Doctor Who: The New Series

I was a bit disappointed with saturday's episode. Davies can write some funny lines but he shouldn't play the show just for laughs. The plot too was rather silly. I know its scifi /fantasy but some things could be more realistic. for a start it would probably take ages to seal off the spacecraft, the news presenter was hammy and had too much information, the body would be under armed guard with scientists swarming the place, not just one, the cabinet would not be indisposed, and even if it was a committee chairman would not take over, the queen would call a privy council meeting. last weeks episode with dickens was much more in the old tradition and the best so far. I hope in the next series the cybermen are brought back. I quite liked the sea devils too.

If you analyse everything on telly in such a detailed way then it surprises me you are ever satisfied with anything you watch. They only have 45 minutes to fill and getting bogged down with unimportant realistic touches that most people aren't going to notice is a waste of time.

I thought it was excellent, and to have a classic "Doctor in distress" clifhanger was marvellous! However they did kind of negate it straight away by showing him in next week's episode in perfect health.

The only other thing I didn't like was that I thought they over-did the trumping joke.

Disappointing about the ratings, but having said that it still has a very universal appeal. I think this really is a credit to Russel T Davies' writing; he's got the sci-fi / techno stuff in there, the present day realism, and the soapy stuff with Rose et al, without over-doing any of it so as to put people off. I, for example, am not too bothered about the sentimental soapy stuff, but I don't think it was over-done at all, and no doubt there was enough of it to appeal to those types that like that sort of thing. It really is pitched excellently.

The cybermen are crap and aren't coming back in this series as far as I know.

I believe they'd gone the same way as the PM had they not? Or at least the fat guy had cancelled their meeting. Remember the important members of stuff had been turned into suits (the head of MI5 and stuff).

I agree to an extent but the news coverage clips (with the exception of Andy Marr) were distractingly "false". I know that sounds stupid when the subject matter is an alien crashing in London, but it just didn't feel quite right.

As did the farting.

Do you mind not farting whilst I'm trying to save the world!

I think this series just gets better by the episode, it's slick movement from Sci-fi to drama to comedy and back again is what Russell does best (see also Casanova/Queer As Folk).

As for audience figures dropping off, the BBC have done well to keep 7 odd million people happy as, I for one would have had the TV switch off if it wasn't on. Once again its great to see 14 million people catered for by both the BBC & ITV. If this is the way forward then bring it on.

But to go from 8.3 million to 6.98 million (and it wasn't even good weather outside), is a real surprise. Also I don't think this episode was promoted enough. They only started showing trailers before Friday's EastEnders!!! I doubt they'll do that this week as they had a trailer before the BAFTA's on Sunday.

The narrow win for Ant and Dec can perhaps be put down to the fact that it was the last in the current series of Saturday Night Takeaway, next week Dr Who is up against...Celebrity Wrestling.

Erm..narrow win?!?

Ant and Dec got above 9 million .

erm no, they got above 7million.

So there.

That's wrong. Dr Who got 7m viewers average (peak 7.5m) and Ant & Dec got 7.1m average (peak 7.8m).

[quote="Bail"]

Excellent.................thanx