My first impression, at the end of this episode, was that it went at a rocketing pace. My second was that it's a hell of a cheat to call Dark Water a stand-alone episode. Whatever else this episode is, above all, it's setting up tomorrow's finale. I rather wish Moffat had given both parts the same title, just separating them with Roman numerals, but I digress.
Let me start by staying Milk and the entire special effects department outdid themselves. The Nethersphere calls to mind the holodeck on the Enterprise D (that's Next Gen for the uninitiated) New York and Ridley Scott's Blade Runner. The mausoleum water-tombs? Those giant cubicles, each with a skeleton enthroned? Truly creepy. Mildly gruesome. And probably the stuff of a great many children's nightmares, last weekend.
Special effects are a thing of beauty, as was set design. From the water-tombs to the doors with port-hole Cyberman eyes - complete with a tear - the look of this episode is gorgeous. The supporting cast (Both Chris Addison and Michelle Gomez) and the hook for the finale are fantastic. The episode itself? My second viewing confirms that I feel a little lukewarm about it, plot-wise.
At the heart of Dark Water two questions are discussed, albeit obliquely: The nature of love - romantic versus unconditional - AND the nature of existence. Is a human soul pure consciousness and memory? Or something more? Can we be reduced to binary code? Uploaded to a Time Lord data-slice matrix? For all that the Doctor declares Doctor Chang and Missy (soon to be revealed as his nemesis, The Master, now transformed) to be charlatans of the first order, the questions are valid and just as pivotal - if not more so - than the Doctor's quest to find the Underworld, the entrance to Hades, Hel, or to traverse the Nine Circles of Dante's Inferno, i.e. the 'Hell that is within the Earth'.
In introducing the concept of an afterlife, as perceived by humanity, Steven Moffat is attempting to inject an element of mythology directly into the plot. Interesting, and slightly ironic, given that Doctor Who can be seen as a modern myth.
When the Doctor (apparently) banishes Clara, saying: "Go to Hell" it's a direct nod to the Norse Goddess of the Underworld Hel. The army of Cybermen made up of the consciousness of the dead - emotions deleted - can be read as a nod to the army sewed into the earth by Cadmus (in the myth of Cadmus and Jason, the latter of Argonauts fame) which grew up out of rows upon rows of sewn dragons teeth and which, in a hollywood film, were animated as skeleton soldiers.
Thus, in Metamorphosis Ovid writes:
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Cadmus obeys, and with his plough's deep share opens wide furrows, then across the soil scatters the teeth, the seed of humankind. The tilth (beyond belief!) began to stir: first from the furrows points of spears were seen, next helmets, bright with nodding painted plumes, then shoulders, chests and weapon-laden arms arose, a growing crop of men in mail
It's a brief step in time, and technology, from those men in chain-mail to Cybermen.
Subtextually (so probably unnoticed by Moffat, wearing either his writer or executive producer cap) there are disturbing yet interesting allusions being drawn in this episode about soldiers. In the Moffniverse lines are drawn between good men and bad, for all that Danny Pink spans the spectrum of both. As a teacher Pink embodies the height of goodness. As a soldier the direct opposite, his soldier-self a reflection in a dark mirror.
Danny (now deceased) has flashbacks as his consciousness writes itself onto the hard drive of the Nethersphere. As he is being saved. We see his compassion and his guilt for the death of a child he inadvertently killed while serving in Afghanistan. And that guilt is just one of the emotions which will be deleted if he presses the button on the iPad construct, handed to him on that balcony in the Nethersphere. Disturbing. Powerful. This moment of choice, a rather overt nod to suicide: Distraught man on balcony, driven to end his existence completely, should he hit delete. Choosing to eradicate himself on that balcony is similar to Danny choosing to fall from such a height in the physical world. Mind you, it's a nod in very bad taste given that we know UK soldier and veteran suicides 'outstrip Afghan deaths.
By killing and uploading Danny, which his particular backstory, there is the implication that every soldier currently involved in a conflict on earth has been so uploaded, their brainwaves then downloading into Cybermen. A combat-ready Cyberman army, planning conquest. Is Steven Moffat equating soldiers with Cybermen? Is he standing in the Doctor's shoes, proclaiming all soldiers 'bad'?
I wouldn't like to think so.
The problem with Danny Pink is that while Clara may indeed be owed a 'do-over' (having travelled across the Doctor's timeline, her self scattered like leaves off a tree) Danny isn't. In this series (at the end of these twelve episodes) he seems to have existed only to prove himself to be a red shirt in a fantastic advert for road safety aimed at primary school children.
It's not that I dislike Danny Pink. It's just that he's spent much of the series on the fringes of both the episodes and Clara's life. So, personally, I didn't feel the love they apparently have for each other. I did believe Clara in The Caretaker when she yells at the Doctor, saying she loves Danny. Her explaining Danny to the Doctor and to us? It never happened. Or if it did, it happened off screen which doesn't add to plot or character coherence. More so, I rather have the feeling Clara has persuaded herself she's in love with Danny because she saw her possible future in the form of one Colonel Orson Pink. His very existence, and the Doctor stating Clara is strongly connected to Danny, no doubt makes her think that she and he are fated.
Fated love?
It's a huge and highly attractive trope in young adult literature and television drama. After Danny's death, Tumblr is probably awash with the feels of tweens. Am I being a tad vicious? Probably. But this death - quasi or otherwise - doesn't feel earned in terms of plot.
When Ten mind-wiped Donna, I sobbed. When Rory died - and died - and died again - I cried. And when Amy finally left the Doctor and chose to return to Rory in 1940's New York, so he wouldn't die in a room, all alone, not having lived his life with Amy, my face was awash. Moffat played me like a fiddle and I both loved and loathed him for it. Not so here. Not at all. Danny Pink isn't isn't Rory Williams. He isn't even pale reflection of the boy who waited, of the Centurion or the nurse. His death may be what spurs Clara to action, (leading her to betray the man she loves - Yes, OK loves as a friend, though I have my doubts on that one) but her betrayal is the strongest emotional moment in this episode.
Clara's betrayal of the Doctor, not her loss of Danny. And the strength of that bitter moment is compounded by the next, in which the Doctor reveals his unconditional love for this "Impossible Girl", and I paraphrase: "Do you think I care for you so little, that betraying me would make a difference?" It's a great line (great line delivery, by Peter Capaldi) and it's heightened by the way his voice softens when he speaks her name. Clara's romantic love life, and loss, just doesn't come close to the level of emotional connection seen here. Given she is supposedly then storming the underworld to rescue the love of her life, I find that a little problematic.
The attempted theft of the TARDIS (or blackmail of the Doctor) is set-up through a series of lovely visuals as Clara scavenges in the TARDIS for the seven hidden keys. Seven keys for a ship originally designed to complement a crew of seven. Keys which appear from out of trinket boxes, drawers, and the pages of an aptly chosen novel: "The Time Traveller's Wife" - a lovely visual nod to River Song. But, since the day Ten 'lost' his wife in the largest library in the known universe, we've known he can open the TARDIS doors with the click of his fingers. Destroying all keys, in a sea of lava, seems like a strange way to sever the Doctor's connection with his TARDIS. I did love the gunshot sound effects as each key hit the lava, and was destroyed, to the heavy toll of the Cathedral bell. The inconsistency as to the keys, and the Doctor's connection? I leave that down to Clara's imagination and the lack therein.
That her attack on the Doctor takes place in a dreamscape (fashioned thanks to a patch and augmented by the Doctor's telepathic skills and her own suggestibility) doesn't only exemplify her heightened, suggestible, emotional state; it's intimate. And it also calls to mind the conference at Madame Vastra's in Name of the Doctor and reminds us of River Song. River who is human consciousness uploaded to a database. Only she obviously never had her emotions stripped and deleted.
There are clues and red herrings in this episode which fascinate me, and which obviously won't have occurred to either younger, nor casual, viewers.
Are the people who work in the Nethersphere representations of someone living? Are they long dead? Clusters on a hard drive? Is it coincidence that the library computer - into which River was uploaded and saved - was named CAL? The computer interface running the Orient Express Experiment GUS? And the PA to Missy/Master (she whom he thinks of as God) SEB? What's with computer hard-drive names having three letter designations? And the company headed by The Mistress being named 3W. Three letters? Three words? Utter coincidence?
Missy moves between the Nethersphere and the physical world (see The Caretaker) just like Rassilon did, moving from the Matrix. It's a nod to the Classic Series, but over and above that, I hope there's a purpose.
It was fairly obvious Missy was the Master from Deep Breath onwards. But, what makes Michele Gomez doubly wonderful in the role is Peter Capaldi's reaction to her, from the first moment he mistakenly thinks she's a droid to the later moment when his hand (having pressed against what we're meant to infer is the thump of two beating hearts) hangs, stock-still in mid-air. Acting against Gomez, Capaldi shows what a great physical actor he is. The reaction to her unwanted kiss is fantastic, and straight of out the body language of a squirming child. But this is surpassed by the look of absolute horror - eyes wide mouth agape - when he realises exactly who Missy is. Like Matt Smith, Capaldi too is a very strong, physical actor. Also well worth noting is his running, down the steps of St Paul's and into the streets. His arms are flailing, his entire being is flailing. And his acting is fantastic.
Michelle Gomez, in comparison, manages a good turn as a malevolent Mary Poppins (it's the hat with the cherries, as much as the Victorian Garb) and with her smile, twitch of her lip, and reference to Dear Doctor evokes memories of the original 1970's Master, Roger Delgado.
Why would Missy harvest the engrams of the dead? Well at the mid-point in this two-parter, we have to take it as given that the Master, now Mistress, is quite mad. She acts thus, because she can. A rather more interesting question (which will doubtless be ignored by Moffat altogether) is where she got the Matrix drive from? And how it exists in this physical universe, given that Gallifrey was saved by being tucked away outside this universe altogether.
Anyone? Moffat? Anyone?
The idea the Mistresses' Cyberman army wait, enthroned and statuesque much like Jardis once did in the Halls of Charn (before she was awoken and conquered Narnia) works for me. I have no problem with dark water as a curtain, a camouflage behind which the troops are hidden; until enough engrams have been harvested and downloaded. The idea the Halls in which they rest are in St. Paul's Cathedral is more problematic. I can suspend my belief that there's a transmat somewhere in the cathedral, leading to a ship in orbit. Not that Missy's army are dormant, waiting in the cathedral dome or crypt.
And don't ask me how the skeletons appear as they do, through Cyberman armour and dark water. A fantastic visual, but I can't get my head around the 'how' of it. Not that this is my main reservation. If I were to have one, and I do, it would be that the Doctor still feels as if he's on the fringes of the story looking in, even kissing and confronting The Mistress. Hopefully, that won't be the case tomorrow.
Pacing is break-neck, acting is superb. Chris Addison is quite wonderful (SEB in his white suit as a corporate angel) and even Samuel Anderson surpasses himself. I do wonder if his relationship with Clara will turn out to be the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice given a Whovian twist. And if that's the case, it may prove a more satisfying conclusion than his current state.
Above all this episode is a feat and a feast of set design and special effects. It looks phenomenal.It packs a hell of a punch visually and looks, dare I say it, iconic. Do I think it's successful? Ask me in a little under twenty-five hours. I'm reserving judgement until I see "Death in Heaven".