The Doctor arrives in a sleepy seaside town in 1986 – and realises he’s not the extraterrestrial there…

Daniel Blythe’s tale for Jacob Dudman’s 11th Doctor has an interesting structure, with “diary entries” from one of the principal characters running throughout. This gives us a subjective view of the Time Lord as well as dropping clues as to what’s really going on.

Jo Woodcock gives a very sympathetic performance as Kayla Worthington, the author of this diary, and there’s a nice repartee between her and Dudman. Nicholas Briggs provides another gurgling monster while directing this with the necessary light touch. Lee Adams’ sound design does a good job of differentiating this particular alien menace from the one it could easily have resembled (think of a recent animation).

Jacob Dudman deserves a lot of credit here – I think this is the best rendition (to use Briggs’ description from the extras) that he’s given yet, working from a script that’s picked up on the various foibles of the 11th Doctor, which allows him to evoke that feeling of a brain working thirty times faster than a mouth that’s already at warp speed.

Verdict: A different backdrop for a cracking 11th Doctor story. 8/10

Paul Simpson

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