Now that the first half of the series is over, I have found myself in the position where I am three episodes out of date for my reviews. Instead of keeping you all waiting another 3 weeks (yes, a full review does take about a week to write), I've decided to condense said reviews into one, and give an overview of my opinion of the episodes.

A Town Called Mercy

The premise to this episode was great - a morality tale in the Wild West. Unfortunately, the execution was lacking. The episode wants us to be on Khaler-Jex's (joint creator of the Gunslinger) side, but why should we, when he shows a ruthless streak about midway through the episode? And just when we've all decided that Jex is the bad guy, his character softens again, and he becomes repentent, scared of death because of his religion. So what is he? A harmless scientist or a ruthless scientist? The episode never really makes its mind.

Much like Boomtown (2005), A Town Called Mercy tries to present a situation where the Doctor has to choose whether a character lives or dies. Ultimately, like in Boomtown, the decision is taken out of the Doctor's hands, but in a much less forced way - Jex commits suicide.

Overall, A Town Called Mercy attempts to tell a morality tale that falls flat on its face. The episode can't work out whether Jex is good or bad, and takes the biggest decision of the series out of the Doctor's hands. I rate the episode:

6.5 out of 10

The Power of Three

This episode is the second romp of the series, and is as enjoyable as the previous one: Dinosaurs on a Spaceship. In my opinion, this episode does everything right - until the conclusion. I'm not going to discuss it here, that's already been done, but I'll just say that it made me think that John-Nathan Turner was right when he got rid of the sonic screwdriver back in 1981. Oh well.

The idea of a 'slow invsion' is new to Doctor Who, but director Douglas MacKinnon does a brilliant job of capturing the feel of a world in panic, wondering what on earth these cubes are. Rory's dad, Brian returns in this episode, and provides many comedic moments, such as the way he stays in the TARDIS for four days after the Doctor told him to watch the cubes. The introduction of Kate Stewart, Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart's daughter, was a welcome touch, but it was a shame that her character wasn't developed further. Hopefully we'll see more of her in the future.

Overall, The Power of Three really should have been a two parter. So many elements felt rushed and underdeveloped. But apart from the horrible ending, none of the said elements detract from how good the episode is. I rate The Power of Three:

8.5 out of 10

The Angels Take Manhattan

I'm going to ask one question: how many of you cried at least once during the episode? Guess what - I didn't. I'm not an overly emotional person, so the Pond's goodbye didn't affect me as much as other people. That being said, I though their send off was brilliant - Amy and Rory end up living to death, together. However, I do think that parts of it were very contrived - why can't the Doctor just pick them up somewhere outside of New York? Why couldn't he just skip ahead to 1939 and pick them up then? If they had to die in New York, he could do one of the aforementioned journeys, take them back to their present day, let them age there, pick them up when they're old and take them back to NY. There, simple, the Doctor can see them again, and they can live together in the 21st century, all without disrupting the timeline.

River's return to maturity was welcomed,as she was much less annoying, and the idea of her writing a book in which the events where running parallel to the Doctor and Amy was genius, especially the punchline where we find out that the 'skinny guy' is actually Rory. Speaking of which, he manages to die twice more in this episode, although the second is permanent. I did find it a bit tragic that he never got to say goodbye to the Doctor or River (or Brian for that matter) though.

I have to say this, but the weeping angels are not scary anymore. Yes, the 'weeping cherubium' were a nice addition to their lore, but they've already outstayed their welcome, and I hope that the producers decided to retire them soon before their appeal is leached out of them (like what happened to the daleks)

Overall, The Angels Take Manhatten was a thrililng, enjoyable, not-that-emotional conclusion to the Pond's tenure on the show. I rate the episode:

8 out of 10

(Mind you, WHY WASN'T BRIAN TOLD OF WHAT HAPPENED TO HIS SON AND DAUGHTER-IN-LAW???? And the music while Amy and Rory were falling was absolutely heavenly.)

What did you think about the episodes? Let me know in the comments.