3. Cold Blood
Who to Blame? Chris Chibnall The reason that this episode comes higher than the others on this list is because it is an anti climax that lets down not only the episode in which it features but the previous episode as well. I don't know about general fan opinion but I feel that 'The Hungry Earth' (The first part of the Silurian two parter released in 2010) is really well handled. It was slow, yes but ultimately it built everything up beautifully. The growing tension between the humans and the silurians was paced evenly and in the end each side had hostages and war seemed inevitable. Sadly, as previously stated all of this falls down in the second part. The whole of 'Cold Blood' feels stretched out as though there were ten minutes of plot to fill up a forty two minute script. It also betrays part one in multiple ways. The character of the Silurian Doctor who cut open Mo, the father whilst he was awake is not hardhearted psychopath who sees humans as dumb animals but the kindest of all the silurians and one who loses his life in his determination to protect them. Not so much character development as complete backtracking, we were promised macabre fear from this character and anti-climatically got nothing. The major fear at the end of part one was that the war would start because of the foretold death of Alaya the silurian. Instead the chief Silurian brushes off the death, and Alaya's sister in one scornful flourish for her insistence that a war is necessary. A disappointing resolution once again that ultimately makes the whole build up of it pointless. Yes, Restac (Alaya's sister) is angry but from the attitude displayed throughout both episodes by the silurian warriors they were going to try to start a war with the humans whatever they had done. Its bad story telling, two dimensional, inconsistent characterization and a 42 minute long anti-climax from start to finish.