Fear and Loathing
Ssshhhhhhh!
The penultimate story of Series Two, before the much anticipated two-part finale, was the enigmatically titled Fear Her (although I rather enjoyed the title proposed earlier in production: Chloe Webber Destroys The Earth). Coming off the back of the Abzorbaloff turkey/masterpiece* (* = delete as applicable) and suffering from a slightly disappointing “Next Time” trailer we find our dynamic duo arriving at the 2012 Olympics. However, rather than heading to the Beach Voleyball or Greco-Roman Wrestling, they wander into a suburban street and stumble upon a mystery surrounding some children that have been disappearing. Obviously, there is a suitably Who-ish twist to the events as it turns out that 8-year-old Chloe Webber has been drawing pictures of the children, which manage to pull them out of reality and into the images themselves.
The scary aspect to the story was the juxtaposition of the frightening (the possessed, monsters in cupboards, disappearing kids) against the mundane (suburbia). Everything looked utterly ordinary on the surface, and I think that this may be the reason why the story failed to entirely capture the imagination of this particular viewer. It was the visual impact of episodes such as Tooth and Claw and The Impossible Planet that gave me a certain satisfaction that I was watching something truly special. Here, it looked (whisper it) a little bit Hollyoaks. However, it has to be said that Abisola Agbaje did a sterling job as Chloe, in a role that demanded two personalities and lots of screen-time. All in all I’d have to say that this was a fair to middling story but it served well as an entree to the Army of Ghosts.
Tags: Billie-Piper, David Tennant, Doctor Who, Fear-Her, Rose-Tyler, The-Doctor
