Doctor Who #1061: Wish World

"This isn’t just exposition."

TECHNICAL SPECS: First aired May 24 2025 (the real world date by the end of the episode).

IN THIS ONE... The Doctor and Belinda wake up in a world of 50s Suburbia.

REVIEW: Well, I, for one, am glad that, as I was expecting or hoping, everything RTD's done since his return (what I call the Broken Universe) could be "fixed" by the end of the season. And that while Mrs. Flood didn't turn out to one of the Toymaker's children, the Rani's plan is nevertheless connected to the Giggle. The Doctor broke the universe, let the gods in, and they're making mush of reality. And so the Rani wants to use one of them - the infant God of Wishes - to change reality to something bonkers, leading to universal doubt as to its validity, in turn creating cracks in it until it sinks into the Under-reality where a certain someone lives. It kind of looks like a glitch in a sandbox video game, but what's down there is really the anti-matter universe (I guess) where Omega (the One Who Is Lost revealed) still resides. Beyond that, we don't know, but I have hopes that she's trying to recreate Gallifrey and that we can have the Time Lords back after the Jodie era cruelly snatching them away again. Maybe this is even how the Search for Susan ties in. Whether they are led by an evil Omega...

Davies is really going after the forgotten big bads in this new era - first Sutekh, now Omega - and the Rani does a fair job of parsing Time Lord lore for fans new and old here. She calls Rassilon "president eternal", but Omega "the creator of the Time Lords", which ties into what I've always seen as a public relations war between them. Both considered founders of Time Lord society - the Rani even has the Seal in her sanctum! - but as to wish is "worshiped" by the Time Lords depends on the era, as if different factions rewrote the history books depending on their affiliation (or perhaps after Omega went mad, it was convenient to erase his contribution). In any case, the possibilities are intriguing and one hopes the show doesn't drop the ball in the next episode by wasting the potential of this idea.

So back Wish World. It's this crazy alternate reality where the Doctor and Belinda are married and have a baby. Where Mel is their happily lonely next door neighbor. Where UNIT is a fascist insurance company. Where giant animal skeletons loom over London (no good explanation for that as yet). And where doubt is punishable by law. A nice mystery brews as to the nature of this reality (just be careful where you put the cup), and as it turns out, this is the role the Ranis had in store for Conrad (I held off on throwing a shoe at my television there, but it wasn't easy) - he wishes this world into being by taking care of the infant god. Some of this is out of his playbook - the disabled are invisible to him and everyone (including the always kickass Shirley), gay people don't exist, the lifestyles are out of a Make Earth Great Again playbook, UNIT is a mundane office, he's the only media star there is, and DOUBT is a driving force. Presumably, there are no alien invasions, and we might see some racism in the fact that the country he claims to have forgotten about once, causing hardship, is in Africa. But he does seem under mind control too, which would explain all the weirdness that has nothing to do with Conrad's toxic worldview - the skeletons, the phasing cups and tables, the bone palace, etc. It's perhaps because they've used Conrad as their vessel that Ruby expresses the most doubt (next to Shirley's Irregulars), but it's all part of the plan. As an audience, we would fully expect, like them, that doubting this world is the solution. Instead, it's what the Ranis need us to do. I think perhaps we should also doubt the Rani's story about her and the Doctor being lovers, since it's all one big mind game. Rogue's message is probably a fake (is the glimpse at Susan?). (Indeed, feel free to keep doubting the canonicity of Dimensions in Time despite the one of the flashbacks being pulled from that crazy crossover special.)

The episode does fire up the imagination, so I'll have a lot to say under THEORIES. For now, I will somewhat lament getting yet another Doctor-lite episode (he's not himself until the final moments) and state that I like this new, very theatrical (the gesturing alone) Rani. The idea that she's about life where the Master was about death is a nice way of putting things, so her attempt at Omega's resurrection (and maybe the Time Lords' - she seemed to be about to suggest she and the Doctor should procreate, but then pushed him off a balcony) finally takes her away from Master territory (Mrs. Flood's embedding was very Master/Missy). So okay, I'll bite. Also interesting that the previous season ended with Death, and this one with Life. (As a complete aside, I'd like to mention that IDW's current Star Trek comics are doing this storyline at the same time, with Lore as the "god" who twists everything in his image, and Sisko remembering the universe as it was.)

THEORIES: After a crisis of faith last week, I'm back. Back with a vengeance. First, while I will always hate bigeneration as a concept that deflates the drama inherent in losing a Time Lord actor, we can start seeing the Doctor's through the lens of the Rani's. Mrs. Flood still considers herself the Rani, but not the MAIN Rani, and is therefore subservient to the "Mistress". Why? Is it possible that some important factor is NOT duplicated in bigeneration, the motivating force of the Time Person, perhaps. The new Rani has all the drive and the old Rani submits to it. This might explain why Doc14, despite Earth coming under threat on his watch, is never seen and does nothing. It's a bit bleak to think as bigenerated Doctors as shadows of their former selves who can't be bothered to lift a finger when needed, retirees with abundant faith in their replacements to sort things out, but it perhaps fits the mold this episode seems to establish.

I've heard all sorts of theories about the giant skeletons and the Rani's bone palace. Weird elements that have nothing to do with Conrad's vision (as alien things, they perhaps should be completely fake or not exist at all). The truth perhaps depends on what extracanonical stories RTD remembers and poaches from, as the most convincing theory is that the bone palace is the Doctor's TARDIS (mentioned and unseen), or perhaps more simply the Rani's. It wouldn't be unlike the strange Time Lord structure from the 8th Doctor novel The Ancestor Cell (which was more flower-like) and also held similar secrets. The monsters might be Ergons that, while less chicken-like here, are that dissimilar to the odd monster seen in Omega's second story, Arc of Infinity.

But my most interesting thought is about Poppy. This wished-up Poppy is evidently not the one from Space Babies, as she thinks and speaks like an actual toddler. It's odd for her to be in a reality shared with Belinda who had never met her, though Bel did glimpse her presence in The Story & the Engine. However she was created by the Wish, she was at least drawn from the Doctor's memories, or Mrs. Flood's who's been observing the 15th Doctor. Now, one of the things evoked by the shot of her in TS&TE is that of the Timeless Child, the same kind of dreamy appearance of a young black girl (and remember, the Fugitive Doctor appears in the episode as well, perhaps to create that resonance). Maybe you're seeing me coming... What if Poppy is the Timeless Child? We know she came from another universe - why not "Wish World"? - and had regeneration powers. At the end of this, she is sent to an Ancient Gallifrey (Omega is in the wings), her powers, which are her father's powers, indeed her own powers transmitted back to her genetically, are then transferred to the Time Lord race. Poppy (or Poppy Two, at any rate) is the Doctor. Not only is this perfectly timey-wimey, but it even gives the Doctor a human mother (Belinda) so the 8th Doctor can claim to be half-human. All of which would confuse the hell out of anyone who started watching with Disney+, but RTD hasn't seemed to care about this a jot since he started. Thoughts?

REWATCHABILITY: Medium-High - A really intriguing set-up, now it's all up to the resolution to satisfy.