Why 'The End of Time' was the Second Worst Episode of Doctor Who

Firstly, I would like to make it very clear: David Tennant as the Doctor has been absolutely fantastic. Seriously brilliant. He has done an amazing job of the Doctor, and this rant has nothing to do with his ability to play the character… Also I would like to make it clear that this is just my humble opinion, I don’t expect you to take it as fact, if you liked it please feel free to write in the comments below what you liked about it and how wrong I am!

This was not the worst episode of Doctor Who, not by a long shot, hat tip to Huw for reminding me of this fact and redeeming ‘The End of Time’ a lot. The worst episode by far goes to the episode Love and Monsters written by Russell T. Davies (Season 2, Episode 10). If you have seen it you’ll know what I mean, if you haven’t seen it then don’t. Anyways on to ‘The End of Time’…

I have never been a real fan of Russell T. Davies (RTD) story lines, the first season worked more or less for him, however it all went down hill, there were a couple of good episodes that he wrote, however the majority have been poor. I am very grateful that he brought Doctor Who back, of that I am completely grateful, however his plot lines leave something to be desired…

Donna

Lets start with the reoccurrence of Donna Noble… can somebody explain to me why she was there? what exactly did Donna’s character add to the whole thing? I see no reason for her being there… RTD started to set it up for DoctorDonna to return and save the day, however all she did was take out a couple of the Master’s copies and then curl up and fall asleep… a touch on the pointless?

The Master

We all knew from the time that the ring was dropped at the end of ‘Last of the Time Lords’ that the Master was coming back, and I am glad that he came back for the finale of the David Tennant era. Despite not quite explaining how they brought the Master back, they did it with style! However why why why did they kill him off? Ok, I presume they have killed him off… but there is no sight of him after the Time Lords vanish back into the time lock. Grrg. There is implication, spoken by the Time Lords, that this is the final battle between the Doctor and the Master.

The Time Lords

Actually, no I liked the Time Lords… nothing bad to say about them. TimothyDalton played his part very well.

The Doctor’s Fall

There is no way that the Doctor could survive the fall through the glass, he is just as fragile as a human, in ‘Last of the Time Lords’ we see that a bullet can kill a Time Lord unless they regenerate. The Doctor cannot fall that far with out having to regenerate, it should of killed him. Fact.

The White Point Star

While I have little problem with the use of the White Point Star to pull the Time Lord’s out of the time lock, what I do take issue with is how the diamond managed to make it out of the time lock… How exactly did that work again, throwing a diamond into a hologram? Oh wait… that would be a plot hole.

Immortality Gate

Aside for the lame name, it was a good way to turn everyone into the Master, I think that did work, however killing the template reverts everyone back to normal? No, that doesn’t work, in part one it was explained that it was used for healing entire planets, if there is a connection with the original template then the whole world would become ill when they did, or revert back to the original condition when the original died of old age?

Star Wars

What? What is Star Wars doing here? The sequence in the space ship is a direct rip off of Star Wars where Luke and Han Solo are fighting off the tie fighters. Even the sets look the same. There is a reference to the galactic assembly in the way that the Time Lords assemble… there is even a cantina scene at the end of the episode! This is one of my main gripes with RTD, he likes to reference a lot of pop culture… I just don’t know why he does it.

There was a line that the Doctor said in response to Wilf saying “I’ve heard you talk about your people; they’re wonderful” and the Doctor response with “that’s how I choose to remember them”. I will choose to remember the David Tennant era by many of the brilliant episodes (Girl in the Fire Place, Human Nature, Silence in the Library and of course Blink to name a few), I have really enjoyed them. No, I didn’t enjoy this episode, however it isn’t going to colour my memory of David Tennant’s Doctor.

Looking into the future with Matt Smith, I am very excited, there is a lot going on there. The new beginning looks brilliant!