Well, after a first episode that was enjoyable enough but felt confusing and bloated at times it's nice to get an episode that felt like it did a lot with the story without being overwhelming; delivering a good monster of the week style story that still played a part in the bigger story.
The story pretty much picks up where the last one left off, with the Tardis coming under attack from the mysterious Flux, some kind of energy wave/cloud thing that's destroying all of reality itself. After a brief dream-like sequence where the Doctor stares up a strange broken and twisted house floating in the air (this has to be Lungbarrow right?) our three companions wake up outside the Tardis on a fog covered battlefield surrounded by dead British soldiers.
The three of them are quickly found by Mary Seacole, confirming that they must be in the middle of the Crimean War; however, when they learn that the British aren't fighting Russian forces, but an army of Sontarans it indicates that history may have gone awry. Unfortunately, the Doctor is barely able to begin processing this before Dan and Yaz are swept away somewhere and somewhen into the timestream. With the Tardis refusing to let her back inside the Doctor has to find a way to stop the Sontaran invasion before she can go after her friends.
Meanwhile, Dan finds himself back in present day Liverpool, where the Sontarans have taken over, whilst Yaz is taken to the planet Time along with Vinder, where they discover the Mouri, strange almost religious figures that have a connection to time itself. Unfortunately, Swarm and Azure are also heading to Time.
So, a lot does happen this episode, but thanks to the main focus being on the Sontaran invasion of Earth, even across two time periods, it feels a lot more manageable than the previous episode. It had a briskness of pace that felt good, as it needed to wrap certain things up before the end of this episode, whilst still keeping the main plot going. If this is how the rest of the series is going to play out I'm much more excited now to see the rest than I was at the end of the first episode.
Another thing that this episode really gets right is the Sontarans. I was never completely happy with the Sontarans during modern Doctor Who, their designs felt a little too smooth and neat, their costumes were too bright and colourful, and they were often too comical for me to really see them as any kind of threat. All that seems to have been addressed here. I mentioned in my previous episode review that I liked that their design was a more modern version of their classic look, and we get to see a lot more of that this episode. Their armour actually looks like armour now, rather than purple and blue rubber it looks like heavy weave cloth and thick metallic plates; it looks like something a warrior would have to wear.
Their faces are also a big improvement, having gotten rid of the smoothness and almost sanitised look they had, instead looking rougher, uglier, and meaner. Their faces don't look like they're fresh out of the cloning tanks, but that these are creatures that live on the battlefield, have taken hits and have scars and look like they could really hurt you. This is also reflected in the way they act, with these being the scariest and most aggressive Sontarans we've seen in the modern era. Yes, they still have moments of humour, such as Commander Skack admitting that they'd invaded this era because he wanted to ride a horse; but they were much more threatening, mercilessly killing prisoners, and even executing their own soldier for the disgrace of being caught.
Speaking of that particular Sontaran, I thought we were going to get a reveal that that particular warrior was going to be Strax from a point before we'd met him previously. He was played by Dan Starkey, seemed to have medical knowledge because he fixed himself up, and when he admitted that he had been captured and taken to heal by the enemy he asked for a fitting punishment; and I thought this was going to be the point where his commander would make his punishment healing the sick, as a kind of joke upon how he brought dishonour to himself. I think it would have fitted really well, and would have been a neat connection to previous seasons. But sadly my hopeful fan theorising wasn't to be.
The modern Sontaran stuff was probably the weakest of the episode, with Dan's ability to sneak right into the heart of their top secret and supposedly heavily guarded time ship construction yards being very easy and convenient. With how much the rest of the episode did to build up the threat of the Sontarans they felt a lot less of a bother in the modern sections. Thankfully, the fun that John Bishop is continuing to bring to the role made these scenes fairly enjoyable, and his moments did elicit some genuine laughs from me. I'd never really seen much of John Bishop in things before, so had no real opinion on his casting, but having had two episodes with him now I'm really enjoying the energy he's bringing to the show.
Aside from the Sontaran plot the most intriguing parts of the episode are those that took place on Time. Not only did we get to see a bit more of Vinder and learn a tiny bit of him, but we also get another appearance from Joseph Williamson, who has also somehow ended up inside the temple briefly. With this being two episodes in a row with him and his tunnels making an appearance I'm very interested to see what kind of explanation we're eventually going to get. These sections also allowed Yaz to take the lead for a while, working under the mantra 'what would the Doctor do?'. Along with her moments helping to pilot the Tardis last episode it's clear that she's had the chance to learn more from the Doctor since Ryan and Graham left last season, and is beginning to act more like the Doctor. Whilst this isn't necessarily a bad thing, the last companion who tried acting like the Doctor and got a bit too cocky ended up getting them self killed; so it does make me worry about Yaz a bit.
The best part of the scenes on Time, however, are those that involved the villains Swarm and Azure, along with their new companion the Passenger. Passenger has to be Di inside some kind of robotic prison suit or something right? Azure took her last episode and Passenger did nothing but stand around so I'm guessing she's locked inside it. Whilst Swarm did some creepy things last episode I didn't really get much of a sense about the kind of character he was, but episode two really gives him a chance to shine, despite only being in the episode for a short amount of time. The level of confidence he has, the bravado and subtle threat he exudes really sells that he's going to be a big villain, and Sam Spruell plays him wonderfully. It's still pretty early days yet, and I'm sure we're going to get more of him as the series progresses, but I genuinely loved every scene he was in and can't wait to see more.
With an entertaining plot that gets resolved in this episode, more mysteries being revealed, and a cliffhanger that feels a lot more of a threat than the first episode (we all knew the Flux wasn't going to kill our three leads in the first episode, but who knows what Swarms plan is going to do) this feels like the episode that has settled into a good pace for the rest of the series to emulate. I was worried how a series long arc was going to play out, and if everything would work out by the end, and whilst things could still go wrong if the landing doesn't stick, I'm certainly more hopeful for the rest of the story now, and think that this is going to be Chibnall's best work as show runner.
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