Skip to content
Fugitive of the Judoon is the fifth episode of Doctor Who Series 12, and brings the rhino-faced space police to present day Gloucester.
Tour guide Ruth thought she knew everything about the place, but not about the impending visit from ol’ horn-face who was looking for the fugitive. Is it her other half, Neil? Cake store worker Allan thinks it is because he has the hots for Ruth. Can it be that straight-forward?
(NOTE: I will discuss elements of the episode in this, so expect one necessarily spoiler in the next paragraph)
For some unknown reason, Captain Jack Harkness (John Barrowman) has returned, and thinks that Graham is the new Doctor and not Jodie. Either way, I guess Chris Chibnall has run out of ideas, given that he’s recalling characters from the awful Russell T Davies era. Kudos to the powers that be for keeping his appearance under wraps. That said, I did see his name turn up on Twitter last night, although I just assumed it was because people keep thinking he’s one of the contestants in the awful The Masked Singer.
He was popping up just to say hello and then disappear again, but not before setting up a future plot point by telling the Scooby Doo gang, “Beware the lone Cyberman”… and they had no idea what a Cyberman was… even though they’ve attacked Earth zillions of times.
We know he’ll come back because he promised he would be.
Still, on the plus side, we had the uber hot Ritu Arya (Sticks And Stones), as the Judoon’s boss, Commander Gat. Can we have her every week, instead? And to that end, she wasn’t in it much, sadly. Maybe she can be the next Doctor?
Elsewhere, the story arc was brought into play as The Doctor admitted to trips back to Gallifrey as she looks for The Master, which we know was torched by him, and I thought the place had been destroyed, but no, Peter Capaldi was just looking in the wrong place. What a stupid-head!
Overall, this episode passed 50 minutes, like last week, but nothing I could get deep into.
And for a bit I’ll put behind a spoiler header…
Fugitive of the Judoon is available on the BBC iPlayer.
You can pre-order this series on Blu-ray and DVD, ahead of its release on March 16th.
Out the same day, is the Limited Edition Blu-ray Steelbook.
Score: 4/10
Director: Nida Manzoor, Jamie Magnus Stone
Producer: Nikki Wilson
Writer: Chris Chibnall, Vinay Patel
Cast:
The Doctor: Jodie Whittaker
Graham O’Brien: Bradley Walsh
Ryan Sinclair: Tosin Cole
Yasmin Khan: Mandip Gill
Captain Jack Harkness: John Barrowman
Ruth Clayton: Jo Martin
Lee Clayton: Neil Stuke
Commander Gat: Ritu Arya
Judoon Captain Pol-Kon-Don: Paul Kasey
Judoon: Richard Price
Voice of the Judoon: Nicholas Briggs
All Ears Allan: Michael Begley
Tourist: Katie Luckins
Marcia: Judith Street
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.