Hello, dear listener and welcome back to Flight Through Entirety
the only Doctor Who podcast that woke up from that storm an hour
ago with literally no idea who we are.
I'm Nathan.
I'm Pisa.
I'm Simon, and I'm Dosty Springfield, extruded through a PVC ag
pipe for this episode.
Well, it's the 22nd century.
We're on a small island, possibly off the coast of Kent.
No one knows if they are who they think they are, and a simple
demarkation dispute is about to turn homicidal.
So let's see what happens when we come face to face with the rebel
flesh.
Can we start this week by talking about the teaser?
Because I actually think this teaser does a very good job of
establishing what the episode is about.
Yes, absolutely.
It gets straight in there and you're immediately asking, well, wait
a minute, how does this work?
They're also casual about this guy being, you know, falling into
the acid vat and dissolving into nothing.
And then, you know, he appears a moment later.
And so it gets us asking those questions as well as being a kind
of an exciting sequence.
I think too, the fact that it ends, because always the most
important part of a teaser is the very final shot, and the final
shot is the face, and it looks like a screaming face, dissolving
in the acid.
And so already the sort of idea that there's something wrong about
the sort of casualness with which they treat this, you know, what
looks like an industrial accident.
I think it's really quite effective, but also start, as you mean
to go on, I think the direction lets it down slightly, um, right
from the off, because you have the, uh, the bit where Jen pushes
the other guy in, and she keeps saying after that, I never touched
you.
I took a swing, but she did.
She clearly pushed him and he stumbled.
And I don't think she's meant to be lying.
I think it's confused direction and we'll see more of that as the
episodes go on.
Oh, I read that as Jen being just a little bit too fast and loose
for everybody's own good.
Maybe.
I think there is another problem with the direction, which is that
you don't get a clear look at Buzz's face.
And so when he turns up, it takes a 2nd before you realise that
the person who's turned up is the person who just dissolved in the
acid.
So you haven't got a clear look at his face.
And I also think the fact that his name is Buzzer is a problem too
because when Jen says it.
Firstly, she says it with a northern accent.
But secondly, she sounds like she's talking about a bit of
equipment that, you know, needs some attention or something.
Has anyone seen me comforter?
I mean, me also.
Yes, no, it sorted.
I mean, all these characters start off as a collection of
irritating accents and they just go from there.
We're not talking about new Doctor Who.
No, we are.
But that's a problem as well.
And that is one of the major problems of the episode, I think, is
that the characters just aren't quite clearly drawn enough.
Yeah, I mean, each character is so briefly sketched, I think.
I mean, you can attach a one word description to each of them.
So Cleaves is like world weary.
Jimmy is Scottish and maybe loves badly acted son.
Jen, Jenny's Australian.
Yes, he seems to be Australian, right?
Jenny's meek. and, you know, with the inability to say Rory
without emphasising 2 syllables.
Rory.
And Buzzer and the other guy.
I can't even tell anyone.
Yes, it's extremely annoying.
And so, yeah, I think there's a problem with these characters in
that, um, there's actually not much to them.
I actually watched this ages ago because I watched all of sort of
Amy and Rory's episodes in preparation for doing series 5 on the
podcast.
And when I watched it then, and perhaps I wasn't sufficiently
attentive, I have to admit that I didn't know how many people were
on the base by the end of the episode.
And I think the problem is Dickon, who is a person with literally
no discernable characteristics at all.
I kept calling him turning during the episode because I couldn't
remember his real name. because he does nothing apart from dicking
around.
And when you compare it to something like the Impossible Planet or
um, Waters of Mars or something like that, where you have, you
know, well-drawn characters who are diverse and sort of
interesting and seem to be sort of very well sketched, I think
these ones come up short, and I don't think they're helped by
putting everyone in yellow jumpsuits as well.
Yeah, I agree that they're not particularly well-created
characters.
In fact, one of the problems I had was knowing, not so much who
was who because that's sort of pretty obvious, but in terms of
knowing what everyone's names are.
I remember Jennifer, because Jen is mentioned over and over again
but and again, maybe it was the Northern accent thing, but it took
me a while to work out that one of the characters was called Buzz
or Buzz, whatever it was.
So I do get that, and certainly the characters in something like
Waters of Mars or Impossible Planet.
They're definitely better, but I don't think that that's what
they're particularly caring about when they're putting this story
together.
I think they're wanting to do something which focusses on, you
know, the concept and focusses on the, the, the, kind of the
horror nature of it.
And so yeah, you're right.
The characters, the characterisations to get to.
Why not do both?
Well, why not indeed?
And I'm not saying that it's excusable.
I'm just saying that it's less important than it might be.
I actually think it's incredibly important because the whole thing
is about identity and whether these new people that we have
created are us or not.
And so I think the whole thing would benefit enormously from
having more interesting, better drawn characters.
I think the person who comes off best is Cleaves.
Because she has the most rounded character in the most line.
Yeah, yes. and you can feel the truncate, and you know the cast
was twice as big in the original writing and too expensive, and
that Matthew Graham had to cut all of that because it just felt
like a, I think it was even Stephen Moffatt at the end, said it
just felt like a spaghetti factory of pasta shapes. running about
at the end.
You end up with that Warriors of the deep situation where you've
just got a dozen extraneous characters where you think, what are
all these people doing?
They did have lovely disco jumpsuits in that one.
Yes, yes.
Yes.
I mean, I'm not suggesting that it wouldn't have been better had
we had sort of more interesting and well-rounded characters, but I
suppose what I'm saying is that it didn't prevent me from enjoying
what I was watching.
The consistent eye-level direction.
I agree with you, both really let it down for me too.
You're in a very interesting location.
There's no space corridors, though, for once, and I'm disappointed
that I was just getting flat 5 foot 10 linear shots constantly of
the actors' faces.
I would have liked to have seen some, you could have created a lot
of drama just with some more interesting angle shots and
particularly kinetic shots as the actors are moving about.
What did you think about that?
I couldn't think of a single close-up in the story.
I tried.
I was on the lookout for them.
I didn't see a single closeup.
It was very, it was very flat medium close-ups or distant shots
for the entire thing.
Yeah, I found that kind of doll to watch, especially considering
what out could have been. was nicely lit.
I do think they got that right and I know they're time poor.
But we're skirting around what this is actually about, aren't we?
Well, let's get on to that because I actually do want to talk
about the look of it a little bit 1st if that's possible.
What you say, Richard, about the location is that it is much more
interesting.
There's a proper attempt to make it something more than just
another space base.
It's not inferno.
It's not, you know, we're we're not.
No, it's disappointing for you. a lot of space reasons.
Disappointing for me.
And, you know, the idea that it's a monastery mining acid for the
army is so weird and kind of, it's like a Cluto game. going to be
in the monastery.
Money acid. for the army.
But I actually think that that's kind of fun and interesting, and
I love that the acid's not explained.
We've got no idea what it's for or why it's here.
What it does.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And it just runs through pipes along the corridor. centuries of
embittered religiosity soaking through the stones. the cause of
it.
That's it.
You know, I think the tone meeting for this episode was meant to
be Gothic and understated, but instead we got washed out and
dreary.
How did that happen?
I can't say it's dreary.
That's ridiculous.
I really have.
Has anyone seen the Russian Hamlet of, was it the late 60s?
I haven't seen that. remember it?
It's shot in what we assume is Elson or Castle.
And it's gorgeous.
It doesn't matter that, in fact, I think it helps that it's in
Russian because, you know, you know the story anyway.
You can hear the inflections.
But it does look beautiful, but everything is an angle shot.
And there are whole long shots of the water rising against the
rocks and rising against the cliffs.
I would have liked to have seen more than just a conflagration of
somebody's Photoshop page against the backdrop.
I know they're time poor, but I really think this could have been
the most richly visual story of the season with very little
technical requisites in it.
You could have just pointed the camera at all the interesting
things going on.
I think that we have a problem where this 2 parter means that we
have 4 fairly kind of dark and dreary looking episodes in a row.
I just kind of think, let's turn the lights up somewhere for a
change or do you remember the colour green?
I love that, you know?
That's right.
I made exactly the same note, Nathan.
It's funny.
It's just this string of gray murky nighttime stories and it saps
the season's energy as surely as that string of night shoots did
in David Tennant.
I don't have a problem with that, though.
I think it adds to the sort of the overall dark flavour of it.
Yeah, I just think there's a sort of sameness and we commented on
the curse of the black spot episode where we make the choice to
exchange an exciting pirate ship for some pretty dreary space
corridors about halfway through.
And I do think that, you know, the locations do look great, but
there is a kind of washed out flatness to the whole thing, which I
think actually ends up making it a bit less fun.
I think flatness is the wrong word.
Colourless.
Yes.
I think it's drained of colour and I think that's fine because it
does make a change.
I mean, there's a lot of stuff going on in the impossible
astronaut. two-parter and so on and yeah, you're right.
Look, maybe it's just the accidental nature of having consecutive
episodes that are like this rather than anything deliberate.
And at the time it's realised it's too late.
And I'm kind of, I kind of forgive that kind of thing, even though
I take your point.
I'm fine with monochromatic Doctor Who.
Yes.
Yeah, we had those so many years there with hardly any colour in
them.
Is that the reason that all the episodes of the Dominators looks
the same?
I think being set in a series of murky chambers kind of undoes the
story a little bit and undermines the direction because in a
doppelganger story, it's paramount that you'd be really clear
which set of characters you're with and where you are.
And I think the fact that all of the chambers look the same undoes
that and makes it confusing.
No, but it isn't the point that we can't tell the difference.
So we might not be able to tell the difference between the 2 of
them.
So in some respects, dressing them all in the same kind of hive
these inspired sort of outfits. communicates that more.
We don't want to know who to.
And then we have the acid suits.
That's nice to start with.
And the same way is, you know, it's nice that we don't know
Cleaves is the gang of Cleaves at the start.
But then it just becomes confusing as you go on.
It's just like, it's almost with now. and who am I looking at?
If it's confusing, in a particular instance, it's meant to be
confusing.
We are meant to not be sure whether this is the real or whether
this is the ganger.
Organic.
Does that make for a satisfying viewing experience?
Absolutely.
That's the whole point.
I actually found it kind of refreshing that everyone is in the
same outfits, and they are a bit like they're wearing high vis.
I think it was a fine idea to do like Waters of Mars an impossible
planet as, you know, they're all basically wearing contemporary
like our contemporary clothing on this, you know, science fiction
base, partly to make it feel a bit more real and not to spacey.
Um, but I was kind of, I liked the fact that they are, they look
like they're dressed in something that one might wear when working
in a dangerous environment.
And I think, you know, do we want that every week?
No, but I think given the fact that we've had so many episodes
where people have been wearing contemporary street clothes, I
think that this makes a nice change.
If we're talking about reproductions of humans and what makes you
a person, We do touch on the notions of slavery.
Of course, there's a lot in this.
I'm also interested that they're pasty white. rather than have a
colour.
So there's all sorts of levels of, of the underclass and how they
work and what sentience is.
There's lots of science fiction.
Can we say tropes in this episode?
No, I'm here.
But yeah, but we go back to Benjamin again who talked about the
aura of reproductions and how a copy is diminished because it is
never going to be the original.
And Amy actually partly quotes or or, um, might say, yeah
Benjamin's own words when she talks about, you're the, um, you're
the original doctor.
I know, I know which is which.
There's a quality of you.
Anyway, it's paraphrasing Benjamin's own essay.
Uh, and I think that Graham's, has anyone seen Nash's 2 ashes?
No.
Graham's other heat at the time.
He's a good writer.
And he does explore themes within his writing.
I think that's something that Stephen Moffat appreciates in his
writer's guild.
They um, he likes people who have more to say than what's
necessarily on the screen at the one time.
And I think this story.
I agree with you all.
It has a certain flatness when you look at it as a TV episode, and
I don't think the direction helps for that, but thematically, it's
terribly interesting.
And then it, if you want to posit it, Benjamin talked about art or
any reproduction of the aesthetic is boulderized or diminished
under late model capitalism, which he says is fascism, that the
control of the autonomy of any person is completely directed by
outside sources, and therefore we live in a state of artificiality
and our own aesthetic and our own aura is subsumed by the nature
of how we move and how we live, and of course he was, um, He was a
victim of the 2nd World War and, um, and suffered terribly through
it.
But he's his writings and his thinking.
I really do believe her in this story and they like your opinions
on that because I'm starting to tire myself with my own voice
here.
But I just want to know if you take on that.
Yeah.
Richard, I'd agree with you.
I think the premise is reasonably interesting.
I think there are some themes at work here.
Is that sort of perennial Doctor Who idea of whether a person is
just the sum of their memories or not.
Um, there's a there's a whole lot of sources here.
There's some Blade Runner there.
I was going to say, that's clearly inspired by Avatar as well.
And and we know that Moffat discussed Avatar as a... with Much
with Graham.
Yeah, as an impetus for this writing, yeah.
I think Stephen also mentioned the thing as something that they
were drawing on.
And Wales Frankenstein, the scene with the lightning over the
crucible.
Yeah, absolutely.
Yeah.
Beautifully done, actually.
Mind you, mentioning any of those things is drawing a pretty long
bow in terms of their visceral impact compared with this.
It's like saying time lashes like the work of HG Wells.
Well, yes it is, but no, it isn't.
I think I think that comparing this to Timelash is somewhat
unfair.
Okay.
Oh, Simon, you know what, actually, do compare this to Time Lash
unfavourably.
Outrageous.
Let me pick up on some of that because I do think that there is a
clearer attempt that a critique of the exploitation of workers.
Our very 1st scene is a horrific industrial accident that we don't
really care about, that no one is sort of particularly upset by.
We have everyone in high vis, as Simon points out.
We have a range of regional accents.
We see that the workers have to kind of bundy on and off.
It's not kind of emphasised in the direction or the script
particularly, but there's a thing called the metre that they have
to kind of clock on and off to, you know, register how much time
they've been spending.
And I think we'll talk more about this next week when we do the
2nd episode because I think it actually fails.
I don't think it's a successful critique.
It's partly because it's kind of muddled because partly because
the workers and the people exploiting them are the same group of
people, but also because it does the usual Doctor Who thing of not
wanting anyone to be too rebellious in these situations, or
they'll turn into a villain.
And so, so we will get on to that more next week, but I do think
that that there is a very clear intention of doing that.
And I guess it's in the kind of robots of death tradition of
portraying a sort of slave uprising and then ultimately getting it
horribly wrong.
At least the doctor is not unequivocally on the side of the
oppressor.
No, and that is very different here, and I really, really think
that there's something particularly good about that.
And I do think too, that the way that we encounter the characters
after the big storm is really great.
So, you know, um, buzzer, Dickon and Jimmy are all in their
harnesses, so we know that they're them, but we encounter Cleaves
quite early on and she's sort of clearly confused.
And we encountered Jenny, both out of their harnesses, and it
turns out they're both gangers.
And did you understand?
Do you know the scene in the dining hall where the doctor heats up
some food in the microwave and then hands it to Cleaves to test
whether she's a ganger or not.
She doesn't realise she's a ganger at that point.
Is that right?
100%.
She doesn't realise she's a ganger.
And Jennifer certainly doesn't realise she's a ganga at all.
Neither of them do.
And I think that's, but I think that's one of the things that I
sort of really love about it in that they, it's only when it's
pointed out to them, that they're, the duplicate, the ganger.
And then something inside that goes, 0 my god.
Um, I'm the fake one and yet I feel like I'm the real one.
And that's kind of what sends them a bit a bit crazy or at least
because they know that they would want to destroy themselves.
Do you know what I mean?
So there's that they're probably in an internal conflict.
And there's probably a certain amount of inner hatred there too, if
you wanted to extrapolate.
I mean maybe it's going a bit far.
But that kind of self-loathing.
Oh my god, I'm the fake, I'm the fake.
I think that's actually quite well done in both in both instances
there.
And it's good that we don't do it and it's good that we don't do
it for everyone.
We just do it for 2 and then and then that's enough.
Yes, it's an excellent observation and also touches very nicely on
the um, position of the fan.
And how we are as observers of ourselves.
Yes, there you go.
Self-loathing is of the heart of the fandom.
Is that what you're saying?
Very much so.
I would hope so anyway.
I mean, it's terrifying conceptually because, because the, you
know, something about the subjectivity of the, of the people
involved that they, their experience is that they are a human
being up until the point of the storm and then suddenly they've
been turned into monsters.
That's what it feels like to them because they have all of the
memories that their originals have, but suddenly now they're kind
of disposable industrial tools.
And they're no longer sort of part of our moral community in a way
it's all right to kill them.
And the doctor kind of intervenes and sort of demonstrates, no
that's wrong.
That's the wrong attitude.
Look at them.
They're people.
They are literally you.
And so they are part of your moral community.
But that's not how, you know, we automatically react to them, I
think.
And one of the one of the successes, I think, in the
characterisation is, say, the difference between the way that
Jimmy reacts to his ganger, which is he pretty soon realises that
they're the same person and there's one scene where they're about
to go off together to hunt for Jennifer.
And they seem to be kind of willing to work together and that will
obviously develop next episode.
And then you have Cleves, who says, no, this is industrial
equipment owned by the company that has gone rogue and it's okay
to kill them.
The quicker we put things back to the way they were, the better.
I mean, this actually touches on what you're saying about, I can't
remember the character's name, funnily enough, the Scottish guy
with the king.
I mean, Jimmy.
It's Jimmy's even got a Jimmy name.
It is that sort of thing.
I mean, going back to the characterisations being poor.
I mean, they just throw in the thing with the kid, his son to use
that as a way of making him communicate with his ganger in a way
that makes him realise what you just said, that, oh, he's actually
a fully functioning entity.
Just going back to the sort of the, the thing about the, the sort
of the workers' rights or slave oppression or whatever it was you
were sort of talking about, it's, yes, it is, but not quite in the
way I think you said, because it's kind of complex because the
gangers are like the industrial equipment.
So you can't really suggest that the people working there are in
some way an oppressed working class.
There's a suggestion that they're being reasonably paid.
Yes, it's hard work, it's a terrible work day.
It's dangerous work.
They have to do it for a long period of time.
But they kind of, and they're looking forward to, to it being
over.
It's more like a sort of an ood situation.
Like, the gangers are sort of like the ood, uh, in a thirst, we
sort of treat them as disposable doesn't matter.
They're just they're cattle, basically.
But nevertheless, the gangers are created by the company or by
whatever the technology is to make it actually safer for the
workers to do their job.
So it's it's kind of, I like it because it's not actually clear.
Yeah, you see, I I dislike it because I think it is a little bit
muddy.
I'm not suggesting that the, um, the people working on the base
are, the oppressed class.
I think the gang, the gangers are, um, because the doctor shows us
that in fact, even before the storm happens, and the gangers come
to life, magically like in Frankenstein, um, that the gangers are
absorbing the personalities and memories of the people that
they're called on to imitate.
And so the flesh, that sort of big puddle of, it's horrible, isn't
it?
sort of like milk with hair in it or something.
It's super upsetting looking.
Um, that that has actually acquired a measure of sentience and, and
it has the ability to suffer.
And in fact, we're told that the way that the gangers are set up
is that the pain they experience is not conveyed through the
harnesses to their operators.
And so it's very expendable.
They can be destroyed.
There's an unlimited supply of them.
We just treat them like forklifts or something like that.
In fact, I think that comparison's explicitly made, isn't it, in
the script. think so, yeah.
Yeah.
It is worst, worst Delia Smith pudding.
It certainly didn't set correctly.
No.
You're meant to wear a hair nest for you.
Reminds you of the milk you got at school.
I think there are some really good ideas in motion here, but I
don't think it helps.
There's two things I don't think help.
One is that the pivotal moment that puts the humans and their
gangers at war is pretty simplistically rendered.
So it should have been tragic and regretful that Cleaves kills
someone to set this whole thing in motion.
But instead, we don't dwell on that.
Instead, 2 scenes later, both groups are chanting us and them, us
and them.
And so you reach that point really quickly and kind of a bit
uninterestingly.
But the other thing, I think, is that the gangers aren't rendered
that well, I think.
I think they look a bit comical, and they're not uncanny valley
enough.
Um, they needed to be something where you would look at them and
they really did look like the originals with just something a
little bit off, whereas in fact they just look like Odo off Deep
Space 9.
Like the makeup is almost designed to kind of like it deliberately
removes their facial features.
Like it makes them look less like the people that they're
imitating, um, with some exceptions, there's some good stuff with
Jennifer, where they just kind of make her pale and give her the
sort of veins and stuff.
And that's when they're emphasising.
There's a beautiful moment where she starts weeping and her face
goes from being just that sort of pale white to sort of being
fully human, which I think is sort of very well done.
And like maybe that's intentional as well.
Like the fact that the gang of makeup obscures the, the, the
features of the people in a story about identity.
That's the example, his exact example I was going to give, maybe
they should have looked like that sequence with Jennifer, the gang
of Jennifer, with the, you know, where she's just, it's more
subtle, the, the, um, imperfections of her, uh, to make, to make
it clear. she's a ganger.
I'd be curious to know why that's the only sequence that a ganger
looks like that.
Whereas in all the other sequence where the gangers look like
gangs.
They are the Odo sort of the wet looking Odo version.
Do you notice, though, too, that, and this is particularly when
they, you know, after the us and them sequence, and they, and they
all, the gangers all go off into their hide away, wherever it is.
It's like they're evil.
They plot the destruction of the humans when they look like Odo.
Uh, and when they go into full human form, is when they seem more
reasonable and um, uh, and and are able to sort of talk about, well
yes, maybe we can, we can, we can all get on.
Uh, I don't know whether that's deliberate or accidental, but it
is a bit sort of um, an interesting choice.
It's like Bruton in Terror of the Zygons.
He has all the dry wis of the, uh, of whoever is impersonating.
Yes, exactly. but not as himself.
Yes, yes, yes.
Yes.
He absorbs that bit of the personality.
It's curious.
Giving them the odo look and all that, I think is, is more a
choice about, let's make them look a bit horrific and, you know, a
bit subhuman and a bit, all the rest of it, just to sort of scare
the kids, get the action figure set out. whatever it is.
And so I think that's why those sorts of choices are made rather
than.
I suppose what I'm saying.
I think we tried to read too much into it by wondering why they
did that.
It's obvious.
They just wanted to have a monster. something that looks like a
monster.
I think that's absolutely right.
Yeah.
In a story which is already struggling to sell its, its themes
it's another thing that muddies the waters a little bit, I think.
Or does it help us identify what is the other?
Yeah.
In that, those, all those things that you've said, those, those
slices on the slide under the microscope and yet they have an
aorta, they have, they apparently have a functioning pulmonary
system.
He had a heart.
I'm still not sure whether that's the original or the copy in that
scene.
Obviously, it's the copy, but there's a point that, yes, they
become more monstrous as they lose the face, but then you see a
human face, but then you see other scenes where the originals, you
might say, the original, you might say.
I'm so sorry.
He's equally if not more monstrous in there in their drives
especially with cleaves.
Should we throw in that Raquel Cassidy's mother named her after
Raquel Welsh, because she was a fan of all of those of all of
those Bob Hope Christmas specials.
I think that that would cause anger in itself.
Originally funny, just pick up on that because that's actually a
very interesting point.
I think maybe we do need to see them as a bit of a monster and a
bit ugly in order to remind us that they're not real, not the
originals, but we still need to care for them.
So I think I think you're right.
There is a bit of the rills from Galaxy 4.
We need to have a bit of ugly there to make us question, oh, you
know, can we accept these people as real, genuine people?
Yeah, I agree.
I think that's sort of part of the horror, part of the terrible
thing that's happened to them.
You know, they've been othered by this sort of industrial accident
and suddenly they're kind of a bit disgusting and monstrous.
And I do think that one of the things that that can do is to
elicit sympathy for them.
And I think it does do that with Jen, but the problem is she is
such a kind of thoroughgoing monster that it's a problem.
I think it's a little bit like, you know, Doctor Who and the
Silurians, which is brilliant, and please don't, uh, said you hate
mail.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
That's right.
Send it.
Please don't blow up your base.
You know, the one of the problems with the Silurians is that the
premise is that they're people, but they just very quickly turn
into monsters who want to just kill us all.
And that's a bit of a shame because that premise gets slightly
thrown away.
And I think that this story kind of suffers from that a bit as
well.
But in both instances, it's not because the Saudi Urians or the
gangers are innately monsters.
It's because of internal political shenanigans that make, in the
Southerins case, convince them that they have to, you know, they
overthrow the peace-loving leader so that the warmonger can get on
with it and destroy humanity, sort of similarly with the gangers.
You've got some of them. they're discussing, or what can we do?
Should we try and, you know, get together or and then they go, no
we have to destroy them.
So they're not just acting as a block.
And they do split up into factionettes quite quickly.
I also think too, that it's a little bit like last year's Silurian
Supato, where one side murdering someone from the other side
actually is a kind of, you know, inciting moment.
Please, I hope you're not suggesting that this is as bad. as that
two-parter.
Uh no.
Well, there we are then.
Okay.
Fear her channelled through Chris Chipnall.
How could it go wrong?
One of the things that we haven't discussed this far into our
episode is the Dr. Amy and Rory.
Um, and I actually think that this 2 parter kind of has an
interesting role in this half season.
Because the doctor is clearly lying to Amy and Rory about what's
going on.
And so in that opening scene in the TARDIS, which has a
spectacularly good diagetic music choice, I have to say, the
doctor is going to drop Amy and Rory off so they can get fish and
chips because he has something that he wants to do and he doesn't
want them to come with him.
And when Amy says to him, I want to be where you are when you're
doing this thing, he looks at her really super weirdly.
And the opening of the episode has him looking again at the
quantum pregnancy screen, which he seems to be doing a lot of for
our benefit, I presume.
So it's very clear that he already knows that Amy is a ganger and
that he is here to find out more about them, but he actually lies
to them about that.
And I do think that this is one of the points where Matt Smith's
doctor actually becomes sort of quite devious and unlikeable.
Well, this is kind of he's showing his Sue Ester McCoy new
adventures kind of persona at this point.
But I never have a problem with that.
I think it, um, it accelerates a problem with Amy this season in
that a lot of the joy has been sucked out of her character, and I
know that there are plot reasons for this.
You know, the doctor is looking at Amy in a super weird way
because of the thing that's going on in the ark.
Um, But there's just not that same sparkle that they had last
year.
And I think it's a problem for just the enjoyment of watching it
episode to episode.
I think that there is a problem here. where our regulars actually
aren't all that fun anymore.
No, that's yeah.
Yeah, and I think I think in some ways it makes the episode
unpleasant to watch because it's a little bit unrelenting.
And even though we've thrown some dusty Springfield in the
beginning, which, you know, awesome.
There's precious little kind of fun or whimsy to be had.
And maybe that's okay.
Maybe last week and the week before were sort of fun and whimsical
and this is kind of the dark serious 2 parter.
But I still think it could be more fun.
I think there's more fun to be had next week, actually, to be
honest, but I agree.
With the game doctor, yeah.
Yeah, I think this is a little bit miserable.
And not only do you have the doctor being a bit strained with Amy
and Rory, but this episode makes Amy and Rory strained as well.
And so, if I'm honest, the Rory Jennifer Link is a bit weird.
I don't think it's sold in the script at all.
I don't worry if we're meant to think that Rory is actually a bit
attracted to Jennifer or if he's just giving care to her.
Um, she's all over him with kind of the kisses because he's the
only man who's ever shown her any kindness, which is a bit gross.
I just think the script fumbles this.
It drives a wedge between Amy and Rory.
Whereas actually a friendship between Rory and Jennifer, a proper
friendship would have been the way to go.
I think there's a little moment where Amy visibly gives Rory
permission.
So they make eye contact.
That's a very nice moment.
Yeah, that's a very nice moment.
And after that it goes a bit wrong.
Yeah, it does.
I think that might be a little bit of the way it's played.
I agree with you, but sort of not, not overly.
I think it's, I think my reading of it is that Rory is attracted
to Jennifer, uh, because, you know, for whatever reason, and he
but he knows that it's not, nothing's going to happen and he has
no intention of anything is going to happen.
He's certainly not going to stray.
But I kind of see, he's got a little bit of guilt about the fact
that, yes, he's a little bit attracted, attracted to her, but he's
got to care for her because she's, you know, upset, distraught, and
all the rest of it.
So I sort of think that works by making it a little bit ambiguous
that you're not entirely sure where it's going to go because
that's kind of often what life is like in this regard.
Yeah He certainly does seem to be being shunted off into a sort of
side plot.
He's kind of NISA assembling an android back in the TARDIS or
something in this episode.
It's a good way of actually splitting up the regulars because one
of the things that, especially when you've got 2 companions, is
that you want to be able to split the team up.
And I think that's just a method of the Jennifer subplot as a way
of getting Rory away from the others.
It does lead him to do kind of things that are irrational so that
he doesn't join them in the room at the end of the episode.
But it's integral to it.
It's integral to his character.
It's organic because everything that Rory does is empathetic.
Everything that he, and he's, he's so troubled by the fraternal
paternal feelings he has for Jen.
I don't believe there's any.
Oh, and of course he's a boy.
There's going to be some level of attraction.
We've already read that, but then there's all of that guilt that
goes into it.
I believe he's trying to, um, a parent and, in, indeed.
And he's so guilty about it, which which is a much a very
necessary moment of humour in this episode.
Nathan, do you think there's an element of Taranton Perry from the
Blake 7 episode Assassin, where the man just wants to take care of
the helpless woman.
The place that it does pay off is in that bathroom scene, which I
think is really good, because that makes it clear that Jen doesn't
know that she is a ganger until she sees herself in the mirror and
then vomits up, you know, some slime.
Yeah, yeah.
And then she turns into like that weird snake thing.
Yeah, that's, that's, and that was a poor choice at this, at this
time of the story, I think.
She turns into a monster too soon.
Yeah, yeah.
And there's no rational reason for that, at least at this point.
She needs to get a bit more demented before.
I'm a little bit on board with the face on the stalk, but I'm not
really on board with the big fist. just looks bizarre.
We don't really properly see it.
What are they trying to do, Terminator 2, aren't they?
I like the grotesqueness of it and we will get more of that next
week.
It is sort of super grotesque in a way that's nearly comical.
And I'm not sure the special effects are quite up to it, but, you
know, if I wanted to complain about that.
I'm watching the rock show.
Watch your mouth out there.
I think there's a very salient. plot reason that Jennifer is the
1st to go AWOL, which is the only real person to show genuine
sympathy for the gangers in those 1st few moments of the of the
episode.
So, you could say that it's a subversive writing that those who
care the most have the most to lose and therefore become the most
dangerous.
We were talking about lockdown earlier.
And um, I think I can see some threads here.
And how people behave under suppression and or oppression
especially the most sensitive in the group.
I've seen that both on the far left and the far right.
So perhaps it is yet another little bell to holding up a mirror to
how we behave.
I think this is very well written, and perhaps what it's losing
what we've talked about earlier in the episode is that just
through the process of getting a production onto screen, some of
these subtleties.
We have to question because they're not necessarily evident in the
script and maybe it shouldn't be evident.
Maybe it should be there for us to work out ourselves, the nuances
that just as there are nuances in this very conversation.
Yeah, I'm happy for things to not be explicit and I'm not, I'm
happy for things to not be explicitly, explicitly portrayed.
And I'm also very happy for different people to get different
ideas of what might be going on.
Uh, independently, and in fact, you can get slightly different
ideas each time you watch it.
Yeah, I think that sort of ambiguity is actually a strength.
Now maybe it's unintentional.
Maybe it should have been clearer.
But I don't think the end product is that problematic from that
point of view.
I think the ambiguity of it is fine, but this whole story, there's
something missing from, particularly this episode.
I was talking earlier about the sense of the uncanny valley about
the gangers.
The whole thing is like this.
It looks like Doctor Who, but it doesn't feel like it very much to
me.
It feels like the show's wit and warmth are a little bit absent
from this episode.
Yeah.
Yeah, I think you're right.
It's lacking some warmth, but I think there is still wit in this.
I think we're kind of nearing the end of our discussion here.
So let's talk about the cliffhanger.
How do we feel this one works?
I think it's really good.
I love the centrality of, of, Matt of the doctor calling himself
Smith.
Thereby subverting any level, all the levels of the narrative, in
fact, at once and telling us that, you know, that he is living
very much this part of the duality.
And it, I found it, even after several watchings.
There is a base spine level disturbance to it.
Matt does that very lovely with but not of creepiness.
With his sugar coated marshmallow piglet face.
It's nice that the end of the episode gives Matt something to do
because I think he's been a bit poorly served throughout the rest
of the episode.
Um, all of that dialogue about e- bye-bye gum and that, even he
can't say that.
It's dreadful.
But then, you know, we do get that moment at the end where he
comes face to face and you think, well, you know, we're going to
have some more entertaining stuff for next week and I think that's
borne out.
And I think it's very classic who, Cliffhanger, and I think it's
it caps off what is effectively quite a classic who story for an
episode.
Uh, and I mean that with all the pluses and minuses that one might
be able to uh, infer from that.
All the all the wonderful imperfections about how the episode has
been made.
Uh, I'm not denying, but I think it's, it's capped off with a
cliffhanger, which summarises that whole thing quite, quite well.
Well, dear listener, we really should head off to the bathroom to
fetch a towel right now, but we'll be back next week to see if
anyone's going to collapse into a puddle of white goo or anything
in the almost people.
In the meantime, you can find us wherever you get your podcasts
and you can keep up with us at flight through entirety on Facebook
at FDE podcast on Twitter, and on our website, flight through
entirety.com, where you'll find links to our other podcasts
Bondfinger, and Jody Interterterra.
Until next time, remember, you don't have to say you love me, just
stay close at hand.
Thank you very much for listening and good night.
Good night.
Bye for now.
Good and knocked.
That was Flight through Entirety, starring Nathan Bottomley, Peter
Griffith, Simon Moore and Richard Stone, theme arrangement by
Cameron Lam.
This episode, centuries of embittered religiosity, was recorded on
the 15th of August 2021 and released on the 10th of October.
Check out our YouTube channel for a how-to video on creating your
own flesh to help you out with unwanted domestic chores, family
gatherings, and quality time with the kids.
All you need is some lightly curdled milk, a handful of armpit
hair, and 4 to 5000 human souls damned to eternal perdition.
Can you give me a 2nd because I have Alfie crying and scratching
at the door outside the room, and I don't know whether it will
come over on my track, and plus I'm a very caring pet owner.
So I will go and deal with him.
I'll be back.
Okay.
I think it's another quick we.
It's all of these coffees.
It's a longer way. a longer way.