Who Review: Demons of the Punjab

Yaz is celebrating her grandmother’s birthday with her family when her grandmother springs gifts on her daughter and granddaughters. The gift she gives Yaz is strange and intriguing. A broken watch which she says should never be repaired and that’s all she will say. She also lets slip that she was the first Muslim woman to be married in Pakistan. Overwhelmed with curiosity and getting no answers from her grandmother, Yaz turns to the Doctor. Just one hour to see her grandmother when she was young and learn about the watch–what harm could that do? Pressured by the rest of the TARDIS team and her own curiosity, the Doctor allows the TARDIS to read time and navigational information from the watch. The TARDIS materializes in the Punjab in 1947. The Doctor quickly realizes the potential danger. It’s the day before the partitioning of India. As tensions mount between Hindus and Muslims, Yaz’s Muslim grandmother is about to marry a Hindu. And the man she’s about to marry is not Jaz’s grandfather, and he’s wearing the watch. As if this isn’t enough, the religious leader who is supposed to officiate the wedding turns up dead in the woods. Presiding over his body are members of a race of aliens the Doctor knows as vicious assassins. Plans to leave in an hour might have to be scrapped… perhaps permanently.

SPOILER ALERT!! My comments may (and likely will) contain spoilers for those that haven’t seen the episode. If you want to stay spoiler-free, please watch the story before you continue reading!

This story is the first of a set of stories not written by show-runner Chris Chibnall (he co-wrote episode 3, “Rosa”). “Demons of the Punjab” was written by rising playwright Vinay Patel, who in his relatively brief career so far has already received some notable accolades. And I think he does an outstanding job with his first Doctor Who story. A fine balance of sci-fi mystery and historical drama, “Demons of the Punjab” is a great piece of storytelling.

The historical aspect of the story is one that is probably lost on most of the Western world outside the UK. And even for those in the UK, unless you are of Pakistani descent, I doubt you know that much. I certainly didn’t and I grew up and went to school in the UK. That said, I can’t vouch for how historically accurate it is, though I think Vinay has kept factual detail to a minimum so the purists will have less to complain about. The broad facts are, from what I can determine, true. There was a partition line drawn in India that created the modern state of Pakistan in 1947. Somewhere around 2 million people died in the violence following partition. Many millions more moved from India to Pakistan or vice versa depending on religious affiliation–the largest mass migration in history. Its around this framework that Vinay builds his story.

One of the first things that occurred to me as I watched was how close this story is to being a Who historical in the true sense of the word. The true historical is one in which the Doctor (and perhaps one or more of his companions) is the only alien presence. Everything else, including the enemy they’re fighting, is of the period. I think the last historical story of this nature was “Black Orchid” in 1982. In Vinay’s story we have the Vajarians who are a spiky, many-eyed race of assassins. But as the Doctor learns, they have repented of their murderous ways. Now they live to attend the deaths of the forgotten so they will never actually be forgotten. They know when people are going to die and show up in time to record their deaths. The Vajarians therefore have no influence on events.

I’m not sure why the Vajarians didn’t explain themselves from the get-go. That would have saved a lot of time. But I suppose it would have also robbed the story of a major twist. Perhaps they gave a reason why they appeared so hostile to the Doctor and her friends at first and I missed it?

Some might critique the show as being rather obvious PC pandering. Yes, we have a Muslim-Hindu wedding set in the Punjab written by an Asian. I would certainly concede that Doctor Who is trying to be culturally relevant. But that’s not new for Doctor Who. And while diversity carries a lot of cultural currency these days, Doctor Who has rarely shied away from casting diversely, even when it was not popular to do so. The show’s first director, Waris Hussein, was Asian, and the first producer, Verity Lambert, was female. It was also not uncommon to have black actors cast in roles that could have equally gone to white actors, even early in the Classic Series. I think particularly of the astronaut Williams in “The Tenth Planet” from 1966. So, sure, the show is playing to a more multi-cultural and culturally-aware (even culturally-sensitive) society. But this is not really that much of a stretch for Doctor Who. And here I think that cultural awareness makes for a fascinating story.

There are some other interesting elements embedded in the story. One of these is the Doctor’s willingness to marry Yaz’s grandmother to the wrong man. She tells Yaz to tread lightly with her grandmother since her interference could wipe herself out of history. The Doctor then supports and agrees to officiate Yaz’s grandmother’s marriage to the guy who is not Yaz’s grandfather. This is a huge gamble. What if her encouragement causes Yaz’s grandmother to marry the wrong person, eliminating Yaz from history? And yet not supporting the union could have roused suspicions and questions, perhaps creating even more danger for Yaz.

To sum up, I enjoyed this story. While it is another play on the classic Romeo and Juliet theme of forbidden love, it is compellingly told and performed. It also entices the viewer to learn more about this difficult time in Pakistan and India’s history. I’d certainly recommend watching it.

Did you see it? What did you think?