“You are not a good Doctor."
In Steven
Moffat’s recent history his second part of two part episodes has failed to
deliver. He does really well setting everything up in part one and giving us a cliff-hanger
to talk over during the week but when we get the conclusion we are scratching
our heads going that was it. Yes, I have
not been a fan of Steven Moffat’s two part stories lately as I thought Series 8
season ender was ok and better than normal but other than that he hasn’t done
well with the second part since The Doctor Dances back in 2005’s Series 1.
The Witch’s
Familiar is the second part of the series 9 opener The Magician’s Apprentice
and it has the tough job of explaining what happened to Missy and the Daleks
and how will The Doctor escape from Davros.
Well Steven Moffat did a pretty good job answering these questions and
in fact gave us a second part that was pretty good. In fact I was surprised how good it really
was.
I really
liked the pairing of Clara and Missy. It
really worked and they seem to have good chemistry between them. I like how
sinister Missy is and the fact that Clara does not trust her an inch. That tension works well and helps with their
part of the story as you are waiting to see what might happen to Clara like
being pushed into the sewer. That isn’t
even the worst part of what happens to Clara.
Missy convinces Clara to get into a Dalek and act as her capture. Missy has a more devious plan for this as
what she really wants is for The Doctor to kill Clara. With Clara in the casing when she says her
name it comes out as “I am a Dalek.” So
The Doctor would not know it is her.
What a devious and evil plan that Missy came up with. I was really impressed with this that I just
thought it was brilliant. What a devious
way to get at The Doctor if he kills his friend and then when he finds out that
he did it that revelation would absolutely destroy him.
What really
made The Witch’s Familiar were the scenes with Davros and The Doctor. In most of their stories they never really
had much time to talk. Sure there were
the interrogation scenes and confronting the enemy, but they never really had
any dialog together that was meaningful.
We get to see The Doctor and Davros talk about why they did what they
did and you could see even though they are enemies they do have some respect
for one another. It was actually quite
an emotional conversation as Davros acted like a man dying and wanted to see
The Doctor with his own eyes. Now that
was creepy as I never thought Davros’ real eyes were closed but were not
there. It was, to me, creepy seeing two
eyes in the black void where they should be.
For the
most part that part of the story was really good and even the part where
everything came unravelled and it was all a trick by Davros to get The Doctor
to use his regeneration powers to help give the Daleks ultimate power. Ok.
The Doctor knew that was what Davros wanted and he also revived the
Daleks in the sewers but did he really think that Missy would come to his
rescue. It did not look like that The
Doctor was going to get free from the snakes in that machine so how was he
planning on getting free? It was a lot
of assumption on The Doctor’s part for that part of the plan to work. Just seem too convenient of a plot device for
Moffat to fall back on but it did work and was just a minor thing like where
did Missy get that rope from to tie Clara up with? It’s just stupid things like that hurt a
story a bit.
So I guess
The Doctor has sonic sunglasses now. He
used them to activate the TARDIS’s return from using the HADS. Nice touch doing that but come on sonic
sunglasses. It just seems that they are
trying too hard to make this Doctor the cool Doctor. I’m not sure about the sonic sunglasses but I
am hoping that they don’t make this a recurring thing and that this was the
last we have seen of it.
I liked The
Magician’s Apprentice and The Witch’s Familiar as it was for once a story that
was pretty dark and did not have to rely on the sonic screwdriver as a
solution. It was evenly paced and it
told a story that you had to watch and pay attention to. It had some really great moments none more so
than when The Doctor saved the young Davros and instilled the meaning of mercy
to him. That was a great touch and was
the main reason of saving Clara. Steven
Moffat surpassed my expectation and with only a couple of eye rolling moments
he gave us a very enjoyable two part story to start off Series 9. I’m hopeful that the rest of the season will
follow suit and we will have a very enjoyable Season.
Grade A
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