[Zeke]

I too beg to differ, Valium. I've only seen three episodes so far, but they had plenty of good sci-fi in them. The pilot was great (I've watched it twice now and even based a scene of Cliffhangers 7 on it), the second episode was wacky but fun, and "Dalek" was marvelous, if a bit misguided near the end. ("He's not the one pointing a gun at me"? He was pointing the gun at the DALEK to SAVE you. Blatch.)

Now granted, I'm coming into this as a new Who viewer. But I tend to think that if something stands up well on its own merits, it deserves credit even if it doesn't serve its larger context quite as well. Mega Man X7, for example, does basically nothing to advance the complicated storyline of the first six games -- but while that's annoying, what should matter more is whether it's a good game. Similarly, Season 3 of ENT dropped all the plot threads from the first two seasons in favour of a self-contained storyline -- but the result was the best season of Trek in years. That's a trade I'm willing to make.

Besides, judging from some of the Who fivers I've read, the first eight Doctors had some pretty silly adventures. ("The Ark," anyone?) Surely the Ninth Doctor can't be that much worse.