It takes a certain cheek to call an
episode “The Pilot” at the beginning of a programme's tenth, or
even thirty-sixth, season. It's a statement of intent: Steven Moffat
has called the episode a reboot, and while this is overstating it,
there's a clear design to make this a new starting point for the
series. To an extent, this works. We've got a new companion, who acts
as the viewpoint figure the series has been missing for some time,
through whose eyes we discover the elements of the programme. The
kids who started watching Christopher Eccleston and David Tennant are
grown-up now, and a new generation of children are starting to tune
in. Doctor Who has a sort of
soft-reboot built into its concept, with a continually changing
roster of companions and Doctors, and the occasional slate-clean is
good for its continuation.
On the
other hand, this is the last season for both Capaldi and Moffat. The
decision to make this a new starting point seems willfully perverse
with Chris Chibnall taking over as showrunner, and a new Doctor
joining at the same time. While there are callbacks a-plenty in this
episode, it works reasonably well as something standalone. On the
other hand, during the upcoming series, we have Ice Warriors,
retro-Cybermen and two versions of the Master to look forward to. All
wonderful fun, but hardly a fresh start.
There
were several attempts to bring back Doctor Who in
the long gap between the TV movie and “Rose,” and more than one
of them had the Doctor grounded, living and working as a professor in
some dusty old college. (Usually, they were proposed with an eye to
having an older Tom Baker return to the role, and Moffat's already
done that.) It's a perfect set-up for an introduction to the
character, putting him in a position of authority but also making him
interesting, a little distant, and with plenty of opportunities to
impress. It's a nice touch making Bill, not a student who's impressed
him with her intellect, but another outsider who's impressed him with
her enthusiasm (and also recognising that not everyone can afford to
go to university).
I
wasn't keen on Bill based on her brief appearances in trailers and so
on. She just came across as gobby and a bit dense. It goes to show
how poorly done those trailers were. Pearl Mackie is extremely
likeable as Bill, and by the episode's end I was thoroughly sold on
her. Bill is, admittedly, a bit of a re-run of Rose (with a touch of
eighties Ace thrown in), but she's different enough to make an
impression herself. It's gratifiying to have a character who's genre
savvy, not only pointing out the obvious sci-fi-ness of everything
that's going on around her, but immediately rationalising everything
as a clever effect. After all, a clever knock-through is a much more
logical explanation than a dimensionally transcendental timeship.
Also, although everyone has made way too big a deal of it, it's great
to have a companion who's happily, uncomplicatedly gay. Plus having
an actor of colour, playing someone in foster care... there are lots
of different ways to live a life in Britain today. I didn't care much
for Bill's jokes about models and fat women; those were low shots.
I'm
also now completely sold on Nardole. He works perfectly as an
assistant and valet to the Doctor. He exists as a sort-of cushion
between the Doctor and the outside world, easing his interactions.
It's looks like they've been good for one another, with the Doctor's
hardened exterior softening and Nardole becoming more Doctorish (his
explanation of the TARDIS' nature is cribbed almost exactly from the
fourth Doctor's explanation in The Robots of Death).
The
alien threat for the episode is a clever one, albeit highly
derivative (we've seen living water in “The Waters of Mars,” a
mimic in “Midnight” and a ship in need of someone with wanderlust
to become its pilot in “The Lodger”). It's an arresting visual
and a witty but easy-to-grasp concept, and leads to a clever,
non-violent resolution. It drives me mad that both Bill and the
Doctor take an age to realise what's wrong with the reflection. I
understand that the script can only move as fast as the slowest
member in the audience, but Bill's meant to be intelligent and the
Doctor's a genius. It's infuriating.
The
problem with being sic-fi savvy, of course, is expecting storylines
to go a certain way. I was convinced that Heather (a lovely
performance from Stephanie Hyam) was going to be an alien of some
kind, just as Bill was convinced that the star in her eye was
evidence of an alien possession. In the event, she was an ordinary
girl, until she fell victim to the sinister puddle (and why would you
want to get a “defect” like that fixed? It looks amazing!) We
were also forewarned that the Daleks were going to appear in this
episode, so naturally I spent much of the episode wondering how they
were involved with the whole thing. I assumed that the spacecraft
that left the oil and scorch marks was of Dalek origin (the last time
we saw a landing pattern like that was in Remembrance of
the Daleks). As it happens, the
Daleks were nothing but a brief sideshow, presumably only included so
as to incorporate the little scene from over a year ago that
introduced Bill. Quite why the Doctor thinks it's a good idea to hide
out in the midst of a Dalek assault isn't clear, but it's a fun aside
and drops that last essential element of the series into the episode.
“The
Pilot” is the best opening episode for quite some time, probably
since “The Eleventh Hour” way back in 2010, which remains one of
the best episodes in the revived series. As much as I enjoyed much of
the last season, the series needs a shot in the arm, and maybe a new
companion was just what it's been waiting for. I am optimistic for
the remainder of Capaldi and Moffat's last run. We shall see what is
kept within the Vault, and why it's important enough to keep the
Doctor grounded for fifty years, although I hope it doesn't override
the individual episodes' stories.
Title
Tattle: “The
Pilot,” although clever, is the most generic possible title for an
episode. There must be a thousand American series that have begun
with an episode called “Pilot,” even when they're not actually
pilot episodes. It is, however, a better name than the working title
“A Star in her Eye.”
Links:
The
Daleks are seen battling the Movellans, a race of androids we saw in
1979's Destiny of
the Daleks.
By this stage, the two armies had become locked in stalemate due to
their logical natures (it was suggested that the Daleks were, at this
point in their history, entirely mechanical). It's a cute little
aside for fans, and in no way intrusive for normal people. They just
look like fun disco aliens. The Doctor states that they've gone into
the past here, although that probably means from the perspective of
their previous stop-off, 23 million years in the future.
Among
the many little callbacks in the Doctor's study are photographs of
two of the most important women in his life: his late wife River, and
his (presumably late) granddaughter Susan. Capaldi has made no secret
of his desire to see Susan return to the series, so perhaps this is
foreshadowing of her eventual arrival later in the season.
The
Doctor's moonlighting as a lecturer calls back to his old friend
Professor Chronotis, a Time Lord from the previous generation who
retired to live as a don at Cambridge. This was in Douglas Adams's
notoriously unfinished serial Shada,
many elements of which he reworked for his Dirk Gently books. He also
pitched a story which would have seen the Doctor retire from
adventuring and settle down on Earth, possibly as a tutor. (Adams
also wrote Destiny
of the Daleks.
Any Hitchhikers
references
I didn't spot?)
The
Doctor again tries to wipe his friend's memory, and again gets
shouted down. It's good to see that Moffat clearly thinks that this
is pretty unconscionable behaviour on his part. It calls back to the
end of the previous season, where he intended to erase Clara's memory
of him, only to get the tables turned. This was almost two years ago
now and the missus had completely forgotten about it. This is the
difference between people who watch things normally and people like
me.
Best
line: “No
one's from space. I'm from a planet, like everyone else.”
I've
been shouting this at sci-fi shows for years.
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