just gratuitous "remember how clever and funny I was then, well, laugh at it again."

Coming up: "Turn Left," with Donna and Rose (!!!) and not the Doctor so much.