2nd Opinion, Take 1 “Once, Upon Time” – Exposition, Upon Time
Gustaff Behr’s take on the third episode of Series 13.
This episode.
And just when I’d got my hopes up. I don’t even know where to begin. First off, no! It was not complicated, Doctor Who. Don’t pretend like it was, because it’s not. It was most probably written by a ten-year-old using crayons. What it was, is ‘unnecessary’.
We are introduced to Bel, a character who exists to exposit information to the audience. That’s fine. Stories often have characters like that. I can accept that. What I struggle to accept is that the first five minutes of this episode is pure exposition and narration. Narposition? Exporation?
But then it doesn’t stop. Seven minutes in…exposition. Twelve minutes in…mostly exposition. Twenty minutes in and we’re STILL EXPLAINING! I was legit yelling at my television to stop. True story.
Half the dialogue in this episode is devoted solely to either explaining to the audience what is happening onscreen (because Doctor Who fans are idiots, according to the BBC) or what happened with a character’s backstory. I’m not even exaggerating here. Go and watch this episode two more times (my condolences). The first time, turn off the volume. The second, switch off the screen and listen to the story. You’ll see what I mean. That’s the biggest problem Chris Chibnall has: it’s all “Tell, Don’t Show!” And nobody at the BBC wants to correct him.
Moving on to the plot, what is going on here? Not the overall plot, that’s easy to understand. It’s basically Exposition: The Movie. But so much of it is there just to pad the runtime. The scenes with Yaz and the Weeping Angel (both times) prove to be a really clever way of using them. Seriously, putting a Weeping Angel in a video game? Someone has been playing Edge of Reality. But even though those scenes work really well, they do not add anything to the story except letting audiences know that the next episode will be a Weeping Angel episode. Nothing of value is added to the story.
The same with Dan. We don’t need to see how Time is being messed up – we can see it happening in the Bel storyline. Instead of making this a Companion-lite episode and showing us how the universe is being affected through the eyes of Bel (without narrating/expositing), we have three (or four) side plots all devoted to doing the same thing and giving the supporting cast something to do.
…this also means we get to see the Doctor exposit (see what I’m getting at here) the same damn thing multiple times over, so in-universe the characters know what’s going on.
The Doctor’s side-quest is basically a rehash of “The Timeless Children” PowerPoint slideshow, except she gets to move around in it. If she stopped telling the audiences matter-of-factly exactly what she is feeling and what is going on, the scene would be more enjoyable. Ruth is also wasted in this episode. I feel it would have worked better had the Thirteenth Doctor been a ghost plaguing the Fugitive Doctor instead of the Jodie Whitaker trying to badly impersonate an incarnation of the Doctor we have only seen in one and a half episodes.
This side-quest of hers is also just another way of showing the backstory of Swarm and Azure. Wait show? You mean you’re not going to tell us what it is? I’m sorry, but I’m committed to this now. I don’t care how many people have to lose their jobs, I DEMAND YOU EXPOSIT SWARM’S BACKSTORY TO ME!
If you’re familiar with Doctor Who lore, you’ll have noticed two things: 1) This event takes place during the Dark Times and 2) Both Karvanista and the Doctor are at least 1 billion years old. I don’t know which is more unlikely.
Let’s tackle the gaps in logic this episode throws at us. Starting with the Cybermen. Once again, a powerful enemy of the Doctor is bested by one (pregnant) woman with a Tamagotchi? Fine, that might as well happen. Why does the Cybermen answer all the questions posed to it? Did it develop a fault when it was sh—Oh, it’s just an excuse to deliver more exposition to the audience. Gotcha! Why does the Doctor believe that defeating the Ravagers using the same method as before would work a second time? Why wasn’t Yaz blinked back in time when she obviously looked to the side in her apartment? The Angel was literally inches away from her—ooh, it’s not the next episode yet? Gotcha!
Vinder’s backstory genuinely captivated me. It helped flesh out his character. It is a shame Chris Chibnall has him state he’ll help Dan get his girlfriend back, only to forget about that and drop him off, so he can guest star in another episode. Consistency is an expensive present to ask for Christmas, but hell, I’m going to ask for it.
In the end, this episode perfectly encapsulates what is wrong with current Doctor Who. It’s not clever, it’s patronizing. It isn’t stylish, it’s messy. It’s fan fiction is what I’m saying. I take back what I said before about rewatching it two times to understand what I mean about the abundant exposition. “Once, Upon Time” is not worth it.
I need a whisky.
