This seems to have gone down well with fandom at large. For once, a story with a strong message isn’t being pilloried for being “woke garbage” or tarred with similarly meaningless epithets. That’s rather heartening. And once again it’s great to see the breadth that the series is capable of, as we leap from literal animated fantasy to flesh-creeping science-fiction terror to domestic UNIT-based psycho-drama.

But to me, this all felt a bit “will this do?” And it pains me to say that because I know how much hard work goes into making any television, let alone something as ambitious as Doctor Who. The pitch isn’t bad. Catching up with an ex-companion and seeing UNIT and its fight against alien invaders through the lens of the manosphere/online trolls/misinformation warriors/conspiracy theorists/delete as applicable. Sure, I’ll watch that. However, the execution seemed to me to be consistently lacking.

Millie and Conrad’s ghastly flirting is relentlessly generic, yet the bland lines in the script might have worked if Jonah Hauer-King had found something distinctive to do with the part, but he (like everyone else) is just settling into familiar grooves. Such a disappointment after McTighe’s thrillingly original Kablam! and his amazing work on the Blu-ray range. And following an episode which did “something nasty hiding in the shadows” so brilliantly, this time the men in rubber suits look like that and only like that, whether that’s what they’re supposed to be or not. What last week’s director did seemingly effortlessly has left this week’s flailing. Do you know how rare it is for me to find myself criticising writing, directing and acting on new Who?

Of course, this is the season’s double-banked episode, with no Varada Sethu and barely featuring Ncuti Gatwa, which does make life harder. But sometimes that makes everyone else up their game, and we get classics like Blink or Midnight or Turn Left or 73 Yards. Here alas, the lack of Doctor is keenly felt. And, now I’m distracted by how familiar this feels – bits and pieces of Blink (the glimpse of the Doctor on another adventure), Love & Monsters (fan’s eye view of the Doctor), A Christmas Carol (the Doctor’s chance encounter with young Conrad), 73 Yards (Millie Gibson telling everyone in a scary pub to listen to her) and so on.

And crucially, the big switcheroo doesn’t really work at all. Either Conrad is a very well-known anti-UNIT, anti-alien podcaster with a large and loyal following and therefore everybody knows who he is and what he stands for, OR he’s the kind of podcaster which Ruby Sunday would happily go and talk to. But not, as this story needs him to be – both at once.

And just why does actually seeing real aliens and a disappearing police box make him a dyed-in-the-wool sceptic instead of, as would seem to make rather more sense, a true believer? Why does he think that making his own fake aliens will convince the world that other aliens are also fake? If I showed you fake potatoes, would you stop believing in potatoes? And why doesn’t he take the damned antidote – other than to make the plot work? Then again, he’s the kind of conspiracy theorist whose bonkers claim is that UFOs aren’t real, so maybe I shouldn’t expect logic from him. But worse, there’s no complexity to him either, no hint that he is in any way conflicted over his treatment of Ruby. We’re right back in Chibnall-land, where subtext is forbidden and everybody has a single dimension and just says what’s on their mind as directly as possible.

Look, there’s good stuff here. Millie is great, as usual. I adored her in the pub bluntly telling the old git who dared question her authority “Go and get some fresh air, big man, see what happens.” Yes, mate. It’s always a pleasure to see Jemma Redgrave, Alexander Devrient and Ruth Madelely. And the Vlinkx, was… also there. The UNIT traitor, though, isn’t so much hiding in plain sight as sticking out like a sore thumb, forefinger and big toe. Sure, I can get behind the message. I agree: Internet trolling equals bad. But to me this all felt a bit reheated, and a bit half-hearted. And I don’t think I really like the idea that if you meet the Doctor as an impressionable child, there’s even a chance that this interaction will turn you into a cartoon villain like Conrad. The Doctor is responsible for our current toxic online culture? Really? I don’t want that even hinted at. Damn.

2.5 out of 5 stars