Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows - Trailer Review

So this came outta nowhere, the new trailer for the sequel to 2014's Ninja Turtles movie; Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows. Personally I thought the 2014 movie was just okay. I had fun watching it but as a movie it sucked, as a Turtles movie it sucked with potential. But the action was decent, the jokes were decent and they did a decent job of portraying the Turtles. But nothing so far has topped the 1990 movie as the best Turtle movie. So the first thing that stood out to me about this trailer is the tone it establishes. The first 30 seconds or so are played up like your stereotypical blockbuster movie, dramatic end of the world, variation on the Inception horn, evil, destruction, bla bla. Then we see the Turtle Van and this trailer instantly becomes nothing but action and jokes, which is so refreshing! The first film while still self-referential still tried to be serious and mature, well now we have a Warthog mutant with a Mohawk, mature is thrown out the window. Because that's the secret to the turtles, you can be insanely stupid and insanely serious at the same time, but never mature, that's not what the turtles are. It's as if the first film had the vibe of "Yeah we know this is stupid but we'll try and make it work" while this one is all "Yeah we know this is stupid but it's also awesome!!!".

Then there are the Turtles themselves, my instant reaction to them was "...They look different...They look better" and doing a comparsion to the prior film, they've clearly done some redesigns, their skin is brighter, they're not as bulky and their outfits aren't as cluttered and they've given them the slightest resemblance to a snout. They also didn't come across nearly as obnoxious or annoying as they did at parts of the prior film, hell, the prior film's trailer, especially Mikey, god he could be annoying in the other film what with his perverted attitude to Megan Fox, hopefully they've toned that down in this one. Speaking of Megan-because i still don't acknowledge that this is April O'Neil-she...barely did anything in this trailer, admittedly she got a pretty funny line in when she was about to be attacked in an alleyway and she just responds "You know this never ends well for you guys right?" also there was that one shot of her in a school girl's outfit because of course that's there, we gotta appeal to the 13 year old horny boy demographic somehow. And Will Arnett was only in one scene in this trailer, hopefully that is reflective of the movie. Don't get me wrong I like Will Arnett, but damn he was pointless in the last movie.

Next is Casey Jones, played by Stephen Amell. I'll be honest, i don't really care for Casey, no matter what movie or cartoon, i just don't care for him and i didn't care when he was announced for this movie...but then they announced Stephen Amell would be the one playing him and I was instantly hooked, because I like Stephen Amell, so at the very least that got me excited to see Casey Jones in the movie. There wasn't nearly enough of him in the trailer to be able to tell if he's going to be any good, but you know, ever the optimist.

Now for the villains of this movie, also known as fan service central. So Tyler Perry is Baxter Stockman...I honestly do not give a crap. As long as he's not forced into the movie as stupid villain comic relief then sure, why not have him in the movie, i just have that feeling he's going to be overused. Then there is Bebop and Rocksteady, putting some truly awful CGI aside, they're kinda perfect. They sound right, the designs are excellent, seriously i'm surprised they kept the Mohawk and glasses. But there was one character i was confused by, i was thinking "Who's the asian dude?...Wait that's the Shredder!? No it's not, they had their version of the Shredder in the last movie!" But no, turns out that is the Shredder again. So I guess they decided to reboot Shredder and pretend the last one didn't happen and go for one more accurate to the comic book. Also people are saying the giant portal in the sky is supposed to be the Kraang...okay good for them. I don't really care for the Kraang myself, but sure why not.

Finally, there is the money shot...no i don't mean Megan Fox, i mean the last shot of the trailer, Mikey and Donnie riding down a river when a tank jumps out of the water (No idea how) being driven by Rocksteady as he fires at them and misses by mere inches. Between this and Doctor Who I think we can say definitively that tanks make everything better!

So overall, I liked this trailer and it already looks like they're improving on the last one. I don't know if i'd say i'm that excited for it but at the very least it looks like a fun time.

-Danny

Why You Should Be Supporting Dragon's Lair On Indiegogo

If you didn't know, Don Bluth, director of so many great films has an Indiegogo campaign going now for funding to create a pitch for a Dragon's Lair movie. So yes this is funding for a pitch, not an actual movie, and before you ask, they are funding most of it themselves, they just need that little extra. If you never played Dragon's Lair it's this...bizarre retro game where instead of traditional 8-bit graphics the entire thing is animated, so you're basically controlling a traditionally animated movie. It's one of the most creative and beautiful games out there...it's impossible to play and is extremely aggravating but god does it look good.

If you're interested in learning more yourself then here's the link: https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/dragon-s-lair-returns

Now i'm the type of person who very rarely backs a project unless there are some great perks or if it's a project that might legitimately not get made unless people like me support it, but this is one of those projects i absolutely want to see get made no matter what. So one of the reasons why it would be excellent if this film did get made is because one: it'll be another fully 2D animated film, drawn by hand, out in theatres, something that we haven't seen in a while, at least not in full and in a wide release. If this film is a hit then it'll show studios that there is still an audience for this and the craft isn't dead which means we could see even more films in this style. But a reason even bigger than that is something more personal and that would be just getting to see another Don Bluth film. This man is one of my favourite film makers and is a huge inspiration to me. The man behind An American Tail, All Dogs Go To Heaven, Anastatia, The Secret of NIMH, The Small One, The Land Before Time-one of my all time favourite films-this is a man who never talked down to kids and never made things simple for them. He made these films that were beautiful and thought provoking but they were also dark and realistic. The answers weren't always clear and the journey wasn't always happy but they all still had that level of hope, that there is still a way for things to come out on top. The happy endings in his stories were earnt, and things weren't always made clear, lessons weren't forced down childrens throats but at the same time they never felt like they were a waste, like kids and adults can take away from these films and just feel different and feel better for watching them. When I think of art amongst animation, i don't think Studio Ghibli, I don't think Pixar, I don't even think Disney, I think Don Bluth and Gary Goldman, the two men who have made some true masterpieces in their time.

Yes he made a lot of stinkers, hell, i consider Titan A.E. to be the second worst animated film of all time but nevertheless, i never lost hope, i've always said "god, i wish this guy would come back, he needs to make more movies" and this is his chance. Taking one of his most popular projects and making it into a feature length film. This is a man who deserves this, and honest to god, i would much rather see this film get made than all of the upcoming Marvel films, i would gladly cancel them if it meant this one movie was made and it was another masterpiece. Because I need that, and i would hope i'm not alone, i hope other people remember how sad you felt when Littlefoot's mother died, or how happy you were when Feivel found his family, or how admirable you thought Mrs Brisby was because of her bravery. So if you do then please support this project and maybe, just maybe we can get another great film from a legendary film maker.

-Danny

Doctor Who "Hell Bent" Review

So here we are, the end of a great series for Doctor Who and after the masterpiece that was last weeks episode, does the finale end on a high note? Let's find out. Hell Bent sees The Doctor finally return to Gallifrey and plans on manipulating the entire planet in a way to bring Clara back to life. In the end she is brought back in a way, her body is in suspended animation so she is technically on her last heartbeat but that heartbeat can last as long as they want. In the end The Doctor is forced to have his memory wiped to prevent himself from destroying the universe to try and protect Clara.

So let's get to some details, starting with all the stuff on Gallifrey. Now I will say the first 10 minutes or so were awesome, no dialogue from The Doctor and he still some how gets his way and is able to manipulate and scare all of Gallifrey, first they threaten him, it doesn't work, then they send the council, it doesn't work, then finally the damn Lord President shows up and what does The Doctor say to him? "Get off my planet" Mic-fucking-dropped! But then we get to the bad stuff about Gallifrey, kinda something that seems to be a recurring thing in modern Doctor Who, the Time Lords are fucking retarded! The big thing here is that they are scared of a prophecy of "The Hybrid" a believed creature that is half-Time Lord, half-Dalek, making it an unstoppable monster. Of course it turns out not to be one person but two, a Time Lord and a human, The Doctor and Clara. So where do we begin? How about the fact that the mere concept of time travellers being afraid of a prophecy is really dumb. You're fucking time travellers, you should know whether or not a prophecy comes true! Also The Doctor and Clara being an unstoppable monster when combined, not really true, The Doctor is the unstoppable monster, Clara is just his motivation.

Speaking of Clara, this was a pretty bad way to end her storyline, i mean not for her personally, i'm sure she's very happy, but as a character in a narrative it was awful. She had a dramatic, heavy and excellently handled death which lead to another great episode of The Doctor experiencing grief and sorrow and pain trying to deal with it. Turns out that was all pointless because she's not really dead. Yes she is still technically dies but she can choose to go back there whenever she wants, and because her death is a fixed point in time she's now immortal just like Jack Harkness was, and she's travelling across all of time and space with Ashildr. So basically we went from an emotional death that lead The Doctor to experience pain like he's never felt, to Clara becoming immortal and travelling like before except now with a different person. BULL-SHIT! You don't give a character this incredible and momentous death and have another character go through a traumatising experience just to turn around and say "So none of that was important!". Doctor Who has brought back dead characters before and done it really well. When Rory died Amy experienced a quiet pain, she forgot he even existed but was still crying tears without knowing why and when he did come back and she remembered her character changed and grew, nothing beforehand was lost for either parties and they both changed and were better for it. That's not the case here because the development was all lost by bringing her back.

Then there is erasing The Doctors memory, admittedly and interesting concept but executed so poorly. A good companion should change The Doctor, make him grow, learn, adapt, build new relationships, all things I admit Clara did do well, especially for Capaldi's Doctor. But now with his memory erased of her, all that development is now gone and made the last 3 seasons pointless. Oh but his memory wasn't completely erased, he remembers bits and pieces of her. Well then that makes it a shallow plot point then doesn't it? Again, it's another case of creating this big dramatic scene and then having that lead to nothing. He only sort of forgets Clara, so he remembers enough for her time to have not being wasted but not enough so it's okay for her to leave the show. I repeat BULL-SHIT!. Isn't that just convenient? He only remembers the important things that the writers want him to remember, so i guess we should all just go for half-measures on these things, cheap and easy drama with no lasting consequences! Because that's good storytelling!

Good lord, what happened? This show was on such a high streak, but thankfully, unlike this episode, one element does not ruin everything that came before it. The good episodes are still good and the bad episodes are still bad, and thank god this season had some truly excellent episodes and overall this was the best season of Doctor Who since Matt Smith's first year.

I'm giving this episode a 5/10.

I'm giving this season a 9/10.

-Danny

The Death of "Superman Lives": What Happened? - Cheap Thoughts

This is one of those film that i'm very torn on but for unreasonable points. Death of Superman (Because that title is a mouthful) is a documentary by Jon Schnepp that explores the production and eventual cancellation of a planned Superman movie that was to star Nicolas Cage and be directed by Tim Burton. Now i was very much looking forward to this film because it's an interesting subject matter and i am a big fan of Jon Schnepp, I even got to meet him at London MCM Comic-Con and talk to him about the film. But watching this film i found myself getting very angry, but not because of the film, but because of the subject matter.

Before watching this documentary, my opinion on the film 'Superman Lives' based on leaked photoshoots and small details was "wow thank god they didn't make that film" and now after seeing the documentary i can say "WOW. Thank GOD they did not make that film". Because honestly apart from Kevin Smith it seemed like nobody even cared or knew anything about Superman and they got the entirely wrong team behind this film. Let me start off with the man who pissed me off the most, the producer Jon Peters, now i'm sure he's a nice guy in real life and everything but good god this might be one of the dumbest producers in Hollywood. He was a hairdresser turned producer who didn't like to read scripts and said he didn't want Superman to fly or wear his uniform...I don't think i need to say more, but i will. Some more of his ideas were to have Braniac arrive at the fortress of solitude and fight Superman's guards, and when told how stupid it would be to give Superman guards he said "fine, polar bears"...what is going on in this guys head!?

Even taking him out of the picture this film still would have sucked, Tim Burton was very clearly the wrong person to be put in charge of this project. Yes, he directed Batman and he did a good job with it, but Batman and Superman are completely different characters. He wanted to make the look of Superman's world more Gothic and Art Deco based, again, that's fucking Batman! Not Superman! Then the designs and choices for the costumes to make it more tech based and having it being passed down from generation to generation, as well as wanting to make the character darker and more edgy. Look i'm not against changing characters but you have to actually understand characters before you're allowed to change them. Make Superman dark and edgy, yeah and while you're at it why don't you make Sherlock Holmes more like Daffy Duck? Or Atticus Finch more like Tyler Durden? Or Yoda more like Mr T? Because the best way to make a character interesting is to completely ignore everything that made them popular in the first place and be different just for the sake of being different you fucking morons!

But again, these are all unreasonable complaints because none of them are to the documentary itself but the subject matter, and it's not like the documentary is edited in a way to vilify anyone, except maybe Jon Peters but even then that's quite subtly handled. So this is clearly my subjective interpretation of the material getting in the way of the merits of the project. As for the technical aspects of the documentary it is very well shot and edited as well as the amount of research and material that went into this film is admirable, after all making documentaries takes a lot of hard work, especially an independent documentary which i can only imagine how much hardwork was put into making this.

I'm very sorry but i cannot get my own personal feelings out of the way when talking about this documentary. Superman is my all time favourite hero and he gets a bad rap these days by people who clearly don't understand him (The next person to complain that he's not relatable gets punched in the face). So seeing professionals in the film industry who were given the character and treating him with such little care just makes me mad as a Superman fan. I praise Jon Schnepp and his team for the effort that was put into the film but i just got so angry watching this and i cannot put that aside no matter how hard i try, but i have to be fair and give this documentary a 7/10.

-Danny

The Flash & Arrow "Legends of Today/Yesterday" Review

The thing i'm most conflicted about with this episode is whether or not that Age of Ultron reference was funny & cool or lame & badly delivered. This is the yearly Flash and Arrow crossover, this time round Legends of Today and Yesterday, Team Flash and Team Arrow discover the truth behind Cisco's girlfriend Kendra, that being that she is the reincarnation of an Egyptian priestess along with her life partner (Literally) Carter, the two are fated together along with Vandal Savage, an immortal who has dedicated his life to hunting them down and killing them over and over again.

It's strange how the charm of seeing these characters together has worn off so quickly, but even stranger is that i like that. The fact that this group of characters from two different shows can appear in episodes together without it feeling gimmicky or distracting just shows how well they blend and how good the chemistry between the actors are. Even more so is that one episode doesn't draw more focus to one team than the other, yes the Flash episode had more Flash characters and the Arrow episode had more Arrow characters but in terms of focus and individual stories they split them down the middle very well. Lots of Flash's episode took place in Star City, lots of Arrow's episode focused on Cisco and there are plenty of other examples like that making it feel not just like "Flash featuring Arrow" or "Arrow featuring Flash" but "Arrow and Flash" together.

With that being said there were still individual story arcs that took place across these episodes, let's start with the most prominent one, Oliver's son, a storyline i have wanted them to address since it was set up back in season two and for what we got, i wasn't disappointed. As of right now this only got a small bit of development, Oliver has set up the stepping stones towards building a relationship with his son and a friendship with the mother, also as a little note i respect that the mother didn't cash the cheque that she was given to leave Oliver but rather leave for her own good and the good of the child. I also like that Oliver's son is more a fan of Flash than he is the Green Arrow. SIDE NOTE: Surely Barry should be getting some royalties money in someway for those action figures, otherwise that's a lawsuit on their hands. Also Oliver's choice on not telling Felicity about his son is an enigma, on one hand this was supposed to be Oliver turning over a new leaf, being honest and not keeping massive secrets between his friends, especially the woman he loves. But on the other hand, a man is entitled to his own secrets, especially when they don't actually involve anyone but himself, but of course Felicity is going to find out eventually so then it becomes a question of how she finds out. If she goes snooping and learns it behind his back then she's a total bitch, if he tells her and she reacts negatively then she's still a total bitch. Frankly if she in anyway considers it unreasonable that Oliver did not tell her then she is absolutely, positively a total bitch

Then there is Barry who didn't actually get much to do in this crossover apart from be a plot point, he travelled through time again...yay, because that doesn't dissolve any tension this episode had going for it and exploit a plot device that Barry only used once before and using it any other time would be seen as redundant, cheap and lazy. But seriously, why do this? This feels like it was there to fill up time rather than for any actual plot change or character development, after all, learning that their plan to fight Savage will fail means that they're going to...do pretty much the exact same thing? The only difference is they brought more people with them, which it didn't make any sense why he didn't bring them along in the first place, nor would it signify enough of a difference in the equation to change the outcome, in fact the fight ended the exact same way, the only difference being Oliver "wasn't distracted" what!?

I suppose I should also probably talk about Hawkman and Hawkgirl seeing as they are officially introduced to us in this episode. To talk about my prior history with the two characters, i don't care for them. Hawkgirl i know better because she was in the Justice League cartoon, yeah she was good in that show but she was my least favourite of the team, as for how she was portrayed in this show, she was fine, and Hawkman just seems like the biggest bore on the planet. So ya know, give em points for accuracy. So yes neither characters were that good but neither were that bad either, but you know something? That ain't enough. If they were just a character of the week then i would have no problem, but seeing as they are two of the main characters for Legends of Tomorrow i would expect more and now that they are the last two to be introduced apart from Rip Hunter they are so far my least favourite of that team. They don't have interesting personalities or super powers, their backstory is interesting enough but honestly the more detail we got the less i found myself caring.

Then there was Cisco's part to play in this as Kendra's (Hawkgirl) boyfriend, a relationship that was incredibly rushed, pointless and not nearly as effective as it should have been. Cisco's speech to Kendra to make her more comfortable in her destiny honestly feels like it shouldn't have had the effect that it did because him and Kendra don't know each other well enough, he doesn't know what she's like as a person to know she can get through this and handle it nor would he know what's best for her. Also when Oliver implied that the two were in love is absolute bullshit, they've been dating for about 2 weeks, cool your jets.

Vandal Savage was...a little better? I say that because at least he left an impression on me and seemed threatening to an extent, having a 4000 year old immortal villain is a great set up, they say it takes you 10,000 hours to master something, i feel like this is a man who has had more than enough time to master a few tricks. But at the same time, Team Flash and Team Arrow teaming up to take him down seems like more than enough. I don't care how long you've been training you can't beat a man who runs faster than you've been alive. And then he is killed but Malcolm takes his ashes and is planning on bringing him back an-oh god i do not care, shut up Malcolm, i'm mad at you for not making a single Jack Harkness joke, seriously you were up against an immortal man, not one reference? You got the damn Age of Ultron reference but not Doctor Who?

Also there was a subplot in the Flash episode involving Harrison getting shot by Patty and then Jay has to save him. It was meh, it was pretty pointless and got such little focus that it feels like it should have been saved for another episode, mostly because Patty now knows Harrison Wells is alive! Also Harrison and Jay are on their way to becoming friends, yay.

So to sum up two episodes worth of plot it was...meh. You know how Iron Man 2 was just a set up for Avengers? Well this feels like it was nothing more than a set up for Legends of Tomorrow, while Oliver's story with his son, Patty shooting Harrison, Cisco's relationship with Kendra, Hawkman & Hawkgirl's relationship get underdeveloped while Caitlin, Laurel, Diggle, Thea, Barry, Joe & Iris almost get shoved to the side with how little they have to do in the story. 6/10.

-Danny

Doctor Who "Heaven Sent" Review

I probably should have mentioned in the previous review, the reason why i'm doing these Doctor Who reviews on different days is because really each episode has enough content for me to do a full review on rather than having one over stuffed review. Especially when all the episodes are really self-contained stories...also i have nothing else to fill up these days, might as well.

In this episode we see The Doctor on an adventure on his own, he has been teleported into his own personal hell, a prison designed specifically for him, based on his nightmares and a never ending mystery. In the end The Doctor realises that he has been trapped there for thousands of years, just repeating the same day over and over again until after 2,000,000,000 of repeating the same day he's finally able to escape.

So where do I begin? Let's actually go with the directing and tone of this episode, this is one of the most creatively directed episodes i've seen Doctor Who do in a while, The Doctor only having a split second to think of a plan imagines himself back in the TARDIS with Clara helping him figure out a plan, asking the right questions, remembering the right notes, like a good teacher would. I especially love the first time they do this, making you think it was a time skip ahead and now they're going to recount it, but in fact the entire thing is his fantasy and we're watching him figure it out as it's happening, that's actually really clever. Not to mention holy crap this episode was terrifying! Now i'm not one who gets scared at Doctor Who, believe it or not i didn't even get scared at Blink, and i was only 12 years old when that came out...holy shit that episode is 8 years old, what the fuck. But back to this episode, the monster in this episode named The Veil is a reflection of The Doctor's nightmares he had as a child and it terrifies him as much as it terrified me, and what's great is even when there are jump scares, they really aren't, you're always aware of it's presence due to cameras and the flies, but that made it even more intense, hearing the buzz of the flies and you instantly know it's nearby, it was fairly horrifying to watch and certainly made my heart skip a beat on several occasions.

Then of course there is Peter Capaldi, not only does it show how talented this guy is how even when he's the only character with dialogue for the episode and even then half of it is exposition that he's explaining to himself, that's not usually good writing, but good god this guy keeps your eyes glued to the screen. Every line, every scene, he is just giving his all and just the range of emotions he goes through, from his typical cocky smartass to fearful and confused, to broken down and depressed, his exploration of his grief over losing Clara and his eventual breakdown. This is truly the best performance Capaldi has ever given in his career. I already liked him as The Doctor but seriously, if there is anyone out there who still is not convinced this man is The Doctor, you need psychiatric help.

Then there is the punching of a diamond wall, for 2 billion years, The Doctor punches away at a diamond wall, okay it's actually 400x the strength of diamond but nevertheless, an impressive feat. Fact is not only is this most definitely a Doctor thing to do, dedicating 2 billion years to one cause, each day slowly working at it to eventually achieve your goal and never giving up, but again, this is something in the episode that was really well handled. After all the pieces had come together and The Doctor had realised he had just been reliving the same day, there was a brief time there where i thought "What's he gonna do? Is he giving up? The Doctor doesn't give up! Has he just accepted the fact he's gonna be reliving his life over and over again?" But then you see it fairly quickly, which is another brilliant thing about this episode, you're still guessing as long as The Doctor is guessing, you never figure it out before him, this episode has you on the ropes for almost the entire run time and then finally you get your answers alongside him.

Also brilliant music in this episode, Murray Gold has done a lot of phenomenal-and I mean phenomenal-work on Doctor Who but I actually feel like he hasn't done that much great stuff recently and none of Capaldi's tunes have done anything for me. This episode finally redeems that and we have a dramatic, moving, fitting and impactful track to go along with The Doctor punching the diamond wall-as previously mentioned.

Oh and yeah I guess The Doctor has found Gallifrey. Neat.

Both fans and critics alike are considering this to be one of the best episodes of the season. I agree. They say it's one of the best of the revival. I agree. They say it's one of the best of all time. I agree. This episode of course gets a 10/10, it's damn near perfect.

-Danny

Doctor Who "Face The Raven" Review

So...that was something. This is the first part in the three part finale of this season of Doctor Who, here Clara's friend Rigsy (Yeah, remember him?) calls her up about a strange tattoo he's received, as it turns out, he's been sentenced to death by a hidden alien city in London after supposedly murdering an innocent alien. The Doctor and Clara investigate and as it turns out the entire thing was a hoax so Ashildr could capture The Doctor. However because Clara took Rigsy's sentence for him, she is killed and The Doctor is powerless to do anything.

Let's get the small stuff out of the way, Rigsy is a character from the previous season, granted it was the best episode from that season he really didn't leave much of an impression and i don't see why they brought him back. I guess they just needed someone to be a walking plot point who has some connection to Clara and The Doctor but seriously this is not an important character. He's not bad per say but...seriously, who gives a damn about this guy? Also Ashildr is back, hey, always happy to have more Maisie Williams in this show but i feel like she was wasted, this felt like a role that anyone with a grudge against The Doctor could play, it didn't require any of Ashildr's previously established skills, in fact they had to give her an entirely new one just so the plot makes sense. Both these roles feel very transferable and that really hurts the narrative of this episode.

But that's not what you care about, let's get to Clara's death. Now there are a few things that need to be established beforehand, i've made it clear i was not a fan of Clara in her first season but she has gotten much better lately mostly because of her chemistry with Capaldi and the fact that they've finally written a character for her outside of little miss perfect. And also no, i did not cry at this, not even teary eyed. With that being said, they couldn't have handled her death scene more perfectly, her dialogue with The Doctor and even in death she has to comfort him because she knows he can be a loose cannon, if he blames anyone for her death, hell will break loose. That's what a good companion should do, be there to humanise The Doctor but not fix his mistakes, just help steer him away from making those mistakes in the first place. Even more so Jenna Coleman's performance is excellent, having the perfect mixture between brave yet fearful, compassionate yet angry, supportive yet sad. Not to mention this is pretty rare for Doctor Who to kill off the companion before the finale, i mean yeah this is technically part of the finale but this is only the 1st act, this is usually the bittersweet end of the 3rd act type material, give em credit for handling it differently and making me curious what they're going to do with the next 2 episodes. Seriously i can not understate how well handled this death scene was, the build up was shocking, the killing was disturbing and the aftermath was worrying, top it all off with The Doctor's threat/promise to Ashildr should she mess with him again "I strongly advise you to stay out of my way. You'll find it is a very small universe when I'm angry with you." truly brilliant.

Really that's all there is to talk about, the death scene was perfectly handled while the rest of the episode was ok and didn't really have much to talk about, actually that's kinda been a recurring thing for several episodes this season, most of the episode is just ok but then the finale is fucking brilliant. Hm. Oh well, guess i'll do the same i did for the Zygon episode.

The majority of this episode gets a 6/10, there was a lot of nice production design but the story was lacking.

The final few minutes gets a 9/10, perfectly executed it's just i didn't care enough about Clara to get invested to the point for a 10/10.

-Danny