Live Review: S8.E1 - Deep Breath

And so it begins. The second half-century, the Doctor's second regeneration cycle, the Twelfth Doctor's era, Series 8 or Season 34... it all begins here with Deep Breath. Following the massive success of the world dominating anniversary special simulcast, Moffat and the crew wanted to capitalise on the show's new found audience and set off on a twelve day world tour to give the first episode of the new series a cinematic preview with Q&A sessions in six countries across all five continents. They were struck by the scale of the show's popularity and recent news that lax security on a server in Miami had lead to the first few episodes leaking and the dubbing delays this lead to for German viewers all seemed like a drop in the ocean. Who fans are loyal and dedicated the whole world over and we don't want spoilers, we want to enjoy the ride. That is why the world tour worked and they were able to screen the first episode each time - the less fortunate majority would be happy to wait a few more days for the television broadcast (again simulcast in several countries) The only disappointment was missing out on the little prequel which we will presumably get to see on DVD/Blu-Ray...

Hopefully, the prequel will fill in the gap nicely, because we last saw the Doctor leaving Trensalore as he completed his regeneration and told Clara he didn't like the colour of his kidneys, then asked if she knew how to fly the TARDIS... we first see them in Deep Breath arriving in Victorian London courtesy of a giant dinosaur...

Season Three Reviews Completed

The turbulent third season was made up of 10 stories across 45 episodes and came to an end with the reasonably high scoring The War Machines which had a score of 72% (matching the two previous season scores). However, even The Daleks' Master Plan's 84% wouldn't be enough to bring the Season Three average in line with its two predecessors because the lows were just too low...

#	Title	Content	Production	Total
018	Galaxy 4	36%	80%	58%
019	Mission to the Unknown	29%	46%	38%
020	The Myth Makers	47%	82%	65%
021	The Daleks' Master Plan	81%	86%	84%
022	The Massacre of St Bartholomew's Eve	38%	62%	50%
023	The Ark	51%	50%	51%
024	The Celestial Toymaker	53%	74%	64%
025	The Gunfighters	43%	78%	61%
026	The Savages	68%	64%	66%
027	The War Machines	68%	76%	72%

The resulting final score for Season Three is therefore just 61%, 11 down on the previous two.
There will now be at least a two week break because I'm away on holiday!