Before we get into this week's post of Doctor Who Is NEW, I just wanted to mention Andrea and I made our first visit to the pool for the summer this past Saturday. It was a pleasant enough day but we both did get a bit sunburned despite layering on enough sunscreen to make us look like the Joker and Harley Quinn.
What's that got to do with a new episode of Doctor Who?
Nothing really. Just like to remind people we do things other than sit around and watch TV.
Empire of Death
by Russell T Davies
Well, everyone is dead now 'cause of Sutekh the god of death and that's why we can't have nice things like new episodes of Doctor Who.
The Doctor Who Christmas Special will be 60 minutes of static but no is going watch that because everyone is dead!
OK, not quite.
The Doctor and Ruby Sunday are still alive because Sutekh still needs to solve the riddle of who is Ruby Sunday's birth mother.
And Sutekh needs to know this because....
...
Sutekh is a Doctor Who fanboy who doesn't want to cancel Doctor Who with a dangling plot threat still... dangling?
...
Go with it, I guess?
Anyway, the Doctor and Ruby use Sutekh's burning fanboy curiosity to lure him into a trap and from the TARDIS, the Doctor drags Sutekh's sorry ass up and down the time vortex.
Because...
Hold on here! This may take a bit.
- Wherever Sutekh goes, he brings death.
- Where there is life, Sutekh kills that life and leaves death.
- But what happens when you bring Sutekh to where there is death?
- (I think I got this.)
- Where there is death, Sutekh kills that death and leaves life.
- Or something.
Look! Good news!
- Kate Letheridge-Stewart dead? Now not dead!
- Carla Sunday dead? Now not dead!
- Melanie Bush dead? Now not dead!
- Random UNIT soldiers dead? Who cares about them, still dead! No! Just kidding! Now not dead!
You get the picture!
Just this one more time, everybody lives, Ruby! Everybody lives!
Except Sutekh who the Doctor consigns to flaming ash in the screaming void of the time vortex.
The Doctor feels bad about that.
Sutekh is the friggin' god of DEATH! It's not like he had other career options.
Oh, we get an answer on who is Ruby Sunday's birth mother is.
And her mother was...
River SongAmy PondClara OswaldRomanaRose TylerRuby Sunday herself (that was mine)The 13th Doctor- Louise Miller
Oh! Of course it was Louise Miller!! I knew it all along.
And I am a damn liar.
Louise was a very young woman (only 15) in an abusive relationship with her baby's father and sought to protect her baby by taking her to the church on Ruby Road.
And contributed to naming the child by pointing at the road sign by the church which makes no....
Russell, what the hell are you doing to me here?
Look, there are a LOT of cool bits here.
The Doctor and Mel in action together once more. Back in the day (1980's), Mel was irritating as hell but an older Bonnie Langford has made Mel a viable and interesting companion
The bit in the middle of the episode where the Doctor has an encounter with an unnamed woman on a distant planet who has survived Sutekh's wave of death for the moment. It's an oddly discordant scene and feels shoehorned in but it underscores the scale of what Sutekh has done. Billions dead is a statistic. One person alone in a dead universe is a tragedy.
The Doctor takes action to set a trap for Sutekh and executes that trap. I've seen criticisms from others that the Doctor himself has not been as actively involved in the resolutions of other stories. The same cannot be said here.
Russell did make the right call on Ruby's mother not being someone snarled up in 60+ years of continuity. Ruby's mother being a normal person is the right choice. Even if it doesn't account for all the quasi mystic stuff that was happening to Ruby (like the mysterious snow fall).
But for the good individual bits that Russell stirred into the pot, did it really make sense? Did it really pull together as a coherent story?
Has Russell decided in the new world of Doctor Who, story logic is optional?
Speaking of optional story logic, Mrs. Flood breaks the 4th wall and talks to us again.
Who the HELL is this woman?!?
OK, that brings us to the end of season but I've got one more Doctor Who Is NEW when I'll do a post on the season as a whole. What worked? What didn't?
Until next time, remember to be good to one another.
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