Doctor Who Review: The Eighth Doctor: The Time War 1: The Starship of Theseus

When the Doctor and his companion land on ‘The Starship of Theseus’, they find something sinister going on. But worse, much worse is to come, as ‘The Eighth Doctor: The Time War’ begins…

Finally, after two years of waiting, The Eighth Doctor: The Time War 1 has finally been released. The War Doctor series with John Hurt was of course absolutely brilliant drama. But I was still eager to hear events of the Time War from his previous incarnation.

Unlike the War Doctor, however, it was made clear in The Night of the Doctor that Eight completely refused to take part in it. How do you tell stories of Paul McGann’s Doctor caught up in the Time War without compromising that?

If The Starship of Theseus is anything to go by, actually really well. The first episode of The Time War begins with the Doctor and his current companion Sheena arriving on luxury space-liner Theseus. It’s not long before they hear of something sinister going on, of course. When the Doctor and Emma hear of passengers mysteriously disappearing, it’s up to them to investigate!

More from Winter is Coming

Now that sounds like a surprisingly standard Doctor Who adventure, right? Certainly, it’s nothing as explosive as the opening scenes of The War Doctor: Only the Monstrous, with the War Doctor right in the middle of a battle before coming close to death.

And that’s what I really liked about The Starship of Theseus. In the first half of this episode, it’s everything you’d expect from a regular Doctor Who story. There’s even a moment that was very reminiscent of a scene from The Talons of Weng-Chiang, with someone blaming the ship’s captain for a family member’s disappearance.

‘Something wicked this way comes…’

What really makes the episode so great is when, halfway through The Starship of Theseus, things start to go wrong. I won’t go into too much detail on how. Even when you can probably work out the cause from the title of the box set, there’s a lot of fun in discovering exactly how this is a Time War story.

When the Time War impacts the adventure in full, understandably, everything in the story rapidly escalates. The Doctor meets new companion Bliss, although she only appears towards the end of the episode. He also meets a few others that he has to help, including married couple Rupa and Quarren. The episode also sets up a few hints towards the arc for the rest of the box set, before crashing – quite literally – into the very next episode.

Running from the War

I really, really loved the approach that The Starship of Theseus took. Taking the template of your standard Doctor Who story was a bold move. But it also highlights exactly why Eight is so different to his next incarnation. The War Doctor was reluctant to fight, especially for the Time Lords. But he would also do what he felt was needed to be done.

The Eighth Doctor, on the other hand, isn’t simply “reluctant” to fight. He barely acknowledges that there’s a war at all. At the start of this episode, it’s clear that he’s been running from it for a while. He’s trying hard to act like nothing’s changed, trying to have fun and solve mysteries across the universe. So it’s fantastic how this story places him in a full on Time War battle that he absolutely refuses to take part in.

The Starship of Theseus kicks off The Eighth Doctor: The Time War in a very exciting way, and shows a lot of promise for the rest of the box set.

Next: Can we expect to see Nardole again in Doctor Who expanded media?

Next time: ‘Echoes of War’

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