Doctor Who: Victory of the Daleks*

Have you ever tried to do too much at once? You probably know the scenario - you've got a load of good ideas, and you want to implement them all right here, right now. So you do. But when you come to review what you've done, you realise that none of it quite worked the way you both thought and hoped it would, because you just tried to do too much at once.

This scenario perfectly encapsulates Victory of the Daleks.

On paper, this story should be epic. It has Daleks. And they change their appearance (they almost, in a sense, regenerate). And the Daleks win. They actually win. Plus there's Winston Churchill. And World War Two. And hints of what is to come from the rest of the series! Hurrah!

But when you see the results on screen... well, they don't quite work.

The Daleks probably are the real stars of this particular tale. But you know what? They are at their most interesting at the beginning of the story, when they are pretending to be the allies of the British. Once they reveal their true (dayglo) colours, they become less interesting. And yes, they change their appearance. But the previous design of the Daleks - the one from the RTD era - was a work of absolute genius. It made the Daleks look sturdy and formidable. However, this redesign makes they look a little too sturdy. In truth, the Daleks now look fat. And Daleks shouldn't look fat. Plus, their new colours don't really work. I mean, can you really take a Dalek seriously when it looks as yellow as a daffodil? I can't.

Of course, the Daleks win in this story. They get what they want. Yet it doesn't seem to have the power it should, partly because winning in this story simply means the Daleks run away, and the Doctor isn't as devastated by their victory as he should be. And somehow, it devalues the whole story to have it just becoming a trap for the Doctor in order to extract one sentence from him. Plus, the whole piece ends up feeling like an elongated attempt to reboot the Daleks so they can crop up in future adventures. By all means make the Daleks formidable again - something that worked so well in Dalek. But the story has to be something more than just a way of making the Daleks look different.

And Winston Churchill... Quite why he hasn't been in Doctor Who before now is beyond me. He is such a natural choice for inclusion in the series. Which makes it a bit of a shame that he was played by Ian McNiece, who does a passable Churchill impression but appears to have been picked for the role mainly based on his ample girth. I swear to God that when Churchill was on screen I didn't so much notice what he was doing or saying, but rather just watched the wobbling of McNiece's huge double chin. Seriously, the way it moved was positively hypnotic.

Then we have the hints of what is to come. Yes, there are cracks appearing in each story - but with the exception of The Eleventh Hour, they don't fit in with the overall story and instead are crudely tacked on at the end. It is a bit like having a character intone "Bad Wolf" at the end of each episode of the 2005 series. And the idea that Amy Pond is unable to remember the Dalek invasion of earth is intriguing, but is undermined by the fact that the Doctor forgets about it as soon as he's noticed it. A story arc needs to be carefully woven into the fabric of a tale, rather than crudely grafted on like the chest unit on a Cyberman.

But enough with the complaints. There was much to enjoy in this story. Matt Smith remains outstanding as the Doctor - which is no mean feat as he had to spend much of this episode just standing and reacting to the also largely static Daleks. And Amy Pond was given much to do, even saving the world through her ability to empathise more effectively than the Doctor. Indeed, her interplay with the mercurial Eleventh Doctor is proving to be a highlight of the show. I particularly like the way he refers to her as "Pond" all the time - it is a refreshing change from the more touchy-feely Tenth Doctor.

Ultimately, this story may be best seen as a warning sign of the potential dangers of the Moffat era. Some stories within the RTD era felt like they were scenarios in search of a real plot; however, the Moffat era may have exactly the opposite problem: a struggle to rein in the scope and the depth of the stories it wishes to explore. Victory of the Daleks felt like a six part, old-school Doctor Who story shoe-horned into a 45 minute slot. A writer as talented as Moffat can get away with this - he can juggle numerous plot elements and still make the story work as a whole. However, other writers - even talented ones like Gatiss - may struggle with doing the same. Sometimes less is more; certainly, fewer plot elements within Victory of the Daleks would have made the whole thing far more credible and enjoyable.

*I promised this review would appear on Monday. Sorry, it is late - something caused by having to scrabble desperately to get away from Narita Airport, which was increasingly becoming a refugee camp for stranded Europeans.