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“THAT'S ALL RIGHT, MAMA: A HIP-SWIVELLING, TIME-TWISTING TALE OF LOSS AND LEGACY”

In That's All Right, Mama, Paul Magrs delivers a bittersweet Doctor Who story that spins a single offhand comment from Rosa—about the Doctor once lending Elvis a mobile phone—into a poignant meditation on grief, time, and the road not taken. This isn’t just a sci-fi celebrity jaunt; it’s a warm and moving character piece that dares to imagine what might’ve happened had Elvis Presley lived beyond 1977—and what it would cost to undo that vision.

What begins as a playful gimmick—multiple Doctors bumping into Elvis at different points in his life—quickly blooms into a touching exploration of one of the 20th century’s most mythologised figures. The tone balances light, nostalgic whimsy with aching emotional depth, and while there’s a fair amount of box-ticking when it comes to tropes (southern drawls, Graceland, starstruck companions), Magrs finds a very Doctor Who way to ground it all in emotional truth.

THANK YOU VERY MUCH, TIME LORD

The story is framed through short, era-hopping encounters as Elvis meets Ten, Eleven, and Twelve—each of whom makes their mark before vanishing from his life again. The unifying thread is a piece of alien tech: a Drahvin communicator given to Elvis’s mother Gladys by Ten, which allows for long-distance communication across time and death itself. It’s this piece of tech that becomes both the story’s engine and its moral complication.

When Thirteen finally picks up the trail, she finds a timeline gone awry: Elvis never died in 1977. Instead, he’s led a long, healthy, even inspirational life, living a vegan lifestyle in a more optimistic 2018 and having unknowingly reshaped the world for the better. But the cost of this alternate reality is the integrity of time itself, and the Doctor—always the reluctant reaper of better-but-wrong futures—must put things back.

ELVIS, GLADYS, AND A PHONE CALL THAT NEVER ENDS

The heart of the story is the relationship between Elvis and his mother, Gladys. Her early death in 1958 left a real, lifelong wound in Elvis, and here, Magrs offers a science fiction solution to that wound: what if Elvis never really lost her? The Drahvin communicator lets him speak with his mother every day, forever suspended in the moment before she died.

It’s a brilliant and tragic metaphor for grief—Elvis is unable to move on, and his life, though seemingly flourishing, has been shaped by a ghost he refuses to let go. The communicator becomes both a tether and a trap, and the Doctor’s challenge is not just to fix time, but to help Elvis confront the loss he’s postponed for sixty years.

THE KING AND THE THIRTEENTH DOCTOR

Thirteen and her Fam take centre stage in the main story, and while the companions are largely left in the “awestruck by celebrity” category, Jodie Whittaker’s Doctor is given rich material to work with. Her regret at having to undo a better world—one where Elvis lives and inspires millions—is palpable, and the final act gives her a scene that’s bound to be remembered alongside Vincent and the Doctor.

In a deeply moving twist, the Doctor allows the elderly Elvis to say goodbye to his mother properly before he fades from existence. It’s a sequence dripping with heartache and beauty—Elvis facing the moment he’s dodged for decades, getting one last embrace before time reasserts itself. As a finale, it’s devastating, lovely, and deeply Doctor Who.

A LOVE LETTER TO THE MAN WHO CHANGED MUSIC

This is as much a tribute to Elvis as it is a sci-fi morality play. Magrs clearly has affection for both the man and the myth, and by imagining what could have been—had Elvis avoided the destructive path laid out for him—the story becomes both a celebration of his influence and a lament for his real-life tragedy.

At its core, That's All Right, Mama is about the people we love, the pain of losing them, and the impossibility of holding onto the past forever. It’s about listening to our parents, learning from their love, but also recognising that letting go is sometimes the kindest thing we can do—for them and for ourselves.

📝 VERDICT: 8/10

That's All Right, Mama is a touching, time-twisting tribute to Elvis Presley that builds a simple joke into a profoundly moving story about grief, love, and the danger of living in the past. Paul Magrs crafts a quietly powerful narrative where the Thirteenth Doctor shines and where the King of Rock 'n' Roll gets a moment of redemption, goodbye, and peace. It’s Doctor Who at its most emotionally resonant—less about paradoxes and more about the people we leave behind. A beautiful, tragic echo of Vincent and the Doctor, and a heartfelt hymn to the man who never really left the building.

The Thirteenth Doctor #7

'That's All Right, Mama' (2019) from Star Tales.

Really interesting and nicely done concept here. The idea of Elvis calling his mother throughout his life, and she's recieving all of the phone calls on the day of her death, is really touching and feels very truly Doctor Who. I could easily imagine this story taking place in the televised show. The way that The Doctor explains Elvis' morality here doesn't sit quite right with me, as she approaches the situation mostly purely from the angle of solving the time-space issue. Which is still a very Doctor-like thing to do, and definitely something that Twelve would have done. But considering that her character is meant to be a continuation of the kindness and giving nature of Twelve towards the end of his life, this only feeds into my issue with her writing in the show which kind of makes her a harsh and unapproachable character. Her letting Elvis go on one last trip to actually see his dying mother was nice though, but you don't really get any time to see her and Elvis interact regarding that.