Doctor Who blog: The Lodger

“Annihilate? No, no violence, do you understand me? Not while I’m around, not today, not ever. I’m the Doctor, the Oncoming Storm… and you basically meant beat them in a football match, didn’t you?”

11 things I loved about ‘The Lodger’ (since it’s the Eleventh Doctor’s eleventh full episode)

• 1. James Corden: Considering his celebrity image, it’s easy to forget that he can actually be a really charming screen presence. He brings a real warmth and depth to the role of Craig, and he really holds his own against Matt Smith.

• 2. The Doctor referring to Amy as “Pond”: For some reason, it just works.

• 3. The shower scene: The BBC felt the need to declare that Matt Smith wasn’t completely naked in this scene, releasing a statement containing the rather marvellous sentence: “He was sporting an item to protect his modesty”. You wouldn’t have gotten that with William Hartnell.

• 4. Daisy Haggard: Craig’s love interest Sophie had to be believably sweet and funny, and Daisy Haggard pulled it off effortlessly.

• 5. Matt Smith’s face: Obviously.

• 6. The Doctor’s weirdness: This episode was adapted from a rather sweet comic in Doctor Who Magazine starring the Tenth Doctor, but I really can’t imagine it working as well on screen with David Tennant’s incarnation, or even Christopher Eccleston’s. They could probably have fitted in on Earth fairly well, but the inherent oddball nature of Matt Smith’s Doctor means that his completely mad behaviour feels right. Besides, Smith is clearly having the time of his life acting like a complete nutter.

• 7. The love story: It was sweetly played and wittily written, and ended up being key to the resolution of the episode, which is actually quite a difficult thing to pull off without being sentimental.

• 8. The amusing lines: I think “amusing” is the right word to describe this episode – it wasn’t laugh-out-loud funny, but I don’t think it was meant to be. “Paris, in the 18th Century. No, hang on, that’s not recent, is it? 17th? No, no, 20th. Sorry, I’m not used to doing them in the right order”. The wry smiles brought on by the Doctor’s strange ramblings brought me just as much pleasure as any belly laugh.

• 9. Matt Smith and Karen Gillan: I know I’ve been saying this for eleven episodes now, but they really are rather amazing, and Miss Gillan’s hair is a marvel.

• 10. Its inconsequentiality: I think this is what appealed to me most about this episode. It didn’t have a massive agenda, it didn’t have something deep to say about the Doctor. It was the cheap episode of the series, and its central message was, “Well, the Doctor’s a bit weird, isn’t he? An old romantic, but definitely weird”. Which is actually quite a lovely message, if you think about it.

• 11. The epic trailer for next week: What could “the most feared being in all the cosmos” actually be? I have no idea, but I most certainly can’t wait to find out.

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