Fully agree - it's refreshing to see inclusion of folks we don't usually see in media without a big deal made of it. Representation matters and they did this seamlessly 😊
This is one of my favourite twelfth doctor episodes because of how silly it is. Bacteria that turn people to slop is so Doctor Who, and I love it. Also the Monks are dealt with really well in this episode in my opinion, as you think they might be forgotten but continue to be important.
I still can't believe RTD made it so that Sutekh has been hanging on the TARDIS since the fourth doctor. Imagine the "God of death" just chilling watching aliens still his whole motif but by promising life instead of death.
It's interesting that you say that the Doctor's blindness is what stops him opening the door - because keypads like that should be accessible for blind people, using tactile elements such as a raised bump on the middle key. I think it would be more accurate to say that systemic ableism resulting in inaccessibility was the problem here!
My favorite line in this episode is when Erica tells the Doctor that when she was a kid, she wanted to be a bus driver because she liked how the drivers waved at each other whenever they drove past another bus. It’s such a good little character tidbit that doesn’t necessarily add to the larger episode plot at hand, but helps to ground the episode in a real place and show the humanity that stands to be lost if the Doctor loses. I just thought it was nice ❤
I am always left a little confused with this episode because it’s so deep with its message that I get lost in the sauce. And it may be my own fault, but I cannot deny how much the 12th Doctor’s character is at his absolute peak here. Or one of his peaks. Well… we still have the finale approaching and man… I’m not ready
I live in the States, so I can't say that I'm terrobly surprised to hear that the doomsday clock is at 90 seconds to midnight. I worry it will shorten even more this January.
This is a great three parter because each segment is so different from the others. Doesn’t feel like one episode drawn out over the runtime of two or three.
8:54 Anyone else born post 2000 feel serious anxiety in that we don't even really have a say in the current world events contributing to the doomsday clock. I think it mirrors the episode a lot too. The earliest any of us turned legal adults is 2018. It feels like the world is in such chaotic turmoil and it's not even our say yet it is our mess to clean up if we even get the chance. It's all just the old and wealthy going round and round for short term gain. I think it mirrors the episode a lot too. The idea that people don't have control over the end of the world and using that fear to make them give up power under the belief that an older and more powerful species will "save" them for the small price of servitude.
I will say The Pyramid at the End of the World is a great follow up from Extremis and I really did enjoy it. It really does show the mystery and the power of the monks.
Personally really like this episode, the small , unimportant events in everyday life piling up to become world ending is a fascinating concept and i think the monks are used perfectly in this episode, sort of blackmailing the world leaders into giving them the planet, its not as good as extremis but its very solid episode. 8/10
A weakness I found with this episode is they don't have/take the time to show why the Monks' rule is so bad. It's _implied_ it's bad but given it's world peace it's hard to tell what exactly is so terrible about it.
I feel like that’s meant for the next episode, a dictator makes it appear like everything is better with them and then the truth reveals itself Though since people are inherently flawed there is no way to make a perfect society without changing that. The Best you can do is the illusion of perfection
Surely the fictional country is more likely to be sort of where Kashmir or Uzbekistan is, not the Middle East? Seeing as how it is bordered by Russia and China.
I always felt Kate Stewart should have been in this episode. After the Zygon Invasion two parter, we never see her again till series 13: Survivors of the Flux
I do like how the doomsday clock is used. Countdowns can be a bit cliché, but because the Doomsday Clock is an established thing IRL, it feels very different. Plus the passiveness and manipulation of the Monks makes them a fascinating and unusual villain
What great analysis of the themes of this episode! I find it a little funny though that you had so much good things to say about the episode, but the negatives amounted to it meandered too much and that it felt hollow 😂Which is totally fine since everyone resonates emotionally to different things! I thoroughly enjoyed this episode though, I felt a lot of suspense in the mystery of what the monks’ plan actually was, and the existential themes too. Of course it can’t top Extremis but I found it a very solid episode! A rank for me!
By the way the one thing they can't recreate is Jewish history because we just put everything in code and sometimes we can't decipher the code either lol.
This massively underrated three parter is a perfect example of what went wrong with having Moffat as showrunner. Of all of the very best episodes of relaunched Who, a disproportionately huge amount were either during Moffat's tenure as showrunner, or written by Moffat. The fanbase got complacent. Drop this three-parter into Tennant's first season and its a standout success. Near the end of Capaldi's run, it actually gets kind of overlooked.
Hell nah. S10 is way worse than S2. S2 has the christmas invasion, girl in the fireplace, impossible planet/satan pit and army of ghosts/doomsday. S10 only has world enough and time/doctor falls that can really compete, and if your being generous oxygen and extremis. Both have some really bad episodes like eaters of light, lie of the land and fear her, idiots lantern with a lot of mid ones in between.
@@sycaccino8533 Girl In The Fireplace was very good. So was Tooth and Claw. New Earth and School Reunion were good. World Enough and Time and The Doctor Falls were better than anything in series 2. The three part Monk story was on the same level as the Girl In The Fireplace (not entirely coincidentally, the Moffat episode). Twice Uppon a Time was extremely good. The weakest season 10 story is probably Doctor Mysterio, and it's steal head and shoulders above Fear Her. Tennant is popular - I understand that - but honestly, most of the best Who since the relaunch happens after Tennant.
@@MichaelJohnson-kq7qg world enough and time/doctor falls is extremely good and is on the level of army of ghosts/doomsday and impossible planet/satan pit however the monk trilogy is straight ass cheeks. Extremis is good, pyramid at the centre of the world is dogshit and lie of the land is even more dogshit therefore nowhere near as good as girl in the fireplace. Fear her is trash but so is that episode with the wood lady and the eaters of light. Twice upon a time is enjoyable but it doesn't really have a plot and just meanders. S4, S3 and S1 were peak revival Dr Who 100%. Capaldi's only really good season was S9 imo.
This trilogy of episodes is perfectly summed up by the ‘2 parts flaming horse body, 1 part terribly drawn horse head’ meme. Extremis and Pyramids being excellent and Lie of the Land failing to stick the landing
So the monks save the soldiers who were trying to destroy them, yet disintegrate the people who were trying to save the world because they weren't trying to save the world for the right reasons?
Extremis is one of my favourite episodes but I feel it takes the “Moffat can’t finish a two parter “ to Moffat writing the fierst episode and letting other writers to finish I liked the second episode but felt it fizzled out by episode 3 ( although tbf the episodes were better than some etc)
90 seconds to midnight... with a malignant narcissist, criminal, grapist, conman in the highest office on earth... AGAIN yes, slay queen... or something
@@Sillimant_ tell me you're politically and economically illiterate without telling me you're politically and economically illiterate. and the absolute "you're overreacting" chestnut is textbook complicity. just because you don't pay attention or care, doesn't mean you get to hold that against others.
I did enjoy the episode. Having the Doctor blind and with the monks was interesting. I did like it, setting up the next part and building off Extremis I enjoyed. Good thoughts
I can't imagine ncuti in an episode like pyramid at the end of the world ,because he is not too philosophical about the end of the world as peter c ,neither Tennant,like in listen
@@Sillimant_”diversity hiring “ isn’t the problem . Writing And directing is. Also nucti does a fantastic job in moments like the end of dot and bubble
I think it’s just that we haven’t seen him in that kind of scenario yet. I can easily see him musing on similar concepts in the right situation. There’s also the fact that every Doctor has a different outlook and personality. I can’t see Colin Baker managing to calm himself to fool a villengard mine nearly as easily as Gatwa does, for example.
Gee, it’s almost like language is constantly evolving, and every generation has weird slang that doesn’t last more than a couple years, anyway. I’m sure your parents said the same things about you.
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i really like how Erica's dwarfism is treated as normal. nobody needs to comment on it and it isn't used as a plot point. she just...is.
Yeah, she's a regular normal person. She's just very short.
Fully agree - it's refreshing to see inclusion of folks we don't usually see in media without a big deal made of it. Representation matters and they did this seamlessly 😊
That's exactly how you do it.
This is one of my favourite twelfth doctor episodes because of how silly it is. Bacteria that turn people to slop is so Doctor Who, and I love it. Also the Monks are dealt with really well in this episode in my opinion, as you think they might be forgotten but continue to be important.
I bet Sutekh was like. “ I was going to appear. But these things stole my plan”
I still can't believe RTD made it so that Sutekh has been hanging on the TARDIS since the fourth doctor. Imagine the "God of death" just chilling watching aliens still his whole motif but by promising life instead of death.
@vullord666 "Okay, I'm gonna manifes- Oh, oh these monks are taking my thing? Well now I'm not doing it"
It's interesting that you say that the Doctor's blindness is what stops him opening the door - because keypads like that should be accessible for blind people, using tactile elements such as a raised bump on the middle key. I think it would be more accurate to say that systemic ableism resulting in inaccessibility was the problem here!
My favorite line in this episode is when Erica tells the Doctor that when she was a kid, she wanted to be a bus driver because she liked how the drivers waved at each other whenever they drove past another bus. It’s such a good little character tidbit that doesn’t necessarily add to the larger episode plot at hand, but helps to ground the episode in a real place and show the humanity that stands to be lost if the Doctor loses.
I just thought it was nice ❤
I am always left a little confused with this episode because it’s so deep with its message that I get lost in the sauce.
And it may be my own fault, but I cannot deny how much the 12th Doctor’s character is at his absolute peak here.
Or one of his peaks.
Well… we still have the finale approaching and man… I’m not ready
I live in the States, so I can't say that I'm terrobly surprised to hear that the doomsday clock is at 90 seconds to midnight. I worry it will shorten even more this January.
8:57 it’s little connections to other media I love that make these videos some of the best on WhoTube.
This is a great three parter because each segment is so different from the others. Doesn’t feel like one episode drawn out over the runtime of two or three.
It’s not a three-parter.
This episode always felt like it had a slow start to me, but had such a banging ending
Love this episode and the whole trinity. Such a brilliant series. 12 and Bill and perfect
8:54 Anyone else born post 2000 feel serious anxiety in that we don't even really have a say in the current world events contributing to the doomsday clock. I think it mirrors the episode a lot too. The earliest any of us turned legal adults is 2018. It feels like the world is in such chaotic turmoil and it's not even our say yet it is our mess to clean up if we even get the chance. It's all just the old and wealthy going round and round for short term gain. I think it mirrors the episode a lot too. The idea that people don't have control over the end of the world and using that fear to make them give up power under the belief that an older and more powerful species will "save" them for the small price of servitude.
Why would you think that during the Cold War regular people thought they could do anything about it?
I will say The Pyramid at the End of the World is a great follow up from Extremis and I really did enjoy it. It really does show the mystery and the power of the monks.
Personally really like this episode, the small , unimportant events in everyday life piling up to become world ending is a fascinating concept and i think the monks are used perfectly in this episode, sort of blackmailing the world leaders into giving them the planet, its not as good as extremis but its very solid episode. 8/10
If only that combination lock had braille or something.
A weakness I found with this episode is they don't have/take the time to show why the Monks' rule is so bad. It's _implied_ it's bad but given it's world peace it's hard to tell what exactly is so terrible about it.
I feel like that’s meant for the next episode, a dictator makes it appear like everything is better with them and then the truth reveals itself
Though since people are inherently flawed there is no way to make a perfect society without changing that. The Best you can do is the illusion of perfection
Surely the fictional country is more likely to be sort of where Kashmir or Uzbekistan is, not the Middle East? Seeing as how it is bordered by Russia and China.
I always felt Kate Stewart should have been in this episode. After the Zygon Invasion two parter, we never see her again till series 13: Survivors of the Flux
I do like how the doomsday clock is used. Countdowns can be a bit cliché, but because the Doomsday Clock is an established thing IRL, it feels very different. Plus the passiveness and manipulation of the Monks makes them a fascinating and unusual villain
What great analysis of the themes of this episode! I find it a little funny though that you had so much good things to say about the episode, but the negatives amounted to it meandered too much and that it felt hollow 😂Which is totally fine since everyone resonates emotionally to different things! I thoroughly enjoyed this episode though, I felt a lot of suspense in the mystery of what the monks’ plan actually was, and the existential themes too. Of course it can’t top Extremis but I found it a very solid episode! A rank for me!
By the way the one thing they can't recreate is Jewish history because we just put everything in code and sometimes we can't decipher the code either lol.
Good content son
I just go about my life trying not to worry about supposedly unconnected wider events tbh. Just adds more stress to everything and doesn't help.
This massively underrated three parter is a perfect example of what went wrong with having Moffat as showrunner. Of all of the very best episodes of relaunched Who, a disproportionately huge amount were either during Moffat's tenure as showrunner, or written by Moffat. The fanbase got complacent.
Drop this three-parter into Tennant's first season and its a standout success. Near the end of Capaldi's run, it actually gets kind of overlooked.
Hell nah. S10 is way worse than S2. S2 has the christmas invasion, girl in the fireplace, impossible planet/satan pit and army of ghosts/doomsday. S10 only has world enough and time/doctor falls that can really compete, and if your being generous oxygen and extremis. Both have some really bad episodes like eaters of light, lie of the land and fear her, idiots lantern with a lot of mid ones in between.
@@sycaccino8533 Girl In The Fireplace was very good. So was Tooth and Claw. New Earth and School Reunion were good. World Enough and Time and The Doctor Falls were better than anything in series 2. The three part Monk story was on the same level as the Girl In The Fireplace (not entirely coincidentally, the Moffat episode). Twice Uppon a Time was extremely good. The weakest season 10 story is probably Doctor Mysterio, and it's steal head and shoulders above Fear Her. Tennant is popular - I understand that - but honestly, most of the best Who since the relaunch happens after Tennant.
@@MichaelJohnson-kq7qg world enough and time/doctor falls is extremely good and is on the level of army of ghosts/doomsday and impossible planet/satan pit however the monk trilogy is straight ass cheeks. Extremis is good, pyramid at the centre of the world is dogshit and lie of the land is even more dogshit therefore nowhere near as good as girl in the fireplace. Fear her is trash but so is that episode with the wood lady and the eaters of light. Twice upon a time is enjoyable but it doesn't really have a plot and just meanders. S4, S3 and S1 were peak revival Dr Who 100%. Capaldi's only really good season was S9 imo.
@sycaccino8533 that's definitely an opinion.
@@MichaelJohnson-kq7qg A very common one too
This trilogy of episodes is perfectly summed up by the ‘2 parts flaming horse body, 1 part terribly drawn horse head’ meme. Extremis and Pyramids being excellent and Lie of the Land failing to stick the landing
So the monks save the soldiers who were trying to destroy them, yet disintegrate the people who were trying to save the world because they weren't trying to save the world for the right reasons?
Extremis is one of my favourite episodes but I feel it takes the “Moffat can’t finish a two parter “ to Moffat writing the fierst episode and letting other writers to finish
I liked the second episode but felt it fizzled out by episode 3 ( although tbf the episodes were better than some etc)
monks are kinda fit 🙃
Really solid episode, pays off the Doctor’s blindness arc well, is worse than Extremis, is a lot better than The Lie of the Land.
90 seconds to midnight... with a malignant narcissist, criminal, grapist, conman in the highest office on earth... AGAIN
yes, slay queen... or something
Yeah because the world ended the last time he was in office. Nothing ever happens
@@Sillimant_ tell me you're politically and economically illiterate without telling me you're politically and economically illiterate.
and the absolute "you're overreacting" chestnut is textbook complicity. just because you don't pay attention or care, doesn't mean you get to hold that against others.
Another evolution for a return...is they have an ability to see through time in some capacity to be able to see all the possibilities
it would be interesting to see them again on a different world & Dr sets the population free....
or indeed their home planet
I did enjoy the episode. Having the Doctor blind and with the monks was interesting. I did like it, setting up the next part and building off Extremis I enjoyed. Good thoughts
Yet another, "perfectly fine" mid level episode where Harbo's video is more well thought out and engaging than the episode itself.
23:52 the the bacteria
I love me
My faviroute of the monk trilogy
I’ll never get over Doctor Who killing Brian from My Parents Are Aliens.
I can't imagine ncuti in an episode like pyramid at the end of the world ,because he is not too philosophical about the end of the world as peter c ,neither Tennant,like in listen
That's what happens when you go for the diversity hire instead of the quality hire
You need to watch his episodes, no the anti-wokers videos.
‘Oh look a pyramid’ *starts crying*
@@Sillimant_”diversity hiring “ isn’t the problem . Writing And directing is. Also nucti does a fantastic job in moments like the end of dot and bubble
I think it’s just that we haven’t seen him in that kind of scenario yet. I can easily see him musing on similar concepts in the right situation. There’s also the fact that every Doctor has a different outlook and personality. I can’t see Colin Baker managing to calm himself to fool a villengard mine nearly as easily as Gatwa does, for example.
wrf dose 'slay' mean? I only heard this on 2024 Big Brother
Bloody kids not able to use the English language
Yes we're all illiterate
Gee, it’s almost like language is constantly evolving, and every generation has weird slang that doesn’t last more than a couple years, anyway. I’m sure your parents said the same things about you.
I thought the Doctor would be in the guise of the Valeyard in this episode
Bill potts still sucks and will forever be the absolute worst companion to exist in this timeline or any other timeline.
Oh look, a DEI hire causes the end of the world. How prophetic.
Said no-one with a brain ever.