"Dan... are you from Liverpool?! Why did you never say?"
IN THIS ONE... The Doctor finds out about Division and the Flux while her friends travel the world in 1904.
REVIEW: Much like our universe under Flux pressure, it's all starting to unravel at this point. The episode presents three main villain groups and in each case, I failed to grasp WHY they were doing what they were doing. That's not good, especially since I don't think the finale to come affords very many answers. Let's start with Division. This is certainly the most intriguing part of the episode. Our heart skips a beat when Tekteun is revealed and when we find a fobwatch whispering at the Doctor, containing all her pre-Hartnell memories. I love the tree-like TARDIS-looking thing at the heart of Tekteun's station in between universes. But that these super-powerful shadow players would scorch-earth "Universe 1" because the Doctor has made it impossible to control the "experiment" is unnecessarily bloodthirsty. If you can leave the universe and move on to another (hopefully Doctorless), why don't you? There's no easy way to jump universes, so there's little chance of the Doctor following you there. I know there wouldn't be a story without it, but I find the motivation here a little thin. And then the Ravages show up, having been released as a smoke screen, but grown out of control and wanting revenge on Division. They disintegrate Tekteun, a paltry anti-climax especially considering that they have the same essential goal - letting the Flux destroy the universe. We've just traded one villain for another and nothing's changed. Not that I understand the Ravages' game any better. Actually worse. Whenever they talk about it, it's metaphysical mumbo-jumbo.
Meanwhile, Yaz is playing the Doctor's part with Dan and Jericho as her companions. Since the Doctor is involved in some conversational scenes, this is where the action and comedy come from, but... I dunno. The comedy I find silly and almost jarring as the Flux bears down on the universe. The slapstick in the Aztec pyramid? Meh. The teasing old wise man in Nepal? Eech. Even Williamson is COMEDY ANGRY rather than the real thing. I do like the way he shakes Yaz in gratitude when she brings some explanations to the fore, but the humor remains at odds with other elements, like Yaz's lack of squeamishness asking the boys to throw an assassin's corpse overboard. But the worst of it is, their actions are pretty pointless. That they've been globe-trotting for three years in search of prophecies that echo back from the present in search of a doomsday date, fine. Yaz's only other support a hologram of the Doctor, ok. But if in the end, Williamson is going to coincidentally stumble across them and if their means of returning home lies in those tunnels and time portals, the rest is just hi-jinks to pad out the episode. I find the bit where they leave a River Song message for Karvenista - who is NOT time-active - particularly pointless in that context, and don't get me started on the beards in that scene... Just how long did it take them and how did the message survive 120 years of tourism? At least it's the start of the Liverpool/Sheffield banter.
But anyway, the villain HERE is the Grand Serpent who used to lord it over Vinder's civilization and now finds himself on Earth and IS (somehow) time-active. Judging by the serpent tattoos, it's his agents who are trying to stop Yaz, Dan and Jericho from accomplishing their mission. Why? Who knows. How? Can't tell. What we mostly see him do is infiltrate UNIT from the very beginning (or before, 1958 being post-Remembrance of the Daleks preliminaries and the organization being too new to respond to The War Machines in 1967), killing an officer here and there and gaining final control in 2017 when he stops it dead in its tracks just so Earth is unprotected by the time the Sontarans arrive in 2021. It's a VERY convoluted plan, which had many thinking he was the Master (his AKA, Prentiss, sounds like Apprentice, the opposite of Master; the tattoo looks like Pertwee's seen a couple times in the early 70s also leading some to think the character was a Time Lord; and he allies with an evil alien race), but no. Even the weird snake-spine stuff I have questions about (and I don't love the effect - it would be the worst in Flux if not for the explosion at Kate Stewart's house). So while the Grand Serpent seems to come out of left field and given his connection to Vinder, it's a HUGE coincidence that he's one of the few refugees to make it to Earth, it at least gives us some cool Kate Stewart action and explains why UNIT hasn't been active in the Chibnall era.
Speaking of coincidences and Vinder, his life must be charmed (well, cursed). He arrives at a creepy space station just in time for Bel to show up, but also just in time for Karvenista to recall her stolen ship to Earth to help plug a hole in the barrier, so they just miss each other. He's discovered by a Passenger and sent to its interior dimension, but the place is empty except for... that's right, Dan's love interest Diane (who's surprisingly bloodthirsty). Is it a cosmic joke or just creaky plotting?
REWATCHABILITY: Medium-Low - The episode in which it becomes apparent that all the pieces don't really matter or make sense.
Comments
I want to love Flux so much, but so much is just so poorly planned out and communicated that I don't have much of a foothold.
It's strange that Tektaeoun gets killed off so soon... despite being a drama show written by an award winning drama writer, this era sure as hell loves to avoid actually showing drama on anything other than the most banal, surface-level moments.
'You adopted me as a child because you saw that I was alone and helpless! This makes me upset because I care too much about my genetic heritage over my own identity!' is focused on, while 'You murdered me as a child over and over in unethical experiments!' isn't even brought up.
And yeah, it was almost hilarious to have the dramatic "we've written a message to be seen from space!" reveal that's immediately undercut by "I can't time travel". But the use of Williamson might be even more pointless. I'm not actually sure if his plot contributes anything to the overall story.
And as much as I love Kate, I'm always a bit icky about "UNIT is great because of nepotism".
Speaking of Kate, I remember feeling really excited when she was introduced way back when - the idea of the show always having a recurring/rotating UNIT cast across eras feels like such a no-brainier, espically as to make it so that every time they appear isn't just aimless fan-service to remind Classic fans that they like the Brig.
Then almost instantly it became obvious that Kate was just a cardboard cutout that exists for Classic fans to remember that they like the Brig.