Television Review

Doctor Who — ‘Revolution of the Daleks’ [New Year’s Day Special, 2021] ★★★☆☆

The Doctor finds herself imprisoned, as an alien threat returns in a familiar new form back on Earth…

The prospect of seeing The Doctor (Jodie Whittaker) doing time in “space jail” sounds like an engaging special — maybe providing a big acting showcase for Whittaker in a sci-fi Shawshank Redemption type of story. The ‘prison break’ storyline may be overused, but transposing the genre’s many cliches to Doctor Who would have been entertaining — with The Doctor potentially facing aeons behind bars, surrounded by hardened alien criminals with a reason to hate her. So it’s a shame “Revolution of the Daleks” dispenses with this juicy idea so quickly, in favour of something run-of-the-mill, with Jack Harkness (John Barrowman) swiftly arriving with a “breakout ball” to whisk The Doctor back to her TARDIS. We’re told it took him nearly two decades to exact this plan, but the passage of time isn’t felt — despite a few scenes of The Doctor chalking up the days on her cell’s walls.

Quite why Chris Chibnall chose to write another Dalek story for New Year’s Day, precisely a year since he already wrote one (2020’s “Resolution”), is anyone’s guess! We know the Terry Nation estate demand Who’s most iconic villains are used once a year, under terms of their license, but it seems unwise to have them be the basis for two seasonal specials in a row. And that issue’s exacerbated by the fact this special is effectively “Resolution: Part 2”, not adding much new to the Dalek mythos.

However, I can’t deny “Revolution of the Daleks” was mostly entertaining and contained a few smart ideas and enjoyable sequences. Having the Dalek race revived by Jack Robertson (Chris Noth), the smarmy American hotelier from “Arachnids in the UK”, was a decent idea that meant time didn’t have to be wasted introducing a new human villain. I especially liked how his intentions were honourable, if greedy, as he stole the remnants of the ‘Recon Dalek’ from “Revolution” thanks to tip-off from politician Joe Patterson (Harriet Walker) — and then financed inventor Leo Rugazzi (Nathan Stewart-Jarrett) to turn them into riot control automatons. A little shady, but he wasn’t intending to use the Daleks as anything other than a money-making scheme.

The difficulty with Dalek episodes is finding fresh ways to tell a story involving them, as they have a narrow scope in terms of their goals and personalities. I thought Chibnall’s script found a fresh way to bring them back for another “invasion” story, even if it might’ve been nice to remind audiences why nobody seems to remember the countless times the Daleks have tied to take over Earth before now.

And returning to the development from “Revolution” (that squid-like Daleks can control the minds and bodies of people, by attaching themselves to us), continues to give them a more insidious menace — even if that’s now just a rehash of last year’s New Year’s Day special.

The rest of the special was on shakier ground, but the quality of Doctor Who under Chibnall’s stewardship has cratered so much that anything half-way competent feels like a winner. So this special got by on the inherent fun of seeing a resurrected Dalek mass-produce clones of its kind, plotting to teleport themselves into their readymade shells just as Patterson (now the Prime Minister) announced them as the UK’s new security defence.

One can debate the plausibility of how we get there (it’s never adequately explained how the revived Recon Dalek setup a laboratory in Japan without Leo knowing about it, despite them having a symbiotic relationship), and the way the squid-Daleks are able to teleport across the globe is heinous corner-cutting… but I’m in a forgiving mood. It was Christmas last week.

One extra source of excitement was the long-awaited return of pansexual Captain Jack Harkness, who was a prominent part of the Russell T. Davies era, but somehow never appeared in the Steven Moffat run — despite how Moffat technically created the character, or at least wrote for him first. If you’re a fan of Jack, there was certainy fun in seeing him back on the show that made Barrowman a cult favourite around the world. He got to make unsubtle jokes about The Doctor’s change in appearance and earned plenty of welcome side-eye from Yaz (Mandip Gill) about his tendencies to seek approval for everything he does. Insecure, much?

Chibnall’s era is clearly an attempt to bring back the accessible charm of the RTD years, when the show was at its ratings peak and you didn’t need a PhD to track the timey-wimey plots. Having Jack back reinforced that feeling. The strange thing is that Jack’s return, while amusing in bursts, didn’t seem like a big deal in the context of the story itself — perhaps because there was too much else going on! And in a series that has problems juggling three companions, having Jack around as a fourth made it difficult to concentrate on the fact he was back on another overdue adventure with The Doctor.

One aspect that worked for me, and partly rescued the episode, was The Doctor’s creative way to solve the Dalek invasion. Her sonic screwdriver wasn’t even used once! The idea of surreptitiously hailing “SAS Daleks” to exterminate the “impure” strain Robertson created was enjoyable enough, with after some ‘Dalek vs. Dalek’ action on a suspension bridge, I loved the final solution to destroy the victorious OG Daleks. Having the leftover TARDIS from Gallifrey disguise itself as the regular police box TARDIS, then have all the Daleks swarm inside and find themselves trapped and crushed when it self-destructed, was a clever way to end their threat. In a show that often rushes to find ludicrous solutions to big problems, with The Doctor spewing gobbledegook or waving her sonic around at consoles, this felt both intelligent and plausible to me.

It also helped remove the stink of The Doctor needing rescuing from the Judoon prison, as I was worried this might become another story where Thirteen kind of bumbles her way to success or relies on someone else doing most of the work. (But again, the episode missed a trick in not showing us a trial sequence and leaning into the idea of a locked-up Doctor, if you ask me.)

A solid ending was slightly undone by the extended denouement, as Ryan (Tosin Cole) suddenly announced he wants to stop going on adventures with The Doctor and… well, go back to hanging around with his mates? And this means Graham (Bradley Walsh) felt compelled to stick around with his adopted grandson — forgetting he’s in a time machine and could literally spend every day with Ryan in-between other adventures. Oh well.

It’s been rumoured for ages that Ryan and Graham would be leaving the show, so there was no surprise here, but it didn’t work even despite that. There was nothing about this story that factored into Ryan’s decision to quit being one of the “fam” (wince), so it just felt like a random choice. His life in Sheffield hasn't been presented as preferable to what The Doctor is offering, so there was no emotional anchor there. They could have done a subtle arc of Ryan suffering PTSD from battling aliens and monsters, or something, so that a dull life back in England now had an appeal. And it’s strange considering they did introduce Ryan’s absentee father last year — so bringing him back might have made it seem understandable why Ryan just wants to try living a normal family life now. (Oddly, the denouement suggests Ryan and Graham will go on their own adventures, using the psychic paper The Doctor gave them, helping to defend the Earth in her absence. So, do you want a normal life with your fiends, or not, Ryan?!)

I won’t be sad to see Tosin Cole go. He always seemed to be operating with a low energy level, when a show like Doctor Who demands you grab these scripts by the scruff of their necks. His presence was always a drag. But he did get a decent scene here and there, including one here when he spoke one-on-one with The Doctor (for what seems like the first time!) tried tried to get her to open up about her experiences in “The Timeless Children”. (It was a comical reminder that the companions have no idea what happened in that finale, from The Doctor’s perspective!). Anyway, Ryan’s laidback vibe worked for that scene, as a way to encourage The Doctor to open up — a little. I just don’t think the actor was ever a good fit for the show’s tone, so didn’t shed any tears over him leaving.

I’ve enjoyed Bradley Walsh a lot more on the show (for his own innate charisma), but can’t even say I’ll miss Graham too much either. And that’s because the character’s story arc ended long ago and he’s had no real direction since his first series. It makes sense to continue the show with The Doctor and Yaz as a traditional time-travelling duo¹, but saying goodbye to two companions should have been more emotional than it was! This easily ranks as the limpest farewell for two companions, and they both had twice the time to leave an impression compared to Freema Agyeman, Catherine Tate, and Pearl Mackie. It just goes to demonstrate the lack of quality to the writing that we can spend so long with characters that, ultimately, haven’t left a mark.

It was also a strange choice to have Ryan’s final screen moment be him falling off his bicycle on the top of that hill overlooking Sheffield, mirroring his introduction in “The Woman Who Fell to Earth”. It signified he’s progressed very little since Series 11, when it might have been better to see him cycling away with more confidence and ability? It was an unintentionally amusing way to leave Ryan face-planting on the grass just as the credits rolled.

Overall, “Revolution of the Daleks” felt bigger than last year’s special, even if none of the ideas were as fresh and it struggled to give two regular characters a suitable exit. This wasn’t a disaster, but I’m still waiting patiently for Chris Chibnall to quietly leave the show and pass the baton a writer with a vision that pushes Doctor Who forward — without needlessly picking away at what made it good.

1. Okay, bit of an update: comedian John Bishop has been cast as a new companion for Series 13, called Dan. As I commented below, it does seem strange to go with another 'older' companion (Bishop's 6 years younger than Bradley Walsh at 54), and stranger still that he's another household name British comedian. Chris Chibnall clearly seems to think Catherine Tate's casting was sublime and is trying to recapture that lightning in a bottle. But let's see what Dan's all about, and Bishop did already prove himself a decent actor on Skins.

Cast & Crew

writer: Chris Chibnall.
director: Lee Haven Jones.
starring: Jodie Whittaker, Bradley Walsh, Mandip Gill, Tosin Cole, John Barrowman, Chris Noth, Harriet Walter, Nathan Stewart-Jarrett,