The Lords of the Rings- The Rings of Power: Alloyed

 "He is not Sauron! He is the other! He is the Istatr!

Where to begin? This first series has struggled at times. Yet, having seen the whole design, IU'm full of admiration for its construction. The number of huge moments in this finale was staggering- not least the singing of "one Ring to Rule Them All" during the closing credits. 

It must be said, before we get excited about the revelations, that the episode is extraordinarily well directed by Wayne Yip, in every way fit for a finale.

We begin, cleverly, with a nice bit of misdirection: those three evil women from last episode hail the Stranger as Sauron and, well, that's that. Nori and the other Harfoots who went after him are doomed. He is the Dark Lord.

Except... he isn't. He's a wizard, it's explicitly stated. I'm guessing Saruman. And he saves the Harfoots, except poor Sadoc.And we end with Nori accompanying him on a quest for next season.

And then we have a bigger shock. I suspected Halbrand may not actually be the King of the Southlands... but he's Sauron! I had not a clue. This is very, very clever.

We also have what looks like the ruin of Numenor. The Queen and Elendil pledging to go on to the end. And, of course, the triumphant forging- visually brilliant- of the first three rings by Celebrimbor. This will save the elves in Middle Earth.

Yet it was Sauron who made the suggestions that made this happens. Sauron who now rules in Mordor. In the land of Mordor, where the shadows lie.

Doctor Who: Empress of Mars

"We're British! Mars is part of the Empire now!"

You can always rely on Mark Gatiss to bring a good bit of fanwank, but this time round he does a splendid tale of post-colonialism in the format of a mummy film (shades of Tomb of the Cybermen crossed with Zulu) which has things to say about the colonial Victorian mindset, war, and more about the Ice Warriors than we've ever seen. We even get Alpha bleeding Centauri back, played by your actual Ysanne Churchman. And, just to rub in that this is written by an uber-fan, we get a delightfully gratuitous rehash of Mike Yates' "RHIP" line from Day of the Daleks.

It's so delightfully steampunk, so very Space:1889, for a bunch of Victorian soldiers from the First Boer War in 1881 to come across a Martian spaceship and be taken to Mars by an Ice Warrior whom they nickname "Friday". There's plenty of room for some fun with the tally-ho Victorian attitudes contrasted with the Martian martial attitude. The happy ending for the dishonoured colonel is positively heartwarming.

The Doctor and Bill continue t have excellent chemistry too, and I can't believe they have so little time together. I loved Bill's referencing of both The Terminator and The Thing (she's one of us) while the Doctor, in a move my two year old daughter would approve, instead chooses Frozen as his obligatory pop culture reference. But the dialogue sparkles and the chemistry between the two of them is a joy to behold.

But, for this old fan, the real meat of this episode is that, however much they may have appeared five times before, we've never before seen the Ice Warriors in their natural habitat, on Mars, or had any real reference to their history or culture. But this time we meet an Ice Queen, learning of how the whole race has slept for 5,000 years (linking nicely with The Ice Warriors), and how the oxygen is now escaping and the planet will soon be lifeless. It's a splendidly fanwanky moment as Alpha Centauri, last seen in, er, 1974 in Monster of Peladon, who welcomes the entire population of Mars into the Galactic Federation, a "New Golden Age", and presumably a New Mars.

But the end, with Nardole having to enlist Missy's help to pilot the TARDIS back to Mars, ends with a hint of sexual tension between the Doctor and a reformed/reforming Missy. What's happening here...?

Doctor Who: The Lie of the Land

"Worse than that, you had history. History was saying to you, 'Look I've got some examples of fascism here for you to look at. No? Fundamentalism? No? Oh, OK, you carry on."

So at last this three or four-part mid-season arc comes to an end and it's a perfectly well-structured and composed piece of narratively interesting dystopian drama. I like it. It's good. It certainly continues this season's run of form. And yet... Toby Whithouse's script, while good, lacks a certain extra sparkle.

Not that it isn't a compelling scenario, and one with real power in our current era of "fake news"; the monks, after last week's dramatic denouement, have ruled the world utterly for six months, and have falsified all of history to force people, chillingly, to believe that things were always this way. We see first hand how those who question this new narrative are arrested and disappeared.

One of those who still remembers, much as she thinks she's going mad, is Bill. Yet the Doctor, it seems, is the Monks' propaganda mouthpiece and there's a wonderful scene where he goes full force propaganda to Bill and Nardole, convincing them, but not we of the audience who know the Doctor much better, that he really believes all that stuff. The dialogue, and Peter Capaldi, are superb here, much as the reveal that the Doctor is (duh) obviously anti-monk comes as no surprise whatsoever and is played for laughs. 

And then there's Missy, finally shown in the vault and allowed to say cool stuff while utterly stealing the episode and, interestingly, seeming to have a genuine crisis of conscience in spite of her lingering villainous habits. Is it me, or did she also remind you of the evil simprisobed sister from the last episode of Sherlock?


Yes, the whole episode inevitably feels rushed given the scale of what it's depicting, but the episode ends up working, despite the somewhat forced denouement with Bill being all heroic and cool, being a bit forced. It's a good episode. The fact that an episode like this should be my least favourite of the season so far just goes to show what a bloody good season it is.

Class: The Metaphysical Engine, or What Quill Did Next

"Coal Hill provides. It always provides."

So here we have an episode that takes place simultaneously with the last one, give or take some timey-wimey strangeness, as we find out what Quill was doing (the kids hardly appear) to regain her free will at last, albeit painfully. We know from the start that this unlikely occurrence is going to happen as we saw the Arn die last episode; we don't know how.

I'm not entirely sure this episode works; there's an awful lot of padding. It's interesting to get more background on Quill and her species, and even more interesting to get more hints about the mysterious Dorothea, but I never really invested much in the shape shifting alien Ballon, who is far too removed from normal human reality to be at all relatable without a hell of a lot more introduction than he gets in this short episode. The episode drags at times and is the first real misfire for Class.

It's an odd lead-up to the season finale. Still, the first five episodes of the season were superb and I'm confident we will end on a high.

Class: Detained

"Sometimes action isn't pretty, you big Polish giraffe!"

Interesting bottle episode, this one. It's obviously the season cheapie, with a tiny cast, no location filming and limited sets, and Miss Quill is clearly off having her own simultaneous adventure elsewhere- obviously involving the removal of the creature from her head. Isn't detention a wonderful plot device?

Essentially the classroom is moved to nowhere and no time, a bit like The Mind Robber except the nothingness is black. This is a harsh alien prison but, more to the point, it revolves around a MacGuffin which causes people to be both angry and uber-honest, thus getting the gang to say loads of hurtful things to each other which give the episode it's emotional beats and break up the team somewhat. Thus we learn that Matteusz may love Charlie but is also a little bit scared of him, that Tanya fears insecurity from being so much younger than the others, we get a bit of valid criticism of C.S. Lewis for his authorial agenda in the Narnia books, and Ram feels that he loves April more than she loves him back, which is devastating.

As a bottle episode it works, and genuinely advances some character stuff, but bottle episodes always show their working a bit and so does this; it may shake up the format a bit but this is by necessity rather than creativity, and the limitations, well, limit things. This is not one of the greatest episodes. Still, it works well within its limitations while not quite transcending them as the best bottle episodes (Midnight) often do.