Season Two (Series 15); Episode Two - “Lux” by Russell T. Davies

Why am I still watching Doctor Who? My review of The Robot Revolution was basically 1000 words of me saying why I’ve fallen out of love with the show and yet here I am, sat down for episode two. Well, I’m not completely done with Season Two/Series Fifteen yet, still waiting hopefully for another 73 Yards or Legend of Ruby Sunday. Now, Lux certainly piqued my interest, with its intriguing concept and neat visual style, but I had a sneaking suspicion it would end up being another Devil’s Chord: a unique idea with a weak execution. And you know what? I think I hit the nail on the head.

15 people have gone missing from the Palazzo Picturehouse, and now the old projectionist sits alone at night, playing movies to an absent audience. But where have the missing people gone? And what does it have to do with cartoon character Mr Ring-a-Ding?

(CONTAINS SPOILERS)

If there is one consistent positive I give to Modern Who, it’s the visual effects. So let's get the elephant out of the room: we have to talk about the titular Lux. Easily, our antagonist is the best thing about this episode. For one, the effects bringing him to life could be the greatest visual effect Doctor Who’s ever put to screen, and I am not saying that lightly; this looks f**king incredible. On top of that, we have Alan Cumming giving a spellbinding performance that lends the character a wonderful amount of gravitas, making him seem an actual threat. Plus, I liked the reveal that he was another member of the pantheon and it’s interesting to see RTD keep playing with what is undeniably a cool idea. My one grip is I don’t really get what the giggle is; like, I thought that was just the Toymaker’s thing, why is it now the call sign for every pantheon god?

Other than our villain, I did appreciate the originality of Lux after I felt The Robot Revolution dipped hard into derivativeness. For one, the setting of Miami Dade county was great as I am a firm believer we should visit some places other than England once in a while and it really reminded me of the 1960s setting of The Impossible Astronaut. Not only that, but it was well realised with a fantastic production behind it.

Obviously, there’s also the meta qualities this episode plays with, having the Doctor and Belinda getting sent into film stock and becoming animated. I definitely enjoyed what the episode was going for here and I like Russell playing with experimental formats but only a few ideas really worked for me, mostly in the realms of space with the characters flipping through frames and escaping by stopping the film and igniting it. However, we also have a few moments that really don’t land for me. This episode struggles a lot with execution; it has tons of ideas but doesn’t really follow through on most of them. For one, I like the idea of our travellers becoming animated and having to revert to live action by gaining character depth - that’s a wonderfully meta idea that is painful in this era of all things and shock horror, the scene is the characters just explaining their emotional arcs to the other person, removing all subtlety and, ironically, depth from the scene.

And then there’s the bit where the Doctor and Belinda break into our world and have tea with some Doctor Who fans. Now, on the tin, this is a great idea (that has been done better before) but I just can’t bring myself to love this moment. The fans we meet are far too eccentric and feel more like caricatures than characters and it just leaves this whole section too hokey to feel like a love letter to the audience and too unsubtle to be any kind of commentary, just causing the scene to feel like an intrusion. It also doesn’t help that Russell does that thing again. You know, the one where he forces in an emotional moment with characters we don’t know. I have to repeat this: Russell. You. Cannot. Do. Emotional. Beats. With. Characters. We’ve. Known. For. Five. Minutes. It doesn’t work and you keep doing it. In the end, what could’ve been a really cool moment just left me sighing.

As for the rest of the episode, I said before that Lux feels like a second Devil’s Chord and I stand by that fact - mid 20th century setting, dealing with a form of media and a pantheon god; hell, we even get the same costume change shot from Devil’s Cord. I will say though, the conclusion is a lot better here, using the flammability of film stock to pull an Inglourious Basterds and drowning a god of light in light, which feels like a better version of Death killing death from Empire of Death. Certainly a lot better than John Lennon appearing to play a single note and end the episode.

However, Lux is most definitely imperfect. As I said before, it fails to follow through on its ideas and the emotional beats are practically unbearable but these are more problems with this whole run. And the more I think about it, the more I think these episodes rarely have individual problems and are much more about the general direction RTD is taking the show. For one, the dialogue is something that is really grating on me and here it is especially terrible. Russell does this thing where you can really tell when he’s setting something up because he’ll just have a character force the topic into a completely different conversation, like the repeated exposition dump of what happened to Gallifrey, which he screwed up last season too. Russell mate, you did this in Gridlock perfectly, at least just do that again. I don’t know, everything feels so scripted and forced, characters will just openly explain their mental state in overly convenient ways and all subtlety seems to have gone out the window. It all lacks some genuine quality, none of these sound like real conversations actual people would have.

And before I wrap up this review, I have to address something that’s really disappointing me. I think I can see where Belinda’s character is going. Now, it’s only been two episodes, I could be wrong, but RTD’s not exactly a difficult person to read. I like the idea of a companion who’s antagonistic towards the Doctor, I really do, we’ve had far too many giddy playmates recently. But whilst Belinda might be characterised as not putting up with the Doctor, it only really surfaces when the show wants it to and the rest of the time, she is identical to every other companion. RTD either needs to up the animosity or stop treating Belinda like what she isn’t because I can already picture the forced moments of isolated arguments already and I’m beginning to dread them.

Again, Lux is par for the course that Modern Who is on. It looks stunning, it has its fun moments, but is lacking any kind of depth. A brilliant antagonist and some fun ideas that don’t always come through don’t make Lux for me and I find myself with another episode I can’t help but feel lukewarm on. It’s fun, it’s interesting, it’s not very good.

6/10

Pros:

+ The visual effects on Mr. Ring-a-Ding might be the best in the show’s history

+ Well realised and original setting

+ Interesting use of meta mechanics

+ Good conclusion with sound logic

Cons:

- Unbearably hammy and forced dialogue

- Keeps doing painfully awful emotional beats

- Belinda is becoming less promising the more the series progresses

- A lot of its ideas lack proper execution