malicerewatchesdoctorwho:

Written by – Brian Hayles
Director – Julia Smith
Producer – Innes Lloyd

Episode One

(“I have no control over where I land, nor the period I
land in!” – The Doctor to Ben and Polly, his new companions, after they find themselves
in the TARDIS after she dematerialises.)

Likes

– Ben and Polly in the TARDIS and neither of them believing
that they have travelled anywhere, let alone through time and space.

– Polly loving the scenery, and after getting over her fear
of having moved, enjoying herself a walk up the cliff.

– Apart from the whole mistaking her as male thing going on,
I like how Polly plays along with it to keep herself as safe as possible.

– Ben enjoying the inn when they first get there and are
suspiciously accepted.

– Ben and Polly trying to defend the Doctor after barely knowing
him.

Dislikes

– The storyline…

– Polly being called a lad.
Ummm, how?  She clearly identifies
as an adult female…why is everyone calling her a boy?
It makes zero sense.  Is it that cute
as hat she wore in the beginning?  Is she
still wearing it?  I thought she took it off?

Awesome

– The death scenes in this serial are kept in.  Longfoot got stabbed in the back
there and we saw it all in lovely motion.

– Horses!  I like
when they get animals on the show.

Shitty

– It’s missing.

– Longfoot mumbled quite a lot of his lines, so I only heard
properly half of his dialogue.  And then
he died.

– Fight scenes in recons are horrible.  You can’t see any of the action.

In Conclusion

Oh boy, The Smugglers…

I want to get this one over with as quickly as possible,
so thankfully it is only 4 episodes long…

This episode was boring.
Half the dialogue was mumbled, so I couldn’t understand half of what was
said, the telesnaps are bad quality in the recon I watched, so it was hard to
know what was going on by sight.  There
were very few actions given in scrolled writing to tell us what is happening when
all is quiet.

So between finding the story boring, unable to hear it
properly and unable to see it properly…yeah, I found myself barely able to
follow along with it at all.

At least in other boring episodes, I was able to follow
along unless my attention wandered.  This
one I couldn’t follow along with even when my attention was on it.  I liked a few parts, mainly focusing on Ben
and Polly and the Doctor.  I kind of liked
Kewper the innkeeper.  Sort of.  And the boy, Tom.

Death count – 1.  Longfoot
Stabbed in the back by Cherub, one of the pirates.