By its very nature , Doctor Who is a formulaic show . You ’ve get the Doctor , you ’ve experience a companion , they go on an risky venture , there ’s a scary monster , they overcome it , and are back in the TARDIS in metre to do it all over again . But its latest episode did something to twist that : it gave some major consequence to the threat the Doctor and Bill faced .
Without that addition , “ Oxygen ” would ’ve been an entertaining , if benighted , take on classic Who ’s rebellious streak of anti - capitalist economy — like the Tom Baker serial publication “ The Sunmakers”—with a destiny less ingroup and a lot more space zombie . That would ’ve been all fine ; Doctor Who loves itself an “ rust the productive ” sort of story every once in a while . And this was a ripe one of those , especially as it played with the ongoing theme of this season , the value put on a individual life , in an interesting if literal manner . But what elevated “ Oxygen ” from a good episode of Doctor Who into what could be a game - vary episode of Doctor Who was the fact that the Doctor ’s brash actions finally caught up with him in a way that had real , real consequences for both himself and his fellow traveller .
ordinarily the MD can get by with a lot over the course of his dangerous undertaking — he ’s the Hero of Alexandria after all , it ’s sort of his job — and unremarkably the only sort of rebound he face up is that every once in a while someone will chastise him for the people he ’s gotten killed or the lives he ’s smash and make him feel bad for a bit . Sometimes the terms is that he loses a traveling supporter , but even then he can eagerly find himself a replacement and pack on doing what he does . But “ Oxygen ” finally gave the Doctor a effect that could n’t just be handwaved away in time for the next instalment : something that might , finally , play into how Peter Capaldi ’s twelfth personification exits the serial altogether .
Before we get into that , though , the episode also give something similar to Bill in the bod of not one , but two completely torturous experiences : being force out into the vacuity of space without a helmet , and then abandoned in a malfunction spacesuit to be attacked by the ogre of the hebdomad and apparently die alone . While both moments dissolve in way that think Bill was okay by the episode ’s end , in the moment they were both extremely effectively done — especially the latter which saw a desperate Bill scream out for her mom while she was apparently being killed on screen door .
A Doctor Who associate usually faces danger ( like I read , part of the job ) but they ’re unremarkably protected by the fact that , unless they ’re about to leave the show , they ’re one of the independent stars . The hearing sleep with that , the writers have it off that , but even then these moments campaign the limit of what the show could do to a fellow in some unrelentingly grim way for what is still a family TV show . Sure , it also made the eventual resolution — that Bill ’s go spacesuit did n’t have the vitality to fully terminate her , just render her unconscious — feel even sleazy than it usually does when Doctor Who pull an “ everybody lives ” consequence , but hopefully the fact that this episode put Bill through hell in away like nothing so far this time of year has , go to some longstanding leg about how she feels travel with the Doctor .
Even if the prior incident — being push out into the emptiness of place — didn’t have as many branch for Bill herself , it had a immense one for the Doctor . In a typically Doctorish enactment of bravado , it ’s bring out that Bill was saved by the Doctor sacrifice his own helmet to keep her alive , but at the cost of him being temporarily dim . Like most things in Who , and even like Bill ’s dilemma by the terminal of “ Oxygen , ” it was expect the Doctor would , as he always does , get over this with a paw waving and move on to the next adventure . The fact that , as the episode ’s cliffhanger ending revealed , he ’s still blind and the cure he thought he had does n’t act , gives the show one of its most fascinating dilemma in a recollective while : not just for the fact it stimulate the Doctor more vulnerable than he ever has been , but for the fact that he now has to face a tangible consequence for his action .
Time will tell if this is ultimately a courageous experimentation for the show or just a diversion that ’s solved an sequence later instead of like a shot . The latter would n’t be too surprising , but it certainly would surcharge “ Oxygen ” of a lot of its impact . If this blinding of the Doctor has a larger role to wreak in his impending regeneration , however , Doctor Who is embarking on some pretty bold storytelling in way it rarely has .
Assorted Musings (in Time and Space):
The initiative prologue to this installment might just be one of the most effective openings the show has done in a while . creepy-crawly space action , wonderfully chatoyant — the moment poor Ivan face up only to see Ellie ’s helmet float by into outer space was brilliantly done .
It was really nice to see Nardole have a substantive role in this episode , especially as a contrast to Bill in terms of someone who by design does not want to be on an adventure at all . It ’s probably not something the show could confirm over a foresighted menstruum — although it ’s played with the mind with a few companions in the past , arguably proper from the beginning with Barbara and Ian — but it ’s an interesting angle to add into the mixing .
Still no answer to just who ’s in the bank vault , but the trailer for next calendar week ’s episode seems to to a great extent imply that it ’s Missy , which would be far from a surprise at this point . We ’ll have to look and see if it all pan out as everyone predicted , but still , it feels so obvious at this point I ’m pretty convinced it ’s a red Clupea harangus .
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