Review: Doctor Who: The Well

THIS REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS SO PLEASE STOP READING IF YOU DON'T WANT TO BE SPOILED!

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READY?

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OK THEN ... YOU WERE WARNED ...

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Doctor Who has enjoyed several 'sequel' stories over the years, most often of course featuring (and because of) the popularity of the monster that featured in the first one. Thus we have 'sequels' featuring Daleks and Cybermen and Sontarans to name but three. There are others of course: The Meddling Monk returned for a second outing in the season following 'The Time Meddler', the Yeti were back for another outing in the season following 'The Abominable Snowmen'. Sil was back the season following  'Vengeance on Varos' ... you're sensing a theme here ...

In 'New-Who' there have been some returns with quite a distance between the new and the original appearance. The Autons and the Nestene Intelligence returned in 'Rose', 34 years after 'Terror of the Autons'. The Macra were back in 'Gridlock', a mere 40 years between that and their first appearance in 'The Macra Terror'. With 'The Well' we are treated to the return of an enemy from 2008, just 17 years ago. To put this in context, it's a little like the Sensorites turning up in 'State of Decay'! 

Let's get to the story though, and it's a cracker. The Doctor and Belinda are still trying to get back to Earth using this 'vindicator' device, and so the TARDIS lands on a space ship, but not before the pair get changed out of their gear from the previous story and into some rather natty spacesuits which just happen to completely be the same as those worn by a bunch of marine-like soldiers who are about to descend to the surface of the planet below. That TARDIS wardrobe is darn clever like that!

No sooner have they left the safety of the TARDIS than the Doctor and Belinda are completing their suiting up and jumping out of the ship to arrive safely on the planet surface. The Doctor does his vindicator thing, and then they're off exploring with the soldiers.

We're totally in Aliens territory here. There's a mining operation which they have lost contact with, a missing crew, and a blasted planet. So they explore and find a lone individual, Aliss, who is deaf, but who seems to be the only surviving person there. All the rest of the crew apparently went mad and killed each other. Except Aliss.

All the mirrors are broken as well, and, it seems, no-one has heard of the Earth. They are far in the future, and whatever happened to the Earth on 24 May 2025, it wiped the planet from existence.

So they try and work out what happened. Belinda starts seeing glimpses of something behind Aliss, and the Doctor discovers that this was a diamond mine before the star was destroyed. He further discovers that Planet 6767 used to be called Midnight ... and he has been here before (in the story called 'Midnight').

So they now have a dilemma. They want to save Aliss, but the mystery creature has latched onto her and is always behind her. Anyone who ventures behind her is violently killed. And also, the creature wants to get off the planet ... so they can't take Aliss with them.

A solution presents itself when the Doctor, using the fact that for some reason the mine runs on mercury, blows some holes in the pipes behind Aliss to create a huge mercury mirror. This allows them all to run ... but the creature is also fast and latches onto one of them again - this time it's Belinda! The Doctor tries to get it to switch to him, but no dice. Thus the marine commander Shaya, shoots a hole through Belinda, just missing her heart (we have been told several times that she is a crack shot), and the creature switches to Shaya, who then runs to the mining shaft and falls down it, apparently taking the creature with her.

But then, as the remaining marines return to their ship, one of them seems to have something behind her ... the creature has escaped the planet!

As a story 'The Well' is excellently put together and is quite claustrophobic and scary. As I say, it's very much influenced by the film Aliens  and I also caught a sense of 'The Waters of Mars' episode of Doctor Who which has a similar bleakness to it, and a noble suicide at the end.

Where it fell down for me was in the realisation of the threat. In 'Midnight' the plot revolved around this unseen, unknown entity which could take over a person, making them speak the same thing as someone else the creature wanted to possess - the Doctor fell into that trap! Whereas here it's completely different. The creature lurks always right behind someone on their back, and anyone who goes behind them is killed. Maybe the thing got fed up with there not being anyone to take over by the speaking thing and changed the way it attacked?

But also, given that we are many hundreds and thousands of years after the events of 'Midnight', how long does this thing live? And why didn't it attack the mining works when they were first set up? Why wait until now? Maybe they found it deep in the planet's surface and brought it to the surface while looking for diamonds?

The mercury thing was a nice idea, but very convenient when they needed a mirror to try and break the thing's influence on Aliss. I'm also not sure why Aliss being deaf was significant. There was something to do with people it attached itself to being able to hear the thing whispering, but what was it saying? And why was that important? Not sure. 

For an entity which wants to get off the planet, killing everyone violently would not seem to be the best approach to be honest. Why not lay low and wait for a ship to arrive and then get on it? Much easier.

And the Mrs Flood moment? This comes at the end when the Senior Officer of the marines bizarrely turns out to be Mrs Flood (remember this is in the far, far future) who is interested that the Doctor was using a vindicator. Why, we have no idea! So is Mrs Flood a series of splinters like the last of the Jagaroth (from 'City of Death') ended up as - that story also had a time fracture which is what happened to Belinda in 'The Robot Revolution'? Is she a time traveller who is stalking the Doctor? At this point ... I've no idea.

Overall, another superb episode of the show, with a great setting and some stellar performances from all concerned. 

News: New DOCTOR WHO book!!!!

It's been twenty-seven years!  Twenty-seven years since I was last commissioned by an external publisher for a new Doctor Who book. In that time I set up Telos Publishing, and of course we published some of my books, like The Target Book and The Who Adventures. I also self published two volumes of my Doctor Who reviews, called Then and Now (available from https://samantha-lee-howe-ltd.sumupstore.com/search?search=David+J+Howe)... but this is news of a totally new book, from a new-ish publisher in town!

BEDFORD SQUARE PUBLISHERS ACQUIRE TITLES FROM HUSBAND AND WIFE

Editor-at-Large Maxim Jakubowski is thrilled to announce the acquisition of two strikingly different books by a married couple. USA Today bestselling author Samantha Lee Howe introduces a smart and seductive new cosy crime series, Mel Greenway Investigates, while David J Howe – renowned Doctor Who authority – shares a heartwarming and delightfully geeky memoir, Who Me!

Maxim says 'It's not every day you get the pleasure of acquiring two very different books from authors who happen to be husband and wife! I've long been a fan of Sam's fast-paced and cinematic USA Today bestselling writing, her new series introduces a gutsy British heroine and sleuth of the first order. While^.  David's memoir of how the iconic TV programme changed his life is a monument to geeky charm and Terry Pratchett-like in tone, and will become indispensable to its millions of fans.  

Samantha Lee Howe says:

'I've always been fascinated with post-War thrillers and I love quirky independent investigators, so combining the two fed straight into my passions. In addition, I have christened this novel "co-sexy" as its cosy crime, but mixed with simmering and sexy undertones, all filleted with the twists and turns and unpredictability that I know readers enjoy in my novels. I hope readers will love Mel as much as I do!'

In contrast, David J Howe's memoir is a nostalgic, emotional, and often humorous journey through a lifetime spent immersed in the world of Doctor Who.

'It seems like I've lived my whole life to be able to write this book,' says David J Howe. 'I often say, if you cut me you will find Doctor Who written through my flesh like the words in a stick of rock! I feel that many readers will find echoes of their own lives in the pages, and it's superb that a shared appreciation of a television programme can bring so much love and hope into the world.' 

For both titles, Maxim Jakubowski acquired World English Language rights from Camilla Shestopal at Shesto Literary.  

Bedford Square can be found at: https://bedfordsquarepublishers.co.uk/

David J Howe is at: www.howeswho.co.uk

Samantha Lee Howe is at: www.samanthaleehowe.co.uk

The plan is to publish Who Me! in October 2025, so watch out for it!

Review: Doctor Who: Lux

Way back in the late sixties, Doctor Who presented a story set in the Land of Fiction. 'The Mind Robber' included the Medusa, a Unicorn, Clockwork Soldiers, the Minotaur and a strange man named Gulliver ... Doctor Who is no stranger to episodes which push the boundaries and play fast and loose with 'reality' as we know it. And so 'Lux' is the latest entry to go down this route and to present a story which is very inspired by the TV series Sapphire and Steel as well as allowing the characters to have a little fun with the nature of film and television.

Unlike 'The Robot Revolution', 'Lux' is fairly simple. At a cinema, the Palazzo, in 1952 in Miami, Florida, a stray beam of moonlight reflects off a spoon and joins with the light from the projector and brings a cartoon character called Mr Ring-a-Ding to life. The character then traps the patrons of the cinema in a strip of film where they live on forever.

Unable to get to 24 May 2025, the Doctor decides to try and use a circuitous route, and so arrives in 1952 to find the cinema locked and chained, and segregation in place (the cinema and the coffee shop across the road are 'whites only'. The Doctor being the Doctor ignores this, and gets some information from a lady in the coffee shop, before he and Belinda break into the Palazzo to confront Mr Ring-a-Ding.

Turns out that he is one of the Pantheon of Gods mentioned by the Toymaker, the God of Light, and introduces himself with the laugh from 'The Giggle'. He turns the Doctor and Belinda into animated versions of themselves, and they have to try and work out how to escape.

I liked the idea of giving them 'depth' by adding emotion and backstory to their 'characters' which brings them back to themselves, but they're still trapped in the 'film'. In true Loony Tunes/Screwy Squirrel style, they break through the screen at the front and are confronted by three fans of Doctor Who ... it's all gone proper meta with them arguing that the best story was 'Blink' and that they love the show. But the Doctor and Belinda have to return to the screen to continue the fight, so they do this and end up back in the cinema, where they call on the projectionist Reg to burn the acetates and destroy the cinema. He is encouraged to do so by his dead wife who he had a reel of film of, and the explosion blows out the back of the cinema and allows sunlight in.

Mr Ring-a-Ding bathes in the light and grows larger and larger until he grows so large he eclipses the Earth and floats off into space! It's a little strange as it left me wondering what Mr Ring-a-Ding's plan was ... he could never, by his own admission, leave the cinema because the sunlight would do this, so what was he hoping to gain?

So the Cinema is saved, and the people trapped in the film strip are returned to life and leave to find their families and friends. All is good.

Except that Mrs Flood is there again, telling people the show ends on 24 May ...

This date is quite clever at this point, as it's when the penultimate episode of this season is expected to air ... so how did they know that when they made the show a year or whatever ago. I suspect plans for this season have been in progress for some time, and this included the air dates ... and maybe, just maybe, all the fan 'noise' at the moment predicting doom and gloom and the show's cancellation and whatever (Doctor Who must be the only show on television where a proportion of the fanbase actively campaigns for it to be taken off air. Very bizarre!) is smoke in the wind, and there is a plan ... the BBC, Bad Wolf, Disney and BBC Studios just aren't prepared to reveal it as yet ... all part of the fun and games of the season.

We shall see!

So here I loved this story, It's simple to follow, a neat idea, and riffs on another of my favourite shows. Mr Ring-a-Ding is marvellously created, and I liked how he became 3-D as he drew in the Doctor's energies (but how much energy does a bi-regenerated Time Lord have? Quite a bit it seems!!) and Alan Cumming's vocal talents for the character were superb.

The subsidiary character of Reg was nicely played, and the whole segregation thing was more throwaway - it didn't probably need to be there at all - but overall the effect was very pleasing. Even the fourth wall breaking and the meta-playing was OK for me. The three Doctor Who fans were a little stereotypical (recalling the character of Whizz Kid in 'The Greatest Show in the Galaxy') but one had exceptional taste in wearing a 'Telos' T Shirt. Thanks Russell! Overall again it worked ... achieving something that probably only Doctor Who could achieve in this day and age.

I'm reminded of the episode of UFO where they end up running around the real TV Studios where the show was made ... but is there an episode of any science fiction TV show where the characters actually meet the actors who play them ... in a very meta way? Some alternate dimension type thing? I'm sure people will let me know if there are.

A great second episode for this season. Clever and self-aware in a way rarely seen in Doctor Who before.

Review: Doctor Who: The Robot Revolution

 A new season ... a new set of adventures for Ncuti Gatwa as the Doctor, and as usual with the introduction of a new companion, the old one is pretty much all but forgotten immediately!  Poor Ruby ... but apparently she crops up again later on ... a little like Rose, or indeed Clara, who just didn't know when enough was enough.

'The Robot Revolution' is a tough tale to start a season with in that it's very 'timey wimey' and you need to keep your wits about you to understand all the twists and turns courtesy of an unexplained 'time fracture' (shades of 'City of Death'!) which sends Belida Chandra all over the place.

So 17 years ago, a would be boyfriend buys Belinda a Star (well he buys a certificate saying that the star is now called 'Miss Belinda Chandra' and of course that has no significance beyond the Earth and the bank balance of whoever sells these things ... but let's gloss over that!). 17 years later and Belinda is working at a hospital as a Nurse, and the Doctor is inexplicably looking for her. He keeps missing her, even as she goes home, and then in the middle of the night a rocketship arrives along with a bunch of robots who kidnap her, claiming she is their Queen. They also bring along with them the certificate which she had kept above her bed.

These Robots want her to marry the AI Generator which runs the planet Miss Belinda Chandra (so called because that's what it was named - actually the star was named that, not the planet, so presumably the planetary inhabitants somehow knew that the star was called this (on Earth) and so named the planet likewise).

It gets confusing because the Doctor arrived six months previously, and has managed to become a historian of some sort, and the Robots cannot hear every ninth word (!) and so he relays a message to Belinda about rebels and an attack ... 

Ten years previously, the robots went and grabbed Alan Budd, Belinda's would be suitor because she told them to do this in the rocketship and the time fracture and timey wimey. So Alan was made sort of king of the planet and put in a machine and changed into some half (literally) human half-robot thing which now wants Belinda to marry it! Are you keeping up!

But he's not a nice person - an Incel Belinda calls him - so thanks to a convenient duplicating of the star naming certificate, Belinda is able to get the two 'the same' certificates to touch and the resultant explosion kills Adam and sets the planet back to be ruled normally again and for the robots and humans to live in peace. Hoorah!

There's some strangeness going on as well ... how does Belinda know what the TARDIS is called? She seems to pull the word from the air. And how are she and the Doctor connected as the Doctor keeps claiming? And why at the end can he not get the TARDIS to go to 24 May 2025? And why are the destroyed remnants of the Earth floating around in space along with a calendar which suggests that the destruction happens on 24 May 2025?

Oh and Mrs Flood lives next door to Belinda and again breaks the fourth wall, telling the viewers that they haven't seen her.

Visually the episode is a delight with the effects really knocking the budget out of the park! The spacerocket is pleasingly retro and the Robots are nice and clunky. The makeup for Adam is amazing when he is part robot - very impressive.

So as a season opener I enjoyed it a lot. There's a lot to like (even if the Doctor cries again), and Belinda seems likable and sparky if a little complainy and obsessed with getting back home ...