Doctor Who 4x08 - "Silence in the Library"
 

"Silence in the Library" by Steven Moffat

The Doctor and Donna enter a world of terror inside an abandoned library. They are given only one warning: "Count the shadows".

Oh, dear.

I thought it was really good. Despite that not much happened in it, I found it exciting and after watching it for a couple of minutes I glanced up at the clock to find it was 7:30. It was very well written (well it's Moffatt), but I'm not sure how I'm supposed to feel about what happened to Donna. Overall an excellent episode, except the music sucked badly. I mean, for fuck's sake, it was completely wrong. None of the music fitted the mood, and there were several sections where Murray's music was obviously way too loud and they had to turn it down. I think several James P.'s dressed in bubblewrap hitting large kippers against greased-up cupboards would probably do better.

I honestly liked the music. The music where Moon was telling the Girl that the Library was real was great.

It was a great cliffhanger as lots of stuff has to be explained about nearly all the characters.

I think River Song is being set up by Moffat so he can bring her back when he takes over.

I also found the automated voice repeating quite creepy but its yet to scare me as much as Blink (not a huge amount of scaring going on but it got quite ... tense).

Also I have just remembered next weeks episode was meant to be called River's Run. River being River Song. Does the run mean run or .... something else.

And the new title, Forest Of The Dead is intriguing.

The theme sting seemed louder and longer this week.

I hope that was a joke, I really do. I'm with Josef on this one, and willing to put this score forward as the worst one in the history of the show. Honestly.

It was a ridiculous cliffhanger that was almost on a level with The Sontaran Strategem or the resolution to the one from Rise of the Cybermen (the resolution is simple and they're not in any real peril anyway...we've seen that she's got a sonic blaster that can cut through walls merely seconds ago ffs).

I'm willing to put money on her not being a viable option for return after next week.

It was so, so, so annoying after a short period.

Uh, I'm pretty sure Run means Run. What else could it mean?

Not really.

The whole theme has been 2 seconds slower, and thus longer, for weeks now.

I quite liked a recurring electronic theme that was used every now and then....and then....and ok that's too much now....

But Murray's music has been too loud since the middle of TW S2.....Oh, and that's poor sound editing and not actually Murray's (yup, his first name is "Actually") fault. And if you shoot me for saying that, I'm going to steal all your apple hardware.

I did enjoy it but I've seen better.

Apparently it's something to do with how peoples TVs are set up...but that's a really lame excuse and I've never bought it. I've always watched it on the same TV and some episodes (eg Partners in Crime) have been fine, whereas in others (eg The Doctors' Daughter) the dialogue has been almost inaudible at points. I'd definitely put it down to craptacular sound mixing.

That is a pretty shocking excuse. I think I might steal their apple hardware.

Guys, there's a post in the ep discussion forum, let me know if you can see and post in it (in that thread). Ta.

Nope, different opinions.

I didn't say it had anything to do with peril. Its what is yet to be explained thats exciting.

I actually agree now, as I've remembered the Ood said, Your SONG must end soon.

Yeh, very annoying but they are a bit creepy


So far we have seen a library and a house interior. What the hell has a forest got to do with anything. Hopefully it will have a good meaning.

Yeh but the sting was longer this week. There was a hissing sound after the actual sting.

Lots of quantum physics has yet to be explained to me yet it hardly fills me with anticipation for the next installment...


I've seen people on DWF making the same epic jump to conclusions, and I honestly think it's a huge grasping at straws...

A forest of white trees was featured quite prominently through the windows of the little girls house.

If your very interested about quantum physics and the things connected to it matter to you then you would be excited to find out what happens yet.

You may not find it exciting but it really doesn't matter ... I do.
And the Sontaran cliffhanger wasn't very good but there was some peril as you didn't know what the gas would do and it was the whole world.

I saw it in a comment on youtube. But we know DT is going to be in the Xmas Special. I don't think they (the writers) would refer to an event in a future series (or the specials) as they are too far off.

It probably is wild speculation but its an interesting idea.

Wasn't that prominent. I think most people were concentrating on the characters and their dialogue instead of the scenery outside the house.

OK, thought I'd best go into more detail on stuff.

From a purely writers standingpoint, this is probably the best episode we've had all season. Structurally, plot wise it is very sound. There isn't the array of gaffes and bloopers that we get with most episodes and everything seemed to have an explaination worked into the dialogue quite naturally in a way that didn't seem forced. In fact, almost all of the dialogue I'd say was rather excellent. Well almost all of the dialogue was good. Some parts felt rather like it was Steven Moffat speaking rather than the characters in order to push the oh-so witty dialogue...

Of course, this is giving the liberty that this is one of two parts and assumes that the unresolved matters will be resolved in the next part. As a sound script, it could easily go tits up in part two.

The monsters, despite having a rather awful names (Vashta Nerada? wtf) were very original and worked exceedingly well despite (or perhaps because of) their unseen nature. Of course this all became unravelled with the "let's chaze ppls with ded skeletun n funy catchfrase lol" scene...I digress, but bonus points for the monsters. Even if the "Count the shadows" spiel seems a bit like a variation on a theme of "Don't blink".

The music was basically a whirling cacophony of doom that never fitted the mood and often (especially at the beginning) sounded like a terrible Harry Potter knockoff. I shan't speak any longer on the abomination that is this episodes score.
The episode seemed to sag a lot in the middle for me. Nothing really happened, with all the exposition either over in the early stages of the episode or saved until the end. This meant an episode that was basically two interesting sections (and I did love the first 10 minutes or so, perhaps the awesomeness of the opening made the rest more of a disappointment than it would otherwise have been) bookending a lot of nothing. The Doctor and friends talk for a bit, they stand here, they stand there, they repeat the same shadows crap over and over and over again. They contact little girl with no result. They ring little girl in exactly the same scene as that one from The Empty Child. Etc etc etc.

The characters themselves were utterly 2D and cardboard cliches...you have pretty airheard assistant, arrogant scientists confident in their own knowledge who of course so, so regret treating airhead assistant as stupid when she tragically dies, entrepreneur who cares only in his own interests at the expense of others. And the random guys who are never really elaborated on. You could see the assistant dying as soon as she entered that random passageway. It's a horror movie staple.

After this shocking plot development, we are then given five minutes of tear-jerking rubbish in a scene that makes RTDs ham-fisted emotional scenes look positively subtle. I mean it just goes on, and on and on. I really couldn't care less about whether her transmitter made an echo of her after death. She was a character I neither connected to nor cared about, and her death had no effect on me. I wouldn't care if Microsoft Sam was eaten by pirranhas and then transmitted a message of himself after death, and this is basically the same thing.

The cliffhanger is possibly the worst ever, tying only with The Sontaran Strategem (and people on the Steven Moffat, sorry Doctor Who Forum are saying that this is the best cliffhanger in the history of Doctor Who.I mean, wtf? Utopia? That one in Caves of Androzani? Army of Ghosts for God's sake...). A villain is slowly shambling towards our heroes. Big whoop. Catherine Tate is saying the same thing overandoverandoveranadoverandomgitsinmymindpleaseg etitoutitburns. There's no real peril here. We've been shown that ER woman has a sonic blaster for cutting through walls merely seconds earlier ffs.

The twists, which have been leftfield and original in previous Moffat scripts, are now tired and, honestly, predictable. Even I (who lets almost all twists go way, way over his head until they are spelt out for him) worked out that the "saved" people became the data nodes about 25 minutes in. The 'shocking reveals' of Donna as a data node and 'Dave is really dead' could also be seen coming about a mile off...

So yeah, I think I covered everything I disliked with this episode and I hope the 80% of people who rated it 5/5 understand and appreciate why I simply did not enjoy this episode. God I loved The Empty Child so much, disliked The Girl in the Fireplace but still rewatch and and enjoyed Blink. But this was such a letdown for me.

Also apologies for the overwhoring of italics and bold. I'm just in the mood for it.

I thought it was okay but not brilliant, they've left too much to be explained next week and it's made for a rather thin first part. Not much happened.

Saying that, there were some very intriguing parts. Obviously, the book which is likely a biography of the Doctor was quite an interesting concept although it's hard to believe that anyone could gather that much knowledge about the Doctor. I thought the idea was that he dropped by to save the day and then faded away again only to be forgotten.

I'm honestly torn between a 9 and 10 myself. I'll add my vote and comments after another watch.

I think that's what I'll do too.

Well, after an official second watching.. it only got better.

My one complaint remains that the death scene drags out to long. But it is a horrifying death / idea, so in the end I'll cut it slack and let it slide.

Besides that, I personally really have no problems with it, at all. I think this is brilliant Doctor who, as it should be. Spooky, with a perfectly woven plot that doesn't seem to slow down, even when they're not moving from set to set, great direction, great acting.. plenty to keep you thinking.

Plus, I now can -not- wait for next week.

All in all.. 10/10. You've done it again Moffat!

First episode I've ever rated a 10/10 on these forums, I do believe. Hopefully next week will be even better. :D

I will be glancing at shadows a bit more often, from now on though.. and all that dust in sunbeams. Just like the whole statue thing after Blink last year. Dammit.

I agree with Kody (how surprising). Great atmosphere, original setting and plot, great concept for a monster and frightening execution. This episode freaked my mom out more than The Empty Child, which nothing else has done since, and that's saying something (generally it's hard to actually scare her). So roll on next week, and I look forward to seeing how the story stands up as a whole. 10 out of 10 for this week.

Oh, also related. Just finished watching the Confidental for this.. highly recommended!

Steven Moffat talking about Doctor Who and the story alone, make it worth it.

Best episode so far this season, next weeks looks to be mega!