The Rebel Flesh marks the second episode Matthew Graham has written for Doctor Who, his first being the rather unremarkable Fear Her from 2006. However, the Rebel Flesh was of a markedly higher quality than Fear Her, if still running a little slow. That’s not to say the episode was particularly bad, it just wasn’t of the kind of quality we’ve been spoilt by in regards to the opening two-parter and the Doctor’s Wife.
The TARDIS is caught in a solar tsunami and hurtled to 22nd century Earth, a point in our future which seems to be decidedly industrialised, where the Doctor, Amy and Rory discover a monastery-turned-mining-operation largely occupied by workers from the northern counties (Foreman Cleaves excluded). Clearly the future subscribes to a stereotypical view of the working class! Dopplegangers (simply referred to as Gangers) are employed to carry out tasks deemed too hazardous for humans to complete. The Gangers are completely expendable, and are incapable of feeling pain, so appear to be the ideal work force for dangerous tasks (despite obvious ethical complications).
The creation of each Ganger is strongly reminiscent of the resurrection technique employed by the humanoid Cylons in the re-imagined Battlestar Galactica, and used for very much the same effect. One copy dies, another is reborn.
However, as with any SciFi in which an artificial work-force is taken for granted (Galactica, again), it’s only a matter of time before that work-force becomes sentient and starts demanding human rights. Violently. The Gangers are no different, and after a second solar tsunami they all get a bit self-righteousy and a little bit perturbed at their original selves. The ‘natural’ workers, of course, respond the way most people do in this situation - with an equal level of fear, loathing and violence. It appears only the Doctor and Co (and the Co to a lesser degree) have a sense of perspective on the situation, and the Doctor attempts to broker an agreement between the two factions. This is inevitably thwarted by the inexplicably infuriating Foreman Cleaves (Raquel Cassidy), whose classic narrow-sighted authoritarianism results in the rekindling of the fire of war. And now the Doctor has a Ganger who may or may not be as inclined to murder and violence as the others.
The episode itself was not intrinsically bad, and it had a fair few elements to keep the viewer watching, but it didn’t feel as if it was getting anywhere. Evidently, judging by the cliff-hanger, the Rebel Flesh was simply the set-up for next week’s episode, and it definitely provided a good basis for the story, but only really got interesting towards the final five minutes.
In context of the continuity and obscure arc’s running throughout this season, the hatch-opening-eye-patch-lady makes a return after her much deserved holiday from opening hatches and being enigmatic last week (or perhaps she had difficulty opening a hatch to outside the Universe?), but this time around she has nothing to say and closes it again. “Curiouser and curiouser.” cried Alice, whilst she sat drinking tea with the March Hare and I.
The Doctor is also seen scanning Amy’s on-off pregnancy again (still unbeknownst to her) in the opening of the episode. I hear speculation that perhaps eye-patch-woman is the midwife who delivers Amy’s wibbly-wobbly-timey-wimey baby, who is most likely the little girl who regenerated at the end of Day of the Moon, who may or may not have been the astronaut who killed the Doctor. Further theories suggest that perhaps the child, Amy’s baby, and so on, is River Song, who then kills the Doctor. All of which is quite probable, but I’m not willing to place my money on anything just yet!
But by far the more tantalising question I’m left with at the end of the Rebel Flesh is how they intend to deal with the duplicate Time Lord. Will he be more of a help or a hindrance? Is his fate to be sealed in the next episode, whether he needs to be destroyed or left to his own devices? And is this how the Doctor will cheat his death that we have foreseen in the Impossible Astronaut?
So many questions, and still so few answers… How I love an intriguing plot-arc!
If you missed the Rebel Flesh, you can catch it on iPlayer here.
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