Doctor Who: 9x11: Heaven Sent

As a Saturday evening tv program, Doctor Who tends to be made with the mainstream audience in mind. Yet many writers try to push at the boundaries of what one can do in this time slot.
In the original series this resulted in stories like Warriors Gate, Kinda. In the current series this led to Midnight and now  Heaven Sent with simply only the Doctor and the monstrous Veil being any kind of characters. trapped inside a bizarre castle where the architecture changes around.

Although a little confusing on first watch, the story of Heaven Sent is actually pretty simple. The Doctor is reborn inside a castle prison every generation or so to punch through a diamond wall to the exit on the other side. Once again Steven Moffat uses his interest in loops but does so in a more painful way. The Doctor discusses issues of death just as he discovers evidence of the deaths of his other selves. Everything is just a bit more brutal than usual and the better for it.

Of course, the main event of this episode is getting to see Peter Capaldi carrying the whole episode with many, many monologues. He successfully shows the Doctor at his most raw and vulnerable after the supposed death of Clara. He also shows the Doctor's tiredness when he considers losing.  The Doctor's look of surprise when the wall finally breaks is also a nice touch. I hope that executives at the BBC value having such a great leading man working on the series.

Kudos must also go to the director, Rachael Talalay, for realizing this episode. She succeeds in making the castle feel uneasy and uses a lot of moody lighting.  The moment when the Veil attacks the Doctor is shown to be very painful.Even the visible blood on the wounded Doctor helps to make everything feel more real.

Another factor is the great music score by Murray Gold, which blends a classical orchestra with more modern synthesizer sounds to give the whole castle world a sense of not being quite right.

The episode ends on two important revelations. One is that the Doctor was being sent to Gallifrey. The other is the Doctor making his final confesseion that the much talked about Hybrid is 'Me'. This could refer Ashildir o it could be that the half-human revelation of the TV Movie is being brought back. It is possible he may be mistaken and it may be someone else entirely.

With a Gallifrey story on one side and Clara's supposed death on the other, this episode will probably be overlooked in years to come. That is a shame because it is one of the best episodes that Series9 has produced. Even if the casual audience hated it it is important that the Doctor does these things.

10/10