Pop Vultures

Doctor Who, S04 E09: Forest of the Dead

This week: The Doctor brings the dead back to life. Again. Also, he can open the Tardis just by clicking his fingers.

We begin with the little girl from last week watching telly. She seems to be watching some sort of hospital based soap - but wait a second, that’s Donna! She’s in a hospital called CAL in what appears to be a strange parallel world, presided over by the kindly Doctor Moon. Whenever she starts to remember her real life, the Doctor “reminds” her of what’s supposedly really happened, and she instantly remembers. Her “life” keeps jumping from one scene to another - Dr Moon suggests a walk by the river, and suddenly there they are. Donna almost notices these sudden changes, but every time she does, Dr Moon again gently reminds her of how they got to wherever they are. Donna meets another “patient,” the sweet, stuttering Lee, and in a series of jump-cuts we see her marrying him and settling down in a nice house with their two charming children. She has a visit from Dr Moon - but suddenly he shimmers and is replaced by the Doctor, who calls her name. Donna remembers all for a few seconds before Dr Moon returns and convinces her that nothing has happened. It’s very creepy and very well-done.

Over in the library, things are pretty much the same as when we left off. The Doctor and co. are racing through the library, pursued by Proper Dave. They escape with the help of River Song’s souped up sonic screwdriver. Something is sending out waves that are interrupting the Doctor’s own screwdriver - it turns out to be the “Doctor Moon,” the library’s anti-virus software. That’s a pretty weird name for antivirus software. River is frustrated that the Doctor doesn’t remember her, after all their experiences together in her own lifetime. She misses the Doctor who knows her, the Doctor who could “open the Tardis with a click of his fingers”. The Doctor scoffs and says that’s impossible, but River says she’ll prove how trustworthy she is and whispers in his ear. The Doctor’s face changes - she’s whispered his true name. The touching scene is interrupted by poor Anita, who’s just noticed that she’s got two shadows. Oh dear. And if that wasn’t bad enough, Proper Dave (or what’s left of him) is back too.

Back in Donna’s strange world, our heroine keeps noticing a strange, black-clad figure outside the window, and a note has just been delivered through the letterbox, apparently from said figure. “Dear Donna” says the note, “the world is wrong.” Shiver. The stranger goes on to ask Donna to meet her at the playground when she takes her kids there the next day. Donna decides to go, despite the dodginess of meeting a mysterious veiled figure who asks you to bring your kids along for the assignation.

Back in the library, the others run on while the Doctor stays behind with Other Dave in an attempt to reason with the Spacesuit Formerly Known as Proper Dave. He asks where the Vashta Nerada came from, and is told through Dave’s communicator device that they came “from the forests…these are our forests.” A nervous Other Dave keeps saying “Doctor, we should go,” but the Doctor keeps talking to the VN and realises that the forests that were home to these shadow creatures were pulped and turned into the library’s books. The Doctor then realises that Other Dave has said “Doctor, we should go,” in exactly the same way a little bit too often and, with a heartfelt “Dave, I’m so sorry,” he disappears through a convenient trap door.

Donna heads to the playground and her kids run off to play while she nervously sits next to the mysterious woman who is wearing 19th century mourning garb. The woman tells her that the the 4200 people who vanished from the library have been literally “saved” - to the library computer’s hard-drive. They - including Donna - are all still alive in digital form and can technically be brought back. She asked Donna to meet her at the playground because that’s where the virtual world’s limitations are most obvious - and points out that all the children are the same, because there weren’t lots of children in the library so they had to use the same two digital models. We see that she’s right - all the boys and girls on the swings and roundabouts are identical. Donna is horrified, as well she might be - it’s a brilliantly creepy moment. She asks who the mysterious stranger is, and she flings back her veil to reveal that she is none other than Miss Evangelista, last seen in skeletal form, but her face is all distorted and horrible!

Those of a certain age who grew up reading British girls’ comics will remember a particularly terrifying story called ‘I AM Margaret!’ which ended with a nasty girl who had been mean to a gypsy (or something) waking up to find that not only was her face hideously distorted but her voice had changed too, so no one would believe she was really her (I always thought that voice thing was a brilliantly scary detail). Anyway, Miss Evangelista looks exactly like Margaret. Apparently there was some sort of glitch when her details were being digitally transfered so she is now enormously clever but hideous. She says she’s the perfect observer - “I am brilliant, and unloved”. What sort of fucked up message is that? Only attractive people can ever be loved? Shame on you, Steven Moffat. Also, why is she wearing full Victorian mourning dress? I think the simple answer is that it looks creepy and cool. I mean, there are other, less cumbersome ways in which someone could cover their dreadful mutated visage.

The little girl watches this scene. “Stop it!” she shrieks at the on-screen Miss E, “you’ll ruin everything!” She starts to panic and points the remote at her dad - and turns him off. In frustration and distress, she throws the remote to the floor - and activates the library’s self-destruct mechanism.

Back in the library, the remaining adventurers head to the computer core in an attempt to override the self-destruct programme. “We have to save Cal,” says Mr Lux. He reveals that CAL is Charlotte Abigail Lux, who became very sick as a child. When she was dying, her family created the library for her and plugged her memory into the computer so she could spend eternity reading happily. But when the 4200 people were saved into the library’s memory, it overloaded the core. I think. It’s all a bit confusing. The only way to stop this is to bring the people back to the library, but (a) it’s full of Vashta Nerada and (b) CAL can’t do it alone.

Back in the fake library world, the sky is weird and red Donna’s kids are terrified. There’s a chilling moment when they tell Donna they don’t exist - “even when you close your eyes, we just stop” - and disappear. Donna screams in horror - this world may be fake, but it’s very real to her.

The Doctor realises that Anita has been taken by the VN. He tries to make a deal - if they hold off operations for one day, long enough to get the people out of the computer and out of the library - they can have their “forest”. The VN emerge from the suit in a shadow and advance towards the Doctor - but he tells them “You’re in a library…look me up.” And they retreat. Even scary shadow piranhas are scared of the Doctor. I’m not sure why, though. I mean, I love him and everything, but we haven’t seen too many examples of his enormous power, apart from his genuinely terrifying punishments at the end of the ‘Family of Blood’ two-parter last year.

The Doctor is going to hook himself up to the library core to provide more memory - but it’ll kill him. So River knocks him unconscious and when he wakes up, he’s handcuffed to a pipe and she’s strapping herself in. “Why do you have handcuffs?” he asks, and she smiles and says “Spoilers!” Alex Kingston is very foxy. Let’s hope they keep up this new “slightly older companion” pattern. I like it. There’s a moving scene when River tells the Doctor about the last time they met, how nice the Doctor was and how he seemed strangely sad - and now she knows why. It’s because he knew that this was the last time the older him would see her, and he knew what would happen to her next. I may have shed a tear at this point. Just maybe. River plugs herself in.

Back in Donna’s fake life, she and her husband are being torn apart. It’s really sad, seriously.

Everyone’s back in the library, ready to be teleported out again, and the Doctor has mysteriously escaped from his handcuffs and joined Donna. She asks him if he’s all right. “I’m always all right,” he says blankly. “Is all right special Timelord code for ‘really not all right at all?’” says Donna. “Then I’m all right too.” Sniff. She’s been looking for Lee but can’t find him, even in the library records, and realises he may never have existed. The duo turn and sadly walk away. But who’s that arriving on the other side of the room? It’s Lee! He desperately tries to call out to Donna, but his stutter won’t let him get the words out. Steven Moffat, you are very, very cruel. Although one should note that Lee doesn’t just yell out a noise or just run after her or anything.

The Doctor lays down River’s diary and screwdriver on the balcony. Donna tells him that she’s worried that River had never met her. “Shall we peek at the end?” asks the Doctor, but they decide they’d better not, and walk away - until the Doctor realises that there must be a reason that he gave River the sonic screwdriver in the future - there’s a data ghost device in it. Some of River might still be left! “I’m good!” he boasts, heading to the computer core before the batteries in the device run out. He plugs it in just in time, and River finds herself in the digital world, with all her old muckers (Miss E’s face is back to normal, somehow) and Donna’s old kids - plus Charlotte, the little girl whose library this is. I think it’s meant to be sweet but it’s actually a bit creepy and strange because we know it’s all really fake. That said, Alex Kingston does get a good, albeit slightly cheesy, speech reminiscent of the one at the end of ‘The Doctor Dances’ (which had me in floods, I might add), in which she says that “Some days, nobody dies at all.” Except she did! Otherwise they’d have been able to bring her back with the other people saved in the library! And now she’s stuck in some sort of soft-focus imaginary computer world! Anyway, the Doctor approaches the Tardis - and clicks his fingers. It opens. That was pretty cool. Albeit a bit Fonzie-esque.

River bids her imaginary children goodnight. “Sweet dreams, everyone,” she says, looking straight at the camera. And we’re done.

Overall, a slightly disappointing episode after the awesomeness of last week. But I still trust Steven Moffat to do right by the programme next year.

Next week: a plane. Or a bus. Some sort of transporting device, anyway. And a scary flying thing.