Doctor Who: Eve of the Daleks (2022 New Years Special)

Now this is what I'm talking about!

Cons:

All through this past season, I've been complaining that I wanted more interactions between Dan and the Doctor. And while there were certainly a couple of improvements in that regard, I still feel like I don't get a sense of their friendship as its own entity. Yaz and Dan? Yes, I totally get their deal. But Dan and the Doctor still feels a little weak to me.

I felt like there were a couple failed jokes with our guest stars of the episode, Sarah and Nick. I liked a lot about them, which I'll go into momentarily, but there were a few things that seemed almost too... farcical, like they weren't really human beings? Especially Nick. Is Nick... homeless? A hoarder? A stalker? The joke is supposed to be no, he's just an awkward, earnest weirdo, but... the thing about keeping all the items his exes had left behind, prompting Sarah to wonder if he's a serial killer or whatever, then rant about how strange he is, leading him to sacrifice himself to the Daleks in one of the loops? That's... a bit of an odd energy, to be quite honest.

Pros:

Another thing I was constantly complaining about with the whole last season was the bigness of the story. Way too much going on, so many characters and concepts to contend with. The Doctor's looming backstory, various story-lines that hardly ever connected. All I wanted was something simple, contained, focused. And... miracle of miracles, that's what I got here!

It's a time loop episode, but one where the loop gets shorter by one minute each time around, closer and closer to midnight on New Year's Eve. So there's a real sense of impending doom, a ticking clock in a very literal sense, but also the relief of knowing that if there's a mistake and someone gets killed, they're not gone for good. This is such a clever way of doing a time loop and I don't think I've ever seen it quite like this, where they gather more information every time, but have less time to act on it. Also clever was the fact that everyone involved knew about the loop, so there were no characters who had to be brought up to speed each time everything reset. It's fun to be in a sci-fi universe like this where the Doctor and her companions don't even blink twice when they realize what's happening. There's no "time loops are impossible" bullshit, they just get straight to work.

And Sarah and Nick! Despite maybe some missteps with being a tad extreme with their goofy character traits, I really liked how realistic their developing relationship was. It wasn't some intense, passionate love affair, it was just Nick, having a quiet crush on this woman for years, and then Sarah, actually abandoning him to his fate and trying to save herself, like I think a lot of people might have done, then grappling with that choice and coming to see Nick in the full light of who he is.

The Daleks are a pretty tired Doctor Who enemy at this point; I feel like we've seen all the things you can do with this concept. That said, there's an automatic nostalgia and prestige that comes from having them be the baddies, and I liked that this episode kept the whole thing pretty simple and straightforward. The Daleks kill the Doctor and her friends again and again, but they too are stuck in the loop. We learn that the TARDIS is the reason for the loop, so it's not really a situation where the Daleks are the big bad masterminds and the Doctor must defeat them, but more a mutual situation of fear and aggression as each side tries to win.

And finally, you knew I was going to save this for the end... let's talk about Yaz and the Doctor! I'm literally so happy I don't know what to do with myself. This feels like a somewhat familiar trajectory for me in mainstream fiction with queer rep, where you can kind of tell that this wasn't necessarily the plan from the jump, they didn't write Yaz in to be a love interest for the Doctor, in the way that arguably many of the previous companions have been. But as the story developed, and as the fanbase really gravitated towards that pairing, the writers seemed to go with the flow and take the story in that direction.

What I love is that so many of the earlier Yaz/Doctor moments, that energy we've felt between them, could so easily have been left in the realm of subtext, and honestly I wouldn't even have been mad about it. Nothing up to this point has felt like it was promising me something it wasn't going to deliver. And then here? Good old Dan, talking not only to Yaz, but then to the Doctor as well, about the obvious feelings he can see between them? I'm completely shocked and utterly delighted! I love that this is putting paid to something we kind of already know about the Doctor, which is that she's been keeping people at arm's length, as a preservational method. We know that Yaz has been trying to get through to her, get her to open up about all she's been through and all she's not saying, and now we get the sense that this is directly tied up with Yaz's feelings for the Doctor, and the Doctor's denial about said feelings.

I just... love the tenderness of it all, the way Yaz can stand up to the Doctor and demand better treatment, the way the Doctor clearly wants to give her that but at the same time can't quite let the wall fall down. And that moment when the Doctor snaps at Yaz and then backtracks and apologizes, even despite the urgency of the ticking clock... I loved that so very much! I love what this might turn into! And I love, love, love, Yaz asking Dan what to do, her confession that she's never told anyone, not even herself. That felt so beautiful and true and like it could be the makings of something really special.

I'm... admittedly kind of scared, knowing we've only got a few more specials with Whittaker in the role, before moving on to new Doctors and new companion(s)... so we'll have to see how they decide to leave things for us!

9/10