I definitely wasn't expecting this one to be an intense episode about racism from the trailers, and I really didn't think they'd tackle it in such a head-on way in general.

Also I liked that they used a futuristic society for it and suggested that these problems persist is the future instead of just doing it in a historical episode which would have been the obvious choice IMO.

With the exception on Boom, every episode this season seems to have a huge pacing problem. To me every single one seems to drag with very little happening, until suddenly there is a massive climax that invariably is unsatisfying and makes no sense, before the episode abruptly ends. How is this the same show that gave us complex stories like Midnight or Heaven Sent in the same amount of time?

Quick rundown:

• Space Babies: Everyone is scared of the monster, until suddenly the monster was made by a computer error and needs to be saved
• The Devils Chord: Jinx Monsoon is stealing all the music, until suddenly they have a ridiculous music battle, which the Doctor somehow loses, but the beatles return to play a note and the day is saved
• 73 Yards: A great horror concept of Ruby being followed by a mysterious entity, that turns out to be herself as an old women making herself lonely for her entire life??
• Dot and Bubble: Turns out the Dot hates humanity and is killing them off, but instead of instantly braining them all, as it is clearly capable of, it creates giant slugs to eat them? And the people don't want to be saved?

I genuinely think a lot of the themes and concepts in this series are very good, but the scripts need to be tightened up, instead of juggling so many metaphors and societal commentaries in each episode.

I actually liked this one more than I thought I would from the trailer, but once again the resolution just leaves me confused and unsatisfied.

I'm just wondering how a whole planet got eaten by slugs. Or why slugs were needed at all.

You know, I've been wondering why everyone is talking about all these new Doctor Who episodes and yet I couldn't find it in any of my lists. Today I did a search for just "Doctor Who" without the year (2005) or season number (14)... and WTF is "Doctor Who 2023"??? This is still the 2005 series, and still season 14, so why is it now being listed under 2023 season 01 which isn't even when the current season began? None of this makes any sense.

Decent episode, not amazing but certainly not bad. As you say having 2 Doctor lite episodes back to back is a weird choice, hopefully we'll see more of him in the last few episodes.

And hey, the outside scenes were filmed at my old university campus, too bad I wasn't there when they were filming

Miscellaneous thoughts:

The social media society is a trope that has been done before, and I don’t feel like this episode did anything interesting with it. The character of Pepper-Bean did not have an arc, she began as a vapid mole, and ended as a vapid mole who killed a guy. Not engaging, and felt like a bit of a waste of an episode.

I did not feel any of the tension they seemed to have intended, because the characters were so insufferable that their death would have been a relief.

Ruby and the Doctor needed Pepper-Bean to turn off her Dot because they could not see into the Dome. How then did they switch to an external camera to have a chat with the pop star towards the end?

Feels like an episode written by a Boomer just to take the same old digs at the younger generations. “Kids these days can’t find their way without a gps”, “Gen Z literally can’t see past their phone screens”.

I don’t know if it was intended, but the conclusion felt like a commentary on racism, considering that a majority of the finetime characters that got screen time were white, and talked about their “God given duty” to “maintain standards”. And calling The TARDIS “voodoo”. I dunno, it could definitely just be more commentary on vapid millennials, but it felt more pointed, especially considering the Doctors reaction.

I had problems with 73 Yards, but at least it was an engaging watch and felt like it was trying to do… something?

I really liked this episode, which feels nice because I haven't been able to be honestly positive about an episode of Doctor Who for quite a long time. Maybe since Resolution? And in that one I had to ignore the fact that the Doctor could sonic a Dalek's gun. So a swing and a hit is refreshing. Here's to more.

this episode suddenly got really dark towards the end

Two Doctor-light episodes in an eight ep season is definitely a choice.

Alternate Title: Instagram, the series

~/j~

Someone saw Black Mirror's Nosedive and thought "let's do this but do it right"