An Hour of Who a Day: 09/07/20

September 7: "Can You Hear Me?"

Promotional photo for "Can You Hear Me?" (from BBC One - Doctor
Who, Can You Hear Me? gallery) ©BBC

Oh look, another pre-titles sequence! And (somewhat surprisingly, given the name of the show) our first question mark in an episode title! (If only they'd let episode 3 of The Myth Makers go out under the title "Is There a Doctor in the Horse?"...)

"Can You Hear Me?" is cowritten by Chibnall and Charlene James (a playwright and new writer to the show who's the second black writer ever on Doctor Who), and this is probably the closest episode to the "weird" one in series 12 -- the episode that pushes the boundaries or does something different in some way. But whereas previous episodes have experimented with the structure or point-of-view, this one (a lot like the last one, "It Takes You Away", in some regards) is more just a bizarre story, with strange imagery and an almost dream logic at times.

It starts out normally enough, with the Doctor dropping the others off in Sheffield for a day so that Yaz can observe some anniversary. It gives us a nice little look into what the others are like when they're in their natural habitat, so to speak: we get some more overdue character development for Yaz, with her conversation with her sister about some event that we learn about later; we get to see a bit what it's like for Ryan's best friend Tibo, who seems a bit lost now that Ryan's been off travelling; and Graham is enjoying a game of poker with two of his friends. It's good to be reminded that the Doctor's companions do have a life without her, that they have something to return to should they desire.

But then it starts getting strange, with a bald man with a tattooed head watching people sleep and then having his fingers detach from his hand so that they can fly around the room, lodging themselves in people's ears so they can activate and store people's nightmares. (Like I said, this episode is weird.) Meanwhile, the Doctor is in 1380 Aleppo, also dealing with strange nightmare creatures. And it turns out that somehow these events are linked: the bald man is named Zellin (a name the Doctor recognizes as the mythical name of a god), who has lured the Doctor to a space station in the future. Zellin is immortal and is stealing nightmares as a way to amuse himself: "The Eternals have their games, the Guardians have their power struggles," Zellin remarks, namedropping some classic Who characters along the way. "For me, this dimension is a beautiful board for a game. The Toymaker would approve. And I do like this form. It's so small. To exist within molecules and atoms is fascinating. I can shape them, regrow, mould my form to provoke fear from humans as I extract nightmares from the scared and vulnerable. Now, that is a good game." And while the Doctor believes he's been torturing someone trapped in a prison caught between two colliding planets, Zellin has in fact tricked her into releasing his companion Rakaya, who explains (in a really nifty animation sequence) how she came to be imprisoned in the first place.

Maybe it's because it's the Doctor facing off against ancient, immortal beings, but this story has a real seventh Doctor vibe to it at times -- a feeling no doubt helped by the fact that the main locations that Zellin and Rakaya show up in are a single space station set and a deserted English street at night, which gives it a bit of a low-budget feel in keeping with the McCoy era. We also get Zellin making speeches while the Doctor tries to outwit him, only to have been played by Zellin, which also feels rather like late 80s Who. This isn't necessarily a bad thing (as you might recall, I like the McCoy era), but it does mean the story feels a bit vintage at times -- pleasingly vintage to my tastes, but vintage nonetheless.

Really, the main genuine complaint I have is that it's a bit difficult to follow the timeline aspects of the story. We're in 14th-century Syria, 21st-century England, and far-future Space Station Past the Geskon Straits, but it's never completely clear why. Why are we in the far future, instead of just 21st-century Space Station? If Zellin and Rakaya can travel the "time waves", why does it matter when we are? Why do we go to Aleppo at all in this story? (It doesn't seem to add anything beyond a scary monster that doesn't seem particularly relevant to medieval Aleppo.) It occasionally feels like things were done just because they seemed like they'd be fun, rather than because careful thought was put into it, and you get the sense that the whole thing might collapse if you think about it too hard. But because this story is about dreams, they juuuust about get away with this by making it seem like dream logic.

But in some respects the best parts of this story have to do with characterization: learning that Yaz ran away from home at one point because she was being bullied, only to be talked out of it by a police officer, is interesting (and may provide insight into why Yaz decided to join the police?), while Ryan's interactions with Tibo feel real and enjoyable. I also really enjoy how the Doctor talks to herself because she forgets/doesn't realize no one is around to hear her, which feels like an appropriately thirteenth Doctor trait. But the dreams of Ryan and Graham in particular -- Ryan coming back to a world on fire (in a callback to "Orphan 55") while Tibo grew old waiting for him, Graham learning his cancer is back from Grace who then asks why he didn't save her -- also provide some insights into the two of them; Ryan in particular seems somewhat shaken by this, if his conversation with Yaz at the end ("Is this our lives? Going from one place to the next, ignoring home? We're getting older, but without them. Missing out bits of their lives") is anything to go by. Graham is also worried about his cancer returning, which he attempts to confide in the Doctor about but leads to a bit of a duff note as the Doctor doesn't know what to say and sort of awkwardly does something at the TARDIS console to cover it. I can see what they were going for, suggesting that even the Doctor doesn't know how to handle these sorts of conversations all the time, and it doesn't look like Graham is particularly offended by it, but it does feel slightly off -- partly because they've spent a fair amount of time (in the last series in particular) establishing that Thirteen is a Doctor who's actually better at these sorts of human interactions than some of her predecessors, so having her declare herself to be "socially awkward" (which we've seen when it comes to small talk, but not so much regarding things that matter) feels wrong for the character. It's not a huge concern, but it is there.

So overall, "Can You Hear Me?" is generally quite good, albeit in a slightly retro way, but if you're OK with that, as I am, then there's plenty to enjoy here. It's more mid-tier Who than anything else, and I can understand why one wouldn't particularly like this episode, but I find I rather do. It hits enough buttons for me to keep me entertained, and sometimes that's enough.