Bye, Bye RTD

On January 1st the BBC aired the conclusion of The End of Time and it was, sort of, the end of an era. With this episode Russel T. Davies has resigned his post at the helm of one of the most historied and beloved tv series ever, and he went out, not with a whimper, but a bang.

While I admire Davies for resurrecting the old sci-fi classic with such panache and marketing savvy, I am not really sorry to see him go. The episode that made me fall in love with the show was The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances two-parter from the 2005 season, and that was penned by Steven Moffat, who will be taking over for Davies in the new season.

I'm bouncing-in-my-seat excited about what the new season will bring, but in the meantime I'm happy to engage in a little nostalgia for the Davies-era. Here is a good, not overly sentimental look back at Davies' work with Doctor Who.

Whoops Apocolypse by Paul Kirkley (excerpt below)

From the beautiful chips-and-friendships coda of The End of the World to the holographic Doctor telling Rose to have a fantastic life; from that devastating farewell on Bad Wolf Bay – “I’m burning up a sun, just to say goodbye” – to the whip-smart, deliciously timey-wimey first meeting with Martha Jones; from the Doctor and Donna’s hilarious mime in Partners in Crime to our hero’s heartbreaking final sacrifice, curled up like a helpless child in the bottom of that glass booth, this was television built to last. Though whether it will last five billion years, like the respective oeuvres of Soft Cell and Britney Spears, remains to be seen.