Well, it’s here at last. The first episode of the new series of Doctor Who has arrived, bringing with it another first for the long-running British series: the first female Doctor, in the form of actor Jodie Whittaker. So does it deliver the goods?

I confess that, despite being an almost lifelong fan of the show, I have drifted away over the past few years. I had high hopes for Peter Capaldi in the role, but too often he seemed saddled with scripts that failed to capitalize on his strengths as an actor, or that pretended to deliver high drama when they were really just frivolous and silly. Too many episodes ended with the Doctor waving his hand like a kind of space-age Harry Potter and everything would be restored back to normal.

To me, Doctor Who had always been a family-friendly program, full of a mix of whimsy, optimism, and often sophisticated ideas. This new version, on the other hand, was becoming a program for children.

Having seen this first episode featuring Whittaker as the titular character, however, I can say I am cautiously optimistic.

The first thing you notice after the BBC logo disappears is that this episode has no opening credits sequence, in effect making it the longest cold open in the history of the show. There’s a brief teaser of the beloved theme music, but we’ll need to wait for the second episode to get a look at the full credits.

As the episode rolls on, it becomes clear that this is a theme. New show-runner Chris Chibnall is taking his time revealing the iconic elements of the Doctor Who mythology and how they might have been updated for 2018. The TARDIS makes no appearance in this episode, and the Sonic Screwdriver shows up late (though I must say it’s a welcome return to form after Tripaldi’s laughable “sonic sunglasses”). The official wardrobe for Whittaker’s Doctor isn’t revealed until nearly the end of the episode.

Another promising change is what seems to be a tonal shift toward more realism and a more honest sense of drama. An early moment in which a group of travelers encounter what appears to be an alien entity on a train is genuinely scary. When our main baddie arrives, he is much more menacing and sinister than past Who foes, with a costume that resembles the Japanese manga character, the Guyver. And the reveal of what he does with the teeth he steals from his victims’ mouths is truly disgusting.

All of this feels like a return to what I enjoy most in Doctor Who stories. “Hiding behind the couch” has a long tradition among young Who audiences. With luck, Chibnall may be steering the series back in that direction, away from the more cartoonish elements of recent seasons.

Not everything is dark, of course. Jodie Whittaker’s performance is excellent, and she seems far better suited to the modern Doctors’ manic energy than, say, Christopher Eccleston. And the supporting cast – we apparently call them the Doctor’s “friends” now, rather than “companions” – are likeable, relatable, and suitably diverse, and I look forward to seeing more of them in future episodes.

The episode wasn’t entirely free of the kind of deus ex machina nonsense that plagued Steven Moffat’s era as show-runner. A scene in which the Doctor “reformats” a mobile phone to turn it into some kind of alien tracking device ranks with the worst past abuses of the Sonic Screwdriver. It can be forgiven because it moves the plot along, but I hope we’ll see less of this junk as the season continues.

The plot of this installment was fairly thin. It’s not spoiling much to say our alien this week was a reasonable take on the Predator and not much more. That’s acceptable, though, for an episode that also needs to be an origin story for our new Doctor and friends.

Despite this, though, Chibnall did bring the episode to a satisfying conclusion. Some of the action scenes in the third act raise the bar from the usual running-around we can expect from the Doctor and are legitimately thrilling. If the rest of the season considers in this vein, this may prove to be the most cinematic incarnation of Who we’ve seen yet.

I’ll need to see more episodes to fully make up my mind. But I will say that, based on what I saw tonight, I am ready to see more – which is more than what I could say of Moffat’s Who. Fingers crossed.