Who Review: Boom Town
Blon Fel-Fotch Pasameer-Day Slitheen, also known as Margaret Blaine, is back. She survived the Tomahawk missile attack on 10 Downing Street (see “World War Three”), and now she’s Mayor of Cardiff, and plans to build a nuclear power station in the heart of the city. The “Blaidd Drwg” project, as she calls it, promises growth and prosperity for Cardiff. But there are rumors of a curse, and reports that the station is flawed. Safety inspectors and officials have died under mysterious circumstances, and some say that, according to the plans, if the proposed station reaches capacity, it will blow. Margaret dismisses the nay-sayers, but, of course, they’re right. After all, Blon doesn’t want to stay on Earth any longer than she has to, and a nuclear explosion might be her ticket out of this solar system. Unfortunately for her, the Doctor, Rose, Mickey, and Jack are onto her. But with the TARDIS getting a power charge on a rift in space and time that happens to be in Cardiff, keeping Blon contained might be more of a challenge than they bargained for…
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!
Just when you thought the Slitheen family were done for, it seems Blon teleported away from Downing Street in the nick of time, leaving the rest of her kin to perish. This is a fairly light story, focusing mainly on the characters, and exploring the moral dilemma posed by the TARDIS crew taking Blon back to Raxacoricofallapatorius. In their absence, the Slitheen family were put on trial, found guilty, and sentenced to death. By returning her, the Doctor and his friends are complicit in her execution. Her blood, according to Blon, is on their hands. But the Doctor knows if he doesn’t somehow call her to account for her crimes, she will continue to wreck havoc on Earth, and wherever else she goes. Blon insists she can change, but she attempts to kill the Doctor multiple times over dinner. Of course she won’t change.
Meanwhile, Mickey and Rose have unresolved issues they need to get out into the open. They try to carry on as normal, with Rose telling Mickey about the places she’s been, and Mickey suggesting they get a hotel room for the night (not something you would ever have heard suggested in Classic Who). But finally Mickey cracks, and tells Rose how betrayed he feels. It plays like a big split-up scene from a Rom-Com, but it’s a defining moment for them both. Especially as Rose tries to figure out where her loyalties lie. She may want both Mickey and the Doctor, but Mickey isn’t giving her that option.
Of course, Blon has no intention of allowing herself to be taken home by the Doctor. When the power station plan falls through, she enacts plan B: find a way to get her extrapolator hooked into the rift, and the power build-up will tear the planet apart, and she can ride those shock waves home. Captain Jack had already hooked the extrapolator to the TARDIS to try to speed up the refueling, not knowing that’s exactly what Blon wanted. What she didn’t count on, however, was the TARDIS. It opens up and she gazes into its heart. Crisis resolved–crises actually. Not only does this stop the rift destroying Earth, but it makes Blon regress back to an egg. The Doctor can now take her back to the hatchery on Raxacoricofallapatorius, and hope she will be given to a family that will raise her better. Russell T. Davies, the show-runner and episode writer, acknowledges this to be a bit of a deus ex machina solution, but not entirely. We’ve established that the TARDIS is telepathic, and can affect the minds of those who travel in her (e.g., translation–see “The End of the World”). The effect the TARDIS has on Blon is, therefore, not completely out-of-left-field. This concept of the heart of the TARDIS opening will become important later, too.
“Boom Town” is a good story, though not exceptional. As I said, it’s fairly light, and more about characters than plot. One important plot point that’s highlighted is the “Bad Wolf” theme. Rose mentions that the words seem to be following them. No matter where in time and space they go, “Bad Wolf” crops up somewhere. In this story, “Blaidd Drwg” is Welsh for “Bad Wolf.” The Doctor acknowledges it’s a strange thing, but dismisses it as a meme, like a tune that gets stuck in your head so you think it’s everywhere even when it isn’t. I don’t think he’s convinced, however. So this is an episode worth watching, but not “Must-See.”
