The Doctor (Jodie Whittaker) ends up in medieval times or thereabouts as the TARDIS she says is sending them on unusual locations. This time they witness a witch trial and a witch, so-called, being dunked until she drowns, thus proving she's not a witch. What's the logic behind that anyway, you die, you're not a witch! The Doctor reminding them not to interfere with changing history. Though she did enjoy taking part in the apple bobbing, pulling out an apple. Another thing she loves, of course this ep would've been more suited to Hallowe'en but never mind! Getting back to the ducking, the Doctor dives in to save old woman Twiston, who says to her granddaughter that she will be with her through the wind, earth etc, a clue if ever there was one to what was happening, but she can't save her. Lady Becka Savage (Siobhan Finneran) tells them she was a witch and the Doctor shows her the Psychic paper again (been using that quite a bit) to tell her she's the Witchfinder General. In which case Becka suggests they should talk in private. The Doctor agrees as long as there are no more deaths.
She takes them to her house and Graham (Bradley Walsh) recognizes they're in Lancashire as he sees Pendel Hill - scene of the witch trials. He's been on the walk and he didn't see Bilehurst Cragg (apt name!) which they suspect means Becka must've done something to erase it from existence. When they reach the Hall, Yaz (Mandip Gill) decides to check up on T but she didn't think of that before she came all this way. When she finds her she's burying her grandmother and she gets attacked by a tendril (which reminded me of that scene in Supernatural season 13.17 The Thing ep with Dean (Jensen Ackles) and the tentacle! ha.) Yaz beats it away with a stick. At the Hall, they talk of what they are doing and Becka has killed 35 people by accusing them of being a witch. They're interrupted by King James I (Alan Cumming) who was watching them out in the woods wearing a mask. He looks at the Pyschic paper and tells her it reads Witchfinder Assistant, thus Graham must be her boss - being a man! He says it's a flat internal structure where everyone has a job to do. The Doctor confessing if she was a man she could just get on with the job and not have to defend herself or be seen as a useless woman. "These are hard times for women. If we’re not being drowned, we’re being patronized to death." James takes a shine to Ryan (Tosin Cole) who says he's in paperwork. Which makes him like him even more!
When they get a chance they sneak out and search Becka's room, where she finds books on Satan, and plenty of hankies. As Ryan finds an axe under her bed. Thus there's more going on here than meets the eye. As Yaz finds them and tells them about the tendril. The Doctor analyzes the mud on Yaz's clothes and concludes it's just normal mud. But she goes to see Willa (Tilly Steele) who tells her that her grandmother was a healer. The Doctor saying she's a doctor too. She's too frightened to face Becka as Yaz tells her a story about being bullied at school by Izzy and she just had to put up with it. Willa can face her fears and face up to Becka or she can help them.
James shows Ryan and Graham his witch hunter box of gadgets and body parts and shows off the pricking tool which hits the mark on the witch and draws blood. Ryan tries to talk him out of anymore killing; but they're not successful. Though he gives Graham his former Protector's hat, who betrayed him and so he shot him, as well as giving Ryan all seeing eye to keep an eye on him. They head out to the woods to find some more victims and as the Doctor searches in the mud which she finds is alien, she finds an alien species of some sort, Yaz and Willa point to her grandmother who has risen. The Doctor adding it's the alien form "filling" her body, as she demands the thing she found and eats it. More turn up. The Doctor concluding she wants to fill her body too, but can't have it. The others hear screams and find the Doctor.
As they follow after them, James arrests the Doctor for being a witch and being behind it. She talks to him about seeing many things and she could tell him all about it if he gives her back her wand - the Sonic. But he refuses, even mentioning his mother again. As he did when he spoke to Ryan about her and how she died when he was young; being beheaded. As well as Guy Fawkes trying to kill him, though he's not mentioned by name. Ryan adding he lost his mother and Nan too; but they weren't killed, which makes things different. However the Doctor tells James how he could've seen his mother if he wanted to, but he didn't.
"You can’t go hurting people just because you’re scared to face up to the darkness inside you, you have to be better than that." He doesn't give in to her and the Doctor finds herself in the dunking chair. As she tries to reason with Becka and find out what happened, she finds she can't. Becka's eye bleeds and she doesn't have a hankie either.
The Doctor is dunked and finally Witchfinder Graham tells him to stop it. When he does, the Doctor's vanished and comes out of the water later, saying she got some tips of getting out of chains from Houdini. Becka tells her how she cut down the tree on the hill as it was obstructing her view and then she was afflicted by something she thought was the work of Satan. She changes into the true alien, the Morax. They were locked in the hill where the tree was and the tree was the lock keeping them in. Which wasn't that hard to figure out. They must fix the lock again to keep them in as Becka tries to revive her king. The Doctor lights up torches from the fire which will stop them, as Willa wants to help.
The Doctor saves James from being killed and he burns "the witch" Becka as he puts it. Thanking the Doctor for saving his life. He wants Ryan as Protector, but Ryan replies he will be keeping his eye on him, as he returns the eye to James. The Doctor telling James she doesn't want word of what happened here getting around and he agrees. Explaining why there wasn't nay mention of Bilehurst Cragg. He also sees the TARDIS along with Willa, who is going to become a healer too.
Oh what another Doctor Who baddie with a name ending in an "...ax" Not very original! Neither was this Lady of stature actually chopping the tree down herself, otherwise she wouldn't have gotten others to do the dunking and also done that for herself too. James preferring to travel incognito and Becka having a copy of his treatise 'Daemonologie' in her room, was willing to accept him for who he was and to undertake his work with him. Though James was flawed in that this Lady was more acceptable to him in carrying out the killings, yet the Doctor as Witchfiner General was too serious a role for a woman to undertake. Class differences there seeping through like the thinly veined mud aliens. Those vampires from Doctor Who in Vampires of Venice the women being 'filled' by the Morax really weren't ha! Siobhan Finneran of course was the dastardly O'Brien in Downton Abbey.
No comments:
Post a Comment