Doctor Who
The Woman Who Fell To Earth
Written By Chris Chibnall
Directed By Jaime Childs
Doctor Who came back to our screens last night, as 8.2 million viewers tuned in to watch the new doctor 'Jodie Whittaker' debut.
This review will be short and sweet and will not contain any spoilers.
Well, I think it was undoubtedly the best episode that Chris Chibnall has written for Doctor Who so far, and it was a great opener for the new series, it served its purpose in terms of setting things up and establishing all the characters and introducing the new doctor.
I'm happy with the decision to move it to Sunday, I think that was maybe what the show needed, Saturday evenings will always be Doctor Who's home, but for now, this seemed like a good move. It's been done before, it was on midweek in the 1980's, so this isn't a new thing.
It was a very enjoyable episode to watch, some of the main factors about it were characterization and identity of all the characters within the story and their status which added emotional depth to the overall story. I really liked all the characters, I thought Ryan was very good, I like Yaz, Graham was good in terms of providing comic relief as well as contributing to the overall progression of the episode's plot, and Grace was good too. I liked everyone for the fact that these all seemed to me like normal everyday people which you're likely to meet, something which we didn't really get with Steven Moffat.
Coming into Doctor Who in 2018 really does feel as if an evolution of the programme is essentially taking place. It definitely had a few niggles, but overall, looking forward to the rest.
It didn't have the greatest monster/villain ever, but some really good character development, mostly solid laughs, great direction with fantastic cinematography, music was very good, I liked the score and Jodie Whittaker was brilliant throughout, all that I'll say about the new doctor for now is, I need to see more of her before I can establish a solid opinion. I don't feel like I can justify her character from this episode alone, because she's going through some post-regeneration trauma and I just felt we didn't get an overall consensus of what her character of the Doctor is about yet, that will come over time and watching the series each week. Having said that, I do really miss Peter Capaldi and think that Jodie Whittaker has some big shoes to fill.
But I liked it when the new doctor got into her costume, One of my favourite scenes from any pre-regeneration story is when the new Doctor decides on his or her outfit, and when she comes out in the clothes she picks that we've seen from the publicity photos, it's just marvelous.
I like the new theme music, it has some nice Derbyshire elements to it, not so keen on the drums, I'd personally tone them down a bit, but it worked fine for me.
The Woman Who Fell To Earth exceeds expectations for not just Doctor Who fans, but for television viewers as a whole. 8/10
