Ribbit… or is it tibbir?

The TARDIS lands in a Nordic forest. The companions enjoy the views while the Doctor confirms the time and place by tasting the grass, then everyone jumps when the Doctor spots a sheep. She determines that they are in 2018, leaving 193 years before the great Woolly Rebellion, an event that forced a renegotiation of the entire human-sheep relationship on Earth.

Weird.

The team sets their sights on a distant cabin, and the Doctor wonders why there’s no evidence of smoke from the chimney despite it being the middle of winter. The cabin is boarded up but Ryan catches a bit of movement through the window. The Doctor uses her sonic screwdriver to unlock the three locks on the front door and the team investigates. Ryan finds a girl hiding in the upstairs wardrobe, but she refuses to move when the Doctor asks. Once Graham offers up his emergency sandwich(!), the girl joins the team in the kitchen.

The girl’s name is Hanne and she’s afraid of the thing from which her father was defending the house. She can’t explain what the thing looks like because she’s blind, but she knows that her father disappeared four days ago. She asks the Doctor for help.

Ryan’s not great with kids, but Yaz immediately bonds with Hanne over a t-shirt for the Arctic Monkeys band. Hanne knows that her father didn’t simply leave her because the boat is still tied up nearby. Hanne gets nervous when her watch beeps, signaling the daily hunting time for the beast. As Yaz and Ryan scout around, they find animal traps and hear a loud roar. The team convenes outside but can’t find a beast to accompany the roar, so the Doctor orders everyone to secure the house.

Upstairs, Graham sees a mirror that doesn’t reflect his image. Ryan wonders if they are vampires before the mirror bleeds strange energy and the Doctor arrives. The mirror changes to normal for a moment before shifting again, but the Doctor is able to lock it in phase and take a look inside. The mirror is a portal to another dimension, and the Doctor decides to take another look but wants to leave Ryan behind to look after Hanne. She writes “Assume her dad is dead. Keep her safe. Find out who else can take care of her.” on the wall, telling Hanne that it’s a map of the house for Ryan’s benefit. Then the Doctor, Graham, and Yaz enter the mirror in search of Hanne’s father, Erik.

What lies beyond is a foggy and narrow cave. After leaving a trail of string to find their way home, they follow a light to a strange being named Ribbons. Ribbons offers his lantern in exchange for the sonic screwdriver (which looks pretty), and the Doctor promises payment upon delivery if Ribbons can show them the way to Erik.

As they progress, the team is introduced to killer flesh moths which Ribbons lures away with dead rats. He then cuts the thread while the team is distracted and betrays the team. As flesh moths descend, Ribbons mentions that this place is an anti-zone, a buffer that appears wherever the fabric of spacetime is threatened. The flesh moths extinguish the lantern and Ribbons tries to run after snatching the sonic screwdriver, but Graham stops him. The Doctor warns the team to stand still, but Ribbons tries to grab the sonic and is consumed by the moths. While the moths are busy, the team runs to a nearby portal and escapes, but they’re on the other side of the mirror.

Back in normal space, Hanne calls Ryan’s bluff about the map. Hanne is upset about Ryan’s attitude, but they team up when the roars come closer.  Ryan finds a wire and follows it to a speaker, discovering that the roars are a recording. Ryan runs back to tell Hanne, but she knocks him out and goes through the mirror. When he comes to, Ryan pursues.

In the mirror world, the team finds a beautiful and tidy cabin. They also find Erik, wearing a Slayer t-shirt with a backward logo, and a revelation: The monster is a recording. Erik tried to keep Hanne safe while he was gone because Trine (Hanne’s mother) is in the mirror zone. Or rather, her mirror universe version exists here, but cannot travel through the mirror. The team is also introduced to another traveler.

Grace is here.

Both of the women have memories of their lives before death. Graham tells Grace all about his adventures with the Doctor, but he’s unsure if he can trust Grace until she explains her passion for frogs. Meanwhile, the Doctor tells Yaz about the Solitract, a story that her fifth grandmother shared when the Doctor was a child. It existed at the start of the universe along with all of the other elements, but it couldn’t exist in the universe so it was exiled to another plane so it could exist naturally. The Solitract isn’t malevolent. It’s just lonely. But because of its nature, nothing from this universe cannot enter N-Space.

Graham and Erik have to choose between life here with their loved ones or their real lives in the normal universe.

As this detail is made clear, Ryan and Hanne navigate the anti-zone. Ryan sends Hanne ahead while he distracts the flesh moths. Hanne is overjoyed to find Erik but is not convinced that Trine is her mother. The world around them is falling apart since it is full of incompatible N-Space energy, but the Solitract wants to keep them as a cure for its loneliness. When the travelers reject the Solitract, they are knocked back into the anti-zone, and the Doctor offers herself in exchange for the others. She will stay behind since she’s seen the universe that the Solitract misses. The Solitract rejects Erik to save its universe.

Then the mirror universe goes white.

When it resolves again, the Doctor is faced with a skeleton of the cabin’s attic and a frog sitting on a chair. It speaks to the Doctor in Grace’s voice, taking an avatar that once delighted Grace. The Doctor begins to vibrate as the universe continues to destabilize, and the Doctor makes the case that the Solitract cannot survive if it holds on to what it cannot have. The Doctor tells the Solitract that they will remain friends even in her absence, and the Solitract sends her back into the anti-zone.

Everyone runs back to N-Space as the anti-zone collapses. The Doctor seals the portal behind them as the survivors come to terms with their losses. Erik and Hanne plan to move back to Oslo and start again, and Hanne is proud of her father for coming to terms with Trine’s death. Ryan and Graham talk about how Grace would react to this adventure, and Ryan finally calls him granddad. Together, they join their TARDIS family and set course for a new time and space.

I’m going to avoid a Calgon joke.

This is a beautiful story without a true villain. Instead, the Solitract is lonely, and to make connections, it offers companionship to those who grieve. Erik and Graham both get to heal a bit from their grief, and they extend this to their dependents. Graham specifically makes a deeper connection with Ryan through their shared trauma.

Now, I understand the Solitract taking a frog’s form in honor of Grace, but I think it would have had a better impact if it had taken a form that would tempt the Doctor to stay. Sure, the Doctor is tempted by this Time Lord fairy tale, but the whole point of the Solitract’s game was to bait companions with someone they miss. The perfect avatar would have been Susan, extending some goodwill with the return of Carole Ann Ford.

After all, “one day, I will come back”… yet the Doctor never really has on television, have they?  Instead, we get another fast ending and more questions about things we’ll likely never see again.

The casting was great with Eleanor Wallwork, the first blind actor in Doctor Who to play a blind character. That degree of authenticity was wonderful, as was the general low-budget horror atmosphere of this kinda spooky tale.

Rating: 4/5 – “Would you care for a jelly baby?”

UP NEXT – Doctor Who: The Battle of Ranskoor Av Kolos

The Timestamps Project is an adventure through the televised universe of Doctor Who, story by story, from the beginning of the franchise. For more reviews like this one, please visit the project’s page at Creative Criticality.

If a Time Lord weighs the same as a duck…

The Doctor wants to take her companions to see the coronation of Elizabeth I, but the TARDIS has stubbornly dragged them to the early 17th century and a village where a party rapidly changes into a somber trial of an accused witch. The Doctor cautions her companions to not interfere in historical events, but she breaks those rules almost immediately as Becka Savage condemns Mother Twiston to a test by the dunking chair. The test itself is flawed: If Twiston survives the test, she’s obviously a witch and will be executed accordingly, but if she drowns, then she’s innocent.

Either way, the accused will not find justice. Twiston doesn’t survive, but because the Doctor interfered, Savage must now treat the corpse as if the woman was a witch. Savage is furious, but the Doctor uses her psychic paper to pose as a Witchfinder General with her special team. Savage’s demeanor changes as she asks the Doctor to join her, and the Doctor places a condition on the meeting: Savage will leave Twiston’s granddaughter Willa alone.

Savage is the owner of the village lands, which she inherited after her husband died, and in her quest to eliminate satanic influences, she shot all of the horses. Yaz meets with Willa as the team listens to Savage’s story. It turns out that she’s trying to uphold the newly published King James Bible – “Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live” – which the Doctor counters with a twist from the sequel – “Love thy neighbor.” – which actually originated in the Book of Leviticus.

As if on cue, a man in a plague doctor mask opens the door. He is King James I, traveling incognito to hear of Savage’s crusade and offer his assistance. He reads the psychic paper as the Doctor being an assistant to Graham – a woman cannot outrank a man – then sets his sights on Willa.

No one in the village is safe from the crusaders.

Yaz finds Willa saying farewell at her grandmother’s grave. The young woman is nearly attacked by tentacle-like roots and then runs off after Yaz stops them. Yaz finds the rest of the team in Savage’s room. The Doctor scans the mud splatters but finds nothing of interest. The Doctor and Yaz set off to find Willa while Graham and Ryan keep King James occupied.

King James and his entourage inspect a box of witch-hunting artifacts before the king sets them on his quest to burn out the witches. Graham tries to understand Savage’s motivations while Ryan and the king compare traumas. The king believes that his god will protect him as he performs holy works.

Yaz and the Doctor find Willa and enter the Twiston home, finding a room of bottles and herbs to make medicines. Willa doesn’t feel well because of the hatred and mistrust of the village against her, something with which Yaz can empathize. She also reveals that Savage is her cousin, but she’s willing to help figure out what’s going on with the tendrils and the mud. The Doctor finds a sample near the grave that is very active in a sample jar. The women are interrupted by Mother Twiston’s reanimated corpse which is eager to absorb the sample. They are soon surrounded by a large group of reanimated corpses.

A scream summons the king’s group, and after the reanimated kill the king’s assistant Alfonso, the Doctor orders everyone to run. The Doctor wants to return and examine the reanimated, but she soon narrows her focus to Savage. The landlord flips the accusations back on the Doctor, accusing her of witchcraft and inspiring King James to action. Under pressure, Willa turns on the Doctor and the Time Lord is taken into custody.

As the companions follow the mud creatures to Savage’s home, the king interrogates the Doctor. King James holds the sonic screwdriver – the Doctor’s magic wand – so the Doctor resorts to psychological warfare, including the secrets of the king’s mother and how she was scapegoated in his father’s murder. If the king wants to understand the secrets of existence, he must understand the mysteries of the human heart.

Unconvinced, the king summons his guards and orders the Doctor to the dunking chair. As she’s strapped in, the Doctor notes a spark as Savage touches the chair. Savage starts her speech as mud trickles from her eyes, then dunks the Doctor as the companions arrive and plead with the king to end the trial. When the chair is raised, the Doctor has vanished – having studied under Harry Houdini – and swam upstream.

Savage calls for the Doctor’s execution but the mud creatures arrive in pursuit of the landlord. Some time prior, Savage had cut down a tree because it spoiled her view of a hill, but the tree infected her with the mud. She had Mother Twiston executed because the woman was too weak to heal Savage, using the cut parts of the tree as the dunking chair. After this confession, Savage transforms into a creature and reveals that the hill is a prison for war criminals named the Morax, reduced to their basic DNA and stored in the ground. Savage knocks everyone out and leaves to free her people.

The Doctor cuts the dunking chair apart and creates weapons from the wood. The team is joined by Willa as they march on the hill as Savage tries to infect the king with Morax DNA. The Doctor and Willa face off against Savage, eventually restoring the prison and returning the Morax to the mud. King James strikes the final blow and Savage is destroyed.

Disgusted with the king, the Doctor returns to the TARDIS. Willa decides to take up her grandmother’s title as healer – Doctor – and Ryan turns down the king’s offer to stand as his protector. The team boards the TARDIS and departs, leaving the king and Willa astonished by the magic.

After eight on-screen adventures, the Thirteenth Doctor finally faces challenges due to her gender in this third pseudo-historical story. This is a good use of gender swapping in drama and really wasn’t exercised enough during this era of the show. This happens in a story written and directed by women – Joy Wilkinson and Sallie Aprahamian, respectively – which marks the first such combination in the revival era and the second in Doctor Who overall after Enlightenment.

In that drama, the tension of twisting conspiracies is well used, as is the battle between compassion and fear. The latter battle is an exercise of the show’s very ethos and adds a lot of power to this adventure. The atmosphere and the tension make this story work. Also doing phenomenal work here are Alan Cumming (chewing on every piece of scenery he can find) and Siobhan Finneran (whom I know best as Miss O’Brien from Downton Abbey).

All of those elements combined make the magic of one of the best episodes in the series so far.

Rating: 4/5 – “Would you care for a jelly baby?”

UP NEXT – Doctor Who: It Takes You Away

The Timestamps Project is an adventure through the televised universe of Doctor Who, story by story, from the beginning of the franchise. For more reviews like this one, please visit the project’s page at Creative Criticality.

Prime shipping is killer!

The TARDIS is flying wildly due to the Doctor’s attempts to evade something pursuing them. She finally recognizes it as a teleport pulse and is excited when the pulse materializes in the console room as a Kerb!am Man, a delivery employee with a package for the Doctor. The box contains a fez and a call for help, and the companions urge the Doctor to investigate.

They materialize at Kerb!am’s headquarters on a moon of Kandoka. Ryan inspires the Doctor to have the team go undercover as new hires at the warehouse. They go through indoctrination and orientation with Judy, the Head of People, and learn that the robots around the facility supervise the ten percent organic workforce. They get scanned and tagged with ankle bracelets so they can be tracked, and then sorted into their respective departments. Ryan and Graham are assigned to packaging while Yaz works fulfillment. The Doctor uses her sonic to swap places with Graham, which moves him to maintenance.

The Doctor and Ryan meet Kira Arlo. Ryan is a natural since he used to do this work back on Earth. The Doctor asks Kira about the environment at Kerb!am, learning that the ten percent organic worker standard is a law to prevent full automation.

Yaz asks similar questions of her teammate Dan, who warns her that the robotic managers can hear everything. Dan is a superstar at work, becoming a literal poster child for the company. His daughter works upstairs but he only sees her twice a year. Their discussion is interrupted by a robotic manager who demands that they increase their efficiency. When Yaz gets a fulfillment request for the Triple Nine sector, Dan swaps places with her.

As periodic power drains plague the facility, the packaging team meets Kira’s boss, Jarva Slade, who is pretty abusive toward his subordinates. When the Doctor asks him if anyone needs help, he becomes unnerved and leaves in a rush. Meanwhile, Dan is ambushed by a robot in the Triple Nine sector. Yaz goes to find him and hears his screams, but she only finds his scanner and the necklace from his daughter. She evades the robots and ducks through a door.

Graham meets his teammate Charlie in maintenance. They are startled by an emergency break period, and the TARDIS team meets up in a nice park area for the period. Charlie meets Kira after she spills her lunch, and the Doctor takes the news of Dan’s disappearance to the head office while Graham makes a map of the facility. Judy and Jarva promise to look into it.

The Doctor, Ryan, and Yaz hide in a nearby alcove to wait until the managers leave the office. The Doctor regales her friends with stories of wasps and Agatha Christie. Meanwhile, Graham and Charlie build a relationship as the former works his way into building a map of the building. Charlie introduces Graham to the museum area where a map is kept. The Doctor, Ryan, and Yaz are shocked by a list of missing employees, but they are surprised by Judy (who is also shocked by the list). Charlie and Graham arrive with the map as the building goes into lockdown. They are all ambushed by a robot which is disabled by the Doctor. A scan of the robot’s memory shows that the overall system is acting up.

The employees on the list are shown as alive in the system, meaning that the system may be compromised. The Doctor finds the original delivery robot code in the museum and uses it to reset the computers. Elsewhere, Kira is abducted by two robots, prompting the team to go after her in the Dispatch areas. To do so, Ryan, Yaz, and Charlie dive into the chutes and ride them down into a vast maze of conveyor belts and sorting machines.

Kira is led to a concrete bunker. Upstairs, Judy, Graham, and the Doctor convince the 1.0 robot to scan the system and look for anomalies. They discover that the Kerb!am system is who summoned the Doctor for help. The rest of the team is summoned to Dispatch where Ryan, Yaz, and Charlie are dodging decontamination protocols. When they teleport downstairs, they are ambushed by Slade with a gun. The Doctor disables him with Venusian aikido before he reveals that he’s investigating the disappearances. They discover the liquified remains of the missing workers near an army of delivery robots, each holding a package.

Kira receives a gift, presumably for her stellar performance, as Ryan, Yaz, and Charlie try to break her out. The box contains only bubble wrap, and she is instantly vaporized when she pops one of the bubbles. Ryan and Yaz note that Charlie knew what was going to happen. Meanwhile, the Doctor discovers that the bubble wrap in every package is a collection of bombs.

The pieces come together when Charlie is revealed as the villain. He wanted to frame the Kerb!am artificial intelligence for the murder of millions of customers so the ten percent rule would be lifted. He’s fighting for organics, but the AI asked for help to stop the plan. The Doctor tries to reason with him, pointing out that the systems aren’t the problem. The people who exploit the systems for personal gain are the problem.

Charlie activates his army and destroys the controller. As Charlie escapes into the robotic ranks, the Doctor uses the 1.0 interface to reroute the delivery addresses, forcing the army to materialize in the hangar and detonate their bombs. The Doctor offers Charlie one last chance to survive, but he refuses and the team teleports back to the lobby.

The workers are given two weeks of paid leave as Judy and Jarva decide to transition Kerb!am to a company led by organic personnel. Yaz asks the Doctor if she can return Dan’s necklace to his daughter, and as the Doctor agrees, Ryan and Graham ponder the bubble wrap that accompanied the fez as the adventure started.

This story deals with the constant modernization of workplaces and retail environments, as well as the backlash that working environments that aren’t focused on the worker may face. It remains relevant in many ways today, both in labor actions like strikes and the popularity of self-checkouts in big box retail stores.

But this story also flips the script midstream by leading us to believe that a worker has asked the Doctor for help before revealing that the Kerb!am system is really the petitioner. Does that mean that the Doctor stood up for the corporation over the people? No, and this is the part that really made me think about this adventure, because helping the system led to systemic change for the organic workers. It’s a really neat twist with someone in power on the inside forcing a positive change from within.

I rather liked the idea of the Kerb!am Man being able to deliver directly to the TARDIS, as we previously saw in The Greatest Show in the Galaxy and The Doctor’s Wife. I mean, sure, the ship is virtually indestructible and has shields to prevent intrusion but how often has this show ignored the TARDIS’s physical security for the sake of plot? Quite often, really. It’s science fiction/fantasy, not reality. Roll with it.

Finally, I loved the concept of taking something we all do – popping bubble wrap – and making it questionable or nefarious. It’s a very Doctor Who thing to do.

Rating: 4/5 – “Would you care for a jelly baby?”

UP NEXT – Doctor Who: The Witchfinders

The Timestamps Project is an adventure through the televised universe of Doctor Who, story by story, from the beginning of the franchise. For more reviews like this one, please visit the project’s page at Creative Criticality.

Bearing witness.

Yaz is home celebrating her Nani Umbreen’s birthday. Each of the women gets an heirloom gift – Najia gets a stack of handwritten letters, Sonya gets a photo of her grandfather and a pressed flower, and Yaz gets a broken watch that must never be repaired – and Yaz has a burning desire to travel back in time to learn more about her grandmother.

The Doctor is skeptical about taking personal trips, but Graham quips that this team is no stranger to risk. The Doctor apologizes for that run-in with the Death-Eye Turtle Army before setting course for Pakistan, 1947. Shortly after arriving, the Doctor gets a telepathic shock before meeting a man named Prem and his ox-cart. The Doctor is shaken but accepts a ride to escape the troubles on the road ahead. As the cart pulls away, they are watched by an armored being.

The team arrives at a small home where they meet Umbreen as a young woman. Yaz stumbles over herself as they learn about Umbreen’s upcoming wedding to Prem, but Yaz is confused because Prem is not her grandfather. They also note that Prem is wearing the watch that Yaz was given in the future.

Against the Doctor’s better judgment, the team decides to stay. They learn that they are watching the Partition of India in action. The Muslims are forced into Pakistan, the Hindus get India, and tensions rise across the region because of how the British handled the situation. Additionally, Umbreen is Muslim and Prem is Hindu. The tense moment is exacerbated as two supposed demons appear, sparking another telepathic shock for the Doctor as they lead everyone to a dead Hindu holy man named Bhakti. They warn the Doctor not to interfere before Prem shoots at them. Prem explains that he’s seen the demons before and questions the Doctor’s team about their true intentions.

They watch as a purple powder vanishes from the corpse. The Doctor scans the area while Yaz and Graham lay the body to rest. The Doctor, Ryan, and Prem find a transmat doorway in the forest and are teleported into an underground ship. The Doctor determines that the demons are Thijarians, an ancient species that evolved into the deadliest assassins in the universe. Prem last saw them in the midst of World War II when his older brother Kunal was killed. The trio is forced to leave the hive ship when the Thijarians return, and Ryan and Prem are separated from the Doctor because of miniature transmat devices scattered through the forest. The Doctor confiscates the devices and a canister of the purple powder as she runs.

Back at the family farm, Umbreen continues to argue in favor of her upcoming marriage despite the family’s insistence that it be canceled. Yaz struggles with the history she’s seeing because it doesn’t align with the reality she knows. Graham consoles her and asks that she live in this moment and watch as history gets sorted out. As the Doctor, Ryan, and Prem return, everyone is gathered in the barn. The Thijarians follow and threaten everyone with death, but the Doctor uses the transmat devices to lock them out so she can formulate a plan. The Doctor asks for oil, tree bark, saucepans, nine containers, ox spit, a biscuit, and chicken poo to create a “demon repellent” to analyze the powder. She also tries to scan the powder but the substance overloads the sonic screwdriver.

The women and men are separated for pre-nuptial rituals. Umbreen asks the Doctor – a woman with a respectable title – to officiate the ceremony. The men play cards as Prem argues with Manish, a Partition sympathizer. Later on, the Doctor discovers that the powder is a dense amalgam of genetic material before the Thijarians break the transmat lock and take the Doctor back to their ship.

The Thijarians explain that they are no longer assassins. Their world was destroyed – the remnants are left in the powder jar – and they have become witnesses to honor the living in their moments of death. The millions who will die in the wake of Partition will be forgotten in history, and they have come to bear witness to their sacrifices. They reveal that Prem will die next and there’s nothing they can do to stop it. They also explain what happened to Bhakti.

The Doctor returns to the barn and reveals what happens to Prem on the day of his wedding. Despite the coming pain, Yaz and the team decide to stay and celebrate with her family. As Ryan and Graham see to Prem’s final preparations, Prem mourns for those around him who have lost their minds – Muslims, Hindus, and Sikhs who lived in harmony are now divided in a frenzy – and Graham comforts him with the knowledge that the best they can be is good men.

The ceremony takes place on the new border, making Umbreen the first woman married in Pakistan. The Doctor uses her sonic screwdriver to drop the rope border, speaking of the certainty Prem and Umbreen have in each other despite the uncertainty in the world around them. The certainty of love and hope. Umbreen uses the border rope to bind her hands to Prem’s, formalizing the ceremony.

Later on, Umbreen offers Manish reconciliation, but Manish rejects it. Prem offers Umbreen his watch but it falls to the ground, which Umbreen declares as their moment in time. The Doctor follows Manish as he grabs a rifle, asking if it was what he used to kill the holy man to stop him from marrying Umbreen and Prem. It is interrupted as men arrive on horseback to take the land by force. The Doctor warns the newlyweds to run and Prem asks Umbreen to gather some essentials. Yaz discovers a map of the world with Sheffield marked as a place where Umbreen wants to visit.

Prem offers to stay behind and distract the raiders while Umbreen and her mother escape. As the Doctor and the companions watch from the distance, Prem stands in defense of the land and confronts his brother Manish. A fellow soldier named Kanon draws a rifle on Prem as the Thijarians arrive to watch over the proceedings. A shot rings out as the travelers walk back to the TARDIS.

In the TARDIS, the Doctor confirms that Umbreen survived and reached Sheffield. When she returns home, Yaz and Umbreen talk about family history. Umbreen is happy about her life and where it has taken her, and she offers to talk about the watch. Yaz asks her to tell the story another time.

This powerful historical story is centered on the hidden and forgotten parts of our individual histories. I love the stories where the “bad guys” aren’t what they seem, and just like in Twice Upon a Time, the mistaken identity of those who honor the fallen and forgotten is beautiful. The episode also puts the audience in the same position as the Thijarians. We cannot interfere, but instead, we can only watch as this family goes through the turmoil.

It’s also really nice to see a British television series pay tribute to a time when the Empire really screwed up the geopolitical landscape with arbitrary lines on a map. This story takes place in 1947, and even now – 76 years later – the politics of the region are still a source of contention (to say the least). Leave it to a show about compassion and being the best of humanity to show the personal devastation associated with the Partition.

It’s touching that the episode premiered on Remembrance Sunday (November 11) and the centenary of the armistice that ended World War I.

I really liked the end credits version of the Doctor Who theme. This version was inspired by Indian music and performed by Shahid Abbas Khan, who was also featured throughout this episode’s soundtrack.

We get another nod here to adventures not seen on the television screen. The name Death-Eye Turtle Army alone makes me want to know what happened there.

Rating: 5/5 – “Fantastic!”

UP NEXT – Doctor Who: Kerblam!

The Timestamps Project is an adventure through the televised universe of Doctor Who, story by story, from the beginning of the franchise. For more reviews like this one, please visit the project’s page at Creative Criticality.

Stitch, Roy Kent, and a safe sacrifice.

Our heroes are hanging out in a junk galaxy. On Seffilun 27, one of the planets in this refuse-filled wasteland, the travelers are hunting for spare parts to patch up the TARDIS. As they dig, the Doctor uncovers an active sonic mine. When it detonates, everyone is knocked out and awakens in a hospital. The nurse, Astos, mentions that scavenger bots brought them to Tsuranga, which sets the Doctor off and motivates her to find the TARDIS.

As they search for the exit, the travelers meet Eve Cicero – over whom the Doctor fangirls – her brother Durkas, and her android consort Ronan. Eve is a fan of the Doctor, recognizing her name in the Book of Celebrants. The travelers move on and find a pregnant man named Yoss Inkl – a Giftan, a species of which both genders can give birth, but only to their own gender – before the Doctor succumbs to her injuries and collapses.

Also, the Tsuranga isn’t a building. It’s a rescue starship.

The Doctor picks herself up and tries to find the control room. Unfortunately, the ship is completely automated, crewed by nurses Astos and Mabli. Overriding the automatic systems would be seen as an act of hostility, and the Doctor finally relents when she realizes that she’s in the wrong.

Astos reveals that the ship is in an asteroid field close to Constant Division, a disputed territory, and both of them are startled by an alarm warning of a fast-approaching object and a subsequent hull breach. They track something moving around inside the shields, and Astos provides the Doctor with a communication unit as they investigate. Meanwhile, Ronan asks Mabli for some adrenaline blockers while Durkas attempts to hack into Eve’s medical records. Graham finds Durkas and they discuss how loved ones can sometimes hide bad news, which Graham attributes to keeping people from pain. Durkas says that Eve is being treated for Corden Fever, but her distance makes him think there’s more to the story than an easily treated disease.

As Astos and the Doctor track the disturbance, they find that the port escape pod has been jettisoned. Astos investigates the starboard escape pod but is trapped inside when it engages. He says a cryptic farewell to Mabli over the comms before the pod explodes. When the Doctor arrives at the pod door, she finds a small, angry creature snacking on various metal components. As Mabli, Yaz, Ryan, and Graham join the party, the Doctor tries to scan the creature but it bites the sonic screwdriver, spits it out, and dives into a nearby hole.

Everyone regroups in the ship’s control hub. Mabli mourns Astos’s death as she digs into the computer databanks. They soon find out that the creature is a Pting, a highly dangerous, toxic-to-touch, very hard-to-kill eating machine.

Fun.

The Doctor tasks her companions with gathering everyone in the assessment area while she and Mabli develop an attack plan. Ryan and Yaz have a touching discussion with Yoss that stirs up childhood memories for Ryan, including how he found his mother dead from a heart attack when he was thirteen. Meanwhile, the ship detects the Pting and activates a sequence to prevent the creature from reaching Resus One, the Tsuranga‘s home port. The Doctor can postpone the sequence three times, but after that, the ship will self-destruct to save the station.

The Doctor briefs everyone in the assessment area on the situation. The ship’s main power goes out, leaving them on backups as heat and oxygen become premiums. Ryan and Graham end up acting as Yoss’s doulas as he goes into labor, and Mabli suggests that the Doctor scan Eve for more information on her condition. Eve has experience with a Pting – it decimated an entire fleet – and coordinates with the Doctor, Durka, and Ronan as they work on the antimatter drive. Yaz and Ronan stand guard duty over the drive as the Doctor, Eve, and Durka work on the computer.

The Doctor discovers that Eve has Pilot’s Heart, a condition among neuro-pilots that causes heart failure when adrenaline spikes. Durkas finds out as he tells the women that he’s rigged a primitive holographic interface to pilot the ship, and Eve decides that she will be the one to use it.

The Pting breaks through to the drive room. Ronan stuns it and Yaz wraps it in a medical blanket and punts it down the corridor. Meanwhile, as Eve is hooked up to the interface, the Doctor realizes that the Pting is hungry for energy, not for killing people, and races for Yaz and Ronan after postponing the ship’s autodestruct for the last time.

The Doctor’s sonic screwdriver reboots in time to help find the bomb built into the antimatter drive. She extracts the bomb and leaves Ronan to stand guard over the drive. Yaz accompanies the Doctor to the airlock and lures the Pting to them by speeding up the timer. The Pting takes the bait and the Doctor ejects it into space as the bomb explodes. The creature absorbs the entire blast and contently drifts into the asteroid field.

Eve pilots the ship out of danger and expresses her love for Durkas before she dies. Durkas takes control of the ship and pilots it to Resus One.

During all of this, Ryan and Graham bond over Yoss’s labor and delivery. Ryan channels his anger and grief into counseling for Yoss. Yoss doesn’t have to be perfect… he just has to be there for his new son. Yoss names his son Avocado after the legendary Earth hero Avocado Pear, which is a humorous misreading of Earth history.

When all is said and done, Mabli has arranged for the Doctor and her team to be taken back to the TARDIS. The collected survivors are buoyed by hope and their shared grief, and they all say farewell to Eve in a traditional ceremony.

This episode presents another case of interesting ideas being bogged down by questionable writing. The idea of the Pting is the typical no-win scenario trope found throughout science fiction, especially when coupled with a medical emergency that would drive urgency in a typical by-the-numbers script. But the urgency isn’t present because the medical expertise exists to deliver a baby without fancy technology. Humans have been doing it successfully for 200,000 years or so, and one can assume that Gifftans have done so as well.

So, instead of a medical emergency driving the urgency, we get an automated system that inexplicably allows three chances to override it. Instead of transmitting the data to the station and permitting the on-board medical attendants to explain the situation, a system is used to wipe out the problem without context. It becomes a sterile logic problem: A threat exists, eliminate the threat. Black and white, ignoring shades of gray.

I can get on board with this, but this time it comes with a major problem. We’ve seen systems like this before in Doctor Who, but we also take the time to discuss them and paint the allegorical picture for audiences to explain why they don’t work. There’s none of that here. The questionable writing is evident in a lack of follow-through. The plot ideas are seeded but are then promptly forgotten, which is a problem that plagues Chris Chibnall’s work on this show.

It also shows with the Doctor’s injuries, which nearly crippled her at the beginning of the story. They are virtually non-existent once the Pting arrives except for a bit of lip service paid in one or two exchanges, but she’s miraculously cured when the credits roll.

That said, we have a lot of excellent character development for Ryan and Graham as they grow closer. The rift isn’t quite sealed yet, but it’s getting there. The treatment of anti-matter is also well-researched.

It’s hard to not draw a connection between this story and Flesh and Stone, which also traps the Doctor, the companions, and the dangerous creatures in the same dramatic bottle. In that story, the energy was used to defeat the Weeping Angels, but here it merely gives the Pting a snack as it is removed from the ship to go kill bother someone else.

It’s also not hard to draw the connection between Pting and Disney’s Stitch. Cute, small, and dangerous? This is the second time that I have seen the episode and I can’t not make the comparison.

Finally, there’s the Ted Lasso connection. The show about footballers wasn’t around in 2018, but I nearly leaped off my seat this time when Roy (F’in) Kent appeared as a nurse. It was quite the surprise and was nice to see him in a somewhat more lighthearted role.

To sum up, this episode is merely okay. The drama of the threat fails because the hand is tipped well before the final round. Eve and Astos have to die because the story demands heroic sacrifices, but everyone else is safe and happy in the end.

That’s exactly what this story is. It’s just safe science fiction.

Rating: 3/5 – “Reverse the polarity of the neutron flow.”

UP NEXT – Doctor Who: Demons of the Punjab

The Timestamps Project is an adventure through the televised universe of Doctor Who, story by story, from the beginning of the franchise. For more reviews like this one, please visit the project’s page at Creative Criticality.

An unhappy ending for an unfocused story.

In an empty hotel on a golf resort, American businessman Jack Robertson is upset with his personal assistant, Frankie Ellish. Robertson wants to throw money at the problem, especially in light of his potential political run in 2020, but Ellish says the problem is too complex. He fires a woman who stumbles upon their conversation, then gives Ellish one hour to solve the problem.

Meanwhile, the TARDIS navigates through the temporal vortex and arrives in Sheffield a mere half-hour after the fam originally departed. The Doctor is prepared to say goodbye to the team, but Yaz invites everyone to her place for tea. Graham has something else to take care of, so he passes on the offer. On the way up, the Doctor spots a woman in need of help, but the woman tells her that everything is fine.

The group meets Yaz’s family and the Doctor tries to figure out small talk. She engages Yaz’s father about the garbage that he’s collecting, eager to learn more about the conspiracy. Yaz gets a call from her mother, the woman whom Robertson fired, and goes to pick her up. After Yaz leaves, the Doctor offers to deliver a parcel meant for the next-door neighbor who hasn’t been seen for days.

The Doctor and Ryan enter the neighbor’s flat with the woman from before. The place is without power and filled with spider webs. They find the flat’s occupant Anna wrapped in spiderwebs like a trapped insect, and they find the spider responsible hiding under the bed. They trap it in the bedroom and the Doctor finds vinegar and garlic to keep it away. The spider goes around via the ceiling, and the Doctor asks it to stay in the apartment until she can solve the mystery.

Graham returns home. The place seems empty, but he imagines Grace standing with him as he thinks about everything he wants to tell her. He sits with one of her coats until he hears a noise from upstairs. He investigates and finds a shed spider carapace. He returns to the Doctor and tells the team what he found.

The woman, Jade, tells the group that these aren’t the first incidents. Something is happening to the spiders in the city. They follow Jade to her lab where she works as a zoologist specializing in arachnids.

At the hotel, Ellish descends into the lower levels while recording a statement for the authorities. She’s soon consumed by the spiders living there. Yaz arrives moments later to retrieve her mother, Najia, and Robertson confronts the women as trespassers and his bodyguard Kevin holds them at gunpoint. Robertson cites the room conditions as the reason for firing her.

Jade explains that her work is about extending spider lifespans. Apparently, spiders can keep growing throughout their lives. The spider population has exploded in Sheffield lately. The Doctor sees a pattern in the data and points them toward the golf resort.

Robertson shows the Khan women a guest room filled with spiderwebs. He leaves for a scheduled bathroom break and the Khan’s listen to a crawling sound in the walls. The Doctor calls and asks if they can let her in.

Robertson, meanwhile, is attacked in the bathroom by a giant spider that breaks through a bathtub. Kevin tries to defend his boss, but Robertson locks him in the bathroom. The ensuing gunshots bring everyone to the guest room as the spider drags Kevin away. Everyone but the Doctor and the Khans are a bit starstruck, and they investigate the carnage. The Doctor takes a look below the tub and comes face to face with the spider. They all run to the lobby but find the entrance blocked by a literal wall of webbing, so they retreat to the kitchen.

Robertson is beside himself that the Doctor doesn’t recognize him. When she asks if he’s Ed Sheeran, Robertson goes off her while flaunting his portfolio. He’s also running for President of the United States in 2020 because he hates Trump (and hates the name even more). The Doctor hatches a plan that involves catching a spider, sending Ryan and Graham to execute it. The plan, not the spider. They trap one before running away from an entire group of them.

The Khans discuss how Yaz knows the Doctor as the Time Lord digs into the hotel’s history. It seems that the resort was built on an abandoned coal mine. Against Robertson’s wishes, the team goes into the depths, finds Kevin and Ellish wrapped in webbing cocoons, and uncovers the blustering businessman’s secret: His waste disposal company used the mine to store massive amounts of toxic waste. With nowhere to go, the waste is being concentrated and has affected the spider population, including the dead spiders from Jade’s lab.

While Graham and Ryan search for another spider specimen, they discuss the letter that Ryan’s father wrote to him. Ryan’s father wants to be his “proper” family, but Ryan’s not interested. They find a massive spider in the ballroom and trap it before returning to the others. The Doctor concludes that the large spider is the mother and the others are returning home. She remembers that Robertson has a panic room and asks for a tour. Robertson wants to shoot them all, but the Doctor decides to trap them in the panic room for a humane death.

That doesn’t sit right.

Ryan lures the entire population to the panic room with “Know Me From” by Stormzy. With the spiders locked away, the Doctor develops a plan to herd the mother outside, but Jade notices that it has grown too large and is literally suffocating under its own mass. Robertson storms into the ballroom and shoots the mother spider, claiming it as a mercy killing that will secure his place in the White House. The Doctor is angry but can do nothing as Robertson leaves the room.

Later, the companions make their way back to the TARDIS, deciding that life with the Doctor is better than what they have in their homes. Graham needs to heal his grief, Ryan doesn’t want to go back to the warehouse, and Yaz wants more than the insanity that her family offers. They want to travel with the Doctor.

The Doctor warns them of the dangers. When they’re sure, this new Team TARDIS pulls the lever together and embarks on a new adventure.

This story had a lot of potential, but it was squandered with a meandering and unfocused plot. As such, the ending is way too quick and doesn’t resolve anything. The toxic waste problem remains, Jack Robertson doesn’t face any consequences, and the spiders are left behind to die of starvation in a panic room.

I’m not a fan of spiders, but the fate of these spiders really bothers me. The Eleventh Doctor once remarked that in 900 years of time and space, he had never met anyone who wasn’t important. Leaving the spiders to die a long and painful death for something that they didn’t have any influence on seems out of character. I wonder what a better writer could have done in consideration of Planet of the Spiders and Metebilius III.

Jack Robertson’s character also bothers me as an example of the “ugly American” stereotype, though it’s understandable given the time in which this episode was made. I recall watching this one when it first premiered and rolling my eyes at the stereotype. This time around, it makes me wonder if Chris Chibnall even knew what he wanted from the character since Robertson embodies the very man that he despises so much. Chris Noth reinforced this by loosely basing his portrayal on the real-life reality star. The character isn’t very clear-cut, and that further confuses an already muddy story.

I did like meeting Yaz’s family and adding more depth to her character. I was also impressed with the reimagined temporal vortex. But this story overall? Not a keeper.

Rating: 2/5 – “Mm? What’s that, my boy?”

UP NEXT – Doctor Who: The Tsuranga Conundrum

The Timestamps Project is an adventure through the televised universe of Doctor Who, story by story, from the beginning of the franchise. For more reviews like this one, please visit the project’s page at Creative Criticality.