Specials
Episode title: The Next DoctorFeaturing: Tenth Doctor
Companions: Jackson Lake, Rosita Farisi
First shown: 25th December 2008
Related articles: Cybermen, Mercy Hartigan
Guide: It is Christmas Eve, 1851. The Doctor has travelled alone since losing Donna at the end of Series 4, but that doesn't mean his work load gets any smaller.
He encounters a man and a woman. The man identifies himself as the Doctor, and the woman as his assistant named Rosita. The pair of Doctor’s attempt to capture a Cybershade, but fail and start to talk about each other. Our Doctor believes that this new Doctor is indeed a future regeneration of himself, however the new Doctor is missing many memories from the Doctor’s life. Doing some searching at the house of a dead man reveals infostamp devices – Cybermen technology. Cybermen attack the duo but the new Doctor manages to destroy them with an electrical discharge from one of the infostamps.
At the funeral of the dead man, the mourners are attacked by Cybermen led by Mercy Hartigan. Four are spared and fitted with the ear-pod devices that the Cybermen have used since their re-introduction in 2006. They are dispatched to recruit children from their workhouses. Meanwhile, our Doctor is taken to the new Doctor’s H.Q. and is shown the new Doctor’s TARDIS. Only it isn’t what our Doctor was expecting. Instead of a machine that can travel in time and space (Time And Relative Dimension In Space), our Doctor is presented with a Tethered Aerial Release Developed In Style (pictured below).
Our Doctor now realises what has happened. He has learnt that when the Cybermen first came, they claimed the life of a man called Jackson Lake and his family. Except Jackson didn’t die, he used an infostamp to destroy the Cybermen, but it backfired and implanted what the Cybermen knew of the Doctor (our Doctor) into Jackson’s mind. Jackson was so distraught at the loss of his wife and child he entered a fugue state and believed that he was the time travelling hero, the Doctor. At this point, the children that Mercy demanded have been taken to a sluice gate to the Thames. Jackson is now upset to learn the truth, and so the Doctor (the real Doctor) and Rosita investigate alone. They are confronted by Miss. Hartigan, who orders that the pair be deleted. Just as the Cybermen are about to attack, Jackson comes along to save the day with another infostamp, allowing them all to escape. Miss. Hartigan furiously announces that “the CyberKing will rise tonight!”
Jackson tells the Doctor about the night of the Cybermen invasion and the Doctor realises that the Cybermen base may be at Jackson’s house. The trio venture forth to the house to find a Dimension Vault, Dalek technology stolen by the Cybermen to allow them safe passage through the Void. Meanwhile the children are all working hard to generate enough power to allow the CyberKing to rise. Miss. Hartigan is betrayed by the CyberLeader when she is converted to the CyberKing. The trio of heroes evacuate the children to safety, which includes Jackson’s abducted son from when they were attacked. The CyberKing, which is a giant Cyberman shaped robot ship, rises from the River Thames and begins to destroy London. The Doctor uses Jackson’s TARDIS gas balloon to confront Miss. Hartigan and offer her the chance to live in peace. She refuses, and the Doctor uses an infostamp to sever the connection between her and the CyberKing. As she realises what she’s become, she screams in horror and destroys the Cybermen along with herself. Before the CyberKing can crash down on London and crush it, the Doctor uses the Dimension Vault to send it to the Time Vortex.
The episode ends with Jackson thanking the Doctor for his help, and inviting him to Christmas dinner. The Doctor refuses, as he always does, but Jackson persuades him, and they walk off to have dinner in honour of those they have lost.