Doctor Who – Series 10, Episode 6: “Extremis”

• Well, I wasn’t expecting Missy to turn up so quickly in this episode. And it’s Missy in the vault, too? I wasn’t expecting that reveal mid-season, either.
• Should have known this episode was written by Steven Moffat, with that execution fake-out. (“Ah, you thought the Doctor was being executed, didn’t you? Psych!”) At this point, the episode was already reminding me of Season 4 of Sherlock – which is not a good thing.
• A murderous mystery within the Vatican, with a possible connection to CERN – are we sure this episode wasn’t written by Dan Brown?
• I found myself thinking of what the Veritas might say that would drive anyone who read it to commit suicide. Maybe, “We’ll keep getting Transformers sequels for the next hundred years.”
• I must be too on edge for when John Simm’s Master is going to turn up, now that we know it’s not him in the vault. First I thought he was the priest at Missy’s execution. Then I thought he was the shadowy figure in the portal.
• I was plagued by frustration for much of this episode – and some of it was fuelled by the Doctor’s constant dishonesty about his blindness. I know the Doctor has to lie from time to time, but he doesn’t normally do it so continously.
• If that’s the oath the Doctor swore, to guard Missy’s not-dead body for a thousand years, I can understand him feeling edgy and wanting to get out and about again. As for his decision to prevent Missy’s death in the first place…well, he’s often been inconsistent with how he treats his enemies. Missy caught him on a good day, I guess.
• Oh my God, when that CERN scientist asked Bill and Nardole to think of a number, I thought of 36 as well!!
• And suddenly, after all the other confusing turns in this episode, we get the twist thrown at us that it’s all a bunch of simulations! It barely feels connected with anything else.
• Oh no, Planet Earth is under attack again! By a bunch of bland, nameless aliens that we know nothing about. Who wasted a great deal of time building complex computer simulations to decide how they’re going to defeat humanity and the Doctor, when there should surely be a simpler way to figure out their strategy if they already have the information necessary to make those simulations in the first place.
• The executioners running away from the Doctor when they see how many fatalities are attributed to him – it would be cool if we hadn’t seen it done a whole bunch of times before.
• Can’t believe I’m saying this, but Nardole is one of the better things about this episode. His function is now established, and he even manages to be a bit cool.
• I also liked the Doctor’s remark about needing to be strapped down to read Moby Dick (“Just shut up and get to the whale!”), and that mass suicide scene in CERN was pretty chilling.

This episode was trying too hard to be clever, and instead came off as a mess. The switching back and forth between non-linear events, and the random twists, were just frustrating. For a long time, the story didn’t seem to be moving forward – sometimes it wasn’t even clear what the story was. The first five episodes this season at least provided some entertainment, but I really didn’t enjoy myself watching this one. Rating: 1.5/5.