Really good episode, the Doctor has to solve a murder on Gallifrey. We see more of Gallifrey in this episode than any so far and its great. We get a sense of the Doctor's role in the society that we did not have before.

The Master is back, this time as a weird skull face guy. The duel between he (or his henchman I guess) and the Doctor is really cool as well.

The Deadly Assassin!

A brilliant first two parts, and... a third and fourth part. It may be that the Gallifrey series has spoilt me for gallifreyan intrigue and politics, but while the first two parts set that all up really nicely (the assassination of a president, the exposition about life on Gallifrey, seeing the bureaucracy in action, the loopholes in law), when the Doctor enters the matrix near the end of part 2, it starts to somewhat fall apart.

It's not that the matrix sections are particularly bad or anything, it's just that they feel very much like standard fare for the show, and the story up until that point had managed to feel somewhat out there, even despite its 'grounding' of the Time Lords. It'd felt somewhat more unique, the bureaucratic aspect being something not often seen in the show, and here The Doctor isn't the clear smartest man in the room like he often is, we're even introduced to his old mentor.

When we get into The Matrix though, it's The Doctor running around a quarry. The show can say that The Master's controlling the environment as much as they want, but it doesn't really affect all that much, and it still ultimately comes down to, well, The Doctor fighting an enemy in a quarry, about the most standard story you can have in classic who.

It does somewhat come back after he leaves, especially with The Master's plans with faking his death to get what he wants and that, but even then, it feels like a Master story. Master stories are always good, and I of course appreciate that there hadn't been one in such a long time, but for a story that started setting itself apart from the standard action of the show, it's a little disappointing that it ends up being standard Who story.

Don't get me wrong, a good standard Who story, but still a standard Who story.

After 13 and a half seasons of randomly pottering around time and space, with the occasional dash of continuity, The Doctor finds himself back home and revealing unprecedented amounts about his his race and home planet.

This story has the rare accolade of being both set on Gallifrey and actually being good. It helps that a large chunk of the story is set in a frightening nightmare hallucination, so you never get a chance to get bored of the setting - which is home to assassination, lies and political games.

I like that The Time Lords are set up as generally being total bastards. It makes total sense of why The Doctor left his home planet. It was wonderful to see The Master back after all this time - and in a new incarnation. It only increases the grand sense of history this story has. It’s a very special 4 parter that fees like a reward for sticking with the show up to this point and a celebration of its 13 year history.

Deadly Assassin is far from perfect, and has a number of strange quirks to it, but by and large it is a very unique story from the Classic series that kind of has an irreplaceable, vital part of the franchise and its history. Sure, we had gotten scant glimpses of the Time Lords and Gallifrey up until now, but this is a whole new level, building so much into the world in these four short parts and bringing in a lot of new ideas and concepts to the franchise and the Doctor's people.

That being said, it is a bit of a double-edged sword. While Deadly Assassin does a number of things right, like getting into multiple chapters and the fun use of colour in their costumes to denote each character's faction and position in Time Lord Society, it isn't perfect either. The danger of stories like this is that they simplify the Time Lords a bit. I find it weird they don't have a word or concept of framing somebody for a crime to the point they have to borrow it from the English language according to the dialogue, even when they prove as a people more than capable of such an action. As always in stories like these and the Gallifrey series, the Time Lords become a little too basic and easily susceptible to manipulation when we subject them to stories like this, and I prefer the air of power and authority they are more generally given from a distance.

These are more insignificant concerns though, as Deadly Assassin is creative and entertaining, which matters most to me when evaluating something from Doctor Who. It is still held back by issues with its pacing, but it is an exciting story, a nice take on a politically themed thriller that is definitely worth checking out. It is weird to me that the Doctor is so unfamiliar with Time Lord politics here, and I think that was more done for the sake of exposition and the fact there isn't really a companion in this story. That's part of what makes it so unique and special though, the Doctor being involved in this story on his own without the usual support structure he leans on adds to the tension very nicely here. Still, there are a lot of good characters surrounding him in these four episodes and I really like the ending between the Doctor and Borusa alluding to their history. A great entry in Doctor Who history, to be sure.

The Gallifrey murder mystery plot is fun. The Doctor wandering about the dreamlike matrix is fun. The Doctor wandering about the dreamlike matrix slap-bang in the middle of the Gallifrey murder mystery plot brings the whole thing to a screeching halt for part 3 and the story never quite recovers itself