BBC HD - 23rd December - 9.00pm



All the strands set up in the previous five episodes are gathered together here into a pacy and violent climax. The rather evil Dexter, whom we encountered in Episode Two, is revealed to now be the enforcer of Samantha Willis' new totalitarianism. The Tom, Anya and Sarah relationship goes through some further twists and there's a dash into the city to find Naj after he sulkily runs off because Abby shouted at him! Kids, eh?

The arrival of Willis and Dexter not only prompts us into thinking about how and why we elect our governments and hold democracy to our hearts but it also violently forces Anya and Tom into revealing their true identities. Willis is symbolic of the 'government by fear' brigade that we're currently having to put up with here and now. Anya, although known to the group as a doctor, tries to hide the fact from Willis. Dexter forces Sarah to go back with them to look after Bob, the warehouse manager she abandoned and claimed was dead back in Episode Two, and it is thus entirely predictable that the blonde twig will betray Anya. Tom, meanwhile, is forced to reveal to Abby his status as ex-con. Director Jamie Payne handles these scenes very well, maintaining a tension that reaches a climax as Anya is dragged away by Willis and Dexter.

A non-too-subtle go at crappy parenting skills

Meanwhile, writer Adrian Hodges plonks in a sub-plot about Craig and June, the Fagin and Nancy of a devastated Manchester, using child labour to stock pile everything from food to oil for generators. They brainwash the kids by offering them treats like playing on the Nintendo Wii in exchange for a day's work. A non-too-subtle go at crappy parenting skills and kids deprived of any other cultural reference points other than electronic games. Craig and June are genuinely creepy and the poor kids are starved into submission if they don't go out on their bikes scavenging. Some great visuals of them pedalling their way through a deserted Trafford Shopping Centre and the empty streets of Manchester.



There's a great confrontation between Tom and Sarah and you honestly think he's going to kill her there and then (and let's face it we'd be glad if he did) but he resists the urge and obviously thinks it best to leave her alive to put her through some mental torture instead. Tom, Greg and Al take off after Anya and Willis' men and ambush them. Tom's true nature comes out here as he finally gets to complete a task he started when he was staying at Willis' complex...to kill Gavin, her henchman. He shoots him down in cold blood and this act is the catalyst for everything else that follows. The scene on the stairway with Abby is a key one - he lies to her about how Gavin was killed, calling it a 'dispute' when in fact he just simply shot him where he stood, and he's pretty much the same as Dexter at this moment, using force to get his own way and, strangely, as a perverse form of pleasure. He's a complex character and the series has been blessed to have him as part of the group of survivors.

She gets ear marked for lab rat treatment.

Fearing reprisals from Mrs. Fascist, the survivors decide to up sticks and take off for the south coast. Well, it is grim up North. However, Naj buggers off and joins Fagin's gang whilst returning from a visit to his home, not realising he's now a member of 'Child Abuse R Us'. Craig's cure for for one of the kid's coughing is to steal him away in the night and er...dispose...of him. Whilst this is going on Dexter is given orders to track Abby and Co down and to kill them as a punishment for Gavin's murder. And then as those two sub-plots crank up, yet a third sub-plot dragging in the scientists holed up in their bunker also makes an appearance after Ronny Jhuti finds out that Abby had the virus and survived. She gets ear marked for lab rat treatment.

This makes for a very busy second half of the episode, including some nice visual touches of a wrecked Manchester city centre complete with good effects sequences of burning apartment buildings. However, I only counted one decomposing corpse and one rat which is hardly realistic is it? Still, the story really moves up a pace and the race is on to find Naj and get out of the city before either Dexter or the scientists can track them down. The sub-plots collide and Tom ends up in a shoot out with Dexter, Al gives Craig a good thumping for his exploitation of the kids and rescues Naj and the military descend upon Abby and ferry her off into one of their military vehicles. There's barely a chance to pause for breath but an attempt is made with one scene set in deserted department store where Abby and Greg have a chin-wag about their kids. We get some scant information about Greg's marriage breakdown and his kids and that's it. If there is one thing that the series has singly failed to do is to engage the audience with Greg as a character. It has made Greg completely anonymous and surplus to requirements. Paterson Joseph has had very little to really get his teeth into and I think they've wasted his talent. Wonder if that's why Greg gets shot at the end?



It's an exciting conclusion to the series with plenty going on to keep the interest up. Quite a nail biter, in fact. I could have done without that little sequence at the end of Peter Grant running joyfully through the bright greenery to get on a horse and tell the audience that yes, Peter, is alive and Abby was right to have hope. Oh, hell. That means she's going to be as annoying in the second series as she was in the first. A second series has been commissioned and I know that Julie and Max are confirmed as returning but no word on Paterson. I wonder if he'll be working in Cardiff on a certain show when filming commences again in Manchester? Anyway, I enjoyed Survivors but it has barely touched upon the issues that the original series was rightly praised for. Certainly the final three episodes were far stronger than the start of the series. But its tone is still wrong and that's down to Adrian Hodges refusal to get bleaker and grittier and the whole premise of the original series, re-learning the skills that we've abandoned for our technology, has clearly been dumped. No homilies on starting a farm, planting crops in rotation, creating medicines from plants...more a reflection of what we're like now, plague or no plague. Just depressing, then.

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Something Old / BBC HD - 23rd December 2008 - 11.00pm
The Knocker / BBC HD - 24th December 2008 - 11.00pm



In Something Old we're whisked back to the 1920s and a masked, costume ball at Geap Manor where petty jealousies threaten to wreck the recent engagement between Felix de Momery and his sweetheart Ruth.

Again, director Damon Thomas works miracles with a minimal budget and creates wonders with the production values, aided by some murky photography from Ian Moss. He also has a rather wonderful cast to work with from lovely Samuel Barnett as Felix's gay friend Billy, who has a sweet crush on him, to the fabulous double act of Jean Marsh and Barbara Kirby as Lady Constance and her companion Miss Adams. This is steeped in the great tradition of the female Gothic, with the story focusing on groups of women; the older pairing of Constance and Adams, the rivalry between the younger Ruth and Katherine (a suitably vampish Anna Madeley) and, of course, the spectral bride as the symbol of the family secret. All simmering away in a spooky old house.



This middle tale does slightly drag, labouring a little to get to its point, perhaps paying a little too much attention to the unrequited love of Billy for Felix or the bitch fight between Ruth and Katherine. Ruth is well positioned as the innocent, virginal one amongst the other female sinners, almost a younger version of Miss Adams. The notion of a cursed wedding is what we're more interested in and it does take a while to get to the denouement. However, the ghastly vision of the ghostly bride's face, minus eyes, more than compensates and adds a genuine shiver to the proceedings.

With The Knocker we are, naturally with portmanteau horror, told the story of the teacher Ben and what happens after his visit to the curator. It begins as a somewhat predictable tale, very similar to the Ian Ogilvy starring story in From Beyond The Grave in which he installs an antique door in his new home and finds that it has properties that allow him into the past and into a crumbling mansion inhabited by a warlock. Here, Ben puts the old knocker on his door and is awoken in the night by someone or something knocking on the door and then finds that he can enter Geap Manor that was.



What Gatiss manages to do is take a hoary old story and give it some contemporary dimensions. Ben is struggling in his relationship with his wife, who is pregnant with his child, and this is slowly and terrifyingly built into the story in a Rosemary's Baby style riff where the curator turns out to be necromancer Dr. Unthank attempting to provide the original owner of Geap Manor with an heir. There's a suitably creepy scene where Ben seems to witness the conjuring to life of some fetid creature before he runs witless out of Geap Manor and back into his own semi-detached. The twists is if there is an heir, the manor will not end up demolished. It's a neat bluff to have the curator turn out to be the villain and the final scenes where Ben's pregnant wife is spirited away back to Geap Manor to provide Sir Roger Widdowson with his heir, a painting depicts the devastating changes and Ben finds the reconstituted Geap Manor in place of his housing estate, are truly hair-raising stuff.



All praise to Lee Ingleby for his sensitive playing of Ben and for capturing the mounting sense of anxiety and desperation and again to director Thomas for cranking up the tension on this one. It reminded me of some of the better Hammer House Of Horror episodes from their 1980s TV show. A great ending to a reasonably successful series of three tales, The Knocker also shows that contemporary horror can be done on a small budget with marvellous style.

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BBC1 - Christmas Day - 6.00pm

The thing about Doctor Who Christmas specials is that they are required to fulfill a number of audience expectations. They have to be brash, no nonsense populist affairs with an ersatz seasonal message or spirit of intention. It's no good examining the plot too closely or digging around for complex existential homilies.

At the heart of the 'Cybermen at Christmas' bluster is a deeply personal story...

However, Russell T Davies usually sows the seeds of the forthcoming series into the Specials and the one thing that immediately strikes you about The Next Doctor is, deliberately or not, the way it marks time on the tenure of the Tenth Doctor. The Doctor has clearly made a decision to travel without a companion and has set out to explore on his own. Meeting Jackson Lake is Davies attempt to underline this whilst also getting both characters, whose fractured identities require some mending, to engage in a form of neuro-linguistic psychotherapy. The Doctor suddenly questions his current incarnation's future and eventual demise. And Lake is a blank canvas onto which the essence of the Doctor has been stamped but which then excavates the true qualities of the real person drowned by his psychological fugue. By this estimation, Davies certainly bucks the trend. At the heart of the 'Cybermen at Christmas' bluster is a deeply personal story which delves into identity, anxiety and the effects of dissociative fugue. With Lake it's brought about by a traumatic attack on his family by the Cybermen but with the Doctor it's probably self-imposed.

The trouble is that such a heartfelt story, and by extension the twin performances from Morrissey and Tennant, deserves an episode to itself and not mashed in with the cold leftovers of street urchins, Victoriana, snow and Cybermen. Mind you, Christmas can be as much an emotionally distressing time for families as it is a time of joy and good will to all men so perhaps such an examination of the Doctor's persona and nature isn't too far from the true spirit of the festive season. The whistles and bells that decorate the central premise of the empty man who needs his life and memories back and the lonely god who just can't take it any more include the bluff with the fob-watch that then turns out to be an important clue and the info-stamp flashback of all ten incarnations which you could say is pretty much about putting the writing on the wall for the Tenth.

...utterly daft

When you look at the rest of the story it's clear that Hartigan's collaboration with the Cybermen, using children to re-engineer a Cyber-Godzilla, is utterly daft. The entire sequence in the workhouse with masses of kids turning big wheels, pulling chains and levers just needed to be set to music, given some suitable lyrics and you'd have had a West End musical. Sure, it may dovetail with Dickens own attempts to pick apart the industrial society in Hard Times and A Christmas Carol but this was more Lionel Bart than Ebenezer Scrooge. I did enjoy Dervla's turn as Miss Hartigan. The ripe tones used in countless M&S ads come in handy as she makes a delicious villainess who arrives complete with a feminist liberation agenda. The gathering at the funeral is an interesting framing device for the character. She is positioned in the charitable role, looking after the poor in the workhouses, that many aspiring women of the day sought but uses the potency of her sexuality as a way to power. Hence, the obvious symbolism of the red dress but also her assumption that the Cybermen are simply tools of industrialising power at her disposal to rid society of the kind of men she despises. It's an exciting, well edited, sequence as Cybermen emerge from the snow and mist and throttle people. Well, I say people, but men...mostly.

Men, eh? Bloody liars...

The contrast between Miss Hartigan and Rosita is of note too. From the implications of Hartigan's 'I doubt he paid you to talk' we thus gather that Rosita is a lady of the night. Hartigan seems to be confusing the sexual act and liberation and whilst she can talk the talk she certainly doesn't walk the walk. Rosita is compassionate and human whereas Hartigan is ice-cold ambition, preferring the company of Cybermen than that of real men. One of them definitely will be Nancy, clearly after the wallop Rosita gives Hartigan. Velile Tshabalala was very impressive in the quieter moments, with sensitive playing particularly in the scene where the Doctor reveals that the other Doctor is Jackson Lake. Quite neat then that the Cybermen are simply setting up Hartigan to be the Cyber King. Men, eh? Bloody liars. But why did the Cybermen need to enslave loads of kids to power their ship, couldn't they do that themselves? A highly contrived notion to get masses of children to shovel coal into the belly of the Cyber-King, this was obviously some heavy symbolism about the continuing exploitation of children in the 21st century.

Forty five minutes in and this goes a bit pear shaped. A blend of Dickensian steam-punk Gothic with a very tender story about two broken men gets sadly derailed by the need to have a big special effects climax. More ho-ho-hum than ho-ho-ho. Hartigan suddenly gets the screaming ab-dabs as the threat of Cyber-liberation looms. You see my dear, there's liberation and then there's liberation and independent women should have no place in Cyberdom. I rather liked the way that Hartigan then rewrote the software and put the willies up the Cyberleader in another twist on the power of sex over the sexless. Dervla is terrific in this scene, with her black contact lenses and brass worked Cyber head. And I suppose the old adage 'behind every great (Cyber) man is a great (Cyber) woman' is the only way to describe the Iron Man rising from the Thames and stamping the populace to bits. The Doctor's offer is a bit pointless isn't it? Why would Hartigan want to be dumped on another world with no one to convert? Her whole raison d'etre is to do just that. It's very handy that the Doctor can recondition Hartigan at the drop of a hat and it's rather silly that she suddenly, as a result, becomes a screaming girlie. With such powerful screams that it all goes tits up for the Cybermen and she and they blow up? Er, what exactly happened there?



It's all entertaining enough with some eye-popping visual effects and the sentimental ending suggests a Doctor not quite given up on mixing with the plebs at Christmas time but, I don't know about you, I was expecting some last minute twist ending to lead us off into the specials for 2009. So, it all felt like a bit of damp squib of an ending with no punchline to whet our appetites for next year. Andy Goddard's direction was spirited, with some lovely visual compositions and great lighting and, as ever, the production values were very high. Murray Gold was somewhat in 'this music will tell you how to feel' mode and I didn't much care for it. I did think that David Morrissey somewhat eclipsed David Tennant in places and that's a shame in a way as it's unlikely that we'll see him as the actual Doctor in a future series. And there's a real sense here that the tenth Doctor is about to exit stage left. He doesn't look particularly happy once he's met with Jackson, possibly because he sees himself reflected back, and there's a weary inevitability about how he moves through the story. Change is in the air.

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BBC HD - 22nd December 2008 - 11.00pm

Good God, Lawrence Gordon Clark lives! And my Christmas gets off to a spine-tingling start. Mark Gatiss, writer, and here playing the curator who links the three stories together, clearly loves both the portmanteau horror films of the Amicus stable - From Beyond The Grave given the greatest of nods here - and the stories of M.R James, some of which were adapted by the BBC (and Gordon Clark) in the early 1970s. He takes the James-ian idea of ghoulish retribution and here stirs into it our contemporary financial ills, creating a Bernard Madoff for the 18th Century in the character of Joseph Bloxham, superbly played by Phillip Jackson. Lots of astute lines about stock market bubbles and subplots about greedy financiers destroying innocent families. It doesn't need wigs and brocade coats to dress up this particular allusion.

Bloxham's ill gotten gains allows him to acquire and renovate Geap Manor but something is amiss with the wainscoting installed by the unreliable builders. Strange noises emanate from it and one evening Bloxham witnesses the walls drown in inky living shadows. And just where the builder got the wood for the wainscoting mirrors James' The Stalls Of Barchester for good measure too. Despite its small budget this is beautifully mounted by director Damon Thomas. He and Gatiss not only pay homage to two genre traditions but also find time to put in a visual in-joke too in the form of the 'Hob Lane' sign sitting in the clutter on the shelf above the curator. If you know your genres I'm sure a quiet little chuckle danced upon your lips tonight. He also expertly builds the tension using sound effects and efficiently weaves together the various strands of the story and where James would leave the ending an ambiguous one, this story goes for a ghastly denouement. If he and Gatiss stick to their course we will no doubt get a similar climax for the framing story that involves Ben, a local history teacher, the curator and the Geap Manor door knocker. It's a portmanteau and it must follow the rules!



The only weakness, apart from the paucity of the budget not stretching to give us enough period detail, was Andy Nyman's playing of Duncalfe, Bloxham's drinking buddy, which did tend to waver on the unconvincing. Jackson clearly steals the honours for his superb turn as Bloxham, a fine essay of a man gnawed at by his conscience and he's supported by a wonderful turn from Julian Rhind-Tutt as the haunted Noakes. Surely it is time for Rhind-Tutt to take on the mantle of Gatiss' Bondian hero Lucifer Box based on this evidence. His delivery of a line as innocuous as 'the hum of bumblebees and the smell of jasmine' will get your heart beating just that little bit faster. Overall, it is the sheer relish, from Gatiss, director Thomas and an enthusiastic cast, of putting together the three stories that results in a little gem of spookiness that is sure to be welcomed to that established canon of a ghost story for Christmas. Roll on, Part 2.

Here's an interview with Gatiss and a clip from The Wainscoting, thanks to BBC Four.


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More from The Next Doctor with a clip originally posted on the official website in day 21 of the advent calendar. This one features Miss Hartigan in brief conversation with the Cyberleader. Enjoy!



The Next Doctor is transmitted on Christmas Day, BBC1 at 6.00pm.

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The PR drive for The Next Doctor is in full flow. Two interviews today: Firstly, Dervla Kirwan, playing the evil Miss Hartigan in the show, tells the irrepressible Paul O'Grady on his Channel 4 show, about filming and we get an exclusive clip. And Alan Carr gets a word in too.


Secondly, Jon Culshaw mets David Tennant on the TARDIS set and goes behind the scenes of the special for Friday's The One Show on BBC1. Again, we get an exclusive clip of the Doctor swordfighting the Cybermen.



The Next Doctor is transmitted on Christmas Day, BBC1 at 6.00pm.

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S P O I L E R S
A H E A D

Well, the press preview of The Next Doctor was held yesterday and Jane Tranter has implored journalists not to spoil it for the great unwashed who will be tuning in on Christmas Day. And you won't be getting any revelations about what Russell T Davies described as a' ferocious ending' but I can provide a few tid-bits along with a whole new gallery of images (thanks to Sky TV's website for those).

Look out for a flashback to all the Doctors, a hot air balloon and mention of the mysterious Jackson Lake.





Two Doctors? Or is one of them an impostor?



Perhaps the fob watch holds the answer...



...to the two Doctors working as a team?





The Cybermen are unwelcome guests at a stranger's funeral



Are the orphans of London town due for an upgrade?





Just what are the sinister Cybershades?



Is the Cyberleader checking out the Doctor's biography?

The Next Doctor is transmitted on Christmas Day, BBC1 at 6.00pm.

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All hail James Insell and his Colour Recovery Group for restoring the original colour to the existing black and white copy of the Dad's Army episode Room At The Bottom (transmitted last Saturday on BBC2). I first heard of Insell's theory about three years ago and hoped that he could progress it. And he did. And it looked terrific judging by what we saw last weekend.

What this means is that, funding permitting, he might be able to put a bit of colour in Jon Pertwee's cheeks as a number of colour episodes from the early 1970s only exist as black and white copies at the moment. The black and white episodes of Planet Of The Daleks and Invasion Of The Dinosaurs may well be candidates for the process.

Here's Insell on Newsnight explaining the process and Dad's Army actor Ian Lavender's introduction to the episode transmitted last weekend.

BBC HD - 16th December 2008 - 9.00pm



Well, that was interesting. Not quite what I was expecting. Let's cut to the chase and thank our lucky stars that Max Beesley and Zoe Tapper are in this series because they absolutely stole that episode from every other member of the main cast. Their relationship has been gently smouldering away since the first episode and indeed their secret identities have only been known to the audience at this point. Tom is a fascinating character. There is something so deliciously attractive about a man who is, by all intents and purposes, evil and yet seems to be aching for some sort of redemption. He's violent and frightening, has a possessive hold over the weaker characters and prowls around the situation like a big cat, toying with the group.

Anya has found a little chink in Tom's armour...

It was perhaps a little obvious that as soon as a pregnant woman and a paranoid schizophrenic turned up in the series that Anya's cover would be blown. And I think Zoe Tapper absolutely delivered with her take on Anya's denial about the way the virus had snatched away all the people she had loved as well as the masses of patients she felt so impotent to help. By not being the doctor she obviously is, she's pushing away responsibility for the well being of her fellow men and women. Her redemption and the reassertion of her skills as a doctor were well written and sympathetically portrayed. She's also not afraid to challenge Tom about his homophobia, his ignorance and more to the point, his deep seated anger. Our Anya has found a little chink in Tom's armour and seems to have actually touched him judging by that sensitive holding of hands at the end of the episode. Beautifully played.

Sarah's true colours as a possessive blonde twig

Alas, one could not say the same for Julie Graham. I'm getting more and more disappointed by the Abby character, which may be the writers' fault, as she's overtly turned into a hand-wringing liberal who is a quite appalling judge of character. Graham wasn't particularly good in this episode except for the quiet little scene with Paterson Joseph where they both discussed their ties to the community. Paterson Joseph also needs a script that focuses on Greg as he is in serious danger of lacking any characterisation at all. Yes, I can see that the theme of not knowing anything about the total strangers you end up sharing your life with is central to the series but if they keep his background closeted any further I'll lose interest in him. Demonstrating Sarah's true colours as a possessive blonde twig was naturally going to occur and now that her nose has been knocked out of joint by Tom and his flirtation with Anya, I suspect she'll side with the next big lump of testosterone that comes along. Dexter, anybody? I also thought the love triangle between Al, Mike and Louise sensitively exposed more of Al's vulnerability and naievty. It was quite sad watching him wave Mike and Louise off at the end.

...was it appropriate to align religious belief with a paranoid schizophrenic delusion

Wasn't quite sure how the writer was going to play his cards when it came to the tricky subject of religion. At the top of the episode you could have been led to believe that this was going to be an examination and rediscovery of faith in a secular society seemingly punished by the wrath of a particularly recalcitrant God. There was a slight discomfort to begin with by showing us John, superbly played by Kieran O'Brien, as a voice hearing God botherer and the various reactions from our jolly band towards the arrival of his cult at the community. Were we going to end up with disgrunted Christians phoning up the BBC duty office complaining about how badly religious beliefs were being depicted and/or derided in a post-apocalyptic world? Or, likewise was it appropriate to align religious belief with a paranoid schizophrenic delusion? In the end, it managed to sway away from both areas and generated sympathy for poor John who was clearly, desperately ill. Linda, having brought her son into the world, exorcises those demons by showing her unswerving faith in John and her ability to simply love him in return for the care he had shown her. And not a God (other deities are available) in hearing distance. What disgruntled me was that John's 'followers' simply abandoned him at the end of the episode. Oh, so he's not got a hotline to God then? We're off and we're not helping to look after some mental bloke. See ya.



A strong episode with some interesting character development for Tom, Anya and Al but little for Greg or Abby. The treatment of religion was slightly bogus (certainly the original series had a fascinating episode By Bread Alone which examined a Church of England vicar's loss of faith in a post-apocalyptic world and how that faith is rediscovered) as we were really dealing with schizophrenia and how that could or couldn't be managed in such a world. That the mismanagement of such an illness is then framed within the environs of an abandoned church where Tom can no longer hear the voice of God suggests a subtext, although heavy handed, about how secular society itself no longer listens out for its chosen deity. It raises some pertinent issues that are worthy of those the original series managed to explore.

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Fresh from the BBC's advent calendar ( thanks www.bbc.co.uk/doctorwho) the new trailer for The Next Doctor. International access too!



The Next Doctor is transmitted on Christmas Day, BBC1 at 6.00pm.

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BBC1 - 13th December 2008 - 7.10pm



Arthurian scholars look away now. Julian Jones not only irrelevantly nicks Thomas Malory's title for the episode but uses the legendary Questing Beast to tell a rather different story from the one Malory told. Now, it's not all wrong. The Mill actually get the look of the thing right, at least according to Malory. "The strange creature has the head and neck of a serpent, the body of a leopard, the haunches of a lion and the feet of a hart. Its name comes from the great noise it emits from its belly, a barking like "thirty couple hounds questing". According to Wiki.

I'd pay good money to see that on a Saturday night

The Beast is supposed to "appear to King Arthur after he has had an affair with his sister Morgana and begotten Mordred. Merlin reveals the Questing Beast had been borne of a human woman, a princess who lusted after her own brother. She slept with a devil who had promised to make the boy love her, but the devil manipulated her into accusing her brother of rape. Their father had him torn apart by dogs, but before he died he prophesied his sister would give birth to an abomination that would make the same sounds as the pack of dogs that killed him. The beast has been taken as a symbol of the incest, violence, and chaos that eventually destroys Arthur's kingdom." Cor, I'd pay good money to see that on a Saturday night. Mind you, you probably could get to see it for free in many an inner city up and down the land.



Never mind. Morgana seems to have one of her nightmares and foresees the danger. She rushes out in her nightie, several sandwiches short of a picnic, to warn Arthur. And that's pretty much all she gets to do. The Beast is still an omen of doom here and when Arthur goes out to hunt the creature he gets injured whilst Merlin uses his Jedi powers to plunge a sword into its vile heart. There is no cure for the fatal wound apparently and Uther drags his son's dying body through the square. Can't decide if Anthony Head thought he was on Strictly and was trying an American Smooth lift and dropped Arthur or just got a bit tired. I was somewhat sidetracked at this point because Bradley James then had his chest on display again as he lay all sweaty and ill in bed. I've waited thirteen episodes for this. And it was worth it.

Hurrah, at last for Gwen.

Merlin has a natter with the dragon. I really don't trust the beast. It's got an agenda of its own. Turns out that only ancient magic to be found on the Isle Of The Blessed can save our Arthur now. And Arthur must not die. It's that destiny thing again. Gaius reveals that in order for Merlin to save Arthur the price will be the taking of another life. Despite the script departing from the established legend, this episode really goes for full on epic, mythical storytelling. There's a moral dilemma at the heart of the story, sweeping mist enshrouded landscapes and a building sense of doom. It feels and looks more Arthurian than many of the earlier episodes of the series and this is an aspect of the series that must be retained and encouraged. Audiences like visual storytelling on this scale. What also works are the little moments between Gwen and Arthur, when she's nursing him and suggesting out loud that he will live to be King in a Utopian Camelot and then later when Arthur picks up on that, as this finally establishes a connection between the two characters that hasn't been given enough attention before. Hurrah, at last for Gwen.

And the dragon lets rip with some fire in a spectacular effects sequence.

The whole sequence at the mist covered isle is superb and makes use of some wonderful locations. Nimueh greets Merlin to discuss the bargain he must make. Good performances from Colin Morgan and Michelle Ryan add to the atmosphere and there is a sense that Nimueh isn't going to offer Merlin the cure for Arthur without some further twist. The score on this episode is fabulous and helps convey the epic scale of the story. And both Gaius and Morgana clearly know that Merlin's bargain isn't as straightforward as he assumes. Merlin's mother shows up at Camelot, gravely ill, and Merlin, believing he's been spared, then understands that it is her life that must be given in exchange for Arthur's. There's a dramatic bitch fight with the dragon, culminating with Merlin vowing never to free the creature once Arthur is king and it's thunderously good stuff from Colin Morgan. And the dragon lets rip with some fire in a spectacular effects sequence.

...by the time the titles roll we are more or less back at the beginning again.

There's a beautiful little scene between Gaius and Merlin in which the fruits of their relationship are emotionally articulated. Morgan is again wonderful. Gaius decides to sacrifice himself and departs for the isle whilst Merlin makes his goodbyes to Arthur and his mother. He gives chase and, finding Gaius apparently dead, there's a great fight sequence between him and Nimueh, chucking fire balls at each other. The trouble is that as the story builds towards its climax it tries to have its cake and eat it - Merlin rescuing Gaius, Merlin destroying Nimueh - and the expectation is that the plot will fulfill the terrible omen of the Questing Beast. Things should never be the same again but by the time the titles roll we are more or less back at the beginning again. Not much has changed. Gaius lives when he should be dead. It would have been a tremendously emotional ending if Gaius had remained dead. A missed opportunity to make some permanent changes to the series despite the thrilling conclusion to the episode.



Overall, it's been a slow burn for the series. It dragged interminably for the early stories, with serious issues of pace and structure, and only really picked up about half way. The second half benefited from directors embracing the visual sense of the stories and the actors getting into their stride. The writing for the female characters has been poor and Gwen and Morgana are central characters to the series, even if it is called Merlin. They should be served better. Writer Ben Vanstone should get more work for the second series as he clearly understands the characters and the way they connect. Match him up with director Stuart Orme and watch this take off on the basis of this quite promising start.

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Cathode Ray Tube Merlin Le Morte D'Arthur

BBC1 - 6th December 2008 - 7.25pm

I think I'm in love with Morgana. Wasn't she magnificent standing up to Uther like she did! Katie McGrath really rose to the occasion in this episode with a cartload of motivation driving her character development. Pity, I can't say the same about Gwen. Yes, the two women were centre stage here but certainly Morgana got the lion's share of the episode. Poor Gwen, poor Angel Coulby. She gets a juicy bit of motivation when her dad gets killed by Uther's men but just tends to go off sobbing in the corner and then gets sent to bed about 7 minutes into this. She should have joined up with Morgana and kicked Uther's ass.

Has Uther got a built in sorcery sniffer-out in his nose...

So, Gwen's dad gets mixed up in 'The Alchemy Affair' with the obviously very evil Tauran (hooded fella with a beard y'see) and finds out the hard way that turning lead into gold is a massive no-no in Camelot. Tauran uses this big glowing stone that must radiate waves of sorcery because Merlin's built in detector starts up. Unless he was getting up in the middle of the night for a wee. Lead into Gold! Are they mad...they'd be rich beyond the dreams of avarice. And how can they tell the gold's been obtained by using the 's' word (pay attention, that's sorcery)? Has Uther got a built in sorcery sniffer-out in his nose too? Mind you if he did have, then Merlin must stink to high heaven. Tom gets thrown in the dungeons on a charge of treason and Uther executes him. It's really quite shocking how uncompromising Uther is in this and I would guess that most of the audience is rooting for Morgana to get back at him for his ruthlessness.



Katie McGrath is great in this and is as hard as nails with Uther. The episode hinges on that moment where she watches poor Gwen trailing after her dead father's body on a cart. You can see her boiling up with anger at Uther. Her confrontation with him is visually a treat too, with sunlight streaming through the window as she tears him off a strip. Stuart Orme, the director, has been a shot in the arm for this series and visually he's delivered some beautifully shot work and seems to have figured out how to pace the slowest scenes and not induce boredom into the audience. Uther's reaction to her gobbiness is to hurl her into a dungeon too. God knows what his foreign policy is like. However, Tauran's lost his alchemy stone and goes after Gwen, thinking her father took it from him. Do you get the impression that Gwen is reduced to the status of victim throughout this series? She was good in the fight with Julian Bashir last week so why can't we have more of that?

Merlin rushing to the rescue with the light sabre of Aulfric

The long and the short of it is that Morgana has the stone and starts plotting with Tauran to bump Uther off. Merlin gets wind of this and seeks advice from John Hurt about what he should do. The dragon's bloody useless and just bangs on about 'destiny' and then flies off to leave Merlin with a whopping great moral dilemma - does he stop Morgana from killing Uther? Morgana plays on Uther's heartstrings about her own father and cons him into visiting his grave where Tauran's men will assassinate him. For me the whole scene at the graveside, where Morgana is presented with an Uther who realises he's done the wrong thing and is clearly contrite about the death of Tom, is one of the best dramatic moments of the series. Yes, perhaps it is rather heavily telegraphed that Morgana isn't going to kill Uther but it still works emotionally and dovetails nicely with Merlin rushing to the rescue with the light sabre of Aulfric. Good action scenes, tense moral dilemmas, fine performances from Katie McGrath and Anthony Head, and an Uther welcoming Morgana's upbraiding of his every decision. Great stuff from writer Jake Michie.

However, the Gwen problem hasn't yet been solved. They must give her more to do than washing and crying. They also can't keep this whole love/hate Uther thing going. At some point someone has got to really hate him enough to bloody well kill him so that Arthur can become king and all that destiny whatnot can be fulfilled. Uther, your time is running out. I suspect that the death of Uther would make a particularly good series finale...


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Cathode Ray Tube Merlin To Kill The King

BBC1/BBC HD - 9th December 2008 - 9.00pm

Definitely a gradual improvement is creeping in as this series progresses. What does help is the fact that this week we get three sub-plots interweaving and not one sign of the dreary scientists-in-a-bunker conspiracy theory nonsense. Essentially, Abby leaves to try and find her son Peter at a place called Waterhouse, as mentioned by fascist supremo Samantha Willis in last week's tale; everyone else apart from Greg and Anya abandon the house and join Willis' concentration camp community; Greg and Anya, meanwhile, have some very nasty visitors.

...she'll be chucking people out for being too tall or too short

The sub-plot involving Tom, Al, Naj and 'I've got no lines' Sarah is faintly ridiculous. Surely, even though Abby has told them to watch out for the politician with the trigger finger, they wouldn't want to go within miles of the place? They all traipse off and introduce themselves and it's pretty obvious that they'll be a divisive presence there. Al is bound not to like rules and regulations, Sarah hasn't got two grey cells to rub together and will just follow the herd and Tom will have an agenda of his own. It is the development of Tom that is the most interesting element here as he engages in a war of nerves with both Willis and her security man Gavin, played with great intensity by Andrew Tiernan. Max Beesley is rather good at giving Tom a completely calm exterior but with a clear indication that beneath the surface there is much plotting and thinking going on. Tom will sell anyone out and it comes as no surprise that he gets Al thrown out of the camp. And it is again fairly obvious that Naj will want to be with Al and vice versa as they've formed a nice little bond over the last four weeks. Predictably, Al breaks into the camp and gets Naj away. Nice gesture but how the hell did the rather useless Al manage to bypass camp security and escape into the night from Max Beesley brandishing his man boobs? Willis also has Tom's number as a former con and throws him out too. She's not particularly good at building her community is she? Before long, she'll be chucking people out for being too tall or too short.

Survivors guilt is obviously not getting in the way of a skinny dip and a shag.

Meanwhile, Abby finds Waterhouse and walks into an ongoing feud between the rather charismatic Jimmy Garland and a bunch of local kids who've taken possession of his ancestral home. The writer Simon Tyrrell manages to balance the Lord Of The Flies theme of the kids gone native with a sense that actually they're just scared and desperate and are looking for those basic human needs - shelter and protection. Garland, superbly played by Joseph Millson, is offended by the way they've treated his home but isn't willing to give way. Abby forms an attachment to Garland but you do wonder about the passage of time here - how many days has it been since she set fire to her husband and went looking for her missing son? Survivors guilt is obviously not getting in the way of a skinny dip and a shag. She tries to broker a peace between them but it all goes horribly wrong and the youngest boy is accidentally stabbed. The shock of this act is conveyed well and it flips the young lads into a realisation that their game is a very serious affair indeed and could be fatal for one of them. It's a much more interesting view of a divided group finding common ground after a violent act that's in counterpoint to the Willis 'shoot all troublemakers' policy.

Likewise, Greg and Anya are subjected to some random thuggery from passing strangers which then begs the question of their community now needing a form of defence. The two thugs were clearly trouble and yet both of them didn't bother to at least guard themselves from attack. Anya was a bit nifty with her knees and rather conveniently both her and Greg overcame their attackers. It would have been far more shocking if the intimated rape of Anya had take place but Adrian Hodges is too busy taking out the grim stuff to be bothered with it. The main point is of course that neither of them is a killer and the trussed up thugs are merely deposited in the middle of nowhere for their trouble. Again, a counterpoint to the way of the Willis.

And Anya still hasn't come out.

It's certainly the best episode so far, due mainly to the work of the guest actors, Bird, Tiernan and Millson and a less clunkier script. Sarah is melting into the background and simply flirting at anything in trousers but I suspect she'll turn traitor just for shock value alone, Tom is by far the most interesting character, Abby and Greg are a bit Mr. and Mrs. Goody Two Shoes whilst Al and Naj seem to share an interest in chickens and football. And Anya still hasn't come out. The time frame does bother me - all these people seem to have miraculously adjusted to living on a devastated planet and seem to be behaving as if the food supply will last forever and they have no need to re-learn basic skills - and it all looks rather too green, lush and summery to suggest cities filled with rotting corpses. It's very picturesque, but should it be? If you didn't know better you'd think they'd all gone on holiday by mistake, got lost in the woods, escaped from a brutal holiday camp and all got back together for a big squashy group hug cos they missed each other sooooo much.

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A quick look at the films I'm really looking forward to in 2009. I'm not including Star Trek and Watchmen in this bunch simply because I'm covering the hype on those two elsewhere. This is an opportunity to spotlight a number of forthcoming releases for early 2009 from some of the biggest directors in the industry.

FROST/NIXON
Released 23rd January 2009
Director: Ron Howard



Frost/Nixon is a play by the British screenwriter and dramatist Peter Morgan. Its subject is the series of televised Frost/Nixon interviews that former US President Richard Nixon granted David Frost in 1977 and that ended with a tacit admission of guilt regarding his role in the Watergate scandal. The play premiered at the Donmar Warehouse theatre in London in August 2006. Directed by Michael Grandage, it starred Michael Sheen as the talk-show host and Frank Langella as the former president. Frost/Nixon is now a 2008 historical drama film based upon the play of the same name. The film version is directed by Ron Howard and produced by Brian Grazer of Imagine Entertainment and Tim Bevan and Eric Fellner of Working Title Films for Universal Pictures. The film reunites its original two stars from the London and Broadway productions of the play. www.frostnixonthemovie.com



MILK
Released 23rd January 2009
Director: Gus Van Sant



In 1977, Harvey Milk was elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, becoming the first openly gay man to be voted into major public office in America. His victory was not just a victory for gay rights; he forged coalitions across the political spectrum. From senior citizens to union workers, Harvey Milk changed the very nature of what it means to be a fighter for human rights and became, before his untimely death in 1978, a hero for all Americans. Academy Award winner Sean Penn stars as Harvey Milk under the direction of Academy Award nominee Gus Van Sant in the new movie filmed on location in San Francisco from an original screenplay by Dustin Lance Black and produced by Academy Award winners Dan Jinks and Bruce Cohen. The film charts the last eight years of Harvey Milk’s life. While living in New York City, he turns 40. Looking for more purpose, Milk and his lover Scott Smith (James Franco) relocate to San Francisco, where they found a small business, Castro Camera, in the heart of a working-class neighbourhood that was soon to become a haven for gay people from around the country. With vitalizing support from Scott and new friends and volunteers, Milk plunges headfirst into the choppy waters of politics. Milk serves San Francisco well while lobbying for a citywide ordinance protecting people from being fired because of their orientation – and rallying support against a proposed statewide referendum to fire gay schoolteachers and their supporters; he realises that this fight against Proposition 6 represents a pivotal precipice for the gay rights movement. At the same time, the political agendas of Milk and those of another newly elected supervisor, Dan White (Josh Brolin), increasingly diverge and their personal destinies tragically converge. Penn's performance is already being singled out by LA and New York critics and an Oscar nomination looks likely. www.filminfocus.com



THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON
Released 6th February 2009
Director: David Fincher



Already receiving rave reviews from US critics, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, adapted from the 1920s story by F. Scott Fitzgerald is about a man who is born in his eighties and ages backwards. A man, like any of us, unable to stop time. We follow his story set in New Orleans from the end of World War I in 1918, into the 21st century, following his journey that is as unusual as any man’s life can be. It follows the life of Benjamin, who is born with the appearance and physical limitations of a man in his eighties. Abandoned in a nursing home by his father, Benjamin begins aging backward. While in the home, he meets Daisy, a young aspiring ballerina. As the film progresses, the two fall in love, while struggling to deal with the issue of one growing younger while the other grows older. Directed by David Fincher, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button is a time traveler’s tale of the people and places he bumps into along the way, the loves he loses and finds, the joys of life and the sadness of death, and what lasts beyond time. www.benjaminbutton.com



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Cathode Ray Tube Frost/Nixon Milk The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button

Part 1 / BBC1 - 8th December 2008 - 4.35pm
Part 2 / CBBC - 8th November 2008 - 5.15pm



I don't know how many of you remember Les Dawson and Roy Barraclough and their double act as fishwives Cissie and Ada but it struck me at about ten minutes into Enemy Of The Bane that Mrs. Wormwood and Sarah Jane had started how they meant to go on. And on. And on. As the highly camp Samantha Bond and our Lis traded insults in a disused factory I did imagine them leaning across their garden wall as they bickered about the Archetype, Bubbleshock and Bane. And no, that's not a firm of solicitors. Mrs. Wormwood's elaborate calling card - pretending to buy flowers, subduing Gita (permanently I'd hoped) and leaving a cheque to pique Sarah Jane's interest - seemed a tad on the excessive side but who cares when Bond and Sladen take the crackling dialogue and run with it, trading bitchy insults whilst running away from monstrous CGI blobs. You could tell director Graeme Harper was savouring this in the way he shot the sequence of Mrs. Wormwood and Sarah Jane belting down the corridor to get out of the factory. A frenzy of close-ups, medium shots and some great low angle stuff are joined by a quick flash of Samantha Bond's high heels clacking along very camply. I'd also like to know Mrs. Wormwood's tips for keeping a violent purple hood permanently stuck to her head too.

...the Tunguska scroll looks...well...a bit like an ornate dildo

It transpires that the Bane are out to get their revenge on Mrs. Wormwood for the Bubbleshock affair but Sarah Jane's having none of it. After Clyde's priceless, 'But I thought you said she was an ugly bug-eyed squid thing' and Mrs. Wormwood's exasperated retort of 'Children!', the first hints of what writer Phil Ford is actually wanting to talk about in the drama start to emerge, even after the rather tongue in cheek one-upwomanship between Sarah Jane and Mrs. Wormwood as they mark out their territory in the attic. This is about family. Yes, the major theme of this second series is brought out again for another airing. It's clear from Luke's reaction to his Bane mother/creator that there are issues a plenty lurking under the surface of these witty and rather arch episodes. Both women squabble rather broodily over the confused Luke and there's a whiff of a strangely skewed Oedipal love-hate undercurrent emanating from the relationship between Luke and Mrs. Wormwood. In fact, I'd go as far as to say she displays a certain amount of sexual desire for Luke, with her purring, 'I made you rather handsome, didn't I?' One could also argue that the displaced bits of Horath, a sort of dismembered father-figure, represent the absence of mature masculinity in a world populated by brooding mothers and immature teenagers. It's also significant to note that the Tunguska scroll looks...well...a bit like an ornate dildo.

Sladen and Courtney play the reuniting of Sarah and Lethbridge-Stewart to perfection

And the dildo is kept in the Black Archive. That mention of UNIT and their stash of alien artefacts neatly swings the script towards the highlight of the episode. The return of Nick Courtney and Sir Alistair Lethbridge-Stewart. Even before we meet him, UNIT is posited as another symbol of the story's play on the role of the masculine with Clyde getting scolded by Sarah Jane for thinking the use of guns will solve all problems. Still, it is a delight to see him back and Courtney is in fine form as he dresses down the rather annoying Major Kilburne who prattles on about 'homeworld security' in front of a living legend who has dealth with his fair share of what he charmingly refers to as 'space thuggery'. Kilburne's an odd one and Simon Chadwick's performance is angular and brittle, indicating that he's not quite the full shilling, especially with that unsettling moment where he peers at himself in the metal lamp. And Sladen and Courtney play the reuniting of Sarah and Lethbridge-Stewart to perfection even though it's purely a fanboy pleasing moment and the kids watching won't have a clue who the hell he is. Perhaps this will usher in a cameo in the parent series for good measure.



The brief moments between Clyde and Luke, discussing Clyde's dad, leads us to the inevitable scene where Luke's confusion about his parental stock will necessitate a confrontation with Mrs. Wormwood. Clyde recognises that without his dad he wouldn't be alive and this spurs Luke into demanding to see her, despite Sarah's wishes to the contrary. It's a nicely played scene, showing off both Daniel Anthony and Tommy Knight to great advantage. The following scene between Knight and Bond, as Wormwood turns on the charm to escape from the attic, is also a triumph and again emphasises the themes of children and their relationships with their parents that's been running through this series. Here, it is Luke's turn to shed some light upon the woman that created him within the context of nature versus nurture in the development of adolescent social orientation.

We get to see the Black Archive but I was slightly disappointed and had hoped for a few recognisable objects as a little treat for us older fans. All we ended up with was a nod to Raiders Of The Lost Ark and mention of Queen Victoria. A shame really. The episode's cliffhanger mixes Sarah and Rani stealing the dildo of Horath and causing a security breach at UNIT with Wormwood's battle against one of the Bane that hilariously turns up on the doorstep posing as a pensioner collecting for charity. Ah, but then there's the bluff and Wormwood it seems is in league with Kaagh, the Sontaran seen off by Sarah at the beginning of the series this year. Universal domination and the sweetness of revenge are on the menu once more. A good opening episode, well directed by Harper and full of wonderful performances, especially from Bond and Courtney, and a reminder of the sheer fun this series can be.

...a hint at ancient myth and Biblical symbolism with the story positioning both Sarah Jane and Wormwood as barren women

Over to CBBC for Part 2 then. 'Nice one, Mrs.W' as Clyde and Luke are smothered in exploding Bane matter. The gang realise that UNIT are on the trail and hide out in Gita's flower shop with Mrs. Wormwood and Lethbridge-Stewart. It's here that Sarah Jane asks the very pertinent question, around which the whole story is built, 'Don't you have any children of your own...?' This aimed at someone who gives herself the title of 'Mrs'. Again, we have some very accomplished playing by Sladen and Bond as the two women sensitively discuss...well...their barreness. Of course it then descends into bitterness as Wormwood takes a pot shot at Sarah Jane's new found sense of purpose as a result of her surrogacy of Luke. There's a hint at ancient myth and Biblical symbolism with the story positioning both Sarah Jane and Wormwood as barren women, with Luke perhaps indicative of some form of immaculate conception. It's again telling that Wormwood bitches to Sarah about the sonic lipstick being 'very female' and demands 'a more masculine influence' as they go for handbags at dawn in the shop. Of course, the male influence is revealed as Kaagh and the pair of them are double crossing the Bane in order to revive the 'father figure' of Horath.



Kaagh becomes Wormwood's fawning eunuch which is a rather demeaning role for a former warlord of the Sontaran race and a further reference to Wormwood's power representing an suggestion of anxiety about male castration. Samantha Bond caresses that scroll a little too sensuously for my liking and I'm pretty sure she has cottoned on to what exactly is going on and is camping it up for all it's worth. When Luke asserts himself and stands up to Wormwood she again gets rather aroused and wants to possess him. Her ownership of Luke comes at the price of breaking the mother/son bond between him and Sarah Jane. Their passionate declaration of their familial love for one another is something that Mrs. Wormwood would never understand. She simply sees her relationship to Luke as one of sexual and intellectual possession it seems.

...a mother bequeathing her son with the power of life and death

Oh dear. Bloody Gita's back, sticking her nose in again. Except, she stumbles across a rather oddly behaving Major Kilburne and it's at this moment that it becomes apparent that Kilburne isn't what he seems. Not someone you'd invite in for a quick cuppa then. Meanwhile Luke is dragged off to another desolate factory location where he denies Wormwood's aspirations for him to be her concubine. Tommy Knight is exceptionally good, getting across Luke's bile for the woman's plan of galactic revenge. Bond also gives superb value, managing that tricky balance between sincerity and ham that all good villains need to achieve. Luke establishes that Horath actually isn't a living creature and we learn that he/she/it is some cyborg computer capable of reshaping the universe and 'can destroy worlds and give birth to them in a blink of an eye'. Some sort of interstellar father/mother then, with a galactic cradle to which Wormwood compares herself. And with that she hands her 'prince' the glowing dildo of Horath, a mother bequeathing her son with the power of life and death.



Brilliantly, that scene sucks the audience in and just for a brief second you think Luke's fallen under her spell. And then he legs it. What a fantastic twist to a carefully built scene. After a bit of a chase, a couple of explosions and some gloating, Kaagh decides to finish Luke off. However, Wormwood puts him firmly in his place, completing her castration of the warrior and reducing him to the status of slave. Whilst this life/death struggle is played out, Clyde gets all 007 (the look on Lethbridge-Stewart's face is priceless) and the gang have to deal with Major Kilburne. Kilburne is, of course, Bane. But Nick Courtney rises to the occasion and obviously relishes the scene where Lethbridge-Stewart promptly shoots the creature with his walking stick gun! Pity about that appalling 'slimy creep' gag from Sarah Jane, though.

...he simply says, 'I don't want to be a God' when she offers him the universe on a plate.

The climax to all this running around is Horath's dildo opening a big hole in time and space at a neolithic stone circle. Hang on, let me read that again....yeah, that's about the right level of innuendo. And holes are very important symbols when it comes to fertility rites and fertilising power as well as standing for the 'opening' of this world into other planes of existence. Oh, whilst we're at it, it might be useful to flag up that the herb wormwood is often used as a tea to give to pregnant women to ease labour pains. When she prepares to insert the scroll in the hole (I'm sorry, I can't help it) Wormwood even gets a solicitor joke in when Kaagh reminds her of their partnership. But ironically, only the human Luke can enter the circle and open the gateway. I love that moment where he simply says, 'I don't want to be a God' when she offers him the universe on a plate. It's the culmination of a very strong character arc that's been developing for Luke over the series. And Bond's reaction when Sarah Jane arrives and Luke runs to her with a shout of 'Mum!' is beautifully played. She's defeated by very simple human emotions, especially unconditional love, and that resignation is there in her desperate pleading for him.

Kaagh does the honourable thing and with a shout of 'Sonta-ha!' he pulls himself and Wormwood into the black hole. The episode ends on a delightful coda that embraces true friendship, including Sir Alistair, and the visual motif of star-gazing wonderment at the universe. A great conclusion to the story and a script that gets the series on track again after a run of uneven stories that took liberties with character development at the behest of recycled ideas. Clyde and Luke did get some terrific episodes, Sarah went somewhat out of character in the penultimate story and I'm afraid Rani and her family ended up as the major casualties this year. There needs to be some serious work done to make Gita and Haresh more appealing. But at least this is a high note to end this series on.

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