The problem with Cold Blood lies not with the story but with ourselves. When a story, inadvertently or otherwise, steps all over cherished remembrances of stories and monsters past, it wrong-foots itself into a hole which is hard to climb out of. Last week in this space we lamented this occasion, at least for the THT Brain Trust, with regard to the Silurians. Perhaps the worst part of all for those of us plagued with long-term memory, it that this has all happened before. Back in 1984 when JN-T was hip-deep in needless continuity with the past, Peter Davison's final season led of with Warriors of the Deep, one of the few stories in classic Who which often elicit visceral negative reactions amongst long-term fans.
It's certainly unfair to visit the sins of Warriors of the Deep upon The Hungry Earth / Cold Blood. For a start the latter is simply a much better story in concept and execution than it's distant cousin, but as we started with in this post, the memory simply does not cheat in this case. This story was probably tasked with the charge of being "the one to evoke Classic Who," but for anyone familiar with The Silurians the societal breakdown in Cold Blood seemed all-too-familiar, and needless. Matt Smith channeled his inner-Pertwee as best he could, but he seemed a little too-distant in this story.
And then there's Rory, who's happily did not turn out to be Adric in any sense of the word. The little bit with the engagement ring in The Hungry Earth should have been a dead-giveaway (pardon the pun) about what was to come, and while it seemed rushed in terms of it's abruptness it also book-ended the crack-o-doom appearances quite nicely. Thank you Arthur Darvill. Perhaps we'll be seeing you again when the Pandorica opens.
Images and caps for Cold Blood are now online.
A few weeks back when 
This week however the series nods decidedly to the 
Amy's Choice
The joy in this story, owing to Toby Jones' performance, is what a mean-spirited imp the Dream Lord is, always being derogatory and yet playful as well to the Doctor at the same time. The story also advanced, in a much more satisfying way, the Doctor-Rory-Amy triangle, begun in 
It's a syndrome I-tells-ya. Let's call it OFS or Old Fan Syndrome. It's an affliction borne of too many years watching and more importantly remembering all too well our favorite TV program. When you begin spotting elements from other stories, too many other stories, within the story you're watching, it could well be the onset of OFS, or it could be 
The whole of the story exceeds the sum of it's parts, but ask yourself if you also saw elements of 
It's a curious thing, this continuation of 
Paces and pulses also quickened at the end of the episode with the Smoochie, Smoochie Time (as described by Smith and Gillan). At the risk of sounding die-hard traditionalist, we 're always a but discomfited by overt sexuality in Doctor Who. Amy seems to switch into this mode in odd ways and odd times–but it also seems this ties back to the overall theme for the season. As for timing–she's getting married during the World Cup! But because June 26th, 2010 is also a Saturday, what will be the schedule implications for the rest of the Season? Should the season run uninterrupted, June 26th would be when episode 13 airs. Hmmm.