Doctor Who Series 15 Episode 8 Review: The Reality War – Exposition and Madness

After last week’s episode of Doctor Who, I was truly hoping that things would turn around in a big way and that the season finale would deliver everything that the show needed to possibly thrust itself into a new season down the line. Except, that’s not what we got, IMO. Instead, we got another rushed tale that was full of exposition, questionable antics, and Russell T. Davies once more “reaching back into his greatest hits” to try and bring the show back to what it was during his first run. My review of The Reality War, won’t be too kind, but I’ll do my best to be fair. Call it a…wish…that I have…

Let’s start at the beginning, shall we? After the events of the last episode, The Doctor was hurtling to his “death,” the world was literally falling apart at the seams, and then…everything reset. Well, except for The Doctor, as he was saved by the one and only…Anita! You remember her, right? From the last Christmas special, at the Time Hotel? Anyway, she reveals that the day, May 23rd, keeps repeating, which is destabilizing the hotel, and she’s been granted a special key card to help him and save the day. So, with his memories now intact, he uses the Time Hotel to “let real time flow back in” and bring back everyone who knows the truth and get them on board to fight The Rani.

I’ll admit that was a clever way to handle things, as they established that the Time Hotel was both “in and out of time” all at once, so it made sense that going there would “fix things.” Then, using Kate’s UNIT gizmo to help further wake everyone up was well-handled, as she definitely would be prepared for something like that, given all the madness that she experienced in the past, and through her father’s records.

Sadly, this is where things truly go off the rails and doesn’t really get back on track. You see, what follows that opening is numerous scenes of exposition, including The Rani, Kate, and others trying to literally “spell out” the importance of Omega (and why Mell hates The Rani), even if it rewrites continuity as a result. For example, The Doctor is…sterile…? Um, okay? Was that really something that needed to happen? Also, I didn’t even recall that the Time Lords were wiped out by a “gene bomb,” so that shows how little that made an impact on me, and thus clearly needed to be “reexplained and expanded upon.”

It didn’t get better from there, for outside of a fun battle via UNIT Tower trying to take on massive bone skeletons, the rest of the plot, which, if you recall, was something built up over the entire season, was done away with in seconds flat.

The Rani was able to summon Omega…who then promptly ate her, and then Mrs. Flood used her own time travel device to flee. Okay… As for Omega, he was sent “back to hell” because he had been turned into a monster by his “own legend” and thus needed to be sealed back up. …okay…

That alone got me rolling my eyes after ALL THE EFFORT gone into the Vindicator/Mrs. Flood storyline. Just like with Ruby, it was a lot of buildup for no true, meaningful payoff. But the biggest and most confusing thing of all was Poppy and Belinda.

I’ve noted pretty much all season that Belinda was one of the “lower-tier companions” for Doctor Who, and that was enforced in this final episode. Why? Because they basically made her “relevant” by making her a mother to a baby that didn’t technically exist…and then making it clear that she “refused to let Poppy die.” That made no sense at all, especially her line about “her remembering Poppy makes her real,” except that she DOESN’T remember her in any meaningful way. In the last episode, she couldn’t remember Poppy’s birth or anything outside of her just being there. Yet, she was willing to “be stuck in time” for her, even though Poppy was nothing more than a “wish baby” that she had false memories of.

Davies doubled down on this with the ending, where The Doctor wins, Poppy survives…until she doesn’t…and then Ruby Sunday is the only one who remembers her and almost has a mental breakdown trying to convince everyone that she’s real and that The Doctor needs to save her.

None of that makes sense. Naturally, The Doctor decided to save her because the universe was “one degree off” and he needed to fix it. But it would literally cost him his life (which I’ll get to), and when he did it…things got even more maddening! How is that possible? They used that “one degree shift” to make it so that Belinda’s whole story was about “coming home to Poppy,” who was the child of her and…Al. Yeah, you remember, Al, right? From The Robot Revolution? The “incel” who dominated a planet because he thought it was a game and then tried to force Belinda to be his queen?

You see, when Ruby and The Doctor “reworked the world” via wishes and “timey-wimey” magic, they made it so both Conrad and Al had “better lives. That’s yet another “break in logic” from this episode, because apparently they (especially Ruby) remembered the evil that Conrad had done, but Al’s past misdeeds were erased from everyone’s minds, including Belinda’s. I don’t like that, because that makes it seem like “everyone gets a happy ending” instead of injustice being punished. They even had Ruby try to make Conrad a more sympathetic character via his parental woes, as though that “fixed” everything he did in “Lucky Day.” It didn’t.

So, “The Doctor’s Daughter” was no more, he “fixed reality” (Kind of?), and then it was time for Ncuti Gatwa to give his final goodbye. Yes, he regenerated after just two seasons, and I’m really not happy about that. That makes him the shortest tenured Doctor since Eccelston when the Doctor Who reboot began. And no, I don’t count Tennant’s return, that was just an “extension” of his run as the 10th Doctor. Oh, speaking of which…guess who’s back…?

…yep. Billie Piper is the new Doctor Who, and that raises all sorts of mind-numbing questions, including, “Does Russell T. Davies have any original stories left to tell?” I know that sounds mean, but this is a fair question. Across the Gatwa seasons, he’s rehashed numerous storylines, kept telling “end of the world” tales, brought back old foes just to get rid of them, and before any of that started, he brought back David Tennant to “tie up loose ends” on his original run. And now, he’s brought back Billie Piper to be The Doctor! Huh?!?!?

Given all the concerns about Doctor Who “taking a break,” this honestly reeks of him, BBC, and even Disney going “we need something to bring the fans back in!” so they looked to one of the most famous companions ever to “save things.” Except, that’s not how it works!

Not to mention, I’d be remiss in my Doctor Who The Reality War Review if I didn’t mention all the plot threads and unanswered questions that didn’t get resolved. For example, remember the Rogue cameo in the last episode? Unanswered. Or how about all the visions of Susan? Unanswered. How was Mrs. Flood able to break the 4th wall, and why did she say that the Doctor “is going to fail” if he clearly wasn’t? Unanswered! Heck, they didn’t even give Ruby a proper sendoff after her tear-filled plea to save Poppy. And, when Ruby asked, “Why did I remember everything?” The Doctor literally went, “I have no idea…but we’ve seen stranger stuff.” That’s just lazy writing. Even Anita, bless her heart, wasn’t immune from this, as “her boss” was the reason for all of the time hotel shenanigans, and we just have to “put that way” for now, and after having a big return, she was left to…hold the door…for the rest of the episode. Not cool! Oh, and The Doctor saying he “wasn’t alone because of Joy?” Just…stop.

Now, I do want to end my Doctor Who The Reality War Review on a positive note, because there was one “OMG!!!!!” moment for me…and that was seeing Jodie again. I didn’t see that coming, and Jodie Whittaker, I felt, was an incredible Doctor, and her getting a “second sendoff” after the rushed nature of Flux (which I didn’t like) really mattered to me. She and Gatwa were performing as though they had been screenmates all their lives, and much like Gatwa said near the end, I wish they had more time together.

So, where does that leave us? Well, I feel bad that Gatwa had to go out on such a weak note, as I felt he had more stories to tell. He could come back, of course, but right now, we don’t even know the future of Doctor Who! Despite all my mixed feelings about the last couple of seasons, I do want it to come back. But, if it’s only to keep “rehashing the past” instead of giving something meaningful to put out there going forward…then what’s the point?