N.B. there might (or might not) be spoilers in this article!

Doctor Who‘s first two-parter of the twenty-first century is perhaps somewhat unfairly remembered for its flatulent villains and an augmented pig. In truth, it’s also what I mainly recalled about Aliens of London and World War Three before sitting down to watch the episodes again. If The Green Death is forever the one with the maggots Aliens of London / World War Three will always be the one with the farting aliens.

“He’s good in a crisis, I’ll give him that.”

Rose, World War Three

But there’s a lot to like, not least the pacing, which after the breathless trio of episodes that opened the series, offers a welcome change in tempo.

The Doctor’s mistiming of his returning Rose home, by a whole year, is a masterstroke, giving us the opportunity to witness actual consequences for one of his companion’s leaving Earth. (I’ve always wondered how Ian and Barbara’s return after three years away would have been received.) I suspect life would have been even tougher for Mickey than his explanation here.

Having the spaceship crashing into Big Ben (and dinging the old bell to boot) was a nice touch as was Slitheen being the name of the invading family rather than the name of their alien race. Raxacoricofallapatorius is the kind of tongue-twisting planet name of which Douglas Adams might have approved.

“Do you mind not farting while I’m saving the world?”

Doctor, World War Three

The military are rubbish here though: Mickey eludes them with ease and hides behind the bins. And from a structural point of view, the ‘Next Time’ trailer is clearly in the wrong place, wrecking any tension the cliffhanger might have built up.

All these years later, I’m still not sure how I feel about all the farting in Aliens of London and World War Three but if you can set that aspect aside, the story has a lot to offer.

Finally, as many of Doctor Who‘s twenty-first century multi-part stories do not have overarching titles (at least until they get a novelisation), I’ve decided to come up with my own. I suspect most of these will be fairly obvious appropriations of one of the episode titles.

These then are my potential Target Library titles for Aliens of London / World War Three:
— Doctor Who and the Aliens of London
— Doctor Who and the Slitheen Invasion
— Doctor Who and the Smell of Fear