Doctor Who Series 5 Episode 2 - The Beast Below - Review

Starring: Matt Smith, Karen Gillan, Sophie Okonedo & Terrance Hardiman

Written By: Steven Moffat

Directed By: Andrew Gunn

 

With the TARDIS recovered from the battering it received in The Eleventh Hour, it's time for the old police box to take the new Doctor and new companion on their first proper outing in time and space. When the second episode in a series comes along, most shows usually decide to take a step back and calm down a little. But as we all know, Doctor Who is not a typical series, and instead it usually decides to get bigger and even more extravagant. Does The Beast Below follow this trend? Well, it tries to …



Following on from Amy's decision to come traveling with the Doctor, the two arrive on Starship UK – a ship featuring all the different locations of the UK re-built and bolted together whilst traveling through space. The Doctor soon realizes that all is not well aboard the ship as everyone appears to live in fear, and there are multiple mysteries to be solved – such as why there are no vibrations coming from the ship's engines, yet it is still moving. And around every corner, whispers and tales can be heard of a certain beast below the decks of the ship.

 

One of the first things that strikes you about The Beast Below is its impressive and ingenious visuals and design. I doubt there would be many other shows on which you could see the UK bolted together as a ship flying through space. However, the ship is very well designed and conceived, whilst also looking very British as places such as Surrey can clearly be seen on particular parts of the craft. Congratulations also has to go to the production team, as there are many set pieces and designs that can't have been easy to bring to life, particularly the giant “tongue". While the “tongue” scene looks great, and my sympathy goes to Matt Smith and Karen Gillan for having to film it, it raises the question of why the two weren't vomited into space, when the mouth is seen in space at the end of the episode. Nonetheless, another highlight of this episode is Matt Smith's performance as the Doctor. Matt Smith really hit the ground running last week, and this episode gets to show his new Doctor in even better ways, particularly towards the end of the episode where he shows just how powerful he can be, With more time and development, Matt Smith could easily become a Doctor to be remembered.

 

Unfortunately, it's going to be a struggle to say much more positive about this episode, as it suffers from a number of problems and is riddled with more holes in its plot than you'll find in a block of cheese. Now, it's established in the episode that every five years, the people aboard Starship UK are told about the terrible hidden secrets that keep the ship running. Once they've seen this information they are told they have two choices – Protest or Forget. Everyone on board the ship, including Amy when she goes into one of the voting booths, chooses to forget. However, if they choose to forget, why are they constantly seen to be living in fear of the Smilers in the booths? What do they fear? Speaking of the Smilers, they are admittedly creepy in the promotional images, but once we see how little they can actually do, as well as how easily they can be taken down, they fail to be threatening in any way. The Winders didn't fare much better either, because they're pretty pointless in the grand scheme of the actual story, and could have easily just been regular humans.

 

A character that was probably written as somebody sympathetic is Liz Ten. While Sophie Okonedo gives a great performance, the character that she is playing is nowhere near the same quality. You do feel the emotional trauma that she faces towards the end, but for the rest of the time, her character feels flat and very inconsistent. She starts as a mysterious masked figure, but later turns into a gun-wielding monarch, who goes around telling everyone:

 

“I'm the bloody Queen mate. Basically I rule.”.

 

The mystery surrounding her character does little other than raise even more plot holes. For instance, how is it any way possible for Liz Ten not to have made the connection between her mask being over two hundred years old, yet still being perfectly sculpted to her face? Also, why does it take her ten years to reach the Tower of London, when she's the Queen? What is going on? All these plot holes and inconsistencies are due to one reason: The Beast Below is trying far too hard to be mysterious. Obviously, there's nothing wrong with building an episode around a sense of mystery, but here there's so much effort gone into trying to be mysterious, that the answers were never really going to make much sense. While things such as hooded figures being seen in shadowy alleys and subdued lighting do hook the audience in, there are moments early on in the dialogue that feel too vague to feel like words that people would actually use.

 

Steven Moffat has made it clear that while The Eleventh Hour focused on introducing the new Doctor, it was the job of The Beast Below to develop Amy's character and show how important she is to the Doctor. Personally, I welcome this approach as a minor criticism of The Eleventh Hour was that it didn't really show us who Amy was. Unfortunately, The Beast Below doesn't do a great job of fleshing Amy out. While Amy eventually ends up saving the day here, this sudden change felt somewhat out of character compared to the rest of the episode. Her first bit of time away from the Doctor, while it does show her resourcefulness, ultimately ends up with her being kidnapped, and until the final few minutes, she doesn't really do all that much for the majority of the episode. That being said, the relationship between the Doctor and Amy in scenes where the plot slows down for a while, are great to watch, particularly the closing scene of the two in the TARDIS.

 

Overall, The Beast Below is a brave and high-concept episode that sets out to try and deliver a mysterious story, but ultimately falls flat. It has good intentions but its simply trying too hard to be mysterious. Despite Matt Smith's great performance as the Doctor, and some impressive visuals and set designs, central characters such as Liz Ten feel wholly inconsistent, the Smilers are very forgettable, Amy is still in need of much more character development and the entire episode is sadly riddled with plot holes.

 

 

The Beast Below



4/10