Wasn’t an A+ episode, but it was a solid B. Good fun, although as is becoming sueful for this version of Doctor Who, the villain was almost incidental to the story, not even getting a full backstory or a real name. It was basically an excuse to play with TV in the 1950′s… and why not?

Maureen Lipman, of all people, is the Big Evil, kind of the embodiment of Evil Television, sucking your brain (and visually, your face). It’s kind of interesting when a TV program slags off TV… I can’t think of any books that ponder the dangers of books, or movies that tell you that movies are Bad And Evil, yet TV is a frequent target of TV itself.

The 50′s period was very nicely done – compare and contrast to Delta and the Bannermen. Nice design and sets, which we are beginning to expect from this incarnation of Who.

As we’re also beginning to expect from this incarnation of Who, there’s a little bit too much silliness, and the Doctor’s obsession with Rose comes to the fore – he only really wants to beat the baddie when it affects Rose. You’d think that a face-sucking monster would be reason enough to get involved.

Maureen Lipman hits almost all the right notes as Everything Bad About Television, going a bit panto on the high notes, but other than that she’s very good.

And the nice thing about Who these days is I can just say, “and everyone else does their usual good job”.

Overall a rollicking good Monster of the Week Doctor Who.