Just a Person

Hello, dear listener, and welcome back to Flightthrough Entirety the only Doctor Who podcast on Constant Alert against the threat of Shark Attack. I'm Nathan. I'm Todd. I'm James. And my knee, my name's Tegan Javanka. I'd like to speak to the pilot. Oh my God, Peter. Well, we mostly took 2016 off after using up all the ideas we had for the show, but now we're back for one last year and taking the opportunity to make a completely fresh start. So let's see how that goes as we discuss the pilot. It was interesting listening to you last episode about the fact that Nardal was put into that Christmas special and wasn't going to be there because I can't believe that this would have just been his introduction in sort of in the background doing things. Like it's a bit of a nothingness, really. And so I just can't imagine, like, I know he's not around a lot because we've got to introduce Bill. Yeah. And she has to have 3 or 4 episodes because she's a one and done companion. we know that coming into this? I think we suspected that. Yeah. Yeah. But it's just interesting seeing this introduction of Bill and the sort of the beats that Stephen plays in this compared to other companions that have been introduced over the last 6 or 7 years because, like we had an Adol last week, he was suddenly just there. Yeah. And if I look back at the last, maybe the last 4 episodes, like we had the end of Clara, which was exhausting, but that dynamic had been in the show for 3 years, and she'd been around. So, and then we had River, and that was a different dynamic with the Capaldi doctor showing different aspects of him. And then we had Nadol last week. And it's the only male Tartars team we've had since the keeper of Trark and really. I mean, yeah, we had Planet of Fire, but Turlo was out and Perry was coming in. And now we've got a different dynamic again, having to introduce another companion, and we're just used to a certain rhythm and there's certain beats in this where I kind of think, oh, I don't know if I like that, but it's just a different flavour. If you go back, look, even Clara wasn't introduced the normal way. Like, suddenly the doctor was after her. You look at Amy. We had young Amy first. Look at Donna, like she was coming back, finding the doctor. The last time we had a true companion who just sort of appeared on the scene, was in fact with Martha. And then all Doctor Who companions are sort of these high concept people that just automatically, like people die and they just accept it. Whereas with Bill with this, over, and I'm sort of going ahead with these episodes, she's just got a different kind of rhythm and a different energy. And, you know, in the 3rd episode she's really going to question death. But even here, it's like, you know, Dr. Watt, and all this, a kitchen, I like sci-fi. There's certain things where I kind of think, oh, is that working? And the whole rhythm of Peter Capaldi, like we've had, as I said, 4 different episodes with him having to play the doctor slightly differently, and now he's getting written, as you mentioned, last week, much more like Matt Smith, which I didn't pick up on. And so I just find this episode really intriguing to see how that rhythm plays out through the episode and her introduction and everybody's slightly quirky between the doctor and Nardol. Sorry to sort of monopolise this. No, no, exactly what you mean. This feels like Moffat, I think, has been freed up a little bit because he's starting off his 6th series, a showrunner, and he's essentially doing the same thing that he's had to do on which Russell had to do many times, which is introduce an earthbound companion. He just adopts a really relaxed way of doing it. And so Bill's 1st scene is almost like a casting scene. He comes in and is cast by the doctor. Absolutely, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's almost as if that actually could have been her audition piece in a way. Yeah, absolutely. Although probably her audition piece was that terrible friend from the future. But let's not go there just yet. I think it's really nice that she's just a fairly normal person. She's not one of these superhero companions who kind of like blunders or fumbles their way into the Tartars. She just kind of appears and the doctor is interested in her rather than her being interested in the doctor. He sort of takes her under his wing and has seen that she has potential and just sort of wants to play with that. And it's a really nice introduction for a new companion. I think relaxed is the right way of putting it. So that scene is really very unusual. So the pre-credit scene is entirely just the one scene, and it opens with that very kind of symmetrical shot, you know, of the 2 doors with the desk in between them. We just hear the clock ticking, and then we just have this dialogue, and it is a piece that's written to introduce these 2 actors and show us how they work together. They're not meeting for the 1st time. They both know one another. So we never see the meat for the 1st time. He's seen her in the lectures and has formed an opinion about her. She's been to the lectures and has formed an opinion about him. We've got some jobs to do in this scene. We need to reveal that Bill is a lesbian. We need to reveal the doctor's new job and that the doctor's been there for a long period of time. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. All of that stuff we need to introduce, and it's done incredibly well, and it's done in a way that's funny. And I think the Dr. Watt thing at the end before we go into the opening credits is that Moffatt is going to use Bill to kind of undermine the doctor a little bit. So the doctor has a tendency to be a bit pompous, and because she's not really on board, she's not like the perfect companion the way that Clara was, she's not born to be the doctor's companion, almost, you know, from childhood, the way that Amy was. She's just a person that he mad. And without all that high concept stuff without having the doctor having gone back into her past to see her as a child or anything like that, none of that, it's just a person that she met. And so he's doing something new. And I think it works incredibly well. And there's the thing we go into the, after the opening credits, we go into a lecture, and the doctor's giving a lecture about time and he's saying that time, the passage of time is an illusion, that time doesn't really pass when you're watching a movie, movies are a series of still pictures, and that events, you know, that events don't just sort of go in order, and that's the doctor commenting on the way this is being told, because this story actually is more than a year, isn't it? Like we see Christmas. We see summer. Yeah, change of seasons. Yeah, yeah, yeah. All of that stuff. So, so what we get, instead of the usual thing, we get the relationship between the doctor and build developing over months and months, and we get just these little bits and pieces, these little vignettes. And it's not really until about 20 minutes into the episode that it starts to be a normal Doctor Who episode. It's like a biopic, you know, when you, you, you see a film that someone's, someone's life and it just has little bits and pieces from their life. I guess the moment that I saw it really was just that scene where she comes into the doctor's study and she sees that the Christmas rug is now under the TARDIS and she comments on it and then we're out. Like, then we're out. There's certain ways of storytelling. Doctor Who does it sometimes and things like turn left and 73 yards where you just drop in on someone's life every so often just to catch up on what's happened to them. And this way of introducing a new companion is a really interesting way of doing it because normally a companion has to kind of jump into the doctor's life and accept so much and it sort of begs belief a little bit, whereas the gentle way that Bill gets to know him introduces us to this new format quite gently as well. And I really like that. It's a very peaceful opening episode, which isn't trying to dance on the head of a pen and do too much and be too crazy. It's just saying, okay, we know what Doctor Who is. We've done this before. Let's have a nice solid stately doctor 2 episode. Yeah, I think I think the beginning of it. The way that it's told differently from a normal Doctor Who episode actually bumps this up in my estimation. This puts it among the best episodes that Moffatt has done. Because what Moffatt's doing is another formal experiment, and he does it with the 11th hour, right from his 1st episode, where it's like, okay, I have to create this show Abinitio, you know, like new, everyone's been watching it kind of thing, so they kind of know what the deal is, but I've got a completely new cast and I've got to introduce it. I'm going to put the doctor on the back foot and I'm going to have him save the world in 45 minutes without the title, so the Sonic screwdriver. Here he's doing the same thing. He's saying, all right, let's pretend no one's watched this before and I'm introducing the entire concept of Doctor Who for the 1st time. And so that's how he does it. So it starts very, very differently. It starts a little bit like an unearthly child where we're in an educational institution and, you know, only this time it's the teacher that's kind of unearthly. Do you think he had charter on his mind a little bit when he was writing this? A little bit. I mean, we have a picture of Susan on the desk. you know. So we're introducing the whole concept, again, from the beginning. And I think just doing that. Like, I'm so, I'm so on board with doing things in Doctor Who that we haven't done before. And you mentioned 73 yards, Peter, but this is like that as well but it's much less high concept. This is a way that you tell stories all the time on television, but Doctor Who never does it, and it's great to see it try. It feels like the introduction to sort of a miniseries on Netflix does it? Where they introduce the characters. I also think it plays into the fact that Moffat probably, you've always said that Moffat rebels against what he's done previously. He probably felt the need to get away from a high concept companion. He had them with both Amy and Clara. And so when he introduces Bill. He probably recognised that he had to do the same thing that Joe Grant did for the 3rd doctor, and he needed a companion, who just warms the doctor up, and she does that constantly throughout this episode and the season. And she plays into that quirky kind of companion that we see every so often, like Joe, like Dodo, like Romana 2, who just kind of jolly their doctor up a little bit. And I think that's such a nice thing to do for this whole season. They kind of puncture their pomposity. Yeah. Yeah. And it works because this has, like, Capaldi has absolutely nailed it by now. This is one of the best sustained performances as the doctor ever this season. Do you remember how Christopher Eccleston's doctor went back in time and gave Billy Piper a bike for Christmas when she was 12. Red bike for Christmas when you were driving. Is that the empty child? Yeah, yeah, that's Moffat. Here, that wonderful moment, that incredible Christmas where she comes, she brings the rug. There's that hilarious line where he says, I didn't get you anything and she says, well, it didn't cost very much. But then he gets her something. He goes back in time, takes photos of her mother after she says she's got no photos of her mother, and in the very next scene we see, her going through the photos and weeping, and we see the photos, and obviously that will play into a terrible episode later in the season. But then she goes back into his study and the TARDIS has moved. the rugs under the TARDIS, and clearly it's under the TARDIS because he's moved the TARDIS to go back in time and visit the mother. And it doesn't go anywhere. Like we see her see what might be the doctor in the background, you know, in the mirror taking the photo, but she never says anything and it never comes up again. And no conclusions drawn from it because that's how the story's being told at the moment. It's those shots. Remember when the sort of the field of view pulls back and we see a series of images, steel images from different points of time in the narrative. That's how the narrative's being told at this point. I would have liked to have been party to that scene where the doctor just turned up to Bill's mother and said, I'm just going to take some photos of you. I'm very impressed by this discussion because listeners, I work on a much simpler level, which has nice intro sequence. What's going on with Susan and shot very differently, but you've just articulated everything that I kind of encapsulated in my just lemme gas has gone from a 7.5 to a 7.75. It's actually solidified, isn't it? eight? So it's actually gone up in my estimations. But everything that you're saying is totally true. And I think it's a testament to Stephen Moffat that 6 seasons in, 7 years or whatever. He can still do this, whereas I think other people struggle. Well, because he's not relying on it being a puzzle box. This is incredibly straightforward. It's very, very straightforward. There's no kind of twists or loops. There's no things that, you know, initially means something and then later means something else. He's allowed the episode to be funny. Like there's some really great funny lines. It's properly scary in all sorts of ways. This guy, the director who is called Lawrence Goff. What's he directed before? So maybe Whitney Houston's I want to dance with him. No, he all he's done for Doctor Who is this and smile, and he did friend from the future. Oh, well, that's one black mark against him. Yeah, so that came out to introduce Bill. that was introducing Bill, it came out like earlier in the year. Cup. Yeah, it was World Cup, wasn't it? Yeah. It's not very good. It is. When Moffatt writes the pilot, he actually kind of almost includes that scene with the Daleks and the Movellans in order to kind of make that scene canon. But in fact, there's a moment where, like, Bill says, what is it? And the doctor says it's a dalek and she says, what's that? And the doctor says, oh, you know, it doesn't matter. It just a dalek. And in the episode that we see she smiles, and all I can think of is that brilliant line in the opening scene where the doctor says when most people encounter something they don't understand, they frown, but you smile. And that's, you know, that's actually better than what we see in Friend from the Future, which is a bit too much, I think. That friend from the future thing. was so appalling that I was so put off by the character. And I just kind of thought, oh, no. And and then we were hearing like, oh, Nadols had to be introduced because she's not very good and all this sort of stuff. So I was on the back foot, you know, to begin with, has sort of proved me wrong that you're not terrible, right? But in fact, not always written in because Matt Lucas contacts him and says, I really enjoyed working with you. Can I be in more? And so they, he asked to be written back in a bit of a Catherine Tate situation. Well, I can't believe that because he gave up other work to be in Doctor Who. He gave up on a pilot in America to be indoct. Look, gave up on a pilot, shoot the pilot. I think that's incredible because like I can't imagine this season without him. Yeah. And the fact that how he is actually used, as I said, in these 1st few episodes giving space for Bill, and then that team just sort of takes off mid-season. The reason I think that Friend from the Future doesn't work is that it picks up on one particular aspect of Bill's character which is quite funny in the context of the episode, the fact that she's very literal. And it just kind of focusses on that without any of the warming up and the introduction to the character. So she seems like a bit weird and a bit of an idiot in Friend from the Future. I think this episode kind of teeters on the edge of that a little bit. It goes to that well too often. Yeah. Like the Dr. Watt thing is brilliant. Like that's perfect because that is what you would say. And it just reminds you of the Christmas invasion, you know tenants 1st episode. We go into the credits with Jackie saying Doctor Who. So having her say Dr. Watt and then going into the Doctor Who title sequence, I think is kind of perfect. But it takes too long, I think, for her to realise, you know, Nadol and the doctor kind of are both going, wow, it's taking a long time to get to. It's bigger on the inside than the outside, isn't it? As if she's a bit dim. And of course, she absolutely isn't and makes it clear that she's not. And once she knows what's going on. She asks a whole heap of really sort of pertinent questions. There's that introduction, which I think really works well, but visually, but makes her look like an idiot, which is she's at the door talking about how they're trapped or the, or whatever they're in the room. And the camera pulls back and we see that she's actually in a small part of a very large black space. And then the lights come on. That's really great, but it does, I think, it does make her look a bit stupid. I guess that's what I was saying earlier about the fact that sometimes the beats in this kind of they're not the wrong beats but they're a bit uncomfortable. Like Dr. Watt is an uncomfortable thing because you're used to Doctor Who, rather than Dr. Watt. And that's another example of that. So there's points in this where it's sort of like, what is that dynamic? What is that actual relationship, the energy, the energy is different. She brings a different energy, and we're not used to it, and it's not a wrong energy. It's just playing different notes. And when you get into it, and as it builds in the next few episodes up to knock, knock, where I really think it's like working so well by then, it's absolutely brilliant, and you can see what a wonderful companion she is for this doctor. and what a great dynamic they have. You can see that the, the, her puncturing his pomposity thing most clearly in that 1st scene in the TARDIS, because you've got Murray there, bizarrely using River Songs theme for some reason, we're in the TARDIS, we've got the River Song theme, and the doctor's making this sort of big pompous statement, and then the music goes away for when Bill says it's like a kitchen, and the same thing happens. He does this, you know, this can take you anywhere in time and space, blah, blah, blah. Murray is going crazy. And then she says, can I use the toilet? And like that's a little bit of a kind of low hanging fruit that's a little bit easy, that line. And I did spend the time on the Movellan spaceship kind of worried for her because she didn't seem to actually get the chance to go to the toilet at that point. Maybe she did and they just didn't mention it. Maybe she went in Australia. Maybe that's friend from the future part two. No, I think if you're going to make companion goofy, they've got to be funny and Moffat weirdly misses a couple of opportunities here. The kitchen remark is just weird. The TARDIS doesn't look like the kitchen. So why does she say it looks like a kitchen? It needed a better punchline to that. Yeah, yeah. There is one piece of dialogue, which I think is absolutely superb and it is in the bathroom at the thing in Sydney, which, and I don't want to compromise Simon's Opsec, but it's really close to where he lives, isn't it? When they come to Sydney, they land on Simon's doorstep. But there is no cafe there. No, I know. I know. Like, I'm sorry, that's one of the things that irritates me about mini TV shows when they put in things that aren't there. They're just housing, Stephen. Geography is always wrong in TV shows. It's all fun. But she says to the doctor, can I ask you a personal question? And he says no. And then she says, can I anyway? And he says, yes. Which I think is surprisingly funny for something so simple. Yeah, like I think she is smart. She does come off as smart and she kind of knows what she's doing but it does risk making her look stupid, some of that. Yeah. But the time we get to the next episode, the 1st time for the next episode, with them in smile. Yeah, there's just an obvious chemistry there that's working so well. I love the fact that she gets to work with a Dalek contract, really um, obliged to have a Dalek in the season and we get the Mavellins. Like, I just think that's so funny. Stunningly true to June Hudson's original design. Yeah. So what's really good about this is we're around about halfway through before it turns into a Doctor Who episode. So it is an episode about Bill at University. Oh, can I just say St. Luke's University and Luke, who writes more of the New Testament than anyone else, anyone else by words? He writes 2 books, but they're quite long, he is famously a doctor a physician, and so it's clearly named for that reason. So it's a story about her at St. Luke's University and her meeting Heather and that sort of relationship and stuff and only turns into a Doctor Who episode around about halfway through. Maybe the moment it turns into a Doctor Who episode is that brilliant moment where she's at the window talking about what she's seen and she looks down and there's Capaldi running outside the window and she turns around and the chair is still spinning and we get the doctor's music and stuff and then it turns into a Doctor Who episode. So it takes a while. That's where you get the fabulous line. Why do you run like that, like a penguin with itself on fire? Well, Armando Unucci said, you can't put anything funnier on television than Peter Capaldi running. And I think that's definitely true. Pearl Mackey's also quite funny when she runs. She all armed. She is, isn't she? Particularly at the end where she sort of arrives at the puddle. Do you know what I mean? And the doctor's been there and she's sort of kind of tired. She does run it in a funny way too, doesn't she? I like this episode becomes Doctor Who when they realise they've got to escape in the TARDIS. There is nothing more Doctor Who than that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. But it's doing a lot of work, like, you know, up to that point too. With, you know, having the doctor at the university, having the vault introduced and them checking on that. So there's that sort of mystery going on with the doctor and Nardol, and then she's following him and all that sort of stuff. It also introduces Moira. Like it gives us a little bit of background to Bill. Like we know that her mother's died and so she's being looked after by Moira. Moira is played by Jennifer Hennessy, who we last saw in Gridlock as Valerie. I knew I'd seen her somewhere else before. Yeah, yeah. Your cat mother. She is really horrible. And there's a there's a real attempt... casually horrible. just sort of brittle and not very nice to be around. Again, there's a brilliant line that where she gives Bill money for Christmas. And then she's looking in the mirror, the clothing that Bill's bought her, and she says, I hope you haven't spent too much money on this, and Bill says, like, looks at the money she's bought and says, no, I think this will cover it. which I think is so brutal. But the one where she goes to the bar and, you know, like, oh, I just need some me time and stuff. And so she's a little bit, she's kind of horrible and selfish. She's like Jackie, but with no charm or charisma at all. Does she go on? Is she in it much for the rest of the season? seen one more episode, is she? Is she an extremist? She's in the Pyramids trilogy. Right, okay. She one of the monks, yeah. I thought she was going to be in more, really. But then again, Stephen's not really interested in exploring. No. Yeah, you know, she never finds out that her foster daughter is dead. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's just there to reflect an aspect of Bill's slush. not meant to be a character in her own right. No, that's fair enough. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The other character we have is Heather. She is astonishingly beautiful. I think. And her smile is really something. There's that smile. Yeah, yeah. So there's that scene, the last time that they meet before she gets captured by the puddle. Um, and it's... And it's summer, isn't it? And we see that shot later where she just turns to Bill and smiles. And I didn't realise I watched this twice in preparation for this recording and once this morning. I only really realised this morning that we hear this kind of whooshing sound of her being sucked into the puddle. So when Bill kind of rounds the corner. She no longer there. But it's that last smile. And it worried me a little bit as I was watching it because there's that scene, the 1st scene just before Bill runs upstairs into the doctor's study. It's outside its night and they're there facing one another and she's repeating. Yeah, yeah. And Bill says you're dead. So I'm there wondering, well, spoiler alert, how does she come in in the final episode and kind of rescue her? How is that in any way a satisfying ending? But that smile happens enough for zombie Heather. We see her smile a couple of times. And even when they say goodbye to one another, the actress just lets there be a little bit of actual heather, you know, kind of play on her face that you believe that it's going to be okay. Well, it's because it's believable that she's regaining her humanity, as in her humanity is resurfacing slowly throughout that episode, and you see glints of it when she wants to take her away and then they say goodbye, that you believe that she's spent all the intervening, potentially aeons because when is that season finale set? Yeah. Um, becoming Heather again? Heather again. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. I think like there's that moment where she appears. There's a really beautiful shot. You know, on the planet in the future, 23000000 years in the future where we're on the planet with the weird wavy kind of... They've gone to that quarry with the big sort of headstone up the top in the background. Yeah, yeah. And there's a shot from the side where she's emerging from the puddle and you can see the reflection of her face. You know, it's a really kind of beautiful shot. But when she sees Bill. She smiles in recognition and she's pleased to see her. And then, you know, she grabs her face and tries to pull her in the water and that's all horrible. But there's just enough of her there, I think. And I also think just the moment they 1st made in the bar is great where they just sort of stop and stand in front of one another and they look at each other like I buy. It's quite nice because they've made eye contact, then Bill makes a move and Heather's already making a move. So they've obviously just tried to cross each other's parts. Yeah, it's lovely. Yeah. I guess this is one of the aspects of the episode for me, which is less satisfying with the puddle and it's home motivation, the fact that it's come to earth, and then it's choosing heather. And then it's not totally evil. Like Heather's initially like the pilot and appears to be evil like with, you know, the jump scares with all the water in the bathroom and all the chasing and that sort of thing. Like, it's like, what is its motivation, why her? Yes, I think it's great that we get all these smiles because then you can retrofit the story back. It's sort of like to me, has he gone and written the conclusion of the season knowing where that's going and going, well, then how do I get her out of being killed, spoiler alert? But now I need to fit it back into this story. So I guess I was just kind of going, does this make sense in my head and the clogs that are turning and that sort of thing. And I can see everything that you're saying, but at the same time kind of think, well, why, except that we want Bill to live? Yeah, I mean, he had he had the idea of her being saved at the end whilst he was writing this story by Heather. Yeah, it's not retrofitted. It actually kind of inspires the ending of this episode. I guess I just want more of an explanation. Like, I always want more of an explanation, but then when I do get an explanation, am I satisfied, is it just too much technobabble you know, so sometimes it's better, less is more. Maybe you just don't like characters who are a bit wet. So. So, twice the doctor talks about things rhyming. So there's one time where Bill says you were supposed to give a lecture on quantum physics, but instead you talked about poetry and he says, well, they're the same thing they rhyme. And Nardol asks the doctor how he can possibly be teaching Bill everything and he says, well, because everything rhymes. And I wonder whether that's an allusion to the fact that a lot of the stuff that the sort of silly sci-fi plot covers has been covered by the show before. So the use of water, pouring off people, and puddles and things obviously comes from waters of Mars, zombies, water zombies, which worked incredibly well in waters of water. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I think it works really well. here. And then the other thing is, of course, the lodger, where you've got the Silencers TARDIS, is looking for someone who wants to leave so that it can pilot it away and it decides on Sophie remember? So Sophie is going to be the pilot to take that TARDIS away. It's looking for a pilot and it keeps killing all of those people because they don't, you know, they don't work. In a way, it's sort of shorthand because it's stuff that we've seen before, it rhymes with something that we already know. And your reflection, you never see what you look like. Well, that's so Moffat. That's absolutely Moffat. And just think about it. You're standing next to someone looking in the mirror. someone you know You and someone else are standing next to each other looking in the mirror. That person always looks weird. Yeah? The person, your friend who's looking in the mirror with you kind of looks weird because although that's the version of their face that they're most familiar with. It's the version of their face that you nearly never see because it's flipped horizontally. And so playing with that, I think, is really brilliant. It's really moffety. And I also think the shot, the way that it shot as if the puddle is like a massive hollow under the, under the ground, that it's a window up into the sort of upper world and there's a big void underneath with Nicholas Briggs underneath going, pilot acquired you know? I tell you what, those effects have come on since TNG skin of evil. Well, I think that I think that looks really good. And so the idea is that it's what a liquid spaceship that shape shifts. It's kind of like whatever we need to make this happen. fuel and now it's a bit old. Yeah, yeah. Then why does it have the Dalek ship scorch marks? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Again, something we've borrowed. So before this episode, did Mothite just watch like Tear of the Autons, Remembrance of the Daleks, the Lodger? I know what I'll do. Yeah, well, I mean, because it's the sort of thing that it's like Boomtown. Remember how Boomtown is not at all a Doctor Who story maybe until the last sort of 10 minutes and it has the thinnest possible science fiction plot. You know, it's like Annette Badland's going to blow up Cardiff and surf off into space, you know, or something. I've actually seen it. Oh, I've got a vision right there. And here, it is a very, very thin science fiction plot, but what it does is it gives us the chance to gradually introduce Bill to what the Tartars can do. And one of the funniest lines, I think, is where Bill goes, oh my god, is it a, have we travelled in time? And the doctor says, no, we're just in Australia. And so, you know, like it shows us what Doctor Who can do. We can travel in time and space. It introduces us to the Daleks, which I think is absolutely brilliant. Doesn't he say now we've travelled in time? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Now we've travelled. Well, in fact, well, they travel in time because the quarry is 23000000 years in the future. So yes, it travels in time as well. And we go and fight monsters as well. So it introduces the show to her. You know, in sort of 3 stages, I think, at the end. But that, but that again is playing with our expectations. We're so used to certain beats like that automatically with a new companion, we're going to go through time and space to begin with but initially we just changed location. Yeah, actually change time. So that's another thing where you kind of go, oh, that's a bit of a different energy, a bit different vibe. Well, in fact, normally a new companion's 1st story is set entirely on earth. Yeah, what it's actually doing what we see, the traditional Russell T. Davis introduction to a season over a course of 3 or 4 episodes, you know, future past, back on Earth. All in one goat. Yeah, yeah. In fact, we're going to the past. The Dalek Mobel and War, presumably, is taking place around 1980 or something. So we're going back into the past. Or maybe it's the John Peel theory that, you know, Genesis of the Daleks takes place in 1831 or something like that. Like, it's some... There are some things that are so stupid. The only thing we were missing was a phone call back to that shrew of a foster mother. Yeah, yeah, she is terrible. I thought this might be an 8.5. to horses, listeners. I love listening to you talk yourself up. No, no, no. I think this is good, but you've just highlighted some real strength of this episode, not only in performance, but in terms of writing and what Stephen can actually do. And again, this got an audience appreciation of 83. And the better Capoldis often get like 8384 and it was seen by 6.68 million, the highest rate at episode of the season. But it's a really good episode to come in on. And there's so many strengths here with the team and the writing and the direction and to give a different vibe of the season. This is what we're going to be going with. There's some red herrings, like, you know, would we get the Movellins back? Would Susan be coming back? I found that really the shot of the focus on both River and Susan I find quite interesting. Yeah, it's hard to know what they're doing, isn't it? Reverend Susan have a moment in that episode. He looks at her. He looks at the Susan photo when Bill asks why he's interviewing her. And I think that he is interviewing her to be someone who goes off in the TARDIS with him. Absolutely. So what we learn, and there's a mystery, isn't it? Like, we're kind of very familiar with it now, but we don't know what's in the vault at the moment, and we know that he's pledged to look after the vault and that he's been here for 50, 70 years or something at this university looking after the vault. And we don't know what's there. And he's promised Nardol, and he's clearly tasked Nardol to kind of keep him honest because he knows what he's like. And so Nadol is a little bit older now, and he doesn't play it quite as goofy and fun as he did in the Christmas special. Does other people feel like that? They actually had a conversation about that, Matt, said to Stephen. I think we need to tone this down. We need to flesh him out because over the course of this season, if we play, if I play it that way, that, you're going to hate that character by the end of the season. So he is kind of telling the doctor, like he tells the doctor that he can't sort of go anyway, the doctor has to reassure him that things going to be okay, that the psychic paper will kind of inform them if someone breaches the vault, you know, the doctor has to establish, like we go down to the vault, don't we, to establish that, um, Heather's not after what's in the vault. So one of the weird things about Nadal then is that Nadal is, I think, the 2nd longest companion to be with the doctor by duration. He's been with him clearly for the entire time that the doctor's been at St. Luke's University. So at least 70 years, the Nardol that we saw in The Return of Dr Mysterio is much younger and much sillier and much more fun. This one is creaking a bit, isn't it? Yeah, this one's creaking in, which I just think is so funny that's it. dropping his knots on the floor. We don't see where he kicks it under the rug and nothing gets said again because we're where Bill's point of view. That's just for us. You know, how did he get to be a person rather than just ahead? Which is how he left? He's doing that same smile for Bill that Matt Lucas does in Little Britain in the sketch where the guy comes in and asks for impossible books in the bookstore. Yeah, kind of like just smiles at him, kind of... It's really funny, isn't it? Because she has this sort of look with the creaky noise of his arm and he just sort of looks sort of weirdly passionate. It sort of well played. So he's the 2nd longest companion. He's been with the doctor for at least 70 years, possibly Romana travels with a doctor for that long, but we don't know. And who's the longest serving companion? Is it his closest predecessor handles? Yes, it's handled. He's with 100s and 100s of years. My hand has just gone to my head, as you said this, because I never really thought about that. Thank God it wasn't that other squishy thing from last week. I would have thought his longest serving companion was the veil from... Does they count as a companion? There's a line in there, like about it being a companion. A podcast and companion of death. I think it was probably Dodo, or maybe that just felt the longest. But back to what you were saying about Nadol. Yes, he's got a bit more gravity here and you see that throughout play throughout the season and that character development is something that I think plays really well into the show and always does. And I think that's a really good thing. As James was saying, like, the fact that Matt Lucas could discuss this with Stephen and Stephen could take it on board and actually run with it really does work well because at the moment he's not really annoyed by Nadal. Like, you know, at the end of the season, like, you know, when your day couldn't get any worse or whatever he happens to say. It's just interesting seeing that dynamic and the way in which I always love it in a show where you have a comedic character who you just think does comedy, but then when the going gets tough they get tough. It a bit like Jackie. like you think she's whatever. But when they're going, it's tough, she is there. And this is the same with my adult. That's the great thing about Nut, although he is a very competent character. He's weird and quirky, but he drives the plot. in a couple of places in the season. He was flying the Tartars last week, remember? and he went to 12th century, Constantinople and ruled wisely for a little while and stuff. Like, he's sort of competent, although there is that thing where you know, he's given the Sonic screwdriver to destroy all the panels and I think Bill says something like, uh, you know, are we safe? And he says, well, I think that's down to Nardol, so probably not you know? He does that Pat Troughton thing from the invasion where things blow up behind him and he runs down the corridor going, Oh, hoo. He really does, doesn't he? He even runs a bit like him. Like, the sort of, oh, my, my pants are on fire. So I think that's really good. And I think also something that's not done enough is the show is given a shape and a narrative by the Pertoy era. So something happens to the doctor that changes the premise of the show. And so for years he's working on earth with unit and then he's he sort of gradually goes back into space and sort of rejects unit. And so mostly the show is just the doctor travels in time and space except for those kind of 5 years or whatever in the middle here, Moffatt has done a similar thing. He said, now the doctor has been here for 70 years and he is now a teacher at a university. And we go back to that. That's the premise of the show. That's the doctor's job. He doesn't travel in time and space. so much. He's based here. And there's a little bit of that in Russell's early stuff where you know, he hangs around the power state with Jackie and and, you know, Rose's family and things. And Russell's doing it a little bit now in the most recent series where you've got unit and you've got, you know, some people that the doctor knows and stuff. But here I think that giving the show a shape and changing its premise is something that should be done more often, I think. And it's interesting how similar it is, and the doctor has a home base. He has a goofy but competent new companion. He has sort of a brigadier figure to spa with and to keep him on track and he also has a master in close proximity. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. I think I would have liked to have seen more of that throughout this season. I know I'm jumping ahead. It sets it up here, but then how much of it do we actually get? And I think I would have liked more. And I think it comes back to how long we have companions for these days. I would have loved to have seen this introduction in this team in half of last season, get all the introductory stuff out of the way and then have them fully within this season. I think in knew who, often for me anyway, one season is not enough with a companion, but sometimes 2 seasons is too much. It's almost like you need 18 months, but there's never an easy way to separate that out or actually make that work in terms of the beats of a season and how all that works. I mean, if you look back at classic Doctor Who, many companions really are in the show for just over a year or span 2 series, even if they don't do the complete 2 series. And even the earlier companions, you know, if you look at Susan Vicki, Steve, Ben Polly, Victoria, Zoe, all do about 40 episodes or thereabouts, like just over a season, and that's a good amount. And so here, I guess the one thing is that he introduces all this stuff, which is great, but it's sort of like I want a little bit more with this crew. I want another 3 or 4 episodes of them. But I think that's a good thing, though. Do you know what I mean? There's 2 times you can stop doing something, and that is before everyone's sick of it, and after everyone's sick. Welcome to Clara series 9. Yeah, yeah. flights are entirety, to be honest. But... But here I think, you know, the fact that you've got this new companion, you've given the show a whole new shape. It's still able to tell the sort of stories that it really does anyway. And it does leave us wanting more. You asked earlier, Todd, whether we knew that Bill was a one and done companion, and I'm pretty sure that we definitely did, because we do know at this point that Chibnil's taking over. We know that Moffatt has agreed to do a year because Chibnall's not ready. been persuaded to stay. He's been persuaded to stay. I think it works really well because Moffatt doesn't have a whole heap of balls in the air. Everything's kind of been resolved. There's a little reference to Clara, which I think is really effective at the end of the episode. You know, which is when the doctor is persuaded not to do the memory wipe on Bill and we get Clara's music. Bill says, how would you feel if this happened to you? And just for a 2nd we get Clara's music. But that's the only kind of callback to anything that we've had earlier. That is also so nice because they've set up Bill as being a spaniel who likes sci-fi. And so she just knows that the mind wipe is coming. I know what a mind wipe looks like. I also love that great line earlier in the episode. I know you're not much of a sci-fi. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's so good. Yeah, so I don't know. The new shape that the show gets at this point is something that I'm really, really in favour of. And I think by clearing the decks, by doing a new thing, by raining it in a bit, he knows that he doesn't have seasons to kind of follow up on staff, he doesn't want to set up too much for his successor. So it's a sort of constrained thing. Yeah, he just goes in with a mission to make a season, a good season of Doctor Who. Yeah, and I think he really mostly manages. I haven't gone as far ahead in my rewatching as you, Todd. I am up to I've got to watch smile after this, actually, after we record this. So I'm not ahead at all. And I do know that there are some episodes coming up that I'm not hugely enamoured with, but what I do like is this version of the show. I think it's really interesting that you say that because, like I'm much Empress of Mars. I've watched that. And seeing the dynamic of this crew, as I was saying, I would really love them to have been in earlier. But reflecting on the journey that we've had so far with the Capaldi doctor, last year I was so surprised and how much of that season I liked and how strong I thought it was, we were just exhausted by the Clarodynamic in that last run of 4 or 5 episodes. But then seeing the Capaldi doctrine and his evolution over these seasons, how much I've actually enjoyed it to get to this point with Peter. And as you said earlier, he's just nailing it. I know this is your favourite version of his doctor. I really love last year. I really like the balance between the narkiness and the comedy perhaps a bit more than I thought I would, right? But just seeing him go through the 3 stages of per twee, the 3 stages. No, no, I... 5 stages of grief. The 3 stages of perchway, there's 3 stages of Colin as well. Here is like the 3rd stage, and I cannot express how wonderful I think Peter Capaldi is in this role, and no matter what he's given the dynamics, what he brings to the show, just underpins everything so much. He is just so good and and just seeing him work out that chemistry with Pearl through this episode and the next few is beautiful to watch. I've bored people many, many times. You have, James, it's true. I know, yes. I'm trying not to do it now, Peter. Can you tell? I love series 10 of Doctor Who. It is my favourite series of the modern era. Wow. And I'm not saying it's perfect, but it's because of Capaldi. Capaldi is my favourite doctor. Yep. I would have said modern doctor, but I think he's actually my favourite doctor because he's never short of brilliant, despite the stories around him often. Often the show he's in can be quite, quite messy or lopsided, but he always lifts every scene he's in, even when it's an overritten script or a plot that's not quite shelling. He is always brilliant in this role. Like, I hear you in this. Like, it's a Tom Baker thing where he will lift anything, any scene that he's in and I'm with you because Peter is my favourite doctor of the new series as well. But I don't, like, I'm 9 episodes into this season, but I don't think it's as strong as the previous two. Like, that's, like, it's very consistent, but there's nothing that I've loved like I've loved in the previous too, and nothing guests that I've loathed as I've loathed as well. But it's an interesting season because I think there is so much great character stuff and performances. But there's some stories where it's like, like, it's not quite at the heights that I've experienced over the last couple of years. It's really a juxtaposition which I'm sort of struggling with at this point. But this season also has a great ensemble cast. Yeah. Yeah, he's great in it. Matt is great in it. Fantastic. And then you bring in Missy. Yeah, on top of it, there's icing on the cake. it really it really does work. I think Paldi's so on point here and the entire episode is just sort of simple and elegant. And it's interesting that Motha was clearing the decks for Chipnall, because I think this kind of episode is what Chipnall was aiming for. Chipnell so often just wants to go for a simple and elegant story. And totally, he often gets it quite right. Pacing, he often gets wrong and it's almost never written as well as you want it to be. But this is the template. This is what Doctor Who should have been going forwards and it's a pity that we didn't get this from the next couple of years. Well, in fact, what's kind of odd is that both Moffatt in his final season and then Russell in his 1st new season are trying to clear the decks are trying to change what Doctor Who can do and are trying not to rely too heavily on stuff that it's done in the past, are trying to kind of open it up and do new things. And, you know, I guess that's a showrunner's role. But it's pretty wild seeing Moffatt do it in his 6 season as the showrunner after he's already the person who's written more Doctor Who than anyone else ever and he's still finding kind of new ways of doing it and new approaches to take. I think it's it's pretty great. Well, El Isra, that's all the time we've got for this week. We'll be back next week to learn how the young people are communicating these days in smile. 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 our social media links, as well as links to all of our other podcasts, including our other Doctor Who podcasts 500-year diary, and the 2nd great and bountiful Human Empire. Until next time, remember, you can always have both beauty and chips. We're doing it now. Thank you very much for listening and good night. See you soon. Ta-ta. Good nights. That was Flight for Entirety. Sorry, Todby, it'll be Nathan Bottomley, Peter Griffiths and James Selwood. Theme arrangement by Cameron Lamb. This episode, Just a Person, was recorded on the 28th of July 2024 and released on the 15th of September. Time for your occasional reminder that flights or entirety doesn't end with its closing theme music. Stay tuned after this announcement to hear, among other things Todd's final score for this episode, and we'll see you next week. Oh, right. End of it. So what we did mention was that Moffat again. Do you know what I mean? Like, as we talked about. We didn't talk that much about gender politics in, um, uh Mysterio. We talked a little bit about it, but it's that kind of idea that you know, he's the perfect man because he actually does some housework for a change or whatever. Do you know what I mean? Because he's a hot geek. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But like here, where the original idea was that it was a man, you know, that Bill, the whole reason that Bill is made a lesbian, and that's a big deal. She's, you know, Clara's bisexual, but she's sort of bisexual and quietly bisexual. Yeah, but it's also in a way that like men fight straight men find attractive. Do you know what I mean? It's the thought of, of, you know, pretty Jenna Coleman snogging a girl. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And whereas Bill is like, like, Bill, Bill's look is very, very contemporary, isn't it? Like the way that she looks. We see lots of hairstyles, these episodes. She got the big eyebrows and all of that sort of thing, the clothes she's wearing are really, really superfessional and really kind of now. She's really kind of modern. She's not like, she's not model. She's not like Jenna. Do you know what I mean? Or Karen, who are these sort of sort of, you know, models and stuff like that. She's a beautiful woman, but not in the same way as those two. It's a warm beauty, right? Yeah, yeah. And she's queer. Do you know what I mean? Like the character's queer, but she's only queer by accident. She's only queer because Moffatt couldn't get the pilot to work if the guy was a man because the man pursuing her, like stalking her through time and space. My favourite, my favourite anecdote, my favourite thing about this entire season of Doctor Who, is that is outside of it, which is that playing Bill and playing a strong, independent, queer character, made Pearl, realised she was queer. Yeah, yeah. Just in the last few months, there were photos from Pearl Mackey's wedding and she marries these sort of terribly beautiful women, the 2 of them just look unbelievably glamorous and adorable at the wedding. And so you've got, and you've got Matt Lucas, who's gay, you know like, have we had that before? Do you know what I mean? Have we had out gay people in the regular cast in Doctor Who? Mikey Yates? Yeah, that's about it. Was he out at that time? Well, probably. Yeah, yeah. John Barriman, I guess. I know what you're saying here. Like you know, this is the 1st representation. Yeah. The full representation that we're not shying away from or trying to get, you know, around. And even if it comes to by accident, as often with Steven Moffin's things, he then fully embraces it and moves forward with it. That opening scene where she tells the story about fatting, the woman, like the woman who is, and like, I'm there going, do we do this? Because you know you Russell's got his problem with fat people because he himself is a large man. Do you know what I mean? And he's gay and there's all of that sort of body stuff. And so you've got her talking about fatting this woman. And but the way that she ends, like I was kind of worried about that. And it's clearly there to establish that she's queer straight away. That's how we know and it's in the 1st scene. And even we kind of admit that it's there for that reason because the doctor says, what's that got to do with why you come to my lectures and she says, I don't really know. I just hope something would defend. Like, so she's just telling that story for no reason except because we need to know she's queer for the Heather romance to work, but also because that's the character. But the thing about the fat thing is where she says beauty or chips. I like chips. She likes chips. So you know, that's good. And then when we see her later, she kind of beautiful. She's a, you know, she's a... English woman, you know, with pale skin, but she's large. And the 2 of them wink at one another and smile and we kind of go yeah, like whatever, she's fat, but she enjoys chips and so do I and we're totally into that. So like I kind of like that. Weird phrasing in that scene, though, where she says, you looked at her and it was immediate perversion. Perversion. And she's talking in the 3rd person about herself. But I think it's perving. I think she's using perversion as a comedy novelisation, but it also it almost reads as if you looked at her as in the doctor looked at her. The 1st time I watched it, kind of came in the car. Is she accusing him? No, no, no. And then the next couple of lines say, like, elaborate on that. But it just, it's weirdly phrased. I mean, I really like that. And using the word fatted, I fatted her as well is pretty funny. Like, that's a funny scene. That's a properly funny scene. God, just those words, I pass it on. Every time it comes on, I kind of go, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm sure that there, like, I'm a fat person and I wasn't offended. That doesn't matter. You feel free to be offended by that scene, if you like. But I think there's a warmth to it. And that warmth is absolutely solved by the scene where she comes up later and gets some chips from Bill and the 2 of the week at one another and smile. I think it's wonderful. Well she doesn't make it into a negative thing. No, no, no. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Beauty or chips. I gave her lots of chips. I gave her a couple, but she's not judging. Yeah, yeah, yes. It is such a shame that Bill is one and done because friend of the podcast and good friend of mine, Matt Jones, said that if he'd been showrunner, which, let's face it, is not beyond the realm of possibility. If he'd come in after Moffa, the one thing he would have said was ooh, let's keep Bill, because the possibility of Bill being a lesbian and falling in love with the 1st female doctor was this character who she'd known and respected and suddenly was someone who she could fall in love with would have been such an interesting arc for that 1st season. Wow. We going to be cancelled by the year teen people. Don't worry about that. I think it's great that Stephen can embrace as a straight man. And he's made missteps in the past. Of course. Yeah, yeah. And he learns from that. And I think that's a brilliant thing. So have you seen, have you seen Douglas is cancelled? No not yet. It's worth seeing. I think it's really worth seeing. And it is another one where you kind of think, oh, what's he doing? I'm not quite sure I'm worried by this. worried by where it's going. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm still only halfway through because I was like, it was so compelling. I had to stop. Yeah, you want to save it. I watched it. binged it all in one day. It is kind of set up as a, oh, like, and promoted by ITV as being a, sorry, by sky. Not that this is going the episode, is it? As being a cancel culture TV show, but it's not. It's much more. It tells you why we have to have cancel culture, essentially. It is, I think it's really good. And it is, again, Moffatt learning. do you know what I mean? Like, like a straight man, already aware that he's a problem right back from joking apart, and learning and developing and stuff, and just having, like, just introducing our 1st queer, regular explicitly queer regular, uh, you know, apart from Jack, who's just in a bunch of episodes. I think he's pretty great and he's a milestone, I think. And another reason why, you know, this episode might get an 8.5. Who knows what I'm going to say next? I'm totally giving it like a really high mark. I think it's an absolutely top tier episode. It really is a great start to the season. And actually, when they did that recent Doctor Who magazine poll of all of the stories, it came quite highly. Oh, good. So no one knew. No one knew what fandom thought of Peter Quality 0 in context and suddenly they realised they liked it a lot. I love how Moffat originally was going to call this a star in her eye and then went, oh, I'm repeaching the show. going to lean into calling it the pilot. Well, actually, it was Mark Gatis going, are you really going to call it that? him going, oh, I don't know. Stars in their eyes. Yeah, exactly.