- Title: Doctor Who – The Giggle
- wiki: link
Apparently there are no rules left in the Whoverse worth following. To introduce our next Doctor, Russell T. Davies pulls out all the stops (some of which work, some of which don’t). Dusting off a classic Who villain in the Toymaker (Neil Patrick Harris), a powerful adversary from one of the lost Doctor Who serials, we get David Tennant‘s final (again… but not really) adventure as The Doctor. Sporting a pretty awful accent, Harris’ Toymaker is presented as a being of immeasurable power from somewhere outside the known universe who returns to toy with humanity for fun by driving them mad hijacking the first ever television signal with a creepy puppet. While the character has been referenced over the years in comics and novels, this is the first on-screen interaction with The Doctor the Toymaker has had since “The Celestial Toymaker.”
Helping The Doctor are Donna Noble (Catherine Tate), U.N.I.T. (who apparently bought Avengers Tower from Tony Stark), former companion Mel (Bonnie Langford) now working for U.N.I.T., Kate Lethbridge-Stewart (Jemma Redgrave), and Shirley Anne Bingham (Ruth Madeley). We also see references to several other former companions both during the Toymaker playing with The Doctor and later in the discussions of The Doctor with… himself. This is where things get problematic, although it does lead to a fun scene with two Doctors taking down the villain.
For those who don’t remember, a copy of David Tennant’s Doctor (albeit a human one) was created back in the Meta-Crisis and was sent off to live with Rose Tyler is a sickly-sweet ending the bends itself backwards to offer her a life with The Doctor (sort of). Apparently one extra Tennant Doctor running around isn’t enough for Davies who breaks the rules of Doctor Who again and allows Tennant to stick around while also introducing Ncuti Gatwa as the new Doctor through never-before-seen bi-generation.
This allows both Doctors to work together to defeat the Toymaker, Gatwa to sail off into the unknown, and Tennant to stick around with Donna’s family for a much needed rest. However, this also creates all sorts of paradoxes and unforeseen consequences such as can they both regenerate? If so, which is the actual Doctor’s timeline (and for god sake can one of them please become the Valeyard already!)? It also robs fans of a proper goodbye to the character who apparently is just going to stick around off-screen forever? While it’s been fun to see Tennant again, and it’s helped wash out the bad taste of recent events suggesting The Doctor isn’t even a Time Lord, his return has felt a bit aimless and if this was the ultimate payoff, unless there is something we haven’t yet seen, I don’t think it was worth the trouble.
