Doctor Who Social Club

I'm always on board for a (quasi-) Jackie Tyler episode; she's one of my favorite parts of the Rose era. It is funny that Camille Coduri is playing a 20-year-old Jackie Tyler here with just an '80s perm to convince us. She's entirely unconvincing as a 20-year-old, but it's not really much worse than Billie Piper being 19. It's the Dear Evan Hansen industrial complex over here.

I love any time there's Back to the Future II (my favorite!) shenanigans in a time travel story, so the opening with multiple Doctors and Roses a few minutes apart immediately wins me over. They're followed by some pretty naff effects throughout, with the red-cellophane vision and dodgy CGI monsters all over the place. I'm still on board.

It's interesting to see the Doctor actively frightened about what he's done to the timeline, since plot conceits usually dictate that whatever he does is fine. There's some interesting moments like him watching that time-displaced death car with genuine concern. We also get his line, "An ordinary man, that's the most important thing in creation." I wonder if somebody overheard the Doctor saying this in 1987 and that's why we're dealing with the manosphere today.

The scene(s) where Pete starts to understand that he's not in Rose's future and in fact not in anybody's future are well written and performed by Piper and Dingwall, who is unfalteringly believable as a deadbeat husband and dad who both knows and regrets it. Rose's false monologue about the kind of father he becomes and his ultimate recognition that he can in some way be that father is genuinely affecting. Even though the music is doing its best to hammer the emotional beats home throughout, I don't think it was necessary in that moment.

This isn't an episode that I think should have won any awards, and don't worry: it didn't. Nothing ground-breaking for the show happens here, the music choices are incredibly un-subtle, and it's ultimately very predictable stuff. But I find it enjoyable from start to finish. It's the fun kind of silly. I like getting to meet a bunch of the recurring cast at a different point in their lives in a story that's self-contained but with a satisfying payoff in the final Jackie and child-Rose scene. This isn't Doctor Who at its best, but it's supremely comfortable viewing and I'm happy with that.

Bonus points for the pre-Rickroll "Never Gonna Give You Up" in the scene with Rose and her father in the car on the way to the church. The meme didn't exist when this episode was first broadcast, it was just a hit song from the '80s. Hearing it in the background just to set the scene without the 20 years of baggage is a fun time. It's hard to remember what it was like to hear it without the modern context, but having nobody react strongly to it in-universe gives us a small taste.