Orphan Black: Scarred by Many Past Frustrations

Unsurprisingly, Mark did not kill Sarah at the end of the previous episode. Instead her taken her back with him to the army base while the dead baby body is given to Dr Virginia Cody who plans to use it to understand the Castor condition.

It’s good to see Sarah and Helena reunited at long last. The scenes of these two clones together, talking between the cells are the best moments of the episode, as we see them initially antagonistic but slowly learning to trust each other. Sarah is usually shown to be more thoughtful than Helena, but here int he jail, Helena's survival instincts are better while Sarah seems lost. Helena escapes without Sarah but feels guilty about it. Whether this guilt is enough to make her turn back is not clear yet.

With Sarah being held captive, Felix and Mrs.S are unable to support her. Nevertheless they prove useful in another way when Art brings Gracie, Heinrich’s daughter, to their house for help. It’s interesting seeing Gracie trying to acclimatize to life outside of her family. We also find out that more about Mrs S backstory. Gracie partying with Felix and Siobhan is another fun moment. Unfortunately she is suffering as it seems that intimate contact spreads the defect from the clones to people.

Cosima's subplot moves on a little further as goes on a date with Shay, who seems to be a likeable character, if a little dull and uninteresting. New partners often turn out to be monitors and spies, so if
if Shay turns out to be a spy it will be one of the most obvious plot twists ever. I'm hoping that either the writers go in a different direction or they  make this betrayal a little different, otherwise it's just the show treading the same old ground.

Although all the plots are fairly strong, a weakness in Series 3 is highlighted through Alison's absence from this episode. What's bad is that this absence is barely noticeable is a sign of how little her election/drug dealing subplot has contributed to the overall story arc. This still needs to change. 

Overall this is a pretty satisfying episode. With Helena finally out of prison and Cosima given a new direction in the series, things can start to move forward.

9/10

Tennant and Tate in Big Finish

Even though this news was leaked ages long before the War Doctor news came out, it still feels good to have it officially confirmed.  The Tenth Doctor was never better than when he was alongside Donna Noble and it's another reason to buy the audios if you don't already do so.

When The Runaway Bride first aired I didn't particularly like Donna.  The character seemed loud and annoying. Like a character from Catherine Tate's comedy sketches rather than a proper character. Her only decent moment was when she slapped the Doctor. When it was later announced that she would be succeeding Martha Jones I wasn't very happy. Fortunately, when Series 4 came along, they'd toned the character down a little. She was a little older and wiser than the previous two companions and could bring the Doctor down to earth. Catherine Tate worked really well alongside David Tennant and by the end of the series I was sad to see her go. The Tenth Doctor and Donna had become one of my favourite Doctor/Companion teams of the show's history. In my personal canon, Donna's memory lock is broken and she finds a way to go off into the stars to have further, solo, adventures.

It's not quite as surprising that David Tennant is doing Big Finish plays. He's appeared in them long before he became the Doctor, so it felt like it was only a matter of time before he came to do more.

With the War Doctor and the Tenth Doctor it can only be a matter of time before Eleventh Doctor Matt Smith takes part in audio adventures. With news of Series 10 still sketchy this is further evidence that Big Finish will be leading Doctor Who in 2016.

Doctor Who 9x06: The Woman Who Lived

Immortality is a recurring theme in Doctor Who as well its spin off show, Torchwood. Writer Catherine Treganna has already brought her own notion to Torchwood. Now she gets to play a similar situation when the Doctor's search for an alien artifact leads to a run in into the immortal Ashildir.

Since we last met her, Ashildir has become Lady Me, a lady who also has a double life as the highwayman known as the 'Knightmare' and trying to track down an artefact known as the 'Eyes of Hades'. Treganna does a good job showing the transition of Ashildir from a hopeful, caring young storyteller into a hardened, cynical killer. The whole idea that Lady Me stopped having children from the pain of losing them is a good one. Maisie Williams puts in a great performance once again. Lady Me has much less in commin with Arya Stark than Ashildir, and we get to see Maisie playing a much colder character.

The coldness of Lady Me gives Peter Capaldi a different angle from which to play the Doctor. This time the Doctor is the voice of compassion, speaking for the little people. The scenes of the Doctor and Me trying to steal the Eyes of Hades is funny and overall the episode is at its strongest when it focuses around on the interplay between these two characters.

Unfortunately, the sub plot of the episode is not as strong. Lady Me is in cahoots with the leonine alien, Leandro. It is a well designed creature, harking  back to Beauty and the Beast. Unfortunately the interesting appeance hides what is basically a generic monster of the week. He and Lady Me scheme to use the death of highwayman, Sam Swift to activate the Eyes of Hades and
a portal to another dimension. Leandro claims he is simply a stranded survivor trying to get home, but it soon becomes apparent that this is a ruse to allow his invasion fleet in. The fact that Lady Me  is surprised by this revelation unfortunately makes her look a little stupid. She had previously been shown to be a cynical character, and even told the Doctor that  she'd kill Leandro if he betrayed her so she shouldn't be quite so surprised that he didn't keep his word. The invasion is halted as abruptly as it is introduced, when Lady Me uses the other Mire medical device to prevent Sam's death and possibly make him immortal.

Fortunately the episode gets back on track in its final scenes. The Doctor and Me's final conversation in the tavern about the mayfly lives of humans is great. Sam Swift, who is initially introduced as a simply bawdry comedy highwayman, gets to be the topic of this conversation about how important it is to live life to the full. Lady Me settles on the idea of becoming the woman who helps the people the Doctor leaves behind. It's an interesting role.

Clara is absent for most of this episode, only appearance in the final scene. Despite this, The Woman Who Lived  is all about the absence of Clara. All of this talk of mayflies is all to do with how the Doctor perceives Clara. This is yet another episode with hints of Clara's mortality. Given his track record, I don't Steven Moffat is going to kill the character, at least not in a straightforward manner. But the appearance of Ashildir at the end is good. Sarah Dollard has hinted at the character's return. This will undoubtedly take place in some prerecorded scene from this story's recording block, but I definitely look forward to it.

This is definitely the best two parter of Series 9 so far. Only the Leandro side of the plot lets it down.

Episode Score: 8/10

Doctor Who 9x05: The Girl Who Died

Jamie Mathieson's episodes of Series Eight came at the top of the Doctor Who Magazine poll for 2014 so the news that he would be working with Steven Moffat on The Girl Who Died suggested that the audience were in for something brilliant. The resulting episode did not disappoint.

Any guesses about which author wrote which part are usually clouded by personal bias but I personally assume that the basic pitch of the story was Mathieson's. It's a straight forward, Seven Samurai inspired tale of  the Doctor trying to help a group of Vikings defend their village from alien warriors known as the Mire after a girl, Ashildir, declares war on them. Like Mathieson's previous episodes, we have a straightforward story that nonetheless feels seems more sophisticated when one peers under the surface.

The Doctor was faced with the dilemma on whether to help the villagers against the Mire. Peter Capaldi is brilliant in these scenes. The Doctor speaking baby felt twee in the Matt Smith years but here it came across quite well here as a form of telepathy rather than literally speaking to a baby. The character's ultimate decision to defeat the enemy using storytelling is a great example of what the Doctor does at his best. Somehow Jamie Mathieson seem's to write for Capaldi's Doctor better than anyone else.

The other big highlight of this episode is, to the surprise of no-one,  the presence of Maisie Williams in the role of Ashildir. Comparisons between this character Maisie's Game of Thrones character, Arya Stark, are somewhat inevitable. They are both outsiders who are nonetheless loyal to their family and have a zeal for combat . In Arya's stark it was her fighting spirit that made her different. In Ashildir's case it is her storytelling that makes her an outsider and also provides the key to defeating the Mire.
As the girl who died of the title becomes immortal and it will be interesting to see how this changes the character. The final scene where we see Ashildir harden through Maisie's facial expressions alone are a sign of how this actor is up and coming.

While the Doctor and Ashildir were clearly the most important characters, Clara was not too badly sidelined here.  She plays a crucial role in saving Ashildir from the Mire Ship and confronting the Mire's leader, Odin. The scene of Clara talking Odin into revealing his plan is another example of how much she is becoming like the Doctor and Jenna is perfect here. The character's knowledge of the Doctor is crucial in  prompting him to defeat the Mire. Less successful is the moment when she quips about fancying Ashidir. Clara's bisexuality came out of the blue in The Magician's Apprentice and although it's nice to see it as more than one line, it still feels like a last minute change to the character. Clara's development in the show has always felt a bit patchwork and this is just one example. With Clara's departure imminent it might have been better if Steven Moffat waited to make the next companion bisexual instead. Then it wouldn't have felt so tacked on.

The rest of the characters are decent, if undeveloped. The Viking villagers are fairly funny, but it's hard to remember anything beyond their funny names. The alien Mire look impressive, and the concept that they drain testosterone from their enemies is an interesting one, but they are faily standard invaders. David Schofield gives a decent enough performance as Odin, but perhaps the role required a more bombastic, over the top performance to work.

This episode certainly succeeded in presentation. The direction was decent and the music was decent, especially the Ashildir theme. Murray Gold's music has been fairly subdued this series and it felt like he'd finally woken up

While previous episodes of Series Nine have been fun they've felt a bit like they were going through the motions. The Girl Who Died is fairly familiar in some regards but also very well done. It's probably the first genuine success of this series.

9/10

Orphan Black: Formalized, Complex and Costly

Events never really slow down for poor Sarah Manning. No sooner are she and Felix stuck trying to dispose of the body of Seth than Art arrives with news about the location of Mark. Once again, Art is put upon to bend the law and pretend he didn't see the body.

Art has often been an odd character. He has constantly helped Sarah even when she keeps away from information he needs to know. We finally get an admittedly not surprising answer for this in that he actually loved Beth and she phoned him the night she died. It's a nice little bit of development although one might argue that this information could have been revealed earlier. It does at least mean that Sarah and Art are closer now.

Mark himself gets developed much more than previous episode . It seems that he was a Castor mole, sent to spy on Heinrich, in much the same way as Paul was sent to spy on Dyad. He tries searching for Heinrich's old samples but has no luck. Ultimately, Sarah's search has alerted the Prolethians and Heinrich's wife shoots and kills Mark. Gracie was apparently brought back into the fold. It is interesting seeing Gracie understand what she has let herself in for.

While Sarah and Art go after Mark, it is up to Cosima and Scott to examine the body of Seth for more DNA information. Cosima's removal of Seth's brain and Scott's reaction are pretty funny and a good example of the vein of dark humour that runs through the series. Their examinations also reveal that the Castor and Leda clones are actually siblings. This does of course make the scene where Rudy kissed Crystal pretty gross.

Castor Clone Rudy is back at the desert HQ where Helena is being held. He is seemingly back under Paul's command. It is also evident that the Castor clones see Dr Cody as some kind of mother. Paul forces him to search for Mark.

Alison is now selling drugs disguised in soap bars and gaining voters. So far her subplot seems to be disconnected from the main threads. It is bound to come together sooner or later. Hopefully it will be sooner.

Rachel is another Leda clone with issues. Doctor Nealon appears to be assisting her recovery. She is currently out of Dyad, but when she gets better there may be trouble ahead.

8/10

Doctor Who 9x04: Before the Flood

The news that Series 9 would be mostly made up of two part stories was met positively by many Doctor Who fans who remember and love the shock of a good cliffhanger. However, the risk with two part stories is that the second part will fail to live up to the promise of the first part. This is exactly what happens in  Before the Flood.

Where the story left off, it had just split off into two different threads. The Doctor, Bennett and O'Donnell traveled back in time to a fake Soviet village to find out what is causing ghosts in the future. Back in the future, Clara, Cass and Lunn are trapped in the Drum with the ghost, including the new ghost Doctor. Ultimately neither of these threads proved particularly interesting.

The journey into the past led to the Doctor, Bennett and O['Donnell encountering the still living Tivolian, known as Prentis. This reviewer was excited to see Paul Kaye making an appearance in Doctor Who but like many a guest star he is ultimately wasted in a minor role. Prentis is just a comic relief character with none of the darker side that Gibbis had in the God Complex. There's no expansion of the Tivolian race here. Prentis is in this story simply to remind the Doctor that the ship is a space hearse before he is killed by the story's villain: the Fisher King.

The Fisher King, it transpires was creating the ghost signal in order to launch an invasion while it survives inside the stasis pod. It's a pretty anticlimactic reveal. The name suggests Arthurian legend but the creature itself is bog standard. It showed promise early on, when it ruthlessly kileld Prentis and O'Donnell and the costume looked great when it was hidden in shadow in interior locations. Unfortunately the monster has to go outside, and we get an embarrassing scene of the monster waddling out of the building since the actor clearly finds it difficult to walk in the suit. It's like those Ice Warrior in the original series all over again. The Fisher King also turns out to be one of the most easily defeated of the Doctor's foes. The Doctor tricks it into checking the signal in the spaceship before nipping into the stasis pod and exploding the dam to flood the village. It all felt too easy.

The story wasn't particularly compelling back in the Drum either. Clara, Cass and Lunn proved helpful in translating the ghost Doctor's words but then they just had to hide in the Faraday cage with the phone outside to contact the Doctor. When the phone is nicked by the ghosts the trio risk their lives to get the phone back. This turns out to be a waste of time since  they ultimately don't need it again after all. When Rose helped a base crew in The Satan Pit she contributed to the destruction of the mind of the devil creature while the Doctor dealt with the body. Here, Clara's team felt almost peripheral to the plot.

The Doctor ultimately returns to the drum in the stasis capsule, as pretty every sci-fi savvy viewer already guessed. It also transpires that the Doctor's ghost is simply another hologram which is used to trap the remaining ghosts in the Faraday Cage.

The episode is, as the Doctor reveals at the beginning of the episode, a bootstrap paradox. Steven Moffat's done this kind of thing before as a one second joke, like the Doctor stealing Amelia's drink from the past to to give to the thirsty future version in The Big Bang. Here, in the pre-titles sequence, the Doctor explains it like the viewers are totally new to the concept. The paradox even work anyway. After O'Donnell is killed her ghost appears at the base. But the nature of a paradox loop means the ghost should have been there from the beginning, just as Prentis' ghost was.

The supporting characters were not given much in the way of further development. O'Donnell was the standout character of last week's episode so it is irritating that she is killed fairly early on. We find out that she and Bennett were secretly in love. The only hint of that in Under the Lake was when O'Donnell thumped Bennett the shoulder. Here it feels pointless. Bennett gets to stand up to the Doctor.

Bennett's other role is to force Lunn to admit to Cass that he loves her. Yet again, we have a relationship which feels tacked on. Cass was certainly shown to care about Lunn, but this could just be a deaf person caring for her interpretor, or close friends. It feels like the easy route to go down. Individually Cass gets a nice moment when she evades the ghost Moran's axe attack but Lunn remains with no distinct personality.

Jenna Coleman was good as Clara but her one task was to get the phone to call the Doctor, something they didn't even have to do in the end. Her only other role was to comfort Bennett for losing a loved one. It's difficult to see how advice could be useful to Bennett since he can't gallivant around the stars as she does. However, it does indicate that Clara is hollow inside. Without Danny she has lost her anchor to Earth and the consequences of this will hopefully be explored later in this series.

Peter Capaldi's portrayal of the Doctor was one of the few highlights of this tale. He continues to balance the silliness of playing a guitar with the grim determination when he realises that he must save Clara.

The set design is pretty decent. The Soviet village was well realised, even though the soviet link was ultimately pointless to anything. The episode had a cold and stark feel which set it apart. The guitar version of the Doctor Who theme was good and I hope it becomes a regular.

I wanted to like this episode, but watching Before the Flood is ultimately a hollow experience. Paper thin characters in an underdeveloped plot. It's not a patch on The God Complex. I would go as far as to say that this one of the few genuine clunkers in the Peter Capaldi era of the show.

5/10

Orphan Black 3x02: Transistory Sacrifices of Crisis

Now this was much better! The previous episode reintroduced the status quo in a fairly straightforward manner only hinted at events to come. In this episode, those plot threads began to move forward and Series 3 starts to get interesting. 

The Castor Clones came into focus in this episode, in particular the efforts of Seth, the scarred clone and Rudy, the one with the moustache. It becomes clear that while they are still officially take orders from Paul Dierden, they have a personal mission. Seth appears to be suffering from a degenerative condition and Rudy hopes to cure this using Dr Ethan Duncan's original genome for the Castor clones, which, along with the Leda genome, has apparently been lost. Their hunt for this brings them into contact with Sarah and Kira. Although Rudy threatens Kira for the genome, he clearly has a protective side for his brothers, much as Sarah does for her sisters. Likewise, Seth's condition puts him in a similar situation to Cosima. It also adds a layer of vulnerability to these characters which almost enough to make you sympathize with these two, even if their treatment of women makes this difficult. Ultimately, Rudy has to put Seth down. 

Sarah's plans to rescue Helena were put on hold as she is forced to look after Kira, making amends with Siobhan and allowing Kira to stay with Carl. She is still nonetheless reckless, when she approaches the Police Station to get answers from a female victim of the Castor brothers. Her best moment comes when she is trying to save Kira from Rudy. Across the three series, Sarah has transitioned from a primarily selfish character to one who wants to protect a larger family. But this is a task that is getting harder and harder. 

Alison takes her first real step in her plan to challenge Marcie as she buys Ramone's drugs as well as the contact details of his clients. This plan is undoubtedly going backfire in some way and it will be fascinating to watch how this happens. Donnie is on Alison's side so far, but this may change if the situation becomes more difficult. 

It was also good to see more of Cosima, who is now in a better state of health and able to contribute something to the plot. She and Scott have yet to understand the contents of Professor Duncan's book but they were able to find out more about the supposed loss of the Castor and Leda genomes from the mysterious Dr Nealon. How far Cosima and Scott will be able to pry in to these matters remains to be seen. 

Felix was once again on the sidelines, though he did try and bring Sarah and Siobhan to make up. Kira proved to be a brave girl in the face of Rudy's threat to her life. 

Helena's pregnancy spares her from the stress tests. Her complete ignorance of the 

voigt kamf style testing was interesting. Dr Cody was an interesting character. Using a veneer of kindness to make Helena cooperate with the military. 

This episode sees the welcome return of several supporting characters, including Carl. His attempts to help Kira and Sarah are in keeping with his goody goody attitude so far, but this time we got a hint of his making money from weapons development which adds a nice shade of grey to his character.  While he promises to look after Kira, we know that this is a promise that is difficult to keep. 

Paul Dierdan also makes a return appearance in this episode. He seems like a no nonsense military man for most of the episode, but his brief encounter with Carl suggests that he still genuinely cares for Sarah and wants her away from Dyad. 

Detective Art is back on the police force and is involved in the case which involves the  Castor Clones. Once again, he's the character who gets used by Sarah for information and dumped when his use is up. 

Our final returning character is Mark, the first Castor clone we ever met. His one scene in the episode, where he burns his Castor identification tattoo from his arm, makes it clear that he knows something of his heritage and is trying to put it behind him as he embarks on married life.. With Sarah on his tail he won't be able to hide from the past for very long. 

The episode concludes with the body of Seth to dump and Alison has a campaign to run. It's a much more compelling ending to an episode and one that makes the next episode worth looking forward to. 

8/10

Doctor Who 9x03: Under the Lake

Ever since Innes Lloyd's time on Doctor Who, the 'base under siege' has become a tried and tested plot formula of the program. This episode particularly harks back to The Ark in Space, Revenge of the Cybermen and The Moonbase. As in those stories, the Doctor and companion arrive and explore a seemingly deserted base. They soon meet up with the base crew and discover that people are being killed off by monsters. In base in this story is a 22nd century underwater facility called 'the Drum', built over a military town . The base crew here are a group of scientists and soldiers who have uncovered an old spaceship and the monsters are ghosts of a Tivoli alien and the crew, who attack the crew after they find symbols on the spaceship.

The obligatory base commander is a woman named Cass. She's a fairly standard responsible leader type of person except that she's deaf and has to communicate through sign language. This proves useful in deciphering the message that the ghosts are chanting. It is great that Toby Whithouse has included a deaf character in his tale, however, that doesn't change the fact that she's still a standard base leader archetype.

The rest of the crew were also standard archetypes. The ill fated Pritchard was the annoying corporate representative. Like Burke from Aliens, or even Lux from Doctor Who's own Silence in the Library, he's the kind of character who is always more of a hindrance than a help in these kinds of tales. Unsurprisingly he is killed off for his stupidity. Bennett is the cowardly scientist who only feels compelled to stay because others do. O'Donnell is likable enough  but her one defining trait is that she is a fan of the Doctor, which basically makes her a Scottish Osgood. The last member of the crew is Lunn and I might be missing something but I'm not sure what personality he really has. He just seems to be there to translates Cass' sign language. At least his resistance to the ghosts may make him play a more useful role in the next episode. We'll have to wait and see if these are characters are developed in any way in the next episode.

The ghosts are pretty well realised. The moment when the ghostly Pritchard nearly smashes Lunn's head in with a spanner was particularly nasty and compelling to watch. It's not clear if there's a plot reason why the ghosts walk and don't run after the characters, other than to fulfill the zombie cliche. One of them is a Tivoli, like David Walliams character in The God Complex. Hopefully we'll see the living version next episode otherwise it will be a waste of guest star Paul Kaye.  The fact that they can be locked in a faraday cage somewhat diminishes their threat and it might have been spookier if we, the audience, hadn't known about it so early. Presumably the ghosts will be released and caused havoc again.

Peter Capaldi continues to impress as The Doctor, who is back to being delightfully aloof. The idea that he needs cue cards to tell him to be nice was hilarious. Nevertheless the existence of the cue cards shows that he knows his callousness is something that he needs to deal with. It's nice to see that he is worried about Clara becoming like him. His excitement when he thought the ghosts might be from the real afterlife was also a great moment for the Doctor.

While the Doctor was compelling to watch it seems that Clara has had a complete personality transplant this week. She is now addicted to adventuring to the point where she's taking on some of th Doctor's traits. I suppose we can assume that there's a bigger time gap between this and The Witch's Familiar. Jenna Coleman conveys Clara's developing personality well enough but the character doesn't really contribute much to the plot. She helps to lure the ghosts into a trap, but that role could have been taken by any of the base crew. I hope the writers haven't left it to the last few episodes to actually give her a journey this year otherwise there doesn't seem to have been much justification in keeping Jenna Coleman on for an extra year.

Overall, the story is simple, which I suppose is why fans like it. It's nice to have the Doctor and Clara arrive straight into the adventure instead of meeting up on Earth before hand.However, the adventure as a whole is almost too simple. The dialogue is less snappy than usual. Again some people will find this refreshing from Moffat's more comedy background oriented dialogue, but this is a somewhat less interesting alternative. Nevertheless, the end of the episode hints at more interesting things to come. What was responsible for the flood? What is the content of the capsule from the spacecraft? And what is the reason behind the appearance of the Doctor's ghost outside the station? At a guess I would say that the Doctor's the one inside the capsule. If that's the case then it was too obvious. Hopefully the isolated Clara will be forced to contribute more.

The story is nonetheless well realized by the production team. The base is functional and lit atmospherically enough. The director manages to keep a decent sense of horror. Murray Gold's music was slightly more prominent this week and helped to raise the tension of the action sequences with the ghosts and the flooding. It seems that the set designers had fun with the 22nd century setting and added some amusing little Star Trek easter eggs such as the wall painting with the sailors in yellow, red and blue jumpers to the door code and the '1708'.

Under the Lake is the kind of episode is probably comfort food for older fans, but will probably fail to interest those, like me, who prefer it when the show pushes against its boundaries and stock features. The progressive cast hides a simple tale. Next week may be more interesting, and hopefully make the story as a whole more to my liking.

7/10

Orphan Black 3x01: The Weight of this Combination

The third Series of Orphan Black has been airing in the UK for a couple weeks now although you'd be forgiven for not knowing it, seeing as BBC Three have stuck it on in a ridiculous slot in the early hours of the morning. This poor treatment is nothing new. Back when Series One started airing the show was barely publicized and the episodes were largely rushed through in double bills. On a more positive note, all of the episodes of series three can be viewed on the iplayer. I suppose that this is to get people ready for BBC Three's switch to being an online only channel but it still doesn't justify the tv timeslot. If the Channel can't be bothered to spread the word properly then I guess I'll have to do it through my mediocre reviews.

When we last left the show we'd discovered the existence of the male Project Castor clones as well as Topside's role with the Dyad Institute. Paul Dierdan's links to the military were revealed, and Mrs. S sold Helena out to the military to save Sarah and Kira. There were plenty of questions that needed answering. What would happen to Helena? Who are these Castor Clones? What happened to Rachel and will Cosima recover?

Helena predicament hasn't changed much since last series. The opening of the episode features a happy Helena surrounded by her sisters. Predictably she wakes up in a small box in the military base. It's a fairly cliche beginning which I suppose it was the only way the writers could think to remind viewers of Helena's feelings towards her 'sestras'. Her only company in this box is an imaginary scorpion friend called 'Pupok'. One of the highlights of the show is its ability to mix dark situations with crazy humour and this is a good example. Helena spends the rest of the episode in the box, only to be released at the end by the soldier Castor Clone. She's proved adept at surviving in the past, so it'll be interesting to see how she'll cope in her new situations and whether her captors can really contain her.

The Castor Clones remain mostly shrouded in mystery. Mark is off the radar so far and the Soldier one only appears briefly at the end of the episode. We do at least get to see more of the imprisoned one with the scar who made his debut in last year's cliffhanger. So far he seems to be a generic psychopath type who does manage to give Sarah a clue about the missing Helena. This episode introduces another one with a mustache who beats up Siobhan for information about Professor Ethan Duncan's research. These two clones claim to be operating independently from Paul. The mustached clone frees the psychotic looking one at the end of the episode so it remains to be seen what trouble these two will cause, and where their allegiances ultimately lie.

The most important plot developments took place within the Dyad Institute. Since the end of the last series Marion has gone to Europe. Rachel is recovering from her eye injury and Delphine has taken Rachel's place in Dyad. These circumstance force Delphine and Sarah to make a deal. Sarah must pretend to be Rachel in order to fool Ferdinand, an investigator from Topside while Delphine will look into finding Helena. Alison also helps out by pretending to be a captured Sarah. These scenes are full of tension, and Ferdinand follows in the example of the creepy intimate male agents of the higher powers seeking to control the clones. Ultimately Sarah's charade fools Ferdinand into revealling a plot between him and Rachel to try to kill the Dyad clones. Fortunately, with Delphine's help, the plan is thwarted at the last minute.

Sarah Manning spends much of the episode determined to protect her sisters at any cost, even shutting out Siobhan or attempting to kill Ferdinand in the process. She's as cunning at impersonating her sisters as ever and Tatiana Maslany is as reliable as ever at making Sarah's impersonations convincing while at the same time showing the deeper awkwardness. It was particularly interesting to watch Sarah's violent reaction to the news that her sisters were about to be assassinated. Her attempts to throttle Ferdinand when she thought hope was lost demonstrates how far she can go when pushed. Delphine's intervention ultimately prevents Ferdinand's death, but it will be interesting to see if Sarah

Delphine features prominently in this episode. It appears that she genuinely want to help Sarah for now but she is beginning to distance herself from Cosima because of her responsibilities to Dyad. The moment when she hurts the injured Rachel for information reveals a harsher, more ambitious side. Whether Delphine's new position mean she stays allied with the clones or is forced to become their enemy is something to look out for.

Alison Hendrix continues to be a highlight for the show. This series she intends to run for election as School trustee against a neighbor, Marcie. Campaigning for a public position will no doubt bring some of her background to the surface which will probably create a lot of drama later on. The scene of her disguised as Sarah was a hoot but also filled with tension when Ferdinand started to grope her. With that and the assassin that came to kill her, this is the episode where she has been in the most physical danger. Donnie has got himself fired so it will be interesting to see whether this puts any strain on the family.

Cosima, still suffering from her sickness, spends the episode in Felix' flat. Her relationship with Delphine is shown to be faltering and she shows Scott the book left by Professor Duncan, trusting him to help her over Delphine.

Felix remains the grounded individual helping Sarah out, though both he and Kira contributed very little to the episode. Maria Doyle Kennedy is as a good as ever as Mrs. S, getting to be brave against the Castor Clone but also humble as she pleads Sarah to trust her. Whether she and Sarah will be able to trust each other again remains to be seen.  Art and Carl were completely absent from the episode but hopefully they turn up later on. We also get introduced briefly to another clone, Crystal, responsible for the capture of the psychotic looking Castor clone. She's only briefly seen on security footage so there's little personality to judge her on yet but she may prove more important later on.

As is often the case with first episodes, The Weight of this Combination is concerned with reintroducing the core plot threads while setting up small hints of things to come. It keeps you curious about what happens next but a lot of what is in this episode has been seen before. Hopefully the other episodes will take the show in a new direction.

6/10

The War Doctor comes to Audio

For the first time since 2012, a new Doctor has joined the Big Finish fold. It's not just any Doctor either. It's the War Doctor played by John Hurt. It's exciting enough that it's a new Doctor, but also the fact that Big Finish have secured an actor of John Hurt's caliber to something as obscure as an audio spin off series.

Of course, to use the new cliche, he's not quite the Doctor we were expecting. Many fans have already heard rumours David Tennant and Catherine Tate would be reprising their roles as the Tenth Doctor and Donna for audio adventures. That may yet happen of course but as great as it would be to see one of the best Doctor/Companion teams, I'm even more excited at what we've got right now. It feels inevitable that one day David Tennant would participate in these audios. He has done already as other characters. But John Hurt was a person I never expected to do them. It's great that he's doing this. Fans can get to hear more from this great actor who gets the chance to reprise role in a manner which demands less physically tiring work.

I have no doubt that the Big Finish writers are relishing the opportunity to write for the time war. George Mann's War Doctor book, The Engines of War, only just scratched the surface of this dark time in the Doctor's life and I'm hoping Big Finish can push the darkness and the grittiness even further. Some might argue that stories of the Time War were best left to the next generation of fans to explore. I sympathize with this view, but it's also the case that this is the best time to get John Hurt to participate. Let's hope the quality of the story-lines do justice to the talent of the leading man.

While 2016 is looking to be a gap year for Doctor Who on television, Big Finish is leading the way with more and more promising arrivals from the new series. I've dipped in and out of Big Finish once or twice, but this is certainly making me inclined to look at their catalogue.

Class

When I first read the title of this new Doctor Who spin-off I had a horrible moment of dread where I thought we were getting the 'young Doctor Who' series that the BBC wanted to make during the RTD years. The childhood of the Doctor on Gallifrey is something we really never need to see. Fortunately, this isn't quite as bad as that. It's not particularly exciting news though.

The problem is there's nothing to get excited about. It's a show that happens to be set in a building that's cropped up in Doctor Who once in a while. Jenna Coleman's not going to be in it. There's been no indication yet whether Ellis George will return as Courtney or how much of a connection to the parent show this will have. At the moment it just sounds like Buffy with aliens, or alternatively the Sarah Jane Adventures without Sarah Jane. Something that perhaps could have been developed as its own show without a Doctor Who connection. Those who've read Patrick Ness' writing might have a better idea of whether or not the show will be successful, but that's not me.

It's been strongly suggested for a while now that  Doctor Who's will have an decreased episode count next year. If true then I suppose this will keep the fans entertained until the proper show turns up. Until then we'll just have to wait for further casting and plot details to see if Class is worth getting excited about.