Doctor Who: The Reality War

 "So much for the two Ranis. It's goodnight from me."

Obviously, the above line is so brilliant that this episode is a triumph for that reason alone. And yet... against all the odds, although I'm sure subsequent viewings will reveal the odd dangling thread, after last episode seemed to promise a finale full of too many elements and loads of fanwank, we ended up with nothing of the sort. Instead... we get an ending that satisfies emotionally as well as narratively. Plus a cameo by Jodie Whittaker that I never saw coming. 

 So...

We resolve the cliffhanger by bringing back Anita and the Time Hotel, another returning character. Yet, with this being Ncuti Gatwa's swansong, it's good to see her again. And we use the hotel's timey-wimeyness to bring the UNIT gang back together, merging Conrad's awful wishes with reality. The plot threads- May 24th never arriving, the future in which the hotel exists existing only barely-just about work. And so we have... UNIT versus the bone dinosaur thingies which, let's face it, is the coolest thing ever.

And, of course, the Rani confronts everyone. It's a reunion with Mel, the sort of sequel to Time and the Rani that we were all definitely waiting for. And... the Rani wants to bring back Omega, and thus the Time Lords. Oh, and Time Lords have been sterile since the Time Lords were destroyed... that is, the most recent extinction, not the time before that. So Poppy is real... but she's an impossibility. And, to the Rani's Gallifreyan supremacist disgust, half human, like the Doctor is. Or isn't. Let's not dwell on this one.

The dilemma here is a nice one: bring back the real world, and Poppy vanishes. Yes, the story promptly cheats by building a zero room to magic away the paradox but, given what happens later, this doesn't really feel like a cheat. The Doctor confronts the Rani while Ruby (successfully, and psychologically) confronts Conrad. And... there's Omega. A terrifying beast, for sure, but as little like the Omega we remember as, well, Sutekh was last season. And, after gobbling up the newest Rani, he's quickly vanquished. Because, as we'll see, this is an episode where the Big Bad isn't really the point.

At first, Poppy exists. Ruby watches, alongside the audience, as the Doctor and Belinda plan to travel through time and space with her, making sure the TARDIS is toddler proof. Because that's totally what matters, right? In no way will the places they travel to be the real threats to child safety...!

And then... suddenly she never existed. Only Ruby remembers her. Only after much debate does the Doctor realise... and that's when we realise: he's going to regenerate. Sacrificing his life for a child. And... yeah, Ncuti Gatwa was good, but the other side of that is that he was in demand. Doctor Who, especially with this hiatus, was never going to keep him for longer. Which is a shame. We never got Daleks, Cybermen, so much, And two such short seasons...

It's a good send off, though. Nicely done, visually, and surely the most expensive regeneration ever. Nice cameo from Jodie Whittaker, too, doing some nice little characterisation for her in one short scene which knocks everything Chris Chibnall ever wrote into a cocked hat.

The coda with Belinda makes total sense: she always had to get home for Poppy, who is, after all, completely human, with a human father. It all feels as though it fits together, at least on just one viewing, and it satisfies.

But then... what? What? What?

Doctor Who: The Legend of Ruby Sunday

 "I am in Hell..."

Needless to say, this is going to be a long one.

It's sort of fasionable within fandom, and indeed within fandoms, to prefer the good, unusual quirky episodes to the big, two-part season finales with Big Things happening. I'm quite of that school of thought myself. But let's not pretend here: there's room for both, and I, for one, love a big season finale.

And this episode is very no nonsense about what it is. It advertises, from the start, that this is an episode about Big Things. Bang bang bang, one after another. The Doctor and Ruby arrive at UNIT! Ruby's meeting them for the first time! Rose and Kate! That robot thingy's had an upgrade! And, er, there's this bizarre child genius figure about whom the less said the better, but never mind.

And there's exactly zero faffing about as the episode hones in on the arc stuff, starting with this mysterious woman whose face has been following the Doctor and Ruby around all season. She's a big computer tycoon, very famous... and her company, S Triad, is an acronym of TARDIS, while her first name is Susan. And this in a season where the Doctor's perennially ankle-spraining grandaughter has alreadsy been mentioned. Could it be...?

I love the quip from Kate about how UNIT are always stopping evil software geniuses with alien tech "excelpt him, obviously". Hah. But again, it's zero faffing about as we get straight on to the mysterious origins of Ruby back at that church on Ruby Road that Christmas Eve, as UNIT set to try and solve the mystery with the help of impossibly advanced tech, technobabble and, er, a video tape. I'm not sure why UNIT is happy to use its resources, no doubt expensively, to do this... but never mind. This is season finale logic, and I'm enjoying the ride.

And, of course, Carla needs to be along for the ride too. Which means her mother needs looking after, by our old friend Mrs Flood. Except... as soon as the two of them are left alone together, Mrs Flood starts to act all sinister, stating that "He waits no more".... yep. It's the One Who Waits.

But... and please do indulge me here: I say this totally unspoiled. But could Mrs Flood be that trope that's the hilariously sinister red herring who is actually not a baddie at all? I'm aware, of course- and this is jumping ahead a bit- that she could be Susan,but it would be cool if Susan herself were just a bit of misdirection, although perhaps to be followed up next season?

Anyway, digressions aside... we see a reconstruction of that night, with Ruby's birth mum being an uncanny, hooded figure whose face cannot be seen. Yet she points at the observing Doctor, memories and even video footage change, and there's a deeply creepy, malign presence that horribly kills the poor redshirt, obviously doomed though he was. I love the brief look of disgust Kate gives the Doctor. This is his fault.UNIT are doing all this only to indulge the Doctor, and they lose one of their own.

So what of the mysterious Susan Triad? The Doctor is paired here with the delightful Mel- Bonnie Langford is quite, quite wonderful- who is far better written here than she ever was as a companion. There are even hints of a backstory ("I lost my family to the most terrible things...")... and it's clear that Susan Triad is not who we thought she was. The reveal- another harbinger, the "wrong anagram"- is deeply effective... we get a bit of horrifying exposition of the Pantheon- the Toymaker, the Trickster, the Maestro, the Mara, some others... and, atop them all...

Sutekh. And they've only bloody gone and got Gabriel Woolf.

I suspect this won't make much sense on a second viewing. I don't particularly care. The storytelling beats were exquisite and had me on the edge of my seat. I LOVED this.

Doctor Who: 73 Yards

 “Everyone has abandoned me my whole life…”

Let’s just pause to get the praise out of the way before we start: this is a bloody brilliant bit of telly. Now that’s out of the way… yeah, this is going to be a long one. Make yourself comfortable. 

So the Doctor and Ruby land in what’s instantly recognisable as the South Wales cost to we long-running Doctor Who fans. The Doctor briefly mentions a future prime minister from the area, Roger ap Gwilliam, but it’s nicely downplayed, a throwaway remark and not obvious as Chekhov’s gun at this point.

Ruby disturbs an odd little new age shrine thingy… and suddenly the Doctor vanishes, for this is a Doctor-lite story. And suddenly the direction, the cinematography, the texture of the footage itself, suddenly start to look like the best of co temporary horror. And the central conceit is utter genius: a ghostly old female figure always follows Ruby, staring exactly seventy-three yards away. Others can approach her, but not Ruby… and when others approach, they run. This is deeply creepy and possibly the best horror idea ever in Doctor Who, in terms of both idea and execution.

Of course, I’m sure I’m not the only one who thought of the Watcher in Logopolis…

Anyway, we soon meet a hiker lady, played by Susan Twist, who was the AI ambulance last episode but, in hindsight, has played an awful lot of bit parts recently. And Ruby notices, at this point, that her face is sort of familiar… yeah, definitely a Bad Wolf sort of situation. Who is she? And, while we’re at it, who is Mrs Flood, who briefly appears again? Susan was mentioned last episode- could either of them be her?

There follows a quietly brilliant scene in a local pub where Ruby, at a loss with what to do, meets with an unfriendly reception, being English. Yet there is fault on both sides. The pubgoers are certainly rude, unjustifiably so, but Ruby is also guilty of stereotyping although, perhaps, “racist” is a strong word. I love the prank they play on Ruby about the fairy circle thingy and “Mad Jack”, and all that stuff about the cliff top being a boundary between land and seas and a “liminal space”… the first time that concept has been mentioned in Doctor Who. Oh, and yeah, up until the joke is revealed it’s all bloody terrifying.

It gets worse, of course. Ruby goes home, Carla goes to talk to the figure, runs… and abandons Ruby, shockingly. We get a nice, reassuring cameo with Kate Lethbridge-Stewart… but the same happens with her… although not before, as the explains UNIT to Ruby, complete with its habit of employing ex-companions, as an organisation that deals with extra-terrestrial threats and now also the supernatural as “Things seem to be turning that way these days”. Hmm. Since the Doctor did that thing with the salt in Wild Blue Yonder, perhaps?

Ruby, though, is alone… and the years and decades go by, the figure always there and Ruby never finding happiness, being dumped by boyfriend after boyfriend. It’s an extraordinary direction for the story to go in, much though we sort of know at this point that there’s going to be some sort of reset button.

And so we have the clever resolution. The decades going by and the slightly off near-future feels very Years and Years. But Ruby manages to save the world from a nationalistic nuke -happy maniac by using the figure as a weapon to get Ap Gwilliam to give up. Don’t you think he looks tired?

And so Ruby lives out her sad lovely, life, a life dedicated to saving the world but at a terrible cost to her. No snow, no family, no excitement, no love. And then… the final reveal. The Doctor. And Ruby suddenly has a second chance at life.

I suspect, if you look too closely. There may be the odd little plot inconsistency. I don’t care. This is more than just brilliant. It’s beautiful.