Doctor Who: Silence in the Library
May. 31st, 2008 08:00 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
purplecatExpectations are Terrible Things.
Like with the Sontaran Strategem its actually very hard to form an opinion about this without seeing the second half. It set up so many intriguing ideas and it really all depends if they end up going somewhere interesting. Though Stephen Moffat, of course, has form in terms of pulling this sort of thing off which Helen Raynor does not.
In brief then: I liked the character of River Song but I was a little bemused why the Doctor seemed to be having so much trouble with the concept of meeting someone out of sequence and right now the mystery of her relationship to the Doctor seems a little extraneous to the rest of the story. Like the Doctor's daughter, she seems like a character crying out for a second appearance which makes you wonder about the season finale - maybe Rose? the Doctor's daughter? this future ?friend/?companion/?lover - that would be quite a mixture. The Vashta Nerada are a good scary idea, I could wish they weren't described as unbeatable, but I liked that they were used in a variety of ways and we didn't fall back on people endlessly accidentally falling into shadows or lights going out. The little girl was well-played. We have a lot of hints about her identity and the fate of the users of the library but not quite enough to be certain what is going on. The data ghosting was a surprisingly effective idea and the aftermath of Miss Evangalista's death was beautifully played and directed in a show which usually has little time to mourn its bit parts.
But, but, but, I wasn't as gripped as I was expecting to be. I was going to write that the children weren't scared either, but my nephew has just returned from a friends' house and reports that they were all scared there, maybe there was too much snuggling going on at our end.
Like with the Sontaran Strategem its actually very hard to form an opinion about this without seeing the second half. It set up so many intriguing ideas and it really all depends if they end up going somewhere interesting. Though Stephen Moffat, of course, has form in terms of pulling this sort of thing off which Helen Raynor does not.
In brief then: I liked the character of River Song but I was a little bemused why the Doctor seemed to be having so much trouble with the concept of meeting someone out of sequence and right now the mystery of her relationship to the Doctor seems a little extraneous to the rest of the story. Like the Doctor's daughter, she seems like a character crying out for a second appearance which makes you wonder about the season finale - maybe Rose? the Doctor's daughter? this future ?friend/?companion/?lover - that would be quite a mixture. The Vashta Nerada are a good scary idea, I could wish they weren't described as unbeatable, but I liked that they were used in a variety of ways and we didn't fall back on people endlessly accidentally falling into shadows or lights going out. The little girl was well-played. We have a lot of hints about her identity and the fate of the users of the library but not quite enough to be certain what is going on. The data ghosting was a surprisingly effective idea and the aftermath of Miss Evangalista's death was beautifully played and directed in a show which usually has little time to mourn its bit parts.
But, but, but, I wasn't as gripped as I was expecting to be. I was going to write that the children weren't scared either, but my nephew has just returned from a friends' house and reports that they were all scared there, maybe there was too much snuggling going on at our end.