Tate Brilliant

“And off we go again…”: Season 30, Adipose... Episode One.
Er, have they put some harsh, tasty beats under the sig tune or something? Not to worry - and not to worry too much about the plot, here, while we’re at it. The start of term is always about finding your feet and working out who you’re going to get on with, and I don’t care who knows it: I Like Donna.
And I say that as someone who didn’t like her in the Christmas special. Nor am I a Catherine Tate Show fan - it’s just not funny, right? But Tate’s clearly a fine actress, and surely nobody seriously expected Donna Noble to just shout for 13 weeks? She’s changed, the Doctor’s changed, and as Donna shifts between soupy stargazing and seen-it-before mild disappointment (“That’s one solution, hiding in a cupboard… I like it!”) it occurs to me she might be the perfect match for the quicksilver tenth Doc because she is, simply, a bit crackers.
And she doesn’t fancy him! Phew! Jury’s still out on the “I just want a mate/ You just want to mate!?” schtick, but the leads interact beautifully on the whole (and for the first few minutes don’t interract beautifully, too, missing each other by parsecs); the mimed meeting through the glass will rightly be replayed across the land tonight. Look at her face, yeah?
Loving Tennant, too: electric, cocky, cold, brooding, and a dab hand with a fire exit. How odd-yet-right that, just occasionally, The Oncoming Storm is found checking catflaps. That tells you as much about the real Doctor as does all the mythopoeic, grandstanding stuff.
It was a bit too loosely directed to be screwball, and a bit-too Sarah Jane Adventures story-wise to merit close examination (actually, that’s unfair to SJA; I’ll get back to you on that one). Was there a deeply-hidden message about too-busy parents undermining society? No, I didn’t think so. Old Whovians might want to suggest ‘It’s a bit like an inverted Terror of the Autons, with the troll-like invaders coming from our insides’, but they would be trying too hard. Sarah Lancashire: ace… but just two henchmen? Hmmmm…
But, hey, c’mon, what’s not to like? The EastEnders trailer that followed made we want to kill myself, and it makes Primeval look like a cheap ITV knock-off. Ahem.
And guess what? Just when you start thinking you might get over Martha, it’s Rose that casts a cold shadow over proceedings. Brilliant.
But Donna we like: roll on volcano day…