The Haunting of Villa Diodati - The First Review

WARNING! THIS REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS FOR DOCTOR WHO: SERIES 12 EPISODE 8! YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!

From left to right: Polidori (Maxim Baldry), the Doctor (Jodie Whittaker), Yaz (Mandip Gill), Mary Shelley (Lili Miller) and Claire (Nadia Parkes) wonder when Storm Dennis will pass.

Starring Jodie Whittaker, Bradley Walsh, Mandip Gill and Tosin Cole, with Lili Miller and Jacob Collins-Levy.

Written by Maxine Alderton.
Directed by Emma Sullivan. 

'Nobody mention Frankenstein. Nobody interfere. Nobody snog Byron.' Should be easy, right?

The Doctor and her gang arrive at the Villa Diodati at Lake Geneva in 1816 on the night that inspired Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. The plan is to spend the evening soaking up the atmosphere in the presence of some literary greats, but the ghosts are all too real, and the Doctor is forced into a decision of earth-shattering proportions. 

After a few weeks of shaky episodes, with a number of problems set against them, aspects that didn't quite work and elements that, to this reviewer at least, seemed against the spirit of what this era was aiming for, Doctor Who is back on much firmer ground. "The Haunting of Villa Diodati" is one of the better episodes of the season with a strong plot, some fantastic atmospherics, a great portrayal of its historical characters and even a decent use of the, thus far, rather flimsy series arc. It wasn't perfect, or even particularly ground-breaking, but it was a decent Who story with some good elements to it, and I cannot fault it for that.

The Doctor finds that there's more to her trip into history than
she planned...

The basic plot sees the Doctor, Graham, Ryan and Yaz arrive at the Villa Diodati on the night that Mary Shelley is inspired to write Frankenstein. However, as soon as they arrive, they find that strange things are afoot: Percy Shelley, who should be here, is missing, ghostly things seem to be happening and the walls and geography of the villa are twisting in on the occupants... Now, this how to set up an intriguing mystery, in my opinion. There's plenty going on to catch the audience's attention, and writer Maxine Alderton quickly sucks the viewer in with the various things that are going on. There's some wonderful suspense in the early parts of the episode, especially as the landscape of the house starts to twist in on itself. Sure, it maybe a recycled idea from Fifth Doctor debut "Castrovalva", but here, the story plays more on the horror aspect of the scenario than that story did. Some of the ghostly goings on are a little perfunctory, as far as I'm concerned, and designed merely to lean into the Gothic imagery, although they are enjoyable. I loved the skeleton coming back to life, which was a much creepier and unsettling image than that seen in a lot of modern Doctor Who. In fact, this whole story feels a lot scarier than most modern Doctor Who episodes, and that might be one of the reasons why I really enjoyed it. It was, in some ways, shockingly dark, and might be a contender for being one of the most nightmare-inducing episodes in quite some time. That being said, I did find that some of the scares didn't really lead to anything in the end, and some elements of the plot simply weren't explained. Who were the ghostly figures that were watching Graham? Why was the skeleton coming back to life? I think events in the later half of the story overshadowed answering some of the questions in the first half of the episode, and, as such, "Haunting" does end up feeling somewhat disjointed as a result. The big twist at the half way mark does pivot this story in a completely different direction, which, lets be fair, was what the story needed. You couldn't really make the whole 'haunted Villa Diodati' thing last over fifty minutes. However, Alderton doesn't provide us with that many answers to all the elements in the first half, and so it  looks like that bit was unfinished. It's certainly better than "Fugitive of the Judoon" with its surprise twist, however, as it actually enhances the story, and twists it in a very different direction. "Fugitive" just changes the story before its finished doing the thing that could have made it interesting: "Haunting" does it just as the story could have run out of steam. We were, of course, expecting the Lone Cyberman to turn up at some point, and when it was announced that this episode was featuring Mary Shelley, theories started to fly. So, one could argue that it wasn't as much of a surprise as the team were clearly intending. However, what was a surprise was how well it was handled, and how surprising this era's take on the Cybermen is. The Lone Cyberman is absolutely terrifying, more so than possibly any other individual Cyberman in the show's history. While one could argue that giving the Cybermen the semblance of emotion would lessen their impact, in this rather special case, it does the opposite. The scene where it talks about killing its children is actually shocking, and adds to the feeling of intense terror this story exudes. It's not as overtly graphic as "World Enough and Time", but it manages to find something new for the Cybermen to do, and I'm looking forward to seeing how it all pans out in the finale, something I certainly wasn't saying beforehand.

Yaz, Mary and Lord Byron (Jacob Collins-Levy) aren't
impressed with Percy Shelley's attempts to do a Banksy...

The historical characters here, are, of course, all real people, something that presents Doctor Who with something of a problem. In the case of most historical stories, the writers usually try to keep the number of real historical figures down to just the one (Shakespeare in "The Shakespeare Code", Vincent Van Gogh in "Vincent and the Doctor", Nero in "The Romans", to name a few examples). There are exceptions to every rule: "Rosa" features a cameo from Martin Luther King, after all, while "Nikola Tesla's Night of Terror" featured both Tesla and Thomas Edison. But, normally, they're all treated as important historical characters, not just the sort of regular archetypes you'd find in a base-under-siege Doctor Who story. As such, I feel like the historical aspect of the episode is fudged slightly, and the point that these events are meant to inspire Mary Shelley to write Frankenstein doesn't really come across, to this reviewer at least. That is not to say that I didn't enjoy the characters here: quite the opposite; I found them an engaging bunch that kept the story interesting. However, I didn't feel like they needed to be there, like the story needed to be set at that moment in history. Sure, it adds to the drama, as we wonder if Percy Shelley is going to die, but I think you could have got around that problem fairly easily, to be honest. Where this approach does work is in the acting and the fact that Maxine Alderton does attempt to get inside the heads of these characters, and find out what makes them tick. I'll be honest, I'm less enamoured with this version of Mary Shelley than the version Big Finish gave us in Mary's Story. Sure, Lili Miller gives a fantastic performance, and its great that Alderton included Mary's young son, a character who is normally cut out of the story, but I just found Mary to be really too bland and generic. If she hadn't had been such a hugely important historical figure, I don't think this would have been a problem. The other members of the household are much more interestingly presented than Mary, maybe because they're not quite as famous as she is. Jacob Collins-Levy, particularly, is wonderful as Byron, and brings this quite boisterous character to life with real style and flair. His dynamic with the Doctor is also wonderful, and the scene where he attempts to chat her up and she flatly dismisses him is, quite frankly, iconic. What's interesting is that the disparate personalities fit in well into a base-under-siege story, and they enhance the feel of the story. It was nice that, once again, there was material that gave all our leads something to do, although it does reinforce the feeling that we'll be saying goodbye to at least some of them at the end of the season. The outstanding light this week was Jodie Whittaker, who really brought all of her skills to bear as the Doctor. If you hadn't been convinced by her before, this episode will most definitely convince you that she is a great choice to play the Doctor. The material really gives her a chance to take control of the narrative, as opposed to just sort of reacting to it, something that this series has been a little guilty of at points. Her confrontations with the Lone Cyberman are magnificent, and are a definite high-point of the episode.

"I need your clothes, your boots and your motorcycle." 

The production work, as I have mentioned throughout this season, continues to be of a very high standard. While not marking itself out as the most dynamic story, director Emma Sullivan brings a clear understanding of the visual iconography of the horror genre to bear on this episode. The way the camera shoots the scenes of the villa twisting in on itself are wonderful, and really give you a sense of the difficulties facing our heroes. And as soon as the Cyberman turns up, Sullivan runs riot, making it look as intimidating as possible with close camera work, frenetic action and dark lighting that frames the metal horror in just the right light. The design work on the Lone Cyberman is also amazing, with the design team creating a visually striking look that somehow manages to accentuate the horror of the Cybermen conversion process without showing us too much graphic detail. The blending of different designs is something that I have seen fans attempt over the years, and, very often, I have found they don't really succeed, mostly due to being too cluttered and unfocused. This one, however, manages to capture that perfect blend, and the design, together with the strong writing, helps reinforce my view that, at least as far as the main three monsters go, Chris Chibnall knows what he is doing. The Daleks, the Master and now the Cybermen have all been well treated by Chris (we'll overlook the Judoon for the purposes of positivity), and he has managed to reinvent the central concept that drive the characters from the ground up, much better than Russell T Davies ever did. I feel like a word about the series arc as well might be useful here, especially as those of you who've read my "Fugitive of the Judoon" review will be interested to see whether my opinion has changed. While I haven't come around to throwing three different and seemingly disparate arcs at the audience just yet, I did find my concerns mollified somewhat, at least in regards to the Lone Cyberman arc. Sure, it was basically introduced as a bit of clickbait in an episode which was doing its own set-up for another arc, but I actually feel like, for once, we have used that, and can use that, as a springboard for something more interesting. This episode fills in a lot of the detail, and provides us with tangible reasons to get invested. After all, we know the Doctor has made a potentially catastrophic decision that could have consequences for the future of the universe, and if the Cybermen have the data that the Cyberium claimed to hold, then they could become unstoppable. Sure, I'm pretty certain that the two-part finale won't follow through on any of that potential (modern Doctor Who finales have a habit of doing that, I've found), but at least I can say that an attempt was made to give people a reason to get invested, not empty promises and vague words.

"Do you know, this would make an awfully good book..."

Overall, "The Haunting of Villa Diodati" is a strong effort in what is shaping up to be a fairly middling season. In the grand canyon of Doctor Who canon, this isn't really anything that special, and there are some issues and niggling little flaws that prevent it from truly being considered one of the greats. However, for what we do get, this is very enjoyable. An interesting historical setting, good guest characters, some fantastic production work and an engagement and attempt to make the ongoing stories actually work adds up to make a fun, engaging watch. "The Haunting of Villa Diodati" is just good, old-fashioned Doctor Who with a dark twist, and sets the scene for the finale with good grace. Once again, proof that the historicals are the standouts in the Chibnall era.

All pictures copyright to the BBC. Thank you very much for reading.