somebody LIED to me and said this story was boring and skippable. instead, it turned out to be a perfectly serviceable spooky cyberman jaunt. the worldbuilding is especially notable here, taking the Doctor and Charley from a bustling market on an interstellar backwater to a grungy old garbage-collection ship. you can really feel the rust-caked, creaking, shoddy, unglamorous side of space travel here, far from a bright sparkling future, it's grim and realistic - misogyny, petty crime, smuggling, espionage abound. and, like all the best cyberman stories, it's affirming of what it means to be human, or, in this case, the idea that 'humanity' is neither innate nor permanent. you can take on the mantle of humanity with all the sacrifice that entails, or you can relinquish it. or you could stop angsting and put the kettle on