REVIEW: Doctor Who, Series 7 Episode Ten 'Journey To The Centre Of The TARDIS'
REVIEW: Doctor Who, Series 7 Episode Ten 'Journey To The Centre Of The TARDIS'
Given how similar the fantastical worlds of Jules Verne are to the universe of Doctor Who, it is a wonder it took so long for a Jules Verne-inspired episode of the show to come to fruition. 'Journey To The Centre Of The TARDIS' draws some clear inspiration from the author's iconic adventure tale 'Journey To The Centre of the Earth', in the way that it explores this mythical location that both the characters and the audience know so little about. Despite being a prominent part of the series, the TARDIS has been barely explored on screen, with 'The Edge Of Destruction' and 'The Invasion Of Time', and (to an extent) The Doctor's Wife being the only other stories to explore this time/space ship. The episode doesn't quite reach the same heights as Jules Verne's most iconic story however.
There are some nice references to Doctor Who mythology too - the Eye of Harmony for instance returns from the 1996 TV Movie - but overall there just isn't enough meat to the story. It's a shame because the plot contains some real promise, but writer Steve Thompson never really follows through on it. A lot of the screenplay mostly deviates into characters running around TARDIS corridors, and the time zombies which are introduced later into the narrative just feel forced in order to provide a 'monster of the week' when the episode doesn't really need it. Ultimately the episode feels like it is simply an excuse to have a TARDIS-centric episode rather than because Stephen Thompson had a story he wanted to tell, and yet there's an intriguing idea at the heart of this regarding the salvage company. Why not explore the idea of the TARDIS being so valuable on a grander scale, and show what would happen if they had actually managed to get a hold of a part of the TARDIS? Wouldn't it have been interesting to have seen Tricky, Bram and Gregor grab their hands on a piece of TARDIS coral, and have the Doctor and Clara travel forward to see the ramifications from the trio, having grown their own TARDIS, let loose on the entirety of both space and time, in order to locate items of value? They could have expanded on the central narrative greater, and offered a more engaging script than we received.
The main issue I have with this episode, however, is just how much Steven Moffat and Stephen Thompson promised beforehand. We were told as viewers that this episode would give us a full exploration of the TARDIS, and yet we are hardly shown anything other than various corridors within the space and time machine. We do spend a great deal of time within the confines of the TARDIS library but other rooms like the TARDIS swimming pool are merely glimpsed rather than properly explored. It was a big disappointment to not have seen more of the various rooms within the confines of the TARDIS, and there's no real excuse for not giving us more. Why not show us the Zero Room from 'Castrovalva', for instance? What about Adric's old room, or a TARDIS kitchen? Clara's got to make her souffles somewhere, after all.
The resolution is a little weak too. It's a literal reset button, meaning the events of the episode never actually happened. This unfortunately renders it a pointless episode of the show, as there our protagonists have not learned or developed from their experiences within this story, seeing as it never happened to them in the first place. Essentially by watching this episode you waste forty five minutes on something that means nothing to either the Doctor or Clara. A better solution would have been to have developed the characters of the salvagers' further, beyond their otherwise rather two dimensional characterisation, to a point where they realise they don't want to salvage a sentient machine and opt to leave upon locating Clara. The whole time rift is unnecessary when the story could instead have been an exploration of the cruelty behind trying to salvage a sentient machine, and the moral ethics behind actions such as this within the wider Whoniverse. The episode does touch a little on the moral ethics, with the wounded TARDIS fighting back against the salvagers, but it could have been explored further for sure.
I did like the cinematography of this episode though. There were some beautifully shot moments, such as this one in the The Architectural Reconfiguration System:
It is absolutely stunning production design by Production Designer Michael Pickwoad, showcased through a beautiful extreme wide shot by Camera Operator Joe Russell. It has that very distinctive Jules Verne feel, which I had hoped the episode's writing would have greater evoked also. Michael Pickwoad and Joe Russell worked wonders on this episode and should be applauded for it, even if the episode itself is lackluster.
The show's stars (in this case, Matt Smith and Jenna Coleman) are quite rightly applauded for their excellent work on the show but people tend to forget the production crew, who work tirelessly around the clock to help ensure the show is the best it can be. Matt Smith and Jenna Coleman are consistently great throughout their run as Doctor and companion, but it is those who work behind the camera who deserve more recognition for the sheer amount of graft, effort and creativity they input into the show's creation. It's easy to forget about this aspect, which is a shame because they do a stunning job and the show would not be the same without such talented people behind the camera.
Overall, 'Journey To The Centre of the TARDIS' was a concept which shows great promise but ultimately fails to deliver. Instead it comes across as little more than an excuse to have an episode set entirely in the TARDIS, which is a shame because its narrative offers plenty of interesting directions in which the plot could have been taken in. It's a script that makes the odd decision to crowbar a monster-of-the-week into a plot, despite the fact that the TARDIS already fulfils something of an antagonistic role within the episode. Journey To The Centre Of The TARDIS is an episode that ultimately needed a bigger emphasis on TARDIS exploration, and a stronger resolution that sees the events of the story leave something of an impact on the protagonists at the centre of the show. The story does contain some amazing cinematography however, and the production design by Michael Pickwoad is incredible.It's just a shame that the story doesn't quite send you 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea with excitement.
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What are your thoughts on Journey To The Centre Of The TARDIS? Let me know in the comments section.
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