Doctor Who: Deep Breath

For me it's whn Clara tells him it's him on the phone. That's far reduced from Matt Smith's complete ownership of all his history, and defines his identity through his relations to others and binds that to Clara above all, and I love all of that.

Did not like the appearance of Matt Smith in that episode. No, sir. That would be my primary criticism of an otherwise good intro episode for a new Doctor.

You're both dead to me.

Hey, I love em, I just thought their scenes were mostly forced. I want Strax as a constant companion.

So it's official - Capaldi is the WORST Doctor in Doctor Who history. The episode was crap, but more importantly Capaldi was crap! It's no wonder Jenna Louise Coleman is opting out after this season, she sees the writing on the wall.

Ah, then perhaps one day you and I shall meet on the field of battle and I will destroy you for the glory of the Sontaran Empire.

Those three can be a little iffy for me. Mostly hit, but sometimes underneath is the feeling of . . . this is gratuitous humor that doesn't entirely earn its runtime or interruption of plot.

Or, as evenflow put it, forced. But I really don't mind in the long run.

I kind of gt the sense they were spending a lot of credit on humor up front before the went dark in upcoming episodes

I don't dislike Strax, Jenny, and Vastra. But if we can have them continue from one Doctor to another, then I want Captain Jack Harkness to return, he was 10 times more entertaining than all of them put together.

Though the chick that plays Jenny Flint is pretty damn cute.

Jack got his own spinoff. Vastra and crew were supposed to get theirs. That was the whole point. But, between Who and Sherlock, Moffat says he doesn't have time. So, I don't object to their frequent use.

Can we remember that Tennant spent most of his first episode unconscious and wearing Jackie's boyfriend's pajamas? Comparatively speaking, Capaldi's coming into himself was far more interesting, IMO.

And that spinoff is over, now he can come back, because I want more Captain Jack.

Well, if they're taking the hints at Capaldi's face seriously, I guess some crossover to Torchwood's Children Of Earth is ahead.

He played a Roman in a Tennant episode. Coincidentally the one with Karen Gillian as well.

Very cautiously optimistic. I still don't really know where the Three Stooges come from or why they are featured so heavily. I have no idea, really, despite watching every episode since the first one with Ecclestone. Clara better stop being wide-eyed and surprised whenever something weird happens. She's been at it long enough to expect the unexptected. At it too long if you ask me. She's my least favorite companion to date. Not because she's unsympathetic or anything but because she doesn't grow and everything that has to do with her seems terribly forced. I blame the writers, not the actress.

The episode itself was kind of wasted. If you do a monster of the week with a new Doctor, give him time. Nobody cares about the dinosaur or the android thingies. We want to see the new guy in action. So... Capaldi certainly has potential but Tennant and Smith had each a better start. They clicked with me immediately. Capaldi didn't.

Agree with this bit. She's definitely pretty to look at, but rather vanilla in all other aspects.

I rather enjoyed Jennie's modeling. She may do that again, any time.

No one will ever have as messy a start as Colin Baker though.

Yes, but he also played a banality-of-evil-type bureaucrat in Children of Earth, and Moffat is on record saying that Russel T. Davies gave him an idea how to tie all of those together with the Doctor's new face.

It's strange reading this thread; I loved Capaldi's first episode, love his portrayal and his theme of self-searching, and I enjoy Clara as a companion.

In other words, you're all wrong about what you like and dislike, and it's time you figured that out and mended your ways.

...or as messy a run as Doctor Who. Colin Baker was shite.

No, he was screwed over.

Time once again to ban Packard.

I've seen enough different Whos that nothing about Capaldi leaps out as horrible or special yet. We'll see.

Actually based on the last 10 minutes of the episode or so, I am very hopeful for Capaldi as the new Doctor. It was the first 70 minutes of the episode that gave me spasms.

The completed version is a vast improvement over the leaked one.
Enjoyed it much better the second time around.

We did. We saw his reaction to those things. He was very Doctory-protective toward the dinosaur and not very Smithy-wowed by the androids. Next week looks like it'll have plenty of action. They wanted to set up some character arcs in this episode, it worked reasonably well, and as long as nobody spends half the season being emo all over the place I'm probably going to be okay with it. I don't feel like I got shorted on the monster of the week plot.

Clara is an interesting choice to have experience this rejection, because she's the one who's seen all his previous regenerations and therefore the most capable (aside from Romana) of dealing with the idea of "it's the same guy, just a different face and personality." At the same time, she didn't have to trust her life to running around with most of them, nor do I think she had any experience with post-regeneration difficulties, much less any of this severity. So this arguably reflects her youth and her inability to cope with being out of control, as reflected in the out-of-hand classroom flashback?

I need to rewatch the first one. My initial view (from a veil of an afternoon of double vodkas) was that Capaldi came across well, but the story...

Well, it was a tiny bit shite. From "oooh! lookee" scene with the dinosaur at the start, to Moffat mining his own past material. Hopefully Into the Dalek will remedy that.