This time of year of Doctor Who has been one of young payoff on conversant themes — sometimespushing the boundariesof what the show can do , sometimes pull it back toits earliest roots , sometimes justfrustratingly provingit ’s still Doctor Who . But this week , in among the high camp and the mud - beldam , it told a taradiddle only this earned run average of the show could .
Much of “ The Witchfinders ” finds itself concerned with the mind of prejudice . It ’s in the name , as the Doctor and her friend detect themselves in 17th 100 Lancashire amid the excitement of witch - hunting across England , sparked by none other than the personal obsessions of King James I ( he literally wrote the al-Qur’an on it , Daemonologie , in 1597 , a copy of which is in short go steady in this episode ) . But it ’s also focus on more than just accusing people of casting spells and curses over the small town of Bilehurst Crag . It ’s an instalment that deals with prejudice in multiple form , from spiritual persecution ( obviously , yield that witches were see as agents of Satan ) to class persecution — Becka Savage , Bilehurst ’s landowner and the antagonist of much of the sequence , is a former peasant who married up into the realm of shore gentry . But it ’s also about the prejudices lobbied against women , whether in the 17th 100 or far beyond .
Most of this thematic idea , unlike prior diachronic picnic this time of year ( like “ Rosa ” and “ Demons of the Punjab ” ) , is go on at the periphery of “ The Witchfinders , ” whose other elementary vexation is a bit of classic Doctor Who camp . From zombies possessed by alien mud , toAlan Cummingdelivering a majestically cheesy operation as James I , the installment ’s intent at first is more about delivering a playfulness romp than it is offering a truly serious lesson about England ’s witch - douse craze .
It ’s made clear from the get - go that it ’s an episode unlike the historicals we ’ve seen in time of year 11 so far . Literally seconds after the Doctor reminds Yaz , Ryan , and Graham that they ’re not to interfere , they promptly set about interfering in a witch trial unfolding before them . And while due are given to people acknowledging that the Doctor and her friends are clearly not normal mass of the time , any issue of raceway that might have arise is brush over or just obviously unacknowledged . “ The Witchfinders ” wants you to have a just time , be freaked out by some mud zombies , and laugh at Graham wearing a slaphappy lid for most of it — just like the old Dr. Who you know and fuck , a changeless theme of this season so far . And for the most part , it succeeds at doing so , even if it mainly fall on the back of Cumming ’s delectably over - amplify guest performance to do so .
But as the tension of the sequence escalates for its climax , “ The Witchfinders ” throws down a barricade that transforms it from a playfulness , if otherwise slightly inconsequential , pseudohistorical adventure into something that only this season of Doctor Who could harness : It reminds the Doctor that herlatest incarnationis female person , and that means the usual program of walking into a room and just naturally take bureau is something that is going to be questioned repeatedly ( and often ignore ) .
The seeds are sown for this actualisation too soon on , if only because they ’re play for laughs — the insouciant neglect for cleaning lady at any layer of self-confidence beyond being child - bearers or wives is made open by King James being able to naturally override the Doctor ’s psychic paper , experience her less as a witchfinder - general and more like a witchfinder - supporter . But it ’s only when that prejudice comes to the fore , and the women of “ The Witchfinders”—Becka , and untried Willa Twiston , whose grannie was drowned as part of the witch trials — begin to turn on each other as the peril becomes dangerous , that the Doctor regain herself direct in a agency she never would ’ve been before .
Aside from a individual acknowledgement from the Doctor that if she were still a guy no one would question her flourish around a magical verge taking gobbledegook , interestingly “ The Witchfinders ” does n’t treat this as a tremendously sublime bit — even if it ’s the first time it ’s really happened this season , 80 percent of the path in . It is not really a teaching instant for anyone other than maybe the Doctor herself . But it becomes another obstacle for the Doctor to overcome in lodge to start saving the people around her , an obstruction that she is , at first , unsure how to navigate after centuries of assumption . It makes the Doctor ’s eventual victory that much harder earned , because she has had to prove herself to the multitude around her before she could even harness it .
It ’s a point that gets more or less undercut , as moments after said authority is won is when the alien mud ( actually remand beings phone the Morax , released from their prison beneath Bilehurst by … Becka chop down a tree she did n’t wish , apparently ) truly reveals itself as the scourge of “ The Witchfinders ” rather than human prejudice , and the installment hastily rush along to its “ barricade the monsters ” conclusion . But even then it ’s a clever and nuanced approach to the Doctor ’s current gender that goes beyond just the occasional back talk - service nod of it having been a while since she get into women ’s dress , or what have you . While it ’s something the show probably ca n’t get out with repeating too many time , the fact that it did so here advance “ The Witchfinders ” beyond its fun , if fleeting , romp into an adventure with a smashing more deal to say than you might have first expected .
Assorted Musings
You might think that King James openly toy with his , err , dodgily key “ Nubian Prince ” is a Doctor Who - atomic number 39 number of extra pseudohistory , but no . Although it ’s hotly debated just how intimate the relationship actually were , historians believe that James had multiple manlike and distaff lovers during his reign , on top of his marriage to Anne of Denmark . The most notable of all was allegedly withGeorge Villiers , the boy of a horse that the infatuate James elevate to the position of Duke of Buckingham — among several letters discussing the men ’s alliance with each other , a 2006 regaining of Apethorpe Hall , one of James ’ royal residences , break a obscure handing over between the bedrooms of James and Villiers .
God bless Bradley Walsh ’s commitment to wearing that Witchfinder General hat for most of the sequence . Graham front silly as hellhole in it but you have to admire that he kept it on even when he had no tangible ground to .
For all the greatness we arrive in Alan Cumming just going above and beyond what would be see “ over the top ” in every panorama he was in , the conversation between King James and the Doctor about the whodunit of the worldly concern , and James ’ own traumatic puerility , was a attractively performed and unpretentious second between the two .
apply how much of the conflict in this episode is based around fair sex being sidelined and ignored , how different would this episode have been if the Doctor had send off Graham into Bilehurst Crag to talk with the locals — which would ’ve made sense , reach his passenger vehicle driver people skills — and brought Yaz with her and Ryan rather ? King James probably would ’ve had a right previous time with only Ryan in a position of authority , at least .
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