An Hour of Who a Day

August 16: "Empress of Mars"

(Who, working at BBC America, thought it was a good idea to put scenes -- not trailers, actual scenes -- that haven't actually aired in the episode yet as mid-commercial teases? What on Earth is this even for, other than to potentially spoil the episode for the viewers?)

This opens with a frankly pointless scene at NASA (and that shot of the building is very cheap-looking) to establish that there were humans on Mars in 1881 -- rather than just having the TARDIS show up on Mars in 1881. This leads to a story involving British troops on Mars, dealing with Ice Warriors who've been hibernating. In theory this should be a bit daft but also exciting, the sort of juxtaposition that Doctor Who is fond of doing. But it just never really gels.

Iraxxa in front of her hibernation device. ("Empress of Mars") ©BBC

Part of the problem is that it's a pretty shallow script that Mark Gatiss has given us. On its surface level, "Empress of Mars" is admittedly a lot of fun. We get Ice Warriors actually on Mars, for the first time ever on TV, and we get an entertaining clash with Victorian troops, with Victorian ideals (although, somewhat surprisingly, we also get a black soldier -- something even Gatiss commented on, although it seems there were a couple). The new way the Ice Warriors kill people, by basically crushing them into small, twisted balls, is suitably horrific. There's a noble leader in Godsacre and a slimy one in Catchlove, and since this is the Ice Warriors we're dealing with, the script takes some pains to establish that even though they're currently killing soldiers, they're not an evil species, not really. (And they do get provoked by the incredibly stupid Catchlove, so their aggressive response is sort of justified.) We even get a brand-new Martian design, in the form of the Ice Queen Iraxxa. (Not sure about the hair-like tendrils though.) And Alpha Centauri! And Ysanne Churchman doing its voice again, even! That's a genuinely thrilling moment for any old-school fans.

So the initial, undemanding watch of "Empress of Mars" works, just about. But that's the only level on which this works; there's no substance behind this story, no themes you can grapple with -- not even straightforward ones like "imperialism is bad", or "jingoistic arrogance only leads to destruction" (which is right there to take up, with Catchlove's comments about up-right crocodiles, but is cheerfully ignored), or even a token effort to compare Victorian and Martian philosophies, which seems like it would have been a pretty easy scene to do. The closest the story gets is the way Iraxxa spares Godsacre's life, but that's only because of the Martian code of honor, rather than because any characters have experienced any real growth.

Actually, that's another problem with "Empress of Mars". Gatiss hasn't provided us with characters, but rather with caricatures. Everyone's defined by a broad stroke or two and nothing more: Catchlove is impulsive, Godascre is a noble coward, Iraxxa is imperious, Jackdaw is your standard conniving selfish soldier, Vincey is a bit scared and misses his girl and home... None of these characters have any hidden depth to them. And not even the regulars are spared; they'd mentioned in interviews before the series began that Bill might be more into pop culture than other companions, and so that's pretty much her only defining characteristic here, while the Doctor is just your standard Doctor, rather than anything that marks him out as the twelfth Doctor. (Although, admirably, Peter Capaldi does a good job of playing against this somewhat; I particularly like the moment where he tosses off the "too quiet" line with a quick little grin, undercutting what could have been a rather groan-inducing line.) And Nardole gets shunted off into the TARDIS, which is misbehaving for reasons that are never explained, other than that Gatiss doesn't want to deal with a third companion. (Actually, given that Nardole wasn't initially intended to be a regular, this could just be Gatiss's way of handling suddenly having a third TARDIS person to worry about.) All this means that it's difficult to really get a grasp on any of the characters beyond those broad strokes, and so it's subsequently hard to care about their fate -- certainly the deaths of some of them don't really elicit any reactions from the audience.

So by the bare minimum standards, this works: it looks gorgeous, it's exciting if undemanding fare, and if you just let it all wash past you the story's all right. As a pastiche of silly B-movie SF fare with some Mummy archetypes thrown in, this is OK. But the minute you try to sink your teeth any deeper into "Empress of Mars", the whole thing collapses like spun sugar: pretty to look at, but ultimately unsatisfying.

(And what the hell is going on with the ending? Why does Missy ask the Doctor if he's all right with such gravity, given that what's he's just experienced is pretty much a walk in the park by his standards? If she's referring to something deeper (which is probably what we're meant to think) we never find out, as this is never brought up again. It's heavy foreshadowing for something nonexistent, which is really weird.)

August 15: "The Lie of the Land"

The Monks are in control, having convinced the population of the planet that they've always been there (because "however bad a situation is, if people think that's how it's always been, they'll put up with it," as Nardole points out), and the Doctor is apparently their figurehead, broadcasting to the world how good the Monks are (despite the fact that they have Memory Police who arrest and kill people who remember that the Monks have only been around six months or who own comic books (i.e., proof the Monks weren't always here)). Bill is one of the people who remembers the old days, although she has to fight every day to keep it that way (mainly by talking to an imaginary version of her mother), and once Nardole gives her the chance to rescue the Doctor she takes it.

The third part of this story is by Toby Whithouse, who's usually a fairly solid writer. So that's why it's a bit disappointing to find that "The Lie of the Land" is rather unfortunately mediocre. I'm wondering if that's because he's essentially been brought in to wrap up this three-parter (and it really does feel like a three-parter, despite what the production team said), rather than conceiving of a complete story from scratch.

Honestly, the production team on this show continues to be so good at what they do that even lesser efforts like this can still boast of solid production values and interesting direction. (The way the Monks' reality keeps threatening to break through the characters' resolve, with the symbol and the word TRUTH flashing up every so often, is a particularly nice touch. And there's that homage to the McGann movie, with the Master's eyes superimposed over another image.) So it definitely helps that the whole thing looks great. It's just a bit of a shame that the storyline is so standard-issue. Having rebels break into a secret base to locate a figurehead just isn't that exciting, and while they do a good job with it, it suffers from that feeling of familiarity.

The best part of the episode, though, is Bill's confrontation with the Doctor. Her growing disillusionment is pitched perfectly, and Capaldi makes us initially believe that he really does want to help the Monks -- no knowing winks or sly smiles or anything that might give the game away. "What about free will?" Bill demands. "Yes, well, I mean, you had free will, and look at what you did with it," the Doctor replies. "Worse than that, you had history. History was saying to you, look, I've got some examples of fascism here for you to look at. No? Fundamentalism? No? Oh, okay, you carry on. I had to stop you, or at least not stand in the way of someone else who wanted to, because the guns were getting bigger, the stakes were getting higher, and any minute now it was going to be goodnight, Vienna. ... All I can say is that we are lucky it was a benevolent race like the Monks, not the Daleks. Yes, I know the Monks are ruthless. I get that. Yes, they play with history and I'm not exactly thrilled about that. But they bring peace and order." Capaldi makes it seem like he agrees with the Monks, like he's tired of having to save humanity from itself, in such a way that even we the audience aren't certain if he's really on their side, and if Bill is going to have find a way to stop the Doctor as well as the Monks. And honestly, that might have made for a far more interesting back half -- perhaps with Bill and Nardole having to go to Missy to get her help to stop the Doctor.

The Doctor seemingly regenerates. ("The Lie of the Land") ©BBC

But that's not what we get. Instead we're told this was all an elaborate set up to verify that Bill wasn't a Monk plant (complete with the Doctor faking a regeneration, most likely so they could include bits of it in the series trailers (the more cynical side of me says)) and then it's more business as usual, with the freedom fighters infiltrating the Monks' base to shut off their broadcast. Even the appearance of Missy, telling the Doctor that the easiest way to break the Monks' control would be to kill Bill (since she's the one who invited them in in the first place), doesn't do too much to liven things up. The best bits are Missy being snarky to the Doctor: "I've had adventures too," she tells the Doctor in one instance, after he asks if she's met the Monks before. "My whole life doesn't revolve around you, you know." (And they do explain a couple of the questions I posed last time after all -- though not the "why are they here at all?" one -- so that's a good thing at least.) But no, most of this is, in many ways, just Who by numbers, right down to the final solution to the Monk problem being love (in this case, Bill's pure love for her mother). Ho, as they say, hum.

So as I said, the production values are excellent, and that goes a long way in making this palatable. But as a story, "The Lie of the Land" feels just a bit tired, almost going through the motions rather than trying to push the envelope. Considering we started this three-parter with "Extremis", it's perhaps inevitable that the wrap-up wouldn't be as exciting as the beginning. But nevertheless it's unfortunate that a storyline that started so adventurously ended by playing it so safe, but that's how "The Lie of the Land" feels: safe. And in some regards safe is fine; it's not the worst sin to shoot for that, but it does mean that it's all too easy to feel let down by the result.

August 14: "The Pyramid at the End of the World"

Promo pic for "The Pyramid at the End of the World" (from BBC One -
Doctor Who, Series 10, The Pyramid at the End of the World) ©BBC

Interesting that they brought back the blue berets, now that this is ostensibly the actual UN and not UNIT...

Last time around we got a fresh, interesting take on a conspiracy thriller, which got to actually pull the trigger on killing people because it was actually a computer simulation. This time around, we get the people who set up that computer simulation, arriving in a giant pyramid for some reason (effect, I guess) and telling humanity that they're doomed unless they let the Monks rule over them. Their simulations pointed to this moment, and it's up to the Doctor to work out why and then stop it.

This episode is co-written by Peter Harness, who wrote last series' Zygon two-parter, which is probably why this episode has a similar feel. There's a sense of international danger presented that's rather nice, although it does require the Doctor being President of Earth again. I dunno; the first time it was a fun gag, the second time it was like, "Yeah, OK", and this time around it's starting to get tiresome. That might be because now that it keeps showing up we have to actually consider what it means, rather than just letting it be a throwaway joke. Is it really likely that Earth would readily give up sovereignty to an alien? Or even to a single person? This is one of those things that seems less and less likely the more you look at it. (That said, I'm fully in favor of them bringing this back next series, now that we know the thirteenth Doctor will be female.)

The Monks activate their plane-catching beam. ("The Pyramid at the End
of the World") ©BBC

And speaking of weird things... What exactly is the Monks' goal here? We get told that they can't just invade the planet, but they have to be invited in. This is presumably because it would be a real drag, having to deal with the population resisting them, and it would be way easier to be asked nicely to take over the planet, even though they've clearly got a lot of power and can bring down planes and subs without damaging either the vehicles or the crew. (Maybe they only have enough power for one show of strength like this.) This plan involves frightening the hell out of the populace, by the way, with sending everyone a Doomsday Clock notification telling them they're at 3 minutes to midnight²⁷⁸, but then informing the representatives of humanity that consent must be given but not out of fear. So maybe not your best plan, guys. (Also, so long as one person consents out of love, that takes care of everyone else who maybe wouldn't have agreed with that decision (such as the Doctor)? How does that work?) And then when they get the planet, what do they get out of it? Is there some natural resource they need? Do they just enjoy bossing people around? Or do they just like the adulation from convincing the populace it loves them? (These questions don't really get answered here or in the follow-up next time, in case you were wondering.)

So that's what doesn't work. What does work are the smaller moments. Watching Bill's date with Penny go awry a second time, this time due to the appearance of the UN Secretary General instead of the Pope, is still fun, and both actresses sell it really well. (Ooh, and a quick dig at the US President's Cheeto-like complexion.) Nardole also gets some fun moments ("Course I can [hack the systems], I'm not just sexy"), and the way he keeps helping the Doctor with his blindness is nicely done as well. But this episode is primarily the Doctor's, and Capaldi does a great job with it, standing up to the Monks, working out what the problem threatening humanity is and how to track it down, and his interactions with lab scientist Erika (played wonderfully by Rachel Denning) are lovely to behold. And the other thing that really does work is the doomsday scenario they've concocted, with a killer bacteria being unwittingly unleashed (almost) upon the world through a series of small accidents that compound into one big one. (This is reminiscent of the genetic alteration of plant bacteria Klebsiella planticola, which was modified to produce alcohol when it broke down crop residue but when introduced into non-sterile soil would have (possibly) killed all plant life due to alcohol poisoning -- and note that the strain used here has a similar name.) This is played as a simple mistake with horrific consequences for the entire world as it aggressively breaks down organic matter (with Capaldi's one-time Thick of It co-star Tony Gardner being the first victim, as Erika's lab partner Douglas), with the possibility of it being vented into the larger world. The way the Doctor finds out which lab is having the problem is also clever. (The geography of the lab and what portions are safe from the bacteria and the Doctor's sterilizing explosion and which are affected is occasionally confusing though. And so if the Monks had never shown up then the world would have definitely been doomed then, yeah? So maybe it's a good thing they showed up when they did...)

So in general this is a pretty average episode, with some logical problems but a number of good moments to counterbalance. But the ending is fantastic, by making it hinge on the Doctor's hubris. He can't quite bring himself to tell Bill (or anyone besides Nardole, in fact) that he's blind, and while the sonic sunglasses help him with larger shapes they can't help him with images or painted details. And so he's defeated the Monks and saved the planet from mass extinction, but because he hasn't told anyone (like, say, Erika) that he's blind, he can't open the combination lock to get out of the affected areas. And so rather than have him die, Bill consents to let the Monks rule Earth, so long as the Doctor gets his sight back and can escape the explosion. It makes the Doctor pay for his pride in a very significant way, refusing to let him off the hook, and it's incredible to watch it happen, to know what Bill is going to do. This is one of those quintessential "defeat snatched from the jaws of victory" moments, and is easily the most memorable part of the episode. That alone helps tip the balance for this episode to the "favorable" side. "You'd better get my planet back!" Bill tells the Doctor, but we'll have to wait until the conclusion to see what happens. The "next time" trailer certainly suggests that that might be a problem, what with the Doctor now working for the Monks and all...

²⁷⁸ Three minutes to midnight is where the real Clock was set until January 2017, when the inauguration of the new US President, Donald Trump, helped nudge the clock thirty seconds closer. But that didn't happen until literally a week after they finished filming this story, which is why there's this slight discrepancy.

August 13: "Extremis"

Interesting; the recap at the start of this episode uses a slightly less hysterical line reading from the Doctor ("I can't look at anything ever again") than at the end of "Oxygen", as if they know that now it's not a cliffhanger any more they can dial it down a bit. In some ways it's a lot like the classic Who days of providing slightly different reenactments of cliffhangers.

The last couple of series, Steven Moffat has been taking an episode and using it to push the format of the show. In series 8 it was "Listen" (a bit), last series it was "Heaven Sent" (a lot), and this time it's "Extremis". The clues are there at the beginning, of course, with the Doctor getting an email called "Extremis", but we don't really remember that as the story progresses. No, this time around Moffat is going full-blown Dan Brown conspiracy theory thriller, with forbidden texts in the Vatican and suicidal CERN physicists. (And remember, The Da Vinci Code borrows a lot from The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail, the book that claimed Jesus and Mary Magdalene married and had kids who ended up as part of the Merovingian dynasty and which was co-written by Henry Lincoln, who also co-wrote three Troughton stories -- thus bringing the Doctor Who connection around full circle.) Consequently we get lots of clandestine meetings with high-ranking Vatican officials, including the Pope himself (albeit not the real current Pope, Francis, probably because a) it's not great to involve the real Pope in this story, and b) Francis isn't Italian, and they clearly want that European Da Vinci Code vibe) and rumors of a text, the "Veritas", that is so dangerous that everyone who's translated or read it has subsequently committed suicide. (An idea which unintentionally mirrors Monty Python's "Killer Joke" sketch.)

The Doctor seemingly executes Missy. ("Extremis") ©BBC

Interspersed with the Veritas storyline is the Doctor remembering an encounter with Missy, who'd been captured and was going to be put to death. It's...actually not quite clear why he's remembering this now. Certainly the thing River Song said about him that Nardole reads to him ("'Goodness is not goodness that seeks advantage. Good is good in the final hour, in the deepest pit without hope, without witness, without reward. Virtue is only virtue in extremis'") keeps coming to mind, so maybe that's why, but it does feel on some level like Moffat just wanted to get the fact that Missy is the one in the Vault out there now so he didn't have to worry about teasing the viewers the rest of the season -- and, of course, so that he can use Missy later in this three-part story, and it makes more sense to introduce her here than in the next episode. But it's an interesting storyline, and it makes clear just why Missy is in the Vault (because of that "without witness" stuff), and why Nardole is still around too (because River sent him after the Doctor). It just doesn't quite gel with the surrounding storyline.

But that's OK. This is an episode that nevertheless succeeds because it commits to its premise. We get a secret library of heretical books under the Vatican, created by Pope Benedict IX, who was apparently a woman. (Interesting that Moffat chose a pope considered to be one of the all-time worst to retcon as female.) There's some creepy decaying monks walking around threatening people, and portals that lead to places all over the world. Even when things get a bit weird, they still do a great job of having everything slowly unfold, so that by the end, when the Doctor is confronting the Monks in the Oval Office, next to the body of the American president (who isn't orange, interestingly enough -- see next episode for why this matters), it's still a logical progression. But the best thing is that the only really logical way to end the story Moffat is telling is to basically have the Doctor and his friends lose, and so that's what happens. There's no deus ex machina here, no Missy swooping in at the last minute (say) to fix things. Instead we learn this world is a simulation, for the Monks to work out their best plan of invasion, but this doesn't feel like a cheat because the whole episode has been building to that moment. The Veritas and the Shadow Test wouldn't work in the real world, but because they're in a computer simulation it does.²⁷⁷ And the way the characters also discover this -- Nardole by moving outside the limits of the projectors, Bill by being told the truth, the Doctor by reading the Veritas -- is also well done, with no punches pulled. And finally, because the episode straight up told us about this Extremis email, there's no sense of letdown that, in some ways, it was all a dream, because we knew that going in, even if we didn't necessarily realize it.

It's the first part of a three-part story, so "Extremis" doesn't wrap things up all nice and neat. But what it does do is mess with our heads, just a bit, but in a way that feels satisfying. This is an episode that fully commits to its premise, with hardly a foot misplaced. This is another success in a series filled with successes, but it does leave you wondering: how can the next two parts of this story match this? I guess we'll have to watch and see...

²⁷⁷ Personal moment of pride: the minute they started doing the Shadow Test I instantly realized it must mean they were in a computer simulation because of pseudorandomness. It made me feel clever.

August 12: "Oxygen"

Promo pic for "Oxygen" (from BBC One - Doctor Who, Series 10,
Oxygen) ©BBC

It opens, cheekily, by lifting from the famous opening from Star Trek: "Space, the final frontier..." Except instead of continuing with a stirring, optimistic speech, here the Doctor uses the phrase to illustrate just how deadly space is. It's a fun little subversion.

"Oxygen" is by Jamie Mathieson, who, after a bit of an uneven entry last series ("The Girl Who Died"), is back on form, with a tense, thrilling affair that's right up there with his series 8 episodes ("Mummy on the Orient Express" and "Flatline"). We get some stuff early on regarding the Vault... oh right! The Vault! I haven't even mentioned the Vault yet. It's the reason the Doctor is staying at the university and lecturing, because it's a safe place to guard this mysterious Vault that Nardole keeps reminding him about. In some ways the Vault is the overarching plot this series, but as pretty much everyone correctly guessed who was in the Vault, they wisely don't milk it till the end -- in fact, we'll find out who's in it next time around. But yeah, the Vault comes up basically so that Nardole can chastise the Doctor about it and the Doctor can ignore him, but in a way such that Nardole gets to come along on the adventure this time around, instead of remaining behind like he's done in the last three episodes.

One of the neat things about "Oxygen" is how it takes an argument of free, unfettered capitalism and extends it to a logical conclusion: in space, oxygen is a resource just like any other, and corporations charge money for resources, so therefore corporations would charge its employees for oxygen. So the number of breaths you have left becomes the measurement for everything, and it creates a tension of a constantly ticking clock in the background that the audience is aware of on some level, even if it's not being brought up all the time. Then there's the reference to the idea that the Doctor and company are from the union, which the others believe to be a myth. And of course, there's the fact that the life-preserving spacesuits that everyone is required to wear are programmed to start killing all the employees because it would be cheaper to just bring in a brand-new crew than to either fire this crew (and thus have to transport them back from the mining station) or train them to be more efficient or something, which also reads as a critique of capitalism and the focus solely on the bottom line. (One is reminded of the infamous memo related to the Ford Pinto, where Ford calculated that it was cheaper to just deal with the cost to society of accidents and deaths than to alter every vehicle to be in accordance with higher safety standards.) But the cool thing about this critique is that it's there in the background, motivating the plot, but Mathieson isn't beating us over the head with it, shouting "Look how terrible capitalism is!" or anything. It's just a logical extrapolation, like all good allegorical SF.

Bill's suit malfunctions. ("Oxygen") ©BBC

The cast, of course, is great; Pearl Mackie still excels as Bill, while Matt Lucas gets to slip back into the comic relief role that he had in "The Pilot". It's a relationship that works really well, and seeing the two of them with the Doctor continues to be a real joy. (In particular, the bit at the end where Bill hugs the Doctor, and then Nardole hugs them both to be part of the moment, made me laugh out loud.) There's also the way Bill reacts to being confronted with an alien with bright blue skin, which leads to her being called a racist, which is handled with a nicely light touch. And it's good that they have these light moments, because the rest of the story is properly scary, with basically zombies trying to kill off the remaining crew. As I said earlier, the tension doesn't really let up, and the atmosphere (sorry) of the episode is therefore very effective -- certainly, for my money at least, much more effective than last week's episode. The moment where it looks like Bill might die from vacuum exposure is excellent, and the way that the solution has repercussions for the Doctor, blinding him, is clever. It makes the Doctor have to rely even more on his wits, now that the TARDIS, his sonic, and even his sight are unavailable to him. Really, the only thing that doesn't quite work is the idea that Bill is only knocked out by the electrical charge, not killed, and that's probably more an issue with the direction and makeup making her look dead than with the idea itself.

So "Oxygen" is a compelling, scary episode that provides a nice set of thrills, but with a point about capitalism lurking in the background, adding another layer to consider and appreciate. In fact, it's worth taking a moment to ponder just how good this run of episodes has been so far. It hasn't been a perfect success, of course, but even the weaker episodes have plenty of moments to make them at least somewhat worth your while. It's a sign of just how confident and experienced the production team has become: this is a team that knows what works and what doesn't, but critically, this doesn't mean that they've gotten complacent. Doctor Who is still pushing itself, coming up with new ways to thrill and entertain viewers, all while making it look natural. Some of this is their excellent casting, of course (seriously, you should just accept that I'm going to be raving about Pearl Mackie for the rest of series 10), but some of it is the way they're still taking risks. Like that cliffhanger at the end, making the Doctor still be blind. A less adventurous production team would have made the Doctor better at the end of the episode, and in fact we the audience assume that that's what will happen -- but making his choices have long-term repercussions, even if those choices were the correct ones in that moment, is the sign of a show still pushing itself. Doctor Who isn't resting on its laurels by any means, and having the Doctor's blindness persist makes you want to know what will happen next. What more could you want?

August 11: "Knock Knock"

A large, old house, a group of students, a creepy landlord... what could possibly go wrong?

"Knock Knock" is the debut Doctor Who script from noted playwright Mike Bartlett, and it explicitly wants to be a haunted house horror(ish) story. And so we get many of the clichés present and correct, including a group of young people who can be picked off one by one and a weird old guy (played wonderfully by David Suchet) who knows more than he's letting on. And, like Doctor Who does, "Knock Knock" puts the Doctor inside the cliché and consequently distorts the story, sending it in a new direction. That's probably why the story ends the way it does, an example more of "misguided" than "evil" at the heart.

But before we get to that point, the story does need to go through the motions, which is why we get the setup of six young, attractive people, with some romantic possibilities (such as Paul being into Bill (who obviously isn't interested, being into girls and all), while Shireen is into Paul) and a sense of people being happy and having fun -- which obviously won't go well when a haunted, sort of alive house is involved. (Although while we're here, it's a bit weird how everyone seems to know who the Doctor is, yet Bill has to spend time explaining who he is.²⁷⁶ [Edit: It's because he lectures at their school; it's embarrassing how long it took me to work that out.]) The story doesn't really demand much from the housemates other than to be cheery and then afraid, but to their credit everyone here does really well, even when they don't have a lot to really do -- so, for instance, Felicity is claustrophobic (rather like Charlie from Class) and sells it quite well, even while she demonstrates that it's not any safer outside the house than inside. But the star of the show is David Suchet, who brings a quiet, matter-of-fact manner to a rather creepy character, which makes him even more creepy as a result. It's one thing to have a character cackle that you're going to die, and quite another to have a character calmly and cheerfully state it. I only really know David Suchet as Poirot, and seeing him play such a different character was a bit of a revelation. The Landlord is quiet, a bit oily, and very self-satisfied, and he's a delight to watch, even as you're rooting against him. I also really like the way his character almost never tries to hide what's going on, such as when Bill and Shireen find Pavel trapped in the wall. "Music can be pleasant, but a simple repetition like that [record currently skipping], it's merely a distraction from the inevitable," he comments. "Hope is its own form of cruelty. ... Oh, look. He's released. Mercy at last. Beautiful, isn't it? Nature contained. He's preserved in the walls, in the very fabric of the building forever." Suchet is so matter-of-fact and pleased as he says this that it's really rather wonderful.

But here's the thing. The way the story picks the housemates off one by one is well done. The discovery that this has been happening for years and years is skillfully done. The living house thing works well, and the woodlice/Dryad bugs are really creepy -- the initial shot of them pouring out of the doorframe in the kitchen as the Doctor and Harry watch is effectively gross, and the way they can just show up out of nowhere is also suitably unpleasant. The effects in general, in fact, are really good -- seeing Pavel swallowed up by the wall is nicely nasty, and the makeup on Eliza, as she's essentially made of wood, is top-notch. This should work. And yet I just didn't find it that engaging. Maybe it's because I'm not really into horror movies, so I'm not really the target audience? I dunno; on paper this sounds great, but while it seems like all the individual parts are good, the sum is somehow less.

Is it the ending? There is a sense, a little bit, that the story is pulling its punches by having the Landlord not be evil but just trying to desperately keep his mother alive, to the exclusion of all else. They're doing it for a reason, of course -- this is part of the subversion that the Doctor's presence has on events, after all -- but it does come at the cost of not being quite as visceral. And that feeling is only compounded by the semi-happy ending, with all six housemates being "restored" by Eliza as she ends things -- nice, yeah, but it does neuter the horror rather. But is that enough to retroactively lessen the impact of everything up to that point? It doesn't seem like it should, but maybe.

So in the end it's a bit difficult to judge. Maybe if I were a bigger fan of the genre this would work better for me (so obviously your mileage may vary), but as is, while it's easy enough to admire the care and skill that's gone into everything here, it just doesn't quite do it for me. Its heart and its brain are both there, but it's like they don't quite click together. "Knock Knock" is entertaining enough, but it's not as outstanding as it seems like it should be.

²⁷⁶ This might be because Harry was, in initial drafts, supposed to be related to one-time companion Harry Sullivan, so it could have been him who told the others about the Doctor, rather than Bill. But when they cut the reference to Sullivan they didn't adjust the rest of the script to match -- in other words, draft artifact.

August 10: "Thin Ice"

Three episodes in and I haven't even mentioned the slightly different font style for the episode titles that they've been using. No, it does matter, come back!

Nah, it doesn't actually matter. Just an observation.

Anyway, "Thin Ice" is by Sarah Dollard, who wrote last series's excellent "Face the Raven" and is back with this outstanding story. It's not an adaptation of the unmade McCoy-era Ice Warrior story, though (sorry, Big Finish fans), but instead this time around we're back to the time of the last frost fair in London, in 1814. This is when the Thames used to freeze over and people would hang out on the frozen river and have parties and fun. And yes, they really did have an elephant out on the ice. In some ways, despite only being 200 years ago, the idea of the Thames freezing over seems really alien -- Bill even comments on it, wondering if the TARDIS has landed in a parallel dimension.

And once again the Doctor and Bill steal the show, thanks to both their easy relationship and some sparkling dialogue.

BILL: Traveling to the past, there's got to be rules. If I step on a butterfly, it could send ripples through time that mean I'm not even born in the first place and I could just disappear.
DOCTOR: Definitely. I mean, that's what happened to Pete.
BILL: Pete?
DOCTOR: Your friend, Pete. He was standing there a moment ago, but he stepped on a butterfly and now you don't even remember him.
BILL: Shut up! I'm being serious!
DOCTOR: Yeah, so was Pete.

(from The Doctor Who Transcripts - Thin Ice)

Seriously, Bill and the Doctor's interactions are so good, and they're so relaxed together, that I wouldn't be surprised if these two end up being considered one of the best Doctor-companion pairings ever. And here they get to say Dollard's dialogue, which is full of sharp, insightful moments ("Regency England," Bill comments. "Bit more black than they show in the movies." "So was Jesus," the Doctor replies. "History's a whitewash") and quieter, more significant ones. The scene between the Doctor and Bill, where she asks him if he's ever killed anyone, is well done because you understand both sides, and crucially, both of them choose to underplay it. We could have gotten Pearl Mackie shouting and raging at the Doctor, but she plays this much quieter, and consequently it's a lot more impactful. It's also good how the script has her move on, so that we don't have to deal with a lot of outrage, as with Clara and the moon situation in "Kill the Moon" -- Bill focuses on the task at hand, which is good. And then a later scene, where the Doctor tells Bill to let him do the talking because it's best not to get emotional, before slugging Lord Sutcliffe for being racist to Bill, is fabulous not just because it's great to see the Doctor punching racists in the face (although that's definitely part of it) but because it reveals to Bill the sort of man the Doctor is: it's not that he doesn't have time for outrage, as he claims, but rather that he doesn't have time for anything else. And of course, that gorgeous speech that sums up the Doctor's philosophy: "Human progress isn't measured by industry, it's measured by the value you place on a life. An unimportant life. A life without privilege. The boy who died on the river, that boy's value is your value. That's what defines an age. That's what defines a species."

The actual storyline of the episode is a good one: there's a creature living in the Thames that's eating people, except that someone has actually chained it down there. That someone, it turns out, is one Lord Sutcliffe, who is harvesting the creature's waste as a fuel source which burns a thousand times longer than coal and hotter than they can measure. We find this out slowly, as the story satisfyingly unpeels thanks to the Doctor and Bill's investigations. And the villain isn't an alien or anyone deserving of any sympathy, but simply the racist, unfeeling Lord Sutcliffe, who doesn't care who dies (in fact, he encourages it) so long as the creature is kept fed so that it can keep producing fuel. (Quick aside to note Bill's cheeky almost-swear: "No sh-" *immediate scene change*.) This leads to another parallel to "Kill the Moon": as in that one, the Doctor declares that the choice of how to deal with the creature, to set it free or to leave it be, is not his to make, but rather Bill's, as a representative of humanity. But unlike in "Kill the Moon", he doesn't leave Bill alone to make the choice but rather helps her after she decides to set the creature free. It's a suitably action-packed finale to a story that's been both thoughtful and exciting.

I feel like I've doing a lot of raving about this story, but that's because "Thin Ice" deserves it. This is a script with dialogue that sparkles and a storyline that unfolds at just the right pace, and everyone in this, on both sides of the camera, do their very best to make this work, and they definitely succeed. This is easily one of the best stories (if not the best) of series 10, and possibly of Capaldi's whole run.