📝7/10 = ENJOYABLE!

Thworping through time and space, one adventure at a time!

THIRD IMPRESSIONS: “LOVE & MONSTERS”

Hey, look! It’s the infamous bottle episode from Series 2, known for its ELO-heavy score, weird characters, an alien designed by a child, and a sex joke cruder than anything ever seen or heard on Torchwood!

The silly opening scene introduces us to Elton Pope, who finds Ten and Rose in the middle of an adventure. It’s deliberately over-the-top silly and successfully shows us how the Doctor's adventures might look to an outsider.

The entire episode is built around the idea of obsessive fans and how they could form clubs inspired by the Doctor in hopes of meeting him. While this meta-level commentary is fun, it tends to veer towards parody from time to time.

Love & Monsters breaks the usual formula for the show. It focuses on different characters and looks at the show and its tropes from a new perspective. One of its fine aspects is how it tells Elton’s story and how he witnesses some of the failed alien invasions we've seen throughout Series 1 and 2. Another is the support group-like club (L.I.N.D.A.) formed by the characters, which brings these perfectly normal characters together through shared experiences, music, and song. And then there’s the casual mix of an alien slowly killing the characters while they keep looking for the Doctor, and Elton bonding with Jackie Tyler.

The use of ELO’s music throughout the episode adds to the unique feel. It's very infectious music.

I had forgotten the gut-wrenching twist at the end, revealing that the Doctor failed to save Elton's mother when he was a boy.

Marc Warren is a sympathetic lead and a great audience surrogate, easy to identify with. Shirley Henderson (always Moaning Myrtle for me!) makes for his obsessive, slightly creepy but sweet girlfriend, with a fiery attitude whenever needed to defend the things she holds dear. Her ultimate fate is a bit heartbreaking though.

Peter Kay is the Joseph Furst of the revival. Over the top and with a scenery-chewing presence, he’s impossible to take seriously, but he has that silly villain aura over him that works as long as he looks like a human. Once his true form, the Abzorbaloff, is revealed, he turns into more of a joke. The alien design is based on the winning entry of a monster design contest for children, and what we get here is something that would suit better for The Sarah Jane Adventures of the K9 spinoff.

It’s lovely to see Jackie again, and Camille Coduri truly makes the episode with her fun and warm presence, proving that she is a well-rounded character even when not directly involved with the series regulars. The scenes with her are used effectively to show us how family members react to and cope with being left behind and not knowing what is going on with their loved ones.

All the faces on the Abzorbaloff's body are more cringeworthy than creepy. And the face in the slab thing is a step too far if you ask me (especially when you consider that Elton has “a bit of a love life” with a stone slab).

RANDOM OBSERVATIONS:

• Fun fact: There’s a real club named L.I.N.D.A. (short for Lindas Involved in Network Development Association), and it welcomes anyone named Linda With an I or Lynda With a Y.
• The twin planet of Raxacoricofallapatorius being named Clom is a fun gag.