Rock, an Ood on Who

[angelophile]

Episode three of the new series of Doctor Who. And tonight we visited the Planet of the Ood. Who fans will remember the bald headed, betentacled Ood from the second series, ranking amongst the best of the Who New's aliens. Well, they were back in force for this episode.

Firstly, the good. Tim McInnery as the villain of the piece, adding a few layers of gleeful black humour to what could have been a bland role and plenty of character as well. A solid cast in support, including Ayesha Dharker. Some excellently handled action sequences and some decent cliffhangers hrough the episode itself. The Ood themselves, suitably alien, but able to interact with the humans without having to become human to do so. A true alien world, at long last and kudos to the special effects team for doing some nice work.

Then David Tennant and Catherine Tate. Tennant's reliable as always, but Tate's managed to move me in both this and last week's episode and do some decent character work that wasn't just shouty for comedy effect. I hated the idea of her in the series but she's bringing me around as they've layered her character considerably.

The weak had to be the elements of the ending, which obviously I won't talk about so soon, but rather took the polish off the whole thing. But it rumbled along nicely, even with the flaws. It's not a stand out episode, but miles from being the abject failure that the first episode of the series was.

So, two solid episodes in a row and next week's trailer showed the return of some old friends and some old enemies. and potentially could rock, so my optimism for the rest of the series is rising.