Let's start off by saying that Will Sasso is awesome - he was brilliant on MAD TV, and his Vine videos about lemons are some of the best short comedy sketches ever. That being said, his turn as Pete the Morgue Intern is not his finest hour. Perhaps it's because Pete acts exactly as everyone fears that morgue attendants actually act. He does a little comedic bit with the Seventh Doctor's corpse - or what passes for a comedic bit, anyway - and then shouts, "Party on!" down the dead man's ear. Luckily McCoy had previously walked unflinchingly away from an enormous explosion while filming an episode, so he was probably better prepared for this than we were. It's also hard to say which bit of the rest of Pete's time onscreen is more embarrassing: the heavy-handed foreshadowing of Pete watching the 1931 Frankenstein movie while the Doctor has a spasm, er, regenerates in his freezer; or Pete's fainting, accompanied by a "funny" music cue, when the Doctor emerges. It's somewhat made up for by his genuinely funny interactions with Grace the next morning, but it's one of those moments in the TV movie you just have to gird your loins for and endure.
Tony Whitt has previously written TV, DVD, and comic reviews for CINESCAPE, NOW PLAYING, and iF MAGAZINE. His weekly COMICSCAPE columns from the early 2000s can still be found archived on Mania.com. He has also written a book of gay-themed short stories titled CRESCENT CITY CONNECTIONS, available on Amazon.com in both paperback and Kindle format. Whitt currently lives and works in Chicago, Illinois.
