Season Two (Series 15); Episode One - “The Robot Revolution” by Russell T. Davies

Doctor Who doesn’t excite me anymore. I’m sorry, sorry to myself, sorry to the whole fanbase, but I just can’t care anymore. Doctor Who in its new, frankly unnecessary era, is entirely style over substance, a flashy soap opera with the depth of a puddle in a drought that I simply can not find myself excited about. The Robot Revolution was a competent episode with needlessly glorious visuals that felt as if ChatGPT was told to write an episode of Doctor Who, the bare essentials needed for an episode in a trenchcoat masquerading as the first in a new series. I’m not angry, but I am very disappointed.

Average nursing student Belinda Chandra wakes up to find herself queen of a far off planet inexplicably named after her and ruled by a tyrannical AI supercomputer. With her life and freedom at stake, she has to put her chances in the hands of rebel leader the Doctor if she wants to escape.

(CONTAINS SPOILERS)

Alright, sulking out of the way, what did I actually think about The Robot Revolution? Not much, honestly, this is a very hollow episode. But I suppose we still have a pretty face and what a face it is, this episode is one of the best looking of the new era and that is saying something, given the competition. It’s ultra flashy and incredibly impressive to look at, with not one of the many, highly complicated props cheaply made. If I have to give this era some praises, it would be that it looks utterly incredible but looks aren’t everything.

The one place I did find some genuinely interesting depth was in our new companion, Belinda, who does feel to me like a rehash of other companions still but, once again boasts a good performance and instantly likable personality. I don’t think she works quite as well with Ncuti as Gibson did last season but the idea of a companion genuinely not wanting to be in the TARDIS is a fun concept (that has already been done with Tegan but hey-ho). But even so, she seems so superficially likable at times, like with the obvious self-sacrifice attempt that’s just so mundanely trying to get me to like her when the episode was already succeeding.

And you might be saying, “Speechless, it’s just a fun season opener, don’t take it so seriously”. And, I mean, fair enough, our villains are literally called Missbelindachandrabots for christ’s sake but I have some issues with that. There were a few moments I genuinely chuckled, the aforementioned robot naming convention being one of them, but there’s just something missing for me. A single episode like this is perfectly fine - not for me, but not egregious. However, nearly every other episode in this new era is exactly the same; you can’t expect me to not judge any of them because they’re just goofing off.

Especially when the episode keeps on shoving sentimental bullshit in my face every five seconds. Russell seems to have forgotten how to write emotional beats because he keeps making the same mistakes over and over again. Try as you might RTD, you can not get me to care about a character I’ve only known for five minutes. It also doesn’t help that you do this every, single episode in an identical way, making every single moment like this feel so bland and repetitive. He also can’t write drama anymore, a character will just come up to somebody, be antagonistic out of nowhere and then disappear for the rest of the episode and we’re meant to pretend it meant anything. Emotional beats in this new era are equivalent to the “APPLAUSE” signs they put in live studio audiences.

As for the story itself, I find everything so utterly bland here. No interesting ideas, no cool moments, no tension, no pacing, f**kall structure. Russell clearly just looked at those phony buy-a-star scams and went “but what if that was actually real” and then tried to spin a whole episode out of it. You know, for an episode where the big bad is an AI, it’s pretty ironic that it feels like one of the most procedurally generated scripts of the whole show. In addition to this, it moves so weirdly quickly. I checked the time after what felt like ten minutes and I was halfway through. There is no building here, no rise and fall of action: it begins, it goes and it stops with nearly no downtime in between plot beats. Because of this, it gave me no time to care. Not one scene impressed me, the rebel shootout was contrived and barely engaging, the bunker scene felt like a checklist of character interactions and the final scene is a lot of talking and annoying dialogue, with the completely unintimidating Jonny Green robot (Oh yeah, Tyler’s actor show up) having a second “it was the wrong anagram” reveal.

You know what, I actually think Russell’s running out of ideas. The companions are all the same, all the tender moments feel copied and pasted, hell, we even get a rip off Gadget from The Waters of Mars here that just goes to prove that he had exactly four series worth of ideas in him. All of this makes me ask, why is it I don’t care? Why is it I’m just not excited anymore? I mean, last season we got a couple great episodes that felt genuine and had actual, interesting character arcs going on. Am I not at least looking forward to any more of those? Not really, everything in the new Doctor Who is just lacking something, a certain charm that made the original RTD series so endearing. Maybe it’s the fact I find the new Doctor so utterly dull, even if Gatwa is a blast in the role. Maybe it's the fact that every character interaction, every emotional beat, every dramatic moment feels so disingenuous and like it's phoning it in. Maybe it's the constant, patronising attempt to make me feel something towards characters who truly refuse to grow and deepen.

I’m sorry if I’m being a downer but just know that I want to like this, I want to be excited to sit down every Saturday for Doctor Who but I’m being honest here and I have to say that I simply can not care. I’m giving The Robot Revolution a very low score and not because it's particularly incompetent but just because it's such an utterly hollow episode and everything I get out of it, I can find elsewhere. This is truly empty TV.

4/10

Pros:

+ Looks utterly incredible

+ Belinda is easily relatable and likable

+ Had moments of some genuinely fun TV

Cons:

- Incredibly superficial and surface level

- The pacing makes the story feel like a minisode

- Has a huge cast of cardboard cutout characters

- Once again, has forced emotional moments

- Absolutely awful main antagonist