Doctor Who 10.05 'Oxygen' Review

Doctor Who 10.05 'Oxygen' Review

The fifth episode of series 10, where the Doctor, Bill and Nardole arrive at a space station in response to a distress call. There is more going on at the Station than it appears. The intro to the episode does a really good job of setting up the situation, with the Doctor's riffing of the Star Trek intro ('Space, the final frontier. It's final, because it wants to kill you!') and the fate of various characters at the station. The visual design of the station is impressive also, like a much smaller Deep Space Nine.

Each main character is impressive, and undergoes changes in this story. The Doctor's problems get a lot worse. It leaves me wondering how this development would affect his efficacy in the future episodes. Nevertheless, he leads the investigation into the problem on the station in his usual manner, despite Nardole's objections. Although I'm not sure why he would be hiding the problem he gains from Bill at the end. Talking about Bill, she continues to be an interesting character, seemingly supporting the Doctor against Nardole at the beginning.

The way she reacts to the threats are quite believable, anyone would panic at having to go into space with limited are (more on the air situation below). She is also quite shocked at the fact that people had died. Nardole is much the same as before. It is revealed that he is following the Doctor's orders, to stop going off when that Vault needs defending (and whoever it is would know that the Doctor is injured, and given the nature of the Doctor's injury... Uh oh!). However, when problems amount, he is quite helpful in the situation.

That the Doctor is able to 'negotiate' with the TARDIS despite his injury is interesting. But there is the elephant in the room, or rather the Megacorporation that owns the station. Is the story anti-capitalist? That is a high possibility. However, workers deemed expendible is plausible given many historical precedents. Charging for air seems to be an efficient way of doing this. This is a good story despite any caveats above, albeit not as good as any anti-capitalist tales in the classic era (Capaldi doesn't quite match Baker), but still quite well recommended.

8.5/10.