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September 10, 2014

Review of Robot of Sherwood
Warning: This review contains episode-specific spoilers and wild speculation about future episodes.

I’m not sure I’ve ever seen a Doctor Who episode with such strong metatextual themes. From the moment the Doctor tells Clara that “old-fashioned heroes only exist in old-fashioned storybooks” and she asks, “What about you?” the ideas of story and reality overlap in ever thicker layers.

Nor is the episode afraid to call back to the pre-Hiatus era—and skillfully enough not to make new fans wonder WTF is going on, I’d wager. Twelve certainly channeled his inner Three, first with reference to a miniscope and then with a carefully timed “Hai!” to chop Robin’s sword from his hand at the archery tournament.

Even without any of that context, though, Robot of Sherwood serves as an important milestone in the Twelfth Doctor’s tenure: his first “romp.”

Writer Mark Gatiss is on top form here. It’s certainly my favorite from him since his inaugural outing in The Unquiet Dead. The fact that Clara an active role in sorting out what the Sheriff’s plan is, having proved herself the ringleader through the simple act of keeping her yap shut, is refreshing (though I’m not sure that making the Doctor into a petulant twit set on one-upmanship is a great trade-off). Clara and Twelve are settling into a more comfortable relationship, and she’s back to happily giving him what-for when he needs it (“Can you explain without using the word ‘sonic screwdriver’?”).

Of course, not everything can be perfect. For one, much of the humor borders on slapstick (which is going a little too far, in my opinion). I’m thinking particularly of Robin and the Doctor tricking the guard for the keys. Parts were amusing, but taken together, the scene began to chafe my sensibilities.

Another imperfection cropped up in the way the “mysterious peasant woman” reacts to the robot vaporizing the old man she’d stopped to help. Perhaps she is merely made of sterner stuff than I, but I’d have been nearly hysterical with fear if I’d seen an energy weapon do that—and I’m familiar with over eight hundred years’ worth of further technological advancements. Yet all she has to say is, “damn you!”? I’m unconvinced.

Finally, the denouement leaves something to be desired. The resolution hinges on the idea that a gold arrow stuck into the exterior of the ship would add enough gold to its system to give it the necessary power boost—something I found utterly unbelievable. Even if that chunk of machinery targeted was exactly the spot that needed the extra metal, why would piercing it make the proper electric connection? And would the circuit even work with some of it sticking outside the ship’s framework? I’m willing to cede that the shot to be called to hit an exact target—he’s flippin’ Robin Hood, after all—but the rest strains the narrative seams.

I know, I know: never examine the story mechanics too closely in Doctor Who. So from here on, I shan’t. Instead, I’ll gush about how quotable the script was (“I’m totally against bantering.” [Later] “I’m bantering. Listen to me!”), how very reminiscent of Ainley’s Master (and, to a lesser degree, Count Grendel of Gracht) the Sheriff was, and how over-the-moon I was to see Patrick Troughton‘s image appear in his own turn as Robin Hood (I literally stopped playback so I could dance in my seat, and show my rather bemused husband the awesome cameo).

That last, of course, brings me back to how meta the whole thing was. Showing an image of an actor portraying a legendary character—someone who looked just like the Doctor once had—is another example of story and in-universe reality (perhaps even our reality) folding in on themselves.

Just before we see that image, the Doctor barges into the control room saying, “At last, something real. No more fairy tales.” Given that Moffat stated over and over that the entire look-and-feel of Matt Smith’s era was to be defined as “fairy tale,” this seems another conscious nod to the audience, stating baldly within the dialog that things are headed in a different direction with a different Doctor at the TARDIS controls.

And of course, there’s Robin’s farewell to the Doctor: “I’m just as real as you are.” Within the story universe, it’s a legitimate statement; from a viewer’s perspective, it pulled me back out of the narrative to say, “oh yes—they’re both just stories like Robin said, aren’t they?” It seems a strange choice, emphasizing the point to the audience after such a lovely soliloquy about the importance of inspiring others through stories of heroism. Maybe I just missed the point.

Or maybe it doesn’t matter. Because “stories can make us fly.”