From MadCap's Couch - "Doctor Who: The Fires of Pompeii"

Russell did what?!

The eruption of Vesuvius and the destruction of Pompeii is one of those big historical events that keeps popping up in fiction. It legitimately surprises me that it took until 2008 for Doctor Who to actually get there - on the actual show and not in spin-off material, anyway. Like with Martha's first trip in the TARDIS, Donna's is to the past: in this case, the titular Pompeii.

The Doctor and Donna arrive in the cold open, the Doctor showing his newest companion the wonders of time travel by standing in Ancient...or, rather...Current Rome. Donna is ecstatic about the entire thing, yet shows more depth of character as we saw last time - asking questions about things like the TARDIS translation matrix and wondering what happens if she speaks a Latin phrase (with a hilarious result of speaking Welsh).

Also, yes, I'm aware that the translator on the TARDIS is a cheap way to have all the actors be British anyway. Let's not even start with that, we'll be here all day.

As they make their way through the marketplace, the Doctor and Donna are stalked by Amelia Pond wearing some face makeup and a hood. No, it's another character although she is played by Karen Gillian. She won't be the only familiar face we'll be seeing this episode, either. As the pair make they way into another alleyway, Donna points out a mountain nearby and mentions the Seven Hills of Rome and that she can't see the other six...and the ground begins to quake, and the mountain begins to smoke.

The Doctor realizes the terrible truth: they're in Pompeii, and it's volcano day, leading us into the opening credits.

When we return, the companion later to be known as Amy Pond comes to a temple with a bunch of other women in red cloaks and face paint and begs an audience with the High Priestess. The blue box has come as foretold in the prophecy!

The Doctor and Donna make their way back to the TARDIS with gusto only to find it gone. The merchant who Donna spoke to in unintentional Welsh sold it off to none other than the Twelfth Doctor...I mean, Caecilius. Yes, Peter Capaldi in a role that would be referred to again in the Twelfth Doctor's era. With did Caecilius buy the TARDIS? MODERN ART!

Because, y'know...sure.

Come along, Pond...in one more Series.

Caecilius' wife Metella thinks it's an eye-sore, but is too busy prepping their daughter Evalina for becoming a seer, and their son Quintus is brought up as being a manwhore once and then it is never mentioned again. Evalina has apparently been becoming a seer by inhaling fumes, and she sees the most terrible things: in particular a face made of stone. They are awaiting the town augur to come and inspect their daughter.

Meanwhile, as the Doctor and Donna scramble to find the TARDIS, Donna brings up the moral question of saving Pompeii. The Doctor refutes her, saying that Pompeii is a fixed point in time. Donna, on the other hand, has something to say about that - as she does - and resolves to tell the people of Pompeii of the danger herself if she has to.

The Sisterhood of the Clown Faced make up apparently can communicate with one another through the eye tattoos on their hands and have indeed confirmed the prophecy Not-Amy spoke about: the one of the Blue Box coming on a day of fire, death, and betrayal. As opposed to wind, fire, and all that kind of thing because that's something else. The High Priestess, however, speaks with a raspy voice from behind a veil and insists that Pompeii has nowhere to go but up. If the Doctor and Donna refuse, their blood will flow across the temple floors!

. . .being that this is the Russell T. Davies era, it's a very idle threat.

The Doctor and Donna finally reach the family Caecilius and, posing as "Spartacus & Spartacus" (as Donna puts it when the Doctor introduces himself, "So am I".), they fast-talk their way into getting the TARDIS back. Donna and the Doctor have what I call an argument-not argument where neither directly says what they mean, but the intention is clear - in this case, Donna trying to get Caecilius and his family to leave Pompeii while the Doctor refutes with the desire to preserve history as it happened. Pulling her aside for a second after she mentions the world "volcano", the Doctor mentions that they don't even have a word for volcano here...which does nothing to help improve her mood, since they'll come to learn the word in the worst possible way.

However, the plot kicks back in full force as Lucius Dexterous - aka Satan from Being Human - arrives. Lucius is the aforementioned augur and proves himself to be a right ass from line one. The Doctor and Lucius banter, the Doctor using a pun that - if it's being translated into Latin - doesn't really work and the Doctor nudges Donna toward the TARDIS...until Caecilius unveils a piece of marble he's been working on for Lucius that looks suspiciously like computer circuitry. The Doctor attempts to explain to Donna that the soothsaying is just ass backwards superstition made official...and then Evalina begins to speak of them as tricksters.

The Doctor is not swayed...until she calls him by name. Well, "Doctor" at least. And Donna as "Noble". Lucius adds onto this when called out, calling the Doctor a "man from Gallifrey" with a home "lost in fire" and telling Donna that she is a "daughter of London". He tells the Doctor that "she is returning' and tells Donna that "there is something on your back". Evalina mentions the Doctor's real name is burning in "the stars of the Medusa Cascade".

I usually like foreshadowing through prophecy and omens and the like in fiction...but this is done with about as much subtlety as a crowbar on fire being slammed into a kneecap while Slayer plays on a tumble drier filled with screaming cats.

That is to say...the Russell T. Davies era in a nutshell. 

So at least it's on brand.

Look who it is in Pompeii, Mama...it's the Devil...

That night, Donna and Metella talk as Metella tends to a scratch injury on Evalina's arm - the skin almost appears to have turned to stone. We get a scene of the Tenth and Twelfth Doctors looking into the vent the fumes are coming from - Caecilius mentioning terrible noises coming from down in the hot springs. He reveals that all the soothsayers in town have been saying the truth since inhaling the fumes. The Doctor does that taste test thing he'll do later and determines that it's Vesuvius. 

The Doctor then bribes Quintus to take him to Lucius' place. The pair do a bit of breaking and entering and they find more marble circuitry before being confronted by Lucius himself, who claims to be building the future as dictated by the gods.

We get a short scene where Donna is a bit more humanized talking with Evalina before she tries to warn her about the eruption of the volcano...and the Sisterhood overhears through her with their magic eye hands. The Sisters are ordered by the High Priestess to silence Donna...

Back at the ranch, the Doctor rearranges the marble tablets and calls the markings an energy converter - although he has no idea of what it's converting energy for. Lucius finally has enough of him babbling and poking his nose into things and orders the execution of both the Doctor and Quintus. Quintus who, until this point I thought would have been an interesting choice for a companion, tries to weasel his way out of it at the expense of the Doctor. The Doctor makes a last request, offering his hand to Lucius for a shake...and then pulling the man's right arm clean off of him.

The way the scene is shot, Lucius had plenty of time to move away, but he didn't. Instead, we're treated to the Doctor having pulled off his arm...his stone arm. It seems that he's inhaled enough of the fumes to start actually turning to stone. The Doctor knocks down the shelves holding the carves (though they are undamaged) and he and Quintus escape. Lucius takes it well...summoning a rock monster from down below. It pops up in Caecilius' house and the Doctor attempts to talk to it while Donna gets kidnapped by the Sisterhood - Evalina witnessing the event.

Quintus takes it out with some water, forcing it to retreat from both the house and it's carapace. The Doctor then shouts for Donna...only to realize that she's gone.

Not for long, alas, as we cut to Donna about to be sacrificed with a knife that would make Crocodile Dundee feel inadequate and the Doctor arrives to banter his way to her rescue. The High Priestess demands to see him and the Doctor is brought before her...getting the reveal that she has been completely overtaken by whatever affliction has begun on Evalina, Lucius, and the Sisters. The Doctor finds it strange that the seers haven't foreseen the explosion of Vesuvius and eventually gets the High Priestess to name the race responsible for this in some of the best ham vs. ham combat we've seen in the series thus far: the Pyrovile.

The Doctor warns that he's armed...using a water pistol...as he instructs Donna to clear their way out through the vents. Once more using that fast talk skill, the Doctor works out where the aliens came from - they crashed and slept beneath the mountain for millennia before an earthquake seventeen years ago woke them up. Now, they're seeding themselves into humans as a way of restarting their race. However, the gift of prophecy is beyond them...or so he says.

When the water pistol is called out as harmless, the Doctor uses it to spritz the High Priestess before he and Donna escape into the vents. Lucius orders the summoning of the cult of Vulcan, planning to head to Vesuvius and accelerate the plans of the Pyrovile. At Caecilius' house, the family is worried concerning their fate after killing a messenger of the gods. When Metella asks Evalina to see their future, she tells them that a choice is to be made...a terrible choice.

ROCK MONSTER! *ukulele solo*

Down in the volcano, the Doctor and Donna once more butt heads over the issue of saving the people of Pompeii. When Donna brings up the fact that he saved her and the whole world back in 2008, the Doctor explains the concept of fixed points in time. Things that must happen, no matter what, fixed in time. The Doctor claims to know what is, what was, what must be, and what must never be, and knows it every waking moment. It's the burden of being a Time Lord, and now he is the only one left. This is something I've read as the burden being harder for him because he is the only one, though nothing he says outright confirms that.

Donna asks him how many people died in Pompeii...and he angrily asserts that it's 20,000, Donna asking him if he thinks that's alright. Before that can be further argued, they head further into the mountain. While Lucius brings the Pyrovile the circuitry they need, the Doctor and Donna finds what it is supposed to go to - a ship of some kind. They attempt to sneak, but Lucius calls them out and sics the Pyrovile on them. The Doctor manages to get the final words out of Lucius about what the Pyrovile mean to do - conquer Earth in the style of the Roman Empire.

Why? Pyrovilia, their homeworld, is gone.

Huh...two missing planets in one season. I wonder if there's a connection?

With the choice being clear, the Doctor and Donna get into the Pyrovile ship and the Doctor seals it up with the sonic. Basically, the ship is using the lava to power itself. Vesuvius is never going to blow up because of that. The Doctor can change it...but doing so means that Pompeii is destroyed. When Donna points out that the Pyrovile are rock and will just reform, the Doctor mentions that Vesuvius erupts with the force of twenty-four nuclear bombs. Nothing can survive it - not even them. While another, far more selfish and arrogant companion whom I've had a running gag counter about how awful she is might try to weasel her way out of it, Donna has that amazing thing called empathy and declares "never mind us". The Doctor laments having to kill 20,000 people. He hesitates with his hands on the lever. A moment passes before Donna rests her hands over his, and together they push the lever down.

The seers go absolutely batshit as their visions see nothing but fire, death, and destruction. Vesuvius erupts, the Pyrovile are destroyed, and the consumption of Pompeii by the volcano begins. The ship throws the Doctor and Donna clear of it and the pair of them defy physics in a very Prometheus-y manner to avoid the initial flow. Getting back to Caecilius' house, they are all huddled together and the Doctor refuses to bring them along. Donna, crestfallen, comes back to the TARDIS and we get the reveal of Pompeii being used as a metaphor for Gallifrey - scores of people that the Doctor not only couldn't save, but that he outright caused the destruction of and that he can't go back and save.

In the wake of this, a devastated Donna Noble makes the Doctor a plea that Catherine Tate plays as so empathic and earnest that it very nearly drove me to tears the first time I heard it:

"Save someone, please...not the whole town...just save someone."

I honestly still get a bit sniffly. In that moment, however, the Doctor makes a choice.

Catherine Tate is absolutely perfect in this.
This is the hill I have chosen to die on.

The Caecilius family hears the engines of the universe as the TARDIS descends once more, the doors opening and the Doctor stretching out a hand. "Come with me." He says, and Caecilius reaches to take the hand of the Time Lord.

Pompeii is consumed, and the TARDIS lands on a hill a safe distance away to watch it happening. The Doctor assures the family that one day Pompeii will be found. Evalina no longer has the gift of prophecy - she's free.  Metella asks the Doctor who he really is, and he's enigmatic as always. Caecilius coins the term "volcano" (technically he steals it from Donna, but that's the Romans for you). As the family mourns their lost city, the Doctor and Donna depart.

Donna thanks the Doctor for what he did, and the Doctor admits that Donna was right: sometimes he needs someone. He welcomes her aboard, and they are once again off into time and space. In Rome, six months later, Caecilius and his family have settled in Rome. Caecilius is going for a marble contract in Alexandria that will make them rich beyond the dreams of avarice. Evalina gets to experience life as a normal, Roman girl for the first time, looking significantly better than she did under the influence of the Pyrovile fumes. Quintus is studying to be a doctor, and Metella reminds him to thank the household gods before he leaves.

Quintus, who had been flippant in giving thanks to the household gods, kneels before the marble plaque and thanks them for everything. The camera cuts to show a relief of the Doctor and Donna, with the TARDIS between them.

The Fires of Pompeii is another great episode from Series 4. Like a lot of episodes in the Russell T. Davies era, the bits that are shoved in to further the series arc can make them turn sour. Not so with this one, though. The relationship between the Doctor and Donna feels very natural and, while Donna can come off as rather flippant, it's both fitting of her character and something that the Doctor desperately needs at this point: a counterbalance. He even admits as much in the episode himself, sometimes he needs someone to stop him.

. . .we'll get to when that's used in a bad way in a few seasons. Ironically, something I can't blame on Russell.

As I said, though, The Fires of Pompeii is a great episode. Next, we have a little bit of an odd one. We get the return of the Ood from The Impossible Planet and The Satan Pit. The episode itself is Ood-centric...and it's odd, but not for that reason. Next time, The Planet of the Ood!