Who Review: Flux Chapter Five: Survivors of the Flux

Last time, the Doctor was turned into a Weeping Angel. This episode begins by revealing that this was just for transportation purposes. She was “converted” and the Weeping Angels decided to use the Angel form for their amusement. When she arrives at her final destination, she is led by an Ood to an old lady she’s met before: Awsok, who welcomes her back to Division. Meanwhile, the Doctor’s friends, Yaz, Dan, and now Jericho, are in Mexico looking for a pot. The year is 1904 and they need that pot because properly decoded, it can tell them when the end of the world will be. They need to know so they can find a way there to try to stop it from happening…

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

I don’t know about you, but I found this episode quite convoluted on a scale that would impress Steven Moffat. So I re-watched and took notes. I understand what’s happening better, but if you’re having to cram this much story into 50 minutes, you’re doing something wrong. One of the things that made the previous episode good was that the story was relatively easy to follow. Sci-fi doesn’t have to be simple, but if you only have 50-60 minutes to tell a story, you have to engage your audience and keep them following you. The more strands, twists, sciencey-sounding gobbledegook, and characters you throw in, the greater the chance you will lose your audience and they’ll switch over to Coronation Street, Big Brother, or whatever else is on. And I think Chibbers ran that risk (and possibly succeeded) with this one.

So what was going on? Bear with me, this will take a little explaining.

First, we have the Doctor’s story strand. She ends up in what turns out to be Division’s command center located outside the universe currently being destroyed by the Flux, and on the cusp of other universes. She meets an Ood, of course, because… it’s Chibber’s last season and he wanted to add an Ood somewhere since he’s bringing back a bunch of other characters (Cybermen, Sontarans, UNIT, etc.)? I don’t know. Maybe there’s a good reason we’ll find out about in the finale? Anyway, the Ood takes her to Awsok who later reveals herself to be Tecteun. Who? I know you blocked “The Timeless Children” from your memory (I don’t blame you), but she’s the woman who supposedly found the Doctor as a child, took her back to Gallifrey, and raised her as a Time Lord. And then she experimented on her, discovered how she’s able to regenerate, isolated that gene, and implanted it into her own people. Yeah. And you wonder why Whovians were upset?

Anyway, we’ll come back to the Doctor’s strand in a moment. Let’s shift to Yaz, Dan, and their new friend from last chapter, Professor Jericho.

After a short but explosive adventure in Constantinople where they failed to find out anything more than the end of the world will be on December 5th (which also happens to be the air date for the final chapter–who’d’ve figured it?!), they travel by ship on their way to Nepal. While on the ship, they’re attacked by a man with a snake tattoo on his wrist, clearly trying to stop them. They manage to overpower him, but he kills himself before they can get any information out of him, such as why he’s trying to kill them.

Later, sitting on her own, Yaz triggers (presumably not for the first time) a device the Doctor slipped into her pocket before they parted ways. It shows an “adaptive hologram” of the Doctor explaining what exactly Yaz and her friends are supposed to be doing. This is clearly for our benefit because Chibnal can’t resist a bit of info-dumpy-exposition, and we’ve gone long enough without that. It seems that the Earth has been shielded from the Flux (thanks to our Lupari doggy friends) but the Earth will be vulnerable. All those alien races who have lost their planets to the Flux will be looking for a new home, so the Earth is about to become a battleground, and the winner of this almighty war will want to take over what’s left of the Earth when all’s done. Yaz and Dan need to figure out when that will be so they can help the Earth be ready… or stop it happening… or something. Exactly what she expects them to do against fleets of Sontarans, Cybermen, Daleks, or who-knows-what I can’t begin to imagine. I guess we’ll find out.

Back to the Doctor, and time for some more exposition. Tecteun explains to the Doctor that the “conversion” thing she experienced was how they are able to exist in their present form outside the universe. But that’s a bit of a side note. The real meat of her monologue is to explain what Division is and why they want the Doctor. It seems Division started on Gallifrey as a group of people trying to ensure the safety of their galaxy. Their power and numbers grew to the point that they were able to guide and shape events, interfering with other civilizations and influencing their progress. They became more powerful than they ever imagined, recruiting people from all species to do their work. The Doctor used to be part of Division but she got out. Division figured that when the Doctor realized all they had done, she would want to try to stop them. They decided they would have to destroy the universe to stop the Doctor otherwise the Doctor would never stop hounding them. This is why they created the Flux: to protect Division by stopping the Doctor. So the universe is being destroyed because of the Doctor. Did Moffat co-write this story? It’s turning out like one of his “the Doctor is the center of all things, like God” epics.

Let’s leave the Doctor’s storyline again for a moment and meet a new character…

In England, 1958, a man named Prentis ingratiates himself to a former decorated officer who’s been commissioned by the United Nations to set up a new task force dealing with potential extraterrestrial threats (wink, wink–we know what that’s about!). He wants this man Prentis to look over his plans since he seems to have a keen interest in the otherworldly.

Ten years later, Prentis hasn’t aged and the former officer is now a general leading this new organization called, you guessed it, UNIT! As the General walks with Prentis, we hear a familiar voice shouting in another room. That, the General notes, is a new Corporal they just brought in after missing “the thing at the Post Office Tower.” The Corporal is clearly (at least clearly to Whovians) Lethbridge-Stewart, soon to be Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart. The “Post Office Tower thing” is, I presume, a reference to the 1966 First Doctor story “The War Machines”–one of Hartnell’s last. The General takes Prentis to a room where he notices a blue police box. The General says they picked that up in a field in Devon but they can’t get into it. (If this is an allusion to a specific Classic Who story, I can’t think what it is.) At last, after all these apparently pointless references designed, no doubt, to make the fans squee with delight (or roll their eyes), we get to why the General has brought Prentis to this office. He wants to show him a device for detecting non-terrestrial life forms. The General tries it on himself and it beeps happily, indicating he’s human. He points it at Prentis and, shock and horror, it beeps unhappily. Prentis is not human. Prentis then kills the General with a strange snake-like creature, kind of like the tattoo Prentis has on his wrist, that comes slithering out of the General’s mouth and absorbs itself into Prentis, who identifies himself to the dead General as “Grand Serpent.”

Back to the Doctor. Tecteun explains to the Doctor (yes, more exposition–Chibbers does like to tell his stories) that the Ood is generating the final waves of Flux that will finish off the universe while they travel to the next, taking the remnants with them. She wanted the Doctor with her on the control center so she wouldn’t be in that universe trying to save it. The Doctor asks whether what the Master told her about her past (see “The Timeless Children”) is true (yes, Division is destroying the universe, including the Doctor’s friends, and she’s still hung up about her past), to which Tecteun says it is. The Doctor is indignant about her stealing what life she might have had if she hadn’t been raised a Time Lord. Tecteun compares her rescuing the Doctor and giving her a new life to the way the Doctor treats her companions. The Doctor says they’re not the same, and to be fair, they’re not. But this whole line of dialog is a bit of a distraction from the main issue, i.e., the end of the universe.

Tecteun leaves the Doctor and the Ood for a moment and while she’s gone, the Doctor persuades the Ood to help her by showing her the Flux culmination in progress. Maybe there’s a way to de-compress the universe? The Doctor is shocked by how little remains, and how it seems to be off-center. Tecteun returns and explains that the compression is happening around Earth, which will be the last thing to go. The Doctor hears faint whispering noises, but the Ood hears nothing. Then the Doctor notices a fob watch encased in a bell jar-type thing. (Remember “Human Nature” from New Series 3?) Tecteun explains that she had ordered the Doctor’s memories to be removed (When? Was this before the Doctor escaped Division? It couldn’t be after otherwise they wouldn’t have let her go again. Anyone?) The Doctor’s memories had been quantum stored in the Weeping Angel (see the previous episode), but now they’ve been transferred to the fob watch. Naturally, as the Flux eats away the universe, drawing ever closer to Earth, the Doctor wants to know how many lives she’s lived. Because that’s what’s really important right now. Tecteun tries to use the Doctor’s extremely unhealthy fixation with her past as leverage to try to get her to return to Division. If she comes back, she can have all her memories. Who knows, the universe they’re going to may contain her home planet. She could go back and really connect with her past. The Doctor says no.

Let’s pause a moment to understand. The Doctor is so desperate to find out about her past, she will forget about the Flux-consumed universe to pummel Tecteun with questions about her origins and her lives, things that don’t make a hill-of-beans difference to what’s going on now, or who she is now, or what she will do next (a point I’ve made before, and one of my chief critiques of this entire “Timeless Child” thing)!!! And this is SO important to the Doctor, that when she’s offered this knowledge in exchange for her returning to Division, an organization she knows nothing about except what Tecteun has told her, she’s not even remotely tempted. Oooookay…

Anyway, since Tecteun can’t entice the Doctor with the answers to her questions, she resorts to using her friends: if the Doctor comes back to Division, she might just leave the Earth alone and let her friends live. That’s a much more realistic temptation, and I was glad to see the Doctor actually consider this option.

Leaving the Doctor once again, let’s pick up where we left off with Dan, Yaz, and Jericho. It’s still 1904 (they have no means of time traveling), and they’re in Nepal visiting with a Seer who lives up a hill and can supposedly tell them what they need to know. It turns out this Seer is, in fact, some comic relief. He wants to know the gossip from the village and feigns disappointment when they reveal they haven’t brought him a newspaper. It seems he likes to tease, especially since he doesn’t get to tease people much… because he’s a hermit. Anyway, after some silliness, the Seer gives them three words: “Fetch your dog.” He has no clue what it means, but Yaz has an idea. They travel to the Great Wall of China (where’d they get the money for all these trips? Best not ask, eh?) where they clear some land on either side and paint in big words: “Karvanista! Dan is here – 1904. Fetch your human.” Karvanista should be able to see that from his spaceship above Earth. Indeed he can, but he’s in 2021 and can’t time travel. I’m a little curious as to how that message was still visible in 2021, 120 years after it was first written. But, again, probably best not to ask…

You’re probably wondering what happened to Vinder. Remember Vinder? He just missed meeting up with his wife, Bel, last episode and he’s gone looking for her. He turns up on this strange-looking structure in space, hears a hyperdrive in the distance, and runs into Swarm along with two Passengers. Swarm recognizes Vinder as a friend of the Doctor. One of the Passengers then swallows him up. Next we see Vinder, he is in this temple-like portico where he encounters Diane, Dan’s friend from Liverpool.

That hyperdrive Vinder heard was, of course, Bel. She had stolen a Lupari ship and was looking for Vinder when her ship got a recall. It seems one of the Lupari ships that are shielding Earth from the Flux had broken away from the fleet creating a breech. Karvanista recalled a missing Lupari ship to come fill the gap. That was the ship Bel stole. Just as she was about to land on the structure Vinder was on, the ship was pulled away. Karvanista contacts the rogue ship and warns he’s coming aboard so they’d better get off. Naturally, Bel stays, and she has a bit of a shoot-out with Karvanista. But then the ship comes under attack, along with the entire Lupari fleet.

Meanwhile, Prentis is keeping busy jumping around time. In 1987, he kills a man to become chair of the UNIT oversight committee. Then, in 2017, he meets with Kate Stewart, the Brigadier’s daughter, who is now head of UNIT. Prentis says he’s winding down UNIT operations. But Kate’s got his number. She’s figured out he’s not human, and after doing some digging realized he has hostile intent and the ability to travel in time. Clearly, he’s trying to undermine UNIT for some reason. In case he tries to pull the funny snake business on her, she tells him she’s wearing a psychic manifest shield that protects her from such things. Kate warns Prentis to stop whatever he’s doing or she will expose him. Worse, she will call in a favor from “someone you really don’t want to argue with.” She goes home, narrowly escapes an assassination attempt, then calls Osgood (remember her from the 50th Anniversary story?) to tell her she’s going dark.

Back to Dan, Yaz, and Jericho. They’re back on the ship when a man bursts into their cabin. Dan and Yaz recognize him, Dan from a tunnel and Yaz from Atropos. It’s Joseph Williamson, the man who was building tunnels in 1820s Liverpool (see the first episode). Williamson mumbles something about shifting doorways and runs off. Dan remembers that they’re excavating his tunnels in 2021. If he keeps turning up in different times and places, they should follow him. They end up back in Liverpool, still in 1904, where they manage to gain access to Williamson’s tunnels. They find Joseph skulking around in one. When Yaz explains to him they believe the fabric of space and time is under threat and the Earth is about to be under attack but don’t know when or from who, Joseph is overjoyed. They need to find others who can help. Joseph takes them to see the heart of his excavation project: a chamber where he has built defenses against the coming destruction. There are twelve doorways to different worlds. However, since Halloween, some of them have been shifting. He warns them not to go through Doorway Nine. It’s especially dangerous for some reason…

In 2021, Prentis is on the phone speaking to a young lady with a snake tattoo telling her to lower all defenses, arm all weapons, and make sure the weapons systems are aimed inward at the planet’s surface. He hangs up and then addresses a Sontaran hologram. He tells the Sontaran that everything is in place. The Sontaran is very pleased. Now the forces of Sontar are ready to exact revenge. A very, very large fleet of Sontaran ships appear above the Lupari ships surrounding Earth.

On board Bel’s ship, Sontarans break in and threaten Karnavista and Bel at gunpoint.

In 1904, Sontarans invade Williamson’s tunnels and point their guns at Yaz, Dan, Jericho, and Joseph.

Back at the Division command center, the Doctor informs Tecteun that she’s going to save her friends, save the universe, and destroy Division. It’s personal and she’s going to win. But a familiar voice tells her no. Swarm and Azure have managed to break into Division control center by means of a psycho-temporal bridge Swarm has been building powered by the energy harvested from the life forces he’s been capturing throughout the universe. He wants revenge on Division for imprisoning him, starting with Tecteun. After killing her, he approaches the Doctor, hands outstretched. “Now you…”

And that’s the cliffhanger. I know this has been long, but I’ve tried to make it entertaining. You probably don’t need a detailed account of the issues I have with this episode. If you read through the above, you probably have an idea of the areas I thought were problematic.

To his credit, Chibbers tried to tie up ends and make things connect. But there’s just too much stuff going on in too short a space of time. Overall, this was okay. I’ve seen worse. But it’s far from the best.

The next episode is the finale. Lots of loose ends to tie up. I’m hoping it’s good. Really I am. Though this episode was not encouraging.

Did you see this chapter of Flux? If so, what were your thoughts? Let me know in the comments.