My thoughts on The Long Game

[kaliha]

With illustrations and everything!


Out of all this episodes this was the one I was looking forward to most of all. Mainly due to the added Simon Pegg-ness. (Who really needs to pull his finger out and make a third season of Spaced). So I feel somewhat let down by the finished product. Maybe I built it up too much in my head ("Ooh Nasty!Pegg"), maybe it just wasn't a very good episode.

I really, really liked the first scene where the Doctor primed Rose so she could look good in front of Adam. That was sweet.



"It's going to take a better man than me to get between you two."
The episode really needs a shipper!warning at the start of the episode. It's a sad fact that you can spot a RTD episode a mile off as he spends a good portion of the 45 minutes smacking you over the head with the whole Doctor/Rose omgtheirlovecrossestime OTP.

For me, this isn't a bad thing because I'm a bit of a 'shipper at heart, but it does annoy His Lordship no end, because there's no need to make their relationship so blatant. Maybe blatant's not the best word, but the fact Adam (who was busy dreaming of world domination) noticed it goes to show how textual it's become.


Bad Wolf Watch
Are we making assumptions out of nothing? This week's Bad Wolf reference was the crow-barred in Bad Wolf TV Starring the Face of Boe (who muct be very old indeed if they showed up in the year 200,000 and the year 5 Million). So does our Futurama-inspired Head in a Jar have something to do with the mysterious Bad Wolf?


"I'll Hug Anyone"
A more carefree and happier Doctor this week. (Well after all the emoting of last week he probably needs a rest from the angst). Although it's a happiness that's all in the mouth and not in the eyes (as illustrated when he sends Adam and Rose off to enjoy the atmosphere). This could be down to two things; the rather painful time he's just spent in Utah or the big J because Rose gets on rather well with Adam. It's probably a bit of both.

Our Doctor is certainly a lot more touchy feeling this episode. Hugging complete and total stangers before sending them to their deaths, (okay, maybe not a total strange he did know her name) as well as the now-obligatory hand!porn.

Although his hugging around and kissing total strangers is now canon thanks to RTD. (This path will only lead to flamewars and mini-wanks). I still reckon his big Suki-hug was to make Rose jealous.

Some nice interaction between the Doctor and Rose again this week. I did laugh out loud at the "He's your boyfriend."/"Not any more." line after Adam's wonderful faint. And the bit with the sonic screwdriver.


"The walls are made of gold."
Oh Mr Pegg, how I adore you. You helped pull what was a below-medicore episode up to above-average. Pretty much single-handedly. I quite like him ev0l. I don't like him with bleached eyebrows though. That just makes him look freaky. As did the contact lenses. Did he die? Or did he just end up getting buried under alien entrails?

I also liked Tamsin Grieg too. And I don't particularly like her that much.

"Trouble?"
"Oh yeah!"
Can they just go somewhere, enjoy the view, maybe stop at a roadside cafe for a salad or something then head off on their way? It must be really tiring going from crisis to crisis.

So this week our themes will be immigration, xenophobia, plastic surgery and the media. All brought to you with the letters R, P and the number 42.

Adam's family dog was a cutey. Although I did spend the epsiode waiting for him to wipe the answermachine (As we were expected to I suppose). I'd have preferred that to the phone getting sonic screwdrivered.

"How can you walk through the world and not leave a single footprint?"
It's true; nowadays from the moment you are born there's a record of you: birth certificates, national insurance numbers and all the other official bits of guff that you need in order to be recognised as a 'person'.

Did anyone else notice when Adam was sick, his 'sick' had carrot in it............. Just me then.

"I want to go with you."
I can understand why the Doctor was a bit narked with Adam. He was going to change the world rather significantly with his white noise knowledge, but he was a bit mean to him. I put quite a bit of the anger down to Adam putting Rose's life in anger. (Although the Doctor does it *every* week). But to leave him back in 2012 with a huge sunroof in his head as punishment. That's just a bit cruel. Mind you judging by next week's epsiode not even Rose is immune from the 'one rule for me one rule for everyone else' attitude the Doctor's developed.

I wonder if we'll ever see Adam again? He's got the genius and the freaky sunroof, plus Doctor!Revenge and Rose!lust to make he a viable returning character at some point. Or will he end up helping Mickey run whoisdoctorwho.co.uk?

One last thing; did Adam give Rose her phone back? I don't remmber him doing so, unless it was while they were going back to 2012.

So, in conclusion
Overall it would get a 7/10 (And that's with 2 extra marks purely for having Simon Pegg in the episode).

Comments

[whydah.livejournal.com]

I think I agree with you almost entirely, although I thought the episode was alright, it wasn't quite on a par with 'Dalek' for me. Then again, sometimes you do just need pulp ;).

I'm glad they got shot of Adam for now, but the fact that he appeared precisely half way through the new series when a regular audience has been established? Yeah, he'll be back. Possibly with an angsty "I was exiled because you left me with a hole in my head!" story. Or possibly "VAN STRATTAN ADDED ME TO HIS COLLECTION YOU WANK-" ;)

[taperoo2k.livejournal.com]

I thought it was a good enough filler episode, made fantastic by Mr Pegg (i like the albino look). He's probably alive, waste of a good villian if he's been killed off after just one episode.
And as for Adam he might inadventerly use some cybermen technology he's stolen from his old company and turn himnself into a new breed of the cybermen. Or he could just show up later on as the big bad wolf "Hey Doctor remember me ? You stole my woman and left me stranded in 2012" The Doctor "Damn dirty apes". Or something like that hehe.

[11nine73.livejournal.com]

Did anyone else notice when Adam was sick, his 'sick' had carrot in it............. Just me then

No, not just you. I noticed too.

[silver-phantom.livejournal.com]

Yep, but to quote a line from the movie Atlantis...

"Carrots? Why are there always carrots? I didn't even eat carrots!"

[khallandra.livejournal.com]

I actually liked the angriness the Dr showed to Adam at the end. The Dr is very intolerant of 'incompetant people' he really only gives you one chance - you blow it - your out - in 'most' cases :)

[thelastdalek.livejournal.com]

yeah i reckon adam's gonna be a new baddie. even if the writers dunno it yet, they'll remember him later when they're fishing after running out of ideas

i think the doctor only has companions as pets, or at least should, he sees humans as being inferior to him, so i cant really see him shagging one, this crappy emo-lovey-dovey crap is precisely what turned superman from a super-kickass-baddie-killer in the films and 50s tv series to 2 seperate series of a sensitive emokid boring-as-fuck loser

of cours rose isnt immune to his punishment and anger, from what i saw of the preview she's like a dog who's shit on his favourite carpet and he's gonna kick her around a bit and run her nose in it to make sure she doesnt do it again

[monkey-junkey.livejournal.com]

Simon Pegg makes for a great villain...bleach blondness and all. I would definitely like to see him back on the show.

I was pretty relieved when they got rid of Adam though; he was really getting on my nerves with his silly get-rich-quick scheme. My boyfriend and I were personally wishing he'd just die :P

Ditching Adam at home may not have been the brightest idea though: "Hey this kid has year 200,000 technology in his head! Let's leave him in 2012 while snapping causes a big hole to open in his forehead!"

[glass-juju.livejournal.com]

"One last thing; did Adam give Rose her phone back?"

as far as i could tell, no. but i guess we'll find out if it ever pops up again. that's a big thing to forget, the scene where she gets it back may have just been cut for time... or this could be a future plot point. the sunroof is one thing, that phone that only calls 2005 is a whole different kettle of fish.

[bludfeast.livejournal.com]

I'm probably going to get flamed mercilessly for this, but...

I am SO GLAD they ditched Adric:2012!

That moron made some of the crap Adric pulled in State of Decay and Kinda look like playful teasing.

He was about as useful as a half dozen tribbles in your chicken sandwich and coffee... oops... mixing sci-fi metaphores again... Bad me!

[--kali--.livejournal.com]

I think if he'd been characterised a bit better I'd have wanted him to stay. As it is I'm glad he's not travelling with them anymore. Although I'm sure we'll see him again.

[taperoo2k.livejournal.com]

He's an evil genius in the making, from what Russel T Davies said. He also said the master would need to be written extremely well, and have a good reason for comingback. So we could yet see the master. Though i doubt Davies will tackle the script. I suspose he could always get the bloke who wrote the Dalek episode to write a master story, once he's free to do Dr Who again.

Face of Boe

[wimble.livejournal.com]

Do we know what "Boe" actually is? For example, is it an individual, or a race?

If it's an individual, then you're right: it's managing to keep its face around for a very long time.
Alternatively, if the Boe are a race, then it makes sense for "Face of Boe" to be the title of their ambassador. And the Face seen in this episode is not (necessarilly) the same individual seen in EOTW.

[ed-zeppelin.livejournal.com]

I thought it was a fine little breather, nothing special. 6/10. But 45 minutes wasn't long enough back with Rose and it's not long enough now (I'll say that 'till they change it). I too have wondered about the age of the Face Of Boe. But at least now we have a Russel T. Davies script without any major plot holes.

[anne-asta.livejournal.com]

This comes a bit late, as I wasn't able to download this episode before tonight and held off on spoilers until then ...

Best. Review. Ever.

[--kali--.livejournal.com]

Thank you very much :D

it's nice that people can make sense of my ramblings.