Smith and Jones

The Judoon platoon on the moon.

Smith and Jones was the first story since Rose that had to introduce a new companion and the first one overall in the new series that had to do it with an established Doctor. In that regard, it did it's job fairly well.

Plot Summary

Martha is going to work when she runs into the Doctor who takes off his tie in front of her. Martha continues, all on the phone with her family who are all freaking out about her father bringing his girlfriend to her brother's 21st birthday party. In the hospital, Martha goes around with a group of medical students under the supervision of a senior teaching Doctor. There she meets the Doctor again but he has no memory of meeting her earlier. In her examination, she discovers that he has two hearts but he winks at her to keep it a secret. A few hours later, Martha is on the phone with her sister again and discovers that the rain is localized around the hospital and falling upward. Suddenly the hospital is transported to the surface of the moon.

Martha and a colleague try to calm the patients when the Doctor shows up and the two of them investigate how they still have air to breathe. They discover a shield around the hospital that traps the air in but also realize that with no filtration, people will soon suffocate as the oxygen runs out. While investigating, three Judoon ships land and march their troops into the hospital. They have transported the hospital to the moon and are looking for an alien criminal. They begin to scan people and mark off anyone who registers as human. The Doctor realizes that if he is detected, the Judoon will simply mark him as non-human, proclaim him the criminal and execute him and possibly the entire hospital for harboring a fugitive.

Meanwhile, the real criminal, a plasmavore disguised as an elderly woman, attacks the teaching Doctor and drinks his blood to mask her own alien signature. She is discovered by the Doctor and Martha and she sends two robots after them to kill them. They elude one and the Doctor destroys the other by modifying an X-ray machine although his sonic screwdriver is destroyed in the process. Leaving the room, they run into the Judoon who realize the Doctor is non-human. They run away and hide on a floor the Judoon already have searched but realize they will be discovered soon. To buy time, the Doctor kisses Martha, leaving a trace of alien DNA on her skin while he runs to the MRI lab. There he discovers the plasmavore modifying the MRI machine to emit a pulse that will kill everything within a 250,000 mile radius except her in a shielded room.

The Doctor pretends to be human and tricks the plasmavore into thinking that she will need more blood to escape a second scan. She promptly starts to drink the Doctor's blood. The Judoon, having discovered Martha, pause to do a full scan on her due to the trace of alien DNA. Upon discovering that she is fully human, she leads them into the MRI room. The Judoon see the Doctor's nearly drained body and prepare to close the case. Martha grabs the Judoon scanner and points it at the plasmavore. The Doctor's alien blood counters the human blood previously consumed and the Judoon recognize her true nature and promptly execute her.

Realizing the danger of the MRI bomb, the Judoon evacuate. Martha manages to revive the Doctor and then passes out due to the lack of oxygen. The Doctor manages to disarm the bomb and as the Judoon leave, they transport the hospital back to Earth where everyone is revived. The Doctor leaves and Martha heads home and then to her brother's birthday party. A fight breaks out between her parents at the party and in the chaos, the Doctor motions Martha over to an alleyway. He shows her the TARDIS and invites her aboard for a trip as a thank you for what she did for him. She is skeptical but he then goes back in time briefly to show her him removing his tie before she went to work. Convinced, Martha enters the TARDIS and they take off.

Analysis

Smith and Jones is a fun little adventure that does it's job of introducing Martha as a companion. In that regard, it isn't so much a standard adventure but instead more of a character study. The down side of that is that while fun, things move a bit too quickly and simply and you are left with a feeling of That's it?

I did like the Judoon and their simplistic logical efficiency. They are similar to the Sontarians in many regards and an amusing send up of military and police bureaucracy. I also liked the villain in this story. It was rather nice to see an older actress play a sinister character with a bit of brain to manipulate their way out of a situation. I also liked the interaction between the Doctor and Martha. When they focus on the problems at hand, such as in the hospital situation, they have a nice chemistry and readily bounce ideas off each other. It is also nice to see the beginnings of a companion who doesn't take the Doctor's guff and is willing to put him on the spot.

What I didn't care for or just didn't sit right with me about this episode was how quickly everything wrapped up as far as the source of danger. It was both over too quickly and it made too much room for the inclusion of Martha's interactions with her relations. Not that there was anything bad about them, but it brought up an immediate feeling that like Rose, there would not be just the companion. The stories would involve her whole extended family as well and having done that dynamic with Jackie and Mickey, it had a touch of the shoehorn to fit an established style.

Rose also hangs heavy over this episode which is another slight knock against it. The Doctor is clearly still pining for Rose and that makes him mopey and mopey Tenth Doctor is annoying. There is also the beginnings of the unrequited love of Martha which has two negatives. One, it again forces us to constantly call back to Rose when we should be done with her. Two, Martha going into big eyes adoration mode destroys the natural chemistry she and the Doctor have. They function better as an investigative team, bouncing ideas off each other (Holmes and Watson so to speak) and whenever that is lost by Martha taking whatever the Doctor says because she is fond of him, it just seems to undo the natural order of things and takes you right out of the story.

Those drawbacks aside, it is a fun little story and easily watchable again. It would not be my first choice of the Series Three options but you'll get no complaints from me if someone suggested it.

Overall personal score: 3.5 out of 5