Review of Doctor Who (1996) by Thomas R — 29 Jun 2009

Not a bad premise for a Doctor Who story, but it completely falls apart in the execution. It's hard to rate Paul McGann as the Doctor from this alone, but unfortunately for him this is all we have. He's awful. Plain and simple. Maybe he would have gotten better with time. I'm reminded of when Tom Baker took over, and his doctor was just as crazy and all over the place as McGann, but Baker really turned it around in time to be pretty great.

Coupled with McGann is Eric Roberts, a terrible choice to play The Master, and Daphne Ashbrook who is definitely one of the more worthless companions.

This is a good example of why Americans shouldn't be allowed anywhere near the Dr. Who legacy. I hope they'll attempt another Dr. Who film in the future. With Steven Moffat at the helm, it would be incredible.

The film does raise an interesting question about Time Lord biology though. It claims that a Time Lord only gets 13 lives. With the doctor about to enter his eleventh incarnation at the end of this year, it raises the question if the tv series will hold to this concept or not. Of course, three more doctors can span many years, so we may not get an answer to that for a long while.