'Doctor Who's "The Interstellar Song Contest" Earns Null Points for Singing

On paper, Doctor Who meets Eurovision feels like an unbeatable premise. An over-the-top, purposefully high-camp event, with flashy outfits that may or may not light up, coordinated dance numbers, and dedicated fanbases waging voting campaigns should result in an hour that's fun, if nothing else, and it seems a natural choice of setting for Ncuti Gatwa's charismatic, joyful Doctor. More importantly, whatever happens in the forthcoming two-part season finale is so brutal that Russell T. Davies successfully pushed for a release schedule change to ensure we're all forced to watch the end of it together. A musical number-focused romp is precisely the moment of levity we need beforehand.

Unfortunately, that's not the kind of episode this is at all. It turns out that "The Interstellar Song Contest" is actually a story that uses its high camp framework to attempt to dissect more themes than its narrative is equipped to handle. The result is a rare misfire in a season that has been otherwise full of bangers. The fun Eurovision-esque bits most of us likely tuned in expecting are restricted mainly to the episode's opening moments; there are half a dozen random supporting characters we barely get the chance to know, and a central plot that tries to wrestle with questions of oppression, vengeance, exploitation, and colonization.

The problem is that it doesn't really handle any of those questions well, and its central plot is clunkily resolved (both technically and thematically). That's not even touching on the whole "the Doctor is suddenly seeing mysterious visions of his granddaughter Susan (Carole Anne Ford)" thing, a moment that's literally been decades in the making, and will probably be the only thing anyone actually remembers about this episode. (Well, that and the post-credits scene that finally offers some answers about Mrs. Flood.)