Doctor Who: Orphan 55 (12x03)

This was a really great episode, and it made me feel more connected to the Doctor as a character, than maybe any other episode we've seen in Whittaker's run.

Cons:

There is a very Planet of the Apes reveal in this episode. Which is to say... it contains the same reveal from Planet of the Apes. I didn't hate it, and the environmental message is good and all, but this is not exactly breaking new ground for science fiction, obviously.

I could have done without Ryan and Bella actually kissing? Sometimes I think we undersell the value of a romance without explicit onscreen confirmation/physical affection. It's all very heteronormative to have this flash-pan romance play out on our screen, and then to actually show them kissing at the end of it as if we couldn't have figured out what was going on without that. It's not a huge complaint, it's just something I notice sometimes - that these types of kisses feel like forced story beats.

Pros:

One of the hallmarks of a successful episode of Doctor Who is when all the guest characters are distinct and memorable. There were a lot of different dramas and relationships playing out this week, and I felt like we had the appropriate amount of time with all of them. There was Bella, and then the surprise twist with Kane being her mom... there was the father/son engineer team of Nevi and Silas, and there was the old couple, Benni and Vilma. And each of these characters had distinct traits. I understood who they were, what they wanted, and how their relationships worked with the people around them. When you have less than an hour to tell a story, that's really impressive!

I also like how we had two different child/parent dynamics, each of which seemed to be a foil to Graham and Ryan. One of last season's most compelling through-lines was the tumultuous relationship between Ryan and his step-grandfather. And now, they are in a really good place. One of the sweetest parts of this episode was Graham running through the halls and pulling Ryan into a hug, relieved to find him unhurt. In contrast, Bella and Kane are in about the worst place one could be as a mother/daughter. I love the complexity here, with Bella seeking revenge, but her actions triggering consequences she couldn't have predicted. And that leads to a very moving joint sacrifice, where at least at the end, they did their best to reunite and make amends.

Nevi and Silas had a more low-stakes relationship, although they had their issues as well, with Silas, the child, being the more competent, and his father having to grapple with his skill. They mostly provided comic relief, and unlike our other guest characters, they made it out alive in the end!

Benni and Vilma's story was extremely depressing. They had been together for decades, but never married, and then Benni gets taken, and Vilma travels with the others to rescue him... only for him to propose and then be killed, to spare him the fate of being tortured by the evil aliens... and then later Vilma sacrifices herself so the others can get away! It was a sad end for these two happy old people, but I suppose it was tempered by the knowledge that they'd had a happy and long life together.

I talked about how the whole Planet of the Apes twist was perhaps a touch too derivative to really get a pass from me, but that doesn't mean I hated the episode overall. Essentially, I'm in love with any story that hits the viewer over the head with the fact that climate change is going to kill us all. It was also nice to see a story that highlighted the snowball effect of climate change. It's not just that the climate will change. It's the way that it will lead to mass migration and war, and the ultimate destruction of the planet as we know it. This isn't as science fiction as we want to pretend it is.

Really, the biggest reason I have for adoring this episode is the way the Doctor is portrayed. We saw in the two-part opener to the season that it's not always fun and games and fast-talking quips. And this week, I feel like we're settling in to a world where the Doctor gets angry sometimes, where she lashes out and also hides things from people. It was, in short, the most connected I've felt to her character, especially as it relates to the legacy of the Doctor from earlier regenerations.

And yet she's still the same bouncy person she has been since we met her. My favorite detail is that her oxygen supply runs out sooner than everyone else's because of how much she talks. That is so on-brand, I'm obsessed with it.

And the way that her relationships with her companions is being complicated... I am in love with it. You've got the mistrust, and the secret-keeping, and the way the companions are starting to question what other things they might not know or understand about their unusual friend. The seeds are being planted here for some excellent exploration later on, and I definitely have my eyes peeled for that!

9/10