"Boom" wears its primary inspiration on its sleeve, at least for fans versed in the 20th-century run: this is, at its heart, an expansion of the landmine sequence from Part One of Genesis of the Daleks (and Moffat has been forthright about that being where this stems from). Here we have the Doctor stopping a war and saving a planet while being transfixed to one spot, trying very, very hard to remain calm. It's a set-up that obviously lends itself naturally to lots of tension, and Moffat milks it for everything he's got.
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| Ruby prepares to hand the casket to the Doctor. ("Boom") ©BBC |
There's also the main Anglican marine, Mundy Flynn, who is initially hostile to the Doctor but then starts to come around as she realizes just how bad things would be if the Doctor activated the landmine. Flynn is played Varada Sethu, who one month earlier had been announced as the Doctor's companion next series. We'll have to wait and see if this is a deliberate choice, like Jenna Coleman in "Asylum of the Daleks" and "The Snowmen", or more like Freema Agyeman in "Army of Ghosts", but for a number of fans it made them sit up and take notice, though on the face of it Sethu seems to be playing a different character. She does a good job of being both likeable and pigheaded, needing the Doctor and Ruby to talk her round but finally willing to trust the Doctor. Joe Anderson as John Francis Vater and Bhav Joshi as Canterbury both do what's required of them, while Susan Twist (no longer in a cameo role!) hits just that right level of cruel niceties as the ambulance AI, meaning that you really dislike it. Really the only weak link is Vater's daughter, Splice, and that has less to do with Caoilinn Springall's performance and more to do with the fact that she's simply too old: the script treats her like she's 4 or 5, while Springall is fairly clearly a few years older than that. This means that most of the time her character ends up looking like an idiot, rather than a young kid; the scenes where she doesn't understand what happened to her dad (on a battlefield, mind you) make you wonder if there's something wrong with her.
But this is a Steven Moffat script, which means a lot of his obsessions and in-jokes are present and correct. So it's set in the 51st century (that one's a bit subtle, but 2004 (Ruby's birth year) + 3082 = 5086, except it's 5 October so it's actually 5087), it features the Anglican Church as a military organization, the Doctor mentions fish fingers and custard, and he recites a poem about the moon and the President's wife that seems to be the same thing as something Missy mentioned during "The Magician's Apprentice". The most overt reference, though, is the weapons manufacturer Villengard, which the ninth Doctor implies he destroyed in "The Doctor Dances" and which the twelfth Doctor visits the ruins of in "Twice Upon a Time". Here Villengard seems to be in its prime, supplying weapons to the Anglicans and maintaining a casualty rate slightly above the acceptable number, so that the war continues and Villengard makes more money. This means if it's not profitable to heal someone the roving ambulances will kill them instead, so as not to waste resources on them. It may not be the most original critique of war profiteering ever, but that doesn't mean they shouldn't do it. And this way you get to see the Doctor defeat the warmongers, even if the actual method is literally a deus ex machina. Plus I like the way the enemy is handled, even if it is a bit too obvious that there's no enemy -- but the Doctor uses that as an opportunity for a critique:
DOCTOR: Ruby, stop that. Hang on in there. I still need you. I can't think unless I'm talking, and I can only talk to you. Mundy thinks that she's fighting the Kastarions, what do you think? You figured it out yet? I don't think Mundy's figured it out.It's perhaps Moffat's most anti-religion script, the way it dismisses faith and religion, although he does give a little bit of grace at the end: "Just because I don't like [faith] doesn't mean I don't need it, Mundy," the Doctor says. That may not be to all tastes, of course, but it's more an aside than the main thrust of the episode, so it doesn't really ruin things if you disagree with him.
MUNDY: Figured what out?
DOCTOR: So this lot, Ruby, they came here, what, six months ago? They set up their defences and fired their warning shots into the air. "Watch out, we come in peace." Yeah?
MUNDY: We advertised our presence. It's standard procedure.
DOCTOR: Did you hear that, Ruby? They advertised their presence. And do you know what that does? Ruby, that activates the Villengard algorithm. The acceptable casualty rate algorithm. Keeps you dying, keeps you buying. Huh? Do you get it? Huh? Do you get it? ... There's nobody else here. You declared war on an empty planet. There are no Kastarions in the mud, they're not in the fog. There are no Kastarions. Just the algorithm maintaining an acceptable casualty rate in the face of nothing at all. You are fighting your own hardware and it's killing you at just the right amount to keep you buying more. I mean, most armies would notice that they were fighting smoke and shadows, but not this lot, Ruby. You know why? 'Cos they have faith. ... The magic word that keeps you never having to think for yourself. Just surrender, Mundy. Just stop, and it's all over.
And the thing is, this really is a well-done story. It's not perfect, of course, and some things may grate, depending on your general opinion of Steven Moffat, as this is a pretty Moffat-esque script. But even with that, the production is so well done that any qualms about the storyline disappear like the fog being sucked up by the vacuum drones. "Boom" is an excellent story that shows just how much you can do with basically a single set and a handful of characters. This is one of the standout episodes of series 14.