Series 10, Episode 12 | Part 2 of 2 | First broadcast: 1 July 2017 | Writer: Steven Moffat | Director: Rachel Talalay
Cast
- Peter Capaldi as the Twelfth Doctor
- Pearl Mackie as Bill Potts
- Matt Lucas as Nardole
- Michelle Gomez as Missy
- John Simm as the Master
- David Bradley as the First Doctor
- Stephanie Hyam as Heather
Summary
Having secretly reprogrammed the Cybermen’s network to target Time Lords as well as humans, the Doctor turns the tables on Missy and the Master and, with Nardole and a still-transforming Bill, retreats to a solar farm sheltering the last human survivors on the ship’s upper levels, where Nardole rigs the fuel pipes to hold off the advancing Cyberman army. Faced with a final choice, Missy at last turns against her former self, fatally stabbing the Master, who shoots her in return before she can regenerate, denying them both a future together; the Doctor, badly wounded, ignites the entire solar farm in a final stand that destroys the Cyberman army but leaves him at death’s door. Bill, transformed by grief and reunited with Heather from “The Pilot,” is restored to a new, immortal existence as a fellow living-liquid being and departs to see the universe, leaving the Doctor to return alone to his TARDIS, where, refusing to change into someone new, he begins to resist his own regeneration entirely — a refusal that is abruptly interrupted by the unexpected appearance of his very first incarnation.
Interesting Facts
- This finale is the culmination of the season’s biggest reveal: John Simm’s original Master, hidden as “Razor” since the previous episode, is now fully confirmed and paired against Michelle Gomez’s Missy, marking Doctor Who’s first-ever multi-Master story and Simm’s first appearance in the role since 2009-2010’s “The End of Time.”
- Missy’s arc across the season reaches its tragic conclusion here: after a year of ambiguous redemption, she chooses to side with the Doctor at the last possible moment, only to be killed by her own past self before she can prove it to him.
- David Bradley appears as the First Doctor in the closing cliffhanger, having previously portrayed original actor William Hartnell in the docudrama “An Adventure in Space and Time” — setting up the following Christmas special, “Twice Upon a Time.”
- This is the Twelfth Doctor’s penultimate story: rather than regenerating immediately, Capaldi’s Doctor explicitly refuses to change, declaring “I don’t want to go” is not the whole story this time, deferring his regeneration to the Christmas special.
- Bill’s fate, transformed into an immortal being alongside Heather rather than dying, gave the character an unusually hopeful send-off compared to many prior companions, and closes the loop begun in the series opener “The Pilot.”
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