Lost Library of Ukko

5️⃣🔼 = MIDDLING!

Barking through time and space, one adventure at a time!

“I WANT THUNDER AND LIGHTNING!”

I’m intrigued by the title: “Ukko” is the God of Thunder (with "ukkonen," the Finnish word for “"thunderstorm," literally meaning “small thunder”) in Finnish mythology (and it also means “old man” or “geezer” these days).

It’s nice to get out of the mansion a little! It’s Department tour day!

Smug Face 2 appears properly here, and he looks a bit like Paul Bettany, which is distracting to me. And he’s up to no good, because of course he is!

Bad Starkey suddenly finds himself on Discount Tatooine (AKA a quarry), which is really just a futuristic library card for an alien race of librarians. It’s actually a pretty fun twist in an alien race.

When will the Department learn not to mess around with alien stuff? They keep making the same mistake in every single episode.

The alien race seen here is actually well-designed and interesting (brings Chantho from Series 3 to mind for some reason). The way she acts and talks feels a bit RTD-era Who to me.

The latter half of the episode goes more into typical K9 shenanigans.

RANDOM OBSERVATIONS:

The way they pronounce “ukko” throughout the episode sounds so hilarious to me.

I’m shocked. This one is good! The guy who plays Thorne is the best actor in the show, genuinely menacing. He raises the game of the general cast. I have previously singled out Deborah Parsons as the best writer on this show, she returns in fine form. Because the cast is in much better form too at this point in the series, finally this script is able to sing to its full potential. The librarian alien in a cheap 1970s alien outfit is so camp and classic-Doctor Who like. I love it!