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Review: Doctor Who S8, Finale: "Dark Water/Death in Heaven"

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Writer: Steven Moffat
Director: Rachel Talalay
Starring: Peter Capaldi, Jenna Coleman, Samuel Anderson, Michelle Gomez, Chris Addison
Ah, the Doctor Who series finale. It’s a time for shocks, thrills, hilarity, heartbreak, and incredible reveals all in one bright-burning story. Traditionally, of course, since the series was revived and returned to our screens, the finale would be a two-parter (or even a three-parter, in the case of Series 3’s Utopia/The Sound of Drums/Last of the Time Lords), all the better for delivering a truly epic closer to a season. The last two years, however, have given us finales contained to one episode, with Series 6’s admittedly-slightly-underwhelming The Wedding of River Song and Series 7’s incredible closer The Name of the Doctor. Now, for the end of an absolute rollercoaster of a series, we’re given a great big two-parter once again, featuring old foes and old friends alike, questions answered and left unanswered, and, quite literally, hell on Earth. In honor of the occasion, I’ve decided to do this review for both at once, to cover the story in one go!
Strap in, Whovians. This is Dark Water and Death in Heaven.

SPOILER WARNING: NOT A MAYBE THIS TIME, THERE WILL BE MILD SPOILERS AHEAD.

A point I’ve made constantly in my reviews of this run thus far is that Series 8 has quite some stock in the ‘incredible pre-credits scene’ department, and the finale eclipses them all. Dark Water’ opens with a return to Earth and Danny Pink, who is casually chatting away to Clara over the phone. Clara’s nervous, and understandably so, as it seems she’s finally going to stop lying and tell Danny everything about her adventures with the Doctor. Unfortunately, she doesn’t get the chance, as Danny, beloved companion’s companion and character that he is, is struck by a car and killed. It’s ordinary, it’s boring, he deserved better, and Clara knows it, unable to reconcile such a thing happening to such a person. She elects to bring the Doctor into the situation, attempting to 102714_DoctorWho_DarkWater10trick him into changing Danny’s timeline and saving his life. The Doctor, of course, refuses to change a timeline…but, he affirms, there’s no reason why he shouldn’t be able to go pick him up from the afterlife.
“Our darkest day, our blackest hour,” the Doctor states, and it’s hard to say he’s wrong. From the high-concept outset, the two-parter delivers a story that is firmly grounded in a bleak, almost oppressive tone. There are moments of levity and humor, of course, not to mention several rather heartwarming ones, but ultimately it’s a dark tale, arguably the darkest of Series 8 thus far. This feels appropriate, naturally, given the recent trend towards murkier waters, morally and tonally speaking, and Dark Water/Death in Heaven exemplify this in spades. The Cybermen, making their return as villains in the first time Moffat has truly written for them, continue the trend they started in Nightmare in Silver of continuously growing stronger, and appropriate to the tone of the story, they are scarier than ever, perhaps scarier than they’ve been since even Patrick Troughton’s run as the Doctor. Conceptually, the core idea of Dark Water in particular, that of the question of life after death, is a truly-horrific one, by far one of the most genuinely terrifying ideas that the show has hinted at in recent memory (thankfully, however, this particular notion is resolved in a vastly-more optimistic way soon enough afterwards, so rest easy, kids!). The two stories have rather different narratives going on, to boot, Dark Water feeling like more of a mystery/classic sci-fi while Death in Heaven is very much a character piece by way of sci-fi horror. The two make for a fascinating watch, especially back to back, and it’s a very tight story indeed. Some questions are, as I briefly mentioned above, answered to us at last while others are left blank, I feel to be answered at another date. I imagine there are certain queries that some fans will be disappointed to see unanswered, but as I said, this is a tight story, Moffat aiming to tell us only what needs to be told, and answers will doubtlessly come later.
I’ve referred to this story, particularly Death in Heaven, as a character piece now, so it seems only right I address that next. Multiple relationships are addressed throughout, giving us a veritable diagram of interlocking personalities, and it’s quite a fascinating one to watch. Two duos, in particular, stand out of course, and neither of them are Clara and the Doctor, who indeed spend much of the episodes apart. The first duo is that of Clara and Danny, the romance that, in retrospect, was almost certainly doomed from the start. This is the first story to openly show this, however, particularly given the fate of Danny throughout. Make no mistakes, he is put through the wringer in this one, folks, and it’s testament to his strength of character that he remains largely himself throughout. Clara, meanwhile, is finally forced to confront the character trait that has been growing over the course of the last few episodes: is she becoming like the Doctor? If so…is that a good thing? The resolution of things likely won’t surprise anyone as to the answers, but it’s an extremely engaging watch nonetheless.
DW4The key, however, is that of the Doctor and the mysterious Missy, who finally makes her debut in this two-parter. Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the last week and a bit, you now know that Missy is, of course, that most nefarious of the Doctor’s nemeses, none other than the Master herself, returning for the first time since David Tennant’s swansong The End of Time as the first Time Lord depicted on-screen to become a Time Lady. The newest incarnation of the Master is terrifying, rather restrained in Dark Water but allowed to fully cut loose in Death in Heaven, and my word, does she cut loose. She mixes the manic nature of John Simm’s Master with the cool, casual villainy of Roger Delgado, sprinkled with a slight dash of the off-handed psychopathy and theatrical nature of Alex Macqueen and the strange pseudo-friendly relationship with the Doctor that Anthony Ainley embodied. She is the Master, there are no two ways about it, and she’s returned to make a tremendous impact on the face of Doctor Who. Every action she makes, whether flirting early-on with the Doctor to throw him off-guard about her identity or casually disposing of certain characters merely because they were there, is designed specifically to torment the Doctor, to cause him pain. She is manic, there’s no doubt about it, but it’s a vastly-more controlled madness than she lets on, almost using it as a clever excuse, as it were, and there are moments of utter cruelty in this story that will leave the viewer under no wrong impressions as to just how dangerous this new incarnation is. Following the last encounter between the two in The End of Time, one has to wonder if there isn’t a certain amount of sincerity when she claims that the Doctor left her for dead on Gallifrey, a sincerity that has perhaps manifested in her new target placed squarely on the Doctor’s head. I appreciate that I’m going on about her quite a bit, but after the ever-so-slightly lacking writing for John Simm’s Master (no qualms about his performance, of course), it’s so good to see everyone’s favourite villainous Time Lady back in the driver’s seat. While the question of how she regenerated and escaped Gallifrey are left open, I suspect they’ll return when she does, as she most certainly will…
As for the Doctor himself, one question that Dark Water and Death in Heaven certainly do answer is this: is the Doctor a good man? It’s been the question that drives this series along, largely speaking, and one that the Doctor himself has struggled with. Now, the question is thrown even more into sharp relief as the Doctor finds himself contrasted once again against one of his greatest enemies, and there’s a definite fear that the answer might not be something we like. Thankfully, however, the eventual answer, decided on by the Doctor himself, is a beautiful scene, one of those marvelous moments that just reminds us so clearly that, yes, he is the Doctor. Whatever else he may be, he is the Doctor. It’s an incredible and surprisingly moving scene, and it’s an excellent way of bringing these lingering threads together.
7309677-high_res-.jpgPerformance-wise, this two-parter brings everything it has and more. Every single performance by every single actor is just thoroughly astounding, really lending the occasion the gravitas it demands. Jenna Coleman and Samuel Anderson play off of each other fantastically, their scenes providing some of the most emotional content of the story. Anderson truly gets the nature of the horrifying events that have happened to Danny across, making for a watch with a lot of pathos. Coleman, meanwhile, continues to deliver her A-game, seeming just tired out at this stage, tired of everything that’s happened, like Steven, Tegan and Martha before her, among others. Capaldi’s performance as the Doctor is at its strongest yet, utterly gripping to watch throughout. There’s one particular scene close to the end of Death in Heaven (and everyone who’s watched it knows what I’m talking about) where the long-awaited raging outburst of this new, angrier Doctor finally occurs, and it is genuinely hard to watch, to see the Doctor in this unusual state. Stellar guest performers such as Chris Addison as snarky and funny AI interface Seb, and Jemma Redgrave and Ingrid Oliver as fan-favourite UNIT characters Kate Stewart and Osgood add a great deal to the story and filling it out (Oliver’s performance as Osgood, in particular, brings one of the most shocking moments of the tale to an even more shocking climax). Truth be told, however, the star of the story is unquestionably Michelle Gomez as the most wonderfully-twisted incarnation of the Master we could have gotten. She’s clearly having a huge amount of fun in the role and it shows, her presence utterly dominating every scene she’s in. She’s endlessly watchable, and her interactions with Capaldi’s Doctor are simply incredible to observe.

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Combine everything mentioned above with a tightly-scripted and very clever plot, many great throwbacks to the past including one which, without hyperbole, just about had me sobbing, a great visual look with everything shrouded in dull, bleak tones, and one of the best endings in recent memory and you shouldn’t be surprised to hear that I simply adored this story. I’ll admit, there were parts I was somewhat uncertain about before the release of Death in Heaven, but it blew me away. It was a bold story, a bold move in fact, very different to the finales we’ve had before in tone, surprisingly low-key considering the events at hand, but it took that risk and it paid off in spades. Is it my favourite of the modern series finales? I’m not sure, to be honest with you (The Pandorica Opens/The Big Bang two-parter are hard to beat), but somehow I suspect it may well have taken that necessary step ahead.

Uncompromising, bleak, and real edge-of-the-seat type stuff. 10/10

Well, it’s been good, Series 8, incredible in fact. But the Doctor will return, of course, at Christmas…and it looks like he’s bringing a friend. See you then, readers, see you then!

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