Doctor Who: Lucky Day

 "How committed are you to the lies you've told?"

Like, I trust, most of us, I was somewhat displeased by the dismaying tendency of so many people to vote Reform UK on Thursday. The disease of far right populism is a very present danger. So it's highly gratifying to see good old RTD write an episode addressing this, with the real monster not being an alien creature but a cynical, far right grifter, a thinly veiled version of Tommy Robinson. Good. On this occasion I don't even care about the total lack of subtlety towards the end, as the Doctor turns up to give Conrad a proper good bollocking. 

To paraphrase what a wise man once said... there are parts of the Internet that have bred some terrible things, things that oppose all that we believe in. They must be fought.

One may question, of course, the need for Doctor-lite episodes where seasons are only eight episodes long, but heigh-ho. After that brief scene at the start, in 2007, we don't see Belinda again at all (then again, if she appeared, we wouldn't be able to have a story set in 2025...) and the Doctor appears only for the later scene with Ruby from just after The Devil's Chord and, of course, for the aforementioned bollocking. Instead, it's down to Ruby Sunday, her family, and the UNIT gang, to hold the fort in the Doctor's absence. And, actually, this is an interesting long term writing choice to use Ruby in this way. Are we going to keep checking in on her, focusing on the after-effects of being the Doctor's companion and adjusting to "real" life? Having had this experience- betrayal, doxxing, worse- is going to have a deep effect on her character.

The episode is very clever: until the twist arrives, the relationship between Ruby and Conrad develops in ways that are rather sweet, only for the rug to be pulled from underneath us as Conrad turns out to be the cynical leader of some vile conspiracy theorists profiting from insinuating that UNIT are just faking all these alien invasions, which will ultimately result in Earth being vulnerable. They remind me in many ways of anti-vaxxers (Conrad, I note, doesn't take the antidote), and remind us that conspiracy theories- all of them- are dangerous.

The final showdown (it's a shame Mel was missing) is fascinating- yes, it's satisfying to see Kate release the Shreek on Conrad, and the result seems to discredit him, but I suspect the harm has not gone away entirely. And Kate, it very much seems, will have to face the consequences.

There's a satisfying resolution, of sorts- well, until bloody Mrs Flood turns up- but these people will never go away, never stop endlessly flooding the zone with their bullshit and their dead cats and their hate. But the future doesn't belong to the incels, the MAGA morons, Nigel Farage, or Elon Musk. It belongs to us.

So that's four bloody good episodes out of four so far. Good going. Here's hoping they can keep this up.

Doctor Who: The Robot Revolution

 "Apparently I'm the Queen of Outer Space. If you could tell the police..."

Well, that was rather good, I thought. One of the better season openers of recent years, certainly head and shoulders over Space Babies. It's a solid concept, a satisfying plot, a good introduction to new companion Belinda Chandra... and it's actually about something. Even better, while social commentary in Doctor Who can sometimes err on the unsubtle side, this time the balance is nicely judged.

So... yeah, fairly long blog post coming up. I'm in the mood. And it's Doctor Who, always the core of this blog, however much it's grown. 

So we begin seventeen years ago, with teenage Belinda and her boyfriend, with Belinda being given a certificatre naming a star after her, a cheerfully blatant example of Chekhov's gun. It's a cute little scene, with Alan's adorable nervousness about kissing her, so much s that we ignore the fact that Belinda blatantly looks Varada Sethu's actual age. But it's a nice, innocent start... or so it seems.

And then we move to Belinda's life in the present day, as a nurse, with all the overwork and dedication and stress and being lovely that is implied by that. We briefly see that, as well as the fact that she lives in straintened circumstances with housemates. Little does she know that things are about to get worse, and she's going to be desperate to get back to this life.

This is Doctor Who, so naturally a spaceship lands and some mech type robots kidnap her to be "queen" of the planet named after her, which is a hilatriously brilliant Doctor Who idea... and feels very Moffat in an RTD script.

Interesting that she knows Mrs Flood, though: Ruby must be a neighbour too, and they may even know each other too. That's as much of a coincidence as the stuff the Doctor later pontificates about regarding her 51st century descendent. But she really is in a rather entertaining pickle. And it's very admirable indeed how RTD manages to make the exposition itself highly entertaining- at first it seems these people welcome their new robot overlords, but all this stuff about every ninth word is clever and highly entertaining. And yes, if you feel like questioning why words should matter to a machine instead of syllables and, indeed, you feel that this makes no sense... ah, actually that's a clue, and after the reveal at the end it makes perfect sense. Nicely done.

Also nicely done is a little subversion of the trope of aliens that look exactly like humans- with Belinda being a nurse we learn that these people's internal organs are very slightly different from ours. And then there's the timey-wimey stuff, with the two star certificates from different time zones and the Doctor lightly lampshading that the two objects must never, ever touch, or else. Yes, Chekhov has a fair few firearms in this story, but I'm fine with that.

I'm also fine with the Doctor's emotions- Ncuti Gatwa's tears show us just how much the loss of Sasha 55 (his partner?) meant to him. He's such a bloody good actor, best since Capaldi and possibly even Eccleston.

And then... Belinda betrays them all, shock horror. Except she does it in order to sacrifice herself in order to save all these people, whom she's only just met and who haven't, on the whole, been particulartly nice to her. This tells us a fair bit about her- she's brave, selfless, a good person, but not one for just blindly doing what she's told. 

And so we have the reveal... it's not AI, it's Alan, and the "planet of the incels". This is brilliantly done, with Alan's coercive control of Belinda given a much bigger canvas in the shape of an entire planet. It's clever. Mind you, I hate planet-wide robot tyranny as much as anyone, but could we still just send that imbecile Andrew Tate into space anyway? Please?

And then the really clever bit. I'll confess I'm a bit worried aboiut Belinda being "important"- why do companions always have to come complete with a pre-existing mystery these days?- but it's delightful how the Doctor isbeing his usual self with a new companion but Belinda calls him out on his behaviour, including scanning her DNA without permission, as crossing a line into being controlling. This is brilliant, reminding us that all pf us, even the "good guys", need to watch ourselves for this kind of behaviour.

So we have Earth of 2025 repelling the TARDIS, meaning that Belinda who, like Ian and Barbara all those decades ago, just wants to go home, is unable to do so. I like her. She has depth, and doesn't just defer to the Doctor.

So yes, not really sure we need that much mystery, but this episode is an excellent start to the season. Let's keep this level of quality, if we can...

The Defenders: Worst Behaviour

 "The Black Sky! We have it!"

The opening is thrilling. After Alexandra once again hints she may be older than she looks- did she know Istanbul when it was Constantinople and if so under a sultan or a basilius?- we get an incredible sequence in which a vaguely amnesiac Elektra is resurrected, trained, and used by the Hand. Wow.

What follows is equally awesome, as our four heroes follow their different leads to follow Midland Circle and all meet up fighting the rather combat-proficient board of said company... but not without some great character moments along the way. The early meeting between Luke and Danny is priceless. Luke's scepticism about the dragoins and mystic monks is a nice little meta touch, reminding us they're not quite from the same genre. But Luke's reminding Danny of his privilege packs a puch. As does the poor old lady's reaction to the news that Cole, her last surviving son, is dead.

Then their's Stick, escaping from Alexandra like the cool customer he is, casually mentioning a "lifetime of serving "K'un Lun": he's a proper dark horse, he is. And Jessica's private eyeing, finding out about Midland Circle by pretending to be some eccentric tech sis(?), and of course wondering what that suspiciously fleet of foot blind lawyer is up to.

But now, at last, they've all met! I'm loving this, and I can't wait to see what will happen next. But I'll have to, because I'm struggling to keep up with Loki and Gen V...

Iron Fist: Black Tiger Steals Heart

 "Wow. You are the worst Iron Fist ever."

Oh, Iron Fist, why so inconsistent? This episode is actually pretty good, all about lies, the murkiness of the truth, whom we should believe, whom we should trust. For 2017, it's a pretty accurate harbinger of the directions in which society has moved.

Joy, of course, has been lied to, in that she was not told of her father's resurrection. Now she knows, and Harold is busy gaslighting her, with some success. Yet his temper briefly shows, and he tells his first outright lie. Yes, by murderous means, Harold performs a boardroom coup, getting the Meachums and Danny reinstated. But is Joy beginning to see through him? It's all cleverly done, with much ambiguity.

But the A-plot, with Danny and Colleen, is even murkier. All starts in a lovey-doyey way, with both of them waking up together, the adorable couple. Then Danny is properly introduced to Bakuto, who shows him more about his powers... and shows him footage of an earlier Iron Fist, from 1948.

But secrets are being kept, as a conversation between the seemingly idealistic Bakuto and the certainly naive Colleen attests. And the secret is out- Bakuto, as much as Gao, is part of the Hand, and so is Colleen. The argument between the lovers is heartbreaking. Colleen is sincere... but Danny is right. Bakuto may be less brutal than Gao, but it seems clear that his wider goals are the same- he even slots right into Gao's place in Harold's life.

And then we find out who Sacha Dhawan is playing- Davos, sent to rescue Danny and return him to K'un Lun. Danny's doubts and anger have lost him his power, his chi. And he's accused of abandoning K'un Lun... why? Worse, the two of them are only able to escape because of Colleen deciding what side she's on. I'm genuinely excited to see what happens next, and I haven't always been with Iron Fist.

Daredevil: A Cold Day in Hell’s Kitchen

 “What if this isn’t the end? What if this is just the beginning?”

This, in the end, is a fairly predictable finale, but it’s so well-crafted and emotionally resonant that that’s ok. It’s not much of a spoiler, given the forty years since Daredevil #181, that Electra dies, so why not have an emotional Matt pledge to be with her, and go with her anywhere, before their final battle against the odds, just to rub in the fact we all know she’s not going to survive?

It’s an all-out battle with Nobu and the Hand, with much of the supporting cast involved as hostages. Even Frank Castle, while taking a lower profile, gets to play his part at the end… while wearing that proper Punisher skull t-shirt. Daredevil finally gets his billy club, too.

It’s a highly satisfying closer, and that’s not even taking into accountthe cameo appearance of Jeri Hogarth from Jessica Jones- will Foggy take that high flying job? Will he appear in other Netflix Marvel shows before the next season of Daredevil? And we get that dramatic moment, right at the end, where Matt finally reveals to Karen that he’s Daredevil.

I’ll wait for the Netflix shows to transfer to Disney Plus, then I’ll carry on with the first season of Luke Cage…

Daredevil: The Man in the Box

 “This is your jungle. This is your blood, like it is mine.”

We're moving close to the end of the season and things are speeding up. An assassin tries to kill a departing Elektra, after flirting with her- and he was sent not by the Hand but by Stick. Frank Castle is on the loose and is seemingly on a killing spree... or is he?

Frank is seemingly assassinating everyone who he believes to have wronged him, starting, in an effectrively shocking scene, as Reyes confesses to being behind the sting gone sour and the cover-up, before being suddenly killed... with Foggy lucky to survive, showing the danger Matt's friends are in. And Karen, pursuing the sory as a reporter again, discovers that there are further targets- the doctor from the trial and herself. She's saved, in a not-entirely-unpredictable twist, by none other than Frank. So who is the killer?

All this is just plot, of course, exciting that it is. What the episode is really about is Matt's increasing isolation, deciding he wands "no more law" and "no more friends", despite Claire rather sensibly telling him that cutting himself off from normal life, justive, human connection and, indeed, sleep, is not exactly an awesome idea. 

We end this splendid episode with the hospital under attack from without by ninjas and from within from those blood-poisoned people Daredevil has just rescued, and both Claire and Foggy in peril. I bet that would never happen in a country with an actual health system...

It's a Sin: Part 5

 "I haven't handled this well. I realise this now."

RTD, you magnificent bastard. You have this grown man still teary an hour after seeing the episode, damn you. You get us to like these very human characters, and then you do horrible things to them.

This is an incredible conclusion to a sublime television drama that will be remembered through the ages. Keeley Hawes shows us exactly why she's there in what had previously seemed like a suspiciously small role as Valerie realises what's happening with her dying son ("I've got AIDS. I'm gay" all at once) and reacts with a heartbreakingly realistic sense of denial and a very specific type of bigotry, the bigotry of Middle England and the Daily Mail: the bigotry that sees itself as "common sense". RTD absolutely nails this attitude as Richie's parents whisk him off to the Isle of Wight and keep him away from the people he loves- and Ash, his boyfrend, is stuck in London.

It's not all about Richie's death: Roscoe starts to reconcile with his contrite father, shocked at the treatment of AIDS patients in Nigeria. Valerie says some interesting things about Jil having no life of her own, and we see at the end how Jill, a familiar face to the hospital staff, holds the hands of men dying from AIDS, whether she knows them or not. She's lovely.

The dialogue, the characterisation, the structure, all of them are perfect. The fact that we end not with Richie's death but, like a wake, a flashback to a moment that makes us smile. The lttle things about Valerie's reaction- and how Richie's dad, previously so firm abot Richie's career choices, just collapses emotionally. The skeweing of a sort of stiff-upper-lip English type of family emotion. And, of course, the cruel revelation of Richie having dies alone, kept away from his real family. Jill's parting words to Valerie are powerful and, I think, authorial voice: the real tragedy of AIDS is that so many men died in shame, shame of what they were, shame that is drip, drip, dripped on them by a culture that erases and centures any thing that does not conform to traditional family values. The curse of Middle England, that evil place.

It's a Sin: Part 4

 "Something's wrong with your skin..."

Four episodes in it's quite clear that this series is an extraordinary masterpiece; following Colin's death last episode we have nothing comparable here, but we have somebloody good drama where, yet again, each character gets developed and every character is three dimensional and real. RTD has had a long and distinguised career, but this is his magnum opus.

It's 1988. We get THAT advert. We get a superb bit on Section 28 where Ash also gets to point out how history and culture has erased LGBT+ people for centuries. Well, except for Mary Renault. But this is also a time where the Pink Palace gang are attending funeral after funeral in what looks like a punishing schedule. There's a powerful moment at a funeral where it's pointed out that the vicar hasn't mentioned the dead man's boyfriend, and indeed he has no rights at all.

But greed is good. Richie and Jill have got a mortgage on the Pink Palace- even if Richie has to lie about his sexual orientation; it seems, incredibly, you could be denied a mortgage for being gay. But the fact that Richie and Jill have joined the Thatcherite revolution (Richie even voted Tory!) is soundtracked, inevitably, by Yazz' "The Only Way Is Up". The soundtrack of this entire series is really rather glorious, and often clever in how it uses those well-known '80s hits that have almost become divorced from their original context.

There's a fascinating sub-plot with Roscoe, and his dalliance with a Tory MP, portrayed to perfection by Stephen Fry, who doesn't see himself as gay because he's a top. There's a perfect punchline to this whole sub-plot, and Roscoe himself is a wonderfully nuanced chaacter. I love his outburst about how he loved Colin, but Colin behaved himself, and died- so why behave?

But Richie. Oh Richie. It's implicit, after last episode and given his cautious behaviour throughout, that he is HIV positive, and it's while acting with some Daleks (ah, RTD!) that it becomes clear something is wrong and he has full- lown AIDs. He fails to tell his blood family, who seem to live in a different world, and ends up telling all his friends in the back of a police van after a defiantly awesome demonstration. And the last line is perfect. 

I'll save the real superlatives for the finale; I have high hopes.

It's a Sin: Part 2

 "There's nothing wrong with boys from London."

Wow. That was another masterclass in television drama from RTD, again managing to meld the deeply tragic with the humorously human in a way that feels like life, with his extraordinary flair for dialogue and characterisation. The spectre of AIDS gets closer and closer to our three stars, and again claims the life of someone whom we care about.

Richie and Jill, bookending the episode with a pair of duets, five is a stark contrast. Richie’s oh-so-clever conspiracy theory scepticism gets a gloriously choreographed monologue to camera, quite rightly breaking the fourth wall in ways that remind me of RTD’s Casanova, which I haven’t seen since before this blog existed. And yet, one of those theories he mocks about where AIDS could have come from is, probably, correct.

Jill, meanwhile, is keen to learn the truth, sending Colin on a fact finding mission in New York and being Gloria’s only confidant, with him in a devastating scene as he tries to deny what is happening, and looking after him while vigorously sponging herself and washing up with rigour. It was 1984, and people really did know nothing.

There is much else happening- the sadness of how Roscoe being himself is affecting his family, and the uncomfortable scenes of Colin’s lecherous boss trying to have his way with the young man in a very MeTok sort of way until he spots the AIDS literature Colin’s being collecting- leading shortly thereafter to the most cheerful sacking ever.

What haunts us most, though, is the sight of Gloria’s family, at his wake, throwing all his loved possessions on the fire and rejecting who he is. Horrible.

I’m dreading what awaits us next week. And yet this is extraordinary telly, still on track to be RTD’s masterpiece.

It's a Sin: Part 1

 "You haven't got a parrot, have you?"

Russell T. Davies, after a few quiet years since leaving Doctor Who (alas, said quietness for tragic personal reasons) has not only been very much back over the last few years but is arguable at the very peak of his career right now. Cucumber was perhaps underappreciated, as was Years and Years, but few deny that A Very English Scandal was sublime. If this first episode is any guide (and I'm told reviews are raving from those who've binged the whole thing on All4; I'm soing it week by week), this could be the best thing he's ever done.

RTD has always said he wanted to return to gay themes in recent years, and this series confronts the elephant in the room: AIDS, which destroyed and traumatised a generation of gay men through the cruel double whammy of a horrifying disease and the added cruelty of society. I'm sure we will see much overt homophobia in later episodes (RTD has already shown with truthfully subtle dialogue the casual racism), but just as cruel is the fact that same sex relationships must be covert, informal, unrecognised, existing only at the margins of society. 

We see this, horrifyingly, in the person of Henry, played superbly by Neil Patrick Harris. He's lived with his partner (that unsatisfactory word) Juan Pablo for thirty years, a blissfully married couple in all but name. And yet, when they both become sick with this mysterious new gay plague (and yes, this all has resonance in early 2021, with our plague being less easy to ignore for most than the plague of forty years earlier), Juan Pablo's mother takes him "home" to Portugal and they must both die without seeing each other again. Equally horrifying is the sight of Henry, alone in a ward to himself, food left at the door, with no one approaching unless wearing what we have over the past year come to refer to as full PPE.

This episode is about introducing the characters, however, although not without a little foreboding. RTD is making us like these very human, flawed, likeable individuals before putting them through the wringer. We focus on three young gay men- Richie, student turned actor; Roscoe, who has fled the worst kind of religious fundamenalism with his Nigerian family set on "curing" him; and Colin, a shy young tailor from RTD's part of the world. There's also the very lovely Jill, the heart of the Pink Palace, but this episode shos lots of joyous, hedonistic sex, silliness and young people behaving as young people should, ignorant (and in denial) of what's coming.

Worryingly, we end with our three principals expanding on their dreams for the future. Let's hope at least some of them have one.

This is utterly sublime television. RTD makes it look effortless. I already feel I know and care about these people, and am worried.