42

Burn with me.

The Tenth Doctor

Synopsis

The Doctor and Martha must stop a spaceship from hurtling into the sun. But time and a malevolent alien force are against them.

Review

Looking back at 42 following Chris Chibnall’s era as show runner is certainly an interesting look into how he felt Doctor Who should be written. A lot of the elements that Chibnall brought into Series 11 to 13 are present in his debut script for the show, from exposition heavy dialogue to an overstuffed and underdeveloped guest cast are present here.

That’s not to say that 42 is a bad episode, it just doesn’t seem like a potential audition for a future showrunner like The Doctor Dances and The Empty Child feel for Steven Moffat. Whilst Moffat’s stripes were earned by writing the best episode(s) of a series, Chibnall’s were earned away from the show, most notably on the murder mystery Broadchurch and he would only sporadically come back to Doctor Who. The lack of spectacle is not something that can entirely blamed on Chibnall, however, as his story is placed in the distinctly budget conscious part of the series’ running order. Mindful of the expense of making a period drama and a three-part finale, 42 is confined to set based filming on board one spaceship and limited special effects shots.

What cannot be faulted is the ambition of trying to make an episode of Doctor Who that appears to take place in real time. Of course, that’s not actually the case as there are framing scenes that take place in the TARDIS at the start and end of the episode and the concluding scene with Martha’s mother. This is in part due to the placement of this story in the series; 42 has to pick up the dangling plot threads from The Lazarus Experiment as none of the following four episodes pick up on the subplot concerning Martha’s family. Graeme Harper helps the episode’s pacing, and he feels like a perfect choice to direct, as I’m sure that his cry of “lots of pace and energy” echoed through the sets used in this story. Harper makes that scene with Martha and Riley’s escape pod is falling away fro the ship into the sun really resonate, with the muffled audio and imagery. It’s a serious alternative to the comedic scene in Partners in Crime.

Ultimately, 42‘s pacing does cause the majority of the guest cast struggling to leave an impression. There are two members of the crew that serve no purpose but to get killed off by Korwin, Abi and Erina, and another, Ashton, is only there to provide more muscle for the Toraji star to possess. To a certain extent, that’s what happens in Doctor Who, but 42 feels as though all of this happens very quickly, leaving the story with no crew members to kill off as the story goes on. Part of the problem is Chibnall’s propensity to give characters expositional dialogue rather than giving them any depth or feeling of personality beneath. Characters are too often talking about the ship or the sun than the crew actually interacting like real people. The quiz questions to get to the auxiliary engines being set by the crew on a drunken evening is a hint at dynamics and relationships that we don’t really see.

Riley does get some development, being paired up with Martha for the majority of this episode, and William Ash does a decent job of making Riley sympathetic, especially in the scenes with Martha in the escape pod and follows a pattern of characters falling for the Tenth Doctor’s new companion. There are hints that this is reciprocal, and he does get a kiss for his troubles at the end of the story. The other character who does get some character development is the ship’s captain, Kath, played by Michelle Collins. Kath is ultimately the cause of the death of the majority of her crew and her husband by utilising illegal fusiom scooping to remove the heart of the living sun Torajii. I think that it’s quite a good performance from Collins, who ultimately takes accountability for her actions.

Keep moving, fast as you can. And, Martha, be careful. There may be something else onboard this ship.

Any time you want to unnerve me, feel free.

Will do, thanks.

The Tenth Doctor and Martha Jones

This is an interesting story for the Tenth Doctor, as it shows a sign of suffering that has not been seen before. Once possessed by the alien sun, the Tenth Doctor is rather stripped of his heroism and bravado, and convinced that there is no way out of the situation. It’s even a scenario where the Doctor feels as though it may cause him to regenerate, and without the quick actions of Martha, he may well have done and it is nice to see the Doctor acknowledge this at the end of the story. This story does feature some acting that might seem over the top in another story, but I do think that the context of this episode that David Tennant’s performance is perfectly judged. The Lazarus Experiment seeing Martha finally being given the position of full-time companion, this story sees her given the TARDIS key and her phone upgraded to give her universal roaming, something that is almost the modern mark of a companion in the modern series. 42 puts her into the difficult position of having to solve a problem without the assistance of the Doctor, but allows her to prove herself. Martha is great at taking the lead in this story, acting quickly and decisively to ensure that the fuel is dumped quickly and effectively to ensure that the SS Pentallion can escape the gravitational field of the sun. Freema Agyeman does a good job in this respect and I feel that it is a good example of how her character has developed since the start of the series. The story also establishes that Martha is not perfect; despite being on the phone to her mother whilst a woman screams over the address system, she is still determined to lie to Francine. Martha’s mother’s concerns are certainly likely to have been heightened from those phone calls.

Verdict: 42 is a story that is interesting but feels as though it is rushed and guest cast are underdeveloped.7/10

Cast: David Tennant (The Doctor), Freema Agyeman (Martha Jones), Adjoa Andoh (Francine Jones), Michelle Collins (Kath McDonnell), William Ash (Riley Vashtee), Anthony Flanagan (Orin Scannell), Matthew Chambers (Hal Korwin), Gary Powell (Dev Ashton), Vinette Robinson (Abi Lerner), Rebecca Oldfield (Erina Lessak) and Elize du Toit (Sinister Woman).

Writer: Chris Chibnall

Director: Graeme Harper

Producer: Phil Collinson

Composer: Murray Gold

Original Broadcast Date: 19th May 2007

Behind the Scenes

• This story has the shortest title of any televised Doctor Who story and is at the time of writing, the only one to consist of only numbers
• The approximate length of a Doctor Who episode, when the series was revived in 2005, was 42 minutes. This episode was meant to unfold in real time.
• This story was written by Chris Chibnall, who was at the time the head writer on the spin-off Torchwood. This was his first story written for Doctor Who, and he would go on to become head writer and executive producer for the show between 2018 and 2022. Chibnall would also write Broadchurch, which starred David Tennant alongside future Thirteenth Doctor Jodie Whittaker.
• Chibnall was instructed to make this a story in which Martha became an established companion, as in the following story, the Doctor would be trusting her with protecting his identity.

Cast Notes

• Michelle Collins voiced Winnie Tyler in the Big Finish adaptation of Damaged Goods.
• William Ash also voiced Sam in The Condemned, starring Colin Baker and India Fisher.
• Vinette Robinson would go on to play Rosa Parks in the Thirteenth Doctor story Rosa. She also appears in Dead to the World, part of You Are the Doctor and Other Stories.

Best Moment

The scene with the escape pod falling into the sun, with both Martha and the Doctor powerless.

Best Quote

The wonderful world of space travel…The prettier it looks, the more likely it is to kill you.

Riley

Previous Tenth Doctor review: The Lazarus Experiment

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