Rather than go to series five, departing series creator Russell T. Davies wrote 4 specials for Tennant, who was performing Hamlet with the RSC, in order to facilitate the tenth Doctor's regeneration to the eleventh Doctor (Matt Smith). To this point, I'd seen the first three: The Next Doctor, Planet of the Dead, and The Waters of Mars. What remained was The End of Time (parts 1 and 2).
I really thought I'd reviewed them before, but apparently I never got around to that, I'll give you a quick once-over of the first three specials:
The Next Doctor - despite the title, it's pretty clear that Paul Morrissey is not going to be the eleventh Doctor, but Davies manages to withhold that information for as long as possible. The special itself is fun, if a bit frivolous even for a Christmas special (technically placing it in 2008). Morrissey is clearly having fun playing a facsimile of the Doctor in the beginning, and manages to sell the shift halfway through to a traumatized survivor of the Cybermen.
Personally speaking, I'd be happier if we moved away from the "alternate reality" Cybermen of season two and dealt with the fact that there are actual Cybermen in the "normal" Doctor Who-niverse, but the story works well enough, despite some cheats involving the disposal of a giant steampunk Cyberman near the end. Despite suggesting (mostly through sketches) in previous stories, The Next Doctor is the first story I can remember to show every version of The Doctor on-screen from William Hartnell to David Tennant, including Paul McGann's oft neglected eighth Doctor (as part of the Cybermen's information file on The Doctor).
Planet of the Dead - The story, which involves the Doctor, a jewel thief, and a busload of commuters passing through a portal to another planet, is fairly light weight stuff. Despite teasing a potential new companion (Michelle Ryan), the only plot development to really come from Planet of the Dead is a last minute prophetic vision that "your song is ending, sir. It is returning, it is returning through the dark. And then, Doctor... Oh but then, he will knock four times." This hint at his impending death rattles the Doctor, setting up the next story, which is admittedly far more interesting than Planet of the Dead.
The Waters of Mars - finally, a good story (the Doctor arrives at an Earth colony on Mars that he is forbidden to change the history of), with some genuinely creepy monsters (the Flood, which are zombie-like humans that constantly produce water), and an honest to goodness shift in character that could - in theory - shift the direction of Doctor Who heading into the final special. Oh well, two out of three ain't bad.
I gives Davies credit for asking the question "why can't the Doctor break the rules of time in order to save someone who cannot be saved?", and answering it in a novel way. The Doctor, who has been traveling alone through these specials, decides near the end that he's not the survivor of the Time War, he's the victor (something that turns out to be quite important in The End of Time), and his impulsive decision to alter a "locked" historical event could have moved nicely into Tennant's final story, but Davies backs off at the last moment.
To present the possibility, have the Doctor act on it, and then immediately rescind his actions in order to restore the status quo is a missed opportunity. The Doctor has, for better or worse, generally adhered to the "Rules of Time", especially in the new run, but Davies poses an interesting direction for the series and then backs away from it almost immediately. It's frustrating, because Tennant moves from being the altruistic Doctor to an almost megalomaniacal Time Meddler, but the ramifications of this change don't get to play out. Instead, Davies shoehorns in a guilt trip and resets the Doctor to "guilty and facing certain death" at the end. The Waters of Mars is a maddening special accordingly; part of me loves the set up, but I wish the Doctor's change of heart extended into The End of Time.
The End of Time (parts 1 and 2) - There are a handful of things I really like about the last tenth Doctor story, but many of them are canceled out by arbitrary or, worse, stunningly arbitrary plot points. It's easier to just cover them in bullet points:
- The return of The Master (John Simm) is pretty cool, save for a totally unnecessary inclusion of lightning powers, which leave the Master looking like a reject from Heroes. The Master's plan(s), involving turning an entire planet into versions of himself sounds like a great concept at first, but the execution is so silly that it's hard to maintain half of part 2 with John Simm in various costumes.
- The Doctor spends 80% of The End of Time moping and whining about how he doesn't want to die. This really seems to be more for David Tennant's benefit (speaking directly to the fans) than for the Doctor, since we (and he) are perfectly aware that the Doctor's regenerated before and will again before the series ends. Worse still, Bernard Cribbins is wasted at Donna Noble's grandfather / companion for the special. His role in the prophecy is almost laughable considering how hard Davies tries to make you think that the Master will be knocking "four times."
- Donna Noble gets her memory back, but rather than face certain death, she simply emits some energy that takes out a few Master clones and then passes out - part of the Doctor's "safety measure." It's symptomatic of the way that Davies is simply unwilling to take any risks or offer series shifting twists, even at the end of his run.
- Speaking of which, if you're going to bring back The Time Lords without bothering to explain that when the Doctor said repeatedly he was the "only survivor", he meant that they were actually just locked out of time, then don't immediately dispose of them (and the Master). Give the series some gravity, for crying out loud! It's like suggesting that bringing back Gallifrey physically will "knock Earth out of orbit" but then just smoosh them up next to each other for ten minutes and then undo the whole thing. Why bother?
- On that note, you can't just build up Timothy Dalton as the President of the Council of Gallifrey and then have a throw away line that he's Rassilon. THE Rassilon, who was very dead in The Five Doctors. Like Omega, Rassilon is more of an element of Time Lord history, and not the kind of stunt casting you can expect to get away with if you aren't going to take the character seriously. I certainly hope that we haven't seen the last of the Time Lords (or the Master), but for now Davies leaves us hanging with a not-at-all explained appearance of a long-dead character suddenly back and power hungry.
- When the actual regeneration happens, I'm fine with the Tennant to Smith transition, but the Return of the King-esque sequence where the tenth Doctor visits all of his companions (including a clever cheat to include Rose Tyler) in order to "say goodbye" is more frustrating than poignant. It doesn't help that the series already went this route by bringing all of them together at the end of season four, but it indicates in no way whether we'll see Mickey and Martha join what's left of Torchwood, or why Alonso from "Voyage of the Damned" happens to be in the same bar as Captain Jack Harkness (and every alien from the first four seasons). The inclusion of Sarah Jane Smith in the montage is so pointless one wonders why it was included at all, and an inordinate amount of time is spent making sure we know that Donna Noble is going to be just fine after all.
For his part, Matt Smith has fun with his brief introduction, which manages to top Tennant's "Where was I? Ah yes, Barcelona!" season one cliffhanger. It seems clear that new show runner Steven Moffat is making a clean start, with what looks like a new TARDIS interior and a companion yet to be introduced. Smith is reminiscent of early Peter Davison, which is to say a youthful vigor that could benefit the show greatly as it moves forward.
Overall, the four specials are non-essential viewing. There are interesting ideas, and some fun stories, but none of them are as good as individual episodes from the four years of relaunched Doctor Who, and parts of them are as bad as the series gets. I'm pretty sure you can watch them all on YouTube, so unless you're a die hard fan (like the Cap'n), save your money and catch them elsewhere.
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