Review:
Doctor Who: The Eleventh Hour

501: The Eleventh Hour

‘Hello. I’m the Doctor.’ – The Doctor

So, after a terrible fourth series with very little to recommend it and a whole year of disappointing specials (say what you like, but the entire run was resolved at the end by a MAGIC GLOVE), can Doctor Who salvage his own tarnished reputation?

Everything has changed for this new series – a new production team, new logo, new titles, new music, new Doctor, new assistant and a new showrunner. Steven Moffat, creator of Coupling (as well as writer of some of the best Who episodes, ‘Blink’ and ‘The Empty Child’), has his work cut out for him. Can he reintroduce a whole new Doctor to the world without resorting to the infuriatingly tired ‘plot reverse’ button that former head Russell T Davies was so fond of?

Yes. Absolutely, yes. No word of a lie, this opening episode is so strong, so funny, so dramatic, so well-crafted and structured that all bad memories have been completely blown away by Matt Smith and his jaw-dropping portrayal of the Doctor.

After absorbing a huge amount of radiation and regenerating, the Doctor comes to in his TARDIS as it tears itself apart, before crash landing in the garden of 7-year-old Amelia Pond. Despite his weakened state, he begins to investigate a tear in time and space that has appeared in Amelia’s bedroom wall, a tear that links to a prison ship overseen by a giant eye. It seems that Prisoner Zero has escaped from the facility and is hiding somewhere in the house, but before the Doctor has a chance to hunt it down, he is called back to the TARDIS to avoid a meltdown.

When the Doctor returns, twelve years have passed. Amelia has grown up into Amy (Karen Gillian) and she’s bitter at being left by herself for so long. Unfortunately, Prisoner Zero is still in the house, which puts the entire planet at risk…