Doctor Who Is NEW!: The Vanquishers

We've reached the end of Doctor Who series 13, the culmination of Chris Chibnall's grand storytelling experiment known as "Flux".  

For 5 episodes, this storyline has been a wild ride of dizzying perspectives and a mish mash of strained credulity and fractured logic.  

With a headlong rush into episode 6 propelled by chaos and confusion, could Chibnall stick the landing? Can he take all the various characters and subplots that weaved their way in a most tangled web in the previous episodes and making sure it all means something? 

Something we care about?  

Well, about that....

To quote my wife Andrea at the end of the episode: "Wait a minute! Is that it?"  

After the break, let's find out if indeed that was it. 

The Vanquishers

by Chris Chibnall 

There is a lot of ground to cover in this episode. So much ground, the Doctor gets split into three people.

Doctor #1 pops up with Yaz, Dan, Professor Jericho, Joseph Williamson and Kate Stewart. Williamson's daft network of tunnels underneath Liverpool are reaching out to various points in time and space which is convenient. 

Williamson is sent on his way but the Doctor and the rest go fetch the TARDIS from UNIT in 1967 to get Claire because she's needed for part of the Doctor's plan to attack on the Sontarans. For... reasons.   

Doctor #2 arrives on the Lupari ship with Karvanista and Bel where they get drafted into the Doctor's plan to attack the Sontarans. 

It's a bit of a daft plan. Doctor #2 is captured and tortured/interrogated by the Grand Serpent because the plot requires him to do something.  

Don't worry about the Doctor. She gets rescued by... Doctor #1. 

Doctor #2 thinks Doctor #1 is cute and Doctor #1 admits to having a crush on Doctor #2.

This is how the universe ends, the Doctor in love with herself.

Sad tidings: Professor Jericho dies because, well, somebody has to. To be honest, it is a powerful moment as Jericho confronts the moment with wit, wisdom and bravery befitting the self desribed "Scourge of Scoundrels".  Actor Kevin McNally uplifts every moment Jericho is on screen.

More sad tidings: all the Lupari are dead. Apparently the Sontarran shot all 7 billion of them out of 7 billion airlocks.  

Andrea was very sad about it.

I hate to say it but I didn't care.

And here's why.

Chibnall never bothered to introduce a single Lupar other than Karvanista.  The idea of the Lupari race was just that, an idea, an abstract one at that.  

And it undermines the Sontarrans.  They didn't defeat the Lupari in battle. They murdered them.  

The information that the Sontarrans destroyed all the Lupari was just that, information.  Other than Karvanista's baleful howl of mourning, there is no weight, no power to this information. Chibnall's looking for a shock moment because it's time to have a shock moment. 

Of course it doesn't shock. 

Doctor #3 is still outside the universe in the ship/station of the Division with an Ood as well as Swarm and Azure. Swarm and Azure threaten to torture and/or kill the Doctor. But don't. For... let's say, reasons?   

OK, let's get this shit out of the way first. Remember how back in the first Flux episode that Swarm was being set up as the big bad? He was sinister and creepy and ugly as sin.  

Over the course of six episodes Swarm and his ickily incestuous sister Azure never get beyond "sounding, looking and acting like bad people".  What exactly do they want? What is their endgame for all of whatever the hell they are up to?

At the end of six episodes, your guess is as good as mine. They wind up getting dusted by (I am so guessing here) the personification of Time....

"MORE BALLS!!!"

Because they didn't quite succeed at doing...   something?

The personification of Time drops an unsubtle hint that the Doctor is going to get hers and soon and there ain't no regeneration going to save her.

And the Master will be involved. 

The... personification of Time literally hand waves the Doctor's triple split because Chibnall doesn't need three Doctors anymore and...

The end. 

Really?

Really.

WAIT! I forgot Bel and Vinder! Bel and Vinder gets reunited, she gets to tell him she's pregnant and absolutely nothing else happens with that.

Why, Chibnall, why? 

Damn it! Diane! 

Forgot about Diane! Our museum guide from Liverpool suddenly becomes a super expert on how Passenger works and comes up with the solution on how to stop the Flux. Well, good for her! 

But really? Diane, our museum guide from Liverpool susses out a solution that did not occur to the Doctor? 

Double damn it! The Timeless Child!!! 

The Doctor gets the fob watch with her collected memories from the before times when she was an agent for Division. And does nothing with it?

She drops it down in the heart of the TARDIS, telling the TARDIS to hide where she can never, ever find it.

Unless she really, really wants to.

For... reasons?

And the Doctor and Yaz have a moment where the Doctor finally confesses she's not been open with Yaz about what she's been going to and is super sorry about that.  It's a super powerful moment, fraught with heartfelt emotion. And yes, there is romantic tension who can cut with a sonic screwdriver and nothing happens with it because Chris Chibnall hates all of you! 

So... there. 

To be fair, The Vanquishers does check off all the boxes that were opened way back in The Halloween Apocalypse. But too many of those boxes are checked off with "because it was time to end this". 

It's hard to establish the status quo at the end of Flux. 

Just how much of the universe is still destroyed in the wake of the Flux?  

Is Division still a thing? With Tecteun dead (checks notes from last episode to confirm... yes, she's dead) and one lone Ood left in their space HQ, who knows? 

Hey, wasn't the TARDIS supposed to be sick with black goo oozing out everywhere? That was because of the Flux, right? Except the black goo ooze disappears before the Flux does so...  reasons? 

I will admit "The Vanquishers" does hit some strong beats.  

• Professor Jericho meets his fate.
• The Doctor crushes on.. the Doctor.
• The Doctor and Yaz finally have an emotional moment. 

But the end of the Flux storyline is undermined by a surprising lack of import, of gravitas, of any kind of emotional heft or weight.  

It's a lot of sound and fury signifying very little. 

Series 13 does not end well. But for all the mistakes and missed opportunities, I can't say it ends badly.

The worst assessment I can give for Series 13 is it just... ends. 

For... reasons.