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| The Devil's into cheap jump scares. Go figure. |
After the opening credits, the security team (that is, the security chief and one of the other dudes) begin to fire on the Demonic Ood as the base stabilizes. The Captain orders the implementation of "Strategy 9" - blasting all the Ood out through the airlocks - just before Rose manages to get a hold of the Doctor again. The Doctor and Ida report that the seal is open and all they have now is a very fancy CGI pit. No sign of the Beast at all. The Captain orders Ida back upstairs, causing Ida to cut off her comms and question the Doctor about what they should do.
The Doctor monologues a bit about humans are so brilliant for wanting to jump headlong into danger...and then decides to back away from the pit. They start to head back up.
Rose talks the security chief out of taking out the archaeologist...for the record, no, I'm not taking away a point for that considering it does cause some trouble later, so...
Rose Tyler is Awful Count: 5,055,636,230
And I'm not entirely convinced she isn't just showing kindness to the man because he hasn't shown any interest in playing with the Doctor's sonic screwdriver. The archaeologist is convinced that he was possessed by the Devil.
The Doctor and Ida start back up which, of course, doesn't go as planned. The Beast cuts the power and starts to monologue to the people of Sanctuary Base 6 in a way that is totally not Sutekh-like. He claims to be not only the Devil, but every Devil and tells them that they're all going to die. The Doctor shows some skepticism that something could have existed before the universe...
...even though he's battled several beings, such as the Animus and Fenric, who were beings who existed before the current universe.
And the Time Lords have battled beings of the like who are documented as being much the same...
This is basically the equivalent of Reed Richards denying the existence of Galactus after playing chess with him.
And, of course, the Beast knows everyone and calls them out on their sins and inequities. The Captain fearing command, the Doctor slaughtering the Time Lords, and...Rose. "The valiant child who will die in battle so very soon." Rose can be described with many words. Valiant is literally none of them.
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| Good morning, sir! Can I take a moment to tell you about our lord and savior, Gabriel Woolf? |
And, of course, Rose Tyler is perfect and therefore has no sins that the Beast can make her feel shame for. Let me add a little karmic balance...
Rose Tyler is Awful Count: 5,055,636,231
My well-reasoned and rational rage against Rose Tyler aside, this is a thing that Russell T. Davies likes to do, hint at things about the ancillary characters in a story without actually giving any meat to them. He'll do this again, in particular The Waters of Mars comes to mind. I think this is meant to make these characters memorable to us or endear them to us, but it falls flat. If I were to point out any one random individual who you'd never met and told you some vague, random nonsense about them, would you care? Of course not.
Russell actually can develop characters well. I really enjoy all his characters who aren't Rose. Jackie, Mickey, later Martha, and Donna when she comes along. While you only have a forty-five or two forty-five minute episodes to develop characters who aren't the Doctor or the companions...use it, Russell! It's not that hard!
And before anyone gets on my case about it, Moffat is guilty of this in some instances as well. So is Chibnall, but one of those is far away and the other is way further away.
Getting back to the plot, though, Rose freaks out about the prophecy of the Beast that she's going to die...showing no regard for the other people in the situation or the fact that they are currently in a great deal of danger and trouble.
Rose Tyler is Awful Count: 5,055,636,232
If Rose were as good and noble a character as Russell wants us to think she is, then her first instinct should have been trying to help the Doctor or the others. And while she does do that, she only does it after the Doctor is cut off and falls into the Pit with Ida. After a pep talk from the Doctor about how humans are amazing (two in one episode, wow!), the Beast is tired of hearing the Doctor do variations on his speech from The Ark in Space and cuts the cable holding up the Doctor and Ida's pod. At least, that's what the episode implies is happening. I'm of the theory that the cable was just some shoddy workmanship that finally saw its last leg broken.
But Rose tries to rally the troops in a Doctor-esque fashion and, like Clara a few Series from now, she is a poor substitute.
The Doctor and Ida manage to survive without any broken bones - convenient! - and contemplate the Pit, eventually deciding to use the cable to enter the Pit. Upstairs, Rose and the Red Shirts begin to work out a way to turn the tide against the Ood and escape (or find the Doctor, as Rose wants to).
Rose decides to get snarky with the guy trying to find solutions to the Ood problem rather than actually try to be helpful. It's framed as "rolling her eyes at the pessimist", but comes off more as "doesn't actually have anything useful to contribute, either".
Rose Tyler is Awful Count: 5,055,636,233
But luckily, Danny (yes, I used a name. Sue me) comes up with a solution to the Ood - use a signal to break down the telepathy field. A solution to their location problem is also given - un-ventilation shafts running under the base, not meant for humans but for machines. Luckily, the Captain can pump air into them...somehow...so they can use them to escape. The claim that they're made for machines makes it all the more confusing, really.
Considering they have the Ood doing most of the labor onboard, why have a design centered around robots or the like doing maintenance? And where are these robots that we never actually see in this episode? Given how the base is constantly being damaged to the point of losing entire sections of itself to storms and groundquakes and the like, wouldn't we be seeing more of them? I'll just chalk this up to a lack of budget rather than the writer and producer thinking a concept through and press on.
Anyway, they're heading off to Ood Habitation to blow the Ood's minds. The Doctor and Ida set up a winch and Ida begins to lower the Doctor into the Pit of Despair. The Doctor and Ida have a lovely few scenes here where they discuss genetics, philosophy, and so on.
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| "Sick Iron Maiden album cover, brah!" |
Back at the ranch, the Ood are busting in and Rose and the Red Shirt Squad begin to make their escape through the shafts...Rose taking a moment to insist that they come back for the Doctor rather than worrying about the situation at hand or any of the people involved.
Rose Tyler is Awful Count: 5,055,636,234
They head through the vents with the Ood in pursuit, with plenty of "hehe, butts" jokes about - particularly about Rose's backside. La di da.
...no, Rose doesn't get a point for that, I just find it remarkably tacky.
The Ood bust in and the Security Chief unfortunately doesn't make it through the gate in time, having held up the Ood with gunfire so that the others could escape. He asks that the air be taken out so that he doesn't die at the hands of the Ood, the Captain complying with his request. The remaining trio get surrounded by Ood anyway and manage to escape back into the base proper at the last second. Also, the archaeologist guy is revealed to be possessed by the Beast...but not where Rose and the other can see it.
Kind of a misstep in the episode, but I'll get to that in the conclusion.
The Ood give chase, and they finally reach Ood habitation. Danny defeats the Ood with the power of funk and all seems...well?
Back with the Doctor and Ida, while all this is happening, they run out of cable with the Doctor dangling in the Pit. Because the Doctor is the Doctor, he decides that dropping down the Pit not knowing if it's several miles down or just thirty feet is a brilliant idea! And, because he's the Doctor, he's correct as the episode will show us. Before he drops, he tells Ida to tell Rose..."oh, she knows". Rose then cuts in over the comms again, which I'm sure is supposed to be wonderful sad and dramatic and tragic...but I refer you back to my constant problem with the Doctor and Rose relationship. Short recap - I get why she likes him, I do not get why the feeling is mutual.
Rose can't bare the thought of the Doctor being gone, insists that she's staying and waiting for the Doctor...and the Captain earns being called by name as Zachary Cross Flane when he subdues Rose with the help of the others to get her onboard the rocket and off of this asteroid.
...no, really, this isn't mean getting onto Rose again (seriously!). The guy has lost most of his crew, has dealt with some incredibly frightening crap, and has an avenue to get the rest of his people out of there. He's gonna take. And he's very smart to do so.
As Trek put it, "the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few".
Even worse, now, the Ood are getting back up...somehow.
The Doctor awakens with a broken helmet, finding a breathable atmosphere (somehow) and finds he cannot communicate with Ida.
Zachary and the others blast off from the asteroid with a protesting Rose. This, she's actually getting a point for. Before she was simply being "noble" due to her own self-interest. Now she's just being insane. And annoying.
Rose Tyler is Awful Count: 5,055,636,235
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| NOBLE. HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEROOOOOOINNNNNNE. |
Also, somehow, the Doctor and Ida are both able to hear the rocket even though SOUND DOESN'T TRAVEL IN SPACE!
Also, Rose threatens to shoot Zachary with a bolt gun if he doesn't take her back to the asteroid. Truly the actions of a good, noble, and selfless individual.
Rose Tyler is Awful Count: 5,055,636,236
Zachary is unfazed by this. And I'm sure we're supposed to feel sad for Rose, but I've just chalked up the 5,055,636,236th reason why it's impossible to do that. More if I wasn't taking points away in the interest of fairness every so often.
In the Pit, the Doctor finds some cave drawings, two vases, and a CGI Beast. Going with my Sutekh comparison earlier...the CGI Beast looks somehow more embarrassing than a costume job done in 1974-75. The Doctor begins to quickly work things out about the base - namely that the Beast didn't lure him down here, the people who bound the Beast to begin with did.
On the rocket, archaeologist boy begins to laugh with joy...totally revealing that he definitely isn't possessed by the Beast.
The Doctor works things out - the Beast jumped into the archaeologist to allow his mind to escape because his body leaving will cause the prison to fall into the black hole. There's a moment where the Doctor is about to break the vases...when he thinks of Rose. If he breaks them, the gravity field collapses and Rose could get sucked into the black hole. Unfortunately, Harriet Jones isn't here to give the Doctor the same speech of "get the hell on with it!" that she did in World War Three.
On the rocket, Rose starts putting two and two together and coming out with twenty-two.
The Doctor finally decides that he can totally do it because he believes in her above anything else!...and smashes the vases.
Rose Tyler is Awful Count: 5,055,636,237
And thus, the Rose parasite has successfully lodged itself in the Doctor's brain, only to be expelled by his regeneration in The End of Time.
On the rocket, the archaeologist goes insane with the destruction of the Beast's body. Rose blasts a hole through the viewscreen and unclips his belt, sending him spiraling into the black hole. Alas, the gravity funnel collapses and they're falling into the black hole themselves. No possibility of escape. Much the tragic.
...and the Doctor cuts the tension by finding the TARDIS, getting Ida, and then towing the rocket ship away from the black hole in record time. Mugging about how the Time Lords invented black holes...which makes his declaration that orbiting a black hole is impossible in the last episode all the more weirdly confusing.
But the Doctor trades Ida for Rose...and mentions that he couldn't save the Ood, he only had time for one trip...when he literally has a time machine.
...ugh...
Rose comes back to the TARDIS, it's all sweet and fluffy and I'm still vomiting. Goodbyes are shared by the separate crews. Rose asks the Doctor what he really thinks the thing in the Pit was, him declaring that beating it was good enough for him. Rose mentions the Beast's prophecy that she was going to die in battle...the Doctor simply saying "It lied".
Allow me to put on the Narrator voice, but...It definitely did not do that.
This is also notable as the last scene that David Tennant and Billie Piper filmed together before the latter left the show as a regular character. Nothing to note about it besides that.
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| Mentos: The Freshmaker. |
As for the episode itself, The Satan Pit is a bit more notable than its predecessor. It raises more than a few logistical questions that it doesn't answer, somehow allows the Doctor to hear things through the vacuum of space, and chips away even more at the character of Rose as both the Mary Sue paragon that Russell T. Davies wants us to think she is and as she actually is to anyone with more than two working brain cells.
If I had been writing the story, the reveal of the archaeologist still being possessed would have come right at the end in the rocket rather than on the base. It would have made the entire thing much more of a last minute surprise twist. With things as they are, it's not that surprising or interesting when the Doctor works out that the Beast left its body behind and jumped into someone else's. It's almost as if they didn't think we would remember that he had been possessed.
The Ood also get absolutely 86'd in the end, especially with the Doctor refusing to use his time machine to go back and do some funny hijinks to save them all.
Because, let's be honest, he could have if he'd really wanted to.
On the whole, no, The Satan Pit is not a bad episode. It's your standard "everyone trapped in one area and shit goes down" story that Doctor Who (usually) does very well. My minor issues aside, it's an enjoyable enough watch...just don't expect to have Rose made all that endearing to you if you aren't one of her fangirls already.
Next time...we come to what is potentially the most infamous episode of the Revived Series of Doctor Who. A good idea done so terribly, terribly wrong that it spoils the entire thing. That's right...next week, we finally come down to it.
It's time for Love and Monsters.
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