Doctor Who - Dot and Bubble

"Dot and Bubble" is problematic. An episode that focuses more on its guest-stars rather than The Doctor (Ncuti Gatwa) and his companion Ruby Sunday (Millie Gibson) can work, and work spectacularly in "Blink," but it does require those guest-roles to be strong enough to carry the episode. Unfortunately the thinly-veiled sermon against overuse of social media, presented with the subtlety of a sledgehammer, centers around a twat. And the rest of her planet turn out to be no better. Thankfully the tension in the episode works, despite the odd setup, and there's enough interesting visuals to carry us through events eventually offering a hard lesson to the new Doctor.

What the episode does showcase is this version of The Doctor wants to save everyone, and is far less forgiving of whether or not they deserve to be saved than some of his previous incarnations. Our main character is Lindy Pepper-Bean (Callie Cooke) who, like everyone else on the posh planet for spoiled twenty-somethings, spends all of her time in a literal social bubble (it actually wraps around her head). The bubble allows her to talk to equally vapid others and ignore what's happening in the real world. The problem is, what's happening in the real world is a host of aliens slowly eating the population.

One could argue The Doctor's visit ultimately changes nothing. Had he never visited, is the result any different? Yes, he's able to save a small number of the ungrateful rich brats who refuse any further help from an outside, but with stunted survival skills (even having trouble walking without the explicit direction of their bubbles which won't work in nature) there is no chance of them surviving in the wild. The outcome of the episode hurts more than angers The Doctor and it will be interesting to see if this failure has any lasing effects.

• Title: Doctor Who - Dot and Bubble
• wiki: link