Clara follows, and soon both are taken by Vikings (real ones, apparently), and the Doctor's precious sonic sunglasses are summarily snapped. We also get an important line about the Doctor's role as a time traveler...tread lightly, because everything you do makes ripples, and he daren't make a tidal wave.
Once they return to the village, they see a young girl, Ashildr (about whom more soon), whom the Doctor doesn't recognise yet seems to. 'Premonition is only remembering in the wrong direction,' he says ominously, and they are taken to the center of town, where he makes an attempt to prove himself Odin. Unfortunately, the 'real' Odin appears overhead, and sends down his choicest warriors (whom we will soon find are called the Mire), and calls for the finest Viking warriors to come feast in Valhalla. They are transmatted up...as are Clara and Ashildr by accident.
Clara and Ashildr witness all of the Vikings destroyed by some kind of energy weapons, and carry on through the ship, where they come face to face with Odin, guarded by the Mire. Clara tries to talk Odin out of his plans, which include the liquification of great warriors into a mix of testosterone and adrenaline to feed him (f course it's green...soylent green). Meanwhile, Ashildr, being a Viking, decides to challenge him, which he gleefully accepts, for the next day. He then sends them back down, to a village depleted of warriors, filled with fishermen and farmers, old men and women, and babies...and one man who has held a sword in combat...the Doctor.
He takes it on himself to try and train the village...a plan which will fail miserably, yet he sets to it, seeing as how his first plan...get everyone to run away, was summarily ignored and rejected by everyone as Vikings to not run. Meanwhile, the Doctor is extensively translating monologue from a baby, who is explaining how afraid she is, yet she will sing (laughing is singing) despite her fear. This scene is one of the tensest, most dramatic monologues, and I think it will go down as one of the defining moments for the Twelfth Doctor. She also talks about fire and water repeatedly, which the Doctor tries to figure out but can't.
Ashildr is an interesting part of the story here, as the Doctor finds she crafts puppets and tells stories about them when she's scared...mostly when the warriors go out on raids. This seems to resonate with the Doctor, but he can't figure out why.
Not yet.
Clara meets with the Doctor outside the town hall, while the weapon forges of the Mire pound away, to make sure the town can hear their coming. The Doctor is convinced there is nothing more to be done, that the town will find their honourable deaths, which is more than most people get, and that he's lost. Clara tells him to keep looking, because the thing he is best at is winning, so he'd better keep looking.
Enter baby with Lofty the blacksmith, heading to the fish house, where they go when the baby can't settle. Serendipity, and the Doctor follows, finding barrels of electric eels...fire in water. He MacGyvers up a plan, and soon the whole village is at work crafting things to help defeat Odin and the Mire.
The next day, they appear, and head to the long hall, where everyone is dancing. The Doctor points out the fact that no one has any weapons, and as such the Mire can't attack them. Of course, that's when one of the townsfolk hits a Mire in the head with a ring...the signal to attack. Suddenly a barrel of eels is struck, and thousands of volts of electricity short circuit a group of Mire. Then a second barrel is struck, taking out another batch. Retreating, Odin and his last batch of Mire are chased after by a massive jormungar, and the Mire finally elect to retreat, with Odin left behind. Closed in, the townsfolk ridicule him, while the Doctor and Clara jest about the retreat, even showing video set to the Benny Hill theme. Odin retreats, vowing revenge, and the town is saved. Happy ending.
Only not really.
For Ashildr is unmoving with the helm on her head, and once removed, she collapses into her father's arms, dead from heart failure. This is too much for the Doctor, who runs off distraught. Clara finds him in the fish house, raging at the situation. Clara tries to calm him, but he's moved beyond being able to be comforted...the Doctor is at the brink, talking about how he can do anything but he's not supposed to...when he looks into the water, and sees his face again. This sets off a whole flashback sequence, in which he realises finally why he took this face, courtesy of some clips from The Fires of Pompeii...it's a reminder to him that sometimes, all he has to do is save one person who wasn't meant to die.
Cue the Doctor running back to the Longhouse, where Ashildr rests on a bier, with the Doctor digging through a bag until he finds a white microchip. He explains that it's a Mire repair kit, which he has reprogrammed to work on humans. He places it on her forehead, where it is absorbed, and after a bit, she awakens, and thanks the Doctor. He tosses a second chip to her father, and enigmatically tells Ashildr he'll see her sooner than later.
As the Doctor and Clara walk back to the TARDIS, he's silent. Clara is unnerved, and the Doctor finally explains that the chip will continue to repair Ashildr forever, rendering her essentially immortal. Clara asked if that's the case, why did he give her a second chip? In one of the chillingest lines, the Doctor explains 'People think immortality is living forever. It's not. Immortality is everyone else dying.' The second chip is for Ashildr to use when she finds someone she can't live without. Time will tell, it always does, the Doctor says, yet Ashildr is not more than human...she's a hybrid.
The Doctor and Clara leave, and the episode ends with an amazing shot of Ashildr being encircled by camera, lighting effects in the sky, over an indeterminate time. She starts out smiling, but the smile soon turns to fear, uncertainty, and finally determination.
Roll end credits.
Now, there's a lot to talk about here, and let's start with Ashildr. According to Radio Times;
"Ashildr is a combination of two Old Norse words: áss, which translates as god, and hildr, battle – an appropriate moniker given that she helped defeat an (admittedly fake) deity in a battle to save her village, and has since become a god of sorts herself.
But there’s more to it than that. In Norse mythology Hildr was a valkyrie, one of 12 of Odin's handmaidens who chose which warriors would live or die on the battlefield. As the Doctor pointed out, “Immortality isn’t living for ever… Immortality is everyone else dying”, which is why when he brought Ashildr back from the dead he also gave her another medical kit – so that she could one day choose a companion to save from death, just like Hildr the valkyrie."
What exactly is going to happen with her? We won't know till next week...if then. We know she is returning in an episode titled 'The Woman Who Lived.' We know that the concept of the Hybrid has been bandied about at least twice now...in the series opening 2 part Davros story, and now in this one. Is Ashildr the Hybrid? I kind of doubt it, but it's entirely possible. Again, my love of Norse myth has me loving the idea of an immortal Valkyr, so that I loved.
Maisie Williams was wonderful. I know she's gotten some bum reviews for her acting in this episode by some, but I thought she portrayed all her emotional points excellently, and her acting for me required no criticism. I think Odin should have been played by Brian Blessed...he screamed to be played by Brian Blessed. The town was amazingly staged and set, and the difference in 'caste' between the warriors and the townsfolk was well handled in costuming, yet all it was, was job related, rather than the warriors being better than the townsfolk. Everyone had their place, and respected each other equally.
The screenwriting from Jamie Mathieson and Steven Moffat was solid. While not as exceptional as the previous 4 episodes, it was solid, devoid of any major tropes or silliness, and gave our mains (the Doctor, Odin, Clara and Ashildr) enough to do without it feeling stretched. And while next week features our Maisie again (The Woman who Lived), it's not a true two parter because it's written by Catherine Tregenna (female writer female writer hurray!).
Here's what we know so far:
The episode is set in England, 1651, featuring a highwayman revealed to be Ashildr (going by the name of The Knightmare) and "her fire breathing accomplice", when "The Doctor, on the trail of an alien artifact, is brought face to the face with the consequences of his own actions".
I, for one, can't wait. I only hope it's not the end of Ashildr.
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