(12-10-2014 10:38 )biggles Wrote: [ -> ]...
Good acting especially from the guest stars even Frank Skinner wasn't too bad.
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Really? I thought Skinner was awful, he clearly isn't an actor, and his delivery/accent was Dick Van Dyke-esque. For me he illustrated why they should just stop the guest appearances and hire proper actors instead. The show is aimed more and more at its american audience, but guests like Skinner are anonymous to the yanks, so why even bother?
The sub-plot of Clara and DW 'splitting up' was nonsense, and Clara's last minute turn around was laughable.
As mentioned already, a train full of scientists and experts gathered to study this being, and only a couple of them had any contribution to make, with the engineer being centre stage
The reveal that the mummy goes after the weak, then lo and behold, the conductor or whatever has PTSD and how convenient, he becomes the next victim. Then the first victims grand-daughter is grieving, so conveniently she becomes the next victim. There's a train full of people there, surely someone-else could have been the next victim, just sloppy convenient writing. It's writing like this that puts the show on a level with childrens programming.
Not to mention the very notion of a space Orient Express, hot on the heels of the Titanic previously, been there done that, new ideas please.
Oh, and the 'mummy' turns out to be an old soldier, spot the oh-so subtle theme running through this series, guess that will be a central feature of the finale then, such creative writing!
The one thing I'll say is that they seem to have learnt the lessons from the David Tennent 'running manically around waving the sonic screwdriver' era. Still just loads of pointless running around and shouting to try to generate a sense of excitement and danger, but much less of the all powerful sonic screwdriver, good move
but you have to assume that it was Gus's plan and that she was there due to her age as it would make her victim one, without wasting a scientist. That's how I took it. 
