In the Dark Reviews

After a quartet of specials near the end of last year, the latest season of "Doctor Who" is underway on its new American streaming home of Disney+, so with a little more than three aired episodes under his belt, it's time to take stock of the 15th Doctor, played by Rwandan-Scottish actor Ncuti Gatwa.

Alert viewers may have already spotted Gatwa as one of the army of Kens who populated the cast of last year's "Barbie" (sporting frosted blond hair, no less), but what strikes me about his portrayal of Fifteen is how free he is from his predecessors' melancholy, which has been an ever-present trait of the character since Russell T. Davies resurrected "Doctor Who" as a TV series in 2005.

So far, Gatwa's Doctor has shown himself to be clever, friendly, playful and compassionate, demonstrating both an innate curiosity and an uninhibited - occasionally even delighted - willingness to admit when he doesn't know something.

I'll be interested to see how he responds to villains and monsters like the Daleks and the Cybermen, with whom peaceable coexistence simply isn't possible, since as close as he's come to such

adversaries have compelled him to admit his fears, and rely upon outside help (although there's certainly no shame in leaning on The Beatles' talent in a musical episode).

Perhaps most importantly, the 15th Doctor has proven excellent at thinking on his feet, which should serve him well in a "Whoniverse" that mixes the series' traditional science fiction with more outright fantasy than ever before, thanks to Davies using the 2023 end-of-year specials to establish that the rules of reality have been made more magical.

Because this new era of "Doctor Who" has the Doctor himself contemplating what's possible, all three of this season's episodes have required him to analyze the narrative tropes of genre story telling itself to prevail, first by tying together resonant coincidences in "The Church on Ruby Road," then by recognizing a deliberate recreation of a children's fairy-tale template in "Space Babies," and finally by acknowledging how emotionally essential music is to humanity's healthy self-expression in "The Devil's Chord."

Speaking of which, Neil Patrick Harris' extended musical sequence as The Toymaker in last year's special, "The Giggle," was not a one-off, as we're treated not only to goblin sky-pirates performing a stage-show tribute to feeding a Christmas baby to their goblin king (the CGI, and the Doctor rescuing the infant, makes it goofy rather than gruesome), but also a duel against a living embodiment of music itself.

Jinkx Monsoon's performance as the "Maestro" was probably as over-the-top as that role required, but what made me laugh was when the show's background score itself was weaponized against our heroes, with the Doctor offering a metafictional Bugs Bunny-style aside about how "I thought that was nondiegetic."

Given that The Toymaker and Maestro have been explicitly established as existing outside of the show's standard reality, I can't help but suspect more fourth-wall breaks in the future, which could be leading someplace terrific, in both senses of the term.

Since we're talking about long-term plots, let's get to the latest companion, the improbably named Ruby Sunday, played by Millie Gibson as a remix of previous companions Rose Tyler and Clara Oswald.

Now 19 years old, Ruby was a foundling, left outside a church on Christmas, thereby earning the audience's sympathies and establishing the mystery of her parentage, since not even TV presenter Davina McCall (playing herself) can find any DNA relatives of Ruby ... on modern-day Earth, anyway.

Gibson plays Ruby as earnest, affectionate, brave, occasionally klutzy in her absent-mindedness (albeit not entirely by her fault alone) and easily swept up into the rush of chaotic happenstance, with attractive cheekbones and a doting adoptive family.

For my taste, Davies could trim the length of a few of his musical numbers, and our main players remain a bit light on dramatic substance just yet, but I've seen nothing to discourage my enthusiasm for the rest of this season, nor for Gatwa's remaining tenure as the Doctor.

Plus, I absolutely love the new Sonic Screwdriver, simply because it is completely unlike any previous version of that fictional multitool, and I can't wait to buy the toy.

Author Bio

Kirk Boxleitner, Reporter

Shelton-Mason County Journal & Belfair Herald
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