Planet of the Dead by: Russell T. Davies & Gareth Roberts and directed by: James Strong

 

“Planet of the Dead” stars David Tennant as the Doctor and Michelle Ryan as Lady Christina de Souza with Lee Evans as Malcolm Taylor and Noma Dumezweni as Capt. Erisa Magambo.  It was written by: Russell T. Davies & Gareth Roberts and directed by: James Strong with Lindsey Alford as Script Editor, Tracie Simpson as Producer, and Russell T. Davies and Julie Gardner as Executive Producers.  It was originally broadcast on Saturday 11 April 2009 on BBC One.

 

When Russell T. Davies and Julie Gardner were planning the 2009 specials, they were determined to air them across the year so Doctor Who would not be off air for more than a few months at a time.  This meant in between the 2008 and 2009 Christmas specials there would be two other specials, one to coincide with Easter 2009 and one at some point in the fall.  Although not writing a full series this year, Davies was also working on the five-part Torchwood: Children of Earth and decided that at least two of the specials would have to be cowritten with other authors.  The first of the year was intended to be a special effects heavy episode, partially because Doctor Who would be airing in high definition for the first time and partially to accommodate David Tennant’s schedule with the Royal Shakespeare Company.  Davies developed the episode with Gareth Roberts, wishing to take ideas from Roberts’ The Highest Science as a basis for the episode after ideas for a Star Trek parody fell through.  Davies came up with the desert setting which Roberts developed into San Helios, while the elements of the flying bus directly evolved from The Highest Science’s London train as well as the original idea of the aliens being the Chelonians.  The Chelonians would be written out due to the logistics of shooting in the desert.  Roberts attempted to make an overweight one episode companion tour guide while Davies developed cat burglar Hermione who developed into Lady Christina De Souza in the final episode.  Tracie Simpson came onto production as Phil Collinson’s replacement with Nikki Wilson filling in for the fall special that year as well while directing duties were given to James Strong by the time the title became “Planet of the Dead”.

 

“Planet of the Dead” as an episode has a production which is largely a misstep for the Doctor Who Production Team, the setting largely being a desert meant that the production was allocated location filming.  The location chosen for the production was Dubai in the United Arab Emirates meaning both Davies and Roberts could not be present for the location shoots, written on paper as Davies having to write the final two specials.  This could have been avoided as the desert locale could easily have been found in other, more progressive countries such as the United States.  This was also an episode that had to be rewritten on the fly to add extra scenes in London as it was found to be severely underrunning and when you watch it you can tell.  This is an episode which really suffers from not having a strong enough plot, nor strong enough spectacle to make it a particularly interesting watch.  The bus is transported to the planet, the Doctor and Lady Christina find the first group of aliens (flies in boiler suits called Tritovores), discover aliens that create the wormhole and devour everything in their past, find a power source, get back to the bus, and leave.  There’s a B-plot essentially added on Earth with UNIT watching the wormhole led by Captain Magambo and Dr. Malcolm Taylor, played by Noma Dumezweni and Lee Evans, which are fun enough to watch but feel more like they’re meant to fill time.  Capt. Magambo also has the setup for some sort of story arc, pulling a gun on Malcolm when he refuses to close the wormhole when the bus hasn’t returned but that aspect of the episode is just abruptly dropped because the resolution happens.

 

The big problem here is that the only thing of note is a very quick sequence at the end of a character telling the Doctor he is going to die soon to build hype for the regeneration.  This is communicated with another character who happens to be slightly psychic, something that really doesn’t play into the episode outside of repeating things that the Doctor is already discovering: she hears the wormhole which the Doctor is already on track to discover and hears the psychic imprint of the dead which the Doctor already will discover again.  Now “Planet of the Dead” isn’t entirely bad.  David Tennant’s performance has some very good moments, especially when calming everyone down on the bus and he has chemistry with Michelle Ryan as Lady Christina de Souza.  Christina as a character is a bit flat in places, Davies and Roberts hinting at something deeper as to why she steals and while both authors claim to have intended her to be a one-off, she feels more like the natural successor to Donna as a companion for the Tenth Doctor in particular.  Ryan as an actress brings something nice to the role, even when the writing itself is really giving her very little to work with (and for whatever reason the impression impressed people enough for the character to have a spin-off and several appearances in audios from Big Finish Productions).  Her best scene is the moment where she takes command of the situation in addition to the Doctor making the pairing of the characters work quite well.  Sadly she doesn’t really have an arc, she just gives up the ancient gold artifact she stole at the climax as the end of a character arc and the pre-credits of stealing it as the beginning of one without really anything of depth in the middle.

 

Overall, “Planet of the Dead” looks good under director James Strong despite the problematic decision of filming locations leading to the episode to really just being a boring hour of television.  There are moments where Davies and Roberts give glimpses into what might have been, but it’s an episode that is almost too simple for its own good, leading to the second lackluster special in this big series of specials.  4/10.