"Doctor Who"
The Long Game (2005)

Director:

Brian Grant

Writer:

Russell T. Davies (written by)

TV Series:

"Doctor Who" (2005)

Original Air Date:

7 May 2005 (Season 1, Episode 7)

Genre:

Adventure | Drama | Sci-Fi

Plot:

The Doctor and Rose arrive in the year 200,000 to see The Fourth Great and Bountiful Human Empire. But something has gone wrong - someone is holding back the development of mankind. Who could have done this? And why? |

Plot Keywords:

Fantasy | Christ Allegory | Man With No Name | Telephone Booth | Doctor Who

Cast

Christopher Eccleston	...	Doctor Who
Billie Piper	...	Rose Tyler
Bruno Langley	...	Adam Mitchell
Colin Prockter	...	Head Chef
Christine Adams	...	Cathica
Anna Maxwell Martin	...	Suki (as Anna Maxwell-Martin)
Simon Pegg	...	The Editor
Tamsin Greig	...	Nurse
Judy Holt	...	Adam's Mum

Runtime:

45 min | 45 min (50 episodes)

Country:

UK

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Certification:

USA:TV-PG | UK:PG

Company:

BBC Wales

Trivia:

The character of Suki Macrae Cantrell in "The Long Game" is named after Tom MacRae, a television writer and a good friend of Executive Producer Russell T. Davies. Davies later hired Macrae to work as a writer on series two.

Quotes:

[first lines]
The Doctor: So, it's two-hundred thousand, it's a spaceship - no, wait a minute - space station, and, er... go and try that gate over there. Off you go.

The Long Yawn

Without doubt this is the weakest story of the first season of the DOCTOR WHO relaunch and it's all down to writer/executive producer . Like most episodes written by RTD it has a very good opening hook and a very good closing sequence but in between we have a fairly bad structured and paced story where nothing much happens

The opening revolves around new companion Adam experiencing his first trip into space with humorous results and it's at this point the audience are left rubbing their chins thinking hey this guy might be a really good addition to the Tardis crew but unfortunately as the story progresses it becomes obvious that he's only included to take up some running time and to set up a joke at the end . Likewise the inclusion of both Simon Pegg and Tamsin Grieg seems more like gimmick casting in order to make the episode more memorable than it really is and there's no way you'll believe this story was part of the Bad Wolf running theme . As always Ecclestone's performance as possibly the most callous incarnation of The Doctor is fantastic