The songs were: "Bad Guy" - Billie Eilish "Poker Face" - Lady Gaga "Strange I've Seen your Face Before" - Grace Jones. "Can't Get You Out Of My Head." - Kylie Minogue. This episode is now a must for Pride Month. Potential subtitle for "Rogue": Invasion of the Bridgerton Body Snatchers OR The Doctor Goes Wilde (yes, pun heavily intended.) Indeed, I love the Jack Harkness vibe and letting it mature with a new character. A sudden favourite to add to my already long list of Doctor who favourite episodes.
Also Astor Piazzolla's Libertango during The Doctor and Rogue's dance scene. It's a tango on classical instruments so it doesn't sound as obviously modern, but it's actually from the 70s
This season is great so far, but the 8 episode format is really hurting it. When the Doctor flashed back to promising Carla that Ruby would be safe, my first thought was, "Wow, I wish we could have seen this before the moment the Doctor flashed back to it."
This season really needed the equivalent of the slitheen 2 parter from series 1. An earthbound story after Ruby has been traveling with the Doctor for a while where we see the Doctor have those conversations with the Sundays.
Thank Disney they are too scared and only do 8 incase it doesn't work and they can cut and run. This age of tv movies and film is like that. Just look at how Disney curns out lots of star wars short run spin offs doing them to death. It's their formula. Short then dump in run to a new version but it's still star wars like in the 50s where 9 out of 10 tv shows in a week where all cowboy shows did them to death but all the basic same thing eventually SciFi will be killed by them but takes a very long time 50 years of star wars currently who is the only thing that still works but they will murder it in the end
@@williamshaneblyth While Disney definitely has that issue with a lot of their shows, this case isn't Disney's fault. The reason this season was so short, as well as why there were two doctor light episodes, was because Ncuti Gatwa was still filming Sex Education while this season was filming, but they wanted to be able to release a season and not have to make everyone wait a whole year for new episodes. Disney actually has a fairly small impact on the show itself, with it seeming like they can give the occasional note and influence the marketing outside the UK, but RTD and BBC are still the ones in control of any creative decisions. Disney sucks, but if you're going to complain about them, complain about the stuff they're actually doing, don't make stuff up.
And yet they’ve done a better job allowing us to get to know fully fleshed out characters than Chibnall did in many more episodes. Even with 2 of the 8 episodes being Doctor lite episodes. Davies is superior at developing consistent, sympathetic characters. Still, I also wish we’d gotten more episodes.
@@Tolly7249I think the happy medium is ten regular season episodes and one holiday special. Eight or nine episodes is enough time to establish all of the necessary groundwork for the characters and plot leading into the finale, while also not dissuading Disney or the BBC from going forward with it. Of course, more episodes would be better, but that’s just not realistic with the way shows are budgeted and scheduled these days. Audiences expect the budget, effects, and style of modern streaming service shows.
The anachronistic music is probably a Bridgerton reference, they do this a lot over there: classical covers of modern songs that have lyrics that match either exactly or ironically what's happening on screen
I think that was the intention but it comes across as a bit lazy. I don’t know why rtd couldn’t be bothered to actually develop the primary character dynamic of the series.
There was a painting of Susan Twist and Ruby doesn't react strongly to it like she thought it was familiar but not to the level of recognition in Dot and Bubble.
I am glad his romantic interest wasn't with Ruby. I hope we come across the Rogue again at some point. An issue I have with the doctor having romantic interest in travelling companions is the power imbalance. They are naive to the universe by design and are heavily dependent on the Doctor. If there is going to be a romantic relationship, I like this scenario a lot more.
I think the same. That's the dinamic with the doctor and the companions. The times we had super power companions, was always for a very short time period. Also, the conflict of interests in having a romantic relationship for the doctor would be a problem I think
yeah, i didn't always _love_ the direction with River but to me it was much much better than any of the Rose stuff (which i think i'm in the minority for hating). Rogue is taking most of the best parts of Jack and making it work (what is it with the doctor and having R-named love interests?)
I've felt the same way about the Ruby & Doctor relationship: they keep telling us how close they are without having shown us first. I'm actively annoyed that we're getting such a short season for Fifteen's first outing--Nine at least got 13, which gave him and Rose much more breathing room to establish themselves.
Yeah, the actors are doing their best to sell it, but they haven't done enough in the writing to show it and though I have always been fine with the idea that I haven't seen everything that the Doctor gets up to, the friendship building is a must show for me.
I think they sell it in their interactions (mannerisms, physicality, etc.), but I agree it would help if we'd see more of them together, so more episodes that aren't Doctor (or companion) light, and just more episodes in general.
I 100% believe now thanks to this episode that 15 unfortunately hasn’t processed any of his past traumas and is defaulting to his own “Doctor” persona to cope. I went through a very similar phase in my own PTSD recovery where it was basically this super unhealthy cycle of denial and I recognize that in Ncuti’s performance completely.
@@erin_3569 Yeah, same. Trauma can be very complicated like that and 14 going to rest and recover with Donna and her family doesn't mean he fixed everything. Trauma has layers.
You make a good point about Ruby's "best friend" thing. I also keep thinking about how young she is and how young so many companions are. It would make more sense to me for the Doctor to feel very strongly about protecting the life and well-being of a young adult who trusts them and to think of the possible betrayal of Ruby's trust and Carla's trust if anything happens. Flashing back to a promise made to Carla meant more to me than the "best friend" thing.
That promise absolutely resonated way more than the best friend thing. I get the feeling almost like they're fun uncle/cool niece more than they are besties.
At the time, I took it as more of him empathizing with Rogue's experience of loss by saying he doesn't have many friends left. In retrospect, it also may have been more about establishing that Ruby isn't his girlfriend or wife, since, ya know, Rogue might wanna know that.
It took acouple watches to realise - when rogue pushed ruby out, her shoes stayed behind. We saw it in the teleport grid before she went. And the lone shoe earlier in the episode forshadowed it.I kept wondering how the trade woked! I? think the point is that if she had stepped bare foot onto the ground or fallen onto it there would have been no way to get her out. There was even a small close p on her shoes to clue us in.
I really like Rogue. It’s nice to have a fun episode again after the two rather heavy ones previously. I know there are many times when we’ve seen one-off characters that said they’d return but it really feels like we’ll see Rogue again. And I really like the chemistry that Ncuti and Jonathan Groff have. It took me a rewatch to buy their romance. Whenever he’s fallen in love, it’s always been either with a companion or with a one-off character reluctantly. It's never so quick and so obvious. It took him forever to admit his feelings to Rose, River, and Yaz. That being said, I liked the chulders and that they just ended up maliciously playing. I love the _Caberet_ reference they make. I never believed for a second that Ruby was dead… again. At the rate she’s going, she’ll beat Rory’s record for deaths. And it was really funny in a really meta way to hear Kylie Minogue’s “Can’t Get You Out of My Head”. I almost wanted the Doctor to reference Astrid as a character directly.
I feel like that hug scene at the end shows real development in the Doctor's and Ruby's relationship when compared to, for example, the end of Boom. At the end of Boom, the Doctor very suddenly says "ok, done here, let's move on" and Ruby questions why so fast, but doesn't really push back very much. She almost just died, they watched other people actually die, and it was Ruby's first alien planet, and the Doctor takes (and gives Ruby) no time to process before moving on. Now, just a few episodes (but implied to be a longer amount of time and trips) later, Ruby understands the Doctor's character well enough---and feels like an equal partner enough---to push back, get the Doctor to pause and process. There's been a lot of discussion about the smaller episode count meaning we don't get to see the development of the Doctor's and Ruby's relationship as much, and while I largely agree with that, I think they've done a lot of good, subtle writing (especially small dialogue moments) that can show the growth of their relationship. On a separate note, I get why you associate some of the Doctor's vengeful moments with 10, but I think other Doctors get plenty of similar moments. Eccleston lets Cassandra die in "The End of the Earth" when he could easily save her, and in "Dalek" he orders the last Dalek to kill itself. His whole arc over the season is becoming less vengeful because of Rose's influence so that, by the end of the season, although he builds a machine that can wipe out the Dalek fleet, he chooses not to use it at the last second. Matt Smith has plenty of vengeful moments as well ("I want you to be known as Colonel Runaway, I want children to laugh at you when you walk down the street"). In his time stream, he makes a big deal about how John Hurt was himself when he didn't live up to the name "The Doctor", with the implication that this side of him is always part of him, under the surface, and it's a constant choice to hold it back and live up to the ideals he's chosen by naming himself "Doctor". This idea comes back with Capaldi in one of the most memorable vengeful Doctor moments for me ("the Doctor is no longer here, you're stuck with me!").
I cannot wait for this episode to cause as much if not more of a scandal among reactionaries as the Doctor and Rogue dancing together did in 1813. Time is a circle! Also, silly as they were, I really like this episode's villains and sorta hope they return at some point? The idea of aliens killing and replacing people just so they can cosplay living their lives until they get *bored* is the perfect mix of fun and actually quite harrowing, and it feels like a deliberate parallel to the way the Doctor and his companions usually insert themselves into historical settings (since with historical settings they are almost always there for fun, at least in the modern show).
@@HuntingViolets The idea of something killing you horribly just so it can steal your appearance and life for a little bit before it gets bored of being you and repeats the process with someone else it finds more interesting is so twisted. I mean we've had villains that kill for the fun of it before, but doing so as a demented sort of costume party and that's *it*, no grander motive? In a way it'd feel less evil if it was serving a larger plan.
@@mxrichardsonsneighbourhood5402 I do think on that front they were going for a more ahistorical Bridgerton style stance on race. You'll have noticed several of the other high society guests at the dance were also black, so I don't think that was necessarily the point the scene was trying to make.
While I do agree that I don't think it's super believable that Ruby and Fifteen are best friends, I will maintain that the Doctor's freak out when he believes Ruby is dead works. Something that the Doctor has always taken seriously is his duty of care to his companions and the way the episode flashes to Fifteen's promise to Ruby's mother really cements how that is a major part of what is going on here. He is aware of how he has failed when he she supposedly dies and the hole it will leave in the lives of the people around her. Interestingly enough, I think that the conversation between The Doctor and Ruby at the end of the episode makes them feel more like best friends to me. Between that, the brilliant dynamic between The Doctor and Rogue, the side story with Ruby and "Emily" (even if it kind of means nothing at the end), and the overall fun of it all, this has overtaken Boom as my favourite of the season so far.
Indira Varna returning for a new role in the franchise is more or less common. Freema Agyeman, Karen Gillian and Peter Capaldi come to mind. When Davies likes an actor he will reuse them if he can. The differene her is that Varma went from an important role in Torchwood to a guest one this episode.
Yes, although they immediately retconned Martha as Adeola's cousin (if they'd realized they wanted her sooner, they might have just had the first character survive). Capaldi in _Torchwood_ was a descendant of the Pompeii character, and the Doctor wonders quite a bit about why he receives this face when he becomes Twelve. Although Varma didn't play Suzie very long (I think) and she does look a little different now (especially when she's a birdwoman for a good percentage of the episode), so there's that.
Don't forget Eve Myles, who played a character in the Unquiet Dead (the Dickens ghosts episode) and then went on to be Gwen in Torchwood, though there is a brief comment on that in a later Doctor Who episode, I think Journey's End.
I've learned Peter Purvis played a comical American on Doctor Who in the exact same serial where he at the end was cast as Steven. This trope goes back decades. (I assume he spoke through his nose to indicate he was now American?)
For me it was extra funny that they made the D&D connection because it was ALREADY giving ME D&D vibes because of the owl people because I play an Owlin in my main D&D game so humanoid owls in historical cosplay was already giving me that vibe lol
I do like to think of the Doctor as mostly asexual (Tom Baker saying "you're a beautiful woman, probably" lives rent free in my head), but he's definitely had romances and flings before, and he has a granddaughter from the very second we meet him, so I don't think his sexuality is at all taboo or sacred ground or anything. Plus, the episode is very meta as a Bridgerton pastiche, so i assume the quickfire romance is as much of a genre obligation as a character moment
There is only one Doctor. The Doctor that aged Sutekh to death is the one that trapped the Family of Blood. The doctor who couldn't press the button to kill Ruby, couldn't activate the Delta Wave, The Moment or the Death Particle. It's the same Doctor that didn't erase the Daleks at their birth or kill Missy.
Well , it is a standard Doctor Who trope to split the Doctor and companion specifically to follow the A and B plots. Or in this case, two sides of the same plot.
It brought me to tears! I think I cried for at least half the episode. I wasn’t prepared for what it would be like to see a normalized queer romance in a fun frivolous story, & on a mainstream screen. We’re so used to only seeing our stories, even in campy comedies, with a sense of shame and heaviness & a looming threat from the human world. In the absence of that weight, I was overwhelmed by emotions-relief, joy, sadness, anger, hope… Somewhat ironically the un-seriousness of this episode is what made it so impactful.
I first thought it was a situation where ALL the people at the party were playing roles as "Fake" characters. There are actually places where you pay to dress as people from another time period. (EXample: One group plays the Rich People and another group plays the Servants.) Also I really thought for a minute they might actually kill Ruby Sunday off in this. Just because in 73 yards for a moment it made me think how before the TWIST it didn't matter about who Ruby's real family was and how it seemed important early in the season. But Regardless in THIS EPISODE I immediately after that Realized RUBY OUT SMARTED the Alien who was trying to be her. That the Doctor trapped Ruby not realizing she was stronger than he realized.
As someone who used to have a special interest in Argentine Tango, the musical easter egg that really got me was that the song played during Rogue and the Doctor’s dance is an instrumental version of Santa Maria (Del Buen Ayre) by Gotan Project!! I couldn’t believe it at first because that’s fairly obscure compared to the other songs used but it made me so happy ❤ Edit: I was mistaken on the song! It was actually a very famous tango song called Libertango, which has been performed by many different artists. I strongly believe that this is either the version by the string quartet group, Bond, or it’s a cover inspired by their arrangement.
The Doctor: We can't kill them, we'll just send them to a barren dimension so they can't hurt anyone. Me: In a BARREN dimension? To do what? Slowly starve to death? Sounds like the Doctor's just killing them with extra steps. What is this American cartoon fate worse than death thing?
I know, would have rather had them locked down and signalled for a shadow proclamation ship to come pick them up? Did they establish it could only stay on for a little while? Or just send them to a SP prison? I can buy it maybe that he can't be too precise because he's jury-rigging it but it does seem like death with extra steps.
I thought the Bridgerton style anachronistic racial harmony felt a bit strange after last week's episode, which finally acknowledged the uncomfortable persistence of racism. I do hope at some point they acknowledge that this Doctor will have some challenges when he travels to Earth's past.
I'm not really sure this was the "real" past but more like a television _Bridgerton_ version (the racial harmonies were accompanied by anachronistic modern musical covers like in _Bridgerton)._ Kind of something that fits in this season's theme of the walls of reality being thin after the spilling of salt at the edge of the universe to invoke a superstition, causing magic and stories bleeding through. (The Toymaker is also boxed in salt.)
@@HuntingViolets That could be the case. If it was it wasn't apparent early on so it still felt odd. This Doctor is likely to have more adventures in the past, and by next season there will be another POC companion, so it will be interesting to see how it is handled.
Yeah, I noticed that too and it bugs me. Not because I have any problems with diversity, but I like historicals to be somewhat accurate, or to try hard to be. I've thought about this a lot actually and I think what bugs me is it kind of instils this outlandish notion that only European history is worthy of exploring. That somehow because it is well known in the west, we should only tell western cultural historical episodes, thus making the only way we have that and diversity, is to have anachronistic POC present. Instead what we should be asking for, nay, Demanding, is that Doctor WHO and other fiction tell more diverse stories from other parts of the world. Black Cultures Matter! Let's tell some pre-colonial stories! Let's visit the pasts of Africa, the Middle East, North and South America, Asia, and Oceana, before white people came and started screwing with them. Those stories aren't well known because people don't tell them. Be the change you want to see showrunners, and tell those stories before they are lost to time!
@@R_SENAL Yeah I'd love to see that. Doctor Who has the TARDIS translating foreign languages so there's no reason they can't travel to other parts of the world (they have before, but not enough... I get that it's a British show for primarily a British audience, but the audience is becoming more international). On another note, I'm a big supporter of more diversity and representation in movies and TV, but too often what happens is so called "color blind" diversity which can often sanitize the ugliness of the real world, which if it gives people the idea that these problems have been solved, can have some negative impacts. Even setting these stories in the past can be a problem if it suggests it's a thing of the past (an issue with the "Rosa Parks" episode, which also had the double problem of it being a British show which relegated these problems to America-- British people love to think they are less racist than Americans). Putting out that idea that it doesn't exist anymore can be a problem. People often forget that a lot of people thought racism was over when Obama was elected, and we're still reeling from that misconception today.
Tell me if I'm mistaken, but when the Doctor pulled Rogue's ring at the end of the episode I thought he was going to plug it into the TARDIS and ask it to psychically steer in order to find where Rogue was sent to, I remember him doing something similar with Clara, and then with Yaz and her grandma's watch - so is that not possible anymore or just a chibnall invention that RTD decided to ignore because it was too easy and we want to bring Jonathan Groff next season and not in the finale? or I was simply the only one that thought of it?
I had the same thought. Will be interesting to see what happens with it. With the introduction of more magical elements this season, I feel like there's even more precedent for the ring to draw them back together. This Doctor has a bunch of new technology, but maybe in the TARDIS change could result in some getting lost, too?
@@R_SENAL forgetting is very much a possibility and i wouldn't blame him, though it's a bit funny given this tardis feature was used in the first episode of rtd era
It's also weird how the Dr just abandoned Ruby this episode... Like as soon as he understood the threat he should have at least wondered where Ruby was but he seemed to just ignore her completely after meeting Rogue. Also, Ruby and the Dr seem less close on screen than the actors behave in real life.... I think the problem is that they've never had those "becoming friends" episodes that previous companions had so it feels rather forced and rushed this time around.
yeah it feels very much implied that all the "becoming friends" stuff happened between eps 1 and 2 (i get that they only had so many episodes but this was a bad decision)
What really got me excited in this episode was the dancing - it felt like a reference to Pride and Prejudice (2005), specifically the scene where Darcy and Lizzy dance and everyone around them briefly disappear in the face of their intense connection.
It just occured to me, RTD complained the Loki show copped out on claiming Loki was bi-sexual but not showing it. So he hired the writers of that and they did an episode where we see Gatwa confirmed to be gay. It was like a direct response to that Loki moment. As much as it'd be easy to assume all doctors were pansexual, I sort of get the sense that 9 was bi, 10 was straight, 11 was straight, 12 was too old to care either way, 13 was gay, 14 was bi-sexual, 15 is gay. Just something about the way 13 never seemed attracted to men, even Captain Jack, while 12 was so non-flirty that I dont think it matters what his orientation was, 10 i cant remember if he flirted with men but definitely felt like a straight casanova type. Eccleston happily flirted with Rose and Jack. 11 hit on Clara and commented on her skirt but apart from s7 I would have said he was A-sexual but he makes kissing noises when they mention Melody Pond grows up to be River and River eventually marries him. Its hard to say because RTD inherently makes the doctor more on the comfortably flirty-gay side and Moffat went from 'cant help but sexualise everyone' to 'capaldi is older and everything is platonic'. Whitaker and Yaz was so late in the story but that said Yaz is the only person she shows interest in AND she was pretty queer coded to begin with so im not chalking that up to that one event. I dont think its a coincidence that all 4 of RTD's doctors so far are more on the romantic side and Moffats women were more on the sexualised kickass side but I dont think Chibnalls own attitude or orientation had anything to do with how Whitaker was presented. TL;DR The doctors orientation seems to change heavily based on the showrunner behind it, so its really difficult to be sure if the doctor has just been consistently pansexual when 4 out of 7 doctors were all written by RTD and 1 out of 7 seemed blatantly straight-horny if not asexual and joking about bunk beds being cool, and 2 out of 7 seem one-sidedly gay; i cant see Gatwas doctor being into women and I cant see Whitakers doctor being into men, and then 1 was so no-hugging no-kissing that it seems irrelevant. There's every possibility the doctors orientation changes each doctor between each, or some sides are just more emphasized. Though Gatwa in The Giggle says he loved Rose, so maybe I'm just overthinking it and all doctors are indeed pansexual though some doctor personalities and attractions bring out one side more than the other.
I've always thought of them as Bi/Pan because that's easier than going through the whole thing you just wrote. I will say though, regardless to partner or wanna-be partner, it feels more in character for the Doctor to be pursued, not to be the pursuer, that feels wrong to me. It also bugs me that the Loki writers are doing this as if in answer to RTD's criticism, which for me at least, delegitimizes the character progression a bit because something out-of-universe is the incitement of it. They made a character for the Doctor to be with and tacked a story on top of it, instead of making a good story where the Doctor meets someone interesting.
Pre-RTD Doctors had queerness going on, too, though (some more than others -- definitely Two was probably the most queer with Jamie). Also, I know it's open to interpretation, but I DEFINITELY didn't see Twelve/Clara as platonic. But YMMV.
Maybe a niche take but I’ve always thought of the doctor as abrosexual and genderfluid. His gender identity matching the sex of whatever body he’s given, and his sexuality fluctuating along with his regenerations, just as an easy way to explain different writer interpretations I think. I think the VAST majority of Doctors ( particularly Classic Who ) are aroace but that’s just my headcanon!
Dot and Bubble made me comfortable with people being swallowed alive and now, Rogue made me comfortable with bird people destroying the human race. For blood thirsty monsters, I thought the Chuldur were a lot of fun. They knew how to have a good time and I loved how unique each one's design was. Aesthetically, they're probably my new favorite aliens. I genuinely hope they become the next reoccurring villain species going into the future. Plus, there leader was played by Indira Varma.
The thing I appreciate most about the Chuldur is that they aren't just "copy+paste" designs, each one is based on a different bird, so they are easy to tell apart.
@@Tuaron Exactly. Plus, they're a lot more pleasant to look at, than Zygons. Also, the Chuldur might act as a backdoor, for introducing Frobisher, the shapeshifting Whifferdill, from the DWM, comic strip.
I think what sold the Doctor/Rogue relationship for me was that The Doctor started the flirting. If it had been the other way around then my protective instincts towards The Doctor would have kicked in. This way round, I was happy The Doctor was having some fun. The fact that Fifteen has already been established as the flirty type helped, and I think it wouldn't have worked earlier in the season without the build up. For example, this romance had to come after his little tussle with Ruby over Ricky September; we needed to get to know this side of Fifteen's character first, and if the Ricky exchange had happened after Rogue then it would have felt callous.
Something I noticed an hour or so after watching - Rogue getting his nom-de-plum from a D&D class (implying he specifically likes playing Rogues) matches how he chose to stake out the party. Brooding quietly in a corner, observing without interacting. Which... Just matches a fairly stereotypical way rogues sometimes wind up getting played. Which... Is either a funny coincidence or an intentional tie-in to the 'cosplay' (closer to larp in what's going on, but whatever) theming of the episode, where everyone is cosplaying, sometimes cosplaying as someone cosplaying as themselves. ...Come to think of it, that entire episode wound up going fairly Twelfth Night in parts albeit without the gender fuckery going on in that play... Interesting thing that came up in the Unleashed considering what you said about RTD not skirting around the issue of homosexuality on a big sci-fi show. This episode was written by Kate Herron and Briony Redman, and apparently, the queer romance angle was pitched by them rather than an element he specifically was asking for. Which is particularly interesting to me since RTD was critical of Loki S1, directed by Herron, for skirting around the edges when it came to sexuality (The way he said it sounded more critical of Disney for that to me than of Herron, or Loki generally, specifically to me - A frustration at streaming services generally that Loki just happened to wind up in the firing line of when he was asked about representation in media because of the fan and media response to a throwaway line of dialogue.)
This episode was a lot of fun and felt like a much needed breath of fresh air after how heavy the last two were. Though I do kinda feel like Rogue should have been around longer for the idea of the Doctor falling in love with him to really land. Like, I know the problem of "characters meet and then two or three scenes later they are lovers" is hardly *unique* to this episode of this show, but... it still felt a bit fast. Ncuti Gatwa and Jonathan Groff did have really good chemistry together on screen though, so that did help make it easier to accept despite how quick it went by, and I hope that, since the Doctor kept the ring at the end, that will stay as a permanent reminder of this episode. And, yeah, even if he said at the end that there was no possible way to find Rogue again... this episode feels like it could very easily get a sequel.
I totally agree. My very first thought after watching was finally, a simple episode that actually feels like good ol' NuWho! It wasn't anything groundbreaking, but it still had everything I could want from a good DW story - It was fun and camp, yet emotional at times; great setting, cool uncomplicated monsters, awesome character moments. I feel like I finally got a chance to actually get to know Ruby and 15 better as people, and see what they're actually like on a run-in-the-mill type of adventure. The Doctor felt more like the Doctor here than he did in many of the previous stories imo, and Ruby finally showed some real agency as a companion (she also did in 73 yards and Boom, but there she didn't really have a choice but to be separated from the Doctor; I liked that in this case, they just decided to split and she actually chose to do her own thing). I do wish it would have happened much earlier in the season, but better late then never I suppose lol :) i do get what you mean about the Doctor and Ruby's relationship, I did feel the same when he called her his best friend.. But I did love their scene at the end, and the moments we did get with them together. I also loved the chemistry between Ncuti and Jonathan Groff, and his character was really interesting (Yeah, similar to Captain Jack in many aspects, but I personally didn't mind it at all), so I hope he comes back in the future! But even if we don't get to see him again, it was a great choice of guest star and a very cool dynamic to watch unfold. And yeah, I loved your comment about them USING the homophobia of the era for their benefit, I totally felt that scene was really special while watching, and couldn't find a way to explain exactly why in words, so thank you. I still have to think it over a bit more, but my initial take on first viewing alone, is to give this episode about an 8/10. My only, very tiny gripe tbh, is how quickly the Doctor believed Ruby was actually gone. I mean, I liked Ruby's side of it, using the earring's previously established combat-mode and "cosplaying" was very clever on her part and I can totally believe that it worked. It was also well established that the creatures don't identify each other very quickly so I can even buy them not clocking her. However, personally, since all the other Chuldur were in bird-form, and she was supposedly the only one that wasn't, I immediately assumed that it was actually the real Ruby. When the Doctor ran off, I expected him to go search for her body, to want to verify that she's actually dead before he rains down hell on them.. But instead, he just went away to cry, which was a bit disappointing tbh. I'm not one of those people who has a problem with him crying in every episode, I think that's a nice character trait for 15; he's emotional and wears his heart(s) on his sleeve and that's cool. I just didn't like how quickly he accepted it without even checking - and even if he did believe it and just felt like crying, I don't get why he had to go off to another room to do so. I doubt he'd be the kind of person who cares about other people seeing him cry, not only cause it never bothered him before, but also just cause that's such a human male-ego type of trait that doesn't fit the Doctor imo, but oh well.
I've just been rewatching Torchwood, and the dance scene here is very similar to the Torchwood episode where Captain Jack gets transported back to 1941, and ends up meeting the guy he stole his name from, the *real* Captain Jack. The two of them have a dance together before Jack returns to present day Cardiff.
I’d love to see Rogue return, but I’ll need an explanation how he got transported to an alternate dimension with a bunch of killer bird people and still survived.
Indira Varma (the leader of the bird-folk) popping up in all my favourite shows, reminding me that I am, in fact, bisexual. I loved the string version of "Poker Face"! The only problem I have with that song is, because of Axis of Awesome, I mentally add "Come on Barbie, let's go party" to the chorus 🤣🤣
I hope they find Rogue again. He was a great character. I wonder if John Barrowman was younger if he'd have been brought in as Captain Jack. Speaking of Jack, this episode felt a little like Torchwood: Captain Jack Harkness in how The Doctor and Rogue interacted. I've been liking this season more than I expected.
yeah, i feel like this episode was written for jack harkness instead of the rogue, except they couldn't bring back john barrowman in light of what's happened
My spouse has a theory that the Rogue is pre 9th Doctor Jack Harkness (re-casting the character). I like that idea even if it probably isn't what is going on. I did notice at the end of this episode the Doctor did a salute, which was almost identical to the salutes Jack used to give. Either way, it was a brilliant episode!
Even if I also don't see how Ruby is the doctor's best friend, I was kind of shocked with the fact that when Rogue dissappears, the Doctor was more interested and worried about him than Ruby, he was even the most troubbled one, when Ruby was a second away of dying.
I think that in the effort to sell the romance for this episode they neglected the heart of the series. I'm sure it's happened elsewhere, but at least in the best episodes of Who I never felt like the Doctor forgot about their companions and especially not once he knew people were getting murdered for a cute face.
The only moment that grated for me was the Doctor/Rogue kiss, it works from Rogues perspective as he knows what he's about to do, but for the Doctor, who's seeing is best friend in peril, it feels uncharacteristic in the moment.
I don’t mean to joke about a serious issue, but ngl someone yelling “You Queers” while Ncuti & Jonathan Groff kiss in period costume is kind of a beautiful scenario 😂 Love the review Jessie
I guess it depends on whether Jonathan Groff will be available for future stories, and whether the seasons are long enough to fit future Rogue stories in.
When Fifteen and Rogue were dancing, was that Grace Jones' "I've Seen That Face Before" arrangment in the background? I feel like no-one noticed this song among the others. I think it was but I'm not sure 😅
I was thinking that until the "them," because I thought Jack always identified as a he, and then the vague "they" seemed unnecessary, so I thought, nonbinary?
@@HuntingViolets Due to personal experience I took "they" to me a thinly veiled cloak for "he" since in my mind they felt like they were sort of dancing around the confirmation that these were both queer characters but maybe I am projecting way too much lol. I guess if we see Rogue again we might get to find out!
@@HuntingViolets"They" can be used for people with a binary gender too. (That's kinda why non-binary people started to use it; because "they" works regardless of gender)
Dungeons and Dragons has been around since the late 1960s. It got really popular in the 1970s. Satanic Panic almost destroyed it in the 1980s, but it survived that right-wing side-show. While people did dress up, mostly Trekies and sometimes Star Wars fans, it wasn't called "Cosplay" until at least the late 1990s. That would be the difference. And to add some emphasis to this - because at my age I anticipate the arguments, there were costumes, mostly during Halloween, but the unifying nomenclature of "Cosplay" wasn't a thing in conventions of old. And it was women who made it a business and an integral feature that literally saved sci-fi/comic conventions. Yes, there was a brief moment when convention looked like they were about to die away, and Cosplay is an important factor of what saved it. And while LARPing was a thing for a minute, it was never thought of as cosplay. (Sometimes you kids are absolutely sure of things so one has to stress the actual history.) So yes, it is possible Rogue may know of a time of Dungeons and Dragons without knowing the culture around Cosplay. Like knowing a cordless phone without actually knowing a smartphone. Earth history is complicated to aliens.
As a point of order: D&D was first published in 1974, although there were proto-variants bouncing around in wargamer circles before that. But those weren't "Dungeons & Dragons", they were "Using Chainmail rules to resolve individual adventures."
Not understanding cosplay just gives us a time reference for when he might have been on Earth.Based on the clear colored dice, mid 80s to mid 90s.Though Rogue rather than Thief implies around 3rd edition. Hes from the 90s.
This episode made me laugh so much and broke my heart.... I'm not a Bridgerton person, but man... the spice! I found it so funny up until the end where Rogue broke my heart. I so hope he's coming back, even better if he one day becomes a companion, I'm so up for it! The Cosplay thing, I think Rogue didn't knew about it so the Doctor could explain it for parts of the audience. It's stupid, but I give it a pass. And yes, there were both Bad Guy and Pokerface in the background at the perfect moments! (Bad Guy during the first meeting of the Doctor and Rogue, and Pokerface when we saw how Ruby knocked out the birdy)
Terrific analysis. I adored this episode, and agree with both your criticisms and praise of it. I can't believe this season is almost finished. I feel like it should have gone on a bit longer - especially with Ncuti himself getting so little screentime in many of the episodes. He absolutely shines every single time he's on screen. Here's hoping next season gives him the opportunity to shine even more.
Boom subverted the mystery box plot armour trope as we saw the snow which gave the Doctor hope and then it stopped when she flatlined. So it didn't do anything to save her. It just rubbed in that Ruby was lost.
I agree 100% if this came out between 73 yards and Dot and Bubble I think the season pacing would have been a lot better. Really wish this season was 10 episodes instead of 8, but at least this shorter ep count will mean more consistent seasons moving forward
This episode was so much fun! Lots going on, but it felt more like a "traditional" episode of Doctor Who than what we've had lately, even with RTD going, "yep, gonna do the gay!" (I was waiting for that kiss all episode and it did not fail to deliver). I love all the new ways of storytelling we're seeing this season, showing all the things that Doctor Who can be, but there's something very comforting in the more "old school" straightforwardness of this episode. Rogue is a good addition to the Doctor's allies - I look forward to seeing him again - and a good way to handle a character type that is reminiscent of Jack Harkness, but without the baggage that having Jack in the episode would have brought. I'd completely forgotten the "battle mode" remark with the earrings, but I don't think we're meant to dwell on it. It made the reveal all the more special, particularly because the Doctor didn't think of that, either, and was genuinely shocked that Ruby was herself. I love that she mimicked the sharp neck movements to help sell her "disguise". I think the series being so short definitely hurts it overall. I like this episode where it is, as a palette cleanser after "Dot and Bubble", but we did need another more episodic, light-hearted one earlier in the series, too, either right before or right after "73 Yards".
Spoilers... I was afraid they would not deliver when they were interrupted at first! Fortunately, they did. But Rogue disappearing right afterwards was terrible! Please, have him back somehow!
Watching this episode was really fun for me as a fan of bridgerton. I’m just glad that they used the actress who plays Queen Charlotte in Bridgerton in a different episode. If they used her in this one it would have thrown me for a loop.
Would not say the doctor is gay. The doctor can be any gender so I think it’s what and who they are attracted to. Sure they were in love with Rose, Madame DP, had an affair with Queen Elizabeth. So I think they just are attracted to people
While there are core elements of The Doctor that remain between (almost) all regenerations, there are many things that change, and new regenerations are framed to a degree as new people. I do not think that sexuality is one of the static elements, just like how gender isn't. This Doctor has repeatedly and exclusively been shown to be attracted to men, and I think that's because he's being deliberately written as gay.
Rogue is like a combo of Captain Jack and River. subliminal messaging i picked up on even before their dance. thats a subtle but sweet twist to Whovians' fave characters💖
11:06 for me i was kind of worried and freaked out a bit at the prospect that Ruby might've gotten cosplay drained for a moment and that The Doctor messed up and hadn't saved her. i was kind of relieved when Ruby said she cosplayed out by switching the earrings to COMBAT MODE ⚔️🛡😆. made me chuckle with the poker face bit. i could sort of recognize some of the music, but couldn't really do it as well without the aid of the captions.
This was the best new series episode. True writing, true acting, outstanding directing This is how Doctor Who should be. It felt very much like Doctor Who. I’m happy that camera wasn’t doing flips during dialogue scenes. I love Rogue and have an idea of who he is but I don’t want to ruin anything. Anyway, loved the review.
I’m sure it’s been mentioned, but you were thinking of Human Nature/Family Of Blood…which is funny, because the family in this episode reminded me of the group in that one.
Did anyone else spot _that face_?! I'm pretty sure it was meant to be Richard E Grant between One and Four when the holographic heads swirled around Fifteen, but I couldn't be certain. Justice for the Shalka Doctor! Was he with Division? Are we getting an in-person cameo later? Or is this some Great Intelligence, Valeyard, timey-wimey stuff? Or was it just something thrown in as a true easter egg for its own sake?
14:07 To be fair, considering the source material was a 7th Doctor story. It is definitely his characterisation projected onto 10. Which ended up being some of my favourite 10 era stories. It's strange how Doctor and Rogue almost paralleled the first story with Doctor and River Song. It would be interesting to see if they continue that dual narrative or if Rogue is a one and done character.
I thought for a minute we were going to get a Ruby/Emily kiss and was actually surprised when the transformation happened. I usually would have been more suspicious of that. (Although so far, her only dating/sex partners we've seen have been men.) The Doctor: I don't even know his real name. Turnabout is fair play. It feels a little different with the Doctor having a romance -- even with Rose and River, to some extent, it was always skated by a little bit with seeming like a couple but kind of "are they/aren't they" and maybe "will they/won't they" in the air too. Rose's one big kiss with the Doctor was with TenToo (unless you count when she was Cassandra). And the one romance I wanted, I never quite got. (Which is neither of those.) So it was interesting they finally went there. [Edited to add: Oh, yeah, Mme. de Pompadour. I forgot that one. And Joan Redfern, but I don't count that, because that wasn't the Doctor, although that whole story had a lot of issues.] But Rogue and the Doctor will meet again, I believe. I understood his feelings for Rogue a lot more than either his or Ruby's being interested in Ricky September. Sorry, Ricky. I kind of enjoy the idea that the Doctor can change sex and sexuality with different incarnations. Sometimes bi, sometimes ace, gay, het, demi, pan, anything I've forgotten. Male, female, nonbinary. The dance reminded me a little of Louis and Lestat's dance in _Interview with the Vampire,_ since it was shocking for the room they were in. (I may be forgetting if they ever really have before. I know he spent 24 years with River, so I assumed, but it wasn't onscreen.) Not being willing to kill someone to save the world reminds me of season five _Buffy._ Again, probably not the only thing that comes to other people's minds. Hello, Indira Varma aka Suzy. Doctor, hug Ruby back! Jack Harkness would have loved to meet this incarnation of the Doctor. I wonder how _Bridgerton_ plays into this bleeding of fiction into reality. Probably liked the previous two episodes better, but this was cool. Groundbreaking in some ways. Should expect more complaints about the Doctor tearing up, I guess.
Loved this one. Seeing the time period, and attire. Oh the Doctor, (was that outfit a nod to Pertwee? Because whos) and Ruby looked amazing in her ball gown. The fun music cues, love it. Especially the callback with Kylie, and "Can't get you out of my head" 🎵🎶 Rogue, fascinating character. And that moment. Wow. Definitely someone we will see again. That ring, has some significance
They actually mentioned Pertwee on Unleashed when discussing The Doctor's costume. When finding a jacket that worked for Ncuti they realised a nod to Pertwee in a deep wine, velvet jacket.
SPOILER ALERT The Doctor grooving while activating Rogue's ship's stereo to play the Kylie Minogue song was, hands down, my favourite moment. Selling the quick romance to an audience was ultimately settled by the casting. Jonathan Groff was absolutely superb and yes, the chemistry between he and Ncuti Gatwa was palpable. One thing still bothered me though, Rogue sacrifices himself. That's a big decision to make for someone he has only just met a few hours ago and that decision needed more substance to it. A bit more elaboration about Rogue's absent partner and friend could have tied that impulsive act to something, some kind of redemption for him, say, that act needed more motivation underwriting it. That said, it was a fun episode and I loved that there was a flirty, romantic element and there is the portend of Rogue's return in some future episode.
It's funny that both Astrid and that song are now in-universe together, but 10 never mentions she looks just like a singer he knows. The chemistry felt forced to me, but I do agree with you that the sacrifice needed more behind it. The only things we know about Rogue are his job, he lost someone, and he likes the Doctor. More is needed to make his motivations more based.
Thx Jessie for your early reviews! I loved this one, watched it alone (the fam usually lags, I can’t!) and so nice to feel the shared vibe right away. I was so so sad about this one tho, didn’t feel as fun rompy as it may have seemed. It’s a super tragic & beautiful love story to me! (Is that “of the time”? Maybe… Hell, I haven’t seen Bridgeton, my bad for sure) Anyway, I adored this ep, up there with some of my old faves. May well watch again on my own - a sign of a great ep to me.
@@HuntingViolets It does look fun, just didn’t get to it. May do now ;) Fan of the real study of history, bc I like facts & learning from it, but I still enjoy crazy anachronistic tales. I love Who historicals, usually silly & often hilarious :)
This episode was fantastic! I had so much fun with it. Johnathan Groff was great as Rogue, and he and Ncuti had such amazing chemistry with each other. And when The Doctor couldn't banish the aliens without losing Ruby, only for Rogue to finally kiss them and save her, I got emotional. This was definitely a wonderful episode.
I think I'm bothered by that Ruby doesn't have personality flaws, something that gives their relationship resistance. I think a part of seeing the companion and doctor relationship grow is when characters do little things to grow as humans. For me, I fell in love with Donna the moment she defends the ood, when she uses a characteristic about her that is generally played as annoying to become her strenght. During that episode, the interactions betwen her and the doctor is very up and down. They have some conflict, and their friendship feels more deep too me. Ruby and the Doctor do not really have disagrements that matter. Ruby doesn't question anyones, especially the doctors, intention or ask for accountability when things are done to her. The only episode that happens is in 73 yards. But in that episode when she does, she isn't recieving anything back, so you never get a conflict that resolves and gives a growth. And that lifetime was then erased. But Ruby and the Doctor only complement and lift eachother, they never have moments when they critique the other. They are just two perfect people with their perfect friendship.
I agree, but I'm honestly wondering if it's deliberate. There have been so many meta elements to the series so far, from the Doctor referencing diagetic music to the ongoing Susan Twist thing, to referencing other TV shows (Star Trek and Bridgerton). If the big bad of this series has something to do with stories and has been messing with the Doctor then it could make sense for Ruby to be their creation - the perfect companion to trap the Doctor, to fit in with the story. RTD normally does characterization really well, and normally does include conflict and growth as you've said. He normally earns the 'she's my best friend' moments. I don't know, maybe it's a stretch, I think I'd enjoy a big rug-pull like that at some point.
Thanks for saying this. I really like Ruby, but I'm also a little bothered by her having no flaws. I think she's meant to be a strong female character (in the good sense) but reads a bit like a 21st-century version of all "sweetness and light," like what makes her a strong female character is that she's flawless. That struck me in "73 Yards" because the level of ostracism she endures as someone who already has abandonment issues would have been extremely traumatic for most people and led to some maladaptive behaviors beyond being abstracted with her boyfriends. (For context, I'm writing a book that deals with ostracism trauma, and our society's failure to recognize ostracism as deeply harmful is a big social problem, which I felt that episode reinforced a bit, though it was mostly excellent.)
You can tell that they are still finding just how to write Gatwa's Doctor. Several moments in this episode, while he does fabulous in don't get me wrong, was totally in Capaldi-style. I can't wait until we finally find, from the writering side, a true Gatwa's voice, you know? He has so much potential, and you can feel him being able to hit a lot of phenomenal emotional moments that these scripts have not really let him get to yet... But again, it's a first season AND a Disney season, so it's expected to ease us into the darker moments. It kinda bothered me that we didn't reference how Rogue had modern music from Earth on his ship... I suppose that he's a time traveler as well, but... eh? And why did they pick THAT EXACT ANGLE for the almost-kiss? It made Gatwa look cross-eyed and completely pulled me out of the scene. I think part of the reason we don't jive with the relationship between The Doctor and Ruby, I think it is due to the episodes being out of order to what it was likely intended (plus missing more episodes). The episode with the Meastro really fit perfectly as the episode prior to this one (which if moved here it would explain the whole June 2024 reference, and the "first alien planet" in Boom). I agree it needs more, but I think it'd make more sense to that emotional moment. That said, ehh, while I like the flirting, it felt rushed to me. I thought we were going to get Rogue betraying the Doctor, and in that case I was thinking the kiss was overdone. But once it turned out that he was going to sacrifice himself to replace Ruby, I feel the kiss was underdone. So, it basically didn't quite hit me right either way, I don't know. We now know the final scene of series 15/1: The Doctor standing in the entrance of the TARDIS staring out into the void (we knew it was coming, but it's obvious now). It's all leading up to The Doctor being... alone. And likely, at least believing, it is all his fault. He fails... To Be Continued.
Rogue is basically a re-cast of Cap Jack since the revelations about Barrowmans onset proclivities of exposing himself to cast and crew, so he is now cast into the eather along with the actor who played Mickey.
I'm a big fan of Indira Varma! She was on Obi-Wan too, one of the reasons I actually liked it. Her first film role was with Naveen Andrews in "Kama Sutra: a Tale of Love" - an absolutely brutal romance/drama directed by Mira Nair.
I adore this episode! We needed a fun and lighthearted episode after the great heavy ep of last week. I have rarely been a fan of romance on the Tardis simply because of the power (and age) imbalance. River I accepted because they began their flirting with her having all the knowledge about him and being in love without idolizing him. I don't care when they do it.... the doctor needs to find Rogue again! That chemistry is my favorite "doctor's possible partner" I've seen. In all honesty (aside from Missy) this is the only character on the doctor's level that wouldn't seem like a power imbalance if they got together. I mean even Captain Jack had an idol worship of the doctor that I didn't get with Rogue. He seemed like someone who could effectively challenge the doctor. I do have to admit everyone here was yelling "kiss him damn it" right before the kiss. Saying is was palpable is an understatement. Edited to add: I know this is going to be obvious but I will bet money on the fact that the "boycott Doctor Who" and "Boycott Disney" crowd that will yell after this episode will be citing The Doctor and Rose Tyler and being the ultimate romance despite the age difference and power imbalance. I didn't truly hate the companion falls in love with the doctor eras but I know the reason why such a large audience loved The Doctor / Donna so much and unfairly cold to Clara.... we don't need anymore very young girls romantically involved.
What I got out of the Doctor calling Ruby his best friend, was the fact that's supposed to be sad. The Doctor just said he lost everyone, so when Rogue calls out that he does still have a companion, the Doctor is establishing that 1. he has so few connections left that the one person he's been seen with is his best friend, and 2. he's not dating anyone.
My only (joking) complaint about the episode: That ain't cosplay. That's LARP.
Exactly!!! Finally someone says it
THIS!
I didn't even think of that, but you're correct. I guess none of these people had the correct term.
I have a feeling that the original script said larping but got changed on the day
Yeaaah... It's just more people are aware of the term cosplay and not so much LARP.
I can't believe Russell T. "fuck the homophobes who cares what they think" Davies is the same guy who didn't want Tennant to wear Whittaker's clothes
Have you considered that people can have more than two beliefs at the same time ?
@TheSpaceNerd1000 -- SAME.
I kind of think he didn't want to do that as it would come off as Drag. Not good drag or even "MTV hated I want to break free Drag" but "gag Drag"
I'm not a a Homophobe I just fucking hate this Doctor
He said that he didn’t want to deal with the tabloid backlash after Jodie’s regeneration into David
The songs were:
"Bad Guy" - Billie Eilish
"Poker Face" - Lady Gaga
"Strange I've Seen your Face Before" - Grace Jones.
"Can't Get You Out Of My Head." - Kylie Minogue.
This episode is now a must for Pride Month.
Potential subtitle for "Rogue":
Invasion of the Bridgerton Body Snatchers
OR
The Doctor Goes Wilde (yes, pun heavily intended.)
Indeed, I love the Jack Harkness vibe and letting it mature with a new character.
A sudden favourite to add to my already long list of Doctor who favourite episodes.
Also Astor Piazzolla's Libertango during The Doctor and Rogue's dance scene. It's a tango on classical instruments so it doesn't sound as obviously modern, but it's actually from the 70s
the doctor says his disguise for his ship was parking behind a tree…. this whole episode was hilarious
I laughed SO HARD at that one
This season is great so far, but the 8 episode format is really hurting it. When the Doctor flashed back to promising Carla that Ruby would be safe, my first thought was, "Wow, I wish we could have seen this before the moment the Doctor flashed back to it."
This season really needed the equivalent of the slitheen 2 parter from series 1. An earthbound story after Ruby has been traveling with the Doctor for a while where we see the Doctor have those conversations with the Sundays.
Thank Disney they are too scared and only do 8 incase it doesn't work and they can cut and run. This age of tv movies and film is like that. Just look at how Disney curns out lots of star wars short run spin offs doing them to death. It's their formula. Short then dump in run to a new version but it's still star wars like in the 50s where 9 out of 10 tv shows in a week where all cowboy shows did them to death but all the basic same thing eventually SciFi will be killed by them but takes a very long time 50 years of star wars currently who is the only thing that still works but they will murder it in the end
I'm pretty sure we have seen it before...in another flashback.
Thought that was a scene near the end of The Church on Ruby Road, was pretty sure we'd seen it before now, at least.
@@williamshaneblyth While Disney definitely has that issue with a lot of their shows, this case isn't Disney's fault. The reason this season was so short, as well as why there were two doctor light episodes, was because Ncuti Gatwa was still filming Sex Education while this season was filming, but they wanted to be able to release a season and not have to make everyone wait a whole year for new episodes. Disney actually has a fairly small impact on the show itself, with it seeming like they can give the occasional note and influence the marketing outside the UK, but RTD and BBC are still the ones in control of any creative decisions. Disney sucks, but if you're going to complain about them, complain about the stuff they're actually doing, don't make stuff up.
I agree with Vera, I think a huge issue is the lack of episodes. We haven't had enough time getting to know them, being with them.
Plus the doctor doesn't appear in one of those and hardly in last week's, so we've literally had about 6 and a bit episodes
I want about twice as many episodes, we need more time with these characters.
@@Tolly7249 I think we need at least a solid 13 episodes.
And yet they’ve done a better job allowing us to get to know fully fleshed out characters than Chibnall did in many more episodes. Even with 2 of the 8 episodes being Doctor lite episodes. Davies is superior at developing consistent, sympathetic characters. Still, I also wish we’d gotten more episodes.
@@Tolly7249I think the happy medium is ten regular season episodes and one holiday special.
Eight or nine episodes is enough time to establish all of the necessary groundwork for the characters and plot leading into the finale, while also not dissuading Disney or the BBC from going forward with it.
Of course, more episodes would be better, but that’s just not realistic with the way shows are budgeted and scheduled these days. Audiences expect the budget, effects, and style of modern streaming service shows.
The anachronistic music is probably a Bridgerton reference, they do this a lot over there: classical covers of modern songs that have lyrics that match either exactly or ironically what's happening on screen
Definitely.
Indeed - in fact pretty sure the Billie Eilish "bad guy" cover was straight out of bridgerton!
@@bhmth I think so!
Yes but also the LARP harpies probably handed the musicians their custom playlist!
My head canon assumes Ruby and the Doctor have had many adventures together offscreen we didn’t see. And that’s why they are such great friends.
Well, there ARE three books coming out later this year from the New Series Adventures label. They're probably set in between episodes :)
Leaves some room for Big Finish audios later too.
@@HuntingViolets, True :)
I think that was the intention but it comes across as a bit lazy. I don’t know why rtd couldn’t be bothered to actually develop the primary character dynamic of the series.
@@Creek932 Maybe we'll find out in the last two episodes.
My conspiracy theory is that they meant to put this episode earlier in the season, but then they waited to ride on Bridgerton’s release energy.
No evidence for this but I wonder if they swapped around devil's chord and this episode
Based on the sightings of Susan Twist, I don't think so.
There was a painting of Susan Twist and Ruby doesn't react strongly to it like she thought it was familiar but not to the level of recognition in Dot and Bubble.
@@floraidh4097To be fair, the painting is the least directly recognizable of her appearances.
This series and 15 is so wonderfully musical. I always thought an ancient wizard would have a musical soul
I am glad his romantic interest wasn't with Ruby. I hope we come across the Rogue again at some point.
An issue I have with the doctor having romantic interest in travelling companions is the power imbalance. They are naive to the universe by design and are heavily dependent on the Doctor.
If there is going to be a romantic relationship, I like this scenario a lot more.
I think the same. That's the dinamic with the doctor and the companions. The times we had super power companions, was always for a very short time period. Also, the conflict of interests in having a romantic relationship for the doctor would be a problem I think
Yes, I wasn't really up for a romance with Ruby. He had a nice chemistry with Rogue, though.
@@LuxieDamned I have shipped him with a companion on occasion but mostly I'm a no on it.
These two seem like peers, in that they are both wanderers who have lost people in their travels.
yeah, i didn't always _love_ the direction with River but to me it was much much better than any of the Rose stuff (which i think i'm in the minority for hating). Rogue is taking most of the best parts of Jack and making it work (what is it with the doctor and having R-named love interests?)
It depends on when he picked up D&D. It's older than calling costuming 'cosplay"
I've felt the same way about the Ruby & Doctor relationship: they keep telling us how close they are without having shown us first. I'm actively annoyed that we're getting such a short season for Fifteen's first outing--Nine at least got 13, which gave him and Rose much more breathing room to establish themselves.
Yeah, the actors are doing their best to sell it, but they haven't done enough in the writing to show it and though I have always been fine with the idea that I haven't seen everything that the Doctor gets up to, the friendship building is a must show for me.
I think they sell it in their interactions (mannerisms, physicality, etc.), but I agree it would help if we'd see more of them together, so more episodes that aren't Doctor (or companion) light, and just more episodes in general.
I 100% believe now thanks to this episode that 15 unfortunately hasn’t processed any of his past traumas and is defaulting to his own “Doctor” persona to cope. I went through a very similar phase in my own PTSD recovery where it was basically this super unhealthy cycle of denial and I recognize that in Ncuti’s performance completely.
I don't think he didn't process any. I think he actually took the time to rest as the 14th Doctor but that doesn't mean everything is resolved
@@erin_3569 Yeah, same. Trauma can be very complicated like that and 14 going to rest and recover with Donna and her family doesn't mean he fixed everything. Trauma has layers.
You make a good point about Ruby's "best friend" thing. I also keep thinking about how young she is and how young so many companions are. It would make more sense to me for the Doctor to feel very strongly about protecting the life and well-being of a young adult who trusts them and to think of the possible betrayal of Ruby's trust and Carla's trust if anything happens. Flashing back to a promise made to Carla meant more to me than the "best friend" thing.
That promise absolutely resonated way more than the best friend thing. I get the feeling almost like they're fun uncle/cool niece more than they are besties.
I prefer the older companions like Donna and Wilf, the 8th Doctor’s Liv and Helen, and the 6th Doctor’s Evelyn.
At the time, I took it as more of him empathizing with Rogue's experience of loss by saying he doesn't have many friends left. In retrospect, it also may have been more about establishing that Ruby isn't his girlfriend or wife, since, ya know, Rogue might wanna know that.
It took acouple watches to realise - when rogue pushed ruby out, her shoes stayed behind. We saw it in the teleport grid before she went. And the lone shoe earlier in the episode forshadowed it.I kept wondering how the trade woked! I? think the point is that if she had stepped bare foot onto the ground or fallen onto it there would have been no way to get her out. There was even a small close p on her shoes to clue us in.
Interestingly enough, RTD didn’t write this episode. But damn, the chemistry between the Doctor and Rogue was off the charts.
I really like Rogue. It’s nice to have a fun episode again after the two rather heavy ones previously. I know there are many times when we’ve seen one-off characters that said they’d return but it really feels like we’ll see Rogue again. And I really like the chemistry that Ncuti and Jonathan Groff have. It took me a rewatch to buy their romance. Whenever he’s fallen in love, it’s always been either with a companion or with a one-off character reluctantly. It's never so quick and so obvious. It took him forever to admit his feelings to Rose, River, and Yaz. That being said, I liked the chulders and that they just ended up maliciously playing. I love the _Caberet_ reference they make. I never believed for a second that Ruby was dead… again. At the rate she’s going, she’ll beat Rory’s record for deaths. And it was really funny in a really meta way to hear Kylie Minogue’s “Can’t Get You Out of My Head”. I almost wanted the Doctor to reference Astrid as a character directly.
I feel like that hug scene at the end shows real development in the Doctor's and Ruby's relationship when compared to, for example, the end of Boom. At the end of Boom, the Doctor very suddenly says "ok, done here, let's move on" and Ruby questions why so fast, but doesn't really push back very much. She almost just died, they watched other people actually die, and it was Ruby's first alien planet, and the Doctor takes (and gives Ruby) no time to process before moving on. Now, just a few episodes (but implied to be a longer amount of time and trips) later, Ruby understands the Doctor's character well enough---and feels like an equal partner enough---to push back, get the Doctor to pause and process. There's been a lot of discussion about the smaller episode count meaning we don't get to see the development of the Doctor's and Ruby's relationship as much, and while I largely agree with that, I think they've done a lot of good, subtle writing (especially small dialogue moments) that can show the growth of their relationship.
On a separate note, I get why you associate some of the Doctor's vengeful moments with 10, but I think other Doctors get plenty of similar moments. Eccleston lets Cassandra die in "The End of the Earth" when he could easily save her, and in "Dalek" he orders the last Dalek to kill itself. His whole arc over the season is becoming less vengeful because of Rose's influence so that, by the end of the season, although he builds a machine that can wipe out the Dalek fleet, he chooses not to use it at the last second.
Matt Smith has plenty of vengeful moments as well ("I want you to be known as Colonel Runaway, I want children to laugh at you when you walk down the street"). In his time stream, he makes a big deal about how John Hurt was himself when he didn't live up to the name "The Doctor", with the implication that this side of him is always part of him, under the surface, and it's a constant choice to hold it back and live up to the ideals he's chosen by naming himself "Doctor". This idea comes back with Capaldi in one of the most memorable vengeful Doctor moments for me ("the Doctor is no longer here, you're stuck with me!").
I cannot wait for this episode to cause as much if not more of a scandal among reactionaries as the Doctor and Rogue dancing together did in 1813. Time is a circle!
Also, silly as they were, I really like this episode's villains and sorta hope they return at some point? The idea of aliens killing and replacing people just so they can cosplay living their lives until they get *bored* is the perfect mix of fun and actually quite harrowing, and it feels like a deliberate parallel to the way the Doctor and his companions usually insert themselves into historical settings (since with historical settings they are almost always there for fun, at least in the modern show).
That is an interesting new villain category.
And not only was it two men dancing in 1813 but a Black man dancing with a White man. Then the Black man walks out on the White man. Scandalous!
@@HuntingViolets The idea of something killing you horribly just so it can steal your appearance and life for a little bit before it gets bored of being you and repeats the process with someone else it finds more interesting is so twisted. I mean we've had villains that kill for the fun of it before, but doing so as a demented sort of costume party and that's *it*, no grander motive? In a way it'd feel less evil if it was serving a larger plan.
@@mxrichardsonsneighbourhood5402 I do think on that front they were going for a more ahistorical Bridgerton style stance on race. You'll have noticed several of the other high society guests at the dance were also black, so I don't think that was necessarily the point the scene was trying to make.
@@swiftlymurmurs I think the justification is how stories are bleeding into reality.
I think the anachronistic music is another callback to bridgerton, which featured a lot of vitamin string quartet music
While I do agree that I don't think it's super believable that Ruby and Fifteen are best friends, I will maintain that the Doctor's freak out when he believes Ruby is dead works. Something that the Doctor has always taken seriously is his duty of care to his companions and the way the episode flashes to Fifteen's promise to Ruby's mother really cements how that is a major part of what is going on here. He is aware of how he has failed when he she supposedly dies and the hole it will leave in the lives of the people around her.
Interestingly enough, I think that the conversation between The Doctor and Ruby at the end of the episode makes them feel more like best friends to me. Between that, the brilliant dynamic between The Doctor and Rogue, the side story with Ruby and "Emily" (even if it kind of means nothing at the end), and the overall fun of it all, this has overtaken Boom as my favourite of the season so far.
Not Captn Jack , someone else said it perfectly, Jack is a top, Rogue is a bottom
IDK, Jack is a definitely a bottom when it comes to the Doctor tbf.
I dunno.... Rogue could be a switch
Rogue is like if Jack was an introvert.
@@Velociraptour If Jack was a brooding melancholic emo fella
Indira Varna returning for a new role in the franchise is more or less common. Freema Agyeman, Karen Gillian and Peter Capaldi come to mind. When Davies likes an actor he will reuse them if he can. The differene her is that Varma went from an important role in Torchwood to a guest one this episode.
Well she was a guest in Torchwood too.
Yes, although they immediately retconned Martha as Adeola's cousin (if they'd realized they wanted her sooner, they might have just had the first character survive). Capaldi in _Torchwood_ was a descendant of the Pompeii character, and the Doctor wonders quite a bit about why he receives this face when he becomes Twelve. Although Varma didn't play Suzie very long (I think) and she does look a little different now (especially when she's a birdwoman for a good percentage of the episode), so there's that.
Don't forget Eve Myles, who played a character in the Unquiet Dead (the Dickens ghosts episode) and then went on to be Gwen in Torchwood, though there is a brief comment on that in a later Doctor Who episode, I think Journey's End.
I've learned Peter Purvis played a comical American on Doctor Who in the exact same serial where he at the end was cast as Steven. This trope goes back decades. (I assume he spoke through his nose to indicate he was now American?)
For me it was extra funny that they made the D&D connection because it was ALREADY giving ME D&D vibes because of the owl people because I play an Owlin in my main D&D game so humanoid owls in historical cosplay was already giving me that vibe lol
I do like to think of the Doctor as mostly asexual (Tom Baker saying "you're a beautiful woman, probably" lives rent free in my head), but he's definitely had romances and flings before, and he has a granddaughter from the very second we meet him, so I don't think his sexuality is at all taboo or sacred ground or anything. Plus, the episode is very meta as a Bridgerton pastiche, so i assume the quickfire romance is as much of a genre obligation as a character moment
There is only one Doctor. The Doctor that aged Sutekh to death is the one that trapped the Family of Blood. The doctor who couldn't press the button to kill Ruby, couldn't activate the Delta Wave, The Moment or the Death Particle. It's the same Doctor that didn't erase the Daleks at their birth or kill Missy.
Well , it is a standard Doctor Who trope to split the Doctor and companion specifically to follow the A and B plots. Or in this case, two sides of the same plot.
Yeah, RTD has always done that.
It brought me to tears! I think I cried for at least half the episode. I wasn’t prepared for what it would be like to see a normalized queer romance in a fun frivolous story, & on a mainstream screen. We’re so used to only seeing our stories, even in campy comedies, with a sense of shame and heaviness & a looming threat from the human world. In the absence of that weight, I was overwhelmed by emotions-relief, joy, sadness, anger, hope… Somewhat ironically the un-seriousness of this episode is what made it so impactful.
Flirty doctor was amazing.
I first thought it was a situation where ALL the people at the party were playing roles as "Fake" characters. There are actually places where you pay to dress as people from another time period. (EXample: One group plays the Rich People and another group plays the Servants.)
Also I really thought for a minute they might actually kill Ruby Sunday off in this. Just because in 73 yards for a moment it made me think how before the TWIST it didn't matter about who Ruby's real family was and how it seemed important early in the season. But Regardless in THIS EPISODE I immediately after that Realized RUBY OUT SMARTED the Alien who was trying to be her. That the Doctor trapped Ruby not realizing she was stronger than he realized.
As someone who used to have a special interest in Argentine Tango, the musical easter egg that really got me was that the song played during Rogue and the Doctor’s dance is an instrumental version of Santa Maria (Del Buen Ayre) by Gotan Project!! I couldn’t believe it at first because that’s fairly obscure compared to the other songs used but it made me so happy ❤
Edit: I was mistaken on the song! It was actually a very famous tango song called Libertango, which has been performed by many different artists. I strongly believe that this is either the version by the string quartet group, Bond, or it’s a cover inspired by their arrangement.
My 1980s AD&D playing self wouldn't have got Cosplay, but he'd have got LARPing
The Doctor: We can't kill them, we'll just send them to a barren dimension so they can't hurt anyone.
Me: In a BARREN dimension? To do what? Slowly starve to death? Sounds like the Doctor's just killing them with extra steps. What is this American cartoon fate worse than death thing?
Yeah, I didn't really get that either.
I had practically the same conversation with my husband last night while watching this. That's just torture then death!
Reminded me a bit of Thirteen and the giant spider. :/
@@NicoleM_radiantbaby Yeah. :(
I know, would have rather had them locked down and signalled for a shadow proclamation ship to come pick them up?
Did they establish it could only stay on for a little while? Or just send them to a SP prison? I can buy it maybe that he can't be too precise because he's jury-rigging it but it does seem like death with extra steps.
I thought the Bridgerton style anachronistic racial harmony felt a bit strange after last week's episode, which finally acknowledged the uncomfortable persistence of racism. I do hope at some point they acknowledge that this Doctor will have some challenges when he travels to Earth's past.
Yeah, I thought that was odd too. I kept thinking it would come up at some point...but nope.
I'm not really sure this was the "real" past but more like a television _Bridgerton_ version (the racial harmonies were accompanied by anachronistic modern musical covers like in _Bridgerton)._ Kind of something that fits in this season's theme of the walls of reality being thin after the spilling of salt at the edge of the universe to invoke a superstition, causing magic and stories bleeding through. (The Toymaker is also boxed in salt.)
@@HuntingViolets That could be the case. If it was it wasn't apparent early on so it still felt odd. This Doctor is likely to have more adventures in the past, and by next season there will be another POC companion, so it will be interesting to see how it is handled.
Yeah, I noticed that too and it bugs me. Not because I have any problems with diversity, but I like historicals to be somewhat accurate, or to try hard to be. I've thought about this a lot actually and I think what bugs me is it kind of instils this outlandish notion that only European history is worthy of exploring. That somehow because it is well known in the west, we should only tell western cultural historical episodes, thus making the only way we have that and diversity, is to have anachronistic POC present. Instead what we should be asking for, nay, Demanding, is that Doctor WHO and other fiction tell more diverse stories from other parts of the world. Black Cultures Matter! Let's tell some pre-colonial stories! Let's visit the pasts of Africa, the Middle East, North and South America, Asia, and Oceana, before white people came and started screwing with them. Those stories aren't well known because people don't tell them. Be the change you want to see showrunners, and tell those stories before they are lost to time!
@@R_SENAL Yeah I'd love to see that. Doctor Who has the TARDIS translating foreign languages so there's no reason they can't travel to other parts of the world (they have before, but not enough... I get that it's a British show for primarily a British audience, but the audience is becoming more international). On another note, I'm a big supporter of more diversity and representation in movies and TV, but too often what happens is so called "color blind" diversity which can often sanitize the ugliness of the real world, which if it gives people the idea that these problems have been solved, can have some negative impacts. Even setting these stories in the past can be a problem if it suggests it's a thing of the past (an issue with the "Rosa Parks" episode, which also had the double problem of it being a British show which relegated these problems to America-- British people love to think they are less racist than Americans). Putting out that idea that it doesn't exist anymore can be a problem. People often forget that a lot of people thought racism was over when Obama was elected, and we're still reeling from that misconception today.
Tell me if I'm mistaken, but when the Doctor pulled Rogue's ring at the end of the episode I thought he was going to plug it into the TARDIS and ask it to psychically steer in order to find where Rogue was sent to, I remember him doing something similar with Clara, and then with Yaz and her grandma's watch - so is that not possible anymore or just a chibnall invention that RTD decided to ignore because it was too easy and we want to bring Jonathan Groff next season and not in the finale? or I was simply the only one that thought of it?
I had the same thought. Will be interesting to see what happens with it. With the introduction of more magical elements this season, I feel like there's even more precedent for the ring to draw them back together.
This Doctor has a bunch of new technology, but maybe in the TARDIS change could result in some getting lost, too?
RTD didn't watch the Chibnall era either. 😜Nah, he did, but he probably forgot. I did.
@@R_SENAL forgetting is very much a possibility and i wouldn't blame him, though it's a bit funny given this tardis feature was used in the first episode of rtd era
It's also weird how the Dr just abandoned Ruby this episode... Like as soon as he understood the threat he should have at least wondered where Ruby was but he seemed to just ignore her completely after meeting Rogue. Also, Ruby and the Dr seem less close on screen than the actors behave in real life.... I think the problem is that they've never had those "becoming friends" episodes that previous companions had so it feels rather forced and rushed this time around.
yeah it feels very much implied that all the "becoming friends" stuff happened between eps 1 and 2 (i get that they only had so many episodes but this was a bad decision)
What really got me excited in this episode was the dancing - it felt like a reference to Pride and Prejudice (2005), specifically the scene where Darcy and Lizzy dance and everyone around them briefly disappear in the face of their intense connection.
Rogue should have had the Doctor roll a saving throw versus death. Chekhov's polyhedrals were right there.
It just occured to me, RTD complained the Loki show copped out on claiming Loki was bi-sexual but not showing it. So he hired the writers of that and they did an episode where we see Gatwa confirmed to be gay. It was like a direct response to that Loki moment.
As much as it'd be easy to assume all doctors were pansexual, I sort of get the sense that 9 was bi, 10 was straight, 11 was straight, 12 was too old to care either way, 13 was gay, 14 was bi-sexual, 15 is gay. Just something about the way 13 never seemed attracted to men, even Captain Jack, while 12 was so non-flirty that I dont think it matters what his orientation was, 10 i cant remember if he flirted with men but definitely felt like a straight casanova type. Eccleston happily flirted with Rose and Jack. 11 hit on Clara and commented on her skirt but apart from s7 I would have said he was A-sexual but he makes kissing noises when they mention Melody Pond grows up to be River and River eventually marries him.
Its hard to say because RTD inherently makes the doctor more on the comfortably flirty-gay side and Moffat went from 'cant help but sexualise everyone' to 'capaldi is older and everything is platonic'. Whitaker and Yaz was so late in the story but that said Yaz is the only person she shows interest in AND she was pretty queer coded to begin with so im not chalking that up to that one event. I dont think its a coincidence that all 4 of RTD's doctors so far are more on the romantic side and Moffats women were more on the sexualised kickass side but I dont think Chibnalls own attitude or orientation had anything to do with how Whitaker was presented.
TL;DR The doctors orientation seems to change heavily based on the showrunner behind it, so its really difficult to be sure if the doctor has just been consistently pansexual when 4 out of 7 doctors were all written by RTD and 1 out of 7 seemed blatantly straight-horny if not asexual and joking about bunk beds being cool, and 2 out of 7 seem one-sidedly gay; i cant see Gatwas doctor being into women and I cant see Whitakers doctor being into men, and then 1 was so no-hugging no-kissing that it seems irrelevant. There's every possibility the doctors orientation changes each doctor between each, or some sides are just more emphasized.
Though Gatwa in The Giggle says he loved Rose, so maybe I'm just overthinking it and all doctors are indeed pansexual though some doctor personalities and attractions bring out one side more than the other.
I've always thought of them as Bi/Pan because that's easier than going through the whole thing you just wrote. I will say though, regardless to partner or wanna-be partner, it feels more in character for the Doctor to be pursued, not to be the pursuer, that feels wrong to me. It also bugs me that the Loki writers are doing this as if in answer to RTD's criticism, which for me at least, delegitimizes the character progression a bit because something out-of-universe is the incitement of it. They made a character for the Doctor to be with and tacked a story on top of it, instead of making a good story where the Doctor meets someone interesting.
Pre-RTD Doctors had queerness going on, too, though (some more than others -- definitely Two was probably the most queer with Jamie). Also, I know it's open to interpretation, but I DEFINITELY didn't see Twelve/Clara as platonic. But YMMV.
some of them were probably asexual. thats valid too
Maybe a niche take but I’ve always thought of the doctor as abrosexual and genderfluid. His gender identity matching the sex of whatever body he’s given, and his sexuality fluctuating along with his regenerations, just as an easy way to explain different writer interpretations I think.
I think the VAST majority of Doctors ( particularly Classic Who ) are aroace but that’s just my headcanon!
Dot and Bubble made me comfortable with people being swallowed alive and now, Rogue made me comfortable with bird people destroying the human race. For blood thirsty monsters, I thought the Chuldur were a lot of fun. They knew how to have a good time and I loved how unique each one's design was. Aesthetically, they're probably my new favorite aliens. I genuinely hope they become the next reoccurring villain species going into the future. Plus, there leader was played by Indira Varma.
The thing I appreciate most about the Chuldur is that they aren't just "copy+paste" designs, each one is based on a different bird, so they are easy to tell apart.
@@Tuaron Exactly. Plus, they're a lot more pleasant to look at, than Zygons. Also, the Chuldur might act as a backdoor, for introducing Frobisher, the shapeshifting Whifferdill, from the DWM, comic strip.
The classical versions of pop songs were a direct reference to Bridgerton. I only watched the first season, but they do that a lot in the show.
I'm not over the gaydar option on the screwdriver
Oh my god you're right 😂
I think what sold the Doctor/Rogue relationship for me was that The Doctor started the flirting. If it had been the other way around then my protective instincts towards The Doctor would have kicked in. This way round, I was happy The Doctor was having some fun. The fact that Fifteen has already been established as the flirty type helped, and I think it wouldn't have worked earlier in the season without the build up. For example, this romance had to come after his little tussle with Ruby over Ricky September; we needed to get to know this side of Fifteen's character first, and if the Ricky exchange had happened after Rogue then it would have felt callous.
I love the Timeless Child faces especially the Scream of the Shalka/Richard E. Grant appearance
I know right, if Richard actually got to show up on screen as the doctor I would lose it
@@nefariousgremlin7554 SAME!
Something I noticed an hour or so after watching - Rogue getting his nom-de-plum from a D&D class (implying he specifically likes playing Rogues) matches how he chose to stake out the party. Brooding quietly in a corner, observing without interacting. Which... Just matches a fairly stereotypical way rogues sometimes wind up getting played. Which... Is either a funny coincidence or an intentional tie-in to the 'cosplay' (closer to larp in what's going on, but whatever) theming of the episode, where everyone is cosplaying, sometimes cosplaying as someone cosplaying as themselves.
...Come to think of it, that entire episode wound up going fairly Twelfth Night in parts albeit without the gender fuckery going on in that play...
Interesting thing that came up in the Unleashed considering what you said about RTD not skirting around the issue of homosexuality on a big sci-fi show. This episode was written by Kate Herron and Briony Redman, and apparently, the queer romance angle was pitched by them rather than an element he specifically was asking for. Which is particularly interesting to me since RTD was critical of Loki S1, directed by Herron, for skirting around the edges when it came to sexuality (The way he said it sounded more critical of Disney for that to me than of Herron, or Loki generally, specifically to me - A frustration at streaming services generally that Loki just happened to wind up in the firing line of when he was asked about representation in media because of the fan and media response to a throwaway line of dialogue.)
This episode was a lot of fun and felt like a much needed breath of fresh air after how heavy the last two were. Though I do kinda feel like Rogue should have been around longer for the idea of the Doctor falling in love with him to really land. Like, I know the problem of "characters meet and then two or three scenes later they are lovers" is hardly *unique* to this episode of this show, but... it still felt a bit fast. Ncuti Gatwa and Jonathan Groff did have really good chemistry together on screen though, so that did help make it easier to accept despite how quick it went by, and I hope that, since the Doctor kept the ring at the end, that will stay as a permanent reminder of this episode. And, yeah, even if he said at the end that there was no possible way to find Rogue again... this episode feels like it could very easily get a sequel.
I totally agree. My very first thought after watching was finally, a simple episode that actually feels like good ol' NuWho! It wasn't anything groundbreaking, but it still had everything I could want from a good DW story - It was fun and camp, yet emotional at times; great setting, cool uncomplicated monsters, awesome character moments. I feel like I finally got a chance to actually get to know Ruby and 15 better as people, and see what they're actually like on a run-in-the-mill type of adventure. The Doctor felt more like the Doctor here than he did in many of the previous stories imo, and Ruby finally showed some real agency as a companion (she also did in 73 yards and Boom, but there she didn't really have a choice but to be separated from the Doctor; I liked that in this case, they just decided to split and she actually chose to do her own thing). I do wish it would have happened much earlier in the season, but better late then never I suppose lol :)
i do get what you mean about the Doctor and Ruby's relationship, I did feel the same when he called her his best friend.. But I did love their scene at the end, and the moments we did get with them together.
I also loved the chemistry between Ncuti and Jonathan Groff, and his character was really interesting (Yeah, similar to Captain Jack in many aspects, but I personally didn't mind it at all), so I hope he comes back in the future! But even if we don't get to see him again, it was a great choice of guest star and a very cool dynamic to watch unfold. And yeah, I loved your comment about them USING the homophobia of the era for their benefit, I totally felt that scene was really special while watching, and couldn't find a way to explain exactly why in words, so thank you.
I still have to think it over a bit more, but my initial take on first viewing alone, is to give this episode about an 8/10.
My only, very tiny gripe tbh, is how quickly the Doctor believed Ruby was actually gone. I mean, I liked Ruby's side of it, using the earring's previously established combat-mode and "cosplaying" was very clever on her part and I can totally believe that it worked. It was also well established that the creatures don't identify each other very quickly so I can even buy them not clocking her. However, personally, since all the other Chuldur were in bird-form, and she was supposedly the only one that wasn't, I immediately assumed that it was actually the real Ruby. When the Doctor ran off, I expected him to go search for her body, to want to verify that she's actually dead before he rains down hell on them.. But instead, he just went away to cry, which was a bit disappointing tbh. I'm not one of those people who has a problem with him crying in every episode, I think that's a nice character trait for 15; he's emotional and wears his heart(s) on his sleeve and that's cool. I just didn't like how quickly he accepted it without even checking - and even if he did believe it and just felt like crying, I don't get why he had to go off to another room to do so. I doubt he'd be the kind of person who cares about other people seeing him cry, not only cause it never bothered him before, but also just cause that's such a human male-ego type of trait that doesn't fit the Doctor imo, but oh well.
I've just been rewatching Torchwood, and the dance scene here is very similar to the Torchwood episode where Captain Jack gets transported back to 1941, and ends up meeting the guy he stole his name from, the *real* Captain Jack. The two of them have a dance together before Jack returns to present day Cardiff.
I’d love to see Rogue return, but I’ll need an explanation how he got transported to an alternate dimension with a bunch of killer bird people and still survived.
I’m not sure Vera doesn’t like mystery boxes as much as she’s tired of them in every single Doctor Who season.
Indira Varma (the leader of the bird-folk) popping up in all my favourite shows, reminding me that I am, in fact, bisexual.
I loved the string version of "Poker Face"! The only problem I have with that song is, because of Axis of Awesome, I mentally add "Come on Barbie, let's go party" to the chorus 🤣🤣
I hope they find Rogue again. He was a great character. I wonder if John Barrowman was younger if he'd have been brought in as Captain Jack.
Speaking of Jack, this episode felt a little like Torchwood: Captain Jack Harkness in how The Doctor and Rogue interacted.
I've been liking this season more than I expected.
yeah, i feel like this episode was written for jack harkness instead of the rogue, except they couldn't bring back john barrowman in light of what's happened
My spouse has a theory that the Rogue is pre 9th Doctor Jack Harkness (re-casting the character). I like that idea even if it probably isn't what is going on. I did notice at the end of this episode the Doctor did a salute, which was almost identical to the salutes Jack used to give. Either way, it was a brilliant episode!
Anytime the Doctor doesn't remember something I assume the Akaten god thing just slorped up the memories back in the 11th doctor's run
Even if I also don't see how Ruby is the doctor's best friend, I was kind of shocked with the fact that when Rogue dissappears, the Doctor was more interested and worried about him than Ruby, he was even the most troubbled one, when Ruby was a second away of dying.
I think that in the effort to sell the romance for this episode they neglected the heart of the series. I'm sure it's happened elsewhere, but at least in the best episodes of Who I never felt like the Doctor forgot about their companions and especially not once he knew people were getting murdered for a cute face.
The only moment that grated for me was the Doctor/Rogue kiss, it works from Rogues perspective as he knows what he's about to do, but for the Doctor, who's seeing is best friend in peril, it feels uncharacteristic in the moment.
The thing I loathed about this episode... is that I was reminded that the next episode will be the last of the series! Man, that seems crazy.
Are they doing a two-hour one next week?
@@HuntingViolets AFAIK it's one story in two parts. Yeah, it might give us 2 shows, but last episodic story
I don’t mean to joke about a serious issue, but ngl someone yelling “You Queers” while Ncuti & Jonathan Groff kiss in period costume is kind of a beautiful scenario 😂 Love the review Jessie
If Russel gets to hang around long enough .... we've seen the next River Song for the Doctor
Also the dance scene is very reminiscent of the to Torchwood "Captain Jack Harkness" episode.
I guess it depends on whether Jonathan Groff will be available for future stories, and whether the seasons are long enough to fit future Rogue stories in.
Those bird people where straight out of The Garden Of Earthly Delights by Bosch.
When Fifteen and Rogue were dancing, was that Grace Jones' "I've Seen That Face Before" arrangment in the background? I feel like no-one noticed this song among the others. I think it was but I'm not sure 😅
My current headcanon: the "other guy" that Rogue lost is Captain Jack Harkness.
With the D&D dice, and Rogue saying "they", it's likely more than one person
I was thinking that until the "them," because I thought Jack always identified as a he, and then the vague "they" seemed unnecessary, so I thought, nonbinary?
@@intrinsical I was thinking maybe nonbinary, but that could be.
@@HuntingViolets Due to personal experience I took "they" to me a thinly veiled cloak for "he" since in my mind they felt like they were sort of dancing around the confirmation that these were both queer characters but maybe I am projecting way too much lol. I guess if we see Rogue again we might get to find out!
@@HuntingViolets"They" can be used for people with a binary gender too. (That's kinda why non-binary people started to use it; because "they" works regardless of gender)
Dungeons and Dragons has been around since the late 1960s. It got really popular in the 1970s. Satanic Panic almost destroyed it in the 1980s, but it survived that right-wing side-show. While people did dress up, mostly Trekies and sometimes Star Wars fans, it wasn't called "Cosplay" until at least the late 1990s. That would be the difference. And to add some emphasis to this - because at my age I anticipate the arguments, there were costumes, mostly during Halloween, but the unifying nomenclature of "Cosplay" wasn't a thing in conventions of old. And it was women who made it a business and an integral feature that literally saved sci-fi/comic conventions. Yes, there was a brief moment when convention looked like they were about to die away, and Cosplay is an important factor of what saved it. And while LARPing was a thing for a minute, it was never thought of as cosplay. (Sometimes you kids are absolutely sure of things so one has to stress the actual history.) So yes, it is possible Rogue may know of a time of Dungeons and Dragons without knowing the culture around Cosplay. Like knowing a cordless phone without actually knowing a smartphone. Earth history is complicated to aliens.
As a point of order: D&D was first published in 1974, although there were proto-variants bouncing around in wargamer circles before that. But those weren't "Dungeons & Dragons", they were "Using Chainmail rules to resolve individual adventures."
Not understanding cosplay just gives us a time reference for when he might have been on Earth.Based on the clear colored dice, mid 80s to mid 90s.Though Rogue rather than Thief implies around 3rd edition. Hes from the 90s.
I'm glad RTD was willing to do with Rogue what Chris Chibnall was afraid to do with Yaz.
Human Nature and The Family of Blood if I remember correctly.
This episode made me laugh so much and broke my heart.... I'm not a Bridgerton person, but man... the spice! I found it so funny up until the end where Rogue broke my heart. I so hope he's coming back, even better if he one day becomes a companion, I'm so up for it!
The Cosplay thing, I think Rogue didn't knew about it so the Doctor could explain it for parts of the audience. It's stupid, but I give it a pass.
And yes, there were both Bad Guy and Pokerface in the background at the perfect moments! (Bad Guy during the first meeting of the Doctor and Rogue, and Pokerface when we saw how Ruby knocked out the birdy)
Shalka doctor is canon now, holy fuck
Terrific analysis. I adored this episode, and agree with both your criticisms and praise of it. I can't believe this season is almost finished. I feel like it should have gone on a bit longer - especially with Ncuti himself getting so little screentime in many of the episodes. He absolutely shines every single time he's on screen. Here's hoping next season gives him the opportunity to shine even more.
Boom subverted the mystery box plot armour trope as we saw the snow which gave the Doctor hope and then it stopped when she flatlined. So it didn't do anything to save her. It just rubbed in that Ruby was lost.
I agree 100% if this came out between 73 yards and Dot and Bubble I think the season pacing would have been a lot better. Really wish this season was 10 episodes instead of 8, but at least this shorter ep count will mean more consistent seasons moving forward
The budget for this episode's music rights must have been insane.
This episode was so much fun! Lots going on, but it felt more like a "traditional" episode of Doctor Who than what we've had lately, even with RTD going, "yep, gonna do the gay!" (I was waiting for that kiss all episode and it did not fail to deliver). I love all the new ways of storytelling we're seeing this season, showing all the things that Doctor Who can be, but there's something very comforting in the more "old school" straightforwardness of this episode. Rogue is a good addition to the Doctor's allies - I look forward to seeing him again - and a good way to handle a character type that is reminiscent of Jack Harkness, but without the baggage that having Jack in the episode would have brought. I'd completely forgotten the "battle mode" remark with the earrings, but I don't think we're meant to dwell on it. It made the reveal all the more special, particularly because the Doctor didn't think of that, either, and was genuinely shocked that Ruby was herself. I love that she mimicked the sharp neck movements to help sell her "disguise".
I think the series being so short definitely hurts it overall. I like this episode where it is, as a palette cleanser after "Dot and Bubble", but we did need another more episodic, light-hearted one earlier in the series, too, either right before or right after "73 Yards".
Spoilers...
I was afraid they would not deliver when they were interrupted at first!
Fortunately, they did.
But Rogue disappearing right afterwards was terrible!
Please, have him back somehow!
Watching this episode was really fun for me as a fan of bridgerton. I’m just glad that they used the actress who plays Queen Charlotte in Bridgerton in a different episode. If they used her in this one it would have thrown me for a loop.
Would not say the doctor is gay. The doctor can be any gender so I think it’s what and who they are attracted to. Sure they were in love with Rose, Madame DP, had an affair with Queen Elizabeth. So I think they just are attracted to people
While there are core elements of The Doctor that remain between (almost) all regenerations, there are many things that change, and new regenerations are framed to a degree as new people. I do not think that sexuality is one of the static elements, just like how gender isn't. This Doctor has repeatedly and exclusively been shown to be attracted to men, and I think that's because he's being deliberately written as gay.
Yeah, they're definitely bi or pan with some long centuries of ace mixed in when they couldn't give af
Rogue is like a combo of Captain Jack and River. subliminal messaging i picked up on even before their dance. thats a subtle but sweet twist to Whovians' fave characters💖
I agree that we could have used more episodes, but I think that maybe the ones we got could be in a better order
maybe: "Space babies"; "Boom"; "The Devil's Chord"; "73 Yards"; "Rogue"; "Dot and Bubble"
@@luzcastelo9839 Yea, the way we have the episodes now feels very disjointed
11:06
for me i was kind of worried and freaked out a bit at the prospect that Ruby might've gotten cosplay drained for a moment and that The Doctor messed up and hadn't saved her. i was kind of relieved when Ruby said she cosplayed out by switching the earrings to COMBAT MODE ⚔️🛡😆. made me chuckle with the poker face bit.
i could sort of recognize some of the music, but couldn't really do it as well without the aid of the captions.
Finally, a great Doctor centric episode this season.
This was the best new series episode. True writing, true acting, outstanding directing This is how Doctor Who should be. It felt very much like Doctor Who. I’m happy that camera wasn’t doing flips during dialogue scenes. I love Rogue and have an idea of who he is but I don’t want to ruin anything. Anyway, loved the review.
Seemed a very vanilla episode almost a filler the most exciting thing was Suzanne twist playing a portrait in the form of a painting
I’m sure it’s been mentioned, but you were thinking of Human Nature/Family Of Blood…which is funny, because the family in this episode reminded me of the group in that one.
Did anyone else spot _that face_?! I'm pretty sure it was meant to be Richard E Grant between One and Four when the holographic heads swirled around Fifteen, but I couldn't be certain. Justice for the Shalka Doctor! Was he with Division? Are we getting an in-person cameo later? Or is this some Great Intelligence, Valeyard, timey-wimey stuff? Or was it just something thrown in as a true easter egg for its own sake?
It is apparently the shalka doctor according to the doctor who wiki
WAIT!!! Does this mean that Rogue is "The One Who Waits"?!
I was nervous about the loss of captain Jack, but Rogue was a great stand in. Clearly a similar, but distinct character. I hope he comes back…
14:07 To be fair, considering the source material was a 7th Doctor story. It is definitely his characterisation projected onto 10. Which ended up being some of my favourite 10 era stories. It's strange how Doctor and Rogue almost paralleled the first story with Doctor and River Song. It would be interesting to see if they continue that dual narrative or if Rogue is a one and done character.
I thought for a minute we were going to get a Ruby/Emily kiss and was actually surprised when the transformation happened. I usually would have been more suspicious of that. (Although so far, her only dating/sex partners we've seen have been men.)
The Doctor: I don't even know his real name.
Turnabout is fair play.
It feels a little different with the Doctor having a romance -- even with Rose and River, to some extent, it was always skated by a little bit with seeming like a couple but kind of "are they/aren't they" and maybe "will they/won't they" in the air too. Rose's one big kiss with the Doctor was with TenToo (unless you count when she was Cassandra). And the one romance I wanted, I never quite got. (Which is neither of those.) So it was interesting they finally went there. [Edited to add: Oh, yeah, Mme. de Pompadour. I forgot that one. And Joan Redfern, but I don't count that, because that wasn't the Doctor, although that whole story had a lot of issues.] But Rogue and the Doctor will meet again, I believe. I understood his feelings for Rogue a lot more than either his or Ruby's being interested in Ricky September. Sorry, Ricky.
I kind of enjoy the idea that the Doctor can change sex and sexuality with different incarnations. Sometimes bi, sometimes ace, gay, het, demi, pan, anything I've forgotten. Male, female, nonbinary.
The dance reminded me a little of Louis and Lestat's dance in _Interview with the Vampire,_ since it was shocking for the room they were in.
(I may be forgetting if they ever really have before. I know he spent 24 years with River, so I assumed, but it wasn't onscreen.)
Not being willing to kill someone to save the world reminds me of season five _Buffy._ Again, probably not the only thing that comes to other people's minds.
Hello, Indira Varma aka Suzy.
Doctor, hug Ruby back!
Jack Harkness would have loved to meet this incarnation of the Doctor.
I wonder how _Bridgerton_ plays into this bleeding of fiction into reality.
Probably liked the previous two episodes better, but this was cool. Groundbreaking in some ways. Should expect more complaints about the Doctor tearing up, I guess.
Loved this one. Seeing the time period, and attire. Oh the Doctor, (was that outfit a nod to Pertwee? Because whos) and Ruby looked amazing in her ball gown. The fun music cues, love it. Especially the callback with Kylie, and "Can't get you out of my head" 🎵🎶
Rogue, fascinating character. And that moment. Wow.
Definitely someone we will see again.
That ring, has some significance
They actually mentioned Pertwee on Unleashed when discussing The Doctor's costume. When finding a jacket that worked for Ncuti they realised a nod to Pertwee in a deep wine, velvet jacket.
SPOILER ALERT
The Doctor grooving while activating Rogue's ship's stereo to play the Kylie Minogue song was, hands down, my favourite moment. Selling the quick romance to an audience was ultimately settled by the casting. Jonathan Groff was absolutely superb and yes, the chemistry between he and Ncuti Gatwa was palpable.
One thing still bothered me though, Rogue sacrifices himself. That's a big decision to make for someone he has only just met a few hours ago and that decision needed more substance to it. A bit more elaboration about Rogue's absent partner and friend could have tied that impulsive act to something, some kind of redemption for him, say, that act needed more motivation underwriting it. That said, it was a fun episode and I loved that there was a flirty, romantic element and there is the portend of Rogue's return in some future episode.
It's funny that both Astrid and that song are now in-universe together, but 10 never mentions she looks just like a singer he knows.
The chemistry felt forced to me, but I do agree with you that the sacrifice needed more behind it. The only things we know about Rogue are his job, he lost someone, and he likes the Doctor. More is needed to make his motivations more based.
Thx Jessie for your early reviews! I loved this one, watched it alone (the fam usually lags, I can’t!) and so nice to feel the shared vibe right away.
I was so so sad about this one tho, didn’t feel as fun rompy as it may have seemed. It’s a super tragic & beautiful love story to me! (Is that “of the time”? Maybe… Hell, I haven’t seen Bridgeton, my bad for sure)
Anyway, I adored this ep, up there with some of my old faves. May well watch again on my own - a sign of a great ep to me.
_Bridgerton_ is super anachronistic but can be fun.
@@HuntingViolets It does look fun, just didn’t get to it. May do now ;) Fan of the real study of history, bc I like facts & learning from it, but I still enjoy crazy anachronistic tales. I love Who historicals, usually silly & often hilarious :)
This episode was fantastic! I had so much fun with it. Johnathan Groff was great as Rogue, and he and Ncuti had such amazing chemistry with each other. And when The Doctor couldn't banish the aliens without losing Ruby, only for Rogue to finally kiss them and save her, I got emotional. This was definitely a wonderful episode.
I think I'm bothered by that Ruby doesn't have personality flaws, something that gives their relationship resistance. I think a part of seeing the companion and doctor relationship grow is when characters do little things to grow as humans. For me, I fell in love with Donna the moment she defends the ood, when she uses a characteristic about her that is generally played as annoying to become her strenght. During that episode, the interactions betwen her and the doctor is very up and down. They have some conflict, and their friendship feels more deep too me. Ruby and the Doctor do not really have disagrements that matter. Ruby doesn't question anyones, especially the doctors, intention or ask for accountability when things are done to her. The only episode that happens is in 73 yards. But in that episode when she does, she isn't recieving anything back, so you never get a conflict that resolves and gives a growth. And that lifetime was then erased. But Ruby and the Doctor only complement and lift eachother, they never have moments when they critique the other. They are just two perfect people with their perfect friendship.
I agree, but I'm honestly wondering if it's deliberate. There have been so many meta elements to the series so far, from the Doctor referencing diagetic music to the ongoing Susan Twist thing, to referencing other TV shows (Star Trek and Bridgerton). If the big bad of this series has something to do with stories and has been messing with the Doctor then it could make sense for Ruby to be their creation - the perfect companion to trap the Doctor, to fit in with the story.
RTD normally does characterization really well, and normally does include conflict and growth as you've said. He normally earns the 'she's my best friend' moments. I don't know, maybe it's a stretch, I think I'd enjoy a big rug-pull like that at some point.
@@peggy7744 that's such a Moffat thing to do xD
Thanks for saying this. I really like Ruby, but I'm also a little bothered by her having no flaws. I think she's meant to be a strong female character (in the good sense) but reads a bit like a 21st-century version of all "sweetness and light," like what makes her a strong female character is that she's flawless. That struck me in "73 Yards" because the level of ostracism she endures as someone who already has abandonment issues would have been extremely traumatic for most people and led to some maladaptive behaviors beyond being abstracted with her boyfriends. (For context, I'm writing a book that deals with ostracism trauma, and our society's failure to recognize ostracism as deeply harmful is a big social problem, which I felt that episode reinforced a bit, though it was mostly excellent.)
@@arwenspicer YES!
You can tell that they are still finding just how to write Gatwa's Doctor. Several moments in this episode, while he does fabulous in don't get me wrong, was totally in Capaldi-style. I can't wait until we finally find, from the writering side, a true Gatwa's voice, you know? He has so much potential, and you can feel him being able to hit a lot of phenomenal emotional moments that these scripts have not really let him get to yet... But again, it's a first season AND a Disney season, so it's expected to ease us into the darker moments.
It kinda bothered me that we didn't reference how Rogue had modern music from Earth on his ship... I suppose that he's a time traveler as well, but... eh? And why did they pick THAT EXACT ANGLE for the almost-kiss? It made Gatwa look cross-eyed and completely pulled me out of the scene.
I think part of the reason we don't jive with the relationship between The Doctor and Ruby, I think it is due to the episodes being out of order to what it was likely intended (plus missing more episodes). The episode with the Meastro really fit perfectly as the episode prior to this one (which if moved here it would explain the whole June 2024 reference, and the "first alien planet" in Boom). I agree it needs more, but I think it'd make more sense to that emotional moment.
That said, ehh, while I like the flirting, it felt rushed to me. I thought we were going to get Rogue betraying the Doctor, and in that case I was thinking the kiss was overdone. But once it turned out that he was going to sacrifice himself to replace Ruby, I feel the kiss was underdone. So, it basically didn't quite hit me right either way, I don't know.
We now know the final scene of series 15/1: The Doctor standing in the entrance of the TARDIS staring out into the void (we knew it was coming, but it's obvious now). It's all leading up to The Doctor being... alone. And likely, at least believing, it is all his fault. He fails... To Be Continued.
Doctor stepped in it again. I’m seeing a theme.
What's the count up to? Ruby had at least one.
Land mine, fairy ring, transport device. Ruby stepped on a butterfly. I didn’t count if it happened in the specials at all.
7:20 there's also a tango playing when rouge and the doctor are dancing and tango didn't even exist at that time
Rogue is basically a re-cast of Cap Jack since the revelations about Barrowmans onset proclivities of exposing himself to cast and crew, so he is now cast into the eather along with the actor who played Mickey.
I'm a big fan of Indira Varma! She was on Obi-Wan too, one of the reasons I actually liked it. Her first film role was with Naveen Andrews in "Kama Sutra: a Tale of Love" - an absolutely brutal romance/drama directed by Mira Nair.
I adore this episode! We needed a fun and lighthearted episode after the great heavy ep of last week.
I have rarely been a fan of romance on the Tardis simply because of the power (and age) imbalance. River I accepted because they began their flirting with her having all the knowledge about him and being in love without idolizing him.
I don't care when they do it.... the doctor needs to find Rogue again! That chemistry is my favorite "doctor's possible partner" I've seen. In all honesty (aside from Missy) this is the only character on the doctor's level that wouldn't seem like a power imbalance if they got together. I mean even Captain Jack had an idol worship of the doctor that I didn't get with Rogue. He seemed like someone who could effectively challenge the doctor.
I do have to admit everyone here was yelling "kiss him damn it" right before the kiss. Saying is was palpable is an understatement.
Edited to add: I know this is going to be obvious but I will bet money on the fact that the "boycott Doctor Who" and "Boycott Disney" crowd that will yell after this episode will be citing The Doctor and Rose Tyler and being the ultimate romance despite the age difference and power imbalance. I didn't truly hate the companion falls in love with the doctor eras but I know the reason why such a large audience loved The Doctor / Donna so much and unfairly cold to Clara.... we don't need anymore very young girls romantically involved.
Unfairly treated Martha too, although I think there are other reasons for that.
@@HuntingViolets Totally agree!
What I got out of the Doctor calling Ruby his best friend, was the fact that's supposed to be sad. The Doctor just said he lost everyone, so when Rogue calls out that he does still have a companion, the Doctor is establishing that 1. he has so few connections left that the one person he's been seen with is his best friend, and 2. he's not dating anyone.
Did anyone else get the feeling that Captain Jack is the one that Rogue was with? I got that feeling from him
It occurred to me.
The family of blood ending...chills.
Just wanted to say thank you for being part of my weekly Doctor Who routine, I always come straight to your review once I have done watching ❤