Doctor Who Review: The Lie of the Land (Season 10 Episode 8)

It’s the Doctor, Bill and the resistance vs our current political climate (and also aliens) on Doctor Who Season 10, Episode 8 “The Lie of the Land.”

Doctor Who is not messing around in the Trump era of television. There’s no thin veneer of fantasy or tip-toeing around calling a spade and spade; the Doctor and Bill plant themselves in front of us and declare that the world we live in is wrong.

The Monks could easily be any of Doctor Who’s totalitarian alien races hell-bent on world domination. However, as we learned in the previous episode, it is not enough for them to simply win the game — they must be adored for it. They must be revered. They must be loved, as dictators yearn to be.

What’s more, the Monks demand consent from the people they aim to oppress. They sell Bill a half-truth dressed up with enough promises of salvation that she consents to their machinations and unintentionally allows for a fascist takeover of Earth. And after that takeover, the Monks rule via propaganda, brainwashing, and witch hunts, all packaged up prettily and delivered from the mouth of someone we trust: the Doctor.

THE DOCTOR: Fake News Central.

In short, this episode is and was never about aliens, or a madman in a box, or the wonders of the universe just waiting to be explored. It is about us, and the future Doctor Who believes we can fight.

A Daughter’s Love

In this version of reality, the very survival of humanity rests on the shoulders of a group of people smart enough to realize the version of history they’re in is wrong. Bill has been talking to a figment of her mother through the months she and the Doctor have been separated. It is her mother that anchors Bill back to reality, just as it was River Song who anchored the Doctor previously.

Love, as Doctor Who has always said, is the key to saving us all.

Bill steps up and takes the Doctor’s place as the person ready to sacrifice themselves to save the Earth. After all, it was never supposed to be the Doctor who saves everyone. Much like River’s choice in “Forest of the Dead,” Bill restrains the Doctor and volunteers her own mind for the taking.

The message here is not that the world — any world, whether it be ours, or a fictional one — and its future depend on a single man. It relies on the bravery of the oppressed, of the disenfranchised, of people who will stand up and declare that the world they live in can be better than it is.

No, it is not the Doctor who saves the day. It is Bill. It is a young, gay, black woman laying gentle hands on the embodiment of fascism and projecting love out into the world.

THE DOCTOR: All those years you kept her alive inside you, an isolated subroutine hidden in a living mind. Perfect, untouchable. She’s a window on the world without the Monks. Absolutely loved, absolutely trusted. And that window is opening. Everywhere. A glimpse of freedom, but a glimpse is all you need.

Bill’s beautiful, healing love for her mother is such a pure thread of good that it single handedly breaks the Monks’ hold on humanity. It allows people to regain their agency and rise up against a force who sought to keep them afraid.

It’s an idealistic message for Doctor Who to send out, but it’s a damn necessary one. It’s emboldening and empowering. Sure, the episode is on the nose. Sure, it’s fantastical. But we live in strange times, and sometimes a lack of subtlety is, well…exactly what the Doctor ordered.

STRAY CRITICISMS:

• While this episode resonated socially and in a broad manner, up close it’s a bit of a mess. The logic of the Monks is flawed — why even use Bill in the first place? Why enslave humanity? Literally what was the point? But the message of the episode sort of landed, and I chose to focus on that. I see you though, Doctor Who. I see that clunkiness.
• Hey, so, if you’re Bill, you’re going to be a little pissed at the Doctor, right? First he tricks her into believing he’s on Team Monks, then tricks her into shooting him, then says “JK!” and has a good laugh at the trauma she endured…yikes, dude.
• Speaking of “yikes”: the Doctor declares that him giving Bill the photographs of her mother means he saved the world. Uh. No? Pretty sure her love for her mother wasn’t dependent on pictures, but they did give a nice visual reminder of her. I just…man, he’s really gotta pick his times better.
• Why was Missy even in this episode? Why waste my girl in such a manner? She was around long enough to info dump about the Monks, then didn’t reappear until the end to cry about her previous victims. I know she’s on the road to “good,” and objectively (and unobjectively) Michelle Gomez is the prettiest crier that has ever walked this Earth, but we all know Missy isn’t going to change so easily. I’m already dreading that character development retcon.
• This isn’t a criticism, but River Song parallels: like…3. Bill and River giving up their brains to save the Doctor’s, someone rebooting reality inside a pyramid, and the Monks having the exact same powers as the Silence. It’s likely just plot recycling, but there’s a tiny part of me that can’t help but hope. Hope is everything.

Until next week, sweeties.

 

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Doctor Who airs Saturdays at 9/8c on BBC/BBC America.

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