SEARCH MY BLOG

Tuesday, September 30, 2014

Doctor Who: The Caretaker Review

"The Caretaker," a fun and comedic episode with a surprisingly dramatic twist.

The Doctor goes on an undercover mission to Coal Hill School to stop a robotic killing machine, before it destroys the planet. 
Steven Moffat and Gareth Roberts penned the episode, and unlike Moffat's last attempt at comedic dialogue, in the premiere episode of the season, both the comedy and the drama worked in "The Caretaker." The dialogue was fun and witty, while the excellent performances from Capaldi, Coleman, and Anderson made the dramatic character driven segments some of the highlight moments of the season in terms of acting. Jenna Coleman continues to be a standout with her performance being very believable and human ever since the first episode and Samuel Anderson as Danny finally received some true character development and screen time. Of course, Peter Capaldi's Doctor is still at the top of his game as always. In terms of plot, "The Caretaker" mostly served to create a MacGuffin so that the Doctor would have a reason to "go undercover" at the Coal Hill School, so that Danny could discover Clara's secret, and thus drama ensues! 

*Spoilers Ahead*
Leading up to Danny discovering the truth, there was a lot of great humor, in the vein of "The Lodger," one of the funniest episodes of the Smith era, except with Capaldi's different style of humor. 

One of the funnier moments of the episode is when the Doctor thinks that the other teacher, who looks like a certain bow-tie wearing Time Lord, is Clara's boyfriend, and considering how vain the character has been this season, his satisfaction that Clara might still be fond of his old look is rather clever and funny. 

Moving on to the interstellar MacGuffin, the Skovox Blitzer was neither a bad foe, nor a good one, but just a generic and forgettable one. That being said, the Skovox Blitzer reminded me of a certain Mass Effect character (Garrus).
“I'm in the middle of some calibrations.”
"The Caretaker" is one of those inevitable episodes that had to happen at some point because Danny needed to find out about the Doctor, and it is handled in a decidedly different way than other similar takes on a (possible) future companion seeing the TARDIS. Danny's reaction is refreshingly logical. Instead of being "wowed" he is more skeptical and afraid, yet ready to take action. One thing in general that has confused me about Doctor Who's universe is how much does the public know about alien invasions? When considering how many countless times aliens have invaded or caused something strange to happen in England in both Doctor Who and Torchwood, does something always happen to make everyone forget or to cover up every time? If someone knows the answer, please let me know, because I cannot remember.

Back to Danny, Anderson's performance was particularly top notch in the episode. Having the Doctor dislike him because of his military background was certainly expected, but Danny saying that the Doctor is an officer was not. The Doctor's dislike of soldiers has been a recurring theme throughout this season, and it really pays off in this episode. The entire heated exchanged between Danny and the Doctor in the TARDIS was acted superbly well. 
Danny and Clara's brief moment of relationship drama has not been done in Doctor Who, but it is not all that original either. However, it worked thanks to the strong performances from both actors, who sold the scene well. Also, the ending scene with Danny talking to Clara about not pushing herself too much was a nice touch. My only problem with any of Danny's scenes was that frontflip. Wasn't there some other way he could have distracted the Skovox Blitzer?

And finally, Missy returns, well, kind of. The security guard that is blown to pieces by Skovox Blitzer is now in the "After-life" or "Promised land," and considering that we saw his burnt remains, it is safe to assume that he was not just teleported to safety. Hopefully the explanation for Missy and her "Promised Land" will not be as daft as I expect it to be.   

Overall: 8.0/10- While lacking in plot, "The Caretaker" is a superbly acted and humorous character driven episode with some new character beats not often seen in Doctor Who.

The Caretaker Review by Tegan
The Caretaker review by Gypsy King


If you want to contact us or have any questions please send an e-mail to johnstarslayer@gmail.com.

12 comments:

  1. The episode was a fun one, with lots of humor. The scenes with the Doctor thinking that Adrian (the bow-tie wearing teacher) was Clara's boyfriend was funny, and was a nice reference to Eleven. So far, I'm liking Danny, and I'm interested to see how his story will continue. One of the most hilarious parts of the episode is one that I didn't catch the first time I watched it, only when I saw people talking about it on Tumblr that I had to go back and re-watch the scene: the scene where Clara tells the students to clean the chess board and the Doctor is standing not that far away, and starts to whistle, he's whistling 'We don't need no education'. Anyway, the episode was good, interesting, and had a good one-off villian, but I think the episode was at it's core about the Doctor, Clara and Danny. It's interesting to see the Doctor and Danny meet, and I'm interested to see how that relationship will continue, seeing as how neither like each other very much. The episode was good, and I like that they're doing lots of light-hearted episodes this year, well more than usual at least. Next week looks Freaky, though, with a capital 'F'. Excellent review, James! And thanks for the link to my review!
    -Tegan

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. We definitely agree on basically everything. Haha, thanks for pointing that out! I did not notice the Doctor Who whistling that! Thank you, and glad to do it! Can't wait for the next episode too!

      -James

      Delete
  2. Great review! :) While not my favorite of the season, I did like the episode and the character moments were really great and important to the overall story. The humor was also pretty great.
    As for no one remembering....I'm not sure, but it reminds me of the Sunnydale syndrome in the early seasons of Buffy where all the people didn't seem to remember or realize that vampires/demons existed. I do remember the people in the whoverse remembering stuff when Donna was around, bu since Moffat took over I think that went away.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you. :) Agreed, not the best, but the character moments were great.

      Hey, I think Gypsy King answered it well as to why they don't remember.

      -James

      Delete
  3. Fun episode, though definitely more character-driven than plot-driven. And the part where Danny thought that the Doctor was Clara's "space dad" was pretty funny. As was the boyfriend miscommunication. Ah, the doctor's vanity :) And of course, I personally enjoyed the fact that Clara was teaching Pride and Prejudice. Typical Janeite moment there ;)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yes, the "space dad" scene was hilarious! :) And the Doctor's vanity is hilarious. Thanks for commenting. :)

      -James

      Delete
  4. I agree, another fun and funny episode! Didn't replace the last episode as my favorite though. There were a few things that bothered me too. I really like Danny though, and I hope he'll wind up actually traveling with them at some point. Great review!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Agreed, fun episode but not as good as the previous one. It would be interesting if Danny ends up with the team, but I am sure it will happen at some point. Thanks!

      -James

      Delete
  5. I think Moffat used the Big Bang restart in Series 5 to reboot the universe and conveniently make Earth forget many of the invasions. Remember: Amy didn't know about Daleks even though they invaded Earth in The Stolen Earth - also to do with the cracks in Time. Certainly, the Moffat Earth is less savvy when it comes to aliens than the RTD one was. Nice review. I too like Mr Pink. More of him, please!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you for reminding me GK! I completely forgot about that until you mentioned it. And thanks!

      -James

      Delete
  6. This one was enjoyable; definitely liking Danny so far. I will be disappointed if he doesn't end up time traveling with them! :P Nice review! :)

    ~Jamie

    ReplyDelete

One rule: No strong profanity. If you want to link to one of your posts, please do; I am always interested in other reviews and such.

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...