Doctor Who: Spyfall, Part One (2020) - Review

After yet another 365-day hiatus, Doctor Who is back on our screens for the new year, with a brand-new series of adventures. Kicking things off with 'Spyfall: Part One' (our first two-part story since 2017's series finale), the series aims to kick the stakes up a notch, and get audiences excited for the next several adventures in time and space. And, in many respects, 'Spyfall: Part One' succeeds. It nicely reintroduces the ensemble cast, it sets up an intriguing and original premise, it's a big-scale globe-trotting adventure, and it features a great twist and cliffhanger ending. However, despite the episode theoretically succeeding on all fronts, it mostly fell a bit flat for me.

I was excited to see an extended episode to open the new series, by considering how little plot is developed over the course of 'Spyfall: Part One', I'm not sure if the extra 10-15 minutes really added anything to the episode. Writer Chris Chibnall sets up so many mysteries, but none of them are actually resolved by the end of the episode, meaning that the episode's narrative hasn't actually progressed at all, leaving a lot of loose threads for 'Spyfall: Part Two' to resolve. Sure, 'Spyfall: Part One' features more action - there's a car chase, a motorcycle chase and then a plane crash - but none of it feels motivated by story, it's all quite random (bar the obvious motivation for the plane crash to raise the stakes).

A good chunk of the episode doesn't make a huge amount of sense, either. MI6 invite the Doctor (Jodie Whittaker) and her "fam" over, but bundle them all into one car, instead of spreading them out in the other cars for added security. There's always at least two MI6 agents "kidnapping" the characters at each place, so what happens the spare one? And why aren't there any other MI6 cars looking after the Doctor and company? And why does the driver need a sat-nav to get to MI6 in the first place? It all feels contrived to get to this car sequence, which whilst impressive, lacked any real stakes. Then, later on in the episode, the gang chase after Lenny Henry's baddie Daniel Barton on motorbikes, and it goes from a casual chase to Barton just shooting at them across a field...which then magically cuts to an airfield. There are also other oddities in the episode, like how Yaz is freed from the "netherworld" she is seemingly imprisoned in, or how C (Stephen Fry) sits in prime position in front of a window so he can be easily shot from a distance. Bit rubbish for the head of MI6.

Because 'Spyfall: Part One' hasn't got much in the way of story, it does feel like a slow-burn introductory episode, making the extended running time quite annoying. There's very little pace to it, and it still suffers from Chris Chibnall's "explain everything very clearly" method of writing dialogue. I do wonder if Chibnall would be better to suited to writing radio drama, the way characters explain everything to one another as if the situations don't explain themselves. If Steven Moffat can be accused of rushing his explanations, Chibnall sure takes his sweet time explaining through dialogue.

On the other hand, the episode features some nice character beats, be it Graham's appointment at the doctor's, or Yaz recovering from her experience in the "netherworld", or even just the little interactions between the characters. Bradley Walsh is still the undisputed highlight of the companions, but you can definitely see Mandip Gill and Tosin Cole warming to their roles as Yaz and Ryan. Jodie Whittaker is as lovable as ever as the Doctor, and whilst I was slightly annoyed how little she had to work with, balancing her screen-time with the companions', I am very much looking forward to seeing her on her own in Part Two. Jodie's Doctor always feels like she's supported by her friends, so to see an episode without that support will be very interesting.

And then, of course, we come to the elephant in the room: the return of the Master, now played by Sacha Dhawan. As soon as Dhawan was introduced, I realised that he'd turn out to be the Master. He's too good an actor to waste on some random, all-too-nice supporting player. The reveal was very well-handled though, and I think that Chris Chibnall did a very good job at sewing the seeds without beating you over the head with a mystery box. Dhawan's performance was more manic than I was expecting, but he's nevertheless a nice contrast to Whittaker's Doctor. More of him please, and more menacing. I'd like to see a recurring Master for this new series.

Overall, 'Spyfall: Part One' is a solid start to this new series of Doctor Who. There's action, intrigue and a big old twist ending, but it all feels oddly formulaic. Despite some nice moments here and there, the plot didn't develop into any interesting places, making the extended run-time feel ultimately wasted. That being said, this is part one of two, so I'll be interested to see how 'Spyfall' resolves on Sunday. Tentative 6/10.