Dr Who is coming to town

Doctor Who is a contentious show. It is praised by some critics for its great imagination and the influence it has had on other SF programming. Others claim that it has never really gone beyond its original concept as a ‘family show’ – a term seen by many as a euphemism for ‘children’s programme’. Not that these opposing points of view are mutually exclusive – a major London fan group recently voted Doctor Who the worst SF show of 2012 while at the same time proclaiming its leads the best genre television actors of the year. I have much the same attitude myself, having previously said on pages that I believe the show’s episodes can be split up into three categories – a third of them are brilliant, a third are just plain disappointing while a third are so bad that they’re good. I had, however, found all the episodes in the first half of the latest series, broadcast earlier in the year, surprisingly enjoyable so I had high hopes going into this Christmas special. Unfortunately, as I was soon to find out, ‘The Snowmen’ lies firmly in the ‘disappointing’ category.

The episode begins an indeterminate amount of time after the end of ‘The Angels Take Manhattan’ – with the Doctor, still grieving for the loss of Amy and Rory, living the life of a recluse in Victorian London. However, the return of old enemy the Great Intelligence and the appearance of the mysterious Clara, looking suspiciously like Oswin Oswald – the woman turned into a Dalek who was killed at the end of ‘Asylum of the Daleks’ – soon convince the Doctor to come out of his early retirement.

There was nothing particularly wrong with the story – it was just, well, painfully average. Using the Great Intelligence as the antagonist meant that there were plenty of references for fans of the Second Doctor and old Doctor allies Strax and Madame Vastra make a welcome return but the episode itself was just a repeat of the same tropes and clichés that I’ve seen in Doctor Who and in countless other SF shows dozens of times. Perhaps the show’s creators thought that a safe, uninspiring episode with a cookie cutter plot was just the thing for audiences who had just finished their Christmas dinner and were unlikely to be paying full attention to the episode but for someone who’s seen as much genre television as I have it was just boring.

The best thing about the episode was the introduction of the Doctor’s new companion, Clara. Intelligent, adventurous and witty, she seems the perfect addition to the show. She also has a very intriguing ability, which looks like it will dominate the story arc of rest of the series – whenever she dies she seems to be reborn in some different period of time. For a while it even seemed that the Doctor was finally going to have a companion form a time period other than our own, until the episode’s coda revealed that it was a present day version of Clara that would be travelling with the Doctor. Still, I am looking forward to seeing more of her when Doctor Who returns in April.