Hi guys, Sharp-O back once again with another Mint in Box and today I’m rolling around at the speed of sound and coming in like a wrecking ball with a review of the remote-controlled Baller vehicle and Hybrid Stage 2 figure.

Find out more about Jazwares’ Fortnite toys HERE!

Doctor Who season eight comes to a close with Death in Heaven, a thoroughly dreary and depressing affair and something of a lacklustre finale, only saved by the performances of most of the cast.

The Clara Backdown can finally end because Jenna Coleman’s character, veteran of a season and a half, ends her tenure as a companion and I breath a huge sigh of relief. Clara could be a fantastic character at times but, as a whole, she is the wrong kind of companion for Capaldi’s Doctor. In a fun moment at the start of the episode, after Clara declares herself to be the Doctor, the credits roll and Jenna Coleman’s name swaps places with Capaldi’s, and her eyes replace his later in the credits. It’s a clever little wink to the audience. The final goodbye between the Doctor and Clara is a microcosm of their emotional relationship. Even knowing they’ll never see each other again, they’re all too willing to lie to one another, perfectly summed up in the line: “Never trust a hug, you can’t see someone’s face.”

Danny gets the short end of the stick, first getting jobbed out by a car and becoming a hired goon in a Cyber-Suit for Missy. His performance is strong as steel and gets a big damn hero moment and a speech worthy of Stacker Pentecost. Still, Samuel Anderson is a fantastic actor and despite getting dumped on all season, I hope to see him in other stuff in the future.

Guest stars come thick and fast, with the return of Jemma Redgrave and Ingrid Oliver as Kate Stewart and Osgood, respectively. Kate is still living up to her father’s legacy and I’m glad she keeps appearing, another case of a character we need to see more of. Osgood… Poor sweet and smart and adorable Osgood… I’m pretty bummed by her death, more so than Danny. Danny got to be a badass, Osgood was little more than fodder and that’s just plain wrong. Sanjeev Bhaskar also guest stars but his role primarily consists of saying “It was Captain Scarlet” and getting sucked out of a plane window. Such a waste of a good actor. We also get the return of… THE BRIGADIER! In a last minute save, a now Cyberised Brigadier saved his daughter after she fell from the plane and finally gets that salute he always wanted from the Doctor. Then he flies off, presumably to solder on a metal moustache and fight aliens as CyberBrig.

Missy; aka The Master, aka Missy Poppins, aka Miguel Sanchez Michelle Gomez takes the performance from last week and dials it up to Heath Ledger! Obviously taking some elements from John Simm’s Master and adding her own hectic, bat-shit-insane mannerisms to it. Gomez is a very express and energetic actress and I’m glad to see that transfer into her performance as the Doctor’s oldest nemesis. Missy escaped thanks to the Doctors’ intervention and moving Gallifrey out of time (Thus negating John Simm’s tenure as the Master?). Her ultimate fate is mysterious, as the effect of her being vaporised is the same as the teleportation she used earlier so perhaps she can return in the future!

Peter Capaldi’s first season as the Doctor has been very rocky. Inconsistent writing, coupled with the wrong companion has made this whole season very lacklustre, despite some very strong episodes and performances by him. As the Doctor and Clara part ways and the credits roll, we suddenly cut back into the TARDIS with a melancholy Doctor and a booming voice at the door. Our mysterious caller enters the TARDIS and…

IT’S SANTA! *flails* Nick Frost’s role in the upcoming Christmas episode is confirmed with his appearance here and I cheered. Love me some Nick Frost and he is going to play this perfectly! As for the Christmas episode itself? Check it out:

Nick Frost as Santa in a Doctor Who episode homaging John Carpenter’s The Thing? SOLD! I’ll see you guys at Christmas!

With the Doctor Who Season 8 finale coming this week, I figured it was about time I took a look at the Doctor’s signature tool, the Sonic Screwdriver!

Also be sure to go read my coverage of this season of Doctor Who in our weekly column, No, YOU’RE a TARDIS!

After watching Dark Water, I looked back on the season and realised that the over-arcing theme of darkness was barely present, only two episodes really lived up to that potential. Don’t get me wrong, there were still great episodes this season but compared to Dark Water, most of them are weak sauce.

Dark Water doesn’t pull its punches from the get-go when Danny is ploughed down by a car before the credits. Jaysus… I know I wanted this season to be darker but still… Danny Pink was cool. Not cool, show. Naturally, Clara is traumatised but her wheels are already turning on a plan. She is purposely going to betray her friendship with the Doctor to get Danny back and for the first time in who knows how long, I actually admire Clara.

She’s got some chops to pull this stunt and I’m actually impressed with her preparation, stealing all spare TARDIS keys and knocking the Doctor out after asking to see a volcano. This plan is pretty genius and, even more shockingly, Clara follows through and throws all of the keys into the lava! It’s a brilliant strategy and even after the shock of what she’s done hits her, she still admits that she’d do it again, even before this scenario is revealed to be a dream state. It’s an incredible show of strength on Clara’s part and Jenna Coleman plays it very strongly but it’s just a shame that she’s just kinda… there for the rest of the episode. Luckily, Capaldi is on hand to carry this episode.

The Doctor, despite being betrayed, cares far too much for Clara for that to matter and takes her to the Nethersphere to where he gets be an asshole to guys in suits, which is fun. He gets molested by Missy, who is pretending to be an overly amorous android and threatens to beat someone with a shoe! He realises a little too late that the skeletons in the cells are actually Cybermen. Just a shame that a lot of promo material spoiled this because they clues would have been cool to solve on their own merit but if someone didn’t see trailers and such, this would have been a fun little mystery.

The various guest characters are pretty solid. Seb, played by Thick of It’s Chris Addison, is a delightful dickbag who condescends Danny in his post-death confusion and then there’s Dr. Chang who reveals what 3W means and that’s pretty gruesome and that‘s what makes this episode so fantastic! There’s also a small boy that Danny killed during wartime, something that’s been alluded to before. Sort of predictable but Samuel Anderson plays out Danny’s grief as well as can be expected.

SO! That Missy reveal, huh? People (including myself) had been speculating her identity since the start of the season and it’s finally revealed that she’s the Master, or rather, the Mistress. While the reveal is awesome, it couldn’t have been the Rani? Or maybe an embittered Romana? Regardless, Michelle Gomez is fully channeling John Simms’ particular brand of Master Madness which makes her quite entertaining. With a Monty Python reference, she initiates the Cyberman invasion of six dudes. I found it funny that this was the extent of the enemy force after the whole “the dead outnumber the living” line. It’s an awesome line but kind of undercut by having only 6 dudes in Cyber-suits.

Dark Water is a fantastic start to the season finale but you don’t need me to tell you that, you saw it! I’m excited to see where this goes so I’ll see you next week for Death in Heaven.

While Mummy on the Orient Express could be considered the Companion-lite episode, this is most definitely a Doctor-lite episode, where the Doctor is trapped inside a tiny TARDIS while Clara assumes the role of the Doctor to solve a mystery and stop an invasion.
First up, the new enemy! “The Boneless”, as the Doctor dubs them, are beings from a two dimensional realm, probing and dissecting humanity until they can transfer into our dimension. They’re a fascinating new bad guy and I tip my hat to Jamie Mathieson (who also wrote last week’s episode) for their concept. These guys are Weeping Angel tier of terrifying new threat but I hope they’re used a little more sparingly than the Angels were.

Capaldi, though side-lined and suffering from bad hair continuity, does a good job of working things out despite the disadvantage. Naturally, being trapped in a tiny TARDIS leads to some rather funny moments with his face and hands, even though the effect can look especially ropey in some places. The Doctor activating Siege Mode presents an interesting question, since it appears to be the Pandorica and the final scene is especially good but I’ll get to that.

The Clara Backdown is postponed because she’s actually a good character this week. It’s weird, the first half of the season she was mostly insufferable but now she becomes good every couple of weeks! Trying to get a thing going here, show. But, yes, Clara plays her version of the Doctor superbly and has a great rapport with her companion, Rigsy (who is also fantastic in this episode) and can even get harsh with the jackass Fenton (played by Christopher Fairbank, whom I last saw in Guardians of The Galaxy).

The Doctor and Clara dynamic has it’s first real sign of coming undone. Clara, feeling full of herself, keeps prodding the Doctor to tell her she was a good Doctor and he relents finally and agrees. But says that “goodness” had nothing to do with being a good Doctor. And Clara shows a quick flash of realisation. The companion becoming as dark as the Doctor is something that was played with by Rory. When told by the Doctor to make the choice between the present Amy Pond or the older, battle-scarred Amy who never stopped loving him, Rory screamed at the 11th Doctor that he was “turning me into you!” so while Clara acting more like Capaldi might make for a good episode, ultimately, it’s the sign of the end drawing near. As is Missy declaring “My Clara, I’ve chosen well” to an iPad before cackling like a Vaudeville villain.

Flatline is an interesting, terrifying and entertaining one-off episode and I can’t recommend it enough. Next week we’ll have more mysteries and the return of Danny Pink in In the Forest of the Night!

This week’s episode is definitely an episode of two halves as the Doctor/Clara dynamic ends up coming off as a severe case of Stockholm Syndrome and this plot line book ends an immensely entertaining, dark, and clever story.

The Clara Backdown continues as this episode only serves to highlight that she is entirely wrong for this Doctor. Sure she’ll challenge the Doctor on occasion but she just comes running back and that’s dumb. It lacks the soul that Donna/10 had, where Donna challenged the Doctor but stayed with him in spite his questionable actions because she knew, at that time, he needed her to keep him in line. Clara worked for the whimsical “fairy tale” 11th Doctor but feels out of place for the more cynical, pragmatic 12th Doctor.

Mummy on the Orient Express‘s main plot is pretty interesting as the entire trip is an orchestrated plot by an amoral AI to gather a bunch of scientists to solve the riddle of an ancient mummy curse before it kills them all. It’s got shades of Portal with Gus acting as our GLaDOS, purposefully hiding details about the Foretold that it knows to test the assembled scientists. This AI has been present for several previous attempts to unlock the mysteries of the Foretold, possibly for military purposes, where everyone has died and Gus has ranked their progress. It’s the kind of “throw bodies at the problem” mentality that we’ve come to expect from rampant but affable AI. The Mummy is an interesting take on the monster idea, as it’s an ancient undead soldier from a long forgotten ware and it’s curse is a result of tech keeping him going, unable to rest.

Capaldi has some interesting pieces in this episode. He proves he’s a more pragmatic Doctor than others, all too aware that people will die here before he solves the mystery. He’s even unintentionally funny as he talks to those about to die with the kind of disrespect he’s given to people before. The only person he seems to have a passing respect for is Perkins, the train’s Chief Engineer. Perkins is played by notable British comedian and massive Who fanboy, Frank Skinner. This role is perfect for him and Perkins comes off as one of the most engaging and interesting side-characters we’ve had all season. It’s another case of hoping he’ll make a return in the future because his performance was brilliant.

Mummy on the Orient Express gets a stamp of Must See. Despite Clara being… well, Clara, this episode has a fantastic premise, a chilling monster and enjoyable side characters. Be sure to come back next week when we Flatline.

Kill The Moon could be considered our Doctor-Lite episode for this season and, given it’s premise, could be a pretty strong episode and while I was under the assumption that this would be a horror episode, what we inevitably got was pretty interesting.

The outset of this episode sees the Doctor kowtowing to Clara’s bitching. Oh boo-hoo, Courtney Woods, the annoying student from last time, doesn’t feel special. I’m actually with the Doctor on this. Why does it matter? Plenty of former companions struggle with the idea of life sans-Doctor but this girl went on ONE trip AND threw up when presented with the majesty of the universe and is using it as an excuse to act up, it’s bullshit. But whatever, the nagging nanny gets her way and Courtney is accompanying us for this story.

I will say, despite the stupidity of this set-up, Courtney isn’t quite as insufferable as I expected. She’s a pissy teenager sometimes (but what teenager isn’t?) and even comes across as a decent person underneath her bravado. It’s Clara’s insistence that she comes along that pisses me off. Clara, who knows full well how god damn dangerous ANY trip in the TARDIS can be, even gets angry about the presence of the dangerous space spiders when I don’t feel she really has any grounds to, considering she forced him to bring the kid along. “Duty of care”, pft.

Speaking of the space spiders, we don’t really get a name for them, they’re just large bacteria so SPACE SPIDERS it is. They’re creepy, well-designed and could have easily been the focus of a fantastic Alien homage if it wasn’t for the plot focus.

The Moon is an egg. I’ll let that sink in for a second. Okay, great premise and it presents an interesting dilemma UNTIL you throw abortion subtext and have three women left alone to make this decision. How am I meant to comment on this? The subtext is so overt it borders on parody, so much so that at one point during the episode, I thought of the line from a recent episode of Dragonball Z Abridged: “This isn’t about a right to life, it’s about making a choice. A choice we both need to make. A choice between a terrible mistake that could ruin lives and-FUCK IT, I’m dropping the pretenses, we’re aborting Cell.” Ultimately, I think this is more a test of humanity, much like the events of The Beast Below but unlike that episode, humanity decides to kill the innocent creature that means them no harm, because humanity are dicks.

Thankfully, Clara and Courtney have a last second change of heart and spare the creature resulting in a beautiful shot of the moon-egg cracking from Earth, with everyone watching as GHIDORA EMERGES TO DESTROY THEM ALL! Seriously, I hope they have Jaegers to deal with that problem later. The creature leaves behind another egg-moon so the Earth’s tides aren’t super-boned. And every goes home for tea!

UNTIL, Clara goes on a three-minute rampage where she proceeds to chew the Doctor a new one for not only putting such a massive burden upon her, her student and a stranger but for also knowing the outcome and making them go through such an ordeal. The Doctor explains that he left to allow them to make the choice as humans but Clara fires back that he was being patronising and given his history with the Earth, he was obliged to save his second home. Clara then does the unthinkable and orders him to leave and never come back. This is an emotionally charged and powerful scene and actually goes a long way to improve Clara as a character so if she quits being the perfect little tag along and starts acting like she has opinions other than the Doctor’s I will announce the start of the Clara Backdown Backdown.

Overall, an entertaining little episode, especially given last week’s bore-fest but next week we’re boarding our non-stop train to Murder-Town in Mummy on the Orient Express.

The Caretaker marks a special occasion for me. This episode marked the start of The Clara Backdown. I am officially tired of Clara as a character and the show focusing on here, especially since her role as “The Impossible Girl” is now pointless to the plot. The one good thing is that she’s a gateway for Danny to become a companion (however short-lived that may be).

This episode has a promising premise. Clara is run ragged by her double life until her two worlds collide, hi-jinks ensue. There’s some really interesting scenes and some good performances but I can’t say this is a good episode as a whole, mainly because of the focus on Clara again.

The Doctor infiltrates Coal Hill school as a caretaker, hoping to flush out a Skovox Blitzer. This diminutive destroyer of planets is a weird war machine that seems out of place in this universe, especially given it’s similarity to alien races in the Mass Effect series. It’s a simple plot device that gets no development outside of the basic schtick they use for Daleks.

Capaldi is on top form as usual; sassing Clara, Danny, teachers and pupils alike. His dismissive attitude towards Danny’s role as maths teacher could possibly be a call-back to his time as the Fifth Doctor and the Brigadier (who became a maths teacher after retiring from UNIT). His hostility towards Danny as a soldier is one of the highlights of the episode and is the angriest/most offensive we’ve seen the Doctor in a long time.

Clara is Clara. Nuff said.

Danny Pink gets lots of character development this episode! He continues to be a really likeable guy and even shows how he acts in his relationship with Clara (which some have described as abusive because of this episode. Those people are retarded) and even has a big damn hero moment with a sick front flip for style. He takes some abuse from the Doctor but responds in kind. He’s not going to let the Doctor’s attitude slide and that’s refreshing. It’s very Donna Noble and she was the best companion, hands down.

The Promised Land makes a return after a three episode absence but we’re dealing with someone other than Missy, who is “busy”. This suit (who is apparently called Seb) is interviewing the police officer who fell victim to the Blitzer early on, and refers to the realm they’re in as The Nethersphere (his favourite name for the place). Still not sure of the rhyme or reason of these sequences but hopefully we’ll find that out at the end of the season.

Half way through Season 8 and the only outstanding episode in this reviewer’s opinion is Listen. That’s poor form, Who. Poor form. This show needs to up it’s game, especially if it wants to keep getting reviewed. I dropped Miracle Day, I’ll drop Who if it turns to shit and I’ll turn my full attention to Agents of SHIELD and The Flash! Come back next week for the Alien homaging – Kill the Moon (That’s a pretty good title…)

We set course for merry olde England this week with Robot of Sherwood, written by the writing luminary Mark Gatiss. This was a pretty fun episode as The Doctor takes Clara to meet one of her childhood heroes, Robin Hood. The Doctor, cocksure that this legendary figure is mere fiction, soon finds his match in the dashing rogue who seems a little too good to be true.

The guest stars this week are pretty damn stellar, with Tom Riley (Return to House on Haunted Hill, St. Trinian’s II) playing Robin of Loxley and Ben Miller (Armstrong & Miller, Johnny English) as the Sheriff of Nottingham. Unfortunately, Ben Miller is pretty forgettable in his role, playing the Sheriff as you’d expect the sheriff to be played and as we’ve seen before. He’s the baddie, that’s it. Interestingly, his demise in the episode was changed. He was originally revealed as a robot after being decapitated but in light of recent high-profile news events, that was deemed inappropriate. The Sheriff’s robotic knights appear to also be in search of “The Promised Land”, same as Mr Half-Face in the first episode. Curiouser and Curiouser…

Tom Riley, however, is in a league of his own this episode. He plays Robin so camp that it borders on parody but is so earnest in his performance that you can’t even be annoyed by him, especially as he reveals that his joyful nature is just a facade to hide a broken heart. His antagonistic banter with the Doctor is pure joy to watch as they goad and wind each other up, much to Clara’s chagrin. Once he finds out his status in history, he doesn’t shy away from his legacy and even gives the Doctor something to think about and that goes a long way to making him a character I hope returns.

Capaldi is on top form this episode, with more of a “no fucks to give” attitude than last time. His skepticism of Robin Hood’s existence, the arrow shot into his TARDIS, and then the sly finger he gives to Robin really shows of the animosity the Doctor has toward Robin. He even breaks out some Venusian Karate on him! By the end, however, the Doctor relents and even leaves him a gift, the lost Maid Marian.

Overall, a solid episiode with fun and fights for all the family! Next, we peek through the looking glass so be sure to Listen…

This being a regeneration story, it’s amazing how much time we spend with the Paternoster Gang, developing them a little more and more Strax hi-jinks. One of the major insights we get is into the relationship between Madame Vastra and Jenny Flynt. Naturally, as an interspecies lesbian married couple, they’re already pretty interesting to watch in terms of character dynamics but we find out that while they present the veneer of master and maid to the outside world, it kind of bleeds into their home life, something that Jenny takes exception to. There’s also the fact that Vastra has a bit of a wandering eye and can be quite flirtatious with other women. They’re by no means a perfect couple but their affection feels legitimate and I think that makes them feel like better characters, with a fun back and forth that makes them a delight to watch.

Strax is also funny as usual, with Clara acting as his straight man for many scenes. Not much in terms of character development but he’s the comedic potato and that’s good enough for me.

The villain of the week is actually a nice throwback to an older episode. Tell me if this sounds familiar! Clockwork robots, cannibalising humans for spares and repairs? That’s right, these are the same clockwork droids from Season 2’s The Girl in The Fireplace. Well, not the same exact robots, these being from the sistership of the SS Madame de Pompadour, the SS Marie Antoinette. They’re okay antagonists but they’re really there to job out to the new Doctor and not a lot else.

Clara’s role this episode is as audience proxy, naturally. This isn’t our prancing, young handsome Doctor and that’s just not on! Or do we need to accept that this old dude is the new norm and accept that he’s still the Doctor? Of course we do, this may be a radical change for fans who have only seen the revived series but this old hat for older fans.

Peter Capaldi’s first outing is manic, delusional and all together unsettling. His mad ramblings and underlying hostility to everything around him has shades of dementia to it, as he struggles with his new face. Since Capaldi has already appeared in Who (namely Season 4) it’s good that they address it as the Doctor struggles to remember who this face belongs to and where he’s seen it before. Capaldi also has some fun with his new Scottish accent. Being his first outing, I’m still not sure on this Doctor’s personality but his underlying principles are still the same.

And finally, we come to this lady. Half-Face awakens in a seeming paradise and Missy is there to welcome him. She claims to be the Doctor’s girlfriend and instantly establishes herself as untrustworthy and devious. She clearly has an agenda and will be the over-arcing villain for this season.

This episode sets the tone for the upcoming season quite effectively, coming off as so much darker and less whimsical than previous seasons. The villain tries to escape in a hot air balloon MADE OUT OF SKIN! If that’s not an indication of how dark this season’s going, I don’t know what is. A disorienting 76minute affair but a solid story and a nice set up for the stories ahead. Thanks for reading and I’ll catch you guys next week!