12.15: The Witch’s Familiar

In which Davros opens his eyes.

Broadcast: September 2015

Watched: March 2022

“Why does the Doctor always survive?”

Audacious as all f*ck. Absolutely screams, “This is my last season I’m going to let rip”. (Well, funny story-) Also, one of those where I’m going to have to use subheadings, sorry.

The prologue and the Doctor

First off, Missy’s story which is maybe a flashback but probably isn’t, with multiple Doctors in it, briefly, functions like a dumb show about the Doctor’s MO “He assumes he’s going to win” is basically the theme of the episode; the vampire monkey punchline is basically the theme of the entire series, how he’ll always stumble straight into the next episode.

Later, he says, “There’s no such thing as the Doctor. I’m just a bloke in a box”: it’s a part he plays, the ideal he wants to live up to. Even though it’s at the wrong end of the season, since it’s a weird backwards sort of season, this feels like it was meant as Moffat’s final statement on the series, maybe?

The companion

I love the way as per the title it at first looks like Clara is going to be Missy’s companion in this one, and she seems weirdly comfortable with the situation, *considering what Missy did to her boyfriend literally two episodes ago*, and trots after her like the puppy she was compared to last week. She momentarily seems to change her mind after Missy pushes her into a sewer, then immediately trusts her again, despite everything Missy does screaming, “I am going to betray you”. It’s a bit baffling.

Then again: “You are the last person I would ever kill”. Jesus f*cking christ Clara.

Missy

That prologue also doubles as a way of highlighting Missy’s obsession. Cool. There’s some irony in the fact she’s the one to save the Doctor? Or maybe that’s a comment on their relationship, too.

Anyway, she makes the BF “Colin meets the Brig” meta joke about finally being in a story with Davors, and then immediately pokes him in the eye. When the Doctor tells her to run she laughs (compare the vashda nerada or atraxi). She tricks Clara into the Dalek, and then tries to get the Doctor to kill her, and then just says, “Oh look at that, now there’s a surprise” when she’s caught out. 

The new series seems to have decided that the Master’s key characteristic is refusing to take any of this stupid shit seriously. Love the “her daughter’s wedding” line, thrown in just to wind us up, though.

Davros

So, er, *can* Davros die? It’s never explained why he comes back to life in Destiny. Oh, and the Doctor in Davros’ chair while the real one is lying on the floor, his spinal column hanging out (”So, anyone for dodgems?”) is hilarious AND f*cked up. Nice.

Anyway, for the first time since Genesis he’s written as a person when he opens his eyes, he seems like an insanely old man, not some kind of monster, and his apparently sincere congratulations on discovering Gallifrey survived is just stunning. Then he makes a joke and laughs. Julian Bleach is amazing in this....

...especially considering that, once you’ve seen it before, you realise that the entire thing is just Davros trying to trick the Doctor into touching that cable. He suggests he examine it, then says it’ll wipe out the Daleks, then literally moves his hand. The slightly odd thing is that touching it is not enough? It surely needs the regeneration energy too? But still. 

It doesn’t matter because it turns out the final twist the Doctor knew all along he was being played. He’d just assumed he was going to win.

The mythology

Is this the most different models of Daleks on screen ever? Also special weapons dalek!

Anyway, this is a proper bumper crop of fanboy jokes and fan theories Moffat has clearly had since the 80s. The fact Daleks have a single work for sewer and graveyard. Davros below the waist. “The only other chair on Skaro.” The Dalek translation bit, in which everything automatically comes out as hate, is genuinely quite unnerving. “Emotion fires the gun” is just astonishing (”Cybermen repress emotion. Daleks channel it”). And Davros opens his eyes!

Basically, Moffat has better ideas about Doctor Who than anyone else in the history of the series. 

Other things:

• What exactly are the odds of the Doctor showing up on a battlefield and running into baby Davros? TARDIS being a dick again, I guess.

• The Doctor’s threat to burn everything if Clara is dead prefigures the finale.

• Jenna in a Dalek again, just like in her first episode. Is this a deliberate “She’s going to die” call back thing?

• Missy’s American accent is actually worse than the living poo daleks.

• The use of regeneration energy to resurrect the sewer Daleks repeats as farce with Chibnall's cyber Time Lords.

• The wearable technology is fucking lame. [This is apparently Moffat’s deliberate riposte to the fact everyone had stopped finding the sonic screwdriver silly.] Ditto, “Just the Doctor and Clara Oswald in the TARDIS”: it’s a bit “RTD calling Gwen Cooper a living legend”.

• The Doctor thinks Daleks can’t say mercy but one already had in a Moffat script, to River in The Big Bang. Oh! It's not a continuity error, it's retrospective foreshadowing. Righto. Clever. [Nope, I have no idea what I meant by that either, sorry.]