Doctor Who Series 10 episodes 10-11 review - The eaters of light/World enough and time

We return for another double-dose of Doctor Who, with the final episode so very close, spoilers will follow for it.

The eaters of light

This one’s out late and I’m sure I can you hear your voices of surprise. Or it might just be tumbleweed

So, in this episode, the Doctor, Nardole and Bill go in search for the 9^th Legion of the roman army, invading the Celtic lands that would become Scotland, but what they find is an unspeakable enemy because stone formations always equal interdimensional portals.

Seriously, first Horath now this? (See SJA s2p3) anyway, this episode is interesting, it’s a kind of Doctor who episode we haven’t really seen much of this season. For one, this is the first time Bill’s spent an extended portion of the episode away from the Doctor as for some reason, the Doctor lets her head off alone. She meets the 9^th Legion, or what’s left of them and in an interesting-ish turn, she reveals her sexuality and instead of this being a major talking point they call her narrow-minded since the norm is being attracted to both sexes. I’ve no idea if this is historically accurate but I found it kinda funny none-the-less. You don’t find out a lot about any of the romans but it’s only a 45-minute episode, had it been a 2-parter I would’ve expected to know them a little better.

Same goes with the natives the Doctor and Nardole encounter the young Celts who claim to have defeated the 9^th legion, by unleashing a beast which will destroy quite literally everything. Will they listen to the Doctor so this plot can actually be resolved? Could this episode have done with being a 2-parter? Yes, both of these, yes.

So, the alliance of convenience comes together, the monster shows itself, and I’ve seen much worse CG on this show and we get bits about the Doctor sacrificing himself which we know isn’t going to happen, especially since there was a bit of foreshadowing in the beginning about time differentials and some sh*t.

OK, some issues. Nardole in a dressing gown. Don’t wish to see that ever again. And a fact of the matter is this episode and the one that came before strike very similar beats. I’d hesitate to call them carbon copies but they’re very similar and the fact they came back to back is just weird.

Oh, and the reveal that made up most of the ending, Missy is now a prisoner in the TARDIS rather than in the vault. The Doctor is giving her more trust and freedom but isn’t entirely sure whether or not it’s another scheme.  I’m gonna guess that the Master will corrupt her when he appears in the season finale, which is next week.

It’s a decent episode but feels very familiar and perhaps could’ve done with a longer running time.

Rating 8/10

World enough and time

What can I say, this was a superb episode!

Let me start off by saying what a lot of people are saying about this episode. Yes, the spoilers harmed it greatly. This episode built up its big reveals with great care which may have been less boring if we didn’t already know what the payoff was going to be. This is not really the fault of Moffat, it wasn’t him who initially leaked that John Simm was coming back as the master, something that absolutely should’ve been kept secret, he did ultimately include it in his previews, which may have been a poor choice but the damage was already done by that point.

So, like with all the great Moffat stories, there’s a great premise to this. The Doctor and company arrive on a space-colony about to be sucked into a black hole, it’s engines are on full reverse (and how they don’t run out of fuel I don’t know) but they seem to be stuck. For the one janitor at the top it’s been 2 days, for the world below it’s been over 1000 years.

The Doctor wants to redeem Missy, she’s the only person that’s really like him. We all know this can only end in disaster and it doesn’t pull its punches, within the first 10 minutes the consequences are felt, and they are felt hard. Bill, if you don’t make it out of this series alive, thank you for being the most entertaining of the Doctor’s companions since Moffat took over.

Missy is still hard to pin down, she was a joy to watch in this episode, as she gleefully took the complaint of ‘Doctor Who’ being a name used by casual fans for the Doctor and made it a joke about it being his actual name, or it might even be his actual name, who knows? She really is at her best in this episode and I look forward to seeing more of her interacting with her predecessor.

Nardole is once again a minor complaint about the episode, with Missy on the team as well, he really has very little to do and this actually has begun to piss me off. A good comic relief character is a character first. Nardole has had nothing to do of any importance all series apart from spouting the occasional one-liner and being the butt of a few of the Doctor’s jokes. He was in dire need of a character arc, and this does not provide. He is, in my opinion, as a character, the worst recurring supporting character in the modern show, worse than Jackie, worse than Mickey, worse than even Strax.

So, back to the plot and to the Master who has dawned a disguise in an attempt to lull Bill into a false sense of security. He would surely be recognised in his usual self. (Look, I’m a sucker for the master in disguise, I’m going to overlook how little sense it makes) My inner continuity buff does raise a few questions about when this would be taking place since he doesn’t seem to have lightning powers. Adding to it is the fact Missy doesn’t seem to remember being there and adding to it how he ended up on a Mondasian ship in the first place and why he wants to make Cybermen, if he is indeed the one responsible (there were other humans, or were they robots too?) who knows.

All I do know is despite the deliberately sillier design for the Cybermen, this episode makes them incredibly creepy. It’s all down to build up, they handle it very slowly and methodically. At the same time there are a lot of funny moments in the episode, from Missy being Missy to the Master’s cooky disguise.

If it weren’t for the spoilers, this could’ve been a near-perfect episode, as it is, it’ll have to settle for really good.

Rating 9/10