A lot of moving parts in a story where nothing is as it seems.

Picking up immediately after Fugitive of the Judoon, several plot threads are rapidly laid down.

A spacecraft plummets toward Earth. An astronaut named Adam Lang tries to salvage it, but his capsule begins to spin violently. On the planet below, a suspended police officer named Jake Willis tackles a shoplifter, but he’s scolded by his manager for his actions. Finally, in Peru, Gabriela Camara and Jamila Velez are disgusted by a river polluted by plastic waste. Later that night, Jamila is attacked by an unseen force.

Jake retires to a local bar and sees the news about Adam Lang’s crash. Jake is distraught, but his mood changes when he receives a text message from someone claiming to be Adam asking for help in Hong Kong. He tries to break into a warehouse and fails. Lucky for him, Yaz and Graham arrive with a set of skeleton keys. He questions Graham and Yaz, assuming they are from the European Space Agency, but Yaz explains they’re following some strange energy readings. They’re also being watched by a man in a hazmat suit.

Gabriela wakes up and searches for Jamila. When a bird falls from the sky, Ryan arrives and warns her away from it. Gabriela presses Ryan about her friend before introducing herself as a travel vlog influencer. She soon gets a message about an ambulance call-out a mile away.

In Madagascar, a lab worker named Aramu greets his co-worker Suki Cheng. They both rush to help the Doctor as the Time Lord rescues someone from the ocean. The stranded man is a member of the US Navy, a survivor of a recent submarine accident. The sailor is soon consumed by a rock-like substance and disintegrates. The two lab workers are very confused.

Ryan and Gabriela arrive at a deserted San Pedro hospital. Ryan finds another dead bird and Gabriela finds Jamila inside a quarantine area. Jamila is covered in the same stone substance, prompting Ryan to call the Doctor. The TARDIS arrives as Jamila disintegrates, leaving Gabriela upset as the Doctor realizes the severity of the situation.

Yaz and Graham track down the strange energy readings and find a room filled with alien consoles. Adam is strapped to a table, looking sick and still in his spacesuit. Yaz calls the Doctor as two figures in hazmat suits burst in and start shooting. Yaz distracts them with a control panel while Jake and Graham escape with Adam. Jake steals the rifles and shoots the attackers. The Doctor arrives and realizes the attackers and their weapons aren’t from Earth.

All of the players thus far board the TARDIS, but Yaz and Gabriela decide to stay behind and study the control device. The Doctor is hesitant but soon relents, sending the TARDIS on its way and examining Adam. She gets a call from Madagascar and returns to the beach. As the team heads for the lab, Graham learns that Adam and Jake are married but on a break. Meanwhile, the birds begin to swarm over the beach.

In Hong Kong, Yaz determines that the control panel is triangulating signals from two other places, including Madagascar. One of the hazmat aliens survived, and it stumbles into the room and teleports away. Yaz and Gabriela decide to follow, landing somewhere dark but safe amid equipment from the downed submarine

Ryan shows a dead bird to the Doctor and she asks him to dissect it. She asks Graham and Jake to give Adam an IV drip, then works with Suki to analyze Adam’s readings. The astronaut is infected with an alien pathogen and the Doctor has no idea how to stop it. Jake leaves and Graham tries to comfort him. Jake explains that he’s not good with emotions, commitment, or foreign travel, and knowing that his husband is an astronaut, he doesn’t believe that Adam could possibly love him.

Jake returns to Adam’s side as Suki analyzes Adam’s blood. Ryan finds that the bird is full of plastic, and the Doctor presumes that the alien pathogen attacked and metastasized the plastic. The Doctor rules out Auton interference before remembering that humans of the era always ingest microplastics. The pathogen has a buffet, but the Doctor notices that the bird’s natural enzymes are fighting the infection. Suki theorizes that she could make a countervirus.

The Doctor contacts Yaz and exchanges information. When she finds out that an alien signal is coming from Madagascar, she has an epiphany about Suki and learns that the infection is called Praxeus. Suki teleports away as the birds attack the lab. Everyone barely escapes with the samples and boards the TARDIS. Unfortunately, Aramu was previously attacked and unable to join them.

Adam volunteers for a clinical trial of the Doctor’s cure. The Doctor administers the antidote and programs the TARDIS to make more if it succeeds. She then leaves Adam and Jake in the TARDIS while the others search for Yaz and Gabriela. They discover they’re on an alien base under the Indian Ocean, centered under one of the world’s plastic pollution gyres. The birds are the infection vector and the travelers need to find Suki to stop them.

They find one of the aliens and suppose they’re also trying to find a cure. They soon find Suki, the last of her crew from a planet ruined by Praxeus. She traveled there to find a perfect lab and Earth fit the bill. The spacecraft was the source of the strange energy readings and the radiation that brought down Adam’s ship. The Doctor tries to help Suki but Praxeus overcomes the alien woman. Luckily, Jake and a cured Adam arrive with the antidote, and the team works together to distribute the cure with the alien shuttle’s organic engines. Everyone returns to the TARDIS as the shuttle takes off and floods the alien base, but Jake decides to stay behind when the shuttle’s autopilot fails.

The plan succeeds, but everyone thinks Jake has died after the shuttle disintegrates. The Doctor materializes the TARDIS around Jake at the last minute and the husbands kiss in gratitude.

Returning to the beach, Team TARDIS bids farewell to their new friends. They go their own ways, safe with the knowledge that no matter how far apart they are, the seven billion connected lives are safe.

This story has a lot of potential, but it gets bogged down with the varying plot threads, none of which gets enough room to breathe. It’s another example of a Chibnall-era story that would thrive as a two-parter with another editing pass.

The ecological message is definitely heavy-handed, but it doesn’t oppressively stifle the story like Orphan 55. We’ve had a preachy Doctor in the past, but this era’s interpretation lacks a degree of finesse.

Also missing in the finesse department is this story’s twist: I love adventures where there is no clear villain and the feint that portrays Suki as the villain is underwhelming because we learn that she’s a victim of Praxeus within minutes of her big reveal. With a little more subtlety, the twist could have been powerful on the level of other Doctor Who stories where the true villain is a force of nature instead of an army or single entity.

That said, I like the fast-moving mystery plot where the Doctor had to split her team to solve the puzzle. I also like the parallels between Praxeus and COVID-19, which was a full-blown pandemic when this episode aired.

Finally, I perked up when the Doctor mentioned the Autons. Their inclusion here would have made sense – we’ve only seen them in action three times in the franchise: Spearhead from Space, Terror of the Autons, and Rose – but, while creepy mannequins are fun additions to Doctor Who, it was a good move to not have a story about plastic pollution lean on them as villains.

This story settled out at a high 3, and as I’ve mentioned over the years, I tend to round up.

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

UP NEXT – Doctor Who: Can You Hear Me?

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.

Two great minds collide at the turn of the century!

The place is Niagara Falls. The time is 1903. The man is Nikola Tesla and he is marketing his new method of harnessing electricity through a wireless system. The assembled group is impressed until he names the price tag of $50,000. That ask is one too far, and an investor named Brady publicly flounces after recalling Tesla’s claims about a signal from Mars. The whole affair is interrupted by the discovery of a corpse nearby.

Tesla and his assistant Dorothy Skerrit wonder if the man may have been killed by electric shock. That night, Tesla realizes that some parts have been stolen and discovers a green orb floating nearby. Tesla and Dorothy find the Doctor, then Brady holding a gun. When Brady is killed by a laser blast, the Doctor helps Tesla and Dorothy escape.

They end up on a passing steam train heading to New York City. After introducing the fam in their period costumes, the Doctor helps everyone escape from a cloaked attacker wielding a Silurian blaster. The attacker is one of the investors from the meeting.

The Doctor explains that her team was visiting the area when they found a strange energy reading that led them to Tesla. When Tesla doesn’t cooperate, the Doctor decides to stick to his side. When they arrive in New York City, they run into a protest staged against Tesla and his science of alternating current. Once past the protest line, the Doctor talks to her companions about Tesla’s future achievements. Tesla eventually shows her the orb, a device she identifies as an Orb of Thassor. It belongs to an ancient race who created it to share knowledge, though this model has been modified.

The Doctor and Tesla bond before Dorothy arrives with a letter from Mr. Morgan, an investor who just withdrew his support. When a spy for Thomas Edison snaps a photo from a window, the Doctor decides to visit the rival inventor. Edison decides to give the Doctor and companions a private audience when confronted with the Silurian weapon, but he denies wanting to steal from Tesla and explains their history together, claiming that Tesla is bitter.

Meanwhile, Yaz asks Tesla about his Wardenclyffe project. He muses about his plans to transmit all of humanity’s knowledge wirelessly – the dreams of databases and mobile phones – but he has no investors to realize his dreams. The orb activates just as the red-eyed assassin arrives at Edison’s facility and electrocutes all of the engineers. Edison theorizes that the Doctor’s team is trying to sabotage his work. They are interrupted by the assassin and flee, realizing along the way that it can mimic people. Specifically, dead people. She uses zinc to trap the creature behind a wall of fire, but it disappears after being confronted.

The Doctor tries to warn Yaz, but Dorothy arrives, the hostage of two assassins wearing dead men’s bodies. The creatures teleport Tesla and Yaz to a room filled with scorpion-like aliens. The Doctor arrives moments later with Edison in the TARDIS and takes Dorothy along as they pursue the aliens. The Doctor realizes that the orb has been hacked to receive information about the period. It has been searching for Tesla, and after Dorothy recalls the claims about signals from Mars, the Doctor sets a course for Wardenclyffe.

The leader of the scorpions introduces herself as the Queen of the Skithra. She has been scavenging Tesla’s equipment and wants the inventor to prepare them for battle. When Tesla refuses, the queen decides to kill Yaz. Luckily, the Doctor arrives with a Braxium Bouncer (Mark III) to teleport the humans home. The Doctor realizes that the Skithra ship is made from stolen tech and the queen needs someone to fix it. Once the bouncer recharges, the Doctor teleports herself, Yaz, and Tesla away.

Of course, Tesla is surprised to find Edison in his private lab. He’s even more surprised by the TARDIS. Once inside, the Doctor issues an ultimatum to the Skithra to leave Earth. The queen sends her disguised minions to find Tesla while he ponders her decision to either take him or destroy the Earth. The Doctor asks him to explain his Wardenclyffe project, realizing that could generate an electric bolt and hit the Skithra ship. Edison disagrees, but the Doctor presses her plan into action.

Tesla and the Doctor work on the tower after extending the TARDIS shields around the area. Edison and Yaz clear the streets while Dorothy, Graham, and Ryan fortify the laboratory. The Skithra attack as the tower charges – there’s not enough energy to keep the shields up at the same time – and the queen lands at Wardenclyffe before the tower can fire.

The queen threatens the group as the Doctor confronts her. The Doctor tries to take the bouncer, but the queen takes it instead. The Doctor activates the device with her sonic screwdriver, teleporting the queen back to her ship. Tesla activates the tower and blasts the ship, forcing the Skithra to teleport back before leaving the planet for good.

As everyone recovers, Edison offers Tesla a job, but Tesla turns him down. Yaz wonders if the events they witnessed will change history, but the Doctor laments that Tesla still dies forgotten and penniless. His inventions still change the world, though, and as the team says farewell, Tesla promises to work for the future.

In what seems to be a better version of the previous episode, we get a good monster mystery with a good historical basis to go with it. The setting of 1903, which is never directly stated in the episode, is an approximation based on events: The real Wardenclyffe Tower was completed around 1902 and was primarily funded by investor J.P. Morgan; the real letter from Mr. Morgan was dated July 14, 1903, and was a refusal to fund Tesla’s project after the inventor changed the project’s scope; and that night, the tower apparently came to life with bright flashes of light.

Indeed, we don’t speak enough about Nikola Tesla. I spent a lot of time learning about him in my physics studies, but the rest of the world thinks more about Thomas Edison when considering electricity. The resurgence of popular interest in Tesla over the last few decades has been amazing to watch.

The villains of this piece, the Skithra, could have easily been the Racnoss. True, the Empress and her people that we met in The Runaway Bride were supposed to be the last of their kind, but this is Doctor Who, where everything is made up and the continuity has been fluid since 1963. The queen was a mindbender since I’m used to seeing actress Anjli Mohindra as Rani Chandra on The Sarah Jane Adventures. She and Bradley Walsh crossed paths in the Whoniverse during The Day of the Clown.

Robert Glenister, the actor who played Edison, is also a familiar face. We last saw him as Salateen in The Caves of Androzani.

I loved the mystery behind the Skithra, and even though they come across as more violent versions of Star Trek‘s Pakleds, the menace and creepiness were a lot of fun. The Braxium Bouncer (Mark III) bit was a nice double-cross in an era where the Doctor seems more reactive than proactive.

All told, I really enjoyed this episode and consider it a great step forward for the season.

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

UP NEXT – Doctor Who: Fugitive of the Judoon

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 monster tale armed with a messaging bludgeon.

Wrapping up another adventure we don’t get to see, the Doctor, Ryan, and Yaz are mopping the TARDIS floor after encountering a deep-space squid during mating season. Meanwhile, Graham has been collecting coupons from the Bandohzi Herald to win a free vacation. The coupons assemble into a transport cube and the team is teleported away to Tranquility Spa.

They are greeted by a furry humanoid named Hyph3n who insists they can return to their ship at any time, but should enjoy the perks of their two-week all-inclusive stay. As the team splits up, the teleport station shorts out. Because why not?

Below decks, a pair of staff members named Vorm and Kane react to a virus in the system. The same bug, a hopper virus, infects Ryan. The Doctor can treat him, and as Ryan swings at hallucinations in the form of bats, Yaz finds the pool and an elderly pair named Benni and Vilma.

While Vorm and Kane hunt the virus, the spa enters lockdown and Ryan meets a woman named Bella, a supposed hotel critic. The Doctor finds Hyph3n and enters the deadlock room while posing as a resort inspector. She meets Kane and discovers that the spa is guarded by a defensive ionic membrane. The hopper virus is in every system and Kane is attacked by a ferocious humanoid creature.

Graham finds Nevi and Sylas, the elder of whom is working on systems in the bar. The guests are scrambling for safety throughout the spa, and the Doctor tries to coordinate efforts from the lockdown room. The Doctor repairs the ionic membrane and forces the creatures to retreat.

Outside, Kane describes the creatures as Dregs, locals who have broken through the invisible walls surrounding the “fake-cation” resort. Unfortunately, Benni and his oxygen tank have been taken outside the walls, so a team of volunteers is assembled to rescue him. The resort is located on Orphan 55, and the outside atmosphere is inhospitable. Luckily, the radiation levels have died down.

What?

The team consists of pretty much everyone we’ve met so far, and they take a large armored vehicle into the outside area. The Doctor reasons that the Dregs have evolved to survive in the wasteland, even by adapting to weapons. Kane tries to call off the mission when she realizes that the Dregs have Benni, but Vilma and the Doctor convince her otherwise.

The truck eventually ends up stranded deep in Dreg territory after it hits a trap. The group can only survive for ten minutes on the surface, so Kane sets course for a nearby service tunnel. They are forced to retreat when the Dregs arrive and surround the truck. Benni’s voice sounds through the truck, pleading that someone shoot him. The Dregs attack the truck, everyone runs, and they make it to the tunnel. In the process, Hyph3n and Vorm are captured and Kane is injured.

Kane also reveals that she killed Benni. Vilma is horrified and Bella pulls Kane’s gun. In a twist, it turns out that Bella’s father is dead, she wants to burn the resort to the ground, and Kane is her mother. When a Dreg attacks, Bella and Ryan teleport back to the resort as the team continues their walk home.

Unfortunately, that path takes them right through a Dreg nest.

The Doctor finds evidence that Orphan 55 is Earth, a revelation that stuns Graham and Yaz. As the team’s oxygen supplies dwindle, Vilma sacrifices herself so that the others can run. The Doctor finds a dormant Dreg and discovers that they exhale oxygen. She also telepathically links with it and sees images of how they arrived on Earth. When it turns on the Doctor, Kane sacrifices herself to save the Time Lord.

Bella tells Ryan that she introduced the hopper virus into the resort. She also placed bombs throughout the place to destroy it. Ryan learns the truth about Orphan 55 when the group returns to the spa, linking the demise of their home to climate change and food chain collapse.

The survivors – the Doctor, Graham, Ryan, Yaz, Nevi, Sylas, and Bella – gather in the lockdown room. Sylas grows frustrated with Nevi and leaves, so the Doctor and Bella go after him while Nevi and Graham focus on the teleport, and Yaz and Ryan fight off the Dregs. The Doctor and Bella save Sylas and encounter the alpha Dreg. The Doctor traps the alpha and reasons with it, securing their escape.

As everyone reunites by the teleport (where Sylas has saved the day), Kane returns and joins forces with Bella to fight the Dregs. The teleport engages and sends everyone else home, including the travelers back to the TARDIS.

The companions are upset that their home is destroyed, but the Doctor reminds them that Orphan 55 is only one possible future, but humanity has the power to decide.

This is such a mixed bag. On one hand, the monster story was good, and if it had stuck with the simple monsters invading a resort, the episode would have been good. But, there’s the twist that one of the guests is trying to burn the place down because she has mommy issues. And if the plot wasn’t convoluted enough, we get a great message about climate change presented as a bonk-bonk-sledgehammer-to-the-head.

There’s subtlety and then there’s Orphan 55.

The production was also shoddy, probably due to the same budgeting issues that have plagued the Whittaker era. The monsters outside the dome were inconsistent, often disappearing from longer shots when we’re told they’re surrounding the survivors. Also, scientifically, fires shouldn’t burn in such oxygen-poor environments. Holes in a story can be compensated by good production (and vice-versa), but it is obvious when both are found lacking.

Also lacking in this story is the Doctor’s character. By the end credits, Kane and Bella are still on Orphan 55 fighting the monsters. The Doctor has control of a time machine, but does not immediately set a course to save them. What? Even if this is one possible future for Earth, the two women can still be saved with minimal contribution to the already messy timeline.

Writer Ed Hime forgot this fact while musing about climate activism. I sympathize with him and his views, but his story was lacking. Notably, this was his second and final story (to date) for Doctor Who, following after It Takes You Away.

Sadly, all of this combined means that the pace set by Spyfall slams to a halt as this season tries to get off the ground.

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

UP NEXT – Doctor Who: Nikola Tesla’s Night of Terror

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.