‘BLINK‘
Please feel free to comment on my review.
Weeping Angels and Sally Sparrow with the Tenth Doctor and Martha
This episode is by Steven Moffat. It’s brilliantly scary and terrifying to watch. It features the first appearance of the Weeping Angels and focuses on the story of Carey Mulligan as Sally Sparrow.
This story, like ‘Love & Monsters’ before it, is a Doctor-lite episode in Series 3. But unlike ‘Love & Monsters’, this episode is more serious and it has more of the fear factor featured in it.
Sally Sparrow takes photographs of an abandoned house where there are strange statues. This starts Sally receiving messages from the Doctor who warns her, the Weeping Angels are coming.
This is a very clever episode that is well-written by Steven Moffat. It features a superb performance by Carey Mulligan as the main star and the Weeping Angels are also very terrifying.
The Weeping Angels appear as statues but can move when you’re not looking or when you blink. If you blink then you’re dead as the Angels zap you back in time to live your life to death.
Remember the ‘grandmother’s footsteps’ game where you look behind you and the kids stay still as statues? The same applies here, as the Angels move when someone isn’t looking at them.
The use of a DVD extra by the Doctor when sending messages to Sally Sparrow is clever. I liked this concept. Sally gets the DVDs and has an odd conversation with the Doctor via a DVD player.
The scenes where Sally talks to the Doctor with Larry beside her are my favourites from this episode. It’s confusing indeed, but it’s very clever and exciting as it gets very frightening later on.
This story features the use of tricksy paradoxes or as the Doctor describes ‘wibbley-wobbly, timey-wimey’. This is a term that’s become very popular amongst ‘Doctor Who’ fans to this day.
Carey Mulligan is lovely and amazing as Sally Sparrow. Carey has been in BBC TV dramas and films before this and continues to do so today. She delivers one of her finest performances here.
The cast also includes Lucy Gaskell as Kathy Nightingale; Sally’s best friend and Finlay Robertson as Larry Nightingale, Kathy’s brother who helps Sally to solve this DVD and the Angels mystery.
There’s also Michael Obiora as DI Billy Shipton who fancies Sally immediately and calls her ‘hot’. And there’s Louis Mahoney as Old Billy, after he was zapped back in time to 1969 by the Angels.
David Tennant and Freema Agyeman rarely appear in this episode. The Doctor and Martha get stuck in 1969 by the Weeping Angels and need Sally Sparrow to send the TARDIS back to them.
The Angels, when coming for Sally and Larry, scared the life out of it. They just appeared when they weren’t looking. I was scared for Sally and Larry as I wonder how they would survive in this.
‘Blink’ is one of the greatest ‘Doctor Who’ episodes ever made. This episode won a BAFTA and it got into the list of the top 10 favourite episodes of ‘Doctor Who’ by the fans. It’s well-written by Steven Moffatt and Carey Mulligan is superb as Sally Sparrow, the star of this amazing episode.
The DVD/Blu-ray special features for this episode are as follows. There’s an audio commentary with writer Steven Moffat and composer Murray Gold. There’s also the ‘Doctor Who Confidential’ episode ‘Do You Remember the First Time?’. There are also David’s Video Diaries, which provide behind-the-looks into ‘Daleks In Manhattan’/’Evolution of the Daleks’, ‘The Lazarus Experiment’ and ’42’ from David Tennant’s point of view. There’s also a video diary on ‘The Weakest Link’ edition of ‘Doctor Who’, which was shown in 2006.
‘Blink’ rating – 9/10
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Bradley's Basement 
I just don’t understand how Steven Moffat can write such an amazing episode like Blink & then turf out drivel in his own era?
This is a nuwho classic, inventive, original & emotional.
As ever Tim you’ve written another detailed amazing review.
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Yes, this is one of the best episodes Steven Moffat wrote for ‘Doctor Who’. I can’t understand it either as I had high hopes for his era of ‘Doctor Who’ after Russell T. Davies.
I enjoyed the Weeping Angels in this episode. I think they work better in this episode compared to their later appearances in the TV series under Steven Moffat’s era of ‘Doctor Who’. It’ll be interesting to find out what the Weeping Angels will be like on audio in their first chronological appearance with the Fifth Doctor in the ‘Classic Doctors, New Monsters’ box set coming out soon.
Thanks again, Timelord Simon. Very pleased you enjoyed my review on ‘Blink’. Tim. 🙂
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Blink was certainly phenomenal for probably being the first to fully recapture the horror magic of the Hinchcliffe era. And for my first impression of Carey Mulligan, it was also a homage to how far feminine strength has come in the Whoniverse. The Weeping Angels are great villains, even if their best potential as a recurring villainy has been questionable. At least until their remarkably creative return for Flux because seeing Jodie’s Doctor turn into a Weeping Angel is timeless. Indeed there’s been a theory that the Weeping Angels are what become of dead Time Lords, or so I recall learning from somewhere. Thank you, Tim, for your review of Blink.
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Hi scifimike,
Thanks for sharing your thoughts on ‘Blink’. This is a very effective episode in the new ‘Doctor Who’ TV series and it’s one that will always be remembered for how scary the Weeping Angels are in their debut appearance. I enjoyed Carey Mulligan in this episode and it’s amazing to see her in other roles including 2005’s ‘Pride and Prejudice’, 2007’s ‘Northanger Abbey’ and 2015’s ‘Suffragette’. I agree that some of the Weeping Angels’ later appearances in ‘Doctor Who’ aren’t as good as ‘Blink’, including the ones during Matt Smith’s era. I enjoyed their return in ‘Flux’ and you’re right about Jodie Whittaker being turned into a Weeping Angel as one of the most effective cliffhangers at the end of the fourth episode. Interesting theory that the Weeping Angels are dead Time Lords. I wouldn’t have considered that.
Many thanks for sharing the ‘Stone’ short horror film. It’s very well-put together by John Smith on YouTube and it feels like the opening to a ‘Doctor Who’ episode. In fact, I’ve envisioned that being the opening to a ‘Doctor Who’ story if I wrote one with the Weeping Angels in it, featuring the Fifth Doctor, Nyssa and Billy.
Thanks again,
Best wishes,
Tim 🙂
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