Doctor Who: Twice Upon A Time ( review with spoilers )

"Time to leave the battlefield..."

This year's Doctor Who Christmas special, the final Peter Capaldi story, was a strange beast. It didn't have much of a plot, didn't really have a villain, and it starred a companion who wasn't really there. And yet I loved it. I must be a strange beast too...

The concept of this story, of course, is the unlikely meeting of the First and Twelth Doctors, both at the point of regeneration, both refusing to change. After mysteriously appearing at the South Pole while still dying from the mortal wound sustained in his last battle with the Cybermen, Capaldi's Doctor meets his former self ( David Bradley channelling William Hartnell ) and also a World War One captain ( Mark Gatiss ), also plucked from his own time-stream and dumped in the snowy landscape. As the two Doctors inevitably bicker the Tardis is captured by a strange glass-like humanoid, one of a race known as Testimony, who want the Doctors to tell them a story. A fairy tale if you will...

As I said, it's quite a slim plot to hang a story on but, in true Steven Moffatt style, it's really an excuse for the Doctor to examine his own mortality and his own fears... and for each iteration of the Doc to crack a few jokes at his counterpart's expense. ( The "Mary Berry" line had me in stitches. ) The First Doctor is refusing to change because he fears the unknown, while the Twelth is tired of saving the universe after all these millennia and just wants to slip away. The consequence of them both dying at the same time in the wrong timeline would be catastrophic for reality, but luckily Bill Potts is on hand to help out...

Apparently, Bill wasn't originally intended to be in this story but Moffatt found, during the writing of the script, that there was a need for the character to appear and luckily Pearl Mackie agreed. This isn't quite the Bill we saw in Series 10, but "the sum of her memories" to paraphrase the Fifth Doctor  -  the essence of the long-gone Bill's personality, encased in a crystal simulacrum of life by Testimony. This "slight return" for Bill Potts is a delight. As bubbly and funny as ever, and still asking the questions no-one else would, this echo of the character is still recognisably herself while at the same time also something alien and melancholic. It puts me in mind of the last, heart-breaking scene in John Crowley's SF novel, Engine Summer, and is just as moving.
The scenes set during the iconic Christmas armistice at Ypres in 1914 hit home in a similar way, even though they are obviously sanitised for a Christmas Day tea-time TV audience. This brief respite from the insanity of the Great War is a lovely evocation of the Doctor's philosophy of seeing things from both sides and, when it comes down to it, just being kind to each other. This idea of kindness is now the defining theme of the initially cold and prickly Twelth Doctor, a man who has been made better and indeed kinder by the time spent with his human friends.

Of course, he also spends some time with his former self too, as portrayed by the wonderful David Bradley. The veteran actor has a ball as the First Doctor, ridiculing Twelve's sonic screwdriver and sunglasses ( "Indoors"? ) and generally being very un-PC. ( This does overstate the conservative attitudes of the early '60s but is funny. ) Bradley's Doctor shares some charming moments with Bill as they talk about the real reason he left Gallifrey long ago, and there is a genius moment at the top of the show when B&W footage of William Hartnell from The Tenth Planet morphs into colour HD footage of Bradley. If there is one small criticism I have of Bradley's performance it's that he doesn't quite catch Hartnell's impishness  -  his Doctor wasn't just a crusty old man, there was a real twinkle in his eye at times too. Otherwise it's a fine performance without the extra baggage of him playing Hartnell playing the Doctor, as in An Adventure In Space And Time.

As for Capaldi  -  what can I say? It's another barn-storming turn from this great actor, bringing us a Doctor who's at the end of his tether, wanting to give it all up, but finding renewed hope in the future. The scene where Testimony restores the Doctor's memories of Clara is just sublime, Capaldi purging all the hurt from the Doctor's eyes and giving us a heart-melting glimpse of his softer side. And it was so good to see Jenna Coleman again, if ever so briefly.
I'm really going to miss Peter Capaldi. His Doctor may have started out a little shakily by being just a tad too unemotional and distant but he's grown into the role until he IS the Doctor  -  a crazy old rock 'n' roller who rattles around the universe in his old blue box, helping out, trying to be nice but not always succeeding, saving people ( most of the time ) and trying to find the good in his enemies. We've had 40 episodes of the Twelfth Doctor and he's been amazing. But now, a brand new era is just around the corner...
Well, if you can call next Autumn "just around the corner"  -  it can't come soon enough!

Four And A Half Out Of Five Sonic Scredwrivers :-)

"Oh, brilliant!"

And the 13th Doctor is here...

The 13th Doctor

...is Jodie Whittaker. ( But you all know that, right?, because I'm probably the last person in the world to post about the subject... )
I think she's a great choice  -  she was fantastic in Broadchurch and also has experience in fighting aliens after appearing in Attack The Block. For a long time I was in two minds about a female Doctor ( Would it just be stunt casting? Is it too gimmicky for a mainstream audience? ) but I now believe it's an idea whose time has come and Whittaker is certainly a good enough actor to pull it off.
She had the following to say on her casting as Doctor Number 13:

"It feels completely overwhelming, as a feminist, as a woman, as an actor, as a human, as someone who wants to continually push themselves and challenge themselves, and not be boxed in by what you’re told you can and can’t be. It feels incredible... I want to tell the fans not to be scared by my gender. Because this is a really exciting time, and Doctor Who represents everything that’s exciting about change. The fans have lived through so many changes, and this is only a new, different one, not a fearful one."

And incoming showrunner Chris Chibnall added:

“After months of lists, conversations, auditions, recalls, and a lot of secret-keeping, we’re excited to welcome Jodie Whittaker as the Thirteenth Doctor. I always knew I wanted the Thirteenth Doctor to be a woman and we're thrilled to have secured our number one choice. Her audition for The Doctor simply blew us all away. Jodie is an in-demand, funny, inspiring, super-smart force of nature and will bring loads of wit, strength and warmth to the role. The Thirteenth Doctor is on her way.”

It's indeed an exciting time for Doctor Who and I can't wait to see the new Doctor in action...

It's Almost Time...

The 13th Doctor will be revealed tonight! As much as I'm sad to see Peter Capaldi leave ( would one more year have hurt, Pete, huh? ) I'm excited for the new Doctor.
Let's just hope Wimbledon doesn't over-run by too much :-)

Doctor Who: Monks and Warriors

These Doctor Who reviews have slipped down a wormhole in the time / space continuum to become monthly ( -ish ) instead of weekly, so I have five (!) episodes to catch up on, starting with:

Extremis
This was a bold, challenging episode with a very divisive twist ( which I personally loved ) and some memorable new monsters, the ( meddling ) Monks. These corpse-like creatures were trying to get their claws into the planet Earth with the help of the Veritas, a fabled ancient text in the Vatican's restricted library which causes anyone who reads it to commit suicide. Quite a dark theme for a Saturday evening TV show and one which strangely reminded me of that old Monty Python sketch about the funniest joke in the world, which no-one could read or tell without instantly dropping down dead.
And the Doctor was in the dark too  -  still blind after the previous story's shocking final scene and managing to get by with the aid of the dreaded sonic glasses... and a little help from Nardole. Apart from a hilarious scene of poor Bill's latest date being interrupted by the Pope himself, this was a gloomily Gothic episode with some head-spinning twists and turns. Moffatt says this was his last chance to push at the boundaries of the format and I think he did a fine job. The final revelation that all this story had taken place in a computer simulation may have borrowed from The Matrix ( and possibly Warren Ellis' Planetary ) but I loved the audacity of it, and also the idea that even Sim City versions of our heroes can be heroic when it counts. I'm giving this one
Four Out Of Five Sonic Screwdrivers ( or VR headsets )

The Pyramid At The End Of The World
Part Two of the "Monk Trilogy" saw the red-robed revenants return and this time actually put one of their world-conquering plans into place. Even though it was a bonkers one. A 5000-year old pyramid suddenly appeared from out of nowhere, in a disputed region of Absurdistan ( or something like that ) where the Russian, American and Chinese armies were facing off against each other, while the President of Earth ( aka Doctor Twelve ) was called upon to help decide the future of the planet. Meanwhile scientists in a bio-research lab had inadvertently created a substance that could kill all life on Earth. And the Doctor was still blind...
While the script ( by Moffatt and Peter Harness ) didn't always hang together  -  there were a lot of unanswered questions  -  the scale and sense of impending doom made for a slow-burning but intense episode. And Pearl Mackie as Bill yet again played a blinder ( sorry! ) when she was forced to choose between condemning the Doctor and subjugating humanity to the Monks' rule. I really think Pearl brings a breath of fresh air to the show and it would be a shame if she were to leave along with Moffatt and Capaldi... although I suspect that's what will happen.
Three And A Half Out Of Five Sonic Screwdrivers ( or Sonic Glasses )

The Lie Of The Land
The finale of the Monk Trilogy saw Toby Whithouse ( sort-of ) tie up the loose ends of the walking cadavers' story as Bill and Nardole found themselves lost in a grim Dystopia where the Monks ruled over all ( and had done since 1975 apparently ) and the Doctor appeared to be their propaganda mouth-piece. A kind of Lord Who-Haw if you will... and you won't see a more obscure reference than that ladies, gents and Gallifreyans...
Reminiscent of Martha's night journey way back in Season Three, this story took Bill across a subjugated world, and across a sea, to point a gun at a Time Lord. But this time the Doctor and not the Master ( remember him? ) was the supposed bad guy. Of course, this all turned out to be a double-bluff with the Doctor playing the Monks at their own disinformation game, and making some acid observations about democracy on the way. While not terribly convincing ( would Bill really shoot the Doctor? ) it still gave our Tardis companions some meaty drama to chew on and held up a distorted mirror to our own post-truth times. ( The biggest disappointment of the episode was the surprisingly passive portrayal of the Monks themselves  -  they didn't put up much of a fight and didn't utter a single line of dialogue... ) The final showdown, with Bill's love for her long-lost mum beating the cynical manipulations of the Monks, could have been corny but was in fact quite moving as it reminded us that love is really all you need...
Three And A Half Sonic Screwdrivers ( or Levitating pyramids )

Empress Of Mars
Mark Gatiss! Ice Warriors! Mars! I was hoping for a lot from this episode and thankfully it delivered. Gatiss has had his ups and downs on Who in recent years, from the dull and juvenile Night Terrors to the campy Gothic of The Crimson Horror, but the Ice Warriors obviously bring out the best in him, as seen in the tense and claustrophobic Cold War.
After a fun pre-credits sequence involving Bill and Nardole bumbling around NASA HQ, the story got its ass to Mars where a jingoistic platoon of displaced Victorian redcoats were digging for treasure under the Martian surface. Supposedly helping out "last of his kind" Ice Warrior "Friday", the soldiers were in fact being used to uncover an Ice Warrior hive full of the resting reptiles... and also a new Martian  -  Iraxxa the Empress of Mars.
This was a proper, old school Who episode which wouldn't have looked out of place in, say, Season Nine ( home of the Ice Warriors-starring Curse Of Peladon )  -  except for the budget of course. The Doctor's attempts to broker peace between the Earthmen and the Martians had a definite Pertwee vibe about it, although in this case the Empress was more interested in Bill's opinion than those of young soldiers or old Time Lords. Add to this a very post-modern running gag about science fiction movies and some deftly-sketched character work, and this hybrid of The War Of The Worlds and The First Men In The Moon ( or Mars ) was a hugely enjoyable slice of Saturday night entertainment.
Four Out Of Five Sonic Screwdrivers ( or Mars bars )

The Eaters Of Light
The Tardis trio go on an educational trip to find out what actually happened to the fabled Ninth Legion of the Roman army  -  were they wiped out by Pictish warriors or maybe slaughtered by some tentacled, chlorophyll-loving alien creature? It's an age-old question...
I'd been looking forward to this one as it was written by playwright Rona Monroe who had scripted Survival waaay back in 1989, the last episode of "classic" Doctor Who. Survival hadn't been the greatest Who story and has certainly gained stature because of its end-of-an-era position in the canon, but it had some great moments and in many ways anticipated the form of Nu Who. Unfortunately, this story didn't reward the wait as far as I'm concerned. Again there were some lovely moments ( Bill's scenes with the young Legionnaires, the Doctor's "Grow the hell up!" speech ) but the episode just didn't hang together for me.The justification for the Doctor and co. to be in ancient Caledonia in the first place was very weak and ( just for a change! ) the nature of the alien threat was poorly realised. I'm still unsure of what the locust-like creature was actually doing to the humans it killed. It supposedly ate light but how was that killing the humans? And I did expect to see the creature's light-eating abilities having more impact on the environment but this again was very poorly explained.
I've only seen this episode once ( I usually watch an episode twice before blogging about it ) so I may be being unfair here and there were indeed some nice images and ideas in this story, especially the theme of the Romans and Picts uniting to stand forever at the gate to the other dimension, but ultimately I will have to give this one
Three Out Of Five Sonic Screwdrivers ( or Roman coins )

And next Saturday... Old Cybermen, New Cybermen, Two Masters, a Black Hole, a 400-mile long spsceship...
Really looking forward to this two-part finale!

Doctor Who: Series 10 Catch Up

As has been pointed out to me by certain fellow bloggers ( initials KR and JP  -  who else? ) I've been neglecting the good Doctor's latest adventures so I'll do a very quick run down of my thoughts on the recent crop of stories, starting with

Smile
In the second episode of the series the Doctor takes Bill on her first proper Tardis journey into the future. They arrive at a human colony on a distant world which seems like a paradise... except there aren't any colonists. It turns out the AI that have been sent on ahead of the first settlers have gone haywire and have been using their seemingly-cute "Emojibots" to turn colonists into fertilizer.
This episode is designed to give the Doctor and Bill a chance to get to know each other while investigating this deserted world. There's some lovely location footage here ( filmed at Valencia's beautiful City of Arts and Sciences ) and some interesting moments between the two leads as Bill starts to figure out who the Doctor is and what he does. Unfortunately, there's not a lot else going on  -  the threat is never very convincing and the story-telling energy levels have dropped significantly since the first episode, so I'll give this a lukewarm Three Out Of Five Sonic Screwdrivers ( or Smiley Faces )

Thin Ice
The third episode is much better. Another fine script from promising newcomer Sarah Dollard
 ( author of last series' Face The Raven ) which sends our Time Lord and friend back to Regency England and the last of the great Frost Fairs. People have been disappearing in mysterious circumstances and something extremely fishy is going on underneath the frozen Thames.
This episode is a delight  -  lots of convincing period detail, some excellent effects and more charming moments between the Doctor and Bill. Underlying all this are themes of capitalism and racism which give the story some backbone... and give Peter Capaldi as the Doctor the chance to rail against the evils that men do ( always worse than the aliens ) and to actually punch out a bigoted capitalist fop. Well, he did once describe the character as 100% Rebel Time Lord. The only slight let down is the actual monster  -  a supposedly huge sea-serpent which, when finally revealed, is about as frightening as a fish finger. But, never mind, this is a wonderfully old-fashioned Who adventure with some modern twists which I'll award Four Out Of Five Sonic Screwdrivers ( or fish tails )

Knock Knock
There have been a few "haunted house" stories in Nu Who and the production teams always seem to find a new take on the old trope. In this episode, Bill and some friends are looking for student digs and end up in a creepy house, owned by an even creepier landlord ( the fantastic David Suchet ) who has no intention of letting them leave. There's something lurking in the walls of this creaky old building and Bill and her housemates are on its menu...
Another cracking ( and creaking ) episode with some genuinely spooky moments  -  especially if you have a phobia of insects en masse which Sarah certainly has ( she had to cover her eyes a few times during this one )  -  and an eerie but beautiful "monster" with a tragic secret. Capaldi and Suchet both give it the full thespian treatment and there's plenty of awkward humour in Bill's relationship with the Doctor  -  here more parent and child than teacher and pupil.
This one rates a Four Out Of Five Sonic Screwdrivers ( or creaky floorboards )

Oxygen
Probably my favourite so far, this episode has a take-no-prisoners script from the ever-challenging Jamie Mathieson, some proper science fiction concepts, beautiful special effects and some real jeopardy for the Doctor, Bill and Nardole. ( Yep, Nardole has a proper role in this story and Matt Lucas does a great job in showing the real person behind Nardole's bumbling facade. I have to admit I really misjudged him and he's growing on me episode by episode. )
The story is set on a mining station in deep space ( no, not Red Dwarf ) where evil capitalists ( see a theme here? ) are now even exploiting the very air we breathe and not even the dead are beyond the bosses' control.
A tense, claustrophobic episode with some beautifully played scenes by the main cast ( especially Pearl Mackie who knocks it out of the park ) and top-notch direction from Charles Palmer, this is sure to be seen as a classic in years to come. And that cliffhanger! Excellent stuff.
I'll give this one a breath-taking Four And A Half Out Of Five Sonic Screwdrivers

And still another 7 episodes to go this series! If this momentum can be maintained, Capaldi will definitely go out on a high...

Doctor Who - The Pilot

"What's the one thing you never see when you look at your reflection...?"

The tenth series of Nu Who finally kicked off on Saturday with The Pilot, an episode showcasing new companion Bill Potts, the Doctor's new job as a university lecturer and, in the words of a previous story, a "sinister puddle".

As the episode begins the Doctor appears to have given up the old time and space travelling and has settled into quarters in the fictional St. Luke's University in Bristol, even hanging an Out Of Order sign on the Tardis door. ( There is, of course, a Mysterious Reason for this. ) He's noticed that kitchen worker Bill has been turning up to all his lectures even though she's not a student and he arranges for an interview with her, via his PA / batman, the possibly-cyborgised Nardole. Seeing something promising in this under-appreciated young woman, the Doctor offers to become her private tutor  -  an Educating Rita-like relationship, except this lecturer is an alien not an alcoholic.
A chance meeting between Bill and Heather ( a girl with a strange star-like marking in her eye ) and the discovery of a strange puddle of something that looks like water but isn't propels the Doctor, Bill and Nardole into a desperate chase across time and space. ( I knew that Tardis wouldn't stay Earthbound for long... )

Surprisingly, considering the show will be rebooted next year with a new Doctor and new showrunner, this opening episode already seems like a reboot. In a similar way to Rose, the very first episode of 21st century Doctor Who, this story gets back to basic principles: a young woman with a lousy job but much potential meets a madman in a box who whisks her away into a far more dangerous, but exciting, world. There are a couple of nods to previous characters ( River and even Susan Foreman ) but, beyond that, there is no hint of backstory or need for prior knowledge. This is a fast-paced and colourful episode, fizzing with style and energy, not bogged down by arc plots or continuity. The menace of the week is briefly sketched but effective ( even if it is yet another example of the "broken spring" plot ) with a lovely turn by Stephanie Hyam as Heather, the unwitting Pilot of the title.

Of course, the most important aspect of this story is the introduction of the new companion. The first glimpses of Bill in Friend From The Future ( the sneak preview from last year ) weren't too encouraging  -  she just came across as irritating. Luckily, this proper introduction shows that Pearl Mackie is more of an accomplished actress than previously suggested. Bill is bright, lively and very down to earth, and her unrequited love affair with Heather is both sad and sweet. After Amy and Clara seemed to be inextricably linked with the madness of the Doctor's world from day one, Bill seems more like one of us  -  a normal person whose life could do with just a little bit more excitement. Her role seems to be that of the companion who asks the questions everyone else has missed. Hopefully this won't become irritating ( there's that word again ) but will flow naturally from the character. Welcome on board, Bill!
All in all, a very promising start to the Twelfth Doctor's final run, so I'm giving this:

4 out of 5 Sonic Screwdrivers