An intriguing set up with clever ideas falls flat as soon as Me enters the story. The momentum of the story relies on the audience looking forward to seeing Ashilder back and Maisie Williams having enough charisma in the bank as an antagonist, but for me she is a limp baddie.

The pairing of Rigsy (“local knowledge!”) Clara and The Doctor is a real treat though. I wish I could have seen a bit more of them outside of the contexts that didn’t work. Rigsy made for an excellent recurring character.

The way that trap street worked and how the masked aliens behaved didn’t always make sense to me. Why is a friendly Cyberman being repaired by an Ood? Some of the pairings didn’t quite ring true.

While Clara’s exit, and the exact rules around how the raven works is a bit contrived, the emotional beats really work and there are some powerful scenes between The Doctor and his companion.

I am a big Stewart Lee and Richard Herring fan. Real Time is the only time their worlds collide with Doctor Who - it also marks one of their very last (if not their last) professional engagement as an ongoing double act. On his website Stewart Lee describes a picture of him standing next to a Cyberman as a career low (he may have been joking) and Herring did not speak highly of this either on his RHLSTP podcast. I don’t think it’s quite as bad as they describe.

The main issue with this story is how thin the plot it. It could be stretched across 45 minutes but not 70. Various parties spend most of the run time trying to get through a couple of doors. Big Finish have done much better in audio, so it’s a shame that it’s this one that got the animation treatment. While the animation is much improved compared to Death Comes to Time, it is still ultra low budget.

The cast are quite good - Herring’s initially dodgy accent aside. It’s always good to see the 6th Doctor and Evelyn in Big Finish, not that Evelyn is given all that much to do.

The story has a slow paced charm of its own.

This is my vote for the most underrated episode of Doctor Who of all time. I simply don’t get the hate. I love the tone and the naturalistic POV direction made in an effort to match the found footage format. It sees Mark Gatiss on very fine form, working in the horror arena. There has never been such a “slice of life” approach to a darker Doctor Who story, it leads to a captivating tone. The monsters  are pretty freaky, and the darkly lit environment matches them perfectly.

I remember watching this for the first time in my year after uni. My two housemates and I were spellbound. They thought it was one of the best ever!  

It’s not all about that speech. But my God that speech has to be Capaldi’s defining and proudest moment as The Doctor. The show has a chance to breathe and focus on something which defines it: peace.

This second half is a showcase for a killer cast who are given the chance to slow down and have a series of compelling character moments. It’s odd that this is what comes out of a sequel to The Day of the Doctor, and the follow up to last week’s globe trotting adventure. Such a serious and well composed piece of small scale drama, the world away from a romp.

I don’t think I appreciated at the time what a fantastic team the Twelfth Doctor and Clara were. I didn’t realise how good I had it.

I was wowed by just how detailed the plot is and the amount of effort put into building out the characters. I do feel modern day UNIT stories could learn a thing or two from The Zygon Invasion, Kate Stewart’s finest hour as she gets stuck into the action in New Mexico, lost in the moment of her new mission. And Osgood makes up the second half of the perfect double act. Nerdy, courageous, relatable.

There are thought provoking themes in this story about terrorism and forces trying to disrupt multiculturalism, giving The Doctor the perfect set up to talk about the sort of world he passionately believes in.

The Zygon’s now being able to take on the form of loved ones is an exciting new detail, even if it does lead to the only clunky scene in the whole story of gormless soldiers marching to their death.

Peter Capaldi is on excellent form - he is in funny mood trying to be cool. Potentially the most Doctor-ish mode we’ve seen him in up to this point. Jenna Coleman gets the meaty task of playing two characters, one of whom is evil - and she is living up to the task beautifully. I wish I hadn’t seen the story before so her turn could go unnoticed! Brilliant drama.

The high level concept for Me is very interesting, combining this with a formidable actor like Maisie Williams seems like a sure fire bet on paper. Unfortunately somewhere in the execution (either the writing, performance or both) it just doesn’t click.

The writers have been working hard to bring levity back into this series, but the balance of comedy and serious, thought provoking drama in this episode are awkward and clunky. Neither end up landing as a result.

Rufus Hound as Sam Swift though is phenomenal. The way he churns out gallows humour in front of a rowdy crowd in the style of a late night club comic is the definite highlight of the story.

There are some cool character moments and a nice arc for our characters, but at this point in the series they are just too obsessed with what has come before, and making sure each comic feeds into the overall arc, making sure it all adds up. The inability for them to have a monster of the week which is not linked to a larger narrative is a little suffocating and means that every issue has to be an epic - which is not my favourite mode for Doctor Who.

A touching story which has an impact which outsizes its word count. The idea that the Thirteenth Doctor would go out of her way to right the wrong of previous incarnations (and that Paul Cornell would himself encourage this) is a significant piece of rare character development. One which is welcome.

Cybermen in the land of fiction leads to them having some pretty mind bending, it generates compelling Cyberman dialogue. A very rare thing! I like their plan. Taking away humanity’s ability to use their imagination is a creative way of Cyber converting.

Some of the twists you can see a mile away (Jamie and Zoe being fictional). Others are a bit more of a surprise (Zoe being the Mistress of the Land of Fiction). By the beginning of part 4 though all of these threads come together in a very satisfying way.

Jamie’s emotional speech (why did The Doctor never come back?) is a touching moment, as well as the continuation of Zoe’s story, even if it isn’t “real”.

Elsewhere the plot was a bit fluffy for my liking, which is the danger of a land of fiction story. At points it threatened to tip into “and then this happened, and then that happened” with no real consequences.

All in all it’s a very rewarding listen.

I like the idea that covid prompted Paul Cornell to rethink the fate of the little girl with the red balloon. The Doctor can, on rare occasion, doll out cruel but fair justice. But maybe once in a while they are compelled to undo their worst excesses. I think my Doctor does.