Doctor WhoFeeds a New Mystery by Plundering One From Its Past

The Weeping Angels are one of mod Doctor Who ’s strangest paradox . Theirsmash - hit introduction in “ Blink”instantly created a iconic presence few other tool of the revived era of the showcould immediately require . And yet , they ’re dangerous to habituate : theAngels are beloved , so multitude want more , but the more you see them , the more what made them iconic gets blunted . This workweek Doctor Who might have finally pushed that danger a little too far .

“ Village of the Angels ” for the most part opens with what feels something in the vein of “ War of the Sontarans ” early on in Flux — a few scant here and there nod to thezillions of lingering story threadspermeating the entire miniseries , but otherwise a standalone episode revolving around a authoritative monster . It ’s here that “ Village ” in reality works comfortably , giving us Doctor Who ’s most favourite of tale coif ups , the base under siege , but making that base … a quaint , darkly dismount British village in the tardy 1960s . A lone scientist , a vicar , and some pensionary : not a soldier in sight , no citizenry who might even have a vague idea of the horror on their doorsill , just atmosphere and drama , mystery , and threat .

That ’s the stark environment to throw the Weeping Angels into , and they work here rather wonderfully . There ’s some truly dandy moments of desperation , even as we as an interview know full well just how badly thing are about to get for the Doctor , Yaz , Graham , and their fleeting young friends ( mostly Professor Jericho , played by Kevin McNally , and Annabel Scholey ’s Claire , the mystery fair sex who showed up to yell “ Hello ! I ’m setting up this installment you ’re now experience four calendar week later ” in themessy season premiere ) . solitary angels in disguise as tombstone in church building burying ground , darkness and fog obscuring armies of them trying to track down down the Doctor as she desperately tries to see out going on . “ Village ” even , here , induce to leverage its status as a connected miniseries to play with our expectation and deliver a proper surprise to the audience when both Yaz and Dan get zapped into 1901 not even 10 minutes into the sequence — our untouchable heroes , now very much touched and forced to carry on with the ramifications of the Angel ’s original , chillingly tiresome “ last . ” This is Doctor Who as a creature feature in the horror common sense in a manner we ’ve rarely seen in Chibnall ’s geological era — perhaps outside of“Haunting of Villa Diodati ” last season , and it ’s fitting then that this episode is the sole of Flux to have a co - writing acknowledgment , with that episode ’s author , Maxine Alderton — and it really works , just letting the Angels be the mysterious , scary unyielding lunar time period they were when we first suffer them .

Nothing says a bad time like a hot sonic screwdriver.

Nothing says a bad time like a hot sonic screwdriver.Image: BBC

… If you ’re sensing a but coming , well , here it is . There comes a degree in “ Village of the Angels ” that its status as a one - off creature feature of speech has to derive smashing into the dramatic unavoidably of not its titulary monster , but its nature as part of this ongoing Flux story , and it ’s a showdown that arguably not even the Angels get out of unscathed . For the most part , the primal central mystery of “ Village ” is what the Angels want with Claire , who ’s see visual modality of them in her dreams , was aim by them in the present , and now find oneself herself the target of their ira , much to the Doctor ’s mental confusion , plagued by imaginativeness of their image , and herself as becoming part of their quantum - touch brood . The way “ Village ” reply this mystery blows the inquiry about Flux ’s blanket story wide open , blows the story of the Doctor ’s own past open even more than it was already , and sets the stagecoach for a enormously long list of things to get direct in just two episode of Doctor Who . But in doing so , it take one of the core , scary conceit of the Angels — that we do n’t cognize what their overarching purpose is , that they just feed off fourth dimension as creatures crave of its potentiality — and practically wholly obliterate it , render them significantly less substantive than they were before .

It ’s finally revealed that the reason that Claire is target by the Angels is there is one manifested inside her psyche — have it so that previous “ any mental image of an Angel becomes an Angel ” rule applies to even thinking about one in your idea ’s eye — not maliciously , but to hide from its fellow Angels . This is because these Angels , and their rogue operative , are all actually in secret members of Division , the unknown organization that has ties to both theFugitive Doctor ’s yesteryear workwith them and … basically everything pass in Flux . Remember when “ Crack in sentence ! ” used to be the go - to apologize for anything happening in Matt Smith ’s first season as the Doctor ? For Flux , it ’s “ naval division ! ” dispose into as many sentences as potential , in the desperate hope that our gross lack of knowledge of what the Division even is will paper over the chap pass on in any ongoing plot . The ex - Division Angel in Claire want the Doctor ’s help in interchange for memories that will explain both her past and what the Division is really about , and their former friend are very stabbing to lay off that by … suddenly being able-bodied to do a caboodle of new things that feel less like natural phylogenesis of the room the Angels function and more like necessities for the plot of Flux to reach a particular termination .

Even away from Angels judge to certify inside constitutive beings — an interesting idea with the groundwork in stories like “ Time of the Angels ” and “ Flesh and Stone”—things just chop-chop accelerate for the Angels ’ tool kit once “ Village ” play its variance trump card in a baffling way . Angels can suddenly talk now , using people ’s voices as psychic imprint . They can snub off villages from quad and time ( we ’re told it ’s quantum extraction , but we ’re never render how or why it ’s done , people just say “ quantum descent ” and nod sagely like it means something ) , they can transport victims back to a individual specific spot and time at will , they can drink down by “ double - touching ” victims , they can push limbs through cave wall , they can make an integral cairn system out of Angels , just because . Suddenly , by being lift as authoritative to this wider doc Who mystery story , the Angels become less of a specific terror an instalment has to be devised around , and something break and reshaped to meet the need of this specific episode and the Flux narrative . And the second the Angels feel like they can just do anything as long as the plot needs it , the mo they lose one of their greatest assets since we first met them : the mystery of how and why they function so well in the first position .

Image: BBC

Those limitations been chipped away turn by bit with every appearance since “ Blink , ” but that ’s just an inevitability . There ’s only so many ways to re - assure the concepts of that initial appearance , so the Angels do want to grow and amplify in their toolkit . But now that mystery story feels all but go , but not because we really learned more about them as wight — it ’s but been replace with the Angels being a part of this still - unanswered mystery of whatever the snake pit the Division is , and its kinship to Azure , Swarm , and the Flux .

And so , rather of concluding a story in the mo , “ Village of the Angels ” instead involve us to wait a little more for its return : the Doctor is turn out off from her friend , betray by the Angels and turned over to the Division , and finds herself transform into an Angelic , prisoned statue form herself . It ’s a prominent cliffhanger to be sure , and one that call forth the stakes for whatever answer are to amount as Flux gets into its final time of day . But whether those answers are deserving the sacrifice of so much of what made the Angels such a compelling physician Who creature all those twelvemonth ago remains to be seen .

Assorted Musings

As bizarre as the cliffhanger was , the shot of the Doctor being turn “ into ” an Angel for capture was really pretty well done , and a creepy look . If there were still Doctor Who activeness figure being made on a regular basis , Angel Doctor would be a great one !

The hyper - specificity of the Angels zapping villager back to the same village but 66 eld prior produce the strange secular loop of the unseasoned lacking girl Peggy meet her aged ego , Mrs. Hayward , but … how did n’t that produce a timey - wimey incubus ? possibly if we shout “ quantum origin ! ” enough we ’ll be fine .

The other Flux thread we get to see throughout this episode is a piece more of Bel and Vinder ’s attempt to colligate up with each other — and how that cross with Azure ’s plans , tempting survivor of the Flux into “ safety ” via being absorb into one of the masked Passenger being . Why these forms ? Why gather them if , as with the case so far , all we ’ve seen is people in these anatomy being used as mass - extinction bargaining chip ? Given next week ’s title , perhaps we ’ll line up out preferably rather than later .

Image: BBC