Every episode this season has been an improvement for Doctor Who. “Rogue” is no exception in this case, which is good because this one’s the big one. The one that fans have been theorizing would go in a norm breaking direction. It does. “Rogue” will live in infamy no matter what — which makes it all the more wonderful that it’s the most fun and entertaining episode of the season on top of that.
Eat your heart out, Shondaland
“Rogue” takes the intensity of the previous episodes down quite a bit. Ruby (Millie Gibson) and The Doctor (Ncuti Gatwa) pop over to 1800’s England to give Ruby a “real” Bridgerton experience. It’s not often such a specific reference gets dropped, but it turns out to be a very important one. It remains extremely fun to see the Fifteenth Doctor leaning into the adventure as much as his companion. We don’t need to see Ruby explaining Bridgerton to The Doctor to convince him to set the destination, he’s just as excitable about these destinations.
Very quickly, that excitement opens a new door for The Doctor when he encounters Rogue (Jonathan Groff), a time traveling bounty hunter also crashing the party. Rogue is on the trail of a Chuldur, a non-Zygon shapeshifter alien, first mistaking The Doctor for the culprit. This leads to the episode dedicating a third of its time to giving Ncuti Gatwa and Jonathan Groff plenty of time to flirt. Bless them for it, because these scenes are cute and sexy and fun in a way that other relationships with The Doctor haven’t been. Look, I love Alex Kingston and am a River Song apologist, but her chemistry with Matt Smith during the Eleventh Doctor run doesn’t even come close.
Finally, an episode not written by a Doctor Who showrunner
Much of this fun comes from Gatwa and Groff’s performances, but a strong script from Kate Herron (Loki season one) and dual actress and writer Briony Redman (The Inside Man) is no slouch. Herron also directed several early Sex Education episodes and there’s a good chance she channeled that experience with Gatwa here. The end result is a deepening of the Fifteenth’s personality.
So far the best way to explain Fifteen is “cool,” which remains true, but with several episodes needing to be Doctor-light this season, that hasn’t been explored as much. Seeing The Doctor leverage that cool factor to hit on someone is fun. It’s even more fun when Rogue finally starts playing back and The Doctor himself becomes flustered. These scenes are the strongest of a strong episode.
Ruby Sunday, now with less plot devices
Meanwhile, Ruby Sunday tries to bring third wave feminism to the 1800’s while living out her Bridgerton fantasies. Despite playing backup this week, she’s given a lot more of her own personality to flesh out. This woman definitely has an Ao3 account, for one, and her bond with a local lady she tries to cheer up (Camilla Aiko) makes her very enduring. What’s more, it seems that Doctor Who at this point has given up on centering the seasonal mystery on her, which is a blessing.
Multiple times during the episode’s final act it seemed like the same kind of weird stall out would happen regarding Ruby’s history and instead she gets in and out of scrapes on her merits instead. I’m sure the series will circle back next episode but it has been refreshing for Ruby to be a character rather than a plot device.
The bird costumes at least look great
The Chuldur agenda is properly silly in a way I adore: they’re literally cosplaying Bridgerton. It’s so goofy and dumb it could only play in Doctor Who — in no small part because it’s the exact same reason Ruby and The Doctor are there. However, they are also the weak link of “Rogue.” Instead of just leaving things there, the Chuldur end up significantly more violent once their gig is up. It’s a strange tonal shift to have their leader (Indira Varma) start screaming about vivisection with no real prompting. They’re already killing people to steal their skins, isn’t that enough? It does give us the incredible line of “We will cosplay this planet to death,” which had me laughing out loud at the sheer ridiculousness. I love when Doctor Who plays it dumb, even if it doesn’t make sense.
These aliens are also bird-like for no real clear reason. I love a good physical effect, so the costuming is pretty impressive, but the bird motif is a miss. Doctor Who has no shortage of body snatchers, and I can’t shake the sense that the production just needed something to differentiate them. There’s other wonderful production standouts. The Doctor now color coordinates the Sonic Screwdriver to his outfits, which is so cool. Rogue’s ship is a very different setup than the TARDIS, all while maintaining a similar circular room shape, very clever stuff.
Coming out
This all culminates in the big historic moment: after accidentally trapping Ruby in the same portal as the Chuldur, Rouge takes the portal switch out of The Doctor’s hands via a very distracting kiss. Yes, The Doctor has his first male-male onscreen kiss. This will obviously heat up the bigots who somehow didn’t get the message from “Dot and Bubble” that they’re not welcome here, but this is a moment that deserves remarking.
Doctor Who has had various levels of queer subtext, which would become some level of text after the 2005 revival. For The Doctor himself though, subtext only: throwaway lines, teases, hints. Frankly speaking, some sort of sexual fluidity just makes more sense. Time Lords (of which The Doctor still identifies as his race, pedants) already change gender regularly, to say nothing of regenerations having differences in personality. If The Doctor can hate certain foods and have varying levels of intensities across incarnations, it makes more sense that would apply in other details! Canon aside, even in cases where genre fiction does lend space to LGBTQIA+ characters, it’s still rare to be between two men and even rarer still for protagonists. Doctor Who has helped break down some of these barriers before, but it’s still heartening to see it take a jackhammer to them.
Even The Doctor’s old habits die hard
The climax of “Rogue” is tight and interesting even beyond the historical impact. Rogue’s actions save Ruby but send him away with the Chuldur instead, with the final words “Find me.” It’s pretty cold to yank him away right after canonizing a queer Doctor, but it fits in a couple of notable ways. First, I imagine Jonathan Groff isn’t exactly available for multiple appearances a season and I’d rather have him in this role than not. This way, the producers can see how everything plays and work in a return if Groff’s interested. Additionally, what ends up connecting Rogue and The Doctor beyond physical attraction is their discussion of what they’ve lost and how to go on. The Doctor takes his own words to heart in the loss, trying to immediately move on to the next adventure.
Given that what really worked about the “bi-generation” was the ability for The Doctor to grant himself a rest, it’s very interesting to see him now fall back into old habits. One self-therapy session can’t fix ingrained behavior alone. I’m curious to see if this is just the next step in exploring The Doctor’s grief process or a reminder of how he always is. Ruby forcing himself to stop and just be sad, if even for a moment, gives me hope it’s the former. Perhaps we’ll even get to see this journey manifest in an actual effort to find Rouge?
Doctor Who really has returned to form
Even if it didn’t include the historic kiss moment for Doctor Who, “Rouge” would be a fantastic episode. It’s got great cast chemistry, a fun spin on a current trend, genuine heart, and a little bit of shlock. It’s extremely hard not to get sucked into this one. That it affectionately and responsibly confirms The Doctor’s queerness is a huge treat. I know I’ve been critical of the season in spots, but going into the two part finale, I truly feel this era has finally found its footing. Happy Pride!
Doctor Who “Season 1” is available on Disney+.
Featured images via BBC/Disney
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‘Doctor Who’ 1x07 “Rogue” - 9/10
9/10
Travis Hymas is a freelance writer and self appointed Pokémon historian out of Salt Lake City, Utah. Known to be regularly obessive over pop culture topics, gaming discourse, and trading card games, he is a published critic featured on sites such as Uppercut and The Young Folks.
