Dinosaurs on a Spaceship - One for the kids.

So the seventh series of Doctor Who continues, but after a Steven Moffat kicked things off with a strong season opener, Chris Chibnall lowers the bar quite considerably with an unremarkable second episode. 

From the title alone we know what type of episode Dinosaurs on a Spaceship will be. Though the show lends itself beautifully to darker, more adult themes, at heart it will always be a bit of fun; forty minutes of escapism for the whole family to enjoy. There's a fine line, however, between harmless fun and the outright childish, and sadly Chibnall's fourth contribution to the Who mythos strays far too often onto the side of childish, and with a lazily constructed script to match one wonders if Dinosaurs was only ever a title, never an idea. 

Technology wise the animals themselves actually look surprisingly good (for Who standards), but like a lot of things in the episode they're there without reason or explanation. Though we learn the Silurians were responsible for putting them on the ship in the first place we're left pondering the real reason as to why; similarly the Doctor has two new companions for the episode - Egyptian Queen Nefertiti and an African big-game hunter named Riddell - but why he brings them along or how he really knows them in the first place is questionable. The same again goes for the introduction of Brian Williams, Rory's father, and though the interaction between father and son remains a highlight of the episode we're left wondering what he really adds to the proceedings.

The episode, however, doesn't fall apart over lack of justification over characters, it's when Chibnall tries to justify himself. With a title like Dinosaurs on a Spaceship we expect a certain amount of madness going in, but halfway through the episode Chibnall fears that he's got to give the reason madness to be there, and as a result Nefertiti and Riddell are romantically paired up and Brian Williams is subject to an all too convenient plot device, where we learn the crashing ship can only be controlled by two people who share a gene.

To Dinosaurs' credit, it is not as instantly forgettable as Chibnall's previous episodes, 42 and The Hungry Earth/Cold Blood. Neither good nor particularly bad, those episodes just don't linger in the mind the way, say, Moffat's strongest or Russell T Davies's worst might. Dinosaurs, however, will be remembered for all the wrong reasons. Convenient plot devices (the missiles are attracted to what exactly?), underdeveloped characters and awkward humour (the Mitchell and Webb robots were nothing short of annoying); children will, undoubtedly, get a kick out of it, but there is little to enjoy for anyone else.