Flatline

"Their idea of language is just as bizarre as their idea of space. Frankly, the TARDIS is confused."

Writer: Jamie Mathieson 

Format: TV

Broadcast: 18th October 2014

Series: 8.09

Featuring: Twelfth Doctor, Clara

Synopsis 

On the streets of an ordinary council estate, the Doctor and Clara face an alien threat they can barely understand. As the creatures close in, Clara has to take charge of the spiralling situation - while the Doctor struggled with some dimensions that have become a little too relative for comfort...

Verdict 

Flatline was another great episode in this debut season of the Twelfth Doctor that just continues to impress. After reading the preview for this episode in the latest DWM I was mightily intrigued to see how the concept of 2D monsters would be approached and I have to say I was mostly impressed. As my blog entry from 7 days ago describes, I absolutely loved Mummy on the Orient Express and for me it is the best episode of the series thus far and I was sneakily hoping that with the same writer, this episode might surpass that. Now, don't get me wrong, this was a fantastic episode and as my rating will suggest I throughly enjoyed what I watched, but instead of being the best of the series so far I thought it was the worst. I annoy myself in saying that because it makes it sound like I disliked the episode when that certainly isn't the case! Clara was just magnificent from start to finish and her relationship with the Twelfth Doctor is back to the heights of the early episodes of the season prior to the Kill the Moon shock. The intrigue of the dimensions affecting the TARDIS were excellent! How powerful and unique must the opposition be if it baffled both the Doctor and the TARDIS as to who they were and also drained power from the time machine and affected its dimensions in a massive way! The humour surrounding the shrunken TARDIS and then miniature one was hilarious and the contrasting reactions between the Doctor and Clara were wonderful. I wasn't a great fan of the Doctor peering out of the figure-sized TARDIS and I really didn't buy into the way he moved it off the tracks sadly. But the siege mode was something I loved the sound of! The setting of a Bristol estate could have been better I thought - it's not the nicest of places with all due respect and that was perfectly shown with the character of Ruscoe who was basically an arrogant bastard. I really disliked him which in turn is what the writer intended and therefore is something I like, if that makes sense. Rigsy reminded me of Courtney from The Caretaker and Kill the Moon, and I'm not convinced that using youth as such pivotal characters in stories is a good direction. I've not a problem with it at the moment but I'd rather it not continue if I'm honest. The Doctor's helplessness in the TARDIS was comical and I absolutely loved how Clara took full advantage of that. For one episode, she was the Doctor. And I loved her approach and it was also lovely to see how much she's learned from her space friend. It was fascinating seeing how a familiar character reacted and approached being in the situation the Doctor's usually in. She really was just beautiful, as always, but I didn't mean physically. Of course, in that respect she was pretty much perfect as per usual. The 'memorial' of the missing people actually being the memorial was horrifically frightening! The danger of a 2D monster turning things into 2D cleverly avoided the danger of seeming childish and cartoon-like which was nice to see. The absorption, if you like, of the police women was a scary scene! The Doctor not knowing literally anything about the situation and his excitement at something extremely new occurring was magnificent. I loved how Clara worked out how to get the TARDIS back from siege mode and to full size by following what the Doctor would do, use the enemy's power against them and that charged the TARDIS conveniently. The emergence of the Doctor to defeat the "killer graffiti" (sorry, Doctor, but that's what I'm calling them!) was fantastic but I thought something more explanatory than the sonic would be how the 2D invaders would be defeated. I loved how the theory of the 2D universe was proved here in this episode and their attempts to break into the third dimension were done so in frightening fashion. Overall, a great episode and an extremely intriguing end scene with Missy. The Doctor seems to know something is going on by saying Clara's excellence had nothing to do with goodness, but I'm more intrigued by Missy claiming to have chosen well. I'm guessing it's a reference to The Bells of Saint John with the phone number but just why did she choose Clara and what for? It's not long until we find out. 

Rating: 8/10