Written by Chris Chibnall And Ella Road
Directed by Haolu Wang
The Doctor (to Yaz): "I wish this would go on forever."
First of all, Happy Easter everyone and for the second time in the show's history, here's an Easter special, though unlike Planet Of The Dead, don't expect a reference to the event here. Instead we have something of a maritime adventure, which again isn't a first for the show.
It's deeply amusing that Chris Chibnall spent all of his first series avoiding past monsters to a blinding fault, only for his latter two series to feature as many of returning monsters as possible. This time, it's the Sea Devils getting an update as they serve as the only antagonists for this somewhat half baked story.
The Doctor, Yaz and Dan find themselves in an early 19th Century Chinese village and it's not long before desperate pirate Queen Madam Ching (Crystal Yu) has inadvertently released the leading Sea Devil (Craige Els) and incurred the wrath of young villager Ying Ki (Marlowe Chan-Reeves). However it doesn't take long for Ching to force both Ying Ki and Dan into becoming her new crew members while the Doctor and Yaz take a journey back a few hundred years.
Their journey gave the Doctor and Yaz a fair bit to mull over. Namely witnessing the Sea Devils forcing a deal with another pirate, Ji-Hun (Arthur Lee) and punishing him after he retaliated a betrayal. There was also the fact that Ying Ki held in possession an artifact needed for the Sea Devils predictable scheme while Madam Ching had her own reasons to get possession of Flor de la Mar treasure.
The Sea Devils were overdue a return in a post 2005 and design wise, it's mostly faithful to their original look. Craige Els does a solid job as the lead Sea Devil but the story itself definitely felt somewhat all over the place with the resolution being somewhat hastily resolved for it's own good. It definitely could've done with an extra five or ten minutes.
As for our main players, Dan had some great moments with Ying Ki and Madam Ching as well as a phone call with a certain character but it was the Doctor and Yaz confronting their own feelings that dominated this episode. Regeneration is certainly on the Doctor's mind and this episode slightly hammered that point home. It also reminded audiences that any potential Doctor/Companion romance will always be doomed, so for me there's definitely no way that won't repeat with this Doctor and Yaz.
- This episode was a last minute addition to the schedule and the only one this series with a new co-writer.
- We learned that Dan is 42 in this episode and we got to briefly see Diane again, who seemed to be missing Dan.
- I'm genuinely surprised we didn't get a reference to the Silurians in this one.
- I figured out fast the Sea Devils took Ji-Hun's ship. The underwater scenes with the TARDIS did look good though.
- While the title for the final special wasn't revealed, a trailer did show the return of various characters such as the Master, Ashad/Cybermen, Daleks, Vinder, Kate Stewart as well as Tegan Jovanka and Ace McShane.
- Chronology: Both 1533 for Ji-Hun and 1807 for Madam Ching.
Legend Of The Sea Devils had the makings of an entertaining Easter special and while it certainly wasn't horrible as such, it was undeniably a very under cooked and rushed story. Unfortunately that's been an ongoing problem with this era but here's hoping the last story can end this era on a better note.
Rating: 6 out of 10
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