Gridlock
Story 181, Episode 727, Series 3 Episode 3
Doctor: The Tenth Doctor
Companions: Martha Jones
In the final episode of the 5 billion years/Face of Boe trilogy, the Doctor and Martha fight the endless road.
The Review
Gridlock is a commentary on something, but I’m just not sure what. We get introduced to these mood patch drugs that the Doctor detests, and we learn a virus spreading through them decimated New New York but that’s all we really get. The undercity of New New York is filled with people driving slowly on an infinite motorway, thinking they’ll get to the promised land. Martha is carjacked because three people means you can take the fast lane. Maybe so many people not finding even two other people to agree with to go in the fast lane to cut out years of travel could have been a commentary on social isolation, but maybe there were tons of fast laners that all got chomped by the Macra. The Macra have to be the most delightfully out of nowhere throwback the new series has done to the old, I assume someone looked up if there were giant crabs in the history of the show and was delighted that there were so threw them in. We think the story might be about rich people allowing the poor to waste away, but Gridlock does a ninety degree turn.
What really happened is a disease instantly killed everyone in New New York’s ruling elite, but left them just enough time to seal off the undercity. The all-powerful Face of Boe kept it running on automatic essentially waiting for the Doctor to come on back. Instead of a real-world allegory, we get to see the amazing self-sacrifice of a billions-year-old face in a jar which is moving but kind of weird. The Face of Boe gives the last of his life to open the motorways, and tells the Doctor that he is not alone. It’s a whammy of a line, and Martha’s demands to know more about the Doctor end with him waxing lyrically about the beauty of Gallifrey, a Gallifrey he can never return to me. Reminds me a lot of the end of Spyfall actually. Overall this is a fine episode, it has a nice revelation and some fun set pieces with the Doctor jumping down on different people’s cars. With some more fine tuning and maybe a cutting message thrown in there, this could have been WALL-E a year before WALL-E. But, solid Doctor Who is better than almost anything else.
Should I have tagged the Face of Boe trilogy with Captain Jack? Oh, no reason.
8/10 Ok but how are a cat and human’s kids just cats. And babies don’t count for the fast lane?
Reviewing Doctor Who from Start to Finish 