Whoo, a thread bump. Not a particularly old thread, so I think we'll get away with it. The fourth series is still airing in my country, but I got sick of people spoiling it for me so I've cheated and watched ahead to the end.

I'm glad that, contrary to all the moaning and whining when she was first cast, Donna's gone on to become a generally liked and respected character. It was neat to have her acting as a kind of 'moral compass' for The Doctor, sometimes restraining him and sometimes pushing him to go the extra mile to do the right thing, rather than just accepting the way things unfold. Some extremely strong stories this series.

I'll join with the others who felt that the finale was a bit jumbled and overpopulated... I get the feel it was trying to go a bit too far, in particular trying to please all the whiny obsessive internet fans who are never actually going to be satisfied if they get given what they want to see.

spoilers start here, don't read unless you've seen "Journey's End"Bringing back the entire 'team' from the previous seasons was a great move, as well as returning to the Bad Wolf meme and other recurring concepts. Having a threat to not only the entire universe, but all universes certainly meant there was a lot at stake, so plenty of scope for heroics, which we got.

As with any episode of any TV show, there's a lot of complaining going on about this one. However, while I agree with some of it, I feel that it's not all justified.

The Daleks weakened and cheapened? Anyone see The Five Doctors, where the First Doctor and his granddaughter kill a Dalek by pushing it into a hall of mirrors to trick it into lasering its own head off?

Some say the plot was non-existent, or impossible to follow. I say it works well enough, but requires a lot of attention. Thanks to whiny internet fandom demanding servicing, there're so many nods and re-visits to events from throughout the series. A lot to keep track of.

Donna's memory not being jogged by seeing The Doctor? Well, those memories had been erased and suppressed. His face was just a face, after that. It'll take something strong to actually make her remember what's happened to her, but you can bet that it'll happen at some point, and a suitable plot contrivance will allow her to survive it. It just feels unfair for her character to get fobbed off like that.

The Doctor trying to save Davros? The issue was genocide. He's killed often enough in the past, and even believed he was responsible for exterminating the Daleks in the Time War, but whenever possible he'll give his enemies a chance to choose life. And wiping out an entire species is usually an unthinkable option to him. Davros isn't like the other Daleks, he could be contained and controlled - so executing him needlessly, especially if he's been rendered helpless and is the last of his kind (for now), is just un-Doctorly. It's one thing to deal mercilessly with villainous individuals - the Family of Blood, the stray Dalek from Eccleston's series, the Racnoss - but it's something else to make the choice to exterminate a sentient species altogether.

Rose's story and its resolution? I agree, it doesn't feel complete. After regenerating, The Doctor hardly seemed to care about seeing her again, and was awfully quick to shoehorn her back into the other universe. I can't imagine her being happy in the long-term, either. Maybe in future, they'll get a proper reunion, and we'll find out that the 'human' Doctor didn't survive the unnatural biological processes going on inside him. There's a lot they can work with, anyway.

I did, however, like the Torchwood crew's involvement in this episode. Jack's always awesome, but it was nice to see Ianto and Gwen acting like they've actually got brains once. If this story had happened inside an episode of Torchwood... when they found themselves trapped (but protected) inside Tosh's time bubble, but with no real hope for survival, they'd probably have decided to have a threesome with the pterodactyl. It's the kind of 'decision' those half-wits normally make when they're left to make their own choices.

So, I'm now very much looking forward to series five. It's going to be a long wait till 2010, but there's at least one or two specials before then. I'm hoping for more companions. I mean, a greater number and diversity than usual. People from other time periods, other worlds even. Captain Jack was a great example, hailing from the distant future. But the old-school Doctors were accompanied by humans from the distant future, androids, and all sorts in between. River Song's going to be one to look forward to, unless they take the cop-out route of altering the future to write her out of the story. It looks like Martha's going to be an important figure within UNIT, so I expect we'll see her at or near the top of that group in future as well.

Anyway, with Steven Moffat at the helm, the stories are likely to be more psychological and more horror-oriented than most of RTD's stuff. I swear, the Library two-parter managed to include every single recurring image from my worst nightmares. Even looking at screenshots from those episodes can make me want to look away. Blink remains one of my favourite stories, with the best aliens too. Moffat's contributions have been consistently brilliant, so here's hoping for more of the same quality.

But as long as there's still plenty of drama, storytelling, seriousness, fun, humour, and emotion, I'll continue to be happy. They'll have to try damn hard to let me down.

It's been great these last few days, re-watching all the past four year's worth of stories. If you can watch the end of Doomsday without crying, then you're a bastard and I hate you.

:tardis: <-this forum needs a new icon