Here’s Why 42 is Your Most Underrated Series 3 Serial

Rebecca Crockett is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

In Series 3, there are a great number of episodes that are important not only to the story of the Doctor and his current companion’s journey, but to Doctor Who as a whole. We first meet not only Martha Jones, but also future companion Donna Noble, after her wedding goes awry. We are reintroduced to the Master, a fellow Time Lord and the Doctor’s oldest friend and foe. And then there is that little episode called Blink. Nestled among those many noted and wonderful stories is a small but exciting and action packed episode titled 42.

It’s the episode you, dear K readers, voted as your most underrated episode of Series 3, with its 20.6% besting Gridlock (17.59%), The Shakespeare Code (11.56%), and Smith and Jones (9.55%).

How can an episode that advances the over-arching plot of the whole series not be important? How does it get overlooked? Precisely because of the episodes surrounding it. The Lazarus Experiment has a fantastical plot device and an over the top monster in the creature Dr. Lazarus becomes. Human Nature and The Family Of Blood see some of the best performances of the Tennant/Agyeman series, and has absolutely heart breaking moments. Who doesn’t weep with the Doctor as he is asked to give up the humanity he longs to live?

But 42 deserves more attention than it’s usually given. It is a proper hide-behind-the-sofa scary episode in its own right and one that fits well into Who canon. The episode itself actually gives Martha something to do aside from being the fish-out-of-water companion to the savvy Doctor. It also advances the Martha/Saxon/Master series subplot and will be the last episode of the series to speak of that subplot until that story comes to a head a few episodes later.

The title of the episode is the caveat that the Doctor and Martha face when answering a distress call from a cargo ship about to crash into a sun – they only have 42 minutes. This gives us a different kind of energy and urgency to the Doctor’s actions. Added to the situation is the fact that the Doctor can’t use his typical get-out-of-plot devices as things can’t be fixed with the sonic screwdriver and they are cut off from the TARDIS.

The Doc will have to get out of this and save Martha and the ship’s crew with just his wits. And even more dangers are thrown the Doctor’s way when a crew member becomes infected and possessed with burning body temperatures and glowing eyes and a desire to kill the rest of the crew.

There are a number of other specific things about this episode that make it just as important as those previously mentioned. First, it gives us a glimpse into what’s been unfolding at home while Martha is off on adventures with the Doctor.

We see her call home to speak to her mother. The first call shows her mother’s annoyance at Martha’s attitude and once again her negative opinion of the Doctor and what being with him has done to Martha. In the second call, made when Martha believes she may not live much longer, we see that her mother has been joined by ominous people in suits who are listening in on the phone call. Again, we can hear her mother’s negative feeling toward the Doctor, which is of course not much comfort to the endangered Martha. The third time, we finally get an answer – her mother is being watched by the mysterious Mr. Saxon. With all the action in the episode, this short scene is probably the most important as it plants a final seed for Martha’s future. When she does finally come home, she’ll find her family being held by Mr. Saxon…

Secondly, it’s the first Doctor Who episode written by Chris Chibnall, who would later write episodes for the Eleventh Doctor and was the original head writer and co-producer of the spin-off Torchwood, and is someone who has been on a few fan lists for their choice as a future showrunner for Doctor Who.

Thirdly, it is a style of episode that Who hadn’t done before – real time. It’s Doctor Who meets 24 with the Doctor standing in for Jack Bauer. It’s different from the others that Chibnall has done for the show, and more like what he would later write for both Broadchurch and for Law and Order: UK. (It’s interesting to note that those shows would also go on to star Tennant and Agyeman respectively.) Yet it is one that works well with Doctor Who and one that I am surprised hadn’t been tried before or since. The real time format gives a vigour and desperation to the danger that the characters are in. For a show that puts its lead characters into mortal peril in virtually every episode, why didn’t anyone think of this sooner?

Martha’s chance to do a little bit is great – when the Doctor himself is possessed by the living creature that was mistaken for a sun, it’s up to Martha to put him into the stasis chamber and use her medical skills to help him. She also gets to tell the ship’s crew what to do, though the idea of how to save them is the Doctor’s – he channels Jack Bauer to the end, even while he is possibly dying.

One of my two issues with the episode comes at this point. I’d have had it be Martha, once the Doctor was sorted, to have come up with the idea to vent the particles. She’s a smart woman! She is a doctor after all!

Of course, I would also be remiss if I didn’t happen to mention that the title of the episode directly references Doctor Who’s connection to The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy. Forty two is, after all, the answer to the ultimate question of Life, the Universe, and Everything. This is the other issue I have with the episode – I’d have liked them to find a few more places to reference Hitchhiker’s. It seems a bit of a waste of a title to have not done more, given how connected the two properties are.

So don’t skip this one on your rewatch.  Don’t dismiss it. You’ve got a 42-minute appointment with the Doctor.

The post Here’s Why 42 is Your Most Underrated Series 3 Serial appeared first on Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews.