Following the highs of the first two-part adventure, could Toby Whithouse deliver more in the second? His previous work has been mixed, in my opinion, but despite its tendency to go a little off track it has mostly been good. Under The Lake delivered a few classics right off the bat but introduced its own twists and turns as the episode unfolded to make it another great adventure - his best in my eyes.
The episode opens with an establishing shot of a base under murky, green water and I'm instantly reminded of Warriors Of The Deep and The Moonbase (a tried and tested 'isolated base under siege' scenario). A caption tells us this is "The Drum: Underwater Mining Facility" and I'm reminded of The Silurians and Inferno to name just two (drilling never ends well in Doctor Who!) The year is 2119 and a craft has been found at the bottom of the lake that must have been missed in the initial survey 20 years earlier. The Drum's inhabitant are reluctant to call it a space craft but it seems like nothing from Earth. An alarm sounds, complete with a corporate identity message, and we see the episodes point of threat... ghosts!
Any long term viewer will know that in the Doctor's world there's no such thing as ghosts, yet as the TARDIS lands three days later, she isn't happy!
We first see Clara and the Doctor as they step out of the TARDIS. There is a lovely subtle effect shot that could pass the casual viewer by. The Doctor is standing to the side of the TARDIS stroking the Police Box's outer wall as Clara emerges, then steps back in for what turns out to be no reason at all before finally stepping out and closing the door. A subtle indication that the TARDIS interior is deeper than the Police Box but it is hard to determine where the join is, especially since the camera was moving at the start of the shot - it did cut to a close up of Clara after she stepped out, but cut back to a long shot before she went back in... perhaps a clever mix of multiple tricks. Either way, I noticed, and I liked!
Back to the plot, Clara expresses an enthusiastic desire for a new adventure (whilst referencing things they have seen since the last episode) yet is rather fearful when they encounter "the things that aren't ghosts", but then it isn't long before the Doctor decides to start calling them ghosts as well and realises this aberration is why the TARDIS wasn't happy. The cloister bell tolls and the Doctor realises the TARDIS is desperate to get away from this unnatural phenomenon... so he races to apply the hand brake in a rather odd scene that actually does nothing for the plot and unexpectedly sees the Doctor talking about duty of care towards Clara and how she should get a hobby! On second viewing, this really stood out for me and it occurred to me that it could well be an additional scene added to pad out the episode as it is very nearly a full two minutes of nonsense. However, the preceding scene saw the Doctor reacting to the cloister bell and running off which suggests the scene was fully intended... On closer examination, Clara shows no indication of recognising the cloister bell (which I'm sure she should) and the Doctor's only line "The TARDIS cloister bell!" only comes once his back is turned, suggesting that perhaps it was added later. Then again, the crew seem to be reacting to something and one says "Erm, what's doing that?" and the next time the Doctor is seen after the TARDIS visit, he is calmly helping gather things to take into hiding, so without the 'extra scene' he would be running to nowhere. Another option is that there was to be a different scene that may have been cut for unknown reasons (too long, related to a sub-plot that had otherwise been removed from other scenes, technical problems noticed after the set had been dismantled, etc) and therefore had to be replaced to cover the fact that the Doctor ran out. As convoluted as some of this is, there is an extremely brief exchange between the Doctor and Clara in The Girl Who Died that seems to have been the seed that let to the expanded 'duty of care' scene (I can only say this now thanks to my delay in writing this review as The Girl Who Died is two episodes after Under The Lake!
There are some clever touches in this episode that play on expectations. The ghosts only come out at night (giving credence to the idea that they are indeed ghosts) but The Drum is so far under water that they have to control the illusion of day and night manually. This of course allows them to keep the ghosts at bay until they learn to put the base back into night mode (quite a feat when you realise that they can't be present when the base is in day mode!) Things take a more sinister turn when they also call for a rescue sub... that is to say the crew discover that the ghosts have already called for the sub!
At times, the Doctor sounds strangely like Tom Baker in his tone and delivery. At other times he even acts like the fourth Doctor, very alien and not quite grasping the human side of things. Clara has even given him cue cards to read when he is being insensitive, but even gets that a bit wrong. Another classic touch is the company rep on board The Drum who only sees things in a monetary sense, "It's alright," says the Doctor, "I understand. You're an idiot." Then in a new twist, the Doctor's new wearable technology, his sonic sunglasses get a perhaps obvious use as they provide remote viewing. It is at this point that the casting of deaf actress Sophie Stone as Cass becomes relevant. There is an interesting dynamic between her and her interpreter Lunn (played by Zaqi Ismail) as well as the joke early on that the Doctor thinks he can read sign language, but there is a plot reason for having a deaf character. She can lip-read what the ghosts are muttering, which she is now safe to do from a distance. There's a further pairing between O'Donnell and Bennett that is subtly nuanced, leaving the audience to wonder what their relationship is without it being addressed beyond simple moments of body language.
Finally, for reasons I'll let the episode explain, the crew get split up with the Doctor in one group and Clara in the other as they try to escape, leading to the episode cliffhanger... the Doctor has taken the TARDIS back in time but appears in the Drum as a ghost!
A spooky and altogether intriguing adventure so far, with several questions asked and not many answered. There will be a shift in the next episode as the characters will be separated by time and the explanations will need to unfold, but as Steven Moffat has said, these are two part stories, not just stories told in two parts.
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