Previous episode reviews:
Episode 7: Kill the Moon
Episode 6: The Caretaker
Episode 5: Time Heist
Episode 4: Listen
Episode 3: Robot of Sherwood
Episode 2: Into the Dalek
Episode 1: Deep Breath
Summary:
A few weeks after the harrowing events on the moon, The Doctor and Clara travel aboard an intergalactic Orient Express train across space. Clara is determined to make this the last hurrah for her and The Doctor after what happened, but their troubles have to be put on hold. Aboard the train people are dying under mysterious circumstances, to a killer only the victims can see. All the victims can say is that a mummy kills them in under 66 seconds, and The Doctor and Clara have to put a stop to it before any more die...
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Fandoms are really...fickle, to say the least. Fans of any ongoing series of any medium, be they books, TV shows, movies, comics or video games, can turn their opinions and stances on a dime. The worst I've witnessed in the many years I have been part of various fandoms is the ever classic declaration of "This new installment sucks! I am never going to like this again!". While I'm sure it's exaggeration, it really does annoy me that people can act this way because of the freedom of the Internet. Just because I advocate different opinions doesn't mean I advocate poorly written, poorly thought-out, immature ones.
The point I am making with this? Well, last week's episode...really turned a lot of people off. Sure there were those folks who said they're willing to sit the season out, but then you got that small, yet very vocal group who loves to whine and complain like brats and pretty much right the equivalent of shouting when it came to last week's "Kill the Moon". While I admit I did not like the ending to that and the supposed "pro-life" message to the episode, there were those who took it way too far. Any time people say "they will quit" I just laugh because very rarely does it play out. They always come back anyway.
But yeah, this latest episode "Mummy on the Orient Express" deals with The Doctor and Clara aboard a space train and solving an issue of an invisible killer mummy. They do this while we have the B-plot of Clara still coming to terms with her actions last week and the determination of this being her last trip. These two plots, combined a very intriguing story of this episode, the mysteries of the mummy, the supporting cast, and the big plot twists made this a REALLY good episode. If there is any bad, it is again the ending, but unlike last time the ending actually makes sense in a context, and could possibly have major repercussions later on. I know I sound like a broken record, but this episode continues to pile on the success of this season, and possibly supplant "The Caretaker" as my favorite episode so far.
If this episode plot sounds familiar, that's because it is. This story was inspired by the mystery novel "Murder on the Orient Express" written by famed author Agatha Christie.
If this episode plot sounds familiar, that's because it is. This story was inspired by the mystery novel "Murder on the Orient Express" written by famed author Agatha Christie (Who funnily enough appeared as a character in the show). One of the strong points of this episode is its usage of the sense of foreboding and fear. Whether or not it's because of the Halloween season, it is still a very effective usage. An example of this is when the mummy appears to claim its next victim. A timer counting 66 seconds appears on the screen and with each passing second, you can feel that tension rising as it gets closer to zero. We the audience knows what it means, but for the characters in the episode, it's unknown until much later, and it adds to the creepy factor. Major props to that.
As said, the character plot of Clara and The Doctor revolves around them after their argument last episode. The Doctor in most of this episode is rightfully focused more on thwarting the mummy, so a lot this plot falls onto Clara. She seems to have taken Danny's advice in the previous episode to not part on bad terms with The Doctor and calm herself down, so she decides that this trip on the Orient Express would be her final one. While I am annoyed that we still have to go through the whole "Can I trust The Doctor?" shtick again, it still is one of the major plot elements of the story, so credit where credit is due for not making the thing so tiresome and that annoying. It's rightful to think so anyway; this version of The Doctor is so different from the past two ones, and is a major changer for the Revised Series and newer fans. So a shake up to the status quo in this case is good, if slightly tiresome given that we're a few episodes away from the season finale.
One minor note here, is that Jenna Coleman as Clara this episode really looked pretty. It's a tradition of Doctor who for the characters to dress in the time period they are in or relatively close to. In this episode it's 1920's, and Clara in this episode really looked great in the dress and the bob cut. Kind of makes you wish this was her regular hairstyle.
It is here where Clara meets Maisie, the granddaughter of one of the victims killed by the mummy. Both encounter a suspicious room that is locked by Gus, supposedly the artificial intelligence of the train. We know something is not right because Maisie is barred from at least seeing the body of her grandmother. The Doctor meanwhile meets Perkins, the chief engineer, and Professor Moorhouse, expert on alien mythology. Moorhouse and the Doctor discuss the legend of the Foretold, a mythical mummy, and how the legend states of those who fall under the Foretold's gaze die in 66 seconds. This is conveniently juxtaposed with one of the chefs of the train seeing the mummy and dying, no matter how much he tries to run from it. Whether or not this episode was made because of the Halloween season or because it was a coincidence, this is still a very effective mystery and creepy image of the stalker killer mummy.
It is at this point where we get the huge twist of the episode. Clara and Maisie enter the forbidden room and discover a sarcophagus, and are trapped. The Doctor meets the train captain, Quell, and bears witness to more deaths. The Doctor, ever the sharp mind, notices that all the passengers on board the train are related to a specific field of scientific study. The one truly in charge is the AI, Gus, who lifts the veil. Gus was the one who brought the Foretold on board via an ancient scroll, and these scientific minds were brought together to study how to stop it as an experiment. And just to prove that Gus means business when The Doctor attempts to get help from Clara via phonecall, Gus de-pressurizes the kitchen and kills all the kitchen staff in space. Again, very effectively setup about who is the real antagonist of the episode. Yes, the mummy is killing people, but Gus is the one that set the thing loose. It's enough that we have a mummy, but a killer AI too? Awesome touch that brings to mind Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Via research, they discover the mummy's pattern; it attacks those who are either sick, unwell, or suffering from any type of aliment, be they big like old age, or small like the common cold. It is in this way that Professor Moorhouse and Captain Quell fall victim to the mummy, and just to show how callous The Doctor can get, he asks the two to describe what the mummy looks like and other aspects for clues. While Perkins and other people present are horrified by The Doctor's behavior, Gus can only applaud The Doctor for taking the experiment so seriously. Things only get worse when they discover that Maisie is the next victim. Clara again can only be aghast and enraged at The Doctor using another innocent life to stop the mummy, but The Doctor then takes Maisie's grief and implants it into him so that the Foretold will come to him instead. The Doctor's behavior in this episode again continues themes seen in previous episodes of the season, from using other people's lives (specifically those who are pretty much doomed to die), to being uncaring at how people react to his behavior and sacrificing. It is a shocking thing to be sure, and one which I applaud again, because it goes to show how different The Doctor is from the past.
Through a series of, admittedly, confusing events, The Doctor deduces that the mummy is actually an ancient undead soldier that never finished his battle. With near death, The Doctor says that he surrenders to the mummy soldier. The soldier complies, and crumbles to dust. Gus, ever the callous AI, congratulates on the success of the experiment and proceeds to kill all of them anyway. The Doctor manages to save all the surviving passengers in time before the train explodes, transporting them all to another planet.
After Perkins declines an invitation to join the TARDIS, the Doctor and Clara talk, and we get the conclusion of the events of last episode. It's the ending where I have mixed feelings, though as I said, this one is much more favorable, more to the point, and can possibly have much larger repercussions than the one last week. Clara asks The Doctor about his behavior on the train, and The Doctor gives it to her straight, that he can't sugercoat things just for the sake of being good, and that tough choices and decisions need to be made. He reassures Clara though that he's not a monster, and that he felt sorry he couldn't save those who died. Regardless though, even if he couldn't save one, he would've tried again and again, using more and more passengers, until Gus was defeated, because he couldn't stand what Gus has done to them. The Doctor pretty much makes impossible choices, and it's something that he's never tired of doing.
Clara's decision on leaving seems to connect to that, as she starts viewing her trips with The Doctor as an addition because she seems tired of it. When she gets a phone call from Danny however, she says a lie. A lie that will most definitely have repercussions when we reach the season's end. Clara lies to Danny in saying that its her final adventure, and Clara lies to The Doctor in saying that Danny approves of her continuing to travel with him. Clara is not willing to give up travelling after all, which again is rather anticlimactic since, if we know Clara is leaving, we would have news of it. But anyway, yeah, The Doctor and Clara, their friendship restored, switch the TARDIS on and the adventure continues.
Final thoughts:
Mummy on the Orient Express is a most excellent episode, boasted by the two main leads, a good supporting cast, a strong, creepy story held by strong villains, and an ending that, while mixed, is obviously going to set up things that will happen later on and have major consequences. The episode continues the trend of our two main characters having major flaws about them that can bite them back, and continues the trend of building thematic elements of this season despite this season not having a story arc. Past seasons of Doctor Who tended to revolve around story arcs that connected every single episode one way or another. This one does not, and the connections are much more subtle. Subtlety is king this season to be sure.
I put this episode roughly the same as The Caretaker. That episode and this one tie for me as the best of this season so far.
My score: 5/5
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