The highly-anticipated return/reboot of BBC's revived Doctor Who series is here, and without wasting one moment of your time, it's exactly what diehard Who fans have been waiting for.  In a nutshell, “The Eleventh Hour” has two objectives; to set up Matt Smith as the latest Doctor, and to help reestablish this new beginning as its own.  The show looks and feels almost entirely new, and is the first solo effort from Steven Moffat since becoming head-writer and executive producer of the series.  It's incredibly fun, dramatic, and with a crack new team both in front of and behind the camera, this unique blend of fantasy/science-fiction/comedy looks and feels fresher than it has in years, and is an outstanding new beginning to one of the most popular shows in television history.  Geronimo!

Picking up right where the two-part “The End of Time” left off, we first join the recently-regenerated Doctor (Smith) as he’s hanging for dear life onto a burning Tardis that’s hurdling towards Earth.  Soon after crash-landing in an English suburb, he soon meets a young Amelia Pond, a precious young girl who’s without parents and is often left to fend for herself.  In short, she’s just itching for a friend, and that’s exactly what she finds in this wild man from space who is, as he puts it, “still cooking.”  A hilarious montage of the Doctor experimenting with his ‘new mouth’ and different foods leads to the pair examining a crack in Amelia’s bedroom, which has been emanating strange voices during the night.

It turns out the crack leads to another universe, or more specifically, an intergalactic prison in which the mysterious ‘Prisoner Zero’ has escaped – and right into Amelia’s home.  A few plot devices – and years – later, the Doctor returns to find a grown-up, sexier Amelia (now Amy) Pond, and it isn’t long before ‘Prisoner Zero’ makes his appearance known to the world.  His alien jailors, the Atraxi, have come to retrieve him by any means necessary, which is typical Who-fashion means incinerating the earth itself.  I think you know where things are headed from this point on, and I wouldn’t dream of spilling the details, which means you’ll have to watch for yourself to see how it all plays out.

So how is Matt Smith in his starring debut?  In a word – he’s brilliant.  No, one word isn’t enough to describe this strange, odd-faced 26-year old (the youngest to ever assume the mantle) as the eleventh Doctor (hence the episode’s name).  That bit about his looks isn’t a smear, and they even play on this, as one point he looks at a young Amelia/Amy Pond and says “Am I people?  Do I even look like people?”  His Doctor jumps, giggles, and seems to relish the role in ways that are difficult to articulate in a micro-review like this, yet come across in an instant onscreen.  He looks, sounds, and actually FEELS the part – in short, he is The Doctor.

Make no mistake; David Tennant was a PERFECT Doctor, but this is a series that celebrates different kinds of perfect, and let’s hope Smith can join this most elite of clubs.

Karen Gillam plays the Doctor’s new companion, Amy Pond, and is introduced with one of the best set of legs I’ve ever seen...impressive stuff!  A fiery redheaded Scot (yet sounds almost American), longtime Who fans will recognize her as a soothsayer in the excellent season four episode “The Fires of Pompeii”, and now joins Freema Agyeman/Martha Jones as actresses who’ve graduated from bit parts (and different characters) to full-time companions.  The Doctor’s universe can be small sometimes, but it’s seldom looked this good!

But it’s not just a new Doctor and Companion to watch out for – there’s also the time-traveling police box itself, the Tardis!  Much has been speculated as how much has changed, and I’m pleased to say pretty much everything has.  If Matt Smith is this show’s Willy Wonka, the Tardis is his Chocolate Factory.  Strange, impractical tubes and pipes look like candy when pumped into even stranger, less-practical designs with impossibly wonderful shapes and doo-hickey devices and wires jutting out from every direction.  This is definitely less science and more fiction, and the moment you see the Doctor program his ‘girl’ with an old-fashioned manual typewriter, you know everything is going to be just fine.  Remember this advice, because it just might save your life - “I am definitely a madman with a box.”

But it’s not all fish and chips for Matt Smith’s debut, as much of the CG work is absolutely dodgy, and ranks among the worst of the new series (even giving early Torchwood episodes a run for their money – ouch).  And what’s the deal with the newly composed theme music at the beginning?

I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the closing moments that teaser the rest of the season…talk about tingle-inducing.  The weeping angels from “Blink”, guest stars (Bill Nighy!), Cybermen that finally look terrifying, and most exciting of all, the return of River Song.  That last bit alone should make any serious Who fan weep tears of joy, and it helps bridge the past with the future – and back to the past.  The questions of “The Forests of the Dead” may soon be answered…

In what is effectively the fifth season of the reactivated Doctor Who, the show manages to feel fresh, and yet completely familiar.  Essentially a reboot of everything we’ve seen during the past five years without entirely rebooting everything, the new adventures should be something to watch out for.  Matt Smith is a revolution, and I’m certain his tenure will echo his offer to Amy Pond: “Anywhere you want, any time you want. One condition, it has to be amazing!”  With this new beginning, Doctor Who has gone from being one of my favorite shows on television to my favorite.  This is going to be good, and this is going to be a lot of fun.

Doctor Who: The Eleventh Hour premiers on BBC America on April 17th.  The adventure begins again!