The Reality War

And that’s exactly the word. This has been an absolute joy. It’s time to say goodbye to another Doctor, and to another era, with no real idea of what’s coming next. Just like life, really. Here’s the link to the BBC press release about this episode.

This week, we find ourselves living in an unconvincing parallel reality where gender norms are rigidly enforced and disabled people are openly despised. Maybe this week’s Doctor Who episode will help take our minds off all that.

This week, the 803rd Interstellar Song Contest is disrupted by a violent act of terrorism and then reinstated by an act of camp fabulosity, complete with comedy montage and everything. And then, to top it off, the [redacted] shows up. Here’s the link to Simon’s interview with Eurovision runner-up Michael Ball on his weekly podcast In Conversation.

This week, in a barbershop in Lagos, we find a web of myths and stories — and a whole world — that we (at least) never knew existed. Here’s a link to Inua Ellam’s story What I Did On My Holidays By Omo Esosa on the BBC website.

The Doctor and Belinda are back in 2007 this week, after missing Voyage of the Damned by only a few days, so we decide to to pop forward in time to early May 2025 to see how Ruby is getting on after her year of travelling with the Doctor. Turns out, not well. But fortunately she’s got a pretty and supportive new boyfriend. Men, eh?

This week, Johnny Spandrell joins us as we stand around gazing into this deep hole in the ground, long enough for it to also start gazing back at us and complaining about the thing lurking behind our backs — a thing that’s unknowable, unreasonable and vile.

Everyone’s breaking the fourth wall this week, with Alan Cumming escaping through the cinema screen to terrorise some white Floridians, and the Doctor smashing through our 55-inch OLED to admire our massive collection of Dapol figurines. And we all learn a valuable lesson about how much we love the Doctor, including Belinda.

And we’re back — just in time to see a young English nurse named Belinda Chandra kidnapped from her backyard and taken to a planet named almost exactly the same thing — a planet where, it happens, a whole new season of Doctor Who is kicking off. Let’s see how she gets on.

Hope might be in short supply this Christmas, and so Steven Moffat is back for his ninth Christmas Special, with a message of hope — or possibly just a message of nuclear fusion. Also back are all his favourite heartwarming and exasperating tropes, along with just a soupçon of righteous anger. Merry Christmas, everyone.

This week, there’s a lot of hoovering to be done but nobody left alive to do it. So instead, let’s talk about how we felt about the final episode of Season 1 — a very happy ending or absolute terror?