Doctor Who wusses out

When I discovered they were planning an episode focussed on the devil in this season's run, I was curious to know what would happen. Well, sadly disappointed but not surprised was the final verdict after Saturday's episode of Doctor Who. If you haven't yet watched it and plan to, read no further, as I will spoil the plot.

So we had what appeared to be the devil threatening the existence of the universe by trying to break out of the prison it had been put into eons earlier, and the Doctor coming face to face with the possibility that spiritual beliefs/superstitions might actually exist in reality. Unable to rationalize this as a scientist (which, by the way, he hasn't really been all that much since the new series re-started last year), he uses logic and faith in humans (specifically, Rose) to defeat the monster, and together they sort everything out and help most of the rest of the cast live happily ever after. And in the final shots, in the TARDIS, we discover that the Doctor's inability to accept what he can't explain leads him to simply put it out of his mind. This is beyond me, and anyway human life is better, so it doesn't matter/can't even possibly be worth considering. Humanism proudly displayed for all those 8-year-olds with no spiritual input to speak of to lap up without realising that's what it is.

I guess it's easy to see the Devil as something to be defeated, but what if the Doctor were to discover God, with all the great qualities of humans magnified to the nth degree, and more on top? What would he make of that? The other thing that this series is showing again and again, though, is that Tennant's Doctor clearly considers himself the end of the line when it comes to moral questions and what to do about evil: he basically thinks he is God, and so if he has found the Devil on an asteroid (which, of course, it can't actually be, because only God can ultimately defeat Satan), then this challenges his position as the all-powerful Doctor, cos surely God exists somewhere if Satan does.

Like I say, I wasn't surprised that this was the conclusion come to by producer Russell T Davies and his writers, as it is so totally symptomatic of the times we live in and the attitudes his work has displayed in the past (The Second Coming, mini-series with Chris Eccleston a few years ago). I was saddened though that the existence of God was never even suggested or considered - none of the crew members even prayed, which under stress like they were, wouldn't have been weird.

This isn't really new for Doctor Who, but has never been so explicit before: past stories with Devil figures always turned out to have some sci-fi explanation (The Daemons is a good example). Also, no previous doctor has been quite as arrogant as David Tennant's - I'd like to see them go somewhere with that, and there be a come-uppance of some kind. I'd love him to discover that his faith in humans is misplaced, and particularly his faith in Rose - that would be fantastic. What am I saying - that I want one of my childhood heroes to fail and fail abysmally??!! Yes, I think so - but it sounds shockingly like realistic sci-fi...