The next stop on the Doctor’s attempt to get Belinda home has them arrive inside a dropship as it’s actively deploying a squad to investigate an abandoned space station on an uninhabited planet where they- SUPRISE FUCKERS it’s actually a follow-up to Midnight. Y’know Midnight the episode that fans like for its tense, paranoid atmosphere, with its one-off monster that no-one actually sees. The one where a sightseeing tour almost chucks David Tennant out an airlock.

Thousands of years after being kicked off a tour bus for trying to murder everyone onboard, the unnamed monster from Midnight has climbed outta a mineshaft to pull its biggest prank yet on a crew of diamond miners.

They just looked at an episode that people liked and said, “can we make it higher stakes?” The answer is yes, but they really shouldn’t’ve.

This one’s going on the meh pile.

What I liked:

• they’ve consistently managed to nail the look of these episodes this series. Although it’s cannibalising aesthetics from older Dr Who episodes such as The Satan Pit as well as the huge well of space station Sci-fi horror as a whole, the sets and costumes are incredibly well realised. My personal favourite this episode is the Dead Space RIG holoprojecters they use to caption their dialogue when it turns out only the Doctor is able to use BSL to communicate with sole, deaf survivor of the mining crew.

• this one’s more of an appreciation of restraint. They maybe dredged Midnight back up, but at least they didn’t try to explain what the whole deal with the creature there. They could’ve gone the whole weeping angle route and unnecessarily dropped increasingly contradictory and convoluted lore for it. But they didn’t (for now).

• plot twist, there was another and now it’s got off-world. Good ending. Dr Who’ll often trip over itself and spoil the vibe of an episode to give it a good ending at the last minute and I like this sorta uncertain ending. Though I do worry it’s opened the door for them overuse of this thing in the future.

What I didn’t like:

• that it had to be set on Midnight in the first place. The monster doesn’t work like it did last time and the Doctor’s previous encounter with it doesn’t factor into how he figures out to escape it. All it serves to do is remind me of a better episode I could be watching instead.

• they’re trying to build up intrigue around Mrs Flood, and I just don’t care. Every time the story grinds to a halt so she can slide onto screen and coyly gesture at a grander plot, I find my eyes drifting to my phone.

Overall:

Better than last week’s but still mediocre. Dr Who frequently threatens to be good and it might just be if it can escape the gravitational pull of fan nostalgia baiting.

“I’m scared that something bad happened in 2025.”

In a desperate attempt to get Belinda back home, the Doctor has cooked up scheme of using some sorta time gizmo to manually drag the TARDIS back to 2025. This will involve him landing at random locations/time periods and turning the thing on.

The first landing place is Miami during segregation, where another one of those old god thingies is causing a mischief in a cinema.

Cue a brief sequence where our intrepid heroes get caught inside film and the worst metacommentary I’ve seen since Red Dwarf: Back to Earth.

What I liked:

• Mr Ringading, odd since as a whole I deeply dislike the gods, but this one wasn’t so bad. The cartoon character in the real world, while derivative, was well executed, especially close to the end as he grows increasingly creepy looking as he becomes more real. The fact that he’s just out there slowly getting bigger does leave the worrying possibility that he will be back though.

What I disliked:

• the entire scene where the Doctor meets his fans.

• Mrs Flood, I just don’t care much for this character whose entire purpose is to wink at the camera and make shitty jokes.

Overall:

I don’t feel particularly strongly about this one, I didn’t hate it, I’m just gonna stop thinking about it once I’ve hit post.

Despite knowing it’ll cost her everything, she still doesn’t hesitate to throw down against the forces of oppression.

The speech she makes at the ransacked albinauric village sums it up:

I witnessed a sight much the same, in my infancy.

The oppression of the weak. Murder and pillage unchecked.

A waking nightmare, made by men.

But this time, I’m a woman grown.

And though the suffering cannot be undone, I can still mete out justice.

Justice to the oppressors.

Let the scars I carve remind them. I am Nepheli Loux, Warrior.

Other than being an IED slinging communist travelling all of time and space to kick the shit outta various embodiments of capitalism and fascism, Ace’s greatest strength is the compassion she shares with others. A reminder that often more than the strength of any individual, collective solidarity with others marginalised by the capitalist hegemon is what’ll allow us to win.

Despite being scared shitless, despite lacking any of the skills of his peers, despite being way out of his depth, Rincewind still gathers the courage to face down multiple apocalyptic threats.

Bravery is not a lack of fear, but rather the strength to push on despite that fear.

“You’ve turned coercive control into complete control of a planet!”

“Planet of the incels.”

When a nurse’s shitbag ex names a star after her as a gift, a series of escalating farce and time travel bullshit leads to her being kidnapped to serve as queen of an empire of warbots.

What I liked:

• the aesthetic was a cool mix of retro-futurism and more contemporary sci-fi that I thought looked kinda cool. I guess that mouse money is being put to use. My personal favourite was the knock-off Borg that got wrecked at the end of the episode.

• the floor polishing robot and the duplicate certificates were both well set up pieces.

• the shootout in the throne room was good, although it did feel a bit like something outta Star Wars insteada Dr Who.

• Belinda telling the Doctor off for analysing her DNA without her permission. Get his ass!

• dialogue was less marvel quippy than last series, a marked improvement.

What I didn’t like:

• the tinnitus exacerbating ring during the climactic scene, the BBC does this shit all the time and I don’t get why.

• “it was Al not Ai.” This whole plot twist woulda been better if they didn’t treat the audience like complete idiots during the reveal.

• Belinda being a magic special girl linked to some series spanning background arc. This is a personal taste thing, I just prefer when Dr Who is more like a series of one-off adventures instead of the series arc thing.

Overall:

A decent start to this new series especially compared to the weak start of the previous one. I’m cautiously optimistic.