Doctor Who wrapped it’s eleventh season with The Battle of Ranskoor Av Kolos. So far, the new creative team has focused on individual stories while building up the Thirteen Doctor. This year, instead of a Christmas Special, fans got a New Years Day special. Essentially, it’s true season finale, and Resolution tied up a number of lose ends for one of the TARDIS crew. It also raised new questions.
The Impossible Opponent
The episode opens with a narrator talking about a historical event. The narrator describes a massive battle against a remorseless opponent. The enemy they battled was so terrifying it scared them into dedicating their lives to protecting the body of this mysterious creature. One of the group, called the custodians, doesn’t make it to his destination. He’s shot and killed and his body is left under Sheffield hall. In the present era, two archaeologists are excavating the third custodian’s body. The workers, called Mitch and Lin, unearth a piece of the remorseless opponent’s body. They place it under an ultraviolet light. Doing so causes the body piece to come to life. It disturbs the two other custodians descendants as the creature puts itself back together. It escapes into the sewers and one of the workers goes to investigate it.
Meanwhile, the Doctor and her crew are viewing cosmic fireworks. The whole group is entranced by the sight. An alarm goes off on the TARDIS that draws them back to earth. The Doctor arrives and meets with Mitch and Lin. There is slime on the walls of the site. The Doctor takes samples of the slime and orders her crew back into the TARDIS. Mitch and Lin leave the site with Lin acting strangely. Meanwhile the Doctor heads to Graham’s house to analyze the samples she collected.
Aaron’s Microwave Oven
The TARDIS arrives with a bang, breaking one of Graham’s chairs. The group discusses the alien and there’s a knock on the door. Ryan goes to answer it and returns refusing to say who it is. Graham goes to answer it and reveals that it’s Aaron, Ryan’s absent father. Aaron wants to take Ryan out for coffee. Graham warns Aaron about hurting Ryan, saying that he’s been through a lot. The episode takes us back to Lin who is now acting as the host for the squid creature. The squid creature calls her it’s puppet. Back on the TARDIS, the Doctor is horrified to read the results of her analysis. The Doctor identifies the creature for the first time . It’s a Dalek.
The Doctor describes the Dalek to Ryan, Yaz, and Graham. The Doctor impresses the seriousness of the situation onto Graham telling him that it won’t stop. Yaz tries to reach Lin and fails. Lin is now fully under control of the Dalek. The episode shows us her driving along the highway. She’s pulled over by the police. She kills them while under the Dalek’s control. Back with the group, Ryan and his father have coffee. His father tries to sell a microwave oven to a local coffee shop. Ryan berates him for his actions and not being there for him.
The Doctor retrieves Mitch. The group talk about how the Dalek put itself back together and Mitch introduces the group to the order of the custodians. The custodians paid for the excavation that Mitch and Lin were working on. The group put together that Lin is somehow being controlled by the Dalek. Meanwhile, Lin breaks into a warehouse and steals a bunch of mysterious weapons. Fans of the series will recognize them. They’re the parts of a Dalek’s weaponry.
Me And a Dalek? It’s Personal
The Doctor learns that the Dalek is a recon scout. That makes the Dalek a different Dalek then one seen in the series before with different capabilities. The doctor interrupts the Dalek leaving the warehouse and trades barbs with it. The Doctor tells the Dalek it doesn’t have any chance. While they try and hunt the Dalek down, the Doctor tries to call for help. When the Doctor dials UNIT, Unified Intelligence Taskforce, the Doctor learns it’s been disbanded. As the Doctor and the government representative talk, the Doctor declares that the group is on their own. Back at Graham’s house, Graham points out Aaron’s faults to him. They reconcile.
Meanwhile, the Dalek arrives on a mysterious farm. The Dalek kills the farmer and goes to work in his forge, using Lin’s body as a tool to help rebuild it’s body. The Doctor, Yaz, Ryan, and Mitch arrive at the farm. They find Lin, who has fought the Dalek off and is no longer being controlled. The Doctor orders everyone out of the barn and faces off against the Dalek who is back in it’s metal casing. The two battle and the Dalek flies away.
The Doctor chases after the Dalek, as the Dalek goes up against the British military. The Dalek flies off to the central hub of communications for Britain. The Dalek kills the man on duty and takes over the building. It uses the communications array to try and signal the Dalek fleet.
I Will Always Be In Your Way
The group returns to Graham’s house to collect him and ends up collecting Aaron as well. They use Aaron’s microwave oven to try and build a device to fry the Dalek inside it’s armor. When they arrive at the communications hub, the Doctor and the Dalek exchange more barbs. The Dalek’s casing is destroyed. It escapes and takes over Aaron’s body. The Dalek demands that the Doctor take it to the Dalek home world. The Doctor agrees to do so but tricks the Dalek. The Doctor takes the group aboard the TARDIS and opens the doors above a star going super nova. The Dalek refuses to let go and nearly gets Aaron sucked out into space. Ryan steps in to save him. The Dalek is pulled off his back and dissolved in the supernova.
The Doctor takes the group back to earth. The Doctor offers Aaron a trip and Aaron declines. He gives Ryan a hug and promises they’ll talk again when he gets back. The Doctor takes the group back out for another adventure. The TARDIS fades out as Mitch and Lin watch and hold hands. The episode ends with the narrator describing their battle just like the narrator described the battle at the beginning of the episode.
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