Lux

You're listening to a podcast of spurious morality. Hello, and welcome to a podcast of spurious morality. I'm Johnston, and with me this week again, I have Mansell. Hello. Hello. And we're continuing to look at each new episode of Doctor Who on its week of release. This week is Lux, second episode of season... We're back to seasons, aren't we? Season two. And I... Straight off the bat, I liked this one. I thought it was a really good episode. I felt as though we were finally seeing

the Disney money on screen. You know, all of this, you know, the production budget is so much higher now and that sort of thing. This one was visually fantastic, which we will discuss a little bit more in a bit. But I thought it was just a nice sort of... Started off as a good old -fashioned Doctor Who mystery, Doctor and Companion land somewhere, there's something weird going on, let's investigate it. And it sort of turned into a, maybe, well, I suppose a spiritual sequel

to The Devil's Court, similar thing. Very, very similar villain, and it's all sort of building towards some kind of resolution with the Pantheon, I guess. Yeah, awful lot of fun, this one. Some really good performances. It looked great. And I really do like how the Doctor and Belinda work together. I do think they're a really good pairing. So your sort of general thoughts on the episode, Mansour, go ahead. Yeah, I like this one. And yeah, a lot of parallels with The Devil's Chord.

So when that clip came out ahead of time of them getting dressed and heading out in the TARDIS, it seemed a bit odd that Belinda would go from being so confrontational and questioning to just having fun. And there is still a bit of a gear shift, but I like the way that that was part of the episode, that they were having conversations right the way through about... coming to trust

him and that wasn't completely dropped. So yeah, really enjoying their dynamic and also the fact that Belinda's character has got some continuity and coherence from the last episode. Yeah, I quite liked how that uncertainty from Belinda continued through to this. It would be very easy to set something like that up and then... drop it and we never hear from it again. And, you know, stuff like that has happened in the past.

Remember when Rose was unhappy about Mickey joining the TARDIS at the end of school reunion and that seemed to never, ever go anywhere ever again. Well, there was a time jump with that, wasn't there? But yeah, like on screen, we didn't see that. Yeah, there just wasn't. In fact, there wasn't a time jump, was there? Because didn't Mickey say something about, oh, great, it's a spaceship at the start of Girl in the Fireplace? Oh, yeah, unless they've never landed on that.

Yeah, I think it's something like, oh, I'll get my spaceship on a first go or something like that. It's before Boomtown, isn't it? Like, their dynamic is, like, completely changed at that point. Yeah. The point being, you know, stuff like this does get introduced and then very swiftly dropped. Yeah. I think Nyssa and the destruction of Trachan as well, that seems to go away pretty damn quickly. So all this sort of thing. That

was a big thing. Around that same time, Tegan having her aunt horrifically killed and it not being mentioned that much, or Adra dying, you get an episode or two and then it's just forgotten. And despite Tegan wanting to go home... That part of it's never really mentioned again. It's literally just, no, I want to go to work. So yes, we've not got that, which is a good thing. It feels like this friendship is earned and being

developed and all that kind of thing. And I think it's kind of a little thing to want, but it's definitely something that I do want and something that I do think is working here. And the flip side is it didn't. sort of dominate the episode either. You know, it could very easily have gone on a bit too long, been a little bit too heavy -handed and all that kind of thing and kind of

got in the way of telling a story. But there's such a good story with such a good villain to be told here that I think we've actually got quite a good balance. So, yeah, it's really, really good to see these characters developing. There were a few little things in there that... Maybe we could have spent a bit more time on, but then we don't need the whole usual checklist

of new companion things. We had a new companion last season and we did, you know, in the last couple of years, we've explained regeneration, we've explained bigger on the inside, all of the usual, you know, this is psychic paper, this is the sonic screwdriver. That reintroducing the viewer to all these concepts while introducing

a new companion. We don't really need that. But at the same time, there was just a reference to by generation for, I feel as though it was more the audience's benefit than Belinda's because there was no real context given to Belinda. She probably walked away from that going, well, what the hell is he on about? But it makes his hand better and he glows a bit. So, okay, carry on. And I thought that was a little bit odd that he would have used up that reserve of energy

on his head. And maybe he was hiding how much pain he was in, but it didn't seem like the sort of critical injury that you would use that for. It's not quite having a hand chopped off, is it? No. But, you know, the rules between healing and regeneration energy have always been slightly... and by generation is a different thing. So I guess, yeah, I can let it slide. It's not harming

the episode for me. So, yeah, I think that while some little bits were a bit clumsy and maybe a bit rushed, I do like the dynamic between the Doctor and Belinda and I like where it's going. I like that she does trust him more now than she did last week. But it took an adventure to kind of get through that. I just hope things do develop like, you know, next week. I hope

there is something else. I hope there's something that makes her doubt the doctor a little bit more or makes her want to get home a bit more or just something to move it forward. It would be a real shame to have all of that fantastic

set up in Robot Revolution. low -key but still effective continuation in looks it would be a shame to just kind of go right the friends now and they're carrying on as normal and that's that um obviously getting a home is part of the the series storyline but i still want to see the actual characters developing and that kind of thing happening yeah and we've only got like a limited number of episodes to do that we've had two already there's six left and two of those

are going to be taken up with the finale where there's probably going to be a lot going on so yeah that's one of my hopes that in those four episodes in the middle is enough to fit in some good development with Belinda who like I really like how different the relationship is to Ruby's and it's sort of paralleling Rose and then Martha a little bit but I think it's more interesting than the relationship between the Tenth Doctor and Martha, where that was kind of just like

one note of it being a bit of an imbalanced relationship and the Doctor actually not treating her particularly well because he was just talking about Rose and focusing on Rose. We don't have any of that here with him going on about Ruby to Belinda. And I think... the Belinda and the 15th Doctor's relationship has got so many more layers to it, which is, like I said last week, one of my favourite bits of Robot Revolution, that scene at the end.

It's going to be interesting to see how Belinda and Ruby and the Doctor kind of, you know, we know that... all three characters are going to be together further on in the season. So it's going to be interesting to see how they kind of mesh, I guess. And I mean, I still don't quite know what's happening with Ruby. Is she coming back sort of working for unit now, Mel style going to be in a few episodes or is she kind of rejoining the TARDIS further along in this

series? Like it's all been a little bit, not inconsistent, but it's not been particularly, Any press releases, that kind of thing, haven't been particularly forthcoming. When Belinda was first announced, it was very much, we're going to have two companions in the TARDIS with the Doctor, which kind of implies that Ruby's travelling again. But she's not in the trailer all that much. And from what I can gather, she does just seem to be popping up with Unit. So I don't quite

know where that's going. I mean, given how much of a meal was made of them saying goodbye at the end of season one, I'd be really surprised if she's back travelling full -time for more than maybe an episode or two. Maybe what they mean is she is there for the finale or the last couple of episodes, in the same way that Mel was travelling with them at the end of season one. Or the same way that Martha came back in. Series 4. Yeah, Martha is what I assumed the

model would be. They're popping back and occasionally there might be a triple two that they come along on. I'd say it was just the wording of that press release, you know, the Doctor's going to have two companions travelling with him in the TARDIS. And it even said something like, for the first ever time, because all the fandom went, what are you on about? Like, okay, you know, I'm happy to... not count Amy and Rory. They're a married couple. I suppose if you squint, that doesn't

count. But we still had two companions in the TARDIS for Flux, and we had two companions in the TARDIS when Martha came back in Series 4. So, yeah, don't know. But if Ruby is sort of back travelling with them for the second half of the series or whatever, I do hope that... that there's still some sort of questioning and

conflict between the Doctor and Belinda. I hope it doesn't just all smooth out because Ruby's there now and they're just three best mates kind of thing because that's not how Belinda has been set up and it wouldn't be fair on the character to just kind of smooth everything over because we've got another friend there now as well. I guess. Yeah. And what the relationship between Ruby and Belinda might be like. Yes, that's what

it's worth. Because Ruby was always the sort of very enthusiastic, yes, I'd love to travel, really enjoying this. I mean, I still don't think her sort of exit was properly earned. I don't

think... It's just enough time to like... Because we had two seasons of Rose when she first left and that... had and two long seasons and ruby we had like one short season i think that was just a major factor like we just didn't have enough time to be invested enough to to to care when they split apart and and it wasn't like them being ripped apart by a dimensional wall it was she's spending some time with her family it's not like he's never going to see her again

Yeah, I kind of wish it had ended on a more I'm just dropping you off for a bit, I'll see you later kind of way. Because we knew she was coming back, we knew she was going to be in this second series even at the time. So yeah, I don't know. The way it was handled felt a bit funny and I hope that whatever we're getting with Ruby later on in this series is. Just sort of handled it

a little bit better. And, you know, if the end of the series is time for Ruby, Belinda, whoever to go, I hope it's a proper goodbye and not just a, oh, well, we found your mum, mystery solved, off you pop. We'll see. We'll see what happens. And, of course, Ruby's reappearance could tie in to Mrs. Flood quite well as well, because obviously, you know, Ruby knew Mrs. Flood lived. Was it next door, a few doors down, whatever from it, that kind of thing? Yeah, same street.

Yeah, so there's more to be done there, I think, more to be kind of picked up on. So, back to looks. This episode, the thing that struck me the most was how fantastic it looked. Like, it set out from the start to be... a very visual episode. It's an episode that deals with the God of Light from the Pantheon. So we've had the God of Music in The Devil's Call, the Maestro, and that. That was very, very music -focused. That was an episode that had to sound great,

and it did. But we don't necessarily equate how good an episode sounds with... The cost of that episode, the budget of that episode, and the one thing that I've seen mentioned a lot about looks is it finally feels like we're seeing that Disney money on the screen. And it certainly can't have been a cheap episode to produce. Not only do we have to recreate the 1950s, and it looked good. It looked very, very good. You know,

definitely. sort of in the vein of Back to the Future and that kind of thing, recreating that era. They did a good job. It was believable. But we've also got this sort of very visually impressive villain. I believe that Lux was actually animated, like hand -drawn, if what I've sort of read briefly on Instagram. It's true, if I've interpreted it correctly, they've sort of traditionally animated it and it's not just another CGI creation, which is brilliant, it's just what you'd want.

But we also had this fantastic sequence of the Doctor and Belinda being animated and we had sort of all the great stuff of them breaking through the screen. Yeah, it was a very visually impressive episode and I think it... I'm not sure it is fair to say this is the first time... that Disney money is believably being visible on the screen. I think maybe it's the best it's been showed off. Yeah, it's just sort of an interesting point. Is there anything you want to sort of

add to that at all? I mean, I agree it looked really good, but I felt like there were, like right from the Star Beast, I think there's been like just impressive visuals and like... really careful blending of physical and um cgi effects with like doing as much as i can practically and then enhancing it and um yeah so star beast um what else like the church on ruby rose like this there's yeah it didn't strike me like oh this is the first time you're seeing that you

know that disney money um but that it did stand out in terms of like just creatively what they were doing in this episode and the attention to detail again with the adding like little bits of grain to to mr reading and like the yeah just the the animation of that main character i think was really really good um and well i think the animation and also the vocal performance are the things that that made that work for me with

Alan Cummings. This whole Disney money needs to appear on screen thing from day one has kind of, I mean, I've not quite got it because at the end of the day, yeah, you know, on Disney +, there are some very, very visually fantastic and impressive series. You know, it cannot be denied that. A lot of the Marvel stuff looks very good. A lot of the Star Wars stuff looks

absolutely fantastic. But I think people are underestimating how much it actually takes to produce something that looks all right on screen now. I've seen sort of calls for, oh, Doctor Who needs to go back to its low budget. It's like, well, TV's not made like that anymore. There's no modern equivalent to making something look good on a shoestring like, I don't know, Planet of Evil or Talons or something like that. That just doesn't exist anymore. It's not a thing.

And we don't need... Go on. I was just going to say, it's sort of sitting... In the middle, you have these things like Star Wars and Marvel, and if my understanding is right, Doctor Who's budget is nowhere near those big franchises. So they are still relative to those biggest things that are out there, like getting less money, and they are still having to think about how to do things creatively and make the most of what they have. Yeah, absolutely. That's it,

though. Disney isn't just handing out the same amount of money to absolutely everything it produces. It's a well -known fact that Doctor Who has consistently made more money than anything else for the BBC pretty much since it came back. I can't think of anything off the top of my head that's ever

properly rivaled it in terms of revenue. you know maybe maybe top gear when clarks and hammond and may were still on it that kind of thing but like you know strictly come dancing eastenders top gear there's not going to be the amount of well maybe top gear has the international audience but you're not going to have as many like you know books dvds toys connected to those shows strictly has the stage shows i guess or the tours

and that kind of thing. I don't know. But Doctor Who's in a very unique position where it's very, very marketable. Every week there is something new that you can create merchandise from. I've just seen, literally before starting to record this podcast, a Mr. Dingling pin badge. And we're recording this on Monday. The episode first went out on Saturday. And it's not taken long for that to be available for pre -order. So there's the merchandise with Doctor Who's just insane.

You know, look at some of the figures and sets and that kind of thing that we've had. Like personally, I don't really go for them, collect them. But like you can get a Vord action figure, which

I still find completely insane. Having said that, there's something I've heard today, which is for the next year, there's very little that's been announced in terms of upcoming merchandise, like even less than last few years, which might be, again, part of that sort of theory that there is going to be a gap, or a bit of a lull at least. But the merchandise carried on. in the wilderness years. We had regular book ranges. We had audios towards the end of it. Big Finish isn't going

anywhere. We know they've got the license for another five years. Yeah, I don't know. Doctor Who does seem to make a lot of money, and it's still got to work within reason, though. It doesn't make as much money as the MCU or Star Wars. and therefore it's not going to have that level of money sunk into it. I do think that we couldn't have had looks done as well previously in any other era. Maybe that's the sign of the Disney

money on screen. I don't know. But, like, can you imagine them trying to produce looks in, I don't know, David Tennant's first? I think the animation is... Anything like that. I can see, like... Because there were period stories, I could see a version of it, but I think it's the animation that would be the weakest link if it was done in previous eras. I'm thinking something like the Lazarus experiment, for example. That's not an episode that's aged particularly

well. Nearly 20 years later, or 18 years later, it doesn't look particularly amazing. Whereas I think this will still look good in 15, 20 years' time. Which will be interesting to see. I think it will. Although, like Lazarus, I think Doctor Who, even going back into the classic series, has always been good with the setting for period stories, like costumes and sets and things. With the Lazarus experiment, it's when you have that monster on top of it that can be more challenging

to get right. I think that monster is just, it's there with the giant rat from Talons or the magma beast or, you know, anything else that always gets wheeled out as wide as Doctor Who look dreadful. I mean, it's not quite Mirka bad, but, you know, we're judging a 20 -year -old piece of CGI that did not have. this amount of cash spent on it, whereas Mr. Engeling did look fantastic. So it's,

yeah, it works. I like it. I'd like sort of the fact that, you know, we are, Doctor Who is achieving things visually that it hasn't been able to before, but I think it's doing it at a level that it can do and a level that it can sustain. I don't think it's going to fly off into. looking like Star Wars anytime soon and nor should it either.

Well the main thing is it's doing it it's making the most of what it has but still having some weirdness and creativity it's not just like creating the spectacle for the sake of it it's serving the story and it's doing it in interesting ways with an interesting performance behind it. Yeah and it's lots of things made looks work well. I think that just because of the concept and because of the idea, it had to be an episode that looked good just to start with. And it did

that. And just the fact that we had such a great performance from Alan Cumming, the fact that the Doctor and Belinda are such a brilliant team, the fact that it was able to push sort of crazy concepts like the Doctor and Belinda stepping out of a TV screen and meeting some Doctor Who fans who were... you know, wearing the Telos t -shirt and a scarf and all that sort of thing.

I think it was a really great way to just explore some of this sort of slightly bizarre meta stuff that, you know, has been part of the conversation for quite a while. You know, I know that this podcast we've discussed sort of the concept of Doctor Who as a TV programme in universe. I know that that's a theory that Mark's sort of championing quite a bit. we were obviously sort of bending reality and we have things like the Toymaker

and other Pantheon characters. And yeah, it just, we're able to explore concepts that Doctor Who hasn't really explored before. And that's, that's good. And if that's a budget thing, then fantastic. You know, let's, let's see what we can do that we couldn't previously with that. But also if it is just an ideas and concept thing, then let's keep playing with that as well. do it the best we can. It seems to be doing quite well at this point. So Lux was a Pantheon character, so we've

had quite a bit of the Pantheon now. Toymaker, Zootac, Maestro, and so on. I do wonder, are... are we still sort of aiming for Pantheon characters to be a big bad? Is there some kind of big leader behind the Pantheon, you know, a god of gods type thing? Is this going somewhere, or are we just going to use it as an excuse to get a load of reality -bending type characters in? I think

it has to be. Yeah, I don't know. It sort of doesn't quite feel like it's particularly going anywhere, and it feels like, as a concept, it's getting a bit cheaper every time it's used now, because, you know, the Toymaker was a really, really good choice of villain for the giggle. You know, we've known the Toymaker since Early Doctor, who was this sort of big, powerful, omnipotent, reality -bending character. And, you know, the Doctor had to beat the Toymaker at his own game.

as has always been established. But now we just seem to have lots of characters that can do weird, visually impressive things, but then be beaten at their own game because there's this set of rules. And ultimately, it's always going to sort of end the same way. I like the idea of the Doctors battling slightly higher -level villains than usual, but also it's slightly higher -level villains than usual that... do seem to be getting defeated

sort of easily. So, yeah, I just... I'm hoping this Pantheon thing doesn't drag on for too long because it's going to get fairly, save me fairly quickly, I think. I'm enjoying it, don't get me wrong, but I think it has a sell -by date.

That's the danger of having, like, threats that are built up so much and then... having to resolve that in 45 minutes and even in the two -part finale last year um it's going to have to be wrapped up in what risks seeming like too easy in a way like this week i liked the resolution and the way it all played out but um to an extent the doctor and blender didn't do loads to because If I'm following it right, Lux chose to go out into the open and that's what defeated them,

just being absorbed into the universe. So maybe the Doctor and Belinda hurried that process along by giving him the regeneration energy and letting him out. But I could see that playing out without them turning up, like Lux eventually finds his

way out of the cinema somehow. some other way and um and the same thing happens um but yeah it is a danger like the the talking about like the wilderness years books and the new adventures did a lot of stuff with gods and things like that what i liked about that and what which is like a lot easier to do when you've got the space of a series of like you know 50 60 novels um there were major consequences for for the Doctor, like moral compromises he had to make, losses

that he had that were kind of the result of deals made with cosmic entities. So maybe that's the thing, like however things get wrapped up at the end of this season, for there to be some consequence or some impact so it's not just all done and forgotten about. Yeah, and the Doctor does seem to be sort of bumping off a god every three weeks at the moment, and it feels fairly

consequence -free. I'm aware that the pantheon and all of these godlike characters appearing is a consequence of something the Doctor did in Wild Blue Yonder, or at least is hinted to be. But what actually are the consequences? Because... Well, more or less, everybody lived. I know the caretaker didn't in looks, but more or less everybody lived. You know, the giggle didn't have a high body count. Everybody more or less lived in. The Sutec two -parter. And I think the only real

victim of the maestro was June Hudson. So it's kind of... These don't feel like big... end -of -the -universe shattering threats, and they should do. It doesn't have to be a physical cost, because he wasn't fighting gods, but the way the Tenth Doctor ended up, there was the whole thing about the timeline of Victorious and the impact on his character of going too far and hubris and all of that, and there was the death in Waters

of Mars, which was really impactful. But there was an arc and an impact from his actions, even though he was winning and beating those monsters in individual episodes. So that would be something that it impacts on the Doctor or someone else in some really significant way. I think it would perhaps help to have a Pantheon -focused episode. not on Earth. I know part of the storyline here is that Earth has been destroyed, or at least has hinted to have been, but that's not going

to be a Doctor Who permadeath, is it? That's never going to stick. We've had the Earth be destroyed and come back quite a few times in

Doctor Who in the past. Whereas I would quite like to see one of these godlike pantheon characters actually have some kind of apocalyptic effect you know let's let's have them wipe out alien planet number 745 or whatever let's actually see the real damage that these characters can do because everything that we've seen them do so far more or less has been reversible on defeat and defeat has come fairly easily for all of them um so yeah i kind of want to see the actual

impact of these characters i want to see i know we've seen what would happen to earth if they just left the maestro to it for 30 years or whatever but that's that's not it's still not hammering home what these characters are capable of and i think to up the threat let's see them I don't know, Decimator, Androzani or something like that. You get the idea. Something that isn't going to be reversed, something that's going

to stick. Well, that was quite a big contrast with, like, we were talking about Marvel earlier, right? So in that CTEK two -party, you have everyone, like, dusted in a very similar way to half the population are in Marvel's Infinity War. And, yes, those people come back in... the next Marvel movie, but it's not consequence -free. Those people who had gone away had lost five years, and it's picked up to varying degrees in the

shows and movies that come on after that. Whereas in the Doctor Who finale last year, there are far fewer consequences or impacts. It's all just like reset, pretty much back to normal. So little things like that. And I know that that then has that impact on future storytelling because you have to remember those world -changing events that you set up. And Doctor Who kind of keeps going through patterns of rolling those things

back to reset back to normal. Is it season five or season six where the cracks were used as an explanation as to why people didn't remember

the Daleks or the Cybermen? bits like that Doctor Who doesn't seem to want to change the status quo of the real world which I guess is understandable but I think it would be interesting if they did play with that a bit more I think the other thing about Doctor Who is there's no there's no bible and there's no established what is canon type thing And therefore, you know, we can have... I mean, how many times has Gallifrey been destroyed in the expanded universe? You know, it's got

to be on TV. Is that two or three times? Well, TV's been a couple of times. I was reading something earlier, actually, that sort of said, like, this time round, it's difficult to believe that the Doctor's the last Time Lord. Like, was nobody not on Gallifrey when... when it was destroyed by the Master. Because Rassilon was sent off in hell -bent and all that. We have seen Time Lords leave Gallifrey. Doesn't he talk about Susan in ambiguous terms as well? I'm trying

to think back to last year. When he mentions her fleetingly, it's like he's unsure of where she is, not that she was back on Gallifrey and she died. Yeah. And there just doesn't seem to be any level of consistency to that. I mean, there's no consistency as to whether Gallifrey's destroyed or not, really, when you take the last 20 years into account. But, yeah, I don't buy that every single Time Lord was on Gallifrey

when the Master did what he did. The whole last Time Lord thing just doesn't quite feel as... as solid this time as it did when the Time War was what had destroyed it up to... I wonder if, you know, saying, like, it's a resolution going to be focused on the pantheon, the gods, I wonder if it's going to be bringing together things like Gallifrey, Susan, and this god stuff, like, you know, maybe the ultimate villain is some Time Lord god or gods. And maybe the real pantheon

was the friends we made along the way. There's so many little things, like the mentions of Susan, and we might get to the end of season two and go, okay, we've just been mentioning her a few times. But it feels like some of these things are set up or being mentioned just a couple of times too many to just be random lines. Yeah, the sort of rug pull with it not being Susan last series was a bit strange after how much

it had been signposted. It feels like that's something that needs to be continued and so far it's not really been, but we'll see. Again, this is ongoing. We are dealing with something that is very bit clearly being set up as a multi -series arc. This is at least a two -series arc and we

are. at the start of the second series still we're a quarter of the way into the second series when you consider the the episode can but you get my point yeah there's a fair bit left so i kind of am interested or excited about like these big concepts coming in at the end but then what we were saying earlier i don't want that to be to the detriment of just having like a solid character arc for belinda and her story and just telling something more self -contained.

I think that should be the priority. And then gods and universe ending events should be the sort of window dressing around that. Yeah, agreed. It should all be pieces that make up the puzzle and we shouldn't make just one piece bigger because it's the last week of the series or whatever.

Yeah. Okay, other sort of big point from this episode then was the, the kind of breaking of the fourth wall, the Doctor and Belinda crawling out of a TV and meeting three overly stereotypical Doctor Who fans, like I say, Scarf to watch the series and Telos T -shirt and all that kind of thing. And I liked this sequence. I thought this sequence worked well for a minute or two. it just felt like it went on a little bit too much. Like, it was a nice little cutaway gag, but it

then outstayed its welcome. And, you know, three, four, five minutes after meeting these characters, we get, oh, they're not real and they're going to die, and sort of the Doctor trying to force the message to us of us at home that it's all very sad and these people are an inadvertent creation of... everything that's been going on and uh and then of course at the end it turns out that they they were still there and still aware and um it was all a bit strange and again

feels like it it's another piece in a puzzle it feels like it's going somewhere um i think it would have worked as a standalone joke had it just sort of gone on for two minutes stopped and gone away but the whole about the actual existence of these characters and that kind of thing muddied things a little bit. I did like

the references. I liked the fact that they all thought blink was the best thing ever and the Doctor kind of turning around going, yeah, but what about the one with the goblins or the one where it was on the landmine? That was good and that was fun. That was a laugh and, you know, nice, nice nod to blink, which is still beloved. But yeah, I thought it was quite a good little sequence. I thought it was okay. I just thought

it outstayed its welcome. But the fact it outstays its welcome makes me think that maybe there's more to it and that we may get a bit more out of it, particularly with a series finale title like The Reality War. Yeah, I think that's something there. I was just thinking back to other times the show is done on TV. There's loads more in the extended universe, but on TV, there's stand -ins for fans. And it's never been quite as directly meta as this week. But there's stuff in Greatest

Show in the Galaxy with Wizkid. And then I think also like Love and Monsters, like that whole group of people in Linda. Well, there's a lot going on about stand -ins for fans with the Absorber off as well. There's them as well that are kind of interested in the Doctor, looking for the Doctor. For me, the three characters in Lux sort of fit in between in terms of how much I liked how they were done. The top for me is Love and Monsters and Elton Pope and everyone in Linda.

I think that's the most fun, interesting, engaging. example of like building a whole episode around that concept of fans of the doctor um but yeah i thought it was all right i've heard a lot about the outstanding the welcome thing and i can sort of see that that the biggest thing for me was the the the music and um that other people have said and i completely agree that it almost felt like parody like how how loud the music was getting

at the end. And it was really nice music and calling back to some of the best themes from previous seasons, which makes a lot of sense, again, with the whole meta nature of the scene. But it was so loud that it was like really sledgehammering home the message and the genuine emotion that they wanted to get across. And I thought, yeah, the mix could have just been taken down a little bit or there could have just been like a little less music. But yeah, the scene itself worked

for me. And I do agree with you that that end credits bit and combined with episode titles and the things that Mrs. Flood is dropping, it all makes me think that there is something that we're going to come back to with the land of fiction or the god of stories or something going on around reality. The walls of reality breaking down. I'm not sure exactly what, but something. I'd be very surprised if it doesn't link to Mrs. Flood breaking the fourth wall and that kind

of thing. Let's address this then. So obviously there's rumours, various news outlets and all this kind of thing about the show being cancelled. Doctor Who's been cancelled. This is the last ever series. We're getting this in a spin -off, and then that's it, done. And I've thought all along, this just sounds like something Russell T. Davis is keeping fairly quiet about, sort of fueling ever so slightly, just to get Doctor Who in the press. Like, it's free advertising,

isn't it? You know, Doctor Who might be being cancelled. It's definitely... It's going to get newspapers talking about it, and if you sort of... You know, subscribe to the belief that somebody talking about you is a good thing regardless of what they're saying. So I've thought about this all along. But now the series seems to directly be addressing the concept of its own cancellation, which makes me just think the whole thing is bobbins and it's all sort of very meta, handling

the press, that kind of thing. And if that's the case, I really, really like it. And it does play into the whole concept of reality wars. Doctor Who fans meeting the Doctor in episode and Mrs. Flood breaking the fourth wall. It all seems to be sort of very, very linked. And if this is what's going on, it's very, very clever. You know, I do like the idea of let's drop rumours of Doctor Who being cancelled so that the Mirror and the Sun or whatever report it. And actually

it's all just an in -universe. meta -y type storyline thing that's been going on anyway. Or maybe I'm just being really, really optimistic that Doctor Who is not being cancelled. I don't know. It could be some combination. Like maybe Russell T. Davis always knew that there would be a pause and that's just how the deal would work in terms of recommissioning. And it's just making a virtue of that. Maybe it is still uncertain, but he's playing off of that and weaving it into the actual

story of the show. Yeah, it could be either. And like you said, Doctor Who has done this sort of thing before. Love and Monsters and certainly the greatest show in the galaxy. I'll forever question the decision to have Wizkid wandering around going, oh, it's not as good as it used to be. Yeah, that's a bit of an own goal, that is. But, yeah, it's obviously all leading to something, and I can't help but think that this sort of real -world press scare, and it is just

a scare. At the end of the day, there's no actual conversation beyond, oh, well, we'll find out at the end of the series. And I'm actually starting to think that... The series is going to end with Mrs. Flood confirming Series 3 or something along those lines, you know. Oh, we'll be back at Christmas. It's already filmed, that sort of thing, you know. So it'll be very curious to see kind of what's going on. Maybe we won't get a series next year. Maybe that's what The War Between

the Land and Sea is for. It's to kind of fill

that gap. um i just i don't know it's all speculation at this point but it's good speculation and if if the series itself is playing on the concept of fan speculation then yeah let's go with it it's going to be a hell of a ride yeah i think it's interesting yeah either way like you say because like there are so many other shows that have done like an episode where you question whether where the characters start to question whether their reality is the real world or not,

like Buffy and Deep Space Nine and loads of other shows, I'm sure. But it's always been very self -contained, like there's either a definitive answer at the end or a bit of uncertainty, but then you move on and the series gets back to normal. So I like the concept of Doctor Who seeding

this. through and potentially picking it up at the end of a series that was like the original the series finale of deep space nine i think there was a concept of coming back to that idea that um that the captain sis the captain cisco was actually a 1950s sci -fi author and bringing that thread back in to have the final shot be him walking through the paramount lot and they They didn't go with that in the end, but I could see Doctor Who being brave or interesting enough

to do something weird like that at the end of the series. I say go down the Red Dwarf route and have it all be a video game. But again, Red Dwarf has done that a couple of times with Back to Earth, the video game one, but they've always walked it back in a very definitive way of like

it was. the dream squid or it was a VR game again I could see Doctor Who being the one where they're kind of brave enough to go oh it is just this or just leave it on an ambiguous note at the end yeah let it stick for a little bit at least yeah all very interesting and I hope that I hope that it continues to be interesting. I hope there's no cop out and I hope there's no press this big red button and you're not a TV series anymore, which there's certainly a danger of, but it's

going to be a hell of a journey regardless. And I'm enjoying this series so far. I think that it's ticked a lot of boxes for me already that maybe the last one didn't. I did not enjoy the last series. I just felt as though we were missing. certain types of story, certain types of character. And I feel as though we've pretty much got a lot of that in the first two weeks of this series.

It feels more confident as like the fact that we'll be getting into the arc in the first episode, that there's like a mission for getting Belinda

home. Yeah, it just feels like it's got the confidence to start running with things, which again would be like a massive parallel to... the classic series seasons 25 and 26 it's like just when that era was starting to find its voice and to tell some amazing stories it was it was cancelled so like worst case scenario we could be looking at something similar where it ends but it maybe ends on a high that's well regarded for decades afterwards which well I've said it many times

before We would never have had Rose if we didn't have survival. Despite there being the 16 -year gap, like, Rose is absolutely a continuation of where Doctor Who started to go with survival, like that type of story, that kind of domestic mystery setting type thing. And it's something that's served Doctor Who incredibly well since.

Lots of other novels, but I think... The novels you could trace back to survival as well, because they were picking up on the direction that, but the importance of the companion was going in and the character of the doctor. So yeah, I think you're right. Survival is, well, what was going on in series 25, 26 is like what set up the 2005 show. Definitely. Let's just hope that the reality war isn't this generation survival. We'll see. Well, that's probably a good point to leave it.

We'll come back next week and we'll talk about the next episode, which, if certain rumours, alleged leaks, so on, would leave you to believe, will be really, really good. Like, by all accounts, we're on for a good 'un this week. So we'll be back to talk about that. Roll it on. But for now, thanks very much for joining me, Mansour. It's been good to talk about another episode. Yep, thank you. And we will be back next week. Goodbye now.