April 23: "The Invasion" Episodes Five & Six

Now we know that the Cybermen are involved in this intended invasion, we can see what they're up to.  Although at this point the answer is "not much."  Vaughn's people have been reviving them and sending them to lurk in the sewers until they're needed.

This is a "holding" episode in multiple ways.  The Brigadier attempts to get the Ministry of Defence to investigate Vaughn's facilities, but as Vaughn has gotten to the minister first, he doesn't have much luck.  He can go over Major General Rutlidge's head to UNIT HQ in Geneva, but that will still take a couple days.  (Except it does make Vaughn nervous, so he decides to bring the invasion plans forward.)  Meanwhile the Doctor's trying to work out what the extra circuits in all of IE's equipment do, but he's not having much luck either.  So all that's available is a lot of reports and hearsay but no physical proof.  Thus it's left to Isobel and Zoe (accompanied by a reluctant Jamie) to go down into the sewers and get photographic evidence that the Cybermen are in fact here.  And that's really about it.  Now, that said, the scenes between the Brigadier and Rutlidge are quite entertaining, and Vaughn remains as watchable as ever -- particularly when he gleefully orders that a half-revived Cyberman be hooked up to Watkins' Cerebraton Machine and made to experience fear -- but this is an episode in which little happens to advance the plot.  Cybermen are in the sewers and the invasion is being brought forward, and that's all you need to know.

Episode six, on the other hand, has quite a bit of action.  There are the scenes at the beginning, where a few UNIT soldiers fight a couple Cybermen in the sewers with grenades (and one grabs Jamie as he's climbing out the sewer in a scene reminiscent of a similar one in The Tomb of the Cybermen).  There's also the quite worrying scene in Vaughn's office where Watkins is goaded by Vaughn into shooting him: Vaughn hands him a gun and tells him to fire, and when he doesn't immediately do so he slaps him hard across the face, leading to Watkins firing the gun three times.  The sight of three smoking holes in Vaughn's chest, while Vaughn himself simply laughs, is rather disturbing and memorably effective.  Of course, all this and Professor Watkins' rescue still happens offscreen by "at least thirty" UNIT men (indeed, this seems so abrupt that for years there were rumors that this part of the episode had been edited out).

The Cybermen begin their invasion. (The Invasion Episode Six) ©BBC

But really this episode has been building up to the cliffhanger, with the beginning of the invasion.  The Doctor has worked out that the extra circuits are designed to put everyone on the planet under Cyber-hypnosis, to make their takeover of the planet easy.  There's a wonderful moment of calm in the early morning.  "Do you think the Doctor could be wrong this time?" Jimmy asks.  "I mean about the invasion." "... Yeah, I know what you mean," Isobel replies.  "... Looking at all that peace out there, it's so difficult to imagine."  And at that moment the signal is broadcast.  We see people in the streets collapsing (excitingly, as this is really the first time we've seen anything like this happening out in the city, other than a man being attacked by a War Machine) -- and the Doctor succumbs too, his special anti-Cyber-signal gizmo having fallen off his neck.  And then, most memorably of all, the Cybermen burst out of hiding, throwing aside manhole covers and stalking the streets of London.  The invasion has begun, and it seems that everyone but the Doctor's small group has succumbed to the hypnotic signal...