Doctor Who Episode Review: The Star Beast (2023)

Synopsis: After regenerating into a form almost identical to one he once had, the Doctor (David Tennant) returns to London and inadvertently crosses paths with his former companion, Donna Noble (Catherine Tate), who still does not remember him after having her memory erased to keep her exposure to Time Lord knowledge from killing her. The Doctor's attempts to keep his friend safe are soon put in jeopardy when an alien craft crashes in London and an alien refugee, Meep (Cecily Fay), is discovered by Donna's daughter, Rose (Yasmin Finney), putting them all in danger as another group of aliens known as the Wrarth continue to hunt Meep down.

Review: My wife and I used to watch Doctor Who together on a regular basis after the series was rebooted in 2005. However, we both started to lose interest around Doctor 12 (Peter Capaldi) and just stopped watching it about midway through Doctor 13 (Jodie Whittaker). To clarify, the latter had less to do with the actor playing the role and more to do with the storylines getting a bit too complex, especially with the long breaks between new episodes.

I re-discovered the series on Disney Plus a few days ago and, intrigued about David Tennant returning to the role, even in a limited basis, convinced my wife to watch The Star Beast with me last night. As it turns out, it helped us regain our love for the series.

Donna Noble was always my favorite companion. Tennant and Tate have great chemistry together and that showed on screen. In fact, when she finally left the series and Donna's memory of the Doctor and all the great things she had accomplished were wiped, I am not ashamed to admit I had tears in my eyes. I think it was considerably more heartbreaking than any other goodbye. 

This episode does a great job reuniting the pair. I loved how Donna's memory wipe had her somehow missing key alien events as a self-preservation method while still allowing her personality to shine through, even if she couldn't explain why she did the things she did (such as giving away all her lottery winnings to charity). The episode also does a great job of letting her regain some of those memories slowly as well, revealing why even just being around the Doctor was such a danger for her.

The part about her having a daughter named Rose was also intriguing. At first, I wasn't sure what to think about that character, mostly out of concern she would take away from the Tenant/Tate dynamic. However, I absolutely loved how she ended up playing a surprise key part during the final battle. 

I'm sure there will be those out there who will complain about this episode being (using their words) "too woke." However, while those elements were noticeable, they also weren't done in a way that took away from the main plot. In fact, if I had any complaints about this episode, they would be much more about the not-so-surprising twist involving Meep, which I predicted fairly quickly. Though, admittedly, even with the twist not being a surprise, it was still entertaining.

Final Opinion: The jury is still out about Doctor 15 (Ncuti Gatwa) because I haven't gotten that far in the series yet but since this episode seems to have recaptured some of what got my wife and me hooked in the first place, I am optimistic and can't wait to see what happens next.

My Grade: A

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Here are some other Doctor Who reviews:

Doctor Who Episode Review: The Return of Doctor Mysterio (2016)

Doctor Who Episode Review: Flatline (2014)

Doctor Who Episode Review: Mummy on the Orient Express (2014)