Why does Love and Monsters not work? Well there
are many different reasons for the story being a failure. First it’s biggest crime is that it is trying
to be the New Series equivalent of the Seventh Doctor story The Greatest Show in the Galaxy, but not
in the way you may be expecting. It
doesn’t rip off the plot from The
Greatest Show in the Galaxy, but it is using the idea of being a commentary
on Doctor Who as a whole and Love and
Monsters gets the idea wrong in every way.
The Greatest Show in the Galaxy
basically states to the audience that yes Doctor Who has been on some tough
times and we aren’t nearly as good as we used to be, but please stick with us
and you might just find something worth watching again. It also helps that The Greatest Show in the Galaxy was the finale to the penultimate
season of the Classic Series and while yes the Whiz Kid was an annoying
character, the story is brilliant in comparison to Love and Monsters. Love and Monsters comments on the show
in two main ways. First up the
commentary is that this is the best show ever with God himself as the star in
the form of David Tennant. Savor any
moment your eyes have glimpsing the sheer brilliance of Russell The Davies and
his godly production team. Second is
that the fans are puny mortals who have obviously no lives and are plainly
worthless. So yes this is something that
we fans can get annoyed with and me in particular as it is this kind of
egotistical writing that puts me off David Tennant’s Doctor on the whole.
The plot of Love and Monsters follows Elton Pope
played by Marc Warren, through the framing device of a vlog where he is out searching
for the Doctor whom he saw in his home the night his mother died. Through this quest he unites with others
searching for the Doctor for whatever reason when they are approached by Victor
Kennedy, a rather hilariously bad parody of Ian Levine, who forces them to look
harder when Elton being the main character meets Jackie Tyler, whom he
upsets. His friends start disappearing
one by one and he and budding girlfriend Ursula Blake played by Moaning Myrtle
from Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
aka Shirley Henderson discover Kennedy is actually an Abzorbaloff from the
planet Clom who wants to find the Doctor to absorb him. The plot is extremely silly and not in the
good Douglas Adams or Dennis Spooner type of way, but in a bad way. It feels a lot like a child was responsible
for the story much like a child was in fact responsible for designing the
villain. The only real relief is that
the Doctor and Rose are barely in this story which is for the best as Rose is
my least favorite companion and David Tennant’s Tenth Doctor is my least
favorite Doctor.
The acting in this story
is honestly really bad with the biggest offender being Peter Kay who is way too
over the top for any sort of Doctor Who story.
Kay is also extremely creepy in a sexual way in several scenes and gives
away that he isn’t quite right early on but none of the other characters which
shows just how Russell T Davies cannot write these supporting characters. Shirley Henderson’s Ursula is also a really
bad performance as she is doing the same performance she did as Moaning Myrtle
which really doesn’t suit the character who honestly had a lot of potential to
be interesting in the hands of a different actress. Marc Warren is also a huge disappointment as
he was brilliant in Terry Pratchett’s
Hogfather and you can barely tell they were the same actor here. Elton is a complete idiot of a character
whose pride forces Ursula to be cursed with immortality a la Borusa in The Five Doctors and the Doctor allows
this to happen. Seriously Doctor, that
is cruel even for you and she only died.
The only decent actor in this is Camile Coudri as Jackie Tyler who is
actually quite sympathetic for once which is a bit odd as I usually don’t like
Jackie on the whole.
The direction and visual
effects work on this story also help in dragging it down. We run into the first problem in the opening
scene where there is a random Scooby-Doo
style chase that really doesn’t make any sense as Doctor Who isn’t a cartoon
even if they were trying to make a running through corridors joke. It would have only worked had this been a
parody of Doctor Who which it isn’t. The
direction is also extremely over lit in places especially where the Abzorbaloff
is concern which reveals just how bad the costuming is on a whole. Most of the story takes place in a warehouse
which could have easily been done with darker shadows and they could have done
a quick night shoot for the final confrontation scene. Now I will make my complaints on the
Abzorbaloff brief as it is awful and unforgivable even if it was designed by a
small child. The framing story about the
vlog also doesn’t work and chops up the flow as well as looking awful in the
process.
To summarize, while there
are a few redeeming elements Love and
Monsters is still one of the worst Doctor Who television stories and in the
Doctor Who Magazine Poll of 2014 actually deserves to be lower than it
was. 11/100.
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