The Doctor Who Review - Season 10 Episode 04

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WARNING! SPOILER ALERT! Welcome back to the Doctor Who Review, where I recap the week’s episode and give some thoughts and opinions on it. Please do not read if you have not seen this week’s episode. There are major spoilers ahead. You have been warned. Check out the rest of the Doctor Who Reviews here.

Title: Knock Knock

Written by: Mike Bartlett

Taking a step into the flatting world, Bill joins a group of 5 other students as they start the hunt for a house together. After what seems like an endless amount of unsuitable houses, an elderly gentleman offers them the use of his ancient mansion. Which, incidentally, looks like something out of a horror film … which is rapidly what it turns into.

One the 6 flatmates moves in a day before everyone, and the rest follow, choosing their rooms as they go. As the Doctor helps Bill move her boxes into her new home, he notices odd things, and something doesn’t sit quite right with him (although, to be honest, when does it ever?). When they eventually realise that they haven’t seen the first flatmate yet, they find him half eaten by the wall in his bedroom.

As it turns out, the elderly gentlemen is pretty much feeding young people to the house, which is actually the alien wood lice living in the house who are keeping his daughter alive and who need human bodies to suck energy from to do so. Just another average day for the Doctor, really.

My thoughts on Knock Knock

This was probably my favourite episode of the 4 that are out so far. Knock Knock was everything I love in a DW episode and more: it was set on earth, in the same town where the university that Bill and Twelve are hanging about at, it involved people that the companion knew, it was a seemingly normal plot line at first – no space ships or other planets, just a bunch of young adults trying to find a flat – and everyone made it out alive.

I did really like the plot line, and how our much loved Hercules Poirot (played by David Suchet) turned into the bad guy. The lovely twist at the ending was only really evident a few moments before you discovered that the Landlord’s daughter was actually his mother, so for a twist it was really quite well done, and not something you could ‘call’ before a minute or so prior.

Bill once again shines in this episode, and each week she’s quickly becoming one of my favourite companions (other than Rose, and Amy and Rory). Side bar: how cute does her hair look up in a bun-like pony tail? So cute.

We were given slightly more information about the mysterious vault this week. As the Doctor returns from his murder-house shenanigans, Nardole is dutifully guarding the vault and whoever is inside it. Twelve tells Nardole to go home, and then the Doc walks.into.the.vault. We’ve gone from ‘oh hey there’s something in the vault’ to ‘there’s someone in the vault who is an excellent piano player and to whom the Doctor is actually chatting with’. The theory my friend and I were talking about: The Master/Missy is in the vault. We know they’re coming back at some point in the season, so why not?

Final thoughts

Written by newcomer to the show, Mike Bartlett, I really hope we see more episodes written by him in the future.

Next week’s episode doesn’t look like it’ll be a favourite of mine – I secretly hate the space-suit space-ship something’s-eating-crew-members type of episode. I feel like it’s overdone. However! We did only get a sneak peek at episode 5 so I may be jumping the Hate It gun. We shall see.

What did you think of Knock Knock? Enjoy it?