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The Reality War is the eighth and final episode of Doctor Who Season 2… or, perhaps Series 15 or Series 45.
Although the cinema screening I attended featured both Wish World and the finale, before the latter, we had an introduction from Varada Sethu (Belinda), so obviously, after Ncuti Gatwa‘s no-show at Eurovision, he’s done the same with this. They could so easily have paired up for this, so it was clearly a last-minute thought.
As for the episode, I will mention some minor spoilers in this, and despite Doccy falling to his apparent death, it was clearly never going to go that way, so he was saved at the last minute by Anita from the Time Hotel – from Joy To The World – who was somehow able to make time go back one day, so while there’s a problem to resolve, it’ll always be May 23rd…
In fact, just stopping there, if the finale was always meant to take place on Saturday May 24th 2025, why didn’t the series start one week earlier? Last week’s episode only took place on the 23rd, so there was no reason for that to be shown on the 24th. I guess someone cocked up, there.
Another weird thing came when Anita said she goes looking for the Doctor on her days off, and in brief clips, came across no only Jon Pertwee (obviously, an old clip, since he’s dead), but also Matt Smith. I didn’t recognise his scene being in it previously, so was that something newly recorded? His name wasn’t in the credits, even though, later on…
uh oh ☹️😬 #DoctorWho pic.twitter.com/ZA95TfhOBB
— The Post Monument™ (@thepostmonument) April 10, 2025
For The Reality War, though, Cootie’s wearing a skirt again, in the outfit that was used to initially promote this series, alongside Ms Sethu.
In the cinema, one line that got a laugh was when our Doccy said to everyone at UNIT, “This is our daughter, Poppy”, leading to Kate reply, “Well, now you’re going too far!”
That said, I never got the significance of Poppy. She was there for a while, then she wasn’t – with only Ruby remembering who she was, then she returned later… who cares? All she did was gawp a lot, even though she inadvertently acted everyone else off the screen!
And in the end, it was odd that they retconned most of this series’ episodes, to include Belinda having knowledge of Poppy, with each line clearly recorded at the time of the filming of those respective episodes.
For another scene, despite all the money spent by Disney on this and the last series, when it came to a rather redundant ‘time travel’ moment for Shirley in her wheelchair, it left behind the firey scorch marks seen by the DeLorean in the Back to the Future films, yet didn’t bother to spend any money on watching her disappear! Lazy!
And why did she need to time travel, anyway? Ruby managed to make her way to UNIT quite easily.
I’m in Row C, at the back of the front section.
When things started to get back on track, the Rani explained she survived due to a Time Ring, and then offered some sort of allegiance to Doccy, in order to create the next race of Time Lords, but despite this having some potential, it was quickly thrown away as soon as it started. And the same went for the much-announced return of Omega, even if it was one of those awful skeletal dinosaurs… but that was such a fucking appalling waste of a return, given how things quickly turned out.
In fact, I made the assumption beforehand, that Omega would be done and dusted in five minutes. I was wrong… it was FOUR!
As such, it left everyone to tread water for the final 30 minutes. If you thought Mission Impossible: The Final Reckoning was way too long, The Reality War said “Hold my beer!”
Still, at least it allowed Anita Dobson’s Mrs Flood to quip her final line, for now, “So much for The Two Ranis… And it’s goodnight from me!” – even if no-one under 40 will get that.
I also got a giggle from when events had led to a reality shift, leading Kate to comment on all the things that had changed, including, “…and Ernest Borgnine is still alive!”
When it came towards the end, though, Cootie finally had the realisation that everyone had had enough of him, with “Oh man, I liked this face”, which led to…
As for what comes next, the dire ratings have clearly shown no-one cares about Doctor Who any more, so I expect this show to be rested for several years, same as when Sylvester McCoy’s ratings crashed down to 3.5m by the end of its 1989 run… and this latest series couldn’t even manage that! …bar the Eurovision episode, which had a lead-in from the FA Cup Final, a boost from the real Eurovision, afterwards, and the lack of any competition from Britains Got Talent.
Oh, and for some reason, Russell T Davies brought back Yasmin Finney‘s Rose Noble. RTD tried to make her a major star in the three-parter with David Tennant and the ridiculous pronouns discussions, but then realised that no-one gave a shit about this Rose, and he sidelined her to the background, playing with an iPad.
As an aside, when I saw this at Cineworld Didsbury, at first, it felt like the treble was ramped all the way up, but then I realised the volume was just way too loud, like they are for the trailers and ads (similar to how they are on TV, except that they ramp up the levels but keep the volume the same, so – and this wil sound odd – they only SOUND louder, even if they’re not, thus bypassing OFCOM’s rules!), before they go back to normal during a regular film.
Since we had no trailers or ads this time (other than what was within the programme, itself, after the BBFC title card appeared – two for iPlayer and one afterwards, for The War Between The Land And The Sea), I figured someone cocked up with the settings. I posted about this on Reddit, and several people confirmed it was the same for them, so it was a BBC problem, not a Cineworld problem.
As for The War Between The Land And The Sea, it’s RTD’s UNIT spinoff, bringing back Russell Tovey. However, although filming was complete as of December 2024, and since no-one gives a shit about Doctor Who any more, I really can’t see it getting aired any time soon. It’s just asking for sub-1 million ratings!
The Reality War on the BBC iPlayer. It was not available prior to broadcast.
Season 2 is available to pre-order on Blu-ray and DVD.
You can also buy Season 1 on Limited Blu-ray Steelbook, Blu-ray and DVD.
Score: Oh, Goodbye!
Director: Alex Sanjiv Pillai
Producer: Chris May
Writer: Russell T Davies
Music: Murray Gold
Cast:
The Doctor: Ncuti Gatwa
Belinda Chandra: Varada Sethu
Mrs Flood: Anita Dobson
The Rani: Archie Panjabi
Ruby Sunday: Millie Gibson
Conrad Clark: Jonah Hauer-King
Otto Zufall: Atilla Akinci
Violett Zufall: Leni Adams
Poppy: Sienna-Robyn Mavanga-Phipps
Melanie Bush: Bonnie Langford
Shirley Bingham: Ruth Madeley
Kate Lethbridge-Stewart: Jemma Redgrave
Rose Noble: Yasmin Finney
Susan Triad: Susan Twist
Colonel Christofer Ibrahim: Alexander Devrient
Lakshmi Chandra: Nila Aalia
Devika Babu: Josephine Lloyd-Welcome
Val Balham: Hermon Berhane
Winnie Petheridge: Sam Lawton
Lakshmi Chandra: Nila Aalia
Brian Dale: Joshua J Parker
Carla Sunday: Michelle Greenidge
Cherry Sunday: Angela Wynter
Rogue: Jonathan Groff
The Vlinx: Aidan Cook
Voice of Omega: Nicholas Briggs
The Doctor: Jodie Whittaker
The Doctor?: Billie Piper
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.