By Owen Quinn author Photos copyright BBC
I’ve watched this episode three times now and being the penultimate episode of the season, the stakes were high with the arrival of not one but two Ranis. Both they and the Doctor were on course for 24th May 2025 when the world ended. We knew Ruby and Conrad would be back so how was it all connected?
To be honest, I wasn’t impressed. It all starts off well with the Rani murdering an entire family so she can steal the newborn seventh son. he turns out to be yet another god, the god of wishes. She locks him in a room with Conrad in her palace above London who broadcasts stories to the world, a world that he wished for. Archie Punjabi certainly has shades of Kate O’Mara in her performance and it is nice to see Kate O’Mara in flashback. She was a legend.
It is a world where a woman is a woman, destined to be a good little wife and a man is a man, out working nine to five. Therefore the Doctor and Belinda are Mister and Mrs John Smith with a daughter called Poppy. Could this be a reference to the Poppy Honey from the last episode? And no man can love another man as it’s not in Conrad’s rules.
John Smith works for UNIT, only it’s a national insurance company ran by hard nosed boss Kate Stewart. You start at nine o’clock and be happy, happy, happy. The world is perfect which speaks volumes about Conrad’s character and how he sees the world. And it isn’t pleasant.
I have to say there is a nice commentary on the disabled. Ruby is on the run as anyone having doubts about the way things are are taken away by the police. She meets Shirley, the disabled wheelchair scientific/advisor from our UNIT who is now homeless and begging on the streets. In Conrad’s world, there are no disabled people or misfits; everyone is happy, able-bodied and living an almost fifties lifestyle. This is exemplified in the scene with Belinda, her mother and grandmother who discuss Poppy’s future as a good wife and mother. Yet none can remember her labour or even when she was born. And no-one sees the disabled. I still wish Morris was back though.
His begging on the street and living in cardboard city would have been a more powerful image than Shirley.
This reflects the real world as disabled people are literally a community of their own, mostly unseen by the world and if seen in the street, glanced at out of the side of peoples’ eyes. It’s also interesting that Russell T Davies cited Davros’ disability as too extreme so give him a normal body as people would associate disability with evil. Now here we have two wheelchairs storming the Rani HQ with Ruby. The show’s logic about representing disability confuses me. And I speak as a disabled person, an amputee to be precise.
The Ranis need the doubts of the world especially that of the Doctor’s to break open reality to find the Lost One, Omega. Omega is the first and most frightening Time Lord as seen in The Three Doctors when the entire universe was in danger because of him trying to break through from the universe of antimatter he was trapped in, bringing the first three Doctors together to save the day. He would once try again with the help of sympathetic Time Lords in the fifth Doctor story, Arc of Infinity.
Here we hear the dialogue from The Three Doctors as the world begins to collapse in a fantastic special effects scene but it isn’t loud enough to be heard properly for the casual viewer. Stephen Thorne’s portrayal of Omega is iconic so it is great to hear that voice again. But the return of Omega opens up a huge contradiction in Time history and indeed the show’s history, thanks to the Chris Chibnall era.
Omega harnessed the power of a black hole to give the Time Lords the power to time travel along with Rassilon. But in the attempt, Omega was lost, believed dead. He was their greatest hero even to the Doctor. But when Gallifrey and the universe was attacked by a force from within a black hole, they discovered Omega alive in an antimatter universe. He had been forgotten, furious that he had been abandoned by the Time Lords, living in isolation in a world of his will just like Conrad but he had been driven insane and his body had gone. Only his powerful will kept him alive. Tricked by the Doctor, he was believed dead again, destroyed in a matter/antimatter explosion creating a new sun. But somehow he survived and helped by some sympathetic Timer Lords, he wanted to use the Doctor’s body print to reclaim his place in our universe.
However, the Doctor is the basis for all Time Lords, a lost child found by Tecteun who harnessed her regeneration abilities, transplanting them into every Time Lord, creating the society of Gallifrey. It was under Tecteun’s guidance that they discovered the ability to time travel. She enforced the twelve regenerations rule while heading the secretive Divison.
So the Rani may not be aware of this but the Doctor is the first and most frightening Time Lord. So Omega’s return is kind of underwhelming. The Rani’s plan seems convoluted. The next episode trailer has revealed why she wants Omega but it’s a plot line that is the similar to the Time Warriors book Tempest.
I’ve watched it three times now and still get that underwhelmed feeling. The return of Mel, Rogue and Susan are titbits. Are the latter two real or just manifestations of the Doctor’s fractured memories? Where’s the David Tennant Doctor in all of this? Is he off planet or has his memory been erased too?
So with Earth collapsing Inception style, the Doctor plunging to his death, crying out that his daughter Poppy is really his flesh and blood daughter, just left me with a feeling of… just get on with it now.
This is a very mixed episode that seems to be struggling with its own logic. We can only hope part two delivers in spades.
The Time Warriors and Beyond 