Series 10, Episode 7 | Part 2 of 3 | First broadcast: 27 May 2017 | Writer: Peter Harness and Steven Moffat | Director: Daniel Nettheim
Cast
- Peter Capaldi as the Twelfth Doctor
- Pearl Mackie as Bill Potts
- Matt Lucas as Nardole
- Togo Igawa as the UN Secretary General
- Rachel Denning as Erica
- Tony Gardner as Douglas
- Tim Bentinck as the voice of the Monks
Summary
A five-thousand-year-old pyramid appears overnight in the disputed war-torn territory of Turmezistan, prompting the United Nations to recall the Doctor to his ceremonial role as President of Earth to negotiate with the mysterious Monks now occupying it. Still secretly blind, the Doctor watches world leaders fail to intimidate the Monks, who reveal Earth is about to be wiped out and offer to save humanity — but only in exchange for consent freely given out of love, not fear, disintegrating the UN Secretary General when his offer proves rooted in panic. Realising the true threat is not military but biological, the Doctor and Nardole race to a research lab where two scientists have accidentally created a world-ending super-bacterium, and the Doctor becomes trapped inside as he tries to neutralise it, unable to see the combination lock without help and forced to finally admit his blindness to Bill over comms. With disaster imminent, Bill gives her own consent to the Monks in exchange for restoring the Doctor’s sight, unwittingly handing the invaders the “loving” consent they needed to seize control of the Earth.
Interesting Facts
- This is the middle chapter of the “Monks trilogy,” bridging “Extremis” and “The Lie of the Land,” and was filmed as one continuous production block with “Extremis” from November 2016 to January 2017.
- Writer Peter Harness originally wanted the human delegation to be thinly veiled versions of real-world leaders Kim Jong-un, Donald Trump, and Jeremy Corbyn, but had to rewrite them as generic military commanders instead.
- The fictional country of Turmezistan, setting for the standoff, was introduced by Harness in his earlier Series 9 two-parter “The Zygon Invasion”/”The Zygon Inversion.”
- A planned reference to terrorism was altered following the Manchester Arena bombing, which occurred close to broadcast, leading some critics to note the episode’s careful handling of real-world political anxieties.
- The cliffhanger ending, in which the Monks quietly seize control of Earth through Bill’s well-intentioned “consent,” was widely singled out by critics as an unexpectedly dark and effective twist.
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