Trap Street Issue 2

The editors' chance to again allude and pontificate plus also an apology.

More quirky and interesting weblinks to try.

Series 10's stories are put under the microscope in this lengthy appraisal.

Just in time for you to peruse before watching Series 11.

A Doctor Who cryptic crossword with a difference. Do you know your Troughton and Pertwee stories?

The 'Astral Map' looks at various Who related events around Australia. A board game is scrutinised plus a couple of pithy mini-reviews.

Commemorating its 50th birthday, just a little late. Its reappearance 24 years later is remembered.

The Big Finish Class audios 'Gifted' and 'Tell Me You Love Me' are reviewed.

Fiction. The Doctor is caught up in one of the major events in Earth's history.

Just who does the the Doctor really know?

More is revealed about about Black Holes and how they have influenced Doctor Who.

Contributors to this issue

....

‘Bok’, Lisa Cook, Tony Cook, Aaron Creaser, Alan Creaser, Ivan de Vulder, Niall Doran, Sarah Gutteridge, Richard Halcolm, Darran Jordan, George Ivanoff, Dallas Jones, Rob Lloyd, Damian Magee, Nick Mays, PatrickMoore, Matthew Rayner, Roger Reynolds, Joel Rose, Ashley J. Tuchin, Craig Wellington and Daniel Worsley.

CONFESSIONAL DIAL It’s the usual “What ho!” from Roger and a 'waves from behind the sofa' from Dallas.

You’re probably been wondering “Where the heck is Trap Street Two?” It’s been a while, admittedly, but we’ve been otherwise engaged: Roger with Uni (BSc & Music studies), plus moving house – twice; and Dallas with the big let-down after doing a regular e-zine for two years and thus needing a breather to recharge the batteries. We have, of course, completed our first Trap Street Special with the Series 10 Survey results and, along with entrants' comments, the results were analysed. The findings make for interesting reading.

Well, we’re now in a position to re-invigorate Trap Street and devote our energies to providing you all with an interesting and informative e-zine.

We’re definitely looking forward to the new series with Jodie Whitaker. With a completely new crew working on this series, it promises to be an innovative and imaginative prospect, don’t you think? Let us know your thoughts on this. We'd like some actual letters to publish in next issue, so start putting pen to paper, or fingers to keyboard.

reviews of all episodes from Series 10. Many thanks to all contributors to this section, especially those who answered our recent call for help when we got this issue back up and running.

For fiction, we have the first part of 'Extinction Day' by Daniel Worsley, which will conclude next issue.

In this issue we have the follow-up article on Black Holes and their love / hate relationship with the Doctor in the Nu Who. We also have a reminiscence by Niall Doran about his first seeing of 'Tomb' when it originally came out on VHS all those years ago.

Darran Jordan's article looks at the Doctor's preponderence to namedrop. Darran investigates and asks why, plus gives us some examples.

Class returns in audio form, from Big Finish, and we have reviews of two of the stories in this issue.

Talking of reviews our 'Astral Map' section, as well as a number of reviews of recent events in Australia, also continues with publishing a number of ‘mini reviews’ on many and varied stories in the Who gamut, all contribute to provide interesting, if not controversial, viewpoints..

DR Productions Website Yeah, it’s been a while, but we think you We haven’t been completely idle during will find Trap Street Two interesting and a this time. We’ve put together a Website for thoroughly enjoyable read.

DR Productions. It contains interesting material from many and various sources and As always, we are interested in your comprovides a contact point for people to submit ments and feedback. You can contact us at: their works (article, videos, stories etc.) to enquiries@trapstreet.org us for publication or to be put up on the Website. Go here to see the Website and for For written submissions to Trap Street, more information. email us with your submission attached at: This issue publications@trapstreet.org Is a mixture of material prepared nearly a ☼ Dallas Jones & Roger Reynolds year ago with material very recently received. It starts off with a lengthy series of Doctor Who is copyright to the BBC. Copyright of all other material contained within returns to the

contributor on publication. No attempt is made to supercede any copyright. Views expressed within are those of the writer and not necessarily held by the editors.

he Pilot opens Series 10 of the revived Doctor Who, and introduces us to Bill Potts (Pearl Mackie), the Doctor’s first lesbian companion (that we know of). The opening of the episode establishes that the Doctor (Peter Capaldi) has been laying low as a University academic for fifty years, with Nardole (Matt Lucas) as his assistant. The Doctor has been guarding a vault because of a promise.

Bill Potts works at the University cafeteria selling hot chips, but has been sitting in on lectures that the Doctor gives and he has summoned her to his office where he offers to be her tutor, and to sort out her university admissions later. Perhaps the Doctor sees a potential companion in Bill and wants to train her for that role.

Time passes, and Bill meets and develops a mutual attraction to a young student named Heather (Stephanie Hyam) who has a defect in her iris that looks like a star. One day Heather shows Bill a puddle where her reflection doesn’t look right. A voice in the puddle proclaims that a "pilot" has been found.

Later, Heather shows Bill the puddle again, and promises Bill she won’t leave without her but before Bill can come around to the puddle she disappears. Heather has been chosen as the Pilot. Bill tells the Doctor who investigates, and tells Bill it’s not water and that it’s something mimicking them.

Bill returns to her flat and is soon chased by a fluid-Heather. She gets help from the Doctor who takes her into the TARDIS. Bill takes a while to realise that the TARDIS is bigger on the inside than out, initially thinking the TARDIS must be an entrance to a bigger room.

The Doctor, and Nardole check on their vault, Heather has followed them but is only interested in Bill. The Doctor, Bill and Nardole escape in the TARDIS and materialise near a restaurant on Sydney Harbour. Heather follows them here, so the Doctor takes them to an alien planet, millions of years in the future. Heather has followed them in a tiny puddle on the planet. They work out that the fluid is a living alien spaceship that has made Heather its Pilot and it’s focussing on Bill as a potential passenger.

The Doctor takes them to a battle between the Daleks and the Movellans. Heather takes on the form of a watery Dalek.

Fluid-Heather returns to her Heather form and Bill touches her hand and sees how fluid-Heather now sees the universe.

She is tempted to become the passenger but manages to convince Heather that she has turned down her invitation to travel through time and space with her.

Later, back at the University, Bill convinces the Doctor to not wipe her memory. He tells her to leave before he changes his mind. As she leaves, he looks at his photos on his desk of

River Song, and his granddaughter, Susan, and talks about having promises to keep. He later materialises in the TARDIS in front of Bill and offers to take her through time and space to see if they can see Heather again. Bill becomes the Doctor’s new companion.

'The Pilot' is a beautiful episode, and a good introduction to Bill Potts, and to Series 10. It establishes a number of things that will play out across the season. It’s also a nice little love story between Bill and Heather, across time, space and reality. I quite enjoyed it.

oved it! Loved it! Loved it! A perfect season opener. Great set-up for the season ahead.

Great new companion. Good solid plot. Perfect tone – the dark / sombre / brooding tone of Series 8 / 9 is gone, but we don’t have the light and fluffy tone of the last Xmas Special either. Rather, an adventurous, balance tone.

I liked the soft-reboot set-up of this being so many years after the last Christmas episode.

The back-story of the Doctor having been a uni lecturer for 50+ years (very 'Shada') while hiding something in the basement (Hmm… Hand of Omega?) is intriguing. Hoping it leads to interesting things for future episodes.

Even though much of the episode was set-up and character introduction, the story was excellent. It’s my favourite sort of Doctor Who story… one on a personal scale rather than that of saving the universe. And I loved the fact that there was no actual villain plotting nasty megalomaniacal evilness. So pleased this wasn’t a Dalek episode as the trailers were leading us to believe.

Bill was awesome. So nice to have an ordinary normal person as a companion. And, she’s likeable! Yay! And she has a great chemistry with the Doctor.

Favourite things:

• “It’s like a… kitchen.”

• Photos on the desk.

• Sonic screwdrivers on the desk.

• The Doctor’s office.

• Nardole getting to use a classic sonic screwdriver.

• The incidental nature of the Daleks’ and Movelans’ appearance (that was a bit of a squee moment).

• The back story.

[Editors note: this was written by George immediately after watching the story.]

aking his new companion Bill (Pearl Mackie) on her first trip in the TARDIS, the Doctor (Peter Capaldi) looks forward to a new adventure. This they receive when they land on an off-world Earth colony. Finding it empty apart from millions of nanobots called the Vardy, the Doctor and Bill initially think the planet is a paradise. Communicating with humans via emoji, the Vardy seem determined to keep everyone happy. With their ‘smiling emoji’ permanently switched on, the Vardy are on the planet to get it ready for looming colonisation. Soon the Doctor and Bill discover all is not well in this virtual Eden. Uncovering a world where any form of sadness is unacceptable, the duo’s frowns refuse to go upside down as they learn the sinister secret of the Vardy and the world brimming with artificial delights.

When the new series of Doctor Who began in 2005, it was often noted the stories shared thematic similarities with its ‘classic’ forebear. Not just in the surface elements of Doctor and companion but in the style and substance of the tales it told. Several long-time fans commented how the new series followed on from the Sylvester McCoy / Seventh Doctor era with the urban grit and themes of the new series echoing the aims of his latter stories. Nowhere was this more evident than in the second story of series ten ‘Smile’. Mirroring the Season 25 Seventh Doctor story ‘The Happiness Patrol’, ‘Smile’ again saw the Doctor, in the guise of Peter Capaldi’s Twelfth Doctor, and new companion Bill Potts, face a barrage of happy thoughts, no matter how unhappy they made them.

Like many good Doctor Who stories, ‘Smile’ is more than its dazzling surface CGI. For a tale about being happy, ‘Smile’ explores the notion of grief and how people deal with it. Suppressing it and other emotions, can be unhealthy, with happiness 24/7 just as unobtainable as everything else. Stripping away a part of our emotional core takes away a bit of humanity, with our emotions making us who we are. Despite how certain emotions can cause pain, only by facing them and learning from them can we truly heal and move on. Very heavy themes for a show about a time-travelling alien, but Doctor Who has always been unafraid in tackling difficult subjects. The key to making them accessible is how entertainingly they are expressed. ‘Smile’ has an abundance of interesting incident to mask the severity of the underlying motif.

Frank Cottrell-Boyce’s script teases out these elements well as does Lawrence Gough’s astute direction. Both conjure the sense of atmospheric dread in this supposed paradise. The Vardy emojibots, like any good Doctor Who character, can be looked at in different ways.

They are either misguided villains or victims due to their inherent programming. As the series has shown since it began, nothing is ever black and white with the shade of grey more deadlier than straight out villainy. The CGI and practical effects to render the Vardy emojibots and the world in which they inhabit look amazing. For long-time fans it’s incredible seeing how far special effects have moved on over the decades. Whilst the CGI changes, the stories basically remain the same with Doctor Who’s central morality never fading.

Being her character’s second story, Pearl Mackie as Bill Potts shines brightly. A companion filled with energetic eagerness, Bill is a breath of fresh air. Bringing a new sense of purpose to the Doctor and the series overall, Bill’s enthusiasm in travelling the universe is palatable.

A lot of credit should go to Mackie for hitting the ground running with a character easy to relate to – which is a sign of a good companion. Mackie’s chemistry with Capaldi is first rate with Capaldi settling into this new dynamic with ease. Capaldi’s skills as the Doctor have already been praised elsewhere with this versatile actor clearly in his element as he indulges in his ultimate fan-boy fantasies in playing the role. The support cast are solid with the light moments deftly mixed within the drama.

Looking back, Series 10 got off to a solid start with its first few stories. ‘Smile’ was one of the best with a focussed narrative giving the new series a solid foundation upon which to build. Mackie in particular hit the ground running with her fresh appeal and injection of vitality into her role. Peter Capaldi’s final series began strongly with this story giving casual and longer-term fans reasons to ‘smile’.

All the various faces of the emoji robots from 'Smile'

hen I was given the choice on which new 10th series episode to review, I couldn't go past this single story. Naturally, I assume that those who read this fine publication, do not need to know the ins and outs of the storyline, nor the history of the show.

This is more of my honest reflections and thoughts of this fantastic episode.

There are many factors that drew me to it.

Throughout the entire episode, I was constantly reminded that, no matter which embodiment of the Doctor, he would always have fought as valiantly to save the humans who were in peril.

The period setting, in 19th Century London, evoked a favourite Tom Baker Era adventure, 'The Talons of Weng Chiang'. This story also offered the same mystique with the solving of the mystery.

As a child of the '70s I also look upon the Doctor as a hero. When children are cast as characters, it is a wonderful reminder of why I fell in love with the show, more than forty years ago. Particularly when the street urchins, looked upon the Doctor with wide wonder as he read them the tale of the tailor who cut off the thumbs of children who sucked their thumbs (Der Struwwelpter).

Bill too, gazing upon the Doctor when she sees how big his hearts are and his choice to use his knowledge and audacious skills to help humanity.

The use of simple lights to indicate impending doom, for the various victims of the Beastie under the ice, was also a tremendous nod to the simplicity that the series has always offered in creating a good scare.

The episode also offered a great reminder about how the show is made to entertain and be fun. Namely, when the Doctor instructs Bill that "It's just Time Travel. Don't overthink it".

The main reason I was drawn to revisit this episode though was how it dealt with racism, starting off with the wonderful statement made by our favourite Gallifreyan, 'History's a Whitewash'.

However, Sarah Dollard, offered Peter one of his finest little speeches, in all his tenure. I loved it so much I made a mime of it and share it (albeit slightly shortened), when questioned why I still love Doctor Who. I hope you agree.

4½ Jelly Babies out of 5.

e come to an end of Series 10 and Peter Capaldi as the Doctor. It’s time to look back at one of the more interesting stories of the season, 'Knock Knock' by Mike Bartlett; a haunted house story that kept you on the edge of your seats and shouting don’t go up there or look behind you, for most of the time.

The plot of the story is that Bill and five students are looking for a place to share with no luck, until they meet a mysterious landlord who has place to rent very cheaply. The Doctor helps Bill to move in, but for some reason the Doctor feels the house is not right, it’s a house that has creeping floor boards and walls expanding, lights goes out and the mysterious landlord seems to appear from nowhere, always smiling and willing to help. Each of the students begins to disappear. Bugs are seen within the wooded walls and who is this petrified wooden lady? The landlord seems to be on hand when the students disappear. The Doctor begins to investigate the house to find the other young people have disappeared over period of time as he finds their belongings. Slowly the pieces are put together about the bugs, the petrified wooden lady, disappearances of the students and the creepy landlord.

This story is 'Gothic Horror' in the classic mould of a locked house – and there is no escape. It all plays out through the tense use of the sounds of the huge wooden house and the silence of the landlord, played wonderfully by David Suchet, as he interacts with the Doctor and the students. You really don’t get to know the other students in this episode; I thought some could have turned up in few more episodes.

When the truth is revealed, to the viewer, by Bill, who worked it out, there is no alien invasion, just a sad story of a boy’s love for his mother trying to keep her alive for many decades by making a deal with the bugs. When the mother knew what her son had done with those students, she felt it was wrong and told him “It’s our time” as mother and son disappear within the house and some of students are restored back to normal.Unfortunately, for the other students, they will be be lost within the walls of the house for all time.

Most reviewers gave this episode, directed by Bill Anderson and written by Mike Bartlett, a positive review saying how effective and spooky it was. However, most seem to agree that last ten minutes of the story was an anti-climax. Many reviewers felt it was rushed to get to the conclusion of the story. Maybe if the episode was little longer, it may not have felt so rushed. To me it was the right length. Onto the story conclusion, where we have the Doctor sitting next to the vault. We are asking ourselves, “Who or what is in the vault?”He is playing the piano, I wonder many people around the world were already guessing who it was?

The character of Bill, played by Pearl Mackie, continued to shine in this episode as the strong woman she is, and made it clear to one of the males in the house that she prefers girls. Bill and the Doctor have this father and daughter, or mentor, relationship, which had previously been absent in the series. Peter Capaldi continue to be great as the Doctor. To quote from another review of 'Knock Knock' by Grant Watson for filmink ; about Capaldi’s Doctor “…to be channelling some middle ground between his predecessors Jon Pertwee and Tom Baker”, which is great that Doctor's other selves are still with him.

David Suchet, has been one of the finest actors coming out of the UK, he can play anything from: being Sigmund Freud ( Freud); a modern policeman ( NCS Manhunt); a classic detective ( Poirot); the evil Augustus Melmotte ( The Way We Live ) and even dressing up as Lady Bracknell in The Importance of Being Earnest on stage. Suchet took the role for the Landlord without seeing the script; he gave us one of the most powerful performances from a guest star in recent years as the tense creepy landlord. He goes from so cold to what he had done, to one emotional small child as he weeps at his petrified mother.

I think Series 10, even with some of its flaws in the writing, will be remembered as a classic Who season. The stars, Peter Capaldi and Pearl Mackie, took the roles and made them shine, both were equal to the tasks presented, even with mistakes. Also Matt Lucas grew into the role as the series and stories progress.

xygen is a modern masterpiece… plain and simple. From beginning to end you (as a viewer) are grabbed by the throat and dragged kicking and screaming through a tight, tense and beautifully crafted piece of television for 45 minutes. As with the best examples of the science-fiction genre, the themes of this story are directly pulled from issues we face today but placed in a more fantastic setting with, you know… space zombies.

A distress call from the depths of space send our three adventurers into another ‘off world’ trip because as the Doctor proclaims: “You only see the true face of the Universe, when it's asking for help”. Cut to Chasm Forge, a mining space station run by the Ganymede Corporation who have made the very air we breathe just another product you need to buy.

Cut off from the TARDIS and forced to don the ‘smart’ space suits provided, the Doctor, Nardole and Bill must try and save the remaining crew before they run out of oxygen or before the other ‘smart’ suits, still occupied by the dead crew, make them one of them.

It’s a fantastic concept, expertly executed.

Jamie Mathieson has well and truly established himself as one of the modern series most prolific writers, being responsible for such instant classics as: 'Mummy on the Orient Express' and 'Flatline'. This episode matches these two previous efforts with snappy dialogue, a clear understanding of the main characters, a relentless sense of pace, tension and dread and a wonderfully smart punch to the dangers of big business and capitalism.

Charles Palmer’s direction is impressive here too, presenting some truly haunting images of the vastness and terrible beauty of space. His excellent depiction of the spacewalk race and subsequent battles using flashes of slow motion images, was another masterful way of conveying the intensity of an action-packed moment, yet keeping within the limits of a TV budget.

Our main cast are all in fantastic form. This trio is most definitely my favourite TARDIS Team of the modern era.

Capaldi shows us just how much this role has seeped into his pores. He is funny, smart, prickly, desperate and, above all, brave.

Pearl Mackie goes from strength to strength in Series 10. There is a freshness, energy and power to her performance as Bill, the like that hasn’t been seen in a companion for a long time. Pity we only had her for one year.

And rounding off our Time Team is Matt Lucas as Nardole. Look to be honest, I’ve never really rated Lucas as a performer especially when it comes to his comedy. However like Catherine Tate before him, Doctor Who proves to be the show that can take an average comedy performer and turn them into a powerhouse dramatic actor.

Lucas’ ability to effortlessly slip from whimsy to full force dramatics is an incredible sight.

Oxygen is a highlight of Series 10 and of the entire modern era of Doctor Who. It doesn’t get any better than this.

10/10

he “Monks Trilogy” is nothing if not ambitious and, for the most part, it works. While the quality of the episodes vary, they do come together to form a more than a pretty good story.

First off, we have 'Extremis', arguably the best episode of the trilogy. Featuring an intricate plot and a twist that would make M. Night Shyamalan gasp, 'Extremis' is Moffat at his best. Here we see the Doctor being summoned by the Pope to unlock the secrets of the Veritas – a book that drives all who read it to suicide. Intriguing enough as the plot is, it’s the final twist that really elevates this episode to new heights. Intense, clever and surprisingly funny in parts, this is definitely one of Capaldi’s best.

Of course, it’s here that we’re first introduced to the villains of the piece: The Monks. Seen here as shadowy and mysterious figures. Although they’re not overly original in design, they do make for a creepy baddie. However, it’s the final reveal about their plan that really marks them out as unique among Doctor Who villains.

They only grow more intriguing in the next episode, 'The Pyramid at the End of the World'.

This is where the story really begins, with the Doctor once again taking on his role as President of Earth, when a five-thousand year old pyramid suddenly appears in the middle of a war zone. What at first seems to be a typical alien invasion, soon gives way to yet another surprising twist which continues to set this story apart from others. Throw in another plot about two scientists, which runs parallel to the main plot and you get a very different kind of episode. Everything comes together rather nicely in the end and Bill’s decision to sacrifice everything for the Doctor is a nice moment, even if it was somewhat predictable.

The third and final episode, 'The Lie of the Land', is the 1984 part of the story. Not only are the Monks now in control of the Earth, but apparently they always have been, serving as benign rulers that have guided humanity from the very beginning. Bill and Nardole are some of the few to remember the truth, but anybody who tries to deny this new history is treated as a criminal. Worst of all, it seems that the Doctor has sided with the Monks.

This is a great way to start an episode, leaving the audience in uncertain territory. Marking the Doctor as a villain was a clever move that really helps boost the tension, and the scene in which the Doctor tries to convince Bill that he really is working with the Monks, is one of the best parts of the episode. It’s just a shame that it ends with a fake-out regeneration, that was clearly only included for the trailer.

Ultimately, the episode has a lot of good ideas which could have been handled better. The ending, especially, feels a little anti-climatic. Bill’s decision to sacrifice herself in order to defeat the Monks was a beautiful touch, but it was undermined by a cop-out ending. There have been a few Doctor Who stories in recent years, to have the villains defeated by love or memories and it always feels a bit silly. When you’ve had villains built up to be as powerful and interesting as the Monks, it just feels cheap to find out that, in the end, love conquers all.

That said, it does still work well enough to make it a decent ending to the trilogy.

Viewed as a whole, the 'Monks Trilogy' is a great story, with interesting ideas and some beautiful acting from all involved. Viewed individually, not every episode is on equal footing, but that’s usually the case with multi-part stories. A lot of effort was obviously put into it and for the most part, it really pays off.

’m not really sure about this Doctor Who story. Admittedly, it’s enjoyable, with lots of really good bits, some deadly serious, some very funny and yet – it leaves me with the same sort of feeling after eating a vegetarian meal consisting mostly of lentils – i.e. somewhat uncomfortable and a sense of “What the hell was that all about?”

Needless to say, the acting is impeccable: Peter Capaldi as The Doctor; Peal Mackie – Bill Potts (what a great name!); Matt Lucas as Nardole; and a special mention for Rachel Denning as Erica (one of The BioLab scientists) – all brilliant.

I guess, for me, the premise of the story itself is, at least, dubious. Why would an alien race who are, evidently, a powerful and extremely advanced civilisation, (they can remotely cure the Doctor’s blindness in a Bio-lab in Yorkshire) be the least bit interested in our little speck of blue dust stuck out on the rim of the galaxy?

Motive? What’s their motive?

But, putting aside this conundrum, it’s a good yarn well told.

The Doctor’s soliloquy about “The End of your life” – every tiny step you take leads to its final conclusion. Devastating. Love the way this segués into series of tiny, seemingly unrelated, events leading, ultimately, to an end to the human race – and all that sort of thing.

The introduction of the doomsday clock is a trusty old chestnut, adding to the urgency of impending doom and disaster.

We examine the representatives of the three most powerful nations on Earth and the Secretary General of the UN, who, thankfully, are not portrayed as power-crazed maniacs. And one by one they disintergrate, as they consent to the Monks ”Not out of love”. What love, for what reason, for what thing? Love of self, country, family, the planet, their cat? It seems to be an arbitrary definition. (P.S. – I love the disintegration effect) By a further series of apparently unrelated small steps, a deadly bacteria, capable of extinction of all life on Earth, is being created in that Yorkshire Bio-Lab. It’s kinda chilling to think that such a sequence of trivial events might actually have such disastrous effects, is it not?

The Doctor’s brilliant logic in finding the actual Lab making the bacteria is just wonderful, but I can’t help thinking that a race of beings a smart as the Monks (and I certainly don’t mean ‘snappy dressers’) might be capable of working out what the Doctor is doing.

Anyway – Doctor (and Nardole) to the rescue.

We land in the Bio Lab – Erica agog with it all, as the Doctor and Nardole step out from the TARDIS. “Oh, my God.” “No. I’m the Doctor. It’s an easy mistake to make.”

We quickly learn that the deadly bacteria will soon be vented into the atmosphere. So they decide to blow it up! Lovely! BUT – as they say, “The best laid schemes o' mice an' men / Gang aft a-gley.” as Robert Burns famously penned.

The Doctor’s in the Lab and just needs to dial the combination lock number to get out.

3614 – one insignificant and tiny action – that’s all it takes to save the world.

But the Doctor is blind! He calls Bill.

Bill, via her mobile (what the heck did we do before mobile phones?) learns of the Doctor’s blindness and makes a sacrificial decision – she asks the Monks to give sight back to the Doctor.

And now we discover what the Monks mean by ‘love’ – they mean unconditional love for another, willing to sacrifice yourself for that person – The Doctor.

The Monks give the Doctor back his sight, he dials in the correct numbers and manages to escape the Lab explosion. Again, one wonders why the Monks don’t realise what they’re doing by giving sight back to the Doctor. Or do they?

“Enjoy your sight Doctor. Now see our world.”

Great ending to a good story.

To cap it all off, there are some wonderful/crazy bits: • UN’s Secretary General (Ban Ki-moon?) invades Bill Pott’s apartment; “World War Three.

Wha’d think? We’re basically against it.”

• “You look like corpses.” “You are corpses to us.”

• “Fear is temporary, love is slavery.”

• “Bacteria.” “I like the sound of that.”

• “What do you depend on?” “Air, water, food, beer.”

• “Do you follow me?” “Yes, I think I do.”

• “What is that thing?” “It’s Nardole.”

• “Park it close, monitor me – oh – tidy up your room.” “Pffffttt.”

Prelude: the 1970s

I was a child in the seventies when the ABC continually repeated Doctor Who. Seemingly seasons 11 to 14 were the most frequently looped. 'The Monster of Peladon' from season 11 was a particular favourite of mine. I fell in love with Aggedor, Alpha Centauri and the Ice Warriors. The arrival of the Target novelization of 'The Curse of Peladon' confused me, as I had presumed it was the TV story I knew and loved with a slightly revised title. It fast became apparent it was a prequel (how exciting!) It was not until a repeat of the entire Pertwee era in the mid-eighties that I finally saw the televised version of 'The Curse of Peladon'.

By then I had long read the 'Ice Warriors' novelization and the importance of these Martians was as established in my mind as the Daleks or the Cybermen.

Interlude: 2013

As we all know from his public comments, and I know from interviewing Mark Gatiss myself two years ago, he loved the Ice Warriors as much as any child of the seventies. After forty years 'Cold War', written by Gatiss, brought the Ice Warriors out of the cooler (zing!). It gave them a decent modern Who comeback… Apparently some casual viewers and many of the crew at BBC Wales thought they were a new creation. That last piece of trivia might be apocryphal stemming from publicity or spin, or it might be true. If true it adds kudos to the captivating Ice Warrior design from 1967.

Suddenly: 2017

'The Empress of Mars' is an excellent stand-alone romp for the casual Doctor Who viewer.

It is also a wonderful nostalgia rush for those of us a bit longer in the tooth.

The opening scene is unexpectedly set at NASA. Why are the Doctor, Bill and Nardole at NASA? We never get an answer. The scene, played for laughs, is as forgettable as it is best forgotten but gives a reason for the trio to go to Mars… Home planet of you-know-who…

Gatiss must have had a blast scripting this. The script combines many elements he seems to favour: Victoriana with Anglo characters speaking catch phrase “period” dialogue; Character names with a Dickensian flavour; Characters in an incongruous setting; steam punk flourishes; Ice Warriors – but with a new twist, The Empress. Characterization and motivation frequently suffer with guest roles feted to such brief screen time in modern Who. I felt the cast here were served better than many, both the human and Martian characters. The humans are all charmingly realized and felt solid and just on the correct side of contrived.

The backstory of how the humans got to Mars – they found Friday in his crashed ship and helped him – was a little weak. Of the four Ice Warrior stories set on or near earth, this is the third to feature Ice Warriors crash-landed here. Are these guys bad pilots or what?

The effect of the guns folding the victims in upon themselves was scary and funny and very reminiscent of, yet different to, the folded screen effect of the sixties and seventies Ice Warrior weapons.

The Empress was an excellent creation and a solid addition to Ice Warrior mythos. No wonder we’d only ever seen bloke Ice Warriors previously – here they are revealed to be insect-like as well as reptilian – a hive with a Queen. Great stuff. The Queen Empress also perfectly resonates with the Victorian era of Earth represented by the English military. These crazily disparate elements all gel. Friday and his divided loyalties are resolved well. The brilliant Doctor / Bill combination shines throughout. Poor Nardole…

Ditched evidently because the script was all or mostly written before confirmation Matt Lucas would become a regular cast member. It was great this device enabled the plot to bring Missy into play, but... Why did the TARDIS de-materialize and return to the Earth? It worked excellently that Nardole had to seek Missy’s help to get back to Mars, but why did it do what it did? Did Missy somehow do it? Will this be revealed in the series finale? Probably not, which is an annoyance. The production was obviously committed to Nardole being written in / out / back in but the random TARDIS behaviour was a little lame except for Missy stealing the show at the end. Michelle Gomez has been a tremendous addition to modern Who. As well as asking why did the TARDIS de-materialize, I also asked why the soldiers had built a Brig in which they could lock the Doctor and Bill? Is it military procedure to always have a Brig? Was that where they kept Friday when he wasn’t making tea and washing up?

So many of the questions in these episodes could be explained with a single line or one more pass at the script.

Alpha Centauri, wow! Ysanne Churchman, brilliant! What other show can pull a continuity trick like that out of the hat four decades later, reviving both a character and the original voice artist? I know I am SO 1974, but I wish instead of “Welcome to the Universe,” Alpha Centauri said, “...to the Galactic Federation.” That is not a plot hole, it is a personal aside.

I have focussed on some plot holes in this review (Another – the viewer is left to assume that Centauri arranged to both collect the Martians and return the Humans to Earth, but why not say so with a word or two?) but the fact that these plot holes are relatively minor and not so gaping it would require a dissertation to address them shows how well constructed 95% of the episode is.

Peter Capaldi has been a wonderful Doctor, not only in the opinion of this viewer, and shines episode after episode. My subjective opinion, from the moment his casting was announced, was that it would be wonderful if he stayed five years in the role. I am still dealing with my personal trauma at his leaving after three years. Is three years now standard before total burn out in this role for the actor? It appears so. During his reign the scripts have sometimes not been to the standard deserving of the quality of cast, especially Peter Capaldi. One thing is certain, Peter Capaldi has been committed, marvellous, engaging and brilliant across the entire ride. The introduction of Pearl Mackie as Bill Potts has been a breath of fresh air. In a way it is a shame the Capaldi era did not start with 'The Pilot' and go from there, but that’s an alternate reality there is no time to discuss here. In 'The Empress of Mars' the Doctor / Bill relationship has fully bloomed into a companionship that works without throwing the original teacher / student framework out the window. Bill’s interactions and deductions are excellent and the sidestep of the Empress demanding Bill’s opinion because she is not one of the “noisy males” is a deft and humorous touch. Well scripted Mr Gatiss. This Doctor / companion combination is a great one. The matter of fact, just getting on with it, chatting while we work manner in which the scene unfolds where they leave themselves the message that will bring (and did bring) them to Mars is a prime example.

In an analysis of the nine television scripts written for Doctor Who by Mark Gatiss there are many and varied opinions about each. I felt this was among his very best. If he doesn’t write any scripts in future it felt like a fitting finale. A farewell tour of elements prominent in many of his past works, or elements selected from across each, but not in a way that felt it was a retread. It was honed in a way that felt fresh and dynamic. I am glad that this script was written and not a sequel to 'Sleep No More' as had once been mooted. Not that I dislike that episode, I believe anything that bold and experimental deserves credit whether it is to your taste or not, but I think a sequel would have been far less fulfilling than 'The Empress of Mars'. This was a good, solid, well constructed and entertaining piece of drama. A worthwhile addition to the sporadic but memorable history of the Ice Warriors along the Doctor Who timeline since 1967. If it is Mark Gatiss’s last TV Doctor Who contribution it was an excellent final fling.

hen I watched this story, things kept popping up that I thought were strange or wrong and then later on I would find the problem solved. The first of these was in the opening scene with two of the standing stones having a lintel which looked very Stonehenge-like. I thought this was a bit of a design overkill but later on, I found that these rocks were, actually, what was left of the entrance to the cairn.

Next was the use of the crows. I thought that they were going to play a very important part in the story because of their appearance in the opening scene, but they did not appear that often through the rest of the story and they seemed to be a throw away idea until it is revealed at the end just what they now say.

The carved TARDIS is an obvious ploy to let the audience know where the Doctor is going.

It is immediately confirmed with Bill telling the audience just where and when they are.

Her comment “I’ve read a book” is funny but very much millennial. I assume the book is The Eagle of the Ninth . The Doctor and Nardole add to the comedy with reference to a Vestal Virgin an obvious teasing reference to Doctor being / playing a female. Although I enjoyed the Doctor / Nardole interaction I thought that they tended to be a tad too flippant .(e.g. wi-fi code, action figures, spag bol).

It is something that is not done very often when a character is introduced and looks like he is important and then is killed off. Interestingly his name is Simon, which, at the time, would indicate that he was Jewish. I really thought the two of them worked well together and it is a pity that it was cut short so quickly.

I loved Bill’s comment about lip-synching, it is an obvious nod to fans nit-picking about this problem. This is a common trait during Moffat tenure as showrunner, to try and answer / explain things that fans have picked up upon over the years. Another would be Nardole’s comments about the Mary Celeste – purely for the fans.

A main theme for this story is ‘growing up'. All the characters are kids, the adults have killed themselves leaving the kids behind. As the Doctor says to Karl “Time to grow up” and then later yells “Grown the hell up” to both groups. Part of growing up is understanding and empathising with other people, and this is nicely portrayed by having the Picts and Romans understanding what each other says.

The story is called ‘The Eaters of Light’, so let’s talk about them. They, for quite a while, for me had the problem, with many alien races constructed in Doctor Who, that their back story did not appear to be well thought out.

Firstly, how do you eat ‘light’? as light is part of the electromagnetic spectrum. So I am assuming by light it is meant ‘visible light’ and they only absorb those wavelengths corresponding to visible light. To make it clearer to the general audience vitamin D was mentioned, as it is well known that absence of sun-light causes loss of vitamin D (an obvious allusion to the lack of sunlight in Scotland!). To make the bodies desiccated was, I feel, the best way the production team thought of showing the effect of the locusts eating whatever ‘light’ is in a human body.

The next problem was how did this all start? At first I thought that the procedure was not clearly explained but after rewatching the story you can put together an idea of what originally happened. This is how I see it occurring. Sometime in the past, probably thousands of years ago, based on the depiction of the cairn, a crack between dimensions was found by the Eaters and they tried to enter our dimension. The crack was very small and luckily, before the Eaters of Light could enter our dimension, it was noticed by the local inhabitants, who probably sent their shaman in to investigate. The shaman vanished and they built a cairn on the spot. The cairn they built was orientated such that sunlight would enter it only on a few days of the year. Usually, for cairns in the UK, this is the spring equinox, celebrating the end of winter. This, as the Doctor said, could mean that the sunlight hitting the crack acted as a pressure valve, stopping the crack from getting larger and thus allowing only one Eater at a time to enter. About 70 years later the locals noticed that the crack was getting bigger and sent their current shaman in to have a look. Like the Doctor, he would have only been inside for a few seconds and he then would have told the locals what he had seen and then returned back inside to battle the creature. Approximately every 70 years this continued to occur and thus the tribe created a post they called the Gate-Keeper.

The final, remaining problem is “What is the Doctor’s plan?” He tells Bill he has one, but as usual she (i.e. the audience) is not given details at the time. At first I assumed his plan was, as he said, for him to fight the Eaters, but even he could not do this forever and when Kar, the musicians and the Romans took over and entered, I assumed we were in a position where at some time in the future the Eaters would be able to enter into our dimension and, as the Doctor said, go on from eating everything on Earth to eating the sun and then all the stars – in fact the end of our universe.

Then I looked carefully at what happened and realised that Kar, the local musicians and the Romans by entering the crack altogether had caused it to close. It is quite clear that only a single eater can get out and previously only a single Gate-Keeper had entered. The Doctor’s plan was to overload the crack by getting more than just Kar to enter, thus forcing the crack to close. When this occurred, it caused a tremor that lead to the collapse of the cairn.

To me, it's a very devious plan and reminds me of the dark side of the seventh Doctor. I can see why he did not tell Bill what he was trying to arrange to occur.

A few other comments about this story before briefly discussing the Missy epilogue.

The opening of the gateway was, to me, very 80s, plus I could not see who or what constructed it. I can accept having a wall but for it to so neatly break in two like a Star Trek sliding door, no way. When they held the creature at bay so as to get it to go back through the crack I felt that one or two of the people should have been hurt.

When the Doctor said “Holding back the dark” I thought ‘Is this a quote?’ and when I did a bit of researching I found what may have been the original “You’re this beautiful ball of fire spitting sparks out at the world, burning fiercely, holding back the dark by sheer will.” by author Rachel Vincent in her book If I Die .

The ‘story’ ends after 45 minutes, the normal length of 2 parter in the 80s. Then the Missy interlude. Luckily this goes on for a few minutes and builds quite well, so in the end its does not feel that it has just been tacked on. In the middle of the Missy interlude we return briefly to the 'story', we are back in present day Scotland and we now realise why the little girl hears the music.

The story has now been told.

he season finale, a storyline to wrap up the current season, while done only twice in the show’s first twenty six years has been a staple of 21st Century Who. ‘World Enough And Time’ is the penultimate episode of Series Ten and the first episode of the finale.

It starts with one of the shortest ever pre-credit teasers, and what a teaser – the Doctor seemingly regenerating in the snow. And in true cliff-hanger fashion, that won’t be explained until the following episode…

Then we are introduced to the setting for the episode a four hundred mile long spacecraft slowly backing away from a black hole. And on the command deck at the top of the ship – closest to the black hole – Missy makes her entrance and immediately steals the show, something she doesn’t stop doing for the episode thanks to Steven Moffat’s twinkling repartee – “my disposables, exposition and comic relief” anyone?

The arrival of yet another blue man results in Bill getting shot – with a surprisingly gratuitous depiction – and the arrival of mysterious people from the other end of the ship (with somewhat familiar voices) who claim they can repair her.

This brings into play a truly interesting scientific concept – increasing gravity slows the relative passage of time. Whether the exact figures stack up in this example is really neither here nor there. If you haven’t noticed yet, scientific concepts used in the show over the last 12 years have been more in the principle than the details. But in essence the higher gravity in the control room means time is passing much more slowly than in level 1056.

Result – life signs are seemingly exploding at the bottom of the ship, when in reality it is just simple population growth.

Bill does indeed get repaired and meets Razor, as well as other inpatients who have also been repaired. These are probably the most creepy hospital scenes since 'The Empty Child' / 'The Doctor Dances'. That the solution to the patients crying out in pain is to turn their volume down is truly disturbing.

After a little too much exposition with the blue man, The Doctor, Missy and Nardole decide to follow Bill down to the bottom of the ship, just in time for the episode climax. But just a little too late for Bill.

The final five minutes of the episode is one of the best set pieces in Steven Moffat’s reign as Showrunner and lead writer. The parallel revelations of 'CyberBill' and Razor being the Master are wonderfully handled, with succinct writing, taut directing, powerful acting (especially by Gomez and Simm), and even an echo of the Master’s old music.

Of course, how good this ultimately is will depend on how it plays out in the next episode, but as a cliff-hanger, it’s a perfect hook to get people talking – and watching.

As the penultimate episode for the series, 'World Enough And Time' works very well.

Plenty of questions are asked, there is an excess of peril for the series regulars, especially Bill, and plenty of questions to be answered in the finale.

Steven Moffat weaves the rationale for the Cybermen being created (replacing body parts to help the race survive and to enhance it) with environmental degradation – the city on level 1056 is dying, turning to rust and people are breathing engine fuel. It’s a new link, but a logical and topical one – in the best traditions of the series.

The lighting in the hospital is creepily atmospheric – so much shadow. It mirrors the city which seems in perpetual twilight.

And amidst all this is the elephant in the room. Why we were spoilered by the BBC in regards to John Simm’s Master’s return? As mentioned above, it is a wonderful scene, scintillatingly played. But we know it’s coming. To be fair, I suspect many viewers didn’t realise what was happening until shortly before the reveal, although repeated viewings reveal that Razor is dropping hints from almost the moment he appeared, but we were still all waiting for it. Such a pity.

On the upside, for older viewers it is fun to see the Master use two of his 1970s-80’s signatures – the rubber mask disguise and the goatee beard. This is the first time in the show’s history where we see multiple incarnations of the Master meet, it is an iconic moment, and one I’ve personally wanted for a long time. And it was spoilered!

Overall, this is one of the best starts to the season finale in many years. All the elements of a good show (acting, writing, direction) come together to bring the series to a stupendous crescendo!

And at the end, we are left with a single cyber-teardrop…

o, where can one start with a review of the two-part finale to what has, for my money, surely been one of the freshest, innovative and downright watchable seasons of our favourite show for many a year? Well, let’s start with what a little preview of what we knew up to the point of broadcast…

The original Mondasian Cybermen are back! It’s a shame in a way that we do get so much official as well as unofficial trailering of what Who delights await us (“Spoilers, Sweetie!”), so the revelation that the Mech Men from Mondas were due to return was known well in advance.

Now, when I was a young Doctor Who fan growing up, my earliest Cyberman memory was of the more metallic types from ‘The Moonbase’ (1967) and the variants thereafter. I didn’t have a memory of the ‘Tenth Planet’ Cybermen at all, apart from the few photographic stills of them to be found, and frankly, I wasn’t impressed. They were obviously men in fabric costumes covered with plastic and metal tubes and an accordion-sized chest unit.

Pah! But as I grew older and arguably wiser, I realised that these earliest Cybermen were the most realistic of all – because they were men in fabric costumes covered with plastic and metal tubes etc. And that’s’ the real body horror of it all – these are human beings who have had large parts of their bodies replaced and not very elegantly. You can keep your Borg (which are a Cyberman rip-off anyway) – these guys were the first and they’re real deal!

Certainly, the original Cybermen made a huge impact on young fan Peter Capaldi who was on record as saying he always wanted to do a ‘Genesis of the Cybermen’ story with the original scary Mondasian versions. Well, he managed to convince showrunner Steven Moffatt that if they were written and directed well and with respect, the original Cybermen could work. So what better way to celebrate his last regular series swansong than with just that story?

So… 'World Enough And Time' starts pretty much like any other adventure – Answering a distress call, the TARDIS materialises on a giant Colony Ship which is attempting to reverse away from a Black Hole. There’s a new addition to the TARDIS crew of the Doctor, Bill and Nardole – Missy. She is attempting to ‘be good’ and help people in distress and the Doctor thinks that this is the perfect opportunity for her to do so.

They are confronted by a blue skinned humanoid, ship’s pilot Jorj who holds them at gunpoint demanding to know which of them is human, because their presence has alerted creatures from the lower decks who, two days previously, took away the human crew and are heading to the bridge by lift. When Bill admits to being human, Jorj shoots her in a blind panic, and we get to see an impressive GCI hole in Bill’s chest. At this point, the lift doors open and tall humanoid beings in gowns, wearing cloth facemasks carry Bill’s body away saying they can restore her.

Bill awakes in a truly grim, Victorian-type hospital and finds that her heart (and most of her chest) have been replaced with a mechanical unit. With clever costume design, we don’t see the horror of the heart unit which appears clunky underneath her clothing, visible by the bulge it creates and its flashing lights, the old adage of what you don’t see being more frightening than what you do see. Yet we do get to see plenty when Bill explores the hospital. She is horrified to find wards full of patients, all clad in gowns and face masks who are in constant pain, their staccato voices being generated by electronic communicators. “Pain.

Pain. Pain” and “Kill Me. Kill Me.” The scary hospital matron’s approach to dealing with their pain is simply to turn down their communicators, which is as stark and act of uncaring cruelty as you’ll see in any episode of Doctor Who. Here is where Rachel Talalay’s direction, coupled with Murray Gold’s sinister score really sells us the story – this is a dystopia writ large and Bill is, literally, a part of it. She can’t even venture far outside the hospital into the smog choked streets, infested by shambling, deformed citizens without her heart unit stopping. Her only company is Razor, a bearded, shambling hospital orderly who tells her that the patients – descendants of the original human crew – are very ill and are being ‘upgraded’ for ‘Operation Exodus’ to escape the pollution and environmental mess of the Colony ship’s lower levels. Faced with little choice in the matter, Bill assists Razor in his duties over the following weeks, months and then years.

This example of ‘timey wimey’ is explained by some very cleverly intercut scenes of the Doctor, Nardole and Missy on the bridge being observed by Bill and Razor hundreds of decks below, but years apart, due to time dilation caused by the effects of the Black Hole (correct laws of physics there, kids!). So from Bill’s perspective events on the bridge unfold incredibly slowly.

Taking only minutes in ‘their’ time, the Doctor, Nardole and Missy arrive at the hospital level by lift. Whilst the Doctor and Nardole explore the hospital Missy accesses a computer data bank to find out more about the ship. She is shocked to learn that it originates from Earth’s twin planet Mondas – the home of the original Cybermen.

At this point, Razor confronts her and reveals himself to be… her! Or rather him… Her earlier John Simm incarnation who, if anything, is even more psychotic than when we last saw him in ‘The End of Time’. Meanwhile, the Doctor and Nardole are themselves confronted by a creature that the Doctor identifies to be a Mondasian Cyberman who plaintively tells him in the staccato voice which harks back to the Tenth Planet cyber-voices: “I waited for you.” A tear rolls from the creature’s eye socket – Bill has been fully upgraded!

So yes, that’s how you do a double-edged cliffhanger, but it’s a crying shame that we were all told about the return of the Simm Master as well as the original Cybermen.

Spoilers Sweetie – they’re a bugger!

fter the two shock reveals – despite spoilers – at the end of the preceding episode 'World Enough And Time', you’d be forgiven for saying to writer / showrunner Steven Moffitt: ‘Follow that!” But you know what? He does, and with a far better pay-off than many of his other multi-parter stories and story arcs, including this season’s ‘Monks’ trilogy.

The action starts with a triumphant Master and Missy capturing the Doctor and indulging in that most Master-ly of pastimes, taunting the Doctor whilst he is helpless. In a face-off atop the grim hospital building the trio of Time Lords (or is it a pair?) are surrounded by falling ashes – which we are led to believe are incinerated human remains – from the vast disposal factories in the benighted lower deck of a Mondasian city. There’s a sly reference to Peter Capaldi’s own wish to take part in a story called ‘Genesis of the Cybermen’ when the Simm Master mockingly welcomes to him to witness just that; because that’s what he’s been doing behind the scenes in the lower decks for decades, first as leader of the humans, then, when deposed, hiding out in disguise as ‘Razor’ and overseeing the abomination of bodypart replacement that has become known as Operation Exodus. Yes, the Master created the Cybermen!

Just to make things even more temporally confusing than the time differential between the decks of the ship caused by the proximity of the Back Hole, we have the two Masters. The Master is, of course, the ultimate narcissist – he really loves himself and even hints to Missy that “maybe we should – er –?” which she flatly (and probably wisely) refuses. The implications of that are… well, let’s just not go there. Missy can’t remember any of these events from her previous incarnation, which are neatly explained away by the temporal effects of a Time Lord meeting an earlier / later version of him / herself. Whatever in the ‘in universe’ explanation, it’s a joy to see John Simm and Michelle Gomez sparking off each other so gleefully, but without sending the whole thing into parody. We’re used to multi-Doctor stories every couple of decades or so, but a multi-Master story takes it to a whole new level.

The action shifts several hundred floor levels to a rural deck of the ship where human settlers are living an agrarian lifestyle tending a solar farm. But this rural idyll has been soiled – literally – by the frequent incursions of proto-Cybermen, smock-clad ‘patients’ from the lower decks who are shot dead and used as scarecrows in a vain effort to deter more of their kind. The Doctor finds himself in a four-way dilemma. First, he must help the human settlers to defend themselves against the inevitable mass Cyberman attack, as the inhabitants of the lower decks have literally time in abundance to evolve into more powerful forms. Then he has to attempt to keep the Master and Missy onside to “do the right thing” and help defend the rural community. Whilst Missy falters, the Master’s having none of it, which leads to one of the most powerful verbal exchanges which arguably only Peter Capaldi can pull off with such righteous anger and indignation, harking back to his anti-war speech in ‘The Zygon Inversion’. Next, he must try to keep Bill, now a Cyberman from mentally collapsing. In some excellent directorial flair from Rachel Talalay – again – Bill’s perception of herself is human, but everybody else sees her as a Cyberman. It shouldn’t work, but it does, with seamless jumps between the two perspectives. Finally, the

Doctor is fighting to suppress his own oncoming regeneration. In fact, he’s been fighting it down for several episodes and this, too, plays with our perception as viewers. Is he going to die at the end of this story? Is the Moff cheating us again and we’ll only see Capaldi briefly in the Christmas special, supposed to be his swansong, before the new Doctor comes along?

But before those questions are answered, there is the whizz-bang blow-‘em-up mother of all battles, as the Cybermen attack en mass. And not just the Mondasian ones either, but the 'Nightmare in Silver' and Cybus versions too. Continuity-wise this could be a clunker, but the Doctor explains this with some very neat exposition. They have simply upgraded themselves. And in a brilliant nod to long-time fans from the Moff, he adds that “Cybermen will always evolve somewhere – Mondas, Earth, Marinus…” Marinus? Yes, that’s right, Marinus, home of the Voord and the setting for the comic strip ‘World Shapers’ in Doctor Who Magazine thirty years ago which posits that the Cybermen evolved there too!

Is there a happy ending? For Bill, perhaps. Believing the Doctor to be dead, Cyber-Bill carries his burned, injured body across the desolate landscape that used to be the rural haven of the solar farm and sheds a tear… and through that tear she is reunited with her watery girlfriend Heather from the season’s opener, ‘The Pilot’. Heather is able to restore Bill – or at least make her like herself – and in this form, Bill is able to return the Doctor to the TARDIS. Bill regretfully leaves him for dead and travels on through the universe with Heather, so she gets her happy ending.

Nardole, meanwhile, has become very much the action hero, fashioning solar powered guns for the human settlers and leading them to safety on an upper level. He even has had time to indulge in some romance! So, he gets a happy ending too.

The Master and Missy… well, not so much. The question is, was it murder or suicide? Or both?

The Doctor begins to regenerate, his wounds healed, but he gets no closure whatsoever.

He believes his friends gone, possibly dead, he believes that Missy ultimately betrayed him but didn’t see her final redemption, her truth to her glib-sounding assertion that she was always on his side. It’s painful. It’s heart-breaking and it’s bleak. We have seldom seen the Doctor so defeated and broken.

The final scene takes us back to the pre-credits teaser for 'World Enough And Time' and this is where 'The Doctor Falls' finishes– in the Antarctic snow, screaming to the cosmos that he does not want to change again. In fact, as the episode ends, he seems to have fought his regeneration down, only to realise where the TARDIS has brought him… the South Pole, where he first encountered the Cybermen way back in 1966’s ‘The Tenth Planet’… the First Doctor’s final story before he changed for the first time (no regeneration then kids!). And who should shuffle through the snow, clad in cloak and Astrakhan hat, hands on lapels and haughtily proclaiming: “I am the Doctor, the original you might say.”…?

Yes, this was another spoiler that was doing the rounds before this season aired. But boy! What a way to finish it!

Follow that!

Not to mention of course that the new Doctor is a woman…!

his is a review of 'The Doctor Falls' with a couple of comments added about Christmas and the identity of the 13th Doctor, so please read no further if you haven’t watched this episode and / or want to be kept in the dark about the 13th Doctor (if that is even possible).

'The Doctor Falls' begins where 'World Enough And Time' left us. Let’s recap. Bill had been converted into a classic Mondasian Cyberman, the Doctor and Missy not getting to her in time due to time dilation and Missy's former self, the Harold Saxon Master, being the one behind it all. Missy is trying to be good but is this appearance going to spoil things?

This episode begins on floor 507 of the Black Hole – affected space ship. We are all wondering about Bill’s fate and wonder immediately if that question have been answered when we see a young girl. But it's not Bill, somehow restored to a younger, it's Alit, one of the villagers who later proves herself against a squad of Cybermen.

Bill is indeed still a Cyberman; the image of her crashing upwards though the ground carrying the Doctor is now, already, iconic and very similar to the CyberBrigadier carrying Kate.

Back to Bill soon.

The relationship between Master / Missy is hilarious and complex. Like the Devil and an Angel. Missy doesn’t know whether to listen to herself or her past self, argues with and gets along with herself. She even knocks herself out – literally. She still has "the bump". In a 10th Doctor throwback, they tease the Doctor about that he has died, or wants to die, while tying him to a wheelchair in a 10th Doctor throwback. And the Master gives a new meaning to self appreciation. Ahem. I honestly didn’t know what to make of that scene! They did cooperate to save their own necks however. Missy determins that she is not sure if she is, or wants to be, the next Master, leaving wriggle room for the future.

Missy and The Master both show their cowardice when confronted by the Cyberman in a typical Doctor moment when the Doctor reminds them all that what is needed is him. He reveals he has reprogrammed the Cybermen which leads to a Cyberman which is subsequently electrocuting him being destroyed by another Cyberman.

Back to Bill… we see Bill, as a resting human. Nazran, head of the solar farm, has asked Bill to stay in the barn and she doesn’t understand why. Nazran simply says Bill may scare people. Alit enters the barn and gives Bill a mirror. Bill sees that she is a Cyberman, but resolutely rejects the fact. The Doctor offers Alit a jelly baby in a 4th Doctor throwback, and he explains that Bill's will is so strong it is like a perception filter (much like Oswin Oswald).

Bill freaks out, blowing up the barn. Scared.

Nardole displays his leadership and calm by downplaying the situation and continuing on.

It also seems that our Nardole may be feeling something special for Nazran, as he flirts with her and gently shows off by revealing that the farm isn’t real but a computer. This is useful since “The Genius Twins" (Missy and the Master) have allowed some upgraded Cybermen access to floor 507. Due to time dilation, The Cybermen have had many years of time to upgrade.

The Master takes his chance to take a dig at Bill for both being a Cyberman and taking away her identity – being deeply inappropriate. Going into detail about why children are used. Bill is afraid to lose her 'self' and doesn’t want to live at all if she cannot be herself. The Doctor reminds her that she cried real tears and so, she is still ‘herself’.

The Master questions Missy about her having empathy, and, when the Doctor insists on female pronouns for Bill, he demands “Is the future going to be all girl?” This is a huge clue about the gender of 13th Doctor, to which the Doctor’s answer is “Yes”.

The Master and Missy are about to run away when they reciprocate each other's feelings for the Doctor. “I don’t know what you see in him.” “Likewise”. After what is a winning speech from Capaldi, the Master tells him he has ignored every word. Missy looks on confused but leaves with the Master.

The upgraded Cybermen arrive and the inevitable battle ensues. We see: Nardole humble / bragging while blowing up things up; the Master wanting to escape “with the help of a scary lady” and Alit giving the Cybermen an “Apple upgrade”.

An evacuation to five levels up is needed, and, due to the Doctor’s weak state, Nardole is elected to lead the villagers there. This is a touching scene and I have to say I will miss these people, as well as having a TARDIS team. It has been a while since we had such a team, and I enjoyed watching the interplay and dynamics.

It was kind of sweet the things Missy said to the Master – except for the stabbing that followed. But in true Master style they tricked each other. I had to laugh when she said “Welcome to the sisterhood." I know, so wrong. I also kind of expected what followed and even though it was expected I was still devastated. I doubt this is the end for the Masters.

Bill’s goodbye to the Doctor (at this point) struck me as odd, especially the Doctor's response. But it gave me a clue, I looked up mid-30s actresses who have appeared on Who. I didn’t find the right one but was on the right track.

As the evacuation takes place, the Doctor shoots Cybermen reciting places he has fought them before, in a beautiful tribute, before another regeneration causes a massive explosion.

He sets the explosion to kill them all.

“Pity, no stars" he says… I will never not cry. I knew then Heather was back. After all a Tin (wo)man needs oil. Bill crying over the Doctor was also beautiful in its pain.

A gorgeous full circle ending, as they put the Doctor back in the TARDIS (that tear on the head!) and Heather gave Bill a human-like form, and can re-make Bill fully so if she chooses.

And Bill refuses to believe the Doctor is dead (and indeed, will see him at Christmas).

It was lovely to see the montage of companions then…

Regenerative panic, with flashbacks to so many Doctors, and an absolute refusal to regenerate whether this is true or due to panic, it's hard to say. The Doctor exits the TARDIS into the snow to stop the regeneration process, thus taking us back to the beginning of last episode and then we zip very far back in time indeed.

This may have been a multi Master episode, but who is that in the hat? The First Doctor?! The original you might say?!

This was a loving tribute to Capaldi and Whovians everywhere, and you will be deeply missed sir, as well as all the current team. But also, welcome to our incoming Doctor whom I look forward to watching, please don’t be strangers.

avid Bradley, playing the original Doctor in 'Twice Upon a Time', has an uncanny knack for seeming like William Hartnell in style, sound and look. He has a truly remarkable resemblance to the 1st Doctor with a brilliant performance throughout this story.

This is Peter Capaldi's swansong; his tenure has had some great stories including this one. Others have been let down by writers pushing different ideologies into the Who universe. This story has the first appearance of Jodie Whitaker at the end as the 13th Doctor. Our famous Time Lord grandfather has now changed into a woman, a female Time Lady.

As a young boy I always looked up to the Doctor especially Tom Baker. I remember eating freshly cut potatoes with vinegar in a bowl and watching Doctor Who and The Goodies. It felt like heaven slurping up the vinegar with the Doctor saving the universe. Things have changed, the Doctor is now a woman and my boyhood self is so sad as there is no male hero to look up to. But as Colin Baker says it's "change my dear, and not a moment too soon".

I think the BBC is taking a massive gamble with the shows traditional fan-base by changing the Doctor's gender. Anyway let's see what happens. I hope it works out and is successful. I adapted to Captain Janeway in Star Trek – she was one of my favourite captains.

'Twice Upon A Time' poses the question. Are memories what define a person? Elvis best illustrates in his Memories song "Memories and laughing eyes and simple ways and quiet nights and gentle days with you". I often think of my Dad, who passed not so long ago, he exists in my memories and my daughter and mum's and many others. But he was so much more than memories a loving human who had such a loving soul. He lives in our hearts and minds and continues on in spirit.

The story's concept of a companion being created from their memories, is truly amazing. The Daleks have created a hive mind which extracts their memories at the time of death and they become glass avatars of their original selves.

Are we in the end just our memories in the minds of others or more a soul consciousness that exists after death? Well I suspect the later but who knows maybe our memories and energies are reconfigured and are eternal and the Daleks are behind it. Maybe the Eternals from 'Enlightenment' can shed some light.

This story truly illustrates how war is a pointless exercise, with millions of lives lost. It illustrates a stalemate between a British Captain, a relative of our beloved Brig, which entails a loan gun battle between a German soldier and the British Captain who are both frozen in time. The humanity of it is truly played out when the Doctor decides to transport the Captain to the end of the war. Thus altering the timeline to save him and therefore our beloved Brig will exist in the future. The Doctor has changed history.

All the soldiers are singing Silent Night, a truly human moment in the Great War, at the story's ending. To end a pointless war where so many lives were lost for so little gain – just a few metres gained in trench warfare over many years.

The Doctor tells his future incarnation that "Hate is always foolish and love is always wise". This best sums up 'Twice Upon A Time': love conquers all things, love never ends. Hate turns us into a twisted abhorrence, like Sutekh the destroyer, while love never ends. It is eternal and exists in all of our hearts. My love for the Doctor will always be in my heart a force for good who changed a scared little boy into a loving human.

The power of love wins over all, including the tragedies of war.

his is a review for 'Twice Upon a Time', so please get some jelly babies or fish fingers and custard and if you haven't already watched it please do so first, unless you don't mind spoilers. 'Twice Upon a Time', was the last episode of Doctor Who for 2017, a Christmas special and our farewell to Peter Capaldi.

Right after our multi-Master episodes, this episode treated us to a multi-Doctor adventure. Unusually, however, it did not involve immediate predecessors, but instead took us right back to the first ever time the Doctor was about to regenerate.

It blended original footage almost seamlessly with newly acted scenes from, as it said on the screen, 709 episodes later. This was a lovely touch, as we see both the First and Twelfth Doctors refusing to regenerate in separate situations, before meeting – which brings us to where the last episode ended.

It is quite comical as the Doctor meets himself especially with such a dramatic difference in time; after all, this is 2000 years, or almost 60, depending on your point of view. The First Doctor is of the opinion he is the original and Twelfth, for his part, is somewhat shocked and ashamed that he behaved like this.

Their squabbling is cut short as some unknown 'entity' has frozen time. In the middle of a WW1 battlefield. As you do.

The Doctors are taken, along with one particular Captain, to a location meant for those who are about to die. The Doctors, about to regenerate, quality as far as Time Lords go, but the Captain is an unknown quantity. It is assumed the good Captain is due to die, having been face to face with an opposing soldier, but as a person who is a pacifist he was only going to shoot because he couldn't tell the other man not to.

In the facility the group are introduced to Testimony, which records memories of the dying. It is interesting to see the First Doctor see what will be his future, his quite prideful nature taken aback.

A surprise from the recent past is in store, as Bill enters the room. The Captain, dutiful soldier that he is, says that he is willing to go 'quietly into the night' if that would mean Bill could be brought back to life – his not-yet-death allowing some apparent flexibility on the matter. This is heart-warming, since the Twelfth Doctor is not convinced this is actaully Bill.

Bill is amazed and amused to meet her friend's younger self, who chews the fat with the Captain and embarrasses his current self, quite like someone showing your worst 80s haircut photos to young and old. Bill, for her part, speaks her mind with hilarious consequences. Poor Twelve.

It is interesting that in the end, what seemed to be a threat wasn't, but just a huge alien database. And Bill, well, she wasn't what she seemed but was benign, and this served as a beautiful way to have her and others say a proper goodbye to the Doctor.

The resolution of the plot by using a real life event (a Christmas event) was inspired and incorporating a member of the Lethbridge-Stewart family, made it perfect. I am among those who guessed by the Captain's physical appearance but this didn't take away from the revelation and I admit to crying into my cup of tea.

The regeneration was emotional, and fitting, with the Doctor's speech humorous and poignant. Twelve's cycle ended the way it started, we saw his eyes, and then, we see Thirteen's. And I feel this was a fitting bookend.

I admit I cried as the Doctor's wedding ring fell off, as that meant it was official, but welcome Jodie Whitaker to our screens, and thank you Peter Capaldi for being the Doctor.

ack in the day, it was a long wait between seasons. After Series 9 finished with the Christmas Special 'The Husbands of River Song' in 2015, the next new story we got was the 2016 Christmas Special, 'The Return of Doctor Mysterio'. Both Specials were very festive and silly in their own ways. 'Husbands' is essentially a comedy of mistaken identities (River Song doesn't recognise the Doctor to start with, a nice subversion of when they first met) and there's a lot of daft running around with a robotic galactic conqueror's head.

There's a very poignant ending though, when the Doctor and River's story comes full circle in some typically neat dovetailing by Steven Moffat – they spend 27 years at the Singing Towers of Darrilllium. It's after this adventure that River leads an expedition to the Library and meets the Doctor (in his Tenth incarnation) in what, for him is the first time… and she refers to their time at the singing towers. Very neat.

'Doctor Mysterio' meanwhile, is a comedy of secret identities – a comic-strip action packed run-around which plays up to all the masked superhero comic book tropes.

Autumn 2017 saw us get Series 10 at last, and this was Capaldi's swansong series, as it was too for showrunner Moffat. By then, we all knew that Peter was leaving and that his successor was to be a female Doctor, so it's hard to watch this again and try to suspend that knowledge. Moffat described the first episode 'The Pilot' as a "soft reboot", an ideal jumpingon point for new viewers for a series that was now 12 years old. And it works! We, the audience, meet this mysterious Doctor through the eyes of university caterer and would-be student Bill Potts, and asking questions "is her thing". This leads her to asking questions about this mysterious lecturer known only as the Doctor, who has apparently been at the University for at least 50 years and probably more like 70! Along the way, we find out that Bill is gay and has a crush on a sad student named Heather. We never find out why Heather is sad, but we do find out that she gets converted into a pilot by 'smart rocket fuel' and this mysterious Doctor chap knows all about this sort of thing. What's more, he's an alien called a Time Lord, who travels in time and space in a fantastic machine called the TARDIS, which looks like an old police telephone box but is much bigger on the inside And he has been at the university for decades guarding something (or someone) in a mysterious vault, assisted by a rather odd factotum-cum-secretary named Nardole who may not be fully organic!

The series progresses merrily along with the Doctor becoming personal tutor to Bill, but not just in academia – he tutors her in all of time and space. This clearly annoys Nardole who points out that he made an oath to guard the vault and not to go off-world. Along the way, it comes as no surprise to regular viewers that the vault contains his arch nemesis Missy, who

he is trying to teach to be 'good'. So the theme of teaching runs along the later stories for Missy too the Doctor genuinely wants to save her and teach her to appreciate the beauty of the stars rather than burn them.

Thus it is, that we end up with a TARDIS team of the Doctor, Bill, Nardole and, latterly, Missy. But whereas it should be crowded, it isn't. It works, and all four characters bounce off each other brilliantly, which is reflected in the sterling work by all four actors. Peter Capaldi is now, definitively and unquestionably the Doctor, with his big hair, insightful intelligence and, as we see, a sense of love and caring under his less flinty exterior. Pearl Mackie is a revelation as Bill. Early concerns that she'd be just another 'gobby' companion were quickly dispelled. Yes, she does berate the Doctor when he deserves it, but it's always justifiable and within context. She's likeable and her being gay doesn't intrude on her characters' portrayal. This is Bill, get on with it. Matt Lucas is a great surprise as Nardole. Forget his Little Britain characters – he shows real depth. Yes, he makes flippant remarks, but you get the sense that he does this in the same way as the Doctor – to deflect attention from his real intelligence and, as we see in the series finale, his ability to be a warrior. Michelle Gomez makes the most of her final appearance as Missy and she knocks it out of the park you believe she is regretting her past actions when she cries, you buy into her prancing around calling herself 'Doctor Who' and when she meets her former self, the Master, – played as smoothly and nastily as ever by John Simm – well, the screen positively crackles. I found myself feeling the same sense of regret that this brilliant combo was a 'one series only' event, but maybe that's as well, because they all go out on a high note – no chance to overstay their welcome or become a part of storylines done to death Throughout the series, there's an underlying sense of melancholy – we know it's Peter's last as the Doctor, and quite early in, we get a hint that his old body is wearing rather thin he is blinded in 'Oxygen', he almost regenerates in 'The Lie of the Land' and spends a full two episodes into the Christmas Special fighting off his latest regeneration. Personally, I wish that Capaldi had done one more series as the Doctor, it would have been fascinating to see what he would have done under new showrunner Chris Chibnall, but as it is, Chibnall now has the biggest clean slate to work on since 2005 and 1970. There’s no soft reboot to come So all in all, the 2017 series did its job it reintroduced audiences to the Doctor and his mysterious world(s), it allowed a great actor to do give of his very best work and to see off the character he's loved all his life and to pave the way for new excitement to come. It may not have been a symphony, but as a concerto it played all the right notes and in the right order too, Sunshine.

So to my scores:

'The Husbands of River Song'

Silly, frothy, just right for something to chuckle to after your Christmas Dinner. 6/10 'The Return of Doctor Mysterio' If you know your comics you'll know that superheroes are pretty improbable. But trust the Doctor to make it work! Pow! 7/10

'The Pilot'

The 'soft reboot' works brilliantly. The alien menace really isn't much, but there's plenty of mystery unravelling it as we meet this strange old geezer called the Doctor through Bill Potts' eyes. 8/10

'Smile'

A brilliantly realised future colony world, with Emoji robots and nanobots that eat people if they don't smile! What a neat idea! Keep smiling or else! 8/10

'Thin Ice'

Oh, I did so want this to be a genuine historical, set in 1814 on the frozen River Thames as the last great Frost Fair. Okay, it's got a giant fish-monster thing which may be prehistoric or alien, but I'd say it's 80% a proper historical. Some very clever explorations of race and class, but all a bit too quickly resolved. Might have worked best as a two-parter. 8/10

'Knock-Knock'

A spooky old house, a tree monster created by aliens and a misguided landlord who acts out of love. Some wonderfully dark undertones, but spoiled by a 'happy ever after' ending for the potential victims. Some brilliant comedy dialogue between Peter Capaldi and the young cast though, and David Sachet plays a brilliantly spooky landlord with old fashioned manners as he kills you. 7/10

'Oxygen'

Hints of 'Silence in the Library' here with smart space suits and their occupants turned into corpses that walk. But oxygen as a commodity to be paid for‌ with your life? Great! And the Doctor doesn't get off scot-free! 9/10

'Extremis'

First of a three-part cycle, which baffles and delights and frustrates in quick order. A very neat twist on what is reality and what isn't and how a blind Doctor who isn't really the Doctor can get wind of an alien invasion with sonic sunglasses. 7.5/10

'The Pyramid at the End of the World'

Properly introducing the Monks. They're rather like the Silents and they've been with humanity forever – and you have to invite them to become invaders. Some very clever twists and turns and a great should-be companion in Erica. But the twist is that it's Bill that finally invites them in, because she wants to save the Doctor. 8/10

'The Lie of the Land'

Another one about mind control and human perception, with a dose of 'The Impossible Astronaut' / 'Day of the Moon' thrown in with the Moffat trope of the Grand Re-Set and all's well. Sadly, a bit of a let-down after two strong episodes in setting it up. However, the whole trilogy works better on a re-watch with only a day between episodes. 6/10

'The Empress of Mars'

Victorian British redcoats on Mars! An Ice Queen! Ice Warrior Hives! Plus a pretty gruesome depiction of what the Ice Warrior's sonic weapons actually DO to human bodies! A nice little parable about redemption and honour, with a smidgen of 'Imperialism is Bad' thrown in for good measure. 8/10

'The Eaters of Light'

Rona Munro who wrote the last story in Doctor Who's original run returns with a cleverly crafted tale which hinges on people's need to communicate and unite against a common threat. The monster's a bit generic but it all hangs together well enough. 6.5/10

'World Enough and Time'

This was a story suggested by Peter Capaldi to Steven Moffat – the origin (or one possible origin) of the Cybermen. Some very clever science involving a massive colony ship trying to accelerate way from a Black Hole, time dilation and gruesome body-replacement surgery which includes Bill. The image of the 'upgraded' patients sitting in their bleak wards, with monitors plaintively saying "Pain. Pain. Pain" and "Kill Me" is one of the strongest in the series' history. Then the Master turns up and Bill is converted into a Cyberman! 10/10

'The Doctor Falls'

A slight change of tone from 'World', a lot more shoot 'em up, action and adventure, but there's nothing wrong with that. The Doctor fights off regeneration to save a human colony on a solar farm, white Bill still perceives herself as Bill and not as a Cyberman. The Master and Missy are a brilliant double act who eventually double cross each other just before the Doctor saves the day at great cost. For once though, Bill coming back from the dead, thanks to her watery girlfriend Heather from 'The Pilot', works and fits in very neatly. But oh, what a cliffhanger to take us into the Christmas Special! 10/10

'Twice Upon a Time'

The much-vaunted farewell story for the 12th Doctor. He meets his First incarnation played wonderfully by David Bradley and there's some very clever exposition as to why he looks a bit different to William Hartnell's Doctor. There's the expected round of multi-Doctor insults and bemusement as both incarnations meet, and true, the First Doctor wasn't nearly as sexist as this one seems, but it's played for laughs, especially when he interacts with Bill (or is she really Bill?). Plus a wonderful star turn from Mark Gatiss as the stiff upper lipped ancestor of a beloved character. All ends with a delightful goodbye scene from Bill, Nardole and a guest turn from Clara – and the Doctor gets his memories of Clara back. All so neatly carried out during the Christmas Truce on the front line in WW1, Christmas Day 1914. A brilliant sign-off for Doctor and Showrunner alike. :) And then we meet Jodie Whittaker's Doctor in a finale which harks back to the 10th Doctor's swansong and the 11th's début. How is she going to get out of that??? 10/10 Season Average: 7.93 :)

ASTRAL Exterminate! is the new boxed Doctor Who tabletop miniatures game from Warlord Games. It can either be bought direct from Warlord Games (https://doctorwhotimevortex.com), or from your local games store, if you have one. I picked mine up from The Hall of Heroes at Campbelltown, NSW with a RRP of A$79.00. Warlord Games have secured the BBC licence for the entire 54 years of the show, and have already started fleshing out their range of both New Who and Classic Series figures, under the banner of "Into The Time Vortex".

The Exterminate! game box provides the player with a complete game.

There are miniatures for two factions (plastic Daleks and Cybermen),

10 specialised dice, 2 Quick Reference Sheets for the rules, the Rulebooks, markers and counters for game effects, a playmat, 2 dimensional terrain pieces, cards for all of the released factions, and even a 12 inch ruler. This is perfect for the complete beginner in tabletop gaming, as there are no extra pieces that you are assumed to own.

Experienced miniatures gamers can use items from their existing collections to enhance the game, but you can also just set up and go, straight from the box.

One of the best features of the game is its simplicity. Mostly the game can be played just using the Quick Reference Sheets, without constantly checking the Rulebooks. The basic rules are also avail-

able from Warlord Games as a free PDF download, but the extra books in the boxed game really expand your gameplay. The custom dice have three symbols on them, with different in-game effects.

It follows the fairly traditional miniature gaming principles of rolling to hit, rolling again to save, and then rolling a third time to inflict damage on unsaved hits. Advantages and difficulties when shooting or fighting either increase or decrease the number of dice rolled, rather than requiring calculations; More likely to hit? Roll extra dice. Less chance of hitting? Subtract dice from your pool.

Warlord Games have made an excellent compromise with the miniatures that make up the boxed set. You get 12 plastic Daleks, 12 plastic Cybermen, and a swarm of plastic Cybermats (Useful for sneak attacks!).

The figures require very little modelling skill, and are mostly push-together. Once together, they hold very well. Experienced modellers will also be happy

L MAP with the finely detailed miniatures, which take paint very well, but as the Cybermen are moulded in silver, and the Daleks in bronze, even fans new to gaming will have visually pleasing figures, from the get-go. The other figures in the current range are mostly cast in lead-free pewter, and mostly are single piece castings. The figures are in the popular 28mm gaming scale, but have realistic proportions, unlike some other ranges. All of the figures that I have so far come across have been free of casting flash (Excess metal or plastic around the figure, needing to be trimmed.), and have been highly detailed. A great deal of planning has gone into the range, and the BBC have been heavily consulted in the likenesses that have been

Despite a floor decoration providing an indefensibly lame cliffhanger to episode three, 'Death to the Daleks' is a story I am very fond of. I know it isn’t the best Doctor Who there is, but in its defence I had the benefit of seeing its first broadcast in Australia.

sculpted.

Exterminate! provides excellent value for money, as all the new player needs to play is around a square metre of table space. The figures are a great combination of the expectations of both gamers and fans, and the rules, while simple, give a rewarding and challenging game. I played my

For four successive Sundays in terrifying black-and-white this seven year old was transfixed and petrified. I saw no wires holding up monsters, the quality of the Dalek voices was irrelevant, the incidental music wasn’t... questionable.

The overall atmosphere

first game with a complete miniature gaming novice, and she enjoyed the game enough to immediately go out and buy her own copy! (I may also have gone and bought 3 expansion packs... More Daleks, Cybermen, and the Twelfth Doctor pack!)

was genuinely unnerving, every monster was real, the alien planet was definitely alien and was utterly terrifying. Quarry?

What quarry? Ah, the innocent lens of youth.

Of course, I can’t watch it now. It’d look rubbish.

'The Robots of Death' is super. Great script, direction, designs and performances. The three classes of robot are well thought out and are important to the narrative beyond just the obvious (I.e. the strangulation bits): D84 speaks. SV7 doesn’t recognise the voice of Toos. Great stuff.

So much else to enjoy...

The decision to go all Art Deco as a nod to Agatha Christie; choreographing robot movement so they are always in sync with each other – inspired; D84 is destroyed – pathos; and the dialogue hits the screen with more dazzle than a JJ Abrams lensflare fest.

So how is it that something so super – so super-

ior – can let some dumb things negate the mystery? This story would be even MORE super than it is if the mystery was allowed to play out in tandem with the threat. Due to some D for Dumb dumbness we are left with the threat alone...

One: Agatha Christie would never call a novel on this subject

Thursday the 13th of April 2017 was the start of the 42nd Swancon.

Held over the Easter Long weekend at the Metro Hotel in South Perth, Swancon’s theme for this year (admittedly a no brainer) was 42. We were blessed with a great line up of guests including Michael Troughton, son of the Second Doctor Patrick Troughton.

Over the course of the weekend we were treated to many stories about Michael’s life and hearing some more personal stories about his father’s life.

Michael had worked on Doctor Who in the 'Last

Christmas' opposite Matt Smith and Jenna Coleman. A small bit of wise advice he gave us all in the audience was that when you are working on TV / Film etc. – is to "never eat anything". He then went on to describe the scene in the 'Last Christmas' where he had to eat the turkey leg. Now when you watch it he only has to take one or two bites.

But that scene, like most in the TV / Film industry, will do as many takes as necessary to get the scene right and can sometimes go up to take 50+. He jokingly said that he alone could have made

Controller by only showing his legs and feet – in a costume unique to one character alone, clearly seen throughout other scenes. This ‘footsie shot’ and the title of the episodes put this story at “super” and that’s just shy of “master piece”, which is a shame.

The Case of the Robots Who Strangle All the Passengers, so

call this ANYTHING BUT 'The Robots of Death'.

Two: the camera “hides the identity” of Mr Naughty Robot

turkeys extinct during that filming.

Michael was on numerous panels over the weekend including, Patrick Troughton Remembered, New Who panel, From Script to Performance and I was lucky enough to be on a panel with him talking about his work on Big Finish. Michael has been in a few of their Doctor Who audio’s, his first was 'The Lords of the Red Planet' which is a part of Lost Stories range, 'Lords of the Red Planet' was an alternate story that would have been made instead of the 'Seeds of Doom'

and was an Ice Warrior origin story.

Michael worked alongside Frazer Hines and Wendy Padbury for this audio adventure and they were able to reminisce about Patrick. Prior to this story Fraser had been voicing for the Second Doctor also with a fairly convincing 2nd Doctor Impersonation. When Fraser saw that Michael was on the cast list he was worried that Michael might take his role as the Second Doctor so he started to ask subtly at first .

Then, as it was getting close to the recording day Frazer asked more directly, and Michael (knowing his character was, in fact, a Martian Scientist) was mischievoulsy playing with him and not telling him till much closer to the recording day.

His other role within Doctor Who was in Big Finish’s novel adaptions,

where he played Manlove Stokes, an artist and scaredy cat; playing opposite Tom Baker and Lalla Ward in two adventures, 'The Romance of Crime' and 'The Well Mannered War'.

Over the weekend there were a few other Doctor Who related panels held by various members of Swancon covering a variety of topics. Being Swancon 42, the Classic Doctor Who panel looked back at Season 17, starting with 'Destiny of the Daleks' to the unaired story 'Shada'. Douglas Adams was the script editor of the series at the time (hence the link to 42 for all those Hitchhikers Guide fans).

One of the other notable panels run over the convention was a panel called 'The Regeneration Game', where we looked back at the idea behind Regeneration: how it

came about and how each incarnation of the Doctor reflects the times of the show, and how the different regenerations could be seen as how a person ages normally through life – e.g. in the Doctor's first regeneration (the youngest) all you want to do when you're young is you want to be older.

Overall Swancon was an enjoyable convention this year and if you haven’t been to one of these conventions before it is always worthwhile to give them a go, you will find it is far more relaxed than the hustle and bustle of the Expo’s (Supanova and Oz Comic Con to name a couple). The guests, after these conventions, have, in the past, found it hard to do other styles of conventions.

Swancon next year will once again be held over the Easter Long Weekend. https://swancon.com.au/

The train station is a quiet place at 7:30 am on a Sunday morning, not exactly the place you'd think to find two Doctors and Missy. But that is what happened Sunday 4th June as the Newcastle Local Group of the DWCA began their exciting adventure to a recording of the ABC’s Whovians.

Lucky thirteen was the number of club members who made the journey by train from Newcastle to the Sydney ABC studios at Ultimo. A few heads turned and there were a few interested onlookers during the journey as a few members were in full cosplay for the day – we had the 6th Doctor, the 5th Doctor, a TARDIS dress, Osgood and Missy.

Arriving at the studio we all lined up and filed into the studios – excitedly sitting close to the front. Rove McManus came out to greet everyone and introduced the episode we were going to watch before the record-

ing – 'The Lie of the Land' Episode 8.

Watching a TV show being made is fascinating – it looked to me that Whovians is very loosely scripted, with room for the discussion to explore different ideas on both the episode and the developing story arc for Series 10. Interesting, the main segments of the program were shown as they occurred, with no rerecording when a presenter made a mistake – they just made light of it and powered on with the discussion.

After the recording, the presenters mingled with the audience, photos were taken, theories debated and a lot of Who was discussed. After an exciting day, we stopped to refuel before heading home on the train (still in full cosplay).

Side note – Rove took a photo of the Newcastle cosplayers while we were at the recording and this

photo featured on the show two weeks later!

The excitement of seeing yourself on television when you don’t expect it is unbelievable, I thought my phone was going to explode with the number of messages I received! It was awesome.

The Newcastle DWCA members enjoyed themselves so much, a trip to the finale recording of Whovians was organised (Sunday 2nd July). Only a few members went down on the train this time, most noteworthy a Cyberman who had difficulty sitting down for the two hour and a bit journey (although he didn’t have his cyberman head on which must have looked very interesting). Once in Sydney the journey from Central Station to the Ultimo studios took double the usual time. This was because the group included the 6th Doctor, a mini-Dalek and a Cyberman – they were stopped numerous times on the

way for photos.

A group of about thirteen members in all made the journey and we met at the ABC studios in Ultimo. The cosplayers in the Newcastle group included the 6th Doctor, a Cyberman, a mini-Dalek, Clara (from the Orient Express episode), a TARDIS dress, Osgood and Missy – other members wore Doctor Who outfits or shirts to get into the spirit.

We were there early and were very excited. Luckily Whovians are fun people to pass the time with and the group discussed all manner of Doctor Who nonsense and took photos while waiting for the doors to open. Being close to the front of the line was important at this recording as they had released double the tickets and to get a good seat you needed to be fast.

Once inside and good seats secured, our Cyberman friend realised he could sit down! The look on Rove and the other cast members faces when they came out to see an 'Earthshock' Cyberman in the audience was priceless. Also, there was another cosplayer dressed

as Adric in the audience – luckily, he was over the other side or things could have become awkward.

A quick trivia game for prizes set the scene for a great recording. The Newcastle crew came away with three prizes – two for trivia and one for best dressed (yes, the Cyberman won the day), the prize was Part 1 of Series 10 DVD set.

As this was the finale, enthusiasm was high and you could feel the anticipation in the air. A quick pole of the audience revealed that some had been up early to watch it on I-view, but a lot hadn’t, which made the screening very exciting. The gasps, cheers, tears and laughter while we all watched the episode was wonderful – it is hard to describe the feeling of being in a room where you are all excited about the same thing, it is electric.

The cheers at the end when the First Doctor appeared was fantastic!

Then to the re-

cording of the show.

Again, the presenters were passionate in their approach to the episode and to the series as a whole. It was a privilege to be in the audience of a show where the presenters really cared not only about Doctor Who, but about the fans too. Our Cyberman friend was shown in the episode a bit – which was a lot of fun as the Newcastle crew were all seated with him and so we were seen too!

Both events were such fun and we all hope that Whovians gets another season next year!

I was thrilled when I heard that John Levene (Sgt. Benton) would be attending Supanova, Sydney. It’s not that often that we get Who stars appearing at our conventions, so each opportunity to meet one of our beloved characters in the flesh feels like a Godsend.

Mr. Levene was a positively charming man (and a sharp dresser), who could not have been more friendly and engaging if he tried. When I first approached his autograph table, I was nervous, but he was just so friendly and talkative. He asked me, without a trace of condescension, whether I actually knew who he was or whether I’d just heard that he’d been in Doctor Who. I suppose he thought I looked too young to have watched the classic series, but I assured him of my love for the Third Doctor’s era, Benton included. He asked me why I thought Benton was so popular, but star struck as I was, I couldn’t come up with an answer. He suggested that it’s because Benton is such an everyman; the type of bloke you’d be glad to have fighting by your side. Upon reflection, I think that he was right. We continued to talk for a few minutes, on subjects ranging from my Third Doctor fan-fiction, to his recent Big Finish work, before he finally signed my photo. I ended things off by offering him

a jelly-baby (I was in 4th Doctor cosplay), which he readily accepted for both himself and his aid.

When it came time for his Q&A, John was still in top form. He spoke nonstop about his life and career, regaling us with stories and jokes, even before the questions started. He’s a vastly interesting man, even away from Doctor Who, with a number of interests, ranging from singing and comedy, to video-editing.

I was lucky enough to have my own question answered, which was on whether he’d ever suffered any injuries from the pyrotechnics used on the show. The short answer: yes. Apparently, accidents were common place and he even recounted a time where he would have died if he had been just a few seconds slower at jumping out of a jeep.

It was obvious from the way he spoke that he had a deep love for his time on the show and especially for Jon Pertwee.

One funny story went as follows: He blew a line and cursed, saying “Doctor, you’ve got a phone call, it’s... Jesus Christ!”

Then, without missing a beat, Jon replied, “Alright, you’d better put him through.” Apparently, that’s just the kind of man that Jon was – always ready with a witty retort.

Perhaps the most surprising bit of information

he revealed, was that he once came close to winning a role that would have placed him at the head of a multi-million dollar Hollywood franchise. Apparently, he made it into the top two but then lost out. It turned out to be for the best, though, since the franchise never got off the ground.

It was pretty clear that John could have talked forever and there was no shortage of questions to keep him going, but before we knew it, the MC informed us that time was just about up. He wrapped things up by showing us a video he’d made, in which he’d filmed a beautiful poppy field near his house and then recorded a voiceover of himself reading the poem 'Invictus'. It was really quite lovely.

Meeting Mr. Levene was an incredible experiencing and I would highly recommend it to anybody who gets the chance.

Kind, funny and interesting – he’s one of the best actors you could ever hope to meet.

a broad grid and a huge burst of energy. It was Benton taking charge. He launched into a series of humorous anecdotes and reflections of his time on Doctor Who. The language was a little colourful at times but it would be hard to take offence at and the For many SF fans the date suchhea person told the stories. of Supanova is noted and way He covered a lot of the reserved each year as a obvious questions and “must do “event. The showed a shrewd undergathering of friends and standing of how things the likeminded ensure a worked in the industry. memorable time. Each He is under no illusions year a variety of guests as to his status in the flown in from overseas, show and his place as an make their way to the actor, not as a leading Perth Exhibition Centre man but in a supporting where the local version role. takes place. time allocated for The trouble with these theThe appearance was 40 events is that the sheer minutes which was way number of people attend- too short. Levene’s preing means that the guests pared talk took most of are kept somewhat disthat time but he allowed tant, with their appearenough time for at least a ances being rather few questions at the end. formal. Some guests do John is never one to not go out of their way to be “chatty” and in the photo call a spade a spade and signing sessions you may he is free and open about his life achievements and get a word or two in and the shake of the hand.

Rarely however do you have someone who goes out of their way to personally meet their fans.

Such was the way with John Levene known best to fans as the reliable Sergeant Benton.

In his one and only panel appearance, Levene was preceded by a short series of clips from Doctor Who. Then after a brief introduction he came onto the stage with

ambitions. Where he has succeeded he acknowledges and where he has failed he concedes. His forthrightness is a rare commodity in actors.

But where Levene shines as an actor and indeed as a person is his ability to relate to others, to instantly make strangers feel comfortable, to turn acquaintances into friends. Twice during the convention, after the commitments of the day were over he came down to the West Lodge stand to personally meet and talk to the fans.

He was patient with the photos (and let’s face it actors must surely get fed up with those) and kind with his words. He paid especial attention to those who put time into costumes and displays and complimented them on their efforts.

I am sure that all who attended the appearance and indeed met the man, can say “Well done Benton!"

ils ; itnd de tas ix u o au r g k c o b a e a c h o f t h e t h re e n h it w t in . In o or s s tranigthhe TV s to rdieusc e d, o nly utws ly b e e n ll e g n This sto ry has an lu p o s to ry o u have s e einis h has p r is has o b vio w as us ing a arlie, Matte us Ch This m y F p p e ar. Th e r to fo llo llo w in an s e ig B u t s a on various d s act a to rie s th ac te rs a to fo s te n sto ry to the othe dio s e main c har e as ie r fo r thee live ry diffic ult o f th to make it e rs wo uld b me ntioned. As I ge , Aps rQiluill a t s e r t do ne ain c harac t odd, I wo nder if take cgeannd late r Mrise fe re nc e il r s ix m s to ry. p ies and, if so, it A d an b e ginnin y b it mo re e d as it m a R audio y d e r Jordan see ms to e a t th at a tin e n inc luigno re irs t s to I n thismfe ntio n C haurlit I tho ughthtohuld have bilew ms to be str d see ld an ou se he has do e s e d ab o ut, bc harac te rs s am and Ap r to ry I s at do wnnive rs e cau be t. Everyon is talkt the o the r ange that Rning to the s the Cla ss u ’ as en acc ab o u s it ve ry s tr tio n o f lis te to ry is s e t in ightvis ting the sto ry and w make . O n c o mp le whe n this sly s e t afte r ‘N I like that the t the m to wo rk o ut as de finite s . in this e ïv a int when ‘th n po w r d o e to trie I c an s ay it rie f mo ns t it t b a h a t s t the write r ly a tha n k and me ntio ns g f Ram cwatc h o n qunicte d ho us e s cee, o r Arn and I t e the t m c a a r o R c ha t ap p e ar t g. The hau no c k’ fo r mc lic e h can ge t ar t to it t h I tho ugas he do e s gneo is hap p e nnint o f ‘Kno c k, KM ab ) and c y have be uld wo s to ry thing s tran o re minis c e Landlo rd vs ) 4 9 ye ars ) . be ing n ers act t u ift b y r s o mewas it b it to b itant ( The e ars vs ( 7 x7 e h t h The bigge st p ario it e e rie inha rac te r ( 2 0 y e throouuggh I am hap p m o c t a phani, in th o h Em h I n wit n o f the c my hnasturie s and altthhe e ne my isn, tio ne d a nic e no tio n e n e e re t u r h t twis t, any c e ut what le as t me falls ap art (e. g I n a neiceen the re foior nmis made asbhoo uld have at phras e to cha has bno e xp lanat il and Ram r t The conclusio tha ght that Ap ut this . d s o u t. n a t s y, very wr ver y th o u m e n te d a b o ll re a g in m ethos o h t ole o wh o c / rt , b u t n wha a by t ay s aw K O An a gre at cop o LOST­ GUITAR. If found please return to April MacLean

characte rs with ern ob vio us gro up inger,of as the y can all int s eth sz and Quill tog ere is no refere nc e in thi different levels . Thly the Do cto r was briefly on rs, er characte very us review this see ms said in my pre vioou sto rsix ole wh the t ou gh f it's the same thrive giv rs. ite wr the en to may be a direct lish acc ent, as it his on up o have po lished we he ardPoon TV, or mayb e, ronge r than what it ap pe ars to be a stronge r s a lot of dialogue logue due to the nature of ne has a lot of dia in characte rs. what the aliens do to our ma ct ps” is said at thetoexasee term “the pe nny dro d gla s wa I . me for ’ e pe nny dro pp ed d uatio n with Quill an r did no t forge t thel” sit use to try uld wo t Quill tho ught “ho w coom. tha it w sho TV a s wa s thi If round the pro ble re is me ntion of the chareen 'M ' rated as the fly be ing op en. nake d and als o of Charlie’ s ry is the aliens, the rob lem with the stotor do es no t ho ld up . Itait's he end the ir backsat inyde l the whole ide r but when loo ke d m de cidtai to pic k a partic ula e the g. what makes ange bo die s). of pe op le will find it on: what can I say?yAoulot characte r of the of t tel rong and compleothers will love it. I was blo wn of Doctor Wh o; e I tho ught it was at the y did but at the same tim out.

IN MEMORIUM MR FRANK ARMITAGE HEAD TEACHER 27/10/2016

Namedropping for Time Lords or How to Impress the Lesser Species when Traversing Time and Space

By Darran Jordan

n his 2017 Doctor Who comic 'Heralds of Destruction' writer, Paul Cornell, had a time tossed Brigadier LethbridgeStewart and Third Doctor wind up in 1868.

When approaching the Houses of Parliament the Brigadier remarked: “Doctor, I could swear you once told me you knew the Prime Minister of this era, Benjamin D’Israeli!” To which the Doctor replied: “Ah, well, yes, but, you know how it is old fella…” – leaving Lethbridge-Stewart to neatly summarise: “By now Doctor, I rather do”. River Song stated it rather neatly when she said – “Rule One: the Doctor lies!” But why does the Doctor feel the need to namedrop so frequently and how did an alien first get into the habit of claiming to know so many famous historical figures from Earth?

It is not as if the Doctor hasn’t actually legitimately met a wide variety of historical figures in his travels. Across the span of the show he has crossed paths with Marco Polo and Kublai Khan (in the 1964 story 'Marco Polo'); Robespierre (in the 1964 story 'The Reign of Terror'); Emperor Nero (in 'The Romans' from 1965); Richard the Lionheart (in

'The Crusade' from 1965); Charlie Chaplin and Bing Crosby (in the 1965 epic 'The Daleks' Master Plan'); Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday (in 'The Gunfighters' from 1966); King John (in 'The King’s Demons' from 1983); Robert Stephenson (in 'The Mark of the Rani' from 1985); H. G. Wells (in 'Timelash' from 1985); Albert Einstein (along with other famous faces in the 1987 story 'Time and the Rani'); Charles Dickens (in 'The Unquiet Dead' from 2005); William Shakespeare (in 'The Shakespeare Code' from 2007); Agatha Christie (in 'The Unicorn and the Wasp' in 2008); Winston Churchill (in 'Victory of the Daleks' from 2010); Vincent Van Gogh (in 'Vincent and the Doctor' in 2010) and Adolf Hitler (in 'Let’s Kill Hitler' of course, from 2011), to name but a few. This doesn’t even scratch the surface of famous faces when you also consider tales

from various books, audios, comics and other media. Of course, these often offer conflicting accounts, such as the various versions of the Doctor meeting Guy Fawkes, as shown in the comic 'Gunpowder, Time Lord and Plot', novel 'The Plotters' and game 'The Gunpowder Plot'. Without question, this shows above all that the Doctor has no need to make anything up, but regardless of need that is exactly what he has done from time to time.

The Third Doctor once boasted to have had a close friendship with Napoléon Bonaparte, saying in 'Day of the Daleks': “Do you know, I remember saying to old Napoleon.

Boney, I said, always remember an army marches on its stomach”. Of course, Bonaparte did appear in the story 'The Reign of Terror' but did not meet the Doctor, encountered instead by his companions Ian and Barbara. Similarly the Fourth Doctor once remarked that he recognised the handwriting on the manuscript of early draft of Hamlet. When asked if he meant Shakespeare’s, he replied: “No, mine. He'd sprained his wrist writing sonnets”. The Doctor had of course viewed the Bard through his space-time visualiser in the story 'The Chase', but the suggestion that he acted as scribe for him suggested a close friendship, something that was proven not to be the case at all when the Tenth Doctor finally met him in 'The Shakespeare Code'.

Why then, would the Doctor lie about having met historical figures if he hadn’t in fact done so? One explanation might be his own

memory, too often fragmented through the process of regeneration, possibly to the point that he made things up because he honestly couldn’t remember. That might be the case for later incarnations, as with the Twelfth Doctor having forgotten Madame de Pompadour post-regeneration in the story 'Deep Breath', but it couldn’t possibly be so for the First Doctor, who proved to namedrop on a surprisingly regular basis.

The first example of this was in conversation with Ian Chesterton in 'The Keys of Marinus'. “You should read Pyrrho, my boy,” the Doctor suggested. “He founded Scepticism. A great asset to your business.” When Ian responded with: “Thank heaven you remembered reading Pyrrho, Doctor”, he was quickly treated to the reply: “Reading? What are you talking about? I met the man.”

Pyrrho of Elis was a Greek philosopher, credited as being the first sceptic no less.

This namedropping trend continued in 'The Sensorites', where the Doctor described: “That extraordinary quarrel I had with that English king, Henry the Eighth. You know, he threw a parson's nose at me… [I] threw it back, of course. Take them to the Tower, he said. That's why I did it.” Because of course the TARDIS was in the Tower of London, and that was exactly where the Doctor wanted to go. In the same story the Doctor couldn’t help but show off in new apparel and remark: “Beau Brummell always said I looked better in a cloak”, referring of course to Regency England’s fashionista George Bryan “Beau” Brummell.

stated of his doctorate qualifications in 'The Moonbase': “I think I took a degree once in Glasgow. 1888 I think. Lister”. This being a reference to Joseph Lister, the British surgeon who pioneered antiseptic surgery while working at the Glasgow Royal Infirmary. By the time he reached his third incarnation the Doctor was namedropping like there was no tomorrow, such as in 'The Sea Devils' where he emphatically stated: “Horatio Nelson was a personal friend of mine”.

Which brings us full circle once more, to the Brigadier’s resigned acceptance of his scientific advisor’s frequent stretching of the truth in order to regularly work the names Soon after that the Doctor upped his game further by namedropping a non-existent historical figure, claiming in 'The Romans' that “I tend to forget the delights and satisfaction of the arts, the gentle art of fisticuffs… I am one of the best. Do you know it was I that used to teach the Mountain Mauler of Montana!” Later in the same story he returned to familiar ground once again when he stated: “It’s the old fairy story, child. The Emperor’s New Clothes. Yes, I gave it as an idea to Hans Anderson.” Then in 'The Space Museum' he recounted witnessing a historic moment of discovery, with the words: “The least important things sometimes, my dear boy, lead to the greatest discoveries. Like steam, for instance, coming out of a kettle.

Yes, I was with him at the time. Let’s see now, yes, what was that fellow’s name?” Of course, he was referring to James Watt, a Scottish chemist, inventor and mechanical engineer, who designed the Watt steam engine in 1781, an improvement on Thomas Newcomen’s 1712 Newcomen steam engine and one which had historical repercussions by providing the technology that enabled the Industrial Revolution that followed.

Of course, the Doctor’s namedropping continued thereafter into the various incarnations that followed. The Second Doctor

of famous people he’s met into conversation.

The answer to why the Doctor namedrops is of course the same as why anyone does it, namely to signal his status, to frame himself as a member of an exclusive in-group, to look good to others by demonstrating an association with famous people, even to boost his own self-esteem. But why would the powerful member of a time travelling race of aliens, a Lord of Time no less, feel the need to do something like this? Behind his own bluff and bluster, the Doctor has always been well aware of his own status in Gallifreyan society – he is an outcast, a renegade, used when it suits their purposes but soon after discarded and otherwise largely ig-

nored. Although he eventually became President of Gallifrey and later a war hero to his people, the man that won the Time War, there has always been a mutual rejection between himself and his own people. After taking Ian and Barbara on board his ship and starting to find unexpected affinities with the people of Earth, the Doctor no doubt sought the kind of acceptance he knew he was unlikely to find amongst his own kind. And so began a kind of showing off, an obvious attempt to ingratiate himself with the humans that increasingly became his regular companions – the friends and family of his choice if not his birth. It really is no surprise that in his third incarnation, exiled to Earth with his sections of his mind blocked and the secrets of time travel taken from him, that more than ever he tried to impress those around him by namedropping personages from across time and space.

The Doctor has repeatedly namedropped at various times, relating legitimate encounters, exaggerating brief encounters and wholly inventing instances where there were no encounters at all. He has done so to try and fit in, to impress his friends and find a place for himself in the wider universe, having both rejected and been rejected by the home of his birthright. But perhaps the needs of a younger Doctor just aren’t there anymore – perhaps now that he has become a she, the Doctor will no longer feel the need to stretch the truth in quite the same way.

Or, then again, maybe she will – but if she does, one might hope she would, at least, find the names of a few more female historical figures to add to that predominantly male dominated list!

[Dallas: The last person the Doctor has namedropped was Pope Benedict IX in 'Extremis'.]

aving postulated the idea of objects having infinite density and occupying zero space, and then to have actually identified such objects, was an amazing feat of mathematics, physics and astronomy. However, as they say, the devil is in the detail.

In Part II of this two part exposé on Black Holes, we’ll look at current thinking on how they are created and their ‘anatomy’, that is their main characteristics and identifying features.

Black Holes are thought to be created in one of four ways. (There may be other ways, science, and physics in particular, is an ever-changing landscape) Black Holes are thought to be created as a result of a supernova, the incredibly violent explosion resulting from the inward collapse of super-giant stars. The ‘burnt out’ remains of a supernova explosion can manifest as a Neutron Star (Pulsar) or, sometimes, a Black Hole.

The Crab Nebula is a remnant of the supernova SN1054, which was widely observed on Earth in the year 1054. The Crab Pulsar is a relatively young Neutron Star existing within the Crab Nebula.

A Neutron Star has a mass of at least 1.1 and perhaps up to 3 solar masses, however, the maximum observed mass of neutron stars is about 2.01 solar masses. Between 3 and 5 solar masses, hypothetical intermediate-mass stars such as quark stars and electroweak stars have been proposed, but none has been shown to exist. The smallest observed mass of a stellar Black Hole is about 5 solar masses.

A more recent observation, by the combined resources of the Large Binocular Telescope (LBT), NASA's Hubble and Spitzer space telescopes, have revealed that some massive stars may forgo the supernova explosion phase and collapse directly into black holes.

The observed star, identified as N6946BH1, which was only 25 times as massive as our sun, should have exploded in a very bright supernova. Instead, it fizzled out – leaving behind a black hole.

This observation might well hold the solution to the problem that, observationally, there are too few supernova explosions; that is, it is possible for supernova candidates to ‘spontaneously’, collapse into Black Holes.

So far, 25 spontaneous collapses have been observed.

Supermassive Black Holes, (SMBH) that is to say, Black Holes with a mass of ten thousand to 10 billion times the mass of our sun (solar masses) are calculated, initially through astronomical observation, to exist. See the table below.

Class

Mass

10 5 –10 10

Size

Supermassive 0.001 to Black Hole Sun's mass 400 AU Intermediate about 10 3 10 3 km Black Hole Sun's mass approx Earth Stellar about 10 about Black Hole Sun's mass 30 km Micro up to up to Black Hole Moon's mass 0.1 mm Such massive objects are known to exist at the centre of all the currently known Galaxies; their mass being calculated by observing their ‘local’ (i.e. nearby stars at the centre of the galaxy) gravitational effects and hence deducing the mass required to create these effects. Since no massive objects are actually visible at the centre of Galaxies, it is assumed that these are, in fact, Supermassive Black Holes.

An SMBH has been detected at the centre of our own Galaxy (The Milky Way).

It is a very modest 4.5 million solar masses and corresponds with the location of Sagittarius A. The possibility of Micro Black Holes, or Quantum Mechanical Black Holes, was first postulated by Stephen Hawking in 1971. They have the characteristics of a singularity with zero volume and infinite density but small mass, for example, the mass of our moon. Such objects would have a Schwarzschild radius (see later) of less than 0.1 mm.

The origin of Micro Black Holes might possibly be from the high density environment of the early universe – i.e. Big Bang.

Alternatively, some hypotheses, involving additional ‘spatial’ dimensions (other than the 3 we’re familiar with) predict the formation of Micro Black Holes.

Micro Black Holes have, as yet, not been observed, however, their energies are such that they might be detected by particle accelerators such as the Large Hadron Collider.

Although having a core of zero volume and infinite density, a Black Hole does have some characteristics, albeit, at times, they are somewhat bizarre and baffling.

This may be regarded as a ‘shell’ surrounding a Black Hole (imagine it to be spherical, but this is not always the case) marking the ‘point of no return’. The event horizon marks the boundary within which nothing can escape the gravitational pull of the Black Hole at its core; not even light.

Any object approaching the event horizon from an external observer's side, appears to slow down but never quite passes through the horizon, with its image (i.e. light) becoming more and more red-shifted.

The travelling object, however, would experience no strange effects as it passes through the event horizon.

The Schwarzschild radius (sometimes historically referred to as the gravitational radius) is the radius of a sphere such that, if all the mass of an object were to be compressed within that sphere, the escape velocity from the surface of the sphere would equal the speed of light.

The accretion disc (or shell) is a region surrounding a Black Hole where incoming particles are ‘crushed’ by the Black Hole’s gravity. The mass of these ‘crushed’ particles is converted directly into energy according to Einstein’s famous equation

The gravitational effects associated with a Black Hole, although extreme, are observed with any gravitational field, even that of Earth’s: but they are minute in comparison to a Black Hole.

Time Dilation: Gravitation affects the flow of time. As the strength of a gravitational field increases time flows more slowly.

Although the Earth’s gravitational field is very weak (comparatively speaking) there is constant need to re-align the clocks on orbiting satellites and those on Earth.

Gravity gradient: A gravity gradient describes the rate at which the gravitational E=MC 2 , thus producing a massive amount ‘force’ ii changes with distance. In the case of of energy. It is worth noting that the energy a (relatively) small Black Hole, there exists conversion rate (i.e. mass to energy) for the an extreme gravitational gradient. This nuclear fusion process (as in the sun) is less means that, for example, for an object like a than 1%, whereas, within the Accretion disc, human body, there would be a massive difit is estimated to be well in excess of 25%. ference in the strength of gravity between Note that an accretion disc is just that – a the head and feet; such that the body would disc. The material that is falling into the ac- be ripped apart. cretion disk usually comes from gas that is Gravitational Red Shift: This effect is a orbiting the black hole and therefore already direct result of gravitational time dilation. in a flat plane. Energy jets (spiralling Conversely, it can be regarded as a conparticles) outpouring from a Black Hole sequence of the energy required to escape come from the accretion disc; they flow from the gravitational field. along the magnetic lines of force which are From the point of view of time dilation: at right angles to the plane of the disc. moving away from the gravitational source means that time (crazy thought!) speeds up! the wavelength increases, since the The Eddington Limit, a concept describing Hence of light MUST remain constant. Ina maximum radiation limit, was introduced, speed creasing the wavelength means the entire originally, in the context of massive stars. electromagnetic spectrum shifts towards The notion is very simple: for any object in hence red shift. (i.e. orange moves tothe depths of space, there is a maximum lu- red: ward red, blue moves towards green) minosity beyond which outward radiation pressure will overcome the ‘pull’ of gravity.

Seen as a loss of energy process: energy is The outward radiation (a sort of intense sol- ‘used’ as light escapes the gravitational ar wind) forces incoming materials away field. Since, again, the speed of light MUST from the star. remain constant, (i.e. it can’t slow down) enis taken from the photons comprising This principle also applies to Black Holes. ergy the electromagnetic spectrum. Shorter Particles, pulled in by the Black Hole’s inwavelengths (e.g. blue – about 475 nmiii) tense gravitation, are swept up in the have more energy than the longer powerful outward flowing radiation ‘wind’ wavelengths (e.g. green about 510 nm) – surrounding the accretion disc.

There is, thus, a dynamic balance between the outward flow of radiation and the inward stream of particles.

This argument leads to disturbing conclusion that there is a maximum size beyond which a Black Hole cannot grow; an argument which is, unfortunately, proven to be observationally incorrect!

thus by removing energy from the spectrum there is a spectral shift towards longer wavelengths i.e. a red shift.

Note that this effect is not unique to Black Holes, an exactly similar condition exist for light escaping from Earth’s gravitational field – although the red shift effect is minute.

Gravity Waves: This story, as so many do, starts with Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity, published in 1915, in which he predicted the existence of Gravity Waves. As we should all know by now, gravity is regarded as a consequence of space / time being distorted by mass.

Gravity Waves are created by objects accelerating (i.e. changing velocity). However, Gravity Waves are very weak, i.e. low energy, and hence are very difficult to detect.

Furthermore, all our astronomical devices use light as the means of detection and analysis; gravity detection requires a completely different kind of instrument.

LIGO is the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory and is one of our first Gravity Wave detection devices. (see also VIRGO) The first, confirmed, observation of gravitational waves was made on 14 September 2015 and was announced by the LIGO and VIRGO collaborations on 11 February 2016.

Previously, gravitational waves had only been inferred indirectly, via their effect on the timing of pulsars in binary star systems.

The waveform, detected by both LIGO observatories, matched the predictions of general relativity for a gravitational wave emanating from the inward spiral and merger of a pair of Black Holes of around 36 and 29 solar masses and the subsequent "ringdown" of the single resulting Black Hole. The signal was named GW150914 (from "Gravitational Wave" and the date of observation).

It was also the first observation of a binary Black Hole merger, demonstrating both the existence of binary stellar-mass Black Hole systems, and the fact that such mergers could occur within the current age of the universe.

This theory predicts that, contrary to expectations, Black Holes can radiate energy, defying the principle that nothing can escape from within the event horizon.

It is so named after the physicist Stephen Hawking who provided a theoretical argument for Black Hole radiation in 1974. iv One way of explaining Hawking Radiation employs the concept of virtualv quantum particles.

At the quantum level, there exists a roiling ferment of particles exchanging energies and identities, jumping in and out of real and virtual reality. (yes, I know this seems like a figment of a physicist’s or mathematician’s wildest imagination, but such a state has been proven to exist!)

This state of chaos exists everywhere in the universe, including the vacuum of space and the interface at the event horizon.

The argument is that, at this interface, particles will divide into real and virtual particles and most particles will recombine back to their original, stable state. However, some will particles will divide such the virtual part crosses below the event horizon, leaving the real component to escape / leak into the ‘real’ universe. This leakage is Hawking Radiation. It can be regarded as a kind of ‘evaporation’ of the Black Hole.

The rate of evaporation depends mainly on the size of the Black Hole and, of course, whether the Black Hole is being ‘fed’ by incoming matter. For isolated Black Holes – i.e. they’re not being fed by incoming matter – the time it takes for them to evaporate depends on size. Smaller Black Holes evaporate faster than do larger Black Holes. For example, Microscopic Black Holes would evaporate very quickly, but a Black Hole with the mass of our Sun would take 10 67 years to evaporate – that’s a 10 followed by SIXTY-SEVEN ZEROS. Recent laboratory experiments have given credence to the existence of Hawking Radiation.

Go here for more details about the theoretical prediction that Black Holes emit radiation.

Due to the Law of Conservation of Angular Momentum, the gravitational collapse of a massive spinning star or the collapse of a collection of stars or gas with a total nonzero angular momentum, demands that the resulting Black Hole must conserve the original spin. As most stars rotate, it is to be expected that most Black Holes are consequently rotating Black Holes.

A Kerr Black Hole is a type of Black Hole that possesses only mass and angular momentum but not electrical charge. In other words, a Kerr Black Hole is an uncharged Black Hole that rotates about a central axis.

It is named after the New Zealand mathematician Roy Kerr who, in 1963, became the first person to solve the field equations of Einstein's general theory of relativity for a situation of this kind.

If a Black Hole is rotating, then it will be shaped as an oblate spheroid, i.e. slightly larger around the equator than at the poles.

However, the equations of general relativity tell us that rather than having one radius, the location of the event horizon, there are two important radii, the spherical event horizon on the inside, and the oblate spheroidal exterior surface. The region in between the two is called the ergosphere, where particles cannot remain at rest and objects can still escape the Black Hole gravity field.

At the time of the initial discovery of Quasars (quasi-stellar-objects), no process was known that could produce such vast energies (in excess of 10 30 Watts); an even greater mystery was that the energy levels could vary in the space of a few days – implying that the object was in the region of only one or two light-days in diameter. Also they seemed, predominantly, to exist at great distances; billions of light-years away.

With the (relatively) recent discovery that Black Holes exist at the centre of most galaxies and that they radiate huge amounts via mass / energy conversion rates in excess of 25%, the problem is solved (we hope) if we accept that Quasars are, in fact, Supermassive Black Holes.

High-resolution images of Quasars, particularly from the Hubble Space Telescope,

have demonstrated that Quasars occur in the centres of galaxies, and that some quasar host galaxies are strongly interacting or merging galaxies.

The peak epoch of quasar activity corresponds to red-shifts vi around 2, or approximately 10 billion years ago. The most distant known Quasar is at redshift z=7.085; light observed from this Quasar was emitted when the Universe was only 770 million years old.

The Black Hole Information Paradox is a puzzling concept, resulting from the combination of quantum mechanics and general relativity. Calculations suggest that physical information could permanently disappear in a Black Hole, allowing many physical states to devolve into the same state.

This is an unsettling conjecture, as physics is based upon the principle that information is NEVER lost, but is always conserved in one or another, but equivalent, form.

Much remains to be uncovered regarding Black Holes. We have no idea of the physics of infinitely dense space; we have no conclusive evidence about how Supermassive Black Holes are formed; all our well proven theories on quantum physics do not help us; do Micro Black Holes exist?; the information paradox is as much a physics problem as it is a philosophical problem.

Needless to say, physicist, mathematicians – and philosophers – just love this!

AND SO DOES OUR FAVOURITE SHOW!! i Sir Arthur Eddington (1882-1944). Famously quoted: Journalist: “Sir Arthur, it is said that only three people in the world understand relativity!”

Eddington: “Yes I’ve heard that. I am trying to work out who the third person is...” ii Note that the ‘force’ of gravity is, in fact, due to space / time distortion – one of Einstein’s most famous discoveries. iii nm – nano metres = 10 -9 metres = 1 billionth of a metre. iv And named, sometimes, also after Jacob Bekenstein. v Virtual particles are indeed real particles.

Quantum theory predicts that every particle spends some time as a combination of other particles in all possible ways. These predictions are very well understood and tested.

Quantum mechanics allows, and indeed requires, temporary violations of conservation of energy, so one particle can become a pair of heavier particles (the so-called virtual particles), which quickly rejoin into the original particle as if they had never been there. If that were all that occurred we would still be confident that it was a real effect because it is an intrinsic part of quantum mechanics, which is extremely well tested, and is a complete and tightly woven theory – if any part of it were wrong the whole structure would collapse vi Red-shift is a method of determining how far away astronomically distant objects actually are.

he fascination with Black Holes continues in Nu Who, this time with more scientific accuracy; but – whatever, we shouldn’t let science or physics interfere with the telling of a damn good yarn, should we?

Or should we?

The Doctor and Rose have landed, well the TARDIS has materialised, on a mysterious planet called Kroptor, viz the ‘Bitter Pill’, which orbits a Black Hole, designated K Three Seven Gen five.

ZACH: Brace yourselves. The sight of it sends some people mad.

(The shutters overhead pull back to reveal a white hot, angry, disc with a black centre and black dots falling into it.)

ROSE: That's a Black Hole.

DOCTOR: But that's impossible.

ZACH: I did warn you.

DOCTOR: We're standing under a Black Hole.

IDA: In orbit.

DOCTOR: But we can't be.

IDA: This lump of rock is suspended in perpetual geostationary orbit around that Black Hole without falling in. Discuss.

ROSE: So, they can't be in orbit. We should be pulled right in.

DOCTOR: We should be dead.

IDA: And yet here we are, beyond the laws of physics. Welcome on board.

Comment

Well, Doctor, for a man of science, your language is a bit ‘wobbly’. In space, there’s no up, down, "under" or above.

Ignoring the Doctor’s loose language, the main point, however, is that, as long as you’re outside the event horizon, a Black Hole and its associated gravitational field behave in exactly the same way as any other object with a gravitational field.

This means it’s perfectly possible to be in orbit, even a geostationary one, around a Black Hole. (again, a bit of ‘wobbly’ description, since ‘geo’ means ‘Earth’ – but we know what you mean, Ida.) Although not explicitly discussed, IF they were inside the event horizon, THEN, agreed, it would be an impossible situation.

Indeed, they would be pulled into the maw of the Black Hole and crushed into nothingness, beyond the known (well, our ‘currently known’) laws of physics.

The depiction of the Black Hole’s accretion disc seems accurate enough, as far as our imagination allows us to go. Not having observed, close up, an actual live, active, accretion disc, we can’t really be sure what it would look like. We know there’s a lot of xray radiation, objects would be falling into the Black Hole and they would flare up (not necessarily in visible light wavelengths, though) and there would appear to be a black central disc.

DOCTOR: We are so far out. Lost in the drifts of the universe. How did you even get here?!

ZACH: We flew in. You see, this planet's generating a gravity field. We don't know how. We've no idea. But it's kept in constant balance against the Black Hole. And the field extends out there as a funnel. A distinct gravity funnel, reaching out into clear space.

That was our way in.

Comment

Zach’s explanation, to say the least, makes very little sense at all – unless… … s he possibly talking about a counter balancing gravity funnel, pointing outwards, away from the Black Hole? Such a gravitational field, could ‘pull’ Kroptor away from the Black Hole, hence offering a ‘constant balance’ against the Black Hole’s gravity.

This gravity ‘ funnel’ effect is totally unknown to science today – but “Who Knows?”

As a means into landing on Kroptor, well, it’s possible, I suppose.

What the heck! – Why spoil a great story? i

The Family of Blood, having failed to gain the Doctor's Time Lord essence contained in a Fob watch, are captured by the Doctor; to each he assigns an ‘eternal punishment’ – as follows.

Yeah, Rose, that’s what they say – but there’s no evidence that it’s true.

BAINES [OC]: He never raised his voice.

That was the worst thing. The fury of the Time Lord. And then we discovered why.

Why this Doctor, who had fought with gods and demons, why he'd run away from us and hidden. He was being kind.

(Clark, wearing heavy chains, falls into a pit.)

BAINES [OC]: He wrapped my father in unbreakable chains, forged in the heart of a dwarf star. He tricked my mother into the Event Horizon of a collapsing galaxy to be imprisoned there forever.

(Jenny is sucked out of the TARDIS in deep space.)

Comment

The point about an Event Horizon is that, at that very interface, time stands still. As discussed earlier, time slows down as the gravitational field increases in strength, to a point where, at the Event Horizon, to the outside universe, it stands still.

Quite a severe punishment, I have to say.

ROSE: I've seen films and things, yeah. They say Black Holes are like gateways to another universe.

Comment

COMPUTER: He is awake.

SCOOTI: What?

COMPUTER: He is awake.

SCOOTI: What's that supposed to mean?

COMPUTER: He bathes in the black sun.

Black Sun? I’m not sue what this might be, the Black Hole; or perhaps a literary, impressionistic, illusion?

ZACH: The gravity field. It's going! We're losing orbit! We're going to fall into the Black Hole!

Comment

Zach is correct, this would be the effect of losing the counterbalancing effect of the gravity funnel.

So, in the end the TARDIS tows everyone away from the Black Hole. Well, let’s face it, the TARDIS can do just about anything.

In summary, then – this story is certainly a more scientifically based depiction of a Black Hole than we previously saw with ‘Classic Who’. The accretion disc and the gravitational effects are fairly accurate. The idea of a gravitational funnel – hmm – no such thing exists in today’s physics – but, let’s face it, the story rocks!

Comment

'Time Crash' was a special Doctor Who "mini-episode" produced for the 2007 Children in Need appeal. It was written by Steven Moffat, directed by Graeme Harper and featured David Tennant as the 10th Doctor and Peter Davison as the 5th Doctor.

The Tenth Doctor has just said goodbye to Martha, and is attempting to take off when the TARDIS goes haywire.

Suddenly, someone else is in the TARDIS: the Fifth Doctor. The Tenth Doctor realises straight away this is his past incarnation and excitedly begins reminiscing about his adventures in his fifth incarnation, much to the latter's confusion. The Fifth Doctor, irritated, decides that this strange, skinny bloke in his TARDIS is an obsessive fan of his – possibly affiliated with Linda.

In this mini episode – Black Holes feature Comment An interesting concept ‘a Black Hole strongly, but alas, none of it really makes strong enough to swallow the entire uniany sense at all. verse!’ That would have to be a mighty large (The cloister bell tolls.)

Black Hole, but with the TARDIS anything is possible.

DOCTOR 5: The cloister bell!

It has been conjectured (i.e. it’s an idea DOCTOR: Right on time. That's my cue. and NOT a scientifically based theory) that (They both start throwing control levers.) the universe might oscillate, over many bilDOCTOR 5: In a minute we're going to crelions of years, between expansion and conate a black hole strong enough to swallow traction. The ‘big crunch’ would occur as the the entire universe! universe falls in on itself, like a Black Hole, and ultimately to a point of infinite compresDOCTOR: Yeah, that's my fault, actually. I was rebuilding the TARDIS, forgot to put the sion, a singularity; after which, there’s the shields back up. Your TARDIS and my TARD- big bang, and we start the cycle of expanIS, well the same TARDIS at different points sion and contraction all over again. in its own timestream collided and whoo, Such an idea has a nice anthropomorphic, there you go, end of the universe, butcyclical, feel to it, that’s for sure. terfingers. But don't worry, I know exactly ‘Supernova and Black Hole at the exact how this all works out. Watch. Venting the instant’ – ‘The explosion cancels out thermobuffer, drawing the Helmic regulator, same the implosion’. and just to finish off, let's fry those Zeiton Not sure what to make of this; linguisticcrystals. ally, an explosion counterbalancing an imDOCTOR 5: You'll blow up the TARDIS. plosion makes some sort of sense, but in DOCTOR: No, I won't. I haven't. terms of physics, absolutely imponderable.

DOCTOR 5: Who told you that?

We know that Black Holes can be many billions of times the mass of our sun, but DOCTOR: You told me that. there is no evidence that a supernova ‘sun’ (Whiteout, then) could ever reach an equivalent mass. Now add into the equation that this Black Hole is DOCTOR 5: Supernova and Black Hole at large enough to ‘swallow the entire unithe exact same instant. verse’.

DOCTOR: The explosion cancels out the imWell, send in your answers on a paper plosion. napkin – cheers!

DOCTOR 5: Pressure remains constant.

DOCTOR: It's brilliant.

We are high above the Earth in The Master’s spaceship. The Master, (a complete maniac – and how we love him!) has finally captured Martha and her family, he is in full ‘rant-on’ mode and about to take over the Earth and, it would seem, everything else.

MASTER [OC]: Citizens of Earth, rejoice and observe.

(Guards bring Martha in. Clive, Francine and Tish are already there on one side. and Jack on the other.)

MASTER: Your teleport device, in case you thought I'd forgotten.

(Martha throws the vortex manipulator to the Master.)

MASTER: And now, kneel. Down below, the fleet is ready to launch. Two hundred thousand ships set to burn across the universe.

Are we ready?

MAN [OC]: The fleet awaits your signal. Rejoice!

MASTER: Three minutes to align the Black Hole converters. Counting down. I never could resist a ticking clock. My children, are you ready?

Comment

‘Black Hole’ converters??

Nice!

Maybe they are a means of converting mass into energy. We know that Black Holes are very efficient at doing this, far more so than nuclear fusion, namely, upwards of 23% versus 0.07% , respectively.

Doctor and Clara sort of gate-crash their way into a paranormal investigation of Ye Olde Stately Home.

Ex-wartime hero Alec Palmer and his assistant empath Emma, were investigating the tale of the 'Witch of the Well', a seemingly malevolent spirit who had haunted the area for decades, and who enjoyed nothing more than a regular bang and a wail around the place – much to everyone else's terrified inconvenience.

Yet while everything starts off all solidly with a ‘Wailing Woman in Black’, the necessary spooky occurrences, inexplicable cold snaps and self-extinguishing candles, 'Hide' soon evolves into a whole ‘Other Beast’ – a sci-fi-time-travel-monster-love-story.

A thick silver cable and other wires run from the TARDIS into the house. A large (blue) crystal is held in a cradle at head height.

CLARA: What is that?

DOCTOR: A subset of the Eye of Harmony.

CLARA: I don't...

DOCTOR: Of course you don't. Be weird if you did. I barely do myself. Right. You, sit down. All the way from Metebelis Three.

Comment

This very cursory remark, of course, explains nothing. This is a reference to the the Third Doctor’s visited Metebelis III (or it is Three?) where he steals a blue crystal which is used to enhance mental powers.

‘A subset of the Eye of Harmony’ indicates that the set up is a smaller version of a suspended supernova about to degenerate into a Black Hole.

How these two ideas are related is totally unexplained – so – just go with it!

It’s complicated! Essentially, the Doctor, Clara and a bunch freelance salvage guys, journey to the centre of the TARDIS to access the source of power that sustains / drives it. In passing, without much relevance to the action taking place, the Doctor offers the following explanation.

DOCTOR: The Eye of Harmony. Exploding star in the act of becoming a Black Hole.

Time Lord engineering. You rip the star from its orbit, suspend it in a permanent state of decay. This way, quickly.

Comment

It seems like The Time Lords have a method of plucking a star, which is about to go supernova, from space (not sure what is meant by ‘from its orbit’ single stars don’t have an orbit – maybe he’s talking about binary / multiple star systems) and place it in some sort of suspended time loop. To power the TARDIS, energy is drawn from the exploding star as it decays into a Black Hole.

Not sure about the suspended time loop – but certainly, supernovas can explode and leave behind a core remnant which can collapse into a Black Hole.

This story is a very oddball take based on the 1934 novel of the same name by Agatha Christie – only, in this case, it’s a mummy doing the murdering. Well, it’s not exactly a mummy and it’s not exactly murdering - but we are on a sort of train trip – well not exactly a train trip – it’s a trip across intergalactic space. (You gotta love the amazing flexibility of the Doctor Who precept – there are just no limits)

(The onboard computer speaks.)

GUS: Ladies and gentlemen. If you would be good enough to look from the windows on the right of the train, you'll be able to see the soaring majesty of the Magellan Black Hole.

Comment

This reference to Black Holes is one of the few which is probably correct and contains no techno-babble commentary. There will be, almost certainly, a Black Hole somewhere near the centre of The Large Magellan Cloud. There is also The Small Magellan Cloud, so we’re not sure which Magellan Cloud Gus is talking about.

This is the 2015 Christmas Special. River Song and the Doctor, unknowingly, run into each other when the Doctor is mistaken for a surgeon and is called upon by River to remove the head of her new husband, the very much hated – King Hydroflax (Greg Davies).

Of course, there’s more to it than that: there’s another husband / assistant (Phillip Rhys); a sycophant (Matt Lucas from Little Britain) ; there’s a Baymax-like robot body that exchanges a few revolving heads and is chasing down the Doctor and River Song – who’s real requirement for a good surgeon is for him remove a precious jewel that she will then sell for a vast sum of money – and the said jewel just happens to be embedded in Hydroflax’s head.

You see, it’s all quite simple – really!

HYDROFLAX: Kill me, and my body will burn.

DOCTOR: Burn what?

HYDROFLAX: This world!

RIVER: Suppose we believe you. How? HYDROFLAX: My body contains a split quantum actualiser.

DOCTOR: A perpetually stabilised black hole. That's your power source.

Comment

Not sure what a ‘split quantum actualiser’ is – but it definitely sounds impressive I think we’re back to the Eye Of Harmony – which is proposed to be a stabilised Black Hole and, depending on its size, it would be capable of wiping out an entire solar system.

All of which is wonderful piece fanciful imagination – but that’s what Sci-Fi is all about. Today’s Sci-Fi is tomorrow’s reality.

This story is chock-a-block full of Black Hole references and, the plot, to some extent, hangs off the effects of a Black Hole.

As they say, it’s complicated.

We learn, early in the story, that our intrepid adventurers are aboard a vast spaceship 400 miles long and 400 miles wide.

But, it’s not nearly long enough to house the 1056 floors, as observed on various dials. If we allow that each floor to contain a biosystem, as shown several different scenes, then, at a minimum, each floor would need to be approximately 10 miles high to contain an atmosphere with cirrus clouds. SO number of floors (1056) multiplied by height (10 miles) gives approximately 10,000 miles. The space-ship is far too short!

However, (and this is where things start to get very messy) we have not allowed for the space / time dilation effect of a gravity field (i.e. near a Black Hole, where time ‘slows down’ and space ‘compresses’; according to current theories).

SO, although the space-ship might appear to be only(!) 400 miles long – it might well be that, due to space itself being compressed, it is much longer in normal space, (i.e. where there is no gravitational field).

And it gets even more complicated folks.

The next problem arises from the time dilation rate. From various dials we see that floor 000 has a time given as; 2 days, 10 hours, 45 minutes, and 17 seconds; while floor 1056 has a reading of 365034 days 12 hours 31 minutes and 2 seconds. This implies that floor 000 is closest to the Black hole and floor 1056 is farthest away from the Black Hole; i.e. time ‘ticks over’ more slowly at floor 000.

My problem here is that I cannot mathematically construct a theoretical Black Hole which would give these figures – although I haven’t actually factored in any space / dilation effects (it’s beyond my maths!).

However, such a scenario (as in the story) might be possible, given certain space dilation effects due to a massive gravity field.

There’s nice little touch here from the Doctor, reinforcing my maths limitations: Downstairs, Razor is cooking a fry-up. Bill is yawning. She checks the scanner. The Doctor, Nardole and Jorj are by the lift.

NARDOLE: But it's been ten minutes, so she must have been down there for years.

DOCTOR: Yeah.

NARDOLE: We can take the TARDIS, go back and get it right.

(The lift arrives.)

DOCTOR: This close to a Black Hole, we'll never be able to pilot her accurately.

Comment

Sort of confirming my difficulties in manipulating the spacetime equations and the effects of a large gravitational field – if the Doctor / TARDIS can’t do it – it seems reasonable that I can’t either with my puny little ape-brain.

Well, in-spite-of the detailed considerations of the physics of the story, broadly speaking the characteristics of Black Holes are correctly portrayed. There is a time differential between the ‘top’ of the spaceship and the ‘bottom’: the Black Hole’s extreme gravitational field does draw in matter which gets ‘crushed’, emitting masses of high energy particles; it is possible to be in orbit around a Black Hole (as long as you’re outside the Schwarzschild radius); it is possible to draw away from a Black Hole, provided you have powerful enough propulsion system.

So – again, although the facts are not entirely consistent, it’s another blockbuster of a story.

Well, in the Nu Series, certain ideas are now more accurately portrayed: the accretion disc; time and space dilation; high gravity characteristics; but there is much techno-bbbbbable – things that do not exist, or ideas that are not within our current understanding. But we still have a series of great yarns, do we not?

Is the TARDIS 'roomy' enough?

Click on the image above to see a report on inflatable Daleks in Australian Womans Weekly June 16 1965.

Click on the following links to find out more about Daleks in Australian publications over the years.

Link Link Link Link Link Link Link

Thin Lizzy live doing a cover of the Doctor Who theme.

A TARDIS in Hall. Another report here

Doctor Who It's a Square World

Jigsaw aficionados have fun!

Frazer Hines interviewed for SciFiNow An Australian Doctor Who

Create your own logo!

podcast.

Give it a listen.

NEW TO WHO

An extended podcast interview with Andrew Cartmel.

his crossword has 45 clues, one for each story of Troughton and Pertwee's time as the Doctor. The answer for each question is a word that appeared in a story title. There is a clue for each answer based on an important event in the episode plus there are many answers that have a second clue based on the actual word. As an example, to give you an idea of how this works, I could have had a clue of “Flowers but are not alive”. The answer for this is “Dead”. I will leave it to you to work out how these two clues would give the answer.

5 Crabby but not separated 7 Not on a spaceship 9 Serendipity 10 A baron doesn’t face up to truth 11 First meeting, sort of 13 A cannula becomes entangled 15 Returning but now more experienced 17 Indian circus 19 No stools in the hangar 21 Not having a ball of a time 22 When was Edward trapped, in the afternoon?

23 Possibly the edge of the Caribbean Sea 25 Sounds like you can look at these imps 27 Bonnie 29 On the verge of hallucinating 31 Earthly imposter 33 Nearly future Roman England is attacked by two babies 36 Fighting a fake rook 37 Variant message delivered 39 Taming elementary particles 40 A tank was used as a disguise 41 Promoted whilst being assaulted 42 Start of mushroom transport

1 Not evil or dead but invisible 2 Hammering on what could be a mussel 3 Not a good goodbye 4 Previously bottom of the Earth 6 He’s cuddly but not all there

8 Starting with a bungalow near Thornwood 11 Rooting from the start 12 A deadly purpose arises 13 Organising new phenomena with cheese!

14 Confused when to feed 16 Provides an evaluation of hexagonal plus two 18 Rocket campaigner 20 Ring a Ring o' Rosie 22 Straight bars above an old resort

24 One eyed hell 26 Brown and three originally 28 Tabletop ending 30 Kringle homophone I think 32 Not an insignificant diastole 34 Egg and possibly toast 35 Sooth the savage beast 38 Nobody in Wentworth

“Have you heard? There’s talk that they’ve found a complete story. The best bit… it’s rumoured to be 'Tomb'!”

I remember this phone call from a long-time friend who was keen to share the news. It was by landline, in the days before mobiles and instant news feeds, but the information had come via the internet. The web was in its infancy compared to what it is now, but there was still enough wariness about whether the story was true.

Did we dare to get excited about something that could just be an unfounded rumour? The finding of any episode was exciting in a decade that had very little new Who, but a whole intact story seemed too much to hope for. Let alone that it could possibly be 'The Tomb of the Cybermen'.

To be fair, Doctor Who has many Grails: 'The Tenth Planet' episode 4, 'Power of the Daleks', 'The Web of Fear' (also mostly still missing at that time), and 'Fury from the Deep' to name other highly sought-after classics. But 'Tomb' was always right at the top of that list.

It was a story of which absolutely no footage survived, yet people who had been lucky enough to see its original transmission seemed to remember it more potently than the others. One such friend often talked about the thrillingly desperate attempts to knock Cybermen back down the ladder into the Tombs below. Backing this up, photos of the emerging Cybermen looked spectacular, and the novelisation portrayed the Cybermen at their crafty best, laying a centuries-long trap for mankind.

Doctor Who ’s second most popular monsters have not always been well served in the scripts in which they appear. The recovery of one of their best stories was exciting, especially as none of their First or Second Doctor encounters was complete in the BBC archives – an effective broadcast loss of the first five of their appearances in the series as a whole. Added to that, was the fact that so little of the Second Doctor’s run was complete, so this was a great opportunity to see Patrick Troughton shine too.

As the good news was confirmed from other sources, another unexpected piece of information arrived: the story would be fast-tracked for release on BBC Video. The story behind this, with BBC Enterprises intercepting the recovered tapes before returning them to the Archives, explains why this happened, but whatever the reason it was a godsend at the time. No need to barter on the private fan circuit for tenth generation copies with images so distorted they could make your eyes bleed.

'Tomb' was coming, and it was coming to everyone in the best quality available…

Now the other questions started. What if it didn’t live up to the immense reputation that had been built around it? What if we were now about to see this much-vaunted classic only to find that it really wasn’t any good?

In defending some of the more controversial parts of his era, John Nathan-Turner (the last Producer of the classic series) had famously commented on how “the memory cheats” as a means of dismissing claims that the show during his time was no longer as good as it had once been. Now 'The Tomb of the Cybermen' was going to be able to be compared directly against 'Attack of the Cybermen', JNT’s own sequel in the same setting. The Cyber-War was on!

I remember trying to approach this with a strong sense of realism. Terminator 2 had only recently come out, and had redefined audience expectations of special effects. There were many people who were clearly expecting 'The Tomb of the Cybermen' to match these production values, despite having been made in black and white on BBC budgets for low-resolution television a quarter of a century earlier. Having seen the other surviving ‘60s Doctor Who episodes, I knew the limitations the story probably faced. To me, it only had to live up to a fraction of the towering reputation that it had in order for the story to be a success.

Slipping the brand new VHS of 'Tomb' into the video machine for the first time, I told myself I would watch it one episode at a time, with breaks between them to prolong the experience. Of course, I failed at that and watched it all in one go. But what an experience!

From scarcely believing that I held this story in my hands to finally seeing the iconic moments that had burnt themselves into the minds of viewers in the ‘60s, 'Tomb' certainly delivered.

Yes, it has its dodgy moments – but then every 'Androzani' has its Magma Creature, or every 'Talons' a giant rat. Not every special effect is a winner, especially now when viewed on large, high resolution screens vastly superior to the viewing experience of 1967. You can also pick fault with many elements of the script, from plot holes to some stunningly sexist lines and racial stereotypes that are a clear and unfortunate product of its time. The character of Klieg is consistently a less logical logician than even the Cybermen appear to be across their stories, while they in turn seem to have an odd fetish for putting their logo on absolutely everything in the Tomb.

For all this though, 'Tomb' does not come up lacking.

Like most Doctor Who of this era, it strives to turn its constraints into benefits, using a couple of main sets for most of the action, and confining everything else to claustrophobic tightness. The main sets are large and impressive, and there is a clever conceit in that the levers and control panels look comically large and simple while only the humans are using them, but suddenly appear to be the right size and more realistic when the giant Cybermen resume control. These Cybermen are enormous, an effect enhanced by a human cast that is mostly short and small.

The Cybermen don’t end up doing a lot in this story (again, due to budget limitations), but they don’t have to. As is typical of the ‘60s Cyber stories, their presence is very limited for the first half of the story (not just the first episode), which lets it play for suspense with shadows and hints of movement that may or may not have something to do with the creatures themselves. This adds a sense of brooding danger throughout the story, combined with the cleverness of the trap itself. You know it’s there, but when will it be sprung?

A surprising amount of the story is shot on film, which adds to the atmosphere. There is an epic quality to the location footage that feels like Hammer Horror, and the main Tomb honeycomb is a truly impressive construction. Having actors in extremely sight-limited Cyber costumes climbing down ladders without safety railings from three to four floors above the ground would have modern day Health and Safety monitors cringing in disbelief.

Set pieces such as the awakening of the Cybermen and the one that chases the Doctor through the hatch are extremely well handled. They even get away with the Cybermats – a moment where the production really could have come unstuck.

There are also great tender moments and interplay between the three regulars. Troughton’s Doctor is wonderfully manipulative: reassuring his companions but watching everything that’s happening, closing pompous people down with some pre-Pertwee abruptness, and prodding events along where required. He knows this archaeological team and others won’t leave the Tombs alone now that they’ve been discovered, so he may as well be there while the exploration is underway (we’ll gloss over the ethics of him re-electrifying the doors at the end).

JNT was right about one aspect of the memory cheating: Doctor Who is about creating impressions from the images that it shows, so that your own mind builds on them and fills in the gaps. 'Tomb' has had such a long-term impact because for whatever script and production faults it may have, it is packed with moments that stick and grow in the minds of kids.

Dark rooms, an unseen but increasing menace, giant Cybermen waking up to stalk people through the corridors, and some surprisingly graphic deaths are all the stuff of fond nightmares. This is a story with relatively explicit electrocutions at the start and finish, bodies smoking when shot by Cyber weapons, and a Cyberman beating Klieg to death (just offscreen, but with brutally solid sound effects) before being disembowelled by Toberman.

It has now been 51 years since 'The Tomb of the Cybermen' first aired in 1967. Unbelievably, it’s been 27 years since that phone call in 1991 to pass on the rumour that it had been recovered. That means 'Tomb' has now been rediscovered for longer than it went missing.

Its legacy through all of this is one of hope. 'Tomb' showed that complete stories could still be found, not just single episodes and fragments. It also showed that significant stories, those sought-after Doctor Who Grails, could still be out there.

It is a terrible loss that so much material is still missing from the BBC Archives, especially as time marches on and the ongoing survival of old film and videotape becomes less likely.

But there have been spectacular finds, not least four episodes of 'The Ice Warriors', all of 'Tomb of the Cybermen' and most of 'The Web of Fear' alongside all of 'The Enemy of the World'. ['The Web of Fear' may be missing episode 3, but oddly that is most expendable of its episodes aside from the first appearance of Lethbridge-Stewart – and I would rather trade that than not have the Yeti / Army battle of Covent Garden later in the story].

There was a time when I could only have dreamed of seeing the Cybermen emerge from their tombs, or the Yeti attacking in the streets of London – but now these stories can be found in any DVD shop, and even in the bargain bins! For that I am happy and grateful – even if nothing else resurfaces in future.

'The Tomb of the Cybermen' is a great survivor – for decades it lived in memories and reputation, and then it reappeared in full to give new generations a glimpse of the Cybermen and Troughton’s Doctor at their peak.

“We will survive,” the Controller intones several times within the story.

Thankfully they did indeed.

The Doctor felt hope in his hearts for the first time since his eighth incarnation, even though Rose’s rejection of his offer to travel with him risked crushing them into his rib-cage. The TARDIS doors creaked closed and the Doctor sighed. All was silent, as if even the TARDIS was holding her breath. And then the Doctor decided, “No.” No debating, no equivocation. He wasn't going to let that flicker of hope die. He turned to the console, and with a fierce grin said, “Well… show me the cosmos. I'm the Doctor after all, the Doctor wanders. Let's wander”.

And so he did.

Under a night sky illuminated by the sapphire ball of a sister planet, a battered wooden blue box materialised with a wheezing groan. Underneath the words “Police Public Call Box” a pair of doors opened with a creak, a tall man dressed in a bright blue jumper under a battered leather coat looked up at the sky and muttered, “Well, there's a familiar view.” *** The security team trampled through the scrub-land, a routine patrol that was about to have a less than routine encounter. The leader of the team was a grizzled plains-walker, a veteran of nearly a hundred summers, and despite being there for nearly two entire cycles, still wasn't used to all the plant life. Fellok mentally shrugged, he probably never would be, not with The Cataclysm so close. His offsider, a jittery caves-dweller named Yella was taking point as they were best suited for the night-time conditions. “AN APE!” Yella hooted worriedly, his third eye emitting waves of psychic force at his victim. Fellok’s eyes, in his case only two, might not have been as dark adapted as Yella’s but he could see well enough that Yella’s “ape” was nothing of the sort. It was too tall for a start, and too hairless. “Hold lad,” Fellok commanded, and when Yella didn't comply he cuffed him around the head, it might have been a violation of the Community Orders, but secretly Fellok enjoyed it just a little too much. Once Yella stopped his assault, Fellok knelt over the crumpled body of the “ape”. It was the Doctor. *** The Doctor came abruptly to consciousness. In the moments before he opened his eyes, he sought answers to three questions, “Where am I?” “Who am I?” and “Who are you?” Unfortunately, he could only answer one of those, and so resorted to the tried and trusted approach of asking out loud “Where am I?”

A young green-scaled woman was standing over him, looking down at his recumbent form curiously and she jumped when he suddenly spoke. “’ello there,” the Doctor gifted her with a rare genuine smile, “I'm the Doctor. Who are you?”

“She doesn't need to answer you, Mondasian,” a new voice said. It was commanding and cold, and if the Doctor was being honest, all too familiar. “Ohh the bully squad has arrived.

What’ll be first? 'We ‘ave ways of making you talk?' or straight to attaching electrodes to parts of my body? Cos really, I'll talk to anyone.” The Doctor got up slowly, dusted himself down and conducted a quick assessment of the contents of his pockets. Toothbrush, yes.

Psychic Paper, yes. Jelly Babies, yes, although he had no idea how they kept appearing in his pockets. Sonic Screwdriver, no. So the bully squad weren't idiots. Part of the Doctor relished the idea of outwitting them, but he had his suspicions that leaving sooner rather than later was of the essence. Finally, he turned to regard them. He offered them a smile, not a genuine one this time, and said “’ello. I'm the Doctor,” he still relished the sound of his voice saying that after so long of denying it, but he felt it was going to be the only bit of enjoyment he was going to have this evening. He looked at the trio of Silurians, a green scaled one like his young guard, a plains-walker if he remembered correctly, and a pair of the brown scaled, three-eyed caves-dwellers. It was another piece of evidence suggesting that once again, despite weeks of success in avoiding trouble, the TARDIS had dropped him into the middle of history as it happened. “A science caste?” the obvious leader of the Silurians present asked, her eyes narrowing. “Ohh I've dabbled. ‘Ere and there, bits an’ bobs.”

He was baiting his captors, testing how far they’re prepared to let him go before stopping him. His captor scowled, which was a good sign as far as the Doctor was concerned. “Why are you here?” She asked. Still questioning, so she either hadn't made up her mind or was waiting to play a trump card. “Holiday,” honesty and infuriation in one simple package, the Doctor mentally patted himself on the back. He was met with a short bark of a laugh, “If you are genuine, Mondasian, than you picked a terrible place for one.” Another tick in the ‘I know what's coming’ column the Doctor thought. At least they weren't automatically assuming some criminal conspiracy on his part. “And I'm not Mondasian,” he added as an after-thought. “You're certainly not one of us,” she said imperiously. She then waved at one of the caves-dwellers, who held up a scanning device. The Doctor’s body tingled pleasantly as he was scanned and he couldn't resist laughing at the sensation. “He's not Mondasian Commander,” he warbled.

“What are you?” She asked, eyeing him warily. A wave of sadness washed over the Doctor, consuming the small amount of Bon-vivancy he was experiencing. The truth still hurt, a gnawing agony of loneliness that the Doctor was studiously trying to avoid facing. “I'm a Time Lord,” he said, his voice far away and long ago.

“Never heard of them. Although the title seems to be rather overly melodramatic.”

“There's not a lot of us about… Not any-more” the Doctor said in a small, pain-filled voice.

His captor took note of his mood and, either out of compassion or in the knowledge that she'd get no more answers, such as they were, she left him in peace. *** It took the Doctor a long time to realise that he was alone. With visible effort he shook off his funk, he scanned his cell and dug around in his pockets. Producing a rumpled paper bag the Doctor barked a short laugh when he saw that, somehow, instead of jelly babies, it was now full of mint leaves. “One o’ these days,” the Doctor said conversationally as he popped a mint leaf into his mouth, “I'm going to work out where you come from and how you get into my pockets.” But the everyday mysteries of his life took second place to escaping from a cell on a world which, he was almost certain, was set to face disaster. *** The Doctor’s captor regarded footage of him with cool but curious eyes. At her shoulder stood one of the caves-dwellers, Sellec who acted as chief scientist of their mixed race facility. Sellec who had the unenviable duty of creating the great arks capable of whisking their peoples away from the looming rogue planet. Duplicating the technology that the people on their neighbouring world of Mondas had already perfected. In any other age, his achievements, up to this date, would have made him a legend, but the critical failure to get the arks into space had, instead, rendered him a pariah. “Could he hold the secret?” she asked Sellec.

"Logically,” he said in the sing-song voice of all caves-dwellers that worked so well in the depths they favoured but made conversation difficult for most plains-walkers. “Logically, if it came here, it must have a ship.”

“The patrol that found it also found a…” she hesitated as she struggled to not sound incredulous, “a box. Made of wood. Could that be its ship?”

“Perhaps. We know the Mondasians use metals for their ships while we on the whole use rock. Other species might use any number of other materials. Couldn't we simply ask it?”

“Not until we've looked inside that box. I want to negotiate from a position of strength.”

“VASTRA,” Sellec scolded, “we need to work together. All the peoples of this world and of those beyond too if we want to survive. Talk to him. Please. Or let me talk to him.”

“It,” Vastra corrected, “we don't know its gender, or even if it has one. Nor…” she added venomously, “if it's worthy of being considered on par with us.”

“Those old prejudices die hard, don't they Vastra?” Sellec said, “aren't you just a bit curious about him? I seem to remember you were always questioning things, back in the old days.”

“Curiosity is the purview of the scientist,” she said, almost as if quoting something verbatim.

“Caution is my responsibility now,” she couldn't meet Sellec’s eyes as she said it.

“What happened to the infamous Vastra? The woman who walked to the sea? The woman who questioned the Triad itself? The woman who looked to the stars?”

Vastra didn't answer for the longest of times, and then said quietly, “She grew up.” *** Hours later, the door to the Doctor’s cell opened and Vastra stood in the doorway. “Feedin’ time already? I'll ‘ave the soup du jour. And seeing as grapes haven't evolved yet, it’ll be ginger pop to drink.” The Doctor smiled in such a way his ears wiggled. Vastra regarded him levelly, and said, “I don't think you're as stupid as you want us to believe.”

“Well, it's been said before that no one is as stupid as I appear,” the Doctor relished trading barbs with his captors. It was a tried, trusted and true method of getting interesting results. Today was no different, it seemed that his apparently smug reply struck home and Vastra lost every vestige of self-control and she burst forward and grabbed the Doctor hissing “My people are facing death, and some alien,” she all but spat out the word, “comes here and jokes and mocks. Either help us or leave. No one here will stop you. No one has the time to.” She pushed the Doctor away and turned her back on him, but not before the Doctor caught sight of the desperation in her eyes and heard the fear in her voice. He felt the weight of history on his shoulders, the looming pressure of a fixed point in time pressing on his soul. He knew he should leave. But he also knew what it was to face extinction. “No more,” he said softly.

"What?” Vastra asked, turning to face the Doctor again.

“I'm not gonna run away. It's not my nature. I'll help you however I can.”

“I don't trust you,” Vastra said.

“That's okay, friendships have been built on less. One of my best friends tried to kill me when we first met. Now,” as if a switch was thrown the Doctor went from flippant to deadly serious, “what's your problem?” *** The Doctor was like a dervish, all but skipping from console to scientist and back again, asking questions of everyone he passed. He was like a sponge, absorbing information. And then, as if a switch had been flicked, he stopped. He cocked his head to one side and asked “Where did the moon come from?”

“Moon? What's a moon?” Sellec asked in reply.

The Doctor mentally slapped himself, “The rogue planet,” he added.

“No idea, we detected it one day and…”

“An’ it's been all hands to pumps since. Gotcha. And the neighbours haven't been any help?”

“They,” Vastra hesitated and the Doctor read a lot into her silence, “have kept themselves to themselves. They are working as hard as we are to save their own people. But they're not communicating.”

“Nah, they wouldn't,” the Doctor muttered. Any further rumination were interrupted by a cry from one of the technical staff, “CHIEF SCIENTIST! LOOK!” The Doctor had never heard a Sea Devil shout, and it wasn't a pleasant sound, like a stabbed man’s final rattle. But seeing what had alarmed the technician froze even the Doctor’s hearts. The planet Mondas, nearest neighbour to the Earth was moving away. Slowly at first, but glacially faster. The Doctor felt his stomach flip, history was happening and extinction was sure to follow.

TO BE CONCLUDED…