#18 (2.8): The Reality War.

The new Doctor Who themed "Souls-like" game is looking really weird...

1 episode. Running Time: Approx. 66 minutes. Written by: Russell T. Davies. Directed by: Alex Sanjiv Pillai. Produced by: Chris May.

Note: This review contains spoilers.


THE PLOT:

The Rani has won. As the clock sounds midnight on May 24, 2025, Earth hurtles towards its destruction, with the Doctor helpless to stop it.

Then a door opens. Anita (Steph de Whalley), the hotel manager the Doctor spent a year with before getting her a job at the Time Hotel, uses the hotel's capabilities to rescue him. The doors to the hotel also allow reality to disrupt Conrad's "wish," meaning that the Doctor can quickly restore the memories of Belinda, Ruby, and UNIT.

Conveniently, the Rani needs one more cycle to gather the energy to let the first Time Lord, Omega, into reality, so she has to reset the Earth to May 23 once more before the end. This gives the Doctor and his friends time to zap a bunch of CGI before he returns to her Bone Palace to try to stop her.

But it may be too late for that. The Rani's plans come to fruition (on May 23, squashing any significance to the May 24 date). Omega is returning to reality - but the wish has transformed him as well, and not for the better...


CHARACTERS:

The Doctor: In a confrontation with the Rani in which he appears to come out the loser, he actually tricks her into providing data to bypass the Bone Palace's security. He tries to argue against the Rani's plan to bring back Omega, reminding her that the Time Lords of that era were despots, but Mrs. Flood silences him with a single question: "Don't you want to see him?" - and he has to acknowledge that yes, he does. He draws on all his ingenuity to try to protect his and Belinda's "wish" daughter, Poppy, from being overwritten when the wish is broken.

Belinda: The Doctor/Belinda partnership has been a joy, with Belinda's mix of enthusiasm for and wariness of the Doctor helping to make many of this year's episodes sparkle. Her reward... is to spend the finale sidelined, right down to being locked in a cupboard for the climax. I don't object to her being protective of her "wish daughter." Belinda as a mother would be fiercely protective. I object to her entire personality being reduced to only that and nothing else.

Ruby Sunday: Internet rumors suggest that Millie Gibson's Ruby was meant to be the companion for both seasons, with Belinda's presence in Season Two being a change of plans. I don't tend to put much stock in Internet rumors... but if it's true, it makes a lot of sense with regard to how this episode plays out. Belinda, the season's actual co-star, is sidelined, while Ruby plays a key role in resolving the crisis. After the wish is broken, it's not Belinda - Poppy's mother - who insists on the child's reality, but Ruby, with Millie Gibson doing the emotional heavy lifting for the early epilogue scenes. The story would make more sense, both in terms of emotion and plot, if Ruby was Poppy's mother... and given that Ruby was more prominent than Belinda in both of the final episodes, I'm not sure why that wasn't the case.

Recurring Cast: The UNIT crew are all there... and that's most of what there is to say about them. Kate barks orders to facilitate the Doctor's plan and gets a slightly bizarre mini-speech in which she refers to them all as the Doctor's children, while UNIT's role is basically to add to the CGI activity by breaking out big guns to zap monsters that serve no actual narrative purpose. Mel probably gets the best bit, reacting to the Rani with a loathing that would suggest the existence of a much more interesting version of Time and the Rani than the one that aired. All of these characters could be removed entirely. Not only would the story not be harmed, I think their removal would help the episode to feel less overloaded.

The Rani: In one of the few clever bits of scripting, she fully anticipates the Doctor's attempt to trick her. As a result, she's ready when he arrives at the Bone Palace to confront her. She goads him about his compassionate nature, sneering that all he's armed with are "dazzling words, maybe a pun, and then... platitudes." She's eager to use Omega's power to recreate the Time Lords of old...

Omega: ...Except that Omega is a CGI monster who looks like he stepped out of a Dark Souls game. Kind of like Empire of Death's Sutekh. This episode isn't as bad as that one, but the treatment of Omega is actually worse than that of Sutekh. At least the Egyptian god had always been portrayed as a monster devoted to destruction. Omega's main ambition in his two Classic Series stories was basically just to live. Now he's a parasitic creature who wants to "feast upon this world." Sure, there's the excuse that this Omega has been twisted by the wish into the mad titan of legend - but when the character (if you can call him that) bears no resemblance to the original Omega, then I'm left wondering why the script bothers to even call him that. Other than empty fanservice, that is. Oh, wait - I think I just answered my own question.


THOUGHTS:

The Reality War has a few good moments. I enjoyed the Rani and Mel sniping at each other, even if that scene doesn't actually lead to anything. The acting is generally good. Though there's the usual RTD finale "frenetic activity" going on, it is competently structured and is legitimately telling a story, albeit badly, and that's more than enough to make it a step up from Empire of Death.

Which doesn't change that I'd still rank this as a bad episode.

It repeats some of the same mistakes as Empire of Death. When Omega finally appears, he's a cannibalistic CGI monster that looks like it stepped out of a video game. When it speaks (briefly), it's not to bemoan its fate. Instead, it boasts of how it intends to feed. The Doctor doesn't defeat it through cleverness. Instead, it conveniently turns out that the Vindicator gadget he's been playing with all season just happens to double as a big gun. Because nothing says Doctor Who quite like watching the Doctor zap a CGI beastie with a ray gun, right?

Bizarrely, I think the best part of the episode is the epilogue, much of which consists of reshoots that were hastily thrown together after Ncuti Gatwa opted to leave. There's an excellent scene in which Ruby watches the Doctor and Belinda giddily debate their next destination while they forget something that should matter to them.

The scene is pulled off through the simplest techniques: a series of edits, a shift in the performances of Ncuti Gatwa and Varada Sethu, and Millie Gibson's horrified nonverbal reaction. It's by far the episode's best moment, and the follow-up scene in which Ruby persuades the Doctor, Belinda, and UNIT that her memory isn't at fault is almost as good. It's as if Russell T. Davies is able to create something reasonably involving when he's forced to put down his CGI toolbox.

The 13th Doctor (Jodie Whittaker) shows up for the outgoing Doctor's sendoff.

A REGENERATION, A WELCOME CAMEO, AND A MASSIVE MISJUDGEMENT:

In October 2024, while guesting on The Graham Norton Show, Ncuti Gatwa briefly confirmed plans to shoot Season Three in early 2025. Disney delayed making a decision about renewing their co-production deal (as of this writing, they still have not handed down their verdict), and the remarks were edited out before broadcast. By February 2025, Gatwa had decided to exit the role. He publicly cited the physical toll of being the Doctor, but his October remarks indicate that he would almost certainly have done a third season had the show been renewed promptly.

Regardless of the exact reason or combination of reasons, February saw last-minute reshoots that resulted in the surprise regeneration of Ncuti Gatwa's 15th Doctor in an epilogue that was very much bolted onto the end of the episode.

As I've observed, many of these scenes are better than the episode itself. While he's contemplating sacrificing this incarnation, the 15th Doctor receives a visit from Jodie Whittaker's 13th Doctor. I thoroughly enjoyed the interplay between Whittaker and Gatwa. I wouldn't have minded a proper multi-Doctor story with these two, as they're a natural contrast: Thirteen was arguably the most emotionally guarded incarnation, while Gatwa is the most emotionally open. He blurts out that he loves her, which stuns her: "I never say things like that."

The cameo does have one unfortunate knock-on effect, however: Whittaker's appearance makes me realize that I feel more of a connection with her Doctor than with the one who is actually departing. I think Gatwa really needed that third season. He's been good to great throughout Season Two, and for all my issues with this episode, his second season has been generally quite good. But I came into Season Two feeling zero connection. Ultimately, eight episodes, even with most of them being of high quality, were not enough to make up the difference.

The regeneration sequence is mostly decent on its own terms. My issues with this episode's treatment of Belinda aside, the Doctor's goodbye to her is enjoyable in its quietness. I also rather like him choosing to look out into the Vortex as he regenerates.

Then all of that gets overshadowed by what I consider to be a serious misjudgment.


A MISJUDGED ENDING:

The regeneration ends with another surprise cameo, this one seemingly designed to get viewers talking. It worked... if you don't mind that many viewers vocally wondered if the show was disappearing so far up itself that it might just create a singularity.

The credits fudge the exact nature of the cameo, and RTD has indicated that even he isn't completely certain what he's going to do with it. I wish I thought he was just baiting people, as he's done multiple times in the past... but in this case, I believe him. I suspect much of what comes next will be down to one actor's availability whenever the show gets back into production - which doesn't strike me as a recipe for quality or even internal consistency.

Say what you will about Chris Chibnall, but he had the right idea for how to handle a regeneration in the face of a potential gap. Initially, The Power of the Doctor was meant to end with the regeneration in longshot, with viewers not seeing the new Doctor. This allowed freedom for the next showrunner to properly cast and plan, allowing them to either pick up at that moment or well in the future, maximizing creative freedom while maintaining unbroken continuity. It was a good plan, one that became unnecessary once Davies came back to helm the next era... and it was exactly what should have been done here.

Wherever this final turn goes, it cements one of my fears about RTD's return: Looking backward. Doctor Who is at its best when it puts a new spin on its own tropes. "RTD 2" has done this multiple times - in midseason standalone episodes, such as Dot and Bubble and The Story and the Engine. Unfortunately, its event episodes have leaned on the series' worst tendencies, creating empty spectacle that relies on fan buzz in response to references to characters last seen decades ago!

When Doctor Who returns - and I believe that it will, and likely sooner than Internet rage-baiters believe - I fervently hope that the series focuses on moving forward again.


OVERALL:

The Reality War is a bad end to a good season. I almost wrote that it was a "disappointing" end, except that it was pretty much what I expected: lots of activity, urgent pronouncements that the actors seem to be barely managing to utter with straight faces, and too much CGI. The most involving part of the episode is the epilogue, which mostly consists of last-minute reshoots!

It's a poor finale for Varada Sethu's Belinda, who helped to make this season better than the previous one, and who is rewarded by being reduced to a plot device while being upstaged by her predecessor. As if to make that upstaging a theme, the 13th Doctor pops into Gatwa's extended farewell just long enough to make me realize that, for all of her era's flaws, she feels more like the Doctor to me than he does.

The very good set of episodes leading up to this is an excellent argument that Doctor Who has plenty of life left in it... but I have to admit that it's hard to cling to that in the face of this dreary final episode. Ncuti Gatwa deserved better. Varada Sethu deserved better. This season deserved better. And the viewers certainly deserved better.


Overall Rating: 3/10.

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#6 (1.5): Dot and Bubble.

The Doctor and Ruby try to rescue spoiled Lindy Pepper-Bean (Callie Cooke).

1 episode. Running Time: Approx. 43 minutes. Written by: Russell T. Davies. Directed by: Dylan Holmes Williams. Produced by: Vicki Delow.


THE PLOT:

"We come here from the Homeworld. No stinky old folk, just people ages 17 to 27. I mean, no, not just anyone. If you can afford it, obviously."

Lindy Pepper-Bean (Callie Cooke) is a resident of Finetime, a carefree luxury city for the children of the elite. These teens spend two hours per day working and the rest of their time partying. Lindy and her friends are constantly online inside their "bubbles," holographic social media spheres that encircles the users' heads.

Lindy lives completely inside her bubble, so much so that the Doctor and Ruby have to push her to look beyond it before she even notices one of her co-workers being literally eaten right next to her. Finetime has become infested with monsters: sluglike creatures that are consuming the population - and yet, for whatever reason, they are ignoring Lindy... at least, so far.

Finetime's security is too tight for even the Doctor to get in. If Lindy wants to survive, she'll need to follow his and Ruby's instructions in order to reach a place of safety. All the while, the Doctor tries to piece together what's happening based on the snippets of information available to him.


CHARACTERS:

The Doctor: He tries to contact Lindy right at the start of the episode. When he appears on her screen, talking about monsters, she instantly blocks him. It's only after Ruby manages to gain a small degree of trust that the young woman is willing to listen to him. He shrugs off Lindy's wails that she hates him, doing his utmost to keep this frankly idiotic young woman to focus on her own survival. Gatwa delivers what I think is his best-acted scene of the series thus far at the very end: The Doctor, letting out a cry of pure frustration before he lapses into a deep, still silence.

Ruby: Gets the time-honored companion's role of acting as the Doctor's intermediary when he alienates Lindy. She alternately ignores or agrees with Lindy's complaints about how "stupid" she is for not knowing about Finetime and the bubble, showing impressive patience and compassion for the girl. She's still working class at heart, though; when she learns that the residents are "the rich kids," she can't help but snark about it.

Lindy Pepper-Bean: Lindy's bubble is her world far more than any actual physical space. It's where she has fun, where she interacts with her friends, and where she distracts herself from having to ever actually think. There's a wonderful little moment after she witnesses the monster eating her co-worker. She shuts down, unable to process it, retreating into her bubble and playing music to avoid engaging with reality. The importance of Callie Cooke's performance to this episode can't be understated. We experience the entire story through Lindy's eyes, making it critical that this fundamentally selfish and unlikable person still comes across as human enough to make us care about her fate.

Ricky September: The social media star idolized by Lindy, Ricky (Tom Rhys Harries) has a "star account." In defiance of the stereotype, he is probably the least narcissistic person in Finetime. When he sees Lindy struggling, he helps her immediately, and he is protective of her both physically and emotionally from that moment on. He's more capable than her, and we discover why: Despite owing his success to social media, he likes to turn the bubble off while walking around and reading. Some of his behavior is almost Doctorish, with him putting himself in harm's way to save Lindy.


THOUGHTS:

Dot and Bubble is the best episode so far this season - and following on the heels of two other excellent episodes, that's an impressive achievement.

The story is well constructed. We open on Lindy and stay with her for the entire running time. A lot of world building is achieved in the opening minutes, with her turning on her bubble as soon as she wakes, her head engulfed in social media "noise" even as she walks to the bathroom (following directional arrows) to brush her teeth. A couple of her friends are bizarrely "offline," and the Doctor appears to give a warning that she ignores. That warning aside, this opening mostly establishes her daily life, which is so consumed by her bubble that reality has become all but irrelevant.

Lindy's bubble isn't a metaphor or analogy for social media, because it explicitly is social media. It's not the only bubble that exists in the story, though. Lindy happily declares that Finetime is reserved for the young and rich. Poor people and "stinky old people" have no place, keeping her and her friends isolated from anyone belonging to a different social class or even generation. Finetime is itself a domed city, so thoroughly locked off from the outside world that even the Doctor can't get in. When you break it all down, Lindy and her peers: live inside their personal social media bubbles... inside a bubble of youth and privilege... all of which exists inside the bubble of Finetime itself.

The epilogue takes the already existing ideas of social media isolation and separation according to class and adds a new wrinkle. This doesn't come out of nowhere, with hints dropped in character reactions throughout. However, unlike the "bubble" themes, this last is kept reasonably subtle and in the background, so that its full revelation comes as a shock to the Doctor and probably much of the audience, as well. The epilogue deals with this change-up well, with the final minutes particularly effective in not only the scripting, but also in Gatwa's performance and some outright beautiful closing shots.


OVERALL:

Dot and Bubble is my favorite episode so far this season. A good script provides an effective monster story while at the same time delivering plenty of social commentary. The performances are universally excellent. It's also extremely well-directed, with a wonderful contrast between Lindy's noisily cheerful bubble and the monsters chowing down on people outside of it.

This also marks the third standout in a row. At this point, not only has "Season One" (Series Fourteen, I mumble stubbornly) firmly recovered from its stumbling start - It seems on track to be one of the revived series' stronger seasons.


Overall Rating: 10/10.

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#4 (1.3): Boom.

The Doctor has to remain very still after stepping on a land mine.

1 episode. Running Time: Approx. 44 minutes. Written by: Steven Moffat. Directed by: Julie Anne Robinson. Produced by: Vicki Delow.


THE PLOT:

The Doctor brings Ruby to her first alien planet. Unfortunately, the planet in question is Kastarion 3, which is in the midst of a devastating war between the Anglican Marines and an unseen enemy. The Doctor arrives just in time to hear the dying scream of marine John Francis Vater (Joe Anderson). He runs out to help - and steps on a land mine.

This is a smart mine. Not only can the Doctor not move without triggering it, he also needs to control his emotional responses. His attempts at forced calm are disrupted first by the arrival of the dead man's young daughter, Splice (Caoilinn Springhall) and then by another Anglican soldier, Mundy (Varada Sethu). Mundy brings him more bad news: The mine has a failsafe. Even if the Doctor is able to avoid setting it off, it will self-detonate after a certain period of time. Time that is rapidly running out.

"Thoughts and prayers!"


CHARACTERS:

The Doctor: This episode absolutely depends on Ncuti Gatwa for its success, and he delivers a great performance. The Doctor spends the bulk of the episode frozen in place, leaving Gatwa to act with his voice, facial expressions, and eyes, and this allows him to finally show how good he can be. The Doctor is clearly scared - even more when he realizes the full stakes involved - but he maintains control. Every time the mine advances toward blowing, we see his struggle to keep his adrenaline and heart rate from triggering it. Most importantly, even though he's frozen in place for most of the episode, he's still the most powerful figure on screen.

Ruby: Early on, the Doctor sends her to search for a counterweight to allow him to safely lower one foot that's suspended in midair. When she returns, he tries to get her to throw the object to him from a safe distance. She refuses, knowing that he'll have a much better chance if she hands it to him, and she flatly ignores his pleas to stay back. Millie Gibson matches Gatwa, putting strong emotion into her voice as she attempts to act as his hands during this crisis. When the fog clears, she also catches her first glimpse of an alien sky, which allows a brief moment of wonder to interrupt the terror.


THOUGHTS:

YES!

After three episodes of being mostly cardboard characters, the 15th Doctor and Ruby finally, finally! feel like real people. Credit to Gatwa and Gibson who, given meaty material at last, deliver very good performances.

I'm going to give even more credit to writer Steven Moffat for crafting that material. Moffat's scripts have consistently ranked among my favorites since Doctor Who's 2005 return. Boom's premise is simple - the Doctor stuck on a landmine - but Moffat uses the situation to focus tightly on the two regulars. Despite liking the actors, I have been badly struggling with a lack of connection to this Doctor/companion team. Moffat's script gives me that missing connection within the first few minutes.

The teaser establishes the nature of both threats in a sequence following the doomed John and the equally doomed younger soldier trying to get him back to safety. We spend just enough time with John to get to like him... though anyone who has ever seen any form of war story knows that he's done for as soon as he calls up his young daughter, Splice. Then the younger soldier steps on a land mine, showing what will happen to the Doctor if he moves or reacts, and the first threat is established. Then the second threat - the one that truly represents the villain of the piece - is shown when John is killed by a more unexpected source.

From that moment, the tension just keeps rising. The Doctor follows John's scream and steps on a land mine. Just as his situation is temporarily stabilized, Splice shows up to learn about her father's death at the worst possible time. Then Mundy arrives, gun drawn, ready to shoot the Doctor if he doesn't get himself blown up first. And then... Well, suffice it to say that complications keep coming, and the stakes keep rising to encompass more lives than just the two regulars.

Moffat fills out bits of world-building from his own era. The Anglican soldiers were established in Series Five's The Time of Angels, and we learn more about them here. The episode also touches on themes similar to Series Ten's Oxygen, in which the real monster was an extreme form of capitalism. Cold capitalism is again the villain here, with the entire scenario caused by a privatized weapons industry and its business model: "The algorithm maintains a fighting force at just above the acceptable number of casualties... War is business, and business is booming."

I could argue that the resolution is reached a little too easily. Even that largely works, though, with the Doctor succeeding through a combination of cleverness and a direct and honest emotional appeal. If pressed, I think the ending is the weakest part of the episode, but it doesn't undercut the tension building up to it.


OVERALL:

Boom is the first great episode of showrunner Russell T. Davies' second tenure. It's tense and personal, while still finding room for future world/universe-building. It's unabashedly political, as Moffat's era tended to be, but its themes serve and arise from the story rather than distracting from it.

Most importantly, it makes the new Doctor and companion finally feel like fully formed people. I've been struggling to connect with the 15th Doctor and Ruby; this episode fixed that almost immediately without seeming to even try very hard to do it. Fingers crossed that the remaining episodes are able to sustain it!


Overall Rating: 10/10.

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#2 (1.1): Space Babies.

The Doctor tries to save some talking space babies, while star Ncuti
Gatwa tries to save the episode. One of them is more successful than the other.

1 episode. Running Time: Approx. 46 minutes. Written by: Russell T. Davies. Directed by: Julie Anne Robinson. Produced by: Vicki Delow.


THE PLOT:

The Doctor and Ruby arrive on the lower level of a space station in the distant future. They have just enough time to note that it's in poor repair before they find themselves fleeing from a monster who fills them with terror.

On the upper level, the Doctor discovers that this station is a "baby farm," designed to grow babies for colonization. The station has been abandoned, but the babies were left behind. Now the babies (who talk) are keeping the basic functions of the station going.

It's been enough to allow them to survive so far, but it's only a matter of time before the food runs out or the station falls apart. And that's not even mentioning the "Bogeyman" that stands between the time travelers and the TARDIS!


CHARACTERS:

The Doctor: An early clue to the nature of the Bogeyman is the Doctor's own fear. After he runs from it, he wonders why he was so terrified. He relates the babies' situation to that of him and Ruby, two "foundlings," and he's determined to help the infants... though given that this is the second baby-themed adventure in a row, he does ask Ruby, "What is it with you and babies?"

Ruby: Once she realizes they have traveled in time, she's excited. She still has the presence of mind to stop herself from running out the door, though, pausing to ask if it's safe. She becomes instantly maternal toward the babies. When they discover that the children were birthed for legal reasons but then abandoned, the Doctor remarks on how strange that is; Ruby replies that "It's not that strange", a perfect fit for her background both as an abandoned baby and as someone who has helped her adopted mother look after many foster children.


THOUGHTS:

"Babies to the rescue!"
-the Doctor is saved by a baby with a flamethrower. Or possibly the pharmacy mixed hallucinogens into my blood pressure pills.

I always strive, in these reviews, to rationally look at the positives and negatives of any given episode. I like to parse what I think worked, what I think didn't work, and why.

And so, in the spirit of dispassionate evaluation, I have to ask...

WHAT THE F*** WAS THAT?

This episode has talking babies, complete with creepy CGI lip sync for their dialogue, running a space station by pushing buttons and pulling cords. When the Doctor and Ruby get into trouble, the babies drive their strollers down to the dangerous section of the station to rescue them. From a monster that's made out of... well, I won't spoil that except to say that, much like Ruby, you really don't want to know. Oh, and the Doctor saves the day by getting the space station to fart at the end. Yes, really.

It's appropriate that this was made for international release on Disney Plus, because this feels like a Disney film. Not one of their big theatrical features, mind, but one of the direct-to-video titles they pumped out during the late 1990s.

A few good things manage to sneak in, keeping this from a rock bottom rating. An opening "butterfly effect" gag provides a great hook, and it even gets a small callback when the Doctor tells Ruby his reasons for not letting her go back to the church on Ruby Road. There's a terrific moment mid-episode in which the Doctor and Ruby are distracted by a memory of that church, complete with actual snow. The tag scene, as the Doctor goes from cheery in front of Ruby to secretive once her back is turned, strikes an effective chord to end the hour. I suspect it's not a coincidence that all of these are moments that have nothing to do with the standalone story.

Writer Russell T. Davies is quite good at story structure; and to give the episode its due, this is competently structured nonsense. Both the nature of the Bogeyman and the solution are planted early on, so that neither revelation comes out of nowhere. There's a refrain of the Doctor pushing buttons that pays off at the climax. There's a bit of social commentary about forcing babies to be born only to refuse to care for them that's a bit on-the-nose, but that at least has some substance to it. Too bad it's all surrounded by wacky baby shenanigans.

In my review of The Church on Ruby Road, I said that if you're going to be silly, you may as well go for it. But there's a fine line between "silly" and "stupid" - and to my tastes at least, this episode crosses that line. I didn't laugh at the comedy baby moments, but I did roll my eyes, sigh, and check the time. A lot.

Finally, to be a grumpy old man about it: Back in the day, original producer Verity Lambert got in trouble for having a teenager played by an adult actress menacingly wield a pair of scissors. This episode has babies in strollers literally playing with fire, and nobody so much as blinked. Um... progress?


OVERALL:

I suspect one's tolerance for this episode is going to be tied to how cute one finds the idea of talking babies ("SPACE babies," as the Doctor irritatingly keeps exclaiming). Personally, I had my fill of that by the end of the first Look Who's Talking film, so I was neither charmed nor amused.

Gatwa and Gibson remain a winning duo, even if their characters continue to exist in only the broadest of strokes, and there are some good bits around the edges. That's (just) enough to keep me from giving this a "1." But I truly hope the rest of the season is a whole lot better than this.


Overall Rating: 2/10.

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#1 (1.0): The Church on Ruby Road.

The Doctor (Ncuti Gatwa) and Ruby (Millie Gibson) meet
on the ship of a band of infant-eating goblins!

1 episode. Running Time: Approx. 55 minutes. Written by: Russell T. Davies. Directed by: Mark Tonderai. Produced by: Chris May.


THE PLOT:

Ruby Sunday (Millie Gibson) is having a run of bad luck. She's interviewed by Davina McCall while searching for her biological parents - only for the interview to end when the studio lights begin falling. Her band's club performance is disrupted by electrical problems, costing her a job. She can't even bring in the groceries without the bottom of the bag splitting open!

This isn't simple clumsiness. Ruby is being stalked by goblins, creatures that are powered by bad luck and coincidence. Coincidences such as Ruby's adoptive mother, Carla (Michelle Greenidge) fostering newborn baby Lulabelle at Christmas - exactly as happened with Ruby nineteen years earlier.

This is the key coincidence that brings the goblins to Ruby. They snatch Lulabelle right out of her crib. Ruby gives chase, and she finds herself pulled into their ship.

The good news is that she isn't alone. The Doctor has been tracking Ruby and the goblins as well. The bad news? The goblins plan to eat baby Lulabelle - and the time for their feast is at hand!


CHARACTERS:

The Doctor: Ncuti Gatwa brings enormous energy to the role. He grins as he and Ruby are pulled into the goblin ship, seeming downright joyful as he tells her that if the creatures catch them they will eat them. An early scene (apparently, one requested by Disney) has the Doctor showing his intelligence by deducing, Sherlock Holmes-style, that the police officer he's just met is planning to propose to his girlfriend. The scene is a good addition, serving as a quick encapsulation of how quickly the Doctor's mind works and how what seems like "magic knowledge" is actually well reasoned.

Ruby: Millie Gibson matches Gatwa's energy with her own. The character is drawn in broad strokes at the moment, though there are traits that have potential for development. She has a positive attitude which she seems to try to force even when she's disappointed or anxious. She also has a lot of determination. Not only does she chase after Lulubelle when the goblins kidnap her, she doesn't hesitate in jumping onto the goblin ladder (a ladder in the sky) to keep up the pursuit... a degree of recklessness that even the Doctor comments on!

Carla Sunday: She was originally Ruby's foster mother, then ended up adopting her. Carla is a generous person who has made a difference in the lives of 33 foster children, many of whom she's remained in touch with. She isn't entirely without jealousy, however; when Ruby is unable to find her birth parents, Carla declares that she's glad of it, adding that she wonders what her life would have been without Ruby. This being a Christmas special, that prompts an It's a Wonderful Life scene in which we and the Doctor glimpse exactly that, transforming her into a bitter and selfish figure. Michelle Greenidge is very good as both versions of Carla, critically showing these as possibilities for the same person rather than making "alternate Carla" seem like a different character.


THOUGHTS:

So we have singing goblins who snatch a baby from a young girl watching it. The girl tries to recover the child, following it to the lair of a Goblin King, where she's treated to a full musical number. I think I know what movie Russell T. Davies was watching before he wrote this...

The Church on Ruby Road is not a particularly substantial story, but it's a lot of fun. It showcases the new Doctor and companion both individually and as a team. Ncuti Gatwa and Millie Gibson have good screen chemistry, and there's just enough of the macabre in the episode's Grimm's Fairy Tale trappings to lend an edge to the silliness.

The high point comes midway through, when the Doctor and Ruby observe the goblins singing as they prepare to eat baby Lulabelle. The song is so catchy that it's all but guaranteed to live in your head for days after viewing, and the mix of comic lunacy and ghoulishness is a delight. The goblins begin throwing salt and seasonings on the baby as it runs on a conveyor belt directly to the open mouth of the waiting Goblin King - twisted, ridiculous, and wildly over-the-top all in the same instant.

Nothing else in the episode lives up to that scene, but it's smartly paced throughout. Unlike some of Davies' past scripts, some of which I thought turned into rushed jumbles, The Church on Ruby Road knows when to apply the brakes and slow down.

The first twenty minutes has plenty of incident, but it builds mystery as well. All we see of the goblins is their hands as they engineer the mischief surrounding Ruby's bad luck. At the same time, this opening Act gives us plenty of time with Ruby. She may be drawn mostly in broad strokes, but her backstory and relationships are parceled out nicely, and she's likable enough that it's easy to identify with her.

The mid-episode shifts into high gear, as the Doctor and Ruby properly meet and then rescue the baby from the goblins (I doubt it's a spoiler to reveal that no infant is eaten in a Doctor Who Christmas special). Then the final Act slows down again as it becomes the Doctor's turn to get some character moments, from him sharing the recent discovery that he's also a foundling who was "adopted" to his pondering whether he himself might be "the bad luck." I think this also a good choice for Gatwa's introductory story, showing him handling some dramatic and emotional beats as deftly as the comic ones.

Even at the end of the episode, I'm still left feeling that I don't yet know this new set of regulars. But they're an engaging duo, which is enough to have me looking forward to getting to know them.


OVERALL:

Like most of Doctor Who's Christmas specials, The Church on Ruby Road does not have the most complex of stories. The goblin tale is there mostly to support the introduction of the new regulars, both of whom make an excellent impression here, while also providing a couple of enjoyably bonkers set pieces.

I'd rate it toward the lower end of the new series' introductory tales. Even at the end, I'm left feeling like I don't know the new set of regulars, something that wasn't true of either The Eleventh Hour or The Woman Who Fell to Earth. Still, the episode shows a lot of promise for this new team. Most importantly, it's just plain fun to watch - and fun isn't something I'm inclined to argue against.


Overall Rating: 7/10.

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