The Doctor’s friends are in pairs while he’s off telling a story…

The third Stranded set starts off with an episode that’s about as far removed from the initial premise of the series – the Doctor, Liv and Helen stuck in 2020 because the TARDIS isn’t working – as you could get. It’s very much a story about the characters from this strand, and they are indeed stranded… but it’s not on Earth, no matter how many pairs of Hawaiian shirts Andy may choose to bring!

The pieces slowly fall into place as the nature of the storytelling becomes clearer – and that’s not just the narrative devices that Tim Foley uses that I’m referring to. What appears to be errors (or something operating in a way we’re not used to) are made clear, and there’s a terrific gag involving the Judoon that you can imagine a writer expecting to get cut at every stage of the edit process but which makes it through to the end.

The character work is nicely done, giving some unfamiliar pairings a chance to work together, and it’s all built round a clever conceit that takes us slightly into New Adventures territory in its handling of a certain race.

Verdict: An unusual start to the set which suggests that the serial elements of Stranded will be coming to the fore. 8/10

Paul Simpson

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