Journey's End

"Something is destroying everything..."

Writer: Russell T Davies

Format: TV

Broadcast: 5th July 2008

Series: 4.13

Featuring: Tenth Doctor, Donna, Rose, Martha, Captain Jack, Sarah Jane, Mickey

Synopsis 

The Daleks are the masters of Earth. The Doctor has been exterminated and now Davros schemes to end all of reality itself. Can the Children of Time do anything to save creation? Even when one of them will die?

Verdict 

Journey's End was an incredible finale and a brilliant conclusion to the story already started in The Stolen Earth. We don't get to see a great deal of the Torchwood team or Luke, whom were both representing the Doctor Who spinoff shows, but what we got was still absolutely superb. It begins immediately where the previous episode finished and that was with the Tenth Doctor regenerating. I think the resolution of using the spare hand to feed the regeneration power into should have occurred before the opening credits as we knew immediately that a regeneration wouldn't be occurring. Well, that's not strictly true I guess. We would later learn in The Time of the Doctor that this did in fact use up one of the Doctor's twelve permitted regenerations despite not changing physically. The amount of control Time Lords have on regeneration is interesting and I liked how The Christmas Invasion was referenced and brought full circle where the Doctor's hand was chopped off by the Sycorax Leader. We saw the hand throughout the first series of Torchwood and it's been in the TARDIS since the finale of Series 3 and now we saw the hand grow into another Doctor! The prophecy told in Planet of the Ood of the DoctorDonna came true and we technically saw three versions of the Doctor. The Daleks were still as ruthless as ever and I liked how they transported the TARDIS to the Dalek Crucible. The Doctor was reunited with Davros once again and it was brilliant to see them together again. The former didn't want the nostalgia tour, he just wanted to put things right. Davros was as insane as ever in this episode and that was absolutely fantastic. Davros and the Daleks were intending on a reality bomb which literally meant the end of everything. The Daleks wanted to be the only species in existence and in achieving that, Davros also wanted to show the Doctor his soul. It was quite harrowing really when the Doctor realised what his companions had become. Martha was in Germany and prepared to actually blow up the planet whilst Jack and Sarah had connected a warp star to the Dalek Crucible and were just as prepared to blow the ship up. Davros forcing the Doctor to remember all the sacrifices people have made for him was tough to see and we saw a lot of those who had died in helping the Doctor to victory. Davros recognising Sarah Jane from Genesis of the Daleks was a wonderful moment and I liked how Sarah mentioned she'd grown up since that first meeting. Tosh perfecting a time lock in the Torchwood hub to save Gwen and Ianto from extermination was good and I liked the quick arrival of Mickey and Jackie to save Sarah Jane. There were brilliant references to School Reunion, The Runaway Bride, Voyage of the Damned, Partners in Crime and The Sontaran Stratagem/The Poison Sky. The metacrisis Doctor was intriguing to say the least and I loved how he was part human, had one heart and even acted a little like Donna! The differentiation by wearing a blue suit was terrific and I liked how Army of Ghosts/Doomsday was brought full circle with the Doctor finally telling Rose that he loved her, even if we didn't get to hear it. The metacrisis Doctor committed genocide on the Daleks and the real Doctor made him stay in the parallel universe with Rose. They could go grow old together and that was a nice touch. Donna being the companion that died, or at least the metacrisis version of her, was really emotional and the fact she had to have her memory of her time with the Doctor was a sad ending. Overall, an incredible finale full of action, emotion and brilliance! Seeing all of the companions in the TARDIS was a real treat.

Rating: 10/10