This review is as spoiler-free as possible. There are mentions of characters who have appeared in trailers and the officially announced cast list, but should not be anything else beyond that. My spoiler filled review will follow the BBC One transmission on Saturday night.
So, we’ve reached the penultimate episode of the first season with the Fifteenth Doctor, and The Legend of Ruby Sunday certainly feels different to any other first part of a finale that I remember seeing.
I wonder whether it is a byproduct of the truncated episode count but this episode is full of exposition that feels as though it could have possibly been seeded more throughout this series, and maybe through the David Tennant specials that preceded it as well. I will admit that I have not been back and watched those episodes again since their broadcast last year, so there may be hints there that I did not pick up on at the time, but I understand that perhaps, for the new audience, this all might have been a bit too much to expect them to watch before Space Babies. There are hints of these plotlines being tied together, but I think a lot of how The Legend of Ruby Sunday is thought of in the future depends hugely on how well Empire of Death sticks the landing. I’m not a massive fan of Russell T Davies’ way of tying up series finales – the first two from his first run are really good, but Series 3 up until The End of Time is trying to rely on spectacle and emotion rather than actually trying to tell a satisfying story. This story is frenetically paced, and some elements at times feel more convenient than is usual for a Doctor Who story. Still, Russell T Davies ensures that there are quieter moments. Still, I feel that where The Legend of Ruby Sunday falls down is in having too many characters trying to do too many different things and there is simply not enough time to do them all justice. Certain characters ultimately feel wasted, and that’s when cracks start to show.
I’m not even going to talk about the big reveals in this story, as I really don’t want to give anything away.
This story has a really packed cast list and certainly at some points feels as though there are too many pieces on the board and one sub-plot – it is almost certainly the C or D plot – features so fleetingly that it might as well not be there. We are reunited with Kate, Colonel Ibrahim, Rose Noble and UNIT, following their brief cameo in 73 Yards, and it is interesting to see how far they have come along. One of the quieter moments mentioned above is shared between the Doctor and Kate, which is a really touching scene and something that it feels like we’ve not really had the chance for on television before. We have been told earlier in this run of episodes that UNIT have prepared for more supernatural and fantastical villains than they had been used to facing in the years before, so it will be interesting to see how competent they really are. 73 Yards certainly showed that they still need a madman in a box to help them out from time to time.
Speaking of that madman, I really cannot sing Ncuti Gatwa’s praises highly enough. He continues to be a truly engaging screen presence and gives everything he is given to the best of his ability. The Fifteenth Doctor continues to be an incarnation who is not afraid to wear his emotions on his sleeve, which is to be expected given the subject matter of this episode, but I would not be surprised if his therapy in reverse referred to starting in The Giggle has not worked as well as planned, or is maybe a work in progress. Perhaps the therapy was focused on past traumas, but it does not seem to have equipped this Doctor to deal with problems in the here and now. Then again, having a hero without flaws would be deeply dull! Millie Gibson is yet again solid and shines in the scenes that are focused on her, but as mentioned above, it does sometimes feel as though there are too many characters present here and I feel that Ruby, despite her name being in the title, does suffer most from that.
I’m intrigued to see where this goes, and I did enjoy a lot of The Legend of Ruby Sunday, despite its flaws.
For more spoiler-free reviews, see below:
Space Babies – Spoiler-free review
The Devil’s Chord – Spoiler-Free Review
73 Yards – Spoiler-Free Review
The Impossible Blog 
One thought on “The Legend of Ruby Sunday – Spoiler-Free review”