12.23: Face the Raven

In which Clara dies, there’s a shock, who could have seen that coming.

Broadcast: November 2015

Watched: April 2022

Just realised that the titles of this and the previous episode don’t actually go together at all (which makes sense, because they’re the most disconnected pairing all season). But the titles trick the brain into thinking they do because “Sleep No More” has the same rhythm as “Nevermore”. Which is quite clever. 

Anyway:

“So you’ll just let Rigsy die?” “To keep the peace? Yeah, I will.”

I wasn’t expecting much – Clara dies, how dramatic, yawn – but it’s... really, really good? Other than the ending I’d forgotten almost everything about this, but it’s great. We’re moving into the bit of the show I don’t know inside out for the first time this century – so hopefully lots of other nice surprises up ahead, even if in the Chibnall era they’re mostly, “Oh, that wasn’t the complete disaster I assumed it was” rather than “actually, really good”.

Brilliantly, this one starts with another pre-credits denouement of a missing adventure – only this time it’s Clara bragging about sorting it. It literally begins with her saying “I told you it’d work”. Then the phone rings. Nicely played, that: hubris, nemesis calling.

The “Trap Streets” concept means, I think, it’s the only episode I ever got a CityMetric piece out of. It’s a clever new way of both hiding aliens  in plain sight within the fiction, and announcing “This is literally a trap!” without it. The street itself is brilliantly realised – the vaguely Harry Potter set, the idea the environment itself disguises aliens from view (in roughly the same manner as the Dalek Asylum, now I come to think of it). Love the quantum shade and the tattooed countdown.

Ashildr... Clara cheerfully reveals that the Doctor has been tracking her in secret, which suggests he might have been lying about bumping into her by accident in Woman. I joked that she was the show’s version of Sabbath, but actually that fits unnervingly well: she’s not an antagonist, exactly, but she comes to represent an alternative morality, order to the Doctor’s chaos, cleaning up his mess but also being very slightly fash while she does it. (She explicitly contrasts her activities with what the Doctor’s done with the Zygons.) Delightfully, the show’s ongoing argument about the morality of Thomas Hobbes goes right back to the very first story.

The other sort-of-hinted-at-theme is that of a duty of care: the Doctor has to protect Clara, who has to protect Rigsy, who needs to survive for the baby. (“Bring the new human! No, don’t bring the new human, I’ll just get distracted.” I love that this Doctor loves babies.)

The ending... “Well if Danny Pink can do it, so can I.” I quite like the throwaway implication that Clara’s been running so fast to avoid the inevitable depression about losing the love of her life.

Her death doesn’t quite work for me because a) I can’t bear Clara, b) I know it’s sort of undone, c) bloody hell it’s overwrought, it needs to be about half the length – in sum, it’s sort of the “watching Doomsday now” problem, but much, much worse. But it’s played very well, especially by Capaldi.

“The Doctor is no longer here! You are stuck with me. And I will end you, and everything you love.”

Other thoughts:

• It feels a bit weird and unnecessary to move Rigsy to London? I guess they felt “hidden street in London!” sounded cooler than “hidden street in Bristol!” but still. Anyway, nice to see him again I guess, he’s great in the bit where the Doctor tells him he’s going to die (“Don’t start using my actual name now!”).

• Another “Clara is shagging Jane Austen” joke, yawn.

• Rump, the growly official in the Trap Street, was also the doomed stewart in The End Of The World.

• Clara opens arms to death in the same way Jack does in Parting of the Ways.

• Were teleport bracelets a thing pre Blake’s 7?

• The post-credits scene of Rigsy decorating the abandoned TARDIS is lovely, and I only saw it because I cancelled iPlayer’s autoplay response to see if there was a Heaven Sent trailer.