Doctor Who - "Turn Left" (Part 1 of 3)

[iainjclark]

Not quite sure what to make of this one.

THE GOOD

It's a mostly well-executed tale of a road not taken, peppered with allusions to just about every major event in modern Who history and spiced up by the SF device of Rose's interventions and the Evil Space Beetle. For an RTD script it's surprisingly low key, the music isn't terrible, and generally speaking Catherine Tate does a reasonable job of suggesting an earlier, spikier Donna without losing the core of the current iteration of the character.

The sheer darkness of the alternate history of the Earth is remarkable, recalling last season's devastated Earth under the Master's dominion but in a far more gradual and realistic way. I don't quite believe the idea of concentration camps for immigrants but it's a strong image that wasn't hammered home TOO unsubtly.

THE BAD

It's almost entirely dispensable, almost entirely prelude, and serves only to convey a small nugget of data to the Doctor which, had Donna never encountered the Evil Space Beetle, would not have been possible. Dramatically the parallel history may be well-executed but it comes too quickly on the heels of Donna's alternate life in 'Forest of the Dead'.

THE UGLY

IIRC I thought the Titanic crashing would wipe out all life on Earth? Maybe Torchwood fixed that too. I'm sure this wasn't the only potential plot hole in the alternate worldbuilding.

More importantly, if Rose could simply splice the Bad Wolf words into history in that way, why was any of this necessary and why has she been shouting impotently on various TV screens all season? And when exactly did she do the splicing? Back when she was linked into the space-time vortex in Parting of the Ways? Mighty convenient. Also, why did it suddenly appear now instead of having always been there? There's no logic to this at all that I can see, just a cool idea and plenty of Russell T Davies' patent bluster. Also Murray Gold cranks the music up to "SEASON FINALE" mode at the end.

Edit: Also, if all it took to put history to rights was a road accident, why did it even have to be Donna who went back?

THE OTHER STUFF

I did still mostly enjoy this one, and with coalescent's recent poll in mind it probably rates as one of RTD's better episodes.

Despite the ending descending into Total Bollocks Overdrive (mainly through Rose helpfully having a Total Bollocks Overdrive machine and switching it on), it's a mostly well-realised and effective episode.

It's obviously the Doctor-lite episode of the season, but splitting this and last week's Donna-lite episode is a smart move that disguises what they're doing far more than in past seasons. It successfully reintroduces an older, more self-assured Rose and impresses upon us the seriousness of the threat about to descend. And of course we're now more clear than ever that Donna is IMPORTANT and also DOOMED. It also pays off the "there's something on your back" foreshadowing from the Pompeiian psychic.

And last but not least: Cloister Bell!

As for next week, we're gleefully shown every recurring or spin-off character ever to appear on the show. This can only get messy.

Comments

[williamjm.livejournal.com]

I don't quite believe the idea of concentration camps for immigrants

Why not? It is implied that future-Britain is under some sort of military dictatorship and I don't find it unbelievable that a sufficiently brutal dictatorship could resort to such measure - after all there are sadly far too many historical precedents.

[fba.livejournal.com]

Well - given that Mr Saxon didn't happen it is probably still Harriet Jones and as The Doctor says, you need to keep an eye on her.

[iainjclark.livejournal.com]

I never quite worked out what the time loop did and didn't wipe out in the season finale. In theory if the loop went back to the moment Saxon introduced the space balls, then he was already PM at that point. Very unclear unless I missed something.

As for the concentration camps, it's not that it couldn't happen, but it seemed a bit of a stretch from "we're overcrowded" to "we're gassing immigrants". Which I think is what was implied. The Detention Centres, sure, I could see that. But I never felt the ideological leap required to get from there to cold-blooded mass murder.

[fba.livejournal.com]

Well if the Doctor was dead he never went to Utpoia - so The Master died as Yanna with Chan'tho.

As someone else has pointed out - the big discontinuity is that the world should be over-run with Human-Daleks as The Doctor and Martha weren't there to stop them in New York.

[iainjclark.livejournal.com]

Maybe 1930's Torchwood stopped them. ;-)

[fba.livejournal.com]

Jack and the steampunk lesbians!

[snowking.livejournal.com]

Well, they wouldn't be able to invade New York what with not existing when the witch-aliens invaded via the Globe. Of course, they couldn't have done that because the volcano people from Pompeii conquered the Earth in 79AD.

I think we just have to assume someone dealt with it and personally I reckon it was Gandalf riding a T-Rex.

[iainjclark.livejournal.com]

I'd watch that show.

[snowking.livejournal.com]

The T-Rex is Grimlock!

[iainjclark.livejournal.com]

Gandalf on a T-Rex had real artistic integrity, but now it's just crass attempt to sell toys.

[tizzle-b.livejournal.com]

See; the whole thing is bobbins. If you're going to do this whole "how life would be without him" thing then do it properly.

[snowking.livejournal.com]

Wibbly wobbly timey wimey etc etc. Surely Ms Jones was totally Gordon Browned at the end of Christmas Invasion?

I don't think we're meant to assume they're immediately gassing everyone but it's really much fun in forced labour camps rather than, you know, ovens. It's like V For Vendetta! Except 10 Downing Street is already gone so that'll leave V a bit stumped.

[despotliz.livejournal.com]

I thought we were supposed to think they were gassing them, after Wilf's references to the last time this happened and talking about how we didn't really need the labour, etc.

(PS dino icon just for you!)

[snowking.livejournal.com]

Last time this happened[1] there were also camps where people were worked to death in addition to the extermination camps. I am sure Fascist England could totally find useful jobs for slave labourers to do. Troops to go take back Scotland, I guess.

[1] Well, it's not the last time since we're talking about WWII.

[snowking.livejournal.com]

(PS that is going to form part of my pitch for Gandalf 'n' Grimlock: Partners in Time.

[williamjm.livejournal.com]

I was thinking more "Children of Men" but yes, I think the labour camps weren't initially going for the full holocaust effect although they may have ended up there eventually.

[veggiesu.livejournal.com]

As others have said, I'm not sure the implication was that the "labour camps" were secretly full of gas chambers; but that they were a step down that path. Internment camps, might be a better way of putting it? I mean, we already imprison immigrants in "detention centres" now. And it is horribly believable... when trouble hits, we point the finger of blame at Them, where They are anyone who doesn't look, speak, act, believe or think like Us, even if we only suspect that to be true (which ties in with last week's hysteria on the bus). And of course, in this scenario, there's been plenty of trouble, the country is overcrowded and isolated.

Actually, the scene where they guy was saying goodbye, where he and Wilf clearly understood what the truth was whilst Donna was completely blind to it was my favourite of the episode.

[iainjclark.livejournal.com]

Yes, it's just that Bernard Cribben was so full of the horror of it happening again it semed a bit more certain than that. Like you I found this element of the episode to be very successful.

[tizzle-b.livejournal.com]

Actually, the scene where they guy was saying goodbye, where he and Wilf clearly understood what the truth was whilst Donna was completely blind to it was my favourite of the episode.

I thought that was off - much as I dislike her, Donna's not been painted as that stupid or naive so far and therefore why does it take SO LONG and so much SHOUTING before she (still) doesn't understand but runs around shouting her confusion?

[iainjclark.livejournal.com]

Like most people she doesn't think it could happen here.

She may be slightly too slow on the uptake but at the end of the scene though I assumed that she did understand what was going on - she may have been shouting "where are you taking them?" but the reason for her concern and panic was that she had realised what was happening and suspected where they were in fact being taken.

The bit of the episode that worked best for me was the slow spiral of future Britain into a wretched place. The bit that worked least well was the (lack of) logic at the end - but the rest was good enough on its own terms to overlook the stupidity at the end.