Doctor Who "Night Terrors" Talkback (Spoilers)

[HellCat]

Doctor Who
Night Terrors
By Mark Gatiss
Saturday 3rd September, BBC One and BBC America

A young boy suffers sleepless nights due to irrational fears. But are they really so irrational? As one man knows, monsters are very real...
​

 

[MonkeyFunk]

Well, it was a Mark Gatiss episode. By now I've learnt that that means an okay idea, okay execution, enjoyable experience, but with an ultimate feeling of "right then - what's the main course?"

To be fair it's probably his most solid episode, with no clunky bits like Unquiet Dead's cop-out resolution or Victory of the Daleks' drawn-out Bracewell romance.

And the dolls were cool. Doll-Amy was actually kind of cute.

 

[HellCat]

The worst I can say is that it felt like a retread of 'Fear Her'. This one didn't even have a CGI killer doodle, so it must have been saving the effects budget for something else (although granted Confidential showed them making alot of overscaled furniture and props).

It was pretty obvious this one had been pushed back from its original place. It felt a bit off with how heavy the season arc has got and the revelations of last week.

The story wasn't bad but this was very clearly one of those episodes where scare factor was prioritised over story. Which makes it all the more awkward when the scares don't hold up. I'm sure this will give kids some unease but every 'scare' seemed to amount to 'Don't open the door now!'. There were some creepy moments like the people being turned dolls (let us never complain about the sculpt on Character Options figures again) but I think alot of the fear was lost when it became clear George was unknowingly controlling things. An episode like 'Blink' was consistently scary and then ends on a reveal that suggests the entire audience is now in danger. Things got defanged pretty quickly although I partially blame that on the show's formula. 99% of the time, the show will get scare factor out of an alien or monster before revealing they're just misunderstood. I couldn't be scared because I was almost certain we were headed for that kind of end, which we were. I'd welcome a few more 'I'm a straight out space nasty and the Doctor needs to stop me!' stories.

I probably sound harsher on this then I meant to but overall I found this to be filler that didn't even bring the promised scary.

 

[Angilasman]

I thought this was a terrific little episode, and it's good to have one of those while in the midst of a gargantuan storyline. The direction was some of the best I've seen in Who, and despite being a rather low budget episode I think it beat most effects heavy ones in visual beauty.

 

[Mr. Hypocrite]

I'm a little baffled as to how the Doctor was able to convince that dude to take him seriously without a psychic headbutt.

11 really does need to learn to be more subtle, and a little less blunt about things.

Those dolls were a little unnerving as well.

 

[anime_guru]

The worst I can say is that it felt like a retread of 'Fear Her'. This one didn't even have a CGI killer doodle, so it must have been saving the effects budget for something else (although granted Confidential showed them making alot of overscaled furniture and props).

It was pretty obvious this one had been pushed back from its original place. It felt a bit off with how heavy the season arc has got and the revelations of last week.

The story wasn't bad but this was very clearly one of those episodes where scare factor was prioritised over story. Which makes it all the more awkward when the scares don't hold up. I'm sure this will give kids some unease but every 'scare' seemed to amount to 'Don't open the door now!'. There were some creepy moments like the people being turned dolls (let us never complain about the sculpt on Character Options figures again) but I think alot of the fear was lost when it became clear George was unknowingly controlling things. An episode like 'Blink' was consistently scary and then ends on a reveal that suggests the entire audience is now in danger. Things got defanged pretty quickly although I partially blame that on the show's formula. 99% of the time, the show will get scare factor out of an alien or monster before revealing they're just misunderstood. I couldn't be scared because I was almost certain we were headed for that kind of end, which we were. I'd welcome a few more 'I'm a straight out space nasty and the Doctor needs to stop me!' stories.

I probably sound harsher on this then I meant to but overall I found this to be filler that didn't even bring the promised scary.

I don't know but how many of those stories do we really need? I mean given a good man goes to war and the several new aliens and armies after the doctor, this is a pretty decent balance given the overly sci fi aspect the show adopted recently.

I do admit, as far as freaky episodes for the reboot, nothing beats Blink, ever. I think I accept this episode (save from the "freaky" bludgeoning over our head that the doctor dies) as a filler episode. It could be far worse (pirates episode), but overall it was a silent hill-esque episode. Even if it was predictable, it didn't pack nearly as much plot that as Let's kill hitler making for a ease of progress episode.

Although, I have to be honest, I am waiting for next week's episode because there is so much that needs to be explained about Amy Pond. It's really about time.

 

[Kitschensyngk]

The name of the game is Make-Timmy-Happy-or-Get-Sent-to-the-Cornfield.

Which is creepier, those dolls or those twins from The Shining from the start of the episode? ...which was on before this encore I'm watching now because I was at a football game when this premiered.