Doctor Who #1062: The Reality War

"Aren't you tempted, Doctor, to start again?"

TECHNICAL SPECS: First aired May 31 2025.

IN THIS ONE... The Doctor tries to undo the Wish, but what will it mean for Poppy?

REVIEW: I know everyone wants to talk about that final shot and what it means for the show, and if that isn't a red flag about the episode itself... So let's start there and work our ways outwards, if we can. Restoring reality hinges on - surprise! - Anita and the Time Hotel, the doorways of which act like the Pandorica in The Big Bang, allowing UNIT to remember how things should be and locally undoing Conrad's wish (Rose Noble appears out of nowhere, since Conrad apparently erased trans people from the world). Lots of hugging. And more hugging. And let's hug some more. It won't be the last issue I have with pacing. But for now, we spend all the Disney mega-bucks on the Avengers Tower turning into a cannon and blasting at the Bone Beasts while the Doctor uses an air scooter to fly at the Bone Palance (which will turn out to be the TARDIS, we were right about that). Although, not before the Two Ranis (and yes, they make that joke overt, though non-Brits may not get it) show up to explain their plan. There's a lot there to unpack.

First, Mel has the Rani dead to rights and gives a description of the old enemy that's on-point. This is important because the basic criticism, to this point, has been that she was treated as the Master/Missy. But Mel reframes her actions as those of an amoral scientist, and indeed it seems she wants to recreate the Time Lords using Omega's DNA (in her image), a grand scientific endeavor that is absolutely predicated on hurting others, so this all works. What doesn't is that Omega, like Sutekh, turns out to be a dumb CG monster that "eats Time Lords" (he was going to go hungry in this reality) and immediately gobbles up the new Rani, after which the Doctor blasts him with his gee-tar back into the Underverse with almost 30 minutes to go. This is all very anti-climactic. We lose two Classic Who villains (even if Flood Rani escapes) back to back, abruptly, and fairly undramatically. Any promise of the Time Lords returned is put aside in favor of the same old status quo (Davies does love his "lonely god") and even doubles down on it by retroactively making what Time Lords there are completely sterile ever since the Spy Master exploded their DNA.

Because suddenly, the Big Stakes are elsewhere. If the Wish is undone (which is Ruby's task, even showing Conrad some grace), then so is imaginary Poppy, so it's all about saving a baby that has only really been ascribed to Belinda for two episodes. The pacing really slows down here and we're asked to care about it. It felt off, to me, that Belinda didn't feel any kind of psychological impact to suddenly realizing that she had a daughter with the Doctor, essentially overnight. She goes into Mamma Bear mode and the Doctor puts her and Poppy in a Zero Room (really, a Pandorica built in 10 minutes) so they can ride out the break in reality. Certainly, there's no outrage that motherhood has been foisted on her by Conrad's reality, and it's even seen as a "good". By the end, however, when the Doctor nudges reality to fix the coding errors left by the Wish, the new paradigm has Bel always having been Poppy's mom (to a human man), and the reason she really needed to get home on time. All those weird conversations where she mentions her parents are re-imagined as her talking about Poppy. And so if the Ranis had been meddling with reality for a while (we're told there was a time loop), and the Doctor crashed into Belinda's life during an iteration of the Wish) where Poppy had already been erased, and that he here restores the true timeline... Well, that may explain why Belinda recognizes her daughter as real and natural, and the Doctor was fated to fix the paradox, intersecting with Bel's future descendants, not only Mundy in Boom, but Captain Poppy from Space Babies as well. I'll throw in Bel's vision of Poppy in The Story & the Engine for free.

Except... Except, it's not explained very well (if you think it's explained at all). And there's no consistency to how reality errors and wishes are handled. UNIT somehow remembers the universe the way it was, but no one but Ruby remembers Poppy. That seems to include the Doctor and Belinda once the kid disappears (and I do love the image of the jacket getting small and smaller as they fold it), although the Doctor does wink at Ruby as if to say he remembers, but doesn't want to upset Bel. But then he really doesn't, and we're left wondering just what's happening exactly, if perhaps, different versions of the scenes were spliced together. Though we can try to no-prize it, we eventually have to admit the only true explanation is that things happen because the writer decided they should happen. The Doctor can force a regeneration? If you say so. It will nudge reality back into shape? If you say so. But if narrative rules are in effect, the writer hasn't really been playing fair with his audience. If this was going to be the ending, then why tease us with not only the opportunity for Poppy to be the key to a Time Lord return, but themes that support this - visions of Susan that amount to nothing, for example, and Desiderium being handed to a foster family, Anita looking on different Doctors and establishing doorways into his past... I had no real hope that my theory that Poppy would be the Timeless Child, or even others' that she was Susan's mother, but this is almost upsetting. I'm not saying such continuity-laden explanations would have been a good idea, but as long as you're going to do fanwank (which there is a lot of in RTD 2) anyway, might as well create a Rosetta stone for the show.

A lot of this is unearned, is what I'm saying, up to and including the surprise appearance of Jodie's Doctor. Happy to see her and she has a few choice bars about this era (the TARDIS' size is a good one), but what was the point? It's Time Crash, but played as an odd cameo, not as its own thing. Perhaps he wanted a cue, for new fans (who are well confused by now), that the Doctor can regenerate into female form before Billie Piper (of all people) steps into his shoes. I think it rather takes away from the SURPRISE for newer fans, but Jodie certainly isn't there to remind viewers of the Timeless Child, and neither was Jo Martin mid-season. It's confounding even if you take a lot of this as a way to create conversations to say goodbye to the 15th Doctor. But this does bring us to Billie, and I'll make most of my comments under Theories, if that's okay. For now, I'll only say that RTD's only recourse to keep the show going seems to be stunt casting, and this is just another take on him absurdly bringing back Tennant as the 14th Doctor.

THEORIES: There are some weird things going on with Ncuti's regeneration (and at least, bi-regeneration is stated to be a thing of the past). And I don't mean that he takes a face from a past companion. We don't see a morph between the two faces; she comes out of regeneration energy in an entirely new way. Secondly, she's not credited as "The Doctor"; they leave it blank. The meaning of this depends on whether the show is continuing or INDEFINITE hiatus. Rumors are rampant, especially since RTD muddied the water with false statements (in the show itself!), but the latest news is that he's no longer showrunner, but is in conversations to pick the next showrunner. In other words, he and his company retain their production duties. Those who hated the past two series are, of course, adamant that he was "fired" and the show well and truly "cancelled", but we've yet to have proof of that. SO! Is Billie really the 16th Doctor (see Versions here), or could she be something else? I liked her "Oh hello!" and it felt like her performance of the Moment in Day of the Doctor. So that's one possibility. Think back to the 50th Anniversary special (as we head for a potential 20th Anniversary of NuWho special) and the Moment's contention that she picked her face from his future (or is it the past?). We thought Rose, but it could also be a future Doctor. That episode also ends with Tom Baker's Curator prophesying that the Doctor would "revisit old faces", and this seems an important line for Davies - he's brought back two of them. And of course, the Doctor morphing into a face he knows from his past isn't unheard of. Colin Baker and Peter Capaldi both did (the latter even acknowledged it).

So if the show DOES continue - and there are plenty of dangling plot threads for a new showrunner, especially one under RTD's thumb, to explore, from Susan to the Boss (rating a mention here) - Billie may or may stay in the role for long (especially if it's a couple years away). If she's Not-the-Doctor, then a single special or opening episode could solve that before moving on. If the show DOESN'T, then this is just a crazy note to go out on, à la Newhart or St. Elsewhere, perhaps one designed to generate interest IN a continued series, but perhaps just trolling, of the audience and the broadcasting partner. Less cynically, RTD ending NuWho with the same face he started it with. But if it is, I think it would be a rather shitty move, considering Doc15 could have had many uninterrupted adventures from this point in other media (which will now take place in between seasons), and given his age, COULD have shown up to actually pass the baton in any revival. Instead, we seem to be in a rush to do all the teary farewells before a non-concern steps in. So I'm going to go with the first and more positive of these premises until proven wrong.

VERSIONS: The two final episodes were presented theatrically on date of release. Some of Disney+'s dub credits DO credit Billie Piper as The 16th Doctor.

REWATCHABILITY: Medium - High on razzle-dazzle, but low on satisfying explanations. The 15th Doctor goes out on a "mid" story, in a seeming rush to get to a heartfelt ending for a Doctor who kept getting pushed out of his own stories.