Day 767: The Lodger

The Lodger's another highlight of Series 5 for me because it acts as the real showcase for the Doctor of Series 5. It's a simple character piece as we see the effect that the Doctor has on ordinary people, exposing what it's like to live with this fantastic magician of a man for better and for worse.

I think that, in order to best sum up how the story shows off the Doctor of Series 5, we should have a look at the simple scene where he convinces Sophie to follow her dream and work with monkeys. He deliberately antagonises Sophie into saying her feelings about working with animals, and how much she cares about them. Then, just as things start to get a little bit too unfriendly, the Doctor reveals the magic trick to Sophie and how he's helped her realise her inner feelings. This scene shows off the Doctor well by playing him as someone that can easily take control of the situation when he nees to, even if this is not obvious at first. The magic of the scene is thus created by the moment when we realise that the Doctor has been secretly taking control without us realising it, and so we get a small sense of wonder as we see how he did it. But not only that, there's also the magic of how he did it. Instead of using a simple method, he opted for a more complex but effective method that would change Sophie's mind. The fact that the Doctor is able to pull off such a complex trick from underneath our noses shows the degree of magic that is present within the character.

And this magic applies throughout Series 5. We saw it in the capture of Prisoner Zero in The Eleventh Hour, as well as the defeat of the Angels in Flesh and Stone and the ending of Amy's Choice. It's also inverted very well in the next episode, but that's another time. And speaking of the future, we begin to get a sense in this episode that the Doctor may not be as nice as he seems. Because even though he helped Craig and Sophie in the end, he still put Craig through a small amount of emotional trauma in order to reach his end goal. And that's just the start of the slippery slope that will lead to the darker Doctor that we'll meet in the next series. But, for now, we've got work to do as the Pandorica is due to open.