Under The Lake

Under The Lake is a story with a lot to write about. The first being the transmission time which was 8.25pm and this was to allow Strictly Come Dancing to air for two hours, bearing in mind that they are competing with The X-Factor which wasn’t on last night due to England playing Australia in the Rugby World Cup, the BBC could easily have moved this forward by an hour and thus allow people to enjoy this story. It’s also the latest (to my knowledge) that a Doctor Who has ever been transmitted although the way the BBC keeps throwing this show around the schedule I could easy see it put on after Casualty or even Match of the Day. As I don’t care about Peter Andre or Jeremy Vine or some guy from McBusted prancing around the dancefloor, I managed to keep myself entertained (thanks to Netflix) and when 8.25pm arrived, I was able to enjoy a story that from the ttrailer was going to be something that I enjoyed. I always enjoy base under siege stories and anyone who followed my marathon blog will know this and whilst I know it wasn’t going to be as good as base under siege stories such as The Moonbase or Horror of Fang Rock or The Tomb of the Cybermen, it has the potential to be the best story for quite a while. I’m going to cut any tension out of the story by saying that this is the best story of the series and the best story of Peter Capaldi’s era.

This story has been written by Toby Whithouse who has clearly been told to crank it up to 11 and certainly has done that which bearing in mind he wrote the very creepy God Complex back in 2011 perhaps isn’t a difficult request. The set up of the story is that the Doctor and Clara arrive on an underground base where the crew are holed up in a Faraday Cage type room because there are ghosts that are trying to kill them so that they can use their bodies to strengthen a signal. The thing is that the story works so well in making things as creepy and scary as possible that I found myself not really concerned with why things are happening. There is a scary ghost with the weirdest face and no eyes running around after people who can pick up weapons and walk through walls but just cant do both at the same time.

As with any base under siege stories there has to be a group of people on it that are a mix of annoying and not so annoying. What is quite impressive is that one of the cast member is actually deaf and I thought that the sign language part would be dropped quickly but it wasn’t and so credit goes to Whithouse. The effects used to create the ghosts is superb and there is one shot where a ghosts face is inches away from someones face and it was quite an incredible shot. The cliffhanger shot of the Doctor in the sea with his eyes removed is one of the most impressive last shots in recent years and so everyone involved in creating the effects for this episode should be very proud with what they have achieved.

The central performances have been quite good. Peter Capaldi is on fine form in this story but yet again I don’t think that Jenna Coleman was as good. She was better than the previous two episodes but I just don’t think that the character is as noticeable as she has been. I don’t know if that’s because the plots aren’t centered around her but something has changed since the new series started and whilst I approve of the fact that Clara isn’t at the centre of the story, something needs to be done for the character to fill the gap.

It’s never possible to fully judge a story until the second episode but the thing is that I wasn’t expecting this to be a two parter. I know that some people might say that it was obvious but it wasn’t to me and so when the next time caption appeared I was genuinely shocked. This story achieved a lot whilst just being about running down corridors. Judging by the NEXT TIME trailer for next weeks episode, things aren’t going to have the same base under siege vibe. Anyway one thing is for sure and that this series is shaping up to be a very strong one because its now three strong stories in a row and there doesn’t seem to be any sign of the quality dipping any time soon.