The Shakespeare Code by: Gareth Roberts and directed by: Charles Palmer

 

“The Shakespeare Code” stars David Tennant as the Doctor and Freema Agyeman as Martha Jones with Dean Lennox Kelly as William Shakespeare and Christina Cole as Lilith.  It was written by: Gareth Roberts and directed by: Charles Palmer with Simon Winstone as Script Editor, Phil Collinson as Producer, and Russell T. Davies and Julie Gardner as Executive Producers.  It was originally broadcast on Saturday 7 April 2007 on BBC One.

 

Gareth Roberts is an unapologetic transphobe, tweeting several transphobic statements over the years disparaging trans women specifically.  Once again this is not up for debate and once again this is a mark on any media written by Roberts that will be reviewed.

 

After the success of “The Unquiet Dead” and “Tooth and Claw” Russell T. Davies wished to continue the appearance of a historical figure in the third series of Doctor Who turning to novelist Gareth Roberts who had already contributed several Doctor Who novels through the 1990s and held an interest in the life of William Shakespeare, studying Shakespeare’s plays and two catalogues indicating a comedy called Love’s Labour’s Won as a potential lost work (which in actuality may be an alternate title for an already written play such as Love’s Labour’s Lost or Much Ado About Nothing).  Roberts initially used this for the title before amending it to “Theatre of Death” and Davies believed the idea would work well for Martha Jones’ first trip in the TARDIS, seeking permission to film at the Globe Theatre in London which was a reconstruction of the historic Globe.  Due to the popularity of The DaVinci Code which posited a secret history involving Leonardo DaVinci, Davies amended the title to “The Shakespeare Code” during production which was the second episode of the third series and the concluding episode of the second production block once again under the direction of Charles Palmer.  Roberts’ script also took delight in adding little sly references, overt and subtle, to the work of Shakespeare and actual history with fairly mixed success.

 

The plot of “The Shakespeare Code” is quite simple, a trio of witch like Carrionites, Lilith, Doomfinger, and Bloodtide, played by Christina Cole, Amanda Lawrence, and Linda Clarke respectively, use their advanced magic like science and the power of words to manipulate William Shakespeare into releasing their species, trapped by the Eternals from the classic series, using the odd 14 sided architecture of the Globe Theatre and the right words at the right time.  It’s a great idea for an episode and makes for a very pulpy watch as the Doctor takes Martha on the one trip he promised her into the past, get easily wrapped up in first the idea of just seeing the potential of a missing play of Shakespeare and then to investigate the death of the Master of the Revels, who drowns on dry land.  The idea is that the witchcraft is just an advanced branch of science and mathematics that use words instead of numbers, partially a reference to the thousands of words Shakespeare added to the English dictionary.  The episode is a fun time once you get past Roberts’ tendency to write an anachronistic setting, the opening sequence of the Doctor and Martha stepping out of the TARDIS to the streets of London and the rest of the episode being full of these contemporary references and customs with no attempt to couch things in historic language outside of the dialogue of plays which is in either real or faux iambic pentameter.  This is especially troubling as Roberts lampshades the fact that Martha Jones is a person of color and directly implies that history wasn’t actually all that oppressive, his general conservatism coming through with a recurring gag about global warming.  There’s also a recurring gag about the at the time to be released Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows which while Roberts shares Rowling’s abhorrent views, was clearly just meant to be references to the most popular book series in the world at the time that has aged poorly.

 

These are the major issues with the episode outside of the continuation of the relationship between the Doctor and Martha.  Mainly that the Doctor believes that this is a situation where Rose Tyler would somehow know the answers to what is going on in the first third of the episode, despite Martha proving herself more than capable and in the very next moment the Doctor actually acknowledges her.  Roberts also leans heavily into the idea that Martha has developed romantic feelings for the Doctor and it is painfully obvious that he does not see her that way, something that will contribute to the character arcs for this particular series, an issue from this point forward.  Tennant and Agyeman also just play every other scene incredibly well from their first scene, to Martha realizing the Doctor is feigning death to putt the Carrionites on the back foot, to even the Doctor triumphantly naming the Carrionites.  Roberts also includes one of the more lackluster instances of LGBT representation in this era of Doctor Who, Shakespeare, played by Dean Lennox Kelly, is obliquely referenced as being bisexual by flirting with the Doctor exactly one time and it being called out as academics punching the air in joy.  Kelly’s portrayal of the Bard is quite flirty with women so it’s genuinely a shame that the script does not allow him to flirt more than this single time.  The rest of the episode is a generally pulpy good time with the Carrionites being a great idea for villains, and put into practice quite well, with instances of sympathetic magic keeping the protagonists on the backfoot throughout the episode and a rather nice effects heavy climax using the power of words and theater tot defeat the ancient evil.

 

Overall, “The Shakespeare Code” is perhaps most marred by the author of the episode dragging everyone else down with his views that in some ways are foreshadowed in the script.  By no means a bad episode, it is an episode that struggles with its lighter tone in a dark story, almost reviving the 1990s guns vs frocks debate upon which Roberts is one of the few authors to reside squarely with the frocks while his script desperately wants to go towards the guns in some very dark places.  It’s a decent episode that has a great premise and idea but perhaps needed a few more drafts and steadier hand to make it a great episode.  6/10.