Doctor Who: 73 Yards Review - 6 Ups & 4 Downs

What on Earth did RTD actually answer in this episode? What even happened?

At the end, we don't know where the Doctor has been, how Ruby became herself and travelled back in time, what the status of Roger ap Gwilliam is, who left the fairy circle in the first place, or what Mad Jack actually is. Most frustratingly, we don't know why future Ruby does any of the things she does, or what the goal of the episode was.

While it's frustrating to not know what Ruby was saying to make people run away, I accept it's probably symbolic, as previously mentioned. The bigger question is, why does she do this? Why make everyone run from herself, including her own adoptive mother? Was this a case of getting Ruby to exactly where she needed to be at the right time, with the right knowledge? Either way, this is a point that didn't benefit from being ambiguous.

It seems like RTD saw how much everyone loved the unknown element of the Midnight Entity and tried his luck again, expecting similar results. You have to give us something to go on man!

This episode had 10/10 written all over it. Perhaps it still is, or perhaps the last ten minutes completely dropped the ball and took the lazy way out by not explaining a thing. It entirely depends on how much you enjoy filling in the blanks. I don't know if this is the best thing RTD has ever written, or the biggest case of style over substance in the show's history.

Ask me again in a year.