Movie Review: Doctor Who: The Giggle (2023)

Movie #9 of 2023:

Doctor Who: The Giggle (2023)

In hindsight, I probably should have approached these three David Tennant/Catherine Tate Doctor Who specials as a single season of television, miniature though it’d be, rather than a trilogy of discrete movie equivalents. More even than the previous round of Tennant specials that followed series 4 from 2008 to 2010 in the lead-up to his regeneration into Matt Smith, these installments have really all felt of a coherent piece with one another across their run. That’s true both on a level of plot / character — exploring the Fourteenth Doctor’s fresh trauma and allowing him the chance to rehabilitate his earlier self’s treatment of his friend Donna Noble — and as a practical, metafictional transition period for the franchise.

It’s no secret that Whovian viewership has dropped off in recent years, and the BBC has clearly been positioning the upcoming Fifteenth Doctor’s tenure under returning showrunner Russell T. Davies as a great starting place for new viewers. These 60th Anniversary Specials, likewise under Davies, don’t seem to have been part of that same commercial push, but they do form an important throat-clearing effort to win back the segment of the old audience that had started tuning out. The inherent nostalgia appeal of the stars of a decade-and-a-half ago returning to our screens is one element of that, but we’ve also gotten some lovely spins on Classic Who canon tweaked for the modern age and a resolution of sorts to some lingering matters from the Jodie Whittaker years. Though it’s not the cameo-heavy celebration of all six decades that some fans might have wanted, it’s been three strong hours of scripts packed with continuity nods that never obscure the emotional impact of each story. Honestly? This is Davies in his wheelhouse, completely showing off. You want moves, Rose? RTD2 will give you moves.

Which brings us to today’s final outing, The Giggle. Dragging back a First Doctor villain from 1966 is maybe even odder of a choice than adapting the old Beep the Meep comic storyline in The Star Beast, but as usual, Davies makes it work. Guest star Neil Patrick Harris chews the scenery with Master-ish aplomb (and with a variety of Count Olaf-ian accents), and while it’s not quite in line with the character’s original appearance, it’s close enough to get the point across and ultimately succeeds better than The Celestial Toymaker serial ever did at establishing a distinct identity for the figure. He’s a spiteful clown and a cosmic threat who can rewrite reality at will but respects the rules of established games, and that’s driven home in a variety of unsettling setpieces.

Against it, we have our familiar Doctor and his stalwart bestie, joined by some more old friends from UNIT — including Melanie Bush from the Sixth and Seventh Doctor eras, as the latest Classic companion to pop back up again for an adventure. (More of that going forward, please! I’d love to get some additional Classic characters back for an episode here and there that doesn’t try to wring pathos out of their appearance but instead just lets them be trusted competent auxiliary support like Mel is in this special.) And as a regeneration story, it offers us our first look at Ncuti Gatwa in the TARDIS, already dazzling in his role as Tennant’s successor.

There’s a late-act twist you likely won’t see coming if you managed to avoid the leaked rumors, and while my fannish brain wants a little more in-universe explanation for how it’s going to work going forward, it’s no more objectionable than other big swings Doctor Who has taken in the past. And the benefit of the move is clear too, not just for the immediate fun team-up that results from it, but also to satisfy that impetus I mentioned above of presenting the Gatwa era with as firm a fresh start as any incoming Doctor’s ever had. Thematically and then more or less literally, the Fourteenth Doctor’s adventures with Donna represent the Time Lord finally going to therapy and talking through some of that pain they’ve been running from for so long. There’s even an acknowledgement of poor dead Adric from the Fifth Doctor days! (Sarah Jane’s death is also finally made canon, twelve years after the passing of her actress Elisabeth Sladen, while Wilfred Mott is graciously allowed to live on despite the fact that Bernard Cribbins died before he could film the scenes intended for this episode.) It’s no wonder Fifteen seems so much lighter after all that.

It’s a pretty effective passing of the torch, overall. Davies does indulge in some of his weaker impulses, like a new round of ominous yet vague forebodings, and I don’t love that the Toymaker is ultimately defeated more through athleticism and luck than a clever Doctorish plan. But this is an inventive and satisfying way to close out Tennant’s unexpected reprisal of the alien time-traveler, which has turned out to be far more than just a blip of a detour on the path from Whittaker to Gatwa as the main series actor.

[Content warning for gun violence and body horror.]

★★★★☆

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