The Mark of the Rani review [Pip and Jane Baker]

The Doctor goes to the year - umm, see below - and encounters the Master (disguised as a scarecrow for reasons), the Rani (armed with an interesting spec and some of the worst dialogue) and a cavalcade of incomprehensible Englishmen. And to top it off, he's accompanied by Peri.

When and Where: The "where" is Killingworth, England. The "when" is a little more complicated. As Thomas Liddell is Lord Ravensworth at this point, this story must take place after 17th July 1821. Humphry Davy died on 28th May, 1829 and is to be in attendance of the meeting at Killingworth, meaning that this is before 29th May 1829. The season is clearly autumn, so this story takes place in an autumn between 1821 and 1828.

In terms of subjective timelines, for the Doctor and Peri this is at some point between Vengeance on Varos and The Two Doctors. For the Master it's between Winter and The Ultimate Foe and for the Rani it's some time before Time and the Rani.

The Doctor's Case:

• A Good Quotation:
• "What's he up to now? It'll be something devious and over-complicated. He'd get dizzy if he tried to walk in a straight line."
• "They're carnivores. What harm have the animals in the fields done them? The rabbits they snare, the sheep they nourish to slaughter. Do they worry about the lesser species when they sink their teeth into a lamb chop?" It's hardly groundbreaking but for a Pip and Jane script this is practically poetry.
• What is Peri's character spec? After you've listed American, whiny and supremely unfashionable, all you have left is "botanist". Like Mel after her, who despite being a computer programmer never exercised any real skill with computers on TV, Peri almost never gets the chance to show any knowledge in her supposed field. This is one such example, where Peri gets to talk about the native plants and animals and, for a short amount of time, feels like she has had experiences outside of her tenure as a companion. It's important that companions get the opportunity to show individual skills that we've not seen from their predecessors. It makes them less interchangeable.
  
• We've had the suave Master, the trickster that is the Monk and the power-hungry War Chief. The latest addition to the ever-increasing list of renegade Time Lords is the Rani. Like the Monk, she isn't evil - she's a chemist who's pursuing scientific research to quench her own professional curiosity, but without any morality or care for her test subjects. It's a far more interesting stance than the pantomime Ainley Master and makes her one of the more notable villains of the recent seasons.
• The Rani's TARDIS is beautiful but has the side effect of making the Doctor's and the Master's TARDISes look incredibly basic as a result. Couldn't the Doctor have made off in this one at the end?
• Horrifically unnatural dialogue isn't Pip and Jane's only forte: they're also very good at writing the Sixth Doctor, which they will do again in Terror of the Vervoids and The Ultimate Foe.

The Valeyard's Case:

• A Bad Quotation: Pip and Janeisms:
• "You suspect another motive?" Are we sure this is Peri? It must be some sort of switch like Amy's Flesh avatar in series 6.
• "Spare me the dubious pragmatism."
• "Fortuitous would be a more apposite epithet!"
• "Murderous would be more apt." Definitely not Peri.
• "Who's this brat?"
• "Doctor? Do you get his drift?"
• "Finito TARDIS. How's that for style?"
• "All the way down. To the bottom."
• "Grandiose schemes of ruling the universe will mean nothing if that dilettante Doctor is still at large."
• "Now perhaps you'll accept there are more things in heaven and earth than are ever dreamed of in your barren philosophy."
• "I'm a scientist. I've calculated the odds, and they and not idiotic pride dictate my actions." / "You intellectual microbe."
• The dodgy accents of the English working class are often incomprehensible. It's truly terrible and makes the admittedly believable setting lose any and all credibility.
• One of the more interesting parts of this story is Miasimia Goria, a planet over which the Rani reigns and whose people are restless and aggressive because of her experiments. What are we doing in a dull Industrial Revolution village filled with accents less convincing than Nicola Bryant's when this is going on? A sleepless and lawless planet is infinitely more interesting a setting.
• Another plotline, albeit a retread of The King's Demons, is the Master deciding to change the course of history upon learning of the gathering in Killingworth. Unlike Miasimia Goria, this has absolutely no bearing on the story and is very quickly forgotten about.
• Peri's dress is vile. Truly, truly vile.
• The violence of the Luddites is wholly unconvincing, with the tapping of the chain the Doctor clings to in the pit being particularly awful.
• Another TARDIS malfunction?
• This story was so boring that it's taken more than a month to write this.

I'll Explain Later:

• Kew Gardens wasn't open until 1840. Why was the Doctor trying to land there in the 1820s? And why in the autumn when the outdoor gardens would be much less impressive?
• Why is the Master a scarecrow and what does he have against birds? In fact, what's he doing in the 1820s in the first place?
• How does the Rani know about the events of Planet of Fire and the Master's supposed end?
• Why does the Master refer to the Doctor's time machine as "the TARDIS"?
• What was Peri thinking pushing the Doctor down the hill?
• How come the Doctor's key can open the Rani's TARDIS?

His Constant Companion: The Master kills a dog and a man with his Tissue Compression Eliminator. One of the peasants falls down the well. The Master kills one of the Rani's assistants. The Rani kills three of her goons.

This Reminds Me...:

• We visit Miasimia Goria in Planet of the Rani.

The Inquisitor's Judgement: It's been almost two months since I reviewed Vengeance on Varos. Why has it been so long? Because The Mark of the Rani was so boring and so awful that I found myself no longer enjoying writing reviews and almost stopped completely. Gosh, is it bad. The Rani is a good idea but this story is plagued with elements that go nowhere, atrocious dialogue, poor performances and a complete lack of any sparkle. I might have to rethink my position as a season 22 apologist. As a Sixth Doctor fan, this is embarrassing. This story is terrible and earns itself an F.

Doctor Who (Season 22)

Vengeance on Varos  |  The Mark of the Rani  |  The Two Doctors

Mastermind review [Jonathan Morris]

The Vault - an archive of alien artefacts securely stored deep beneath the Angel of the North.

There's also a prisoner in the Vault. An extraterrestrial known as the Master. He has been on Earth for some time, but now he's under lock and key.

This is his story.

Or, as Captain Ruth Matheson and Warrant Officer Charlie Sato discover... perhaps it is theirs.

When and Where: The Master's story takes place after the TV film. After his escape, he's saved from a predicament by Narvin and his adventures continue from Time's Horizon.

The Doctor's Case:

• A Good Quotation:
• "I am known as the Master. Universally."
• "I am the living embodiment of entropy. Rotten to the core."
• Learning how the Master survived the TV film and what he's been up to since then is one of those gaps in continuity that Big Finish happily fills. The Master's life on Earth contrasts with the Doctor's: rather than join UNIT and selflessly protect the human race from extraterrestrial threats, the Master becomes a gang boss and crime lord, running all the casinos in Las Vegas. The Master has an obvious Silence of the Lambs vibe that allows Geoffrey Beevers to deliver a captivating performance. But then he managed that even in Dust Breeding.

The Valeyard's Case:

• Whilst it's interesting to learn what the Master got up to after the film, this story lacks an emotional element. Master showed that there is depth to the character and that there's plenty of emotional and psychological exploration to do with the character. This could have been in the same vein as Davros or Master, but instead it's the Master simply recounting his history like a wiki page.
• Matheson and Sato are entirely one-note and without character and, given that this range is The Companion Chronicles and not The Master Chronicles this really shouldn't be the case. They're a very dull pair and it's a shame that Ashbrook and Tso don't have more developed characters to play. Neither Grace Holloway nor Chang Lee were breakout characters but they're preferable to these vapid characters.

I'll Explain Later:

• The defences seem pretty extensive, but are Captain Matheson and Warrant Officer Sato really the only people guarding him? They're just asking for him to escape.

This Reminds Me...:

• Excalibur was found by the Seventh Doctor and Ace in an adventure with Brigadier Bambera in Battlefield.
• The Master mentions the events of the TV film and explains what happened to him. The Deathworm Morphant allowed him to survive in the Eye of Harmony for an uncertain length of time before he was able to project his mind outside of the Eye. He reached out into the mind of the Eighth Doctor's companion Edward Grainger, who set him free into 1906.
• The Master mentions the Brigadier and Jo Grant.

The Inquisitor's Judgement: With a lack of an emotional dimension to any of the characters, Mastermind doesn't make for a truly engaging listen. The Master matter-of-factly delivers to the dull Captain Matheson and Warrant Officer Sato a portion of his autobiography before escaping, which was the obvious ending. Geoffrey Beevers, however, is always brilliant. This story should have covered a shorter length of time and had far more interesting characters that Matheson and Sato. This story is okay, and that earns it a C.

The Companion Chronicles - Series 8

Council of War  |  Mastermind  |  The Alchemists

Dust Breeding review [Mike Tucker]

"Mysterious and wealthy. I'm so looking forward to getting to know Mr Seta."

Socialite Madame Salvadori hosts an art auction aboard the space liner Gallery, with funding from the mysterious Mr Seta. Who is this masked man? What is it that he's so desperate to protect in his cargo? And what's the connection between a dusty planet plagued with the screams of Daleks and Edvard Munch's The Scream?

Where are we?: The planet of DuChamp 331, a refuelling station off of the major space lanes. Also aboard Gallery, a pleasure cruiser/art museum.

When are we?: The 26th century, set post-Survival at some point between The Genocide Machine and Master.

Who are the bad guys?: The Master wants to gain control over a superweapon called the warp core, which was created to kill the vicious Krill that the Master has eggs containing.

The Good:

• Geoffrey Beevers gives a fantastic performance as Mr Seta. His suave voice hidden behind that expensive mask makes him an interesting enigma from the off, although anyone who's watched the classic series will quickly be aware of the anagram. A little better than Estram. As we learn, the Warp Core stripped the Master from the body of Nyssa's father Tremas and he had returned to the degenerated form seen between Delgado and Ainley. With a performance as magnetic as this one Beevers is very much welcome to return to the role. Ainley was originally to appear instead but a deal could not be struck - not necessarily a bad thing, as the Tremas Master was much too camp (with the exception of in Survival).
• Doctor Who and accents don't have a fantastic history, but the ones at the beginning of episode one aren't too bad.
• Edvard Munch painting The Scream to get the screams out of his head (the warp core) is a dark and interesting idea that makes the already somewhat disturbing painting even creepier.
• Caroline John (assistant to the Third Doctor and prospective scientific advisor Liz Shaw) gives an unrecognisable but very good performance as the materialistic Madame Salvadori.
• The constant screams of the Daleks are very disturbing and an inspired idea. A corpse with its veins full of dust is also a wonderfully eerie image.
• "I am the Master and you will obey me," Mr Seta says in a very good cliffhanger as the newly-hatched Krill emerge. 

The Bad:

• The story is a jumble of good ideas, none of which are properly fleshed out nor satisfyingly intertwined. 
• The Doctor's playroom (rescued art that history records as being lost in fires and disasters) is an intriguing tidbit that shows a new side of the character, building a gallery that only he and his companions will ever see, even if it does seem a bit strange that the Doctor would do this. He's all about seeing the universe and, whilst it might be unfair to compare his actions to the Monk since it isn't really doing any harm, it is questionable.
• Sophie Aldred is a bit shouty sometimes, especially during the scene that Damien leaves her with The Scream. "Doctooooooor!!!" she wails. Ace simply isn't this screamy.
• Was there really any need for Bev Tarrant to return in this story? Whilst not a bad character she hardly made a groundbreaking impression in The Genocide Machine and this story doesn't warrant her return. 
• The Master scolds Madame Salvadori for being so enamoured of his supposed wealth that she never bothered to question his identity - but she did and couldn't find anything about him. Then she sent Klemp into the cargo hold to dig around his crates. The tiny message that the story is trying to give fails because of this. What more could she have done?
• The warp core inhabits the Doctor and then drops exposition and backstory on Ace without any prompting, an example of lazy writing. The Master later explains the Krill to Madame Salvadori and tells the Doctor everything... for some reason.

A Good Quotation: "Curiosity can be a particularly dangerous pastime." (Mr Seta)

A Bad Quotation: "The girl from Perivale hits the jackpot again!" (Ace)

This Reminds Me...:

• The Terileptils, who created a sculpture placed in the Doctor's playroom, appeared as the main villains in the Fifth Doctor story The Visitation.
• The Doctor references the Fourth Doctor's City of Death when talking to Ace about the Mona Lisa.
• Bev Tarrant previously met the Seventh Doctor and Ace in The Genocide Machine.
• The Master's previously used aliases include Colonel Masters (Terror of the Autons) and Sir Gilles Estram (The King's Demons).
• The Master threatens to shrink Klemp to the size of a toy, referencing his tissue compression eliminator first used by "Colonel Masters" in Terror of the Autons.

His Constant Companion: The body of Tremas of Traken (although already described as being dead) is destroyed by the warp core before the story. Munch's friends get swallowed up by the monster. Klemp is killed by the Master. Madame Salvadori sacrifices herself to the Krill to allow the Doctor, Ace and Bev to escape. Guthrie causes an explosion that rips the planet apart, killing the Krill and dispelling the warp core.

I'll Explain Later: The Master clearly disapproves of Madame Salvadori and her beguilement, as well as that of all of her guests, describing them as base peddlers of human misery and calling them uncivilised. How come this Master is so moral? This is the same incarnation who inhabited Nyssa's father Tremas, who would never have espoused such views.

The Inquisitor's Judgement: Dust Breeding has a number of good ideas; the eeriest painting of human history being painted as a way for Munch to exorcise the screams of an alien life form in his head, the Master behind a bejewelled mask mixing with the corrupt upper echelons of society aboard an airborne art gallery, a planet with Daleks' screams echoing from the sands... Unfortunately the final script is too busy for its own good, with none of these ideas being given the focus or properly fleshed out. Instead, Dust Breeding messily jumps between various things as though it hopes it might be able to avoid good storytelling by distracting you with cool ideas. Without the first Big Finish appearance of the Master, this would be a forgettable, below average release. I'd rank this story as a D.

Main Range

Loups-Garoux  |  Dust Breeding  |  Bloodtide

'Empress of Mars' review [Mark Gatiss]

The Doctor and Bill are waited on by an Ice Warrior at a Victorian tea party on Mars.

After NASA finds a message on Mars reading "GOD SAVE THE QUEEN", the Doctor, Bill and Nardole head to the Red Planet in 1881 to investigate. There they find Colonel Godsacre and his Victorian soldiers, as well as their pet Ice Warrior in search of his queen.

Mark Gatiss is a regular contributor to Modern Who, writing 'The Unquiet Dead', 'The Idiot's Lantern', 'Victory of the Daleks', 'Cold War', 'The Crimson Horror', 'Robot of Sherwood' and, most recently, the much-maligned 'Sleep No More'. None of these are exactly classics and are, at best, divisive (with the possible exception of his first episode). He intended to write a sequel to 'Sleep No More', but (fortunately) he instead wrote another Ice Warrior episode. Was it any better than his last?

Spoiler Zone

The episode

With limited sets, the crew being separated from the TARDIS and the Doctor trying to unite two opposing sides, this episode shares a lot in common with Classic Who stories such as 'The Silurians' or 'Warriors of the Deep'. The Doctor as a peacemaker certainly echoes earlier Doctors such as Jon Pertwee or a less-bumbling Patrick Troughton. Bill is similarly in the role of a classic companion (minus the screams), largely taking a backseat but asking the usual questions. This isn't always a bad thing considering her large role in 'The Lie of the Land'. Nardole is rather gingerly removed from the episode. Was that necessary? Couldn't the Doctor and Bill have landed on Mars without him? It seems to have been done just to bring Missy in for the briefest of scenes.

Considering the Ice Warriors are an iconic Doctor Who villain (behind the Daleks and the Cybermen, of course) they've made very few appearances. Mark Gatiss makes the most of this by fleshing out the Ice Warriors a bit, giving us a bit of backstory, more of a clue of their hierarchy and weaponry, and leads into 'The Curse of Peladon' with contact between Mars and the Galactic Federation. The Ice Warrior weapons are a new, visually-interesting and gruesome way to die, and the faceless race are given a figurehead in the shape of the Ice Queen Iraxxa, Empress of Mars. She's played as a snarling villain with little subtlety, but shows some depth when she shows her respect for the ashamed coward Colonel Godsacre. Iraxxa's desire for Bill's opinion because she was a fellow woman amongst "noisy males" came across as unnecessary and a clumsy way of getting Bill involved in the negotiations.

The more charismatic villain of the episode is Captain Neville Catchlove. Whilst not a well-rounded character, he is less cartoonishly evil than Lord Sutcliffe of 'Thin Ice' and much more fun to watch. The Victorian soldiers each fulfil a particular trope, but the script and performance means that they feel much more alive than, say, the forgettable colonists of Gliese 581 D or the underdeveloped crew of Chasm Forge. The colloquialisms sometimes come across as a bit forced and awkward, but it's at least an attempt at world-building. It's also a shame that there's no real sense that the soldiers are in much danger. We're told that food is running low and so is morale, but there's no feel of the desperation that no doubt they should be experiencing.

All-in-all, 'Empress of Mars' was a decent episode reminiscent of not only Troughton and Pertwee's run, but also, unfortunately, Matt Smith's. The pre-credits sequence was self-satisfied and unneeded. The scene is far more suited to Eleventh, Amy and Rory, which isn't a good thing.

A good quotation

"That's why you helped him come home. To claim Mars in the name of Queen Victoria, to loot it of its riches, stake a claim. The red planet turned pink."

TARDIS crew and co.

• The Doctor: "The last thing I'm going to do is take sides." The Doctor isn't a hero, just a good man trying to do what's right. Some more conflict about whether he's helping the Ice Warriors or the humans would have been nice; the Doctor mentions that the humans are the invaders here, but this isn't really delivered on. As always, Capaldi is great in the role.
• Bill Potts: "We can stand together." Bill has spent six months on a dystopian Earth and tried to kill the Doctor. Where are the consequences of this? Bill's walking along making pop-culture references as though she didn't shoot the Doctor in last week's episode. We're reminded that she's a fan of science fiction.
• Nardole: "So, er... What did I miss?" An awful lot is the answer. After being a key part of the TARDIS crew since 'Oxygen', Nardole sits this one out.
• Missy: "But, Doctor, please tell me. Really, are you alright?" Missy helps get the TARDIS back to Mars to save the Doctor and Bill, then says she's happy to return to the vault and seems genuinely concerned for the Doctor's welfare. Is she really turning over a new leaf?

Plot holes and continuity

• What were the Doctor, Bill and Nardole doing at NASA?
• Why did the TARDIS disappear? Hostile Action Displacement System? It didn't seem to be in any real danger.

Click here for other series 10 reviews

'The Eaters of Light' review [Rona Munro]

The Doctor held at spearpoint by the Picts.

Present day - In the ominously named Devil's Cairn in Scotland stands an ancient stone circle where, if you listen carefully, you can hear the music of the ghosts.
2nd century - The Doctor, Bill and Nardole land in Scotland to discover what happened to the lost Ninth Legion of the Roman Army.

Rona Munro is the first Classic Who writer to return to write for the modern series. She previously wrote 1989's 'Survival' starring the Seventh Doctor and Ace, the last episode of Classic Who and arguably McCoy's very best if not one of the best of the show's original run. The script had a decent story, menacing villains and was a great episode for Ace and the Master. Will she work her magic a second time, twenty-eight years later?

Spoiler Zone

The episode

Unfortunately not. The episode is paced like a classic episode but there's ultimately very little threat, so instead of building to a climax it just... coasts along. We're told that the Eater of Light killed an entire Roman army and the Doctor called it the deadliest creature on the planet, but it isn't sufficiently threatening - perhaps we should have seen it do more killing. It doesn't help that neither the Picts nor the Romans are particularly interesting. We know that the creature won't kill the Doctor or his companions so we have to care for the guest characters for there to be any sense of jeopardy. It's visually an impressive enough monster, though.

The story was a bit run-of-the-mill, which doesn't always matter if there's some interesting twists or a new take on mythology or some excellent characterisation. Unfortunately there's none of that. We know the Doctor isn't going to enter the gateway and Peter Capaldi knows it, playing it with little conviction. The scene where Bill is talking to the Roman soldiers about their sexuality seemed forced in and unnecessary. Didn't Pearl Mackie say in an interview that Bill being a lesbian wasn't a big part of her? Then why is it being brought up so often?

The episode wasn't all bad. Bill realising that the TARDIS translates other languages is funny, especially when she calls it "auto-translate" and points out (for the first time) that it includes lip-sync. Nardole is funny whenever he opens his mouth and Missy is sterling as usual in the best scene of the episode. As silly as the crow saying "Kar" was, it was suitably Doctor Who. Unfortunately, the bulk of this episode was boring and familiar, and had a similar feeling to the previous episode 'Empress of Mars' (the Doctor trying to get two sides to team up and all that).

A good quotation

The Doctor: It's as if his bones have disintegrated.

Nardole: Ooo, what could do that?

The Doctor: A complete and total absence of any kind of sunlight.

Nardole: Death by Scotland.

TARDIS crew and co.

• The Doctor: "I've been standing by the gates of your world, keeping you all safe, since you crawled out of the slime. I'm not stopping now." Was this the return of the prickly Twelfth of the eighth season? He was often unlikeable in this episode, particularly in his interactions with Kar, where he's relentlessly patronising and unnecessarily hard on her. He's governed, farmed and juggled in Roman Britain and was once a second-class Vestal virgin.
• Bill Potts: "You don't know more about the Ninth Legion than me. You don't. I read the book. I loved the book. I read everything." We know from 'The Pilot' (and were reminded in 'Empress of Mars') that Bill is a fan of science fiction, and now we learn that she also has a passion for the vanishing of the Ninth Legion. She's not shown much of an interest in history before, but Bill having a great interest for a mystery doesn't seem out of character. She's surprised at how liberal the Romans are with regards to sexual orientation and is told that she's "restricted" for only fancying girls. 
• Nardole: "Don't make me go squeaky-voiced!" Nardole's role is mainly restricted to comic-relief, a job he does fantastically. He doesn't want to be here; he just wants to go back to bed. Again tells the Doctor that he should be guarding the vault, but we're all past caring about that at this point. He claims to know 10% of the Doctor's darkest secrets. 
• Missy: "I don't even know why I'm crying. Why do I keep doing that now?" Missy shows up at the end of the episode for a touching scene between her and the Doctor. She seems to have some sentimentality hearing the music, which she can't understand. She seems truly elated for a moment when the Doctor says that they could be friends again soon. What a jump from calling him her boyfriend in series eight and saying how much he loves her.

Plot holes and continuity

• "Return journeys are easy," the Doctor says about the TARDIS. Does he not remember trying to get Ian and Barbara home? Or Tegan? But then the TARDIS is in better shape now.
• Does Nardole have his facts right? In episode three of 'The Chase', we see the crew of the Mary Celeste jumping overboard after the Daleks arrive chasing the First Doctor. 
• Shall we assume the Picts saw the TARDIS offscreen in order to carve it into the stone?

Click here for other series 10 reviews