{"id":5626,"date":"2016-06-06T08:00:45","date_gmt":"2016-06-06T15:00:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/?p=5626"},"modified":"2016-06-03T00:10:47","modified_gmt":"2016-06-03T07:10:47","slug":"mark-watches-doctor-who-s09e08-the-zygon-inversion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/2016\/06\/mark-watches-doctor-who-s09e08-the-zygon-inversion\/","title":{"rendered":"Mark Watches ‘Doctor Who’: S09E08 – The Zygon Inversion"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the eighth episode of the ninth series of\u00c2\u00a0Doctor Who<\/i>, wow. Intrigued? Then it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s time for Mark to watch\u00c2\u00a0Doctor Who<\/i>.<\/p>\n

Trigger Warning: For talk of war, genocide, and suicide.<\/b><\/p>\n

I honestly didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t expect this ending, but the more I thought about the Doctor\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s big monologue, I realized how very\u00c2\u00a0Doctor Who<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0this episode was. The Doctor despises guns, and,\u00c2\u00a0especially<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0after the Time War, is opposed to war as a general concept. (He\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s been anti-war pretty much the entirety of the show\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s existence, too.) So I found it fitting that a conversation \u00e2\u20ac\u201c albeit a difficult and emotional one \u00e2\u20ac\u201c was what resolved the conflict from \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The Zygon Invasion.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n

LET\u00e2\u20ac\u2122S TALK.<\/p>\n

Clara<\/b><\/p>\n

As you saw in the last review, I was concerned that Clara\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s capture\/duplication meant that she wouldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t appear much herself in this episode. It was fun seeing Jenna Coleman get to play an antagonist, sure! But I wanted more from\u00c2\u00a0Clara<\/i>, and OH MY GOD, did I ever get it. You can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t have this episode without her. You just can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t! Clara\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s willpower and determination is\u00c2\u00a0the\u00c2\u00a0<\/i>key to the Doctor\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s and Osgood\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s survival. Peter Harness and Steven Moffat achieve this by having Clara exploit the connection that she has with her duplicate, Bonnie. And just from a design standpoint, I loved that Clara saw the dream world as a distorted version of her own flat. These things combine to give Clara a role in \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The Zygon Inversion\u00e2\u20ac\u009d that felt\u00c2\u00a0necessary<\/i>.<\/p>\n

How electrifying was that scene where Bonnie interrogated her??? My god, Jenna Coleman is so talented, y\u00e2\u20ac\u2122all.<\/p>\n

The Plan<\/b><\/p>\n

In a lot of ways, this two-parter was a lot more brutal and scary once you thought about the implications of it. I touched in the political themes of immigration last time, and if you consider them, it makes the Zygon who kills themselves one of the saddest\u00c2\u00a0Doctor Who<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0characters of all time. Since Bonnie\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s plan was always about the forced transformation of all Zygons back into their \u00e2\u20ac\u0153natural\u00e2\u20ac\u009d form, then the unnamed Zygon here is the end result of her plan. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s terrifying and sad and horrible to watch. The Zygon was\u00c2\u00a0happy<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0living as a human, and Bonnie forced them into a form they didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t want.<\/p>\n

Even worse, the Zygon\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s appearance online was going to be the spark that ignited a war on Earth. That is a terrible thing to live with, even though they weren\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t the one responsible for it. God, it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s just so\u00c2\u00a0sad<\/i>. They would rather die than live knowing their image was used to start a war.<\/p>\n

WHAT IS THIS EPISODE.<\/p>\n

The Osgood Box<\/b><\/p>\n

I really want to focus most of my energy on the stupendous final sequence inside the Black Archive. I couldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t figure out what the Osgood Box was, nor could I guess at how this was all going to be resolved peacefully. Too much had happened! Too many people had been kidnapped! THE DOCTOR\u00e2\u20ac\u2122S PLANE HAD BEEN BLOWN OUT OF THE SKY.<\/p>\n

Kate Stewart had also killed multiple Zygons, which was more of a roadblock for the Doctor. If anything, I feel like \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The Zygon Inversion\u00e2\u20ac\u009d shows us that even in complicated situations like this, a carelessness towards violence will inevitably lead to something horrible. Kate had every right to defend herself, point blank. She was going to be killed by that Zygon in New Mexico! (How did she get from New Mexico to London so fast???) But what the Doctor tries to get these people to understand is that there\u00c2\u00a0always<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0is another option. Maybe not in Kate\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s initial escape, but she didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t have to kill the two Zygons with her. What purpose did that serve? How accustomed to violence had she become?<\/p>\n

I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll get back to that. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s important because the reasoning behind the Osgood Boxes (BOXES!!!! THERE ARE TWO OF THEM!!!) is related to it. The terror of there being two boxes was bad enough, especially since I knew that Bonnie was desperate. I actually thought that after she pressed one, she\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d rush over and press the other one out of spite. But the Doctor\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s plan to include a\u00c2\u00a0secondary<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0set of buttons highlights his ultimate point: What is the truth of war? What are the actual consequences of waging war against someone? Bonnie sees limited ends: victory or defeat. She imagines herself and the Zygons as victors, unaware that she\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll never be able to stop the cycle. So, she forces the Zygons out of hiding, they fight the humans and win. Then what? How will she deal with all the dissatisfied Zygons who never wanted war in the first place? How will they survive on Earth?<\/p>\n

It might seem like this is so philosophical that it borders on being self-righteous, but I never read the scene this way. It helped that there was an emotional basis for the Doctor\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s desperation, too. He had the experience that Bonnie thought was so singular that she and the other Zygons were the only ones to ever live through it. But the Doctor knew loneliness, and he knew war. Oh, did he\u00c2\u00a0ever<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0know war. The usage of the Time War here is apt, since Bonnie and the other rebel Zygons wanted to commit genocide. They wanted to wipe out humans. And for what? Self determination? The right to be who they are?<\/p>\n

The Doctor forces\u00c2\u00a0both<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0Kate and Bonnie to acknowledge the consequences of their actions, to spell them out. And then: he forgives them. It blows Bonnie away. (SERIOUSLY, WATCH JENNA COLEMAN IN THIS SCENE. SHE\u00e2\u20ac\u2122S SO GOOD.) The idea is unfathomable to her. How could the Doctor forgive her after everything the rebel Zygons had done? I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t read this as some grand statement on forgiveness, as if forgiveness should just be handed out without a care. No, the Doctor\u00c2\u00a0meant<\/i>\u00c2\u00a0his forgiveness, and he genuinely wanted peace. Which makes the entire affair all the more impressive, given that he reveals that it has happened FIFTEEN FUCKING TIMES since the peace treaty was first signed. FIFTEEN. The cycle keeps repeating, but the Doctor and the Osgoods have been stopping it every time.<\/p>\n

I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122M JUST SO HAPPY OSGOOD ISN\u00e2\u20ac\u2122T DEAD.<\/p>\n

The video for \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The Zygon Inversion\u00e2\u20ac\u009d can be downloaded\u00c2\u00a0here for $0.99<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Mark Links Stuff<\/b><\/p>\n

– I am now on Patreon<\/a><\/b>!!! MANY SURPRISES ARE IN STORE FOR YOU IF YOU SUPPORT ME<\/a>.
\n– I\u00c2\u00a0will be at numerous conventions in 2016! Check the full list of events on my Tour Dates \/ Appearances page.<\/a>
\n– My Master Schedule<\/a> is updated for the near and distant future for most projects, so please check it often.\u00c2\u00a0My next Double Features for Mark Watches will be Death Note<\/em>\u00c2\u00a0and\u00c2\u00a0Neon Genesis Evangelion<\/em>. On Mark Reads, Diane Duane’s Young Wizards<\/i> series will replace the Emelan books.
\n<\/b>-\u00c2\u00a0Mark Does Stuff is on Facebook!<\/a>\u00c2\u00a0I’ve got a community page up that I’m running. Guaranteed shenanigans!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"