Notes on - Doctor Who - The Power of the Doctor

 

Power of the Doctor notes

The train tunnel is a cool effect

Pefectly serviceable setup train under attack – oh look it slowly yrevealed to be the cybermen

I could have lived without seeing the regenerating cxybermen again.  How does the train guy know the term regenerating in this context

Quick explanation for why they have to have an action sequence instead of materializing in the train

Yaz barely hesitates to follow the doctor

Dan has a date to get to

Surfing on a space train

I get why they’re setting up the time lord energy cybermen, but they were supposed to be all done and thewy were a one episode gimmick

Dan just got shot in the face

Nice job establishing that the hole in his facemask is freaking Dan out

We’re expecting the cargo to be ashad, right?

Yaz has some solid med skills and now Dan can pilot a space train.  But not well

The cargo is a little girl.  IOs that the very first Doctor Tecteune found?  Is this all going to loop?

Siberia 1916

We all know thanks to publicity photos that this is going to be the Master.  And they reveal right off he’s being Rasputin.  So was there never an actual Rasputin?  Was it always him?

Yay, Ace!

It’s strange seeing Ace as an adult.  Good on her for pushing on the painting.  She’s doing it very differently than she would have done at 16

Tegan’s in Romania.  How do they know each other?

Their introducing missing seismologists and missing paintings.  This feels like too many unrelated things

Russian doll – thematically tying back to the master in 1916. 

Why are they calling that a Russian doll?  It’s nothing like one

***”You don’t have to come back for me”

That’s so cold.  Dan’s exit is so abrupt.  And at the beginning of the episode like it’s just housekeeping

Nice that they remembered that his house is gone

She’s being really cold to Dan about the exit

Dan and Yaz really feel like friends

Hologram Dalek betraying its people on top of time lord cybermen – too much

Interesting distinction between saving the Kaled race and saving the Dalek race.  Odd that’s never come up before.

The Daleks are also about to invade Earth and he’s offering the Doctor a way to destroy them all.

Tenth planet – they’re beggin for Mondas comparisons and no one is saying it

They took the child to Earth 1916, where the Master is, but now there’s a 10^th planet back then

St. Petersburg 1916

He makes a good Rasputin

They mention a new moon in the sky

I wish I knew more about the Russian revolutions so that I got what parts of this dialog are resonant to that.  I know the Winter Palace had some significance

The new 10^th planet has organic life transformed into metal

The Master put a police box TARDIS on the 20^th planet to mock the Doctor

I don’t like this set.  Too busy

How does Yaz recognize an energy source on the monitor

They took the child to tie it into the planet as an energy source.

Oh, OK.  It’s not a child, it’s a big ropey energy thing hiding

Qurunx

SO how did it end up in that box on the train?

And now Kate from UNIT is calling for help from a totally unrelated plotline

This is too much

Doctor:  Have you any idea what’s going on in outer space in 1916 right now?

Kate:  Strangely enough, no.

It’s sweet how nervous Tegan and Ace are to see the Doctor again.  And a great choice that Tegan’s surprised because she’s young, not because she’s a woman

Ace:  That is a good look on you Professor

Tegan’s pissed that the Doctor never got back in touch

Yaz:  I’m Yaz.  The only one here that doesn’t really know what’s going on.

Tegan:  We used to be you, decades back.

Tegan, you did walk out on your own decision…

Why is Master/Rasputin in all of those paintings?

Oh right – Both Tegan and Ace met the Master

We should have been able to see what the Doctor was doing with the static

Naples

It’s sloppy that they don’t include the date on both title cards

So he kidnapped and shrunk the seismologists just for effect?

The Doctor even lists all the unrelated shit the Master is throwing out there.

So does the Master want her to run away or stay or what?  So muddy

OK, so they kind of address the muddiness

Sacha Dewan is really giving his all

There’s really no reason to bring back the Cyberium into this.  It just overcomplicates things

Vinder really has no place here.  Just shows up out of nowhere for no reason

He had a lovely ending with his love and child.  Why would he be here?

*** I guess you could say… mission partially successful? 

The Master’s shot about the Brigadier is cruel

Ace:  Last time I saw you, you were half cat.

I like that Ace is still calling her Professor

What’s the planet in 1916 even doing?

Tegan doesn’t feel like she feels like she belongs with UNIT

They answered the big Ace question, Books v. comics

Bolivia

All the data is contained in its casing.  Weirdly intimate

So the Daleks are behind the seismology, creating volcanos.  Did the master orchestrate that, or just tell the Doctor about it?

They’re really playing up Tegan’s abandonment issues

It was not a Russian doll until this reveal.  It’s stupid they kept calling it that

There’s no reason to bring back Ashad

He cloned Ashad, so the original is still dead.  You can clone broken metal shells now?

They put the Doctor in a Dalek to transport her.  Total ripoff of when the Angels did the exact same thing

The Master got the Daleks and the Cybermen to work together?

The Masters Dalek Plan.  That’s actually funny

Forced regeneration callback to The War Games

So the tenth planet is just there to provide the power to force a specific regeneration

Boney M!

There should be more history disco

What did she give Vinder again?

Why did Vinder even come here?  Plot conmvenience

I can of love the Boney M dance

It’s actually a really cool idea that the Master’s plan is to literally force the Doctor into becoming him.  Interesting, and on brand

So is the Master’s body dead at this point?  It can’t be the same consciousness in the Doctors next regeneration

The Master has always both wanted to be the Doctor and wanted the Doctor to be him.  This is a good concept

Ace’s jacket!

Ace:  Beyonce copied all my moves.

They’re using a lot of the shows iconography really well.

This is an interesting riff on the usual Doctor post regeneration

Funny mix of old doctor costumes

It’s not at all clear where these two planets are that the Master tricked into destroying one another.  They really needed a title card with made up planet name and year

He’s really trying to make this a celebration of his whole era.  Copy of eyelashes shot when Doc 13 wakes up in the land of previous regenerations

David Bradley!

Colin Baker!

Peter Davison!

Paul McGann!

Sylvester McCoy

8^th Doctor:  I don’t do robes

7^th Doctor:  There’s always one that has to be different.

I like this metaphorical land of passing out of your regeneration

Very Timewyrm Revelation

Holographic Doctor that responds appropriately for whatever companion it’s talking to.

What exactly does the nano receptor do now?

Oh, it allows them to see the Mega Doctor hologram.  That could have been a little clearer

Nice subtle way to establish that the hologram can be other Doctors

So the cybermen are wasting valuable plot time converting humans to an army like they always do.  Pointless

Tegan’s been married twice and has an adopted son

Kate and Tegan are quite nice together

It’s really nice to see Ace in the jacket again

Ace base jumping!

Ace in the TARDIS!  Great surprise rescue

It’s sad.  The Master does have a part that genuinely just wants to live the Doctor’s life and have friends

5^th Doctor:  You think you left and I never thought of you again.  I never forget any of you.  I remember everything.

Tegan:  Yeah?  Then what am I thinking seeing all these Cybermen.

5th Doctor: … Adric.

Peter Davison and Janet Fielding are absolutely wonderful together here

Nitro 9!

Syl and Sophie!  They’re so moving together here!

Ace:  So… We’re good?

7^th Doctor:  Oh, we’re more than good.  We’re ace.

This scene could not be better

Yay Graham!  Wish Ryan was here.  He must have been filming something else.

The Daleks and Cybermen are totally unnecessary in this

Ecuador

Indonesia

Iceland

Yay, Jo Martin!

Nice usage of the setup of the hologram!

And now we see why they had to bring back the regenerating cybermen back – to power the doctor’s de-regeneration

Master/Doctor:  Don’t let me go back to being me!

More Jo Martin!

Technobabble to clear up the cyberman conversion plot.  Pointless and stupid

Tegan’s stuff was wrapped up when she reconciled with Doc 5

Ace and Graham make a lovely team

It’s nice that Ace gets to use some Nitro 9, but this plot is still a waste of time

Now the Master’s Rasputin body is back up and running.  Maybe it did transfer his consciousness

This is a rip off of Journey’s End

Vinder’s really wasted in this

So they time jumped the whole cyber planet 106 years by combining TARDISes?  Technobabble

And because the cyber planet converted energy into metal it’s turning all the lava into steel.  It’s hard to care

So the Master’s body is failing because of the effort to try to become the Doctor and he had the energy thing hit her body out of spite

One last ice cream before dying is sweet

So we’re just never going to deal with thasmine

Dan got screwed here

This is a really sweet goodbye

Graham formed a Doc-Anon group for old companion cameos.  That’s fun

So there’s Graham, Yaz, Dan, Tegan, Mel, Jo, Ian, Ace

The Doctor: Right then.  Doctor whoever I’m about to be.  Tag.  You’re it.

Boo, David Tennant