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Series 1 Boxset:
Series 2 Part 4:
Series 2 Boxset:

Director:

James Strong

Screenplay:

Matt Jones

Cast:

The Doctor: David Tennant
Rose Tyler: Billie Piper
Mr Jefferson: Danny Webb
Zachary Cross Flane: Shaun Parkes
Toby Zed: Will Thorp
Ida Scott: Claire Rushbrook
Danny Bartock: Ronny Jhutti
Scooti Manista: Myanna Buring
The Ood: Paul Kasey
Voice of The Beast: Gabriel Woolf
Voice of the Ood: Silas Carson

Synopsis: A demonic being controls The Ood, willing them to kill the crew of the mining station.. while 10 miles underground, The Doctor descends into a gigantic pit...

The Satan Pit continues the excellent work begun last week in The Impossible Planet, with telepathic slave race The Ood now being controlled by a demonic entity beneath the planet's surface - and under orders to kill the crew. As Rose and the crew try to defeat them, The Doctor makes a descent into the pit.

After a shaky start, in which a lot of last week's tension and expectation is extinguished, only to be replaced with tired sequences of people scurrying around inside air vents, The Satan Pit soon regains momentum to deliver memorable scenes and fine examples of Doctor Who morality.

There are emotional death scenes sprinkled throughout the show, although the writing often embraces the sci-fi clichés of deaths that involve slow stragglers, hatches that can't open for the good of the majority, and verbal obituaries from the Captain.

Still, for every moment of laughably forced humanity delivered with total seriousness, there are some decent monologues to keep the balance right, particularly when The Doctor discusses the human impulse to explore dangerous environments out of sheer curiosity.

Matt Jones' writing affords David Tennant some jucier moments to relish; likewise Billie Piper, although the latter's assuming command of a futuristic crew rings totally false. No matter, as Piper gives her best performance of the year upon hearing The Doctor's supposed death/loss. As an actress, she can definitely rise to the challenge of big emotions (and death doesn't come much bigger), so I only hope the writers create more situations for Rose to show her mettle in a believable manner, instead of flashing a toothy grin every five minutes and delivering misplaced gags.

The visual-effects are just as strong as last week, with the new space sequences and a rocket take-off being fine additions to the Who canon. But the most striking and accomplished visual (perhaps of the entire show up till now) comes in the form of The Beast itself - a gigantic horned demon chained inside the titular pit (right).

A combination of Lord Of The Rings' Balrog and The Darkness from Legend (with a hint of Jason & The Argonauts), it's a stunning CGI achievement that increases the sense of grandeur further, making The Satan Pit particularly epic. Of course, the downside is that it illustrates just how comparatively pedestrian and childish the rest of the series has been (New Earth and School Reunion the biggest offenders).

Overall, this is a strong continuation that only falters with some sloppy clichés in the first ten minutes. By the time the action has built up its momentum again, culminating in the excellent Beast sequence with The Doctor, then The Satan Pit is a guaranteed favourite.

It was also interesting to see an episode conclude without a neatly-explained denouement from The Doctor, who instead admits some of the mysteries will never be solved (well, I'm sure the religious connotations also had something to do with it…)

If you also forgive an extremely unlikely plot contrivance with the TARDIS in the closing moments, you can't deny The Satan Pit offers a level of competence and scares rarely seen in Who these days…

NEXT WEEK: A man called Elton Pope becomes obsessed with finding The Doctor...

OVERALL

Review copyright © Dan Owen, 2006.

The following is a list of all the Doctor Who content reviewed to date :

2008			Series 30, Episode 13 - "Journey's End", by Dan Owen
2008			Series 30, Episode 12 - "The Stolen Earth", by Dan Owen
2008			Series 30, Episode 11 - "Turn Left", by Dan Owen
2008			Series 30, Episode 10 - "Midnight", by Dan Owen
2008			Series 30, Episode 8 - "Silence in the Library" (part 1 of 2), by Dan Owen
2008			Series 30, Episode 7 - "The Unicorn and The Wasp", by Dan Owen
2008			Series 30, Episode 6 - "The Doctor's Daughter", by Dan Owen
2008			Series 30, Episode 5 - "The Poison Sky" (Part 2 of 2), by Dan Owen
2008			Series 30, Episode 4 - "The Sontaran Stratagem" (Part 1 of 2), by Dan Owen
2008			Series 30, Episode 3 - "Planet of the Ood", by Dan Owen
2008			Series 30, Episode 2 - "The Fires of Pompeii", by Dan Owen
2008			Series 30, Episode 1 - "Partners In Crime", by Dan Owen

2006			Series 28, Episode 1 - "New Earth", by Dan Owen
2006			Series 28, Episode 2 - "Tooth & Claw", by Dan Owen
2006			Series 28, Episode 3 - "School Reunion", by Dan Owen
2006			Series 28, Episode 4 - "The Girl in the Fireplace", by Dan Owen
2006			Series 28, Episode 5 - "Rise of the Cyberman", by Dan Owen
2006			Series 28, Episode 6 - "The Age of Steel", by Dan Owen
2006			Series 28, Episode 7 - "The Idiot's Lantern", by Dan Owen
2006			Series 28, Episode 8 - "The Impossible Planet", by Dan Owen
2006			Series 28, Episode 9 - "The Satan Pit", by Dan Owen
2006			Series 28, Episode 10 - "Love and Monsters", by Dan Owen
2006			Series 28, Episode 11 - "Fear Her", by Dan Owen
2006			Series 28, Episode 12 - "Army of Ghosts" (Part 1 of 2), by Dan Owen
2006			Series 28, Episode 13 - "Doomsday" (Part 2 of 2), by Dan Owen

2005			Series 27, Episode 1 - "Rose", by Dan Owen
2005			Series 27, Episode 2 - "The End of the World", by Dan Owen
2005			Series 27, Episode 3 - "The Unquiet Dead", by Dan Owen
2005			Series 27, Episode 4 - "Aliens of London", by Dan Owen
2005			Series 27, Episode 5 - "World War Three", by Dan Owen
2005			Series 27, Episode 6 - "Dalek", by Dan Owen
2005			Series 27, Episode 7 - "The Long Game", by Dan Owen
2005			Series 27, Episode 8 - "Father's Day", by Dan Owen
2005			Series 27, Episode 9 - "The Empty Child", by Dan Owen
2005			Series 27, Episode 10 - "The Doctor Dances", by Dan Owen
2005			Series 27, Episode 11 - "Boom Town", by Dan Owen
2005			Series 27, Episode 12 - "Bad Wolf", by Dan Owen
2005			Series 27, Episode 13 - "The Parting of The Ways", by Dan Owen
2005			Series 27, Episode 1 - "Rose", by Dom Robinson
2005			Series 27, Episode 1 - "Rose", by Paul Manners

And the Audio CDs :

2000			04: The Land of the Dead
2000			06: The Marian Conspiracy
2000			10: Winter for the Adept
2000			12: The Fires of Vulcan
2000			14: The Holy Terror
2000			15: The Mutant Phase
2001			16: Storm Warning
2001			18: The Stones of Venice
2002			28: The Chimes of Midnight
2002			30: Seasons of Fear
2002			31: Embrace the Darkness
2002			35: ...Ish
2002			39: ...Bang-Bang-A-Boom!

2003			Doctor Who Audio CDs: An introduction

DVDs reviewed by the editor are watched on a Panasonic TXW32R4 32" widescreen TV connected to either a Creative Dxr2 DVD-ROM player or Microsoft Xbox and played through a Sony STR-DB930 amplifier.

PC games reviewed by the editor are on: