A creepy twisty time travel tale.

Under the Lake

In the year 2119, Captain Jonathan Moran records a private journal entry. He is the leader of an underwater mining facility in Caithness, Scotland known as the Drum. The team has discovered a strange craft and has brought it aboard to investigate. The team – Cass, her sign language interpreter Lunn, and Bennett, Pritchard, and O’Donnell – discuss the vessel as they are stalked by a shadow. When a fire breaks out, it consumes Moran as the team runs to safety. Moments later, they are confronted by the ghost of Moran and another figure.

Three days later, the TARDIS arrives in the middle of the abandoned complex. The Doctor notes that the TARDIS is unhappy and wonders why it brought them here, but Clara is excited about the adventure. They investigate the nearby mess hall, noting the signs of a fight that happened mere hours before. The travelers find the ghosts of Moran and the mystery man and follow them to the mysterious craft. The Doctor recognizes it as alien but cannot decipher the writing within. He’s also concerned that the TARDIS hasn’t translated the language.

The ghosts reappear and arm themselves before attacking the travelers. A chase ensues and the Doctor and Clara eventually find themselves in a chamber with the human survivors. Posing as members of UNIT courtesy of the psychic paper, they begin to unravel the mystery.

The Doctor also has a terrible moment here when he claims to understand sign language but doesn’t.

The room is a Faraday cage designed as a shelter in case of an accident with the base’s nuclear reactor. While Cass claims to be in charge of the people, Pritchard steps in as the representative of Vector Petroleum. Since it’s the company’s site, he takes responsibility. When morning comes, the group ventures into the base.

Apparently, the ghosts recognize the artificial day/night cycles of a base housed deep underwater.

The Doctor recognizes the second ghost as a Tivolian, a species known for their cowardice, and questions where the power cell and suspended animation chamber have been moved. The humans claim to have no idea, so the Doctor begins thinking out loud.

The Doctor comes to the conclusion that these beings are indeed ghosts and is overjoyed until the survivors explain that Moran was their friend. Clara reminds him to take out his cue cards, a stack of reminders with kind and apologetic things written on them. Clara takes out the correct one and the Doctor reads it, promising to solve Moran’s murder. With that done, the Doctor resumes being excited about wrestling a ghost and exploring the states of existence.

His musings are interrupted as the base shifts itself back into night mode.

The TARDIS sounds the Cloister Bell and the travelers return to the time capsule. The TARDIS wants to get away but the Doctor locks the ship in place. The Doctor then tells Clara not to “go native” and start acting like him. He doesn’t want her to get hurt.

Pritchard has gone out looking for the missing power cell. When he returns, the Moran ghost ambushes him in the airlock, mouths something, and then floods the lock. He later appears in the galley where Clara and Bennett are gathering supplies. They notice Pritchard’s body floating outside the base and that their new visitor is a ghost. Pritchard attempts to attack but O’Donnell shifts the base back to day mode, forcing the ghost to vanish.

Back in the control room, the Doctor asks Cass what they should do. Cass’s priority is to abandon the base and protect her crew, but the Doctor is eager to investigate. The crew is stymied when they get word that a rescue submarine is en route, and the Doctor uses his UNIT credentials to cancel the rescue and prevent the ghosts from escaping.

They then start determining why night mode is so important to the ghosts. He asks O’Donnell to place the base back in night mode so they can capture a ghost. Lunn, Bennett, and Clara lure the ghosts toward the Faraday cage as the Doctor, Cass, and O’Donnell coordinate from the control room. The plan goes well until the ghosts split up.

Lunn ends up cornered by Pritchard but the ghost doesn’t kill him. Pritchard rejoins the other ghosts as Bennett corners them in the Faraday cage with a hologram of Clara. The Doctor begins to investigate, eventually joining the ghosts in the cage to get a better look with the sonic sunglasses. Cass recognizes the lip movements. They are repeating the same four words: “The dark, the sword, the forsaken, the temple.”

The Doctor recognizes that these must be coordinates leading to the flooded town outside the base. He can’t figure out if the message is a call for help or a signal for invasion, but he notes that the temple is an old church. Something there must be commanding the ghosts and waiting for something to happen.

The team decides to solve the mystery and use a remote submersible to explore the church. The missing stasis chamber lies within. They bring it aboard but the Doctor cannot open it with his sonic device, so the Doctor starts retracing his steps. The ghosts didn’t try to kill anyone until they read the symbols on the spacecraft wall.

He asks Cass about them. With her help, he deduces that the writing acts like a magnet. They were not surprised by the message because it was already in their heads, like a song that gets stuck on repeat in your head. The words act as a beacon as each new ghost is generated, waiting for the being in the stasis chamber to awaken.

Alarms sound throughout the base. O’Donnell explains that messing with the day mode so often has caused the system to malfunction and assume that the reactor is about to go (super)critical. As the computer system floods the base to cool the reactor, the team is split up. Clara remains with Cass and Lunn as the Doctor, Bennett, and O’Donnell end up at the TARDIS. The Doctor takes them back to the time before the flood.

As the TARDIS dematerializes, Clara’s group returns to the galley where they are shocked to find another ghost. This time, it is the Doctor.

Before the Flood

The episode starts not where the story left off, but with a break of the fourth wall. The Doctor literally addresses the audience and explains the bootstrap paradox. An unspecified time traveler wanted to meet his favorite musician, Ludwig van Beethoven, but when he arrived in 18th-century Germany, the man literally did not exist. The time traveler panicked but recalled that he brought a piece of sheet music for Beethoven to autograph. Thus, he copies out the music, gets it published, and becomes Ludwig van Beethoven, keeping history on track without ruffling a feather.

However, one question remains: Who really composed Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony?

With that, the Doctor plays the symphony’s opening bars on his electric guitar, and Peter Capaldi plays the Doctor Who theme to open the episode.

Returning to the story, the TARDIS materializes in 1980. While Bennett throws up from the trip, the Doctor and O’Donnell exit the TARDIS to look around. O’Donnell explains her fandom of the Time Lord: She was once military intelligence but was demoted. As Bennett joins them, she has her “bigger on the inside” moment as the Doctor walks away.

The team finds the ship, which the Doctor identifies as a hearse, and they note that the body, stasis chamber, and power cell are still on board. They are greeted by Albar Prentis, the Tivolian who will become the ghost and identifies the body as the Fisher King. The Fisher King ruled over the Tivolians for a decade before the Arcateenians liberated them.

When the Doctor can’t determine who sent the signal to the future, his team returns to the TARDIS to contact Clara. Back at the base, Clara, Cass, and Lunn note that the Doctor’s ghost is not hostile. Cass also sees that it’s saying something different. “Moran, Pritchard, Prentis, O’Donnell, Clara, Bennett, Doctor, Cass.”

Clara takes the Doctor’s call and is shaken by the knowledge that he will die. He talks to Clara privately about this supposed fixed point in time, and Clara convinces him to try. The Doctor analyzes his ghost as it moves into the base and opens the Faraday cage. The ghost’s message changes to “The chamber will open tonight,” prompting the Doctor to instruct the survivors to take shelter in the cage but to leave the phone outside to monitor the ghosts.

Meanwhile, the Fisher King has risen from the dead and has engraved the words on the wall. When Prentis reads them, the Fisher King kills him, giving rise to the first ghost. The Doctor, O’Donnell, and Bennett return to the ship to stop the chain of events. They determine that the Fisher King faked his death to escape the Arcateenians, and after hearing the Fisher King roar, decide to return to the TARDIS.

Unfortunately, they get cut off and spilt up. O’Donnell is soon killed by the Fisher King. O’Donnell’s ghost appears in the base and takes Clara’s phone.

The Ghost Doctor’s names are the order in which everyone will die. The Doctor and Bennett move to save Clara, the next person on the list, but the TARDIS will not travel to the future. Instead, it takes them 30 minutes back in time, locking the Doctor in his own time stream. While trying to avoid their past selves, they see that Prentis is still alive, but the Doctor stops Bennett from trying to change history: “If you save them, then somebody that was supposed to be dead is alive. Then you really are seeing ghosts.”

In the future, Clara figures out that the Pritchard ghost didn’t hurt Lunn because he wasn’t exposed to the signal. Clara notes that Lunn can retrieve the phone, though Cass objects while questioning if traveling with the Doctor has changed Clara. Lunn proceeds on his mission, leaving Clara and an angry Cass behind.

In the past, the Doctor orders Bennett back to the TARDIS and goes to confront the Fisher King. As they talk, the stasis chamber in the future engages. The Fisher Kind knows that the Doctor is a Time Lord, and he knows that the Time Lords battled in a war so great that the entire universe felt the effects. The Fisher King sees that he can make a strong transmitter out of the Doctor, and once enough Ghosts are created, the signal will reach the Fisher King’s people. They will bring an armada to conquer Earth.

The Doctor notes that the plan could work, but he erased the words on the ship. The Fisher King calls his bluff, but the Doctor points out that any change that prevents the Fisher King from conquering the planet is a good one. The Fisher King races to his ship but finds the words intact, realizing that he has made a critical error.

He has left the Doctor alone with the stasis chamber. One of the power cells is missing and is attached to the dam. When it explodes, the town is flooded and the Fisher King is killed. Meanwhile, the TARDIS activates Security Protocol 712 with Bennett trapped inside.

Lunn finds the phone in the galley, but it ends up being a trap. Clara and Cass decide to go after him but end up separated. After Cass narrowly avoids death, she, Clara, and Lunn regroup in the hangar. As the stasis chamber pops open, the Doctor leaps out and connects his sonic sunglasses to the base’s speaker system. It projects the call of the Fisher King, luring all of the ghosts to the Faraday cage where the Doctor ghost awaits.

As a hologram. As it has been all along, courtesy of the Doctor being in the chamber.

The Doctor uses the sonic sunglasses to erase the signal from everyone’s minds. He also tells them that UNIT will cut the cage free of the base and eject it into space. The lack of a magnetic field will kill the ghosts. Bennett asks Lunn to translate a message for Cass: Lunn complies, finally admitting his love her Cass, and they kiss.

As the Doctor and Clara leave in the TARDIS, he explains that the order of deaths after O’Donnell was entirely fictional. He placed Clara’s name where he did to motivate himself into action. Clara asks the Doctor how he knew what to make his ghost’s hologram say. He only knew what he had to do because he found out through future knowledge of what had been done.

Which leaves the question: Who composed Beethoven’s Fifth?

It was a really fun idea to play with paradoxes and the crossing of time streams again. This story also had some great special effects and costume work, especially with the creepy Fisher King.

The Doctor continues his detached attitude toward humanity and the universe at large. His first impression upon meeting Cass was terrible, but his respect for her throughout the rest of the episode is great. He talks to her, not her translator, and admires her perspective of the world. The visual twist is that he correctly signs “you’re beautiful” to her when he attempts to communicate, even though he thinks that he’s saying “go ahead”.

The theme carries forward with the apology cue cards. I got a laugh out of “It was my fault, I should have known you didn’t live in Aberdeen” and its callbacks to The Hand of Fear and School Reunion. Is he expecting to run into Sarah Jane again?

Speaking of, take note of the Arcateenians. They are original to Torchwood and The Sarah Jane Adventures, so this marks the second time in this series that spinoffs get a nod in the main show. Another spinoff gets a tip of the hat as well with O’Donnell’s musings about 1980. She noted that they were in a period before Harold Saxon and the Moon exploding, both of which the Doctor was aware, but she also mentioned the Minister of War. This was explored in a Third Doctor audio adventure called The Same Face.

I loved the quiet point of view for Cass being stalked by Moran. I also noted the minimal and more deliberate use of sonic technology. This was the first episode since The Unicorn and the Wasp not to feature the sonic screwdriver, but it does feature the sonic sunglasses.

Finally, let’s talk once again about nuclear reactors. One of my biggest pet peeves in science fiction is when a reactor “goes critical” because it’s just not accurate. In general, nuclear reactors have three basic states in relation to criticality – subcritical, critical, and supercritical – which is just the measure of the chain reaction within the fuel. The reality is that a reactor “going critical” is good. It means that the chain reaction is self-sustaining and controlled, which is where a reactor is happy and doing its job. In fact, most reactors in the world today naturally tend toward subcriticality. Given enough time and lack of operator action, they are designed to shut themselves down for safety.

What most science fiction writers mean to say is that the reactor is uncontrollably supercritical, which would imply that the chain reaction is growing too fast and cannot be stopped. The writer in me understands the shortcut. I know what they mean to say. But the scientist, engineer, and fan in me all scream that we are smarter than the writers are willing to give credit. It’s okay to say supercritical (or even prompt critical) if you really mean it.

I won’t hold that against the overall score because it’s not Doctor Who‘s fault. It’s just another opportunity to beg writers to be better.

Rating: 5/5 – “Fantastic!”

UP NEXT – Doctor Who: The Girl Who Died and Doctor Who: The Woman Who Lived

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.

And to all a rushed denouement.

‘Twas the night before Christmas and all through the house, not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse. On the roof, however, the sound of a crashing sleigh and untethered reindeer awaken Clara Oswald. She looks upon the unlikely sight of Santa Claus and his elves, Ian and Wolf, trying to recover from the accident. Clara tries to dismiss the reality of Santa Claus, but the trio dismisses her instead. Even Santa challenges her belief in fairy tales as the Doctor arrives.

The Time Lord ushers Clara inside the TARDIS, prompting her to comment on how much she missed it. The Doctor asks if she truly believes in Santa, and she replies that she does. After all, the Doctor has returned at Christmastime.

At a base near the North Pole, a group of scientists are tracking a woman named Shona as she enters an infirmary. The scientists tell her not to worry about “them” and focus on something else, and when she enters the infirmary, she begins to dance to Slade’s Merry Xmas Everybody. She’s warned to not look at the beings in the room and the music helps her do that. When she reaches the end of the room, she finds the Doctor and Clara, and their presence brings her mind back to the beings.

Those creatures begin to move, homing in on the constant image of themselves in the victim’s memory. The Doctor tries to distract Clara from the threat by invoking the memory of Danny Pink, and Clara slaps him, finally revealing that Danny is dead.

As the scientists rush into the room, a mass of crab-like creatures descends from the ceiling. The attack is presumably stopped by the arrival of Santa, the elves, and an army of toys. Santa orders the victims back to bed, then introduces himself to the collective humans. He also shows the threat to the Doctor, revealing that Kantrofarri – “dream-crabs” – have invaded Earth.

The group retires to a different room to discuss the threat. The dream-crabs are likely killing everyone as they blur the lines between dream and reality. In fact, reality and fantasy are difficult to tell apart because both are ridiculous. The Doctor and Clara both admit that they lied about the circumstances around their previous parting in an attempt to help each other move on.

The Doctor and Clara find Shona, who is interrogating Santa and the elves, and review the CCTV footage with Ashley of the four crew members who discovered the Kantrofarri. The same beings who are currently in the infirmary. The dream-crabs only wake up when someone thinks about them, and scientist Albert compares them to facehuggers from Alien. Humorously, the Doctor is beside himself that a horror movie was made about extra-terrestrials.

Notably, the polar expedition team refuses to explain its mission.

Clara goes to check on the captured crab and soon finds herself face to “face” with it. She awakens in her room with Danny in a Santa suit to surprise her for Christmas Day. Clara is enthused, but also sees notes on a blackboard similar to the Doctor’s warning her that she’s trapped in a dream. Outside of the dream state, the Doctor and the expedition team discuss how to save Clara from the dream-crab. The only way they know of is to kill Clara, which the Doctor refuses outright. The Doctor turns to Santa, who seems immune to the Kantofarri, and asks for a dream-crab so he can enter Clara’s dream.

The Doctor arrives as Clara and Danny snuggle near the Christmas tree. The Doctor tries to convince Clara that everything she sees is a fantasy. He tells her that the Kantofarri is literally liquefying her brain and Danny encourages her to move on from her grief. She can still mourn, but she can limit it to five minutes.

With tears in her eyes, Clara accepts the truth and wakes up. The Doctor wakes up next to her and the dream-crabs disintegrate from the stress. As the team investigates the remains, they all remark that they still have the “ice cream” pain in their heads. The Doctor leads them to the conclusion that they’re all still dreaming and have been since the first meeting in the infirmary. The rescue by Santa Claus was a dream. The Doctor uses the manuals in the base, which should all be identical, as proof that the humans are still trapped in the dream state. With help from Santa and the elves, manifestations of their brains acting as warning signs, the team wakes up in the infirmary.

The team narrowly avoids the original four team members and seals the infirmary. The Doctor and Clara take their leave with the knowledge that if the expedition team doesn’t free the Kantofarri, they’ll be fine. Clara asks why Santa was on her roof, prompting the Doctor to rush back into the base and question the number of people inside. There are four manuals but eight people in total, and everyone is still in a dream state. This is confirmed by another test with the manuals. As the beings in the infirmary rise, aware of the approaching endgame, the dream morphs into a nightmare that kills Albert.

The team runs for the TARDIS, but it too is a construct. The dream-crabs multiply and the Doctor suggests that they all dream themselves home. Santa Claus and his sleigh materialize above them as an escape pod. When the Doctor asks, Clara admits that she’s always believed in Santa, but he’s always looked different to her. With that, she gives the Time Lord a hug. After that, the Doctor takes the reins and flies them around London in a fun-filled fantasy.

Each person beings to remember their real life outside of the dream. One by one they awaken, each in their proper time and place. The Doctor awakens on a volcanic planet and rushes to Clara’s side as she decides to remain in the dream state. The Doctor uses his sonic screwdriver to free Clara of the dream-crab, but finds that it has been 62 years since they said goodbye in the coffee shop. Clara is now 89 years old.

They sit together in the living room and share Christmas hats. She admits that there were plenty of admirers, but only one man besides Danny ever measured up. Sadly, he was impossible. They open a Christmas cracker together and the Doctor apologizes for not returning sooner. His wish is made a reality when Santa enters the room and whispers “wakey-wakey”.

The Doctor awakens one last time, rushes to Clara’s side, and removes her from the dream. She hasn’t aged a day, and the Doctor invites – rather, begs – her to travel with him once again.

As they dematerialize together, a Christmas tangerine sits on the window sill as sleigh bells ring.

What we have here is a fun mind-bending adventure marred by a terrible ending. Jenna Coleman was planning to leave the series with this story but changed her mind at the last minute thanks to Peter Capaldi and Steven Moffat. Since the decision was made so late in the process, the script was revised at the eleventh hour, resulting in this rushed and hackneyed conclusion.

Before that decision was made, Shona was intended to be the next companion. I adore Jenna Coleman, but this should have been her exit based on everything that transpired over the last series of episodes. She got her chance to say goodbye to Danny and to the Doctor, and Clara’s departure here would even make this episode’s title make sense. After all, it is the last Christmas.

It’s yet another stumble by Steven Moffat.

Otherwise, we get the usual Christmas episode fare mixed with elements of Alien, The Thing from Another World, and even Miracle on 34th Street. Coincidentally, these are all of the films that Shona had intended to watch on Christmas Day.

Just like Amy’s Choice, this adventure was mostly a dream. We also get nods to The Time of the Doctor with the Christmas cracker and The Claws of Axos with Clara doing multiplication tables to avoid thinking about the threat. It was also quite fun to see Dan Starkey outside of his normal Sontaran garb as the elf Ian. We also see the first on-screen appearance of Michael Troughton, son of Patrick Troughton and brother of David Troughton (The Enemy of the World, The War Games, The Curse of Peladon, and Midnight). Notably, both younger Troughtons would take on their father’s role in audio stories.

All of this spooky fun is spoiled by that ending. It just drags the whole thing down. The dream-crabs were such a fascinating and scary idea, and this twisted holiday story would have been so much stronger as Clara’s swan song with a bittersweet goodbye over Christmas.

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

UP NEXT – Doctor Who: Series Eight Summary

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.

Forest conservation saves the world.

A schoolgirl runs through a forest in search of a doctor. Instead, she finds the TARDIS. When he answers the door, the Doctor finds himself among trees instead of in London (where he expected to be). He and the girl have a discussion inside the TARDIS about Clara, Danny, and the inner dimensions of the blue box.

The TARDIS refuses to start because it’s exactly where it’s supposed to be. The forest is actually Trafalgar Square. The trees have returned to London with a vengeance.

Meanwhile, Danny and Clara are chaperoning a group of students on a museum sleepover trip. After they deal with an annoying student, they pack up and head for the exit. On the way, one girl notes that a tree cross-section shows a thick red ring, leading Clara to quip that it was a good year to be a tree. When the class exits the museum, they find that the city has been flooded with trees. Danny goes to the roof to scout out this development as the world responds to the invasion with panic and awe.

Clara phones the Doctor and finds out that the little girl in the TARDIS, Maebh, is one of Clara’s students. Clara asks the Doctor to bring her by as Danny chastises Clara for talking to the Doctor. The students dismiss the argument as Clara and Danny being in love.

Danny and Clara lead the group through the forest as they discuss the trees. Once they rendezvous with the Doctor and Maebh, they find out that the forest sprung up overnight. The Doctor is unable to get any readings and decides to move everyone into the TARDIS for safety, but he soon finds out how bad that plan was when the kids start playing with the console and touching everything.

Danny notices folders of homework assignments that Clara left in the TARDIS, prompting the Doctor to search for Maebh. Clara explains that Maebh is fragile and hears voices, which the Doctor interprets as the girl being on a different frequency. The Doctor tracks Maebh with Clara’s phone as Danny remains skeptical that Clara ever left the Doctor’s side. The children persuade Danny to follow.

Maebh encounters teams from the government who are trying to burn paths through the trees. She’s frightened, so she continues to run but leaves items along her path like breadcrumbs. The Doctor and Clara also find the burn team and are amazed to see that the fire has no effect. The Doctor believes that it’s because trees control the oxygen and can suffocate the fires.

The Doctor also reveals that Maebh has accurately predicted a massive solar flare that will destroy the planet. He believes that this is because Maebh has lost someone close to her, so she’s always looking and observing, searching for hope in the world.

The whole crisis is further exacerbated when the trees break the gates at the zoo, releasing the wild animals to chase Maebh, Clara, and the Doctor. The wolves jump the fence and run away scared, but that’s only because of a large tiger that has now arrived on the scene. Luckily, Danny arrives with the kids and scares the tiger off with a flashlight.

The Doctor notices that Maebh is waving at the air above her head and refuses to give her any medication. Maebh runs to a lighted area and explains that her own thoughts in her grief led to the forest’s growth. The Doctor is able to illuminate the beings swarming around Maebh, making them present as fireflies while they explain that they are the lifeforce of the trees. They have been and will always be there and are aware of the powerful solar flare. The lights leave and Maebh is freed from their thrall.

Clara realizes that this threat cannot be stopped and urges the Doctor to use the TARDIS as a lifeboat. They arrive at the TARDIS and Clara tells the Doctor that he should leave without them, but the Time Lord refuses. Earth is his planet too. He’s reminded that the trees were flameproof and boards the TARDIS, leaving the humans behind. Once the realization strikes him, he returns to Earth and summons everyone to the TARDIS. He explains the threat to the kids, which accidentally frightens them, then reveals that it has happened before, namely in the Tunguska and Curuçá events. The red ring in the museum exhibit is proof.

Maebh offers to appeal to the world. The Doctor calls every phone in the world simultaneously and Maebh advises everyone to remain calm and leave the trees alone. She also asks her sister to come home. When she’s done, her mother arrives and their reunion inspires everyone except Clara to turn down a trip to space to watch the flare. Clara will join the Doctor after the children are returned home, and Clara apologizes for lying to Danny. She and Danny then share a kiss, which proves the children right about those dating rumors.

From the TARDIS, the Doctor and Clara watch the flare harmlessly strike Earth. Missy watches as well, surprised at the resolution. Later on, the trees vanish as the Doctor and Clara watch, and Clara is surprised to realize that the people of Earth will forget that this ever happened.

Finally, Maebh and her mother return home. When they arrive, a hydrangea vanishes like the trees did, revealing Maebh’s lost sister, Annabelle.

This is a fairly interesting episode that runs along the same narrative lines as Kill the Moon. The events would have happened with or without the Doctor’s interference, and the events do not truly pose a threat the humanity or the planet. Effectively, our normal protagonists could be removed from this story entirely and nothing would change.

What’s left is an intellectual mystery that the Doctor and his companions are compelled to resolve so that they can understand it. It’s that perpetual quest for knowledge that our favorite Time Lord seems to follow. Further detail comes from the investigation of Maebh’s behavior, which is often disregarded as a disability by everyone. I enjoy the beauty in exploring how such differences make us unique, but I’m not too keen on the idea that her unique skill is completely “cured” by the end of the story.

The title of the episode is taken from a verse of William Blake’s “The Tyger”. Not only does this foreshadow the tiger’s appearance (dodgy CGI and all), but it also calls back to Planet of the Spiders where it was previously read aloud. This poem also made an appearance in the audio story The Emerald Tiger.

Of course, in a moment of meta, this episode is an example of Doctor Who as a television show being referenced within the show itself. There is a bus (which is really a cardboard cutout) amongst the trees displaying a one-shot ad for Series 8. We previously saw this in Remembrance of the Daleks, which was set on the same day that the show first premiered, where a television aired the BBC commentator’s lead in before the debut of An Unearthly Child. Once again, the Doctor is a character in his own story.

We’ve seen solar flares before (Time Heist, The Ark, The Ark in Space, The Beast Below, The Mysterious Planet) as well as evidence of humanity’s “capacity for self-deception” (World War Three, Victory of the Daleks, Remembrance of the Daleks) and communication with telepathic trees (The Doctor, the Widow, and the Wardrobe).

Overall, this was a slightly above average story even with its somewhat problematic approach to neurodivergence. The fairy tale ending was also a bit syrupy.

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

UP NEXT – Doctor Who: Dark Water and Doctor Who: Death in Heaven

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.

A familiar dimension in time travel.

A bearded man calls the police with vital information about who committed a crime. As a hissing grows around him, he begins to panic. He is soon ripped from the phone and literally inserted into the trim on the wall, a two-dimensional figure screaming in silence.

On the TARDIS, Clara is packing because Danny is a bit territorial, even though the Doctor claims that she can leave anything because there is plenty of space. The TARDIS lands in roughly the time and space where Clara lives, but the door has shrunken. Once the travelers extract themselves from the capsule, they find that it is roughly half its original size.

They’re also in Bristol, not London. Shades of Sarah Jane?

The Doctor doesn’t want to travel anywhere else while the TARDIS is malfunctioning, so he asks Clara to investigate while he gathers some tools. She meets Rigsy, a graffiti artist serving community service in the care of an abusive ass. She also notes a large makeshift memorial and a tunnel full of images of people. These people are missing and the memorial is for them.

Clara returns to the TARDIS to find that it is now action figure-sized. The interior of the TARDIS (and the Doctor) are the same size, and the Doctor asks Clara to pick up the craft and follow his readings. She meets up with Rigsy again and mockingly poses as the Doctor while she investigates. Together, they go to the apartment where the caller lived.

Rigsy muses that the victim could still be in the room since he went missing while the flat was locked up. He gets a little skittish about Clara until she shows him the TARDIS and the Doctor within. Rigsy is amused until the hissing screaming sound starts up and energy is drained from inside the TARDIS.

The pair next poses as MI-5 courtesy of the psychic paper and start investigating the walls under the Doctor’s direction by breaking them apart with a sledgehammer. While they work, a local police officer who was helping them is absorbed by the mysterious being. The Doctor is cued in by a new painting of a human nervous system on the wall. The aliens are experimenting with humanity in order to understand three-dimensional life.

The door slams shut as they pursue Rigsy and Clara, and while Clara takes a call from Danny, they escape by smashing a window with a suspended chair. Danny is very skeptical about Clara’s claims that she’s left the TARDIS.

They end up back in the tunnel as the community service workers start painting over the portraits. Clara tries to use the psychic paper but the supervisor lacks enough imagination to be affected. It isn’t until the images pull one of the workers into 2D that they all run and end up in a train warehouse. Clara convinces the supervisor in a very Doctorly fashion before rallying her new team and figuring out how to communicate with the aliens.

As they learn to communicate via mathematics, another worker is taken and it seems that the humans are deliberately being targeted. The Doctor creates a device to restore elements from two dimensions into three, but it fails. As another worker is taken, it becomes apparent that the aliens have evolved, but the team is able to escape after the Doctor fixes his device. The aliens give chase as they assimilate into three dimensions, and the TARDIS is knocked from Clara’s bag in the process.

The TARDIS lands on a train line and is nearly smashed into pieces by an oncoming train, but the Doctor is able to move it with his hand and then activates siege mode. This locks down the capsule, but there’s not enough power to turn it off or sustain life support.

Meanwhile, Clara, Rigsy, and the abusive supervisor stop another train in the tunnel and use it to punch through a blockage created by the aliens. The plan fails, but Rigsy proves himself to be rather heroic in the process. Clara also spots a cube with Gallifreyan markings and presumes it to be the TARDIS.

The team, now including the train driver, takes shelter in a disused office where Clara devises a plan. Using Rigsy’s art skills and a poster, they paint a fake access door that the aliens attempt to make three-dimensional. When they do, the energy is channeled into the TARDIS and restores it to normal.

Using the enemy’s power against them, Clara proved her mettle to the Doctor, and he praises her for doing so.

Realizing that the creatures (which the Doctor calls the Boneless) have no interest in peace, he declares that this plane is protected and that they are not welcome here. With that, he sends them back to their own dimension, echoing the confrontations with both the Sycorax and the Atraxi.

The Doctor returns everyone to the railyard above ground. The Doctor is disgusted by the supervisor but is pleased with Clara’s performance in his stead. He’s also intrigued that Clara rejected a call from Danny.

Meanwhile, Missy watches Clara on a tablet. She believes that she has chosen well.

This story marks a major milestone in the Doctor/Clara relationship. I love how the Doctor is still technically in charge, but he’s forced to act through Clara. In this way, he learns about how he is seen in the universe and gains respect for his companion and “pudding brain” humans. Clara gets to exercise the understanding of this Doctor’s character that she gained last adventure.

This new role for Clara will likely take a toll, as both Davros and Rory have pointed out in the past that traveling with the Doctor can turn companions into worse people. The Doctor is obviously uncomfortable with the development.

I also like the chemistry between Clara and Rigsy. The artist has the typical everyman backstory that we associate with the Doctor’s companions, and he also seemed to catch on quickly with the role.

Looking back, this story echoes similar adventures from the past. The TARDIS was previously shrunk in Planet of Giants, Carnival of Monsters, Logopolis, Let’s Kill Hitler, and The Wedding of River Song, and we saw enemies who were able to shift targets through dimensions in both Fear Her and Mona Lisa’s Revenge.

These recycled story tropes aside, this adventure carried the day well with wonderful character development and a good balance of fear with the action and completely silent antagonist. It seems to be Jamie Mathieson‘s trademark.

Rating: 5/5 – “Fantastic!”

UP NEXT – Doctor Who: In the Forest of the Night

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.