"Time may change me..."

From the Doctor Who trailer for Season 14 - best eight second time travel joke ever.

- Sid

Chef Who.

Idris: Are all people like this?
The Doctor: Like what?
Idris: So much bigger on the inside.

The Doctor's Wife, Doctor Who

I just received  the above late-arriving Christmas from my sister-in-laws Lisa and Stefanie - I am always touched that anyone would care enough to find something that so perfectly matches my interests in life.  Thank you so very much!

- Sid

"The Doctor will see you now!!"

Atraxi:  YOU ARE NOT OF THIS WORLD.
The Doctor:  No, but I've put a lot of work into it.

Doctor Who, The Eleventh Hour.

Easter Sunday, and I honestly have to wonder how many people are spending any time at church today? When I was younger, Easter Sunday was a significant religious holiday which more or less closed down the country, but I see that a lot of stores and restaurants are open, and the Easter Bunny seems to be as much of an object of worship as Christ.

I can't be too critical, though, since you might say that I have also chosen to worship at a different altar - I've just finished watching The Eleventh Hour, the first episode of the new season of Doctor Who.

It's very tempting to make unfair comparisons between the previous incumbents and Matt Smith, the new Doctor.  (I briefly considered titling this post: David Tennant Light.)  However, I think that it's worth taking a moment to consider the unique nature of the Doctor Who series.

Unlike any other ongoing series, Doctor Who has an institutionalized method whereby the actor playing the main character can be replaced.  The process of regeneration allows the program to be virtually immortal (rather like the Doctor himself).  Actors can grow bored or grow old, move on, get fired, and the character simply regenerates - presto!  A new Doctor takes the place of the old one.

However, this process presents an odd challenge for both actors and writers. For the actor, it's a bit like doing Hamlet or Macbeth - the part has been played by many other actors, each of whom has left his mark, and it's now up to the new performer to offer what will hopefully be a new and different interpretation of the role while still remaining true to the essential nature of the character.

For the writer, it's almost the opposite.  The writer starts by wanting to be faithful to the character of the Doctor, as they have to be - the Doctor is the center around which the show revolves, after all. But there's always been a tacit understanding that after a regeneration, the Doctor is a new person, which allows for some innovation, and of course each new actor has strengths and weaknesses that need to be written to.

So, all that being said, how does Matt Smith fit into the Doctor template?

Short answer:  he's a pretty damn good fit.  In fact, he's such a good fit that I completely forgot about the fact that he was the new guy while watching the episode.  He's less dramatic than David Tennant was in his first appearance, but again, different actors, and I'd be willing to say that it might just be that he's making a deliberate effort to bring some steadiness to the role. As the youngest actor to portray the Doctor, it may be that the 27-year old Smith is trying to balance his perceived youth with some gravity, and we'll see how that develops over the long run.

Second-guessing aside, I'd give Mr. Smith a strong A, possibly even an A+ for his debut, but I'll certainly be watching that mark as the season develops.  Oh, and there's none of this David Tennant four-specials-a-year coyness, they're going right into a standard 13-episode run, with a fresh program next week.  The trailer at the end of the debut episode showed an intriguing mix for the upcoming shows:  olive drab Daleks with Union Jack flag decals, Stonehenge, vampires, Spitfires in space, lizard men, and (I think) van Gogh.

As always, I'll be downloading the episodes as they come, but those of you with more patience, less computer savvy, or just a stronger sensitivity to the international copyright laws will be able to watch the new season starting April 17th on the Space Channel.

- Sid

P.S.  The dissipated looking Easter Bunny is my niece, Jody.  There's a matching shot of a little fuzzy tail, but I'm trying to keep a Family rating for this blog, or at least PG.

P.P.S.  At the start of every week we have a staff meeting which starts out with everyone saying what they did on the weekend.  I was the only person who downloaded a Doctor Who episode...sigh...sometimes it's lonely.

It's Matt Smith, it's Matt Smith!!!!

Today the BBC announced that 26-year-old Matt Smith would be replacing David Tennant as the Doctor on Doctor Who in 2010. My reaction, and I suspect the reaction of almost everyone, seems fitting.

Who?

- Sid

A successful ten bucks on Robbie Williams would nicely take care of Christmas presents.

David Tennant, who has been playing the role of the Doctor on Doctor Who for the last three years, has announced that he will be stepping down from the helm of the Tardis at the end of 2009. Sad news, but I can certainly understand why someone would want to get out before it completely took over their life, as has happened with more than a few cast members from Star Trek and its various permutations.

Of course, the immediate question that arises is: who will replace the talented Mr. Tennant? (One has to give full points to series script editor Gerry Davis and producer Innes Lloyd, who were jointly responsible for introducing in 1966 the idea of the Doctor's regeneration as a tool for continuing the series in spite of old age, boredom, and unsuitability on the part of lead actors. Hopefully raises were involved.)

I was surprised to learn that it's possible to gamble on the identity of the new Doctor, and that there is a substantial odds list available:

ODDS ON NEW DOCTOR FROM PADDY POWER (3rd Nov 2008)

• 2/1 David Morrisey
• 6/1 Paterson Joseph
• 8/1 James Nesbitt, Chiwetel Ejiofor
• 10/1 Russell Tovey, John Simm
• 12/1 Anthony Head
• 14/1 Robert Carlyle, David Walliams
• 16/1 Richard E Grant
• 18/1 Richard Coyle, Aidan Gillen, Alan Davies, Sean Pertwee
• 20/1 Jason Statham, Harry Lloyd, Nigel Harman, Marc Warren, Jack Davenport
• 25/1 Julian Walsh, Adrian Lester, Alexander Armstrong
• 33/1 Julian Rhind-Tutt, Rupert Penry-Jones, James McAvoy
• 40/1 Bill Nighy, Stephen Fry, Ben Wishaw
• 50/1 John Barrowman, Ben Miles, David Suchet, Hugh Laurie
• 66/1 Gary Oldman, Matt Smith, Paul Bettany, Joel Beckett, Christopher Eccleston
• 80/1 Alex Kingston, Dean Lennox Kelly, Christopher Villiers
• 100/1 Ricky Gervais
• 150/1 Hugh Grant, Russell Brand, Vinnie Jones
• 200/1 Robbie Williams

Personally, I'd like to see Sean Pertwee get in: as the son of Jon Pertwee, the third Doctor, there's a certain geeky appeal to having him step into the role, and he has some background in the genre. (Apparently he also put fifty quid on himself, according to an interview in The Sun.)

A few of the candidates are black, and one can imagine that there's a tempting synergy involved in following the election of Barack Obama with a Doctor of colour - but wait, why is there only one woman on the list? I'm aware that Joanna Lumley was under consideration a few years back, and David Tennant jokingly suggested that Billie Piper could step into his place quite easily, although for me that would involve one hell of a script. British comedian Jennifer Saunders has been mentioned in connection with the part, although apparently just for a one-off appearance.

For myself, I think that Claudia Black would make a fabulous Doctor*. She has an impressive resumé in the genre, would come with an established fan base, and she's drop dead good looking, something for which Doctor Who has not always been noted. Her transition from Aeryn Sun on Farscape to Vala Mal Doran on Stargate SG-1 demonstrates an ability to move from serious to comedic roles, something that would suit the Doctor's character.

Circumstantial evidence (and smart bettors) would seem to be leaning toward David Morrissey, whose picture appears at the top of this posting beside Ms. Black's. I'm a bit sceptical about Mr. Morrissey, to be honest. Successful Doctors have always had a slight spark of craziness in their personalities - nothing personal, but the man looks as exciting as dry toast. Oh well, let's not give up yet: there's always that 100 to 1 shot that Ricky Gervais will get it.

- Sid

* November 21 - And then the Doctor would be a woman, and Black - I'm sorry, I waited a week but I finally couldn't hold out any more.

We'll go with "incestuous" for this one.

Over the last few years, television science fiction series have become oddly...recursive? incestuous? - you know, I couldn't find a term that was appropriate. I refer to the practise of casting both guest spots and ongoing roles using actors who have appeared in other shows. Ben Browder and Claudia Black from Farscape ended up on Stargate SG-1, as did Robert Picardo from Voyager, (who then moved to Stargate Atlantis, along with Jewel Staite from Firefly); James Marsters from Buffy the Vampire Slayer did a recurring role on Smallville and a guest spot on Torchwood, and Anthony Head did one on Doctor Who; Andreas Katsulas from Babylon 5 showed up on Enterprise; and in the great recursive coup of all time, Richard Hatch returned to Battlestar Galactica.

But somehow all of that seems to pale against recent events from Doctor Who. Rumour has it that David Tennant, the Doctor, has recently started dating Georgia Moffett, who appeared in an episode of Doctor Who entitled "The Doctor's Daughter" in the titular role of the Doctor's daughter. Just to make the situation a little weirder than it already sounds, Ms. Moffett is actually the daughter of Peter Davison, who played the fifth incarnation of Doctor Who. So, just to clarify that, they cast the daughter of the fifth Doctor to play the daughter of the current Doctor, who then decided to ask her out. I realize that there's nothing actually wrong with any of that, it just seems odd, somehow.

- Sid

Sequels, Endings and Unendings.

As part of a recent income tax refund spending spree, I made an impulse purchase of the post-series Stargate SG-1 movie The Ark of Truth. I've followed Stargate SG-1 to a greater or lesser extent over the years, and although it's never been one of my favourites, for the most part I've been pleased with the show. 

However, I found The Ark of Truth less than impressive, especially when compared with similar offerings from other science fiction series over the years. 

As far as research reveals, science fiction originates the idea of the post-series movie. It's possible that Star Trek breaks ground on the concept, although my good friend Alan pointed out, the Peter Cushing Doctor Who movies from the 60's may have a better claim as the first TV-series-to-movie films. Regardless of which series gets the ball rolling, the genre has certainly taken to the idea, especially in cases where cancellation has prevented the completion of a major story arc, as in the cases of Farscape and Firefly. 

The Peacekeeper Wars - a marvellous title - is Farscape's entry into the post-cancellation sweepstakes, and as such sets the standard in terms of quality. Massive fleets meet in apocalyptic combat, a major character dies, the two lead characters marry in a hail of mortar shells and gunfire, the existence of the galaxy itself is threatened, and the post-climax dénouement provides a touching and appropriate conclusion to the series. (I have to confess to a certain degree of bias here, I feel that Claudia Black, who plays Aeryn Sun, may be the most beautiful woman on the planet.) 

Coincidentally, Serenity, the Firefly movie, has some of the same elements, including huge fleets of starships in battle and the death of a major character - or two - or three. However, Joss Whedon's unique style makes any sort of comparison irrelevant, and Serenity has the sort of ambiguous morality that he seems to build into all of his work. 

And so to The Ark of Truth - how does it miss the mark compared to Serenity or The Peacekeeper Wars? I think that I was expecting something more dramatic and with less deus ex machina. The parallel story lines of Ori and Replicators are both resolved almost casually - admittedly at the last moment, but there was no real sense of tension and climax to either resolution.  Yes, the characters are all in danger, yes, it comes down to the last moment, but in both cases the "last minute" solution comes and goes with no sense of drama, to the point where I found myself wondering thinking, "That was it? That's all?". 

I'll be fair and say that The Ark of Truth isn't terrible, but it's not great, either, it's basically an average episode of the TV series. The only bright spot was an unexpectedly monologue by Teal'c which for the first time in the series offered some insight into his guilt about his actions as First Prime to Apophis. 

The unfortunate thing is that in the Stargate SG-1 series finale, Unending, the writers came up with a brilliantly simple series send-off that really didn't require a followup, regardless of whether or not the menace of the Ori was ever dealt with. The idea of trapping the major characters in a bubble of time for sixty years sounds boring, but it offers an ideal opportunity for those characters to reveal their true natures when faced with a completely different kind of tension and pressure. 

Michael Shanks delivers what may be his best speech in the entire ten years of the series during a poignant, vulnerable scene between his character Daniel and Vala, played by Claudia Black. Interestingly, the scene was rewritten entirely after the two actors found that the original version "didn't feel like the characters". 

Apparently there's another Stargate SG-1 movie in the pipe, but I have to say that I'm going to be a bit leery about running right out and buying it at full price. After all, once bitten and all that, and unless it's substantially better than The Ark of Truth, it won't be difficult to find it in the 2 for $10 box at HMV.

- Sid

"Tonight, when they asleep, I gonna escape..."

Donna: "And I tried, I did try. I went to Egypt - I was going to go barefoot and everything. And then it's all bus trips and guide books and don't drink the water and two weeks later you're back home. It's nothing like being with you. I must have been mad turning down that offer."

The Doctor: "What offer?"

Donna: "To come with you."

Doctor Who, Partners in Crime

"I never fully understood the label of "escapist" till my friend Professor Tolkien asked me the very simple question, 'What class of men would you expect to be most preoccupied with, and most hostile to, the idea of escape?' and gave the obvious answer: jailers."

C. S. Lewis, On Science Fiction

Thanks to the miracle of the internet, yesterday I was able to download the premier episode of the fourth season of Doctor Who, featuring the return of Catherine Tate as Donna Noble, the eponymous Runaway Bride from the second Christmas Special. I have to confess to mixed feelings about the new episode, but it does point out an interesting perspective on fans of science fiction and fantasy.

The new Doctor Who episode, Partners in Crime, ostensibly deals with yet another threat to Earth, this time in the form of diet pills that convert first fat and then the rest of the body into alien "children". As plots go, it certainly doesn't measure up to the standards set by previous episodes, but to be honest I don't think it's intended to. The alien Adipose are simply an excuse for the Doctor and Donna to reunite and strike sparks off each other. And there are definitely sparks, there's obviously a strong chemistry between the two actors that gives their scenes an over-the-top energy.

However, I'm a bit worried that this season will suffer because of that very energy. The scene where the two see each other for the first time is certainly funny, but again, it's an over-the-top funny, and I'd hate to see the writers get distracted by that aspect of the relationship.

My concerns may be premature, though. There are some very good (and completely serious) bits describing Donna's dull and meaningless life, and an excellent scene wherein she tries to explain that lack of adventure to the Doctor as being the reason why she's been looking for him in hopes of joining him on the TARDIS. (Which, by the way, the Doctor obviously views as a mixed blessing.)

One of the criticisms levied against science fiction and fantasy over the years has been that they are "escapist" genres, although why that would be a bad thing I have no idea. In this case, it is literally escapist, in that Donna has fixated on the idea of exchanging her boring life for one of adventures in time and space with the Doctor. In the context of the episode, her determination to find "the right man" is considered to be admirable by her grandfather*, and pointless by her mother.

However, in the context of the real world, everyone watching the show has made the same decision that Donna has, although hopefully not to the extent of being unemployed and living with their mother. On a weekly basis, we've decided that we would rather vicariously travel the universe with an alien than, oh, do dishes or watch a hockey game.

"Escape" - it's an interesting description of what we're doing, and as C. S. Lewis points out, strongly suggests imprisonment.

As I've mentioned in an earlier post, my family did not have a lot of money when I was growing up, and I have to wonder if that was in any way a factor in my interest in science fiction and fantasy. I wonder if there are any statistics connecting low income with a desire to escape into another world? The stereotype of the socially inept SF geek is firmly established in the cultural matrix now, but which comes first, the chicken or the egg? I think that it's perfectly logical for someone who is being beaten up at lunchtime on a daily basis to want to escape, to seek refuge in a completely different universe: The Lord of the Rings, where the hero is small and weak, Star Wars, with its boyish saviour of the day, and so on. Spiderman's alter ego, Peter Parker, is a science nerd, and Captain America was originally someone so weak and skinny that they couldn't get into the army. Harry Potter? Adopted kid who lives under the stairs.

Part of the reason for my childhood interest in science fiction was because my mother was a fan, although I doubt if she thought of it in exactly those terms - I think that my mother would have found the term "fan" to be an inappropriate designation. I suspect that for her, science fiction was most definitely an escape, a gateway to a more interesting place than the one where she'd ended up. Considering that she had relocated from England to Toronto, and then to Muskoka, I sometimes wonder if my mother had spent her whole life trying to escape.

Coincidentally, she used to say that if a UFO landed in the yard, she would jump on board. Mother, this posting is dedicated to you - hopefully you would have seen a kindred spirit in the Doctor's new companion.

- Sid

* Donna's Grandfather made an appearance in the 2007 Christmas Special as a news stand operator, but when I saw him again in Partners in Crime I thought to myself, "Wait, who is that?" The character of Wilfred Mott is played by Bernard Cribbins, who, in addition to his numerous other film, stage and television appearances, co-starred with Peter Cushing in the 1966 Doctor Who movie, Invasion Earth 2150 AD. I can only hope that they'll write in a reference to that- after all, Sarah Jane Smith made a guest appearance, why not police officer Tom Campbell?

Antici.....(say it).....pation.

Boxing Day in Vancouver - well, everywhere, I suppose, although I'm not certain of the internationality of the concept - and I'm sitting here at the computer watching BitTorrent struggle with three different downloads of the 2007 Doctor Who Christmas Special, guest starring Kylie Minogue. In theory, at least one of them will be finished by lunch...perhaps leftover turkey and David Tennant? 

- Sid

Postscript: Lunch was in fact spent watching the Christmas Special. Not a great episode when compared to some previous scripts, although Kylie did a reasonably good job and was an acceptable romantic interest for the episode. Considering that the entire episode took place on a ship called the Titanic, it was really more of an homage to The Poseidon Adventure.

"Twas the night before Christmas."

In spite of its religious origins, Christmas has ended up as the ultimate fantasy holiday, an odd blend of wish fulfillment, time travel and good will. Santa Claus somehow fills innumerable stockings overnight - but how? Tachyon reindeer? Teleportation technology? Cloning? Sorry, no, none of those options are ever mentioned, which indicates that the tradition of Saint Nick defies scientific explanation. NORAD's annual announcements about Santa's progress around the globe just seem wrong, somehow - one would expect that Kris Kringle's exploits are taking place on a plane removed from that of radar and tracking satellites.

The holiday season occupies an interesting role in the SF/fantasy canon, with several prominent examples to demonstrate the extremes. An often overlooked (or miscategorized) example is Dicken's A Christmas Carol, a ghost story mixed with time travel that sets the standard for the concept, as witnessed by the countless adaptations and reworkings of the character of Scrooge and his Christmas Eve experience. Doctor Who pays tribute to Dickens' contribution in the episode "The Unquiet Dead", which coincidentally takes place on Christmas Eve, 1869. And, given C. S. Lewis' almost militant Christianity, it's always surprised me a little that Father Christmas makes an appearance in The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe, although to be fair the history of the original Saint Nicholas is a deeply Christian one.

The oddest entry in the canon would have to be Harlan Ellison's short story, "Santa Claus versus S.P.I.D.E.R", which portrays Santa Claus as a James Bond-influenced superspy whose red suit makes him into a walking armoury. The second oddest may be Clive Barker's "The Yattering and Jack", wherein a demon reanimates the Christmas turkey as it sizzles in the oven. (Anyone planning to cook a turkey tomorrow, imagine if the damn thing battered its way out of the oven and attacked you.) H. P. Lovecraft's "The Festival", a quietly horrifying description of "traditional" holiday celebrations, runs a close third.

Terry Pratchett gives us one of the best long-form tributes to the season in Hogfather, which deals with the Discworld version of Santa Claus. It's easy to take Pratchett's pork-dispensing character as a simple parody, but, as with all of Pratchett's creations, the underlying elements that he references provide a fascinating perspective on the evolution of mythic figures.

However, when I started this posting, one work came immediately to mind as the most memorable seasonal piece: Arthur C. Clarke's short story, "The Star", an uncharacteristically somber piece for Clarke. A Jesuit scientist, part of an expedition to the Phoenix Nebula, discovers that the supernova which produced the nebula destroyed a civilization not unlike our own. His other discovery shakes his faith:

There can be no reasonal doubt: the ancient mystery is solved at last. Yet, oh God, there were so many stars you could have used. What was the need to give these people to the fire, that the symbol of their passing might shine above Bethlehem?

- Sid

"Wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey stuff."

People assume that time is a strict progression of cause to effect, but actually, from a non-linear, non-subjective viewpoint, it's more like a big ball of wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey stuff.

The Doctor, Blink

Time travel stories, I love a good time travel story. Obviously this would make me a strong candidate to be a Doctor Who fan, although I freely admit to having been in and out over the years. Recently I've been downloading episodes of the current season that have been posted by English fans, and in spite of a couple of shaky concepts they're doing some quite nice stories. (Hopefully this blatant confession won't result in a lightning raid by BBC copyright commandos. Given that I'm in Vancouver, British Columbia, which is damn near the other side of the planet from England, I should be safe unless they have some kind of agreement with the CBC black ops teams. But I digress...)

The most recent Doctor Who episode is entitled Blink, and deals with the sort of time travel opportunities that are parodied in Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey - decide to use your time machine to go into the past to set up things so that you win a fight in the present, then go back to set things up after you win the fight. In this case the Doctor gets sent back in time without the TARDIS, but sends messages to someone in our time to get it back - and then gets the information he needs to set things up after everything is resolved, but before it takes place in his personal timeline.

This directly addresses the real question of time travel: can you change the course of events? The two basic philosophies here are that you can't change things in the past because you didn't - commonly known as the Grandfather Paradox - or that it's an open field, in which future events exist in an indeterminate state. (For those unfamiliar with the concept, the Grandfather Paradox is as follows: build a time machine, go back to the past, kill your grandfather at the age of ten. As a result, your father is never born, you're never born, and you don't build a time machine. So you DON'T go into the past, you DON'T kill your grandfather, your father IS born, you're born, you build a time machine... It's easier to assume that the gun must have jammed when you tried to shoot the little bugger, or, in the big picture viewpoint, if you went back in time to kill Hitler before he starts the Nazi party, you'd fail, because history records that he did start it.)

Both of these philosophies have given rise to some interesting stories, although the approaches required are wildly different. The landmark story for the open field approach is Ray Bradbury's A Sound of Thunder. All you need to do is to step on a butterfly while trying to shoot a dinosaur that's going to die anyway, and the result is a slightly but significantly changed future. (This begs a bigger question, which is why anyone with a time machine would waste their, ah, time running tours into the past so that people can shoot T. Rex. If things were at the point where it was that popularized, I would think that flattened butterflies would be the least of your worries.)

The cast-in-stone position is less obviously interesting, simply because it's less exciting. Going back in time with an anthill and coming back to find out that the ants have evolved into the dominant species and destroyed humanity is a bit more of a climactic ending than coming back and finding out that they haven't. The predestination stories tend to read a bit like inverted detective stories, with the characters running around like mad making sure that all the clues are in place to ensure that the crime happens. There's often a loose thread that miraculously weaves back in at the end, just to ensure that all's well historically. A good example of this would be Connie Willis' To Say Nothing of the Dog, which is rather like the time travel version of The Importance of Being Earnest.

- Sid

The Good, The Bad, and the Tardis

 

In short, the straw of a manufactured realism with which the sf writer makes his particular literary bricks must be entirely convincing to the reader in its own right, or the whole story will lose its power to convince.

- Gordon R. Dickson

The future depicted in a good SF story ought to be in fact possible, or at least plausible.

- Frederik Pohl

A lot of the definitions of science fiction that I've read tend to deal with what makes for good science fiction - not a bad thing to have definitions that concentrate on quality, although I think that some of the motivation for that sort of definition comes from a kind of defensiveness about the genre, as per Sturgeon's Law. 

For a perfect example of the line that divides good SF from bad SF, let us turn to the popular media - okay, the BBC, but still - and take a look at the reborn Doctor Who. 

In the first season, with the excellent Christopher Eccleston capably filling the Doctor's shoes, there was a two-part episode: The Empty Child and The Doctor Dances. Set in WWII London, the Doctor is presented with the odd phenomenon of an inhumanly powerful child, wandering the streets in a gas mask while looking for his mother. Even odder, the child's condition appears to be contagious - people are mysteriously changing into gas-mask faced entities requesting their mummy. 

This is explained as being the work of military medical nanobots from a crashed spaceship, nanobots that have no idea that the model they are using to rebuild the population of London is in fact a flawed one (people not normally having gas masks for faces, even in London) and the boy's powers being the result of being brought up to alien military spec. 

This would qualify as "good" SF by my standards: an apparently inexplicable situation which is logically explained within the context established by the plot. 

Sadly, David Tennant, Mr. Eccleston's equally gifted replacement, is not always as ably supported by plotline. In The Idiot's Lantern, once again people are falling prey to a mysterious ailment, this time in 1953 London: after watching television, their faces vanish. (I've often thought that might happen.) 

After seeing a sort of corral full of faceless victims, the Doctor finds a room full of TVs, each one containing a missing face. Apparently this is because an alien entity known as the Wire is stealing energy from people. 

What? Why in the world would that cause their faces to vanish? How do these faceless, mouthless, noseless remnants breathe? Shouldn't they all be dead in about four minutes? Sadly, this episode rings the bell for bad SF, where the science fiction element is really just for show, intended to create an interesting visual effect but with nothing in the plot to explain why and how such a thing would happen. 

And, as a postscript to the whole thing, it really does make me wonder if I'd feel safe living in London.

- Sid