Doctor Who: Boom Review - 9 Ups & 3 Downs

12. UP - A Gloriously Simple Concept

Some of Doctor Who's most memorable episodes have been delightfully simple at a conceptual level. For a show that is fond of location-hopping, it's often the episodes that strip back the cast size, the action, and the scale that are among the very best.

Allowing us to focus on our central characters has given us some fantastic character pieces (Midnight, Heaven Sent, and recently, Wild Blue Yonder). Here, we're treated to another bottle episode, taking place almost entirely on one small set and taking this trope to its logical extreme by rooting the Doctor to one spot for almost the complete runtime of the episode. This forces Boom to progress in some really creative ways that most certainly set it apart from other episodes.

From there, it almost plays out as a sort of twisted 'comedy of errors', with the situation ramping up on a constant basis. Each new character that is thrown into this disastrous little cocktail brings their own complications to the situation and a new danger for our protagonists. It's an episode that uses its runtime extremely well, knowing exactly when to let our heroes breathe for a nice character moment, and when to pull the rug out from under them.

Cracking stuff.