In the final epic chapter in the story of the Flux, all hope is lost. The forces of darkness are in control. But when the monsters have won, who can you count upon to save the universe?

 

Hyped! Although so many elements to tie up and getting the landing right is certainly not a Chibnall strength. Whilst we will get more Division answers, I’m certainly expecting that thread to carry on over the specials. I had been wanting a Master return but that can certainly wait for the specials, it’s way too overloaded for him to also turn up :lol:

 

I’m intrigued as to how the actual Flux will be resolved given it’s destroyed so much of the universe already, part of me wonders if it will be a case of moving universes :o

I am NERVOUS but this series has delivered on almost every level so far, in a way the previous Chibnall series haven't, so I'm really hoping everything pays off tonight!

Looks shite. Last episode really was just a royal flux up.

I'm so lost. What the heck was that. It didn't even feel like a finale - I know the next 3 episodes are the true 'end' to her tenure, but I expected more from that. I was hoping Swarm and Azure would turn out to be something more too.

oop

 

not everything leading to nothing

why introduce all those characters for not one to be anything of importance

What a load of old SHET

 

SACK CHIBNAB NOW!!!

I really liked it - it did everything it needed to and tied up pretty much every loose end. I think the runtime could've done with being 15-20 minutes longer, just to flesh out some of the elements that felt underbaked. I'd have liked to see Vinder and Diane in the Passenger form for a bit longer, it seemed like they were there for 20 seconds and then got out! :lol: and a bigger build up to the downfalls of Swarm/Azure and the Grand Serpent, but the manners in which they were defeated were fine.

 

I thought Flux had the best selection of guest characters we've seen in not just Chibnall's era but possibly since RTD left, or at least since series 5? I quite like how none of them were particularly "important" but they all played a part in the Flux plotline and it all tied together well at the end. It's a change from the likes of Clara among others who are always the most important people in the universe - this time, we had some "unimportant" characters and they all excelled in their own ways. Jericho! :( :(

 

Easily my favourite Jodie series and she's never been more comfortable in the role. LOVED the three Doctors in tonight's episode - great way to tackle all the ongoing threads effectively! So glad we've got more from 13, Yaz and Dan together, such a great team :heart:

It isn’t as though it was a bad episode, it’s just underwhelming in the context of the series and proved there was no need to introduce so many characters. It’s a running theme of this era to just chuck in a hundred characters and take them nowhere.

 

It could have been an incredibly strong series if it had just had more focus and cut out the unnecessary elements. What was the point in the Grand Serpent? There were already enough villains so why introduce another one who isn’t integral to the plot and has no history. Why bring back Kate Stewart and do nothing with her? Obviously she must be returning in one of the specials (given her line about hoping to meet her again) but just have her return then, you don’t need to introduce another element to an already crowded series. What was the point in Vinder and Bel - so much time was spent on their backstories and yet the overall story could have easily been told without their involvement.

 

If you introduce so many elements, they all need to be integral to the story. You shouldn’t feel like you can take one away and still be able to tell the story by maybe rewriting a couple of lines. It was my problem with Captain Jack returning as well - there was no purpose for him to be in either episode other than as a deus ex machina to break the Doctor out of a jail that she was in for 5 minutes and for no reason.

 

I’d have had Swarm & Azure being the main threats for the full series. Keep the Sontarans, Angels, Division etc but tie up Swarm/Azure more with the division and have a clearer aim for their purpose.

 

It felt like wrapping up a normal episode, not the biggest story the show has told. It just all fell a bit flat which is what I’m most disappointed by. I’d really enjoyed the journey but it didn’t lead us anywhere. :(

My head hurts after that honestly, I kinda knew he wouldn't stick the landing but I didn't quite expect it to be quite so much throwing everything at the wall and seeing what sticks. I entirely agree about the overload of characters, some worked (Jericho was wonderful </3) but most were utterly pointless. There's just no development to any of them, past companions may have been a bit over-important but gosh, they were developed and rounded characters that I really cared about. I can't really say the same for any character here except they're here to help the plot (What on Earth was going on with Diane, she somehow knew all that spacey stuff, and then just went back to normal at the end as if nothing happened, huh?! It's like all her character came at once :lol: )

 

Same for the villains, Swarm and Azure weren't really given any development except they were evil and hated Division, didn't really know their back story or anything or why . They were just pantomime villains by the end. Same with the Grand Serpent...

 

Also what was the aftermath of the Flux? It was stopped pretty easily for something so world altering and it just seemed to just be business as usual, unless this is going to carry on into the specials.

 

It wasn't entirely without merit (Jodie was great as the various Doctors, the Sontarans had a good mix of laughable and frightening in them and the Karvanista reveal was very interesting and something I really hope comes back) but it was mainly annoying and taints the whole series. Flux had some great moments (Village of the Angels and War of the Sontarans were some of the best episodes of this era), but as a whole, it was a complete mess that was ultimately pointless in every way. I know there's still three specials to come and I hope they can pick up some of these loose threads, but this just proves that he can't bring threads to a complete whole (please bring back Maxine Alderton x).

 

Also Daleks at New Years AGAIN?! What new story can they tell here? (I'm also unconvinced they would've joined the Sontarans willingly, they'd have been planning an ambush I'm sure).

Yet more mess for the next show-runner to clear up then with more timey-wimey nonsense to add to the existing stack. Chibnall real seems to have wanted to leave a lasting impact on the show, to be honest part of me really hopes RTD just turns round and does a Dallas 'it was all a dream' thing. The Timeless Children was going to leave the show going in a weird direction, but it's all mental. The peripheral characters in this series were more rounded than anything in this incarnation of the Doctor despite feeling closer to 'Classic Who' flat characters. And Chris Chibnall's now upheaved the entire cannon of Doctor Who and introduce lives that didn't exist, just for the Doctor to throw them away and not explore it at all. Sorry but that's a complete let-down, what was the point? I'm all for developing new canon, but to completely upheave the entire show's mythology to then not change anything is pointless.

 

Don't get me wrong I found this series far more entertaining than anything in Series 11 or Series 12 but the whole things just ridiculously implausible now.

 

Looking at ratings, a move to weeknights doesn't seem implausible if the next series doesn't capture the imagination.

Edited December 9, 20213 yr by ChristmasFridays

The ratings are fine and perfectly competitive, its weekly chart placings are good and actually better than series 12. If it moves anywhere it'll be back to Saturday.

 

I think it's obvious they haven't finished with the Doctor's past lives yet. The last line of this episode was purposely ominous, and Jodie still has 3 eps left so I expect at least one to provide some sort of closure to the story (from Chibnall's POV anyway)

Yeh, ratings are largely down across the board this year (although I’m a Celebrity is perhaps suffering the biggest brunt of it!). I think the show can do better but it’s comparatively doing well on the weekly charts, especially for a drama that has been going for 16 years and counting in its current run.

 

I definitely see the Timeless Child storyline returning in the specials, Jo Martin heavily hinted in one of the behind the scenes videos that she’ll be back. It’s the overarching storyline for the era, like the cracks with Matt Smith, so it would be bizarre for them not to return to it in Jodie’s final episodes.

Yeh, ratings are largely down across the board this year (although I’m a Celebrity is perhaps suffering the biggest brunt of it!). I think the show can do better but it’s comparatively doing well on the weekly charts, especially for a drama that has been going for 16 years and counting in its current run.

 

I definitely see the Timeless Child storyline returning in the specials, Jo Martin heavily hinted in one of the behind the scenes videos that she’ll be back. It’s the overarching storyline for the era, like the cracks with Matt Smith, so it would be bizarre for them not to return to it in Jodie’s final episodes.

 

Yes, ratings are down across the board but there was a time it was one of the biggest shows on telly, it hasn't been so for years. An yes, for a 16 year old show (if we only count the new incarnation) that's not entirely unexpected but it now looks as though it could hit 'a new low' (new series overnights, it would take a special kind of failure to consolidate to Battlefield Part One's 3.1m :rolleyes: ) for the NYE special with it going up against The Masked Singer

It still *is* one of the biggest shows on telly! There's room for it to do better but it's still performing strongly. No show can remain at its peak (obviously David Tennant's era for the modern incarnation of Who) but, taking into account the ratings drop affecting everything, it's doing very well and the chart positions are definitely what we should be looking at. It's not a choice between "biggest show on TV" and "cancellation territory", there's a massive amount of middle ground and Who is very comfortable there.

 

I'm not worried about ratings at this point anyway when there's a future guaranteed into 2023 and beyond! We're bound to hit new lows going forward due to traditional TV viewing falling out of fashion but to put things into perspective, series 13 hasn't finished any lower than 25 in the weekly chart so far (taking into account I'm a Celebrity's airing currently as well so the chart's somewhat distorted). The last time classic Who was top 30 was with Time-Flight part 1, an episode that aired in 1982 - a whole 7 years before the show got cancelled. Before that, it was The Horns of Nimon part 4, a whole 2 years before! It was regularly out of the top 100 of the week. The individual figures are higher of course, because more people watched TV live then (they didn't have a choice), but it really puts into perspective how well modern Who has fared - the lowest modern Who chart placing was for Can You Hear Me (series 12), which placed at... #35!!!

 

That was a longer post than I anticipated but tl;dr - the show isn't in danger and the ratings aren't any cause for concern right now :magic:

If you wanna do direct compares with the original run it's now been running 16 years as 'New Who' which would be the equivelant of 1979 when the show was achieving the highest ratings it ever has (yes I'm aware of the ITV strike but even outside of that the show was doing well).

 

The show is definitely not in as good a health level as it was then. Whilst I don't think it will be cancelled in the next few years (between the Sony deal, the international market for its old episodes still being healthy and the fact Amazon/Netflix would pick it up asap if it was all point to it continuing).

 

A year or two's rest (there still doesn't seem to be much clarity on whether RTD will do a series before the 60th, you'd hope there's be a Jan-Mar series or Aug-Oct and then the 60th special rather than only specials in both 2022 and 2023.

 

I honestly think the shows suffered from a case of getting a bit stuck up it's own arse since the Matt Smith/Clara stuff (not that everything since is entirely without merit) and neverly fully recovered. The whole Timeless Child arc is just that on steroids tbf - I'm also pretty annoyed at the whole rewriting canon bollocks. I'd hope that Russel T Davies manages to go back to the adventures type feel of his original era.

 

Anyway the prospect of only 3 episodes next year does mean it might be time to finally go and watch all the classic run in order instead of dipping in and out with random episodes, and maybe rewatch the new ones too. With Britbox there's really no excuse anymore.

Edited December 12, 20213 yr by ChristmasFridays

And yet through 1979, Doctor Who only appeared in the top 30 of the week five times, out of 26 episodes! As I said, the pure ratings were naturally higher but it wasn't performing as well relative to everything else as the show currently is. We definitely agree that it's not performing as well as it was a few years ago, but nothing can sustain its peak for very long of course.

 

I've seen reference to RTD doing a series that includes the anniversary special which is what I'm hoping for! Ideally I'd have liked a series in early 2023 but it doesn't seem like that'll be the case, so as long as we get more than 1 episode in 2023 :lol:

Also, for the following season it then sank down to figures that are the same/worse than what the show is getting now. It’s completely unreliable to do a like-for-like of figures with the classic series, the best measurement is placing in the weekly chart as Joseph is doing.

Also, for the following season it then sank down to figures that are the same/worse than what the show is getting now. It’s completely unreliable to do a like-for-like of figures with the classic series, the best measurement is placing in the weekly chart as Joseph is doing.

In 1980 the show went directly up against the big budgeted and much hyped US series Buck Rogers. Even I watched Buck's adventures instead and it wasn't because I didn;'t love Doctor Who.

 

It's probably hard to appreciate how big Buck Rogers was that year but that's the reason Who dipped in ratings.