Amazing episode! I don’t really have much to say except that it felt just like old times. Loved it!
Absolutely amazing episode. Good mystery, clever answer, and it was creepy. Don’t even know where to start with the praise for this one… It’s nice to see the doctor without the sonic or the tardis, I don’t remember any episodes playing around with alien languages so it was cool to see them without the translation matrix.
Also I know some people are gonna be annoyed that the timeless child stuff wasn’t retconned, but honestly I’m happy with with they’re doing with it. Chibnall had ideas but didn’t do a good job of actually making it effect characters. For example, during Flux a few companions were stuck in the past for like 5 years and basically nothing changed about them - no trauma, no growth, nothing. RTD using Flux as a modern “time war” of sorts is exactly what I wanted from it in the first place - it’s something that gives the doctor immense guilt and we actually see that in this episode. I totally think that Chibnall’s era was horrible but if RTD can make lemonade out of lemons, I’m all for it.
But like, man that was a good premise. Good mystery, amazing setup - that moment when the doppelgangers are revealed was so well done, I thought it was just weird editing until I realized what was going on. Also the two parallel confrontations, knowing that one person in each is fake, but not knowing who it is in either group… Then turning the doctor’s need to figure things out against him… Good shit.
Managed to go into this without any-trailers/spoilers/etc. Hated the “Children in Need”-esque intro, it felt like the ye-olde cartoon before the movie starts.
I can understand concerns about this being the second of only three Tennant/Tate episodes, that it’s the anniversary and we want big celebrations and megabucks worth of explosions and monsters and all that. Instead, we get a full episode with the two stars and their talent, no distractions or crawling through attics. PS. Sylvia and Wilf still - and always will - be awesome.
This was like RDT’s and Moffat’s lovechild, like Midnight and Event Horizon and Alien. Confidently slow-paced with great writing and time for running around, and still having time for a proper ending rather than a magical macguffin arse-pull.
Properly loved it.
Easily one of my favourite episodes in years. I’m a sucker for creepy monsters, cosmic horrors and monsters whose origins are only vaguely hinted at and this had all of that. Overall much more polished, better-paced and intriguing to me than The Star Beast (which I still liked!). This was Doctor Who back at its best for me.
Someone elsewhere pointed out that the aliens were going to become a horse person to enter the universe, like a trojan horse. Also that’s why every button was big and round on the ship, it was made for hooves!
But anyway… Wilf!
