Review of Dr. Who Episode 11, "Blink"

Summary: Everyday, ordinary average person Sally Sparrow finds herself caught up in a time traveling mystery as friends and new acquaintances suddenly disappear, only to turn up again - ages older, or writing letters to her from the distant past. On the periphery of her senses, she senses an alien species - masked as statues of weeping angels - stalking her in between blinking eyes and quick glances away. As usual, the last Time Lord - Dr. Who - pulls strings from the past in a desperate effort to save the universe from total destruction...all in a day's work for the good Doctor, indeed.

When Sally Sparrow first entered the old, abandoned house on the edge of town, prospecting for all the interesting things such an old building might offer, she never imagined she'd stumble into a mystery of epic - perhaps even galactic - proportions. However, there it is anyway...as she snaps pictures around the old house's interior, she notices what looks like a message scrawled under bits of peeling wallpaper. As she peels away the moldy wallpaper, a cryptic message is revealed: "Beware the Weeping Angels...and now you really should duck...right now!" Not satisfied, she pulls away the paper until more is revealed: her name, "Sally Sparrow", with the repeated admonition, "Duck! Now!"

As instinct takes over and she ducks, a smallish boulder flies through the window into the room, smashing against the wall where her head had been moments before. Aghast, she looks out the window and sees an algae encrusted weeping angel statue standing just outside.

When she looks back at the wall, the message is signed: "Regards, the Doctor - 1969".

Frightened but undaunted, Sally revisits the home with best friend Kathy Nightingale in tow. Nothing seems amiss as they pour over the wall's strange message, but a ringing doorbell outside interrupts them, sending Kathy scurrying to hide while Sally answers the front door. While she's hiding, Kathy's blissfully unaware of the weeping angel statue that creeps upon her with every camera sweep.

Amazingly enough, the visitor is a courier given strict instructions decades earlier to deliver a letter to Sally Sparrow right at that exact moment. As Sally opens the package in bewilderment, she discovers the identity of the package's author - no other than Katherine Nightingale, writing from over fifty years in the past - just as the stalking weeping angel falls upon the hiding Kathy, instantly marooning her in London, year 1920.

Sally dashes upstairs, looking for Kathy - only to find herself unexpectedly surrounded by motionless, weeping angel statues. Though she misses their hidden, predatory glances when she's not looking, she senses the danger and flees...but not before snagging what looks like an ordinary YALE door key from one of the angel's outstretched hand.

Things only get worse when Sarah tries to tell her wild story to police. She's directed to a charming detective who at least believes her that there's something wrong about that house - especially given that over the years, nearly twenty running cars had been found parked in front of it, their drivers disappeared. Stranger still, found among the cars is an antique old "police box" - but it's locked, by an ordinary YALE lock - and believed to be nothing more than a prop of some kind.

Sally gets to the street, realizes that a YALE key is what she took from the angel statue...and the pieces, though not fitting yet, begin to swirl. She heads back to find the detective....however, in the interim; the detective has been waylaid by another gang of creeping, weeping angels, and shoved back to the year 1969, luckily to meet up with the quirky Dr. Who himself, who finally offers up some explanations.

The weeping angels are "death feeders", a unique type of entity that feeds on the displaced "potential" energy of someone who dies prematurely. They are humane; shoving people into the past to die of old age, leaving all their potential energy in the future for the angels to consume. However, now they've after the Tardis, Dr. Who's infamous "much-larger-on-the-inside-than-on-the-outside" police box time machine. The danger, Dr. Who says, is if they feed on the Tardis' heart, the very fabric of time itself will come apart.

Sally of course meets with the detective again....minutes after he disappears, only now as he lies dying of old age in a hospital, having waited sixty years to catch up to her. After hearing his story and then discovering secret messages Dr. Who has left in her own collection of DVDs, (because of course, with the good Doctor's instruction, the time-displaced detective turned from a career in law enforcement to one in video production, and ultimately DVD production), Sally is pitted against the weeping angels, left to her wits, and the faith the Last Time Lord has placed in her.

This recent episode is just another example of how excellently BBC's revamped version of "Dr. Who" captures the feel of the original series. Though decidedly less "cheesy" than some of the classic "Who" episodes, contemporary Dr. Who succeeds in the same way its predecessor did: with excellent acting, tongue-in-cheek humor, and serious science fiction themes - all without blazing special effects. In this episode particularly, the storyline's smart, the intersecting "timelines" are meticulously laid, and the weeping angel statues are absolutely creepy.

All the loose ends of this twisting-time travel tale are neatly tied off, with an especially nice touch at the end, when - after a year has passed - Sally finds herself still in possession of all her notes, letters, documents, and records of her adventure, unable to let go and move on with her life. One day, however, she notices a quirky, handsome and distinguished young man dash by her DVD shop with a striking young woman - both brandishing odd looking bows and arrows in the middle of London.

When she runs outside to flag them down; she realizes it's the Time Lord himself and his ever present and attractive female side kick. Of course, in true time-twisting fashion, he bashfully admits to Sally that "due to the uniqueness of my existence, I'm forever meeting people whom I don't know whom I'm sure I'll know someday eventually", but Sally simply smiles and hands him everything about her adventure a year ago in manila envelope, remarking casually that he'll need all of it someday - badly. In his usual amiable, off-beat fashion he smiles, dashes off, and the circle is closed.

For more of the irrepressible, smart, and absolutely "cheeky" Dr. Who, tune into the Sci Fi Channel Friday night, at 8:00 Eastern Standard Time.