#oops
Why wait so long to do another one? Simple! I didn't want to do anything in the post-Series 2 world of Doctor Who without having finished my review of that Series...which I'm certain that every single one of you has been very, very diligently keeping up with! Or not.
Also, I wanted to pick one that would be relatively short and easy to do. Call me lazy if you like.
Either way, I've reviewed that episode from thirteen years ago to avoid spoilers, so it's time to put on the speculation cap again. This time, I want to look back at the first two-parter of Series 2, Rise of the Cybermen and The Age of Steel and ask a simple question - what would have happened if the TARDIS had not fallen into the universe of Pete's World? If the Doctor, Rose, and Mickey had not managed to accidentally slip that groove in time and end up there...for them, not much would change. Presumably, the events of all the episodes from The Girl in the Fireplace to Army of Ghosts would still happen as they happened, just with Mickey along for the ride and maybe with the Doctor and Rose finally realizing what they do in Rise of the Cybermen about how poorly they treat Mickey.
On Pete's World, however, it's a very different story. While Pete Tyler tried his best to get the information to the authorities, he got the Preachers and only the Preachers. The Preachers, who roll up into Jackie Tyler's "39th" birthday party, are severely outgunned. Mrs. Moore is able to give them an opportunity to escape with her improvised EMP bomb. They even manage to get a hold of Pete, who outs himself as Gemini to avoid being executed and laments his situation as he does in the proper timeline. With virtually no resistance due to the Preachers not having the know-how or the numbers to fight back, London falls while the best they can manage to do is escape.
The next few weeks are absolutely brutal. The Cybermen are basically able to run wild across the Earth, taking over the Republic of Great Britain before moving into France and other Western European countries. Spain, Italy, Germany, they all fall in a matter of weeks. Even with the advanced warning given by the Preachers, the Cybermen are simply too powerful and too numerous. Within a few months, they're pushing toward the other continents.
All is not lost, however. Under the management of Pete, the Preachers do their best to grow their numbers and take victories wherever they can get them. They do gain the aid of various individuals better known to us in the main universe - people such as retired UNIT Colonel Benton (and yes, UNIT did exist on Pete's World according to some audio plays), journalist Sarah Jane Smith, Yvonne Hartman, medical student Martha Jones and possibly others if we want to get uber-fanservice-y - into their ranks.
Without the Doctor netting them the emotional inhibitor code, however, they have to settle for a lot of pyrrhic victories until they catch on to it and how to use it. They manage to hit the Cybermen at a few points, but it's treating the symptoms rather than the actual problem and it doesn't deal with the fact that the problem is growing at a nightmarish rate.
During this time, we'd see some real character development - Pete reminiscing about Jackie and the daughter that he'd imagined them having (which strengthens his resolve to stop the Cybermen so future generations can have that dream), Jake getting to reunite with his parents and younger brother just in time for all three to be Cyber converted (much to his horror), and Mrs. Moore eventually revealing her family and likely losing them as well.
Granted, if this were in the actual show then we'd never actually see any of it, but "the Doctor, Rose, and Mickey don't go to another universe and just play around in theirs" wouldn't make this a particularly interesting story, now would it?
Given how time in the parallel universe is about three years ahead of the Doctor Who universe, it is about two and a half years of long and arduous fighting. With all the major population centers of Pete's World controlled by the Cybermen, the Preachers are more hard-pressed than ever as they try to fight from on the fringes of society. Slowly, but surely, it seems that they might gain some ground. However, the Cybermen attacks and the density of their armies seems to be lessening. While this is curious to the good guys, they decide they can't waste a golden opportunity and decide to make a raid on London and the main Cyber Conversion Factory where all of this started.
As Pete said in Doomsday, the Earth is growing steadily warmer. The polar ice caps are melting because of Torchwood's discovery of (and experimentation with) the Breach. Rather than try to save their world, the Cybermen are electing to leave it and have indeed accelerated the process through their Cyber conversion factories - drawing power from the Breach to widen it and ensure that no survivors remain. Not the ideal Cybermen plot, but they have reasoned they just have a lack of time and the remaining stock of humanity (small as it is) is an acceptable loss for their survival.
When they go through, Lumic declares that they will widen the breach more than any other attempt, drowning the remaining human population.
Lumic gets killed by Pete as revenge for Jackie, but the damage is done. The Cybermen begin to withdraw from the battlefield and escape across the Void as a tidal wave of ungodly scale descends on London. Horrified, the three in Canary Wharf watch as London begins to flood in earnest knowing that, if their fellows aren't dead, that they will be soon enough and there is nothing they can do for them. They have to make a decision and they have to make it now.
Pete elects to follow the Cybermen through and try to stop them. When it's pointed out that they obviously don't know where the Breach is going, if at all, he brings up the very good point that they don't have any choice - they either go and die trying to stop the Cybermen or die on a drowned, lifeless Earth. Using the universal jumping devices, Pete, Jake, and Yvonne leave the Earth behind as London is engulfed by the rising oceans. They trail the Cybermen through the Void, and end up in the main Doctor Who universe.
As seen in Army of Ghosts and Doomsday, the ghosts are a worldwide phenomenon. Torchwood doesn't take well to the sudden intruders in its base, but Yvonne is able to entreat with her counterpart on this Earth. She explains the threat of the Cybermen and the danger that they pose to not only England but the Earth. Prime Yvonne orders the Ghost Shifts suspended permanently. Unfortunately, it's too little too late. The Cybermen have already gotten through at least in small numbers due to the larger numbers they had back on Pete's Earth moving through.
With earpods attached to some Torchwood employees, they are able to open the Breach a little at a time to bring forth more numbers. The mysterious golden orb that definitely isn't carrying Daleks comes through at around this time, with Pete, Jake, and Yvonne not able to identify it - it's no Cybermen device or craft that they've ever seen. Prime Yvonne ends up catching onto this, but not before the Doctor, Rose, and Mickey come into play. Having returned to London thanks to a phone call from Jackie, they witness a Ghost Shift and the Doctor naturally starts poking it with a stick because he's the Doctor and that's what he does.
Rather than doing something that can be tracked by Torchwood, the Doctor uses the TARDIS to track the energy signatures of the Ghosts to their source, landing in Canary Wharf. As in Army of Ghosts, Torchwood welcomes the Doctor as an honored house arrest guest. This time, however, things are a great deal less laid back on the part of Prime Yvonne. The Doctor is immediately battle ready at the mention of the Cybermen and decides to go about closing the Breach and trap them in the Void forever.
Unfortunately for his noble intentions, it's too late. The Cybermen manage to get the Breach open and destroy the equipment that allowed it to close. The Cybermen come through, all six billion of them. As this happens, however, the Orb downstairs also opens to release the Cult of Skaro. The Daleks and the Cybermen have their trash talking and the battle commences. As on Pete's World, however, the Cybermen have had more time to develop further through all the minds that they've added into their collective and so they put up a much better fight and Dalek Thay is actually taken out in the Daleks' first encounter with the Cybermen.
The other three Daleks are particularly worried by this and shore up their defenses. As in the original timeline, Mickey accidentally opens the Ark. Daleks Sec, Caan, and Jast escort it out into the open air, releasing an army of Daleks on the Earth. Back within Torchwood, the Doctor has worked out the Void stuff and plans to reconfigure the device Torchwood was using to open the Breach in the first place, sucking both the Cybermen and the Daleks back into it as in the actual Doomsday. We get an emotional scene where Pete and Jackie meet and the Tylers are all together for the first time and it's a rather lovely moment to pay off Pete's angst from earlier.
Jake can't stand to be anywhere near Mickey, still pained by the memories of Ricky, but eventually comes around to him a bit more as they two have to work together for part of the repair job the Doctor is doing. As they're working, Rose mentions the Beast's prophecy from The Satan Pit that she was going to die in battle. The Doctor reaffirms his belief that it was lying to her.
While the Prime Yvonne does die in the battle (in a way that actually makes sense rather than that bizarre thing in the actual episode where she somehow keeps her sentience despite being Cyber-converted, what the hell?), the refugees from Pete's World do avoid falling into the Void. All's well that ends well...at least until they hear a familiar mechanical groan. A lone Cyberman survived the battle and with a cry of "DELETE!!!"...
...it blasts Rose, who leaps in the way of the beam to save the Doctor. Jake and Mickey blast it into a pile of scrap, but the damage is done. Rose tells the Doctor much as she did way back in Dalek, she wouldn't have missed it for the world. An instant later, she's gone, having fallen in battle just as the Beast predicted. The Doctor weeps over her, as do the Tylers, Mickey, Jake, and Yvonne.
Some time later, the Tylers and Mickey are attending her funeral. One of many that we see going on. We get some exposition about the goings on. Apparently, the British government has exposed Torchwood and is hunting down any of its remaining operatives. Yvonne and Pete have had to assume a new identities as "Alan" Tyler and his sister "Tracy" Tyler (with the Doctor getting in touch with some UNIT contacts to help with the transition). Jake, meanwhile, was able to slip into the life of his counterpart who died during the battle - claiming amnesia from injuries sustained therein in case of any differences. He is overjoyed to be reunited with his younger brother and his parents after the horrors he's seen on both his world and this one.
While Pete and Jackie console each other after the funeral, Mickey looks into the distance to see the Doctor standing and looking forlornly on the proceedings next to the TARDIS. Mickey starts toward that blue box, but stops after a only few steps. The two men exchange looks, and there is an understanding between the two - Mickey isn't coming back, he's done. The Doctor gives only a brief nod and the two, in their shared grief, depart. Mickey doesn't look back, even as he hears the TARDIS dematerialize for the last time, the Doctor gone from his life.
But he will never forget the adventures he had, even if they cost him so much. Nor will Pete, Jake, and Yvonne forget all those who died in their struggle against the Cybermen. They will not forget the years of hardship or the fact that they left behind a dead Earth. However, the three can rest more easily knowing that the Cyberman threat has finally, once and for all, been put to rest.
...at least until they learn about the Mondasian Cybermen in this universe, but that's another story that Russell oddly left hanging and Moffat took over.
Meanwhile, the Doctor is suddenly shocked that Catherine Tate has appeared in the TARDIS wearing a wedding gown...but that is a story for another day...
And that's where we're gonna leave this What If?. Army of Ghosts and Doomsday has a much higher body count and a much more, in my opinion, tragic ending for the character of Rose - heroically sacrificing her life and actually doing something rather than wait for someone else to do it for her. No, by the way, this wasn't something I worked backwards from to get to this premise. If Rose was as good and noble a person as Russell T. Davies says she is, then self-sacrifice to save the Doctor would have made a fitting ending.
But as for the rest of it, the development of other characters, I really enjoyed. A larger threat and a more satisfying conclusion. Who knows how this would affect the Series going forward? 3 and 4, at the very least? And is Pete's World really a flooded globe devoid of human life? Give some of your thoughts in the comments below. Maybe, if I get the itch, I'll continue this little universe I've concocted. Thanks for reading!
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