Tuesday, April 22, 2008

Doctor Who S04E03-Planet of the Ood

Setting the Tardis coordinates to random, The Doctor and Donna land on a far off ice planet. Here, The Doctor once again encounters the mysterious slave race known as the Ood and learns of their creation and distribution across the galaxy. But a deadly wave of deja vu is about to hit as the eyes of the Ood begin to glow dangerously red and a mysterious voice not their own begins to speak, leading them to rebel against their human masters. As The Doctor and Donna hurry to escape and discover the mystery behind "The Circle" they must also face the horrifying truth of the human race of the far off future.

Well, here we are at episode three and I must say, this is the most topical Doctor Who episode I have ever seen. The whole subject of using the Ood as inbred slaves was touched on slightly during their initial introduction in Series 2's "The Impossible Planet" and "The Satan Pit", but here it is the full blown heart of the story. Again, Donna becomes the viewer who spews out exactly what we are all thinking. It is horrific to think of just how cruel us humans can turn out to be if we fail to remember our own history. That being said, their cruel masters, even the real pretty one, get what they rightfully deserve in the end and the Ood get their freedom.

However, with all this hype of bringing the Ood back as villains, the hype actually fails here as the audience no longer finds them as scary as they were when possessed by the Devil, if scary at all. Hence, this episode does lose a bit of its strength based on failed advertising. When the Sontarans and the Daleks show up again later on, you know it's time to get scared. But not here, all in all disappointing.

But was this episode bad because of such story qualities? No, but it wasn't the best either. It was fun watching The Doctor getting chased by the crazy security guard with the CGI crane, always some of the best stunts when you work on something like this. And we finally got to see the Ood origins, which are sad enough, but still interesting in their own way. And wow, seeing the head honcho transform into an Ood at the very end was, well...whoa. Nuff said.

Next Week: Martha's Back!!! But so are the Sontarans and their bringing the noise for the first of a two part epic struggle. Doctor Who fans, this is one alien encounter that is sure to please all.

Rating-7/10

No comments: