The Unquiet Dead

Finally some proper scares for the boys. Interestingly, neither of them remember watching this one before, and there's no coincidence: familiarity reduces fear. It also explains some of their undiminished enthusiasm - there are lots of episodes that they just haven't absorbed or re-watched and they are eager to see what they've forgotten. I think they are enjoying getting to grips with Eccleston's Doctor too, although they haven't said as much yet.

The Unquiet Dead is seen as an attempt to try and do 'traditional' Doctor Who within the new series' format. The macabre humour and horror trappings all hark back to the Hinchcliffe/Holmes era, whilst the Victorian setting specifically evokes classics like The Talons of Weng Chiang. But of course it feels more traditional when the TARDIS goes back in time, because visions of the present and the future are always having to be revised. A 2005 trip to the future will have to look different to anything we've seen before, whereas filming 1869 means finding an un-redeveloped street in Swansea and breaking into the BBC's extensive Costume Drama wardrobe.

And there is some innovation here. After decades (centuries?) of name-dropping, we get to see the Doctor rub shoulders with the great and the good. Yes, alright, we had previously (and infrequently) seen him encounter Marco Polo or George Stephenson, but such historical encounters were just period dressing. With The Unquiet Dead the audience begins to expect that the Doctor will meet famous people in the past. It also, with its treatment of Charles Dickens, establishes a template for some of these meetings. Far from just providing a flavour of the times, Dicken's presence here is substantial and consequential. There is a large amount of biographical detail woven through Gatiss' knowing script and the story ends with both Dickens and the Doctor each having comprehensively affected the other's life. We'll soon see the same thing happening with Queen Victoria, Madame du Pompadour, Shakespeare, Agatha Christie and Vincent van Gogh (though not with Churchill, Nixon or Hitler), and I'd argue that this style of episode has quickly become a staple of the new series.

Some of this is down to Simon Callow, definitively Dickensian, and the presence of an actor of his standing was a real shot in the arm for the show at this point. But credit must go to Gatiss (and RTD) for making this such a thoughtful script. But this comes at the expense of some action and excitement. The middle section, although lovely (Dickens talking to the Doctor, Rose talking to Gwynneth), does rather slow things down. The scares, though, when they come are excellent. Dead people sitting up and shuffling around, grasping at you - it's so simple, but Doctor Who has never really done zombies before. It all works brilliantly, and the boys were shifting in their seats each time the menace ramped up towards the intense cellar-full of lurching corpses.

Once again, the Doctor isn't in a position to save the day - it's up to Dickens to dash in and have the bright idea, and up to Gwynneth to posthumously destroy the Gelth. The Doctor's heroism is sacrificed, seemingly, so he can have that final moment with Rose - but unlike in the previous episodes this climax is missing the full emotional punch that helped compensate for the slightness of the resolution.

Nonetheless the boys enjoyed it a lot. William scored it a 9, enjoying a "well written mystery"; Chris liked the "cool zombies" and how Dickens became less grumpy during the episode, giving it an 8. I don't think it is quite as successful as those first two episodes. There's a lot of mileage in the 'immigration' aspects of the plot that goes unexplored and the gaseous Gelth should perhaps expand to fill some of the available space in the story.

But the bottom line is, of course, that we got to meet Charles Dickens! How cool was that?


NEXT TIME...