(S05E11) After the disappointing 'Vincent and the Doctor' two weeks ago, it was nice to see the show return to greatness (or at least goodness) with an episode written by Gareth Roberts, who has written 'Doctor Who' for several mediums including television, audio, novels and comics. This episode is an adaptation of one of his comics which originally starred the David Tennant Doctor with Rose and Mickey.

In fact, some of the best episodes of the new series have been adapted from 'Doctor Who' stories in other media. The first season 'Dalek' episode was adapted from one of the Big Finish audios (although the adaptation ending up being very different from its originator) and the stories 'Human Nature' and 'Family of Blood' from the third season were adapted from one of the Virgin New Adventures books.

But I digress ...
This episode represented one of those episodes that was intended to be "low cost" so the series could save some money for the season finale. As the "low cost" episode, it was better written then most of the ones from the Russell T. Davies era.

It was this episode more than any of the previous that gave insight into the character of Matt Smith's Doctor. The viewer gets to see how alien the character actually is. It was somewhat out of character for the Doctor to be unfamiliar with so many Earth customs given how many times he's visited the planet, but he's a new version and his brain did seem a bit frazzled since he took on the role. Of course, he still shows knowledge about the human condition with his mastery of Craig's job and his subtle encouragement of the Craig/Sophie relationship.

The plot itself was fairly simple. The Doctor has to pose as a human (without actually becoming human as in 'Human Nature') in order to investigate strange time-related shenanigans that is interfering with his TARDIS. To do this, he takes a room with a fellow named Craig in a flat in Colchester which is the source of the interference. Naturally, aliens are involved and the good guys win in the end. This episode was more about character than plot.

Craig himself was an interesting character that is easy to relate to. He reminded me a bit of the character of Elton from 'Love & Monsters.'

If memory serves, this is the first Doctor to appear naked on screen in quite some time. Jon Pertwee got caught in a shower in his premiere episode way back when and Christopher Eccleston was shirtless once, but it has been some time. Of course, the Doctor has never played football (or soccer, whatever you wish to call it) on screen before. Cricket, perhaps, but never football.

Naturally, there is a crack in time at the episode's end. Plus Amy discovers Rory's engagement ring. They must keep the season story arc going.

This was more of a fun, lighthearted episode than the ones previous. It also didn't have much shared screen time between the Doctor and Amy. But it did give us tremendous insight into the 11th Doctor's character, and that's a good thing.