The New Doctor Is In

So much like the rest of the internet I'll take a bit of time to talk about the first installment of the new look Doctor Who. The series began afresh on saturday under the stewardship of new chap in charge Steven Moffat (for some reason British TV doesn't quite have the same show runner setup has those Yanks) and so including a number of new things to signal a new era.

New logo, new titles (they might take time to grow on me), new assistant and of course new Doctor in the form of Matt Smith.

So far I like him, but then I liked David Tennant to begin with but ended up preferring Christopher Eccelston's take. Truth is it's going to take seeing him in a couple of more dramatic episodes before I really commit to what I think but early signs are good as he seems to have a strong sense of comic timing and can certainly do the slight mad babbling and the look (once chosen) worked well.

Karen Gillan as new assistant Amy Pond has promise too, seems to be a strong and feisty type and hopefully not someone who make eyes at the Doctor all the time, though again it's still early days and we'll have to see how well she develops. Plus of course those skirts might cause a distraction.

Overall for the episode itself I'd say it was one of the strongest, if not the strongest series opener. It managed to introduce us to all the people it needed to (Amy, new Doctor, family members)and drop in things for the series to come with out feeling too forced. Plus it managed to have a bit of creepy presence with 'prisoner Zero' who was quite sinister as man and dog, heck even quite sinister when it was Olivia Coleman.

We got some comedy, some scares (it's an old trick but the door suddenly being open in back of frame was well used), a Patrick Moore cameo and somewhere that wasn't Cardiff or London! All this without a wildly pitching tone as well, the thing held together very well successfully including a beginning, middle and end which a lot of Russel T Davis' own stories never quite managed.

Davis did well to bring the show back to screens and make a hit of it (though I still believe Christopher Ecceslton deserves more credit than he gets for this)but I get the feeling under Steven Moffat the show is going to be stronger than ever this year.