DOCTOR WHO - SERIES 10 EPISODE 3: THIN ICE
Thin Ice. London 1814. The entire city has turned out for the biggest Frost Fair in decades. But beneath the frozen Thames, revellers are disappearing, snatched through the ice and pulled into the depths where a terrifying monster lurks. Will the Doctor and Bill stop the slaughter before they too are dragged into the icy waters?
I always love period episodes, episodes set in the past, particularly ones set in this period, the Victorian/Edwardian sort of era. That's my favourite time period. I love the whole gloomy industrial atmosphere of the setting of London at that time, I love the costumes, the tone of sense of place of where you are is very apparent and the times is very apparent too when Bill comments on the colour of her skin and slavery and she is verbally abused in the story for being a coloured girl.
I had a feeling that when the events of last week's episode leading into this one from last week and then seeing the next time trailer, I had very optimistic thoughts for this one and thought 'this looks good', 'this looks interesting'. And then actually having watched it, it didn't disappoint. It was a very good episode, compared to last week's which was a bit of a dud, this one was excellent. I love the idea of the monster in the frozen Thames, I loved the whole atmosphere of the market stool on the ice. It reminded me of a big finish story which you'd expect to listen to on audio, maybe with the Fifth or Sixth doctor?
The title, one can only think did Sarah Dollard come up with that title herself? because there is a seventh doctor and Ace story called "Thin Ice" with the ice warriors in it. Coincidence?
This is Sarah Dollard's second Doctor Who story, and the story quickly moves its constituent parts into place. Even in the pre-credits sequence, you get the reveal of the monster under the frozen Thames, we have learned that the TARDIS has steered the Doctor and Bill to this location and that danger lies ahead. Also, a quick trip to the TARDIS wardrobe. I liked both Bill's and the Doctor's costume in this episode to adjust to the time period in which they are in.
The Doctor doesn't usually bother changing his costume to suit the period, the only other time where I can recall he changed his outfit to suit the victorian period was in 'The Talons of Weng-Chiang' where he dressed in that Sherlock Holmes get up. Though there are photos of the Ninth Doctor in a victorian outfit for 'The Unquiet Dead' which is a shame that he see him wear in the episode. It's a very Dickensian look, especially with the top hat which I thought was a nice touch and actually suited Capaldi well, he suits wearing hats and I think his Doctor could pass off wearing hats.
It starts off being like one of those mystery episodes, we're not quite sure straight away what's going on.
But then there are strange lights under the ice? Dollard’s script soon begins to escalate the mystery here, with Thin Ice going about its business a little quicker than the episodes we’ve seen thus far this series. We get children luring people to the lights, which then pull people down into the Thames and, more pertinently, the teeth of the massive creature we saw at the start. The internal logic of the story then plays out, with Nicholas Burns’ particularly slimey Lord Sutcliffe overseeing a plan that involves sacrificing people and it’s a very cold drama at times, with a young child proving to be fish food, creating fuel, and a bit of good old-fashioned child labour thrown in for extra measure.
To unravel all of this, Thin Ice becomes more of a Peter Capaldi-centric episode, albeit hinging, again, on a choice that Pearl Mackie’s Bill is forced to make. I liked the Doctor and Bill's partnership in the ways in which they played off each other in this episode. It almost reminded me of another successful and famous Doctor and companion partnership. I think you guess whom I'm talking about. The Seventh Doctor and Ace. And when you think about it Bill is a bit like Ace in a sense, only she doesn't want to blow stuff up. But I think the whole teacher and student thing is working really well.
It's one of those episodes that you can get so sucked into it that you can just run away with it and enjoy it no matter what happens. Those are the episodes which I really enjoy over all others and it was actually not too complicated a plot to follow, everything made sense, the pace of it was good, Peter Capaldi and Bill were excellent, it's all you could really expect to see.
I didn't really feel that it needed to end with them coming back to the doctor's office, I would have liked them to stay a little longer and for it to end on a light humorous note as for the whole of the episode has been bleak and mysterious, a light humorous note would have finished it fine for me.
I don't really care about that sub plot with what's going on in the vault. It's something that's going to drag on throughout the whole of the series. And that bit at the end was the only part I didn't really like. But overall, a very enjoyable episode. One of my favourites of the series and the whole of the new series. 8/10.
Next week's looks as if it's going to be another good one too. Let's hope so.
