Skip to main content

Notes on - Doctor Who: Flux - Chapter One: The Halloween Apocalypse

 

The Halloween Apocalypse notes

Extended edition

Karvanista – we don’t get to see him at first to preserve the dog surprise

Very samurai inspired outline

He conveniently tells them it will be the final hours of planet earth but not that he isn’t causing it

Nitro 9 shout out.

I totally buy them taking a high gravity acrobatic class

This whole opening action sequence is fun, but the CGI feels a little off

Love them riding the broken bar like broomsticks

It looked like the TARDIS was on a raft, but it wouldn’t need to be, would it?

The relief release gag is funny

Liverpool 1820 – Williamson is having tunnels dug out.

What is Williamson creating?  Clearly he has a big plan

I bet Williamson is actually trying to do something good and just seems creepy because we don’t have context

Liverpool 2021 – cool Museum

We’re supposed to think he’s a guide, but he’s just super into the city’s history

I like that they don’t make any kind of deal about Di’s disability.  Even making her Dan’s romantic interest.  Good on them.

The TARDIS doesn’t want to go to Earth

Swarm reactivates the psychic connection with the Doctor just in time for her to watch him escape.  Is his escape why the Earth is about to be destroyed?  This all feels much more coincidental than it actually is.  He must know he’s about to escape based on opening the link for the doctor to watch

Burnished Rage battleground.

The guards work for Division – That’s who the Doctor worked for.

Cool effect for him exploding them with his mind

I love how asymmetrical the design for Swarm is

They’re really making Swarm feel like a proper big menace.

And now the TARDIS is bleeding black goo?

So what is the black goo that’s bleeding in?

They’re making Dan a little too carefully crafted/ideal.  Poor, volunteering at the food bank

Dan:  Wilma, who likes soup?  Really?

What black shape just went by?

That must have been Karvanista, right?  Or something as yet unexplained?

How has Dan gotten to this point?  He owns a home, so he was OK at some point

The Lupari

I love how not impressed Dan is by Karvanista

Does the mind control glove normally work on humans

The klittle nose wiggle

Karvanista: You defile the sacred legacy of my forebears!

Dan: You don’t look anything like four bears.

Cool little stasis cube

Klopp era?  I just don’t know the references for these jokes

Wait, did the Doctor head for Earth and they just happened to land right by Dan’s house?

Funny how they deduce he’s single.

Red must be a football thing

They’re really doing a nice bait and switch making us think the Lupari are invading

Why was he ahead of them?

It seems weird that Karvanista left the laptop, but they sort of explain it well enough later

Arctic Circle.  How would they have built that house and how do they ever get supplies?  Who are these people?

‘They’ promised this would never happen.  That has to be a warning from the Division, doesn’t it?  Probably not a great plan to ignore it.

I kind of like Karvanista

Dan:  I’m going to report you for kidnapping.  What do you think about that?

Karvanista:  Well, that’s what’s happening, so… fine.

They’re giving these two all the best banter lines

Very clever how they’re making all the ‘you’re mine’ stuff feel sinister when really he’s just explaining that Dan’s his pet

The Doctor is tracking down Karvanista to get info on the Division

LOVE the stuff with Claire.  It’s the same scene from Blink from the other perspective.

Claire is INSTANTLY likable. She should be the new companion

She describes herself as taking the long way home – Moffat reference

They don’t show very clearly the extra doors in odd places in the console room

What is Claire’s story?  I’m itching to know

Final adjustment means hit it with a mallet.   I wonder how long they’ve been off together since revolution

Yaz is much less inclined to let the doctor evade questions now that it’s just the two of them.  I like that.

Good on Yaz for refusing to be distracted by the Doctor evading the question

Temporal residue around K.’s ship.  That’s a clue

*** Too much out of the ordinary tonight.

And now Claire’s encountered a weeping angel after referencing their first episode several times

Subtle the way they use Claire’s muttering to herself to explain how the angels work on the off chance someone doesn’t know.

Nice that they’ve stripped back the gimmicks and returned the angels to factory settings

I really thought Claire would get away

Observation Outpost Rose.  Eye roll.

Officer Vinder.  It’s nice that even though he’s super bored he can still appreciate the beauty

Vinder:  In all other respects, I conclude this report with my usual sign-off request that you all go to Hell.

Is Vinder Human?  He can’t be if no time travel is involved with the Logopolis wave

It’s very like the antimatter wave in Crisis on Infinite Earths

Really nice cut to the wave crashing.  Reinforces the image of violence in the energy wave while underscoring the metaphor

How does Swarm travel?  Is he the wave, or did he trigger the wave, or what?

I bet that arctic circle dude was Division

Ooo, great twist reveal that the woman we thought was his victim was really his sister in hiding

Very Día De Los Muertos influence in the makeup

Leftover Hopper virus is a deep cut callback

Loving the constant exasperation dynamic with Yaz/Doctor

Really great timing on the reveal that the Lupari aren’t invading.

Yaz has gotten good at spotting booby traps

Formerly PC Khan.  She’s given up on her career?

Dan:  Hallamshire.  What, like Sheffield?

Yaz:  Why, what’s the matter with Sheffield?

Dan:  Too near Leeds.

The regional shade throwing is cute

Karvanista is the last Division operative alive?

‘Species Recall’

Lupari are species bonded to humanity.  I like that

Every Lupar has a designated human

Karvanista:  Just because we have to save them doesn’t mean I have to like them.  They’re infuriating.

The Flux is a hurricane ripping through the universe.  It basically is the wave of entropy from Logopolis

We’re assuming Swarm triggered the Flux, but did he?

Was Williamson building something in Liverpool that can stop this?

Where the Flux started is going to be relevant, they raised the question then dismissed it.

What caused the time distortion that jumped Karvanista ahead.

SO many direct quotes to past episodes .  Nice to meet you Dan, Run for your life!

What’s the significance of all the extra doors?

Did Dan really have a mate who had a TARDIS?

Thirty Trillion light years away

George C. Scott as a Sontaran

These Sontarans are a lot more like the initial Time Warrior model

What do the Sontarans imagine they’ll get out of the Flux

Dan:  What, is it alive?

Yaz:  No idea.  But they do chat.

Cloister bell – first heard in Logopolis.  Coincidence?

Really lovely shot of random aliens being destroyed with their world.  That’s a nice touch that they didn’t have to do

Swarm was apparently an old enemy of the Doctor in their Division days

Why is the Doctor leading the flux to Earth?

Poor Diane thinks she’s been stood up

Why did Swarm’s sister kidnap Diane?

We never did get asn answer for what the black goo was

The interlockling ships – very Guardians of the galaxy

So Earth is cocooned inside the armor made of ships/

Kind of cute nod to days passed – the vortex energy could have saved everything as a Deus ex machina, but then fizzled out

 

 

 

 

 

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Notes on - Doctor Who: Joy to the World

  Doctor Who – Joy to the World notes. The Queen’s Hotel – Manchester 1940 I quite like Basil and Mrs. Basil Why are we in WWII again? Basil: It’s the end of everything, you know. Everything we hold dear.   Democracy itself will fall. I hate Pumpkin Latte Aren’t those locked doors pretty much always just connecting rooms? Orient Express – Italy – 1962 Do a lot of people read Murder on the Orient Express on the Orient   Express?   Bit on the nose. OK, we’re opening with a montage of the Doctor bursting in on various time periods and places to offer them the same lukewarm toastie and pumpkin Latte.   That’s a pretty clever way to establish the concept of the hotel from the back door, as it were MOTOE is a much thicker book than that.   And she has handwritten pages Base camp – Everest 1953.   Is there only one base camp? Sandringham Hotel – London 2024.   So, time of airing then. I’m not loving Joy’s outfit Apparently the...

Notes on - Doctor Who: Wish World

  Wish World notes Pretty white horse Bavaria 1865. I wonder what’s special about that year? Very fairy tale atmosphere It’s the new Rani Frau Rani Herr Zufall. Seventh son of a seventh son. And his 7 th son was just born Do not hand your baby to this woman. If she hadn’t, would the Rani have had control over the baby’s powers? Bavaria is kind of the home of fairy tales They’re very much setting the atmosphere by associating this with the foundation of so many fairy tales. The 7 th sons, and the woodcutter, and the cottage in the forest and all that Good on you Violett How is the Rani magically turning women into violets? Cool effect though The Rani has always stood for the opposite of this magic stuff All of her transformations are fun to watch though. I like the ducks Does this track with the Rani we’ve always known? What’s the one very special wish. We totally expect the alarm to be stopped by Ruby, but it’s the Doctor in bed with Belinda??? ...

Notes on - American Gods: Tears of the Wrath-Bearing Tree

  Tears of the wrath bearing tree notes Eggs with two yolks always freak me out What’s with the boxer walking in and out? Bilquis needs to find ‘the other’ and convince him he isn’t alone? They’re really lening into the fluid in slow motion shots. OK, the wax forming the US was cool.   And a nice visual to introduce the concept of the exact center of the US So who is Shadow’s other?   Laura?   TB?   Wednesday?   We saw all three of them Shadow jiust claimed the ravens as his own. That was a pretty tenuous description for him to recognize Laura from, but then he did know she was headed to kill Wednesday ****   One shock at a time. He’s still Crispin Glover.   I thought he was only supposed to be in one episode this season.   I wonder what the real reason for the casting changes was How did he convince Laura to go the the Gods place? World very carefully told Laura that Shadow was there and then played every reverse psyc...