An Hour of Who a Day: February 19: "Utopia"

February 19: "Utopia"

Well, it took six months (in contemporary real world terms), but we finally find out what happened to Captain Jack when he ran out of the Torchwood Hub at the end of "End of Days" -- he clung to the outside of the TARDIS as it dematerialized (having stopped off briefly to refuel at the rift -- "Should only take twenty seconds," the Doctor remarks in one of the few acknowledgements of the events of Torchwood in Doctor Who; "the rift's been active"), and the TARDIS was so freaked out by Jack's presence that it went to the end of the universe -- the year one hundred trillion -- to try and get rid of him.

It's really great to see Captain Jack back with the Doctor again -- the chemistry between the two is well done, even with Tennant playing the Doctor as stand-offish (since, as we learn later, the Doctor finds Jack to be "wrong" now that he's a fixed point in time -- and this is the first time this now oft-recurring phrase gets used). Fascinatingly, Jack snaps back into focus as a character; he's perfectly happy to accept orders from the Doctor, he's flirting with people again, and his energy and liveliness are back to where they should be. The brooding Jack of Torchwood is nowhere to be seen. (Although, oddly, it's in this episode and not Torchwood where we learn something about Jack's history between "The Parting of the Ways" and "Everything Changes", and how he used his Vortex Manipulator (the thing on his wrist) to travel back in time: "I thought 21st century, the best place to find the Doctor, except that I got it a little wrong. Arrived in 1869, this thing burnt out, so it was useless. ... I had to live through the entire twentieth century waiting for a version of you that would coincide with me.") One of the best moments of "Utopia" is the quiet conversation between the Doctor and Jack as Jack sets the couplings that will let Professor Yana's rocket fly. Part of it is just bringing people up to speed/reminding them of past events, and part of it is to trigger things in Yana's head, but the way Tennant and Barrowman interact is genuinely lovely.

But what's also great about "Utopia" is the story: Russell T Davies does a great job depicting the end of the universe (so the Doctor Who universe has an end then -- but then that's consistent with Logopolis, so it's not the first time the universe has been chronologically finite), showing that people still survive in some form, clinging to hope. There may be no better exemplar of this than the character of Professor Yana, who keeps on plugging away at his rocket, giving the humans living on Malcassairo hope that they'll one day reach Utopia. Sir Derek Jacobi is incredible as Yana, full of energy and enthusiasm and brilliance, all wrapped in a kind-hearted package -- albeit one bothered by a constant drumming sound in his head. All that makes Yana's true nature all the more surprising and compelling, as he reveals that he has a fob watch just like the Doctor had in "Human Nature" / "The Family of Blood". Once Martha brings the watch to his attention, he starts to hear voices -- including a chuckle from Anthony Ainley and one of Roger Delgado's lines from The Dæmons: Professor Yana is in fact the Master.¹⁸⁵

What's really impressive is how incredibly evil Jacobi is in his few short minutes as the Master. It's all too easy to see that this is the same Master as before, selfish and vindictive and wanting to make the Doctor suffer -- in particular, the hatred in Jacobi's eyes as he confronts his assistant Chantho is frightening indeed. You sort of get the impression that Jacobi is living out a dream here, to be on proper televised Doctor Who (remember, he'd already played the Master in Scream of the Shalka, but that's not really the same thing) -- and apparently he was. It's somewhat sad that he's shot by Chantho at the end of the episode -- "Killed by an insect. A girl. How inappropriate" -- and regenerates into John Simm. Not that that's meant as a slight against Simm, mind, but it would have been cool to have seen even more of Jacobi.

Hell of a cliffhanger, though, as the newly-regenerated Master takes the Doctor's TARDIS away while the Futurekind are trying to get at our heroes so they can kill (eat?) them. "Utopia" is a gripping, enthralling success, with a glorious return for one of the Doctor's oldest enemies, and I can't wait to see what happens next.

¹⁸⁵ Allegedly they wanted to use a clip of Eric Roberts from the TV Movie as well, but the complicated rights issues surrounding that production -- note that the US didn't receive a home video release of that story until 2011 for that same reason -- prevented it. It probably would have been a line like, "Life is wasted on the living," but I like to think it would have been "I always drezz for the occasion."