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TARDIS Guide

Review of The Exiles by NobodyNo-One

18 November 2024

This review contains spoilers!

The Exiles - ★★★☆☆ 

This is one of the takes of the first moments in the TARDIS after the Doctor and Susan's departure from Gallifrey; it doesn't really contradict The Beginning but fitting this one there is a little contrieved. You can justify that by Susan's own word in The Beginning though, that everybody remembers things differently.

I like it. It's not a fully fleshed out story, it feels more like a scene you never saw of Susan exploring the TARDIS for the first time and her feelings and thoughts regarding the ship and being an exile. This one is part a terror anthology, and that's tied in this story both by the atmosphere of the narrative - Susan is a little bit afraid of the TARDIS - and her meeting kind of a ghost. It's the coolest moment, I love it.

She is trying some new clothes and sees a man behind her in the mirror; it's implied it's a vampire. When she tells her grandfather later, he responds saying that the TARDIS doesn't exist in a traditional flux of time and there is not exactly a present, past or future for the ship itself; and that Susan must've seen a glimpse of its history (I interpret it as being a ghost from its past). It's creepy, it's mysterious, I love it.