Cold Blood

So, the second part of our Silurian epic leaves us with yet more loose ends, and with the end of season finale getting progressively pumped up, one wonders how it's all going to get sorted out... but of course, that's the point.

Now I'm still moaning about the loss of the Silurian third-eye, and I don't think the appearance of a long sticky tongue fills the gap. Rather than being evolutionary superior to humans, as they undoubtedly were in their first TV appearance, these Silurians are perhaps more our equals. Again we have Silurians killing each other rather than respecting their own authoritarian systems, which I find a bit two-dimensional and undermining my ability to believe in their intelligence or civilisation.

Anyway, whilst Cold Blood touched on aspects of Silurian history and culture, and echoed many elements of their original Pertwee story, it didn't really get to grips with any single theme and develop it to give us something new. The Big Finish audio Bloodtide is an example of what could have been done - and it's not as if the new series hasn't been afraid to raid the BF plot book before (check out Jubilee, by Rob Sherman, and then watch Dalek, by, err, Rob Sherman).

The opportunity for the development of a thread on climate change was sadly missed, something which I am sure their creator, Malcolm Hulke, would surely not have shied away from. I was hoping for a Silurian plan to accelerate global warming in order to re-colonise the earth. Next time hey. And by the way, why would our reptile friends want to block out the sun with their isolation barrier in last weeks episode? To make it dark just to scare us? Surely not.

But what we did get was good nonetheless, with the interesting development of the Silurian female warrior class, contrasted with our own human female warrior character of Ambrose, who I didn't really like. I guess that the development of the Silurian warrior class is to fill the gap previously uncomfortably occupied by the Sea Devils.

That poor old Dad, slipped the tongue by a Silurian last week, should decide to stay with the Silurians, along with Nasreen, appears a bit odd, but then with the Doctor telling them to set their controls to reawaken in 1,000 years time, we obviously have the makings of a follow up story, and apparently do get to see the Silurians again before the end of the season. Well, when you’ve spent all that money on rubber masks and costumes…

And poor old Rory gets killed again! Shame, I was actually beginning to like his character more than Amy, who just treats him like shit. I'm not sure that their relationship works, or that the actors are convinced of their roles either. At least we have their double appearance at the begining explained. But we're also pretty sure Rory will be back, as perhaps will everything that's been sucked into that crack... and I'm betting that the Doctor sacrifices himself, and the TARDIS, to seal up the crack and restore everything to normal in our season finale, and that Song gets the rap for killing him. I'm also thinking we may even get a Star Trek TNG style end of season cliffhanger... who knows.

8/10, not bad, but not as good as it easily could have been!