Revisiting Doctor Who - Series 2, Episode 5 - Rise of the Cybermen

Revisiting Doctor Who - Series 2, Episode 5 - Rise of the Cybermen

I'm really making a conscious effort here to shorten these reviews - you could get a full run-down of each episode at tardis.wikia after all. So, hopefully this will get you through a little bit quicker.

Crash landing on a parallel Earth with the TARDIS dead, The Doctor, Rose and Mickey seem to be stranded. It’s similar to their Earth, but with Zeppelins in the air, and another version of Rose’s dad, Pete, on an advert for a fruit drink. The Doctor warns her that she cannot get in touch with him no matter what. Whilst he and Mickey manage to find a power cell to charge in the TARDIS, however, Rose accidentally connects to a local phone network, and after viewing a video of John Lumic, the guy from the prologue, she looks up her father. She heads off to find him, whilst Mickey heads off in the opposite direction, as The Doctor tries to order them both to stay, but fails.

Meanwhile, it turns out that Pete is a lot more successful in this universe, living with Jackie and a dog called Rose in a huge house with posh cars and servants. He’s in contact with Lumic via an ear pieces that everyone appears to have, and Lumic is able to take over Jackie’s mind with some that he gifted her, learning security arrangements for her party that evening. Lumic also tells his assistant to go on a recruitment drive, which involves enticing a lot of people in to the back of a van, whereupon we hear a load of deathly screams. Someone who used to be on Byker Grove films this from nearby. Later, Pete meets the President of Great Britain at an airfield, boarding Lumic’s Zeppelin.

Rose and The Doctor are wandering through London when everyone stops moving following a mobile phone ringtone sounding, as they receive a daily download of news to their ear pieces. They all move on when the download is finished. As it turns out the update is administered by Cybus Industries, who own just about every company in Britain, including Pete’s, The Doctor can’t really turn down Rose anymore. Mickey, meanwhile, visits his ‘gran’, who has died on our Earth, though she thinks he’s called Ricky, as do the people who kidnap him and throw him in a van, which includes the guy from Byker Grove. Though they believe him to be Ricky, when they meet the real Ricky it immediately becomes obvious that they’re a little bit mistaken. After a brief scene where they strip Mickey down to look for bugs, the blonde lady of the group says that they’ve received confirmation of Lumic making a move by ‘Gemini’, and they make to intercept.

In the air, Lumic is explaining Cybermen to the President, who denies him permission to make this widespread, telling him that he isn’t God. Like all crazy dictator people, Lumic believes he will be prolonging humanity through the project, and doesn’t see the slightly dodgy evil part of the plan. He tells his assistant to begin the upgrades anyway.

The Doctor and Rose use the psychic paper to blag their way in to Jackie’s party as serving staff, where they mingle and look out for clues, though Rose finds it difficult when she sees Pete and Jackie. She has a brief conversation with Pete that turns awkward, whilst The Doctor finds a computer to search, seeing Lumic’s presentation to the President. The group that Mickey is with are outside, planning on making an entrance, when a bunch of Cybermen appear out of a van. Rose tries talking to Jackie, but learns that she isn’t anything like her own mum, when spotlights come on in the garden as the Cybermen approach. She finds The Doctor, who notes that ‘it’s happening again’. The Cybermen smash windows and break into the house, as Lumic addresses the President, calling them all ‘his children’. The Cybermen tell the guests that they will all become like them, with upgrading compulsory, and when the President refuses he is ‘deleted’, as are many of the guests. Jackie and her increasingly heaving bosom flee to the basement, whilst Rose and The Doctor flee outside along with Pete, but there are too many of them to escape, even with the help of Mickey, Ricky and Byker Grove. Though The Doctor surrenders, the Cybermen tell them that they are inferior stock, and as the episode ends we see them advancing towards our heroes, shouting ‘Delete! Delete! Delete!’...

So, the first appearance of the Cybermen in new-Who; how does it measure up? Well, not amazing, really. I really like seeing how they came into being, and they certainly seem very menacing at the end of the episode when they advance on The Doctor et al, but to me there's a sense of danger missing from the episode as a whole. I love alternative Earths, and it's great seeing Pete, Jackie and Ricky, as well as raising the question of how important they should be to Rose and Mickey, but even this doesn't make me that excited by the episode. It's hard to put my finger on exactly what the problem is, but at the end of the day I think I'm just not overcome with a desire to see it again. If I wasn't revisiting every episode, then I think I would have chosen to skip this one beforehand from previous memories, and that hasn't changed at all. There are some really good bits as ever though, highlighted below.

Aside from the conundrum of whether to interact with those you know in a parallel universe, I think the episodes highlight is Mickey. It's almost a given by now, but he really does leave me thinking 'poor Mickey' half the time, as he laments the fact that The Doctor will always choose Rose when they both decide they want to wander off to do things The Doctor doesn't want them to do. Noel Clarke has always given Mickey a very sympathetic trait, and it's highlighted brilliantly in that short sequence. David Tennant's reaction is equally as good, as he acknowledges Mickey's assertion that Rose will always come first with an almost apologetic stare that speaks volumes. We also learn a bit of Mickey's background, that his mother couldn't cope with looking after him and that his dad left shortly afterwards, leaving his gran to raise him, who died five years ago. The Doctor says how he never knew, and Rose points out that he never asks, which sums it all up. It's even more tragic when Mickey spots the dodgy carpet on her stairs that she tripped on in our universe, and he wells up as he realises he should have gotten it fixed. Mickey getting to tell The Doctor that it's London, not an endless void, that they've landed in is a great chance for him to be right for a change.

Kudos too to Noel Clarke for playing the complete opposite of Mickey as Ricky. I know that he can play the hardman from seeing him in films like Kidulthood, but it's great seeing the contrast here, showcasing his versatility as an actor. 

Billie Piper, too, is very strong with Rose's struggles at wanting to see her parents, even thought they aren't technically her parents. Her look of horror as she comes to realise this really is the case when Jackie shouts at her in a way she never expected is spot on. Also, I don't know why, but I loved watching Rose smile sweetly on the shoulder of The Doctor when he realised that they were going to have to talk to Pete after all - I think it's because it's exactly the sort of look a friend can give another that causes them to give in to a request, and it highlights Rose and The Doctor's friendship well. I'm also loving the fact that Pete and Jackie's dog is called Rose - Doctor Who does this sort of thing so well. It's brilliant when Rose and The Doctor discover this and The Doctor bursts out laughing.

The Doctor giving Rose an almost aggressive warning that this Pete isn't her Dad is classic-Tenth Doctor. You can feel the reason behind it, that he is genuinely concerned she'll end up getting hurt and that he wants to avoid it at all costs because of how much he cares. He can have a very urgent, almost pleading tone at times, and it's used to full effect here.

Sometimes it's the little moments that help to improve the viewing experience. There's a very nice bit of elaboration on the Time Lords history, as The Doctor says that universe-hopping was easy when the Time Lords were around, but when they died it all ceased. The Doctor's face shows how much the Time War still effects him, and though he now has much more freedom in many ways, he's more stifled in others.

There are a couple of bits of the episode that I just didn't get on with. I'm not loving at all the use of The Lion Sleeps Tonight as we see the first upgrades happening - reminds me too much of the stupid use of pop songs in The End of the World. Just a joke that doesn't work for me. Far too cheesy.

Also, Mr Crane, Lumic's assistant, could not be channelling Michael Caine any more if he tried. Either they're aiming for this (his name, Crane, being eerily similar to Caine) or the actor just genuinely sounds like that, but whatever the reason I can't see him without having that comparison in my head. 

Torchwood Mentions

The video on Rose's phone mentions the Torchwood Institute publishing a report on an unknown event or subject.

Pete asks someone called Stevie how things are going at Torchwood.

Overall

Whilst there's a sense of danger with the Cybermen, and the conundrum of whether parallel-universe versions of your loved ones should be sought out is well displayed, there's just something missing from this episode that means it could easily be skipped without any difficulty.

6/10

Revisiting Doctor Who - Series 2, Episode 4 - The Girl in the Fireplace

Revisiting Doctor Who - Series 2, Episode 4 - The Girl in the Fireplace

France. Some year. Some palace. Some clockwork creatures attacking people. And Madame de Pompadour, convinced that a man, the only she has ever loved, is coming to save them. She shouts into the fireplace, for the clock on the mantel is broken, and it is time, and his name is- Oh, it's The Doctor. Damn, how did I not see that coming?

Cue title sequence...

3000 years later, the TARDIS materialises on a spaceship. Mickey's excited, Rose is curious, and The Doctor is getting everything switched back on, though despite the engines being on full and generating enough power to punch a hole in the universe, they aren't moving. And there's also a roaring fireplace and 18th Century French mantel in a room off to one side, with a girl called Reinette on the other side, in Paris. She asks him what he is doing in her fireplace, which is a fair question really. A short story about a firecheck later, and he bids her farewell. Looks like they found that hole in the universe. The Doctor also finds a switch that rotates the entire wall and brings him into Reinette's room, months after their first meeting. He's a bit freaked out though - there's only one clock in the room, it's broken, and yet...something's ticking. Something the size of a man. Something that might be sort of hiding under her bed...Yep, it's a creepy clockwork man size ting in a creepy mask with a creepy wig that's been scanning Reinette's brain. Though apparently she's 'incomplete'. It tries to attack The Doctor, but he manages to activate the wall again and bring it back to the ship.

Here, he uses a futuristic fire extinguisher to freeze it, whipping off its wig and mask to reveal a clockwork brain inside a transparent shell. The Doctor loves this, of course, as it's beautiful. Before he can disassemble it though, it uses a short range teleport to vanish. The Doctor heads back to France, telling Mickey and Rose not to follow the alien, which naturally they ignore.

Back in France, Reinette has grown into the rather beautiful Sophia Myles. Ooh, something tells me he's a little bit smitten. She has a lot of questions and very little time, so to get things running quickly she kisses the hell out of him, leaving him dazed, confused and I'm guessing a bit turned on at the knowledge that he just snogged Madame de Pompadour. Returning to the ship to spread the good news, he finds Mickey and Rose missing, but also finds a horse, so it's swings and roundabouts really. The couple in question find a CCTV camera with a real eye, and a beating human heart seemingly powering it. The Doctor meanwhile ends up in the palace gardens, spying on Madame de Pompadour taking a walk with a friend.

On the ship, Mickey and Rose are still being monitored, when they come across some one-way windows, through which they can see the King of France. The Doctor joins them along with his horse, explaining and questioning why there are time windows from a 51st Century spaceship focusing on the life of one French aristocratic woman. When Reinette enters the room and is then left alone, the clockwork ticking begins again, and The Doctor, Rose and Mickey swivel the windows to come and save her with fire extinguishers. The Doctor questions it as to what their plans are, and it reveals that it is a repair both, telling him that the ship hasn't moved in over a year because they didn't have the parts. Remember the eye and heart? Well, they had to use the crew for parts in the end...They just require one more part, and that part particular part seems to belong to Reinette. Before it can answer any more questions, it teleports away. The Doctor sends Mickey and Rose to the ship to look for it, where they immediately get knocked out by more repair bots, and then he mind-melds with Reinette. Apparently there's something special about her though, because she does a bit of probing his mind as well, finding his lonely childhood and the way he's still lonely now. And then she tries to teach him how to dance, because that's an important part of stopping killer repair bots.

Mickey and Rose and being prepared for an operation to turn them into spaceship parts. Rose starts to tell them a tale of the myth of The Doctor, but he rather ruins that by bursting in on them all looking rather worse for wear with a drink in his hand and his tie around his head, singing loudly. Must be love. It does strange things to you. He rambles a bit, for a change, and then reveals that the aliens were scanning Reinette's brain for her 'mile-ometer' a.k.a. her age, because the ship is 37 years old, and they believe that when Reinette gets to that age then her brain will be compatible, as that is the last piece that they are missing. The Doctor disables all the repair bots, and they set about disabling the time windows, but they're unsuccessful because one of them is still around in Paris. All the aliens reactivate and teleport away, as the remaining repair bot has found her at age 37. Rose is sent to warn Reinette at age 32 that in five years they will come for her. She's not quite as good as The Doctor at explaining things, though she tried hard as he can't do it in person for some reason. Reinette laments that The Doctor can step from one window to the next in seconds, but she has to wait years. When Mickey tries to get Rose to hurry back, Reinette follows them onto the spaceship, hearing glimpses from her future. She returns, knowing that she must take the slow path.

Five year hence, the aliens are terrorising the inhabitants of the palace, telling Reinette that she is ready and preparing her for teleportation. The Doctor tries to find a way to reach her, whilst she tells the repair bots to get stuffed, which they ignore. Cue The Doctor arriving through a mirror on Arthur the horse, to save the day. And accidentally get stuck there for 3,000 years, judging by the wall that's appeared behind the mirror, with no way back to the ship. 

On the ship, as Mickey panics, Rose looks distraught. The repair bots have lost their link to the ship too, and shut down. The Doctor sacrificed the next 3,000 years of his life to save Madame de Pompadour's life, and dammit I think that's what they call love. The Doctor begins preparing for a life with Reinette, telling her that he isn't going anywhere, but she takes him to her bedroom to show him that she had the fireplace from her childhood room moved here in the hope that he would appear again from within it. He fixes it, returning to the ship (though she is crestfallen that he does so), telling her to pack a bag to go visit the stars, and that he will return in two minutes. Reuniting with Rose (who appears to have brought a green-eyed monster with her), he learns that he was gone five and a half hours from her point of view. He pops back to get Reinette, only to discover the devastating news that years have passed in those two minutes, and she has died. *wipes away tears* Oh God, her coffin is getting pulled away by horses *wipes tears again* SERIOUSLY, DOCTOR WHO, WHAT ARE YOU DOING TO ME?

He gets into the TARDIS, not telling Rose or Mickey what has just happened. Rose asks why they chose her, but The Doctor says they'll probably never know, and that corruption in the repair bots databases likely mean they just got her mixed up with someone else. Though he denies that anything is wrong when she asks, both she and Mickey know that something is up, and leave him in peace. Reading the letter that she left behind for him, where she begs him to hurry to see her one last time before she dies he-I CAN'T DO THIS ANY MORE, I'M A COMPLETE WRECK, JUST CUE THE CREDITS ALREADY - Oh, the ship was called the SS Madame de Pompadour, which explains why they were after her. 

NOPE, I'M STILL HAUNTED BY IT ALL, SOMEONE PASS THE TISSUES AGAIN

You can probably guess what I'm going to say about this episode. This is without doubt one of the best episode of Doctor Who, classic or new, if not of any British television programme, ever. It's an absolute tour de force on how to make an emotionally powerful piece of drama, framed with a science-fiction concept, with outstanding performances from the two lead characters, David Tennant and Sophia Myles. The story itself is a great one, with the aliens not really being baddies, just following their programming, and the science-fiction concepts of time travelling at different speeds, but it's the underlying love story between The Doctor and Reinette that is at its heart. 

God, what a heartbreaking moment when The Doctor manages to fix the fireplace and return to the ship, asking Reinette to wish him luck, only for her to say 'no' in a crestfallen voice, the look on his face turning from joy to shock when she does so. When he tells her that he will be back in two minutes and that she should pack a bag, only for the time difference to mean that she has died in his absence...well, it's astonishingly emotional television. David Tennant's face says it all. I honestly had to continuously wipe away tears during the whole sequence. It's stunning. It also sums up how The Doctor always ends up alone. This tragedy is the tragedy of his life as the last of the Time Lords. It's telling just how much this has affected him by the way he doesn't even mention it to Rose and Mickey. To not give a hint of what happened, not even to Rose, speaks volumes, though she knows something is up. Seriously, I can't praise this episode, particularly the emotional turmoil of the last ten minutes or so, highly enough. 

David Tennant is clearly in his stride now. He has the little quirks of the Tenth Doctor nailed down now, particularly the way he delivers certain types of lines ('it's just a routine...firecheck'), but he shows just how effective he is as the tortured soul, utterly captivating as the man who has just lost the woman he has fallen in love with, forever. There's some classic 'You are BEAUTIFUL' lines at the clockwork aliens from Tennant too, one of his trademarks. Sophia Myles is similarly stunning in her role, and a candidate for best guest star in an episode of Who. The chemistry between them is perfect, and there's never a doubt that she truly feels she has found love from the stars. 

Though they take a back seat, Billie Piper and Noel Clarke are still fantastic as Rose and Mickey. Rose is clearly jealous and a little hurt with The Doctor's obvious infatuation with Reinette, but Piper plays it so minimally with fleeting glances of sadness that really highlight just why she was so great as Rose. Mickey is still as funny as ever - I don't know why, but Mickey's line about 'Even French?!' when he learns that the TARDIS translates any language for you killed me. I think it's Noel Clarke's delivery, with such surprise behind it. I miss Noel Clarke and Mickey. Comedy gold at times. I loved Rose's exasperated cry of 'No, you're not keeping the horse' when The Doctor tells her to use it to find the repair bot, especially with The Doctor's reply of 'I let you keep Mickey!'. Even in this tragic story, Who still manages to weave comedy into it. 

Developing on the sadness at the heart of The Doctor post-Time War, Reinette sees into The Doctor's mind as well as him seeing into hers, and feels his lonely childhood, and how he still feels lonely even now. It's this sort of connection that makes their bond so strong, even after so fleeting a time together, and helps hammer home was beautiful a love story this really is. And she asked 'Doctor. Doctor who?' which makes us love her even more. 

Torchwood Mentions

None

Overall

One of the best episodes of New-Who, and an absolute emotional powerhouse. Stunning performances all round, and as memorable a final ten-minutes as you could ever hope to see. Absolutely breathtaking.

10/10