Mark Watches ‘Doctor Who’: S02E012 – Army of Ghosts

In the twelfth episode of series two of Doctor Who, WE WERE NEVER FUCKING PREPARED. Intrigued? Then it’s time for Mark to watch Doctor Who.

I can’t. I just can’t. I cannot believe like half the shit that just happened. RUSSELL T DAVIES, YOU ARE A (sometimes) GENIUS.

I can’t fathom that this episode opens with a monologue by Rose that outright says that she dies and then, 44 minutes later, I’m still on the edge of my seat, wondering who this is going to play out.

This is the story of how I died.

For the entirety of series two, the ongoing myth-arc concerned the word “Torchwood,” first mentioned at the end of the last series and dropped in nearly every episode since then. We knew the Torchwood Institute was formed due to the events in “Tooth And Claw” and we saw the Institute’s power in “The Christmas Invasion.” The word wasn’t as mysterious as the phrase “bad wolf,” and I’m glad that this wasn’t executed in the same way the second time around. We’ve known all along what Torchwood was, but in “Army of Ghosts,” we learn what Torchwood has done.

The Doctor takes Rose to visit her mother and we find out that the world has completely changed since the last time they were there. Now, “ghosts” walk about the world, seemingly harmless, and visit the people they once loved. I found it very fascinating that the Doctor generally just accepts the weirdness of the world, yet was instantly suspicious about the existence of ghosts. It was a nice change of pace to see the The Doctor act suspicious, and here it leads him to the Torchwood Tower. Nothing like a healthy serving of doubt, right?

I will say that I expected Torchwood to be a bit more malevolent based on the first few minutes inside the Institute. When we meet Yvonne Hartman, as she strangely congratulates the Doctor, I was worried that she was going to utilize the Doctor for something against his will. When she says that anything is alien belongs to Torchwood, I worried about a repeat of Henry van Statten: they considered the Doctor their property. (Hauling away his TARDIS in a truck certainly didn’t help.)

But as the episode progressed (and the Doctor consistently asserted his authority), Ms. Hartman began to operate with much more respect for the Doctor than I initially expected.

The thing is, though, that this episode highlights how Torchwood (and humans in general) meddle with things they don’t understand, not just to discover more about their world, but to do whatever they can to exploit it. In a way, this episode is the polar opposite to “The Impossible Planet.” Yes, those humans were also looking for an energy source, but a great deal why they were motivated to descend ten miles into a planet orbiting a black hole was out of extreme curiosity. The situation for them was far more dangerous than what Torchwood deals with here.

In “Army of Ghosts,” it appears Torchwood is in control of the ghosts that have mysteriously appeared in our world. But then things just get super weird and creepy.

That goddamn sphere. Just seeing it, even knowing that it’s not real, is immensely unsettling. The mechanical hum it makes, the precise manner it must have been constructed with, and the sheer mystery of what’s inside it….ugh. Gives me the creeps.

Fairly early into this episode, we’re given confirmation that it’s going to be Cybermen-based, which also confirms that the “bridge” that Torchwood is using to harness the power of the ghosts is actually a bridge to the parallel world where Cybermen actually exist. The thing is….man, this episode does a fantastic job of answering my questions and then still completely surprising me.

I wasn’t that amped on another episode dealing with the Cyberman, as I didn’t find them particularly frightening the first time around. However…good lord, I love parallel universes. (Heeeeeeeeeyyyyyyyyyyyyyy, Fringe, heeeeeeyyyyyyyyy.) When the Doctor is taken to observe the sphere, it terrifies him. (By the way, why is he always wearing 3-D glasses? It’s cute as hell, but I don’t get it.) He spouts off a lot of expository explaining in that very matter-of-fact manner that he does: this sphere is the actualization of a theory that one could build a ship to cross “the Void,” which is the empty space of nothingness in between parallel universes. So, my first guess was that whatever traveled in the sphere had actually gotten out: it was the Cybermen we saw earlier.

Holy shit, I was so wrong.

This episode also separates the Doctor and Rose and we see more of her growing confidence here, but when she tries to use the psychic paper on the scientist in the room with the sphere, it unfortunately doesn’t work. (Can I get some of that basic psychic training?) That’s when Dr. Singh orders his assistant Samuel to check the locks. Samuel….who is actually MICKEY SMITH.

MICKEY!!!!1 oh my god HOW HOW HOW HOW HOW HOW. HOW IS THAT POSSIBLE. Did he come in the sphere? I DON’T GET IT BUT I LOVE IT SO VERY MUCH

This is the precise moment when Davies’s script immediately turns into SHIT IS SO REAL. He is not fooling around at all. Because those converted Cybermen employees? They start controlling the ghost shift, opening the breach into a parallel universe. Oh, and that sphere? It starts to come to LIFE. Oh, and those ghosts? They’re not ghosts. THEY’RE CYBERMEN FROM A PARALLEL UNIVERSE. Does that make the Cybermen scary? Yes, it does.

I was never prepared. NEVER PREPARED.

The Doctor: But I don’t understand: the Cybermen don’t have the technology to build a void ship. How did you manage it?

Cyber Leader: The sphere is not ours. We followed in it’s wake; its origin is unknown to us.

The Doctor: Then what’s inside?

no. NO NO NO NO. Are you serious? If Mickey doesn’t know what’s inside (meaning he did not travel inside it) and the Cyberman just followed it through the void, WHAT ON EARTH IS INSIDE THE SPHERE.

Knowing this was part one of a two-parter, I thought the episode would cut away before we found out. Instead, the sphere slowly opens and FOUR FUCKING DALEKS COME OUT OF IT. And some other weird thing.

DALEKS???? ARE YOU SERIOUS HOW IS THAT EVEN POSSIBLE

My brain cannot handle this. There is no way I am even remotely prepared for “Doomsday.”

THOUGHTS

• Who ya gonna call? GHOSTBUSTERS. Oh my god, I LOVE IT.
• “Please, when you come to write my official biography, please don’t say I traveled with her mother. Well, I have a reputation to uphold!”
• “So, you find a breach, probe it, the sphere comes through, 600 feet above London, BAM! It leaves a hole in the fabric of reality. And that hole, you think: ‘Should we leave it alone, should we back off, should we play it safe?’ Nah, you think: ‘Let’s make it bigger!’ “
• Daleks. And. Cybermen. I can’t. I can’t even function.
• HOW DID MICKEY GET ACROSS. WHAT THE FUCK.
• I feel like I am no closer to learning how Rose dies than I was at the beginning of this episode. Bravo, Davies.
• Does Jackie count as a companion now? Technically?
• MICKEY!!!!!
• Can I expect Jack Harkness to show up? I WOULD BE EXCITE.
• WHY 3-D GLASSES.
• Guys I am so scared. 🙁