The Doctor has parted with his previous companion, Ruby, and is again travelling time and space alone. He meets a potential new companion, Belinda, a human abducted from Earth by alien robots, but she only wants to go home. To the Doctor's alarm, every attempt to return her home fails: the TARDIS is simply unable to return to Belinda's time. The Doctor and Belinda have to go "the long way round" in order to return to Earth in May 2025...a date of huge significance for the human race.
The fourteenth series of the relaunched Doctor Who was an attempt to clear the decks and get the show back into the big leagues, after a decade of gradual commercial decline under previous showrunners Steven Moffat and Chris Chibnall. Russell T. Davies, the superstar writer who'd relaunched the show to huge success in 2005, returned with plans for a connected number of different shows in the same universe, with the main show to be led by a charismatic new actor (the charismatic Ncuti Gatwa), all backed by big money courtesy of a new international distribution deal with Disney+.
Things didn't exactly pan out, with the show's commercial decline not only continuing but accelerating (despite a brief bump of interest in the specials led by David Tennant). Crucially, the show delivered several hugely-praised episodes (such as 73 Yards and Dot & Bubble) but also possibly the worst single episode since 2005 (Space Babies). More to the point, there was general discontent with the show's tone, which seem pitched towards very young viewers who simply weren't interested, and with the season's "mystery box" approach to storytelling, setting up companion Ruby Sunday as a puzzle to be solved, "subverting expectations" by giving her the most ordinary backstory possible and then discarding her immediately. The season had a very mixed reception as a result.
This second series under Davies' stewardship continues to be a mixed bag. The Christmas special Joy to the World, penned by Steven Moffat, has a huge amount of potential which isn't well-realised. Much-heralded guest star Nicola Coughlan hasn't got a lot to do or work with, and it's Steph de Whalley's scene-stealing turn as hotel manager Anita (who has to work with the Doctor for a year whilst he waits for his timestream to sort itself out) which becomes the most successful idea from the episode. Otherwise it's a little underwhelming.
The season itself kicks off with The Robot Revolution, introducing new companion Belinda Chandra (a great performance by Varada Sethu, of Andor fame and who had a guest spot in the previous season's Boom). Potentially clever ideas are let down by a clunky denouncement and the episode lurching between tones without much elegance or subtlety.
Lux puts the Doctor and Belinda in a Miami cinema in the 1950s, where they are menaced by a cartoon character who tears itself out of the screen. An impressive technical feat which combines real menace and tension, and a brief nod at 1950s social issues without smashing the viewer over the head with them with the subtlety of a mallet. A rare example of Davies knowing when less is more.
The Well is easily the season's - and the entire era's - highlight and sees the Doctor having to deal with a creature that can only be perceived in certain circumstances. The atmosphere is creepy, the tension builds superbly and the episode is enhanced by a terrific guest performance by Rose Ayling-Ellis.
Lucky Day is an almost wholly Doctor-and-Belinda-lite episode, with the story focusing on Ruby and UNIT on Earth as they deal with an unusual threat. There's something deliciously contrarian in the Doctor Who universe that the most successful conspiracy theorists are the ones who don't believe in aliens, telepaths or computers controlling everything, and Jonah Hauer-King gives a great performance as the supremely punchable Conrad. It's Millie Gibson, once again, who emerges as the star of the episode with her enthusiastic performance. However, once the story reaches its well-executed midpoint twist, Davies seems at a loss how to proceed, and the episode bogs down in lots of righteous shouting before an unsatisfying ending.
The Story & The Ending is an episode about the power of story and myth, as retold through a group of customers attending a barbershop in Lagos, Nigeria. It's a richly atmospheric piece, thanks to Inua Ellams' excellent script, and there's some tremendous visuals. The episode is let down a little bit by not having any real location shooting in Nigeria, an odd limitation when the press for the show is constantly hollering about the increased budget (recalling that the supposedly much cheaper Chibnall era had multiple episodes shot on location in Africa). But the inventiveness and atmosphere here is compelling.
The Interstellar Song Contest is a surprisingly enjoyable, fun bit of total nonsense, with the Doctor and Belinda attending "Eurovision but in space," complete with minor C-list celebrities and some bonkers novelty acts like the meme-generating "Dugga Doo." There's some good comic beats but the episode is let down a little by pulling its punches and teasing the return of the Doctor's long, long-missing granddaughter Susan (last seen in an episode that aired in 1983), only to not really do anything with the idea.
The show's two-part finale is a mixed bag. The first episode sees Earth transformed into an unquestioning state loyal to the Rani (a superb performance by Achie Panjabi) with even the Doctor and Belinda unable to remember their true identities. Obviously, eventually they realise something is up and lead the fight back. Wish World is a little clunky but builds up a nice feeling of dread and tension.
Unfortunately, this promise is immediately squandered in The Reality War. As is now well-known, the original plan for the episode (which would have addressed Susan and other story threads) was completely derailed by Ncuti Gatwa's decision to leave, resulting in hasty reshoots and a complete change to the second half of the story. These decisions result in a hasty removal of the Rani, the complete pointlessness of teasing the return of Omega and then doing nothing interesting with him, and then having the Doctor stumble around for half the episode before finally regenerating. It's great to see some old faces returning, but the episode feels like it's the walking wounded, whatever original promise it had lost as it struggles to tell a different story to the one it was set up for.
As the confusing episode ends, fans will likely be left wondering what the heck happened with Susan, if the Doctor has imposed a child who shouldn't exist on his companion Belinda for no apparent reason, and why the Doctor now looks like one of his former companions. A whiff of desperation can be detected, as if Davies is more interested in stoking the fires of Reddit and celebrity columns rather than just telling a good story with a good enough reason for existing.
The fifteenth series of the relaunched Doctor Who (***½) is solid. It has a potential future classic and several very good episodes. No Space Babies here. But the season-long arc is resolved painfully blandly, the final episode is a total mess (for the second year in a row), and the season somehow ends up feeling less than the sum of its parts. The cliffhanger is daft, and there's a general lack of confidence to proceedings, which frustrates after the good work done by The Well, Lux and The Story & The Engine.
- 15X1: Joy to the World (***½)
- 15.1: The Robot Revolution (***)
- 15.2: Lux (****)
- 15.3: The Well (*****)
- 15.4: Lucky Day (***½)
- 15.5: The Story & The Engine (****)
- 15.6: The Interstellar Song Contest (***½)
- 15.7: Wish World (***½)
- 15.8: The Reality War (**½)
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