Every week Tor Books UK rounds up the thoughts of author and Whovian Paul Cornell on this week’s episode of Doctor Who. This week: 5 brilliant things about “Flatline.”
1.) This was another ready-to-be-filmed, considered, and sorted story in a season notable for its structure and order. As a long-term Who watcher, such consistent quality and attention to detail is a rare luxury. It’s visible in little moments of spot-on exposition, perhaps added in post-production by a production team who want us, this season, to be able to keep up, lines such as “They’re wearing the dead like camouflage.”
2.) That same logic applies to characters who always do the most direct, logical thing. Clara explains she’s talking to someone remotely, rather than do five minutes of awkward comedy concealing it. She proves her story by showing the interior of the TARDIS. Like one would.
3.) Which connects to yet another resonant character story in a season full of them. Clara gets to have a go at being the Doctor, and does it through honesty, directness, and not letting people sacrifice themselves. She’s more Davison than Capaldi. His comment at the end about goodness is crushing because it’s utterly unfair. He’s making far too much of some utterly understandable white lies. Not the first time this season, or this episode, when he’s “mirrored” her, assigning his own flaws to her and vice-versa: “I think that you were wrong about this lad.”
4.) Who would have thought there’d be so many new, simple, genius things to do with the TARDIS? There’s a lovely sense of offhand skill to the work of Jamie Mathieson, making every turn seem smooth, easy, and, only after the fact, almost obvious. The result is a lived-in, breathing, real fantasy world with real monsters. A new definition of monster is even offered, and of course it feels obvious after the fact: monsters are those that choose to be.
5.) The special effects were off the scale this week, from the sofa flattening into the wall to the flatlanders themselves. And if I’m allowed a sixth, it’s great to hear, because it’s rather rare on TV, some heroic, positive characters with West Country accents.
Read our in-depth review of “Flatline” here.
This article originally appeared on Tor UK.
The special effects for the monsters were great but I was very unimpressed with the effect of looking through the miniature TARDIS doors. I’m not sure whether it was lack of depth or a different resolution but it just felt like looking at another screen with a TARDIS around it (though to be fair- it was), just felt off.
I have a question though – When the Doctors did his Adams Family bit was the manoeuver he started with possible the way he did it?
The way he stood the Tinydis up was to wedge his palm against the edge and the base then twist his hand but being inside all he was bracing against was the TARDIS itself. I don’t think this works, does it?
@1 It didn’t look like it would work, but then I remembered that the TARDIS scoffs at event horizons, and decided she is just special. A tiny physical bootstrap paradox should be very easy with that ship.
@1
Why does he need to brace against anything? Since the door is essentially an extra-dimensional portal, all that matters is the torque on the door frame.
@2 Good point but she was having a nap at the time.
I’m still geeking out about what a big Logopolis shout-out this episode was.
I like how willing they are to court theatrical disaster and somehow pull it off. I really enjoyed this episode.
@3 But the torque on the doorframe is countered by the torque traveling from his hand to his feet to the floor to the wall to the doorframe.
Maybe Homer Simpson can solve this one (morning roundup).
I think the most brilliant thing was fairly subtle… the Doctor handing Clara a long sledgehammer through the TARDIS doors, which was in her bag.
Suddenly her bag has become a bag of holding.
They could have done so much more with that, but they pretty much just left it to that and one scientific tool.
There was so so much to like about this episode–the more I think about it, the more I like it. But I do not excuse Clara’s lies as “white” lies, and I look forward to seeing her face the consequences next week.
@7 I had to pause my DVR at that one to take a long moment of literally rolling on the floor laughing — who actually ROFLs!?
Jokes about pockets that are dimensionally transcendent are one thing, but slowing building up the TARDIS-in-the-satchel for that one perfect gag of her pulling out the sledgehammer was beyond glorious…