"The Day of the Doctor" by Steven Moffat, directed by Nick Hurran. Spoilers after the cut.
I saw someone complain that the former Jenna-Louise Coleman's contribution had been neglected by everyone praising the episode so let's start there and acknowledge that she done the acting good. A particularly praiseworthy feat considering she'd just been through a Louise-ectomy, and was now just Jenna Coleman. I really thought the episode could have spent a bit more time investigating the mystery of the missing middle name, but I guess they were busy enough. I thought we might be getting the resolution to the cliffhanger in this episode, and finding out how the Doctor rescued Clara Version 1.0 from that limbo state where she split herself into lots of other versions, and I got grumpy when it turned out we'd skipped ahead and we were at some point after that. But it looks like we'll be getting a return to Trenzilore for Christmas instead. Although if this story takes place after the Christmas Special I'm not sure how we're supposed to get a regeneration in there as well. Timey Wimey I suppose. And speaking of regenerations:
This little cameo was another one overshadowed somewhat by Tom Baker's appearance at the end. Playing, as far as I could tell, a future regeneration of the Doctor from a time when he's so old he's returning to familiar faces. Which reference may be something to do with how the Moff plans to explain how he's acquired a face he already met in Pompeii (I didn't imagine him saying he was going to address that at some point, did I?)
As for "The Day of the Doctor" itself, I liked the fact that its structure wasn't what I might have expected from a big anniversary episode that had been built up as centring on the John Hurt Doctor and his actions that killed all the Time Lords in the Time War. Instead we got more of a romp episode, with three Doctors, some Zygons and Elizabeth I, Queen of, er, Wales apparently. And instead its clever conclusion with a peace treaty where nobody knows which side they're on is the catalyst for the John Hurt Doctor to realise that becoming the David Tennant Doctor and the Matt Smith Doctor is worth the things he has to do. Plus, of course, the return of the Time Lords and Gallifrey. Also, David Tennant's return to the show bringing half the RSC back with him, with Peter de Jersey and Jonjo O'Neill turning up. Actually the latter might have been brought along by Dame William Piper, who was back as not-Rose.
Around the main event there was a lot of other fun stuff - "The Night of the Doctor" short finally gave Paul McGann his regeneration, albeit not into who we thought, and that whole mini-episode just made it look all the more churlish that Christopher Eccleston didn't turn up even for the split second of the regeneration from Doctor Eight-and-a-half to Nine. Of course there was also Mark Gatiss' drama about the show's early days "An Adventure In Space And Time," which a lot of people preferred to the special itself, and I loved (shame it ended on the miscasting of Reece Shearsmith as Patrick Troughton; well, I guess it's not as if Troughton has a whole family of actors who look and sound like him who could have portrayed him... oh.) And then everything's thunder was almost stolen again by Peter Davison's own little comic tribute to the fact that his Doctor hadn't been cast in the Special, "The Five-ish Doctors Reboot." Who knows, maybe that was Doctors Five, Six and Seven under the sheets. All in all although Doctor Who can be particularly hit-and-miss lately, I found little to be disappointed in from the 50th anniversary celebrations.
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