Previously: A penis-faced Dalek-human hybrid proved to be an even more terrible idea than you’d think.
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The Lazarus Experiment
Kirsti: The Doctor and Martha furiously work the controls of the TARDIS, then the Doctor compliments himself on a perfect landing. Martha excitedly wants to know where they are, and the Doctor replies “The end of the line…” She clearly doesn’t hear him, and rushes out the door excitedly. Her face falls when she realises that she’s standing in her living room. The Doctor informs her that it’s the morning after they left on their trip, and she’s only been gone about 12 hours in real time.
Marines: So, basically he gets the landing and timing exactly right when he’s trying to dump someone? Cool.
K: Oof. That hadn’t occurred to me.
Martha sad pandas when she realises that the Doctor’s being all “OKAY, BYE FOREVER”-y, but their farewell is interrupted by her phone ringing. It’s her mum, informing her that her sister’s on TV. She turns it on while informing the Doctor that her sister, Tish, has a new job as PR something something to a research company. The Doctor makes this face and I actually paused at this moment and then laughed for like two straight minutes because I find it inexplicably hilarious.
Mari: It kind of says, “PR? That’s almost as terrifying as a mortgage.”
K: Pretty much.
On the telly, Tish stands behind an old guy who’s wibbling about how he’s going to change what it means to be human with the push of a button. The Doctor looks intrigued, but Martha shuts off the telly and is all “Well, BYE”. She thanks him for everything, and he grins at her before stepping into the TARDIS and vworp vworping away. Martha looks feelsy. But then the TARDIS reappears, and the Doctor’s all “Wait, WHAT did that dude on the telly say?”
DOO WEE OOO!
After the credits, the old guy from the press conference – who reminds me of the Cryptkeeper – is talking to an older lady in a high tech looking office. She asks if some unspecified thing is safe, and he assures her that it is. She also wants to know that their investors will get their money’s worth, and mentions Mr Saxon, thereby earning us our season 3 continuity shots. WOO, SHOTS! Tish walks in with a guest list, and Cryptkeeper gets kind of sexual harassment-y. She’s grossed out, which is legit.
Elsewhere, Martha’s wearing a fancy dress and the Doctor’s looking decidedly uncomfortable in a tuxedo. She tells him he looks like James Bond and he’s all “Ew. Wait, really?” and preens a little. Bless. They head into Lazarus Laboratories, where Tish works. In the centre of the gala is a white box with frosted glass panels on all sides that’s roughly person sized. The Doctor gushes about the canapes.
Tish comes over, and she and Martha exchange some sisterly banter. Then Tish gives the Doctor total side eye until Martha introduces them. Tish is impressed that Martha’s with a guy, but then twigs that he’s “a science geek” when the Doctor gushes about the equipment in the room.
Mama Jones is all “Hey, so about that time you left early last night. Did you go ALONE??” while staring pointedly at the Doctor. Martha makes introductions again and there is much awkwardness.
Mari: Some of it could’ve been avoided with a fake name, but okay. I’ll ignore that because Martha’s mom is giving extreme judge-y eyebrows and it’s kind of fabulous.
K: We love judge-y eyebrows around these parts.
Luckily for the Doctor, they’re interrupted by the Cryptkeeper starting his speech. He tells the room that he’s going to perform a miracle for them, and that it’s the most important discovery since the atom was split. Tomorrow, he says, they will wake to a changed world.
He hops into the big white machine, and some scientists push buttons. A bright blue light flashes, and the machine begins to swirl. It’s kind of like a reverse TARDIS or something. An alarm sounds, and the Doctor yells that something’s wrong and the machine is overloading. Sparks fly in the control room. He leaps over the desk and starts sonic-ing things. The old lady from earlier shouts for someone to stop him, but no one does. He yanks out a power cable, and the machine grinds to a halt.
Martha rushes over and opens the door. Cryptkeeper staggers out of the smoke and he looks 40 years younger. More specifically, he looks like Mark Gatiss because he IS Mark Gatiss. He yells that he’s been reborn, and everyone cheers. Except the Doctor, who gets “Excuse you, that’s my trick” face. (M: “And I definitely got a better face than you did.”) (K: So true.)
As the media take photos, Martha refuses to accept that it’s the same guy, and says it must be a trick. But the Doctor assures her it’s not. Old Lady walks over to Gatiss and gushes about how amazing it all is and how people will spend a bajillion pounds to have the procedure and she wants to be first. Gatiss makes this weird movement like he’s about to sneeze, then grabs a tray of canapes from a passing waiter and scoffs the lot.
Old Lady is horrified by his manners, but the Doctor wanders over and informs him that this sort of process always leads to an energy deficit. Gatiss scoffs that he can’t possibly have seen this process before, but the Doctor’s all “Here’s how you did it”. He also says with concern that Gatiss can’t have taken all the variables into account. Gatiss snaps that all experiments come with risk, and that with the exception of the machine almost exploding, everything went to plan.
Martha snaps that he can’t know that until he’s done tests, and Old Lady says they’ll iron out those kinks before the machines are used commercially. Martha’s all “WHAT THE FUCK”, and Gatiss says it’s all about changing humanity. The Doctor coldly says that it’s about people living longer, and Gatiss smirks that it’s about people potentially living forever. Old Lady says they have things to discuss in private, and Gatiss leaves with a “Goodbye, Doctor. In a few years, you’ll look back and laugh at how wrong you were.” He kisses Martha’s hand creepily as he leaves.
The Doctor glares after him a little, and says Gatiss has no idea what he’s doing. Martha asks what they do now, and he says they should use the labs to do their own tests. Martha waves her hand around and says it’s a good thing she collected a DNA sample. The Doctor grins and tells her she’s a star.
Mari: Meanwhile, I’m super grossed out by that kiss being called a DNA sample.
K: Urgh, true.
Upstairs, Gatiss points out where he grew up, and Old Lady says it’ll have a blue plaque on it soon. But no. It was destroyed in the Blitz. I suddenly want to rewatch The Empty Child. (M: Are you my mummy?) Old Lady gushes that he’s creating an empire they can rule together. She kisses him, but he’s all “Ew, you’re old” and pulls away.
In a lab, Martha and the Doctor study Gatiss’ DNA. Martha says it looks normal, but the Doctor points out that it’s changing spontaneously. Martha’s all “Um, HOW?”, causing the Doctor to infodump about the process Gatiss used and how he basically hacked into his own genes. Except he missed something in the process and now the genes can’t stabilise. They need to find him before he turns into something weird, and they rush off upstairs.
Back in Cryptkeeper’s office, Old Lady is rambling about how all of this is because of her, and Gatiss points out that it’s because of him. She just provided the money. She insists that when the device is ready, they can be young and hot together, but he’s all “Ew, no” because apparently he was just using her for the aforementioned money. She asks if the process made him more cruel, and basically says that she’ll tattle on him to Mr Saxon (more shots!).
Gatiss grabs at his collar and cries out in pain. There’s a cracking sound and he falls to the floor in agony. Old Lady hovers over him, looking concerned as he writhes around. (M: Nope. As soon as you hear spontaneous bone cracking? Run away.) Then he transforms into something decidedly Mayor-like and lunges at her.
Downstairs at the gala, Mama Jones grills Tish for info on the Doctor. Martha’s brother, Leo, is all “Just be happy she found a man”, because that’s all that matters, right? (M: Oooooh, a man?? Gosh why didn’t anyone say so before…) But Mama Jones is worried that Martha won’t finish her medical training if she’s all distracted by being in love or whatever. Across the room, Gatiss – now wearing a new suit, seeing as the transforming into a giant beastie ruined his old one – steps out of the lift. He places a creepy hand on Tish’s shoulder and says to the crowd that he needs to take care of her. Tish’s face is all “Um. No thank you?”
Mari: She has to go, though, because he’s a man and TIL you have to be happy when one finds you.
K: I mean, we’re totally useless otherwise, so…
Meanwhile, Martha and the Doctor are in Cryptkeeper’s office. It’s empty, and Martha wonders where Gatiss is. Except she trails off in mid-sentence when she spots a skeletal foot behind the desk. They rush over there and find Old Lady, now looking a lot like Inca Mummy Girl. (M: A less awesome memory than The Mayor…) The Doctor says she’s had all the life sucked out of her, “like squeezing the juice out of an orange.” That…is a horrifying analogy.
Martha asks if this means Gatiss has changed already, but the Doctor reminds her of how the DNA was constantly shifting, and says it might mean that this didn’t give him enough energy and he’ll have to do it again. They hop in the lift and head back downstairs just before a second lift arrives with Gatiss and Tish inside. Gatiss flirts creepily, but now that he’s not a thousand years old, Tish is far more open to it.
Back downstairs, Martha asks Leo where Gatiss is, and he mentions that he left with Tish a few minutes earlier. Martha freaks just as Mama Jones walks up, wanting to grill the Doctor some more. But he and Martha rush past her to the lifts, making her spill her champagne. She goes to dry off, and a snooty looking man hands her another champagne and asks who the Doctor is. When Mama Jones says he’s a friend of Martha’s, the snooty man creepily replies “Perhaps she should choose her friends more carefully“. The zoomy cameraman zooms in on Mama Jones looking confused.
Mari: About the Doctor and not the random guy walking around, giving friendship advice. But also, can I have that job?
K: Seriously, why is that not a real job?
Martha and the Doctor rush back into Cryptkeeper’s office to find it deserted. Conveniently, contrivance demands that the Doctor can track Gatiss using the sonic screwdriver. He does, and it leads them to the roof. Up there, Gatiss and Tish are looking across Southwark Cathedral to St Paul’s, and I’m wondering if this was filmed on top of my little brother’s old office building.
Tish strokes Gatiss’ face, and says she’s still taking it all in. He says he is too, after working so many years on this project. She asks if it’s what he expected, and he quotes T.S. Eliot at her in reply. The quote is finished by the Doctor, with his SUPER SRS face on. Martha tells Tish to get away from Gatiss, and Tish does the typical younger sibling “you’re not the boss of me” thing.
The Doctor sasses a little at Gatiss, saying that he’d have thought he was too busy defying nature to quote poetry. Gatiss smirks that one lifetime wasn’t enough to learn everything he wanted, and he’s looking forward to seeing what he can do with a whole bunch more. The Doctor tells him that it doesn’t work like that, and “Some people live more in twenty years than others do in eighty. It’s not the time that matters, it’s the person.” (M: Says the man with a time machine. -_-)
The Doctor sonics the roof door closed as Tish freaks out. The lights flicker as Scorpion Gatiss slams into the door repeatedly. A security alert locks down the building. The Doctor rushes the Jones girls down the stairs, as Scorpion Gatiss breaks through behind them. Downstairs at the gala, the Doctor tosses the sonic screwdriver to Martha and tells her to open a door while he addresses the crowd.
He stands on Gatiss’ machine, and yells at the crowd to get out because they’re all in danger. A woman eyerolls that the biggest danger is choking on an olive. Obviously, Scorpion Gatiss bursts into the room to prove her wrong. Everyone panics. Leo gets knocked down in the confusion. Martha gets the door open and everyone rushes out. Except for Olive Woman who freezes in terror and gets turned into an Inca Mummy Girl.
Mama Jones is helping Leo when Scorpion Gatiss closes in on them. The Doctor yells out, distracting him/it, and giving Martha a chance to help her family to safety. The Doctor says Gatiss is a joke, and that Nature got her own back when he tried to defy her. He leads Scorpion Gatiss off down a side corridor as Martha diagnoses Leo with a concussion and orders Mama Jones and Tish to get him to safety.
In the Basement of Seriously Why Do You People Never Listen To Us, No Good Can Come From Going Into the Basement, the Doctor creeps around. Scorpion Gatiss says he can’t be stopped and that the Doctor is trying to prevent progress. The Doctor yells that he’s killing innocent people for the sake of progress, but Scorpion Gatiss calls it “a necessary sacrifice“.
Meanwhile, the crowd has made it to the front door, only to find it locked. People cry and bang on the glass. Martha grabs the sonic screwdriver and slides over the security desk to find the override switch. She laughs excitedly when she gets the door open. (M: Go Martha go!) The lights come back on with it, and down in the basement, the Doctor looks up to see Scorpion Gatiss is right above his head. “Oh, hello!” he says before making a run for it.
Martha announces that she has to go back to help the Doctor. Mama Jones is not well pleased with this turn of events, and looks hurt when Martha runs off. Tish and Leo pull Mama Jones towards the exit. Meanwhile, the Doctor is in a laboratory. Crashing noises outside indicate that Scorpion Gatiss is getting closer. The Doctor rigs up a trigger with a light fitting, then turns on all the gas taps. Scorpion Gatiss comes into the lab and sasses at him. The Doctor runs out, flicking the light switch as he goes. The lab explodes.
Martha hears the explosion and rushes towards it. She collides with the Doctor and gives him back the sonic screwdriver. Martha asks if the explosion killed Scorpion Gatiss, but he/it appears and lurches towards them, so no. They run. Out on the street, the Jones family are hella confused about how Martha can have such strong feelings for a guy she literally just met. Snooty Man appears and tells Mama Jones that there are things she should know about the Doctor. He whispers in her ear, and she looks horrified.
Mari: To be fair, it probably wouldn’t take a whole lot to horrify Mama Jones.
K: Valid point.
In the main room, Martha and the Doctor realise that the only place to hide is the machine. They huddle inside, and the Doctor says he’s betting Gatiss won’t destroy it to get at them because the machine is his masterpiece. She asks what the plan is, and he doesn’t have one. Martha is not well pleased. He pulls out the sonic screwdriver and says he’s going to improvise. She looks shocked as he shimmies past her out of the frame, and Tumblr likes to get all “Doctor, what are you doing with that sonic screwdriver??” about this scene.
He yells back that he’s trying to reverse the machine so that it reflects energy rather than receiving it. This, he suspects, will kill Scorpion Gatiss because he’s at least three times his normal size so his energy is spread a bit thin. A blast of light comes out of the machine, and throws Scorpion Gatiss across the room. The machine spins to a stop. Martha and the Doctor emerge to find a naked Gatiss on the floor. Martha comments on how pathetic he looks, and the Doctor quotes T.S. Eliot some more: “This is the way the world ends. Not with a bang but with a whimper.”
Outside, ambulance men wheel Gatiss’ blanket covered body away as Martha and the Doctor look on. The Jones’ rush up, relieved to see Martha. The Doctor happily greets Mama Jones, but she slaps him in the face and tells him to stay away from Martha. She says he causes death and destruction everywhere he goes. Martha insists that he saved everyone, but Mama Jones gives zero fucks.
Mari: I like that the Doctor’s big takeaway is that another mom slapped him in the face. Moms are proving tricky for him.
K: Maybe that’s why Eleven chose Amy and Clara… But I’m getting ahead of myself.
Suddenly, there’s a big crash. The Doctor runs off to investigate, and Martha follows. After a moment, Tish runs off after Martha, and Mama Jones looks feelsy. The Doctor finds the ambulance on the side of the road. The back’s open and it contains some more mummy people. Because Gatiss’ name is Lazarus, geddit?
Martha asks where he’s gone, and the Doctor sonics for his DNA some more. The trail leads to Southwark Cathedral. This is a total segue, but I now regret not going into Southwark Cathedral when I was in London last year. I DID eat lunch in the churchyard one day, but only because there was nowhere to sit at Borough Market. (If you’re ever there, allow me to highly recommend stopping by Konditor and Cook for a brownie because they are to die for.) (M: I’ll be there in 2 weeks. WAIT FOR ME, BROWNIE.)
Anysegue, they head into the cathedral, and it seems to be empty. The doctor tracks the DNA with his trusty sonic, and it leads them up to the altar. Gatiss is behind the altar, gasping and wrapped in an altar cloth. He tells the Doctor that he thought he was going to die in the cathedral once before – when he was a child during the Blitz. The Doctor says he was there, and Gatiss is all “Bitch, please” because the Doctor is way too young for that.
“So are you,” the Doctor replies. Gatiss chuckles, then grimaces as his back cracks. He talks about the Blitz some more, about how he swore to fight back against death. And that’s what he did with the machine. The Doctor snaps that other people died today, but Gatiss says they mean nothing. He’s changed the course of history.
The Doctor says they might have too, and that facing death is part of being human. It’s very Dark!Doctor, the camera angle and the way his face is lit. Gatiss hisses that avoiding death is the strongest impulse humanity has, and that he’s only doing what everyone before him has done. He’s just better at it. The Doctor suggests that maybe being a skeleton scorpion hybrid thing isn’t the biggest sign of success, but Gatiss insists that it’s progress, and that he’s now more than human.
He lurches again, and Martha whispers that he’s about to Hulk out. The Doctor whispers back that he’s got an idea. He just needs to get Gatiss up the bell tower. Gatiss smirks that the Doctor’s sentimentality would indicate that he’s older than he seems. We get another Dark!Doctor moment as he says “I’m old enough to know that a longer life isn’t always a better one. In the end, you just get tired. Tired of the struggle, tired of losing everyone that matters to you, tired of watching everything turn to dust. If you live long enough, Lazarus, the only certainty left is that you’ll end up alone.” Cheerful.
Mari: I know this is not the most subtle thing in the world, but we’ve been hammered over the head for a bit with the way the Doctor is treating Martha and the Rose Shadow looming over them. To have him say in so many words that he’s tired of losing people and he’s just sure that he’ll end up alone ties that together in a way I liked.
K: Excellent point.
Gatiss thinks that’s a price worth paying, and convulses again before saying that he’s going to feed soon. The Doctor snaps that he won’t let that happen. Martha steps up and says she thought Gatiss had a taste for “fresher meat“. The Doctor is all “WTF ARE YOU DOING OMG NO”. Gatiss lunges at her, and Martha runs. Tish runs with her, and they head up the bell tower. Martha calls out to the Doctor as they go.
In the stairwell, Gatiss has trouble keeping up with the Jones’ (ha) (M: beautiful) because he keeps having to stop to mutate. Martha tells Tish to keep moving. In the cathedral, the Doctor stares around in desperation and screams Martha’s name. She pops her head out of an archway, and he tells her to lead Gatiss to the top of the bell tower. She asks what to do then, but Tish grabs her because Scorpion Gatiss is coming. They run some more. The Doctor sprints to the organ and grabs his sonic screwdriver.
He jams the sonic into the organ and pulls out all the stops. Up in the bell tower, Tish screams that they’re trapped. The bell is directly above them and there’s nowhere to go. Martha insists that this is part of the Doctor’s plan and that he knows what he’s doing. Tish isn’t okay with being bait. As Scorpion Gatiss closes in, Martha tells Tish to run for it if Scorpion Gatiss takes her. I get sibling feels.
The Doctor hears a scream from the bell tower and starts playing, pressing down on the pedals with both feet. When I was a kid, my grandmother had my dead grandfather’s electric organ in her living room, and it was basically the most! fun! ever! to turn it on and muck around for like an hour. Occasionally, we made the windows rattle. My poor, long suffering grandmother never told us to STFU whereas I can’t listen to my niece muck around on our piano for more than 5 minutes without wanting to scream.
Mari: If my nieces has any toys that make noise, I basically want to kill the toy with fire within 5 minutes too.
K: ANYWAY. Scorpion Gatiss swings his tail at Martha, and she ducks out of the way, but slips and falls into the hole leading to the cathedral below. She holds on for dear life as Tish screams at Scorpion Gatiss to get away from her. The Doctor plays louder, and the air around them pulses with soundwaves. Scorpion Gatiss topples over the edge and falls to the cathedral floor with a thud.
When the Doctor hears the thud, he stops playing and turns around to see a naked and slightly mangled Gatiss lying on the floor. Martha loses her grip just as Tish grabs her wrist and pulls her to safety. They cry together as Martha yells out to the Doctor that she’s okay. They have a sibling bonding moment, and it’s cute.
Meanwhile, the Doctor is studying Gatiss’ body. He looks at him thoughtfully, then reaches out to close his creepy staring eyes. As he does, Gatiss morphs back into the Cryptkeeper. The Doctor runs across the cathedral towards Martha and they hug. Martha asks where he learnt to play the organ, and the Doctor nonchalantly mentions hanging out with Beethoven. Martha sasses that that certainly would have taught him to play loudly.
Martha turns around in surprise, and realises that he’s saying okay to her being a legit companion. She flails a little and they hug before heading into the TARDIS. It vworp vworps away just as Martha’s phone rings. We stay with it as the answering machine picks up, and Mama Jones leaves a message telling Martha to call her urgently because the Doctor is dangerous and she’s going to get herself killed and also this information comes from Mr. Saxon (shots!) so it’s totally legit. Fade to black.
This episode feels…fillery. I like that we get introduced to all of Martha’s family and we see how they react to her newfound relationship with the Doctor. But the monster of the week was both stupid and the product of terrible special effects, and I just flat out didn’t care. Also, the way the Doctor defeated the monster wasn’t even properly explained?? Like, why did they have to be in the bell tower if he was going to play the organ? Surely the BELL should have been involved??? Plus, I really can’t stand Mark Gatiss, so this episode basically did nothing for me.
Mari: Meanwhile, I’m over here doing a happy dance because this was way better for me than last episode. It’s not an amazing episode but one that better strikes the balance between ridiculous plot and monster + super serious Doctor emotions. Here we explore his near-immortality and the price he pays for it. Gatiss as a human-monster is weird and lends itself to plot holes, but I liked that the Doctor is there, lecturing him about old age and dying, when he escapes both these things. Gatiss tells the Doctor that ending up alone is a price worth paying, and isn’t that the same stance the Doctor takes? I mean, he keeps fighting and regenerating and moving forward. However sad he may be now, he must believe that this is a price worth paying.
This is not the first time we’ve heard the Doctor talk about the value of a single life. I’m specifically remember Nine in Father’s Day, talking to the about-to-be-married couple and again to Rose about how much one person can make a difference. He says this to Gatiss here, who feels totally cool about sacrificing other lives for his scientific achievements. The Doctor knows, though, that each of those lives had the potential for making and altering history. I love that as an ongoing theme and it’s central to WHY the Doctor keeps going and keeps fighting.
I loved Martha here. I know I’ve been all over the place with her. I hate it when the episode takes time (pretty much every episode so far) for Martha to comment on her relationship with the Doctor and all that. It was less grating for me, here, coming from her family. That they should comment on how attached she is to him after one day, that they should wonder what she sees in him and who he is, feels more natural and a little less anvil-y. Martha, meanwhile, is running about, saving days, being brave, using her smarts, and generally being one hell of a companion. This I love. Forever and ever.
It’s all concept heavy and yet these concepts don’t take up too much time. Instead, what we get is an inexplicable scorpion immortality monster running around, dragging this episode down to where it does feel rather fillery. Onward, though. Better things are yet to come.
K: Thank God.
Next time on Doctor Who: The Doctor has 42 minutes to save the crew of a spaceship that’s heading straight for the centre of the sun in S03 E07 – 42.
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.
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.
