July 25: "Sleep No More"

Stuart Manning's poster for "Sleep No More"
(from Incredible set of retro Doctor Who
series 9 posters)

I have a suspicion that this is one of those polarizing stories Doctor Who occasionally puts out, the ones that people either love or hate, with few falling in the middle.  (The stories sometimes referred to as "Marmite" stories.)  I have to confess, I'm not really on the "love" side for this one; I find "Sleep No More" to be pretty frustrating.

I think the problem for me is the basic concept.  Not with the "found footage" aspect of it (although I have some reservations about that, as I'll discuss below), or even the idea of a machine that eliminates sleep -- that's a neat idea.  No, my problem is that we're asked to be afraid of monsters made of sleep dust.  Sleep dust.  The crud that builds up in the corner of your eye.  How on Earth are we meant to take this seriously?  That sounds like something someone would come up with if they were trying to parody Steven Moffat.  "Let's see, we've done ticking clocks, statues, shadows, gaps in your memory, WiFi...what other common everyday things can we make people scared of?  I know!  How about sleepies?"  I mean, yes, the Sandmen are sufficiently creepy and menacing and such, but they're killer eye boogers for heaven's sake.

Rassmussen addresses the camera. ("Sleep No More") ©BBC

Now, if the rest of the episode were more light-hearted, maybe this wouldn't matter.  But other than an odd Hitchhiker's Guide-meets-Portal moment where Deep-Ando has to sing "Mr. Sandman" to the computer to get it to open the door (even though we never see anyone else have to go through this to enter a room), this is an episode that is definitely taking itself seriously.  Part of this is because of the "found footage" approach, which seems to naturally lend itself to scarier narratives, with unfocused or half-in-shot monsters and the "startled" effect of having monsters suddenly appear out of seemingly nowhere.  And I do applaud the use of this technique; it's nice to see them trying something new.  What I don't like is how the script decides to undermine this by making it a plot point that there aren't any cameras to be found and that in fact it's the sleep dust floating in the air and such that's monitoring people; a nice idea from a creepy surveillance point of view, but a terrible one for what they're actually trying to accomplish.  If any dust mote can potentially be a camera, then that means we can suddenly have a camera anywhere -- but then what's the point of doing "found footage", if you can place the camera in the same places you'd put it if you were shooting this as a typical episode?  To his credit, director Justin Molotnikov doesn't take advantage of this until the Doctor mentions it, and even after that he doesn't use it much, but it still takes away from the documentary feel they're going for.

In fact, if this episode succeeds at all it's because of what's happening on camera.  Molotnikov does an excellent job with this style of directing, and all the actors are doing fine (with the possible exception of Reece Shearsmith, who sometimes seems like he's playing things up a bit -- but as that's rather the entire point of his character, it's easy enough to forgive), acting appropriately scared and all that.  And as I said before, the underlying idea of a machine that removes the need for sleep by rewriting your brain chemistry is a neat idea, one that hasn't been done on the show before.  Although I can't decide if the idea that Rassmussen has been arranging everything as a story, with appropriate bursts of excitement here and there, is clever or not.

But still.  Sleep in your eye that wants to consume you.

So if you can get past the sheer ridiculousness of the monsters, I suspect there's quite a bit here for you to enjoy.  But for me, they're so silly that they ruin the episode; worse, this means that I find large stretches of this story fairly boring, as I don't really believe in the monsters or the threat they entail.  "Sleep No More" just isn't my cup of tea.

Although despite that it's kind of a clever ending, I must admit.  If you'll excuse me, I think I've got some sleep in my eye...