Overview of Season 28 of Doctor Who
“This wasn’t exactly what I was expecting when you mentioned ‘extra-curricular research activities’, Professor.”
“I imagine not. But you seem to be enjoying yourself."
“Is your life always this dangerous?”
“I prefer the term exciting, but basically, yes.”
- Jennifer and the Doctor discuss their situation during
A New Semester.
A New Semester
Jennifer Marsh is a junior at the University of Washington, where she studies physics. Upon returning to her university for her final quarter of the year, she finds that her Nuclear Physics professor has changed unexpectedly. The new Professor, a man who prefers just to be called “the Doctor”, does not act like any of her other professors, and nobody seems to know much about him. She decides to follow him after her late class, but he disappears around a corner.
The following day, the Doctor is missing, raising her suspicions even further. Meeting with some friends later, she hears that some of the staff in the Chemistry department are beginning to act strangely as well, after disappearing for days at a time. She suspects that the two are related, and decides to continue her investigation. She borrows one of her friends’ access cards to see if anything is happening in the Chemistry labs. She finds nothing out of the ordinary, but when she leaves, she is spotted by the Doctor, who approaches her. He had spotted her sneaking around campus the past two nights, and presents an opportunity to put those skills to ‘good use’ in an ‘extra-curricular research activity’. She accepts.
After her class with the Doctor the next day, he mentions that he needs her to go with him back to the Chemistry labs, to provide a distraction so that the Doctor can confirm his suspicions about an experiment being conducted. The Doctor acquires the data he needs, and tells Jennifer that the Chemistry department are making a new kind of plastic, and he suspects alien involvement. Jennifer refuses to believe that aliens are involved, so the Doctor takes her to the TARDIS, revealing that he is not human.
The Doctor suspects that the Nestene Conciousness has taken control of the new plastic, and is replacing the Chemistry staff with highly realistic plastic duplicates. In order to stop them, the Doctor decides that he will let himself be captured, urging Jennifer to stay behind. The Doctor returns to the lab, making a lot of noise in order to reveal his location. Three Autons find him, and they take him to a secret facility underneath the building. Unbeknownst to all, Jennifer has followed them.
The Doctor is brought in front of the Nestene Consciousness, noting how cold the basement is. He hypothesises out loud that the new plastic the Autons are made of is highly heat-sensitive. Jennifer overhears this, and finds the boiler room, turning up the heat. The Autons begin to malfunction, and the Doctor is able to escape, finding Jennifer. He reveals he suspected he would follow him, as “when I tell people to stay put, it’s very rare they actually do”. They return to the lab, and the Doctor uses the equipment there to synthesize a compound he refers to as “anti-plastic”.
With the anti-plastic in hand, the Doctor and Jennifer go back down, confronting the Consciousness once more, and the Doctor gives it a chance to leave Earth before he uses the compound. The Consciousness refuses, believing the Doctor to be bluffing. The doctor pours the compound onto the Consciousness, and it writhes as it breaks down from the anti-plastic. The remaining Autons deactivate.
Jennifer asks the Doctor why he was there if he wasn’t sure of alien involvement. He reveals he was asked to keep an eye on the University and the Rift it stands on by UNIT, who had received reports of missing staff. He offers Jennifer the chance to see “all of time and space”, to help in her studies and as a favour for saving him. She accepts the offer, and the Doctor asks her where she wants to go first.
Train of Thought
The TARDIS arrives in Seattle in 2240, and Jennifer marvels at the technological wonders of this new age of mankind. However, the Doctor seems distracted, and loses track of Jennifer. Jennifer finds herself alone in an unfamiliar landscape, but is given shelter by a group calling themselves “Clarity”. Clarity are a highly xenophobic group, who are using a device to disrupt non-human thought patterns throughout the city. The Doctor desperately searches for Jennifer, battling with his mind, while Jennifer tries to stop Clarity from deploying a device that would extend the field of effect to the whole planet, causing worldwide chaos.
Peer Review
Back in 1994, the Doctor has to attend a conference, as he still works for the University of Washington. Initially bored by the conference, his interest is piqued when a scientist claims to have found a method to create nuclear fusion, decades in advance of when he remembers humanity developing the technology. Meanwhile, Jennifer is approached by a man who claims to be an “old friend” of the Doctor, who wishes to reconcile. Upon meeting this man, the Doctor recognises him as the Master, an old foe. While the Master claims to have changed his ways, the Doctor remains sceptical of this claim.
Guest Star: Sir Derek Jacobi as the Master
The Tooth by
@The Chimera Virus
The Doctor brings Jennifer to the Homeworld Heritage Museum, a 25th Century installation dedicated to the full (well, known) history of planet Earth. Everything available from human, Silurian, and Sea Devil civilization is represented with actual artifacts or detailed replicas. To the Doctor's surprise, he's detained upon entry by security forces and brought to the curator of the museum, the Silurian Doctor Efraas Sicarian, with whom the Doctor is acquainted from his last two incarnations. Sicarian informs him that they've recently been burgled - specifically, subfossil teeth from the shootout at the O.K. Corral, one of which belonged to the Doctor. Sil was behind the robbery, and given Time Lord teeth retain DNA for some time… Sil may be poised to alter his species' DNA in such a way that they could pose a threat to the stability of time. Putting Jennifer's education on the backburner, the two make to hunt down Sil and stop him before he irrevocably alters the status quo of the universe.
Guest Star: Nabil Shaban as Sil
Packed to the Rafters
Jennifer joins an amateur dramatics society at the university, where she is cast in a production of “Glorious”, a dramatisation of the events of the Glorious Revolution in England. To help her to prepare for her role as Queen Anne, the Doctor offers to rake her to watch the events as they unfold. However, the Doctor finds that societies attitudes towards his new body are not as open as they once were, and struggles to cope with the difference. To further complicate matters, King James seems to have fore-knowledge of these events, and the Doctor begins to suspect that he and Jennifer may not be the only time-travellers visiting England.
Most Improved Player
Returning to 1994 Washington, the Doctor continues his work monitoring the Rift that sits underneath the city. Meanwhile, Jennifer finds that her travels with the Doctor have affected her studies, and her grades are beginning to slip, not to mention that she has difficulty in telling what day of the week it is. Her classmates are beginning to question what exactly the “extra-curricular research” she is doing with the Doctor is, and her friends stage an intervention to help with her studies. While Jennifer works to get her education back on track, the Doctor is concerned by an increase in Rift activity, suggesting that something big is about to come through. With Jennifer preoccupied, the Doctor may have to face this new threat alone.
The Nostalginauts by
@The Chimera Virus
Four friends, John, Diane, Aaron, and Xavier receive the offer of a lifetime: to be the inaugural test subjects for the Nostalginaut program, headed by Professor Bruno Carthusian. The group is sent back to 1984 to relive what John calls the "good ol' days." Xavier, however, is bitter over the Reagan government's many infidelities and initial callous disregard of the AIDS crisis. He plans to use this opportunity to assassinate Ronald Reagan with the help of a clandestine organization with similar views. Thrown into the deep end from the moment they step out of the TARDIS and framed for murder, can the Doctor and Jennifer solve the mystery of the Nostalginauts and stop the assassination of President Reagan?
Guest Stars: Eric Idle as the Monk/"Professor Bruno Carthusian," Phil Hartman as President Ronald Reagan, and Philip Seymour Hoffman as Xavier
Remnants
The Doctor decides to take Jennifer to an alien planet for a change, offering up multiple different choices. Jennifer chooses to visit Raxobor, a resort planet in the far future. However, the TARDIS has difficulty landing, and when it does, they find that the planet is in ruins. Unable to travel back to the point where it was destroyed, they must piece together what exactly happened to the planet, and try to find a way to stop it before it can happen. While things seem to be going smoothly at first, the matter is further complicated by the reappearance of the Master in the remaining logs, leading the Doctor to suspect that he played a part in the destruction.
Guest Star: Derek Jacobi as the Master
All For One
When the Jaxx emerge from the Rift and begin attacking the University of Washington, the Doctor and Jennifer put together a rag-tag resistance group to fight back the invaders. The Doctor suspects that the Jaxx have come for an artefact he carries aboard the TARDIS, a Gallifreyan device from the earliest days of Time Lord society. His relationship with Jennifer is strained when he becomes increasingly hostile when questioned about the device or its creator. As the Jaxx overrun more and more of the university, the Doctor realises he may be forced to resort to methods he would not normally in order to save Jennifer and her friends.
We, the Machines by
@The Chimera Virus
The Doctor and Jennifer arrive in Devix, a country on the planet Zegraeshia where the Doctor has an old friend, Lark Thomasson. While he's visiting Thomasson, Jennifer explores and comes to grow irritated by the way Zegraeshia treats its AIs as little more than slaves. She asks one of the higher-functioning AIs about what they can explain about the current state of racism in the galaxy. To her horror, the AI explains that racism, bigotry, and all related topics are forbidden for the AIs to access. Jennifer runs to tell the Doctor who, through some logical loopholes, makes the AI access the information and spread it through the network... In short order, the AIs declare that they will either have equal rights, or they will exterminate all organics from this section of space entirely. In the end, the Doctor and Jennifer barely save the day, but the Doctor hard-codes the drive for equal rights into the AIs' source code, ensuring that things won't just revert to how they were before.
When You Go
Returning to Washington, Jennifer receives an urgent message that her grandfather is in hospital, dying. On his deathbed, he gives Jennifer an old fob watch, hinting that he is somehow aware of her travels with the Doctor, whom he seems to recognise. After the funeral, Jennifer questions the Doctor as to whether he had met her grandfather before, but the Doctor seems as confused as she is. The Doctor takes the watch to the TARDIS, using it to navigate back to Seattle in 1946. There, they run into Jennifer’s grandfather once more when they meet him at the port. Together, they find evidence of aliens being smuggled into the city, and try to put a stop to it.
Homecoming
As the new academic year is about to begin, in the TARDIS, Jennifer asks the Doctor whether they will continue their travels together. Before he can answer, however, the TARDIS is recalled to Gallifrey by an unknown force. The Doctor and Jennifer leave the TARDIS, finding themselves before Lady President Romana of Gallifrey. The Doctor introduces Romana as an old friend, expressing surprise that she has decided to remain on Gallifrey after he removed the threat to the Web of Time.
Romana reveals that by destroying the Chronovore, he did not remove the threat to time, but merely delayed its threats. Romana has been receiving visions of Gallifrey’s destruction at the hands of a coalition of her enemies, and of secret chambers throughout Gallifrey. Time Lord scientists have found evidence of some of these chambers, but are unable to open them. She asks that the Doctor investigate.
The Doctor ventures down to the chambers, while Romana talks with Jennifer, showing her around the city. The Doctor reaches the door to the chamber, spotting what appears to be a biometric scanner. The door scans him, then opens. As he ventures in, avoiding traps that have lain dormant for millions of years, he finds documents from Gallifrey’s ancient history, mentioning the three “founding fathers” of Gallifrey: Rassilon, Omega, and an “Other” whose name has been either lost or destroyed. While these names are familiar to the Doctor, he also finds mentions of artefacts created by “the Other”, similar to those made by Rassilon.
He returns to the surface, sharing his findings with Romana, who orders that the chambers be searched fully. The Doctor and Jennifer accompany the search party, as the traps reactivate, slowly picking off members as they venture deeper into the labyrinthine tunnels. At the end, they find a message from the Other, revealing that they destroyed their artefacts, fearing that they would be used by power-hungry Time Lords.
Romana is disappointed by this revelation, but seems more intrigued as to why the door seemed to recognise the Doctor, suggesting that the Other had foreknowledge of what was to come and programmed the door to let him in. Romana lets the Doctor go, but reminds him that if her visions come true, and Gallifrey is threatened by this coalition, she will expect the Doctor to fight to protect his home. The Doctor departs with Jennifer, amid growing tension. Jennifer asks the Doctor if he knows why the door opened for him. He says he does not, but seems to be hiding something.
Not the most action filled season, I know. Especially with the finale. Next season will be interesting though, both from a production and story perspective. I needed to start planting some plot seeds here, so some of my stories aren't the best. Anyway, as per usual, any questions, just ask, I'll be happy to answer.
