Written by Russell T. Davies
Directed by Dylan Holmes Williams
Ruby: "It's taken me all this time to realise what I'm here to do."
Boyfriend: "Which is what?"
Ruby: "I'm gonna save the world."
It has been nearly a decade since we've had a proper Doctor light episode. Often, they're bottle savers and nearly always they strongly stoke discussion, both good and bad. They can universally praised like Blink and Turn Left, liked like Flatline or generally divisive such as Love & Monsters.
73 Yards from what I've seen already before even watching the episode seems to have garnered all three reactions. It's certainly the most experimental episode in Ncuti Gatwa's era so far and more so because he's barely in it. Seriously, he took a backseat this week, giving Millie Gibson the opportunity to come into her own as Ruby Sunday.
The episode started modestly with the Doctod and Ruby landing on a Welsh clifftop. Within moment, both of them had disrupted a fairy circle and as a result, the Doctor was taken out of the episode. This left Ruby very much to fend for herself as a mystery woman (Hilary Hobson) kept following her throughout the episode.
Ruby took shelter in a pub and became a fugure of mockery and mistrust with the landlady being particularly bitchy towards her before Ruby was told to leave. It quickly turned out every time someone talked to Ruby's mystery woman, the person would then flee in terror and turn on Ruby. What the hell did she say?
Some locals turning on Ruby was one thing but having both Carla and Kate Stewart/UNIT do it only served to isolate Ruby further from everyone. Minus her mystery stalker of course. Then the episode kept jumping in time, Ruby passed milestones and lost boyfriends and then, the source of her troubles came to light.
The fairy circle contained Mad Jack. The Doctor and Ruby inadvertently released him. Mad Jack was also an ambitious politician named Roger ap Gwilliam (Aneurin Barnard), who as the episode was speeding towards its conclusion was venturing into Harold Saxon domain. Fortunately Ruby was able to use her stalker to bring about Roger's downfall far quicker than the 10th Doctor had done Harriet Jones back in the day.
Then there was more trips into the future with a very older version of Ruby still being stalked by that mystery woman. Yes, it became clear halfway through the episode that it was an older Ruby (Amanda Walker) stalking her younger self. It was also obvious that she was trying to prevent Ruby and the Doctor from breaking the fairy circle. In the end she succeeded and those 65 years never really happened. Am I right? Oh, ask her then.
- There's a few times in the episode where the phrase The War Between The Land And The Sea was mentioned. There's been rumours of a spin-off series with that title.
- I loved how Mrs Flood appeared long enough to tell Ruby the current story had nothing to do with her.
- Susan Twist appeared as a hiker who interacted with Ruby before being frightened off by her older self. Ruby almost recognised her from another time. Ruby also mentioned her snow ability to her nurse.
- Carla was confirmed to be a lesbian in this episode and Kate talked about the supernatural as well as UNIT'S methods of dealing with them.
- Nice guest performance from Sian Philips as Enid. She stood out the most in the pub crowd who didn't take to Ruby.
- Chronology: Ruby's still from 2024, but the Roger stuff was in 2046 and the last few scenes with Ruby were 40 years after that.
I can somewhat see why 73 Yards didn't hit for everyone but as a showcase for Millie Gibson, I mostly enjoyed it. The third act was a tiny bit rushed and I do feel they could've pushed the horror aspect a bit harder than they did. I changed my mind, I loved this one on further watching.
Rating: 9 out of 10
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