I was going to give this a go and I did (typing this in a Sheffield accent - or should that read Hoodezfield). However feelings of deja vu overtook me in how we met Doctor Eleven (Matt Smith) and even if he was my fave Doctor - all bias aside, this just didn't do anything for me. Don't get me wrong, it's not that the Doctor's a woman but couldn't help thinking it's been done before. He (et al) did plenty of running around in his intro ep, as did Doctor Ten (David Tennant) just to me they both brought something different to the character. This just seemed a rehash, even down to getting a new Sonic, in this ep made by the Doctor herself and from Sheffield stainless steel cutlery! It just had something missing. (Won't be using that 13 number as it just haunts me anyway for reasons of bereavement).
Also there was Amy Pond dressed as a policewoman, a kissogram in her encounter with the Doctor and sorry the title wasn't very original either!
However her companions were different in some respects, although it was apparent Grace (Sharon D Clarke) wouldn't be around for long thus giving Graham (Bradley Walsh) a reason to become part of the "team." He reminded me a little of Wilf (Bernard Cribbens) not believing in aliens and then coming across them for real and having to believe. Perhaps even more so after losing his beloved Grace, married three years and it ends with the appearance of the Doctor! Doesn't it always, always casualties of collateral damage who get in the way; but in all fairness do have the time of their (short-ish) lives. The title also being an allusion to Grace in an homage, in my opinion at least.
Ryan (Tosin Cole) talks of his grandmother being a wonderful women on YouTube as we're taken back to how it all began with him trying to keep his bike straight and ride it as he has no sense of coordination. Throwing it over the cliff in desperation, with Graham telling him he'll have to find it himself as they're late for their train. As he finds it, he comes across what I referred to as a blue turnip! Well it wasn't an onion. Ryan calls for help, Yasmin Khan (Mandip Gill) (Yaz to her friends) a policewoman, cue Amy Pond as a kissogram, but Yaz is the real deal, wanting something more to do in her work than just sorting out two women arguing and vandalizing cars over parking. My gripe: why is it always the name Yasmin and Khan, like there's a shortage of both Asian forenames and surnames! Ryan tells her to touch it cos he didn't leave it there, being cold to the touch. So later when 'Tim Shaw' says they're cold as ice why didn't her fingers get stuck to the turnip!
As Graham and Grace get cuddly on the train with Karl (Johnny Dixon) watching them, there's an intruder, a probe, with lightning streaks emanating from it. Grace calls Ryan telling them where they're stuck and the phone cuts out, luckily he has a policeman in tow. There's a thump and a woman falls into the train, the Doctor (Jody Whittaker). All frazzled and hyped up, not quite rebooted yet and having a barely vague recollection of who she is. Though the probe leaves, there's dialogue over what it was and how it's an alien. She wonders if there have been any strange occurrences around and Graham being a bus driver, former, goes to ask his friends. As the Doctor passes out and is left on the couch. Grace examines her saying she's got two pulses, as energy leaves her body in
the form of her breath.
A man has stolen the turnip and taken it back to the garage as he claims it took his sister. As the alien breaks out of the shell, he tells the man he won't see his sister again and takes care of him. As well as another man on the street who throws his salad at him. Inside the the garage, they find the man dead and one of his teeth removed. The Doctor manages to build a sonic out of Sheffield stainless steel as she doesn't have one, as fans went crazy over a woman being able to build things from scratch. This Sonic equipped with a tracking device able to find the location of the alien, as she thinks there are two making Earth their battleground, so what's new. Graham's friend follows through on the quest of questions of unusual activity and they head to the building where she finds the rounded tentacle probe and knocks it out. As Tim Shaw arrives, well it's a joke at her pronunciation of who it really is and he shows her his real face with teeth stuck to it. Trophies he collects of his Vics. She realizes he's on a hunt for humans and their targets have already been tracked and marked. Which doesn't explain why they have DNA ticking bombs inside them.
She finds Karl is the next target who's been singled out from the train and head to his workplace. A building site where he's inside a crane. The Doctor decides to climb onto the other crane and then Karl can move over onto that one. As Tim Shaw climbs the ladder to the crane, she tells Yaz and Ryan to start the other crane. Grace and Graham get electricity as she uses it. Funnily enough Ryan managed to climb the ladder but couldn't ride a bike. As the Doctor manages to trick Tim into returning home as she took his return device from his ship, Karl kicks him over the top. The doctor telling him he didn't have any right to do that. She also managed to neutralize the DNA bombs. However Grace falls from the ladder and dies.
Leaving the Doctor without any proper clothes and a missing TARDIS to find. She picks a suspenders outfit for herself, a little Mork I thought and they end up into space. Obviously the title referring to Who but also the number of times she mentioned 'Who' and not knowing Who she is. Not taking anything away from the character or the actress stepping into these shoes, not an easy thing to do, there were to many similarities to other Doctors as I've already said. Even though she did try to maintain Doctor Twelve's (Peter Capaldi) persona and character for a bit, she was out of place in that and his clothes obviously. And for the theme tune it sounded like metal rubbish bins being banged and clanged together, even if they weren't really!
As if that wasn't enough the BBC then teased the guest stars at the end, as if perhaps that may be an attempt to tempt people into watching the next ep and indeed the remainder of the series! Such as Phyllis Logan (Mrs Hughes from Downton Abbey) Chris Noth, suit 'n' all: either a Mr Big character or from Law and Order! - he was trending on Twitter! Also Mark Addy, Shane Zaza, Alan Cumming, Shobna Gulati, Siobhan Finneran, Josh Bowman (Revenge) to name a few.
I have to add that the Doctor being woman isn't a'new' concept since Joanna Lumley was also put forward for the role all the way back in 1986 by TV producer Sydney Newman but this was rejected. Joanna played the Thirteenth Doctor in The Curse of Fatal Death (1999). Though other women were touted over the years for the ole, it didn't actually transpire until now. Other actresses at the time in 1986 included Frances de la Tour and Victoria Wood.
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