Who you said…? S08E10 In the forest of the night.

Here we are again, ready for a spin through time and space. Turns out we are neither going through time or space this time… Eh well a little space but it is hardly nothing. But that is not to say that this is not an interesting episode. In fact it is a very nicely paced and tense episode that strike a good balance between light-hearted banter and some good old fashion mystery. We also see Danny Pink in action and that is always fun in my mind. Now the story goes as follow.

A small girl dressed in a red overcoat (oh you not so subtle red riding hood reference) knocks on the Doctors door and tell him that she has been sent to find him as it turns out that the entirety of London, and the world have been overgrown by trees. Next we find the dynamic duo of Oswald/Pink as they are having a museum sleepover… Is this I thing… It seems I went to the wrong school when I was young. Any way as the class exit the exhibition they had been straying in they see a big slice of a tree with a strange year ring. Turns out the door is blocked by enough foliage to all but shut them in. It would seem that leaving is not as easy as it seems. As the Doctor and Maven, the girl with the red hood get ahold of Clara and set up a meeting between the two groups with the Doctor and Maven staying at Trafalgar Square and O/P + kids moving from what I assume is the museum of natural history(seeing as they are on Cromwell road) to meet up with them. With the mystery squarely afoot the Doctor take son his oldest nemesis… Wood. 

In the meantime we get to follow the by now rather horrid train wreck of lies and deceit that is Clara’s relationship with Danny as Danny slowly puts together that Clara have been lying right to his face the entire time about her relationship with the Doctor. Things take a turn for the weird when it turns out that Danny is a tiger tamer and that Maven is a conduit for the sentient forest that acts as the guardian of earth. It also turns out that earth is about to be dipped in to the fryer by a solar flare. Hence the mighty morphing power Ents… We get a very nice moment as Clara tell the Doctor that she does not want to be saved because she does not want to be the last of her kind and that this time it is the earth that saves the Doctor. But it turns out that the trees are going to save the earth with oxygen and well everything works out in a way so perfect that even Hallmark would have a hard time writing it.

As I mentioned earlier I really liked the pacing of this episode and while not a massive tension builder it keep a fairly constant level, enough to keep you invested in what was happening. With that said it is a bit sad in my mind when the companion get upstaged twice by a child. First the girl who puked in the TARDIS and now Maven would both make for much more interesting companions then Clara in my mind. But that is just my humble opinion. Beyond that this was a nice little filler episode in which exactly nothing of any real value happened and by the end of it everything was back to normal.

What does Nelson rest his eyes upon..?

But as the teaser for the next episode showed  us.. It is in every way the calm before the storm as we move up on the season finally. I was hoping to see some sort of de-asshattering of the Doctor but he remains the crazy alien. It is like they have to compensate for Tennant and Smiths understanding and well attuned Doctors. Hopefully we will see some change over the final episodes and in to the next season.

The sets in this episode were gorgeous, the organic and lush world mixing with the familiar everyday backdrop made for some very nice sets, even if I am not sure that I have ever seen London that small or empty. Also I have never seen Londoners that passive. But it was a really nice change and whatever you can say about this season it has at least had a very good variation in the sets used.

So if I should say there was a emotional theme in this episode it would be… .. . Caring and open-mindedness. But this was really just a filler.

So let´s get in to a holding pattern on the express elevator to hell as we get ready for next weeks episode.

T.