Vincent And The Doctor - Gaz

Whew!

After last week's shite-fest it's great to see an episode back on the form I've come to expect from this series, it was a great caper. It could have all gone a bit Pete Tong with guest writer Richard Curtis, remember he may have brought the world Blackadder, he also brought us The Boat That Rocked! He's a comic genius when he's on form, exhibit a) Blackadder II, but can also be fantastically sentimental and over the top, exhibit b) Love Actually.

Of course a lot of what works and does not work for Richard Curtis can be tied to who he works with, such as Rowan Atkinson and Hugh Grant, so it's great to see something where he's without any of his familiar players... errr hold on, there's Bill Nighy there only slightly hamming it up as Dr Black, the art historian, but he did no wrong and clearly was not out to set to steal anyone else's thunder.

I thought it was a wonderful episode that played to the strengths of Richard Curtis, such as witty dialogue,  romantic notions and some wonderful nostalgia for an age that never existed then and does not even exist now, but we all would like to think it could. That means it was light on the science-fiction, and many ways better for it, for the first time in years it was nice to see the sonic screwdriver removed as a solution and a plot device... it's a fuckin' tool for fuck's sake, not a character, nor something to resolve every episode.

Now to the heart of the episode, loss, for that's what it was about. For Amy it's about her unknown, but still felt loss of Rory, for The Doctor it's the loss of control. He knows something is going amiss with the universe, but he's really at a point where he cannot grasp as to why and for Vincent, well he's just losing his battle with his mental capabilities (I'd have said his loss of marbles, but that seems cruel, insensitive and really I'm not sure if he liked to play with them, knuckle bones or dominoes). Bravo to Tony Curran for his portrayal of Vincent though, bravo!

It was an emotional episode, there is no denying that, what I was impressed with was it's range of joy (Amy and The Doctor at the gallery and then meeting Vincent), sorrow (the sunflowers and the return to the gallery), the hope (Vincent) and the despair (Vincent and Amy). Great work from the guest writer, Neil Gaiman next year has some big shoes to fill an will the Stephen Fry episode ever get written and then brought to screen? 

I liked:

The caper aspect of this weeks episode

Not a timey-whimy-crack-n'-space-n'-timey in sight

Tony Curran as Vincent.... bravo again sir, bravo

The design of the episode

I disliked:

The killed a blind space rhino with an easel... ewww, that was just cruel

I'm need to be convinced:

Next weeks episode is looking like a weird, potentially lame version of Spaced

Next week on Spaced... errrr Doctor Who