The Matt Smith Review: Part 1 - The Eleventh Hour
In the
run-up to the new series, we’re going to do a Cher.
No, we’re not going to have a facelift that makes us look frightening to young children and animals, we’re
going to turn back time and find a way to review every episode of the Matt Smith Era so far.
We’re going to re-watch every episode and see if our original reactions to them
differ from now. First up is The Eleventh Hour, which obviously provided the title for this fanzine!
What we first thought: This is the best thing since
discovering that the off-licence up the road doesn’t ask you for ID.
I’ll
preface this by saying that I gushed like a Teenager at a Justin Bieber concert
when I first watched this. The general ‘even
though I’ve never seen him in a episode yet…’ negativity towards Matt Smith
from supposed fans, made me want this first episode to succeed so much that
they would crawl back into their holes and never hear from their
miserable gobs again. More importantly,
it needed to be good to capture the imagination of the fickle viewing public,
after the success of the David Tennant Era.
And you know what? I believe they pulled it off in some style - Matt’s
triumphant walk through the mournful face of Tennant, left us in no doubt that
this man IS The Doctor! I really love
this episode and I’m going to make no apology for this somewhat biased review.
It’s 2010
and the Doctor Who fandom is spilt.
There are those that are so distraught at the departure of David Tennant
(and to some extent, RTD) that they weren’t prepared to give Matt Smith and
Steven Moffat a chance, in turn not getting what the show is about. REGENERATION is the key word and like its
central character, Doctor Who has always changed and adapted. Then there were those who were excited
(perhaps a bit too excited) about this new era of Doctor Who, that expectations
went through the roof What Steven Moffat
had to do, was to start well from his clean slate and establish his Doctor Who
quickly.
Moffat is a
writer that likes to play with the imaginations of children and watching this
episode back has made me realise what a genius piece of writing it is. From the very first scenes when The Doctor
meets Amelia, you can see just by looking at the scene and listening to the
words used, that this has been made to engage a child and hook them into the
story. Lines like ‘You know when grown-ups tell you everything is going to be fine and you
know that they’re probably lying, to make you feel better’ will just hit
home with some kids (and possibly some adults too!) What’s more poetic is that Amelia and
this new Doctor are children. Many a
Keyboard Warrior may get angry at this, but Doctor Who is primarily made for
Children. Yes, it is described as a
family drama, but how can a family drama be a family drama with no children
watching? That’s how you get your
viewers – parents of kids will watch something if their child is interested in
it. That’s how Doctor Who has worked for
nearly 50 years and always will. Trying
to ‘adultise’ Doctor Who simply doesn’t work (see the 1996 TVM).
The story
has somewhat become a sideshow, what with me banging on about Doctor Who in
general, but after watching this again, I can understand a bit more about Amy’s
backstory. It’s very much in the vein of
‘Boxset Telly’, where TV shows are now made for the commercial market, so are
designed to be watched over-and-over again.
I don’t particularly subscribe to the view that you need to watch this
episode (or series) over-and-over again to understand it, as everything you
need to know is in plain sight. But I
think it adds another dimension to the characters if you go back, knowing what
you know. You can see how much planning
has gone into creating these people and their stories.
What more
can I say about Matt Smith? He sold me pretty much from his first scenes in the
TARDIS in The End of Time. You can see that child-like enthusiasm in his
face when he first meets Amelia, which is probably a major reason in her trusting
this strange man. I got a ‘Doctor
Reborn’ mantra from this first episode and everything about it seemed
to be starting from afresh. I’m not
talking about the theme or the titles, but the actual direction and lighting of
the episode. I remember watching it for
the first time and the picture just seemed so different. The bright
colours of the RTD were gone, with little Amelia all alone in her scary house -
and the picture just made the house look cold.
There are many ways which you can scare people without any lines or
action being played out, and this is one of them.
As
mentioned above, some of the lines in this episode are pure gold. Another one I particularly enjoyed was the ‘Am I People?’ comment from The Doctor to
Amelia, just before he left her. Here’s
a girl that has been let down throughout her short life by people and here
comes a strange man who she thinks the world of, barely an hour after meeting.
The acting is superb too – that resulting smile from Amelia and the look of
hope and happiness in her eyes when The Doctor is about to jump back in the
TARDIS...then he had to spoil it all by turning up years late! Despite being a bit upsetting, it’s still one
of favourite scenes – she’s sat there on her suitcase with a massive smile on
her face and we know that he’s not coming back.
The rest of
the story was an absolute breeze, as an hour and a bit passed extremely
quickly. The major compliants I hear about this episode are for the SFX. I think the usage of people being Prisoner Zero (or 0, if you prefer) helped our imaginations - instead of having the actual creature, made up out of ropey-CGI, roaming around all the time! Yet another thing I thought was
pure genius – was the fact that The Doctor and Amy already had a history before
they met. It’s something that’s never
been done before, and I think Doctor Who should always strive to try something
different. Here we have a girl whose
life has been affected by a strange man, who (in his timeline) met her as a
little girl about 10 minutes ago. That
plotline just opens up so many possibilities and at the same time – saves time
in inserting any tedious scenes for the companion to ‘familiarise’ themselves
with The Doctor, and thus mucking up the pace of the story. I’ve commented in the past that Moffat isn’t
a writer who writes meaningless lines, he finds uses for everything and is able
to move a story along at pace. I feel that The Eleventh Hour just proves that
assumption.
How this
will work out for the rest of the series? Well let’s find out!
What we think now: The Eleventh Hour was a crucial
point in modern Doctor Who history, if they got it wrong it could have been disastrous
for the show. But they got it so right
and in turn, adopted a back-to-basics approach which in itself, provides a solid
base to build from for the future.
We also put
the word out on Facebook and Twitter, asking for 5-word reviews of this
episode. Just to be awkward.
David MacGowan: “Giddy, naughty and a great start”
Andrew Myers: “Great performance from Matt Smith”
David Carey: “Matt hits the ground running!”
@totallynerdybird
“it brilliantly introduces Matt
Smith”
Simon Pearce: “Eleventh Hour cracking series opener”
@backtoblack5: “perfect from start to finish”
Allison Price: “Brilliantly introduces Eleven and Amy”
Alistair Gauld: “No
ducks it’s A Pond”
You can read our original review on The Eleventh Hour in our first Issue here
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