Monday, May 12, 2008

Doctor Who S04E06-The Doctor's Daughter

When the Tardis is suddenly yanked from Earth, The Doctor, Donna and Martha are thrown onto the world of Messaline. Here, a faction of cloned humans and a faction of alien Hath are locked in combat over a mysterious object referred to as “The Source”. With Martha captured by the Hath and the human faction looking to gun down the pacifistic Doctor, the only hope of halting the escalating violence lies in the quick wit and survival instincts of a the human faction’s newest recruit, straight from The Doctor himself. That hope is Jenny…The Doctor’s Daughter.

The Doctor’s Daughter, while not the most superbly crafted episode of Doctor Who ever, has plenty of saving grace to it. While the potential for action sequences is toned down greatly, giving us a build up with no pay off of Human vs. Hath action, the character moments are what makes this episode great. David Tennant has been my favorite Doctor since he first appeared on screen and he continues to excel in the role by adding a new dimension to it…fatherhood. The way he is thrust into the role of the parent and has very little idea of what to do with his own flesh and blood gives him that bit of humanity that he rarely show, that is he is fallible and not all knowing as he would like to think he is. This is one situation that one simple sentence can’t solve for him. Donna also continues to impress, serving as more and more of the emotional support system The Doctor sorely needs in his life.

But there were some characters that slowed the plot down tremendously. Martha once again faces a similar situation like the one she was in at the end of her Torchwood tenure. Martha is underused and virtually useless in the story, used only as a poor attempt to add a bit of human understanding to the Hath side of the story. This is sad considering how much we all love her. However, we all also know she will be back for the tail end of the series. So hopefully she will have a much larger role then. She shares the role of underused material with the Humans and the Hath that inhabit the story as they come off as no more than two sides that need a quick refresher on the value of life to solve their differences. Needless to say, they were just plain boring.

The real saving grace of this episode is its title character, Jenny. Played by Georgia Moffett (who coincidentally happens to be the daughter of Peter Davidson a.k.a The Fifth Doctor, hence her actually being…well you get the idea) Jenny is a spark of brilliance to the show and I hope that we will be seeing more of her in the future. Not only is she drop dead gorgeous (I think I might be in love with TDD (for sake of the term being overused to the point of annoyance), she is simply fantastic; young, smart, shares her dad’s knack for solving problems quickly, everything you could expect from an offspring of our favorite Time Lord. And considering most of her abilities as a new Time Lord have yet to be fully explored, the series could go off in several directions, but personally I’m hoping she joins the Tardis crew one day soon.

The Doctor’s Daughter lacked plenty to make it an exceptional Doctor Who outing (it may even be the weakest installment of the series thus far) but there’s plenty to make it a worthwhile viewing...if only for The Doctor's amazing offspring.

Next Week-Solving mystery’s with Agatha Christie. Oh, and there’s a giant Bee too.

Rating-7/10

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