Blink and Survival

Sally Sparrow loves old things which is why she goes to the old house and finds a message meant for her. It is written on the wall under the wallpaper and is from the Doctor. The next day she brings her friend and notices that the weeping angel statue has moved. A stranger comes to the door with a letter from the friend she brought with her. Things become stranger still and she has no choice but to trust the messages sent to her from this Doctor.

Like "Love and Monsters" shown around the same time last year the Doctor and Martha have very little viewing time. It is all about Sally following these messages to save the world from the moving statues. I didn't particularly like "Love and Monsters" but I did like "Blink". There is nothing creepier than statues which move when you aren't looking. I think if I had watched this as a child I would have been terrified. A good thing as the scary episodes were always my favourites as a child. The movement of the statues would have been enough but the change in their facial expressions really set it off. The story itself sounds very familiar though. This idea of statues moving when you aren't looking isn't new.

I have had this DVD for a couple of weeks now and I just got round to watching it yesterday. The Doctor has returned Ace to her home town of Perivale. Not wanting to admit she is a little home sick Ace insists to the Doctor that she just wondered what her old gang were up to. Funny things have been happening in Perivale. Most of Ace's friends have disappeared and they now have a problem with stray cats. They soon find out that people are being transported to the planet of the Cheetah people and they have the Master to thank for it. The Master is trapped on the dying world and hopes the Doctor will help him escape. Meanwhile everyone on the planet are in danger of becoming like the Cheetah people.

This was the last storyline in the classic series broadcast on television. Although it wasn't filmed last (that was "Ghost Light). I liked the idea behind this story and I think it could have been better had more gone into it. I can't help but wish that they had went into how the Master became trapped on the planet. I also think that more could have been made of the Cheetah people themselves. We only really saw their personalities through Karra who befriended Ace. When looking up this episode I did find out that Lisa Bowerman who played Karra also played Bernice Summerfield in the audio adventures. I immediately recognise Hale and Pace as the shop owners. One other person I didn't recognise was the girl who played Squeak, Midge's 9 year old sister. She was played by Adele Silva who now plays Kelly in Emmerdale.

Lili, yes "The Village of The Damned" is the film you are thinking of. I looked up the film and discovered it was actually remade in 1996 starring Christopher Reeves, Kirsty Alley and Mark Hamil. I didn't realise that it had been remade. Has anyone seen this version? I wonder if it is any good.

Timewarden, I haven't read any books by Thomas Hardy. Another author I always meant to try. I have a huge list of those. What surprised me about Wyndham is that he is American. I always saw him as British. Possibly because of Chocky. He also tried his hand at farming amongst other things. That I can believe thanks to "Chrysalids" which was set in an old farming community.

Crazee4books, the books are so much better than the movies. I highly recommend them.