Here's what you need to know; through mysterious circumstances, the Doctor, Rose and Jack find themselves back aboard satellite 5, now a game station filled with twisted and murderous reality shows and game shows, but a much larger, much darker force is pulling the strings, and now the war begins to save the universe from the Doctor's oldest and deadliest enemy.
here we are, the 2 part finale of series 1, now let's get to business. I'll start as the episode starts, never being a fan of Big Brother, or Weakest Link, I have mixed feelings on the game shows in Bad Wolf, on one hand, it's kind of goofy, no, it is just goofy, but on the other hand, it's kind of interesting seeing these well known game shows take on a really fucked up form, where the reward for winning is not getting blasted to atoms, that said, I really would be inclined to say it's the weakest part of these episodes, the problem is it's not, more on that later. Something I do like is that they don't reveal the big baddie until near the end of Bad Wolf, it's a shame then that they showed who it was in the preview, and that the first anything you see related to them immediately gives it away, but there's a very good and kind of creepy scene with the Doctor and the girl wired up on floor 500 who's name I don't know, and it sets up the reveal very unnervingly. At that point whether or not you're disappointed by who it is depends on what you're expecting, but again I'll get to that. Another thing I think works in this episode is the characters, particularly the Doctor, Jack, and god/emperor, whatever you want to call him. Jack is a badass in these episodes, notably in The Parting of the Ways, while the Doctor is faced with a very difficult decision, not only in keeping Rose safe, but in ultimately possibly wiping out all life on Earth, this episode implies that he has made this choice before, which really puts some extra gravity on the situation. Rose on the other hand, I get what they were doing with Rose, but I just wasn't interested in her story on Earth with trying to get back to the Doctor, and to be frank, I really feel bad for Mickey, once being in the position of loving someone so blindly myself, and how horrible of a mistake it was, I didn't hate Rose in this episode, but I was not on board with it. And the big climax of the episode was actually a bit weak, with Rose swooping in full on Deus Ex Machina to save the day, ending in the culmination of a really unnecessary romantic element with Rose and the Doctor that, looking back on, I remember accepting, but now I don't like it, it's just unnecessary.
Enough negative, lets get back on track, and now is when I go full spoilers, while Bad Wolf is all figuring out what's going on, the interesting portion of The Parting of the Ways is an all out war between the remaining staff of satellite 5 and the Daleks, who are the big baddies of these episodes. I really enjoy these scenes, not just because I love the Daleks, though that certainly helps, these are just cool scenes in my opinion, as the Daleks climb up Satellite 5 floor by floor, constantly meeting futile efforts of resistance. This attack is when Jack is at his most badass, as he orchestrates and spearheads the resistance, and eventually goes down with no fear what so ever, awesome. And there's a scene on floor 0 with Jack that I love, so much that I'm going to quote, "And if you hear fighting up above, if you hear us dying, then tell me that the Daleks aren't real," that quote and the music used, it's giving me goose bumps thinking about it. Speaking of goose bumps, the scene where the Daleks kill Lynda, that really is creepy, if only for the shot of the Daleks at the window, there is no sound, but the dischargers are flashing, and you know exactly what the Dalek is saying, it's a grim scene, at least for me. Finally, by far my favourite parts of the episode are the scenes where the Doctor and the Dalek Emperor are talking, the Emperor thinks of himself as a god, more quotes, "I reached into the dirt and made new life, I am the god of all Daleks," the scene aboard the mother ship at the start of the episode is a real highlight, and I do genuinely love it.
These 2 episodes are a funny thing, I do have some pretty major criticisms, notably the weak ending, unnecessary plot elements and the Rose story as a whole, in addition to the goofy opening with the game shows, but at the end of the day, I like pretty much every scene with the Daleks in it, I like the villain, I like the talking between the Emperor and the Doctor, this isn't a perfect ending to a series, but it's got some really good stuff in it that makes it, in my opinion, an excellent watch.
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