Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
Cast: Jodie Whittaker, Bradley Walsh, Tosin Cole, Mandip Gill, Laura Fraser, Gia Re, James Buckley, Julia Foster, Amy Booth-Steel, Will Austin, Col Farrell, Lewin Lloyd, Spencer Wilding.
Regardless of whether we feel like we are being preached to, or we accept that occasionally we require reminding, we are not the masters of our world; we may act like it, we rape and pillage all the natural resources, shed a tear as animals burn but count the pounds, shillings and pence as we profit from yet another mine opening, another plastic bag found at the bottom of the sea but we save a tenner on a flight. Such is the cause and effect of our actions on the planet, that we can be seen as monsters in our own reflections, not matter how much good we try to bestow.
There is always an inevitable backlash when it comes to Science Fiction being seen as orating a political view, but within all stories that the genre has held, politics is never far from the surface, even the old B-movies of the past had a vein of political agenda going through them, but we ignored those, we scoffed perhaps at the message the writers were trying to impart; so it no wonder then stories such as Orphan 55, the third episode in the 12th series of the renewed Doctor Who, is absolutely overt in its dire warnings, its apocalyptic threat.
It is not as of the viewer has gone down this journey before with the Doctor, but somehow Orphan 55 uses our own sense of damage to drive home a monster that is just as much a victim of other’s misuse, and one that, despite the clunky feel of the narrative, is amongst the most frightening to have been shown during the long term run of the programme.
An episode that has an agenda is not new, and whilst we all look to our televisions for escapism, there has to be a pay-off, a return to which we are given the chance to glimpse at the horror to come if we do not change our ways; even changing our nature to exploit and harm, the underlying message of Orphan 55 is one we are doomed to feel firsthand.
An episode of consequences, one in which the viewer, regardless of preached to or accepted of, cannot fail to grasp.
Ian D. Hall