Dinosaurs On A Spaceship

Since the first few episode titles were unveiled a few months ago I was dreading this story. The fact it was also written by Chris Chibnall almost had me not watching at all to be honest but hey, it was Saturday night and there was nowt else on...

Synopsis

The Doctor and a group of miscellaneous hangers on (Amy, Rory, Rory's dad, some Indiana Jones type and Queen Nefertiti) are summoned to a spaceship that has dinosaurs on it. The group are split up and The Doctor and his mob find Solomon on board, a space-trader / Fagin type who found the Dinosaur Ship in space and wanted it's cargo to flog.

In the meantime Amy and her Merry Band have discovered from the helpful computer that the Dinosaur Ship is actually a Silurian Ark. Turns out Solomon tried to buy the dinosaurs from the Silurians, and when they refused he had them ejected into space.

I forgot to mention, the Dinosaur Ship is on collision course with Earth, and the ISA (Indian Space Agency?) aren't too happy about this so shoot some missile at it to destroy it. It's now a race against time!

Shenanigans occur, Rory and his dad take control of the Dino-Ship and steer it away from Earth, The Doctor tricks the missiles to blow up Solomon in his escaping ship instead, and everybody is home in time for tea and crumpets.

Analysis

The first ten minutes or so of this episode did nothing to make me want to watch further. Nefertiti is trying to sexually assault The Doctor (when did he turn into such a Horn-Monster???), then the Tardis is suddenly materialising around the Pond family living room, picking up Rory's dad in the process.

Last week there was consternation among Fandom that the 'Asylum of the Daleks' prequel was only available on-line when it was quite relevant to the ensuing episode. The opening of Dinosaurs On A Spaceship (DOAS) SHOULD have been an internet only offering for all the reasons AOTD shouldn't have.

I'm sure I'm not the only person who had guessed the spaceship would turn out to be some kind of 'Ark In Space' (where have I heard that before?), and with Chris Chibnall as writer it didn't take Quincy to work out that the Silurians would be in the mix somewhere. Perhaps with a different episode title the surprise could have been greater (like the appearance of the Cybermen in 'Earthshock').

Once this first section had passed the story settled down into a reasonable, if very predictable, sci-fi romp. Comic relief was provided by Solomon's two hench-bots, hulking great rusty things with effeminate voices, bitchy personalities (think of a mixture of C3-PO, Frankie Howerd and a nasty Drag Queen) and lasers. No doubt the toys will be in the shops in time for Christmas, folks!




Solomon himself was something of a disappointment; why are all merchants on TV portrayed as Fagin-esque Jews? If only Solomon had been able to rub his hands together the characterisation would have been 100%...I swear if he had called the Hench-bots his 'lovely boys' I would have kicked the TV in (that's an exaggeration BTW!).

A few elements of the story seemed to be there for no reason other than to give the characters something to do (more padding!) such as the entire scene at the beach / engine room, the stunning of the veloceraptors and the dual-piloting thing with the Silurian ship (surely any two humans could have done this, as they all share genetic material...maybe it should have been shared DNA?).

'Hoy you! Yes you, Chibnall. Outside NOW!'

 Well, that would be my normal challenge to any bloke who upset my wife so much that he made her cry. Yes, I'm talking about the death of the Triceratops. This was  the great talking point on the social media sites I visited immediately after the story had finished, and quite a few people have said it marred their overall enjoyment of the episode.

Unusually The Doctor also directly and deliberately brought about the death of a human by leaving the homing device on Solomon's ship. What happened to the man who never would?

It was these last two details that jarred with the rest of the episode. The overall tone of the story was of a jolly gambol through Jurassic Park and the deaths should have been shocking instead of upsetting. Something like this is personal perception but, to me, they were about as subtle as a speed metal solo halfway through a string quartet recital.

My final nitpick. The Silurian Ship had entered the Earth's atmosphere so the ISA launched the missile which would take 30 minutes to impact. Blimey, are they a new type of missile that walks to the target, stopping for a McDonalds on the way? When they were seen in pursuit of Solomon they looked pretty nippy...

Conclusion

The success or failure of this story hung primarily on how well the dinosaurs were rendered, and all credit to the SFX people for doing a great job. I only hope the first two episodes of the season haven't eaten up the whole budget.

All in all DOAS was the closest Doctor Who has ever been to being 'Scooby Doo'. Personally I feel the story would have been much improved by being 'darker', but this little comic burlesque was quite refreshing. I'll give it:

72 /100

Phew, I managed to write that whole blog without mentioning Father Williams's balls. Oh sh.....