Jodie Whitaker’s Doctor’s era comes to a close. Simon and Eugene begin a two-part discussion of the fall of the Thirteenth.
Episode Synopsis
The enhanced Time Lord Cybermen are attacking a train in space carrying some very special cargo, a small child. The Doctor, Yaz, and Dan do some derring do and rescue the train, but fail to stop the Cybermen from taking the child.
In 2022, Tegan and Ace are now working for UNIT. Ace is investigating some “missing” paintings, while Tegan is investigating missing seismologists. Tegan reports to Ace that she found a present from the Doctor. A Russian nesting doll with a miniature Cyberman doll inside.
Returning Dan to Earth in time for his date, Dan says, “don’t bother to pick me up. Bye.” And then there was but one companion. While Yaz says bye to Dan, a Dalek appears in the TARDIS asking for help and offering a way to destroy the Daleks.
In 1916 Russia we learn that a mysterious second moon has arrived at Earth, that the Master is actually Rasputin, and that he has hypnotized the Czar and Czarina to do his bidding.
The TARDIS has traced the missing child back to that very same “moon” which is actually a cyber-planet, with another TARDIS on it, and the child isn’t really a child, it’s a Qurunx, which is just an energy McGuffin powering the cyber planet. The Cybermen arrive and the Doctor and Yaz escape back to the TARDIS just in time for Kate Stewart from UNIT to call the Doctor back to Earth for an emergency.
The Doctor is not happy at being called in for a few missing paintings and seismologists, is uncomfortable meeting Tegan and Ace, and Yaz is shocked to learn that she’s neither the first nor the last of the Doctor’s special friends. The Doctor’s interest is piqued when she learns that the paintings had all been defaced with the face of the Mad Monk himself, Rasputin, and… it turns out Rasputin looks a lot less like the Fourth Doctor and a whole lot more like the Master. Cybermen, Daleks, the master… it can’t all be a coincidence, can it?
The Master delivers a message. He’s holding a seismologists’ convention near Mt. Vesuvius. They’ve all been killed in signature Master fashion, of course, and, after warning the Doctor that today is the day I erase you from existence, they take him prisoner and return him to UNIT HQ for imprisonment.
Meanwhile, Vinder is also looking for the Qurunx and crashes on the cyber-planet.
Ace and Tegan stay at UNIT HQ the help monitor the Master while The Doctor and Yaz go to a volcano in Bolivia to meet with the turncoat Dalek. The turncoat is legit, but unfortunately, the Daleks were onto him and used him to capture the Doctor. Yaz escapes in the TARDIS.
At UNIT, the doll left behind for Tegan turns out to have been from the Master, not the Doctor, and it is a compressed vehicle for a Cyberman assault force, led by a clone of Assad. Assad rescues the Master while the Cybermen capture UNIT and start converting the soldiers. Kate makes plans for Tegan and Ace to escape the building.
In 1916 St. Petersburg, the Master reveals that he’s teamed up with both the Cybermen and the Daleks to defeat the Doctor, and now he’s going to force her to regenerate into him, or he’s going to regenerate into her. It really makes no difference what’s happening at this point, it’s all just words on a page.
Anyhoo, the TARDIS has managed to trace the Doctor and Yaz arrives just in time to see the Master be regenerated into the Doctor. The Master appears to die, and the Doctor has become the Master and the Master says he’s the Doctor, but, of course, he’s really just still the Master in ill-fitting clothing.
Heading off is “his” TARDIS, he takes Yaz along as a companion, and he demonstrates his brilliant plan. As “the Doctor” he’s going to cause lots of mischief and death and ruin the Doctor’s legacy. Yaz leaves him stranded on a desolate planet.
In the after-regeneration life, the dead Doctor meets previous dead Doctors 1, 5, 6, 7, & 8, and they’re all metaphysical about falling off cliffs and unfinished business.
Aboard the TARDIS, the dead Doctor appears to Yaz in the form of a AI hologram, programmed to be the Doctor. With the AI-Hologram-Doctor’s help, Yaz manages to respond to Vinder’s call for help and picks him up. They hatch a plan to un-force-regenerate the dead Doctor. Next Yaz goes and saves Ace from certain death, and sends her on a mission to Bolivia.
At UNIT HQ, Tegan has stayed behind, feeling responsible for letting the Cybermen in. Kate puts in action a plan which sees Tegan try to blow up the building, entombing the Cybermen. Kate surrenders herself as a distraction. The AI-Hologram-Doctor-In-The-Form-Of-The-Dead-Fifth-Doctor appears to Tegan and they have a touching moment during which Tegan seems to forget that she’s the one who left the Doctor and not vice-versa.
In the Bolivian volcano, Ace meets the AI-Hologram-Doctor-In-The-Form-Of-The-Dead-Seventh-Doctor, and they have a touching moment talking about Ace’s departure that we never saw on screen. Using enhanced Nitro 9, she plans to blow up the Dalek drill, but first bumps into Graham who is… there.
Yaz returns to pick up the Master-Who-Pretends-to-be-the-Doctor-acting-like-the-Master and takes him back to 1916 Russia, where he decides to launch the volcano attack in 2022, plus kill Yaz. Now, the AI-Hologram-Doctor-in-the-form-of-the-imaginary-Dead-Fugitive-Doctor shows up and fools the Cybermen into recreating the final scene of Blakes 7 and killing all the Cybermen.
Being Time Lord Cybermen, they begin to regenerate, so Vinder and Yaz force the Master-Who-Pretends-to-be-the-Doctor-acting-like-the-Master back into the cabinet, where they use the Cybermen’s regeneration powers to un-force regenerate the Master-Who-Pretends-to-be-the-Doctor-acting-like-the-Master back into the dead Doctor and reviving the dead Master.
Time to sort this mess out.
Tegan gets help from the AI-Hologram-Doctor-in-the-form-of-the-now-not-dead-Doctor-but-that-now-doesn’t-know-they’re-no-longer-a-dead-Doctor on how to destroy the Cyberconversion devices, save Kate, and blow up the building. Ace and Graham’s sabotage blows up the Daleks, and the whole gang is now aboard the TARDIS, but not Dan.
They return to the Cyberplanet, the Doctor fixes Vinder’s ship and sends him away, they use the Doctor and the Master’s TARDIS to move the Cyberplanet forward to 2022, using it’s power to turn the erupting volcanoes into steel.
Finally, the Doctor convinces the Qurunx to destroy the planet and go free, which it starts to do, but the Master shows up and makes the Qurunx spin wildly out of control, blasting the Doctor with its planet-destroying power. Yaz rescues the unconscious Doctor. They escape.
The Doctor is unconscious for a long time, so Yaz dumps all the others off somewhere so she can have some alone time with the Doctor, but that will be short-lived, the Doctor is regenerating. The Doctor takes the time to make sure Yaz realizes she’s no more special than any of the countless other companions.
They have ice cream, and then the Doctor dumps Yaz off, too, where she meets up with Graham, and Dan, on her way to meet up at Compananon, a support group for former companions, including Ian, Jo, Tegan, Mel, Ace, Graham, Dan and Kate.
The Doctor heads off for one more sunrise before regenerating, clothes and all, into a noticeably-aged Tenth Doctor.
Everybody, all together now, say it with me: “What? What? What?”
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