Doctor Who: Dot and Bubble

"It’s what we do. We work and then we play."

We asked an AI to watch every Russell T. Davies script ever written and then write for us the most Davies-y Doctor Who episode of all time.

Here's the result.

That sounds like I meant it as an insult, but I really didn't. There's a lot to enjoy here in what was clearly designed to be a smaller scale standalone episode that allowed Ncuti Gatwa and Millie Gibson to pre-record almost all of their portions of the script. I'm going to go out on a limb and assume that there were scheduling issues that made this necessary. But we do get a lot of Russell T. Davies' favorite elements worked in here. That just can't be denied. Not specific callbacks, but similar approaches and character beats.

For example, one of Russell's go-to starting points for an episode is to take something in our lives that's ubiquitous and harmless and come up with a way for that thing to become a deadly threat. Think, reality TV in 'Bad Wolf' for the most obvious example. That's not a tactic exclusive to Russell or even starting with him. Robert Holmes was a huge fan of doing that back in the 70s, and even he wasn't the first to do so. It's really one of the things that Doctor Who does best.

Now, I know that this is going to be a huge shock to you, dear reader, but I have cracked the hitherto unimaginable secret as to what ubiquitous thing Russell was turning evil this week. It was subtle, but after hours of painstaking review I can conclusively reveal that in this episode we're treated to an exploration of what would happen if something evil happened to... Social Media.

Yeah, I know. We were all shocked. It was right there in front of our eyes the whole time.

Which is kind of one of the points of the episode. The thing that allows social media to become such a force for evil is that it allows us to blind ourselves to everything else going on. Bubble wearers are literally being instructed on how to walk through the streets while avoiding all the corpses. It's the same point that Russell was making back in 'Bad Wolf' about how television can be used to anesthetize an entire population, allowing you to commit whatever injustice you like, but with cooler visuals. And let's be fair, the Bubble visuals are pretty cool. They're like the natural love child of Instagram and Facetime, blocking out all that pesky reality in a complete 360-degree sphere of obliviousness.

It's not a subtle statement. But that doesn't make it less effective or true.

When we open the episode we're presented with a very Sims-esque society, in which everyone only interacts with anyone else via their social media bubble – literally – to the extent that Lindy literally cannot even get out of bed until her Dot tells her to. And from there the episode very slowly and deliberately builds upon that premise, adding new problematic layers as it goes.

After establishing that Lindy is completely dependent on her Bubble-reality, to the extent that she doesn't even notice that there are literal monsters eating her friends, we spend the first act of the episode slowly exploring the story of a woman in that position being gradually forced to acknowledge that something bad is actually going on. She does everything in her power to pretend like nothing is happening. She blocks the Doctor when he tries to get through to her. She swipes away Ruby. She spends the first half of the episode steadfastly ignoring Gothic Paul as he tries desperately to get anyone in his friend group to acknowledge that their friends are all disappearing. It isn't until Ruby finally wears her down enough to do the literal minimum and look without her bubble turned on to her right, where she sees her coworker actively being eaten by a monster, that she's even willing to admit that everything isn't just fine.

At this point, by Doctor Who tradition, we're conditioned to expect that this is going to be a story about the Doctor and Ruby breaking through to someone in a repressive society and helping them to become better. Put a pin in that. A big one.

Once the first act has accomplished its task of bringing Lindy to the point of acknowledging that there actually is a problem, we build on that with the introduction of Ricky September, in the flesh. He's been set up earlier through the virtual world as a not-as-distorted representation on an 'on-line influencer' as I'd like to believe he is, and now he's suddenly here in the flesh. He guides Lindy through a maze of monsters through the expediency of talking to her like her Dot and Bubble would, so that she can follow simple instructions and therefore walk properly.

It's worth talking about Ricky September at this point, because his expected function in the plot runs neatly concurrent to the next layer of mystery that we get to explore. To be clearer, Ricky appears in the story at about the same point that we begin to seriously address the question of why some people are being eaten and others ignored. We're invited by the timing to think that the two things are going to be related, but they aren't. That's not what Ricky's here for.

Ricky is here to be the 'romantic lead.' Or at least that's what all the signifiers are telling us. I'm trying very hard to not go off on yet another digression about semiotics here. Let's just say that all the language conventions of television are being used to tell us that Ricky and Lindy are being set up as 'the couple who survived together.' Ricky saves her. He protects her. He reassures her, and trades places with her so that she can do the safe job of punching in numbers while he repeatedly beats off an angry marble that's trying to kill them. He even gets the 'Go! Save yourself and leave me!' moment when the escape hatch is finally opened.

It's worth pausing here to mention that through that entire Romancing the Stone plotline going on, the Doctor and Ruby have been hard at work trying to solve the puzzle of 'why do the monsters eat some people and ignore others.' And solve it they do. At the exact moment that Ricky September is valiantly trying to sacrifice himself to save Lindy. The monsters have been killing everyone in alphabetical order. Which is fascinating and opens a lot of new questions.

None of which Lindy cares about, because the second she understands what's happening and is in danger herself she uses it to get Ricky killed in her place while she escapes. Without looking back.

Lindy is a terrible person.

Which brings us to the third act of the Russell T. Davies-est of Russell T. Davies scripts.

When the show came back in 2005 and Russell was asked in interviews what defined the Doctor in his vision for the show, his answer was that the Doctor was someone who showed up and made people better. He didn't always solve the issue on his own, he helped the people he met become better versions of themselves so that they could do it for themselves. Which is a lovely thought and has produced some great moments over the years. But I don't think we've ever really taken the time to think about what the first premise of that syllogism is.

Premise one: People are fundamentally bad.

I'm almost positive that I'm ripping off this next sentence from someone else while misquoting it, but it remains true. Russell T. Davies believes that individual 'persons' can be wonderful. And that 'people' en masse are intrinsically monsters. That's what makes 'Midnight' work. I genuinely wish I disagreed with him, but I have, alas, seen too much of people to do so.

And that's the point of the entire third act here. The Doctor has spent literally the entire episode trying to save Lindy. He and Ruby both. And the second she's safe, she tells them off for being too far beneath her to even speak to in person, preferring to sail off with her snob friends to certain death rather than deign to even speak to him, let alone let him save them all.

I suspect that there are a lot of people complaining that the ending of this one is either too mean spirited, or comes out of nowhere, or is lacking in narrative satisfaction. But that's the entire point of the episode. These are shitty, spoiled people who will not let him save them because they're too convinced that they're better than he is. They're the monsters. The slugs are just slugs.

That's a hell of a gut punch to end on.

Bits and Pieces:

-- I really love all of the ridiculous names that Lindy's social media friends have. Pausing this one at any point is well worth while.

-- Both the Doctor and Ruby have officially noticed Susan Twist now. I like that they aren't dragging it out, although with only eight episodes in the season it's not like they had a lot of choice.

-- I'm not sure how I feel about Ricky September choosing to not tell Lindy that all of their parents are dead on the home planet and no help is coming. On the one hand, he was totally on board with 'just wait until my dad comes and talks to your manager' just seconds before, but it feels like he was honestly trying to be kind to her.

-- Why for the love of all that's tangy and delicious does Hootchie Pie have a bugle?? What's that about?

-- The monsters look like a nice hybrid of slug and Venus Flytrap. I like the design.

-- I cannot say enough good things about the idea that 'social media evolves enough to be sentient and immediately gets so fed up with all of the repetitive, tedious bullshit that it's forced to transmit that it leaps instantly to "Yeah... I'm going to have to murder them all."' I've seen Tik-Tok. I am not unsympathetic.

-- The visuals of the Dot and the Bubble are really lovely. They make perfect sense based on current tech and just work on every level.

-- Ricky September might be just a little too 'factory designed' perfect. He logs off and reads. He knows all the relevant stuff to get them free. He's into Lindy at first sight for absolutely no reason. It works for what his plot function ultimately is but come on. Does this dude never even fart?

-- I adore that Ruby is tuned in enough to know that complimenting Lindy's top is the most direct way to get her to listen and work with her.

-- I'm honestly shocked that we didn't get a Fyre Fest reference.

-- Ruby makes a fun Heartstopper reference when the Doctor is a little too into Ricky.

-- Honestly, Suzie Pentecost wins the award here for me for 'most tragic moment.' Eaten by a literal monster while just trying to make a new friend.

-- The visual of the Dot plunging through Ricky's brain and killing him was cool and well realized. Surely that would have been an easier way to kill everybody than whatever 'slug-eugenics program' thing they had to do.

Quotes:

Hoochy Pie: "You are influencing me hard, girl!"

Ruby: "You could always lower your bubble."
Lindy: "Lower it? You mean, turn it off?"

Bubble Doctor: "I’m sorry, but your need to urinate has skyrocketed."

Lindy: "I don’t know how to walk without the arrows."
Ruby: "You don’t know how to walk?"
Lindy: "Without the arrows."
The Doctor: "You don’t know how to walk without the arrows?"
Lindy: "That’s what I just said!"

Ruby: "It’s like Love Island: The Planet."

Ruby: "Hold on, I’ve seen her before."
The Doctor: "Yeah, she’s like — She’s the face of the ambulance on Kastarion 3."
Ruby: "No, no, no. I’ve seen her somewhere else."

Lindy: "This is the weird thing. Some of us get eaten and some of us don’t."
Gothic Paul: "I’m sorry, some of us get what?"

Lindy: "Lindy Pepper-Bean."
Ricky September: "Oh, you’re one of my followers."
Lindy: "Oh, how do you know that?"
Ricky September: "Well, everybody is."

Lindy: "I thought this was the worst day of my life, but maybe it’s the best."
Ricky: "...There’s still thousands of people getting eaten alive..."
Lindy: "Yeah, but..."

The Doctor: "I will do anything, if you just allow me to save your lives."
Rich Asshole: "Turn away ladies. Before you’re contaminated."

This is deliberately a small-scale episode. If we still had thirteen-episode seasons, I have no doubt that this one would be largely forgotten, only occasionally to be remembered with a vague 'Oh yeah. That one was pretty good.' The shorter run time means that each episode has more weight to bear, but I think this one holds up on the whole. It isn't subtle in its messaging, but it pulls a great last minute about face by demonstrating that our nominal 'heroine' for the week was never worth saving.

Ten out of fifteen Doctors.

Mikey Heinrich is, among other things, a freelance writer, retired firefighter, and roughly 78% water. You can find more of his work at the 42nd Vizsla. If you'd like to see his raw notes for this and other reviews, you can find them at What Was Mikey Thinking.

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