Hello, dear listener, and welcome back to Flight Through
Entirety.
The only Doctor Who podcast, all of whose hosts just discovered
that somehow they have the number 12 tattooed somewhere on their
body.
I think it looks cool.
I'm Nathan.
I'm Brendan.
I'm Simon.
I'm Johnny.
Well, over the past 3 years.
We've seen Clara being kind, brittle, foolhardy, dishonest, funny
and incandescently furious, but can she also be brave?
Let's find out as she discovers that she must, like all of us, I
guess, base the raven.
So we start, once again, at the very end of a Doctor Who adventure
just like we did, I think, in The Girl Who Died, and what's
happening here?
I guess what's happening here is the recurring idea that Clara is
somehow getting too big for her boots, you know, that she's being
more reckless.
Uh, it's always a shame when the when the adventure they've just
come from sounds really exciting.
You think, man, I want to watch that adventure.
Why, why didn't we film that today?
But peppered through this season has been this idea that Clara is
getting more and more daring and taking fewer and fewer
precautions.
And so you can't have that scene.
That scene actually happens twice in Face the Raven, doesn't it?
Because there's the beginning scene where the doctor's giving her
side eye because she's been taking too many risks.
And then it happens later on when she's headfirst out of the
TARDIS looking at it.
So we are really getting that idea reinforced again and again and
again.
Yeah, in fact, there's some dialogue between Rigsy and the doctor
where Rigsy comments on how foolhardy she is and the doctor says
it's something like a known issue or something.
It's a thing that happens.
And Murray also gives her the doctor's music when that happens.
So as she's hanging out of the TARDIS.
A little bit like Matt Smith in Day of the Doctor, she does get
the Capoldi Doctor's theme music there as well.
So the whole show is kind of saying that. and sort of leading up
to it, I think.
I mean, the adventure sounds fun, doesn't it?
There's a sentient plan that the doctor has to marry, you know, a
whole heap of stuff like that.
And the other thing is that Clara is delighting in how clever she
is.
So she's saying, you know, I saved your life.
If you hadn't been for me, you would have been done like this.
And I think this feeds into this sort of uncomfortable
relationship, I think that fandom has with Clara, that she's
trying to be the doctor, and there's something weirdly patriarchal
about this too, that we're not really comfortable with her
stretching her wings a bit and trying to behave in the way that
the doctor is behaving.
And then on top of that, she's really rather proud of the whole
thing.
She seems to get not just a sort of adrenaline buzz from it, but a
kind of self-esteem boost from it as well too.
And I think there's something in that, which has rubbed people up
the wrong way throughout the thing.
And I'm not sure how I feel about that.
I think it's a little bit unfair to have the female character in
the show be the one who is trying things that the doctor does.
And for us to have a slightly disapproving lens over that.
I mean, there are some other things that she does that are doctor
ish here too.
She's the one who does the exposition about what a trap street is
and I think that seems very striking that does seem to be the sort
of speech that the doctor should be giving.
Yes.
Yeah.
And I love how the doctor's reaction to that is basically like
well, you know, I don't think it's going to be a cartographer's
trick that is going to solve this and then immediately says, but
we look for one in real life.
Yeah.
And so he's kind of doing the 12th doctor-ish thing and saying, no
that's a silly idea before turning around. like, no, actually it's
great.
Well done.
Well, but he also has the line, you know, it's a missing street
and you humans immediately decide that it's a copyright
violation.
There's no right for the end.
On the topic of Clara developing this reckless streak.
Yeah, I do think there was this pervasive sense of, oh no, she
shouldn't do that because that's what the doctor does.
Whereas at the time, what I remember thinking is it felt like we
were going in a direction of she's doing this because she's lost
Danny and the show is presenting.
This is an unhealthy way to cope with your grief to seek out
risk.
And it is a recognised thing that some people do.
And I remember the only problem I had with it is she is punished
by the narrative for being like the doctor.
And it's a conscious decision.
It was one that Stephen Moffatt developed, but also Sarah Dollar
the writer of this episode, was behind.
But I still feel uncomfortable with it, but I feel uncomfortable
with it in the same way I feel uncomfortable about Donna's mind
wipe in that, oh, this is highly effective drama in that it's
making me feel things, but I don't like it.
Yeah, I do think that that's the problem.
And she is like the doctor, you know, right from, I mean, she
appears in the opening credits of Death in Heaven, doesn't she?
It's her face rather than Capaldi's face.
And the relationship's been presented as an addiction and it
creates problems in Danny and Clara's relationship, it causes her
to sneak around and be dishonest and all sorts of things like
that.
I think we've said before that that central relationship in the
show, the one that we all kind of aspire to have.
I don't know about you, but I was always...
Yeah, absolutely.
Of course, 100%. yeah.
Specifically Bonnie Langford for me.
Well, I was mostly Liz Slade.
Yes, I was mostly Liz Slade, yes.
Like Russell T. Davis.
I think, you know, Clara starts out a little bit like Sarah Jane.
But actually, she ends up more like Mel, I would say, because she
has a sort of relationship with the doctor, where she tells him
what to do quite a lot of the time.
And so she's his teacher.
She's his coach, and it gets to the point in the girl who died
where she's not even that concerned about the main peril of the
episode, because she just knows the doctor is going to get there
eventually.
And she knows it all she has to do is sit there and just sort of
coach him along till he gets to that and then everything is going
to be all right.
Um, that has a sort of mel like feel.
I think.
And she kind of tries to play that trick again in Face the Raven
in that she takes this enormous risk mid-episode.
So confident is she, that everything is going to work out all
right because the doctor is by her side and that's the bit.
That's the bit that backfires.
Yeah.
I'm not sure about the fact that the story, the plot punishes her
for being like the doctor, because what the story is punishing her
for is being complacent, and that's what you get in, the girl who
died and so on. and what you see at the beginning of this episode
as well. is this kind of relaxed complacency that it's all right
all going to be all right.
The doctor's going to solve everything and we're all going to get
away with, so it doesn't really matter what I do.
So it's like the doctor looks like he's being reckless, but
actually he always knows what he's doing underneath or at least he
takes calculated risks.
Whereas Clara is starting to take reckless risks.
And I think that's what she's being punished for.
But I think because it's the Moffat era.
It is kind of presented as well as Clara knowing the rules of a
Doctor Who story.
And so she and she actually recognises the individual beats in the
girl who died.
You know, she spots the moment where the doctor has his final
proper good plan and she knows that he hasn't come up with that
yet and so on.
And so it's similar here, and the show actually does it here
because then you get Capaldi at the end, and we'll talk about this
later, saying, have you ever heard of anyone who managed to stop
me?
And so the doctor himself knows that he always wins in a Doctor
Who episode and he turns that into a thread at the end of the
episode.
And we have had that before.
I think Matt Smith's doctor does that sort of grandstanding as
well.
And Tennant, as far back as silence in the library, is also kind
of saying, there have been a lot of Doctor Who stories to the
Vashta Narada, and I've won all of them. back off.
Yeah.
You even have a copy of the wheel in space in this library.
It's that well funded.
I think it's hard to talk about Clara being punished for her role
in this story, in the conclusion, without referencing Hell Bent
because eventually, eventually she is going to become a doctor
like figure.
She is going to travel the universe with an irregular heartbeat
and a companion and they're going to go and have adventures the
long way around.
So, in a way, this is almost a bit of a feint, in fact, because
we're the full arc of this story, she is going to end up in a very
different place in a few episodes time.
And it's not impossible to have a doctor-like character as a
companion. like River has shown us that.
And Romana has shown us that back in the day.
It's something about Clara being human.
And I think, Simon, I think you've put your finger on it where you
say it's this, she's, she's doing one particular thing, a
particular style of recklessness, which is the problem, which the
other characters that we've seen behave in a doctor-like manner
perhaps don't do to such an extent.
I just want to also comment, though, about the what it actually
does to what it feels like to watch these episodes.
And that's, I think, where I start to not like where it goes.
I don't mind per se, this is a sort of a plot point, but I
actually start to find the whole thing quite tiresome.
And I think it does take away something about how an episode
should be.
Yes, a companion should always have faith that the doctor can
solve it, but there's something about what Clara's response is
throughout this season that makes me not find the episodes
entertaining, not as entertaining as, I don't feel there's as much
a sense of risk anymore because everyone's kind of bit too blasé
about, oh, we'll just get out of this, and so it doesn't really
matter.
So I think it actually does actually affect my enjoyment of the
episodes, if that makes sense.
I'm not really expressing that right.
No, I think it's, and I could be wrong, please correct me if I'm
being presumptuous, but that whole kind of meta narrative thing
where Clara is aware on some level that she's in the Doctor Who TV
series.
And so we're always going to win.
And we know that.
I mean, there is supposed to be a sense of risk as far as the
characters are concerned.
The characters need to think that there's a sense of risk.
Yeah, but we obviously are in the comfortable position of knowing
that the doctor will win and that's part of the pleasure of the
show for us, but that, because the new series is based not so much
on the old series as it is on our experience of the old series.
The characters are a little bit more aware.
And it's a Moffat thing, really, rather than an R2 game.
It's not throughout the whole new series.
It's just, it's just what's happening at this period.
I think.
But I think Moffat does do that a bit.
Yeah, Simon, I'm, I'm kind of with you on that in that, I think
it's a symptom of this series in particular that goes right the
way back to the same old, same old promotional material.
The production team is sort of saying to the audience, you know
what to expect from us.
And it does remove a little bit of the drama.
And I think there is an element to having the best of both
worlds.
You know, if we talk about Liz Laden again in, say, the seeds of
doom, she has every faith that the doctor will get them out of
this situation, but I'm thinking sort of on the Antarctic-based
episodes.
She has every faith doctor will get them out of this situation.
But she still sells the gravity of the situation in her
performance.
I think what probably helps here is bringing back Rigsy, who we
really loved last series, and so he's the one saying, no, no, no
like don't take the tattoo off me because it's not going to work
out well.
Yeah.
You know, he's the one who doesn't know the rules of Doctor Who
and is the sensible person screaming at the screen watching a
horror film saying, don't go upstairs.
Don't investigate the noise.
Go back to the party.
Yeah, it's one of those situations of, oh, this is really terrific
drama, but I don't feel the danger as much.
I'm not, as say, the idiot's lantern.
Yeah, I'm not being drawn in.
And you're absolutely right.
It's like, it's like the difference between saying the doctor will
get us out of this and only the doctor can get us out of this.
Do you know what I mean?
It's sort of like, you still have to, as I think, Nathan, you've
said it right in that, in that the characters can't be, we can be
aware that we know that there's going to be another episode next
week in another season next year.
And so therefore, the lead character will survive, one in one form
or another.
But the characters can't know that.
And I think I think you can get away with that on a one here or
there or every now and again, but when it sort of starts becoming
this recurring theme throughout an entire season, that's when it
starts to lose me.
And I think that's my main problem with the season, I think, is I
start to, I start to kind of lose interest.
I'm not being drawn in.
Although, to be fair, she does get killed in the episode.
Do you know what I mean?
There is a genuine risk and she is action.
And that's the payoff, but we'll come to that long drawn out
sequence a bit later, I suspect.
I was trying to remember if I if I knew whether Clara was coming
back on 1st viewing this episode.
And I think I may have seen, I may have seen an image of her in
the diner, the diner uniform, so I think maybe I kind of knew.
Even if I didn't, I suspect the chances of Jenna Coleman not
turning up in the next 2 episodes.
I think I would have thought she's going to turn up again.
And this comes back to whether the episode is trying to break the
mould of a Doctor Who episode and then whether it succeeds.
So it does, I think, try to break the mould of the episode in a, it
does that thing where a character dies, you're getting the sense
that time is running out, you're getting the sense things are not
going to work out the same. as they did every other time we've
been in this situation.
And yet, we've seen so many characters in the new series of Doctor
Who turn up again after seemingly fatal incidents have occurred to
them that it is hard now to break that rule of the new series, the
new series that, if someone can be remembered, it can come back.
That rule is now so entrenched that it's hard to find the jeopardy
in these characters storylines.
Exactly.
I, you say, Nathan, she dies at the end.
I never thought when I was watching it the 1st time, that that was
the death of the character, that she had actually does.
I just thought it was like, yet another one of those things where
oh, actually, no, it wasn't a disintegrator.
It was a teleport and she's somewhere else.
I mean, you know what I mean?
So that's what I'm saying.
The show has always done that, though, hasn't it?
And like when Billy Piper is shot by the Android in Bad Wolf, I
don't think we think she's dead, I think we know that she isn't.
And that sort of stuff happens all the time.
Like Sarah's weeping over the doctor at the end of Pyramids.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
But are we supposed to life?
Aren't we supposed to think that the character's been killed in
this episode?
I think we are.
I was surprised.
Like we're supposed to think it's earth shock.
Yeah I didn't expect it.
And I think killing the companion is a bad idea on the whole.
I think it doesn't work in Earthshock and we just chose the most
disposable companion that no one really likes and then we all get
over it in about 30 seconds. including the car. that's right.
That's what makes.
I think that's what makes Earthshock work is that we never really
like that guy in the 1st place and now he's dead.
And I think that's what really, that's where the real kicker is.
Yeah, except that we're all over it.
I mean, you know, Adrich wouldn't want us to mourn, Simon.
We should go after the great exhibition.
You know.
So it's kind of the, it's crappy.
And then I think that it was really gross in mind warp because you
have the companion of Perry who is constantly being mauled by
people and exist basically to have her rape, you know.
Yeah, it's all just so rapey and creepy and that's really
terrible.
So I think it's generally a bad idea.
And I think the surprising thing is that she has been in it as the
companion for longer than anyone else.
She's the longest serving companion in the new series by this
point.
Are you talking about episodes or just...
So, well, no, I think in episodes.
No one's done 2.5 seasons before her have they?
Well, Amy.
How many did she do?
She does 2.5 as well.
Well, her half is a shorter half, admittedly.
Yeah, you've got to take into account, shorter episodes, a longer
episodes, but I think someone did the maths and it's like Amy
Clara, Jamie, and Yaz and Tegan have similar tenures.
And I think...
Pantheon...
Minutes on screen.
Yeah, and I think I think Clara just beats out Amy due to like the
longer series 7B half and the extra specials and what have you.
So you can imagine, like, it's not like killing Katerina, right?
It's more significant and there are kids watching and the death is
pretty brutal.
And what we get is exactly what we expect from Moffatt, where the
story goes wrong in that she's killed and in that her death is a
fridging in the sense that it's a female character whose death
exists primarily to make the male protagonist have the feels.
And boy, does he have the feels?
I tell you what.
So that's a problem.
And I think Moffat is aware of the problem and I think that the
rest of the season, we have, you know, the doctor hit absolute
rock bottom in the next episode, but then we have the problem
fixed.
It's no longer a fridging because we're actually centring Clara in
the final episode.
Clara is the character who knows what's going on and the doctor
doesn't.
The story is being told to Clara, and she's the one who we
discover is in control of that entire situation, and she's no
longer dead.
So Moffat does what he does so often, which is that things reach
an absolute low point before they get better.
That's just normal in drama.
I think the absolute low point, though, is that the actual
storytelling goes wrong in Moffat and that it gets fixed at the
end.
And so this is pretty standard sort of moffetry, I think.
And I think he is aware of what's going on with this, that why
this death isn't the sort of thing that should happen on Doctor
Who.
And to add to that in Hellbent.
Clara, of course, has to correct the doctor's behaviour, yeah. to
set the story right.
She does have an important role to play as an agent of change in
that episode.
And I think it's also interesting in that episode, how she keeps
trying to tell people that she's okay with the status quo and
she's okay with how she is.
She does it about 2 or 3 times in that episode.
And eventually she has to say, why won't anyone listen to me when
I'm saying?
What do we think about Maisie Williams in this episode?
Uh, look, I think she's really great.
I remember at the time there was sort of disappointment around her
portrayal because I think everyone was just expecting her to be
Aria from Game of Thrones, but she's an actor.
She's giving a different performance.
And I think it's subtly different enough from what we've seen
before.
And she's got like such self-assurance and such confidence until
everything goes wrong.
It's hard to act in that scene with Jenna and Peter doing their
thing, but I think she really holds her own in that final scene.
I'll just sort of echo what I said in the woman who lived episode
which was, I'm not 100% convinced she's that great an actor.
I think she's fine and I think she was very engaging in Game of
Thrones partly because the character in it all worked.
And I don't think it's typecasting.
I don't think it's the fact that, yeah, I'm imagining her as Aria
Stark and that's all I can see.
I don't think it's that, but I've never been convinced in all the
episodes she's in this season.
I'm just not 100% convinced of the performance.
So I watched the girl who died and the woman who lived and then
faced the raven in that order so that I could see what happens to
a shoulder or slash me across those 3 episodes.
And it's a really good way to watch, actually.
And then I watched Hellbent after...
So I really got a sense of 4 quite different performances, actually
from her, which is what she's called upon to do.
Like she's called the one to be distinctly different in each of
those 4 episodes.
And it's, I think it's a really difficult job she's been given.
And I think she acquits herself pretty well, actually, in doing
those different things.
Like if you go back to the girl who died.
She really is playing a teenager in that and she's got a whole
sort of body language and a whole sort of mannerisms, which is
very different to when you get to face the raven.
If there's something that doesn't quite land about it.
For me, it's, she doesn't seem to have a sort of gravitat in her
in her, um, in her physical performance, and particularly when you
get to this episode where she's in control of this world.
I think she does it pretty well, but there's something about her
something about her stature or the way she's delivering her lines
which doesn't quite land.
And I think the other thing, I keep thinking about a shoulder
about how many times we've seen Moffatt, do a woman as a sort of
complex space-time event, which is popping up in the doctor's
history.
You know, it's getting pretty crowded in Dragonfire and the 5
doctors with people popping up in the background in photos or
clips, you know?
So if you think about river, if you think about the impossible
girl and you think about a shilder, there's a pattern here about
women as puzzle boxes and people who confound the doctor and who
keep peering in times of his life.
And I, you know, I think there's also something unsettling about
the doctor in a Schilders relationship.
So, it's not uncommon, you know, in TV, Doctor Who, in books
Doctor Who, in all sorts of things to have these sort of morally
ambiguous characters who are sometimes helping the doctor and
sometimes at odds with the doctor.
And I think, I think that bit is okay.
But I've never been sold by the reason why the doctor couldn't
have just rescued her in the woman who lived, as she was
requesting him to do.
So take me away from all this.
And it reminds me, Nathan, of your, uh, the, the phrase that keeps
coming back to me about this is space reason.
You know, there's actually, it's not particularly convincing that
this very powerful figure, this very powerful man shouldn't do
what his friend is asking him to do.
His friend's asking him for help.
And he constantly says, no, it's not the right time or no, it
wouldn't work out very well or, you know, insert unconvincing
reasons.
Well, the unconvincing reason, sorry to butt in there, I think, is
usually presented as the doctor feels that the person in question
has some kind of moral failing, which means that they deserve to
go with him.
And I sort of felt like at the end of the woman who lived, that
that was an inadequate reason because he's not giving her enough
of the benefit of the doubt for the kind of life she's had to
leave for the last half many 100 years. you know what I mean?
Completely by that.
I mean, what that episode says is that he doesn't take her because
the 2 of them are the same and so that's a problem.
But he doesn't need to take her.
No.
He doesn't, he just needs to take her away from that period of
history so she can live a better life.
She does, in fact, though, get to she does seem to have more
purpose here.
There is that kind of, you know, Yeah, yeah, yeah.
She's a bit distanced and a little bit, you know, she cares about
something.
She has something that she cares about doing.
And she cares about people in the way that me didn't.
And so her interaction with the doctor has done something, has
given her a renewed sense of purpose.
When we did the Woman Who Lived episode, Richard mentioned that
Rufus Hound and Maisie Williams had been given cameras and were
recording each other, and I went and watched some of that, and I
was just so shocked.
Like Maisie Williams is 17, I think, at this point.
Is she?
She's really young and it's why she's so babyfaced.
And she's so girly.
It's so adorable.
Like, it's terribly cute.
Rufus Hound says to her, oh, this is your 1st TV, isn't it?
And she says, yes, you know.
And he explains to her.
This is a mark and that's where she has to stand.
And like it's really funny, but she's so sweet.
Like, it's really surprising.
And, you know, seeing her like, she's not carefree in that 1st
episode.
She loves the boys, you know, the Vikings who come back safe and
stuff and she loves them and he's loved by them.
But other than that, she's kind of an austere figure and she's
really sort of distant and serious and stuff.
And it was just funny seeing how different that is from herself at
this point.
Yeah, yeah, but just take care of what Johnny said before.
I think she does lack a certain stature to be able to then fully
carry it off.
And I think that's what I'm trying to say before about.
I'm not convinced she's the best actress.
Maybe that's unfair.
I think she's a little bit miscast for this.
I think they're too excited about having her from Game of Thrones
in this and they've got this role and I think it needed...
I didn't realise she was that young still.
So I think she, I think it needed someone who was just a little
bit older to carry it maybe.
I do like the kind of contrast between that sort of chubby-cheeked
baby-faced appearance that she has and, you know, how powerful
she's become clearly at this point.
And then seeing her at the end of the universe in 2 weeks' time is
putting a coat of all as well.
She's terrific in that scene at the end of the universe too.
And I really do sense another step change in her performance from
there again.
You know, they've made a conscious decision to cast someone young
who's going to age across in the narrative.
And I suppose the other option would have been to cast someone
older and to get them to be younger at the beginning.
And I think the risk is the same.
You know, I think it's a difficult thing to do whichever way you
choose to go.
I think that change between just an actual girl, like a 17 year
old, uh, you know, who the doctor does this weird thing too, and
now she just sort of lives forever, and she's eternally 17, And so
there's this weird dissonance between her appearance and her kind
of demeanour.
Yeah.
She gets a nice line in the woman who lived, incidentally, where
she's talking about Clara, and they're stuck in, they're stuck in
a chimney for story reasons.
I can't remember at the moment, but she says she says to the
doctor about Clara, but there's something bad is going to happen
to her and she says she'll blow away like smoke.
And actually, actually is a reference, I think, forward to face
the raven.
He only saves a shilder because he's terrified of Clara dying and
he even says that in The Girl Who Died.
So, you know, we've been seeding Clara dying and Clara's death has
been bound up with a shilde all the way through the season, I
think.
So what about when he says, Captain Jack, he says, he'll get
around to you eventually.
What are you saying, doctor?
No wonder he got cancelled.
It's interesting like with how effective that death is.
And, you know, it's not a transmat beam, it's not a glowing effect
or anything like that.
It's very unequivocally physical.
You know what I mean?
And there is a body at the end of it.
And we've already seen someone else die like this.
What's amazing to me is reading up on this episode.
Sarah Dollard basically pitched for episode seven.
Basically pitched for a one off story, unconnected from the arc
pretty much the same structure.
So there, it was called Trap Street.
It was still the sort of alien refugee camp, but the mayor was not
a shielder.
It was an original character, and the plot revolved around.
There was a Santarian in the camp.
So Dan Starkey gets another paycheque.
Um, and Clara even walks in and distracts.
What the hell are you doing here?
And he's like, no, I'm Commander Scan.
And what it is, he's actually a plant for the Santarans and is
planning an invasion of Earth and masterminds the whole situation
to destabilise the camp so that the Santarans can use it as a
base.
And so it's just a basic who done it.
And then after getting the script, Moffatt went, well, if we put a
shoulder in this and I've been talking about when to kill Clara
this season, if we do it just before the finale, hey, Sarah, how
would you like to kill off a companion and use Maisie Williams and
Sarah said, yes, please.
I think I'm really preferring that episode we didn't have, actually
because I think there's so much interesting stuff in there that is
effectively just brushed over in this and that's one of the issues
I have with the episodes.
I think there's so many interesting there's so much interesting
potential with this refugee camp and what you could do with it.
And basically, I just think a much better story could be
constructed in it and that one sounds like it'll do.
Thank you very much.
See, I feel the opposite way.
I feel like surprised me.
Yeah.
Like as I'm watching it, as the death of Clara comes in 10 minutes
from the end, it's like a full quarter of the episode is that
scene.
I kind of think, well, that's okay. okay.
I don't think, though, that, like, what it is, instead we get an
alien invasion, which are just sort of 10 a penny.
It always surprised me that Trap Street was pitched as a
standalone story because I just didn't think that there was enough
there.
And I think what we do get.
Like, I think it's an inventive idea.
I think it's really it is really... a very inventive idea.
Do you know that?
I love that.
I love that idea.
I think it's great.
But it's a backdrop.
It only being allowed to be a backdrop to what they want to do
this piece of self-indulgence that they want to go through
basically.
But I mean, I'm not sure that it's a piece of self-indulgence.
I mean, it is, you know, when companions leave in the new series.
It is always traumatic.
Yeah.
And, you know, things like doomsday and journeys end and stuff.
And I think the show can do that and can have that.
And when we were watching it as children, the companions leaving
was never quite that, but that's how we felt about it.
Perhaps with the exception of Joe, when Joe leaves and the
doctor's really broken up about that.
And Joe is probably signposted through the relationship with
Cliff.
I think the Trap Street stuff is, as you say, it's a backdrop to
what happens.
And it's an unusually rich and interesting backdrop, actually, and
it does feel like there's a Doctor Who story there, which could be
played out, but it's a sign of, it's a sign of confidence in the
series that it's prepared to just let it be a backdrop.
It's also a massive diversion as well too.
So, there's actually the murder mystery within the Trap Street is
of no relevance to what happens in the episode.
It's not even necessary.
It's not even a murder.
She's fine.
Yes, yes, yes.
Shelda could have grabbed the doctor the moment he walked into the
trap street.
And so it has no impact on the plot.
And that does make it feel a bit off putting that we've put so
much time and energy into world building of this place.
And I think that's done pretty well pretty quickly.
You get a sense of somewhere, which is, uh, which is an
interesting and exciting place to be, but we're not going to spend
much time there.
And then when the episode ends, we never hear of it again.
It's not revisited.
Presumably Rigsy gets out of Trap Street with his memory wiped or
something and everyone goes back to being a cyberman with a human
face or something or, you know, presumably life goes on in Trap
Street.
But I find that a really common thing in the Moffat era and is
that ideas are introduced or scenarios are introduced and then
dumped relatively quickly.
Sometimes mid-episodes, sometimes at the end of the episode
because they've just been a way of getting us in to the story and
getting us to tell the story Moffatt really wants to.
I think that's a nice way of looking at it.
But I think it's a generous way of looking at it.
I think that it's more a question of that, you know, whatever
whether it's time pressures, last minute changes, and then things
are left over from things that were taken out, then there's this
bit of detritus that's been left behind.
And I suppose what I'm saying is I think you give them too much
credit in terms of how these things actually unfold.
I guess I'm not trying to give them credit.
I'm just trying to, I'm just trying to explain what I'm fair
enough.
Really, is all I'm trying to do.
I don't quite know how to feel about it.
I'd actually, I actually wouldn't swap out the conclusion of the
episode for us to tie up some loose ends around Trap Street.
I think we've moved on from that relatively.
I mean, I think the involvement of the time lords and Clara's
behaviour just come in and break that story and now we're going to
do something else.
I don't think the story would benefit from having a less rich and
interesting backdrop against which to have this drama.
Oh, I'm not saying.
And so I think that because the forces are so great that warp this
story.
Do you know what I mean?
I think the time lords can come in and turn the narrative around
or do something really odd to the narrative and that's what's
happening here, I think.
I think that the original version of Trap Street might have been
interesting.
And I think Sarah Dollard is really pretty damn great.
And her next episode is also pretty good as well.
And she writes very, very well for Capoldi's doctor.
I don't know.
I mean, I actually quite like the scene, even before we know that
Clara's going to die, the way that things start falling apart
before that happens, the way the story, as a murder mystery just
breaks down because the victim's alive.
Like, I think that that's actually, that is actually pretty great
and pretty interesting.
And, you know, that backdrop is a real place and a really
interesting place and I think it is well realised and I'm kind of
just content to have that and we move on to something else.
I think my issue is the way the sort of the death sequence unfolds
is that it is, I mean, whilst the fact that capality is absolutely
spectacular in that sequence, in those sequences and afterwards.
I just find the whole thing, that whole thing just goes on far too
long.
And because I just don't feel invested in it.
I just I just feel like, okay, yeah, I get the point.
I get what's going to happen.
I think it just needed to unfold a little bit more rapidly because
I think it's more shocking if it happens a bit more suddenly than
this endless march to the execution.
And I know the feeling they were probably trying to get that
feeling of that, you know, like, you know, someone being escorted
to the electric chair or something.
But it just for me, the whole thing just slows down to a
standstill and I can't get invested in what's going to happen
partly because I, going back to that previous point, partly
because I'm not buying the fact that she's actually going to die.
And so all that endless lead up is over the top for me.
Yeah, I mean, I think I think what's interesting is having a
character knowing that they're going to die and that there's
nothing that can be done.
Absolutely.
And then just that interaction between those 2 actors.
I mean, yes, look, I do, I do find myself moved by that episode
but I'm also watching it being done.
Do you know what I mean?
You're watching the dialogue you're watching, the characters, and
I'm happy to watch TV like that.
Like, that's generally how I watch it.
The sequence in the drawing room where they're talking about
what's going to happen.
That's great.
It's then, even though maybe it goes on a little bit too long.
But then it's these desperately slow sort of things where she goes
out into the street and these shots with the raven.
It's all that that's, oh, please.
Yeah, something we discussed last night was as soon as the credits
rolled, Rod said, it's really good. the repeated shots of Clara
crying out.
He said, that's cruel. cruel for a child.
And I think it's there to sell that this is real.
Just trying to say that she's actually dying as opposed to where
it's not a trick.
Yeah.
And you know, it's a recognised cinematic device, especially for
violent moments that you repeat it from several angles.
I think it just needed to be a little bit tighter on some of those
shots in terms of time.
That whole buildup where they're talking to each other.
It's the same kind of buildup as the doctor, Nissa and Tegan
running around the console room saying we have to get Adric out.
It's Brian Blessed running down the corridor to get to Perry.
It's his sort of buildup of action where you as the viewer are
going, no, no, no, no, no, no.
It gives time for that realisation of, oh, she's actually not
going to get out of it this time.
But at the same time, it's a double-edged sword.
It's like if it's not working for you from the 1st line, it's not
going to be working for you by the last line.
The moment in that speech when you twig that it's not going to
work out this time, is the moment you start to lose interest in
the scene because there's a discomfort.
There was for me anyway watching it, it's like, actually, I just
want to get past this bit.
I want to get past this bit because I know what's coming now and I
am uncomfortable.
Yeah, I feel like there's no right answer.
I think that scene is too long and I think that the repeated shots
of the silent scream at the end are a little bit clunky.
But then the whole artifice of Trap Street is present throughout
the whole thing.
Like, so we move, at the beginning of the episode, we're in the
real world, we're wandering around London, we've been to Rigsey's
flat, and then we move into what's clearly a fantasy world.
You know, the sets look very theatrical.
You know, it's full of witches and smoke and birds and it feels
like it's from a, from a fantasy perspective.
And so it's hard when you get to that bit of the end where you're
going to kill off a character.
When everything about the aesthetic of the episode has felt quite
storybook or quite fairy tale, if you like.
There's a China Mieville book called Kraken, and it also has
hidden streets in London that have fantasy creatures in it.
I was getting sort of diagon alley vibes from the street itself.
And I think that's right.
It does take place suddenly in this storybook world.
And part of what happens is that Clara misunderstands the rules of
the world.
Like there's no reason why her plan shouldn't work.
And it's only that moment at the end where we learn that it's, you
can pass the thing on, but you can't cheat it completely.
And then we, you know, the thing that Rump tells her earlier.
And then we suddenly realised that we should have known all along
that this was how that worked, that that was what he meant by
that.
But in a sense, the rules are magical and arbitrary. aren't they?
That's not a criticism.
I think the fact that it is a storybook thing, the fact that it's
a raven, I think, is stunningly great, and the way that the, we
start seeing shots of the raven, as we are learning that Clara is
inevitably going to die, and hearing it cawing, and all of that
and even just the expression, face the raven, I think, is is so
good, like all of that stuff works really, really, very well
indeed.
I mean, that's true.
Like, it just has to be that way because that's what the fictional
version of this is going to be.
You know, like it's never going, the quantum shade, which we never
find out what it is.
It's rushed over what it is.
It's never going to take the form of a bunny rabbit, right?
It's never going to take the form of something cute and cuddly.
It's got to be something vaguely menacing like a raven.
There's no in story reason given for why it likes to spend its
time as a raven.
Why it likes to spend its time caged up all the time.
It has to be like that because, because we have this, because it's
symbolic, because it brings back ideas about the occult and, you
know, that darkness, which, which, that shiver you, you always
feel when you see this big blackbirds, you know, and you think it
can't be anything else.
So, I think I'm convinced, well, what you're saying, Nathan, is
you know, the fictionality of it kind of takes over.
Yeah.
You know, it gets drawn by what it has to be to make the fiction
of it work.
I mean, it's just telling the doctors explanation of what it is is
it's a kind of spirit.
Like we're well and truly not doing anything remotely resembling
science fiction.
Well, no, you don't need to...
That would just really get bogged down.
Oh, yeah, it's from the planet Quam.
Exactly.
Like blah, blah, blah.
And they lived for 370 years.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
And they have to kill once every 3 days. otherwise they lose their
connection to the dimmy-dong thing, you know.
Well, in fact, all this is now, all this is now.
Exactly, you know.
Return to quantity.
Big finish.
It doesn't I didn't quite get understand the reason why if you can
pass it on and so and so on.
Why can't Clara pass it back to Rigsy and then she, if for
whatever reason the deal she's done means that she can only
extract it from Rigsy and no one else.
Yeah, she can't give it back to him.
Or if she did give it back to him, he would die because me says
that you've cut me out of the loop.
This was an arrangement between me and the shade.
And now it's not I haven't given the shame.
Yes, yes.
So there is some dialogue to kind of try and work around that and
it's not too tedious and it just does what it means.
And it doesn't really matter.
I have to say, too, that the even just that beginning thing where
Rigsy calls up and says, I've got a tattoo on the back of my neck
that's counting down is so brilliant.
Like, it's so clever.
You know, we've been at this for so long, this stupid show.
And like it matches to do something incredibly different that you
would never have imagined before.
That's really visual and effective, that doesn't require 15
minutes of exposition to get it.
To get it there.
Exactly.
It's very clear what it is And it just leads to some absolutely
joyful moments like the doctor being in awe over Lucy, the baby.
A new human.
Yes.
Yeah, and then and then when he figures out that he can't
immediately think of a way to rescue Rigsey, he grabs the cards
and starts using Rigsey's name and Rigsey's like, no, don't use my
name. use my name.
I know it seriously.
Speaking of Rigsy, his proper name in one version of the script
which is not spoken on screen for obvious reasons, was Christopher
Riggins.
No, please no.
I think Sarah Dollar knew it would never make it discreet.
I mean, Rigsy's an interesting choice because we've seen him once
before.
It could easily have been Osgood or someone we're more familiar
with.
It doesn't, you know, it's someone we've seen in multiple
episodes.
I think it's never a bad idea to have positive male young role in
the show and I think that a lack of knowledge about Rigsey's world
and what else is happening to him makes us do fear a little bit
more for him that things might go wrong for him.
He might actually be in genuine danger here.
But I think that beginning section suffers a little bit from the
pacing problems that we're mentioning about the end of the, the
end of the episode as well.
I think it does take a little bit too long, all of that stuff in
the map room and then walking around London, and actually, why
couldn't we have just gone there because the doctor makes this
enormous leap of logic when he says, oh, Rigsy, you've had contact
with aliens in the last 24 hours.
Suddenly he goes, right, well, it must be because there's a group
of hidden aliens somewhere, if we look for a trap story, we'll
find them.
So it takes up a lot of time where we could have, you know, the
simple narrative device about finding a piece of evidence would
have led them to that point could have been done a lot faster and
we could have been in the world a lot faster than we are.
That's a very good point, actually.
It reminds me of that long sequence at the end towards the end of
the visitation where they're all standing in the console room
looking at a map of 1666 London with a line going across it.
It's like we just get there, just arrive.
So they find the place and they arrive, you know?
But, I mean, those scenes do have a sort of character thing
because we did talk about Clara hanging out the door and stuff
like that.
And I do think the conceit is super interesting.
Like that's really fun.
And I know that we've had perception filters and things like that
before, but you know, I love the detail of how when you walk past
it, if you're counting, you might lose count.
Oh yeah, that's cool.
All of that stuff is really kind of...
I mean, if that was true, then honestly, I'd be passing trap
streets every day.
I can't remember what I'm doing at any point in time.
And the idea of the trap street is a trap for the doctor is nice.
There's a nice little kicker as well too.
There was originally a lot more searching for the Trap Street, so
it got cut down to what we got, but there were moments like the
doctor would just walk face 1st into a wall thinking it was going
to be at the Trap Street.
When they finally found it, they were sort of going to join hands
and the doctor's like, right, we need something to disrupt the
psychic field, and Rigsy would remember the birth of his kid, and
they walk forward and find themselves in a coffee shop with
coffees, like 10 minutes have passed and they're like, oh.
Well, what happened?
But part of the reason I'm bringing in Rigsy was Sarah Dolite had
the idea.
This was when it was just Commander Scan trying to start a war.
He's the one who phoned Rigsy.
Rigsy came along, painted a door to go through to the Trap
Street.
Oh, because he's a graffiti.
Graffitias, yes.
That's a good case.
And then later when, yeah, when the doctor thinks there's nothing
we can do.
He and Clara take Rigsy home and go in to meet the family to kind
of be honest with them and say, hey, this is what's happening.
And the doctor looks around and there's drawings of the TARDIS
everywhere and the doctor's like, you draw the TARDIS, you draw
doors.
And they would go back and draw the Tartar store and go through.
So, you know, in.
It's like the door got convinced basically. not the 1st time he'd
drawn doors to advance the plot.
Exactly.
Johnny, with what you were saying about there must have been a
simpler way.
I just thought to myself, there's actually nothing in the rules
with fixed points and whatnot that the doctor couldn't have gone
back to half an hour after Rigsey got the call, park guitars
opposite the street and just gone, oh, okay, that's it. and then
pop forward and that would have got us there in about 5 minutes.
I mean, I was thinking the reason that we have Rigsy is because
Rigsy is from Flatline, which is a story, again, where Clara plays
the doctor, and he has a relationship with Clara, not the doctor.
He barely meets the doctor at the end.
And so he's calling Clara for help because in his world, she's the
doctor.
And so I think that that's important.
The other thing is that Jen, who we hear on the phone, but we
don't actually see is Naomi Aki, who is Whitney Houston in the
biopic, really?
And is also Finn's sort of love interest in Rise of Skywalker as
well.
So she's cut completely doesn't appear on screen at all, but she
does have a credit when we do hear her over the phone.
Yeah.
And we also have Letitia Wright as Anna son who would go on to
find great fame in the MCU and the Black Panther films.
And to be a sort of weird COVID denialist or something.
Yeah.
Yeah, and speaking of another bit of questionable casting we could
have had is the 1st draft of the script opens in a regency era
garden with the doctor playing poker with Jane Austen, while Bill
Hickock and Jeremy Clarkson.
Oh my god.
Now, then in early March 2015, of course, there was an incident
with Jeremy Clarkson not being able to have a hot dinner.
And he was shortly thereafter dumped by the BBC, in the next
version of the script dated the 27th of March, 2015.
Jeremy Clarkson is replaced with a far less controversial figure
Russell Brand.
Oh, great.
So it's probably for the best that we got that opening sequence.
We just had this really fun adventure.
Maybe controversy. don't know.
That's right.
Yeah, the sentient plant might have been Russell.
Yes, exactly.
I have to say, it's disappointing.
I would have liked to have seen Rigsy as a short-term companion
like maybe doing some 4 or 5 episodes.
I think he's very very cool.
The actor is very engaging to watch.
And yeah, and yeah. and I think it would have worked better if
he'd have been in it maybe a few more episodes of this season
while Clara is getting more and more reckless and careless and
confident to have a companion who is, wait a minute, this is all
terrifying and we're all going to die.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
Joyvin Wade has, you know, thankfully gone from strength to
strength.
He's also Victor Stone slash cyborg in Doom Patrol and Titans.
Oh, okay.
So he, you know, thankfully has done well for himself.
And he is a great actor and like on the Doctor Who extra making of
both Capaldi and Jenna talk about how much they enjoyed working
with him.
And he's on the making of going, I'm back for Doctor Who.
I got the call again.
It's funny because it's not an ear that does memorable guest
characters, I think, generally.
I think Russell can do that, but it's not something that Moffatt's
particularly interested in.
And I think he's really great.
I think he does it more in the Matt Smith era.
I think it just a Capaldi or a thing.
I think it's just the direction that they're taking they're taking
the show.
Yeah, the kind of the kind of stories they're doing are
different.
The kind of episodes they're doing, the structures of changes.
Most of the drama happens to the regulars rather than to other
characters, I think.
Oh, I was just about to say, it's a very introspective time in the
show, it's history, the Capaldi era, whereas the Matt Smith era
did seem to look outwards a little bit more.
Indeed.
We are really, for these 3 years.
I mean, the 1st year is about, you know, the doctor asking himself
about his own character.
I know.
The 2nd one is about what is happening with Clara.
And then 3rd one is even about what's happening with Missy.
You know, so. on board with that one though.
Well, yeah.
I'm only on board for it for that last year.
But the drummer is really, you know, you know, my companion's
comic relief and...
Yes.
But, you know, never is that true of an in Face to Raven, where we
abandoned the plot.
We abandoned the trapstrait plot to get back to the to the drama
which is happening to our internal characters.
And I think I think there are pros and cons about that.
And I think one of the pros of it is enables Capaldi to show what
a fantastic actor.
Yeah.
He's magnificent in that whole sequence, isn't he?
He's so great.
He's so good.
And even that sort of conversation, you know, which is obviously
going to lead into next week, the I'm not going to make you
promise I'm giving you an order, you know, no one else is to
suffer.
And you know, then he says, well, what about me?
And she says, well, I can't help that.
All of that stuff is so good.
And Capoldi is so great.
There's a moment where he's like, he's peering up for most of
that.
But there's one where he just looks at her with such love.
Like he just loves her so much.
It's so well done.
And, you know, like, I think I think Matt Smith is an
extraordinary actor and one of the very best actors to ever play
the role, but I can't imagine him doing what Capoldi does here.
He's so magnificent.
He's so good.
He's very good.
And it's that's why it's so great he gets next week's episode to
himself as well too.
And it's really allowed to own that space for 45 minutes.
It's amazing.
Well, that's all we have to look for this week.
We'll be back next week to talk about Peter Capoldi doing a lot of
things over and over again in heaven's sent.
In the meantime, you can find us wherever you get your podcasts
and you can keep up with us on our website, flightthroughentirety
com, where you'll find all our social media links, as well as
links to our other podcasts, including Startling Barbara Bain
maximum power, and untitled Star Trek project.
Until next time, be reckless, like the doctor.
Thank you very much for listening and good night.
Good night.
Bye bye.
See you soon.
That was Flight Through Entirety, starring Nathan Bottomley
Brennan, Jones, Simon Moore, and Johnny Spandrel.
Theme arrangement by Cameron Lamb.
This episode, the planet Quantos, was recorded on the 29th of
October 2023 and released on the 19th of November.
Next weekend, a new series of Doctor Who special sits our screens
and with it, a new Doctor Who flash cast in which we offer our
half baked opinions on every new episode.
It's called the 2nd great and bountiful human empire, and it
launches on the 27th of November.
Find us at the 2nd great and bountiful human empire.com.
Okay, what do we do?
How are we going?
We've got an hour and 5 minutes.
I think that we have an end where we can edit Maisie back into the
beginning.
Do you know what I mean?
Like talk about the thing, then talk about Maisie, then talk about
the final scene.
Like, I think that that's easily doable without sort of too much
effort.
Does anyone have anything that any closing remark?
Probably be the tag, anything hilarious to say?
Hilarious.
I could go for a quick Wii.
I mean, I did have a mild Todd experience, the mildest of Todd
experiences with this, which I'm not prone to.
I think you may have mentioned. and he may have noticed.
But in that, I thought I really wasn't going to like this and I
found much to like in it.
But like some of my comments on several other episodes of this
season.
I'm frustrated by the episode that might have been.
So I sort of, I'm feeling, and that's, you know, obviously
completely ridiculous.
But I, I, I, I kind of, I, I wanted different.
I wanted a different set of episodes, basically, with broadly the
same brush strokes, but just kind of the differences in how they
unfold.
That's one experience of a Doctor Who.
The one except the one exception being what we're about to have
and that is one of the one of the best episodes slash stories in
the entire history program.
So, yeah.
And I think it's only, I think you could only do it with Capaldi.
I can't think of another actor who could.
He might have been able to do it with Matt, but I think...
But again, the gravitating thing, yeah.
It's the reason that the doctor can't be the good cop.
We've talked about this, doctor. your face, your eyebrow.
So neat.
I've got one small thing.
I looked up the Doctor Who magazine's done the 60th anniversary
poll.
They've done it per doctor this year.
I was wondering if anyone would like to guess where Face the Raven
came out of 35 Capaldi's.
Oh, it's like three.
Do you know this or are we predicting this?
No, I know this.
I know the answer. prepped?
I've done some prep.
Why don't I just walk up?
It's the 2 part finale, isn't it?
Like it's the, it's the, um, world enough in time in Dr. Falls.
Is first, is it?
Heaven's sent is up there as well.
Heaven Sand is second.
Yeah.
And Mummy on the RA Express.
Oh, really?
Yeah, I think that's a good one.
Face the Raven.
Face the Raven is 11th.
Oh, wow.
And it's behind under the lake for the flood.
The Husbands of River Song.
Oh, well that's good.
Extremists.
So I was surprised, actually.
I thought it might have ranked a little bit higher than some of
those.