Doctor Who: The Story & The Engine Review - 8 Ups & 2 Downs

10. UP - Inua Ellams

Inua Ellams is a welcome addition to the Whoniverse, delivering a story that – for the first time this year – doesn't feel like a Doctor Who episode we've seen before. Obviously, it shares DNA (and some cast members) with Ellams' 2019 play Barber Shop Chronicles, as The Story & the Engine also places the safe space of the barber shop at the centre of stories and storytelling.

Ellams seamlessly adapts his original play into something more Doctor Who-y, using sci-fi and mythic tropes to explore how stories can be appropriated and weaponised.

As well as being a playwright, Ellams is also a poet, and he brings this to bear in the dialogue. Look at how beautifully he sums up of the story of Doctor Who in six words:

"I'm born. I die. I'm born."

The poetry of Ellams' script gives us a Doctor Who that feels more mythical than anything we've seen so far in these supposedly mythic struggles between the lord of time and the gods of games, music, death or light.