Cold War

Tonight's episode of Doctor Who entitled Cold War was very appropriately named both in accordance to the time period in which the episode took place, and the fact that the protagonist was a Martian Ice Warrior. Old fans of the show along with those who have jumped into the old series might remember the Ice Warriors from the early episodes of DW, dating all the way back to the first Doctor. The Martian natives got a serious revamp for their return to the screen as do most of the old faces Moffat and the other writers choose to dig up from the old series.

                               

Cold war was written by Mark Gatiss and was, atleast in some ways, remniscent of the days when Russel T. Davies used to write for DW. The episode began with The Doctor and his companion ending up in a place they did not intend to be in (a Cold War era submarine in the Northpole in this case) and then while there something bad occurs and they have to save the day(Ice Warrior wants to kill everyone on the sub). This used to be the way most episodes went in the RTD days, but lately with Moffat as head writer things have been more deliberate and purposeful it seems. Every episode has to be useful and play into the larger over all story of the season with no fun 'just cuz' episodes mixed in. I happen to rather enjoy the old style of The Doctor popping in and saving the day simply because he happened to be there at the time. 

Even though this episode followed that old style it wasn't enough to convince me that this was a very good episode. Sure it wasn't terrible, but it just wasn't awesome. I like when I finish watching an episode and I can't get the stupid grin off my face because it was just that good of a show. Tonight's episode just didn't do that for me. We didn't learn anything new about the great mystery that is Clara Oswald, we didn't get any epic speeches or stellar moments from The Doctor, and we didn't get any big "oh wow that will forever change the way I look at _____" type of events. The Ice Warrior came, a few people died, The Doctor and Clara come in and spout some words of wisdom, and the Ice Warrior leaves. Nothing really memorable. 

As much as I love new episodes of Doctor Who, I kind of wish Mark Gatiss would have spent more time trying to speed along the 3rd season of Sherlock instead of writing this episode.