User Reviews

The Doctor, Amy and Rory land on board a Pirate ship, after some tomfoolery the Doctor and co witness what's been haunting the crew, a Siren summoned by any injury, big or small, that mesmerises her victim with her song, then destroys them upon touch.

Oh the imagination of this episode huge, I don't see lots of love for Curse of the Black Spot but I really liked it. It's not buried in complexities, you can watch it as a lone episode. I've always been intrigued by the Sirens of the Sea and Pirates, what an interesting tale. The music is possibly the best I remember in Nu Who, so bewitching and melodic, it fits! More beard jokes, can't be bad.

I especially loved Hugh Bonneville and Lee Ross's characters, they could have easily overdone it, but both restrained.

I struggle to see why there are so many negatives, I get it's a little bit of a fairy tale, no more so then then 2010's A Christmas Carol. It's a swashbuckling fun episode, that's easy for a new fan to watch, it's not bogged down in story arc or complicated plot. The ending is also very touching. 8/10

After the two-part opener to the sixth and latest series of NuWho, I was looking forward to a stand-alone story that wouldn't mess around with the growingly tiresome conceit of playing around with time travel. A concept that executive producer and head writer Steven Moffat has got into the habit of exploiting. With "The Curse of the Black Spot", penned by a new writer to the series Steve Thompson and with a fairly constrictive and isolated setting there were never really going to be any problems with that.

The setting is that of a 17th Century Pirate ship riding the ocean waves where the crew led by Avery (Hugh Bonneville) are being picked off one by one by a Siren. A ghostly apparition that appears in the form of a beautiful maiden and lures men to their fate with Its haunting Siren song. The one indication they have of knowing who will be the next intended victim is a Black Spot that appears on the hand of one of the men before the phantom strikes. All seems like it might be lost for the men who can practically do nothing to defend themselves against the creature. That is until they come across the Doctor, Amy, and Rory who they think to be stowaways. The Doctor intrigued by the Siren and determined to put a stop to what it's doing endeavours to discover the truth behind It. Curious to learn what motivates it to prey upon the crew.

I have to give writer Steve Thompson credit for something with "The Curse of the Blackspot", an episode which while not being particularly outstanding at least avoids the temptation to going down the obvious route and making some inane gags or references to "Pirates of the Caribbean". But leaving that little thought to one side, it would be easy to write it off as being purely filler and while that might be true to some extent it's not a bad piece of filler as fillers go. The premise is mildly intriguing and there is ample scope to do a nice spin on traditional and literal folklore. A concept that has been neatly exploited before in the classic and old series with 1989's exceptional "The Curse of Fenric" and 2010's Christmas special "A Christmas Carol". The sad fact is however that Thompson ultimately wastes a good opportunity to do this by borrowing tried and tested plot devices with a final reveal that I suspect was plundered from another NuWho story. 2005's "The Doctor Dances" which funnily enough was scripted by Steven Moffat. Undoubtedly with the constrictive nature of the ship, it would prove stilted and tawdry for the protagonists to do their best Scooby-Doo and the Gang impressions and have them running around willy-nilly while attempting to solve the case. To this end, Thompson does hit on the idea of the Siren being able to use mirrors or anything with reflections as portals so that it might leap from one location to another. With the Doctor, Amy, and Rory being trapped in the middle of the ocean it would seem like a fairly ominous plot device were it not for the fact that It's been done before. The 45-minute allotted format proves to be a hindrance as well with a tale which although unoriginal is of a magnitude that it forces Thompson to cram a lot in so that It's like an over-stuffed sock drawer. Problematic still is the fact that a sub-plot involving Avery and his son who has been discovered and the one true stowaway aboard the ship is left underdeveloped with one or two questions left hanging in the air. While there is the niggling notion as to how a young stowaway could conceal himself for a relatively long period without being found in the first place. Worse still is the fact that Thompson wastes the father/son dynamic on a final pay-off which is pretty daft and ridiculous given its context.

There is though some fun to be had however, the sight of Amy trying to buckle her swash and take on a crew of pirates while trite is done so in the right spirit as is the Doctor being forced to walk the plank. The concept of the Siren being able to use mirrors or anything reflective as portals although hackneyed is deftly utilized and with keen direction, by Jeremy Webb, he manages to at least raise some tension out of it. The production values as usual are of the ultimate standard with Webb being able to successfully capture the rain-drenched decks and the turmoil of a ship caught in a storm as close to perfection as possible. Lilly Cole although given no dialogue to work with is necessarily beautiful and makes a haunting presence as the Siren.

Matt Smith once again manages to convince as the Doctor although I find once again we're not seeing enough of the darker side and the righteous indication that we saw in Tennant's tenth incarnation. I am beginning to be convinced that Moffat seems resigned to Smith being more clown-like and light-weight which I feel necessitates being counterbalanced if we're going to see a more rounded and convincing eleventh personae. Arthur Darvill is once again spot on as Rory although I'm beginning to get a bit disheartened with Karen Gillan who is a bit too artificial when playing Amy. With reliable support from Hugh Bonneville and a decent turn from young Oscar Llyod that rounds off the cast and a neat and curious coda to hook us in further to the series, "The Curse of the Black Spot" is passable filler at best. But with the teaser for next week's episode heralding "The Doctor's Wife" and that Neil Gaiman is behind the script, It's a double whammy that I can't resist and only hope that my high hopes are rewarded.

I think this episode is alright. There are a lot of reviews that call it forgettable or the worst in the season, but it's really not that bad. It's fun filler! It doesn't need to have some big purpose or meaning. Maybe I am swayed by nostalgia because I loved it when I was younger, but I really do think it's a fine episode. It may not reinvent the wheel, but it's an episode about pirates being stalked by a siren doctor in a show about an alien with a time machine.. it's not going to be perfect. It has plenty of fun adventure, funny dialogue, and alien nonsense near the end. Overall this episode doesn't deserve nearly as much of the hate as it seems to get.

Of the two reviews currently up, one acknowledges the inherent child-like fantasy that permeates the Dr. Who Universe. The other complains about this point. really, I think I can see both sides of the coin (or pirate medallion. This episode certainly has plenty of plot, and while it doesn't specifically go for silliness, IT is hard to choose a much more romanticized and cheesy topic than English pirates. The more I think about it, the i realize that yes, i acquiesce (I doubt I spelled that right), it could have been much more of a claustrophobic psychological thriller, a la Blink (I don't care what anyone says, the weeping angels and the 3 episodes they've appeared in are far scarier than the silence). But maybe because of the confines of 45 minutes, they had to keep stuff moving at a fairly brisk pace. The quest to make the characters legitimately deep continues, and I think they are getting better at it. Maybe. Also, two thirds the way through, there was a delicious non sequitar cameo thrown in, one that will probably make more sense in the coming months. All in all, a solid, fairly entertaining episode.

At the end of the previous episode, the Doctor suggested an adventure for a break. So naturally, we find ourselves dealing with pirates.

Doctor Who was originally conceived and for many years was produced as a show for children. As a result it has picked up a lot of storytelling techniques that are not considered adult: its basic serial form; its reliance on plot driving character as often as character drives plot; an attitude that the creators can occasionally slide one past the audience and be accepted if the jokes are funny enough; and, most importantly, a work crew that does this show because they grew up loving it and do it as much for themselves as the audience.

Doctor Who, in short, has become fan fiction, full of glosses and details that arise because some child or adolescent has focused on it to the exclusion of things that most people consider important; and when parents or teachers ask "Don't you have something better to do?" loudly reply "No." They're the sort of people who write sequels to loved books or focus on obscure characters or impose their own manias on the series; and like that other hotbed of fan fiction, Star Trek, if Bill Shatner tells them to get a life, they will blink and answer "This is my life." Leading this band of madmen currently is producer Steven Moffat. He loves children literature and the remnants of 19th Century literature that has evolved into modern children's fiction. He translates Victorian literature into the 21st century in JEKYLL and SHERLOCK. He has written the screenplay for Steven Spielberg's TINTIN, due out next year, and which I am eagerly await. He fills the episodes he writes personally with jokes and gags and silliness and terror and that's what he demands of his fellow writers and directors, and if occasionally logic seems to go out the window, the audience is too dizzy to notice.

That, in large part, is what this episode is about: pirates and children stowing away, straight out of TREASURE ISLAND and mermaids and the Doctor and his companions turning up for a lark, straight out of James Barrie's Peter Pan. That's the symbolic thrust of yet another Steven's script: Steven Thompson, who has already written a script for Moffat's other TV series, SHERLOCK. His thrust, though, is not the pure adventure and childish wish-fulfillment of Barrie. Instead, he focuses on the adults, on the father who has grown up to be a pirate, seeking gold and adventure, and giving up the treasure that is his wife, now dead, and his son. It's a melancholy subtext, and it can zip right past the viewer. Quite right, for the purpose of symbolic fiction is to suggest those issues which we cannot bear to speak aloud.

Look in the mirror of symbolism and you see another world that looks disturbingly like ours. Accept it and you can shave in it, but it's not really you. And if you're not paying attention, you can cut yourself badly.

Thompson's script is a bit too complicated to fit into a single episode of Doctor Who and as a result it lacks the time for the jokes and pratfalls that amuse me. It also does not significantly -- or, perhaps the word I want is 'obviously' -- advance the complicated plot arc that that Steven Moffat the writer used the first two episodes to set up. However, Moffat the producer knows that a break is a good idea, both to give us a rest and to make us, childlike, anxious to get on with it. What better break than an adventure with pirates that winds up with them sailing towards the first star on the right?

The Doctor, Amy and Rory, board a pirate ship lost at sea, there's a bit of a kafuffle after the sight of blood summons something like a banshee (but with a better song), this is usually preceded by the mark of the Black Sharpie, also causes everyone to flee, though not that far as they're on a boat lost at sea. Then the mark gets Rory, and before too long they are down to three, the Doctor, the Captain and Amy and then it gets all science fictiony, and a bit silly, but it goes with the territory. The next episode's a treasure though you'll see, might be the best one ever.

Did I really say I was looking forward to watching this episode in my last review? The start of the episode wasn't too bad and pirates in Doctor Who could have and should have worked with a decent script. The humour is solid and some of the design work is interesting. The biggest problem with the episode is the Siren which looks goofy whenever it pops up and the child actor was particularly awful as well. Overall, the curse of the black spot is a forgettable and unimportant story that leaves a lot to be desired.

The problem when making episodes like this is that you have got the child aspect of the show mixed in with the adult aspect of the show and like usual that doesn't work together. While the middle part of the show is quite alright the start is poor and the end is atrocious.

It's times like these you need minties...no but really it's times like these you miss the old classic Doctor Who where while originally being kid shows they also where horror stories.