Sometime this past year, the head accountant at the BBC’s headquarters in London must have looked at Russell T. Davies’ budget request for the episodes of this season’s Doctor Who, especially the two-part finale beginning with “The Stolen Earth”, then broke out in laughter before incredulously asking Davies “ARE YOU NUTS?!?”

This single episode was probably one-third of the entire season’s funding. And there’s still the conclusion next week.

But first, a look at “The Stolen Earth”, beginning with the standard screencap and select quotes…

“Martha, look at the sky. Just look at the sky!”

“You get back inside Sylvia. They always want the women.”

“Do you like my gun?”

“I’m receiving a communication from the Earth-bound ships. They have a message for the human race.”

“There’s nothing I can do. I’m sorry. We’re dead.”

“Soon the Crucible will be complete.”

“Clom… Clom’s gone?! Who’d want Clom?”

“He

It’s gonna be the craziest Doctor Who title sequence ever…

And the rumor is that this still isn’t the full roster of the good guys! Over the past few months I’ve heard that K-9 might be making an appearance too, and maybe even a previous version of The Doctor himself (hmmmm… Paul McGann?). Heck, with that kind of a lineup it wouldn’t surprise me if Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart himself was brought in to order “five rounds, rapid”.

It promises to be the most epic clash in the entire 45-year history of Doctor Who, as The Doctor and his friends face the wrath of Davros and his new Dalek Empire. The two-part season finale begins with “The Stolen Earth” this Saturday on BBC One in Great Britain, on Sci-Fi Channel a few weeks after that in America ...

Russell T. Davies, if you’re reading this, you have made me feel very sorry that I doubted you.

Yeah, there have been some low points during your reign as showrunner on Doctor Who (insert standard derogatory reference to “Love & Monsters” here). But you know what? If the two-part season finale that begins this coming Saturday is anything as good as “Turn Left” was this past weekend, then I will gladly declare that you learned from your mistakes and that you triumphed in every way so far as bringing Doctor Who back is concerned. This past season of Doctor Who might have been the best yet since the series’s revival. And it looks to be going out with a bang…

“It’s sort of complicated. I ended up in his spaceship on my wedding day.”

“What if you turned right? What then?”

“There’s something on your back!”

“We found a body,

“Baaaah! Taking a big space truck with a bunch of strangers across a diamond planet called Midnight. What could possibly go wrong?”

This is about the time every season since Doctor Who revived its run that we get “filler” episodes before the big multi-part finale. Sometimes they go well (last year’s “Blink” which was written by Steven Moffat, who has received exceptional praise for the two-part story of the previous weeks) and sometimes they don’t go well at all (cough-cough “Fear Her” and “Love & Monsters” cough-cough). This year it chimes at “Midnight”.

Essentially a one-scene play apart from the bookends, the eponymous planet of “Midnight” is an interesting world: the entire surface is crystal, and the star it orbits puts out enough light to flash-fry exposed flesh. But none of this has stopped a thriving resort from being set up on Midnight’s surface. While Donna gets in ...

Last Saturday the BBC transmitted “Forest of the Dead”, the newest episode of Doctor Who (until tomorrow night anyway, when “Midnight” premieres). I watched it on Tuesday.

And it’s taken me this long just to get my thoughts together about it…

“Donna?”

“You said ‘river’, and suddenly we’re feeding ducks.”

“The only story you’ll ever tell… if you survive here.”

“Yo… WHO ARE YOU?!?“

“I’m going to prove it to you, and I’m sorry. I’m really, very sorry.”

“LOOK AT THAT! I’m VERY GOOD!!!”

And that is as far as I dare go with the usual choice quotes from a new Doctor Who episode.

A few weeks ago I finally figured out what the “Media Extender” capability of our Xbox 360 is. So now it’s configured into our home network and now I can watch those wonderful Doctor Who episodes (uploaded onto BitTorrent courtesy of our Brittish brethren) on ...