Entry tags:

bbc, billie piper, christopher eccleston, david tennant, doctor who, russell t davies, sci-fi, tv

Doctor Who - The Runaway Bride (Christmas Special), BBC1, 25 December 2006
All images in this review are copyrighted material belonging to the BBC, and are reproduced here for critical and non-profit making purposes, and can be removed on request.

The Doctor and The Bride
It’s amazing how complacent and conservative people can quickly become, especially your radical creative types. When Doctor Who was brought back by the BBC in 2005, it was entrusted to TV tyro Russell T Davies, who, publicly at least, was more renowned for dramatising premature ejaculation than premeditated extermination.

And although the new Who was sexed up, it remained within the norms of pre-watershed television, but with a new found emotional core that was deeply submerged if not completely repressed in the original series. It was, on the whole, disciplined, well-scripted, with a committed central performance from Christopher Eccleston as a war-weary, if not damaged, refugee seeking humane meaning and order in a chaotic, vicious universe. Episodes such as Dalek, Boom Town and Parting of the Ways reimagined Doctor Who for a modern audience, while staying true to the fundamentals of the series’ basis and a gentle, but not overbearing, affection for 30 odd years of continuity that preceded the revival.

New Doctor Who was a complete and unmitigated success, reaching levels of popularity unimagined by the old series even at its early 60s and later 70s peaks. On occasion it even overshadowed the cornerstone of all BBC1 programming, Eastenders. But when is huge commercial success ever artistically liberating? Maybe for the successful, garroulous author, who is happy to chuck commercial reward on a bonfire for gauche literary immortality (which is never assured). But for a television series, that has a production crew of hundreds and is expected to remain a popular draw for a Broadcasting Corporation that is always trying to justify its existence to a hostile government? Never.

The Runaway Bride is a case in point. Within two years of its miraculous rehabilitation from having been a national cultural laughing stock, Doctor Who is solidifying once more into a mild formulaic embarrassment, transforming from a subtle, subversive family drama (that no other mainstream broadcaster in the world would make) into a rehash of former glories, laden with clichéd Hollywood tropes delivered with a leaden predictability.

For this reviewer, the true litmus test for a Doctor Who episode is whether one can watch it in polite company (those who remain resolutely neutral to the show), and The Runaway Bride fails miserably in this regard. Having convinced a family member that there is nothing wrong with his 30 year old son following such a series by showing him some of the highlights of the previous two years (including last year’s Christmas special and the aforementioned Dalek), this reviewer experienced a sudden rush of blood to the cheeks several times during the episode’s exceedingly long 60 minutes.

So what was precisely wrong? Well…

• It was a complete rehash of the previous year’s Christmas special, hitting the same narrative beats to the same pace and to the same resolution, but with less originality and genuine flair. Last year's special was stylish and self-assured, where as 2006's Christmas episode was neurotic and narratively timid.


• Doctor Who, like all good science fiction, works best when it is layered – you can enjoy it on many levels. The Runaway Bride was monothematic and mono-toned, a madcap childish mishmash of loud, brash, confusing CGI strung together by tenuous plotting with the odd attempt to inject a sense of poignancy about a character who left in the previous series, and who would be a total mystery to any potential new viewer.


• It was not really self-contained. Any TV series should be accessible in terms of plot and dialogue in a self-contained episode. Plot arcs can be built and continued, characters can evolve and be developed, but at its heart an episode should be able to explain to the new viewer what is going on and be thematically interesting in itself. Did we care about any of the characters? No. Were we engaged with their plight? No. Was there any genuine tension? No. Was there any point to the whole proceedings apart from simplistic thrills and bangs? No.


• The episode was too in love with its own special effects. Having spent three decades trying to portray the vast expanses of all time and space with a ball of string, some bubblewrap and a quarry, the BBC are overjoyed with the possibilities of affordable CGI. However, accomplished as they are (and they are not always good as the production team think they are), the need for spectacle is beginning to dictate plot in precisely the same way the constraints in effects limited the original series. Just because you can replicate a car chase from The Matrix Reloaded doesn’t mean that you have to do so, especially when it is ineptly crowbared into the plot. Dramatic tension combined with sympathetic, stylish production values retain audiences far more effectively and affectionately than a Primark version of a Jerry Bruckheimer film.
  
  Nice effects, but where's the script?
  
• Fan wankery. It preached to the converted. Russell T Davies and his team of writers are fans of the original series in rather a big way, having written numerous spin off novels between them during the 1990s when the series was off air and unloved. When the series returned, one got a sense that they were maintaining a tremendous self-discipline to keep the show to the basics, and not literally turn off new viewers with a convoluted continuity that only appeals to those who get an Asperger’s-esque thrill from obscure and ultimately meaningless references to what has gone on before.
  
  There were nods in the first season that were painful, but the whole enterprise was trying to put the “Who?” back into Doctor Who. In The Runaway Bride (and in the last full series of the show) the mask slipped, and pointless namechecking of the Doctor’s planet Gallifrey and the rather tedious cross-platform promoting of the spin off show Torchwood meant that the programme was solely talking to the converted, playing off old riffs, like a jaded 60s rockstar touring soulless stadiums with no new material of worth.


• THE MUSIC WAS TOO LOUD. The BBC Symphony Orchestra of Wales now records the soundtrack for each episode, and one imagines that this is not cheap. This does not mean that they have to be playing the entire time, crudely signposting what the audience is meant to be feeling at every single moment, like Steven Spielberg/ John Williams collaborations at their worst. The sound mix was all wrong, drowning out the admittedly witty dialogue (from what I could hear of it) and smothering any attempt at subtlety. Murray Gold, the composer, is capable of writing and arranging some lovely scores (last series’ Doomsday being a case at point), but he, like the production team are trying too hard to mimic the worst of Hollywood blockbusters rather than retaining the series’ own quirky charm, which they have done so well on the whole over the last two years.


• The villain was a rather naff giant spider played with camp, panto relish that recalled the series' late 1980s nadir. One supposes, given that young children could be watching the show, that the makers had to allieviate the horrific elements of such a character, but every time the character was on screen a certain sense of shame washed over me as if I really was too old to be watching such nonsense – the villain offered no interest to the adult viewer, whereas, when the show is at its best, the makers can develop the threat so it works on different levels for different age groups. Instead, we got OTT acting thrown together with a somewhat confusing and nonsensical motive and plot (which will not get taken apart here).

Catherine Tate - saving the show as well as the day
In its defence, the thing I was most dreading turned out to be the episode’s saving grace: Catherine Tate. Although not particularly familiar with her own comedy sketch show, this reviewer initially thought that the casting was a touch too populist and odd as the temporary replacement companion to the surprisingly good Billie Piper. However, Tate played the role well, injecting comedy touches at the right places while not making her character a caricature. If anything kept me watching, it was Donna’s (Tate’s character) plight and reaction to this new universe but this element (which surely was intended as a way in for new viewers) was drowned out by the overblown production and set pieces.

David Tennant turned in his usual performance as the Doctor, which is animated but ultimately bland, although there were one or two moments that allowed him to shine. Rumours are that Robert Carlyle will be taking over in the role in 2008, and this may inject some new life into the show if the forthcoming Season 3 (to be shown in March 2007) turns out to be as much as a turkey as this year’s Christmas special.

Formerly Christopher Eccleston, soon to be Robert Carlyle?
Although important, it is never just the actor in the role that defines Doctor Who – it’s the intention of the production team. This review could be seen as over critical, but it is so because the intelligent audience is aware that the current producers and writers are capable of so much more, and this Christmas they were caught going through some overly simplistic motions. Let’s hope they can raise their game with the new series in March, as otherwise 25th December 2007 will be one doctor’s appointment I wont be keeping.

Past Peter Crispin Doctor Who Reviews:
Doctor Who - New Earth

Official Site:
Doctor Who (BBC Site)

Unofficial Fan Site:
Outpost Gallifrey