Review: Doctor Who, ‘A Town Called Mercy’

OK, when Doctor Who wins its obligatory Hugo next year, I vote we give it to this episode. I thought that was stonking.

That said, I can see my Twitter feed is already a flutter with voices of dissent. I won’t pretend to know everybody’s reasons (people always take the trouble to tell me that it was for something different when I guesstimate), but US set episodes are always a slightly tougher sell. I know there have been grumblings around the blogosphere about catering to the growing US audience, but in all honesty, I can’t see why that’s a reason to complain. I mean, it isn’t like all the UK-based episodes aren’t catering to the UK audience. I grant you, ‘Daleks in Manhattan‘ was not the most successful of gestures in that direction, but Doctor Who has a long history of flirting with locations across the pond*. William Hartnell, the first doctor, even had a wild west story arc himself, in ‘The Gunfighters‘ (1966).

I also rather liked the touch of the Doctor saying that they were heading for a Mexican day of the dead festival (before someone spilled from crumbs on the console). Like so many science fiction programs, Doctor Who has always been limited in its realism by its centring on the country of its origin for its plots. Budget has been a big factor in this – I don’t suppose we shall see a Doctor Who episode set in New Zealand in the near future. Curiously, New Who has had, if anything, even more of a problem in this way than Old Who, setting unusually high numbers of episodes on Earth in an attempt to not scare away mainstream viewers, and consequently giving more time to Great Britain over alien locales. Exploring a bit of Earthly culture outside the European therefore seems rather healthy, to me.

But then, I spent a couple of years growing up in the US as a child, and have a longstanding affection for the wild west as a result. Perhaps I am biased because of this, but overall I thought this episode was tightly plotted, original, well-acted, challenging, and exciting. We were not tortured by the notoriously bad American accents that were one of the many flawed elements of the Manhattan based episode mentioned above. Moreover, rather than the recycling of old favourites that we have seen so much of, lately, we got a new (to my knowledge) alien race and a cyborg. (OK, so it is hitting a lot of the Ro buttons, but surely everyone likes cyborgs, right? Right?)

Minimally Spoiltastic Plot

The Doctor, Amy, and Rory arrive at the town of Mercy, somewhere in the US. The town is surrounded by a mysterious ring of rocks and wood, as well as a pointed ‘Keep Out’ sign, which the Doctor pointedly ignores. Almost immediately upon arrival they are challenged by the locals and when the Doctor confirms that he is both a Doctor and an alien, they unceremoniously evict him. In response to his crossing the ring around the town, an ominous figure, named by the locals as ‘The Gunslinger’ materialises in fits and starts, slowly getting closer to the Doctor, hefting a big gun.

At the last moment, the local sheriff, Issac (Ben Browder), declares that the Doctor must be allowed back in, and takes him aside to explain. There is, apparently, another alien doctor in the town, and the Gunslinger wants to kill him. The other doctor, Kahler Jex (Adrian Scarborough), has apparently done a lot of good. The sheriff mentions that the war he, Issac, fought in is only a few years in the past, and the experience convinced him that if a man wants a second chance, he can have one. Kahler Jex has done a lot of good to the town, and Issac is determined to protect him from the Gunslinger.

The Doctor agrees, but is naturally curious as to why it is that the Gunslinger wants this other doctor dead, and whether Kahler Jex is truly a man worth protecting, whatever he may have done for Mercy.

Analysis

I felt like there were a lot of geek nods hovering around this one. You can’t say ‘The Gunslinger’ to me and not have me think of Roland of Gilead, who is so termed in Stephen King’s magnum opus, The Dark Tower. But I’m willing to concede that I’m super sensitive to such things. I also don’t know if it’s just me who found that the Gunslinger bore a striking resemblance to a warped version of Kryten from Red Dwarf, which, of course, had its own western episode. I dunno, maybe it is just me, but the black, bulky clothes; the waxy, cyborg face; the awkward stance and movements; the misshapen hands… it just felt familiar. On the other hand, I know that the Terminator font used for the cyborg-view writing that said ‘TERMINATE’ was intentional.

So what were all these references (or putative references) doing? I’m not entirely sure. They might have been just nods. However, this episode was particularly concerned with exploring the themes of warfare, justice, law and order, and the impact of the past on the present, as well as whether an individual can change. The responsibilities and changeability of the individual is a frequent question where artificial intelligence is concerned. Dave Lister, in Red Dwarf, is constantly trying to get Kryten to change as a way of enabling freedom by defying his programming. This is positive freedom, and yet could also be seen as a restriction of Kryten’s negative freedom to simply be who he wants to be. Kryten seems to enjoy the positive freedom that Lister grants him, yet he is also frequently wracked with guilt over the minor transgressions Lister persuades him to because they are in conflict with an existing moral code that Lister is not entirely successful in providing him with reasons to reject. I’m not saying Red Dwarf has any especially in-depth discussion of these things, but it is a feature of debates about artificial life that they always bring with them questions of responsibility and freedom. Programming is taken as restrictive – yet arguably, we are just as predetermined by the laws of physics and our circumstance. Can programming free one from responsibility? If a choice is unavoidable, does that mean it was not chosen? Was it really as unavoidable as we like to tell ourselves it was? And if we create life, are we not responsible for the actions of that life? Or does accepting such responsibility deny the power over its own life that each individual has?

These are questions that the Terminator movies (especially Terminator 2: Judgement Day) are more overtly concerned with. Questions of responsibility and freedom stem from both the AI plot elements and the time travel ones (another shared theme with this week’s Doctor Who. John Connor’s message to himself, via Kyle Reese and his mother, is that ‘The future is not set. There is no fate but what we make for ourselves’. It’s a bastardisation of a quote from Sartre’s seminal paper, ‘Existentialism and Humanism‘**:

Man is nothing else but that which he makes of himself… man is, before all else, something which propels itself towards a future, and is aware that it is doing so

Terminator 2 is all about choices, and I’ll restrain myself from getting too deep into my thoughts on T2***, but I hope this is sufficient to show the connection. Anyway, ‘A Town Called Mercy’ is also about choices and the weight of responsibility – the weight of the past. The Doctor is a man who has tried to wipe his past away – a thing that might feel like freedom, but must also be dangerous, especially for a man with a past as weighty as the Doctor’s. Here he is confronted by a number of mirrors: the sherif, who has responded to his experiences of war with kindness, and a resolution to judge all as though their crimes can be written off if they can prove themselves valuable members of the community. The other doctor, who has worked hard to atone for a murky past, but whose past has followed him, anyway, and now threatens others because it has been ignored. And the Gunslinger, another dealer of death, who is bitter and full of anger for the role that has been thrust upon him, yet who follows a certain code nonetheless. The nature of morality and when and whether it is ever right to kill is constantly challenged and interrogated from a number of angles. And hanging in the background, addressed with a subtlety that New Who has sometimes lacked in the past, is the issue of the Doctor’s own past, of his war-crimes, of his status as a warrior, and whether he even has the right to call himself the ‘Doctor’ and not the ‘Predator’ or something more ominous.

One senses that the Doctor can never truly resign himself to the passive role of healer. The clean slate that Issac wants for others (and tacitly for himself) is perhaps an ideal that cannot be attained precisely because the history of our past actions frames our present and our future. The Doctor was always more the sort of doctor who searched after knowledge than who stopped to attend to the less exciting business of tending to the sick. He has helped people, countless people, but he has also left a wave of destruction in his path. The ‘Oncoming Storm’, if you like. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: ‘He’s not the Messiah, he’s a very naughty boy‘. Or perhaps, he’s a little bit of both.

The Doctor is one of the more interesting heroes – one of the most enigmatic, charismatic, and magnetic – precisely because he is both darkness and light. Even before this episode aired certain corners of the Interwebs were muttering about the Doctor handling a gun and behaving in a morally questionable manner. But he’s always been a bit morally questionable. He’s not a comfortable hero, and his value lies precisely in that, because he makes us question ourselves. He’s makes us question whom we choose to idolise, and whether people can be fitted into neat categories of ‘good’ and ‘bad’. Not a lot of television shows suitable for children dare to muddy the waters in this way, and yet I think it’s a thing that children respond well too. It’s an important lesson, not only that good people can do bad things, but that bad people can do good, and that maybe the distinction between the two is not as clear as our parents might like to pretend when they tell us that ‘No – don’t do that. That’s wrong – only bad children do that’.

This is a challenging and nuanced look at morality and responsibility all packaged up in a great ball of fun filled with aliens and cyborgs and the wild west. What’s not to love? I might just go watch it again.

In the mean time, and because I cannot resist it, I just have to post this glorious video again, as a reminder of the Doctor’s darker side…

*He-he, I said ‘pond’.
**The literal translation is ‘Existentialism is a Humanism’, but the title is usually rendered in English as ‘Existentialism and Humanism’.
***Give me enough time and freedom and space to write in and I will almost always end up talking about existentialism and Terminator 2 – it’s like monkeys and Shakespeare.

Doctor Who: Dinosaurs on a Spaceship

It’s been a long while since I’ve reviewed Doctor Who, and those who follow me on Twitter probably know why, but suffice it to say that I don’t really enjoy writing strongly negative reviews, I enjoy even less doing so for a show to which I am strongly attached, and I really don’t enjoy writing the sort of review that might attract vitriol in response a) because it’s very negative about something a lot of people like, and b) because it’s about sexism.

I’m reviewing Dinosaurs on a Spaceship because it’s the first episode in a long time that did not make me very angry at some level. In point of fact, I really enjoyed it.

To be clear: this is not an episode that’s gonna go down as one of the great classics. The comedy was a little forced and the general tone was very silly, but it was great fun, and largely not offensive. It’s such a relief to be able to say that about an episode of Doctor Who again.

And let’s make no bones about it: ‘Dinosaurs on a Spaceship’ is a fantastic concept for Doctor Who. One might have written a much more nuanced and intellectual script on the concept, but you didn’t have to. It’s a concept that will make kids and old hardcore geeks alike clap their hands with joy and start bouncing off the walls of the Internet. If you’re onto something that will please both kids and fans of the classic series alike you don’t really need to do a lot else but make sure that your script is relatively inoffensive. If we hadn’t endured the second half of the last season that might be damning with faint praise, but in contrast it’s just… it’s just really, really nice.

And it wasn’t just about dinosaurs in space. I was always a fan of the crowded TARDIS – Davison’s era is a favourite of mine from that point of view, although I know it bothers some people. When the Doctor has just one companion it does funny things to him, and funny things to the script. I was relieved when Rory became a regular feature of the TARDIS, but this episode went multi-companion in a delightfully spectacular way. It threw itself into the idea with great abandon and with largely good results. We had: Amy (Karen Gillan), Rory (Arthur Darvill), Rory’s dad (Mark Williams), Nefertiti (Riann Steele), and a big game hunter named Ridell (Rupert Graves). And the Doctor has apparently specifically pulled them all together because he fancies having a ‘gang’ along for the ride, and because he thinks they will each appreciate the wonder of dinosaurs on a spaceship (that, and Nefertiti was unwilling to be left behind).

I’m going to try and keep the spoilers small, so I won’t tell you why there were dinosaurs on a spaceship, but the reasons were fun and interesting, tying back to events and peoples the Doctor has met before in both New and Old Who; again, lending the episode broad appeal. But I will say that he’s in a race against time to save the dinosaurs before the spaceship they are on is blown up by missiles launched by an Indian space agency in defence of the Earth.

Rory and his dad are delightful, and Mark Williams is a perfect match. Whilst the gags based on a bumbling-but-always-prepared picture of dad-hood are rather obvious, they are performed to perfection. He’s also not the only familiar face. David Bradley is delightfully grizzled as the opportunist, Solomon, who wants to steal the dinosaurs to sell. David Mitchell and Robert Webb also cameo as a pair of daft and somewhat whiney robots.

It’s always a delight to be entertained by Mitchell and Webb, and they were certainly suitably cast, but whilst it sounded like they were having great fun (well, you would, wouldn’t you?) the whiney-robot jokes were rather predictable and fell a little flat. It all felt oddly Douglas-Adams-esque, which I’m sure was intentional (what with the complaining robots and wacky shenanigans in space) but didn’t quite hit the spot there, either. All the same, it was harmless, gentle humour that I’m sure would have delighted children, who are not as cynically familiar with such material as me. I enjoyed the nod to Adams even if it didn’t 100% pay off.

There was some reasonably well-executed gender debate, the range of characters allowing different attitudes to be expressed, although, to be honest, Amy and Nefertiti might have been interchangeable on that front. A point Moffat has been criticised on before, although this episode was penned by Chris Chibnall and not Moffat himself. That said, Amy fell less flat for me than she has for a bit, being allowed to take control of herself and others in ways that have nothing to do with her reproductive system. Both Nefertiti and Amy bounce off the sexist Ridell, and although for Nefertiti the sexism descends uncomfortably into flirting, Amy offers a nice counter-balance by looking askance at this. Moreover, between Rory, his dad, Ridell, the Doctor, and Solomon there are a wide variety of expressions of masculinity on display, and it’s very clear that Ridell marks an exception (and even he seems willing to change his mind).

The one moment that struck a raw note for me was one in which the covetous Solomon refers to Nefertiti as an object to be possessed, owned, and sold. Yes, it was clear that it was only her uniqueness and historical fame, not her gender, that made him respond so, but with the recent history of the series I really didn’t need to see a plot about a woman being treated literally as an object and in danger of being sold as the property of a male, in need of rescue from the Doctor. Such a plot has the potential for use in a context of sensitive and careful writing, but I mentioned that this was not an episode marked for that style of writing, right? It’s balanced, to some extent, by the resolution of that plot, but it still made me… uncomfortable.

Overall, Soloman’s plot is one markedly concerned with the Evils of Capitalism. It’s a little heavy-handed, but I remember what it was like to be a kid opened up to such big ideas and challenges to societal norms. It’s an interesting and important thing that science fiction does particularly well, and I’m OK with it’s use. I’m OK with Doctor Who taking on the big debates of the day and introducing them to children, the way I was introduced to the ideas of environmentalism by Silent Running. And if, as an adult, it started to feel a bit too much, well, there were always the dinosaurs.

Overall, the episode was fun and inoffensive, with some big fun concepts that are totally correct for Doctor Who. Definitely worth a watch, especially if you’d been as disheartened with the show as I had last year.

Doctor Who, A Good Man Goes to War

Sweet zombie kittens that was awesome! The little I saw on Twitter before I wisely closed my feed for the duration suggests that the Internet may not agree, but I don’t care. I thought that was phenomenal. Somehow it managed to do the sort of motherload pay-off that RTD Who always went for and missed in the season finale. I’m stunned.

It’s a puzzle how to review this, because I’d like to avoid giving the Great Big Honking Spoilers away. Obviously the episode concerns the Doctor’s rescue mission for Amy. He basically calls in all his favours and goes to war. It all goes remarkably smoothly, and just as you’re starting to think ‘Good lord, this episode has no dramatic tension, it’s just about how awesome the Doctor is’… the game changes. And I won’t say any more about exactly how, except to say that there’s lots of fighting and it’s pretty cool, as well as sad and poignant at times. Also, at the end, we find out who River Song really is, but don’t worry, I shan’t say.

Madame Vastra and Jenny kick butt

Despite the potential for cheese, I really enjoyed the way the Doctor’s ‘favours’ are called in. Some of the friends he calls on we recognise, some are brand new, but of races we recognise. I was particularly pleased by the Victorian silurian lady, Madame Vastra (Neve McIntosh), and her human maid (or possibly lover?), Jenny (Catrin Stewart); and the sontaran who had spliced his DNA so that he could serve as a nurse (as punishment). Both concepts could have gone horribly wrong, and the sontaran walked a very close line, but they came out on just the right side. Additionally, we saw glimpses of some awesome war scenes had on a planet where men in gorgeous period-wear shoot laser pistols. I suspect much of the budget of this half of the series went on this episode, but it was worth it.

Rory. Nuff said.

Rory was also impressively awesome. I have this feeling there was meant to be more Rory this season, and it somehow got cut out. I very much appreciated Rory wandering around in a roman uniform calling himself the Centurion, but there was no build up. We’ve had the odd reference, but I have seen others speculate that there were originally more conversations between Rory and the flesh Jennifer in which he talked about his time as a Nestine more, and that it ended up on the cutting room floor. If so, that is a shame, it would have helped pave the way for this.

I also like seeing the bad side of the Doctor. I’m always puzzled when there’s an outcry that the Doctor did something not 100% OK. The Doctor has always been morally ambiguous. At first he was simply selfish and insensitive (recall how he ended up meeting the daleks in the first place, tricking his companions into thinking the TARDIS was broken just so that he could satisfy his curiosity?), but he’s made a number of morally dubious decisions in every carnation. If anything, he’s grown: his selfishness has expanded to encompass those that he cares about, and in general he tries to help those he encounters, and to impose rules for acting when things are not so straight forward. He definitely doesn’t like guns, but he has used them in the past*. He’s committed and contemplated genocide a number of times. This is not a New Who phenomenon. All that seems new, to me, is that he is more openly concerned by the consequences of his actions. This episode was a great exploration of these complexities in his character and I loved it.

I also loved the speechifying and the poetry: not a thing you will hear me say often. This virtually never works, in Doctor Who or otherwise, but they pulled it off and deserve the credit for it.

It’s not all perfect. Whilst I enjoyed the implied relationship between the silurian lady and her ‘maid’, the relationship between the two men identified by their weight, homosexual relationship, and religion, instead of by their names, sat ill with me. It felt like it was meant to be comment on how gay relationships or religious affiliations are usually token… but it actually just felt token, and uncomfortably so. Similarly, Amy is simply the princess to be rescued, not doing anything that moves the action along at all, either when she’s waiting for her ‘boys’ to save her, or afterwards. Apparently giving birth makes you go uncharacteristically passive?

On the other hand, there was no shortage of other women kicking ass in this episode. I’ve mentioned already how much I liked Vastra and Jenny – they were awesome throughout, but especially in the fight scenes. As were the other female soldiers, not to mention Madame Kovarian (Frances Barber) and River Song. I guess it’s swings and roundabouts, it’s just a shame that the lead female had all her umph taken out of her just ’cause she had a baby. I’d have imagined Amy as a fearsome momma-bear sort, rather than a ‘hide-in-the-corner-and-let-Rory-take-care-of-it’ lady. But ho hum, you can’t have everything.

All in all, there was very much to enjoy, and only a few reservations. I thoroughly recommend it!

* For true, that man knows his way around a gun:

In case this YouTube video is juddery (as they sometimes seem to be when I embed them) please go here to enjoy it in all its glory.