Warning: The following article may contain links to videos with strong language. Readers discretion is advised.

Every-single-time I come to one of these big climatic episodes, I wonder why I’m the one talking about them. I’m the one that has to make sense of it all, just so maybe my editor will think about watching it after the millionth time of me telling him to. That and when The Orville is done, he’s going to listen to me on TV suggestions from now on. It is a losing battle, I know. However, let’s try and make sense of the last two episodes/single story of series 2 of Doctor Who.

It is a very strange one, because like most I really enjoy the climatic Dalek cacophony of madness from series 1. It had a solid set up. There were a couple of duds, but on a whole, the story built even in tiny ways to make a climax about saving the universe and a little bit about Rose. It did all it needed to. It reinvented Doctor Who into something a bit more up to date while holding the alien adventure. This one doesn’t continue that, instead, it feels like a little bit of step down from everything built in the first series.

Don’t get me wrong, I do enjoy “Army of Ghosts” and “Doomsday” for their own reasons, but it is a more personal story. It is a story on and about the earth, as well as a story about individuals. It is not anywhere close to a plot about the universe being at risk from Nazi space dustbins who are about to kill the last vestige of hope for all life. There is one scene the explains this well, the one where Jackie tells Rose the reality of her little escapades into space. With Ricky gone and when Jackie is dead, what’s to stop Rose from never coming back or settling down? What kind of life is that for a human?

I’ll also point out, it might not be the Torchwood for sex pests, but I still hate it. Yeah, I like Tracy-ann Oberman’s Yvonne Hartman, but as a villainous type, I just can’t stand all the guns, self-importance, and presumption they are doing good when they don’t do any good. Well, that’s a lie, they do more good than Miss Kizlet from “The Bells of Saint John.” Yet that’s what you get from having your secret armed taskforce in a battleship-grey colored building, like a responsible villain. I mean, who really picks The Shard? It is a building for robots and banks, and it looks like a giant turd. You might as well set up shop in the Gherkin, sure it looks like a sex aid, but it looks better than The Shard.

Anyway, the first of the two episodes, pickis up where we left off with “Rise of the Cybermen” and “Age of Steel.” It makes the last five episodes meaningless. Continuing with the multiverse theory after a long padded wait, the rather reluctant domestic nonsense of the revival both helps and hinders. Between domestics and the gawking of Tennant, there is a lot to moan about, though they are minor gripes at the very least.

Probably the best thing to come from this episode is Freema Agyeman playing Adeola Oshodi. I like her, she’s going places. Sure, the character is dead by the end of it, but I’m sure this Agyeman woman will do something. I just can’t think of what it is, she’s got something about her that says, “I’m going to be a household name one day.” I wonder why?

Swiftly moving on, it also brought with it (though years later) Joe Vevers‘ humorous videos, starting with “The Bitch Fight of Canary Wharf.” There have been quite a few since then, but that one is the best by far. They are simple, effective, and have just the right amount of pointing and laughing at Doctor Who. It also sums up the story perfectly, just a big clash between the Daleks and Cybermen, that’s all it is. Sure there is a bit of a domestic content I need to get to, but at its core, the first episode was a long drawn out way of getting the Cybermen and the Daleks to battle it out in a base under siege motif. Oh, and Ricky is back.

I like the Cult of Skaro, they prove to be interesting for a while, but they will never have anything over the Ironside. Meanwhile, the Cybermen are once again as dull as dishwater. This is why I don’t care about the big battle we’re never given. In a fight of space Nazis VS the Nick Chopper in flairs, my money is on space Nazis rather than the Tin Man. I’d rather have seen quite a bit of the Torchwood setup cut for a bit more of the interspecies war, it might have made the episode a bit more interesting.

However, let’s get to that soppy ending I need to talk about. I like Rose, she’s the first companion and by default, I’ll always like her for being the viewer surrogate in the alien worlds of danger. However, I don’t care for the endless will they/won’t they plot of The Doctor and Rose. It just doesn’t work, as he’ll live on for hundreds of years and she’s more extinguishable than a chip pan fire on the sun. She’s enticed by the mystery of who and what he is. A mystery wrapped in an enigma wrapped in a sausage roll. He cares about her because, much like Sarah Jane, she makes him feel normal and like he has a connection with someone.

I just don’t care, it is part of the show and I know that. It would be like getting upset that Eccleston left after one series. As for Tennant, he has nothing on the big-eared lummox. It was time to move on, her story had ended, so it was only time for her to go. No matter how much it is hammed up, and no matter how emotional it gets, it was time for her to leave with a rather mixed finale that left nothing major worth saying. If I haven’t said so already, the story and the episodes were just fine.

That was the series as a whole, just fine with spectacle moments. I love “New Earth,” but that’s because Zoë Wanamaker makes Cassandra her own. “School Reunion” is great because you can see Tennant filled with glee he gets to stand across from the Sarah Jane Smith. You could see his love of her character. “The Girl in the Fireplace” is Moffat showing his chops as one of the greatest writers for Doctor Who, and is hardly ever matched. “The Idiot’s Lantern” was funny in places, and “Love & Monsters” is fun because you can never beat a bit of ELO and Danny Blue, so it will always be one of the best.

Though, what ruins this story and the entire series is the tease for the next series’ Christmas episode. I hate “The Runaway Bride,” I hate Donna Noble, and I can’t stand Catherine Tate thanks to that. As Russel T Davies said at some point with the Doctor Who magazine; as a character she’s just annoying and her entire act is god awful. Out of those that have been single companions, I put her down there with Clara, just above her but still down there in fourth place. Anyway, next week expect me to moan about her gawking, a giant spider that is the Racnoss Queen, and moan a bit more about Donna-bloody-Noble.

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Doctor Who "Army of Ghosts" & "Doomsday"

0.00

7

Score

7.0/10

Pros

• It's nice to know Jackie is happy with Pete.
• The Cult of Skaro proving to be a threat.

Cons

• A long build to finally get to the point.
• Donna Noble.