Previously: The Doctor took Rose to the end of the world and it gave her lots of feelings.
—
The Unquiet Dead
Sweeney: I have been putting this off for an unreasonable amount of time, mostly because I’ve been busy but partially because of my struggle to get into this show. I was feeling kind of guilty about it, too, because I want so badly to love this thing that everybody else loves. Then I remembered that (a) the 1×01 comments are filled with amazing stories of many a devout Whovian’s struggle to come into the light -and- (b) There are a half dozen, “LOL you gave Sweeney that episode to start with?” comments on the last post. So, you know, these are all things. What I’m saying is THANKS, GUYS.
(In truth, there’s no winning for you – either you don’t warn me and I’m all, “WHAT ARE WE WATCHING? WHY WHY WHY?’ or you do warn me and I’m all, “THANK YOU FOR PLANTING SEEDS OF DREAD.” Just as you all get to laugh at my ignorance, it’s my prerogative to complain about all the nothing I know. That’s the deal.)
Kirsti: I, on the other hand, was all “Awww, Sweeney gets The Unquiet Dead?? NO FAIR.” But that’s because I’m a giant nerd and the Victorian era is my jam. So.
Marines: Mostly, I’m all:
Sweeney: I can’t even be mad because that’s my favorite popcorn eating gif of all time.
We begin in the past with a man mourning his grandmother with an older man in the room. The grieving grandson sends the older man out of the room for a moment alone with his grandmother. He leans in and she gets all glowy blue and opens her eyes and chokes him. The older man comes back in the room and is more agitated than surprised by this scene. He calls out for help, but Zombie Grandma (so that’s a thing that’s happening…) knocks them both out and heads off into the night to tear shit up like Zombie Grandmas do.
DOO DEE DOOOOOOO! (Guys, this theme music is super fun, but I’m having a hard time keeping track of all the weird sequences of of toddler noises we’re using as title sequence signifiers these days. Traumateers: 50 points to your house if you can recommend a better thing for us to shout at our screens/you.)
(As a recapper, I also dig that they blast the episode title front and center at the end of the credits. It’s a super helpful reminder!)
K: Just be glad you don’t have to recap Supernatural where not only is there no theme music but the title credits change every season meaning that every 22 episodes you have to come up with a new catchy thing to indicate that the credits just happened.
Mari: I’m heartily against anything other than DOO DEE DOO. If we’re changing anything, it should be the Dollhouse la-la-la-la-la. Less iconic.
Sweeney: UGH. FINE. I resent this, but fine.
After we watch the TARDIS warp through space, Rose and the Doctor are inside of it, struggling to stay in control of stuff. The Doctor decides they’re going to 1860, for no discernible reason. I guess the TARDIS takes orders from the teaser.
The older man from before – a Mr. Sneed – calls out for a woman named Gwyneth. He tells her that “the stiffs are getting lively again.” She asks how he dealt with Mr. Redpath. He didn’t have to deal with him because “she did.” Gwyneth tries to tell him that their curse has reached some sort of critical mass. I’m not sure what her zombie threshold is, but mine is 1. At the rising of 1 zombie, we burn the house down. (M: Choice words, considering how the episode ends.) (S: SPOILERS! I didn’t know that when I typed those choice words.) That’s the deal. (K: Agreed. I also flail when Gwyneth turns up because EVE MYLES!) Sneed tells her to worry about stuff like that later because they’ve got to go catch Zombie Grandma.
TARDIS. The Doctor informs her that they’re now in 1860 and it’s Christmas. Rose is excited, but pauses again to wax philosophical about the temporal nature of things for everybody except for him (and now her!) until she abruptly gives up on that because there’s a Christmas to explore. The Doctor stops her, though, because she’s in her tragically unflattering early 2000s wardrobe. He claims it’s because she won’t fit in there, but I think he’s just trying to be a good friend about it. He gives her convoluted directions to the wardrobe on board where she can find some era-appropriate clothing.
Streets of 1860. Sneed and Gwyneth are riding around town in a carriage, looking for Zombie Grandma, to no avail. Sneed tells Gwyneth to “use the sight,” but she super doesn’t want to, probably because her other exposure to magic raises the murdery dead. Begrudgingly, she explains that Zombie Grandma is lost and excited because tonight – before she died – she was going to see a great man from London.
Segue Magic to a man knocking on a door announcing that he’s talking to Mr. Dickens. LOL. (K: I flailed because Dickens is my favourite. But it’s also hilarious because he’s played by Simon Callow, aka Gareth from Four Weddings and a Funeral, aka the guy who’s played Charles Dickens in five different movies/TV shows. AMAZE.) Charles Dickens has a headache and he’s super busy brooding. Popular activity for TV people from the past. Dickens is bummed because he’s lonely on Christmas Eve and doesn’t have a good relationship with his family. Regardless, he puts his game face on to go greet his adoring crowd. People who probably are having a good Christmas Eve. Don’t worry, it’ll be ruined for them soon too! Then you can all be miserable together!
TARDIS. Rose comes out in her period gear and the Doctor tells her she looks beautiful but adds an underhanded, “considering that you’re human.” Rose has no time for his shit, and he apparently doesn’t have to change, (M: He probably did just want her to change her bad outfit…) so she hurries out to go giddily step into some fresh past snow. They explore the streets just as Sneed and Gwyneth arrive at the theater. The Doctor grabs a newspaper and realizes that he got the flight plan wrong and they’re not in 1860 Naples but 1869 Cardiff. (After I typed the date so many times? Rude, show. Rude.)
Mari: Cardiff is always said with such a verbal fist shake. What’s wrong with poor Cardiff?
Sweeney: It’s clearly a running gag for the benefit of the show’s British audience. I don’t know enough about British things to fully appreciate the joke. Question: there’s a reality show that seems to be the British equivalent of Jersey Shore and this guy who wears physics-defying dick-holder bathing suits keeps popping up in tabloidy places for his insane sartorial choices. Does this show take place in Cardiff? That would make me appreciate this gag more.
Theater. Dickens is on stage reciting A Christmas Carol to an enthralled audience. As he says, “as Molly used to look, it looked like,” he spots Zombie Grandma chilling in the audience with her glowy blue face which apparently nobody noticed before this moment. He freaks out and calls the audience’s attention to it. They join him in their panic and scream. The Doctor hears the screaming on the street and gets excited, heading in that direction.
Inside, the theater-goers are fleeing as the ghost goes crazy. The Doctor and Rose enter to all that chaos. While the ghost does its swirling thing, Zombie Grandma has gone limp, dead again. Her body is being carried off by Sneed and his psychic assistant. Rose chases them outside while the Doctor stays inside and excitedly asks Dickens a bunch of questions.
Outside, Rose tries to figure out what Sneed and Gwyneth are doing with the old woman, confused when she realize the woman is dead. Sneed sneaks up behind her and chloroforms her. This is what happens, ladies! Time travel with strangers and get chloroformed in 1869 Cardiff! I bet this wouldn’t have happened if she didn’t have 2 or 3 whole inches of chest exposed on that dress of hers. How could Sneed not chloroform her?
Mari: Women have been asking for it for ages, you guys.
Sweeney: Back inside, the Doctor watches the ghostly specter dissolve and realizes it’s made of gas. He emerges from the theater and sees Rose being carted off in the hearse carriage. He jumps into a nearby carriage and orders it to follow the hearse. It is, of course, Dickens’s, so he hops in with him, confused by this hijacking. The Doctor realizes who he’s talking to and gushes about how he’s such a big fan of Dickens, which warms Dickens over. They also have a brief discussion of this word, “fan.” The Doctor even manages to woo Dickens to urge the driver to speed up.
Sweeney: Funeral Home. Sneed and Gwyneth bring Zombie Grandma’s body back inside. Gwyneth wants to know what they’re going to do about Rose and why this zombie thing keeps happening to them. They leave Rose in the same room we opened the episode in.
Once they leave the room, Rose wakes up. So, too, does the glowy ghost gas as it finds its way into Mr. Redpath, the grieving grandson from the teaser.
Gwyneth answers the door and it’s Dickens and the Doctor. She tries to tell them they’re closed, but Dickens demands to see her master. The Doctor notices the fire flickering behind her and asks if she’s having trouble with her gas.
K: A line which would generally have a whole different meaning in the twenty first century…
Mari: And sadly not that last gas joke we’ll have.
Sweeney: Rose turns around and sees Zombie Grandson rising. She tries to escape but the door is locked. Zombie Grandma is up now too. The Doctor is pressing his head up against the wall, trying to figure out this gas situation. When Rose screams he goes running and arrives just as Zombie Grandson is about to get with the killing. The Doctor asks the zombies what they want, very matter of factly. They answer in unison that something needs to be opened because they’re dying and there’s a rift and they’re trapped in this form. If precision on that was we really important, I’m sorry; I listened to it twice and there were still words I couldn’t get quite right. I know nothing. (M: It’s super cute though; think of how pretty Jon Snow’s hair is!)
Later, Rose is tearing into Sneed for drugging her, feeling her up, and leaving her for dead in a room full of zombies. It’s awesome and the Doctor agrees – we get a quick shot of him smirking at this. Sneed defensively says it’s not his fault, but the house’s. Yeah, no, the chloroforming and groping were all you, pal. He goes on to explain that they can’t keep the zombies down and they weirdly cling to different scraps of their lives – like Zombie Grandma running off to see Dickens. Dickens, for his part, begins his state of denial and the Doctor tells him to STFU.
Sweeney: The Doctor asks about the gas, but Sneed says that’s new. The Doctor says that means its getting stronger and “the rift is getting wider and something is getting through.” The Rift, he explains, is a weak point in the fabric of time and space. (K: It’s also Significant with a capital S in the future!) Dickens sees himself out of the room and nobody pays him any mind.
Out in the hall, Dickens is exploring the house. He hears weird whispering noises and is dismissive of them. He then goes back to further inspect the corpses for the secret to the magic trick, waving his hands in front of Zombie Grandson LIKE A MANIAC WITH A DEATH WISH. The Doctor sees this and tells Dickens he needs to accept that there’s a lot more stuff in this world for him to learn. Dickens isn’t ready to accept that everything he knows about the world is a lie. Fair. He dedicated his life to justice and great social causes, not fantasy and if the fantastical is true, he fears he wasted his life.
Rose is helping Gwyneth in the kitchen, in spite of Gwyneth’s protestations. Rose asks about her salary and educational background – 8 pounds a year and Sunday school. Gwyneth hated Sunday school. Rose laughs that she did too.
K: Me three. They kicked my best friend out for turning the Noah’s Ark dove into a flamingo. But also, I adore the fact that Rose is travelling time and space and yet still finds the time to get pally with working class girls and check up on their rights and working conditions.
Sweeney: The gossipy laughter cuts short when Rose confesses that she used to skip out to look at boys. After some prodding, Gwyneth confesses that she has a thing for the butcher’s boy. Gwyneth is confused because while Rose seems like she’s got all sorts of breeding, she talks “like some sort of wild thing.”
Then things get feelsy, when Gwyneth explains that however harsh Sneed seems, he was good to her when her parents died, but she knows she’ll be reunited with them soon enough. That kind of talk is always so creepy. To add to the creep, Gwyneth says that Rose could be reunited with her father soon too, and Rose realizes that she never told her that her dad is dead. They talk some more and Rose is confused as Gwyneth uses her psychic powers to dive deeper into Rose’s head – she knows she’s come a long way and that the London in Rose’s head is scandalous and weird. Gwyneth gets terrified as she goes on about the things that Rose has seen and scares herself out of her trance.
K: BAD WOLF SHOTS! because what scares Gwyneth out of her trance is, “The things you’ve seen. The darkness, the big bad wolf.“
Sweeney: I DON’T KNOW WHAT MEANS, BUT YAY SHOTS!
She apologizes profusely, saying that she’s been this way since she was a little girl, though her mother told her to hide it. The Doctor enternounces that it’s been getting stronger and Gwyneth confirms. The Doctor explains that she grew up on top of The Rift – she’s part of it. She’s “the key.”
K: Sort of, except more Welsh.
Sweeney: Anyway, the Doctor says that everything she’s done to try to make sense out of things could make her useful. He’s decided that they’re going to have a seance.
Cut to a table where Dickens is throwing a temper tantrum about being asked to participate in this seance, but eventually he gets over himself and takes a seat so that Gwyneth can begin. She asks if the spirits are there and tells them to speak. Gwyneth rocks back and forth, saying she can see and feel them. Sure enough, the blue gas is swirling around above her. The Doctor translates that the swirl is saying it can’t get through The Rift before explaining to Gwyneth that she is in control, not the ghosts. She concentrates harder and the gas forms together to be people-formed. The people shaped gas explains that they need to take the girl to The Rift to build the bridge. TAKING THE KEY TO DIVIDES BETWEEN WORLDS CAN ONLY END IN UNSPEAKABLE SADNESS, GUYS.
Mari: Especially when you consider what came next. *shudders*
Sweeney: I choose to believe it was all an elaborate fever dream.
The blue gas explains that they’re creepy ghastly children and they are the last of their kind. They used to be corporeal, but they suffered tremendous losses in the great Time War. And now they’re dying out. They desperately want some sort of physical form to feel the sunlight again – they want the corpses so that they can live again. Rose is horrified by this idea, but the Doctor considers that propriety a pretty inferior concern to the possibility of saving the blue gas people. They make one last final plea to “take the girl to the The Rift” before they leave and Gwyneth collapses.
Later, Gwyneth wakes up, and has hazy memories of what happened – remembering that they needed her. The Doctor confirms that she’s there only hope, but Rose tells him to back off. The Doctor goes on to explain to the confused old men that the blue gas people are aliens and that Gwyneth can go to The Rift and make a bridge. Rose is on my “NOPE.” train with all of this because she knows it ends in rivers of sadness. Rose angrily tells the Doctor that this is disrespectful to the dead. He asks if she carries a donor card and when she protests that it’s different he says it’s “a different morality,” adding that she needs to, “Get used to it or go home.” He calms down to say that he heard the aliens say that this is a very time sensitive thing.
K: This whole conversation is very interesting when you have the benefit of hindsight. The Doctor is, at this point, very much suffering from the effects of the Time War. He’s the last of his kind, so obviously when another species tells him that they’re the last of their kind, he’ll transfer his feelings onto them and do whatever it takes to help them avoid the situation he’s currently in. He has a lot of feels and guilt, and even with Rose acting as his moral compass, his Last Of The Time Lords feels win out.
Mari: The Doctor is always going to want to save the most things as possible. Rose’s knee-jerk reaction is, “BUT PEOPLE!” when he’s thinking of an entire other species he can save.
Sweeney: I dig that larger philosophical thing they’re doing there. There’s a lot to set up here, in terms of getting the audience on board with the scope of the show and there’s a lot of, “This show is exploring a universe much bigger than what you know,” stuff going on in this episode. The delivery of that varies, but the idea is interesting and this moment was one of the better executed of the lot.
As Rose holds her ground on the corpse issue, Gwyneth speaks up to ask if she gets a say in this. She says that she can tell that Rose thinks she’s stupid, but she knows her mind here and now. Gwyneth says the angels have been singing to her since she was a child and they need her now, so she wants to do whatever she can to help. The Doctor begins to talk strategy, asking what the weakest part of the house is. It is, of course, the morgue. Rose and I were both hoping he’d say, “Gazebo.”
In the Basement of No Seriously Don’t Fucking Go In There Because Corpses and Probable Zombies (K: A+ nickname), Rose tries to insist that she knows zombies weren’t traipsing about in 1869, but the Doctor explains that her world can be rewritten in the snap of his fingers. Dickens interrupts them to say that the room is getting colder, just as the blue gas comes swirling into the room. The creepy child voices are clearer now as they praise the Doctor for coming to help them and ask Gwyneth to follow. Rose begs them to promise not to hurt Gwyneth. The Doctor offers to take them to a place where they can build proper bodies when this is done.
Gwyneth stands in the place where they told her and there’s a whole lot of swirling gas craziness. Gwyneth says she can see her angels and calls out to them to come into her world. Then, because we have 10 more minutes of episode and also because I am so good at TV and knew this would end badly, the swirly ghost gas above her gets a fire orange color and the voice gets deeper and demonic. They’re not saving a few alien children so much as letting in a zombie raising hoard. Sneed tries to order her to stop talking and listen to her master, but he’s promptly killed by a nearby, newly risen zombie and then promptly joins their legion. He tries to beg Gwyneth to make it stop, but she’s kind of possessed right now. They lock themselves behind a convenient gate as the zombies explain that they want the world’s flesh. Dickens flees.
K: I particularly like the fact that as he rushes out the front door, the Gelth fly through the door knocker. I mean, come on. It’s Christmas Eve and Charles Dickens just saw something appear in a door knocker. It doesn’t get much better than that.
Sweeney: Rose tries to figure out how it’s possible for her to die when she hasn’t even been born yet. The Doctor apologizes, since he brought her there, making this his fault. Then he takes a moment to lament his own impending demise.
Down in the dungeon, Rose promises the Doctor that they’ll go down fighting. They grab hands and say they’re glad they met each other. Aw, cute. That’s only cute because I know you’re not actually about to die.
Mari: But also, there are very few shows capable of/willing to kill one of two title credit starts in episode three.
Sweeney: Exactly.
Just then, Dickens runs back into the dungeon, explaining that he’s trying to fill the room with gas. The Doctor marvels at the brilliance of this plan, explaining to Rose that this should suck the ghosts from the room. Dickens hopes it’ll do that soon, so the Doctor smashes a gas pipe, and it all happens pretty quickly.
Except Gwyneth is still standing in the doorway, engulfed in the orange gas. Rose is choking and the Doctor tells Dickens to take her upstairs, but Rose refuses to leave Gwyneth. Gwyneth, for her part, understands now that the ghosts aren’t angels, but she can’t send them back. She says that all she can do is hold them in that place and she takes out a box of matches. The Doctor promises Rose that he won’t leave Gwyneth while she’s still in danger and insists, again, that she goes upstairs. She and Dickens rush up and out to fresh air.
Down in the morgue, the Doctor realizes that it has to be Gwyneth to do this. He apologizes and kisses her forehead. He thanks her and runs up and out of the building. Gwyneth pauses to give him time to flee, but only just enough time.
Outside, Rose is upset that Gwyneth didn’t make it. The Doctor explains that Gwyneth had been dead for at least five minutes. He figures she probably died the minute she stepped into that archway and became the bridge. (I TOLD YOU.) Rose tries to wrap her head around how that’s even possible and Dickens speaks up. “There are more things than in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in your philosophy – even for you, Doctor.” Rose adds, sadly, that a servant girl saved the world and no one will ever know.
K: Dickens (mis)quoting Shakespeare. Excellent.
Sweeney: Later, the Doctor and Rose head back to the TARDIS. Dickens says he’s going to rush back to London to spend time with his family because that’s what’s most important. He also resolves to write about all of this, subtly at first. The Doctor and Rose say goodbye, though Dickens is confused as to where, exactly, they’re going, what with the TARDIS having that whole bigger-on-the-inside quality. Dickens asks the Doctor to answer just one question: who is he. The Doctor hesitates before answering, “Just a friend, passing through.” Dickens also wants to know what becomes of his books and the Doctor assures him that they last forever. Because books are magic. Then our time travelers hop in the TARDIS, leaving behind a scandalized Charles Dickens.
K: NGL, the fact that the Doctor flies through time and space helping famous people with shitty self-confidence by assuring them that their work endures forever gives me feels. So many feels.
Sweeney: Inside, Rose wonders how this blue ghost business will affect history, but the Doctor explains that the current time is just shy of Dickens’s death. Speaking of, Dickens gets to have one last surprise from the Doctor, as he stands by and watches the TARDIS glow and blink and disappear.
K: I love this episode. Sometimes I think I’m the only one, but that’s okay because I have enough love to make up for all the rest of the haters. This was the episode that sold me on the show as a whole, and as a result I love it forever.
Mari: I admittedly liked it more than I thought I would. As I’ve mentioned like 10 times, I skipped this one when I first watched, but I think perhaps it was a combination of the craziness of those first two episodes coupled with the craziness of that first scene with the Zombie Grandma. That’s when I quit.
I love that we got to see a bit of the duality of the Doctor here, who at one moment can say he’s your biggest fan and laugh with you in a carriage and in the next scene tell you to STFU. I like that we see here that while he is this force to be reckoned with, he doesn’t always get it right, from flight plans to trust in other beings. He can be duped and preyed on in some regards.
I mean, I wouldn’t say I love this episode but I appreciate it a bit more. There’s only like five more episode until the first one I loved.
Sweeney: I’m going to go ahead and say the warnings were valid. The Dickens stuff also falls into that category of absurd shit that I suspect is more enjoyable if you actually care about this show. Going back to my earlier comment about the way this episode touches on what I suspect are big! show! themes!, the Dickens bits (which was a lot of it…) were all too overwrought. I enjoyed the campier portions – the Doctor being a fanboy, for starters.
The Doctor and Rose are growing on me but the show still isn’t, if that makes any sense. It’s hard to rally behind an episode with zombie grandmas. It also didn’t help the episode much that I kept seeing parallels to one of my favorite (if soul-crushing) episodes of TV.
But I’ve now cleared my initial point-of-no-return (animated shop dummies) and Mari’s (zombie grandmas) as well as the tree with boobs and skin trampoline, so while I still don’t care for this show, I’m settling nicely into resigned acceptance.
Next time: A UFO crash lands in London, present day in Doctor Who S01 E04 – Aliens of London.
Nicole is the co-captain of Snark Squad and these days she spends most of her time editing podcasts. She spends too much time on Twitter and very occasionally vlogs and blogs. In her day job she's a producer, editor, director, and sometimes host of educational YouTube channels. She loves travel, maps, panda gifs, and semicolons. Writing biographies stresses her out; she crowd sourced this one years ago and has been using a version of it ever since. She would like to thank Twitter for their help.
I'm a 30-something south Floridan who loves the beach but cannot swim. Such is my life, full of small contradictions and little trivialities. My main life goals are never to take life too seriously, but to do everything I attempt seriously well. After that, my life goals devolve into things like not wearing pants and eating all of the Zebra Cakes in the world. THE WORLD.
I'm a 30-something librarian and I still live with my parents because I'm super broke. Leader of Team Heartless Cow. I have an inexplicable love for 90s television, eat too much chocolate, and read more than is good for me.
