Just recently on the UK talkshow Jonathan Ross a clip was shown of the upcoming Doctor Who episode “Utopia.” At a guess, I’d say this is probably the pre-credits teaser. I won’t post a link to it, if you’ve not seen it, but I found it on YouTube–that’s all I’ll say about that. 😉
Spoilers behind the cut.
The TARDIS lands in Cardiff atop the Rift. As in “Boomtown” the Doctor wants to recharage the TARDIS’s batteries.
Then we see Captain Jack Harkness running full out across the Roald Dahl Plass towards the TARDIS, yelling for the Doctor.
The Doctor sees Jack in the TARDIS scanner, a worried look on his face. “Oh dear,” his expression says, “this can’t be good.” He throws the TARDIS handbreak, and the TARDIS starts to dematerialize.
Jack jumps for the TARDIS doors.
The time rotor moves. The Doctor looks at it triumphantly. A bullet dodged, clearly!
The the console explodes, throwing the Doctor and Martha to the ground. The TARDIS is racing ahead into the distant future!
And outside the TARDIS as it races through the time vortex, Captain Jack Harkness clings onto the TARDIS, screaming for his life!
What’s the takeaway?
Presuming this is immediately after Torchwood‘s “End of Days” (and it’s been said that it is)…
Obviously, Jack is rather adept at escaping from the Torchwood Three Hub. He didn’t leave the Hub through the pressure door (as Owen, Tosh, and Ianto arrive through the pressure door with coffee). Nor is there any indication that he took the lift as Gwen would have noticed. Jack must have a secret exit, so secret the team didn’t use it during “Cyberwoman.” (Though it may have been disabled by the power loss, too.)
Second, the Doctor clearly isn’t happy to see Jack alive and well. There are two possibilities. The first is that he may think this is a pre-“Emtpy Child” Jack Harkness, working for the Time Agency, and he doesn’t want to cross his own timeline. The second is that the Doctor is aware–well or vaguely–that this is a post-“Parting of the Ways” Jack and he doesn’t want to deal with the problems that raises (from Jack’s resurrection to how Jack got to the past to what Jack has become in the interim to the Doctor’s own cowardice and impotence in “Parting” that resulted in Jack’s vain sacrifice).
Four weeks to wait until “Utopia.” Bleh.
At least in the meantime we get what will no doubt be smashing stories from Paul Cornell and Steven Moffat… 🙂
True. 🙂
I’m trying to decide. Do I want to reread Human Nature in the next week or not?
And I know absolutely nothing about “Blink.” Except that it’s Moffat, and Moffat’s never let me down.