Time and Space: A Doctor Who Journey

Series 1, Episode 2 : The End of the World
Written By : Russell T. Davies
Directed by : Eros Lyn
Villians : The Lady Cassandra O'Brien
Synopsis: The Doctor takes Rose on her first journey in time to the year 5 billion and the day the planet Earth is destroyed by the expanding Sun.  They find themselves on a Platform One with a group of various aliens gathered to watch.  Sabotage and murder are at work and the Doctor and Rose must race to solve the mystery before it's too late.

Trust me, this show gets better as it goes.  I have known a ton of people who after the first few episodes have given up on this show.  Don't stop now.  By the time you get to "The Empty Child" you'll be hooked!  This episode is primarily used to establish a relationship between Rose and the Doctor.  Everything starts out good and Rose seems to be handling this new experience quite well until an old Earth song seems to give her a crisis of faith.  She wonders what she has done, running off with this man she knows nothing about to a place she can't even go home from without his help.  In true Doctor fashion he finds a way to reassure her by charging up her cell phone so she can make calls home no matter where or when she is.

The introduction of multiple species of aliens begins to give a sense of the scope that this show is capable of.  From the Face of Boe, to Jabe the tree alien to the blue servant class we see that this show is only limited by the writer and designers imaginations.  We also see the absolute charisma that the Doctor exudes.  He is able to calm down situations and get people (or aliens) to follow him willingly and sacrifice themselves for him without a second thought.

The Face of Boe is one of my favorite minor characters from this show.  The debate about who he is can go on for eternity and I hope that they keep us guessing forever on this one.  I think it's more fun to not have a clear answer on this one.

Some of the best humor in this episode is found in the references to Earth of the past.  It makes you wonder if in the future things such as a jukebox and an Ipod could so easily get confused with one another.   They both have the same function, so I suppose it is plausible that this could really happen.

Overall, this episode was a little weak for my taste.  I realize that they are still establishing the characters at this point, but it almost seems as though they focused too much on the flashy things they could do with this show (they apparently used a large portion of the entire series budget to do the effects on this episode) and a little less on the witty banter that truly carries this show.

Rating: 6 out of 10

Interesting Details:

• The year 12,005 is the New Roman Empire in Earth's history.
• 5 Billion years in the future is knows as the year 5.5/apple/6
• Platform One prohibits the use of weapons, teleportation and religion
• The first use of psychic paper is in this episode
• The first appearance of The Face of Boe, who is also the sponsor of the event
• This episode pokes fun at the human race's obsession with beauty and cosmetic surgery.
• Cassandra describes an ostrich as something more like a dragon
• One of "humanities greatest composers" is apparently Soft Cell with the song "Tainted Love"
• The speaking of English in the show is explained as the TARDIS having a telepathic field
• The Mox and The Face of Boe are discussing "the Bad Wolf scenario"
• Cassandra has had 708 operations
• Jabe is a direct descendant of the tropical rainforest
• Brittney Spears song "Toxic" is referred to as a traditional ballad
• Jabe is the first character to sacrifice herself to save the Doctor
• Rose tries unsuccessfully to stop the Doctor from allowing Cassandra to die
• The Doctor reveals that his planet was destroyed in the Time War and he is the last of his kind
• The Time War is mentioned once in this episode
• The title is spoken once in this episode
• There are 4 mentions of chips in this episode