Human Nature

[dc]

Unexpectedly, one of the highlights of the weekend was Doctor Who. At last, eight episodes in, an episode that felt like Who, and which I was inclined to watch again. I was beginning to think the whole series would be a dud. Martha is still irritating and poorly characterised. When Matron said she thought she knew a lot more about concussion than Martha, I had to remind myself that Martha is supposed to be a medical student (not that a medical student would necessarily know a lot about concussion...). I repeat, never met a medical student remotely like Martha.

Mostly, though, this was good. Interesting continuity references (pictures of McGann, Hartnell, McCoy, Baker and Davison, I think, plus the slightly superfluous musical reference to “Remembrance of the Daleks”), with the namechecks of Sydney (Newman) and Verity (Lambert) as Mr. Smith’s parents. One or two slightly false touches: Matron talking about another war; that, surely, is an expression which would fit the period between the two World Wars, but not before the First. I would have thought it more accurate if she had talked about going to war.

Also, I may be wrong, but I am pretty sure machine guns (cutting-edge military technology) were not generally available for use by schoolboys. Would the disparity between well-armed troops and assegai-wielding tribesmen from the Dark Continent have really been so hard for the audience to grasp if they had been shooting rifles?

I am unsure about life in an English village, but is (was) it usual for them to have annual dances in November?

Still, a good one. I hope they do not blow it in part two.

Comments

[wibbble]

I found that the whole thing was let down by the parody-like acting of the guy playing the possessed schoolboy.

[akicif.livejournal.com]

1913's close enough to the BoreWore (as the One True Histroy Book calls it), or the whole series of Imperial border skirmishes fought "with Maxim gun and Nordenfelt" that "another war" could have been merely something minor like the Ashanti expedition or another Afghan war: no-one really expected anything like the pan-European conflagration that we know now was just round the corner.

As for machine guns, yes - the then-OTC training included at least some machinegun practice. But it would probably have been on a termly "Field day" or at annual camp.