Flesh and Electricity: A Julie River Review of “Nikola Tesla’s Night of Terror”

Episode Rating: 8/13

One thing I love about the Chibnall era is the focus on historical episodes. There’s this term fans use, “pure historicals,” which describes an episode where the only science fiction element is the TARDIS and otherwise the episode is just about the Doctor and their companions getting swept up in historical events. Now there haven’t really been any pure historicals since all the way back in the 1^st Doctor era (although some argue that there’s one in the 5^thDoctor era) but the 13^th Doctor era has come close a few times, particularly with “Rosa” and especially with “Demons of the Punjab” where the aliens in the episode turned out to be benign and basically inconsequential to the plot. There’s also a focus on historical accuracy that hasn’t been seen perhaps ever in the history of the show. “Rosa” is probably the most historically accurate episode of Doctor Who ever made. “Nikola Tesla’s Night of Terror” is not as close to a pure historical as “Rosa” or “Demons of the Punjab,” but there’s a huge emphasis on the real life history of Tesla and educating people about him, harkening back to the show’s original intention of being an educational show for children when the show started in 1963.

That being said, I thought there were a few flaws in the episode, the biggest one being that the strictly non-violent 13^thDoctor seems all too eager to blast the Skithra queen with electricity and kill her. Why is blasting her ship with a bolt of electricity any better than shooting her with a gun, Doctor. Also the show has finally reached the point where it’s ripping off itself, because the Skithra were an absolute carbon copy of the Racnoss from “Runaway Bride.” If you’re going to put the Racnoss in an episode, just call them the Racnoss. Or was the idea that they’re such thieves that the Skithra stole their appearance from the Racnoss? If so, that should have been made clearer in the dialogue. And one more nitpicky complaint: the British actor who faked an American accent to play Edison did a pretty good job, except he kept using the British pronunciation of the word “patent” with the long a sound instead of the American pronunciation with the short a.

But complaints aside, it was still a pretty strong episode, especially compared to last week’s disaster, “Orphan 55.” Goran Višnjić, a Croatian-born actor living in America, does an excellent job portraying Tesla, a Serbian-born man living in America. The episode went out of its way to educate people on the forgotten history of Tesla (although I think that he’s making a resurgence in public consciousness anyway. And it’s always fun to see the Doctor get excited about meeting a celebrity. Jodie Whittaker again does a good job or depicting a Doctor who is still recovering from the events of “Skyfall,” as the Doctor seems closer back to her old self but not all the way there yet.

I’m excited for this coming week’s episode, partially for the return of the Judoon, but more so because the BBC has been teasing a bigger reveal than the return of The Master in this week’s episode. I’m really hoping they’re not full of it, but we’ll see. Catch you next time!

Broken World: A Julie River Review of “Orphan 55”

Episode Rating: 2/13

Every now and then an episode comes along that’s so god awful that you pretty much have to pretend it never happened. The last time this happened was three seasons ago with the Gatiss-penned disaster that was “Sleep No More,” an episode so bad it comes with a warning at the beginning not to watch it. “Orphan 55” might be irredeemably bad, but it’s at least a half step above “Sleep No More.” In “Orphan 55,” not only does the main plot fail, every single subplot of the episode fails to work as well. First of all the Dregs, who look like the Ood on steroids, are not scary. The twist that the planet is actually Earth both fails to be interesting but it also contradicts established continuity. The episode can’t seem to decide if it’s about global warning or nuclear winter, so it kinda does both and hopes you won’t notice.  Then the heavy handed message at the end, which I wholeheartedly agree with by the way, is lacking in any remote semblance of subtlety. The whole episode hits you over the head with a message that it didn’t really think out.

Then there’s the terrible subplots. First there’s the aborted romance between Ryan and Bella which, after every single scene shows Ryan striking out with her, ends with probably the most unearned kiss in the history of Doctor Who.Vilma and Benni’s story could have been really sweet if the episode hadn’t killed them off in such a callous fashion. Nevi and Sylas, two characters that barely have a plot line, seem to fight and make up based on what the script needs, not based on any particular motivations. Similarly, Bella’s plot line about her estranged mother seems completely chaotic with characters’ emotion changes coming from seemingly nowhere.

There was very little that this episode got right. Graham’s giddiness at being on vacation is earnest, endearing, and amusing. Jodie Whittaker does a good job or keeping a cloud over the Doctor’s mood, showing none of her typical joy and light following her discovery about Gallifrey. Other than that, there’s nothing redeemable about this episode, which is surprising considering how good Ed Hime’s last episode, “It Takes You Away,” was. Here’s hoping that “Orphan 55” is the low point of the season and not par for the course, because this was easily the worst episode since “Sleep No More.”

First World Anarchist: A Julie River Review of “Spyfall Part II”

As much as I think it was too soon to bring back the Master this soon, I can’t get over how truly magnificent Sacha Dhawan’s performance is as The Master. He’s possibly the most terrifying and most sinisterly playful Master to date. I really want to see the regeneration from Missy to Sacha Dhawan’s Master, simply because I think Dhawan would absolutely rock that dress.

Now, I brought that up in a Doctor Who Facebook group and several people suggested that Dhawan is playing an earlier version of the Master, perhaps even from the Master’s first set of regenerations back in the classic series, citing his obsession with killing the Doctor as well as his use of tissue compression, both of which are more indicative of early Masters than they are of Missy. Nice theories, but there’s a fatal flaw in them: the Master knows that Gallifrey is in a bubble universe, which places him after “Day of the Doctor,” meaning he has to be at least a later version than John Simm’s Master. It’s possible that this Master is between Simm’s Master and Missy, but I doubt it. I think that this is probably the next Master after Missy, which, as I pointed out last week, means Chibnall is essentially ignoring the redemptive arc that Missy was on. But then again, regeneration can change a lot of things, like when the 12^th Doctor became a much angrier man than his predecessor. Others bring up that Missy was supposed to be unable to regenerate after the Master shot her with the full blast of his laser screwdriver, but that’s a ridiculous and petty complaint as the Master has easily escaped much worse fates than that and I can imagine several ways they could have survived. I would have liked an explanation for how the Master survived, but I can understand why the Doctor didn’t ask since the Doctor wasn’t there for Missy’s death.

It’s hard to believe that Doctor Who is a children’s show sometimes, and this is one of those times, as Barton killing his own mother and the Master posing as a Nazi are pretty dark even for the show that suggested once that we might be fully conscious when we get cremated after death. I said I missed the show’s darkness last season, and it was sort of nice to see it return. Still, it was a little frustrating to see Gallifrey gone again after the Doctor (not to mention Steven Moffat) went through so much effort to bring back Gallifrey and the Time Lords. I really hope that we find that some Time Lords survived (and some promotional images from later in the season suggest they have).

And oh yes, the Timeless Child. Finally, a new season-long mystery to unravel and speculate on. Who is the Timeless Child? While it has echoes of “An Unearthly Child,” it doesn’t make sense for Susan to be the stuff of legends around the founding of Gallifrey. Omega would make a bit more sense, as he’s supposed to be the founder of Time Lord society. Could we finally be getting into some Cartmel Madterplan stuff? Probably not, but a girl can dream. But it’s nice to see Chibnall taking a deep dive into the show’s mythology.

Chibnall seems to be doing much less writing than last season, and next week we get an episode from Ed Hime who gave us last season’s brilliant Norwegian string theory mystery, “It Takes You Away,” so I’m looking forward to it. So see ya next time!

The Long Grift: A Julie River Review of “Spyfall Part I”

Episode Rating 4/13 

The fuck was that? I love The Master more than anyone, but the show needs breaks from its greatest villain. We had three seasons jam packed with Missy, so we needed at least two or three seasons with no Master whatsoever. But nope! We get the Master back again and, after the magnificent gender swap and the incomparable performance of Michelle Gomez, and at a time when the Doctor is finally a woman, the Master has regenerated back into a man. He’s also regressed from the character that The Doctor almost turned good in “The Doctor Falls” and seems to have returned to his old schtick of trying to kill the Doctor. I’ll give them credit for making the Master’s identity a twist at the end, like it always should be, unlike John Simm’s not-so-surprise appearance at the end of “The World Enough and Time” that was spoiled by all the trailers, but this just feels like going back to the well way too soon. 

That being said, if the character has to be brought back and downgraded back into a man, Sacha Dhawan is a perfect casting choice. I think some tabloid got ahold of the news that Dhawan was the new Master, but tabloids have been reporting a lot of wacky nonsense lately that has turned out to be horseshit, so I didn’t necessarily believe that. Dhawan goes from innocent and friendly and even flirting with Yaz only to turn on a dime and letting his deliciously sinister side out. His expressions on the plane are absolutely priceless, and were frankly my favorite part of the episode. While I have some problems with the way this Master was handled, I have nothing but praise for the casting choice. 

But that’s the problem with this episode: it’s mostly just killing time until we get to a pretty mediocre reveal at the end of the episode. The whole thing was fairly dull, to be honest. The episode plays around with some tropes from the Daniel Craig Bond films, which I have to admit a certain prejudice against.  I fell asleep during Skyfall, so when I heard that this episode was going to be “Spyfall” you could color me less than thrilled.  And by the time we get to the big cliffhanger, I’m left with more questions than answers, but I really don’t care what the answers to those questions are going to turn out to be in part two.  Why are these aliens attacking spies and dumping them in some creepy forest? Why is the Master involved in this?  Why was Stephen Fry brought in only to be killed off after about three minutes? 

Actually, let’s touch back on this one, why bring in Stephen Fry for so short a time?  Rumor has it he was offered the role of the Doctor during the classic series, and it’s known he wrote a script for the revived series in season two that never got made, so after years of almost getting one of the greatest comic actors of all time on the show we finally get him for an extremely minor role that’s over too quickly. 

So pretty much the only saving grace in this snoozer of an episode was Sacha Dhawan’s brilliant performance.  The rest was a snoozer of an opener to this season and I can only hope that part two picks up the pace and delivers something a lot more interesting than part one. 

Oh, and like all good Who villains need to be resurrected, welcome to the resurrection of (the slightly redesigned) Horror of Fan Blog!  I tried to retire it last season in favor of posting on the Mile High Who website.  But I got sidetracked, and now the MHW website is no more.  So this season my reviews will appear in the blog and as notes in the Mile High Who Facebook group.  Let’s get ready for what, I hope, will be a better season than that episode suggests.