“Doctor, will you read the Veritas?”
Written by Jeffrey Zyra.
Extremis is the first part of a three-part story that is penned by Steven Moffat while the next two episodes will have different writers along with Moffat. I have to admit that I had to watch Extremis a couple of times to figure out what was going as it was a typical Steven Moffat story with a lot of stuff going on. In fact that is one of the reasons to watch it again as there was so much going on that you definitely didn’t pick everything up on first viewing…or even on the second viewing. Extremis however, was a better story than anything that Steven Moffat wrote for Season 9.
With Extremis, I don’t really hate it nor do I really like it, as it’s the first part of a three episode arc but if this was a standalone story that was leading into a story that came later on in the series then yes this was a really good story. But I cannot really rate it until I see all three parts but from what I saw with Extremis I liked for the most part. It was pretty entertaining and did open up possible scenarios that haven’t been done in Who before. For example the whole world inside a computer program with the simulants start killing each other when they figure out that they are just a simulation. It has been done before in science-fiction shows but not certain if it has been done in Doctor Who before?
I really liked the Missy (Michelle Gomez) storyline; we finally get to see who is in the vault. For once it was not an overtly dramatic reveal or saved for the end of the series. I really liked how we found out with The Doctor having to make a promise to watch over Missy’s body for 1000 years. Plus it was also clever if pretty predictable of a way for him to save Missy from death also. Rewiring the machine of execution was pretty predictable but really, that was probably the right choice Steven Moffat could make in that scenario. It also raises some questions too. Will the Doctor in the next two parts of this story free Missy from the vault to help with the impending invasion from The Monks? Or will she just be in there giving him advice and not have much of a presence? I’m sure we will find out in time but I wouldn’t be surprised if she ends escaping at some point.
It will be interesting to see what happens from Extremis and how the next two stories will tie into it. I really liked The Monks and how they are planning on taking over the Earth from the simulations but did they have to run it for over 2000 years? I’m hopeful that we can get a new reoccurring villain from this story as that is something that the show needs. So far Extremis has started off pretty, let’s just hope that the next two stories will be just as good.
