I’ll be the first one to admit it. I don’t think the B and C plots of this final story of Series 3, starting with last week’s “Utopia,” stand up too well. Don’t get me wrong: I like them, and I think in their own way they work. However, with a total runtime of 142-minutes or two and a bit hours, I think it is a little long-winded. Classic Who fans are trying to sonic their screens away right now and trying to do a mix of the 12th Doctor and Malcolm Tucker by swearing at me and threatening to hit me with their shoes.

I love what it does to Doctor Who, and I love the lasting moments it features; yet it does have that big red button and fantasy issue. The ending is what really does it, or rather the bit before the proper conclusion, I.E. not the bit where things are being resolved with compassion. It all feels like “When You Wish Upon a Star” mixed with the mythos of the Mr. Jésus that those Christians and Catholics love. It is very much a lack of sci-fi, which I’ve shown a hatred for before with Shakespeare, werewolves, and other assorted rubbish.

In my head as I write, I’m honestly trying to work out the math that would balance the problems I have with the story’s length while keeping its better qualities. A two-parter in place of the three would simply cut too much for the overall quality. However, that 90-minute length would have kept brevity overall. Again, I understand the qualities and the richness of the overarching plot itself, though watching it back last Sunday with “Utopia” before it, I wanted it to wrap up several times before I knew it would. This is where time gives distance, and distance gives perspective. If I were to watch each episode a week apart, I may not have had as much of an issue.

Thinking about it, it may also be the case that each episode is in itself a whole plot and its acts. When referencing points in scripts, the common language is A, B, and C plots with acts 1, 2, and 3 (sometimes 4 and 5 also) comprising the arc of the story. Doctor Who 187A, 187B, and 187C all feel like act 1, 2, and 3 stretched out to 45-minutes for the former two, and 52-minutes for the latter part. If you’ve ever tried to write an adventure script, that’s a glacial pace. One that might be harmful when you spend a majority of the third act (187C) with its own act structure being quite slow itself.

I feel like I’m repeating myself. That isn’t to say I hate the episode though. I’d vote for Harold Saxon, but that’s probably because the Archangel satellites connected to my phone are telling me to with a rhythmic tapping that I often do on occasion. Oh yes! I can finally talk about this at an appropriate time to do so. I may have been saying, “Vote Saxon!” in reviews where he came up in the episode (aside from “42“) because Harold Saxon is your new Prime Minister. Harold Saxon is The Master!

Finally, I get to talk about a good Master… Ok, not good in the sense of doing good or being The Doctor, I just mean the quality of John Simm as The Master. Again, I’m going to be up to my eyeballs in hatred from Classic Who fans for what I’m about to say: John Simm is The Master, period. Anthony Ainley or Roger Degado may just be the staple point for the classic era, but you can’t deny that John Simm has defined that role for the modern era. I treasure what Sacha Dhawan tried to do with what he was given by Chris Chibnall, but it was a bi-polar and watered down John Simm impression if I’ve ever seen one.

Out of the four current Masters we’ve had in New Who: I cherish Derek Jacobi, and he brought complexity to a character that 11-years prior was one-dimensional (thanks America!). Michelle Gomez is just perfection as it stands, I love her and her disposables: exposition and comic relief. However, the reason Simm is so beloved is his exuberance as a genocidal maniac that was used sparingly and given a proper build towards the reveal. He brings and always will bring (if you ignore “World Enough and Time” and “The Doctor Falls”) a special occasion that jolted the episode from being fine to “that is an amazing performance.”

“The Sound of Drums” might spend 10-minutes continuing an act 1 premise of setting up the story, with the following 34-minutes being act 2 of the overall story. The final minute or so sets up act 3 with The Doctor dramatically aged. Martha escapes The Master’s capture, and the Toclafane are released on the people of the world. Episode 13 “Last of the Time Lords” is just a prolonged act 3 with Martha setting up for the resolution to the problems that I’ve already moaned about enough at the start. She spent the better part of 35-minutes wandering about the globe like it is Middle Earth just for the magic Jésus moment of restoring The Doctor from Dobby in a cage to Super Tennant.

It is that last episode building to the resurrecting space Jésus via prayer that really puts me off. Yes, it is using the archangel network to link people telepathically, but that’s the most sci-fi part of it. It is still people praying. Just ask the “pray the gay away” lot how well that works out for them. It is not really Doctor Who; It is a quick cop-out. I’m not saying there being a very literal big red button would have made it better to solve the problem, but at least something more sci-fi may have left me more satisfied with the third-part.

Maybe it is because of Martha’s character. She’s a smart woman who was training to be a doctor of medicine. She’s a woman of science and logic, but she’s sent on a year-long crusade to talk of a man from the clouds that’s really old so people will believe in him, so people will say his name on a single day that year. I’ll repeat myself, it smells of religion in a sci-fi adventure show that is often quite agnostic. While it does depict religion and spirituality in several episodes, including “The Satan Pit,” it takes the point of the observer to someone’s belief. “Last of the Time Lords” is making The Doctor the literal second coming.

Though, to return to the focus and the lasting point of the episode, the most charismatic Master since 1989 (possibly if you ignore “Doctor Who: The Curse of the Fatal Death“) takes center stage, and then immediately dies. See there are 4th and 5th acts, but typically that would mean the Mr. Jésus moment for The Doctor is the climax. The Master’s death is the fall in action, while Martha leaving the TARDIS is the Denouement and resets us back to a pre “Utopia” level. Of course, until the RMS Titanic smashes through the TARDIS walls, as it would.

To wrap up the plot of “Bad Wolf,” and later “Utopia,” Captain Jack is released back into the wild of Cardiff to spend time with his pervert friends. As The Doctor drops him off, he asks about his inability to die after a year of torture. That is where Davies created what is argued in the annals of Who forums, as Jack talks about living Boeshane Peninsula and being nicknamed “The Face of Boe,” for being the first to join the Time Agency. It is a thread of Who that will probably never be definitively concluded as Russell T Davies walks around in circles on Jack and Boe. Meanwhile, Julie Gardner, series producer, outright states Jack is Boe.

Anyway, next week, I’ll be talking about a ship crashing into the TARDIS, a blonde Australian in a French maid’s outfit, The Doctor talking to himself, and Tennant talking with his future father-in-law who’s daughter is The Doctor’s daughter by DNA cloning. I might have just broken my editor with the summation.

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Dr Who "The Sound of Drums" & "Last of the Time Lords"

8

Score

8.0/10

Pros

• John Simm's Masterful performance.
• Master defining moments.
• The reveal of the Toclafane being those looking for "Utopia," great.

Cons

• The third act amounts to little of a satisfying climax.