A strange story that has elements of the Time Warrior, the Rebel Flesh and the Curse of the Black Spot... yet it's still fantastic.

It's like Tom Baker's had a new lease of life on this show - The Fourth Doctor just runs off and has a break, leaving Romana to find the next segment - this shows the further development of the Doctor in this season, initially being cynical towards Romana, but now trusting her to find it herself - unfortunately his break is cut short when is hat is set on fire. When the Doctor interrupts the wedding, I was reminded of Nikola Tesla's Night of Terror when the Doctor storms in to save Yaz and Tesla. I really love those moments where the Doctor strides in confidently and immediately takes over the whole room, they're really iconic moments that go unspoken. The gimmicky "Romana has a doppleganger" was a bit odd, it seemed to only exist for plot convenience rather than actual character stuff, which is a shame, but I found it rather fun when the two had a brief interaction at the end. But more "Romana is a damsel in distress" stuff, which I'm not a fan of.

The conflict between the Count and the King was a fun adventure, felt very fairytale-esque, a theme that's not uncommon in my favourite series of the Revived Era (Series 5), so that gets high praise from me for that. Grendel was a fun villain, with some panto elements, but in a humorous way. He often gets his way, creating some high stakes, leading to the duel between him and the Doctor at the end of the story, where he ends up losing at the thing he's meant to excel at. Irony is really common for these villains, isn't it?

Mike Hayes does an excellent job at the location filming here - Leeds Castle and the forest around it is so beautifully shot, and whilst it's clearly just Earth, the atmosphere feels so different to Earth that it's very believable. The fairytale element fits into the scenery here, being set in a rural area like this, and the indoor studio sets are made out of wood, still adding to that natural theme.

The android idea was nice, but felt too similar to the Android Invasion, and seemed to only be there to add confusion to who was who. Probably the weakest element of this story, for me. The nobles were great fun for the Doctor to be around, and their characters reminded me a lot of the British nobles from the early 1st millenium that I've been studying in history - and I love historicals, so this was a little treat for me to experience them in a different style.

Really fun story, but let down again by a few key subjects - A common element of Season 16.